Ashamed

It was one of those cloudy, rainy days. I was actually kind of glad for that, I hated the sun. Indoors is more of my thing. Anyways, before I accidentally get off subject, my dad was going to this indoor volleyball thing. I didn't really pay attention to the details, as I don't care much for sports. I asked if I could stay in the car, and he said that was fine.

As soon as he left I locked the car, as I'm very paranoid. Then I tuned the radio to my favorite station and turned up the volume as loud as I could without busting my eardrums. Now that I had felt comfortable, I pulled out my Gameboy, which I had brought with me. Inside it was FireRed. I turned the volume on my GameBoy down, as I wanted to listen to the radio while I played my game.

It had been a while since I last played the game. When my save file loaded I found myself to be standing on Treasure Beach, that island below One Island. I opened the menu and clicked on my Pokémon, to find my normal party, except for a Dratini that I normally didn't use that had an Exp. Share. I wondered why I was training that Dratini the last time I played. Shrugging it off, I exited the menu and flew back to the Pokémon Center at One Island.

I went to the PC and reveled in the memories all my Pokémon I had caught there brought back to me. After looking through all the boxes, I got bored. I didn't really know what to do. Then I got an idea, I was going to stop being lazy and level up my team so I could finally beat the Elite Four. I never really found any good training places in the game, as to why I never beat the Elite Four. But I had nothing else to do, so I thought I might as well train them up.

I took the Exp. Share away from the Dratini and placed it in my box I had that was full of Dratinis. This left me with my five main party Pokémon; Spark the Zapdos, Flame the Charizard, Machoke, Pidgeotto, and Golduck. My last three didn't have nicknames. I thought of finding a different and better water Pokémon to replace my Golduck, I didn't really like his moveset, and just him in general. He wasn't really special to me, the main reason I had him was so I could have a Pokémon that knew Surf.

After a bit of thinking, I decided I would just keep him because I didn't feel like training another Pokémon up to his level of 51. Then I realized I should probably find a sixth Pokémon, since I had space for one more. I was eager to start training though, so I thought I would find another Pokémon later.

I saved, left the Pokémon Center, and surfed back to Treasure Beach. I gave the Exp. Share to Machoke, as he was currently the weakest. With Spark in the front of my party, I started training. The wild Pokémon were in the levels of around late thirties to early forties. They were very easy to beat though, as most of the Pokémon I fought Spark had a move that was super effective against them. While battling I sang along loudly with the songs playing on the radio.

After thirty minutes Spark and Machoke had gone up quite a few levels. I saved the game and continued training. During one of the battles, I randomly started thinking about shiny Pokémon, and how someone I knew on the internet had said to make sure you always had PokeBalls with you in case one showed up, and how pretty they looked. After the battle, I checked to see if I had any PokeBalls. I found to have a ton of Ultra Balls. I felt satisfied and continued training, although I knew chances of me finding a shiny then and there were very slim.

After beating a couple of Tangela and trashing a Meowth, I ran into a male Persian. I practically screamed when I saw stars fly around it. I kept yelling, "Oh my god! Holy crap!" and the like for a few minutes while staring at the screen in shock. I couldn't believe I actually found a shiny! This wasn't my first though, as I had run into a shiny Snover but accidentally fainted it as I didn't know what a shiny was back then, and I had caught my own shiny Flygon with some help from my little sister. This still was a very exciting moment for me, as it would have been to any of you.

I loudly cursed profanity as I remembered my entire team was made up of high leveled powerhouses. A sense of hopelessness washed over me as I searched through my Pokémon's summaries to see if any of them had weak moves, which none of them possessed. A little hope sparked in me as I checked Golduck's summary, as he was the weakest in my party then. He had the move Rock Smash, which despite being a fighting move that was super effective to normals, it didn't do much damage. He was my only hope, so I switched him out with Spark.

The shiny Persian attacked with Pay Day, which didn't bring forth much damage to Golduck. After its turn was over I chose for my Pokémon to use Rock Smash. Thankfully, it only took off about 1/4th of Persian's HP. After it attacked me again with another Pay Day, I decided one more Rock Smash would be good. I hit it with Rock Smash again.

It was a critical hit.

I screamed in rage as the shiny Persian fainted. I kept throwing profanity at the Golduck despite me knowing it wouldn't accomplish anything. After many moments I finally cooled down. I decided I would just put it all behind me and forget it ever happened. I thought Spark was trained enough, so I switched it out with Pidgeotto and started leveling him up.

After about fifteen minutes of battling, I started to get cheery again. I sang along with some of the radio songs again to boost my spirits. After a while, I thought Pidgeotto had enough training, so I checked my Pokémon to see which one would train next. Spark had enough training, Flame was already an incredibly high level, Machoke had enough training since he held the Exp. Share the whole time, Pidgetto was done, so all that was left was Golduck. I still personally blamed him a little for making the shiny Persian faint, even though it was the game that decided when critical hits happened. But I switched him out for Pidgeot and started training him anyways.

I didn't train him for long though. He kept missing too often, and when he actually did hit the Pokémon it didn't do much damage. I kept training him hoping this would eventually stop, but it didn't. "Useless piece of crap." I muttered as he missed hitting a Meowth. Just then though, something very odd happened. The radio started to static. It would cut off, come back on, have static, go off again, and come back on. It kept doing that for a solid minute until it finally just shut off.

I sat in my seat and whimpered like a dog. At the time I had recently been watching one too many scary videos, and the fact it had become foggy outside didn't help either. I decided I would turn the volume up on my GameBoy to drive the silence away. The music emitted from the GameBoy sounded reassuring, and I tried to push what just happened to the back of my mind. I walked a bit in the grass and a wild Tangela appeared.

During the battle though, there was no music. Sound effects still played though. My Golduck started acting strange though. Whenever he missed, the animation would play for him like when your Pokémon gets hit with Astonish. Golduck was still missing too often, so I switched him out with Flare and ended the battle quickly.

The next Pokémon we ran into was a wild Persian. I half hoped it would turn out to be shiny, but of course, it didn't. There was still no music and the sound effects still played. When I selected for Golduck to attack though, he refused to. This text would appear, "GOLDUCK is too ashamed to attack!" I was getting very worried at this point. This definitely wasn't normal, and I had no idea what to do. Once the text box went away, the Persian attacked with Pay Day. Golduck surprisingly went down in that one hit. I brought out Flare afterwards, who beat the Persian in one turn.

After the battle, I checked Golduck's summary. Everything was still the same, except for his nature which had changed. Instead of Adamant like it used to be, it was now Ashamed. I was scared, to say the least, as I had never before encountered anything like this in one of my games before. I exited from the menu and walked in the grass, with Flare now in the front.

I jumped when the radio suddenly came back on. After taking a moment to recover, I started to feel relieved. I then assumed that the whole mess must have to do with Golduck. I decided I would just not use him for a while, and hope things would eventually get back to normal.

I flew back to the Pokémon Center on One Island and healed my Pokémon, saved, and went to the PC. I decided I would use my Hypno as my sixth Pokémon. He was already a decent level, he only needed a little training to be in range with my other team Pokémon. I put Golduck in the PC and hoped when I was done training Hypno that he would be better.

It didn't take long at all for Hypno to be in the same level range as the other Pokémon. Once I was done training him, I flew back to the Pokémon Center and saved. Then I got my Golduck out of the PC and fed him a couple of Rare Candies. I really wanted to go ahead and beat the Elite Four then, and I didn't feel like training another water Pokémon to replace Golduck. I just had to hope things were back to normal with him.

I flew to the Indigo Plateau, bought a ton of items, and went to challenge the Elite Four. They were surprisingly easy, and I practically flew through them. But the battle against my Rival was a different matter. It was a very tough fight, and eventually it was down to his Arcanine and my Golduck. They were both down to little HP. This was it. I just couldn't fail now.

I ordered for my Golduck to use Surf. With his Quick Claw, he was able to go first. The Surf animation started to play, and my heart started frantically beating. But in the middle of the animation, the giant tidal wave stopped, and disappeared. "GOLDUCK can't concentrate! SURF failed!"

"What?!" I screamed at my GameBoy as Arcanine finished off Golduck with Bite. I started yelling at my Golduck for failing me on a critical moment yet again. It was partly my fault, as I should have known better than to use Golduck in the Elite Four when he had been messing up, but I didn't care.

The game then returned me to the Pokémon Center that was right before the Elite Four. I thought about turning off the game, but my Pokémon had leveled up a lot during the battles, so I decided to save it instead. I then went immediately to the PC to put Golduck in it. But the game wouldn't let me. "GOLDUCK is sorry and won't mess up again." That message appeared every time I tried to put him in my PC.

"Screw this." I angrily muttered to myself as I clicked on Golduck and selected "Release". Thankfully, to me at least, he left without a complaint. After a couple of minutes I thought that might have been a rash decision. Before I knew it I had turned the game off and back on, as I hadn't saved when I released my Golduck. I wanted him back to give him one more chance.

When the game finished loading up though, Golduck still wasn't in my party. Regret quickly washed over me, and I felt awful for letting him go like that. I told myself that there was nothing I could have done to fix him, but I didn't fully believe it. Remorseful, I went to the PC to pick out another water Pokémon to replace my lost Golduck. I pretty quickly decided I would use my female Dragonair named Silver, as I greatly loved the Pokémon's design.

I decided I would just forget the whole Golduck event ever happened and that he ever existed, just as I had with the shiny Persian, which I then cursed myself for remembering. I flew to Vermillion City and sailed out to One Island. As soon as I landed on the island I surfed down to Treasure Beach to train Silver.

I didn't get a chance to train her though, as when I walked further down the beach I found a Golduck sitting in the middle of the grass, its back facing towards the screen. Getting a bit scared, I walked forward and talked to it, "GOLDUCK is dreaming." As soon as that text disappeared, a battle started.

The background was different hues of purple and looked sort of misty. There was also no music, but sound effects played. A male shiny Persian appeared, but it seemed lighter than normal, kind of like a ghost. Golduck came out on the side of the screen where I should have been, but I couldn't control him. Golduck went first and used Rock Smash, which took out 1/4th of the Persian's HP. The opposing feline used Pay Day, which didn't do much damage to Golduck. The blue duck then used Rock Smash again, which was a critical hit that knocked out all of the shiny's HP.

But instead of fainting, the Persian remained. It used Pay Day and knocked a little of Golduck's HP down. Golduck would attack, but each time he missed. The shiny eventually had the blue duck's HP down to a sliver. Golduck used Surf, and it actually worked, but the animation cut off halfway across the screen, and the shiny Persian took no damage. Instead of using Pay Day to finish him off, like it had been using before, it attacked with Bite. Golduck fainted, and the battle ended.

Once everything faded back to Treasure Beach, a text box appeared, "GOLDUCK jumped and woke up!" Then an exclamation point popped up above Golduck's head, along with more lines of text, "GOLDUCK is shocked to see you!" Then Golduck's sprite started shivering, with more text, "GOLDUCK is ashamed!" Then another battle started.

The background looked the same as a normal fight on Treasure Beach, green and blue. When Golduck appeared, his sprite looked different. There were streaks under his eyes where it looked like he had been crying. His eyes looked slightly red and swollen too. When my trainer came out, she stayed there instead of throwing out any Pokémon.

The battle went on without me choosing anything. "GOLDUCK used Quick Claw!" I wondered how he could use Quick Claw in battle like that, but before I could think too much about the matter I found out. Golduck's sprite shivered, and his sprite changed. A Quick Claw appeared to be stabbed into his stomach with crimson blood surrounding it. His HP dropped to zero, and he fainted. The battle didn't end though. A male shiny Persian appeared on the other side of the screen, except it was lighter than normal, just like in Golduck's dream. It let out its battle cry and then faded from the screen. The battle ended.

Once the game had faded back to Treasure Beach, Golduck was gone. I stared at the screen, my hands shaking a bit. I let out a slight scream as I heard knocking on the car's door. Relief washed over me as I saw it was just my dad locked outside the car. I unlocked the car, and he came in and told me that the game took a little longer than he thought it was going to and he was sorry. I said it was alright, and I didn't mind.

He started up the car and we left. When I looked at the radio's clock, it said it was 6:58. I had started playing my Gameboy around 3:40. All of what had happened on my FireRed had only taken 3 hours. I sighed and continued playing my game. Nothing else strange happened the rest of the night or the next day. Eventually, I beat the Elite Four with my team, but the victory felt hollow without Golduck.

After I had beaten the Elite Four I felt so awful for getting rid of Golduck that I decided I would catch a male Psyduck, raise it to be a Golduck, and teach it the same moves as my old one. It wouldn't be exactly the same as my old Pokémon, but it was the closest I could get to having him back. So I did just that. The Psyduck I caught also had an adamant nature to boot, just like the old.

Sometime during training my new Golduck I went back to Treasure Beach. Everything went normally until he hit level 51. Right after he leveled up, we ran into a wild male shiny Persian. I knew this was too much to be just a coincidence, but I didn't really care at that point, I still wanted that shiny Pokémon. I used Rock Smash on it, which took away 1/4th of its HP, and it attacked me with Pay Day.

Golduck hit it again with Rock Smash.

It was a critical hit.