This chapter was officially rewritten by Twin2 on 3-9-07.
Readers new and old, welcome to Winging It. If you've been reading for a while you'll see I've done a bit of a plot review; apologies for that, but it was driving me crazy. Crazier than Wing on one of her bad days. If you've already read chapters one to six, then you can skip over these and go straight on to the new chapters I'm sure I put up earlier this morning. If you're new, read on and enjoy.
Drakoleses, apologies, but I'm not kidding, these chapters were seriously driving me insane. I've got everything back on track now, though, so get ready for one hell of a ride.
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One: The Benden Master
May 23rd, spring
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"Sparks!" the girl cried out. She cupped her hands around her mouth and tried again. "Sparks!" Nothing.
Swearing quietly, she continued down the path, limping slightly and leaning on a wooden staff to keep her balance. Her path was confident, as if she knew where she was going, even though she was searching for her currently AWOL friend. After a hundred metres or so she paused once more, filled her lungs, and shouted a deafening cry. "SPARKACHU!"
Faintly, on the edge of her hearing, she heard an answering shout from all too far off and sighed softly, not quite with relief, but not at all uncaring.
"Finally," she muttered, eyes flashing with annoyance. For just a minute they flickered with a paler brown tint and speckles of gold before steadying to their usual mahogany. There was a slight twitch at the side of her eye that might have indicated pain at the switch, but the girl walked on without pause, unsmiling. Her face was deadly serious, and even though her tanned skin and often lively brown eyes would indicate otherwise, this was her usual attitude. Long black hair was tied into a loose ponytail that fell to her knees – a long distance, as she was also quite tall.
A small yellow Pokémon suddenly leaped onto her shoulder with shriek, but she wasn't startled. Never was, never would be.
"Where the hell have you been?" she asked, not reprimanding, merely interested.
"Chu, ka ka chu!" the Pikachu-like creature declared in its Pokémon dialect, waving the tail that was much more tapered than an average Pikachu's.
"You're evil, my friend," the girl announced nonchalantly, watching several flocks of Taillow and Pidgey shoot overhead, looking rather aggravated.
"Chu chu," said the Pokémon happily. She and the human walked on – well, the human walked. The small electric-type rode on her shoulder, an easy fit; the shoulder was a popular place for members of the Pikachu evolutionary line to sit.
The sun was almost directly overhead when the girl stopped walking and sat with her back against a tree, grimacing faintly. The Pokémon immediately hopped off her shoulder and chirruped at her anxiously, tugging on the sleeve. "Chu! Ka, kachu?"
The girl nodded slowly. "Don't worry, I'm okay. This leg just makes it a little hard to move. And –" she cut herself off with a gasp. "It's starting to ache, bad." She let her staff fall to the floor. "Sparks, you're evil."
"Chu?" The little creature she called 'Sparks' looked up innocently.
"Quit poking my leg or I'll poke you!" the girl snapped, her voice suddenly a whole lot more annoyed. Her eyes streaked with silver as the Pokémon jumped back, stumbling over a rock, before fading once more to brown.
Sparks poked out her tongue and leaped away, making the girl, known as Wing, even madder. "Come back here! You're a menace to society! And me!"
Sparks grinned. "Kachu, kachu, chu ka ka."
"You're evil," said Wing, for the third time that day.
But, evil and a menace to society or no, it didn't stop Wing from getting out a pot and knife and making a quick vegetable soup-stew-casserole thing for the pair of them. Sparks filched a slice of dried leppa berry from Wing's backpack when she wasn't looking and watched her stir the pot absentmindedly.
The girl wore a pair of considerably battered jeans, torn at the knee from one too many stumbles with her bad leg. Her top was a pale blue polo shirt with black cuffs and collar, and a pale blue headband kept whatever long black hair that escaped her ponytail under control and out of her face.
Wing ladled out two bowls of soup and handed one to Sparks, who peeped happily and dug in, accepting the spoon Wing thrust at her after a messy slurp or two. Shaking her head, the girl prodded at her own bowl listlessly for a moment, took a couple of mouthfuls and then pushed it away.
Sparks looked up immediately. "Chaa?"
"I'm just not hungry," she muttered by way of explanation. "I just…" she sighed. "I don't want to eat."
"Chuu! Cha chu!" Sparks waved her spoon at the girl vehemently. Wing couldn't hold back a smile, even though her stomach was churning.
"Sorry, girl. I just don't want to eat anything." Wing sighed again, leaning back against the tree and closing her eyes. "Not hungry."
"Chu!" Sparks stood up and poked at the human with her spoon. Wing opened one eye to glare at her. "Chu chu ka ka chua!" the creature explained emphatically, waving its arms around and pointing at the spoon to help get its message across. "Ka!"
"Sparks, I'm not hungry," Wing said crossly. "I just feel a little sick, okay? Nothing to have a mental meltdown over."
Sparks leaped from the ground onto her companion's head and smacked her on the forehead with her spoon.
"Ow! What the hell!?"
"Chu! Chu chu chu!" Sparks poked at her friend's mouth with the spoon.
"Ow! Sparks, I don't want to eat! Flaming hell!" Wing grabbed the spoon in one hand and the Pokémon's middle with the other.
What could have become a fight was swiftly broken up by a large Skarmory suddenly diving from the sky and trying to snatch the creature Wing called Sparks straight out of her grip. The electric-type ducked the blow.
Wing grabbed up her staff, dropping the spoon for now, and smacked the steel/flying type with it, Sparks still clinging to her head and Wing's hand still on her to hold her steady. "Oi!" Wing shouted, furious, not at Sparks for once, but at their unwarranted attacker. "You leave Sparks alone!" The Skarmory came swooping down again for another shot and Wing whacked the left wingtip, forcing the Pokémon to sweep off to the side. Elementary physics of flight.
Wing clumsily alternated Sparks and her staff so that the weapon/walking stick was in her right hand – her strong one. "Try that again," she snarled, moving her body into an aggressive position but holding the staff defensively.
The apparently very hungry Skarmory dove towards her again, and Wing's bad leg chose that moment to give out: she was well-balanced, too well, with too much weight on the injured limb. She fell sideways with a startled yelp.
Sparks decided to take things into her own hands – paws. Leaping from Wing's head, she charged up, sparks spitting from her distinctive star-shaped cheeks, and released a powerful electric attack with a yowl of fury.
The Skarmory screamed and fell back, shaking its now-smoking head. Wing sat up dazedly. "Thanks for getting off before shooting that charge, that looked like it hurt," she said.
Suddenly the steel-flying combo decided that this was too much trouble for a skinny electric rodent and flapped off quickly, to find a lunch with less firepower and fewer angry humans defending it.
Wing blinked as Sparks landed in front of her. "That was a piece of excitement I didn't count on," she remarked, and turned back to the covered soup. It was still bubbling happily, completely undisturbed and uncaring that the two who had been tending it had just been fighting for Sparks's life.
Wing shook her head sadly. "Life, why do you hate me?" she sighed mournfully.
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Jessie, James and Meowth of Team Rocket had been watching this whole encounter on a nearby hill. "I can't believe you lost those twerps!" Well, James and Meowth had been watching. Jessie was fuming over losing Ash and his friends in the nearby forest where they were trekking, completely oblivious to the life-and-death battle that had just taken place.
"That girl's Pikachu is very strong," James observed, not paying attention to Jessie's shouting. "Possibly even stronger than the twerp's Pikachu. It drove off that Skarmory in a single shot."
Meowth nodded his agreement, also ignoring Jessie, who was still ranting in the background about maps and binoculars. He adjusted his own binoculars fastidiously and piped up, "It's not a normal Pikachu, either. It's too small, for one thing. Its tail is a funny shape, the black on its ears dips inwards and its cheeks are star-shaped. Very distinctive. It must be a rare sub-species."
"Let's capture it!" Jessie announced randomly. James and Meowth looked at each other.
"She was actually listening?"
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Wing carefully dabbed at Sparks with a cloth soaked with a mix of disinfectant and Potion, even as the Pokémon complained and wriggled, trying to escape.
"Sparky, there's something cut here, and I don't want it infected." The girl pinned her friend down ruthlessly and swiped the cloth she was using over the Pokémon's cheeks. "If it's stinging, there's a cut there, so quit whining and hold still!"
"Chu!" The Pokémon pinned her ears down with her hands, trying to shield them from Wing's rampage.
"Oh." Wing paused and drew back a little, letting the electric-type stand up. "So, you'd rather that I don't swab your ears because it stings?"
Sparks nodded.
"So you'd rather let them get infected because I couldn't wash them once and get rid of the germs, and instead have to have them washed every day for a week and bandaged because if I don't you'll get gangrene and die? Or would you rather just let me run the cloth over them once?" She held up one finger to emphasise her point.
Sparks glared at her for a moment, grabbed the cloth, and started cleaning her ears herself.
"Atta girl." Wing poured the uneaten stew/soup into an airtight container – it could be reheated over a fire or camping stove for dinner or tomorrow's lunch. Quickly and keeping an eye on Sparks, she washed out the pot she'd used to make the soup originally and put it back into her backpack, along with the spoons and bowls. She zipped up the bag and dropped it near the path she'd left off before picking up her staff again. "Alright, are we ready to go?"
Sparks threw the cloth at her friend, who caught it without blinking and turned away to cram it into her backpack, saying as she did so, "I guess that takes care of that, right, girl?"
A small explosion interrupted her.
"Chaa!" Sparks screamed, more from surprise than fear. A net had just exploded out of the shrubbery, entangling her and dragging her down. Instantly she began to fight, biting at the ropes of the net and squirming like anything. The ropes began to cut into her sensitive ears, tangled in the cords, and she shrieked, fighting in earnest.
Wing whipped around and her brown eyes widened before flashing grey tinged with gold. "Sparks!" she howled in anger and shock.
Raucous, annoying, sneering laughter announced the arrival of two people and a Pokémon. A balloon shaped like the head of a cat Pokémon began to rise above the trees, a line dragging from it to the net that held Sparks.
"Prepare for trouble!" shouted the woman with long red hair.
"And make it double!" added the man with shorter blue hair.
Wing disregarded them both, dropped her staff and made a flying dive for her Pokémon, which was being lifted into the air.
"Hey! Pay attention!" the woman yelled, before continuing to recite their motto. "To protect the world from devastation!"
"To unite all people in our nation!"
Wing was hanging off the bottom of the net that held her Pokémon captive, swinging slightly with her momentum, but clinging on grimly. "Hang in there, Sparky," she whispered, unable to ignore the lyrics wafting down on her from above and gritting her teeth because of it.
"To denounce the evils of truth and love!"
"To send our reach to the stars above!"
Wing made a disgusted face, struggling frantically with the knots that held the net closed as the balloon drifted higher and trying not to let go and fall off.
"Jessie!"
"James!"
"Team Rocket blasts off at the speed of light!"
"Surrender now or prepare to fight!"
"Meowth! That's right!" the Pokémon announced.
"I think I'm gonna be sick," Wing told her Pokémon with a grimace. "Those lyrics just… ugh." She shuddered.
"Hey!" Jessie shouted, having only just noticed Wing clinging grimly to the net. "Get off there! We stole that Pikachu fair and square!"
"Pikachu?" Wing said, confused, tugging on the loosening tangle of wire rope. "Boy, are they in for a surprise." The knot gave way at last, and Sparks wriggled out of the snaring cords to sit on Wing's shoulder again.
"Stop that!" Jessie yelled, infuriated.
Meowth sighed. "Here she goes again."
And sure enough, Jessie was off ranting about how people should make their own way in the world and not feed off the success of others. James and Meowth stood by idly and pretended to listen.
Wing ignored them all once more and began to climb up the rope that connected the net to the balloon, arm muscles straining, hand over hand, until she gauged she was close enough, set her foot in a loop of the rope and used it as a platform to push off from, jumping straight into the balloon's basket.
Jessie paused in her ranting, obviously not ready to have a calmly angry girl suddenly leap up from below the basket. James and Meowth stared at her with obvious surprise as Sparks transferred herself from the girl's shoulder to stand next to her on the edge of the basket.
"How the hell did you get up here?!" Jessie shouted, furious.
"I told you we should have –" Meowth was cut off by Jessie, who shouted, "How dare you interrupt me!"
It probably would have gone on a lot longer than that, except Wing intervened by saying loudly, "Y'know, evil monologues are not cool, they are really annoying and a pointless waste of time."
She had their attention again, although for how long was still in question. So she took advantage of it. "Stealing Pokémon is cruel, cowardly and lazy. You should be ashamed of yourselves, but, seeing as I doubt you will, I'll have to administer a punishment myself."
"What are you gonna do, twerp?" Jessie sneered confidently.
Wing ignored the jab and turned her head slightly to the side and down to look at Sparks. "Hey, little Sparkachu," she said clearly, making sure Team Rocket heard every word. "Got enough power for a Discharge?"
The electric type grinned and cracked her knuckles. It was answer enough.
Wing inclined her head and braced herself. This was going to sting. "Go for it, girl."
"Spark…" the creature began to say, electricity crackling around her cheeks.
"What in the world?" Meowth wondered.
"Kaa…" it continued, clenching her fists to brace the power of the attack. Wing tensed, getting ready.
"CHUUUU!"
Electricity blasted through the balloon as Wing sprang off, executing a perfect backflip and getting zapped only slightly from the offshoots as her Pokémon followed her suicidal leap off the exploding balloon.
"Team Rocket's blasting off again!" the trio shouted as they were hurled into the distance.
As they flew through the air Jessie suddenly pointed. "Hey, look! It's the twerps!"
Sure enough, the Pokémon team were standing around in a clearing, arguing. Pikachu looked very bored.
"This calls for a new plan," Jessie announced as they continued their unscheduled flight.
Wing was falling headfirst, but the girl could only grin, knowing Sparks to be coming up behind her.
The little electric-type was moving faster than Wing, and as she reached her, grabbed onto her shoe, beginning to pull back. "Sparkaachuu!" she shouted once more.
A pair of massively long, brown-and-white wings snapped out from her back, emerging from the hidden hollows in her back made to hide them, and beginning to flap strongly. Wing found herself slowing, being hung in midair by a Pokémon not even two feet tall. She hit the ground lightly and lay there for a minute, still grinning like a maniac.
Wing sat up and brushed the leaves out of her hair. "Thanks, Sparks."
"Sparkachu!" her Pokémon announced cheerfully, folding her feathery wings again. They tucked themselves neatly into the niches in her back, hiding them from view until they were later needed and creating the illusion of two brownish 'D' shapes on her back in place of Pikachu stripes.
Wing picked herself up and checked her Pokémon over. "Bunch of weirdoes," she muttered crossly, dusting herself off.
She began to limp back towards the clearing where she'd left her gear, wincing at every step unsupported by her staff, and at the same time, a feeling of something long forgotten flickered inside her, and she pulled out a battered Pokédex.
It flicked open smoothly and Wing pressed a few buttons in sequence. A picture of a small electric-type Pokémon appeared on the screen. It was quite small, slightly confused-looking, and staring inquisitively at the camera. The tips of its ears, covered in black fur, were shaped like a Pikachu's, but the colouring was shaped more like that of a Pichu. Its tail was tapered to a razor of a lightning bolt, shaped more like a Raichu's tail than a Pikachu's. The stripes on its back, only just visible from the angle the photo had been taken at, were non-existent, and its back looked slightly concave and too thin. Stubby brown and white streaked wings spread from its shoulders, slightly crooked and clumsy-looking.
The Pokédex's voice piped up, still strong after nine years of use. "Sparkachu. The Flying Mouse Pokémon. Sparkachu is a strange Pokémon that appears to be a part of the Pikachu evolutionary family. Its wings are more powerful than they look, and can be used as weapons, often in more than the traditional Steel Wing and Wing Attacks. Its various electrical attacks are strong enough to short out a small city, and it can charge and hold as many volts as a battery four times its size. It is uncertain how this Pokémon originated, and there is only one in captivity."
"Yeah, you," Wing whispered to her Sparkachu.
Something made her press another button, and the dex's voice rang out once more. "This Pokédex belongs to Wing Benden, who first won the Johto League and defeated the Johto Elite Four when she was twelve. A year later she took on and defeated the Indigo League and Kanto Elite Four, and soon afterwards defeated the Hoenn League."
Wing shook her head gently. "I did so much when I was still so young," she murmured, snapping the Pokédex shut before it could read her the autobiography she knew by heart.
She picked up her gear and began to limp off on the trail she'd been walking before her leg had started to bother her and started this whole ruckus. She didn't like to stay in one place for too long.
Sparks trotted along beside her, content for now. The trouble that followed them had dropped back a few paces. Sparks was the only Pokémon Wing kept with her. With only one it could be tough to survive, but if she had any others, the Teams who sought her would have more leverage.
I can't stand still, but I can't run forever. It's too dangerous for me to stop. I have to think of everything that could go wrong. I have to expect the worst out of life.
Because of the path destiny chose, it's all I'll ever get.
Because of the path destiny chose, I'm one of the best. Of the best.
Because of the path I chose, my Pokémon aren't safe if they're with me. So I only take Sparks with me, and I'd prefer it if she was even safe. Even though my other Pokémon are upset at being left behind, it's better than the alternative.
It was her destiny to do this.
It was her destiny to be the strongest Pokémon Master of them all.
Her thoughts echoed mockingly. She was the best of the best, and she was running from the entire world, and her own mind.
Wing Benden, a Pokémon Master at twelve.
Wing Benden, the Master of three Leagues by fourteen.
Wing Benden, an international hero.
Wing Benden, missing, presumed dead.
Wing Benden, the top of the list on Team Rocket, Team Magma and Team Aqua's Most Wanted by fifteen.
Wing Benden, almost murdered at sixteen, who struck back and saved the world one last time.
Wing Benden, the eighteen year old no one could find.
Mess with me, and I'll mess back.