1436

            Ash awoke to the feeling of something poking at his calf. He looked down and saw a little yellow mouse poking him and looking up at him.

            “Oh, hey Pikachu.” He said.

            “Pika pik pikachu.” Said Pikachu, pointing to the television. Ash looked up and saw that the TV was on, and nothing but static was on the screen. He looked around and saw papers everywhere. He searched through them and found what looked to be a note.

            Ash, chances are you’ve forgotten all about me and what I’ve done for you, so I’ll remind you…again. Your fiancé was killed, you want to find the guy who did it, that much you probably know. But you probably don’t remember what all of this has to do with it. This is the police report and some other files about the case, as well as a videotape that was in with the files. I haven’t watched the tape, nor have I read the file. That part wasn’t part of the deal. I hope you read all of it before you take another one of your impromptu naps.

-Kint

            Ash looked at the front of the binder, ‘Case file 1436’ and looked through it. Some of the file was blacked out with a marker or something. He looked through it and found that most of it wasn’t quite helpful. He looked towards the VCR and saw the tape was sticking out. Either he hadn’t watched it yet, or he’d fallen asleep and it had reached the end and ejected it’s self. He popped the tape back in and found that it was the latter. He waited for it to rewind and pressed play. The image was staticy at first, but suddenly cleared up. It was a house, it looked like someone’s home movies, but he didn’t recognize the people. The house had a sense of familiarity, but he ignored it and concentrated on the video. It showed the usual home movie stuff, kids running around, almost frolicking, the Misses doing whatever, more kids, the Misses trying to avoid the camera, and all that stuff. The camera started panning around, and it got almost across the street, the neighborhood looked a bit familiar, but it also looked generic so it could’ve been any neighborhood anywhere, and suddenly the video cut out. He looked confused, and looked around for a minute and saw a comp notebook with his name on the front. He opened it and thumbed through it. It was all in his handwriting. It seemed to be notes to him that he’d written himself. There were little blurbs of information all over the pages. “You left the hospital, you’re living with Brock now”, “Write everything down”, “Always get a receipt” “He took away your life”, “Find him and kill him” were some of the notes. Only the first 8 pages were filled, so it couldn’t have been that old. He turned to the last page and saw one note circled and underlined. “Write the important things on your arm or leg or anywhere on you that there’s room.” He looked on his arm and saw a couple of notes already written on the underside of his forearm. They were “Always keep the file and the tape with you” and “The file’s been blacked out and the tape’s been erased”. He must’ve seen it all and written it down before he blacked out. Suddenly he remembered the note about living with Brock.

            “Brock?” He called out.

            Brock walked in from the other room. “I’m here, Ash, do you need anything?” he asked.

            “What time is it?”

            “It’s…” he looked at his watch, “ 4:48pm”

            “What day is it?”

            “It’s Thursday.”

            “How long have I been staring here?”

            “10 months.”

            “How long has it been? How many years have I forgotten?”

            “Going on 11 now. Ash are you okay?”

            “Yeah…I’m fine. Maybe I should write this down.” Ash looked down morosely at his papers.

            “Are you hungry? I can fix us something to eat.”

            “I don’t know…when did I eat last?”

            “Sometime this morning. What do you want to eat?”

            “I’m not hungry, but thanks anyways. I’m gonna look through these files some more. Could you poke me or something and wake me up if I’m out?”

            “No problem. Try to relax; you can’t be dejected all the time.”

            “I can’t remember to relax.”

            “Listen, Ash.” Brock said; sitting down next to Ash in a space where there wasn’t paper cluttered about. “You’re being too obsessive over this. Face it, you probably won’t find him. I don’t mean to be callous, but it’s the truth.”

            “I have to. I have to find him, Brock. He took her from me and he took 11 years from my life. Hell, Brock, he may as well taken all of it. I’m not me anymore. I’m a shell. I live my life through these notes. I can’t do anything that takes more than 12 minutes, I can’t learn anything if I don’t have a month to learn it through repetition, I can’t meet anybody new, I can’t do anything. I’m only alive because I have to find him.”

            “But even if you do, what then?”

            “I’m going to kill him.”

            “Ash, that’s not you. You don’t kill. You can’t kill anybody.”

            “That’s right. ASH can’t kill anybody. But Ash is dead. He died in the car accident with Misty. I’m just his ghost, staying here long enough to find the bastard responsible for it, and after that, who cares?”

            “I care. If you kill him, you will be tried, and you’ll either go to jail or you’ll go into another hospital, only this time you won’t be able to leave your room, you won’t get visitors, you’ll be lucky if you don’t get a padded room. And that’s if you don’t go to jail. It’s a 50/50 shot, you could go to a mental ward because of your…condition, but you could just as well go to jail. Do you want that? You’d be in jail and you wouldn’t have a clue what you did.”

            “I’d know. It’d be murder.”

            “No, you wouldn’t. Besides, say you do find him, you get your revenge and you manage a miracle and get off scott-free. What then? Even if you do get revenge you won’t remember.”

            “You will. Pikachu will. Besides, what does it matter if I remember? It doesn’t matter. Misty deserves revenge, whether I remember it or not.”

            “Ash…” Brock began, but already Ash was out.

 

“Ok, Brock, I’ve made up my mind. I’m going to ask her tonight. Sometime after she gets back I’m going to go out and get the ring.” Ash said.

            “Ash, are you absolutely sure about this? I still say you need to wait, like, a long time. But, it’s your decision. I just really hope you know what you’re doing.” Brock said. They were in the living room sitting around the TV with Pikachu flipping through channels. Ash caught a glimpse of Brocks car coming up the road towards the driveway.

            “Oh, I do.” Ash smiled. “I know exactly what I’m doing.”