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Chapter 8: Gotta catch a few
Ash was sitting in the Pokémon Center drinking a bottle of water, while he waited for Anabel and Brock to arrive. Brock had said that he would need a few hours to prepare for the journey and Anabel said she still had to get ready for her journey. They told Ash they would meet him at the Pokémon Center right after lunch. It didn't take Ash long to finish his meal and now him and Pikachu were waiting silently for one of the two to arrive. "Hey Pikachu, what do you think is taking them so long," Ash asked the small rodent. Of course, all Pikachu could do was try to aimlessly communicate to its trainer. It only took another minute for Brock to show up and make his way over to the anxious trainer.
"Hey Ash," the Breeder called to the Trainer. "Did I keep you waiting?"
"Nah, it wasn't so bad. I had Pikachu to keep me company."
"Well Ash, this will be your third time through Kanto, and your second time challenging the Kanto League. Do you think that more than just an adventure can be had from this journey?"
"What do you mean by that Brock?"
"Well, I mean that maybe after this you'll decide what you want to do with your life. You can't be travelling forever. You might decide to be a Gym Leader, a member of the Elite Four, or you may get the shot at being Champion. All I want to say is keep your options open. You might experience more than just Pokémon, like maybe a little romance, hmm."
"Uh Brock, I don't feel that way about you."
"W-W-WHAT, I DON'T MEAN ME!"
"Oh…well that's good," Ash stopped there, and there was a long awkward pause shared between the two friends. Finally Ash decided to break the silence with, "So, uh, who DID you mean."
"I was talking about Anabel," said the exasperated Brock.
"Oh," Ash stated nonchalantly. It took a few moments for what Brock said to sink in. "W-Wait Anabel," said Ash as the revelation dawned on him. He immediately began to make excuses such as, "I don't even know her that well, plus how do you even know she likes me." These were just Ash's way of hiding his feelings. In fact they were so well hidden, that Ash himself didn't even know he had them.
"Uh Ash, It's pretty obvious that she likes you."
"Now Brock, that's ridiculous. I don't to hear anymore on the subject." The two of them stood there for a short while in more awkward silence, until Anabel came into the Pokémon Center wearing her normal clothes, with the addition of a light purple satchel swung over her shoulder. She walked over to her new companions.
"Hey there you two," she greeted the two of them.
Ash eyed what Anabel was wearing. "Hello Anabel. Hey, don't you think that you should have changed into clothes appropriate for traveling." Anabel just stared blankly at Ash. "Uh, never mind."
"Okay then," Anabel said, "don't you think we should get this show on the road."
"Well we were waiting for you so, sure let's get moving," Brock stated.
The group talked for a little while longer until they finally walked out of the Pokémon Center. Unbeknownst to them, they were being watched by a certain disguised trio. Although their disguises consisted of only magazines held over their faces, it got the job done. As Ash and company left the Center, the male on the left said, "Jesse, they're on the move, what do we do now?"
"We follow them James," said the female who went by Jesse.
"Yeah, but we've been tracking the kid for so long now, can't we do something else."
"No, James, we now have direct orders from the boss to track the kid. I'm not happy about it either. Not that the order even came from the boss."
"Yeah, it came from that weird cloaked guy. Who does he think he is bossing around the boss?"
"He thinks he's the guy that Giovanni is indebted too, and he would be correct in that assumption."
"Okay, but what's the point of being a criminal organization if he just buys all of the resources and all actions have to go through him."
"Hey, while youse two are debating our new designation, the twoips are getting away," the third member of the trio finally spoke up. The two known as Jessie and James, first looked at said member, then at each other, and finally to where the twerps had originally been standing.
"Ah, Meowth," exclaimed Jesse, "why didn't you say anything earlier." But before Meowth could answer, he was being dragged away by Jessie, as they attempted to catch up with Ash.
Ash, Brock, and Anabel made their way through town toward the eastern exit. There wasn't much conversation going on, as Ash was recovering from the confrontation with Brock so he was walking a few feet ahead, and Anabel was nervously staring at Ash, all the while Brock could see the obvious feelings the girl had for him. Ash you idiot, why can't you see how she feels for you. Alright then, I guess it's up to me to play matchmaker. And so, the group all walked ahead silently, each one deep in thought.
They soon made it to the city gates, if you could call a sign that said 'Now Leaving Pewter City' a gate. The group was still quiet, until they heard a voice calling to them, specifically Ash. "Ash, hey Ash," the voice called from the path out of Pewter. Ash knew the voice to belong to Tracey. "I'm glad I ran into you Ash, you see we had this problem at the lab and a few of the Pokémon escaped."
"What, that's terrible," exclaimed the Trainer. "Did you get them all back?"
"Well that's the problem, we got all but one of them back," explained the Pokémon Watcher. "And that one just so happens to be yours."
"Well which one was it, Tracey," said Ash.
"It was Gible, we looked all over Pallet but we just couldn't find it, so we thought that maybe it had gone looking for you, so the Professor sent me to inform you of its disappearance. Keep an eye out for it and if you find it please let us know."
"I will, and the same goes for you too Tracey."
"Right, well I had better get back to the lab. Good seeing you again Ash," Tracey called back as he ran toward Pewter's southern exit. Through all of this, Brock and Anabel simply stood behind Ash, listening to what Tracey was saying.
Brock was the first to speak up. "Well Ash, should we start looking for Gible?"
Ash thought for a moment. "Nah, if what Tracey said is true and Gible is looking for me, then we'll run into him eventually. So until then, we'll just keep on our way and if we find him, good for us, if we can't, well it's not like he can't take care of himself."
"Alright Ash, it's your decision," said Brock.
The group fell back into silence as they walked out of Pewter and onward on their journey. Anabel took this moment to ask a question, "Hey Ash, how many Pokémon have you captured anyway."
"Uh, wow, let's see," Ash began to do a bit of math in his head. "I'm guessing around thirty-four, give or take a few.
"Whoa, that's a lot of Pokémon. I really envy you Ash. You've been able to travel around and catch Pokémon. I never got to have that experience."
"Wait, you never caught Pokémon before? But what about Espeon, Metagross, and Alakazam?"
"Well," Anabel began to turn red in embarrassment, "you see, Eevee was my first Pokémon, given to me by my dad, Uncle Steven gave me one of his Beldam, and Abra was a gift from Scott when I joined the Frontier. So you see I never had a chance to catch Pokémon."
"Man, Anabel, that's a real shame. Nothing feels better than catching and raising your own Pokémon."
Brock took this moment to begin sparking the two of them toward each other. "Hey, Ash, since you started on this journey, you haven't caught any new Pokémon have you," he asked Ash, who shook his head, "and Anabel you haven't caught any Pokémon, uh, ever," Anabel returned the same response as Ash, "then I propose a challenge between the two of you. Both of you go looking for Pokémon, and whichever one of you makes it back with a new Pokémon, doesn't have to help with dinner. What do you think?"
Ash, always up for a challenge, was eager to accept, but Anabel wasn't so confident. "Uh, I don't know Brock."
"Oh come on Anabel," Ash pleaded. "It'll be fun, and there's no better time to get experience then from the very beginning. Or are you just afraid you can't beat me?"
That was all the inspiration Anabel needed. "I don't think so. I think you're going down." Note to self, get better banter.
"Alright, if both of you are in, then you better get going, I'll be getting dinner started in an hour, so you have until then." Ash and Anabel both started running into the woods that surrounded the path. Brock just smiled to himself at how easy it was to get those two to loosen up. Brock just started a small fire to start making some tea while he waited for the two of them to return.
It had been twenty minutes or so and Ash was having no luck. It was like the forest was devoid of Pokémon or something. Ash, being the impatient guy he is, was just about to give up, when he began to hear a light chirping sound coming from the trees. Pikachu jumped off Ash's shoulder to stand the ground in front of its trainer. The chirping got louder and louder, until, finally, four Pokémon dropped from the trees. They were grey with brown claws and small green wings. Ash brought out his Pokédex to see what these things were. "Nincada, the Trainee Pokémon. It grows underground, sensing its surroundings using antennae instead of its virtually blind eyes."
"Well Pikachu, looks like we found what we were looking for." The four Pokémon continued to chirp louder and louder. Ash was just about to give an order to Pikachu, when the four Nincada stepped aside and a fifth one stepped into the clearing. But Ash noticed that something was different about this Nincada from the other four. The scales on this one were gold instead of grey. This took Ash by surprise and he was caught off guard when the gold Nincada began to charge toward Pikachu. "Pikachu, looks like we're fighting this one, now dodge." Pikachu was able to sidestep out of the way of the charging Pokémon just as it slammed its claw into the ground.
The two Pokémon squared off. Nincada charged its two claws as it once again ran at Pikachu. "X-Scissor, huh, well then Pikachu, answer with Iron Tail." Pikachu leapt into the air and charged its tail to full power and brought it down on Nincada. Nincada defended with its two already charged claws, with the attacks ending in a stalemate. Nincada chirped angrily at Pikachu and spread its wings out. They soon began to glow brighter and brighter. "Glowing body parts, now what attack does that again," Ash began to think long and hard until it struck him. "Pikachu, that's Solarbeam, get away from it."
Nincada spread its claws out and unleashed a powerful beam of solar energy at Pikachu. Luckily, the order to dodge got there just in time for Pikachu to dive to the side right before he was hit with the attack. "Pikachu, use Quick Attack." Pikachu sprinted toward the golden bug Pokémon and hit it directly in the face. It flew back through the air and it landed on its back. Ash saw this and took the opportunity to throw a pokéball at it. The ball came in contact with the Bug/Ground-Type, and drew it into the ball. It landed on the ground and began to shake violently, back and forth, back and forth, over and over again, until it finally gave out a small ding, signifying a successful capture.
The other four Nincada hung their heads and headed back into the woods. Ash ran over to the pokéball that contained his new Pokémon. He lifted it up, examined it a bit, then turned to congratulate his Pikachu for a job well done. Then, he began to make his way back to Brock, but he didn't get very far when he heard a scream, a loud blood curdling scream coming from the forest. It didn't take Ash long to figure out who was screaming, and he took off in the direction of the sound.
Ash ran and ran, toward where the screams were coming from, until finally he came to a small clearing in the woods and saw Anabel sitting backed up against a tree while staring ahead with evident terror in her eyes. She looked like she was clutching something but Ash couldn't tell what it was. Ash then looked at what had Anabel terrified. There was a pack of three Mightyena snarling at the terrified girl. Ash didn't really understand what was going on, but he could get an explanation later, now he had to help her. He leapt out in between the Mightyena and Anabel. She looked up to see that Ash had come to her rescue, she smiled slightly but she fainted afterward. The Mightyena snarled at Ash at bit but when they saw no fear in his eyes, they all fled.
Ash turned to see Anabel lying on the ground, unconscious. Ash knelt beside the girl and looked her over to see if there were any injuries. Finding none, Ash began to debate how he was going to get the girl back to camp. After a while he came to the conclusion that the best way to get her back was simply to carry her back. At the thought of this, Ash blushed slightly. He sat her up and picked her up bridal style. She was a lot lighter that Ash had anticipated, so he stumbled back a few steps. Once he regained his footing, he began to make his way back to camp. On the way back, Ash could swear he could smell flowers. He liked the smell but there weren't any flowers around the area. Ash once again blushed lightly when he realized that it was Anabel that smelled of flowers. Ash looked at Anabel and once again noticed that she was clutching something in her arms. He tried to see what it was but it was no use, her arms were blocking his view so he just brushed it off as something he'll learn later.
Ash was able to make it back to Brock without much trouble and once Brock saw the unconscious Anabel, he ran up to Ash to help him. They laid her on the table that Brock had set up. After Brock had given her a quick checkup, he turned to Ash with a few questions, none of which Ash had the answers to. He simply told Brock what he saw, and that they would have to wait until Anabel woke up to get the full story.
They were sitting on the ground around the fire, and Ash was frequently looking up at Anabel to see if she was waking up. Brock took notice of this action and smiled lightly at his close friend. Unfortunately, this moment was broken with a large snap followed by three thuds. Ash and Brock turned to see what had happened, only to see Team Rocket piled on the ground. "Oh, come on," said an irritated Ash, "you three are still stalking me? When will you get the hint that you can't win."
The trio jumped up from the ground and Jessie said, "We are not stalking you."
"But Jessie, I thought we were stalking him."
"Shut it, James," Jessie told her blue haired companion. Turning her attention back to Ash, "It doesn't matter anyway. It's not like we want to do this, but we have direct orders not to steal your Pokémon, so you can rest easy knowing your safe, at least for now."
"Jessie I have a question."
"What is it now James?"
"Normally Meowth won't shut up, why isn't he saying anything."
"Maybe because the writer can't write in a New York accent."
"Did you just break the forth wall?"
"By saying 'the forth wall' you break the forth wall, James."
"That's not very nice Jessie."
"Pikachu, thunderbolt."
"Yeah what he sa—wait what." The trio looked up just in time to see a large bolt of electricity headed toward them. And in unison they said as they flew off into the distance, "Team Rockets blasting off again," ding.
After that, Ash and Brock heard a bit of stirring behind them, and they turned around to see Anabel sitting up with a dazed look in her eyes. The two of them ran over to the girl. "Where am I? What happened? Last thing I remember was being attacked by some Pokémon and then it all went fuzzy."
"Well as for where you are, you're back at camp. As for what happened, Ash here rescued you from a pack of wild Mightyena."
"M-Mightyena, did you say Mightyena."
"Yeah, could you tell us what it was all about?"
Anabel bit her lower lip in embarrassment. "S-Sure," she began to explain the whole situation, "I was walking around looking for some wild Pokémon, when that pack of Mightyena jumped out at me. Had it been a pack of any other type of Pokémon I would have been fine, but the Dark-type just simply terrifies me."
"Why is that, Anabel," asked a concerned Ash.
"Well, as you know, I have the ability to read the minds of Pokémon, so when I look at them I can almost automatically read its thoughts. It's just that the thoughts of Dark-type Pokémon are evil, especially wild ones. Those horrid images that run through they're minds, no one should ever have to see that." Anabel began to breakdown into tears. After a while, the tears subsided and she looked up at her two new friends and smiled.
After the small fiasco, Ash decided to ask the question that's been on his mind from the beginning. "Uh, Anabel I do have one question. What have you been clutching this entire time?"
Anabel looked at Ash, blinked a few times, and then looked down to see what Ash said was true, she was indeed tightly holding onto something. "Oh, I remember, when I backed up against that tree, something fell out. I didn't even know what it was, but I guess I was just holding it instinctively." Anabel suddenly felt the object in her arms start to wiggle around. She released her grip on the object, and out popped a large acorn with feet. It spun around a bit, and then fell over, its eyes in swirls.
"Hey, that's a Seedot," said Brock, "but it looks exhausted, probably from you holding it in that death grip."
Anabel picked up the small Pokémon and examined it. "I think it's kind of cute. I think I'll keep it." And with that, Anabel drew out a Pokéball from her satchel and gave it a light toss at the Acorn Pokémon. After a short while there was a small ding sound heard.
Ash leaned over to Brock and whispered in his ear, "Do you think we should tell her what Seedot evolves into?"
"Nah, let's let her figure it out."
"So Ash," said Anabel, "did you catch anything?"
"Hm, oh yeah," Ash drew out his newly caught Pokémon and released it into the world. The golden Nincada greeted the world with a loud chirp.
Brock was astonished. "Whoa, a golden Nincada, I've never seen this before. It must be really rare. You're one lucky guy Ash."
Anabel stared at the Pokémon. "Uh, Ash, your Nincada doesn't have much of a personality."
"Why do you say that?"
"Cause all its thinking about is 'bananas'." At this everyone burst out laughing. Once everyone had calmed down, Ash reminded Anabel that since she lost the challenge, she had to help with dinner. After a bit of arguing, Anabel decided to just give in and help. The group enjoyed a hearty dinner and then they headed off to bed. But, the night is just beginning and what waits in the shadows for our heroes. What waits for them tomorrow? Stay tuned and find out.
To be Continued
I AM SO SORRY THIS TOOK SO LONG. But please let me explain. First I would like to say that in the last authors note I had a lot more info that I went blank on when I was writing it. That being said, this will be a bit longer than usual. Okay, so on the fourth of October, my school sent my class on our class trip so I had no way to even think of writing. Then when I got back the following weekend, I was dead tired, so I didn't really have the inspiration I would need to write. Then this past week, my teachers pile on two week of homework saying that because we missed a week, we had to make the work up. So Saturday came and I was ready to write, and my Microsoft Word crashes. So I come back today, October seventeenth, and I have finished the next chapter. I hope that explains why it took so long and you don't need to point it out to me…please.
The other point I completely forgot last time was that I was going to explain how I connected Anabel and Steven as being related. I kind of scratched it in this chapter but I just want to clarify. Anabel and Steven are from the same region. The only way to ever get a Metagross in-game is to get a Beldam from Steven, this is how it is in every game…to my knowledge. Anabel has a Metagross, which she must have gotten from Steven if we go by game logic. Lastly, Anabel never really traveled in my story, so she couldn't have won against him and earned his respect so he must have given it to her for another reason. And that's my explanation…yeah.
Alright now onto this chapter. I really enjoyed this one. It had some good humor and some good shipping material (though I may be pushing it with the bouldershipping jokes). Also, about the cloaked man, I will continue to build his character throughout this whole fanfic, but he won't be revealed until much later (but feel free to keep guessing, here's a hint: He isn't an OC). That's all I have to say about the chapter.
This is my final anoucment point (sorry this is taking so long, but if you are reading this after Halloween 2010, go ahead and skip this paragraph if you want to). What I was thinking, and this was just on a whim, was I wanted to do a Halloween Special. But I don't want to do Abilityshipping (gasp). I really want this to be my main ability fic for now. So what I want to know is what other pairings (besides AshxAnabel) do you guys like. Put it in your review somewhere and I will either pick the one that gets the most picks or the one that I think would be the most fun. Just a few rules if you want yours picked: 1. It can't be yuri, yaoi, or with a Pokémon, 2. I will probably only consider Ash pairings, but i do accept crack pairings, 3. It has to be put in the review section for me to count it. Yeah that should be everything. ( I just hope this works like I want it too)
And finally, I would once again like to ask you guys to review this chapter as after all this time I hope I haven't lost your love.
Sincerely yours,
The Twitch E. One
