Make sure to read the memo at the bottom!
Welcome to the Family
"Hello dearies!" half of the people in the courtyard flinched at the overly zealous voice that could only belong to Emerald.
Erika smiled as the young man skipped towards where her group stood. His childish face was filled with joy (he was like this every time he came outside on a good day) and his emerald eyes sparkled in happiness as his silvery green hair flopped in them. Out of all the siblings, Emerald was her favorite. She didn't understand why everyone hated him so much, including his siblings. He was so happy and cheerful! He was funny too, and always nice to her.
"Hello Emerald!" she called and waved in welcome.
His eyes immediately locked on her blue ones and he nearly squealed, "Oh Eri-Love, you always make my day brighter!"
Erika gave a little "oomph" as the childish man engulfed her in a friendly hug. Ah, Emerald was very touchy too; she couldn't blame others if they weren't comfortable with that.
Emerald had been the Jewel sibling to show her around- what had it been? It had been only three weeks ago, but it seemed it had been so much longer since she had become part of the Gem "family". Anyway, she had been one of the recruits to bond with their designated sibling, like how Amethyst and Ace bonded. An example of when the sibling and recruit didn't bond would be Diamond and Rhina- though Rhina hardly needed for Diamond to show her around and soon went to her own devices. The third type was when the two were mostly indifferent to each other, this being where Sapphire and OJ falls.
Emerald and Erika had hit it off as soon as it became apparent that Erika could stomach his cheerfulness and even embraced it. They had slowly been growing an even better friendship since the first day, though Erika still didn't know where he wondered off to throughout the day, and sometimes he confused her all together…
A couple days ago Erika had been walking through the hallways towards the kitchen around lunch time. Along the way a flash of coral caught her blue eyes. She could have sworn it was hair, but she didn't remember anyone in the team having coral colored hair.
Erika hesitated for a moment. The person had gone down a hallway she hadn't traversed yet (not surprising considering how big the house was) and she wasn't very keen to get lost in the huge house. Her curiosity got the better of her though, and she began her walk down the hallway.
The thumps of her feet seemed to resound in the dim corridor and it felt as if every shadow would reach out and grab her. It was probably just paranoia, but now that she thought about it, it didn't seem like the smartest idea to go down a dark hallway that you had never seen before, following someone that probably shouldn't have been there.
Just as she was about to turn back, she saw someone fleeing around another corner. Erika unconsciously began to run after the person, her shoulder length brown hair whipping behind her.
Erika rounded the corner, expecting to see the mysterious coral haired person (by now she figured she'd just call out one of her pokemon if she felt like she needed it), instead she stopped and stared. There was absolutely no one in the dark hallway. She began to creep down it and her eyes darted around, wary for someone about to jump out at her.
When she felt an arm grip around her forearm, she nearly had a heart attack. She whipped her head around and met a pair of emerald eyes.
"Oh, Emerald, you scared me," Erika sighed and brought her hand over her fast beating heart as Emerald released it.
"Quite sorry, Eri-Love; I didn't know I could be so quiet," Emerald chirped happily.
Erika studied him for a minute before giving a weak smile, "It's no problem," she paused, "But I came down here because I was following someone, did you happen see someone with coral colored hair?"
"Nope, it's only you and me."
Erika paused again, "What were you doing here anyway Emerald?"
Emerald looked in her eyes and smiled innocently, "Little old me? I was exploring around the base, there are so many rooms and corridors here."
Erika remembered Emerald telling her about how he liked to explore, but it still seemed suspicious. He just happened to be lurking down this hall? Also, he must have seen the person with coral colored hair, she was sure he had to. "Emerald-"
"Oh, Eri-Love, you're wearing a star on your clip today?" Emerald asked happily, acting like he hadn't just cut her off, and fingered her clip.
For some reason, though he appeared just as cheerful as usual, the hackles on Erika's neck rose and she stiffened. It wasn't that he was menacing, or anything close to it, there was just something about Emerald at that moment…
Her stomach chose that moment to grumble about her forgotten lunch and Emerald brightened. "Oh, it is about lunch time, isn't it? We can eat lunch together then!"
Emerald grabbed her hand and Erika let herself be dragged from the hallway, feeling like she had almost treaded upon something very dangerous. Black eyes that faded to green with gold flecks watched after them from within the deepest shadow they could find in the hallway, watching the childish late teenager's back with suspicion and slight curiosity: he certainly had seen her.
"Emerald, could you please not suffocate Erica?" Amethyst asked, exasperated, and broke Erica out of her reverie.
"Oh, sorry Eri-Love," Emerald apologized as he let go of Erika; a split second after, he glomped Amethyst in a "surprise hug".
"For the love of- Emerald, get the hell off me!" Amethyst growled with venom dripping from her words as the attempted to pry Emerald off of her.
"Oh Ame-Babe, I'm just showing my favoritest person in the whole wide world how much I love her," Emerald squealed as he rubbed his cheek against hers in some type of Arceus-forsaken nuzzle.
Amethyst was turning green in disgust and red in anger; she absolutely hated Emerald sometimes. She heard a snort that turned into a vainly repressed chuckle from her side and she turned her glaring amethyst eyes towards it.
Ace had to admit, it was hilarious watching Emerald and Amethyst interact; the guy must have been on crack. Ace pushed is hands over his mouth when he saw Amethyst glaring and tried to stifle his laughter. Beside him, OJ was glaring at the green haired man assaulting his Amethyst.
Sapphire smiled at her two sibling's antics and walked up to her older brother and pulled on his sleeve, "I think you should let Amethyst go brother, she's not very happy."
Emerald stopped nuzzling (Arceus, Amethyst hated that word) Amethyst and looked down at his blue sister fondly, though he didn't let go of his purple one. After all, he didn't often actually catch Amethyst. She was getting too skilled at avoiding his hugs after all the years, and, he winced slightly as Amethyst got one of her arms free and socked him in the jaw, she was getting stronger. He was happy she didn't get a direct hit since she was in an awkward position; it was probably going to bruise as is.
"Saph-Baby! How is my littlest sister?" Emerald asked smiling and ignored the teenager in his arms pushing viciously against him.
Sapphire sighed as her brother completely ignored last statement and looked down next to him, "I'm fine, but I think Bloom is trying to tell you something."
Emerald look down to see that Bloom, his leafeon, was desperately trying to get his attention with Storm and Gypsy aiding their sister. Bloom pawed at her master's leg and looked up at him, exasperated, as if he was forgetting something.
…Was he forgetting something?
"Brother, didn't I ask you to go out here to get everyone?" a silky voice that caused almost everyone in the courtyard to stiffen.
Alayna grinned when she saw her idol walk into the courtyard and smirked as she saw everyone stiffen. The heathens were lucky that Diamond even graced them with their presence. Alayna sashayed to where Diamond stood and smiled up at her, "Hello Diamond, it's a pleasure to see you."
Diamond smirked back down at her and patted her head, "Well, if it isn't my favorite recruit? It's nice to see you too Alayna."
Amethyst scowled at two of her least favorite people in the team. Both didn't like her, both had the same opinion of her, and both pissed her the hell off. They both made her scowl almost as much as Onyx and that was just unacceptable.
Amethyst looked up to her brother's face when she felt him tense. She narrowed her eyes and tried to analyze his feelings. He didn't like Diamond, though he didn't openly show it like Amethyst and Onyx did. He was much stiffer around her, though he did put up a good pretense of being as cheerful as usual, and he didn't like her hanging around his younger siblings much. Amethyst was sure he loved her (could he even hate someone?) but he was just uneasy around her like everyone else.
Though she didn't get along with him, Amethyst was sure she knew her brother. After all, he was pretty much an open book, and what could he possibly want to hide?
As soon as he let go of her, Amethyst moved next to Sapphire, who was standing next to Yuzuki. Diamond's cold ice blue eyes slid over them, and they temporarily locked with her sister's violet ones. After a moment she smirked and flipped her dark tinted hair, "Well, come on. We have a meeting and everyone must come."
With that said she began walking back into the building with her younger blond counterpart following close behind her. After a couple moments hesitance, the rest of the members in the courtyard began to follow her.
Yuzuki looked up at the sky and shrugged. Dark clouds had begun to accumulate not too far off and seemed to be heading their way. Oh well, it looked like it was going to storm soon anyway. Hearing a rumble in the distance, she quickened her pace inside, but couldn't shake off a slight feeling of foreboding rising up in her.
….
Kristal shuffled her feet in the meeting room and took in the vibrations from the ground around her. It appeared that all of the Team Gem recruits and Jewel siblings were in the room, but the parents were absent. Oh well, though Topaz, the father, was okay, Ruby was clearly evil.
If it wasn't for her mother, Cecilia, that had made her join, she wouldn't be here in the first place. Her mother was a big supporter of Team Gem, having been Ruby's friend, and was absolutely outraged when she heard that her daughter believed that Ruby was a hypocrite.
Her mother threw a fit and made her to join to "see the error of her ways". Don't get her wrong, Kristal believed that the people who joined the team were good people and had the right intentions; she just didn't think much of Team Gem itself.
"Hey blondie," someone murmured from a little in front of her. Kristal swung her head that way, her blond hair in a low side ponytail swinging slightly, and her unseeing eyes settled in the general direction of the voice.
She moved her bare feet slightly and focused on the vibrations from the person in front of her. She immediately relaxed somewhat as she felt the hunched posture from the person. "Hey purple," she greeted and looked to her face.
"It still creeps the hell out of me when you look at me even though you shouldn't know where I am," Amethyst muttered, though she was smiling.
Kristal smiled, not offended, and kept her glossy blue eyes trained on Amethyst, almost as if to spite her. A white layer had settled over them, almost as if she was perpetually trying to see through mist that would never let up, "And the fact that your family is trying to take over the world freaks me out."
"World peace," Amethyst chided mockingly, "Not taking over the world. Whatever gave you that impression?"
Considering both of their mothers are friends and being the same age, the two naturally met when they were smaller. Both being failures to their mothers created a bond, and Kristal thinking Onyx was a power hungry asshole sealed the deal. The two were friends; Amethyst found Kristal's bluntness amusing, and Kristal thought that she wasn't as crazy as the rest of her family. Did Kristal trust her? Was it ever smart to trust a Jewel? Did Kristal even trust anyone? It didn't really matter to either if they trusted each other, being friends was enough.
"Rose, roserade," Kristal's pokemon said and nudged her trainer.
Kristal concentrated on the vibrations in the direction that her roserade had nudged her. It took her a moment, but she soon "saw" that a woman, no doubt Diamond, and another man a little behind her had taken the stage.
"I see her Iris," Kristal told her pokemon.
"No you don't."
Kristal punched Amethyst in the arm, who was laughing quietly at this point, and focused on the people on stage.
Diamond smirked as she looked over the people who surrounded the stage, now quieting as they saw her standing up there. Admittedly, she didn't command as much respect as her mummy, and gained a lot more hate than her, but she also had fear, and not many wished to cross her.
When there was quiet she started, her ice blue eyes gazing at them smugly, "Gordon, come here."
A man, about the same age as Diamond, came forward. He was wearing a tan trench coat over a brown suit and a brown fedora was covering his hair, though a bit of navy could be seen. His brown eyes were calm and stared forward, though he seemed slightly tense.
Gordon was the Jewel's bodyguard. After being discharged from the military, he had decided to apply as a bodyguard for rich families. After a demonstration of his skill, apparently Ruby and Topaz had been impressed and decided to hire him. Gordon never felt quite right around Ruby, who gives him the chills despite her motherly persona, and never speaks to either of the parents. He could care less about what they do though, since they sign his checks.
Gordon handed a piece of paper that he had been holding to Diamond and coolly backed away. As it turned out, he didn't like Diamond either.
Diamond kept the paper fisted in her hand and said nothing, keeping a smirk on her face. After a minute, a certain onyx-eyed teenager spoke up impatiently, "Well, what the hell is this all about?"
The icy-eyed woman's smirk increased, "Well, little brother, mummy and papa have decided that we're going on a mission."
This grabbed everyone's attention, much to Diamond's delight, and they looked at her intently. This would be the first –official- mission the team had done. It almost had seemed like they wouldn't be doing anything but training and bonding, but now it reoccurred to them that Team Gem had a goal…
"What's the mission?" Yuzuki called out, golden eyes curious.
"We're going to obliterate Team Avian," the twenty four year old announced giddily.
A gasp sounded from inside an air vent that overlooked the room. No! They couldn't fight Team Avian yet, she wasn't ready! She hadn't found out the two teams true objectives… The person slipped back down the vent and hurriedly disappeared around the corner.
The room was alive with talking, some surprised at the sudden action, some excited, and some dreading it. Diamond waited a moment before she went on, "This paper," she gestured the paper clenched in her fist, "holds the names of the people who will be participating in mission."
"We're not all going on the mission?" someone asked.
"That's what I said," Diamond said in a clipped tone and unrolled the paper, "Now here's whose going: well, I'm obviously the leader of this mission-"
"Delightful," muttered Rhina, arms folded across her chest and grimaced ever-so-slightly.
"-and out of the people going, I have picked Gordon to be my assistant, since he is my bodyguard."
Gordon grimaced ever-so-slightly.
"The others going are Onyx Jewels," said boy smirked happily, "Yuzuki Kagiri," she smiled excitedly, "Erika Thompson," she smiled nervously, "Kallen Phoenix," a teenager with shoulder length black hair and black eyes who was standing alone and hadn't said a word to anyone acknowledged her name being said by glancing up, "Toby Cruz," the black haired brown eyed boy smiled, "Luke Avery," green eyes glimmered as golden blond hair shook from a nod, "Ace Brake," the boy's eyes lit up in excitement, "and Sapphire Jewels."
There was a tense silence before it was shredded apart, "Are you fucking insane?"
Amethyst's violet eyes were blazing and her voice was a roar. Her body was nearly shaking with rage and even Diamond was taken aback, "Sapphire is nine you bitch, and even if she is a phenomenal battler, she cannot go on a mission like this!"
"Are you jealous that your little sister gets to go and you don't Amethyst?" Diamond snarled cruelly.
Amethyst looked up at her incredulously, "I couldn't care less if I go on this mission," she hissed with contempt, "or not. I just don't want my kid sister to be hurt."
Amethyst slammed her hands on the stage, without realizing she had walked up to it, and glared heatedly at her older sister, who happily returned it. The tense silence was back, punctuated only by Amethyst's enraged heavy breathing.
After a few moments Diamond whispered, "You can scream at me all you want, but I didn't decide this, mummy did. You'll have to take this up with her if you have a problem."
"Then I will. Is she in her office?" Amethyst said without a pause.
"No. I don't know where she is. She took papa and left on business," Diamond sneered, her dark tinted icy hair falling in her face from looking down at her sister.
The girl's amethyst eyes hardened and became harder than diamond. Her older sister wasn't sure if she had ever seen her sister show this much emotion. Sure she knew that Amethyst was very protective of her younger sister, but she didn't think she would react this violently. It was almost as if she knew something bad would happen. Though she tried to deny it even to herself, Diamond was getting a little nervous from her sister's sharp stare. Was she feeling…even fear? No, it couldn't be possible to be afraid of her failure sister…
"It's okay sis," a timid voice broke the silence. Over a dozen eyes turned to the form of a nervous little blue girl. "I want to help, and I'll be fine. You always say that I'm unbeatable, right? And mom wouldn't send me on a mission unless I could handle it, right?"
"Sapphire…" Amethyst muttered, eyes softening.
Gathering up resolve and appearing more confident, Sapphire said, "I'll be fine sis, nothing bad will happen to me."
Releasing the stage, by now her knuckles were pure white, energy seemed to pour out of Amethyst. She lowered her head and her lavender hair shadowed her face. She stepped back from the stage and began to walk back to where she was standing before. She paused before Sapphire and gave her a pat and murmured, "Be careful," and said nothing for the rest of the meeting, appearing drained.
After a moment, Diamond shook out of her stupor and made her face fierce, "If anyone else has a problem with being picked: deal with it. If you have a problem with not being picked, then I'll tell you why you weren't."
She pointed to Emerald, who had been uncharacteristically quiet the entire meeting, "We need someone in charge, though Arceus knows why mummy picked you." She pointed to OJ next, "You don't even know where you are half the time." Rhina "You have to work on some project." Alayna "I need you here." Kristal "You're blind." She paused, pointing to Amethyst, "Useless."
"We set out tomorrow, I suggest you be ready," Diamond twirled away and stalked off stage, gesturing for a quiet Gordon to follow her.
Nothing was said as the Team Gem members trickled out of the meeting room, Sapphire clutching Amethyst's arm tightly.
…
"Are you sure you'll be okay?" asked Ace worriedly the next morning.
"I'll be fine," Amethyst reassured, though it did little to reassure Ace. Amethyst had dark circles under her eyes and seemed more distant than usual. It seemed as if all the energy had been sucked out of her body from yesterday. She wasn't inactive though, you could see in her eyes that she was thinking, and she responded whenever someone talked to her.
"I have Kristal here, and OJ will make sure to never leave me alone. Take care of yourself, you're the one going on the mission," Amethyst reassured further, actually looking at Ace when she said the last part.
"I will, don't worry. The Avian won't know what hit them."
The two were in the front of the building, with just about every other Team Gem member. The front had many trees shading the area, and the end of the island was in sight. Many water and some flying pokemon were waiting at the edge; waiting to take their trainers to their enemy's base.
In the shadow of the branches of a particularly big tree stood two figures; both clearly male. The first and slightly shorter spoke, "They're clueless, huh?"
"Yeah, the Gems won't know what hit them," the second and taller smirked, imitating what Ace had said moments before.
"You're sure they won't see that sub of yours?"
"It's under water; of course they won't see it. I'm just thankful that Lauren and Mika didn't bang it up when they came here."
"How do you have a sub anyway?"
"…It doesn't matter Corey. I had a sub, and they most likely would have seen us if we were on our pokemon, so just be happy I had one."
"Whatever Arthur."
"That's Captain Arthur to you."
"Just because he made you second in command doesn't mean I have to call you Captain," Corey said angrily.
Arthur waved it off, "Yeah, yeah. We'll finish this argument later. We have to report to the boss that everything is going as planned."
A gentle wind brushed through the platinum blond hair of the second in command of Team Avian and stormy gray eyes flashed smugly. The nineteen year old crouched on the branch next to his three years younger companion and tapped on his headphone.
"Yeah, boss? I have good news…"
….
And here comes the plot! I also finished introducing the rest of Team Gem, and even introduced two more Team Avian members :) Also, I added two characters, Toby and Luke, for reasons that will be explained later.
This chapter turned out longer than I expected…though I'm sure I'm quite happy with it…oh well.
Anyways, if you're OC isn't going on the mission, don't worry. It won't exactly be quiet over at the base :P
Attention: I won't be accepting any more OCs! Any more and I won't be able to keep track of them.
Attention again: I have a pole up on my profile for the name of the Team Avian leader. I know his personality and everything…just not his name ^.^' be sure to vote for it!
That's it! R&R and all that :)