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| - Steven led Brendan and May out of Granite Cave and over to the dock where Mr. Briney's boat was parked. Since the two had not visited Slateport City before, Steven offered to be their personal guides for the time being. As new trainers, they thought that traveling around with a powerful trainer would be nothing but beneficial tot heir learning. Brendan especially felt like he had a lot to learn from Steven after his embarrassing loss. "Well, there's Mr. Briney's ship," Brendan told Steven and pointed to the old sailor sleeping on his boat's deck. The sky was dark so it was only natural that Mr. Briney had taken a nap. "I've heard many legends of the man," Steven commented. "However, I have never actually had the fortune to meet him." "Mr. Briney!" May called out to the sailor and stood across from his boat on the dock. Mr. Briney instantly propped up from his sleep and went to unlock the boat's side door. "Have you two young 'uns delivered the letter yet?" He asked and looked to Steven. "Oh, who's this?" "I am Steven, it is a pleasure to meet you," Steven shook his hand as he entered the boat. "You must be the famed Mr. Briney." "Oh, it's nothing lad," Mr. Briney chuckled and returned the handshake. "I take it you're Mr. Stone's son?" "Yes, sir," Steven nodded. "Well then, where would the three of you like to head to now?" Mr. Briney asked and took command of the boat's controls. "Slateport City!" Brendan answered with a confident smile. "It's the next city in the Hoenn Region where I can train my Pokémon and become the very best!" "Then Slateport it is!" Mr. Briney announced. After a few minutes of toggling switches, the boat slowly left the dock. As Mr. Briney got more into the open water, the boat finally picked up speed. With full throttle, the four of them were headed to Slateport. Due to Slateport's location across the Hoenn ocean, it would take a while before the boat would be able to reach the city. As a result, May, Brendan, and Steven all managed to fall asleep on long chairs kept on the boat's deck. Mr. Briney, on the other hand, was wide awake and had his eyes glued to the sea. Despite being retired, Mr. Briney still enjoyed sailing. He was one of the few people who made his passion his career as well. If there was anything that he knew more than anybody in the Hoenn Region, it was the waterways and what lurked beneath the waves. He knew that sometimes powerful monster Pokémon such as Gyarados and Tentacruel made their homes in the Hoenn seas and would attack without any warning or reason. However, it was in the air that Mr. Briney would find his threat. Three Team Magma members tailed the ship on their Crobat. They had spotted Steven leaving the Granite Cave with two young trainers as part of their mission and thought the sea would be the perfect place to ambush him. By using their speedy Flying-type Pokémon, they could catch up to him in no time and give him no room for escape in the open ocean. "Now!" The semi-Admin commanded and led the other three Grunts to the ship's deck. They landed abruptly with loud thuds and woke all of the trainers up. "What's going on!?" May asked and hopped up from her chair. "Get off my boat!" Mr. Briney shouted without leaving the controls. Since he had no time to park his boat in the deep seas, he could only continue driving. "It's Team Magma!" Steven exclaimed when he realized they were being ambushed. "What do you think you're doing here?" "We found you Steven Stone!" The semi-Admin exclaimed. "We're going to take you to our boss and get that bounty he had on your head!" "Never!" Steven growled. "Then we're going to have to get to you the hard way!" The semi-Admin shouted. All three of the Team Magma members called their Crobat back into their PokéBalls and pulled out different ones. At the same time, each of them threw their PokéBalls forward with a battle cry. "Magmar!" "Grimer!" "Solrock!" All three of the Magma members sent out their Pokémon, with the Solrock being the semi-Admin's Pokémon. "Brendan, May, help me out!" Steven told the two teenagers who quickly rushed to his side. "Solrock is at least part Rock-type, right?" Brendan asked. "If so, then I'm sure my Grovyle can take it!" "Nincada is part Ground-type, so I'll take on Grimer!" May declared. "That leaves me to take care of this Magmar," Steven nodded. At the same time, the three trainers sent out their Pokémon. Grovyle burst free from Brendan's PokéBall, Nincada burst free from May's PokéBall, and an Archeops burst free from Steven's PokéBall. "What is that thing?" Brendan asked and observed Steven's Archeops. "It's an ancient Pokémon from the faraway Unova Region," Steven answered. "I found its fossil while excavating for rocks there." "A Pokémon battle on my own ship..." Mr. Briney commented and watched the three-on-three fight. "At least I've got something to watch while sailing." "Solrock, use Confusion!" "Grovyle, run through its attack and hit it with a Leaf Blade!" Solrock charged its body as it glowed in a powerful purple light. When its eyes reached the same glow, it emitted a powerful wave of energy at Grovyle. Grovyle, following Brendan's commands, used its speed to run straight through the attack as it slashed at Solrock with its Leaf Blade attack. The super effective hit launched the levitating Pokémon back. "Nincada, let's see if you can use Sand-Attack!" May commanded her Bug Pokémon. At May's command, Nincada spat a flurry of sand at Grimer's eyes before its trainer was able to give it commands. It used its sludgy hands to attempt to scratch the sand out of its eyes, but its fingers were too blunt for its efforts to be effective. "Great, now use Leech Life!" Nincada turned its head back at May and nodded. It hopped in the air and bit onto Grimer's body. "No, Grimer throw it off and use Sludge!" "Don't let it to that, Nincada!" May exclaimed. "Bite down harder!" Grimer flailed its arms around and finally let Nincada loose off of itself. It successfully wiped the sand off of its eyes and hurled a blob of sludge at the Bug Pokémon. Under May's commands, it slashed the blog of sludge out of the way and latched itself onto the Sludge Pokémon yet again. This time, however, it made sure that its Leech Life attack hurt twice as bad. "Archeops, use Smack Down!" Steven commanded his formerly extinct Pokémon. "Magmar, don't let it get to you and burn it down with Flamethrower!" Archeops formed a small ball of yellow energy from its mouth and fired it at Magmar. However, Magmar was able to burn it out of the way with a Flamethrower. Unfortunately for the Grunt, the Flamethrower attack fizzled out after being used as a self-defense mechanism. "Archeops, use your quick speed to hit it with another Smack Down before it can charge another attack!" "No, protect yourself with another Flamethrower!" Archeops again formed the yellow ball of Rock powered energy in its mouth and shot it directly at Magmar. Despite its success at preventing the attack last time, Magmar was not able to charge up another Flamethrower in time. Archeops's Smack Down hit Magmar directly in the center and flung it right on the ground. "Grimer, use Sludge!" The Grunt that was battling May commanded. "Nincada, stop the attack and use Sand-Attack!" Grimer flung a ball of Sludge at Nincada at the same time that Nincada spat a flurry of sand out of its mouth. However, Grimer's Sludge attack was heavier and had move volume and easily trumped Nincada's Sand-Attack as it hit May's Pokémon directly. Due to Nincada's weak state, the one hit was enough to knock it out. "No!" May exclaimed and called her Pokémon back to its PokéBall. "Grovyle, use a spinning Leaf Blade combo!" Brendan commanded his Pokémon. He figured that if one attack wouldn't suffice, a combo of attacks would. Before the semi-Admin could give his Solrock a command, Grovyle spun itself and slashed its leaves at it. As a result, Solrock was spun in circles with the intensity of Grovyle's attack. "Good, Grovyle," Brendan pumped his fist. "Now do it again!" "No, use Confusion!" The semi-Admin commanded his Pokémon. Once again, however, Grovyle proved to be the faster Pokémon. As Solrock charged its attack, Grovyle used its super effective spinning Leaf Blade combo attack to severely damage it. Due to the high amount of super effective attacks used on it, Solrock succumbed to its damages and was knocked out. "Solrock, no!" The semi-Admin cried out and called his Pokémon back. "That's how we do it!" Brendan cheered and ran to his Pokémon to give it a high five. Grovyle hissed happily and smothered its trainer with love. "Archeops, finish the job with one more Smack Down!" Steven commanded. Archeops charged the same ball of energy and shot it at Magmar. Due to Magmar's slow recovery speed, Archeops's attack was able to hit it dead in the center again. This time, due to Steven's intense training of the Pokémon, it was able to knock it out effortlessly. "Magmar!" The Grunt growled and called his Pokémon back. This left just Grimer on the battlefield to have to take on both Grovyle and Archeops. "Do you wanna just give up now?" Steven asked. "Never!" The remaining Grunt shouted. "Grimer, use Sludge!" "Archeops, use Acrobatics!" "Grovyle, use Pound afterwards!" Archeops flew directly at Grimer and slashed it repeatedly using its high agility. When Grovyle found an opening in Archeops's attack, it went in and slammed down hard using its tail leaves. The barrage of attacks was enough to knock the weak Poison-type Pokémon out easily. "Grimer!" The Grunt shouted and called his Pokémon back. He fell to his knees and growled. "You may have defeated us this one time, Steven Stone, but we will not let you get the best of us!" The semi-Admin warned the three. "And Great Leader Maxie will be notified of these two new pests by your side, mark my words!" "Pests!" May exclaimed defensively. "Who are you calling pests?" "Let's get out of here," the semi-Admin instructed his subordinates as they all sent out their Crobat and flew out on them. When the battle ended, all three of the trainers sighed loudly. Brendan and Steven went in to congratulate their Pokémon, but they decided they would be better off with their Pokémon traveling outside of their PokéBalls for the rest of the boat ride. "My, that was an exciting battle," Mr. Briney commented when everything settled down. "It's been a while since I've seen a three-on-three triple battle." "Why did Team Magma come for you?" May asked Steven. "I guess they know that I've been doing research on these legendary Pokémon and they want to know everything I know," Steven shrugged. "They've been on my pursuit for a while now after I refused to give them information." "That's shitty of them," Brendan said. "But you can clearly wipe the floor with them." "I can wipe the floor if it's a few of them," Steven answered. "But we still don't know how big the organization really is. Maxie can just one day decide that he wants to let the entire army out on me and then I'll be screwed." "Who's Maxie?" May asked. "He's the leader of Team Magma," Steven informed them. "It's his dream that the Hoenn Region's land can be expanded." "Isn't that selfish to all of the Water Pokémon?" "At this point, I don't think he cares. All he sees is his vision and he'll stop at nothing to achieve his idea of a 'perfect world'." "That's crazy..." Brendan mumbled before taking a seat on a chair next to his Grovyle. "Anyways, I'm going to sleep, wake me up when we're in Slateport." Steven and May nodded and followed suit. If they wanted to last a day in the bustling city of Slateport, they would have to be rested up. Despite the attack, it was not the right time to be thinking of Team Magma's next move. Instead, they decided that a good rest was exactly what they needed.
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