_Come and be my friend_
A newspaper article from September 10:
Boy disappears without a trace! The mother is drowning in sorrow. The police is determined to investigate the boy, but hasn't found a lead yet and is at a loss.
How could it get tot his? Well, I'll tell you a story, one that might seem impossible, but is true nonetheless.
I strolled over the monthly flea market in the big car park with my mother.
As always, I didn't really want to be here. 14 year old boys really had better things to do than hang out with their mums... But I had to be here. There wasn't anything special to be found at the stands, but I was still hoping that this time one of them would be selling good old games. Pokémon games, that's what I was looking for. I've played almost every edition, but my mother still didn't want me to buy those games. For the last few years she'd been like that - how did she put it? They 'destroyed' my health.
My mother worried about everything. Even a lost bat would scare her, she always jumps. However, that wasn't the point.
Back at the flea market all I could see was old lamps, albums, and other useless stuff like that. Nothing I'd be interested in.
I sighed, continued like this for another 10 minutes, and heard that it was beginning to rain. Fine, I was feeling like that anyway.
Suddenly I saw a big stand that had its things spread out on a white sheet. My hope was rising again, and with sparkling eyes I ran over to the stand at once.
The younger woman standing behind the stand, who probably owned everything displayed, looked at me aghast.
My gaze wandered over the countless games - there were games for the Playstation 2 and 3, X-box games, Wii Games, Gamecube games, and a box with Nintendo DS games! Right away I grabbed it, and looked through it, but there were no Pokémon games inside.
"Are you looking for something specific?" the woman asked with a quiet voice. I turned around to face her, my eyes meeting her pale ones.
"Yeah, Pokémon", I replied.
The woman's shoulders jerked, and her eyes widened a little. She looked as though a spider had crawled up her back.
"Well, I do have one", the woman muttered, looking for something under the stand. I heard another box slide over the ground, and she put it on the stand. She rummaged around in the box for a bit, and then pulled out a silver package.
My breath caught.
That was Sould Silver! Wow... I had wanted to play that game for such a long time! And it looked almost completely new. The package had already been opened, but the game, the Pokéwalker, and the little Lugia figure, which had been included when Soul Silver and Heart Gold had first been released, were all there.
I turned around, and checked that my mother wasn't paying any attention to what I was doing. She was looking at some clothes, just like always.
"How much is it?", I asked as I turned back to the woman behind the stand.
The woman looked down, saddened, and whispered in her quiet voice, "I'm sorry, Greg." Then she looked back up, and cleared her throat.
"It's free, I'll give it to you. It's useless to me..." She pushed the box into my hands, and tried to smile. For a second I was speechless, because I was too excited. "Thanks", was all I could reply.
My mother was not supposed to find out about this, so without further ado I put the game into my bag, buried under all the other things she has already bought for me.
The I walk over to my mother. Of course I don't say anything, I don't want her to find out about this. Never ever!
"Oh, dear, take a look at this. Do you like it?" she asked and turned around to me as though I'd stood there the whole time. She was holding up a strange, striped t-shirt, looking hopeful. Thankfully she didn't realise that I had bought the game.
When we finally got home, I wanted nothing more than to play the game! I'd already played Gold, Silver, and Crystal, so I was thrilled to play the remake of Silver.
I quickly ran to my room, locked the door behind me, and emptied the bag onto my bad. I opened the package and pulled out the figure first. It was beautiful, the way Lugia should be, and flawless. Apparently the previous had just put it somewhere and never played with it. Good!
I put it on my bed side table, and took out the Pokéwalker next, which looked pretty new as well. At last I took out the game.
The cover with Lugia on it looked very classy.
I opened the case and saw the familiar game card, even though I had never touched it.
I pulled it out, and looked for my DS that should be on my shelf.
Sitting cross-legged on my bed, I put the Sould Silver card into my DS, take a deep breath and start my DS. Of course the strange health warning welcomed me, I pushed start and came to the actual DS menu.
I press A in order to start Soul Silver. Sweet, Lugia really looked great in the start menu! It was just so pretty the way it dived...
Then I arrived in the main menu, where it already had someone's game saved.
"Greg" with 16 badges and... the game time was 999:99? That was strange, and I was curious... Curious about his Pokémon, so I clicked on the saved game, and the game started at the Ruins of Alph. The music made me shudder a bit at first, because I wasn't prepared for it at all.
My player sprite was that of Silver, and a Lugia was flying by my side. It was... grey? GREY?! At first I was glad because I thought it was a shiny Lugia, but then I remembered that shiny Lugia wasn't grey, but that its blue body parts were red instead.
That amazed me. Did this Greg hack the game?
Then I remembered something. The woman... Hadn't she said something about Greg?
I was in shock.
Quickly I opened the menu and clicked on "Pokémon" to see what this was all about.
I was surprised, he really had just 2 Pokémon! Lugia and Typhlosion, both level 100, and the Lugia was named "Gregia".
I realised that Lugia's sprite was different. It really was just plain grey, while its blue body parts were coloured black, just like on the little overworld sprite hovering behind Silver.
When I tried opening Lugia's info nothing happened. Nothing at all, but I could open Typhlosion's inf just fine. However, when I did so, the Typhlosion didn't move, or scream, and it only showed its regular sprite.
Something seemed strange to me, because the Typhlosion didn't have any fire on its back either, and its eyes... something was missing there! Perhaps his pupils? I couldn't figure it out exactly.
His stats all were 999, but that didn't really surprise me.
It didn't have any moves, either. It simply showed an empty moveset.
I closed the menu and clicked on the Pokédex. Even stranger!
The previous player had seen 493 Pokémon, but hadn't caught. Again, that confused me, because obviously Greg had a Typhlosion and a grey Lugia!
Whatever... I closed the whole menu and moved my sprite up to where the passage was. Suddenly the music stopped, and with it my sprite.
Then strange high notes started playing. They were the sounds of Pokémon, I realised! I head Unown, Geodude, Magikarp, Graveler, and Tentacool's cries, just higher than they regularly were, and somehow much more pathetic.
I quickly walked into the passage, and the normal music for the routes in Johto started playing. Somehow there were no NPCs there, though, and that confused me even more.
My sprite walked further up, until I reached route 36.
Lugia appeared behind me again, but something had changed. Somehow it was flapping its wings more slowly. I turned my sprite around, and pressed A to speak to the Pokémon. All that happened was that a feeble cry sounded, and it was difficult to even make out Lugia's regular cry.
What was I supposed to do now? Where should I go next? Maybe to the National Park?
Suddenly the music stopped again. For just a moment the whole of Johto seemed to hold its breath.
Then the sad, unsettling Pokémon cries started up in the background once more, but there were gaps between them. I could make out Nidoran, Stantler, Growlithe, and Pidgey. It sounded as though they were in pain.
I didn't want to hear this, so I decided to hurry up on my way to the National Park.
I moved my sprite to the left, Lugia followed.
The screams became more and more piercing, and I was beginning to think I couldn't bear this anymore. Fortunately, the passage came into sight, and my sprite entered it.
The screen stayed black instead of showing the next area. Did the game freeze?
Without a warning, a text message appeared: "I like you."
Two red points appear on the black screen, shocking me once again.
Lugia's piercing cry sounds once more, but this time louder, and mixed with the painful cries that I recognised as Typhlosion's!
The pupils disappeared, and a new text message show up: "Typhlosion died."
I had to read it twice to understand it. Died? How could this be? Why? Was he really dead?
As the screen turned white again, I found myself in Ilex Forest, much to my surprise.
I was more than confused.
Of course the first thing I did was check on my Pokémon. Typhlosion wasn't to be found in my party overview anymore, which was strange, but the game had told me it had died, after all.
I still couldn't check Gregia's status.
I closed the menu, and just as I wanted to move my sprite again the Pokémon cries could be head in the background again.
Lightning flashed across the screen and when it faded, Ilex Forest seemed darker than before, and the death screams of the Pokémon could still be heard in the background.
I moved my sprite up to a strange shrine standing there, and with every step the screen turned darker and darker. Then I noticed that Lugia's wings didn't move anymore.
It looked really strange, and what was adding to that strangeness was some dark red spots appearing in the forest. I just wanted to do something normal in this game, so I pressed A in front of the shrine, but now the screen turned dark again.
I noticed a few beads of sweat dropping off my forehead.
Finally the darkness blurred away, and I was myself standing in a clearing in the Ilex Forest, although the clearing didn't seem familiar at all.
What I saw made me gasp in shock. All over the clearing there were parts of Pokémon sprites! Everywhere was blood! My sprite didn't move anymore.
When I pressed A, a text box appeared again: "They weren't worth it!"
The Ilex Forest was still darker than normal, and I decided to save.
Fortunately that worked, and after saving, I switched off my DS, and fell back on my bed.
That had been one of the strangest experiences of my life.
After a few minutes, I decided to search the internet for answer. Maybe someone knew about a grey Lugia, because I was somewhat afraid now.
These screams... I swallowed hard.
I started my PC, and opened Firefox. On I opened a new topic, and called it: "Grey Lugia in Soul Silver".
I wrote about the screams, the dead Typhlosion, and once I had posted I kept refreshing the topic, because I was so anxious.
I was surprised when an answer appeared.
Normally you didn't get answers so quickly.
The user who had written the reply was ?. Huh? Well, it didn't matter.
? wrote: You are kind.
And oddly enough the topic was closed. I clicked on ?'s profile, but all it came up with was an error.
Now I was properly scared. A message in the game had told me exactly the same, and now it showed up in the forum?
I tried to distract myself from all of this, but it didn't work.
That night when I went to bed, I couldn't sleep at all, because I was still thinking about the Lugia and the screams.
I had a sleepless night, but at least I still had holidays.
In the morning I couldn't concentrate at all.
I had to eat breakfast, but all I wanted to do was play Soul Silver. Even though the game scared me. I liked games like that, despite them being spooky.
As fast as I could I finished breakfast, and got dressed.
Finally! I was sitting on my bed once again, and switched on my DS.
The saved game was still there. I clicked on it, though I probably should have started a new game after everything that had happened yesterday.
I wished I had done that.
The game started, and my sprite was standing behind the passage of Route 34. I was confused. I had saved in the strange clearing in Ilex Forest, hadn't I? It didn't really matter, and maybe it was better this was. I moved my sprite straight up, but then I noticed something.
Lugia wasn't following me anymore. That was unsettling to me, especially because the Pokémon cries could be heard once more, and this time Ditto and Drowzee were among them.
Somehow they became more painful and piercing every time I heard them.
I checked my party, because I had to be sure that I didn't have any Pokémon with me. They were all gone?! I couldn't understand it. Where was Lugia?
I tried to walk back into Ilex Forest, but when I tried to enter it, another message popped up: "You aren't allowed to do this."
The game became more confusing by the second, but instead of trying to enter Ilex Forest, I walked along Route 34. There weren't any NPCs either, except for the old man from the pension. I was relieved to finally come across an NPC, considering there were still the screams in the background.
Happily, I tried talking to him, but he just told me to start the Pokéwalker. No matter how often I talked to him, he kept saying the same thing. Getting frustrated, I tried walking into the pension, but a message came up: "Nobody is there."
It seemed like I didn't have any other choice, but I was also curious as to why I should start the Pokéwalker. I looked at my beside table, and there it was! Next to the Lugia figure, which somehow scared me now. Nevertheless I took the Pokéwalker, and pushed on the big button in the middle.
An image appeared, but what I saw shocked me more than everything else. My eyes widened, and I almost dropped the Pokéwalker.
It was Gregia! Only this time I could make it out properly. It looked horrible, and it had colours, even though it looked pixelated.
I couldn't see more than its head and a part of the body, but its dark eyes were fixed on me, and another piercing scream came from the Pokéwalker.
Then the picture disappeared, and a text wrote itself in the Pokéwalker. The letters looked strange to me, they looked like Unown letter, squiggly, and half of them were missing. From one second to the next the letter cleared up, and I was shocked to find that I could make out what they said: "They all refused".
What did that mean? I was scared. I glared at my DS, which, in the meantime, had gone black again.
Another message appeared: "That's why they had to go".
The screen lit up again, and I found myself in the Bell Tower in Teak City. That was unsettling. That no music was playing was normal, but in the background there was a quiet whistling sound. It sounded strange – a bit too high, a bit too spooky.
"Greg used Fly", appeared as a nother message to me.
My sprite started turning before the screen turned white, and I found myself on top of Bell Tower.
What? I was able to fly? I was shocked, even more at what I saw in front of me. There it was! Gregia!
It was hovering on the spot in front of me, but something had changed. Somehow its eyes weren't normal anymore. Its eyes were dark, and with two red pupils it glared at my sprite.
Directly behind Lugia I saw a destroyed... something. It was red, and gold, and there were some green bits. I froze. Was that Ho-Oh? As though the game had read my thoughts a text message appeared: "Yes".
I noticed how the screen turned darker, and that Ho-Oh was screaming in pain. Its cry was even shriller than the others, and a long painful whistling followed it.
I was shivering.
Lugia had stopped flapping its wings.
I knew that it had done this.
It couldn't have been anyone else.
The screen turned black again, and I was scared as hell when the Lugia picture from the Pokéwalker appeared in the middle of the black screen. The red eyes seemed to penetrate my sould, and
That was...Ho-Oh? As the game could read thoughts another text message appeared : "Yes"
I realized how the screen gets darker, and Ho-Ohs pain screams , even shriller than all the others, sounded and hereupon a long pain whistle.
Now I was shivering.
Lugia stopped to flap with it´s wings. I knew that it has done this.
Who else?
Then the screen turned into black again. And I almost scared witless as the same image from Lugia which appeared on the Pokewalker, appeared in the middle of the black screen. The red eyes seems to penetrate my soul. Blood was sticking to Lugia, and even its eyes were bloodshot.
Goose bumps broke out all over my skin when its shrill cry could be heard again.
Then another message appeared: "Come and be my friend".
I held my breath.
The screen faded and turned into something new once more.
This time my sprite was beamed into an empty room. I saw that I could move forward, so I moved in that direction. The area blurred, and my sprite walked into pure darkness.
The it stopped.
By itself.
The quiet rustling of wind could be heard in the background, and the next message appeared: "...".
My breath caught, but nothing happened. No Gregia, nothing else.
Just the wind.
Then there was a noise just like a person passing through a door, and my sprite disappeared.
A new screen, and my sprite turned up again.
I recognised the place at once! I was inside the Ruins of Alph!
Oddly enough, there was a ladder in the middle of the room. I was scared what could happened next, but I had to know what was going on, so I moved my sprite down the ladder.
For whatever reason my sprite was no on the Whirl Islands, where Lugia could be caught. However the waterfall wasn't flowing, instead all the water was black, and I could make out Gregia again. Slowly I recognised it silhouette, then saw the glowing eyes, and at last I saw the corpses of Pokémon in front of it.
I was scared.
Gregia landed in front of my sprite.
A message popped up: "They all said no".
I froze wondering what it wanted from me. Only one thing was clear to me: Gregia was a murderer, though I had no idea why it had done that.
I shrugged, and glared at the box of the game the woman had given to me. I noticed that I had overlooked something, there was still something in the box!
Suddenly I heard the save sound of the game, and my head snapped back to stare at my DS. It said "Game saved" before the Nintendo switched off by itself.
I was unsettled, but I shut my DS, and focused my attention on the box.
I grabbed it, and indeed! What I pulled out was a note pad, just one half of it.
I read the first page, which had a phone number above the name of a woman. Was that the woman from the flea market?
Maybe she would be able to tell me what was wrong with the game. I swallowed hard, took my phone, and dialed the number. All she had to do was pick up now, and I heard the sad voice of the woman from the flea market.
I was so lucky!
"I'm the boy from the flea market. The one you gave Pokémon Soul Silver too", I said, and tried to sound as calm as possible.
"Oh, you... So that's where the note pad is. Why're you calling me?"
"It's about the game. There's something wrong with it."
"How so?"
"This Greg... And there is a Lugia. It's just really strange!"
"Greg was my friend", the woman whispered.
"What?" I asked completely taken aback.
"Yeah. He bought the game when he was 13. He never had many friends, because he was different, he r
"Greg was may friend...", the woman whispered then.
"What?", I asked faithless.
"Yes...As he bought this game he was 13 years old...He never had friends in school, because he was different. Playing Pokémon was his escape. Whenever I asked him if he had any friends, he just said that he had a friend in the game, but one day he committed suicide... Before he did so, he always said that I should give his game to a true fan, someone who's different like he was... And well..."
I didn't know what to say, but I was slowly beginning to understand, although not everything was clear to me yet.
The whole night there was just one thing I could do – stare at his Lugia figure.
I knew there there was something amiss with Greg... Come and be my friend, that sounded like Greg, after all.
But what was I talking about? That night I came up with another name for this monster: Creegia.
The next morning, I was already up at 3am. I took my DS, and decided to play along. I realised that I had a headache, and it was still dark outside...
This time I found myself in front of the Indigo Plateau.
That was strange... The screams of the Pokémon sounded in the background, and the only way I could move was into a building.
There weren't any NPCs either, and I was scared of what would happen next. My sprite walked up the stairs, but halfway up the stairs, parts of an NPC fell in front of me. I froze.
I recognised Lance's head, and some other parts. My sprite wouldn't move anymore.
The screen turned white before it appeared again – Creegia!
This time it was as stiff as never before.
A message appeared: "Not him either...".
The screen turned black again, and my sprite arrived in Viridian City. The music played normally, and the NPCs were in the right places.
I was incredibly glad, and thought that I was all done with the spooky stuff now.
I walked into the Pokémon Center and checked out my boxed.
I swallowed hard when I saw that there were only parts of Pokémon left in my boxed.
When I opened their info I heard a piercing, painful scream, and the even the bigger Pokémon were completely destroyed. I looked through all the Pokémon, but none of them had any HP or anything else left... The I finally got to something that made me freeze up once more – Creegia. I'd finally found it.
I was tearing up when I saw it.
Its sprite looked awful – the red eyes boring into my soul, and it was missing parts, blood was everywhere.
I was about to open its info when Creegia's head jumped out of the screen.
It almost scared me to death.
Then the screen turned black.
Greegia appeared once again, and I realised just how much I hated its red eyes.
Suddenly the screen flared up, and I could see the dismembered body of Mewtwo, Celebi, Suicune, Entei, Raikou, Latias, Latios, Groudon, Rayquaza, Kyogre, Jirachi, Arceus, Shaymin, and Deoxys. Hundreds of pained screams could be heard at one, and then I saw regular Pokémon such a Pidgey cut up into pieces on my screen. The awful screaming that was normally in the background could be heard the whole time now.
Creegia appeared again, and a message popped up: "Come and be my friend!"
Right after that I could choose between yes and no.
What would happen if I pushed no?
I remembered all the sprites I had just seen.
What would happen if I pushed yes?
I was too scared to choose, but it was clear that I had to pick yes or no.
I chose "no". The Creegia cried, and the screen flashed in all colours at once.
Then it was dark.
When I woke up again, I realised that I was lying on my bed, and that the DS had switched itself off.
Then I saw a trail of blood in front of my bed.
It lead out of my room, and I realised that my Lugia figure wasn't there anymore.
Unsettled from the experience, I crawled out of my bed, and left my room to follow the bloody trail.
It lead into the kitchen, and as I got down the stairs I heard a shrill squeal. I noticed that it was still dark outside, but I entered the kitchen anyway.
As I entered it I noticed that there was blood everywhere, smelling fresh, and Creegia's face had been drawn on the wall in blood. On the table stood the figure, but it had changed.
It didn't have a head anymore, and it was bloody.
My whole body started trembling, and tears welled up in my eyes.
There was another quiet scream that sounded as though someone was in pain, and tried harder to see what was in the darkness. I could have sworn I saw Creegia's red eyes.
I took a few more steps forward, only to realise I was crying.
I looked to the ground, and saw that the blood trail was leading directly into the darkness.
My heart was beating way too fast.
Then I felt something pass through my body.
