Roy was awoken the next morning to Antonia violently shaking him awake. "Huh? What is it?" he murmured sleepily as he shook her off and then rubbed the sleep from his eyes. As he adjusted to the sunlight streaming through the canvas of his tent, Roy saw Antonia come into focus. Her face was pale and there were signs of strain on her usually composed features. "Toni, what's wrong?"
"It's-" Antonia stopped to swallow, but when she did speak she could not keep the quaver out of her voice. "It's my kakuna, Roy. Something happened to it." She did not move to elaborate, and Roy did not wait for her to do so. Instead, he hurriedly crawled past her towards the entrance of his tent and emerged into morning on Mt. Moon.
Antonia came out after him and led him to her tent. As they neared their destination, she spoke again, "I thought that it would enjoy some fresh air, so I let it sleep outside of its poké ball last night, bulbasaur too, but when I woke up I found this." There was no need for her to explain, instead Antonia just gestured to a mess on the ground next to her backpack. There was the telltale gold of Kakuna's exoskeleton, but it was torn up and mangled so badly that there was nothing left but scraps of it scattered over the clearing next to Antonia's tent. Bulbasaur was standing in front of the scene, shaken and seemingly unsure of what he should be doing. At the sight of the carnage, Roy swallowed and then grimly said, "We ought to tell Sarah about this, she'll know what to do."
To neither of their surprise, Sarah had gotten up with the sunrise and was already working on clearing up the campsite and packing things up for the last day of the group's trek to Cerulean City. When she saw Roy and Antonia, she waved them over and was about to hand off some tasks for them to work on but then she saw their somber expressions.
"What happened?" the older girl asked.
Unusually, it was Roy who was silent while an explanation readily burst forth from between Antonia's lips. "I woke up and something happened to my kakuna. It was torn apart by some kind of wild pokémon. I don't know what it could be, but I thought that you would know since you know this mountain so well, and you can figure out what it is and if we need to wake everyone else up so that we can leave before anyone else gets hurt."
"Whoa, slow down there, Antonia," said Sarah. "Why don't you show me, huh? Then I'll have a better idea of what we should do."
Sarah followed them to the same site where Antonia had brought Roy and, unlike him, she had no reservations kneeling down and examining the scattered remnants of Kakuna's body. She worked in silence, picking up one piece of gold and turning it over in her hands before repeating the process with another, and then another. Her care and calm were reassuring to the two younger pokémon trainers and their shock gradually lessened until they were ready to hear Sarah's conclusions.
She started off with a bold pronouncement, "I don't think that a wild pokémon did this." Once Roy and Antonia let that sink in, Sarah continued, "First of all, there's no sign that your backpack was disturbed, Antonia. A wild pokémon would have been sure to sniff around such an inviting target and rummage through it for any food that you have in it. Secondly, look at this." She held out a piece of kakuna's carapace for them to examine. Roy did not accept it, while Antonia took it numbly, her brown eyes still trained on Sarah. "You can see on that one especially that the tears and rips were made from the inside, not the outside."
"From the inside?" Roy asked.
Antonia's round face lit up with understanding. "Oh!" she exclaimed. "So then, does that mean that Kakuna evolved?"
"That's right," answered Sarah with a smile. "Congratulations, Antonia, you are now the proud trainer of a beedrill!"
Matching sighs of relief escaped from both Roy and Antonia, and then they caught each other and smiled.
"So, where is it then?" Roy asked.
"Oh, I'm sure it's around. Probably cleaning itself off and stretching its new wings. I bet that it'll come if you call for it."
"Wings!" said Antonia giddily, and it was only after Roy elbowed her in the side that she thought to cup her hands around her mouth and holler, "Beedrill!"
It took two more tries, with Roy and Sarah joining in, before a high-pitched drone started up from just beyond the tree line next to where they had all set up camp. By now others in the hiking group were waking up and emerging from their tents to see what all of the early morning commotion was about. Their reward was the sight of Antonia's newly-evolved beedrill emerging from the top of one of the taller conifers which grew on Mt. Moon and flying down to its trainer, tracing loops in the sky as it flew.
Barring Brock's onix, Beedrill vied with the wild pidgeotto that they had seen in Viridian Forest for the title of the largest pokémon Roy and Antonia had yet seen on their journey, with much of its size attributable to the four glossy wings which beat a steady rhythm to create the pokémon's telltale drone. The rest of Beedrill's body was full of warnings, from its yellow and black markings to the three prominent stingers capping its forearms and its abdomen. Encountered in the wild or under the command of an opposing trainer, it would have been an intimidating sight, and some of the other hikers shied away from the insect pokémon's approach. But Antonia did not feel any fear and she smiled brightly at her beedrill, seeing in it the same weedle she had caught and the kakuna she had carried over the past few days. When the trainer and pokémon embraced, Sarah led the group in applause, and then quickly put the onlookers to work before they could slink away and try to catch some more sleep.
Roy and Antonia were spared for the moment from work detail, and they both were able to spend a few minutes marveling at Antonia's pokémon. Little was spoken aloud, except for "wow" and "cool" from Antonia and Roy respectively, but nothing else needed to be said. Beedrill, for its part, basked in the attention and was especially eager to show off its new wings to the appreciative trainers, but while it was flying about in daring maneuvers overhead, Antonia noticed that someone did not seem pleased with Kakuna's evolution.
"Bulbasaur, what's wrong?" the girl asked her other pokémon, and received only a huff in return. The squat pokémon had been with them during Sarah's explanation, but now his back to her and he was trying very hard to look interested in a single patch of bare dirt. Antonia approached him and tried to rest a hand on his bulb, but Bulbasaur jerked away from her touch and huffed again. She was about to try and say something, when Roy unintentionally interrupted her.
"I think you've got the right idea about getting our pokémon some fresh air," he said and then whatever Antonia was going to say to her bulbasaur was forgotten when Roy released his charmander and nidoran from their poké balls.
Both of Roy's pokémon were drawn to Antonia's new beedrill as it returned to solid ground. Charmander approached the other pokémon to sniff it and get a better look at its wings, and especially at Beedrill's stingers. Meanwhile, Nidoran took one look at the yellow and black pokémon and tried to make a run for it, only to be caught in a red beam of light and returned to his confinement in the poké ball in Roy's hand. "He'll get used to you," he told Beedrill apologetically, but the larger pokémon did not seem to mind and was plenty excited to show off for Charmander.
Before Antonia could turn her attention back to Bulbasaur, Sarah called for them to help with packing up the campsite so that the group could get started on the day's trek. "This is our last day, we're almost there, so let's get a move on, people!" she announced excitedly.
Roy and Antonia passed out food to the other hikers as they did the first day of their journey over Mt. Moon. By now they were all well-practiced at handing the granola bars and fruit up and down the line of their convoy. Two days of traveling and two nights of sleeping on bedrolls instead of beds had left the journeyers tired but also hardened and as they marched they overtook with ease obstacles which at the start of their climb would have challenged them. Compared to the days before, people talked more freely with one another, and Antonia received many congratulations for her beedrill, who was flying over the group. It eagerly raced out to scope out the path ahead of them at Antonia or Sarah's command, and returned to report back and to receive even more adulation.
Every word of praise Beedrill received seemed to put Bulbasaur in a worse and worse mood, however, until the short pokémon was snapping at Antonia and lagging well behind the group. Even Sarah's own bulbasaur, who Antonia's pokémon had spent the past two days shadowing, was unable to improve the grouchy pokémon's mood.
The disconnect came to a peak when the group stopped for lunch. Roy and Antonia handed out the food to the other hikers again, but when they turned their attention to feeding their pokémon, Antonia's bulbasaur was not with the others and he did not come when she called for him. After a few minutes of searching, Antonia grew worried, and her anxiety spread throughout the group of hikers until everyone in their group was looking around for the missing pokémon. Antonia sent her beedrill to look for Bulbasaur in the air and asked Sarah for any suggestions for where the wayward pokémon may have ended up.
As they searched, the day continued to grow hotter under the midday sun and the initial urgency and enthusiasm for the search began to wane. Even Sarah's determination flagged and she explained to the increasingly frantic Antonia, "If we're going to get to Cerulean by nightfall, I need to get these people moving."
"But I can't leave Bulbasaur behind!"
"I know that. Of course, I know that," soothed Sarah, "and I'm not saying that you need to stop searching, but I have to help the others." While Antonia blinked away her frustrated tears, Sarah handed her a red and white poké ball. "This is my bulbasaur's poké ball. He's going to help you find your pokémon, and he can help you find your way down the mountain and catch up with us when you are done."
"I'm staying with Toni," Roy said from where he had standing off to the side of the two girls. His only apology for eavesdropping was a sheepish grin, and then he was talking rapidly, "The more people looking for Bulbasaur, the better chance that we have of finding him, and the sooner we can rejoin the group. Plus, if anything happens then there's someone to help, or to go for help."
Sarah nodded. "That makes sense, Roy," she said, eliciting a wide smile from the younger trainer, "but make sure you stick together. The last thing we need is for more people to get lost. Be careful and listen to my bulbasaur." Then, to Antonia, she added, "I'm sure your pokémon didn't go far. You'll find him in no time."
After that, Sarah headed back to gather the rest of their group, wishing Roy and Antonia luck one last time before departing. That left Roy, Antonia, their pokémon, and Sarah's bulbasaur to conduct the search for Antonia's missing pokémon. Beedrill was quickly drafted into flying over the mountains to try and find Bulbasaur from the air while Roy offered Charmander and Nidoran's services as trackers.
No sooner had he released his nidoran from his poké ball did the small pink creature make a bolt for it. Roy groaned and tried to recall the pokémon, but Nidoran darted into some scraggly brush and the cover and his speed made it impossible for his trainer to connect the poké ball's beam of light with his nimble form. "We're not losing another pokémon!" shouted Roy and he took off headlong after his nidoran, to be followed shortly by Charmander, Antonia, Sarah's bulbasaur and even Beedrill, who flew closer to figure out what was causing so much commotion.
"Roy, wait!" pleaded Antonia while she ran through the hardy bushes and trees which dotted Mt. Moon's surface. "We have to stick together!"
To her surprise, Antonia's words appeared to have an effect on Roy's mad dash, and he skidded to a stop so abruptly that Antonia and the pokémon chasing after him had to veer away lest they run into him. "What is it, Roy?"
"I was right behind Nidoran, close enough to grab him really, and then he just dropped out of sight."
"What are you talking about, Roy?" Antonia scoffed. "Pokémon don't just vanish into thin air."
Roy turned to her and frowned. "No? Listen." But Antonia couldn't hear anything, and heatedly told Roy as much. Then Roy tilted his head and said, "There's running water, it's faint, but I can hear it. There's a cave under us, I think. That's where my nidoran went, and I bet that your bulbasaur's down there too!"
Antonia was skeptical, but she let Roy lead her to the bush where he said that Nidoran had disappeared from sight and as they knelt down and parted the branches and found just what Roy had been expecting. A narrow tunnel under the earth, worn smooth by countless years of erosion from the elements vanished into darkness. Ignoring the vegetation catching on their skin and clothes, the two young trainers peered into the black and then looked at each other, sharing matching chills which ran down their spines.
"You think our pokémon are down there?" asked Antonia in a voice scarcely louder than a whisper.
Roy's own mouth was dry when he replied, "Only one way to find out, isn't there?" Then, he cleared his throat and hollered down the hole, "Hello! Nidoran? Bulbasaur? Can you hear me?"
The immediate response was a strange rustling sound which was loud enough that even Antonia could hear it. The two trainers looked at each other uneasily, but neither moved and their reticence was rewarded when something emerged from the hole, the end of a tell-tale blue-green vine.
"Bulbasaur!" gasped Antonia and she rushed forward to embrace it, only to be stopped by Roy's hand on her shoulder.
"Be careful, Toni, you don't want to slip and fall down there."
Sure enough, the tunnel, narrow as it was, was still large enough for someone of Roy or Antonia's size to fit through. The ground around the cave's lip angled downward and was smooth and treacherous. But even taking into account the risks, Antonia still pulled free of Roy's hand and, more carefully, lowered herself to the opening in the earth and cradled her bulbasaur's vine close to her chest.
"Is Nidoran down there too?" Roy asked the vine, and as foolish as he looked to Antonia, his question was still answered by Bulbasaur's appendage bobbing up and down in a rough approximation of a nod. "Okay, great, so we found them," he said, "but how do we get them out?"
Bulbasaur retracted his vine back into the darkness of the cave and then, after some muffled squeaks and other sounds of struggle, the vine returned holding the trembling form of Roy's nidoran. A quick flash of light later and Nidoran was back inside of his poké ball. "Well, that's one of them at least," said Roy happily. "Now to get Bulbasaur out."
Antonia's brow furrowed as she thought. "Can we pull him out?"
Roy tried grabbing ahold of the vine protruding from the hole and tugging on it, but not only did it slip from his grasp but before he relinquished his grip, Roy's feet had also started to skid towards the mouth of the cave. "I don't think we can do it," added Roy a bit unnecessarily as he wiped his hands off on the legs of his shorts.
While Antonia continued to think in silence, Roy snapped his fingers and said, "What if my charmander uses his fire to try and light up the cave?"
"Are you crazy?" asked Antonia. "What if you hit him?" She looked over at Roy and Charmander, who looked equally put out by how strongly she rejected the idea. Then, she looked over at her beedrill, which had lit upon a branch of a tree overhead. With its wings, Antonia thought that there was no way that it would fit down the narrow tunnel. Nidoran just got out of the cave, and besides he was too flighty to be of much use. That left one last pokémon, Sarah's bulbasaur.
"Okay, what if we tried this?" she said. "If we can get the two bulbasaur to twist their vines together, then they should be able to hold onto each other, right? I'll hold onto Sarah's bulbasaur and together we'll pull mine out of there."
It was as good of an idea as any of them had come up with, and so the trainers and pokémon arranged themselves around the cave so that Antonia was holding onto the larger bulbasaur while Roy and Charmander stood off to the side. The two bulbasaur's vines had been entwined like a braid of hair and then, with a grunt of exertion, Sarah's pokémon started to reel in its fellow bulbasaur. Everyone else held their breaths but the process seemed to be working, with slow but steady progress.
Then, without warning, the coiled strands of vine jerked violently and Sarah's bulbasaur nearly fell out of Antonia's arms. She held on tight, but lost her balance and fell forward, landing on her stomach with an "oof" of outrushing air, and then sliding forward until she was perched at the lip of the cave, hands holding onto Sarah's pokémon so tightly that the tips of her fingers were turning pale. The pokémon gritted its teeth, but did not release its hold on the other bulbasaur.
Even in the uncomfortable position, the team started to make progress at rescuing Bulbasaur again, but then Antonia heard the rustling from under the earth again. Then the sound was joined by another, more unsettling one, a chorus of tinny shrieking voices rising up out of the earth like something out of a horrible fairytale. To make matters worse, Antonia felt herself sliding towards the opening and the screams as she failed to find purchase on the ground. She saw the black growing larger in her field of vision and suddenly her face was in the darkness, when something grabbed her.
Antonia screamed, her voice joining those coming from inside of the cave, but it was only Roy seizing hold of one then both of her ankles. Behind him, Charmander was holding onto his trainer's midsection and even biting down on the back of Roy's shirt.
As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, Antonia saw her bulbasaur looking up at her as he rose through the air inch by painstaking inch. "Bulbasaur!" She was so happy that her grip on Sarah's pokémon almost slackened in relief, but instead Antonia remained vigilant. "Almost there!" she shouted for the benefit of her pokémon below her and the others behind her.
It was a mistake. In the confines of the cave, her voice bounced around wildly, echoing as a distorted version of itself. Her attention pulled away from Bulbasaur, Antonia could also see the other inhabitants of the cave, blind zubat hanging from its ceiling. They were the source of the rustling and the screams as they jostled amongst each other in a sightless, writhing mass, and now, with Antonia's exclamations, they were in a panicked enough state to take flight.
Antonia bit down hard on her tongue to keep herself from screaming as the first leather-winged pokémon flew at her face. It skimmed over her head, only barely escaping from getting tangled in her brown hair, but it was only the first of many. The other zubat were not far behind it, and they swarmed towards Antonia and the two bulbasaur with a manic energy, beating wings and shrieking as they desperately sought exit from their underground home. Antonia wanted to close her eyes and just wait for the awful moment to pass – the pokémon flying around her, touching her skin and her with their warm squirming bodies – but she kept her eyes open and focused on her pokémon. Even with her mouth shut tight for fear of something flying inside of it, Antonia tried to convey some kind of reassurance to Bulbasaur, even as the pokémon was sent rocking back and forth on its swing by the exodus of zubat from the cave.
Behind her, Antonia heard Roy swear loudly as the horde of zubat emerged into the open air, but he did not release his friend's ankles from his grip and in fact started to pull back, fighting the weight of Antonia and the two bulbsaur as he did so.
The last of the zubat escaped from the cave and it was a quiet few minutes as Bulbasaur was lifted up and out of the cave to be reunited with the others. The pokémon did not let go of Sarah's bulbasaur until he was far from the cave. Then, Bulbasaur leaped into Antonia's arms, any lingering bitterness between the girl and her pokémon forgotten. When Beedrill landed next to him to check on its teammate, Bulbasaur even tried to comfort the larger pokémon as it fretted over him. Roy and Charmander, for their part, both looked at Antonia with newfound respect. When she asked them about it, Roy simply said, "That was the bravest thing I've seen anyone do, Toni," and he left it at that.
Catching up with the rest of the hiking group meant driving themselves harder and faster than they had over the past two days of hiking, and both Roy and Antonia returned their pokémon to their poké balls for some rest, leaving only Sarah's bulbasaur out to help guide their way. The borrowed pokémon was an excellent guide and its expertise combined with the two trainers' determination to bring the trio within earshot of the rest of their group after a little over an hour of strenuous traveling and within eyeshot not long after that.
When she caught sight of them, Sarah halted the hiking group and ran back to meet Roy and Antonia. After making sure that they and their pokémon were all right, Antonia received a hug from the older girl while Roy had his blonde hair mussed up. After the excitement of the day, it felt almost relaxing to only have to worry about the rocky terrain of their hike as Roy and Antonia joined the others in descending down the eastern side of Mt. Moon.
As the sun started to set, a few of the lights in Cerulean City came on, and the sight sent up a cheer among the entire hiking group. "If we can get to the pokémon center by sundown, I'll buy you all dinner!" promised Sarah, which elicited another wave of cheering from the weary travelers.
Incredibly, they just managed to meet their guide's arbitrary deadline, walking through the sliding glass doors of the Cerulean City pokémon center just as the last streaks of sun-given color blessed the sky. The pokémon center was smaller than the one in Pewter City, and Sarah explained why as they neared it. Many of the city's inhabitants raised water pokémon, and the local pokémon gym was able to provide specialized care for them that an all-purpose pokémon center simply couldn't match. As a result, the center played host to visitors, especially those venturing through or over Mt. Moon while the gym took care of the locals' more particular needs.
With a complimentary dinner waiting for the weary travelers at the pokémon center's expense, Sarah's promise had been more than a little disingenuous but that was all-but-forgotten as Roy, Antonia, and the others in the group were more than happy to put up their feet and enjoy a hot meal. Little was said as they ate, but many smiles passed easily around the abruptly bustling cafeteria. Everything that would pass between the group seemed to have been communicated over the past three days and, besides, the excitement for sleeping in a real bed dueled with the appetite for real food. So it was that Roy and Antonia, after excusing themselves, unpacked their things, washed away the grime of their days spent in the wilderness, and then fell asleep in rooms on opposite sides of a pleasantly if sparingly furnished hallway.
