The night Meowth died was the night hosting the worst fight I ever had with my best friend.

Meowth had been killed as a brutal reminder that the Boss did not take failures well. I remember the horror James and I had shared as we just watched him lie there, bleeding, eyes staring sightlessly at some light we did not see. The Boss had shot his tiny, feline heart. I, to this day, am still sickened by the smug look he had on his face. Then, he just dismissed us, not even caring to clean up the mess. We didn't take any chances; we bolted out, fighting tears. The other agents had heard the gunshot. I wonder if they were disappointed that there wasn't three of them.

Our fight had been over something stupid, like always, but then it really intesified. We started blaming each other for Meowth's death, each accusation stupider than the last.

"You made the plan!"

"You made the mecha!"

"You said the motto wrong, James! What kind of moron forgets the motto?!"

"What's wrong with spicing things up, Jessie? Maybe if you were a little bit creative this wouldn't have happened."

Eventually, I got sick of it. I was so angry, I had tears in my eyes, on my cheeks. I shouted something. I was so angry I didn't care -and didn't care to remember- what I said. Whatever I said, though, it must have really hit James, because after I said it, James just stopped dead in his tracks. There was now a dark, hurt look in his eyes. Then he lowered his head, and slowly walked away.

:::

"Prepare for trouble," I sighed, as sick of hearing this motto as the twerps were.

"Make it double," James muttered with equal enthusiasm.

"Why don't we just skip that?" Twerp suggested, smirking. "Pikachu! Thunder..." His words seemed to dwindle in his throat. "Where's Meowth?"

"Ready to launch a surprise attack," James retorted. I could tell by the strain in his voice that he was fighting the waves of sadness still swallowing both of us whole. "Just shock us and get it over with, all right? And hopefully I'll crush my skull on a rock and die."

I gave James a look of pure confusion. "That's a little morbid, don't you think?"

James just shrugged.

The twerps looked equally as puzzled. Eventually, they just shrugged and Pikachu did his thing.

After we landed, I immediately confroted James about what he had said earlier. "No big thing," he replied, as though all he did was trip on something or misspeak. "I just had a little sad slash morbid streak. No biggie."

I was terrified that it was more than that. But James' answer had reassured me enough to stop worrying about it, and so we set up camp. "Jessie?" he asked.

"Yeah?"

"Should I make a fire or will it be warm enough to sleep without it?"

I thought for a bit. "Winter's coming on pretty strong," I replied after a moment. "You should make a fire."

"As you wish," James nodded. And with that, he set off into the woods in search of kindling.

:::

It was dark before James returned, plenty of wood in his arms. "About time," I yawned, sitting up in my sleeping bag. "I thought you had gotten lost."

"Never," James chuckled, his sadness apparently gone. "I know this forest like the back of my hand." Then, he looked at the back of his gloved hand and exclaimed in mock surprise, "Hey! That's new!"

I couldn't help but smile. Watching as James arranged the stones he had also found into a circle, I noticed something- a large amount of blood, fresh, on his sleeve. "What happened?!" I asked, staring at his forearm.

"Wha?" James looked up for his work (which was now rubbing one stick against another stick). "Oh, that?" he said casually, glancing at the sleeve. "I just got attacked by a wild pokemon. It was weak."

"Looks like it clawed like something fierce."

"I'm fine."

"Let me see."

"I said I'm fine."

"James-"

"I'M FINE!!"

I leaned back a little, taken aback by his shouting. James glared at me for a moment, then returned to rubbing his sticks together. And, miraculously, it made a spark.

:::

As the fire licked greedily at the burning branches James had collected, I lied in my sleeping bag, wondering what was up with James. Why had he yelled at me? That gash from whatever pokemon that hurt him must've went real deep. So why didn't he let me see?

I looked over at my partner, curled up in a sleeping bag right next to mine (literally. Our sleeping bags were touching.). He moaned a bit and turned over, facing me. Looks like he's asleep, I obverved, taking a finger and wiping that one little persisting strand from his face. The strand, of course, fell right back. I tried again, tempted to cut off the offending strand.

"What're you doin'?"

"Huh?" I looked at James, who had apparently just awoken. "Oh. Nothing."

"Why is your hand on my face?" he asked, sitting up in his bag. The fire burned on behind him, bringing even more intensity to his bluish hair.

And the blood on his arm, I thought grimly. "Just seeing if you were warm enough," I lied, sitting up with him.

"Jessie?"

"Yeah?"

"That night Meowth died..." I was taken by surprise; we barely ever spoke about things like this directly. "What were we fighting about?"

I blinked, thinking hard. "Do you mean how it started out?"

"Yeah."

I looked down, trying to recall. Eventually, I admitted, "I don't know."

"Oh," James murmured.

"Why?"

"No reason. Just wondering." I could tell he was lying. I had known him long enough to know when he was lying to me. But ever since that fight, we had drifted apart a bit. Was that little drift, over time, going to expand into a gorge of lies and secrets, we on opposite sides? The thought shook me so much I forgot what we were even talking about, and so I lied down in my sleeping bag and closed my eyes.

"It's pretty out tonight, isn't it Jess?" James had lied down in his sleeping bag as well.

"Wha?" I opened my eyes and looked up at the sky. What must have been zillions of tiny stars flickered in the night like lightbulbs running out of power. "Yeah," I breathed. I'd never seen so many stars in my life.

"We found Meowth on a night like this," James murmured, obviously pained by the memory. "A little stray kitten, shivering in the moonlight." He sighed. "I don't understand it, Jessie."

"It's all that rat's fault," I spat.

"No it's not," James said, surprising me (and I think himself, too.). "Pikachu is just defending his master and himself. Would you want to be captured and experimented on? Would you want your best friend to be taken away from you?"

"No," I replied. But are you already being taken away from me? I wondered. James, I don't know what's going on with you, but something is definately wrong. And whatever it is, I'm going to find out what. And with that, I closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep. But before the darkness claimed my mind, I could have sworn I heard some sort of soft, quiet sobbing.

:::

By the time I woke up, the fire had burned out. The pile of firewood James had gathered still stood by the firepit. James, I saw, was still curled up in his sleeping bag.

"Get up," I called sharply, arising and standing over James. When he did not rise, I repeated my call and kicked him in the ribs.

He winced before he opened his eyes. "Unbelievable," he murmured, a look of slight annoyance on his face. "I wake up this morning and the first thing I see is your face." He sat up and yawned. "That's gonna leave me feeling funny all day."

I was a little stung. That remark reminded me of the sarcastic, contrary James I had met when we first teamed up (remember the Pokemon Journals: Just an Innocent Victim! thing?). "Yeah, you're not exactly a pocket full of sunshine yourself either," I retorted.

"At least I look decent," James snorted, standing up and rolling up his sleeping bag. "Come on. Into the balloon. We have some blasting off to do."

I merely nodded, not wanting to probe him further. He was obviously in a foul mood and egging him on was just a bad idea. Rolling up my bag and throwing into the balloon (which had just conviniently shown up out of nowhere- hey, it's anime.), I jumped in with him and leaned over the side, looking for Twerp.

James pretended to push me over the edge, grinning. I slapped him and his sarcastic alter-ego seemed to evaporate and he was back to normal. "Don't even joke about that!" I snapped. "Suppose I did fall out?"

"Then I'd catch you."

"And if I slipped?"

"I'd jump out after you."

That must have been the first time ever that James had, in under six words, stunned me into silence.