A/N: Sorry I took so long. I'm a slow-as-hell baka. You know those people who basically act like they'll procrastinate later? That's me. Hehe. The next chapter is already partially written, and should be out a lot sooner. Summer now and all. Remember: reviews motivate me, so if you want the next chapter out sooner, review.
Note: Last chapter, I forgot to mention that the unnamed mercenary belongs to BeJammin and Marcus Torrent belongs to Katie H. The boss of that base is mine. Although I don't really want him. You can take him if you want him. -.-
This chapter: Rio Starbright belongs to GIRs cupcake. Ryan Tani belongs to Raven Star. Sasha Hawk belongs to Dragonet. Sarah and Kyp are mine.
Note: I gave dark types the ability to communicate with people. I don't think they normally can. This is fanfiction, and since I'm the author, I'm all powerful. ^_^
Time's Edge
Chapter Three: Shadows
Outside the Team Rocket training base at Mt. Mortar, a young girl with purple hair sat, her back against an enormous maple tree, eyes closed, legs bent up toward her chest, arms encircling her legs. She was dressed all in black; a black tee shirt, black shorts and black boots. She appeared to be asleep.
The tree's shadow moved, twisting in on itself and spreading up into the air, forming into the shape of an umbreon. Color spread throughout the shadow, and it solidified into a real pokemon seconds later. The girl opened her eyes slowly and looked over at the dark type. "Took you long enough. I was bored out of my wits. Did you find anything?"
Quite a bit actually, responded the dark type, ignoring her trainer's complaint.
"Care to share?"
Hey, that rhymed. You're a poet and you didn't know it.
"No comment… so what did you find out?"
All right, all right. The rockets are making some sort of move in Saffron. I'm not sure what though, I only overhead the end of the conversation. They also seem to have recovered several potentially valuable artifacts from some underground excavation site just outside of Blackthorn.
"Great..." she said sarcastically, "Who'd you overhear talking?"
The boss of the base and some mercenary who got assigned to Saffron. They were arguing about pay or something.
"Did they mention his assignment?"
He's just supposed to commit random acts of violence. Get the police's attention and stuff. And they mentioned something about jewelry. Not sure what they meant though.
"All right then, let's get moving. Saffron's a full day's hike from here."
But Rio, if Team Rocket's gonna attack Saffron, shouldn't we stay away from it?
"No way," she said as she started back toward the path. "There's a big tournament there Nightrunner. That's where most of the area's good trainers'll be.. Imagine what would happen if T.R. took out all of them, and stole their pokemon. They would have a virtually unstoppable army. Saffron's also the capital of the region, so if it falls, the remaining cities be able to make an organized strike against the Rockets. See?"
Yes. You know they won't listen though.
"Yeah. But maybe we can at least set up some sort of escape route for the trainers or something."
Okay, he said, following alongside his trainer.
~*~
Two figures walked along the path to Saffron City.
The taller stood at about five feet ten and wore an unzipped red windbreaker, with a brown short sleeve shirt underneath it, and brown pants. He had somewhat short, light brown hair and blue eyes. Given the heat, he should've been burning up, but he hadn't even broken a sweat. On his belt was a single pokeball.
His companion was an inch shorter than him, dressed in a slightly worn green tank top and black jean shorts. Her hair was also brown, reaching down just past her shoulders. Her mouth was moving nonstop, and had been for the past hour or so.
"But what I don't understand is why he used a houndour. He had to know that it wouldn't stand a chance against Starmie. Aside from the obvious level advantage, Starmie had type advantage on her side. What was he thinking? Oh, by the way, you have a dickfore on your forehead."
A slight smile touched his lips as he listened to his friend ranting about her battle from earlier this morning. He sometimes wondered if she needed to breath in between sentences.
"Very funny Sarah, yes I am listening to you, and no, I'll never fall for that."
"It was worth a try..."
"Not really."
"I didn't see a reason not to."
"That's 'cause you're blind."
"I see... well then, why haven't I walked off the path?"
"My theory is that talking for you is like echo-location for bats. You give off so much sound that it bounces back to you and creates an image-that's why you never shut up."
"Yeah, but at least it means I don't have to actually look at you; after all, you blinded me in the first place."
The boy's right arm turned completely green and two eyes opened an inch below his shoulder the instant Sarah finished her sentence.
"Gah! You know I hate it when you do that Kyp. Arms should not be green."
"So you can see; echolocation can't distinguish colors last I checked. I guess I need a new theory… maybe you're psychic? No… that wouldn't work… missing the prerequisites…"
"Baka Kyp-kun..."
"Well, if I'm such a baka, then how come I outsmarted you?"
"Well actually, if you think about it..." A howling from somewhere within the forest interrupted Sarah mid-comeback . It lasted for about 15 seconds, then stopped abruptly.
Kyp's arm returned to normal again less than a second after the howl had started, and he immediately began visually scanning over the area it had come from.
Sarah reached for her pokeballs and released Growlithe, who assumed a defensive position in front of the pair.
~*~
Rio had been walking for hours, and the sun had just begun to set, giving the sky that familiar sunset-pinkish-orange color. It highlighted the clouds perfectly, giving the whole atmosphere a peaceful, dream-like feel.
As she walked along, a trainer came into view in front of her along the side of the road. He looked a bit older than she did and was wearing all black, save for fingerless red gloves on each hand. Blue sunglasses covered his eyes, and he was hunched, unmoving, over something on the side of the path. Beside him stood a meganium, equally interested in whatever its master was studying.
"Hey, you okay?" she asked as she walked toward him.
He turned around to look at her, and in moving, allowed her to see what he was hunched over. It was a little yellow pichu, who looked hurt. "Ohh, is it okay?"
"No, he's injured. I'm so stupid. Let him wander around a meadow and he got attacked by a rattata. Forgot how weak he still is. Do you have any potions or anything?" He sounded desperate to help his poor little pokemon.
"Yeah, wait one second and I'll get one out of my pack."
Rio swung her backpack around her shoulder, crouched down onto the ground, reached into it, and dug around for the potion. Thankfully, she kept the pack relatively well organized, so it took practically no time to find, even though it was all the way on the bottom.
"Here ya go," she said and handed the little white spray bottle to the boy.
He grabbed it and smiled gratefully, then turned around to spray it on Pichu's wounds. The little rodent started to heal instantly, and his trainer recalled him to accelerate the process.
"Thanks for the help. My name's Ryan Tani, and this is my meganuim, Iris."
"Rio Starbright, where ya headed?"
Ryan smiled "Saffron, I'm supposed to meet my sister there. She's competing in the tournament. She wanted me to come watch."
"Aww, that's sweet. So wait, you sounded like you're not competing yourself?"
"Nope. Taking a break from all the tournaments and fanfare and all that for a while, decided to just train. How 'bout you? Gonna be competing?"
"No, but I'm still going," Rio considered telling him about Team Rocket's plan, but decided against it. She didn't know that much herself anyway, and if his sister was going, then she wasn't going to worry him yet. The attacks weren't scheduled to start for another two days anyway.
"Cool, well in that case, how 'bout we get moving? We can talk more on the way," Ryan suggested.
"Sure," she replied.
~*~
Sasha ran after the blue haired Rocket who had dared to enter her forest haven. True, the girl wasn't wearing a uniform, but her posture, and her attitude and... her whole being just screamed Rocket. She was headed out of the forest, toward the path to the city. Pointless of course, she could not outrun Sasha.
Normally, Sasha wouldn't have tried to kill random passerby's, but Rockets were totally different than other people. They all deserved to die. They were the ones who had done the experiments on her, turned her into this ninetales-human hybrid.
She smiled as she fingered Angel's pokeball at her belt. Angel; such a deceptive name.
The Rocket reached the path just ahead of her, and in the second it took her to follow, a growlithe had moved between Sasha and the young Rocket trainer. Behind it stood a young girl.
"Get. Out. Of. My. Way. NOW!"
The non-rocket girl, presumably the growlithe's master, freaked out at her slightly at Sasha's appearance, but regained her composure seconds later. "No."
Her companion looked almost bored, as if he wasn't concerned or disturbed by the appearance of a half-ninetales.
"Go, Angel!" she yelled, releasing one of her most powerful pokemon. Both of the girls chuckled slightly upon hearing the name, but their mouths dropped when 'Angel' actually materialized. Houndooms generally have that effect on people.
The non-rocket regained her composure first, stepping forward and saying, "You think you and your demented dark doggie scare me? Think again. No way it can beat me and Kyp."
Her companion, apparently named Kyp, looked on indifferently. "Actually, I think I'll let you handle this one Sarah. It shouldn't be too hard." Kyp calmly sat down on the edge of the dirt path, rested most of his weight on his arms behind him, and looked at the battle-to-be with a bored as hell expression on his face.
What's that guy's problem? I'll show him. "Angel, Faint Attack, take out the little growlithe first, then go for the Rocket."
"Dig."
Houndoom vanished from sight, but when he reappeared a fraction of a second later, Growlithe was already underground. The giant black dog focused all his senses on the ground around him, watching for any slight movement that would give away his opponents location. Unfortunately for him, he forgot to watch the ground under him. His opponent hadn't moved after going underground.
Growlithe exploded up, slamming into Houndoom's vulnerable underbelly. The dark type flew threw the air and crashed through a tree, causing it to fall toward the Rocket. Sarah tackled the bewildered girl out of the way before the tree fell on her, and ordered Growlithe to finish the Houndoom with a Quick Attack.
~*~
"I could use some help here Kyp, if you wouldn't mind that is. I wouldn't want to impose or anything."
"You're doing just fine without my help. I'm confident in your ability to handle the situation. Look, you already beat that 'demonic Angel', what's she gonna have that's more powerful than that?"
"Frelling son of a ditto," she mumbled under her breath.
"Go! Cleopatra!" Sasha yelled.
"Crap," Sarah said. Cleopatra, a typhlosion, stood almost three meters tall, with an all-to-large-to-make-you-want-to-fight-it-flame. She recalled Growlithe, and sent out Starmie.
"Cleopatra, Wheel of Flames! Forget the starmie, take out it's master."
The overgrown lizard pokemon burst into flames and spun around on the ground. It rolled toward Sarah, kicking up superheated dirt and causing the ground behind it to blacken. Sarah waited until a second before the lizard pokémon hit her, until she could feel the heat from the flames warming her face, then threw herself to the side, executing a somersault and stopping it as soon as she could.
The typhlosion turned for another attack. Sarah had already anticipated this, and had stopped rolling about a meter short of his turning radius. He rolled right past her. He spun out several meters and turned around for another pass.
"Starmie, Hydro Pump," she ordered.
The water pokémon launched a powerful stream of water at the typhlosion, which hit the still-spinning pokémon mid-turn. He flew backwards and crashed into the tree trunk that that houndoom had inadvertently knocked down.
Sarah whipped out Espeon's pokéball and released the powerful psychic eevee evolution. If her opponent could attack her, she saw no reason not to attack her opponent.
"Psychic on the fox-girl!" Sarah commanded.
Espeon's eyes glew white and a matching aura surrounded the enemy trainer. She was picked up off the ground and hurled nearly twenty meters down the path.
~*~
Sasha landed hard on her back and skidded across the dirt path for another meter or so. She then rolled backwards and assessed the situation. She was pretty sure she could take on the girl. Jigglypuff just had to sing her enemies to sleep.
"Cleopatra, return. Cleff, I choose you!" The little pink balloon pokémon formed in front of her. "Use sing to put them all to sleep, leave only us awake."
Cleff started singing instantly, and within seconds, the trainers were all asleep. Sasha calmly walked over toward them, and re-released Cleopatra.
"Kill them all." The typhlosion raised it's right claw to attack, but before killing the brown haired girl, turned to Sasha and asked, "Why are we killing them, they are not Rockets." Since Sasha was part pokémon, she could understand Cleopatra as easily as she could any human.
"Blue hair is. Kill her."
"No she's not. We've had this discussion before. You can't tell whether a person is with Team Rocket based on how they look. Please, don't kill her. Killing Rockets is fine, they deserve it, but she's innocent."
"Fine. You win, this time."
The sun was almost finished setting by now and there was almost no light to see by, although since Sasha's senses were heightened, the lack of light didn't really effect her.
Sasha recalled Cleopatra and Cleff and walked back into the darkening forest.
~*~
Kyp waited until the girl was gone, then waited another minute. Once he was sure she wasn't coming back, he got up and walked over to the still-sleeping Sarah. She was a better trainer than the ninetales girl, Kyp was sure of that. Usually, Jigglypuff's song knocked out everyone who heard it, but she had stayed awake during it. Strange.
Kyp had blocked sound from entering his ears, thereby preventing him from falling asleep. However, since the other trainer wasn't part ditto like Kyp-or at least he assumed she wasn't-he had no idea why she didn't just fall asleep like everyone else.
Kyp bent over and shook his friend awake.
"What happened?" she asked groggily. Then, before Kyp could answer her question, she remembered on her own. "Is that girl okay?"
"Her breathing and heart rate look normal from here, she's alive at least."
"Good, let's wake her up and get outta here," Sarah said.
~*~
"Wake up," someone said quietly to Rei.
"Huh? I'm awake," she said, "What happened?"
"Actually, we were hoping you could tell us, my name's Sarah Dia and this is my friend, Kyp Noch," said a young brown haired girl.
"My name's Rei North, thanks for saving me."
"Her pleasure," Kyp said. "So who was that?"
Rei laughed a little and Sarah mock-glared at Kyp, remembering his lack of help.
"I have no idea actually. I heard a ninetales howling in the forest repeatedly last night, and decided to come see if it needed help. That girl-pokémon was the one who was howling though. She seemed to think I'm part of Team Rocket or something."
"Are you?" Kyp asked bluntly.
"Nooooooo…" Rei replied.
"Okay," Kyp said.
"So you headed to Saffron?"
"Yeah, I can show you to the Pokécenter if you want."
"Oh, that's okay, we wouldn't wanna impose or anything," Sarah said.
"You just saved my life… don't worry 'bout imposing, 'kay?"
"Alright. Hear that Kyp? I don't have to worry 'bout imposing. But since you didn't do anything, you do," Sarah smiled evilly.
Kyp facefaulted.
"So where are we gonna sleep? We usually just sleep outside on the city's outskirts, but with that freak running around I'd prefer to sleep indoors," Sarah said.
"Don't worry. You can stay at the Pokemon Center."
~*~
"Or not."
The center was totally packed. Little kids were running all over the place, either playing tag or trying to kill each other, Rei wasn't sure which. Then there were small groups of older kids hanging around talking; some sat on the couches or chairs, but due to the lack of places to sit, most just stood.
An enormous, unruly line had formed in front of the desk. Nurse Joy was running back and forth between the center's sick-bay and the main desk. The people on the line were restless and seemed like they had been waiting forever. The ones at the front were arguing with Nurse Joy while she was at the desk, and amongst each other while she wasn't.
Rei seriously doubted that the center had enough space for Kyp and Sarah to spend the night. With all these people, some would probably end up sleeping outside.
"Jeez, why are all these people here? Did everyone just decide to take a vacation to Saffron all of a sudden?" Sarah asked.
"Oh, that's right," Rei said, snapping her fingers, "The big regional tournament is being held here in two weeks. But why are all these people here so early? You would think they would wait until a day or two before the tournie to show up."
"They just wanna make sure they have a place to stay while competing," Kyp said.
"Why wouldn't they wait a little though, the local hotel is reserved for participants..." Rei asked.
"They all figured they'd be the early birds I guess. Make sure they get a nice room at the local Center or something. People are stupid like that. Or maybe they have some other, unknown but equally stupid reason," Sarah said. "Or maybe there's some sort of pre-tournament or something. Regardless, I should go get officially registered before they run out of openings, shouldn't I?"
Kyp laughed, and Sarah realized that she had just accidentally come up with the right reason that people were here early - to register before the tournament fills up. Rei realized the same thing a second later, and the three started laughing uncontrollably.
"It's really," Sarah said in between laughs, "not that funny."
"Yes it is," Kyp responded, still laughing himself.
Rei, unused to the way that her two new friends always manipulated words, didn't see why it was that funny.
Kyp noticed the confusion on her face, and after getting his laughter under control, explained it to her.
"Okay, it's not that funny. But if you noticed, she had just been insulting everyone who had come here to register, then decided to go register herself when she figured out why they were here. If anyone else had said it, we wouldn't have laughed that much. But Sarah's always bragging about her wordplay abilities, so for her to say something like that is pretty bad. It's funnier if it's not explained."
"It's still pretty funny actually," Rei said now once again laughing, "Hey listen, I've got two extra bedrooms at my house, and I bet my parents would be fine with letting you stay for at least a night or two."
"Well we wouldn't wanna - " Sarah cut Kyp off mid-sentence.
"Oh, shut up Kyp. She wouldn't have made the offer if it was an imposition. 'Sides I don't have to worry 'bout that, remember?"
To be continued…
Okay, I set up a mailing list to tell people when each new chapter comes out. If you want on, e-mail me telling me. My e-mail is Tempral_Bouncer@hotmail.com.
If you want off, just respond telling me so.
Lastly PLEASE REVIEW. I need feedback.
If you do not review, there is very little chance of your character appearing. Conversely if you do review a lot, your character will get quite a bit of "screen time." ^^
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