AN: Hello! This is the Catflower Queen! This story is dedicated to pmd-headcanons on tumblr since they're turning 17 today! I hope you enjoy it! I also hope you go check out that blog, because the headcanons on there are all really cool!
I just want to make sure you know that this story isn't canon with my "World's Treasure" universe. So those of you who were hoping on an update of "Missing Scenes" or part two of the longer works… sorry, but you're going to have to wait just a bit longer. I am working on the next chapter of "Missing Scenes," though, so hopefully it will be out soon! I'm also trying to work out a story for the Homestuck fandom, but that one's going a bit more slowly….
In any case, please enjoy this little taste of what life would be like if the Hero of the Explorers games was an Eevee named Alex and the Partner a treecko named Sam…
Disclaimer: I still don't own Pokémon. Or memes.
Outside the day was bright and sunny, but inside the Wigglytuff Guild the atmosphere was gloomy and cloudy. This wasn't just because most of the guild members were in a bad mood since they were confined to the guild that day and couldn't go out and enjoy the beautiful weather, but also because there were literal clouds of dust rising up every so often from the myriad of ancient boxes that were being shuffled around and moved from place to place, some of which hadn't seen the light of day in years.
That's right: Today was the Wigglytuff Guild's semi-annual cleaning day. Of course, the "semi-annual" part was more like "Chatot had finally reached the end of is rope in regards to this appalling storage situation and there was no way that Wigglytuff could find an excuse to dissuade him from going through with cleaning and reorganizing it this time, unlike his attempts the past seven years or so." Besides, Chatot argued, with so many apprentices acting as free manual labor, the task should be done with quickly, right?
Wrong. The guild was now into hour five of the cleaning frenzy, with no signs of stopping in sight.
This certainly wasn't the type of thing that Sam the treecko had envisioned when he made plans to join the guild. His dream was to become a great explorer and find the secret of his Relic Fragment, and he had assumed—quite reasonably, in fact—that becoming an apprentice at the esteemed Wigglytuff guild would mean that his life would be full of adventure and exploration, with dangers every which way he turned. But the only danger he could see right now was in the form of accidentally dropping a box on one of his fellow apprentices or getting a paper cut from rummaging around all the old files in an attempt to better organize them.
Though he also supposed there was the danger of dying of boredom. Or getting caught in the crossfire if someone tried to murder Alex because she just would not give that little "obsession" of hers a rest. It certainly wouldn't be the first time—Loudred had attempted such a scheme just last Tuesday and was only placated when Alex bribed him with a White Gummi. He really was a glutton for those things.
"Hey! Hey, Sam? Sam?"
Of course, there was always the possibility that Sam would be the one to snap this time. He knew that the smart thing to do was to ignore her, especially since he just knew he was going to regret opening his mouth as soon as he initiated a conversation—broad though that definition might be in Alex's case—but… well, when it came to his precious partner he just couldn't help himself.
"What is it, Alex?" he wearily asked the spunky eevee standing beside him.
Her response was to take in a huge breath before pointing at a group of boxes sitting beside her and demanding "WHAT ARE THOOOOOSE?!"
Sam slapped a hand to forehead, causing Alex to cackle with amusement. Of course it was a meme. It was ALWAYS a meme. Sometimes, it was as if memes were Alex's only means of communication! Honestly, Sam was starting to wonder why he even put up with Alex's antics as patiently as he did…
"No, but, uh… seriously, what are they?" Alex asked after her cackling had faded out into a soft chuckle. "They have labels on them, but I'm still not that great at reading your guys' writing, so, uh… yeah," she tapered off sheepishly, blushing in embarrassment.
…Oh, right. THAT was why Sam put up with it. Alex was so good at hiding it that it was hard to tell that she'd only been an eevee for a few months; before that, she had been a human. What's more, she couldn't even remember what had happened to cause this, or what her life had been like before. She was pretty much a total amnesiac, and, aside from her name, the memes were the only ties she had left to her former life.
"Hold on a sec—I'll find out," Sam assured his partner, his voice softening. He went over and turned the box at the front a little bit so that he could get some better lighting, then he read aloud, "Property of Chatot—Do NOT Open!"
Sam blinked. He shared a glance with Alex, and then they both looked back at the box. The wheels in their minds turned as a devious plan began to form. The two locked gazes again.
"…Challenge accepted?" Alex asked hopefully.
Sam gave a curt nod. "Where doin it man," he replied, quoting one of her favorite memes and savoring the sly grin growing on her face. "Where MAKING THIS HAPEN!"
One complicated and convoluted operation to get the box stashed safely in Team Rick Astley's crew room and key the other apprentices in on the prize they'd found—all without letting Chatot find out about it so that he wouldn't be able to put a stop to it—later, all the apprentices found themselves in clustered in a tight circle around the unassuming cardboard box, scarcely even breathing for fear that it was just an illusion which would vanish or turn to dust at the slightest breeze.
But finally the tension became too much for Alex. "You'd better start calling me Eve, because I'm about to take a big bite of this forbidden fruit!" was her only warning before she shoved the box on its side, spilling its mysterious contents out all over the floor. The apprentices then pounced on it like a pack of feral wolves on a fresh kill. Sam and Alex's small room was then full of the sounds of laughter and shocked gasps as the apprentices discovered new pieces of information about their guild's head of intelligence that either amused or amazed.
"Hey, hey! I found his birth certificate!" Corphish called. "It turns out that his middle name is Shirley!"
"That's NOTHING!" Loudred said, holding up a small stuffed toy in triumph. "Look HERE! He used to play with DOLLS! HA HA! How EMBARRASSING!"
"What's so embarrassing about that?" Chimecho asked, as small frown on her face.
Loudred rolled his eyes. "Well OBVIOUSLY it's because only weak, little, GIRLS would EVER play with dolls!"
Sunflora scowled. "Oh really?!" she demanded. "Then what about that doll collection that you have hidden under your pillow?"
Loudred spluttered. "Th-That's NOT the same thing! Those are ACTION FIGURES!" he denied.
Sunflora just rolled her eyes. "Uh-uh, suuure they're not," she said, the sarcasm practically dripping from her voice.
But before their spat could escalate further, Alex cried out, "Oh! Neat!" and held up a pair of wooden knitting needles and a small, handmade beanie. "I didn't know Chatot could knit, too! I should totally challenge him to a knit-off sometime! I bet I'd win by a landslide!"
Everyone looked at her quizzically. "Since when do you know how to knit?" Diglett asked.
"Since—huh," Alex began, before pausing abruptly and blinking in confusion. "That's actually a good question…"
Everyone just rolled their eyes, chalking it up to be just another one of Alex's random quirks, before going back to searching through Chatot's personal items (though Sam did flash a concerned glance in his partner's direction first).
"Oh my gosh!" Sunflora squealed in amusement, holding up a picture and waving it around. "Look at this, everyone! Chatot used to have a mohawk!"
The others all gasped before demanding, "NO WAY! REALLY?!" and going to look for themselves.
It was true—there in Sunflora's grasp was a picture of a much younger Chatot sporting a colorful mohawk and beak piercings. He also seemed to be wearing a leather jacket emblazoned with the words "Poké and the Mons" and a picture of a cubone skull. What's more, that wasn't the only picture of him dressed like that. There were about a dozen more scattered on the ground and stuck to the inside of the box, along with a mysterious looking object… it was sort of roundish, and it looked almost like it was made of ice crystals. What's more, there seemed to be some sort of cloudy, white substance covering part of it…
"Oh!" Sam suddenly said, startling everyone. "I know what that is! It's called a Frism!"
"A Frism?" Dugtrio repeated. "What is a Frism? What does it do?"
"It can record sounds!" Sam explained, his excitement at seeing such a rare treasure growing. "You see that white stuff? It means that something's recorded on it!"
"No way! Really?!" Bidoof exclaimed. "Gosh, what do you think is on there?"
"If we warm it up, we can find out!" Sam said, moving forward to do just that. But he was surprised when Sunflora held out a leaf to stop him.
"Hold on a moment," she said, "I'm not sure if we should do that. I mean… what if this Frism is, like, his personal diary or something? If it is… and then if we were to just pry into like that… Eek! How embarrassing! Nu-uh, that's not right at all! Diaries aren't things that you should sneak peeks at!"
Sam and Alex shared a guilty glance, since reading Sunflora and Bidoof's diaries was one of their national past times, before Alex covered it up and rationalized her worries away by saying, "Well, it's kind of too late for that now, since we've already looked through most of this box that specifically said 'Do NOT Open!' on it…"
"Yeah, Sunflora!" Sam was quick to jump in. "Besides… if he really didn't want anyone to look at this stuff, then he would have gotten rid of it ages ago!"
Sunflora mulled it over for a moment before slowly withdrawing her leaf. "Well… I guess you have a point," she said, allowing Sam access to the Frism.
Sam grinned and went to warm it up. The others tensed in anticipation, which quickly turned to confusion when they heard the sounds of music playing.
But the confusion quickly turned to shock and everyone was knocked flat on their behinds when, instead of something classical, or even something operatic, that seemed more suited to Chatot's "wise and all-knowing" persona, the sound of someone shrieking filled the air.
"I WILL BE THE VERY BEST! LIKE NO ONE EVER WAS! EXPLORE THE WORLD AND PASS YOUR TESTS! WITH SCREAMO AS MY CAUSE!"
"H-hey, Sam! Turn it off!" Alex ordered, trying to cover her sensitive ears with a paw.
"I-I don't know how!" Sam said as the screaming-disguised-as-music continued.
"Well you'd better find out soon, because I think that if this goes on much longer, Chatot is going to hear it and—!"
"SQUAWK! WHAT IN THE BLAZES IS GOING ON IN HERE?!" a new scream, one that managed to drown out even the shrieking from the screamo, demanded.
Sam dropped the Frism, coincidentally at the moment the "music" recorded on it ended, and the guilty apprentices slowly turned to face their doom.
Chatot was fuming as he stormed into the room. "Do you people have ANY idea what time it is?!" he demanded. "You all have a busy day of work tomorrow, and yet you're in here making all this racket and—"
"Meh heh heh… Well technically speaking, you're the one that was making the racket,"Croagunk said mysteriously. "But that's to be expected from a screamo artist."
Chatot glared at the Poison-type, angered by the fact that he'd cut short his rant, before Croagunk's words caught up to him. He blinked before taking a closer look at the mess on the floor, and especially at the Frism by Sam's feet, before he started shrieking in wordless rage.
The apprentices all knew they were in big trouble and would probably be denied dinner for a long, long time as a result of this little stunt, and yet… they couldn't bring themselves to regret it. Picturing Chatot doing screamo—especially since they had an accompanying mental image thanks to the photographs—was so, so worth it.
Especially when it came to a certain, purple, loudmouthed Pokémon; Loudred was never letting Chatot hear the end of this.