SoulSilver Log: Part 3

Little Blue has had quite a journey over the last week.  The land of Johto has fallen into chaos while Blue was on her journey to be the very best that no one ever was.  The sinister international crime syndicate with a logo stolen from Rutgers University, Team Rocket, has emerged from the shadows to do vague bad things like "use Pokemon for evil".  Since Pokemon dare frighten kids with any actual instance of Team Rocket being evil*, we'll just have to take their own word for it that they're out to do bad things for bad's own sake.

So when Blue traveled to Mahogany Town, she found that the door to the local gym was being blocked by an annoying man.  No matter what she tried, she couldn't find a way around him, as all people in the Pokemon universe are roughly the same size and the door was exactly the width of an average human.  Blue, desperate to get her seventh badge, called upon the great power from another dimension for help.  It told her that all this was being caused by an evil organization the power had fought back in a time known as "the original games", Team Rocket.  The only way to get to get into the gym was to defeat the local Rockets, who were hiding in a secret ninja base below one of Mahogany's two houses.  And the great power told her that there would be help:  the dragon master, Lance.

Unfortunately, Lance did very little in terms of real fighting.  Instead, Blue had to go around and fight all the grunts with her new beautiful Gardevoir, while Lance hid someplace and popped out every time something flashy needed to be done.  Apparently Lance defeated Blue's rival, Red, at some point, not she couldn't have done it herself.  Also, what kind of name is "Lance"?  Shouldn't this jackass and his silly cape and hair be in a 90s boy band or something?  By the time the Rockets here were defeated, it was clear to absolutely everybody that this was just a test run of Team Rocket's real scheme.  But even so, Lance went home, certain that he had saved Johto for good.

By the time Blue had beaten Pryce, the seventh Gym Leader, it was clear that Lance was exactly 100% wrong.  But Lance wasn't going to come back, naturally.

Team Rocket had captured the Radio Tower in Goldenrod City, trying to send a message to their former leader, Giovanni.  The great power claimed that it had forced Giovanni into an early retirement back in the days of "the first games", and assured Blue that it had seen the future - Giovanni wasn't going to return.  Blue felt that was sort of lame, since this Giovanni character sounded like an enjoyable challenge to fight.

All Blue had to do was defeat this rebel Rocket faction.  Instead of doing that, Blue wound up joining Team Rocket by accident.  She looked rather fetching in her black uniform, and the cap was absolutely darling.  Blue actually considered staying with the criminal organization forever.  It wasn't like she minded being vaguely evil all the time.  In fact, Blue wanted to fly home that very second and show Mom how leaving her only child to wander the Earth unsupervised had ended up.  However, the universe closed in on Blue.  She was not allowed to leave Goldenrod City until she cleaned up the Team Rocket mess.

Heading over to the Rocket-occupied Radio Tower, Blue attempted to use her Grunt rank to sneak into the enemy lines, defeat the boss, and then be done in time for famous Goldenrod Fried Seaking.  Unfortunately her plan was ruined by none other than her arch rival, Red.  Red, seeing that Blue had joined the dark side, immediately freaked out and stripped her naked on the spot!**  But thanks to the magic of Nintendo family values, Blue was magically clothed in her regular outfit, saving herself much shame.  Still, that was a bit forward, wasn't it?  Red walked away with blood gushing out of his nose, and Blue went ahead to save the day as she away did.

All the remained for Blue to do was take out the final gym leader, Claire, the younger of the dragon-master siblings.  Yes, she was Lance's sister.  First, though, Blue demanded that her Feebas evolve.  The haircut treatment was taking too long.  So the great power helpfully made the days go faster and faster though an ability it called "messing with my DS's clock".  Three days passed by in ten minutes, and soon enough Feebas was beautiful enough to evolve... into a mighty and breathtaking Milotic.  As for her Vaporean, well it still had a purpose:  it would be useful in clearing waterfalls and whirlpools and whatever.  "Sorry Vaporean", Blue thought, "but Milotic is so much prettier, and stronger.  Nothing personal.  Having two Eeveelutions is tacky anyway."  Blue thanked the great power, and moved on, hoping to use her great new Milotic to kick some dragon butt.  Which she did, as usual.

But Clair was haughty and proud and a bit of bitch, and refused to let Blue have her final badge.  So Blue had to explore a flooded cave to find a house filled with strange old people who asked her really basic questions.  The great power told Blue to answer in the ways that were the most clearly benign and not be a smart-aleck and say stuff like "I hate Pokemon".  After seeing Blue pass this moronic quiz, Clair fell into despair - for Clair had never passed herself.  "How?" Blue thought, "its only five questions with three answers - two of which are correct, even by guessing wildly you'll get the right answer in two or three tries."  Blue was given her final badge.

Even though Blue had proven herself worthy of the Pokemon League challenge, she still could not surf over to the Pokemon League.  Ethan, being the creeper he always was, kept on getting in her way and babbling about some kimono girls in Ecruteak City.  The great power, sighed, and told Blue that she would have to take care of it, Ethan would never stop until she completed this quest.  So Blue flew up there and beat each one of the kimono girls, who were oddly ungrateful even though Blue had saved each one at least once during her journey.  Instead of gifts they sent out powerful Eeveelutions.  Though the battle was close, Blue's Gardevoir saved the day.  Now the kimono girls wanted Blue to journey down to the Whirl Islands and meet a legendary Pokemon God, Lugia.  Instead of being reverent to the holy and exclusive creature, Blue caught it.  Then she threw it in a box on her computer, never to be used again.

Now it was time to take on the five members of the Elite Four.  Blue, fearful that she would fail against these great and legendary trainers, leveled her party up another five steps to 45.  And she evolved Vulpix into Ninetales.  Clearly the battle would be long and fierce.  First came Will, the Psychic Master.  He fell after an embarrassingly quick battle.  Then came Koga and Bruno, masters of Poison and Fighting.  Gardevoir, nearly entirely on her own, defeated both these Pokemon Masters like they were nothing.  With Karen, the lord of Dark-types, things got more threatening.  Blue barely passed though because of how strong Karen's Houndoom was.

After healing up her party with endless Hyper Potions and Revives, Blue walked up to the Leader of the Elite Four, the Champion of all trainers.  Who would it be but the boy-band member once again, Lance?  The great power warned Blue that Lance was quite strong.  Even though Blue felt she was prepare, the great power feared the Lance may be too much for its young protege.  Blue charged forward... and was defeated soundly***.  Luckily, the great power used a time travel method called "restarting the game" and brought Blue back to just before she fought Lance.  This time, Blue thought, things will be different.  And they were.

It was a close and bitter match.  First Lance sent out Gyarados, and Blue sent out Ampharos.  Ampharos used a Thunderpunch, but was ultimately beaten by the quicker Gyarados.  Meganium was sent in to finish the job.  Lance, seeing this, brought out Charizard.  Milotic switched in from Blue's team to take this fire dragon on.  Milotic scored a victory, but then had to face an Aerodactyl.  This time, things were not so clean.  Milotic won, but only after being paralyzed.  Now came the trio of Dragonites.  The first one managed to defeat not just Meganium, but Ninetales as well before falling.  The second fell thanks to Gardevoir's strength, but she was left very weak by the end of the battle.  Then Lance sent out his final Dragonite, his prized partner.  Blue was on her last legs.  This battle was going to be down to the wire.  Glaceon was sent out to fight the last Dragonite, with hopes that her (yes, her) ice-skills wound be enough to destroy this last dragon.  However, Lance used Outrage and Glaceon fell - but not after leaving Dragonite with a nice dent in its HP and speed thanks to Icy Wind.  Finally it all came down to Milotic, still suffering from her wounds with the battle with Aerodactyl.  Luckily Dragonite fell confused and hurt itself.  Milotic sent out one final Ice Beam, with all of Blue's hopes dreaming that she were not fully paralyzed, and the attack struck.  Dragonite fell.  Blue was now the champion of trainers in Johto.

Well done, Blue!  You've come a long way, my dear little feminized avatar.  But your journey is not yet over.  There is still another land to conquer, and greater challenges to face.  Blue now heads to the land of Kanto, where another eight Gym Leaders await her challenge.

Meanwhile, the greatest trainer who ever lived, a boy who never speaks, waits quietly on the peak of Mt. Silver, ready for a challenger worthy of his untold power.  "Pika!"

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* I'm saddened to say that the censorship on these games seems to have gotten a lot tighter.  For example, the slot machines are gone from the Game Corners because gambling is too "adult" for children.  Instead now we have a ridiculous and halfway luck-based version of Minesweeper called "Voltorb Flip".  Trust me, it sucks.  Yeah, the slots weren't much fun either, but they weren't half as annoying as this game is.  At least with slots you know its all luck.  Here they're trying to pretend there's some kind of strategy.  There isn't.  Anyway, back on censorship:  The old man in front of Cerulean City gym used to oogle all the girls inside, but now he says "there are lots of strong trainers here".  Come on, Game Freak!  Let the dirty old man be a dirty old man.

** Not kidding.  That happens during the game.  Maybe I was talking about of my ass about the censorship stuff.

*** Since when has Waterfall caused flinching?  Why wasn't I notified of this change??  You can't expect me to be able to fight if you keep on changing the effects of attacks.  And why does Lance have two Full Restores?  That's absolutely preposterous and totally unfair.  It should be unfair in my favor!