Jon Chapter 03
Chapter-3 A Gastly Encounter
Then they saw it, a large open field and drive way up to a forbidding looking house. More than a house actually, it was a mansion. Matt had lived in the area all his life, but hadn’t heard any stories about the mansion, who had owned it, and why it had been abandoned. As they parked their bikes they looked around. Matt felt a chill around the entire area, and looking at the dark, decrepit house just made him feel very uneasy.
“Can we look around outside first? Just to be safe.” Matt said as he cautiously locked up his bike, and adjusted his pack. “Really? Outside? I thought you wanted to learn something about ghost-type Pokémon.” Jessie let her vulpix take the lead. It seemed alert, but not unsettled by the atmosphere. Maybe he was just getting cold feet. Matt brought out his meowth, but it only sat down, staring up at Matt. “What? I didn’t do anything.” Matt said in a slightly angry voice.
“Matt, you need to be a better trainer. He won’t listen to you if you’re just going to let him do all the work. Even researchers need to treat their Pokémon with respect and love.” Jessie sped up to her vulpix which was now at the front of the mansion. Matt quickly picked up his pace to Jessie as she walked up the creaking and rickety wooden steps.
The whole mansion looked like no one had lived there for years. The front doors were falling off the hinges almost as they entered into the foyer. There were doors on both sides of the entryway as well as in front of them going up the stairs, and a farther hidden door below the stairs. It looked as if there used to be rugs on the floors, but they had long since been removed or destroyed.
Though it was still day-light outside Matt couldn’t shake the feeling of overhanging darkness. “Aughh!!!!” At that moment Matt felt something rubbing around his shins and screamed for a moment. Jessie spun around quickly and Venus was ready standing in an active defensive stance as Matt finally calmed down. His meowth was rubbing itself against him as he looked down.
There was a slight crack and then a rusted chandelier crashed down in the space between Matt and Jessie. Both of them stood silently looking to each other for an answer. It was extremely tense for a moment as Matt strained to listen for anything. He was still feeling very chill, and now he was really wishing he hadn’t come or at least had more of a team than just one Pokémon.
Jessie and her vulpix slid over to the right side of the room, just beyond the fallen chandelier. Looking up they could see eerie blue flames swirling around above them. Suddenly they were flying toward Jessie’s vulpix and Matt’s meowth. Venus stood and braced as the flames bounced harmlessly off her, but Matt’s meowth had to scurry around to avoid being burned. Matt could now see the source of this trouble; 2 gastlys were floating around above their heads, chuckling to themselves.
Thinking quickly Venus focused and managed to get the attention of one of the gastly that was tormenting them. The gastly moved in slowly, looking for a way to best unnerve her, but just before it came within reach Venus shifted her stance and hit with a faint attack, throwing the gastly totally off balance and knocking it out. Several other gastly were now appearing from the ceiling at the clear prodding of the one left floating above them.
“We need to get away from those gastly, now!” Matt said in a moment of clear thought. It would be madness to fight all of them, so they should try to get somewhere safer before fighting back. Matt grabbed Jessie hand, not thinking really of anything but getting away from the group of increasing gastly. They ran to the kitchen to the right of the entryway followed by their Pokémon.
As they slammed the door behind them, Matt’s meowth leapt up on the counter and continued to simply keep a watch out, as Jessie’s vulpix Venus stood ready for action. Matt’s meowth was the first to notice some old kitchen knives start rattling around, and called to Matt’s and Jessie’s attention. Two of the drawers sprung to life and several knives began levitating trying to balance themselves in mid-air before directing themselves toward their targets.
“Venus! Flamethrower!” Venus let out a blast of flames, engulfing the knives and they fell to the floor lifeless. More knives started floating out of the draw and this time they made a run past the knives into the dining room. The dining room was calmer by comparison, since the gastly seemed less interested in trying to harm them since escaping the kitchen. They also seemed a bit weary of vulpix’s flames.
Where the kitchen had been fairly well-lit the dining room was much darker, as most of the lights were long since burned out and windows were far fewer. “Ok, now where should go Matt?” Jessie asked, as she carefully checked her vulpix for any injuries. Matt’s meowth was still just wandering around, almost totally ignorant of the situation they were in. “I haven’t had a chance to scan any of them on my pokedex yet, so we need to at least single one of them out for my scanner to pick it up.” Matt said.
“They have us outnumbered now, but if we keep them moving, maybe they’ll get tired and then we can single one out?” Jessie suggested as she brushed some dust off Venus’s tail. “I can’t think of any other plan, so let’s just give that a try for now.” Matt said as he caught his breath for a second. Things hadn’t been this tough since they caught Marc’s geodude a few months back. Straightening up Matt leaned on one of the old chairs around the dining room table, just as the walls started to vibrate. There were bulges slowly bubbling out over the old crackling wallpaper, as the gastly were trying to move into the dining room now.
It was well known that gastly could move through solid objects, being ghosts and all. But, it seemed they enjoyed toying with them for the moment, maybe they just hadn’t had this much fun in a while. Maybe even a little lonely since people tended to avoid the old Raymond ruins. Matt and Jessie moved to one of the large closed doors on the opposite end of the dining room, past the large dining table lined with dusty chairs.
Matt yanked the door open quickly, but was met by several more gastly, who had been waiting for him to open the door. Matt yelled and fell back for a moment, but Jessie wasn’t too shaken to lose focus. “Venus!” By now Venus knew what to do, and loosed another blast of flames at the open door way. The gastly quickly scattered this time, and let the group pass. Matt got up, as this time Jessie took the lead and they rushed out of the dining room, turned a hard right, went up some stairs, down more stairs, and found themselves in what looked like the servant’s quarters.
As soon as they stopped Matt lurched over in exhaustion. “Do we really have to run this fast? I’m still just a rookie researcher.” He said as he slumped down on a pile of old clothes. Jessie was tired too, but still not too winded to sit down. “That’s what makes it fun. Besides, I think those gastly will need a little time to find us again.” She was leaning up against the wall of the old servant’s quarters, looking around at the room.
It was a very dusty room with two small beds, and a small closet with what looked like servant’s clothes. Matt was sitting on a large pile of what had looked like clothes, and bed sheets, but as he relaxed he started to feel a little cold. Matt quickly jumped up, now remembering that same chill from the first time he had entered the house. Jumping up he grabbed the rags and looked down.
There, relaxing peacefully was a haunter. It didn’t even seem to mind that he had been sat on. There was even a slight snoring sound coming from it, as Matt carefully pulled out his pokedex and began scanning it. It really looked like it was just taking a rest, and they hadn’t seen any haunters in the group that was currently trying to scare them. Matt nervously snuck over to his meowth, now resting on one of the beds, thinking what to do next.
Matt’s meowth immediately, sensing his trainer nearby awoke and seemed to be ready for his order. “Meowth, attack that haunter.” Matt said. It was in a slightly ordering tone, but didn’t come from a trainer who was really willing to commit himself to a battle. His meowth stood up and straddled over to the haunter who was yawning now. The meowth started pawing at the haunter, but it didn’t even feel the swipes. “Meowth, scratch!” The meowth now started attacking with more force, but the haunter just turned over in its sleep.
“Matt, are you a complete novice? Normal-type moves don’t work on ghost types.” Matt felt dumbfounded, having forgotten some of the most basic things about Pokémon and their different types of attack moves. “Use odor sleuth first, then your attacks will start working.” Jessie said. It was at that moment that the haunter woke from its slumber and faced Matt’s meowth. “Odor sleuth!” Matt said clearly, as his meowth took a stance and focused its senses to locate the haunter.
The haunter, not willing to be taken completely unaware used spite, weakening meowth’s use of that move. His meowth was now pacing, keeping its full attention on the ghost Pokémon. “Meowth scratch it!” A weak move, but this time the haunter felt the blow and was pushed back a bit. Matt knew what was coming next before the haunter closed in. The haunter smiled a toothy grin and opened its mouth to reveal it large dark tongue. It tried to lick Matt’s meowth, but the move had no effect, just as the meowth’s attacks had not worked before.
“Scratch it again meowth.” The meowth attacked again, and the haunter was hit again. It was not weakened too much, but was feeling less energetic than it had at the start. The haunter then locked eyes with the meowth and started to glow a deep blue aura. A subtle but violent shock pulsed over Matt’s meowth, as the haunter took a very heavy blow. But strangely the meowth took a physical hit as well just as the haunter was recovering from the last attack.
“I think it used a curse on your meowth, Matt. He’s trying to take your meowth down before it does too much damage.” Matt knew he was in a bit of a bind now. The haunter was stronger than his meowth, and given enough time he’d lose his chance to catch it. Jessie was still watching from behind Matt, giving advice but otherwise not letting her vulpix take part in the battle; it was Matt’s fight to win or lose and she knew that.
Hoping his meowth was up to the task Matt knew he still had one more good chance to get the haunter. “Meowth, bite.” Matt said confidently, he knew the normal moves weren’t a good bet, but bite wasn’t a normal move, so it couldn’t do much worse. His meowth, weakened but still feeling fairly strong lunged at the haunter and bit into the ghost Pokémon. The haunter really felt the power of the attack and pulled away hard, but the meowth clamped down even harder with its bite.
The haunter was shaking wildly from side to side, trying to get loose of the cat Pokémon’s grip. The meowth continued to smack at the haunter while being swung around. After a few moments, and some more flailing, the meowth let go; weakened as it was now by the curse. The haunter was swaying back and forth, showing almost no sign of fight left. Matt knew what he had to do now, he reached into the side compartment of his back and pulled out and empty poke-ball.
He threw the ball squarely at the haunter, and watched as it connected, opened, and pulled the ghost into the ball. The ball hit the floor of the room with a light thud, and rolled for a second as the ball’s capture systems tried to lock the ghost into the ball securely. The little red light on the ball flashed on and off for several tense seconds. Matt could only hope he’d weakened it enough for the ball to hold the haunter, and wouldn’t have to continue the battle another round.
The ball jumped for a second, and Matt’s heart skipped a beat, but fell to the floor again, and the light turned off. For a second he didn’t know what to do. “He’s yours now.” Matt felt a flood of relief now that the battle was over, and his meowth relaxed its guard, no longer having to worry about taking any more damage.
Matt reached over to pick up the poke-ball, still not fully sure it wouldn’t hop up again. It felt warm actually, despite being a ghost-type, and he took a moment to put it onto his belt. “Well that’s all over with, where should we go now? My guess is they avoided this room because of the haunter. Now he’s gone, we should be on the move.” Jessie and her vulpix walked over to the door of the room, and listened for any more sounds.
The mansion had quieted down considerably since they had entered. For whatever reason, they had slipped back into silence, and waiting. Jessie cracked the door open just a little to sneak a peek into the hallway, and saw a few gastly just lazily hovering around. Matt and Jessie slipped out the door and into the hallway with little difficulty as they gastly seemed to be congregating somewhere else this time.
The few that had been hovering around the hallway now floated into the entryway and then back into the kitchen. Several more came out of the attic, glanced over at them, but simply paid them no attention as they went through the floor and into the basement. Their curiosity getting the better of them, Matt and Jessie walked over to the stairs that led down to the basement and decided they wanted to know why they had been left alone.
Getting over the smell of mildew the two could see a group of gastly now tormenting a solitary eevee. They seemed to delight in getting close enough that it felt cold, but never close enough to connect. At which point the eevee would try to tackle the gastly, but go straight through them and fall down. The gastly simply kept floating around the scared eevee, and just watched it attempt to attack them in vain.
Jessie, feeling sympathetic and a bit appalled by this behavior stepped in view of the gastly. “Hey! Over here gas heads!” Venus had also stepped out at her side, ready for action again. So far it seems Venus hadn’t been having any trouble with these ghosts and had taken no real signs of damage. “Confuse ray!” Several wavering, shimmering, lights began floating around in the air around several gastly, and in seconds they were bobbling around. Most of them didn’t even know who to attack, or how to get at them.
It was actually pretty funny seeing these ball shaped orbs trying to lick or bite each other, Venus, Jessie, Matt, or his meowth. When one of them did finally get a clear beat on one of them they would just attack back, knocking them back into the fray, to be attacked by several other confused gastly. While Matt and his meowth kept them busy near the bottom of the stairs, Jessie took this chance to pick up the exhausted eevee and make a run for the stairs.
The gastly were mostly over their confusion and had started to give more serious thought when attacking. At least twice they managed to hit Venus, but she held firm from each hit and sent them flying with a faint attack. Meowth was also getting tired, more from all the biting he had to do to keep them in check than the fighting or damage. The gastly seemed to be getting agitated from the attacks and were building themselves into a slightly less than friendly rage.
As Jessie reached the stairs and started to climb, the door at the top slammed shut. The gastly had stopped attacking and instead seemed satisfied with keeping them trapped. What had been an even dozen or so gastly had grown to something like a double dozen as some came from other parts of the house. Matt looked down at meowth, and he looked fairly tired after all of today’s adventure. He’d been chased through this house, avoided a falling chandelier, flying knives, slamming doors, lots of running, and finally a long fight with a haunter.
‘That was it!’ Matt thought. He reached back to his belt to the only other Pokémon he had. The haunter materialized in front of Matt, turned and looked a bit quizzically back at him, as if to say, “What do you want me to do about this?” Matt wasn’t feeling particularly playful at the moment and looked sternly back at his haunter. It seemed to understand and just stood its ground, staring back at the gastly. Matt hoped that the gastly feared the haunter more than the fighting, and would back off, and it looked like this time his guess was right.
The gastly slowly backed out of the basement, disappearing into the walls, ceiling, and out of the area in general. Jessie kicked hard and the door opened with no trouble this time. Matt, a bit spent managed to back out of the basement, up the stairs, and out of the mansion. Looking back he could see some gastly still looking out the windows in the attic, a bit longingly, but probably glad it was all over as well. They had had a good day, the first good day in would could have been months or years of haunting that old mansion.
Matt and Jessie got to their bikes, picked them up from the ground, and started to walk down the dusty dirt road back to the main route. “You may not be much of a trainer, but you kept your head in the game.” Jessie said, looking back at Matt. Venus was walking along side as the eevee had now taken the basket on her bike. The eevee looked completely exhausted, and just slept in the basket, its head over the edge of the basket in the light breeze. Matt looked down at his meowth, it had done a great job today. It had managed to fight off not only the gastly, but wear down a haunter in pitched battle.
Matt’s haunter floated beside him on the other side of his bike. He sure didn’t seem as scary now that they were outside of that mansion and back on the road. Matt had scanned both ghosts at the house, and was feeling more like a researcher than when he’d left Cement city. Though, if all field work was this tiring he didn’t know just how long he’d last.
The sun was now nearing the tops of the trees, and it was getting late. “Shall we press on or camp out tonight?” Matt was all for whatever caused the least difficulties for them. He had his sleeping back on his bike along with some snacks still in his bag, but not much else. He’d have to recharge his equipment at a poke-center when they got back into town. “Camping out seems like an ok idea. There should be a clearing a few miles south of here, we passed it yesterday.” Jessie said, sounding a bit tired as well, but in good spirits.
They reached a nice open spot just off the main route around 7 that afternoon. Matt set up a fire pit and Jessie had been out with her vulpix gathering wood. Matt’s meowth helped dig out the fire pit quickly, and seemed to listen to him more since the day before. It was nice to have a little respect for both of them, and they both seemed to reciprocate the feelings. His haunter was on this belt for now, but maybe he’d let him out at night to watch over the camp.
After a few sandwiches and some berries for their new friends they both went to sleep just as the fire had started to die down. Looking up at the clear night’s sky Matt was wondering if this was how so many trainers before had started their journeys. Out in the world for the first time and away from everything that had been their past lives, here was a new adventure and a new chance to be someone different. As Matt dozed off he couldn’t help but think about all that had happened in the past 72 hours of his life.
He’d met a new friend who had now joined him along his journey, he had managed to escape several close calls with some slightly violent if comical ghosts, and best of all grown closer to his meowth. His meowth was wandering around a bit, but seemed content to just slowly circle around the camp site and keep watch a while. Jessie’s vulpix was curled into a ball, covering itself with its tails, and her new eevee was snuggled up close to her sleeping bag. They looked so happy just resting there.