I've wanted to write a Pokémon Mystery Dungeon story for a long time, and finally, I've decided to do so. When I finished Explorers of Time, I began to wonder how Grovyle and the main character met, how they decided to go back in time, how they found Celebi in the first place and how they got on Dusknoir and Dialga's bad side. It probably had some to do with the Dimensional Scream, but still, I was curious about the history of Grovyle and his human partner. So, I decided to start writing this and see where I got. I don't know if I'll stop my story when Grovyle and his partner are attacked by Dusknoir while attempting to go back in time, since most of you know how everything goes from then on, but I'll see. It'll depend on how well I think I'm doing. I don't own Pokémon or the Mystery Dungeon games. I just love them so I had to write about it. :)
I haven't played Pokémon Black or White, so I just looked up map information and stuff, and made up a bit of the geography, so it might be wrong; I hope that doesn't bother anyone too much. Oh, and a couple of the human characters have names of characters from the games, but they aren't the same people. I just made up characters and picked names of my friends.


Visions

I opened my eyes a bit and glanced at the clock on my beside table, but didn't see anything except a pale blue wall, at a lower level than I was used to. Blinking a couple times, I noticed that I was lying on the floor with the bedsheets tangled around me. I realized sleepily that I must have rolled out of bed sometime during the night, something I had a tendency to do from time to time. Glancing up, I saw that I'd rolled off the left side of my bed. I couldn't stay still sometimes and that carried over into my sleep. Yawning loudly, I rolled over onto my left side and curled up, too lazy to stand and get back into bed. Sleeping on the floor didn't bother me. I'd been dozing for a minute when a rumbling noise reached my ears. I decided that it was a plane flying overhead and ignored it, but suddenly I felt tremors that sent tickling vibrations across my skin. The vibrations increased and I slowly sat up, wondering what was going on. My mind still wasn't coherent enough to realize that something was wrong. But as startling as a flash of adrenaline, an almost-painful flash of déjà vu hit me and my eyes widened in alarm. My impulse was to jump up and run, but I remembered the right thing to do in an earthquake if I was in bed. I grabbed my pillow and pressed it over my head, trying to keep as still as I could. Heart still beating heavily, I counted the seconds and stopped when I hit sixty. The tremors gradually began to die down and a few moments later they finally stopped. Shaking a little in alarm, despite having seen this situation countless times before, I slowly raised my head and looked around, and saw that it could have been worse. Sighing, I sat up and quickly stood.

Most of my books had been jostled free from their bookshelves and lay scattered around the wooden floor. The first bookshelf was to the left of my closet and the other was near my bedside table, but if they ever fell during a quake they had been positioned so that they wouldn't land on anything. The books were all paperback, so if they fell on me then it wouldn't be that big of a deal. I had video games, but I kept them—along with a few hand-held consoles—in a box under my bed. I'd been too busy lately to play them. There was just a week left until school started up again, and my parents were pressuring me to get ready for the new year. I complied, at least on the surface, so they wouldn't keep bothering me about it. They normally left me alone when they thought I was studying, but once I got tired of schoolwork I would check outside my window to make sure my parents weren't around, then climb onto my window ledge and jump the few feet to the ground below. After that I'd be in the backyard. Sometimes I would climb out the window so I could leave the house without anyone noticing, but for the most part, it was just more fun than using the front door. That window, the only one in my room, was just to the left of the desk. It had pretty sturdy glass, and it would take a lot for the window to break, according to my dad.

When it seemed that the earthquake wouldn't cause any aftershocks, I crawled out from beneath the desk and stood. I noted with satisfaction that the bookshelves hadn't fallen over, since they'd been secured to the wall and floor. Most if not all of the books had tumbled from the shelves, though. It was good that I didn't like to move my furniture around because the bolts made that impossible. My family lived in an earthquake-prone region, so my father and I had taken the necessary steps to earthquake-proof our house quite a while ago. We'd moved here about five years previous, and I'd been ten years old then. I'd had too much energy than I knew what to do with, so my father had decided to let me help him work instead of letting me run amok somewhere else. I hadn't been allowed to use any tools, though; I had just gotten anything my father had needed from his toolbox.

A few months ago I'd just turned fifteen, so it had been a while since my family had moved to Nacrene City. I still remembered that a while after we'd settled in was when my visions had started...or that was the earliest one I could remember, at least. I'd been watching my dad bolting my desk to the wall, and he'd needed another one, so I'd rifled through his toolbox, moving the hammer out of the way as I searched. I had been offering him a bolt when an unexpected dizzy spell hit me. A jumble of pictures filled my mind, and I don't remember what I saw, but according to my father I'd said something about him hurting his hand. A couple days later, he'd injured his hand while nailing a new shelf together in the kitchen. I hadn't been able to tell him clearly what had happened during the dizzy spell, but even if I could have, he and my mother probably would have passed it off as the imagination of a hyperactive boy. The visions hadn't stopped, though, and eventually my parents had taken them, and me, seriously.

Well, seriously enough to decide that I needed serious help...they believed my visions were a result of something that had gone wrong with my mind, even though I was normal in every way except for the visions. My parents had never told me that I was messed up to my face, but I'd overheard them one day and had felt uneasy around them since then. Whenever I had a vision, they thought I was getting worse and would be over-anxious around me, and then take me to the doctor whether I'd wanted to go or not. So I had gradually learned not to tell them about the visions I got unless they were serious...though even then...nothing good came of mentioning what I'd seen. My parents still took me right to the doctor, no matter how much I tried to convince them that I wasn't sick. Once I'd run away to my friend Brandon's house, using my window as the escape route, but later I realized I hadn't accomplished anything. My parents had eventually called Brandon's house looking for me, and my short run-away trip had ended. I thought that I would be taken home, but my parents had taken me to the doctor anyway, and in addition to the doctor visits, I'd had counseling appointments for a couple months. The only thing I regretted about that time was that I'd gotten Brandon and his family involved.

"Gale!" I jumped and glanced towards my bedroom door, which my mother had suddenly flung open. Her bright brown eyes—the color of my own—were wide with fear, and her medium-length brown hair was tousled. She was still in her long gray cotton nightgown. It seemed that the tremors had been her alarm clock, too. She approached me and drew me close in a relieved embrace. "Are you alright? Did you get hurt?" I shook my head and gave a muffled reply.

"I'm fine, mom." Struggling a little, I tried to pull back. "What about you? And dad?" Finally she released me and drew back, wringing her hands.

"I just called him. He's fine. The museum wasn't that damaged, and he says that the town made it through alright, too. A few people were hurt, but not badly."

"That's good," I sighed, then thought of my friends. "I'm going to call my friends."

"Alright," my mother said, wringing her hands, "but after that, could you get dressed and help me clean up?"

"Sure," I replied with a nod, and turned to my desk to pick up the black cordless phone, then paused. The phone wasn't on the desk. It took me a couple seconds to locate it; the phone had fallen off its charger and onto the floor during the earthquake. First I called Sam, and then Brandon, and learned that their homes hadn't been damaged at all. There were just lots of things to clean up, items that had fallen during the tremors, and they were all fine. With a relieved sigh, I hung up after telling Brandon goodbye, and that we should hang out sometime before school started. A thought struck me suddenly as I recalled the recent tremors. I bit my lip in consternation after I slowly set the phone back on its charger.

The day I'd had a vision about the future—now past—earthquake, Sam had been heading home from the store. I'd been heading home at the same time but had not noticed her as I had stayed lost in thought. I would have walked right past Sam without a word had she not called out to me. Afterward we'd walked back towards our houses together. Sam was tall, a bit taller than me, something she liked pointing out whenever she got the chance. Her hair was brown and she usually kept it in a high ponytail. Her eyes were different than most of the people that lived in Nacrene City; most people, including me, had brown eyes. Sam's eyes were a bright blue and always had a mischievous but friendly spark in them. Her favorite clothes to wear were a knee-length skirt and a short sleeve shirt, usually orange, as that was her favorite color. In the winter she wore longer skirts, and sometimes she thick black leggings or jeans underneath when it got too cold even for her, but rarely wore blue jeans or pants just by themselves. Sam was creative, and didn't mind learning about or making up new styles that might not be popular. And maybe because of her creativity and kindness, she didn't mind being around someone even if they were a little off...which was likely why she'd become my first friend. Sam lived just a little farther down the road than me and we often hung out together, along with Brandon, who I'd just been visiting before running into her. Brandon and I had been playing one of his new video games together, unbeknownst to our parents; they thought we were studying, which we had found pretty funny. When I didn't play my video games, Brandon and I would play games from his collection together. On the phone just now, he'd explained that that his parents had been telling him to start studying in preparation for the new term too.

Brandon could get along with anyone as long as they let him do things his own way, and as long as they got along with his friends. He had short red hair, and he would have had the same brown eyes as most everyone in Nacrene City had it not been for his pale green left eye. He'd explained to me after I noticed the difference that almost everyone in his family had heterochromia. We'd met a couple years ago when we'd both been twelve, and had become quick friends who liked a lot of the same things. We both liked video games, and we usually wore the same style of clothes—mostly T-shirts and shorts in mid-spring and summer, then jackets, long-sleeved shirts and blue jeans in fall, winter and early spring—which caused Sam to say we were weird and that we just liked to copy-Meowth each other, while we'd tell her jokingly that she was weird for the things she wore. She'd then smirk and haughtily respond that we wouldn't know fashion if it kicked us in the face.

After meeting up that day, Sam and I had been talking...well, Sam had been talking, and I'd been listening to her end-of-summer plans, when without warning something tripped me. In the evening, Diglett liked to come out and often got underfoot when they emerged from the ground, and I had been too busy listening to Sam to avoid stumbling this time. So I found myself spitting dirt while I pushed myself onto my hands and knees. When I stood, the Diglett hurriedly burrowed back into the ground; a raised trail of earth moved away into the distance as the Pokémon fled.

I'd been glaring at Sam while she held her stomach and laughed, and right then the dizzy spell struck and made me grip my head with both hands as I tried to stay upright and focus on the vision all at once. I saw myself in my room, ducking under my desk as the furniture around me rattled but didn't fall over, and saw my books spilling from the shelves like falling rocks. Then that scene had changed abruptly: A floating white-and-blue tower that stretched to the heavens had suddenly started crumbling, sending huge pieces of stone whistling to the ground while a red vortex swirled high above it, but I still wasn't sure what that had been about. I had never seen any building like that, though I'd overheard a rumor from one of my high school classmates that there was a huge tower like that somewhere in the country. It was probably just one of the "Seven Wonders"—rumors that showed up in probably all the high schools these days—so I hadn't cared about it much. But all of the visions I'd seen had been true...so maybe there was a tower like that out there somewhere.

After the dizzy spell and vision ended, I'd explained it to Sam, and she steadied me as we walked the last stretch to my house. She was helpful as always when I had visions, unlike my parents who didn't know how to help me aside from periodically taking me to the doctor to get tests or new medication. I was frustrated with how my parents acted, but couldn't bring myself to blame them or get too angry. I tried to tell myself that they weren't acting out of order, since I knew how strange I must seem. It wasn't their fault that I'd been born a little off. I was their son, and they did care about me, but I was always going to be strange. It was just how things had been. The doctors had never been able to explain why I had the visions. The medicine didn't seem to help the visions stop, but I took the medicine anyway, hoping they'd eventually do something that would make my parents stop worrying about me. They didn't know what to do with me, and I knew they wanted me to be normal.

What was important though was the way my friends still stuck by me even though I obviously wasn't normal. According to them, no person was normal, no matter how much they pretended. My friends often admitted to being strange themselves, or would jokingly accuse the other of being weird.

"Gale?" I shook my head to clear the memories away as my mother stepped back into my room. She was holding a set of clear blue plastic salt-and-pepper shakers in her hands.

"Just thinking. I'll come out in a couple minutes," I told her absently, then took a breath and decided to bring up the vision after all, despite knowing that it wasn't a good idea. Somehow I had to make her believe that the visions weren't a sign that something was wrong with me. "Mom," I started bracingly, "I know you don't like hearing about this, but do you remember the vision I had a few days ago? About the earthquake?" Her face darkened and she turned away.

"I remember," she said icily, "but it was a hallucination. Just some strange daydream that you had." She didn't look at me as she strode out of my room. "Clean your room, then come and help me clean up the kitchen." I gave a quiet sigh; this was how she reacted to all of the visions I'd had, but now she had much less patience in dealing with them compared to a couple years ago.

"But...never mind," I told her dully, then closed my door quietly. With a long sigh I began clearing up my books. After I'd gotten them all back in order on the two bookcases, I changed out of my pajamas—consisting of a gray shirt and black boxers—tossed them onto my bed, then crossed to the closet across from my bed. Pulling open the doors, I stared at the contents and eventually found a red shirt I liked and a pair of khaki pants draped over a coat hanger. My closet was a mess, cluttered with my backpack, some dirty clothes that hadn't fit in the full laundry basket, a couple textbooks and a couple pairs of shoes, but I never managed to make myself clean it up. I grabbed my favorite pair of shoes, blue and white, and set them down at the foot of my bed, then shut the closet. I'll clean it up someday. I yawned as I headed towards the bathroom and went through my morning routine slowly, not wanting to face my mother after bringing the vision up. She still didn't believe me, and it was likely she was now off scheduling a doctor's appointment for me. While I brushed my teeth I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and shook my head. I usually looked bad after the visions, like I hadn't slept in days, but today I looked even more disheveled. I rubbed the circles under my eyes and shrugged, then quickly brushed my hair and left the bathroom, almost forgetting to turn off the light. After that I moved reluctantly towards the kitchen, hoping that my mother wouldn't be there. Her mood usually went downhill when I mentioned the visions, so I tried not to, but there were times—like the other day, and today—when I had to bring them up. But I was starting to think I should just stop mentioning them entirely. If I did, my parents might think the visions had stopped, and they might think that nothing was wrong with me. The thing I wanted to stop the most was the doctor visits. Whenever I went, I'd get lots of tests, including blood work and brain scans. The results never showed anything abnormal, but I still had to take the tests, even when I hadn't had visions. I wanted all the testing to end someday, but that meant I couldn't ever mention the visions again, no matter how much I wanted to. The testing was expensive, and I constantly felt guilty and unhappy about it.

I strode down the hall and then took a left into the kitchen, and glanced around to see how it had come through the quake. There were a couple of things on the floor: pens and a couple pads of paper that my mom used for writing grocery lists. There were also leafs of old shopping lists scattered around the room and since these were closest to me, I bent to pick them up. My father wouldn't be home for a while, and my mother was probably talking to the doctor right about now, the way she always did after I mentioned a vision. I sighed. It didn't matter—I could clean up without her. Thanks to dad fixing all the furniture to the walls, and putting locks on anything that swung open and shut—including the refrigerator—there wasn't a lot of mess. I finished cleaning up the letters and set them on the counter beside the fridge, then moved to pick up the pens and pads of paper. I pulled open a drawer in the counter to the left of the fridge, dropped them in, and was about to push the drawer shut when something caught my eye. I reached in with both hands and pulled it out so I could examine it more closely.

It was a slightly faded photo, and it had been taken when I'd been a lot younger—how young, I wasn't sure. Maybe five or so years old, I decided eventually, so it had probably been taken before we'd moved from Fallarbor Town to Nacrene City. In the picture, my parents were standing as they looked down at me and smiling, looking on the verge of laughter. My mother had her brown hair up and was wearing a blue dress shirt and black dress pants, while my father was wearing a dark blue suit and red tie. He was leaning down towards me, hands reaching out. His eyes were a little sympathetic even though he was laughing. My young self was was wearing a deep red shirt with a blue tie, along with tan dress pants. My hair looked the same now as it had then: short, black and straight. My father had black hair, too, but it was a little coarser and stuck out a bit on the top. We had almost the same dark skin, just a little darker than my mother's. I seemed to have more traits from my father. I rubbed my forehead and closed my eyes tightly, then slowly opened them. There was nothing unusual about this picture; it was a typical family photo, but...

There was someone in the picture that wasn't part of the family now. The reason that my parents were reacting the way they were was because I was tightly hugging a small Treecko to my chest and laughing. The Treecko seemed caught between discomfort and happiness as I squeezed it probably too tightly. I frowned at the picture, then glanced at the fridge. My mother was avid about sticking magnets and pictures on it—there were pictures of me from when I was a baby, a few group photos of the three of us with me at varying ages, as well as a couple pictures of friends and relatives—so the reason why she'd left this one out was probably because of the Treecko. My parents had never mentioned it, not even once. I turned the picture over to look at the white back, where she usually wrote dates or descriptions, but there was nothing on this one. I glanced closer, and noticed that there was a line of white paint on the back, and I knew that something had been written there and covered up. I lifted my left pointer finger to scratch at it, but I stuffed it in my right pocket when I heard my mother coming into the kitchen. If the picture had been left in a drawer for ten years, then my mom had not wanted it to be found. I'd never been interested in that drawer, but even so, there had always been a chance that someone would open it and find the picture. So why hadn't she just thrown it away? I was glad that she had kept it, though, because now I was very curious about that Treecko.

"Gale, thanks for cleaning up." My mother smiled as she walked into the kitchen, but her face was pinched, and I could tell she was still upset with me. She had changed her clothes and was wearing khaki pants and a yellow shirt, and she'd brushed her hair and pulled it up into a bun. Inwardly I felt annoyed at her reaction, even though I was used to it. I decided to let the topic of my vision drop. We'd already been prepared for the earthquake. There were many of them each year, too many to count but fortunately nothing too powerful. People were always prepared for quakes, so my visions weren't particularly useful. I wondered if anyone would listen to me, and with the exception of Sam and Brandon, I knew that no one would. It was rare that anyone was killed because of an earthquake, but there were usually some minor injuries. Only a few people had been killed during earthquakes in Nacrene City, and that had been a long time ago, before people started earthquake-proofing their houses. "It was good that the quake wasn't very big." I nodded.

"But there have been a lot of earthquakes lately," I noted, watching her expression carefully so I could see what reaction she would have. "More than normal." I didn't get visions all the time, but I had eventually figured out that they only happened when I was touching something. I had figured it out only after recalling as many visions as I could, and I confirmed it was only after I came in contact with some object or person. But the visions didn't always happen; otherwise I'd probably never be able to relax. They always happened without warning, and as hard as I'd tried, I'd never been able to teach myself to control them. And there was another thing: All of the visions I'd had so far seemed to be in the future. My mother frowned and shook her head, oblivious to what I was thinking about.

"I haven't noticed, if so," she disagreed, and shook her head again. I bit my lip, then shrugged and grinned. "The amount of earthquakes seem normal."

"I guess so," I said, deciding to relent. "I don't like them, so maybe I notice them more and think there are a lot."

"Maybe so," my mother said, nodding, and she seemed to relax a bit once I gave her some explanation for my uneasiness. "What do you want for breakfast?" She asked, walking to the refrigerator. I winced when she pushed the drawer shut, the one that the picture in my pocket had been in. I'd forgotten to shut it—would she realize the picture was missing later?

"Um...I was just going to have cereal," I mumbled, and she turned. A disapproving look was on her face.

"You should have something better than that," she chided. "How about scrambled eggs?"

"Alright...thanks," I said, fighting back a sigh. That meant I'd probably have to eat with her at the table, which would open up a possible Q&A session that would be very awkward. I watched as she turned back to the refrigerator, then let my gaze wander out the window while I listened to her crack the eggs into a bowl. After that, my mind wandered. My family had never had Pokémon, but my parents had jobs that involved them. It was rare for someone to have a job or career that didn't have to do with the creatures. My mother helped out at the Pokémon Center every day, usually leaving at ten in the morning and coming back early in the evening. My father worked at the Nacrene Museum, and some days he came home pretty late. Despite where he worked, he had never been too interested in Pokémon, and my mother hadn't, either. I liked Pokémon and spent plenty of time around them despite not having any. I went to the museum sometimes to take my dad lunch, or to wander around and look at the exhibits.

Whenever I'd visit my friends, sometimes we'd train or play with their Pokémon. Sam had a Meowth, and an Eevee that she was considering evolving into a Vaporeon, while Brandon had a Torchic and a Pachirisu. My friends weren't trainers, but they still trained their Pokémon and occasionally battled each other, usually after homework, on weekends and during holidays. Sam and Brandon's Pokémon were almost always with them, except for when they were at school, and when I went to see them they'd be playing a short distance away from the three of us or crowding around us asking for attention. I thought they were cool, and liked being around them, but I'd never thought about having some. Sam always told me that I should catch a Pokémon of my own, but I was never sure if my parents would agree, so I'd usually just change the subject. Until now I'd never wondered why my parents didn't seem to be interested in Pokémon, despite their careers; I'd always just thought it was just that—a lack of interest—but now I was a little suspicious.

I thought I'd never had Pokémon, but the picture I'd discovered suggested otherwise. The question now was why had my parents hidden that picture and not told me about that Treecko? Maybe something bad had happened...it had run away, or died, maybe, though Pokémon usually lived a long time. But if something bad had happened, that explained why my parents might not have wanted to tell me. I'd been too little to remember, so there had been no need for them to explain what had happened to it. I glanced at my mother, saw she wasn't watching me, and then slipped the picture out of my pocket. Turning it over, I tried scratching at the paint again, and a few seconds later, I started to see the words that had been hidden. Gale, I read, and swallowed, but kept scratching at the dried correction fluid.Gale's...first...Pokémon...

I kept the picture under the table as I studied it, then slipped it back into my pocket when I heard my mother coming to the table. She was balancing two plates of scrambled eggs and toast, and I stood hurriedly and took one, then sat down. "Thanks. It looks good." My mother smiled and sat in the chair across the table from me and started eating. I was hungry, but didn't feel much enthusiasm for eating, though I did so my mom wouldn't ask any questions. Once I was finished, I stood and picked up my plate, and took my mother's when I saw that she was finished. I washed the dishes quickly and put them away. "Thanks for breakfast, mom," I said, and headed for my room, not waiting for her to say anything. I grabbed a small gray backpack and put the picture in my pocket, then grabbed a video games Brandon had lent me and tossed it inside the backpack. I quickly made a plan; I'd go visit Brandon and talk to him about the picture. I didn't want to bring it up to mom. Somehow, I knew she wouldn't take it well. I grabbed my house key and dropped it into my left pocket, then slipped on a pair of sunglasses and headed back down the hall into the kitchen. Not saying anything, I headed towards the front door.

"Are you going somewhere?" I heard my mother ask just as my right hand gripped the doorknob.

"Just to Brandon's house. He lent me a video game, but I never got a chance to play it, so I'm gonna give it back." I turned and saw my mom nodding approvingly. That was true, at least, so I didn't have trouble sounding convincing.

"Well, see you later, then," she said. "Don't forget to take your medicine." I thought of the plastic case that looked like the pink-and-white Heal Ball (it was hard to get non-Pokémon related items, but I didn't mind) in my backpack that held the pills I took once a day, and tried not to look or sound resentful.

"I have it," I told her, then opened the door and headed quickly through it before she could tell me anything else. I shut the door, a little roughly, I noticed too late. I'd probably get lectured when I got back home, I thought sourly.

Once on the road, I turned right and looked down the road. It took around ten minutes to reach Brandon's house, and there was a small grove of trees along the way, so I looked around to see what kinds of Pokémon were wandering nearby. There were a bunch of Pidove fluttering around overhead, chirping and singing loudly as they did so, and a few Pansear and Swadloon were ambling around. I'd heard before that it was dangerous to walk around without a Pokémon, in case the wild ones attacked, but the Pokémon around here weren't too dangerous. I had bothered a couple of them in the past by accident though, and had come away with a couple bites and scratches. Some had been serious enough to leave scars on my arms and legs, but I hardly noticed them now. They'd faded eventually and now almost blended into my skin.

I was watching the sky as another Pidove shot over my head when a loud rustling in the grass brought my attention back to my surroundings. The rustling was coming from behind me and to the right, so I turned and looked around, and finally spotted a large bush with red flowers that was moving. Warily, I approached the bush, then stopped as a feeling of warning came over me. I stepped backward slowly, sensing that I shouldn't be poking around the woods anymore, and after I'd retreated a fair distance I turned and quickly began walking away. The rustling continued, and I kept sneaking backward glances, a little unnerved. The Pokémon around here weren't too big, but whatever was in that bush sounded like a fair-sized Pokémon.

Glancing back ahead, I saw that the end of the woods was coming up, and gave a little sigh of relief. I hurried my steps, then stopped suddenly as the ground below me began rumbling. My first thought was that it was another earthquake even as the ground burst open in a shower of dirt, revealing a large Pokémon that lunged towards me, knocking me to the ground and pinning me by both arms. I looked up at it in alarm, noting with amazement that it was a large Grovyle. It leered down at me and raised its arms suddenly as if it was going to slash at me. Without thinking I reached up and grabbed its arms, trying to push it away, and it growled angrily and pinned me down again. Grovyle had never appeared here as far as I knew, and definitely not any that looked this big or powerful. I kicked my legs and struggled, trying to throw it off, but it was too strong. Suddenly I felt the ground spinning, a sign that a vision was coming on. It was stronger than any vision I'd had before, and I closed my eyes tightly in pain as images appeared in my mind.

I saw a younger me playing eagerly with a Treecko; I threw a small blue ball and the Treecko went darting after it. Never mind that it wasn't a canine Pokémon, I guess, because the little guy seemed to be having a blast. As the Treecko ran back to me and dropped the ball in my hands, I laughed and hugged the little creature close to me. But suddenly, the Treecko was pulled from me by someone whose face I couldn't see. The figure seemed familiar, but I couldn't place the person. I jolted as the vision ended with me running, hands outstretched towards the Treecko, who was reaching for me too. A cry broke into the silence of the vision, startling me awake. My eyes opened opened abruptly to see the Grovyle still leaning over me. It was staring downward with a slightly bewildered expression. I tried to get up, but still felt dizzy, and I knew I couldn't go anywhere, anyway. The Grovyle had me pinned strongly and wasn't letting me up. I felt my eyes slip closed and knew that I was blacking out.


It was dark when I opened my eyes again, and wearily I wondered how long I'd been out. I was lying on my back, but gained my bearings and then rolled over and carefully rose to my feet. The dizziness seemed to be gone, and I glanced around nervously, wondering if the Grovyle was still around. What had gotten into it? Maybe I'd accidentally disturbed its home which had caused it to attack. I'd done that many times before while going to see Brandon. I still didn't think Grovyle lived around here, though. A rustle nearby made me jump and fall backwards in shock. I gaped into the darkness and saw the Grovyle step out from a bush and approach me slowly, as if it were just curious now. I dug my heels into the hard ground and backed away from it, afraid it would attack again. "If you want me to leave, I'll leave." The Grovyle tipped its head and stared at me, halting for a moment, but soon began approaching me again. I scooted away until my back hit something; I glanced around and up and saw a large tree towering above my head. When I looked back the Grovyle was standing right in front of my, our eyes level. Its yellow orbs looked right into my eyes, and I tried to sit still, thinking that it would lose interest in me and leave. But it didn't. We sat there for a few minutes and I began to fidget. "What is it? I don't have any food." One of the scars I had was from a Pokémon that had wanted the candy bar I'd been eating during one of my visits to Brandon's house. The Grovyle closed its eyes and shook its head, and I flinched as it reached towards me. But I just felt the soft touch of its hand on my forehead, and I opened my eyes to see its right paw raised, as if it was checking me for a fever.

This Grovyle is a little odd, I thought uneasily, trying to move away from it, but it suddenly threw its arms around me and yanked me closer. I yelled and squirmed but the Pokémon didn't let go. It was like it was hugging me but why, I didn't know. Then the vision came back to me in a flash, the one of the Treecko I'd been playing with. I'd hugged it just before it had been taken from me by someone. As the Grovyle pulled away and released me, I stared at it and found myself reaching into my pocket for the photo I'd discovered earlier. It was well beyond sunset and darkness had stretched to every corner of the woods by now, but I had read somewhere that Grovyle had good eyesight, even in the dark. I held out the picture with shaking hands and watched as the Pokémon took it and studied it curiously. "Is that you? The Treecko?" I asked, voice shaking a bit, and my breath caught when the Grovyle lifted its gaze from the photo and nodded once. If I'd been holding the picture, I would have dropped it out of shock. "That is you?" The Grovyle nodded again and handed the picture back to me; I slipped it back into my pocket. "Really?" Grovyle hesitated, then gave me an impatient look. "Why didn't you live with us? What happened?" I blurted out questions before I realized that I wouldn't be able to understand the answers. "Never mind," I sighed, then stared at in amazement at the Grovyle. "What do you want to do now?" I asked, standing up, and the Grovyle tugged on my arms and began to walk away, in the opposite direction of Brandon's house. I followed it carefully, and soon we'd left the woods and were heading back towards my house. I headed towards the front door, knowing my mother would be worrying about me, but I felt a tug on my shirt and looked at the Grovyle. It didn't seem to want to go inside. "What's wrong?" The Pokémon gazed at my house and shook its head firmly. "I need to tell my mother that I'm alright. I've been gone for a while." I took my house key out of my pocket, quickly unlocked the door and stepped inside, and heard the Grovyle following. There was no one in the kitchen, and the lights weren't on, so I fumbled for the one near the door and flipped it on. I saw a note on the table and moved closer to read it; picking it up, I grimaced and felt dismay sweep over me.

Gale, if you're reading this, stay put! Your father and I are out looking for you.

"Great," I muttered, and dropped the note back onto the table, watching it flutter onto the wooden surface, then headed to my room. I emptied the contents of my backpack onto my bed, and gathered a few things to put inside it: a couple pairs of socks, a small blanket, a flashlight and batteries, a first-aid kit, a map of the region, my wallet and my tan bucket hat. Shouldering the backpack I turned and saw Grovyle looking around the room with interest. "So...you want to go somewhere? Is it far?" I asked, and its yellow eyes fixed on me as it nodded. "I'm going to get some food first. I haven't eaten in a while. I'll get you something, too." I followed as the Grovyle strode out into the hall and then into the kitchen. I rifled through the pantry and grabbed a box of granola bars, then emptied it into my backpack and grabbed a tin of dried fruit as well. I found some cheese slices and bottles of water in the fridge; I took a handful of the slices and four bottles of water. I wandered towards a drawer, pulled it open, found a few small notebooks, a couple pens and a few matchboxes. I decided to take all of those, too, and put the matches in a plastic bag so they wouldn't get drenched in case the water bottles opened.

On my way out, I hesitated at the kitchen table and picked up the pen that had been left there, and wrote a few lines on the note. Mom, Dad, there's something I have to do. I'll be back, but I don't know how soon. I'm safe, I promise, so don't worry about me. Pocketing the pen, I turned to Grovyle. "Ready." The note on the table had said to stay at home, and I may have if Grovyle hadn't been with me. The Pokémon didn't seem to want to stay here, and I wasn't going to leave it alone. My parents had kept the picture of Grovyle, then a Treecko, from me and I was more than a little miffed about that—plus I was curious about what the Pokémon wanted to show me. And I knew that if my parents hadn't wanted the picture to be found, they likely wouldn't want Grovyle anywhere near the house. "Lead the way," I told Grovyle resolutely, and with a satisfied nod the Pokémon walked across the kitchen, opened the front door, and led me out into the darkness. I followed closely and didn't look back as I locked the door and shut it firmly behind me.


Well, there we have it, the first chapter. In the next, Grovyle starts leading Gale to the forest where Celebi lives, and on the way, things get interesting. In the game, Grovyle and the main character are attacked by Dusknoir when they are going to the past, but I didn't know how long they'd known each other, or how much the main character knew about the time gears before that happened. When I started writing this story, I decided to have it set just before the planet had been paralyzed, and by the time the characters went back to the future, the planet's paralysis would have been completed. But anyway, I'll just let you read and see all of it for yourself. Thank you for reading! Whether this is good or not, I'm just glad I started writing, because I have been wanting to write a Mystery Dungeon story for ages. For me, starting to write this was like having cheesecake. XD

Oh, and "Copy-Meowth" is my made-up Pokémon world version of "Copycat", since there aren't any cats per se...just Meowth and Skitty and Glameow.