Ratatta's Revenge: A Pokemon Creepypasta

When I heard the news of the Kanto remakes FireRed and LeafGreen coming out, I thought it would be a good idea to pick up my old Red game that I had beat several times. I dug my gameboy out of my dresser and inserted the cartridge.

The game started as usual, or so I thought, but it seemed that when I pressed Start, Charizard’s cry was different. Higher, maybe. Or perhaps I just didn’t remember what it really sounded like and expected it to sound different.

When I reached the menu, I had no desire to continue my old game, so I pressed “New Game.” The game started as usual, with Oak’s speech, asking my name, (I typed in the name “Jake”). I had no idea why I was being so paranoid; what could happen to my old Red cartridge?

The game continued normally; I chose Bulbasaur as my starter because I had never chosen it before. When Oak gave me the pokedex, however, it was not so I could finish it. It was actually completed, and Oak dropped hints about a brave young man who had completed it years before. Somewhat creeped out, I continued on to Viridian City. I caught a pidgey and ignored all the annoying ratattas that showed up. Honestly, I can’t stand the little purple rats.

The game started getting weird when I entered Viridian forest. I can’t remember any ratattas appearing in the forest before, but now the forest seemed to be only half-populated by the ever-present bug pokemon. The rest of the forest was inhabited by Ratatta, and some of the “bug catchers” commented on the annoying ratattas. This was definitely unusual, so I decided to look it up online. Sure enough, all sources showed that only bug pokemon, pikachu, and pidgey’s evolution line ever appeared in Viridian forest. So could mine be a hacked game? I had bought it at the local game store the day it arrived there, and the package looked brand-new and just like the others at the store.

Then I remembered that I had cut off the front side of the package with scissors and kept it as a reminder of the good old days. I took it down from where it was hanging on my bulletin board and looked up a picture of the Red package online. Everything looked exactly the same as I could tell; even the little Nintendo stickers were in place. Huh.

I was a bit creeped out by the game, but I was anxious to see more of this rattata-craziness. Maybe this was a weird earlier version of Red that incorporated many more rattata than the normal copy?

I decided to continue the game, after all, it’s just a game, what can it do to me? I continued on to beat Brock and go through Mount Moon. In every patch of grass or in every cave it seemed that a Rattata would appear, only heightening my suspicion of it being a hack. But the rattata seemed the only weird thing about the game so I went on.

The game got really strange when I had gotten to Fuchsia City and tried to go into the safari zone. The guard inside the building stopped me, not to take my pokeballs and give me safari balls, but to deliver this disappointing news:

“I’m sorry, but the Safari Zone is closed due to the ratatta infestation. We hope to get it up and running again.”

However, he did not stop me from actually entering the Safari Zone. When I went inside, a horrible scene met my eyes.

Rattata sprites scampered everywhere. With every step into the grass, a ratatta would appear, and its cry seemed louder than ever before. Only now did I realize that the cry of the charizard at the start of the game had sounded so strange because it was being drowned out with the cry of ratatta.

Everywhere sat still sprites of the normal pokemon that appeared in the Safari zone- nidoran, chansey, parasect, kangaskhan, tauros and many more. When I went up to one and pressed a, a text box appeared:

“A pokemon that has been mauled by the wild rattata”.

I stifled a scream and slammed the gameboy down on my bed. This was too much. Too much. But with my eyes away from the screen, I felt bored already. This game was definitely messed with but would it really hurt to play just a bit more?

I picked up the game again and ran straight out of the Safari zone. The attendant stopped me, though, and said:

“I told you the Safari Zone was closed. It’s not what it used to be.”

Then it hit me. What it used to be….

I continued the game, but it seemed the ratatta problem was only getting worse. On a curious visit to Lavender town, I found the Pokemon Tower packed to the brim with people mourning over their dead pokemon. Nearly all of them shared some dismal message about never going into tall grass again, and one lady ever said that she had heard news of a young child being killed by a horde of rattata.

After defeating Koga in Fuchsia, I flew back to Pallet Town so I could surf down to Cinnabar Island. I battled the swimmers, several of them saying that the water is the only place safe from the ratatta. Then I went to Pokemon Mansion to try to catch a ditto for breeding. That was my mistake.

The moment I stepped inside the pokemon mansion, battle music played. “A wild rattata appeared!” The text box read. I sent out my strongest pokemon, Venusaur. To my surprise, the battle did not begin. The text just continued.

“A wild rattata appeared!”

“A wild rattata appeared!”

“A wild rattata appeared!”

It kept going on and on until the screen was nearly filled with the ugly gray rattata sprites. Then it faded to black.

“Wild rattata tore apart your Venusaur. Send out another pokemon?”

As always, the yes/no menu appeared. Panicked, I selected no.

“Can’t Escape!”

It sent me to my party. To my horror, Venusaur was no longer there. In its place was just an empty slot.

“No, no, no, no!” I cried, horrified. For lack of anything else to do, I sent out Snorlax.

The screen faded to black once more.

“Wild rattata tore apart your Snorlax. Send out another Pokemon?”

“No”

Again, I couldn’t escape. I watched in horror as the rattata tore apart each of my pokemon, until I was left with only Rapidash.

“Wild Rattata tore apart your Rapidash. Send out another Pokemon?”

What? I had no more!

I selected No, and once more I was told that I could not escape. Then it sent me to my party once again.

There, in the first slot, was the sprite of my character, Jake. My hand was shaking as I selected my own character. As I sent out the character, I saw that it too was trembling.

The screen faded to pure red as a text box appeared:

“RATTATA: Perhaps now they will pay attention to us…”