Ray's POV

So, nobody was gonna say it, huh? Nobody was even going to ask? Nobody was even going to acknowledge we lost a member of our party? Nobody was going to look for Flygon, or even ask where he was?

Fine, I would do it.

This did not sit right with me, though. This did not sit right with me. Maybe I was just

imagining things, but it seemed to speak to the rift I noticed increasingly in this world. There was a rift in between humans and Pokemon. Pokemon, although they were valued by humans, did not seemed to be valued as much as humans. At first I thought it was just Emerald, but now I saw she was merely a product of her society. We were treated as somewhat less, somewhat secondary. It wasn't outright, and it wasn't violent, but Emerald being worried about Strider and not even asking about Flygon was a fantastic example. Why should that be? Why should it be that neither Emerald nor the old coot had said a word about him. Strider could be excused, since he had been on those drugs the whole time, which made him incredibly unlike his usual self.

But… it was something I would not have to deal with for very much longer. I was going back to my world, where there were only Pokemon around, so there couldn't be the discrimination exhibited here. I only felt bad for those who had to stay here. Maybe they didn't even realize they weren't being treated fairly. Maybe they thought it was all normal and justified? It wasn't, but we were tackling enough problems with the world here. The Pokemon on this ship at least looked more or less happy. For now, that was enough. There was a horrifying, world swallowing void to destroy.

So, I would find Flygon myself. I wondered to myself, where he could have gone? No matter how lightly, he and Strider were still bound together. So, he couldn't have gone too far from Strider, right? So I guessed I would check all around us, in as wide a radius as I could considering my own bond to Emerald.

First, I checked the interior of the ship again, all the decks and whatnot. Nothing. He wasn't in the hallways, or in any of the rooms I checked. Just in case, I checked the medical bay again. Stride was still in there, sleeping away. I half expected to see Flygon curled up next to him, because they seemed to sleep that way. He was not there, just Strider, alone.

I thought about checking the cabins themselves, but that seemed like, a violation of privacy. Besides, if Flygon was in one of the crew member's rooms, he would show up eventually.

I found a large room with rows upon rows of tables and benches, long benches made of what looked like the same wood as the interior of the ship was made of. There were lots of people rushing around with food. A sailor came up to me with a funny little bowtie. I wanted a bowtie. It was… it was something I wore for my wedding. Well, my almost wedding… Anyways, he stopped me at the door.

"Sorry, Ray, but the dining hall isn't open until the meal call." And so I turned away.

So… not inside. What about outside, flying around, perhaps? He needed his exercise as much as I needed mine. Maybe we just kept missing each other or something? I didn't know. Only one way to find out though. I went up on the deck. I couldn't see him from my vantage point, but that didn't mean much of anything. He could have been behind cloud cover or something, or be in some place obstructed by the bottom of the ship? I took off and started a wide circle around the outside of the ship. At first glance, again, I saw nothing, but it was pretty cloudy.

I flew out in one direction, as far as my bond would let me go. I kept going until I felt a slight tug backwards. That was how I knew I was at the end of my rope, metaphorically speaking… and literally speaking, too, I guessed. I didn't really want to pull Emerald overboard for this one, so I stopped there. I looked back, a bit surprised at just how far away I was from the ship now. I couldn't even see it anymore, though I knew it was there. I flew through the clouds, weaving in and out and away. Everywhere… I looked everywhere, and he was nowhere.

Wait, I had one more idea. What if it was like Emerald before, and he got dropped into the ocean and was just sort of being dragged along. If that was the case, it would mean he was unconscious, because otherwise he would have flown back up, unless his wings were injured or something happened to him when he got water all over him. I didn't know a lot about the Flygon species, but I knew that it's type was ground, and ground didn't mix too well with water.

I dived down, as far as I could go, which it turned out wasn't anywhere near far enough. I could see the ocean level, but it was all misty and foggy down here. Plus, it was getting late, it was getting dark. I didn't realize how late it had become, how long I had been searching for Flygon, and still, I had not found him. Well… I wasn't going to get anywhere like this. Plus I heard a disturbingly loud noise, there was just, just a racket of noise just raining down on me. It almost hurt a little. I shook my head clear. I could not let myself fall again, I could not let myself slip again. I could not… I took a deep breath… and went back to the ship.

And found it dark and empty… and strangely very loud? There was the sound of hundreds of pirates, but muffled, inside the ship. Wasn't this a ship that prided itself in never being discovered? They had to have a lot of confidence about that if they were making this much noise and still planned on not being discovered.

Ok, well, the place wasn't completely empty. There was one guy I could see. It was James, standing all by himself on the deck. Was he supposed to be… a lookout? That was probably it. Still, a single lookout for an entire ship this big was a little irresponsible in my estimation, wasn't it? I flew over to James to see what I could see.

"Oh… Ray, my lad. Been wondering where you've been." James said. They were so welcoming to us, eerily so. I wasn't entirely sure I trusted these guys. I didn't know why. There was probably absolutely no reason to think that. No rational reason, anyways. Was it just, just paranoia? Was it happening again? Was I safe to be around? Or were they right to tie me up before.

"Hey." I said, a little too casually. What I meant was, I was forcing myself to sound casual just a little too much. I saw the look on James' face changed to one of unease. That wasn't good. He needed to believe I was safe, even if I didn't, because then they would… restore safety any way they could…

What was I talking about?! Of course I was safe to be around. This stupid sickness, stupid affliction, or the vestiges of it, was messing with my mind.

"Where have you been?" James asked.

"Out looking for Flygon. You haven't seen him, have you?" I asked. He paused for a moment, like he was thinking, but a little bit not, like he was, I didn't know. He had a look on his face I couldn't really decipher, and it didn't help that it was petty dark out the the shadows of candle light on the deck played across his face.

"Haven't seen a Flygon recently, cept when we picked the boy up."

"Strider?" I asked. James nodded. "That's the one. You seen him?"

"Nope." James replied. "Sorry."

"It's fine. I just hope everything's alright."

"That's Strider's partner, yeah? So he has to be somewhere." James said, thoughtfully scratching his beard. "You should go eat some dinner, Ray. It's first come first serve, and you're the last to show up. If you want anything good, you'd best hurry." I gave him a look. I wasn't sure why, but I couldn't shake the feeling that he was up to something, that for whatever reason I could not trust him. But I do not think that was my rational mind at work. Whatever. It was fine. I was fine. I had to be fine. If not, then the pirate crew would stop working with me, and I would never get home, I would never… never see my precious Meliae again.

So I shoved it down, gave him a shaky smile, and went off towards the dining hall, the source of the noise.

"Ray. One thing before you go. Stay yourself, alright?" It was like he could read minds.

"Alright." I answered, without turning my head back to look at him. I quickly made my way downstairs.

It was just as visually chaotic in the dining hall as it sounded from the deck. Pirates feasted, and doused themselves in drink with reckless abandon. It seemed to be in the buffet style, with a big table of food in the middle that you could take from and go to a table of the periphery. A lot of people seemed to just keep close by to the central table so they could take and take without having to move a lot. Pokemon were around, too, the companions to the pirates. It was good to see that they were at least fed as well as the humans around here.

"Hey, Ray! Where ya been, buddy!" Emerald waved over to me from across the room. Either she was impressively loud in a room of rambunctious pirates, or I was beginning to be able to pick her voice out of a crowd. Either way Emerald seemed a little… different right now. She may have been slightly intoxicated, or was at least acting like it. That wouldn't surprise me too much, since it seemed like nearly the entire crew was intoxicated as well. Maybe that was the reason James was on the lookout?

Emerald sat with Captain Jesse, the old coot, and Strider. Strider was up but he still seemed a little out of it from the anesthetic. It had been hours since he had been given it, hadn't it? He must have been given a particularly strong dose, or else his body was more sensitive to it. Everyone was having a great time, it looked like. It seemed like a pretty serious situation we were in, and yet it looked like they were having the time of their lives. I sat down next to them.

"Nice of you to finally join us. Where ya been?" Emerald asked again. I had heard her the first time.

"I was looking for Flygon. Remember him?" I asked.

"He's fine…" Strider managed to say through his daze. I was… a little doubtful. I wasn't sure I trusted Strider's word for it. Especially since he was all sort of out of it.

"Long tether, and he can tough, he's fought off better than you." The old coot pointed his winked finger at me and laughed out loud. Ok, I could decipher that. He and Strider had a very long tether, probably, ironically, because they were so close to each other. Well, I thought they were close. It could be that they weren't. They didn't really talk a lot, and he didn't seem very friendly with Flygon outright. But there was something about the way they interacted… that made them seem close. I couldn't quite put my finger on it. Flygon had fought off better than me, huh? Well, that wasn't very hard to believe right now. I wasn't particularly powerful right now, what with Emerald being a bit of a wimp. We would soon fix that issue, though.

"Alight, alright. Just don't forget about him. We matter, too." I frowned. Strider laughed a little.

"I won't he'll… we'll… don't worry." Stride said, and then he seemed to doze off.

"Hey! Everyone!" Jesse bellowed at the top of her lungs, and slammed down a mug she was carrying for good measure. Almost immediately, the hall, which had been a chaotic wall of noise not two seconds earlier, now came to a hush. She raised her glass, and everyone followed her lead. These people… they really respected their leader, didn't they?

"I wanna make a toast, a toast to our newest crew mates, a toast to the times ahead. In a day's time, we'll be over the trade center. We are going to war, my friends, war against the oppressors of this world. It won't be easy, but we have to, for survival, or nobody else will. Nobody else has the guts! Hah!" She struck a pose.

"We are in for hard times ahead, rough skies… but, tonight, let us drink and be merry! Let us laugh uproariously in the face of fate! Drink up, lads!" She toasted her glass, and so did the rest of us, and we drank, and it was uproarious.

Have an awesome day