Parallel Heart Chapter 6
Mega couldn't believe what he seeing here on this book: his dad and he doesn't understand why. Is this some kind of trick? What exactly was his father like? Mega could only think back to his childhood, only remembering one part that his father was actually in his life, after that, he went off traveling somewhere and never came back.
It was a rough time for he and his mother after that, but Mega could feel that his mom was still waiting for him to come back.
"Dad either left us for good, or he's dead," Mega thought outloud as he thinks about. He knew his father was an honest pikachu when he first hatched from his egg and carried him gently with love and care. This thought alone left him to believe that his father died during his travel.
He looks back at the picture and sees that his father looks younger than he remembers. "This picture must've been taken before I was born," then he notices there was another page stuck behind it. Mega pulls it and sees two more pictures of his dad, on the left side, he was being tackled-hugged by a female pikachu with a look of embarrassment on his face and a hand behind his head. He knows who that female pikachu is and smiles at the embrace between them, "this must've been around the time when Mom and Dad were just friends."
Mega remembers the stories his mom told him about the adventures they had together. They started out as friends, closest friends at that, but everything changed when his mother confessed her feelings and began chasing after him around all over the forest, telling him how much she loves him. This went on for several weeks, when he hides from her, she always find him in an instant and hugs him. When he's eating peacefully, he finds himself being hand-fed by her. She would brag to their friends that their mates, making him want to die from embarrassment. Heck, when he just flat-out runs away from her and turns a corner, she's right there, eyes-closed, ready to kiss him on the lips.
Eventually, his father gave up running away and finally return her feelings, making them official mates. Mega couldn't help but laugh at the stories because of how his dad always ends up being in a near-death-experience from her hugs at the end of the day, despite the fact that he was twice as fast as her. How she always managed to catch him at the end, she only answered that question with 'determination will get you far when you're in love.'
Mega never understood what that meant, but she always used to say he will... eventually anyways. Then he looks at the other picture of his father. He was holding a sleeping baby pichu in his arms with a happy look of content, "Dad..." one more thing he notices was there was a hand-written note next to it.
'I'm proud to have such a gift like my son, I know for a fact that he'll become stronger than I'll ever be. If I would leave this world too soon... my last concern would be whether or not he'll be able to carry on without me.'
Mega hold back his tears in attempt of not ruining the book, "Dad... I'll become stronger... not just for my brothers' sakes... but for yours also." He says in tears but with a determine smile.
Rose was in her room also and hears footsteps on the lower floors once again, "it must be Mega again," she assumes and walks downstairs. To her surprise, she sees him, but his cheek are wet, as though he's been crying, "Mega, are you okay?" She asks in concern for him.
All he does is smile and responds, "yeah, just the book did answers some of my questions. Just a few I didn't expect to be answered."
"Really? What kind of questions?" She could see he doesn't want to talk about it, "anyways, you should go to bed, I don't want you to be sleeping in the middle of the day again," she says and looks at the book he's carrying, "I'm glad you got the book you were somewhat looking for."
"Thanks, g'night," he replies as he watches her going back upstairs to her room. "She's right, though," he said to himself, "I should get some shut-eye." With that, he walks upstairs to his bedroom to sleep in his new nest, not once letting go of the book he now treasures.
Meanwhile outside the hideout, a shadow figure, with a brush in it's hand, was drawing something on a boulder, "how can I call myself an artist... when I don't know what to draw?" It asks itself in the dark, "I've been up for three days and nothing I made was anywhere near perfect." The frustrated shadow figure continues drawing to whatever comes to mind.
Dawn broke through the skies, making the crystals in their rooms to shine brighter indicating that it's morning. Mega wakes up by it, stretching his arms and legs to a new day. He stops to realized something... his book was missing, "HUH? Where's the book?" He looks all over the room to look for it, but fails to find it.
"I-is this what you're looking for?" He hears a voice at the door to the room and turns to it, only to find Knolla standing there holding his book.
"Give it back, Knolla!" He highly demands with a serious expression on his face.
"Sorry Mega, but if you want this book, you'll have to catch me first," she replies and quickly flies down the stairs.
Mega grabs a sitrus berry from his bean bag and chases after her on all four down the stairs with the berry in his mouth. He's surprise she would do something like this just after introducing an entire library just the day before.
Almost immediately, the mischief togetic flies towards the door that leads outside and opens it with her free hand. Seeing Mega right behind her, she slams the door shut against him, causing him to faceplant against it. "I can't believe you fell for that," she giggles.
The door immediately opens after. The world seems to be spinning too fast for Mega to catch up from the hit he just took. "Twinkle, twinkle, little stars dancing around my head," he says as he falls on his back against the ground.
With guilt consuming her, Knolla flies down to the dazed pikachu, "a-are you okay?" She asks in concern, only to see him biting something in his mouth and swallowing it.
Mega leaps at Knolla like as though he was never hit in the face by the sudden door slam, "Metronome," she shouts, wiggles her free hand at him. Suddenly, leaves starts to come out the tip of her hand like a tremendous storm and sweeps Mega off the ground, to a nearby tree, "Leaf Storm!" Knolla screams as she knows what the attack was and flies away as fast as her wings can go.
"Thunderbolt," Mega shouts and unleashes a tremendous amount of electricty from his body to cancel out the attacking leaves, "ow, she's not getting away that easy, Quick Attack," and gave chase with amazing speed.
Soon he spots her and ran even faster than before, he jumps at her until, "Metronome," and sees her wiggle her free hand once more. He ends up hitting a copy togetic as it disappears.
"Really? Double Team?" He asks her with a reply from the other five togetics was just a shrug in unison. "Fine, Double Team," he split himself into five mirage pikachus. The mirage pikachus all leap onto the mirage togetics, one by one, the mirages contacts and they both cancel each other out, but one mirage pikachu leaps at a togetic, but that togetic didn't disappear. The real Mega leaping at a mirage sees this, "that must be the real one!" He then leaps again at her.
"Metronome," was Knolla's reply as she wiggles her free hand again, this time she dashes past his leaping expectation, making him land on his feet against the ground, "Agility," she says as she flies pass him as if to mess with him.
Mega's frustration starts getting the better of him as he's runs after her, "Quick Attack," and runs after her with another amazing speed attack.
"Why am I such a failure as an artist?" The shadow figure from last night asks itself, the sunlight reveals that it's a smeargle and the drawing was a aipom enjoying a nanab berry under the moonlight. "I need something that is inspiring, powerful, and has an edge when battling," he continues.
As if it was a sign, a togetic flies above the drawed rock with tremendous speed, "give me back my book, Knolla!" He hears before a yellow blur crashes onto his rock of artwork, breaking it in the process.
Everything slowed at that moment for the smeargle as he saw what it was that broke the awful artwork... a pikachu. It takes a powerful pokemon to break a rock like that, the pikachu looks determined, and gives off a glow like no other pokemon has. The smeargle smiles as time returned back the way it was.
"Finally, I got my book back," he hears the pikachu say. He turns to that sound and sees his great inspiration dancing around with a very unusual book.
"No fair Mega, you cheated," the togetic complains to him. So the pikachu's name is Mega.
"How did I cheat, Knolla?" He questions the togetic as she sits on ground, heavily breathing.
"I don't know, but you just did."
The smeargle coughs to regain his momentum to address the pikachu for his request, "excuse me, Mega."
Mega hears his name from someone he never heard from before and turns to the owner of the voice, only to see a smeargle walking up to him. His insticts tells him that it's male. "Yes?" He asks, wondering what he would want from him.
"Sir, you broke my painting," the smeargle says as he points to the rock that was destroyed by the pokemon before him.
Seeing the rock that he broke, Mega couldn't help but feel guilty, "sorry, I should've looked where I was going," he apologizes.
"No, I should be thanking you, sir!" The smeargle replies with a bright smile.
"HUH?" Was all that Mega could reply to such a statement.
The smeargle just coughs once more to explain, "I've been looking for inspiration for years now, and not once could I get it." He lumps at the memories of his failures, only to stand back up with joy, "but thanks to you, I might have the inspiration I've always been looking for!" The smeargle lend out his hand as an offer, "I wish to paint you Mega, my payment is very high, what do you say?"
Mega actually feels honored by this offer he's receiving and opens the book to the first page, but to his surprise, the picture of his father isn't there, instead it's in the second page. The first one is blank and the picture was labeled 'Mega', he couldn't believe it, how did it get there? Why doesn't it have a picture of him? He looks back at the pictures of his dad and examines that they seem painted by someone, this makes him believe that if the smeargle draws his picture, then the blank paper labeled by his name would have his picture as well.
"I would be honored to have you paint me," Mega shakes the offered hand in acceptance, leaving the smeargle to just smile.
"Then let's get started at my cave, good sir." The smeargle then leads Mega to a small cave nearby, "this is my home. It was given to me by two of my closest friends some time ago."
When they walk inside the cave, the smeargle grabs something from his pile of artwork, "here, put this on!" He tosses Mega a black, soft... whatever it is.
"What is this?" Mega asks as he dangles it between two of his fingers. The mysterious substance feels real smooth and warm for some reason, he likes it, but he doesn't know what to do with it.
"That is what humans back then call a cape, you put your head through the hole and make sure that most of it is on your back," smeargle replies as he pushes Mega on top of a flat rock.
Mega did what he was told and put his head through the hole and made sure that most of it was on his back, the texture of the cape was splendid against Mega's body as he looks over it: there seems to be two gold cloth lines connecting and holding the cape together, some of it was still over his arms, the bottom part of it seems to be ripped, and there's a lightning symbol on the back of it.
"There, you look perfect in it. I've only let a single pokemon wear this, but once I'm done, you can have it as payment."
Mega begins to protests, "I don't want to take advantage of you!"
"You're not, I was going to give it away anyways. I've just added the lightning symbol on the back for decoration," smeargle insists, "now give me your fighting pose."
Mega complies and got to his usual fighting stance with the cape draping all over his back, but where the smeargle was looking at, feels splendid to him.
Hours went by as the smeargle sketches Mega on that pose with a square piece of rock, Mega was itchy all over, but still kept still. Whenever he sneezes though, smeargle would just scowl at him to keep still. They would take a break every once in a while and have a small snack in silence.
As smeargle was about to be finish, the colors of his tail tip to keep skecthing, "how much longer?" Mega asks.
"Almost finish, please be patient," all Mega does is sigh and tries to keep his aching body to keep still at the pose.
"Yes, this truely is my greatest painting," smeargle says as he quickly swipes the finishing touches to his perfect masterpiece, "you can come down now, sir."
Mega practically flops down next to the book he placed, "thank... you," he said exhausted from that long pose. He thinks this counts as training for the day to keep balance.
"Would you like to see?" Smeargle asks as he turns the flat, square rock he's been painting on to where Mega could see, "it's... perfect," was all he could muster up.
The painting of Mega in his fighting stance, was absolutely detailed: He was standing on a lone rock against a roaring, thunderous ocean with lightning coming out of both his hands, ready to strike at the storm against him. The shading, coloring, and texture almost makes the picture itself look like it could pop out and come to life anytime.
"If anything else, I want to thank you," smeargle says as he was getting ready to sleep on a nest nearby. The two became silent, not knowing what to say next to each other.
"You know, you look exactly like the pikachu I painted years ago," the smeargle tries to make a conversation from all the silence.
This catches Mega's attention, "really?"
"Yeah, except he had a girl pikachu always chasing after him," he laughs at the old memories of his younger days, "I was a traveling smeargle back then... this very cave used to belong to them, they gave it to me as a gift after painting them."
Mega probably knows who he might be talking about, "was there any chance that these pikachus names are 'Ray' and 'Hope'?"
This question surprises the old smeargle and looks at Mega with wide eyes, "yes, how did you know?"
Mega smiles widely and nervously scratches the back of his head, "I'm their son."
The smeargle couldn't help but yell at this answer, "WHAT!?" He then rushes up to Mega's face and slowly examines him, "now that you mentioned it, you DO have Ray's determined face, you have Hope's beautiful eyes, you even give off the same exact glow they used to have together." The smeargle then smiles, "you are indeed their beloved child... I know you probably don't remember me, but I was there when you were born from your egg."
Mega could believe that, considering there's the painting of him and his dad. The smeargle puts his hands on Mega's shoulders, "the reason why your parents left this place to me was because your mother gave birth to you and they thought you shouldn't be raised in a cave." Then he gets back up to see Flat Mountain, "they thought that Flat Mountain Village was the best place to raise you... but then I heard of the Houndoom Horror Raid." Tears begin to fall down his cheeks, "I thought I lost my only family."
Mega couldn't help but feel sad for the smeargle, "did your mother and father suffer the same fate?"
Mega shakes his head in response to that question, "no, I never saw Dad after he decided to travel as soon as I was born and Mom died from a horrible sickness... I was left to be raised by someone else." Mega hopes that smeargle could feel a little better after hearing his mother's fate wasn't as gruesome as he anticipated it would be, only to see that the smeargle goes back to his nest after hearing that.
"It's getting late and I'm very tired, good night to you, good sir." And he falls asleep without saying anything else.
Mega opens the book and sees the painting slowly appearing on the page he was suppose to be in, "what kind of book is this?" He asks himself as he was about to leave the cave, towards the hideout. "Thank you, I hope you feel better after seeing the son of Ray and Hope again," he says as he walks out of the cave with his new cape wavering over the wind.
"Where's Mega, Knolla?" A concerned buneary asks the togetic, "yeah, he's been out there for three hours now," Beauty yells as she's equally worried about the situation.
"I told you girls, he's with a smeargle," was all Knolla could reply.
"Then why hasn't he come back yet? It's been hours since then," Rose says. It's true that it's been hours since Knolla told them about the smeargle, but they're starting to get worried about him. If anything were to happen the pikachu, Knolla would be held responsible.
The door suddenly opens, the girls look to see the pokemon they were waiting for so long, "Mega!" "Meggy!" Rose and Beauty squeals as they jump on him with great force.
"H-hey Rose, Beauty," he greets them out of breath as he falls to the ground. His back impacts against the ground. The two doesn't seem to care, all they're doing is snuggling against both his red cheeks, "can you get off me now? I need to get some sleep."
The two friends realizes this and get off him, "sorry." Rose offers her hand, which Mega accept and let her pull him back up to his feet.
"What is that you're wearing?" Knolla asks as she examines the wavering material against his back.
"It's call a cape," he answers as he dust the dirt off his body.
"Well it certainly makes you look cuter," Beauty says with a wink.
"I'm going to sleep," Mega says, completely brushing off the compliment and heads for his room, "g' night."
"good night," they replied as they go their own room as well.
Rose was drinking berry juice she made earlier, "not as good as Mega's, but it's still tasty," she said to herself and continues drinking.
Mega is such a nice pokemon to be around with, she's glad he's living with them, "I haven't met a pokemon like him in such a long time... he just reminds me of... him... I guess that's why I have a crush on him..." she said as she continues drinking the juice.
"Come to think of it... he also had a swinub for a friend..." she thinks it's more of a coincidence, "I need to know him a bit more..." she thinks back of what Mega and Diggy said when were together that night, "what exactly is their dream?" She asks, thinking about it, "will they leave the forest? Are they planning something big? Who is the third brother they mentioned? And why did they have to train in such deadly environments?"
These were questions that Rose need to find the answers to, "I guess I should ask him when I get the chance," with that, she leaps at her bean bag nest and slowly begins to fall asleep.
