Ash Ketchum:
Superman Chapter 7
Note: Superman
and all related characters and material are trademark and copyright of DC
Comics.
Pokémon and
all related characters and material are trademark and copyright of Game Freak,
Nintendo and Pokémon
--
“Wow,” said
Ash. Pikachu mirrored his statement with the equivalent in his language.
“I’m not sure
if I’ve seen a skyline like this,” said Misty. “I’ve seen pictures of
“I know. And
this is where Brock’s meeting us,” he said. It was not a question.
“Yeah; he told
us to meet him at the
“So shall we
go,” said Ash. “I’ll race ya!” At that, he took off running towards the city,
but keeping his speed under check so Misty wouldn’t either suspect or fall too
far behind.
“Hey, no fair,
you got a head start!”
--
Because of the
size of
“So where is
Brock meeting us, again?” A curious Ash queried.
“He said he’ll
meet us at the
“Did you just
not ask him or did you forget?” He asked.
Misty put her
finger to her chin and looked up at the ceiling in an inquisitive manner, than
she said in a gleeful tone, “I forgot!” Ash simply dropped his head in
embarrassment, as did Pikachu.
“Why did I
ask?” He said to himself in a rare moment of genius—for his character, anyway.
Superman is a different story.
“Well, we’ll
find out when we see him, I guess,” Misty said in her normal way. “The
“Okay, then,”
said Ash.
As the train
pulled into the city, the two marveled at the high-rises that made up the
city’s skyline and the twisted metal jungle. The latter overwhelmed them the
most.
“Wow,” said
Ash. “I wonder how many Gyms are here.” Now it was Misty’s turn to be
exasperated, having annoyed Ash just minutes earlier.
“Is that all
you can think about,” she said to him in a very annoyed manner. “Is obtaining
badges all you ever think about?” She asked.
“Of course
not,” He replied. “Bein’ a Pokémon Master is another thing I think about!”
Misty sighed in exasperation at Ash’s (fake) stupidity.
“I give up!”
--
“Hey guys,
over here!” In the crowded
“Hey Brock,”
said Ash as he and Misty ran to greet him. “How ya been?”
“I’ve been
good,” he replied. “I just had to check on the Gym to see if it was being run
well.”
“Well,” asked
Misty. “Is it?”
“Well, to my
dismay, I never got to get to the Gym,” he said. “I had to deal with some
issues in the city. They’ve been having some problems with Team Rocket
recently.” Ash and Misty looked at each other with dread on their faces, enough
that Brock got worried and asked, “So, what happened to you two?”
“Well,” said
Misty, trying to explain. “The first day you left, we were attacked by Jesse
and James,” she began. “They tried to take Pikachu first, but then they told us
that their boss wants to kill Superman.” The look on Brock’s face was a
combination of horror and worry, but a voice in his head was telling him that since
he was talking to them, they obviously survived.
“So what
happened?”
“We sent ‘em
flying,” Ash said in a nonchalant manner that made him sound sociopathic, in a
sense. But the message got through, there’s no doubt of Pikachu’s ability to
send someone into the stratosphere faster than a Saturn V rocket. “But that’s
not the worst of it, though.”
“Two days ago,
these two Rocket agents named Bonnie and
“Well what
happened next?”
“Superman
showed up and flung them past the horizon, but not after a few setbacks.” Brock
listened to this with a concerned look on his face, telling Ash that there
seemed to be something going on here with Team Rocket. In fact, that’s exactly
what Brock was thinking, too.
“Do you think
there’s a connection?” He asked, much to the surprise of Ash and Misty.
“Might be,”
replied Ash. “I mean, you had problems, and so did we. There’s gotta be
something going on here with Team Rocket. I mean, we had to deal with them
twice and—what kinds of problems did you have with them, by the way?” Misty
looked at Ash in a surprised manner, since he was acting too damn smart for his
idiot character, but Brock didn’t seem to care, since the gravity of the
situation was far more important than an idiot actually being smart for once.
“Right now I
can’t think of anything,” he said. The statement disappointed the both of them
until they remembered something.
“Hey Brock,
you said you were going to take us somewhere,” said Misty. “Where are you
planning on going?”
“Oh yeah, I
was going to take you to the Star City Natural and Human History museum!” He
said, with a much more positive tone of voice that earlier. “They have a great
exhibit on Pokémon and dinosaur bones as well as a great rock collection I want
to see.”
“Rocks? Oh, I don’t want to see rocks!” Ash said with a whine.
“Oh, shut up!”
--
Like many
museums—or at least the Field Museum of Natural History and the
Anyway, the
interior of the museum left the three travelers in awe as soon as the stepped
in through the doors. The main hall contained several life-size models of
legendary Pokémon: Articuno, Moltres, Zapdos, Mew, Entei, Raikou and Suicune in
various poses, the birds hung from the ceiling and the land Pokémon were facing
each other down. And that was just a preview of things to come. The group paid
their admission fee thanks to Brock. But the mood was ruined when Misty saw a
newspaper and started to cry. Ash, who was deeply worried about her, said,
“Misty… are
you okay?” Misty nodded and said, to his surprise,
“Yeah, it’s
just that that issue has the interview with Superman that I never got to do!”
Ash retracted his hand in exasperation
“Misty, you’re
making a big deal over nothing!” He said to her.
Instead of
listening to him (he was right), she grabbed him by the collar and hollered at
his face, “I wanted to interview Superman! Instead, he sends a letter to every
newspaper in the area and ruins my chan…” Misty stopped her little rant when
she noticed that the people around her were looking at her with a “what the
hell is going on here” look on their faces. Utterly embarrassed, she let go of
Ash and dropped her grievances.
“Next time,
please don’t grab Ash in the middle of public,” said Brock. “It’s embarrassing
for all of us.”
“I’m still mad
at him,” She said with a scoff and crossing her arms.
It’s not my
fault.
Ash thought to himself. I just wanted people to know more about me. You
see, two weeks ago, Ash had sent a letter to local newspapers telling people
his origins and his powers. When Misty saw it, she was devastated, because she
had wanted to interview him herself. Well actually, it’s more liked ticked off
than devastated.
The group’s
first stop was the Pokémon and dinosaur exhibit that got Ash excited. Being
that he’s pretending to be slow-minded, he felt that something like this would
be exciting. Of course, since his interest in Pokémon is legitimate, his
excitement is justified. The exhibit featured bones of long-dead Pokémon like
Aerodactyl, Kabuto and others, as well as some Pikachu bones, which made poor
little Pikachu a little nervous. With the exception of Pikachu, who should have
been a little more relaxed and Togepi—who was understandably scared due to its
infant nature, prompting Misty to put the egg-shaped Pokémon in her back pack.
Brock, meanwhile, studied the fossils as best he could as if he was studying
for some kind of Breeder test.
After an hour
in the Pokémon bones exhibit—Ash left after half an hour, though because
Pikachu got too scared—Brock took them to the rocks hall, much to Ash’s
(apparent) displeasure. The hall contained some of the most spectacular rocks
and gems—which excited Misty, who marveled at the fantastic diamonds—and even
ordinary rock, which interested Brock. Ash, trying to keep up the illusion that
he was an idiot, pretended to be bored. Until Brock and Misty weren’t looking,
that is. Pikachu, who had seen Ash turn from himself into Superman, however,
didn’t buy it. But the little critter kept it to itself.
For a while,
things seemed to be wholly innocent, until Ash caught a glimpse of a strange
rock about 20 feet from him. The rock was encased in a circular case, which
allowed people to look at it more closely on all sides. As Ash approached the
rock, he began to feel strange, like the rock was doing strange things, but he
paid no heed to it. However, when he got within 10 feet, he not only got to see
what it looked like—it was a green, glowing rock—but he began to feel pain in
his entire body. He started to feel very dizzy and sick to his stomach, like he
had just been on a very intense tilt-a-whirl. And he was getting weaker. Soon
the pain was almost overwhelming and he was struggling to breathe, as though something
was pressing on his chest and preventing him from breathing, forcing him to
take some much labored breaths. He could barely keep on his feet. Now he knew had had to get away from the rock--fast. It was
at this time he realized he was very close to the rock, which he realized must
have been the cause of his strange symptoms. Unable to take it, he turned away
from the rock and struggled towards the exit. That’s when Misty saw him.
“Ash,” she
said in a very worried voice. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine,”
he lied, not wanting Misty to know what was happening. Right now the pain was
taking a toll on him and if he didn’t get away fast, he was in big trouble.
“I’m just going to the Egyptian exhibit, I’ll meet you guys later,” he said,
leaving Misty and Brock in the rock exhibit. Pikachu tried to yell at him, but
Ash firmly whispered, “Don’t say anything.” Finally he was out of the exhibit,
but he was still feeling the effects of the rock. As he staggered through the
museum, he noticed some sunlight pouring out of a window about 40 feet away. It
took him a while, but he finally managed to get to the sweet sunlight. As he
bathed himself in the glow of the sun, he felt his strength return and the pain
and nausea leave. Pikachu looked on in confusion, but he was happy that his
trainer was okay. But as he felt his strength return, Ash worried about that
rock. Were there more rocks like that? Would he survive the next time he
encountered it? Those thoughts haunted him severely.
--
Flashback
“Professor,
what can you tell me about Ash?” A very concerned
Delia Ketchum asked her old college professor, Prof. Samuel Oak. She had been
noticing Ash’s very strange abilities, and was now asking for help.
“I’ll do all I
can, Deila. But I’m more of a Pokémon researcher. However, I have managed to
translate the hieroglyphs on the capsule you say Ash landed it.”
“You did? What
does it say?” Oak took out his notepad, and said,
“It says,
‘This is Kal-El of Krypton, our infant son, our last hope. Please protect him
and deliver him from evil. We will be with you, Kal-El, for all the days of
your life’.” Delia simply looked at Oak, confused about what was going on.
“Delia, an astronomer friend told me that there was a supernova of a red star
about 5 years ago. He suspects that there may have been an Earth-like planet
orbiting the star, and that it may have been destroyed by the supernova. I
believe that Ash is a survivor of that supernova. The data dicks that you gave
me indicate that this planet had a technology so advanced that ours is
primitive in comparison, almost Neolithic compared to theirs.”
“Oh dear,”
Delia said in reaction to Oak’s revelations. “I didn’t know there was life out
in space!”
“Yes there is,
apparently,” replied Oak. Now his face got serious. “Listen Delia, I want you
to do me a favor. No, make me a promise.”
“What do you
want me to do, Professor?” She replied.
“I want you to
promise never to reveal Ash’s nature to anyone. If you do, well, I cannot say
right now. But if anyone finds out, there could be trouble, understand?”
“Yes, I do,”
she replied in a very worried tone of voice.
“Good, then,”
he said, turning away. But then he turned around and said, “You must also be
aware of this substance.” He pressed a button on his keyboard and a picture of
a green, glowing rock showed up on screen.
“What is that,
professor?” She asked him.
“That is the
only known substance that is lethal to people from his planet. To us, it’s just
a harmless rock. But the specific radioactivity is so high that this substance
is poisonous and possibly deadly to anyone from the planet Krypton!” Now Delia
was frightened beyond words, knowing that there was something that could kill
her little boy so easily. “These are pieces of his home planet. My non-Pokémon
colleagues told me that it was once part of a planet, and we believe it may be
from Krypton. There are also other colors of this substance, but we don’t know
where they are. We also don’t know where all the green rocks are either, so it
will be difficult to track it all down. We have done tests on the green
substance, and there seems to be no short or long-term effects on humans.”
“Oh dear,” she
said. She could only imagine what kind of experiences Ash would soon have.
--
About an hour
after encountering the green rock, Ash met up with Brock and Misty at the
Egyptian exhibit Ash had spoken of earlier. But Misty and Brock were not about
to let Ash get away without explaining what had happened in there. “Really
guys, I’m fine,” Ash said. “I just felt a little queasy, that’s all.”
“Well you
didn’t look queasy!” Misty shot back. “You looked like you were in immense
pain, I was wor—I mean, I thought you were lying.”
“Sheez guys,
I’m fine!” He said firmly. “Come on, let’s get something to eat, I’m hungry.”
Misty dropped her grievances, since she knew that she could not get Ash to fess
up to what had happened. She would be kept in the dark for a long time.
--
“So, my
scientists tell me this is the only substance that can kill someone of his
kind, huh? Well that makes things much more interesting. HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!”
--
To be
continued
So class, tell
me, what is the name of the only substance in the known universe that can kill
Kryptonians? If you get it right, you get an A+! And include it with a review,
will ya? Thanks.