Here is an edited version of Chapter 39, with slight changes, and added things that the old notepad version took out, making it hard to read.
Chapter 40 is being worked on right now, and should be out soon.
Sorry for the wait everyone.
Chapter 39: Sunset Spire
"Where is Isaac?" Asked Jennifer. "Why haven t we caught up with him yet?"
"Jennifer, I ve said this like three times already..." Rita told Jennifer as they walked through the Wasteland. "We don t know. He might have taken a different path for all we know."
"I wish he had waited for me at least, so I could have talked to him about it."
"We know Jennifer." Said Lloyd. "Lets just keep moving for now."
The wasteland was fairly cool thanks to the rain from last night, but it also made the typically dry, sandy ground very muddy. The trip to Sunset Spire would definitely take them much longer then expected because of it.
The sound of rumbling filled the air, it sounded like thunder off in the distance.
"I think it might rain again." Said Lloyd, who looked in the direction of the booming sounds. He saw a massive cluster of dark grey clouds being blown in their direction by the wind.
"That s the last thing we need." Rita moaned as she looked at the same cloud formation Lloyd was looking at. "That ll just slow us down even more. The muds already all thick and..."
"Actually..." Interrupted Regal, who fluttered overhead with the baby Plusle in his arms. "We re at the Spire already, I can see if from up here and its just over the next hill!"
"Can you see Isaac anywhere?" Asked Lloyd.
"No. I don t see Isaac anywhere around the Spire, and I can t see the top of it from here."
Lloyd sighed loudly. "So this means he either took a different path to the Spire, and hasn't arrived yet, or we didn't catch up to him and he's already inside."
"What should we do now then, Lloyd?" Asked Jennifer, who looked and sounded very worried about Isaac.
Lloyd waved to Regal, signaling for him to come down. "Let me hold Plusle." He asked. Regal listened and passed him Plusle, who was now sleeping quietly. "I want you to fly as high as you can and see if you can get a good view of the top of Sunset Spire, then come back and tell us what you saw." Lloyd told Regal.
"Right away, I'll be back as soon as I can." Regal took flight and flew towards the top of the Spire.
Plusle woke up a moment later. It reached up at Lloyd cheeks, but couldn't quite reach them.
"What? Again?" Lloyd asked her. Plusle had already shocked itself five times during their trip to Sunset Spire, what was enough electricity to knock out all but the most hardy of pokemon seemed to be nothing but a light snack to this tiny little pokemon.
Lloyd lifted Plusle near his face and she immediately grabbed Lloyds cheeks, causing much of the electricity stored in Lloyd to unleash itself into Plusle.
Suddenly, Lloyd felt very strange, he felt tired, and his vision was going blurry. He closed his eyes tight and rubbed them, hoping that would make his eyesight be clear again.
"Is something wrong?" Asked Rita, who noticed Lloyd rubbing his eye.
"I felt kind of strange after Plusle shocked itself, my visions all fuzzy and I felt like I just woke up from bed..."
"Perhaps you're using too much electricity or something?" Suggested Sakura. "I don't know anything about electric types, but I know when I breath out too much fire, I get all tired and weird like that too."
"Maybe..."
"Just hold off on, er, feeding Plusle for awhile. At least until after we get Isaac and start going back to the Headquarters."
"Right... Good idea Sakura." Said Lloyd with a smile. "If we do end up having to go inside that place, it would be best if I kept myself in good health."
"We should all probably sit a rest while we wait for Regal to get back." Said Rita. "There's a dry spot over here where we can all sit down."
"Good idea."
The sky rumbled again, this time it sounded closer. It wouldn't be long before it started to rain again.
---
Time went by, and it wasn't long before Lloyd spotted Regalflying back down to meet with the team.
"See anything?" Lloyd asked as soon as Regal had landed.
"Yes, I saw Isaac up there, as well as two cages with the missing pokemon in them." Odd thing was, Isaac wasn't doing anything, just sitting around and waiting. I wanted to go ask him but it started to get really windy up in the air and I had to fly back down."
"Maybe he's just resting?" Suggested Rita. "Huh... I guess Isaac really didn't need us to come save him after all."
"Yeah..." Said Lloyd. "But we should still get up there and see if he needs help." Lloyd picked up one of the supply bags and slung it over his shoulder. "Are you all ready to go?"
Everyone nodded, and stood up off of the dry patch of dirt.
"Then lets be careful, and stick together!"
They all got up and went towards the Sunset Spire, when they got to it they walked around it until they found a fairly large sized door which lead inside. Standing at the door, Lloyd looked straight up, and got a good idea of how big the spire was. He figured it was at least twenty or more floors until they reached the roof.
With Lloyd leading the way, everyone walked inside the entrance to Sunset Spire.
---
The inside of the spire was nothing anyone expected. From the outside, Sunset Spire looked nothing more then a tall, naturally formed stone pillar. The inside, however, looked like some kind of old temple or something, the kind of place an archeologist would just die for.
The walls and ceilings were all completely smooth, with the floor being made of a black stone tile that didn't match the stone of the Spire. There were three hallways in the first room they had entered. Along the walls there were small statues of various pokemon, placed on top of white stone pedestals that also didn't match the orange stone of the Spire.
"This place kinda looks like the place I found you, Lloyd." Said Rita. "Except this place is less of a dump."
Lloyd nodded, still looking around. "Ok guys, lets be careful, this place is a mystery dungeon like any other, so expect to see some wild pokemon here." Lloyd was trying to keep everyone focused on why they were here in the first place. "Lets hurry to the top, we need to see if we can help Isaac in any way."
"Lead the way then." Said Sakura.
Lloyd stood in the middle of the room and looked down each of the three corridors. All three of them looked exactly the same.
Since there seemed to be no way to determine the right direction, Lloyd randomly picked the hallway. He reached out and pointed to the path that was to the right of the door they came in. "Lets start with this one." He said, still pointing. He started walking down the hall, with everyone close behind him.
Half way down the corridor, Lloyd heard a soft click sound below him, and felt the ground sick an inch downwards. When he looked down, it looked like he had stepped on some kind of switch.
Before anyone had realized what had happened, a big, metal gate came crashing down in the middle of their group. Everyone barely managed to dive out of the way to avoid being crushed.
Lloyd looked around to see if anyone was hurt, and was relieved to see that everyone managed to avoid the gate crashing down on them, but he saw that the gate had separated Jennifer from the rest of the group.
Jennifer was on the side of the large, metal gate that lead back to the door they came in, and it looked like there was no way of getting her through. The door was obviously too heavy for everyone to lift, it looked very sturdy and the bars of gate were far to tightly spaced for Jennifer to just squeeze through.
"Lloyd!" She yelled to him. "What should I do?"
Lloyd thought for a second. "You ll have to go back outside Jennifer, its too dangerous for you to be wandering alone in here."
"But... What about Isaac?"
"We'll get Isaac, don t worry. I'm sure the last thing he wants is you getting yourself hurt, or worse, wandering around here trying to find him."
Jennifer looked disappointed, but she nodded and said, "Alright then, good luck everyone." and then made her way back outside to wait.
"Alright everyone..." Said Lloyd. "Lets watch our step for more traps, I don t anyone else getting separated... or anything worse."
---
Jennifer sat outside, sitting on a rock that was near the door to Sunset Spire. She sighed aloud, looked up towards the top of the spire.
"Oh Isaac..." She said to herself. "Why did you have to go alone..."
Just then it started to drizzle rain, and the sky above began to rumble with stored up energy. Jennifer sighed even louder as the light rain began to soak her.
She looked around as she sat on top of the rock. She thought see saw something on the horizon coming towards her. Jennifer looked at the thing and saw it was a big, blue pokemon, but from this distance she couldn't tell what exactly it was.
Too big to be Isaac. She thought. But Isaac wouldn't be down here anyways... Who's that pokemon? The figure got closer, and Jennifer could finally tell what she was looking at. The pokemon looked like a Prinplup.
A Prinplup? Wait a sec... That Maverick pokemon Isaac told me about is a Prinplup! But what would he be doing down here? She jumped off the rock and hid behind it, hopping it wasn't really Maverick.
The Prinplup stopped right outside the Spire, and right beside the rock Jennifer was hiding behind. Maybe he was waiting for everyone to get inside and then ambush them from behind or something? She thought to herself. This isn t good...
She looked out for a moment, and saw the Prinplup turn towards her. She fled back into hiding immediatly, he heart beating fast as she began to panic.
Oh no... Does he know I m here? Did he see me?!
"Hello?" The Prinplup called out.
At first, Jennifer was scarred, because she knew now that the Prinplup must have seen her before she could hide herself. But then, something about this pokemons voice sounded kind of familiar.
"Anyone there? I saw someone! Come out!"
Jennifer heard footsteps coming towards her. She tried to stay as quiet as she could, barely even breathing.
The Prinplup walked over to the rock and looked over it, staring at Jennifer from above. Jennifer let out a small yelp of surprise. "Oh no." She said out loud.
"Jennifer? Is that you?"
Jennifer couldn't believe it at first, but up close she could recognize the voice that spoke to her that had belonged to the Prinplup. It was a little deeper then before, but it was unmistakable whos voice it was.
"I... Isaac? Is that you?"
"Er, what are you doing hiding behind a rock?"
Instead of just answering, she stood up and leapt at him, hugging him around the neck, smiling. Oh Isaac! I was so worried! I m so happy to see you!
Isaac let out a small laugh. "I figured as much. Where is everyone else? Are you waiting for them or something?"
"They re already inside, going to go up and... Oh."
"Oh? Oh what?"
Jennifer's smile faded, and was replaced with a very worried face. "They're going up to look for you. Regal flew up and saw a Piplup, who he assumed was you, and now everyone is going up to help you."
"Listen, Jennifer. Said Isaac. This trap, the one that you all think is set for me by Maverick... it wasn't meant for me."
"What do you mean?"
This trap is meant for Lloyd. And I bet that the Piplup up there is just a fake to bait everyone to the top."
Jennifer gasped. "Oh no! We ve got to go and tell them!"
How far are they inside? Do you know?
"Not far, but a trap was set off that separated us, so we can t follow them the same way they went."
"Alright... Lets hurry then, come on."
Isaac and Jennifer both went inside the Sunset Spire. Both of them hoped that they could find Lloyd and the rest of the team before it was too late.
---
Already on the fourth floor, Lloyd, Rita and Sakura fought their seventh wild pokemon since coming to the spire, a fire type known as Slugma.
So far, all of the pokemon they had fought were fire types, which, thanks to the fact their group was composed of a grass type and another fire type, meant they would be at an extreme disadvantage here. Many of Sakuras attacks would be nearly useless, and Rita would be seriously hurt if she was hit by any of their fire type attacks.
Lloyd unleashed a charged up Thunderbolt at the Slugma. The thing wasn't very fast, so the attack easily hit it. Slugma slumped down to the ground, everyone figured that it had been knocked out by Lloyds attack.
"Isn't this just great." Said Rita, who was already getting tired from the battles. "A mystery dungeon full of fire type pokemon, and our only teammate who can fight these guys effectively is the same guy were trying to find."
"Here comes another one." Said Sakura, who was looking down a nearby corridor. "Don't worry, its just a Zubat this time."
The Zubat in question flew into the room and squeaked loudly. It immediately dove for Sakura, who was closest to it. Sakura shot out an ember attack at it, and knocked it out of the air. Her attack seemed to have knocked it out, the little bat pokemon didn't get back up after it hit the ground.
"Well at least not ALL of the pokemon here are fire types." Said Sakura.
"Zubats are in almost every mystery dungeon though Sakura." Pointed out Rita. "I thought you of all pokemon would know that."
"I did I just... Wanted to point it out to Lloyd is all."
"Come on you three." Said Lloyd. "We should hurry."
"Right." Said both Rita and Sakura.
"Right behind you, Lloyd." Said Regal.
---
Isaac and Jennifer were already on the third floor after only ten minutes of exploring the spire. So far, neither were attacked by any of wild pokemon.
"Isaac. While were walking, do you mind if I ask you something?"
"Not at all, what is it you wanted to ask?"
"Well I...."
But Jennifer was suddenly interrupted by Isaac, who shot out a huge stream of bubbles down the hallway. She looked in the direction Isaac had attacked and saw a Ponyta only a few feet away from where Isaac and Jennifer were. The Ponyta, looking enraged by the attack, charged at them, closing the distance fast.
Jennifer leapt forward at the Ponta, and kicked it multiple times right squarely in the head. The wild Ponyta, mid-gallop, crashed to the ground. Jennifer on the other hand, landed gracefully next to the now unconscious wild pokemon.
"Great job Jennifer, I almost forgot how good at fighting you were."
"You're pretty good yourself, Isaac. I ve never seen such a powerful Bubble attack before! I m surprised that Ponyta was still standing afterwards!"
They both continued walking down the hall, stepping over the now unconscious Ponta.
"So, what was it you were saying?"
Jennifer had almost forgotten what she wanted to talk about. "Oh yeah! Um... This is kind of embarrassing now that I think about it."
Isaac stopped and turned to look at her. "You know you don t need to be embarrassed around me. Please, ask me what it is you wanted to ask."
"Well..."
But once again she was interrupted by the wild pokemon that lived in the spire. A wild Zubat flew straight at Isaac, only to get itself knocked out of the air with one of his Bubble attacks.
"You know what." Started Isaac. "I think we should probably wait until we get out of here. Unfortunately, these wild pokemon seem to lack any manners."
Jennifer laughed. "Yeah, alright. Lloyd and the others should be our top priority anyways."
---
An hour went by, and both Isaac and Jennifer, and Lloyd, Rita, Regal and Sakura slowly made their way up the Sunset Spire. Lloyd, Rita, Regal and Sakura, who were nearly exhausted from the number of fights they had fought, arrived at top most floor of the spire.
It was simple compared to the others, it was composed of only a single, very large room. What was strange was the fact that this very large room was also very empty. What looked like what could have been the lair to some giant wild pokemon was without even the smallest of wild pokemon.
"Weird..." Whispered Lloyd. "What do you think this room is for?"
"I heard a rumor that Sunset Spire used to be the home of a legendary pokemon a very long time ago, way back before the humans were wiped out." Explained Sakura. "Maybe this was where it lived? It's certainly big enough."
"Hey, look over there!" Rita said, running towards what looked like a large stairway. Everyone followed her and saw that the stairway went outside, to the top of the Spire where Isaac was. "Wow, what a huge staircase. I bet this is how whatever lived here got in and out of here."
"Lets get up there then." Said Lloyd, who was already on his way up.
Everyone followed Lloyd up the massive staircase, all standing side by side. Except for Regal, who flew overtop of everyone, still carrying the baby Plusle.
"Wait guys, stop. Said Lloyd, everyone did so right away, but looked confused as to why they had to stop. "Did you hear that?"
Nobody said anything.
Lloyd turned around and faced back in the direction the four of them had just come from. "I could have sworn I heard something."
Lloyd was about to turn back and continue up the stairs, thinking that the sound was just something he imagined. But suddenly, another metal gate came down from above, just like the one that had separated the Jennifer from the rest of the team back on the first floor. The gate hadn't separated any of the team, like the first, but now they had no way of getting back.
"Great!" Said Rita. "How are we going to get back down now?"
Lloyd looked for any opening, and found that the very top part of the gate had much wider spaced bars then the rest of the gate. Wide enough for a pokemon to actually fit through.
"Regal, see the openings in the bars way up there?"
Regal squinted his eyes and looked straight at the spot Lloyd was referring. "Yes, I see it."
"Do you think you could fly through there and look for a way to open the door, a switch or something, while we go get Isaac?"
"You can count on me." Said Regal. He took off, flew up towards the openings at the top of the gate, and slipped through. "Be careful you three!" He yelled from the opposite side.
"Come on, lets go." Lloyd said to Rita and Sakura as he continued to climb the steps.
---
Not a moment after Lloyd, Rita and Sakura continued to climb up the steps towards the top of the spire, Isaac and Jennifer spotted Regal, who was flying around with the baby Plusle, looking at the wall around a large stairway. It looked like he was searching the walls for something.
Isaac and Jennifer ran over to him. Regal turned around and when he saw Isaac he jumped, looking startled. But when he saw that Jennifer was with Isaac, Regal looked confused.
"Wait a sec, yo' re not Maverick are you?" Asked Regal.
"No, Its me, Isaac." He stated simply.
"Yep, he found me at the entrance of this place and we came up here to catch up to you guys." Explained Jennifer.
"So you evolved too huh?" Said Regal. "Congratulations! But wait... I saw you on top of this place earlier... And you weren't evolved."
"You saw me?"
Well... I thought it was you. I couldn't really imagine any other Piplup having a reason to be up there.
"This isn't good!" yelled Jennifer. "Lloyd and the others are walking into a trap and we can t stop them with this giant metal gate here!"
"Trap?" Asked Regal. "What trap?"
"The pokemon that has been hunting Lloyd, Mewtwo, he set this trap up for Lloyd. He knew that he would come try to save me from coming here alone, so he had me captured right outside Havok City." Isaac shook the bars of the massive metal gate. "Argh, were so close! Regal, have you found any way to open this thing yet?"
"No, unfortunately. And I m not even sure there's any way for us to open it."
"There's got to be a way." Said Jennifer. "Lets all look together, we gotta get to Lloyd and the others in case they need our help!"
The three of them all split up and began to search the entire room to look for a switch or button that would open the gate.
---
It was pouring rain when Lloyd, Rita and Sakura reached the top of the steps. Even though it was the middle of the afternoon, the thunder clouds and rain made everything dark as it would look in the middle of the night.
Everyone looked around the large, circular pad that was the top of Sunset Spire, and found that Isaac was nowhere in sight. The two pokemon that had been kidnaped were gone as well, the doors of the two cages that must have held them were wide open and neither of then were anywhere to be seen either.
"Where is he? Where did he go?" Asked Sakura.
Lloyd looked around, but there was definitely nobody up here other then the three of them. "He must have..."
"Wait..." Sakura interrupted "I think I see something. Over there!"
Lloyd looked off into the distance, and eventually he saw something too. It was big, and orange, but he couldn't really tell what exactly it was.
"There's something over there too, and its coming this way!" Rita was looking into the opposite direction when she said this.
Lloyd turned in the opposite direction, and looked in the direction Rita pointed too. Once again, he saw something as well, this time it was smaller, and more of a brown color.
When the two flying figures got closer, Lloyd saw what they were. The first, the thing Sakura had pointed out, was a Charizard, the second, the thing Rita had pointed out, was a Fearow.
"Oh no." Said Lloyd, a hint of panic in his voice. "We need to get out of here."
But when they tried to turn to head back down the stairs, yet another metal gate closed in their faces, blocking any possible escape from the roof.
Lloyd, Rita and Sakura were trapped, with at least two dangerous pokemon on their way to capture Lloyd.