"You would be like this too, in my situation!"
"What's wrong, cat got ya tongue?"
Protector of Silence
Chapter Three – First Test
Kellyn woke the next morning with one thought: something different about today. He looked over at the door and saw something: a suitcase. And on top of it, was a blue slip of paper...an entrance pass.
'It's today!' he thought, his blue-green eyes flashing open with excitement 'Today's the first day of Ranger School!'
He was out of bed in an instant. He looked around, checking he had packed all of his things. Then he realised he'd forgotten something. On top of the bookshelf. That was where he kept his locket. He'd been wearing it when Lunick had given him to his father before the ex-ranger died beside him. A golden locket with two pictures in it: one of a dark-haired boy with aqua eyes, another of a blue-haired girl with red eyes. These were Lunick and Solana respectively: the locket given to him to make sure he never forgot them the same night Lunick delivered him to the farm. He would never dream of leaving it behind.
He stood on his tiptoes, reaching for the locket at full arm's length. No use, why was he so short? The only reason he could look anywhere near Luke's height was because of the single lock of hair that spiked up on top of his head anime-style and refused to lie flat. He jumped up and his fingers clipped it, but that only proceeded to push the locket even further from reach. In the process of this, Kellyn silently yelped as his toe caught the edge of the bookshelf.
"Kellyn! Melissa! Breakfast!" a voice called from downstairs.
"Coming!" his little sister called from the room next door. He heard the door next to his slam shut and someone running down the stairs.
Kellyn growled with annoyance, blinked and let his eyes turn that blue-white colour that gave away his psychic gift. The locket flew down from the top of the bookshelf and into his hand.
"Kellyn! I've made pancakes!"
Kellyn beamed, pancakes. Well, figured; after all he was leaving today. He heard a knock at the door and he opened it. Standing in the doorway, grinning, was a girl with long curly blonde hair, about eight-years-old and had dark blue eyes. He gave off the grunt that everyone had learnt meant a single word: Melissa.
"I don't know whether your deaf as well as mute, but Mum wants you to come down for breakfast." Kellyn rolled his eyes and gave her a 'Alright, I'll be down in a minute!' look. She left to head downstairs. Kellyn turned to slip a notebook and pencil into the pocket of his blue shorts he had just changed into before rushing after his little 'sister'.
"C'mon Gira!" The girl gripped the small giraffe's mane and urged it on "We have to find him before he reaches the school!" The Girafferig neighed, showing it's rider its cute face before leaping into a gallop. Up ahead, a young boy with chestnut-brown hair was walking down the wooded path with a long-strapped suitcase over his shoulder.
"Kellyn!" she yelled, waving one arm in the air as her ginger hair bounced to the rhythm of Gira's gait "KELLYN!"
Two blue-green eyes locked onto her, a pair of white pupils dilating. He mouthed her name: "Clio."
The girl named Clio slowed Gira down to a walk beside her friend.
"Leaving without saying goodbye?" she smiled. Kellyn gave a shake of his head, and wrote her a message.
I'm not really fond of goodbyes.
"You never were" Clio smiled "I wouldn't have known you were leaving, but Luke spilled it all out under pressure."
Kellyn shook his head and gave out a high-pitched sigh that sounded unusual for a boy his age. Typical Luke, and typical Clio! No doubt she got Houndour to help her out with the interrogation.
You shouldn't bother. You're going to be visiting Kanto soon, aren't you?
"Yeah, but I could be back for Christmas" Clio answered "Still, a simple goodbye would suffice."
Well, goodbye then.
Clio smiled and laughed at the message. Kellyn sighed again. Out of the few friends he had made, he was going to miss two the most: Luke and Clio. He wasn't sure why, but he had found a deep friendship in the excitable green-eyed ginger in front of him. Not a romance relationship or anything like that, just very good friends.
"Clio will miss you greatly" Gira looked at him "She almost died on the spot when she discovered you were leaving today."
Kellyn nodded. He hadn't been sure when he had started communicating with Pokémon. Maybe he had since birth, or maybe an event had kicked it off. Either way, he found their conversations quite interesting, especially since he could mentally talk back. One of the few perks of being a psychic being.
'I know' he said mentally 'I will miss her too.'
They were now approaching the bridge that crossed to the small island east of Vientown that was Ranger School.
"Well I guess I should go" Clio sighed "You know, find the others."
See you around Clio.
Clio read the message before wheeling Gira around.
"Catch ya later Kellyn" she smiled, before clicking her tongue and galloping towards the west. Kellyn watched her leave before turning to the bridge.
'This must be it.'
Kellyn turned and looked at the metal arch before him. It was in an arch shape and looked very solid, the only way past the school wall. Kellyn grasped the bars of the gates and tried to pull them open. No avail. Then he tried pushing them. Zero, nothing, zilch. He gave the gates a rough kick.
"Temper, temper."
Kellyn looked over his shoulder and saw a little blue and white squirrel, a Pacharisu, at the base of a tree, looking at him with fiery yellow eyes.
'You would be like this too, in my situation' Kellyn thought, grunting.
The Pacharisu got the message and disappeared up the tree. Kellyn re-diverted his attention to the gates. He gave them one last yank before letting his eyes rolling to their unnatural colour. Automatically the gates swung open slightly. He stepped forwards, pushed one of the gates open wide enough for him to get through and walked up the steps set into a cliff. At the top of the steps was a female teacher with deep red hair.
"Good morning" she smiled "Are you the new student starting today?"
Kellyn nodded and opened his notebook to deliver a message.
Yes, my name is Kellyn. It is nice to meet you.
"Kellyn" the teacher smiled "Well, it's nice to see there are students with manners, unlike some..." She grimaced at the thought of what appeared to be a certain student bugging her. Then she smiled again "My name is Miss April, please follow me Kellyn..." She looked a little confused and slightly embarrassed. "I apologise, I don't believe you told me your surname."
Surname? He bit his lip. He didn't have a surname. He could always use his foster parents' name, but it didn't seem right. He paused for a second, then had an idea. He wrote it down and showed it to Miss April. He smiled at his own creativity.
My name is Kellyn Solluna.
"Well Kellyn" Miss April led him into what appeared to be a side barn, but looked more like a lab or something "As you know, Pokémon Rangers don't use Pokeballs. They use capture stylers to temporarily capture wild Pokémon."
Kellyn nodded, he knew that. Standing in the middle of the floor, a Pikachu was sniffing the ground.
"Well then," Miss April handed him what appeared to be a red metal armband with a blue diamond-shaped spinning-top on top of it "Let's see how you cope capturing this small Pokémon, the standard Pikachu."
Kellyn nodded, slipping the armband onto his arm. He aimed it as the Pikachu. Unbeknownst to him, his eyes flashed blue-white, almost with anticipation.
'Let's go!' he thought, smiling with pleasure 'Capture...on!'
The little spinning-top disc detached itself from his armband. It whizzed towards the little yellow squirrel that was Pikachu. Kellyn pointed his armband to the right, the spinning top went right. He pointed to the left and it went left. He smiled and redirected it to the Pikachu. The spinning top began making light-blue circles around the Pikachu. After about four of five loops, the circle closed in and seemed to be absorbed by the Pikachu. Its eyes took on a new glint as it chanted its name. He paused and turned a small red nob on the metal armband. The Pikachu's eyes lost their glint and it trotted over to a man in a lab coat.
"Well done" he smiled in a some-what evil voice "You have passed the test to enter the Team School! Together we shall stand together, rule the world and...!"
"Mr Kaplan!" Miss April gave the man a disapproving glance.
"Oh, way to ruin the mojo Miss A!" the man complained "Oh fine! Forget the ruling the world thing! Just, welcome to the academy!"
Miss April smiled at the correction. She looked down at Kellyn.
"Less than ten seconds" she commented "Impressive. You're a natural."
Kellyn gave her a thank you smile. With his parents both farmers and a sister so far uninterested in anything that wasn't cute and pink, complements on any ranger abilities were scare between.
"Well, you can bring your bag with you" Miss April said "Let's introduce you to the class."
They exited the side-barn and walked towards a round area of grass that might be a square. They then walked to the left towards the door of a large building, Kellyn examining his styler the entire time.
"You appear to like it" Miss April commented. Kellyn nodded eagerly. "I see" she pursed her lips in thought. "You don't speak."
Kellyn felt all the excitement wash off him. He hung his head and shook it, giving a small sigh.
"Well, I doubt it will matter" Miss April smiled "It appears you have no trouble communicating your thoughts, and there certainly nothing saying a mute cannot be a ranger." She opened the door which lead into a courtyard. There were two doors jutting out on the left and right half-way up, and at the far end were two more doors, plus two sets of stairs leading either up or down.
"Your dorms are upstairs" Miss April explained "You'll be sharing with five other boys, two in my class, and three in Mr Kincaid's. His classroom is to the right." She pointed at the right jutting out at the right. She led him to the other door "However, your classroom will be this one." She opened the door. Kellyn stayed in the door as she walked in fort of a desk with a blackboard behind it. The class room was small, but long. Maybe it was because there were only six desks in it. Three girls were in a line on the left, then there was a small gap down the middle and three desks on the right. Two had boys behind them, but the one closest to the walkway was empty.
"Everyone" Miss April said, getting their attention.
"This better be good" a ginger-haired boy grumbled. From the back, it appeared his hair was styled in hair-gels spikes.
"Yeah, it's a Friday!" yawned a black-haired boy next to him "And like 8:00 in the morning!"
"I know and I apologise for having to class you up like this" Miss April sighed "But I had to inform you that as of today we'll be getting a new student." Immediately everyone started whispering in excitement.
"A new student!" a girl with blonde hair on the end of the their line whispered "I hope it's a girl!"
"It's plainly a boy Rhythmi!" the ginger boy snorted "The desk is on our side of the class!"
Kellyn decided to remain in the doorway, they didn't appear to have noticed him. They were to busy bickering. Well, except for one person. A girl on the far end of the girls' line. She had light-ginger hair with pale blue eyes. She looked like she could be sociable if she wanted to, but judging by the way Rhythmi and the brunette next to her were talking she looked a little shy. She gave him a wink before staring back at the front of the class again. She appeared to have been the only one to notice him, but he still ducked behind the door in case anyone else tried to see where she was winking.
"Everyone! Please!" Miss April got their attention "I think it would be best if we let him introduce himself." She beckoned for Kellyn to come in. Immediately the creaking of chairs signified everyone, and I mean everyone, was turning around to look at him. Kellyn paled - he hated being stared at like this. I mean, who did? Those questioning stares that just wanted to know your every little secret and throw them to the world.
"Come on, don't be shy" Miss April coaxed him. Don't be shy? What? Oh, fine. Better get this over with.
'Luke would be laughing his socks off right now' he thought. Taking a deep breath, he tried to ignore the stares as he walked stiffly up to the blackboard. Picking up a piece of chalk, he did the only reasonable thing he could do. With the squeaking of white rock on blackboard, he wrote something.
KELLYN
"Kellyn" the blonde girl called Rhythmi read "Is that your name?"
Kellyn nodded in response.
"What's wrong, cat got ya tongue?" asked the ginger-haired boy.
"Keith!" Miss April immediately cut in. Kellyn though just shrugged and nodded. They were going to have to find out sooner or later.
"Ah" Keith simply said, folding his arms on his desk and placing his chin on top of those arms "I take it you're the mystery person who'll be taking the top bunk."
"Stop moaning Keith" the black-haired boy put in, and Kellyn was glad for some sort of back-up, even if he didn't know who this boy was. "You're scared of heights, that's why you were assigned a bottom bunk."
"Argh, stuff it Ponte!" Keith grumbled.
"No you stuff it!" Ponte complained right back.
"You stuff it!" Keith didn't look happy at being told what to do as he sat up and glared. Ponte did too.
"You stuff it!"
"You stuff it!"
"You stuff—!"
"Keith! Ponte! Stop it!" Miss April snapped "Introduce yourself to Kellyn!"
Ponte rolled his eyes. "He already knows our names. Thanks to Muppet here."
"You're the muppet!" Keith snapped.
"No you are!" Ponte complained.
"No you are!" Keith complained back.
"Stop arguing with me!" Ponte growled.
"No you stop it!" Keith complained.
"You stop it!"
"You stop it!"
"Both of you stop it!" the blonde-haired girl with the blue eyes called Rhythmi chipped in "You're hardly setting a good example!" She growled, then smiling at Kellyn "Hello there! My name is Rhythmi. I'm class representative!"
"She forgot to mention she was the only one who ran for it" the brunette next to her smiled "My name is Sami. Don't get on my bad side."
Secretly making a note not to do just that, Kellyn looked at the ginger on the end of the line - the one who had first noticed him. She had her chin in her palm, her elbow resting on the desk, staring off into space. Sami elbowed her. She gave a brief smile to Kellyn before staring into space again.
"Kate" Sami put in "That's Kate."
'Proud and silent huh?' Kellyn thought 'Kinda like me. Well, not like I have a choice.'
"Well, now you stammered through a hello" Miss April sighed with relief "Boys, take Kellyn up to your dorm. And...try not to kill each other before then."
Keith shot her a cheeky smile. "No need to worry Miss A! Kel's perfectly safe with us!"