[X] The nest you were born in, hidden under the brambles.
[X] Travel. Your mother had a rebellious phase when she was as young as you, though not as destructive as yours, and her journeys helped her grow, mature and satisfy her wanderlust.
[X] The nest you were born in, hidden under the brambles.
[X] Travel. Your mother had a rebellious phase when she was as young as you, though not as destructive as yours, and her journeys helped her grow, mature and satisfy her wanderlust.
Really tempted by teaching some siblings to become horrible gremlins, but I want to see where travel takes Trixie.
[x] An abandoned Human dwelling near the edge of the Forest.
[x] Trade. You've made a lot of enemies in your campaign against the Humans, but you've also stolen trophies you don't need or value much - and which others do, enough to pay you for them.
[X] Travel. Your mother had a rebellious phase when she was as young as you, though not as destructive as yours, and her journeys helped her grow, mature and satisfy her wanderlust.
[X] Teach. You have a new litter of siblings, and the last few Pichus from your own littermates could use your help in pushing past the last barrier of evolution. If nothing else, they'll be allies.
[X] Trade. You've made a lot of enemies in your campaign against the Humans, but you've also stolen trophies you don't need or value much - and which others do, enough to pay you for them.
[x] An abandoned Human dwelling near the edge of the Forest.
[X] Travel. Your mother had a rebellious phase when she was as young as you, though not as destructive as yours, and her journeys helped her grow, mature and satisfy her wanderlust.
[X] The nest you were born in, hidden under the brambles.
[X] Travel. Your mother had a rebellious phase when she was as young as you, though not as destructive as yours, and her journeys helped her grow, mature and satisfy her wanderlust.
I know it's closed, but I'd have voted that way anyhow.
The nest you were born in, hidden under the brambles.
Travel. Your mother had a rebellious phase when she was as young as you, though not as destructive as yours, and her journeys helped her grow, mature and satisfy her wanderlust.
Chapter 6: In a world we must defend
You wake up slowly and unwillingly to a patiently looming feeling of acute nausea, throbbing pain along your leg and tail, and general overall awfulness.
You won, so it's worth it, but you still decide to vent your displeasure on the next Human trainer you see with especial creativity.
Once the initial swell of sick-feeling-ness ebbs away, your senses report other things. A chorus of rambunctious squeaking, for a start. The soothing scent of soil and brambleberries and charged fur. Familiar softness under you, and a sour sort of taste at the back of your mouth that makes you gag.
At this sign of life, the squeaking redoubles, and you barely get your eyes open before you're swarmed by a dozen tiny bodies that are all but vibrating out of their fur with excited adulation, all clamouring to talk over each other at the top of their little lungs.
"Kaaaa," you moan, and do your best to roll over under the weight of a delighted litter of younger siblings. Argh. It's not that you're upset Ma brought you home, but did she have to do it while her new pups were in the noisy-squeaking stage? Couldn't she have left you in one of your tree-hollow dens or something?
Well, it is what it is. Grumbling to yourself about the aggravations that are baby Pichus - you're sure you were never this ear-hurty when you were little - you lever yourself up onto three legs under the press of bodies, exchange staticy nuzzles and cuddles with a few of the more complimentary of your fans, and crack your eyes open as you struggle out of the pile.
Home. It's been a while since you've been back here, but it still looks the same as ever. You're in the biggest hollow of the warren, on the main nest-bed. The walls are lightning-scorched earth, hardened by Shocks into baked clay that allows a nicely spacious den with pretty black lightning patterns running up the walls. A thick root goes through the middle of the hollow, serving as an earth-clad pillar that helps hold the roof up, and the floor is covered with the soft green Human-leaves Ma uses as bedding. When you were little you used to search for the trees Humans found such strangely-shaped foliage on, but they must grow outside the Forest, because you never saw any. Why they draw their own faces on weird square leaves, you have no idea, but they make good bedding so you're not inclined to question it.
As well as your siblings, there are a few of Ma's things here. A little round Human box, empty and smelling of the awful taste in your mouth, the red box that makes the pretty lights when it's Shocked and sometimes shows pictures of other Pokemon, the broken Pinsir horn from the attack when you were still nursing. Also a lot of Human food, wrapped in brown bark-stuff with 'VIRIDIAN POKEMART' marked on it. Ma must have been making more trips to whatever den she gets it from in order to feed her new litter.
... yeah, you're not getting anywhere while this lot is still trying to clamber all over you.
"Pika, ka!" you command authoritatively, whacking one of your more adventurous little brothers over the head as he tries to nibble on your tail. "Pikachu!" You nod towards the red light-box and gently Shock it in the right place with a little trickle of electricity. The screen springs to life, showing a round pinkish thing, and a little Human voice comes out of the box.
"Ch-Ch-Ch-Chansey, th-the Egg Poke-Pokemon. Ch-Chansey lays nu-nu-nutritionally excellent eggs on an ev-everyday basis. The eggs-eggs-eggs are so del-delicious, they are easily and eagerly de-devoured by even those people who have-have-have lost their appe-appetite."
"Piiiiiii~" the little ones chorus in wonder, wide-eyed with awe. You're almost immediately forgotten as they cluster around the box, and a chorus of dismay goes up when it stops talking. There's a brief scuffle as they try to bite, poke, tail-whip and talk back to it, resolved when one of the older girls bites several of her siblings on the ear and intently concentrates on building up a charge on her cheekpads. She's not very good at holding it, but it's enough that when she carefully nuzzles the right spot - glancing at you for approval as she does so - it lights up again, to another entranced chorus of wonder.
You, of course, already know about Mew, so you leave the red box stuttering out the tale of the First Pokemon and go off in search of your mother.
You find her lying by the south entrance, looking out through the bramble thicket at a pair of Sudowoodo squaring off among the nearby trees. Her posture looks lazy at a glance; tail lying flat behind her, ears relaxed, head resting on her paws. You're not fooled. Where you're small for your breed and age, she's big; bigger even than Grandpa, and far stronger. You can see the coiled power in her limbs, the bulges of muscle on her forelegs and the callouses on her paws. You've seen her take on an adult Pinsir and win in pure physical might, and you have no doubt she could pin you to the ground effortlessly. She has in the past, whenever she thought you didn't look clean enough and needed washing. It was one of the big reasons you stopped visiting the burrow after establishing your tree-dens and taking up your campaign against the Humans.
"Ka," she chuffs, twitching an ear back at you without taking her eyes off the duelling Sudowoodo. It's unlikely that they'll turn their attention to the bramble thicket and what might lie beneath it, but if they do they'll find that their rock-hard skin offers no protection against a high-powered Thunder Punch. Warily, you edge closer, alert for any risk of being pinned down and forcibly washed behind the ears.
A moment of probing yields the conclusion that she doesn't feel like getting up at the moment, and you settle beside her with less caution. "Pii-ka?" you query. "Pipi, chuu-uu! Pika pika chu! Pii, pikaa!"
She snorts, apparently unmoved by your argument. You huff in response. Okay, fine, maybe you needed that Antidote she forced down your throat while you were unconscious, but you still won, didn't you? You didn't need her help! You'd have been fine on your own once you woke up and found a Pecha Berry! Or four! And... maybe some Cheri Berries too. Possibly another Sitrus tree, or an Oran bush, or...
... completely unrelatedly, you decide to change the subject.
Chittering away under her lazy sideways attention, you recount your battles and victories of the past few months, crowing about your humiliation of Rojo, excitedly retelling your daring infiltration of the Humans' territory, boasting smugly about your clever defeat of Wenge against unfair odds. She listens indulgently, flicking an ear every so often or chuffing in interest at your bolder or more unconventional moves.
You have to admit, it's... nice, getting to sit beside her and tell her all about your adventures again. It's been a while since you were last able to do this, but back in your Pichu days you made time for it every few days. You were always the bravest and most independent of your litter, but for as long as you lived in the burrow you'd come back every so often to announce your deeds to the patient warm presence of Ma, snuggled into her side as you revelled in your triumphs and planned on how to turn your failures around.
Eventually, you run out of things to boast about. Your mother doesn't pick up the conversation, and so you stay snuggled into her side as the Sudowoodo squabble and brawl and eventually depart, leaving you looking out at the thicket of berry-rich brambles and the treeline of your childhood. You can even, with a warm glow of nostalgia, see some of the old scorches and long-healed broken branches from your early acrobatic endeavours. Yes. It's good to be home. You should have visited long ago.
Then, suddenly, doom! A paw with the effective weight of a well-fed Snorlax clamps down on your neck, pinning you to the ground, and a rough wet tongue starts washing your ragged ear! Abuse! Calamity! You squirm and struggle and complain, but against Ma's strength there is no escape. You're forced to stay there, vocally expressing your displeasure, as she goes over your fur with ruthless efficiency and gets rid of all the snarls and tangles you haven't been bothered enough to tend to since your campaign began, all the little twigs and burrs from your rushed fight through the deepest part of the forest, even most of the interesting smells of wild leaves and Berry juices and lightning that you've cultivated. Woe! Woe and foolishness, that you let your guard down for even a moment! You jump away as soon as she releases you, chittering angrily, and meet a completely unimpressed wall of maternal impassivity.
"Pika," she orders. Her voice is deep, rumbling slightly in her golden chest. "Pika-chuu."
You bristle. You're not still a Pichu. You don't need any more lessons. You're a big strong Pikachu of five whole winters who can look after herself!
"Pika-chuu," Ma emphasises, and there is no refusing that tone. You grumble quietly, cheekpads sparking, but follow her as she rises to all fours and leads you off into the trees.
When is a stream not a stream?
The answer, you discover at your mother's behest, is when it's a trickle. The shallow brook that you remember learning to fish in, once deep enough for you to float in as a Pichu, now barely comes up past your paws; a despondent trickle at the centre of its bed. When you trace it upstream, you find vegetation choking the channel, dense and unnavigable even to your small size. The bushes, too, are stripped of Berries - not by your siblings, but by Bugs in their fast-breeding multitudes. And your favourite tree, the one you learned to jump and climb on the many wide branches of... it's shattered. Uprooted, Ma tells you, by a lumbering Venasaur migrating through the forest thickets to find new clearings. It had been forced off the game trails it would normally have used, she says. They'd become too overgrown and closed up to fit its bulk.
The story stings. But then she brings you back to the nest, and real guilt settles in as she introduces you to your younger siblings, and the repercussions your actions have brought down on them. The little female who was keeping the others in order and working the talking-box has a burnt tail and back paw, courtesy of a Growlithe barking fire at a yellow shape in the undergrowth near one of the main routes still open. One of her littermates is nursing a paw he got caught in a wire trap, because apparently Humans cannot learn and are starting to set out more of the things in the hopes of catching you! And one little Pichu who's barely even a pup is curled up at the back of the den, refusing even to go out and play under the brambles after being chased back from the stream by a Raticate sent out to hunt anything with a lightning-shaped tail.
Feeling bad about your actions, you decide, is awful. Whoever invented it deserves electrocution. And also savage biting.
Your mother is beside you for every revelation, voicing no opinion, her body language inscrutable. Eventually, though, the list of injuries and indignities comes to an end, and she takes you back out to the south entrance of the burrow. Unsettled by vague and unfamiliar feelings of guilt haunting you, you settle next to her, this time keeping your guard up for attempts to pin you.
"Ka," she rumbles, deep and thoughtful. "Pika. Kaa."
You perk up. This is new information. You'd known that she hadn't always lived in the Forest, vaguely, but she'd never really told you much about it. "Chuu," you reply, despite your wariness at how this topic might come around to guilt-trip you some more.
She chuffs, perhaps guessing your thoughts, and explains. She'd been a little hellion of a pup too, when she was little. But she hadn't confined her mischief to the woods she was born in. She'd travelled, gone far away from her home - first on her own, and then later with Humans, only some of whom had actually wanted her travelling with them. She'd learned many things on her journeys; grown strong, grown smart. It'd made her better at picking fights, but also better at choosing which fights to pick. And it had sated her wanderlust, too. She'd come back only when she was good and ready to settle down and have a litter, content with how much of the world she'd seen.
"Chu," she finishes, inclining her head your way, and your ears flatten back against your skull at the suggestion. Leaving the Forest would be... it's something you've never even considered before. So much of your fighting style - so much of your life - is rooted in these trees. Yes, of course you're curious about the world beyond. But can you really bear to leave the only place you've ever known?
Also, more importantly, it would be like admitting defeat. Which is just unthinkable. No way are you backing down from a bunch of riled-up Humans just because they're starting to target you specifically.
"Pikapika," you promise sulkily, and then dart off before you can be pinned down and washed again for your insolence. It's not binding, at least. You only promised to think about it. Which you will do. Right after you dismantle all those new traps that your little brothers and sisters are getting caught in, and punish whoever's setting them. And also rain down Shocks and misery on whoever's been sending Pokemon after little yellow things in the Forest that aren't you. And you might have to terrorise some of the useless pathetic Bug-trainers into opening up the game trails around your burrow again. It can't be that hard to convey what you want them to do. Right?
But after that, you'll give due consideration to your Ma's advice. If you're not too busy with other stuff. For sure.
Despite how you absolutely don't have time for them right now, the nagging feelings stay with you over the next few weeks. In response, you venture further and further out from the edge of the Forest, drawing the baleful eye of the Humans away from the shelter of the trees and out to the grassland between their settlement and your home. It means even more careful planning before your ambushes, and a few unsettlingly close calls, but that's a small price to pay for the opportunity to hit trappers and hunters before they can even get as far as your favoured stomping grounds.
But some of the magic has been lost. Oh, you still enjoy tormenting them; the moans of horror when they find stinksap in their bags or droppings in their food never gets old. But it's starting to feel... pointless. After your initial vicious reminder, the wire traps stop, and once that lesson is relearned, you find that most of your targets are there for you and you alone. You're not fighting back against Humans trying to despoil your home or tormenting stupid easy targets anymore, you're dealing with stupid grudges from stupid trainers who can't move past a few little cases of painful electric total and utter humiliation.
Your hilarious crusade has become a chore.
Stubbornness and pride prevent you from giving up, though. Which is what brings you, one hot morning, to discover with outrage that the nasty horrible metal-Berries that act as spying eyes for the Humans have been replaced! And this time, Shocking them doesn't make them die! The lightning just scatters across their outsides!
You remedy this by chewing through the wire attaching them to the trees, dropping them down onto the ground, and then dragging each and every one of them into a river or stream. The ones near your treetop dens or the warren under the brambles, you drop rocks on from treetop-height first. But no sooner have you finished dismantling the entire network than it's back again - and this time with thicker wire attaching it to the branches!
Grumbling angrily, you make your way along the whole network again. You can't gnaw these spying-eyes out of the trees, and you can't Shock them to death from a distance, but you're clever and resourceful and laden with spite, and so with a stick and a leaf as your tools you smear each glittery unblinking metal-eye with the stickiest, stinkiest, stingiest mixture of Caterpie-silk and droppings and poison-moss juice you can concoct, taking the time to really work it into every crack and across every surface until the spying-eyes are more like smelly-balls of yuck and eww and nasty.
The web of spying-eyes leads you over hills and down gorges, along trails and across rivers. And eventually, it leads you to a place you know well. The pond where you fought Rojo.
There is a Human here. She has long berry-coloured hair tied back in two streamers, a purple frilly pelt, shiny silver bracelets on both arms and glittery dangly earrings. She smells of the same mix of sweet, strange Human-fruits that lingered on bits of the spying-eyes. There are three Pokeballs on her belt - two of them unlit empties, the third vacant; her Pokemon's - and a circular badge on her chest that has the same red upper half and white lower half pattern. She's sitting daintily on one of the rocks next to the pond, eating a wild Berry with delicate little nibbles, her wide-brimmed hat shading her eyes from the sun.
And none of this matters at all compared to the Pokemon with her. You recognise its big ovalular body and long floppy ears, the blue bobble at the end of its zigzag black tail. An Azumarill. It wades out of the pond as you watch, its fur dripping, its expression a beaming smile.
And there's a small, glittering grey shape in its paws.
Rojo's Boulder Badge.
Your eyes narrow. And you spring to the attack.
As ever, you're only going to get one shot from surprise. What do you go for?
[ ] The Balls. She's smart enough to have brought a backup Pokeball in case you fry the first one, but little does she know that you have two paws! Steal both so she can't throw them when you're distracted. [ ] The Badge. You put a lot of hard work and effort into utterly humiliating Rojo and robbing him of his precious badge and possibly also making him cry. How dare she try to undo your efforts? [ ] The Bunny. Come on. It's a big dumb slow goofy Water type. Like an egg with ears. It'll go down in a single zap, and then she'll have lost the badge and you'll have a perfect hostage! [ ] Benevolence. Nope nope nope, absolutely not, you're not having any of this "mercy" or "tolerance" nonsense; she is insulting your glorious victory and has chosen her doom.
[x] The Badge. You put a lot of hard work and effort into utterly humiliating Rojo and robbing him of his precious badge and possibly also making him cry. How dare she try to undo your efforts?
[x] The Balls. She's smart enough to have brought a backup Pokeball in case you fry the first one, but little does she know that you have two paws! Steal both so she can't throw them when you're distracted.
[X] The Balls. She's smart enough to have brought a backup Pokeball in case you fry the first one, but little does she know that you have two paws! Steal both so she can't throw them when you're distracted.
As ever for a cheap shot from surprise, go for the balls.
[X] The Bunny. Come on. It's a big dumb slow goofy Water type. Like an egg with ears. It'll go down in a single zap, and then she'll have lost the badge and you'll have a perfect hostage!
[X] The Balls. She's smart enough to have brought a backup Pokeball in case you fry the first one, but little does she know that you have two paws! Steal both so she can't throw them when you're distracted.
This is not a vote for tactical utility. This is a vote for Trixie the Freedom Fighter fighting against the tools of enslavement.
[X] The Balls. She's smart enough to have brought a backup Pokeball in case you fry the first one, but little does she know that you have two paws! Steal both so she can't throw them when you're distracted.
[X] The Balls. She's smart enough to have brought a backup Pokeball in case you fry the first one, but little does she know that you have two paws! Steal both so she can't throw them when you're distracted.
[x] The Badge. You put a lot of hard work and effort into utterly humiliating Rojo and robbing him of his precious badge and possibly also making him cry. How dare she try to undo your efforts?
We worked hard at getting that thing away from Rojo how dare someone else try and undo our hard work.
[X] The Bunny. Come on. It's a big dumb slow goofy Water type. Like an egg with ears. It'll go down in a single zap, and then she'll have lost the badge and you'll have a perfect hostage!
Much like a vampire cannot abide a mirror, a pikachu cannot abide a water pikachu.
[X] The Balls. She's smart enough to have brought a backup Pokeball in case you fry the first one, but little does she know that you have two paws! Steal both so she can't throw them when you're distracted.
[X] The Bunny. Come on. It's a big dumb slow goofy Water type. Like an egg with ears. It'll go down in a single zap, and then she'll have lost the badge and you'll have a perfect hostage!
Consequences? I don't know the meaning of the word!
[X] The Balls. She's smart enough to have brought a backup Pokeball in case you fry the first one, but little does she know that you have two paws! Steal both so she can't throw them when you're distracted.
[x] The Balls. She's smart enough to have brought a backup Pokeball in case you fry the first one, but little does she know that you have two paws! Steal both so she can't throw them when you're distracted.
[X] The Balls. She's smart enough to have brought a backup Pokeball in case you fry the first one, but little does she know that you have two paws! Steal both so she can't throw them when you're distracted.
[X] The Balls. She's smart enough to have brought a backup Pokeball in case you fry the first one, but little does she know that you have two paws! Steal both so she can't throw them when you're distracted.
[X] The Balls. She's smart enough to have brought a backup Pokeball in case you fry the first one, but little does she know that you have two paws! Steal both so she can't throw them when you're distracted.
The Pokétariat must seize the Means of Ensnarement!
[x] The Balls. She's smart enough to have brought a backup Pokeball in case you fry the first one, but little does she know that you have two paws! Steal both so she can't throw them when you're distracted.
[X] The Balls. She's smart enough to have brought a backup Pokeball in case you fry the first one, but little does she know that you have two paws! Steal both so she can't throw them when you're distracted.
We get to make ball jokes AND reformat communist memes? I'm in.
