I own not. Do not steal from a thief, that’s just tacky.
With grand words not primarily used in the english langauge this fic should not be read by young ages. take heed.
Return to Roots
Homeward Bound...
We arrived on the mainland as the howls of the night greeted their master. A bone-chilling wind and an impassable darkness assaulted our journey. After paying the captain what surely was too many pounds my company decided to take up rest at the local tavern, Sports, Songs and Love. The owner inquired about our business and looked at the baggage we carried with distrust, and with a generous pourboire he quickly changed the subject to the lovely trails leading into the forest that offered total privacy.
His portly, yet charming wife showed us to our rooms. After some quick stashing we looked around the town, Northtreeshire was indeed plain and overrated. There wasn’t even any town square, you need a town square, or at least a posting board! I made a note to myself never to accept travel plans from swindlers named after songs my forebears called hip. We returned to the inn.
It was a quaint place, with many a treat and tempting. Elijah went early to rest while Sam and I went to the bar for some entertainment. I joined the drunken choir in a mindless song as my companion had a match of stones with a comely young gentleman.
I took another shot as I watched in horror as Samantha was charmed by that little devil. Both were experts at the game, he would have to be just to keep up with her natural skill at it, she bested all of us within three movements at the last game. It seemed all those tomboyish ways were dropped for this man. Then she let him win. Never in all the travels we have had, has she let anyone win. I tried to avert my eyes, but found it impossible, that little demon.
Another man might have been angry, another man might have been hurt, but that other man was sober. I was the one screaming inaudibly the words to Hey Jude. I tried my best to pick up my coat and left the saloon. The off-pitch performance sounded the same as I fell asleep next to Eli.
The next morning Sam had a devious smile on as we left the town by cart. Elijah heard my rant about it before and did not comment. He just glared at me for being “too rash” whenever Sam talked about the person she had met yesterday. I suppose droned would be a better word. How dare he! Still my friend, but we made sure to leave him behind. To which Samantha readily agreed knowing the danger, however his comment about returning the horses to him resonated in my mind. ‘She paid in full already’ my ass. Or did she? I closed my mind to the thought. Yet her lying there, smiling, as he reached deep into his pocket… I tried to whistle some Debussy as Elijah continued his book and Sam lay bundled up against the autumn cold with a coat that looked a little too big that I had not seen before in the hay. That little traitor.
Once we were deep enough in Manor Woods, Elijah loosed the reins of the horses and dispersed them off the path, busily sweeping away hoof prints leading off-trail. Sam was still asleep, her long, copper-brown tresses shining with every glimmer of sunlight that would surmount the cover of leaves and grace us. My russet headed companion reached deep into those burdens of so long and pulled out two tiny, minuscule even, red and white spheres. I admonished him for this, was he that reckless or just an idiot?
My pleas for sanity were met with that same inconsolably despairing gaze. How could I compete with that? I threw him my orb and commented on how with his petite figure and elevation it was a wonder that he ever reached the horses at all. Again, I met that feeling of dreaded horror with that stare of dissapointment. Somehow it just forced me to lose all trace of backbone and just become fully compliant. Perhaps a blindfold was in order, no, I would still feel and be burned by the fires of those eyes, or freeze in the glacial watch. Damn him.
He tossed his own containers into his satchel and with a slight lack in the grace of it all, opened my ball. With time we all grow rusty. Inside the thick hemispheres of the orb was nothing but a dull cherry light. The light took some time to take further action, as if it were surprised to be summoned. It soon adjusted to this forlorn dimension as the laser being took its shape. In a flutter of a hummingbird’s wings it created itself and at the time of the upstroke it was complete. I gazed at my one-time champion, and since she was in stasis nothing about her was changed. I removed the straw hat that veiled my eyes and the mighty colossus’s eyes met my own. In a moment that was infinity we traveled into each other’s souls though her dusty grey eyes and my own blue ocean. She recognized me and I saw the majestic creature that was my own.
Moved with an unmistakable compassion, the glorious beast, not a day older than I had left it, proudly graced across the unworthy earth as it stepped towards me in a waltz pattern. I hopped off my seat to brush the mane of the maiden not yet in her prime, if only I was a trainer in his. Sam kept her smarts, whenever possible training her pokemon and honing her skill, Elijah did the same. I was far too ashamed and scared to tell the people from beyond the sea of my work. Yet Moo did not know of this, she affectionately brushed her soft, lush coat against my blistered and flaking hand. I did not deserve such a prize. The calf still loved me, I never truly cared.
It all started one day, you see I was short, rather stout also, and I wanted to go on an adventure. So I decided to catch the best pokemon ever, then travel the world in glory. In short, I bit off more than I could chew. The Mayor caught wind of this, knowing that it happens more than worth counting. Johann, seeing my folly, instructed me to receive a simpler creature and mature it. I found a Tauros calf outside of Sander’s farm and it was to be my own. From the start my training methods and naming were unique, but the promise of what she would become was unquestionable. If only I was trainer enough to finish the job, I put her in storage after a humiliating loss against Pierce.
I was a horrible person, yet all that mattered to me now was the she-bull that stood, obedient, in front of the cart. I hooked her to the reins and gave her a friendly pat on the back before letting this magnificent beast tread on the undeserving ground. I still am a horrible person. I suppose I’ll just keep going on like this, badly, that is. I remember hearing that somewhere. I will stop digressing and return to the tale.
We were going deeper into the woods, or should that be closer to the end? It doesn’t matter. By this time Sam had woken up and was busily training her Horsea. The little bugger looked promising. A little over-aiming with her attacks, but that would be corrected after some judgments. All training was no longer for the joy anymore, people just wanted to win contests and boast.
I remember the first time we ever met, it was at one of those breeder conventions. She was talking about some team training idea and I almost joined her. I look back and find it a good choice, if I had talked to her that early we would probably detest each other by now. Since we waited it out I at least got four months or so of juice left to squeeze out of this friendship till I toss it away with Joel’s and Dean’s in that pile of compost. Before I found that there was nothing out for me in that world, now I’m off to see if that trash has turned to soil and grown me some flowers. Sam is Sam, and probably always will be. A tomboy by nature she was always there to talk about the madness of masculinity and blow some dust off the great mystery of women.
I suppose all of us balanced it out some way, whenever two of us were together we wished for the other instead of the current. Grass is always greener I suppose. Though there were some things we always kept secret from everybody else, like another man once said, it made the friendship ours. While I’m in my pointless nostalgia Moo stopped dead in her tracks and in recoil cleanly knocked me out of my seat.
Buried under the mud, the others don’t know whether to laugh at me or be terrified at what made the proud she-bull stop. Neither of them could see it, both were still huddled in the hay stack from the abrupt whiplash with their heads poking out one way to see my probably comical sight. I spit out some of the mire that got into my mouth, it hang a stinging iron aftertaste to the shit and dead leaves flavor it possessed. I tried to open my eyes, however the lips were crusted shut by the quickly drying, as if it was cement, in the dirt. I cursed in my head, since whenever I opened my mouth more dirt found its way in to fill the void. Attempting to get up was fruitless, the slick ground held itself strongly against my moccasins. I knew I should have worn the boots.
Out of my last attempt, one of my ears was currently chock full of that lovely mud. The other was currently being tickled by something I didn’t want to know. It was like a thousand tiny bristles were just busily sweeping and eating all the crumbs it could find. Or that could explain the chewing smell. My ear started feeling lighter, and due to the lack of immense pain I guessed it was not trying to eat me. Though I did hear a squelching noise, like a juice rubber sack against polished marble. Oh shit. Caterpie. I read about this once. Those damn bugs just love cleaning, though they don’t know when to stop. One man found himself bald and naked in the middle of the woods. Being my companions and my love for my hair, I did not care for this to happen to me.
This is where I find out what made Moo really stop. As I heard a quick heft of breath and felt the skin around me boil the little bugger stopped dead in its tracks. It then melted or at least it sounded like that with that cry that was also in the story about the guy named after a dog’s adventures, having the kindness to share some of its boiling guts and blood to me. I found the fire had turned the mud into some sort of hardened clay and with my bulging muscles I was able to finally break free and see what the hell was going on.
The acid and clay washed away easily with my handkerchief after some spit wetting. Now I saw a young kid, probably only twelve or so, and his very mean looking Charmander. It was then I saw Horsea float up in front of me and let loose a watery hell on the bastards that saved me and nearly killed me at the same time. While cleaning out my other ear I saw Elijah sharply rebuking the kid in a combo of whacking him with an umbrella. Was this sight surprising? Not in the least.
That little devil didn’t harm my wonderful locks after all. I naturally had the colour of hair that was almost exclusively shared by one of the greatest trainers of all time. For this reason I was asked almost daily to donate my long gorgeous hair to others less fortunate or don some new clothes and make some punk’s birthday party all the better. I couldn’t do either. I didn’t care much on disrespecting that titan among girls, but if anyone found out about my fantasies it would be the end of me. I noticed I was in need of a bath and yelled at the two, which were trading off pummeling or nursing the poor kid, that I would be back soon. Sam waved me off as she tended to the stranger’s ever increasing wounds. Yet that idiot just egged Elijah on. Pathetic.
I hadn’t taken a bath in so long, I don’t even think my hair shone through the grime that always covered me. Maybe I ought to use that ointment that the magicians gave me for my dandruff and face spots. Heh. Who knows, maybe I’ll start to be the secret admired than always the other way round. I took Ot with me for luxury. I’m sure it’ll be happy to see me again too. That great shapeless buddy of endless possibilities cut short by my limited skill. I heard a babbling like that of running water down the hill and ran to it.
Ot was a bathtub now, my drying clothes lay across the basin on a low fruit-bearing tree. A sweet, moist apple lay in my raisin hands. The waterfall spewed cold water across my breast and ran down my naked body. It flowed away with all the muck and waste that polluted me. I am washed clean. It mixed with the strange gel in my hair and swept out the excess as I felt the moist orange hairs tickle my neck and see the glow of its strands. My journeys have rid me of my once pleasant portly-ness, and my newfound love of sleep has cleared my eyes. Ot happily squeaked as I sat down in the overflowing tub. The cream worked miracles as well, never has my skin felt so pore-less and smooth. My razor happily shaved away my mock of a beard and I felt as if the world had never touched me in its crudeness.
I used the transforming wonder to dry off. I am born again, naked and cozy in the comfort of a pink devil. Ot never made much for itself and I rush trained him. He, like Moo, was one of those that can never evolve, so there really is no judge for them there. Though even if it squeaked constantly whenever touched or could never move in another form it made a great help and was quite a good subject for painting.
I waded in the knee-deep water and dressed again in my still somewhat soggy wear. The dusty overcoat was now shrunken, due to my foolishness, and cast away. My tailored pants were free of all the dirt that hid in their many hems and stitches. It was one of the only pair I had seen to be knitted with a thin type of string. The murex dye had washed out and I had to use the last of my precious indigo and woad to recolor it from the white. The result was something that I really would never be caught dead in public with if it wasn’t one of the only things I owned.
My pullover was not soaked and thus spared. I hung it over my naked torso, my arms far outstanding the sweater’s. I’d have to change from it later. The Ditto was left under the falls till I recalled the lack of swimming ability. After I ordered it to change into a log it floated over and glowed strangely till it formed a hand mirror, as was my want. My hair was allowed to fall freely since all my attention was paid to those damn eyes of mine. Why did I have to be blessed with such girlish eyes? The unkempt hair and scraggily face had kept me safe from even being noted for them before, but now it was apparent as a snowman at the beach. Fuck. I did look like her. Now I remember why I never bathed.
Really though, those blue eyes. They just stared at you like they knew some devilish secret you never told anyone. I didn’t recognize my face. I never recognized my face. I never looked at portraits or the mirror too often, so I was nearly unidentifiable to myself. Those eyes though, I didn’t know it was I and believe me, I checked. I think I may have gone insane from staring into them for so long. Some part of me tried to collect my hair up in a side tail, I fought it off.
I walked up the hill slowly and in a train of thought. By now Sam was training the Horsea again and Elijah was mumbling something to himself while reading some new book that he had bought in the town. It was called Aqua or something smart sounding like that. The new kid had probably run away. Something in me told me I would meet him again. Sam looked at me from head to toe and gave that damn knowing smile of hers.
“You look nice Dick.” Damn her. Eli looked up from the book and blew off some hair from his face. I preferred the painful silence to whatever the hell Samantha was plotting in that devil head of hers. I tried to get out of the awkward silence. I threw Ot’s filled pokeball into my satchel and jumped on the driving seat of the cart. Moo started trotted along again. “No, really you do.” Why did women torment me so?
Part II.
We were setting up camp at a great tree. I thought about the last two days. How the stranger had been genuinely afraid of Elijah’s biting disapproval and seemed content no matter what Sam said. He seemed to be almost as a blob in the mind. But not in body, his wire frame seemed to be the only constant thing about him. I only knew this from Elijah’s silent complaints and Sam’s mute defense. My inquiries could get me anything, the only troubles laid in translation...