Chapter Eleven: Annoying.
The next morning, I woke up to see Brendan fast asleep in his pile of supplies. I laughed at him before heading to the bathroom. Once I was done showering, I got dressed and packed up my bag. For some reason, I'd been letting Brendan sleep in a lot more lately.
"Brendan," I whispered while sitting on his bed, "come on, let's get going."
He stirred a little bit, I rolled my eyes. His bag was laying on the floor wide open, so I began to sort all of his stuff into it. Finally I heard his voice. "What time is it?"
"Time for you to get up?"
"I see..." He got up and stretched. "So what are we doing today?"
"Well, we have a long way to go to get to the next Gym, so I figured we should start heading there."
"Right," Brendan got up, changed his shirt, and put his bag on his back. "Let's go!"
Verdanturf Town was very pretty in the morning light. I began to walk back towards Route 117, but Brendan grabbed my arm.
"Wait, look over there..." He was pointing at a small cave at the north point of town. "Wanna check it out?"
I didn't want to. Caves weren't exactly my thing, but... I was starting to get a little more adventurous. "Why not?" I answered.
We entered the tiny cave to find that it was very well lit inside. It reminded me of the cave that we met Mr. Briney in. I watched my step until we got to a hiker, who confirmed our location.
"Hello fellow travelers! You wouldn't happen to be trainers would you?"
"Yes?" Brendan answered.
"Oh, great! You see, a few weeks ago, all those rocks fell and blocked the path to Rustboro Town. I was hoping that one of your pokemon could help smash up the rocks?"
I looked to Brendan. He was thinking hard. Of course, I had an immediate answer. "I think my Gyarados can."
"Awesome! Well, get to it young lady!"
I was ecstatic! I loved being helpful, especially when I could show off my Gyarados. The pokeball flew up into the air and in seconds all the rocks were gone and the path was cleared. It made the loudest, coolest noise ever too. When the dust settled, I heard Brendan's and the hiker's voice, "Awesome!"
Suddenly a man appeared, from the Rustboro side of the cave. "Y-you cleared the rocks?"
"Yes..." I was a little scared, this guy sounded upset. "I-I'm sorry..." I stuttered.
"No, this is amazing!" his voice changed dramatically. As he said this, a girl wondered into the cave from the Verdanturf side.
"Oh my God," she said, then ran forward to embrace the man. The two of them hugged, kissed, and thanked me once more. I smiled at them.
Brendan came up and put his hand on my shoulder, which made my stomach do a few flips. "Come on, cupid, we have to keep going." I laughed uneasily, he must have felt how awkward it was. We exited the cave together.
It didn't take too long to get up to Route 111. However, it did take a long time to get through it. There were so many trainers. Once we got to the desert, Brendan said we went too far.
"We're supposed to be looking for a cable car... Not a desert..." He mumbled looking at his map. "Route 112... Should be to the left of here..."
Brendan was terrible with directions, it was actually shocking that we made it that far. We only went a few steps when I saw a giant sign labeled "ROUTE 112". I rolled my eyes as we walked past it.
There were a few more trainers to battle as we climbed up to the cable cars. Needless to say, we crushed them. Pretty much all of the trainers were defeated, except for two. Brendan headed off toward them, then I put a hand on his shoulder.
"Wait... There's something weird about them..." I said. When I noticed they were talking, I put my finger to my lips. We slowly inched toward them, hiding behind a few rocks. I peeked over the top to get a good look at them. The two were wearing a red and black outfit with the hood up, it looked incredibly odd. One of them talked, and I threw myself down.
"Do you really think this will work?" The voice was raspy and deep.
"How should I know? All the boss told me was that this might be it. That's all." This voice was high and very stern.
"Well I don't understand why we have to stay here. Why can't we help get the Meteor-"
"Shut up! You want our plan to be out there to everyone? That's exactly why you can't help!"
I was deeply interested in this conversation. Brendan pulled on my sleeve and pointed for me to move. We crept back to the stairs and onto the grass of Route 112.
"Who were those guys?" He asked quietly.
"I don't know... But they were talking about getting something... Maybe they're still talking...?" I moved toward the stairs once again. Brendan grabbed my arm roughly.
"May, obviously they're up to no good. Who wears hoods like that?"
"Duh they're up to know good. But maybe we can stop them?"
"I don't want you to get hurt, you don't know what they can do."
"I know they can guard a chairlift." I scoffed.
"Come on, you were just rushing me to get to the next Gym. I think I know a shortcut."
"Fine." I said shortly. We continued into a cave underneath the chairlift. It was incredibly hot and steamy, it just didn't seem safe. Luckily, before I passed out, we emerged into an area covered in soot.
If there had been more warning, this place would have been pretty. But, I took a giant breath of what I assumed would be fresh air, and got a mouth full of ash. Brendan laughed at me as a coughed and hacked up the soot.
"Yeah, it's so funny!" I shouted through my choking.
"I'm sorry, I thought you knew..."
I didn't dignify that with a response. The soot finally cleared and we were able to walk the dirty path. It was actually fun to kick up all the dust. Brendan and I basically ran and jumped through the whole route. Finally we got to a tiny town with a sign that read "Fallarbor Town". The sun was far from setting... And I wasn't exactly ready to turn in. I looked over to Brendan.
"You want to um... Waste more time?" I asked motioning toward the dusty road. Brendan smiled at me, I didn't need a reply.
We spent the better part of three hours sprinting through the grass and kicking up clouds of soot before I stopped for a second to breathe through my shirt. I looked around, trying to see through the grey fog. Brendan was nowhere to be seen. Right when I was going to call for him, I got swept off my feet and landed in a giant pile of soot which exploded on impact.
A combination of the surprise, the shock, and the thick air made me cough like crazy. I felt a lot of weight land on me, which didn't help. In between my hacks, I heard laughing.
"I'm sorry, May. I couldn't resist." Brendan said laying on top of me. I could see him through the soot, and I could feel his laughter. My stomach did a bunch of twists, but then I kept coughing... Ruining the moment.
Brendan pulled me up to my feet and led me into the town. Eventually, when we got to the pokemon center, I calmed down a little. My rib cage hurt intensely, and my head was aching. I just wanted to get into the room.
When we got into our room, he must have asked me a million times if I was okay. I was okay, I was just slightly annoyed at how weak my body was. It was hard to make it this far, and it was annoying that I couldn't even do something that was truly fun...
It all went back to my mother again. I kept thinking of her as I tried to go to sleep. It was becoming more and more apparent that she had legitimately ruined my life. Of course, there was a chance for me. However, that chance was slim, incredibly slim. Then to top it all off, I had some weird internal challenge to complete that I wasn't even sure existed. My mind raced in a hundred different directions until it finally let me sleep.
