Chapter 7
By the time Azrael had made her way back to the house, the gaslights were burning brightly. This was her mother's equivalent to leaving the porch-light on for her daughter to find her way home, in spite of the fact that both of them knew for a fact that Azrael was more than capable of tracing the route to her house—and anywhere else in the forest, for that matter—blindfolded and bound.
Still, it was a nice thought. Azrael turned the wrought-iron key to the gas flow down until it flickered out and died before letting herself in through the old, creaking screen door. Sure enough, there was her mother, looking up at her in a startled way that let Azrael know beyond a shadow of a doubt that she had been crying only moments before and didn't want her daughter to notice.
Azrael pretended not to. "Morning, Mom," she said, slipping out of her ankle-high black boots and propping them up against the wall. "Have a good sleep?"
Her mother gave her a watery smile and nodded. "Where did you go this morning, Azzy?" she asked, getting up and busying herself with straightening the already straight pile of papers in front of her.
"Oh, just went out for some early-morning Pokemon catching," Azrael said, ignoring her mother's use of her much-hated nickname. If she were a few years younger, Azrael probably would have complained loudly at the use of the affectionate term—but lately, she couldn't bring herself to do anything at all against her mother's wishes.
Instead, Azrael moved into the kitchen to pour herself a cup of tea. From the living room, her mother's voice called, "Oh? Did you get anything new?"
"Actually, yeah," Azrael called back, making sure to raise her voice much higher than it needed to be. Although her mother was still quite young—barely in her forties—she was practically deaf. It was only one of the many things that showed the affects of depression on the woman. Gritting her teeth, Azrael fought down a wave of hot, resentful emotion towards her father. Hate gets you nowhere, she thought to herself. Too much of any emotion is bad for you.
Feeling somewhat calmer after repeating one of her mantras to herself, Azrael continued. "It's a Murkrow, probably level five from the fight it put up," she said, replacing the rusted teapot back on the burner and turning the flame down to a simmer.
"Oh, excellent!" her mother said as Azrael returned to the room. "Your—you must be so proud," she said, catching herself and smiling widely to cover the slip-up. "Just the type of Pokemon you excel at, too."
Azrael knew that the words that had almost escaped her mother were, "Your father would be so proud"; she also knew that it wasn't true. Brushing it off, she said, "Yeah, it's quite fortunate."
They shared the companionable-yet-tense silence that Azrael was all too familiar with as they sipped their respective beverages. Unbidden, a twitch started up under Azrael's right eye and didn't go away until she closed her eyes and forced herself to breathe deeply. The twitch had been present since four days ago, when Azrael had had one of her most intensive introspective moments while looking through her father's old things. She'd come across the certificate awarded to Koga by the Elite Four, granting the man permission and full rights over Fuchsia City gym.
As Azrael blew the dust from the framed piece of parchment, she couldn't help but feel a pang of panic, and that's when the twitch had made its first appearance. She knew that she was getting no closer to her aspiration of becoming a gym leader by staying at home, in one place, training a grand total of two Pokemon. She could hear her mother's stricken voice in her head, though, making up any excuse to keep her daughter with her: "Azzy, you don't need to go out so soon, you're only thirteen," or "Azzy, don't feel like you're wasting your life away! You don't need to be a gym leader," or "Azzy, am I too much trouble for you?"
So, Azrael had spent the last four days desperately trying to think of a way she could break the news to her mother that, yes, she needed to get away from the house for a while to train in the real world. A way that wouldn't make it seem like an escape from her home.
So far, she'd come up blank. There just wasn't any easy way to talk to the woman these days, especially about a topic so delicate as change. For her entire life—after the year where her half-brother was taken from her, that is—Azrael had made it her personal mission to see to it that no upsetting change happened around her mother's spun-glass world any more. Unfortunately, that somehow became all change. The two of them shared a ritualistic routine that bordered on obsession, and if something were to fall out of place—no matter how small—Azrael's mother was thrown into a deep depression that usually lasted for days.
But it couldn't be put off any longer. Azrael cleared her throat.
"Mom?" She had the woman's attention immediately. "Well… I was thinking about taking a trip," she said, trying to make it sound as menial and unthreatening as possible.
"Trip?" Her mother's wide grey eyes became even wider. "What kind of trip? Where to?"
Azrael cut in to answer her first two questions before an avalanche of others could follow. "Just a trip around different areas of Kanto. A training excursion," she said, and continued hastily as she saw her mother open her mouth to interject. "Not a full-on 'Pokemon master' thing—that's the last thing I want to do."
Her mother was kneading her lower lip with her teeth. "I don't know, Azzy… it's a big world out there, and you're only thirteen… really, deary, you don't need to rush so much. You're doing fine here with Eevee!"
Azrael closed her eyes and made a silent plea for patience. "Mom, it's true that I'm doing okay here with Eevee, but that's all I'll ever be if I stay here. 'Okay,'" she opened her eyes and tried to make contact with her mother's, but all she caught was a silvery-gray haired head turned to the side. She was being shut out. This was bad.
"Mom, please look at me." Reluctantly her mother turned to face her again, although her eyes remained miserably trained on the coffee table. One nail was worrying a chip off of the edge. "I'll be okay. I promise you that I'll be back in two months, at the very, very most."
"Two months? Azzy… I really don't like the sound of this," she said, looking up and fixing her with a pleading stare. "You're all I have… I'm just not ready to give you up."
"Give me up? Mom, you're hardly going to be giving me up," Azrael said, moving to sit beside the woman and pulling her into an awkward, one-armed hug. Azrael wasn't great with physical contact, but she felt that this time some of it was called for. "I'm old enough to go on a two-month trip. Other kids manage to survive across Kanto for over a year when they turn ten. I'm thirteen now… and I'll be fourteen soon enough. I can handle myself, and I'll send Murkrow to you with a letter every week."
She seemed a little more at ease with this promise, and actually appeared to be contemplating the proposition.
Azrael plunged on. "I have to follow my dream, Mom. Remember, you told me that you always wanted me to be everything I could be."
It was true, Azrael though. Her mother had said that to her—before her father disappeared with her older brother. Before her half-brother had gone to live with his father and never come back for a single visit. Before her mother had suffered her biggest nervous breakdown and refused to leave the house for anything besides hanging up the laundry. Azrael was putting all her money on the wild hope that somewhere within this sad, scared shell was the brilliant, vibrant young woman that Azrael had strived to be like.
Her mother was speaking again, and Azrael forcibly pulled herself out of her reverie. "Azzy, you have to promise me you'll write me at least twice a week. And I don't want you leaving until you can prove to me that that Murkrow knows its way here."
Azrael could scarcely believe her ears. "Are you saying that I can go?" she asked, hardly daring to hope.
Her mother smiled at her with a hint of her old exasperation mixed with playfulness. "Well, what else would I mean, silly goose?" She looked old and tired, worried, sad; basically everything that she always was. However, she also seemed resigned, accepting this new turn of events and—Azrael could hardly wrap her mind around it—adapting to it.
She was prouder of her mother than she'd ever been in her life.
"I am more than happy to meet your terms, Madame," Azrael answered playfully, standing up and hooking an arm in front of her stomach to swoop low in a bow. "Now, if you'll pardon me, I have a Murkrow to train."
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Training Murkrow turned out to be a trifle more difficult than Azrael had anticipated.
The Pokemon wasn't really difficult, so to speak, but it did so its best to be completely learning impaired whenever Azrael tried to teach it anything. Whereas Eevee had been willing to learn right off the bat due to their childhood bond, and Sneazel intelligent to a fault as it stubbornly defied her every step of the way, Murkrow honestly seemed to be just plain stupid.
Azrael mentally berated herself for thinking like that. Certainly the Pokemon couldn't be blamed for being young and inexperienced. Still, she thought to herself with a sigh as it refused to understand a command as simple as "get me that stick," this was going to be difficult.
If she could only manage to get it to understand the "fetch" command, she would be well on her way to proving to her mother that it could handle letter-carrying. Azrael was sure that she could make it come back to its home no matter how far away it was; the trick was convincing her mother that it could do this.
It had been a week since the two of them had come to an agreement; Murkrow would fly to Cerulean City and bring back a pamphlet from the Cerulean City gym door. Azrael had readily agreed, but now she was having second thoughts. Murkrow didn't seem able to recognize a stick ten feet away from her as a target; how was it supposed to know exactly what to get from Cerulean?
"Eevee, I sure wish you could tell this guy what to do," she said begrudgingly, staring down at her brown companion. Eevee looked up at her in commiseration, before seeming to come to an idea. Trotting over to the hopelessly confused black bird, Eevee nudged the stick with its nose and looked at Murkrow hopefully. Azrael had never seen a Pokemon do a better impression of a blank stare. Eevee sat back on its haunches thoughtfully before looking over at Azrael and nudging the stick with its paw.
"Well, Eevee, okay. Bring me the stick," she said, curling her fingers outward and pulling them in toward her chest in the "fetch" sign. Eevee eagerly clipped up the stick and bounded for her, depositing it at her feet.
Meanwhile, Murkrow was watching with interest. Azrael picked up the delivered object and thrust it out again, watching as it flew about twenty feet from her. "Bring me the stick," she said again, using the hand-signal. She thought she knew what Eevee was up to, and was more than willing to partake.
Murkrow was cawing now, and seemed ready to try. Eevee dropped the stick at Azrael's side and sat back to watch.
Picking the thing up again, Azrael made sure she had Murkrow's full attention before she gave her command. "Bring me the stick!" she said, chucking it in the air with one hand and using her signal with the other.
Murkrow took off in a flurry of feathers and dirt, and—Azrael could scarcely contain the sudden surge of triumph that welled suddenly in her—caught it in his beak in midair!
"Very good!" Azrael said as Murkrow performed loop-de-loops in the air. "Now, bring it here!" She made the sign again, and the Pokemon flew to her feet and dropped the stick on her left boot. It fluffed its feathers in unmistakable pride and seemed to eye Eevee as if saying, "See? I'm just as good as you."
Azrael dropped a bit of meat for Murkrow and stroked its head in congratulations. As the bird chowed down, Azrael sighed. Well, that was step one. Now she had to figure out how to get it to bring her something it had never seen before.
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Two weeks later, Azrael had managed to get her hands on a map of Kanto and a photograph of the front of Cerulean gym. A short walk to Pallet town had been in order to manage these two things, and her mother had been gripped with irrational distrust and paranoia that her daughter was going to skip off into her two-month journey ahead of schedule. Azrael had to explain to her in layman's terms that it would be near impossible for Azrael to get far with no clothing packed, no food, no money, and only Eevee at her side. She also had to play a guilt trip on her mother—something she really despised doing—and gave her the "don't you trust me?" trip.
And so, it was a triumphant, but exasperated Azrael that trekked her way back to her house that day.
"Murkrow," she said, and the bird flew from the top branch of a tree to sit on her shoulder. Azrael was pleased at how readily she'd gained the Pokemon's trust. It took half of the struggle of training away. Now all she needed to do was get the thing to comprehend her commands.
Azrael cozied up on the dirt beside her team (she'd decided to let Sneazel out for a breather) and spread the map down on the slightly damp ground. Smoothing out the creases, she pointed at their forest. "Murkrow, this is where we are right now," she said, placing a small drawing of the Pokemon in the forest. Azrael wasn't the best artist around, but she could capture the likeness of things well enough. Murkrow seemed to recognize itself, and a knot of tension loosened in her stomach. If Murkrow could connect pictures with reality, it obviously wasn't as dumb as she'd previously thought.
"Okay, and this is a picture of what I want you to bring to me," she said, laying the photo of Cerulean's gym down on the map of the city and accompanying it with the hand gesture for "fetch." Murkrow tried to retrieve the photograph for her, but Azrael stopped it with a hand. "No, not this," she said, waving the photo in the air. She placed it back down and pointed to the clear box of pamphlets fixed to the door. "That."
Murkrow eyes the place Azrael's finger was and nipped at it. Azrael sighed heavily and massaged the bridge of her nose with her fingertips. "It's that way," she said half-heartedly, pointing north.
She hadn't really expected the Pokemon to know what she meant, but she was surprised as a flurry of dirt and leaves were kicked up in her face as the Pokemon took wing. Getting up and watching the black figure grow smaller and smaller in the distance, she frowned. What could it be up to?
Even though things had been taking a surprising turn for the better lately, Azrael knew better than to get her hopes up. Life was never fair, and very rarely did things work out the way she wanted them to—unbidden, she thought of what her mother would say if she actually shared her philosophy with her. "How pessimistic, Azzy," but no; she wasn't pessimistic. If anything, Azrael was a die-hard realist.
Returning inside and giving her mother a shrug, she padded down the hall to her room to catch some sleep. She was halfway there when she thought she saw movement in one of the rooms.
Azrael knew better than to ignore details. Freezing in place and tapping her thigh softly with two fingers—Eevee sidled up beside her at the command—Azrael opened her eyes wide and strained her ears for any sounds of an intruder. When none came, she peered into the room she'd thought she'd seen something in. nothing was there.
Stepping into the dimly lit room and groping for the light, she keyed it up to a dim glow. The gaslight in the kitchen must have dimmed, because her mother's voice called through the house, "Is anything wrong?"
"No," Azrael answered. "Just checking out the storage room."
Azrael spotted the open window a second before she heard the sound of something very large taking flight outside. Without thinking of the possible danger she dashed for the window and leaned out, straining to see what it was. When she couldn't get the right angle she hoisted herself out—landing hard on her bad ankle as she did—and tore around the side of the house.
By the time she got there the thunderous flapping had subsided, and her mother was outside as well. They both watched as a majestic creature got smaller and smaller in the distance, although neither of them could make out what it was. Frustrated, Azrael accompanied her mother back inside to help with dinner as the woman babbled on about how "you rarely see Pidgeots around here!"
Azrael wondered if her mother honestly thought a full-grown Pidgeot—or whatever it was—would come right outside their house out of its own volition, or if she, too, thought that it belonged to a trainer and was merely gabbing on about a different theory for her daughter's sake. Or her own. It occupied her thoughts all throughout dinner, taking away whatever conversational skills she had.
No, Azrael thought, as she was washing dishes later on that evening when her mother had gone to bed. No, Pokemon don't usually come right up to people. They make themselves quite scarce, normally—especially the fully evolved ones. That Pidgeot-thing had definitely belonged to someone… the question was, who?
Azrael passed by the storage room again and realized that she'd left the light burning softly inside. Feeling foolish at such a waste of energy, she ducked her head inside to turn it off—and that's when she caught sight of it.
A flash of silver dug into the side of the window. Squinting her eyes, she drew closer to it, an inexplicable feeling of apprehension rising in her like a storm cloud. She swallowed it, but it returned, this time, with a lightning strike of dread as she realized what the thing was.
Embedded in the soft wood of their windowsill was one of her father's shuriken.