Biggest chapter to date. And the weird part is, it was actually twice as big but I decided to break it into two parts.

EDIT: As was suggested by a reader, I prefer to warn you. Violent and possibly disturbing content in this chapter.

Chapter 10:Drift away

Blue walked through the double glass doors of the Pokémon Center in Cherrygrove City. The building was lively; dozens of trainers and workers moved around or sat at the tables, chatting animatedly. The gym leader didn't pay attention to anyone on his way to the counter, though. After leaving his pokéballs in the care of the nurse, he turned around and spotted an empty seat near the window. The teenager let himself plop down on the cushioned chair, sighing heavily and closing his eyes.

A group of trainers, kids, for the most part, chattered loudly in a circle not far from him. Blue might have been annoyed by their high-pitched blabbering some other time but right now, he didn't care. He was in a decent mood today, and though he was exhausted from his last three days of walking across the country side with minimal rest, he just let himself melt into his chair, letting his thoughts wander.

A few minutes later, somehow, some words of the noisy group's conversation found their way to his conscious mind and they caught his attention for some reason.

"You know that ghost they've been talking about that supposedly haunted Mount Silver?" one of the group, a young girl, asked her companions. "I hear the Johto League champion actually saw it!"

"No way!" someone exclaimed.

"And that's not all! The ghost challenged him to a pokémon battle and the champion won! They said the ghost had an unbeatable team at his disposal. A charizard, a pikachu... a lapras too, I think."

Blue opened his eyes. He began listening intently to the conversation that was taking place. An unbeatable trainer? A charizard, a pikachu and a lapras? This all sounded awfully familiar...

"Somehow, the champion managed to beat him on top of Mount Silver. They said the ghost dissapeared afterwards. Maybe it moved on to the afterlife or something like that!"

Blue looked out the window without paying attention to what he saw. He was completely focused on what he was hearing.

"So was it really a ghost?"

"Who knows? But, I mean, who would be crazy enough to stay on a mountain for three years just waiting for someone to come by? It has to be a ghost!"

"Maybe the champion knows."

As the conversation took a different direction, Blue stopped listening to them. He pondered the gossip he had just heard. What was that about a ghost on the moutain? A supposedly unbeatable trainer with a charizard, a pikachu and a lapras? It sure sounded like someone he knew... Someone who had dissapeared more than three years ago around the same time that ghost was said to have appeared. What an odd coincidence...

Blue snorted dissimissively to himself. Whatever, he figured. It was just a stupid rumor; the likes of which he had heard a thousand times already in his short life.

The gym leader started thinking about what he was going to do, today. After four years of absence with little to no contact with his family, the teenager figured it was time for him to go back to his hometown. The prospect made him nervous but he felt like he had to do it. Though he was far from forgiven, he wasn't as angry at his grandfather as he had been when he left. It would surely be awkward to talk to him after the fiery argument they had parted on but it had been a long time. Surely they had both gotten over it?

He hadn't seen his sister in a while, either. They had called eachother a few times to catch up but they eventually had lost contact and hadn't talked for over a year. Daisy was 20 now. It was high time they caught up with eachother. He sure had missed her. She was the one who had raised him, after all.

"Oh, hi, Blue!" he heard his grandfather greet him as soon as he had opened the front door. The two shared a familiar hug.

"Hey, gramps," Blue responded with a slightly forced smile. "I just came to visit a little because things have been quiet around the gym lately," he added quickly, hoping to dissipate the awkwardness. It seemed a though it got harder and harder over time for the wandering trainer and the pokémon professor to deal with eachother given their complicated history and the less than amicable terms on which they had parted.

"Of course! Of course. Come in! You're always welcome in the family home," Samuel said, stepping aside to allow his grandson inside the house. "I read in the newspaper that you had taken over the Viridian City gym. How have things been going?" he politely inquired as they both made their way to the living room. Blue dropped his bag on the floor and stretched to release the tension in his back.

"Well... I'm doing good," he answered, running a hand through his messy orange hair. "I haven't lost to a single challenger yet. The viridians didn't like me at first and they didn't want me representing their city… but they turned around after my sixtieth win in a row." Samuel nodded in understanding.

"How have your pokémon been since you took over the gym?" he asked, the researcher in him genuinely curious about his grandson's semi-familiar team.

The young trainer involuntarely raised a skeptical eyebrow at the old man's inquiry, unsure if it was an innocent question or a way to question about whether or not he had been a 'tyrant' to them. He didn't let his mistrust show and thought it wiser to act like he didn't suspect a hidden intention to his question.

"They're fine. Better than ever, really. They're very happy to get competitive battling on a regular basis. Rhydon has evolved into Rhypherior… Pidgeot's been carrying me around for a while but I'm getting too big for him to fly with, now. So I've been training Arcanine to carry me on his back since he's plenty big enough to carry me no matter how big I get."

"Really?" Samuel exclaimed, his eyebrows raised in sincere surprise. "A trainer riding an arcanine… Now that's something you don't see every day. They're strong… and very fast but I wonder if they're as responsive as a tauros or rapidash…"

Blue could see from the way his grandfather scratched his chin thoughtfully that he had awakened the curious man of science in him and he couldn't help but smile in a knowing way.

"I can show you some time today, if you want," the young gym leader offered, seizing the opportunity to rekindle his relashionship with his former guardian. Samuel was beaming with enthusiasm and his eyes were sparkling.

"That would be great! Then, I want to know all about the way you trained him to carry you."

Blue nodded and the conversation came to one dreaded awkward pause. Samuel took a long look at his grandson, whom he hadn't seen in three years.

The youngest member of the Oak family had changed a lot since the last time he had been to Pallet Town. When he had last seen him, he had been a small ten year old boy. Now, at almost fourteen years of age, Samuel could tell the process that would see him go from a little boy to a fully grown adult had begun. He was taller. He hadn't reached his maximum height yet; he was still much shorter than Samuel was, but he was most definetly taller than his ten year old self. His shoulders were broader. His face was losing its childish roundess and started showing the defined angles of an adult. Samuel recognized his son's traits on the young trainer. Blue hadn't gotten much fatter like many other growing boys did, though. True to his Oak genetics, he was still pretty scrawny, though he looked healthy and strong. His voice didn't reach its deeper register yet but it wouldn't be too long.

Samuel still remembered how his own 'becoming a man phase' had gone and he knew that Blue was just getting started. It would have been nice for him to have a father to advise him through the process but the elder Oak promised himself that he would guide his grandson through it, if he let him.

"Where's Daisy?" Blue inquired, finally noticing her abscence. It was not necessarily surprising, though. Daisy was an adult now. She probably didn't hang around her grandfather's house all day anymore.

"Oh, she's probably out with her fiancé. I'll let her know that you're here so she can-"

"Her what?" Blue let out inadvertantly, not having had enough time to hold back the displeasure in his tone. And of course, his grandfather noticed it.

"Is something wrong?" the latter asked, crossing his arms over his chest. The previously peaceful and casual conversation suddenly took a turn for the worst and an all too familiar tension reemerged between them.

Blue winced inwardly for being so careless around his grandfather. Even if they hadn't talked in over four years, the young trainer was still conditionned to avoid provoking Samuel as a result of being scolded constantly by the man for as long as he could remember. He had learned to watch his tongue carefully around the patriarch but it seemed that after such a long time of not censoring himself, this had somehow escaped him.

Now, what was he supposed to say? Though he would never admit it, Blue still feared the wrath of his former guardian. When he had left home was the only time he had ever openly defied him and it had been in an unpreceded burst of anger; one too great for him to stop and wonder if it was a good idea. Still, even though his subconscious fear was still deeply rooted, Blue reminded himself that Samuel only had as much power over him as he allowed him to have. He was fully independant financially; he had a home of his own, a long term job and he did not feel like giving up his well-deserved freedom just yet.

"I... didn't know she was engaged," he said carefully.

It was Samuel's turn to raise a skepical eyebrow but since Blue hadn't said anything out of line yet, he decided not to go for a full on confrontation. "It's relatively recent," the professor explained. "She tried to write you a couple letters and call you but she hasn't been able to get a hold of you since you're always moving around."

Damnit… Blue made a mental note to get himself a cellphone. The League had been pestering him to get one since he only took challengers who made appointments with him directly so they surely would be glad to pay for one.

"I don't check my mail very often…" he blurted out just to buy himself some time to figure out a way to get out of the situation.

"Well, as I was saying, when she hears that you're back in town, she'll surely come over. Then you can congratulate her in person." It sounded a little bit like a warning.

"Yeah…" Blue uttered abscentmindedly, not quite realizing how thightly his fists were clenching.

"So, you're getting married, huh?"

Blue and Daisy were sitting in the Oak house's backyard, siping some of Daisy's favorite tea. The siblings hadn't seen eachother in a while and had spent the last half hour catching up. Blue's older sister was pretty oblivious to her brother's discomfort.

"Yes!" the twenty year old woman confirmed with joy. "I mean, not right now. We're waiting until our finances allow it and we move in together. But we're engaged! It's like a dream come true!"

Blue's only response was a nod as he looked off into the distance, wishing he could be anywhere except here at the moment. Why did he ever come back to Pallet Town, anyway? His visits to his hometown never seemed to end well.

It seemed that Daisy finally noticed his lack of enthusiasm and his unwillingness to provide the usual congratulations for such news.

"Whats's wrong, Blue? I thought you'd be a little happier for me."

The young trainer couldn't help but snort at that. They may have been siblings but Daisy apparently didn't know him that well if she thought he'd be happy about that.

Her new fiance was one of their grandfather's assistants whom she had met some time when he was away, when she had gone up to the lab to bring Samuel some lunch. The guy was a 22 year old technician who did most of his work on computers. Daisy told him he was nice, smart and handsome and Blue had to refrain from gagging at the description.

The youngest Oak had known his sister all his life and he had seen her go through many phases. She had almost singlehandedly raised him while their gramps worked to feed them so he knew her well and was pretty in tune with her moods and her ups and downs. He knew his sister to be a smart, capable young lady; as soft as a ribombee. They had both been orphaned pretty young but Blue had a least sweet little Daisy Oak to care for him and it helped him understand how girls worked. They weren't as much a mystery to him as they were for most guys his age. However, for as nice and smart as she was, she was also plagued with a very deep-rooted need to be loved. Considering she was six years older than he was, she had known their parents longer and better than he did. Their sudden abscence had left a hole in her heart; a feeling of loneliness that contantly needed to be attended to. Though Blue loved her with all his heart, he was not the most demonstrative person in the world. In fact, love was the thing he had the most trouble expressing. Samuel had always been very busy, so even though he had been as loving a guardian as a grandfather could be, he had hardly been a replacement for their departed parents.

This need to be loved led Daisy into many different relashionships with almost any guy her age that paid attention to her. And she was bound to attract attention from the opposite sex. She was beautiful; she had long flowing chesnut hair, a pretty face, a fair complexion, big blue eyes and a petite frame. Unfortunately. She was also terribly naive.

When they were both younger, Blue remembered her always talking about her wish to be a princess and to meet her prince charming. As far back as he could remember, she had wanted to have her fairytale wedding and live happily ever after. She couldn't understand, it seemed, that men were not like that. All in all, her very way of being was a recipe for disaster. She almost systematically attracted the wrong kind of attention. Guys who were only interested in the physical part of the relashionship, guys who were unwilling to commit, guys who treated her like she was an expensive piece of jewelery to be showed off, cheaters...

How many times had he seen her come home in tears because her boyfriend of the moment was not who she thought he was. For Blue, seeing her get her heart broken over and over was as painful as it was frustrating and he subconsciously cursed himself for not being a more loving brother. He was always caught between her and his difficult relashionship with their grandpa which only drove him away some more. It was unfortunate but there was no changing her now.

When Blue had heard about her engagement with Samuel's assistant, given her past history of heartbreak, he was understandably skeptical. The gym leader vaguely knew the guy but it was enough for him to know that he was a sweet talker. He was what Daisy would consider handsome and gentlemanly but Blue didn't buy his persona one bit. He was too perfect; like he was tailor-made for Daisy to fall in love with and regardless of the fact that this was her most long-lasting relashionship to date, Blue was certain things would sour sooner or later; they always did. He didn't want his sister hurt again. He was convinced that their upcoming marriage was headed straight for a wall.

"Don't you think you're moving a little too fast, Daisy?" he asked carefully.

"I know he's the one. I just know. He loves me."

Blue sighed. He didn't know what 'being a good brother' would be in this situation. Be supportive and give her his blessing to make her happy? Or follow his intuition and warn her against it? He knew the former was what she wanted to hear but he wasn't convinced she knew what was best for her.

"Blue," she said, breaking the silence and laying a gentle hand on his arm to get him to look at her, which he did out of respect. "Since mom and dad aren't around anymore..." The youngest member of the Oak family's eyebrows furrowed in apprehension. "Would you walk me down the aisle?"

Blue's eyes widened with a mixture of disbelief and anger. He quickly recovered from the shock, though, and his displeased frown returned.

"I will do no such thing," he answered without a trace of hesitation, pulling his arm away from her gentle grasp. Her previously happy smile vanished instantly.

"Why not?" she asked, totally confused.

Blue put down his cup of tea and got up, pacing back and forth like he did when he was frustrated; something he unknowingly picked up from Samuel.

"You're asking me for my blessing. To 'hand you over' to that guy and I'm sorry but that's just not gonna happen."

"Why not? We're in love! We want the world to know. This is gonna be my perfect day. I want my little brother, whom I've cared for since he was five, to be a part of it!"

Blue flinched when she brought the 'I've raised you' card. He felt a pang of guilt upon hearing it and seeing the hurt in her big bright eyes but he was not letting himself being blackmailed into doing this.

"That guy is not good for you," he argued, refusing to let go.

"You don't know anything about him," Daisy retorted, getting angry herself. "He's a good guy. He treats me well and he loves me!"

Blue couldn't help but roll his eyes. "How many times have I heard that? How many guys have you said that about? And how did it end huh?!"

Daisy was either too stunned or too angry to respond.

"It ends with you crying and me wondering why you haven't learned your damn lesson yet!" Blue knew his temper was getting out of hand now and that his words were way too harsh, considering he was trying to do her a favor, but he couldn't help it. He loved her. He was worried about her. But it was the only way he knew to show her that he cared.

"Blue, why are you doing this? I thought you'd be happy for me!"

It would have been so simple to say: 'Because I care about you and don't want you to get hurt again!' but for some reason, the words would never get past his lips. He could only clench his teeth and continue his pacing.

"You're making a big mistake and I'm not gonna encourage you," he said dryly.

"Oh, my fourteen year old little brother who never had a girlfriend thinks he knows better than me what's good for me!" Daisy yelled indignantly, getting up as well and nearly spilling her tea on her clothes. "You don't know him! Are you really so full of yourself you think I'm too stupid to know what's best for me? Is that it!?"

Blue resisted to urge to answer with the affirmative, which would surely not go over well, and instead glared at her. She was dangerously close to personnally insulting him now and considering she knew very personnal and sensitive things about him and feeling that if the conversation went on much longer, he would say things he would later regret, he buried his hands in his pockets as a sign that he was ending the discussion and not changing his mind.

"Whatever, Daisy. You're an adult. You can do whatever the hell you want. But there's no way I'm coming to that wedding to watch you throw your life away for this... poser! Don't bother sending an invitation, 'cause I'm not coming!"

Blue walked away back into the house without waiting for her reply.

When the sun fell over the horizon was the moment it got bitterly cold on Mount Silver. Red had no choice but to retreat back into his cave so that he didn't end up an icicle decorating a froslass' lair. After yet another day of making his pokémon battle eachother, he would withdraw the tired beasts into their comfy capsules save for his Charizard which he kept close to him for warmth and light, his fiery tail illuminating the treacherous path to his fortress of solitude. Red was grateful his pokémon couldn't talk.

He could see it in their eyes, the doubt, the confusion and even a tiny bit of resentment for bringing them to this god-forsaken place. He could see it but it didn't matter. They needed to get stronger; so strong they would be unbeatable. Only then could he come down the moutain and face the world again. Their loss was unacceptable.

Red had no idea how long he'd been up there. Day or night, it was all a blur. He had no idea what month or even what year it was. Everything looked the same on the frozen peak; like it was so far away from everything that not even time could reach it. The only hint of its passage was his continuously growing hair which was now a horribly tangled mess that reached the center of his back.

The nights were always the worst for Red. Sitting alone in the ghostly silence of the cave, in a darkness so opressive he felt it ensnare him like a spider web, his sensorially deprived mind began to drift into his most unpleasant places.

The fallen champion had realized some time ago that he was losing his mind. Alone in the dark, he started hearing things. It started out unintelligible murmurs; like words spoken from behind a thick glass. Over time, though, they became clearer and clearer. He could almost never remember what they said. Like they were part of a dream he would forget minutes after waking up but one thing he did remember was how awful they made him feel.

They were scary. They would say awful things about him. They would tell him to do things he didn't want to do. After a while, they began to threaten to kill him or tell him that someone was coming to kill him. They would keep him awake all night sometimes and when they would finally quiet down, he would find himself standing in a random corner of the cave, not remembering how or why he got there. He would push himself and his pokémon even harder in training, hoping to drive away the persistant voices by wearing himself out so much that he would have no choice but to sleep. Unfortunately for him, though, not even in his sleep could he catch a break from his torment.

Though time was nothing more than a vague concept to him at this point. One thing he knew for sure now was that he had lost. There was this black-haired kid that came up to him on the moutain and Red had challenged him to a battle. Only the strongest trainers could make it up the moutain. Battling them was the ultimate test of his skills. And he had failed. One after the other, his pokémon fainted and he was left with nothing more to do than punish himself for his own failure.

He started having dreams; nightmares so horrible he would wake up drenched in sweat despite the biting cold. He started seeing faces he would recognize. He often dreamed of the Elite Four who would sometimes heap praise on him or sometimes lock him up in a room filled with monstrous looking people whose eyes emitted flashes that would blind him. Other times, it would be professor Oak putting a gun or some blunt weapon in his hand and beckoning him to kill the pokémon of his defeated, faceless opponents. But, by far the worst ones were his nightmares about his long lost rival. They didn't come up as often as the others but they felt so real they pushed him closer and closer to insanity everytime.

Blue rarely appeared in some surreal, faraway place. His silhouette would unnaturally detach itself from the pitch dark of the cave and walk towards him, bearing that same dreadfully hateful glare he had darted at him in the champion's room and leap at him with a knife in hand. Red would wake up still feeling the pain from the imaginary stab wounds that his rival had 'inflicted' upon him. Everytime Blue came to murder him, Red was helpless to stop him. However, there were a few instances where the roles were reversed.

In this dream, they would both be in the champion's room. Blue would be on his knees and Red would be standing a few paces away from him, his own face twisted in a foreign sick cruel grin not unlike a gengar's. Blue's pokéballs would be scattered around, broken and rusty, and he would lay there, defenseless, like a prisonner waiting for his executionner to bring down the blade of the guillotine. And Red would watch himself clamp his hands tightly around Blue's neck and choke the life out of him. His rival would punch, kick, scratch and trash against his hold for unbearably long minutes but his struggling was as effective on this monstrous version of Red as a tackle on a steel type and sooner, rather than later, his eyes would roll in the back of his skull and he would go limp in his grip like a doll. Then and only then woud he release his hold and watch his rival's dead body crumble on the ground, wondering why he did what he did.

How much time had passed? Days? Months? Years? One thing was sure, however: his hallucinations got more and more violent and more and more real. He was hoping to whatever deity was out there that it wasn't a reflection of his own darkest desires. He was not a murderer. He was a good person! It was difficult to reassure himself with that, though; he didn't know what was real and what wasn't anymore. He could already have murdered Blue and was hiding up there for all he knew. This frozen peak could very well be his jail cell, his purgatory, while he waited for his judgment.

Red spent his days afraid of being murdered and his nights afraid of murdering someone. He trained and trained and trained obsessively until his pokémon collapsed in exhaustion. It was never enough. His mind was the same as the moutaintop: lost in a sea of clouds and frozen in time. He was slowly fading away, becoming one with the moutain, not seeing himself grow dirtier and dirtier, thinner and thinner... weaker and weaker...

I swear not every chapter is gonna be this weird and surreal. This idea came up to me because I happen to work in the psychiatric ward of a hospital so I hear about this kind of story (and witness a whole lot of weird and nasty stuff on a daily basis) all the time.

What Red is experiencing is an actual diagnosable condition known as psychotic depression. In a nutshell, it's a severe depression that's accompanied with psychotic symptoms including delirium and hallucinations. For instance, Red experiences delirium in the form of believing someone is out there to kill him and hallucinations in the form of seeing things that are not real, feeling pain that is not real (like the 'stab' wounds) and hearing voices. Most people mix up psychotics and psychopaths but they're two very different disorders that actually rarely go hand in hand.