<U>The Chain of Mishaps Upon Meeting Apolline Geyity</U>

Chapter III
By Cloudburst
3



In the ultimate abyss, I heard the gentle thumping of my heartbeat. Faintly, the sound of my breathing grew in my ears. I slowly peeled my eyes open and the fading light of the winter day illuminated my world.

Laying there, staring up at the light gray sky, I let my body join my brain. When it did, I sat up, swaying when the light-headedness took hold of me. Holding my hand to my head, I looked out over the blinding white snow. Finding what I wanted right next to me, I dragged my blue and green duffel bag to my side and pulled off the first thing on top.

Opening the pokedex, the neon blue digits blinked at me. It was just like usual; I only was out for a minute. And I thought I had gotten over the “black-outs.”

“Emh,” cringing, I placed my legs under me and stood up. Another jolt of pain surged through my system, stopping me in my tracks. I bent over and breathed deeply in short gasps. When the shock subsided, the even brighter pure white snow nearly blinded me. But I wasn’t worried about my eyeballs now.

All I cared about was getting away from the burning building. Trudging through the snow, I dragged my pack behind me. Going around the bend, I found a huge array of onlookers behind two fire trucks.

I moved towards them, “P-proff-ffesser.”

Nobody moved towards me from the scene. All eyes were still strained on the muddle behind me.

“Eheh!” I coughed, clearing my throat. Not even the more attentive pokemon moved, all rooted to their spots.

“Professor!” I cried out quietly. This was getting me nowhere! They couldn’t hear me over the roar of the fire and the blasts from the numerous water attacks.

Changing course, I shifted back to straight ahead in hopes of avoiding one of those powerful streams of water. Still, I marched on until, shivering, I dropped my bag behind a girl in a white lab coat.

She turned around, her face full of angst, “What do—Oh my God! Someone, I need some paramedics over here!”

Another surge of pain ripped my back as I moved forwards. I lurched forward, my hands dropping to my knees. I stayed bent over like this, hacking and breathing in between. Through another wave of tears, I found the girl now standing next to me, holding my arm. Her face showed determination with a mix of fear. Boy, I must look a lot worse than I feel.

A few minutes later and a couple of paramedics were by my side, gently directing me to an open ambulance car. They sat me down and in a whir of color, shoved a mask over my mouth and nose. One took my hand and placed it on the mask.

“Just hold this here. There ya go,” the paramedic let go when I finally managed to grasp my left hand around it.

“Thet must’ve been some escape ya made,” whoever, guy or girl, paramedic kept talking to me.

I nodded my head. It was beginning to clear with the help of the oxygen emanating from the mask. My eyes now also clearing, I found it to be a man with black hair in front of me.

“Well at least ya made it out ok,” he was gently lifting my arms, hands, legs, and feet to check for any injuries.

“We got a second degree burn,” he called to the blurs behind him. “Thet was really brave of ya to make yer way all the way out here without any assistance. Was this burn part of thet escape?”

I didn’t even stop to consider this question, just simply nodded, in-taking the oxygen deeply.

“Ouch. Did ya achieve any other problems as ya got out?”

I nodded.

“Do ya think ya can tell me where?”

With a cough, I released my hold on the mask, easing it away from my face, “My back.”

He nodded, and gently moved me forward. Now with my back to him, I felt him gently prod my back. Near my mid-back, to the left, I collapsed forward from the intense shock that followed.

“Ohp, sorry bout thet, but I think I found it,” I felt something carefully grab my elbow, and in the next second, I was pulled back into a sitting position. No, really.

Feeling along my spine, he kept on talking, “It looks like ya only bruised yer left back. No damage was done to yer spine. Do ya think ya might—”

“Apolline! What do you mean--?” The poor paramedic was cut off as a gap appeared in the crowd and Professor Oak came through slowly. He was hunched over, his hand holding an ice bag to his forehead. The same girl that I first saw was strutting beside him, having a hard time keeping her pace down. She was leaning in at the professor’s elbow, trying to explain something to him.

“Apolline, who? Apo—” My poor body ached as I caught sight of Professor Oak’s distraught expression upon finally seeing me. “My stars…the girl with the Charmander…”

My head started to pound. The legendary professor stayed rooted to the spot where he first glimpsed me, three yards away. I watched humiliated as his face passed from surprise, to relief, to embarrassment, and on to horror, before finally settling on just plain old age. I didn’t mean to cause him so much grief.

Now showing all signs of old age, the professor leaned upon the arm of the assistant and walked to within a yard of me.

His face contorted into an extreme look of pure pain; “I’m…How…”

“Professor, I’m fine,” or at least I was. I reached out and carefully laid my left hand on his shoulder; afraid I might break him. The other paramedic from before was carefully binding my right hand in gauze.

“What happened?” Professor Oak shook off the girl and stood up straight, removing the ice pack for the time being. His weathered ocher face seemed to have aged twenty years. His thick white eyebrows were scrunched worriedly over his deep mahogany eyes. His white hair showed out brightly against his dark gray remnants.

Taking one more gulp from the transparent air-mask, I started my story. When I was done, I found myself wrapped in a thick burnt-orange blanket with a steaming hot mug of hot chocolate held in my hands. How fitting that the blanket was “burnt.”

A low whistle filled the air in the silence that ensued.

“Thet was some escape ya made there, lil’ missy.” It was the black-haired paramedic that helped me in the beginning.

I nodded my head at his Japanese face as I took a sip of the hot chocolate.

“That stuff should warm you up instantly. Oh, and before I forget, you dropped this in front of me,” the “girl” from before walked forward.

Getting a better look at her, I found her to be a full-grown lady with shoulder-length wavy purple hair. I so don’t get this new dying hair phase.

But my attention was distracted as I finally caught sight of what she was talking about. I hungrily reached out and grabbed my now grayish looking duffel bag.

“Thank you,” was my breathy response, I didn’t want to take my eyes off my new life’s belongings. Running my bandaged hand over the surface, I brushed off some dust before I noticed a small bulge near the bottom of the pack.

“Charmander!” I ripped open the zipper and, with my good hand, brought forth the half-and-half sphere.

“C’mon out, Charmander!” I tossed out the ball again in similar fashion to the first time I released my first pokemon. This time though, I managed to catch it on its rebound.

The same laser red light as before shot out, forming itself into an orb, one foot in diameter. In a split second, the light dissipated to reveal a not so happy fire lizard.

It stood in front of me on the grassy ground with its arms crossed over its chest and its foot tapping up and down impatiently. Its tail waved dangerously fast behind it. Its tip blazed a dangerous violent white.

I felt my face contort into a very angry grimace back at its cock-a-maymee attitude.

A second later and I let the fire lizard have it: “Don’t you give me that look! You know what I’m talking about! I just went through, well for lack of a better word, H-E-double hockey sticks to get where I am now, and no thanks to you! So you’re not happy with who your trainer is, big deal! I’m not happy about getting my spine dislodged, and neither is Professor Oak exactly ecstatic about his lab burning down, but do you see us moping and complaining? NO, I didn’t think so! Now I saved both yours and my butt back there by escaping from that room, and this is the thanks I get? Heck, I should have just LEFT you in your poke ball! Who cares if you’re all right or not? Oh, that’s right, I DO!!!! So if you don’t mind, I’d like a little more respect shown, or you can just stay in your poke ball for the rest of your stupid little life!!”

With that last part shrieked out of me, I took in a deep breath of air in vain to steady myself from pummeling the little booger. And believe me, I’d do it. My brother, I emphasize brother, once got me so angry that I kicked him in the stomach. I used so much force that he literally flew back into the fridge and shook the whole appliance that a few water bottles on top fell off.

Glaring out at Charmander from my extremely long bangs, I found a different pokemon standing before me. The toddler held the blankest look on its face I have ever seen it give. But what scared me most was the posterior extension of its two-foot tall frame. It was completely still and had changed to a bright orange shade. Only one-step away from the completely calm red.

Then, it laughed. Amongst the chaos and confusion, the toil and trouble, the roar of fire and water, its tiny little voice overflowed with a mirthful laugh. It resembled the sound of a striking of a match over and over again. It sang innocence and joy: “Char-char-char-char-char-char-char-char-char.”

And then, because I have this weird habit of following other people’s leads, I laughed. I whole-heartedly laughed right along with the psychopath fire tamer. I just couldn’t help myself. It sounded so silly and like it was enjoying itself.

When we both finally stopped, I had a few tears in my eyes. Wiping them away, I smiled at the now grinning Charmander, “Return, Charmander. I think you’ve had enough excitement for the day.”

Placing the smooth sphere at the top of my duffel bag, I zipped it up and turned to face the professor. The paramedics had gone to help other people and the assistant probably went off on some business errand.

“Erm…Well now…” Professor Oak began with a baffled look upon his countenance.

“I’m so sorry you had to see that Professor Oak. I swear I won’t go off like that on him again,” I heard myself lying. Of course you will if he acts up again. “I don’t know what got into me,” yes you do, “but for that matter, I don’t know what got into Charmander.”

Gazing intently at the bag, I let out a confused sigh through my nose. Slowly shifting my focus back to the professor, I discovered him rubbing his forehead with his hand. His eyebrows creased once again. He’s going to revoke your license!

“Professor, please don’t take away my license on account of this,” I whispered.

He looked up from his stupor and raised an eyebrow at me, “Eh, what’s that? Revoke your license? No, no of course not. Not many will show it, but a lot of good bonds between a trainer and pokemon begin with a fight. In a way, it opens the boundaries for an honest connection to be made. Numerous great trainers have had problems with their pokemon at one time or another. What’s best is that you have shown fully well how to handle such situations. I always say, ‘Fate chooses the right pokemon for the right trainer.’”

I smiled gratefully at his wise remark and kind face.

“Apolline! Are you all right?”

In the next instant, my mom and dad surrounded me, blocking me off from all else as I sat on the edge of the ambulance trunk, holding a cup of hot cocoa with a dusty sea green and periwinkle-blue duffel bag sitting on my lap.