A/N: wow! Second OC story I've done. Enjoy, and please tell me what you thought about it. Okay?
"Stop, thief!"
"Don't let her get away!"
"Faster! Run faster!"
A small Vulpix tore through the streets of diamond village, running frenetically away from her pursuers, a small cloth bag with stolen goods clenched tightly in her jaw. She pushed other Pokémon out of the way and ran faster, her delicate paws pounding into the ground.
Dodging some rocks thrown by the locals, the Vulpix dove behind a pile of hay and, recognizing a tiny green hill with a scrubby hole by the side, she turned her head to her pursuers, gave them a mischievous grin and disappeared through the Buneary hole, pushing past some very stunned Buneary; she flicked the stolen goods onto her tails and released small flames from her mouth and onto the Pokémon who had followed her into the tunnel, it must have hit at least one, because when the flames hit the end, a harsh cry of pain was heard. Grinning, she navigated through the series of maze-like tunnels and shot out of the other end, with the cloth bag's string glowing faintly from an ember that had hit it.
"Finally" she sighed, stopping by the exit. "I... finally have it!" she took the cloth bag and tipped a large gem out of the bag. She took it out and held it up, catching the sun's rays.
It was an exceedingly beautiful gem, as large as apple and shimmered delicately when the sun's rays hit it. It was a pretty silvery white on one side, with what looked like fluffy white clouds swirling on the inside, and on the other side, a pitch black swirling mist of odd shadows and black smoke, it was no wonder the Vulpix wanted it, ever since she had first set her eyes on it from Garchomp's gem stall, she knew it was going to be hers. Her grin widened as she admired it...
"Grr...Gwoh..."
She turned around, what was that noise? She peeked through the opening of the tunnel, but quickly dismissed the idea. After all, she had burned her pursuers, right? And you had to have at least a map to get through the buneary maze, but she had a right to be cautious...
She waited for some time for something to happen and, like a scene from a horror film, something long and thin poked out of the hole.
A green and white sickle-like object pushed its way through the hole and swung down on the earth, dragging something out of the hole, a triangle shaped head poked out and grinned maliciously at the Vulpix.
The Vulpix screamed and shot embers at the head instinctively. The Scyther cringed and roared in agony. But then something very odd happened.
The Scyther disappeared.
The Vulpix jumped and looked inquiringly into the hole, had it fled? Yet, her instincts told her that the Scyther was still around. Whimpering, she was about to flee when a green blur appeared to the right of her and grabbed her neck down with a scythe.
The Vulpix growled and struggled, but with every move she did, the scythe tightened around her neck, the sharp blade digging into her flesh.
"I've got you now, little thief" snarled the Scyther. "Now stop struggling, worm. It'll only make it worse; you'll never get away, deputy Stryke never loses his prey" he laughed, looking down at the Vulpix. "You'll be serving top time in the Pokémon prison now!"
The Vulpix froze, the Pokémon prison... the worst place a Pokémon could be in. She'd heard tales of arduous punishments and terrible food, most Pokémon died in the first two months, or went insane...
She looked up at deputy Stryke, whose eyes glittered with malice. She had to do something... anything... she couldn't end up in Pokémon prison...
The Vulpix quickly thought of a plan, she took in as much air as she could, and waited. It had to go right the first time, or deputy Stryke would finish her. She stared at deputy Stryke, waiting for the moment his head would be facing her.
His head turned around, a sneer plastered on his face.
Quick as lightning, the Vulpix released a stream of mega-heated air and embers at his eyes, he howled in pain, releasing the Vulpix to shield his eyes. The Vulpix picked up her precious bag and ran away as fast as her legs would go; she knew that the mini- heat wave would only delay deputy Stryke. So, picking up speed, she hurried as fast as she could, until she got to a beach.
She looked desperately around for a hiding place and, seeing a small cave, hurried towards it.
Bad move.
In her haste to get to the cave, she didn't notice an odd shaped lump of yellow sand until it was too late. She tripped up with it, and her jewel shot out of the bag... the Vulpix watched in horror as her treasure hit a pebble and shattered.
Screaming, she rushed over to the jewel and picked up what hadn't shattered into tiny fragments. Two small egg sized shards, one black, one white, remained.
The Vulpix picked these up mournfully, why hadn't she been more careful? Then her sadness turned to wrath, if only that stupid lump of sand hadn't been there...
She turned toward the lump of sand, which stood innocently, unaware of the damage it had just caused. The Vulpix growled, and stared at the lump, it must have been a sandcastle made by some stupid kid... suddenly, forgetting about deputy Stryke or the cave, she attacked the lump.
She kicked it hard, and began jumping up and down on it. "Stupid... useless...piece of..." she spat with each kick.
"Oow... quit it" said the lump of sand.
The lump of sand?
The Vulpix jumped and backed away. A talking lump of sand? That wasn't possible, was it? Was it a Ditto? A spirit? She stepped warily towards it, her nose twitching nervously.
"Ah... that hurt..." said the lump, taking a sandy hand and rubbing the reddened spot one of the Vulpix's kick had made.
"S-sorry" stammered the Vulpix.
"Um... could you help me up please?" said the lump, holding its hand out.
The vulpix nodded and picked the hand up gently and pulled. What came next were both a relief and a shock.
As the figure lifted itself out of the sand, she realised that it wasn't a lump of sand, but a sand-covered Pokémon! A Pikachu! Sighing with relief, she smiled at the Pikachu, who was dusting herself out.
"Whoa, where am I?" she groaned, rubbing the bruise on her head. Opening her eyes she looked around and, spotting the Vulpix, gave out a squeal of delight.
"A... Vulpix! Wow, I've never seen one this close up before, hey buddy, where's your trainer?" she cooed.
"What? Trainer? You mean a human? I don't have any, and why are you talking like I were a baby?" said the Vulpix.
The Pikachu gaped at the Vulpix in awe. "WOW! A talking Vulpix! Amaaaazing! Howd'ya learn to talk?"
"Same as you?" said the Vulpix with a small frown. "Anyway, what's a Pikachu like you doing lying around in the beach?"
"Um, sorry, I think I misheard you" said the Pikachu, tipping sand out of her ears.
"I said, what are you doing lying around in a beach?"
"No, not that part, I meant the last part, you called me a Pikachu"
"Well, if you don't want me to call you Pikachu, tell me your name" said the Vulpix. "I'm Fia, actually Fiametta, but don't call me that"
"Oh, ok... I'm... er...R-Ruby... yeah, that's it, Ruby! But anyway, why did you call me Pikachu? I mean, I don't look like one, do I?"
Fia frowned. "What do you mean? You look like a perfectly normal Pikachu to me"
"Come on, Fia. I'm not a Pikachu; I'm an ordinary hum-OH GOD!" Ruby screamed, staring at her chubby yellow paws."I-its... true! I... oh my god, how did this happen? What happened to me?" she squealed, tugging her tail and pulling her ears as if trying to yank them off.
"...Man, I reeeeally kicked you hard, didn't I? Come on, I'll get you some bandages..."
"NO! Please, believe me. I was a human; you've got to help me! I need to find out how... how I got like this!" she said, looking at Fia with pleading eyes. "Help me, please..."
Fia looked at Ruby. Should she help her? She couldn't afford to have somebody demanding food; she hardly managed to get enough food for herself, since she couldn't go to the diamond village market to buy supplies in case she was caught, unless...
Unless of course she helped with the stealing...
Fia considered Ruby's electric powers, they could paralyze! Of course! She imagined being in the market place, Ruby paralyzing everyone and them emptying all the food in the market place, they could even attack the jewel shop! She imagined deputy Stryke's stunned face as they made off with the whole loot...
She turned towards Ruby and smiled. "Well, of course I'll help you, don't worry about anything, but I just need a favor"
Ruby's ears perked up "R-really? You're going to help me?" then, before Fia could stop her, Ruby had enveloped her in a bone-crushing hug. "Oh wow, thank you! This is so nice of you, and I'm a total stranger and you're still helping me! That means so much to me-"
"Okay okay, calm down, let's go to my house and sort things out before, ok?"
After a long walk, Ruby and Fia finally reached Fia's house, which happened to be a gigantic hollowed out tree trunk with a secret entrance in the side. Ruby gaped when she opened the door; it was a pretty messy room lighted with a dusky torch, with two soft hay beds at one side, there were a few coins and broken things lying around the floor. But what was most astonishing of all, were the walls, they were covered in pictures, there were some maps and pictures of Fia with other Pokémon, and pictures of a Ninetales with two other Pokémon, a Meganium and a Hitmonlee. Fia saw Ruby looking at the pictures and smiled.
"That was my mother's exploration team" she said, she walked toward a big picture of them and tapped each member with her paw. "That over there is Vera" she said, tapping the Meganium. "And he is Inder" she said, tapping the Hitmonlee. "And, well... that's my mother" she said, motioning to the Ninetales.
"What's an exploration team?" asked Ruby, tilting her head to one side.
"It's a little like a rescue team. You see, if Pokémon are ever in trouble or something like that, exploration teams rescue them; sometimes they fetch items for Pokémon, or catch outlaws..." Fia smiled at the word outlaws. "And they explore and find riches, that's what they do, I think"
"Wow, they certainly seem busy, and... um, can anybody join an exploration team?"
"Eh... I'm not too sure, but I think so, I mean, there's a whole lot of trouble and I don't suppose you can get too picky with teams" said Fia.
"And, do they get paid?" said Ruby, scratching her head.
"Yeah... in a way, you see they get rooms at the guild, and they can keep 10 % of the riches they find, they also get food"
"Oh cool, and... talking about food... um, do you have something to eat? I'm hungry... ehehe" said Ruby, giggling slightly.
"Uh... I think so, wait here" said Fia, rushing off to her food cupboard, it was bare, except for a lonely apple sitting in the top shelf, she bit her lip but pulled it out and split it in half, she gave one half to Ruby and munched on her own half hungrily.
"So... um, I'm sorry if I'm being nosy, but, could you tell me more about your mother's exploration team?" said Ruby, munching on her apple.
"Wow, so you really don't know? Mother's exploration team was one of the most famous of all! Fiametta was My mother's name, I inherited her name... you see, Vera, Inder and Fiametta were one of the toughest exploration teams around, they were called: team fate, they were pretty well known for being able to undertake any mission with ease... well, almost any."
"You see, in that time there were a lot of tales of a so-called sceptre of legends, nobody knew if it really existed, but a lot of people thought that this sceptre would grant the holder the powers of all the legendaries together, including Arceus, because it had a small part of every legendary, alive or not alive, and it was rumoured that it was hidden in an ancient and hostile mountain called Regigigas' crown"
"Then, what happened?" asked Ruby, forgetting completely about the piece of apple in her mouth.
"Well, somebody sent an urgent message to the guild saying that somebody very unpleasant was out to steal the sceptre and, of course, team fate and other tough teams volunteered to go and help defend the sceptre or something... none of those exploration teams ever came back, nobody knows if they're alive or dead..." Fia stopped talking and hung her head.
Ruby stepped up to her and patted her back gingerly. "Gee, I'm sorry to hear that, Fia. Uh... did you say something about a favour? I want to help you in every way I can"
Fia looked up and hastily wiped tears from her face. "O-oh, yeah, about that... I'll fill you on the details later, but now we should go to sleep, it's getting really late and we need energy for tomorrow" she yawned and motioned to the hay beds. "Here, these should do nicely" she walked towards one of them and curled up on top of it, falling asleep almost immediately.
Ruby sat on top of the hay bed, she wasn't feeling sleepy at all. She sighed and tried to remember something about her being a human. Shutting her eyes, she concentrated...
Nothing...
She opened her eyes and looked towards Fia, who was snoozing peacefully under the soft glow of the torch, it was so weird, she thought. She couldn't remember anything about being a human, but she was certain that she had been one before; closing her eyes again she imagined the smiling face of a pretty girl with straw coloured hair. She grinned and gave the girl a yellow dress with brown stripes, similar to her own stripes.
Letting her imagination flow; she conjured up the idea of two pigtails and blue eyes, and maybe a pet Pichu perching on her shoulder. She knew the chances of her being this imaginary human were one to a million, but it was fun to think otherwise.
She yawned, and, feeling her eyelids droop, she let the image of the girl fade and slipped into a deep sleep.
A/N: so, what did you think about it? Reviews greatly appreciated.