Chapter 37
The winding, dusty road was without a single soul aside from them. And the only motivation that was moving them forward was the fact that they had completely run out of any food they had stocked up on. According to Brock's map, there was a town just up the road ahead. While it was good to have a destination, it also made traveling seem to go by that much slower.
They were finally approaching the town itself when on the outskirts of it at the edge of the thick forest just to their right, they saw another person at long last. This person happened to be an old man with long shaggy hair that fell over his eyes and down his back. He was sitting cross-legged on a large boulder and perked up when he saw the pair approaching.
"Groovy," he greeted as they got closer. "Greetings, children of the universe."
"Hi," Ash responded, and they walked up to him. "How come you're just sitting here all by yourself?"
"I'm not by myself," the old hippie corrected. "I have my music." Reaching behind him, the man pulled out a large flute with a Poké Ball at the end of it before pressing it to his lips. A combination of the wind instrument's singing and the movement of his fingers over the keys on the flute gave way to a beautiful melody that while it seemed like a lullaby, seemed to perk Ash up slightly. The pair of Pokémon Trainers smiled and laughed in joy at the musician's song, and though it only lasted for a minute or two, it was the best they had felt in a few days.
Finally, the old man pulled the flute away from his lips. "Wow!" Ash complimented, unable to be able to wipe the smile from his face. The old man bowed his head in thanks, and then held out his hand.
"Now that you've heard my music, you have to give me some food." Now the smiles were wiped from their faces at the hippie's insistence, but they weren't upset, mostly surprised, and this showed on their faces. When they hesitated, he spoke up again. "Isn't my flute-playing at least worth a sandwich?"
"Uh, we'd like to give you something to eat..." Ash muttered as a frown pulled his mouth down once again. "But we don't even have anything to eat ourselves."
"Not even a cookie?"
"Cookie? We don't even have crumbs!" Brock told him. The man let out a sigh and slumped over onto his side where he rested his head on his hand.
"Another free concert..." he sighed deeply, and waved them along. "Well, guess you should hit the road then." They felt bad for the old man, but didn't know what else they could say, so they thanked him once again for the song. He only grunted in reply, and they continued on their way.
The journey to the next town wasn't too far ahead, but the mention of food only reminded them of the fact that they had none. They hadn't had anything to eat since yesterday when they had ate the last of their reserves. Ash's stomach wasn't helping either, and its growling kept serving as a painful reminder that they were running on empty. "Uhhh, I'm so hungry..." Ash whined as he patted his empty belly.
Typically, Brock would give words of encouragement or scold him for whining, but even the Pokémon Breeder didn't have the energy, and added his own complaint. "I'm about to collapse..." he moaned. But as they climbed to the top of the hill, their eyes caught sight of their destination, and slight relief swept over their bodies. It wouldn't be long now until they had something to fill their bellies.
o 0 o
"We finally made it..." Ash uttered with the last of his energy as they entered the heart of the town. They walked like extras from a zombie film; it took all of their energy not to keel over right there in the dirt road of the village. It was a tiny town, not even big enough for a Pokémon Center, so they simply had their eyes peeled for the closest restaurant or food place they could find.
They were in luck, as they stumbled across a bakery not far from the entrance of town. However, when they looked through the big display window, their hearts fell. There was absolutely nothing in the whole bakery. Ash and Brock exchanged confused glances. Maybe it was just all of their bread that was on display that got bought already. The younger boy walked up to the serve window and called in. "Excuse me! We'd like to buy some bread, please!"
It took a moment for someone to show up, and the baker stepped out with a skeptical look. "What's that? A customer?"
"We'd like to buy some bread, please," Ash repeated, clutching his backpack straps as he spoke.
"I'm sorry," he replied. "We don't have any bread left..." Their heads hung at the same time in disappointment. "You can try the farmer's market down the road. Last I saw, they were selling some vegetables."
"It's better than nothing," the black-haired boy said in response. Following his directions and going up the road to the shops, they noticed that all of the shops were closed and boarded up. And when they had finally stumbled across the farmer's market the baker had told them about, they were just as disappointed, but even more surprised.
"There aren't any vegetables, either!" Brock exclaimed.
"Where'd all the food go?!" Ash's eyes were the size of saucers as he looked around at the deserted market. There had to be some food somewhere.
They continued their way through town until they eventually spotted a restaurant. It wasn't a surprise to see that the restaurant was closed down, but it was still disappointing. Ash was desperate for food, and was willing to eat even scraps at this point, so he walked up to the locked door. He ignored the closed sign which featured a Slowpoke wearing a chef's hat taking a nap and pounded on it with the sides of his fists. "Excuse me! We're paying customers and willing to buy a meal!"
"We'll even wash dishes if we have to!" Brock called. Footsteps could be heard on the other side, and a bell rung as the door opened up.
"Hello, sir. We're traveling through town, and we're hungry. Would we be able to stop and eat here?"
"I'm sorry, but we are closed," the chef answered with a nervous frown. "I'd like to cook, but I have no ingredients." Like before at the bakery, Ash's head hung in disappointment. If he wasn't so dehydrated, he'd probably cry.
"Okay..."
"Come back some other time," the cook said before closing the door and locking it tightly once again.
With no options left for the pair, they dragged their feet over to the center of town. It wasn't exactly comfortable, but they sat at the edge of a fountain that had long since dried up and leaned with their heads hanging low and arms wrapped around their backpacks to suppress the pangs of hunger that wouldn't seem to go away. "This is great..." Ash muttered. He barely had the strength to keep his eyes open.
"An entire town with absolutely no food anywhere..." Brock added quietly.
"Children?" a man asked. They looked up to see an older man with a toothbrush mustache walking on a walking cane on a stroll looking down at them through squinted eyes. He was the first townsfolk they had seen outside of the baker and chef. "What's the matter?"
"We've been looking all over for food in this town, but... there's nothing to eat," Brock answered.
The man hummed in thought before speaking up. "You know, I was just on my way back to my house from my stroll, and I know there is a big meal waiting for me back there," he responded. "If you two want to accompany me on my way back home, I'd be more than willing to share." Instantly, both boys sat upright as if they had just been invigorated with energy.
"Really?!"
"Sure! We don't get travelers much, so it would be nice to have some company and hear about your journey," the old man said, smiling under his mustache. They agreed, and with a newfound spring in their step, they followed the older gentleman home.
o 0 o
The town was so small that the edge of town wasn't too far off from the town square, so it didn't take very long to get to his house. It was certainly the biggest house they had seen so far, and with a green yard and well-watered trees, it was almost the exact opposite from the town itself. With a house this size and a yard that beautiful, it was no surprise when he told them on their walk that he was the mayor of the town. They, however, didn't pay any attention to this. What mostly grabbed their attention was the enticing smell of warm food.
They sat in his dining room with the food already set up on the table, and their mouths were both watering as they sat politely with their twitching hands in their laps as they looked at the food in front of them. It wasn't much by any standard – just warm bread and a small stew to go with it, but it was more food than they had seen all day.
"Go ahead; there's no need to be polite," the man told them with a chuckle. They didn't need to be told twice to dig in, and ate as though they had never eaten before in their life. Even Brock – who normally had table manners – was shoveling his stew in his mouth to stop his tummy from aching.
The mayor poured himself a cup of coffee, and wrapped his aged hands around the mug, but he didn't grab any food for himself. "So, you're trying to become a Pokémon Master," the mayor said. "That's very difficult."
Ash looked at him while scooping food into his mouth with his spoon, and swallowed cooked potatoes and carrots before putting his empty bowl down and moving onto the bread. "It certainly has been so far," Ash agreed. "But why is there no food in this town, anyway? There was no bread in the bakery."
"And there aren't any... vegetables in the market," Brock added through his mouthful of food.
"The water in the river has completely dried up, killing all our produce," he answered somberly. "So food in our town has become very, very hard to come by." Instant regret made both Trainers freeze in their tracks, and guilty eyes slowly lingered at the mayor as he continued. "It's hard enough to keep food for ourselves to eat..." Noticing a distinct lack of noise, the mayor looked up from his folded hands to see them staring at him with hesitance, and he quickly realized how it sounded and put up his hands in protest. "Oh, please! Don't worry! My family can live off our food stores for quite a while yet!" Ash didn't need to be told again, and continued on his bread, but Brock lowered his spoon as he thought.
"It rained just like it always does..." the Pokémon Breeder pondered.
"It's not the rain."
o 0 o
Their bellies finally full after so long, they accompanied the old mayor outside toward the end of his property. On the other side from where they had entered from was a deep ditch that headed toward town. A stone bridge arching between the two sides hinted that it used to be a river, and the old man confirmed it with his next words. "This is the river that used to flow through our town," he told them. Ash leaned his head closer and he could see a small trickle of water running through, but a sink had more flow than this river. "For some reason, it suddenly stopped running two weeks ago." His saddened glance turned over to a garden nearby, but the plants that inhabited it were dead.
"The plants... they're all dried up." Ash walked into the center of the garden and fell to his knees before cupping the plant's leaves delicately in his fingers as though it were a newborn chick. Its leaves were crunchy and withered.
"We can't produce wheat or vegetables," the mayor continued. "Our town's in real trouble."
"And you can't grow anything without water, can you?" Brock pointed out as a frown lined his face.
"No. This is a serious problem."
"Could the source of the problem be somewhere upstream?" the Pokémon Breeder questioned as Ash rejoined them again.
"Let's go check it out," the Pokémon Trainer suggested. It was the least they could do for him so generously giving them some of his food. "Mr. Mayor, we'll be back as soon as we can."
"I should warn you that no one dares go upstream anymore," he told them. "There's no telling what you might find."
"That's okay! We're always ready for anything!" Ash assured him, and gave him a wink and a thumbs up.
They decided the best course of action was to jump into the ditch itself and follow the minuscule remains of the river, so after giving one last wave to the mayor, the pair left the old man standing with his walking cane clutched in his hand and the town behind to investigate.
o 0 o
According to the mayor, it had been two weeks since the river had dried up. The fact that they could walk without sinking in mud showed that this was true. Following the ditch with ground up all around them like the trails of a giant Onix, they were left to only hypothesize what had happened. "Why would the river just dry up like this?" Ash asked aloud. Brock didn't answer his question, and both silently pondered their own theories, but soon enough, they came to the edge of the forest they had passed not too long ago with empty bellies.
"Hey, what's that?" Brock questioned rhetorically. Up ahead, the riverbank that opened out of the forest was covered with thick vines with sharp thorns all over them.
"The river leads to a dead end!" Ash answered, and they hurried toward it to get a better look. Standing on the tips of their shoes, they could just barely see over the top into the forest.
"The whole thing's covered with thorns!" The whole forest looked to have been infested by the vines like some sort of parasite. Not only did they bunch up at the river's mouth, but they also had wrapped themselves around trees and bushes alike. But the only way through was to go in head-first, so they got down on their hands and knees and crawled their way into the sharp jaw of thorns.
Progress had quickly slowed due to having to maneuver around the sharp prickles that stuck out along the wild and unruly vines. Every once in a while, their backpack or clothes would get caught in the foliage, so they would have to untangle the other out of it. It was Ash whose bare skin got caught on it first, and his lips peeled back in pain as blood drew on his arm right where his jacket's sleeve stopped.
"Be careful; those things are sharp," Brock warned.
"It's hard to be careful when it just gets worse the more we go in," Ash protested.
"Say, Ash, let's get our Pokémon to help us out here," the Pokémon Breeder suggested. The Pokémon Trainer agreed, and drew a Poké Ball from his belt. Throwing it forward, the ball burst open, and in a bright flash of light, his Bulbasaur appeared crouching in the thorns.
"Bulba-zaur!"
"Bulbasaur, Razor Leaf attack!" Ash declared. Sitting down to avoid getting pricked, Bulbasaur grunted and a flurry of sharp leaves spun out like a cyclone out from underneath the bulb on its back. The leaves did their job, and as they spun out, hacked up the vines directly in front of them.
Next, Brock pulled out his own Poké Ball and drew his arm back. "Geodude... goo-" Suddenly, a flash of light swirled out of his pocket before the ball left his hand, and instantly, Brock flinched knowing what was happening. Frozen with the Poké Ball still in his hand, his eyebrow twitched as the flash of light condensed together, forming into his Psyduck. The Duck Pokémon, however, had decided to appear right in the middle of a large cluster of thorns off to the side of them, and it hung suspending in the air, its whole body red in patches from where it had been stabbed.
"Psy-yaiy..."
"Oh... Psyduck..." Brock murmured, rubbing his temple and thankful that no one else was around. Both Trainers recalled their Pokémon, and with their path mostly unclogged thanks to Bulbasaur, they continued onward. Though they were still on their hands and knees, they didn't have to twist and contort their bodies nearly as much as before, so they were already saving on time.
Finally, Ash was the first to exit the sea of thorns, and he let out a sigh of relief as he touched grass as last. "Ah, we're finally through those thorns!" he said. The pair brushed the mud off their pants best they could and their joints cracked as they stood at long last, and they continued their journey up the river on their feet this time.
The forest parted into a small clearing that was already beautiful without the river, so Ash must have guessed that it would be two-times as great if the river was flowing normally. Either way, the scene brought a smile to his face. "Ah! It's a spring!"
"It looks like the spring is starting to dry up, too," Brock observed, looking down at the mud that was much more fresh-looking than the riverbanks in town. But something was cutting through the silence of the forest, and Ash cocked his head at the sound.
"What's that?" he asked. It was almost a rumbling sound, but somehow sounded familiar. They followed where they thought the sound was coming from, which required them to jump into the mud and up the river again, only to discover a massive Pokémon. The giant bear-like Pokémon was mostly comprised of its great girth, which rose up and down as it snored heavily – the source of the noise. As they approached, it scratched its side with one of its paws that was the size of Ash's torso, but it did so in its sleep. "It's huge!"
"It's a... Snorlax!" Brock exclaimed.
"That's a Snorlax?" He had always had a stuffed Snorlax in his room from when he was a little kid, but he never knew they were this big. Nevertheless, Ash pulled out his Pokédex to learn more about the giant Pokémon.
"Snorlax, a sleepy Pokémon. Snorlax wakes only to eat."
"It doesn't sound too hungry," the Pallet Town native commented as he closed Dexter's cover and put it back in his pocket. But when he did, his eye caught movement, and he looked down to see small streams of water running alongside Snorlax's feet. "Hey, look! Snorlax is blocking the water from emptying out into the spring!"
"That's why the water in the stream stopped flowing!"
"So we just have to get Snorlax out of the way!" he replied with a smile. However, this was a lot easier said than done. Walking up to the sleeping Normal-type, he shook its arm, but the Pokémon didn't even budge. He tried again, but the massive Pokémon just continued to snore rhythmically. Eyebrows furrowing together, he climbed up onto the Pokémon's shoulder and shook its belly. The stomach wiggled back and forth like jell-o, but it still didn't work. "Wake up, Snorlax!" he sang lightly, reminiscent of how his mother would wake him up in the mornings for school.
On its other side, Brock was pushing on its body as well, but it wasn't working either. "Wow, he's really big!"
When that wasn't working, Ash pulled in a deep breath and called into Snorlax's ear. "Hey! Snorlaaax! Wake uuuppp!" Ash slid down and planted his feet back on the ground in case the Pokémon suddenly got up, but the Sleeping Pokémon hadn't even moved a muscle. "It won't wake up..."
"Well then... we'll have to move it!" Brock suggested. With Ash on one side and Brock on the other, Ash grabbed a hold of one of its paws and tried to pull it toward him while Brock pushed with all his might on the Normal-type's shoulder. Snorlax didn't even move a centimeter, though it grumbled in its sleep and licked its lips before continuing snoring peacefully.
"Why is it so hard to move?!" Ash frowned as his hands fell uselessly to his sides, and let out a sigh before pulling out his Pokédex once again.
"Snorlax is the heaviest species of all known Pokémon, with some weighing more than one-thousand pounds."
"A thousand pounds?!" he exclaimed in disbelief. "There must be some way we can move it..."
"What if we tried to capture it in a Poké Ball?" Brock offered.
"Oh! That's it!" Ash called out, slapping his fist onto his palm. Putting some distance between him and Snorlax, the Pokémon Trainer retrieved an empty Poké Ball from his backpack and pressed the button in the center to enlarge it to normal size. "Poké Ball, go!" The Poké Ball soared through the air and hit the Snorlax's tummy, but bounced off it uselessly and rolled down before clattering to the ground by its foot. "Oh, great..." Frustration took over Ash's senses now, and he let out a yell of annoyance before cupping his hands around his mouth. "Snorlax! Wake up! Come oooon!"
o 0 o
Giving themselves time to cool down, they sat off to the side to brainstorm ideas. "Well then... how should we wake it up?" Brock questioned. Together, they came up with ideas on how to get Snorlax to wake up and tried them one by one.
First, they tried an alarm clock – typically handy for those mornings that they needed to head out early. Put on the end of a fishing rod from Brock's backpack, they hung it next to Snorlax's head, and when the ringing went off, it was basically drowned out by Snorlax's snores.
Next, they tried water in the face. Pulling out a Poké Ball, Ash threw the red and white sphere forward. "Wartortle, I choose you!" he called, and within moments, his starter Pokémon was standing beside him, looking up at the massive Pokémon. "Wartortle, Water Gun attack!"
"War!" His Pokémon nodded, and it jumped into the air and took a deep breath before sending out a spray of water at Snorlax. The water doused it completely, and they looked on with hopeful smiles as the Turtle Pokémon landed back on the ground. Not a sound came from Snorlax, and their breaths hitched in their throats excitedly, but then it cleared its throat and its snoring continued. Their heads fell simultaneously, and Ash pulled Wartortle back into its Poké Ball with disappointment.
They sat in silence for a bit longer before Brock was the one who came up with the next idea. "Well, how about the story of Sleeping Beauty? Where the princess is woken up by a noble prince's kiss? Maybe Snorlax will wake up with a kiss from a noble Pokémon."
"Hey, that might just work!" Ash said with a smile. But when they sat on a couple of rocks and pooled their Pokémon together in their heads, a frown pulled down the corners of his mouth. "Do we even have any noble Pokémon? Whatever that means..."
"Hey Ash, what about your Tauros?" Brock suggested with a finger in the air.
"Tauros?"
"Yeah, it's kind of like a noble steed!" Ash's discomfort was clear on his face as his brown eyes flickered from Brock to Snorlax, and his eye twitched as he imagined his Tauros climbing on top of Snorlax in order to kiss it.
"Well, it really is our best bet..." the Pokémon Trainer murmured, pulling out the green Poké Ball from his belt and pressing the button on its face. He stared at it for a while before taking in a deep breath and rearing his hand back. He pulled in an intake of air to call for his Pokémon, but just then, a burst of light shot out like lightning into the air from Brock's backpack, and it came together to form into his Psyduck.
"Psyduck!" it announced, and soared forward before planting its beak directly on the front of Snorlax's mouth. It puckered its beak and gave Snorlax a big kiss right on the lips, and Ash and Brock both took a step back and let out a cry of horror at the sight. The kiss lasted for just a few seconds, but the image would forever be burned into their heads as Psyduck separated from Snorlax and bounced off its belly before landing on its backside on the ground.
"Ps-Psyduck, there's nothing noble about you!" Brock yelled at it, but the Pokémon simply held its head and looked up at its Trainer. A blush crept up on its face and it gave a coy look up at him before dragging its hands down to its chin and puckering up once again. But before it could plant another one on the poor defenseless Pokémon, Brock took out its Poké Ball and pulled Psyduck inside.
But a grunting noise from Snorlax quickly captured their attention, and they looked up to see Snorlax's face was scrunched together into a grimace. "Is it...!" Ash breathed. They both stared intently, but then its face evened out and it leaned to the side as it let out a breath. From the position they were at, something caught Ash's eye that stuck out amongst the mud. "Huh?" Reaching down, he picked something up that had originally been stuck under Snorlax's body. It had been wedged pretty tightly, but with some finagling, he was able to retrieve it.
"What'd you find, Ash?" Brock asked his friend, and they both overlooked it. It looked like a door-hanger that would be hung off hotel room door knobs, and it featured a Snorlax sleeping on a bed with Z's coming from its mouth.
"It says 'Do not disturb'," Ash read.
"Turn it over, Ash." The Pokémon Trainer did so, and more words were inscribed on the back in small letters.
"'In case of emergency, please use a Poké Flute to wake'."
"That's right! Now I remember! I heard once that you play a Poké Flute to wake up a Snorlax!" Brock stated hurriedly.
"A Poké Flute?" Ash questioned. He had never heard of such a device, and pulled out Dexter to see if it had any information. Luckily, it did.
"The Poké Flute is used to wake sleeping Pokémon. Snorlax will only wake up to this flute."
Ash let out a hum on thought as he looked at the image being shown on Dexter's screen – the flute looked very familiar. "Hey, that flute looks just like the one that old hippie had!" Brock realized, and Ash smiled and closed the cover to his Pokédex.
"C'mon! Let's go find him!" Pocketing the Pokédex, they wasted no time in leaving the spring to get to the winding dirt road before town where they had encountered the old man begging for food.
o 0 o
After backtracking through the woods and hurrying as fast as they could, the pair skidded to a stop at the boulder where the hippie had been sitting on. Lucky for them, he was still there, laying on his side with his elbow leaning on the flat side of the boulder and his hand supporting his head in boredom. But when he saw that they had came up to him in a hurry, he sat up straight and crossed his legs to his bare feet were under his long shawl.
"What's the rush, dudes?"
"Thank goodness you're still here!" Ash said with a smile on his face. "Please sir, we have a favor to ask of you."
"Ask away."
"Just come with us!" the Pokémon Trainer insisted, pulling at the man's arm. The action took the old hippie by surprise, and he let out a cry of shock.
"Hey hey, chill out, my friend," he protested, and Ash immediately let go.
"Sorry sir, but it's just a bit of an emergency." The man nodded, and it was hard to tell his expression as his face was covered by his hair and mustache, but nevertheless, the smaller man climbed off his boulder and followed Ash and Brock.
It was much easier to get back to the empty spring this time around, as they just had to follow the tracks they made through the thorny vines. Not before too long, they made it back to the Sleeping Pokémon. "Please, play your Poké Flute to wake this Snorlax," Ash requested, having to look down at the small hippie beside him, but the man paid him no mind and instead spoke to the Normal-type.
"Heeeyyy, you've gotten a lot bigger since saw you last, Snorlax," he said. "Your girth is blowing my mind."
"Wait, do you know this Snorlax?" Brock questioned with an amused look on his face, and the old man looked back at him.
"I don't just know it; this Snorlax is mine. This little dude loves to snooze. I can't even take it for a walk – I just come to wake it up once a month."
"Huh?" Ash looked down at the man with his eyebrows raised up to the brim of his cap.
"I'm running a little late this month, though."
"Your Snorlax is stopping the water from flowing into town," the black-haired boy told the old man with his fists on his hips. "We've gotta get it out of the way."
"No problem! I can do it," the hippie assured. Retrieving his Poké Flute out from under his clothes, he put the tip to his mouth and began to play the same song that he had played for them back before they had gotten into town. Just as the song had invigorated them with energy, Snorlax's ears began to twitch at the soothing sound of the flute. It scratched its belly as the song went on, and in a matter of moments, the Pokémon sat up, and grunted as it stretched its arms – first one side, then the next.
"Snore, snore, snore, laaaax!" it groaned as it stretched. It was almost mystifying how instantaneous the effect of the flute's music had woken it up – especially considering how much they tried to wake it up themselves. Once the song was over, Snorlax gave a grunt and stood up on its feet at long last.
"I guess that did it..." Brock observed as Snorlax simply glanced at the group of three before stomping away into the woods behind where it had slept.
"Later, Snorlax!" the hippie called as the giant Pokémon stomped away, each one of its footfalls causing a small earthquake from its size. But, with Snorlax moved, their eyes darted over to the mouth of the stream that had been blocked by its massive body. Much to their disappointment, the water was still not running.
"Aaah! Look at that!" Brock cried in horror. Following the point of his finger, Ash's mouth opened in a silent yell as he saw more thorns blocking the way – and there seemed to be even more of them than they had crawled through before.
"That means... we'll have to clear out all of these thorns before the river can start flowing into town again..." Ash put together with a frown.
"What a job!" Brock complained with a palm hitting his forehead. Movement in the thorns grabbed their attention, and it looked as though the vines were being pulled in a direction to the right of them. Both Brock and Ash uttered a noise of confusion before turning their eyes to where Snorlax had disappeared to, and they saw that the Sleeping Pokémon was sitting on its rump and it had vines in each of its paws and was munching on them one after the other. Beside it, the hippie stood looking up at his Pokémon with his hands behind his back.
"Chow down, Snorlax; looks like you've got a case of the munchies!" The pair walked up to them, and the hippie elaborated. "Thorns are Snorlax's favorite snack item." Ash blinked in confusion, and looked up at Snorlax. It had already eaten quite a bit of thorns already, and it was still going.
"Snorlax's hunger isn't satisfied until it consumes nine-hundred pounds of food. Then it goes back to sleep," Dexter told him after he retrieved it to learn more.
"B-back to sleep?!" Ash exclaimed as the pair reeled back in shock. But just in the time that Ash had scanned it with his Pokédex, Snorlax had already eaten enough of the vines to make the stream flow a little bit more than a trickle, and they watched in amazement as the minutes passed, and Snorlax continued eating, and before too long, enough of the vines had cleared out for the river to start flowing heavily once again. "Look guys! The river's back to normal again!"
The pair gave a huge thank you to the hippie and his Snorlax, and they left the Normal-type to continue eating the thorns out of the forest before following the river downstream. With the thorns gradually disappearing, it took much less time to get to town than it had to get into the forest, and they came just in time to see the townsfolk rejoicing at the flowing river.
Continuing down the river, they found the mayor at the edge of his property after hearing the news, and a huge smile could even be seen from underneath his mustache. "Thank goodness! The river's flowing just like before!" he cried happily. "How can we thank you?!"
"It wasn't just us!" Ash replied humbly with a knowing glance at Brock.
"This calls for a celebration! We'll hold a special banquet!" Ash and Brock didn't protest in the slightest, and big grins spread across their face from ear-to-ear at the sound of that.
"All right!"
"Okay!"
-end-
Ash:
Party:
Wartortle (Poké Ball)
Moves: Skull Bash, Dig, Water Gun, BubbleBeam
Pidgeotto (Poké Ball)
Moves: Gust, Quick Attack, Whirlwind, Wing Attack
Bulbasaur (Poké Ball)
Moves: Tackle, Vine Whip, Razor Leaf, Leech Seed
Charmander (Poké Ball)
Moves: Flamethrower, Fire Spin, Skull Bash, Ember
Tauros (Safari Ball)
Moves:
Mankey (Poké Ball)
Moves: Thrash, Mega Kick, Scratch, Seismic Toss
At Professor Oak's Lab:
Muk (Poké Ball)
Moves:
Tauros (Safari Ball)
Moves:
Krabby (Poké Ball)
Moves: ViceGrip
Badges:
Boulder Badge
Cascade Badge
Thunder Badge
Marsh Badge
Rainbow Badge
Soul Badge
Brock:
Party:
Onix (Poké Ball)
Moves: Tackle, Bind, Dig
Geodude (Poké Ball)
Moves: Seismic Toss, Tackle
Zubat (Poké Ball)
Moves: Whirlwind, Supersonic
Psyduck (Poké Ball)
Moves: Tail Whip, Water Gun, Disable, Confusion
Vulpix (Poké Ball)
Moves: Fire Spin, Flamethrower, Agility
