EVERYONE: Journeys, Ashes, and Dangers

[Jewel the Quaxly]

Lesson I: Pretext of War
***
There were many things about Ash Ketchum that people didn't know. Such as how he used to be afraid of thunderstorms and would sleep with his mom whenever one would happen. There was also the fact that he was fairly decent at drawing and singing respectively. Additionally, all his clothes were personally made for him by his mother.

Those are three simple facts that most people didn't know about him. Except, maybe, a select few.

That being said, something that almost everyone knows about him is that he has a horrendous sense of direction. The same thing applied in this very situation Ash was currently stuck in: he was lost. Not only was he lost, but he was alone, too. He didn't have a clue as to what happened after he had blacked out and the only clue he could've gotten was if he had woken up near the plane. But life never makes things easy for Ash Ketchum, so instead, he woke up in a tree. Without any of his Poke balls on him, he realized that his pokemon must have landed elsewhere.

He also felt an odd feeling of deja vu.

Furthermore, he was desperately trying not to completely freak out over the fact that when he woke up, his body was glowing. A soft blue light had covered his entire body-from his viewpoint-and felt almost like a warm blanket. There was also a strange sound the accompanied it: a quiet sound of tranquil running water...similar to that of a stream.

Once Ash had made the connection that the sound he had heard when he woke up was the same sound he heard from before he blacked out on the plane, his body abruptly stopped glowing. Almost as if his body didn't want him to find out why it was glowing like such in the first place.

That being cleared up, Ash was now wandering in a strange forest, lost, alone, slightly terrified, and with a good several hundred questions in the back of his mind.

'I hope everyone's okay...' He swallowed, thinking back to the events that transpired on the plane. From his strange dream to meeting Stacey, Claire, and Lila; from learning geography to Team Rocket hijacking the plane and causing it to crash...

Ash frowned, correcting that point in his head. Not even Team Rocket had planned this. Something had struck the plane. The only problem was that he nor anyone else on board at the time had any clue as to what hit the plane. And as if that wasn't mysterious enough, there was also the fact that the plane had crashed into an ocean-meaning Ash should be dead-but Ash woke up in a tree, in a forest.

Taking that as a good sign that perhaps there were other survivors, Ash decided to keep his spirits up and explore this weird place for any other people that were on the plane during the crash. And his pokemon, of course.

Ash made a face suddenly, realizing something that had been nagging him at the back of his mind when he first woke up: it was too quiet. Far too quiet for this to be a forest, especially considering how pokemon typically lived in areas like this. While it was more than likely that this forest was on an uncharted island-otherwise the pilot would've deduced there was land nearby-the question as to how this island wasn't mapped remained to be answered.

Or was Ash simply making assumptions once more? 'I should probably wait until I find someone I know here...or someone from the plane...or the plane itself...' Shaking his head, Ash continued in his search. 'Man, I've never been good at figuring out these kinds of things...'

A sudden rustling sound caused him to snap out of his sheepish admission and tense, frantically looking around. "Hey! Is someone there?"

The rustling sound suddenly stopped, as if whoever had made the sound in the first place had been frightened by Ash's voice. A pokemon, perhaps? The young trainer began cautiously walking towards the direction from where he had heard the sound. "Are you a pokemon? Don't worry I won't hurt you..."

A rattata instantly jumped out from the bushes and tackled Ash to the ground, causing him to cry out. A group of many different kinds of pokemon all scurried out from the bushes as well, seemingly triumphant over the teenager boy who had fallen to a small rattata.

Ash would've panicked over this at any other time, in any other situation. However, this situation happened a little bit differently from whatever he was used to. Instead of panicking over the fact that these forest pokemon looked just about ready to attack him, he was panicking over this:

"I got him!" The rattata-yes, the pokemon-sneered in victory. "This filthy human thought he could just walk into our turf without permission, but I sure showed him, didn't I?"

Ash just stared, eyes wide. Was he losing his sanity? This was another one of his dreams, right? 'Nah...' He immediately shot this idea down. One of the main reasons why he confused reality and his dreams so much was the fact that he had never once had a lucid dream. After all, if he did have any lucid dreams, then he would be more likely to differentiate between reality and fantasy better. Plus, usually, when he realized that he was dreaming-although, this was very rare-he immediately woke up. 'But I'm still awake...so I'm not dreaming...' Ash deduced, slightly in a daze. 'I'm actually hearing that rattata speak...'

"Excellent job, Rattata." A nasal voice praised. Ash bent his neck slightly to see a smirking machamp tower over him, hands on his hips. "The Boss will be very pleased."

Several questions rushed into Ash's head. 'What boss? Why am I hearing these pokemon speak? Am I hallucinating? Do pokemon call each other by their species name? What 'turf' are they talking about?'

Ash decided that the best way to figure out if he was hearing things or not was to be as subtle as possible to make sure the pokemon didn't think he was crazy. "Who's your boss?"

Ah yes, very subtle.

The machamp frowned and two other pokemon-a sandslash and a poliwrath-exchanged looks. The rattata looked confused. "How did he know about the Boss?"

"I don't know..." The machamp muttered, his eyes scanning Ash up and down, causing him to squirm uncomfortably. The machamp smacked a fist into his palm, almost as if he had gotten an idea, before smacking Ash dead across the face and leaving him in a temporary daze. "Did you feel that, Human?"

As soon as Ash snapped out of his daze, he tried to sit up but was pulled down by the poliwrath and sandslash. "Hey!" He glared at the machamp. "That hurt! What did I do to deserve that?!"

The machamp paused for a moment, seemingly considering something, before calmly replying. "Are you deaf? Did you not hear Rattata say earlier that you had wandered into our turf? Or are you really so stupid?"

Ash growled though he tried his best to keep his cool. Any other time, he would've collected himself fine, but this time, it didn't work. "I'm not stupid!" He snapped, not realizing the reaction his words had gotten was not beneficial to his situation at all. "And would you let me go already? I'm sorry, I didn't know I was on your turf, I swear!"

The machamp narrowed his eyes. "You can understand me." It was not a question.

Ash swallowed. He couldn't explain it, but he felt very hot all of a sudden. Or perhaps that was due to the proximity of the poliwrath and sandslash tightly pinning him to the ground by his arms. "Yeah." He muttered. "I can."

The machamp hummed thoughtfully for a moment before clapping his hands together and curtly saying, "Knock him out."

Ash instantly panicked. "No, wait, don't-"

And everything went black.

***

Ash groaned as he opened his eyes. It was pitch black. Blinking, he waited for his eyes to adjust to the darkness before turning his head around. 'Damn, I still can't see a thing...' He tried to move but found that he was unable to. So he was stuck. 'Well, that's just great...' Ash thought dryly.

He was getting tired of waking up over and over again. Ash wished that Pikachu was here, or at the very least, someone he was close to. Though, that would probably put them in danger as well-considering how he was currently in the hands of wild pokemon.

Ash frowned, considering that for a moment. Was it wild pokemon or pokemon under the orders of a trainer? If the latter was the case, then wouldn't that means there were other people here? Dangerous people, considering the hostility of the pokemon?

Luckily-or unluckily-for Ash, he was about to receive an answer. A bright light suddenly blinded him, causing him to squint his eyes to see. What he saw made him feel deeply unsettled. A large and menacing looking fearow was gazing down upon Ash with a cold and calculating glare, piercing through his soul and sending shivers throughout his body. He swallowed a lump that had suddenly formed in his throat and stared back at the fearow with a steely gaze. He needed to figure out what was going on and get out of this situation, so panicking wasn't going to help anything.

"So," The fearow crowed softly, his cold gaze somehow becoming a few degrees colder. "We meet again, Stupid Human. And you can understand me now, I believe?"

Ash's blood ran colder than the fearow's gaze. That being said, Ash recognized this fearow as the same Spearow that had attacked both him and Pikachu on the first day of his journey; and as the same fearow who had returned almost a year later to exact revenge, only to be stopped by-

Ash gasped sharply, all thoughts of keeping a level head completely gone. "What happened to Pidgeot?!"

Fearow stared, confusion flickering across his face for a moment-momentarily leading Ash to believe he had been wrong somehow-before crowing in recognition. "Ah, yes...Pidgeot."

Ash stared expectantly. Fearow did not continue. "If you're here," Ash began slowly, repeating his question. "Then what happened to Pidgeot?"

"She is fine," Fearow stated and said nothing more. Ash tried to push down his feelings of worry for his pokemon and mistrust for the large predator in front of him to put on a brave face. This, however, was very difficult considering the situation Ash was currently in. Fearow looked Ash over with his piercing gaze, causing Ash to be somehow more unsettled than he already was. The Fearow he had remembered was hotheaded and furious, not cold, and...was he even still angry with him? Ash decided 'yes'. "And I would be more worried about yourself, if I were in your position, Stupid Human."

'Yup.' Ash thought miserably. 'He definitely still hates me.'

"Machamp. Scyther." Fearow spoke sharply, causing Ash to peer over Fearow's long beak and see the two aforementioned pokemon standing right behind Fearow. Ash recognized the machamp as the same one from earlier, though he didn't know if that was helpful knowledge or not. "Take him to the cave, and keep him separated from the other humans. He'll be a perfect hostage..." Fearow tilted his head towards Ash before adding, "And search the island for the stupid rodent of his. Bring him alive...I plan on killing that rat personally."

Ash's blood ran cold at that statement-leading him to ignore the meanings of the previous ones-and he instantly began struggling against the vines he had realized he was tied up with. "No! Don't you dare hurt him!"

Fearow put his face right in front of Ash's, causing the latter to lean back slightly in trepidation. Fearow's face twisted into something mad for a brief second, as he spoke his next two words. "Watch me." He grinned as he continued, ravishing in the pure panic across Ash's face. "And no need to worry, because I'll make his death as slow and as agonizing as possible."

Ash glared at Fearow, consequences are damned. Nobody hurt one of his pokemon and got away with it. "If you even touch him, so help me, I swear that I'll...I'll..." Ash clenched his fists and he heard a strong buzzing noise resound in the back of his mind like a gong. The Fearow blinked in surprise, seemingly shocked by Ash's inability to complete his verbal threat.

Ash, a mere second later, found that this was not what Fearow was surprised over.

"Intriguing..." Fearow began, and Machamp and Scyther exchanged looks, eyeing Ash with caution. "Why are your hands glowing like that, Stupid Human?"

Ash blinked, his fury faltering for a moment. "My...hands?" He looked down to see that his hands were, in fact, glowing-a light blue color, the same color that his whole body was glowing as from earlier-while being clenched into fists. 'Okay.' Ash thought dumbly as the blue light faded away. 'That was weird.'

"Boss," Machamp spoke up, snatching Fearow's attention away from Ash. "Should we take him to the cave?"

Fearow suddenly seemed hesitant, glancing back at Ash's mysterious hands before his gaze hardened and he nodded in reply. "Go. And remember to send out teams to capture the pikachu, alive, if you would."

Machamp nodded in reply and with the help of Scyther, picked up Ash from his position on the floor. Ash instantly began struggling as the two pokemon took him away from Fearow. "H-hey, wait! Where are you taking me? And what's going to happen to Pikachu?!"

Machamp and Scyther glanced at Ash, but said nothing, carrying him away from Fearow and outside of...was he held inside of a dungeon? Ash furrowed his eyebrows and squinted against the bright light as the two pokemon led him down a stone corridor. What was a dungeon doing here? On an island, no less? And that isn't even bringing up the fact that pokemon were manning it by themselves.

'Man, this whole thing is just weird...' Ash thought trying to wrench himself out of the tight grips of both Machamp and Scyther. 'I'm tied up, apparently being held hostage by a bunch of wild pokemon, and I have no clue where everyone else is-' Ash stopped his train of thought and suddenly remembered what Fearow had said earlier. "Hey," Ash spoke, causing the machamp to look at him and raise an eyebrow. Scyther simply ignored Ash. "Earlier you mentioned other humans...are those the ones from the plane? You know, the big white thing that looks like a bird?"

Machamp frowned. "How did you know where we found the humans?" He eyed Ash curiously. "Are you psychic?"

"Psychic?" Ash repeated. "No. Or, I mean, I don't think so..." He gave a sheepish grin. "When I woke up I suddenly could understand pokemon, and my body was glowing...I don't even think I should be alive right now, to be honest." Ash confessed, causing Scyther and Machamp to exchange looks once more-were they close friends or something? "See, the plane-the big white thing-crashed into the ocean and the windows shattered while we were underwater...so I'm pretty sure I should be dead right now..."

Scyther frowned before he spoke in an incredibly deep voice. "You are a strange one, Human. Certainly different from any other human I have met before."

This piqued Ash's interest as he tried to adjust his position a little. "Oh, yeah? What humans have you met before?"

Scyther hesitated before simply replying, "Ones who don't deserve the trust of pokemon."

Ash was taken aback by that response and tried to change the subject. He needed to figure out a way to get out of here and fast. That being said, maybe he would be able to find the other people on the plane if he let Scyther and Machop lead him to...wherever they were taking him. 'I hope Claire, Stacey, Lila, and everyone on the plane are okay...and Pikachu, Hawlucha, Noivern, and Talonflame...' He reluctantly added, '...and Team Rocket too.' Shaking his head out of his thoughts, he continued his questioning. "So...earlier Fearow mentioned that he was going to use me...as a hostage. For who?"

Machamp was the one who replied. And he gave Ash an answer that completely threw him off guard-and sent him into a state of panic and confusion. "According to Boss? Your pidgeot."

***

Pikachu had a pounding headache. And his current situation certainly didn't help much.

Pikachu had woken up just after Ash had gotten knocked out and water began pouring into the plane at a rapid pace, nearly killing everyone on-board...until something happened. Everything had suddenly frozen, a soft blue light stopping all the water-and almost as if it had stopped time itself-and instead of the loud sound of rushing water heard moments earlier, there was a tranquil sound of stream water filling the ears of the passengers. As if that wasn't surreal enough, the plane had slowly moved out of the water and began floating towards a nearby island-which had magically appeared, just as how the water had magically been prevented from drowning everybody-and suddenly, while in the air, the blue light had stopped and caused the plane to descend into the forest. When the plane impacted across the forest floor, it had torn itself up. Pikachu had blacked out at this point and didn't remember anything after that...

He was woken up later by Talonflame and Hawlucha, the former which was going into a bigger panic than Noivern, the only child there. Hawlucha had explained to Pikachu-since Talonflame wasn't making a lick of sense-that he, Noivern, and Talonflame had woken up out of their Poke balls and they had no clue where they were.

Regaining his bearings, Pikachu decided to send the three flying types on aerial duty, searching for any survivors from the plane crash from the sky, while he searched below. The trio had been reluctant to leave Pikachu alone and became even more reluctant when Meowth had stumbled out of the bushes in a daze.

With the cat spouting the usual "you can trust me" nonsense, Pikachu managed to convince the three flying types that he would be fine. Plus, now he would be able to get the full explanation as to what happened from Meowth.

It was not a good situation. Team Rocket had hijacked the plane, was the reason why he was so nauseous, and something had hit the plane, causing it to "crash" land into the ocean...before being pulled out of it by a mysterious blue light...and then crashing into the forest. That crash was probably what caused the pokemon to be separated from the other passengers. Ash was most likely separated as well.

Pikachu twitched when he heard Meowth sigh for what felt like the fourth time in a row. "I miss Jessie an' James...hope dose lugs find me fast..."

"I hope Talonflame, Noivern, and Hawlucha come back fast..." Pikachu muttered under his breath, somehow managing to ignore the splitting headache he had.

Coincidentally, all three flying types landed in front of both cat and mouse with a soft thump on the ground. "We did not find any survivors." Hawlucha solemnly reported his voice carrying a bit of an eloquent accent, as he bowed. "It appears to be forest all around."

Pikachu's ears fell. "You're sure you found nothing else?"

Noivern raised a claw shyly. "Um, I remember seeing a few temples. Those, um, big triangle buildings." He turned to Hawlucha. "Right, Papa?"

Hawlucha nodded, a hint of a smile on his face. "Indeed. Perhaps we can search in those temples and see if anyone had the idea to go inside and seek shelter?"

Meowth snorted as he crossed his arms. "Shelter from what, Wise Guy?"

Pikachu sighed and touched his paws together, fidgeting with his small claws slightly to prevent himself from massaging his head. He didn't want to draw any attention to his headache, as it was a minor problem. They had other things to worry about, after all. "Did you see any pokemon? Maybe locals that live around this area?"

Hawlucha crossed his arms and held his head high. "We did see slight...indications, that there were pokemon living on this island." Pikachu frowned at Hawlucha's odd emphasis on the word 'indications', but before he could question it, Talonflame spoke up.

"You know what we did see? A flock of butterfree."

"Butterfree?" Pikachu echoed, memories scratching at the back of his mind.

"Um, yeah, we did!" Noivern replied, before looking down at Hawlucha slightly. "Right, Papa?"

Hawlucha smiled softly. "That is correct. However, they were in quite a rush and we were unable to catch up with them."

"Catch up with them?" Pikachu murmured. Pikachu was unsure if it was because Hawlucha had spoken in the Kaloseon version of Syllabus, the pokemon language, that he was misinterpreting what the fighting type was saying, or if he was simply too slow on the uptake. "Were they far away?"

Meowth rolled his eyes. "Obviously, ya stupid twerp."

A second later, there was a blackened and groaning Meowth lying on the ground in an undignified manner with electricity sparking all over his body. Everyone stared momentarily before shrugging it off. Being teammates of Pikachu, they were used to this.

"We saw the butterfree flock from a distance, though at that point we were heading back, so we saw no point in dragging out our search in the sky," Hawlucha explained, bowing his head towards Pikachu slightly. "Talonflame tried to get a closer look, though I am not sure whether the information he had supposedly gathered is...relevant to our situation."

Talonflame huffed and ruffled his feathers in offense. "Well, excuse me for actually trying to find some information! What did you do? I'll tell you what: nothing!"

"Hey!" Noivern snapped, standing in front of Hawlucha, who merely crossed his arms with his eyes closed, showing little reaction that Talonflame's childish taunt had affected him. "Don't insult Papa! And how's what you found out, um, important, anyway?!"

"It's a lot more important than nothing!" Talonflame huffed.

"Yeah?!"

"Yeah!"

Hawlucha sighed and held out his hand, the other arm crossed before he tried to reason with the large dragon type. "Noivern, please, calm down." He reasoned. "Remember, getting angry does not solve anything. It will only further anger your opponent and make you lose sight of what is truly important."

Noivern perked his large ears before hesitantly nodding. "Um, yes, Papa." He then turned around and childishly-quite fittingly-stuck his tongue out at Talonflame, who rolled his beady eyes. Hawlucha then turned towards Talonflame, about to lecture the bird, but was stopped by Pikachu, who raised a paw to catch everyone's attention.

Pikachu sighed, rubbing his eyes with his other paw in an exhausted manner. His headache was getting worse each passing second, and the argument that had previously ensued mere seconds ago had not helped matters. "Let's get back on topic. Talonflame, what exactly did you see?"

Talonflame huffed and ruffled his feathers. "The ugliest freaking scarf I've ever seen in my life."

Pikachu blinked. He blinked again. Yup, his headache was getting worse. It was beginning to become almost unbearable, in fact. "...can you repeat that, please?"

Talonflame waved his wing broadly. The bird always had been incredibly animated, even back when he was a fletchling, as strange as it was. "See, the leader-at least, I think that was the leader-of the butterfree flock was wearing this tattered yellow rag of...Arceus, I don't even know if that can be considered a scarf-in any case, just know that the butterfree that was leading the flock was wearing a stupid, yellow...thing."

Hawlucha gave an almost inaudible sigh. "As you can see, Pikachu... as I have stated mere moments ago, Talonflame's ramblings are indeed useless to our cause. I think what the best course of action would be now is to-" Hawlucha suddenly frowned in concern, reaching a hand out towards Pikachu, who was swaying slightly on his feet. "...are you alright, Pikachu?"

"Huh?" Pikachu blinked, then waved him off, tapping his paws together nervously. "Ah, no, I-I'm fine...don't worry about it." Pikachu winced as the headache came in full swing, almost splitting his skull in half. He gritted his teeth to endure the pain and tried to direct his focus somewhere else. "Talonflame, you mentioned a butterfree-" He shuddered, his vision blackening as he lost all feeling in his legs. "...b-butterfree flo-" Pikachu desperately tried to finish his statement, but he couldn't hear or see a single thing and his headache was certainly not helping matters-why was he in so much pain?!

Pikachu's hearing momentarily came back for a brief second to hear cries of worry from his panicked teammates, and surprisingly enough, Meowth. He cracked his eyes open-when had they closed?-to see the pokemon looking over him in concern. Meowth was saying something, followed by Hawlucha, Talonflame too. Pikachu didn't understand much of what happened after that, however, because at that moment, the headache finally caught up with him, and he lost all consciousness.

***

When Pikachu awoke, the first thing he realized was that he thankfully did not have a splitting headache preventing him from functioning properly anymore. The next thing he realized was that he was lying on leaves, staring up at a stone wall; meaning that he most likely was in a new area. The third thing he realized was that he wasn't alone, as indicated from the voice that had spoken when he groaned upon regaining consciousness.

A rather familiar voice.

"You're awake." A soft, almost motherly-like voice made Pikachu's eyes widen slightly. "I was worried about you."

Pikachu's mouth parted slightly, a gasp barely escaping his throat as he craned his neck to see where the voice had come from. As he did so, he managed to get a brief glimpse of his surroundings. He was lying on the stone ground, on a bed of leaves, and right beside him was a tired-looking smeargle. He was in a small cave, he realized, with a few torches aligning the wall and making it easier to see. Talonflame, Hawlucha, and Noivern all stood in the corner of the small cave, blinking in almost creepy unison as Pikachu looked around. Then Pikachu's eyes landed on the pokemon whose voice belonged to, standing a few meters away from the three Kaloseon pokemon in what appeared to be a doorway-a cave-way?

His eyes widened even further-nope, shouldn't have done that, the headache was coming back now-as he saw the owner of the voice. "Pidgeot?!"

Pidgeot-Ash's Pidgeot, his teammate Pidgeot, the same Pidgeot he hadn't seen in years Pidgeot-carefully stepped over to where Pikachu lay next to the smeargle and gently nuzzled Pikachu with her beak. "Hello, Pikachu. It's been a long time."

Pikachu was stunned for a moment before nuzzling back affectionately. "Hi, Pidgeot." He giggled slightly. "It has been a long time, hasn't it?"

Pidgeot nodded, amusement twinkling in her eyes as her voice put on a teasing tone. "I see you're still as cute as ever." She nudged him slightly with her talons, careful not to poke the small mouse too hard. "And I also see that you've lost some weight."

Pikachu's face turned a scarlet red as he heard a few snorts of barely contained laughter from the corner of the room. Most likely from Talonflame, no doubt. "W-well..." His ears flattened as puffed his cheeks. "Pidgeot..." He whined.

Pidgeot gave a warm laugh as she nuzzled Pikachu's head with her beak, ruffling up his fur and causing him to bristle slightly with annoyance. "It really is nice to see you again, Pikachu."

"Yeah..." Pikachu muttered, his face still red with embarrassment. With Pidgeot's help, he managed to sit up, fully looking around the strange cave and realizing that the smeargle and the Kaloseon pokemon were staring at the entire interaction. Why, oh, why did Pidgeot have to embarrass Pikachu so badly on their first meeting after, what, almost four years, now? Pikachu mentally shook his head. He already knew the answer to that. This was how Pidgeot acted towards her teammates back in Kanto and it was something that he and the others have come to accept. It was just part of her personality, and over time, it was something that they came to love about her. Her affectionate personality, that is. "So, uh..." He averted his gaze from the Kaloseon pokemon and instead decided to glance at the smeargle, who, for the most part, was minding his own business. "Where exactly am I, anyway?"

Pidgeot perked up straight as she replied, "See, that's a bit of a long story..." She glanced at the smeargle, then at Hawlucha, Talonflame, and Noivern. "But perhaps we should introduce ourselves first?"

"Oh..." Pikachu muttered, adjusting his sitting position before pointing his paw at the group, ready to introduce them, when he stopped suddenly, realizing something. "Wait...where's Meowth?"

At that, oddly enough, Talonflame burst into laughter. Pikachu looked at him oddly while Noivern and Hawlucha remained indifferent, though the former looked mildly annoyed-most likely due to Talonflame's insulting of his "Papa" earlier. "Oh, Arceus..." Talonflame chortled. "It was hilarious. You know the butterfree with the hideous yellow scarf? See, the second that guy saw Meowth and got a rundown of the whole situation, h-he..." Talonflame was unable to finish his statement as he continued cackling with laughter.

Pidgeot looked a mixture of both disturbed and concerned. She looked at Pikachu. "Is he...well?"

Pikachu waved a paw, his ears flicked back. "You get used to it. Anyway..." He frowned, then did a double-take as Talonflame's words sunk in. "Wait, Butterfree's here?!"

Pidgeot smiled slightly at the mouse's eager excitement. "We seem to be skipping from one subject to another, don't we?" She chuckled to herself before answering Pikachu's question. "Yes, Butterfree is here. I'll explain in a bit, but for now..." She looked around expectantly. "I believe introductions are in order?"

Pikachu touched his paws together awkwardly. "Oh." He pointed towards the Kaloseon birds. "Guys," He pointed back towards Pidgeot. "This is Pidgeot. Specifically, Ash's pidgeot. I've told you about her, remember? Ash released her a few years ago in Viridian Forest back in Kanto so she could protect her flock from a fearow. Pidgeot, this is Talonflame, Hawlucha, and Noivern; the pokemon Ash caught in Kalos."

Hawlucha puffed out his chest proudly before going up to Pidgeot and bowing. "Hello, Lady Pidgeot." He held out a claw as he bowed, offering to take her talons in his own. Pidgeot awkwardly accepted and watched with a bewildered expression as Hawlucha lightly pecked her talons before letting go of them. "I have heard many great things about you from Pikachu."

Pidgeot blinked. "Ah. Is that so?" She set her talon down back on the ground. "If you don't mind me asking, why did you-?"

"I have three rules." Hawlucha interrupted boldly. Pikachu couldn't help but smile slightly as he heard Noivern squeal in adoration. Talonflame simply grumbled under his breath with annoyance. They already knew what was coming. "Rule One: always be honorable. Rule Two: always attempt to look your best. And Rule Three-" He bowed, a slight smirk plastered on his face. "Always be kind to a lady."

"I see," Pidgeot replied with uncertainty in her voice. She turned to Noivern. "What about you, darling?"

Noivern stiffened slightly, before stammering out, "Um...nice to meet you, Miss, um Pidgeot..." He bowed his head before glancing at Hawlucha, who gave him a reassuring nod. Noivern smiled slightly before saying, "I'm from Kalos, and, um, this is Papa!" He pointed at Hawlucha with a claw, who nodded in reply, touched by the excited gesture.

Pidgeot cooed slightly. "Aw...nice to meet you too, child."

Talonflame ruffled his feathers and chirped angrily. "Well, you damn better not forget about me!" When everyone turned to him, he ruffled up his feathers again then huffed. "Thank you. Anyway, I'm Talonflame. I'm great. We're done. Thank you." He posed triumphantly before blinking and looking around expectantly. "Why didn't I get hit by-" He deflated suddenly, becoming very quiet all of a sudden. "Oh."

Pidgeot's eyes softened with concern, recognizing a hint of pain and longing in Talonflame's voice, though, at Pikachu's inaudible urging, she remained silent. Whatever the fire/flying type was upset about was his business, though Pikachu knew what it was; Noivern and Hawlucha did too, apparently, if the sympathetic expressions they suddenly held were anything to go by.

An awkward silence lingered in the air for a moment before the smeargle cleared his throat. "I believe I have not introduced myself yet. I'm Smeargle, one of the prominent fighters working for Pidgeot and Butterfree."

Pikachu's ears perked. "Fighter? Wait, is this the reason why you and Butterfree are...here wherever here is-instead of Viridian and wherever Butterfree went? Are you guys fighting someone?"

Pidgeot's expression sobered as she went into business. "I guess I should start from the beginning. After Ash released me, Fearow became my nemesis; and I became his. We fought on an almost daily basis, becoming stronger and stronger with each passing day. Ash had come back for me, just as he had promised, but with some help from Pikachu-" Here, Pikachu nodded, as if knowing what the flying type was about to say. "I was able to explain to Ash that I still needed to stay in the forest. That was the last time I had seen him or Pikachu, unfortunately..." She trailed off before sending a bittersweet smile towards Pikachu. "Until now, that is. Anyway, Fearow didn't break from the status quo of regular attacks to take down my flock until a year ago: one day, he just didn't attack."

Hawlucha frowned. "How peculiar."

"That's what I thought, too." Pidgeot agreed before continuing. "With the help of some forest pokemon, I found out that Fearow was heading towards the ocean. I was suspicious. After all, he wasn't one to just give up like that-he had grown over the time we fought each other. He had become more cold and calculating; more dangerous and malicious...while the pokemon of Viridian was now completely safe from him, there was no guarantee that any other pokemon would as well." She took a deep breath. "So, I went after him. My flock wanted to come with me, so I allowed them. It was their choice, after all, though I was initially against it..."

She shook her head as if trying to shrug off certain thoughts. "We followed Fearow over the ocean, with the help of some water pokemon that had seen the direction he had went towards. He didn't seem to be trying to hide his tracks very hard, in all honesty; most likely because he didn't suspect we'd follow. On the way, we had bumped into Butterfree, his mate, along with his flock. After explaining the situation, I found out that Butterfree and his flock had been attacked by Fearow moments before I met up with him."

Pikachu sharply inhaled. "Butterfree was attacked?!"

Pidgeot nodded. "Yes, and after exchanging some information on where Fearow was headed, Butterfree and his flock agreed to help us in our search to find out what Fearow was up the to-the fact that he had managed to take out Butterfree's flock by himself was a strong indication that he was up to no good. With some difficulty, we found an island, but there was a catch-the island was hidden."

Talonflame frowned. "Then how the hell did you find the island?"

"I'm getting to that. See, we didn't know the island was hidden because it wasn't hidden to us. We later found out that it was only hidden to humans."

"Or at least, that's what we figured." Smeargle interrupted. "Seems most logical at this point. Otherwise, humans would be all over this island with all the temples and such." He then grumbled something under his breath before smoothing out some of the furs on his tail.

"I didn't ask, but are we in a temple, right now?" Pikachu frowned, ignoring the thought at the back of his head that compared Smeargle to Ash's bulbasaur. He hoped that Smeargle didn't curse as much as Bulbasaur did...

Pidgeot nodded. "Right, darling. Anyway, we trailed Fearow and found that there were other pokemon on this island, some who lived in a few temples. We familiarized ourselves with some of the locals when about a day later, we found out that Fearow had taken over a temple and had convinced some pokemon on the island to 'join him'."

Smeargle sighed as he picked up on the story. "The thing is many pokemon that live here have a bad image of humans due to its hidden nature and the fact that the only thing they've had to go on about humans are tales about how dangerous they are. I wouldn't be surprised if Fearow had spun something with that damn silvery tongue of his to try and convince all the pokemon that they should help him in the fight against the human race."

The other pokemon gasped sharply at the revelation. "Hold up, 'fight against the human race'...is this pokemon even sane?!" Talonflame chirped.

"Wish I knew," Pidgeot replied solemnly. "In all honesty, I don't know where he got the idea from, but I did not that he was recruiting an army-and I needed to stop him. So, I decided to fight fire with fire. With the help of Butterfree, we convinced some other pokemon on this island that humans weren't bad and to not trust Fearow. Somewhere along the line, Fearow had gotten wind of our activities, no doubt from one of the forest pokemon on his side, and then..." Pidgeot let out a sigh. "Things just went downhill from there. To put it simply; we're in the middle of a war. A war with high stakes. I realize Fearow's plan is far-fetched, but ideas are dangerous. And the fact that Fearow's idea spread to so many pokemon so quickly is concerning. Imagine how bad it would be if he took his army to one of the regions?"

Pikachu shuddered, as did the others. The thought truly was terrifying.

Pidgeot shuffled her feet for a moment before continuing. "We've been going back and forth for a year now, and we were actually in battle earlier when..." she flinched slightly. "One of our combo attacks had hit a plane flying overhead and caused it to descend into the ocean..." She then shook her head. "We weren't able to get to it in time before it landed into the water, but that's when..."

"The plane floated out by itself, right?" Pikachu finished.

Pidgeot nodded. "We had been in battle, so we weren't able to prevent it from crashing, and it was too close to Fearow's temple for me to risk sending anyone there..." she sighed tenderly. "Thank goodness we found you heading towards our turf...anyway, Butterfree had been leading a scouting party, to see if we could find anyone from the plane crash that might have survived or wandered into our turf, which was when he found you guys."

It was here when Talonflame had interrupted, trying to hold back his laughter. "Yeah, and when we explained what happened-with you collapsing and all-Meowth spoke up and the dumb cat said that it was his fault!" He cracked up. "The butterfree with the hideous scarf got so mad...he pulled a Gust so strong it smacked Meowth into a tree and broke it!"

"Broke what?" Pikachu asked innocently.

"The tree!" Talonflame howled with laughter, causing everyone to stare at him. Smeargle, who hadn't said much overall rolled his eyes and muttered something under his breath about 'kids', causing Pikachu to freak out slightly over the fact that the smeargle was similar to Bulbasaur.

Pikachu shook his head then gave Talonflame a sweet smile. "That's nice, Talonflame." He cocked his head and innocently closed his eyes, putting on the biggest smile he could. His dark and menacing tone starkly contrasted this persona, however... "Now, stop insulting Butterfree, or else I'll fry you to a crisp." He opened his eyes to see a wide-eyed and mildly terrified Talonflame backing away from him. "Got that?"

"Uh..." Talonflame laughed nervously, eyes darting back and forth before slumping. "Right...sorry..."

Pikachu smiled a genuine smile this time. "That's better." He turned back to Pidgeot. "What?"

This time it was Pidgeot's turn to laugh. "You haven't changed much, have you Pikachu?"

"...seriously, what did I do?"

Noivern turned to Hawlucha. "Papa, Pikachu's scary..."

Hawlucha rubbed the dragon's wing comfortingly. "That is quite alright, Noivern. Pikachu is quite a...unique pokemon. He is usually a very kind pokemon." He hesitated before adding, "Except if you have angered him in some manner."

Noivern gulped as Talonflame laughed nervously, slight hysteria bearing his tone. Even after traveling throughout Kalos with Pikachu, it was very hard to fully understand the mouse. Basic knowledge about him at this point was to just give up on understanding him at all, which seemed to be the basic status quo for Ash's pokemon.

***

Ash was on the verge of completely freaking out. Which was rare for him, but after what had happened with Team Flare-just a few freaking days ago, his stress levels had been at an all-time high; and he was damned if he wasn't glad that he was on his way back to Pallet Town.

'But now I'm stuck in this stupid mess.' Ash thought miserably, letting out a sigh as he struggled against the binds holding him hostage.

"You know you're not going to get out, right?" Ash gritted his teeth at the voice who had spoken. Machamp. "It's better for you if you just give up now."

The pokemon, true to their word, had thrown him inside of a cell that itself was in a small cave. Quite literally, they had thrown him inside the cell before locking the door-why was there a cell inside a cave?-before standing guard. Ash quickly found out a few things. One: Scyther was not very talkative. Two: everyone on the plane had survived, thankfully. Three: he was separated from the other passengers, who were being detained in some other cave. And the fourth thing he figured out was that he was previously in a temple before being taken outside by Machamp and Scyther to his cell.

Not much, but until he found a way to get out of here...it was all he had.

Ash adjusted his position against the rock he was lying against. At least his captors were courteous enough to allow him to be able to sit up straight. "I never give up," Ash glared. "Never have, never will. So, unless you have something helpful to say, I'm going to keep struggling, thank you."

Scyther let out an amused chuckle, thought Machamp was the one to speak. "It's best if you give up now, Kid. Trust me, I know."

Ash ceased struggling for a moment, looking at Machamp curiously as he gritted his teeth. "And just what do you know? You're not the one being held hostage against his will."

"True," Machamp confessed. "But that isn't the only reason why you're struggling, is it? It's Pidgeot and the pikachu you're worried about."

Ash pursed his lips, Machamp's words taking him back for a moment. "Yeah." He replied after a moment. "You're using me as a hostage against my pidgeot for some reason-I don't even know what's going on-and Fearow is planning on killing Pikachu..." He shuddered at that last part.

'And no need to worry, because I'll make his death as slow and as agonizing as possible.'

Fearow's words rang throughout his mind like a gong, causing his stomach to boil in anger. As if that weren't enough to add to his worries, he had no clue where any of his pokemon were and these pokemon captured him so they would have some leverage over Pidgeot. But for what reason? And where was he, anyway?

Machamp bobbed his head side to side as if considering Ash's statement. "What's going on? Just an angry fearow with a huge grudge and an extra incentive to follow." Ash frowned. He could've sworn that for a moment the Machamp was implying something, but what? "Maybe you should look between the lines, Kid, and you'll find your answers."

Machamp was definitely implying something.

Ash let out a frustrated sigh. This conversation was going nowhere. And now he had to think about what the machamp was implying-or if Ash had just made that thought up. He scrutinized the large fighting type, hoping that he would gain some type of clue...but he was sorrily disappointed. The machamp had closed his eyes and turned away, exchanging a muttered conversation with Scyther. Ash was too far away to hear what they were saying, but maybe he could try and eavesdrop.

'Yeah, that'll do...' He grunted and silently tried to shuffle his way towards the two pokemon, inch by inch. He didn't want to come too close, or else he would be found out. 'I just need to find a way out of here and then wing it from there...' He gritted his teeth, his mind working into overdrive. 'Until then, I'm going to try and find out as much as I can about whatever the hell is going on.'

Here came a thought he never realized he would think before.

'Time to do some research.'