Chapter 11:Game
I don't own Pokemon or anything linked to Nintendo.
WTLM
"Ash! Ash! Ash, wake up! There's someone in Selene's room!"
Ash sprang out of the bed, tired eyes searching desperately for the unknown intruder. "What? Where? How? Save the kids! Fire the photon torpedoes!" He slurred, sluggishly taking a sloppy fighting stance.
"Oh, you're up?" Cynthia replied nonchalantly.
Ash stared at her, her tired face and bloodshot eyes reflected the light of the thing she held in her hands. "Why the hell did you wake me up at.." He glanced at the clock on the bedside table. "..FOUR IN THE MORNING!"
"Shh, you'll wake the kids!" She scolded him.
"What is it?" He asked again, blinking his tiredness away.
"Do this for me." She stated simply, throwing the glowing whatever-it-was into his hands
He looked down at the whatever-it-was and then at Cynthia with an incredulous expression. "You're kidding!"
Cynthia blushed in embarrassment and looked away. "Just do it!"
"Does Jack know you have this?"
"...Yes? Maybe? No..." Her whole body slumped forward in exhaustion. "Please don't tell Jacky, I've been trying for a week and I still can't beat the bitch!"
Ash took a closer look at the 3DS and lo and behold, there was his wife's character losing horribly against...herself? Ash tried, he really, really did, but he couldn't help himself. He quickly picked up his pillow and slammed it into his face to muffle his laughter. "It's not funny, you dork!"
"It's pretty damn funny, Cyn!"
"No, it's not, the game cheats!"
Ash handed her the game and got into bed. "How does a game cheat?" He asked, still laughing.
"It just does! Whenever I have the type advantage, the bitch just switches out! Only the challenger is allowed to do that!" She argued.
"It's a game for kids, Cynthia." Ash retorted.
"Anyway, if I somehow, by some miracle, manage to get one of the bitch's pokemon down to the red, she just uses a full restore! How isn't that cheating?" She continued, incensed.
"You know, you can do that to, right?"
"Well, unlike some cheating, virtual versions of me, I like to play fair, you hear that, cyber bitch!" She shouted.
"Cynthia... When was the last time you got some sleep?"
"I don't need sleep, I just need to beat her, which would be easy, if only this damn game let me get my hands on a garchomp or a spiritomb and let me use more than four damn moves! Seriously, where are the gible? You couldn't walk around the forest around Celestic without tripping over the little bastards!"
"They're in Wayward Cave." He told her, turning over so he wouldn't be blinded by the annoying light.
"Where the hell is Wayward Cave?!"
"Under the bicycle path."
"Fuck this fucking game! You know what this game promotes? Laziness! You really think that you can travel all of Sinnoh in a day? Well, I'm sorry little Suzie, but that's a pile of crap! You think you can just waltz up and challenge the Elite Four whenever the urge takes you? Sorry, little Timmy, but the real word doesn't work like that, fuckwit!" Cynthia ranted.
Ash stifled another laughed. Sleep deprived, game-rage Cynthia was even funnier than drunk Cynthia and Cynthia was pretty damn funny when she was drunk.
"How can we, as a society, let our children play his mind-rotting filth and not prepare them properly for life!"
"Better question, why did you allow Game Creep the right to use your likeness for the game?" He smirked.
"Because shut up, that's why! Camilla White! What kind of name is that? I'll tell you what kind of name it is, it's the name of a cold, heartless bitch who delights in my agony!"
"Just give it to me, I'll do it!" Ash grumbled, realising that sleep wouldn't come unless he beat the damn game for her.
"Ash, I have five years of experience on you, I am regarded as the second greatest trainer in the entire history of the Pokemon League, except for Red himself! Do you really think that you can possibly do what I, the legendary Cynthia Ketchum ca.. How the fuck did you kill that fucking spiritomb!"
"I just used your arcanine's Flamethrower, since that makes Silverwind practically useless." He explained.
Cynthia frowned. "I tried that, obviously, but It just kept getting weaker.
"Yeah, but I gave her a white herb to keep her special attack up to use it twice."
She gave him a blank stare. "What the hell is a white herb?"
Ash sighed. "Did you even check the medicine section of you bag?" Obviously not.
"No, I just went to Pokemon Centre, they heal them all in seconds, which is another lie!"
"It's a game, Cynthia... Anyway, now that your, sorry, her garchomp is out, you just use Outrage, since you have the speed advantage you should be able to get it off twice..." Cynthia bit her fingernails as the two virtual pokemon traded attacks.
"Yes, she's down! But Arcanine is in the red and confused, Ash, what do I do?" She asked frantically.
"Hey, hey, just relax. Switch out and use your luxray since she's about to use her milotic." He reassured her.
"How do you even know all this? I never got passed her garchomp."
"Jack got stuck here a couple of times too and I've had a lot of free time on my hands lately." Ash replied.
"Oh. Ah crap, she used Attract! Snap out of it, Luxray, you're too good for her!"
"Okay, I'll admit the game cheats a little here, I know it's meant to be fifty/fifty if your pokemon is infatuated, but I don't think that's true. Aha!"
"Discharge? Why not Thunder?"
"Because even if we manage to use it, there's only a seventy percent chance of it working."
"Where does say that?"
Ash looked at Cynthia. "Have you even looked at your pokemon's stats?"
"Stats?"
"Nevermind..." Her turned back to the screen. "Roserade, hm?' "
I hate poison-types, they always go straight for...Toxic! I knew it!"
"No need to panic, just switch out for now. What other pokemon do you have?" He looked through her team. "Infernape? Not bad." Ash nodded approvingly. "Here," He said, handing the game back to her. "I think you can handle it from here. Ash settled again, maybe now he could finally get some sleep.
"GAH! Fucking cheating bitch!"
Or maybe not.
"What is it now?"
"I took out her damn roserade with Flare Blitz, then she used her lucario and I kept using it, now my infernape is out and her lucario still has half his life!"
"Why didn't you use Thunder Punch and keep your HP?" Ash asked, starting to become just as irritated as Cynthia.
"Because I thought the damage would have lessened by now!"
"What?"
"Does Flare Blitz hurt your infernape anymore? No, because he's gotten used to it and learned how to minimise the damage... SO WHY DOESN'T THIS DAMN GAME WORK LIKE THAT!?"
"Because it's a damn game, Cynthia! Just use your gyrados' Surf until it faints!"
"Okay, jeez, no need to snap..."
Ash covered his ears with his pillow. "Just let me sleep!" A few seconds later, he finally, finally, finally managed to slip off into the sweet realm of sleep...
...For about a minute and a half...
"Ash, I did it! I did it! I beat myself! This must be what Reilly meant when he said that the greatest victory comes from defeating oneself, because I feel pretty damn fantastic!"
"Cynthia, I love you."
"Ash, I love you, to.."
"Let me finish. I love you, more than life itself. You are my sun, moon, stars, my reason to be and my purpose to live. I can't imagine living a life that doesn't have you in it and I don't want to. I would climb a thousand mountains, swim a thousand seas, cross a thousand deserts just to see the smile that I'm blessed enough to see every morning of my life."
Tears pricked Cynthia's eyes, only slightly because of extreme tiredness. "Ash..." She choked. "Baby, that's the sweetest thing you've said since..." She couldn't even finish, she just wrapped him in a tight hug.
"So, please, please understand when I say..." He gently peeled her arms from around his neck, laying her gently on her back. Cynthia heartbeat quickened and she moistened her lips, ready to greet his. "Go to the hell to sleep!" He exclaimed, turning over again and grumbling to himself.
"I just wanted to show you my greatest achievement..." She whispered, feeling slightly pissed about being cheated out of a kiss that she was sure was coming.
"In a kid's game!"
"That's what I meant, greatest achievement, video-game wise." Ash ignored her. "Ash?" He still stayed silent. "Ash? I wuv you, Ashy..." She whispered, snuggling into his back and pressing her chest against him.
"I love and respect you too much to respond to you right now."
"Don't be like that! I said I was sorry..." Cynthia muttered.
"No, you never said that!"
"Nevermind! Let's just be happy I won!"
Ash briefly opened an eye and smirked. "Oh, really? I hope you saved before you turned it off."
"Oh, % &$¥, $€£%, son of a &%€£$, bankrupt the Game Creep $¥€%& , and I bet they were %& ¥€ by #$€, their mothers %¥$%# in the #%& ¥ and their fathers smelled of elder-berries!" She roared in rage.
Ash covered his head with his pillow again. It seemed that sleep would elude him tonight. Oh well, it would still be funny to watch Cynthia describe in very precise and gruesome details what she would do with a coconut, a swellow, a catapult and the unfortunate Game Creep programmer she happened across.