Chapter Text
“Are you sure that’s the best way out?” Spark said uncertainly, as Raichu, who was leading the group, waved a paw at a narrow tunnel. Raichu frowned at its Trainer for doubting it, but before it could reply, Togepi, still squeaking happily, slipped from Spark’s arms and dashed into the tunnel. They could hear cries of “Toge toge prri!” echoing back to them.
“Well, I guess that settles it,” Candela said, with a final sort of tone in her voice. “We go in there.”
“Rai!” Raichu pumped a fist triumphantly into the air and scampered off after Togepi, calling: “Rai! Rai chu rai!”
“What is it saying?” Blanche asked, from behind them.
Spark rolled his eyes. “It says, see? I told you to listen to me! ”
“Arcanine, I choose you! See if you can find a way out of here,” Candela called to the large dog-like Pokemon. Nodding, it turned and dashed after Raichu and Togepi, barking loudly back to them. Candela tucked Arcanine’s Pokeball back into her belt, saying as she did so, “ Now this settles it. Let’s go.”
The strange party was bathed in shafts of sunlight as they reached the end of the long tunnel, making their shadows look rather creepy. With every step they took, they could feel the temperature dropping. Clouds of vapour formed as their breath steamed in the chilly air. The stalactites and stalagmites that had formed all around them were cold to the touch, and a thin coat of frost had covered the majority of the rocks.
The harsh light, reflected off the many columns of ice protruding from the ground as they stepped out of the tunnel. They were on another island, and at the centre of the island, a towering, ice-covered volcano loomed.
“We’ve somehow crossed over to Ice Island,” Blanche said, taking in the view around her. Being in the centre of the three islands of fire, ice and lightning, Ice Island had a direct perspective on what was going on. It wasn’t pretty. The three legendary birds seemed to have no aim but to take control of the whole archipelago - and/or dive-bomb each other out of the sky.
“Legends say that when the three birds fight like this, Pokemon from all over Kanto will come. They’ll want to help. But this place is empty,” Spark said wonderingly.
“RAI…..CHU…..” Raichu’s voice was calling to them from the other side of the island. And once they dashed over, they saw what had been hidden from them all along.
A massive airship had been engineered to float in the ocean behind Ice Island, with only a small rod poking through the rippling surface of the water. It would have been indistinguishable from a further distance away. But the clear waters of the sea revealed everything, its width, depth… and a very small, round Pokemon, dwarfed by the underwater ship, playing near the edge of the water.
“Rai chu rai!” Raichu called, starting to run towards Togepi. Spark followed, ignoring the sinking feeling that he had. Togepi was only a baby - and who knew what was in that ship? Or who , he thought with a shiver.
“Gotcha!” he shouted, lunging forward from a couple metres away to grab hold of the tiny Pokemon. “Thank goodness you’re okay -” As he stood up, brushing sand off his clothes, there was a click , and a hatch opened beneath his feet.
“We just found him.” Candela looked stunned by the turn of events. “Now he’s gone off somewhere again…”
“Arc!” Arcanine barked, bounding off towards the spot where Spark, Togepi and Raichu had disappeared. Moments later, it too had vanished beneath the powdery snow, with a last surprised yelp.
“Arcanine! Arcanine!” Candela shouted, running towards the same spot.
A pearly white Pokemon materialised in front of her, waving its wide tail to stop her progress.
“Dew! Gong!” it honked, pushing her back where she had been standing with a sharp poke from its horn. Then it curled up on the snow nearby, watching her and Blanche with a big brown eye.
“What was that for?” she said irritably to Dewgong.
“Be more polite, Candela, or Dewgong might just leave you stranded down there,” Blanche said, casting an eye over the choppy waters surrounding the islands. “It’s the only one who can get us into that ship without falling for the trap.”
“I can swim, I don’t need Dewgong,” Candela huffed, looking at the ship. “Besides, it’s so close to the island - we could just walk in there -”
“And get caught?”
“How do you know there’s a way in from down there?” she asked, now watching the occasional, identically-dressed person exit the ship through the far-off bridge. “What if that bridge is the only way in? Then we’d -”
“We’d be able to test out the strength of Dewgong’s Horn Attack and Cloyster’s Spike Cannon,” Blanche finished, in the same, annoyingly calm manner.
“Yes, but we could still battle those people down there, on the bridge, and take their uniforms…”
“Therefore making one of the most dramatic sneak-ins ever.”
“Okay… you win.” Candela went over to where Blanche was stroking Dewgong, which was waiting at the edge of the water, alert and tense. “It’s okay,” she heard her friend saying, in a vastly different way from her usual manner. “We can do this.” It wasn’t the first time, but she couldn’t help being surprised at how much younger Blanche suddenly looked, in that moment when a small smile appeared on her face. It seemed to have worked, because Dewgong was sliding gracefully into the water with renewed confidence, and she hurried to hold on to it, shivering in the freezing water.
“N-no one c-could swim in t-t-this,” she said through her respirator, her whole body shaking from the cold.
“I told you Dewgong was the only one who could help us. Cloyster’s strong, but it hates anyone holding onto it,” was the only reply, which was as frigid as the waters Dewgong was cutting through. After that, there was silence until they reached the bottom of the ship.
“It-it’s imp-penatratable,” Candela said, looking at the sealed bottom of the ship.
“It looks familiar…” Blanche was saying slowly.
“It doesn’t,” Candela replied. “I’ve never seen it before.”
“It’s in all the history books of the Orange Islands - oh!”
Candela cast a glance at her. “History books?”
“Yes,” she said impatiently. “It’s the old airship that Lawrence III, a Pokemon collector, used when he was trying to capture Articuno, Zapdos, Moltres and Lugia. But it crashed… it should be in quite bad shape by now.”
“Dewgong!” Dewgong called from near the ship, swimming around something in circles.
“What is it?” Blanche called, grabbing Candela’s arm and swimming over.
“Dew!”
“A door!” Candela said, straightening up and looking closely at it. “I dunno about this, Blanche - it’s really thick -”
“Dewgong, try a Horn Attack on that door!”
“Dew… gong!” Dewgong backed away from the door, then, folding its flippers and stretching its tail out like a long, thin fan.
“Candela, move away. Dewgong’s Horn Attack is powerful enough to skewer you, in the right conditions,” Blanche warned.
She backed away, but kept her eyes on the white spot a distance away that was Dewgong. To her surprise, instead of going straight for the door, it seemed to be spinning. A tunnel of water was forming around it, surrounding it such that only a shadow could be seen. Then, with amazing speed surpassed only by that of her Dragonite, the tunnel of water rushed towards them, developing slowly into an arrow shape. As it got closer, a glint could be seen near the tip, which was surely the horn. Then, with a loud boom, it crashed into the exact spot Blanche had pointed out.
“Now we wait and see,” Blanche said, watching the swirling water around the door.
“Now we wait and see.”