Tales Of Beings Not Quite Of This World (Glitch Oneshots)

(So, I felt like writing a couple glitch Pokemon inspired oneshot stories. I love glitches, but they're so ripe for horror… I'm currently working on more, but I wanted to post the ones I already finished.)

The Numberless Things
(Fun fact: Did you know that 'M is far, far taller and possibly more detrimental to your game than Missingno?)

"There goes another one of those wretched things," the man grumbled, looking at the mess the Pokemon - if you could call it that - had left behind.

Plants had become distorted, segments of them floating in the air and withering as they no longer had any way to get nutrients. The grass was "reshuffled", patches erratically varying in lengths. One of the nearby oak trees had been uprooted and now floated upside-down, half of it dissolved into sawdust and chunks of bark. And, stumbling in circles by the tree, was a horribly disfigured Pidgey, chunks of its flesh detached and floating beside it, the insides visible yet not spilling out. Its eyes had been relocated to what was currently its "back", leaving it unable to see where it was going. It kept letting out panicked squawks, not in pain yet horribly confused and uncomfortable.

A frightened child peeked her head out from behind the door to the house behind the gruff man, scanning the area with worry. "Papa, is the scary monster gone?" she asked, trembling.

He looked over, and nodded to her. "But you stay inside the house, that thing might come back. It's already made a mess of the place, musta' been one of them numberless creatures." His grip tightened on the distorted shovel in his hands, not willing to take any chances hurting one of his Pokemon by sending it to fight the thing. But as he looked around, he didn't spot the thing, and went back into his house to calm down. Looking over to his daughter, he saw that she was just sitting on the floor cradling her pet Growlithe, while looking incredibly upset.

"Why aren't you watching that TV of yours?" he asked.

The child frowned and turned it on, showing that it only displayed static. "I think the monster broke our TVs again."

Sighing, the man went outside, looking up at the roof of the house. As expected, the satellite was broken in the same way as much of the flora and fauna around the area. "It's gonna cost us a lot to fix that one," he muttered to himself. Heading back inside, he stormed past the child, heading down to the basement, where several Pokemon of many varieties were huddling for shelter, a single woman comforting them as best she could.

"Dear, is it safe to let the Pokemon out yet?" she asked, worry in her voice.

He nodded, but his eyes were still pained. "There may be some lingering effects, though. It was one of them numberless things… 'missing number' I think those scientists were callin' it? Doesn't matter what it was. Look, hon, we gotta move as far away from here as possible. We're too close to Cinnabar, that's where those things are coming from. Better yet, we should move outta Kanto."

The woman shook her head. "What about the Pokemon Orphanage? We can't just move all of these Pokemon..."

"I don't know-"

That's when they were interrupted by a piercing scream, and hurrying up to the ground floor to find the source, they saw their daughter outside, the door left hanging open. Her eyes were wide with fear, and her Growlithe was whimpering behind her. And in front of her? An enormous indescribable being, its flesh composed of floating squares constantly shifting and floating, distorting all that it touched into something that couldn't possibly exist. It was large enough that it was practically consuming the coast of the island, slowly advancing without any conscious thought.

"It's 'M," he mumbled in shock and fear.

A simple little shovel certainly wouldn't help much now.

They say anyone who had visited the island since that day had only been greeted to grotesque creatures that reached blindly for something, anything, and seemed to be rearranged into painful forms that looked like they shouldn't have even been alive, with blood holding a solid form externally, guts frozen in midair, and organs pumping along as if everything was fine. They kept trying to speak, but all they said was garbled and incomprehensible to both human and Pokemon.

The worst part was that a few almost looked like humans.

Such A Lovely Tune
(♀ . has a very spooky sprite. Also, this one was inspired by some folktales I had read of humans hearing music made by fairies. Fairies were a LOT scarier in old folklore.)

Jonathan knew not to enter the forest. He had been told countless times that something terrible lurked within. So why was he so tempted to explore it? Well, maybe it was because he was a little reckless. Maybe it was because he wanted to prove he would be alright. Or maybe it was simply the burning curiosity of what could have hidden among the trees that was so terrible. With little more than a backpack full of snacks, a flashlight, and a kitchen knife he had grabbed just in case, he ventured into the woods, pretending to be brave.

As he walked, he heard the occasional flying-type Pokemon chirp in the sky, but the deeper he went, the quieter and darker things grew. Eventually, he could barely see his hands in front of his face, and oddly enough, the flashlight did very little to penetrate the thick blackness surrounding him. Jonathan realized, much to his horror, that he was lost. Running through the darkness, he couldn't find his way back, and couldn't even see anything in the direction he thought he had came from.

Just as he was about to give up, suddenly, he heard an otherworldly, feminine voice singing to herself. Jonathan was oddly transfixed by the sound, and began to follow it. The song was somewhat erratic and seemed to have no melody yet plenty of lovely notes, the woman's voice not forming any words, but mere sounds that created a lovely, ethereal tune. He found himself humming along as best he could as he searched for the source. Finally, after what felt like hours of blindly wandering through the darkness, he found the origin of the lovely sounds.

If he wasn't already captivated by the tune, he would have recoiled in horror at the sight. A blood-red creature, its shape twisted and distorted, looking like some sort of specter, simply floated in the darkness. The music was emanating from it, and echoing around it. Jonathan felt a gut instinct telling him to flee, to get away from the unnatural being, but he couldn't bring himself to. So, he sat upon the ground in front of the being, and listened.

After what only felt like minutes, a bright light had shone in Jonathan's face, startling him, yet not prompting a reaction.

"Jonathan, get up!" a voice Jonathan recognized to be his mother's voice yelled. "Dear Arceus, Jonathan, get up!"

But he did not answer her.

The panicked woman ran over to the boy, her thick earmuffs blocking out the sound of the song. Grabbing his arm, she pulled him away from the red creature, Jonathan walking along without comprehending it. After what may have been an hour of walking through the darkness, his mother could see the town, and took off her earmuffs to be greeted with the sounds of Pokemon going about their business. And, as they had left the reach of the shadowy cloud, Jonathan snapped out of his trance, blinking a bit and looking around in confusion.

"Mother… why- why did you take me away from her music…?" he asked, his voice quiet and dull. His eyes seemed empty, and he stared back towards the forest they had left. "Why did you take me away from that lovely tune?"

Ever since his encounter with the being, Jonathan had never been the same. He always seemed drained, staring at nothing and humming the notes, again and again. Any other music he had heard was just inferior, and try as he may to recreate it, it was never the same, it was never good enough. Part of him was missing now, and he feared he would never get it back.

But, years after the incident, he found himself standing in front of the forest once more, and it was time to find her again. It was time to finally hear the song once more.

As he reached her ghastly, scarlet form, he sat down and listened, listened to the music until he started to rot away.

It was such a lovely tune.

Rotten Eggs
(Okay, so maybe this one is more ridiculous than the others, but it's kind of hard to write a completely serious sounding story on the concept of "eggs that rapidly multiply until you can't do anything because you have too many dang eggs". Curse you, Bad Egg!)

It started as ordinary a day as any other for Caitlyn, who was busy training her Linoone in the tall grass.

"Okay, Doodle, that was great!" she yelled over. "But i'd say it's time for you to take a break, alright?" The Linoone happily bounded over to her, taking a Pokeblock she offered and nibbling on it. However, as they relaxed, they heard an unrecognized voice.

"Pssst! Hey you, over there, with the Linoone!"

Looking over to where she had heard the voice, Caitlyn saw an incredibly shady looking man in a trenchcoat and hat, holding what appeared to be an entire egg in a bag. "Come over here, miss! Have I got a deal for you!"

Despite her distrust of the man, he had caught her curiosity, so she approached him despite her better judgement. "A deal? What kind of deal are you talking about, here?"

"Have you ever heard of the legendary Pokemon, Mew? Well, right here in this bag, i've got a Mew egg, and for just five bucks you can buy it!" He had a smug look on his face as he made the offer. "You won't find anything like this anywhere else!"

Caitlyn was quite obviously skeptical, but she felt like she may never have this opportunity again. "Well, i'll play along then. A Mew egg, huh? Three bucks and it's a deal."

"Fine, good enough." he replied, taking the dollars and handing her the bag. "Nice to do business with ya." He walked off into the shadows, gone as quickly as he came. But if Caitlyn had been paying enough attention, she would have heard him mumbling under his breath. "Finally, that damn thing's gone. What a sucker…"

Caitlyn, however, was looking over her just-purchased egg. "It… looks like a plain old egg to me. I bet I just got swindled, but joke's on him - even if it's a Magikarp, i'll train it." Doodle sniffed the egg reluctantly while eyeing it nervously, right before he was withdrawn back into his Pokeball.

So, Caitlyn went on to do the normal egg hatching routines - she had hatched plenty of Pokemon eggs before, after all. But after a few hours of no result, she stopped, sighing.

"Maybe it really is a Mew egg. I mean, rare Pokemon take forever to hatch…" she grumbled to herself as she sat down with the egg. Then, she heard an annoying and familiar shout from behind her.

"Hey, Caitlyn! Check out my new Blaziken!" yelled her childhood rival, Jake. "You up for a Pokemon battle?! I'll stomp you into the ground!"

"Ha, as if!" she laughed, running over and leaving the egg sitting on a bench.

The two were prepared to battle, Jake first sending out the Blaziken he was boasting about. Caitlyn, knowing that it would be weak to water, reached for a Pokeball with a Gyarados inside. Throwing the ball to send out her Pokemon, out came…

An egg.

"Um, what? Where's my Gyarados?" Caitlyn asked, staring blankly at the egg. It just sat there, doing nothing, as eggs are rather prone to doing.

Jake simply laughed. "Are you stalling or something? What're you doing with an egg?"

Caitlyn instantly masked her onset of paranoia, reaching to send out her next Pokemon. A Swellow could take down that Blaziken, right? She threw the Pokeball she KNEW held her Swellow… and it was another egg.

"Look, Caitlyn, if you don't wanna seriously fight me, I'll be going." Jake sighed. "I was looking forward to a real fight, but I guess all you have on you is eggs." He walked away, Caitlyn not even bringing herself to stop him.

What was going on? Why were two of her Pokemon replaced with eggs? Sitting down on the bench, she decided to make sure she at least had her other Pokemon. She still had Doodle, she still had Seviper, she still had Manetric… though Aggron was also an egg now.

"Next time I see that salesmen, i'm going to punch him in the face." She had a deep gut feeling this had to do with her "Mew" egg she had purchased. "So, did my Pokemon just get swapped out with eggs? They might be in the PC…" Deciding that she couldn't just keep a bunch of random eggs in her party, she headed to the Pokemon Center to deposit three of them into the PC. However, when checking it for her missing Pokemon, they were nowhere to be found. She deposited the three extra eggs and began to panic, surely they couldn't have just transformed into eggs? Not wanting to be seen panicking in the middle of the Pokemon Center, she ran outside, hyperventilating a little. The three Pokemon with her which weren't eggs stared up at her, just as worried as her. Looking to her side, she saw the "Mew" egg, despite the fact she didn't remember taking it with her. She pushed it off to the side and sat down, taking deep breaths. There had to be a more logical reason as to why her Pokemon were just replaced with eggs-

Her thoughts were suddenly interrupted with loud yelps of terror, which was quickly accompanied by her own screech of terror as she looked over to see an eggshell forming around Seviper. Manetric and Doodle were trying to pry it off, but it formed faster than they could remove it, and by the time Caitlyn had made it over to help, the shell had already sealed up.

"Wh- huh- Seviper!" she gasped, trying to break the shell. But it was too solid for her to break without risking harm to her dear Pokemon. "What in the name of Arceus IS this egg?!"

Hurrying back inside to deposit both eggs into the PC, she was greeted with a horrifying sight - the entire box she had placed the first three eggs in was now filled to the brim with nothing but eggs. It wasn't just the Pokemon that were replaced, but even every empty slot was just another egg. She reluctantly put the Seviper-egg into the next box, which was thankfully empty, and went to put the "Mew" egg in the PC - only to look back and see a whole pile of eggs. The other people in the Pokemon Center were staring in confusion at the girl frantically shoving eggs into Pokeballs and depositing them into the PC, and the scene only got stranger as Doodle ran in, carrying another egg and panicking as much as Caitlyn - the egg quite obviously used to be Manetric. Quite soon, Caitlyn had filled several boxes with eggs which continued to multiply exponentially through the PC box, and she hadn't even placed the original egg in.

Sitting down on the floor and half-sighing, half-sobbing, Doodle had to nearly drag her outside away from all the stares. And then, of course, he turned into an egg.

When the panicked grief wore off, it soon dawned on Caitlyn that she was now sitting behind a Pokemon Center in a pile of eggs, which were still multiplying by the second. She could mourn later, but right now, she needed to get rid of these eggs before there were too many to handle. Her first thought was to smash one of the eggs she knew wasn't one of her dear Pokemon, so she grabbed it and smashed it onto the floor. While she expected to see yolk or something of the sort, instead some sort of multicolor gunk came out. It did nothing for a few seconds, and then started to vibrate, taking the shape of another egg. In a panic, she started smashing the eggs at random, each one doing the same thing. But the eggs kept multiplying as she did it, and she didn't notice the pile behind her growing unstable until it had already fallen down and crashed upon her, crushing her in a pile of eggs.

As her vision faded, she saw a single egg - the original one she had purchased, hatch into a little Mew.

"Arceus damn it…"

And that's when her internal organs were finally crushed by the collapsed egg pile.