Pidove - the Tiny Pigeon pokemon
Such a fine day today - the sun is shining down with its warm golden rays, the soft breeze is refreshing my whole body. I can spot some clouds, but they don't seem like they want to threaten with rain. The forest around me is enjoying the day as much as me. I wonder what could be better.
"Pidove! Are you even listening?!" a sharp and loud voice reaches my ears and I turn back. "I said use Gust!" a young boy seems as angry as an enraged Tauros.
Oh, that's right - he caught me and now I'm battling a mere Wurmple. But I don't think I landed a single attack yet. Oh well, it's never too late to start.
I flap my wings and take flight. The wind hits me stronger than on the ground, but it doesn't loose the nice feeling. Even a little bit higher I can feel how the sunlight is getting stronger. The sound of a rustling forest from the calm breeze only then fully reaches my ears. A nice scent of Oran Berries can also be picked up. So beautiful.
"PIDOVE!" someone shrieks. I turn back again and see how red my trainer's face is. One more second and he'll start letting out steam.
Well, I think I should get this over with. With a few flaps, I send a wind towards the Wurmple. I understand that the one I created is stronger than the breeze today, because I can almost see the wind from my wings. They look like long knives flying through the air.
The Wurmple faints immediately and I smile and gracefully land on the ground. The world seemed to get smaller when I lost the height.
"Finally! Now listen here, you...you," my trainer probably can't think of great words to praise me with. "That's it! I don't need a pokemon like you!" he takes my pokeball and throws it on the ground. As it didn't break, he stomps on it.
Oh look, I'm free again. For the third time I didn't even leave my native forest after being captured. How strange is that.
"Bye," I smile, warmly coo and fly off.
The forest is such a nice place. The summer air brings it such lush greenness. The air always smells like ripe berries and everyone is enjoying the sunlight.
I get back to my flock that lives near a pretty pond. Many Pidoves, somewhat less Tranquill and a few Unfezant think of this place (the lake and the trees around it) as home. So do I, though I think the whole forest is my home.
This is a rather remote place. Trainers usually don't come here, so I need to fly further away from here to meet those human beings. The rest don't want to be caught and stay hidden. It's a somewhat sanctuary for us here, where other species pokemon and people aren't really allowed.
But it gets so boooring.
"Released again I see," my best friend, a Pidove named Pio gets off a branch, starts flapping his little wings and joins me in returning to the sanctuary.
"Yeah. I helped him all I could," I chirp cheerfully.
"...Dio, don't you think it's kind of weird you get released almost after the first battle when you were freshly caught?" Pio inquires and a breeze flows through us.
"No, not at all," I smile. "Oooh, I see my nest. See ya later, Pio," I wave with one of my wings while still trying to fly and turn to my nest, hidden in one of the trees of the sanctuary. I hear Pio stops and flaps in one place for a bit. Then flies off to another direction. His nest is further than mine after all.
My nest is great. It is mostly made of branches and leaves and though there isn't much room, it's enough for a single Pidove, while others have families and have to share one nest.
But my nest is unique. I always find strange things that I bring home - colorful beads, strange pebbles, anything that catches my eye really. I even have a shiny, azure gem that one of my previous trainers lost. I think it fell out of her right ear or something, because she had another one just like it in her left.
Of course she won't find it here, but I know just how to use it - I'll give it to Piva as a sign of my love.
Piva is the most beautiful Pidove I ever laid eyes on. Her silky grey and black feathers always shine when the sunlight reaches them. Her eyes have the most beautiful golden tone, her black beak is always clean and she always wears the cutest pink ribbon on the side of her head.
Of course, I wasn't the only one after Piva's heart. Many Pidoves tried, even a few Tranquills, but she turned all of them down. But I believe my chance has come and after the Pitrazant meeting, I'll give the azure gem to her.
But it's still long before the meeting. Maybe I should go and wash the gem in the lake? Yeah, that's a good idea.
I pick it up with my beak, look around, to be sure that Piva doesn't see me and dive down from my nest and turn towards the lake. Luckily, most of the pokemon living here where occupied about finding a sacrifice to give in the meeting. I already had it - a dark blue pebble that seemed to shine like the night. I found it while I was walking around another lake, almost at the edge of the forest.
I slowly let the azure gem down and wait until the tiny waves, moving from the soft breeze, calmly wash the jewel. Even in the blueness and purity of the lake, the beautiful color of the gem stands out and shines like a gorgeous star. My eyes sparkle as I look at it, I can feel it.
"Hey, hey, hey! What ya got there, Dio?" a familiar and rather evil voice rumbles behind me and I know I have to fly off.
I quickly pick the gem out of the water and flap my wings as hard as I can. I reach the treetops pretty fast, but I hear flapping behind me. My quest is obvious and they know my gift for Piva will work, so they want to get that chance for themselves. Well, I won't let that happen. I saw how cruel those birds are. They pick on smaller and weaker Pidove just for fun.
I thought Unfezant have to be honorable, but I guess it doesn't matter that you evolve - if you were a jerk, you'll remain a jerk.
"Where ya going, Dio?" the leader of the tree asks. I can hardly hear his voice, but I still understand, even with the wind blowing it off.
"Yeah, we won't hurt you," another adds.
"We totally won't," the third one agrees.
...I'm not stupid. I know what they want.
But I figure it's best to ignore them, until I fly to the edge of the forest. They are somehow scared to leave the forest and I always save myself like that.
This time the same happens when we reach the edge. They break their speed while making their body almost vertical and I just slip out into the great unknown. I smile and start flying in loops of death. I don't look at them, not to provoke them, but I just can't hide my joy. I feel their sneers and finally hear stronger flapping. They are returning home to the lake.
The fields, where the forest finally ends, seem limitless. The luscious, green meadows, the rocky mountains that don't seem to have peaks, the blue water that doesn't have an edge. Who would want to stay in that forest when all of this awaits?
But I couldn't really stay here now. I need to do a few things before the sun sets, so I turn back to the forest and carefully fly back. Luckily, those three Tranquill don't ambush me.
Pidoves and their evolutions are already getting ready for the meeting. We need to sacrifice things for the lake every month and if the spirits of the lake like what we give, they make the sacrificers evolve. I already offered my gifts about ten times, but I guess the spirits always found someone more worthy to evolve than me. Maybe there's a limit or something, to how many can evolve in one go.
Anyways, now I don't really care if I evolve or not. As long as Piva doesn't change into a Tranquil, I still have a chance. But if I evolve, that will certainly not hurt my chances.
I calmly descend into my nest and let down the azure gem for Piva. It sparkles like a little blue star between all the other stuff I have in my nest. Luckily, every nest has some sort of protection and no outsiders can possibly enter a nest without the owner's permission. I bet if there wasn't such a shield, my azure gem would already be long gone. My dark blue pebble would probably be gone too.
I can finally relax and even nap for an hour or so. Somehow I feel worn out. Of course there's a lot of noise around - it is the middle of the day after all, but the chattering of my species only calms me down and as I tuck in my head under my right wing, I can feel how I'm slowly drifting to dreamland.
"Pitrazant meeting in one hour! Only one hour left!" I hear a familiar sound of the messenger Tranquill - Trayo. He is the one to always announce these kind of things. I would say that the spirits of the lakes should award him for his work and let him evolve into an Unfezant, but they are never satisfied with his gifts, so he remains a Tranquill. I wonder what he offered to get the chance to evolve from Pidove though.
I slowly raised my head and blinked my sleepy eyes. I saw the orange and red setting sun, starting to hide behind the big trees of our sanctuary. The breeze was getting colder and as it flew through me, I just wanted to tuck myself into something warm and go back to sleep... But none can miss the meeting.
The chattering is even louder than before, because everyone is hurrying to make their offerings presentable, or some even try to find a present, because they forgot to go look for it earlier. The ones that forgot are mostly Pidoves. I may be distracted, but I'm not forgetful. Pio had his sacrifice too - a rare berry. I actually never seen it before, but he didn't see a pebble like mine before so we should both have pretty good chances at evolving with rare gifts like these.
I look around my nest and find the dark blue pebble. The azure gem is right next to it and I start to think if I should just take both of them and immediately after offering, give the gem to Piva, before she flies home... Yeah, that's a good idea.
...I think I said that before. Oh, never mind.
With both gifts in my mouth, I fly to the lake and descend next to Pio, who was already waiting for me and the meeting. All Pidoves are furthest from the lake and make the third line of sacrificers. The second line is made of Tranquills and of course the first one has only Unfezants. As the smallest ones, we never actually see what happens in the lake, unless we find a good spot to look from. If we were permitted to fly, then everyone could see, but all had to have their feet on the ground, so I mostly missed those shows. At least I could imagine it.
"Welcome to the 549th Pitrazant meeting!" the elder Unfezant announces. He seems to be in the middle of the lake, although there is no little island there and I don't hear flapping wings, so I just figure he can levitate. "The time has come to sacrifice our glorious gifts to the godly spirits of the lake!" he spoke to the pokemon around him and then started talking with the spirits. "We thank you, holy and powerful spirits, for letting us live in this wonderful sanctuary and we offer you our gifts. May they please you."
I start to hear flapping of two big wings. The elder leaves his spot and flies up, towards his throne like nest, from which he can see anything happening near the lake. Of course, the nest wasn't directly above the lake. That would be disrespectful.
Now our chanting begins. It's a rather strange melody that doesn't have any words, but I like it. I wait forward to it every time.
The first line - the Unfezant, let down their sacrifices into the lake and fly up, to give space to Tranquil, while everyone continue chanting. As the Unfezant slowly descend behind the Pidove, the Tranquil give their sacrifices to the water as well and fly up, to let the smallest ones offer their little gifts.
Finally I see the lake clearly. It's not a normal water color anymore, but it somewhat glows. There are many things in the lake, slowly being dragged into the middle by tiny waves. I let both of my gifts down on the shore and only push in the pebble. It plunks into the water louder than other gifts, for I pushed it hard enough to take air. But it doesn't seem like anyone's annoyed by that. I take the azure gem and fly up. Now we have to get into the three lines again and wait. The ones who gave the best sacrifices will start glowing white and evolve, but we have to wait for a long time for the tiny waves to get all the presents into the middle, where spirits decide.
The chanting ends and everyone turns quiet, with occasional murmurs here and there.
I honestly hate waiting for this. Sometimes, if there is no wind, we even have to wait for a half an hour and that happens quite often, because the trees around the lake break the wind. But today the wind was powerful enough to get in here. I could feel it even now and it started making me cold.
I start looking around out of boredom and suddenly I spot that cute Pidove with a pink ribbon on the side of her head. Piva! She's so close! I can gift the azure gem to her now.
Oh, wait... It's rather disrespectful to do that now. But everyone only has to stay still when the spirits start evolving us. I still have a minute or two at least.
I slip out of the third line and, though Pio gives me a glare, start walking towards Piva, who is eagerly waiting for the results.
I get behind her and feel Butterfrees in my stomach. I put the gem in my right wing, breathe in deeply and...
"P-Piva," I whisper and get her attention. She turns to me with a smile. She always has that beautiful smile of hers. "I want you to have this," I show her the azure gem in my grey wing.
Her golden eyes start sparkling and just radiates surprise and joy.
"It's gorgeous, Dio," she can't keep her eyes off it. And I am only surprised she knows my name. My heart starts pounding from the thought that she cares about me enough to even know my name. And then she speaks again. "But I..."
The lights and gasps started breaking out. The sacrifices reached the middle and the bottom of the lake. I noticed a light in the second line. The third line started showing some glowing too.
But I don't care about that. I just want to know what Piva wants to say.
"Go on, Piva. I'm listening," I lean in so I can hear her better.
But then I feel a strange power surging in my body. I look at my wing and see the white glow. Am...am I really evolving?
I hear gasping around me. Piva looks scared... something's wrong. The energy inside me seems almost angry...mad...
I'm not in the third line, like I'm supposed to be. I was even talking when the spirits decided to make me evolve.
Wh-what will happen to me?
End of the Tiny Pigeon pokemon.
Continuing in Tranquill.
Wooo! Passed 100K words ^.^ A true achievement for me.
This chapter is kind of short, but I just wanted to take it easier. Still I like this story... I wonder what will happen to Dio, or rather, what will I write for him ^.^
Review ^.^
P.S. I have a poll up in my profile. Go check it out ;)
