Chapter Six
Mt. Silver
The trio left bright and early the next morning, with Lyra and Ethan both saying their farewells outside the doors to Elm's lab while Pichu and Marill exchanged loud, energetic goodbyes. Kris was apparently still asleep, it seemed; based on Ethan's explanation, she was basically impossible to rouse in the morning, so he was saying goodbye on her behalf as well.
As it turned out, Ethan was also heading out. He'd actually heard back from Hilda, which was a miracle, but not quite as big a miracle as the fact that she had apparently been in Johto for quite some time. In Blackthorn, apparently. AJ wasn't quite sure if she should be offended that her friend had been so close and hadn't bothered to reach out to her, or happy that she'd agreed to meet up with Ethan which meant that she can't be that dedicated to this disappearing act. Not for the first time, she wondered what exactly had happened, but shrugged the thought off.
Hilda had actually responded to AJ's text as well, letting her know it was fine and that, if she was still around after AJ got back from her trip, she'd try to make time to pay her a visit. That made it sound like she was busy doing… whatever it was she was doing, but she hadn't clarified on what that might be, and AJ didn't press. If she wanted to tell her, she would.
They left New Bark Town before the sun was even fully over the horizon, soaring up over the quilt of pine trees and heading north-northeast, in the direction of the large mountain range that divided the Johto and Kanto regions. Further to the east, she knew, lay Victory Road - the path Pokemon League Conference hopefuls would take on the way to the greatest inter-trainer competition the Indigo League had to offer. It was also where most of them were weeded out - the unofficial preliminary preliminaries.
But a little ways to the west of League Headquarters, just past the Johto border, sat Mt. Silver.
Ethan had made the call the day before, shortly after their talk in the lab, and had received permission without much trouble - though he was apparently told by whoever he spoke to that AJ could have just called in and asked herself. True, Mt. Silver was in Johto, but the Indigo League ws still the Indigo League. They wouldn't have denied her because she was the Champion of Kanto.
AJ had blushed at that, suddenly embarrassed. The thought had never even crossed her mind. Johto was Johto, after all, and she hadn't wanted to step on Ethan's toes. More than that, she realized now, she still hadn't fully come to accept that she was actually a Champion now. She still felt like a regular trainer. Maybe she was too young for this.
The journey didn't take long; only a few hours, about the length it had taken to fly from Pewter to Pallet the day before. The difference was, signs of civilization had fallen behind almost as soon as they left the hills of New Bark Town, the wild, untamed land rising up below them like waves of rock and earth, their crests topped with trees like verdant seafoam. The land here was truly uninhabited, and she could believe Ethan when he said this place was untracked - and Mt. Silver wasn't even a speck on the horizon yet.
They had to angle more to the east first, in the direction of Victory Road, before they could continue onward, and check in at a Ranger station. Official procedure and all that, to keep record of who went in and when. They had her, Jade, and Sammy sign their names in a logbook - an actual paper one - and from what she could see, she could count the names of the people who'd been allowed in within the last five years on one page. Ethan's name was only a few lines above theirs, separated by a handful of random researchers and surveyists.
While the mountain was kept mostly off-limits to people, Rangers still occasionally made patrols of the area - looking for poachers mainly, but also keeping tabs on the pokemon population and patrolling the borders of the preserve. It wasn't much, honestly, but it was something. To hear the Rangers talk about it, however, it sounded like a pretty dull job. One of them, a dull-eyed man in his early fifties and a prominent pot-belly, let her know in a dull voice that this was the most action he'd seen all year. Three people, signing a book. Was this where Rangers were put out to pasture?
The detour didn't take long, and before they knew it, they were back in the skies again, soaring closer to the distant mountain. After a time, the greens changed to white below them, seafoam in truth, as they angled higher and higher into the sky and snows began to cover the mountaintops below them.
Mt. Silver finally appeared before them, rising into the sky, a lonely monument on the horizon. Not as tall as Mt. Coronet in Sinnoh, but still the tallest mountain in all of Kanto or Johto. With snows covering its peaks and the faint bluish tinge of the rock, as though it too could feel the effects of the cold. AJ could see where it got its name from.
Well, technically speaking, Mt. Periwinkle probably would have been more accurate - but she could admit that name lacked the same gravitas as Mt. Silver.
It was around this point in their trip, however, hours into their flight, as they neared Mt. Silver, that the effects of the cold could no longer be ignored. Frost had begun to build up around them, dusting the front of the heavy blanket AJ and Jade had wrapped around themselves and Pichu, covering Sammy's hood and scarf. That ice was building up on Metagross as well, and while the sturdy pokemon didn't seem to mind it too terribly much, Corviknight was another story. If they didn't land soon, Sammy was liable to fall clear out of the sky.
They decided landing now was as good a time as any, particularly since they were just about at the foot of Mt. Silver anyway. Soaring low over the trees, AJ spotted what she thought was a herd of Stantler, and what might have been an Ursarang stalking behind them. She could see sleeping Hoothoot and Noctowl in the trees despite the cold, the odd Furret den concealed beneath piles of snow.
They had arrived - finally. Arrived, in the middle of nowhere, miles and miles away from civilization.
Something in her chest seemed to loosen. She felt… free. Unburdened. Though she'd never been here before, returning to the wild still felt somehow like coming home.
Relief turned to joy, bubbling up inside of her. She felt like she was going to burst. They'd made it! Adventure! Her friends! She needed an outlet - quick - or she really was going to explode.
She rose and leaped off of Metagross's back as they reached the ground, and the moment her boots hit the snow, she stooped down, scooping up a handful of snow, packing it into a neat ball.
Before Sammy had even fully dismounted, her snowball caught him full in the face.
He spluttered, bemused, but AJ was already down, grabbing another handful of snow.
"Don't," Jade said warningly, trying to point a threatening finger at her, though the effect was somewhat ruined by her fluffy pink mittens. "Seriously, how old are you?"
"You're never too old for a snowball fight," AJ said, vying for a sweet, innocent smile. Jade rolled her eyes, completely oblivious to Sammy approaching from behind. His handful of snow went right down the back of her coat, earning a shocked shriek from Jade and a full belly-laugh from AJ.
"Oh, Oak, you are so dead…" Jade hissed, and a moment later, she'd launched herself at Sammy, tackling him to the ground, shoveling fistfulls of snow onto his face.
They devolved into full-out snowball war for the next few minutes, each of them running around like children, shouting and laughing and pelting each other with snow. Pichu tried to help her out, but his little paws were too small to be of much use so instead he took to blasting snowballs out of the air with electricity. Jade was cheating, however; her Metagross kept conjuring up psychic shields to protect her, and when Sammy called her out on it, sounding very much like a five-year-old when he did, Metagross used its powers to rattle the tree he was hiding behind and a mini-avalanche of snow fell down on top of him.
That put an end to the fight, mostly because Sammy losing was the only outcome Jade and AJ could agree on. After recalling their pokemon and stretching a bit, the group decided that they may as well get on with it, and they fell into step, heading north towards the mountain proper.
There were supposed to be caves up there, according to Ethan, filled with rare and powerful pokemon. Per the League, they had permission to catch whatever they wanted, so long as they kept it within reason and reported it to the Ranger post when they left. Though AJ didn't have any hunting in mind, she couldn't deny that if she stumbled across a Tyranitar, she'd do her best to snag one. No one could pass up an opportunity like that.
Despite the cold, despite the bitter wind that chapped her cheeks and the foot or more of wet snow that hampered their progress, AJ was having a blast. The air was thin and chill, but the sky overhead was endless and blue, not a cloud in sight, and the bright sun shone down on them, lending them a little warmth and making the snow glitter in the trees and on the ground all around them like a field of diamonds.
They walked for hours, chatting with each other, talking and joking and laughing and catching one another up on everything that had gone down in their lives over the past several months, just enjoying being in each other's company again.
For AJ, this just meant catching them up on her training, which had mostly been done in seclusion in the Cerulean Caves, a series of partially underwater caverns that bordered the northern shore along the cape. Technically speaking, the area was off-limits to regular trainers - but thanks to who her family was, she'd been able to get special permission.
As expected, Sammy had pressed her about rare pokemon sightings. Rumors had it that a rare pokemon lived in the caves, some terrifyingly powerful psychic-type - but AJ hadn't seen anything of the sort. Just a bunch of Golbat and Poliwrath - maybe the odd Golduck or two. Nothing you wouldn't see in the surrounding hills and rivers, though admittedly a good bit stronger. Certainly nothing worth talking about.
The rumors weren't old enough to be legend anyway - they'd only been around for about thirty years or so, so it was doubtful it was a real legendary pokemon. AJ was convinced it was just a story cooked up to scare young trainers away from the caves before they were ready to handle them. All in all, the visit had been a bit of a disappointment - but it had provided a great space to train away from prying eyes.
Sammy's tunnel-vision on the rumors were pretty typical of him, however. He had a secret dream, he'd confessed to AJ and Jade once a few years back - one he'd never told to his father or great-grandfather out of fear they'd laugh. While his goal was to become a famous researcher and world-renowned pokemon authority just like they were - keep the Oak name alive and all that - he secretly wanted to focus his studies on legendary pokemon.
The thing is, most of the time, studying legendary pokemon was the field of archeology, not biology. Legendary pokemon certainly existed - there was more than enough evidence to support most of their existences, barring some extreme outliers like Mew or Arceus who didn't have verified, documented sightings to back them up - it was just that they were so rare that dedicating an entire career to studying them was… well, without live specimens, the best most could do was research old fables or ancient ruins and theorize.
And that wasn't really what the Oaks did. They didn't just theorize - they turned theories into fact, and revolutionized the world in the process. And as the next generation of Oak, Sammy was expected to do just that - not just by his family, but by the world at large. So to say that he was going to go studying legendary pokemon was a lot like saying his plan was to strike it big by winning the lottery. Technically possible - but so improbable as to throw the notion out of the window entirely.
That was why he'd been interning at Elm's lab, he had explained as they'd trudged along through the snow. He had a theory - not one unique to him, but one he was intending to be the first to prove - that most, if not all, legendary pokemon reproduced. Since little to nothing was known of most legendary pokemon, and since most sightings occurred infrequently over the span of decades if not centuries, it was an oft claimed belief - particularly in places like Sinnoh, Kalos, or Hoenn, where their legendary pokemon were more revered - that some, if not all, of their legendaries were more than mere pokemon. They were treated almost like gods, and along with their (allegedly) god-like powers came immortality.
But not all legendary pokemon were said to have created the world, or rule over the forces of nature. Some, like the legendary birds of Kanto, had been spotted across multiple regions, and it was Sammy's belief that these pokemon weren't much different than regular pokemon - that is, that they, much like the common Pidgey or Spearow of Kanto, had migrational patterns, and that they likely had a nesting area they visited where they laid their eggs.
Until he was allowed to strike out on his own and begin doing independent research, he was biding his time, building up his credibility by assisting Elm and Lyra with their studies, but also taking all he could from Professor Elm's research into breeding. He was considered the world's foremost expert on the subject, after all.
And that all sounded great, though AJ kept her thoughts to herself. She wished Sammy all the best, of course - she'd known for a while now that this was something he was particularly passionate about - but considering how he didn't even have a chance at proving his theory unless he managed to not only find a legendary pokemon, but hold on to it long enough to see if it could breed… Well, the likelihood of success wasn't exactly very high.
AJ herself only had a passing interest in so-called legendary pokemon. Sure, it'd be really cool to see one - even better to battle or even possibly capture one - but in her eighteen years on this earth, she'd never even so much as glimpsed one.
It was actually one of the few things she had to concede that her father had beaten her at. During his travels, Ash Ketchum had - allegedly - encountered just about every legendary pokemon that was said to exist in this world. True, many of his encounters were mostly hearsay. That is, he didn't usually bother taking photos of them or trying to capture them. The most he did was occasionally attempt to scan them with his pokedex, which usually resulted in blurred images that sometimes could be corroborated, sometimes not, and it was an oft debated subject among enthusiasts.
Still, he was usually with other people when he had found a legendary, which meant that he had other witness testimonies to back his up. And while a single person encountering so many legendary pokemon in their life was improbable to the point of silliness, it also seemed unlikely that he could get so many strangers to cover for him.
In the end, AJ didn't know what she believed. It would be so easy, so satisfying, to just call her dad a liar and move on. But when her mom, or Brock, or Gary, or uncle Tracy were the ones backing his stories up… Well, it was complicated.
In any event, if he'd seen them all, she'd never even seen one. If this was a contest, she'd lost - and handily. So she'd decided long ago that she didn't care. Seeing a legendary pokemon was a matter of luck, after all, not skill. Nothing to be worked up about.
Jade's story was considerably quicker. She'd spent the last several months helping her dad at his gym. To hear her tell it, she'd actually taken over most of the gym challenges in his place, as he was usually busy attending some conference or another. There were apparently talks of her taking the Gym Leader Certification Exam at League Headquarters sometime next year and making her transition to Pewter Gym Leader official.
Now that, AJ hadn't known - and she'd tackled her friend in such an enthusiastic hug that the two of them had toppled over and rolled down a short hillside, Pichu chasing after them with excitable shouts.
"I don't know what you're so happy about," Jade had muttered after pushing herself up and brushing the snow off of her clothes, affecting cool nonchalance in her tone. "You were just named the Champion of Kanto; what's a gym leader next to that?"
But she was grinning to herself in a pleased sort of way, and AJ had a feeling the pink in her cheeks was from more than just the cold.
And that was more or less how they spent the day. Talking about the present turned to talks of the future, which turned to talks of the past as they recounted familiar stories and anecdotes about their travels together. Occasionally, they would stop when they came across a wild pokemon, sometimes allowing for brief pauses while Sammy took notes or photos on his pokedex, other times changin routes to give a surly pack of Piloswine or a herd of Girafarig a wide berth.
They made camp that first night under a tall cliff, still on the foot of the mountain. It was slow going with the heavy snows they had to trudge through and no paths to follow, but it wasn't like they were in a race, so that was fine. They were met with light snowfall the following morning, but nothing too severe. It actually made the world seem rather serene, and though they still spent most of the day talking, there were several lengthy pauses in which the group merely walked, gazing out at the landscape and taking it all in.
Every so often, one of them would release one of their pokemon to let them get some fresh air and travel alongside them for a time. How long depended on the pokemon, of course, as some endured the cold better than others.
AJ's Togetic managed a few minutes before the chill had her asking to return to her ball, looking absolutely miserable. Sammy's Leafeon seemed determined to tough it out for as long as possible, despite his grass-type nature making him predisposed to a weakness to the cold. He seemed to be affronted that Pichu was handling the cold better despite being smaller - though to be fair, though Pichu spent a good deal of time jumping and racing and rolling through the snow, he kept running back to AJ's side every couple of minutes so it could curl up in her scarf and steal her body heat. He also kept pushing his frozen paws against the skin of her neck and it was really not ok.
Jade's pokemon seemed to be handling the cold the best. Her Mawile didn't seem bothered much if at all, calmly waddling alongside her, occasionally snapping up bushes full of tiny frozen berries in its cavernous maw. Her Sableye didn't seem to mind the cold much either, though it wasn't a fan of the daylight - too bright for it even though it was still cloudy - so she didn't keep him out for long.
They had a quick lunch on a small plateau that overlooked a lake a few miles below. They'd made it partway up the mountain and had been making decent enough time - not that they really had much idea of exactly where they were going. The food was mostly sandwiches, though they busted out their gas-powered stove and whipped up some hot soup as well. Anything to get some of the chill out of their bones.
After lunch, they decided to take a detour down to the lake and do some fishing. It was cold, but not cold enough that the lake surface had frozen over. She let her Milotic out to get a bit of exercise too, knowing there probably wouldn't be much chance once they were up in the caves.
Sammy joined her, the two of them turning it into a contest like they always did, Jade merely sitting beside them, starting a campfire to ward off the chill and complaining like she always did about the cold.
AJ won the fishing contest, of course. She always did. She'd been taught by the best, after all. Sadly, there wasn't much to find in the lake save for Magikarp and the odd Remoraid, all of which they tossed back. Deciding they'd rested enough, they decided to get a move on.
It was a few minutes after packing up and setting off once again up the mountain that it happened.
Something caught her eye, hidden among the rocks on the hillside beside them. She turned back, scanning the perimeter, and almost missed it - it's white coat blended in against the snowy backdrop, but the curved black horn on the side of its head was a dead giveaway.
AJ stopped in her tracks, frowning.
"Isn't that… an Absol?"
Sammy and Jade turned to look in the direction she was pointing. The Absol stood still for a moment, just long enough for them to spot it, as though it were waiting for just that, before it turned and silently vanished into the terrain.
"Welp, that's it, kids," Jade joked. "We saw an Absol. We're all gonna die."
Sammy snorted.
"Figures you'd be the superstitious one. There is no actual evidence that Absol cause or can predict disasters, that's all just myth and dark-type prejudice."
"Ok yeah," AJ cut in before Sammy and Jade could go off on another dumb argument about something they both actually agreed about, "but what is it doing here?"
"Some idiot probably released it," Sammy said with a shrug. "How else could it have gotten here? Absol aren't native to Johto."
"But here?" AJ pressed, spreading her arms and spinning around. "How? No one is supposed to come here."
"Dunno. Maybe it traveled here from Blackthorn or the League? I mean it's far, but it's not that far."
She supposed he was right about that. It could have made the journey after months, or perhaps even years, of wandering. Maybe there was a whole pack of them. Absol were typically solitary creatures, but that didn't mean that they didn't mate.
Jade muttered something dark under her breath about 'introduced species', and Sammy let out a snort.
"Yeah, but what are you gonna do about it?"
She didn't reply, but she was still scowling darkly at the mountains up ahead.
AJ didn't blame her. She had a better reason than most. Introduced Species were one of the biggest issues present in the world today, especially considering how connected different regions were nowadays. Trainers traveling with pokemon from other regions was becoming increasingly more common, but that also meant that pokemon were sometimes released into the wild in regions or habitats that they weren't supposed to be in, and that caused problems.
The League had taken to imposing heavy fines on any trainer caught releasing a pokemon into an ecosystem it didn't belong in. This was both an issue of reckless abandonment, as sometimes the pokemon simply couldn't survive in that area and was left to wander until it died of starvation or exposure or other issues. The offense was bad enough that you could lose your license.
But the other issue - and the bigger issue, in the grand scheme of things - had to do with introduced species. Because sometimes, the pokemon didn't die. Sometimes it survived. Sometimes it thrived. And sometimes, it completely destroyed the ecosystem in the process.
AJ could remember vividly the incident that had nearly decimated Mt. Moon just a couple years back. There had been some kind of Bug Enthusiasts gathering in Pewter City, and some maniac from Unova had thought it would be a great opportunity for him if he caught a bunch of bug pokemon native to the Unova region and brought them along to trade or sell to other enthusiasts. That way, he could collect more rare bug species for himself and pad out his wallet at the same time.
The problem? He severely over-estimated the worth of some of the species he brought with him, and from what AJ had heard, he'd left the convention with still nearly two-dozen Durant he'd brought along and had been unable to sell.
Not able to afford feeding them all and unwilling to keep searching for potential buyers or trades, he decided he'd just offload them into the wild at Mt. Moon, where no one would see him do it.
Absolute chaos had ensued.
Durant had no natural predators in Mt. Moon, but the region was rich in the ore that they ate and used to build nests, allowing them to breed and reproduce at an alarming rate. Durant are also highly territorial and hostile pokemon. They chased the Onix out of their complex network of tunnels, taking them over for their own, and the resulting migration caused landslides and cave-ins all over the mountain, injuring and killing people and pokemon and destroying the once well-known passages through the mountain. What's more, they hunted the Clefairy, already an endangered species, severely reducing their already low numbers.
The Ranger chapter in the area tried their best to stop things, but the situation quickly grew out of control and they were forced to reach out to the League for help. Since Mt. Moon was closest to Pewter, this suddenly meant that this was Brock's problem. For the next several months, he and the trainers of his gym had been forced to join the Rangers in rooting through Mt. Moon, hunting down the Durant, desperately trying to exterminate the menace and preserve the crumbling ecosystem.
Bounties had been placed on the heads of the Durant, offering large monetary rewards to any trainers who managed to catch them. A chapter of Rangers from Unova had flown in, bringing along Heatmor, Durant's natural predator, to assist with expunging them. After all was said and done, the Durant were finally removed, but Mt. Moon was still recovering, Clefairy's endangered species status had been updated to critical, and the idiot who had caused the disaster had been stripped of his license and arrested.
All in all, introduced species were a very big problem.
But Absol wasn't like Durant. They were solitary, typically non-aggressive pokemon who mainly ate berries and vegetation and didn't leave much impact on the environment. She knew that was harder to gauge than she was making it seem, but she really didn't think Absol was about to ruin the ecosystem like those Durant. And anyway, Sammy was right - what could they do about it? They were way out in the middle of nowhere.
Eventually, the endless hiking through the snow and the bitter cold caught up to all of them. There were still a few hours of daylight left, however, so AJ decided to take a gamble and called out her Arcanine.
He materialized in a brilliant flash beneath the glimmering sun, heavy paws sinking into the snow but thick coat protecting him against the cold.
Almost immediately, AJ stepped forward and buried her face into his fur, feeling the warmth soaking back into her numb cheeks. She felt more than saw Jade and Sammy do the same on either side of her, Sammy letting out a contented moan and Jade murmuring a fervid, "Aw yeah, that's the stuff…"
Pichu, who had been once again cocooned in her scarf, wriggled his way free and scampered up onto Arcanine's back, squeaking and nuzzling his friend excitedly.
After a moment of joy, free from the cold, AJ pulled back and looked up at her pokemon.
"Hey bud… I know this might be asking a lot, but… do you think you can give us a ride for just a bit? I can't feel my toes."
Three people was a lot more than Arcanine was used to carrying, but he let out a bark of approval and lowered himself so they could climb aboard. It would be fine, she told herself as she took the front spot, Pichu curling up between her legs and Jade scooting up behind her. They'd keep to a slow walk and take the gentlest route forward. She'd give him a big treat when they broke for camp tonight as thanks.
She'd only intended to stay on his back for an hour at most, maybe two - but the warmth of his back contrasting against the biting cold of the air as they steadily climbed higher and higher had her not wanting to get off, and before she knew it, the sun was setting.
Arcanine didn't seem too terribly tired, but she still felt bad about it. They decided they would break camp now, as it was bound to get much, much colder when the sun fell and nobody wanted to be traveling in that. Plus, as Ethan had warned them, that was when the meaner pokemon came out to play. It hadn't been that bad last night, but why take the risk? The Ursarang would be more active, and there would be Sneasel and Misdreavus up and about. Better to rest through that and move about in the morning when they could see.
They picked a small, partially obscured patch of ground on the mountainside to set up their tent. The trees around it formed a small, open ring that had just enough space to hold them while also hiding them from watchful eyes, which would hopefully keep roving pokemon away. They had some repels too, of course, which AJ got to spraying around the perimeter of their camp while Jade set up the tent and Sammy got to work on dinner.
When AJ returned, she found Sammy hard at work and Jade nowhere to be seen, though the tent was at least erected. Poking her head inside, she found her friend lying across their sleeping bags with her Nintetales out of her ball, Jade having draped her pokemon's luxurious tails across her body like an enormous fluffy quilt.
"You," AJ said flatly, "are ridiculous."
"You don't know me," Jade mumbled, turning her face away and rubbing her cheeks against the fluffy fur. "You're just jealous."
AJ glanced over at Ninetales to gauge it's reaction, but it seemed more resigned than anything else. Lucky for Jade she had an Alolan Ninetales and not a Kantonian one. The ones here tended to be a lot more sensitive about people touching their tails. Then again, Jade undoubtedly knew that. Ninetales had been her first pokemon, after all, back when it was a Vulpix.
They lit a small fire under the setting sun, mostly for warmth. Dinner consisted of a hot stew full of potatoes and carrots, one of Sammy's many recipes. AJ would never tell him this, but he was easily the best cook of the three of them. Still, she thought he knew. It was probably why he was always volunteering to do it.
After they ate, they set about feeding their pokemon as well. This was a bit of a harder process to do, considering how varied pokemon diets were. Lucky for trainers nowadays, then, that pokeballs could be used to store more than just pokemon. Just the thought of trying to carry around enough food on her back to feed her team every day made her shudder. She'd need trucks.
Pichu was easy enough; he ate mostly nuts and berries, though he'd long-since been in the habit of stealing parts of her meal, so he was always well fed. Milotic ate various types of riverplant that AJ typically mixed vitamins into to make sure she was getting her protein when she couldn't let her out in an actual river to find food. Togekiss, like Pichu, ate mostly nuts and berries - only about five times the amount, so she set the three up on a large blanket to protect them from the snow and let them at it.
Arcanine preferred meat, so she set him up with large slabs of Tauros, separated from the others. This was not synthetic, unlike the meat that most people ate. When she was a kid, she had felt bad about pokemon eating other pokemon, and had always had a hard time feeding the Tentacruel or Gyarados at the Cerulean Gym - but as her mother had put it, not all pokemon are omnivores like people, and some needed to eat meat to stay alive. That was just life.
She did usually feed him processed foods, however; there was a brand of pokechow that was typically provided to carnivorous pokemon with teeth that was packed full of the vitamins and nutrients that they needed, but they couldn't eat it all the time. She typically fed him real meat sparingly, but since she'd made the poor guy carry them around like some sort of Mudsdale… Well, he deserved a treat.
Aegislash didn't need to eat - or at least, it didn't derive its sustenance from food, so she let it be. And that just left Hydreigon.
She was about to pull her out, but then thought better of it. They were on the mountainside proper now; if she pulled her out here and she had another freak-out, she was liable to bring an avalanche down right on top of them.
She didn't need to feed yet anyway; being in the pokeball slowed a pokemon's metabolism. She could go another day or two without needing to eat. Still, she resolved to find a better campsite tomorrow, one a little less precarious.
They ended up turning in pretty early that night. They stayed up for a bit, sitting around the campfire and talking, but it really was freezing there on the side of the mountain, and the icy wind was doing a number on their spirits.
Deciding that turning in early meant an early start, they doused the fire and, after taking a cursory look at their surroundings, AJ decided to call out her Aegislash again and ask it to guard the camp while they slept. It was the ideal choice, as the ghost-type had no need for sleep and preferred the night anyway. It agreed with a low, creaking groan - the only sound it was really capable of making - and dipped the top of its hilt toward her in a stiff, austere bow.
Nodding in approval, Sammy called out his Gengar and Jade, after a moment's hesitation, decided to pull her Sableye out as well. They didn't really need all three out at once, but no good trainer needed an excuse to let their pokemon out of their balls, and it's not like the ghosts really noticed the cold.
Their sleeping bags - the thickly-padded kind meant for winter conditions, complete with a warm quilt spread over the top - were arranged side-by-side, feet towards the tent door. AJ hung her belt with her pokeballs on a hook dangling from the top of the tent and immediately jumped towards the middle sleeping bag with a cry of "Dibs!", Pichu jumping in beside her.
She snuggled down deep inside before poking her head back out and peering up at her two friends who were staring down at her, nonplussed. She expected Jade to put up a fight since she'd had the middle spot last night - everyone knew the middle spot was the warmest, you had body-heat in stereo! - but instead she turned and shot Sammy a wry look.
He affected not to notice, instead shrugging and saying, "Good, keep me away from Jade. She kicks in her sleep."
Jade, who had opened her mouth no doubt to say something glib, instead gawked and said, "What? No I don't!"
"Yeah, you do," Sammy said emphatically, hanging his own belt beside AJ's and placing their battery-powered lantern there as well. "It's like you wrestle Primeapes in your dreams."
"It's true," AJ said, then after Jade turned her scandalized look on her, quickly added, "but I still love you?"
Pichu agreed with a bright squeal. Jade scoffed and began undoing her own belt.
"Tonight," she muttered darkly as Sammy wriggled his way into his own sleeping bag, "I'm making sure my every kick connects with one of your shins."
She hung her belt up and turned off the lantern, ignoring AJ's look of horror.
"I have done nothing to deserve this!"
"You sided with Sammy! That's taboo! It's like I don't even know you anymore!"
"Times change, Harrison," Sammy muttered from AJ's other side. "Looks like I'm the best friend now."
"Fine. You two deserve each other."
"Aww, Jadey-poo," AJ joked, scooting closer and wrapping her arms around Jade in the dark. "Don't be like that. It was a one-time fling; you know you'll always be my one and only!"
Jade grumbled, but didn't push her away. It was cold, after all. AJ half-considered asking Sammy to scoot closer behind her - make a warm, toasty sandwich with her in the middle - then thought better of it. That might be a little weird. In any case, despite it being earlier than usual, the fatigue of the day and the warmth of the sleeping bag quickly had her fading away into unconsciousness.
She wasn't sure how long she was out - maybe a couple of hours? That's all it felt like - but she found herself jerking awake as several furious roars rent the air.
Alarmed, but still befuddled from sleep, AJ pushed herself upright and tried to blink the sleep out of her eyes. Something was wrong. Something - several somethings, from the sound of it - were moving around outside the tent. And they didn't sound happy.
There was a brief commotion inside the tent as, from what she could guess, Sammy had moved to turn on the small electric lantern and had stepped on Jade by mistake, who had apparently still been asleep somehow. AJ ignored them, getting out of her sleeping bag and crawling toward the tent flap, hastily undoing the zipper. Pichu leaped out before she could stop him, and as his threatening growls joined the ever-growing cacophony outside, she felt her panic start to grow.
She stepped into her boots, not bothering to lace them, snatching up her belt with her pokemon and stumbling out into the freezing night air. It was dark out, though with the light of the moon overhead and white, snowy landscape all around them, it didn't take too long for her eyes to adjust.
There, behind the tent, Pichu and Aegislash were squaring off together with Sableye and Gengar, the ghosts glowing ominously in the moonlight, as though they were having a stare-off with the trees.
No… No, not trees. Those were Snover and Abomasnow - an entire pack of them, at least twenty or more. They had gathered around, surrounding the camp to the north, upwards on the mountain face, and were steadily growing closer, looking agitated.
Several confused thoughts ran through AJ's mind, from 'Why are they upset?' to 'Why are there so many Snover and Abomasnow here in the first place?', but before she could pursue the thought, a few of the Snover raised their branchy arms and summoned several icicle shards that they began firing at the ghost pokemon.
Gengar vanished into the shadows while Aegislash raised its shield, calmly tanking the hits, doing its best to shield Pichu, Sableye, and the tent - but it wasn't quite wide enough, and the occasional stray shard slipped past it. A few of them tore through the tent, making Jade scream and Sammy curse.
AJ snarled. She didn't want to have to do this, but these pokemon weren't leaving her much choice.
"Pichu, come back!" she shouted, knowing her little electric mouse wasn't to be of much help fighting a pack of trees. "Aegislash! Use slash!"
Pichu darted back to her side upon command, climbing up her legs, perching on her shoulder, as Aegislash lifted its heavy metal body off of the ground and, in a whir of speed that should have been too fast for something of its bulk, spun its sword blade through the air, violently slashing into two Snover who had gotten too close. The thick metal bit through the bark like a woodsman's ax, and the creatures stumbled back, clutching the gashes in their trunks, oozing sap-like blood.
She hated having to get this violent with wild pokemon, but when they were on the offense like this, you often didn't have much choice. When a pack of wild pokemon pressed a fight, they were usually going for the kill. AJ and her friends were severely out-numbered, and those icicle shards they were shooting were sharp. She needed to put on a show of force to drive them back.
Gengar re-materialized out of the shadows, launching sludge bombs at the encroaching tree pokemon, trying to force them away. Aegislash slashed again, this time nearly removing another Snover's arm, while Sableye fired beams of light - Power Gems - from the glowing stone on its forehead.
Jade and Sammy finally stumbled out of the tent then, Jade throwing AJ her coat while Sammy held up both his and Jade's belts, trying to figure out in the dark which pokeballs were his and which were Jade's.
"What's going on?" Jade asked, only now taking in the horde of Snorunt and Abomasnow bearing down on them as another wave of ice shards rained down around them. AJ was forced to duck to avoid them, spinning around and holding Pichu to her chest to try to shield him with her body. One of the shards grazed her arm, drawing blood and a sharp hiss from her lips.
Sammy and Jade had ducked too, only Jade had tried to reach out and snag one of the belts from Sammy's hand, and had somehow managed to instead knock them both out of his hands so they fell to the snowy ground.
"Ok, this needs to stop," AJ growled, reaching for Arcanine's ball on her belt. Let's see how these stupid trees like being set on fire…
But before she could, the chorus of roars took up again, only this time louder, more insistent. The Snover were pulling back, still firing the occasional shard of ice, but the Abomasnow were now in a full-on frenzy, beating the ground with their thick, branch-like arms.
AJ had no idea what that meant. Was this some sort of intimidation tactic? She didn't know a whole lot about Abomasnow, other than that they liked to hide away on tall mountains and keep to themselves. Were they usually this territorial? Or was this just more of what Ethan had said - the pokemon here being wary of humans? More prone to attack strangers?
All thoughts vanished, however, as the roars of the Abomasnow faded away, only to be replaced by a distant rumbling, slowly growing louder and louder.
The Abomasnow turned and began to leave, ambling after their young, but the rumble continued. Nervous, AJ stepped forward, peering through the treeline, up the mountainside, where she could see a veritable wave of white, like a blanket of soft death, steadily rushing down to meet them.
An avalanche.
The Abomasnow had summoned an avalanche.
They were all going to die.
AJ was frozen, her hand still hovering over Arcanine's ball. The rolling tide of snow was bearing down on them - she needed to act, to move - boulders were being swallowed, trees ripped straight ouf of the ground as the very earth beneath their feet trembled as though in fear.
Jade was shouting something behind her, something about her pokeballs. That sparked something in AJ's head, and she realized that if she didn't move, Pichu and her pokemon were going to die there with her. Her hand moved again, grasping Arcanine's ball - and she stopped. What could she do? Arcanine couldn't outrun an Avalanche. There was always Hydreigon, but she would absolutely lose it if she pulled her out right now. She'd probably make the avalanche worse.
Too late, she remembered her Togekiss. She could carry AJ to safety… but what about Jade and Sammy?
Only a few short seconds had passed, but the avalanche was already literally right there. How had it gotten so close, so fast? There wasn't any more time to think. Her friends would have to take care of themselves.
She shouted for Aegislash, praying it could hear her as she fumbled Togekiss's ball from off of her belt. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a flash of light - Jade or Sammy had summoned something, but she couldn't see what - and the wave of snow roared ceaselessly forward.
She held her finger over the button, and for a horrifying moment, she hesitated. What if she called Togekiss out and she couldn't carry her away in time? What if she got caught in the snow and was crushed alongside her and Pichu?
That moment of hesitation ate up the last of her time. The avalanche broke through the treeline, bearing down on them. Someone shouted behind her and she lobbed Togekiss's ball into the air, praying that she, at least, could fly away and survive - and just before the snow hit her, the stray image of the Absol she'd spotted earlier that day flittered through her mind.
Aegislash materialized in front of her, raising its shield as if that could in any way possibly save her, and the world went dark.