1Paper Doll: Cut Along The Dotted Line
Chapter 1
Heart Shaped Padlock
One upon a time on a blue sphere in space there was a little, quiet place (where not much excitement happened) called Pallet Town. And in that town was a research lab on a hill, and in that lab lived the famous Professor Oak and his faithful assistant Tracey.
Their lives were very uneventful, but as long as they had their work to do they didn't mind really. Routines day in and day out were better than not knowing what to do at all, their research was very important. Without the Professor the world wouldn't know so much about the strange creatures he studied called 'Pokemon'. And without an assistant to keep nagging him on in his old age, the Professor would probably have plenty of notes but they would all be disorganized and hard to read.
So to a regular onlooker things appeared to be very boring at the Oak Lab, more dull than watching re-runs of old soap operas at 4 in the morning. But this peace and quiet was about to come to a very LOUD halt, and it all happened of a warm cloudless day in a little place called Pallet Town…
The screeching of tires jolted Tracey from his reading ('Strange Deaths' by John Dunning, an morbid choice for the teen), stuffing the last of an apple slice into his gob he jumped up from the couch and ran to the window. He couldn't see anything past the tall shrubs, but he could hear plenty. Two female voices, laughing and chatting about something but he couldn't make out any real words. They were getting closer, the teenager could hear them walking up the path towards the front door. He rushed to it but didn't open right away; instead he let the visitors knock and waited a few seconds.
"Helloooo? Uncle Sam?" One with a very bubbly voice called out and knocked again.
Tracey finally resolved to open the door, his curiosity was killing him. Very slowly he poked his head out and saw two tall women standing on the doormat. "Uh…hello?" He managed to squeak as they stared down at him with their cold grey eyes, they looked like the kind of people that could smell fear seeping out of a persons pores.
One of them broke the awkward silence and spoke. "Where's Uncle Sam?" The owner of the bubbly voice asked. She had pink hair, white oval glasses and a nose ring. The chubby woman shoved past and knocked Tracey into the door frame, she was followed by a slightly taller, slim female with light purple hair in a spiky ponytail and scary looking leather boots on her feet. She also wore glasses and had extra holes in her face that made Tracey cringe.
"Well, where is he?" The pink fat one demanded looking right down at him with a frown, her round nose reminded him of a jelly bean.
All Tracey could do was point towards the back of the house; the girls clomped off loudly like Rapidash down the hall leaving a trail of dirt behind them. Grabbing a broom from the nearby closet Tracey started sweeping up their mess, they hadn't even been there for a minute and already these strange looking women were turning the place upside down.
Toros in a china shop, the saying was probably coined just for them.
When he was finished Tracey's interest got the best of him, who were these women and why were they disturbing the peace? If he knew more about this species of female, it might be possible to avoid or even get rid of them! Did they make repellant for loud women that pushed boys into doorways and gave them bruises? Had science even come that far yet?!
Putting the broom away he took off to the back of the house, they were outside with the Professor on the patio laughing at something as he watched through the screen door. The one with the purple hair was wearing a little grey plaid skirt with a studded belt, a zip-up white and navy blue t-shirt of some sort and she had the omega symbol tattooed on her right arm. Next to her the pink haired one was in a short polka-dot dress that was a few shades lighter than the color of her hair, white ballet flats and chunky plastic jewelry.
Only people that dressed that silly came from the city, Tracey wondered where exactly they came from to get away with ridiculous outfits like that.
Suddenly the taller woman spotted him, Professor Oak noticed her glaring and waved at his assistant to come outside. Hesitantly he did, feeling the eyes of the women watching him as he trotted over starring at his feet. Tracey theorized that maybe if he didn't look them in the eyes they couldn't devour his soul.
"Girls, this is Tracey. He works here with me; I promise he won't be a disturbance at all." The old man said, at the same time the two women crossed their arms.
"Heh, yeah we kinda met already…I'm Fran Cactus." The pink haired one announced, "didn't realize you studied Pokemon and stray kids, Uncle Sam!"
"And I'm Alexis Orchid." The other one said with a smirk revealing what Tracey saw was a fang. "Do ya bruise easy, kid?"
Tracey put on his best smile and said, "you two ladies are just charming!" Of course that was a big fat lie, his impression of them was not a good one so far and he sensed that they picked up on his sarcasm. Fran and Alexis, the names of the enemies…and what was the Professor yammering about?
Professor Oak, who was dwarfed by both Fran and Alexis, put a hand on their shoulders and started leading them back towards the building. "Well, how about you two go and start unpacking? The sooner you get that done the sooner you can get started!"
Fran smiled and kissed the old man on the cheek. "Thanks Uncle Sam!" She grabbed Alexis by the wrist and ran back inside, once they were out of ear shot Professor Oak sighed deeply and shook his head.
"This is going to be a long month."
That comment startled Tracey. "A MONTH? What are you talking about?"
Professor Oak settled down into a fold up lawn chair and started to tell his story. "Well, you see I received an urgent e-mail before going to bed last night. It was from Alexis, she explained that next door to the girls flat in the city a development was being built. Apparently with all the noise they can't concentrate on getting things done for the competition they're entered in."
"Why didn't you just say no? I don't know if I'LL be able to concentrate with them here. They came through the front door and literally left a mess behind them!" Tracey informed him, he could only imagine what a month with them was going to be like. Dirty dishes stacked like sky scrapers in the kitchen, feminine hygiene products littering the bathrooms and dozens of shoes crammed into the hallway. He envisioned complete chaos and destruction, giving it a week before the roof finally caved in and killed them all.
Professor Oak shook his head again. "I just couldn't. They're daughters of old friends of mine, known them since they couldn't even say Pikachu properly."
With a vision of the apocalypse still prominent in his head, Tracey slumped into the chair next to the Professor. "Are you sure about this?"
"Not at all, but I might go into town and visit the psychic tomorrow just in case…"
The sounds of the girls dragging things in the front door ripped through the serenity of nature around them, both jumped when they heard a loud crash as something breakable hit the wood floor inside.
A moment later Alexis shouted "Opps! Sorry! I'll pay for that Uncle Sam!"
The old man just grabbed his lemonade from the table and tried to pretend his home wasn't being destroyed, however it was very difficult to ignore a pair like Fran and Alexis. He could remember them quite clearly as two little girls, little wrecking balls in running shoes and pigtails. They once demolished a coffee table with their 'dancing', and years later the Professor was still trying to get the 'vomit rainbow' stains out of his good carpet from the time they chowed on candy and orange soda before bed the one night he babysat them.
"Professor? Professor?"
Oak blinked and came back from his recollection of colorful memories, Tracey was tapping him on the shoulder. "Oh! Sorry, er…what was I saying?"
"Nothing," Tracey corrected him. "But I wanted to ask, what exactly ARE they doing here?"
"We're going to kick ass and chop off heads! All in the name of fashion of course!" Fran said dramatically as she hung up more dresses in the small closet, she was running out of space and trying to stuff as many in as possible.
Tracey had gone inside to help the girls after talking with Oak, but mostly to make sure they didn't damage anything else. To his surprise, the girls tossed Pokeballs at him. They really didn't seem the type to own any Pokemon, but they both had two. Alexis with a Ghastly and a Squirtle, Fran with a Bellossom and Jigglypuff. The monsters were more than happy to get out and go prance around in the back, Tracey wondered how long it had been since they had last seen a tree or grass by their gleeful reaction.
Alexis pulled a large black folder out of a box and tossed it at Tracey who was sitting cross legged on one of the beds amongst a giant pile of stuffed Pokemon. "That's the battle plan you're looking at. Not complete as of yet, but with the peace and serenity here it and everything else we have planned should end up looking almost perfect."
Nodding Tracey flipped opened the folder, it was full of messy looking dress designs that had chunks of fabric stapled to the pages, messy notes were written in the corners for changes they had in mind. "So, you're fashion designers?"
"Damn right we are, even got our own label." With a grunt Alexis ripped opened another box, she took out a wad of dark fabric and threw it at him. "Here, you can keep that. It's from last years line of graphic t-shirts."
Tracey unfolded the garment, it was a dark green with an abstract grey design screen printed on it. Somewhere in all the random swirls and blotches he saw the words 'SugarHigh" along with a small heart that had the omega symbol slapped in the middle of it. "Uh…thanks." He replied not sure whether he was fond of it or not and went back to the folder. "So, if you already have your own company, why bother entering a competition to work for a label you don't own?"
Fran flopped down next to him snapping clips onto a lock of her hair. "Because it's always been our dream to work for 'Charmy Bites', and even if we don't win and get on the design team at least we'll be able to show the world that SugarHigh isn't just t-shirts and jeans. Our entire submission for the contest is all elegant dresses, this could be our chance to get into the high fashion world!"
Tracey didn't quite understand, so Fran picked up a few of her stuffed Pokemon to help her explain. "Okay, lets say this Caterpie is Alexis and I. The competition is like us evolving into Metapod, and in the end we'll become a Butterfree! Something beautiful that everyone can admire."
"I suppose I get it…just tell me one thing. You're not submitting this mess with your entry, are you?" Tracey pointed to their mish-mash of a folder, he was right. No judge would be happy seeing a contestant give them something with grease stains on the pages or notes flying everywhere.
"It's not finalized yet, Fran still has to redo the drawings…RIGHT?" Alexis eyed her partner, Fran grinned sheepishly.
"I just haven't gotten around to them yet!"
"That's the same excuse you gave me last week! If this fashion reject can see that it's a crap presentation then we need to get it done!"
"Hey! My fingers have been hurting from putting all those little beads on the Dratini dress!"
The two women argued back and fourth furiously, Tracey could see why they wanted to finish their work somewhere quiet, the stress of being in a city would be enough for them to murder each other. But if they kept going like this they were never going to get their entries completed in time, one of them would be strangled to death with measuring tape and the other would be in a prison cell calling some other woman 'Big Mama'.
That's when he got a brilliant idea, of course at the time Tracey had no idea what this quick decision of his would force him to do. "Wait! Ladies, please stop arguing for just a moment please?"
Mid-spat they both paused and looked at him, their eyes angled angrily.
"I-I have a suggestion? If you would just listen?" Tracey gulped and felt his palms getting sweaty, Fran and Alexis relaxed from the fighting poses they had assumed and waited for him too speak. " Uh, I happen to draw a lot myself. I'm not really experienced with fashion sketches, but I can tackle just about anything you throw at me. And I'm fast too! And organized and thorough, a-"
"Geeze kid, you seem ready to whip out a resume." Alexis commented cutting him off, "so are you saying that YOU would do them for us?"
Tracey nodded, "yes! And I could make it look really professional, not that you girls aren't! But it's clear that you could use just a little help…"
Turning to Fran, Alexis said, "well what do you think?"
"How do we know he's not really Jacob Thorne in disguise?"
This really baffled Tracey, what the heck was a Jacob Thorne?
"Our 'Rival' if you can call him that." Alexis began to explain as she returned to unpacking. "A decent designer…"
"With a personality about as desirable as a zit on your ass!" Fran giggled and hopped off the bed, some of her stuffies tumbled to the floor but she didn't seem to notice. "The guy is a real slime ball, he'll do anything to win. We can't prove it but he snagged the super model Edie for his most recent campaign by slandering us!"
"What did he do?" Tracey asked picking up the fallen stuffed Pokemon and putting them neatly back on the rainbow bed spread.
Alexis snorted, "told her we were trying to launch a fragrance and that we were testing on baby Pokemon. Which is SO not true…but if she was dumb enough to believe him, then they're perfect for working together!" She angrily slammed a spiked collar onto the dresser and growled.
"I see…so Jacob Thorne is public enemy number one." Tracey thought out loud, Fran plopped down next to him again with an opened notebook and handed him a pen.
"Okay, you see this dress I'm wearing? Draw it for me."
Tracey took the pen and glanced at her oddly. "Uh…alright." He shrugged and began scratching lines quickly onto the blank page.
Fran struck and pose and held it. "Consider this your job interview, if I like your sketch you're hired kid."
"I can help out with other things too if it becomes overwhelming for you two…" He said quickly shifting his brown eyes from her to the paper and back again.
"You sure about that?" Alexis walked up behind him and had a look at his work so far, she nodded her approval but still kept a straight lip.
"Well, I know I'm normally very busy around here but I can handle a lot of stress and responsibility. Were you serious about the resume thing? Because I have one of you-"
"No, that was a joke Tracey. You know, something you laugh at?"
"Right…okay. Take a look." He put the pen down and handed the note pad back to Fran, she took it and stared at it with an expressionless face. "Well?"
Fran tilted her head to the side, "well…you captured my baby pudge all too realistically. But you're good, we'll use you."
"The question is, what exactly are you getting out of this? I mean, let's be honest. Us two haven't been the nicest to you so far." Alexis pointed out, hovering over Tracey like a boot camp drill sergeant.
"Would you just believe that I'm a nice guy and want to help out?"
Alexis and Fran exchanged glances and looked back at him, this short lab assistant seemed innocent enough. Maybe too innocent, stepping into their crazy world had the possibility of corrupting him.
"Okay, if you don't know what you want right now we'll draft up a contract and give it to you in the morning. Sound fair?" Fran asked taking the drawing he made and pinning it up on the wall next to a picture of the model Edie, both girls still liked her despite the rumors.
A contract sounded good, and a written one at that! That way whatever deal was made the women could not break their word, the legal document would keep these crazy females from tearing into his flesh and sucking his blood out through his neck. "Sounds good to me!" Tracey said confidently, he was somewhat worried about how he was going to fit this into his schedule but not enough to panic.
"Just realize what you're getting into now, kid." Warned Alexis, "we take our work as seriously as you do. We might just be girls with silly clothes, but they're our life."
Tracey felt one of them flick his ear, it was Fran standing behind him. "You are devoted to us, heart and soul?"
"Yes! Yes already! Just don't put my flesh in a soup and eat me!" He shook her off and got up from the bed. "Well I have to go finish some things up, see you later?"
They both smiled and waved at the same time, it was a little creepy. "Goodbye Tracey."
Not thinking much of their farewell he walked out of the room feeling a little better about their presence, at least now he wasn't so intimidated by them. So if they left clutter on the floor he could ask them to clean it up, or if they made a mess in the kitchen it wouldn't be a death wish asking them politely to take care of it. This month wasn't going to be so bad after all!
Right?
The night was dark and silent, but not all were asleep at the Oak Estate.
The corral was quiet with sleeping pokemon, and all except two people were in dreamland at the house. Long shadows stuck the light green walls in the upstairs hallway, a light clicked off and they disappeared. Fran and Alexis in their pjs snuck out of the small room they shared, each with something in their clasped hands. The object in Fran's hands clanked a little, Alexis held something with a thin chain that glittered. Quietly the women slipped into the room next to them where Tracey slept, it was small like theirs and everything was orderly and had a place. Thankfully for them the curtains were opened and moonlight poured in to light their way.
The women slowly approached the sleeping teenager as he slept blissfully unaware of them, snoring a little and wearing the t-shirt he'd been given by them earlier. Alexis poked his face with a skinny finger to see if he was a heavy sleeper or not. When he didn't even flinch at her prodding, Fran stepped in and loomed over like a storm on the horizon.
"You gave us your heart, you gave us your soul." Whispered Alexis as Fran reached down and slipped something around Tracey's neck, his eyes fluttered for a moment and they froze but he did not awaken.
Fran finished the job, there was a click and it was done…
Their work done they exited the room as quietly as they entered, Alexis still held the object she walked in with and put it around her own neck. They returned to their room and slipped back under the covers, the morning was sure to be unique...
Tracey's dark green hair was a puff ball when he woke up early in the morning, sticking out from all angles as the result of an unsettling nightmare he had sometime in the night. He dreamt of two ghosts coming into his room and trying to take his mortal soul, but he still alive and he didn't really believe in ghost stories all that much anyways. Dragging himself to the bathroom to fix the awful mess on his head and brush his teeth that felt all scummy, he noticed that Fran and Alexis were not in their room. Probably already downstairs hard at work, either that or they were unleashing their fury on the unsuspecting Pallet Town.
When he got to the bathroom, to his horror the counter near the sink was a disaster. Tubes of lipstick, hair products and clips lay scattered about. And worst of all was the box of tampons sitting in the sink, there was a pink note attached that said "Haha! Good Morning Sugar Booger!" on it. Yeah, HILARIOUS.
Ignoring the aura of femininity surrounding him he glanced up at the mirror and noticed something out of place. No, it wasn't the dark circles under his eyes, but something stuck on a thick chain around his neck. It looked like a pink padlock in the shape of a heart, obviously not something he wore on a regular basis. That's when it hit him, the ghosts in the night must have been Fran and Alexis playing a prank. Well, it wasn't a very good joke, the punch line was terrible and really tacky.
Tracey tried to pull the heart lock over his head, but the chain was too short and wouldn't go past his jaw. With a sigh he ran his hand through his hair to flatten it and went downstairs. Fran and Alexis were sitting at the table in the kitchen drinking tea, they tried not to smile as he thumped over to the cupboards and pulled out a bucket of cooking grease.
He slammed the container down in front of them and pulled up a chair, they just smiled and drank their tea calmly as he ripped off his t-shirt and opened the lid. Alexis lost it when he started slathering the grease over his neck and face, Fran nearly fell out of her chair as she had a giggle fit.
"Oh, I bet you do think this is funny!" Tracey growled at them and tried slipping the lock off again, but it was no use. "Okay, give me the darn key so I can take it off."
Alexis, red in the face, stopped laughing to catch her breath. Tracey thought she was starring at his bare chest so he crossed his arms to cover himself.
"Ha! Don't flatter yourself dough-boy! Anyhow...we can't take that off."
"What? What do you mean you can't?" Tracey shrieked in alarm, Fran pulled her chair up next to him and like a mother started cleaning the grease off his face with a paper towel. "Uh...thanks..."
Alexis pointed at the lock. "That's your contract."
"...excuse me?"
"You heard me. It's your contract. When you live up to your end of the deal, it comes off." Taking a sip of her tea Alexis revealed a chain around her neck with a key on it. "You'll get this once Fashion Week is over. And don't even think about trying to steal it from me, because you'll never manage to get it and keep all your limbs."
Tracey in vain pushed Fran away and tried once more to remove the lock, but it was useless. "You couldn't just do something normal like have me sign a piece of paper, could you?"
Fran giggled and poured more tea for herself. "Of course not! That's totally not our style. And this way there's no way you can break our agreement, not unless you get some lock cutters-"
"Don't give him any ideas Fran..." Alexis glared at her partner, "you're not getting any, are you Sketchitt?"
Tracey grabbed his t-shirt off the table and gulped. "No...!"
Before anyone could say another word, the Professor himself walked into the room. At first he didn't notice anyone occupying his kitchen table, but when he did he stopped walking for a second. He saw the cooking grease container opened and his lab assistant sitting there shiny as a new penny.
"Alexis, Fran. I hope you're not planning on sticking him in the oven."
"No Uncle Sam...we were just discussing some contractual obligations!" Fran chimed and stuck an arm around Tracey. She realized that he was still slick with grease and pulled away from him slowly making a disgusted face at the mess on her sleeve. "Ewww..."
The old man sighed. "Alright..." He puttered back to his morning business and let them be, the girls turned to their business prisoner with evil smiles.
"Well, it's settled then. We OWN you for the next month Sketchitt! You will live, eat and breathe fashion!" Alexis said, she grabbed a lock of his messy hair and scrunched her nose at it. "And just as an early warning, you CANNOT come with us to Vermillion dressing the way you do."
"Oh! MAKEOVER!" Fran jumped up from her chair and clapped excitedly.
Tracey groaned and slammed his head on the table, thinking what a brilliant situation he'd gotten himself into. A very valuable lesson had just been learned: 'The cooking grease is futile.'