Disclaimer:
Pokemon is a copyright of Nintendo. Pokègirls and Pokèwomen come from the Pokewomon Forum.
"Wild Horses and Pokègirls" is the creation of Metroanime.
The Festival was coming, and all the Huns and Frozenares were excited. A chance to prove themselves as fledged warriors, a chance to get a life partner, a chance to trade and renew old friendships and old rivalries. A dozen tribes converged on a single town in the plains.
The Festival was the most important aspect of Hun life, every season, the Hun Pokèkits who were going through their first puberty would be matched with Frozenares Pokèkits who were likewise going through first puberty. In an odd way, the Festival accounted for the Huns' reputation for ferocity and cunning in battle. For the hard life on the steppes gave them all the strength and endurance training that were the lot of Ferals the world over. But it also explained the `Feral` Hun's cunning, and their incredible bond with their mount. Born of a wild but not Feral mother, when the spectre of Ferality began to raise its head, the Festival would give the horse and warrior a loving partner who could keep it at bay. It gave the Huns and their mounts, in a Darwinian sense, the best of both worlds: Feral strength, Domestic intelligence.
It also had an odd effect on the Huns' warmaking. When a Pokègirl, these girls would parthenogenically add to their tribe's numbers. As a Pokewomon, the Huns and mounts would rarely reproduce, and effectively had no direct genetic heritage to pass on. Thus their only function in life was to protect their children and grandchildren. Still strong and healthy, with no purpose but defense and attack, well-trained and highly experienced, the Pokèwomon Huns and their Pokèwomon mounts were a ferocious opponent.
The Festival was also a time of release for these elders as well.
Spring Dragon reigned in Thundering Wind, a rare Clydesdame among the much smaller Frozenares. "The village, there are the defenders, and the market place," Spring Dragon told her comrade of nearly 90 Festivals.
"Convenient to arrange it all so close and orderly. The younglings are already surrounding the defenders. Let's see if they can curb their enthusiasm," Thundering Wind commented as she trotted towards the market place, carrying her lover and friend.
In the city, it was the typical bedlam. The 'Old but not dead' Pokèwomon were following the scouting reports of the gray-heads. She watched a comical scene, a Hun with a rather handsome young man slung over her shoulder. The man pleaded, "Please, I'm faithful to my wife!"
"Where is she?" the Hun asked solicitously, "I swing that way too. Teach you both a few new tricks." She laughed.
A woman, presumably the wife, came out of a home screaming, was caught by the Frozenare and carried off along side the similarly burdened Hun. The pair laughed at the man and wife's struggles.
Thundering Wind continued through the streets. Several of the Gray hairs/mares were getting some kids off the streets, aided by some of the older villagers. Spring Dragon approved, "Better to keep the little ones safe, and out of the way."
Thundering Wind nodded, "Don't steal the Kung Ewe's life, and you can take her wool year after year." The Clydesdame knew what her partner was looking for: the fabric bazaar.
Here there were fewer Huns, only the old-timers and those too young to be elsewhere. One man was doing his best to negotiate with a Hun and her partner who leered eagerly at him.
"Let her decide does she want his wares or his body?" Spring Dragon asked.
"Both," Thundering Wind replied calmly, letting her feet carry both of them slowly through the bazaar. Then she spotted the bored-looking woman who sat looking at the screaming men and the chasing Huns.
"Puts an entire different spin on the old 'rape and pillage' legend," the old woman said by way of conversation, "I've negotiated with one of your elders, I know about the pillage part."
Spring Dragon laughed as she dismounted, noting how odd it felt having her weight on her feet when she wasn't preparing to defecate, urinate or sleep. "Well, I have things to buy, as well as - " She removed the bolts of cloth from Thundering Wind's back, and unwrapped the cheaper, tougher cloth to reveal what was inside. "- to sell," she finished, setting the diaphanous silk, in six bright colors, before the seller.
"Amazing! I've never seen such fine . . . I don't suppose you'd tell me where you got this?" the merchant asked, her only answer was a classic example of Hun stoicism. "Thought so," she said, "The things you want to trade for?"
Spring Dragon quickly found the various samples of cloth she was looking for. Tougher and more durable than the silk. Almost a dozen bolts all told.
"All that!" the old woman wailed, "Run me through and trample my corpse!"
"Very well." Thundering Wind moved to collect the silks.
"Wait!" The old woman rummaged around in a pile of bolts, extracting two, and a boy.
Young man, Spring Dragon thought as she stared, she was vaguely aware of Thundering Wind waving a hand in front of her face, but she didn't care.
"This is tougher than these," the old woman said, replacing 3 bolts with the two others, "So you won't need as much, and you have a someone strong enough to help you sew it."
Spring Dragon would have agreed that the sun was green and the sky was orange.
"See something you like?" the old woman asked as she stepped into Spring Dragon's view, blocking out the delicious young man. "He's a bit shy, but a woman of some years should be able to handle him well." She looked at Thundering Wind. "Agreed?"
She saw her partner nod, but she was elsewhere, thinking about the smooth muscular form, that marvelous hair, that oh-so beguiling shyness and . . . Traitor! she mentally screamed, Thundering Wind was leading him to a small building, MINE! She charged after, only to end up tossed in the room, on the bed by her much larger friend.
"Enjoy!" her partner told her and closed the door.
Thundering Wind walked back to the stall. "That was a dirty trick," she said.
"On whom?" the old woman asked, "Lad can dandle girls like he did your Hun, she'll get her wits together and do what's necessary. Boy needs to grow up."
"Very well," she said as she collected the bolts. Sometimes `Dragon, she thought, I get the idea you're still a Pokègirl. She headed out to the combat trials. The fledglings were testing their new bonds against the defenders. One of the defenders was a winged Armsmistress, the flaming hair and emerald eyes were a dead give away. Malakim, she thought idly, as the girl spun and parried, using her wings to lift her out of the trap the fledgling pair had set up and spring, Worth the trouble I see.
"HEY!" she shouted and charged, thrusting younglings out of the way by mass and authority. The Malakim was down and bleeding badly. The young Hun looked at the bow in her hand, and realized she was in for it, a full strength blow from the Clydesdame sent her sprawling. She selected an older pair. "You two, get this one to the Pokècenter. NOW! Who is the weapons master here?!"
"I am," the older Hun walked forward fearfully, Thundering Dragon was known, as was her rarely seen temper.
"You permit this?" Thundering Wind held up the bow, now broken and ground to powder in her hands.
"How else was I suppose to get her?" the young Hun's Frozenare companion shouted in anger, the massive Clydesdame's stare was icier than anything a Frozenare could produce.
"Obviously you and your partner couldn't," the Clydesdame said, "So you are unworthy to be warriors, go back to your mothers and hope she doesn't simply end your worthless life. There is blood between us and that Malakim. As a breed, they are not likely to forgive such an insult. You have dishonored us all! Go, before I lay your bleeding corpses at her feet and beg forgiveness for the shame you've heaped on us all."
The Frozenare ran off without collecting her Hun partner, indicating the pairing was bad, and should be rectified. Thundering Wind turned to stare at the weapons master, the Hun wet herself at the prospect of the Clydesdame's fury descending on her.
Thundering Wind swept the fledglings with a similar gaze. "In case any of you fail to understand, the blunted weapons and non-lethal blows are to test your bravery, not your skill at arms," Thundering Wind announced, more than living up to her name, "They are to see if you will protect and defend each other. Victory in this is measured by the strength of your bond, not by your defeat of the opponent. Ferality is a crawling insanity, a mindlessness that makes you less than a beast. Your partner is all that stands between you and it, between you and submitting to any HUMAN male or female who comes along, between you and being totally at their mercy to decide if you are a Hun, or a beast. If you want to trot alongside some human for the rest of your life, hoping they might occasionally listen to you, then there are Tamers in this town who'd be glad of it. If the biting wind in your hair, the never-ending steppes, the blood-pounding wildness of the charge and the exhilaration of your partners embrace in the night are what you want, you will learn that your bond is all-important and what strengthens it is good, what shatters it is evil." Every fledgling quailed at her tone and ferocious gaze. "Return to your training."
She marched off, in a foul mood. She headed towards the Pokècenter, knowing she would have to make restitution, or accept a challenge from the Malakim. Despite my reputation, she thought morosely, I have few illusions about the skill that Malakim was showing. She realized it was a test, not a fight to the death. This might be. The NurseJoy and the Megami-Sama quailed when she entered. "Blessing on this place," she said quietly, "The Malakim brought in, will she live."
"Yes," the pink-haired Pokègirl said, switching from afraid to interested very suddenly.
Terrific, Thundering Wind thought, Not what I need. I'll like to find a man and show that I can be gentle, and see what I can get. She thought sadly on the little girl, a beautiful human girl she'd given birth to, killed by one of the fiercest winter in memory. She and Spring Dragon had buried her, digging a grave in the frozen ground. She wanted another life growing in her womb. It won't replace the loss, she thought, But it will make me feel less of a failure.
"Please inform me when she is well enough to speak."
"She's a foreigner," the NurseJoy said, "She may not speak Chinese."
"Malakim are from the Sunshine League, she'll probably speak English, Spanish and Chinese," Thundering Wind replied, then turned and left. Outside several elders stood outside, elders from several of the other tribes.
"Who are you to cast one of ours out?" one demanded.
"When a fledgling tries to slay one who is no threat?" Thundering Wind rumbled, "I think I have the right. I'm no Hun, nor am I a Frozenare, but I have ridden with the Huns for over a hundred Festivals, carried Spring Dragon for 90 of them, I think I have learned something."
She advanced a step, the elders gave ground. "We stood and fought alongside the Filipino army during the final attack on Reykjavik," reminding them of the blood-soaked response to the last time the Ice Maidens had tried to dominate the Huns, and the pair rallying the flank that had been the target of the Ice Queen's personal counterattack. Yes, you remember that a non-ice type killed the Ice Queen with her bare hands, she remembered the battle, and the terrible agony of recovering from those wounds, Only Spring Dragon's love and the efforts of the others kept me alive.
"Perhaps we should look into it," the elder said.
"The elder is wise," she said and bowed, let them leave.
She set off to find something to drink, and maybe find a quiet man who wanted a truly romantic interlude.