BLACK, WHITE, AND RED ALL OVER

DC: Hey, welcome back to BWARAO, the Pokémon story with less Muk for your Buck. I hope you enjoy part two…If you didn't read part one, what on earth are you doing here? Back, I say, Back!

Disclaimer: * DC, slightly bruised by the assault from the Nintendo Lawyers, walks down a different street, singing 'Pokémon Johto' at the top of his lungs. Suddenly, he is set upon by a vicious group of Magicarp who rough him over and, when he wakes up, his voice has been stolen by a renegade Jigglypuff! Tune in next chapter for more…DISCLAIMERS OF INTEREST!*

Chapter two: The Theoretical Oven

James listened attentively to his Butler, which is to say that he nodded, went 'uh-huh?' every so often, and pretty well listened with half an ear to what the Butler was saying about the wellbeing of his parents – a pointless topic, James thought, being morbidly convinced that his parents that his parents would probably live forever just so they could keep trying to hammer a square peg into a round hole, so to speak – the wellbeing of Jessiebelle (Sickeningly healthy), the wellbeing of the family's accounts (Numerous and bursting with cash, as ever), the damage done to the roof a few days previously by what they were assuming was a largely unexplained hailstorm, the rocks that had mysteriously appeared on the lawn the day afterwards and the subsequent dismissal of the head gardener. Oh, and Growly's sudden silence and apparent desire for solitude.

 Hold that thought.

'What was that about Growly?' James interjected, glancing out of the side of the booth at the Arcanine, who had eventually given up trying to get into the booth with the Rockets, for whom it was crowded enough anyway, thank you very much for asking.

'Oh, it's most odd, master James. After the hailstorm, the Chief Butler To The Dog  found that some of those peculiar stones had broken through a few of the windows in the Dog House. One of them was in his favourite basket, or so I'm told, and we think he's just a bit shocked, to be honest. Since then, we haven't seen hide nor hair of him, and he's apparently been off of his food.'

'Really? Butler, let my parents know that I'll be stopping by to check on Growly soon.' James lied glibly, his voice dripping with thick oozy ladles of concern, as opposed to, say, thick oozy ladles of Gravy or, for any vegetarians in the readership, thick oozy ladles of Tomato soup, hoping against hope that it would buy them some time to get away. He was well aware of his family's potential reach and influence, and more importantly, their habit of tracing and recording phone calls. If they believed that he would be coming back soon of his own free will, perhaps his father wouldn't be so hasty to set 'the boys' on his trail to drag him back, kicking and screaming, into the lap of luxury and the arms of Jessiebelle. There's a mental image for you, although the luxurious qualities of Jessiebelle's lap are, at this point, unspecified.

He put the receiver down with a definite 'click', and turned, with some difficulty in the crowded phone booth, to face his team-mates who had been, for once, relatively quiet when he was making the call. They looked at him expectantly, and he nodded exuberantly.

'They haven't seen him since the night of the Evolution Stone heist.' He grinned, eyes sparkling. Jessie looked, it had to be said, less than impressed, even for Jessie.

'Ok, great. It's Growly, but what now?' she asked, and James paused mid previously unmentioned 'Victory Boogie'. Since they had begun their twerp-chasing mission, there had been no accomplishments for the Victory Boogie, but James had felt that this was a suitable occasion. Jessie's shrewd question, though, threw him somewhat off his tracks. What now indeed?

 Obviously, he was as pleased as a Politoed on Prozac to be reunited with his Growly, but how would it affect things long-run? He could probably get it back home, but would they believe that it was indeed Growly? Besides which, he had run for two or three days across open terrain until Growly had chanced to catch his scent, which, to James, seemed to be a rather good indication that his faithful pet was not altogether eager to go back to the mansion.. James could certainly sympathise. And because James was absolutely not going to leave Arcanine alone, it looked like Team Rocket had a new member. The problem was going to be the bills. The Rockets could normally only afford the bare minimum of food for themselves and their Pokémon at the best of times, and James had a sneaking suspicion that Arcanine had an appetite like an industrial incinerator.

'Ummmmm…' he trailed off. Jessie nodded.

You bet your intriguing purple hairstyle that it's 'Umm' time!'

'Yeah! How were ya plannin' to feed dat Bulldozer over dere along wid da rest of us? We can't eat, ah, I dunno, snow for da rest of our lives!' Meowth interjected.

'Well, actually…'

'We all know enough about ya dramatic past, Jessie.' Meowth sighed, rolling his eyes. He brightened up as an idea came to him, as ideas are wont to do when the situation calls for ideas.

'Hey, I knows! Why don't we just send it to da boss? He'd take good care of it!'  

James looked doubtful. He wasn't absolutely sure he liked the sound of that idea, but it would indeed solve a lot of the problems that were currently troubling him.

One change of costume, a couple of slick acts of pickpocketry, a Smog attack and a further change of costume later, our terrible trio (Although, should we now consider them a crazy quartet? Probably.) were back in and by aaphone box,  James opting to stay outside with Growly, with enough 'spare' change to call the Boss. That is to say, it was now spare change. The people who had been holding it up to a few minutes previously may have had other plans for it, perhaps a vague idea about say, buying an ice-cream or, depending on the season, roasted chestnuts and toffee apples. But in the almost perpetual summer of the Pokéworld, it's more likely to be ice-cream, let's face it. Ignorant of this fact, or at least uncaring about people's desires for ice-cream, Jessie dropped the coins into the coin slot of the telephone, and dialled the number of the Boss, the Big Cheese, The Fat Cat, The Who-is-the-daddy of Team Rocket, Giovanni himself.

'Hello?' He snapped, obviously not recognising the number.

'Uh, good afternoon, sir!' Jessie trilled nervously.

'Good God, that was fast!' Giovanni marvelled. Jessie blinked and shook her head, slightly derailed by this seemingly random change of conversational direction.

'Pardon, sir?' she asked sweetly.

'I only just a second ago told Mondo to "Get that pair of idiots you're so enamoured with to contact me as soon as possible", and here you are. Promotion for Mondo, then.'

'Uh, actually sir, we haven't heard from Mondo in a few weeks.'

'Scratch that promotion, then.'

'It might be for the best sir, yes.' Agreed Jessie, less than thrilled about the idea of taking orders from someone several years her junior. 'We called because-'

'Whatever it is, it can wait. I want all three of you in Viridian city gym for exactly noon tomorrow for a review, do you understand?'

'Yes, sir.' She said meekly. There was a pause.

'Jessie?'

'Yes, sir?'

'Get off of the phone. You have places to be, remember?'

'Yes, sir. Goodbye, sir.' Jessie said through teeth that were only slightly gritted, putting down the receiver and mentally demoting Giovanni from 'Boss' to 'Charred smoking hole in the middle of Jessie's new office'

'Well, what did he say?' asked James anxiously, crouching down beside his childhood companion, arms lost to the elbows in Growly's thick hair as Jessie and Meowth stepped out of the booth.

'I didn't get a chance to tell him about Growly.' She admitted. 'He wants us in Viridian city gym by noon tomorrow for a review.' James yelped involuntarily, and rightly so. Last time they had gone in for review, they had had their pay cut in half and Giovanni had said some very hurtful things about their progress.

'Ain't dat da trooth.' Agreed Meowth, and not for the first time James wished that the Pokémon would be shot for crimes against the English language. Although he was willing to admit that it was a miracle in itself that the Scratch-cat type had learned to speak, he did wish he didn't sound so consistently like a cab-driver. He had tried to teach his Weezing to speak English, but he had rather given up on that when the poison-type had vomited acid all over the textbook.  

'More importantly, how on earth are we meant to get to Viridian city in that time?' Jessie asked, fuming inwardly at the Boss and his overbearing attitude. 'We don't have any flying Pokémon, we don't have any Psychic Pokémon, we don't even have James's "Rocketmobile"! We'll never make it in time!'

The Rockets sighed, and began to wander slowly down the street, Arcanine butting James playfully in the neck with its nose. Absentmindedly, James clicked his fingers by his waist, and Growly obediently came by his side, as he had been trained to do, and James threw an arm around its thick neck to scratch it behind its ear.

'You're right, Jessie. We'll never make it in time, even if we had a spare balloon. We'd need some extreme speed to get there in agh…'

'Whoaaaaaghohlordaaaaagh…..'

'Jessie, what are you MEEEOOOOWTH!'

 The reason for these rather novel approaches to sentences, it transpired, was that at the mention of 'Extreme speed', Growly's ears had pricked up, and he had shot off at something approaching, rather aptly, the speed of light. James's hand had reflexively clenched in Growly's mane, and his other hand had lunged desperately for Jessie's, who had in turn grabbed Meowth's tail in a vain attempt to anchor them, and then they were off, albeit in a somewhat unorthodox fashion for anyone but Team Rocket.

On a road not so far away, Ash, Misty, and Brock had stopped by for a meal that wasn't quite lunch and wasn't quite dinner that Brock called 'For God's sake, Ash, stop whining.' Togepi and Pikachu were playing in the short grass, and Ash and the others sat with their backs against broad, firm trees amid the dappled sunlight. In short, the typical "relaxing in the wilderness" scene for our quote protagonists unquote.

'How long does this meal take to make, Brock? It smells great, and Ash brain no work good when hungry.'

'Just a few more minutes, Ash. I just need to finish the honey glaze on this ham, get the new potatoes out of the saucepan, and put the Chocolate pudding with special chocolate sauce into the oven.'

'We don't have an oven.' Misty pointed out. Brock tapped the side of his nose knowingly.

'Or…do we?'

Misty wasn't entirely sure how to answer that, and besides, she didn't think she liked where this conversation was heading, so she changed topic to the first thing that caught her attention.

'Does anybody else hear that?' she asked. Pikachu cocked an ear, which is altogether different to cocking a gun, although if you yanked Pikachu's tail it is theoretically possible that Pikachu would fire something at you. Brock listened carefully.

'Like a high pitched wail coming this way?' he hazarded. Ash scrambled to his feet.

'Maybe it's a rare Pokémon!' he exclaimed without basis in fact or logic, rushing out into the path. 'And I'm gonna capture it!' He swivelled his cap around to the back, a habit he had kept from his days living on the mean streets if the Ghetto of Pallet Town, yo. Alternatively, he just did it because he was sadly mistaken it made him look cool. At any rate, he was rebound back into the clearing by a large orange and white blur that was trailing a couple of familiar panic-stricken, wailing people and a Meowth in some sort of living chain.

'LOOKS LIKE TEAM ROCKET'S RIDING OFF AGAAAAAAIIIIInnnnnn….'

They heard before the blur vanished over a hill, accompanied by a little white spark and a noise that can best be described as "Ting". Misty and Ash looked in the direction they had vanished in for a couple of moments, nonplussed. Brock may have been nonplussed as well, but it's kind of hard to tell.

'Well.' Misty said eventually. 'I don't think any of us were expecting that.'

'Or…were we?'

'Just glaze the ham, Brock.' She said wearily.

'How can you be thinking about food at a time like this?' Ash demanded, doing one of his mental 180degree turns. 'Team Rocket must have stolen that Arcanine off of somebody! We have to get it back!' he exclaimed, doing that heroic pose he does.

'Pika!' said Pikachu, and feel free to make of that statement what you will.

'…Right now?' asked Brock.

'Yeah! There's not a moment to waste!' Ash proclaimed. Brock looked around wildly, ham held in oven mitts.

'Okay, I'll just find somewhere to leave the ham and potatoes and pudding. The Pokémon around here'll probably eat them-'

'Wait, there's food? Let's eat!' Said Ash cheerfully, sitting down and discarding his backpack. 'It smells great, and Ash brain no work good when hungry.' He grabbed the offered plate from Brock and began to wolf down the meal, pausing midway to look up with a choked scream and declare that Team Rocket had stolen the brim of his cap, until Misty pointed out that it was still on his head back-to-front. He handed back the now empty plate, patting his stomach.

'Wow, that was great! What did you say about pudding? Because after pudding we should really go after Team Rocket.'

'I'll just get it out of the oven.' Brock promised, putting down the trio of empty plates. Ash blinked, shook his head, looked at his watch, pointed his Pokédex at Misty to see if it came up with anything, and then remembered who he was and what he was doing.

'We have an oven?'

TO BE (Worryingly) CONTINUED!

Well, did you enjoy? Either way, let me know!

Next Chapter: SOME STUFF HAPPENS! Possibly pertaining to some loose kind of plot!

 DC