Chapter 148

Author Note:

This is another situation in which I need to include an author note to hide the start of the chapter, but I don't have an announcement. I suppose I'll just say have a good day?

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To Sam’s surprise, it wasn’t Brock who carried Sammy back. Out of everyone, Ash was the one to pick up the boy, bring his arms and legs up to wear him like a backpack, and then carry him the whole way to Arborville.

Everyone else had already seen this town once before, but this was Sam’s first visit here.

Arborville wasn’t the usual village he expected. It had its small houses and other buildings, but the place was not built on the forest floor. Instead, the people here had made use of the Ilex Forest’s large trees for the base structures of their homes. Buildings had been assembled between large branches, and the trunks supported the cores of their homes. The forest floor was clear of any construction, being left bare and open so that any wild Pokémon could safely pass by.

This place wasn’t located too far from the road that passed through that fallen tree, but it was just far enough away that the trip back was long enough to be awkward. Ash was fine, mostly, but he’d send Sam the occasional strange glare when he thought Sam wasn’t looking. Misty could not stop frowning, Sammy was unconscious, and Richard remained silent the whole way.

For the entire trip back, it was like the world didn’t exist for him. Richard would acknowledge the occasional warning to avoid a potential tripping hazard, but he otherwise spent his time deep in thought.

Sam was very thankful Brock was around. He stayed on alert and kept a watchful eye on the forest around them even though it wasn’t needed since Haunter was on guard, but he didn’t know. If anything, out of everyone, Brock seemed to be the most normal person here.

But of course, that thought was quickly proven wrong.

“Diana, beautiful Diana!”

Oh, come on.

“We need your help!” Brock shouted up to one of Arborville’s tree houses. “We have an unconscious person down here!”

From atop a wooden balcony, a pair of faces peeked out to check on their small group. Sam immediately recognized one of them as Diana, the young woman who had first warned him of the Voice of the Forest, and next to her was an old woman who carried such a strong resemblance that she had to be Diana’s grandmother.

Right away, Diana dashed over to her home’s rope ladder, which she jumped down more than she climbed. The old woman, meanwhile, rushed back into their house to grab their medical supplies.

Diana helped them bring Sammy inside.

Once everyone was up, she helped lay Sammy on their main room’s couch. Brock and Diana knelt in front of him. The old woman stepped into the room carrying a basket of medicines, but when she laid her eyes on Richard and the unconscious boy, there was an almost imperceptible delay to her pace, but she pushed through to bring the supplies over.

Since Sammy was unconscious due to exhaustion more than anything else, there wasn’t much Brock and Diana could do other than give him another once-over. The air in the room was tense, with Ash looking uncomfortable in the back and with Richard having collapsed into a chair to watch the scene in silence.

It felt oppressive.

“I’ll be outside if anyone needs me,” Sam said, but no one paid him any mind.

He stepped back out to that balcony without being bothered, and he leaned against its railing while Misdreavus floated by his side.

“This sucks,” Sam said as he dropped his head onto his arms. “How much did you catch, Misdreavus? I blacked out when everything with Celebi happened, but you—”

She shook her head. She’d seen nothing; she had briefly fallen unconscious, too.

“We’ve been thrown through time. That’s it. That’s the explanation. And I’ve been thrown through time again. My team... I’m not from your time period, Misdreavus. I’m from the future, or at least, I guess I’m this present future’s past?”

He stared up into the branches of the canopy. Out here, the leaves were thin enough to let plenty of light through. The gleam was enough that he couldn’t quite make out the sky, but he could at least tell it was clear up there.

He had to wonder where his team was right now. Was he able to find his way back? Or had they been out here for two full years, just waiting for the day he’d return?

...But his comments had been the first time he truly mentioned time travel to Misdreavus, even as brief as they were. Despite the news being suddenly dropped on her, she went quiet for only a second and then puffed up with a smile to display her confidence.

She’d barely even thought about it, and she had already promised to help Sam.

Her complete faith in him just made him feel worse.

“Whew!” Diana’s voice came from the entrance of her home as she stepped out to join Sam. “Brock does good work, but the moment things lighten up... I don’t have anything against the guy, but man, does he make things awkward at times.”

She swiped her hands together as if cleaning them off after a long day’s hard work. She walked over to the railing next to Sam, leaning on it while facing in.

“How are you holding up?” Diana said. “I haven’t seen you for... what, two years?”

“You remember me?” Sam asked as he stood up.

“Sure. How many people do you think come out here?”

“A decent amount.”

“This group is a little unusually sized, but we don’t get too many people. Definitely not anyone who smiles when I give them that warning.”

She chuckled to herself, but Sam’s eyes flicked to the forest floor. There were a few bridges between the buildings here to allow people to move between the trees, but down there, beneath them, there was nothing. He could even see where a few sections of tall grass rustled to mark wild Pokémon moving around within.

He grimaced before he spoke.

“I last saw you less than a week ago,” Sam said quietly.

Diana opened her mouth as if to respond, but she closed it to take a moment to think.

“...The Voice of the Forest.” Her eyes widened in realization.

“Its real name is Celebi,” Sam grumbled. “It’s a Legendary Pokémon, apparently.”

It took her a moment to truly understand the implications of his, but all she ended up doing was laugh.

“So then you never completed your crazy little training trip? I could have sworn—” She stopped herself. “You didn’t take my warning seriously?”

Sam joined her in her lean against the railing. He didn’t stare inside, however. He didn’t want to. He couldn’t quite call himself a fan of everything that was going on.

“I did take it seriously. I didn’t go toward any voice that cried out, but it wasn’t like there was ever one to lure me close. No. An archway appeared next to my campsite, and when I approached it—” He had to stop to not choke up. “My Pokémon pushed me in.”

Diana shifted around awkwardly. She briefly cleared her throat.

“So, uh, Celebi, huh? I didn’t know the Voice of the Forest was a Pokémon. We always just thought it was a spirit, but then again, no one ever really encountered it. Most we ever hear are rumors fo someone falling victim to its effects.”

“Then what was the point of the bread?”

Sam stared until she let out a short laugh.

“The bread? Oh, the berry loaf! It’s a tradition that started way before my grandmother was born. If I remember the story correctly...” She tapped her chin. “A man visited Arborville, and he was given bread as part of the usual hospitality. When he continued into the forest, he came out years later, saying the bread was the only thing that kept him alive.”

“...I don’t think it ‘keeps the Voice of the Forest at bay,’” Sam grumbled. “I think he just ate it after getting lost.”

After all, that was what Sam did.

“Sure, but you can’t deny its effects! Traditions exist for a reason. I bet it helped you, right?”

Though he continued to grumble, she just sent him a grin.

Diana didn’t talk much after that, choosing to just quietly lean back and use this peaceful moment of silence to relax. That left Sam alone with his thoughts, and he couldn’t stop thinking about the implications of Celebi and all of its powers.

Time travel was confusing. It was simply too much.

But then again, is Celebi why I have the New Pokédex? Did it bring someone from the future to the past? So, if my grandfather is here, he must have met someone. The New Pokédex is old. Are we about to meet some kind of Professor from the future?

Maybe. Unless I was the one to give it to him, but that doesn’t make sense. I don’t have the New Pokédex with me, and I do not have all that information memorized. It’s simply too much.

His only other thought was that it was maybe connected to Sammy since the boy sketched Pokémon a lot. His influence would help explain all the drawings in the New Pokédex, but that still didn’t feel right.

As Sam fell into his thoughts, a few shouts came from inside. Sammy seemed to have woken up, and he lashed out about no longer having Celebi in his arms.

That was when Sam’s grandfather stepped in, and with Richard’s presence, the boy calmed down. Whatever altercation that had been about to happen between him and Ash was stopped by the sudden, familiar face.

After that, the conversation quieted to the point that Sam no longer heard what was happening, and Diana used the moment to start heading back inside.

“Before you go.” Sam pushed off the railing to face her. “Have you... Did you see any team of Ghost Types nearby? Or maybe just a rare species or two? Anything like a Typhlosion, Annihilape, or a Trevenant? Anything at all?”

“Typhlosion? Annihilape?” She blinked at him. “I don’t think I’ve heard of anything like that recently. A Trevenant, though? Hm. Maybe? But I don’t think any have wandered in from the deep woods in the past few years.”

“...Okay. Thanks anyway.”

Sam fell back down.

She tried her best to send Sam a reassuring smile, but she stepped back inside. That left Sam alone on the balcony with just him and Misdreavus.

But Haunter briefly reprimanded him with a chill that spread beneath his feet as if to remind Sam that he was still there in his shadow.

“I don’t know what to do.” Sam leaned against the railing and stared out into the forest once more. “My team is out there, somewhere, or maybe even somewhen. I need to find them, but Celebi— Gah. At this point, we’re years apart.”

He didn’t know if they were still in the woods. He didn’t know if he’d been missing for years or if a future version of himself had managed to return to the past. He considered leaving the woods to head somewhere more connected, but would finding out more just mess with his future? Would that set in stone a reality in which he’d spent two full years apart?

In more ways than one, he hated this. But through everything, he could still trace the source of his problems as well as its solution to one, singular thing:

Celebi.

“I can spend all this time sitting around and worrying, or I can actually do something,” Sam said as he stood up. “Sammy’s woken up. Which means we’re just wasting our time here. More than anything else, if we want solutions, we need to find Celebi.”

We need to find Celebi and make it help us.

At his side, Misdreavus bobbed in the air to show her eager support.

Having decided on his next steps, Sam strode back into Diana’s home, standing in the door frame to look around at everyone here. He somehow managed to time his reappearance with a lull in the conversation. The old woman from before was now kneeling in front of Sammy, and the other boy was now sitting up while staring at a much older version of his sketchbook that he held in his hands.

“I’ve come to a decision,” Sam announced, and his words drew the attention of everyone in the room. “We can’t waste any more time. We need to take action and be decisive. So I’m going to hunt down Celebi.”

In the back, Richard frowned.

“I’ll be leaving as soon as I can,” Sam continued. “Misdreavus and I are going to find it. If anyone else wants to join—”

“I’ll come.” On the couch, Sammy looked up. “Celebi is out there. I remember it flying away. It barely managed to do that. It was hurt. If we’re going to find it, then... Then Celebi needs our help!”

He stood, clutching his sketchbook in his hands.

“If there’s a Pokémon in need, then we can’t sit around and do nothing!” Ash shouted.

His Pikachu shouted its name in agreement.

“I’ll come, too,” Misty said.

“And I’ll help!” Brock added.

And then, turning to the only person who was yet to speak, Sammy looked Richard in the eye.

“Celebi was being hunted by a poacher when we first saw it,” he said. Each word was slow and felt as though they had been picked carefully. “That poacher would have seen us disappear in front of his eyes. That was years ago. If he was hunting Celebi, he would have known about its powers, and who knows how much he’s spread that knowledge around?”

“So what?” Ash countered. “If anyone gets in our way, we’ll just beat them in a fight!”

Richard sighed.

“I’m trying to say that there’s going to be people expecting us. We’ll need to be careful. There’s no telling who or what will be waiting for us to make an appearance—”

“But we’ll win,” Sammy interrupted. “We’ll win like we always do.”

Richard looked up, breathed out, and stood up as well.

He’d be joining the hunt.

With that, everyone had agreed to help Sam, the difference in objectives aside. Staring at him, Sammy grinned before asking a question.

“When are we leaving?”

And Sam wasn’t one to pass up the chance to be dramatic.

“We’re leaving now.”

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The full party was Sam, Ash, Misty, Brock, Richard, Sammy, and all of their Pokémon. Diana and her grandmother stayed behind for now. This group was practically a full-fledged expedition. Some researchers delved into ruins and explored the wilderness with less support than this.

Sam took to the front, and no one questioned his decision to lead the way. However, it wasn’t exactly him who guided everyone through the woods. Haunter was a far better lead, but he kept to the shadows and sent Sam silent signals for where to go. He was able to use the forest’s plentiful shadows to zoom around, and he also did his best to sense any hint of anything related to Celebi’s pain.

As for the Pokémon that were out, Misdreavus kept to Sam’s side, and Pikachu sat on Ash’s shoulder. In her arms, Misty carried an unfamiliar Pokémon that looked like a spotted egg. 

Thankfully, no one seemed to notice Haunter’s presence, but once in a while, Brock would send a glance to the woods. He was sharp, acting as if he had detected some trace of a Ghost Type nearby, but he never pointed Haunter out.

“We already checked that stone shrine, and Celebi wasn’t there,” Sam said as the group trekked through the woods. “That’s where it started, but it’s injured. It might be a Legendary Pokémon, but bringing three people—”

“It’s a Mythical,” Richard interrupted.

Sam ignored him.

“But bringing three people would have seen it expend a lot of energy. With it being so injured, I doubt it did another jump, and it couldn’t have got too far.”

“A-also!” At the back of the group, Sammy spoke up. “When it happened, I was awake. After the ‘jump,’ I mean. Celebi pushed out of my arms and started to fly off, but I didn’t get to see where it went since I passed out and woke up in Towa’s home.”

So we’re on the right track.

Sam nodded to thank him—Towa was the name of Diana’s grandmother. If Sammy had seen Celebi fly off, then Sam knew it had to be nearby, given it would need to rest to recover.

Haunter continued to lead their party, and Sam continued to follow Haunter. After all of his experience with searching for Pokémon, the trip was surprisingly fast.

Sam shouldn’t have been surprised when Haunter found it in almost no time had passed at all.

Not too far away from that stone shrine, Haunter escorted their group to the nearest, largest source of pain. No Pokémon ever bothered them along the way, and they arrived at where two of the Ilex Forest’s massive trees had fallen.

Right where one had landed on the other, the impact had formed a dent that’d serve as the perfect hole for a den.

Seeing that hole didn’t confirm Celebi’s presence, but the Grass and Bug Type Pokémon certainly did. The wild species were nothing that should have been getting along, but despite their differences, they crowded around the hole and watched it with worry.

Only a Legendary Pokémon could cause them to act like that.

Sam was ready to finally confront Celebi and get what he needed, but when he took a single step forward, all of the Pokémon in front of the hole turned around, saw him, and then froze in utter fright.

He had to freeze, himself, after that reaction.

“I don’t look that scary, do I?” he asked around.

“Have you ever seen yourself in the mirror?” Misty said under her breath.

Sam frowned, and though he finally wanted to reach Celebi, it was Sammy who ended up stepping forward.

“No,” the other boy said. “I’ll go. If you try to approach it now... Um, I don’t think it’d work?”

“Thanks,” Sam said flatly.

“Sorry, you just look mean.”

“I’m not mean!”

The boy said nothing, and Sam didn’t know how to respond to that, but it did give him the chance to step forward. With Sam staying behind, Sammy grabbed onto a vine hanging off the bark to climb, and then Ash ran up to climb at his side.

Misty mumbled something about how Ash resembled a Mankey.

Those two reached the top at the same time, leaving Sam and everyone else at the forest floor below. The various Bug and Grass Type Pokémon allowed them to approach the den, and Sam could already hear those two whispering among themselves about how to approach Celebi.

The Pokémon was in that den.

“You’re.... Sam, right?” Richard suddenly said. Sam looked over in surprise; this was the first thing Richard had said to him since that speech back in Diana’s home. “You, uh, don’t think this is suspicious? Like finding Celebi was too easy?”

“Why would it be suspicious? If anything, it’s expected. I’m used to searching for Pokémon. I’ve done it plenty of times before.”

Richard repeated Sam’s words under his breath, but he shook his head to move past the thought.

“That’s not what I mean. I’m talking about the forest. You don’t think it was too easy? How no Pokémon bothered us even though there’s a Legendary Pokémon ahead?”

“So?”

“So...” Richard started. “Pokémon can sense things like that. Shouldn’t at least one have tried to defend it?”

Sam opened his mouth to try to reply, but he had nothing.

Weirdly, Richard had a point.

Right away, Sam began searching through the woods. Above, vines lashed out to try to get Ash and Sammy to step back. Pikachu crackled with electricity to prepare an attack, but Sammy took the lead to stop them and carefully crawled into the hole.

“...Do you see anything?” Sam asked.

Misdreavus was now staring into the woods as well. Brock was helping. Misty continued to watch the exchange on top of that massive, fallen log.

Sam saw nothing, no matter how hard he searched.

Finally, above him, Sammy pulled himself out.

In his arms, he carried that green Legendary Pokémon. Celebi was shaking.

“There,” Richard said. “What’s that?”

Sam followed his gaze.

In the distance, there was a glow, familiar and growing. Sam wasn’t sure what it was at first, but it kind of reminded him of Ursaring’s—

“Get down!”

He grabbed Richard to throw him to the ground, and Brock and Misty were thankfully far enough away to not be hit. Piercing through the air was a full-on laser—a Hyper Beam. As it blasted apart the bark of the fallen tree, the earth shook as a large creature stormed out of the trees behind it.

Following it was a grinning man in a yellow mask.

Sam did not fail to note the bright red “R” on the chest of the man’s jacket.

“Ha ha ha! I knew you kids would lead me right to it! I’ll be taking that Celebi now!”

Richard’s been right since the start. I never noticed anything, but he somehow knew someone would be waiting for us.

But how did Haunter not see?

Whoever this was should have been sensed, especially with that massive Pokémon standing next to him. Towering over them with a body covered in stone plates, the presence of a pseudo-Legendary Tyranitar was already terrifying enough.

However, this one had a strange tint to its stone body, and there was a rage in its eyes that saw it snap its stone-crushing jaws into the air.

It looked half-crazed.

“Give it up, kiddos,” the man said. “No use fighting. I’ve already won.”

He doesn’t know I have Haunter, but...

The Tyranitar didn’t scare Sam. What scared Sam was how the man had completely avoided all of Haunter’s senses.

“...I know you,” Richard said, standing up slowly. “You’re the Iron-Masked Marauder. A poacher for Team Rocket.”

The so-called Iron-Masked Marauder replied with a grin, and he confidently stood with his arms crossed behind his mad Pokémon.

“Got it right in one, kid! For that, I’ll let you go—Well, I’ll let you go as long as you hand over all your Pokémon.”

His expression was far too smug.

Brock and Misty glared at the man out of defiance, and at the top of the log, Ash helped Sammy stand back up. That Hyper Beam hadn’t hit anyone, but it had shaken the fallen tree and caused the wild Pokémon to scatter. It was a miracle the two boys hadn’t been knocked off themselves.

“Hold on,” Sam said. “Wait, wait, wait. Before we do this, there’s something about this I have to know.”

Sam had fought Team Rocket. He had encountered plenty of Ghost Types. He had fought through a horde of wild Pokémon.

He had faced real ghosts before.

That Tyranitar was terrifying, but the man behind it was just a man. Sam had seen worse, and if he really had to, he could just take on a more Redi-like demeanor to make sure he could properly pull off his plan.

“I get following us. I get knowing about Celebi and wanting to capture it. And, you know what? I get working for Team Rocket! Clearly, you’re an awful person that doesn’t have an ounce of empathy to him,” Sam said.

Even through his mask, a vein throbbed on the man’s head. Sam recognized he might have been channeling Redi a little too much.

But he kept going, anyway.

“Except, there’s one big part of this that I really don’t understand,” Sam continued. “Out of everything, you chose ‘The Iron-Masked Marauder?’ Really? That’s your name? You’re supposed to be some terrifying, dangerous criminal, but you don’t realize how stupid that—”

“Hyper Beam!”

“Now, Misdreavus!”

His delay had been just long enough. Misdreavus managed to position herself to land a Confuse Ray right between the Tyranitar’s eyes.

Because of that, Sam barely avoided the second attack fired at him, and the bark of the tree behind him exploded once more. Ash and Sammy used this opportunity to slide down the other side of the fallen trunk to make their escape, and Brock and Misty dashed off to make sure they had room to carry Celebi away.

Sam stayed behind, and Richard stayed next to him. The horribly-named poacher faced the two of them, glaring at them with a scowl.

Though the Tyranitar was trapped by Misdreavus’s illusions, it was not lashing out, even with its strange rage from before. The poacher himself retrieved two darkened Pokéballs. This was a fight he was prepared to escalate, but even at a disadvantage, both Sam and Richard were prepared to hold him off to ensure everyone else could escape.

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Author Note:

The Celebi movie is fine. It’s not great, but it’s not bad, either. I prefer to stick pretty close to canon, so I haven’t changed that much so far, but expect butterflies to spread from here.

Although, if you’re familiar with it, there’s already been one pretty major change (other than the addition of new characters). For this encounter, I didn’t include the Iron-Masked Marauder’s giant spider mecha. Given everything else that’s already going on, it felt that’d be a little too much.

Pokémon included in this chapter:
Celebi
Pikachu
Tyranitar

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