I do not wish to kill or be killed,
but I can foresee circumstances in which these things would be by me unavoidable.
Henry David Thoreau
The Bird and the Researcher
"In the time of ancient men, when cities were aflame. A man, a king, he did stand up, and healed the city's shame," Misty quoted, the big book open. She had settled it along her upturned forearms and braced it against the two cups of her elbows. It was easiest to walk that way, she decided, as she could look up quickly and catch herself just by flipping her forearms over if she tripped. Still, she wasn't too nervous about losing her footing.
This was thanks to Ash, who glanced back and fidgeted with the rope around his waist. He could see it led straight back to her, about three feet apart, and that the knot was still tight around her own stomach. So far, the system had worked, as she had not walked into a single tree or tripped into a single ditch. As far as he knew, she had kept her eyes in the book all morning, stopping only to groan at him about how boring it was.
"That sounds like how a book would start," he accused. "You should've been reading it all morning."
"Shut up, Ash. I have been reading it all morning and I just got to the beginning," Misty grumbled and snapped the book closed on her finger to keep her place. "The book had a long, boring introduction, and it had to open up with a damn poem. I don't do poems, Ash. I hardly do history."
"What'd it say?" he asked, and walked backwards to watch her as they talked. The beaten path looked smooth and straight as far as he could tell, and Ash had walked through forests often enough to know when he was about to walk into a tree.
She opened it again, burying her head in the pages. "Nothing important. Turn around."
"Let me hear! There's got to be something cool!" Ash pleaded.
"There's nothing important, I swear." She turned another page, being as delicate as she could. The paper so old and thin she could hardly feel it through the calluses on her fingers. They didn't look sturdy. Each page was brown with water marks and age, and most were hardly hanging by a thread from the bindings. Misty continued, "There's nothing worthwhile in it, and you wouldn't understand it if there was."
"That's fine.'" He shrugged. "I just thought it'd be nice to hear your voice."
"Wow. What a creeper."
Ash blushed and walked straighter. "I'm not a cree-"
Closing the book on her finger with an overacted anger, she cut him off: "So, this goes back to before we had a king. We've got the League now, and a real long time ago we had the king family thing, and this goes back before the idea of a king uniting all of Kanto was even thought of. They had tribes, and they never got to over one hundred people or it'd just end up falling apart."
His mouth dropped open and he rushed to the book. "How long ago was that?"
"Thousands of years," Misty said, trying not to smile at his enthusiasm, though, as much as she grumbled about how boring the bulk of it was, she was brimming over with eagerness herself. "I mean, this is a history book – like, stories in here that were passed down orally kind of history. Each city was a tribe, and there were loads of tribes, way more than we have now. This is the list of them." She showed him a long, small print page that continued on another page. "They basically had no alliances, no rules, and each one was out for the extinction of every other. And after…"
She trailed off for a moment, flicking back and forth a few pages, "Forty or so pages of wars, and he's not mentioned in any of them, by the way, we get a fun little prophecy from a non-existent town about how a king would appear. He did, in the form of," a few more pages were turned before she could quote it directly, "A youth, dark haired and dark eyed, who was tanned by the peace of the beaches of southern Kanto. His arms and legs and torso were taut and sinewy but his heart was soft, his mind was quick, and he could tame all monsters without a trap." She glanced up and raised an eyebrow, "Muscles and intelligence aside, I'm sensing a family resemblance."
"He's probably not real," Ash said with a shrug. "And if he ever did I'm sure his line died out."
"Never know, Ketchum, things get screwy when heroes are involved. Maybe you've got a direct family line." Misty grinned now, pushing his shoulder gently with hers.
"Well, what did this hunk of gorgeous man-meat do? Save babies from burning buildings? Rescue damsels from burning towers?"
She cackled. "Close. He killed the leader of almost every tribe."
"How is that close?" Ash said, his eyes round and large.
"He burned their bodies afterward, so you were close with your 'burning' part."
He shook his head. "This is a hero."
"This is a king," she corrected, and began to look through the pages as she described the attacks. "But he did leave eight tribes alive. Pewter refused to let him in with their defense and they gave him a woman to keep him busy. Cerulean, oh. Great. They whored themselves out. Uh, Vermillion had too great of a military strategy, but gave him a concubine anyway. Celadon disoriented him with scent – oh, they whored themselves out too. Fuchsia hid and, oh, gees, they sent a girl to get whored out. Saffron mentally whored herself out. Cinnabar hid on the island and Viridian hid under the ground. Oh, but Viridian sent up a whore, just in case Mr. Hunk thought about looking for him."
"What a pimp," Ash snorted, hardly able to croak out the words through his laughter.
"Was sex the solution for everything? It was their distraction, their defense, their bribe, and I'm pretty sure one of the war stories in here was about girls charging into battle naked –" She pointed to another page in the book, this one with a detailed picture of the girls rushing into battle, "which they won, by the way."
"I know I'd lose to a bunch of naked girls." He looked over her shoulder at the page. "Is that the only illustration?"
She started to flip, then stopped. "You want to see burned to death people?"
"No."
"Only picture," Misty said swiftly, turning pages once again.
Ash cleared his throat. "So, what happens next?"
"He becomes king and takes over three hundred wives, and he still cheats. But, all the cities that whored themselves out were under his control. He married the girls and they couldn't risk them dying if they rebelled." She paused, then turned back to where she was originally, where the stories started. "Tribes were small, Ash, most were only fifty to seventy people at best, and almost everyone was closely related. The girls were daughters, cousins, sisters, mothers…they couldn't let them go."
"They never fought back?"
Misty bit her lip, trying to remember the name of the city so she wouldn't have to flip back. That was one of the pages with a color picture, one that majorly featured the color red. She made up the city, hoping she was right: "Celadon first, and the king killed their girl. No one tried for a while after that."
"How long?" Ash asked.
"On a large scale, from what I know? You need to wait a millennia before the first attempted overthrow of the royal line. On the small scale, every fifty or so years there were little attempts that were crushed quickly." She made a face and looked at the huge lump of pages she had already read. "Hundreds of pages of laws and boring crap before anything exciting happens again."
He insisted, "You have to read it all, just in case."
Misty grit her teeth. "I know."
"I know you're all tricky and stuff, but don't try and get out of this." He put a sympathetic hand on her shoulder.
She shrugged it off. "Yeah, whatever."
Ash tried again, "Wars are cool to read about."
"Yeah, if you're a boy."
He smirked. "Then you should be enjoying it, right?"
Misty growled and slammed her foot against the small of his back, and he collapsed to the ground, groaning and rubbing at the sore spot. It didn't heal like his other wounds did, which made her happier than it should have. Once Ash got up, he yanked her knot of the rope tight, under the excuse of "just checking" and continued on at a pace that constantly alternated between quick and slow. It was one that tired him out a bit and left her barely standing.
She looked up at him, making her eyes big and innocent and, she hoped, bluer, as blue eyes were supposed to be more innocent looking. "I've read the first five hundred years," she begged, touching his shoulder so he would look at her, "Can I please stop now?"
He looked into her eyes, which were still more green than blue and would not have persuaded him even if they had changed color, and laid a hand on her shoulder. "You can stop any time you want and live with the fact that you might never, ever, ever get to the end of it and that asshole is going to kill us all in our sleep." He smiled. "Still, I won't beat you up for stopping. You can stop anytime you want."
She slapped his hand off and they continued, now at a regular pace, while Misty muttered, "Never have I ever finished a giant history book."
"Never have I ever had a peanut butter and pickle sandwich," Ash retorted, laughing at the joke.
She winkled her nose, and he realized she probably didn't remember or care about the peanut butter and pickle sandwich he had dared her to eat five years ago. Ash barely remembered the night, just that it was raining, and the only reason he remembered that was because they were inside. When they had traveled together, they were only inside for nights and rain. After an awkward moment, the creased between her eyebrows and smoothed out and she shot back, "Never have I ever been dumb enough to stick my hand in a garbage disposal to get a coin back."
His retort was quicker, "Never have I ever flashed my friends."
She blushed, using the book to give him a good hit to the back of his head. "Accidentally. But never have I ever been caught tongue kissing my rival's sister."
"Let's not remind Gary of that the next time we see him," Ash said, wincing at how his rival had reacted the first time he had heard it, and at how he would probably react again. He steered the conversation back to the cheerier stuff, saying, "Never have I ever said, 'I know' when someone says they love me."
"If you say it more it becomes less special."
"Sure," he said, not sounding very convinced.
Misty scoffed. "What do you know about love anyway?"
He straightened, his male pride offended. "I know plenty! I've had my share of girlfriends."
"Oh really?" She snorted, going to cross her arms and looking stupid when she was blocked by the book in her hand. "Who?"
"None of your business."
"I've dated four different guys."
"Ha! I've dated six!" he shot back.
Misty snickered. "Six guys. Good job."
"Shut up."
"You have a type?"
He thought. "A girl who likes pokémon and gets along with Pikachu."
At her raised eyebrow. He thought harder. "I guess. I mean, I can't really think of anything else they had in common."
"Hair? Eyes? Legs? Breasts? Personality?" No for all, and for the last one he added a laughing snort to explain just how different each girl had been. She matched his pace in two long steps and looked at him full on, not bothering to hide her curiosity. "Come on, there's nothing you like in a girl?"
"Nope, whoever I fall for is whoever I fall for. Personal questions, though, Mist. What's that about?"
The hostility returned. "Don't call me that."
"He didn't call you that," Ash argued. "I called you that all the time when we were growing up. What's wrong with it?"
"We're not growing up anymore. We're not close anymore." Misty folded a page in the old book to mark her place, and closed it. "That's what's with the personal questions, Ash. I don't know you anymore. You don't know me anymore. Since I'm gonna have to be travelling all around this weird clone world with you, I think I should know the person I'm traveling with a little better. So, personal history."
"I'm the same guy. I've just dated a few more people, caught a few more pokémon, won a League and placed pretty well in a few more." He grinned. "Saved the world a bit, made new friends. Same old, same old me. Just more of it."
Misty stared at him, trying to figure out if he was really boyfriend material now, and asked, "You ever been in love?" to keep him distracted from her wandering eyes.
He considered for a moment. "I think I probably have. Been close for sure. What about you?"
She put her head down and murmured, "None of your business."
Ash laughed. "None of my business? What happened to getting to know each other?"
"Tell me more about yourself," she ordered, smiling the fakest smile he had ever seen her wear. "Tell me about the stuff that happened. I just saw the whole bridge thing. Girl falls, you catch her, happy family…Is there anything else to the story or does it end there?"
He shrugged. "I guess that's the end of that part. I mean, we just went back and crashed in the Pokémon Center. The police sent absolutely everyone home. Nobody argued that time around. Nothing else happened. I never really would've thought about it again if it hadn't led to…all this." He glanced off into the woods and then ran his fingers through Pikachu's fur. "Never would've thought it would lead to this, right buddy?"
Pikachu cuddled back, his pillar against Misty's continued questioning of: "How'd you get here?"
"He said I could come save you or he'd kill you all. I chose to save you. Wasn't that tough a decision," he lied.
"Who was stolen first?"
"Pikachu. He went out, he never came back. Little later on, jerkass shows up and acts polite." Ash's fists clenched tight by his side. "Then he says that he took my pokémon and poof! Vanishes. Just…vanishes. Nothing to show he was gone. No psychic blue light, no smoke. You just blink and he's gone."
"Who was next?"
He stared at her for a moment. "I get a question first."
"Shoot."
He stepped in front of her, stopping her, acting so serious Misty wanted to giggle, but held it in. He gave his speech, which was a solemn, short ramble, with all the sincerity he could manage: "I told you again and again that something was wrong, to come to see me. I said people were going missing, that there was some big baddie who was going after everyone I had been close to. I called you again and again. I know you got the messages. Your sisters got the messages and they told me they gave the messages to you. You never came. Misty, you know the kind of trouble I get people into, and you never came. Why did you never come?"
She sighed. "I don't know."
"That's crap. Tell me the truth," he said firmly. "You always know why you do what you do. You overthink everything. That's what you're the sidekick for."
She rolled her head around her shoulders slowly. "I don't know. I guess…I didn't come because I just…I had a lot of stuff on my plate."
"Why were going all out to avoid me?" Ash persisted.
Misty glared, getting hostile. "I wasn't in the mood to see anyone after I killed Aiden."
"It was an accident." That wasn't going to get through, he knew that the second the words left his lips, and her hardened face confirmed it. "I wouldn't have blamed you. Brock wouldn't have. No one would have said anything bad about you. We wouldn't have made you feel bad. You should have known that. You should have come."
"You couldn't have saved me either way! What difference does it make?" she spat.
"We might have grown up and grown apart but that doesn't mean I don't care! You're still my friend, whether you want to be or not." He took a step back, even though he was so frustrated he wanted to shake her. "I don't want you hurt, and like it or not we're safer together than we are apart. You should have come. Maybe, just maybe we could have done something if we hadn't been who knows how far apart. Maybe nothing would have happened, maybe we could have took him on, anything."
Misty gripped the book. "We were friends forever ago. It's not like we were lovers or family or anything. Why can't you just realize that I moved on with my life without you?"
"Because I know you didn't," he said, the urge to shake her almost overwhelming.
She snorted. "And how do you know that?"
"Because people don't move on from me!" he yelled, losing his control. She jumped at his outburst. "People don't forget me. Call me cocky, think I'm an ass, I don't care! People don't move on from me. And you know what? With all the crazy stuff we did? We were family. I don't know what you remember, but from when I was ten to when I was fourteen, you and Brock and Tracey and Mom and even Gary, you were my life. We were close, and you don't move on from that."
"You don't," she whispered. "I do."
"You're lying."
"I'm guilty," Misty said stiffly. "I couldn't face you guys, after what I'd done."
He changed the topic again. "I think we should sleep here. It's late enough. So we might as well set up camp."
"Who takes first watch?"
"No watches," he said. "He plays games, he follows rules. That's what psychos like him do. He's not going to send anything after us."
Misty wasn't so willing to move on from any argument, her temper still hot. "You don't know that."
"Fine," he said, smiling amicably. "You sleep tonight. You didn't get any last night, I bet. You stayed up looking out for monsters. So I'll stay up. Then we'll take shifts from then on. We'll keep it fair that way."
She glared. "You're going to wait until I fall asleep and then you're gonna go to sleep, aren't you?"
"Probably," Ash agreed happily. "But it's not good for you to stay up two nights in a row. You're not gonna be able to force yourself to do it. Why don't you just trust me this one time, and I'll do it your way for everything else?"
She jabbed her finger at him. "Because you know as well as I do that you're not going to believe me. I'm going to figure out everything and you're going to be like the protagonist in every horror movie ever made. 'Oh, no, he can't be the killer. He's so nice!' And I'll keep telling you and telling you and I'll wind up dead because you won't believe me." Misty stomped her foot. "Screw you! I'm not going to wind up dead because you're stupid."
He fake sighed, throwing his hands up in defeat. "You're right. I haven't slept in days. I'm crazy with stress. I mean, all I have to do is let that stress get the best of me and I'm up for another week. It'd not like you're just gonna stay up until you stop getting mad, which you won't, of course. And you won't fall asleep at five in the morning. And then I won't go to sleep the second you close your eyes."
"That's not true!" Then, after a fruitless kick of a pebble, muttered a defeated, "Fine. It is. But at least humor me and stay up until after I go to sleep. There might be something out there that wants to eat me."
He was about to make a joke about her being the same ten year old she was years ago, but was stopped by her figure, her face, and the confident, invincible movements that came from being a teenager and said, "You know that you're…" –here he swallowed- "…you're eighteen now."
Misty stared at him, wondering if his final screw had gone loose. "So are you. You're all grown up, Ketchum. How does it feel?"
"Like crap."
She curled up in her sleeping bag and he humored her. He sat up until her breath finally slowed and she started snoring. Then he rolled out his own sleeping bag and put out the fire. That woke her up, and he humored her a little more until she fell asleep again. Then he crawled into his sleeping bag and slept, Pikachu curled up by his side, and hoped Misty wouldn't wake up again. If she decided to stand guard all night, and he'd have to drag her all across the road the next day.
She woke up without a problem about an hour after he did, both in the early afternoon. Misty didn't bother breaking the book out, and he didn't bother telling her too. Ash was too happy for the company, and they had plenty of time before they reached the League. They walked quicker, almost skipping as they talked. Mostly they talked gossip and pokémon, but the conversation eventually slid back into the situation at hand.
"What do you think his challenge is going to be?" Ash asked.
"Something smart, I bet."
"Nah, people are physical challenges. Pokémon are mental. It's got to be something I do with my body."
She laughed, one hand clapping over her mouth to smother it, so more jokes could be made. "Oh, well, that opens a whole world of suggestions. Things you could do with your body to save Gary. If we run into that guy, I've got a few suggestions of what the next challenges should be."
He groaned. "He's my rival, please don't go there."
Misty continued in her best romance novel narrator voice, "'Oh, Ash,' he'll say with his muscles rippling and covered in sweat, 'I need you so bad right now.'"
"If you keep this up, prepare for lesbian incest jokes about your sisters," he said, covering his ears with his hands. "I swear. They'll only make me feel better!"
She yanked his hands down, giggling. "And you'll just undress each other slowly and make out passionately in order to save him from those chains. You'll have to chain him up again when you get back home, since you guys are so into that, but that will never change how hot and magical that rescue sex was."
Ash taunted, "So, rumor has it you practice kissing with your sisters?"
"Ew, Ash, it's, like, only second base!" Misty said, tossing imaginary long hair over her shoulder.
He chuckled and shoved her sideways. "Seriously, what do you think his challenge is going to be like?"
"No clue." She shoved him back. "Is there anything Gary's afraid of? Spiders, snakes, clowns?"
"Me winning. Aside from his pride getting beat up, I can't think of anything. Not everyone has a secret psychological fear like you with your bugs."
"I know that. But I can't think of anything it might be." She fiddled with a loose thread on the binding of the book. "Maybe I was a fluke, and the rest of the challenges won't have anything to do with the person. Maybe they're just challenges. Like, run a marathon or swim across a river."
"Your challenge sucked, by the way," he said suddenly. "In case you were wondering if people without a fear of bugs enjoy being in a pinching, pointy, squirming bug pit? Yeah. Not exactly highlight of my year."
She rolled her eyes. "Right, so, to the League. No mountains, no real forest, a pretty straight trail. We should get there by nightfall. If we take longer breaks or turn in early we'll definitely be there by morning. We shouldn't have anything come up, though."
Ash groaned, coming to a dead halt. "That irony loving bastard."
He was there, of course, the irony loving bastard as he was. He wasn't playing it cool this time, but standing in the middle of the road like a warning sign, back as straight as if a rod had been shoved up from the bottom of his feet up to the nape of his neck, and eyes just a bit too wide. If they had looked very, very carefully, they could have seen his hands shaking by his sides, but Ash barely noticed, and Misty was too busy foaming at the mouth and rushing at him to care.
"I'm reading the whole damn book!" she cried. "Give me a hint! Tell me if the clue is at the beginning, middle or end. I'm not the one on trial anyway! Ash is! Let's save time."
"I'm immortal. I have all the time in the world," he retorted, voice as calm and cocky as ever.
She picked up the closest rock, which was on the far side of the road, and threw it at him. He had no problem ducking, and she shrieked even louder: "Tell me where the clue is!"
He gave an evil grin. "What clue?
She ran for him, but Ash stopped her, wrapping his arms around her neck to keep her from running him down. When they were little, Misty was stronger than him. He wasn't going to take any chances on their strength ratio now. There would be no comfortable grip around her waist or chest, or even something as innocent as under her arms. His arm was a rope around her neck, and he would have no problems letting her strangle herself.
"What are you here for this time?' Ash asked steadily, ignoring the girl twisting in his grasp.
"I've decided that it'll take too long for you to collect at all your friends before the riddles start," he said. "So, I'm just going to put random riddles up wherever I feel like."
"I thought you had all the time in the world to wait?" Misty sneered.
Ash dropped his head to her ear, barely keeping himself from tightening his grip to shut her up quicker. "I want to be friends, but if you keep this up I swear I will smother you to keep you quiet. Nobody's getting hurt on my watch."
She struggled, her hands fruitlessly grabbing at his arm, scratching and pulling hard enough to break through the top few layers of skin. After a strange looking maneuver of bucking up and tilting her head in an attempt to bite herself free, she let her hands fall and muttered back, "If you had any respect for me as a person you'd let me make my own mistakes and try and kill the guy."
He snorted. "If you were the only one who'd get killed for it, trust me, I'd let you go."
"If you're done, I'm not finished," the man chirped. "I was going to tell you where the clue is in the book."
"Really?" Misty gasped, her hands now clutching Ash's arm with excitement.
"Sorry, I couldn't help myself!" He laughed. Then, he shook his head, controlled his laughter, and explained, "I just want to let you know that you don't have to do a watch. There's no pokémon here. Get your sleep. I like my heroes fresh."
Like before, he vanished. It took longer for them to realize he was gone than for him to actually disappear, and longer still for Ash to realize he still had Misty around the neck. He dropped his grip and took a step back, holding his hands up in case she decided to launch at him. She didn't, just shot him a dirty look and rubbed both her hands around her neck. She didn't cough, which meant he hadn't hurt her throat too badly, and she didn't attack him, which meant she wasn't too mad. Even if she had, Ash wouldn't have regretted it. Misty's mouth had managed to land them in trouble more than once, and the starry haired man was all too concerned about politeness.
"We're keeping watch tonight," he said finally.
"Yeah, you got that right." She hardly took a pause before she said, "Thanks for holding me back. Something about that guy just drives me crazy. I'm usually not this bad anymore."
Ash smirked. "It's nice to see some things never change."
"Like your underwear."
"Flipping them inside out counts."
Misty shuddered. "No, it doesn't."
They walked on, finishing the debate of whether or not flipping it inside out counted (they came to a compromise that it wasn't as healthy as getting a new pair, but still cleaner than just wearing them the same way) and Misty went back to the book. He asked her what the real story was, and she said it was a half poetry, half prose mess that she would tell him about later, once she got through and made sense of it all. Ash kept pestering her about what she was doing and why she couldn't think out loud, until she finally screamed at him to shut up and watch where he was going so she could focus on what she was supposed to be reading.
After ten minutes of focused reading, it was all broken by Ash's halt and question of: "What's that?"
"A barn?" Misty proposed, stepping up beside him. He turned to glare at her, and she ignored him, drawling on, "I mean, that'd be my guess. I'm pretty bad at buildings. Way better at fitting round pegs into round holes. Shapes – that's my specialty."
"The sarcasm is nice. Really helpful."
"It's ironic you're saying that sarcastically," she pointed out.
Ash grinned a bit and looked closely at what was in front of them. She was right about it being a barn, no way around that. It was a nice barn, too, one of the plain ones with white trimmings and a pyramid roof made of black shingles. It was tall enough to break a few bones if one landed the wrong way, and could easily snap a neck if one didn't know how to land. It had appeared just a couple feet in front of them, so they couldn't see the top.
"Right, so, there's a barn," he said. He looked at her. "What's the barn for?"
"Barns hold things: animals, pokémon, food. Maybe your pokémon's in it and you have to get in."
He frowned. "That sounds physical."
"How'd you figure out the last one?"
Ash opened his mouth, about to tell the whole story of saving Pikachu, before he realized she probably didn't want to hear that, and had probably meant how he figured out what the challenge was. So he started again and said, "There was a paper that told me what to do."
"How long did it take?" She looked at him sideways.
"A few hours."
"It took you a few hours to follow the instructions?" asked Misty incredulously. "What was written down on that freaking paper that it took you an hour? Hebrew?"
"It was a riddle," he defended awkwardly.
"So, what? You think they're'll be a riddle somewhere this time?"
"You want to search for it?"
"What else is there to do?" She shrugged. "If you don't have any idea what you could possibly be…?"
He began to wander to the barn. "We've been over this. I'm the muscle, you're the boobs and brains. If you don't get it, how am I supposed to?"
"You're freaking useless," she scoffed.
"I know! That's why I'm so glad you're here!" he chirped. "Hey, are those riddles posted on the door?"
She looked back at the barn, then grinned in spite of herself. "They are! What do you know, Ketchum, you're not completely useless after all. Good eyes!" She trotted up to the wall, Ash alongside her, and together they examined the wall. The paper was brown around the edges, the same look as the book she had been reading all day, and was nailed to the barn door with two rusted nails. The words were handwritten, and Misty was haltingly able to make out the poem:
Up on the roof your monster sits but do not be afraid,
No beasts are here to maim you, only eggs to soon be laid.
Catch the egg, the beast is yours, you can continue on your way.
But which way will the egg fall, dears?
Please have a pleasant day!
Misty was quiet, contemplating, before Ash broke into her thoughts with, "Why does everything turn into a poem during an adventure? I mean, why can't they just tell me? It's not too much to ask for a, 'hey, pull that lever to save the girl' instead of eighty lines of rhyming." He jabbed a finger at the paper. "They do it on purpose. It's like they want me to fail."
"Oh my freaking Mew, did you always bitch this much?" she growled, smacking her hand across the back of his head. "I thought you wanted me to solve the riddle for you!"
"I do," he whined, rubbing the spot.
"Well, you have to shut up! I can't think with you talking my ears off," she sighed and turned back to the riddle, "Arceus."
He sighed, plopping down in the grass. "Fine. I don't care. Solve it without me."
"I thought that's what you-oh, what do I care?" She focused harder on the paper. "I hate you either way."
She liked the riddle, though. It was vaguely familiar. Granted, most riddles were familiar once you figured out how to think like them. It was easy enough to figure out the basis of it. Ash's bird type was on the roof and was, at some point, going to lay an egg. The egg was going to roll down one of the four sides, and they would have to catch it. The trick was to figure out which way the egg would fall. Her mouth watered for a second at the thought of a nice, warm plate of scrambled eggs, then she shook it off.
"Hey, staraptor! I can see him!" Ash shouted, interrupting her thoughts once again. The bird called to his master sadly, and held out his strangely bent wing in obvious pain. "That bastard! He broke staraptor's wing! The bas-"
"Of course he did," Misty snapped. "He'd just fly down to us otherwise. We have to solve the riddle. You said it yourself, he's playing a game. He doesn't want us to cheat."
Ash was still furious. "He didn't have to break his wing."
"No, he didn't, but he did." She held up her hand to haul him up to his feet. He didn't take it. "The best we can do is solve the riddle as fast as we can and save the poor bird. Maybe he'll heal up staraptor like he healed you up. You know, because he completely screwed me over but he healed you up."
"I hate him," Ash said.
"Good. Great. That's what he wants," she explained, sitting down in front of him. "So you'll get distracted by how much you hate him and throttle him, and then he can do it back to you ten fold without ruining his little politeness thing."
He fumed. "Next time I'll let you pummel him."
"You mean let me hit him once and get it back twice as hard and wind up bleeding on the ground?" She laid down, arms behind her head. "That would be fun."
"It'd be great to wipe that smirk off his face," he snorted.
"Ash," she said, starting it like a scolding, but it simply faded into an order of: "Go stand on the other side of the house. The egg could fall at any moment. We should cover every side we can, better our chances for catching the egg."
Pikachu ran to a third side and beamed. Misty rolled to her side and smiled back. "Three sides covered – perfect. That's perfect. Only one side empty. Not bad odds."
"But what's the riddle?"
"It's which way the egg will fall," she said, looking sadly up at the roof. "There's a trick to it, I just have to figure it out."
"Math?" Ash suggested. "Maybe there's a four sided roof equation?"
"Not one that I know."
He licked his thumb and stuck it up in the air, then dropped it down. "No wind. So you can't tell from that."
"Quiet, Ash," she said. "Let me think."
And so she did. For a good twenty minutes she thought. She sat up, laid down, paced, thrashed around, anything to keep the thoughts running. Ash grew tired of it and spent the last ten minutes sitting, feet spread and hands just behind him so he could jump up if the egg began rolling down the side. It struck her like lightning and she began to giggle in the middle of her kick. That made her fall over, and she rolled in the grass with laughter.
"I'm so freaking stupid!"
He looked over, smiling. "You figured it out?"
"Yeah." She smirked, laughter quieting. "I figured it out. I've heard this a million times before. One of my cousins gave me stupid riddles like these all the time, the ones that had one key word in it that you never thought about. The only difference is that it's a rooster on top of the barn instead of your staraptor." She rolled his way and quizzed, "If a rooster lays an egg from the top of a barn, which way does the egg fall?"
"Which way?" he asked.
"It doesn't," she said, walking away from her side of the barn. "It can't fall, because it's a rooster, get it?"
"No. If I did, I'd be a lot less freaked out," he muttered, not sounding freaked out at all.
She laughed, clapping her hands together in intellectual ecstasy. "Roosters don't lay eggs! Chickens do! Roosters don't lay eggs."
"That's great, Misty, it really is, but staraptors do. So I don't think it applies."
She draped herself across his shoulders. "Hey, Ash, what do you have that I don't?"
He shot her a winning smile. "Personality, charm, and looks that Gary can't match up to?"
Misty rolled her eyes and his grin grew wider. "The difference between me and you is that you have sperm, I have eggs. Unless I'm mistaken, birds work the same way on that part. Sure, all their parts are hidden under the feathers, but they do have them. Now, this is just a guess, going by the riddle and your usual choice of pokémon, but I've got to know, Ash – does your staraptor have eggs or sperm?"
He groaned. "You're kidding me! That's not it! That can't be it!"
"That's it. You're the hero. You call it!" She sprung away from him, doing a little cartwheel to blow off some of the excitement.
"No. it's stupid. That can't be right." He shook a fist at the barn. "I refuse to accept this!"
Misty decided one cartwheel wasn't enough, and merrily did another while calling, "Solve it, Ash. Staraptor's waiting."
With another frustrated grunt, he shouted to the sky, "He can't lay an egg. He's a boy!"
Staraptor cried out in pain, and there was a soft, distant snapping sound. Then came the happy cry, and wings unfurled to their full extent with proud, strong, flaps. Down he leapt from the roof, soaring straight up in the air before looping and circling to a few feet above their heads. Ash noted that Misty had a little bit of awe on her face. He bet it was from living in the water gym, which wouldn't have a lot of flying type traffic.
"There you go, safe and sound," Misty said, smiling.
"That's was bull," Ash said back.
"I know."
"That's wasn't hard. It was just stupid."
She shrugged. "Well, that's that. The riddle was stupid but we solved it. So now we have your flying type and we can head to the League and pick up Gary. You said getting people is the physical part, right?"
"Right," he agreed.
She nodded, looking back at him. "Well, I bet he won't let me help you there. So why don't you take staraptor and Pikachu and fly to your next challenge? You can take care of Gary, rescue him, and once you finish with it you can send staraptor along to find me and take me."
"Why go separately?" he asked.
"What do you mean why? We don't both fit on the bird, do we?" Staraptor landed and gave an angry click her way at being called 'the bird', but she rolled her eyes and continued, "I'm amazed one person can fit on it." He clicked his beak at her again and she sighed impatiently, glaring at the creature she had been amazed by moments before. "Is there anything I can say that won't tick you off?"
"Try a compliment," Ash suggested.
"You're very pretty. I can tell you preen well," she said, and staraptor cooed, preening a feather with all the pride of a cat licking its paws clean. Content that she was in the thing's good graces, Misty waved Ash on. "Hop on the pretty bird and go save the jerk."
"No way!" he protested. "We can't split up. Who the hell knows what's out there?"
"He said there wasn't anything, and even though it's ominous as hell, we might as well believe him. Besides, I can take care of myself. I mean, I don't have any weapons or pokémon, but I'm a decent runner." She shrugged. "It'll only be a day or so apart. I'm a big girl. I can handle that."
"You're screwed without pokémon if something comes along."
"I can beat your ass well enough." Misty raised the book threateningly, and he flinched away. Point proven, she said, "I can keep myself alive for a day, so go ahead."
He glared. "You just want to get away from me."
"You seriously do bitch to no end, don't you? No, I don't want to get away from you! I'm trying to help rescue Gary as weird as that freaking is. He's probably in a really crappy situation right now, so why don't you be a good little hero and save his ass? This secondary character is going to go get eaten by bugs in the crappy forest."
"We shouldn't split up! That's how people get killed!" he pouted.
"In horror movies," she retorted. "This is an adventure. Splitting up on an adventure is perfectly fine as long as you're a big enough character to meet up again. I think I'm pretty big – I'm the riddle solver, so I'll be okay."
"This isn't a movie!" Ash growled. "That's a real villain and real people are going to really die here, Misty! This isn't a game!"
She sighed. "It is a game. It's his game. You know that. It's serious to us – but he wants us to keep playing. He wants to win, but he wants a good victory, a hard victory, something he can brag about to future heroes as he crushes their dreams. He wants his name cursed and spat and loathed, because the bad people are famous for a whole lot longer." She amended, "As long as nobody tops them."
"So, you think you'll be okay just because you think he wants this to take long?"
"Yes, Ash," she put a hand on his shoulder. "Believe it or not, I was brought here to think. You are keeping me here to solve riddles for you, to figure out what's going on. I'm reading a book, looking for clues, piecing it together. You're saving people, I'm just pointing you in the right direction. But I'm just as important as you are, so I'm not going to die."
She smiled. "Brock'll be fine too. We're going to need the food and the smart guy teaching us how to survive without television. Gary's pretty useless. Once he hotwires a car he's fair game for the monsters to kill."
"It isn't funny," he said, the corner of his mouth twitching.
She clapped his cheek gently, smiling back. "Yeah, it is. You keep safe, alright?"
"You keep Pikachu," he replied.
She laughed. "You're ki-"
"No." He shook his head. "If we're splitting up, there's no way I'm letting you go alone. You've got to have something. If you don't take Pikachu I'm not flying."
She searched his face, and didn't see much of a chance of arguing that. So she nodded as Pikachu climbed from Ash's shoulder over to hers, and said, "Fine. But you're going to regret it when you get there and you find out you need him."
"Yeah, I'm regretting a lot of things lately," he laughed, and swung up on the bird, zooming up into the sky before he could change his mind.
One of the first things he learned about flying was that flying wasn't like flying. He had first flown expecting it to be like everyone described it; riding a fast land animal, zooming over the sea in a boat, but it wasn't. The wind snatched and stung at his face, making his clothes ripple violently. The feathers were slippery, and it took a lot of strength to hold on and hold steady, especially when they dived. Zooming down gave him the same feeling as a drop tower or a rollercoaster, where his stomach rose into his throat and he lost his breath, and zooming up mostly made his ears pop at the sudden change of altitude. He spent most of him time focusing on whether or not he was getting enough oxygen.
"You've never been to Kanto, right?" he asked the pokémon once he was sure he was breathing okay. Staraptor trilled loudly and gave a little spin – one Ash cursed at under his breath and barely managed to hold on. It was fun when he was prepared – terrifying when he wasn't. "Okay, we're heading straight east…right the way you're going."
Staraptor looked back at his trainer curiously.
Ash grinned. "Yeah, you can go fast, just let me brace myself."
He shifted up, hooking his knees in front of the bird's wings. It would only be a hindrance if they had to make sharp turns or any kind of maneuvering, really, but as long as they were going straight and fast, with the wings locked as rigid as metal rods, it wouldn't hurt – and it gave him extra hold. The seat was more uncomfortable, with the solid block of muscle right under him, but he had practiced enough to be sure he could do it. They blasted forward, and Ash felt himself jerked back, every spot where he held on aching painfully. His legs hooked tighter and his hands seized the feathers in handfuls. The feathers were for balance, as they pulled out much too easily to be anything else.
"You'd never know your wing was broken a minute ago," he laughed, the ground below them blurring.
Staraptor trilled again, and sped even faster. Ash closed his eyes for a moment and sighed, letting himself get carried away in the incredible sensation of soaring. They weren't too far away, so it didn't last very long. He landed by the gates of the pokémon league, stumbling from the bird to the solid ground below. Gary wasn't too far away. No cage, no danger, just him and a pokeball, flying up and down as he tossed and caught the thing in his right hand.
"Hey, Ketchum, having fun?" he asked.
"You're okay," Ash said. There was slight relief in his voice, and a smile. "Here I thought I was going to have to do some insane research physical stunt, like milking a PMSing miltank or something," he laughed lightly. "Let's get out of here before anything else goes down."
"You know what happened the last time we were here, Ashy-boy?" Gary laughed now, anything but light. "You beat me. You crushed me, and I gave up my dream of being a Pokémon Master. You just destroyed my whole career, knocking me out so early. All I could do to make myself feel better was to head back to Gramps with my tail between my legs."
"Shut up, Gary," he said, the realization beginning to sink in. "You didn't drop out because of me."
"Yeah. I did, Ash." His face turned into a vicious snarl. "It's all your damn fault. You took away my dreams, you dick. All I can ever do now is follow in my grandad's footsteps. That's it. That's all I can do now that you've ruined me. I could have been something, before you took it away."
"You beat me a thousand times after that," he said, stepping back slowly. "I don't see why me beating you one time would take it away. You proved you were good later on. I mean, I'm still a better trainer than you. Always have been. But it's not like you're a total pushover."
"Who cares if I beat you later? I lost then! When it mattered most you completely ruined me! A few backyard matches? Yeah. People care about that. It's your word over mine, and you're the finalist! You've been in more Leagues, and placed better in the ones you entered! Who's going to believe that I won? And, even if they saw it they'd think I cheated!" The pokeball was clenched in his hand now, knuckles white against the red.
"I'd stick up for you. I know you'd never cheat, Gary." He swallowed, beginning to make a plan. Flying away wasn't an option, but he was sure there was another way to get out of the fight. There had to be. He said, "You're too stuck up to do it. You wouldn't want to win if you couldn't do it for real. I wouldn't let people bash you."
"Then they'd say it was all a fluke!"
"And I'd stick up for you then!" Ash shouted. "What kind of guy do you think I am?"
"The kind that ruins somebody's life!" Gary threw the pokeball at his head, and, having prepared, Ash managed to duck quick enough to avoid it entirely.
He wasn't prepared for the other boy, taller and stronger than him, to slam him into the ground and twist his arm behind his back. Gary yanked it up, tugged it sharply as high as he could manage to get it. Ash cried out, twisting his head to look back at him.
"And what's this proving?" he snarled.
"Nothing. But maybe I can ruin your life a little. Return the mewdamned favor, hero."
Gary would have never called him a hero, mockingly or otherwise. Gary had avoided the hero topic like the plague, because it was one of the few areas where he couldn't top the darker haired boy. He realized that this was the unavoidable physical challenge, and whether or not it was really Gary, he was all too glad to roll to the side and slam his other elbow into Gary's face. It didn't hit the nose like he was aiming for, but the cheek, where he suspected it would bruise.
Gary grunted, but held onto the arm he still had twisted behind Ash's back. It was making his arm throb, but he had hurt worse, and didn't have too much trouble blocking it out. Instead, he took better aim and slammed his elbow into the other boy's face again, this time catching his nose and knocking him away. The blood started down his face, giving Ash the time to roll away and jump to his feet. He looked around the clearing for a weapon, because that was what he needed. He definitely couldn't handle Gary on his own.
His thoughts were proved when Ash felt the blow to the back of his head, much harder than Misty's playful slaps, that sent him back to the ground. Spots danced in front of his eyes, blinding him from the next kick that slammed into his stomach. He groaned and curled up, his mind whispering in his True Hero voice, The longer you wait to move the harder it'll be, but he didn't know what to do. He wanted to wait a minute for the pain to subside, but when Gary brought his foot into his stomach for a second time, he forced himself to jumped back up.
It didn't bother Gary, who swung at his head again. Ash ducked, just barely missing the blow. He wasn't stable enough to throw one back. Ash tried to regain it, taking a step back and planting it firmly. Another blow, from the same fist, but this duck wasn't quick enough. Gary's fist grazed along his back. Two steps back now, and he managed to trip. Flat on his back as he stared up at his old rival, who wore a cynically gleeful smile, Ash found the nerve to smile back.
This hit was inevitable, and he braced himself for it. It came from Gary's foot, slamming it into his calf. He was trying to break it and, to Ash's relief, didn't succeed. Ash managed to maneuver the thing he had tripped on out from under his back, a thick stick, and brought it up quick. Ash propelled it into Gary's groin, giving it a proud twist as the other boy cried out and dropped to the ground, trying to pull the stick away. Ash didn't let him, pressing harder until he was sure the boy was down.
Then he stood, and raised the stick. "I've already won, so where's Gary?"
"I am Gary!" he shouted. "And you're the prick that ruined my life!"
Ash wondered if it would be the right thing to do to make a joke about how long he had been waiting to beat Gary with a stick, but found his stomach was aching too badly to want to talk too much. In hopes to end it quickly, he slammed the stick into the brunette's head with a light amount of strength, keeping in mind that the head was relatively fragile in parts and that sticks were probably a lot heavier than they felt. "You Gary yet?"
"Yes," he moaned, bruises beginning to show across his once pretty face.
Ash sighed, leaning against the stick. "I did it on purpose. I held back everything until we battled in the Indigo League so you would have your guard down and you were embarrassed all across the nation."
"I knew it!" he cried, bloody spit flying from his lips.
Again the stick came down, this time with a loud crack that sounded the snapping of a neck. Ash pulled the stick away fast, wincing and closing his eyes against the sound. Before he had the time to realize he had effectively murdered his lifelong rival, it cracked again as it all settled back into place. He dared to open an eye and peak, delighted to see the bruises gone from Gary's face, and the confirmation of his not being dead with the words: "Holy shit, Ash, you sick freak."
"You Gary?" Ash asked tiredly.
"Of course not. I'm clearly an orange bulbasaur. Who the hell do you think I am?" he snapped.
Ash was already bored by the situation, his adrenaline winding down quickly, and he folded his hands over the top of the stick, leaning his chin on them. He seemed like Gary now, but he could never be too sure, so he asked, "I made you into a researcher, at the Indigo League. It's all because I made you lose."
Gary glared up. "Yeah, sure. You embarrassed me so much that I could never get over it and swore never to battle again. Screw you!"
"Sorry I beat you up," Ash said unconvincingly. "You were possessed."
He scoffed. "Yeah, I'm sure you didn't have any fun."
"I never said it wasn't fun, I just said I was sorry about it. You know, I'm still kinda guilty." He tried not to smile. "Especially about the right in the face while you're down hit."
"I'm upset about the crotch shot, you mewdamned bastard," he snapped back. "That's still aching!"
Despite the fact that Gary didn't seem to hold any real grudge, both letting Ash help him to his feet and talking with Ash on their walk back to Misty, the brown eyed boy did feel guilty about beating up his friend, because True Heroes didn't slam people in the faces with sticks. Everyone died with honor, even enemies, when the True Hero was there. The True Hero could have stopped Misty without wrapping an arm around her neck. He wouldn't have spent the days tiring her out or snapping as the rope. A True Hero definitely did not snap their rival's neck.
…Even if it was one of the most satisfying moments of his life.
Sorry it took me so long to update. I mean, wow, two whole days to put this chapter up. Feels like a month, doesn't it?
All jokes aside, I am sorry that I'm updating so slow. I have to say that this is the most challenging story I've tried to write. I couldn't tell you why, since I don't think it's that much better than anything else I've written, but for some reason this one just feels impossible – this chapter especially. It's also about two and a half thousand words longer. I think this is a reasonable excuse for taking so long.
Hope I didn't disappoint!
EDITS: Typos and grammar.