Guest, was I really that bad at hinting at Vivi and Carue? I sort of thought the Croconaw looked like a duck... And Cinders' blue hair would look like Vivi's. Ah, forget I ever mentioned it. But I'm glad Zoro was painfully obvious! ^-^


"Luffy, I don't think we can cross here." Gold tried unsuccessfully to pull his friend back to Violet City again. The odd tree was way out of their league, as none of the pokémon knew Cut yet.

The rubber boy grinned, pointing at the people behind him. "They said water would make it happy, right? So if Toto gives it water, it'll go away for us!" Silver wanted to slap the rubber kid.

"That's not the way it works. The tree is clearly a Sudowoodo; our PokéDex's say so! Pouring water on it will only make it mad, and it may attempt to fight us!"

Luffy frowned, thinking deeply about the matter. "We… shouldn't do that, then." Silver groaned, but his friend wasn't finished. "Why don't we just ask it to leave? There have to be better homes in the forest than here, in the middle of this path that everybody uses!"

"Unless it's just purposefully trying to be annoying," Gold muttered. The party slowly turned in unison to stare at the camouflaged pokémon. An eye opened in the middle of the fake trunk, glinting maliciously.

Luffy was just about to bust into it when Silver's PokéGear rang. "Howdy, guys! It's Joey! Remember my super-cool Rattata? My-"

"Die, worthless pokéman!"

"…What was that?"

Silver sighed. "Technical difficulties. Sorry, kid. Please don't call us again." *click*

"Hypo!" Hyperbeam got his two cents in with a Cut attack, which confused Gold and Silver to no end.

"Uh, doesn't he know more than four moves by now?"

Luffy shrugged, blasting the offending tree away with Gum-Gum Bazooka. "Who said he could only learn four moves at a time?"

Silver shook his head. "Ignore it, Gold. Legendary pokémon clearly have different training methods. Don't question it, or he'll only confuse you more."

"Come on, guys! Let's keep going!" Picking up his sleepy leaf child, Luffy strolled down the path, heading for the National Park. The three boys that would have tried to fight him were somewhat discouraged by the two pokémon stomping behind him, fists raised. Gold and Silver tried to look as though they didn't know Luffy, but they still received odd stares.

Hyperbeam wasn't helping, waving his leaf back and forth as he slept. Tall grass that Luffy got too close to were clipped away mercilessly. The people in the park inched away from the strange team, trying to avoid a battle… but Luffy challenged them anyway.

After acquiring several new phone numbers, the party marched down Route 35. The firebreathers on the path stood no chance against Toto, and Cinders took care of the other trainers. Hyperbeam had been poisoned somewhere along the line, and all Luffy was concerned about was reaching a PokeCenter.

"Look! There's one!" Soon after entering Goldenrod City, Gold pointed to a red-roofed building, and Luffy shot off. Two seconds later, a loud yell erupted from the small structure.

"YOU ALWAYS SAY THAT! I know what this place is, already! Heal my pokéman now, or I'll smash this place up!" Loud crashes could be heard from inside, and the two boys backed away cautiously.

"How about we just leave, and act like we never came here?" Silver suggested. Gold was happy to comply. Beating a hasty retreat, the trainers and their pokémon ran back to Route 36.

Luffy joined them some time later, sporting numerous cuts and bruises -and a cheerful Hyperbeam at his side. "Those ladies are so annoying!"

"I know, Luffy. But that doesn't mean you can wreck their PokéCenter," Gold chided. "They'll never let us back now! And I wanted to see the city I was named after so badly..."

Silver glared at Luffy, gesturing at the Sudowoodo that had jumped back into place as they'd returned -along with fifteen Sudowoodo friends. "Not that we can go back anyway, because someone made the "pokéman" mad!"

Luffy shrunk under their cold glares. "Sorry… But, Hyperbeam was dying!"

"For goodness' sake, Luffy! He would have recovered with one hit point left! And doesn't he knew any moves like Absorb?"

The rubber boy shook his head in confusion. "Why would be need to know… 'a sword'? That doesn't make sense, so I wouldn't let him teach himself that. Slash is enough for- ACK!"

Gold felt a little better after slapping Luffy in the face. While Silver took his turn, he redirected the pokémon to Route 32. Hyperbeam shook himself awake to get away from his abused trainer and follow Gold down the grassy path.

With two red handprints on his face, the pirate stumbled after his friends. "I get it, I get it! So you want him to learn a sword move… I'll let him, next time. But we already skipped the mega sword move…"

With four red handprints and three pawprints on his face, Luffy staggered after his rebellious crew, mouth tightly shut. He'd learned his lesson about opening it.

Trainers that dared to challenge the team were defeated in one-hit knockouts by the buff pokémon; Cinders' level 29 being their lowest. Gold had also received an Everstone from Professor Elm. He preferred Cinders as a small Quilava that could still perch on his shoulder, so the fire weasel was staying that way indefinitely.

Silver groaned suddenly, concerning his friends. "What is it?" The boy merely pointed at the PokéCenter around the corner, and Gold started laughing hysterically.

"C-come on, Luffy! I think I see Cebi in the trees over there…" He twisted Luffy's head the other way as the party passed the building, headed for Union Cave.

The rubber head pushed against his hands frantically. "Where? Where?! CEBI!" Gold felt a slight twinge of remorse for tricking the pokémon by reminding him of his lost friend, but he couldn't risk the destruction of another innocent PokéCenter. Luffy just didn't understand that the nurse clones were all different people, and had never seen him before in their lives…

"Who's Cebi?" Silver asked as he led the way into the cave. Luffy's eyes lit up, and he had the boy by the shirt before he could even blink.

"Cebi is my nakama. Cebi ran away. I miss Cebi. Find Cebi."

Gold pulled the pokémon away from the trembling redhead. "Stop, you're scaring him!"

"Find Cebi. Find Cebi." Luffy hugged Hyperbeam tightly, making the Chikorita's eyes bug out. "Cebi's green. Green like Hypo. Cebi has wings. Wings like Butterfree. Cebi has eyeballs, eyeballs like Cebi!"

Gold face-palmed. "Oh Arceus, what have I started..?"

"Eyes. Wings. Mouth. Green. Cebi is my friend, and she ain't mean!" Luffy sang, skipping along. It turned out that he'd just been trying to think up lyrics for a come-home song for the Celebi who may or may not have even been in the area. "Cebi likes tails! Slow-slow tails! Slowpoke, Slowpoke, eat up all the whales!"

"This isn't making any sense," Silver mumbled. "And they're called Wailmers."

Gold glared at the redhead. "We shouldn't have bought him that stupidly expensive snack."

"Yummy yummy tails, made from 'pokes and whales! Come home Cebi, and we'll read Silver's emails!"

Silver moaned, covering his ears with Cinders' long body. "Make him stop!"

"Actually, I think I'm enjoying this," Gold snickered, pulling his pokémon away from the suffering boy. "Keep going, Luffy. Throw in something that rhymes with 'said'."

The rubber boy nodded, casting his loud voice through the echoing cavern once more. "Hurry up, Cebi! I hope you're not dead!"

"Or else we'll have to feed you to this ugly redhead!"

Silver glowered at the two. "Would you guys just shut up?!"

"Hypo, hypo, hypo! Beam, beam, beam"

"If we don't shut up, the redhead will scream!" Luffy laughed, patting his Chikorita. "That was a good one, boy!"

Gold tapped him nervously, his lower lip suddenly bleeding. "Uh, Luffy?"

"I'll kill you!" Silver roared, jumping at Luffy next. The rubber kid yelped in surprise, barely having time to use Gum-Gum Balloon before the hit landed.

Gold watched them, bemused. "Luffy, how thumb you can use yer moveth out-thide of battle?"

"He's battling me, isn't he?!"

Silver nodded, rubbing his sore wrist. The impact against Luffy's rubber body had done a number on it. "I suppose that makes sense… but I sure wasn't expecting it at all."

"Thebi, come thoon! The redhead'th mad at me!"

"Toto, Toto! Croc-croc!"

"Cinders!"

"Hyper-ree!"

The bright pair of eyes watched the ongoings in amusement. But did the strange boy really want her back? He seemed more like he was having fun with the strange song… It wasn't a serious request... Right?

Gold's mouth had healed by the time they left the cave, but Cebi still hadn't shown up. Hyperbeam trudged sadly through the wet grass, indifferent to the rain. Toto was dancing, and Cinders was trembling from inside his dry pokéball.

The Quilava was happy to let Hyperbeam and Toto deal with the trainers, but as soon as he caught the scent of smoke from Azalea Town, he was out of his capsule in seconds. "Cin!"

"It smells bad," Luffy muttered, all traces of his boundless energy in Union Cave gone. "What are they burning, trees?!"

Hyperbeam was faring just as badly, if not worse. Gold attributed Luffy's problem to pokémon's eternal hatred of the destruction of nature, and Hyperbeam's to being a grass-type in the wrong place at the wrong time.

"Are you kidding?! It's great here!" Silver cried, tossing Toto into the air. "Death to the grass-type! Waters can sleep safe tonight!"

Luffy huffed at him. "You're a bad singer."

"He knows. He just wants to annoy you," Gold sighed, sweating from the heat. "I just can't stand this weather. First it was raining, and now it's all humid? They really need to do something about this!"

"Hey! Stay away from the well. It's dangerous down there!" A black suited man was pushing Luffy back up a gentle slope that led down to the famous Slowpoke Well.

Luffy quickly slipped past him, running down the slope. "Yummy, yummy Slowpoke tails! Eat 'em, Cebi! They're from whales!"

"Oh, you're after those things, huh?" A second oddly-dressed man popped out of the well. "People actually eat them?! ..Er, what I meant was, come on in! We'll let you have all you want if you join our cause!"

Luffy nodded eagerly while Gold and Silver face-palmed behind him. "What's your cause? Are you pirates, too?!"

"Nothing of the sort," the man scoffed. Seeing how Luffy was immediately turned off, he backtracked hastily. "I mean, of course we are! We're… the Team Rocket pirates!"

Luffy's eyes sparkled in excitement. "Can I be the captain?"

"Er, maybe, if you work hard for two years…" The man was kicked ten feet away by a rubber leg.

"NO! I wanna be captain NOW!" Luffy jumped down the well, leaving his friends looking at each other in bemusement and his Hyperbeam asleep on the ground.


Please don't ask how they bought Luffy a Slowpoke tail.… uh, Silver's father is really rich, and… the blasted redhead raided the cookie jar when he ran away!

[Edited: 8-14-18]

[Original Release Date: your mom]

Footnote: I left one weeaboo word in this chapter. It kind of fits.. All the others, I've been changing to 'friend', 'comrades', 'companions', etc. ...That should give you an idea of how bad it was.