Spitfire, Chapter 26: Are you friend or foe?

Dawn walked around the house searching for auburn hair. She had an idea; something that she hadn't noticed before when she talked with Brock; something suspicious. If there was anyone that knew about it, Gary would.

Normally, this would have been a problem to reach him, but since Gary made his way back into the house shortly before Dawn brought Ash to speak with Brock; she would be able to find him with ease. He told Ash that Professor Oak had called; but it was hardly believable since Professor Oak was sitting on the back porch. Dawn deduced that Gary was just looking for a reason to stall Ash and Misty's inevitable fate. As she walked near the back exit to the house, she could have sworn that she heard something fall outside, but didn't stop to think much of it; it was probably the wind, anyways. Gary's sneering chuckle brought her attention to the living room, and she abandoned her thought.

He was always so confident, that he would be standing in a corner somewhere, or watching a certain red-head when he didn't think anyone would notice. Unfortunately for him, Dawn noticed everything. Including the fact that he seemed rather bummed out today, but didn't ever specify why. She thought she had an idea while she approached Gary who was leaning against the living room windowsill, watching Bonnie, Max, and Clemont play a round of cards to pass the time. May was sitting beside her brother, though she wasn't playing—she had probably been eliminated from whatever it was. Dawn spied around the corner, she couldn't see Serena or Drew, but didn't think much of it.

"Hey there stranger." Dawn addressed Gary with a small wave. He nodded to her in traditional Gary fashion.

"What's up?" He spoke with a charming smirk climbing over his features.

"Nothing, I just wanted to talk, see how long Brock has known about Misty and did he plan all of this weird shit, and how your day was going?"

"Subtle." Gary swooned sarcastically, Dawn was never one to beat around the bush; this included the night when she pegged Gary as a home-wrecker for trying to tell Misty to fight for Ash. Luckily, he was able to convince Dawn that he meant no harm by it, though his actions continuously proved otherwise. She had to give him some credit though; if he hadn't told her, she would have never noticed how weird and complex Ash and Misty's relationship was. Even now, she struggled to see the connection, but knew that it was there.

"Subtly has never been my strong suit." Dawn admit cheekily, making Gary smile.

"No, I suppose not." He chuckled and then licked his lips, "Since they've known each other. If you'd ask me, he knew before they did."

Dawn pursed her lips at his reply, "And you mentioned earlier that Brock asked Misty here to play reconnaissance, right?"

Gary nodded, making the same connection as Dawn, and he look unimpressed at the blue-haired coordinator who smirked and nodded slightly in her own defense. "Wow, I can't say I'm surprised."

"Does Misty know?"

"You kidding? If she even caught wind that Brock played her, she would string him up by his entrails." Gary remarked loosely while crossing his arms.

"Man that's gross." She paused, "She wouldn't really do something like that, would she?" Dawn asked, eyes wide. She had heard numerous accounts of the infamous 'ginger-rage' but had never seen it first hand. Quite honestly, if the actual thing was as big as the hype, she didn't want to.

"No, she's a lot of talk and no bite," he rolled his eyes, scoffing and then licked his teeth, "But the mallet-waving image from our childhood is sure hard to forget." Gary added, recalling an event that happened during the championships in the indigo league. Dawn whistled,

"Mallet-waving?" she grinned and he nodded making eye contact with her for the first time since she arrived. At the same time, Ash emerged from the dining room, blushing ferociously beside Brock, only moments after Misty had jogged out of there. Dawn honestly wondered what had happened, but by the drawn smile across Ash's face, she could only imagine that it was something good. Good for them, she was happy. Gary didn't seem the share that same happiness however, scoffing abruptly.

"I don't get it." Gary said, "They both know to some degree at this point that they like each other. Why can't they just kiss and call it a day?" His tone was frosty, agitated by the lack of spines his two old-time-former-rivaled friends had and possibly more that he didn't want to talk about; caught Dawn off guard. She smiled at him slowly, and looked back at the closed door. Neither did she.

A moment of comfortable silence washed over the house as they enjoyed the hum of music playing from the study, and Dawn relaxed a little, sitting on the shoulder of the couch. Compared to yesterday, everything was lighter. Situations seemed brighter, and all of her friends were happily waiting for what ever the evening would bring. Even Serena, who was breathing down Misty's neck before, and clinging to Ash all morning was absent... which was odd... now that she thought about it. On cue, the front door was kicked down and her attention faltered.

"Team Rocket!" the unfamiliar voice screamed, scattering everyone who was present to move to the hall way—including Brock and Ash from the top of the stairs.

"Iris!?" Ash yelled, running towards his purple-haired friend who had a few scratches along her face and arm. She fell to her knees exhausted, barely able to speak as her chest rose and fell quickly. Her white shirt and pants, as well as a tan sash that hung from her shoulder and down to her waist was covered in dirt, mud, and something a little darker in color. He tried to brush her off, dragging her to her feet but she rocketed away from them.

"They took Cilan!" Iris yelled drastically, alerting the rest of the group as they turned the corner, trying to all fit into the hallway to see what was going on. Instinctively, each trainer holstered their bags at the mention of Team rocket, and glanced around at each other; except for Dawn who threw out her arms.

"But I just saw Team Rocket today! They were still pulling their harmless gags!" Dawn chanted, but Iris stood up steeply, showing her height over the other girls. She caught her breath slowly and shook her head.

"Not our Team Rocket, a group of them led by Bernard and Cassidy, and they're on their way now!" Ash and Brock looked at one another, having not heard of the blonde and green haired team rocket since they were kids, they looked worriedly at Iris.

"They took all my pokemon and I barely got away." She exhaled, "They heard of a gathering of strong pokemon trainers in Pallet Town and they... We tried to call but Cilan and I we..." Iris mused awkwardly, alerting Ash who spun on his heels. His eyes glanced around the house; and his blood ran cold. He took off, looking in every room. How had he not noticed before? How long had he been gone?

"Pikachu?!" Ash yelled, but when the bountiful pulse-ball of joy and electricity didn't come running at his command, he looked at Iris.

"What happened?!"

"Cilan and I were grabbed off a boat leaving Vermillion City...But we don't have time to talk about this! We need to-" Ash flew off the handle, he couldn't agree more that they didn't have time for this. Pikachu was gone! Without sparing a minute, he checked his remaining pokeballs; counting them all, he was out the backdoor in a second, only to stumble over the pale legs of his mother right outside the door.

"Mom!" Ash screamed, petrified. His thoughts derailed; kneeling towards her, he scooped her head up into his hands as the rest of the group funneled outside. Brock was at his side in a minute, checking her. She had a blunt head wound, but would be fine; she even stirred slightly when Ash swiped his hand across her face. It was at that moment that May, staring wide eyed, shrieked.

"Drew?!" she panicked, spinning around. When she didn't see him right away, she jumped from the porch in one swoop, and down into the field below. Max was right behind her.

"Serena?!" Bonnie and Clemont screamed in unison, pulling Ash away from his waking mother.

"Brock watch her," Ash said, standing up to also jump from the railing, of course, he went over the side in a pseudo cool fashion, leaping onto the ground with a thump. May ran towards the edge of the forest, while Bonnie cupped her mouth to yell louder. Ash had no idea what he was doing, his voice was locked in his throat as he kicked at the dirt below his feet. Everything was spinning.

"Pikachu!?" Ash tried, but a small, faint voice echoed to him.

"Ash?" Serena's voice echoed, near the bottom of the porch; he hadn't even seen her sitting there. All party members had looked over her. He ran to her side, shouting for Bonnie and Clemont.

"What happened, Serena?"
"Team Rocket got the jump on us." Serena winced while sitting forward. She held her stomach slightly, and a concerned Ash draped her left arm around his shoulders to help her to her feet. "They... took Pikachu, Ash." Serena said gently while he attempted to help her walk, but lost patience quickly. Quickly, he scooped her up, much to her surprise and embarrassment, and carried her up the stairs, setting her gently in a chair so that Brock could look at her.

"Do you know where they went?" Ash yelped but Serena shook her head gently; Ash saw from the corner of his eye that his mother was sitting up, holding an ice pack to her forehead, courtesy of Dawn.

"Oh no!" Serena shrieked suddenly as Bonnie and Clemont met her at the top of the stairs to check on her. "My pokemon! They're all gone!" She cried, touching her empty belt.

Delia scoffed at this and looked over, "They took Professor Oak, Ash." She added tiredly, though couldn't tell him why. Dawn watched the group of them spread out to check the area while she remained awestruck on an object at the top of the porch that had been over looked while Ash pampered his mother with questions about her health. Dawn walked very slowly to the red object that had blown in between the wooden paneling and bent over slowly, and scooped it up with her hands. Holding the limp, slightly damaged flower between her index and thumb finger, she looked up slowly.

"Ash?" Dawn inquired to the field. Drew was gone, too, whether May was ready to admit it or not. Dawn swallowed hard, and called for Ash again; agitated, he finally snapped at her, but when she raised the red rose towards him; all the horror on his face turned into a gut wrenching pain.

XOXOXOXOXXOXOXOXOXXOX

Getting hit over the head was never an enjoyable experience, Misty could honestly say it was something she would have lived without, but who was she to complain? At least she wasn't tied up. Oh, wait. Groaning, her head rattled momentarily against the back of the compartment she was riding in. As bumpy and non-low key as it was.. She could feel that her arms were tied behind her back to a pole, or plank, or something of the sort. Either way, she couldn't move. She thanked the heavens that at least her legs were left untied while she swore inwardly. With a sigh, she finally peeled open an eye at a time, to see that she was in exactly what she expected to see; a steel, moving cage. But hey, it could have been worse.

At least she wasn't alone.

Beside her, Drew was passed out, as well as a shadowy figure towards the corner; opposite her, Professor Oak and some other guy with green hair were also tied up. Wonderful way to start the afternoon; getting kidnapped and all. Team Rocket couldn't have picked a better day! She rolled her eyes at the irony, trying to scope out an escape, but she swallowed hard, unable to see one in the solid metal walls.

"Drew." She spat finally, kicking at the younger coordinator's legs. His head lolled in his sleep, and so Misty kicked him again. When he didn't stir the third time; she thought better. Didn't want to damage him more than he already was, she thought while licking her lip. The corner of her mouth was busted open, but luckily the blood had coagulated and seized already. Awkwardly, the thing she worried about most was if it would bruise or not, or scar. Did lips scar?

Stop that, you need to focus Misty, she chanted to herself, exhaling softly. She twisted her arms against their binds behind her and pulled her legs forward in an attempt to holster herself upward; but found that she couldn't. Whatever she was tied to wasn't moving until Team Rocket was ready to let them out. Bastards.

So, she was left with one thing to do, sit in the overbearing silence. How in the world did she let herself even get into this situation? One second she was on the back porch, and saw Drew being pulled away by some team rocket members; but when she stood up to help, she got hit in the face by some guy and fell backwards against the door, swearing.

That was when she saw Delia on the ground, and panicked. She reached for gyarados, only to remember she left the reliable pokemon at the Cerulean City gym, and so when she stood up, she just tackled the grunt off the deck; trying to grab for any other pokemon. Before she could, another grunt shot something into her leg and after falling into violent spasms, she passed out.

A tazer, friggin' wonderful. Of all the things she had to deal with today, getting an electric shock was not on high on her list. She inhaled, then exhaled and then kicked her feet out sporadically.

"LET ME OUT OF HERE!" She demanded, pulling against her binds. Sitting in the dark prison cell, tied to Mew knows what with all of her pokemon missing, and worst of all, all of her friends pokemon missing, sucked. She let out a long, exasperated sigh. Team Rocket upped their game for sure; but she had a daunting feeling that it wasn't their team rocket, the silly Jessie and James and Meowth combination; no, this was the real team rocket. The ones that were actually scary.

Her jaw ached like crazy, too. On a scale from one to ten, she wondered if she was going to need to get it wired. Getting slapped was one thing, getting punched, was a whole different level of pain she hadn't previously gotten the courtesy to familiarize herself with. She licked her lips again, reminding herself of the sting against her lip. Frustrated, she yelled again.

"Professor Oak! Wake up!" She shouted, though the old man didn't stir. She kicked her feet angrily, and then thumped her head against the metal wall behind her. It sounded like they were tunneling through the ground so yelling wasn't going to do anything except blow off steam. However, she wanted to hold onto the steam and cradle it until it came time to look at team rocket—then she wanted to bash their heads in with all of that pint of steam and emotion.

So much for that date, she thought bitterly and then crossed her legs, waiting for her fellow inmates to awake.

Author's note:

Man, I told myself that I wouldn't write another one of these... but, it just didn't seem like a story without team rocket in it. I've been dropping subtle hints (maybe too subtle?) about why Cilan and Iris were so late to the story, and I'm finally happy to reveal this! Hashtag don'tkilltheauthorwhokeepsthrowingholesinyour'ship'?

Not gonna lie, the more reviews I see show up for this story, the more anxious I am getting to read them at the last chapter! Thank you everyone who has stuck around this far! I hope you're still enjoying the story. :)