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Two Pokemon, a Chimchar and a Mudkip, were out chillin’ on the beach. Chimchar let out a relaxed sigh, arms behind his head while he lounged on the soft, warm sand, enjoying the ocean breeze and the occasional sound of the waves that lapped along the shore.
“Ahhhh, good call Mudkip! All that overtime work at the Guild to afford the Switch 2 was worth it but, geez we needed a break. A little vacay on the beach hits the spot...though I’m gettin’ kinda hungry, where do you wanna eat?”
The question hung in the air for a bit, and when he didn’t get the expected response, Chimchar turned over to see Mudkip splayed out, eyes closed.
Rolling his eyes good naturedly, Chimchar shook Mudkip to try and wake him. For some reason it took a little longer than usual, Mudkip seemed to be in a pretty deep sleep, but eventually his eyes fluttered open.
Chimchar chuckled. “Finally! Sorry to wake you, but you feel like grabbing a bite? I was thinking we could-”
“The FitnessGram Pacer test is a multistage aerobic capacity test that progressively gets more difficult as it continues.” Mudkip spouted in an...oddly monotone, robotic voice that definitely didn’t belong to him.
Chimchar blinked. Then blinked again. “The...huh?”
“The 20 meter Pacer test will begin in 30 seconds.”
“I...hey, bro what are you talkin’ about right now? What test? Like for the guild?”
“Line up at the start.”
Chimchar let out a shaky chuckle, but it died when he properly took in the blank, soulless stare in his friends normally jubilant, vibrant eyes. Any more attempts to speak were just met with more obscure instructions for some sort of test.
Convinced that this wasn’t a bit, and disturbed by his friend’s behavior, Chimchar did the one thing his parents always told him to do in situations where he needed help and guidance.
Pray.
He put his paws together and bowed his head, sitting cross legged. “Oh Mother Mew, who comforts and protects us. Lend me your guidance in this time.”
A second later, a bright pink flash of light burst into view next to him. A small pink cat came out doing a somersault in midair, and then floated serenely with her arms out, looking all majestic.
Mew looked down at the Chimchar and smiled.
“Hey son, what’s up?”
Chimchar pointed hastily at Mudkip, who had been on repeat this whole time. “Something happened to Mudkip, he’s not acting himself!”
Mew scrunched her face and looked over at Mudkip. After listening to him drone on for a few seconds, her eyes slowly widened and she put a paw to her forehead, despondent.
“...Oh...dang it...”
“What? You know what happened?”
“I might’ve...ooh I might have messed up in the worst way...” She sucked through her teeth and lowered herself down to stand on the sand. “Um, how long did you say he’d been like this?”
“Just now! We were just hanging out not two minutes ago!”
“Yyyyyyyeah, yup. That was that transfer...Ugggh!” she groaned and drug her paws through her face. “...I knew I shouldn’t have been drinking last night...okay but then where did the actual soul go...?” she muttered to herself.
Chimchar put his paws on Mews’ shoulders and shook her slightly. “Mom, do you know what’s going on!? Where is my friend?”
Mew put her paw on Chimchar’s and gave him a gentle pat. “Don’t worry, we can fix this. Here, let me do some praying of my own...”
She took out a smartphone from somewhere and dialed a group call. It only rang twice before there was an answer.
“Hey. Yeah, get over here. Now. It’s a...yeah, yep, it’s code brown. Okay.”
She hung up. A second later, two more portals appeared. One consisted of verdant flashing leaves, from which Celebi herself flipped out of and struck a pose. The other was a massive purple rip in space itself, from which Palkia lumbered out and sent a mighty roar that shook the heavens itself.
Mew waited for the two to complete their entrances, before levitating the Fitness Gram Pacer Mudkip up and letting them listen to its spiel.
Celebi and Palkia looked, listened and, as one, conveyed the same sentiment:
“Yeah we messed up,” said Palkia.
“Whoops,” said Celebi.
“MOM! EXPLAIN!” shouted Chimchar, thoroughly confused and frustrated. “Why are my kind-of-but-not-really-aunts here!?”
“Son, this here is the earth’s defense plan to combat threats that threaten the safety of the world,” said Mew in a proud, authoritative voice. “Why put our own Pokemon’s lives in danger when we can just get someone from someplace else to take care of our problems for us? So, Celebi, Palkia and I hatched a plan to do just that!”
She put her paws on her hips. “Celebi finds the time, Palkia finds the place, and I find the right person and, after creating a cute little vessel for them to inhabit, bring their soul here so they can live as a Pokemon and defend our world! It’s foolproof!
“Except when it’s not...” muttered Palkia. “You didn’t even get a person this time...”
“Shush!” Mew rolled her eyes at Palkia, before looking down apologetically at Chimchar. “Look, basically what happened to your friend is I put the wrong thing in the wrong body to save the world from a disaster, which is...was there one scheduled for this week?” she asked Celebi, who nodded.
“Yeah, so I attempted to bring someone over to deal with this week’s threat, I even made a cute little mudkip vessel for the visitor to inhabit because I just like that species, but, I guess I got the mudkips mixed up and might have...sent your friend’s soul somewhere...out there...” she waved her paw ambiguously.
Chimchar wore a growing expression of dread. “Out...where?”
“The...uh...” Mew looked to be trying to find a delicate way to say something. Celebi sped up the process.
“The multiverse!”
Before Chimchar could protest that, Mew shoved Celebi out of the way and gave an encouraging smile. “Look, don’t worry too much about that. We’ll just go find wherever mudkip’s soul ended up and put him back in his body. It shouldn’t be too hard.”
So saying that, Mew directed Palkia to open a portal. Once it was open, Mew took Mudkip’s body, and together the three of them entered it, leaving Chimchar alone on the beach.
Not for long though. Only a few seconds later, Mew’s head popped out of it, and she held out Mudkip’s body like it was a trophy.
“Alright, took a while, but this should be the right guy. Can you double check?” she asked, and shook Mudkip around. For some reason, he came back with brown, spikey hair and a key-like necklace.
The little froglike Pokemon stared in dazed confusion at his surroundings.
“Donald, Goofy? Where are you!? Is this another world? Is Kairi here?” he asked in a voice that sounded completely different from before. One that was not at all familiar to Chimchar.
“Um, no I...don’t think that’s right...”
“Drat, never lucky. Oh well, we’ll try again. Sit tight.”
She dipped back into the portal and reappeared just as fast, holding Mudkip out. This time he seemed to have a scar running down one eye and three small swords strapped to his waist.
“What about now?”
“Eh? Dammit, where’s my crew, did they get lost again?” grumbled Mudkip in a much gruffer voice. “Maybe there’s some booze around here, at least...”
Chimchar shook his head, and Mew retreated again, only to come back with a Mudkip that was entirely pink, with bushy hair covering his eyes and wearing a spiked jacket.
“GODDAMIT KRIS, WHERE THE HELL ARE WE!” she shouted, squirming in the telekinetic grasp before looking around. “...Kris?”
Frustrated, Chimchar rubbed his face. “Mom, where are you even getting these people? None of them are Mudkip!”
Huffing to herself, she tossed the pink mudkip back into the tunnel, who screamed as he disappeared. “Look, just be patient, alright? Every time we go back to search it’s like, a year of effort looking around. From your perspective it's just taking a quick second.”
“Ugh, you know what screw this. I’m just gonna call dad,” he grumbled, sitting down and bowing his head again.
“Oh Lord Father Arce-”
“STOP!” Mew rushed forward and shoved a paw over his mouth. “Don’t-do not call him! He’s busy right now and I don’t need his sass if he finds out about this!”
“Fine! Then just let me go look for him!” He threw his hands up. “At least I know who I’m looking for!”
“Don’t be silly dear, Mom’s got this under control. We just have a few million worlds to comb through, we’ll find Mudkip in a flash!”
“Mom, you don’t get it. I need to go out there to be there for him, Mudkip is my ride or die. My best friend. My day one. My heterosexual life partner!”
“...Hetero-you two weren’t dating?”
“MOM!”
“Okay, okay! It’s just...” she sighed to herself, and floated down to be on Chimchar’s level. “I just want to keep you safe. It’s a big, scary multiverse out there and it could be overwhelming. And besides, you’re still an apprentice with the Guild!”
“Mom, I get that, really.” He stepped closer and fixed her with a determined stare. “But this is something I have to do. It’s important to me.”
Mew looked at Chimchar for a long hard moment, before giving a single nod and a sigh.
“...Alright,” she said, and turned towards the portal, gesturing with her paw.
“Come on.”
“FOR DEMOCRACY!”
“PROTECT THE CIVILIANS!”
“LIGHT UP THOSE DAMN ILLUMINATE!”
“WHAT THE FUCK IS AN ILLUMINATE!?”
That last voice came from a fourth Helldiver who sprinted down a ruined street that had been bombarded with alien energy blasts, a haze of gunfire, and the full might of the entire Super Earth defense budget.
Said Helldiver was a bit different than his three squadmates. For one he was only about half their height, came fitted with bright blue and orange armor, and, rather than a confident gait with the full assurance in democracy, ran with the panicked fervor of someone who had no idea what was going on.
His sprint stopped abruptly when they rounded a corner and came face to face with a horde of armed Illuminate Overseers, who wasted no time opening fire. His three squadmates rushed forward, battlelusted with a taste for honor and glory, and were promptly gunned down in front of him.
Arms wheeling, the mudkip-turned-helldiver dove behind a ruined vehicle and shook as he saw the hail of bullets and blasts soar over the car, clutching his military-grade Super Soaker to his chest and praying with all his might that he be delivered from this fresh hell that he’d only entered not long ago.
Someone listened.
A bright portal opened up directly in front of him, and out stepped Chimchar, face grizzled and wearing a red headband rambo-style. He inputted a code on a stratagem device and tossed it over at the hoard, which was obliterated in a glorious explosion from a 500kg bomb.
Mudkip watched in dazed awe as it happened, and turned to Chimchar with that same expression.
“You...you came for me,” he muttered, holding his hand out. Chimchar clutched it and gave him a bright grin.
“Always will. Now come on.” He turned and Mudkip saw something that gave him pause.
His own body, just as he left it, strapped to the monkey’s back.
“Let’s get you back in here and rested up before we head out again.”
Mudkip blinked? “Again? But what about home? The Guild?”
“Pffft, the Guild? Don’t be ridiculous, bro.”
Chimchar came and put a paw on his shoulder.
“We have worlds to explore!”