Chapter 8: Between a Rock and a Hard Place
A/N: All I have to say is that I hope and believe I can keep up this update pace (this still applies now that I'm writing chapters 30 onwards). Enjoy. Alfa19
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Ethan looked up from the map where he was tracing lines with his finger to see a nurse standing in front of him holding a clipboard.
"Mr. Photon?" the nurse asked, looking at him. Ethan looked at her face. She couldn't have been more than seventeen. Her face was thin, her skin healthy and her eyes blue.
"Yes." Ethan replied, snapping back to attention. Her hair was blonde and she was barely five foot two. He would have dwarfed her had he stood up.
"Your Pokemon are being healed, and the nurses wish to keep them for a while. Fights with Jasmine often involve Pokemon repeatedly being blown back into the walls of the pit, and yours obviously have. With the strength of a Steelix. I must say, I commend you for making it as far as Rusty with just four badges. In any case, you'll get a call once you're Pokemon are fighting fit. Thank you." She explained, walking off to the nurses' station.
Ethan noted how she stood by the side of one of the nurses, never moving, never dealing with any patient, except by the order of the nurses. Then it hit him. No wonder she was so young. An intern. Or a volunteer at that. He stood up and stretched, walking back to the room to see if the others had woken yet, and since he didn't have too much to do. In any case.
He walked down the corridor until he reached his room, stepping inside. It was around ten in the morning, and the people he was sharing the room with had good reason to be awake. Yet none of them were, save Katie and Aaron.
"Where the hell have you been? I heard you wake up at seven! Nothing opens here at seven!" Aaron asked, utterly flabbergasted, his belt done around his waist, all his Pokemon in their containers, clipped to the belt.
"The gym is." Ethan replied pointedly, then gestured to his near empty belt with a sigh. "I lost."
For the first time since he had arrived yesterday, he heard Katie speak. Her voice was soft, yet it had a quality which made Ethan want to drop everything and listen. "Jasmine is veritable nightmare for anyone whose team isn't entirely focused on type advantages, or on an offense strong enough to match her defense. She was the only gym leader I ever took on, and even without any badges, she's a pain to fight."
"Come on, let's get some breakfast." Aaron suggested, standing up and bending back to avoid hitting a hanging light in the corner of the room.
"Why not." Ethan replied. He turned on his heels and walked out after Aaron, who had moved around him, all the way to the cafeteria. Katie walked behind them, everything about her silent, even her footsteps were inaudible.
A few minutes later, the four of them, Juliet sitting with them, were digging into breakfast at a table in the half-filled cafeteria. Ethan stared at Juliet for a second as he recalled something that Aaron had said the other day. Frowning, he turned to Aaron, who was sitting next to him.
"Aaron, you didn't by any chance have Guardian raised in a daycare, did you? I was shown around the local daycare by the owner, a relative of someone I know, and he showed me an Aggron. His name was Guardian too." Ethan asked, his brow furrowed.
"Nah. Not a chance in hell. Guardian is one of my two oldest Pokemon. The only one I've had longer than Guardian is Juliet. I trained her, and Bastion on my own. I made a point of it to train my Pokemon myself. Besides, that last detail makes it entirely wrong anyway. Guardian's female. Like I said, I trained her myself." Aaron frowned, the ring of milk around his lips making him look non serious.
"Out of curiosity, what Pokemon do you have Ethan?" Katie asked, shifting slightly, one hand below the table.
"Typhlosion, Feraligatr and Specter, my Haunter, are with the nurses right now. Clipped to my belt I have Riolu, my newest Pokemon, and Scyther, one of my two oldest." Ethan replied, picking at the crumbs of his waffle with his fork. "You?"
"Dragonite. Gyarados. That's it." She remarked, reaching for the bagel in her plate and eating. "What're your plans after you get your Pokemon Ethan? Training and taking on Jasmine again?"
"No. I'm going to act on some advice she offered. I'm going to go to Cianwood City down south. Try and go train in the caves by the city and then take on Chuck. After I beat him, I'll come back and take on Jasmine again." Ethan replied. "Probably have to take a boat though. From a map, it's about a hundred and eighty nautical miles. An ordinary ship that won't empty my pockets on this one trip, would take at least fifteen hours to get there. One hundred and eighty nautical miles is way too much to cover on a Feraligatr, especially since the only land between here and there are the Whirl Islands, which are one, exactly at the one hundred nautical miles marker from here, and two, are surrounded by Whirlpools that take extremely powerful Pokemon or aerial transport to traverse."
"Tell you what we'll do. We're going down to the docks after this to find the ship that's taking us to Hoenn. I mean we've already booked tickets, but there are some things I want to find out. And I have to go register myself as on duty, since the only place I registered myself to be on vacation on is Johto. Like an idiot, I forgot to add open waters to the list. Come with us." Aaron suggested, standing up.
Juliet disappeared in Ethan's peripheral vision, blinking out of existence without any warning or any tells. He stood up, put his plate on a rack and walked out by Aaron's side. Ethan walked ahead, going to the nurses' counter to find out what was happening.
"Nothing much Mr. Photon. Your Pokemon will be fine. Your Typhlosion had a broken bone, but then as you well know, Pokemon Biology has opened itself up to us so much that your Pokemon is resting with a constant stream of cell regeneration accelerant, and healing serum being administered to it. I think it should be ready by six this evening. Your others are pretty much fine." The nurse on duty had replied after checking in with someone else.
Nodding, Ethan rejoined the other two, who had caught up, and walked down to the rooms, re arranging his things and packing some of them away whilst Katie washed up. He had most of his stuff in his pack and his bag by the time Katie was done. They walked out of the center together, making their way down the now lively streets to the docks. Ethan stared at the tall buildings in the background for a moment as he registered the fact that more than half of Olivine's offices were taken up by law firms. He could see silver or gold lettering, naming the partners of each firm, sparkling in the sunlight over the entrances.
He walked straight down with the other two. Katie's choice of a tank top was drawing some stares, but Aaron next to her and he himself on her other side, were dissuading any encouraged onlookers. For the first time since he had reached Olivine yesterday, Ethan properly laid eyes on the famous Olivine Port.
The cobbled street from which the docks extended had festive lights strung up all around and over it, old stained-glass lights hanging from buildings. Shops, cafés and restaurants dominated the property available on one side of the road, and stalls and paths down to the docks lined the others. Beyond the roads, straight down past the stalls, was the port itself. It was a massive harbor with over fifty different ships tethered to land.
At the far end on one side were six massive oil tankers, freight ships next to them, followed by fishing boats, then ferries, and then cruise ships. After the cruise ships came smaller passenger vessels, still capable of carrying up to a hundred people, and slowly they sizes of the ships decreased until at the other end were small rowboats out for hire.
Ethan immediately zeroed in on the smaller passenger ships. To his disappointment there was no indication of where each ship was going. Then, he spotted a ticketing office near the larger ships. Katie lifted her arm and pointed at a large ship amidst the cruises, the lettering on its side glittering gold in the bright sunlight. Ethan squinted, reading the letters off the side of the ship.
"The SS Anne." He read, staring at it. It was a massive ship, a luxury cruise meant to hold probably five hundred or more people. He could make out three decks and two pools on one of them alone. The cabins had tinted windows on the sides facing the sea. Not the entire wall, yes, but still quite a bit of it. Then Ethan noticed the glass sections of the hull. The upper part of the hull had reinforced glass windows in some places, barely visible in this shallow water due to the ship sitting on a raised rail in the dock. Cabins with an underwater view. Those would cost the most he guessed.
"That's our ship. Cabins are on the main deck." Aaron stated, walking down the wharf with the others all the way to the ship.
Standing by the ship, directing around fifty men who were rushing about carrying out various tasks, was the captain, an old man of around sixty with a protruding belly and six great balls clipped to his belt. He was wearing an admiral's uniform. Aaron walked up to the man, as many other people had done in front of them, and tapped him on the shoulder.
"Excuse me sir." Aaron began, and then the conversation was inaudible to Ethan from there. He walked over to a stall for a minute to examine the trinkets it had on display as Katie walked over to Aaron. He turned around to see Aaron with one arm around Katie's waist. In that moment he decided to strike out on his own for the remainder of the day.
He walked back up to them and tapped Aaron on the shoulder, getting him to turn around.
"Hey guys, I'm going to be a while, I need to find a good ship and negotiate a price. I guess I'll see you two in the rooms later then." He suggested, noting the approval in Katie's eyes as she nodded, leading Aaron away.
He smiled for a second, turning on his heels and walked off to the ticketing office. It was a small building, thin and long, about forty-five feet wide and much longer, built into the hillside. For all Ethan knew it expanded below the streets. The side facing the sea was taken up by multiple sales booths, with red velvet ropes forming lines. Each line had a sign over it. Out of twenty lines, five read Cianwood City, whilst there were some lines dedicated to lone Cruises. He walked into one of the half full lines for ships to Cianwood city and waited. Even as he stood in line, he could see ships leaving the harbor, docked fishing boats leaving late, or small charter ships and rowboats going to and fro from the harbor. It took about a quarter of an hour until it was his turn. The cashier was a bored looking man in his early twenties. His skin was pale from sitting in front of a screen daily, sheltered from the sun, and his eyes were a watery blue.
"Hi. Are there any ships going to Cianwood after nine tonight?" Ethan asked, trying to put on a friendly smile.
"One-minute sir." The man replied in a lazy drawl as his fingers started to move over the keyboard. He was moving so slowly Ethan could hear his fingers clacking against each individual key.
"Well sir. The next ship to Cianwood city departing after nine tonight, is the Sailor's Sprint, leaving at six tomorrow morning. But I'm afraid it's fully booked. After that we have the SS Aval at five p.m. tomorrow night. There are tickets available for the SS Aval, which is a two-day journey at a leisurely pace to Cianwood. However, they won't be cheap. The only tickets available are business cabins." He drawled on, unwrapping a piece of chewing gum and popping it into his mouth.
"How much?" Ethan asked. He knew he couldn't afford to buy a ticket for more than two hundred dollars, or else he would lose too much money.
"Six hundred dollars sir." He replied, every pop of the bubbles forming in his mouth louder than life.
"For one hundred and eighty nautical miles!? Isn't there anything else?" Ethan replied, aghast.
"The next ship after that sir is the day after tomorrow at seven AM. The voyage of the Amber Sea-Tail, docking tomorrow at eight AM. One ticket would be one hundred and forty dollars." The man replied.
Ethan stopped, doing the math. A two-day journey meant he would get there on the eleventh, but since he would depart two days later, he would arrive on the thirteenth. That was not an option. He had to be back by the fourteenth.
"Thank you, sir." With that he walked off to the line for information about charter ships. It was entirely empty. He walked up to the cashier, a woman with brown hair, light brown eyes and pale skin wearing a navy suit, blue shirt and a white ascot.
"Hi. I have two questions. First off, how come there are barely any ships going to Cianwood? And secondly, can you recommend a good charter ship I can check out, just for one person travelling to get to Cianwood." Ethan asked with a smile, looking at the other lines for Cianwood for a moment.
"Well sir, its storm season in Cianwood right now. There hasn't been a day in two weeks when it wasn't pouring down on the city. Not many people want to go to a beach town in weather like that. The only people going are going to the Safari zone or to explore caves. As for a good charter ship, go check the Current Cutter, the Loan Vessel, and Captain Alexander at the docks. One of them should be able to give you a fair deal." The woman answered quickly, scrawling the names down on a piece of paper and handing them to Ethan.
"Thanks." Ethan replied, taking the slip and walking down the docks until he saw the first of the ships, the Current Cutter. It was a small white vessel with a crew of three people, and as advertised by the pamphlet attached to a post, could provide travel for up to five people.
He walked up to the captain, a man in his early twenties with slick black hair.
"Sir how much for one person to Cianwood?" he asked, holding out a hand.
"Two hundred- and fifty-dollars kid. Two hundred and eighty for a trainer. Seeing as you have to release your Pokemon on deck to feed." The man grunted, shaking his hand.
"Thanks, I might be back." Ethan retorted, turning and going on to search for another ship. He noted the lack of pokeballs on this man's belt. It made him uncomfortable. It took him another quarter of an hour, but he reached the dock of the Loan Vessel, where a man with grey hair, tanned skin and a Gyarados sitting by his side at the edge of the dock was looking at the ship.
"Sir are you the captain?" He asked, the presence of a powerful Pokemon by the captain slightly calming.
"Aye. Where can I take you lad?" He asked, extending a rough, calloused hand.
"How much to Cianwood for one?" inquired. "And how long will it take you?" he added quickly.
"One hundred and eighty dollars if you can get help us weld a plate on. Two forty if you can't. Our welder's asking around three hundred dollars from us for this project, and I'm looking to save us anything I can manage. A dollar a nautical mile. Travelling at ten knots an hour, we can make it there in eighteen hours." He replied gruffly.
"Sold." Ethan replied, shaking his hand. "Can we take off at nine tonight?"
"Be back here by eight thirty and we can. Leave your information with Callie. Callie!" he shouted, calling a young girl of around nineteen with tanned skin and blonde hair from the ship, one of two ships hands. "Take the lads information. He'll provide a welder and we set sail for Cianwood at nine!"
"Yes granddad. Wesley's looking for you. Says he needs you to look at something!" She shouted back, scurrying down the gangplank as she grabbed a clipboard.
She reached him, breathless, as the Gyarados behind them plunged into the ocean, lurking around the ship in shallow water.
"So. Granddad said to take your information for our trip to Cianwood. I need your name, age, status as a trainer, which is formal battler, etcetera, and how many badges you have. I need half the down payment up front right now to make sure you don't ditch us before departure, and the rest you can give us on board. And I need to see some ID." It took Ethan a moment to process what she was saying, since she was speaking so fast.
"My name's Ethan Photon, I'm fifteen, I am a formal trainer taking on the gyms, and I have four badges, from Violet City, Azalea Town, Goldenrod City and Ecruteak City." Ethan pulled out his trainer tag and handed it to her before he looked around for an ATM. All his money was on his trainer tag.
"I take it you couldn't get Jasmine's badge and you're heading to Chuck now?" she asked, filing away the information she had noted down in a small folder.
"Yes. Is there an ATM anywhere nearby? All my money is on my tag." He grimaced, holding it up to see the two chips embedded in the left side of the Indigo Crest, the sides that made up Johto.
"Wise move. Not many four badge trainers get Jasmine's badge. And there should be one at the Ticketing Bureau. I'll be waiting for you here." Callie replied, going back on board with the folder.
Ethan turned to the Ticketing Bureau and began walking in its direction, and sure enough, he could see the ATM he had asked about. It was at the side of the bureau with its own velvet roping by the sides to make a line. He walked all the way to it and got in the line, behind only a few tourists, presumably. Around a dozen minutes later he was standing back at the dock, waiting for Callie to re-appear. True to her word, she came out a minute later, making a point of it to stand in the exact same spot where she had originally talked to Ethan.
"Just out of curiosity how many Pokemon does your father have on board, or for that matter, the crew as a whole?" he asked, hoping he would get a straightforward answer.
"You've already seen Granddad's Gyarados. Apart from him my granddad has a Machamp, and his old Noctowl. My Gyarados, Granddad's one's kid, is on my belt, and Wesley, our last crew member, has a Mantine." She replied. "Now we're done for now. Be back at eight thirty, like granddad said, and weld what we need, then we're off."
Ethan nodded and turned on his heels, checking his watch. It was around noon and he had at least seven hours to kill. He decided to walk off to the lighthouse, see what it was like, since it was open to tourists and a hub for trainers apparently. From what he had heard, dozens of trainers who had climbed high for the view camped out inside the lighthouse for many a night, challenging others who came by them to battles. He could see the massive building on its little hill, jutting out from the harbor at one end.
He managed to walk all the way down to it before he realized how truly massive it was. The building was at least seven stories tall, made of bricks individually painted off white and cream, forming a gradient pattern. The top of the octagonal building was hidden behind a metal balcony fixed into the buildings with over a hundred different beams and thousands of rivets, secured from the bottom, and presumably from the bottom.
From the top, in the daylight, no beam shone, but Ethan recalled what he had seen from higher up in the city, from the Pokemon center and the streets behind it. Atop the tower was the light room, an octagonal room with mirrors aligned to the windows inside, with two parallel gaps in them. The room had a flat roof as well.
Ethan stared directly ahead of him, at the steps carved into the steep slope of the hill, the whole thing about twenty feet tall. He raised his foot and planted it firmly onto the first step as he started climbing. The steps themselves were carved narrow and tall, as if to dissuade visitors from coming up to the light tower. Indeed, there only seemed to be one couple at the foot of the lighthouse when he reached, an old man and his wife taking a picture by the sea. There was a battle going on to the other side of them, a young boy of around eight fighting another boy his age. It was a Pidgey versus a hoothoot. Ethan smiled as he recalled when he was battling at that level, and at how far he'd come.
Turning to the massive doors of the lighthouse he stared in. The iron doors were made and hinged to the corners of the sides attached to the flat face he was looking at, and made a sharp turn to form corners and join, forming the flat wall. But they had been swung open, allowing light to stream into the otherwise relatively dark room.
Instinctively placed on hand on his belt, slightly put off when he remembered that there were only two ultra-balls on it right now. He started to doubt whether he should try and climb this tower with only two of his Pokemon. A feeling of warmth rushed into him from one of the ultra-balls, one that was highlighted with a deep blue, dispelling all the doubts and making him determined to make it to the top with Scyther and Riolu. Silently he thanked Arceus that one of his Pokemon would always be able to understand him like that.
He looked around, his eyes adjusting to the lower light level as he saw only one person lingering around, someone who had fallen asleep with a machop by his side. He walked around the room, his footsteps echoing in the empty space and going out of the small square inlets for light, about as big as his hand. He walked around until he saw a ladder fixed to a wall on the left side of the room through a gap in the cedar beams that were wedged between the roof and the floor. There was an elevator in the back, but it he wanted to explore. An elevator wouldn't kill time. This would. He gripped the rungs, and climbed up quickly, finding himself on a much more active floor. Active in the sense that there were construction workers there, barring the area and the further ladders off with yellow tape.
"Oi kid. This place is under renovation for weak flooring in the lower floors. Everyone anywhere but the top floor has been evacuated. Didn't you notice the cedar beams holding this floor up?" A worker called out, drawing attention as every person in the building turned to him.
"My bad. I'll get the last person out of the ground floor." Ethan raised his palms and walked back to the ladder, clambering down quickly. He walked over to the guy sleeping and shook him until he woke up.
"There's construction about to start for the flooring above us. We need to get out." He said gruffly, walking to the door as another construction worker followed them down.
"Feel free to take the elevator to the top if you want to. I'm barring the rest off with yellow tape." He shouted from the other side of the room.
Ethan raised an arm with his thumb out, and walked to the elevator. He pressed the button and waited for the vessel to arrive at the ground floor as the other fellow picked up his gear and left, his machop by his side. A minute later a buzzer sounded and the metal doors slid open silently to reveal a room made entirely of metal. Ethan stepped in as the elevator automatically went up, the only two destinations it had being the bottom and top floors. IT took another minute to reach the top floor, Ethan tapping his foot to the beat of the waiting music all the while.
He reached the top and stepped out into the bright sunlight, squinting as his eyes adjusted once more from the dark and dank of the lower floors. Now that he was actually in the top, he could see three things. Firstly, the elevator was made entirely of smoothly curved glass which allowed light to pass through and made it seem like the capsule was metal for the shaft below it. In the center of the room were six mirrors forming an Octagon missing two opposite sides. Standing in the center of the room was none other than Jasmine, feeding a large yellow Pokemon with a red bulb on its tail, and one on its head. Three thick black stripes ringed its neck, as they did its tail. Its stomach was white and its eyes beady and black, and it stood at nearly five feet tall.
"Oh hello! Ethan!" Jasmine whirled around at the sound of the elevator arriving, smiling as she ran a hand down the yellow Pokémon's sparking fur. "Welcome to the light room."
The other two things were that first off, the windows were convex on both sides apparently, magnifying the beams of light which would be fired through them. Lastly, there was no light source in the room. Then it hit him. The Pokemon Jasmine was petting was the light source.
"Hi." He responded, whipping out his phone immediately to scan the Pokemon and wait as Brendan's databases generated a response.
Ampharos, the light Pokemon. They're electric types, and their tails and heads have bulbs that shine bright enough to be used in lighthouses. In fact, the one in Olivine is home to a tame Ampharos by the name of Amphy. Touching a hostile one can result in paralysis, but they tend to be friendly.
"That's interesting. Might I ask how you've come to own, apparently, from our battle and right now, a database on all of Johto's Pokemon?" Jasmine asked, raising an eyebrow.
"I have a friend. He dedicated years to gathering information on all of Indigo's Pokemon, not to mention as much as he could on Hoenn before he moved there and some on the rest of the world." Ethan replied, slipping his phone back into his pocket.
"Interesting. Well, I wish you good luck in the rest of your journey, and I hope to see you in my battlefield again, as a more weathered battler. If you'll excuse me, I'd like to finish grooming Amphy fully before he's on duty tonight." She smiled, gesturing towards the tangled knots of fur that even he could see from the elevator.
"Of course." Ethan replied, taking a good look around the room and getting back in the elevator. He made his way down and out of the lighthouse, his trip there an overall disappointment. It had taken him fifteen minutes to walk there from where he had been, and fifteen minutes to walk back, not to mention the half an hour wasted inside. He walked back to the harbor, looking around to see what was going on. There was some sort of spectacle going on.
He joined the crowd, standing on his toes and peering over the heads of multiple people to see a man riding a unicycle, juggling pokeballs, catching each on deftly. He sighed, stepping back and walking around the crowd to the top of the city once more. That took him another half an hour at the brisk pace he was moving at. He finally reached the Pokemon center and went inside, going to the counter first, to get two of his Pokemon back, to his surprise.
"We just want to keep Typhlosion for some further healing till about seven now. That should be it. Your Feraligatr and Haunter are ready for normal activity." She smiled.
Ethan nodded, clipping them back to his belt and walked back to the room. Only Aaron and Katie were there, flipping through every channel on the TV.
"It took you that long to find a ship?" Aaron asked, feigning a look of utter shock and disgust as Katie bit her lip to avoid bursting into giggles.
"No good sir. I was unable to find a captain, hither or dither, who was willing to ferry me across yonder treacherous seas to the jagged coasts of wood that is Cian." Ethan mocked a bow and smiled as Katie burst out into laughter Aaron following suite. "Nah I went and checked out the lighthouse after. It's being renovated from the second floor up to the last before the top."
He walked back to his room and stuffed the remainder of his belongings back into his pack before collapsing on the bed for the remainder of the day. When it was seven on the dot, he got up, pulled his pack over his shoulder and went down to the counter, to find Typhlosion waiting for him in his Ultra Ball. Grinning like an idiot that he finally had all his friends with him again for the first time since morning, he checked out and walked off, down to the harbor.
In the evening, the lights strung all around stood out, the tinted glass lamps, candles and fairy lights making for a sight which belonged in a postcard. To save the memory in his vision, he pulled out his phone and snapped a picture of the street and the harbor before walking down to the dock where the Loan Vessel was docked.
It was around seven forty when he walked up the gangplank and knocked on the door of the bridge. Almost instantly, it opened to reveal Callie and her grandfather standing in the doorway.
"Oh good. He's here. Wesley, bring about the new screen." The captain instructed as Wesley raised a leg and climbed out of the bridge over the controls. That was when Ethan realized there was no window or screen there.
"You see that metal rim around the edges of the place where our one eighty-degree window should be?" Callie pointed out the thick, riveted metal around the edges of the walls as she spoke. "Our windscreen broke yesterday, so granddad bought a new high tech one that functions as the computer amongst other things. We've rigged up the wires and everything. And the company's assured us it can take the welding heat, and it supposed to be clamped onto with hot metal, but our welder's refusing to do it for less than three hundred dollars. We were about to call him when you showed up. You'll be melting the rims until your Pokemon can open them and we can fit the screen inside, then re-seal them."
Ethan nodded hesitantly as He saw Wesley place a massive piece of tinted glass on the deck and look in. Looking at the screen for a moment, he picked Typhlosion's capsule off his belt and released the fire type into the cabin.
"Hey buddy! Good to have you out of the nurses' station!" Ethan smiled, scratching the enthusiastic fire type behind the ears. "Can you melt the metal around the walls and reshape it like these folks say?"
Typhlosion nodded without a moment's hesitation and scurried over to the walls, spewing a stream of flames onto rim and melting it from every side until it was soft and moldable.
"Good now wrench it open from the outside." Ethan instructed, as the fire type jumped outside, nearly hitting Wesley, and wrenched up the rims with its front paws. Wordlessly the ship hand fixed the glass panel into the gap and watched as Typhlosion clamped down the metal once again, checking its shape.
"Good. Recall it. GYARADOS!" Callie's grandfather shouted out as Ethan recalled his Pokemon. He looked out of the tinted glass window to see the massive serpent, probably twenty-five feet long, rise out of the ocean.
"Spray the window!" He shouted again.
For a minute, nothing happened, then Ethan heard a massive rumbling noise, like a faraway avalanche. He could see something in Gyarados's perpetually open maw, but what it was he couldn't tell. He watched for a moment until he nearly fell on his back when the water type blasted the windshield with a cascade of water. When the relentless pounding stopped, he could see steam rising from the metal.
"Let's give it a shot now." The old man said, turning to Wesley. "Fire her up."
The ship hand nodded silently, moving a bunch of levers and switches as the rumble of an engine sounded. Then the screen lit up, still transparent. He watched as the computer inside it came to life, displaying maps and alignments, and an assortment of other things which made absolutely no sense to him.
"Brilliant! Callie show the lad the bedding room! We set sail in a quarter of an hour!" He laughed in joy as Callie nodded, to no one in particular, before she steered Ethan out of the room and into the other room on the upper deck, a small lounge, and from there down to the bedding room and the kitchens and engine room in the hull.
"Top left bunk is yours." Callie said, walking out to the deck of the ship. Ethan climbed the ladder back to the lounge after he set his pack and bag down on the bed, sitting down on one of the two couches on opposite sides of the coffee table. He sat as the boat was spurred to life by the crew of three who would be sailing to Cianwood City with him.
A few minutes passed as the captain and his crew went about the process of checking everything on the ship and untying their tether from dock. He heard a loud scraping noise and looked out the window to see a Machamp drawing in the gangplank by pulling a crank repeatedly, and swiftly. The boat began to rock slowly in the light waves of the ocean. He looked out the other side to see a pair of Gyarados leap out of the ocean together and dive back into the ocean together, entangled. One was the one he had seen earlier, the other was much shorter, about eighteen feet long as a whole, and had white whiskers, unlike the other's blue whiskers. He nearly fell forward as the boat moved backward using the force of the engine now running at full capability.
The captain pushed the ship out of dock backwards and then turned around in a small circle to face the right way before he pushed the throttle down. The boat started to pick up speed, and this time Ethan was ready, gripping the sides of the couch, which was bolted to the floor he realized. He could see the light fading out of the sky entirely, as they began their voyage into the night, and then a ray of light so intense it made it feel like day once more, cut across his line of sight, growing thinner and going around to the other side. He clambered about and peered out the window to see the lighthouse by the twinkling Olivine lights, shining bright for approaching ships to see.
He reached for his phone, realizing he should put in a call before he left the signal range. He dialed his mother's number and waited, praying silently that the last tower on the coast had a wide range. Within a few seconds she picked up the phone.
"Hi mom." Ethan began. "I'm leaving Olivine by ship right now for Cianwood."
"Young man you need to call me more often. When was the last time you called me? A week ago, from Ecruteak!?" She scolded him down the phone, and Ethan was sure that his face had gone a deep shade of red.
"Sorry mom. I'll make sure I do that. Anyway, I thought I'd call for a minute before I leave the range of the tower. I'll call you once I'm in Cianwood city." He replied.
"Okay sweetie. Take care." And with that she cut the line, just as her voice started to crackle on Ethan's end. He slipped the phone back into his pocket and looked back to see Olivine's coast twinkling in the distance as it grew smaller on the horizon.
"Off to Cianwood… Whatever the future holds for me." Ethan murmured as he watched the lights fade away slowly, blinking out of existence.
"Mate. Dinner's at nine." Wesley was standing opposite him in front of the door from the lounge to the bridge, arms crossed.
"Thanks." Ethan checked his watch. It was eight twenty now.
"Captain says we should make land in Cianwood at around two in the afternoon tomorrow." Wesley finished and walked back out onto the deck, keeping an eye on the sea as he went about various tasks that needed to be carried out. A little bit later Callie emerged from the bridge and climbed down to the bedding and the kitchens. She didn't return. Ethan then assumed it was her who would be preparing whatever dinner was. It didn't really matter. He planned on sleeping away at least twelve hours of the journey, if he could manage it.
He stood up after a while and walked into the bridge, to see nothing active on the new windshield save a grid which was angled to be laid out on what was visible of the sea to a camera outside Ethan assumed. That was with the exemption of a small map in the upper left corner of the screen. He caught a glimpse of one of the two Gyarados outside, the shorter one, jumping out of the water once more and back in as it followed the ship. Ethan followed one of its spikes as it leaped, leading his eyes to a thick pulsing green line trailing through the grids, by a small nearly invisible compass at the bottom of the screen.
"This thing's outlined a path for us to follow. A good path at that, same one I've been sailing for decades now." The captain remarked, having noted his presence. "The name's Allister by the way. Allister McIvor. I already know your name from your forms lad. Tell me, what's taking you to Cianwood."
"I'm going there to challenge Chuck and train in the Cliffside caves near Cianwood. I'm aiming for the Indigo Conference at some point." Ethan replied, looking out into the darkness, lit up for a stretch ahead of them by a seeker light in the nose of the ship.
"Aye. Good to know that you have your sights fixed firmly on one thing. It helps to be determined. Come now take a look at the maps. I'll teach you some things about the Indigo Waters. I've been sailing them since I was younger than you are right now." Captain McIvor suggested fondly.
Ethan walked over to the table which was aught but a block with a screen for a top and looked at it, seeing a map of Indigo, no more comprehensive than ordinary maps.
"Let's start right where we are right now shall we?" He asked, tracing a finger along the route from Olivine to Cianwood. "These waters are fairly calm, and inhabited by Remoraid, Tentacool, Magikarp and the occasional Tentacruel at the surface, or in shallow waters. No one's seen wild Gyarados out here in years."
"Then deeper down, you'll start to find more Pokemon, like Mantyke first, then Octillery near the ocean floor, and swimming around the ocean floor and gliding majestically across trenches you might find Mantine, probably the most powerful Pokemon to live in these seas as far as we know."
"The sea here at the top all the way seems calm, and the sea all around shallow parts is, and for the most part, until you go to depths, it is calm all around. But down near the deeper parts, near underwater trenches and ravines, you might get tangled in currents that none have fought before. Only the Mantine down there dare to brave these currents. Then there are the Whirl Islands. They're a mercy to a traveler thrown from the whirlpools, but the whirlpools themselves are a bane. See, a boat, unless it's about a hundred meters or longer, can very easily get entangled in a whirlpool. Even larger ships do. The only reason I've made every voyage safely is thanks to Gyarados. The old serpent uses whirlpool to make breaks in the current and allows us to pass through very easily. Takes a lot out of him though. That's another reason why there are only five ships dedicated entirely to travelling to Cianwood." Allister went on, stopping to pull out a pipe from his jacket and take a puff.
"East of Olivine waters are easy currents to traverse, though the waves get very choppy around Goldenrod as you sail south to traverse the tip of Johto's landmasses." He traced his finger along the map the whole time, showing Ethan exactly what he was talking about. "There's a small inlet near New Bark Town. Leads to the Tohjo Falls. Barely large enough for this old creeker to make it through. From there, you can only sail up so far east. The river stops after a while in Kanto. Out from the inlet, its smooth sailing down to the Vermillion coasts, past Pallet. It's possible to dock there. Getting to Cinnibar, the currents are strong, but there's aught much to it. It's getting past the Seafoam Islands that's the real problem. The storms get bad there, bad enough to make a crew of weathered sailors shiver when they hear where they're sailing through. I can tell you more about the Pokemon down in all the seas and lakes after dinner, but that about wraps it up unless you want to hear what little I know about international waters."
"I'm fine for now. Thanks for the lesson. It was interesting." Ethan replied, following Callie back out as she brought Wesley and her grandfather plates to eat in the bridge.
"How long do you plan on being in Cianwood?" She asked as they sat down in the lounge to eat.
"I don't know. Two days, maybe more. I want to train a day in the caves by Cianwood, and then take on Chuck the next day. I might train more." Ethan answered, biting into the sandwich she had made. A simple dinner for a simple crew.
"Well if we haven't found any takers to go back when you're done, I suppose we can bank on you to take back to Olivine?" She asked, wiping some crumbs off her lips.
"Sure. I mean I do need to get back somehow." He stated, shrugging as he finished the dinner. He took the plates down to the kitchen and washed them quickly with Callie before going over to the bunks and crashing right away in his.
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Ethan woke up as he flew up from his place on the bunk and hit the roof hard, jarring him. He held a hand to where his head had made contact with the roof as he tried to recall where he was. Then he remembered as the boat rocked violently once more, as though it was on a roller coaster.
He checked his watch to see the time, noting that it was around five in the morning. He sighed and clambered out of the bunk as the boat rose again. He tripped on the ladder due to the turbulence and fell flat on his back. He leaned over onto the bunk and stretched his arms, picking up his things and sitting down to rearrange everything. He managed to fit everything from his backpack into the spare space in his travelling pack and then stuffed the backpack in as well.
He tugged at the zipper, closing it fully and then set it down again in a corner. He was about to ditch it on his bunk and go up again when Wesley literally leaped down the ladder and hit the ground hard, crouching for a moment to keep steady in the rocking boat before he stood up again.
"There's a bad storm out here. Worse than most things we've seen. Wrap your bags in this, tight, and bring them up to the upper level. We're setting up the backup engine. It goes in between the bunks." He informed him, tossing him a large bag made of shiny silvery plastic, and then walked into the engine room.
Ethan stared at the open door for a moment before a particularly nasty swell knocked him back to his senses. He picked up the bag and opened it. It was a large bag, a bit bigger than hit pack, and he managed to fit the pack in it and seal it shut. He climbed up the ladder, hauling it up and tossed it down by three other bags on the floor of the lounge.
"ETHAN! GO DOWN AND HELP WESLEY CONNECT THE BACKUP ENGINE!" the old man at the wheel shouted, struggling with the controls as Ethan saw the monstrosity, they were stuck in.
On every side of the boat, waves around six meters tall at the least were crashing into the ocean, going in no particular direction. The swells extended as far as he could see in every direction. It was five in the morning, and the sun was bound to be up and shining at this time, but it might as well have been seven in the evening. Clouds had amassed in the sky, dark and angry looking.
He flinched as lightning hit a distant rock, going down through it to earth. The flash of light flooded the cabin in this dim lighting. He nearly jumped into the air as a clap of thunder sounded. Ears ringing, he scrambled down the ladder once more to Wesley, whom had with the help of the captain's Machamp, hauled a massive engine, about as big as the one in the main engine room, out of a storage space, and had unlatched over two dozen hatches in the walls of the bunk room, revealing pipes.
"Ethan! Connect them by terminal number and color!" Wesley roared over the thrum of the engine and the sound of the waves crashing against the hull.
Nodding, Ethan grabbed the nearest pipe and pulled it out, revealing a red stripe with the number six marked on the translucent silver tube. He looked around the engine, finding more than a few places for connections marked with red. He scanned them until he found number six at the back. Once more, he pulled on the tube and extended it all the way to the engine. He latched it onto the opening and sealed the holsters, clamping it down in place.
He repeated the process with three more tubes, directing Machamp who was holding four at a time, and keeping Wesley in his vision. IT took another fifteen minutes to weave the pipes through each other, prolonged by the violent spasms the ship would go into with every wave. He connected the last pipe he saw free and stepped back as Wesley moved back. Machamp leaned forward towards the crank wheel on the front of the engine and gripped it with all four arms, turning it slowly. Even over the ocean, the rumble of the engine was audible as the pipes started vibrating, their thick entangled state preventing them from flailing about.
Slowly, something filled each pipe, some filled with a thick, black liquid, petrol or diesel or something, and other filled with various things. Ethan left the room with Wesley and Machamp, only for Callie to grab him by his shoulders and drag him to a side.
"Do you have any water type Pokemon bigger than you?" She asked, barely audible.
"Yes! Feraligatr!" Ethan replied, befuddled as to where this was going.
"Good! We're teaching it dive in case anything happens!" Callie shouted over the din of the engines and the waves. She held her hand out in request for the pokeball, accepting it and slotting it into a machine with a disc inserted into it.
"This will give your Feraligatr the knowledge to apply to you an effect which allows you to withstand as much water pressure as it can, and breathe at that depth, whilst you're in contact with it! Granddad's really worried!" She shouted, handing him back Feraligatr's ultra-ball.
"How bad is it if my Pokemon need to know dive?" Ethan asked, pulling his belt up and wrapping his hoodie around it from the bottom to secure it in place.
"This may be the last day any of us see." Callie admitted, sprinting out to the deck as the waves became weaker, but something continued to tug on the ship.
Ethan ran out to the deck with Callie, wrapping his arms through the railings and his fingers around them. The first of the whirlpools around the Whirl Islands had come into sight. He caught a glimpse of both Gyarados and a large blue flat ray like Pokemon with a white underbelly gliding for meters before plunging back into the currents.
The whirlpool was a massive vortex, about ninety feet in diameter, and with currents raging in a clockwise direction faster than he could keep up with. He couldn't see the bottom of the vortex, and it went ridiculously deep. For a moment, he wondered what was below it. Then he realized that the ship was caught in its range of effect. It was being pulled closer with every passing second, and soon it would be sucked into the vortex.
He dashed back into the cabin and strapped his pack to his back. Extra weight would be helpful right now in keeping his feet planted firmly on the ground. He pointed Feraligatr's ultra-ball out the door and released the beast out, to lumber back into the cabin and follow him as he rewrapped his hoodie around his belt.
"IS THIS HOW BIG THEY NORMALLY ARE?" Ethan shouted to the captain, who was frantically scurrying about the control board, having left the struggle with the wheel to his much stronger Machamp.
"NO. THIS IS WHAT NINETY FEET? THESE THINGS SHOULDN'T GO BEYOND FORTY!" He hollered back as his fingers flew over the dashboard. Ethan caught a glimpse of the captain's distress message before a wave that had managed to stay upright this close to the whirlpool hit the ship and knocked him down into Feraligatr's arms.
"WESLEY! CALLIE! IT'S BEEN A PLEASURE TO SAIL THESE SEAS WITH YOU!" Allister shouted as Ethan felt himself rise into the air for a second, secured by his gator's arms. He saw the ship's point of view tilt as they plunged into the whirlpool, not even sinking a foot before the currents snatched them up.
The tug on his body was too strong. Both he and Feraligatr were thrown against what was the roof, pack and all. He felt his stomach being pressed inwards slowly as the roof creaked and groaned under the pressure. HE could see the captain against the wall, which was now functioning as an upright floor, back to the wall as his Machamp gave up and pulled him back, holding him in place.
He dared to turn his head and look out the window he was flat against, and he regretted it immediately. His heart leapt to his throat as he saw how deep they were. The whirlpool was much narrower at whatever point they had reached, and the velocity had doubled, if nothing. Ethan could see the bottom from here. Despite its size, the whirlpool didn't reach the bottom of the ocean, not even close. He could see where the current closed, into a pinprick, making a perfect inverted cone.
He felt the roof buckle under him as light flooded into the room. The part of the roof he had been thrown against cracked free of the roof and was sent flying into the water, along with Ethan and his Pokemon.
"FERALIGATR! DIVE!" He shouted as high as he could managed, hoping the fact that Feraligatr was right next to him would allow it to hear him. He felt something envelope him a second later, an odd energy, as he was hit the ocean, pack strapped to his stomach, Feraligatr holding him from behind as the currents carried them away.
Ethan could feel his consciousness slipping away as the sheer velocity and the dizziness from all the turbulence on the boat and in the whirlpool took its toll, knocking him out just as they reached a calm depth in the ocean, by rising walls of rock.
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Ethan woke up inside a cave, with a familiar scaly body holding him. He coughed, still somewhat dizzy as he looked around him. He was in a dark cave, how large it was, he had no idea, but it wasn't too big else there would be a draft in here, that wasn't coming from the entrance. The entrance was a rough rectangular shape about ten feet by ten feet in one wall, revealing a thoroughly soaked beach that extended for about ten feet outside. He reached for his belt, the feeling of his ultra-balls beneath his hoodie somewhat comforting. It also helped that his pack was lying out of the plastic sack near him, and seemed to be completely dry. The sack was still dripping wet, but that was expected. He released Typhlosion into the cave, along with the others, warmth and light flooding it as Typhlosion's back lit up with flames.
"Hi guys." He coughed, frowning as he looked at his sopping wet clothes. "Typhlosion could you help out a bit."
"Thanks." He shivered as Typhlosion moved up next to him, nuzzling him as his flames roared and crackled, setting to the task of drying his trainer up. "So… We were on a ship to Cianwood city down south of Olivine after we lost our battle to Jasmine. I was thinking we could take on Chuck and train in the caves there. If we're by the Whirlpools, I'd say we travelled a bit more than half the distance before we got trapped in a massive storm. From what I remember the ship got drawn into the whirlpool and we got thrown out by the force and into the ocean. Feraligatr saved not just me, but all of us."
Feraligatr's jaw extended into a toothy smile in the flickering light of Typhlosion's flames. Riolu was simply sitting in shock and Scyther and Specter were entirely silent.
"Regarding the fact that we're stranded Arceus knows where, we could be worse off. I mean we have my pack, with some food in it and other stuff we might need." Ethan shrugged, trying to remain positive in the face of the overwhelming despair that was threatening to send him into collapse.
"Let's wait out the storm first before we do anything else. Dry up and perhaps wall up the entrance to the cave a bit to stop the wind from coming in. Maybe we can use the boulders around here." Ethan suggested, gesturing to the boulders. Immediately, Feraligatr and Riolu moved to the boulders, each around four feet tall and two feet wide, roughly around the same volume, and hefted them over one by one to the entrance and blocked out the wind using them. A small amount of air was allowed to come in and out by the gaps between them. More than enough to keep the air in this cave fresh.
Then Ethan noticed the opening in the back. By the wall opposite the entrance he had just had blocked was a hole in the ground that looked too neat to have been natural. He wanted to explore it, to see where he was stranded. But honestly, he had no clue what he could do. It was very likely that he might have gotten hypothermia, and even if he hadn't, it was wiser to dry up first and make sure he was fit to do anything rather than risk catching it by exploring a probably drafty cave system in his current state.
"We're going to stay here then for now. I need to dry up, and then we'll see what to do based on the conditions outside." Ethan suggested, lying back against Typhlosion as he eyes the cavern. There was nothing in here he could use to keep a fire going, which meant Typhlosion would be their only source of heat and light.
He pulled off his hoodie and his shirt and pants, sitting against Typhlosion in his underclothes as he let the flames drain them of all their moisture. The heat radiating from Typhlosion was making him drowsy. He closed his eyes and leaned against Typhlosion's sleek coat, drifting away into what he hoped would be a peaceful sleep. Unfortunately for him, his rest was to be anything but peaceful.
|\/|~^-_-_-^-_-_-^~|\/|
Ethan was sitting in a cave, long and narrow, about twenty feet wide, with a high ceiling. The walls were cut into steep slopes outward by his sides, and there were uneven rises in the ground he was standing on. The platform was only ten feet long, though as wide as the room, but beyond it water extended as far as he could see. The room went on far beyond his range of vision. The water was calm, with barely any motion to disturb it, but it was deep right from the get go.
The water started to churn about fifty feet from him, and as he tried to run, he found himself rooted to the spot. A narrow column of spiraling water, a very narrow hurricane, rose out of the spot, a long and curving form barely discernable in the center. The column of water fell with a loud crash, revealing a massive white avian about twenty feet tall. It head, and beak were narrow and angled. Its eyes had deep navy spikes sticking out from around them, and its chest was a pale watery blue. Its wings were less wing like, and straight, with feathers at the end arranged to give the illusion that they were thick straight fingers. Its back was highlighted with dozens of navy-blue square fins in two rows down its spine, and its tail had three navy spikes at the end.
'The child of legend, the bearer of fate, the awakening of legends.' Ethan could feel a deep voice so imposing that even in his dream it occurred to him that the Pokemon was telepathic.
'Stand at the edge of my domain and see how your life teeters on the edge of a cliff. Soon the time will come for destiny to wreak havoc upon the world. The question is whether Johto will stand or fall. But my question is are you worthy? Of this title, of this path and of this position thrust upon you.' The voice was stone cold, not as if it was sneering, rather like an all imposing being to which his life mattered not, which was very likely. 'I charge you with this, lest this region perish. MAKE yourself worthy. Save yourself. Become one with the storm. Lest fire claim your life.'
The avian roared as more hurricanes sprang to being in the narrow lake. Two to be exact. Looking at each gave Ethan a glimpse of some other reality. One with showers of flames wreathing him, of Johto in chaos, disorder, and razed to the ground. The other showed Johto once more in chaos and disorder, but this time there were people alive. It showed him the scraps and fights over food and other necessities.
'Choose, or find a way to forge your own path!' The avian roared, releasing two intertwined columns of spiraling wind at him, each going in the opposite direction. They hit him hard, and he wanted to scream as he felt them tear away at not just his physical form, but his very being, shredding his soul and tearing apart his identity.
|\/|~^-_-_-^-_-_-^~|\/|
Ethan woke up with a start, to find his clothes dry and his neck and hair drenched in sweat. Typhlosion's flames had dimmed, he was still asleep. Shivering, Ethan pulled on his clothes and sat there, trying to make something of the dream. Unlike any other dream, it remained burnt into his mind.
"Come on guys, let's go see what's around here." Ethan shook his various Pokemon awake, and then looked out of one of the gaps in the boulders. The storm raged on, as strong as it had been earlier.
Ethan walked to the hole and peered down it into the darkness, Typhlosion lighting up some of it. There were footholds carved into the wall it was leading down against.
"Typhlosion, you're coming back in, I don't want to scare anything down there. Scyther, by me. Specter, you're my eyes and ears." Ethan ordered, recalling the others and he climbed down the ladder in the wall slowly and carefully.
He brushed off his pants and stepped forward, his foot hitting a pebble. He wanted to swear as it bounced across the floor, echoing across the cavern. He saw a flame being lit on a stick being held by men in black uniforms. Their faces and about five feet around them were visible to him, but thankfully he was still shrouded in darkness.
"Must have just been another Zubat." One of them grumbled as another man stepped into the light. Ethan's heart skipped a beat as the man spoke. "Well then get a move on. Boss wants what he needs stat."
Ethan could see his tanned face and his purple hair, slicked back through the middle, and his scraggy purple goatee. He walked with a slight hunch in an odd way. He recognized this man as Petrel, a renowned master of disguise and criminal from a news report on him. Petrel was an executive in Team Rocket. Ethan was shaking as the men walked off in the other direction. First the dreams, now this. He was well and truly stuck between a rock and a hard place.