Chapter Eleven

CHAPTER ELEVEN

The depths of Viridian Forest at night were as dark as any cave, and just as infested with nocturnal Pokémon. Every other step seemed to set off a new swarm of the damned things to go screeching off overhead, forcing us to take cover or become dinner for some hungry bloodsucker.

Flashlight in hand, I tried my best not to slip on the forest’s muddy floor as I pushed my way through the increasingly dense vegetation. It had rained earlier, the downpour soaking us from head to foot and turning the leaf-mulch-covered forest floor into a shallow swamp. Exhausted and wet, Ace huddled on my shoulder, shivering, while Arashi continued to trundle along at my side, refusing to return to her ball even when the mud reached her belly.

Most trainers would probably have called it quits hours ago, but I knew my Pokémon were strong enough to keep pushing on. We had to keep searching. Even if it meant going against the cardinal rule of never travelling at night.

“I’m tired,” Joey complained, trudging along behind us. “Can’t we stop for the night?”

Ace whined softly in agreement and licked at my cheek. I sighed. Pulling out my Pokédex, I shielded the screen from the water still dripping from above and checked the map. Though no maps of Viridian Forest existed, and many claimed the forest itself changed too frequently to ever truly be mapped, the simple navigation system was still able to pinpoint my location as not far from the center of the forest, and hopefully our goal.

“We’re so close, buddy,” I whispered to Ace. “Just a little further.”

Ace licked my cheek again but didn’t complain. I reached up and gave him a scratch under his chin. Swinging my flashlight before us, I caught a glimpse of glowing eyes watching from above — our only warning before, silently, the Noctowl swooped down low over us, talons outstretched to snatch my starter from his perch. I tried to duck, but I was too slow. Behind me Joey screamed.

“Baaa!” snarled Arashi, electricity flashing in the dark as she struck the nocturnal predator with a Thunder Shock, forcing it to bank hard.

Screeching, the Noctowl pulled up from its dive and beat a hasty retreat, wings beating hard against the still night air.

“Thanks, Arashi,” I said to my Mareep, digging a berry from my pocket to reward her with. Ace yipped his own thanks.

“It—it tried to eat Ace!” Joey said, shaking with adrenaline.

“Welcome to the real world, kid,” I said, pushing onwards. “Wild Pokémon aren’t your friends. They’re hungry and dangerous.”

He didn’t reply, and I hoped he was letting my words sink in. He was destined for a short life if he didn’t. Still following the now nearly non-existent path, I ducked under a tree that had fallen against its neighbours, creating a natural arch covered by thick needles like a curtain, my hands coming away sticky with acrid sap.

“Um, Chloe,” the kid called my name.

“Shh,” I hissed at him. “Keep your voice down.”

“Chloe!” he called again, panic in his voice.

I spun around. Behind me, Joey struggled to free himself from the curtain of pine needles, silvery strands tangling themselves about his body. I swung my flashlight up, the powerful beam cutting through the dark.

“Fuck me,” I said.

Spinarak. Dozens, maybe hundreds, of the fist-sized green and yellow spider Pokémon hung above us in a great mass of spider web strung through the canopy. We’d walked right into a nest. Alerted by the kid’s struggles, the Spinarak scurried toward us, chittering their mandibles. One by one, they began to drop from their nest, descending slowly on sticky strands of web from their abdomens.

“Arashi! Thunder Wave!” I shouted, ducking my head and rushing to help free Joey. “Keep them off us!”

“I don’t wanna die!” the kid wailed, frantically trying to tear himself free only to tangle himself more. Electricity crackled around us, flashes of energy lighting up the night.

“Keep still!” I shouted into his face. He didn’t stop struggling entirely, but he did calm down a little.

From my side, I yanked free my hunting knife from its sheath and started sawing at the sticky trap. Slowly, so slowly, the webbing parted beneath the razor-sharp blade. I felt something shift on my shoulder and panicked briefly before I realised it was Ace, reorienting himself to fire off Swifts at the approaching Spinarak.

Arashi cried out and I risked a glance over my shoulder at her. An Ariados, the much larger evolved form of Spinarak, had dropped from the nest right onto her back, its mandibles biting deeply into the exposed area at the base of her neck. Sparks arced and flashed through her dark wool as her Static kicked in, paralysing the red-and-black spider and causing it to fall to the forest floor.

Arashi swayed on her feet, the Ariados’ venom working its way through her system. Continuing to saw at the trap with one hand, I grabbed Arashi’s ball with the other and returned her in a flash of red light. While only an Antidote or a Pokémon Center could cure her, the stasis effect inside the Poké Ball would keep the poison from spreading.

With a final snap, the sticky trap fell apart and Joey slumped to the ground, free. Grabbing him by the arm, I hauled him back to his feet and pushed him back the way we had come, following right on his heels.

“Go, kid, go!” I screamed at him.

Adrenaline surging, we ran blindly through the forest, desperate to put as much space as possible between us and the spider Pokémon. After what felt like an hour but was probably closer to ten minutes, we both came to an exhausted stop in a small clearing, chests heaving as we puffed and panted. Once I caught my breath, I flashed my light about, making sure we’d gotten away.

“We’ll stop here for tonight,” I declared, seeing no Spinarak giving chase.

I stabbed my hiking pole into the soft earth and hung my flashlight from it, twisting its handle and switching it to lantern mode, bathing the clearing in soft light. Dropping my pack, I dug out an Antidote and a couple of Oran berries, then released Arashi. The Mareep glowered up at me from where she slumped on the soft grass.

“I know, alright,” I told her, spraying her bite marks with the Antidote before passing both her and Ace an Oran each. “I take full responsibility. I should have known better than to continue once it got too dark.”

Arashi snorted and noisily devoured her berry, looking much better after doing so as she perked up and stood to investigate the clearing.

“Ace, Arashi, can you please clear some space for us?” I asked the pair. “We’re going to stay here tonight.”

Ace and Arashi quickly set about clearing a small space for our campsite, removing any loose stones and smoothing out the ground with Sand Attack, or gathering sticks into a pile for kindling, while I set down my pack and started unpacking our camping equipment, including a tarp to cover the wet ground and another to stretch overhead in case it rained again.

Tarps placed, I dug out the tightly folded bag containing our pop-up tent, placed it on the ground tarp and pressed the release. With a whipping sound, the bag snapped open and quite literally “popped” into the shape of a small black and orange dome with a zipper down the front.

“Where is that towel,” I muttered, digging through my pack. “Don’t tell me I forgot to pack one.”

“I, um, I don’t—” Joey started.

Yes, that really was his name. A family name, he had proudly claimed, after an uncle that had once been the finest Rattata trainer in all of Kanto. Okay, that last part I made up, but seriously, Joey the youngster and his Mankey? What next, was he going to start telling me how comfy his shorts were?

“You don’t have a tent, or a pack,” I said, rolling my eyes. I gave up on finding a towel and started drying myself with a spare t-shirt. “I saw. There’s enough room in mine for both of us, but if you snore or fart, I’m kicking you out, got it?”

“Yes! I mean, thank you!” Joey said, jumping up and down excitedly.

“But seriously, what were you thinking heading into Viridian Forest of all places without any supplies?” I asked as I unfolded my camp chair and set up my camp stove. I needed a hot meal after slogging through the rain.

As I worked to cook us some dinner, Joey, sitting cross-legged on the tarp across from me, told me his story. I’ll summarise it here so you don’t have to deal with all the tangents and backtracking I had to, but his story boiled down to this:

Joey had an older brother, a Pokémon trainer with four whole badges, by the name of Ross. Joey adored his brother, looked up to him as an idol, and wanted more than anything to be just like him. So when Ross gifted Joey with a Mankey, Joey decided then and there he had to become a Pokémon trainer just like his big brother.

Joey had no training or education in Pokémon training, of course. He was just a regular school kid from Pewter City, and the only battles he’d been in before ours were against his fellow schoolmates. Apparently it was totally normal in this world to give grade school children walking weapons of mass destruction and let them wail on each other at lunchtime.

But then, his brother stopped calling. They had no word from him for months and then, one day, they got the news they’d been dreading. Ross had been killed defending a frontier settlement in the north from a berserk Ursaring.

Heartbroken, driven by grief and a need to continue his brother’s dream, Joey had thrown together a bug catcher’s outfit and snuck into the forest from the Pewter City side, intending to catch “strong Pokémon” to add to his team.

Unfortunately for me, Joey had become hopelessly lost and wandered through the forest for the past two days until he encountered me.

“And your bright idea was to challenge the first person you saw,” I said. It was a statement, not a question.

Setting water to boil on my camp stove, I moved a short distance away and placed down two rubbery-plastic pet food bowls that could be flattened and rolled up for easy storage. Filling them with Poké Chow, I called my Pokémon over to eat.

“Everyone always said Pokémon trainers only respect other strong trainers,” the kid said, staring into the small flame of my stove. “I thought maybe if I beat you, you’d want me to join you on your journey.”

Ace finished his dinner first, as usual, before staggering over by the stove’s warmth and flopping onto his bloated belly. Picking up his bowl, I swished some water in it to clean it, then refilled it with more Poké Chow.

“Send out your Mankey,” I said. “I doubt you’ve fed it in days.”

Joey managed to look ashamed as he pulled his only Poké Ball from his pocket and released the angry little Fighting-type. It looked exhausted, even after resting in its ball all afternoon.

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At first, the kid had tried to join in whenever we ran into wild Pokémon, but I had been quick to stop him. The last thing I wanted was a Mankey losing its cool and attacking when we wanted to avoid or de-escalate a conflict.

It looked around and I pointed at the bowl of food. Hooting, it hopped over to the bowl and began scooping up Poké Chow with its hands and stuffing it into its face.

Water boiling, Pokémon fed, I tore open a silvery satchel of ready-to-eat Tauros-beef stroganoff and, carefully, poured the boiling water in. Stirring it with a steel spoon to mix it all together, I handed it to the kid who looked at me with surprise.

“What? You thought I wasn’t going to feed you?” I said, refilling my pot with water to make my own dinner.

“Thank you! Me and Mr Wiggles haven’t had anything but berries since yesterday!” he said, digging into the satchel and scooping the food into his mouth as messily as his Pokémon. “Mmm, that’s really good. You know, for someone so scary-looking, you’re actually really nice!”

“I’m scary-looking?” I asked, surprised. At five foot nothing and scrawny enough to count my ribs, I’d been called a lot of things over the years but never scary before.

“Yeah! All those pieces of metal stuck on your face?” he said, waving his spoon at my face between bites. “And you’ve got scary eyes, too.”

I scowled at him.

“Like that!” he said excitedly. “How do those stay on, anyway? Did you glue them on?”

“My piercings? They aren’t stuck on, they go through my skin,” I said. I pulled down my bottom lip to show him how the rings went through to the other side.

“Ew,” he said, sticking out his tongue at me. I stuck mine out back at him and wiggled the steel barbell impaled in it. “Ewww! Doesn’t that hurt?”

“Only at first,” I said, idly spinning my nose ring. “I forget they’re there most of the time.”

Spoon of stroganoff halfway to his mouth, Joey paused and tilted his head to one side, looking at me.

“What?” I said, feeling uncomfortable.

“But why?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” I said, shrugging. Tearing open another pouch of ready-to-eat food, I poured boiling water in and started stirring the mash inside with my fork. “I just like them, I guess. They’re cool.”

“Ma would kill me if I came home with metal stuck in my face like that,” Joey said, scraping the last of his dinner from the foil pouch.

“Lots of people have piercings,” I said, then seeing his look of doubt added, “Where I am from, lots of people have piercings. And tattoos. Or coloured hair. Just whatever makes them happy.”

“Well not where I’m from,” he said, handing me back the empty satchel and spoon. I had sealable waste bags in my pack to hold rubbish so the smell wouldn’t attract wild Pokémon, and I’d wash the spoon later.

“Pewter City, right?” I said.

“Mhm, everyone there is so dull though,” he said, shoulders slumping. “Everyone tells me to be quiet, do my homework, don’t paint the city walls. So lame.”

I laughed.

“It’s true!” he insisted. “Everything is just kind of grey there.”

“Well maybe you can try and brighten it up a bit when you get back,” I said, finishing the last of my own dinner and boiling more water to wash with.

We’d run across a small stream a few hours ago and refilled my water bladder, the built-in filtration system leaving it tasting slightly odd but safe to drink, so at least we had water to spare.

“I’m not going back, I’m going with you,” Joey said, stifling a yawn. “I’m going on a Pokémon journey.”

“I hate to burst your bubble, kid, but I’m not on a Pokémon journey,” I told him. Nearby Arashi had started to snore. “I don’t care about badges or entering the Indigo Conference or whatever you dreamed about when you ran away from home.”

“But you’re a Pokémon trainer,” the kid said, seemingly unable to wrap his head around what I was telling him. “All Pokémon trainers go after Gym badges.”

“Not me,” I said, shaking my head. “In fact, I told the Viridian Gym Leader to stick her badge up her ass.”

“WHAT?!” Joey shouted, suddenly wide awake. “You told Suzie what?!”

I shrugged.

“It’s not that big of a deal,” I said, standing up from my camp chair and folding it up to pack away. “She was a bitch, so I told her to shove her badge up her ass and she challenged me to find some stupid flower. That’s why we’re here.”

“But Suzie is Forrest’s sister!” the kid said, looking incensed.

“So?” I said.

I quickly washed up our utensils with the cooling boiled water and a little powdered soap, double checked any food waste was properly sealed away, and started packing up my equipment, getting ready for bed.

“So? You just can’t, that’s why!” he argued.

“I’m going to bed,” I told him, refusing to discuss Gym Leaders any further. “I’d hurry up and get inside if you don’t want to be left out here in the dark.”

His eyes went wide at the idea of being left out in the dark alone and he fled for the safety of the tiny tent, Mr Wiggles right behind him. I nudged Arashi and Ace awake and they too made their way inside. Taking down my lantern and retracting my hiking pole, I followed.

Dragging Ace in close to my chest to cuddle, Arashi at my feet, I was asleep in minutes.

—

That night, I dreamt of home.

Not Pallet, which I’d called home for the past three months. My real home. My shitty little apartment above a convenience store. I dreamt I was in my bedroom, gig posters plastering the walls to cover the garish yellow paint, the hum of the old radiator as it struggled to hold back the Canadian winter, the faint smell of garbage and car fumes drifting up through my poorly sealed window.

I should have felt safe. But everything felt wrong.

The walls were too close, leaning in towards me, suffocating me. The faces on the posters were blurred, their colours dripping like melting wax. The hum of the radiator, once so comforting, was now too loud. It thumped in my ears like the pounding of my heart.

From somewhere else, I could hear my parents talking. But that wasn’t right. My parents had never visited my apartment. I tried to make out what they were saying but the words blurred together, rising and falling like a car skidding out of control.

I pressed my hands over my ears, but it didn’t help.

The room lurched sideways and suddenly I was staring at headlights. Blinding white, bearing down on me. My chest locked. My throat closed. I couldn’t breathe!

I woke gasping, nails digging into my palms so hard I’d left crescents in the skin. Ace whined against my shoulder, licking at my face. Arashi stirred at my feet, ears flicking at the noise.

“Just a dream,” I whispered, though my throat felt raw. “Just a dream.”

I forced myself to lie back down, clutching Ace against me like a lifeline. I didn’t sleep again. Not really. Just drifted in that half-space where the dark presses close and every shadow feels like it’s waiting to swallow you whole.

—

I woke cold, four different sets of snores shaking the tent, and the foul-smelling feet of a Mankey sprawled across me. Shoving the offending feet out of my face, I tried in vain to pull more blanket over myself, but it wouldn’t budge. With only the one sleeping bag between us, I had unzipped it all the way the night before and turned it into a makeshift blanket to share with the kid. The same kid that was now wrapped up in that blanket like a tightly packed burrito.

“Little bitch,” I cursed him under my breath.

Shoving Mankey off me, I crawled over to the tent’s front flap and stuck my head out. No wild Pokémon bit my head off, so I continued the rest of the way out into the dim morning light, hiking pole in hand and ready to be extended into a weapon in an instant. I took a quick look around, making sure we had no unwanted guests, but found only a few footprints, small and deep, circling the tent before continuing off into the trees. Stantler maybe?

Sticking my head back into the tent, I grabbed my pack and dragged it out to start cooking breakfast. Deciding to save my fuel, I lit a small fire with the sticks my Pokémon had collected rather than light my camp stove, making sure I cleared the ground thoroughly first. I wasn’t super well-versed in survival skills, but I knew I didn’t want to set the forest on fire.

I was a bit limited in cookware options, owning only a small stainless steel pot shaped like a kidney that doubled as a cup and a stainless steel pan barely the size of my palm with a foldable handle. I’d used the pot last night to heat up our dinner.

Grabbing out the pan and some strips of streaky Lechonk bacon, I started cooking, the rich aroma wafting through the forest, and it wasn’t long before the rest of the tent’s occupants joined me, eagerly gathering around my tiny fire. Using my camp stove as a little table, I set the hot pan down and unpacked my team’s bowls and set them up nearby.

“Don’t worry, Mr Wiggles,” I told the Mankey standing nearby, watching my Pokémon eat their breakfast of Poké Chow and bacon. “Yours is next. Do you want bacon too?”

Mr Wiggles jumped up and down on the spot, hooting the affirmative, so I set another piece of bacon to cook over the fire. Before long, all the Pokémon were fed and the kid and I were digging into our own breakfast.

“Oodaraa!” an Oddish called, waddling out of the forest and into our camp. “Oddarah!”

“An Oddish!” Joey shouted, leaping from his chair and spilling bacon that Ace was quick to gobble up. “I’m gonna catch it!”

The kid’s Mankey, hooting like a loon, ran toward the purple radish Pokémon, hopping from foot to foot as it went. Oddly, the Oddish didn’t react to the monkey Pokémon’s approach. Instead, it waddled right past until it reached our fire.

“Draaagh,” it said, the almost moanful call echoing from its open mouth.

“Mr Wiggles, use Scratch!” Joey ordered, pointing at the Oddish.

My own team had moved to stand in front of me but looked as puzzled as I was. Oddish were normally timid Pokémon that preferred to hide in long grass, spraying paralytic or poisonous spores when startled. This one didn’t look the least bit timid though.

Following its trainer’s order, Mankey leaped toward the Oddish’s turned back, hands outstretched to claw at the plant. Without turning around, Oddish hopped to one side, sending Mankey soaring past it and right into the fire.

“Ooo! Oo! Oo!” Mankey hollered, scattering burning sticks all over our camp.

“Shit! Ace, Sand Attack!” I called, stamping on the scattered flames. “We’ve gotta put these flames out!”

Jumping into action, Ace kicked dirt over the burning sticks, smothering them before they could spread and start a wildfire. Without me ordering her to, Arashi lashed out at Mankey with a Thunder Wave.

“Mr Wiggles!” Joey shouted as his Pokémon collapsed to the ground, twitching.

“Focus, kid,” I snapped at him. “Fires, now!”

After a minute or so of frantic stomping and kicking, we managed to stamp out or smother any flames before they could spread, and Mr Wiggles was jerkily climbing back to his feet.

“Return that menace!” I yelled at Joey.

“But—” he started to argue, bottom lip trembling.

“Now!” I shouted.

“Mr Wiggles, return,” the kid called, holding up the Mankey’s Poké Ball and pointing it at the Pokémon. A line of red laser light shot out and Mankey vanished.

“Thank you,” I said, panting. Noticing the tears rolling down the kid’s face, I sighed. “Look, I’m sorry I snapped at you. I’m just stressed out.”

“It’s fine,” he said, wiping his face with his sleeve and sounding very much like it wasn’t fine at all. “I’m used to people yelling at me.”

“Oof, way to make me feel like shit, kid,” I said. I ruffled his hair with my hand, then started picking up our scattered equipment and packing it all away. “Come on, help me clean this up.”

“What about Oddish?” Joey asked, pointing at our strange guest now standing nearby, watching us.

Rolling up my sleeping bag, I looked over at the purple Grass-type. It stared back at me, its mouth still hanging open though it was silent now. I was tempted to try and catch it. An Oddish would still be an excellent addition to my team, and it might know how to find a Jewel Orchid flower, but there was something different about this Oddish. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but it had weird vibes.

“Ignore it,” I told him. “We have more important things to worry about.”

“I came here to catch Pokémon,” the kid said instead, a determined frown on his face. “I’m not leaving here without that Oddish.”

Pulling a different Poké Ball from his pocket, Joey threw it at the Oddish like he was pitching a baseball, the red-and-white sphere hurtling through the air and slamming into the Oddish with a flash of red light.

“Oooragh,” the Oddish said, climbing back to its feet, Joey’s Poké Ball landing on the ground a short distance away.

“Huh? What happened?” Joey asked. “Why didn’t it go into the Poké Ball?”

“I’m pretty sure that means it’s already registered to a Poké Ball,” I told him, folding up the tent and packing it away. “You can’t capture a Pokémon that has already been captured unless its original ball is destroyed.”

“So that means that Oddish’s trainer is nearby?” he said, looking around as if expecting someone to appear.

“Who knows,” I said. Camp packed away, I swung my pack on my back and extended my hiking pole, ready to set off. “Keep your eyes open for any corpses, I guess.”

The Oddish waddled a few paces into the trees, turned its whole body, and looked back at us. Its wide mouth hung open in that silent moan again.

“I think it wants us to follow it,” Joey said, excitement growing in his voice. “Let’s go!”

“Pass. I’ve got more impor—hey! Don’t run off on your own!” I shouted, but it was too late. The kid bolted after the plant Pokémon, vanishing into the shadows between the trees.

“Goddammit.”

I pinched the bridge of my nose, mouthed a silent apology to Oak, and glanced at my team. Arashi stamped her hooves in irritation, ears flicking nervously while Ace’s eyes glinted with excitement, eager to give chase.

“Come on,” I muttered to my team, tightening my grip around my hiking pole. “Let’s go make sure he doesn’t get himself killed.”

With that, we plunged after him into the forest.