Chapter 4:
Chase squinted as snow battered her face, her cloak ripping in the wind behind her. She tightened her grip. Her knuckles were bright red and numb.
Lucky Bulbasaur, I'd kill to get to sit in a poke ball and have someone carry me up these stupid mountains for me. She thought grudgingly.
The only things she could see in front of her were the manes and tails of the Rapidash and Charizard's tail flame from above. Her father always rode Charizard just in front of the rest of Pallet so everyone knew where to go, barking orders from the sky. It'd been just around four hours since they started through the Indigo Mountains and everyone was running out of steam. It was frigid, no one could see where they were going, and the snow swallowed their legs with every step, packing their shoes tightly with snow.
"There's a small cave up ahead that we can rest in, okay everyone? Just keep going!" Her father boomed, his voice barely audible through the howling wind.
Relief flared throughout the crowd. A new energy filled Chase at the idea of getting out of the blizzard, curling up next to her father's fire Pokémon and getting a good rest. Charizard's tail flame swerved to the left, as did the villagers. Her father began to lose altitude until he was barely hovering above the snow.
"Come on everyone, let's move it!" He shouted.
Chase hugged the cloak closer to herself as she tried to move faster. A steep hill had been slowing their paces for what seemed like ages, many slipping with every step they took.
Chase heard a panicked shriek, quickly recognizing it to be Caitlin. She whirled around and saw the brunet struggling to keep a slipping Rapidash on its hooves; the sacks full of supplies weighing the fire horse down.
"Hang on!" Chase shouted, tying her cloak around her waist and racing through the loose snow.
Caitlin shot her a pleading look as she tugged at Rapidash's reins. Realizing she'd never make it to her before the Pokémon would drag her down the mountain, she threw herself into the snow, barrel-rolling down the hill. Others started to try to get to Caitlin, but Chase was quicker, getting up a few feet in back of Caitlin and Rapidash. Caitlin's arms were clearly tiring and Rapidash's strength was wilting away. Gritting her teeth, Chase roughly knocked the older woman aside, taking the reins. Caitlin laid in the snow, her eyes wide in horror.
At the sudden change of tenders, Rapidash panicked, its red eyes turning into terrified round spheres. The fire horse reared, the snow beneath its grounded hind legs giving out and Chase being thrown into the air, her hands still tightly gripping the reins. The Rapidash gave an eerie scream as it fell back into the snow, its mane licking at Chase's arms. She yelled in both pain and surprise as she too plunged down the hill. Out of panic, Rapidash rolled to the right, heading directly towards a drop off. Chase awkwardly stuck one leg out in an attempt to stop herself and Rapidash. A horrid snapping sound filled her ears and pain shot up her leg.
They rolled off the edge and took the plunge.
XXX
When she awoke, her vision was slurred and she was half submerged in fresh snow. Chase started wriggling her fingers, staring at their blurry shapes as she began to recover from the initial shock. She still couldn't quite comprehend what exactly had happened.
Am I dead? She wondered.
The girl shivered, her question answered. She could feel. Her breath billowed around her face and snowflakes gently landed in her open eyes.
"Hello?" She weakly called.
Nothing. Chase shifted around, feeling uncomfortable. Her hands felt the snow beneath herself. Her eyes widened. She rolled off of what she had thought was snow and stared at the area. Everything started coming back to her; the small pilgrimage, the snow, the Rapidash. She now knew how she survived. Chase had landed on Rapidash.
She further examined the fire type. It was dead of course, its mane and tail fire snuffed out and its legs vaguely resembled a pretzel. Its red eyes were half closed, as though it died mid-blink and the mouth was still twisted in a never ending scream.
She flinched at the sight, her breathing quickening. Chase forced her attention away from Rapidash and she began examining herself. Her arms were scorched and her right leg that she attempted to stop the roll with was horribly twisted. She assumed that her face was flamed as well. Chase felt no pain due to the intense cold numbing the broken leg and burnt arms. However, she still had her cloak tied around her waist and the supplies that Rapidash had fallen with hadn't fallen far. Chase began to get over the shock of falling and sat up, blinking the snow out of her eyes and taking in her other surroundings.
"Hello?" She called again, her voice muffled by the immense amount of snow.
She strained her ears, hoping to hear someone that had heard her. Chase sighed. She knew everyone probably assumed the fall killed her. The girl was all alone in the middle of the Indigo Mountains, crippled and injured.
Her eyes suddenly widened and she gasped, "Bulbasaur! Oh thank Arceus I caught you!"
Chase groped through her pockets for the pokeball. As soon as she felt the poke ball relief washed over her that it hadn't fallen out, she grasped the sphere and released the grass type.
"Bulb…" It complained, shivering at the cold.
"Bulbasaur, I need help. Please, take this," she said, reaching back into her pockets and felt for another poke ball, pulling an empty one from her pocket. "Battle and catch anything that could signal help."
"Saur." Bulbasaur nodded, accepting the empty quick ball and running away into the snow without a question.
Chase stared after her Bulbasaur, watching as it became nothing more than a dot in the distance. Her gaze turned to Rapidash and drug herself through the snow and rested her arms on the corpse, scanning the snow for the supplies. She'd just seen them. Chase spotted one of the brown straps sticking out from under the snow. With a grunt of effort Chase managed to grip the strap with her fingers, tightening her grip and yanking it free. Chase sat back in the snow and laid the travel bag out on the body, yanking at the leather that held it closed. She tumbled back when it finally opened. Chase immediately sat back up, digging through the bag.
She gave a sigh of relief; there wasn't any jerky, but there was four blankets spun from Caterpie string lined with the fuzz of some fuzzy plant that grew in the Viridian forest. Chase couldn't quite remember its name.
She wrapped her cloak around her body first, then the four blankets. Stuffing her queasy feelings about Rapidash down, she curled up beside it out of desperation to get whatever body heat the beast had left. Her finger tips were blue now. She assumed that her lips were too. She covered her face with a blanket and forced herself to stay awake, knowing that if she slept she wouldn't wake up. The blankets were still ice cold, but it felt nice for her to be shielded from the snow.
Her breath snaked around her face. She forced herself to think of happy memories, trying to convince herself that she'd live.
Chase sucked in another ragged breath, her eyes narrowed in concentration.
Stay awake… fight through it, you've made it this far. What would Grandma think if I went down like this? Keep fighting… C'mon, Chase… She coached herself.
Chase could practically feel her leg swelling. The throbbing was torturous, tormenting her. She clenched her fists, watching brightly as some of the color returned to her fingers. She unclenched her fists, her color draining.
Chase's heart suddenly sank when she realized she forgot an important detail to her surviving: Bulbasaur was a grass type.
"Damn it." She muttered, knowing she may have just sent her Pokémon to its death.
"So this is how it ends, eh? Dying in the Indigo Mountains, slumped up against a dead Rapidash. Lovely."