Episode 2, All Tied Up! (part 1)

A little story about the beginning of the journey of Ash and Angie, taking place directly after my previous fiction story, "Angie's Goodbye". Updated version with improved layout, with speech now clearly separated from narrative parts. Involves some MorpheusShipping (Ash and Angie liking each other) so if you don't like that idea, stop reading here. The rest, I hope you enjoy this fan-fiction.

"Ash, dinner is ready! Come and get it!" Angie yelled.

"Where is that boy?" She wondered. He had been gone for hours now. It was their first trip together since they left her home in Solaceon Town. Their plans were to get to the Fight Area, on the island north in the Sinnoh Region, and from there catch the boat to the another new region Ash wanted to explore. To get there in time to catch the boat to the Fight Area, they had to fly, literally. Staravia carried Angie, and Ash went on Gliscor. He did have to pay for that with a few unplanned landings, as Gliscor's flying technique still needed some work. After a few of those "landings" Angie began feeling sorry for him.

"Let's switch places Ash, now you fly with Staravia and I'll travel on Gliscor for a while." she proposed.

"No," he said, I'll be fine. Ash said, determined. "Besides, I don't want you to get hurt, Angie."

"He really could be so sweet at times", Angie said to herself. "He may be dense now and then, and also rather stubborn too, but his good qualities make up for that. And besides, he is so cute..."

Even with the unplanned landings of Gliscor, they did manage to get on the boat in time, and soon they set foot on the island where the Fight Area was. However, the boat to the new region was not going to leave very soon. While on it's way from the new region to where our friends ware, it had encountered a storm, and now needed repairs. These were expected to take at least three days, maybe more. Ash was off course very disappointed, but then Angie told him that on Route 228, just north of the Resort Area, lived many Bug Pokémon.

"Really?" Ash asked Angie with much excitement in his voice.

Angie had already learned about Ash's fondness of Bug Pokémon, so she was certain this would cheer him up. And she was right, he never mentioned having to wait for the boat to get repaired, but raced off in the direction of the Resort Area, almost dragging Angie behind him. Before they could reach the Resort Area, and Route 228, where the Bug Pokémon would be, they had to travel along Route 230, which consisted of a large lake. Staravia was still somewhat tired of the long flight from Solaceon Town to the ferry to the Fight Area, so Ash and Angie could not go this way. Besides, riding on Gliscor across a big lake was not such a good idea. So Ash came up with another approach. He would make a raft for Angie, and ask Buizel to pull the raft. He himself would ride along with Buizel then. Gliscor helped cutting down some trees, and soon the raft was ready.

"Why don't you come along on the raft, instead of swimming in that cold water"? Angie asked concerned.

"No, the raft is not big enough for two, maybe I'll knock you over and then you fall in and get wet too" Ash replied firmly.

Angie was not worried about the little room aboard the raft.

"I'll just stay close to Ash, don't mind that at all," she dreamed. "Being close to him is the reason I went on this journey in the first place."

But even though she was a little disappointed about a missed chance so sit cozy together on the raft, she was also charmed by the caring way Ash treated her. The crossing of the lake went without any problems, and after Ash's clothes had dried in the sun, they set forth to route 228. However, after walking for hours, no Bug Pokémon was there to be seen.

"Are you sure this is the right place?" he said to Angie.

"Absolutely", she answered, "I read about it in the magazine my parents receive weekly. It has a special feature about what Pokémon can be found in the Sinnoh region"

"Well, you must have read the wrong route number then, cause there are no Bug Pokémon here," Ash said with an accusing voice.

"Beg your pardon, mister?" Angie replied with an also irritated voice. "I am sure it said so in the magazine!"

"Oh really?" Ash replied.

"Oh yes!" Angie almost yelled, and they turned their backs to each other, both with their arms crossed along the chest. "If you want to be with these bugs so bad, why don't you go look for them alone!" Angie now yelled.

"Fine, I will! We haven't been in that piece of forest yet, so maybe I'll find some there, if you really did not misread that magazine, that is," Ash said.

"Oh you...!" Angie yelled, "well just make sure you don't stay away too long, I am going to make dinner in an hour and if you're too late there will be nothing left!"

"Yeah, yeah..." Ash said and slowly walked towards the dark patch of forest he mentioned they hadn't visited yet.

"The little... Oh why can't he admit that I am right without him getting all mad!" Angie wondered.

But soon her anger faded away, and she started making preparations for dinner. She had never been much of a cook, at the daycare she only had to feed the Pokémon left in the care of her parents, but she had learned a few things lately. During Ash's first visit to her house she had first experienced Brock's cooking, and since she wanted to take care of Ash while they traveled together, had asked Brock for some quick lessons. Luckily he had some of his recipes written down, since there was little time between the moment Ash asked her to join him on his new journey, and the moment they actually left. She was going to make a dish that was Ash's favorite, according to Brock. And it wasn't even a difficult meal to prepare. She started cooking, and a while later, a delicious scent filled the air around their camp.

"What is taking him so long?" she wondered. "He can't still be angry now, can he?"

She looked in the direction of the patch of forest Ash disappeared in more than an hour ago.

"It does look rather spooky" she thought, and a little shiver went down her spine. "What if... something happened to him?"

After all, when Ash left to explore this piece of forest, he only took Pikachu with him and forgot his other Pokémon.

"Pikachu is strong, but it is still only one Pokémon," she thought. "If it got poisoned or hit with Stun Spore, Ash would be all by himself..."

"Ash!" she called, "Ash!" but there was no answer. She raised her voice again and called even louder "Ash, where are you? Dinner is ready! Come on!"

"Would he still be mad at me?" she thought. "He wouldn't think I sent him on a wild goose chase when I told him there had to be Bug Pokémon here? Or was he trying to get even with me, watching from behind one of those bushes, to see me freak out because I am getting so worried about him?"

"Ash Ketchum, the joke is now over, come out from wherever you are hiding, you hear me?!" Angie yelled with a slight touch of fear in her voice.

Then her Shinx seemed to hear something. It looked in the direction of some bushes at the edge of the forest. Angie looked in the same direction, and suddenly she saw something moving in the bushes! It was Pikachu! "So, the game is up" she thought.

"About time you guys showed up," Angie said, "I worked hard to get you something to eat and now it is getting cold!"

But still no sign of Ash and then Angie noticed that Pikachu was not moving forward as fast as usual. She started to run towards the little guy.

"Pika..." Pikachu uttered very weakly before it fell over.

"It was hurt!" Angie thought. "Quickly, let's examine it!" Her experience at the daycare came in really handy now, she had seen her parents treat injured Pokémon before, and learned much from this. Before she and Ash left, she had managed to grab a few medicine-sprays, just in case. Normally Brock was the one to take care of injuries but since he had stayed at the daycare to fill the vacancy Angie had left by leaving with Ash, it now came down to her to be the "doctor". She found a few marks on Pikachu that were clearly stings from a Roselia.

"The poor thing has been poisoned" she thought. "It's a miracle it even managed to get here with this amount of poison"

Quickly she picked the right antidote and gave it to Pikachu.

"There you are, you'll feel much better soon now, little guy," she lovingly said to the little Electric Mouse Pokémon.

And she was right, after a minute, Pikachu slowly opened it's eyes, and looked gratefully at Angie.

"It is going to be okay," she sighed happily, but then her face suddenly grew pale. She slowly turned her head towards the now even more spooky looking patch of forest, and said with a weak and concerned voice "But... what happened to Ash?"

(to be continued)

My second fan-fiction story. I apologize for any typing errors, or grammatically not 100% correct sentences. Remember, I am not a native English speaker or writer. I tried to make this story as close to the Pokémon series as possible, so that the characters will react roughly the same in this fictional story as they do in the series. Comments are always welcome, you can use the review function on this FanFiction site for that.

Disclaimer: I do not own or claim to own any trademarks of Pokémon. Any similarities to the works of others is purely accidental, and not meant as an infringement on anyone's achievements.

6-6-2009: Added the correct Route numbers.