~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-
Disclaimer: I do not own Pokémon. Pokémon is the property of Game Freak and Nintendo and all of those awesome people who invented it.
~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-
The sun was high and hot over the heads of the two trainers, who stood waist-deep in yellowed grass, the shorter blades scratching at Joanna's legs and making her bend over and swat at them furiously. In a way, it was comical, but she could think of nothing more annoying. Mitchell had made a comment to her that she should have worn jeans, and if she hadn't have been so angry with the grass then she would have agreed with him. Charmander had decided to go back into his Poké Ball so he would not set the dry field on fire and burn out all of the wild Pokémon within. Neither knew what time it was, though they suspected that noon had come and gone. Both were sweating, wishing to themselves that the mysterious chilling winds from the night before would sweep through once more, just to cool them off a little bit. They had passed a pond back at the entrance to Viridian City from Route 2, and Joanna knew that the heat couldn't be good for a Grass Pokémon like Bulbasaur.
"This is ridiculous," Mitchell shouted to Joanna from across the field. She didn't know what he was talking about, but he wasn't finished talking.
"How long's it been? Four, five, six hours maybe? Not a single Mankey. I'm tired of all these Rattata. Maybe we should head further in?"
Bulbasaur barked with disapproval, and Joanna picked up on what he meant. She reached for the plastic water bottle that she had bought in town before they left, but it was empty. The Grass Pokémon whimpered. The girl lifted her leg to swat away the grass.
"I think we should head back and sit in the shade for a little while. Give it a couple hours and come back, we'll see one eventually. Let's just go back to the pond,"
The blades of grass around Mitchell suddenly parted and shut quickly, and out of the corner of his eye he saw a flicker of movement. Joanna watched Mitchell rush after the parting grass futilely, but as they approached the edge of the field the unknown creature stopped moving.
"Charmander, go!" Mitchell yelled, and the Fire Pokémon erupted from the Poké Ball, shouting his name as a battle cry before setting off on all fours after the elusive figure. Neither of the trainers was moving at all, and both were holding their breath, wondering if Charmander had caught the Pokémon. It was a very quick one, quick enough to have avoided notice these few hours. Perhaps it had become tired of hiding and wanted to try and make a run for it.
A jet of flame erupted from the area of the field the two Pokémon had come to a standstill in, scorching the grass. A high-pitched squeal followed the roar of the flame, and then there was silence.
Mitchell reached for an empty Poké Ball and rushed forward, closing the distance between him and the fainted Pokémon. When he got to the smoldering edge of the hole Charmander had made, the excitement on his face changed to frustration.
"Damn Rattata!"
Joanna and Bulbasaur walked over to the hole and looked down at the burned rodent, watching it as it tried to summon the strength to continue fighting. It finally gave up when it saw the four faces staring down at it and lay still. With one last sigh it gave into unconsciousness, knowing that it would wake up fully healed, but in captivity.
Mitchell started to walk away, while the other three stood and continued looking at the fainted rat. In a way, it was fascinating, and Joanna kept mentally comparing herself to a small child with a magnifying glass, standing over an anthill and burning the ants as they came up through the tiny hole in the top. Charmander was the first to notice his owner had left, and the others quickly followed suit.
"What are you doing?" Joanna called after him. He kept walking, but turned his head to the side so she could hear him.
"I'm gonna find a Mankey,"
"You're just gonna leave this Rattata here?" she asked, but he didn't respond.
"Come on, Mitch, you can't just leave this defenseless thing here, scavengers will come and eat it! You'd just let a Pokémon die like that?"
He stopped and turned around, now feeling guilty. In truth, he had thought about leaving it behind, and probably would have if Joanna weren't around. But he also knew that chances were, he would never use the Rattata for anything, though it had been a quick little bugger. Mitchell stopped again.
"Why don't you take it? Add it to your ever-expanding collection?"
Joanna's hand fell lightly on the Poké Ball containing the newest addition to her team, a Spearow that she had caught earlier that morning. Bulbasaur had found it first, trying to flee from the encroaching footsteps and the scratching of dry grass. As the bird lifted off of the ground, Bulbasaur's vines had shot out and wrapped around its wings, pulling it in closely and tackling it. Either it was too early in the morning for this bird or it had already been weakened, because it dropped like a brick. It was her first capture.
"Because it's rightfully yours, I don't want to take it if it isn't mine,"
"Call it a gift," Mitchell responded, his eyes scanning the grass for any movement that seemed like it could not have been made with the wind.
"You'd give me a Rattata for a present?" Joanna asked, half-sarcastically, before dropping one of her Poké Balls on the fainted Pokémon. The ball shook half-heartedly, the final chance at escape, before locking shut. She picked it up and clipped it to her belt, noticing that Mitchell was still walking further into the grass.
"Mitchell, you're gonna overexert yourself and get dehydrated or something. Remember, you're only awake because I drugged you. Don't overdo it. Let's go back and rest for a little bit," she shouted after him. He seemed to struggle with his thoughts before finally turning around and going with her. They left the grass and Joanna felt relieved to no longer have the constant grazing of grass on her legs, though the fresh air felt foreign to her. They could see the red roof of the Pokémon Center in the distance, past the town entrance. The pond was on the right hand sign, the edges shaded by great oak trees. Charmander was reluctant to approach the lake, while Bulbasaur ran forward and launched himself off of a rock, the splash loud and huge.
"Ugh, I still think I feel that grass rubbing on me," Joanna said, and she stepped into the shallowest part of the water. She left her shoes up by her bag, which was propped up next to the tree that Charmander was sitting next to. The Fire Pokémon stared at the water as if it could jump up and attack him at any moment, as if the need would arise to fight, but neither trainer mentioned a thing. Both could see the bright flame burning at the tip of his tail. It was common knowledge that if the flame went out, Charmander would die.
Poor guy, Joanna thought to herself. Her feet sank an inch or two into the soft mud and she pulled them out, descending further into the shallow pool as Bulbasaur swam around happily. Mitchell dropped his bag next to Charmander and sat down with the Pokémon, his stare almost identical to the lizard's. He was beginning to feel the light sting of sunburn on the back of his neck and arms and wished that he had thought to ask Joanna for sunscreen. Despite the time she had spent in the sun, her healthy glow had not changed a bit. His shirt was drenched in sweat and sticking to his body, and he wanted to discard it. But if he did, the next step would be to get in the water.
"Come on, Mitch, water's great!" Joanna shouted back happily, now down to her waist. Bulbasaur sucked in a great gulp of the clear liquid and spat it on Joanna's head, and she shrieked with surprise but was not angry. She pushed her hand through the water and splashed Bulbasaur, who retracted and started to send waves at her with his vines. Mitchell looked at Charmander, whose seeming enmity for the pond had not faded.
"No, I'm fine here," he called back.
"Are you sure? You can wash off all that sweat,"
"Yeah, I'm sure. I'm gonna keep Charmander company," he said, but he knew he was lying. Both Charmander and Mitchell sat against the tree in the shade, their eyes aimed at the center of the pond, not distracted by the moving figures that periodically passed. He didn't know what Charmander was thinking about as he stared into the water, whether it was that he could never be like Bulbasaur or of his natural weakness. Mitchell was dwelling on a bad memory.
The boy sat in the bathtub, laughing as his mom massaged a dime-sized drop of coconut shampoo into his short brown hair. She had a smile on her face today, which made the boy happy. He tilted his head back as she reached for a plastic cup and filled it with water, holding her hand just above his forehead so that the shampoo didn't run down into his eyes. The water was warm, and he could feel a little bit of it drip from her hand and slide down. The light stinging was a nuisance, above all, and young Mitchell did not cry.
"Oh, I'm sorry!" Amber Direnetti apologized, grabbing a dry towel and using it to dab the water from Mitchell's eye. He reached up and grabbed it out of her hand, rubbing his eye with it before giving it back. She dunked the cup again for another rinse.
"Mommy, wanna hear a joke?" the boy asked. She smiled and her face seemed to light up. Mitchell didn't know it, but it was a relief to her to hear optimism in her son's voice. He knew that Mommy and Daddy fought a lot, but he didn't know what it was about. She told him that their arguments were so that she could make them all happy, and he accepted it without question. She set the cup down on the edge of the tub and wiped her wet hands on her sweat pants.
"Why was six afraid of seven?" the little boy asked, and Amber smiled. She, of course, knew the answer. She had asked her mother the same question when she had been this age.
"I don't know, why was six afraid of seven?" she responded. His eyes glowed with the knowledge that his mom had not been able to guess, that sense of victory before the punch line.
"Because seven ate nine!"
She smiled and laughed a little.
"That was a good one, Mitchell! Where did you hear that?"
"There was a phone number on TV. I called it for jokes,"
Silence fell on them like a heavy blanket. Amber's jolly mood suddenly became very serious, and she looked Mitchell dead in the eyes.
"How long were you on the phone with them?"
Mitchell was getting scared.
"Yesterday," he said.
"All of yesterday?"
"Until the cartoons stopped coming on,"
Amber told Mitchell to sit still and not touch anything. He looked up at her confusedly, but she just held out one finger and said she'd be back in a minute. She passed through the bathroom door and made a left into the hallway, checking along every counter she passed. The phone bill was supposed to come today, and if the charges from the joke calls had been added within the past 24 hours-
"MITCHELL!" roared Edward, his voice nearly rattling the house. Mitchell only heard this voice if his mom and dad were fighting each other. A new kind of fear enveloped him when he heard his own name said this way, and he reached for something to try and hide from the footsteps that he heard pounding up the stairs. All he could find was the towel that his mother had given him for his eye, and he grabbed it and held it up like a shield when his father's dominating figure appeared in the doorway. Amber was right behind him, screaming, "He's only a child, Edward, how could he know?" But Edward was not listening. He knocked Amber backward and ran into the bathroom, knelt down at the bathtub and wrapped his hand around his son's neck. Mitchell gulped for air as he felt the water coming up over his head. His tiny hands tried to slide up under his dad's, but the man's grip was too powerful. He squeezed three times and used his other hand to cover Mitchell's nose and mouth. The shampoo in the water burned the boy's eyes and he could see the bathroom light above, distorted and ever moving as his struggles kicked up small waves. He saw a shadow behind Edward grab his arm and try to pull him away, heard his mom screaming his name. She was crying, he could tell, and he would have been too if he had been able to. The grip tightened and Edward began shouting at Amber.
"He's a child! Please, let him go!" Amber cried out, but Mitchell could not hear much anymore. His body was begging him for air, but he could do nothing but shut his eyes and wait for his dad to release him. He was starting to move less and less by the second. Edward lifted his hand and Mitchell's nose and mouth instinctively inhaled, the water rushing in and causing him to try to choke it back up. Edward's expression was clear through the water, his face turned almost purple with rage. Amber was crying intensely and slamming her hands on her husband's back to get him to stop. She groped for anything nearby she could use to stop Edward, but the room was too clean for anything to have been just left out. With no other option, she wrenched the hard toilet seat from its place and slammed it down on Edward's head. Instantly, the man's grip vanished and Mitchell pushed his head up above the water, spitting up water and inhaling sweet air. Edward attempted to stand but stumbled and fell backward. Amber's hand was over her mouth, as if she couldn't believe what she had just done. Mitchell started crying, his eyes red and irritated and his breaths short and frantic. Edward, dizzy from the hit, looked up at the boy as Amber rushed forward to retrieve him from the tub.
"You were an accident, you hear me, boy! I never wanted a damn child like you! You've been a waste of my life for years, remember that! Remember we never wanted you!" Edward shouted after Mitchell as his mom rushed through the door with him. Not knowing what else to do, she called the hospital to get Edward away from her. Hopefully Edward's concussion would buy her and Mitchell a few days of peace.
"Alright, we're done for now. Mitchell? Mitchell?" Joanna said, snapping her fingers in front of his face to get his attention. After the second snap, he came to his senses and looked up at her. She was drenched and trying to dry herself off with both the sun and her towel, while Bulbasaur just let the water run off of his skin.
"Are you okay?" she asked, and he nodded. Charmander had stood up and was ready to get back to battling, so Mitchell knew that he had to be ready as well.
"I'm fine," he said, putting on his best fake smile to convince her. It worked.
Almost as soon as he said this, he saw a whitish blur swing by the trees to the west. It seemed to be following the road, and now Mitchell had a clear view of it.
"There it is! Get it, Charmander!" Mitchell yelled, his flashback now resting in the depths of his subconscious to be reawakened another day. The Mankey had not seen them yet, but the two trainers and two Pokémon followed it quickly. When he was close enough, Charmander launched into the air.
"Metal Claw!" the trainer yelled, and the lizard raised its arm, his claws extending and sharpening, shining like steel. The pig-like creature stopped swinging and turned around to look, still hanging on by one arm, when it saw Charmander flying toward it.
"Man-KEY!" it screeched as the claws tore through its skin, three gashes appearing and starting to leak blood onto its off-white coat. Mitchell could see the change in its eyes, even from fifty feet away. Charmander kicked off of the enemy and landed on the ground below, hopping backward a few times to get distance between the two. The monkey dropped down onto the ground and stared down his opponent.
"Ember!"
The Fire Pokémon began to build up a flame in its mouth, but the Mankey was not going to wait. It barreled toward Charmander quickly and spun around on its heel, the other foot flying up and connecting with Charmander's stomach. The flame building up in his mouth dispersed into the air as he let out a cry of pain and pressed both hands on the site of the impact, trying to ease the pain with pressure.
"Back off a little, Charmander, get another Ember going!" Mitchell yelled, now less than ten feet away. He did not dare get any closer, knowing that the Mankey was liable to attack him as well. It squatted and began to stare down Charmander again as the fireball built up in his mouth.
"He's trying to intimidate Charmander," Joanna spoke from behind. Mitchell nodded.
"Don't look him in the eyes!" he shouted to his Pokémon, who let loose the jet of flames that scattered when they left his mouth. Clusters landed on the fur of the Mankey, burning the wounded flesh around the Metal Claw wounds and causing it to scream again. This one, though, sounded more like a cry for help than anything.
"Bulbasaur!" the Grass Pokémon barked, and Joanna looked down confusedly. She didn't know what he was trying to say until she knelt down and Bulbasaur popped up on his hind legs, pointing one leg at her backpack.
"Pack?" she asked, and the Pokémon nodded.
"What about it?"
It pointed to the Mankey, which was lying on the ground in agony. Mitchell pressed the button on an empty Poké Ball and threw it at the Fighting type. It turned into the jellied light and became enclosed in the ball, which sat on the ground and started to rock back and forth.
"Mankey pack?" Joanna asked Bulbasaur, and he nodded again. It took a minute before she realized what he meant.
"Mitch, we gotta go NOW," she said, but the ball had not stopped rocking yet.
"Three…two…" he counted down in his head. He didn't know how long it would actually take, but it helped him to count anyway.
"It called the rest of the pack!" she shouted. The ball clicked shut and sparkled.
"What?" Mitchell asked, "How do you know?"
"Because I speak Mankey, let's leave, now!" she said sarcastically, turning and starting to run for Viridian City. Mitchell picked up his new teammate and glanced at Charmander, who seemed to have no idea what Joanna was talking about. As he started his own run, though, Mitchell saw a large white mass moving among the trees above him. He looked up and saw no less than twenty Mankey standing in the branches. All of them looked down at him with a hungry gaze.
~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-
Author Notes: Wow, I finished that one much more quickly than I thought I would. Staying up to wait for Smash Bros. Updates will do that to a person. Hooray for character development! Well, my contacts are doing the late-night-fade-in-fade-out thing they always do when it's late at night, so I'm gonna wrap this up. If you read, please review, since I know how many people are reading, and that the amount of reviews is severely lower. Thanks for reading. Oh, yeah, next chapter…ch-ch-ch-ch-ch…Bailey will return, there will be Mankey, and it's possible that Rival Battle 2 will also fit in the chapter…maybe.
~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-