The Johto Odyssey Chapter 9: That Green Thing & Team Rocket?, a pokémon fanfic

The Johto Odyssey
a Pokémon Fanfic by Galbinus

Dedication: ALL OF YOU.
Chapter Rating: K
OC's In Use: None
Warning: Attempted humor.

HOLY MILTANK AN UPDATE.

-cough-

Thank you all so much for the reviews!! I can't evenbegin to express my gratitude! I'm also so sorry that this update is a month belated; unfortunately, some, ah, things got in the way. . . but in any case. . .

Drew appears!! 8D And so does a little bit of plot!! 8DD isn't that dandy?

Anyway, here we go!

Chapter Nine: That Green Thing & Team Rocket?

Route 30—10:03, September 7: Saturday

It was with trepidation that Brendan's Milotic inquired as to why Blaziken and Ruru the Gallade were piling the unmoving carcasses of Rattata and Pidgey into small mountains.

":What in the name of Kyogre is it, Ruru?:" Mimi, the Milotic, asked tiresomely, snaking her way up to rest between the two piles of unconscious bodies of the Pokémon while her Trainer ran off to inform May of their Pokémon's doings.

The Gallade shifted uncertainly, apprehensively shining his elbow-blades, which was a nervous habit of his. Blaziken, on the other hand, proudly ruffled his chest-feathers and pruned magnificently. A little perturbed by the Blaziken's almost tangible self-confidence, Mimi shot the fire-typed Pokémon a disapproving glare before turning back to Ruru.

'Blaziken here and I were having a. . . friendly competition of sorts,' Ruru answered, faltering slightly. Blaziken, as if relaying Mimi's glare, glowered patronizingly at the Gallade before continuing to strut about his pile—a king before his mountain of gold. Mimi thought the Blaze Pokémon's actions to be childish, and sniffed primly before looking away. Amazingly, Ruru continued, 'Are you impressed, Mimi?'

The nerve of some Psychics, the Milotic thought to herself, heaving a sigh. ":Darn it, Ruru, the last thing I am is impressed. I would've expected better from a Gallade. . . and as for the Blaziken. . .:" Mimi cast the Blaziken a dark look, remembering when he had burned her tail with his completely uncalled-for 'Blaze Kick' technique. The Blaziken, too, seemed to be reflecting on that fateful encounter, and his ego seemed to diminish somewhat. The Milotic vaguely wondered what it was that caused the Blaze Pokémon's self-confidence to boost so splendidly. ":Whatever. I guess that I should help revive these poor things."

Wearing a confused expression, Blaziken interrupted, ":But just how. . .?:"

Mimi glared daggers at the bird Pokémon, who instantly desisted. ":I'll show you how,:" the Milotic said, grunting as she wrapped her serpentine body around Ruru's pile, feeling the furred and feathered bodies of the unconscious Pokémon lean against her tail and lower torso. Letting her long lashes touch her high cheekbones as she closed her eyes, Mimi tightened her concentration on the color red. Naturally good at focusing, it wasn't long before all that was swarming in the Pokémon's mind was a solid shade of bright red.

Slowly, she felt a warm sensation spark at the tip of the furred horn on her head. With accumulating speed, the warmth shot down from her horn and engulfed her entire body in its heat. Mimi felt herself being refreshed and healed, as was the effect of the 'Recover' move, but she immediately focused on the color blue. As quickly as it had come, the warmth dissipated from her body, but instead of evaporating into thin air, it passed into the bodies of the Rattata and Pidgey.

Opening her eyes, the Milotic barked an authoritative, ":STAND BACK!:" Ruru and Blaziken didn't need telling otherwise, and Brendan was smart enough to perceive the urgency in Mimi's voice. The Tender Pokémon herself snaked back as swiftly as she could.

As the bodies of the previous unconscious Pokémon began to twitch, shaken back to life from Mimi's 'Recover' move, Mimi instinctively lifted the two pink appendages protruding out of her head (1) and shielded her snake-like face with them. Indignant squawks and confused squeaks emanated in rapid succession from Ruru's pile, and in one epic moment, all of the Rattata and Pidgey exploded from the mountain and into the air and grass.

"Ouch," Brendan said dryly, rubbing his wrist where a Pidgey had accidentally scratched in its haste to evacuate the area.

May's shriek back at the camp was very audible in a ten-mile diameter; a horde of Rattata must have passed where she had been sleeping to get back to where they were.

Mimi smirked as all of the blood drained from Brendan's face and he bolted down the dirt path, undoubtedly to check on May's condition. Ruru and Blaziken both looked a little perturbed, but neither said anything.

":Any questions, boys?:" The Milotic asked, flipping her iridescent-scaled cerulean tail to the other side. She noted how her blue and pink scales caught the mid-morning light rather showily, shining a near-blinding yellow, and was instantly reminded of the golden coins the various Game Corners used. A warm feelings bubbled up in the pit of her stomach, but Mimi looked towards the other two Pokémon, who were shaking their heads somberly. ":Well. . . that's good. Now, off to the other pile.:"

Route 30—13:45, September 7: Saturday

They had been travelling for several hours. Three hours back, they had come at a perpendicular fork in the road, and the humans had decided to take the one with more ledges as, according to Max's 'Johto Rougher' Magazine, that was the best route to take to get there faster, even though it did advise to watch out for the many slopes, as one, Pokémon or not, could easily trip down them.

In spite of it all, May's Eevee was bored.

Really bored.

So bored that she was actually reflecting upon the past, which was a rarity. In this particular case, she was remembering with much pleasure the deafening scream May had uttered when the pack of a hundred or so Rattata and several dozen Pidgey passed camp, and the hilarious scenario that resulted from some of the less careful bird Pokémon accidentally tearing several tufts of white hair from Brendan's Shiftry's mane. The Wicked Pokémon had leapt into the air, wearing a positively terrified expression, and promptly woke up Brendan's Aggron by slamming into her face with his two stilt-like legs. Things were rather unpleasant afterwards, and so Eevee returned to the current state of events.

She was bored.

And when the DNA Pokémon was that bored, bad things always entail.

As it happened, the Eevee had been trotting behind Brendan's Shiftry, idly inhaling and exhaling the crisp Johto air. In a rare moment of 'talker's block', she didn't know what to comment on or talk about. Zuzu was ambling behind her, while Squirtle snoozed peacefully in May's arms. (The little git. Eevee hated the Small Turtle Pokémon for stealing most, if not all, of their Coordinator's attention, but for some inexplicable reason, she was able to conceal these feelings very well.)

Her perfectly circular paws were bruised from the sheer work they had to do, plodding along the dirt path at a ridiculously slow pace while Brendan and May talked about mundane topics like astrology and the meaning of life; well, in truth, Brendan was the one doing all the talking, while May looked dopey and rather inferior. . . In any case, these people obviously have not heard of true philosophy.

Looking around herself, Eevee first spotted Brendan's Shiftry, which spelled hell for the poor Wicked Pokémon.

Her amber eyes gleamed with mischief. Slowly but stealthily, the Eevee quickened her pace until she had butted in front of Munchlax and had almost buried her face in the Shiftry's long, flowing white mane. Nervously, she bit her bottom furred lip and began building up energy in her hind legs.

'Don't think about it, young one.'

Startled by the sudden voice in her head, the DNA Pokémon tripped over her feet and landed face-first into the dirt. Frowning and coughing from accidentally ingesting some of the soil, Eevee indignantly pulled herself back to her feet so she could keep up with the pace of the group, however slow they were. Nevertheless, she was perturbed by how high-pitched and feminine the accent of whomever or whatever it was that had spoken was.

Frightened, Eevee barked, ":Who is it?! Don't hurt me! I know karate! . . . sort of.:"

The DNA Pokémon could practically feel questioning glares burning up her fur, but she valiantly ignored all of the rather negative attention she was receiving, although she was enjoying herself. From somewhere in front of the group came the pattering of feet, and in approximately half a second, Max had appeared by Eevee's side and had promptly flipped open a notebook he had procured out of Latios-knows-where and was scribbling down the events that were unfolding.

There was a mental giggle, and a flash of glitter.

Eevee pivoted, and began speeding off in the direction that she thought the voice and laughter had come from. To her distaste, she found that the route she was taking led straight—

Downhill.

Perhaps she ought to have paid more attention to the (monotonous) 'Johto Rougher' excerpt Max had been reading aloud (and later desisted doing so when he found out that the only person who was paying attention was Mimi, but Eevee knew that the Milotic only did so because the article mentioned the Game Corner in Goldenrod on several occasions).

":Wahh!:" The Eevee shrieked, flailing about in mid-air as she tumbled down the dirt hill. Soil flew everywhere; the debris entered her eyes (much to the poor DNA Pokémon's dismay), rendering her temporarily blinded.

"Eevee!" The normal-typed Pokémon heard her Coordinator yell in horror.

":BLARGH!:" Eevee called out, spitting out dirt from her mouth in utter disgust. Shaking her fur in a last-ditch attempt to rid it of soil, the DNA Pokémon glanced around herself to see if what she had been originally chasing was still there. To the Eevee's surprise, she thought she could still catch a glimmer of silvery dust. Enlarging her viewing scope by taking several steps backwards, the Eevee noticed rather disconcertingly that the particles which so subtly caught the afternoon sunlight's flaunt seemed to form a humanoid shape floating in mid-air. . .

Trying her best to remain nonchalant at her most non-nonchalant discovery, Eevee tentatively approached the hovering figure. Unfortunately, whatever it was that was there suddenly disappeared in a final puff of silver glitter.

":Eh?:" Eevee squeaked in confusion, looking around herself for any sign of the sparkly dust, but finding none. A few seconds later, she found herself being lifted up by two strong but delicate hands and smothered in a large (and painful) embrace.

"Eevee!" May said shrilly, increasing her death grip on the poor DNA Pokémon. "Don't ever do that again! You scared the living daylights out of me with your little act. You could have gotten hurt! It's still a little while from Violet City and its Pokémon Center."

Eevee scowled, a little bit embarrassed by the brown-haired Coordinator's incredibly matronly manner but rather pleased with all the attention she was receiving. A few moments later, however, May desisted and let the feline Pokémon leap onto the ground, where Eevee promptly began cleaning her fur. A lady must look her best at all times, after all, the DNA Pokémon reasoned with herself.

":Dude, are you all right?:" Munchlax asked, ambling over and resting a chubby paw on Eevee's shoulder. The DNA Pokémon nodded timidly, comforted by her Teammate's concern. However, it turned out that the Big Eater Pokémon was simply using her as a mean to get closer to May's fanny pack; with surprising agility, the Munchlax unzipped the main chamber of May's dandelion pack and, displaying incredible finesse, removed the Pokéblock carrier case and promptly poured all of its contents into his mouth before stuffing it back inside May's fanny pack.

By way of overcoming this moment of awkward silence, Eevee surreptitiously maneuvered herself back up the hill and back onto the dirt path, discovering that Ruru and Blaziken, the only two who had not gone downhill to see how she was faring, were engaged in a most epic staring contest. Deciding that she should probably not interfere with the two (fighting-type, no less) Pokémon's little competition, Eevee walked away.

Within two minutes, where areas in the 'old days'—or 'golden age', Eevee liked to call it, compared with the authoritarian workout Brendan was forcing so indifferently upon all of the Pokémon; heck, she was actually thinking about the past again—such an action would have taken twenty, thirty minutes with Ash and Brock. What Eevee meant, of course, was the most sudden 'getting-back-on-track.' It seemed that, almost instantaneously, they were back gamboling down the path, and Eevee was back drowning her in boredom.

"Eevee, you look rather bored, don't you?" May said boringly, startling the bored Eevee out of her boring reverie. The DNA Pokémon looked up to see her Coordinator peering down concernedly at her.

The small feline Pokémon mewed in a bored way by way of reply.

"Come back into the Pokeball, then," May said.

The last thing that Eevee saw was a beam of red light enveloping her body, and the peculiar sensation of being tugged by an invisible hook at the nape of her neck before darkness fell.

Route 30—16:45, September 7: Saturday

Cassidy Rohl languidly flopped to the other side of the field.

Her partner, Butch, was occupying the other side. She ended up accidentally kicking him in the side of his stomach.

"HEY! Watch out, Cass'!" The turquoise-haired man cried out in indignation, rubbing his ribs and appearing very pained. With a frustrated 'ugh', Cassidy pulled herself to a sitting position.

"Hmph! If you hadn't been there, then you wouldn't have been kicked! This is your own entire fault, Butch." Cassidy said, scowling and running a gloved hand through her long blonde-orange hair. She deepened her scowl when she saw that the hair gel she used to keep her two long ponytails (pigtails seemed too childish a term to the woman) straight were waxing under the afternoon sun, and had come off on her white-gloved fingers.

Butch, too, pushed himself to a sitting position. "What?You shouldn't have kicked me in the first place! You clumsy old hag—"

"What did you call me, Butch Cleaver?!"

"You heard me the first time, Cassidy Rohl!"

"ARGH! I'll tear your stupid green hair out!"

"It's not green, it's blue-green." Butch said matter-of-factly, frowning.

"WHATEVER!" Cassidy screeched, and lunged, tackling the other Team Rocket member and causing him to 'oomph!' in surprise.

"Ow!"—slap!—"Please!"—slap!—"Don't!—slap!—"Hit!"—slap—"Me!"—slap!—"THERE! Oh, you're going to pay for that, Cass'. . . who cares if you're a girl!"

Kick!

A thousand vulgarities streamed profusely out of Cassidy's parted cerise lips. As sweat rolled in fat drops down her forehead and across her face, her scarlet lipstick liquidated and dropped onto the ground, like blood. Ignoring the fact that her makeup was very much ruined, Cassidy aimed another punch at Butch's stomach, and hit him square in the guts.

Things had ascended to a point where the two, usually so cooperated and sleek in their operations, were actually fighting with each other. Cassidy blamed Butch; and, little did she know, Butch blamed her. Both adults cried out in frustration as they failed to injure the other to a degree of severity of their satisfaction, but after a few minutes, both had acquired a new collection of colorful bruises—luckily, most were covered by their uniforms—and scratches.

"Ouch! Stop!" Butch cried out in pain as Cassidy landed a good hit on his right shoulder. Now content, the blond woman rolled to a side to allow her partner to nurse his bruises as she nursed her own. Muttering underneath her breath about the travesties of men picking on women, Cassidy haughtily dusted her uniform, smoothing out several determined wrinkles on her black skirt, and stood up.

Stretching, Cassidy remarked, "Ah, it's so boring. We caught all of the wild Pokémon we saw on the way here. There are no Trainers to pick on. . . I want to test out the new pushover Sinnoh Pokémon we snatched from that blue-haired Trainer on some poor sucker. . ."

Their brief argument and catfight already forgotten—such was the way of the Team Rocket members for, well, life—Butch frowned again and said, "But Cassidy, we haven't trained that Pokémon at all. It's rather pathetic looking, to be frank; and the only reason we snatched it was coz we overheard that teenager we snatched it from boasting that it was rare-colored or somethin'—shiny was the word, wasn't it?"

"Mmm," Cassidy said, pursing her lips and nodding in agreement, "I can barely tell the difference."

Butch sighed, then glanced at his Rolex watch, which was one of the few possessions the two Rocket members possessed between them that had any monetary value—it was also one of the things that the turquoise-haired man constantly reminded Cassidy that he owned.

"The boss isn't going to be very happy. We haven't really been very productive in a long while. There was that whole Oak fiasco thing. . . and Giovanni hasn't really forgotten about the Breeding Center scandal five years ago."

Cassidy blanched ostensibly; the memory still haunted her nightmares of their usually so calm and collected boss blowing up when they informed him of the incident. Butch wisely took note and remained silent for the next ten minutes.

Then, wonderfully, gloriously—they heard footsteps.

Route 30—16:56, September 7: Saturday

Andrew Rosalind languidly took a sip from his canteen, idly observing his surroundings. His Roselia was out of her Pokeball—well, what else was new?—and so was his Masquerain, while the rest of his Pokémon remained in their respective Pokeballs in his knapsack. The Thorn Pokémon was deep in conversation with the Bug-typed; and as they passed through the route—coniferous trees framing both sides of the dirt road—what had started out seemingly as an affable exchange of words had tangent-ed off into a far more hostile argument.

":Bug Pokémon are superior to Grass Pokémon,:" Masquerain stated smugly, beating his multi-colored wings with even more vigor than usual.

":Shaddup, you big loggerhead,:" Roselia said waspishly, furling and unfurling the red and blue roses that sat at both ends of her tendril-like arms.

":I'm not a loggerhead, spike-face.:"

":Says the gender-confused flying insect with the rod-thing sticking out of his head.:"

Masquerain looked hurt and angry; most likely subconsciously, he began releasing an increasing amount of powdery excretions from his wings. Drew, ever sensitive to glitter of any sort, turned back to look at his two Pokémon. Although he could not understand a word of what they were saying beyond 'Rose, rose,' and 'Masq, Masq', he could easily deduce that they were nearing a fight. He didn't especially mind the extra glitter, but Drew thought that he should not encourage such actions.

"Don't argue," Drew said mildly. Grudgingly, Masquerain and Roselia desisted, and the green-haired Coordinator nimbly turned back to face the dirt path. Glancing at his diamond-crested watch, he noted that it was pretty late into the afternoon, and, doing some quick calculations in his head, decided that it would take only a few more hours to get to Violet City.

Hopping over yet another clump of wild grass, Drew wondered vaguely just how many wild Pokémon the Johto wilderness could harbor. In the morning and earlier afternoon, his Roselia and Masquerain had taken care of several Weedle, several dozen Pidgey, and several dozen Rattata—for some strange reason, the last two species appeared in a giant, congruous swarm, for some reason that completely baffled the green-haired Coordinator—but in the later afternoon, no more wild Pokémon had confronted them.

Oddly enough, after only one more minute of walking, Drew began feeling increasingly edgy—almost as if he was being watched. Looking around himself, he noted that they were nearing another steep ledge; this one was, in fact, a good deal starker than the others he had seen. Glancing over the edge of it, he noted disconcertedly that a lot of very tall, wild grass covered the entire of the slope; one could easily hide there.

He found himself craving the presence of another human. His Pokémon were fairly empathetic with his various flippant whims and idiosyncrasies, sure enough; and they were company, albeit not very lively, for Drew had made it an important habit to routinely subdue their quirks (which was rather hypocritical, sure, but Drew didn't think on it much, believing to be doing the best for his Pokémon), which led to them having rather drab personalities in public—which was his goal, sure. . . yet. . .

Drew wished May were with him.

Because it was May, and May only, who could calm Drew's spirits with her bubbly personality and calming words, despite him criticizing her on many occasions. At times, Drew wondered why did such a thing; but being raised in a strict household and with limited opportunity to socialize with his peers until he left for his Pokémon journey (and even then, he did not exactly have a lot of friends, with the possible exception of May), he did not really know the best way to express appreciation. So he did the only other thing he knew how to do, as his father has done it to him on so many occasions: he berated her.

Drew shook his head, and wondered why his thoughts had drifted to May.

He felt the hairs on the back of his neck prick up. Quickly, he spun around, only to notice nothing suspicious beyond the fact that his Roselia and Masquerain were exchanging a series of very silent and very glittery blows of 'Stun Spore' and 'Silver Wind'.

Frowning, Drew watched as the two Pokémon's 'battle' ceased after a few seconds. Roselia's face burned green-purple with embarrassment, and Masquerain's heart-shaped face burned a hot pink.

"I will not tolerate any of this improper behavior," Drew reprimanded reproachfully, folding his arms over his chest. Roselia and Masquerain's heads drooped lower. "Roselia, you, as my first Pokémon and the only lady on the Team, should know this; and Masquerain, I am deeply ashamed of your childish antics. I know that you two do not get along very well, but we have always tried to mask that fact in Contests and public; however, this does not give you an excuse to behave so irrationally privately! Now, apologize to each other."

Roselia and Masquerain shifted uneasily and reluctantly faced each other.

":I'm sorry, Masq-Crass,:" Roselia said in her sweetest voice. Drew detected nothing wrong, and turned his expectant glare to Masquerain.

The bug-typed Pokémon hummed angrily (why, though, escaped Drew; Roselia's apology had sounded extremely sincere (2)), but said, ":And I apologize, too, dearest Thornelia.:"

Just as Drew began to smirk in satisfaction, a huge eruption behind him interrupted his smile.

Whipping around, Drew was surprised to see was a huge cloud of smoke obscuring almost everything behind him. He coughed violently and waved his hands in an attempt to clear his field of vision. His eyes stung and his eyes grew a little too wet for his liking.

When at last the smoke cleared, Drew was even more surprised to find two adults, one sea-green haired man and one blond woman. Oddly enough, they were both clad in considerably rumpled-looking Team Rocket uniforms. Their figures were carefully positioned in a very superhero-like and immature manner; juxtaposed against the other, it was hard to differentiate their rather smug expressions.

Before Drew could say anything, however, the two adults burst into, well, song.

"Prepare for trouble!" The goldenrod-haired woman exclaimed, twirling magnificently.

"And make it double!" The man said loudly, flinging his arms into the air.

Drew was instantly reminded of Jessie and James; a pitying smirk tugged at the corners of his pallid lips.

"To infect the world with devastation—"

"To blight all people in every nation!" The man was trilling. The sight was somewhat scarring. Even Masquerain was embarrassed.

"To denounce the goodness of truth and love,"

"To extend our wrath to the stars above!"

"Cassidy!" The woman cried, executing a rather bad cartwheel. Drew took this to be her name.

"Butch!" The man shouted with equal vigor, executing a worse back flip. Drew wondered why anyone would them their child 'Butch'.

"Team Rocket circling the Earth both day and night!"

"Surrender to us now, or you'll surely lose the fight!"

From somewhere, a Raticate sprung out of a Pokeball and screeched most vociferously, "Raticate!" while belligerently thrashing his whip-like tail.

Roselia gave a puzzled sort of pruning noise, as if to ask, "Is this a joke?" Drew had been thinking the same thing. He was quite stumped and did not know what to do, though in his dazed reverie he came to a conclusion that they had been hiding in the wild growth on the slope.

Unfortunately, Drew did not have much time to think. He thought he saw Cassidy send out another Pokémon, and the last thing he saw were needles, glowing a venomous purple, hitting him square in the chest, and, for some reason, he managed to laugh absurdly (and most un-Drew like, but perhaps the poison was driving him a little insane?) for a few seconds at his ridiculous predicament before passing out.

Author's Notes:

(1) In all seriousness, what are those things?

(2) Though Drew is close with his Pokémon, that doesn't mean that he doesn't get what they say at times. Besides, I need this for comic effect.

All right! Well, we're done with this chapter. 8D About time. Please excuse the extremely delayed update.

I tried sprinkling in random moments of Hoennshipping and Contestshipping. . . and I have a feeling that I failed remarkably. Also, against my better judgment, I decided to spiral the end of this chapter into a badly composed cliffhanger. Please don't hang me for that.

In any case. . . drop a mean review?