SLACKERS

EPISODE XXIII

SINS OF THE FATHER

CHAPTER ONE - WHAT DO YOU WANT?

35 years ago

"Amanda?"

Ichika stopped in her tracks as she realized her friend was no longer walking in lockstep with her. The only sound she registered was the swivel of her heel on the aging concrete as she turned around to see what had caused the young brunette to stop in her tracks.

"Amanda?"

"Hm?"

Ichika's best friend, her fist gently clenched to her chest, calmly looked back at her companion.

"You okay? You were miles away for a second there."

Amanda responded with a gentle smile before turning back to look at what had grabbed her attention in the first place. Beneath the large wooden archway, the words "Viridian City" carved into it, hung a large white banner congratulating the high school graduates of 1989 in bright, multicolored letters.

Ichika Yamauchi and Amanda Sakura had been best friends since they were 8 years old, having gone to the same schools, sharing the same classroom almost every year. At this point, they figured they knew the other at least fairly well. Ichika never took Amanda to be the festive sort. The girl three months her junior was always fairly quiet. She never went out of her way to form a large circle of friends, and she rarely spent longer than a week away from her room. Home was always Amanda's sanctuary... well, maybe not her entire home as much as her own room, the only place in the world in which she felt like she had control. As far as the rest of house was concerned, it was a prison. A well-built, air conditioned, and comfortable prison, but a prison nonetheless. Amanda was excited at the idea of finally being able to escape the militarian upbringing her parents had enforced. Not that they were bad people, but Amanda was 18 now, and she was beginning to feel stifled and sheltered.

She was often labeled a quiet one, sometimes people even called her a recluse. There was an aura of mystery around her that garnered her some notoriety. Nothing malicious, but Amanda was often the topic of conversation between rumor-hungry school kids in hushed tones. She used to try to listen in, hoping she could learn from it and make herself more likeable, but she eventually decided it didn't matter anymore. Some of the conversations being whispered a bit too loudly involved labeling her such things. She was a homebody; or if she wasn't, hardly anyone ever saw her leave her home.

Another popular hushed topic about Amanda Sakura was her appearance. She was beautiful. She was petite, not much higher than five feet tall, with a slender figure and long, brown hair with straight bangs. She was 18 years old, but in the past year alone, she had been stopped by adults twice, asking if she needed help getting home to her parents. There was a time she resented her youthful appearance, but over time she began to embrace it. She decided she would take it as a compliment to her beauty rather than an insult to her baby face. To her, it only meant she would age gracefully.

Still another hush topic Amanda knew about was the fact that she had been single her whole life. Sure, she'd had crushes, same as anyone, but she had never had a boyfriend before, let alone her first kiss. All hell would have broken loose if she had engaged in that playing field, because she knew her parents would scold her for letting herself become distracted from her studies. Nothing could be more important to them than the bright, young Amanda growing up to become a successful career woman. Most of her colleagues' parents encouraged their daughters to marry rich, which many of them resented, but Amanda's parents were the opposite. They wanted her to succeed on her own. Their intentions may have been noble, but the level at which they enforced this path was strict enough to drive little Amanda crazy.

Seeing that large, colorful banner reminded Amanda of what was to come. She was on the cusp of adulthood, ready to spread her wings and make her mark on the world. She was ready to finally, truly get out there and explore what she felt had been hidden from her. She wanted to travel, to explore the world instead of study it, to learn through immersion instead of textbooks. Of course her parents wanted to to go a prestigious college, and of course that's what she had spent almost all her free time preparing for.

But, the whole idea...

She just... didn't... feel it.

Ichika, the only person in the world Amanda felt she could fully trust, looked puzzled as she tried to examine her.

"Yeah," Amanda finally replied, a small smile adorning her face. "Just been thinking."

"About college?"

Amanda's smile faded as her gaze fell to the ground in front of Ichika's shoes.

"You're still not sold on the idea, aren't you," said Ichika, her tone teetering on the edge of statement and question.

Amanda could think of no response. She hadn't tasted enough of freedom to both agree with Ichika and not feel like she was betraying her parents. During her adolescence, she used to lie in bed and daydream about what all she could do with her life if it were truly up to her. And one particular dream kept coming back to her over and over again.

"You're still thinking about that trainers' club, aren't you," Ichiki continued, her tone the same as before.

Amanda sighed as she allowed herself to gently, but quickly, nod.

"It's just... the way Asahi was talking about it. He made it sound so..." Amanda trailed off, looking for an appropriate adjective.

Ichika tilted her head and smiled, her hair grazing her shoulder.

"Amazing? Cool? Exciting?"

Nothing was really hitting so far.

"Free?"

The timid brunette gasped, her eyes feeling forced to lock with Ichika's. It was a small word, a quiet one, but to Amanda, it was magical.

"Y-yeah," Amanda was somehow able to utter.

"When Asahi told us about Club Rocket, I think that was the most I've seen you light up in years," said Ichika. "You're a smart girl, you could get into any college you wanted. Yet joining a trainer's club without pay is what you want to do."

"I never said that's what I wanted!" cried the easily-flustered Amanda, a redness creeping onto her cheeks as she stomped her right foot and held her fists down. She felt Ichika was being mildly sarcastic, and she didn't appreciate it.

Amanda tried forcing herself to think the idea of spending her entire time Pokemon training was a waste of her potential. She knew that's what her parents would say. She could already imagine them sitting across the dinner table, preaching to her about how Pokemon training was nothing more than a child's hobby that wouldn't amount to anything. She could already feel her heart getting heavier as she sat there, staring at her dinner without an appetite, as she was encouraged... no, pressured into abandoning such juvenile fantasies. She did this to herself all the time; imagining these scenarios in her head so she could prepare herself for when they inevitably happened in real life.

She had a tendency to daydream so deeply, she could almost see her life being played in metaphors.

But she loved it. She loved Pokemon training more than anything. She loved reading about them, meeting them, watching them. That's why, when she often told her parents she was at a study group, she was really off galavanting around Viridian Forest with Ichika and Asahi, catching and battling all the Pokemon they could find. Asahi would keep most of the Pokemon, but often times he'd free repeat catches immediately, not unlike catch-and-release fishing. And Amanda remembered her little heart beginning to flutter when Asahi had first told them, a few months ago, that he knew a guy who knew a guy who had decided to form a new trainers' club that was dedicated to catching and training the strongest Pokemon in the world, in order to make the world a better place. Lofty ambitions, sure, but noble.

"Come on. You don't have to keep anything from me, Amanda. We both know the whole reason you're so excited about Club Rocket is because Sakaki is the boss."

Amanda stuttered and clenched her teeth, the redness spreading throughout her whole face.

"Th-that's not true! Quit being so stupid!" she blurted out without thinking. All Ichika could do was laugh at her friend's expense.

The embarrassed graduate averted her eyes for a moment as she tried to collect herself. There was no way to count how many times she had told herself she wasn't partially entranced by the idea of getting to be around Sakaki, a young man whom had graduated from her school ten years ago. The Sakaki who was the most popular and best-looking boy in school back then. The Sakaki who made no secret his unconditional love for Pokemon and his passion to train as many monsters as possible, bringing them to their full potential and making them stronger than any other creatures in the history of time. The Sakaki whose reputation as an intense, dedicated young man made him something of a legend among all the classes that would come after he had gone.

Without thinking, Amanda closed her eyes and let her imagination run wild once again. Being able to train beneath Sakaki was like a dream. She thought about battling him. She thought about seeing his famous techniques in person. She thought about how dashing he would look as he waved his hand in front of him, giving orders to his loyal and immensely-loved Pokemon. She thought about the pride she would feel once she had finally managed to beat him in battle. The look of satisfaction on Sakaki's face after helping a young girl get stronger under his training. The way his arms would feel around her after she would run to him and feel his tight embrace...

She quickly shook her head, mentally beating herself up for allowing her mind to come up with such childish fantasies. No, she wasn't into Sakaki romantically. She wanted to train. No, she needed to go to college and make her parents proud. No, not proud, satisfied? Indifferent?

She had no idea at this point. So she fell to her knees and sighed.

Ichika approached her and squatted to meet her at eye level.

"Amanda?"

No response. Ichika put a hand on Amanda's back and leaned in, bringing herself within inches of her face.

She asked her calmly, with love: "Why don't you do it?"

"Do what?"

"You know, talk to them, to Club Rocket."

Amanda tried her hardest to look disgusted, but it was obvious she wasn't fooling anyone.

"Why should I? It's so dumb! Even the name is dumb! It sounds like a ten-year-old came up with it! What does 'Club Rocket' even mean, anyway?" she asked, trying to convince both herself and Ichika that chasing that dream was an unprofessional and unworthy idea.

"I think it's something about reaching for the stars for the world to see their impact," Ichika replied.

Amanda groaned. She had hoped it would come across as a groan of dismissal, but to her, it was an audible admission of defeat by reality.

Ichika couldn't stand... er, squat... to see Amanda feeling conflicted about this any longer.

"Ask yourself, Amanda Sakura. What do you want?"

This was an easy one for her, as she had trained herself for years how to respond to questions like that.

"To get into a good college, land a successful career, and..."

"No no no," Ichika bluntly cut her off as she shook her head. Amanda was a little surprised at the sternness of Ichika's normally bubbly voice. "I didn't ask you what your parents wanted. I asked you what you wanted."

That wasn't fair. At least that's what Amanda wanted to think. All her life she had tried to be a good girl and please everyone. Who was she to interrupt the line of thinking introduced to her by the people who gave her life and fed her and clothed her and provided a room and a bed for her? How dare she act so ungrateful that she would try and break those expectations?

And yet...

"What I want?" she heard herself think out loud.

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She raced through her mind, looking for some kind of answer she felt Ichika would find satisfactory.

She saw through it again. "Yes. What you want. Not your parents. Not me. Not your teachers. You."

You, Amanda Sakura.

A fleeting throught came and went in less than a second, and Ichika saw that.

"Yes. That. Tell me what you want, Amanda."

Under pressure once again and on the verge of tears, Amanda squeezed her eyes shut, and finally let herself chase that fleeting thought.

What she found there was extraordinary.

Well, I certainly hadn't been expecting to try a new writing style, but here it is. I wanted to try something a bit more serious and compelling, and yes, I know parts of this will come off as very corny. I've never published anything in traditional prose, so bear with me.