The Legend Thief - Part 5: The Cure

Chapter 22: Mr. Peeve

"Where is this stupid desert?!" Bell cried out in frustration.

Shell rolled her eyes, "Let's just go ask a store or something." She walked stiffly towards the nearest one, which had a stand outside connected to a small stable.

The store-owner was a man, who was sitting lazily on a blue-yoga ball. He was eating handfuls of heffa chips, spilling crumbs onto his beard.

"Hello!" Shelly said, "Oh wait. Do you know how to speak Engl--"
"Of course I do!" the man said, shoving more chips into his mouth, his moustache twitching as he chewed, "I'm Mr. Peeve and I don't care about your favorite color."

"Excuuuuse me?" Ravisu walked up to him, "How could you not care about my favorite color?"

"Hmph," Mr. Peeve said, "Because more people care about me. As a kid, I hated camel-training school. Like, it was the worst place ever! I don't even know how I got this job, as you see, I was this amazing student at Birchly..."

Mr. Peeve kept on talking about himself, until Shelly began to get fed up. She tilted on her range of emotion, landing directly on anger.

Shell reached inside her pocket and pulled out a blue pistol. Designs of white waves patterned the sides. She pointed the gun at Mr. Peeve, "Where is the desert? Hurry up and tell us!"

"No way. I'm not done with my story yet. But I can finish it when you're in jail." Mr. Peeve calmly picked up his phone to dial 911, but Shelly quickly shot at Mr. Peeve's hand. He shrieked, and closed his eyes tightly as not to see his 'bloody' hands.

"Is that a water gun?" Bell whispered in Shell's ear.

Shell replied, "Yes, but Mr. Peeve is also highly vulnerable to the placebo effect."

Shelly plucked a map from the back of the stall, and returned to the friends.

"What if he does call the police?" Pichu asks.

Shell shrugged, "They'll think he's lying. After all, his hands aren't covered in blood. Hey, Ravisu, catch."

Shelly threw the map to Ravisu, who opened it up. She pointed to her right, "We should see the Gobi desert in roughly 10 minutes, if we travel at 30 mph. How many miles would we travel then?"

"What? We're not in math!" Rudia cried.

Bell and Raichu replied unanimously, "5 miles!"

"Good job you get a sticker!" Ravisu stuck a mango price tag on the Bell.

"Gimme the sticker!" Raichu said, and pulled it off Bell. In turn, she grabbed onto the sticker, and the two played tug of war until Pichu pried it away from them.

Shelly urged the friends to hurry up, and soon Bell had gotten out her pokemon, Croissant, for everyone to hop on.

"Ok! Let's go. I'll lead the way." Bell said, climbing on her pokemon. Everyone else hopped on her steed and they took off into the desert.

***

"I'm thirsty!" Rudia complained.

Bell smiled, "That's why I brought all this water!" She pulled out a zip-lock of water. Carefully, she gave the bulging bag to Rudia.

"How do I drink this?" Rudia cried, looking for an opening. She tried squeezing it, but it burst into her hands.

"AHH! RUDIA!" Shell cried, looking at her soaked hands. "WE NEED TO CONSERVE OUR WATER, NOT BURST IT!"

"How do I drink out of a ziplock bag?" Rudia argued.

"Why don't you ask Bell?" Shelly asked, turning toward Bell.

Bell rolled her eyes, "Just carefully open the top, and drink out of the bag like this." She demonstrated by opening the bag and licking the water like a dog.

"That doesn't make any sense!" Rudia called.

"I know," Bell smiled. "It makes dollars instead."

"OOOOHHHHH!!!" Quinci cried at the awesome REK!

"You see," Rudia countered. "I would roast you back, but my mom told me not to burn trash."

"OOOOOHHHHHH!!!!" everyone cried this time. Raichu covered his mouth with his hand. Quinci made a mental note to use that REK later. Shelly gasped at the amazing REK. Ravisu fell on salamence, unable to control her laughter. Even Pichu, the Protego-y person, couldn't stifle out a giggle. Bell looked defeated.

Her face grew as red as a towmato, "Does anyone have any better ideas to drink water?"

"Actually, I do," Ravisu said, taking out her swanna. She took out an empty pokeball and pointed toward it. Swanna condensed the water vapor in the air and filled up the pokeball with water. Ravisu drank the whole thing and summoned swanna back into its pokeball.

"YAS!" Pichu cheered. "WE CAN CREATE WATER OUT OF THIN AIR!"

"Not thin air," Shelly corrected. "Humid air."

"You see," Ravisu explained, "swanna takes the water vapor from the air and condenses it. The more humid it is, the more water it can condense. The more dry it is, the less water it can condense. The farther we get into the desert, the drier the air will be, meaning less water to condense."

"Oh," Pichu sighed sadly.

"That is why we should use this method of summoning water out of the air while we're starting our journey," Ravisu suggested. "Then when there is no more water to condense, we'll use Bell's, um, plastic bags."

"I just hope we can make it that far," Shelly sighed.