Chapter 8: Mysterious Encounter
"Well, I, uh, I-." "Why don't you just come along with us?" Ash immediately cut in before Serena could finish saying what she was about to say. "Yeah, that'd be fun!" Bonnie exclaimed as she began happily running towards Serena and taking her arm. "Come with us, we'll have a great time!" Bonnie cheerfully said. "Yeah, sounds like an excellent idea to me!" Clemont added. After a while of just standing there thinking to herself, Serena finally made up her mind. "Sure, how can I say no to all that!" Serena said with a wink.
"All right!" Ash exclaimed. "Yeah, that's the spirit!" Clemont happily said. "Come on!" Bonnie exclaimed as she began pulling Serena towards the group as Ash then turned to face Ingrid. "So Ingrid, which gym do you say we tackle next?" Ash asked as Ingrid began to think to herself. She knew that the Cyllage Gym would be best since it was only the second gym that Ash challenges in the original anime. "Um… well I heard about a place called Cyllage City and uh, I think I might want to challenge the gym there," Ingrid replied. "Well Cyllage Gym it is!" Ash happily said. "Ash, Ingrid, I can show you two how to get to Cyllage City" Serena said as she began going through her pocket before pulling out a small pink smart tablet with a pink bowtie on it.
"Ta-da, here's where we are now! Santalune City!" Serena said as she pointed towards a red dot on the unlabeled electronic map of the Kalos Region on her tablet. "But look here, Lumiose City is between us and Cyllage City. We have to travel back through Lumiose City before we get there" Serena said before closing her device. "I guess you're right" Ash just simply said. "Ha ha, great! There's a boutique in Lumiose City with the cutest clothes and there's an awesome bakery that has the best pastries you've ever tasted!" Serena cheerfully said as Bonnie's mouth began to water. "What are we waiting for? Let's hurry up!" Serena said before she began to run. "Yippee!" Bonnie exclaimed following suit. "Clemont, Ingrid, step on it!" Ash said running as Ingrid and Clemont both fell behind. "Uh, I'm doing my best," Clemont called after Ash.
This is why I never joined the track team back in high school. Ingrid thought running as fast as she could to catch up with Ash and co.
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The group was now just walking through a path as Ingrid was enjoying the beautiful scenery around her. "As long as we're going to Lumiose City, I'd really like to take a shot at the Lumiose Gym battle" Ash said as Clemont had a nervous expression on his face as Ingrid was now holding back the temptation to reveal her knowledge and call out Clemont on being the Lumiose City gym leader. "Well, it's probably a good idea to keep in mind that you haven't been in the Kalos Region long. I've got an idea, why not utilize this time to catch another Kalos Region pokemon?" Clemont suggested. "Yeah, that's a good point!" Ash said as he then ducked down to observe a nearby patch of grass to search for any wild pokemon.
Ingrid and her bulbasaur both then scaled up the nearby natural land formation to observe the outskirts of the nearby forest for any wild pokemon. Ingrid then found a spinarak sleeping from a web on a tree. She then threw a pokeball and eventually caught it. Ingrid then pulled out her pokedex and she scanned the spinarak as what Ash told her. She could scan a pokemon even when it is inside a pokeball.
Spinarak, the string spit pokemon:
-A bug/poison type.
-It lies still in the same pose for days in its web, waiting for its unsuspecting prey to wander close.
-This spinarak is female, it is about one foot and eight inches. And it weighs about 18.7 pounds.
-Finally, its known moves are string shot, and poison sting.
Well, I am really going to need to train this spinarak. Ingrid thought.
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When Ingrid rejoined the group, she saw Serena holding a small handkerchief with a pokeball symbol on it in front of Ash. "That's Ash's handkerchief?" Bonnie asked. "Yeah, I've been wanting to give this back to you for a long time now but never had a chance to do it. Thank you" Serena said, handing the handkerchief back to Ash. "Uh sure" Ash just bluntly replied. "But then, when I saw the Garchomp news story on tv, and saw it was you, I knew it was time for me to try and track you down," Serena said. "Hold on! Now I remember, you're the girl with the straw hat! Wow that was you! And you came all the way for this?" Ash said. "Not just that, you see I always really wanted to see you again. But I never guessed you wouldn't remember me at all" Serena said with a pout. "Uh yeah, sorry" Ash apologized before everyone began to chuckle.
Suddenly the ground began to shake and at first Ingrid thought that this was an earthquake but to her, since when were earthquakes like this? "That's" Serena said, looking in the opposite direction. There she and everyone else saw at least three people sat atop rhyhorn charging towards the group. Ingrid then picked up her bulbasaur off the ground and she along with everyone else went to the side. The rhyhorn all raced past the group not even noticing them. Eventually, when there were no more rhyhorn, the group went back onto the path.
"What was that about?" Ash asked. "It's a rhyhorn race," Serena replied. "Race?" Ash asked. The group then turned into the direction of the sound of a motorcycle engine and sure enough, they saw Officer Jenny riding on her motorcycle towards them.
"What do you all think you're doing? You're not supposed to be here. You're standing right in the middle of the rhyhorn race course" Officer Jenny scolded the group as Ingrid thought it would be best to step in at this moment. "Well if we are not supposed to be here then why didn't you set up barriers around the race course to keep anyone from wandering onto the course?" Ingrid asked. "It is not our fault that you didn't take proper safety precautions by closing this place off. Heck we almost got seriously hurt back there thanks to your incompetence to warn people about not coming here" Ingrid finished as Officer Jenny now looked dumbstruck. "Oh… I… oh well I guess you're right. I assume that I am at fault for not having proper safety precautions set in place. I will make sure to not repeat this same mistake again. But anyway, you all need to leave this rhyhorn race course immediately" Officer Jenny said. "The rhyhorn race course?!" Ask blurted out.
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Officer Jenny brought the group to a hill overlooking a peaceful looking country village. "This is Odyssey Village where the rhyhorn race begins" Officer Jenny said before bringing the group down to the race course. "The course starts here in the village square, goes through the forest and comes back" Officer Jenny said as Ingrid turned to face the big monitor set up near the track. "Things are heating up here on day two of this exciting rhyhorn race. In the lead is number five Ian!" The announcer announced.
"Wow, a rhyhorn race, never seen one before!" Ash excitedly said. "Rhyhorn races are really popular in the Kalos Region," Clemont said. "This is so awesome to watch!" Ash once again said. "Rhyhorn are so cute too!" Bonnie happily said. "Y'know they even have special rhyhorn race tracks in bigger cities. This course is actually kinda easy" Serena said. "Really, you sure know a lot," Ash replied. "Well, I guess so. Okay an official rhyhorn race consists of six rhyhorns" Serena replied. "Wow" Ash just simply said. "There's a special rhyhorn race anyone can participate in tomorrow. Ash, if you're interested, you might wanna give that race a try" Officer Jenny said to Ash. "You mean it, great I'm in" Ash excitedly said.
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"Well, this should be a good place for us to train," Ingrid said as she brought out her pokeball and sent out her spinarak who was still fast asleep. She wanted to train her spinarak while Ash and the others were all checking out the rhyhorn. Eventually, Spinarak woke up and it then looked at Ingrid for a few seconds before running into a panic. "Hey, hey, it's okay there, I am not here to hurt you. I am your new trainer, Ingrid and I caught you because I want you to be a part of my team" Ingrid said as soon her pokemon calmed down.
"Great, well then, let us begin with training you. Now Spinarak, show me your string shot" Ingrid said but her pokemon did nothing in response, in fact it looked as if it did not want to be here. "C'mon Spinarak" Ingrid pleaded but to no avail. "Okay fine you don't have to show me your string shot but can you at least show me your poison sting?" Ingrid asked but her pokemon still didn't do anything. "Ugh what's even the point?!" Ingrid asked as she was very frustrated now. As she was trying to come up with another method to train her lazy pokemon, Ingrid looked over to see Team Rocket talking amongst themselves and the twenty year old managed to catch the words 'rhyhorn' and 'race'.
She now knew exactly what Team Rocket was going to do as they were going to disrupt the rhyhorn race like they did in the original anime. So she decided to step in and intervene. "Hey! What are the three of you doing here?" Ingrid asked, catching Team Rocket by surprise. "Don't tell me that you are planning another one of your evil schemes" Ingrid added furiously. "Well, well, well, if it isn't the twerpette who nearly jeopardized our mission in Lumiose City" Jessie said. "Yeah, I never knew that she was still with the twerp," Meowth added. "Look, little girl. Just leave us to our job here and we will leave you alone" James said. "And just sit by while you steal all those rhyhorn. Ha, I don't think so" Ingrid replied. "Prepare for trou-." "Shut up and get straight to the point already!" Ingrid angrily shouted. "Wow, always impatient I assume" Jessie replied with an evil smirk on her face.
"Go Inkay!" James shouted, sending out his inkay. "Go Ralts!" Ingrid shouted, sending out her ralts. "Alright Ralts, double team let's go!" Ingrid ordered as her pokemon created multiple copies of itself. "Inkay, use psybeam!" James ordered as his pokemon let out a streaky blue beam with pink circles. The beam ended up hitting most of the copies but missing Ralts.
"Okay Ralts use disarming voice!" Ingrid ordered as the move dealt a decent amount of damage on Inkay. "Inkay hang in there and use psybeam once more!" James ordered as his pokemon let out another blue streaky beam which ended up hitting Ralts.
"Now Ralts use confusion!" Ingrid ordered as her pokemon took control of Inkay's body and began treating it like a rag doll. Eventually, confusion's effect wore off and right before James could say something, Ingrid was right ahead of him. "Ralts use disarming voice once more!" Ingrid ordered as her pokemon used disarming voice, badly damaging Inkay.
"Inkay use tackle!" James ordered as his pokemon became airborne once more and struck a physical blow against Ralts, knocking the smaller pokemon to the side. "Ralts! Are you alright!?" Ingrid asked as her pokemon got back on its feet and let out a sound of approval. "Now Ralts, use-." "Inkay use psybeam once more and follow it up with a tackle!" James ordered as his pokemon did exactly that. "Ralts use disarming voice one more time!" Ingrid ordered as her pokemon did exactly that and Inkay then fell on the floor, fainted. "I-it can't be… I never knew that someone who is essentially new to pokemon training would ever beat me in a battle" James said as he returned his inkay.
"Alright well then Twerp, you may have won this battle but we won your pokemon" James said. Just then Ingrid heard her bulbasaur yelling from behind as when she looked behind her in the direction of the yell, she felt many emotions boiling up inside her. She saw both her bulbasaur and her spinarak trapped inside a net. Bulbasaur desperately struck at the net with its vines but to no avail. "Escape is pointless, these nets are resistant to pokemon moves" Meowth said. "You damn bastards! I will not let you take my pokemon!" Ingrid angrily shouted as she just felt like strangling all three members of the Team Rocket Trio. "Oh look at you, trying to act all tough for your precious pokemon" Jessie teased. "Bulbasaur, use solar beam! To break the net!" Ingrid ordered as her pokemon let out a massive beam of energy that ended up destroying the net and it eventually hit Tema Rocket, sending them blasting away.
Ingrid then ran over to her pokemon and she bent down and placed a gentle hand on both their foreheads. "You two are not hurt are you?" Ingrid asked as Bulbasaur let out a sound of approval meanwhile Spinarak just stared at Ingrid blankly without a hint of emotion plastered on its face. Ingrid then returned both her ralts and her spinarak before her and her bulbasaur walked in the direction in which Ash and co would be in.
Once Ingrid reached the group, she saw Serena and Bonnie both surrounded by a group of rhyhorn who by the look of things appeared to all be very happy. Ingrid then saw Ash and Clemont both looking on and she began to approach the two as when she did, they both turned to face her. "Hey Ingrid, how was pokemon training?" Ash asked. "Well it was interesting to say the least. And the reason why I say that is because well… I encountered Team Rocket and they tried to steal my bulbasaur and my spinarak but luckily I managed to free them and send Team Rocket blasting away" Ingrid said.
"Wait, Team Rocket?! What are they even doing here?!" Ash asked with a slight hint of anger in his tone. "Well if I had to guess then they are here to steal the rhyhorn at the race tomorrow" Ingrid said as Ash became pretty angry. "Rrgh… they just never give up well do they. Well we have to do something" Ash said. "Yeah, so that is why I was thinking about going to the police after this" Ingrid replied as Ash and Clemont both agreed with her idea before the three all turned to face one of the rhyhorn licking Serena in the face.
I am really beginning to miss my dog. Ingrid thought, a little teary eyed.
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Ingrid felt a very strange feeling as she was in some black space. This was by far the strangest dream she has ever had, even stranger than the dream where everyone's head was replaced by a cooked turkey and where all the animals were replaced by bananas. Ingrid then saw a lot of light before a figure of some sort began to materialize in front of her. The figure appeared to be almost entirely white, have four legs, a golden ring of some kind around its body, two red eyes with black pupils in them and for whatever reason, the figure appeared to resemble a llama. It took Ingrid a while but when she found out who this creature in front of her was, she felt her heart stop. This creature was Arceus the alpha pokemon. The pokemon who created the pokemon universe. Right before We Ingrid could even say something, her dream ended and she woke up say up straight innher bed. She looked around to see that everyone else was still fast asleep so she decided to just lay in her bed thinking about the dream she just had.
Was that dream just some random dream or was it legit and did Arceus really try to contact me or something?! Ingrid thought before sinking back into her pillow.
Well, maybe I should just shrug this all off for now and go back to bed. Ingrid thought before falling asleep once more.
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The next day, the group was having breakfast as Ash was eating one hearty breakfast in preparation for his race later that day. After taking a long sip from her coffee, Ingrid finally spoke up and everyone turned to face her.
"So… I had one very strange dream last night. I think that I met a pokemon in that dream albeit it was a pokemon that I've never seen or heard of before" Ingrid said as Ash now looked pretty curious. "What did the pokemon look like?" Ash asked before taking another bite of his piece of toast with an egg on it. "Well it was white and it had a golden circlet around its body, had red eyes with black pupils, stood on four legs and looked how do I put it? Out of this world" Ingrid replied before taking another bite out of her kalos toast which she learned was what french toast was called in the Pokemon World.
"Wait! Hey Ingrid can I borrow your pokedex?" Clemont asked. "Sure Clemont" Ingrid replied as she handed her dex over to the gym leader. Clemont frantically pressed a few buttons on the screen before turning the pokedex around for Ingrid to see. Sure enough, a picture of Arceus was displayed on the dex's screen. "Is this the pokemon you saw?" Clemont asked. "Y-yes it is!" Ingrid replied. "Oh my gosh I can't believe it! You dreamt about the alpha pokemon Arceus. The pokemon who is said to have created it all" Clemont happily said, handing Ingrid back her dex. "Woah you met Arceus?!" Ash said out of shock and disbelief. "Well, we don't know if Ingrid actually met Arceus but if these dreams become a recurring thing then maybe Arceus might actually be trying to communicate with Ingrid" Clemong replied.
"Hey Ash, have you ever met Arceus?" Ingrid asked. "Of course I have, it was back during my journey through Sinnoh when myself along with two old friends of mine both encountered the pokemon itself near some ancient ruins" Ash replied before the trio resumed their breakfast.
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So after the Rhyhorn Race which went smoothly thanks to how the police were alerted to pokemon thieves in the area, the group after meeting Serena's mother left the Pokemon Center then Odyssey Village as a whole.
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A/N: Hello everyone, sorry that this chapter took so long, just a little lazy that's all. I had Ingrid call out Officer Jenny because I think it was justified as if Ash and co really weren't supposed to be there then why were there no measures set in place? I also gave french toast a different name as it was called kalos toast as in my headcanon, France does not exist as the Kalos Region takes France's place. And I know that France was mentioned in one episode of the original series but in my headcanon Misty was actually referring to Kalos and not France. Also the dream scene featuring Arceus is a major plot point as it hints towards something big that will happen later on in the story. I hope that you are looking forward to the next chapter as in that one I will be adapting episode 8. Have a good day!