Pokemon Ice Blue

It was a normal day like every other day when 17 year old Daniel and his mother went to the local flea market. Daniel wandered around while his mother negotiated on a price for a piece of furniture. He must've wandered around for about half an hour when he came to a table selling handheld game cartridges. He'd never seen so many types of games outside of Amazon, ranging from a Mario game for the original Gameboy to the newest one for the 3DS.
Nothing caught his eye until about a quarter of the way down the table. There he saw a cartridge for a 3DS game titled Pokémon Ice Blue. Daniel had played the Pokémon games when he was younger and gave up around the time of Black & White but kept up on what new creatures had been added since then. From what he knew of the newest games there was no such game as Ice Blue. Was this a fan made game that someone sold to the flea market? Either way the answer didn't matter, he just had to try this game out. Daniel payed a couple dollars to the man selling the games and went to reunite with his mother, never looking back to notice the man give a smirk and vanishing along with all the games.
The whole ride home Daniel felt anxious to start playing his new game, cursing himself for not thinking of grabbing his 3DS if he found an interesting game. As soon as he got home Daniel practically ran all the way to his room, grabbed his 3DS and inserted the cartridge.
Turning the system on Daniel noticed that the usual icon for a 3DS game showed nothing, but he figured since this was probably a fan made game whoever made it didn't bother making an icon. Pressing the A button Daniel wondered how good the game might be considering how hard it is to put new games onto these cartridges.
Ten seconds pass before the title screen popped up. The screen was pretty cool looking depicting a snow covered town with various sprites wearing winter clothing and snow themed Pokémon wandering around. Pressing the start button caused the speakers to emit a pixelated sound clip of wind blowing.
A couple seconds pass and Daniel is surprised that there is no professor introducing him to the world of Pokémon. Instead it took him to the name select screen to name his character. He knew people liked to put their own names in for the silent heroes of these games but Daniel never liked doing that. Thinking for a minute he decided on naming his character Winter. Pressing the A button Daniel was brought to a character customization screen. He had heard about the latest games being able to let you select your characters skin tone and change cloths so he wasn't that surprised to see it. What did surprise him was the amount of choices. Hair of every length, every color as well including anime hair, many shades of skin color and eye color. The amount of choices made it seem like the creator of this game had too much time on their hands if they could program a simple game like Pokémon with every variation of skin tone. In the end Daniel ended up having Winter have an albino look, just to play as something different and to stay with the winter theme.
As soon as he pressed A to continue Winter went from the character customization screen to a well furnished room. Knowing how these games went Daniel knew this was Winter's home. Moving Winter so as to go downstairs and meet his mother Daniel took notice of the snow flurries blowing outside the window in Winter's room.
Once Winter was downstairs his mother told him to bundle up before going to see Professor Fir for his birthday present. Daniel was amused that the creator decided to keep the tree theme for the professor in this game.
Leaving the house Winter was standing in front as snow continued falling onto the snow blanketed ground. Wandering around Daniel learned that the town was called Frostbite Village, most likely named for the snow falling, that the region was called Tunberia and that more snow was coming.
After a few minutes Daniel found the lab where Professor Fir should be to get his first Pokémon. One of the assistants said that the professor was out doing some field work out on Route 1. Leaving the lab Daniel pointed Winter towards the exit of the town and-
"Now this is unusual," called out Daniel's father. Daniel closed the system so it would be in sleep mode and went to see what his father was talking about.
Getting into the living room Daniel noticed both of his parents standing at the front door. He looked past them and saw a most unusual sight.
Snow.
It was the middle of July and yet it was snowing. Not only that but it was snowing in Florida of all places.
Both of his parents asked each other what this weather meant before closing the door. Daniel's mother walked over to the tv and switched it to the local news.
"Coming in just now is word that snow is falling all over the state of Florida, despite the fact that we are currently in the middle of a heat wave. Right now meteorologists are getting together to figure out what's causing this unusual change in weather. Stay tuned for more updates."
Daniel went back to his room and tried to ignore the fact that it was snowing right now. But he couldn't get it out of his mind.
Why was it snowing in Florida, a state that never gets snow even in winter? How could it be snowing in summer at all? He was lucky he didn't have to find the answers to that question.
Opening the system back up Daniel immediately noticed something had changed since he played a few minutes earlier. Winter was no longer in Frostbite Village. Instead he was near a snow covered tree on Route 1.
Daniel knew something was up and opened up the main menu. The clock hadn't paused at all and pulling up the map showed that Winter was halfway up the route before the next town. Before he could figure out what was going on Daniel exited the menu and nearly dropped the system. Winter was facing forward, or down according the the dpad, when he was facing up when Daniel entered the menu.
Feeling a little spooked Daniel held down the power button until the screens went black. Did Winter really move on his own or was that a glitch what with it being fan made and all. Either way Daniel wasn't going to be playing anymore Ice Blue tonight. In the morning he'd start a new file and forget all about the experience.
When morning arrived Daniel was surprised to see that it was still snowing outside, at three inches had accumulated overnight. The news wasn't any better at figuring out what was causing this unusual weather. Daniel called his friends to see if they wanted to hang at the mall but all of them said that they weren't going to go out in this kind of weather until it started to clear up.
Not feeling up to go out by himself Daniel decided to start a new file on Ice Blue.
Starting up the game Daniel was brought to the main menu and presented with two options: CONTINUE and NEW GAME. Selecting NEW GAME brought up the usual 'Are you sure' message and he selected YES.
That was when Daniel noticed something strange. The fade out went really slow, the sound of the wind blowing was also playing slow, almost sad, and he swore for a second an image popped up. Then the character customization screen popped in as it did normally so Daniel figured that the game must've had a slow processing speed when deleting the old file, but something kept nagging at him that he shouldn't be playing this game at all now. Ignoring that feeling Daniel proceeded to create his new character.
This time he chose to make his character dark skinned with bright colored clothes and named him Summer. Daniel kinda felt like having some warmth right now, even if it was just a new character designed like the season.
The game dropped Summer in the same house and knowing where to go Daniel proceeded to Professor Fir's lab where an assistant told him the the professor was on Route 1.
Journeying up Route 1 was easy considering there were no wild encounters programmed to go off. After going halfway up Daniel noticed a figure lying under a single lone tree. The same tree Winter was by the night before.
Cautiously Daniel maneuvered Summer over to the figure and it turned out to be the professor, but his appearance startled Daniel. His limbs were a dark blue, almost like he was suffering from frostbite, his hair was a mess and his face, oh god, his face was all bloodied and with impressive shiners. Daniel felt this was wrong, even if it was just a fan made game.
The screen quickly changed to the interior of Fir's lab where his face was all cleaned up and he was wrapped up warmly in a blanket. The dialogue told how the professor was studying the hibernation patterns of Rattata when he was attacked by an unknown assailant. This made Daniel wonder if it was a Pokémon or whatever villainous team was made for this game. Either way there was no way to know at this point.
The dialogue eventually changed to where Daniel could pick his starter Pokémon. The choices presented were a Machop, Abra and Seel. This surprised Daniel since the starters were always a fire type, water type and grass type. It felt different to pick a different type than usual. After a minute Daniel chose the Machop since he'd always like the evolved form of this guy. Afterwards the professor presented Summer with the Pokédex and five standard balls.
Once all the dialogue was finished Daniel half expected a battle with a rival and was disappointed that there wasn't one. Wanting to see if this game was of standard length Daniel checked the trainer card. Surprisingly there were only four gym leaders to get badges from. Not even half the length of a full game. Checking the map also supported this since, outside the starting town, there were only four cities and a couple other towns shown.
Now the real portion of the game could start.
Daniel had Summer head north and east through Routes 1 and 2 to get to the next town, the map showing it to be called Snowflake Town. Along the way he encountered many different Pokémon that would logically be out and about during winter weather. There were obviously ice types but there were also fighting and psychic types, a couple flying types, a handful of water types and surprisingly dark types. There were also some trainers here and there that weren't exactly hard to beat.
By the time Daniel reached the town he needed to find the Pokécenter to heal his Pokémon.
The town was pretty big, about as large as one of the small cities in one of the main games. Around where he entered there was a snow covered park where kids were building snowmen and making snow angels. In the center of town was a gigantic statue of an Abamasnow, feeling even bigger with the 3D display on. The other end of town was the exit to Route 3. Backtracking a bit Daniel noticed a building with a red cross on it that said CENTER.
Going inside Daniel saw that this was a combined mart and center. After traveling down the combined double route he had plenty of money to get some potions and buy more balls. First things first he took his Pokémon, now including an Umbreon and a Ralts, to Nurse Joy and had them all healed to full health. Next he went over to the store clerk and was met with a surprise. There were potions, antidotes and, strangely, revives available to buy. There weren't even any balls to buy. What could this mean? That Daniel would have to continue to the next gym and save his balls for more worthy Pokémon?
Either way Daniel knew he had to really think if he wanted to succeed at this game.
After getting as many potions he could get Daniel decided to have Summer talk to the residents and see what kind of dumb text they were given. What the residents had to say was quite puzzling.
Winter has already passed by this town.
The white terror has spared us.
Don't follow the cold.
What were the NPC's talking about? It couldn't be the weather since there was snow everywhere but nothing else came to mind so Daniel figured it must be some story related dialogue. Afterwards Daniel led Summer east out of the town onto Route 3.
The route itself was similar to Routes 1 and 2, just more trainers, but once the town was at least one screen away Daniel discovered something horrifying.
Bodies.
There were bodies half buried in the snow. The graphics made it hard to figure out by sight what these people died of, but interacting with the first two told Daniel that their throats had been cut. He wanted to puke so badly. What kind of sick mind would put this type of thing into a game designed for kids? By the time Daniel reached Frosten City he had counted half a dozen bodies half buried in snow.
Things seemed normal enough in the city, but the atmosphere felt gloomy despite the city being beautiful. There were museums, two parks, cafes, three hotels, a theme park and a cold storage district, making this city bigger than any of the other cities of Pokémon. During the look around of the city Daniel found the gym along with the Pokécenter.
First things first he went to go heal his Pokémon, now consisting of a nearly evolved Machop, Umbreon, Kirilia and Pidgeotto. Once that was done Daniel headed straight to the gym, mostly to try to take his mind off of the grisly Route 3.
The inside of the gym told Daniel that the leader primarily used bug types with the design looking like honeycombs. Going up to the trainers brought up quizzes instead of a battle, questions about bugs.
Are spiders insects?
Bugs have only six legs?
The answers were really easy so he got to the leader in no time.
The leader, Bugella, dressed pretty similar to a Vespiquen. Her dialogue consisted of bug puns that were very cringe worthy, causing Daniel to groan. Once she was done talking the battle commenced.
Bugella started by sending out a Combee, a pretty weak Pokémon that Machop dispatched with ease. Next she sent out another Combee which was also quickly defeated by Machop and ended the match. Neither gave enough experience to level up Machop which annoyed Daniel since he hoped he'd have Machoke after this gym.
The leader congratulated Summer and handed over the Thorax Badge. As soon as the text was finished Daniel expected to leave. Instead a blacked out mass popped up behind Bugella and a fountain of blood spurted from her chest.
Daniel nearly dropped the system when that happened. He couldn't believe what had happened. All he wanted was to forget Route 3 and instead witnessed a grisly murder, even if it was just a game.
Just as suddenly as the mass popped in it vanished. Without any prompts Summer walked over to where the mass was and picked up a crudely written note.
COME TO FROSTEN FOREST DANIEL
Daniel's heart froze. Why was his name in this game? How could his name be in this game? A horrible feeling came from his gut, something telling him to turn this game off right now. That was when he remembered reading some stories online. Stories about people playing games that were almost sentient in nature. Could this be an undiscovered one? Knowing full well how those stories went he didn't want to know the truth of this game at all. Daniel pressed the power button for five seconds, ten seconds, fifteen seconds.
When he realized that he'd held the power down for twenty seconds and the system didn't shut off, fear flew into his mind. Quickly he ejected the cartridge, hoping that would disconnect the game. The game came out and Daniel held it in his hand before looking back at the screen. The game was still being shown despite the fact he was holding the damn cartridge in his hand.
Daniel wasn't sure what to do now. He was beyond spooked, he was frightened.
Don't be scared. We'll be in this together. He doesn't scare me.
That was in a dialogue box being show on the screen. Daniel wordlessly tried to figure out who was supposed to be saying this.
It's me, Summer.
It couldn't be, it just couldn't! The game was alive and talking to him. Not knowing what to do Daniel looked around his room and spotted the chest used to store rags and old clothes. He took both the game and the system and buried them under all the cloth, clasped it shut and shoved it into his closet.
Daniel vowed to never pick up that game ever again as long as he lived.

************

Two weeks passed since Daniel stowed both his 3DS and Ice Blue away in his closet. During that time the snow got worse. The news stations still couldn't figure out what was causing the strange weather, only that it was spreading. Now it was covering all of the Caribbean, most of the South and starting to creep into Central America. Orlando though was in total lockdown since the snow turned into a snowstorm, then into a blizzard and then into something out of a disaster film.
After two weeks Daniel's family was starting to run out of food and feared losing the electricity and freezing to death.
By this time Daniel was really scared, wondering if the weather would ever clear up.
After dinner on the fourteenth day Daniel went to his room and saw a strange bluish white light emitting from the cracks of the door to the closet. Cautiously he opened the door and the light vanished. Looking around Daniel saw the light coming out the seams of the chest. The same chest he put into the closet two weeks prior.
He jumped back, hands covering his mouth as a horrid thought came to his mind. Was the game waiting for him to continue playing? Daniel was scared. This was like Jumanji and Jurassic Park combined in a horrible way.
Then another thought came to his mind. How was the 3DS still on? The system only had a battery life of four hours so it should've died by now. Was the game able to keep the system alive despite the technical limits?
Quietly Daniel crept out of his room to see what his parents were doing. Peering into the living room he saw both of them asleep on the couch, embracing each other under blankets. No chance of them getting involved with this.
Going back into his room Daniel unlocked and unpacked the chest to uncover the system.
Daniel please! He's getting stronger!
"I'm here. Who's getting stronger?"
Thank Arceus you're back. It's Winter, he wont stop.
"That mass? You mean that was Winter? The character I made before you?"
Yes. He won't stop until he's beaten you.
"What can he do? It's just a game."
Haven't you noticed the weather? He's the cause of the snow you're getting. I've tried to stop him but I can't do it on my own. I need you, a player, to think things through and stop him before your world gets frozen over.
Now it all made sense. The snow started the day he started playing the game. He had been thinking it was coincidence because no other haunted games he'd read about affected the real world. He also thought abandoning the game would stop it because he'd read the horror stories of those game experiences being worse for the player because they had to know. Looks like he has to finish this game, not to see some dark secret but to save his world.
He nodded and Summer's dialogue stopped appearing, the menu opening up automatically showing that Summer had managed to evolve all the Pokémon to level one hundred and managed to grab a Charizard and a Greninja.
Exiting the menu Daniel saw that the screen was almost completely white from a blizzard going on. From what he could tell Summer was in a cave and facing someone.
Daniel knew who it was.
HELLO DANIEL! DID YOU MISS ME!
"Why? Why are you doing this?"
The game paused for a minute before continuing.
WHY DID YOU ABANDON ME? WE COULD'VE BEEN A GREAT TEAM!
Now he understood, "I thought the game had glitched. What was I supposed to do?"
ENOUGH TALK. LETS SEE WHOS A BETTER TRAINER.
The screen changed to the battle screen immediately. The music started up and it was haunting, like snow howling across a mountain. Winter's model looked just as Daniel remembered, except his expression was angry and his clothes slightly torn.
Winter sent out his first Pokémon and Daniel shivered. It was a Dragonite, except it looked frost bitten and frozen over. Knowing that dragons have few weaknesses Daniel sent out Gardivoir and started spamming its fairy moves. Only taking two hits Dragonite fainted while Gardivoir was still in the green.
Next Winter sent out a Gengar, it's eyes an icy blue. The prompt to change out Pokémon popped up and Daniel selected no since psychics were strong against ghosts.
Immediately he selected Gardivoir's strongest attack, caused a super effective attack that one hit killed the ghost.
Winter appeared back on and he looked different. His clothes were torn even more, his skin becoming a light blue and his face looking even angrier.
Winter sent out a Genesect, looking unchanged, and instantly killed Gardivoir. No prompt had come up asking if he even wanted to change Pokémon before the attack.
Almost instantly Summer sent out Pidgeot, exactly the Pokémon Daniel needed.
Daniel spammed the Fly move until Genesect died from the attack. Pidgeot was at half health when the round ended.
Winter appeared once more and was different again. Ice was erupting out of his shoulders and hair and his skin was a darker blue. This time he sent out an Abomasnow that instantly killed Pidgeot.
Immediately Charizard was sent out and used flamethrower to melt the ice type in one hit before being returned.
Instead of Winter appearing again a Magnetric was sent out. Daniel almost swore when he saw the electric Pokémon come out. Now it would have to be based on luck.
Dewdong was sent out and only managed to get the electric type down to half health before dying. Greninja was sent out next. Despite the type disadvantage it's evasion was higher. It nearly died when Magnetric was brought down.
Now Winter came back on and was down to one pokéball. Instead of sending another Pokémon out Winter started changing. His clothes ripped to shreds as the ice enveloped his whole body, ice horns forming on his head, a mighty tail erupting from his rear. The health bar appeared and it went all the way to the edge of the screen.
Daniel gulped at the amount of health he'd need to whittle away. Almost instantly Winter attacked and Greninja went down. The change option popped up and Daniel picked Charizard to try melting this ice monster.
Despite the type advantage all of Charizards attacks were doing minimal damage before the fire dragon was defeated. All that was left was Machamp. Daniel wasn't sure if it could beat Winter but something started to happen on the screen.
Summer appeared behind Machamp and they started to merge into one character. It had eighteen arms, each based on the different types that Pokémon could be attributed, and it had two heads that looked like a mix between Machamp and Summer. Winter looked agitated and instantly attacked and... Got damaged instead.
Now Daniel knew why Summer needed him. A Pokémon couldn't very well give itself commands. Going into the attack section there was only one move: 18 Elemental Strike. Selecting that move gave the most glorious animation ever. When the grass arm landed razor leafs appeared. When the fire arm connected a fireball explosion engulfed Winter. Every time an arm hit the health gauge went down until it was emptied.
Once Winter had no more health a monstrous roar started blaring from the speakers before both screens went black. Unseen by Daniel the game cartridge that was still in the trunk disintegrated into nothing.
Pushing buttons repeatedly Daniel expected something to happen. That was when he realized he didn't hear the howling of the wind anymore.
Setting the system down Daniel ran to the front door and was surprised to see that the blizzard was over.
He won. He had really beaten Winter.
Going back to his room Daniel saw the 3DS was back on, but this time it was in the 3DS memo app where there was written: Thank you, Summer.
Then the battery died.
Later that day the news reported on how the snow storm was officially over. No one could figure out what caused the storm but Daniel knew. He decided the best way to let people know was to put his story online and warn people away from Pokémon Ice Blue.

One week later Daniel found an invitation in his email. An invitation to  join the Creepypasta Investigators.