FicWad

Don't Give Me Diamonds

Diamond 15: Give me Victory

Giovanni and Delia were facing Venom, the leader of the Tempest Gang, while the rest of Team Rocket battled his minions all over the Viridian Gym. Their pokemon, Cloyster, Kingler, Ivysaur, Graveler, Rhyhorn and the new Machoke, stood ready to face any pokemon that emerged from Venom's pokeball.

A loud roar echoed as the dragon pokemon appeared surrounded in red beam of light projected from the pokeball. It was a fierce looking Dragonite with strange silver wires wrapped around him and a machine on his back, armored in thick shiny iron. The pokemon's eyes glowed a bright red and it looked truly furious, shaking with rage, involuntary low growls escaping it.

"Go Dragonite, destroy them all!" Venom ordered with great confidence, pointing at his enemies with his sharp dagger-like claws, "hyper beam!"

The dangerous hyper beam charged faster then Delia and Giovanni expected in a big blinding light. The two humans felt the beam's heat as if it reached them, but it had not, their six pokemon had received the impact protecting them. All six were bruised and cut, though the battle was only beginning. Graveler and Rhyhorn had taken the front of their improvised barrier, having the strongest natural body armor, but they along with their pokemon comrades, had suffered the effects of the devastating attack all the same.

"It's hopeless!" Venom exclaimed, his eyes wild, his voice cocky and mocking.

"I'm not giving up, I'll win this!" Giovanni knew the odds were terribly against him, but losing was simply not an option, the only way to live now was to win. "Ivysaur razor leaf! Graveler earthquake! Rhyhorn tail whip! Machoke rolling kick!"

Seeing the strategy to knock Dragonite down, Delia sent out her pokemon as well to create a distraction, an invasion of bubbles to slow Dragonite and make the other's movements harder to perceive, "Kingler bubble! Cloyster bubble beam!"

Ivysaur's leaves surrounded Dragonite, bouncing off his skin without effect. Graveler caused the arena to shake, but Dragonite, despite being unable to fly due to his deteriorated wings, thin and full of holes, stood firm and unaffected. Rhyhorn ran towards Dragonite, evolving into Rhydon mid way through the arena and delivering a powerful hit, yet Dragonite only batted Rhydon away. Rhydon fell a few feet away, but got up immediately, with a strength and determination to continue battling.

The arena was flooded with bubbles, which seemed to at least annoy Dragonite, though the dragon pokemon went back to being unaffected soon after, ignoring the bubbles and focusing his angry look on the two opposing trainers. Machoke charged in and kicked Dragonite, suffering the fame fate as Rhydon who, not satisfied with the lack of effect of her first attacked, repeated it, though the with the same result.

"They're all so weak, there's no way you'll win. Don't you know that if you want strong pokemon you need to make them strong? Am I the only one who understands this?" Venom growled, "no one else comprehends such greatness, not you, not Amethyst, no one!" He looked down on the pokemon and trainers who dared to oppose him, believing himself to be far superior.

Machoke roared in protest and wildly charged towards Venom in anger, he was the cause of Amethyst's death, an irreparable tragedy. Dragonite blocked Machoke's path, tossing him against the wall on the side of the arena.

"What's wrong? Do you recognize that name, weak little pokemon? Of course you don't, pokemon are too stupid to know what happens around them," Venom mocked, "even if I tell you I killed her, you wouldn't understand!"

Machoke let out a cry of anger and agony and surrounded by a bright glow like Rhyhorn had before, he evolved into Machamp with the intensity of his thirst for vengeance and hatred for the cruel human.

"You're wrong Venom, pokemon do understand what's happening. They might even be able to understand the world better than humans. That's why we study them, to try to understand them and learn from them!" Delia yelled; her emotions then were indescribable. Anger and sadness all at once, being shaped into a desperate need to do something to change this, and that need fueled her determination not to give up.

"Team Rocket is the ultimate power of this world. You're about to see it for yourself Venom!" Giovanni glared at him in anger, his pokemon were losing and he knew it, but they couldn't back down now, there had to be some way to win, an unforeseen strategy that would work. Giovanni knew Dragonite was superior in strength to all his pokemon and Delia's put together, so he would have to make up for it with a good strategy. "Ivysaur vine whip!"

"Cloyster, Kingler, blizzard!" The snow storm conjured by the two water pokemon raged as Ivysaur charged in a cold white veil.

"Machamp cross chop! Rhydon horn attack! Graveler tackle!" Giovanni sent his pokemon on the attack again, they had to keep trying, there had to be a weakness to Dragonite.

Dragonite stood waiting for Venom's order while growling in perpetual anger. Ivysaur wrapped her vine whip around Dragonite, though he escaped, tearing the vine whip to pieces. As Dragonite broke free, he was surrounded by the strong snow storm caused by Cloyster and Kingler's united attacks. Machamp and Rhydon charged in left and right, their attacks reaching Dragonite simultaneously, finalized by Graveler in a frontal assault.

Dragonite nearly lost his balance, stepping back and roaring loudly. Venom remained unaffected by the events, thinking the attempts to defeat Dragonite would be futile no matter what, he was overconfident and enjoyed watching their efforts fail. "Enough playing, I'm getting bored, Dragonite twister!"

The wind was immensely strong, casing the Rocket pokemon to group together, holding on to each other not to be blown away, while at the same time protecting their trainers. Dragonite roared a defiant battle cry and flapped his ragged wings, blowing another gust of air mixed with smoke his mouth.

"Ivysaur, solar beam!"

"Cloyster, aurora beam!"

The other pokemon protected Ivysaur and Cloyster as they attacked, the two beams pierced the wall of wind hitting their target, but they only pushed Dragonite back. However, the dragon ceased his attack and the wind subsided. "Dragonite, outrage!" at Venom's order, Dragonite wildly attacked, having grown impatient with only being allowed to do so much, but knowing not to defy Venom who liked to exhaust his opponents.

"Kingler, vice grip!" Kingler held on to Dragonite's right arm, despite the dragon pokemon trying to shake him off. "Cloyster tackle and hold on!" Cloyster jumped towards Dragonite and closed his shell on impact, attaching himself to the furious dragon's left arm.

"Graveler, Machamp, Rhydon, mega punch!" The three pokemon attacked in perfect unison as the two water pokemon held on to Dragonite. Combining their attacks they were finally able to knock the large dragon pokemon down.

"Get up Dragonite!" Venom yelled, "finish them now!"

Even more enraged, Dragonite thrashed about, but Cloyster and Kingler didn't let go of his arms. Now Graveler, Rhydon and Machamp held on to him as well.

"Ivysaur solar beam!" Giovanni commanded, now was their only chance to win and they couldn't waste it.

"What are you doing Dragonite? Attack, use fire blast!" Venom ordered impatiently.

Ivysaur fired her solar beam and it collided with Dragonite's more powerful fire blast sending sparks all over the arena, the temperature rising rapidly. The fire blast canceled the solar beam and continued on with amazing power. It all happened in a split second; Giovanni and Delia were in danger from the blast of fire heading towards them. Ivysaur jumped in the way and shielded them but caught on fire, taking the hit head on.

Ivysaur advanced towards Dragonite still aflame and unleashed another solar beam despite her extreme pain. Following the solar beam, which hit its target before Dragonite or Venom could react, the blazing grass pokemon tackled Dragonite with tremendous force.

Many of the wires around Dragonite snapped and the metal box caught on fire, sending a shock of electricity all over Dragonite's body. Kingler, Cloyster, Machamp, Rhydon and Graveler quickly let go and back away as Dragonite roared in pain until he finally lost consciousness at the cost of Ivysaur's life.

"Ivysaur!" Delia cried in agony, fearing the pokemon had no hopes of survival, only partially realizing she was already dead. "Ivysaur!" Delia tried to run towards the charred remains, like a pile of burned leaves on top of the unconscious Dragonite, but Giovanni held her back. "Let me go, I have to-"

"It's too late and this battle isn't over!" Giovanni held on to her until she stopped struggling.

Delia had an immense fury in her eyes, a thirst for justice and vengeance. Team Rocket had to clean the world of terrible people like Venom. "You horrible monster, Team Rocket will give you all the pain you gave these pokemon!"

"Is that so?" Venom stepped forward and slit the unconscious Dragonite's throat with his metal claws.

"Dragonite! Why did you do that? He was your own pokemon, he fought for you!" Delia yelled enraged and even more saddened.

"That creature lost," Venom replied simply, his voice filled with indifference.

"Dudes," Luke suddenly emerged from the tunnel leading to the basement out of breath. Giovanni and Delia had been so focused on their battle that they stopped listening for the other sounds in the gym, it was quiet now. "We like won, we got them all, we like took all the Tempest dudes prisoner," Luke held his hand over his ribs, where there was abundant blood, though he also had cuts and bruises all over. "We had to like fight too, you know?" His eyes went to Venom, who looked very displeased overhearing the news. "Whoa!"

"Luke you're injured and the others too?" The war seemed to have no end for Delia; she wanted to somehow heal all her companions, human and pokemon alike.

"We're tough," Luke replied with some difficulty and forced himself to smile reassuringly.

"Listen Luke..." Giovanni whispered something; Luke nodded and disappeared back into the tunnel leading to the basement from where he came.

"So the Tempest Gang has been defeated? It doesn't matter, they were weak anyway!" Venom growled almost insanely, out of focus, wild. "There's nothing you can do to stop me, were you planning your desperate escape just now?"

"Team Rocket has no intention of running away!" Giovanni yelled back.

"Good, because I won't let you!" Venom roared. "You all die now!"

Venom charged forward, Rhydon and Machamp were the first in his way. Giovanni quickly shouted commands to both pokemon, but Venom was too fast and the exhausted pair of pokemon was stabbed simultaneously, falling down defeated, though alive.

Cloyster and Kingler were next; too fast to react they were out of the fight and gravely injured as well, but still breathing. Graveler stood as the only barrier between the rampaging Venom and the two trainers.

Venom slashed away, pieces of rock falling off Graveler. The pokemon was in too much pain and could not react fast enough to follow any commands. More pieces of the rock pokemon fell, but Graveler continued trying to follow Giovanni's orders, though his actions had no effect on Venom.

An echo of cries and growls was heard coming from the tunnel leading to the basement. A stampede of pokemon, sick and injured but thirsty for vengeance made its way up to the arena and assaulted Venom.

Giovanni's order had been for Team Rocket to let all the caged pokemon lose. After the way Machoke, now Machamp joined them to go against Venom and how he and Rhyhorn, now Rhydon evolved to fight him, Giovanni knew it would be useful to free the pokemon. They would surely hate Venom and attack him in their rage.

Venom screamed in pain as the pokemon bit and scratched. He slashed at them wildly, killing several, but there were too many, they buried him completely and relentlessly attacked. Team Rocket members poured into the arena and sent out their pokemon to help, regardless of their tired and injured state, some even got caught in the excitement and joined the attack themselves.

Venom became silent, his previous roars and growls lost. Team Rocket recalled their pokemon and backed away. The crazed pokemon that had been experimented on still buried Venom scratching and biting, not really being fully aware of what they were doing, focused only on revenge for their pain, feral and berserk. Slowly the pokemon began to feel the effects of their exhaustion having exerted themselves against Venom. Many fell unconscious and others crawled away a short distance and lay down breathing heavily.

Team Rocket, full gathered in the arena, cheered, but Delia wasn't feeling victorious, "the pokemon..." Graveler twitched, despite his broken state and looked at the humans. "Graveler!" Delia rushed to his side.

Giovanni observed the other pokemon trained by himself and Delia, they showed a little movement, signs of breathing and some even opened their eyes tiredly. A few of the sick pokemon fighting Venom had but they were in critical. In spite of that, they no longer held that look of rage and madness they had before, as if the effects of their revenge had sunk in and they had no target for their anger anymore. "Everyone, we can't afford to lose any more pokemon, start treating them immediately. We'll celebrate when we recover." Giovanni ordered; the key to maintaining power would be to have the most and strongest pokemon.

Everyone ceased their cheering, realizing that Team Rocket was left virtually powerless by the harsh battle. The team got to work, treating the pokemon, giving them first aid and trying to keep them and each other alive.

xoxox xox xoxox

In the remainder of the night, Team Rocket treated the injured pokemon. Many of the ones that were released from the laboratory didn't make it, but most of their own did.

Binks had examined Venom's remains with the curiosity of a genetic science specialist then went off to find Giovanni, who was in one of the many rooms of the gym taking care of the pokemon with Delia. "It was ditto!" Binks dashed into the room, the door was left open, with different people often coming in and out to say something to their leader. "Venom injected himself with the DNA of Ditto to make his body more flexible to the modifications he made, that's how he survived his extreme surgery, but it wasn't a full mutation it was a combination between mutation and surgery. I also found a lot of interesting information in the laboratory. It seems the epidemic might have originated here by accident from mutated pokemon due to Venom's research. It seems he didn't know what to make of it, he had no control over the disease," Binks sounded very excited about the discovery.

"The cure!" Delia had been half inside Cloyster's shell taking care of the injuries within; Venom had slipped his claws inside before Cloyster could close his shell. She poked her head out the top of the shell, "do you think the information here could lead to finding a cure?"

"It's very likely!" Binks then went on a scientific speech about the properties of the virus that neither Giovanni nor Delia, despite having studied with Professor Oak, could keep up with; it was too technical, riddled complex medical terms and hard to pronounce composite words.

"That's enough, organize the data that could be useful for to research an antidote and clean out any unnecessary information," Giovanni ordered. He didn't need his headache to grow worse listening to Binks' elaborate terminology.

"Yes, boss, right away!" Binks rushed out to get to work. His blond hair was messier than ever and the purplish-black circles under his eyes stood out on his thin face, but he was bursting with energy and enthusiasm.

Delia finished taking care of Cloyster and looked over Kingler's bandages before going off to change Machamp's bandages. "The bleeding stopped, good, now stay still while I apply this cream, it will sting but it will help you heal and you won't even have a scar." The same process had been done with Rhydon who was resting there as well.

Graveler was in more stable condition then the others; his structure was different from the other pokemon due to his thick stoner armor. With so much stone the injuries sealed faster, but he was left permanently scarred. His wounds had closed and would not easily open up again, but he had lost some limbs protecting Giovanni and Delia. Graveler sat sadly in a corner, with a deep line diagonally from his forehead down to his chest over one eye, which was blind and closed. Out of four, he only had one arm left now.

Delia had comforted the pokemon, telling him evolution might heal him, but in truth she wasn't sure, she had never seen such terrible injuries before and Graveler was so depressed he might not have the will to evolve even if he was trained.

Delia yawned and scanned the room for her magenta cup of coffee with a picture of a clashing bright red pokeball silhouette, which was not really hears, but something she found and claimed in the gym's kitchen, it was probably Amethyst's. It seemed that Amethyst had been some kind of coffee addict or maybe she kept the supply for Venom to stay awake experimenting through the night. There was a large supply of coffee of many different kinds in the gym's kitchen.

Spotting the cup on the corner of a polished redwood desk, Delia picked it up and drank what was left, yawning again soon after. "I need more coffee."

"You need sleep," Giovanni corrected, with a look that clearly indicated he needed to rest as well. "I have a plan; I'll take care of things."

Delia shook her head sleepily, her eyes involuntarily half closed, "the pokemon..."

"Save for the sick ones, all the survivors are in a stable condition. You've treated so many, you deserve to rest, but first, I need you to call Professor Oak," Giovanni knew he had no time more to waste for his plan to work.

To be Continued

Disclaimer, I don't own Pokemon. About the attacks used: most of them can be used by those pokemon, but I'll admit to a little creative license here and there, especially with the triple mega punch, albeit those pokemon do have similar punch attacks. You're probably wondering how they're going to deal with the city, the police and the noise that night, I'll get to that on the next chapter.