Phoebe

The gang had a few more adventures with Prof. Birch; they had walked into a forest that had wild Seedot. Seedot were grass type Pokemon that resembled acorns and Ash caught one for himself. Also while traveling in the forest, May's Silcoon evolved into Beautifly and Ash's Silcoon and Cascoon evolved into Beautifly and Dustox which made Ash and May happy. They had also run into a wild Loudred that wasn't feeling well and Brock used his knowledge of medicine to help Loudred. Loudred was grateful to Brock and wanted to go with him, so Brock had a Loudred of his own.

Right now Prof. Birch and the gang were going to visit an abandoned coal mine.

"Is it okay for people to visit the mine?" May asked.

"Yes there's no need to worry May." Prof. Birch said. "Lots of people have explored it before and there have never been any accidents."

May still felt nervous, but Max reassured May that Prof. Birch would never take them to a place that was dangerous.

When they reached the mine, they saw a crowd of people and some police officers were preventing them from going in.

"What's going on?" Ash asked.

"I don't know, but I'm going to find out." Prof. Birch said.

He asked a police officer what was wrong and the officer explained that there have been reports of ghost type Pokemon roaming around the mine and they kept scaring people away from the mine.

"Then that means the ghost type Pokemon have made the mine their territory." Prof. Birch said.

"It's a good thing I came here." A voice said.t

The voice belonged to a black-haired woman, who wore pink flowers and a red bracelet around her feet.

"It's Phoebe of the Elite Four!" Someone shouted.

Everyone was surprised to see Phoebe, especially Prof. Birch.

"What brings you here Phoebe?" Prof. Birch asked.

"I heard the rumors of ghost type Pokemon lurking around in this mine, so I came to investigate." Phoebe explained the reason for her coming to the mine.

Phoebe specialized in ghost type Pokemon.

The gang was surprised to see an Elite Four member of Hoenn, especially May and Max.

"It's been a while since we've seen an Elite Four member right Tomo, Brock?" Ash said.

"It certainly has." Brock said.

"Wait you three have seen Elite Four members before?" Max asked.

Brock told them about the time he, Ash, Tomo and Misty met Lance in Johto. Tomo told them about the time when he, Ash, Tracey and Misty met Lorelei in the Orange Islands. Ash mentioned the time they met Bruno, when he trained his Pokemon in the mountains before the Indigo League. Max felt a little jealous.

Prof. Birch introduced Phoebe to the gang.

"You kids like ghost-type Pokemon?" Phoebe asked.

"Yes." Ash said. He told her about his Gengar and Misdreavus.

Brock, Tomo and Max said yes too, and May nervously said yes because she was easily scared by them. Phoebe invited them and Prof. Birch to join her in exploring the mine and Prof. Birch, Ash, Tomo, Brock and Max accepted the invitation. May decided to stay behind as she wasn't fond of ghost-type Pokemon. So Phoebe, Prof. Birch, Ash, Tomo, Brock and Max went into the mine together.

It was dark in the mine, so everyone had to wear helmets that had lamps on them.

"Do you think that the ghost type Pokemon are living here because this mine is abandoned and no one works in it anymore?" Ash asked.

"It's a good possibility." Prof. Birch said. "Ghost type Pokemon are famous for living in old caves, mines, ruins and buildings that have been abandoned. But it's best that we find out what's going on in this cave, especially since the Pokemon are frightening people away."

"Ghost-type Pokemon don't really mind intruders much." Phoebe said. "But sometimes people disturb ghost-type Pokemon too much. So these ghost-type Pokemon probably don't want the tourists to disturb them, which would explain why they frighten them off. You better have Poke Balls ready, in case we do run into any trouble with the ghost type Pokemon."

"Got it." Prof. Birch and the boys said at the same time.

Suddenly they saw three ghost-type Pokemon, but they looked like they were injured. One was purple and had blue gem-shaped eyes and a red jewel on it's stomach, the second ghost-type Pokemon looked like a shadow puppet and the third ghost-type Pokemon looked like a phantom.

"That's a Sableye, Shuppet and Duskull." Phoebe said.

Ash, Max and Tomo ran over to see if the three Pokemon were okay.

"Hey, what happened to you three?" Ash asked.

The Sableye spoke to Ash.

"What did it say Ash?" Max asked.

"Sableye said that there are miners down here and they are using all the ghost-type Pokemon as their slaves." Ash said.

"Using ghost-type Pokemon as slaves?" Phoebe said. "That's outrageous! We need to do something about this."

Prof. Birch and the boys agreed. Ash asked Sableye, Duskull and Shuppet to take them to where the miners were and the three ghost-type Pokemon did just that.

Sableye, Duskull and Shuppet led the humans further down the mine until at last they came to an area of the mine, where the miners were. There were lanterns, pickaxes and wagons everywhere and ghost-type Pokemon were coming in and out of the mine's walls. There were six men and they had some dark-type Pokemon with them; three Houndoom, a Umbreon, a Sneasel and a Mightyena. Max noticed that there were gold nuggets in the wagons.

"I get it." Prof. Birch said. "Those miners must have found the gold nuggets in the mine and they're using the ghost-type Pokemon to find them and to scare everyone else away to keep their gold mine a secret. And I bet those dark-type Pokemon are to keep the ghost-type Pokemon in order because of type advantage."

"Yeah well, I'm not letting them get away with it." Phoebe said angrily.

She told Max and Tomo to go to the police then asked Prof. Birch, Ash and Brock to help her deal with the miners. Max and Tomo ran back with Shuppet, Sableye and Duskull to the entrance of the mine.

Phoebe, Prof. Birch, Ash and Brock ran towards the miners.

"That's enough!" Phoebe shouted. "I will not allow you enslave these ghost-type Pokemon anymore."

"Neither will I!" Prof. Birch shouted.

The miners were not happy that there were intruders and they sent their Pokemon out to attack.

"Houndoom use Flamethrower!" One of the miners shouted.

"Sneasel use Blizzard!" Another shouted.

"Use Crunch Mightyena!" Another shouted.

"Use Dark Pulse Umbreon!" Another shouted.

Phoebe called out a Sableye and told it to attack with Shadow Ball. Brock sent out Forretress and told it to use Signal Beam and Ash commanded Latias to attack with Thunderbolt. Mightyena, Umbreon, the three Houndoom and the Sneasel were instantly knocked out. Then the police arrived on the scene and arrested the miners.

"What's going to happen to the mine now that gold nuggets have been located here?" Max asked.

"Well we'll have proper miners come here and work here." A police officer said. "And we'll be using the gold nuggets for all sorts of things in the Hoenn Region."

Everyone was happy to know that the mine would be all right now.

When Phoebe, Prof. Birch, Ash, Brock, Tomo and Max exited the mine, they told May all about it.

"You missed an exciting adventure May." Max teased.

"I prefer getting into adventures that don't involve dark, spooky places." May replied.

Phoebe thanked Prof. Birch and the gang for their help.

"We are glad to have helped." Prof. Birch said. "And it was an honor meeting an Elite Four member."

Just then the Sableye, Duskull and Shuppet approached them.

"Hey what are you three doing here?" Ash asked.

The three ghost-type Pokemon spoke.

"I think they want to go with you three." Phoebe said. "I understand a ghost-type Pokemon's feelings well and I can tell that they like you three Ash, Tomo, Max."

The boys stared at each other and smiled; they agreed to have the ghost-type Pokemon on their team. Ash captured Sableye, Tomo captured Duskull and Max captured Shuppet.

After that the gang said goodbye to Prof. Birch and Phoebe. Prof. Birch had to leave to get back to his lab in Littleroot Town and Phoebe had to leave for business. After saying goodbye to them, Ash and the others set off for the Dewford Gym. Ash decided that it was now time for him to challenge the Dewford Gym.