Chapter 9: Over the Moon
For Luigi, Mount Moon was not a tough climb. This wasn't a good standard, since a tough climb for a Mario Brother was a rarity. As it was, Mount Moon was a near-constant fifty degree slope covered in trees – Even if it was a bit steep, the trees provided plenty of footholds for Luigi.
He'd left Bulbasaur with Ash, Brock, and Misty – He really didn't think the little… reptile-plant-thing, would be able to make the climb, or hang on to Luigi while he climbed. Brock had also noted that the caves were home to a lot of Pokémon that Bulbasaur had a type advantage against, while the mountainside itself was mostly empty. Bulbasaur had been all too happy to stay and help keep the others safe.
About halfway up the mountain, Luigi stopped in a treetop for a bit of a breather.
"This place is huge…" He looked out over the landscape of Kanto below. "What a view, though…" It reminded him a lot of the lands far from the Mushroom Kingdom… Densely forested, dotted with towns and cities here and there.
He wondered if Mario was in one of those towns, working to make the world a better place. Luigi reached out again, hoping for anything at all from his brother. Their bond phenomenon was still blocked, as he'd feared…
His thoughts were interrupted by an ominous creaking. Luigi knew exactly what that sound meant, and sighed. "And so it begins…"
Faster than the laws of physics could possibly allow, the tree's roots ripped out of the ground and it began rolling down the steep mountain, Luigi running atop the log as best he could. As it rolled, it picked up speed and swept aside more and more trees, causing a literal avalanche of logs. It wasn't long before the structural integrity of the soil itself was compromised, and Luigi was stuck, running on top of a tree careening down a mountain at two hundred miles an hour, in between two different avalanches.
"Universe, you really don't need to make up for lost time!" Luigi yelled at the sky. "I get the point! I've been getting the point for a quarter of a century! You can stop whenever you feel like it!"
Predictably, the Universe was having none of this and did not stop. Before long, the avalanche managed to roll over a small hollow in the mountain, causing the whole thing to come crashing down on top of Luigi.
Luigi pulled himself to his feet painfully. Now, he was somewhere dark – He could see something softly glowing, but couldn't make out any details of the walls. After a few minutes for his eyes to adjust, he could see he was in a cave – One that hadn't been a cave a little while ago, it seemed, as the ceiling was made of hundreds of logs supporting the boulders that had chased him down the mountain.
This, of course, left Luigi with no readily apparent way out that didn't involve entering a cave or causing another avalanche.
"Should've seen that coming…" The green plumber muttered. He could see what was in the center of the room now – A large rock, that glowed with a faint light and pulsed with magic. Luigi frowned. Or something very like magic, anyway… Whatever it was, it was definitely potent enough for him to transform if he got too close, and he really wasn't sure what it would do.
Now that he could see, he noticed some odd machines attached to the rock in a ring. He couldn't get too close, but he'd seen enough of E. Gadd's machines to have an idea of what they were.
"… Rockets? Why rockets?" Luigi asked. "Wait, it's a magical rock hidden on a mountain… Of course someone's here to steal it."
He heard someone walking from the tunnel – Quickly as he could, he rolled into a small hollow in the wall. He had to share with a small pink creature that seemed to be frightened out of its mind, which he gave a quick and quiet apology before the mysterious figure entered the room.
In the dark, it was hard to make out – It was very short, though. "Oy vey… Dat plan's not gonna work now, is it?" A light flicked on, and Luigi could see it was the same tan cat from a couple of days before, wearing a mining helmet on his head. "What're the odds of dat, though? Dis didn't happen last time…" The cat clambered up the nearest wall and tried to push the boulders out of the way.
Luigi wanted to yell out at how he'd cause the whole thing to collapse, but nothing happened. The cat just wasn't strong enough to budge the boulders even half an inch. After about half a minute of trying, he just gave up.
"Man, I wish those lugs was here to help…" Meowth said, panting from the effort. "I guess I could use one of da rockets ta explode the ceiling…"
"No!" Luigi yelled. That was an even worse idea than pushing them.
"What the… Someone's pokin' their head where it don't belong!"
Luigi quickly rolled out into the open and hopped to his feet. "I am! And I'm not going to let you do anything to that pile of rocks! Or steal this one. I get the feeling that you're not the sort of person to steal a giant magical rock and use it for the good of the world."
"Heh… You're smarter than ya look, then!" Meowth said, jumping back and striking a pose. "A glittering, dark star that always shines bright. Dig it! While Meowth takes flight! That's right!"
Meowth sighed. "It's not the same without them… Uh, Team Rocket, blast off at the speed of light! Surrender now, or prepare to fight!"
"Um, I don't really want fight right now, but if you want to be punched and kicked and stuff, then…"
"I'd rather not," Meowth said, pulling out some sort of cannon-like weapon. "Think fast!" Out of the cannon's end shot a rubber glove on a metal hose. Luigi wasn't expecting it, and by the time he realized what was going on he'd been pinned to the wall by the rubber hand.
Thankfully the wall held out and the ceiling didn't collapse. He honestly had expected it to.
"Huh. Almost expected more of a fight than dat," Meowth said. Luigi growled, and Meowth stepped back, eyes wide. "… You're way scarier than a dumb human has any right to be!"
Luigi glared. "Stop it, you're creepin' me out! Never mind, just let me do my work." Meowth set the cannon down, and looked away from Luigi.
Without being able to move his arms, there wasn't a whole lot Luigi could do. He could kick off the wall, but he wasn't really confident that he wouldn't bring the ceiling down on top of himself. The rubber hand was a lot sturdier than it looked, too. If he could use some magic on it, he could probably break it, but he couldn't exactly do that without use of his hands.
A flash of light appeared next to him, and he saw the pink creature from before. He could see it a bit more clearly – It looked like some sort of cross between a cat, a fairy, and a luma.
"Fairy," it whispered. Its hand began glowing, and it brought it down on the metal cord with a lot of force. To Luigi's amazement, it snapped in two.
"Huh?" Meowth had heard. "Hey! Clefairy! What are you doing?"
Clefairy yelled something at Meowth. Without the machine squeezing him, Luigi was able to quietly slip out of the rubber hand and prepare to fight.
"Right. How's a little pink ball and a dopey human – Wait, where did that hammer come from?" Luigi twirled the massive iron weapon in his hand, daring Meowth to make a move.
"FAIRY!" Clefairy yelled, its hand glowing again.
"Rock Smash…" Meowth said. "… I wish Jessie and James were here. Well… Time to blast off!" Meowth pulled a jetpack out of nowhere and took off into the cave system, the rockets attached to the giant stone quickly following suit.
"…Clef?"
"Let's go!" Luigi dashed down the tunnel. It took him approximately two seconds to realize that he was now inside a cave and what exactly that meant for him. He instinctively dodged to the side out of the way of a falling stalactite, and doubled his speed to outrun the cave collapsing behind him.
"Faaa-iry!" Clefairy was hanging on to his arm. Luigi wasn't sure how it got there, but quickly pulled it under his hat.
"You stay safe," Luigi said. He rolled through a gap in the rocks falling ahead of him, and saw light far ahead. Meowth and the rock were quickly closing the distance to the outside, and Luigi knew he had to speed up again.
In the space of less than an hour, he'd gone from walking along a nice forest path to running through a collapsing cave at dangerously high speeds. Sadly, the only part about that that made an unusual day was that the forest was surprisingly lacking in deadly purple water.
"Stop!" Luigi yelled as he closed in on Meowth.
"Huh?" Meowth turned back. "How'd you catch up? Never mind, I'm almost home free!" Meowth laughed. Clefairy appeared in front of him in a flash of light and punched him backwards, slowing him just a bit.
Luigi caught Clefairy and put it back under his cap. Meowth quickly recovered, but it had been just enough for Luigi to jump towards the stone and brush his hand against it.
"Hope this works…" Luigi said as a familiar energy filled him.
"What's with that dopey kid?" Meowth asked no one as he blasted out of the cave. "Oh well, mission success! I guess going solo worked out!"
A streak of red light shot out of the mountain past him.
"Now what?" Meowth asked. The red light stopped in midair, revealing itself to be the boy from earlier. His clothes had changed color, to a black and green getup. More importantly, his hands were glowing with red light and he was floating in midair. "Oh. Wait-wait-wait WHAT?"
"Put the magic rock thingy back!"
"What?" Meowth asked.
"Put it back!"
"… Yeah, no. Weird flying powers or not, the Moon Stone's a gold mine!"
Clefairy teleported behind Meowth and punched his jetpack.
"… Yeah, I sort of expected that." Meowth's jetpack exploded, sending him flying. "I'm blasting off again!"
Luigi flew down, catching Clefairy and putting it under his hat again. "Thanks!"
All that left was the Moon Stone, which had begun falling back to the ground. Luigi flew after it and grabbed on.
"Heavy…" Through some stroke of luck, Luigi managed to guide it safely down to where it had originally been. Well, moderately safely. He did end up crashing into the ground and causing the pile of rocks to collapse, but thankfully the Moon Stone itself was safe and he didn't accidentally cause another avalanche. Luigi collapsed on the ground, his transformation reversing the moment he hit it.
Clefairy said something to him. It seemed happy enough, but Luigi was exhausted from steering the Moon Stone. More and more creatures like Clefairy came out to cheer on the little pink thing and Luigi. He just lay there for a while, happy at a good days work.
"Fairy-clef?" Clefairy asked him.
"Hey… You did great."
Clefairy nodded. "Fairy! Clefairy," It pointed to Luigi.
"… Are you asking to come along with me?" Luigi asked. Clefairy nodded. "Sure… I need to rest a bit, though, and then we can get going… Glad to have you along."
It wasn't until he and Clefairy were traveling down the mountain to meet with Ash and co that Luigi realized his huge mistake.
"Are you sure?" Giovanni asked.
"Sure as the charm on my head," the Meowth on the screen replied. "His clothes changed color, he's got these really weird eyes, and he was flyin' after me. He's some new rare Pokémon, for sure, and he wasn't around before."
"Hmm… Interesting… Follow and observe him, but do not confront him. Once your teammates return from their mission, you may consider confrontation. Keep reporting any timeline differences and the information you gather about that boy."
"Can do, boss!" Meowth hung up.
"I'd almost given up hope on those three," Giovanni said to his Persian. "But, somehow, they keep doing things that surprise me."
The road to Cerulean City was blocked.
This wasn't unusual in Kanto, but it was usually a Snorlax sleeping in the road that caused such things. Instead of a Snorlax, the way was blocked by fallen trees and rocks.
Several hundred fallen trees and enough rocks to make up a small mountain.
Luigi didn't say anything as Misty yelled at the debris and Brock began planning an alternate path into the city.
After a good night's rest, their efforts to reach Cerulean City were once again impeded. This time, the path they needed to use went over a river.
The river had, of course, flooded over, and the rapids had swept away the bridge and several trees. Misty was not amused, and Brock just plotted an alternate path again.
Predictably, they got lost, and took them a few days to find their way back to the path. In that time, Ash's Metapod evolved into Butterfree, a process that Luigi found fascinating when he saw it.
Once they were finally back on track, Brock's new route led them through a cave. As soon as they entered, several sopping wet trees landed in front of the entrance to the cave, locking them inside. The trees proceeded to knock several rocks on the ceiling loose, forcing them to run to avoid the cascading cave in.
Once they exited the cave, they were both completely lost again and stuck in a ravine. The dangers of the day passed, they camped out for the night once more. In the morning, they left and came across a rock that Ash, Misty, and Brock were very interested in. Brock announced there was a Pokémon Center nearby, and that they should be able to reach Vermilion City the day after tomorrow if they kept up the same pace, just in time for Lance's meeting.
Then he ran off towards the Pokémon Center. When they others caught up, they found Brock flirting with Nurse Joy. Despite the fact that he'd left all of his Pokémon with Forrest, one of Brock's Pokéballs opened.
Croagunk used Poison Jab. It's Super-Effective! Brock fainted.
After they got situated in a room, Luigi was ready to have a good night's sleep in an actual bed. He and Mario could sleep anywhere, but nothing beat a real bed. For most of the night, he slept soundly.
It was only around sunrise when anything happened. A huge surge of energy went through Luigi's bond with Mario, instantly shocking him awake and off of the bed.
This chapter came faster! ... I'm not sure that that's going to happen again.
The Universe makes Luigi's life difficult. In other news, the sky is blue, and things in the air fall towards the ground.
Oh, and Luigi gets a Pokemon. It's not technically captured in a Pokeball, but, whatever. Clefairy knows Teleport and Rock Smash, and does not know Metronome. I don't know about any of its other moves yet. As this fic is based on the show, TMs and HMs are entirely nonexistant.
For Mario and Luigi to transform in the Pokemon world, it takes evolution stones. The only reason the Moon Stone wasn't used up is because it's huge.
Also, Meowth. Team Rocket told their boss about this whole mess, he doesn't actually remember himself.
... The last line there is pretty blatantly foreshadowing who the focus of Chapter 10 is, isn't it? That's right... Mario's finally going to show up! None of the next few chapters have Luigi in them. He'll be back in Chapter 13.
Rocker on: Well, not everything is action. Sometimes I just want to see what the characters do, and who they are.
Still not keeping to a schedule. I'm just trying to make sure each chapter is final as I post it. The entire scene with Luna and Lily changed completely from when I first wrote it - Luna was a more serious character, and the scene had a different tone to it. I ended up making her sillier, and I'm glad for it.
A Pokemon would be able to learn some Mario-Bros-Like moves, and vice versa, because a lot of the time it's different applications of the same sort of power. Some of Mario's moves are impossible for others to preform though.
Magic is the same in both worlds. Luna's magic is about as powerful as that of the Mario Brothers. They've got other powers that don't fall under normal magic - Their superhuman traits, their transformations, and their star power. It'll be quite a meeting, but not in the way you expect.
It's not just about advantage. Bowser's magic abilities fall squarely into Dark. Legendary Pokemon do not hold meetings or votes. Only those that have directly encountered Bowser know about him. Bowser really doesn't care one bit about the Pokemon world. Bowser's still a long way off... I haven't written to the point where he shows up yet.