Legal Stuff: Mondo, Jessie and James is copyright to Nintendo, GameFreak, CREATURES, 4KidsEntertainment, and every other company that owns Pokémon. This is an ameteur and nonprofit story, written only for the sake of enjoyment to whoever wants to read it. It's not intended to copy the ideas, dialogue, etc. of other authors' fanfiction. If it does, I apologize, I didn't mean it. Any complaints mail to Blue9Tiger@aol.com Thanks for all the comments, good and bad. This is the first time I'm writing from Mondo's POV. It's in no way accurate, but I've done the best I can. Semi-dark. Okay, not really dark, but not light, either. It resembles "Won't you Stay"? somewhat. Not the plot, not the setting.....but it will resemble it. WARNING: Lopsided Musishipping and Rocketshipping (don't ask) Rated: PG for mild profanity started: 12/10/00 finished: 12/10/00 modified: 12/10/00 The Dead Flame by Blue9Tiger I'm not an angry kid. They say I'm hyper----- Time moves so fast-----I don't have a choice. I got to keep up with the change.....so I go too fast, and get confused if I've got energy. -- -And they say I'm too good for my own good. I'm not like the others. I don't like to steal. I'm good to almost everyone. But not everyone's been good to me. I've been robbed of the biggest treasure in the universe--------her. Guess it wasn't meant to be, but he could've been slower about it. I mean, they still fight and all, but they're getting closer. Even Meowth feels it. Cute Meowth. But not as cute as Ditto. Ditto's warm and loves me, and I love him. But he's a Pokémon. I need a human. Maybe I'm shooting too high-----she's seventeen. Hell, what are the chances of me getting her? Like searching for buried treasure in your backyard: impossible. Not that I hate him, and he doesn't hate me, but it was---her he's taking away. And I can't do a thing about it because-----I want her to be happy too. It's best to make others happy before making yourself happy. You're happy before others are, it's the end. You're content with being happy---why should you make others the same way? Then they might take your happiness! And he took Jessie. When they met, I was too young to have concept of real love.....we were just friends. But she did love me, she said it. I didn't know what love was, really. It was an infatu---infatuation. But to her it was love. This was when she was trying to pass nursing school. It was a Chansey nursing school.....felt sorry for her...she just didn't fit in. After she flunked out of it, she went off on her own. I hardly saw her then.....and the flame---the love she had for me.....it was dead. I didn't know that, and kept trying, even 'till today. Jessie had a hard time then...she always had a hard time, but she wanted so much to be a part of something, with someone. She hated being a misfit everywhere she went, and wanted someone that didn't think she was. She found that someone at Pokémon Technical----- James Kojiro. Not bad looking...not cute-----maybe she thought he was cute, but I didn't think so. He was high-strung, that was his problem. He grew up rich, and really dependent. First I HATED him-- I'd see him through the bushes, brushing his hair--looking at himself in the mirror---really vain. He liked himself a lot--maybe too much. I'd try to throw rocks at him, but I'm not a good aim. He has a good aim. But he wouldn't hit me back. Jessie's bad guy: weakness. 'Cause of that I couldn't say that Jessie loved him. She was strong, and didn't like weak people. She and-----her friend Cassidy Yamato were the strongest girls at Pokémon Tech. Jessie was strong because she was poverty---grew up in poverty. Her mom loved her, but her boss was slack in giving wages--thrifty lady. Cassidy liked competing, and was jealous, and got strong that way. As for me, I just stayed in the bushes......watching. During those times, she didn't even think of me. I didn't care.....I was mad at James. Hard times hit her, and both she and James failed the big test, and left Pokémon Tech. Being on the streets, there wasn't anywhere to go, and they turned to crime. It was the easiest way to make money: a lost Rattata on the street..pick it up. A Bulbasaur in the window: break the window and take it away. They were good for novices.....and they had a reward as big as a Dragonair on them. They got attracted to the Bridge Bike Gang, who liked their bad rep. So they joined, Jessie famous for a chain she swung riding, and James for his training wheels. Not a good accomplishment, but made him look less mean. Orangized-----Organized crime got big a few years later. Jessie's mom's boss' son continued a gang called Team Rocket...or how I know it: Rocket Gang. The cops thought the earliest ones as weirdos....Team Rocket wasn't too organized then. A bunch of guys in black hats, tops, and slacks running around trying to scare people. You could do that on Halloween! But this was what was left of the Boss' mom's gang. When he took the position he made it mean---got rid of the "pickpockets" and went and hired "assasins". Team Rocket was all over the papers---all of these guys had records before. But there was something missing in Team Rocket. Our goal's to get control by exploding---exploiting Pokémon. These "assasins" were good, but random bandits and killers and didn't look like they thought much about what they were doing. The Boss wanted meaning to it.....wanted to-- uh.....justify it. So he made up a motto. It was "to infect the world with devestation. To blight all people in every nation. To denounce the goodness of truth and love. To extend our wrath to the stars above. Team Rocket, blast off at the speed of light. Surrender now or you'll surely lose the fight." The rest of Team Rocket liked this motto---but when they used it, they forgot their lines and were arrested before they could finish. In other words---a time waster. The Boss himself forgot it. Then Team Rocket was known as "Team Lock-it", 'cause there were so many arrests. Even Jessie laughed at them. But she and James were falling on bad times again. It was causing terror on a bridge wasn't a moneymaker. She and James needed a job---and fast. They went and joined. Her friend Cassidy joined too, and she and a guy named Bitch-- Butch, were the first ones to get the motto right and escape with the goods. But Jessie and James showed them up, and made the headlines every time. They were fast and clever.....and intimi---dating. The Boss liked this, and gave them his favorite Meowth to go with them. They were Team Rocket's trio-----and nothing stopped them. They worked good together. The only thing was they mixed up the motto. Only minor, but they said "To protect the world from devestation. To unite all peoples within our nation. To denounce the evils of truth and love. To extend our reach to the stars above." Then they said their names, and finished. "Team Rocket, blast off at the speed of light, surrender now or prepare to fight! Meowth, 'dat's right." The first time they said that when raiding a house, I clapped. This was when I was starting to like James, but I still loved Jessie, though she didn't love me. James didn't love Jessie then.....it was a partner-in-crime thing only. But one night in a raid on the Tokiwa---Viridian Pokémon Center was the turning point. It sent Jessie and James and Meowth's lives down the tubes. A kid.....just a little kid---younger than me! About ten! This little bastard used his Pikachu---a puny mouse! ---to end their career. From then on it was all downhill. For four days he and a scrawny bitch went through the Viridian Forest, hurting Jessie and James again and again. That's where I came in. I joined Team Rocket around the time they joined. 'Cause the Boss liked me, he let me wear the white Team Rocket uniform--I liked it better 'cause I don't like the hats...and made me feel a part of Jessie's team. So now I was a Rocket, and one of the higher-ranked ones. I didn't steal. I didn't hurt. I didn't kill. After their losing at Viridian City, I was their help. Cooked, cheered up, was really nice. That's why people think I'm a happy kid---a good kid.....a nice one. But in truth I'm sad.....sad that Jessie'll never love me, mad 'cause they can't win........I feel useless. I'm a bad Trainer......my Ditto's weak..my Tauros is wild.....I'd help them fight, but I'd get in their way. Ditto's so confused---so am I. Always confused.....that things happen so quick--never change, never get better. But Jessie and James never see that. They think I'm a great friend---silly sometimes, but great. Did I mention I have two Pokémon? I am a Trainer. I don't have enough time to get Badges, but I have two Pokémon: Ditto and Tauros. People say that your Pokémon're like its Trainer. Well, Jessie says I have a squishy face.....so I'm like Ditto! And Tauros runs around wild, and James says I run around......actually, I've got a Jeep...it's easier to get around that way. So I'm there whenever they need help, or food. Lots of times they're stuck out in the ocean---- -that's when I use the sub. It looks like a Gyarados, but it's too big-----anyone can see it from a mile away.....so later I brought them one that looks like a Magikarp. I only help them when they need it--usually after a battle against that little bastard. I'd help them all the time, but I got a life......I can't help them all the time......wihch makes me sad. I'd get in the way if I helped them all the time. I'm a loud kid, and you can't be loud stealing a Pokémon. Sometimes I can't help them when they need it----the sub breaks down--or my Jeep gets a flat......then I'm sad...no one sees that side. To them I'm always happy. I'm not. It's only a far--ce. It's night now. They've lost against the little kid and his mouse again. Jessie's sad about her face. I can't cheer her up for that--- she does it herself. I'm a secret. She, James or Meowth doesn't say that I help them. The kid doesn't know me. It's better that way, I guess. I'm their support---their wood to them....that's stone. Now I look at Jessie's face...and her hair that she's brushing. It all blows over, like flame...... So perfect---those eyes, like----the surface of water...blue......or like a really healthy Omastar---blue. A hundred different names: sky, navy, light, dark, royal........but blue. I see her brush her hair. Red like fire.....the flames that die at the campfire I made. They die like love.....I love her, but she doesn't notice I do---I act stupid......why should she love an idiot? They died so quickly---like throwing dirt and water on it at the same time, it dies fast. James lies down in his purple sleeping bag, Jessie on his right and Meowth on his left. I lie alone, near the dead flame, wishing that it was love and burning. Wouldn't have to be lust---I'm only a kid to them---their friend and their helper--but still just a kid.....I don't care if she thought I was sexy...she doesn't...-----but at least to feel love. Now I still watch: their hands are together, they smile, they whisper. They love each other...they lock it inside. Maybe if they showed it more like this it would be better for me. Then they'd be a tied knot and I would know that she wasn't for me, and I'd go to look for someone else. But they haven't. I keep watching like a Sentret. Not because I'm jealous or nosy...but I have a heart too. And every second that she and James aren't together it beats....and my brain hurts, thinking if I'd still have a chance with her. They've worked with each other longer, but I feel like I've known her my whole life. Not that I'm ignored, just left out of it. Meowth's stirring, starts to laugh when James' lips hits Jessie's. I feel sad now. But I'm happy for them.....I'm not happy for me. They'll go on and maybe marry.....but for me......the flame's dead. No one else will rekindle it. END -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ----------------------- Comments? Questions? Flames? Send them over at Blue9Tiger@aol.com Thanks for reading this fic. My first attempt at Mondo's POV. Sorry it was so short. I can't write long POV's. This didn't really ahve action---more of a contemplation. Well, anyway, thanks for reading it! Look out for ATRRGXX coming well into next year! Until then, this is Blue9Tiger, (champion of rats, bats, and snakes) signing off.