Chapter three is nigh! Not too much happens in this one, but you have no idea how much fun it is translating 16-bit routes from the games into real places in a fanfic. Well, if you write fanfics, you probably do. I really love it though. I had to stop writing so many times because just writing this gave me an uncontrollable urge to go and play on Silver.

Chapter 3 : Ecruteak City (bluish-gray)

The Pokémon had to shield their eyes from the light upon exiting the mountain; the sun was only just rising, but compared to the darkness inside the mountain, it was painfully bright.

"What now?" Sarol said, feeling a little exposed out in the open once more.

"Erm... I guess we ask for directions. I have no idea where we are." Ritzo shrugged.

Gabzy sighed. "If we came out of there," he pointed to Mount Mortar, "then where we want to go must be over here." He pointed to the west. There was a gatehouse leading though to Ecruteak and it seemed the only way to access the town; thick trees blocked any other form of entrance from both sides.

"That's true," Sarielle said, "but look; there's a human building. "We'll have to pass that, and it looks difficult to get around all the trees."

"You could fly over." Freezachu said.

"Yes, but you couldn't, could you?" Gabzy pointed out. "Sarielle and Ritzo could fly over and I could climb those trees easily, but how would you two get over? We need as better plan. How about I clear a path for you? Those trees don't look too strong."

Before they could ask what he was doing, Gabzy had darted over to the trees and had begun hacking and slashing his way though using his razor-sharp claws.

"What are you doing?" Ritzo asked.

"What does it look like?" Gabzy snapped back, not looking at him but continuing to slash at the tree branches blocking his way.

"You can't do that! Those plants have feelings!"

Gabzy stopped, turned around, gave Ritzo a look that was a cross between "like I care" and "are you stupid?" and then turned back to cutting his way though. It only took about a minute for Gabzy's lethal blades to cut a small tunnel though the matrix of branches that blocked their way. Freezachu, Sarol and Gabzy entered the town via the gap while Ritzo and Sarielle flew over the top, not wanting to risk damaging their feathers on the clawing boughs.

Once they had met up in the town on the other side, they all immediately felt completely exposed. The streets had very few people on, it being so early in the morning, but there were so few things to hide behind that it felt very dangerous to the group.

Ekruteak was small town in comparison to some others in Johto, but was plenty big enough for the group of tiny Pokémon who were dwarfed by the wooden houses.

"Let's get out of here before we're seen." Sarielle said worriedly.

"Agreed. We'd better go down that way." Ritzo pointed down a long route to the south of the city. "Sound good?"

Everyone nodded, so Gabzy took a few steps into the town that was Ekruteak. He kept as close to the enclosing mass of trees as possible, and the Pokémon were, to their relief, were cast into shadow due to the newly-rising sun. They avoided the gaze of all the humans they passed and once had to dart behind a large building to avoid being seen by an elderly human. As they were hiding around the side of the building, Sarol noticed an odd noise coming from it.

"What's that?" she asked.

"What?"

"That music. It's so pretty…"

"I imagine that's a dance hall or something." Gabzy said, checking to see that the human had gone.

"Look!" Sarielle gasped, peeking into the hall through a gap in the wooden slats. The other Pokémon with the exception of Gabzy all peered into the building to watch the dancing.

"It's beautiful…" Freezachu whispered.

"Yeah… magical, almost." Sarielle agreed.

The building was split into two parts; in one was a large collection of people who were all staring down at the top end. There was a large stage at the top end of the hall, which was where the Pokémon were peeking in. On the stage were five young female trainers all dressed up beautifully in kimonos and traditional clothing. They were dancing with each other and five Pokémon who were equally graceful. The Pokémon were all quadrupeds and bore a resemblance to each other, one yellow, one blue, one red, one black and the other a kind of pinkish purple. Their elegant dancing styles were as beautiful as they were. They stood for a little while, almost hypnotized by the magnificence of the dancing.

"C'mon, we'd better go." Ritzo said, moving away from the Dance Hall. "We can't dawdle, it's not like we have forever."

"You're right." Sarol nodded, "Now let's hope we that Route's the one we want."

They sneaked along the outskirts of the town until they arrived at the Route they wanted. It was a relatively long one, and the grass was so long that Sarol and Freezachu were having a hard time seeing over the top of it.

"Can't I just cut it?" Gabzy sighed, greatly annoyed as Sarol's moaning. "I can hack you a path easily if you want."

"No you don't." Sarielle said warningly. "Plenty of Pokémon live in this grass and they need it as protection."

"So do we," Ritzo added, "it's giving us excellent cover from any humans that might wonder past."

"I haven't seen any Pokémon living here." said Sarol, right as she bumped nose-to-nose with a large Stantler.

The Big Horn Pokémon opened his eyes grumpily. He saw the smaller, scared Pokémon that had invaded his territory and attacked him, waking him up. The Stantler got angry and stood up on his four long, powerful legs and glowered menacingly at the group of Pokémon. Four of them looked absolutely terrified and were getting ready to run away as fast as they could, but Gabzy looked furious. He leaped forwards in front of Sarol, who looked petrified, and hissed warningly at the large stag, his claws extended, teeth showing and the fur on his back standing on end. Despite being much larger than the Sneasel, the Stantler was intimidated by the Sharp Claw Pokémon's ferocity. Natural herbivores, the only real fighting he had ever done was head butting other males that entered his territory. He was not at all used to fighting against Pokémon with the sharpest teeth and claws he had ever seen with the ferocity of a mothering Ursaring. Glancing around to check if there were not any other Pokémon, especially of his own kind around, he backed down, lowering his large antlers and standing less aggressively. Gabzy and his friends passed by the Stantler while the large Pokémon avoided eye contact.

Once they were a reasonable distance away from the Stantler, they all began talking excitedly.

"That thing was… three times as big as you!"

"It was amazing!"

"You're going to get eaten one day; you know that?"

Gabzy shrugged them all off. "It was no big deal. Stantler rarely have anything stand up to them, as most Pokémon will run off when they see one. I bet it was a bit of a shock for him for me to do the intimidating."

"Hey!" Freezachu shouted suddenly, "Apricorns!"

"Where?" Sarol said excitedly, looking around.

"You're right," Sarielle said, running over to the collection of small trees, each bearing different colored fruit, "I haven't had these in ages!"

The Pokémon ran over to the collection of trees and picked up some of the ripened fruits which had fallen off the trees.

"You used to bring these in for us all the time." Ritzo said to Gabzy while trying to break though the hard shell of a green apricorn.

"Yeah, there used to be a small plantation not far from the Ice Path. But when the humans realized I was nicking them, they used to patrol there sometimes, so it wasn't worth getting caught." Gabzy sliced though the shell of his red apricorn with ease and took a bite from the soft fruit inside.

They paused in their journey for a few minutes, breaking open and eating the apricorns. After the long trek through Mount Mortar they were all hungry, and the berries were exactly whet they needed to stop the hunger pangs.

Once they had eaten their fill they continued along the route, chatting quietly and hoping not to attract the attention of another Stantler, when they eventually came to another gatehouse that was near-impossible to get around. However, Gabzy's claws made short work of the foliage around the edges, and before long they found themselves in a huge grassy area known as the National Park. To their shock, there were a large number of human trainers in the park, some battling, some looking around for a new Pokémon to add to their collection, others just sunning themselves. In the center there was a large, beautiful fountain, modeled after a Lapras using Water Gun into the air.

"Crud." Gabzy said shortly, looking at all the humans.

"But… but couldn't was hide in the grass or something?" Sarol said somewhat desperately.

"No." said the Sneasel, indicating to the trainers searching in the grass, "We'd be caught before we reached the fountain."

"Is there another way around?" Sarielle asked, looking around desperately.

"Yes!" Ritzo said excitedly. "Look; see that fence around the edge? If we could get over that, nobody would find us. We just have to climb over, walk on the wrong side until we get to the other building at the other end, and then climb back over!"

Gabzy glared at the fence, trying to see if it would hide them all. It was tall enough and the slats were close together enough to avoid being seen by anyone who wasn't trying to look through the fence.

"Yes..." he said slowly. "Yes, that would work."

"But how are we supposed to get over?" Sarol said, indicating to herself and Freezachu. "You two can fly and Gabzy, you're expert at climbing, but we couldn't get over that!"

"Oh really?" Gabzy said, picking up Freezachu in his mouth by the scruff of his neck. Freezachu let out a startled yelp, but Gabzy wasn't using his teeth, so he didn't feel any pain. Freezachu was heavy, but Gabzy cleared the fence with him in his mouth in one giant leap.

"What about me?" Sarol asked, hoping that Gabzy wouldn't do the same thing to her.

"I'll fly you over." Sarielle said quickly, looking somewhat startled at Gabzy's rough treatment of Freezachu.

Sarielle held the Shiny Swinub using her webbed feet and flew over the fence as quickly as possible. It was difficult, as Sarol was rather heavy, but she managed it. Ritzo quickly joined them.

"Okay, just follow the fence." Gabzy told them.

The journey around was definitely the long way around the park, but they avoided all humans whilst doing it. They eventually got to the Gatehouse, where Gabzy carved a hole in the trees on one side large enough for Freezachu, Sarol and himself to squeeze through. Ritzo and Sarielle once again flew over the top and joined them on the other side.

"Oh no…" Ritzo said, gaping at the amount of trainers on the other side.

"We'll never get past all of them unseen!" Sarol gasped.

Sarielle tilted her head, gazing at all the humans along the long gravel road that was Route 35. "I think we can manage it, actually."

"How?"

"All the trainers on this route are doing something. Look."

She was right. Virtually all the humans were preoccupied; many of them were talking to one another or their Pokémon, some were simply rushing to the National Park and one boy was commanding his Growlithe to headbutt a tree repeatedly. "I think that if we go past as fast as we can, nobody will see us."

"I think she's right." Gabzy said, measuring the distance from where they were to the gatehouse at the end of the route, "Plus, there are some trees to hide us if necessary. Let's go, before more come along."

So the Pokémon took off, keeping as low to the ground as possible, but still moving as fast as they could all was going well, until they all froze at the loud yell of "Hey!"

They all looked, but the young human boy was not pointing at them. He was challenging an older girl to a battle. She nodded, and they sent out their Pokémon; he a Psyduck, she a Pikachu. This proved a very useful distraction to the Ice Pokémon; all the other trainers stopped what they were doing to watch the battle. They hurried on as inconspicuously as they could.

Beleive me, more interesting stuff begins happening next chapter. Whoo! Roll on Goldenrod!