Larry walked around with his arms outstretched, simply trying to find his balance with the pebble in his mouth. He came back upon the lake he’d seen inside the cave, checking himself over in the water's reflection again he was still very much a Larvitar. He looked exactly like any depiction of the Pokémon he’d ever seen. However, the stony skin along his body was accentuated more in real life, not being the indistinct green of the Pokémon artwork ‘Guess I AM a rock type after all.’

‘I am kind of happy with how I lucked out though, I’m a future Pseudo-Legendary Pokémon. I know for sure I wouldn’t have wanted to be a Caterpie…’

Having found his bearings, Larry took a stroll around the cave, he didn’t know if this place was really dangerous yet or if Pokémon were really smart enough to not rip each other to shreds. ‘I wonder where this cave is anyway, there were a lot of caves in Pokémon, I could probably be anywhere.’

The only cave that came to his mind that housed the Tyranitar line of Pokémon was Mt. Silver, which would mean that Larry was right in between Kanto and Johto.

Before long he found one of the walls of the cave in the darkness, he already had a plan hatched out, ‘I'll walk along the wall until I find some kind of exit, so I can get out of this damn cave, I know I’m a rock type, but this just isn’t the best environment.’

‘Using the right-hand rule, I should be able to find my way out of here. Let’s just try not to get mauled by anything down here'

Clawing at the wall uselessly, Larry walks along it simply following it in the hopes of finding some way out. The darkness at the edges of the cave is far darker, while out in the open at least some sort of light filtered in from somewhere, in the corners and at the edges of the cave there was practically no light to speak of. To Larry, this felt more akin to walking along the wall to his toilet at night because he didn’t care to turn on the light than the exploration of the wild cave he’d been expecting.

He could still see far better than he might’ve expected, but rock-type Pokémon were bound to have better night vision due to the amount of time these species spend underground.

Just as he was beginning to discount the dangerous world of Pokémon before him, his short stubby feet got stuck on something and he fell squarely on his face. Nursing a hurt snout, he slowly rolled over onto his butt with a groan, the squeak of his new body making the action seem far cuter than any adult human male probably ever wanted to be. ‘God damn it! What the hell tripped me?’

Turning over he saw a round rock, just as large as him wriggling itself out of the ground, a Geodude, the whites of its eyes stared back at him, as it tried to identify what seemed to have woken him up. It bleary eyes blinked away some of the last sleep, but when it finally caught the Larvitar sitting on its butt in front of him, it seemed to just stop.

The next moment, all hell broke loose as it gave of a shrill cry of two stones mashing against another. Noises of awakening Geodude emerged all around Larry, they took him out of his stupor and he finally stood back up and realized that all around him were now a large pack of Geodude. ‘It seems I’ve gotten myself stuck in a Geodude nest…’

Geodude were clamoring all around him in a wild panic, some were already holding their hands up, ready to catch a fist or deliver one to Larrys face. Larry himself stood perfectly still, not daring to move in the presence of the large group of Pokémon, his mind was going a mile a minute trying to come up with an escape route.

‘Alright, they look ready to beat me up, how the hell do I get out of here? Fight? I barely knew how to fight as a human, why should I bet my life on that? Diplomacy? Pokémon are said to be smart, maybe we can communicate!’

A new plan made, Larry cleared his throat theatrically, making a few of the Geodude flinch with the action. Before he began speaking, “I’m sorry, I accidentally ran into your territory. Would you mind letting me back out, so I can go about my way? I didn’t intend to enter your territory and again, I apologize.”

It might’ve looked just like a few squeaks to humans, but the Geodude seemed to understand his words. They looked at each other, before one broke out of the group approaching Larry with a few practiced knuckle-drags and pointed a finger at him. “You broke in Geodude territory, say sorry? You Geodude eater!”

All the Geodude gave off shrill rocky cries of agreement, Larry was confused for a short second before it hit him. ‘Ohh! I’m like a cannibal to these dudes because I eat rocks and earth? Wait, don’t they also do that? How does that work?!’

“You eat rocks too! Why am I the only one being treated rudely! We’re all rock types!”

“Geodude don’t eat Geodude! Geodude eater!”

Once again his group of hype-men gave him a resounding cry of approval, Larry was now getting worked up arguing with something that wasn’t even human, so he steeled himself to answer.

“I don’t eat Geodude! I came here by accident! I can’t see anything around here!”

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

“Geodude eater! No accident!”

For a third time, his hype-men gave him a round of approval. ‘I don’t think there is any end to this argument, let’s just leave’

With a small effort he stood back up, “I’ll just leave, sorry for going into the territory.” As he trotted out of the circle of Geodude that surrounded him, they began to goad him with cries of “Geodude eater” “Dumb eater” and many more. A normal future pseudo-legendary might’ve fallen for their goading, but Larry had heard stronger insults during his school years.

‘So there’s entire groups of Pokémon living around here. I wonder if I could just ask some for directions or if they’ll try to hurt me.’ With the semblances of a plan made, he continued along the wall. The darkness around here was still impressive and before long he finally found a corner in the cave that broke off into its own tunnel.

Larry followed the way into the tunnel, it was leaning slightly upwards, giving him hope that he might find his way to the outside. In the complete and utter darkness of the cave he could barely make out his own limbs, as he kept sauntering upwards, he finally found a stream of light breaking through. It wasn’t pitch-black anymore, but just dim.

‘That must mean there is some sort of exit up there! Or at least a light source!’ Sight finally returned to him, Larry finally let go of the wall and kept going his way upwards, he saw the way upwards in front of him steepen significantly, and at some point it became more akin to hiking than simply walking and Larry found himself fighting to climb upwards, he didn’t have the gift of hands anymore, only the clawed stubs, which certainly didn’t help with the climb.

Before long, he needed to use his hands as well and could only continue on all fours, but when the climb turned into a simple sheer rock wall with a large light source at the top. Larry decided to give up and turn back, this wasn’t climbable, at least not without proper hands.

‘Huff…huff…Alright, this is impossible! I’ve got to find another way out, there has got to be more places I can leave through!’ Huffing to himself shortly in short little squeaks and complaining about his new form for a few minutes he slowly eased his way back down.

He quickly snatched a pretty stone off of the ground on his descent and stuffed it inside his mouth, bliss once again spreading through his tastebuds. On his way back, he spotted another Pokémon, luckily not by tripping over it this time. A small Dwebble was meandering about on the exit of the tunnel he had walked into.

The Dwebble hadn’t noticed him yet and seemed to be searching the ground for something. Larry cleared his throat with a slight “Ahem!” The tiny bug type in front of him seemed to jump at the sudden rasp behind him, and even worse, its face turned grim when it saw what made the noise.

Watching the Dwebbles life flash before its eyes, Larry tried the nice approach, “Um, hello. Do you maybe know a way out of this cave? I’m kind of trying to find a way out of here.”

Larry waited for his conversation partner to answer, but when after around 10 seconds he still hadn’t and the small Dwebble still had a ‘deer in the headlights’ look in its eyes, Larry tried to approach. After his first step though, the small Dwebble immediately responded in kind, by taking a step backward. Larry put another step forward, only for Dwebble to reciprocate by taking one back.

“H-Hey, I’m not planning to eat you, you know?” Larry said jokingly, but when the words left his mouth, he realized how they might sound to the Dwebble. His theory was confirmed, when a small whimper and a pair of beady tears escaped the Dwebble, ‘Alright, now I just feel bad. How do I save this?’

“Haah…Alright, let’s do it this way. I’ll stay at this distance, and you’ll stay where you are. You will point in a direction to the surface, it is completely ok if you don’t know any though, so stop looking at me like I’m a predator.” Larry sat down on the cold stone of the cave and waited for his terrified companion to show some kind of reaction. After a slow 15 seconds or so, the Dwebble began to look around, though only with its eyes, by keeping its body stock still.

After another few seconds, it quirked its head to the side quizzically.

“Why?”

“Hm? What do you mean why?” Larry asked.

“Why aren’t you hunting me?” The Dwebble countered.

“Well, I need to find a way out of this cave. I can’t ask Pokémon who don’t want to come near me.”

Larry's answer didn’t seem to satisfy Dwebble as it warily took another half step back from his sitting position, “Are you trying to trick me?”

Larry was getting slightly annoyed by how evasive and distrustful this Dwebble was being, “If I wanted to hunt you or whatever, why didn’t I just do it before when you were turned around and I could’ve simply ambushed you?”

The Dwebble pondered the question more seriously than he thought necessary before answering, “You’re right, you didn’t ambush me.”

It looked at him more resolutely than before, “You wanted a way to the surface, right?”

“Yes, that’s right. I don’t want to stay here.” Larry nodded along.

Its pincers seemed to open and close while it thought, it seemed conflicted. Finally, with a sigh, it seemed to decide, “Haah, fine. If it will get you to leave me alone...”

Dwebble seemed to take the question seriously and pondered it for a few moments, “Hmm, the best way out is probably through one of the human pathways, they’re barely used anyway, just don’t be spotted by the territorial bosses.”

‘Human walkways? So this IS some mainline Pokémon world and not a mystery dungeon type of situation!’ Larry thought excitedly.

The bug Pokémon turned back to him, “Otherwise…” and pointed at the sheer climb behind him, “…that climb made by one of the Onyx is your best chance.”

Glancing back at the steep climb he’d just given up on, Larry shook his head and sighed, “Hah, yeah. I just tried to climb up there, I don’t think that is happening...”

Dwebble glanced at him curiously once more, “Well, I guess the human walkways are your only way out then.” The bug Pokémon turned and started to make its way back into the darkness, “Well, if you’ll excuse me then...I’ll be on my way.”

“Wait!” Larry squeaked out in a panic.

“Eep! W-What now?!” Dwebble turned back to Larry, who was now approaching him.

“Where are those human walkways?”

Dwebble finally toppled into himself again, another sigh escaping it, “...I-I’ll show you...Follow me...”