Alright! I'm getting a start on my HoennShipping story! Even though when I played Emerald it totally deleted my game when I was at the entrance to Victory Road. And I am so proud of it's title! What I tried to do with it is that I based this off of the Emerald game, so Team Magma and Team Aqua are all about the earth and water, but then Rayquaza comes along and yada yada it flies and I hope that explains it for you. I don't own Pokemon!
WE WATCH THE SKIES
Chapter 1: A Not So Warm Welcome
Bang!
"Ow!" I punched the side of the moving van for hitting a pothole and causing me to hit my head. I now regretted begging my mom to let me ride in the moving van once we had gotten off the plane. It was dark, uncomfortable, boring, and worst of all, I hadn't eaten anything in like, five whole freakin' hours! My stomach grumbled for the millionth time as I leaned up against the side of the vehicle, sighing.
"This sucks." I stated to myself, before the driver promptly slammed on the brakes, causing me to fall onto the cold metal floor.
"I'm going to beat the stuffing out of that butthole..." Suddenly someone pulled up the door in the back of the van.
"Hey Sapphire honey, did you have a nice trip?" I grumbled back at her, staring at the skid marks carved into the dirt driveway.
"Where's the driver? Someone so sucky at driving deserves to be punched in the gut a few times..." Mom sighed and rubbed her hand over her forehead like she often does, pushing her bangs back that had fallen out of her light pink barrette.
"You do remember that your father was driving, right?" I thought about it for a minute. Then I stubbornly crossed my arms.
"Duh! Of course I did! And dad needs a good lesson in vehicle controlling!" Mom laughed.
"I do agree with you there, your father isn't much of a driver."
"May, Sapph, are you guys going to help the Vigoroth and I take everything into the house?"
"Sure dad!" I grabbed one measly box and went inside. Though my parents had seen the place before, I hadn't. This was our last load, most of our things and furniture were already here, shipped far over the ocean from my hometown of Olivine City.
I hadn't been very excited about moving here. Olivine was fun and lively, lots to do. But this was a small town, barely anything here. The small town was called Littleroot in the Hoenn region.
My name is May Sapphire Winters. Everyone calls me by my middle name though, or Sapph, because my mom's name is also May. My dad moved us all across the world because he got a job as a gym leader in Petalburg City. The next two towns over. I mean, if you're going to get a new job shouldn't you at least move into that particular city?! At least there'd be something to do! My parents kept telling me that it was healthy for me to be raised in a small town though. Whatever. I was practically already raised! Yeah I'm always being called immature, irresponsible, or childish, but I'm twelve years old already. And yet another reason why I didn't want to move here, I was supposed to get my first Pokemon a year ago, but we had to put it off because of the move.
I knew my bedroom was upstairs. I hurried up the stairs and looked down the corridor. There were only three rooms down the hallway. A bathroom, and two bedrooms. The first one was my parents room,and the second was mine. Most of my boxes were already in there, a Vigoroth was putting the last of them in my room. I began opening them up, putting up posters and stuff. I quickly got bored of that though, and plopped down on my bed. I soon heard a knocking on my door and looked to see my mom standing there.
"How do you like it here?" She asked, handing me a much needed hamburger. "It has a quaint feel to it but it seems like an easy place to live, don't you think?" I shrugged my shoulders, digging into the unhealthiness that was this burger. My mom always told me that I should eat healthier, but my dad always argued back that I burned nearly every calorie with my hyperness, and that was why I'm always so hungry in the first place.
"I know you're still not too happy with us moving you here Sapphire." I still didn't answer. My mom sighed. "Don't forget to set your clock honey." She went back downstairs. I lazily got up and set my clock to 2:34, the time on both my Pokenav and iPod. The date was August 16th, we'd been moving everything all year and summer. I heard another knock at the door.
"Hey Sapph." This time it was my dad. "How's my complete funny business tough girl doin'?"
"Good."
"Hm." I know he didn't believe me. "Well, I'm taking the moving van and Pokemon to Petalburg with me. You want to have some goodbye shakes?" We always had chocolate shakes and did a personal handshake that only we knew before one of us had to leave for an extended period of time. Because dad worked all the way in Petalburg, he was going to spend the week there, then come home for the weekends.
"I'm not really hungry...?"
"Oh no! What have you done with Sapphire!?" My dad grabbed me, and slung me over his shoulder, spinning me around.
"Dad, come on! Put me down!" I laughed, pounding on his back.
"My daughter would never deny chocolate shakes!" He playfully roared at me as I continued to laugh. Finally though, he put me down.
"I suppose I could go for one right about now." Dad failed at ruffling my ridiculously unmanageable hair, only messing up my green bandana. Then we headed down to the kitchen.
After the shakes and handshake, my gym leader dad left for Petalburg City. It was only Tuesday, so he wouldn't be back until Saturday or Friday, depending on how busy his normal type gym was. That was basically the rest of the day. I went to sleep at only about nine, out of boredom.
The next morning I woke up rather early for me, around ten. Once I had gotten dressed, I went downstairs for something to eat. Boxes and items with no place littered the house.
"Oh, Sapphire! Come here, quick!" My mom called me over to her spot on the couch. The TV was on the news, but I barely looked. The news is boring. "Look it's Petalburg Gym!" She pointed to the television, giddy with excitement. "Your father's about to come on!" They were broadcasting the opening of the gym. Dad was standing in front of it with a pair of scissors, ready to cut the ribbon in front of the gym. Finally I looked with a twinge of cuiriosity, and went to sit down next to my mom. "Oh this is so exciting, isn't it? It's almost like we're famous!"
"Well, dad is." I mumbled. Mom and I watched the entire program while she made omelettes for us to eat. When she picked up our plates to clean, she struck up another conversation.
"So anyways Sapphire, one of dad's old friends lives in town. He lives right next door, so you should go introduce yourself." I absolutely hated it when my mom commanded me like that. I'd always been told I was a real rebel because of that.
"I don't feel like it." She gave me that look. That 'I'm going to make your life a living hell if you don't do what I say right now you problematic rugrat' look.
"Sapphire. Now."
"I said I didn't feel like it."
"You know your father and I have given up a lot for you Sapphire and if I were you I'd start listening for once in your life."
"You've given up a lot for me?! You two forced me to move here because of dad's new job!"
"Do not talk about your father like that young lady!" That did it, we basically started screaming at each other, I couldn't even tell what I was saying. Three minutes later I had somehow gotten out of the house, trying to allow things between us to simmer down. We had been fighting a lot since I was told we would be moving. I found a little corner out of sight up against a large building, larger than any of the houses around here. It was even up against a vent releasing warm air. I just sat there for a period of time.
"What are you doing?" I sprang up, suddenly face to face with a guy my age. Face to face as in, our faces were way too close. Our eyes were both wide.
"Get away from me!" I pushed his shoulder and stepped back, no longer cornered.
"Hey, this is my dad's building loser, I can be here whenever I want!" He shoved me back.
"Oh yeah?"
"Yes yeah!"
"Well my dad runs the Petalburg Gym, and I'm pretty sure he wouldn't mind coming back for a quick second to beat you down!"
"Psh, just lay all the hard work on your dad ya baby!" I clenched my fists ready to jump this guy.
His red eyes were in great contrast to my blue ones. His hat was white with a greed band around the edge of it, the front featured a Pokeball symbol. It looked like he was wearing a pair of black pants underneath a pair of black shorts. Doofus. Though I did like his red and black jacket... His gloves were similar to mine, with the band on the wrist but the fingers had been cut off on them. He also sported a green backpack, with red, green, and black shoes.
"I don't have to if you don't want, I could pound you silly on my own!"
"Oh yeah!?"
"Hell yeah!" We were progressively getting louder, and people were starting to come out of their houses, staring at us. But neither of us really cared.
"I bet you couldn't even push me to the ground, butt head."
"That's it!" I tackled the guy. No joke. Right in his gut. I literally heard the air get knocked out of him. Ah, good times, good times. We started rolling around on the ground, getting a few stray punches in here and there, but neither of us was able to land a square hit. Finally we were being pried apart.
"Sapphire! Sapphire!" Crap. Mom.
"Get off NOW!" An even scarier lady (if that was even possible) was holding that guy back. We just kept glaring at each other, panting. His hat had also fallen off, revealing his short black hair. I hadn't even realized my mother had been screaming at me to come with her.
"MAY SAPPHIRE WINTERS IF YOU DO NOT COME WITH ME THIS SECOND I SWEAR TO ARCEUS THAT YOU WILL NEVER LEAVE THE HOUSE AGAIN." I didn't even reply to that.
"So that's why you call her by her middle name."
"Yes, so now may we hear about the wacky adventures of your husband?" My mom and Mrs. Birch, who was the scary lady from before, laughed, apparently thinking that was funny. She had invited us to her house next door to ours, to get the two of us to apologize to each other. Now they were talking about stupid things while, ha, get this, Ruby and I glared at each other from across the room. His name is Ruby. Hilarious! Though my mom elbowed me really hard when I snickered after figuring that out.
"So anyways, Ruby, Sapphire, since you two have become friends now, why don't you head upstairs to get to know each other a little better?" Ruby and I glanced at each other. We both knew that Ruby's mom wasn't asking us.
"I think that's a great idea!" My mother chimed in.
"Toby thinks too!" Ruby's younger brother, Toby added in. The motherly monsters of the deep glared deep into our souls, brainwashing us into going upstairs. So yeah, that's where we were now. Sitting on the floor of Ruby's room, which looked surprisingly like my own. Both our arms were crossed, just giving each other the evil eye.
"You know my dad told me about you guys moving in, but I was hoping that you'd be a guy."
"Don't push it Ruby."
"So you don't have any Pokemon yet?" Oof. Ah, yep that hurt, that was my soft spot. "My dad gave me one two years ago, when I turned ten."
"Congrats doofus, your daddy gave you a new pet that can't run away!" Silence for a few more minutes, before Mrs. Birch called us both downstairs.
"Ruby, your father called, he wants you to head out to help him catch some Pokemon!" I knew that Ruby was grinning his butt off even if I couldn't see his face at the moment.
"Sure! I'll be back later!" He was already halfway out the door when his mother stopped him.
"Wait a second son, we were thinking-" NONONONONONO- was all I could think about, because even I knew what was coming next. "Sapphire doesn't have any experience like you do with Pokemon or anything, so why don't you take her with you?" Ruby and I glanced back and forth between each other and the hungry motherly monsters. We had no choice. After just a minute we were red in the faces and making our way out of the small town. A little girl was standing at the exit of Littleroot, on her tiptoes trying to see past the tree.
"Hey Allison, whatcha doin?" Ruby obviously knew the girl.
"I can hear Pokemon cries, can you go see what's going on for me Ruby?"
"Sure kid." Ruby then started walking off down the trail. I began to follow him but was stopped by a small tugging on my shirt.
"You're the girl that just moved here, right?"
"Uh, yeah! You can call me Sapphire, or Sapph for short." She smiled sweetly at me, making me jump a little.
"You seem nice! I like you!"
"Um, thanks!" I grinned back. Having a girl like this under my wing might be nice...
"One thing though,"
"Hm?'
"If you don't stay away from my Ruby, I will break you like a Hariyama breaks pebbles." I took a few steps back, making my way after Ruby and away from his obsessive fan girl. Man I hate this town...
We were a ways onto Route 101, when we heard a scream for help.
"H-h-help meee!"
"Dad!" Ruby ran off, and was quickly out of sight and into the forest.
"Dad? With that voice?" I scoffed, now alone. "Well, at least I'm free!" I smiled and stretched my arms up to the sky.
"AHHHHHHHH!" A slightly large man came crashing out of the forest, followed by an angry looking Pokemon. "HELP ME!" He ran straight at me, and boy did that not look like fun. I quickly stepped to the side, both of them barreling right by me. "H-HELP! THERE ARE POKEBALLS IN MY BAG!" I looked off a few feet and saw the said bag lying in the dirt. It looked like a Pokemon had really torn it up. I calmly sat down on the ground going through the contents of the bag, oblivious to the man and Pokemon. Pencils, pens, notepads, empty Pokeballs, potions.
"Man, there is nothing interesting in here!" I complained. Then I saw some more Pokeballs, but picking two of the three up I realized that they had Pokemon in them. "Cool." I stated. I looked at the third one, lying inside of the messenger bag. I set the other two down and picked up this third Pokeball. I stared at it for a brief moment. "Alright! I'll help you now dude!"
"FINALLY!" I managed to step in between the big guy and Pokemon, one I had never seen before being from the Johto region.
"Go Pokemon!" I threw the small device in the air. Nothing happened. Except it hit the angry, spiky looking Pokemon on the head, angering it even more. "Uh, DEFECTIVE POKEBALL!" I began running from the Pokemon who was now intent on attacking me.
"YOU HAVE TO ENLARGE THE POKEBALL AND PRESS THE BUTTON FIRST KID!" I'm not really why we were all yelling like that, but it seemed natural at the time. Meanwhile, that Pokemon was gaining on me and jumped up almost jumping on me before I karate chopped it's head. "WHY DID YOU DO THAT NOW IT WANTS BLOOD!"
"WHAT THE HELL ELSE WAS I SUPPOSED TO DO!?" I managed to run around in a circle, still being chased by the bloodthirsty creature. I also managed to grab that Pokeball from before, and this time actually pressed the button to enlarge the capsule, and when I threw it up into the air, a little blue thing appeared in front me, stopping the spiky thing.
"Kip kip!"
"Zig ga goon zig!"
"Mudkip knows Growl and Tackle! Use those moves and beat that Zigzagoon!" The man told me.
"Only those two moves? That's really stupid." I crossed my arms and glared at the guy.
"Hey! It's still a very young Pokemon!"
"Whatever. Huh?" I looked back at the Pokemon and saw that Zigagoon or something headbutting Mudkip. "Hey!" I called out. "Mudkip, use Tackle!" The little blue guy actually listened to me, knocking Zigagoon backwards. "Alright! We're totally going to beat that Zigagoon!"
"Zigzagoon!" The man corrected me.
"Zigzagoon!" I yelled, throwing my fist up into the air. "Now Mudkip use that same move again!" He obeyed once more, but Zigzagoon dodged it and used the Tackle attack on us. "Mudkip use Tackle again!" Our attack hit, but was countered with Headbutt, doing damage to both Pokemon. Then Zigzagoon used Growl, though I completely ignored it and got in another Tackle attack. "Good job Mudkip, one more time!" We landed a final Tackle attack before Zigzagoon collapsed on the ground. I ran out to the small blue Pokemon, picking it up and spinning it around in the air. "Alright you did it buddy!" We both laughed and spun till I myself collapsed onto my knees. The Zigzagoon was gone.
"You were alright." I looked up, an innocent and slightly surprised look on my face.
"Ruby. Did you see that?"
"Most of it." His arms were crossed and if I hadn't been so dense I would've seen that he had been jealous. "But you could've done a lot less damage to Mudkip if you would've used Growl."
"It's alright son!" That man who put his arm around Ruby's shoulder was smiling greatly. "Thank you, um, what's your name?"
"May Sapphire Winters! Daughter of the great Petalburg Gym Leader!" I grinned toothily and saluted him. "But DO NOT call me May, call me Sapphire and or Sapph!"
"Oh, you're Norman's daughter!"
"Yep!"
"So you've already met Ruby?"
"Sadly, we have met." Ruby answered for me, looking away slightly annoyed.
"Well I am Ruby's father, the well known Pokemon Professor of the Hoenn region!" From the way he said that I guess he assumed that I should have known who he was. I did not. "Oh, you haven't heard of me. Well I suppose that makes sense you being not from around here. Anyways, I am Professor Birch. Thank you again Sapphire. Come meet me at my lab later on, will you?"
"Sure." I replied. He took Mudkip away, it was really sad, I mean, that guy was really cool. Ruby took me back to town, and I told my mom all about what had happened. I didn't even remember our fight and she seemed happy about it. After a large lunch and two freshly baked cookies I grabbed my own green bag, which could be interchanged as a bag just like Ruby's or be placed around my waist. I just threw it around my shoulder and headed off.
The inside of the lab was all white and clean. The usual, I guess for a lab.
"Ah, Sapphire is here!" Professor Birch greeted me. Ruby was leaning up against a table, and barely looked up at me. "You know Sapphire, I have so much about you from your father!"
"Awesome." I stated slightly bored.
"I also heard that you don't have your own Pokemon yet." That was my soft spot. Again.
"Yeah!? So!? What about it, old man!?" He looked stunned, but quickly regained his composure.
"Uh, anyways, the way you battled earlier, you pulled it off like a pro! I suppose you have your father's blood in you after all!"
"Duh! I am awesome like him, after all."
"So, as thanks for earlier, I'd like you to have that Mudkip I let you borrow earlier." My face slowly grew into that of complete hysterical excitement. And to top it all of Ruby didn't look so happy about it and Mudkip right then and there popped out of it's Pokeball right next to me.
"DID YOU HEAR THAT MUDKIP WE'RE GOING TO BE LIKE BEST BUDS FOREVER!"
"Mud-kip!" Birch handed me the male Mudkip's Pokeball as the two of us danced around the lab.
"Psh, whatever. You'll never get as strong as Treecko and I." Ruby just had to put that in here. I glared at him while Mudkip looked at Ruby like he had no clue as of what Ruby had just said. And then sprayed mud all over his face.
"BEST. POKEMON. EVER!" I exclaimed.
"Well, uh, Mudkip learned Mud-Slap! Yay..." Professor Birch added in quietly. Ruby was pretty mad, and stepped off to the side to wipe his face off with a towel one of Birch's assistants had given him. "Anyways, I think that if you work at it and gain experience, you could become a great Pokemon trainer Sapphire. Ruby is also studying Pokemon while helping me me out. Hey, why don't you and Ruby go out tomorrow?"
"WHAT?!" We both said at the same time.
"Oh, no no no no no! Not like that, but Ruby could show you some of the ropes. Plus you'll need to get permission from your mother to leave town Sapphire." We knew we really had no choice, so we both mumbled a quick fine and I left the lab with Mudkip at me side. After we were outside in the middle of town, I realized something. Something I just had to shout out in front of the entire town of Littleroot!
"OH MY GOD, MUDKIP WE'RE GOING TO GO ON A JOURNEY TOGETHER!"