Chapter 3

Hidden Paradise

It was around 6 am by the time everyone was up…. except Ash of course but that doesn't matter. The four of us headed out to Viridian Forest and from there we went our separate ways. Trev and Grace took the Maine road while Gary and I went on a side road that said it would take us into deep Viridian where the more rare Pokémon resided. That's where we were now.

"I swear if I see another weedle I'm going to let Masa have his way with all the bugs here!" I growled. We had been walking for hours and a we had encountered were Weedle, Caterpie, Metapod and wad ya know more Fucken Weedle!

"It could be worse Saber, so lighten up. Anyway that river your we're talking about is up ahead if the map is right and you can fish away while I look for a Scyther." Gary said as he continued to look at the map.

"Well at least that's a pulse, me and Masa can see if we can catch a Horsea and I'd not then build up a little resistance to water." I said as I glanced at the pokeball on my hip. Masa was in a bad mood currently, we had been fighting a Weedle for the hundredth time but I had refused to let him eat the big. I personally didn't have a problem with him hunting but Gary didn't really seem to like the way the ant pit Pokémon would savage his prey and play with it before actually eating it.

My head shot up as I heard the river and it's rushing water. "Finally!" I rushed forward and past Gary and through some trees where I stopped and smiled. The river was pretty large which was good.

"Finally some luck is on my side, Masa come on out, it might be awhile till we get something but you can rest and relax." I said as a red light appeared and the ant pit Pokémon formed in front of me. He gave a grumble as he spotted the water before he went to look for a place to rest.

I myself found a spot on the bank where I pulled out my bag and grabbed a small rod with a button on it. I pressed it and the rod extended into a fishing rod. Yup that's the truth of the games, it's quite handy actually and definitely saves a lot of space.

"I'm probably going to be here awhile Gary so you can go search for your bug." I said as I flicked my rod and the lure sunk into the dark water.

"Alright, I'll be back probably around dusk if I can't find one but otherwise if I get one I'll be back sooner." He said and I gave him a back hand wave.

I listened as he went into the deep foliage and after a few minutes I could no longer hear him so I turned and pulled a book out of my bag.

It was a new release written by Professor Sycamore on the theories of Mega Evolution. Currently Mega evolution was just a myth, there have been no recent confirmation on it though. So far they didn't even know that you needed two stones and a strong bond. All they had found was some ruins that had descriptions of some of the famous starters having a fourth evolution.

Mega evolution was on my bucket list and I was hoping to check out Mt.Moon. There were hidden shrines out there but you could find these stones in some of the strangest places, some in their natural form and some already cut into the round gems.

I had also planned to visit some common rock shops, they were likely to have things they didn't even know they had hidden in their collections.

Pewter city near and the city was famous for its rock and gem collectors and I have no doubt that there were plenty of shops out there. I was planning on first seeing Brock's father and his small little shed where Ash would meet him selling rocks.

I had a feeling that his rocks would be my best bet on getting one of the stones, hopefully a key stone. If not that then Absolite, Altarianite, Charizardite X, Garchompite and so on.

I planned to get a charmander one day because its X mega evolution gave it the Dragon typing. And I wanted all the stones for the dragon and dark types that could Mega Evolve.

I was pulled from my thoughts as I felt a tug on my rod and I immediately went into action, there wasn't much of a fight before I pulled a Magicarp from the water. I gave a heavy sigh and released the Pokémon back into the water where it swam downstream.

I once again flicked the lure into the water before I returned to my book. Apparently the professor had recently discovered a large cavern with paintings descripting Pokémon evolving with and then fighting before returning to the original state. The pictures were in the book and it was of a Gardevoir. In the text it was describing that the Pokémon in the descriptions always seem to have an item on them but they weren't sure. To them this was a priceless discovery and it talked about a possible revolution in Pokémon evolution and power.

Once again there was a tug at my line and I put the book down. After a bit of tug of war I was able to get the Pokémon out of the water.

"A Poliwag, Dexter give me some info" I said as I pulled out the black Pokédex.

Poliwag the tadpole pokemon. For Poliwag, swimming is easier than walking. The swirl pattern on its belly is actually part of the Pokémon's innards showing through the skin.

"Interesting, Masa aid me at the battlefront!" I called drawing the ant pit Pokémon's attention. Happy to have another battle he quickly made his way to me.

"Ok Masa use Sand Attack and follow up with bite!" I called out to him. Masa a Hearld sand at the water types face befor he charged forward and bit the Pokémon that had tried to doge but was cut off. It gave a cry before shooting a bubble beam in Masa's face causing him to release the water type. Masa a bit annoyed shot mud in its face blinding the Pokémon even more.

"That was Mud-Slap, nicely done Masa." I said happy he learned a new move. "Now Masa uses dig!" Immediately Masa burrowed into the ground and disappeared from sight. It wasn't long after that that he appeared under the water type crashing into it and knocking it back into the water.

"Nicely done Masa!" I said as he returned to my side with a happy grumble. I leaned down and rubbed his head causing him to chuff at me. He after a few moments thought he seemed to have enough attention and he went back to his place a few feet away on the river bank.

I gave a sigh before I once again say down with my lure in the water. I fished for a few more hours but still no Horsea and eventually Gary returned but he was empty handed. He hadn't found the Pokémon he wanted but he did get himself a kakuna.

We decided we'd camp at the river and in the morning we would follow the river deeper into Viridian Forest. That night was a bit of work considering it was our first time setting up camp, it wasn't like the times the Professor would bring us out into the ranch and he'd set up small tents for us. Those days were filled with laughter and joy.

The four of us, Me, Gary, Trev and Grace would Play catch a Pokémon which was just a game of hide and go seek in the dark.

That game really stuck to me, I remember perfectly the first time we had gone camping and played the game. That day Trev started as the trainer and so we hid but I ended up getting lost. Jetter the Arcanine had found me and that was my first encounter with the semi legendary. He had carried me while I cried my eyes out back to the others. The Professor was very worried and he gave me a good scolding but I knew he wasn't mad.

Back then was also when Ash was friends with Gary but eventually that changed and they became bitter towards each other. It was kind of Ash's fault but the boy was to thick headed to understand.

Like I've said before Ash became jealous when I came along. Me and Gary both had a passion for Pokémon and we were always hungry for more information so we quickly became the best of friends in school.

Gary spent most of his time with me talking about Pokémon and things we had learned, because of this Gary didn't play with ash as much. I think I helped open Gary's eyes to just how much e did know and I had always told him I wanted to learn everything I could so I could be a good trainer. I told him if you didn't know much then how could you care for the, how would you know what they need in certain scenarios and such.

We still played of course but soon Ash started to ignore me or in games he would always target me in school which pissed Gary off to no end so Gary started to treat Ash the way Ash treated me and it was a downward spiral from there.

For a while after that it was just me and Gary but then his cousins came along. The twins had been living in Hoenn before but their mother wanted to be close to her father so they moved to Kanto.

But anyway when we got the camp set up we fed our Pokémon and then ourselves. As trainers you needed food that could stay good for long amounts of time so trainers usually carried canned foods, or foods in paper bags, a water bottle, a small metal bowl and a fire starter. Tonight we mixed a can of Cream Mushrooms with some noodles and some dried up vegetables.

We cooked it in a small pot and ate our fill. The leftovers were sealed in a small jar and then we went to bed.

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In the morning we quickly packed up and as planned followed the river deeper into Viridian. We've been walking for a few hours now but the past hour we haven't seen any Pokémon which was strange. Only house before we came across some kind of bug at least every fifteen minutes.

"Hey Saber did you hear that?" Gary asked as he glanced at me.

"Hear what?"

"Maybe it was the wind, never mind." He said as he continued on but I could see him glance around every few minutes.

After a while though I also felt a bit uncomfortable, I felt like we were being watched. I found myself turning every few minutes to see if I could catch anyone.

"There it is again, that noise" Gary growled. This time I heard it to and I glanced around. At first I could barely make it out but after a minute the buzzing of wings became very clear and I froze as a large group of Beedrill swarmed behind us.

"Run!" I screamed as I shot forward and grabbed Gary's hand, pulling him forward.

"What's wrong with them, we didn't do anything wrong!" Gary shouted over the loud buzzing.

"I think it's quite simple now that I think about it. We haven't seen any bugs around for hours because this is the Beedrills territory. All the other bugs avoid this are so they won't get eaten!" I shouted before glancing over my shoulder. The bugs were getting closer.

"What the hell are we supposed to do, they'll kill us if we try to fight!"

"One we leave there territory, two we fight or lastly we lose them. Two is out of the question and one isn't reliable."

"Then three it is, you got any ideas?"

I glanced around and after a moment I gave a nod. "Hold your breath!"

"What? W" he didn't get to finish because I slammed into him and we both fell into the river. The pull of the rapids was immediate and I kept my head under for as long as I could tell my lungs screamed for air.

It was a struggle but I brought my head to the surface where I gasped for air. When I felt like I was no longer suffocating I put my energy into keeping myself afloat in the swift moving water.

I was struggling and fear hit me when I noticed rapids ahead. That meant rocks were usually near the surface. I turned to Gary who was a bit behind me and he seemed to see my panic. He struggled for a moment but stopped when a red light appeared In the water before dissolving. In its place was Gary's Squirtle.

"Squirtle we need your help. Do you think you can pull us and avoid those rapids?"

"Squirtle!" The pokemon said with a nod. Gary quickly grabbed onto the Pokémon before it swam to me. I grabbed Garys free hand and with us both secure Squirtle began to swim forward and he guided us around the worse of the rapids. From there the water type started to look for a place to swim us but we had entered a small gully.

I'm not sure how long we were in the water but soon a river bank came into view and Squirtle pulled us ashore.

When we were out of the water I collapsed and stared at the sky. "Wet, everything's we, my cloths, my hair, my pack…"

"Hey at least we're not Beedrill food." Gary said as he returned his Pokémon.

I sighed and nodded. "Come on let's figure out where we are." Gary said as he held his hand out to me and pulled me to my feet.

"Well I don't think we have to worry, it seems we've found our destination." I said as I stared at the forest ahead of us.

It was absolutely stunning, everywhere you looked there were Pokémon, Butterfree flew overhead, and bugs littered the trees and I could even see a Venonat. There were multiple grass types like Gloom, Paras, and oddish. At the corner of my eye I swore I was a yellow tail of a Pikachue and playing ahead of us was some Nidoran of both genders.

"Now would you look at that, I guess falling into the river wasn't so terrible now." Gary said as he looked around.

"I guess so… come on there's lots to do. I want to find a Horsea." I said as I started forward.

"Well I think I'll get me one of those Nidoran, I'll meet you back here." Gary said as he headed a different direction than me.