AN- A commission for rocketmonsters! Thank you so much, I had a blast writing this :DD
It's so good to finally post a story again! I hope it's worth the wait- enjoy! 3 (And I have a bunch of story ideas that I hope to be posting here soon, too!)
"Well, it's very, er…"
James wasn't sure there was an adjective strong enough for what he was looking at. Jessie, on the other hand, had no difficulty summarizing.
"That might be the ugliest thing I've ever seen in my life."
"Dat's just because it's deflated," Meowth assured her, hopping over a loose fold of fabric on his way to the basket. The grass rustled under his paws, warm with sunlight. "Once it's full of air, you'll see: it's a thing a' real beauty!"
Frowning, James studied the stretch of balloon on the grass. "It looks a bit like you melted," he remarked.
Meowth was already clambering over the side of the basket, and shot a passing glare at James before swinging himself over. "Well it won't, soon as you two stop standin' around and help me. Typical humans..."
"I thought the design was meant to be the Team Rocket insignia on a black background," Jessie said, and her eyes slowly narrowed before settling on Meowth. "How then, exactly, have we ended up with you?"
To his credit, Meowth only faltered for a moment before answering.
"Well, I was about to place da order as it was, but it got me thinkin'- we're gonna be da best, right?"
His team mates stared blankly until they realised the question wasn't rhetorical. Their confused agreements overlapped.
"Right!" Meowth continued, peering over the basket's edge with a glinting grin. "But do da best really settle for da same design as everyone else? 'Course not! We gotta think big if we wanna be big- an' dat means brandin' ourselves, so people know who we are! So dey remember us!"
James' eyebrow hooked upwards. "Isn't that the opposite of what we want? What with the, um, law-breaking, and all that…"
"All it means is people'll know it's us, an' not any old dime-a-dozen grunts." He nodded at their shirts. "It ain't like da logo is more secretive, anyway. We'll just be makin' sure we get credit for our work- think of it like signing a paintin'!"
"But why did it have to be your face?" Jessie persisted, still looking vaguely horrified at the crumpled likeness of the pokemon. She could have sworn one of the eyes was looking right at her.
"Because I'm da boss' top cat! Besides, it couldn't have been either of you- dat woulda just looked weird."
Inflating the balloon took longer than their patience lasted (though there was a certain fascination in watching Meowth's giant face fold in and out of itself as the air moved through it). Once the effigy was sufficiently plump, Jessie kicked aside the fan, which James then rushed to cradle before packing with the rest of their things.
"Dis came wid' da package," Meowth noted, holding a paperback book as he dropped down into the basket to join the others. He flipped through the pages, barely having caught his balance. "It's got all da technical stuff about piloting it- oh, an' a beautiful appendix, dat's all too rare."
"Do we actually know anything at all about hot air balloons?" James posed, his eyes drifting wearily overhead.
"Of course we do!" Jessie said. "And what we don't, we're trained to figure out! Remember James, we're qualified field agents now."
"Barely," James murmured, but Meowth heard him just fine.
"'Barely'? What's dat supposed to mean?" he demanded, and Jessie soon mirrored his glare. James shook off his initial horror that anyone had heard him only to grin his innocence.
"Oh, no, I didn't mean it like that!" he assured them, but even he could tell that he was smiling too much. Running his tongue over his teeth, he dodged their gaze, hoping he might be able to dodge the question, too. A tilt of his head confirmed he was under more careful watch than ever, and he dropped his two-bit defence with a sigh.
"Only, er- well, we didn't really technically pass the final test, so-"
"What are you saying?"
Jessie had, up until this point, been quite content watching the exchange from a distance. She was making good progress optimising her leaning spot, warming the wicker under the small of her back. But if there was one thing that required her immediate and full attention, it was slander against her or her team mates- although so far, what insulted her most was who it was coming from.
It didn't take more than two steps to cross from one side of the basket to the other, so it was without preparation that James found his face inches from Jessie's, his wide, worried eyes suddenly matched against hers: scatters of blue wrapped around pupils that didn't leave him for even a moment. There was so much there- passion swam on the surface, but didn't mask the ferocity, nor the fear, underneath.
Fear. Was that really right? He'd never recognised it in her before, at least not like this. He'd seen it from a distance, in moments that demanded fear, from Jessie or anyone else there to feel it.
This was different. They weren't in mortal danger; they were standing still, drenched in sunbeams, without a threat in sight.
His sight. Jessie saw it just fine.
How long had that hesitation been there, poorly cloaked in the green of his irises? He didn't dare look away, but his eyes still danced restlessly between hers, unable to settle on a target.
So much to be contained in so little.
"We earned that victory, James," she told him, like any other fact. She watched carefully for his reaction. Whether or not he'd earned her wrath was yet to be determined. "By every standard that matters, we passed with flying colours."
A grimace flashed on James' face, and he wasn't quick enough chasing it away for it to go unnoticed.
"We did," he agreed, slowly at first, "and I'm er, I'm not disputing that- it's only that I'm not sure if Viper's professional torture qualifies us to pilot a balloon. That's all!"
"That's all?" Jessie repeated, arching her eyebrow halfway to her hairline.
"That's all!"
Exhaling until his shoulders relaxed, James crossed his arms against his chest and peered upwards again. "So, how does it work?"
The others followed his gaze. The three of them mused over their theories silently, until Jessie concluded that hers required practical testing. She reached up and curled her fingers around the burner's handle before giving it a short tug.
They all jumped at the low hiss of flame that followed, a burst of orange heat overhead.
"Right- easy!" Jessie chirped. "Pull the thing, fire makes it go."
"Isn't it da heat dat makes it go?" Meowth challenged.
"How would heat make it rise? No- it's the force of the flames that fuel the flight!" Jessie said. "The heat is just a byproduct of the uh, the flamepower!"
James solemnly nodded along, before looking at the feline with a smug sort of pity.
"Honestly Meowth, didn't you know that?"
Meowth looked at each of them in turn, then broke his perplexed frown with a shrug.
"Guess my lack a' human education's showin'."
Jessie let go of the rope, and her hand was soon replaced with James'; he was a little more tentative, but tested it out as Jessie had done. He could feel the rush of the fire, the vibrations trickling down the handle to his fingertips.
Huh. Not nearly as difficult as he'd imagined.
"Quit hoggin' it- give Meowth a turn!"
And suddenly his shoulders were host to two hind paws as Meowth batted his hand away to take the reins.
Having already watched the two humans try it out, Meowth had a good idea of what to expect, and held nothing back as his claws found purchase in the rubber handle. The hiss of the flames deepened into a gargling roar as two lines of fire rippled upwards, warping the air around into a pulsing mirage.
"Meowth!"
He'd assumed it was James' poor balance to blame for the tangible loss of foundation, until the man's whimper prompted him to look down. Objectively it was a subtle difference, but there was no mistaking that seconds ago, everything had been a little more stagnant, the ground a little closer.
They were floating.
"Oh man!" Meowth laughed. Jessie echoed him with a quiet "whoa".
"Hold on, aren't we-" James swallowed the rest of the sentence as he struggled to glance around while stooped over. "Aren't we just testing it? We shouldn't waste the fuel if-"
"What else is there to test?" Jessie cut in, looking over the side in his peripheral. "It works; we're all set!"
James balked, though no one saw it.
"Wait, but that's- do we even have everything?!"
"If we don't, we got a great view of whatever's missin'." Meowth grinned, turning his attention back to the flame. "Loosen up, Jimmy!"
A series of dull thuds sounded outside the balloon, and the fact that Jessie was dropping the sandbags smacked James in the chest like a rogue baseball. Then everything lurched, an elevator going up.
"Oh, oh it's-" James hissed in air, biting back the rest of the anxious words rushing from his throat. They weren't scared; why was he?
But he definitely reckoned trying to keep a feline balanced on your back during take-off was a pretty good test of anyone's mettle.
"Here we go!"
With that, Meowth hopped back down into the basket, leaving the burners at full blast.
Curiosity chased away the last of James' hesitation as he stretched his posture back to full height.
Live a little, he lectured himself, and-
He buckled at the knees and elbows, cowering backwards for a moment like there was a gun in his face. It was lucky his team mates were preoccupied, it occurred to him, as he fell into the same trance that had them distracted.
He'd seen the world from high up plenty of times before, so it wasn't the view that soaked him in awe- it was the no end to it. No brick or marble or skyscraper to remind you the ground wasn't too far. No frame to the picture.
Rising over the tree-line, he could see every colour on the horizon, and James stumbled a little closer to it as his hands found the basket's edge. He clung to it, drinking in purple and red and orange. They bled into each other, already threatening to swallow the blue above.
It was cooler up here. Nothing else but them to interrupt the wind.
He loved it.
Jessie and Meowth were at the opposite side, and he spun to them with a smile finding steady roots in his drunken excitement.
"Oh, isn't it beautiful?" he cooed, sidling up between them. They grinned fondly at him, then knowingly at each other.
"His accent's like the news," Jessie had deadpanned one night back in training, and for the life of him Meowth fought not to think about it now. He smothered a cackle. It really was uncanny.
James propped himself by his elbow on the rim of the basket, his chin on the heel of his palm. His hair tumbled around his eyes as he inhaled, and Meowth recognised the expression. He'd seen it a few times on James; like he'd been starved, and finally had a meal in front of him.
"You'd better not let the enemy catch you talking like that," Jessie warned, her eyes sweeping over to him. James turned to her with a frown fighting to fit in around his smile.
"Talking like what?"
"Like you're soft." When James mimed a gasp, face scrunched with offense, she shook her head and shrugged. "I mean, it is beautiful. It's uh, it's actually the highest up I've been." Her eyes tracked downwards- it was difficult to look at anything else. She wondered how small their balloon must have looked, from all the way down there.
She shook her head again. "But we're Team Rocket now! And if people hear us talking about how pretty things are, they'll hardly be intimidated!"
James thought about this.
"Does that mean I can say it very quietly?"
"No!"
Meowth's exasperated groan changed tracks to a pensive hum."Yeah, y'know, now I t'ink about it," he chimed in, "you've seemed less an' less evil since we started trainin'." The hook of his claw circled lazily in the air before settling to point up at James. "You're scared, ain't ya?"
"No!" James blurted. Could he call it indignation if Meowth was right? "That's preposterous-"
"Ya flinch just at da concept of crime-"
"Oh he does, doesn't he?" Jessie gasped, meeting Meowth's knowing stare only to break away from it a second later, keen to gauge James' reaction. He looked like he'd been punched in the stomach and then told to smile.
He envisioned a carefree chuckle in his head, and watched it tumble out of his mouth as more of a pained sob. To compensate, James pulled his smile wider, but judging by the look Jessie was giving him, he guessed it wasn't wholly convincing.
"I don't!" he protested. Meowth let out a short laugh.
"Ya just did!"
"That wasn't a flinch, it's just- it's just air sickness!"
Although neither of them looked convinced by this answer, it did prove successful in diverting their attention as they realised that in the midst of the chatter, none of them had been paying much attention to their flight path.
"How high are we?" Jessie mumbled. Meowth glanced back up at the burners.
"Dunno, but we shouldn't be gettin' any higher. I put it on cruise. I think."
Clasping his hands, James swivelled to cast his eyes around the basket.
"We need one of those things…" He began a semi-frantic rummage through their supplies, not entirely sure what he was looking for, and conceded that he hadn't totally quelled his anxiety. The clouds already felt more like home than the earth ever had, but the fear of falling clung to his shoulders with an iron grip. His fall from the bridge in training had left him scattered with bruises that were finally fading, and he wasn't in any hurry to renew their lease.
"What things?" Jessie asked over her shoulder.
He grimaced, and made a series of meaningless hand gestures.
"The um, the thing that measures height?" he offered. Jessie looked confused.
"...A ruler?"
"No, it's-" James sighed as he ran out of objects to go through. "It doesn't matter, we don't have it."
"Eh, who needs it?" scoffed Meowth, batting his paw dismissively. "We can see how high up we are- and da balloon's doin' just fine. We're just coastin'."
"Excellent!" Jessie beamed. She bounced with the spring of the wicker to sit on the edge of the basket, facing inwards. "See? We can fly this thing no problem at-"
"Jessie!" James mewled, tensing at the empty space behind her. Met with her growing smirk, he wiped the pleading creases from his face. "Just erm, just be careful, yes? It's an awfully long way down…"
Meowth only shrugged.
"Your funeral," he muttered, eyes fixed on her hands as he checked her grip.
"Is a very long way away," Jessie retorted. "I know what I'm doing." She slung her arm around the corner beam like it was an old friend, and with a shuffling hop, pulled herself to a stand on the rim of the basket. All her weight on her toes, the heels of her boots rested only on air, and though she kept the support beam wedged in the crook of her elbow, it was merely a fail-safe. She was balancing just fine on her own.
Jessie loved to perform, but her show was seldom understood. People always thought it was for them, and while their admiration was a nice bonus, it was a pity that they never seemed to get it.
She was the audience. She'd wooed herself too many times to count, and here she was, swooning again. The little flourish of her hand; the posed lean of her hips; her teammates' shock, and the practiced absence of her own… All these things dropped her a little deeper in love with the woman on the basket's edge.
But she called curtains soon enough, sliding back down into their safe little box in the sky. Judging by the lack of colour in his face, James couldn't take much more of the production- and despite his best efforts, Meowth didn't look much better.
"Oh thank-" James lost a good inch of height as he heaved out a breath. "Jessie, don't do that!"
"I didn't go through all that acrobatics training not to do acrobatics," she scoffed, shooing away the smile that kept reaching for her lips.
They'd proven it before, but she still wasn't over the novelty that they cared.
"Dat's somethin' I definitely won't miss," Meowth noted, something halfway to a glower crossing his face. "Da cheek of it- humans, thinkin' dey got anythin' ta teach Meowth about climbin'!"
"It might have helped if you hadn't kept falling off the equipment," James offered, the innocence of his tone stark contrast to the smug cock of his eyebrow. The man's formality and private school vocabulary had thrown Meowth off when they'd first met, but he'd quickly learned James could bitch with the rest of them.
"Hey- I'd like ta see you do better widout ya precious thumbs!"
"He didn't," Jessie reminded them. James pouted.
"I don't respond well to pressure! I tried telling Viper, but he just wouldn't hear it-"
Jessie gasped out a laugh.
"He had you running laps all evening!"
"Don't remind me." James shuddered. Butch hadn't shut up about it for at least a day after. Still, framing him had been fun. Turned out Butch's legs didn't run as well as his mouth did.
Meowth sighed, and a more content sound was hard to imagine. "Just t'ink- we ain't ever gotta answer to anybody- 'cept da boss- ever again!" He threw his paws out, miles of sky wrapped in the span of his arms. "Da world is-"
It wasn't the first judder they'd felt, but it was the first that was significant enough to interrupt the conversation. They shared an uneasy silence, then a round of smiles as everything returned to normal- for all of three seconds before adrenaline lurched again, and they were sent stumbling into the side of the basket.
Wicker hurt, it turned out, when you slammed into it, and their collective groan rang out until the wind snatched it away. The balloon would seem to still, then trip forwards, or backwards, or whichever way the wind reeled. The current was tuneless, every direction a whim.
Their balloon, so safe until then, suddenly felt very temporary.
"Meowth!" Jessie yelled, not sure if she was annoyed or worried. She decided annoyed. It was easier to stomach.
She dug her heels into the floor, bracing her weight against the shallow trenches in the weave. One hand shielded her eyes from her hair, liquid now and whipping around her face. Her other hand held the rim so tight she could feel the rough ends of the wicker pushing patterns into her palm, even through her glove.
Her eyes didn't know where to look first, but they pulled to her teammates even without her instruction. Meowth was worst off- lightweight as he was, he'd been thrown back the hardest, and still hadn't opened his eyes from his wince. James, meanwhile, didn't seem to want to blink. Spine flat against the wall, he half-stood with bended knees, hands gripping the edge at either side. The wind rushed into his face, and his eyes watered helplessly at the onslaught. Not real tears, not yet, but if they hadn't pulled so obviously around his cheeks and behind his ears, Jessie would have wondered. He looked scared enough.
Every movement was punctuated with a chorus of low, whistling howls, as the gales swam around them like sharpedo. It was so loud, so all-encompassing, that Jessie forgot her own voice, for a moment. To speak then felt like trying to out-shout the gods.
She reckoned she stood a decent chance.
"What happened?! You said it was on autopilot!"
It took a moment longer than usual to make sense of her words, but Meowth heard her.
"Autopilot don't account for dis!" he shouted back, finally braving a look at something other than his eyelids. He watched the burner, its plume of flame wobbling now, like dropped jelly. "It just keeps us up- it don't steer, or adjust, or-"
"Why not?!" Jessie demanded. "What's the point if it doesn't work?!"
"It works!" James wailed. "It just assumes there's an actual pilot- but there isn't- I told you, none of us know how to fly this thing, and now we're going t-"
"Not helping, Jimmy!"
Meowth had forced movement into his limbs- crouched as he was, the basket's walls provided enough cover from the wind for him to crawl over to their supplies. He pounced on the instruction manual like it was his prey, puncturing the glossy cover with two lines of claw marks before flipping it open.
"Uhhhh lemme see, maybe dere's somethin'..."
Jessie watched him leaf through the pages for as long as her patience could hold, which wasn't very long at all. They were being battered- the basket only stilled as a prelude to each drop, each sideways swing. The butterfree in her stomach swelled to a swarm, breaking off to fill her arms and legs with the same nervous energy.
If it weren't for the walls, they'd be gone already. She knew that there wasn't time to waste.
"James!" she barked, and he snapped to her without pause. He was past his panicked 'I told you so', and desperate for direction. She saw the same urgency in him.
They were back in training, back at the pitfall, and she was pulling him from a second doom. Somewhere in that moment, the resolve in his eyes had shifted. No longer resolve that he would fall, but resolve that no matter what, he wouldn't. And just like that, they were the same thing, the same goal, the same hope, staring into each other, terror and awe.
How quickly they'd fallen off that page. How quickly they were back.
"I'll work the burner- try to bring us down," Jessie said. "You steer."
"Right," James said. They stared just a second longer than they needed to before launching into action.
The burner wasn't fun anymore. Jessie wondered if it would ever be fun again, after this, or if they'd killed its novelty forever. The flames obeyed her every command, but she could only do so much- pull them a little higher, dip them a little lower. The wind still batted them about like its plaything. The treeline was two-dimensional now, a line whizzing past.
"How many sandbags did we drop?" Meowth called. "I t'ink we're too light!"
"Then what do we do?" James asked, not taking his eyes off the handle. He wasn't even sure if he was doing anything. He thought briefly about releasing Koffing and Ekans, but endangering them didn't feel worth it- especially when they weighed next to nothing anyway.
Skim-reading for all he was worth, Meowth shook his head so fast he felt his whiskers skip off his cheeks.
"I don't know! Nothin's concise, it's all waffle-" The wind roared like nothing before. For a moment, all any of them knew was the feeling of falling, and when it was over, only the page Meowth had been holding remained, skewered between his claws.
"WE LOST DA APPENDIX!"
James caught his breath, made his hands into fists as he pushed himself up. He swore he'd been midair for a second. Grounded to nothing, until the basket had rushed back up to meet him.
He looked out to the trees, and was filled with panic even before his eyes could translate to his brain. Whatever Jessie was doing, it was working too well. There was no pause between drops anymore: they were plunging, forwards and down, far, far too fast. Treetops that had been faraway blurs now reached to kiss the basket's base. Just the tallest ones, at first, grazing lightly underfoot. It soon built to a chorus, scraping and snapping on every side.
With everything she had, Jessie yanked the burner's handle, gas and flame wheezing overhead. Nothing seemed to change. There wasn't much to do but watch, and brace.
Meowth held the page for long enough to scour it, praying for some magic piece of information that would stop this; save them.
competitive sport. There are a number of precautions that must be taken when navigating multiple balloons in a shared airspace: staggered take-off is often practiced to minimise the risk of mid-air collisions. If the weather is cold, and especially if the temperature is below freezing, it is very important to
He let it slip from his paw, and didn't turn to watch it curl off into the sky.
Jessie and James were already looking at him when he raised his head. The basket tremorred as it clipped the top of another tree, then another, then-
"Shit," Jessie said.
It had only been a matter of time, and though James threw all his weight onto the lever to try to steer away, it only gave their crash a leftwards lean. The basket smashed into the top of the pine tree, splinters of bark and wicker spraying out like a pathetic firework.
The collision stopped the basket, but not them. They were hurtled forwards, loose cargo, and smacked into the front of the basket chest-first. There was no sound to the pain; there was no air in their lungs to make it, so they only stared, open-mouthed, as the basket spun round to the back of the tree, and continued its descent.
They'd lost a lot of speed, though that wasn't saying much. Pinballing off a couple of trunks, the three of them slid side to side across the basket until the balloon snagged on a tangle of twigs and leaves. The basket swung forwards, almost upside-down, and started to swing back- only to pierce itself on a jagged branch. Before they could even start to get scared about it, they were launched out, and down, more sticks than air at first, slashing through fur and uniform, crackling, whooshing pain, and then there was the ground, rushing to meet them like an old friend, so close-
Jessie was the first to wake up. She usually was.
It was easier to say where it didn't hurt. Her uniform looked like it had been unsuccessfully fed through a shredder- so did James'. Their boots were about the only thing moderately intact.
Meowth's fur didn't look much better. She could see patches of pink underneath, skin peeking out around his wounds.
She tried to remember nursing school. Stop bleeding- there wasn't much bleeding, she didn't think. She didn't know. She couldn't see much, lying down as she was. It occurred to her that she should probably get up.
Could she get up?
Her head didn't like it, but she lifted it. Her legs didn't like it, but they moved.
Of course she could.
"James," she groaned. "Meowth." She staggered to her feet. Broken ribs, definitely. Maybe her wrist.
She walked over to them. At first she just watched, her own breath withheld until she saw evidence of theirs. She stared, until she'd seen both their chests rise and fall, and then knelt to gently shake them in turn.
"James! Meowth!"
James stirred, eyelids fluttering, still closed. "Hm."
She poked Meowth with the toe of her boot, and again, until his whiskers took turns twitching and his paw lifted to bat her away.
"No," he murmured.
"Yes!" Jessie rebuffed. Her head was giddy, and not just from her probable concussion. She'd yet to find a better feeling than this brand of sheer, gracious relief. Despite it all, a smile wormed its way to her face, and stuck.
"Hm?" James repeated, a question this time. He opened his eyes as Meowth let out a long moan. James sat up too fast and yelped. "Ow! What-" His eyes climbed the length of the tree. "Ohh. Oh dear."
"What?" Meowth grumbled, blinking his eyes open, wincing at the light each time until it became bearable. Then he saw, too, and his face fell. "Ah yeah."
Clumsily, Jessie circled them, her face etched with frown lines as she checked for cuts too deep to walk off. Meowth was littered with fine scratches, and a couple more substantial ones, but no real blood to speak of. She guessed he'd avoided the worst of the branches, being so small. James had a nasty one on his shoulder- stitch-worthy for sure, but already clotting. She cringed thinking about how long they must have been out for.
Herself… She hadn't come out of it too bad, she didn't think. Ekans' pokeball was still there, pressing its reassurance against her hip like always. Her knee was a mess, but other than that...
"Anything broken?" she asked. "Can you both stand?"
"My ribs have felt better," James answered, pawing tentatively around his chest. He guessed his resolution never to fall from an objectively lethal height again was down the drain. It was sort of familiar, now. Twice was more than enough.
He stood, and it didn't feel great, but his legs cooperated without buckling, and that was more than good enough for him. It was bizarre to think he might not have woken at all.
Meowth copied him, but didn't make it all the way up before crying out and falling backwards.
"Ugh- no, can't do dat," he hissed, his bad leg stretched out in front of him, the other pulled to his chest. "I t'ink it's just da ankle, but-"
"Hold on," Jessie said, feeling her back pocket. Her face fell until she spotted what she was searching for, strewn across from them: a super potion. Her emergency one, and if this didn't qualify as an emergency, she didn't want to know what did.
She retrieved it, slower than usual but not worryingly slow. She didn't think. She wasn't technically qualified to conclude anything, but figured she was at least half a nurse. Probably.
Definitely qualified to empty a can of spray on Meowth's leg.
It seemed to do the trick almost instantly. Meowth stood hesitantly, half-expecting the same pain as before, but his paw took his weight no problem this time.
"They really need to make this stuff for humans," Jessie observed.
"Are you all right, Jessie?" James asked, a small frown knotting his brow.
"Wrist is…" She stopped to bend it gently, and gave a sharp inhale. "... sprained," she decided. James grimaced, but she waved him off. "But, um, all things considered…" She looked up at the mangled carcass of their balloon. "I'd say we're pretty lucky."
"Lucky?!" Meowth echoed, incredulous as stretched a paw at the wreckage. "Look at m- our beautiful balloon!"
"It's not the best look for you, I'll admit," James concurred. Meowth's warped face thirty feet in the air was nothing short of horrifying.
"It'll look worse at night," Jessie added. "Like a giant cat tree monster."
"Hm." Meowth didn't sound happy at the idea, but not exactly unhappy, either.
No one said anything for a while- not because there was nothing to say, but because no one wanted to say it. James broke their limbo with a slow exhale.
"What are we going to tell the boss?" he mumbled, his lip trapped nervously between his teeth. The others soon mimicked his expression. Destroying their transport not a full day after it was granted to them wasn't exactly the shining first report they'd been hoping for. Heaven help them if Giovanni was in a bad mood…
"Da boss," Meowth said, slowly, tasting the words in his mouth before letting them loose, "don't necessarily got to know." Jessie started to protest, but only got a syllable out before he continued: "I'm not sayin' we lie- never!- but does da boss really need to know every little thing that happens? Nothin' worse dan wastin' his time wid' our little problem…"
He held up his paws in a stagnant shrug, leaving the pitch in the air, waiting for them to take it or leave it. And they took it, greedily-all nods and affirmative murmurs, spinning the certainty they lacked into performance, until they bought their own act.
"Nothing worse than that," James assented.
"Wouldn't want to bother him," Jessie added.
"So I say we just re-run the request like nothin' happened!" Meowth concluded. "And uh, if Meowth's bein' honest, da transport branch don't seem like da kinda place dat'd even notice." He chuckled, shaking his head. "I only had to tell 'em I had permission to change da balloon's design, an' dey just went along wid' it! Didn't check or nothin'!"
"Meowth!" James reproached, but his growing smile didn't match his tone, and his closed lips didn't stop the giggle from bubbling up his throat.
Somewhere along the line, the active danger that had felt like the only thing left in the world had shown itself out, and Jessie found her good hand combing through her hair. Just like that, scrapes and tangles were the worst reality had to offer. For that, she was grateful, even though-
"It wasn't even ourfault anyway," she defended. "Talk about shoddy equipment- what kind of balloon can't stand a little breeze?"
James just gawped at her. Meowth, however, stuttered on his own scoff.
"Dat's a load a' crap an' ya know it!" he shot back. Jessie tried to mirror his incredulity, but he didn't budge. "Look, it's just us here, so we might as well admit it: none of us knew what we were doin'! Jim just happened to be da most obvious about it."
"Hey!"
"Dat's why we crashed.."
"I knew exactly what I was-"
"I did say-"
He glared them into silence, but not before Jessie rolled her eyes.
"An' I believe we're gonna be da best- I do!" Meowth urged. "But youse don't know everythin' and ya gotta stop pretendin' ya do, or we won't live to get dere!"
Jessie laughed, a one note sound. "I don't-"
Oh.
Doubt crossed her path often enough, but they'd sidestep each other with a passing glance, and that would be that. She couldn't remember the last time she'd actually stopped to stare, and all of a sudden she was swallowed. Tumbling, she reached for her ego, and found it falling beside her. Fumble as she might, she found no hand holds, and sank, helpless, in revelation.
Training had felt like home. She'd memorised every detail of the grounds long before Meowth and James were even in the picture. It had seemed natural, that she knew a little more than them- it was her territory.
In the no man's land of everything else, her headstart was void. Questions spilled out of her mouth as often as answers.
Cruelly, without warning, she was as clueless as everyone else.
She didn't see it at first, but James was sinking too.
They were right: he was scared. He wouldn't have to deny it every other minute if he wasn't. But his fear held hands with excitement- for the structure of uniform, the freedom of crime. For them. For this.
Pain, romanticised, sparked a stronger buzz than luxury ever had. Guilt was a nasty aftertaste. If they only knew what he'd left behind, for most people's last resort.
Even in the agony of broken bones, the sting he renewed with each breath, he reveled in the feeling, knowing at least it was his. Letting go of Meowth's tail back at the bridge had been too easy. Maybe he just wanted to prove he could.
So desperate for independence, he'd follow himself off of cliffs, just for a taste.
He'd nearly left them behind for it.
And when they'd grabbed him, the second time, he'd caught a glimpse of what he now saw fully: that to self-destruct was not selfless.
No one had ever needed him before.
Realistically, it couldn't have been long that they spent dropped in thought, but when Jessie blinked herself back to her surroundings, it felt weird, for nothing to have changed. The sun still warmed her face. The trees still rocked, rustling side to side. And that infernal balloon still loomed, grinning her failure down at her.
Not failure, she corrected. Experience.
Meowth looked worried.
"Uh… You lugs okay?"
"Yes." She turned to James. "James?"
A low, shaky breath, rattling his lungs. He wiped his eyes. The tears didn't feel bad, just inevitable. He couldn't remember feeling more awake.
He smiled, and nodded.
"Although," Jessie mused, turning at the hip to eye Meowth, "I don't know what makes you the lecturer- where was all this wisdom an hour ago?" She hardened her stare. "Hmmm?"
"What am I, a fortune teller?" Meowth waved his paw like she was stupid. "Honestly, you humans! Expectin' Meowth ta know everythin'-"
"You know everything when it suits you!" Jessie protested, but the cat's grin disarmed her in a heartbeat. She was happy to drop it, anyway.
"We should steal something," James said, and found himself under two pairs of eyes before the sentence was up. Jessie smiled, quizzical.
"Steal something?"
"Rob somewhere!" His eyes sparkled with a roguish delight- it suited him, Jessie realised, more than she ever would have guessed. Then again, she really shouldn't have been surprised. You didn't join Team Rocket unless you were at least a bit of a bastard.
"Shouldn't we?" James went on. He folded his arms, pulled them to his stomach to quell his fidgeting. He had so much energy. "Only, if we're going to be the best, we'll need to start somewhere- and if we do get bother about the missing balloon, it might help our case if we have some spoils to bring back…"
Meowth hummed. "Y'know, dat ain't a bad idea."
"Of course we'll have to rest first- make sure Jessie's wrist is okay-"
James flicked his eyes up to hers, static as he waited for her reaction. She caught his excitement just looking at him.
"All right- let's do it!"
James blinked. "Really?"
"Let's find someplace reeeal ritzy and rob them blind," she purred. Wiggling her fingers in front of her, she pictured them dripping with jewels, more gold and silver than skin on her hands. "Let's show them what we're made of."
James laughed, amazed at the reality they were spinning. "Oh, let's!"
"Ooh, an' we gotta say somethin', after our entrance," Meowth encouraged, bouncing back and forth on his hind legs, his injury already forgotten. "Like uhhh, like: 'Make wid da goods an' no one gets hurt!'"
"Ooooooo, that's good," James applauded.
"No it's not!" Jessie admonished, appalled at their apparently nonexistent standards. "Where's the professionalism? Where's the brand?! No, what you want is something like-"
She wet her lips and jabbed a finger forward, eyes sharp as ice as she glared down her imaginary victim. Even in tatters and painted with bruises, she was fierce, and gulped in air before bellowing: "'Everything under this roof is now the property of Team Rocket!'"
Jessie nodded to herself. Yep- she'd have to be the leader, no doubt about it. Meowth wouldn't like it, but he'd fold. At least if he knew what was good for him.
"OOOOOooooOO! Jessie, that was wonderful!"
Meowth didn't look nearly as impressed. "Nah, it's not punchy enough- what about-" He jumped into position, posed with some imaginary gun that looked far too big for him, and he actually mimicked struggling with it as he growled: "Da boss sends his regards!"
"That sounds like we're about to murder them," Jessie said.
"...Dat a bad thing?"
Clasping his hands together, James squealed at his own idea.
"What if it rhymed?"
They hashed it out together, walking as they planned and squabbled and refined each other's words, until the sun was a memory, its shadow cast in moonlight.
Most of the words they had went unspoken. Sentences would string themselves together, daring them to let loose the feelings that snuck beyond hype for their first mission. Thoughts confined to their heads until now wanted out, into the safety of each other's company. Their fear. Their joy. Their love. Everything unacknowledged and so obvious in the air between them.
But all that could come later, and it was hard to want for a better distraction.
They had a motto to write.