RE: The Writing Contest - Round 1 has started!!! Ends in 3 days! 2 competitor spaces left!
Here's my Entry:
Chapter 2: Confrontation at Sprout Tower
By the time that Gold had reached the little town, he was huffing and puffing up a storm. He had been running for a straight mile and was worn out from attempting to keep up with his speedy Cyndaquil, and so he was relieved when he first caught a glimpse of the bright red roof that he knew to belong to Prof. Elm’s laboratory. Crystal was already waiting outside of the door when he arrived, and she seemed impatient for something.
“Oh, finally you’re here!” She exclaimed, “Uncle Elm wants us to go to Cherrygrove city immediately and see if we can track down the thief and the stolen Totodile! He will tell you everything you need to know. He’s inside and really wants to talk to you. Come back out here when you’re ready to go!”
Gold nodded and moved past Crystal through the laboratory door. He could here sounds of cursing and scuffling from inside. When he made his way to the main room he found Elm, desperately and nervously attempting to recreate the neatness of his now disheveled lab. The professor didn’t notice Gold’s presence at first as he was rather absorbed in a seemingly nonstop cycle of picking up, fumbling, and dropping piles of papers strewn all over the floor.
It wasn’t until Gold knocked his knuckles against the doorframe that the Professor acknowledged his being there at all. “Oh, Gold, thank goodness you’re here,” he said, neglecting the pile of sheets which he had prior been attending to and focusing his attention on the boy, “I suppose Crystal has already told you but I need you to take a little trip to Cherrygrove for me. You see, that Totodile is vital to the continuation of my studies, without it, I face the desertion of all that I am working to accomplish.”
He paused for a breath and let the redness of the flared up emotions in his face die down before he continued. “You and Crystal are two of the only people who I can trust to accomplish this task. I’ve known my niece her entire life and I’ve known you for the better part of yours. I’m counting on you.”
Gold nodded, excited at the concept of his first mission as a Pokemon trainer and without another word left the room to join Crystal. When he arrived at the spot where she had been standing when he had last seen her she was no where to be found. He looked about him worriedly and called her name into the air but there came no response. Then, suddenly, he was startled by the sound of crunching branches around the left side of the building.
Cautiously, he made his way around the corner, careful to avoid detection in case criminality was involved. However, his efforts were proven pointless when Crystal, riding atop a bright red bicycle, shot through the bushes mere inches from his face. She laughed as she rode around him in circles, honking a little horn on the handle bar every few seconds.
“Hey Gold!” She exclaimed, “I found this bike out back behind the lab and Uncle Elm said that I could have one and that you could too! There’s a blue one back there for you! Now hurry up before I leave without you!”
Within a minute, Gold was seated upon a similar bicycle, varying solely in color, strapping a matching blue helmet under his chin. He nodded to Crystal and the two struck out for Cherrygrove. Along the way, the two conversed about how it felt to be newborn trainers and, directly following a slight argument about who’s Pokemon was the stronger, the conversation turned to the day’s events, namely the theft.
“It was awful,” Crystal said, shivering in remembrance, “Me and my uncle were just observing the rare Pokemon species that I picked up from Mr. Pokemon when a thick smoke filled the room. I couldn’t see or breath well but I just barely caught a glimpse of a boy’s outline through the haze and watched him snatch up the Totodile Pokeball and hop back out the window from where he had come. I wish you had been there.”
Gold was about to remark about his vision when a familiar figure in the distance caught his attention. Although he was difficult to recognize through the dark cloak that covered his body, the bits of bright red hair that stuck up through the hood gave away the fact that this was Gold’s target. He stopped his bike short behind a large oak tree and pulled Crystal with him.
“Ah!” She cried, desperately leveling out her bike despite the rude interception in its path of travel, “What was that for? Why are we stopping?”
“Shh!” Gold hushed, the grave expression on his face silencing his companion in it of itself, “That’s him! That’s the thief over there by the big tower!”
Crystal took a moment to peer out behind the edge of the tree to confirm Gold’s assessment and then nodded. “You’re right,” She whispered back, “That’s him. But how did you know that? You weren’t there.”
But Gold didn’t hear her. He had already struck out from their place of concealment behind the tree and was creeping up on the back of his target. As quietly as possible, he released Cyndaquil from its Pokeball and ordered it to deliver an ember attack on the boy. The little Pokemon nodded in reply and launched its attack with as much force as its small being could muster.
The attack landed at its full force but when the smoke cleared, there was no sign of the target. Gold just managed to catch a glimpse of him out of the corner of his eye dashing up a long, winding staircase that leveled off at the porch of a tall tower. Gold beckoned his Cyndaquil to follow and followed close on the tail of the boy. Crystal was, in turn, following Gold in hot pursuit, Chikorita close at her heels.
Gold watched the boy clear whole levels of stairs with inhuman grace and ease and realized with anguish that he was falling rapidly behind. Nevertheless, he pressed on with all of his strength, until at last he was only directly behind his target. By this time the porch had been reached and the cloaked boy dashed hurriedly into the tower’s leaf-veiled door. Gold followed close on his heels and was surprised to find himself at the attention of a group of monks, each of whom had been disturbed from their meditation by the boys’ presence.
Gold scanned the room for the red-haired boy and ultimately found him lurking in the shadows of a cabinet in the far corner of the room. Without a second thought, he hurried over to the spot and leapt upon the boy in a tackle. The two struggled on the ground for a moment before their tussle was intercepted by four elderly looking and surprisingly strong monks. Each boy was held by two and, though they struggled desperately to loose themselves and spring at the other, they couldn’t do so.
“What is this that you should defy the sacredness of the Sprout Tower?” A fifth monk spoke up. He appeared to be the elder of the rest and sat in a crisscross fashion at the front of the room. His eyes were closed shut and by his appearance one would not have guessed that the man had taken any notice of the turn of events in the slightest, and yet he addressed the boys.
“He stole from Professor Elm!” Gold roared, struggling all the more desperately, though still in vain to free himself, “He’s a thief!”
The red-haired boy said not a word in defense but rather emphasized his anger by attempting with seemingly renewed strength to escape from the monks’ grasps. The elder monk listened intently to Gold’s words and observed the second boy’s behavior but made no sign to acknowledge that he did so. Instead, he merely chuckled under his breath and said, “Here in the Sprout Tower, we solve disputes by the means of Pokemon battling. Therefore, let the ones in question bring out their finest Pokemon and we will see who will get their way!”
“Fine!” Gold exclaimed, full of confidence that he could handle this man’s challenge. His opponent nodded his cloaked head in similar agreement and the elder monk motioned the four that held the boys to release their grip.
“Cyndaquil, I want you to battle for me!” Gold exclaimed, beckoning the small mouse Pokemon that sat patiently at his side to take the field. Cyndaquil obeyed gleefully, charged and ready for a second battle at the hands of his new master.
“You will be sorry you ever accepted this challenge or my name isn’t Silver!” The red-haired boy sneered, pulling a pokeball from around his belt and releasing from it a small crocodile Pokemon; a Totodile. “Take the first move while you can, Totodile, and use Bubblebeam!”
Silver’s words were Totodile’s command and no sooner were the words out of Silver’s mouth was a stream of bubbles out of his. The attack hit Cyndaquil dead on and the mouse Pokemon was severely wounded. Regardless, however, it staggered weakly up and, even without its master’s command, launched a smokescreen attack that filled the tower.
The smoke was of an incredible thickness and far thicker than any Gold had ever seen. The room was immediately filled with the sounds of hacking and coughing as the monks evacuated the tower into the clear open air. Gold would have gladly followed, but it was impossible to see through the dense smoke and so he resolved to hold his breath and wait for it to clear. Fortunately it didn’t take long for the smoke to vanish, but as soon as it had, Gold was horrified to find the room completely vacant; Silver was nowhere to be seen.
As he scanned the room in case his opponent was hiding, his eyes landed on a neatly folded piece of paper that lay in the center of the room. It certainly had not been there before and so he unfolded it and read its contents aloud. “Dear Gold, I think that it’s pretty apparent that I would have won that battle and so I kindly spared you the embarrassment of having to lose to me. Tell Elm I said thanks for the Totodile and that I will put it to good use. Sincerely, Silver.”
