Sol felt the deepness of the rock below in more detail than before. It was all much clearer now, due to having practiced. He could feel the roughness of every bump and lump, its nooks and crevices. It had a gritty and jagged texture that Sol could feel quite vividly. It was sturdy.
He compared it to the feeling of his own energy. Or lack, thereof. His energy was not so much as a feeling. But it was the control… over the world, over anything in his reach. As long as he was strong enough to grasp it.
And now… to mold his energy. At first, this was hard, and Sol could not even complete the first step. But it had been pretty much a week since his first attempt. He could do this. Sol gave his energy a feeling, it was nothing at first, but then it became sturdy. He gave it the rugged feel of the rock, the… everything.
He gave it the essence of the rock.
It was crude, for now. A rock could be smooth, if needed to be smooth, to pierce cut, at least. But Sol could refine it later, he did not need to do these things. He was too prideful knowing that… he had done it!
He was able to convert his psychic type energy to rock. And that would open the gateway to other moves. But for now, he would use it to finally use Rollout. He was satisfied.
Sol stopped meditating, opening his eyes to his green tinted world. His vision was different than a human would see, in that everything was green. Only harsh colors would actually make it through.
Sol connected with Genesis’ mind. It was easy, for it was bright. He spoke to him, thinking in his mind with intent that it would really his trainer.
“I finally fucking did it. I told you I could do it!” He bragged, feeling proud.
Gen was impressed, he could tell. But not that impressed. “Hey, no one ever said you couldn’t do it. That’s actually an easy skill for Pokémon like you.”
“Well, whatever.” Sol huffed. “Should we try Rollout now?”
“Uh… not yet. We’ll practice Rollout tomorrow. Just keep manifesting rock type energy for now so we know it’s not a fluke,” Gen replied.
Tomorrow? He was too excited to wait—he hadn’t learn a new move, ever—, “I know it wasn’t a fluke. Stop being stupid.”
“Well, I want to know too. And also, it’d be best if you were comfortable with doing that before actually learning Rollout.”
“Whatever…” Sol huffed, moving back towards the rock. He closed his eyes again and focused…
----------------------------------------
After finishing training, me and Sol got back on the move again. The last few days had been pretty dull, but traveling itself was pretty interesting. That meant I still hadn’t caught another Pokémon, something I was getting a little more wary of.
It wasn’t a huge problem. I could always go Pokémon hunting when I got to Violet City. But I’d rather capture one around here. The last time I’d gone off route to find a Pokémon, I couldn’t find one willing to talk.
But I was feeling good anyways. We were set to make it to Route 31 today, and we were getting close to Violet City. I wonder why they made Route 30 and 31 two separate routes. Maybe because of Union Cave? People say it used to be bigger or something. Oh, well.
Sol had also managed to use rock type energy. That means we could get started on Rollout. I wanted to wait to start for tomorrow though, just so Sol could get used to it. It had only taken a little short of a week to get it going, but we were finally making progress.
With Reflect, it was basically as strong as it could be. It would get passively stronger, but there was something other than strength they could work on. Gen remembered how the Rattata broke Sol’s big Reflect so easily. I didn’t think a bigger Reflect would take more focus but in hindsight, it made sense.
So over the past few days, I’d also been focusing on Reflect training as well as the rock type energy. That’d been taking most of our time when training, so no new moves quite yet. It seems that the majority of their training would have to be done in Violet City. That was okay though, their time here wasn’t being wasted.
Reflect could be what makes or breaks a situation like the Rattata and Beedrill, despite how unlikely they were to happen again.
There were TMs like Protect, too, which were a lot better for protection. But that seemed so far off at this point. And I wasn't sure if I’d be doing this long enough to spend money like that for training.
Besides, some psychics like Sol could learn Protect naturally. I’d need to double check that…
“Hey Sol, do you think you can turn Reflect into Protect?”
…
Gen spent the next few hours conversing with Sol. Traveling was good for just talking, even if it was only me and Sol. And between conversations, there was a lot of time for thinking too.
Eventually I reached Union Cave, which was a strange cave, all things considered. Maybe that’s because it was man made, for transport purposes back when there weren't as many trained psychic types to teleport stuff back in the war. Because of that, it was a series of tunnels that connected to Route 45, 46 and Blackthorn City. Many trainers used this as a shortcut to Blackthorn City instead of having to through the Ice Path.
That meant it was relatively safe for trainers to use. Even trainers like me, though going to the lower floors weren’t advised.
But it made sense, considering the caves used to be completely filled with humans until a few decades ago.
As I set up camp, I decided I would take a little venture there. I wouldn’t go too far past the entrance, but there was a chance I could meet a cool Pokémon. Those types of caves were crawling with Zubat and Geodude, but there were also lots of pools of water. Pokémon like Wooper, Finneon, Remoraid, even Feebas lived there. And some people said there was Lapras, but not much evidence for that.
I didn’t want to go too far though. Pokémon like Onix blended into the terrain and if one was on the ground level part of the cave I probably wouldn’t be able to see it. Hopefully I could find a Pokémon I liked, at least.
“Are you done? Hurry up so we can get to training,” Sol said, interrupting my thinking.
I nodded, “Woops, yeah. Sorry, let’s do it.”
I watched as Sol made a large Reflect that could protect both of us. We stood still in silence for a few minutes, and I could feel Sol straining through our bond. The Reflect started to lose its color, and in another minute or so it completely faded away. I checked my pokegear.
“Five minutes this time,” I said.
That wasn’t much of an improvement. But much better than when we started where Sol could only hold it for like two minutes. Progress was slow with Reflect, which was sorta frustrating.
Practicing with a larger Reflect was much harder, according to Sol. I’d gone along and added that to his morning exercise, since he’d been getting used to the last one. He started complaining again after that, so it looks like he was getting stressed again. I hope it wasn’t too much, though I don’t think it was.
After more practice with Reflect—which was boring and tedious—we moved onto psychic type energy. This time, I sat down on the ground to observe how Sol was doing.
It was more of the same, really. I could feel how hard he was focusing, but I could also feel what he was doing. I could feel as his psychic type energy turned rock. I wonder if it’d be able to do that before. Was that a sign of a stronger psychic bond?
I wasn’t sure. But I did know that Sol had finally succeeded. I knew he would eventually, but still.
After eating we went to sleep. Today marked two milestones, Sol’s rock type energy, and reaching Union Cave.
Hopefully tomorrow marked my first capture.
—
I stood outside of the entrance of Union Cave. Grass appeared less frequently as I approached it until it ceased. The dirty ground that would’ve been below the grass started to transform into a hardened ground littered by stones and rocks. This rocky terrain apparently remained until the Blackthorn City, Route 45, and 46’s cave entrances.
This specific entrance seemed to be carved into a sudden jump in elevation. I peered inside, but despite the fact that there were two lanterns—who kept the fire going?—lighting up that area, nothing was really visible from the outside.
As soon as you went in, it was a little bit of a downward trek. One that you could easily return from, but that still meant I couldn’t see much of it.
I decided to take all the contents of my backpack for this venture into the cave. Mostly because leaving my stuff behind meant someone could steal it. That wasn’t very common, but it did happen.
I had a flashlight in my hand, since not all of the cave was lit up.
“You ready, Sol?” I asked, more for myself. I was a bit nervous about going into a cave, but it should be fine.
Sol responded wittingly, “Yeah, I’ve been ready! Just waiting on you, let’s go in there already.”
I scowled at Sol before making my way into the cave. Everything around me instantly felt darker, I looked back to see the outside. It almost looked like a whole ‘nother world from here. The black—maybe blue stony walls were so much of a difference from… the outside.
It wasn’t a terrible feeling, though I sorta felt like I was trapped, or something.
“What are you waiting for? Let’s go,” Sol urged, and I turned to see that he was already several meters ahead.
I sighed, “Can’t I take a second to think about this?”
“If you’re thinking now, then what the hell were you doing outside the cave?”
I sighed again, which was something Sol could make me do often. We ventured on, and the feeling of being trapped evaporated almost instantly. The “walls” of the cave began to expand, and the area I was in became way bigger. It was almost hard to describe how much it changed.
Suddenly, I was in a cavern. Looking back, I couldn’t even see the tunnel I had come through. It had just expanded into an open area. I think it was bigger than my house, but I couldn’t be sure. Stalactites and stalagmites extended up or down to half of the room, maybe more. It was a breathless experience.
Before I forgot to, I turned on my flashlight. That helped me get a better look at everything, to make sure I didn’t step on a Geodude, which was very common.
As soon as I did though, several dozen Zubat suddenly crowded the whole cavern. They dispersed quickly, though a few lingered before leaving. That gave me a mini heart attack. Soon, my heart rate returned to normal, and I once again started to venture forward. The silence in the cave made me aware of nearly every noise. Water drops were dropping from stalactites which made me think there might be a source of water nearby…
Or above us? I wasn’t sure. The cave itself seemed pretty moist, so a source of water couldn’t be too far. I was pretty sure I could see Geodude sleeping on the floor, some even looked like they were on the floor…
That was weird. Maybe I’d look into it later?
Anyways, I didn’t want to wake a sleeping Geodude anyway. Those ones tended to be angry, so even if I did beat them in a battle they might not agree to be caught.
Suddenly, I heard movement on my right. I whipped around to see a colony of Woobat stirring from their sleep. The light from my flashlight fully woke them, and they scattered.
Except one.
It seemed to consider a battle, before flapping its wings aggressively. Somehow, a barrage of wind swept through the cabin towards us.
“Sol!” I managed to say before getting swept off my feet. I protected my head as I fell to the floor, a little disgruntled. That was not a regular gust of wind, that’s for sure. It hit me hard, I wasn’t even able to…
The noise that I’d made reverberated through the cave, but luckily nothing seemed to be bothered.
“Gen, get up! It’s attacking again,” Sol warned.
I scrambled to my feet. Still wasn’t used to being hit by Pokémon attacks, hopefully that didn’t continue. I relocated as another flurry of winds was sent towards me. This one barely touched me, and I kept my wits.
“Go in closer for a Confusion!” I yelled out, though I tried not to be too loud.
I ordered for Sol to go in close just in case it used Gust again. It could scatter his energy to and stop an attack. Once Woobat realized what we were doing though, it charged up its own Confusion attack.
They were both let off, lightly illuminating the area as they clashed. No explosion, or anything like most shows. They seemed to just fade, as psychic energy tended to do without a sustainer. I could tell that ours was stronger though, just needed it to hit.
“Come back here,” I ordered.
Sol did exactly that, and I observed as another Gust came our way. I gave a short order to Sol to follow me, with my plan seemingly having worked.
Just like our Confusion used to be, the Woobat’s Confusion was short-ranged. So going away from it forced it to use Gust.
I moved closer to Sol and gave him orders, “When it uses Gust again, go in quick like in your warm-ups and hit with a Confusion.”
“Huh, that’s actually… a good plan,” He murmured before Woobat attacked again. We dodged again, with the winds just barely nicking me. Now that it’d happened a few times, I was more or so used to it.
Sol zoomed to the side and approached the Woobat quickly while building energy. Now he couldn’t say those warm-ups didn’t pay off. He let it off before Woobat could fly away and it was a direct hit.
Despite not being very effective, Woobat seemed heavily hurt by it. I unzipped my satchel and grabbed a pokeball.
Honestly, the Woobat seemed to have a one track mind, with how it attacked without a plan even after seeing it hadn’t worked before. But I could work on that, and I didn’t really mind sharing a type with Sol too.
Type coverage really wasn’t that important. Considering there was a group called the elite four that were the best trainers in the region. It was smart enough to consider fighting us, at least.
Before I could throw it—I’m pretty sure I would’ve missed if I didn’t get closer in any case—the Woobat took off.
“Let’s go after it!” I exclaimed, though Sol had already done so. I grabbed my flashlight as I started running, it would suck to leave it behind.
We were losing ground in this chase. It was hard to keep track of Woobat with the light, considering how it flickered around all the time. Eventually, it got to the point where no matter where I pointed, I couldn’t find it anymore.
I slowed down, panting slightly. Moving with this backpack on me had gotten easier, but not to the point that I could run as fast as I’d like to.
“If I knew you were gonna let it get away, I would’ve just finished it myself,” Sol complained as soon as he floated back towards me.
This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.
I glared with annoyance at him, “Like you could’ve hit it while it was running. Besides, we came here to catch Pokémon.”
There was silence for a brief while, and I took notice of our surroundings. We were still in a giant cavern, though maybe a different one than before? We hadn’t gone through a tunnel or anything…
Maybe this whole area was just a big giant cavern, then? It was then I noticed that my flashlight was the only light source. Looking back, I could see the dimly lit lanterns that had been hung up. Just dull enough to not disturb the population of Pokemon.
If we went any further, we might encounter Pokémon above what we could take. I was pretty disappointed in going home with nothing.
“Sol, you sense any… good Pokémon to capture?” I asked.
Sol groaned at me, “What the hell does that even mean? …whatever, I’ll try and sense something, at least.” There was another moment of silence. “There’s a bunch of Pokémon all around us, but nothing…”
Sol rambled off as I looked around. There didn’t seem to be many Pokémon surrounding us, but it had gotten pretty dark and I couldn’t light up the whole place with my flashlight.
“Oh, I can sense some moving Pokémon, I think…” Sol suddenly exclaimed, catching my attention. “And one’s a psychic type. I’m pretty sure. We could go check that out, I guess.”
It might be another Woobat, or maybe the Woobat that we just lost. I decided that it couldn’t hurt to check it out before leaving. I didn’t want to spend all day in this cave after all.
“Which direction?” I asked.
Sol pointed me in the right direction, revealing a side of the cavern that I would’ve never seen. This place was enormous, were all caves like this?
Anyways, I made my way towards where Sol was sensing them and already I could hear tiny footsteps. Also the flaps of a few dozen wings or so, and also…
The sound of rocks being smashed and their bits scattering all over the cave, the noise was quite loud and clear since the cavern had been so quiet just moments before. Something was attacking something, that’s for sure.
“I think they’re chasing it, the psychic type I mean.” Sol reported.
I quickened my pace, well, that made sense. “Who’s chasing it?”
“I dunno. From the wing flaps, probably Zubat or Woobat. But those Pokémon couldn’t have shattered a rock like that.”
“Zubat or Woobat, and something else, then…”
It probably wasn’t Woobat, because why would the Woobat be chasing… another Woobat? Unless it wasn’t the Woobat from earlier, but I’m pretty sure that’s the only psychic type in here…
Whatever. As I navigated the caves, trying to follow the sound, I saw a ledge leading to the upper side of the cavern, which I didn’t even know existed. I started to climb it, which was harder than it sounded. My backpack was really limiting my movement and it was littered with stalagmites that I had to weave around.
After pulling myself onto the high path, I felt a sharp pain and noticed that my hand had nicked the spike of one.
God damn it.
Whatever, I could deal with it later.
“What’s your plan here? Why are we following them?” Sol questioned, not having any trouble getting over the ledge.
I rolled my eyes, “To save it, duh.”
I looked around the environment, seeing a sparkling pond in the center of this smaller cavern. Pointing to my flashlight, it looked way more beautiful than the one on Route 30. I didn’t have time to admire it though, because the sounds seemed to be right ahead. I headed towards them once again, picking up the pace as I saw that the path they were taking almost seemed like an actual path that was right beside the rocky ledge I’d climbed up. “I think I see them…”
“Why are we trying to save them though? Pokémon attack each other in the wild all the time. Not saying I like it, but…”
That was actually sort of a good point… “Well, I don’t want to see it happen, and besides. Maybe we can catch this Pokémon if we save it, or one of the attacking ones.”
“Whatever.”
We were gaining ground on the Pokémon. I could see Zubat flocking behind it, but couldn’t make out the actual Pokémon…
“There’s a Geodude up there, I can see it,” Sol reported.
That must’ve been what did the rock smashing, then. I nodded and the chase continued. Despite the fact that we were gaining ground, it was actually fairly slow. The chase went on for longer than I thought it would, as soon enough there was a wall on my left side where the ledge used to be. We were in another tunnel, and I’d just lost track of the lanterns. As long as I could backtrack though, we weren’t lost yet.
Maybe this was more trouble than it was worth.
Soon enough, the tunnel expanded into a sphere shape before ending. The Pokémon had stopped running, giving us ample time to catch up. Now it seemed like they were attacking whatever they were chasing.
“Hey, uh. Stop attacking that Pokémon!” I shouted as I finally arrived at the scene. I was fucking tired man, but it seemed like my warm-ups had paid off too. At least I was still functional.
Due to the sudden loud noise, most of the Zubat seemed to lose focus, scattering all over the place. The Geodude turned towards us and I could see that the rock monster was pissed. Before I could get a good look at the cause of all this commotion, it started to charge.
“Sol, use Confusion!” I yelled out, a tinge of panic as I watched the Geodude rush forwards toward us.
“It’s hard to aim with all these Zubat!” Sol exclaimed, and I noticed that he was indeed being swarmed. Nevertheless, he fired off waves of psychic rings that hit nothing but the floor. It was close enough that Geodude stopped its charge.
Had to deal with the Zubat first, “Hold on!” I yelled, before pointing my flashlight straight at Sol. This had the desired effect, with all of the Zubat scattering when confronted with light.
Zubat hated light. It was common knowledge really. They could obviously still touch it and whatnot and some would come to even like it upon experiencing it for periods of times. But most cave dwelling Zubat hated it.
Now with that out of the way, we could deal with the Geodude. I whipped my head to see what it was doing, hoping it hadn’t decided to attack while I was distracted. It hadn’t, instead it had curled up into a ball. It started a Rollout attack, and used a rock as a ramp to get to Sol’s height.
“Just move out of the way.” I ordered.
Sol did exactly that, and Geodude couldn’t exactly change its momentum in midair. It crashed into the side of the sphere shaped cavern, causing a dent in the wall.
“These cave Pokémon are really dumb.” Sol commented, despite Geodude still being conscious.
I shook my head, “Focus up. See if you can finish it with a Confusion…”
I scanned the cave with my flashlight, which seemed to scare any remaining Zubat away. The whole cave was free of Pokémon, except for Sol, Geodude, and…
I squinted to look at the Pokémon under the light. It had some sort of red… horn sticking out of its head, and I think its hair was green. Its body was somewhat humanoid, though it was only like… a few inches above a foot, so it was hard to tell.
I’d seen enough to know what Pokémon that was. It was a Ralts, they were like… one of, if not the most popular Pokémon.
Well, maybe that was an over exaggeration, and their evolved forms, Gallade and Gardevoir, were a lot more popular. But still, there was almost always a part of this evolution line online.
They were also pretty sought after, especially for a first Pokémon. Even more so in Johto, where there were literally zero known places where Ralts was part of an ecosystem. So they were super rare in Johto, and one definitely shouldn’t be in a cave of all places.
A loud crashing nice suddenly came from my right, and I focused back towards the battle. The Geodude has just thrown a rock and was still kicking, apparently. It looked like Sol had been able to dodge it, and I could see that the Geodude appeared to be in some amount of pain. Likely due to the Confusion.
“Don’t stop attacking till it’s down,” I ordered.
“Oh, yeah, fucking duh. Why didn’t I think of that? I must be going brain dead BECAUSE OF ALL THE ROCKS BEING THROWN AT ME!” Sol replied sarcastically as he continued dodging rocks. The Geodude was throwing them with surprising efficiency, not giving Sol a chance to attack.
Okay, I might have gotten a little sidetracked after seeing the Ralts. A quick glance at it shows that it was still in the same place, seemingly afraid of being caught up in the battle.
I should probably end this before one of those rocks hit one of us. I picked up a pebble and threw it at the Geodude. Not really intending to damage it, but these cave Pokémon didn’t seem like the sharpest tool in the toolbox…
Just as predicted, the Geodude immediately lost focus and headed towards me.
“That better?” I shouted to Sol. “Now use Confusion!”
I could see Sol thinking about letting the Geodude get to me, but eventually decided on attacking. Sol’s thirst for violence always trumped a little bit of trolling, apparently.
Anyways this Geodude was apparently tougher than I thought because it survived another Confusion. I sighed, not happy that this was going longer than I thought it would be. Angrily, the Geodude slammed into a wall.
“I think it’s confused.”
“Yeah.”
I sighed again, this time, of relief. “Let’s get out of here then. That Geodude is pretty tough, so we should get out before there’s a chance for something to go wrong.”
“Whatever.”
“And we’re taking the Ralts with us,” I added, pointing at the small Pokémon that was just starting to take a few steps towards us. At my word, it ran up to both of us, which took a lot longer than you might think, since it was so small.
I could tell that it had started to say something, but it was incomprehensible for me. I gave up on trying to understand its body language and asked Sol, “What’s it saying?”
“It’s thanking us and saying we’re heroes,” Sol answered, seeming somewhat exasperated.
That made sense, yeah. “Let’s get out of here before talking. You do want to get out of here, right?”
That last bit was directed towards Ralts. I was assuming that it didn’t live here,but I wasn’t quite sure. Ralts shook its head left to right, affirming my thoughts. “Then let’s get moving, we’ve spent way too much time here already.”
I picked up the Ralts in my hand, but decided to put it on my shoulder because carrying it in hand would be inconvenient.
Ralts instantly started to yap my ear off, though it seemed it was because of some sort of distress? Maybe it had gotten lost or something…
“We’re not fucking lost,” Sol snapped at the Ralts. Maybe I was sort of right? Then he turned to me and spoke. “We ain’t lost, right?”
“No, we’re not lost,” I sighed. “We just have to follow this tunnel and then follow the lanterns back to the entrance.”
There was no way we were getting lost in these caves. That would be a fucking disaster, and would probably lead to my death, or something.
Maybe I should’ve waited before going into this cave. Or any cave, for that matter. But I really wanted a new Pokémon! I glanced at the Ralts on my shoulder, hey, maybe this guy?
“Why are you in this cave? Ralts don’t live in Johto, and definitely not in caves…”
Ralts started to answer, but I couldn’t exactly tell what he was saying. I looked at Sol intensely, waiting for a translation. I can’t tell if he wasn’t giving one on purpose, or…
“Sol, can you translate?” I finally asked.
“Ugh, fine. He says he came from his home region, which is probably Hoenn to here and he’s going on about wanting to be a hero,”
It’s a he, huh? And wanting to be a hero? What exactly did that entail? That was slightly confusing, “What the hell does that mean, though?”
That seemed to prompt another explanation from Ralts that I couldn’t understand. I looked at Sol for a translation, which he supplied, “A bunch of nonsense about helping people and whatever, I’m pretty sure this Ralts is mentally damaged.”
I rolled my eyes, that was a pretty commendable goal, but Sol didn’t seem to care about that kind of stuff. “Shut up, Sol. They’re probably just a kid or something…”
That set off an angry rant from Ralts, which I kinda forgot could actually hear me. I probably shouldn’t have talked like that in front of him, but not being able to understand him made his presence a little more forgettable.
“He swore a bunch and told me that he’s six years old.”
“Uh…”
Upon seeing my confusion, Sol explained. “The Ralts line mature way quicker than humans. This one’s practically an adult I guess, though you wouldn’t know by looking at him…”
Apparently Ralts had heard that too, and had started talking again. Though Sol didn’t seem interested in translating this time, “Well, he’s older than you.” I pointed out.
“And that’s fucking crazy considering he couldn’t fend off a Geodude,” Sol shot back.
Ralts’ angry noises intensified, and I groaned. We’d gotten out of the tunnel by now and I’d jumped down the spiky ledge, all we had to do was follow the lights and we’d be out of here. It would take a little while, though, I’d spent way too much time in that cave by now. By the time I got out it’d already be time to eat lunch.
“Anyways,” I said, talking over Ralts, “Why are you here? In this cave, and why were you getting chased.”
After another moment, Sol translated their answer, “He arrived in Blackthorn and because he’s a dumbass he went into the first cave he saw, thinking it would take him to a better town.”
Ralts shot back at Sol with an insult or something. And I almost sighed again, which I had been doing a lot ever since I met Sol. “And what about the Geodude?”
“Oh yeah. They were practicing their moves in here and attracted the others. He’s gonna need a lot more practice because he’s weak as sh-“
“Sol!” I interrupted, before another argument could be started. “Stop ending your translations with insults,”
I heard Ralts agree, spouting off some random nonsense. Ugh, this had all turned out a lot differently than I thought it would-
FLASH.
A bright light suddenly engulfed my vision for a second, causing my eyes to blink rapidly.
“What the actual fuck?” I exclaimed as my vision began to return to me. Everything was so fucking bright, and it seemed to be emanating from Ralts.
I realized what had happened, immediately questioning Ralts. “Did you just use Flash? Fucking why?!”
I didn’t even know Ralts could learn Flash. Could they…? Well, obviously this Ralts just did…
“This Ralts is a fucking idiot. He used Flash because he said the name of the move! Why would you train yourself to use a move whenever you say it?” Sol said, sounding annoyed, with that last part directed towards Ralts.
That was pretty stupid, thinking about it now. Ralts started to argue back with an explanation but the sound of dozens of wings flapping rapidly. Everyone’s attention turned towards the roof of the cave as a countless amount of Zubat started to flock towards them.
“Shit we should go,” I managed to say breathlessly, already turning towards the lanterns to run. No one disagreed, and I started to run, stumbling over my first few steps due to Flash messing up my perception a little.
I returned to my senses quickly and started to run faster. The Zubat were definitely catching up quicker though. The walls were starting to come closer together, signifying that we were getting close to the entrance.
Still a way’s off though, and having to maneuver around the caves’ natural obstacles was making things harder.
Also I was fucking tired. I’d had enough running and walking so far, I definitely didn’t need more. Maybe I should stop trying to find Pokémon around here and just wait it out until Violet City, I kept finding trouble around this place…
Maybe we should turn back and fight them? Most wild Pokémon, especially ones like Zubat that spent most of their time sleeping were known to be weak. And psychic types were super effective against poison…
“What the fuck are you doing? Use your flashlight!” Sol suddenly chimed in, snapping me out of whatever the hell I was thinking about.
Shit. I’d really forgotten about Zubat’s hatred of light. We’d have lost a battle against all of those Zubat anyways, what the hell was I on?
Trying not to slow down, I pointed my flashlight backwards. I turned my head to make sure I was aiming correctly, inadvertently slowing down anyway. But if this worked, it shouldn’t matter…
Let there be light, I thought. And like clockwork, all the Zubat fucking scattered. Most of them went back the way they came whilst some just tried to escape the light in any way. Falling to the floor or sticking close to the cave walls. The only thing they weren’t doing was following me… except one.
“That one’s not a Zubat,” Sol astutely observed.
“Thanks genius, I couldn’t tell,” I replied sarcastically, and kept running once I saw that the Pokémon was still chasing after me. It wasn’t a Zubat, but it was a bat, or… something of the kind, I’m actually not sure.. It was a Gligar!
Now there was only one Pokémon chasing us. I once again tried to figure out if we could take it by ourselves. Technically there were three of us, but if the last battle was anything to go off of, Ralts would probably be useless.
We had no clear type advantage, but all we would technically have to do is stun the Gligar so we could get out of here. If we knocked it out of the sky, then…
“Can I attack it? There’s only one!” Sol asked preemptively.
I took a second to respond, because I was tired as fuck. “Wait a second… let me think.”
Gligar weren’t terribly rare, but were actually pretty deadly with their claw thingies. Just grabbing something wouldn’t tear it apart, but if it slashed you it could do some mean damage. Not like, slash your head into two pieces, but it could leave a nasty injury.
I had assumed that I’d be able to handle anything because most Pokémon here were low level. But just because it was low level doesn’t mean it couldn’t hurt me. I really should’ve learned that before coming in here.
I glanced behind at the Gligar, pleased to see it wasn’t gaining on us. Despite the fact that I’d been thinking for a pretty long time, and I felt like something should’ve happened. Gligar was not the best chaser, needing to jump off of something every few meters it traveled to gain height.
With how long this chase had been going, we were getting pretty close to the exit. But I figured we should still take care of this. My bones were fucking aching and if I collapsed before we got there I might still get injured.
We’d get ‘em with a hit and run, I decided. Any decent trainer would be able to handle this situation. It was not that deadly, and a Pokémon like Sol could handle getting hit if anything went wrong.
“Okay stop!” I suddenly said, turning on my heel, which took a surprising amount of energy. God I wanted to collapse right now, I should’ve chosen to fight before… or not followed Ralts in the first place. I’d nearly forgotten the little guy was still on my shoulder.
Gligar seemed shocked for a second, and I didn’t miss my attack opportunity. I had learned at least a little from my experience at the battle facility.
“Confusion!”
Sol immediately fired off a beam of energy, and I could almost feel Ralts admiration for that attack. Was that because I was so close to it? It was the Emotion Pokemon, or something of that kind.
Focus on the battle, I reminded myself. Maybe I hadn’t learned anything from the battle facility.
“Again!” I ordered, once I’d seen Gligar had lost its position in the air but seemed to be recovering. Another blast of energy sent it towards the ground, where I quickly turned heel again and began hurrying off. “Now let’s go!”
“What?! You’ve got to be fucking kidding me!” Sol immediately started to complain. “Why can’t I get this guy? He’s on the fucking floor, Gen!”
“Better to be safe than sorry,” I replied. “Besides, we caught him off guard. He could be stronger than you think.”
Sol was still outraged by this, but I could tell he was still following me. “It’s literally on the floor! It can’t do anything! That Gligar was weak as well! I didn’t even get to kill anything in that cave!”
Ignoring Sol’s use of the word kill—he used it a lot more than faint, for some reason—I rolled my eyes, “I’ll let you pick a fight outside. A cave is not the place!”
“You’re a fucking liar! You’re not gonna let me pick a fight out there! You promised me fucking battling!”
----------------------------------------
The sun had never looked brighter, and the sunlight had never felt better on my skin. Being in a cave had been sort of a cave for half an hour. But the novelty wore off after failing to find a Pokémon for a significant amount of time.
The Gligar hadn’t followed us, but Sol kept me busy anyways by bickering with me the entire time. He really wanted to battle, all the fucking time. And I wanted to too, but disrupting the wildlife just to get some entertainment wasn’t cool.
Anyways, because of that. I was still out of breath despite walking the rest of the way. I felt like I was going to pass out, and was seriously debating if I should just sleep the rest of the day away as I laid on where our camp had been the night prior.
Arghhh.
…
“The Ralts wants to join us,” Sol said, waking me from my doze.
Shit. I’d fallen asleep on the ground. “Wait, huh?” I mumbled. The Ralts… It was still here? I’d kinda assumed it’d already run away or something, but…
“Get up already and go talk to it or whatever,” Sol urged me.
I blew a raspberry mentally. I didn’t want to do anything right now, but I got on my feet anyway. “You have to come with me, to translate,” I reminded him.
“This arrangement sucks ass. I wish I couldn’t use telepathy,”
I spotted Ralts on top of a small rock, and walked towards it. “How come Ralts can hear your telepathy?” I asked, remembering how they bickered in the caves.
“Yeah. I can do it with other psychic types easily I guess, but you have to be powerful to do it with any human or Pokémon without a bond,”
That’s good to know. I nodded to myself before approaching Ralts. I kneeled to it, because even though it was on a rock. It still wasn’t even close to eye level.
“So you want to come with me, huh?” I asked, just to be sure.
Ralts nodded before starting another incomprehensible ramble. I was completely unsure of what he was talking about and looked to Sol for translation.
“Okay he says we’re heroes because we saved him and he wants to join us because of that,” Sol explained.
“Because of that, huh? So if you came from Hoenn, were you searching for a trainer or something?”
Another response from Ralts made me groan for a second, “This would be a lot easier if I could just understand Ralts too…”
Sol chimed in with a response, “Just form a bond already. It’s not like you’re gonna turn Ralts down, right?”
Yeah. I mean, I wasn’t going to turn down Ralts. I’d been searching—rather inefficient—for a new Pokémon for like a week. There wasn’t a reason I’d turn Ralts down even if I wasn’t desperate. But this was good luck that a Pokémon just… wanted to join me.
“Well, okay then, Ralts, will you make a psychic bond with me?” I questioned. I was unsure about how this psychic bond stuff worked in the first place. It was common knowledge that they existed but did psychics just… know how to do it? This Ralts seemed pretty weak, so could he make a psychic bond?
I got my answer as soon as a familiar feeling interacted with my head. But unlike in my room with Sol, I had a picture and could feel what was going on. Ralts’ head was connecting with mine, and I could sense the connection forming.
Right away, I could feel stronger emotions from Ralts than I could from Sol. They were almost overflowing into my own head, like any feeling he felt would be sent to my own brain in tiny proportions.
I felt Ralts sent an emotion to me, on purpose I was pretty sure. I could tell because it seemed like I could feel the intent of his… feelings?
Heroes. Together. Curiosity?
Heroes? Ralts was asking if I would be a hero with him… Well, it wasn’t like I was going to let people be hurt on my watch. I’d do my fair share of good.
“Yeah,” I answered. “We’ll be heroes together.”
“This is quite possibly the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen.” Sol replied rudely.
I felt irritation and anger well up within Ralts. But he didn’t argue back with an insult or something this time. Instead he pointed at the pokeball on my belt that held Sol.
Whoops. Kinda forgot about the whole catching progress. I unzipped my satchel and pulled a pokeball out from it and waited a second before bumping it on Ralts’ green hair. He was transformed into his energy form as he was sucked into the pokeball. I waited a few seconds and… no resistance.
I’d caught a Pokémon.