Hello everyone, new part of Life as a pikachu! I hope you enjoy it. Leave your reviews in the review section as usual! Oh, and if you cry quickly, please get your tissues ready, because I won't hold back this chapter!
"She... Died...?" I said slowly without believing the actual words.
"Yes..." Espeon said. "She tried to team up with Tommy and was also killed."
"She and Tommy were mates, weren't they?" I said.
"They weren't but they were at the same time." Espeon said. "She never really accepted him as her mate because she felt it as cheating her first one."
"I thought Lukas' dad died? And besides, pikachu can have multiple mates, can't they?"
"Yes they can. But females mostly have only one partner while males have multiple." she said. "But some females have multiple, it depends on the female..." she added. I sighed deeply.
"Well, they're dead now..." I said while looking around.
"Espeon, can you get all the either dead or unconscious pikachu here for me? I need to check them over and I'll have to tell Lukas his mother died... Somehow." I said while thinking about it. Not the most fun thing to tell someone, even when you think your mother doesn't care about you. I wondered how Lukas would respond to this. He would probably be sad, but would a pokémon respond just as a human? While I wondered that Espeon returned with Lukas in her mouth. She gently put him down inside my lap and was gone again to get more pikachu.
I was surrounded by pikachu from which most were poisoned. You could see that some pikachu really didn't feel good. Hanging ears, laying down on the grass and just staring into nothing, not wanting to move, while others were doing just fine, at least, for now. I checked Lukas, which was still unconscious. The poison sting that defeated him had left some bad marks in his fur, but those would heal quickly. Except the fact that Lukas was completely worn out he seemed fine. The attack hadn't even poisoned him, surprisingly.
While I was looking Lukas over, Espeon returned with Tommy. She put his body in front of me, or what was left of it. Tommy's fur was covered in blood and there were deep wounds everywhere. I turned the pikachu on it's back and while it was clear he was dead, I checked if I could feel anything. I held my finger against his neck and checked if I could still feel his heart rate, which I could. I held my finger before Tommy's nose and mouth to check for breathing, expecting that the heart rate was just some last brain activity before it would also stop. I laid my finger just under his nose so I would feel any breath coming from him. Very softly I felt hot air coming from Tommy's nose. My eyes grew bigger and I looked at the body. Tommy was still alive! But, I knew it wouldn't last long. Even if Tommy would wake up from this, he would have so much pain and his body would be so damaged that he wouldn't been able to live a normal life, except if he would be adopted by someone that would stay with him 24/7. Knowing that Tommy was a wild pokémon and that he probably didn't want to be with humans, I decided to leave him to die. While I hated to do it, it was really the best for the pikachu. I got myself together and placed Tommy besides me in a natural sleeping position when Espeon returned with two other dead pikachu. One was Lukas' mother and one was a old female. She didn't look like she had taken a beating but I couldn't detect any signs of life at her so I placed her next to Tommy. Unfortunately, the same applied for Lukas' mother, except that you could see she had been fighting. She was bruised and had blood spots in her fur. Not as much as Tommy, but still...
Espeon returned with the last dead pikachu. It was more than clear this pikachu was dead, you could see some of his organs were gone. I quickly placed his aside with the 'open' part faced down and Espeon returned with a living pikachu, finally. This one was unable to stand on his two back legs and he was also poisoned. I looked at his legs. One was broken, that was clear, but the other didn't appear to be broken. Whenever I touched it however, the pikachu winced in pain. After gently feeling around his bone I found it was dislocated. With a major push and one long cry of pain from the pikachu I placed the leg back where it should be. As soon it was in place the pikachu looked at me, looked at his leg and tried to move it, which went as it should.
"I'll do your other leg later." I said. He then rubbed his cheek against my belly and with a cute "pikaaaa" he then went back into the crowd, trying to not put weight on his other leg. Espeon returned with two other pikachu who were unconscious, but looked good. After a while, all pikachu that needed care were taken care of when all pikachu looked at me and ran away when they could. Espeon also perked her ears and was gone before you knew. Others just looked frightened and when I looked over my shoulder I sak Oak coming through the bushes.
"Hello...!" he said while screwing around with a box he was holding. The pikachu that ran away took a safe distance from me and looked what that strange guy was doing. Then Oak put down the small box near me.
"You ordered antidotes?" he said smiling.
"Hello and yes, I did!" I said happily. He looked at me and at my leg, at Lukas who was still motionless and at the four dead pikachu. "My god, what have you been doing?!" he said.
"Fighting with a group of arbok and ekans." I said. "When I returned about an hour ago, the colony and the snakes were fighting with each other. They wanted to take over this place and scare the pikachu away, but they didn't succeed. However, they managed to poison almost the entire colony, including me." I said while pulling my leg. I gritted my teeth when I felt pain again.
"But they... My gosh, I already wondered what was happening. I heard explosions when I was inside my lab."
"We had a couple of explosions indeed..." I said.
"Espeon, it's safe, this guy isn't harming anyone." I thought. Espeon appeared right next to me out of nowhere. She spooked both me and Oak.
"Whoa, don't scare me. I didn't know you were there." I said to her.
"That's exactly what I wanted." she chuckled.
"So this is the Espeon you were talking about... " he said.
"Yep, this is her. She makes me able to understand the pikachu. Espeon, this is Oak. He's pokémon professor and he..."
"He's weird."
"He has weird things on his body!"
"He looks like that guy from last year that almost caught Tommy!"
"The one that sounded like a jigglypuff when we thundershocked him?"
"Yeah, that one!"
I looked towards the group of pikachu.
"Do you know him?" I asked.
"He's been here once, but then we chased him away." one pikachu said.
"You've been in this colony before?" I asked Oak.
"By accident, I'd rather forget that." he said. I opened the box and got a antidote. I looked at the pikachu.
"Alright, who's the first?" I said. All pikachu took another step back at the sight of receiving an injection. I sighed.
"Come on guys, this is gonna make you feel much better." I said while grabbing a pikachu that didn't even had the energy to flee for Oak or a injection. The pikachu looked terrified but I quickly calmed it.
"It'll be done in no-time." I said while getting the pikachu ready. I grabbed the injection, injected the pikachu with medicine, and laid him next to me.
"You'll feel better in a minute." I said. The pikachu just looked at me like I was crazy. But after a minute, he stood up and tried to walk. After seeing him on the ground not even able to flee for an unknown human, this was quite extraordinary. It was still wobbly, but he could walk.
"See?" I said to him and to the other pikachu. "Nothing to worry about. Who's..." I said but grabbed my leg when pain erupted when I tried to move it.
"DAMNIT." I said. Oak, standing right behind me, looked at my leg.
"You have to see a doctor..." he said.
"No I don't." I said while getting another antidote.
"Those are for pokémon, not for humans!" Oak warned.
"We'll see about that." I said while I injected myself.
"Are you insane?! This could be deadly for you!" he said.
"No it won't, it's HP-type. Look here." I said. "I also prefer the special H version, but this one is usable in emergencies.
"I didn't know that these existed..." he said. "I have never really gotten myself into pokémon medicine... I know which ones there are and what they do, but I didn't know there were antidotes for human and pokémon... I've got lab assistants for that!" he smirked.
"You don't know much, do you?" I said jokingly.
"Hey, don't say that. I'm not like nurse Joy." he replied. "Do you know how a pokéball works?"
"Uhm, you throw it, the pokémon gets sucked in and is caught?" I said.
"Yeah, but the converting to digital data part." he smirked.
"No... I don't." I said slowly.
"Well I do and let me tell you, that isn't easy." he said while I gave another pikachu an antidote.
With help of Oak, the rest of the pikachu were healed up quickly. Two more pikachu had woken up from their slumber and were now recovering. Lukas however was still sleeping. I sighed when I held him in my arms. The pain in my leg was gone and walking was normal again. I didn't feel sick or anything so the antidote had worked.
Later, in the evening, Oak was gone and Lukas was still asleep. He was the last pikachu to wake up, but for now, he still wasn't moving. Even Volt was worried about him, which said a lot according to one of the females that was with me. Espeon's head was on my knee and Lukas was between my legs while we watched the sun go down between the trees.
"I'm happy this day is over..." I said.
"Yes... I hope Lukas will wake up soon... I'm really worried..." she replied while moving her head up and looking at Lukas.
At the start of the afternoon the pichu were released outside. Some of them looked around at the snake bodies that were still around. I abused the opportunity to show them a arbok and explaining them what was the most dangerous part of them. Most pichu were a bit scared to get outside, but as soon they saw I was back (I had been gone for two days) they came for me and got all over me as some kind of greeting. It felt really good to have them back. I'll miss them when I go home, but I just won't think about that yet.
Some pikachu were very busy cleaning up. It was interesting to see how pikachu got rid of death pokémon. Instead of digging a hole and putting them there, they took them out of the colony and placed them on some sort of clearing. About five minutes after we left, the first scavenger had arrived to eat the dead bodies. They saved the body of Tommy, and, on my request, the one from Lukas' mom so he could say goodbye in a proper way.
When it went dark and I had said goodnight to the pichu, I went to sleep. Espeon slept near my bag and I placed Lukas next to me, keeping him warm. For the rest my bag was empty, whilst normally there would be at least three pikachu inside. After checking Lukas was still breathing and his heart was still pounding, I laid down next to him and fell asleep.
"Of all pikachu, why does Lukas' mom have to die...?" I thought. "Just as I had restored his trust in her... I'd rather had someone else to die..."
I watched myself.
"Selfish..." I said softly.
"I was about to say that..." Espeon replied.
"I know, it's just... It's never good to lose someone and I didn't lose anyone of my family yet. Lukas has lost everyone now, he's the only one left. His brother died, his friend was killed, now his mom and even his dad is gone." I thought, knowing that Espeon would be able to hear it. She sighed.
"Let's just go to sleep..."
"Yeah, that's probably the best. Won't be a nice day tomorrow... Telling him that mom died..." I sighed again. "I just hope he wakes up soon... If he doesn't before morning I'll take him to Oak."
"That's OK with me... I hope he will be alright..." she said. And with that we both closed our eyes and went to sleep after a long day of fighting and nursing.
It was still night when I suddenly woke up. I don't know why I did, but I checked the time and saw it was around 2AM. I hadn't been sleeping long. I stretched myself a bit and wanted to go back to sleep when I suddenly noticed that Lukas... Lukas was gone. I checked in my bag to see if I accidentally pushed him away, but this wasn't the case. He was gone.
Wondering where he went, I got up and looked around. One of the guards should have seen him leaving... I walked over to the colony entrance when one pikachu walked up to me and jumped my shoulder. I couldn't see who it was, but I knew it was one of the guards.
"Did you see Lukas leaving my sleeping bag?" I whispered to him. He nodded and pointed towards a place in the forest.
"That way?" I asked. The pikachu nodded.
"Pika-pikachu..."
"Thanks..." I said to him before he jumped from my shoulder and I left in the direction the pikachu pointed. It was the exact same direction from the corpse of Lukas mom. To prevent predators eating her and preventing a terrible smell at the colony I had placed her inside a towel and placed her somewhere safe not too far from my bag.
I walked towards the body of the mother and when I walked around the corner of a tree into a small clearing, I saw Lukas sitting next to his dead mother. He had unwrapped her from the towel and he sat right next to her. I stood behind him for a couple of seconds, but it seemed like it lasted for ages. Lukas didn't move at all and he didn't even notice me, or so it looked...
When I moved closer towards him he still didn't notice me. I sat down next to him and put my hand on his side and against my head. He almost jumped and turned around, looking at me.
When I could see his face it was wet from tears. He looked at me for a moment before turning around and looking at his mom again. His breath was irregular, quick and uncontrolled. From closeby, I could see his entire body was shaking and soundless tears were rolling across his cheeks and into his fur and onto the ground. I sat next to him and his mother and watched the poor pikachu crying. I gently stroked him across his ears and his back, but it didn't seem to relief the pain Lukas currently had. I moved a bit closer to the pikachu while I grabbed his paw with one hand in an attempt to comfort him. This seemed to work a bit better because Lukas looked at me and back at his mom before he accepted my offer of being lifted and being placed against my shoulder and head. I continuously stroked him across his back when Lukas started to sob and buried his face deep into my shoulder.
Somehow I wasn't able to talk and I didn't need to. Lukas stopped crying for a second and wanted to be put down. I placed him next to his mother where he watched her again. He tried to nuzzle her, trying to get her to wake up although he knew he was too late. He just didn't want to believe she was dead. He looked at me in an attempt to make me heal her somehow, but her injuries were probably all inside and not like Tommy outside her body. I doubted if even Nurse Joy could heal this pikachu. I looked at the ground before I made eye-contact with Lukas and shaking my head very softly, telling him I couldn't do anything to save her anymore. Lukas eyes grew a bit larger and he did another attempt to wake his mother by pushing against her body.
"Pika..." he said slowly. "Pika-chuuuuuuu..."
She was lifted a bit and just rolled back in the same position she was in before, not responding to anything her son did to her. Lukas even tried to power her up by giving her electricity, but after even that didn't work he gave up after several tries when tears formed again when he realised his mother really had died. He looked at his mother one more time before he started sobbing and crying again. He looked at me and walked over to me. He climbed my lap and watched his mother from there, still crying soundless tears, while being endlessly stroked by me. I couldn't really think of something different to do anyway. I don't know how long I've been sitting there, but I didn't care either.
It was early in the morning when the sun rose. I stopped stroking Lukas' fur and watched as it sun beaming through the forest, creating a sort of ghostlike effect through the morning fog.
"Lukas... Shall we go back to the colony...?" I asked gently and slowly making sure I wouldn't say something wrong. The crying had stopped over the last hour and he had just cuddled close to me. The last half hour he had been against my chest and he had just been doing nothing except looking at me and his mom sometimes before cuddling close to me again.
He looked at me and nodded before releasing a deep sigh. I put the towel around his mother again. We probably would move the body to the clearing later this day. We arrived back at my sleeping bag where Espeon was still asleep. I woke her up by gently pushing her back and forth. She looked at me and looked at the sun.
"Is it morning already?" she said before getting up and seeing Lukas.
"He already knows -" I said inside my head "please don't start about it."
The rest of the morning Lukas was very silent. He wasn't really present and whilst he normally was around me and the pichu, he now sat somewhere in a tree watching us. I had been checking him multiple times, but he didn't want to come and play with me or the pichu. It would probably be like this for a couple of days, so I accepted it. Meanwhile I heard that the pikachu were busy with all kinds of stuff. Their colony leader had died, so there had to be a new one. Multiple males were already fighting for dominance over the colony. Two males had even challenged me for a fight, but I had turned them down saying that I wasn't interested in being the colony leader. Not because I was not interested, but mainly to prevent problems with the pikachu in general.
Two days later Lukas was still in a very sad mood. His mother was eaten after we lied the body in the same clearing where the pikachu placed them. The next day it was completely gone already. I decided we would visit Cammy to see how she was doing and to give Lukas some time to be alone without other colony pikachu around him. Maybe it would do him good. On a early morning, three days after his mother was gone, we left for Oak's laboratory. Lukas was on my shoulder and he was still a bit sad, although he looked a bit better.
"How you're feeling...?" I asked gently as we walked towards the path of the forest. Lukas sighed and looked down.
"Hey, don't be so sad..." I said as I gently stroked across his head. "I know it must be hard to lose your mom... But I'm worried that you'll never feel happy again if this keeps up."
"Chu..." he said sadly before sighing again and looking down to the forest floor.
"Maybe Cammy will make you feel a bit better." I said. Lukas ears perked up and he looked at me.
"Pika-pikachu pi?" he said.
"Yes, we're gonna visit Cammy. I promised her I would visit her and I want to see how Jack and Rosie are doing with her."
"Pi-KA!" Lukas said. His voice was much happier already, just as I expected. I suppose I was right when I suspected that Lukas and Cammy liked each other very much. Almost like brother and sister. It didn't take long before we arrived at Cammy's place. It was early in the morning so she was probably still sleeping, but you could never know with young pokémon.
I entered the mini-forest and looked for the entrance of the nest. It was well hidden and I had always trouble to find it. Lukas however had no trouble at all. He simply pointed towards the nest and then disappeared underground.
"Lukas, wait, I think you shouldn't enter... just like that..." I said to him knowing that he didn't hear me. It didn't take long before I heard some noise inside and it didn't sound very good. I saw flashes of electricity and then Lukas quickly ran out of the nest followed by Jack which chased Lukas and gave him a death glare while Lukas fled behind my legs and watched Jack from there with hanging ears and tail. When Jack realised it was me and that the pikachu was Lukas, he changed completely and looked rather guilty.
"Good morning, sorry for waking you up so rudely..." I said while I rolled my eyes at Lukas which stepped before my legs instead of behind them and looked at Jack. Jack sighed and mumbled something to Lukas which nodded and seemed happily again. Jack decided to not make a problem of it and looked at us with a questionable face.
"We're coming for Cammy!" I said. "I promised her to pay her a visit every once awhile so here we are!"
"Pika-pikachu..." Jack said with drooped ears.
"Hmmm?" I said. "What's the matter, Jack?"
"Piiiiiii..." he said, evading the question.
"Where's Cammy?" I asked him. "And where's Rosie? She should be here as well...?"
"Chuuu... Pika-pikachu..." he said while he looked at the nest for a second before looking back to the ground rather sad. A scared feeling slowly made his way across my feet towards my head.
"Jack, what's the matter?!" I said while I sat on my knees in front of him. "Where's Rosie? She's supposed to be here, with you. And what about Cammy?"
Jack looked away from me. I forced him to look at me.
"I'll just assume the worst. Is she dead?" I asked him. Jack eyes widened and he quickly shook no. Well, at least she wasn't dead.
"Pikachuuuu..." he said.
"Is she at Oak's laboratory?" I asked him. Jack nodded and I stood up and turned around to go to the lab. I took a couple of steps when I looked back. Jack remained where he was, whilst he would normally always follow me back to Oak's place.
"You not coming?" I asked him. Jack looked at me for a second and quickly turned around and hid himself inside the nest. Lukas looked at the strange behaviour of the older pikachu before turning around to me. I shrugged my shoulders and headed to the laboratory with Lukas in tow. I wondered what could possibly have happened. Young pichu could easily catch diseases or anything or could have medical problems, but Cammy had survived the first three weeks which were the most critical. She didn't show any signs of anything wrong as long I was with her, but you could never know...
We arrived at the laboratory and saw it was locked. There was nobody there, so we had to wait until someone would arrive. Happily it didn't take long before one of the assistants of Oak arrived and opened the lab. After asking what happened to Cammy she smiled and pointed me at a room where Rosie was sleeping with - to my relief - Cammy. I moved closer with Lukas on my shoulder and moved my head closer to her. She was still asleep and breathing in a gently and regular rhythm.
"Cammy..." I gently whispered to the little pichu. No response. Lukas looked what I was doing from next to the little basket Rosie and Cammy were in.
"Cammy..." I said again, a little louder this time. Still no response from Cammy, but Rosie had opened one eye to check who was waking her and Cammy up. I looked at her and raised my eyebrows twice. She smiled and looked at my attempts to wake Cammy up. I placed my finger under her chin and started to rub it gently. Cammy moved a bit and purred when she felt the attention before placing her head closer to my finger to allow me to rub more efficiently. She didn't bother opening her eyes but continued purring.
"You're freaking adorable..." I whispered to myself.
"Cammy...!" I said, this time on a normal tone. Cammy opened her eyes and looked at me. I smiled, expecting her to jump and trying to hug my face. But no, Cammy looked at me sheepishly and closed her eyes again.
"Hey, sleepy, wake up!" I said. This time Cammy opened her eyes and used her paws to rub her eyes before looking at me.
"PICHU-PIIIII!" she exclaimed before jumping up and running towards me.
"That took you long enough!" I said before receiving a hug from Cammy who had jumped my sweater and climbed my arm towards my shoulder where she was rubbing her head against my neck and chin. I picked her from my shoulder and gently rubbed her face. Playful sparks emitted from her cheeks and she squeaked soft and cute.
"Ah-haha, I love you too..." I laughed at her. "So, how you're doing?" I said while looking at her and Rosie.
"By the way, what's wrong with Jack? He's acting so weird..." I said before Rosie sighed and gave me a "don't start about it" look.
"Oh dear, what happened." I said smiling before I placed Cammy next to Lukas. Lukas took a step back when Cammy jumped him and almost managed to push him over in her enthusiasm. I smiled at the sight of both pokémon playing with eachother. Lukas provoked Cammy to some kind of wrestling match. Me and Rosie looked at it while I didn't notice that Oak entered the room.
"Ah, Maurice! I already wondered who was in here." he said.
"Hey, Oak." I said while I ripped my eyes of the two pokémon. "Just visiting Cammy to check on her. What happened to Jack?" I asked him. "He scared me when he didn't want to tell me where Rosie and Cammy were. I thought they were dead or something."
"What? Oh no no no!" he said laughing. "No, Cammy just got attacked by a pidgey when she stole it's food, but he failed to protect her. She got a cut in her paw and he feels guilty about that. It was back here when we fed some birds, Cammy wanted to get some of the bread that was supposed for the pidgey and one of them got mad at her and attacked her and Jack was just one split second too late."
"That's all?" I said. "And Rosie?"
"Oh, she was eating, Jack was taking care of Cammy."
"Ah, that explains. How's Cammy?"
"Oh, she's fine. A bit startled, but she's all right. No need to worry about her." he said.
"That's good. I wasn't really worried about her when she started playing with Lukas..." I said while looking at both pokémon. They were now playing some kind of shock game. Lukas was sparking his cheeks and Cammy followed him. Then Lukas sparked his cheeks more and more until he engulfed his entire body in sparks. Cammy looked at him in disbelief but then tried herself. She managed to get sparks around her cheeks and around her head, but not around her entire body. She sighed sadly before Lukas smiled and moved closer. He powered her up using his own electricity and showed her again. She tried again and this time she managed to cover her head in electricity. I laughed at the sight. I saw this kind of training every day back at the forest. Shock tag, trying to fry random things with electricity (including me), or just try to tickle each other with electricity that was stronger than your opponent.
"Great to see this..." Oak said without disturbing Cammy. "Just wonderful to see that Lukas is trying to learn her to control electricity!"
"Yeah, since I became the pichu caretaker he also came a bit addicted to them. He loves to show off things he can do which they can't." I said while smiling. After an hour of chatting about the rest of the battle that was fought between the pikachu and the arbok I decided I was going back to the colony. We said goodbye to Cammy and brought her and Rosie back to Jack. After telling Jack he should stop feeling miserable (the cut Cammy got was so tiny it already healed) we departed for the forest. Lukas looked a lot happier after visiting Cammy.
While making our way through the forest Lukas perked his ears a couple of times. He looked around uncomfortably, like there was something that he didn't like.
"Is there something wrong, Luk?" I asked.
"Pika-pikachu-pi, pika-pi..." he said while looking around. He stared at the ground while I saw him perking his ears again, focussing on his senses which were much better than mine. I stopped walking and everything was silent except the gentle rustling of the leaves in the wind around us.
"Pika..." Lukas said while he sighed.
"Probably another pokémon." I smirked when I continued walking towards the colony.
*rustle*
I stopped and looked around. Lukas looked straight into the direction of the sound.
"It should be here somewhere..." I heard a voice.
"Well, where is it?!" I heard another voice. I decided it would be better to hide ourselves and I got down behind some bushes. Lukas stood before me and we both looked through some thick bushes towards the source of the voices. Two males stood before us, they were a fair distance away. They were looking at a map and they carried... shotguns. I recognized one of the men, it was the one I met earlier when I was getting food with Lukas and Espeon.
"Where is that pikachu colony?!" the one asked.
"SOMEWHERE AROUND HERE, I TOLD YOU ALREADY!" the other said. "Now keep quiet or they'll hear us..."
"I want to shoot something today, not look for a pikachu colony that doesn't exist." the one said.
"Me too, me too! I know it's frustrating but I'm sure it's somewhere around here..." the other said. "Trust me, we'll shoot pikachu today. They've always been profitable..." he said while putting away his map. "Come on, let's continue our search..."
"If you say so..." the other said before both continued their way to our left, not in the direction of the colony. Lukas wanted to appear on the small clearing, but I stopped him.
"Let's wait a couple of minutes to ensure these 'pokémon rangers' are gone." I said. "Jerks... Pretending to be pokémon rangers..."
A couple of minutes later we continued our way to the colony and about five minutes later we arrived there. The men were pretty close. I immediately told the guarding pikachu that he should watch out for those men and I warned some other pikachu too. Within minutes the whole colony knew about the threat.
I decided to not scare the pichu but I decided to start training them on hiding yourself in case of danger. Plus, I wanted to train myself in disappearing just in case. Maybe the older and more experienced pikachu could teach me some tricks...
Yup, really getting into this now. I tried to make Lukas look as sad as possible, I hope I did a good job! Please leave your reviews!