Pikachu, Where are You?

Hey, my name is Dudley, and I'm a close friend of Matt's. Matt is a fairly good writer and so when I found this elaborate and creepy little story on his computer I didn't pay much attention. I was over his one night when I decided to read it (I was bored while he was asleep) and it really scared me. This story is real. I remember him telling me about the destroyed Cinnibar, the dead pikachu and the funeral. I put it down to some crazy dream or trick he was trying to play on me. Now I know. After a lot of convincing and arguing, I managed to get him to put the story on here and creepypasta itself to get it known. Please, if anyone knows anything about this glitch/easter egg or anything about it at all, inbox us here. We would be really grateful.

Start

I've read a lot of pokemon creepypastas now, and they put me off pokemon, I was too afraid to fish my old Gameboy Colour out with it's bright yellow cartridge still stuck in the back. My favourite would probably be 'Easter Egg - Snow on Mt.Silver', it terrified me, the niggling thought that it could be real, and made me glad I grew up with Yellow.

Two weeks ago, I moved home into a bungalow, my dad was suffering badly with spinal problems and just couldn't climb the stairs any longer. I had a lot to do clearing out my old room an had to be strict with what I could keep, my Pokemon cards, Yu-Gi-Oh cards and my Warhammer would all have to be thrown or given away and most of my old consoles had to go, there just wasn't room. It was like this for a few days, clearing out, when I found my old primary school backpack, emptied of anything educational, it was now home to my old SNES and N64 games. Nestled in the bottom was my GameBoy colour, still with batteries (though the outer lid was lost) and the iconic Pokemon logo could just be seen sticking out the back on the now slighty mustard-yellow cartridge.

When I was a kid, I loved this game. I also owned Pokemon Blue but disliked the visuals and funny looking Pokemon, they always seemed sullen and scary in that blue-grey tinge, especially Haunter, and the dazed, smiling image of Pikachu was downright creepy. I had also heard about MISSINGNO. and a level 165 Wartortle glitch, so I generally steered clear.

Anyway, after the previous roughly four months of frequenting CreepyPasta, I couldn't bring myself to turn it on. I know i'm a wuss, but I just couldn't. All I could imagine was that the eyeless, soul-less grinning Pikachu from 'Snow on Mt.Silver' would leap into the title screen. I put the GameBoy back in the bag and, with a sigh, threw it in the charity pile.

I thought about the bag for a long time, I knew I didn't have space for the N64 or SNES, so I could live with throwing out the games, but what about the GameBoy? I could buy new games, and it's not like it takes up much space. Also, I remembered my original Mario games and how I used to love 'Pokemon Trading Card Game'. Without giving myself time to think about it, I quickly ran down the hall to grab it out of the bag, but it was gone. The bag had gone. Mom must have taken it already. I dropped onto my bed heavily and actually felt annoyed and upset. I thought about some kid deleting my game save because he was brave enough to turn it on. I had lost my childhood game through stupid fear and bloody CreepyPasta.

My mom came home quite late and talked about all the clothes and jewellery she had given away, I on the otherhand, still feeling let down and annoyed at myself, retreated to my room to play Super Mario 64 DS. My mom walking in about an hour later.

"Matt, I saw this in the bottom of that Loony Tunes bag, I remember how much you liked it so I guessed it was there by accident, here"

She held out my GameBoy colour, teal blue and chipped, I was over the moon. My mom left and I didn't give myself a chance to think, I turned it on.

The GameBoy buzzed into life and I couldn't help but grin widely with nostalgia as the logo flashed up on screen with that familiar electronic chirp. The copyrights and Game Freak logo flashed up before Pikachu started running, silhouetted, straight at me. All at once the images of the black, empty eyes and the manic grin came back and I gripped the GameBoy hard, my heart beating like some demonic hammer.
Nothing happened, Pikachu smiled pleasantly as he was lifted by balloons and showing off his rad surfing skills. I was freaking out irrationally over some silly kids toy, I felt like an idiot. 'There's nothing to be afraid of' I told myself, I've never in my life been more wrong.

The next few days were pure nostalgia as I played through it, head bent for it to catch the light (I had lost my snake-light). I had six months of nothing to do after my exams and this was like a new thing, being so long ago since my last play. I deleted my old save (celedon, after E4, 241 Seen, 68 Caught). I started the game quickly, beating Brock as soon as my Nidoran learned 'Double Kick' and Misty was no sweat with Pikachu. On my third day of playing, I had just gotten off the S.S.ANNE and was heading to Lavender Town when I noticed something, a weird clock or something appeared in the top-right corner, almost invisible. It was only two digits, and seemed to cycle randomly anywhere between 38 and 70 while I played. Eventually I learned to ignore it, and, knowing a little of emulation, assumed it was a Framerate counter I unlocked by using some special GameDev button sequence by accident.

Shortly afterwards, I noticed that whatever I had done was really wrecking the game, random NPC's would appear in caves and tall grass that could neither be interacted with nor would they challenge me to a fight. I don't know much about game programming, so I still assumed it was glitched when Team Rocket appeared, standing by the cave entrance on the Lavender Town side, where there is normally some random girl trainer. They too were uninteractive, except they would occasionally glance at each other, looking more and more like glitched sprites as they randomly flicked left or right respective of their positions. After I finally tore myself away from the strange feeling that this wasn't a glitch, everything returned to normal, and I walked through Lavender Town with, surprisingly, no issues. My dad then called me to go to have lunch, as I was exploring the short bit of bridge before Snorlax blocks the way. I saved, and because i had changed the batteries just after Misty, I didn't think too much of leaving the game on while I ate.

As I expected, I was gone fifteen, maybe twenty minutes before I picked up the GameBoy and carried on playing. I immediately noticed something was off. Pikachu wasn't behind me. I couldn't remember any poison status, and anyway, my character hadn't moved. I checked my party, he was nowhere to be found. What. The. Hell. I thought about the hundreds of Pokemon CreepyPastas I had read, but nothing came to mind that even nearly resembled this. Was the game hacked? Had Pikachu just glitched? Like the NPCs? It took every bit of courage and sheer curiosity to keep playing at this point. What do I do now? Is it ok to keep going or will the game just keep glitching until it breaks? I had to put the GameBoy down, I needed to think.

A couple of minutes later I decided to just man up and keep playing, what could happen? It. Is. A. Game. I kept playing, and no other problems came to light, but it all felt distictly different without Pikachu following my sprite with pixelated happiness. I made my way through the Pokemon tower with no issues and Team Rocket acted normal. I even made it all the way to SILPH.CO with not a single glitched NPC or anything else outwardly wrong. I fought my way through the SILPH.CO maze of floors and reached the top, ready for the battle against Gary, but he wasn't there. The small room had only the original table and the guy that normally gives you Lapras, but he was hiding in the corner, like the woman who gives you SELFDESTRUCT. I walked over a talked to him.

A text box popped up.

"Another kid tried to save us, but he lost"

I chill raked down my back and froze me in place, this was no glitch. It had it's own separate, in-context speech. On the top floor there was no Team Rocket, no Giovanni, no Chairman. The secretary stood at the bottom of the screen behind the PC, a text box.

"Th-they took him..."

I knew now it was some scary Easter-egg or an unfunny hack, but, I've had this game my entire life, this exact cartridge. What the... Was this part of the actual code?

I left, dazed, but noticed that all the Rockets had gone from Celedon. Maybe it was just a silly little trick played by some troll coder. Maybe it won't effect the entire game. I beat Sabrina and flew to Pallet Town, using Blastoise to head south to Cinnibar Island. The water was eerily empty, there were no swimmers, no fishermen on the small plateaus. Nothing. Because it was empty it felt like I was swimming for miles, I kept checking the map because I thought I must have missed it. Then suddenly it began to scroll up from the bottom of the screen. I almost dropped the GameBoy.

Every building looked like it had been burned to the ground or crushed in some Earthquake, the burned out building, the PokeCenter, the PokeMart, all just roofless, broken squares that looked similar to the Vermillion man's building site, but covered in rubble and their respective signs on the floor nearby. The Gym and the Lab in the bottom corner still had doors. I checked out the Lab and the inside was wrecked, looking like the DIG tm man's home, with the same holes in the walls and rubble everywhere, all the doors didn't work, a text box appeared saying:

"Something is blocking the door"

The last door opened normally, and the Lab inside looked relatively unscathed. Neither of the scientists would talk, but there was an option to give either of them your old amber or fossil. I realised now that this must have been meant to be seen and played, because none of the game's core mechanics were effected, this unsetteled me even more, clearly some sick coder had hidden this here for a twisted pleasure. I left and tried to speak with the battered looking citizens outside, two identical text boxes popped up.

"..."

One woman, standing in the rubble of the PokeMart, would talk.

"Team Rocket... My god... They-"

She would say no more. After that she would say nothing like the others.
I wanted to turn the game off, to forget what I was seeing, but I couldn't do that either, my hands, fixed, my mind, curious and paralyzed simultaneously. I headed to the Gym, thinking about how it couldn't get any worse at least. For the second time that day, I was an utter fool.

The door was unlocked, the burned out building now, ironically, burned down and unable to be entered. The room was pitch black. Thank god. I thought that the game had finally glitched itself to hell, that this stupid sequence was over, but the music kept playing, it sounded like the creepy melodic cave music, but higher pitched, and distorted. Each note sounded like a pokemon, that distorted cry they all make in the original games. I waited, and walked around a little, thinking I must have missed a ladder or door or something that would let me out. Then it hit me, FLASH. I quickly taught it to Butterfree and used it.

There is no way to unsee something, or forget what has been shown, despite how it drained the blood from my entire body and left me feeling cold in my very bones. The room was smaller than the original, and lacked the walls or doors or quiz. Every one of Blaine's henchmen were pinned to one side, facing the screen with closed eyes. Pokemon stood over them like sentinels with Rocket Grunts to the left. As I watched, bewildered, several of the Pokemon twitched in the direction of the henchmen one by one, the sprite of the attacked would then vanish. Pokemon attacking people? The scene in front of me was like some binary opposite of the pokemon I knew. The henchmen continued to be killed until I couldn't watch any longer, I dared to step forward and noticed Team Rocket standing by Blaine towards the back, a pokemon standing next to him, facing him, making a perfect square of the group. I took another step closer, a text box appeared.

"ROCKET: We want your Gym, Blaine, this island is easily defensible, and is the best location to make attacks all over Kanto from."
"BLAINE: No... I have been here all my life. Decades. I will not let you turn Kanto into a desolate wasteland like this island."
"ROCKET: Fool! You will not stand in our way! Nidoking, BODY SLAM!"

The battle music screeched from my GameBoy and the dinosaur sprite near Blaine twitched forwards. Blaine's sprite was knocked to the right around two paces before the screen flashed and a fight started between me and Team Rocket. The only difference from the last battle was that now they had a level 60 Nidoking. After I had beaten them a text box flashed up.

"The boss has a big surprise for you. Hahaha"

Surely they didn't mean my missing Pikachu? It's no secret that Giovanni wanted him in the Cartoons, but
I have never seen any mention of it in the games. It just didn't make any sense. Team Rocket disappeared, along with every other Rocket and Pokemon in the room. It was just me and Blaine. I approached him and hit A. A text box appeared.

"Matthew got VOLCANOBADGE!"

Matthew being my characters name, this didn't freak me out too much. I still clung on to the idea that this was some twisted sequence imagined up by a bored and fairly nasty coder and so this text was no surprise. No matter what happened, the story kept going, I knew this wasn't a glitch, no way in hell.
Blaine's sprite then disappeared like the others, I was no longer afraid, no longer wanting to put down the GameBoy. This was messed up, sure, but I wanted answers, I wanted to finish whatever this was.

I flew straight to Veridian City and cycled to the door, I wanted this over with, but I stopped. The last Gym I entered was altered beyond imagination and terrifying, what would I see in here? Could it be worse? I pushed forward on the D-pad.

Again the room was much smaller than I remember, empty except for myself and Giovanni, not even the Nidoking Statues and the helper dude were there. There were faint lines in the wall opposite, like the invisible walls in the Fuchsia City Gym. The music playing was the same distorted cave ambiance from Blaine's Gym. After confronting him, he said merely two words.

"Follow me"

The faint lines opened into a doorway and my character automatically followed Giovanni through. On the other side was a big room, almost identical to Prof.Oak's Lab, it was empty of people, and in the middle, connected to lots of machines covering the walls, sat a transparent ball. At first it looked empty, but there was a flash of yellow, Pikachu! My character walked over to the sphere and interacted with it. A square appeared on screen, but instead of his smiling little face showing his opinion of you, it showed a black-eyed, weary and sad Pikachu. The pop-up disappeared and the battle music played, a text box.

"Pikachu used THUNDERBOLT!"

He was trying to escape. Giovanni laughed. The screen flashed like several leers. The flickering stopped and Giovanni had an item ball in front of him.

"Giovanni got MASTER BALL!"

"One hundred and fifty one Master Balls, think of it Matt, I will own one of every Pokemon in this entire region. There is nothing they can do against one of these. Quite brilliant, the Chairman was most... forthcoming about how to make them, and I already had a Pokemon capable of powering a small city alone... it all went perfectly.
Well done Pikachu..."

The battle music screeched through my Gameboy yet again.

"Pikachu used STRUGGLE!"

A close up of Pikachu's beaten, bruised face appeared again, and I watched in horror as his pixelated eyes began to water, before they gradually closed. A text box, I knew already what it said and felt like bursting into tears as I dared to read it.

"Pikachu has died."

I felt my stomach flip, my mind whirred out of control. What the hell is this? Why would someone do this? I felt like screaming. Giovanni left via a backdoor. Another text box.

"That's it. It's over... You have nothing now, no way you can ever defeat me. Your Pokemon will lose faith in you, and so will everyone else. All those who trusted you have been let down. Run on home Matthew..."

The screen went black.

I was back at home, my room was exactly the same. I went downstairs to find Mom and Prof.Oak sitting at the table. I spoke to Mom.

"MOM: It's ok... You're home. You did the best you could... I'm sorry about your Pokemon dear."
"Matthew:..."
"MOM: You should go get some rest."

I talked to Prof.Oak.

"PROF.OAK:I gave you my last Pokemon, I believed you would go to the top. You were careless, and now the last Pokemon I ever owned is dead."
"Matthew:..."
"PROF.OAK: Your silence says everything... Leave me alone."

I sat stunned as the screen faded black, when it returned, he was gone. Mom stood up and walked over to me.

"MOM: Prof.Oak is very upset, his grandson, Gary, you were friends right? He died in Team Rocket's attack on Cinnibar, he tried to stop them..."

I walked out the house, I didn't want to play anymore, I felt sick. I still had 5 Pokemon, and it felt like I had been punched in the gut when I remembered why the sixth slot was empty. I still had money, and I had the badges. I wanted to end this, so I tried to fly to Veridian City.

"Pidgeot doesn't want to FLY."

I tried surfing back to Cinnibar, my mind wasn't thinking straight, I guessed there might be some quest do with Gary or his body that would let me carry on.

"Blastoise doesn't want to SURF."

I tried walking north, through the tall grass, but the familiar sight of the exclamation mark appeared, this time it was mom.

"Please don't go out there, it's a horrible cruel place. Your Pokemon want to stay in this safe place, why don't you? Please, stay here, with me. Be safe."

I even tried going to see Prof.Oak, I tried the door.

"Prof.Oak has locked the door"

I sat in stunned silence staring at the screen. Is this how this ends? This screwed up code or Easter-egg or whatever the hell this vile scenario was? Do I just wander though Pallet Town, held back by my apparent mistake?

I decided to head back to my room, the only place I hadn't yet checked. it seemed normal, confining. The TV flickered into life and my character automatically stopped in front of it an stared.

"TV PRESENTER: Team Rocket have beaten the Elite Four. No-one is left, no-one strong enough to stop them. God help us..."

The screen darkened and still under the game's control, Matthew walked to the bed and got in. A text box.

"...Pikachu..."

The screen went black. The music stopped. I tried pressing the D-pad, A, B, Start, Select, nothing worked. The menu didn't appear, so I didn't need FLASH. This was it, the end.

After a few minutes waiting to be sure, I turned the GameBoy off and sat stunned, just staring at the wall for hours, thinking about everything I had just seen. i felt emotionally drained and my eyes felt heavy. I picked up the GameBoy with the demented Game and threw them in the outside trash. Everything went back to normal and I tried to forget. I couldn't, of course, so I tried to rationalize, was it a political message from a coder? Or some joke? Or a dark easter-egg? How had I triggered it? Why had it not happened before? (although I was supremely grateful it hadn't) All these thoughts flew around my head all night before i finally drifted off to sleep. I awoke from a bad dream involving Mr.Mime and an invisible cage holding me prisoner. It seeped into nothing as I stared at the ceiling. I had to get rid of this fear. I sat up and nearly had a heart attack, the GameBoy, teal blue and chipped, sat near my feet. I tried to slow my breathing to one a second and tried to think. I opened my door and quickly called down the hall, trying to mask the fear in my voice.

"Mom? Dad? Did either of you put my GameBoy on my bed this morning?"

My dad replied.

"yeah, I saw it in the bin and thought you dropped it or something, you've had you head in it for days so I knew it shouldn't be there."

I relaxed a bit and stared at it. The longer I sat the more my curiosity grew. I hadn't saved it at all since I was on the bridge, Pikachu would still be there. Maybe I could load the game, and see what happens to Pikachu. I could know once and for all what the hell was going on.

I spun the dial for sound all the way down and turned it on, hammering start through the title screen. Just because I wanted to know what happened didn't mean I wanted to play it in the slightest.

The screen faded into view and I saw my character, flanked by Pikachu. I knew I shouldn't have turned it back on. I was no longer on the dock, I was in the middle of a vast church-like building with the first row of people on either side visible. Along the front was me, my mom and prof.Oak, there were several Gym leaders, around four, and some other random NPC's that I didn't recognize. At the front there was an alter, and a coffin. I shivered, a long spine-tingling shiver that wracked my entire body. I decided to look at my Pikachu's stats and opened up the party. All my other Pokemon were there, but immediately I was punched in the stomach again.

Why________Lvl.58
Did_________Lvl.60
You_________Lvl.44
Leave_______Lvl.54
Pikachu_____Lvl.62
To Die_______Lvl.53

I closed the menu and my finger reached for the off switch when something caught my eye. Tiny flecks of brown littered the very bottom pixels of the screen. I walked downwards and gasped. There were hundreds of Pikachu, sitting in neat rows on the pews. It hit me hard and knocked me down. This...This was Pikachu's funeral. I was like a ghost, a memory, walking around while the real Matthew sat in the front pew and Pikachu lay dead in the coffin.

This effected me worse than anything that had came before. I twisted the GameBoy in my hand and smashed it hard against the floor, I went outside and threw it against the paving slabs again and again, and again until it was in pieces. I picked up the yellow cartridge with the pleasantly smiling Pikachu and snapped it in half. It took me an hour to pick up all the pieces and dump them in the bin. I promised that day to never play Pokemon again.

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