AN: Hoooo boy have I missed you guys! It's been a crazy last semester of college and I'm officially graduating in a couple weeks! I haven't had much time to write due to my senior project/thesis (same deal) where I was leading the entire group and searching for a job out of college. Naturally, this took up a lot of my time. That and I picked up watching anime (see details in my profile for my favorites...their mainly rom-coms) as well as light gaming (PERSONA!). I've also started really taking audio engineering seriously, remastering my pieces and discovering new techniques. These hobbies of mine can become rather "obsessive", but I'm back writing.
Also if you notice something different about the story, some of the content has been shifted onto new chapters. This will make it for an easier read instead of sitting through a 15,000 word long chapter. The average chapter count now will be about 4-5,000 words, 8-9,000 being the cap.
Anyways, enjoy!
Chapter 10: Full Moon Splendor – Part 1
October 6th, 2007 – 10:00 AM
-Somewhere on the Silver Mountains-
"Jessie…we're lost, aren't we?" James sputtered out, not wanting to further deepen her rather sour mood. No one bothered to answer him back. He stared glumly at the ground as the Rocket Trio trudged their way through the mountain range. They were supposed to be heading back to The Team Rocket Headquarters to report in their progress, although it was the less popular of the two choices they had, the other being stall longer and try to catch more pokemon; they were going to have to face the Boss anyways. Jessie figured Jamie would not be too happy either. All in all, they just kept getting worse and worse.
"I'm pretty sure the Boss is wondering of our whereabouts since we failed to contact him in 4 days. He might send her after us," Jessie commented with a rather expressionless expression. James and Meowth shivered at the thought. This Rocket Admin was the second most dangerous to the Boss; even Jamie feared her and a good amount of Rocket grunts and agents feared even her.
"No…any-ting but dat!" Meowth quietly recoiled. Alas, the effect of fear was overridden by hunger, exhaustion, and defeat. The three continued to trudge along the mountain range to who knows where…
-Downtown Pewter City-
10:30 AM
The three trainers walked down Marion Boulevard, passing the busy Pewter Central Business District. The sun, now way high up in the sky, blasted its intense rays off the glass buildings nearly blinding everyone on the ground, not that they paid any mind to them. They continued to walk until they crossed the freeway, several neighborhoods, and finally reached the gate around noon. They all looked back on the city, now far below them in a bowl. Ash took a good, hard look at the cityscape.
"So how far does the city spread out?" Brock thought for a moment and started pointing locations out.
"The city doesn't go that far south towards the Viridian Forest since the forest cover is too dense. So at most, I'd say only a good 2 miles from the city center to the south. The Western and Northern neighborhoods, though, cover the foothills of the Silver Mountains. Those neighborhoods go way back in for a good 4 or 5 miles. Each neighborhood is situated in a bowl between hills. I'm pretty sure you saw the East side only go about 3 miles back since behind us is rocky terrain. I assume you both came from a pretty small town, right?" Ash and Leaf nodded. "Ah, then get used to big cities; that's where all of the big gyms are. Well, let's eat a quick lunch and be off. I suspect we'll have to travel 4 more miles until we reach the Pokemon Center."
"Wait," Ash thought for a moment, "there's a Pokemon Center out in the middle of nowhere?"
"Well yeah," Leaf interjected, "Pokemon Centers don't have to be limited to cities, you know. They're smaller than the city ones, though. I took a look at the map of all of the Pokemon Centers as we left the building this morning."
"Ohhh." They all sat down to eat a sandwich that Brock had whipped up. Usually, a man with a backpack could only carry so much. Brock's backpack was insane; it looked like an ordinary backpack. He pulled out a loaf of bread, a portable toaster oven, a chopping block, a knife to cut the lettuce, which was in a cooler along with other vegetables and condiments, and another cooler with drinks.
"What the hell?! Is that thing a U-Haul with no wheels?!" Leaf shrieked in amazement. Brock chuckled in response.
"Well, these are complementary gifts our gym got from the League. Each container, cooler, and other storage device is able to be miniaturized. Therefore, I can carry a lot of things in the backpack. Even the table I have can be miniaturized with a special bag. So who wants to make a sandwich?"
"Hey, Leaf! Make me a sandwich! HAHAHA!"
~SLAP~
"OW GODDAMMIT! I was only kidding!"
"Could you make a less sexist joke then?" Ash grunted and ate his newly made sandwich while Brock was trying to contain his insides before they explode all over his double-decker sandwich. The three finished their sandwiches and cleaned up in less than 15 minutes. They were soon trekking down Route 3 through the looming Silver Mountains.
The mountains were steep, littered with jagged ledges, cliffs, and boulders of all sizes. Sounds of passing traffic echoed throughout the valley walls, although it was not bothersome. The path was long and windy with numerous switchbacks, patchy grass areas, pokemon, and unsuspecting trainers. The pokemon here were varied, with the occasional nidoran. Leaf found herself face to face with several more pidgeys, running behind Ash in fear; she got the worst luck when she ran into a spearow, which she grabbed Ash's hand and gunned it, Brock having to catch up. Other than the two catching a couple of nidoran, Ash ran into a peculiar pokemon what looked to be a round, furry monkey.
The three trainers and their two pokemon were walking next to a rather patchy, green forest area. Behind that was a tall cliff to their left with more ledges as one looks up. To their right was a ledge that led to oblivion and more mountain and cliffs. There were not many pokemon to be seen here other than the nidoran, pidgey, and spearow. There was a high-pitched howl, though, that echoed through the valley.
"Uh…what the hell was that?" Leaf asked nervously, implementing her death grip protocol. Ash and Brock looked around for any movement, not finding anything within the general vicinity. Ash looked down at his right arm and found it turning a tad blue.
"Hey, Leaf. Not that I'm ungrateful or don't want to protect you, but you're aware you're cutting off circulation to my left arm, right?" Leaf still held on.
"Don't worry," Brock spoke, "I'm sure we'll just pass through this area and nothing bad will happen. I mean, it's not like a pokemon would jump out an-" a sound of an object jumping from a distance became audible. The trees swayed from the shockwave of the passing object and landed in front of the party. Pikachu and Jigglypuff instantly latched onto Ash's legs.
"Oh c'mon, guys! I'm supposed to be the brave one?!" Brock laughed at this sight.
"Looks like you're supposed to be the hero, huh. Good luck! I'll watch over here from the side lines while you duke it out with this pokemon." Ash could tell it was a rather odd pokemon: a furry ball with eyes, a pig-like nostril, and arms and legs that protrude. There was no visible mouth, however, which greatly disturbed Leaf.
'Must be a pokemon…let's see what Dexter says.' "Yo, Dexter. That's a pokemon, right?"
"Mankey: the Monkey pokemon. It is light and agile on its feet, and ferocious in temperament. When angered, it flies into an uncontrollable frenzy. Its known attacks are Scratch, Leer, and Low Kick. Proceed with caution."
"Thanks, Dexter. Alright, Nidoran. Let's see what you can do. Peck!" Nidoran lowered his head and ran towards the mankey, who was not facing him. As a result, the monkey got drilled on the back side, sending it high into the air and landing face first. Nidoran smirked at the success of his first attack.
"Great Job, Nidoran!" But the mankey stood back up with its eyes glowing red. Nidoran was suddenly not feeling very confident anymore. In a flash, the mankey leapt forward to start tearing poor Nidoran apart.
'Crap…this was what Dexter was talking about when he mentioned that the mankey are short tempered.' "Hang in there, Nidoran! Try to find an opening!" Nidoran tried to look up, but was pinned back down due to the mankey's barrage of Scratch attacks. Soon, the mankey got bored and stopped, stepping back from what was now a heap of a mess. Nidoran was completely down for the count.
"Well, shit. You did a good job, Nidoran. Rest up for now." Ash was about to send in Kakuna, but the mankey ran off back into the forest.
"Hey wait! I'm not done!" but the mankey was nowhere to be seen at that point. Leaf put a hand on Ash's shoulder to offer him consolation on his first wild pokemon loss.
"Don't worry, you'll get better at it," Brock comforted from the side. Ash nodded and they kept walking forward.
Ash and Leaf found themselves in several battles, both winning in landslide victories. These battles did not last more than 10 minutes each; it rarely went past 5 minutes. Brock did his best to offer his input as an experienced Gym Leader, mostly on reading other opponents tactics and patterns. They must have run into eight or so trainers in a three mile stretch. There were male teen trainers dressed in casual wear. Those trainers had many different types of pokemon, the strangest one being an ekans. There were also female trainers, almost like the male and female were counterparts of each other. These girls, for some odd reason, had a weird attire sense in that they preferred to travel in their school uniform (not that Ash was complaining, much to Leaf's dismay. Leaf, wearing her infamous little black dress, made the other female trainers quite jealous). Ash had to handle the ones with flying pokemon. Leaf got the chance to battle a lass (that was what Ash decided to start calling them after forgetting their names; there were just too many) with the jigglypuff. It was a fairly close battle, with Leaf coming out on top with a crushing Pound attack. The group also ran into various bug trainers and decided to give Kakuna and Metapod some exercise.
Being that these battles were monetarily waged, Ash and Leaf had a system for collecting winnings. They both agreed that the losing trainer would give up 10 percent of the cash they had on them. Most of these winnings ranged from ¥108 to ¥224. It was not much, but it made them satisfied anyways.
-Mt. Moon Pokemon Hotel and Recovery Center-
3:30 PM
The sun was now in the west, inching closer to the mountain tops. The air was still quite warm and humid despite the angled sun rays. The three trainers noticed the path getting wider and the ledge they were walking on open up to a dirt plaza and a small Pokemon Center. This pokemon center was just a two-story building without the pokeball-shaped dome. In its place was a symbol of a red pokeball with a white cross in the middle of the red part. Further up the path lie the entrance to the second tallest mountain in all of Kanto: Mt. Moon.
"They actually do have a pokemon center in the middle of nowhere. I wonder if there's internet reception," Ash wondered out loud. He was so fixated on the pokemon center that he did not realize that Leaf and Brock where yelling at him (after Brock going through his "love-spell" episode and Leaf slapping him out of it), and a girl around his age walking in his direction. In one motion, they both ran into each other and fell to the ground below. The girl clutched her head in pain.
"Ugh! Watch where you're going, asshole!" the girl yelled at Ash, who was clutching the backside of his head from the fall.
"…hehehe sorry about that; I really need to start watching where I'm going…"
"…pft, no kidding," Leaf scoffed, earning the attention of said girl. Ash took this opportunity to see who he ran into. This girl was no doubt taller than Leaf. She also wore a tight, yellow tank top, short-cut jean shorts, held to her body by red suspenders. What had caught Ash's attention though was the very short orange hair that was tied in a very short pony tail to the side. She also has a rather nice set of assets, though nowhere near the caliber of Leaf's. By the time he took this note, the fiery-haired girl returned her attention to him.
"Um…what are you looking at?" she inquired profusely, standing up and tapping her feet. Ash blushed red.
"Um…sorry! I didn't mean to stare! I didn't mean to knock you over! I'm soooorry!" Ash cried. It then got painfully awkward after Ash's rather lame apology attempt. Leaf decided to break the ice. For some reason, the redhead looked very familiar to her.
"So…what's your name?"
"Oh! The name's Misty. Yours?" Leaf went wide-eyed at the name. This was the girl that beat her two years in a row during the Regional Swim Meet.
"Misty? Like in Kanto Swimming Champion Misty?" Misty nodded in confirmation. She narrowed her eyes to remember how anyone would have figured that out since swimming was not that heavily publicized.
'Where have I seen this girl before…wait…she awfully looks like the girl from Pallet Town that keeps getting second place in the 100 meter freestyle.' "What's your name?"
"I'm Lily Greenway!" The light bulb lit in Misty's mind.
"Wow! Fancy running in to you here. I'm assuming you took the Trainer route of a career?"
"Yeah! I figured I'd go and pursue a career in Battle Competition. I'm competitive enough and love pokemon to death."
"Well that's good to hear! Who are your friends?"
"Tall dude over here who died and went to heaven, but got locked out and kicked right back to earth is Brock. And the man-klutz over here is Ash." Misty chuckled at the last one.
"Well it's nice to meet you all. What brings you here to Mt. Moon?"
"We're headed to Cerulean City to get the Cascade Badge!" Ash replied excitably, pumping his fists in the air. Leaf and Brock's sweat dropped. No one noticed Misty's eye twitched. She recovered quickly enough, though.
"Well I'm actually headed back there, too."
"What were you doing out here at Mt. Moon?" Brock asked.
"Well I was on my way back from searching for water pokemon. My sisters sent me out as some 'initiation process' to join them in the family business. It's kinda a silly excuse for me to do all the dirty work, but I figured I'd get a head start if I want to be a Water Pokemon Master."
"So you want to be a master, too huh?" Ash bounced up and down excited.
"You can't calm down, can you," Leaf deadpanned, "well, Misty, since we're all headed the same way, want to join us for a bit?" Misty thought about it for a moment.
"Sure! It beats having to travel alone. Since you both seem the type to catch a lot of pokemon, Mt. Moon is famous for having a lot of pokemon active only at night. We could head out later in the evening for you both to catch some pokemon." Ash and Leaf lit up at this idea.
"Alright! Let's check-in to rooms and take a nap," Leaf happily said as she skipped along into the Pokemon Center. The rest soon followed and met up at the reception desk. Ash and Leaf, of course, asked for a room. This caught the attention of both Brock, Misty, and the resident Nurse Joy.
"Hey, wait a minute! You two aren't planning to share a room are you?" Brock quickly asked, imagining things that would even cause girls to have nosebleeds. Ash and Leaf looked at Brock confused.
"Uh yeah…we've shared rooms all the time ever since we were little. We don't see anything wrong with it," Ash said, tired of all the assumptions. Leaf nodded in agreement.
"Oh," Misty thought, "I would've thought you two were, hehehe, dating or something."
"She's my best friend," Ash plainly replied. Leaf nodded again, a bit less enthusiastically than before. The two rooms, which were located on the second floor, were right next to each other. While Ash and Leaf shared a room, Brock and Misty decided to share a room. Misty, who witnessed one of Brock's "episodes" beforehand, suddenly began to regret her decision. As soon as they got into the room, she pulled Brock to the center of the room. She crossed her arms and looked up glaring daggers.
"Listen very closely. We may share the same room, but that doesn't give you free reign to do whatever you want. So much as lay a finger on me, I will do one of two things: scream and yell 'rape', or completely render your limbs useless…or I can do both, your choice. Whatever idea you had of taking advantage of me, I absolutely do not share the same sentiment. Are we clear?" Brock, by now, had shrunk to the tenth of his normal height.
"…o-o-okay…I understand! I wasn't thinking anything like that… no I wasn't…hehehe…"
"Good, now I'm gonna wash up and take a nap. We should head out around 9:00."
In the other room, it was relatively quiet. The only sounds emanating from the room was a shower, a clock, and soft snoring from the two pokemon. Ash stared at the white ceiling in deep thought, his hands resting behind his head. He slowly let out a deep sigh and turned towards Pikachu, who was curled up in the blankets. He tried to get a grasp at everything that happened over the past seven days.
'It seems all we've been doing is running into excitement; that Misty girl sure is pretty for our age. Nidoran's pretty cool; he's pretty strong despite the whole mankey loss today. Pikachu and Bulbasaur are progressing nicely after all that we've been through. Kakuna is ready to break out of its cocoon in a bit. It's been one hell of an adventure so far. Leaf's pokemon are progressing at a rapid rate. It's funny how she caught a female nidoran…and called it Nidoran. I'll have to bring that up later. I guess I'll take a short nap. Leaf or someone'll wake me up when we leave…'
9:00 PM
Leaf jolted from her ever heavy slumber to a normally brutal beating to the face. There was loud pounding at the door and the voice of a rather agitated female yelling from the other side of the door.
"HEY! ARE YOU TWO AWAKE IN THERE?! IT'S TIME TO GO!" The door slowly opened from the other side to reveal a rather sleepy raven haired teen with a yellow mouse in his arms. Sounds of pounding can be heard in the background with muffled yells of pain.
"This is…typical of a morning…" Ash sleepily muttered, wiping the mess from his eyes and the dust falling all over Pikachu.
"EWWW! GODDAMMIT, ASH!" Pikachu shrieked.
"Haha, my bad, buddy. C'mon, let's get Leaf up before her entire body is bruised." The three walked over to the other bed where Leaf was sitting upright and Jigglypuff face-down on the floor.
"…g'morning…" she slowly greeted while rubbing her eyes, "…can someone get the license number of that truck?" Misty chuckled and helped her to her feet.
"Alright, you two. We're heading down to eat in 5 minutes. Join us when you all are ready!" Misty said as she walked out the door and back to her room. Ash and Leaf rounded up all of their belongings and met the other two down at the cafeteria. After 20 minutes of dinner, they headed out towards the looming mountain before them.
-Mt. Moon – West Entrance-
9:30 PM
At 10,514 feet tall, Mount Moon really did touch the moon. Its open crater top provided a "shelf" for the moon to rest on. The moon, itself, was full and gave a very ominous atmosphere. A soft breeze gave movement to the previously stagnant, humid air. The trees swayed to and fro while the leaves rustled, loosening some of them and flying right onto the faces of the three four travelers. Although it was hard to see, the leaves themselves were beginning to turn to their fall colors and dry out, making them rather crisp and sharp.
Wiping their faces of debris, they looked back towards the Pokemon center, which was a steep 10 minute walk down. They must have climbed 800 feet within a 1000 feet stretch of path. The center's lights were still visible from the path, but it was now the size of an ant. The opening to the cave itself was as tall as Brock, giving him very little, if any, headroom. He looked at the tunnel in dismay.
"Man, how am I going to fit through there? It's not so fun being the tall one," Brock sighed as he lowered his head to give him enough breathing room. Ash, who was not that much shorter, was a little relieved to find that he had a little bit of headroom.
"Well, are we gonna go in?" Ash asked excitedly. Leaf and Misty nodded while Brock sighed again.
"Am I going to even have a head left after this?" Brock complained, not very satisfied with his height predicament.
"Oh, quit complaining, dude. Let's go catch some pokemon!" Ash yelled, as he pumped his fists. Pikachu, Leaf, Jigglypuff, and Misty all pumped their fists as well as they made their way into the tunnel. Ash searched in his bag for a flashlight, only to come up empty.
"Aw crap! I forgot to buy a flashlight on the way out of town!" Ash exclaimed. Leaf shook her head in unsurprising disappointment. She checked in her bag and seemed to be missing one as well and grumbled. Misty and Brock, however, pulled out their flashlights.
"I thought you two would be more prepared for this," Brock shook his head, "okay. So because there are two flashlights and four of us, each person will travel with a buddy. Ash will be traveling with me while you two girls will travel with each other. Understand?" Everyone nodded. "Good. Now let's start moving."
The first steps into the cave were mind-numbing. The space narrowed considerably and only had enough room for two people side by side. Since the tunnel was round and circular, Ash's head was now touching the ceiling and Brock was hunched over.
"Hey, Brock," Ash piped up.
"Yeah?"
"You know that one movie where there was that one dude who had a really bad back and was always hunched over?"
"…shut up…"
Not far behind, the two girls where having an easier time walking. Their conversation was a bit more lively and interesting.
"So Leaf," Misty began, "how did you get into swimming in the first place?" Leaf touched her chin in thought.
"Well…I was little when Ash, my cousin Gary, and I were playing by the sea. I believe we were on the jetty. The waves got a bit rough and hopped over the ledge, taking all three of us with it. We tried to keep afloat, but started to sink since we didn't know how to swim at the time. Luckily, Ash's and Gary's dads saw us struggling and sent their water pokemon to rescue us. I think at that point, all three of us got enrolled into swimming classes to make sure we don't die. Haha. Ash and Gary dropped swimming in middle school though in favor of football; they thought it was "manlier". But, I still continued swimming and whatdayah know? I'm second best in Kanto! So how did you get into swimming?" It was Misty's turn to touch her chin in thought.
"I don't really have any reasons other than 'it runs in the family'. My dad is the Director of Marine Operations for the government, being a veteran of the Navy while my mom is a Water Pokemon Specialist, teaching Marine Biology at Cerulean College. My parents are often not home…well my mother his home more often than my dad…anyways, my sisters formed a water ballet troupe and expect me to become part of it, which I DO NOT want any part of. By the way, we are all very good at swimming as a natural talent."
"Ahhh, I see…wait," Leaf stopped in her tracks, causing Misty to stop as well, "Ash and Brock stopped ahead. Let's go see what's up." The two trainers walked towards the stationary light and found Ash one-on-one with a bat-like creature.
-Moments Earlier-
Ash and Brock walked in relative silence. The beam of light guiding them hovered amongst the rocks littered across the surface of the cave, shining brightly ahead. The only sounds that could be heard were the footsteps of the travelers and small chatter from the girls. Ash decided to break the awkward silence between the two.
"So what are your goals for going on this journey?" Brock thought a bit. He has always wanted to be a Pokemon Breeder, but what could he do with it; he has not given it much thought.
"Well, I've always wanted to be a Pokemon Breeder, so I'm going on this journey to learn about pokemon and how I can help them. Maybe go into research or something. What about you?"
"Well, I've always been pretty adamant about being competitive with pokemon. I did play sports in grade school, so I still have the drive to compete. I guess I wanted to do that with pokemon. I mean it's pret-" Ash stopped in his tracks when he felt something hit his head. "What the –…something hit my head…" Brock shined his light up and found a pit in the ceiling full of bats. They did not look like ordinary bats, however…
Ash, on instinct, pulled out Dexter to perform analysis. "Alright, Dexter; what do we got?"
"Zubat: the Bat pokemon. It has no eyes. Instead, it relies on its ultrasonic cries for echo location to flit about in darkness. Its known attacks are Leech Life and Astonish." The bat on the loose hit Ash again, knocking his hat off.
"Motherfucker. Nidoran, get the stupid bat!" Nidoran jumped out of his ball and rammed into the offending bat. The bat was thrown back several yards and rolled a few times before it shot back up, diving at Nidoran in an instant. Naturally, Nidran celebrated on the first hit so when he looked up, the bat was already at point blank range. He was knocked back several yards into the cave, blowing dust into the faces of Ash, Brock, and Leaf, Misty, and Jigglypuff who had just arrived at the scene. Nidoran stood back up, looking visibly nervous at the suddenness of the attack.
"Nidoran! Look out!"
No matter what Nidoran tried, he could not move an inch as the bat flew up to charge up for the next dive. It dove again, dealing another rather devastating blow. Having been knocked out of shock, Nidoran gave off a rather mean stare, freezing the bat in its place.
"Use this chance to peck it!"
He then jumped up and knocked the bat straight into the wall, leaving it rather heavily damaged. It was rather slow to get up, but was still able to jump and latch on to Nidoran, sinking its fangs in. After about three minutes of shaking it off, the bat was finally shaken off and thrown to the other wall.
"FINISH IT!"
Nidoran took this chance to ram the bat while it was still down. This sent the bat flying back into that same wall, removing any extra energy left. Ash took this chance to grab an empty pokeball and chunked it towards the fallen bat, instantly capturing it.
"Well that took a bit of time, didn't it," Ash wiped the sweat off his brow. The group just nodded and they walked deeper into the cave.
-Elsewhere in the cave-
"Ahhhh…this should make a nice resting place," James sighed. He laid himself out on the ground near the right side of the cave after dropping the firewood at the center. They had found an opening on the side of the mountain and decided to rest there, continuing in the morning. Jessie was still silent, cross, and just overall irritated. Meowth just collapsed on the floor from exhaustion; he was clearly not built for walking for miles at a time. Jessie unpacked, whatever they were able to scrounge up, some fish Meowth got from the stream. She stared the fire and began stabbing the fish onto the ends of the sticks.
"Hey, you two," she stiffly called out, "cook your dinner before I do." They both got up and took their fish, cooked it for 10 minutes, and slowly ate it. It was 20 minutes of painfully awkward silence. In the distance, they heard the sounds of a landing helicopter outside at the bottom of the mountain.
"Is dat a helicopter I hear?" Meowth asked, finishing up his fish. The two humans got up and poked their head out and in the distance, they saw a helicopter land…with a large, red "R" across the side. What made Jessie and James suddenly panic was the blonde woman stepping out, walking towards the entrance of the cave.
"SHIT! I didn't know she was coming! PUT THE FIRE OUT!" Jessie quietly yelled to James and Meowth. They both threw dirt over the fire, extinguishing any remaining flames. Said blonde woman walked towards the cave where she saw the light so out.
"Hmmmmm…I wonder who's up there. I know of three SAs who didn't check in at the last meeting, so I wonder…" She quickened her pace up to the opening. The three in the cave tried to find somewhere to hide, only finding small rocks on the ground.
"FUCK! If she finds us here, we're fucked! Did you find a hiding place yet?" Jessie panicked.
"No! I only see pebbles. Is there a back wall?" James equally panicked. The sounds of clacking heels got a lot louder as it got a lot closer.
~clack~
~clack~
~clack~
~clack~
Meowth started running around frantically around the cave, yelling incomprehensible gibberish.
~clack~
~clack~
~clack~
~clack~
"There's a fucking back wall!" Jessie yelled.
"Crap! We're done for…" James resigned.
~clack~
~clack~
~clack~
~clack~
All of the sudden, the footsteps stopped. A heavy silence followed with the appearance of a silhouette of a lady with an officer's cap. She stared into the deepness of the cave, searching for inhabitants. Naturally, she made her way deep into the cave until she heard movement.
James was never the type to be able to sit still; he always had this problem of having restless legs. This did not help him in this situation one bit. His legs shuffled on some loose rocks, causing a rather loud noise to reverberate throughout the cave. Jessie, who was curled up next to him, gave him a rather evil glare.
"Fuckin' a…" Jessie yelled in her mind. The footsteps drew closer to the couple and stopped. The woman pulled out her flashlight and shined it towards the couple, all within a half second. Jessie and James were shaking, to be facing a smirking Rocket Admin.
"Well, well, well…what do we have here? Three of Rocket's best hiding out in a cave…well after the 'Blunder of Viridian', hardly so anymore. I was beginning to worry about you guys after the failed raid on Viridian. I thought you might be running away, or something. Eloping, perhaps?" the woman began cackling, mostly to herself.
"FUCK NO, DOMINO!" Jessie vehemently yelled back, "we got lost and our phone ran out of batteries. We decided to spend the night in the cave before returning to Saffron."
"Is that so? Well, here's one way to redeem yourselves and appease the Boss's frustration. I'm going to get some moonstones and some clefairy and cefable while I'm at it. If you help me do this, I'll let you three share the credit." They both nodded in understanding.
"Now, get up and stand back." They both stood up and got behind Domino while she grabbed something from the bag she was wearing.
"Is dat a…" Meowth finally spoke.
"…grenade?" James finished up. Domino pulled the pin and threw it towards the back wall. It was not a powerful grenade, just did enough damage to shake the area and rip a giant hole into an adjoining inner cave. The shockwave shook the entire mountain.
-Back in the Main Tunnel-
The cavern shook rather violently, throwing Ash and Brock backwards and Leaf and Misty forwards. A boom, followed by a rumble, was heard sending dirt and dust flying everywhere and knocking the flashlights out of Brock and Misty's hands. All four were knocked out for a couple of seconds.
"…ugh…" Ash grunted as he came to, staring into the darkness. He was face down with his hands in front of him. As he moved them, he realized he was holding on to something…or rather two, soft objects of the same shape. It seemed to be covered in a tight fabric. He looked down and started moving his head towards the center where he found himself face to face with Leaf, who had also just woken up. She also felt where his hands were and her face began to color a very heavy scarlet.
"…so I know you didn't intended on landing this way, but could you please get off before I remove you by force and brand you a perv for the rest of your life?" Ash looked down at where his hands were and immediately jumped off.
"Sorry! Sorry! Didn't mean to grab you there! I'll just walk this way and k-" Ash stopped as his hands where in the same position, only facing the other direction. He felt another pair of soft, round objects in his hands, only smaller. It too was covered in fabric, but had two tough strips of fabric running down the center of each hand. A beam of light suddenly shot up from below to reveal a very embarrassed, pissed off Misty.
"And where do you think you're touching?" she chided as Ash immediately backed away. Misty decided to not give him a change and quickly cocked her fist back, sending a devastating punch to the poor trainer in the stomach. The punch had enough force to send Ash flying 9 feet deeper into the cave. She dusted her hand off and motioned Brock, Leaf, Pikachu, and Jigglypuff to follow.
"…owww…" Ash groaned as he picked himself up and followed the group even deeper into the cave, "…I really need to start watching where I turn…"
AN: Hopefully I won't take too long in developing the next chapter, or the second part of the Mt. Moon events. I should have some more free time to write and spot check for any grammar mistakes or what not. As always, read, love and critique! =)