Eelizabeth's Tale

2

Elizabeth awoke on her side, curled up. "*groan* That was a crazy drea-" she stopped, everything else sounded normal, but what she had meant to be a groan had ended up sounding more like a pitiful whimper. She tried again, which yielded the same results. "Odd." She didn't feel very tired, so she sat up, or at least tried. She found that it was difficult to move her arms and leg in any direction other than inward and outward. She figured she was just stiff. She rolled over on her back, but that was also hard for her, as every time she tried, she rolled on to something, which hurt, so she stopped. She reasoned that it was the sheets on her bed that she was rolling on top of, but this felt somewhat different. She turned her head to look, feeling something like a scarf around her neck, which she ignored. She looked and saw something that looked like a tail. But it was not yellow and lacked the spiky quality that Jolteon's tail had, more of a fluffy brown look, Elizabeth was confused. She followed it with her eyes back to… What is that? she wondered. She looked at it now, getting annoyed at the scarf-like object around her neck, shocked that it led right back to her. "Wha? Why would it… Oh no." She looked at herself. "No. This is not happening to me. No no no no no NO NO NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!" The last 'no' came out sounding more like a howl. "I'm an EEVEE?! How did… The gas… dream…" She started sobbing into her new paws. Several thoughts of her plight flew through her head. What will mom and dad think? I can't go to school like this! Everyone will laugh at me! How am I gonna get back to myself?! Her last question hit her like a pile of bricks. She started sobbing even more uncontrollably now. She felt her tail between her legs now, which didn't help her feel much better.

***

After about 15 minutes of feeling sorry for herself and crying in her room, Elizabeth had resolved to think of some way to get back to her human form again. Unfortunately, being an eevee was pretty distracting and made it difficult for her to think. "Come on Elizabeth," she muttered to herself while pacing across the floor of her room, which she had quickly found was nearly impossible to do on two legs, and reluctantly starting to walk quadruped, "you won't be an eevee for the rest of your life. You just need to think! Ugh!" she growled, her tail swishing between her feet. "This is pointless! I can't think like this!"

An idea popped in her mind as soon as the words left her mouth. She ran, stumbling a little at first, to the kitchen. "Wow, this is further away than usual." She said as she got to the counters. Then she remembered that she was now only about a foot tall. Sighing, she managed to clamber up on top of a counter, though not without some difficulty. Maneuvering around the sink, she got to the cordless phone that her mother had put there several months ago. Remembering her parents, she silently thanked Mew that they had gone to Saffron City for the weekend. Discarding this thought, she picked the phone up in her mouth, put it down so that the buttons were facing upwards, the dialed with her nose, putting the phone on speaker in the process.

"Hello?" the voice on the other end asked.

"Jon! You have to get over here. Now!" She and Jon had been best friends for as long as she could recall, and she was confident that he was the only one that would be nice enough, and crazy enough, for that matter, to believe and understand her position.

"Whoa, hold on there Elizabeth. What's the matter? Are you okay?"

"Um…" she thought about screaming, 'NO I'M NOT OKAY!! I'M A FLIPPIN' EEVEE!!!' but realized it would make her sound even more crazy that she would sound like already. "…S- sorta. There's no time for me to explain right now, and you'd think I was insane…well more insane than I usually am, if you didn't see for yourself. So I repeat, GET OVER HERE NOW!"

"Uh, okay…" he hung up.

He thinks you're crazy insane! Now he'll never come! said a voice in her head who's point was quickly dismissed. Her stomach growled. She felt an urge coming from the same place as the voice telling her to go hunt or forage, which Elizabeth found odd. She shook the idea out of her head, instead walking over to a strawberry pie that her mother had left out to cool. Well, I'm still alive, albeit, not in the same way as before. I guess I shouldn't be too surprised that I still need to eat. she theorized as she munched on the pie.

A few minutes passed before Jon came walking through her door, as Elizabeth thanked herself for not locking it the night before. Jon was a well-built boy, tall, with black hair and dark hazel eyes. Handsome would be the bet word to describe him. "Hellooooo? Elizabeth? Hello? Where are you Ellie?" he shouted into the house, every second prepared to feel his friend jump and land on his back, which of course never happened.

He walked into the kitchen, spotting a small, cowering eevee on the counter, with a strawberry-stained muzzle. "Oh?" he said as he came closer. "Did Jolteon have puppies? Is that what she was calling me about? Oh well, I have needed an umbreon for a while." He pulled something from his pocket, which was a small sphere. A pokeball. The eevee's ears and tail stuck straight up. Jon thought that it would bolt, but it just sat there, looking scared. He put the pokeball back in his pocket, and immediately the eevee seemed calmer. "I suppose I should check if it's all right with Elizabeth, wherever she is." he mumbled, although Elizabeth, with her now improved hearing, heard every word

"I'm down here." she said shyly. Jon stopped and looked around in the direction of the voice. "Here." she repeated louder.

Now Jon looked straight at the eevee, confused. "Did- nah, that's impossible. Pokemon can't-"

"Talk?" Elizabeth finished, "Well, that's true, seeing as I'm not really a pokemon." She stated, sounding reassuring to herself.

Jon's eyes were as wide as… well something really wide. "But that's… Oh, I get it. I'm just… insane!"

"No, you're not. Jon, it's me."

He leaned in close. "Ellie?" Elizabeth nodded solemnly. "But you… and the…Y- you're an eevee?"

"Yeah, it stinks."

Jon put his hands on his face, looking totally baffled. "This is crazy. You're crazy. Everything about this is crazy!"

"Jon, let me explain." And she proceeded to retell everything that had taken place between seeing the machine and calling him.

When she stopped talking, they sat in silence for a while. Then, Jon spoke. "That… whoa. This is just-"

"Crazy, I know." Elizabeth interrupted again, looking worried. "That's why I called you over. One, to make sure I wasn't going mad, which I was pretty sure I wasn't already, especially after walking on all fours for several minutes. And second, I need you to help think of some way to get me back to normal. I would have thought of it on my own, but the fur and the paws and the tail did little to help me concentrate. So please, I can't have you freaking out right now."

Jon shook his head, still in shock. "Okay. I mean, I can't think of anything else that I could do to help right now…" he thought for a minute or so. "The machine! Maybe if it did this to you, it could reverse it too."

Elizabeth shrugged, "Worth a shot, I suppose. It isn't like there's any better idea floating around." Jon started to walk towards the basement. Elizabeth stopped for a second. "Wait." She said after him.

Jon turned around. "Yes?"

"It embarrasses me to ask, but… carry me please. I can't go down stairs as well as before, in fact I toppled head over, um, back paws just trying to get down here. That, and my little legs can't move as fast, so-"

"Stop." Jon interrupted, "It's okay." He smiled and picked up the eevee in two hands, holding her against his stomach. Elizabeth sighed, blushing. Jon started to pet her head and scratch her behind the ears.

"Hey! Stop petting me!" Elizabeth said to Jon "I'm not an animal!" Jon continued. "You're messing up my fur… and it feels sooooo goooood…" she relaxed and sighed.

When they got down to the laboratory, Jolteon was sitting there, waiting for them. Jon put Elizabeth down and she went over to where he was. "Hello Elizabeth." He said with a relaxed grin on his face.

Elizabeth hopped backwards in surprise "Yeah, you can understand pokemon now," Jolteon continued, "It's just set in your mind, so you might as well get used to it." he said, tapping his head. "Anyway, the machine won't help you any, it's completely fried. Sorry."

Elizabeth looked at him in horror of what she had just heard. She ran around to the back of the machine, seeing a large chunk of it where she last night plugged it in, was black and charred. "NO!!" She screamed, barking a bit.

Jon rushed over to where he had heard the cry coming from. "Elizabeth! Are you alright?" he looked at the black part of the machine. "Oh." His expression saddened.

"What am I gonna do now?!" Elizabeth shouted, "I can't live my entire life looking like this!"

Jon sighed. Elizabeth sniffled. Jolteon had an idea. "I'm sorry you're like this, I truly am. It's nice that you can finally understand what I'm saying, but I can't have an eevee be my owner. Already, by instinct I feel like treating you like a child, as that is what nature intends. But I have heard of cases such as yours, and I may have a solution."

Elizabeth perked up at that. "What is it? I can be myself again?!"

"I believe it is possible. Difficult yes, but I think that we may need to seek out the council of legends!"

Elizabeth cocked her head. "Who?"

***