Well the next chapter came quicker than I expected. How Fezandipitous. Hope y'all enjoy. Also, there's no explicit scenes in this chapter.
More notes at the end of the chapter detailing the direction I'm trying to go in with this fic.
Chapter 2-The Ominous Winds of Fate
It was the afternoon, and finally the storm from last night finally passed as students were bustling towards their classes, whether they were held in one of those traditional classroom settings or in the the academy's renowned Terarium, things seemed like it was all par the course. Not exactly the case however for a couple of students, including one exchange student who happened to be the academy's reigning league club champion.
Right now, two students were in the central plaza of Blueberry Academy's Terarium having a chat. At first about what their current curriculars are, then about what they've been up to lately. Then came the last subject, the elephant in the room so to speak. About a certain someone who happens to be one of these two students' kid brother, a first year going on second year at Blueberry Academy.
"Is my dear Kiki eating well, is he getting enough sleep?" Answered one of them, a girl dressed in an all grayish-white autumn style academy uniform.
"Yeah he is but...ever since that day in the underdepths, he has been real depressed. I thought maybe inviting you back to Kitakami along with your friends would snap him out of it. But I guess not." The older student, a young woman wearing her all blue winter academy uniform said before she continued. "In fact, I don't even remember him coming out of his room that weekend." She finished.
"Oh Carmine... I wish I could do more to help him. Even after all this time he's still not himself." The other girl chimed in solemnly before a single tear rolled down her face.
"Seeing this, the older woman softly replied. "Oh Juliana. You did everything you possibly could to help him. What more can you do?" The older woman inquired softly as if to say, 'you've done all you possibly could with that boy'.
At this the younger girl named Juliana tear'd up even more. "Carmine...but...but...I love him." Juliana replied softly and with tears of sadness, can no longer bear to see her friend, no the love of her life, go down a different spiral after rescuing him from a previous one.
The older teenaged woman named Carmine continued. "Of course Julie, I know how much you love him. It must have been heartbreaking to see him work himself and everyone else too hard just to beat you because of the mistakes we made back during that field trip. Now though...it's like he's given up on everything. He isn't even trying to get out of bed anymore most of the time, much less go back to how he was when we first met." Carmine said, having ranted about the various stages and changes of his mental health and state of mind.
Just before they could continue the conversation, another student, a tall girl in an all blue winter uniform much like Carmine's, came running towards the two in a bit of a huff, a panicked expression on her face that is far too uncharacteristic for her given her usual composure.
"Carmine, there you are!" Exclaimed the female student.
"Whoah Amarys, what hurry are you in right now, what's going on with you all of a sudden?" Asked Carmine in response, knowing something definitely was up if this girl named Amarys of all people was this worked up right now.
"It's Kieran! He's GONE!!" Exclaimed Amarys in a state of panic.
"WHAT!!" exclaimed both Carmine and Juliana simultaneously.
Back at the League Club Room, both Juliana and Carmine ran there with Amarys as fast as they could get there.
Sat at a table was 3 other club members, one of them a girl with pink hair wearing a cardigan, the other a boy with red hair wearing a chef's style uniform and wielding a frying pan, and a lanky white haired male jock with an unusual outfit for the academy's usual dress code. After the 3 girls took their seats, the tall jock spoke up.
"Good to see you guys made it here, especially given the...well odd circumstances here." He said nonchalantly, like he had no care in the world.
Oh shut it Drayton, you know Kiki means the world to me! Where in the world is he?!!" Yelled Carmine, now getting visibly distraught before Amarys put her hand on Carmine's shoulders to try and comfort her.
"That's the thing, we don't know. Kieran didn't make it to his first 2 classes of the day and then didn't even show up to our daily club meeting." Said the Pink haired girl before continuing. "After we interviewed students who were at the Terarium, we concluded that he wasn't there as well." She finished.
"So like...Amarys went to Kieran's dorm room and did a check on him. Get this, virtually nothing of his was found in that dorm room. It was completely empty!" Said the boy with the red hair.
"Question is...is the kid simply playin' hookey, or is he now a truant?" Said Drayton, the white haired jock with an air of his usual dejection.
"Oh no no no...I won't allow this!!! Not my cute little Kiki!!!!" exclaimed Juliana in an indignant manner. "He belongs here, he belongs with ME!!!" She finished, clearly becoming a bit unhinged.
"Ugghh did any of you even see him try and leave the school grounds at all today?!!" Carmine yelled, clearly looking to blame one of these four idiots for not keeping a closer eye on her little brother.
"We must hurry and form a search party, we must find and retrieve him." Said Amarys with overbearing concern in her voice.
"Uhh where would we even begin to look?" Said the red haired boy.
"He couldn't have gone far Crispin. I'll find him and I'll hurt him for trying to leave me." Said Juliana.
"Uhh please calm down Juliana, I'm sure he is safe." Said the pink haired girl.
"Easy for YOU to say Miss Lacey, your an only child without a boyfriend that needs extra taken care of on a daily basis!!!" Carmine spat harshly at the pink haired girl in response.
Before things spiraled further out of control, Drayton spoke up to initiate a course of action.
"Well now...looks like we will have to leave school grounds to search for the missing kid. The teachers won't let us leave school grounds unless it's for any school directives so...we will need one of em to 'chaperone' us and help search too. Gotta get Miss Briar in on this." Drayton explained before turning to Carmine and further added. "Since you're Miss Briar's favorite pet, you go get her while Jules and the rest of us get ready and meet by the school entrance." He finished.
"Okay sounds like a plan." Crispin, the redhead said.
"Affirmative, I'll get supplies for our search trip." Said Lacey the pink haired girl.
"I'll be ready, let's not waste time. He is precious to us." Said Amarys who immediately left in a haste. Soon after Lacey and Crispin got up before running out the door to the club room.
Carmine was seething at this point. Who is that bozo, Elite Four or not, to tell her what to do? Before she could seethe more, Juliana got her attention. "Okay, let's find our Kiki, please get Miss Briar to help us, technically she also helped further his frustrations during our assignment in Area Zero. So it's only right she helps in our attempt to correct him." Juliana finished before running out the door as well.
"Well what are you waiting for toots, chop chop." Drayton said to Carmine whilst still in his same position not bothering to even get up.
"Ugggghhh!! Fine but you better hurry up your self ya lazy bozo!!" Carmine exclaimed with abrasive fury in her eyes before she stormed out the room. Clearly flustered and frustrated with this 'idiot of a man'.
Back at the Academy's entryway we see Crispin, Lacey, Amarys, and Juliana all convened at the agreed location to begin the search party. Soon after Carmine arrived with her homeroom teacher Ms. Briar in tow. And not even a minute or two later, Drayton lazily waltzes in.
"Alright student council members, don't worry about filling me in. Carmine told me just about everything I needed to know about this situation. We should arrive first in the Unova mainland and search for him there then we will see about booking flights to regions we know he is familiar with." Briar quickly briefed over with her students before Carmine chimed in.
"Also I checked with my Grandparents and they asked all over town and nearby areas back home. He hasn't been seen in Kitakami neither." Carmine responded.
"Well geez man...that kinda limits our options. Guess we better hurry." Drayton chimes in before walking towards the academy exit point.
"Right!" Said Lacey, followed by Crispin.
"Affirmative!" Said Amarys.
"Okay let's move out!" exclaimed Juliana before the rest of the search party all went towards the exit to head out towards the mainland.
Back in a small town city in the southeastern rural areas of Unova, situated near the old railroads. There's a building that used to house a Pokemon League Gym, it is now but a mere museum and library.
In the library area, there he was... though he changed into a greyish-black hoodie and black skinny jeans(and yes he was able to pull it off given his small and somewhat miniscule frame), wore contact lens that changed his eye color to pitch black with a dark grey pupil, and dyed his hair completely pitch black though largely kept it similar to how he just had it beforehand, this was still the same kid that not even more than 18 hours ago, had fled Blueberry Academy in an act of truancy, fully intending to never return for the rest of the foreseeable future.
Here, Kieran was currently engrossed in yet more reading and book studies, only this time, about various lores, myths, legends, and rumors regarding various Mythical Pokemon that have been spotted, seen, and possibly documented. All manner of various books lay sprawled out before him at the table were he sat alone in an isolated corner of the now famous Nacrene Library. He so far recorded facts, rumors, and details in an empty Notebook which he is using as his primer for jotting down notes about various Mythical Pokemon and so far he has recorded primer notes related to four mythical Pokemon he has researched thus far. And was about to finish up taking notes about facts, rumors, and details about a fifth mythical Pokemon.
Soon midnight would approach after an hour extra had passed and soon he was done. After collecting all the books he checked out he put them back on the return shelf, for the librarian to put them back where they originally were. Then tucked his notebook into his newly acquired satchel before putting up the hood of his hoodie on and putting on a pair of sunglasses. Then he headed towards the front of the building which was the museum wing.
After idly checking some of the exhibits on his way out, he noticed a peculiar brownish and red orelike stone that seemed to thrum with ancient energy, but then thought nothing of it before he headed outside.
After 30 minutes had passed since then, two people came in...it was Lacey and Drayton wearing their usual attires. Lacey went up to the receptionist who happened to be a gracefully aged up woman of color who happened to run this whole proprietary establishment, and handed her a missing persons flyer that had Kieran's picture on it, the most recent one which Carmine, his elder sibling printed out and copied for making these flyers.
"Well child ain't it a little too late for ya to be visiting here, what can I do for ya at this hour?
"Umm hello, have you seen this boy?" Asked Lacey while handing the woman the flyer. The woman responds in kind.
"Well while there was a child here earlier, but it ain't this poor little fella. Why, is he lost somewhere child?" Asked the woman with genuine concern in her voice.
"Yeah this here's our missing pal from school. We are all from Blueberry Academy ya see. But he went AWOL on us for some reason, just trying to bring him back safe and sound is all." Chimed in Drayton, rather chill in his tone, but you could tell he was worried about his friend.
"Aw well sugar, I hope y'all find him soon. Looks like he needs a friend or two. I'm a bit busy since the library is open 24/7 so I would have helped look for this poor thing but I've an establishment to run. Good luck y'all. May Arceus bless your kind souls." Said the woman before waving them goodbye.
"Well this blows. Guess we better let teach and Carmine know he ain't in this town neither." Said Drayton, looking dejected, clearly he and Lacey went and looked in every city, town, and location on the eastern side of Unova and only had a few locations left to search for their missing friend, Kieran.
Drayton dialed Carmine's number on his Rotom Phone to let Carmine and Briar know that Kieran wasn't seen in Nacrene City. Of course no one recognized that boy in the black hoodie wearing sunglasses was in fact the person they was searching for.
"K, that's that. Come on Lacey, next stop Striaton." Drayton said motioning Lacey to follow after hanging up the call.
"R-Right!" Lacey simply responded with a nod before they both headed out the door.
The wheels of destiny are turning and for all these individuals, they won't know what fate has in store for them. Yet one of them is much too determined to let his own destiny slip from his grasp as he works towards his new goal.
Kieran's goal is to catch a team full of mythical Pokemon and train them to be the world's strongest team of Pokemon, only then will he be able to confront his demons head on and finally conquer them.
As Kieran overlooks the rustic railroads leading into the small time city of Nacrene. He turns around and mutters one line of monologue before heading back to go through the nearby Pinwheel Forest. "Soon, not even Sis or Juliana will be able to reach me much less even touch me, I'll be too strong for them. Then they will know what it's like to feel emotional pain and heartbreak, as much as I had to go through." He muttered with renewed embittered determination before heading towards the nearby forest.
Soon the sun will rise and with it, a new road paved by the fates usurped by it's own cruel twists will lie before all that is bound by the ties of bondage yesterday, to be broken tomorrow and so forth, sooner or later.
A/N: Well that went better than I'd hoped IMHO. Now for the next chapter, I'm thinking a time skip of about 2-4 years, haven't fully decided but it will cover what the affected characters were doing since those years had passed and how they dealt with the pains of losing someone close to them for years, not knowing where he is or what he was up to since that fateful day. Still working that part out however so don't quote me on this.
Anywho, if i keep this up i could maybe finish this fic up in quite a timely fashion. However i plan for this fic to have around 10-15 chapters total before it's finished snd no more than 20 chapters if needed. Still i could get writer's block or lose interest quickly so still don't expect any frequent updates.
Leave a review if you want as long as it's constructive and respectful. And many thanks to those that follow and/or favorite this story. Hopefully more to come soon.
Til then...i bid ye adieux.