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The second tunnel was much longer than the first, and it twisted and curved. We ran our hands along the wet walls, in case there was another tunnel or a door. We found none. About five minutes into the tunnel, we heard a horrible, chilling scream.

"That was Misty!"

We ran along the tunnel, still feeling the walls, and a few minutes later, we arrived in a clean-looking, dark room. Tracey shined the light around the walls. There were three doors. We looked in the corner. Misty was crouched there, whimpering. She looked up, her eyes full of tears, and put her finger on her lips. "Be quiet," she mouthed.

Tracey and I stepped over.

"Where's Ash?'

"I... I don't know."

"Let's go back into the tunnel to talk. So nobody hears us."

We helped Misty up. She could barely walk, and she was soaking wet from head to toe. I gave her my jacket and Tracey gave her his gloves and hat. "What happened?"

"Team Rocket members caught us. They took Togepi and all of our pokemon."

"Was it Jessie or James?"

Misty shook her head.

"It was no one we know. They took my pokemon and tried to take Ash's, too. They were going to hurt us. He tried to fight back, and... and fight for m-me."

She began to cry again.

"They dragged him into one of the roms, I can't remember which."

"Jeanne, stay here with Misty. I'll go find Ash."

"You can't go by yourself."

"Misty, you go back to the trap door thing that we slid down and see if you can call someone for help. Please try. We'll get Ash."

"Okay." She stood up. She wasn't as cold anymore. She walked back down the tunnel.

Tracey and I ran back to the big room. I was still holding Pikachu. "Pikachu," I said, "Are you feeling okay?"

"Pika." Pikachu was crying. It missed Ash and was worried for its trainer.

"Be prepared to use thundershock if we need you to."

I brought out all of my pokemon. So did Tracey. We went inside the room. There was nobody there. "Try this door," said Tracey. we pushed it open. It was another big room, full of cages with sleeping pokemon inside. Some of them stirred and woke up. Tracey and I unfastened the cages.

"Pika pi-chu. Chu-pi chu pika." (Don't worry. These people are good.), said Pikachu to the rescued pokemon.

"Hoot-hoot!"

"Fur-furret!"

We found Misty and Ash's pokeballs. They were stashed in a box by the door. I put them in my backpack.

We shined the flashlight all around. We found Misty's togepi in a corner. No sign of Ash.

"Okay, listen up everyone," Tracey said. "If we see any Team Rocket members, attack them."

"Poliwag! Poli!"

"Rattata!"

"Cate! Raticate rat!"

We crept out the door. Tracey, Pikachu, me, and all of the pokemon we rescued went into the second room. The light turned on automatically. Tracey and I stared. There was a mean-looking man in a suit glaring back at us.

"Well, hello," he growled. Two Rockets stepped up from behind him.

"Uh-oh," I said.

"Uh-oh is right, little girl," snarled the man in the suit,

"Get them!"

The rockets sent out their pokemon, two Arboks, which lunged at use. Tracey pushed me out of the way, and we tumbled out the door. The small army of pokemon that supported us battled the Rocket's pokemon. Two other Rockets sent out more arboks and persians. Using this as a distraction, Tracey and I ran into the third room.

There was Ash. He was slumped in a corner, cuts all over his face. His jacket and gloves were gone, and a trickle of blood ran down his face and arms. "Ash!"

He groaned. Tracey and I helped him up and practically carrid him to the tunnel where Misty was. Misty had managed to get three Officer Jennys. They were helping Misty up and out of the tunnel. The Jenny's then took up Ash. Pikachu came running and jumped about seven or six feet, right out of the manhole.

"What some pokemon will do for their trainer."

We sent up Togepi and all of the other rescued pokemon, and our own. I was climbing up the rope ladder that they officers had sent down. Two of the officers drove Ash off to the hospital while one remained to help us out.

Then, the man in a suit came and grabbed at us. He pulled out a pistol and shot one officer. She fell back onto the ground outside the manhole.

"Darn! The stupid thing's out of ammo!"

He glared at us and then lunged. Tracey grabbed my hand and pulled me away. We fought with him for a few minutes. One punch in the stomach caught me completely off caurd, and I tripped over a lump in the cement floor, and fell into the water.

Tracey kicked the man and he smashed into the wet, cold, wall behind him. His head flew back and with a sickening, dull sound, it hit the wall. the man sank back onto the wall.

Tracey reached his hand out to me to help me up.

"Are you okay?"

"I'm good. You okay, too?"

He nodded. "He got me off guard, though."

"Where?"

"Uh... Where it really hurts. It's a guy thing."

We blushed.

"Oh."

The rope ladder had dropped to the floor without Officer Jenny to hold it. "How are we gonna get out of here?" Tracey asked.

"I dunno, the ceiling's pretty high. And if we threw the ladder up there, there wouldn't be anyone or anything to hold on to it. I wish we had a bulbasaur or something."

"Yeah, but all of our pokemon went to the pokemon center to get healed." "Hold on," Tracey said, "The ceiling is about four or five feet over my head. Maybe you can get up on my shoulders and hold the ladder or tie it to a rock or something."

"Good idea."

I put the rope ladder in my backpack and climbed on to Tracey's shoulders. I was pretty short, but I pulled myself up as hard as I could and out of the manhole. I tried not to look at the Officer Jenny who lay on the ground nearby with blood leaking out of her shoulder. I tied the rope ladder to the ring on the top of the manhole cover and Tracey came up with Ash and Misty's back packs, and took another trip down to get his own.

"We gotta work fast, Officer Jenny's in trouble."

"Yeah."

Tracey came up with his backpack.

"There's a phone," I said, "I'll call an ambulance for her. Misty has a bandage in her backpack, see if it will work for Jenny."

I called the Ambulance and walked back to Tracey. "Did you find the bandage?"

"Yeah," he answered.

I heard sirens behind me, and the ambulance pulled up quickly and the Nurse Joy took Officer Jenny to the hospital. Tracey and I walked back to pokemon center to drop off our backpacks and take showers, since we were wet and cold.

"Then we should go and see how Ash is doing."

"You know," Tracey started, "If you hadn't been there with me, wouldn't have gotten out. I'd have to wait who-knows-how-long."

"If we had not had each other, we both would have been stuck."

Then, he moved his hand toward mine a bit, and before I knew it, we were holding hands. I was shocked. Tracey was blushing slightly. It felt nice.

v An hour later, we had picked up our pokemon, all healed up, and we had taken showers. Misty, Tracey and I hurried to the hospital to see how Ash was. A nurse directed us to his room.

"Ash!" Misty cried. She kissed him.

"How are you, Ash?"

"Fine. I just have some suts and things."

"What happened?" We were silent, waiting to hear what Ash said.

"Team Rocket took our pokemon and they were going to kidnap Misty and hold her hostage until her sisters handed the Cerulean Gym over to Team Rocket. I wasn't gonna let them take our pokemon like that, and I especially wasn't gonna let them kidnap Misty, so they gave me a choice. They were gonna take Mist or beat me up."

Misty started crying. "Ash, they could have killed you or something, you shouldn't have done that."

"But I love you." Then they kissed again. Tracey and I looked away from each other and Ash and Misty.

"Give'em some privacy," I said.

"Yeah."

When they were done, about two or three minutes later, I asked, "Ash, were these Rockets anybody we know?"