The Zapdos' Journey
Chapter 2: Answers Revealed and Questions Asked From the Internet
Recalling all of this information is a lot harder than I thought and the longer I take, the more I seem to forget. I guess I just have a bad memory. The memories of my past life still linger on in my mind though, and I doubt they'll ever go away. Anyway, no time to think about it now!
Date: February 10, 2002
Drip, drop, drip, drop… Shhhhhhhhhhhhhh…
The sound that woke me up the next morning was the sound a lightly falling late winter shower. I got up rather quickly and looked at the clock. It was barely 6AM… Ninetales was still fast asleep at the foot of my bed. I got up gently, as not to awake her, and walked to the kitchen. I changed back to human form, which was becoming less and less creepy as I grew accustomed to it and had a bowl of cereal. I almost felt like I was back home, sitting there eating cereal as if nothing had happened.
Afterwards, I poured Ninetales her food and set in front of the bed for when she wakes up. I sat on the couch, and just looked at the ceiling for a while. I thought to myself quietly.
"There's got to be some way I can find answers as to what happened… but how? Where can I look? Who can I turn to? This whole thing happened because of that error I had gotten back in the other world. That virus… it was the same name as the story I had read… it took place in a world just like this actually. The author… I had only talked to him online once through a site to tell him how much I loved his story… his pen name was FireHybrid."
I suddenly had an idea and I instantly sat up excitedly.
"What if I can reach him on the Internet? What if I can find news about a recent massive outbreak of amnesia or something and then talk to one of the other victims? What if some of my friends are still there! Oh man, I have to get to a computer!"
I got up and looked around… my heart sunk when I saw no hint of a computer anywhere.
"Wonderful, great, yeah…" I said disappointedly. Ninetales stirred from her sleep and looked at me. I looked at her and shook my head. "Sorry I woke you…"
"Ni…" she replied… she didn't seem to mind much.
I went into the bathroom and shifted back to hybrid form and got dressed. Afterwards, I went back into the main room to find Ninetales chomping away at her food already.
"Hey, Ninetales, do I have a computer?" She looked up at me, her muzzle covered in food.
"Yeah, you do… it's in the closet. That's why there's a chair in front of it. You turned the closet into a little computer area to keep your CDs and games and stuff, as well as store the hardware in the back of it to reduce the amount of space it takes up. At least, that's what you told me," She laughed a bit then sighed, "still can't remember stuff?"
"Yeah… I guess it'll be like this for a while, huh?" I said with a frown, "I promise I'll recover my memory eventually… but right now it's internet time!" I said excitedly, even though I knew the point of going online was to help me find answers to at least a few of my questions. I ran to the closet and opened the door to find the computer sitting right there behind it.
"It kinda looks like the one I've always used… wait a sec... it's the exact same computer!" I thought to myself as I sat down and turned it on. I realized that I had to shift back to human form again, since it was a little hard to type in hybrid form. Anyway, same old Windows 98, same old login screen, save for the fact that my main login was now Zai. My account had no background, except for the blue screen. All the basic icons were there, MS Word, Recycle Bin, MS Paint, My Computer, My Documents, AIM… wha?
"I have AIM? I never had that before…" my sign on name was automatically displayed and it seemed that I had it save my password, since no one else uses this computer. I signed on, but it seemed that my Buddy List was empty. Guess I didn't use AIM that much myself. I loaded up Internet Explorer, which seemed to run a lot faster, and it opened to the default homepage. Nothing in the news section that looked like much help, so I ran search for recent news about an amnesia outbreak. Nothing… I checked my e-mail account, which thankfully, was also saved on the computer, since it now had been changed. Nothing in my inbox or in any of my folders… unbelievable! Then again, it wasn't much different in my old life. I pretty much never got e-mails.
"Well… this doesn't help me at all… what was I thinking?" I sighed to myself. I checked a few random websites, looking for any sort of clue, but everything came up negative.
Feeling defeated, I went to AIM to check the options for it. After finding the option to create a public chat, I had an idea. "I doubt this'll work, but…" I created a chat room using the name of FireHybrid's story, A New Beginning. "Now I play the waiting game, I guess…" I thought to myself. I got up from the chair and walked over to the fridge. "Hmm… oh. Vanilla Coke! This stuff hasn't even been out long and I love it." I said a bit happily, grabbing a can from the fridge. Hey, it was new at the time this occurred, at least. I walked back to the computer, opening the can and drinking as I sat down. As the cold, vanilla flavored fluid hit my tongue, I was relieved to be reminded that some things are still the same, like my favorite foods and stuff.
I waited in that chat room for a few hours. It seemed hopeless to think that someone would show up, so I reached over at the mouse to close the window when suddenly, someone by the name of Mel had entered the room. Surprised, I quickly highlighted the text box and start typing:
Zai: Hello, is there something I can do for you? My name's Zai.
Mel: Hey there, my name's Melchior, but you can call me Mel. I saw this chat room was named A New Beginning, so I was wondering if it had anything to do with FireHybrid's story.
Zai: So there ARE others that know? Please, I just woke up in this world the other day, and I don't know what's going on! Can you please help me?
Mel: Well, to be honest, I don't know myself. I haven't found out much you probably don't already know and I honestly can't remember what happened before I started life here.
Zai: Wait, so you have no memory of what your life in the other world was like? That's strange… I have a perfect recollection of what my old life was like…
Mel: My mind's pretty much been a blank since I came over here, I mean I know some things, like the story, but not much. I've been here for a little while already, and you just came over, you say?
Zai: Yeah… I came online to try to find clues to what happened.
Mel: I've already tried that numerous times, and each time I came up empty. But maybe if we cooperate, we can find something.
Zai: That's a good idea. If anything, it'll clear up if FireHybrid is really here with us or not.
For the next couple of hours or so, we did searches on ever search engine we could think of, looking for things about FireHybrid, which didn't help much, and "A New Beginning" which helped even less, since thousands of websites used that term in it. After a while, I thought back to the one time I had talked to him… what did he say? Thank you for the comments… something about a new story… uhm… I told him I lived in New Jersey and he said he didn't live that far away…
"Maybe if I search for a record of him living in New York or something", I thought out loud. I went to a search engine and searched for FireHybrid and New York. Nothing, but, it gave me a correction suggestion. There was no record of a FireHybrid in New York, but someone named… Fire Storm? It wasn't a big article, but it said something about a Growlithe hybrid, supposedly called Fire Storm, and his Arcanine hybrid partner had busted a scam by a local group of criminals in an area near a town named Sapphire.
Something in my head suddenly went off, call it a bird's intuition I guess, but I knew he was the guy I was looking for.
Zai: Hey, Mel, I found something. It doesn't say anything about a FireHybrid, but I have this weird… I guess instinct, that I know that this guy… it's him. He apparently doesn't live that far away so I'll attempt to meet him.
Mel: Are you sure that's wise? Meeting him out of the blue like that?
Zai: I need to do this. I need answers. Maybe he can give them to me. I'll try to mention your amnesia to him, too.
Mel: Well, if you think it'll help you, go ahead!
Zai: Thanks, Mel, I'm going to go get ready for my journey ahead of me. I'll talk to you again sometime!
Mel: Sure thing and good luck, Zai!
For the rest of the day I searched out routes from here to Sapphire Town, ate dinner, and took a shower. I turned into my hybrid form once more and got ready for bed. Right before I got in the bed, I turned to Ninetales.
"Ninetales… in a couple days, we're going on a long journey." I said. Ninetales looked up at me curiously.
"Where to, Zai?" she asked. I grinned widely and said loudly,
"To a place in New York… Sapphire Town!"
