Archie awoke in a dark room. There was some sort of spotlight above him, making a small circle of light around him. He was in a chair, but when he tried to get up, he couldn't. He looked towards him arms and legs to find them tied to the chair. He heard a low creak of a door coming from the corner of the room, and footsteps coming from behind him. He shut his eyes tight, hoping to hear the door creak once more signifying that, whatever it was, had left.
He opened his eyes to see a huge arbok hissing at him. He lent back in the chair as it rose higher and higher, all the while hissing. It bent over to his face, breathing into his nostrils. It went back and slithered into a dark part of the room. Archie had a vivid recollection of what had happened, all up to when he was knocked out. His head still hurt, and he started regretting ever leaving his home.
That was when the door creaked open again, letting in Maxie, who Archie had come to learn was team Magma's nefarious leader. He turned on a light, lighting up the whole room, as he saw something that terrified him to his core. Bones. Bones of people everywhere, some still in chairs. He saw the arbok chewing on a skull, before turning his attention to Archie again. Maxie begun "Look, I'll try to strike a deal here. If you tell us everything you know about team Aqua and their goals, I'll consider letting you go. Do we have a deal?" Archie shook his head, nervously replying "I- I don't know the first thing about team Aqua.." Archie didn't know who they were, nor what their goals were, even though the answer he gave may not have been valid.
He said again " Tell is what you know about Tram Aqua before I get angry" He said through gritted teeth. The strangest thing was, He was smiling. That was when he started waking away.Maxie opened the door and shouted "he's being difficult, bring in the next one!" Before turning towards Archie and saying "I've always wanted to do this." Before slamming the door. He heard the lights flicker and die, leaving him alone with a huge arbok, ready and presumably waiting to kill him. That was when he felt himself being dragged somewhere behind him, and he looked back to find a pitfall through a hole in the floor. Archie kicked wildly, trying to find anything to hang onto, but it was too late.
He screamed as he went into the hole, when he found out his chair was too big to go through. He started laughing, saying "looks like you should've used a smaller chair!" He kept laughing, when suddenly he heard a slight snapping noise. Within seconds he was plummeting down for what felt like miles. He suddenly felt a burning feeling on his back, as he tilted his chair around to see what was happening, when he saw a lake. A normal lake would be bad enough, since he was stuck to a chair, but it was a Magma lake. He thought about burning alive, and was terrified. There wouldn't even be a body left afterwards. He screamed, hoping someone or something would hear his calls. What would happen to Growly and Thorn? What would become of the rest of Hoenn? Barely his first gym and he would never be seen again.
That was when they arrived. A hole was blasted through the wall, letting in a barrage of rocks. Growly jumped out, caught him on his back, and jumped to the exit. Archie fell, but a shadowy figure nearly the speed of light caught him at the last moment and escaped. Archie's vision adjusted to find it was Thorn, with burn marks on its skin and leaves. He got out of the chair, collapsing out of tiredness. He looked up, seeing the final straw with Team Magma. Rustboro City was up in flames. He sat there, thinking of all the innocent people, and most likely Roger included. He started crying, being helped up by Growly. It comforted him, knowing he always someone to count on at all times. He slowly shuffled out, and Thorn was being his usual nervous self, realising what he'd done and madly trying to put out the flames and dry itself.
Archie realised: he couldn't get home, with help or otherwise, in his current state. He fell to the floor, gazing up into the sky. It almost looked as if a flock of birds were flying towards him. From Heaven maybe? He hoped so, as a flock of birds that big could maybe kill him early. A braviary picked him up, presumably to carry him up, but to his surprise, he found they were carrying him to an island. Maybe they were going to eat him, he wasn't quite sure. But the island seemed to be inhabited, and they were getting him and his Pokemon to a Pokemon center. He wondered what would happen as he gently passed out.