AN: Hey, Oof here.
*boos*
Oof: A-and I'm bringing a new chapter of Twisted Emotions. . . ?
*Silence*
Oof: Okay. This is fine. If you are reading my fic, and you still haven't checked out 11JJ11's The Path Anew. . . I'll be sad. Because it not only is it longer, still active, I'd also say it's better in overall quality
One random reader: I'll say!
Oof: But please read mine too, it's starting similarly, but it'll get better, I promise.
Disclaimer: I don't own Pokemon.
Chapter 1: Red Wounds
The sun was at its peak, painting the sky a bright blue and filling the world with color. The trees in the forest down below were mostly aspins, yet close enough together to filter most of the sunlight through their shamrock green leaves. The bright and cheery colors of the area were reflected in the weather as well; not too hot or cold.
An overall nice day to do field work. In the aspen forest, stood a man. His hair was an ashy-brown with gray already growing in at the base. Considering his age, the man thought he was aging well. His white lab coat fluttered in the same soft breeze that disturbed the leaves above, revealing the maroon polo shirt and the brown khaki shorts that replaced his usual pants.
"Professor. Professor Oak!" A teen raised her voice slightly, snapping the man, now known as Professor Oak, from his pleasant daydream. Her light brown hair was frizzing up slightly at the humidity in the air and her black leggings and blue blouse were slightly dirty and damp as a result of crawling on the moist ground.
"Oh? What is it, Daisy?" Daisy smiled, a sweet calm smile, before taking a few herbs from her small hand bag.
"I found some revival herbs, just like you asked me." Revival herbs are a rather rare herb to find in the wild. They had been domesticated a long while ago, but they seemed to have better healing properties when raised in the wild. Professor Oak had been trying to create a revival medicine that more pokemon would take, seeing as the taste is so bitter.
"Ah, that's wonderful! Only a little more now and that should be enough to experiment with." Oak took off his traveling pack and unzipped it. Taking the herbs from his granddaughter, he placed it in a cooling capsule to preserve the plant for the trip back.
Daisy smiled as her grandfather wandered off. The old man was quite eccentric, but he had a place in her heart, just like her brother, Blue. Her smile faded. Blue. He was going on his journey soon- two weeks, in fact. He had decided that the poor girl Leaf would be his rival. They used to be friends, but he had let that rival stuff get into his head and made everything a competition. Daisy didn't know how Leaf tolerated it.
"Daisy!" Now it was her turn to be snapped out of her thoughts. She looked up at the Professor, who was running as fast as he could towards her. She straightened and stared at him, worried as he bent over to catch his breath. Panic wormed its way into her stomach.
"What is it?" Her brow was creased. If this was some prank she wouldn't be very happy.
"I . . .(Huff). . . found an . . .(puff). . . an . . .( gasp). . . injured person!" Now, having regained his breath, he rushed the last of his sentence out in one weeze, drawing a gasp from the teen. "And he needs medical attention."
"Where?"
. . .
Professor Oak led Daisy to a clearing, where she stared in horror at the sight below her.
It was a young boy, couldn't be older than eleven. He had numerous bruises on him and his ankle was swollen and bent at an unnatural angle. Cuts were scabbed over, but some had reopened and were leaking blood. His gray clothing was in tatters and his feet were bare and scrapped up. There were shards of glass embedded into his forearm. A curious plastic wringlet was around his ankle, though it was bent, chipped, and cracked in numerous places.
There was a flash of white light and soon a Dragonite stood by Oak. He had a dopey grin on his face but soon sobered up the moment his eyes landed on the young child.
"I need you to help me get him on Barney." The dragonite gazed at the injured one with concern, before lowering himself to the ground. Giving out a small yip, Barney motioned for the small human to be placed on his yellow scaled back.
Daisy stared at the dragon pokemon. Despite his impressive size, he wouldn't be able to carry three people, much less three people one of them being injured. "Come out, Gito!"
With another white flash, a pidgeot appeared. The large bird assessed the situation with intelligent eyes, lowering herself to be mounted after a short pause. Daisy smiled, moving on to lift the boy onto Barney.
He was unnaturally light. Oak and Daisy lifted up the injured child gently. He was a porcelain doll, any rough movement and his skin would crack. A slight jostle and he would shatter. His bones almost felt like those of a baby birds- hollow. He obviously was facing malnutrition, maybe even dehydration.
After securing the child to Barney's slick, smooth yellow scales, the Pokemon Professor swung up upon the dopey dragon himself. Daisy mounted her own Pidgeot. With a flap of her great feathered wings, Daisy was in the air. Dragonite followed soon after, although a bit gently do to the injured passenger.
. . .
The boy was worse than they thought.
There were multiple lacerations on his arm, suggesting that he had pulled out the major pieces of glass, but there were smaller bits of glass embedded in the wounds, he must have not washed out the wound. Washing the wound is the best way to prevent infection without medical supplies on hand- doing so was critical as infections could lead to death.
The skin around the wound was inflamed, and the scabs were an unhealthy white-yellowish color, indicating that pus was under the surface- a clear sign of infection.
Professor Oak sent a grave look at Daisy. "Please leave, Daisy. I need to concentrate."
Daisy flashed him a worried look before complying. There really wasn't anything the girl could do to help her grandfather at this point. He needed space and a calm environment in order to work more efficiently. Having a worried young adult getting in his way would do nothing to help him.
The door to his lab shut and Oak heard the soft pitter patter of steps and creakes of wood as Daisy rushed up the stairs to the living quarters upstairs. The Pokemon Professor glanced once more at the injured boy, who was now taking residence on his couch, before rushing to the medicine cabinet to get the needed supplies: gauze, disinfectant, pain reliever, a surgical knife, a towel, and tweezers.
Setting the supplies on the nearby coffee table, Oak only prayed that the boy wouldn't wake up during the process.
He needed to scrape the scab off first in order to extract the glass. Grabbing the disinfectant, Professor Oak braced the arm before grabbing a surgical knife that was nearby. Mentally preparing himself, Oak carefully moved the razer edge just by the scab and dug into the skin, the clean slice causing beads of blood to bubble up. The scab cracked and yellow pus erupted from the fractures.
Steadily, Oak moved the knife steadily under the surface. Soon it was over, and the flap of scab was officially disconnected from the rest of the skin. Peeling it off, revealed a marbled pattern of yellow pus and crimson blood. Grabbing a washcloth, he dabbed off the wound, before pulling out the tweezers to pick out each piece of glass. Dumping disinfectant onto it, he then wrapped his arm with gauze.
Now that the most fragile wound was dealt with, Oak moved to examine the rest of his body for any similar injuries. Stripping off the remainder of his tattered shirt, Oak was grateful that there wasn't anymore serious wounds like the now treated wound. Other than a few scrapes and bruises, there wasn't an injury.
What he did see concerned him. There hardly seemed to be a square inch of unblemished skin. There seemed to be a scar of some type of every bit of skin. Some were jagged, others clean like from a surgery. Or a knife. They criss-crossed and wrapped around each arm, his back was littered with them, and his legs were also covered in them.
Oak leaned over and dry-heaved into the nearest trash can. The- the mere thought that-. It was just- Outrageous. By the boy's age, those scars couldn't be from simple reckless behavior over years; he was too young to be apart of the Great War. There is only one explanation.
Child abuse. The thought sickened Oak, but it was a real issue. Whoever did this needed to be brought to justice.
Shaking the slightly murderous thoughts from his mind, the grandfather moved onto the ankle. It was a sprain at best and a break at worst. Either way, it needed a splint- an ankle brace should be best.
Onto the strange ankle wringlet. It seemed cracked, and didn't look like it was designed to come off. Oak frowned before grabbing a pair of wire cutters. Wedging them under the wringlet, the Pokemon Professor paused briefly, catching a name engraved into the plastic. 'Red.'
Blinking, Oak field that information into his memory bank for later. In one swift movement the plastic was cut through. There was a thin strip of metal underneath that provided more resistance, but with a bit more wrangeling, its protests were silenced and it was cut through.
With the medical procedure over, Oak managed to relax some, but the scars bothered him. Even if his wounds were healed now, mental scars are not that easy to heal. People with trauma tend to stress out in foreign environments.
That wasn't his only concern. The boy's cloths; though they were in tatters, if anyone was familiar with Rocket uniforms it was recognisable. But there weren't any pokeballs at the belt. And he was alone when found. The injuries made it seem like he jumped from a window, or fell onto ground covered in glass. The wringlet, injuries, and lack of pokemon led Oak to believe that he was an escaped prisoner or. . .
He didn't want to explore that possibility. All he could do was hope.
. . .
Giovanni did not like failure. The news that both Mewtwo had escaped and Red was presumed dead was a failure. Not really the news, per say, but rather the fact that an event like that had occured. He would have killed everyone who had been involved if they weren't already dead, for such a grave mistake as this one.
Grunts and scientists can be replaced. Grunts were simple people with simple minds. They tended to be desperate people who need a desperate job: drug dealers, homeless. Of course the ones who actually rank up tend to be ex military, they had all the proper training. Scientists only occasionally joined willingly, but with enough of a push, they would give in and join the ranks of Team Rocket.
However, one did not simply come across something as extraordinary and powerful as Mewtwo. It was only a matter of time before they were able find a way to control it. Red had been that way.
Giovanni had sensed the potential oozing out of the child. He predicted that the boy would be able to command Mewtwo along with a whole horde of Pokemon given enough time.
However, now they both were gone. The businessman had to start from scratch. On top of that, Mewtwo's attack on the laboratory alerted the League to the presence of Team Rocket in the area.
Ironically enough they had sent Giovanni, himself, to investigate it. Him being the closest gym leader to the reported site was the council fool's reasoning.
There came a knock on Giovanni's office door. Folding his hands, the boss concealed any evidence that could be showing on his face from his unpleasant thoughts. The intercom connected to his door buzzed, and a static voice declared it was one of his Admin's full report on the situation. Pressing another button, led to a soft click and the door swung open.
"Sir!" The Admin, Marquise, saluted. "I have come to bring you the report on the recent escaped subject M2." Pulling out a manila folder, with a nod from Giovanni, he set it softly on the mahogany desk, almost afraid that if a single paper was ruffled, he would be demoted. Good. Fear was good, it kept people in line.
"I want you to tell me some of the suspects of the release." It was already proven that Mewtwo was incapable of destroying that barrier by itself, there was video evidence, so there must be some sort of traitor.
Admin Marquise, to his credit, didn't even flinch at the unexpected question. "There are multiple recorded signatures of Dr. Flinchkook using his card to access Subject M2's containment unit the very day that it escaped. However, there was only three notable ones: one thirteen minutes before the release to the door, then the two swipes required to deactivate the barriers. Experiment Color's tracker had also been detected in that room, before glitching out after it presumably breaks. The Head Scientist's body has been found buried under the rubble after a few hours of searching."
"Dismissed." Marquise gives a sharp 180 turn before walking stiffly out the door. Giovanni picks up his cup of tea, taking a sip of the warm liquid. It had a sharp flavour of lemon, that melted into a sweet honey. Setting the cup down gently into the tray, the criminal lord pondered briefly about the information given.
He had quite liked the scientist. There was a healthy dose of fear in him, fear of death. Fear of his employer. It was the type of fear that guaranteed loyalty from a coward like him. To pull something like this shows that character had been misjudged. Or that there was something missing.
After all, mistakes can be made. They were tolerable. But mistakes lead to failure.
And Giovanni does not like failure.
Note: Please review.
I'm not sure if that ending was satisfying, cheesy, or foreboding. Hopefully it wasn't cheesy. Sorry if anyone feels this was low quality; I tried to make things descriptive, but not too graphic. Also next chapter should flow smoother.
Anyway, I hope everyone has a better than average day!