.:How to be Scary:.

prologue

"Mo-mommy, I don't like it here," a small mawile whimpered, clinging to a megamawile's arm. "It's dark all the time, and scary, and...!"

The megamawile chuckled and patted her daughter's head, from which a pair of crocodile-like jaws sprouted. "Calm down, Thistle, it's not that bad. You'll get used to it." The megamawile's name was called, and she lifted her triple-jawed head to see a mismagious and froslass make their ghostly way over to her. She gave her little girl one more pat on the head. "Go make some friends, OK? Be back at the house by suppertime." With that, the megamawile walked over to the ghostly duo, leaving her daughter all alone.

Thistle gulped. This new home her mother had brought her to was called Spectre Valley. She didn't like it, not one bit. All the buildings were old and rickety and she swore every one of them was slightly tilted to one side, including her own haunted-mansion-esque home. The roads were all cobblestone, making her rule of never stepping on lines on a sidewalk very difficult to follow through with. And worst of all, the place was populated by ghost-types and ghost-types ONLY, who fancied this place over all others because it seemed to always be evening or night, 24/7 (it was evening in the morning, maybe very early morning around noon, and nighttime at all other times). She was a four-year-old mawile. What kind of four-year-old mawile wouldn't be afraid of both the dark and ghosts?

The mawile, with one last shuddering sigh, steeled herself (like her type) and started to wander around the dark town, her horns (jaws) flopping against the backs of her short legs.

Why did Mommy choose this town? Thistle thought while meandering under a stone arch uneasily. Daddy gave us enough money to move to a really pretty town! Prettier than this! Not to mention there are spidey-webs everywhere, and haunted houses, and -

Her train of thought was cut off when, all of a sudden, a navy-blue uni-horned head popped out of the wall closest to her. "BLEH!"

"AAAAAAAIEH!" Thistle cried. In her frightened frenzy, she stumbled over her pair of oversized horns, toppling onto the cobblestone road behind her. Tears began to well up in her light red eyes. Her head darted side-to-side, searching for the source of her fright, until it once again appeared right in front of her. Laughing. Hard.

"Oh, man! Didja see that, Patched? She jumped, like, FIVE meters into the air, I swear!" it howled. Thistle narrowed her eyes at what seemed to be a castform wearing a navy-blue sheet over its head. It focused its blue...dark blue...and yellow eyes at her. "You should've seen the look on your face! PRICELESS!"

Thistle bit back tears. She was shivering in fear. I must look like a fool. "W-wha..." she forced out. But the words didn't make it out of her mouth before her tears overflowed. Before she knew it, she was a crying, whimpering mess.

The thrilled expression on the thing in front of her fell. "Uh...are you OK?" A purple, gem-eyed - literally - creature poked its head out of the wall its friend came out of. "Patched, help me here!" When no response came from the gem-eyed Pokemon other than a kyehh, it gulped nervously. As Thistle continued to cry in front of them, they decided to bolt off for help.

Thistle watched the two foreign Pokemon dart off and tried to calm down. It didn't work. Then, something - something solid - patted her head. She raised her tear-filled eyes to meet yellow ones. She gasped out of fright. A chandelure. "N-no..." she gurgled. "No more g-ghosts..."

The chandelure let out a jingling, clattering noise that Thistle assumed to be laughter. "Don't worry, love," it chirped in a femenine voice that surprised her. "I'm not going to scare you. Unless I already have. But that's besides the point." She floated in front of the young mawile.

"What happened to you? You can tell Auntie Soulette all about it, honey."

"S-some Pokemon...some Pokemon scared me. T-that's all."

Soulette sighed and closed her eyes, then shook her head. "Let's get you home. I'll assume you to be one of the two that moved here today? They're the only non-ghost-types in this town right now, and you don't look like a ghost to me. "

Later, Thistle sat a little more comfortably on her bed of a blanket, a pillow, and another blanket that served as a mattress. She was in her (haunted) house now, having been carried her by a decidedly friendly ghost-type, AKA Auntie Soulette the chandelure. It turned out they were neighbours. Her mother had been contacted immediately, and said megamawile was currently fixing an early supper for the two of them after fussing over her teary-eyed daughter for ten-fifteen minutes.

"Thistle, you have visitors," her mother's voice said through her bedroom door. "Shall I let them in?"

"OK," Thistle said. Her voice was still a tad bit shaky and unsure. Two familiar faces entered the room, and her heart pounded with anxiety. It was those two from earlier...Patched and something. Before she could protest, her mother shut the sliding door, leaving her alone with them. Now, Thistle really wished she was a ghost-type, just so she could jump through her bedroom wall and escape to the outdoors.

An unsettling silence descended upon her new room, until the dark blue floating one cleared its throat. "Your room's pretty empty."

"Yeah, I just moved here today..."

"I see." A few more seconds of uncomfortable silence passed, then it spoke again. "We came here to say sorry for scaring you. Right, Patched?"

"Yeah," Patched the gem-eyed Pokemon said. "Sorry."

Thistle felt surprised. They were apologizing? Gradually, the image of a terrifying, three-eyed ghost that had been burned into her mind representing what ghosts were to her faded away as she replied, "Oh, it's okay...I was just overwhelmed, that's all..."

Both of the ghost-types in front of her seemed to relax with relief. Upon further inspection, they appeared to be around her age, if that were possible. Patched was the same height as her, anyway, and the floating blue sheet...how does one judge that one's age, anyway?

"I'm Garret," it said. "The shuppet."

"Nice to meet you...I'm Thistle, the mawile..."

"Wanna, wanna play?" Patched said, bearing a grin filled with razor-sharp teeth that would be the definition of terrifying to Thistle a few hours ago, if it weren't for the fact that she now found it quite cute, in its own way.

She found herself smiling too. "O-OK," she agreed.

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

It's short. I know. But it's only the prologue so cut me some slack.

Alright, this is a Shinobi-exclusive story for now, meaning only Shinobi Sundae will be writing it. Not sure if Sailor will jump onto the creepy-crawly-cute bandwagon like I did recently yet. And I really really like mawile, sableye, and banette. Sableye looks like Stitch. Adorable :3

Reviews are greatly appreciated.