Author's Note:
I'm finally back from my half-month-long vacation, and also here to resume my story! Thank you for your patience, dear readers, and enjoy this chapter, as well as the ones to come!
Disclaimer:
Pokémon and any other referential materials found in this story do not belong to me. They belong to their respective owners and subsidiaries, and I claim no ownership of them.
Of Children, Men, and Monsters
Chapter Four: Another Day
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"Hello? Child?"
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"Are you entirely certain that you're channeling this dream to the right person, Cresselia? And that we're even sending this projection to the right dimension, Palkia?"
…
"Oh? She is merely having a particularly deep, dreamless sleep?"
…
"I see… We shall merely have to try again at a later point, then."
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"Even if you cannot hear me, child… Have a restful slumber."
…
Marza woke quickly from her sleep, as if she had just been jolted awake.
'Weird… It almost feels like I'm being watched…'
She propped herself up, glancing out of the window. It revealed to her nothing besides the morning light and the tree in her family's yard. She shrugged, brushing the inexplicable feeling of suspicion aside for the moment as she gently shook Oscura to wake her up. The ruby-eyed alien did so sluggishly and with a seconds-long yawn. Marza felt tempted to "d'aww" like she did when she first saw her unhatched, but once again barely managed a refrain. The little Larvitar glanced up at the human before glancing at the window, revealing to her that it was most certainly morning and thusly time to get up. She merely shook her head sleepily in response to this revelation, closing her eyes and attempting to get back to sleep.
Marza giggled at her antics before denying the Larvitar of her sleep, saying, "Come on, Oscura. It's morning; time to get up!"
The green-skinned tyke merely grumbled adorably.
Marza was promptly left with little choice but to be swayed by her unintentional cuteness.
She left the room quickly and quietly, heading off to the bathroom to do her typical morning business. Nearly half an hour later, and she was back in her room, getting her stuff together and packed into her primarily magenta backpack. Oscura was still sleeping, or at least pretending to do so to avoid getting up.
'Well, she is just a child. An alien one that knows way, way more than is should for its age, plus being too cute to be real, but still certainly a child.'
She went downstairs to ingest her breakfast, and once that was over with, she went outside to grab some more stones from the pool of the things lining the perimeter of the house. Julius and Erise didn't confront her this time, as they had to leave to work early on that particular day. Once she got back in her room, she looked on at the Larvitar, who was evidently still asleep. Marza knew it'd likely be pointless, yet she spoke anyway:
"Well, I guess I'll let you sleep in for now. I'll be back at around the same time as yesterday, so hang tight and don't get spotted by my parents if they get home before me; try studying up with those letters if you get bored."
The girl then proceeded to exit her living space, then out of the house, being mindful of closing the door on her way out.
One of the more notorious incidents of her younger years involved her accidentally leaving the door open on her way to the curb for the bus; it was the last day of that school year, so she was rather eager to get her education over with for that moment. As both her mother and father were absent from the house for their respective day-jobs, the door was left open for several hours straight, letting a considerable quantity of hot, pre-summer air into the house.
Nothing in the refrigerator or even the freezer survived those hours of heated air, what with them being more than a dozen years old. Julius and Erise were understandably frustrated at discovering the large amounts of spoiled food and the massive puddle of water surrounding the combination freezer-refrigerator. Needless to say, but Marza was lucky to only get off with a harsh scolding and a few days of being grounded in her room, as well as a reminder to always close doors on her way out of places, be they of rooms or buildings.
Once she heard the house's entrance/exit door open and close, Oscura couldn't help but giggle mischievously. It hadn't really served any purpose, but her little act had managed to fool the human! The Larvitar felt a tad guilty for deceiving her like that, but it was really of no importance in the long run. The ruby-eyed, alien child put a stubby limb to her chin once she came down from her humor high.
'What to do now…?'
Her seven-ish hours of school for the day over and done with, Marza returned home on the bus, as she did nearly every other day of the school year.
'Good thing there's only a week and a half of school left. I don't really know if I can keep Oscura occupied like this for any longer than that…' She glanced down at the homework on her lap. The incessant chatter from the other kids on the bus in combination with the constant bumps in the road made it difficult to focus on finishing the assignment in front of her, but she would get it done. She promised herself that, for the sake of keeping the alien in her room entertained, and subsequently keeping her secret safe, at least for the time being.
'… Now that I think about it that way, it's almost as if I'm re-enacting that one movie… Oh, what was it called again…? I.T.? I.Q.? Something like that… And I really need to finish this thing up already. Stop getting me off track, brain!'
She managed to get her work done a mere minute and a half before the bus came to a stop at her house. Heaving a sigh of relief as the noise contained in the yellow vehicle rolled along and away (as having better hearing than average wasn't always a good thing), she opened the door, being greeted by her father.
"How was your school day, honey?" he inquired from the table, brows raised.
"Just fi–" She halted herself, remembering what her parents had requested of her two days prior to this moment. "It went decently enough, I suppose."
Marza's parents grinned at her response.
"Now, was that so hard, Marza?" spoke Erise, thoroughly amused and pleased at this.
"No, it wasn't," grumbled the lass as she headed into her room. "Oh, and before you go into your room, Marza? I've been hearing some odd noises in there while you were gone. Is there anything I should be concerned about up there? A new pet of yours, maybe? Because you know we don't allow animals in the house."
Marza was glad she was already facing her door; her parents couldn't see her nervous face as a result.
"Oh, nothing of importance, Mom. It's not a pet, and it's nothing you need to worry about," she lied, voice perfectly even, feeling a twinge of guilt in her chest.
'It's not technically a lie, at least; Oscura in no animal, and they really don't need to worry because I've been taking good care of her,' she re-assured herself.
"Well, if you feel so, honey," Erise said back, a knowing edge in her tone.
"And indeed I do, Mom," retorted Marza as she entered the room and shut her door. Erise leaned over into her spouse's ear after a minute of silence, whispering to him, "I'm going to take a peek into her room tomorrow, before she gets home from school. You want to come with?"
"Oh, Erise… So devious of you. Well, if it's to figure out what is going on in her room, then I suppose that I shall," he agreed, half-serious, half-joking. The two laughed for a second, one gently and one slightly over-exaggerated…
The relatively young human was greeted with an odd sight upon entering her room; Oscura was positioned on top of a stack of books, which were, themselves, on top of her computer chair. If the monitor was anything to go by, the Larvitar was apparently attempting to navigate the Internet. She saw that the alien wasn't exactly haven't having any real amount of success, what with the screen displaying a page with the sentence "Webpage not available!" on it.
"Oscura, are you attempting to use my computer?" inquired the human girl, equal parts exasperated and fascinated. The Rock Skin Pokémon turned around to face her, startled.
"… Were you really so into that you didn't even hear the door opening and closing?"
The Larvitar let out an indignant "Larvi!" at her jab, cheeks becoming a tad reddened. Marza giggled for a second at this before getting serious.
"Did you practice the alphabet and English?" Oscura nodded twice.
"Well, now that I think about it, it'd be pretty obvious that you'd get bored of just the alphabet after a while…" Marza nodded, herself.
"Okay, so I'll teach you how to use this thing –" she pointed at her personal computer – "because I know that learning gets boring, and fast, even if it's healthy and productive." She gently picked Oscura off of the pile of books, setting those down on the floor next to her after she did the same to the little alien. Picking her up again after that and putting the Rock Skin Pokémon on her lap, she said,
"It's definitely a bit complicated, but to use the PC, you've first got to master the controls of the keyboard and mouse…"
A number of hours passed, with Marza educating the alien on how the correctly use the PC and its add-ons, only being interrupted by the human's need to eat supper and grab some more rocks and water for her (potentially indefinite) guest, and before either of them knew it, it was once again time to rest up for tomorrow. The undeniably odd pair tucked themselves in after shutting the PC down, and were gone to Dreamland not ten minutes later…
…
"Is she going to be sleeping deeply again?"
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"Hmm. Best make this conversation swift, then…"
…
