CHAPTER 14: The Good, the Bad, and the Scary
July 28st 341 - Tuesday
Anabel lifted the last stack of the pokemix crates from the cart and shoved them in with the rest of the stock.
She was restocking the food shed on autopilot, her hands clammy and her throat dry. What if Dad found out about... everything?
She tried to calm herself. Mr. Cinders was the king of lies. He could help. But every time Anabel thought of telling him, an arbok wrapped itself around her neck. She and V had noticed weird stuff. And if Dad… Anabel swallowed. Dad and Mr. Cinders could never meet.
Anabel turned the now empty wheeled cart around with a groan. She had to hurry, or they'd never make it to the university in time.
Her knuckles tightened on the cart handle when the door to the food shed slammed open.
Lars, the new farm-hand, was a big man with a big nose and a deeper frown. He wasn't rude, but Anabel suspected he didn't like them all that much. He'd said he was twenty-three, but his beard made him look older than Mr. Cinders and he… he just made her nervous.
"Do you know how to adapt rations for juicing?" Lars asked, his shadow covering her completely. "The park's done, you're free until dinner."
He'd come just four days ago, and already he did everything so fast.
"Juicing?" she said, trying to look more confident than she felt.
"Battling to get the right moves out of the pups," Lars said, scanning the big list of rations-per-pokemon nailed to the wall. "Mr. Cinders won't have to transfer so many now that I'll be there to direct Azu to do it."
The words were a Focus Punch to the gut. Anabel had to lean on the cart for balance. Mr. Cinders had transferred all these pokemon to get them trained?
"Why… why couldn't we do that? Mr. Cinders never said-"
Lars chuckled. "He's realistic about how much he can ask of pint-sized moppets. You've been pulling your weight alright. I can't say I'm not even a bit impressed, but there's tasks you've got to leave to the big boys."
Anabel looked away. Kiddy. It was there again. Like she was this cute, useless, little thing. Jaw clenched, she left the food shed and pushed the cart back into the storage closet, her arm muscles taut.
"I'm done." V was washing her hands in the kitchen, both eevee at her feet. "That shiny muk will have enough space to breed without stinking everything up."
'He lied, V,' Anabel wanted to shout. 'He keeps saying we did a good job, but he's lying. He didn't even bother to explain juicing.'
But they had to go meet Dad at the university, so she said nothing.
Soon, with fresh clothes on her back, Eeveea in her pocket, her backpack over her shoulders, and Azu by their side, she was ready to go.
Anabel shuffled her feet by the farm's front desk. Something she couldn't explain was keeping her rooted in place.
"We've got everything," V said. "We both double-checked."
Anabel took a shaky breath.
'Numel's really violent,' she'd told Mom and Dad over the phone. 'She doesn't get along with Eeveea and tried to put my stuff on fire, so I had to free her.'
'Slugma was kind of stupid. V wants a better one. She's angry she wasted two weeks on him, but we're learning to spot which ones are good.'
Lies upon lies, fed to her parents with ditto-staged pictures and fake smiles. Some days she knew she had to, but today was a bad day. A guilt day.
Just three pokemon. Between the two of them. The eevee weren't even half-grown. They knew just one move each.
"Ann, what's wrong?"
"Just… You think you could convince Piloswine to come?"
V nodded after a pause, a smug smile digging into her cheeks. "She's clever. She's my friend now."
Greedy more like. V had started sneaking Piloswine frozen treats again as soon as the mom had come back to take care of baby swinub.
"We'll tell Dad you traded Poliwag for her." Polywag. Another pokemon borrowed from the farm. Another lie.
V nodded slowly. "So we've got no pokemon at the pokecenter?"
Anabel shook her head. Piloswine, for all that she looked like a brown mop with a big snout, had five moves, mastering ice, earth and wind, and she was just... Anabel knew she'd have a pokemon like that by now, if that gengar hadn't ruined everything.
V raised her whistle to her lips and ran back to the park, blowing shrill summons. V had bought the whistle for Eeveevee, but Piloswine had realized that answering the whistle had a solid chance of earning her a snack.
Piloswine scuttled out of the half-melted igloo Anabel had built with V in the early morning (Mr. Cinders had the most awesome ice-maker), and blindly snout-sniffed her way to V. If not for the dull clip-clop of hooves, Anabel would have sworn that Piloswine was a floating ball of wool. A floating ball with sharp ice-tusks. Which was why V threw the treats.
V crouched by Piloswine and cleared her throat. "I need you to pretend I'm your trainer, just for this afternoon. Like, follow me around, listen to what I say, and not disagree even if what I'm saying isn't true."
Snout-nostrils flaring, Piloswine tilted her head backwards towards V. Not that it made her eyes any more visible. Some pokemon were expressive. This one, no.
"You'll get many many treats for it," V added brightly.
"Pilo piloswine." 'One for each pokemon living here.'
Anabel's eyes shot up. "No way," she exclaimed. "You'd bust your stomach. You'll be way full long before, anyway."
"Pih-lo." 'Then until I'm full.'
"Okay, until you're full," Anabel agreed, "but you don't get to lie about it."
V cocked her head to the side, her eyes narrowed at the pokemon. "Huh. Deal."
A thin ray of red energy sucked Piloswine in V's pokeball. Anabel released a breath she'd not noticed she was holding.
"Azumarill, azu?"
Anabel laughed. "Of course! You'll also get treats."
"I don't get how you do it," V muttered. "Pokespeech's still so fuzzy to me."
V looked envious, but Anabel relaxed when her best friend smiled and wrapped her fingers around her arm.
"So, as my pocket translator, you don't get to go more than ten feet away."
Anabel grinned. "I promise. Listen, we've got to hurry. We're going to be late."
They ran out of the farm, Azu bouncing right behind them.
The old ladies on the streets' benches, who'd looked at them so weird on their first days at the farm, now waved back with little smiles.
Half an hour's walk-run later, flushed and gasping for breath, they entered the red-brick buildings of Lavaridge University. A nice man led them to where Dad worked.
"Your new interns are here, Mr. Lila."
"Wh-." Dad whipped around and grinned broadly. "Hey! I was about to go find you."
To find them at the camping grounds they'd only ever slept one night. So many lies. Anabel's eyes misted over but it didn't matter because she was swallowed in an ursaring hug.
"Show us around, Dad?" she managed. "Azu won't touch anything."
Dad was thrilled to, and Anabel even almost understood what he meant about earthquakes, waves and modeling now that she could see the machines and all the posters with pictures and graphs on the walls.
They went to the nearby park, and let Eeveea and Eeveevee set for the first time their paws on unfamiliar grass. Immediately, Piloswine set out to coat grass and flowers with shimmering snow.
Anabel spotted a bench in the shade and ran to lay claim to it. She sighed happily as she sat down. Dad sighed even more loudly as he dropped down next to her, making her laugh.
Piloswine's Powder Snow really was the prettiest thing. Eeveevee was now following her around, bewitched.
Dad leaned back, his arms behind his head as he watched the pokemon. "Piloswine against Poliwag… That boy must've wanted a poliwag very badly."
Anabel held her breath, but Dad didn't press. He never did ask much about the pokemon. Today Anabel was glad he didn't care.
It also made her want to kick at the grass and scream.
Dad turned to her with a warm smile. "I saw the awesome pictures you sent of the water-park," He wrapped his arm around her shoulders. "Tell me about it."
That she could happily do. A grin lit her face at the memory of the giant slides she'd raced V on.
Eeveea eventually made a home for herself on Dad's lap. She stood tall on her hind feet and swiped his long hair with her paws. She growled whenever Dad tried to stop her.
Anabel stifled a laugh.
Dad abruptly intercepted the eevee's little paw and licked it.
Eeveea looked so shocked.
Laughter burst from Anabel's lungs. Dad looked so proud of himself, and Anabel just couldn't stop laughing, tears filling her eyes as she drowned in conflicting emotions.
V's voice filled the air. "Eevee, Piloswine, no!"
Splash!
Anabel bolted to her feet. Ghosts, what -
A soaking wet Eeveevee poked her nose out of the spring-water stream and V's panic changed into muffled laughter. Piloswine was standing where the water was shallowest, loving the break from the heat.
"Roll over in the water, you'll get cooler," Dad called.
Piloswine crashed on her side. Her hooves flailed as she tried to roll, but her hunched back wasn't having it. With a huffed grunt she pushed herself back upright and crashed on her other side, wetting the last of her dry fur.
Anabel laughed. She screamed when Piloswine came to shake herself right by the bench, showering them with way more water than fur should ever be able to hold.
It was dinner time in a blink. Too late to go to the farm. Anabel tried to not look too relieved.
"You know, you're so much cleverer than I was at your age," Dad said as they lounged outside the restaurant, their stomachs bursting. "I filled my teams as fast as I could and did a badge rush, with nothing much in mind except being the best. You… you're taking time to enjoy a new city. You take part in the summer festivities… Why you've almost learned a trade."
He said the last like a joke, winking because it had been just an internship, only a few afternoons every week…
Tears burst out of Anabel's eyes and she couldn't do it anymore. She clung onto Dad, Dad who was proud of a lie.
"She's just… you weren't happy when she left at first," V said softly. "She was scared you'd hate her."
Ghosts, V! Anabel's cheeks burned and she had no words for the conflicted feelings welling in her chest. She was proud of their work at Mr. Cinders. She had learned so much about pokemon. She had enjoyed Lavaridge. She'd not been a mankey to anyone.
But if she told, Dad would take her home. He'd hate her and she'd not even have a chance to prove she could be a good trainer.
They said goodbye in front of Mt. Chimney's Grounds, where they'd said they'd been camping all this time.
"You can come home any time, even just for a weekend."
Anabel disentangled herself from their suspiciously long hug and chuckled. "I know."
"Not homesick enough to come home, yet?" He stuck his lower-lip out.
"Da-ad."
"Right, journey, see if I care." Chuckling, Dad gave them a final wave.
Anabel almost fainted from relief the second he turned around. She clucked her tongue. An oddly bitter taste lingered.
V was staring at Dad's retreating back.
"You're jealous?"
V rolled her eyes. "Ann, sometimes I want to hit you. Yes, you clueless numel." Her lips twitched. "I'd not have met you if my dad had been good, though."
Oh. Anabel shuffled her feet, an awkward smile nevertheless growing on her lips.
Azu nudged V's backpack. "Zuh?"
"He wants his treats," Anabel translated as V frowned at Azu's insistent pokes. "When we get home. It's late already. I don't want Mr. Cinders to get too angry because we missed dinner."
Azu's eyes widened, as if he'd just realized they'd gone behind Mr. Cinders' back. Anabel patted his head. "Lars can handle dinner, even without you. Didn't we have fun?"
"Zuh," the pokemon allowed. He shook himself. "Azumarill mahzu."
The bike? He was agreeing to ride on the back of a bike? Anabel grinned. "Awesome, we'll be much faster."
They pedaled as fast they could back to the farm. Anabel had never hated Lavaridge so much for being all slopes. For the last three weeks, the heat had been of the choking, sticky kind, with storms not big enough to suck the water out of the air. Anabel couldn't wait to shower and sleep. Her shirt was glued to her skin by the time they finally slipped back inside. At least the ride was pretty, with the moon so high and bright in the sky.
The farm was silent when they walked inside, careful not to be too loud.
An odd chime-not-there had Anabel freeze by the big reception counter.
V's silver eyes were huge. Anabel glanced around in alarm, but there was nothing.
Nothing, but V's dull pounding chimes. Shock. Big shock, or Anabel wouldn't be sensing anything.
"What is it?" Anabel hissed. "Azu, come back here!"
"They think we stole Azu and Piloswine."
"What? Who? How -"
Slow, echoing, cold words filled her mind. ~Hello, Anabel.~
The gengar! Anabel's hand darted protectively for Eeveea's pokeball.
That horrible, thieving–
Anabel swallowed. Had Jirachi heard her wishes and they'd get Torchic and Treecko back?
She swallowed again when the ghost appeared on the wooden counter, his red eyes swimming in stormy purple mist. Sudden cold bit into her skin and she struggled not to shudder.
"Wait," Anabel breathed, "you're with Mr. Cinders?"
Azu stood as relaxed as always. He'd just jumped far enough to not feel the cold. Azu knew that ghost?
This was a horrible joke, it had to be.
She edged closer to V. Her best friend was frowning at the ghost, but it was an excited frown, not the I-want-you-to-go-away-right-now frown that thief deserved.
~What do you want?~ Anabel thought-shouted.
She scowled when she got no answer.
"Come on, we're leaving," she decided. It was getting hard not to shout. "Free Piloswine, give them their treats, and we go, V."
Red eyes trapped hers. ~Master fears that you left to report them to the clones.~ The cold words snaked into her mind, intrusive, unwelcome. ~He wants you silenced.~
Something hot and unfair filled Anabel's lungs. "No! We did nothing wrong! Mr. Cinders knows that!" Her foot struck the wall opposite the counter, and she realized only then that she'd been backing away, her knuckles white around her backpack's straps. "I won't let you scare me, I won't! He's just here to ruin things, V, he –"
She spun round when the door they'd just come through slammed open.
A pale, muscled arm snaked around her chest. She gasped, forced on tiptoes, her back squashed against something hard.
A balding man with flushed skin stared down at her with a crazed look in his eyes.
Anabel couldn't move. This... this was the gengar's master?
"Let's get to the bottom of this, eh?" The man's breath was warm on her cheeks.
She tried to tear herself away. She couldn't. He was holding her too tight.
The door behind the counter creaked.
Anabel tore her gaze from the man just in time to see V dash into the farm, her backpack abandoned on the floor.
She screamed and fell on her knees as the bad man shoved her to the ground only to grab her again, almost dislocating her arm.
"LAAAAARS!" he roared, dragging her forward.
Anabel gasped in pain as her knees scraped the floor.
The brute took another big step after V, yanking Anabel upright.
Azu's confused eyes met hers. Anabel stumbled forward, trapped by the man's hold on her arm. She had to scream, she knew it, but her throat was stuck.
"Ow!" she managed. "Stop –"
The man's arm painfully collided with the back of her legs. The world flipped over.
Anabel's cry was cut short when something hard struck her chest, knocking the air out of her lungs.
"Shut up," he grunted.
He'd thrown her upside down over his shoulders like a sack of potatoes, his arms locking her legs against his chest.
"Let me –" Anabel's chin slammed against his hips, cutting her protests short.
She couldn't breathe. With every stride, the man's shoulder dug into her stomach. Her backpack slipped and fell of her as she flailed, beating uselessly against his back. Let go! LET GO!
The lights went out. Floor gave way to dark grass tinged with silver light. They were in the park. Anabel desperately tried to wriggle out, her fists punching his sides.
He gave her a violent shake. "Cut it out or I'm chopping your arms off."
Anabel's hands flew to her belt, her stomach muscles screaming. Eeveea. Anabel couldn't lose her.
A door slammed open. Light flooded her blurry vision. A home?
"You psychopath!" Mr. Cinders! They had to be inside Mr. Cinders' house. "Put her down! You out of your mind?"
His anger unlocked Anabel's voice. "Put me down!" she screamed. "Put me -"
The world went purple. Her legs were free. The floor rushed for her head.
"Ah – ZUUUUUUU!"
Somehow, Anabel found herself gasping on the ground, limbs more or less intact, with no bad hands on her.
Where -. Across the room, Lars was coughing and spluttering, crouched and soaked in front of Azu, and, ghosts, Azu looked furious. Mr. Cinders just stared, eyes wide in – V!
V was on top of the bad man, her hands clawing at his waist, she –
Anabel recoiled at the sizzle of biting energy. Purple light blinded her once more.
A scream –the bad man's scream- filled Anabel's ears. The ghost. The gengar was attacking the bad man.
Anabel stumbled backwards, her hand desperately clutching Eeveea's pokeball. The kitchen. She was in the kitchen. There was a window.
She had to get out. She had to call Dad. She –
She tripped. Something –a hand!- had caught her foot.
Her thumb slammed the pokeball's button before she crashed on her hands and knees. Oooow.
Light flashed. Lilac eyes locked with happy, then confused, innocent brown ones.
No, Eeveea, no! Get back in. Run! "Help," Anabel croaked, her chest heaving on the tiled floor as she tried to push herself back up.
"I said STOP MOVING!" Lars snapped. "Just calm -"
Anabel cried out when Eeveea flew across the kitchen, kicked in the ribs. Her fur had been shining silver, her tail sleek and cutting. The energy sizzled out of her little body the moment she hit the floor with a painful thump.
"Okay, Anabel. Just –"
Stuck in her fetal position, with nowhere to go, Anabel stared up at the bearded man, too petrified to hear the words spoken by his moving lips.
First Torchic, now Eeveea.
Not Eeveea. Please, not her eevee.
Sudden snarling had Anabel's head whip to the side.
It was like a blur. Eeveea was bigger. She reared to full height, swallowed in a mirage, her jaws open wide.
A rumbling growl thundered through the room. The sound crashed through Anabel's chest, jolting her upright. She had to get away!
Lars stumbled backwards. "Stop that!"
Azu had thrown Hypno across a whole arena, but Lars was standing right here, and barely wet from Azu's attack. It wasn't fair!
Anabel snatched Eeveea up, hugging her tight with one arm while her other hand fumbled with the window handle.
Something tried to grab her. Anabel screamed, kicking back blindly at Lars. Suddenly, Lars wasn't there anymore. Anabel risked a look backwards, Eeveea still in her arms.
Lars was on the floor, one small –but huge- onix squashing his legs. Eww, the smell. A muk was almost on top of his face.
"Some men have a problem, you know, in their brains." Mr. Cinders' voice was a strangled half-shout. He looked like he was about to break everything.
Anabel flinched and jumped away from Mr. Cinders, and the fire slicing into her skin like scalding arrows.
But seeing him so upset, tasting fire and glass when she was already so distracted by her own panic, made her feel better. Mr. Cinders would protect them.
"Get off him," Mr. Cinders told the muk suffocating Lars.
Muk became a ditto and stared as Lars gasped for breath and lurched into as close to a seated position as ditto-onix would allow.
Anabel started when she realized she couldn't see V. She rushed back to the living room, hugging Eeveea harder against her.
Anabel froze.
V, disheveled and scarily triumphant, was standing over the also ditto-squashed bad man. On her cheek was a huge bruise that-
Anabel's eyes jumped back to the bad man. Was that blood? A horrible red stain was spreading across his ripped tank top.
V had a pokeball in her right hand. No, masterball. She put the purple-pink sphere on the ground and stepped on it with all her weight.
Anabel stared breathlessly as it shattered. A masterball. The kind that could catch any pokemon, except maybe the legendaries. Where had it come from?
Behind V, the gengar's fangs stretched into an impossible grin and, more terrifying still, V shot him a small smile, as if he wasn't nightmarish mist and evil red eyes.
"You're free," V whispered, sweat running down her face. She took a shuddering breath and rushed towards Anabel.
A red-stained knife casually hanged from her left hand.
The knife clattered to the floor and V's arms wrapped around her and Eeveea. Anabel sucked in a breath, made dizzy by relief. But she couldn't look away from V's knife.
"You stabbed him, really?"
"Not deep. I had to or he'd have used his other pokemon."
"The ghost told you to stab him." Anabel just knew.
"Gengar told the ditto to attack, you know. They'd never have known we were in trouble if he hadn't gone to get them."
The ghost was gone. Vanished. There was only the bad man wheezing under the ditto-onix.
"Just a cut," Mr. Cinders told the bad man, pressing a tissue on his neck. "You paranoid primeape."
"You can't let them go," the bad man coughed. He hated them. Anabel had never met him and he hated her. "They –"
"Work for me," Mr. Cinders snapped. "They had nothing to tell before you barged in here like a lunatic."
Eeveea tensed in her arms. Lars stumbled out of the kitchen, the darkest look on his face. Anabel's breath hitched.
"I wasn't going to hurt you," Lars grumbled. "Just needed you to -. What the fuck just happened?" Lars' eyes narrowed at the bad man, full nasty things he wasn't saying out loud.
"The ghost turned coat," Mr. Cinders said.
Lars paled. "Where's he gone?"
"Far away. He owes me and Ann, he said." V sounded so calm. She was almost smiling. "He promised he'll check on us, and if we say you didn't leave us completely alone, he'll scare you to death."
"Relax, girls, those two don't even know your last names. Come outside." Mr. Cinders turned to Lars. "You watch that fool. No letting him up until I'm back."
V was already relaxed. Anabel had to carry Eeveea, so she couldn't shake her best friend, but, ghosts, she wanted to!
She settled for a pointed glare when they were in Mr. Cinders' garden. V, that huge nasty bruise taking almost half her face, was almost skipping.
"He figured he'd get his way because he was big. We won, though. We're safe, Ann." A shaky smile lit up V's face, her eyes wide as if she couldn't quite believe it. "We're going to journey and he can't do anything about it."
V's mood was catching and nervous giggles tumbled out of Anabel's mouth, even as her bruised arms loudly told her to put Eeveea down.
Not happening.
They had to almost run to keep up with Mr. Cinders. Anabel's discomfort made anger really, really easy. Mr. Cinders was a poacher and she and V had worked for him. It made her sick.
"He stole Torchic and Treecko," she snarled. "We want them back, Boss."
There was nothing funny about Mr. Cinders' smile. "You're going to tell some kids who've had them for months now, who evolved them and love them, that those pokemon aren't theirs?"
Anabel missed a step.
Torchic. Her willful, prove-me-you-deserve-me Torchic.
Anabel couldn't breathe.
Torchic's memory shattered in her mind.
There was no more Torchic. He was gone. He was Combusken now, maybe even Blaziken. Maybe he had a totally different name.
She'd never get him back.
Soft growling jolted Anabel back to reality. Rumbling yaps rolled out of Eeveea's throat, teeth bared at Mr. Cinders.
"I've got no clue where they are," the man gruffly said. "I breed healthy pokemon, it's all I do."
"T's okay, Eevee," Anabel managed. It wasn't. It was so not okay.
She sniffed when V's soft fingers removed the tears from her cheeks. She tried to smile, hugging Eeveea close. Everything hurt. Her arms were the worst.
"Gengar's master got mad because of the dratini Mr. Cinders gave to someone else." What? V shrugged. "Gengar said he gets paranoid when he's mad."
This was 'mad' alright. As in insane. "Does it hurt?" Anabel whispered. V wasn't supposed to get hurt like this, ever.
And Anabel had done nothing. Eeveea had saved her. Instead of sounding like she was gurgling toothpaste like in practice, her fluffy kit Growled. Valeria had saved them. Somehow, V had convinced that gengar to stop being evil. But Anabel? She'd just screamed and been a useless damsel in distress, and she didn't even get the stunning looks and castle to make up for being so tragically useless!
"Only a bit," V said. "He punched me. I didn't want to use the knife. I had no choice after the punch, though. I said I'd kill him, because Gengar said to say, but I didn't mean it. Just to scare him." V straightened, a stubborn glint in her eyes. "It worked."
"This… I'm real sorry, girls." In the darkness, Mr. Cinders looked like a tauros had sat on him and Anabel's anger ebbed away, just a little. "If I'd known, I'd not have given you the job."
Anabel's hold over Eeveea tightened. "Hey, it wasn't that bad..."
The eevee. Seeing pokemon hatch. Azu. Meeting proper trainers like Rosie and Darren.
"Sir, the job was great," V agreed. "It's your friends who stink."
"Ghosts, yes, you've got to change friends! You're… nice. You explain well and everything. You'll totally make new ones really quickly."
Mr. Cinders looked at her like she'd said the funniest thing ever. It was scary.
Anabel crossed her arms. She tried to look stern. "If... if some of those eggs are stolen, you... you should give them back. It's not right."
"You're right," Mr. Cinders agreed.
Anabel's shoulders slumped. What did that answer even mean?
They crossed the farm's grounds in silence and stepped inside. Anabel finally put Eeveea down to pick up her backpack. It hadn't moved. Slumped right there on the floor where the bad man had thrown her over his shoulder.
Anabel's muscles sang in relief, but Eeveea sat stiffly at her feet, ears high and alert, guarding her. Because Anabel was the weak one who needed protection.
Anabel wouldn't cry. She wouldn't.
V freed Piloswine, the pokeball pulsing white for a second longer as it broke the poke-link, making the Piloswine wild once more. V smiled, as if nothing was wrong and gave Piloswine the promised treats.
"I… I'd like to say goodbye to Azu," Anabel whispered as Piloswine gathered her prizes between her tusks and carried them away. "Weren't you scared?" She asked Mr. Cinders. He stood stiff, his jaw tight and square. "That we'd find out stuff? Tell on you?"
"What stuff?" he said softly.
Anabel glowered, even as a sliver of doubt entered her mind. He looked so serious.
"I got in trouble too, once. People need chances. Wanted to give you yours."
Oh.
"Do you need help, Sir?" V said. "Did they threaten you too?"
He chuckled, but his eyes weren't laughing. "What's done is done. This farm's my home. Couldn't do anything else. The pokemon don't get mistreated, not here, not after they leave, I promise that."
But he knew bad people! And ow… Anabel's shoulder hurt. "You hurt people! The people you steal from. How can you not care?"
For a second, she thought Mr. Cinders might shout back. Instead, he just crossed his arms. "Hired you, didn't I?"
Anabel dropped her gaze to the floor, overrun by feeling she had no clue how to handle.
V broke the silence first. "What about the gengar? Who is he?"
"Don't know for sure. I spoke to grandpas who swore the beast was already in town when they were lads. Never had a trainer on the right side of the law. I won't miss him."
"Why can't a trainer make him good?"
Anabel shuddered. The ghost was just… scary. But V had to be annoyed to have him vanish like that again. She shuffled closer to V and her a shaky smile.
V's hand wrapped around hers and Anabel felt stronger.
"We're all better off with him gone. He's always belonged to the biggest bully. He… Rumors are he makes them worse…" Mr. Cinders' head jerked towards his house. "That man back there, he wasn't always that cracked in the head."
"Is he a criminal?" V whispered. "Would the Jennys arrest that gengar?"
Mr. Cinders had always seemed offbeat with his spiky red hair and his amused but careful smiles, but now his eyes were full of dark places.
"He'd be a goldmine to them for sure."
Anabel's eyebrows flew up when V stepped forward wrapped her arms around Mr. Cinders.
"I won't let anything make me evil," V said thickly, burying her face in the man's chest.
Mr. Cinders hugged her back. "I know you won't," he whispered. "You did good here."
His green eyes met Anabel's, his soft smile faltering.
Anabel couldn't hug a poacher.
It was an awkward pause, but then Mr. Cinders extended his hand, his lips twitching ruefully. Anabel shook it, her mind still reeling.
Ghosts, he was a poacher.
"You take the eevee. Go say goodbye to Foxy. Azu's coming. There's time, the other two won't be going anywhere until I say so."
Five minutes later, the kits were cuddling by the eevee who'd raised them. Soon, Eeveea had relaxed enough to accept to go in her pokeball.
Did Eeveevee know she'd missed something big? How would Eeveea explain it? How much had her little darling understood?
Anabel told Azu he was awesome, because it was so true. He showered them with water, poke-water, thin and tickly, and cool. It was almost as nice as a real shower and without the whole it-takes-ages-to-dry-without-a-towel deal.
"Stay safe," Mr. Cinders said, seeing them off on the road. "Don't go looking for trouble."
"Wait!" Anabel said before the man closed the door. "Can't we do anything? Against thieves?" None of this made it fair.
Mr. Cinder flinched. "Theft's rare, girls. It's tricky to steal a pokemon. Few people have enough money to get someone to take the risk. System's almost foolproof."
Anabel pulled a face.'Almost', right.
"It was bad luck, you did nothing wrong. Trust me."
V shook her head, a smile creeping on her lips. "Unlucky, with eevee, money… You also stay safe, Sir."
"Off with you. Get out of town. See the world. Go."
The two girls scampered off, jumping on their bicycles. They knew the neighborhood now. It wasn't so creepy now they'd gotten used to it. But it was night and the dim street-lights filled everything with huge gloomy shadows.
They weren't halfway to the center of town when Anabel pressed hard on the brakes and put her foot down.
It was cold. A not-normal cold she now knew.
"I thought you'd gone," she whispered.
The ghost flashed white and vanished almost as soon as he'd appeared. Frowning, Anabel finally spotted the pokeball on the ground.
"It was always part of the plan," V said. She'd climbed off her bicycle, her eyes glued to the ball.
It moved by itself, shaking. Anabel held her breath. Was it going to - It opened, without breaking or bursting, but just like V had opened it herself. Dark purple mist melted out of the shadows. Dark purple mist with red eyes.
Anabel shivered. He was creepily close to invisible.
"So you can just break out?" V's calm wasn't normal. Anabel wanted to shake her agin.
~Now that I am bound, not even a masterball can capture me.~
Anabel managed a weak smile, glad he was talking to her too. "So… you're going to go? Now that you made sure nobody can catch you, you're going…" her voice trailed off as the ghost's eyes burned into hers.
~ I am no pokemon of the wilds.~
A new, more violent, shiver ran up Anabel's spine. Did that mean he was going to stay with them?
She mustered her courage. "Do you know who has Torchic and Treecko?"
The ghost's mist-body twisted and shrunk, until he wasn't much bigger than her fist. He looked like a ball of floating purple fluff. Scary looking fluff with creepy red eyes.
V poked him. "You're solid," V muttered. Poke, poke, poke.
Anabel stopped breathing until she was sure he wouldn't bite V's finger off. Even tiny, his red eyes shone bright.
"Torchic? Treecko?" Anabel hoarsely repeated.
~Middlemen handled the trade. I was never required to meet the clients.~
How could he not know! He stole and scared but he couldn't make things fair.
And the bad man had screamed. "Do you often hurt people like that? I mean, he was bad, and… yeah, but…"
~No. I usually intimidate. Humans become very reasonable when threatened with haunting.~
His voice swallowed them like winter wind, slow and biting. He liked that, haunting.
And he wanted to stay. Anabel tried to swallow, but her mouth was too dry.
'I won't let anything make me evil,' V had said. She'd better mean it.
Anabel's voice shook. "Torchic and Treecko, they're happy?" She had to know.
V squeezed her hand, her own eyes wide and pained.
~A stolen pokemon's loyalty is not easy to gain,~ the ghost said after a pause. ~Their humans must treat them well, or the money was wasted.~
Anabel let out a resigned sigh. Torchic was happy. At least he was happy.
"We're going to Mt Chimney's Grounds?" V said, climbing back on her bike.
Anabel shook her head. "The Red Terrace. This is trouble, and Rosie and Darren said they'd help."
"You can't tell –"
"I know!" Anabel huffed. "I won't."
I hope the foreshadowing at the farm paid off in the end. Lavaridge is home to a poaching ring, and as you can see, things are a bit complicated for Mr. Cinders.
As for our girls, this emotional day concludes the arc at the breeding farm. Next chapter "Strength in Numbers" will be from V's POV, and posted on Wednesday.