Once Sam regained consciousness, he had a huge headache. He tried to open his eyes, but he couldn't get himself to. He decided to sit there a little longer. Before long, he started to hear voices talking somewhere near him.
"That was a mighty fine job you did back there." Sam recognized it as the first sableye's voice.
"And by mighty," Sam heard the second one's voice, " you mean mightyena, am I right?" The first one laughed a bit at the second's pun.
"I don't see how we did any good," the third one spoke up. "We both lost, didn't we?"
"That is true," the first one said, "but you did a lot better than the last time."
"Not really. We still lost." the third one replied in a sober tone of voice. It took a bit, but Sam finally had mustered the strength to open his eyes. Once he did, he was able to see that he was still in the cave. As he tried to move, his attempts were thwarted by ropes that tied him to a wooden pole, planted firmly in the ground. How they were able to get a wooden pole into rock was anyone's guess. Kate was also tied up on the same pole, but she was still unconscious. All the sableye were sitting on some rocks that were around a little fire that was in the middle of the clearing. The fire was the only light in the entire area, so it was very hard to see.
"Oh, cheer up Ike," the second one said as he sat next to the third one. "To be honest, I don't think I would have known that that mightyena was such a high enough level to know Sucker Punch."
"I guess." Ike responded.
"Speaking of which," the first one said as he turned to the second one, "you probably know what I'm going to say, right Jack?"
"Yeah I know," the second one replied. "I should have been more focused and not let that eevee hit me in the back."
"The mightyena even called out your weak spot. Did you not hear her?"
"Nope." Jack said and then went back to his original place. "Too wrapped up in the battle, I guess."
"That's why you always have to be alert," the first one said, continuing his lecture. "Don't just focus on one thing in a battle, but try and focus on everything. That is one of the key points in battling."
"Alright. I'll try." Jack said and started to lean back on his rock.
"However," the first one changed to a lighter tone of voice, "your rock smash is getting a lot better. I could have mistaken it for a rockslide, to be honest.
"Yeah, I guess it is getting better." Jack said with a little boast in his voice. "Hey K? Why didn't we just eat the souls of those two instead of capturing them?" he said and then nodded to Sam and Kate.
"You obviously have never had eevee meat," the first one who was called K said. "Their souls don't taste nearly as good as their meat."
"And the mightyena?"
"Well, I've never had them, but you know how dark types' souls taste." K said. Jack let out a disgusted 'bleh'.
"I don't think I'll ever get that murkrow taste out of my mouth." Jack commented. They two of them looked over to their other partner, who was still just looking down with an unreadable expression.
"What's the matter, Ike?" K said and sat down next to him.
"It's just… I don't think that I'll ever be a good battler like you to are." Ike said.
"This isn't about the humans again, is it?" Jack said as he, too, went over next to Ike.
"Yeah…" Ike whispered.
"Listen," K said, "I've told you before, even though we have been trained by humans and have moves only humans can teach us, it doesn't mean that you can be any less a battler then Jack or I."
"Maybe," Ike replied back.
Sam felt some stirring beside him and looked to find that Kate was just now waking up.
"Where are we?" she whispered.
"Inside the sableye's den. Are you alright?" he asked in a hushed tone.
"I think so," Kate said in response.
"Do you know what happened back there? How did we get captured?"
"Well, I think that first sableye knew psychic somehow, and that's how he knocked you out. He also some how knew a fairy move, which is how he got me."
"Really?" Sam said in disbelief. "Well, he did say just now that he was trained by humans. Maybe they used some TM's to train him."
"Perhaps."
"By the way, how did you know that the Sableye's weak point was his ruby?"
"Well, all ghosts have a weak point somewhere on their body. You can't usually see them unless you have really good eyesight."
"Or you can sniff them out?" Sam guessed.
"Right."
"Hey, look who's awake." Jack said as he got up from his rock and went over towards the two. "K says that you'll taste good. I hope he's right. I haven't had something good to eat in a while," Jack put on his creepy smile. "The only things to eat around here are the pidgeys and wurmples." He went back to where he was sitting. "So when are we going to eat them?" Jack asked.
"Since we had a late breakfast, we should probably wait a little longer."
Sam had something on his mind, and he wanted to ask it. "Hey Kate?" Sam said, "Since we are tied up here, could I ask you a question?"
"I don't feel like this is the time for that."
"Well, we can't really do anything else right now, seeing how we are tied up."
Kate gave off a sigh. "Alright then, what's your question?"
"You said that you'd been captured once. Could you tell me about that?"
"Not really."
"Will you tell me about it?"
Kate let out another sigh. "Well, since it looks like we are about to be eaten, I don't see a problem with it."
"Alright," Sam said. He, of course, didn't want to be eaten. He would come up with a plan later, but he was waiting for a better opportunity.
"You see," Kate started, "there was a point in time where I was a part of a pack. I was just a poochyena at that point. I loved my pack like they were my family, which some of them were. One day, when I got seperated from my pack, this trainer came by and captured me.
That sounds like how I caught my poochyena Sam thought and he chuckled a bit at the similarity. Then, something clicked inside of his brain. No… that's not possible.
"It felt like forever that I was stuck inside that ball." Kate continued. "When I finally got out, I was in a totally different place, one that I didn't know at all. When the human said he was going to train me, I scratched one of the his legs and then ran off. I've never been able to see my pack since and I've been stuck in this strange land."
Sam couldn't believe what he had just heard. Did he hear it right? Was he imagining this? Was this a dream? It couldn't be true. Kate, the mightyena before him, was the poochyena that he had captured two years ago.
"Well, there they are," Jessie said while looking through her binoculars. "But the eevee and mightyena are still not with them."
"Do you think they're going to look for them?" Meowth asked. He didn't have binoculars of his own, so he had to ask questions to know what was going on.
"Maybe," Jessie replied, not entirely sure herself what they were doing.
"You know," James spoke up, while putting down his binoculars, "why do we need all five? Why can't we just catch the three of them that are above ground, especially now that they are split up again?"
"Do you think that the boss would appreciate us only bringing him three?" Jessie said.
"Well, seeing how we haven't really caught anything for him and those three are eeveelutions, yes, I do think the boss would appreciate us bringing those."
"True," Meowth said, "but wonder what he would say if we would bring him all of d'em. He'll give us even more money and we'll rise up the Team Rocket corporate ladder even faster!"
"Now that you put it that way, I say let's capture all of them!" James exclaimed.
"That's the spirit, Jimmy!"
"So we just have to wait until the other two come out of the caves." Jessie said as she looked back through her binoculars. "Also, that espeon's legs aren't broken, so you were wrong James."
"It was just a theory!" James said as he put his hands up in defence.
"Hang on," Meowth said, "what if the others don't make it out? What if the sableye get 'em?
"That won't be a problem because we'll make sure that they do get out." Jessie said with a smile.
"Do you have a plan?" Meowth asked.
"No, but we'll just play it by ear."
"Well, this looks like another cave entrance to me." Drake said as the three approached a gloomy looking hole on the side of a hill.
"Nice find, Lily." Cassius commented.
"I think you all are giving me too much credit. It wasn't that hard to find."
"Alright then, let us move!" Cassius said and then started to walk down into the cave.
"Ladies first." Drake said to Lily in a semi-serious, semi-kidding voice.
"Age before beauty." Lily said back. To this, Drake gave her a stare that turned into a smile.
"Fine," he said and then went in after Cassius. Lily couldn't help but giggle at Drake's acceptance of what she said. Then, she too went into the cave to try and find Sam and Kate.
Sam had been so stunned by the realization that Kate was the poochyena that had gotten away from him, he just sat there, looking into the distance, lost in thought.
"Are you okay?" Kate asked, seeing how Sam was just sitting there blankly.
"I'm fine." Sam lied. That, however, wasn't important right now. Well, sure, it was important, but not as important as getting out of the cave and not being eaten.
"Well, me and Ike are going to clear out the rocks from your rock smash," K said. "So just make sure that those two don't escape, alright?"
"You can count on me." Jack said.
"Alright, let's go, Ike." The two sableye walked out of their little abode off to where the rocks had fallen. Sam was trying to think of some way to get himself and Kate out of this mess. He observed that there was another tunnel where the cave kept going in the opposite direction from where the rocks were, and therefore where they had come in.
Wonder if there is another way out that way Sam thought. It wasn't much to go on, but it was their only option. Now there was the problem of getting out of the ropes that they were tied to. Sam started to think, and came up with a plan that just might work.
"Hey Kate?" Sam said, feeling really weird calling a pokémon that he had caught before by name.
"Yeah?"
"Do you think you can take a shadow claw?"
"What?"
"Like if a shadow claw hit you, do you think you could take it?"
"Of course, why?"
"You'll see." Sam said. He took in a deep breath and then talked in a purposely loud voice. "Wow, I can't believe how easy those sableye were to defeat. I mean, that guy didn't even land a hit on me."
Jack looked in their direction. "What was that?"
"I said you were weak. I bet you don't even know how to use shadow claw."
"Yeah, I bet you can't even use it." Kate said, catching on to what Sam was trying to do.
"I do to know how to use shadow claw!" Jack said as he hopped off his rock and started to head towards Sam and Kate.
"Oh really? Then why don't you show us?"
"Oh, you want me to show you?" Jack said while putting on a creepy smile. "Oh, I'll show you all right." His claws started to glow with a black and purple color. He charged at the two and slashed his claws at them. His claws went right through both of them. Sam didn't feel anything, while Kate just flinched as it pass through her. As the sableye finished his attack, the ropes that had confined Sam and Kate fell off, setting the two free.
"Wha-!" Jack exclaimed when he had realized the mistake that he had made.
"Did you forget that ghost type attacks don't work on normal types?" Sam said mockingly. Kate and Sam took no time to start running to the other tunnel entrance.
"You get back here!" Jack yelled after him. Sam looked back and saw that he was lagging behind. Sam didn't know a lot about sableye, but he did know that they were really slow.
"Looks like we're good." Sam said, notifying Kate of their lead on Jack.
"Let's just hope there's an exit this way." she said back. The two ran and ran, going through corridors of rock after corridors of rock, hoping that they wouldn't run into any dead ends. Finally, after what felt like forever, Sam and Kate finally reached a point where the air felt a lot fresher.
"I think there might be a way out this way!" Sam said with enthusiasm in his voice. Just then, he saw something appear under him from nowhere. He looked down only to find the sableye from earlier looking like he was 2-dimensional under him. Like he was inside of the rock. Jack put on his creepiest smile and then turned back into his 3-D self right under Sam. This caused the eevee to fall over. He didn't however, feel anything, because he was a normal type.
"Thought you could get away from me that easily?" Jack asked in a sinister tone of voice. "Well then, let's make it so that you can't escape," he said. He turned around and charged at one of the walls and hit it as hard as he could. The cave started to shake as rocks from the ceiling came crashing down. Sam tried to cover his head, but it was in vain because he was now a quadruped. Sam was pelted with a few rocks, most of them being no larger than his head. Sam opened his eyes once he didn't hear anymore rocks falling. The first thing he saw was Kate, who looked pretty roughed up. She obviously got hit with more rocks than Sam did. The next thing he saw was Jack who was still standing next to the cave wall. Finally, he saw large rocks blocking the way out, the way to freedom.
Sam slowly started to get up, the last of his faith crushed. How were they going to get out now?
"Not so smart now, are ya?" Jack taunted. He then launched another rock smash, this time, right at Sam. The human-turned-pokémon tried to avoid it the best he could, but it still hit him right in the side. Sam cried out in pain as he was launched across the cave and smashed into the cave wall. Sam struggled to get up after this. His legs were shaking out of exhaustion, both from the rocks and the rock smash. Kate came behind him and launched a shadow ball at Jack as a sneak attack. Jack jumped into the air to avoid it and launched another rock smash at Kate, who also wasn't able to dodge in time. She too was thrown into the wall. Jack then turned back around to look at Sam, who was now backing up towards the rock pile that was preventing them from leaving.
Is this it? Sam thought. Is this the end?
"Sam? Is that you?" Sam heard a voice from behind him say. He knew that voice. Sam's eyes widened as he recognized it.
"Lily! Is that you?" Sam turned around shouted through the rock wall.
"SAM!" Lily shouted through the rocks. "I'm so glad you're alright!"
"Um, not exactly," He replied, trying to keep the weakness out out of his voice. He turned his head back around to see Kate trying to get up, only to be hit by a shadow claw, which knocked her down again. "Yeah, we're not doing so well. One of the sableye is giving us a hard time."
"Is there anyway to destroy these rocks from your side?" A voice Sam recognised as Cassius said from the other side.
"Cassius? Are you okay?"
"That's not important right now. Is there anyway to destroy these rocks from your side?" he asked again.
"Um… maybe?" Sam said and then came up with a plan. "Hey you!" he shouted to get Jack's attention. "That rock smash you did didn't hurt at all. You sure that you were even trying?" Jack turned around and looked at Sam.
"Son, I may not be the brightest, but I'm not stupid. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me."
Sam growled when he realized that his plan wasn't going to work a second time. He tried to think of something else fast. But he couldn't think of anything. He watched as the sableye got closer and closer to him.
"There's got to be a way we can help them, right?" Lily said.
"Well if you have a plan to clear a lot of rocks in no time, then I'm all ears." Drake replied. Lily started to look around for something, anything, that might help them. Suddenly, something small, black and round rolled down from the entrance and tapped Lily's side.
"Hm?" she said, looking at the object. Lily moved it around with her paws and saw that it had a big red 'R' on one of the sides. That looks like Team Rocket's emblem. Lily thought. But why is it here? Lily looked up towards the cave entrance and saw that no one was there. Looking closer, Lily found a wick on the object. "What is this?" she asked out loud. Both Drake and Cassius came over to see what she was looking at.
"It looks like a bomb." Cassius commented.
"A what?" Drake asked, having never heard of it before.
"It's a human made object. If you light that fuse, then it will explode."
"Really?" Lily asked with enthusiasm. "Does that mean it can blow up the rocks?"
"It's worth a shot." Cassius said.
"Hang on," Drake interrupted. "What if the explosion just makes another cave in?"
"We can't just leave Sam for dead, and this is the only action that we can do to save him."
"But this is much too dangerous. In doing so we might get ourselves killed. I don't think Sam is worth it." Drake pressed.
"Just come on!" Lily yelled. This sudden outburst took Drake by surprise. "Are you just that heartless? Come Cass," She motioned to the espeon "I'm at least going to help him. You can leave the cave if you want."
As Lily pushed the bomb with her snout towards the rocks, Drake started to go out of the cave while he was lost in thought. "That heartless…" he whispered to himself. Am I? Drake thought. Just then, a memory flashed in his mind.
"This berry stew is delicious!" Drake shouted as he slurped down the last of the delicious stew that his mother had made. "Can I get some more?" he asked.
"Yeah, I want some too," Lily said as well.
"Well, I would love to make you guys some more, but we're all out of berries." a glaceon said as she went over to where the two eevees were eating.
"Can you get some more, Mom?" Drake asked.
"Well… I guess I could go out and get some more."
"Oo! Oo! Can I go with you?" Drake said, really excited to get out of the house.
"I guess it couldn't hurt. Do you want to come too, Lily?"
"No, I think I'll wait until dad wakes up to play with him."
"Alright, let's go, Drake."
Once Drake's mom grabbed a basket to carry the berries in, they left the house. After a few minutes of walking away from their house and looking around, the two arrived at an oran berry bush.
"So Drake, do you know what you want to evolve into?" Drake's mother asked him while she started to pick berries with her paws
"Well, not really. I think all of them are really cool. Well, except for vaporeon." Drake shuddered a bit when he said the name. "I was thinking of evolving into a glaceon because of you. Or maybe I might just stay an eevee because dad's a normal type."
"Well, I want you to evolve into what you want."
"I know mom. I may need more time to decide."
"That's fine," she said and finished filling up the basket with Drake's help. Once they were done, the two started home. As they were walking back, they were intercepted by a sandshrew who was leaning on a rock on the side of the road.
"Well, hello there Alyssa. I hope you are doing well," the ground type said when he saw the two coming his way. There was a notable look of sadness on the glaceon's face.
"Good morning, Mortimer," she said back.
"I see you are collecting berries again. Making some of that stew again?"
"Indeed," she replied. By the way that Alyssa responded to Mortimer, it would have looked like the two were friends to an outside observer. Drake, however, was not an outside observer, and he knew what the sandshrew was up to.
"I was wondering if you had taken up my offer?" the Mortimer said, still leaning on the rock.
"I have not," Alyssa responded with a stern, but still soft voice.
Mortimer pushed himself off of the rock and looked at Alyssa straight in the eye. "Come on Alyssa! Why don't you leave that dumb persian and come with me? I thought you said that you loved me?"
"That was a long time ago, and you know that. Why can't you just move on?"
"Alyssa…"
"I'm sorry Mort,"
When Alyssa said this, the sandshrew ran up, took a bunch of berries from the basket, and then ran off in the other direction.
"Hey come back here," Drake started to pursue.
"Don't, Drake. It's alright."
"But he stole our berries!"
"Let him keep them."
"But…"
"It's fine."
Drake turned around and started to follow his mother back to their house.
"Hey, mom?"
"Yes?"
"Why were you so nice to him. He was being really mean to you, but you never once raised your voice or yelled at him."
Alyssa took a deep breath and then started to talk. "Drake, you know that it's very easy for you to be nice to someone who is nice to you back. You and your sister get along very well. But that's not how character is judged. No, character is judged by being nice to people who aren't nice to you back." She then stopped and looked at Drake. "In life, you will meet some people who you might disagree with, or that you don't like for whatever reason. Please promise me that you will not hate those people. And if it's not for building character, then do it for me."
"Alright, mommy. I promise."
Alyssa smiled and gave Drake a small hug. "Alright, let's get back to the house. Your father's probably up by now, and he'll want some stew too."
"I promise…" Drake repeated to himself.
"How are we going to light it then?" Drake was snapped back to reality by Lily's panicked voice.
"Well, if we had some fire we could ignite it that way." Cassius said.
"Did someone say fire?" Drake said as started to go back towards the other two.
"Dray?" Lily said with rising hope in her voice.
"Get back guys," the flareon said and then shot an ember at the wick.
"Sam, get away from the rocks!" Lily shouted. As the three started to run away from the blast zone, Lily went over to Drake."
"Thanks Dray," she said. Drake turned to his sister, and saw how much she looked like their mother.
"Yeah," he replied and then said to himself, "I promise."
Get away from the rocks? Sam questioned in his mind. Okay, I guess. There wasn't anyway to go around Jack, so he decided that he would go through. Sam jumped towards Jack and, as was no surprise, he went right through him. This time, however, Jack was quick to turn around.
"Nope, can't get me again. I actually learn from my mis-"BOOM!
The rocks that were blocking the exit before exploded and knocked up a cloud of dust into the air as well as making Jack fly away to the other end of the cave. At first, Sam couldn't see anything because of the dust, but once it had cleared, Sam saw Lily, Cassius, and Drake running towards him.
"Sam! Are you alright?" Lily was the first one to ask.
"I'm fine, but I don't think Kate is," Sam replied. They all looked over to where the mightyena laid on the floor. She was struggling a lot now just to get up. The other three went over to where Kate was and helped her up. Jack also got up and wasn't very happy.
"Oh no you don't!" he yelled and launched a shadow ball at the group. Cassius stopped it with his light screen. Lily breathed in and the blew out the air. It hit the sableye and he stopped moving, cringed because of how cold it was, and then froze right there in place. The four of them left the cave and once they got outside, the all fell onto the ground.
"That was close," Sam said.
"No kidding," Lily replied.
"I don't think that the sableye will follow us up into the sunlight, so I think we should rest here a bit," Cassius suggested.
"I'm fine with that," Sam said as he just layed down on the ground and rested a bit and was going to take a small nap.
"Are you sure we should have used the only bomb we had left to help those pokémon get out?" James asked, thinking that it wasn't entirely worth it. "They are really expensive."
"Of course it was a good idea. They're all back together." Jessie said, thinking that it was entirely worth it.
"So I guess we capture them now that they are tired?" James asked, starting to get Jessie's plan.
"No not yet, we need to wait a little more longer." Jessie said.
"What?!" James said just under a yell, seeing that he was not starting to get Jessie's plan.
"Think about it James. All the times we've failed, it was because we acted too rash. This time we are going to be patient and wait for the right opportunity."
"Alright," James said in a weak tone of voice. He didn't argue partly because Jessie was right, and partly because he didn't want to get her angry.
"Morning Sun huh?" Sam said and when he heard Cassius's tale. "That's cool." They were all sitting next to a campfire that Drake had made. They had made a little bit more ground before they decided to stop for the night.
"Are you doing alright, Kate?" Lily asked. The glaceon was sitting a little bit farther away from the fire for obvious reasons.
"I've been better," she replied honestly, "but I think I'll manage."
Drake yawned and then curled up to go to sleep. "Well, good night everyone."
"Good night," the rest of them said in unision. Both Lily and Kate fell asleep fast, but Sam just couldn't. The eevee just looked into the fire and reflected on everything that had happened that day.
"Can't sleep?" Sam heard Cassius ask him.
"I guess."
"Hey, Sam?"
"Yeah?"
"Could I ask you a question?"
"Of course," Sam said in a quiet tone of voice to be sure not to wake the others.
"Why did you decide to help me?" he asked.
"What?"
"I thought you were a human only intent on capturing all of the pokémon. If that's the case, then why did you help me?"
Sam looked back and stared deep into the fire. He didn't say anything for a while, but when he did, it was something that Cassius couldn't help but smile at.
"Do you really need a reason to help someone?"
"No, I guess not." Cassius replied with a grin and layed down to go to bed. Sam did the same as he was now starting to feel sleep coming over him. He had a big day ahead of him, and he needed all the rest he could get.