Pomydu

So I’ve been playing Pokémon Mystery Dungeons — Gates to Infinity for years now. I’ve restarted it many times, mostly because you can’t change your Pokémon character and partner any other way, so I’ve pretty much memorized the storyline, especially at the beginning. But nothing like this has ever happened.

The game started as it normally would. I chose Axew, nicknamed Shred, as my starter and Oshawott, nicknamed Scalchop, as my partner. We continued progressing through the game as normal, gathering items and Pokémon for Team Outcasts, which was the team name I’d almost always chosen. Everything went as normal at first.

Things changed once the V-Wave became a part of the game. The V-Wave is a boost that affects a different type of Pokémon every day. It can be changed by talking to Victini and spinning the V-Wheel, Wheel of Fortune style. I went to change the type for the day—it was Ice, which is strong against my Dragon type—and I spun the wheel with a 1 in 5 chance of winning.

To my surprise and delight, the pointer landed on the winning fraction of the wheel, and I changed the type to Water to give Scalchop and a few other Water-types a boost. Once I’d set the type for the day, instead of his normal dialogue, Victini said, “Wow! Now your team’s a force to be feared!” I don’t know why this was so unsettling to me. Maybe it wasn’t the words, but the fact that it had changed after years of the same old “That’s it! The V-Wave for today is now… Water type! V-Wheeeeeel!”

I don’t know what I did different this run. At first, nothing major changed. There were some minor changes: Kecleon no longer had music notes in his dialogue, and Cofagrigus hadn’t been saying “GLORIOUS!” every other sentence the way he used to, either.

I progressed through the story a bit more. Our team visited the Great Glacier and went to save Munna, who had hijacked the dream that had brought me into the Pokémon world, but for the most part I’d just been doing requests to get materials. Still, I noticed a few more little changes. For example, when I stopped by Kecleon’s shop in a dungeon, he seemed less excited to see me. Instead of the hearty farewell of “Please come again! ” I’m used to, Kecleon instead just says, “Come again.” I don’t even get an exclamation point. This doesn’t scare me, to be honest. It just makes me a little sad.

It’s not just Kecleon, either. All of the NPCs seem kind of depressed. When they would normally be smiling, they have the default content face. They’re still smiling, but less happily. On top of that, when they’d normally have the content face, they show the default straight face. The atmosphere in general just seems… sad.

But something went really wrong after I went to save Munna and she attacked me, as usual. Scalchop and Shred got split up, and I guided Shred up the mountain to get away from Munna’s cronies. Once I’d reached the top of the mountain and defeated a few of Munna’s followers, a few more popped up to defeat Scalchop, who was tired from all the running and battling. Before they could attack, though, a voice shouted, “Duck!” I did so, and Hydreigon shot a blue laser out of his mouth at the enemies. He then helped Scalchop get away, and I saved the game there.

By this point, I’d seriously considered restarting the game to make it normal again, but I also kind of wanted to see how this all would end.

Shred woke up in the cave where Hydreigon had brought him. Hydreigon was flying just a space away, apparently healing Shred, and he blandly stated, “You’re up.”
Shred got up and, instead of freaking out at the scary Pokémon he’d woken up to, simply turned and looked at Hydreigon. The three-headed dragon continued: “I’ve hidden us in a cave near Mount Kilionea. Nobody will find us here.”

To be honest, I think my heart skipped a beat. I pictured Hydreigon simply beating me to a pulp, with nobody to stop him, but that didn’t happen.

“I’ve been trying to find you for forever,” he simply said. “I’m the one who brought you to the Pokémon world. However, Munna and her team kept getting between us. I’m the strongest Pokémon in the world, but I’ve been terribly outnumbered. Now that I’ve finally reached you, though, we can get to work.”

Shred performed the talking animation, but no dialogue box came up. Instead, Hydreigon looked surprised and replied, “Oh, you’ve already made many allies? And you say one of them is being chased by Munna’s gang?”

Shred nodded.

I led Shred and Hydreigon through a dungeon to get us closer to home, and I noticed a few more discrepancies. The Pokémon in the dungeon wouldn’t run up to attack me; rather, they’d sort of wander around. They’d take a few steps, pause, and then take a few steps in a different direction. I’d still attack them for experience, and once hit they’d fight back. It made me feel kind of bad, but I didn’t want to have to face bosses later in the game at a too-low level.

After the dungeon, there was a quick image of Shred and Hydreigon setting up camp at night. No monologue about the Voice of Life or the Bittercold; just a quick scene, then a prompt to save the game.

After one more dungeon, Shred and Hydreigon were stopped by Purugly and her Excadrill friends. Purugly told Shred and Hydreigon that they had Scalchop in their clutches. When Purugly and the Excadrill left, Hydreigon turn to Shred and said, “Your ally is in captivity. We must rescue him. We can crush the enemies with no effort.” With that, we went to the Holehills to save Scalchop.

After we saved Scalchop (quite easily), we made our way through the savanna and into the desert. When night fell, Kyurem made his appearance. In the normal game, he would freeze and shatter Hydreigon before beating Shred up. At this point, however, I’d realized and accepted that this was not the normal game.

Kyurem fell from the sky and roared, then charged at Shred. Hydreigon then shot his blue laser at Kyurem. I took a moment here to admire the attention to detail in the shadows made by the blue beam. When Kyurem was hit, he slid backwards and flinched, then turned to run. Hydreigon rushed to him and began moving his head in a motion that I recognized in horror as the animation used when Hydreigon was eating. The screen faded to black, and we woke up in our own home. Scalchop followed me outside as I went about doing what I’d normally do: selling things I didn’t need, buying healing items, visiting my shops in Paradise, etc.

We then went to Post Town, where everyone kept their sadder demeanor. When I went up to the top of the hill, I found Hydreigon looking out at the distance. I pressed the A button to talk to Hydreigon, who turned to me and asked, “Are you ready to become stronger?” I was a bit concerned, so I selected “no”, to which Hydreigon replied “…Pity.” and turned his gaze back to the distance. I tried to go to a dungeon, but Scalchop turned to Shred and said, “We can’t go yet! Hydreigon wants to help you get stronger, remember?” Trying to go do a request yielded the same result, so I reluctantly guided Shred back to Hydreigon, this time selecting “yes”.

“Very well,” the three-headed dragon said with a nod before a battle ensued. This was odd, as I’d never had to battle in town before, but I just shrugged and beat Hydreigon on my first try (which probably wouldn’t’ve happened with any other starter Pokémon). After the battle (which faded to black without the usual “Hydreigon fainted.”), Hydreigon nodded and uttered one word.

“Good.”

With that, a ball of light encircled Shred. I panicked for a moment; the ball of light would usually take your Pokémon up into the sky and back to the human world, but that was at the end of the game, and I hadn’t even gone to the Great Glacier the second time! I still had two empty boss cards on the home screen!
My panic was quickly alleviated when the ball of light began to slow, then stopped completely. It suddenly burst to white, and then the screen went black. After a moment, a text box appeared: “Would you like to save the game?”

I almost laughed out loud at the unexpected save prompt, but I was still in a state of shock. Did Shred just explode?

Apparently not. After I chose not to save the game, just in case, Shred and Hydreigon stood on the hilltop facing each other. Shred had evolved into Haxorus (he’d skipped the middle evolution form of Fraxure). He shouldn’t’ve been able to evolve yet! Something else was weird, too—he didn’t have any yellow on him, just black and red. A quick Google search confirmed that this was shiny Haxorus, another impossible feature, as this game didn’t include shiny Pokémon.

Whatever. I led Shred back to Paradise to do a request (which was now available again), and we blasted our way through the dungeon with ease now that Shred had evolved. If they didn’t faint, enemy Pokémon would run away from my team after being hit, accompanied by the message “Pikachu became terrified.” It honestly made me feel kind of bad, but I needed the experience points. I had a feeling that the bosses in the end of the game wouldn’t become terrified and run away, and even if they did, I’d still have to defeat them to move on. I worked on requests for a longer time than in the original game (about 6 in-game days, I think), but I didn’t mind much as I needed the materials to build certain shops in Paradise.

Finally, a cutscene occurred, starting with the usual night sky, then a shot of Shred and Scalchop laying curled up in their nests. Scalchop shivered and said, “I don’t know if you’re awake, Shred, but you know… When I first dreamed of Paradise, I thought it would be different. I thought it would be a safe place where adventuring Pokémon could rest and have fun.”

As was usual for these types of cutscenes, Shred didn’t reply. A text box just popped up, saying, “… … …”

Scalchop continued, “But this is different. I was hoping that we could all trust each other and become great friends, but it seems like nobody here actually knows anyone else. They’re just here to get stronger, and to get money.”

To my surprise, Shred got up and asked, “…Why do you want friends so badly?”

Scalchop stood to face Shred. “I—”

“Friends only turn around and stab you in the back,” Shred interrupted. “I’m still waiting for you to do so. And I’ll be ready.”

Scalchop looked determined. “But you’re my friend, Shred!” A pause, and then, “…Aren’t you?”

Shred turned away, a blank expression on his face. “I don’t know.”

The cutscene ended there, leaving me with questions swimming through my head.

The next morning, Shred and Scalchop woke up as usual. When they left the house, Emolga ran up to them and told them that the Entercards to teleport to the Great Glacier were complete. I led Shred and Scalchop to the hilltop where the Entercards were usually used. To my surprise, nobody joined Shred in the portal, and he teleported to the Great Glacier alone. This was concerning for a moment, seeing as my dragon-type Pokémon was weak to ice-type attacks, but I was only met with a black screen, followed by the words, “Several months later…”

A few wordless cutscenes followed, showing the normal progression through the dungeon, with one major difference: Shred was replaced by a Snivy. I saw the team take out Munna and then Kyurem, and then I was prompted to save the game. After doing so, a new cutscene played.

Shred was shown suspended in a violet void, his eyes closed as if he was asleep. Small ice crystals floated in the air around him, sparkling occasionally.

Scalchop entered the void, followed by the new Snivy. “Shred!” Scalchop called, breaking into a jog, which slowed as he approached my floating avatar. Suddenly, Scalchop fell to one knee, panting heavily. “Shred…” he gasped, “…come… home…”

Shred remained suspended, his eyes still closed, but a whooshing sound began to emanate from the speakers. The ice crystals floating around him began moving.

“I… miss… you…” Scalchop uttered, his eyes shut tight as he struggled to breathe. Still, Shred remained silent and unmoving. A tornado seemed to pick up, sending ice shards spinning around Shred. They closed in on him, and I saw his eyes open for a moment before a bright light filled the screen. When the light faded, Shred had been replaced by something all too familiar: the Bittercold.

Suddenly, a battle began. I now only had a couple moves, but they did a lot of damage to Scalchop and the Snivy. I seemed to be at a huge advantage for a bit, but the pair had a seemingly infinite supply of healing items, and after several hits, the Bittercold was taken down. I sighed and readied my thumb over the power button to restart from my last save, but then a familiar cutscene began. The Snivy hit the Bittercold one last time, and as the Glacier Palace tumbled down around us, Hydreigon swooped in and saved the Snivy and Scalchop. I was indignant until I saw that nothing remained of the Bittercold except shards of ice—no sign of the shiny Haxorus I’d become acquainted with.

—WIP—


Made by @Bibbit with Picrew