Rose’s Gyarados arrived in the arena with a giant tidal wave, which rocked the iceberg that Aoife was sitting on and almost made her fall into the water.  It was gigantic, almost bigger than any Pokemon Aoife had ever seen (except for Onix, of course).  Aoife compared it to “the Loch Ness Monster on steroids.” 
 “What Pokemon does Aoife have that can beat a Gyarados?” Petra wondered.  “Maybe Chu-Chu, with a successful Thundershock.  Maybe Bellsprout.  Oh, I don’t know.  It’s not really fair to use a Gyarados at Cascade Level, but…it’s Rose’s gym, she can do what she wants, I suppose.”
 “How can I beat this monster?” Aoife shouted in frustration, clinging to the iceberg for dear life.  “I’ll try the same strategy I used on Staryu and we’ll see what happens.  Chu-Chu, stick your tail in the water and zap him!”
 “Pika!” Chu-Chu obliged, dipping only a tiny tip of its tail in, but just enough to make a sufficient circuit for the electric current to go through.  Unfortunately, this tiny bit was also just enough for Gyarados to grab on to, and it took Chu-Chu by the tail and hurled the electric mouse into the wall.  “Chaaa!”  Chu-Chu slid down the wall, badly hurt.
 “Chu-Chu!” Aoife cried.  “Chu-Chu!  That wasn’t fair!”
 “It was too,” Rose sniffed.  “It’s called Seismic Toss.”
 “She’s right, Aoife,” Petra said.  “My Pokemon know it too.  It’s fair.”
 “Darn,” Aoife muttered.  “Let’s see what Bellsprout can do.”  She threw out the Pokeball containing her plant Pokemon, praying that it would be enough to at least weaken the Gyarados.  “Try Poison Powder, Bellsprout!”
 “Bellsprout bell!”  The weed-like Pokemon said, but upon seeing the Gyarados, it hid behind an iceberg, squeaking, “Beeeeeeell!”
 “Be brave, Bellsprout!” Aoife tried to encourage it.  “Go on, try an Absorb.”
 “Bell…” Bellsprout ventured from behind its iceberg, still unsure of itself, but it performed the attack anyway.  As Bellsprout and Gyarados glowed green with an energy draining link between them, Gyarados lost a significant amount of HP.
 Not enough, though.  “Tackle, Gyarados!” Rose commanded.  Gyarados charged at Bellsprout, who instinctively cartwheeled out of the way, just in time.  Gyarados hit the iceberg, unhurt, but leaving a bite mark in the ice.  Bellsprout, by this time, had jumped onto another iceberg.
 “Try again, Gyarados!” Rose yelled.
 “Keep dodging it, Bellsprout!” Aoife instructed.  “There’s something I have to do.”  While Bellsprout was still fighting, she attempted a leap from the iceberg to the side of the pool, and just barely made it.  But as she landed, she slipped and fell.  “Oww…” Aoife muttered.  Still on the ground, she called for Chu-Chu.  “Chu-Chu!  Come here, I have some healing potion to give you.”
 “Pi…pika?” Chu-Chu crept over, as best as it could in its beaten-up condition.  While Gyarados had almost beaten Chu-Chu, it wasn’t out of the match yet.  It still had a few hit points, which Aoife knew and took advantage of.
 “Here,” Aoife said, sitting up and fishing a potion out of her pocket.  “Take this potion and you’ll feel a bit better in a minute.  So if Gyarados beats Bellsprout, you can go in.  Okay?”
 “Pi,” Chu-Chu agreed, drinking the flask of potion.  It already seemed a little better as it leapt across to the iceberg, Aoife following it.
 Meanwhile… “Bellsprout…BEEEELL!”  Bellsprout was avoiding Gyarados as best as it could, and attacking whenever possible with a Vine Whip or Absorb, but Gyarados refused to be beaten. 
 “Don’t give up, Bellsprout!” Aoife said.
 “Gyarados, enough of this, like, playing around,” Rose said.  “Just do Hyper Beam and finish it off.”
 With a frightening roar, Gyarados recoiled like a snake about to strike.  It opened its mouth, and Aoife could see the energy particles gathering inside.  The energy formed into one colossal beam, which was a bit overkill as Bellsprout was already almost beaten.  But needless to say, the beam did indeed finish Bellsprout off, and after the beam was fired it ended up in a heap under the side wall.
 “Bellsprout, return!”  Aoife returned her Bellsprout; there was nothing else she could do with it.  “Okay, Chu-Chu, it’s up to you now.”
 “Pika,” Chu-Chu said, trying to prepare itself for its fight with this terrifying enemy.
 “I have an idea,” Aoife told Chu-Chu.  “Get on the side of the pool, and go behind that iceberg over there so Gyarados will have to go through it to get to you.”  Aoife pointed to an iceberg near the side of the pool, where Chu-Chu could hide behind and avoid Gyarados for some time.  “First do Double Team.  Gyarados won’t know where you are.  Then you’ll be behind the iceberg, and stick your tail in the water again and give it all you’ve got.  Okay?”
 “Pika, pikachu,” Chu-Chu nodded, then leapt back over to the side of the pool.  “Piiiika!”  As it ran around the side of the pool, it used Double Team, making it appear as though tens of Pikachu were running around the pool.  Gyarados, confused, started attacking all of them.  Luckily, while Gyarados was busy, the real Chu-Chu managed to slip into the water where Gyarados couldn’t see it, and crying “CHAAAAAUUUUU!” it did its best thunder attack.
 “Gyarados!” Rose cried, seeing her best Pokemon fainting from the electricity.  “Return, Gyarados,” she said, calling Gyarados back into its Pokeball and facing defeat.  “Okay, Aoife, you win,” she admitted.
 “Really?”  Aoife’s eyes widened.  “I won?”
 “Yeah,” Rose said.  “I’ll only use one more Pokemon.”  She pulled out one last Pokeball and got ready to throw it.
 “Wait a minute!” Petra protested.  “You said you’d only use four Pokemon!”
 Rose smiled winningly at Petra, causing her to melt down into her chair again.  “Wait and see.  I choose you, Golduck!”  She threw the red and white ball, which bounced off of an iceberg and opened, leaving behind a blue duck-like Pokemon on the berg.
 “But you did say that you’d only use four,” Aoife argued.  “This isn’t fair.  I thought you were supposed to let me know if you were going to use more.”
 “Again, like, wait and see,” Rose said.  “I’m not going to use it to battle.  Golduck, give her the badge.
 “Gol-duck!” Golduck quacked, diving into the water.  It swam to Aoife’s iceberg and popped its head out of the water, then held up its hand and opened it.  The Golduck was holding a Cascade Badge, just like the one on Rose’s shirt.  “Duck,” it said, offering Aoife the badge.
 “Oh, cool!” Aoife grinned, taking the badge from Golduck.  “I want to teach my Pokemon to do things like that.” 
 “You will eventually,” Aoife’s Aunt Lily said, coming up to the side of the pool behind Aoife.  “I can tell you’re going to go on to do great things, Aoife.”
 “Thank you, Aunt Lily,” Aoife said.  “And thank you for the match, Rose.  It was really…what’s the word…”
 “Energizing?” Petra suggested, stepping down from the bleachers.
 “Yeah, I guess so!” Aoife said.  She held up her Cascade Badge.  “I’ve got to get something to put my badges on.  I might lose them if I just keep them on my shirt.”
 “Well, like, you did a good job, Aoife,” Rose said.  “Congratulations on the badge.”
 “As much as I would like to stay,” Petra said to Rose, making sure to remember what she looked like in case she didn’t see her for a while, “we should go.  Aoife’s Pokemon need to be healed, and we’re going to go visit Bill.”
 “Who’s Bill?” Aoife asked.
 “You’ll see when we meet him,” Petra said.  “He lives north of here, on the way to Azure City, where we can earn another badge.”
 “Cool,” Aoife said.  “Anything for another badge.  Well, goodbye, guys.  I might pass by this way again sometime, so until then!”
 “See ya,” Rose waved, as Aoife and Petra headed off to their next destination.

(Who's that Pokemon?  It's Pele!)

 “Come on, Petra, tell me,” Aoife pleaded, as the two of them and Chu-Chu walked to Bill’s lighthouse.  “Who’s Bill?  And why is it so important that we meet him?”
 “Have you ever read the Poke-Gazette?” Petra asked.
 “Parts of it,” Aoife said.  “Mom and Dad get it.  But that still doesn’t answer my question.”
 “Hold on, hold on,” Petra said.  “I’m getting to it.  See, Bill writes for the Poke-Gazette.  He’s a researcher…you got Chu-Chu from Professor Oak, right?  So you know Professor Oak?”
 “Yeah, of course,” Aoife answered.
 “Well, Bill is like Professor Oak,” Petra explained.  “They both research Pokemon and study them to see how they grow, behave, and stuff like that.”
 “So what does this have to do with the Poke-Gazette?” Aoife asked.
 “Bill writes for the Poke-Gazette, like I said,” Petra continued.  “Sometimes he writes articles on his findings, but in every issue he has an advice column.  He tells trainers what moves to teach their Pokemon, when to evolve them, and stuff like that.”
 “Cool,” Aoife said.  “If I had known that I would have read the Poke-Gazette more often when Mom and Dad got it.”
 Then, Aoife saw a lighthouse on the horizon.  “Is that Bill’s house?  You said he lives in a lighthouse, so…”
 “Probably,” Petra said.  But she saw something that Aoife didn’t see.  “Hey, what’s that glowing thing flying around it?”
 “Glowing thing?  Are you sure that’s not just the light from the lighthouse?” Aoife asked, but then she saw it too.  It was like a lantern was flying around Bill’s house.  “What is that thing?”
 Petra shrugged.  “Probably nothing much.  Maybe Bill is studying electric Pokemon, and all that electricity is causing St. Elmo’s Fire.  Or maybe that is an electric Pokemon.”
 “Oh,” Aoife said.  They continued walking up towards Bill’s house, but by the time they got close enough to see what the light was, it was gone.  “That’s strange.”
 “Ring the doorbell,” Petra suggested.  “Maybe Bill will let us stay here for the night.  It’s 6:45, so it’ll be dark soon.  The sun’s already setting.”
 Aoife rang the bell, and a muffled voice from the speakers said, “Hello?”
 “Hello, Bill?” Aoife spoke into the speakers.  “Uh, Petra, maybe you should handle this.”
 “Who is this?” Bill asked.
 “Hi, Bill,” Petra said to the speakers.  “I’m Petra Stone, from the Pewter City Gym…I believe we met a while back.  I brought my friend Aoife Ketchum here to see your laboratory…oh, and would it be possible for us to stay here overnight?  We have no place else to go.”
 “Of course,” Bill replied.  “Come in, it’s unlocked.”
 Aoife pushed on the door.  “Are you sure?  ‘Cause the door’s not moving here…”
 “Lemme try,” Petra said.  She leaned into the door, putting all her weight behind it and it budged enough for them to get in.
 Inside, it was mostly dark in the long hallway except for a few lights on the walls.  There were no windows in this room of the house, just a red carpet running down the center with stairs at the end of the hall with pictures of all the known Pokemon.
 “Myuuuuu…” a voice piped up from the end of the hall.  Aoife and Petra looked down the hall to see one of the rarest Pokemon in existence, Pokemon #151, Mew.  The pink cat-like creature was floating around the stairs.
 Aoife’s eyes lit up, and she was so excited she nearly spilled the contents of her backpack looking for an empty Pokeball to catch it with.  “Oh WOOOOOOOOW!  It’s a Mew!  I can’t miss this chance!  There must only be 75 of these in the whole world!”  She almost tripped over herself scrambling up the stairs, and when she got to the top, she impulsively hurled her Pokeball at it.  “I gotcha, Mew!”
 “Ouch!” the Mew cried as the Pokeball hit its head.  “That hurt!  Stop it!  I’m not a Pokemon!”
 “Listen to the Mew, Aoife,” Petra advised, climbing up the stairs behind her.  “Look.”  She pointed to the Mew, and Aoife saw that there were ropes and a harness suspending the Mew above the ground.
 “Yeah…” Aoife said, still not totally convinced.  “But it’s still a Mew!  It’s just in a harness.  Maybe it just doesn’t know how to fly.”
 “I’m a human,” the Mew said.  “I’m Bill!  I’m just dressed in a Mew costume, and I’ve hoisted myself up here so I can see how a Mew feels when it flies.  And now I can’t get down!  HEEEEELP!”
 “Don’t worry, uh, Mr. Bill, sir!” Aoife said.  “Tell us how to get you down.”
 “Go into my lab,” Bill instructed.  “You’ll find a panel marked ‘harness controls’.  Move the controller stick down.”
 “Got it,” Aoife said.  She ran up the spiral staircase, then stopped abruptly as she realized something.  “Uh, Bill?  Where’s your lab?”
 “You’re heading in the right direction,” Bill said.  “It’s almost at the top of the stairs, just underneath the very top room where the light is.  Er…do you have a flying Pokemon?”
 “Yeah, why?” Aoife reached for Spearow’s Pokeball.
 “It’s 11 stories,” Bill said.  “You may need one.”
 “Pii,” Chu-Chu said, as she and the two humans sweatdropped.
 “Okay,” Aoife said.  “Spearow, go!  Fly us to the top!”
 Aoife, Chu-Chu, and Petra climbed onto Spearow and flew up the stairwell to the 10th floor, to Bill’s laboratory.  “This must be it,” Petra said.  “I can see the light above us.”
 They opened the door and stepped into a room filled with beakers, test tubes, computers, all kinds of scientific equipment, and a wall covered in shelves full of Pokeballs.  “He must have every type of Pokemon there is,” Aoife said in awe, gaping at the room.
 “Let’s let him down,” Petra said, hunting around the room for the controls.  “I think this is it…yeah, it says ‘harness controls’.”
 “Pika!” Chu-Chu said, jumping on to the control pad.  She started to slip off, and to prevent herself from falling off the panel she grabbed the joystick.  Bad move, as Chu-Chu’s weight brought the joystick down, causing Bill in the harness to hurtle towards the floor rapidly.  They heard a shocked yell coming from below, then a thud.
 “Oh no!  Bill!”  Petra hurried outside to where Spearow was waiting and jumped on whilst Aoife was still admiring all the fancy machinery.  “Bill, are you okay?” Petra asked, as she and Spearow landed on the ground floor.
 “Obviously not,” Bill grumbled.  “Help me get out of this costume, please?”
 “Sure,” Petra agreed, going over and undoing Bill’s harness.  Bill took off his Mew mask, then unzipped the rest of the costume.
 “Hello, Petra,” Bill was able to greet her properly for the first time since she arrived.  “Last time I saw you, you were just starting out.  How are you now?”
 “Great, Bill,” Petra answered.  “I’m helping Aoife on her Pokemon journey to get her badges and…oh, where’s Aoife?  Aoife!” she called up the stairs for Aoife.
 “Gee, thanks for taking Spearow,” Aoife called back.  She had started climbing back down the stairs and was now on the 6th floor.
 “Sorry,” Petra said.  “It was an emergency.”
 “My foot,” Aoife grumbled.
 “Did you say your friend’s last name was Ketchum?” Bill asked.
 “Yeah,” Petra said.  “And yes, she is related to Ash Ketchum, former Pokemon Master.  She’s his daughter.”
 “Oh, right,” Bill nodded.  “I remember when he, your father, and a girl who I presume to be Aoife’s mother, they all came by here.  We saw that mysterious giant Pokemon…which I am now able to surely say is a Dragonite.”
 “Speaking of mysterious Pokemon,” Petra said, “Bill, have you been working with electric Pokemon, or perhaps fire Pokemon recently?”
 “No, lately I’ve been studying ice type,” Bill replied.  “Why?”
 “Well, on the way in here, we saw a glowing…well, we’re not sure what it was.  Something glowing, anyhow.  It was flying around your lighthouse.  We thought it might be a Pokemon, or perhaps St. Elmo’s Fire from an electric Pokemon.”
 “Hmm,” Bill pondered this.  “I’ve no idea what it could be, Petra.  I haven’t worked with either type you mentioned in days.”
 “Oh,” Petra replied.  “Must have been a wild Pokemon, then.”
 “I don’t know of any Pokemon that you could find wild around here that would look like what you described,” Bill said.
 “That’s strange,” Petra said.
 Just then, Aoife arrived.  “Sorry about that, Bill,” she said.  “Chu-Chu accidentally pulled the joystick down really fast.”
 “That’s okay,” Bill said.  “No permanent damages, anyway.  Want to see my rare Pokemon room, Aoife?” he offered.
 “Would I!” Aoife perked up.  “Of course!”  Then, she hesitated.  “It’s not on the eightieth floor or whatever, is it?”
 “No, not at all,” Bill laughed.  “Just the third floor.  Follow me.”
 The three followed Bill up three flights of stairs to a door with a picture of the legendary birds on it.  “It’s in here,” Bill said, opening the door to reveal more shelves full of Pokeballs, even more than in the laboratory.  “I have Clefable, Arcanine, Dragonite…lots of Pokemon.”
 “Cool,” Aoife gasped.  “And they’re all arranged by type, aren’t they?” she asked, pointing to a red-painted shelf with a fire symbol on it, and a yellow shelf with a lightning bolt. 
 “That’s right,” Bill said.  “And I’ve got something to show you.”  He went over to the fire shelf and took out two Pokeballs.  “Pokeballs, go!”  He threw them, and they bounced on the ground.  Two almost identical Pokemon came out of the Pokeballs, both small fire-types.  They looked like red and orange ducks, with black metal collars around their necks and bubbles on their heads.
 “What are they?” Aoife asked.  “I’ve never seen them before.”
 "MAgby,” her Pokedex said.  “A spitfire Pokemon.  The pre-evolution of Magmar.  Evolves into Magmar with the fire stone.”
 “I have a male and a female Magmar,” Bill explained.  “Recently they had twins, as you can see.”  He gestured to the two Magby, then went on.  “I’m going to do a study of twin Pokemon, and I was looking for a trainer to give one of the Magby to.”
 “Ohh,” Aoife said, catching on.  “So you want Petra to have one of the Magby?”
 “Don’t be silly, Aoife,” Petra said.  “He wants to give it to you.”
 “No way,” Aoife said.  “You can’t be serious.”  She looked at Bill’s face…not smiling.  “You’re serious?  Oh, cool!  My first fire Pokemon!”  She went to hug one of the Magby, but when she touched it, the Pokemon’s high body temperature burned her.  “Owie.”
 Bill laughed.  “You’d make a great trainer for it, and since you don’t have a fire Pokemon already, this is a perfect arrangement.  All I request is that you send your MAgby back to me once a month so that I can compare it to its twin and take some notes.  That would be okay, wouldn’t it?”
 “Of course,” Aoife agreed.  “Chu-Chu, say hi to our new friend.  I think I'll name it...Pele.”
 “Pika pika,” Chu-Chu said, extending its paw.
 “No, don’t shake!”  Bill tried to stop Chu-Chu, but too late. 
Chu-Chu took Pele’s hand, then quickly pulled away as a tiny curl of smoke rose from its paw.  “PIIIIIIKA!  Pika pikachu…” it whimpered, licking its burnt paw.
“Magby, mag,” Pele apologized.
“Pika,” Chu-Chu accepted the apology.  “Pikachu, pi cha!”
“Yes, you and Pele are going to be great friends,” Aoife said to Chu-Chu.  “That’s what it said.”
“You can understand your Pikachu?” Bill gasped.  “Really?  Can I do a few tests tomorrow morning?”
“Sure,” Aoife said.  “Then we have to go to…what’s the name of the city, Petra?”
 “Azure City,” Petra said.  “They train…well, I better not tell you what type of Pokemon they train, if that’s okay.  It’d be like betraying the gym leader’s trust.  You understand, right?”
 “Yeah, that’s cool,” Aoife nodded.  “So Bill, where’s our room?”
 “Fifth floor,” Bill said.  “Mine is on the sixth if you need anything, and breakfast will be served on the second floor tomorrow.”
 “Okay,” Aoife said.  “Come on, Pele.  You can stay with us tonight, and be our heater!”
 "Mag,” it agreed, following Aoife, Petra, and Chu-Chu up the stairs.
 “Goodnight, Bill!” Petra called back down the stairs.
 “Goodnight,” Bill replied, watching them go up the stairs.  He could still see Pele even after the others had disappeared into the darkness, casting its own glow.
 

Author's Notes
Hehe, Bill.  I like Bill.  He's cool.  He kinda sucks in the anime because they gave him such a stupid voice, but he's still cool in the manga.  Anyway...wanna know what the glowing flying thing was?  Well, too bad. :p You'll find out at the end.  I know, that's a long way away, but it'll happen eventually.  Really, it will!  Stop laughing. ^^;;;;  Also, Magby is a G/S Pokemon, and its Japanese name is Buubii (Pele is just the name Aoife gives it).  I'm not sure if it evolves with the fire stone or not, but for the sake of the plot let's say it does, kay?  Okay.  And here's a piccie:
Innit cute?  I think it is.  And I also think this chapter has been long enough so I'll shut up now.

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