Candela paced in circles on the practice field. There was no sign of Darrin, or the starters, or even the discarded pokéballs. The kid had waddled along so slowly before, so he surely couldn't have gotten far. And what had become of the starters? The thoughts clouded Candela's head, and she couldn't concentrate.
Spark cradled the box of tissues like it was a baby as he scanned the scene. Rutabaga sniffed around near his feet, her tail switching to and fro in agitation. "This is where you left what's-his-name?"
"Darrin, and yes, obviously," Candela hissed, kicking up a clump of grass. All she wanted to do was wrap herself in a blanket and forget any of this was happening.
"And you left him out here alone?"
Candela punted another chunk of turf in frustration. "The starters were supposed to be watching him!"
"Most of our starters are new hatches," Spark said between sniffles. "They probably didn't understand what you wanted. Or they could have understood, but then not been able to act on it. Like, Rutabaga is smart, but I wouldn't have her do my taxes."
"Yeah, that's what you have Blanche for," Candela muttered.
"What's the matter with that?" Spark asked. "If the general public was supposed to understand how to file taxes, we would have been taught it in school. Plus, you should see the returns Blanche gets me."
Candela planted her hands on her hips. "What is with you two? Why are you so buddy-buddy? Do you think you owe a life debt to them now or something?"
Rutabaga lifted her ears and started exploring closer to the lab. Spark followed her as he spoke. "We've always been friends. Just like I've always been friends with you."
Candela trailed behind him, crossing her arms to ward against her increasing chills. "Sure, but since the storm…"
Spark cut her off. "You keep bringing that up. Yes, since the storm, we've been spending more time together. I'll be the first to agree that it's out of character for Blanche, but I'm not complaining. They're usually so quiet and withdrawn. It's nice that they want to hang out."
"You guys hang out?" Candela hadn't meant to sound so hurt. She knew they shared a few rituals, but wasn't sure how much time they actually spent together.
"It was by necessity at first. My back got screwed up pretty bad, and I needed their help after coming home from the hospital." He crouched down to see what Rutabaga was pawing at. "We got to know each other a little more during that time, I think."
"And then you started doing things like movie nights together," Candela extrapolated, unable to conceal her irritation.
Spark straightened up and faced her. "I always invite you to those, but you turn me down and make fun of what we want to watch!"
"Yeah, because you watch terrible movies! On purpose!"
Rutabaga chittered behind Spark, but Candela ignored her. It was hard to focus on anything else but her inexplicable anger. The rage ate her up like the flames of a house fire, burning from the inside out. Some part of her knew that this wasn't the time for confrontation, and another part recognized that her emotions had blazed out of proportion, but she was unable to stop.
"Because bad movies are funny!" Spark said. "Candela, what the hell is going on with you? Why are you acting like this?"
Spark exclaimed as Rutabaga jolted him with a small charge of electricity. Now that she finally had everyone's attention again, the raichu held aloft an open pokéball and pointed to a sporadic trail of them leading to the back door of the lab.
"Darrin…" Candela had nearly forgotten what she was doing out in the field in the first place. "I told him to gather up the busted pokéballs so we could recycle them. He must have carried them inside! Er, tried to."
"Good job, Rootie-toot," Spark said woozily to a very unimpressed-looking Rutabaga. "Let's follow that trail!"
§
Candela picked the last of eight dropped pokéballs off the floor in front of the service door to the recycling room. At least the kid was trying to be helpful. The chill of the air-conditioning was almost too much for Candela to bear, and judging by the way Spark shuddered as he reached for the door handle, he was struggling with the temperature too.
"I think once we reach Darrin, I'll send him home. Do a rain check for the rest of the program," Candela said. The anger that had overcome her in the field had been subdued by immense guilt. Guilt for leaving Darrin alone, guilt for snapping at Spark, guilt for everything. Of course Blanche and Spark would want to hang out without someone like her spoiling everything.
"That's probably for the best," said Spark, pushing open the door.
The pokéball recycling room was easily the most industrial-looking area of the lab. A dozen large silos reached from the floor to the high ceiling, each filled with thousands of pokéballs in need of resetting. The balls were beamed directly into the silos by trainers in the field after missed throws or pokémon breakouts. Pipelines led from each silo to an enormous machine in the center of the brightly-lit room. The machine was composed of a huge, steel funnel which the pipes fed into and a long rectangular unit below in which the balls were reprogrammed, sealed, and beamed back out to pokéstops across the region. The constant clicking and clunking of pokéballs created an awful din, but Candela's ears were so congested that the noise was pleasantly muted.
"I've got a bad feeling about this," Spark said as he led the way between rows of pipes and conveyer belts. He walked like a drunk, swaying into obstacles, stopping to lean on columns.
"You sure the bad feeling didn't come from drinking half a bottle of cough syrup on your own?" Candela asked, but she knew better than to doubt Spark's intuition. The truth was, the further they walked into the recycling room, the greater her anxiety loomed. Even with all the safety precautions of the room, it wasn't a good place for kids to roam around freely.
Just as Candela was preparing to shout for Darrin, the charmander from the group of starters rounded a piece of machinery ahead, waving his stumpy arms wildly. Candela and Spark exchanged nervous glances and wasted no time following the pokémon as he weaved through the room. Rutabaga raced ahead, which was an alarming anomaly on its own. Candela panted, unable to breathe through her nose, as she jogged after the two pokémon.
The charmander stopped on the far side of the resetting machine in the center of the room and pointed up at the chubby child ascending the access ladder on the giant funnel. Darrin made his way with steady, deliberate steps up the ladder, never looking down. He carried his backpack, which presumably carried the balls that he hadn't already dropped on his way to the recycling room.
"Darrin! Stop!" Candela shouted.
The boy paused as if considering the merit of the order, then proceeded anyway, still not bothering to look back.
"Wow, cheeky," said Spark. "Hey, Darrin! Little bro! It's dangerous up there! Why don't you come on down?"
Darrin didn't even pause for Spark. Spark made for the bottom of the ladder, but Candela caught him by the shoulder.
"If you go up there, you'll just lose your balance and fall off," she said. "I have a better idea. Do you have any flying pokémon on you?"
Spark shook his head. "All I have is Rutabaga."
Above them, Darrin suddenly picked up speed until only a couple rungs remained between him and the top of the funnel. Fighting the irritation in her throat, Candela lunged for the ladder herself. As she climbed, she couldn't stop yet another fit of coughing. The force of the coughs drove tears to her eyes.
"Darrin, don't let go! Just wait for Candela!" Spark shouted in his cold-ravaged voice from below.
Candela could barely see from her angle that Darrin had reached the lip of the funnel and removed his backpack. Ignoring the ache of her shoulders and thighs, Candela pressed ever faster upward. At last she was within reach of the boy, and she strained to catch his shoe with her sweaty hand.
But the shoe pulled up and away from her as Darrin toppled into the funnel.