Curiouser and Curiouser
Prologue: Down the Azumarill Hole
"Hey, big sis, can we go out to the lake and play with the water pokemon?"
Bouncing and balancing on her tippy-toes a tiny dark-haired girl excitedly peered out the window she was trying to properly look over. The afternoon was bright, warm, and perfect for young children to go on pokemon adventures. The glistening lake behind the house full of playful pokemon was calling her name. Well, okay, maybe not, but how anyone could resist going for a swim alongside a Lapras, Dewgong, Slowbro and a plethora of Poliwag, Wooper, and Marill among other wild water-types was beyond her. She'd been cooped up in this house for at least two hours – two hours too many in her opinion. A sentiment the girl was sure her big sister shared equally, if not maybe more. The little girl turned back from her post to briefly scan the bedroom in hopes that her sister had heard her earlier and come over.
Her lips scrunched into a pout when the bedroom remained empty as ever. Whatever, as if she needed her sister anyways. She'd stay and watch the pokemon all by herself – which was just what she did when she swiveled on her feet to face the window again.
The grin on her face widened into a smile when a wild Azumarill and Poliwag caught sight of her face, blowing bubbles in her general direction to catch her attention. The little girl squealed excitedly when both water-types swam out of the lake behind the house and curiously pitter-pattered their way over to the window she was looking out from. She jumped so they could see her wildly waving at them, they responded by brewing up a storm of bubbles that glimmered with a hint of rainbows as they caught the harsh sunlight.
The girl widened her eyes in wonder; her jaw went slack with awe. Maybe if I climb on the windowsill I can jump out and go swim with them. And as soon as the idea sprouted she was already determinedly narrowing her eyes towards the outside world and putting enough force in her bounce to hook her forearms onto the ledge. The lower half of her body wriggled in the air as she struggled to swing her right leg on the windowsill.
She huffed and puffed, out of breath from the physical exertion and frustration of taking too long to reach her goal. The girl swung her leg in another attempt but she had misjudged the angle needed, sending her ankle to painfully smash into the corner of the window. Ow, ow, no, I'm gonna fall soon if I don't go over. She tried to hold in a sob as her ankle throbbed and her hands and forearms slowly slid back from their hold on the windowsill. Just a – just a little more, please, please, please Mew I just wanna play for a while.
Thump. The frown on her face transformed into a blinding smile as her right leg finally made it onto the ledge of the windowsill, though she visibly winced at the sudden impact. From there she leaned onto her right side and pulled the rest of her body up safely onto the thick wooden ledge.
Ecstatic with the accomplishment of her feat, she flung her aching arms and hands up, whooping triumphantly. She peered outside and saw that the Azumarill and Poliwag were still outside, this time nearly underneath the window.
"'Zumarill," exclaimed the Aqua Rabbit, bouncing from side to side.
"Poli-Poli," chimed the tiny Tadpole yet again blowing bubbles into the air, this time in what seemed like a greeting.
"Nice to meet'cha, my name's Bella." She giggled while waving away the bubbles floating around her head. "Give me a sec, I'm gonna jump out and play with you but ya have to move back so I don't squish you on the way down." The girl smiled and gave them a thumbs up. "I'll meet you at the lake, m'kay?"
The Azumarill and Poliwag considered this a fair point made and with an encouraging cry aimed towards their new human friend, they scurried back to the lake with the other pokemon.
Bella held on tightly to the side of the window as she wobbled up onto her feet, mindful of the throb in her right ankle and the slowly-forming bruise. She closed her eyes inhaling shakily, readying herself for the jump onto the grass and towards play freedom. "A'right, I got this." Bella pulled an obstructing piece of dark hair away from her face before slowly bending her knees for impulse. Five, four, three, two, on—
"No, I don't think ya got this."
Bella squeaked and startled in surprise as a pair of arms encircled her waist, pulling her back from the open window, off the ledge, and away from freedom.
Perhaps Bella was too heavy for the not-so-much-older girl that had hauled her off because both of them went careening onto the floor, which was unfortunately wooden and un-carpeted. Though Bella couldn't complain much, she'd landed on top of the older girl's stomach while the girl underneath had slammed her head on the wood on the way down – which explained why she was softly holding the back of her head and had a face screwed up in pain.
"I hope it hurts, Alicia." Bella stuck her tongue out at the brunette she was sitting on and sent her a poisonous glare afterwards.
"Get off of me, Belladonna." Alicia angrily pushed her younger sister off her abdomen as she got up.
The push surprised Bella, accidentally causing her to put sudden force on her injured ankle so she didn't trip and fall. "Ow, hey, what was that for? My ankle hurts ya big meanie!"
Alicia shot her a pity-less look, "then why were you gonna jump from the window, stupid? You would've landed on it and hurt yourself way more than it does now."
As her words sank in Bella didn't know how to immediately respond. Alicia had a point, a good one to be honest. Without thinking, Bella would've worsened the injury and probably never ended up playing with the water pokemon at the lake anyways – she'd had to call for help or something in the end.
Not that Bella would admit all of that out loud. "So? All I wanted was to go outside and play but no one would let me go – especially you." On the last emphasis the little girl crossed her arms and stamped her foot on the floor.
Her right foot.
Bella wailed as she realized her mistake too late. She plopped on the floor in pain while gingerly holding her hurt ankle. In vain, she tried to hold back the tears that traitorously slid down her plump brown-skinned cheeks.
Alicia's scowl softened into a concerned frown at the sight of her baby sister crying. A baby, that's what the crying girl was to her, even if Bella was five-years-old. Not that Alicia could claim to be much older; she was only eight as of a few weeks ago. But Alicia couldn't think of herself a baby, especially when she had to constantly watch out for her little sister.
Alicia sighed, running a hand through her dark brown hair trying to figure out what was the best thing to do now. She winced as her hand brushed against the bump on the back of her head, which promptly reminded her of the angry-looking bruise on Bella's ankle.
Ice. I should get some. Ice was always the answer when something bad happened. The girls were rough-and-tumble little island girls, an ice pack – or several – to treat commonplace bumps and bruises had become welcoming friends at this point.
She sighed again, this time holding her hand out for Bella to take. The girl hiccupped as she held back her weeping and wiped at her tear-stained cheeks, she took her sister's hand and then the other as Alicia pulled her up on shaky legs. From there she carefully pulled Bella onto her back. She huffed due to the exertion, Alicia wasn't all that big to begin with but the kitchen wasn't that far away and Bella's shaking legs meant she probably shouldn't be walking at the moment.
Bella sniffled and gripped her neck with tight arms. Alicia begrudgingly grinned at the young girl's swift change in demeanor.
"C'mon Belladonna-Prima Donna, we're going ice huntin'."
"Alicia, can we please go outside now? I'm bored, and I promised that Azumarill and Poliwag that I'd go play with them."
The older brunette groaned internally as Bella griped yet again about boredom and the torture of being stuck inside on a sunny day like this, all the while stuffing her face into a plush Politoed doll on the living room couch. If she was being honest she hated the lack of freedom just as much as her sister but there were more than a number of reasons as to why they were stuck at their babysitter's house.
One being that both of their parents were both off-island for the day due to their jobs, another being that their grandfather was sick with the cold and their grandmother had forbidden them staying at their house lest they get ill too, yet another that their aunt and older cousins were busy running their grandparent's daycare in their stead. The girls had protested that they could stay at their own house or at the adjacent pokemon farm with their mother's employees but that idea had been shot down when she reminded them of the unfortunate time that they'd last done that.
All of which meant that their mum had hurriedly rang up their favorite babysitter at the last minute so she could watch over the girls.
Alicia looked down at the crayon drawing she'd been working on while Bella continued her complaints. She'd been lying on the floor working on a picture for their babysitter, who at this point probably didn't look like she was deserving of a gift or qualified to be a working babysitter if anyone walked into the house that afternoon. Fortunately, Alicia knew that Miss Lori was the best of sitters – today was just an off day for her. She'd just arrived from a long trip in Kanto the day before and had fallen into heavy sleep about an hour after the girls had been dropped off.
"Bella, shut up and put back the ice pack on your ankle," groaned Alicia, as her sister had gone off on a loud tangent about how this was all the older girl's fault for not letting her do what she wanted today, "You're gonna wake up Miss Lori with your whining and you know she's barely gotten any sleep since she got back to Four Island." The older girl narrowed her eyes at the little girl. "Besides, Mum said that if we actually behaved this time then she'd let us have some of the cheri lollies from her last trip to the mainland."
After a silent moment Alicia realized that Bella had finally gone quiet. With that, she resumed daydreaming about sweets and working on her picture which was shaping up nicely in her opinion – hopefully Miss Lori would like it since the main subject was her beloved pokemon team. She'd just started coloring in the purple of Cloyster's shell when something round and plush smacked her in the face.
The object had caught her off-guard but after opening her eyes following the impact she saw that it was a pokemon doll, a bug-eyed fluffy violet Venonat to be exact, sat right in front of Alicia's face and on Miss Lori's drawing. Annoyed, she looked up to face her sister and said, "What was tha—"
Thump.
Bella had thrown yet another pokemon doll at her face, a long purple Ekans this time with evil intent in its eyes – it matched the look in her sister's. Alicia shot Bella a glare and opened her mouth to say something rude enough to wipe her snotty sister's mischievous smile from her face but was interrupted by the incoming barrage of plush Weedle, Zubat, Kakuna, and both types of Nidoran.
"For the love of Moltres, seriously? I'm working with crayons and I can't erase anything if I mess up. "
Bella threw herself back on the living room couch and cackled, sounding every bit like the sinister witches found in the tales her mum read to her at night. "But it's the only fun I've had since we got here; you goofed up my only chance."
Alicia moved back and sat up, crossing her arms to look disdainfully at her ridiculous little sister. This was the problem of having around a stubborn five-year-old who either manipulated others so she could get her way or stunk on everybody else around if she didn't.
"I carried you on my back, fixed your ankle, gave you a snack before dinner, and offered you paper and some of my crayons. I'm not gonna do anything else."
Not that Alicia had expected this to be the response that Bella wanted but she should've probably seen the arm that flung an incoming pokemon doll – an angry-looking Beedrill – to her face. Alicia closed her eyes and quickly threw up her hands to block it, the doll harmlessly bounced off her hands and onto the wooden floor.
Furious, she forcefully slung back the threatening doll (she smirked when her sister squeaked) and gathered up her art supplies before thundering out of the living room and into the empty back bedroom that the girls had been in hours earlier.
Though, not before sending a scathing scowl that rivaled the intensity of her sister's satisfied smile.
"You suck and I give up."
Away from the annoyance that was her sister, Alice happily set down her papers and crayons before climbing up on the bed in the room. Finally she could work and finish Miss Lori's present without the interruption of pokemon doll projectiles from a miffed five-year-old. In that moment she didn't care that she'd left Bella alone in the living room, all she had wanted was to get up and away from Bella before her temper boiled to the volcanic levels of Knot Island's Mt. Magma.
Having finished the coloring of Miss Lori's Jynx, Alicia blew her fringe away with a puff of air for what had to be the fifteenth time in the last twenty minutes. Decidedly, she set to fixing her dark brown hair into their usual twin plaits; Bella's plushie barrage had left her hair a loose tangled mess that regularly obstructed her eyesight. The girl was so close to finishing the drawing but she wouldn't get anything done if she kept losing her concentration like this.
Alicia was tightening an orange hair ribbon when she heard a faraway heavy splash and eager giggle.
"'Zumarill."
"Poli, poliwag."
"Wait for me guys, I can finally play with ya."
Oh, snap.
The older girl leaped onto the floor, leaving every previous thought lying on the bed forgotten. She scampered towards the window to confirm the conclusion that she'd jumped to.
Alicia gasped and her breath caught in her throat – it was worse than she'd initially thought. The pair of pokemon that Bella had mentioned earlier had left the lake and moved further inland. Bella, apparently Sevii's most hard-headed five-year-old, had clung to the Poliwag swimming across the lake and followed after the two water-types.
She couldn't believe her eyes; this was more than getting in trouble with their parents and Miss Lori, more than the loss of coveted cheri lollies, more than her previous frustration with her sister.
Alicia's sister instinct kicked into gear and slapped her awake. "Bella, come back here right now!" Yet her sister continued towards her destination, having either ignored Alicia or been too far away to hear anything. Stupid, stupid, stupid, I should've known she wanted me out of the living room so she could slip away – that sneaky little Sneasel. Her sneakers squeaked as she tore out of the room running, anxious heart pounding so loud in her ears that she felt it fuel the pain from her sore bump and turn it into a headache.
Think, Alicia, think. Where's the backpack we brought here in case we needed to stay sleeping over? She spied it out of the corner of her eye hidden behind the Politoed doll that Bella had been using as a pillow earlier. Quickly she headed towards it, unzipped it, and took out the first two warm jumpers* she saw. And without further proper thought as to what was the smart thing to do, she ran like a Zubat out of hell back to the bedroom, climbed over the windowsill ledge, and leaped out the window.
She had no time to waste by going through the front door and around the house. Alicia had weakly hoped that maybe Bella had stopped following the Azumarill and Poliwag to their home, but as she took the grassy shortcut around the lake to avoid getting wet and up the rocky hill, there was no little sister to be found. When she reached the edge of the water and the path of rocks that stretched across this part of the lake and the grassy patch of the entrance on the other side, she stopped.
Suddenly it struck her that the smartest thing to have done would've probably been to rapidly wake up their babysitter and leave it all in her capable grown-up hands and have her prevent any disasters from happening. A responsible adult would've been the best thing in this sort of situation. But Alicia was already here, she couldn't go back to the house because by then Bella could be in danger. Heck, she was in danger as soon as she left the grassy patch on the other side of the lake – that's why she hadn't called on Miss Lori, her first thought had been to get to her sister as quick as possible rather than wait for a tired sleep-deprived adult to wake up and process what was happening before taking action.
At least, that's what Alicia told herself as she carefully jumped from wet slippery rock to wet slippery rock towards the grass on the other side. Maybe she just didn't want to admit to herself that she'd taken the worst action possible, despite being fondly told by grown-ups that she was shaping up to be a clever young girl – albeit an adventurous and alarmingly spontaneous one.
Alicia shrieked as she slipped on the second-to-last rock but before dropping into the water some pokemon's Psychic attack held her up and mentally floated the girl all the way to edge of the grassy patch.
It was a Slowpoke. She seriously had slower reflexes than a wild Slowpoke. Alicia shook that irrelevant thought away before her self-esteem could slink further into the ground; this wasn't the time for any of that. Hurriedly, the girl propped herself up to stand and thanked the wild pokemon before continue her trek across the grass.
Standing nervously in front of the entrance she felt the air swiftly cool around her. Shivering slightly, Alicia took the moment to hastily slip on one of the jumpers she'd grabbed back at the house. Alicia took one last look back, noticing that sunset would soon be approaching as the sun neared the horizon. By the time she got back with Bella in hand it might be dark already, a dangerous time for young children to be out, especially where she'd be going.
No adults, no faithful pokemon, nothing but a desperate eight-year-old with a warm jumper in hand.
The grass is greener on the this side of the lake, thought Alicia curiously as she tried to clear her anxious mind. Though as she took a deep calming breath and ventured alone into the depths of Icefall Cave, there was nothing about this particular circumstance that she found desirable.
A/N
Welcome to the first part of the prologue of Curiouser and Curiouser, thanks for reading. Feel free to stick around and/or review (constructive criticism is wanted and welcome).
Few things I want to point out:
Alicia's name is meant to be pronounced as Ah-LEE-see-ah, not as Ah-LEESH-ah. Though you're free to read it however your brain feels like doing so.
If you have a pre-emptive dislike against characters nicknamed Bella, I understand your pain, but please don't let that color your view of my character.
The story will be mainly set in game canon (specifically, LeafGreen era), though I'm definitely going to take some expanding artistic liberties. And no, none of my characters will replace Leaf or Red in this story. Yes, they will make appearances and have their game roles.
There might be some aspects of the PokeSpe/Adventures manga that I will introduce in the story, but probably just one or two things.
You're not imagining things, there will be "Alice Allusions" all over the place in this particular fic but it is not an adaption of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland or Through the Looking Glass, And What Alice Saw There turned into an OT pokemon fic, hence allusions. Some will be subtle, others will be more on the nose, have fun finding them.
Take note, the first few chapters will be introductory and establishing character before I jump into when Alicia is older and ready for her adventure – though they won't be lacking in foreshadowing.
~Beta(s) Wanted~
There's only so much I can do by re-reading and re-writing by myself. If you are interested, please send me a PM and we'll talk it out.
Seriously, I know my writing's rusty and wonky plus there's a lot of writing fails that come along with not having English as your native language.
(Pardon the long A/N, I just wanted to make some things clear.)
*By jumper I hope most of you realized I mean what can also be called a sweater. Since the central protagonist is a Sevii Island native, I wanted to place a bit of emphasis here and there that she's from a remarkably different region than the one she'll be journeying through when older. Same goes for the use of lollies instead of lollipops and plaits instead of braids. A lot of you probably knew all of these already but my cousin pointed that out I should make a note of it just in case.
Sinceramente, Mariposa~