Chapter 6

A muscle began twitching in Jason's temple as he surveyed the disobedient pokemon. He felt as though he'd tried every single method of motivation known to the modern trainer, and yet… still it sat, sound asleep, unwilling to move on a step further and not even allowing Jason to get close enough to carry it down the path to Pewter. Jason found that every time he went near the damned thing, it woke instantly and showered him in a hail of leaves as sharp and hard as shards of glass, or launched itself with all its might into his stomach with a tackle attack. Jason, cut and sore and nauseous, had ceased his attempts at going near Bulbasaur after that. Now he sat, brooding, thinking, and nursing a gash on his thumb, occasionally shooting surly glares over at the sleeping pokemon. This was not his day.

Groaning and flopping backwards onto the gratefully cool grass, Jason gazed upward at the skies. They were blue, just like always, and stretched on forever, seeing and knowing all, tasting every bit of the world as they had been since the beginning of time. Jason longed to claim the world, to set foot on every inch of soil, dip into every stream and river, coast upon every breeze that beckoned him. He longed to wake up in the morning and realize that he was free to do anything and go anywhere, be anyone. He longed for the ever-distant taunt of freedom to settle and rest upon his heart. Jason's stomach gave a sick lurch whenever he wasn't doing something, whenever he wasn't out there, getting into trouble, meeting people, or having a grand adventure. He shuddered to think of all the things he was missing, laying here on his back and gazing idly up at the sky, doing nothing. He hated doing nothing.

He wanted adventure, and he would be damned if one drowsy Bulbasaur was going to stop him from getting it. Climbing to his feet, he stalked over to the pokemon and stood over it, glowering down and blocking out the sun with his shadow, the one thing he knew plant pokemon hated. Sure enough, one red eye shot open and glared at him in a warning way. Jason scoffed.

"Get up, now!" he exclaimed, pointing a figure authoritatively in the direction of Pewter. "And go that way!"

The pokemon stared him down, a slight growl rising in its throat.

"Dooon't you be giving me any of that," Jason said, kneeling down so as to be level with Bulbasaur. "You can rest after we've beaten Brock! If we start out now, we can be at Pewter and kicking his butt before sundown!" Bulbasaur didn't look as though this idea thrilled him as much as it should have. Jason growled in frustration, grabbing tufts of his hair on his temples and yanking it. "Won't you do a single thing I tell you to!" he shouted.

"It won't ever listen to you if you talk to it that way," said a cheery voice from behind him. Jason gave a start and spun around—a little too fast, and landed unceremoniously on his backside.

Emerging from the trees was a girl about his age, accompanied by an Eevee. The girl had black hair down to her mid back and a tan shawl tied securely around her shoulders. Green eyes implored him as she stepped over a patch of tall grass and looked down at the Bulbasaur.

Jason blinked. "Who are you?" Bulbasaur's attention seemed to be drawn to the new stranger as well, and it actually stood up and surveyed her with interest.

"I'm Evalina," the girl said, smiling. "Good to meet you."

"Um, I'm… Jason," he replied, confused. "What were you saying about Bulbasaur not listening to me?"

"It's pretty obvious," smiled Evalina. "I followed the sound of your yelling over here." She extended a hand to touch Bulbasaur's leafy head.

"No!" Jason shouted, yanking her hand away from the pokemon and causing Bulbasaur to chirp at him in anger. "Don't touch it, it's psychotic!"

Only laughter met his ears. "Don't worry, I've gotten worse bites than a Bulbasaur…" Evalina assured him, and before Jason could properly protest any further she had reached out and begun to scratch the pokemon behind its ears. Jason cringed, waiting for a spray of blood—and when none came, he chanced a peek between his fingers to behold a sight that made him want to pop a vein.

The thing was purring—that was the only sound that could be used to describe what Bulbasaur was doing—and nudging Evalina's hand to guide her to its favorite scratching spots. Jason could do little more than gawk at its sudden change in disposition. Feeling slightly indignant, he crossed his arms and eyed the girl suspiciously out of the corner of his eye.

"And who exactly are you? Some kind of pokemon-psychic?"

Evalina smiled mysteriously and giggled. "Oh, no, I'm not that good yet." She stood up and offered her hand for a shake. Jason regarded her for a moment before giving in at her good-natured smile and taking her hand in his. "Why don't you come with me to my place for a bit to eat? You two look like you could use a rest."

Although he himself was rather tired, Jason was going to mention that the last thing Bulbasaur needed was a rest after it had been sleeping all day, but one glare from the red eyes at the level of his knee made him reconsider. Groaning inwardly as he realized that he was utterly whipped by his own pokemon, the very creature he was supposed to be controlling and training, he allowed himself to be lead by Evalina and Eevee deeper into the woods.

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Jason had always been under the impression that he was physically fit. Not buff, by any stretch of imagination, but fit, able to stand strain and exercise.

Evalina proved him brutally wrong. The slight girl was always at least twenty paces ahead of him as Jason struggled through brambles and underbrush and thousands of other obstacles in the forest. Bulbasaur was at Evalina's heels, and every so often would glance back with what Jason was sure was a gloating look of self-satisfaction. Jason wanted to kick it.

"Evalina," Jason said, pausing to catch his breath. "Why do you live up a mountain?"

She laughed musically. "This is hardly a mountain! We're almost there."

"'Hardly a mountain?'" Jason repeated to himself under his breath. "Good God, I'd hate to see what this girl's idea of a mountain really is."

Jason couldn't quite place exactly why he trusted Evalina so inexplicably the second after he met her. Granted, he trusted most people, but Sabrina's stubborn teachings of cynicism and calculating judgment didn't completely go over his head. He certainly couldn't imagine hiking off into a secluded part of the woods with just anyone.

Just when he thought he couldn't take another step up the insufferable incline, Evalina called back, "Here we are!"

"Finally," Jason sighed, pulling himself up the last part of the hill and beholding a quaint little house. Surrounded by a huge wood fence twice as tall as he was that enclosed a plot of land quite a few acres wide.

Inside the fence, what appeared to be just under a hundred Pokemon milled about. Some were grazing, some were preening themselves, some were tumbling over and over in playful fights, and some were dozing off in bright patches of sunlight. Bulbasaur looked as if it had come to Pokemon utopia.

Evalina was walking the perimeter of the enclosure, as if looking for something she lost. Or checking for intruders.

Jason's feeble intuition started acting up. Granted, he'd never been great at noticing things, but the way Evalina was acting set him off somehow. "Is something wrong?"

Evalina turned to face him again after she made a complete circle around the house. "Oh, no, nothing's wrong. Just checking to see that everything's in order." She said. Then, turning to open the door, the motioned for him to follow.

Shrugging off her strange behavior, Jason motioned to have Bulbasaur follow him in—only to find that the Pokemon had beat him to the chase. Jason honestly wasn't that surprised.

The interior of Evalina's house was all greens and blues and whites, lending the place a feel of underwater tranquility. Nothing in the house looked too expensive, but all of it was worn-in and well-loved. Jason pulled up a chair without asking, only realizing that he hadn't been asked to sit down when she returned to the room carrying a metal tray of sandwiches. He leapt out of the seat as if he'd been burned. "Err, sorry…"

Evalina blinked at him for a moment before bursting into laughter. "Oh, wonderful! They're working," she said, placing the tray down in front of him before walking gracefully over to the doorway. Hanging above the wood, nailed into the doorframe were two little pouches of various herbs, each with a small symbol etched into it. Jason frowned at them, confused, before Evalina continued. "Please, have a seat, and make yourself at home. These things are charms to make guests feel welcome and comfortable. And, well, since you're the first person I've had here in ages, I haven't had a chance to test out how they work."

Jason blinked, not understanding in the slightest what Evalina was talking about, but not minding now that he had permission to do whatever he wanted. Helping himself to a sandwich—and pushing Bulbasaur off the table with one hand as the savvy Pokemon tried to score a treat for himself—Jason took a look around.

The photographs on the walls were pretty much all of Pokemon of various creeds and colors, lending the room their only splashes of red, orange and yellow.

As Jason was surveying the walls and Evalina was fussing with the "charms", a small girl appeared in the doorway. Jason almost choked on his sandwich. She had appeared out of thin air.

"Ev—" Jason paused to dislodge a bit of bread from his throat. "Evalina! There's someone in your house!" He leapt to his feet and placed himself between the intruder and Evalina as if to protect her from the child.

Evalina made a sound of mild alarm behind him—which was followed with a sigh and more laughter. Jason was getting accustomed to the sound of her laughing at him. "Oh, Jason, it's nothing to worry about! She lives here! I forgot to mention—" She pushed past him gently and went to stand by the girl in the doorway.

Jason felt somewhat foolish for reacting so sharply to the girl's appearance, but she had materialized out of nowhere, and she was kind of scary looking. With skin paler than milk and large eyes of an icy blue shade, she didn't exactly look friendly. Not to mention her waist-length silvery-blond hair that was in soft curls and her complete lack of expression. She looked like she was about six, but as Evalina continued speaking, Jason was proven wrong for the umpteenth time that day. "This is Carey. She's nine, and she's my cousin."

"Your cousin…?" Jason asked incredulously. The two of them certainly didn't look alike. Evalina's jet-black hair and warm green eyes made her look actually alive, unlike the girl. Not to mention that the former had a healthy tan while the latter looked as if she'd never left the indoors in her life. The only thing the two girls seemed to share in common was their slight build and the curls in their hair.

"Carey? Say hello to Jason, he's a friend of mine," Evalina prompted, gently encouraging the girl to step forward into the room. Carey had Jason fixed with an unfaltering stare that chilled him to the bone, but something Evalina said warmed him at the same time.

Friend? They'd barely known each other for an hour and she considered him a friend?

In spite of Jason's outgoing nature, he had remarkably few people consider him a friend, due largely to his overprotective mother and his lack of social life due to Pokemon training. It was the one area in his life he was dead serious about, almost to the point of obsession, according to Sabrina. Needless to say, Jason didn't give himself a lot of time to socialize with other kids when he was young, and Sabrina hadn't given him a lot of freedom to do so, either.

Carey chose that moment to speak up. "… Hello."

Her voice sounded even younger than she looked. Jason could have sworn the girl was three from the high, baby-soft sound.

Jason realized they were watching him. Forcing his expression neutral and easy-going, he replied with, "Hey there."

Carey seemed to accept that and turned to leave the room. Evalina looked as if she were going to insist that the girl stay, but thought better of it and let her go. Once the girl was gone—in a way much more normal than her entrance—Evalina turned to Jason again.

"It was very sweet of you to be worried about me! I hope you'll pardon Carey, though—she's very shy around new people."

Jason wasn't sure what to say to that. "No problem," he remarked, waving a hand in the air and doing his best to look manly and in control. He hoped the comment sufficiently answered both questions.

Evalina giggled softly and headed for the door. "If you're done with your food, I can show you around the place," she said. "Bring Bulbasaur, too."