Episode 7 here! :()

Disclaimer: Come on, I do not own pokemon. It belongs to Nintendo, Game freak, 4Kids, and some other large corporations. Not me! I have Destiny but that’s it.

Italics will indicate translated poke speech, ** Are thoughts.

Timeline: 2 weeks after Episode 6.

Episode 7: Calm before the storm

Pika-chan tugged on her sleeping Chosen’s hair. “Wake up, Ash!” Today was the day when he would officially begin his pokemon journey, and she wanted him awake when he picked his starter pokemon. That was a very important decision.

A muffled yawn was her only response. Undaunted, Pika-chan tried a more direct approach. She flew over to the drawer where the pokemon book was and pulled out a card. “Oh Vaporeon, could you do me a favor?”

The card shimmered, turning into a sleek blue Vaporeon, which hopped onto Ash’s desk. What is it, Pika-chan?

“Can you wake him up for me?” Pika-chan asked.

Vaporeon grinned mischievously. Sure! She padded silently over to Ash’s bed, where he was still sleeping. Then, she suddenly jumped up and unleashed enough water to fill three bathtubs on his body.

That woke him up instantly. “Wha?” He looked around frantically, scrabbling for his poke belt, before he realized that it was just Pika-chan and Vaporeon. “You guys…”

“We had to wake you up! You don’t want to be late to Professor Oak’s, do you?” Pika-chan asked. She pointed to the alarm clock.

“AAAHHH!” Ash quickly dove into his bathroom. Within ten minutes, he was dressed and ready to head over to Professor Oak’s laboratory.

“I’ll have breakfast ready when you come back!” His mom called. Delilah was making pancakes and bacon for her little boy. This was going to be such a special day! And tonight, Giovanni was coming over! She bubbled with excitement as she waved to him.

Ash dashed through the door at light speed. “Thanks mom!” He called, before starting up the hill that led to Professor Oak’s lab.

Professor Oak was busy sweeping his floor, when the door to the lab clanged open and something heavy collided with him.

“Oh! Sorry, Professor.” Ash said, helping him up. He had been in such a hurry that he had bowled the old man over. It looks like he had just blown his impression management again…

Professor Oak stood and walked over to the table, which held the three starter poke balls. “Well, since you’re here, I suppose you know which pokémon you want? The other two haven’t gotten here yet.”

Ash put a hand under his chin as he considered. Pika-chan watched from inside his green backpack. She wanted him to pick an electric-type, but she knew that wasn’t an option.

“Can I have Squirtle?” Ash asked. Professor Oak shrugged and opened the poke ball, which depicted a drop of water on the front. Unfortunately, it was empty. Ash sweatdropped.

“I thought I was the first one!” He complained.

“Did you watch my pokédex show last night? I mentioned that we were fresh out of the normal starter pokemon, so you had a choice of Ponyta, Poliwag, or Bellsprout.”

Ash sweatdropped. He had missed the show because he had been off in the woods practicing his feeble teleportation skills. Ditto had been posing for him, but he hadn’t asked it about T.V., figuring that it was unimportant.

“Um, well, I guess I’ll take Ponyta.” Ash said finally, after several agonizingly long moments of decision-making.

“Very well. Here it is.” Professor Oak removed a standard red-and-white poke ball from a storage shelf set into the wall. Then, he also produced a pokédex and five poke balls.

“Cool!” Ash said, running off. Pika-chan sweatdropped from inside the backpack. At least with a Ponyta, travel would be much quicker. She hoped.

Gary watched this scene with frustration. Apparently Professor Oak had forgiven Ash for the Beedrill incident. It just wasn’t fair! He wanted to scream in frustration, but restrained himself. After all, he still had a few tricks up his sleeve…

“Now remember, dear, you can’t eat all the cookies on your first day of travel. And don’t forget to pack enough clean underwear. And yes, those coupons are for fast food, just in case you run out of canned food. And don’t forget to do your laundry every week! Remember, cleanliness is next to godliness, and I hope you have enough soap and shampoo, and…”

Ash tuned out Delilah’s long, drawn-out speech. Sure, it was probably of importance, but right now, he was too excited to care. He had already packed enough underwear to last a month (32 pairs), his blueberry-scented shampoo and soap set that Uncle something-or-the other had sent him for Christmas, at least it was coming in handy, plenty of canned food, some potions and other cures, Gatorade, two extra blankets, his sleeping bag, toothbrush and toothpaste, instant noodles, macaroni and cheese, and a first-aid-kit.

“Mom, I’ll be fine.” Ash reassured her. “I’m twelve, remember?”

“Yes, but- Oh! I forgot to give you these.” Delilah reached into her purse and took out two small packages. “Giovanni told me to give these to you.”

“What is it?” Ash asked, accepting them. They felt very light, and he shook them, trying to figure out what was inside.

“I don’t know. He didn’t tell me. Anyways, try not to eat too much junk food, and remember to brush your teeth twice a day!”

Ash sweatdropped. He tuned out the rest of her ‘importance of dental hygiene’ rant and opened the first package. To his surprise, it turned out to be a pair of dark blue fingerless gloves and a… scarf? He didn’t understand what that was about, but the gloves would come in handy. All the pokemon trainers he had seen on T.V. had gloves for some reason. Probably to hold the poke balls before they threw them.

“Oh, how nice!” Delilah gushed. She handed Ash a wrapped package before continuing her speech. “There’s dried fruit and beef jerky in there, so you don’t get sick of canned food, plus some aspirin and cold medicine, just in case anything happens. There’s also some bottled water, because you should never drink from the streams, it could be polluted. Also, Nurse Joy gave me some pokemon medicine that the center didn’t need anymore…”

Ash nodded absentmindedly and started opening the second package. This one felt harder, so he poked it a few times, seeing if there was a live Geodude in there or something. Nothing happened, so he tore off the wrapping paper like a madman, revealing a pink? Cell phone with a little note attached.

Ash,

This is so you can call your mom no matter where you are. Don’t worry; it’s all paid for already. I hope you have fun on your journey.

Giovanni

“How thoughtful!” Delilah squealed. Ash wished that she wouldn’t act so excited, he was the one going on this journey, for heaven’s sake! But if it kept her from continuing that long speech about how he should take care of himself, he could tolerate it. In his backpack, Pika-chan shifted uncomfortably. She hoped that would be over soon, otherwise she would go crazy!

Finally, Delilah finished the speech. She gave Ash a hug and two kisses on the forehead before waving as he left along the path.

Ash sighed with relief as soon as he was out of sight. Pika-chan quickly fluttered out of his backpack.

“That was so boring! How did you survive listening to all of it? I actually fell asleep!” Pika-chan said. She frowned at Ash. “And I almost suffocated!”

“Sorry.” Ash apologized. “Here.” He handed her a bag of chocolate-marshmallow cookies. Pika-chan’s face immediately brightened.

“You’re forgiven.” She muttered between crunches. “Ahh… I love your mom’s cooking.”

“Well, I’m afraid we’re not going to get much of that on this training journey.” Ash said a bit wistfully.

Pika-chan shrugged. “Are you going to see your new pokémon yet?”

“Yep!” Ash removed the plain, red-and-white poke ball from his simple black belt and spun it deftly in his fingers. “Ponyta, go!”

There was a brilliant flash of red light, which finally faded, revealing a healthy-looking Ponyta, with a long flowing mane and tail. She looked at as questioningly, as if confused.

“Hi, Ponyta.” Ash said, walking up to her. “I’ll be your new master now. Let’s be friends, okay?” He asked, petting her on the head. Ponyta’s head bobbed up and down, and she seemed to smile a bit.

“Okay, let me introduce you to the others.” Ash said. He removed Storm’s great ball from his belt while Pika-chan hopped off his backpack. Dragonair materialized with a shimmery layer of sparkling rain covering her, while Pika-chan just flapped her tiny wings and waved.

“This is Pika-chan! She’s my guardian, plus she’s the Decision Maker of the Kanto pokemon card set.” Ash said, gesturing to Pika-chan, who chirped a greeting in pokespeech. “And that’s Storm, she’s a very nice Dragonair.” Ash said. Storm flipped her tail and held it out for Ponyta to shake. Ponyta raised one of her hooves and they shook awkwardly.

“Now that introductions are over, we should get going.” Ash said. It was past noon, and he wanted to try and reach Viridian city before night fell. “Come on, Ponyta!” Ponyta stood still while Ash mounted her, even though he fell off twice, causing Storm and Pika-chan no little laughter. Pika-chan continued giggling during much of their journey, as Ponyta galloped smoothly across the tall grasses and towards Viridian forest.

After about three hours, Ash stopped Ponyta so she could take a break. He set out bowls of standard poke chow, flavored with ketchup for Pika-chan, tuna fish for Dragonair, and lettuce for Ponyta. He also fixed himself some instant noodles. The four of them ate quietly, until they were ambushed.

Later, when Ash reflected on the incident, he realized that if he had been paying attention to his surroundings instead of his food. Pika-chan realized that she should have sensed the presence of a pokemon card, since her power had risen, but she was too busy enjoying her ketchup-covered poke chow. Ponyta and Dragonair should both have sensed the presence of the wild pokemon, but unfortunately, they had also been too preoccupied with their meals.

All in all, it had been a very good time for the Haunter card to strike.

It swooped down from the trees, cloaked in shadows. First, it stole Ash’s ramen off the small fire where the water had been boiling, while his head was turned. When Ash turned around, he had immediately noticed that his Ramen was missing. Immediately, he had Dragonair shroud the area in mist, to protect them from any potentially troublemaking pokemon.

Ash hadn’t realized that this pokémon was a ghost type. As soon as the mist had covered their surroundings, Haunter had immediately stolen Dragonair’s tuna fish covered poke chow and finished it off in 2.4 seconds. When Dragonair noticed her missing food, she had reacted in the worst possible way, with the worst possible attack. Dragon rage.

Ash and the others barely had time to blink before they went sailing through the air, in the waterspout constructed by Dragonair’s rage. However, Ash actually did the right thing in this situation. He quickly recalled Ponyta (giving Haunter the time to snatch the uneaten portion, unfortunately) and pulled his key out from under his shirt.

“Key that hides the power of the elements, reveal your true form before me! Your master under the seal of contract Ashura commands you, Release!” As soon as the wand appeared, Ash snagged it quickly and whipped out a pokemon card.

“Tangela! Bind whatever’s causing this trouble!” Ash called. Then, he soothing ran some more healing chi over Dragonair, calming her down. The storm immediately vanished like a wisp of smoke.

Tangela wasn’t doing too well. Every time she managed to get a grip on Haunter, he would slip through her vines. And it wasn’t just that, he stuck his tongue out at her too! Fuming, she doused him with about a pound’s worth of sleep powder, knocking him into dreamland.

Ash was smiling at Tangela’s work and preparing to capture the card when he suddenly realized that since the gale force winds were no longer holding him up in the air, he was falling rapidly. He gulped and hoped that he wouldn’t hit the ground as he tried to remember how the levitation spell went.

Pika-chan saved him the trouble, by grabbing his t-shirt with her teeth and dragging him down slowly. Ash sighed in relief, before turning to the problematic pokemon that Tangela had downed.

“Return to your true form, pokemon card!”

Haunter disapperated into curls of purple smoke, before changing into blue energy that formed a blue card. Ash reached up and caught it, quickly writing his name on the bottom before it could escape and wreak more havoc.

Pika-chan sighed in relief. “You’re lucky I was there to catch you! Otherwise, you would be no more than a puddle of goo on the forest floor.”

“I know…” Ash said sheepishly. “Oops.”

“No problem. Just give me that strawberry taffy and you won’t get hurt.”

Ash groaned, but handed Pika-chan the candy. She stuffed most of it into her mouth, chewing methodically as she pondered the situation.

Ash still hadn’t caught all of the pokemon cards yet, and he was already beginning his journey. She hoped that he would finish soon before he got into contact with civilization. Otherwise it would be too difficult to explain.

End Episode 7!