(A/N:) FLUFF. CHAMPIONSHIPPING FLUFF I SAY. So if it makes you sick...don't read the fluff.
Time went by in pain. I knew nobody. I hated everybody. I still felt like I'd failed everything. Along with that, my Dragons were locked up somewhere; I could hear them roaring in the night. Nothing I could think of was enough to prove me innocent in the court trial that was set to begin in less that a week...I was a ruined man. I'd had my life messed with for the entire time I'd been on this earth. Now...to be trapped for the rest of it with the pain of darkness concealed inside my core and all around me...
Now I sat on a rock hard bench somewhere else in the world that I had no visual identification of at all. Surprisingly it was made of wood, not the granite that I had first guessed. Viridian birch. I remembered from the trees that I used to find shelter under when I was out exploring, when I used to use my entire set of senses to examine nature. I just had to run my hands over the surface and feel the texture now. Familiar. So sadly familiar.
Varnished, unfortunately.
Mew, my ass was numb 1. For a while I thought I'd lost two parts of my body permanently. Perhaps not. My eyes were gone but my butt was still very much alive, just dozing.
This had gone on for hours. Blue and Green had had their say and had been led out afterwards. Yellow was still talking, but she would be leaving soon. I had a feeling that she had hired a professional actor to come and teach her how to cry in fakery. It was working very well as she listed all the 'terrible' things I'd done to her on the island.
Arms mend. Eyes don't.
"Mr. Lance Privetwater, it has been proved that you committed the following crimes on the 15th day of September this year: In the location of the Island of Cerise owned by the region of Kanto you assaulted Miss. Yellow Verde using a Dragonite, two Dragonair, an Aerodactyl and a Gyarados as tools to assist your deeds, along with disturbing the legendary pokémon Lugia which has been officially made a promise that it will be untouched and freed by all of humanity..."
As the judge continued to thrust all the untrue daggers of insults at me, the anger boiled up powerfully inside. This man was accusing me of exactly what I was trying to prevent. I never used my pokémon as tools. They were equal beings and were like a family to me. Never...it's not true...
"...and by mind controlling an army of Dragon pokémon you continued to cause devastation in several Kantonian towns, summing up your attempt of the destruction of the human population."
"Your honor..."
Silence. My stomach stretched and twisted uncomfortably and I found myself biting my lip furiously. Did that person know what he was doing? With a few words voiced out I would be thrown carelessly into mental oblivion for the rest of my days. One sentence to destroy a life. Can't he see the pain he would cause? Can't he think that his actions will take the lives of human beings...no...
I wasn't making any sense at all...what was I saying? No...I was wrong...he was just like me...
I deserved it, darn it...I deserved it...
"I don't deny it."
Sentenced to life locked away. I just sentenced myself to my own terrible fate. But I deserved it all...every last screaming second of agony. The darkness wasn't enough.
A familiar voice crying out to the thing that is me. Someone manhandling me out of the room. The clash of wood on wood with call for order. I don't want to go to my demise...I can't stand it...Memories of past and dread of future...unbearable trauma...I can't...I won't...some kind of intense force around me...I can't let this happen to me...I won't let this happen to me...then...
Words from my mouth like fresh blood from a wound...
Everyone was staring at me, wanting to laugh. I could feel it. But I waited because I knew they were there, still standing up for me, still standing together with me as a family.
Then it came...that terrible tugging feel of suspense as the air around the room crackled, having the energy sucked out of it into one great clod only to be blasted out and amplified...
There was a deadly silence of instinct as the entire huddle of people stopped breathing in fear and anticipation, even though they didn't know what was happening. I knew very well. It was just waiting for it to come.
The air sparked furiously now...it wouldn't be so bad. The roaring sound of it is terrible, yes, but the sight of the blinding flash can't be a great way to die...I was glad that I wouldn't experience that. At least I would be feeling the pain that I caused so many others.
Just waiting now...it'll come...my loyal dragons, doing this for me...saving me from torture...
The first explosion came from behind. All the people around me fell to the ground in shock but I stood with both feet firm. Every single atom in the area was shaking and burning with the power of the devastation that my dragons had released on the building.
Several more earsplitting explosions sounded around the building and the air was blasted away in a great gust of wind. I felt my face graze in the strength of it, and the heat was becoming incredible as fire blazed. There was yelling and clattering of footsteps all over the place as the screeching roar of an overhead Hyper Beam coursed through everyone's ears. Dust fell along with wooden beams and pieces of brick as the building began to come apart.
Take me now...take me in your wrath...the wrath of my own favourite attack...
Waiting for a beam to rip through me...
Suddenly a hand grabbed mine and the ground fell away from my feet. There was a shriek of an Aerodactyl as the screaming and explosions faded away. The rush of wind came again and I sensed my dragons soaring nearby. Saved?
NO! I don't want to suffer from this any more...I hate my past...I can't see through the fog in my future...I can't see at all...
"Why?" I croaked weakly, but my voice was drowned out by the passing wind.
The person squeezed me tightly and safely into his body but said nothing. I felt a finger placed on my lips; it was covered in calluses from heavy training. Who the person was, was obvious. I shuffled a little bit where I sat in comfort now I knew his identification.
There was a swooping sound as the Aerodactyl we were riding crashed through some foliage and landed in some grass. I jumped off its back by using its wing joints as foot holds from experience and stood next to the trainer who had saved me. My dragon pokémon had touched down nearby.
The teenager's clothes rustled as he turned to face me.
"Yoooou MORON!"
"What!"
"Why did you do that?" he snapped. "You can't have thought about it at all. What were you trying to do? Kill the entire official jury team of Kanto and get a worse sentence? Kill yourself? WHAT, Lance?"
"I've done it enough times to not think about it, Red." I sighed wearily. "It's not a chore to me."
"It's still wrong!" Red howled in protest. "And you still haven't told me why!"
"I was trying to get last minute revenge before I took my own life using the attack I love so much." I admitted. Why would I lie to the only person I loved?
"Lance, why would you want to take your own life? I know about your past, but that's over. You can learn and forget. You should have learnt about the effects of your actions before you served your sentence, but you try to get revenge again? What's the point? And to kill yourself? That's giving in to everyone and everything! CAN'T YOU SEE WHAT YOU'RE DOING?"
I turned to him in anger for his words and dealt the teen a heavy blow with the flat of my hand. Red cried out in shock and collapsed like I had done all those times before. I then saw...inside my mind...the reality of what had just happened...
What had I become?
Red began to slither slowly away...in fear. He moved further and further away before I cried out to him again like...some little defenseless child. I had become a monster. Deteriorating in my own wrong actions. So dangerous but so weak.
"Red...come back. Don't leave me. Please? Come back?"
Red quietly walked back over and cautiously knelt down beside me again. I grabbed onto his jacket desperately as if pinning the boy onto me permanently, never to let go. Red sensed something wrong and leaned right in close.
"What happened." he whispered so seriously that it didn't even sound like a question at all.
"Blinded." I replied. "Everything completely backfired on me. Everything turned on me, including life. I've become..."
"Your eyes." Red said. "What has darkness done to your eyes?"
"It is darkness, Red. It's in my core and it will be all around me when I'm trapped."
"You're not going to be trapped. I won't let you." the trainer said definitely. "I want to free you, however much darkness you see...there won't be any. I promise you that."
"I've been confused. I've been disorientated. I've been forced to revisit memories..." I murmured absentmindedly.
"Don't worry about that now." Red whispered again. "They're still beautiful, you know."
"I bet they're destroyed, aren't they?"
"They're broken on the inside but on the outside they're the same as they ever were."
"Piercing and yellow."
"It's not yellow, Lance. It's amber." he laughed.
I smiled slightly but I knew it was only weak and probably lopsided. I knew it wouldn't show in my eyes. Then I heard Red slip towards me, closer and closer, his breath touched my cheek...
Drowning in each other...
FLASHBACK
I tore through plants that stood in my path as I ran, even though I knew he wasn't pursuing me any more. My boots skidded to a stop in the clearing, scattering a few bug pokémon but everything was still, even the pond that glittered in the starlight.
Red was lying by the water. He had obviously dozed off in the sun but was now just stretched out across a patch of grass, examining his Viridian gym badge. I moved over to him.
"I left." My voice informed him. I had my face hidden in shadow and eyes cast to the ground.
Red's gentle eyes turned first to my backpack then to my face, no; not my face; my eyes. He could actually look into my eyes and not flinch? From just looking some people in the eye they shuddered and turned away from me, their eyes watering as if I was some sort of onion. I even overheard a group of teachers once commenting on how they became this ghastly shade of yellow. I wasn't amused.
But Red could just look at me, not even boldly, as if standing up to pain, but naturally, even sort of...admiringly...
"Red...I have to go..."
Suddenly Red jumped up and latched onto my clothing, dragging me down to sit on the forest floor. Glistening cinnamon swimming in tears was all that I could see. He didn't want me to leave.
"Can't you stay a while?" he choked, "Just here, in the forest, a little longer?"
I nodded slowly. "You don't want me to leave you?"
Red shook his head, which he was burying into my chest. What had brought this on? The younger teen squeezed my waist as I looked down at him in a sort of caring confusion. Not really knowing what to do, I hugged him back.
I nearly cried, but the tears caught back in my throat and wouldn't come out. I nearly cried because I could never remember being loved. According to everything I knew in my short little life, human contact was violently turned upon me, slashing into my soul with the poison of unreasonable hate and cowardice. Burning my insides into charcoal.
Never been loved. Never been held. Never been told by somebody how special I am to them. Never crossed a single person's mind in this world to say 'Lance, I love you'. Never. Nobody's ever held my hand through life. Did I even know how to love? Did darkness really swallow everything?
Yet Red didn't want me to leave. Was it because of who I am? Why? Why would a hardcore monster like me be cared about anyway?
"Why..."
Red made a muffled crying sound into my chest. Perhaps he was just in a touchy feely mood...but towards me? Why me?
The grass whispered in a breeze where we sat. Red just stayed completely still with his arms coiled around my body in that tight embrace. No matter how surprised and confused I was...I was safe...human contact felt so nice...
Can I stay like this? Safety? Happiness? They were such alien words but also so comforting...
"Why..."
END FLASHBACK
"Because you mean the world to me." Red whispered in my ear.
"Sorry?" I said as we halted. "What was that?"
"You've been asking that question since so long ago." the teenager replied. "That's my answer. And if there is no world, what's the point?"
My hand landed on an imperfection on Red's leg. I prodded the wound gently but the boy winced.
"When did this happen, Red?" I demanded in a panic, gripping his shoulders.
"It's nothing." he lied coolly. No Red, don't you dare lie to me, please don't lie to me...
"Tell me." I snapped.
"Don't worry about it, I was training." he replied.
"I'm not stupid, Red. You haven't had time to train, it's a fresh wound...I may be blind, but I'm not stupid!" I begged. You have to empathize with me...you're the only person I believe in...you can't be like they were, they didn't understand...please understand that I'm still here...
"Let me heal it. Tell me when. Tell me how." I held out my hands for him to decide on his own free will. He moved for me to be able to seal the wound with a sigh.
"It was when a Hyper Beam released some rubble from the ceiling." Red explained. "But it wasn't your fault, Lance. You weren't to know."
A surge of healing light trickled out of my fingertips as he spoke. At the same time my heart dive-bombed into my stomach and I sighed deeply. Red held up my chin.
"It wasn't your fault..."
"I hurt you. I promised I never would, remember? Am I sane? Perhaps I'm not just blind. Perhaps the Megavolt scrambled my brain as well. Oh, no, wait, that can't be, I did stupid things before the Megavolt hit me. I've been such an idiot."
"No!" Red shouted desperately, shaking me, "You're not an idiot, you idiot."
"I hurt you, Red." I retorted. "I hurt you because I was selfish and tried to kill myself. I would have hurt you by dying and hurt you by the attack. I struck you."
"It didn't hurt!" he panicked further, holding my face and screaming into it. "You slap like a girl! You promised you'd never hurt me, and you HAVEN'T hurt me!"
I relaxed a little from my state of fury and sighed again. Red was saying things he wanted to believe. Maybe they should be believed? He trusts me...I should trust him...
"Lance? You're fine. Blindness can't trap you. Don't give in to it. Nothing's going to trap you." He nudged me encouragingly.
I turned my head so that his breath tickled my cheek, still simmering slightly.
"I need a dragon slayer who can save me from myself."2 I breathed, "Nothing's going to change what I've done. Nothing's going to change what's happened."
We sat together in silence for a few moments, then I decided to go and check up on my Dragons. They must be nearby. A soft hiss told me that they were resting in an adjacent glade.
I pushed my way between two trees with the help of my hands. They were young birch trees; I smiled as I rubbed my fingers across the bark.
Unvarnished, fortunately, and still very much alive.
There was a delighted cry from across the glade and I felt the air disturbed by powerful wings as Dragonite swooped over to me. I scratched his nose happily whilst the rest of my friends gathered around me. One of my two Dragonair licked my cheek whilst the other coiled its body around my legs.
"We missed you master..." Gyarados told me. "They took you away...and..."
"Forgive me. What happened happened. But we're free now."
We were waiting until we heard you call, Dragonair explained in its chiming voice. We were always prepared to wait and trust you, because we're all family.
There was a slight minor in its tone. There was something missing. Someone missing...
"Where's Aerodactyl?"
There was a tense, uncomfortable silence. I heard everyone gradually bow their heads and speak again.
"They took Aerodactyl away too. Like they took you away."
Anger surged again. I felt the power of my own feelings course across me uncontrollably.
"What happened?"
"Blinded."
1) I don't like this pokémon that much, so Lance complains in Mew's name that his ass hurts. Simply.
2) A lyric from 'Dirty Creature' by Split Enz (now known as Coldplay). I heard and I thought 'Ooh...that's a yummy line for 'Taru.'