EVERYONE: Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Azure Rescuers (Chapter 15 posted)

[Gengarzilla]

Put yourself in their shoes, their minds, their bodies. Their new bodies.
If you were to be turned into a Pokémon and abruptly torn away from everything you know and love, to be dumped in some strange new world with no memories and no directions... could you fare any better than they?

An old tale, some new spins.
Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Azure Rescuers
I'd love to have a banner for this thing sometime.
​

Hello and welcome to my RRT/BRT retelling fic, Azure Rescuers! Thank you for taking time from your days (or nights, I don't hold prejudice against Noctowl or nocturnal people) to read my very first foray into longterm writing, your interest means a whole lot to me.

This was a little something which first came to my mind in June of 2016 and soon saw life on the upcoming 4th of July, a day after I turned 22. It soon became an important part of my life for the rest of that year and was originally completed during the 11th of January 2017. While I can say with absolute certainty that the Pokémon Mystery Dungeon series is my most cherished part of the entire Pokémon franchise, its first pair, released overseas to North America less than a week over 11 years ago... began to feel as if it was missing something once the next pair was released a couple of years later. Namely, a real post-credits story. Or at least one which wasn't so splintered, fragmented, scattered all over the place.

That's how I saw it, that's also why I created this: To pick up where (Spike) Chunsoft left off and make one myself in my capacity as a huge fan. I hope you can enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it!

With that said...

"Let's get you into the world of Pokémon! Go for it!"

Part 1: The visitors
Chapter 1: Baby steps
Chapter 2: The new rescuers
Chapter 3: A battle a day lures the doctor in
Chapter 4: Ice Crashing the party
Chapter 5: Urban Legend of Zapdos
Chapter 6: A shocking story
Chapter 7: The evening of eavesdropping
Chapter 8: Lies and loyalties
Chapter 9: The seedy technician
Chapter 10: Fire and Ice reunite
Chapter 11: Melting the Black Ice
Chapter 12: The absconder's absolution
Chapter 13: A spiteful punch
Chapter 14: The two faces of fire
Chapter 15: Earth Power (T)
Chapter 16:

Part 2: The opposition
Chapter 17:
Chapter 18:
Chapter 19:
Chapter 20:
Chapter 21:
Chapter 22:
Chapter 23:
Chapter 24:
Chapter 25:
Chapter 26:
Chapter 27:
Chapter 28:
Chapter 29:
Chapter 30:

Part 3: The aftermath
Epilogue:

 

[Gengarzilla]

Chapter 1: Baby steps​

The... the pleasant breeze...

This girl very much enjoyed it, feeling it rushing across her oddly diminutive form and hearing it sweep amongst the trees. She couldn’t quite recall how she had ended up here, laying within what seemed to be a forest of some sort. The only possibility she could even invent was that she had stupidly taken a nap inside a small wooded area near her home. However, it didn’t account for how she felt... a little unusual; as though she were in someone else’s body. She just had to wonder what was going on at the moment...

"Hey, you ok there? Wake up!"

She'd heard an unfamiliar voice among this late day breeze. It appeared as though the girl wasn't along here. At first, she briefly wondered whether this was someone from a search party. She didn’t want anyone to be making a scene over this and so decided to get up, though this did come with a little bit of difficulty however. She still felt a tad strange... and round.

What she saw next nearly made her fall over again. The voice came from someone possessing a round body, four stumpy legs, a large head, and a zigzagging mouth that was lightly hanging open. "A Pokémon?" This individual immediately expressed relief that she had come to, adding to her confusion. She had no idea how long she might have been out for... or any idea about anything else for that matter. What surprised her most was that this Pokémon was actually talking. "Are you speaking? I didn’t know that a human like me could hear that."

"Hah, you say you’re human? You look like a pretty normal Togepi from this angle, you sure you haven’t bumped your head somewhere?" the Pokémon immediately retorted.

Then it hit her, the decreased size and strange shape of her body. She looked at her hands and instead of seeing humanoid hands with four fingers and a thumb on each, she instead found herself looking at... stubby yellow hands. A quick glance down also unveiled an eggshell encasing most of her body, red and blue shapes dotted around it.

"T-Togepi? What?! I’ve turned into a Togepi?!" the former human exclaimed in shock. They were admittedly an adorable species of Pokémon but she wasn’t sure if she was entirely on board with this revelation. "What happened...?" she outwardly asked as she tried to recall how this could have possibly occurred, upon which she began to outright panic once no memories at all could be found. "I can’t remember anything either... What's going on here?!"

The individual bearing witness to this fretful episode could only watch with a mixture of curiosity and concern. "You’re a bit odd... Well, never mind. Do you remember your name at least?"

That’s right. Her name. "My name is..."

Now she was really beginning to get scared. "...I’m sorry, I can’t even remember that." the girl murmured. This day wasn’t going well, she had somehow been found as an amnesiac Togepi by a talking Pokémon. She began restlessly looking around for any way to figure out her predicament before catching sight of a Pidgey flock flying above them both. She didn’t know this for obvious reasons but Flying type Pokémon were her favourites as a human. "Something’s up with that flock, I wonder what they’re fluttering away from." she wondered.

Fluttering... Flutter... Something about that word sounded nice. It calmed her down a little. She had decided. "In place of my human name, just call me Flutter."

"Alright then. Flutter it is. Nice to meet you. I’m Terack, a Trapinch." the Pokémon next to her replied with. Before the newly named Togepi could respond, she heard shouting. A Butterfree was soon passing by them. "Are you alright? What’s the problem?" Flutter said without thinking twice. Whatever had this Butterfree so worked up sounded rather serious.

As it turned out, her assumption was right on the money. "I-it’s my baby Caterpie, a fissure opened up in the ground and he’s fallen in!" Terack’s only reply was a shocked "What?!" and Flutter felt an air of unease creep into her as she heard of how the Butterfree had been attacked by other Pokémon when trying to retrieve her child and couldn’t get past them. They were seemingly startled and angered by the fissure, from what the butterfly thought.

Forget her apparently bad day, this was way worse. There was only one thought on Flutter’s mind at present... "We gotta save that kid, let’s move!" she exclaimed, immediately rushing off with Terack hot on her proverbial tail...

~​

Soon, Flutter’s decision had led her and Terack deep into the forest, where navigating their way through the trees felt like some sort of maze. Several agitated Pidgey, Sunkern, and Wurmple previously made attempts to attack but they weren’t able to hold up that much of a fight against the duo. "Do you think we’re getting close to the Caterpie now?" Terack asked her as he used Sand Attack on a Wurmple, the sand kicked into its eyes causing a Tackle to miss before defeating it with his Bite move.

"I’m not sure, we could be close by now. Heads up!" Flutter replied, letting loose with a Growl to unnerve the Sunkern behind him. As he defeated the inhibited Pokémon, Flutter found herself glad for the opportunity to move about and attempt to adjust to this new form. Aside from the aforementioned Growl, she also knew Charm and the unpredictable Metronome. She had also seen her new Trapinch companion use Mud Slap on top of his Sand Attack and Bite.

There was still no sign of Caterpie though, nor was there a quick and easy way to find the fissure that this kid had fallen in. Just as her eyes skimmed past some bushes while she looked around for this fissure though, a wave of tiredness suddenly collided with her. For some ridiculously obscure reason, a nap sounded like the best thing in the world right about now... wait a moment. No, now wasn’t the time for that. Instead of letting herself drift off, Flutter looked harder at the bushes. Hard enough to the point where she could have sworn to somehow see the outline of six ovoid shapes within one of them. What she didn’t know is that this was her Foresight move.

"Terack, something’s in that leftmost bush!" she called to him in her slight daze. He took the cue, readying himself with Focus Energy before lunging straight into the said bush with Bite at the ready. Within it was an Exeggcute that had been attempting to covertly lull Flutter to sleep with Hypnosis, and the super-effective critical hit defeated it on the spot.

Just like that, her mist cleared. "Good call." he said upon emerging, taking the lead now with her at his back. Within a few more moments they had found the fissure and Terack began to dig a sloping tunnel, just like the sand pits he used to make, down into it after getting a look at the drop. They’d be able to use that to bring the young Caterpie out from the crack. Flutter slid down after the Trapinch once the tunnel was completed and caught sight of a caterpillar-like creature nearby, back turned to them and crying. She could tell right away that this was Caterpie, almost in an instinctual manner.

"Hey, we’re here to help.” she said gently to the scared child. “Your mother’s waiting".

~​

"My baby’s safe!" Butterfree called out in joy when Flutter and Terack returned, Caterpie on the Trapinch’s back. "I’m sorry, I really don’t know how to thank you two. What are your names?"

"I’m Terack." he answered. "This one here is Flutter. You don’t have to do anything, we’re just glad to have been here when you passed by." Caterpie’s eyes lit up at this sentence. "Terack and Flutter... C-cool...!" he had to say, adoringly staring at the two. Terack found it just a little embarrassing but reprociated with a friendly smile. Flutter, primarily due to her total memory loss, couldn’t remember the last time she felt this happy. She had undoubtedly taken a quick shine to the youngster.

Butterfree then appeared to have an idea. "Ah. It’s not much, but these are a token of my appreciation. Please take them." In her hands were an Oran Berry, a Pecha Berry, a Rawst Berry, and a Chesto Berry. Both Flutter and Terack graciously accepted the berries before Butterfree and Caterpie left the area.

Terack then turned to face Flutter as she spoke. "I’m glad that went without any problems, what a sweet kid." she said. The Trapinch replied with "Indeed, and you really did well out there. What are you going to do now though? You’ve somehow lost every last bit of your memory and became a Pokémon, do you have anywhere to stay after this?" The Togepi really wasn’t too delighted with this thought. Now that Terack had brought it up, she really didn’t have anywhere she could go... "N-no, I don’t... know what I'm going to do now..." she answered, looking very subdued and defeated as she stared blankly at her feet. Her Togepi feet. A pair of brutally firm reminders of this scary new situation which she'd found herself in.

"Alright then. Don’t worry about it, just follow me." Terack said to Flutter after taking note of her petrified, fearful expression. He headed eastwards out from the woods, the human turned Pokémon following close behind.

~​

"And here we are!" he said once they reached a three-way intersection. In front of them was a small and simple looking wooden cottage with one floor. The roof bore a resemblance to the top of a strawberry, complete with a green stalk at the top. Situated outside was a mailbox, currently empty.

"Is this your home then?" Flutter asked. Nothing could have prepared her for Terack’s answer. "It was. This is going to be your home now. There’s only one place to sleep in there but you can take that. I’ll pick out somewhere else to stay nearby." She was blown away by these words. Here he was, with a place of his own to call home, and he was moving out to give it to some amnesia-struck Togepi that he randomly encountered in the woods. "T-thank you... I really, really do owe you one, honestly..." she whimpered in a display of overpowering relief and gratitude. He’d just taken a massive load off of her mind and shoulders with this action. "You've really saved me here, is there some way I could ever repay you?" Flutter asked.

"Hey, don’t you worry about all that. I'm not looking for anything more than happiness. You just get yourself settled in and rested up, I’ll drop by to see you tomorrow." he said back to her, looking up at the sunset before leaving down the left path. Flutter waved goodbye to the Trapinch and went inside the house.

The fluffy mat located near the back of the interior looked nothing short of immensely inviting. Ok, now was the perfect time for a nap...