Food Fight

Mewtwo refused to say more about the dream, and I realized that it probably wouldn't be smart to push him.

"Why don't we go get breakfast then?" I suggested, changing the subject. I hoped he'd tell me when he was ready. "I bet everyone's really hungry."

Mewtwo gave a small nod. "Very well."

"Well, there's fruit. I grow berry trees on Avalon. I like plants a lot. I used to help Mom in the garden all the time, and my aunt is a landscaper. Here on Avalon, we have sort of an orchard. I got some the berries from a traveler, so they don't really grow in either Kanto or Johto. Some of them you won't want to eat plain, but a lot of them are really delicious. And…"

I stopped speaking as I felt my feet lift off of the ground. Mewtwo flew over to where the clones were sleeping, carrying me with him. The flight was over almost before I realized that it had begun.

Mewtwo set me lightly on the ground again, leaving me standing there like a statue. I loved flying. It was awesome. But there was still something strange about feeling yourself floating without any visible support. And you don't have any control over where you're floating either. Hopefully I'll get to the point where I'll be used to it, and I'll love it.

I tapped Ben on the shoulder and he sat up, stretching.

He smiled. "Hey. I don't suppose you're gonna tell me that I dreamed that thing about Mewtwo flying to our front door?"

I shook my head and nodded to where Mewtwo was standing.

Ben sighed and stood up. "I just hope you know what you're doing."

"Don't worry. I trust him."

I think Mewtwo might have heard, because he made as though to turn in our direction, but stopped.

Some of the other Pokémon were already beginning to wake up. The stomping footsteps of Rhyhorn and Nidoqueen were effective in waking up the rest of the Pokémon. A minute later, all of the clones, plus a few of my Pokémon, were either awake, or yawning and getting to their feet.

Gyarados, Lapras, Dewgong, Seadra, and Tentacruel remained in the lake where they were most comfortable. The rest of our large group began to follow Ben and I to the garden.

"The gardens are just on the other side of the house," I said, pointing. "Not far. A lot of the grass Pokémon like to go there and help take care of everything. And the water Pokémon help keep it watered."

"What is that?" Mewtwo asked, gesturing to a place off at the edge of the field.

I grinned. "Oh, that's a place that the Pokémon helped me build. Jed donated some supplies too. It took a really long time, but it was worth it. It's pretty much a big obstacle course. Or a playground."

"Playground?" He repeated.

I nodded. "Sometimes we use it to train. Lance taught me to do what ever I told my Pokémon to do."

"If you're physically capable of it," Ben added.

I nodded in agreement. "A trainer needs to train themselves-not rely on Pokémon to do everything. So, the obstacle course helps get us all in shape. But it's also really fun to play on!"

"Fun," he repeated.

"I don't suppose you've done too much of that, huh? Fun? We'll have to take you over there." I paused and looked at him. "Maybe it will get you to smile. A happy smile."

Mewtwo was silent.

"There's the garden," Ben announced.

As we passed the house, we came tin sight of the rows of trees. Smaller plants grew between them and around the edges of the orchard.

The Pokémon gathered around as I began to explain about the berries.

"This row has sweet berries. Those are my favorites. There's sour berries there, bitter, and so on. Over there are apricorns, which you can't eat. And next to those are the medicinal berries, which aren't too tasty. You can try what you want, as long as you don't eat them all, or break the plants or anything.

I went to a Mago tree. Ben, Mew, Mewtwo, Pikachu, Jolteon, and some others followed. "The more curved they are," I explained as I picked a very curly berry, "the sweeter they are."

We handed some of the fruit down to the smaller Pokémon, and then headed to a Bluk berry tree.

Ben rolled several Bluk berries into his mouth and grinned at me. The fruit had died his mouth black. I laughed at him.

"These berries are very squishy," Ben said, picking a Pecha berry. "But they're really sweet too.

I reached up to pick a Pecha berry for myself. When I turned back, a fat, squishy Pecha berry landed squarely in my face, dripping juice everywhere. I spluttered, wiping juice off of my face. When my eyes were cleared, I looked around to see Ben sprinting away from me as fast as his legs would carry him.

"You," I growled angrily. I snatched a fruit from the tree and took off after him, sprinting between the trees as fast as I could.

Ben was a lot faster than me, but he was currently laughing so hard that I was gaining on him. When I was sure I had a good shot, I lobbed the Pecha berry at him and it splatted across the back of his head, dripping down his neck.

Ben stumbled and I launched myself at him. We crashed to the ground in a tumbled heap.

"You big jerk!" I shouted, poking him in the side repeatedly so that he rolled around, gasping for breath and laughing. He finally pushed me away and poked my armpit. I squealed and fell to the side. For several minutes, we lay on our backs under the trees, laughing so hard that I made our sides ache and we could barely breathe. We didn't even care that Mewtwo and most of the clones were staring at us, dumbfounded. Several of my grass Pokémon were also watching on, amused.

When we finally got our breath back, Ben stood up and dragged me to my feet. My face was sticky with berry juice, and Ben's hair was drenched with it.

Mew whispered something into the ear of the clone Squirtle. A moment later, Squirtle had used Water Gun and drenched both of us thoroughly.

For a moment, we stood there, spluttering. Then we started laughing again. This time, most of the Pokémon joined in too. Mewtwo gave a half smile and shook his head.

Did you know that once you really get started laughing, it's really hard to stop? Especially if a lot of your friends are joined in. It must have been five minutes longer before all of us were able to stop laughing. But we remained grinning broadly.

Ben gave me a gentle shove. "Let's get to the 'playground' before something else happens."

"Happens! You're the one who started it!" I took a swipe at him, but he sprinted off in the direction of the training grounds. I took off after him.

It took most of the rest of the Pokémon a while to catch up with us. Ben was struggling to climb up a net woven of ropes to escape my wrath.

Wigglytuff tried to climb up the slide the wrong way. Golduck attempted to slide down one of the poles, and thudded into the sand. Pidgeot perched on the monkey bars.

Finally abandoning my chase of Ben, I showed the clones around, demonstrating on some of the equipment: a rope swing, a slide, the rope net, swings, and so on. Some of the things, like swings, had very little purpose for training, unless you used your imagination.

Then I noticed that Mewtwo was still standing to the side of the training ground, watching us. He hadn't joined in at all.

"Are you gonna come up?" I shouted from the top of the structure where I was standing next to the slide.

He looked up at me but didn't reply.

I hesitated, then used the slide to reach the ground. I walked over to him, and he turned away from me.

"I'm sorry," he said softly. "It really is beautiful here. Your gardens and the field and lakes, and the mountain. Even this place – your playground. My clones are having a good time. I created them and sent them straight into battle. But now they can enjoy themselves. The normal Pokémon that live on this island are happy to play with my clones. Even though my clones were born different. And my storm would have destroyed all of this."

"Yeah. But it doesn't matter where you came from. What matters are the choices you make. You chose to stop your storm before you did any damage. Not that it was your fault that you acted like that. It seems… in the dream, those scientists broke your heart. They made it fragile. And then Giovanni broke what was left of it. I think it's starting to heal though, even if it's still frail." I hesitated. "You're welcome to stay here. I want to help you. I want you and your clones to be happy. I don't know, maybe it's because of the dream, but I feel like I'm supposed to take care of you."

He gave a small smile. "Take care of me, huh? Yesterday I would have scoffed at the idea of a human taking care of me."

"That's not what I mean. I mean, making sure you're all safe and happy."

"Maybe. We'll stay for a while, at least. To rest. I do think my clones like it here. Maybe they will stay."

It sounded like he wasn't planning on staying. I felt my heart sink. Did he want to leave again? Where would he go?

"So… do you want to come play?" I suggested.

Mewtwo shook his head. "I'll just watch for now."

You need to learn to play! Mew exclaimed, floating over to us.

"I know you like to play," Mewtwo sighed. "I just don't feel up to it right now. I'm… tired."

That's cause you didn't sleep last night.

"What about you, Mew?" I asked. "Where are you heading next?"

She paused to think. Maybe I'll stay a little longer. To keep an eye on that guy and keep him out of trouble. She giggled. But I have to leave soon. Being a legendary Pokémon, I have stuff to do.

"Really? Like what?"

She winked at me. That's classified. Besides, that thing I want to talk to you about, I don't think it's time yet.

"Hey, about that, you keep dropping these random hints. Like there's something I'm supposed to know. You say that I've helped you some time before Team Rocket caught you? But I really didn't. You were the one who helped us!"

She laughed. Like I said, it's not time to talk about that yet! You find me when it is.

She darted off to make big pink bubbles for the other Pokémon to play with. I grumbled darkly. "I wish she'd just tell me what she was talking about!"

"Can you tell me more about the time you helped Mew?" Mewtwo asked. "You said you saved her from Team Rocket. I feel like I ought to know, since that was an attempt to… create me."

"Oh, right. Sure, I'll tell you. Come on. Let's go sit down."

We sat at the base of the equipment where all of the others were playing. I told Mewtwo about the Mew incident and how Zapdos, Articuno, and Moltres had come to help us. Without them, we would have lost. And then Giovanni had escaped, and I'd worried for a very long time that he would try to find me to get his revenge. But I hadn't seen him since. And then I'd had the dream and discovered that Giovanni had created Mewtwo anyway.

When I'd finished, Mewtwo told me about what had happened since he burned the lab down. Giovanni took him in, giving him a suit to focus his psychic powers. Giovanni used him to catch Pokémon and defeat trainers in battle. Mewtwo thought that Giovanni and he were partners, but then Giovanni told him that he was meant to serve humans. Once again, humans had proved that they were incapable of feeling for others. And that's what he'd come to believe.

"He thinks of Pokémon as tools," I agreed. "Some people are like that."

"You're not."

He stood up and walked away.