Chapter 9
"Patching Up"
Charizard's "training session", as far as I remembered, was nothing but a painful blur of flames and claws. I must've passed out, because the next thing I knew, I was waking up…
I moaned and groggily looked around. I was on a bed, in some unfamiliar room…
"Per?"
I blinked and my eyes gradually focused on a light tan cat sitting next to me. It had a red jewel on its forehead.
"Perrsian?" it asked.
"Uhhh…….Huh?" I said.
"Per…Sian!" It jumped off the bed and trotted away.
I craned my neck to see where it was going, but I could barely move without hurting myself.
A moment later, the head of Team Rocket entered the room and approached me. He looked at me critically for a few seconds before speaking.
"…So you finally decided to wake up…"
"I never wanted to sleep in the first place," I croaked, surprising myself with the hoarseness of my voice.
He coughed. "Well…You did inhale a lot of smoke…Not to mention the fact that you suffered serious burns and cuts…"
"That's not my fault!" I argued.
"Yes it is. If you hadn't snuck in there in the first place, I wouldn't have had to punish you."
"If you hadn't taken my Pokémon, I wouldn't have had to try to steal them back from you!" I retorted roughly.
He shrugged. "You're in Team Rocket. I wouldn't expect any less from you."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Team Rocket are thieves. We steal to get what we want."
"I'm not one of you," I said darkly.
He laughed to himself. "You try stealing from me, and then tell me that you're not a thief? Are you trying to say that you can't do any wrong?"
"I'm not like you."
He laughed again. "I think that's debatable…"
He was getting on my nerves.
"…What about my Pokémon? You didn't take them back, did you?"
"Of course I did!" he said, "You haven't earned them back yet. Besides, you only need three for your next assignment."
"What…are you talking about?" I asked cautiously.
"…If you're going to compete in the Pokémon League, you're going to have to act as if you obey all the rules."
What the…? Compete in the Pokémon League? But I thought-!
"…What?"
"Ash…Do you realize what a big step it would be if a member of Team Rocket…and a new one at that, competed in the Pokémon League…and won?"
"Oh…I get it. The only reason you want me to compete is so you can get more power for yourself," I said dryly.
"Exactly. See, I knew I was making a good decision when I initiated you."
I looked away. He had just shattered my lifelong dream. What good was becoming a Pokémon Master if it was only going to help Team Rocket? I sighed. Things weren't going my way…
"When you're feeling better, I want you to meet up with Billie in your room. Your assignment, return to Indigo Plateau. You might want to change back to your old clothes, because I don't know if they'll let a known Team Rocket member compete…"
Great. He's using me…
"Persian, make sure he does that."
"Per. Sian."
"Good. Till we meet again…"
Persian jumped back onto the bed and sniffed at my hair.
"Uh! Stop that…" I said, pushing it away.
I rolled over to see it better. It sat down and stared at me curiously.
"What are you looking at?" I asked.
"Per?" it said, cocking its head.
I sighed. "This should be interesting…"
I'm stuck in bed with a cat who I can't understand…Great. Life is going really well for me at the moment…
* * *
"Ash! Are you okay? What happened to you?" Billie asked incredulously as she saw me for the first time that day.
She had a reason to be concerned. My clothes were scorched and ripped, and I had bandages stuck to my head, arms, legs, and body.
"I…had a little run-in with a vengeful Charizard…" I sighed.
She looked me up and down with wide eyes. "Geez…You look terrible."
"Tell me about it…I feel that way too…"
"You should really, um…get cleaned up…uh…and changed…"
Yeah…I could never go out in public with clothes in this state…
"I think I'll do that……Um, Billie?"
"Yeah, Ash?"
"Did…the boss tell you about our new assignment?"
"What new assignment?"
I guess that answers my question…
"Uh…We're supposed to head over to the Indigo Plateau…He wants me to compete again."
"What? After all the trouble he went through to get you out of it?"
I nodded, then winced. That action had disturbed a cut on the back of my neck.
"Yeah…He said it would help Team Rocket out, or something like that…Well, I'll meet you in the lobby when I'm done, okay?"
She nodded. "Okay."
* * *
…You know that guy in the mirror? You know, the one who supposedly looks exactly like you? Well…that guy…in my mirror…he was in pretty bad shape…
I had taken off all of my bandages so I could replace them with clean ones. The old ones were a deep shade of red…
The guy in the mirror had a red cut across the right side of his forehead, and then some more on his left cheek…His whole face was seared…
I looked down at my hands. It was more of the same. I had too many cuts to count, and they were all burnt to an ugly blackened sight.
I decided that the sooner I patched myself up, the better. I doused the bandages in hyper potion before applying them. Even though hyper potion was designed for Pokémon, humans had used it before and it had the same kind of effect on them.
When I was done with that, I put on my normal clothes, with the exception of my hat, picked up my backpack, and left the room.
I found Billie waiting for me in the lobby, just like we'd planned.
"Got everything?" she asked.
"Yeah…Let's go to the Indigo Plateau!"
We left the Team Rocket headquarters, for what I hoped was the last time, and went in search of my other friends, so we could all go back to Indigo Plateau, together.
It didn't take too long to find them actually. We just headed to the Pokémon center, and they were sitting next to the nearby fountain.
"Misty! Brock! Richie!" I called.
They looked up in surprise.
"Ash!?"
They ran to greet us. They too, were mystified by my wounds.
"What happened to you, Ash?" Misty asked.
"…Charizard," I answered.
She just blinked.
"Ash, how come you're not wearing your Team Rocket uniform anymore?" Richie asked.
I winced. "Well, uh…See, the boss doesn't want me to…"
"Huh?"
"What?"
"Let me finish. He wants me to go back to Indigo Plateau and finish up what I started…"
"You mean you're still gonna compete?" Richie asked.
"Yep…Only…" I trailed off.
"…Only what, Ash?" asked Misty.
"Only……I'm supposed to be doing this for Team Rocket………But I'm not gonna let that stop me! I'm still going to do my best!…Just like I promised…"
Richie smiled. "I knew you would keep your promise…You're just a little late, that's all."
"Yeah…A little time never hurt anybody," I said.
"Actually, it can," said Brock, "and it's not like you were gone for a little while too. It's been two whole days already! We'd better hurry back before they give up on you!"
"Oh…right," I said, blushing.
Just then, a truck pulled up next to us. The window rolled down, and…Jessie poked her head out.
"Heya, twerps," she said, "Need a lift to Indigo Plateau?"
"Uh…"
James said something from the driver's seat. "The boss wanted us to give you a ride, and we were just going there anyway…"
"So get in! Now!" added Meowth.
"Let's go," Billie said.
I sighed.
Not another ride in their truck…