52 Revelation (1/2)
-”Make yourself ready, we are almost there!”
Cecile shouted to him, while Fearow was making little dive into the green scenery below them. She grasped her goggles and put them tightly onto her eyes while looking forward to the next moments with a mischievous smirk.
Arthur felt a foreboding sense of danger rising in his guts but just as he was about to open his mouth it happened!
”AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”
That small dive turned into very sharp dive all of a sudden and Arthur mustered all his strength into his hands and fingers to hold onto the feathers, that separated life and death for him.
Of course Cecile wasn't such a crazy maniac as to make such dangerous stunt without having absolute control over the situation, but all that mattered to Arthur right that moment was to not fall into air accidentally!
”HAHAHAHAAH”
Sounds were hard to make out because of the swift turbulent air but Arthur could swear Cecile was happy as hell about his current plight. Couldn't she have warned him about this more clearly?!
As sudden as the maneuver came, it left as well. Fearow chose a patch of green land somewhere and flapped its mighty wings to settle safely without further interruptions.
Arthur was the first to quickly back out of the Fearow Flight Express and after feeling the soft tickling grass on his hands and making sure their surroundings were secure he collapsed silently on the ground.
”What's up? Was this your first ride or what? Hihihi....”, Cecile laughed all the while and made fun of Arthur.
He was too weakened to rebuke her or give her any other kind of remark. The young boy felt he had exchanged years of his life to survive this ordeal, his mind aging in a short span of time. In addition to that he needed some time to acclimate properly to this new environment.
(”Take your time buddy, haha, I am sure she didn't mean ill will towards you.)
”Easy to say for you, not having a body has his perks ...”, Arthur grumbled in his mind.
(”Ouch, shots fired! Hahaha, deserved it I guess. Luckily your ears didn't pop up haha.”
”Why should they pop up?”, Arthur asked.
(”Did you think it's normal for people to fly at high speeds in the air?? We aren't Pokemon Arty. I haven't been long in this world, but the last I looked people still walked on the ground rather than fly in the air.”, thinking that Arthur didn't get his point, Atiqo elaborated,
”Humans aren't meant to stay for long periods of time in the air bud. Our physique limits us, and at a certain height the decreasing air pressure could kill us. Our ears maintain a certain balance for us, but srsly I wouldn't want to test where my limits lie, hahaha. I guess that Fearow has a kind of built-in safe zone where the air pressure stays the same but as to how that works ... no clue at all.”)
During their flight Arthur only glimpses of the land below. He saw skyscrapers and lots of building before the scenery changed to lots of green and blue. He had also seen flocks of flying Pokemon but sensing the strong aura of Fearow they must have tacitly decided to avoid their path.
”So, whats the plan now? Where do we head next?”, Cecile approached him and asked cheerfully.
Arthur looked up warily, almost anticipating her next move that might endanger his livelihood.
But he remembered that time was tight and answered carefully:
”I will head out and look around to locate the keepsake. It's best if you stay here and-”
”Nope!”
”You didn't let me speak ou!”
”My answer will be the same.”
”Why? Someone should take care of your Fear...some. He can't stick around on the ground with us all the time.”
”That doesn't change fact that I am responsible for you!”
”I can take care of myself!”
”Judging by your past record, I don't think so.”
”Grrr..”, Arthur gnashed his teeth in frustration but he couldn't retort that argument.
Just as he was about to give in, he heard a familiar whisper in his mind and a brilliant idea came to be.
”I have a better idea. I will move on the ground, while you scout from the air! I will try find the location of my lost item once I get a better grasp over my position and you can follow me from above to look out for any kind of danger I could face! I am sure Fearow's keen senses coupled with your directions will make our trip much safer this way.”, he finished presenting Atiqo's idea.
At first Cecile was just about to reject anyway, but hearing about her role and task to stay in the air she couldn't find a good reason not to support his suggestion. As much she wanted to have the last say in this matter, she didn't dare become irrational in this situation and let her ego cloude her judgment.
”Fine, we will have it your way. But the moment I see any swarms, packs, crowds of Pokemon you can bet your butt that I will drag you back home! Damn, why did I agree to this again?”, slowly but surely Cecile realised the gravity of the situation again. She would definitely get punished for this if her family ever got wind of their little trip.
She wasn't worried about going alone into the park, her Eevee and her Fearrow would protect her in any case. However, she wasn't that sure about Arthur's current status. Maybe it had been too reckless to let him move so soon after his attack after all.
Before she could change her mind though, the boy in question had already turned around and made his way through the bushes and trees in front of his path.
...
While Cecile was up in the air following behind on the back of her Fearsome, Arthur cautiously walked around the ground trying not to trip and injure himself even more. Some stray Pokemon appeared in the trees or dashed from to place to place thus rustling his environment, but none seemed to have evil intentions towards him.
As far as Arthur could remember from his brittle memories, the Green Garden was maintained in specific ways to attract weaker Pokemon and repel aggressive Pokemon that might harm people.
This way it was easier to research or catch them here. Lots of young children caught their first Pokemon in such environments. Of course that meant that most Pokemon that lived in these areas weren't very strong. It wasn't absolute, but a rule of thumb in the Pokemon World was that Pokemon that feasted upon other Pokemon were usually much stronger for some reason he didn't know.
The Green Garden was thus the home of smaller and weaker herbivores. Though it was likely that even then some Pokemon ate others from time to time. At he risk of getting killed of course. If a carnivore type Pokemon were to appear the rest of the herbivores might gang up to kill that 'invader'. Who knows.
Arthur picked up a red object from his pockets and opened up a display. Of course he had lied about needing to locate his position or attempting to familiarising himself with his surroundings.
”Hehe, with this little baby here I will arrive at my destination in the blink of an eye”, Arthur mumbled under his breath while checking upon his red PokeDex from time to time.
An arrow appeared on the small display which pointed at a direction somewhere north-east. After every 5 seconds or so the display would refresh to account for his ever changing place on the ground.
(”Srsly, this PokeDex is even better than Google Maps! I wish I had something like this back at home.”), Atiqo's voice rang in his mind.
”You don't have PokeDex there? How do you scan your Pokemon then?”
(”Arty! We don't even have Pokemon there, why should we have something cool like a PokeDex then? I mean, I have a lot of merch in my home, anything from the 1.Gen to latest Gen of Pokemon, but they are just Toys after all.”), Atiqo responded with a sad underlying tone.
”Oh right, no Pokemon ....”, Arthur remembered he was housing a ghost from another dimension- ehh universe. After spending so much with his family again Arthur regained that feeling of familiarity with Pokemon in his world. On the other hand he felt strange when Atiqo talked about his home World where according to Atiqo Pokemon didn't exist at all. Instead they other kinds of creatures inhabiting his planet that were less 'awesome'.
”Well, I guess it should be much safer over there, right? I mean you don't have to bother with fire -spitting creatures that could potentially ruin your whole city into ashes ...”, Arthur got a shiver talking about fire.
(”Come on Arty! Fire Pokemon are awesome! A bit of heat shouldn't distract you from their amazing power they can display. Aside from that it depends on the usage of this Power instead of the power itself whether it's bad or not. People or Pokemon can use their forces to do more harm than good and vice versa, yes, that's why we have the law, governments and the police guarding our peace. This shouldn't be different no matter which universe I get sucked in, right? With great power comes-”)
”-great responsibility. I get it. Well, I guess you are right.”
(”Wait, you have Spiderman in this universe?!”
(Spider-who? You just recited Spinman didn't you? That comic book hero who got bitten by a radioactive Spinarak and turned into a Human/Pokemon vigilante. I read that comic when I was younger.”
(”Spinman? Really? Whatever...”), Atiqo was weirded out by this revelation and turned silent. It was better not to pry further into this topic he thought.
”We are almost there!”
The PokeDex showed them that they were approaching the position of the mysterious source of energy they had been looking for all this while. Arthur felt the excitement radiating off of Atiqo's spirit. Arthur knew his companion hadn't told him about everything that happened to them. Why did he posses a mysterious PokeDex that urged him to find random stuff in random places? Why was Atiqo thrown into the Pokemon World ending up in Arthur's own body?Through their conversations Arthur didn't get the feeling Atiqo was much of an important person back on - wherever he came from.
And why was his mind stuck in a huge turmoil ever since their symbiosis took place? Arthur might have died a couple of times without Atiqo's timely help but his regular headaches haunting him made it hard to have any good feelings towards their common ordeal. Hopefully this discovery could clear some of his questions...
Similar thought swirled in Atiqo's non existing head. He may appear with a confident smile all the time, but ever since that meeting with Cornelius in his apartment on earth he hadn't felt like being in control of his circumstances. His positive and light hearted attitude was mostly a distraction from his current surreal experiences.
The PokeDex blinked faster and faster the closer they got to the origin of the signal. Arthur walked several meters ahead finally arriving at a tall tree, while throwing weird glances at the arrow on the display.
”The mysterious signal come from ... this tree?”
(”No! This can't be!”), Atiqo immediately refuted his question. He had built a kind of expectation for the thing they were looking for. A spaceship? Fine! An alien grave? Super! A random 5 meter tall tree in the middle of nowhere? What the heck?! How was he supposed to get back home??? The tree didn't feel magical at all and its barks appeared like every other tree in this forest!
While Atiqo suffered from a sever case of 'short-circuitness', Arthur moved his eyes from the tip point of the arrow to a place above their heads. His sight also caught on to some deep marks on the bark itself.
”I am not a tree expert but these marks look strangely fresh.”, he remarked.
Atiqo awoke up from his stupor and noticed the markings as well as a small area hidden in the thick leaves of the tree.
(”You're right! And do you see that patch of green over there around the leaves and branches? It looks quite artificially made for my taste.”)
They both realized that there was more to this tree than met the eye. It might have looked normal on purpose to conceal its true value!
Arthur gritted his teeth and began climbing up the tree despite the various risks involved in this endeavour. He hadn't fully healed yet so every strain he put on himself hurt double as much as usual! But this was a necessary price he had to pay - both he and Atiqo were sure of it.
Every child knew how to climb in Kanto, it wasn't always useful against Pokemon, but every additional tool in the survival kit could be a potential life-saver! It only took a couple of seconds to reach that weird place on the tree.
As he approached the structure the clearer his sight became and the mystery fully unfolded! It was indeed an artificial construct, a crude but still practical one. A head sized hole was reflected on Arthur's eyes. The interesting thing was that the hole was filled with sticks and leaves in its entrance. Looking from afar or from the ground it could have been easily overlooked or get mistaken for some kind of shrubs!
In reality it was a well covered hideout. Hidden in plain sight.
”Who made this thing? And how is it ... uhhh... connected to that signal???”, Arthur asked out loud while breathing a bit heavy.
Atiqo didn't answer yet, some cogs began moving in his mind but they didn't form a clear picture yet.
Arthur reached out for the hold and grabbed as many branches and leaves away as he could. In the blink of an eye the hole revealed a small stash of miscellaneous things stacked on top of each other. The foundation was made of small berries, a couple of flashy metal things caught his sight, PokeCoins. Aside from that there were also rings, gems, pearles gathered aorund. Was this the hidden stash from a thief?
(”Arthur, look, do you see that red gem?!”), Atiqo exclaimed suddenly.
Arthur moved his eyes around until they got stuck on a palm sized red gem sitting in the corner of the hole. His body unconsciously moved in its direction and pulled out that shiny little treasure to bask in the glowing rays of the sun. Somehow his senses tingled weirdly when his skin came into contact with the object. This thing was more than just some valuable piece of rock, his guts told him so. It was as if a huge tornado swirled inside that little object, but he probably just imagined that he thought.