A/N: This has quite a bit of creative license thrown into it, because I had to come up with something. So Morty grew up in Hoenn, like all the rest of the popular gym leaders. And then he moved to Johto because of his new job or something. That's my story and I'm sticking to it!
Falkner and Morty aren't friends in this one like they are in the anime. Just a heads up.
Prompt: Karma
Pairing: Morty/Phoebe (Ghoulshipping, I believe this is called.)
Warning: Because there was some confusion on this kind of thing in a previous chapter, I'm warning you. Morty and Phoebe are teenagers here, so that's your heads up.
Morty looked at the haze of clouds above his head. He couldn't see the sky, nor could he see the actual ground if he looked over the edge of the summit. He was laying on his back at the top of Mt. Pyre, watching the clouds go by, and thinking to himself about that day, over school. He often went up there to clear his mind, because so few people ever came to the top, if they could make it, and even fewer would even notice him in the mist like he was.
He wasn't the most popular kid ever, In fact, Morty liked to keep to himself, for the most part. People were loud and noisy and boisterous, and he preferred the calm, the quiet, and the alone-ness. However, he would stand up and face it in an instant if there was something worth voicing his opinion for. Today, there had been a couple of students picking on one of the younger kids, Bugsy, who was in Gym Leader school to be a trainer of Bug pokemon.
Falkner and his girlfriend, Whitney, were doing the bullying that day. Falkner was the most popular boy in school, and Whitney the girl. Poor Bugsy had been pushed over onto the grass, and had been told that he was now one step closer to being just like one of his precious favored pokemon. Everyone eating lunch at the benches around them turned away, not wanting to get caught up in what was happening. If one kept to themselves while Falkner was picking on another kid, they were still on his good side.
But Morty had stood roughly out of his bench, nearly tipping it over in the process. He had walked over and placed himself between Bugsy and Falkner with finality, his hands in his pockets and his blonde hair covering his face. Falkner had demanded to know what he was doing, and his response was being told to leave the poor kid alone, he wasn't doing anything. His head had raised, and he was glaring at Falkner from under his headband. Not just a glare, but the kind that literally made Terminator seem like a cheese puff in comparison. Falkner got his face very close to Morty's at that, and he asked him what his deal was, then had flattened his palms against Morty's chest and shoved him down into the spot Bugsy had just scurried away from. A crowd of students began gathering around them when Morty hit the ground.
His face was still dark and his teeth still gritted, his glare still on full force. Falkner had put his hands on his hips and laughed, Whitney giggling behind him. He looked Morty right in the face and held up a fist.
"You see this?" he had said, obviously putting on a bit of a show for the crowd watching. "This is going to connect with your face soon." he then put his fist down and bent at the waist to get his face closer to Morty, who looked about to jump to his feet. "Do you have any idea why nobody likes you? Why you're such an outcast?" he asked then, making Morty stop in his tracks. "Because you're full of bad karma."
Morty had looked at him, his glare replaced by a mildly hurt look, and Falkner knew he had struck a nerve. "Yeah, I said bad karma. You and your ghost pokemon." Falkner stood back up straight and Whitney backed into the crowd, knowing the fight would start soon. "Nobody in their right mind picks ghost pokemon. Haven't you heard? They're bad luck! Only trainers who want to fail pick them!"
The crowd that had circled around them was thick now, and was watching Falkner with interest. A few more words were exchanged, Morty retaliated, and then Falkner struck.
Morty touched a light hand to his cheek just thinking about it. It had a large scrape going across it, and was tender to the touch. Aside from his various other scrapes and bruises, the one that hurt the most was his giant shiner. His fingers barely grazed his eye before he pulled it away in pain. But aside from all that, his pride was the thing that took the greatest blow.
He had been lying there, trying to fight his way out from under Falkner and his swinging fists when out of the corner of his eye, he saw the only person who's opinion ever mattered to him. Phoebe, tanned skin and all, stood in horror and watched the scene before her before running off through the crowd. Morty had felt a fire alight anew in him and he rolled over on top of Falkner, swinging his own fists at the boy. Falkner just made him look like a fool to Phoebe. Even if he hadn't really had an actual conversation with her before...
"Mister Matsuba! Get off of Hayato immediately!" a sharp voice had said, making all the students in the circle crank their heads around quickly then disperse. The teacher was standing there, Phoebe at his side, and looking even more horrified than she had before. Whitney stood back and watched with a smug look on her face.
"Sir, Morty attacked Falkner!" Whitney said immediately. "Poor Falkner never had a chance! Morty just snapped and probably thought we were picking on Bugsy; he had fallen down and Falkner was offering a hand to help him up." she said. Phoebe began to protest, but the teacher silenced her.
"Miss Fuyō, it does not do well to have lies become us. Next time, get the whole story before you come running." he said. "Boys, go to the nurse and get cleaned up. Morty, go home and don't come back until you can learn to keep your fists to yourself."
"Bad karma." Falkner muttered as Morty turned to leave. "See what I mean? You even got Phoebe caught up in it too." And on that note he left, Whitney walking him to the school and cooing at him like he was the victim there.
Morty scowled at the thought. Maybe Falkner... was right about the karma thing. Maybe picking ghosts as his specialty wasn't such a good idea after all. Maybe it was bringing him back luck. He never had the voice to speak up unless it would get him in trouble, and in defending himself he got in trouble, dragging Phoebe along with him. Maybe what Falkner said was true.
He heard rustling behind him, like footsteps approaching, but he didn't make a sound. He was not in the mood to talk to anyone at the moment, and if he just stayed how he was, he'd be passed, unnoticed. But the footsteps got closer, and he began to get a bit jumpy. What if Falkner had found his way up and was coming back to take another shot at him? But Falkner didn't have the ghost pokemon he needed to maneuver through the small mountain's insides to the top. Besides, how would he have known Morty was even there?
"Are you sure he's here?" said a girl voice to seemingly nobody in particular. "I don't see anything. Maybe you made a bit of a mistake and you found someone who isn't Morty..."
"Dusk!"
"Okay, okay, maybe you're right. I still don't think we're going to find him in this fog..." she said again. Morty's heart stopped for a moment. What was Phoebe, of all people, doing on Mt. Pyre? And what was she doing looking for him, besides?
"Duskull, dusk!" said her pokemon. Morty leaped to his feet just before Phoebe's foot landed on his face. She gave a little scream and jumped back at his sudden appearance, and his left knee buckled under his sudden weight. She reached out just in time to grab him before he fell, supporting his weight on her as she lowered him to the ground.
"You're right, you did find him." she consoled the pokemon floating by her head. "Now, I have some business to take care of, so you go run along and play." She waved a hand by the pokemon with a face like a skull, with a floating red orb behind his face that could be seen though his eye sockets. He zipped off happily, leaving a very red Morty and a concerned Phoebe behind. He wouldn't look her in the face.
Morty had had a thing for Phoebe for years, since she entered Gym Leader Academy the year after him. She was shorter than him, with beautiful blue eyes and tanned skin, and wore floral-print clothes like an island native. The only exception were the two giant pink flowers pinned to either side of her short brown hair, which never seemed to match anything she wore. Today her skirt tied around her waist and her shirt was just a small tube top, in light blue.
She and Morty almost never talked, because he was so shy and quiet and she was very loud and outgoing, and almost always surrounded by a group of her equally, if not louder girlfriends. He'd watch her from a distance, wishing he had the courage to talk to her, or wishing he was one of those boy friends that walked with her to class sometimes. But he stayed back, quiet and shy, uncomplaining, dreaming up scenarios in which he'd utterly sweep her off her feet with some smooth comment, or she'd suddenly profess her love for him and he'd do the same or something. Only, now that he had her, and even though they were alone together, he could think of nothing to say.
"P-phoebe, what are you doing here?" he managed to stutter out. She put a hand on his shoulder gently, making sure he wasn't too bruised up there, and tried to look at him.
"Falkner and Whitney." she said finally. "What they did wasn't fair." A light breeze picked up and wafted through the fog around them. "I saw the whole thing, but I didn't have enough time to explain Whitney's lie to the teacher. I'm sorry I made things worse."
"You... you saw the whole thing?" he asked. "Even from where I told them to stop picking on Bugsy?"
"Yep. That's what caught my attention in the first place, since you're usually so quiet." she said. He looked up and they locked eyed for a moment before he broke the contact again. "But more importantly, I came up here to check on you. You took a heavy beating there." She touched a finger to his split lip gently. "I brought band-aids and stuff, just in case."
"How did you find me, anyway?" he asked, trying to avoid the discussion of his whimpy injuries. "I thought only trainers with ghost pokemon could make it to the top?"
"I had my Duskull track you down." she said. "They have a special talent for tracking the aura of a person. I had him follow yours." She sat back on her hands and smiled, crossing her legs in the grass beneath her. "Besides, my grandparents are the protectors of the orbs here! I'd know how to get up here with my eyes closed, even without pokemon!" Her grin was enormous. "I grew up here, you know!"
"...Really?" he asked. "I come up here when I need to calm down." he said. "It's always foggy and quiet, and the pokemon leave me alone when I want them to. They just seem to know, you know?" he asked. Somehow, conversation was coming easier now. He was relaxing his sore body. She was friendly and they had something to talk about! He wasn't sitting in a shy stupor and she in an awkward silence.
"I know. Ghost pokemon are much more in tune with the emotions of people because they were once living and know what it's like. They can sense things other pokemon just can't. Besides, they also connect better though a trainer willing to cooperate through them, like you, who picked them as your specialty."
"How do you know all this?" he asked her. "I know you've been coming here all your life, but all this knowledge about ghosts and stuff..."
"What, you think this Duskull isn't mine? He and I have been together forever!" When her pokemon came at the sound of his name, she snatched him out of the air and squeezed him tightly in a hug. The pokemon seemed to give a little purr and hugged her back with his stubby little arms. She let him go and he floated there by her head after that. "I'm like you. When it comes time to pick my specialty pokemon next year, I'm picking ghost, hands-down."
"Really?" He perked up at this. "But, aren't you worried about, you know, the bad karma?"
"Bad karma?" She waved a hand posh-style at him impatiently. "That was just something Falkner thought of to get you riled up! Karma doesn't exist, and certainly not through pokemon as gorgeous as our little ghosties!" Duskull cooed again and circled her head happily at this, and she giggled. "Come on, let's go back down and get you properly fixed up so you can be in top shape for school tomorrow."
Morty took her hand once she stood and used it to help pull himself to his feet. She led him back down the steps and just as they were about to enter the inside of the mountain, he looked down at her free hand swinging at her side.
He wanted to. She had come up here to see him, to check and see if he was alright, and that must have meant that he held some standard in her book. His face shone with red at the thought, but he took a deep breath and reached out, securing her hand in his. She froze for a moment and glanced at it, then back up at him. He wore a blush nearly identical to hers.
"Well, if there is such a thing as bad karma," he said, struggling to keep his voice even, "maybe both of us can put our bad karmas together to negate it and turn it positive."
"I think I like that idea." she said, her blush turning down and a smile blossoming up in its place. She gave his hand a squeeze. "I like that idea much more."
A/N: I'm ashamed to put my name on this chapter. I'm going to rewrite it soon, after a few more updates, because I don't like it at all. It's been through four drafts, this is the fifth, and I'm still not happy. But eh, if you like it, you like it.
Again, the poll is there for you guys who are becoming regulars, it impacts this story, so vote please!
Also, if you spot any typos, let me know! I've checked through it a lot, but I know I miss something, since I almost always do...
