Chapter 4: Of Beedrills and Bug Pokémon

It didn't take much time at all before they found themselves at the entrance to Viridian Forest. The meadow had stopped, returning to trees once more as Viridian Forest now stood before them. Kiai and Emily stopped at the entrance and Emily stood behind Kiai, wrapping her arms around him as she began to shake. “Okay, Emily...they're just bug Pokémon...you can handle this...” she spoke, then bit her lip. “I hope I can do this...”

Kiai and Emily walked down the main path of the forest, and Kiai spotted several different varieties of Pokémon, mostly Caterpie and Metapod, with a few Butterfree’s flying amongst the treetops. Weedles, being a bit shyer, were harder to find. "See?" spoke Kiai, gently nudging Emily, "there's nothing to be afraid of. You're perfectly safe."

One Caterpie crawled up to Emily and she looked down at it. Her face turned to fear, but she tried her hardest not to move. It began to move closer, and she continued to fight, but the closer it got, the less she could. Finally, she lost it when it grabbed onto her leg and began crawling up. At that pointed she jumped back, falling onto her butt. "Get it off, get it off, get it off!" she spoke frantically as she waved her leg around, finally tossing the bug Pokémon off her leg. "It's creepy and gross!" she spoke loudly.

Kiai shrugged. Experience was experience. He pointed at the Caterpie, and shouted, "Rattata, Quick Attack!" Rattata dashed toward the Caterpie, head butting it and sending it flying into the forest.

Emily sighed and stood up. "I hope I can get rid of this fear eventually...or at least turn it into bug Pokémon just being gross...instead of scary AND gross..." she looked at her leg. "Honestly, though, it is really creepy to feel a Caterpie walking up your bare leg like that...not to mention just gross..."

Kiai hung his head. "You know, Emily, we're going to be going up against a tried-and-tested Gym leader in only a few days. Shellshocker barely has any fighting experience, and you have about the same. This is pretty much your last chance to become comfortable with Pokémon battles. I'm sorry that it's against Bug-types, but think of it this way; you can overcome your fear at the same time.”

Emily sighed. "I know..." she hung her head as well. "I really haven't been worrying about experience much..." she looked up at the bug Pokémon around her. "All right...let's give this a try I guess...Shellshocker, tackle that one over there." Emily pointed to a nearby Caterpie and Shellshocker rushed forward. The Caterpie turned to look at Shellshocker, only to get struck in the head by a Tackle. The Caterpie bounced back a little, then shook its head.

The Caterpie rushed forward, Tackling Shellshocker now. Shellshocker took the hit and bounced back a little. "Shellshocker, Water Gun!" Emily shouted. Shellshocker inhaled a bit, then shot a burst of water from his mouth once more, which struck the Caterpie and pushed it back. It then fell backwards, swirls appearing in its eyes. "Yes!" Emily shouted. "I guess that wasn't too bad..." She turned, her eyes going wide, her face turning to fear, as she found herself now staring at four Caterpies, all facing her. "Shellshocker!" she shouted. Shellshocker quickly rushed to her side. "Hit them with Water Gun!" Shellshocker inhaled, then shot water out of his mouth at each one, knocking each one back. They turned and ran off and Emily sighed.

Kiai approached her, clapping his hands. She turned to say something smart, thinking he was doing it sarcastically, until she saw the sincerity on his face. He wrapped his arms around her and embraced her. "I'm very proud of you, Emily." he spoke.

Emily blushed. "Thanks...that was a lot harder then it probably looked, though..." she shuddered. "Bug Pokémon..." she sighed. "Icky and scary..."

"I know it was harder than it looked, that's why I'm so proud of you." He hugged her extra-tight, then stepped back, still smiling. "I'm somewhat surprised at you. I know you don't like Bug Pokémon, but Butterfree's are really pretty, and not icky at all."

"Well, Butterfree's are pretty...but in general, most bug Pokémon are icky...and they are only scary because of that Beedrill incident..." she sighed. "I think I'll be okay as long as no Beedrill appear, though...if they do...I'll scream..." No sooner had she spoken, then a Beedrill flew over her head.

Emily felt the light gust of wind and heard the Beedrill shout "Beedrill!" as it flew by. Emily held in her fear for a moment, but luckily it had only passed by, meaning as quickly as she tensed up, she also relaxed.

"Well, no point in sitting around and waiting for the Metapods to hatch. Let’s go." Kiai offered his hand to Emily, who still seemed somewhat shaken just to be standing in the middle of the forest. She smiled, and reached out to take it. Together, hand in hand, they walked down the path of the forest.

Emily smiled as she looked at Kiai. Even though she was shaking from fear, she was at least happy that Kiai was here next to her. Another Beedrill flew by her head, and she once again tensed up, but soon quickly relaxed once more. She pulled out her blue pokeball and looked at it as they continued to walk. "I wonder just how powerful Goldy is...since he has the Pokérus."

Kiai looked at it, he too was rather curious. "If it was anything else, it might be easy to tell...but Psyducks are so...weird. You can never tell how intense their headache is, so it would be hard to find a baseline in terms of strength. But I'm sure we could find a bug somewhere to test out on." As if reading his mind, a Venonat hopped out of a bush on the side of the path and bumbled along into the forest.

"Eep!" Emily spoke, but then pushed herself to fight her fear. She tossed the blue pokeball forward. "Go, Goldy!" The ball hit the ground and opened, releasing the Psyduck within. He sparkled as he appeared, then gave a blank stare at the Venonat.

"Psy..." Goldy began and he brought his hands up and set them on his head, holding his head, "...duck..." he finished. Emily pulled out her pokedex to check on Psyduck's attacks.

"Scratch...ok..." Emily spoke, then looked back up at Goldy. "Goldy, use Scratch attack!" Goldy waddled forward, brought his hand around, and scratched the Venonat in front of him. The Venonat barely felt the attack, however, and turned to look at Goldy. It stepped back, then rushed forward, hitting Goldy with a fierce Tackle. Venonant just seemed to bounce off, however, as Goldy gave almost no response to the attack.

"Interesting..." said Kiai. "Here, lets try something. Oi, Goldy!" Goldy turned to look at him.

"...Psy...?" Goldy responded. Kiai began making strange faces and saying all sorts of conflicting gibberish. "...Pssyyyy...?"

"Quick, Goldy, derive Bernoulli's Formula using Newton’s Laws. And while you're at it, write a thesis paper on string theory."

Goldy grabbed its head, crossed its eyes and began wobbling back and forth, muttering "Psy-y-y-y…"

Kiai, grinned, and whispered to Emily, "There, now try!"

"All right...Goldy...use Psychic!" Goldy looked at Emily, giving a confused look. He wobble around a little bit, then, when he faced Venonat, the bug Pokémon charged for another Tackle. It hit Goldy right in the head, and Goldy's eyes began to glow.

"Psyduck!" Goldy shouted. It suddenly seemed to be acting as if it was intelligent. The Venonat soon found itself lifted off the ground and floated into the air. The Venonat then shot off, flying towards a nearby tree, slamming hard into it.

"Good, now use Confusion!" Goldy's eyes continued to glow. Electric-like bolts of purple light shot off towards Venonat, which hit it and made it react in pain. A moment later, the Venonat's eyes swirled as it walked around. "Yes! Now, Goldy, hit it with a Psybeam!"

"Psy...duck..." Goldy spoke and it's eyes stopped glowing and it tilted its head. It was back to its normal self.

"Damn it! Goldy, return!" she shouted, and held out the blue pokeball, allowing the Psyduck to be zapped back inside. "Go! Shellshocker!" Emily shouted and Shellshocker rushed forward. "Hit it with Tackle!" Shellshocker rushed forward, striking the Venonat with a good, hard Tackle attack. The Venonat fell to its back, its eyes swirling. "I don't want it, but you can have it," Emily spoke as she looked to Kiai.

Kiai smiled. "You're a Pokémon trainer, Emily. You don't catch the ones you like, you don't catch a fair amount, you don't even catch the vast majority. You got to catch them all, even if you don't use it. Now finish this off right."

"Aww, all right..." Emily pouted, then shrugged. "But I'll trade it to you later if you get a water Pokémon." She pulled out a pokeball and tossed it forward. It struck the knocked out Venonat and absorbed it into it. The ball landed and shook for a moment, then the light faded. "All right...I caught a...bug Pokémon..." she spoke, not really all that thrilled. "I'll send it to Professor Oak once we get to Pewter City."

"He'll probably be surprised that you caught it." Suddenly he had a thought. "You know something? We should ask Professor Oak about the Pokérus; maybe even send him Goldy for a quick checkup!"

"That's a pretty good idea," Emily spoke, nodding. "He might know something..." She walked over and picked up the pokeball and looked at it. She then placed it on her belt, then looked at Kiai. "You got to admit, that was pretty interesting...using Goldy...I wonder what it will be like when it evolves..."

"As powerful as Psyduck, but without needing a headache to get there." Kiai spoke. They began walking down the path again, when Kiai wondered out loud, "I wonder why there are no spider-like Pokémon..." As he said this, he tickled Emily's lower back, quickly working his fingertips up her spine.

Emily froze. "Spider-like Pokémon?" she felt Kiai's hand moving on her back. She closed her eyes tight. "Are you sure there's none? Cause there's something on my back..." she was trying to keep from screaming, and had no idea it was Kiai playing a joke on her.

"Yes, there is...it's a TICKLEMON!" Kiai swung his other arm around and tickled Emily.

"Eee!" Emily squeeled and giggled. Once he stopped, she smacked him on the back of his head. "You know, you really had me scared for a moment that a bug really was crawling up my-"

Emily’s sentence was cut off by a sudden "Beedrill!" from behind. Her body tensed up, and she turned her head, her eyes coming in contact with a fairly large Beedrill. It seemed to float there, not moving, and Emily quickly spun around, so her full body was facing it, and began to step back. "Don't hurt me..." she spoke, the Beedrill flying up in her face now. "Shellshocker..." she spoke, terrified. "W-water Gun!" Shellshocker inhaled and shot a blast of water out at the Beedrill's side. It knocked him away for a single moment, and Emily's body seemed to react by fainting.

The Beedrill was coming back now, though, aiming its pins at Shellshocker. Shellshocker quickly inhaled once more and shot another blast of water at the Beedrill, knocking it back and onto the ground this time. Shellshocker quickly ran to Emily, then looked to Kiai, almost giving him a look of "take care of that thing!"

"Rattata, get in there and Bite it!" Rattata leapt toward the Beedrill, which narrowly missed the speedy Rattata with its spikes. The two fought, but Beedrill was losing badly, being unable to attack a small target so close. The two fell to the ground, and Rattata leapt away. Kiai glared at it. "You're mine now." He threw a pokeball, easily catching the weakened Beedrill. After collecting it, he returned to Emily, gently lifting her up into his arms. "Emily?" he whispered, "are you ok?"

Emily groaned. "Huh? What?" she looked to Kiai. "Oh, thank heavens." She hugged Kiai. "That's the closest I've ever been to a Beedrill since that day...I was so scared...once I told Shellshocker what to do...I couldn't hold it anymore...my body just lost it..." she began to cry. "It was so scary..."

*     *     *

It was six years ago. Emily was much younger, and it occurred in the summer time. Emily smiled as a small Caterpie crawled towards her. At this time, she, her father, and Kiai, were all out near the Viridian Forest due to some business that Emily's father had. Kiai was there because he had a weird feeling before, and didn't want to leave Emily alone. "Look, Kiai!" Emily spoke, tugging on his shirt. "It's a Caterpie! It's a little icky...but it becomes a beautiful Butterfree!"

Kiai smiled, and reached down to the Caterpie. It lazily crawled up his arm and across his back, which tickled him and made him giggle. "Eww! You let it crawl on you!"

Emily looked up and blinked, seeing her father had walked off. She now remembered that her father had said "Take care of her, Kiai, I'll be back in a minute."

Emily shrugged and turned, now looking up at the forest. "Viridian Forest looks kind of spooky. Dad says there's nothing scary in there...just a lot of bug Pokémon..."

"Bug Pokémon aren't scary." spoke Kiai, as the Caterpie crawled down his other arm and away on business of its own. He was trying to sound brave, even though he was a little scared being in the forest alone.

"They are a little...they're really icky, too," Emily nodded. She looked around for a moment, then something got her eye. A lone tree, sitting separate from the others was nearby, and on it were a small cluster of Kakuna. "Look at that!" she shouted and rushed over. She got close, but not too close. "All of those Kakuna! Amazing!"

Kiai, intrigued, followed close behind her. "Wow...that's really cool..." Suddenly, a sliver of white light shown through a crack down the back of one of them. "Look!" whispered Kiai, pointing, "It's evolving!" The two watched as not one, but three Kakuna began to crack open, and three fully-evolved Beedrill emerged.

"Wow!" Emily spoke. "Amazing! Bug Pokémon are really cool when they evolve." The Beedrills spread their wings and flew up a little. However, the voices of children startled them, and they began looking around. It took only a moment for one to spot Kiai and Emily.

"Beedrill bee!" one of the Beedrill shouted, and the other two responded

Emily's eyes went wide. "What's going on, Kiai?"

"...Run. Just run, Emily!" Kiai turned and ran, and Emily followed. Not a moment too soon, as the Beedrills were already hot on their trail. They dashed through the woods, making for the entrance to the path, when suddenly Kiai heard a shriek and a thud. He stopped short and turned around to see the three Beedrill swarming around Emily, who had tripped over an exposed root. Kiai screamed fiercely, grabbed a stick, and ran head-long into the Beedrill. He bashed one on the head, and swatted at the other two until they gave up and flew off. He looked down at Emily, who had been stung a few times, and was drifting in and out of consciousness. He summoned all his strength to hoist her up onto his shoulders, and he carried her out of the forest to the Pokémon Center.

"Kiai..." Emily spoke. She groaned. As Kiai entered the Pokémon Center, Nurse Joy rushed to help out. The next few minutes were a jumbled mess, seemingly to be an almost infinitely long time period to Kiai. Finally, after a few minutes, things settled down and Nurse Joy walked over to Kiai and smiled.

"She'll be ok," the nurse spoke. "She was just stung a couple times. Luckily you got her here just in time."

At that moment, Emily's father burst through the door. "Where's my daughter? Is she okay?" he asked Nurse Joy and she nodded. Kiai and the nurse both helped explain what happened, and Emily's father smiled in the end. "I have to thank you, Kiai. You're a wonderful friend to Emily, and just now, you saved her life." He hugged Kiai. "I just know something good will happen between you two." Emily's dad stood up and looked to the Nurse, who now looked sad.

"Given the trauma involved in this..." Nurse Joy began, "...Emily may never be able to be around bug Pokémon again...I fear that something this traumatic usually causes a phobia...and really bad one at that..." she looked down. "I don't know for sure, you'll have to find out yourself, but I fear that she may be afraid of any bug Pokémon after this...and it will be a fear that she will probably never get over..."

Emily's father nodded. "I understand, Nurse Joy, even so, at least she is alive."

*     *     *

Emily continued to hug Kiai, sniffling a little. "It's all because I was stupid...I wanted to see the Kakuna..." she sniffled a little more. "I shouldn't have ran that far from the entrance..."

"It's ok, Emily. It's in the past. I'm not as weak as I once was, and you have Shellshocker as well. We'll never let anything like that happen to you again." Rattata squeaked in annoyance, and Kiai corrected himself. "Of course, you have Rattata too."

Emily sniffled and nodded. "Yeah, I guess you're right..." She sniffled again, then raised her head to look at Kiai. Kiai rose his hand and wiped the tears from her eyes and she smiled a little. Emily slid herself off of Kiai, moving into an actual sitting position, her legs swung around at her side, and her arm resting on her leg. She looked to Kiai. "Can you help me up?" she asked.

Kiai smiled, bent down, and wrapped his arms around her. He stood up straight, hoisting her up, but kept his arms around her for a little while. Emily smiled as she hugged him, resting her head on his shoulder for a moment. "I never would have made it this far without you. I'm so glad Professor Oak let you have that fourth Pokémon."

"I'm glad too," spoke Kiai, "I'd be terribly lonely without you, and you'd be completely hopeless without me." He unfortunately failed to avoid another smack to the back of his head, but didn't mind.

Emily then smiled and turned to walk, but her legs wobbled, and she fall back into Kiai's arms. "Maybe...I'll walk with you a little while?" Kiai pulled one of Emily's arms around his neck, and he held onto her waist, supporting her as they made their way down the path, further away from Viridian City, and ever closer to their first step down Victory Road.