Angels Fall First.
Chapter 6: Daisy chains
Clive, the blonde haired Rocket from the school, sat at his computer late at night. On the screen was the picture he'd taken earlier that day, the girl glaring irately at him from behind the glass.
Something had clicked when he'd seen her and it was driving him insane that he couldn't figure out what. He slapped the palm of his hand to his forehead a few times, ordering himself to think.
That's it! He sprung up off the chair, startling the Ivysaur who was lying on his bed, and rushed for the half open cupboard. Tugging out a tattered cardboard box, he rummaged through it until he found a folder labelled 'old stuff'.
Emptying it out messily onto the floor, he shuffled through the various notes and pictures until he located the one in particular he was looking for.
There was a small girl in the picture, maybe eight or nine years old he guessed. She looked sad, and a little too thin, but it was the hair that made him smile. She had it long in this picture, falling in loose black curls past her shoulders. But the short fringe she sported was a deep green.
He scrambled back onto his seat and held the image up to the screen to compare. The girl was obviously older, but that would be about right, judging by the date on the photo. She had much shorter hair that was neatly pulled back into a ponytail, but soft pieces of green were left out to frame her face at chin level.
The eyes looked the same, if not a little less haunted and he found himself grinning.
He grabbed his mobile phone and swiftly dialled the number of his more bulky, green haired team mate.
"Kenny! Listen! I figured out why that girl looked so familiar!" He started excitedly once his friend answered. "What d'you mean, 'what girl?' The one from the academy with the weird hair… Yeah that one.
"Anyway, I found a photo from ages ago and guess what! She was one of the targets from like seven years ago."
He paused to grab the notes that had been attached to the picture.
"Apparently it was some kind of revenge thing, she got the Saffron branch closed down and they wanted her to pay for getting so many guys arrested."
He listened as Kenny spoke on the other end of the line.
"Yes of course I'm sure! She was only ten when she did it.. seems a bit harsh to enact revenge on a kid so young, but who am I to judge." He chuckled, swapping the phone to his other hand.
"She was here in Mahogany town the whole time, guess they didn't think she'd have been shipped to Johto. Says on the photo her name's Airstryke, first name Kira.
"What d'you mean you don't see what the big deal is! She's here, which means she was never caught. And you know how well the boss holds a grudge. He'd probably be well chuffed to find out where she was…. Exactly, glad you see my point.
"I'll send the pictures off tonight and fill you in when I get a reply, 'kay?
"Right, see ya." He hung up and immediately started work.
His eyes scanned the email one last time, checking that both pictures were in it as well as a short note explaining. He signed both his and Kenny's names and clicked 'send', grinning as he stretched and then flopped onto the creaky motel bed.
His Ivysaur shuffled over to give him some room.
"Do you think he'll pay us for this information?" The pokémon asked curiously.
"He's bound to! Unless he's lost his vengeful streak…" They shared a look and shook their heads in unison. "Nah."
In a darkened room somewhere in the world, a shadowy figure sat at a computer. His eyes trailed over the email again and again, finally coming to rest on the image of a young woman as a sadistic grin crept onto his features.
"So they've found you..." He whispered to the empty room, "The one that got away."
He leaned back in the comfortable chair, his fingers dancing out a thoughtful pattern on the arm.
But what to do with this information?
She'd obviously been getting on with her life if she'd been spotted at a college, and since she'd had pokémon on her, it was easy to deduce that she was studying to become a trainer.
He was half tempted to leave well enough alone, but the thought of all the trouble she'd caused him resurfaced.
When she'd escaped he'd been surprised as it was something of an unknown concept for people to actually get away from Team Rocket.
He'd even seen her himself a few times when he'd been in Saffron. When she was little she'd sometimes deliver messages to him or his secretary and he'd thought it was a cute way of stopping older Rockets from seeing him. He liked to keep an air of mystery about himself after all.
This was another thing that had alarmed him slightly about her wandering off. She'd seen his face. It was unlikely that she'd remember him from when she was so young, but there was a chance she would. And if she blabbed to the cops about him he'd have to go into hiding, which was something he despised.
After searching futilely for a couple of weeks, he'd called the search off. It had seemed a waste of resources to use perfectly good men on a hunt for a ten year old girl.
He could still remember the embarrassment when he realised the kid he'd stopped bothering about had gone and spilled her guts to the police. He'd been in Fuchsia at the time and the news was devastating.
The Saffron HQ was the key point for the whole Kanto side of things. Since it was smack bang in the centre it made for easy access to most of the other branches.
He lost a good two hundred men that night, not to mention probably a thousand pokémon and tons of expensive equipment. And he knew that it was his fault.
If he'd just kept them looking for her for a little longer six months prior instead of getting bored, he could have prevented the whole thing happening.
And worse, any Rocket who made the connection about the escape from that branch and its later closure knew he'd messed up. And he couldn't stand that.
He'd had a picture and some notes sent to every operative he could locate within the Kanto region and had them do a thorough search but she seemed to have vanished, which didn't really surprise him too much.
His hands curled into fists. No, he wouldn't just let her be. She'd blemished his reputation, and no one got away with that.
Besides she wasn't just a child anymore, she was what? Seventeen, eighteen? That was plenty old enough to have lost the innocent image and people wouldn't question him using his resources on someone who could actually be a threat.
He smiled thinly to himself; he would prove that he doesn't leave loose ends.
Blissfully unaware of any of this, Kira was enjoying a day off school. After the all too successful heist they'd given everyone a couple of days to recover from the shock.
She felt a little guilty that she could be relaxing when many of her classmates were grieving the loss of their pokémon. But what could she do? No one was stupid enough to run off and try to find and confront Team Rocket, so until the police got a lead everyone would just have to accept that the pokémon were not coming back.
Snapping out of her thoughts, she pulled her hand back just in time to prevent Bleak's teeth from closing on it. She back stepped a little as he crouched down, growling before her, the silver in his ear twinkling in the sunlight of the park.
"Little close there, don't you think!" She grumbled but was quieted as he lunged at her. She tried unsuccessfully to dodge the furry torpedo but it was a direct hit and she lost her balance. He sat on her stomach giving her an innocent smile.
"We can keep doing this all day, but you aren't gonna win." He laughed and prodded her nose with a paw.
Whiplash, who was sitting in the grass a few feet away, giggled gleefully, electricity fizzing at his cheeks.
Kira shot a glare at the mouse before scowling up at Bleak.
"Maybe… or maybe not!" She cried as she suddenly shoved him off her and tried to hold him down against the grass.
With a somewhat bored expression, he kicked her off knocking her onto her back and standing behind her head he held her down with his paws on her shoulders.
Kira groaned. "Couldn't you at least let me win once?" she whined.
"Nuh uh. Sorry but I don't do losing on purpose."
She stuck her tongue out at him, but reached up to rub the rusty fur of his muzzle anyway.
"Is it safe for me to let you up now?" He asked in amusement. "You won't go attacking me again?"
This had all started when Bleak had playfully taken Kira's book, causing her to chase him. It had somehow turned into a battle of strengths, but it was rather one sided.
Bleak might have been smaller but he was far stronger and actually had some knowledge in fighting. Unfortunately Kira was too stubborn to admit defeat so soon and he'd had to flatten her six times now.
"Uh, yeah, I give up." She muttered, dropping her hands to the ground.
"Say it then," Bleak prompted, grinning.
"Do I have to?" She pouted but he gave her a look so she sighed. "Bleak is the best and most incredibly strong being on the planet. He by far surpasses my skills and all should worship him. There. Happy now?"
He tilted his head. "You forgot the part about me ruling the world, but that was close enough." He gave her a mocking pat on the head before backing off to flop in the grass near Whiplash.
Kira sat up with a sigh, "Ugh that houndour will be the death of me," she mumbled but judging by Bleak's smirk he heard it.
Whiplash, deciding it was safe to approach now, darted over to his beloved trainer.
"I can't do it!" he fumed, miserably throwing some daisies onto her lap. Whilst Kira and Bleak had been play fighting, Whiplash had been trying to master the subtle art of daisy chains.
Kira really didn't have the patience to show him yet again how to do it, so she picked the daisies up.
"I'll just make you a chain if you want," she suggested, tossing aside some of the more mangled daisies from his attempts.
"Yes please!" He grinned, instantly joyful once again, "A long one! But you're gonna need more flowers and I kind of mushed a few but I'll go and get some more!" He was hopping up and down in enthusiasm before he dashed off to retrieve more of the little plants.
She yawned, splitting one stalk to thread another through it. Watching the excitable young creature made her tired. Where did he get his energy from?
She eventually made him a chain that was about twenty daisies long and he ran about happily with it, watching it trail behind him.
"I can't believe you got us into this!" Kenny was pacing up and down his team mates motel room, occasionally running a hand through his spiked hair.
Clive frowned and stood up, gesturing angrily. "Well how was I supposed to know he'd put us on the mission personally! I thought he'd just be happy we'd provided him with the location. He was supposed to pay us, not get us involved."
"You sure he wants her alive?" Kenny groaned, sitting on the bed with his face in his hands. "You know how much I hate friggin' kidnapping runs."
Clive nodded distantly, "Yeah it said 'Alive and relatively undamaged.'" He sat on the computer chair with a sigh. "Look, there's a hell of a lot of money in this for us, as well as a possible promotion to admin. And you know we can't just say no."
Kenny nodded but still looked annoyed.
"It's just a straight forward grab and drop off. We've done it before!"
"Yeah, once! And do you remember how much that bastard captive whined? We had to keep him with us for over a week to get to the drop off point. I thought I was gonna go nuts." Kenny growled, not wanting to repeat that experience.
"Well we can gag her if she gets annoying or something, I don't know!" His friend hissed, getting irritated. "The fact of the matter is, we have to do this now. We can get some info from her school, where she lives and stuff, then it'll be easy."
Kenny nodded, still looking unhappy. He liked jobs to be quick and easy… missions like this took too much time and left plenty of room for things to go wrong.
And he wasn't a fan of things going wrong.
To MorriganFearn: Wow, that is one hell of a review! Thank you so much for taking the time to write that for me. I'm thrilled you like the characters (and especially pleased you think Whiplash is written okay. I was worried I was over doing it a little. )
That scene with the Scizor puts my writing to shame, so I'm going to try harder to give a wider perspective. I tend to just narrow in on my little group and block out the rest. But I'll try and fix that in future chapters.
Oh, and your point about the Rockets carrying the pokémon they stole… well I mentioned they were using sacks, and when pokeballs are at their smallest I don't think it'd be too difficult. Plus it was easy enough to intimidate the students since they aren't real trainers yet and their pokémon have very little experience. As for steel and rock types I just plain didn't think of it. Whoops.
But anyway, thanks muchly for reading and I hope I can keep you somewhat entertained.
To Keleri: Thanks for sticking with me and continuing to read this. And yeah, steel types kind of slipped my mind. They're the only type that does that, but they do it when I'm playing the games and everything! Go figure.
Review please:)