The kricketots were chirping loudly outside as the two girls settled into their bedrolls. Alina was still very quiet, presumably lost in her own thoughts. Lyra was surprised that she had just listened to everything she had said, and then accepted her request to travel with her when she didn't even know Lyra very well.
Lyra reached up and clicked off the hanging lantern, turning over in her bed and sighing contentedly. Tomorrow, they were going to go back to Alina's house, and she was going to tell her father that she was going on a journey whether he wanted to or not. Lyra blinked in the darkness, hoping against hope that everything would work out fine.
The next morning dawned bright and sharp. The air around those parts was very crisp and clean. That was part of the reason that New Bark had so many windmills: the air was wonderful in Southeastern Johto.
Lyra and Alina packed up the tent quickly and started down the fork in the road that split to Blackthorn and New Bark.
Eventually, after a few hours of walking, Blackthorn City came into view.
Alina looked at me. "I don't even know your name," she said, realization dawning on her face.
Lyra laughed. "You're right. I forgot to tell you. I'm Lyra. Nice to meet you." She stuck out her hand for Alina to shake.
Alina shook it, and then looked up toward the sky, where Whimsicott was floating lazily beneath the clouds.
The city was full of life, the humid air from the lake that guarded the Dragon's Den filling the streets. All of the roofs of the city were black, but the windows of the shops and the beautifully paved cobblestone streets filled the city with life and freshness. Every few feet, tiny trees were planted, adding to the sense of life and verdancy that the city had.
Lyra took a deep whiff of the air. "Ahh," she sighed, slouching a bit in pleasure. "It smells so good here!"
Alina smiled and nodded. "All of the cafés and restaurants leave their doors open, so all of the smells go out into the streets. Like it?" she asked, laughing at the dreamy look on Lyra's face.
"I love it! It's so different from New Bark, or from Undella Town! Everything just seems so full of life here, and it's amazing!" Lyra spun around in a circle, trying to take in all of the sights at once.
Alina pursed her lips, suddenly becoming quiet and serious. "My house is right up here on Valcamar Street. We live in a second-story apartment. It's not much, but it's enough."
Lyra tried to contain her excitement at the city as Alina buzzed them into her apartment and started climbing the stairs to the door at the top.
She stopped right before they walked into her home. "Now I just want you to be prepared for my father. He's a really big diva, and he annoys a lot of people."
Lyra smiled and poked her friend. "I'm guessing that he annoys you too sometimes."
Alina gave a half-smile. "Well he is my dad. What am I supposed to say? Here we go, but just keep an open mind."
She opened the door and walked in, immediately taking off her shoes and hanging her bag on the hook that was right next to the door. Lyra did the same, and then followed her into the wall-to-wall carpeted room.
"Alina? Is that you?!" A very high pitched voice sounded from the other room. Lyra heard a dresser
drawer close, and then a man appeared in the doorway that led into a room. Lyra smiled at him as he glared at her apprehensively.
"Well it looks like you've brought a friend. Why'd you come home early? Did the convention not treat you well enough?"
Lyra's eyes widened as Alina gave a little gasp.
Her father snorted and waved his hand in front of his face. "Honestly. You take me as a fool, Alina! I am wounded. Cousin Lydia lives in Kalos with her husband's family. I know she disowned the family because I was one of the ones who caused it. Back when Team Rocket was still around, Lydia thought that your uncle, aunt and I were involved with them due to...circumstantial evidence, shall we say. I pretended not to know because I wanted to see how badly you wanted to attend the convention. I may think pokémon are demons, but I know that that doesn't mean you have to. Did you look at your gift?"
Lyra swallowed. She had definitely not expected this. From what Alina had told her, her father was a complete diva with a selfish and hermit-like mind that sheltered Alina needlessly. This was not the father that Lyra had been expecting.
"No. I…I completely forgot about it, actually," Alina said, eyes still wide in shock.
Her father sighed and pursed his lips. "Well, I'll let you open it on your own then. I don't want to be there when you do." He walked over to the kitchen table and picked up an envelope.
"Dad…?" Alina stepped forward, leaving her question hanging.
Lyra understood. It sounded like her father was sending her off.
"Here's a bus ticket to Cherrygrove. I don't want you to have to make the walk again, as I know it's really tiring. I just hope that you will think of your poor, lonely daddy once in a while. I will be fine here, I do have friends you know," he said, sitting down. It sounded to Lyra like he was trying to reassure himself.
Alina sat down next to him. "Dad, are you sending me on a journey? But what about your fear of pokémon, and your…well, your overprotective nature?"
He smiled wistfully, staring at the ground. "Yes…I am. I just want you to be happy. Please, do that for me, okay?" He chuckled to himself, like he was recalling a joke.
Alina stood up and hugged him, then turned to Lyra. "I think we should go now. He's withdrawing into his shell."
Lyra didn't ask what that meant, but she followed Alina out of the apartment and down onto the bustling, beautiful streets of Blackthorn. "What was that? It was like he went insane at the end."
Alina stopped walking and steadied herself against a tree. "The night my mom died, he went insane. He had been drinking earlier that day, and that pushed him over the edge. He tore apart our entire apartment in Canalave City. He…he threw a chair at me, and it knocked me out." Tears started to pour down Alina's face.
Lyra took her friend and led her to a bench. She would have said something, but somehow, saying 'I'm sorry' after that didn't seem appropriate. So she let Alina continue.
"The next morning, I woke up and he was passed out on the wreckage of our dining room table. I thought he was dead at first, but he woke up when I started crying. He had given me a concussion with the chair, and I was really out of it. He managed to call the ambulance, but passed out again right after that. They came and got him, and left me there, all alone. I didn't know what had happened, or what to do. He hadn't even told me that my mother had died.
"When he came home the day after, I had tried to fix the apartment back up as best I could, but I was really messed up from the concussion. He seemed really weird, but he told me to leave the apartment and to get in our car. He drove me to the airport and we took off in a plane. We landed a long time afterwards, and then we got in a new car and drove to this apartment. He told me it was our new home and that I should get used to it because we weren't moving again. Then he told me that my mom had died.
"I didn't cry, partially because of the fuzz of my concussion, and partially because my mother was never home enough for me to really get to know her. Once they treated me for my brain damage, I just got back into the swing of things, but I ended up doing almost all of the house work and the cooking. My father withdrew into a shell that he had never had before, and he became really protective of me, and such a diva. He was really tough and mean before, but it was like he had transformed into a new person. He also started hating pokémon, and wouldn't let me go to the pokémon school. Ever since then, I knew that I wanted to be a breeder, because I wanted to help pokémon, not fear them like my father did. I always told myself that I didn't care about what happened to my father because he didn't seem to care about me that night, but I think I always craved his approval inside. That's why I was so afraid of going to the convention, because I had never directly disobeyed him like that before." She broke down sobbing once more.
Lyra almost wanted to cry herself. It was such a sad story, and she was amazed that Alina was still so strong after all that had happened to her. "I know this may sound pathetic, but I think that the strongest people are so strong because they have overcome all of their challenges, and they are ready to face every new problem with the mindset that nothing can be worse than what they've already been through."
Alina took a deep breath and wiped her eyes with her sleeve. "I'm sorry. I don't know why I just told you that. I've never told anyone that before. You just…you make me feel at home, although I'm not sure if I would know what that means. Thank you Lyra. Do…do you mind if I travel with you?"
Lyra smiled. She had been hoping that Alina would ask that. "I would love you to. You wanna catch that bus? I'm going to Violet City next, and I think that you can still go to some of that convention."
Alina nodded. "Sure. Oh, but wait! I forgot to open the gift my dad gave me."
She pulled the gift out of her bag and took a little box out of it. She opened it, and gave a little gasp. Inside, a little pokéball rested in a carved out half-sphere.
Lyra laughed. "Of course! That's why he didn't want you to open it inside, he was afraid of it! Open it, it's probably some rare pokémon he got you to commemorate your start as a breeder!"
Alina enlarged the pokéball, and then tossed it into the air. It exploded in white light, and then a large pokémon burst forth.
"Bellossom!"
Alina gasped. "I've always wanted a bellossom," she whispered as she watched the flower pokémon stare up at her.
"Bellossom!" The little pokémon ran forward and gave Alina the biggest hug around her legs that it could muster.
Alina froze for a moment, and Lyra could tell that she was slightly apprehensive because she was raised on the notion that pokémon were evil. But after a moment, she reached down and picked her bellossom up.
"Hey you! You're just the cutest thing, aren't you?!"
"Bellossom, bell, bell!"
Lyra smiled as she watched the two form an immediate bond. She was excited to see how they would grow.
The bus shook as it flew over rocks and roots. The road to Cherrygrove City from Blackthorn was rough and unpaved, even though it was relatively well traveled. There had been a campaign a while back to try to raise funds and pave the road, but it hadn't passed because people liked the rough wilderness that the route brought.
Lyra smiled as she watched Bellossom and Alina play in the seat next to her. Alina had been overjoyed when she had seen that the gift was a bellossom. They were extremely rare, since Sun Stones were the rarest of the evolutionary stones.
"You know, it's funny that you were given a bellossom," Lyra mused.
Alina stopped tickling her flower pokémon and gave Lyra a quizzical look. "Why?"
"Because I have a whimsicott, which also evolves by a Sun Stone. But I too got him after he was evolved. I just think that's kind of neat." Lyra smiled when she saw the disappointed look on Bellossom's face as the pokémon realized that they weren't playing anymore.
Alina's face looked serious. "But that might mean something. When Jenna freaked out, she kept saying that the robbers wanted whatever was in my bag. I kind of blew that off, but now that I realize it, they probably wanted Bellossom. And then I bump into you with a whimsicott. They might be going after pokémon that have evolved from Sun Stones, although I don't know why."
Lyra pursed her lips. "That does make sense, but I haven't actually caught Whimsicott. He just follows me around everywhere and does everything I say. I've never officially caught him because he's really shy around pokéballs." Her eyes grew wide. "Come to think of it, I haven't seen him since this morning. That's odd. He normally follows me everywhere."
"It's probably nothing to worry about," Alina said, adjusting the white cap on her head.
Lyra nodded, but she was still extremely nervous. What if something had happened to him? She could never forgive herself, especially if some other trainer had caught him. After being advised over and over to catch him, she would feel horrible if he ended up with someone else.
The rest of the trip went very slowly for Lyra, especially since she couldn't stop thinking about Whimsicott. When they finally got to Cherrygrove City again, Lyra was the first person off the bus. Her first glance was up, but to her disappointment, Whimsicott was not floating around in the sky.
Alina jumped off the last step and landed next to Lyra, adjusting the strap on her bag. "He's not here? Don't worry Lyra, he probably just lost his way. He'll find us sooner or later."
Lyra nodded, trying to convince herself of that. But somehow, the whole situation just didn't feel right.
"Oopsies, sorry dearies. Pardon me." A shrill old woman's voice brushed past them as they both got knocked forward into the street gutter.
Lyra straightened up and looked back down the street at the woman, who was happily humming a little tune as she waddled down the sidewalk, carrying numerous shopping bags. Lyra was about to shout at her for pushing them, but then her eyes caught on something. A little piece of fuzz that was stuck to the woman's satin gloves. Whimsicott fuzz.
"Come back here!" she screamed, tearing after her.
The woman paused and looked back slightly through her glasses. Lyra could see her expression harden. The lady's hand darted into her bag and then threw something on the ground. A tinkle of shattering glass later, smoke started to fill the air.
"A smoke ball," Lyra coughed as she tried to breathe and see through the smoky air. A flash of white satin alerted her to the general direction the woman was going, and she raced forward, trying to get out of the smoke.
Down an alleyway, and out onto another street, the smell of pollen and flowers filling her nostrils as she tried to keep up with the tourist, who had abandoned all of her bags but one and was now flat out sprinting.
"Litwick, Flame Burst!" Lyra called, releasing the candle pokémon.
"LitWICK!" the pokémon yelled as she sent a jolt of fire at the woman.
The lady spun around and threw a pokéball down. "Honchkrow, Whirlwind!"
A sudden gale whipped up around Lyra and Litwick, diverting the flames around the woman and pushing Lyra back.
"N…o!" she grunted, pointing at the woman. "Litwick, Thief! Get Whimsicott back!"
The candle lunged forward and nudged a pokéball off of the woman's belt as she escaped. The ball rolled to the ground and stopped on a sidewalk crack, sunlight glinting off of its metal surface as the wind died down.
Lyra darted forward and picked it up. "Whimsicott?" she muttered. A moment later, she tossed the ball up in the air.
Sure enough, out came the bashful cotton ball. Lyra sighed in relief and hugged her newly pokéballed pokémon.
Alina came running up to Lyra. "Lyra! What happened? Is the woman gone?" she asked, her hands on her knees as she struggled to catch her breath.
Lyra nodded. "She is, but I don't know if she knows I stole Whimsicott from her at the last second. At any rate, she must have captured him and then tried to run off with him. Although why, I have no idea."
Alina frowned as she saw a plastic card pinned underneath a garbage can. She picked it up and showed it to Lyra.
TEAM ROCKET EXECUTIVE ARIANA
SECURITY LEVEL: ALPHA PRIME
Alina frowned. "Team Rocket? I thought they disbanded years ago."
Lyra nodded. "They did. This must be old. At any rate, at least we have Whimsicott back. How about we catch the last bit of the convention and then take a room at the Pokémon Center?"
Alina shrugged. "Sure, why not?"
They set off down the streets of Cherrygrove, amity filling the air. It was all peaceful…for now.
Hello again! Thank you for reading this, once again. Thank you to Alphinia and Green Rune for reviewing also. That is very much appreciated.
I am thinking that I will be doing two chapters a week. Right now, the best upload schedule for me is Thursdays and Fridays, although that will be very changeable. I was actually hoping to get this up yesterday, but I was not home at all yesterday. This chapter I think is a little better than the last, although I have already started writing next chapter and it is turning out very well if I do say so myself.
Alina's past was really hard for me to write because I hate doing bad things to characters, but that is my Achilles heel in writing, so I wanted to start getting over that. This story is a journey for me as a writer to get a lot better, and your reviews really help that (*cough cough* Alphinia *cough cough*.)
So once again, thanks for reading, and there will hopefully be another chapter on Sunday, if not Monday. Have a wonderful day!
-Cole Escapade