Chapter 3
Japanese Names:
Mikan = Jasmine
Gantetsu = Kurt
Yukinari Ookido = Samuel Oak (Professor Oak)
Wataru = Lance
Disclaimer:We do not own Pokemon in any shape or form. Pokemon rightfully belongs to Satoshi Tajiri, Game Freak, and Nintendo. We only own the idea of and plot of this fanfic. Characters are a mix of OC and game characters. Game characters' personalities are loosely based off of the game's counterparts. Please support the official release and enjoy this fic. A few of the quotes from Green are his game dialogue. We don't own that. The cover picture also does not belong to us and is drawn by Nintendo's Ken Sugimori.
The sky was as blue as it could ever be, with the occasional cloud gently floating by. The busy port life of Olivine City swept by as fast as the sea's wind when it was ready to take the sailboats far from the land. Bird pokemon flew through the breeze, gliding above the many fishing boats that are anchored to the ocean's floor. The crowded port city had tourists and sailors crowding around the ships and hotels. The lighthouse's light was turned off because of the clear skies and weather. It was the pinnacle image of the beach city. A perfect day for the protagonists to begin their journey. Well, most anyways...
"Pika, pii," the electric mouse pokemon whined at its trainer. Are you feeling better now? The pokemon patted his trainer on the head to see if he was still unconscious. Pikachu drooped its ears.
The Kanto champion sat underneath a tree on a bench; his head facing the leaves as he cleared his head to not let nausea get the best of him. Green ran off trying to find something salty for his friend to eat, to help him quickly get over the wave of seasickness. However, the gym leader found himself going into a very crowded pub where sailors and muscled men ordered food in huge amounts and talking loudly over one another. He was starting to regret going to Olivine City.
"Excuse me, but are you looking for something?" A feminine voice asked when Green stooped down to avoid eye contact with the intimidating pub crowd. The pub was curiously constructed where part of the building's ceiling started to slant downward. Green nearly bumped his head against the low ceiling when he looked up.
"Ah, yes..." he replied as he ducked down from another swinging elbow of a drunken captain. "Does this place have something salty?"
"I suppose it's for seasickness?" she replied back. She was a tiny young lady wearing an icy blue dress with a huge soft orange colored bow and a white cardigan which covered up to the midsection of her forearms. She had her bangs up in pigtails, held up by two orange orbed hair bands. Her soft brown hair hung down to her waist and fluttered about when she moved her arms or shoulders.
"Mikan," the gym leader recognized. His lips pulled up into a grin. "Hey, it's been a while."
"It's good to see you too," she smiled shyly. "Wait outside for a bit, I'll go get your order."
Green was about to protest when her tiny figure slipped right through in the crowd, disappearing from his sight. With a sigh, he wrestled his way out of the building. As soon as he made it through the door, the Steel-Clad Defense girl was already right in front of him, holding a rather large plastic plate of salted sweet potato fries with the side of ketchup.
"You're a lifesaver," he breathed out, taking the heavy dish out of her hands.
"For a friend?" she asked as the two walked towards the harbor. The crowd was thinning out now with most of the people gathering towards the nearby cafes for lunch.
"Yeah, I'll keep a mental note not to let him ride a boat in the future."
Mikan chuckled quietly while trying to keep up with Green's pace. The Viridian gym leader was a whole two heads taller than the Olivine gym leader. "What's the occasion? You hardly ever come to Johto. Did you come to go visit your friend up on Mt. Silver again?"
"Actually, he is the one seasick right now," he replied with a darker tone.
She tilted her head to look at his expression and asked, "Did something happen on the boat ride?"
Red opened his eyes to see the rustling leaves that swayed with the cool sea breeze, watching the shadows blur together and refuse to stay in place. His head finally stopped spinning around and he felt like he was actually on land instead of the unstable rocking from when he first got off the boat.
"Why did you isolate yourself on top of that damn mountain?" Green had questioned on the boat as it finally started moving. The Kanto champion clearly recalled the brunette's hurt voice.
He couldn't think of an answer right away. The gym leader stared off into the crashing waves and white ripples that the boat had left behind as it sped off towards Olivine City. When the raven haired teenager had finally thought up an answer, he was rudely interrupted by a headache and his vision started to spin and blur. Instead of what he was originally about to say, he instead blurted out, "I don't feel so good."
Luckily, it was a short ride, or else Red would have had to listen to Green freak out the entire time because he didn't what to do with a seasick person while they were still on the boat. During the entire ordeal, a kind soul saw his Pikachu sitting nearby with his ears pulled back and gave the mouse a ripe red apple. At least Pika was distracted, he thought to himself.
"I didn't know how to face you properly after that incident..." Red murmured to himself what he had wanted to say to his best friend. He felt a paw press down on his thigh, making him look back down. His Pikachu crawled onto his lap, curled into a ball, and drifted off into a nap, almost as if he was reassuring his trainer that it was alright.
"Hey, Red! Are you feeling better?" Green called out not to far from where the trainer sat. Red pulled up a finger to his lips and motioned to his sleeping electric mouse on his lap. The brunette came closer and said in a quieter voice, "Woops, sorry. Here, eat these. Salty foods help with seasickness."
Mikan poked her head from behind Green's back to see the Kanto champion as he gratefully took the plate of fries and started munching. The Viridian gym leader chuckled softly and added, "This is Mikan, the gym leader here in Olivine. She's extremely shy and nervous around most people."
As I can see, Red thought as he curtly nodded, his mouth currently full with sweet potato. He watched his friend snicker at the tiny girl as she sent him a glare after his comment. A strange feeling gnawed at him in the back of his mind, but the Kanto champion smothered it down.
"Let's see," Green muttered to himself as he whipped out his Pokegear. "I think we should start with Ecruteak, since it's known for its history and for the reported sightings of legendaries. I haven't been there, so we are going to have to walk from Azalea Town..."
As a child, he was raised by his sister, his father, and grandfather. His grandfather used to take him to Azalea Town every year to visit an old friend of his. Green would spend his summers walking around town trying to catch any reactions of the many Slowpokes that resided in the town. Their dopey expressions never changed.
He turned to the Johto gym leader, "Did Blue ask you to keep an eye and ear out for anything regarding the legendary pokemon?" She gave a slight nod and Green continued, "Anything you can fill us in on?"
"Rumors are always floating around, especially in a port city like Olivine," she answered. "Most are inconsistent, but I've heard that Entei has not been seen in Johto for about five years, though I have heard that a few sailors have seen some pokemon like him in both Hoenn and Sinnoh."
Mewtwo hasn't been seen since Red met it in several years ago, Green remembered. Sometime after Red left the Elite Four, he started traveling around certain parts of Kanto. He found the genetic pokemon in the Cerulean Cave near the city that shared the same name. Red ran into it by accident. Not expecting a trainer to come by, Mewtwo attacked Red before abruptly leaving to who knows where.
"Ilex Forest is nearby Azalea Town," Mikan added. "The forest holds the shrine of the time traveling pokemon. Perhaps Gantetsu can fill you in with more details." Ah, Gantetsu... It has been years since Green properly met him.
"Check on Celebi," Red whispered. They were the first words he had uttered since he got seasick. While the steel type trainer was talking to Green, Red was starting to feel the effect of the salty food. The dull pain started to subside. Not entirely, but the headache lost its intensity. The champion finished the last sweet potato and put the plate down on the bench beside him.
"You might not find Celebi," the young woman said quietly. "It never stays in the same place for too long." Everything known about Celebi in the textbooks was based off myths. Some scientists even doubt of its existence. She took the empty plate and balanced it on her left arm.
"Yes, but we'll have to stop by there anyway to get to Ecruteak." Green said. It was only then did he realize that it was odd that he never went to Ecruteak City. He had the money and time for vacations but rarely invested the effort to for a reason he couldn't think of at the moment. The young man pushed that thought away and went back to priorities: make sure the legendaries are still on the map.
"Let's go," his friend stood up from the bench. Pikachu instantly jumped off his lap and scurried to the trainer's left shoulder.
Green looked at Red nervously, "Are you sure you can fly properly?" It felt too soon to let the Kanto champion to fly on his own after experiencing seasickness. Red looked paler than usual. There was still sweat on his forehead and he had a worn out expression.
"I'll be fine," he said. "I've dealt with worse." Pikachu looked at him with concern.
"Pika, pi..." You don't have to do that, the electric pokemon mumbled.
"There's no need to push yourself too hard," Mikan said to the two young men. "But knowing that the legendaries are disappearing doesn't making me feel good either."
"This isn't good for anyone," Green agreed. "Have the islands been active lately?"
The other gym leader shook her head. He was referring to the famous Whirl Islands located between Olivine City and Cianwood City. The islands are so well known that tourists would come over to Johto just to get a chance of seeing the whirlpools and perhaps try a bit of the Olivine ramen with narutomaki (1).
"Nothing." She checked her watch and sighed. "I'm sorry, but I have to attend my gym duties soon." Green understood. No matter how much he avoided the gym for whatever excuse he had at the time, all gym leaders were required to perform gym duties for a specific amount of hours.
"All right then," Green stood up with Red waiting for him.
Azalea Town
"Celebi, huh?" Gantetsu grumbled when Red and Green showed up at his front step with leaves in their hair. He gave Green a funny look. "How's your grandfather?"
The gym leader was taken aback by the sudden question. "He's fine," Green said. "He still flies to Saffron City every week to take the magnet train for his radio show." And still wakes up every morning to feed all of the pokemon in his ranch and make sure they get their exercise.
"I see," the pokeball maker sighed. "Celebi has been living in Ilex Forest for many centuries now. I have seen the pokemon myself a few years ago." He walked around the small room to examine a picture frame.
"What happened?" Red asked. Pikachu leaned over his trainer's shoulder with a questioning look.
"I don't know the details, but the forest cried that night. The time traveling pokemon brought a passenger with it." Gantetsu only remembered a boy running into his house with a gold and silver plated pokeball in his hand.
"And you haven't seen Celebi since?" Green asked.
"What most people consider is that Celebi is only sometimes in the forest. That is where they're wrong," he said sternly. "Celebi is the spirit of the forest. His presence is always there. If he went to the past or future, another part of himself would remain in the presence. Celebi can never be only in the past or future."
"What is that supposed to mean?" Do all of the elderly speak this cryptically? Green thought frustrated. Or was it because Gantetsu always participated in haiku contests with his grandfather? He looked at Red beside him, who took in every word the elderly man said.
"Though there was an odd occurrence about an hour ago. The forest flickered. Except..." Gantetsu paused. "The forest didn't glow to its fullest... Celebi is gone."
"How would you know?" Green was eager to extract information.
"Boy! I was born and raised besides the forest my whole life! I can no longer feel its presence! The forest is less lively than it usually is. You are still the impatient boy Yukinari brought with him years ago."
Green swallowed at the old man's insults. It has been a long time since he was compared to his grandfather in any shape or form. His gym leader title had somewhat overshadowed his relations as Professor Ookido's grandson. His comment brought back memories he preferred not to think of at the moment. Memories of arguments and arrogance. It was making him feel uncomfortable, especially with Red listening to the whole thing.
"I am impatient," the gym leader admitted. "I haven't changed much. But we need to know about the legendary pokemon. They're disappearing and we can't afford to be polite if we want to stop this from happening."
"If that's the case, then listen to this." Gantetsu said, "Ho-Oh is sometimes rumored to pass by this area. Just an old wives' tale, but there is always some bits of truth in those rumors."
"If Celebi was captured an hour ago, then the catcher is in this forest," Red thought out loud.
"We still have a chance to catch up to him..!" Green finished. He grabbed Red's arm and bolted for the door yelling, "Thanks Gantetsu! Hope you have a good day!"
The pokeball maker just shook his head, mumbling about how not a single young person could sit long enough to actually listen. He felt like he forgot something...
Unknown Path
"They said not to go," Red said, referring to the path he and Green were headed to.
When they checked the map on their Poke Gears, there was a wide gap between Azalea Town and Ecruteak City. A wide gap where according to the map was nothing but forests and wildlife. A haunted forest, the locals whispered. The remnants of an ancient civilization that used to thrive until war broke out and slaughtered the city. From what the Kanto champion gathered, the locals around the area warned them in hushed tones not to step into the forest. There were consistent rumors of people disappearing into the woods and never coming back and if they did, they held a perplex expression as if they were hiding something. Pokemon that aren't native to Johto were rumored to roam in the mysterious forest, another part of the puzzle.
"It's the only short way to Ecruteak City," Green insisted. "Our pokemon are strong. We'll make it." His friend looked uncertain. Maybe it was a bad idea to wander into this path at night...
The first hour of walking posed no problems for the two trainers as they delved deeper and deeper into the dense woods. Green kept his Pokegear open, on a compass setting, to insure that they won't stray off path. Soon enough, the air became thick as the fog started settling down. At first, the two thought nothing of it. It was quiet between the gym leader and champion, they hardly spoke a word outside directions.
"Green," a quiet whisper echoed through the leaves.
"Did you hear that?" the gym leader whipped around to find himself alone. Red and Pikachu were nowhere to be found. Did they get lost? He thought, swearing aloud.
"Did you see his face?" a loud obnoxious voice laughed. "I can't believe the teacher fell for that!"
"I know, right?" another voice said. "Oldest joke in the book!" The voice sounded eerily familiar.
"What are you two laughing about?" A girl's voice pitched in. "Stop laughing!" The three of them laughed together. The children's laughter faded.
"You didn't come to my house last week," first voice cried with a sound of being hurt. Green snapped his head to his left to see nothing but the white of the low hanging cloud.
"Oh," another voice said. It sounded like the speaker shrugged. "I guess I forgot."
"How could you forget?" A girl's voice said this time. "It was his birthday!"
"Ha, ha," It was his voice..! His own voice! Although he voice sounded ten years younger, it was not at all foreign. Perhaps ten or eleven years old? "I'm sorry. I was hanging out with some friends..."
"We are your friends!" He now recognized the voice as Red's. It has been a long time since he had heard that voice. Loud expressive Red, from when he still talked and rambled like most children.
"I'm sorry," the apology sounded empty with no meaning.
"Wait, I said that? Did I really say it like that?" Green shouted to the voices, but they didn't react and continued on with their argument. He spun around, trying to locate the source.
"I told you, I was just borrowing your book." His younger self excused himself.
"You ripped one of the pages!" The younger Red exclaimed. "My mom gave it to me for my birthday!"
"I guess it was an accident," The younger Green said.
"This is your fault!" Younger Red shouted. "If it wasn't for you, this wouldn't have happened!" They were being accused for something.
"Really? Because I think this is your fault!" Green's eleven year old argued back. "You're just jealous because my grandpa is Professor Ookido!"
"No, no no no no no..!" The actual Green wandered towards random directions of the forest. His eyes were wide and full of regret as he had both his hands running through his hair, a nervous habit of his.
"I don't care about you being related to him! He's already like a grandpa to me!" Red yelled.
"Stop fighting!" Younger Blue cried over the two voices overlapping each other.
"You think you're so great!" Green's voice continued, "Because grandpa always talks good about you. You know what? I am sick of arguing with you. SHUT UP, RED! JUST SHUT UP!"
Green's knees met the dark moist grass below him. He tried to cover his ears but he could still hear the harsh words that his past refused to let him forget. His own voice came close to sobs, "I didn't mean that, I didn't mean to yell at you Red..."
"This is your fault!" She sobbed. "How could you do this to him! He doesn't talk anymore because of you!"
Another pause came in.
"Why won't you say anything?" She cried. "I am sick of your stupid attitude!" She yelled. Green heard a small thumping noise of someone walking up to him. The gym leader then felt a force slap him in the face. Green rubbed his left cheek. The slap felt raw and fresh.
She slapped him that day, and not without reason. After that fight, Green refused to see Red, and Red never tried to visit. Blue came up to him later that week and screamed at him how his best friend had just stopped talking. Not a word that wasn't necessary; just silence. There was a short pause before more voices came in, except this time; it was a slightly more mature voice of Blue and Green.
"What kept you, Red? Hahaha! I thought you'd turn out if I waited here! I guess Team Rocket slowed you down! Not that I care! I saw you in Saffron, so I decided to see if you got better!" Green was starting to hate his own odious voice.
"So you decided to go pick on Red after he just battled those Rockets?" Blue's voice raised an octave higher. There was an awkward pause after her comment, but Green knew why. That day, Red shook his head at her when she said that. Why? To tell her that it was okay? Or that he wanted to battle Green? What?
"Huh?" Green's younger self sounded confused.
"You make me sick," her voice said with hatred. "Picking on people who don't talk. We just fought all those Rockets to protect the people of Saffron and you bring you lazy ass here to tell us that you want to battle Red?" She stopped talking to listen in to something. "You want to battle him? You sure?" Green remembered her offering Red healing items, but the silent trainer shook his head and took out his pokemon instead.
The battle brought the attention of the other grunts with Green running away and shouting, "Looks like I have to go heal my pokemon!"
"Come back here, you coward!" She shrieked. Green heard more footsteps of both her and the Rocket grunts. He felt another slap, this time on his other cheek. This slap was worse than the first one. The sound of the footsteps slowly faded away with the pain of the slap. He still knelt there in the forest and the fog, unable to move as his memories echoed around him.
"So it's Blue who gets to me first before Red," Green's voice rose again. "I guess the loser wasn't strong enough, figures."
"I dare you to say that after I kick your butt," Blue's voice growled. The present Green recognized those comments. It was 'the battle'. "Kame-chan, go!" The deep voice of the pokemon cried "Blasssstooooisee!"
"I just became the Elite Four Champion! I'm not going to lose that easily!" Green shouted over Blastoise. "Charizard, go!" The orange dragon roared furiously. The present day Green felt like his starter pokemon was crying into his earlobes. He turned to check but there was nothing.
"Everyone knows water defeats fire!" She cried. The pokemon's cries flooded Green's ears. The sound of water and fire attacks being shot out was loud and audible. "Hydro Pump!" Green heard a loud crash. His Charizard was slammed against the wall from the powerful move.
"Charizard!"
"Who's your next pokemon?" She sneered. "I guess you say can 'smell ya later' to this one."
"Heh," the sound of a pokeball expanding to its full size opened up. "I won't lose with my Exeggutor!" Exeggutor cry overwhelmed present day Green.
"You fought well," Blue said quietly. "Like a girl!" Her voice shook the forest, "Kame-chan, Ice Beam the plant!" Water shot out and made a crackled noise as it was froze and flung at its opponent.
"Psychic!" Exeggutor cried its names. The young Green shouted, "Both of you are so weak, you might as well get married!"
"That's original," it sounded like she rolled her eyes.
"I don't know what you see in him," he continued. "He's weak, a loser, and he doesn't talk."
"I dare you to say that again! Ice Beam again!"
"What happened to Red?" Green's voice echoed through the white and faded fog. "He's a joke! He just shut up 'cause I told him to, if that isn't weak, then I don't know what is!"
"SHUT UP! JUST SHUT UP!" Present day Green felt the air shift as something moved in the wind and hit him in the face, knocking him to the ground. He remembered. After that smartass remark, Blue kicked him squarely in the face. She was disqualified from the match because she was going beyond the battle boundaries.
With a glare from his childhood friend that day, she left and said, "I hope you're satisfied." Her acrid remark left the current Green frozen. Her voice was cold and full of venom. An hour later, Red himself would show up.
"What took you so long?" the cocky brat spat out. Green was really starting to hate his own voice. "Was the Elite Four that hard? My rival should be strong to keep me sharp! While working on my Pokédex, I looked all over for powerful Pokémon! Not only that, I assembled teams that would beat any Pokémon type! And now! I am the Pokémon League Champion! Red! Do you know what that means? I'll tell you! I am the most powerful trainer in the world!"
Red mopped the floor with him that day. Without uttering a word too; his pokemon moved on his silent command, completely throwing the arrogant younger version of himself off. Despite Red being mute, he was still expressive where you could read his face like a book. His body language showed his emotions of the battle and his pokemon synchronized with their trainer without doubt or confusion. The battle didn't take all too long. Red's team consisted of pokemon that he would have labeled weak in the past Green's eyes, but each grew into pokemon that no trainer could compare their own to.
However, Green's tears dripped and soaked into the cold dark dirt of the forest. His soft emerald eyes saw nothing but grayed out blurs as his regrets and darkness took hold. One day, Green went to Red's house for the first time in years. To apologize. Of the worse luck, when he came into the house, Red wasn't there. Instead, he found a sticky note on Red's old SNES saying:
"Going to Mt. Silver.
- Red"
It was a very short note with Red's contact number at the bottom. A new device called the Pokegear was released the year before and was starting to gain popularity among trainers, specifically for the calling feature. Being able to call someone without having to actually use a house phone was, at the time, phenomenal. Green dared to call, but never got any replies.
"He's still on Mt. Silver?" Green asked that day. His voice now sounded cracked. He was starting puberty.
"Yes," Blue no longer sounded angry. She accepted the fact. Her own voice had become lower pitched. "I can't blame him." Present day Green waited for his younger self to reply back, but there was an odd silence.
Her voice shook. "He defeated Team Rocket and he became Kanto's Elite Four Champion. Everyone expects him to be great." There was a pause of quick breathing. "I can't blame him for leaving. All those expectations. I helped Red defeated Team Rocket too, but I didn't become champion." She sobbed, "If I defeated you, I could have been champion and Red wouldn't have left. I should have been the one on Mt. Silver, not Red." The teenage girl cried.
It wasn't until another year before Green finally dragged himself up that mountain, only to have the most one sided, most awkward conversation he had ever had to engage. It ended with him not even being able to say that he was sorry, another regret that gnawed at his heart. He rolled over to his side, his tears freely flowing now. He still went to visit to Mt. Silver, as much as possible. It was a pointless cause where all conversations were one sided, but he still came back. Out of worry, out of fear, out of guilt.
"Red," Green in the present day felt faint and whispered. "I'm sorry..."
Lost. Red wandered deeper into the misty fog, hoping that he would accidentally run into Green's back. The Kanto champion swore that Green and Pikachu were right in front of him, but blink, and they were gone. He looked around and even tried tracking by looking for footprints or anything in the grass, only to find nothing. He continued on, following the figures and shadows of the trees.
"Look! A Rattata!" A loud voice cried. Red stopped in mid-step. He had not heard his own voice being spoken like that. It felt alien.
"Let's catch it!" A second voice shouted. It sounded like...Green? Their voices. It sounded like their voices when they were five. The first two voices slowly faded away.
"Her name is Kora-chan!" A young girl's voice came up later.
"No way! Let's name him Kora! He's a boy!" The first voice exclaimed.
"He's our Rattata," the other boy said. "Let's leave it as Rattata. He can belong to all of us."
"You think you're so great!" Green's voice suddenly switched in volume. His voice was less high pitch because he was now eleven years old. Red remembered how the argument escalated from missing a birthday party, to books... "Because grandpa always talks good about you. You know what? I am sick of arguing with you. SHUT UP, RED! JUST SHUT UP!"
No.
"This is your fault!" She sobbed. "How could you do this to him! He doesn't talk anymore because of you!"
It's not his fault, Red thought. He was a loud child. Too loud. He shouted more often than think of what to say. He was childish. He was stupid. Being quiet taught him a lot. It taught him how to become a better listener.
"I'm sick of your stupid attitude!" Red watched his childhood friend slap the insulting boy, but did nothing about it.
Throughout the journey, Blue kept slapping Green. Red never did anything about it because a part of him was glad to watch him get beaten up by a girl. Blue could freely express her anger and distress about her friendship with Green slowly drying up. Red couldn't. He shouldn't. He was too noisy the whole time and never listened or cared about what others thought of him. Silence was golden. By being mute, he learned that trainers felt uneasiness when he didn't respond to their questions as much as they would have liked. Red also learned how to communicate nonverbally by facial expression and body language.
The voices faded again with the sound of waves crashing against the ship's walls. S.S. Anne. Younger Red wandered through the ship's halls confused, unsure of where to go or how to relax on the ship. He didn't even know his destination.
"Bonjour! Red!" Green's voice greeted him loudly when Red reached the end of the hallway. "Imagine seeing you here! Red, were you really invited? So how's your Pokédex coming? I already caught forty kinds, pal! Different kinds are everywhere! Crawl around in grassy areas!"
At that, the rivals had another battle. As always Red silently guided his pokemon through the battle and always healed them when they were close to being fainted. His rival's face the whole time was anger and a hint of arrogance in his tone as he shouted things to Red. Red answered with all of the insults with silence. Green's last pokemon made Red hold his breath.
"Raticate, go!" Green shouted. The huge brown rat cried its name into Red's ears. A big pause came up again until Pikachu's cry filled the air that came with a crash. Raticate was Thunder Shocked and was slammed into the ship's wall.
"Humph, at least you're raising your pokemon!" He scoffed. The champion remembered seeing fear on his rival's face. The green eyed trainer ran out of the ship for the nearest Pokemon Center. That was the last time Red ever saw Raticate...
Fear struck into Red heart when he stepped into Lavender Town. Something about the town gave off the aura of something deadly. Everyone he talked to seemed depressed and unenergetic. Everyone whispered and talked in hushed voices. Something was very wrong with the town. To top it off, the small town had a Pokemon Tower that housed the graves of dead pokemon and trainers. There, he saw his rival again at the second floor of the Pokemon Tower.
"Hey, Red! What brings you here? Your Pokemon don't look dead!" Green didn't sound pleased. "I can at least make them faint! Let's go, pal!" There was bitterness in his voice. Red recalled him facing a tombstone when they met.
They battled. Red defeated Green's pokemon team, one by one. Red's pokemon performed their usual routine and followed their trainer's orders. By now, they have learned to read his body language and facial expression. While Green fought with anger, Red stayed calm the whole time, waiting for Raticate to show up. But he never called out Raticate.
"What? You stinker! I took it easy on you too!"
It never appeared. Red remembered Green's agonized expression when he left the silent trainer in that tower. He looked around and examined the nearby tombstone closer; the one Green was looking down at. All it said was, "Our dear departed friend. May you rest in peace and only remember the happier days." The date of its death was...several days ago. The same day that Red battled Green on the S. S. Anne.
Red leaned his tired body against a tree, taking in quick deep breaths. His body shook, both from exhaustion and the pain from the memory. That Raticate. Their Raticate. And because of that one battle, no one can ever see that Raticate again. He slid down to the trunk of the tree, staring down at his hands.
"That's the champion!" an unfamiliar voice echoed.
No...
"Wow, he is so young."
Stop it.
"A champion should be willful and strong, but this kid... This kid won't say a word!"
Please, just stop...
"Can he really be the champion? Sure his pokemon are strong, but there is so much more needed."
Shut up.
"When is this kid going to be dethroned? Not a single challenger has come close to beating him!"
Don't say another word...
"I just don't think he has the qualities that would make a great champion. It doesn't matter if can just beat everyone. He doesn't seem to have any compassion for battling or for his pokemon! They just follow every one of his silent commands, like they are robots! How can we call this kid a champion?"
Shut up, just, shut up! What do you know about being the champion? Red's thoughts screamed out as his tangled his fingers in his own hair, his hat falling to the side. There was a time that the young champion felt joy in battling, and even though his life had gotten darker and darker as his time in the Indigo Plateau grew, he continued to shower his pokemon with affection. Rumors spread and words began to circulate as the young Red was buried under all the stress and expectations.
"Are you alright?" a familiar voice snapped Red out of his memory hellhole. The sound of a Dragonite's roar was faint, but definitely nearby. The man's voice came up again through the thick, unforgiving fog. "Hey, kid, can you hear me?"
Loud and clear... Wataru.
"This is definitely not fair to you," the dragon trainer said. He approached Red shortly after the battle for the title. Wataru couldn't help but go after the silent trainer after he somewhat sensed the dread and darkness flowing from Red's aura. The man had a sixth sense. "I can see from your pokemon, that they are worried about you. I heard some people talk about you back in the main room. They need to learn how to keep their mouths shut."
I couldn't agree more.
"Listen, there is a mountain that you can get to if you had turned left instead of going straight towards here, do you remember?"
The entrance, right after Victory Road, of course. Going right would lead to Kanto, and straight is where the Elite Four were situated...
"It's called Mt. Silver, and the place is very isolated, but the pokemon there are very powerful. I think it would be a great challenge for you. You seem bored here, and these people don't seem to make things any better." Wataru continued.
Red felt a strong and firm hand grip his shoulder; the memory conjured up a transparent version of the trainer right in front of him. He watched as the ghostly person say, "You're still young. A growing teenager like yourself should be out in the open on a journey, not here stuck within these walls. Here, if things start getting really bad, go ahead and call me. I won't judge your decision."
The figure handed a transparent sheet of paper to the silent trainer. Without thinking, he reached for it, Wataru's number, but when he touched the corner of it, the ghostly figure dissipated. He remembered that the dragon tamer would go up to visit the champion quite often. Wataru would rant about his lack of good quality capes and how his cousin keeps trying to murder him while training. Of course, he would go and battle the Kanto champion too. Red was surprised how quickly the man raised his dragons, though he always thought that three Dragonites were definitely overkill.
But at one point, he finally gave in with trembling hands. He gave the tamer a call. Red, who was still sitting with his back against the tree, heard himself say, "Please, please let me out of here..."
"Hi Red," Red stood up and glared at the source of the voice. It was Green. His expression softened to default stoic face. Puberty has hit his rival when they met again; Green had long lanky limbs that looked out of proportion and clown like.
"Green and I came here to visit you," Blue said timidly. She had grown out of wearing that black dress she always had and now had a winter jacket over her tank top and red skirt.
Red remembered them always coming every few months or so. Blue would carry a bag of textbooks and they would go over the material very briefly, enough so that Red could read the books she lent to him. Green carried a sack of food, blankets, and other necessities with a sheepish smile on his face. In a way, Green was like Santa Claus. The Kanto trio would quietly talk while their pokemon interacted with each other.
"Red, I'm now Viridian City gym leader." Green was always nervous when he came. Red noticed that his rival had a tendency of rambling on and running off tangents when nervous, which was nearly every time they met since Red went to Mt. Silver.
"Only because he finally grew some new brain cells," the girl smirked that day. Red had to stop himself from chuckling as he watched the two bicker about petty things.
"What are you doing up there?" A new voice rose from the mist. Red could never forget him. "Are you Red?" His voice was demanding. He reminded Red of himself so much. His loud personality, his rash style in battling, the clothes! They even looked similar to each other! The only thing that distinguished them apart was the trainer's even messier jet black hair sticking underneath his cap and for the startling color of his eyes.
"Let's battle," he said. Red of course only responded to his question by a quick nod and took out a pokeball, the universal sign of battle initiation.
It was a long and enduring battle on top of Mt. Silver. The blizzard harshly slowed down the pokemon's movements and made it hard for the opponent's team to hear their trainer's command. Red's pokemon had a hard time seeing their trainer's face in the battle and struggled themselves. After an hour of various strategies and healing items, the opponent narrowly defeated Red when both sides were down to one pokemon.
At Red's defeat he blanked out. It wasn't the usual blank out he felt when he lost against gym leaders. It was different. He felt...happy. Finally there was a trainer who could give him a run for his money. It has been a long time since he a reason to fight down to the very last pokemon. The only other person who had done that to him was Green. Several years ago.
That night, his newly rediscovered emotion was quickly demolished. In his dream, Green's Raticate died in front of him, in a repeated nightmare. Electrocution, over and over. He watched its fragile body twitch from Pikachu's shocks. Over and over, he stood in front of that grave and stared at the words, "Our dear departed friend. May you rest in peace and only remember the happier days." The same tombstone. Repeated hundreds of times to form itself into the Power Tower. Each tombstone saying the same thing.
"Our dear departed friend. May you rest in peace and only remember the happier days."
I'm the reason why the only remaining connection we all had with each other, died.
Extra Notes:
narutomaki (1) = Cured fish surimi in Japan, has a pink or red spiral pattern to resemble the Naruto whirlpools in Japan. The Whirl Islands in Pokemon GSC/HGSS was based off of the Naruto whirlpools located between Awaji Islands and Shikoku.
Author Notes: Took some time to think about the chapter through. Felt sort of depressed actually writing about it. A reminder: two people are writing this story while there is a third person who beta reads it. To clear up any confusion, Red and Green had basically listened to their past selves. They relived their worse moments because what is worse than reliving your worse memory without the ability to do anything about it? Until the next update, see you next time...
RainSonata: Good thing I had my notes out on Red and Green's past while writing this. There was a lot to cover in this chapter. Writing this makes me realize how happy and cheery Hoenn is compared to Kanto and Johto... (this is after I looked up the House of Memories, which is somehow creepier than the original Pokemon Tower).
LunarAbyss: Guess what! Satsuki not the only one with issues...! Though that is not supposed to make me happy... I swear, not all our chapters are going to be this dark. Q^Q IT'S OK, GREEN, RED. WHY ARE YOUR NIGHTMARES SO DARK AND TWISTED? coughcoughnotourfaultcoughsortacoughcough
MikaStoryInc: I feel bad for both of them. Green shouldn't have said a lot of the things he said to Red. Red shouldn't have shocked Raticate so much, but at the same time, he needs to speak up and stop blaming himself for it.