Arc One: Mystery
Chapter Sixteen: One Teeny, Tiny, Problem.
"Aaaand that'll be twenty-five Poke, please." An excited Furret says behind a counter.
Lucas then puts his bag on top of the table and starts to dig through it. Eventually, he pulls out a smaller, brown, bag and pours out some Poke.
"Let's see, ten, twenty, two, three...twenty-five! Here you go." The Rilo says as he puts the extra coins back in his pouch.
We have finally arrived at Central Mountain...well, kind of. We're at the base of the mountain, Rumble Village to be exact. We just stopped by a Furret's shop in order to grab some apples for us, and some string and a small metal point for Eve so that she could make a flower crown. At first, I was confused why we needed that last thing, until Eve tied the end to the string and then stabbed the flowers through the center, and then tied it again to make a necklace.
Aww, she looks so cute with that big smile on her face.
"Have you made a flower crown before?" I ask her as she finishes with her work.
She nods. "I make them once in a while. I think they look pretty, and it takes my mind off things. I just wish that they could always look this alive."
"Well, maybe you can find a Grass-Type that can help you out." Sparks says from the top of my head. "They can probably do something to keep them alive longer."
The Alolan Vulpix says, "Maybe...but I doubt somemon could do that." As she thinks about it.
"Ok, everyone." Lucas says as he puts back on his bag. "I got everything in case everything goes wrong. Let's head over to Central Mountain."
"Ohhh, Central Mountain." The Furret said as he was counting his coins. "Are you four tourists?"
"Yep. Sure are." Lucas says.
"You don't mind me asking why you're going there, do you?" He asks.
"I'll tell him." Sparks says as he hops onto the Furret's table.
He then clears his throat and says, "We're going to find Xatu and ask him why Mystery Dungeons exist and how we can stop them!" He proudly boasts, maybe a bit too much.
The Furret tilts his head. "Ohhh, Xatu. That legend IS really old, bbuuuut some have said that he's real." He then tilts the other way. "I don't know why we haven't tried asking him? Probably because that we couldn't find him."
Lucas then smiles. "Well today, that'll change, because we're about to make history. Right team?"
"Yeah." Sparks then adds, "And then maybe other Pokemon can start asking him questions too."
The Furret smiles. "That's so cool to hear. Do you four have your pebbles?"
I smile, "Yeah, we-"
*Realization!*
I stare at the Long Body Pokemon with a nervous face. "Come again?"
"Your Lucky Pebble. You need one if you're ever going to ask Xatu a question. At least that's what the legend says."
Me, Lucas, and Eve stare into space as the words sink in. Lucky Pebble? Sparks never said anything about-
Sparks!
The three of us then turn to and yell Sparks' name as he starts to sweat. Eve then uses Psychic to grab the Pichu. She then hangs him upside-down in mid-air.
"Sparks." She begins a little angry. "Is there something that you forgot to tell us before we left?"
He then gets really nervous, but manages to say, "W-w-well, I uhh...might have..." He closes his eyes. "leftthatoutbecausethenwewouldn'tgo..."
He opens his left eye as he continues to float in the air until, finally, Eve drops him on the ground.
"Do you realize that this means that we may have just come here for NO reason?!" She yells at the hurt Pichu. "What is my mom going to say when she finds out that you left that part out when we come back empty handed?!"
Tears then appear in Sparks' eyes. "I-I-I'm sorry." He then falls on his face and cries. "It's just that everything was going wrong, and Red wasn't feeling too good, so I wanted to leave it out so that he didn't feel worse. I mean, it may not be true. We can find him, ask him, and then help everymon without using the stone. I'm sorry!" He puts his little arms over his eyes as he continues.
Eve then realizes what she just did and tries to fix it. "N-n-no! I didn't-I'm sorry, Sparks. I didn't mean to get that mad at...ohhh!" She then freaks out, knowing that this is all her fault.
As she goes to figure out what to say, me and Lucas just watch the Tiny Mouse Pokemon cry. I mean, at least he did it to keep me happy, but we were going to find out eventually, so that was destine to fail.
"Come on, Sparks." I say as I try to think what to say next. I then look at the mountain. "Maybe we'll find one in the mountain."
He looks at me as I continue. "I mean, the Lucky Pebbles have to come from somewhere, and this is Xatu's mountain. A-and we still have time, look." I say as I point to the sun, which has quite some time before sunset.
"He's right." Lucas says. "We probably have a little more than an hour to find at least one. How hard can it be?"
The Furret then says, "Actually, no one has even found the entrance to-"
"YOU'RE NOT HELPING!" Lucas and I yell at him before he finishes.
I then turn back to Sparks and say, "My point is that we still have a shot, even if it's now a REALLY long shot, we might as well go for it. Besides, that mountain may hold other secrets."
He then smiles as he finishes drying off his tears. "R-right. We can still do this. We can go through the mountain, find one, find the entrance, and then ask him."
I then hear him say, "It's going to work. It's going to work. It's going to work." Over and over again. I begin to say that to myself so that I don't end up feeling down again.
"But do we even know what it looks like?" Lucas asks.
"As a matter of fact, I happen to have a copy of the legend of Xatu right here in my shop." The Furret says. "I'll be right back."
He then goes into the back wall of his shop, and then looks underneath it. "Where is it?" He says as his tails wags side to side. He then starts throwing stuff behind him (towards us might I add) as he looks for his copy.
"Ahh, here it is." He says holding a scroll in his left paw. He then looks at us and sees all the stuff he threw on the ground, with the exception of a hammer, which happened to be laying on my forehead as I lay on the ground.
Of course that's the thing that hits me.
"Heh, heh, probably should have not thrown all that stuff out like that." He says as he ducks one more time in order to grab an Oran Berry. "Here. Sorry about that. Eat this."
"Thanks." I say in pain. I then receive his gift and go to eat when I stop. "Wait a minute. I'm not paying for this, am I?" I ask the merchant.
He turns white and says, "O-o-of course not! That was my fault! It's yours for free." He then grabs the scroll again and says, "Like I said, here it is."
As I eat the berry, the four of us look at the aged scroll he laid on his desk. On it, it has old looking drawings, with some text near the bottom.
The Furret clears his throat and says, "The description of the Lucky Pebble is that it calls the Pokemon to it with it's warm glow. Whatever kind of light that is in the Pokemon will be reflected off of the pebble. It's a treasure that can only be found if one is willing to accept who he/she is, and what he/she must do. There's no photo of it, but I think the description's good enough."
He then points to the mountain. "That place is said to once be the throne of Arceus, and since he's the creator of the world, there should be at least one inside. It also has his symbol on it, and shines even brighter when near something legendary. "
Lucas crosses his arms. "I don't know if that makes me feel better."
"Well, at least we know more about what we have to look for." Sparks says. "Maybe we'll get lucky...wait?"
The Furret giggles and says, "Well, you better get lucky fast. Sunset will be in an hour. I wish you four the best of luck, and best wishes."
"Best wishes!" We all say as we make our way to the base of the mountain.
As we walk away, Lucas goes through the bag one more time. "Ok, so I'm glad that got cleared up, and I'm also glad Wigglytuff had extra team bags for us. Zygarde really did a number on our last one."
Eve then starts to shake. "D-do you think he'll find us out here?"
"Maybe." Sparks says as he jumps next to the Vulpix. "You may never know when he might-GET YOU!" He screams.
"GAHHHH!" Eve says, somehow turning even more white. Sparks then falls on his back laughing.
"Ha, ha, ha, ha! You should have seen the...look...…" He slowly stops speaking as he realizes that Eve fainted. "Whoops, heh heh. Didn't mean to scare her that bad.
Both Lucas and I watch the Pichu as he rubs his hands together, making sparks in the progress. He then says, "Don't worry. This hurts me more than it will hurt you. Really." And he taps Eve's nose.
Immediately, she twitches from the electric as she comes to. She then looks straight at the Pichu. "Sorry about that. I didn't know that-" He is cut off by a blast of cold air. So cold, in fact, that it almost freezes him, but it still ends up making him have tiny icicles over his body.
I chuckle at the sight of a half-frozen Pichu. Lucas then lets one out, and finally, Eve smiles again.
"Ok, now we're even." She says as she walks to the mountain.
I then go down to my knees and say, "You want to ride on my head? Maybe it'll warm you up." To the half-frozen Pichu.
He nods. "Y-yes please. T-that was c-cold." I then pick him up and place him on my head. However, once he does, not only do I feel his cold body on top of me, but any ice on him begins to melt, causing my head to get wet.
Dang it, why can't I ever think things all the way through.
As we walk inside the mountain, Lucas pulls out two torches that we had bought at a shop back in town. He hands them over to me and as I use Ember to light them up, he says, "So, what's the plan?"
"I'm thinking we should split up into two teams, and seeing that Sparks is using you to get warm, I'm thinking that you and him should stick together, while Eve and I will go another way once we get to-"
"A f-fork?" Sparks asks.
Lucas nods. "Yeah, a...fork." He says as we come face to face with a fork in the mountain, with a wooden post having two arrows pointing in two opposite directions. Above it, there is a map of the paths in the mountain, and it looks like one of those corn mazes that are meant to drive you mad.
Or like a Mystery Dungeon, but it was made on purpose.
"Well, this might be the longest hour of my life." Lucas says. "I mean, look at that map. This mountain is huge!"
"Are you sure we should even separate?" Eve asks. "What if there's something scary in there? Shouldn't we all stay together?"
"C-come on, Eve." Sparks says, still a little cold. "This is a-a public trail. There isn't going to be a-"
"ZUBAT!" She hollers, facing a Zubat that's charging straight at us. I go to use Ember when Sparks turns my head away and causes me to miss.
"Don't hurt it!" He says as the Zubat flies over us at top speed. After it passes, he says, "See, it only wanted to get out of here, that's all."
I put my hand on the side of my head. "Ok, but you didn't have to try to snap my neck."
"Sorry about that." He apologizes. "I just have a soft spot for Wild Pokemon."
"Yeah, your brother mentioned that when we went to Ocean's Island." Lucas said. "He said you were more open to them. But why?"
The Pichu smiles. "I'll show you." He then leaps off my head, which gives me time to dry off my head.
"Look at me." He says. We all stare at him, wondering what he's trying to do.
"Uhhh, ok? Now what do we do?" Eve asks.
"What is the first word you think about when you see me?"
We all then stare at each other, even more confused. Lucas starts with, "What is that supposed to do?"
"Just do it." Sparks says a little annoyed.
"Ok...ummm...cute?" Lucas says.
"Yellow?" Eve goes.
"Recoil damage? I say, trying to hide a smirk.
Sparks' ears drop. "Well, I mean, that's true, but I was thinking of a different word."
Eve then says, "Small?"
Followed by Lucas, who says, "Tiny?"
While I say, "Weak?"
"Bingo!" Sparks says, pointing his finger at me. "That's the word I was looking for. You got it."
He then rushes to the top of my head, and then proclaims from his throne, "I was always looked down to when it came to fighting and many other things. Baby Pokemon are regularly pushed around by the older Pokemon, so as you can expect, that's what happened with me. No one really cared what I thought about anything."
"But I could still survive just as well as any other Pokemon. Just because no mon cared about my ideas didn't mean that they didn't treat me badly. I had a wonderful time."
He then pauses, and then says. "But Wild Pokemon were never given any kind of chance at my old home. Whether they were strong or not, all of them were always chased out. I knew that they caused trouble before, but everymon makes mistakes, and they never knew better. All I wanted to do was to give them a chance to show everyone in my town that Wild Pokemon were more similar to us than we thought. It was mostly my Dad's words on helping those who can't that made me wonder if there was a chance for them to live with us in the same life as we do in towns like mine. Sure, it may be difficult, but you all have seen how Melody turned out."
"Yeah." Lucas says. "I would have never believed that she was wild if Bolt never told me."
"I second that." I say.
"Melody was a Wild Pokemon?!" Eve says shockingly. "How come I never knew that?"
"Maybe it's because you spend most of the day sleeping in your nest." Sparks says.
Eve goes to counter, but nothing comes out of her mouth. She then slowly dips her head down, a sight that we're all too familiar with.
Sparks panics, and not wanting Eve to go through another mood swing, he exclaims, "Wait, no! I shouldn't have said that-"
"N-no, you're right. I really do spend a lot of time in my nest." She says, lifting her head right back up.
My ears then pick up a faint, "Maybe", but I don't know if that was her or just my mind playing tricks on me.
She then shakes her head and says, "Let's get back to the topic at hand. There is a fork in the road. You said we should split up, so let's do that now so that we don't lose any more time."
"Agreed." Lucas says, "Eve and I will go left. You two can go right. Hopefully we won't run into another fork."
I think we will, but I keep that locked up in my head. For Sparks and my sake.
The yellow mouse then says, "Ok. Let's just make sure our badges work. You guys can walk down the path for a little bit, and then I'll call you."
"Sure." Lucas says, as he and the Vulpix walk down the path. They then make a left turn to follow the path, and disappear behind a rock wall.
The Pichu then grabs his badge, (which is strapped onto his left ear) and presses the center button, holding it down.
"Testing, testing. Hello! Can you guys hear me?" He says into the Pokeball-looking badge.
It takes a while to get a response, but eventually we see the center light up as we hear, "This is Lucas. Hear you loud and clear!"
I smile and say, "That's good to hear. Good luck, and let's hope someone finds a pebble or two."
"Will do!" And then the badge's center stops glowing. Sparks then lays down on my head and says, "Looks like we should get going."
"Yeah. We should." I responded. As we walk down the rocky trail, I ask the rodent, "How does that thing work?"
"The badges?" Sparks says, "Ask Daisy. She does all the heavy lifting when it comes to gadgets. I think she said something about a stone of some sort? I don't remember."
"But don't you help her out?"
He pauses, then says, "Yes, but I'm not that good with most of the stuff that goes into making them. I think Wigglytuff just wanted a new mind to help her out and suggest things."
"Uhhh, what?"
"Somemon who's worked in a field for a long time will tell you what you can, and can't do. While somemon who's new doesn't know any better and will try new things."
"Ok." I say. "I think I get it. Did you ever had an idea?"
He nods, "I suggested to her that if she can make one badge teleport to another, in case there's no Glow Poll."
I then look up and see another fork in the mountain. Both of our ears drop lower than before.
"Already?" I go.
"Come on." Sparks then jumps off my head and looks at the map above the sign while I go bang my head against a wall in frustration.
"This is slowly turning into a nightmare." Sparks says. "Now which way do we go?"
I don't answer his question. I'm just so stressed now. I thought we were going to find Xatu, not some stupid rock. "We're never going to find them, are we?" I think to myself.
Right when I finish that, I fall to my knees as I can feel my joy being taken away from me. It felt like all the bad energy had been waiting for the perfect chance to attack, and they did it at the right time...unfortunately for me.
I refused to say it then, but it's getting so clear: We're not going to find Xatu, and I'm going to have to give myself up to Zygarde.
I feel like crying. I feel like locking myself in a room all by myself and just crying. I don't want this pain. I don't want to feel like I'm stuck in the dark. I don't want to run around in circles.
"No." I say to myself. "I can't go through this, not again. Be positive. Be positive. Be positive. There has to be a way to find one. You can't just give up, no matter how bad it looks."
I open my eyes and notice an orange cone. Puzzled by it, I get up and head over to it.
"Hey, Red, what are you doing?" The yellow mouse asks as he runs over to me.
I stop and say, "Why is there a traffic cone here?" And point to where it lies.
Sparks walks over to it and then answers, "There's more of them here. I think something must be under construction. Look, they're covering the right path."
I look up and see that five cones are indeed covering the right path. I feel curious and ask, "Do you know what's behind those cones?"
"Well, whatever it is, it's probably nothing...maybe..." We spend a solid minute staring into the blocked off pathway before he adds, "You want to check that out, don't you?"
I look at him and say, "It's a gut feeling." And I walk past the cones.
Sparks clearly didn't think I was going to do that, so he dashes in front of me and says, "What are you doing?! This path has got to be blocked off for a reason."
"Come on, Sparks." I say. "It'll only take a minute, promise." It didn't work.
As I go to take another step, he yells, "Red, please. I think there was a sign next to the arrow sign that had some writing on it. We should read it first before we go any father."
"..." "..."
"..." "..."
Before Sparks can say anything, I run straight down the path. There's got to be something down here, there just has to be something!
"RED! STOP!" I hear him say, but that's not enough to stop as I rush forward. He then gives chase after me and we disappear into the dark hallway.
"Ok, this time, left." The Rilo says, trying to keep a reassuring smile on his face, but deep down, he's slowly getting worried.
The Emanation Pokemon and the Alolan Fox Pokemon have made at least five turns in only the span of ten minutes. The two have been scanning the walls for anything that might be the Lucky Pebble or something that feels like it's calling out to them, but alas, nothing.
Eve looks at Lucas, and she can tell that he's starting to crack. But she refrains from saying anything, as she doesn't want to say anything wrong.
But the silence that's around the Pokemon is getting so thick that it causes her to question if she should say something. The two sides of her mind fight between each other. One that was her, a kind, yet small and weak voice, while the other was a strong, fierce voice that all too remembers all of her past that felt like a being of it's own.
It called itself Doubt.
"Maybe it'll calm him down if we say something." She said.
"Please, he doesn't look like he's in that big of a mess." Doubt replied back.
"Doesn't look like-Look at him, you can see him shaking. He's worried about his friend."
"I thought you said that you like to stay out of Pokemon's ways? You moment with Sparks earlier didn't work at all."
"Well...he's different. He and Red are...something else. That trip to Apple Woods was...fun."
"Fun?! Let me remember, when was the last time you said something like that?"
Eve became worried. "...please don't."
"Alright, fine, go help him. You won't screw it up, will you?"
The Vulpix slows down as the strong voice starts to loom around her. Lucas, however, is too focused on walking down the path that he doesn't notice.
"I said don't say that." She says scared.
"Come on, you know you've never been good with words. Right before we entered this mountain you made Sparks feel bad."
"That's not true...about the word part, I mean."
"You know what? You're right. You were good with them, but now you're not."
"Well, I need to do it. He needs help."
"And so did everyone else." Doubt yelled.
Eve now comes to a complete halt as the voice continues, "You had a purpose, you had life, but you didn't like it. Despite everything that you had, you weren't pleased."
"Don't phrase it like that. I enjoyed my life."
"THEN WHY ARE YOU HERE?! WHY ARE YOU STUCK ON THIS STUPID ISLAND?!"
"Stop..."
"I'm not stopping until I get an answer. Tell me the reason you're here."
"Please...stop."
"BECAUSE YOU MESSED UP! You can't do anything right!"
"No, no."
Tears were beginning to form as Doubt yelled at her.
"Yes! No matter what anymon says, they're just trying to hide it, like they always have."
"Shut up!"
The Vulpix was getting so troubled that when she opened her eyes, she saw him standing in front of her.
"Answer this then." He said grinning. "Do you believe that Red forgave you for everything that happened in Apple Woods?"
"Y-yeah."
"One-hundred percent?"
"...ye-..."
"You know it's not true. Every test that you did, every battle you fought, all the responses you received...they all lied to you."
"No they didn't-"
"YES THEY DID! AND YOU WERE THERE! RIGHT SMACK DAB IN THE MIDDLE OF IT, AND YOU HEARD IT WITH YOUR OWN EARS!"
It felt like the voice was right in Eve's ear when it said, "They called you a failure, and when you went to prove yourself to them, you caused them, all of them, EVERYMON...to die."
"SHUT UP!" She screams. That was the straw that broke the Vulpix's back and she started crying and began to charge up an Ice Beam to attack the voice that had began to run around the path. Eve was so caught up trying to attack something that wasn't real that she almost hit Lucas, who was very real.
Lucas notices this along with the ground shaking and turns around. "What the-EVE!?" He says as he rushes toward the Vulpix, trying to do the same thing he did last time.
Eve, with eyes closed and full of tears, feels something grab her. She goes to bite it with her fangs, but stops when she hears, "Stop, Eve. Please stop. It's ok, everything will be..."
She is confused when the Rilo doesn't finish. She hears him start over and say, "It'll be f-..."
He still doesn't finish, and she can only worry why he isn't finishing.
What was once a firm sounding voice was now stuttering over and over again. "It'll...it will..."
She then feels something drip on her fur as Lucas's grip slowly loosens. She opens her eyes, and while they're full of tears, she can see that Lucas has fallen to the ground, and now he's crying.
"It's not going to be ok. We're not going to find this Pebble in time. We're going to fail, and...and." Lucas then goes back to crying as the Vulpix watches him.
She closes her eyes in sadness as Doubt returns to mock her once again. "Look what you did now, you screw up." She can see it smile, standing right beside her, and she hated it.
She then takes a breath and says, "I DON'T CARE! I've messed up before, but...Lucas needs some support right now." She stares right in the eyes of her enemy.
The dark being just stares at her and rolls his eyes. "Fine, but don't blame me if things go wrong."
In a blink of an eye, Eve realized that she was only talking to herself as the blue Pokemon slowly continued to cry. She swallows as she walks over to the Rilo and sits down beside him.
As she goes to say something, she can feel the presence of her demon, but she presses forward. "...you ok?"
Lucas briefly looks at the Vulpix before looking down to the ground again. "Stop it, Eve. Leave me alone."
Eve's eyes widen as she hears the words behind her say, "You're making it worse."
Eve growls for only a moment, and then says, "Look, Lucas, there's still time left before the sun goes down. If we put our back into it, then maybe-"
"BUT HE'S NOT REAL!" Lucas screams. Eve is very surprised by this.
Lucas puts his paws over his face and says, "Chatot was right. I don't know why we came over here. He said that the legend had already existed for years and nobody found him. We're just wasting our time doing this."
Eve now really doesn't want to press forward. Half of her body won't let her, but something deep down inside her causes her to continue.
"You're scared what will happen to Red, aren't you?" She says.
Lucas then turns and hugs the Vulpix, surprising her very much, as he says, "He's my best friend. We've done so much together in so little time. He is the first Pokemon that has ever put up with me, that sticks around me...that helps me out when I can't do anything."
"How long have you known each other?" She asks.
Lucas let's go of Eve and says, "Since the day you and I met, twelve days ago."
This makes Eve yell, "Twelve days?! That's it?! You're...best friends...just like that?"
"I told you that no one has ever really been my friend. Red was the first one I ever had." Lucas says. "There's just something about him that just...draws me to him. When we first ran into Scar, he wanted to help you right away, but I wanted to get help."
"After he slid down that cliff, I was going to leave, but I just couldn't leave him. His aura..."
Eve inches closer as he says, "My guess is that we complement each other so well, that I just couldn't leave. He is better at things that I'm not, and vice versa. We just work well together."
"But you two barely know each other. Literally! Red doesn't remember who he was, and I don't recall you ever saying where you come from."
Lucas lets out a small chuckle and says, "You have to start somewhere, Eve. Your best friend is always going to be a friend at first, but after teaching him about this world, going through the Mystery Dungeons, saving you...one and a half times, and fighting Zygarde, he called me his best friend."
He pauses, and then says, "And I made a promise to him that I was going to help him find out who he is, and I can't break it."
Eve then lights up. "Th-then why are you giving up now?"
Lucas looks Eve in the eye as she says, "You made a promise, now keep it. As long as there's still a sliver of hope left, don't give up. You may not know each other that well, but when you guys work together...it's really something special.
"You two are like Melody. She acts so normal, yet I couldn't believe that she was a wild Pokemon, just like I didn't believe that you two only knew each other for only twelve days. So, don't give up...please."
Lucas chuckles once again, but this time manages to smile. "You're right. Time is time, and no matter how small it is, we should still try our best."
Eve smiles as she watches Lucas go back onto his feet, and with a spring in his step, he cries out, "We won't give up until the very end!" He then turns to Eve and says, "Thank you for saying that. You kind of remind me of what Red said before we entered the moutain."
"Really?" Eve says. She then thinks about it a little more as Lucas says, "He's the whole reason why we fought Scar in the first place. He really wanted to protect you."
Eve blushes as she says, "But didn't you also want to join the Guild?"
Lucas goes to respond, but then laughs. "Yeah, that's right. I guess I have work to do."
The two of them laugh, and Lucas wonders if he should continue the discussion, but decides to leave it there.
"Alright, come on, we got a stone and bird to find." And he dashes off to the path.
Eve yells, "Wait up!" And chases after him.
"I did it." She says to herself. "I really did it." She then stuck her tongue out at Doubt, which in real life was just a rockwall.
"Pfft. That's just one time." It says to her. "One time out of-"
"Eve!" Lucas says standing on the path. "Why are you staring at the wall?"
Eve feels the presence of Doubt leave her as she turns to Lucas. "No reason." And she catches up with the Rilo, and they soon continue down the path.
