The New Order: Fading Light
Chapter 2: What Remains
A/N: I know this is a little depressing right now but bear with me. Thank you to everyone who read and a special thank you to those of you who took the time to review. Dbzgtfan2004 and daking718 this one's for you. I hope I can prove worthy of your reviews.
"Over here," Delia Ketchum called to Pikachu.
The electric type scampered to the woman and sat at her feet "Pika…?" the creature questioned with a tilt of its head.
Delia bent down and brushed the ashes away from what at one time had been the brick hearth that had sat before the fireplace in her home. She loosened one of the bricks the third from the right in the fifth row. Beneath the brick was a small secret compartment. She reached in and removed a small box "It's still here," she whispered, stroking the box with awe.
She opened the box and removed the contents. Delia held the small pair of blue and white socks and smiled with tears in her eyes. She looked down at Pikachu "These were Ash's when he was a baby," she explained "I put them here years ago. I don't know why I decided to keep them here but…" she looked around at what had once been her home. Family photos, old letters, the scribbles that Ash had made as a toddler when she'd given him his first set of crayons, they were all gone, destroyed in the fire.
"Pika," Pikachu said understandingly.
Delia sank to her knees amidst the rubble of the house that had seen so many things over the years "It's all gone now," she whispered "What do we do now?" she asked "Where do we go? Ash is gone. Misty's as good as captured by the Rockets and Samuel too and just for trying to help her. What can we do Pikachu?"
Pikachu shook its head silently. There was no easy answer to that question. Pikachu knew that Delia was in just as much danger from the Rockets as Misty and Professor Oak were. Pikachu had heard the assault unit leader saying how they had to have Aurora to secure Giovanni's stranglehold on the world. As Aurora's grandmother, Delia would be interrogated mercilessly if she ever found herself in Rocket custody. Pikachu owed it to his trainer and best friend to protect Delia. It was all Pikachu could do now. Everyone else had slipped beyond Pikachu's reach. With every day Pikachu felt more and more helpless in this new world but surrender was not an option. There was too much at stake for Pikachu to just lay down and allow Team Rocket's new world order to win.
"We can't stay here," Delia said finally "Pewter, Viridian, Cerulean… they're all to heavily populated with Rocket operatives," she reached down and picked Pikachu up "We'll find someplace Pikachu," she promised "Don't worry, I'll take care of you."
"PiPikapiPi," Pikachu nuzzled Mrs. Ketchum's nose. Pikachu would take care of her too. They shared a bond that went far deeper than most. They were bound together by the loss of someone whom they had both loved deeply.
XXX
Misty's eyes opened to survey her surroundings once again. She saw the same bleak hospital walls she had seen the last time. Every time she'd opened her eyes in the past week, she'd hoped that it was some illusion, a horrible nightmarish hallucination brought on by her injuries. But as she began to recover she realized that it was no illusion. She was in the Viridian City hospital. This meant that she must have been near death. That was the only reason that the others would have brought her here. She wondered who among them had sacrificed their freedom to save her life.
Their sacrifice might end up being in vein if in fact her future took the path she was expecting it to. When she was fully recovered, the hospital administrators would most likely hand her over to the Rockets. The Rockets would interrogate her in an attempt to discern the location of her daughter. She knew that the others would find someplace safe to hide Aurora but thankfully, she had no idea where that was. She would probably die after weeks of torture at the hands of the Team Rocket higher ups. She would never tell them anything, about her daughter, about her friends, her husband or the resistance.
One of Misty's hands crept up from underneath the blankets and came to wrap its fingers around the locket that hung round her neck. Thankfully, no one had taken it from her. The locket had been a gift from Ash. He had given it to her just before he had left Pallet. It was the last time she'd seen him.
They had been standing in the front yard of the Ketchum house. She had been staring into Ash's eyes, trying not to cry. Pregnancy hormones were a bitch. Ash had often joked that it made her moodier than usual which always ended in him receiving a hit to the head, an act that after years he had finally managed to take good naturedly.
"I'll miss you," she said in a whisper.
"I'll miss you more," he returned with a chuckle.
"No, I'll miss you more," Misty insisted, refusing to let him win even this small battle.
"I don't think so," he said, kissing her gently.
"Let's call it even," Misty conceded.
"Deal," Ash grinned at her. He took her in his arms and spun her around gently, being careful of her protruding abdomen "You'll be safe here," he told her "And I'll see you soon. I promise," it was a promise that he would inevitably break though not of his own free will.
"Not soon enough," Misty complained.
"I know," Ash commiserated with her. He pulled away and removed something from his pocket "I've got something I want to give to you."
Misty smiled at him as he held out the locket "Oh Ash," she whispered.
He opened the locket and in the moonlight she could see the small picture of the two of them on their wedding day. She smiled broadly "I thought that picture was gone forever," she whispered. When Team Rocket had laid waste to Cerulean City, the apartment that Ash and Misty had been renting had been burned. They and their Pokémon had barely escaped. They'd lost everything accept their Pokémon and the clothes on their backs.
"The photographer gave Mom the negatives from the pictures," Ash explained. They had hired one of the few photographers that still used film in his camera instead of using a digital camera.
Misty's eyes welled up "Thank you," she had been deeply saddened by the loss of their wedding photo. At the time Ash had said that it was only a material possession and the fact that they and their Pokémon were alright was the important thing. By giving her this gift, Ash had acknowledged that he understood how she felt.
"I love you," Ash whispered as he spun her in his arms one last time, kissing her deeply.
"I love you more," Misty said with a grin, trying to goad him into another miniature battle with her.
"You couldn't possibly," he told her.
"I think I could," she countered.
"You could never love me more than I love you," he chuckled softly.
"Call it even again…?" she suggested.
"For now," Ash laughed "But I'm not done with this argument."
"I'm counting on that," Misty told him.
Ash had kissed her one last time before disappearing into the night. Pikachu had hopped up on Misty's shoulder and waved frantically as Ash faded into the night. No one knew what happened between Pallet Town and the resistance base in Saffron City but Misty blamed herself every day for not hugging him tighter, for not kissing him longer, for not being more insistent that she loved him a million times more than he could ever imagine.
Now the locket was all she had left to remember her Ash by. She hated Team Rocket, knowing that they had something to do with taking her husband from her. She hated Team Rocket for being responsible for her separation from her daughter. She hated Team Rocket for taking away every family she had. Team Rocket had left her alone in the world and there was nothing she could do about it. She closed her eyes as the tears began to fall. She was helpless. Heaven help whoever had been responsible for taking her Ash from her. If she ever found out who they were, nothing would be able to protect them. She would claw their throats out with her bare hands. She continued to sob for an hour before sleep overtook her weary body.
XXX
May stood before the grave, her head hung low, tears streaming from her eyes and landing on the simple headstone. It hadn't been easy to recover Max's body. He had been buried beneath nearly ten feet of rubble in Veilstone City's central square. He had been trying to save a group of school kids who had been trapped in the middle of the battle. He had found them a way out but had stayed behind to battle with a Rocket grunt that had snuck into the building. The children and their teacher had escaped but during the course of the battle the building's structural integrity had been severely compromised. Max had died in the collapse along with his Swampert. The Rocket grunt had escaped.
May had been in radio contact with her brother right up until the building collapsed. He had known that he wasn't going to make it and had said his goodbyes to her. May had been overcome with tears. When she'd seen the Rocket grunt escape the building only milliseconds before it caved in, she'd been taken over by rage and ordered Blaziken to burn the man alive. Blaziken had carried out her order and the man whom she deemed responsible for her brother's death was reduced to a pile of ashes.
Drew had found her soon after that. He had told her the battle was lost and that they had to leave. May had been tossing chunks of debris to the side, stating that she wasn't going to leave without Max. Drew had at first argued with her, trying to get her to leave but when she wouldn't budge he began helping her. It took two hours and they had nearly been captured by Team Rocket but they had finally recovered Max's body.
They weren't able to travel to Hoenn to bury Max alongside his parents. The surviving Sinnoh resistance members had held a small ceremony for Max and buried him in the impromptu cemetery along with the bodies of the other trainers that they had been able to recover. May hadn't stopped crying since. She vowed as she stood before her brother's grave that one day she would take him home and lay him to rest in a proper coffin in a proper grave alongside their mother and father as had been his last request of her in the moments before the building had crushed the life out of him.
May jumped at the sound of leaves rustling from behind her. She turned to see Drew. He was holding a rose as per the old days. He pulled another rose from somewhere and offered it to her as he laid the first rose on Max's grave. May bent and laid the rose he had given her on the grave as well "Thank you," she whispered.
"The resistance leaders are planning on heading to Mt. Coronet," Drew informed her "The plan is to find a village too small for Team Rocket to care about controlling and regroup there."
"I can't leave just yet," May replied, not looking at him.
"I thought you might say that," Drew replied, taking a step closer to her "Everyone else plans to move out first thing tomorrow morning but I volunteered to stay behind in case anyone wished to remain at the grave site a bit longer to have a proper chance to say goodbye to their loved ones."
May nodded, she hadn't been the only one who had lost someone in the battle. "Thank you," she said again, allowing Drew to put his arm around her "I just can't leave him yet. He's my little brother. And even though he's gone, I feel like, like he still needs me, you know…?"
"Yeah," Drew nodded, resting his head atop hers "I know what you mean. I know it's not exactly the same thing but I felt the same when Roserade…"
"I hate this war," May sobbed, breaking into tears "We've all lost so much and gotten so little in return for it. Every day we have less and less to show for our efforts. We've lost family, friends, Pokémon. Whole cities have surrendered to Team Rocket. What chance do we have?"
"I don't know," Drew replied, pulling her into an embrace and rubbing her back in an attempt to sooth her even as he began to cry "But if we don't fight, who will?"
XXX
"Professor Samuel Oak," Domino stated as she entered the cell "I hope you're comfortable in your new accommodations," she sneered.
Professor Oak didn't even bother with a reply as he stared straight ahead in stoic silence.
–Domino laughed "Trying to play up the strong silent type angle, are you old man?" she slapped him across the face but to Oak's credit, he didn't react. Domino slapped him again, harder this time and this time managed to elicit a gasp from the man.
"What do you want?" Oak said flatly, looking Domino straight in the eye.
"Two things," Domino began "First of all, I know you brought A certain water Pokémon trainer to the hospital here a week ago. Aside from the obvious question of why you care about what happens to that brat, I'd like to know where the rest of her group is."
"She's a friend," the professor replied to Domino's firs remark "And as for the others, I wouldn't have the slightest idea where they are by now."
"I think you're lying to me," Domino remarked coldly.
"Oh you do, do you," Oak returned, matching her tone "Do you think that they'd screw up now and simply hang around after I brought Misty to what is so obviously a Team Rocket controlled city? If you think that then you're even more foolish than they've been making you look these past months."
Domino growled and struck the professor so hard that the chair he was chained to nearly fell backwards. He was saved from the fall only by Domino herself who grabbed him by his throat and lifted him out of the chair as far as the chains would allow her to "Don't play games with me you old fool," she hissed "You have no idea who you're dealing with."
"Really," Professor Oak laughed in her face "You're a second banana. The one that the Boss sends in when he can't be bothered. You don't scare me."
"You should be scared," Domino told him, producing a syringe from her pocket "I was going to try this the easy way. After all, you're only an old man and this particular substance is expensive and hard to come by. I thought it would be a waist using it on you but you've proven to be far more irritating and stubborn than I thought."
"I'm flattered," Oak smirked at her.
"Keep putting on that act as long as you can," Domino goaded as she uncapped the syringe and rolled up one of Oak's sleeves "Because soon you'll be blubbering like a baby."
She jabbed the syringe into Professor Oak's arm. Samuel fought back a scream as a hot burning sensation flowed throughout his body.