Chapter 10: Desert
Tony slowly opened his eyes and found himself in the middle of the desert inside his destroyed iron suit. He took off his mask and winced at the sunlight he was deprived of for months. Despite the flying mechanisms of his suit shorting out and causing him to impact in the sand, Tony felt proud of the suit that he built in a cave.
"Not bad" Tony said.
He suddenly remembered that this was a two-person trip, he rolled over expecting to find Rani under him only to find sand and bits of his suit. He looked around the vast desert frantically and his eyes spotted a sliver of blue in the sand approximately 100 ft from him. He used all his strength to stand up it hurt like hell, but he needed to get to Rani. He limped towards the blue spot for a few minutes and saw that it was Rani unconscious presumably from the fall. Not wanting to wake her he picked up the emanation Pokémon and looked around the desert hoping to find someone who could help.
"Well Rani hard parts over, now all we need to do is find someone with a phone in this god forsaken sand hole." Tony said in his usual sarcastic tone and proceeded to walk through the desert with a foreign Pokémon in his arms.
Rani slowly opened her eyes adjusting to the harsh light and found herself being carried in a human's arms. Her vision grew clearer and she recognized the human as Tony, suddenly her memory jogged back to when they escaped the cave, to when they crash landed in the desert, to…to when Yinsen died in front of them. The grief and anger that she bottled up was slowly coming out and burst when Tony spoke.
"Rani! Your okay we…had a little bit of a setback but otherwise were doing great." Rani didn't like that Tony said "we" as if they were still a team after Tony let Yinsen go on his suicide mission. She responded by using her underdeveloped but sharp canines on the billionaire's arm.
Tony instinctively dropped Rani, "Ahh! Son of a- "He looked at his arm and saw small bleeding holes resembling teeth marks on his forearm. Rani scratched Tony's upper arm when he was distracted much to his pain, Tony groaned in pain. Rani buried her anger back at the camp because they were in crisis mode but now that they were away from the Ten Rings Rani let all her emotions out.
Rani barked and howled fiercely at Tony telling him in her language that Yinsen saved his life only for Tony to not save his when he had the chance. Tony didn't need a translator to understand Rani's angry yowls and numbly took her lashing with his head bowed down. After a minute of howls Rani stared at her fellow prisoner who didn't even try to defend himself. Rani needed to be away from this man who constantly reminded her of the death of her only friend. She doesn't know if she'll survive this place on her own, but she knows she needs to be away from him. Tony looked up to see Rani turning around and stomping in the opposite direction Tony was going.
"Rani where are you going?"
"Rio!" Rani responded roughly.
"Rani! If we don't stick together, we don't have a chance of surviving out here!" but Rani kept stomping in the desert and Tony decided not to follow her hoping that she'll calm down and come back so that they can get help together.
Rani's spent half the day walking aimlessly through the desert and hasn't seen any humans so far. There are Fearow and Vullaby circling the cloudless skies no doubt waiting for Rani to die from the heat so they can have dinner. Also, there were some Diglett's and Sandshrew's that scurried off as soon as they saw her. This scorching hot desert is what Rani grew up with as a child so she knew she'd be fine, but she can't say the same for Tony.
Rani shook off her concern for the man from her head he's not worth my time or energy, Rani bitterly thought. She saw Tony do nothing as Yinsen was dying and as a result she lost yet another person she cared about.
In an instant her mind flashed back to when she and Yinsen first met. It was the day after her pack was murdered and she stumbled upon Gulmira. She woke up on a couch inside a house where she met a kind bald man as well as his wife and child. They nursed her back to health and for the next month she lived with them. She helped Yinsen with his work and played with his child when there was time. As if she was cursed by a Gengar from birth, the Ten Rings attacked the village and killed Yinsen's family in front of them. Rani was tackled by a Houndoom and his master, Raza, held a gun down at her. Raza told Yinsen to come with them and help them recreate the Jericho missile or Rani would be killed. After seeing his family die, Yinsen couldn't let Rani be murdered so he reluctantly agreed.
Rani felt bad about this for the following months in that cave and tried to make it up to him by being a diligent assistant. Despite Yinsen telling her that the attack had nothing to do with her Rani still wanted to help her friend in his time of need. It wasn't until two weeks after their capture that Raza and Abu brought in a man in a suit with shrapnel about to enter his heart. They ordered the two to save his life by any means necessary, knowing that the alternative was death they did everything they could to get the sharp objects out. They were able to remove some but not all of it so Yinsen decided to something unorthodox. They inserted an electromagnet directly above his heart to keep the shrapnel from entering his heart, its powered by a car battery. Rani internally cringed at inserting a machine to a living human, but it had to be done to keep the three prisoners alive.
Her mind then flashed to the following three months after they saved Tony's life aside from working on means of escaping the three of them supported each other in that god-awful camp. Before Tony arrived she and Yinsen would play a board game or cook with whatever ingredients they were given. She was wry of Tony in the beginning for good reasons due to his profession and dry attitude. After a while she saw that Tony was horrified over his weapons, that he built to defend against terrorist, were instead at the hands of them. When Tony opened up about his parent's dying she saw a different side to the man and empathized with his emotional turmoil. By that time she saw that underneath the sarcastic words and dry tone was a good man who was trying to make up for his misdeeds. It was by that time that Rani didn't just see Tony as a fellow hostage but as a friend…just the same as Yinsen.
She suddenly became struck with guilt over blaming Tony for something that Yinsen wanted from the start and leaving her last friend to defend himself in the desert. She ran in the direction that Tony was walking towards and hoped that she could find him in time. She ran for an hour with no luck, so she used her small but sharp nose to track Tony's scent. After living with him in that cave for months his scent isn't hard to miss, and she caught a faint metallic scent no doubt coming from his miniature arc reactor. She followed the scent for another hour and found her friend huddled up near a small pond filling his canteen. She slowly walked towards Tony who turned his head towards her and refocused on his canteen. Rani saw the scratches and bite marks on his arms and felt remorseful. She silently sat next to Tony in front of the pond.
"Couldn't stay away from my charm, could you?" Tony jokingly said hoping to break the ice but when he saw the remorseful Rani staring at the wounds she inflicted he felt guilty, "Don't worry I've had worse from other women." Rani slightly grinned at Tony's joke and looked up to see his face turning solemn.
"I'm sorry about Yinsen, if I had known what he planned I wouldn't have agreed to it I hope you know that." Rani nodded as if saying I know you wouldn't have. "He was a good man…a better man than me." Rani dropped her head as they both mourned their lost friend, after a silent moment Tony closed his canteen and stood up. Rani stood up as well looking up at the man with a question in her eyes saying are we good?
"Don't worry I don't usually hold grudges against Pokémon…unless they accidentally burn my eyebrows off in that case they get the silent treatment for a month." Tony grinned at the memory of him being in the crossfire between Nine and Claw.
He suddenly remembered the promise that he made Yinsen to protect Rani and to not waste his life, he looked at the emanation Pokémon, "Yinsen made me promise to protect you before he died, I want to keep that promise. You want to keep yours?" Rani looked serious for a moment and nodded her head, she wants to honor her friend and protect her other one no matter what it takes.
Dusk was suddenly here when Tony shoved the canteen inside his cargo pocket and wrapped his shirt around his head to block the sun, "It's gonna get dark soon we need to find shelter and get some rest before tomorrow." Rani nodded and followed Tony for another hour before they settled on the side of the boulder. They hoped that by tomorrow they would be found and return to civilization.
Tony and Rani spent the next day walking aimlessly through the sand hoping to find a village or at least one person. They hadn't eaten since the day they left the cave; they both know that the human and Pokémon body can last without food for three weeks as long as they had water. By the end of the day their canteen didn't even have a drip left. Even though she grew up in the desert Rani was still exhausted and walked as slow as Tony when they went up another hill.
They were tired and dehydrated and had little hope of actually finding someone in this desert. Just when all hope seemed lost, they heard a loud noise from behind them and saw two helicopters passing by to their delight.
"Hey!" Tony yelled while waving his arms.
"Rio!" Rani used all her remaining energy jumping and waving her arms, Tony cackled happily as the helicopters landed in front of them. Tony collapsed in the sand on his knees and Rani plopped on the sand on her belly. American soldiers ran up to them along with their fighting Pokémon, one African American man stood in front of Tony along with his Scizor and Charizard.
"How was the "fun-vee"?" The man asked to Tony's amusement and Rani's confusion. His Charizard picked up the exhausted Rani to take her to their on board Audino
"Next time, you ride with me, okay?" The man hugged Tony making it clear to Rani that the two of them were friends. Rani dozed off and fell asleep in the dragon's arm, feeling safe and happy for the first time in a long time.
Yep I decided to give Rhodey a Charizard after some suggestion from readers and realizing that he should have more than one pokemon. Hope you guys enjoyed the chapter stay tuned for more!
