Wow, ya'll seem to like it! ::beams happily:: I'm also happy that some of you seem to like this Absol's personality. Yay! I hope you all like the other pokemon… they all have their own special traits… Love ya'll!

Cd for today? Um… Titanic soundtrack. Pretty muusic. -

Disclaimer: I own naught but the names and the plot. Wow… RHYME-AGE!!

Price for Freedom

Chapter Two

And Again

I woke up to the smell of medicine. I could already tell I was in a Pokemon center by the stink of anti-biotics, the feel of the hard, metal table underneath me, and by the sound of Nurse Joy's voice.

"Oh! She's waking up! Shayla! Come here!" Nurse Joy called.

Shayla? Was that the name of my… new trainer? With the repulsive thought in my head, I opened my eyes to see the trainer-girl and the nurse hovering over me, staring. Startled, I let a frightened yelp out of my mouth, and then somehow landed on the floor. I scooted away from the trainer-girl, who was trying to console me.

"Hey, girl, it's okay…" she cooed, holding her gloved hand out for me. I growled and snapped at the offered hand. The girl took back her hand and then looked up at Nurse joy, apparently at a loss.

Nurse Joy looked sympathetic. "You picked a stubborn Absol to capture, Shayla," she said softly. " That Absol's been here a few years, but when she first got here, she was abandoned by her trainer."

Shayla's eyes widened. "What?" she asked in a soft voice. At this, I rolled my eyes. This girl's probably let some pokemon go in a place where they don't know what's what as well. That's what trainers do, I thought callously. They train and keep the strong ones and torture and release the useless ones. There's no escaping it…

But Nurse Joy nodded. "I remember the trainer. He was a stocky boy, with brown hair and blue eyes… and he was always training that Absol. Then, I guess he got fed up with her stubborn attitude and left her out here. He destroyed her poke ball."

Shayla's eyes softened as they turned on me. I expected her to say, "So that's how you could use earthquake," but she didn't. She merely looked at me with such sympathy and pity that it made me want to retch. Her expression almost matched the dragonair's.

Shayla stood up slowly and held out my ultra ball. Then, I was summoned into the red light until my trainer wished me to come back out.

-

The ride in the ultra ball really wasn't all that bad. It wasn't as cramped as I thought it would be, especially compared to a poke ball. By the time the trainer-girl let me back out, it was nighttime again, and the rest of the team was out as well. As soon as I materialized, the trainer-girl put down a bowl of food for me, and then began to talk to me.

"I'm sorry about your trainer, babe," she said softly, while squeezing a few mixed berries onto my food. "I might know how you feel, but I guess that's for later." She smiled at me and then gestured to the rest of her pokemon and said, "I hope you get along with the rest of us. Hope you like the food too." With that, she left me to the other five pokemon and went to the campfire, going to her book and leaving the acquaintances to us.

That surprised me. She was actually considering my feelings? Huh. Strange. I perked my nose to my food, which was wafting soft, mouth-watering fragrances into my face. I could almost taste the pecha berries…

"Are you just going to stare at your food or what?"

I looked up to see Tai the jolteon staring at me with an incredulous look as if I had never seen food before. "Because if you don't want it, I'll take it."

I glared, and turned my attention to the rest of the group. There was the dragonair from earlier, an espeon, a scizor and a charizard. They were all eating their food hungrily, and I looked back down to my own food. Still not sure about it, I called out to the most amiable-looking one, the dragonair named Amburna.

"Oi… Amburna. How's it taste?"

The shimmering dragonair looked up from her bowl and smiled. "Different from yours. She puts different seasonings according to the pokemon. I have cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger in mine. From what I can tell, she put berries in yours."

Tai finished munching on his food, and commented, "Yeah, like she put in mine. So, are you going to eat yours or not? 'Cause if you ain't, I'd gladly like to-"

SMACK!

Tai's plea was abruptly cut off by the charizard's tail pounding him into the ground. "Be kind to the lady!" the fire dragon proclaimed, glowering at the pummeled thunder dog. "You stupid gluttonous pig!"

I chuckled. I was already beginning to like this charizard. The espeon was shaking his head slowly and the dragonair threw a rock at Tai. "Tai," Amburna scolded, "this is no time for that. She's new, and you don't need to make her feel more uncomfortable."

Tai grumbled something incoherent and probably insulting to me in the dirt. I let it roll, and finally decided to eat my food. After my first taste, my mouth watered for more. Damn, this stuff was GOOD!

Since I was stuffing my face full of the food, I didn't notice the espeon come up to me and sit down. Actually, I think he was there for a few minutes before I realized he was sitting beside me. Had he not cleared his throat, I would have never noticed him.

When I lifted my head, he smiled. "I'm sure Tai or Shayla haven't told you our names yet," he offered. Embarrassed, I shook my white head and wiped some crumbs off of my face with my clawed paw. He nodded to the dragonair and said, "From what she tells me, you've already met Amburna." At my nod, he smiled. "She said you fight well… Have you been trained before?"

I was really surprised at how amiable this espeon was being. Usually, psychic types tend to keep away from darklings. Also, it surprised me that even though he was talking about my old trainer, I didn't want to beat him up. He was just… too damn nice. All I did to reply was simply nod.

He smiled again, and nodded to the charizard. "That's Shoko, Shayla's second pokemon. He's helped her win all of her badges, and he -with the exception of Tai- is the only one that came from Kanto with Shayla. All the rest of us came to her in Johto. I myself was a gift to her from her parents when she was traveling around in Johto, and have been with her ever since."

I was amazed at how open he was being with me. I knew that I was the new teammate and all, but even back when I was with my old trainer, none of the pokemon talked to me much, and I had to figure everything out on my own. Why was he…?

Before I had acknowledged that information had sunk in, he was already telling me about Saji, the scizor. Apparently, Saji had been caught as a syther, but Shayla wanted him to be stronger, and after consulting it with him, (to this, my eyes bulged) they decided to get him to evolve. Saji had been with the team for 3 years now, one of the older patrons of the team.

"And I'm Kazu," the espeon said, turning to me. "I've been with the team for two and a half years, and helped win fourteen badges." At this, he beamed and I felt myself smiling. "I'm also Tai's little brother."

"I'm sorry," I replied, looking at Tai, who was now trying to beg some food off of Saji. Apparently, Tai was a little glutton. Kazu merely laughed.

"I am too sometimes," he commented. "Oh, and just so you know, Shayla's probably going to give you a nickname as well. Don't worry," he said at my disgusted expression, "She's good with names. She won't give you a cliché name like 'Midnight' or something. Heck, my nickname means 'number'." He smiled again and went over to his brother, who had just gotten beaten down by the scizor. Again, all I could do was smile…

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

For the day and a half that I had been with Shayla and the others, I had learned that Shayla was quite the confident one.

"AMBURNA! ICE BEAM THAT BIOTCH!!!"

I sat on the sidelines with the other five pokemon as Amburna executed one of the strongest ice beams I had ever seen. The golem didn't stand a chance as the ice beam hit it and he went down for the count. The trainer tsked and returned the defeated golem, trying to figure out what to do next. Suddenly, a smile came to his lips and he sent out his next pokemon.

"This dude doesn't stand a chance," Tai whispered to Saji. "Look at him. He's a shmuck. A good for nothing shmuck! No way he can beat our Amburna."

Saji's face grew grim as a jynx appeared out of the red light from the poke ball. "Really?"

Amburna's eyes widened as the jynx performed an ice beam, hitting the dragonair directly in the abdomen. Shayla yelled something, but my ears didn't catch it. I was just shocked as hell to see Amburna go down like that. Sure, she wasn't fainted, but she was damn close. Apparently, Shayla thought this as well.

"Amburna! Good work! Return!" she called. My comrade went obediently into her poke ball, and Shayla winked at me.

"You up to it, girl?" she asked. It took a while for my brain to process that she was speaking to me. Tai nudged me with his spiny elbow.

"You going or do I have to cover your white ass?" he asked, to which I slapped my tail in response. It was a jynx. I could take a jynx…

I hope…

I trotted out to the battlefield and took up my battle stance. The other trainer, a nerdy-looking boy with bright blonde hair and large, oblong glasses snorted when he took a look at me.

"An absol?!" he cried, laughing in an obnoxious way. "That's a pussy's pokemon! I thought you would send out the scizor, being good against both ice and psychic, but not this wimp's pokemon!" He kept laughing, and I heard Tai cheering for me to kick the little guy's ass. The jynx laughed as well.

"Well dearie," she said, beginning to sway her hips hypnotically, "Have a nice nap…"

"Jynx! Sweet kiss!"

"Absol! Dodge it!!"

The jynx came at me, but way slower than what I'd thought. I got out of the way by running to the left of the pokemon and got to where I faced her back. Automatically, I jumped for the neck and bit.

The jynx screamed, and I think Shayla was taken back. After all, she hadn't told me to use "bite". But all the same, the punk jynx went down and I strode triumphantly over her fainted body back over to my side of the battle field. Unfortunately, the jynx was the last pokemon the punk had.

"Damn… you win…" he said, and reached into his poket for the prize money. Shayla took it and then whispered, "And don't you make fun of my pokemon again, you hear me? Or else, I might be forced to clobber you again."

She walked away from the creep towards us and knelt down in front of me with a slight scowl on her face. She looked me in the eye and said, "Now, babe, I know you're an experienced fighter, and you've been owned before, but you must not act until I tell you. Otherwise, you and the others could get hurt." I couldn't tell if she could read my "whatever" expression but then, her face changed to a bright smile.

"On the bright side, I've found you a nickname!" she exclaimed. At this, the other pokemon gathered toward us and listened closely. Tai asked if it was something befitting to my nature like "super bitch" or "xena: warrior princess," but thankfully, Shoko the charizard took care of him for me. :) Shayla was oblivious to this and brought out a greek mythology book and turned to a certain page.

" 'Demi-cerberus: a two-headed dog that wanders the world in search of victims. It stalks innocents in the shadows, not caring who becomes their prey. They are characterized most as "sadistic, evil and mischevious." They love to pull tricks on others and lead people to their doom by bounding into the woods and leading their victims off of cliffs.' " She looked up from the book and smiled.

"And since you've proven yourself to be a mischevious little thing, I've decided to nickname you 'Demi'. Do you like it?"

I cocked my head to the side. She was asking my opinion? Well…

I gave a shrug of my shoulders, to which she took it as a 'yes'. "Good!" she said happily and put everyone back into their poke balls. "Now that you've got a nickname, we can go to the pokemon center and get Amburna healed."

I went into my ultra ball with no fuss, seeing as how I was still pondering on my nickname. "Demi"… Hmm… Sadistic… evil… mischevious…

Maybe going around with this bunch of psychos wasn't going to be so bad after all.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So how'd you like it? ::pleaful eyes:: I hope you did! I love ya'll!

Ja ne!