THE GIRL AND THE LUGIA

By kathlaida-princess

Summary: In order to bring his best friend back to the world he knew, a boy has to make a sacrifice and change into the most beautiful creature, the Sea Guardian itself, so that he could find out the reason why she left in the first place and he could tell her how he really felt inside… However, when the boy is kidnapped by a Pokemon Collector, things get complicated, as the girl must return the boy's love for him to be human again before it is too late.

With the special appearance of Lugia, my favorite Pokemon!

I sure hope you like it!

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the Pokemon characters nor the places in the Pokemon World. And I don't own Friends either. If Friends belonged to me, Ross would keep his monkey Marcel. Blah, blah, blah. But I hope you enjoy this, though.

Author's Note: Hi again! I hope you didn't have to wait much for this chapter! As I always do, I want to thank my reviewers Lost Yoshi (what Chandler meant was to tell him what he was supposed to do the following days, like training, so I guess it should be "I really wanted to talk about what YOU'RE GOING TO DO here". I'm sorry about it and thank you for correcting it. Of course Karen still has a small grudge against Daniel! He let her down when she most needed him! But their friendship was beyond of what you think, they had grown up together, they were like Kim Possible and Ron Stoppable, Takeru and Hikari, so she cared about him more than she hated him. Since Lugia is such a special Pokemon, she wanted to give him a special name, and she found similarities between this Pokemon and her best friend, so I can't see what's the problem with that. About your third question, I believe that if you raise well a Pokemon, you'll be linked by a special bond and amazing things can happen. If Meowth was able to learn to speak in the name of love, than Karen's Pokemon can learn to speak too in the name of a powerful friendship. Daniel knew his friend well, he knew she thinks like me and he knew that if Karen got a Pokemon, they would probably end up being so close they would speak the same language, which happened. Thanks for correcting the mistake about the young Lugia, I noticed it didn't sound that good, but I couldn't come up with something better. My fault. I wanted to give the villain his real name, but I thought they never named him in the movie. Thanks for telling me his name and thanks for your review!), BlackRainWillFall (I'm glad you like this story, and your reviews really made me happy lately! I feel great knowing that at least someone really likes what I'm writing! I should name a character after you… I think my next Pokemon fic will be about a Charizard, and I can give your name to his best friend if you want! Oh, Ross's second marriage! I loved that episode, but I was seeing that coming! Now, I haven't seen all the episodes yet (here in Portugal, they're still showing the eighth season) and I laugh like crazy in all the episodes, but some of my favourites have to be the one with Ross's sofa (the one that got destroyed in the end), the one where Joey had to wear these weird blue braces and Chandler got a girlfriend that screamed in her sleep (specially the last part of that episode), the one when Rachel and Ross got so drunk they got married, the one when Ross had this funny British accent and the one with the Unagi thing. But I could ramble about Friends for hours and hours! If you want to talk about it, you can always e-mail me to paulamoura3sapo.pt, and I won't shut up for a while! Thanks for your reviews!), GoBulbasaur (I'm glad you like it, thanks for correcting the mistake, but I always thought the Pokemon World was on Earth too…) and Foxyjosh (yes, Vulpix are really cute and the Pokemon World does have its wonders! I'd rather stay there too. Maybe Daniel's mind will change with time, too… I'm glad you like it!). The ones who got this far, keep reading, keep reviewing, and make me a happier person! Thanks for your time. On with the story!

CHAPTER 7

I CAN FLY!

As Joey, Phoebe and Chandler went with Karen to start building Daniel's new home, the Lugia and the others went to the backyard. There, Chandler said: "Well, we can't give you our lessons at the same time, so you'll have to choose which one of us you want to train with first. The rest of us will be waiting then."

Daniel looked from Rachel to Chandler and from Chandler to Ross. According to Chandler, Ross wasn't much of a teacher and was quite boring when it came to lessons, so Daniel decided he would be last. Then, he faced Chandler and remembered he would help him with the swimming part. But the Lugia was still a bit scared of his last interaction with the element. Therefore, Daniel thought it would be best to start with Rachel and learn to fly as soon as possible.

"I had better get used to my wings first. I mean, what's a Lugia without its flight? I'll come to you next, guys," he said.

"Yeah, I'd too rather learn to fly with Rachel than learn to drown with Chandler," Ross retorted sarcastically.

"Well, at least, I'm not teaching him to be more aware with screams of 'DANGER! DANGER!'!" the Typhlosion answered.

And Ross had no answer for that, so he just sent his partner an evil look. Rachel whispered to Daniel's ear: "Don't worry, they're at this all the time, but deep inside they really care about each other. You know, it was Chandler's fire when he was a Cyndaquil that made Ross's egg hatch. Since then, they developed a very special friendship. Shall we go now?"

"Yeah, I think so…"

And the two flying Pokemon went away, leaving the two brotherly friends behind.

Daniel got fascinated with Rachel's training zone: every perch, every obstacle and every wide open space caught his attention. He needed to focus a lot to keep his mind on the Pidgeot's speech, who was standing on a perch opposite from him.

"Right, first of all, I need to make sure you know what it takes to fly…" Rachel started.

"A pair of wings?" Daniel hesitated.

"Of course, but that isn't all. You also need an aerodynamic body, something serving you as a helm and the ability to work with it all without a mistake. It was a great evolutionary step when Pokemon learned to fly and it still isn't that easy. Sure it takes a lot to fly, but the emotions you feel and the utility it has make it worth it. So, to start your first lesson, I want to know what your mother has thought you till now."

Daniel found himself in trouble. He wasn't too fond of lying to his new friends, but he had no other choice, so he turned his head away from Rachel and answered: "Huh, I never got the chance to learn much from my mother…"

"But that's strange… How did you manage to survive all this time and why do you need lessons if you did survive?"

More difficult questions… "Well, that's a long story… Let's just say that I always lived on dry land and now I think it's time to become a Lugia like the others and fly and swim, and that was what I was trying to do when I got here…"

Rachel wasn't much convinced with the answer, but she could tell it was hard to survive without one's mother as she was caught as a little Pidgey and learned everything she knew with Karen. "Okay, honey, if you don't want to talk about it, I'll just start from the beginning. Wings are the most important thing in a flying creature. It's the type of your wings that will define the way your flight looks like. Curiously, your wings are adaptable, and you can position them in many ways. Like that, you can glide, you can fly really fast and you can nosedive fast too. It's my job to tell you when it's best for you to use any of the flights I mentioned before and how can you use them. But first you'll have to learn how to take off properly. Besides, before you can fly, you must first get off the ground. I want you to flap your wings quickly".

Daniel did as the other said, but the result wasn't that good… Sure his body hovered some inches from the ground, but he couldn't get higher and the wing-flapping was exhausting. He soon gave up and landed with a great smash on his back. Rachel tried her best not to laugh. Did she look that dumb when she was learning to fly? She came to the ground next to him and helped him out with her feathery head.

"You okay?" she asked.

"I'll be fine, I just fell…" he answered, a bit embarrassed.

"Don't worry, it was quite good for your first try! And I'm sorry about something. I forgot to tell that you Lugias need much more thrust to take off than what we Pidgeots need. Since you can't run, try to jump with your hind legs. That should do the trick."

Daniel remembered he did that to fly for the first time, so he followed her advice. This time, he just made sure he wasn't anywhere near water. Then, he jumped and flapped his wings madly. He got a bit higher than before, but he got tired from the effort again and eventually stopped flapping his wings. However, as his wings were completely outstretched, he glided slowly to the floor, allowing him to rest a bit. From bellow, Rachel yelled: "Now flap your wings again! Get a bit higher!"

He flapped his wings again, but this time it was much easier and he got much higher. He repeated the process several times and started flying around the training zone in circles, as the other Pokemon stared at him from bellow. He got so high he couldn't see their reaction, but he could feel the same joy from before inside him and, once again, he let it all out with his magnificent song.

Rachel joined him immediately, praising his instinctive abilities, and showing him the different types of flight he could perform.

"First, let's try to glide. I know you can do it quite well, but you must learn how to do it longer, just in case you need to stay up in the air for some time and need to save as much energy as possible. I want you to stretch your wings completely and open your hands the most possible. This will increase the air resistance and you can float better that way. Now, let's find a place with good upwelling spots. This way you don't need to flap your wings to stay in the air. Try it out!"

The Lugia did it and flew higher to find that good spot Rachel mentioned. He was so high he could see the whole forest, Marion's village and the entire extension of the sea around him. Some time later, the Pidgeot leveled with him and said, already panting from the effort: "Uff, they say we Pidgeots can fly high, but I'm sure they've never seen a Lugia flying! You're doing pretty well, honey! I think it's time to show you how to nosedive!"

Now, Daniel had been eager to do that since he became a Lugia, but he was afraid he made a mistake. This time, he would fulfill his dream…

"You just need to fold your wings back, turn upside down and let gravity pull you down! And, of course, enjoy it!"

And he did enjoy it! He dived so fast that he couldn't keep his eyes open any longer, his heart thumped so fast he thought he would die of a heart attack right then. And he still wanted it to last forever.

However, good things don't last much, and Daniel found himself too close to the ground too quickly. He was about to panic when he remembered to open his wings widely, making a parachute-like effect. Then, with the remaining energy of the nosedive, the amateur Lugia flew really fast, close to the tree's tips, and singed again. This time, Rachel took more time to catch up with him.

"Honestly, I can't tell who's teaching who anymore…" she said. "I think there's nothing more to teach you! As long as you train everyday, you'll be perfect in no time! I'm just a bit jealous of you, but after all, you're a Lugia…"

Daniel just smiled and flew towards Karen's house to land safely. He even got perfect at that! Rachel said goodbye with a wave of her right wing and the Lugia left for his swimming lesson with Chandler. THAT should be interesting…

END OF CHAPTER

Ta-dah! Another chapter finished, more fun time spent! This chapter was actually quite easy to write, since I've been quite happy lately (thank you, dear reviewers).

I hope you enjoyed reading it and I'm counting with your dear reviews! This time, I'm sorry I didn't put much of "Friends-ness" in Rachel, but I promise, BlackRainWillFall, that she'll cause some of her usual troubles!

In case you're wondering, I love to describe all Lugia's flights because I'm most fond of flying creatures, especially golden-eagles, and being a bird lover, it's quite fun for me to write about Lugias flying (oh, how I wished I could fly too…).

I think there's nothing more to say about it… Please, review and see ya next chapter! And while you're waiting for it, check out my other fic!

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