Strange Emotions

Chapter Four: Risen and Fallen

Disclaimer: I don't own Pokémon.

"I'll avoid him till the end of time," Dawn muttered, clearly annoyed that a certain boy was following her so much that she was tempted to file a restraining order.

She took a quick glance over her shoulder to see that familiar scarf fluttering in the wind as the boy attempted to keep up behind her. Dawn simply sped up and was determined to get back to her secure, beautiful, comfortable sanctuary (The Official Dictionary of Dawn Speech. Secure, beautiful, comfortable sanctuary: n. The building known as a "home", the usual term used to refer to a person's place of residence, "home" being the term generally used by normal people).

She was almost at Twinleaf Town, just a few steps away from the entrance. A few more steps and she would be safely hidden within her sanctuary where the idiotic boy would never find her.

"Dawn, wait!"

At the call, which was the first thing that the boy had said since he started following her earlier that day, Dawn fled wildly into her sanctuary, refusing to even look at the boy that scared her to death.

She slammed the screen door shut, and then the actual door, making sure to remind herself to add ten more locks to the 90 locks she already had attached to the door as she pulled, clasped, and generally locked all 90 locks in one minute.

Gasping, Dawn slid down the wall of the door and rested briefly.

"Not only did I successfully evade him, I've got a record time for closing all those locks!" said Dawn cheerfully as she clambered back to her feet.

She turned around to peer into the eyehole and jumped back, stifling a possibly very loud scream. A huge, distorted eye had stared back at her.

She fled again, this time to her room, her precious, small, sanctuary-within-a-sanctuary. She locked the 100 locks on that door and collapsed onto her bed.

Only to be shocked by a humongous Water Pulse that smashed into her window.

And the doorbell ringing constantly.

"Dawn, why didn't you get the door?" asked Dawn's mother, speaking through Dawn's thoroughly locked door as she passed Dawn's room, going to get the visitor to let him in.

Dawn moaned as she heard her mother slowly unlocking all 90 locks downstairs and quickly fled into her rather large closet (The Official Dictionary of Dawn Speech. Rather large closet: n. Refers to the area in which Dawn keeps her clothes. Is about the size of a large dinosaur, and takes up most of the house's space. It is also used by Dawn as an emergency escape route that leads into the forest behind her house.).

Dawn quickly pulled open the door that led into her closet, locked the door with the 150 locks attached to it (The reasons for making this door especially locked: 1. It was her closet; her clothes were there. 2. It led to her secret escape route. 3. Her clothes were in there.).

She yanked open one more door that led to her secret passageway and locked that door (surprisingly, this door only had 1 lock; she didn't think that many people would be able to get beyond her other doors) before fleeing down the stairwell and out the last door that led into the forest.

She quickly peered around the edge of her house to see if the boy was there; sure enough, he wasn't. He was probably in the house. Dawn smirked; she wondered if the boy would be able to even think of how sneaky she was when it came to her personal safety.

She slowly crept around to the front entrance of her house, planning on sneaking away to Sandgem Town, where she could hide with Professor Rowan. Smirking again, she straightened up momentarily, wondering how she could be so brilliant.

"…"

Dawn felt an oppressive atmosphere gather around her, centralized on the back of her head. She felt the furious glare of two rather familiar eyes. And by "furious glare", she meant furious.

"Care to explain the meaning of locking up the front door completely, and then locking up your room completely, and then locking up your closet completely, and then locking up your escape route?" asked a scarily calm voice.

Dawn quickly got back into her original crouching position before she stood straight up, wincing.

"Why don't you come back in the house? You've got a visitor, after all," continued the voice, still in that scary, calm tone.

Dawn gulped and slowly turned around (still crouching, somehow), and looked up at the familiar eyes of her mother.

"Um… Hi, Mom!"

Dawn soon found herself thrown onto the sofa to await her "guest" (The Official Dictionary of Dawn Speech. "Guest": n. Used in this context with two quotations around it, the meaning of "guest" is equivalent to that of the word "torturer".)

"Dawn! There you are!

Dawn slowly tilted her head up to look at the familiar boy with the scarf and demon horns.

Sure enough, there he stood.

"DAWN! YOU STILL OWN ME 10 MILLION!" screamed Barry.

"Shut up and go away, because I don't plan on giving up any money to you," sighed Dawn, clapping her hands over her ears to prevent herself from going deaf.

"BUT YOU HAVE TO GIVE UP REWARD MONEY IF I WIN AGAINST YOU IN A BATTLE!"

A crazed look entered the blond boy's eyes.

"I CHALLENGE YOU TO A BATTLE!"

Dawn stood up abruptly.

"Never mind; here," said Dawn, pulling out 10 million Pokédollars and slapping them into Barry's astonished hands.

"Huh?"

Dawn left the house, followed once again by a still surprised Barry.

"You… refuse to battle me?"

"No duh."

"…"

"…"

"Well, at least I got my 10 million!"

"Oh shut uuuuuuuuuuuuuu—Oh crap."

Rounding the familiar road leading into Twinleaf Town was none other… than the boy she kissed. Or rather… the boy that had kissed her.

"Crap, crap, crap, crap!" Dawn whispered, mortified as here heart immediately started to beat faster, sending waves of heat rushing up to her face.

She turned around, and performed an act of desperation, something that she would never do normally, but, hey, desperate times call for desperate measures, right?

She turned around, and kissed Barry…

All Lucas knew was that he had to apologize to Dawn and simply hope for the best. He didn't exactly realize that when he rounded the corner, smirking at his ingenious idea of apologizing, he would find the girl that he was currently in love with slobbering on his other best friend's mouth.

"Uh…"

Lucas turned right back around in a sharp U-turn and left the town.

Dawn removed herself from Barry and turned around.

"Whew," she sighed.

She turned back around to face Barry, only to find a statue of blank expression dressed in Barry's clothes.

"Um… Hello?"

She waved a hand in front of his face.

"WOOT, WOOT!" yelled Barry, leaping into the air. "NOW THAT YOU'VE FINALLY KISSED ME, LET'S GO ON A DATE!"

He grabbed Dawn's arm and pulled her out of the town, ignoring all of her strange, choked protests.

Johanna stepped out of her house after unlocking all of the doors and saw only Barry dragging her daughter away.

In her mind, there were three possibilities: 1. Dawn hadn't paid Barry's fines, and Barry was taking her to jail, 2. Barry was challenging Dawn to a Pokémon battle, and 3. Dawn had done something stupid, and gotten herself into a whole lot of trouble. After thinking for a while, she decided that one of those options was the most likely.

You guessed it.

3.