Into the Unown (Pokemon Fanfiction OC)

Beverly and Nina rushed into the dressing room to quickly get changed. It was a tight schedule since they had to redo the whole wedding ceremony in the main arena of the Cerulean Gym in skates. But luckily, they already had a makeup artist and other staff members on standby to expedite the matter.

Their performance was supposed to be a surprise gift for the newlyweds after the ceremony, but Nina was pretty sure that Misty was already well aware of what was about to happen. 

Regardless, the show must go on. Though Nina wouldn’t mind a sudden crisis to derail the entire thing right about now. Unfortunately, the Ace Trainers from the League were extremely competent in maintaining security, and everything has been quite smooth so far, security-wise.

Nina puffed her cheeks up at Beverly’s outfit. “No fair, I wanted to be the prince!”

Their theme was a prince and a princess, so Beverly was dressed up as a dashing prince charming, while Nina’s outfit looked like something she’d find in a reproduction of Swan Lake; a white leotard with a lacy skirt and various adornments.

Beverly snorted in response. “Heh, gotta grow a bit taller first, Nins.”

“We’re about the same height! You just wanted to be the prince cause you don’t have a figure.” Nina quipped. It really was a cruel twist of fate that the wannabe mermaid among the two of them was utterly flat like a board, while Nina had already begun developing curves despite her young age.

Beverly jumped at her cheeky junior to teach her a lesson, only to be held back by a staff member. “Hold still, Bev! You’re going to ruin the outfit!” The staff admonished. While Nina stuck out her tongue in defiance.

“Alright, you two. Get your shit together! We’re two minutes till go time and the show’s being streamed live. You don’t want them to make more memes of you, do you?” That last question was especially pointed towards Beverly, the reluctant meme queen.

“Fine.” The older girl grumbled as she forced herself to settle down.

Nina let out a smug grin at the small triumph, only for her face to completely fall apart when she began hearing the cheers of the audience members when the emcee announced their surprise performance.

“I don’t know if I can do this Bev. I never wanted to be a performer…” 

To her credit, Beverly acted like a proper senior and pulled Nina in for a reassuring hug instead of messing with her out of spite. “You’ll be fine, Nins. How’s this harder than taking down a whole den of Team Rocket bozos? ‘Sides, you’ll need to get used to this when you eventually compete in the conference right.”

Nina shook her head, the flowery tassels adorning her hair waving in the air as she did. “It’s not the same. This is different from battling!”

Beverly lightly shook the younger girl and looked her straight in the eye. “It is the same. You won’t be alone out there, you’ve got me, and Nairy, and Ryu, and Josephine and all the other supporting Pokemon. Two trainers and their Pokemon in an arena, surrounded by a crowd of busybodies, just like a conference battle. You’ll be fine, Nins. Believe in the me who believes in you.”

Nina chuckled, her friend’s oblivious regurgitation of Gurren Lagann helped to lighten her mood. “Fine, but if this goes tits up then you’re going down with me.”

“Heh. I already prepared myself for that when I saw how shit you were at everything.”

And with that, the two girls held on tight to each other’s hands as they skated out into the main arena.

***

Natsumi and her twin sister loudly cheered out alongside the crowd. She had seen first hand how hard her two seniors had worked for this moment and couldn’t help but shed a tear.

Beverly was born into the family so she had been training to become a mermaid all her life. From tireless ballet practices as a kid, to all the vocal lessons she secretly took, all of it led up to this moment, for her to finally debut to the world. 

Natsumi was told not to tell, but Beverly had actually deliberately delayed her debut because she wanted to do it alongside her best friend. Which Natsumi thought was just the sweetest thing ever. “I wonder if Fuyumi would do the same for me. Oh, who am I kidding, of course she would!” She and her sister were inseparable after all.

On the other hand, there was also Nina, without whom they wouldn’t have even gotten the opportunity of a lifetime to be apprenticed at the Gym. Their senior apprentice was always someone she and her sister looked up to greatly; with the way she just effortlessly got along with any Pokemon, and her cool lecturing tone whenever she gave them lessons on training and battle tactics. Aquarium Girl just seemed perfect in every way. Or so she thought…

Turns out, Nina was absolutely hopeless when it came to the performing arts, from stumbling on her own feet while dancing to screeching like a Murkrow when singing. All of it formed a gap to her usually intelligent and highly capable self, which just added even more to the girl’s charm. 

Compounded all the more when Natsumi saw how hard she worked. Nina thought that nobody knew, but Natsumi and Fuyumi noticed her sneakily practicing her singing and dancing in the dressing room when she thought that it was empty.

There was even one time, where the girl was crying after practice because of how much she messed up that day. All of it just made the twins look up to Nina even more and spurred them to cheer for her even harder. 

The emcee gradually ramped up the hype as the two performers skated out into the arena, smiling and waving at the adoring crowd before settling down in the center with a slide.@@novelbin@@

Natsumi could barely stop her heart from pounding as soft piano music began playing from the speakers. The two girls eschewed a live band for the performance because they weren’t good enough to adapt to any spontaneous changes in rhythm just yet.

The audience quieted down as Prince Beverly and Princess Nina ‘sung’ to the prerecorded lyrics while they danced around each other. 

The movements were simple, yet elegant, with both performers gently raising and lowering their hands in subtle waves and circling around on their skates. Until the music began to ramp up, prompting the two dancers to match with more dynamic movements; leg raises, contorting body spins, and even a double axle from Beverly into Nina’s embrace where the older girl lifted her partner up with a flourish, eliciting claps and a scream from Natsumi.

Eventually though, the music died down and lights dimmed as a menacing serpentine figure took to the field. Princess Nina hid behind her partner in fear, while Prince Beverly puffed her chest up and bravely confronted the hissing Dragonair that had come to prey on them.

The make up lady had done an incredible job at making the usually friendly and jovial Nairy look menacing, with sharp eye shadows and various black ‘tattoos’ painted all over his body.

Nina jumped back with a twirl; a move that the girl practiced over and over again until blisters began forming on her feet. While Beverly moved forward to ‘spar’ with Nairy through a series of complex movements.

The Prince jumped and twirled all over the Dragon’s twisting body, barely ducking down against a fierce tail swipe from the villainous creature. The whole sequence was only about a minute long, but the entire audience was sitting at the edge of their seats at how tight the execution was at certain parts. All the while, Princess Nina’s frantic singing compounded the tension in everyone's hearts.

And just when it felt like Prince Beverly was about to lose, she ran. The older girl grabbed at Nina’s hand and pulled her along as they did a lap around the arena, with Nairy in close pursuit. All the while their lips kept moving to the lyrics, ‘singing’ about hopelessness and despair, until they found themselves trapped in the middle of the arena, with Nairy forming a perfect ring and circling around them, steadily closing the loop as he did.

In response, the two dancers locked hands and began spinning in the opposite direction, gradually tightening the spread of their skates until they formed a perfect V. All the while, Nairy kept circling in closer and closer until he was mere inches away from touching his prey. When suddenly, the ice cracked.

The rest of the audience might not have noticed it, but Natsumi and Fuyumi caught a thin sliver of Psychic aura enveloping dancers as the ice began breaking down all around them. Nairy’s encirclement faltered, wobbling under the uneven surface. 

But Nina and Beverly just kept spinning in the middle, completely unphased. Until a loud crash echoed, and the gaping maw of a Gyarados emerged from beneath the ice to push Nairy away and elevate the regal dancers into the air with his scarred face.

The two girls stopped spinning when they were assured of their safety and repositioned themselves on top of Ryu’s head. Prince Beverly held Princess Nina in a tight embrace as they looked down at the evil Dragon who dared to attack them. The embrace was an extra addition because Nina had trouble recovering from the intense spinning maneuver in time and needed Beverly to steady her.

The two serpentine Pokemon began dueling as they ‘swam’ around each other in the air. Nairy tried everything he could to reach the two humans, while Ryu dodged and swiped his tail around in an attempt to keep his passengers safe.

Meanwhile, Beverly led Nina into a waltz atop Ryu’s head, the Prince elegantly twirling her Princess around her. All the while, keeping their footing steady through the aid of Psychic Pokemon and began ‘singing’ again. This time it was about the misunderstood hero, Gyarados. “Fear not his fearsome looks, for underneath it all is a playful rook,” they intoned.

The pair calmly danced atop the fearsome Gyarados despite all the chaos that was waging all around them. Juxtaposed by the unnaturally serene music amidst the horrible clash, and framed by the divine lighting work — it all came together to form a very striking image.

Not long after, the fight was interrupted by another song breaking out. This one distinctly punctuated by soft howls and deep moans. Water began rising to the voice’s rhythm, encircling the two violent Pokemon to pull them apart before eventually enveloping the Prince and Princess in a sphere of water.

Then, like an ethereal water spirit, Josephine the Milotic rose up from the water’s depths and shot a Hydro Pump at Nairy, sinking him into the water. However, just when she was about to do the same with Ryu, the sphere of water containing the two girls drifted down in front of the Milotic to stop her.

The two broke out into an underwater dance in the sphere, circling each other while twisting and writhing their body in an elegant manner. 

Natsumi remembered that this was the part where neither Nina nor Beverly had any issues with, due to how much time they spent underwater. The trickiest bit was being careful enough to not fall out of the sphere, since it was hard to tell where the translucent boundary ended.

Seeing the two dancing girls, Ryu and Josephine joined in as well, enveloping the sphere with their own rendition of Dragon Dance, which was soon joined by Nairy, who was now ‘purified’ of the black marks on his body.

It culminated in quite the spectacle as the scales of the three serpents glowed with an iridescent sheen, giving the sphere of water they were encircling a disco ball-like effect. And as the music reached its peak, the three Dragon Dancers exploded in a burst of blinding light and disappeared from the scene. Leaving only Nina and Beverly in a sphere of water that was slowly being lowered down onto the arena’s central platform.

As a quiet calm took over the arena, the Prince and the Princess looked affectionately into each other’s eyes and slowly turned towards the audience to begin singing as an acapella duet. They declared their undying love for each other as they held up the other’s hands and broke out into another waltz.

There was no background music or applause as the audience simply appreciated the rawness of the young girls’ voices and the emotions contained within. This was also the only part where there was no lip syncing involved, further adding more texture to the chorus.

And in the end, the Prince pulled her Princess into a loving embrace as the lights faded and the audience clapped, signaling an end to Beverly and Nina’s debut performance.

***

Author's note:

Can I just take a moment here to show some appreciation to the mods of Scribble Hub. Like the fact that they actually moderate their platform. Crazy, I know.

But after dealing with the mods on Royal Road, I was starting to rewrite my definition of moderator. Does the word actually mean moderator? Or does it mean asshole who can't even answer a simple question properly without any form of sass.

Anyways, thank you mods. Keep up the great work.

Fun fact:

I wrote two versions of this chapter. The other one was from Nina's perspective, and it ended up being her cussing incessantly and regretting every single decision she ever made in her second life that led her to this point.

Personally, I found it amusing, but not exactly the sort of vibe I was going for. So I ended up with this chapter from Natsumi's perspective instead.

Next chapter on Thursday. Sorry guys, I wanted to make it Wednesday, but something came up and I worry I might not have the leeway.