Ruby felt an odd combination of embarrassed, giddy, and empowered as he watched Sapphire running off to a destination he wasn't sure of. (Maybe Sapphire wasn't sure of it, either; maybe she was just getting some space between them to collect her thoughts.) "This must be what they mean," he thought to himself, "by that 'lighter than air' feeling." Then, that "lighter than air" feeling took a dangerous hold of his thought processes, as he decided to follow Sapphire's lead and leap on down from the tree.

Sapphire, meanwhile, was continuing her run to a destination she wasn't sure of, when she heard Ruby let out a pained wail from back in the vicinity of that tree. She turned around and rushed back over; her strong intuition already giving her a good idea what happened. Sure enough, that funny feeling was an illusion, because Ruby hadn't handled his fall very well. He now was resting on his left knee, with his right leg splayed out. "I—I think I broke it," he said in a voice that sounded like it would start crying if he said anymore.

"Oh my! I'm sorry," said Sapphire, and she really did feel like she was responsible for this on some level. "I know the feeling; that's happened to me before." (This wasn't a lie, though it was a long time in the past, and so she said it just to make him feel a bit better.) "Here; lemme help you up."

"That would be a start," Ruby groaned. "Oh; don't forget our homework, there." Sapphire stuffed the paper into her backpack, and then lifted Ruby off the ground, causing him to cry out in pain. "Aaaagh! It hurts worse now!"

"Squeeze my hand and try not ta think about it," she advised, and he obeyed, but still moaned on occasion. Fortunately, the park they were in was right in Downtown Fallarbor Town, so it wasn't long before bystanders arrived and gave them advice on a medical clinic. Sapphire took the advice and charged in the direction of the place, sacrificing a bit of Ruby's comfort for speed, but he tried his best to be brave and bear it. She was helping him, and at this point Ruby was past trivializing such help. Still, his eyes were dripping tears; maybe even worse because he didn't cry out.

Upon reaching the clinic, Sapphire kicked the door open (not hard, but with a sense of purpose that passionate heroes have—and also, of course, because her arms were full), and yelled to the desk clerk, "This poor guy needs attention!"

Ruby cringed a bit, while the clerk said, "Alright; please be seated and we'll be with you in a moment," in that calm-and-polite-but-obviously-still-irritated way that bureaucrats will say things. Sapphire grudgingly obeyed, and then caught sight of Ruby's tear-drenched face. She said nothing, but yanked off her bandana and sweetly dried him up, while cradling his face in her other arm. Ruby wasn't sure how he felt about that, so he didn't say anything, either.

Ultimately, the doctors did, in fact, see to Ruby's leg, and he arrived home late, in Sapphire's tender loving care, and gauze. Norman took a look at Ruby as Sapphire escorted him in, and instead of "sorry" or "oh; poor guy," said, "Looks like you had a really eventful two days!"

"It certainly had its ups and downs," groaned Ruby in response. "The latter hurt a lot more."

The following weeks were certainly different from those in the past. Ruby often had to make use of crutches to walk around school, but Sapphire also helped him move around when she could. She didn't carry him—Ruby found that to be too embarrassing—but she held his hand or sometimes half-lifted him by putting her arm around his torso while at his side, and she seemed to like that just fine. Privately, Ruby did, too. Physical Education class, which the two had already gained permission to abstain from, was now completely out of the question for Ruby, but Sapphire still did her best that period to act as his physical therapist; ensuring those bits of his body that weren't broken would stay/get strong.

Meanwhile, Ruby had meant what he said about their report. He revised it to include the whole story of Mr. Fukajima's theft of the water, and their apprehension of him, and he even asked Sapphire to read it again to make sure she approved. Indeed she did, which meant the two had gotten their first Geology project done well ahead of schedule, and could spend more time in the sort of after-school and weekend activities that aimed at addressing their deficiencies…though for Ruby, the options were obviously limited.

The two hadn't kissed again since that evening when it ended painfully, and in fact, both felt too embarrassed to talk about it, but Ruby thought about the incident every time he was with her, and sometimes when he wasn't, too. In stark contrast to his attitude at the beginning of the semester, now he felt there was no going back; Sapphire and he were indeed becoming a couple, and no petty injury was going to stop that. He still wasn't sure if he could be the man he thought she deserved for all she did, but he was determined to try his hardest.

A poignant moment occurred one day in Language class, with Cedi talking about Sapphire for the first time in a while since Ruby demanded she stop, but this time, amazingly, it wasn't a mean remark: "Sapphire's being really nice to you, whatwith your broken leg."

Ruby nodded. "She feels partially responsible for that, though really; I was just stupid—yes, though; it is really nice of her."

"Well; good for her," said Cedi, and she astonishingly dropped it at that. Ruby was boggled by this development, and convinced it must have meant something.

Later on, in Art class, Ruby was blazing through assignments (he'd gotten quite good at drawing; perhaps having sewing and photography as hobbies helped), when he came upon his drawing of Sapphire again, and absentmindedly started to doodle around it. He caught himself and closed the book before anyone could see him doing so again, but not before he processed what he was doodling. He grinned to himself. "Maybe," he thought, "this should be a project I undertake with Sapphire. At this point, she probably won't kill me for it!"

Sapphire's own life was also taking some interesting twists. She was finally becoming a better reader; no doubt because of the time she spent with Ruby helping her with her homework. It took her a great deal longer than most students to get a given night's homework done, and even then, she was well below the level of some other students. Still, the long study times were spent with her best friend (boyfriend?), and as such, she threw herself into them with more enthusiasm than she would have otherwise, and also remembered them more readily.

In one such study session, she was struck with the thought: "Gee; it must be exhausting for Ruby to spend all this time helping me, and then do his own homework, too. He must be really smart. Or really dedicated to me. Or just letting his own grades suffer as a result. Or-" this thought was interrupted by Ruby quizzing her about this weird thing called "reading comprehension."

Outside of the time Sapphire spent with Ruby, she was pleased to find school was getting a tad more bearable. Her improved reading skills helped in Language class, and Math, though just as boring as it was before, wasn't as difficult for her as reading still was. Finally, though Sapphire still resented that the curriculum of the History class did not cover her and Ruby's battle against Team Aqua, Team Magma, and their summoned eldritch abominations, somehow she started to see the lessons as visceral adventures in and of themselves. Her teacher was also proving to be nicer than she'd thought at first. A particularly interesting conversation occurred between them after class, but this one wasn't accusatory. "Hey teach! This samurai chick, Kai; she kinda looks like me, doncha think?"

The teacher looked at her next to the portrait in their history book. "Why yes; I guess there is a resemblance! Of course, I don't know how accurate those illustrations really are, but who knows?"

"Yeah; who know? Maybe I'm her great-great-somethin' granddaughter! Or maybe I came from cave people instead!"

The teacher laughed. "That, I can tell you for sure, is entirely possible. Recently science has proven that some modern humans are part-Neanderthal."

"Cool," said Sapphire as she walked to her next class. Was that statement by the teacher intended as an insult? She didn't think so, but in fact, she couldn't care less.

In her Language Arts class, Sapphire settled into another dull, enigmatic, but fortunately, not explosive lesson. As usual, since her resolving to learn to read enough to at least get by in life, her time in class consisted mostly of her staring at her assigned reading, occasionally with her index finger running along the text, while listening to other students read that text aloud. Every once in a while, she got the sinking feeling that maybe those other students botched the reading, by the way they were pausing and speaking in tones that sounded puzzled. If that was indeed, the case, it likely meant that her method of hopefully learning to read was not as practical as she wished it was.

Another bizarre thing was that the Language Art teacher rarely ever corrected these students when they seemed to make a mistake. Hopefully, that meant that they hadn't, but maybe the teacher was just trying to be polite. In that case, though, it seemed a bit hypocritical to Sapphire, seeing as how she was mad at her own inability to read—then again, she hadn't deigned to help her, either. "Could it be," she thought, "that this teacher actually doesn't want to teach her students to read?" That thought was absurd…and yet, surely this teacher wasn't doing all she could to help her students. "Ruby would do all he could," it occurred to Sapphire. "Ruby has done all he could. He wouldn't worry about hurting people's feelings by correcting them, but he'd apologize if he did. So it would actually work out okay."

Sapphire realized too late that she'd been distracted by these thoughts. She had ignored both her text and the live narration thereof by volunteering (if possibly inadequate) students, and now it would be very difficult to find where she was supposed to be. So instead, she just glanced around the room; taking more interest in other things—like the clock. She tried not to giggle at the memory of an amusing incident that occurred about a week earlier. Her Math teacher had decided he was fed up with students constantly glancing at the clock to see how much longer they needed to suffer his boring class. Sapphire, and probably others, thought the best solution would be for the teacher to stop being so damned boring, but in all fairness, doing so was probably impossible for a man of his limits, so he'd taken the simple and creative solution of taping a piece of paper bearing the written message, "Don't look at this," over the clock. The result, predictably to everyone except the teacher himself, was that the students looked at it constantly; not even mere glances, as they had when they just wanted to tell time. Events came to a head when a member of the faculty came by to give the teacher a delivery; upon seeing it, she pointed and laughed. Then, this was all the encouragement students needed to burst out laughing themselves, and after a whole lecture was ruined by the teacher's bad judgment, the clock was soon free once again.

After this flashback, she noticed something else. Ivy was glancing at her occasionally, with a troubled look on her face. Whenever Sapphire caught her doing it, Ivy would quickly look away, but somehow, Ivy kept doing so, and Sapphire thought she could feel it even when she didn't look to check. It didn't surprise her when Ivy approached her after class with an abrupt statement: "Sapphire, gal; where've you been?"

Sapphire wasn't sure what she meant. "I've never left. I still come to school, and believe me, sometimes it ain't an easy thing for me to do!"

"I was talking about Physical Education. You haven't been there for weeks. The team needs you back!"

Sapphire just grinned. "Team? There wasn't any real team in PE, Ivy; they just switched players around a lot. We even played against each other sometimes; remember?"

"Usually that was because that little bitch Cedi put us on separate teams, and still, we need you back. It's your duty to show those suckers up."

"I like you admirin' me," admitted Sapphire, "but my duty these days is helping my best friend outta his problems-'specially now, cos he has a broken leg."

"Awww; I thought I was your best friend," whined Ivy.

"Oh sorry," said Sapphire, now regretting her terminology. "Not to diss ya, but I've known Ruby for a long time, and I know he'd do it for me, so I gotta do it for him."

"So you'd pass up an opportunity to nail Cedi with a ball again," joked Ivy. (Or was it a joke.)

Sapphire chuckled, but didn't need much time to decide. "Of cos I would. That felt pretty good at the time, but ya know; I think I just like helpin' people more'n hurtin' 'em. Sorry, but I need to get to band class now. See ya later."

"Oh, alright then. See you," said Ivy, in a way that made it sound like maybe she wished she wouldn't.

On the way to band, Sapphire wondered if she was too blunt—something she did not wonder too often, but lately interacting with more people than she ever had before (and it being so explosive that one time) had really made her wonder. "Ivy really was being nice inviting me back," thought Sapphire. "But still, I meant what I said. Strength is for helping the weak; not hurting them." Fortunately, arriving at the band room cut her dilemma short.

Sapphire's strong belief in the old Spider-Man mantra may not have been unanimous, but it proved effective for what she wanted to do, and Ruby could attest to that. His broken leg was almost healed within a few weeks, and even better, he wasn't too clumsy after he started walking free again—and he knew why. Had he been left to his own device, Ruby thought he probably would have just loafed around while his leg healed, and as a result, make an awkward recovery, but Sapphire had other plans for him. These included taking him out walking even on the weekends to keep his energy up, even though he still needed her help or that of crutches, and a bizarre exercise that consisted of her commanding him to lie on his back, then half-pouncing on him so he would work to push her off. Ruby found the maneuver all types of embarrassing, but it only took one instance of him not bothering to push back, and Sapphire landing painfully on his broken leg, to convince him that he'd better do it anyway.

Sapphire did not hold back when it came to training, but then, she never miscalculated, either. Ruby was soon walking again, with a limp but without the crutches, in time for the convenient day that their Geology projects were due. On that day, Sapphire couldn't contain her excitement, and now that she didn't need to help Ruby walk, she was charging ecstatically to the classroom, narrowly avoiding knocking some spooked students down in the process. "C'mon, Ruby! This'll be so great!"

As it happened, Ruby and Sapphire had to wait a bit to present their own project while other groups went first, and some of these other presentations were indeed entertaining…though not always in ways that their creators intended.

One group has fashioned a stereotypical model volcano out of clay, and attempted to demonstrate how volcanoes work by pouring in a mix of vinegar, baking soda, and food-coloring. Some students cheered as its bloody-looking contents overflowed, but Sapphire caught the teacher scowling throughout the presentation. At the end, the teacher clarified why. "I see you were passionate about what you did, but unfortunately, that old trick has nothing to do with how volcanoes actually work, and this class is Geology; not Chemistry. Besides, you got a nasty mess on my floor. Talk to me after class." The students sat down worriedly, while some others muttered about them being in trouble. Another group announced that they had written a song about glaciers, which, they revealed by starting to sing, actually meant they wrote new, dorky words for "All Star" by Smash Mouth. Sapphire enjoyed it, but Ruby was clenching up and shuddering in pain. Still another group had baked a tasty cake representing different tiers of sediment. They got a reasonably good grade, and the admiration of other students.

Finally, though, the moment came for Ruby and Sapphire to present their report on the happenings at Mount Chimney as of late. Sapphire bounded up to the front of the class while Ruby moved more slowly up with his visuals, and even before he got there, Sapphire launched into a bombastic speech laden with body-language. She was doing something that Ruby didn't think he had ever seen her do before—acting like a coordinator. "Hey y'all! Ya like adventures? Well; lemme tell ya 'bout the adventures that Geology can give!" The teacher looked impressed at this sort of enthusiastic pandering, or at least, what he thought was enthusiastic pandering. "Here, my man Ruby's got a cool drawing of Mount Chimney, and lookit all those tunnels in it, because they're important! Tell 'em, Ruby!"

Ruby, no stranger to presentations and audiences, launched into it himself: "Some of you may have heard the news about Lavaridge Town's springs receding mysteriously—and then flooding; equally mysteriously. Well; let it be mysterious no more, because Sapphire and I investigated the aquifers, and discovered the cause of this conundrum." Sapphire was grinning at his enthusiasm, and maybe also at his big, funny words. "First, I would like to give a short lecture about water pressure. You probably know something about it. When you press your finger into a hose, you can see that water, being blocked from one part of the opening, rushes forcefully out the other. Likewise, if holes are poked in other parts of the hose, the water leaks out of those, and as such, not as much comes out of the actual nozzle. So as you can see, water is always pushing against everything it touches, and trying to flow out. So how did this translate to Lavaridge's springs failing? Well; why don't you take that one, Sapphire?" (Ruby was surprised that now he had no fear of what she would say.)

"Of cos! The water stopped coming into Lavaridge because it was drained farther down the river, by this nasty villain named Mr. Fukajima! He wanted to steal the water for his evil bathhouse, so he dug this extra tunnel, and Ruby didn't mention this, but once the water disappeared, the ground up on the mountain caved in and these hikers fell down, and Ruby and me both saved 'em." Ruby gave her a look about that, and Sapphire was puzzled by it; he then realized she probably didn't know she had used bad grammar. "So then we went down and Ruby figured out what had happened right away, so we went down the tunnel 'til we found the water where it drained, and we jumped in with our Relicanth and went down the drain with it. What happened next, Ruby?"

"Well, we didn't know about this, but about that time, the water in Lavaridge Town came back up until it overflowed, because the new cave-in obstructed the flow of the water, so it again pressed out of the springs there with much more force." Sapphire looked at him, as though that wasn't what she was hinting at, and so, taking the message, he breathed in, and then ventured, "So then we came out of the pipe and in the bathhouse. Sapphire bullied this employee to find out who was responsible"—he looked at her to see if she was annoyed at this description, but she just grinned—"and so we ran out, and after she called him out, we battled him."

Sapphire took over without even being told to: "Ya bet we did! First of all he got out his Sandslash, and it was about ta dig us ta death, but then I had my Blazikhen jump us up onta the roof of the bathhouse, and the Sandslash came up in the water and got hurt. Then Ruby knocked 'im out with his Swampert, and then the guy got his Gyarados out, and Swampert took its blow, and then I used my Minum to fry 'im into a fish fillet, and then the coward flew off with his Skarmory, but don't worry, cos next day I hear Flannery kicked the crap outta him! And that's why Geology is awesome!"

The crowd went wild. Some laughed, some just cheered; most applauded. The teacher's face was red, but so what? Ruby motioned for quiet, and appended, "In closing, water is a testy substance. It is very useful, but its physical properties make it a very chaotic substance when even a slight upset of the balance is introduced, and so extra care should be taken to ensure that this does not happen. Thank you." This time, most of the audience just laughed, but Ruby didn't care.

After a few more presentations, the teacher called out to Ruby and Sapphire. They took it enthusiastically, but Sapphire's enthusiasm dimmed when she heard his comment: "Very well-researched and investigated; I can tell you cared a lot. But we really didn't need to hear you go on an ego trip about your adventure."

Sapphire just stared at the teacher, and then at Ruby. He could only say, "I tried to tell you…" Silently, Sapphire stalked out the door, leaving Ruby to hobble after her in vain.

First of all, I deeply apologize for not making my quota of releasing a chapter within a month-and even now, only releasing a very short chapter. There are a number of reasons for this, and hopefully I'll explain them sufficiently.

Yesterday, a guest reviewed my story thusly: "This is the best fic I have ever read. Most fics go by quickly and unrealistically, but when I read this I feel as if I am reading a novel with all the relatable traits and immense character development. It's awesome! I love it!" I am greatly honored to have received a review like this, as it is exactly the effect I was shooting for. I think Franticshipping stories fulfill a strong need for many readers; as beloved as the official arc of the manga is, it leaves some unfinished business eating at the fans. Anywhere else, such a story would probably have ended in a kiss and a relationship being finalized, but for some reason, Hidenori Kusaka chose not to do so. Granting that children of that age usually aren't interested in love, it's still somewhat maddening that after all that happened, Ruby can pretend not to remember. Hence (especially since, with no more lack of back-compatibility in the Pokemon series, there probably will not be a Ruty/Sapphire remake and hence, no official sequel arc), demand is high for fanfictions that give some closure on the matter, and many exist, but as that reviewer put it, most are very short and consist of a few events leading up to a kiss. (Some go further than that, but they're still short.) I'm not pointing any fingers, and I admit to having enjoyed reading some of these short fics, but I indeed, resolved that I wanted my own fanfiction to be a worthy story in its own right; not just an epilogue to another.

All that said, coming up with content to fill a story out is hard work. I began this with the end in mind, and I still have it in mind, but much of the other content was made up later. This chapter has Ruby breaking his leg, and I thought of that some time after last chapter, as a key plot point that will be revealed as important later. However, one thing I did not think of initially was that breaking one's leg prevents one from doing a lot. As such, it really was a struggle writing a chapter that both had the leg heal over the course of it, and still had enough content to be entertaining. I had long ago figured that at some point, I wanted to do a "montage" chapter, but this was, with the exception of the finale, not as good as I'd hoped for. Such are the ruts I wander into from time to time, and when I run up against writer's block, I do what many other writer's do; I move away from the thing until the next step comes to me. This time, however, many distractions presented themselves.

Here are the big things that have happened to me recently. First, I have moved into a new apartment, finally. Some time after, as I had hoped to do by moving, I got both a job and the beginning of a social life. Yes; I now work as an editor, and I also am a member of a group that studies the Japanese language. Yet in addition, when getting on the computer in attempts to continue this, I have gotten into some other projects. The first is a fangame, though not based on this series. The second, however, is related. At the time I started getting back into Pokemon last year, in addition to reading the manga, I also became a bit obsessed with the RPG Pokemon Tabletop Adventures. So for all of those who stuck with me and are interested in this, I have a present for you, or rather, two. I've "statted" a lot of official characters for the game, and so I made sheets for Ruby and Sapphire. Sadly, it seems linking them from this site doesn't work, but if interested PM me, and I'll see what I can do.

Fortunately, I doubt that I'll be so stuck as to what to do next chapter; I've had it planned out for a while, with this being merely something I inserted on a whim, so I should get it out more punctually. Thanks again.