Leo spent the next three weeks in Viridian, battling trainers around the city – specifically around the Center and the Gym. He found that most of the more competitive battlers hung around those areas, with casual trainers battling in the city-sanctioned arenas. Just to see what it was like, Leo did spend some time in the casual arenas mucking about, but it wasn't quite the same as when he battled competitively.
He never got that nervous rush like he did with his first battle when battling against the casual trainers – maybe it was the impression that the battle actually meant something when going against the competitive trainers that made Leo more jittery. Whatever it was, Leo knew he didn't like it, so he battled as much as he could to both train his pokemon and to get those jitters out of the way. Which he did, eventually. It just took a little bit of time.
Thankfully the veteran trainers around the area were more than willing to help him out. Like Leo had assumed and the games led him to believe, Giovanni's Gym was considered the gateway to the pokemon league. It was the last gym to battle before Victory Road, the titular Eighth badge that, while it could be avoided by going to a lesser gym, was a sign of a "true competitor" the receive. It was also the only gym besides the Blackthorn gym that could only be challenged after a trainer got seven other badges. In other words, only the most ambitious and most powerful gathered to challenge the Viridian Gym. But even veterans such as those challenging the Viridian Gym had new teammates that needed training up.
The skill level varied greatly, sometimes when Leo challenged them he'd be facing barely-into-training pokemon like Richard's phanpy had been, and sometimes he'd be facing team members that were much stronger but not yet up to snuff. He still lost more often than not – far more often than not, his win loss ratio was abysmal – but thankfully money was basically a non-issue, especially since most of the battles were considered off-record. (A seven-badge trainer challenging and beating a rookie? That looks like bullying on paper.) Pokemon Centers let trainers dorm with them for a set amount of time every month for free, and Victoria had set up a small weekly fund for basic necessities for Leo and his team, such as food. So, with immediate needs and concerns out of the way, he dedicated himself to training with the older trainers.
He preferred the company of the older trainers compared to the young ones anyway. The emotional maturity gap was what really got to Leo – rookie trainers were just not as interesting or engaging to be around. They could be, but most weren't.
That wasn't to say that all the veterans helped him. Most really only "helped" by giving Leo experience battling, and the famous and really powerful trainers didn't even give him the time of day. But the older guys? The retiree's and the ones who had been training for twenty-plus years? They were a wealth of knowledge, and once Leo displayed his willingness to actually listen to them, they started to give a bit more than he asked. It was…eye opening.
At the same time though, he didn't understand how strange his approach to training was until Richard, who he'd been hanging out with from time to time since their battle, pointed it out to him.
"I wish I would've done what you are when I was just starting out," Richard lamented, gazing wistfully at the ceiling as the two sat in the Viridian Ranger Base, situated in one of the skyscrapers that made up Viridian's downtown area. It was the base of operations for the entire Viridian territory, or so Leo was told.
"What am I doing?" Leo asked, brushing Zuko's soft, short fur with a fine-toothed comb. The little fire type dozed happily under his ministrations, his unnaturally high body-heat soaking into Leo's legs but never getting uncomfortable. It was almost like his jeans were in a perpetual state of coming fresh out of the drier, Leo mused. Or at least, the part Zuko was sitting on was.
"Battling the veterans. The seven-badge trainers, the old guys who don't have their full teams anymore but have all the skills they did when they were younger. I learned too late that trying to do everything on your own was…inefficient," Richard said, kicking his feet up onto the glass coffee table and leaning back even further on the leather couch.
"Huh," Leo said eloquently, raising an eyebrow at Richard. He paused in his brushing, which disturbed Zuko and prompted him to nudge Leo's hand with his snout, urging him to get back to brushing. "But didn't you learn a lot about battling in school or something?"
"Yeah, and I learned a lot from my dad too. He got six badges before he quit the circuit. But, y'know, there's just this thing among our generation. It's that whole 'gotta do it myself' stigma. Traditionally, taking a journey is supposed to be a coming-of-age thing. You're supposed to do it yourself, but I feel kids our age have it worse. No one asks for help, and unless it's a gym leader talking, we never take advice," Richard lamented.
"Seems like a normal teenager to me," Leo muttered, remembering his own teenage years.
"Maybe," Richard said with a shrug, and Leo refocused on Zuko, who squeaked in happiness when he scratched his head. Richard could be onto something though. Daisy, for example, hardly ever called Professor Oak for anything. Leo on the other hand? The man was a wealth of knowledge, and if he ever wanted a second opinion on something he'd learned, he'd call the man and double check it.
Case in point, three days ago he'd battled against a retired trainer's slowbro with Santiago. Leo lost, of course, but the man had given him a lot of advice on how to train slowpoke and slowbro – which Leo had fact-checked with Oak, who just shrugged and said "probably. I've never personally trained a slowpoke, but it falls in line with what I do know."
"So what's your plan now? You can't just stick around Viridian forever you know," Richard said.
"Probably head down route twenty-two, follow it to the League Gates. I'd like to see them before I really start my journey," Leo said, setting down his brush and scratching behind Zuko's ears. They were small things, almost invisible on his head, and he let out a huff of contentment as he lay there.
"Aaah, going to go see the goal, eh?" Richard said with a wink. "Can't say I blame you. Every trainer should start off their journey with seeing the gates to Victory Road, it's just…an experience," he said wistfully, eyes growing distant. Leo nodded but didn't comment. After all, his reason for heading down route twenty-two was a bit different.
Namely, it led close to Mt. Silver. As a Youngster he wasn't technically allowed to go all the way to the Gates, as the route started to get too rough and wild, but all Leo was looking for was a bit of a head start before someone came looking for him. His goal was a larvitar after all, and though he could head to Mount Moon to try and find one – the presence of a tyranitar hadn't been confirmed there but from all the research Leo had done he would swear one used to live on the mountain – he knew there was a tyranitar in the Silver Mountains.
"Yeah, I'll probably leave tomorrow. Santiago's still sore over his last battle, and I want him fresh when I hit the road." Leo reasoned.
"Good idea. Wish I could come with you honestly. I love the rangers, I do, but sometimes I wish I hadn't given up my journey midway through. Only got to my third badge, did you know that? Then I joined the rangers. On my next vacation I might go and challenge a gym, get myself a fourth or even fifth badge. My team's more than strong enough for it, and it might make my next promotion easier," Richard said.
Leo smiled and nodded along, content to just listen as Richard jabbered away, launching into tales of his journey in much the same way the old men that hung around the Viridian Gym, complaining about the quality of trainers these days, did. Zuko whined and nudged Leo's hand, having fallen still as he listened to Richard. Leo chuckled at the needy pokemon and massaged his head with his fingers.
He had been expecting a pokemon with a lot more spunk as a fire type, but instead he got the equivalent of a lap dog without a mean bone in its body. Outside of battling, anyway. Still, Leo thought, running his hands through Zuko's fur. This is nice too.
Route twenty-two was very different from what Leo remembered from the games, and he wasn't sure it ever showed up in the anime. Though that was true of many things, so Leo wasn't sure his surprise at the Route was very valid. For one, as he followed the river upstream into the mountains – it turned south sometime just before Viridian and ran down through Pallet to the sea – there was an actual road to follow. Like, laid with bricks and well-kept. Sure, some pokemon roamed the lightly forested area close to the route, but it was maintained well enough that people could drive on it for miles. About a day and a half of walking from Vermillion, only half a day into the Silver Mountains, Leo passed through the same little town Victoria had first brought him to.
It was the last piece of civilization he would see besides the Gates and the cabin, and Leo couldn't wait. Even as he sped through the town (not wanting to be recognized by anyone, just to be on the safe side) he could feel anticipation bubbling up in his chest, urging him onward, further into the mountains. He was so excited, even, that as he followed the swiftly narrowing road – going from paved, to dirt, to a barely marked trail in the span of a few short hours – he almost missed the turn to the Gates, leading north towards the Indigo Plateau.
He paused for a brief moment, contemplating the idea of heading up there to see the gates. He had said he would, but he also didn't want to risk running into anyone that would ask for his Trainer ID. Already he was in a forbidden area for Youngsters, though it could be excusable for ignorance. Any further, on the other hand, was willful negligence of the rules. Not that Leo cared much, but still.
Fluffy white clouds drifted overhead and a cool breeze chilled Leo as he stood at the intersection, looking up north where the path wound its way up a mountain, disappearing between boulders and beneath the shadows of the mountains. He shifted his gaze west then, upriver to where knew what awaited him – a month-long trek, perhaps longer due to it being uphill this time, and at least two Champion-level pokemon. He closed his eyes and sucked in a deep breath, placing his hands over the two pokeballs at his waist. He'd let them out soon enough but…this was his step to take. And he wanted to take it in the silence of being alone.
He had his supplies. During his time at Oak's ranch, he had honed his skills. And, despite all the warnings that had been given to him about re-entering the Silver Mountains, it being considered a zone exclusively for six-badge trainers or higher, preferably higher, Leo was ready.
He had a larvitar to find, and so he marched westward, vanishing into the wild.
Leo shuddered as he lay in the small, one-person tent he had picked up in Viridian, huddled in his sleeping bag with his arms wrapped around Zuko, the fire-type's innate high-temperature providing much needed heat as the wind whipped and howled outside. The spring snow pounded on the tent fabric, and Santiago crooned pitifully as the slowpoke shifted inside the tent, his bulk crowding Leo even as he curled up as small as he could inside his sleeping bag. Zuko whined pitifully, not from the cold temperature, but because he didn't like the confined space.
"Sorry buddy, but I want to conserve heat," Leo whispered, trying hard to keep his teeth from chattering as he buried his head in the sleeping bag. Even fully clothed he was feeling too cold – the wind earlier had pierced right through his jacket, even if it was much warmer in the tent. Zuko's small eyes blinked at him, and though he huffed and squirmed a bit, he stayed put.
"Slooow," Santiago called grumpily, butting his head against a drift of snow piling up outside the tent. Leo reached out with one gloved hand and smacked him.
"Knock it off, butthead. Don't go collapsing the tent, I just barely got it up in time," Leo groused. Santiago grunted but didn't react, dull eyes still fixated on the snow falling outside the tent, only barely visible through the thin fabric.
Leo sighed. Only a week into the journey upriver and already his luck was infinitely worse than it had been that first year. Apparently, it had been a very mild spring, because this? This crazy spring snow came out of freaking nowhere and blindsided Leo. One moment it had been sunny, there was still two hours to sunset, and then storm clouds had rolled in. Leo barely had enough time to set up his small tent before snow was falling.
"Bloody snow. I love snow, but not right now," Leo grumbled, shivering as he practically felt the temperature drop. Santiago huffed, his breath coming out in a puff of white, and stood, staring at the zipped-up entrance to the tent. "What are you doing? Sit down, it's still plenty warm in the tent and I'm not opening the door to let it out," he said firmly, reaching out of his bag and putting a hand on Santiago's haunches, trying to force him to sit.
Zuko whined, Santiago growled, and suddenly there was a knock on the tent door. Leo froze, head whipping to the shadow hovering just outside the fabric of the tent.
But it had just been a trick of the light, shadows dancing in the corner of his vision. Leo let out a sigh, cursing his mind for playing tricks and his pokemon for acting strange – a giggle froze Leo once more, and he dared not move. Once more there was a knock on the tent, a soft tap, tap, tap, that came with the appearance of something outside. It was still day, after all, and the dim light that the cloud cover allowed through let Leo see through the thin fabric. It was thin and long, floating in midair and never sitting still as it paced outside the tent.
The creature giggled once again, vanishing alongside a gust of wind, only to reappear on the opposite side of the tent and knock. Leo's breath hitched and he prayed to everything holy that this was a friendly pokemon.
The shivers that ran down his spine just at seeing this creature's silhouette, however, told him otherwise. It drifted through the air outside Leo's tent, never fully taking shape, as if it was getting lost in the wind and snow. Haunting shrieks and eerie giggles echoed out through the forest, each noise making Leo's blood run cold.
It was a sight Leo was sure would haunt him, even as he pulled out his pokedex and powered it up, muting the speakers and recording the audio. Suddenly something heavy and wet slapped against the tent, forming a dark shadow on the wall before it was swept away by the wind. Another giggle, followed by another wet plop. Leo shivered as the temperature in the tent dropped several degrees, frost creeping up the walls. Fear spiked its way through his system as his mind sluggishly recognized this, white-hot adrenaline doing little to wake up his alarmingly sluggish mind. It's trying to freeze us. Leo realized, shaking his head to clear it.
Zuko whined and struggled its way out of Leo's stiff grip, sparks flaring from his back as it stood guard next to Santiago, steam rolling off of the little cyndaquil's body as it prepared to fight. But…he was right next to me. Why am I so cold? Leo wondered, working his fingers in an attempt to breathe life back into them. Their attacker giggled again, tapping on the tent once more, and Leo finally had enough.
"Stop," Leo croaked, struggling his way out of his sleeping bag. The giggling specter, fell silent as Leo spoke. "You're killing us," he said, glancing at his pokemon. Santiago was shivering a little, but otherwise seemed fine, and Zuko was glancing warily between Leo and the tent door, seemingly none the worse for wear. You're killing me. Leo amended quietly.
Silence reigned for a few moments longer, the temperature in the tent slowly dropping, when the knocks on the door repeated. This time, however, the silhouette that appeared alongside the knocks did not disappear, hovering just outside the tent.
It wants in. Leo realized, taking a deep breath of frigid air and nearly hacking his lungs up because of it. Santiago grumbled and butted his head against the tent wall, eyes flashing with the blue glow of psychic power. Leo shuddered and debated the merits of opening the door. There wasn't much choice though, despite the fire now roaring from Zuko's back, threatening to melt the tent, Leo would freeze to death before long if he didn't get this thing to stop whatever it was doing.
With a shaking hand – because of the cold, Leo told himself - he reached out, grabbed the zipper, and zipped down the front of the tent to see his aggressor.
It was darker than he had thought outside, the light he had mistaken for the sun replaced by blue and yellow witch light that danced in the air, floating between and through the pine trees of the forest. Fat, heavy snowflakes gently drifted to ground, whipped through the air by a fierce wind located only around the tent itself. The creature that floated in front of the tent, skin gleaming like a faceted diamond in the witch light, watched him with piercing blue eyes as it floated in the air. The red ribbon tied around its waist slowly fluttered in the breeze, the torn fabric dusted with frost and snow.
A froslass. It watched Leo as he crouched in the tent, shivering and shaking, and sucked in a deep breath as he slowly forced himself out of his little shelter, limbs aching as he moved and stood.
No warning was given when Santiago fired a jet of water at the pokemon, the froslass' body dissolving into a snowstorm when the water struck – only to reform not but a second later. Its eyes narrowed ever so slightly, a mirthless chuckle escaping its frozen, purple lips that would've sent shivers down Leo's spine were he not already shivering. As it were, he felt too cold to feel fear, and met the froslass' gaze without emotion.
"Are you finished?" he ground out through chattering teeth.
The froslass howled in response, eyes growing far too wide for its face and eerie shadows covering its body, the wind whipping forward with shards of ice forming around it, lancing forward with malicious intent. Leo would've died were it not for Zuko and Santiago. Psychic power enveloped the froslass, flickering weakly as a jet of water knocked the ice shards off course, while Zuko dashed forward through the snow to stand in front of Leo, steam roiling from the ground and air as fire blazed from his back, smoke curling from his mouth and nose and flames sparking from his paws. The froslass hesitated in the face of the fire-type, ignoring Santiago entirely.
"That is enough, froslass," Leo said firmly. The ice-type ghost hissed at him, white arms waving in the wind as it floated around Leo, looking him up and down. He watched the ghost out of the corner of his eyes, Zuko and Santiago growling at it and struggling to keep themselves between it and Leo. A wide grin split froslass face as suddenly it darted forward, forehead aiming for Leo's chest as it faded out of existence.
His sluggish mind instantly got an idea as to what the ghost was doing, and it filled him with righteous anger. His hands snapped out, palms open and slapped against the froslass' still solid forehead, shoving it away and preventing it from possessing him. The icy cold of the froslass' body instantly froze Leo's gloves, ice clinging to the fabric, but Leo didn't have time to care as he straightened his shoulders and met the shocked eyes of the ghost.
"YOU WILL NOT." He bellowed. The froslass spun through the air chased by balls of fire and a jet of water, the two attacks from Leo's pokemon slamming against it and obscuring it in a cloud of steam.
Almost immediately Leo felt better. The icy cold was no longer so oppressive, in fact the bone-deep chill seemed nothing more than a figment of his imagination as he straightened, his breath coming out in forceful, even puffs of white. The froslass rematerialized, watching Leo curiously even as the whipping winds around the tent vanished – allowing the snowflakes to gently and peacefully accumulate on the ground. An almost imperceptible glow appeared around the froslass' hands as Leo met the pokemon's eyes, and he nearly missed the way it twitched, and the chill suddenly returned.
Leo scowled and, without really knowing what he was doing, flicked his hands outward in a motion reminiscent of flicking off water droplets – simultaneously a shiver ran up his spine, feeling as if a giant strip of ooze was being peeled off of it. The cold vanished again, and Leo took a step forward.
"Do that again, I dare you," he challenged with a snarl, blood rushing to his head in a wave of heat, his fists clenching by his sides. When the froslass did not react, he continued. "If you try to possess me again, I swear to everything holy I will – I just, I'll…pain! I promise pain!" Leo ground out, coherent words not coming to him in his anger-addled mind. The froslass stared at him blankly, then shrieked, icy wind kicking up once more and blinding Leo for a brief second – a second in which the froslass vanished along with her witch lights, the floating balls vanishing like candles being snuffed.
Leo stood outside for a few moments, staring at the sky and letting his eyes adjust to the near blackness of the night. The trees creaked and groaned, snow fell, but the world was peaceful now. He huffed out a breath and looked down at his pokemon, who were still looking around warily. Then he examined himself, noticing that his gloves were not as frozen as he thought, and despite the dusting of frost on his hair and jacket, the froslass hadn't caused much damage with her ice attacks.
"Stupid ghost," Leo grumbled, climbing back into his tent and whistling sharply for his pokemon. Zuko immediately bounded in, curling against Leo's side and whimpering as he lay down, but Santiago took a bit more urging. The slowpoke eventually did amble back into the tent and flop down on the ground, allowing Leo to zip the entrance back up. And, for a moment, Leo just lay there until he remembered he had started recording with his pokedex.
He fumbled around in the dark for it for a second, the device having fallen off his sleeping back so the camera was, miraculously, facing the door. It had been recording video, apparently. Leo grumbled and pulled off one glove to thumb through the device as he wriggled down into his sleeping bag, after, of course, remembering to dust off the snow. A few minutes of perusing later, the screen hurting his eyes in the dark, Leo finally figured out the scan function and blinked in surprise at realizing it had scanned the froslass – just a little.
Not much was known about the ghost, apparently, as they were rare enough that few studies could be performed on them. Folklore was a major part of the entry – something about a young woman dying on a mountain during a snowstorm? Like he said, folklore. But what really caught Leo's eye was the two moves the pokedex had somehow managed to recognize. (How that worked Leo had no idea.) The witch light was will-o-wisp, and…Leo stared dumbly at the second move. It was the only thing Leo could think of that explained the sudden lack of cold, and the sudden changes in temperature surrounding the froslass.
"Confuse ray? Did that stupid ghost really confuse me?! How does that even work?!" But alas, there was no answer readily available to Leo, for knowledge about the effects of confuse ray was limited within the 'dex. Does that mean confuse ray is just as much about illusions than anything else? He mused. With gritted teeth and far too much grumbling Leo settled in for the night, and fell asleep a tad too quickly for someone who had just been attacked by a ghost.
It wasn't the scariest thing he'd seen in this world, after all. That title belonged to Victoria's persian.
The next few days Leo forged ever onward, undeterred by the spring snow. Well, not undeterred. He had debated the merits of continuing on despite the snow having hit, but the relatively warm weather and the way the snow quickly started to melt off cemented the idea of forging onward into Leo's head. Despite it being the mountains, the relatively low elevation and regional climate prevented winter from being too harsh or too long – discounting the intervention of articuno, of course. A far cry from his home mountains, where winter could last eight months and have far too much snow.
He continued to follow the river, growing increasingly aware that he had a follower. Santiago, who spent much of his time out of the pokeball swimming in the river alongside Leo, would occasionally pop his head out of the water and shoot a water gun at seemingly nothing, or perhaps a passing spearow or pidgey. Zuko, who often followed close to Leo's heels, only leaving to go sniff some edible plant that was only just starting to push out of the snow, would growl at shadows and fire bursts of flame at snow drifts, sending clouds of steam into the air.
It wasn't until a few days later that Leo finally caught sight of his follower as she darted through shadows – a glimmer of snow in an otherwise snow-free patch of land indicated that the froslass was following him. And from then on he continued to spot her as she tailed him, usually only catching a glimpse here or there and the occasional feeling of being watched as Leo sat by the fire at night. The gazes weren't malicious this time, however, merely curious. His instincts did not scream that he was being hunted here, and Leo tended to trust his instincts.
Still, it annoyed him to no end when he tried to lay down in his tent every night, to feel like something was watching you. Not even the constant presence of Zuko and Santiago could ward that off. And it wasn't like the pokedex was very helpful either – according to it, there had only been three known cases of a trainer having a froslass in the past two hundred years. Not even Agatha, the ghost-mistress herself, had one of the apparently fantastically rare and diabolically evil ghost types.
Because of course they were, and of course Leo had attracted one. Even if, again, this one didn't seem overly hostile anymore.
"You can come join me by the fire," Leo called into the darkness, as he had taken to doing in the past few days. It'd been a little over three weeks since he'd left the trail to the League Gates, and he'd finally gotten annoyed enough to start calling out to the froslass. The suspense was killing him; he just wanted to know what she wanted already.
He hadn't actually been expecting it to work, but a sudden chill ran up his spine and Leo turned around, meeting the icy-blue gaze of the froslass not inches from his face. He yelped and launched himself to the side, avoiding the fire and setting the ghost-type to cackling madly even as Zuko leapt to his feet from where he lay by the fire, charging with a war-cry and fire flaring from his back.
The froslass grinned, shadows stretching and dancing in the firelight as it vanished long before Zuko could crash into it. Leo sighed and dusted himself off, standing.
"Funny," he deadpanned, returning to his old position and flipping the two magikarp he was roasting over the fire. Courtesy of Santiago, of course, the slowpoke was living up to his namesake and could provide more than enough fish for himself, Leo, and Zuko, though the latter was omnivorous. That is, provided Leo occasionally warned him when there actually was a magikarp on his tail. He would forget sometimes.
From then on, the froslass took to harassing Leo. Making it snow even while it was sunny, chill the sleeping bag before he slipped into it, make shadows dance outside his tent at night, pop out of shadows to scare the living daylights out of him…oh yes, the ghost got plenty of opportunities to mess with Leo. It was only right that, a day after another light snowstorm left a dusting of snow on the ground, Leo got his chance at revenge.
He'd been playing around with a ball of snow, having collected it as he walked, and spotted froslass as she floated through the trees aimlessly. She seemed distracted, not really noticing Leo at all, and a thought came to mind that had Leo grinning manically. Crouching, he crept forward, froslass' back still turned to him as he approached, weaving through trees and carefully placing his steps so he didn't make too much noise until he was in range. Then he pulled back his arm, aimed, and threw his snowball as hard as he could.
He laughed triumphantly as it struck true, catching the froslass in the side. The ice-type whirled on him in surprise, eyes going wide and a terror-inducing shriek echoing through the river valley. A blast of frigid wind hit Leo, whipping his hair back and followed by a ball of hard ice that caught him in the stomach. His breath left his lungs and swirling nausea made him want to puke, sheer force of will being the only thing that kept his lunch down.
The froslass cackled evilly, vanishing into the shadows between trees with a haunting cry.
"Ok, note to self, don't try to start a snowball fight with a froslass," Leo wheezed, slowly standing. Luckily Zuko wasn't out, or else he'd be stuck putting out fires as the little fire-type tried to chase froslass. Again. For all he was quiet and calm most the time, Zuko sure didn't like froslass.
Leo sighed then and stood upright, wobbling through the trees as he continued on, still a little bit queasy.
It took Leo another week and a half to finally reach the site of Tyrus' nest, and when he did, he literally stumbled upon it. Nothing looked familiar to him at first, and when he stumbled through the trees to see Tyrus' mountain he understood why.
What had once been a half-destroyed mountain was nothing but a foothill and rubble, churned earth stretching far and wide away from the crater that was Tyrus' nest, the onix tunnels still visible despite the wanton destruction. Entire swaths of forest were blown down, trees pointing away from the mountain, branches still covered in green and brown needles. Boulders of all sizes littered the ground, and despite all this, Leo's eyes were drawn to something else entirely.
A hundred and fifty foot tall glacier loomed in the center of the crater, gleaming so brightly in the sunlight that Leo nearly had to avert his eyes. But his sheer incredulity won out, and he remained staring dumb-struck at the chaos.
"What in god's name happened here?!" he blurted out.
"Sloooow," Santiago answered, walking forward to chew on a bunch of pine needles.
"Can't be. There's no way a fight between Tyrus and articuno caused this when they'd been fighting for thirty-five years and only whittled the mountain down by half – and that's with the help of a ton of rampaging onix. It doesn't make sense," Leo reasoned, replying to Santiago more out of habit than anything. "C'mon, let's go. I want to get a closer look,"
Leo clambered over and around the fallen trees, eventually stopping to recall Santiago when the slowpoke got stuck, and releasing Zuko in his place. The much smaller pokemon had an easier time than Santiago, though he still struggled to get through some places and wound up clinging to Leo's shoulder with all his might. Eventually he did make it to the edge of the crater, which was thankfully clear of most was still mostly as Leo remembered, with the onix tunnels leading deep into the earth and the tell-tale scars of battle, albeit with a giant glacier and no mountain backing it up now. The small hill that had once been a mountainwas littered with craters and deep lines, snow still visible in the more shaded parts of the barren landscape.
"Froslass, if you can hear me, don't get too aggressive. You may very well end up challenging a tyranitar," Leo said aloud, not sure if the ghost type was around. He hadn't seen her in a few days, but better safe than sorry. He reached over his shoulder and peeled Zuko off his shoulder to set him on the ground before sliding down the crater side, wanting to get a better look at the glacier.
Zuko squeaked and scampered after him, narrowly avoiding falling down into a few of the onix tunnels. The glacier itself, Leo found, wasn't all that wide. Maybe fifty feet across as compared to its far larger height, and he closely examined it as he walked a circle around the object, narrowing his eyes at the stark white ice.
"What could you be?" he murmured, watching as Zuko curiously sniffed the object, sneezing a lick of flame when a piece of snow flew up his nose. It didn't even leave a mark. Could this be nevermeltice? Leo mused, pulling out his pokedex and trying to scan the object with it. It took a bit as Leo continued to slowly circle, eyes focused on the screen, until it finally pinged.
"Nevermeltice, a rare form of ice that is said to never melt except for under extreme circumstances. Formed in extremely cold areas in the presence of many ice-type pokemon, it has been shown to withstand temperatures exceeding three hundred and eighty degrees Fahrenheit before starting to melt, although records suggest a more powerful ice-type pokemon may be able to create stronger ice." The pokedex intoned in a dry, metallic voice.
"This is the first time I've actually used you to scan something, isn't it? Froslass doesn't count, it was unintentional. Should probably fix that…" Leo trailed off as he looked up, the sturdy device slipping from his hands and falling to the ground with a thud as his eyes landed on the creature encased in ice.
He should've seen it coming, he really should have. In the past few years he'd almost completely forgotten about coming through an ultra-wormhole. And yet here, in front of him, encased in a tomb of ice, stood simple proof that the wormholes were still active. Two long, black, mouth like appendages reached towards the edge of the ice, visible only through a foot of the thick prison and leading deeper into the ice towards a dense, black shape.
Only one pokemon fit that description. Guzzlord. Probably the most insane ultra-beast of the Sun and Moon series. Leo glanced at Zuko and swallowed heavily. I hope Tyrus is still alive, he thought honestly.
"Lets, uh, wait around for a bit before going searching for a larvitar. I think I need a few days to wrap my head around this, and try and figure out what happened."
Leo hung around the ruins of Tyrus' nest for three days before the tyranitar appeared. For the most part he spent that time exploring the surrounding area, trying to find Longinus while also not straying too far in case Tyrus showed himself. Longinus – Slowking, Leo had to remind himself, for he wasn't sure he would appreciate being called Longinus – was nowhere to be seen however. Whether that was good or bad remained to be seen, though Leo did run into his old bellossom friend.
The grass type had been busy dancing in a circle with a few other bellossom, grasses growing over a scar in the land and tree saplings planting their roots, and had asked Leo for a song after finishing up. He played a little after receiving another leaf, the bellossom laughed at his still-clumsy melody, and all in all it was an interesting experience. No nearly as impactful when compared to seeing Tyrus again, but fun nonetheless.
He felt Tyrus arrive more than anything else. It was the way the air stilled, silence suddenly overtaking the blown-down forest as Leo huddled beneath a few of the fallen trees, piled on top of each other like a teepee as they were. The flames of his fire flickered, and Leo calmly placed a hand on both Zuko and Santiago.
"He's coming," he said, and as if on cue, he spotted the lumbering form of Tyrus as he marched his way across the scarred landscape, appearing more as a moving mound in the dark than anything else. It wasn't until the tyranitar halted at the very edge of the firelight that Leo got a good look at him – Zuko and Santiago tense but unmoving beneath his hands.
Tyrus was different, more scarred. His armor was cracked and broken in multiple places, the green stone completely torn of in parts and ground down in divots in others. Entire spines were missing from his back, and his eyes – one milky white, the other still gleaming black – were far more tired than they had been before. Whereas before he had been a proud ruler of the mountains, now Leo was reminded of a wounded warrior. He couldn't even imagine the sort of battle that took place here, and stripped Tyrus of his armor and pride.
Leo and Tyrus stared at each other for a long moment, Leo trying hard to think of something to say, and Tyrus unmoving. Patiently waiting. In the end, Leo decided to focus on what he came here for – asking about the battle seemed wrong somehow, despite his dying curiosity. If Longinus were here, he'd tell me, Leo thought, quietly ignoring the possibility that the Slowking had perished in the battle.
Leo stood and bowed, slapping his right fist into the palm of his left hand and lowering his head, a way of bowing in the martial art he knew. "I ask your permission to catch a larvitar," he said simply, voice low. For a moment there was silence, only the crackling of fire audible in the night, until Tyrus snorted.
Dust sprayed itself all over Leo's head, and he glanced up to meet his gaze as the tyranitar looked down on him. He inclined his head slightly and turned, revealing his chewed-upon tail as he lumbered back into the mountain, descending into the first onix tunnel he came across. Leo didn't bother suppressing his wild grin – that could easily have been a dismissal on the tyranitar's part, but he was willing to bet it was approval. I've got a shot at getting a larvitar now. Leo thought to himself smugly.
That smugness faded as he looked out over the destruction of Tyrus' nest, and recalled the damage wreaked on the tyranitar himself. His natural armor would regrow, given time, but it had been sobering to say the least. If this is what I'm going to have to defend myself against, I wonder if a larvitar will be enough.
Leo started his expeditions into the onix tunnels with grim determination and tentative optimism masking his fears of delving underground. Larvitar lived underground for the first part of their lives, only emerging close to their evolutions into pupitar, so it wasn't like Leo could just wander around and hope to stumble across one. Unfortunately, however, the onix tunnels were convoluted and wide, stretching deep into the earth with seemingly endless twists and turns. This meant Leo had to be extra cautious so as to not lose his way and become trapped beneath the mountain, all while keeping an eye out for signs of larvitar.
Thankfully his pokedex did have something of a mapping function, which he was able to sort-of utilize to gather his bearing whenever he lost the markers he set, so he hadn't gotten to lost yet. And, according to the research he'd done, larvitar often lived close to tyranitar out of safety more than anything, at least until their evolution/maturities, so Leo was certain he was looking in the right place…the problem was finding them.
It had taken a good two months of searching for Leo to finally recognize some larvitar signs, and he celebrated by taking a good three days off of spelunking. It was old sign, the half-eaten rock probably years old if his guesses were right, and the caves wore on him. He didn't want to go underground ever again if he could help it – it was a godsend that onix tunnels weren't super tight and claustrophobic… except for when they had collapsed.
As a way to preserve his mental health Leo took to taking a few days off of spelunking now and then, something Zuko and Santiago appreciated. They weren't much help in the caves and didn't like them anyway, so more often than not Leo kept them in their pokeballs the entire time just to keep them safe and less-stressed.
By the third month of his searching Leo began to consider heading back to civilization – Professor Oak and Victoria were undoubtedly worried, despite him having left something of a note for them telling what he had gone to do – but actually seeing a larvitar reignited his passion. It had been just rummaging about in the darkness of the onix tunnels, and Leo had only gotten a glimpse of it in the light of his headlamp before it dove into the ground, vanishing. He searched that area for two week afterward, but it was long gone, and Leo eventually settled for searching other chambers. At least he got to see fresh larvitar tracks that way.
Leo sat on a boulder in a relatively large alcove, the stone bored away by one rock or ground type or another. He stared mutely at the ground, his headlamp shining brightly – he'd just replaced the bulb, he'd brought spares just in case – and providing the only source of light in this damp, dark environment. His eyes traced the old signs of larvitar in the area, one had passed through at some point, but he'd slowly grown…tired of searching. Spending so much time underground wandering around was boring and mentally exhausting, not to mention hard on the eyes, and he'd spent much of the past two weeks above ground, playing with Zuko and Santiago and annoying froslass, who had returned to bugging him in the past few days.
Speaking of the ghost-type, Leo glared at her as she floated in the air around him, watching carefully as if expecting something. It…worried Leo. He wasn't that far into the onix tunnel, maybe a few hundred feet underground? He'd been in this stretch before, there was nothing here. But froslass' presence worried him. Normally she refused to enter the passages, understandably so.
"What's got you so worked up?" Leo demanded, shifting himself on his boulder. Froslass tensed, then relaxed and shook her head sadly. "Knock it off, you're bothering me," Leo said, waving his hand dismissively. Four months of failure to catch a larvitar had made him…well, everything seemed lackluster, for lack of a better word. He just couldn't see the point of continuing the search for much longer. Maybe he'd come back, when he had another teammate to help out, and was a bit stronger.
Some part of Leo raged at the implication that he couldn't do it now, but he had to know when to quit. He'd hate to be here when winter hit again, even if that might not be for a while. Plus, the longer he stayed out here, the more likely Oak was to have a heart attack or something.
Lost in thought as he was, he missed froslass approach entirely, the hairs on the back of his neck standing up being the only warning he received when she leapt in front of his face with a soft, albeit extremely creepy, call. Leo jerked backward with a yelp, falling off the boulder and slamming onto his back with a groan, his backpack breaking the fall.
"What was that…" Leo trialed off when he felt the ground beneath him shift. "for?" he managed out, just when the cave floor gave way and he fell even further. The breath left his lungs as he hit the ground with a whuff, dust, dirt, and stone pelting him as it, too, fell into the cavern below. More groaning had Leo scrambling away despite his lack of breath, the rest of the cavern floor collapsing downward in a spray of dust and dirt that filled the air and dimmed the light of his headlamp, leaving him coughing and stumbling through the dark.
He almost howled at froslass for trying to kill him, but sudden movement on his left had him whirling around, still coughing furiously and squinting through the dust flying through the air. Fearing another cave-in, Leo held his breath and stopped moving, trying to not disturb anything. Rocks and dirt rumbled and fell from the other end, and through it all he heard a distinct, methodical…crunching sound.
His heart skipped a beat as the dust settled slowly, revealing a shape in the darkness. Leo squinted at it, eyes narrowing slighting as panic surged through his veins. A long spike atop a small head, small body and a moving arm…Leo was hurling a pokeball – the empty ones secured on the right side of his belt just in case he needed quick access to one - through the dust before his brain could catch up. A flash of red light illuminating the cavern for a brief moment as the shape was sucked inside.
Leo didn't wait to see if the ball was successful, grabbing at the first pokeball he felt on the left side of his waist and releasing his teammate, Zuko appearing with a sneeze and a flare of irritated fire. Leo snapped his finger, catching Zuko's attention, and pointed in the direction of the pokeball in the darkness, waiting for the ball to burst open.
He waited. And waited. And waited, and when nothing continued to happen, he pushed forward through the clearing dust, coughing again, and searched for the pokeball.
When he found it, he couldn't contain his excitement, picking the successfully closed device up and grinning happily, whipping his pokedex out of the side pocket of his backpack and pressing the scanning lens to the ball, adrenaline pumping through his veins as he stared at the screen with giddy hope.
"Please be what I think it is, please, please, please," he chanted.
"Larvitar, the rock skin pokemon. Larvitar is born deep underground, and does not emerge until it has consumed a sufficient quantity of minerals from the surrounding soil. Only once it has breached the surface will its guardian tyranitar show itself, and ensure the larvitar is ready to leave on its own," the pokedex intoned, text appearing on the screen along with the words. "This larvitar is female, weighing 147 pounds (66.6 kilograms), and stands 1 foot 9 inches (.5 meters) tall."
"YES! HELL TO THE YES!" He whooped, thrusting the pokeball into the air and laughing heartily before hacking from the still-present dust in the air. Zuko squeaked, worried, while the haunting laugh of froslass echoed through the chamber. But despite his coughing nothing could dampen Leo's sprits. He'd finally caught a larvitar.