Hello! Sorry some of you got confused over the whole Kaiyou thing- let me explain. Yes, Team Magma revived (key word) Kaiyou, but he retained his memories, and those that didn't come back to him immediately came after a while. Team Magma didn't CREATE him, just REVIVED him. Does that make sense?
Ugh! I hate whatever sickness I have!
Disclaimer: been the same, staying the same.
Price for Freedom
Chapter 15
Illauna
I was dreaming. I had to be. Otherwise, I wouldn't be seeing Kaiyou roaming around in his true form with Yasille by his side. Again, he looked rather young. If he were in his human form, I would guess that he would look sixteen or seventeen, not in his mid-twenties. The siblings looked tense. They were in front of the Black Tomb. Though, as I looked at it, it wasn't as… sinister as before. I took a closer look and saw a welcoming face on the statue. I blinked. Was it like that before Buganti was killed? I looked towards the two siblings and saw Kaiyou making his way to the statue. I followed, allowing my feet to take me where they wanted.
Instead of going through the door of the Tomb, they went around to an underground entrance. I followed slowly behind them, curious. Kaiyou began calling in the dark, dank tunnel we were traveling through. He sounded distressed.
(Buganti! Buganti, where are you?) he called. I listened, and heard no answer. Kaiyou called again, and Yasille shook her head helplessly.
-My premonition was right- she declared in pain. -Lord, they killed him! They murdered him- Kaiyou turned and snarled at her.
(No! I won't believe it! I won't believe it until I see his bloody corpse! To Hell with your premonition, I'm going to find him!) He ran off into the darkness of the tunnel, and Yasille objected.
-You can't! You'll kill innocents! Kaiyou- Yasille cried, but Kaiyou paid no heed to his sister.
I found myself running alongside Kaiyou. I looked up and saw his distressed face and smelt panic mingled into his scent. I fell behind a bit, and then my eyes were greeted with the light glow of fired torches. Were in a large, circular cavern, with strange-looking characters carved into the floor. I imagined they were some kind of chant that went along with Buganti, like the one that went with Kuvai. In the middle of the room was what I guessed was Buganti, except I couldn't really tell. All I knew was that it was huge, bloody and decapitated. It had spears, knives, any kind of pointy object sticking out of it. A pool of bright red blood had formed around it, and I nearly retched at the stench. Oh yes, whatever this thing was, was dead.
Kaiyou took a small step towards the hulking dead thing. (Buganti…) he whispered. Yasille arrived to his other side, and took a step back.
-Oh, no… We're too late…- she whispered, and then plopped down on the floor. She shook her head, and then kept whispering 'we're too late' over and over again. Kaiyou nuzzled his sister, and then discovered something.
I noticed them, too. Small, bloody, human-like footprints made a trail around the dead creature and led out of the cavern to another tunnel nearby. I looked at Kaiyou and saw his fur raise and his teeth bare.
(They killed him…) he said softly, (The villagers… They're the ones that killed him! The bastards -THEY KILLED HIM!) He let out a bestial roar and then ran around his friend's corpse and down the tunnel. Yasille cried for him to stop, but he didn't listen. I found myself following him down the tunnel. It opened up into another huge cavern, this one much bigger than Buganti's lair, and I saw a little city beneath me. There were people gathered in what looked like the town-square, dancing around what looked like Buganti's head on a pike, which was above a huge bonfire.
Kaiyou roared to make himself known. His howl echoed throughout the cavern, and the music and dancing stopped abruptly. From far below, I heard an old woman's voice cry, "It's the Great Black Wolf! I told you he would come if you killed the beast-god! Now he's the one that will kill us all!" She ran from outside of the town-square to an altar below where Kaiyou and I were standing.
"Please, Great Black Wolf, do not destroy this village! I know you are consumed by hate, but please! They know not what they do! They are fools! Ignorant fools! Please, spare them your wrath!"
Kaiyou snarled down at her. (SILENCE!) he barked, (I don't want to hear you speak! Pray that I leave you something to live in, old crone! These traitors will PAY for their insolent crimes! I'll kill them! I'll kill every last ONE!) With that, he howled and then dove down to the city's level and began destroying anything that came within range of his jaws. Many tried to defend themselves against the Dark Legendary, but none prevailed. Kaiyou threw mixtures of sediment and human being into the walls of the cavern, he fed the fire with human flesh, and, to make sure no traitor left, he used a psychic wave throughout the entire cavern, destroying everything in its path. The old woman who had pled with him was still on the altar, shaking. Kaiyou turned to her, panting.
The old woman began to wail in such a sad voice, I myself almost cried. Her voice was the single sound throughout the cavern, and it echoed into the other walls of the cave, almost making it stronger. Kaiyou's hindquarters buckled beneath him and he fell to the destroyed floor adjacent to the bonfire. He looked up and saw Buganti's huge head upon the pike, and sighed. He picked himself up, took the pike with his teeth, and softly put it on the floor away from the fire. Yasille then arrived beside me, and she began to softly weep.
-Kaiyou… How could you…- she asked softly of her brother. Kaiyou didn't answer. Instead, he picked the pike up again, and half carried it, half dragged it to the ledge Yasille and I were standing on. When he arrived at the altar the woman was standing on, he paused, and then put the pike down. He then leaned a little closer to the old woman.
She recoiled away from him. "No… I had nothing to do with it! Please, don't kill me! I didn't want Buganti killed! He was a good caretaker! I don't know why they believed the rogue!" She was weeping uncontrollably now. Tears were streaming down her face like rainfall. "Please! Please… I didn't… I didn't…"
Kaiyou didn't make a move. (What rogue…?) he asked softly. This seemed to reassure the woman a bit, and her body relaxed by a hair.
"A rogue came to our city not two days ago -while you were still away. I don't know his name… he never told us. All he kept on saying was that Buganti was evil -that we had to kill him as soon as possible before he killed us while we slept. I tried to tell them 'No! He's been good to us for as long as this city's been alive! He wouldn't do that!' They didn't listen… They didn't listen! Then, last night, they moved and struck! They killed him as he slept -they knew not much could wake him up if they were quiet enough. Then, they killed him and the rogue disappeared after they killed Buganti. I'm so sorry! I'm so sorry…"
Kaiyou blinked and then picked up the pike again. (I'm sorry too… Please, for your own sake, get out of here. There's nothing for you here now. I've made sure of that.) he said bitterly, and then hopped up the ledge, leaving the old woman to decide what to do with herself.
I assumed time passed, because now I was in Buganti's lair with Yasille at my right side and Kaiyou at my left. Ho-Oh, in all his glory and magnificence, stood before me looking perturbed.
:Tell me, Darkling: he said in slight disgust, :Why should I revive him? Many pokemon are murdered by their trainers every day -should I revive them as well? I cannot treat anyone with special treatment in death. That would upset the balance, as you of all people should know.:
(Ho-Oh,) Kaiyou said wearily, ( I know this, as you say. But… I know that it wasn't the right time. It wasn't his time to die!)
:And how do you know this: the phoenix Legendary asked with a sneer in his telepathic voice. :Did your sister see it in one of her "visions": Kaiyou snarled at the comment.
(How dare you mock her!) Kaiyou cried. (One of her "visions" is what led me here to find him dead!)
Ho-Oh looked down at Kaiyou. :I would be careful if I were you, Darkling. You are asking for my help, and it would not be wise to anger or insult me.:
Kaiyou snarled. (I am not trying to do so. I plead, I beg of you to be good enough to revive him. It was not his time to die!)
Ho-Oh tossed his head. :And who are you to judge this? Are you the deity that decides when every pokemon and human dies:
Yasille growled, which surprised me. -Don't mock my brother! If I recall correctly, my brother helped you win a battle against Moltres! If not for him, you would have lost many worshippers that day, and would have been humiliated by Moltres. Do you wish that to happen again-
Kaiyou's eyebrows raised and Ho-Oh growled. :Fine, I'll revive the beast. Move over so I can do my work.:
Ho-Oh scooted near the corpse of Buganti and began to glow red. The decapitated head reattached itself to its body, and the eyes opened. I retreated from the living corpse, but Kaiyou took a step forward.
(Buganti? Buganti?) he called. The beast blinked its pasty eyes, and lifted its head. Ho-Oh stopped glowing and took a step back to examine his work. Yasille's eyes grew wide and she began to shake her head.
-No! This isn't right! Something's wrong! Something's wrong- she cried. Kaiyou looked back at her, confused.
(Yasille, What are you talking about?) Yasille was about to reply, but Buganti interrupted her.
"Kai…you…" the great beast whispered. Kaiyou looked to his revived friend in hope, but Yasille took another fearful step back. Buganti saw her, and his alligator-like face broke into a smile. "Yasille! How I have longed to see you!" He began to walk towards her, but then he caught a glimpse of the tunnel to the destroyed underground city. His eyes flashed red for an instant. My own eyes widened. The red eyes he had right then were in my other dream.
"The… city…" he whispered. Kaiyou suddenly found the danger in Buganti's awakening, and he put himself between the un-dead beast and the ruined city.
(Buganti, my friend, you can't look at it! It'll-)
Buganti swung himself around and slammed his two twin tails against Kaiyou's body, which sent the Dark Legendary into a cavern wall. Yasille ran to her brother, and she looked fearfully to Buganti. The beast roared and then began to speak in a strange language in rage. Kaiyou looked to his friend in horror. (Buganti, stop!) he cried.
Buganti didn't listen. Instead, his body began to flinch and was ravaged by convulsions. Ho-Oh flew back from the beast, and then shouted in hate, :You see what you have wished for? Your "friend" is consumed by hate! He cannot return to his earthly form:
I looked back from Ho-Oh to Buganti, who collapsed to the floor. I then saw a shadowy figure rise up from Buganti's back, and Yasille hid behind her brother. The shadowy figure then took a semi-solid form and glanced around the room with his malicious red eyes.
And then he looked straight at me. I forgot about the rest of his shadowy figure and stared in horror at his eyes, which bore into me. Then, I was back in the murky ocean and then the claws grabbed me again.
I screamed.
-
It was the next day and we had gotten out of the wilderness and into civilization. We were now strolling about Mauville City, and then something made me a tad nervous.
We had heard on some passerby's radio that the media had caught wind of Kaiyou's existence and apparently, practically every trainer wanted to catch him. The said Legendary was walking along with us in his human form. Some trainers were somewhat smart and kept their dark pokemon out to try and fish out the Dark Legendary. However, Kaiyou was confident in the fact that the trainers weren't as smart as to suspect a human of being a pokemon, and Shayla had to agree with him. So, instead of being safe in his ultra ball, he was strolling about in the open with the rest of us.
Many dark pokemon noticed us as we walked into town and almost tackled Kaiyou out of sheer joy. I thanked the other Legendaries that most of them were on leashes. However, one houndoom got away from his trainer and began to lick Kaiyou like the Dark Legendary was made of peanut butter.
"Gah!" Kaiyou sputtered out as the houndoom licked his face and neck. I saw a trainer -a "cool" trainer from the looks of it, run up and returned the houndoom to his poke ball.
"I'm sorry, man," the boy apologized. He took Kaiyou's hand and pulled the Legendary up. "I don't know what got into him! Are you all right?"
Kaiyou nodded. "Yes, I'm fine. Don't worry about what happened, it happens all the time. I'm used to it by now." The two shook hands and then we went about our way, leaving the trainer in utter confusion about what happened. Tai snickered.
"Man, these guys really ARE stupid!" he whispered to me in delight. "Here Kaiyou is, standing right out in the open, and the pokemon recognize him, but none of the humans have the wits to see what their pokemon see!" He laughed. "This is great!"
Kaiyou wiped his face with the back of his sleeve. "For you maybe," he said in a hushed tone. "But this is insane for me. I hope nothing big tries to greet me, like a tyranitar."
Tai laughed. "Oh MAN! That would be funny as hell. I wonder what it would do first, tackle you down and lick you or give you a bear hug?"
Kaiyou shuddered. "Don't even talk like that…"
We found an open-air restaurant and sat down. Kaiyou ordered some chesto and pecha berry pie (to which I drooled) and Shayla and he began to talk.
"Um…" Shayla tapped Kaiyou's arm. "I don't think I can call you by your real name," she whispered. "What should I call you?"
He thought. "Lord and Master of the Universe," he replied with a straight face.
Shayla's face fell. "Seriously."
Kaiyou sighed. "Oh, fine. Be that way. Call me… Ishmael."
Shayla rolled her eyes and sat back in her chair. "Why do you have to be like this?"
Kaiyou cocked his head innocently. "Why, be like what?"
Shayla didn't really respond. She just sighed deeply and then put her hand over her eyes. I supposed she wasn't quite ready for the real Kaiyou.
Kaiyou smiled triumphantly and relaxed into his own chair. I began to smile myself- it was good to see Kaiyou relax like this. From what I experienced for the last two nights, he really couldn't afford to. Not with the Black Tomb to guard. And to think he had to watch a friend of his turn into a hideous, blood thirsty monster… I turned to my other comrades and tried to imagine the same thing happen to them. I couldn't.
Suddenly, a sneasel jumped up from out of nowhere and clamped onto the back of Kaiyou's head. At first, Kaiyou didn't seem to notice. And then, after a few seconds, he tentatively put a hand to the back of his head to feel the sneasel. When his hand touched the sneasel, she happily licked Kaiyou's hand, which gave the Dark Legendary a start.
"There's a sneasel growing out of the back of your head," Tai commented. Kaiyou gave the jolteon a stale look and then pulled the sneasel off of the back of his head and looked at her.
The sneasel chirped in delight, somehow escaped from Kaiyou's grasp, and then attached herself to Kaiyou's lower torso. The Dark Legendary looked at her in question, and then I began to feel rumbling vibrations in the ground.
In question, I looked around and saw what looked like a mountain heading toward us. "Oh, shit," Tai muttered, and Kaiyou looked down at him in question. Tai merely pointed to the rushing mound of rocky mass, and Kaiyou's eyes got really wide.
The tyranitar put his arms around Kaiyou and lifted the Dark Legendary up in joy. Kaiyou coughed weakly and tried to struggle out of the tyranitar's grip, but to no avail. Tai was rolling on the ground, laughing his spiky yellow head off.
I assumed Kaiyou was trying to threaten Tai, but the tyranitar's Vulcan Death Grip was cutting off the Dark Legendary's air supply. I began to laugh myself, and Kaiyou glared down at me. Of course, that only made me laugh harder since his face was getting so blue.
"Gruzog!" I turned to the sound of the feminine voice and saw a girl run up to us. She had semi-long black hair, which she wore down, and had on a black leather jacket, black jeans and a black undershirt. I mentally guessed what her favorite color was.
She put her hands on the tyranitar's rocky side. "Gruzog, put him down! You'll suffocate him!" The tyranitar, Gruzog, a little surprised by the news, looked down at his catch and stared at Kaiyou's purple face. Gruzog immediately let him go, to which the Dark Legendary collapsed to the concrete. The girl began to ramble an apology as Kaiyou remembered how to breathe.
"Oh my Gosh, I am just so sorry! He's never done anything like this! I mean, sure, he's gentle, but he's never bear-hugged a complete stranger before! I don't know what's gotten into him! And Segalla too! She's usually shy towards strangers…" I looked up at her and saw a blank expression on her face. She was staring at Kaiyou. My heart quickened. Did she figure it out? my mind asked frantically. I followed the direction of her stare and saw that she was looking at the black symbol on his forehead that was slightly revealed through a gap in his black bangs.
Her expression went from blank to suspicious. "What's that on your forehead, sir?"
Kaiyou looked up and pointed to his forehead. "Oh, this? A tattoo I got while I had too much sake in my blood," he said coolly. He got off of the ground and then sat back down in his chair. "Though, I don't see why it concerns you, miss. It's a bit rude to ask things like that."
Her face changed again, from suspicious to apologetic. "Oh, forgive me! I'm sorry!" She bowed, and then looked back up. "May I… know your names?"
Shayla spoke first. "Of course. I'm Shayla, the jolteon is Tai," Tai jumped in the air excitedly, "the absol is Demi," I nodded my head, "the charizard is Shoko," Shoko happily growled, "the dragonair is Amburna," Amburna waved with her tail, "and the man in front of you is K… Ishmael."
The girl nodded. "My name is Illauna. Pleasure to meet you all. The tyranitar is Gruzog, and the sneasel is Segalla. Though, I have to wonder, what kind of trainer are you, Ishmael, to attract the attention of my Dark pokemon when we were so far away?"
Kaiyou smiled. "I'm a Dark trainer, and I guess I have a… an aura that Dark Pokemon like."
Illauna cocked her head. "Is that so? My pokemon have been around hundreds of Dark trainers, and they never acted like this. Why now, for you?"
Kaiyou shrugged. "I'm special."
Then, I saw something catch Kaiyou's eyes. I followed his stare and saw that he was looking at Illauna's waist, where her other poke balls were. I saw his eyebrow lift and say, "Illauna, tell me… what other pokemon do you have with you? And how, exactly, did you get them?" He looked up at her with a well-hidden menacing expression.
She didn't retreat. "Well, I will tell you, Kaiyou, when you tell me how you're pulling off an illusion like this."
I gasped. She figured it out! I looked to Kaiyou, who's expression didn't change. Instead of freaking out like the rest of us were, he merely smiled. "Very good. There is some hope for the human race after all. I will tell you how I'm 'pulling off this illusion' as you proclaim, when you tell me how you captured Raikou and Articuno." He lifted his head and then sniffed. "I also smell Regice and Moltres on you. Have you come here for the other Hoenn Legendaries? Perhaps to complete your collection?"
Illauna's eyebrow lifted and Shayla cleared her throat. "Not to ruin the mood, but I think we should discuss this in a more… private place. I doubt either of you would want any of this information to leak."
They nodded. Kaiyou got up and lead the way into the nearby route to Verdanturf town, but before he did, I saw a glare in his eyes directed towards Illauna.
-
"Alright girl, spill it," Kaiyou demanded harshly as soon as we were in the privacy of the forest. "How the hell did you capture Raikou, Articuno and the others? Raikou especially. Previously, I had highly doubted that there was a competent enough trainer that could actually catch one Legendary, much less four."
Illauna looked up at him innocently. "I would think you would have known. I am Illauna. I've made a pact with the Legendaries: if I can capture them, I trainer them until they're at their highest potential and then release them back into the wild. What I get in return is info for my Pokedex and the chance to actually train the Legendaries." She took a sip of water from a water bottle. "This is to make sure they can't be captured again. I would have thought the others would have informed you."
He raised the corner of his lip in a very wolfish manner. "I've been dead for 3500 years -I haven't caught up with everything yet, apparently."
She looked at him coolly. "I know. I've read your legends. How you were protecting the Black Tomb until a group of humans ambushed you."
Kaiyou glared. "Where, exactly, did you find this?"
She smiled. "A library, of course. When I came here to find the Tomb, I found an old man saying that he knew about a long-gone Legendary. No one but me really paid attention to him, and then he told me about a book I could find about you and Kuvai, called The Black Book of the Tomb. I read it, and then, right after that, I heard rumors that Team Magma had used a dead Legendary's DNA to create a beast that would awaken Groudon."
Kaiyou glared and then turned away while muttering something about stupid, senile old men ruining everything. Shayla turned to Illauna in question. "What are you talking about? Who's Kuvai? What's the Black Tomb? Kaiyou was dead? I don't understand."
Illauna's eyebrow raised and she faced Kaiyou's back. "You haven't told her? Have you told anyone?"
He glared over his shoulder. "The absol, because she… she got involved. As for the others, I saw no reason to divulge my entire life story to them, so I kept my mouth shut. And you would do good to do that as well, trainer, lest you would like to share my own nightmares like the absol to your left."
She blinked and looked at me. "Are they really so terrible?"
I looked at her and then to Kaiyou. He glanced at me, and then walked over to the trunk of a tree. I felt caught in the middle, so I decided to not say anything at all. As I looked away from Illauna, I saw Tai looking at me with a strange face.
I saw Shayla shake her head. "No, Kaiyou didn't tell me, and niether did Demi." She sighed. "I guess they both have right to not tell me -it is their choice, and I don't want to know everything that each of my pokemon has done." She shook her head again. "But let's get off that subject! Illauna, where did you come from? What's your hometown?"
Illauna replied something, but I didn't listen. All of the sudden, I was feeling slightly ill, so I decided to walk around or sit under a nice, shady tree. I got up and searched for a while, well away from the group. I found a wonderful tree -beds of clover grew under it, so it was comfy to sit on. The tree itself was huge -the branches were enormous and the shade could probably cover three or four houses. I sat near the trunk, and then I smelled Tai near me.
I looked over my shoulder to see him standing there, the same strange expression on his face. It looked like… betrayal and worry mushed together. I sighed and then put my weary head on my paws. To be honest, I didn't want to talk to him that much. But, not really wanting to tell him that, I asked, "What is it, Tai?"
I heard his footprints come closer to me. "So… you knew about Kaiyou's past? You know what had happened to him?"
I blinked and stared at my black claws. "Yes. Why do you ask?"
I looked over my shoulder to see his reaction. He shrugged a bit, and then replied softly, "I… thought you would have told us if you knew anything. To tell you the truth, I didn't really know about this Kaiyou guy. From the moment I saw him, I didn't really like him, since he looks so much like a damned mutated umbreon."
I rolled my eyes and let my head fall to my paws. "Not this again."
He sighed and lay down beside me. "I'm not going to go into it, and I don't really want to argue with you."
I looked at him. "Then… what do you want? There must be a reason you followed me all the way here."
He looked at me as if the answer was obvious. "I want to know why you didn't tell me about your dreams. I really was scared when you screamed so terribly that one night," he said. "You're Xena -you're not supposed to scream unless it's a battle cry."
For some reason, I felt guilty. Why hadn't I told him? Because I didn't know how, or what his reaction would be. I thought rationally. I had also wanted to know everything before I divulged information about a topic that I didn't know very well. I sighed and put my head on my paws. "Sorry I worried you. But I'm fine now, really."
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Tai's eyebrow cock. "Really? You woke me up again last night because you kicked me in my side. You didn't scream, but you looked like you were in trouble." He leaned closer to my face. "What, exactly, are these dreams of yours about?"
I retreated a bit from him. Being that close made me nervous. "About Kaiyou. They're his dreams, after all. They're… they're mostly his memories -before he died."
His cocked eyebrow inclined more. " 'Mostly'? Then what's the other stuff about?"
The red eyes flashed before me, and I started a bit. I shook my head vigorously. I couldn't talk about Kuvai -I couldn't. I knew that if I did, my walls would break and I would collapse. I couldn't do that, especially in front of Tai. I couldn't lose myself in that horrible dream in front of him. "I… I can't," I said weakly. I let my face fall into the slight darkness between my forelegs. "I can't," I muttered again. I felt pitiful.
I felt Tai's paw on my leg. "Come on, Demi. It's okay, you can tell me. I won't tell a soul."
I shook my head again while keeping my face in between my forelegs. I saw the red eyes again, and then felt the thing's repulsive hot breath against my fur. I shuddered. "No," I muttered, "you don't understand. I can't tell you because… Because…"
"Because… you're too afraid of it?" Tai asked. "You believe that talking about it will make it… come… true?"
I blinked. That wasn't really it, but it was a small part. I didn't do anything to respond him, so he took my silence for a 'yes'.
"Demi… Ayako," he corrected himself, "it's all right to tell me. I promise, I'll make sure that whatever it is that's haunting you in your dreams, I'll protect you from it." I looked up at him, astonished that he wasn't trying to irritate me or make fun of me. He smiled back at me with his goofy-looking grin. "Now, will you please tell me?"
I sighed and looked at him. He was looking me straight in the eye, wearing an "I'm-ready-for-anything" expression. I felt that he needed to know -after all, he was going through all of this trouble to try and console me, something he didn't need to do at all. My eyes fell from his face and I stared at the base of the tree in front of me and began to talk.
I started with Kaiyou's memories. After all, they weren't as bad as what always seemed to happen afterwards. I guess Tai listened intently, because he didn't move an inch as I talked. I talked about him being murdered by the humans, and about Yasille and the Tomb. I told him about Buganti and how he was decapitated by the very humans he protected and how Kaiyou destroyed them all. I spoke of Ho-Oh and how he revived Buganti, only to have the great beast turn into that shadowy figure named Kuvai.
Then, I began to talk about the smothering, suffocating, murky ocean and the red eyes. I felt myself begin to shudder. The dream then took a hold on me, and I was there again, except I was still narrating. I saw the eyes and teeth, felt his hot breath on my fur. To this day, I still have no idea what I said when I spoke about that part of my dreams. Tai never repeated them to me.
I felt my voice raise as the thing's claws dug into my flesh, and the thing's illuminated eyes and teeth drew closer to me. But, I didn't scream, and then the vision vanished. I blinked and began to pant harshly, as if I had really been suffocated somehow. I didn't look at Tai. I couldn't. We sat there for what seemed like forever when he made the first move.
Slowly, he leaned down and looked at me. I kept my gaze toward the tree. "Ayako," he said softly, "It's all right. You're not dreaming now. I'm here with you, under this tree. And, should you have anymore dreams like… the one you just told me, you can always come to me now." He cocked his head slightly and brushed his right front paw against my cheek. "So no more tears or secrets, okay?"
Tears? I was…crying? I looked at his now wet paw, and I then discovered that my whole face was stained with them, including the tops of my legs. I gave a slight start and started to frantically dry them off, but Tai's paw held down one of my own.
"Ayako, it's all right," he repeated soothingly. For the first time in a while, I looked him in the face. "It's all right to cry about something like that. Hell, I would be bawling like a baby for weeks." I gave a slight tear-choked chuckle. He smiled and then lay down and then said, "You know, I had a really weird dream once."
I was caught a little off-guard by his statement. "Yeah…?" I asked, to which he smiled.
"Yup," he replied happily. "It was when I was really young, when I had just evolved into a jolteon. Everyone was still unevolved, except me of course. I had just eaten a huge sandwich packed with all of this foreign food in it -'Mexican' I think Shayla called it, and in my dream, there were all of these dancing foods!"
The red eyes in my mind were replaced by dancing fajitas and enchiladas. "Really?" I asked without much conviction, but he just nodded enthusiastically.
"Well, I was in a jail made of tacos because I had eaten a member of the High Council, and I was about to go on trial. Well, I was hungry so I ate my way through the jail, and then munched on a few burrito-security guards. Kazu then showed up and he told me that two big guards were heading my way -they were these huge chili-covered chimichungas. I ate one, but I was so full, I couldn't eat the other. So Kazu, since I was so huge by this time, rolled me around like the boulder from that one movie…" He paused to think of the name. " 'Raiders of the Lost Ark!' That was it!"
He kept talking, but I really didn't pay attention. I merely stared at him graciously. I wasn't stupid -I knew he was trying to cheer me up. When he finished, he suggested we go back to camp. I shook my head and told him I would like to stay at the tree trunk a bit longer. He shrugged and then began to trot off, but I stopped him for a moment.
"Tai!" I called. He looked over his shoulder. I smiled. "Thank you…"
At first, I don't think he knew why I was thanking him. Then, his face broke out into a smile and then replied with a casual "Anytime, Xena". He then began to strut off to the beat of the tune he was whistling, The Andy Griffith Show.
To this day, I can't recall a glimmer of a nightmare from that night. All I remember from that night's dreams was helping Tai escape the chimichunga guard with Kazu at my side.
-
Bleh… I'm sick… :hack:cough: My throat's so sore… It really hurts when I cough, or even try to speak. I think I'm addicted to cough drops now that I've had so freaking many.
Lord, I hope this gets past me soon. Even my band directors are concerned about me.
Oh well. Ja.