Episode 5: Lost...AGAIN?!?

Linxie stops, making me bump into him. "Well, this is where my map ends. I was planning on buying a new one in Kimosha Village, but..." a sweatdrop appears at his head,"I kinda got sidetracked.^.^;;" Well, I can't blame him. *I* was the one who caused the sidetracking...with the help of a Serpent we all know and love to hate.-.-;;

So, here we are, stuck at the one place that we'd rather not be stuck in--a fork in the road. You see, Linxie and I reported the whole incident with Viper to the local Officer Jenny, and in turn she told us there was no gym there because the town was too small for one. That was a bit odd because my gang and I(excluding Linxie) were wandering that place for hours.-.-;;

Anyway, here we are, Hydro and Linxie doing rocks, paper, sissors until their hands hurt(mostly because they kept tying), and me staring out into space. How bored, you say? Very.

Suddenly, a voice yells out of the back pocket of my backpack. "Deena!!! Listen! I HAVE A MAP!!!"

Linxie and Hydro snap their heads in Dextra's direction. "A map?" cries Linxie. "Let's use it!"

Alright, this is bad. "Er...Dextra tends to glitch out with the map..."

"Any map is better than no map," Linxie says, grinning like the Cheshire cat.

Hydro speaks up. "*You don't know Dextra...*"

Before Dextra can say anything, Linxie interrupts. "Let's just use Dextra. We'd be lost anyway, so might as well be lost with a map."

Hydro climbs onto my shoulder. "Okay," I say, taking Dextra out of my backpack, "But if we get lost, I'm blaming you, Dextra."

"Hmph." So, we began walking. Again.

***

"Dextra, are you sure we're going the right way?" Her digitized head nods yes. "Okay, if ya say so..."

Hours pass. We're still walking. "DEXTRA!!! Admit it! We're lost!!!"

"Deena, you're such a baby byte. We're almost there! Just another fifteen minutes or so of walking." Dextra grins and folds her arms conceitedly.

An hour later...

"DEXTRA!!!! It's been an hour already!"

"Er..."

Before I could get out my mallet, Linxie snatches Dextra. "Dee, here, let me try." He presses a few buttons, then a digitized female voice spoke.

"Holographic image inducer initialized." A light, coming from Dextra's screen, flickers on, revealing a holographic map, complete with textures.

Hydro and I stare awestruck. "How'd you do that?!"

Linxie smiles. "Didn't I tell you? My dad helped with this model."

"Whoops...heh...I forgot..." Hey, it's an honest mistake.^.^;;

"Let's see...I'd say we're either here..."-he points to Mount Mortar-"...or here..."-he pointed to Dragon's Den.

I hesitate. Both caves are packed with either rare or tough pokemon, and if we get stuck in Mount Mortar, there's no way we'd get out without getting lost. And the worst part, I only brought three pokeballs, so I can't go on an all-out catching spree.-.-;;

Linxie examines the map a little more. "Okay, by the looks of it, we're probably near the fork that leads to either cave. We should probably figure out which direction we want to go first, though we probably won't know where we are until we get there."

I glance at Hydro, then look back at Linxie. "I hope we're going to Dragon's Den."

***

"Linxie, got a shovel?"

"Why?" Linxie had been staring at Dextra's holographic map the whole way, so I'm not surprised he asked that.

"Look at this." We're at the base of a cliff, supposedly where a cave was located. Let me rephrase that--where the BACK of a cave is located. "Linxie, don't tell me we've gotta walk all the way back around!" I point to the cliff. "And no way I'm climbing that thing!"

Linxie stares at the looming rock formation, a baffled expression pasted on his face. "Well, we've gotta do something..."

"Dra!"

"*What was THAT?*" cries Hydro. Rocket somehow comes out of her pokeball.

"Rocket? Do you know what that was? Sounded like it said 'Dra'," I say.

Rocket closed her eyes in thought. "*Hmm. I dunno.*" Linxie and I facefault.

"*Dee,*" whispers Hydro shakily, "*There's something behind me!*"

"Tini! Dra!"

"*WAAH!!!*" Hydro jumps away.

Dextra sighs. "Relax. It's just a Dratini."

Linxie picks a pokeball off his belt. "I've gotta catch this!"

"No, wait!" I shout. "Um...Dratini...do you have a trainer?"

The Dratini shakes its head and inches towards Hydro, who hides behind my legs. Dextra gasps. "Hydro's found himself a girlfriend!"

"WHAT?!?" Hydro and I yell in unison.

*Next Episode: "Love and Nonexistant Noodles"*