THE SMILE OF FAMILY

by Ryan Libra

Author’s Notes

Hello everyone! This is my first fic. There are slightly mature themes here (child abuse, etc.), but nothing unbearably repulsive.

Just some stuff. This story is largely based on the game. However, it occurs in an entire new place (not region). Just an island. You’ll get a bird’s eye view of it in Chapter 1. In addition, psychics exist in this story. They may be scarce, but they’re there. I will also introduce a concept here that I’m sure other authors have thought of in their own fics, just maybe in different names. But they won’t be around in this chapter yet. :D

Pokémon is not mine, and I thank the wonderful people who made it so fans can make their fics.

Hope you enjoy!

- x x x -

PROLOGUE

“Father… why?”

Rain fell down from a bleak, bleeding sky, and it pattered on the rooftops and cemented streets of the town. The icy drops fell on a seven- year old boy who was bruised on the wet, muddy cement, and it mingled with his tears. Neither his tattered dark vest nor his ripped shorts were spared; they were as soaked as the boy’s skinny frame. Like a false balm, the rain coated the blisters on his exposed feet.

In the boy’s hand was a hard, spherical object, a pokéball containing an Eevee that his deceased mother had given him on her deathbed. Around him loomed dark brick walls with illuminated windows that glared and taunted. A doorway, the backdoor of some storage room, faced him and framed the man who was supposed to be his father.

“… Why? …”

Fleshy and bald except for the small patch of raven hair on his shiny head, the boy’s father stared coldly at his son. The rain continued to pour. “No one disobeys the head of the Consable Clan, Wade. No one. Not even my son. When I tell you to steal, you bloody well do it! That’s how you survive in the pokémon underworld! But no, your whore of a mother had to teach you her silly little virtues and her morality. Now look what I got for a son: a weakling! And there’s no place for weaklings here in the Consable Clan.”

“Stealing’s wrong…” Wade whimpered. Mama had taught him that…

“Stupid!” the man roared. Wade shrank further into the wet darkness, away from the light where his father stood. “There is no right or wrong here, there’s only the strong and the weak! We steal from those who are weak, from the pathetic who think that they can continue living their peaceful lives! If you can’t act like the strong, then you’re no son of mine!”

Several more men filed out of the doorway and surrounded the boy. Were they going to beat him up, like his father? The rain continued to pour.

The obese man who was supposed to be his father took one step towards Wade. “I denounce you,” he said, each punctuated word a dagger to the boy’s heart, “You are not my son. You are nothing.”

No more. Wade bounded to his feet and blindly dashed into the welcoming darkness behind him. But before he could stumble a few more paces, something hard struck his head. He tottered down.

“Hey wimp, look what I got ya,” a henchman said as he approached. “A Magikarp. Useless, just like ya, huh? ‘Sides, ya should know by know that useless things are for useless people…”

“Whatcha gonna do now?” another voice asked condescendingly. “Run?” A cackle. “Let’s see how far ya get before we catch ya!”

Fear hauled Wade out of the ground and whipped him into running, the Magikarp’s pokéball gripped like a vice in his hand. His feet were so cold on the muddy cement, but he didn’t care. He could hear the henchmen’s wet footsteps chasing him. The footsteps seemed to be taking their time at first, but they became faster and faster. Wade ran.

Mama, he cried in his mind. Mama! They’re after me!

A turn here. Another there. He maneuvered through the back streets and corners without knowing where he was going. Always, the footsteps remained, and so did the patter of rain. He almost slipped on a puddle, but fortunately he skidded and swerved into another corner. Where was he going? Where could he be safe? He just had to get away.

Mama, why did you have to leave…

Was that light? Maybe a street lamp. Wade was getting tired. The blisters on his feet didn’t help. He leaned against the alley wall to catch his breath, and his heart leapt up when a shout emerged from the constant chatter of the rain. It took him a while to realize that the shout had come from outside the alley. Hiding behind a trash bin, Wade peered into the road and was momentarily absorbed by what he saw.

A fierce battle between two trainers seemed to have just finished. The victor, anxious to be out of the rain, was already jogging off the area. The defeated trainer, though, was unleashing his anger on his pokémon, and what he did made Wade’s eyes widen in shock.

“You two are such useless pokémon!” the boy snarled. “Stupid and slow, no wonder you’re called Slowpoke! I should never have caught you!” He kicked the poor things into the street lamp, hurled their pokéballs at the trash bin, and stomped off.

After a few seconds, Wade felt his heart beating again. He would never get used to trainers maltreating their pokémon. It was common in the Consable Clan, henchmen punishing their pokémon for a job that they had bungled, and Wade always stayed out of it. He could never get too close to the pokémon to help them; they were always recalled into their pokéballs afterwards. This time, though, he wasn’t going to stand by and be helpless.

Making sure that there was no one in sight, he snatched the pokéballs, crept towards the street lamp and gingerly approached the pair of Slowpoke. They were stretched out on the wet, hard pavement like broken dolls, and though they were known to be dense and dimwitted, Wade saw the hurt in their eyes. One of them, thinking that it would receive more punishment, cringed and covered its eyes in terrified acceptance. But much to its shock, Wade dropped on his knees and cradled the two pokémon in his arms.

I’ll be here for you, he thought fiercely.

An eternity seemed to pass by. The cold slithered back to Wade’s consciousness, and it reminded him how unrelenting the rain remained. He suddenly noticed that something was out-of-place, and it took him a few seconds before horrified realization came crashing into him like a stampeding Tauros.

Where were the footsteps?

“Finally caught ya, twerp.”

Time froze. Two shadows loomed from behind him. A hand grabbed his shoulder and held it with the strength of a Kingler’s claw. Wade lurched forward, but it only succeeded in turning him around to face his assailants. Another hand grasped his chin and jerked his head up. He feared for the Slowpoke. He feared for himself. He had to get away.

Mama!

A scream erupted from his throat. He struggled and beat at the arms that held him, but they only pulled harder.

“Let go!”

The goon snickered. “The boss will be pleased when we… what the? What’s going on?”

Need. The need to escape was so strong. Wade raised his arms to knock the hands off him, but they… faded. And they weren’t the only ones vanishing; so was the rest of his body. Wade and the henchmen shared expressions of stupefaction as he disappeared along with the two Slowpoke.

A new milieu surrounded him. He was no longer trapped in the suffocating labyrinth of buildings and alleys; a vast expanse of lush grasslands now spread out before him, grasslands that were cloaked with the mystery and danger of the night. A few solitary trees, dark, silent shelters from the rain, stood motionlessly on the horizon. The rain remained, and it was as merciless as ever.

The outskirts of the town… How had he gotten here? He shot the pair of Slowpoke a puzzled glance, but they only gave him their signature vacant stare. Wade doubted they had done anything. Then how…?

He decided that it wasn’t important; what mattered now was that he was out of reach of those thugs and that he would never go back. He would take his chances with the wide darkness before him, one that beckoned him into its arms. He returned the Slowpoke into their pokéballs and continued running…

Only to be stopped as four henchmen sprang out from the buildings behind him. They produced pokéballs and released a pokémon each. Wade was faced with three Sandshrew and a Geodude. He ran towards the high blades of grass, but the thug with the Geodude overtook him and blocked his path. A chill danced its way up his spine.

“Will you just leave me alone!” Wade cried out. He released his Eevee; it emerged from its pokéball with its fur standing up as it growled. “Why are you still chasing me?”

“’Cuz we need to teach ya a lesson, kiddo!” the man with the Geodude replied with a nasty grin.

Wade faced the henchmen whose Geodude was cracking its knuckles. The air was still cold, but he felt something hot rising out from him. “Leave me alone!”

The grasslands that lay out before him was a nameless shadow that seemed to stretch forever, one that was much inkier than the indigo sky above. The darkness lapped at the feet of the henchman and his Geodude like a living thing. A screech suddenly pierced the constant babble of the rain, and another followed.

And another.

And another.

Wade’s eyes widened in fear, but more with awe.

The darkness rose up from the grasslands and was heading for them like an ominous tidal wave, a moving wall of black that threatened to swallow them all up. From it burst forth screeches that made blood curdle and skin crawl. Yet the sounds calmed Wade.

“What…!”

“They’re everywhere!”

“What are…?”

“Murkrow!”

True enough; the seemingly impenetrable wall of midnight was made up of flocks of Murkrow. The small, angry black birds with dreadful curved beaks and sharp talons rose up in number and rushed the henchmen. They screamed their protest as they took wing to help the boy, who watched in fascinated wonder. More of the Consable henchmen trundled toward the scene, but the birds Pecked them into panicked submission, and they fled.

The Murkrow landed and gingerly eyed the boy they had rescued. Wade slowly picked Eevee up and returned their quiet gazes.

Thank you, his mind said what his voice could not. And somehow, he knew that they understood.

The birds slipped back into the darkness of the grasslands. The rain began to mitigate; from brutal missiles they became light dewdrops. Wade, tired from running, plopped down on the muddy ground and tightly embraced Eevee’s wet form. It whined in commiseration and licked his face.

Images and voices from days past confronted him in his mind, and he was forced to listen to their words. He saw his mother’s face, a slender contour bordered by soft brown curls, downcast hazel eyes telling him that she missed him. Mama’s face shattered into a thousand pieces and was replaced by the rotund form of his father’s expressionless face, whispering how useless he was and that he was no longer his son. More came into mental view, another fat face with a pudgy nose and a chef’s hat, an old, weather-beaten face with eyes that revealed immeasurable greed, and a gaunt face with a long graceful nose and chin; this one had the predatory air of a Fearow and the calculating scrutiny of a Noctowl. The faces were familiar, yet he could not name them now. They appeared, vanished, reappeared, and vanished again, a phantasmagoric parade that reminded him of how miserable his life was right now.

Where would he go? The only place that had poorly resembled a home he could return to was gone. He had no one to take care of him now; he had to survive on his own along with his four pokémon: Eevee, Magikarp, and the two Slowpoke. The night would be his only shelter.

Wade realized that he was crying softly. When he felt something soft and wet licking his cheek, he buried his face in the Eevee’s fur. A Murkrow clamored sadly in the distance, as if to share what he was feeling. The sky’s own tears had dried for some reason, but it was still cold.

Rustling. Feet passing through the grass. Wade mechanically raised his head and observed a long-haired boy, maybe a year older than he was, frantically scrambling after something. Behind him were a Pidgeotto, its wings flapping furiously, a Hoppip, its round red body drifting a little higher than the grass yet still keeping up the pace, and a Ledyba, its six appendages waving around indignantly.

“Give me back my watch, you thief!”

A familiar squawk swept by Wade. The scene should have been comical: a Murkrow with a watch in its beak being chased by an upset, odd-looking bunch, but the hilarity of the situation failed to permeate Wade’s current disposition. He stayed still as the diminutive, black- feathered bird landed a few feet from him and mischievously eyed the boy, who had stopped to catch his breath.

“Man, that’s what I get for forgetting the time while training! Alright, if you don’t give me back my watch, I’ll have Pidgeotto blow all your feathers away! I mean it! And… huh? Hey, what’s wrong?”

The Murkrow, seeing as they were distracted, dropped the watch and, with a final caw, flapped away. The boy’s Ledyba quickly retrieved the item and hovered back to the two boys.

The boy with blue eyes sat on his haunches and asked, “Are you alright?”

There was no answer. And this boy, in all the innocence and taintlessness that only a child could possess, dropped down and hugged the weeping little kid.

“I’ll protect you…”

The rain had finally stopped, and the clouds began to clear away. Sadly, the sky did not promise to stop the coming of more downpours.

- x x x -

Author's Notes

There we go. Constructive criticism is very much welcome. Hope you guys liked it!