Larry was catching his breath and rubbing his stomach where the Slash from the Crustle had hit him, ‘Phew, that really could’ve gone far worse. The entire cave was about to come down on us. If I hadn’t stopped my mom, I think she would have continued to rampage until she killed herself.’

Cracks marred the high ceiling of the cave he’d been born in, threatening to cave in at any moment. No Pokémon were in sight, the clear and pristine miniature lakes of water Larry remembered were now nothing more than mud pits filled with debris and sand. Not a single stalagmite or stalactite stood tall anymore, all of them either having fallen off the roof and shattered spectacularly or having been swallowed by the immense rounds of earthquake his mother had unleashed.

Larry didn’t exactly know if the cave would regain some of its former beauty over time or if his mom had just irreparably destroyed the natural environment of the cave. He simply hoped not too many Pokémon were hurt, he hadn’t spotted any on his way here, so they might’ve gotten lucky.

His gaze drifted back to his mom, who was panting to herself frantically as she looked around the cavern, ‘I just wish I wouldn’t have to meet her like this...’ Larry wasn’t the best at familial relations, back when he was still human, he hadn’t written his mom in quite some time, so he didn’t know how to feel about his second-life mom.

“Umm...Mom?” Larry began, his mom calmed back down after hearing his voice and down closer to him.

His mom's gaze lazily traveled down to him, her eyes were unfocused and weak. When her eyes fell on him though, a fire lit up inside them and she bent down further to caress her head against Larry.

Slowly, a low and rumbly voice spoke up, “Are...Are you, my child?”

“Yes!”

“I’ve been looking...” His mother panted, “...all over...”

Larry looked around a bit unsurely, ‘I’d call this a bit more than looking...’

For now, he needed to assuage her fear and simply play the cute little perfect son, “I’m sorry Mom! I won’t run away again!”

A weak smile spread across his mother's face as her eyes drowsily began to flitter closed, “... That...That's good...”

His mother sat down slowly, sweeping Larry in close for a hug using her large tail. She took him in with her short arms and cozied down onto the dirt in the thrashed cavern, holding him to her chest like a plushy.

Her eyes drifted closed quickly after and before he could even begin to protest, Larry began to hear a calm snoring emerge from behind his head. ‘No way she just fell asleep like that...”

‘I-I don’t know if I should be happy or scared right now...’

Larry didn’t move a muscle, simply looking around in slight panic, his eyes flittered from side to side scanning the terrain until they fell on the Crustle, slowly approaching.

The Crustle saw his panicked stare and sighed assuaging his fear, “Don’t worry, don’t worry. I’m not going to hurt you, I’m not stupid enough to wake a sleeping Tyranitar.”

She closed the distance leisurely, before stopping at a safe distance away from the sleeping beast Larry was currently being cuddled by. Larry needed to know so he asked in a hushed tone, “N-Nice to meet you, are you Dwebbles Mom?”

“Oh? You’re a talkative one. You have met one of my kids?” The Crustle gave a casual smile at the mention of her children before continuing, “I hope they didn’t treat you badly. I try my best to raise them well, they’re just around the nest shorter than I wish.”

The intelligence of the Crustle surprised him a bit, she had the air of an old and well-wised mother figure, not that of a Pokémon living in the depths of a cave.

“N-No, Dwebble was nice and courteous, he treated me well and showed me the ropes just after hatching. I still feel like I’m in his debt for all the things he’s taught me.”

Crustle snickered, “Don’t worry yourself, they love being helpful, it just such a disappointment that none of the Pokémon up here in the third level appreciate help that much.” She clicked her tongue audibly, “Tsk, lousy Wild Pokémon...” She began as the Graveler his mom had fought began to stir awake.

‘Eep!’

Everyone awake immediately turned to it, but when its eyes cracked open and it spotted, the sleeping Tyranitar and a Crustle right next to it, it immediately began rolling away without even so much as a word.

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‘Phew, good that he didn’t want a round two...’

‘...Wild Pokémon?’ The word tumbled around in his mind, ‘Does that mean what I think it means?’

Larry had to be sure, so he sheepishly broached the subject, “Considering you call them wild Pokémon, does that mean...?”

The Bug-Type looked back up at him, being broken out of her internal monologue, “Hm? Oh, yes, you’d be correct. I had a trainer at some point, named me and everything.” She squinted at Larry inquisitively, “You’re a pretty talkative one for being so young, aren’t you?”

Cogs in his head started to turn 'Does that mean someone abandoned her up here? Or was she let go?’ A hundred theories came to mind about her circumstances, but it did explain to him how a Crustle managed to get all this way up Mt. Silver. A trainer who had for some reason released her all the way up in the caverns of Mt. Silver.

His mom grumbled in her sleep and turned over onto her side and Larry almost yelped out in surprise but managed to keep quiet. He wanted to keep talking to Crustle, but she didn’t seem to be the talkative type.

He hurriedly tried to continue the conversation, still stuck like a plush toy in his sleeping mom's arms, “I am talkative, yeah. The name is Larry by the way, what's yours?”

She looked at Larry with a bit of surprise, “My trainer used to call me Griselda, although I haven’t gone by that name in some time.” She eyed Larry curiously, “How’d you get your hands on a name?”

‘Oh...Maybe I shouldn’t have said that...’ Larry started to sweat slightly, “I, umm, gave it to myself?”

Griselda hummed to herself before smiling at him, “It's a good name, nice and simple.” she looked around a bit tensely, “Look, I’d love to continue chatting with you, but I wouldn’t want to be here when your mom wakes up, so I’ll make myself scarce.”

“Oh! Alright, thanks for the talk!” Larry perked up, “It was nice meeting Dwebbles Mom!”

The Crustle nodded to him courteously before turning around to leave, “Bye, Larry!”

Larry watched her leave; this was an unexpected turn of events. Out of all the Pokémon Larry expected to meet up here, Dwebbles mom wasn’t one he had expected. She was far nicer than Dwebble made her sound, surprisingly so. Although maybe the giant sleeping monster of mass destruction that was cuddling him right now was making her opinion more favorable.

‘For now... I guess I’m stuck.’ Larry thought to himself. He might be able to wriggle himself free, but a repeat of the situation was the last thing he wanted right now, and he wasn’t completely against this. He had met his mom and calmed her down, she loved him and was currently cuddling him to sleep.

‘Isn’t this the best outcome?’ He thought to himself, ‘I guess I could’ve done it a bit earlier, but who was going to think the ear-splitting roars that shake the entire cave system are coming from specifically your mom?’

Larry cozied back into his mom, ‘Never, uhm, never really did any of this...’ A slight blush appeared on his face, ‘Aren’t I kind of too old for this kind of maternal love? Wait, am I still a 20-something or did that reset with the whole death situation?’

The marathon he’d done racing back up had tuckered him out and arguing with himself in his mind about the appropriate age to hug your mom was also very draining. It slowly made him sleepy, his mom's rumbling snores and body heat also didn’t help his situation.

‘Damn it, Larry, you’re never too old to hug your mom! I’m not going to run away again, so let's get some shuteye!’ Finally coming to a conclusion in his mind, Larry made a choice, he slowly turned around in his mom's grip and hugged her back, snuggling onto her hard rocky skin.

His instincts spoke back to him instantly and he finally realized that it wasn’t only his choice that got him here, his instincts as a Larvitar had also guided him back to his mom. Larvitar loved their mothers, and Larry wasn’t different just because he was also part human.

‘Instincts are scary...’ He shuddered to himself as his eyes began to close, ‘Really...really scary...’

...

Larry stirred awake sometime later, the cavern still looked the same, completely dark, high ceiling, large pools of water, and most prominently, everything was absolutely trashed. The place still looked as if a truck had crashed through it. Now that Larry thought of it, that description wasn’t even that far off.

His mom was still conked out and cuddling him up to herself like a plush toy and Larry was still stuck for lack of a better term.

Using the time efficiently, he began to plan his next moves, ‘Alright, good morning, my dear self. Let’s plan out how this’ll go.’

‘Should I stay here with Mom or try and convince her to let me go down the mountain cave?’

He weighed his options, from the way his mom had behaved before, he didn’t think it possible for him to convince her to let him go. It also didn’t seem like a bad choice to learn the basics up here with someone who could watch over him, Larry knew that the way things had gone down before was stupid.

The only reason he was still alive was because of the generosity of Pokémon like Dwebble, the sheer incompetence of predators like the Woopers and Misdreavus he’d met and an extra-large helping of luck. He didn’t have any delusion of grandeur yet, sure, he now saw that Tyranitar are terrifying beasts that no other Pokémon liked to mess with.

But in the games, there are also at least 55 levels before any newborn Larvitar gets to that level. You aren’t going to become a Pseudo-Legendary without considerable effort on the trainer's part, and in his case, Larry was his own trainer. It was his job to train himself to get to that level and he’d have to use anything to get there if he wanted to be safe as a wild Pokémon.

‘My mom also got there in the end, so maybe there is some way to make it easier?’ Larry wasn’t even sure how evolution was supposed to work here, he hadn’t seen or felt any sort of leveling system, no stat screen either.

His core thrummed inside him, ‘It's probably got something to do with this thing, doesn’t it? It's the only thing out of the ordinary.’ The energies that Pokémon can naturally express, Larry didn’t know how exactly it worked and why. Maybe his mom could shed some light on it when she finally woke up.

‘Alright, its settled! I’ll stay with my mom for a bit, learn the basics of Larvitarin’ and then ask very nicely if I can leave.’ The darkness pressed in on Larry once more, down in the second level it was far brighter with all the cave exits, up here he could only anything see because he was a Larvitar, ‘I can’t stay here all my life! That would just be miserable!’