Chapter 1
Merge
I first need to express that this idea is not
entirely mine. Megan and I have
collaborated on this story. The story
is named Pokemon: Merge. Thanx,
Meg. Love ya!
It
was almost a month after the Demonstone incident. Now I had fully modified the stone combination machine to handle
the demonstone. Now we were gathered
around it as I hit the button. There
was whirring noise and the machine glowed. Then there was a ding, and we all watched the tray that would catch the
combined stones. Weird goo poured into
it.
"What
the?"
"Isn't
there supposed to be a stone there?"
"Yeah,
but, it's, um, goo."
"Megan,
take this to the lab for analysis, will you."
"Sure,
hon, gimme a second to get it in a vial."
"Yeah,"
I said, "David, can you relay a message to Ash. Tell him about this shit. And somebody clean the floor." In shook my head. What the hell
was this stuff? Megan headed off to the
Lab with a vial of the stuff. The rest
of us went about our chores around the Ranch.
"Well,
James, it appears to be a type of DNA-modifying Virus. What I'm going to do is inject it into a lab
rattata. It won't harm it, but will
alter its DNA. I'd like to find out
what it does." Megan held up an
injection gun. She headed back towards
the lab.
"C'mon,
you too, Sabrina, let's see what it does." Then Megan tripped. I
caught her with my psychic power, but the gun flew into the air. I tried to grab it in time, but it landed,
on Megan's arm, unloading its cargo of Virus into her bloodstream.
"Yeeow,
that hur..." she trailed off, her eyes suddenly closed. I ran up to her. She was still breathing. She was alive, at least. What
had my goo done? I keyed the intercom.
"Brian,
get up here, we got a problem."
"I'm
on it!" Brian was the certified doctor
of the team. Russel, a munitions
specialist, Kim, a the computer expert, and Snowflake the organizer. David,
Sabrina and I provided heavy firepower, making the team almost invincible. Brian ran up. He scanned her body quickly with his electronic diagnostic
checker.
"We
need her in a stasis tube quickly. C'mon. I teleported all four of
us to the sickbay. Sabrina raised Megan into the stasis tube. Megan looked so peaceful asleep like
that. This was my fault. I teleported myself to my room. I gathered a few things and then walked out
of the main building and out into the semi-landscaped wilderness that was then
Ranch. The Ranch, built in 1986, was a
special island south of Cinnabar Island. It had been terraformed to fit its job, which was to be a safe haven for
rare and illegal pokemon. They were
allowed to roam free, and it was a great place to sit and meditate. I could have teleported, but that would be
wrong, using my power when I didn't need it. My legs were fine for getting around. I walked up a slope to the perfect Japanese style mountains that
were in the center of the island. I
knew there was a koi pong up here somewhere. 'Koi Pond Left' said a sign. I
followed it up the narrow path. The air
was cool, and the sun was setting. When
I reached the pond I tossed my bags on the ground between two trees. I suspended my hammock between the trees and
dug a fire pit. I put some wood in it
and psyburned it. It was blazing in no
time. I needed time to think. I pulled my food out of my pack. I made my self dinner: Miso soup, teriyaki,
and sushi. It was quiet and serene as I
munched on what had once been tuna, but now, artfully wrapped in seaweed, was
tuna wrapped artfully in seaweed. I
drank some of the soup. Goddish, I was
depressed. I couldn't face my problems
running away like this. They were
responsible enough, and if they needed me I'd be there. Then I cleaned up the meal and climbed into
my hammock. I pulled out my copy of
Shogun, and read.
Blackthorne
something, something, Toranaga.
Ok,
that was getting boring. I pulled out
my collection of pokemon cards, which had taken up the entire second bag, and
counted them. 133,284. Then I sorted them out into numerical order
by type, and then put the types in alphabetical order. That was boring but necessary. It still didn't distract me from my mistake
at pursuing that stupid thing with the evolution stones. Now my Megan would probably die, or
worse. I had been in enough trouble in
my life to know that there were things worse than death. I decided to swim in the Koi pond. Filled with weak little Magikarp, I wouldn't
get hurt, and neither would the Karp. I
sat down in the unusually deep pool, letting the cool water relieve me of my
worries. I floated on the surface, humming. I heard a crack, a stick snapping. My hand strayed to the shuriken, a ninja
throwing star in my pocket. I opened my
eyes, and looked up to see my wife, Sabrina. She was wearing her old gym uniform. I smiled. I levitated out of the
pool and dried off psychically. She
walked over to me.
"You
know there was nothing you could have done, James. It happened, and we have to live with that."
"I'll
use Mew to go back and fix it."
"You
can't. Time travel is illegal now, even
for the league, after what happened last time." I hung my head. I felt
her hand on my chin. Megan had helped
me when Sabrina had gone evil. Now
Sabrina was there for me, when Megan was gone, not evil, granted, but
gone. She raised my head, I looked her
in the eyes.
"It's
my fault."
"No,
it's not. It'll be alright, it always
is in the end."
"Now
this is starting to sound like fanfiction!"
"C'mon,
what's there to be a fan of, James, this is real life."
"Just
a crazy thing that popped into my head!"
"Yeah."
"Let's
get some sleep," She said, "We have to get back tomorrow morning. Then maybe we can help Megan."
"Yeah,"
I said. I kissed Sabrina. We lay down in the hammock. I fell asleep, my arms around my wife. I wondered what tomorrow would bring.