Caught in the Whirlpool
Part VI
The Wingull Rocks were a trio of mini-islands clustered close together two miles off the coast of Central Uzu. They were too small and their sides were too steep for humans to live there, but it was perfect for huge flocks of wingulls and pelippers. The monstrous sea birds nested there in the spring and summer, and perched there at night all year round.
Few things aside from the wingulls and pelippers ever visited the place. The currents were especially strong there and when combined with the tides and the shallow, rocky bottom it was a death trap to most boats, even in calm weather. It was so dangerous there that even some kinds of water pokémon that avoided the area, lest they become trapped in the triangular dead spot at the heart of the tiny islands and become unable to break through the barrier of fast-flowing currents.
If smugglers lost pokémon near the Rocks, the monsters could get stuck in the dead spot, Kushina mused as the flat-topped columns of rock came into view. Non-native water pokémon wouldn't know to stay clear of the currents and they could end up trapped… It's a good thing that Tsunami's such a strong swimmer!
"I hope we find something," the red-head said.
Maybe there would be tropical pokémon, like finneon and lumineon or corsola. Or perhaps there would be freshwater pokémon, like buizel and floatzel or slowpoke. Or maybe it was something really rare…
Getting into the heart of the Wingull Rocks was something of an adventure of its own. Sometimes Tsunami had to cut sideways across the currents and other times the gyarados had to ride with the currents to progress. Several times they came close to getting battered into the sheer cliffs or smaller spires of rocks. But she and her sea monster made it into the calm heart of the Rocks and Kushina immediately got down to business.
"Hoshi," she called as she released her psychic starfish, "use your illuminate ability to draw any submerged pokémon to the surface." Then she unleashed her lanturn. "Hikari, get ready to drive monsters away, or paralyze them." And then she patted Tsunami's broad scaly head. "And you rest up for the trip out of here, okay?"
The purple starfish dove until the water, sinking just deep enough that the only thing visible of it was its glowing central gem. The electric anglerfish started circling the floating gyarados, ready for anything. Kushina dug around in her waterproof pack to pull out her pokédex and the special specimen-gathering pokéballs, and waited.
Now let's see what's here…
Shun finished checking over the fresh liquor shipment to his uncle's pub, The Salty Pelipper, and wandered out of the back to lean up against the bar while he waited for his shift to start. It was early afternoon so only a handful of alcoholic patrons were inside, nursing their drinks of choice. In a few hours the rush would start with thirsty sailors, fishermen, and workers finishing their job for the day and coming in for something to relax with.
"Coming in for a pre-shift drink?" Arata asked as he slid over.
"Of course not," Shun snorted. "I'm just killing a bit of time."
"Ah, the national pastime," Arata nodded sagely. "What we do when we aren't busting our butts at whatever job we have—kill time."
Shun rolled his eyes and hopped onto a barstool. "You've lived on this island your whole life, right?"
"Discounting the time I did some pokémon-journeying…yeah, my whole life." The dirty-blond started polishing some clean beer steins to look busy. "Why do you want to know?"
"I ran into a former native who I've never heard of before," Shun said. "I was hoping you might be able to tell me about her."
"Her?" Arata's eyebrows lifted up to his hairline. "You want to know about a woman? Who is it? Is she hot? Do you want to bang her? What does she look li—"
"Slow down there, horn-dog," Shun grunted. "She claims to be engaged."
"She claims?" Arata smirked. "There's no proof? No ring? No boyfriend?" His smirk widened. "Are you sure she didn't just shoot you down?"
"Did you know a Kushina Uzumaki?" Shun asked wearily.
"Kushina Uzumaki?" Arata repeated, halting his pointless polishing, his face slack with shock. "Did I know her? …Hell, yes! You saw her around? Like, around here, as in, on this island?"
"Yes, last I saw her was near the Sealed Shrine," Shun answered. "How well did you know her?"
"We were best buddies!" Arata grinned. "Me, and her, and Daichi Myoubikou, and Ando Akisame would hang out together all the time—sometimes her second cousin Hachiro, too. She was just one of the boys; she wore her older brothers' hand-me-down clothes and kept her hair really short. Never had any female friends, and never really ran with boys besides us and her brothers." His grin turned lopsided. "What does she look like now?"
"Pretty. Really long hair." Shun rubbed thoughtfully at his chin. "When did she move away?"
"Long hair?" Arata gaped. "No way! She's always hated her hair. Why the heck would she grow it out?" Then Shun's question seemed to register. "Move away? She didn't move away, she ran away, and never looked back. She used to send these gloating postcards home every now and then and the whole town would be gossiping about them for weeks afterwards."
"Hmm…" Shun braced his elbows on the countertop and stared down at the dark wood. So…she was a tomboy?
"Wait." Arata started poking him in the shoulder. "You said that she said that she was engaged? Like, for real? She wasn't kidding?"
"She seemed serious to me," Shun shrugged and brushed Arata's finger away. "Quit poking me!"
"So, she's back in town, has long hair, and is engaged," Arata mused to himself, tracing his Kurokawa clan tattoo with his index finger. Then he clapped his hands. "I gotta tell everybody! Let's see… Daichi moved to West Uzu, but I've got his number. Hachiro lives on South Uzu now—haven't talked to him in a while; I need to ask him if he has a new boyfriend since he ditched the last one. And Ando, my brother from another mother, is still bumming out somewhere in Jungle Country…the bastard." Arata sighed. "I really need to find a way to go out and join him. All his postcards boast about all the hot chicks that he meets…"
Shun stopped listening as the Kurokawa man started rambling on about his childhood friend's claims of bikini-clad hotties and mused on a far more interesting subject.
A tomboy who ran away from home and never came back… It sounds like she's a real scandal. How come I haven't heard a thing about her until now?
Arashi poked the tip of his tongue out of the corner of his mouth as he struggled to pick splinters out of his fingers with a little pair of tweezers while he sat on the back steps of the house. Repairing the old bleachers had turned out to be a real pain in the butt. And there was still some bench replacement and sanding that needed to be done before they were finished.
His cousin Akane was nearby giving her precious pokémon a little spa day. She had already brushed the fur coats of delcatty and pachirisu to a soft sheen, and now was rubbing lightly perfumed oils into the skin of her other creatures. She'd already finished with her meganium and azumarill, she was working on her vaporeon, and her milotic was next in line.
"It's hard to believe that Kushina's really back after so long," Akane cheerfully chattered as she massaged her vaporeon on the grass. "Have you seen any of her pokémon?"
"Nope," Arashi answered with a shrug.
"I wonder what her milotic is like," Akane said.
"How do you know that she has a milotic?" Arashi snorted. "She was all mad to get a gyarados before she ran off, even though it really wasn't gender-appropriate."
"But…but she's all grown up now!" Akane sputtered. "She's grown out her hair, she has a child, and she's going to get married soon. Surely she's out-grown all those silly ideas she had as a girl. Milotic is the epitome of beauty, elegance, grace, serenity, and femininity. Why wouldn't she want one?"
Arashi just shook his head. I don't think she's magically changed into the perfect woman just because she's all grown up now.
"Well, I hope that she's not so busy tomorrow," Akane continued on cheerily. "I'd love to have a little girl's day with her. We'll do each other's hair and nails, and I'll share my make-up with her, and we seem to be the same size so I can share some of my dresses…"
He rolled his eyes and tuned her out as he worked on his last stubborn splinter. When he finally dug the offending bit of wood from his digit he sighed in relief. Shaking out his abused hand he propped his back up against the back door and stared up at the cloudy gray sky.
Arashi spaced out for a while until his cousin shook his shoulder with a floral-scented hand to get his attention.
"Hey, I asked you what you think Kushina's fiancé is like," Akane pouted.
"No idea," Arashi grunted, waving her back to her milotic. "She said that he's a good guy… But that's what you said about all three of your boyfriends, so I don't know."
"My boyfriends weren't so bad," Akane sighed. "Ayumu was so sweet…"
"When he was sober, which was about half the time," Arashi grunted.
"I could've helped him!" Akane protested.
"Like his mother helped him?" he challenged. "She'd slip him extra money that she knew he'd use to buy booze, and she never put her foot down about it."
Akane anxiously fiddled with the ties that held her billowing sleeves back to keep them clean and oil-free. "Well…well, Itsuki always treated me to dinner and gave me presents…"
"He was a degenerate gambler that had to pawn his grandmother's jewelry to be able to court you," Arashi grimaced. "If you married him our family would've had to pay for the wedding and you'd be living in near poverty."
"Itsuki wasn't much worse than you are," Akane muttered.
"I am nothing like him!" Arashi snapped hotly. "My debts are nothing compared to his!"
"If you say so," Akane sighed and gently rubbed her milotic's dull red head fins.
"And don't you go and try to defend Yuudai," he growled. "Not only was that creep a Kurohi, he treated his old girlfriends little better than slaves. He looks at women like they're property. He only wanted to marry you to 'own' an Uzumaki that would clean his house, cook his meals, and have his babies."
"He was so handsome and so protective…" Akane protested feebly.
"Pretty faces can hide ugly hearts," Arashi responded. "And Yuudai's heart was definitely ugly. I'm so glad that that piece of slime relocated to North Uzu."
His cousin wilted over her milotic's sinuous form. "Why can't I find myself a good man?"
"No clue," he replied.
"Aren't I pretty enough," she asked plaintively. "Aren't I a good enough cook, a good enough housekeeper?"
"No idea," Arashi groaned. Not this again…
"I can sew, I can arrange flowers, I know how to make poffins and pokéblocks, I have dozens and dozens of Contest ribbons and trophies, I can perform the traditional tea ceremony…"
"I know," he sighed.
"Aren't I good enough?" Akane nearly whimpered.
"You're just fine," Arashi told her. "You just haven't found the right man that really appreciates you and will treat you right. That's all."
Akane was silent as she finished oiling her serpentine milotic. She polished the blue and pink scales on the tail until they sparkled. And then she tied fresh white ribbons onto the milotic's drooping red head fins, making them look like a pair of ponytails.
"I wonder…" she said suddenly. "Do you think that Kushina's fiancé has a brother?"
Arashi scrubbed a hand over his face and swallowed a groan.
Minato sat in the train compartment with his hands laced behind his head and half-dozed as he stared out the window. Genma sat across from him and chewed on a toothpick as he read a magazine. And Kiroi and Zang, Genma's zangoose, sat loose with them, napping on the padded bench seats.
"…I can't wait until we get into the station," Genma sighed. "My butt's starting to hurt."
"I don't see why we aren't taking the overnight train," Minato frowned.
"I can't sleep on trains," his assistant answered. "And what's the rush? From what I hear, there's not much to do in the Land of Whirlpools."
"I prefer being early to being late," Minato replied.
"We won't be late," Genma promised. "The weather forecast is good for the next week so the ferries won't be delayed or held in port for days."
Minato nodded slowly and looked out the window again as the scenery blurred by. If he'd visited Uzu no Kuni before, he would've been able to fly there in a day and a half to two days. But since it was a completely unknown area to him, he didn't dare try and fly there. There weren't any real landmarks out in the ocean, the weather out there could be unpredictable, and GPS devices could malfunction or be dropped in turbulence. Flying pokémon had excellent senses of direction and memories for locations, so once he familiarized himself with the Land of Whirlpools he could return there by flying on Ryuu whenever he wanted…
"I wonder what it will be like there," Minato thought aloud.
"Rainy and cool," Genma shrugged.
"Besides that," the blond man said. "Uncle Jiraiya visited there twice briefly, and most of what he told me was that it was chilly, rainy, grim, and nearly devoid of pretty girls in cute swim suits."
"No wonder his visits were brief," Genma half-grinned.
Minato chuckled a little, but his amusement was quickly weighed down with worry.
When he called the place grim, I don't think that my uncle was just talking about the landscape…
The sun was setting when Kushina returned to Professor Utatane's lab. The old woman was in her map room and making pencil notations on an old chart of ocean currents and a tide chart. Kushina strolled over and plunked two metallic pokéballs onto the table.
"Found something, did you?" Koharu remarked and set down her pencil. "Let's take those to my exam room."
The exam room was furnished with a metal table and some scientific equipment. Koharu warmed up the computer terminal and adjusted a few things before plugging in the GPS device she'd loaned the Kushina to get the navigational data. When everything was set up to her satisfaction she nodded to the red-head.
"Alright, let's see them."
"Well, I followed a tip and went to the Wingull Rocks," Kushina explained. "And this was the first thing that I was able to find that was unusual."
The first creature that she released onto the metal table was nearly four feet tall, pink, and frilly. It was a jellyfish that was nearly twice the size of the more familiar tentacool that was native to the waters around Uzu no Kuni. And instead of being part poison like tentacool, it was part ghost.
"A frillish," Professor Utatane remarked with some surprise, and did a little checking on her computer. "A female…with cursed body. Now that it is legal to import them, in limited quantities, the smugglers are willing—or at least more willing—to move them." The old woman did more with her computer before taking the stainless steel pokéball and sealing the frillish back up. "And the other one?"
The next thing Kushina set free was a very ugly fish. It had frayed fins, a bony body, deep-set eyes, and rock-like mottled scales. Most of its scales were a washed out gray-purple but there was a sprinkling of muddy tan, its blue fins were pale blue, and the monstrous fish was lethargic and limp.
"I think they tried to dye this poor feebas to convince some sucker that it's shiny," the red-head said with a scowl. "And it's a freshwater creature. It can tolerate saltwater for a while, but it's been out in the sea for too long."
"Hmm…" Koharu ran through the same basic tests as she had with the frillish, and took a few little scale and fin samples as well. "It's female, that makes it desirable enough with how feebas schools stick to only a few places in a handful of remote streams and underground lakes. But some of my equipment seems to be acting up again. It's saying that this feebas has adaptability when feebas are only known to have swift swim as its ability. I've seen some mention in scientific literature that pokémon originating from that new region are known to sometimes have unusual abilities, but…"
The old woman fingered one of her dangling earrings before coming to some decision and putting the pathetic fish back into confinement.
"Take this with you and see if you can't get it to evolve into a milotic before you leave," the woman professor instructed, pressing the feebas's metallic container into Kushina's hand. "Have Akane help you; she's already raised her own milotic successfully. If you do well I might let you keep it."
"I can't have the frillish?" Kushina asked. Yeah, it's pink and frilly, but it's a water-ghost. I've always wished there was a water-ghost! And milotic is a Contest pokémon…
"I'd like to do a long-term study on it, since it's a species that there isn't any local literature on," Koharu explained.
"Ah," Kushina nodded. Well, maybe I'll trap some other loose smuggled monsters that Professor Utatane will let me take instead.
"I think you've been more helpful in one day than either of my usual assistants have in an average week," the old woman snorted and passed back the GPS device. "Go and get some dinner."
"Yes, ma'am," Kushina nodded sharply. "Have a nice evening."
The professor nodded and waved her off. "I'll see you sometime tomorrow."
"Right," Kushina agreed and headed out of the laboratory. Hopefully I'll have just missed dinner so I'm not stuck sitting with everyone and forced to defend my life choices again…
Naruto gratefully collapsed into the bunk bed at the Pokémon Center where Ken-Ichi had decided to stop. Sasuke was already in the upper bunk flipping through a magazine that he'd taken from the Center's ground floor. Sakura was in the girl's bathroom showering and brushing her teeth. And Ken-Ichi was still on the main level of the Pokémon Center checking things on one of the PC terminals.
They'd spent all day on the road, stopping only to use the bathroom or get a quick bite to eat. The pace was stiffer than Naruto was used to, and Sasuke and Sakura weren't too happy with it either. Naruto hoped that this supposed cousin of his wouldn't push them to travel so fast the whole trip.
My feet hurt, Naruto pouted as he peeled off his shoes. I hope that I don't end up with blisters. He grimaced when he found one of the soles of his shoes starting to peel loose. I don't want to have to get new shoes either…
He sighed and went about changing into his pajamas and crawling under the thin sheets. There had been a couple of times that he'd wanted to stop and look around, but Ken-Ichi had been against it. The older boy was dead-set on getting home as soon as possible to avoid his mother's wrath, and Naruto could almost understand it.
If his mom gets as scary as my mom does when she's mad, I wouldn't want to piss her off either. But…can't he just call her and explain things? And my mom doesn't like it that I travel alone so much, but she lets me do it…
There was a soft pop and then the scrabbling of tiny claws on the side of his bunk.
"Vee!"
Naruto rolled his eyes and leaned over to pull Vee onto the bed with him. All day long the little eevee had periodically escaped from his pokéball to walk with him. But, being a baby, his short attention span meant that Naruto ended up chasing him off the road dozens of times when a flower, or leaf, or small insect caught his eye.
"You can't just come out whenever you want," he scolded. "Not all places like loose pokémon running around, so don't get in the habit of doing it."
The baby eevee was unbothered by his words and spun around a few times before curling up next to his head on the pillow. Naruto sighed in defeat and pulled his ball-belt out of his backpack to set Eve loose as well (and to make sure that Kitsune hadn't escaped) so that the gray eevee could keep an eye on Vee. He would've given the job to Bolt, but Naruto knew that he tended to squirm a lot in his sleep and when he jostled the pikachu he tended to get a little shock.
Eve was an excellent babysitter. She seemed to love mothering Vee—she would groom him with her tongue, subtly herd him with her body to keep him on the road with the rest of the group, and she made sure that he'd eaten all of his food before she ate a bite of her own. But whenever some passerby would see her and run over for a closer look, she would freeze up and then try to hide.
"Make sure he doesn't wander off while I'm sleeping, okay?" Naruto instructed her.
She stared into his eyes for a moment before carefully creeping over to where Vee was snoozing and curling up next to him.
"Man," Naruto closed his eyes, "I hope we don't have to walk as far tomorrow."
"Hn," Sasuke grunted.
"We probably won't," Sakura said as she walked past their bunks with damp hair. "I saw Ken-Ichi checking train schedules on the computer, so we'll only have to walk until we reach a train station."
"We're catching a train ride?" Naruto blinked and slowly grinned. "Cool!"
A train ride means a lot less walking…and there's no way that Kitsune can sneak off a moving train car when I'm not looking, either!