Chapter 19

Volt hadn't liked the little blond bastard since the moment he had first seen him. There was something that just wasn't plain right about him. Maple had picked up on it, which only served to reassure Volt that something really was wrong with him. It wasn't a look or a smell that tipped him off, but more of an intuition. More importantly, he was starting to understand what it had meant.

The Raichu-boy had taken it upon himself to investigate the kid after his sudden disappearance that morning, something that only Volt took notice of. The subsequent rumors about a blond kid raising hype over Mark's single human Pokémon entry only raised his suspicions. Not that Volt should care, but why the hell would he do something like that?

What bothered him the most wasn't the kid himself, but rather the humans' refusal to recognize that something wasn't quite right. For that fact alone, Volt felt grateful that he was still more Pokémon than human. He needed those senses and the added power that came along with it. Because if this kid intended to harm him or any of his friends, then Volt would end him, no questions asked.

Trusting his instincts to be suspicious of the kid, Volt had spent the entire morning tracking him down. He finally found the kid in the square around mid-morning, right around the time the first match would be starting. Lionel was talking with a few other trainers. Hoping to do some eavesdropping, Volt did his best to blend in with the crowd. A near impossible feat anywhere else, Volt was greatly aided by the ever-present mixture of strange ears and tails.

But he didn't get close enough to hear anything before Lionel turned to leave.

Volt was careful to keep his distance as he followed the boy. He stayed a block or so behind him, blending in with any other pedestrians when possible. This became harder and harder as Lionel moved closer to his destination.

He headed east, back towards the docks and the waterfront. At first Volt was afraid he was following him to the beaches, but when he shifted south, he confirmed that the boy was heading for a stretch of warehouses not that far from the main port. Wherever the kid was going, it was out of the way. Volt was getting lucky.

He had to widen the distance between himself and Lionel. Out here the streets were deserted. The entire waterfront was shut down. The workers that normally populated this area were all off during the busy tourism season the tournament created. If Lionel was hiding something, this would be the best spot on the island to do it.

Suddenly, Lionel hooked a right and was gone from Volt's sight.

Volt sprinted to catch up with him. He threw caution to the wind, afraid that he would lose his target. He told himself that he would be fine. If Lionel caught him, then he could just confront the little bitch with no witnesses around. If he resisted, Volt could either take him on or run. What really mattered was finding out what he was up to.

He hooked a right. It must have been the very same turn that Lionel had made, but somehow the boy was gone. There was nothing down the alleyway besides a flight of concrete steps leading up to the side-door of a warehouse. Nothing unusual or strange about it.

Frustrated, Volt scanned the alley looking for anything suspicious. The only thing he noticed was a single security camera watching the side entrance.

He considered the camera. It wasn't that unusual. Plenty of companies and businesses has security cameras watching their warehouses. Had there been others around? Volt didn't remember seeing any, but that didn't mean they weren't there.

Dammit, Volt thought, all that for nothing.

The trail was gone. There was nothing left to do but start over. Whatever Lionel was doing, Volt wasn't going to find any answers here.

The Raichu-boy turned to leave. But before he did, he shot a Thunderbolt at the camera. Yellow lightning streaked from his body and hit the camera, causing it to explode into a shower of sparks.

Feeling slightly better, Volt left the area.

For some reason, no one else stopped Mark and Maple on their way back to the hotel room. Apparently, a human Pokémon covered with blood was a common sight here. It made Mark wonder what the reaction would be if he screamed bloody murder in the middle of the square. Himitsu Island was getting weirder all the time.

Wiping off the small amount of blood that Mark had gotten on himself wasn't difficult, but Maple's dress had become so soaked with the thick red liquid that it was going to stain no matter what they did. Still, that didn't stop Mark from doing his best to scrub it out by hand while Maple still wore it and nervously sat on the toilet in their hotel bathroom.

"Mark?" Maple's voice squeaked out of her. It was the first word either one of them had spoken since it had happened. But either Mark hadn't heard, or he chose not to respond, because he kept scrubbing away at the bottom of her skirt. The blood stain was the thinnest there, but Mark still made almost no progress.

Maple's dress now had a dull, red tint to it across her chest that streaked down her front to the bottom of her skirt, as well as a few other random blotches around her waist. Mark had managed to clean off most of it, but there had just been so much that avoiding a stain was outright impossible.

"Mark?" Maple tried again, trying to speak a bit louder.

"You should change into a new dress," Mark said without looking up, his voice was expressionless.

"O-okay," Maple nodded. She didn't know what to say. Mark had been distant ever since the fight and he didn't seem to be coming back. Worse, she still couldn't understand what the problem was.

They hadn't done anything wrong. Pokémon battles and human Pokémon battles happened all the time, but Mark never had a reaction like this to a Pokémon battle. The only difference was the blood. Was that it? Was Mark afraid of the blood? Why?

"Mark," Maple tried again, "why are you afraid of the blood?"

Finally, he stopped the pointless scrubbing and looked up at Maple, her big, brown eyes wide with fear. A fear of what he was about to say.

"Maple," he sighed, "I'm not sure if you know this, but making somebody bleed is a bad thing." Maple nodded in response. Of course she knew that, how couldn't she?

"It's bad, because it means you hurt somebody," he hesitated for a brief moment, "you hurt them really, really badly."

"Well, I know, but…" Maple started.

"Maple, please. Let me finish," Mark sighed, "I know things are different here. I know that you're not a Pokémon, anymore. I can accept that. But this isn't a game."

"I know, but…" Maple started. Unexpectedly, she found herself becoming angry at him. She didn't want to be afraid. She couldn't stand it, and he wasn't even giving her a chance to explain. What could she do to make it all better if he wouldn't listen?

"Maple," Mark continued to ignore Maple's interjections, "you can't fight. I won't let you. I'm dropping out of the tournament."

"WHAT?" Maple was on her feet in an instant. Her big, brown eyes grew twice as large as panic spread across her face. She knocked Mark back as stood up, but, somehow, she didn't care. "No…" in the next second, Maple's anger and fear were replaced with despair. She lowered her eyes as she fought back tears, "you can't."

"I don't want you to get hurt," Mark tried to explain, "there's just too much that could go wrong."

"But…" Maple panted as she fought against the panic trying to take over, "but, that's why we're going to see Aurum. So I can get stronger. Right? What if those guys come back? I have to fight them, again, right?"

"Maple," Mark shut his eyes, "please understand. You're not a Leafeon anymore. You're a girl."

"No," Maple shook her head, "I'm both. I can't be one, I have to be both. Please try to understand that. I have to fight. Please, let me."

"I'm sorry," Mark couldn't look at her, if he did, he might change his mind, "but this is for your own good."

"No," Maple whispered, "you're wrong." With tears in her eyes, Maple turned and left.

"Son," Eric's father was trying to be strong, trying not to show the pain and the fear in his voice, but his son knew him too well, "Mommy is…very sick, right now." Eric felt the weight of his father's big, strong hands settle on his shoulders. "Mommy…needs us. She needs us to be strong for her. Can you do that? Do you think you can be strong for Mommy?"

Eric couldn't remember what the hospital looked like. It was just a maze of white shadowed by dark faces. He was too young to see anything clearly. The boy was only five years old and his mother was dying.

His father told him that there was something dark growing inside his mother. Growing always sounded like it was good, before. Growing meant things got bigger. The plants outside grew, animals grew, and even Eric himself grew all of the time. None of that was ever a bad thing. But the dark thing inside his mother…when that grew it was hurting her. It was taking everything away.

The only spot of color he could remember from the hospital was the Mudkip at his side. Eric's father had given it to him the same way some kids might get a puppy. He wasn't supposed to train it, it was just a pet. Still, he cherished his pet because he was the only spot of color in the entire hospital. Everything else was just plain white and black.

He hadn't picked a name, yet. His Mudkip deserved a good name. Whenever his father disappeared, which he did more and more often, it was the Mudkip that helped put a smile on his face. Its smooth skin was always slick, even out of water, and it would slide up and down the hallways on its back to cheer him up. Sometimes he would sit in front of Eric and mimic what the boy did. One day they played a face-making game that lasted for hours. Sometimes the Mudkip would simply nuzzle close to him and that was exactly what Eric needed to be strong like his father wanted. It seemed like the Mudkip was stronger than both of them.

But, no matter how brave Eric and his father were, it couldn't change what was going to happen. Eric's father disappeared for longer and longer times during those last few days.

And when Eric went with his father and saw his mother, it was never who he remembered it was. His mother was a strong, beautiful woman whose smile filled Eric's world with light. The tired woman on the bed, racked with pain…that couldn't be his mother. But, then, she smiled. Then Eric knew that it was his mother, and she would be leaving him soon. Then there would be nothing left but Eric, his father, and his Mudkip.

"Well, come on then," Tsunami growled, "come at me, already!" Tsunami was squaring off against a human Scyther. Tsunami's opponent was bent forward, twirling dual, curved swords in his hands. He wore a close-fitting green shirt and shorts that matched the spiky green hair on top of his head. His translucent wings were spread out across his back.

All in all, he looked like he might snap like a twig. It was a deceptive trait considering that he could get hit by a car traveling 70 mph and be perfectly fine. Frail by human Pokémon standards didn't really mean frail.

Finally, the human Scyther fell for Tsunami's taunt and came at him. Charging forward and slicing with the curved swords, it cut into Tsunami's chest. He easily took the blow without even dodging.

However, it wasn't Tsunami's plan to dodge, and Eric wasn't bothered that he didn't try. Eric's best friend since those dark days in the hospital was always made of tougher stuff than that. A few cuts, even from a human Scyther, wouldn't be enough to take Tsunami down. So, instead of dodging, he focused on an idea that he had, and it had paid off. He now held his opponent's wrist firmly in his right hand.

"Stone Edge," Eric grinned. Maintaining his restrictive grip on the human Scyther's wrist, Tsunami reached down to the pavement at his feet. He produced a sharpened boulder roughly half a yard in diameter. Tsunami smiled at it, gently tossing it up and down a few times, testing its weight.

"Shit," the human Scyther's eyes went wide.

An instant later, Tsunami smashed the boulder directly into the human Scyther's chest. He immediately was sent sprawling onto the pavement, a puddle of blood rapidly forming around his body as he coughed and retched, his body convulsing from the pain.

"Thank you, thank you," Tsunami grinned as he spread his hands in a gesture of mock humility. In his own mind, confetti and streamers fell around him while a crowd chanted his name. However, on the streets of Himitsu Island, such was not the case.

He turned back to look at Eric and Fernelia who were both celebrating in their own way. Eric was jumping up and down cheering while Fernelia smiled and rolled her eyes.

"Not bad, kid," the teenage boy that had owned the human Scyther walked up behind Tsunami to congratulate Eric on his victory, "I guess you really are tough enough to compete in this thing."

"'Course I am," Eric grinned.

"You really are something, kid," the boy said, shaking his head, "how old did you say you were? Ten? You've gotta be the youngest person in this tournament. Where are your parents, anyway?"

"Parents?" Eric didn't quite understand the question, at first. Then he gestured to Tsunami and Fernelia, "these are my parents."

"Uh…right," the boy looked back and forth between the two human Pokémon and Eric, "well, anyways, I guess this tournament's full of weirdos."

"Weirdos?" Tsunami raised an eyebrow and took a step closer to the boy, deciding if he should be offended.

"Well, not weirdos," the boy took a step back after seeing the look in Tsunami's eyes, "I mean, just different really. Like, there's actually somebody competing with one human Pokémon. I mean, who does that? It's not forbidden, but still, you've gotta be crazy to compete with just one."

"What's so weird about that?" Eric asked, "I'd compete with one. That'd be fine with me."

"Really?" the boy was taken aback by Eric's statement, but after a second he decided that he really wouldn't know any better, "well, anyway, he's using a human Leafeon. Pretty easy pickings if you ask me. Well, I should get going. I'll be rooting for you in the tournament, kiddo."

"'Kiddo'?" the word left a bad taste in Eric's mouth, but the trainer was gone before he could properly respond.

"A human Leafeon?" Fernelia reflected, "could that be Mark?"

"The kid from the boat?" Tsunami thought it over, as well, "probably is. I wonder what happened to them after we landed…"

"Yeah, me too," Eric said, "they didn't seem to know a lot about what's going on. I hope they're okay…"

"Hey," Tsunami put his strong hands on Eric's shoulders, the same way his father did, so long ago, "you leave the worrying to us adults. Besides, that girl had this really crazy look in her eye. They'll be fine, trust me." Eric smiled back into Tsunami's strong, kind face and Tsunami felt stronger as well.

"Alright, let's head back to the hotel," Tsunami directed his family, "I'm getting hungry." He didn't mention the dull pain in his chest.

"You just ate an hour ago," Fernelia reminded him.

"Hey," Tsunami rebuked, "fighting works up an appetite. Gotta keep my strength up for the big match."

"Yes, yes, yes," Fernelia smirked. But then her husband stopped, peering ahead of them at something on the horizon. After a moment, Fernelia could make out a girl with Leafeon ears running towards them. Her eyes were shut and she wasn't watching where she was going, but nonetheless she didn't trip or stumble or run into anyone. She was just running as fast as she possibly could, directly west, towards the forest.

By the time the group of three thought to call out to Maple, she was already running past them. She wouldn't have heard even if they had said anything. She was running too fast. Fernelia noticed that most of her dress was no longer the gentle shade of earth-brown it was before. Now, most of Maple's dress was stained red.

AN: not even i saw this plot twist coming. i was in the middle of writing their conversation and saw where it was going and was like "oh, crap...umm...i can work with this." sometimes you just never know where your characters are going to take you.

thanks for reading and see you next week!