(DAY NINE)
There was a shortcut through the mountain between them and Azalea Town that was much quicker than taking the route over or around it. The shortcut was a tunnel through the Union Cave, slowly widened out by hikers and builders to make for easier passage. Lights had been hung up to highlight the direct route through so people would not get lost in the passages surrounding it. John had informed them all about the history of the page with his precious guidebook, claiming that there were exactly two hundred and fifty-one lights; this was intentional, he explained, as that was considered by most experts to be the number of Pokémon native to Johto and Kanto.
"We shouldn't need my torches then," John said, patting his backpack with one hand, "but I have them just in case."
"So we'll be prepared just in case every one of two hundred and fifty-one lights fails?" Nila said dryly.
"Exactly," John said.
The entrance to the tunnel was covered with a wooden sign that read 'UNION CAVE', but the paint was fading so, from a distance, it looked more like it said 'ION CAV'. Outside the Union Cave tunnel was a tall, robust man with hiking gear on. The man looked to be having quite a serious conversation with his Geodude, but he straightened up as soon as he saw them.
"Whoah," he said, raising both arms before him. "You lot ought to be careful if you're gonna be going through there." He jerked his head towards the tunnel. "A lotta people have been hurt in there recently."
"How?" John inquired.
"Well, I don't rightly know," the hiker said, scratching his dark beard, "but it seems to have been some sort of Pokémon attack."
The group exchanged glances. John didn't look phased in the slightest; he knew the wild could be perilous, but he'd known that when he'd left home. Nila and Kaida, too, were not too bothered, but they were more intrigued with the idea of a powerful Pokémon roaming about. Flo, however, looked twitchy and terrified; she didn't want to get attacked by the ferocious man-eater that the hiker had clearly just described.
"Well, we still have to go to Azalea Town," Kaida said decisively. "Besides, there are four of us and we have our Pokémon. We'll be fine."
The hiker shrugged. Next to him, his Geodude tried to mimic him, but this was a little difficult considering that Geodude didn't exactly have shoulders. "Well, go ahead then," the man said, "but make sure you stick to the lit up path. It's when people went exploring that the accidents seemed to happen."
"Trust me," Flo said, her voice jittery and rushed, "if I have anything to say about it then we'll be in that cave and straight out as soon as possible."
She shuddered strongly at the thought of ugly cave Pokémon that might jump out and attack her. They would be there in swarms, she thought, disgusted. She certainly hadn't been planning to go nosing around in the deeper, darker parts of the cave even if they hadn't been warned of these attacks. Straight in and straight out...
"Well, if you're sure," the hiker said.
"Of course I'm sure!" Flo squeaked. "Caves are evil, evil places."
"What are you talking about?" John demanded. "Caves are fun." His eyes shone with the usual fervour that he got when about to learn something new or exciting. "There is so much to discover! And all those rocks... those beautiful rocks..."
When everyone gave him funny looks, he cleared his throat awkwardly.
"Um," he said, coughing, "but this time I guess we'll just have to go straight through."
They thanked the hiker for the advice and turned back towards the cave. Flo lingered outside the entrance the longest, but once the others were in she scampered after them, eager to insert himself into the middle of the group where she could feel the safest.
A few of the lights were broken on the way, but overall visibility was all right. They were treated to a short lecture from John about how the lights were checked and replaced where necessary every fortnight by somebody from Azalea Town. It was in the town's interests to keep the lights up and the passage to Azalea open. While there were roads to Azalea, the passage was the best way for anyone walking, and Azalea did want more people to visit their town and bring in commerce.
Cyndaquil didn't like the dark, damp cave anymore than Kaida did. While Kaida wasn't freaking out like Flo – who had stuck herself firmly in-between John and Nila and jumped at every shadow – she much preferred the open air. Kaida would occasionally reach up to comfort Cyndaquil with a stroke down his back; a lot of fire-type Pokémon were unsettled by not being under the sun's rays and her little Cyndaquil was no exception. The same was true for Chikorita, who looked like she might be feeling worse; however, unlike Cyndaquil, Chikorita was trying to hide it and put on a strong front. In contrast, Nila genuinely seemed unaffected, but Nila's indifference didn't stretch to her Pokémon, and, after a short stretch of walking, she patted Chikorita on the head and recalled her to her Pokéball, giving the excuse that Mareep could use her electricity to light the way where Chikorita could not. Flo had her Wooper out, who unlike his trainer, was dancing along happily, quite pleased to be out of the heat in the cool expanses of the cave.
Meanwhile, John took happiness to a new level. He was ecstatic. On more than one occasion he whipped out his magnifying glass to inspect different types of rocks, and he often bemoaned that he couldn't take samples. He also looked like he might slope off down other, unlit paths a few times, but each time he caught himself and forced himself to continue onwards. When he was examining rocks, however, it was often Kaida and Nila who were forced to grab his arms and drag him away, which usually happened when Flo's whimpering reached a level that they could no longer stand.
Time seemed to pass strangely inside the cave with the lack of natural light. However, after a while, they were interrupted by a shrill shriek. Kaida looked at Flo. Her terrified gaze seemed to confirm it had not been her, and, besides, it had come from too far away for that...
"What was–" John began.
The shriek erupted from the depths of the cave again.
"I think it is coming from down here," John said, gesturing to one of the passages leading off to the side.
They peered into the inky darkness. John got out his bulky, metal torches and passed one around to each of them. He turned on his and used it to try to look for the source of the scream. He came up with nothing.
"We should go take a look," Kaida said.
"WHAT?" Flo yelped. "No, no, no," she wailed. "We can't!"
"Someone might be in trouble!" Kaida shot back. "We can't just leave them."
"We can go to the other end of the tunnel and call the police," Flo insisted. "If we go in there then we might get hurt, too, and then nobody will come to rescue us."
Kaida shook her head. "Who knows how long that will take?"
"Hmm," John said, speaking slowly as he considered their options. "Flo has a point, but so does Kaida..."
Nila snorted in laughter. The other three turned to stare at her.
"This isn't funny," John said, now affronted. "Someone could be in danger – someone who needs rescuing!" The thought seemed to appeal to a love of heroism, so Kaida thought he might be turning to her side of things rather than siding with the wimpy Flo.
"You're all idiots," Nila said. "That is not a human noise."
As if on cue, the shriek rang out again. Embarrassingly, it seemed like Nila was right. Now it sounded more like a crabby Zubat than anything else.
"Ah," John said, his face slightly flushed. "Oh well."
Flo breathed a sigh of relief. They would not be going into the uncharted, unlit parts of the cave on some foolish rescue attempt then.
"Come on," Nila said. "Let's move on."
But before they could leave, the shriek rang out again, and for some inexplicable reason, Wooper let out a trill of excitement and dashed down the passage towards the sound. John attempted to grab Wooper, but the small, blue Pokémon evaded him easily.
"Well, now we have to go down there," John said. He got up off the ground where he had fallen trying to catch Wooper and brushed off his knees. He wielded his torch like a weapon as he marched forwards in the direction that Wooper had run off in. He looked back once to say to Flo, "You can stay here if you want."
Flo seemed to consider it, but then realised she would be left all by herself. Besides, it was her Pokémon that was now missing. She scurried after the others, but she complained all the way.
Eventually, they had to stop running. They had lost track of the tiny Wooper in the darkness and didn't want to miss anything. John kept his torch directed at the floor while he instructed Kaida and Nila to point theirs ahead. He tried to instruct Flo, too, but she had a death grip on her torch and swung it around sporadically at every little sound, whether it be the distant sound of water dripping or the flutter of Pokémon deeper into the cave.
"Look," John said suddenly. "I think I see footprints."
He shuffled after them. It was difficult to tell if the footprints were Wooper's, however, as they hadn't spent too much time examining Flo's new Pokémon's feet. With a jolt, Kaida remembered that her Pokédex stored footprints of Pokémon – or at least footprints of the Pokémon that had been recorded; there was no such entry for rare Pokémon like Lugia. She pulled out her Pokédex and clicked to Wooper's entry. She held the device next to the trail John had found, but was honestly finding it a little difficult to tell if the footprints matched up. John took a look and even he seemed a little lost.
"Well, it looks close enough," he decided, "and it's not like we have another trail to follow."
The trail ended at a ladder. Ladders were more common in caves nowadays as hikers put them in to aid people in their exploration. However, one always had to be careful when using them, as John knew all too well from his extensive reading about surviving in the wild. They could easily weaken over time.
"Help me test it out," John said, putting a foot down onto one of the rings to test its strength.
"It looks quite new," Kaida said as Nila went over to help him, adding her own weight to the ladder.
"You have to be careful," John insisted.
John clipped his torch to his belt and then began to climb down. The ladder, thankfully, held.
"You want to go next?" Kaida asked Flo, assuming she'd want to be somewhere in the middle.
Flo looked even more horrified than before. She stared down the hole in the cave in absolute terror. She made several high pitched squeaking sounds before she recovered the ability to speak.
"You think he went down there?" she demanded.
Her voice almost as pitched as the squeaking had been. Kaida privately suspected it would soon reach a level that only dogs could hear. Or, unluckily, they would end up disturbing some Zubat, who would proceed to fly at them and would end up freaking Flo out even more.
"Why not?" Nila asked.
"It's a long way down!" Flo waved a finger at the hole and continued her hysterics. "Wooper is tiny!"
"Most Pokémon can land a lot better than people can," John called up from below. "Come on, hurry up. I think I hear something."
As if on cue, the shrieking noise from before rang out again. Flo yelped and threw herself towards the nearest solid mass, which turned out to be Nila. Nila, however, seemed to have anticipated Flo's reaction and she ducked out of the way just in time and Flo ended up flailing about in thin air.
"Oh for the love of Lugia," Kaida muttered.
Flo was clearly going nowhere soon so Kaida descended the ladder instead, not so magnanimously leaving Nila to deal with the hysterical wreck. Cyndaquil clung grimly to Kaida's shoulder tightly as they climbed down, but as soon as they were near enough to John, Cyndaquil leapt over to him instead. Only when Kaida reached the bottom of the ladder did he return.
Kaida looked up and called, "Nila? Flo? You coming?"
"In a second," Nila replied, sounding extremely irritated.
As Kaida stared upwards, John surveyed the area around them. They were on solid rock, but around them there were deep pools of cold, dark water. Dunsparce, John thought, would feel right at home. John even spotted a few stalagmites and stalactites; in fact, he was about to lecture Kaida about their formation in limestone when, out of the corner of his eye, he spotted a large, dark shadow moving steadily towards them. John swung his torch upwards just in time to see a blue head with an open mouth and a glow of–
"KAIDA. DOWN!"
John grabbed Kaida by her backpack and pulled her to the floor. Cyndaquil let out a small yelp of dismay as he, too, fell to the ground. They had moved just in time. A beam of ice shot over their heads and passed through the ladder behind them. When John glanced up, he saw the bottom of the ladder was completely covered in ice; there was no climbing down it now.
The Pokémon – and if John wasn't mistaken then it was a Lapras – opened its mouth again for a second wave. This time, Kaida rolled over into John and knocked him out of the way. John was then quick to pull them both to their feet, uttering only one word as he did.
"Run!"
Faintly, John could hear Nila yelling down at them from above, a frantic note to her tone, but he didn't dare waste a breathe replying: they had to slid over the slippery rocks whilst evading being struck by an Ice Beam attack. He and Kaida were skimmed by an attack – this time, thankfully, water – just before they threw themselves behind a pillar of rock to escape. The next ice beam broke two stalagmites next to them in half.
"I can't see a way out," Kaida hissed.
She hadn't had much time to look, admittedly, but when she swung her torch about all she could see was water.
"So we either beat this thing or get frozen down here," John muttered, summing up their position. "Why is a Lapras even down here?" he wondered. "I thought they lived in the sea!"
"It's not exactly the time to think of that!" Kaida said, smacking him across the head. "Focus!"
Kaida ducked her head out to look at the Lapras, but she couldn't see anything in the darkness. John pulled her backwards as an attack went skimming past her face.
"OK. So it can see us, but we can't see it..." Kaida murmured.
The torches weren't enough and they couldn't light a fire... but Kaida didn't need any of that when she had Cyndaquil.
"Cyndaquil, use Flash!" she ordered.
Cyndaquil leapt away from her and scrunched up his tiny face. A second later, his back was flaring and light was emitting from him, filling out the corners of the cavern. Kaida glanced around to take another look at Lapras. Now she could see it, she almost wished it were dark again. It looked like a normal Lapras in most ways; it had the huge, hard shell, and the long, arched neck. However, it had a frenzied look in its eyes and Kaida couldn't help but feel it was seconds away from literally frothing at the mouth.
"This thing is insane!" Kaida yelled. "Stupid water Pokémon!"
"We need to use everything we have," Kaida instructed John.
Even in their dire situation, John couldn't help but joke, "Dunsparce?"
"Obviously not Dunsparce!" Kaida flailed. "Just get Hoothoot and Totodile out here." She grabbed for her own Pokéball. "Go, Gastly!"
Beside her, John realised his own Pokémon and uttered instructions. Hoothoot went reeling over Lapras's head to peck at the back of the Pokémon's neck where Lapras could not reach her. Meanwhile, Totodile went dancing merrily around the stalagmites, quacking as he went, to divert Lapras's attention.
"Cyndaquil, use Ember from a distance," Kaida said, "but don't be caught by any attacks. Stay under cover!" Even if the attack didn't knock poor Cyndaquil out, it would probably blast him backwards into the water and then she'd have to dive in to save him. "Gastly, just... do whatever you can do get that thing's health down."
Gastly's eyes somehow appeared devious. The ghost Pokémon puffed himself up and then, with a little cackle, flashed a darker shade of purple. After the attack – whatever it was – he floated down, seemingly weaker, which meant Kaida could put all the pieces together: he had just used Curse.
"Good work, Gastly," Kaida said. "Use Night Shade if you can, but don't over exert yourself... we don't want you being hit now."
Gastly seemed to nod.
Lapras's health was slowly but surely draining away due to the effects of Curse. It was now more of a waiting game, Kaida thought. Eventually Lapras should tire out, but would they be hit by its powerful Ice Beam and get frozen by the ladder first? Kaida ducked her head out to watch Totodile prancing about, but saw Lapras was currently distracted as it was being electrocuted. Kaida's eyes shot to the hole where the ladder was. Mareep was poking its horned head down and sparking happily away. A few leaves, courtesy of Chikorita, came flying down, too. As soon as there was a pause and Lapras managed to recover, however, it shot an ice beam towards the hole that sealed it up completely. Kaida cursed under her breath. It looked like they wouldn't be getting anymore help from above; Nila didn't exactly have the firepower up there to melt that ice any time soon.
But Lapras was weakening, although this didn't mean the attack that hit Totodile looked any less brutal. Thankfully, being blasted into the water didn't hinder Totodile too much, and he quickly swam to shore and got up on the land again. He performed a mini dance of rage before he shot a Water Gun back in Lapras's direction. Lapras seemed largely unaffected by this, and it dove back under water again, only to emerge seconds later, resulting in a wave of water sweeping towards Totodile and knocking him off his feet.
"We need to get Lapras out of here," John said.
"You're still thinking about that?" Kaida exploded. "We have more pressing concerns!"
"It's a lot weaker now," John argued, "and I think it is only mad because it is trapped down here. One of us should catch it. We can set it free when we get outside."
He couldn't help but think about it even while they were in danger. How it had got down in the cave was a mystery, but his mind kept jumping to one conclusion. Someone surely had released it down there, which was an act of extreme cruelty. Who knew how long it had been stuck down in the cave, longing for the open water?
"Fine," Kaida groused. "You're buying me a new Pokéball, though – if it works or not!" Pokéballs were expensive, damn it! He wouldn't get out of repaying her.
She grabbed a Pokéball and stood up from their hiding place. She threw the ball at the Lapras and watched as the red enveloped it. Both John and Kaida crossed their fingers. If this didn't work then Lapras would probably wake up and go on another rampage. However, the ball stopped flashing. Lapras was caught. John got Totodile to collect the Pokéball and the blue Pokémon dashed over to return it to Kaida.
"A Lapras..." Kaida muttered. She'd never exactly thought she'd own a water Pokémon, no matter how temporary it was. She glanced to her other Pokémon. "Come on, Gastly," she said to her exhausted Pokémon. "Take a rest."
She would have liked to offer the same thing to Cyndaquil, who was panting lightly, but unfortunately she needed him to help melt down the ice blocking their exit. John recalled Hoothoot, but said Totodile could help with getting rid of the ice, too. Anything warmer would help melt it, so while a Water Gun attack might not be as effective as Ember, it would still help.
"Here, Kaida," John said, holding out an ice pick that he had just whipped out from his bag. "We can try to shatter it."
Kaida stared for a moment before accepting. How did he fit all of his things in that backpack? Yes, his bag was massive, but it didn't have infinite space!
From above, Nila had been chipping away ever since Lapras had sealed the hole up. Naturally, Flo had been no help at all; instead she spent her time nattering on about what they would do if Kaida and John were dead. Nila had developed such an intense eye twitch that she thought it actually threatened to dislodge said eye from her face.
"Flo!" Nila snapped eventually. "Shut up!"
Flo ignored her.
Nila eventually managed to make a small hole in the ice, and when she peered down it, she was relieved to see Kaida and John were both all right and were working to melt the ice at the bottom.
"No injuries?" she called down.
"Nope!" Kaida replied, looking up at her.
"Good," Nila said.
Suddenly, Flo shrieked. She grabbed onto Nila's back as she yelled, "WHAT WAS THAT?"
Nila swung her torch in the other direction and saw, most irritatingly, Wooper. He hadn't gone down the hole after all. Instead, he was cocking his head at them, looking very bemused.
"I can see Wooper," Nila said through the hole. "I'll be right back."
But as Nila approached Wooper, the little Pokémon ran off again. Nila looked back to see Flo dithering by the hole and her annoyance increased tenfold.
"Flo, get over here!" she ordered. "I need your stupid Pokéball to get Wooper back!"
Flo hesitated, but she did run over to Nila. Nila, with Mareep on one side and Chikorita on the other, hurried down the tunnel in the direction Wooper had gone in. It wasn't long until she saw an angry yelp, which she suspected might be the sound of a Union Cave native getting harassed by the inquisitive pain-in-all-their-behinds. She rounded a slight curve in the tunnel to see this was indeed the case: Wooper had climbed on the back of a now rather agitated Sandshrew. Eventually, Sandshrew managed to get Wooper off and it threw the other Pokémon to the ground. Before either Nila or Flo could do anything, Sandshrew's claws gleamed with a dark energy and it slashed at Wooper.
That was Night Slash. Nila had watched enough battles on TV that included dark Pokémon to know that. At this point, it didn't matter much that Sandshrew wasn't a dark Pokémon itself; it new a dark move and this was enough for Nila at the moment.
"Chikorita, use Razor Leaf!"
Sandshrew was caught off guard and the attack seemed to do a considerable amount of damage. However, Sandshrew wasn't down and out yet; it launched itself at Chikorita, scratching away at the Grass Pokémon. Chikorita managed to get away so she could fire another Razor Leaf. Sandshrew tried to use Night Slash to bat a few leaves down, but the majority hit and Sandshrew tumbled over backwards. Chikorita didn't wait for Sandshrew to recover; she tackled the other Pokémon as soon as it was up and sent Sandshrew reeling backwards. A third Razor Leaf seemed to do the trick; Sandshrew looked dazed enough. Nila took the opportunity to throw the Pokéball at it. The Pokéball flashed several times before stopping. Sandshrew was caught.
Wooper let out a whoop of delight.
"Flo!" Nila said crossly. "I just had a whole Pokémon and you still haven't returned Wooper to your Pokéball?"
"Ah, oops." Flo fumbled for her Pokéball and ended up dropping it on the floor. "Aack!"
Wooper, however, wandered over to her and nudged the Pokéball with his nose, returning himself to his ball. Apparently, he had had enough exploration and it was now time for a rest. Flo picked up the Pokéball, looking unreasonable triumphant, as if she had done something right. Nila bit back the urge to yell at her again and went to retrieve her new Pokémon.
"Come on," she said once she had clipped Sandshrew's Pokéball to her belt and had returned Chikorita to her ball for a rest. "We have to go back to Kaida and John."
By the time they got back the hole, the majority of the ice was cleared up. Kaida and John scrambled back up the ladder and Nila helped pull them up the last stretch.
"Can we get out of here now?" Flo said, her voice little more than whimper.
"Yes," Kaida said firmly. She was eager to see the back of this cave.
John looked a little disappointed but conceded. They returned to the main tunnel as quickly as they could and sped along it. John was still John, however, so did end up inspecting a few more rocks, but they managed to make reasonably good time, even if night was falling by the time they got to the other side so they had to assemble the tent in the dark in the tiny campsite south of the tunnel. John started on their dinner while Kaida and Cyndaquil helped teach Nila and Mareep the basics of Flash just in case they ever got into a similar cave-related incident again.
Tomorrow, Kaida thought after they had eaten their dinner and got into their sleeping bags, they should reach Azalea Town, which meant the next leg of the Pokémon League challenge: Bugsy. Her dreams that night were happily filled with Cyndaquil and Gastly defeating hordes of bug Pokémon, and in the end, they were dreams of her with a shiny new badge. She could hardly wait.