Love Lost, Chapter 11a: Excesses.
#21 of Love Lost
Love Lost, Chapter 11a: Excesses.
Linalool Mall was practically overrun with pokemon. Not only customers, but security, too. Pokemon officers were brought in from miles around to ensure that every type was covered in case of a brawl. That, purely a precautionary measure, of course. There had never been any serious incidents at these events beyond minor lacerations caused by collisions in the moving crowd involving pokemon with sharp edges. Burner spent almost an hour lurking around, watching other, more experienced pokemon shop. He realized quickly that holding his master's T.D. in his claws was probably a bad idea, and got a satchel for himself, and another, purse-like one as a gift for Grace. It was a shade of blue appropriate for both her ball and her own coloring. Next he circuited the mall with certain intent, stopping in at a shop that offered communication devices.
A sales clerk approached Burner with an air of familiarity. "Hey, I think I saw you in a gym competition over the summer. Young trainer, name started with an 'F' I think."
Burner interjected a little too forcefully, taking a step toward the clerk and leaning in toward him. "He's not my master!" The blaziken straightened up again, reclaiming his calm and releasing a tiny puff of smoke from his nostrils while shifting his shoulders. "Mister Finnegan isn't my trainer. My master was not interested in a journey this year, but I wanted to fight so I traveled with a neighbor."
Bryce was taken aback by Burner's forceful response, but realized that it was born of shock, not aggression, and let go of a remote controlled silent alarm button in his pocket. "Yes, well, uh, I guess that explains the difference in your fighting style compared to the others on that team. Well, what brings you in here today?"
"I need a phone for a pokemon."
"Yourself?"
"No, a friend. A good friend of mine."
Bryce grinned a little. "I know that inflection. Better than good, right?"
Burner did not need to respond to reply.
"Will you tell me her species, or at least how useful her hands, paws, or claws, are, assuming she has any?"
"Lucario."
Bryce led Burner across the sales floor. "I know exactly what you need. Trust me."
Carlos wandered around collected exhibits, giving them a third pass.
The museum's curator approached him, unnoticed until he spoke. "Like I do for all our guests, I apologize that our collection isn't expansive enough to keep a bored man distracted as long as his wait lasts."
Carlos turned. The man extended an arm, and Carlos shook it.
"Geoffrey Sindelbock, but my first name is all you need to remember. There aren't any others on this island."
"Carlos Velasquez. No, your exhibit is fine. But, I'm not the history type."
Sindelbock pocketed his hands. "Really? Usually the history type is the only type we get out here. There are no interesting species of pokemon on this island, except for unusually chatty chatot on Gossip Peak, and our community tends to discourage tourism. We get a few cave divers and shell hunters and an occasional escapee from the grid, but you don't seem to be any of those types either. What brings you out here?"
Carlos realized that this was an inquisition. "A boat called The Sphinx almost six months ago. I've been living la vida beach bum all summer, until Captain Gil called my hotel room and told me to visit the museum and check out its library today. I've walked around a few times, but I don't see no library."
"May I see your ticket?"
Carlos fished around in his pocket. The Sphinx was clearly not a passenger vessel, but his ticket had been checked by three strangers in addition to Gil since Onyx gave it to him a moment after he stepped on the boat's deck.
"Very well. The library is over here." Sindelbock led Carlos to a small display in a corner, easily overlooked. Within the case upon clear plastic platforms stood a dagger and a raggedy notebook. "Welcome to the library. As you can see, we have only one book. Well, one title; the original and a copy." Sindelbock withdrew the copy from behind a sliding door beneath the case's window. Sindelbock checked his watch. "It's a little hard to read, but you'll get through it in time for your departure. Just remember one thing: it's non-fiction."
"I'm sorry, Blaziken, you don't have nearly enough money to buy this."
Burner cawed low and turned away as the clerk set a jacket aside into a pile of garments to be returned to their shelves and racks.
As he exited the store, a voice projecting confidence despite a nervous undertone called out to him. "Hey you, having financial problems?" Burner turned and saw nothing at first except other pokemon minding their own business. "I'm down here." No nervousness there, that tone was annoyed.
Burner looked downward and noticed an umbreon seated beside his feet. She wore a sort of pocketed vest with an I.D. beneath a plastic window between her shoulders. "If you're feeling a little short for a change, I could loan you some money. My master forbade me from buying him anything, and there isn't much here for a four-on-the-floor to buy for herself, so aside from visiting the theater a few more times, I'm looking for ways to splurge."
"Uh, thank you, Umbreon, but--"
"Idis."
"Idis. My name is Burner. Thank you, but I would need a lot more money. I spent more than I understood before I came here."
Idis glanced at the logos printed on the plastic bags that Burner held, seeing where he had shopped. "Communications salesmen will get you every time. Please tell me they didn't get you on an automatically billed contract."
"No, it's pre-pay only."
Idis grinned. "Have you had anything to eat today?"
"Breakfast, but we have it very early in the morning."
"Well, I haven't had anything at all." She turned and took a few steps away, tail and chin held high, before glancing back. "Come along, you're going to lose me in the crowd if you don't follow me closely." Although any glow was out-classed by the flood of illuminating panels and skylights above, her rings brightened from a medium amber to a striking yellow. Idis led Burner to the food court. He carried their food, she paid for it; a mutually beneficial situation since it saved her a perceived indignity of being served at the quadruped bar. Together they sat at a somewhat out-of-the-way table with a narrow booth on one side and a chair on the other. Burner took the chair, affording Idis to hop into the booth and enjoy her meal from almost equal eye level. "So, I understand that mathematics isn't your strong suit."
Burner fumbled with a salt shaker. It seemed to have drawn moisture. "I haven't needed to use numbers very much. I know how to read them and what they mean, but I did not understand how quickly the number for how much money I have would get too small." Burner rose and borrowed a salt shaker from a neighboring table.
When he sat again, Idis ventured a guess. "You inherited your speech power, right?"
The salt flowed freely. "Yes, but it didn't work when I was small."
"There's a supplemental T.M. for what they call 'domestic life skills' that they started bundling with the field skill H.M.'s at centers, but if you haven't been programmed with any, then you're probably missing out on intuitive arithmetic."
With little to contribute but to confirm that he had not been programmed with any field moves, Burner thanked her for the information and began enjoying his meal.
Idis ate carefully, not wanting to make a mess of herself, but it was somewhat inevitable. She employed a technique to trap a napkin between one fore-paw beneath it and another above so she could blot and wipe her mouth clean of any moisture or debris. "Is it good?"
Burner swallowed a bit early, and almost coughed as his latest bite went down. "Very. I'm surprised. When I was on a journey this summer, Mr. Finnegan never fed us this well."
"Mr. Finnegan? Is that your trainer?"
"No, a neighbor. My master isn't really interested in Pokemon League."
Idis shifted a little and lowered her voice. "Really? If you don't mind my asking, would you tell me a little more about him?"
"His name's Joe. We like to play games together at night. He doesn't really like battles, but he lets us fight at the park or the gym whenever we want to and it makes him happy when we win even though he tries not to show it too much. He's starting high school today. I wanted to surprise him and the rest of my family with gifts, but I'm out of money now."
"Family? That's a nice word. Is it a big one?" Idis sipped through a straw in her cup while Burner replied.
"I don't think so. It's Joe; his father, James; and Grace, she's a gardevoir that Joe had before I came. I also know a lucario who I hope will join us and there is a mismagius in the attic that we all wish would go away, but they aren't really family."
Idis leaned against the booth's back cushion and looked aside, across the bustling court. "I can tell by your voice you're happy to know them all."
"I am."
Idis smirked. "Even that ghost?"
"Barely."
"Good. I was worried I might have to invite myself over and chase it away for you."
Burner stopped eating for a moment and thought about it. "If Grace were here, she would insist."
Idis giggled and looked at Burner through the corner of her right eye, not turning to face him. "Are you sure you don't want any money to get that jacket?"
"Your offer is very generous, but it was my mistake. It was my mistake that ruined his old jacket in the first place. I should apologize, not spend a kind stranger's money."
Idis nursed her drink while Burner finished his lunch. At that awkward moment when everyone knows someone needs to say that it's time to part ways, Idis interjected. "Why don't you turn that phone on and scan my code? The one on my vest that they scanned so I could pay for our food. I wouldn't mind talking with you over lunch again, sometime. But, it will be your turn to pay."
"I shouldn't do that. The telephone isn't for me, it's a gift for Alice; oh, she's the lucario I mentioned. I don't have one of my own."
Idis glanced across the food court again. Her voice was different, but it was not from nervousness. "I see. I have to be going now; next show starts in a few minutes. I hope you don't mind clearing these trays."
Burner hummed and gathered their mess as he stood.
Idis hopped down from the booth and trotted away, stopping before he too was gone. "Hey, they're surely going to run these sales next year. If you're shopping by yourself, keep an eye out for me, okay?"
"Good morning, Rennin Pokecenter. How can we help you today?"
Grace felt nothing, which disturbed her in a faint, subconscious way. "Um, hello. I need to call someone, another pokemon, but I don't have his trainer's number or full name. Is there anything you can do to help me?"
"Do you know the name and species of the pokemon you wish to contact?"
"Yes, he is an alakazam named Roscoe."
Grace listened to receptionist's keyboard as it emitted faint taps.
"I have only one match for that description, I.D. ? BW-99709/L*... wow, that's an old registration. All the numbers on-file are private, but I'm seeing a note that he does have permission to receive calls at his workplace. Shall I put you through?"
"Please!" While Grace waited, she began second-guessing her decision, but her resolve was steeled by remembering that she truly had no one else she could turn to with her questions. She had already tried her psychic help line, but it was still out of service.
"R.P.D., pokemon affairs department. Roscoe speaking." Barely, Grace noted.
"Hi, Roscoe, I'm Grace. Can we meet somewhere soon, someplace other than the park with everyone else there? I really need someone I can trust with some... personal things. Another Psychic, you know?"
Over the background noise of many voices, telephones ringing, and someone ranting wildly in the distance, Roscoe replied hoarsely, "Rennin Center, we will share lunch at 1300." Roscoe disconnected before Grace could reply.
Grace looked at a clock, finding a couple hours to kill on its dial. First, she poked around in Joe's closet for a dusty old boom box. Second, she battled with its antenna to get reception on a decent station. Third, she fixed a large glass of tea. After casting a foam pool lounge atop the water, Grace teleported onto it and began slathering herself with sunblock. Burn sprays' soothing sensations were not worth the pain of being burned in the first place, although there was something about letting Joe medicate her that she secretly enjoyed. As she relaxed, she started thinking about herself. Not as she knew herself, though, but through others. James especially. Mere hours ago, their relationship changed dramatically and she tried to put a finger on exactly how. The glimpse she caught saw her as something acceptable as a part, even the largest part, of Joe's life. While "acceptable" left much room for improvement, it was a sea-change from his past view that she was something to be done away with at the first plausible opportunity, on pain of corruption of his son. She took a long sip of her tea while that concept of corruption sloshed about in her mind, and while her floating seat sloshed about in the water.
Burner was not corrupting. James did not make it obvious, but she could feel it; he liked Burner. He liked Alice too. It was not simply pokemon that he was worried about. He even tolerated Marianne. She had something to do with this, too. They stayed up late drinking, and the next morning he sets his shield aside. Or, at least, his sword. Merely considering that the ghost was trying to help her brought Grace to shiver and to wonder what ulterior motive she must have. Grace considered the possibility that Marianne wanted James to trust her so she could frame Grace for something and create an irreparable fissure that could break the entire household apart. Then she considered that that might be exactly what Marianne wanted her to be thinking. Both potentials sloshed around, too, until Grace realized that the water should be far more still. She leaned up and telekinetically rotated her seat. A pattern of magenta, cyan, and ecru coiled at the deep end's bottom explained those occasional bursts of waves. "Hey," Grace shouted against the water's surface.
A milotic's eyes burst open and she shot straight upward, breaching, arcing, twisting, and finally landing on the pool's edge in a loosely coiled heap that immediately uncoiled back into the water and thrashed as it made a second attempt at escape.
"Whoa, calm down. It's okay. You're Percival's new pokemon, aren't you?"
The serpent stopped struggling, and squinted back at Grace.
Grace sensed that she was being sized up; not that this monster intended to fight her, but rather that it was trying to figure out how badly the creature in the tiny pond's center could hurt her. Grace patted the water's surface beside her chair. "You can come over here if you would like to. Let's be friends." She had sensed sudden suspicion before, but never was it strong enough to bring her to wince. She sipped her drink just to cover her reaction. "Please?"
Tense and fully prepared to dart away, the milotic approached slowly.
"My name is Grace. Do you have a name yet?"
"Fhhh-iii, oh, gnaah," it voiced explicitly, gently and carefully.
"Fiona? I think that sounds pretty. Can you talk like humans can? Or," Grace continued in her native tongue, "only like pokemon do?"
Fiona seemed somewhat relieved by the switch, but retained her gentle and careful manner. "I do not understand, you, like humans?"
"That's okay, I'll try telepathy," Grace took a breath and closed her eyes for a moment, then stared into Fiona's. "Can you hear and understand me now?"
Fiona's response was a building sensation of panic.
"Don't be afraid; please, relax. I'm not going to hurt you, I just wanted to be sure you can understand me. Okay?"
Fiona remained nervous.
"I wanted to ask you if you can talk with humans like your friend, Sam, or only with other pokemon, like your friend, Frankie."
Fiona winced and shook her head. Grace released her connection. Fiona replied aloud, "Like Frankie. I do not like humans. I do not understand, you like humans?"
Grace began to unravel Fiona's confusion; so accustomed now to speaking with humans, she was making mistakes in her old tongue. She tried again, being more careful to phrase her sentences like a wild pokemon would. "Yes, my best friend is human. Some humans are not friendly, but I am friends with ones that are."
The milotic seemed vaguely doubtful.
"I can show you if you would like to see." Grace reached out toward Fiona, who dove, flipped, and darted to the pool's far edge, escaping its waters and slithering through a hole in the fence. Drenched from Fiona's splashing wake, Grace blindly reached for her tea when Fiona's tail fin slapped the fence's slats, but she grasped nothing resting in her chair's cup holder. She looked to her side and saw why.
Marianne slurped up half of the tea remaining in the cup. "This is too strong, and also not strong enough. You half-ass everything. Even that. If you're going to grab her by her antennas, you gotta be faster. At least the threat was enough to send her home."
Grace held out a palm and snatched her glass away telepathically, which took two tugs; the first was not strong enough as she forgot to compensate for having to reach through and pull through a semi-solid fog. "Is that what happened out here earlier? The screaming, the splashing, the thunderclaps I heard happening on the other end of the block?"
A slice of lemon emerged from within Marianne's mouth. She sucked it dry of its juices and spat its ruined rind into Grace's cup. "Funny, I expected you would have a less accommodating opinion of outsider pokemon coming in and making themselves at home."
Grace plucked out the lemon rind and flicked it away, landing near the radio. "Yech. That depends on whether or not they show respect and manners. You do neither, by the way."
Marianne slowly gestured with a tendril, "If you will look to your right, you will see a floating lump of respect and manners your fishy friend left behind. What's the phrase, 'Haste makes waste'? Of course, you get off easy since you can skim it without touching it with anything, but I'll still count this as a win for my perspective of un-trained pokemon abusing your masters' property." She chuckled as she floated away, while Grace used her powers to glide herself and the deposit in different directions. "Don't forget to double the chlorine level before you go off on your little lunch date behind Joe's back."
Gil changed directions again. It was at least the eleventh time he had done it since The Sphinx left Hollingsmoth Island.
Carlos approached the captain, gripping anything nearby for support. He was not a fan of water, moving quickly, or being in the middle of nowhere. "I don't know much about boating, but why do you keep turning around?"
The captain puffed on his pipe. "Because he wants me to."
"He?"
"The Gatekeeper, we call him sometimes. He and his wife own this tract of water. Of course, it's too big of a job for anything less than a dozen of 'em, but they keep most of the unscheduled travel under control. See these?" Gil pointed out three small red crystals mounted clumsily behind the wheel. "And, how the middle one looks a little brighter? That means we're on track. If one on the side lights up more, we turn. If all three glow full, we stop and wait for our second inspection."
"Second inspection? I don't remember anyone telling me about being inspected. What's to inspect?"
"You. First couple times you failed preliminary, but I guess it finally clicked."
Carlos was not sure what might need clicking, but was sure that the red crystals were beginning to glow despite the shade cast over them by the canopy above.
Gil cut the power and let his boat glide to a stop. "Do you need to use the head?"
"What?"
"Toilet, land-lubber. The Gatekeeper gets off on makin' a flashy entrance, and even though I warn folk about that, sometimes they can't help but cut one loose anyway."
A panel made of scrap plywood vanished from a hole where a window used to be. "Burner?"
At ground level below, a blaziken hesitated as it looked at a door that once was his home's. Like the window above, it too was longing for replacement glass. He stepped backwards from the porch and saw Alice leaning out above him.
"You flatter me, B! I could feel your aura reaching out to mine. Here, see if the old knob actually works, and come on up!" She tossed a small rusted key-ring down to Burner. He came inside with his purchases and locked the door behind himself. The foyer was still dark and distressed, with creaking floor boards that released musty smells when stepped on. The second floor was also unchanged. One trail of Alice's paw prints were the only evidence anyone had stepped foot on the dusty boards since its last human owner resided there. The final step of the stairs was also that world's edge. The top floor looked like it was grafted from a fine hotel. Its walls were clean and freshly painted. Between each door hung crude but interesting paintings. One still bore a little green sticker from the yard sale at which it was purchased. A layer of carpeting was not particularly soft, but it looked nice, and had been crafted so the hallway's floor had a colored border around its edges. Visibility was poor, since there was no internal lighting except what came through a few strategically opened windows and doors. That was enough to see by, but only barely.
"Well, what do you think?"
Burner turned about to face Alice just in time to catch her as she hopped up into his arms. They shared a brief kiss and nuzzle before he set her down again.
"Come on, you've probably been on your feet all summer, and I didn't really get to welcome you back last night." Alice led him into their room.
It was much improved, excepting the glassless window. She had a proper bed now. A box spring and mattress rested on bricks, matching its height to an orphaned part of a sectional couch at the foot of the bed; an accommodation for his stature Burner realized as he set down his purchases beside an old desk along the wall that looked and smelled like it was native to the house. Alice poured half of a can of lemonade into a cup, sprinkled it with salt, and brought it to Burner, ordering him to get face-down on her bed as soon as he finished his drink while she turned on faint atmospheric music and sipped at the other half. Following instruction, Burner set his empty cup on the desk and crawled onto her bed, Alice climbing over the sectional component right behind him.
Burner manhandled her pillow somewhat as he positioned it for his comfort. "You really don't have to--ow!"
Alice dug her elbow into a spot below his right shoulder. "Yeah, your aura was telling me that spot's too tight."
Burner groaned as she began massaging him. "You can sense that from my aura?"
"Ha, not really. But the way you turned when you were looking around the hallway--which I thank you for noticing because it took a lot of work--showed me you weren't twisting freely."
Burner trilled softly as he felt her paws work him over. "Alice, you said something like that about how Grace was walking that one day, didn't you?"
"Yep. When I was little I learned to watch people. My riolu aura sense was only enough to know what was going on around me, it didn't tell me about the auras I felt unless I concentrated hard or got really close. We also ran into some bad people sometimes. I told Daddy about how some people seemed to walk or stand differently if they were strong or weak or nice or mean. He found a book about it at a library and we spent all day reading it together. Everyone I've met after that, I've watched how they stand and walk to figure out what kind of person they are. That's why I decided to play with you at the park. I knew you were someone I would be proud to walk with."
It boosted his ego, although not to excess, to hear her say that. He felt a drive inside him to make his trainer proud of him, and he felt successful at that, but it was his trainer, so Joe had an vested interest in Burner just by virtue of being Burner's master. Alice was a free, independent soul. One who had chosen him, invested herself in him willingly, and too was proud of her relationship with him.
He made a happy birdie sound into her pillow, making Alice giggle. He was finally relaxed enough mentally for his body to appreciate her ministrations.
Carlos felt a reaction opposite of what he was warned about. If he could have formed the thought coherently despite a tide of adrenaline coursing through him, he would have wondered if he would ever be able to un-tighten his rectum enough to ever shit again. A cascade of water, blinding white as its innumerable droplet composition shimmered in the sunlight, fell upon him, knocking him off balance before The Sphinx dropped away beneath him, letting him fall sideways onto the deck. When he recovered he realized that he truly did see what he thought he saw burst from the ocean. Near his right arm, draped over the entire width of the boat's bow, four titanic white digits; a fifth must be hanging overboard. A glance to his left saw something much the same covering the stern. His head and body were firmly turned by a force not his own, directing his view to a face that terminated a long, arching neck that hung over the boat from a massive oval body, white as snow except for a large patch of cobalt on its belly.
In all of his years as a journeying trainer plus a short time trying to make the leap from badge-proven to League-qualified, and working with innumerable pokemon species as he bounced from job to job afterward, he had never seen a pokemon so large as this, and he prayed that if he survived, he would never meet one any larger.
"My wife would take offense to that sentiment, Human Velasquez," Carlos felt echo in his mind so loud that it obliterated any other internal monologues that might be vying for conscious contemplation.
A splash near the boat produced another lugia, only about five feet tall at its shoulders when it landed on the deck. It ran directly toward the captain with its arm-like wings extended wide. "Uncle Gil!" everyone heard inside their heads, the young creature not bothering to direct its telepathy.
"Junior! I know I say this every time but--oof!" the (relatively) small pokemon crashed into the captain, wrapped his body with both wings and his neck, and lifted him up and around in a twirl, "you get bigger every time I see you. Won't be long, you won't be able to fit in the lower decks and use my soda fountain."
Junior looked genuinely shattered by that realization.
"So you better get down there and use it while you still can."
It took no more than three seconds for Junior to dash to the hatch and begin squirming his way inside, the frame of the entrance pressing salt water from Junior's feathers.
Gil turned toward his passenger. "Well, if you haven't figured it out, this little fellow--" Gil thrust a thumb at the lugia looming above them, "is the gatekeeper you heard about. And, before we move on to our next port of call, you need to have certain information kind of, adjusted, in your mind. Are you familiar with the process for applying a technical machine to a pokemon?"
Carlos tried to rise to his feet, and felt them yanked out from beneath him. Another force laid him flat on the deck as the lugia loomed closer and Gil walked near his left foot. "Uh... y--yes, I am."
"Good, because that's about close to what he's gonna to do to you."
"But, do you FEEL like a blue gar-devver?" The little girl was quite persistent.
"Yes, because that's what I am. But, I sorta know how my mother felt because she shared a lot of her thoughts and feelings with me, and they weren't any more green than mine are blue." Grace knew that people on the street always gave her some attention because of her hue, but none had the audacity to actually ask about it. None but this wild child.
"Sometimes when I feel sad or something, I close my eyes like this--" the girl exaggerated the gesture somewhat "--and pretend I'm somebody else and that makes me feel like them, I think. Do you ever close your eyes and pretend you're somebody else?"
Grace thought for a moment. "Actually, I did have a dream, a few times, where I was someone else, somewhere else. I was still me, but I was green, and I was acting--"
A voice called out from just outside Rennin Pokecenter's lobby seating. "Grace!" Both the gardevoir and the young human turned and came to attention. "Time to go!"
The girl hopped to her feet. "Coming, Mommy! Goodbye, Miss Gar-devver!" She waved in a manner befitting her age and scampered away.
Grace settled back into her seat, at least as well has her anatomy would allow. She intended to close her eyes and pretend she were someone else, but a sudden shock-wave of psychic energy got her attention. Roscoe emerged from the teleportation room with a large paper sack in his hands. As he sat beside her, opening his bag and fishing for their lunches, he re-established a telepathic link they still occasionally used while sparring.
"I'm ready. Show me what is bothering you." Roscoe unwrapped a cheeseburger.
"I'd rather just talk it out, Roscoe, if that's okay. It's about Joe and me. We've been doing some things together, and I'm not sure if it's okay."
The alakazam thought with his mouth full. "Have you been defying your doubts, or are they nascent?"
Grace needed a moment for her lexicon to recognize the new word. "Yeah, that. When I evolved and started growing these things," Grace wiggled her gills, "I noticed that when he touched them, I felt good. Very good. I thought it was like how I can touch the sides of his head and feel his mind, but then I learned that when other things touch them, especially cleaning sprays, they hurt bad. Very bad. So, I started asking him to touch them, and every time we did a little more, and after a while it was making me feel strange all over my body."
Roscoe paused and narrowed his eyes mid-bite. "I'm familiar with your species' physiology. Did your body's reaction frighten him?"
"No, but we were synchronized at that moment so, you know. I think I hurt him with my," Grace turned to half-glance behind herself at the green thing pressed into the back of her chair, her--
"Dorsal medial psionic attunement antenna," Roscoe specified. "It's commonly the most inconvenient of the six when a gardevoir lives in a human habitat."
Grace cocked her head sideways, "Six?" and started on a burger of her own.
"The root structure of the four cranial nodes you had during your development remain. With your heightened powers, their roots are enough structure to retain limited function. Your six gills each connect to one of those antennae. Because the gallade form of your species re-purposes itself for combat, their medial nodes work like a local hub for bodily muscles and nerves to have faster reaction times and precise co-ordination. They connect to their nervous systems instead of their brains, however, so the lower pair of gills become practically vestigial, fail to develop, and a gallade's psychic powers are limited to what those four cranial roots can provide."
Grace considered what he illustrated with a little supplemental mental imagery. "So, is that why these things are so sensitive?"
"If chemicals burn your gills, that sensation applies to your nodes, causing you to feel it burn psychically as well as physically. On the other hand, if someone you love is washing your antennae with positive emotions and gently stimulating your gills, those sensations amplify each other."
"Really? All I knew was that it felt really, really good when he touched them, and that he wasn't enjoying it. I mean, he was a little happy, because obviously it felt great to me and I let it show, but he wasn't getting anything. What kinda drove it home was when we were watching T.V., and saw a show where one of the jokes was about a guy whose cat was always demanding to be petted, causing problems and making him get annoyed. It reminded Joe of me. It was just for a second and he laughed it off with a faint chuckle, but he thought of me like a pet and I felt him think it and it was stuck in my mind all night long. I felt so selfish, and I realized that Joe could think of me as anything--a pet, a servant, a slave, a toy to play pokemon battle dungeon with--and I'd be okay with... well, I could accept it; anything but selfish. My mother died and Joe took on a new level of responsibility to give me everything I now have, and I refuse to let myself look ungrateful like that. So, I started trying to give him the feeling he was giving me. It took a few tries, but then he was getting to feel good too, and I started feeling more, because since I was giving him some of the sensation, I could go further each time, exploring the feeling knowing if it got to be too much I could push more onto him for a moment and settle myself down." Grace set the remaining half of her hamburger down and brought her hands together, linking digits in her lap. "But last time, I couldn't stop it. It just took off and when I tried to share it to slow it down, I think it caused him to have the run-away feeling too."
"You were synchronized and you don't know?"
"No, it happened really fast and some stupid flygon from the parcel service rang the doorbell. It almost startled me to death; when I jumped I accidentally bruised him with my, uh, dorsal medium antenna thingy, and then I kinda broke the door when I went to answer it."
Roscoe paused again. Grace felt a jolt through her mind like a blinding flash. Roscoe continued eating. "That could have gone much worse."
"Yeah. After that, Joe was nervous and very short with me and took a shower to relax a little. We kinda talked about it but I don't know if we reached the right compromise. He seemed okay afterward, but I have a feeling inside like we shouldn't do that anymore, at least until I can control it. But, I also really want to. The way it felt..." Grace's attention drifted for a second, then she busied herself with her hamburger.
"Trying to control it won't work; loss of control is the essence of that experience." Roscoe leaned back in his seat, drew out his spoons, and slowly rubbed them together. "You are right. What you are doing is not harmful, physiologically speaking. Humans are very slow to develop, compared to us, but he is entering a developmental period when those sensations become enjoyable. Nonetheless, it is wrong that you solicit him for stimulation prematurely. I realize that you have created your primary bond with his mind and you also seek him as your life-companion, so you crave his thoughts and his touch equally. Both are a gift you should appreciate when he lends them to you. He is now aware of how much you enjoy his attention; don't be greedy and demand more than he wishes to provide, or force on him sensations that he is not yet fully prepared for. You know him well enough to know how much is too much, and that is why this too-much you've taken has upset you."
Grace sat in silence for a half minute before speaking again. "Thank you, Roscoe, very much, for the food and for listening."
Roscoe sheathed his spoons and startled her by forcing a new link as he walked away toward the teleportation room. "I spend so many of my days seeing the aftermath of mistakes, I am honored to be given a chance to help someone maybe avoid making them." With that, Roscoe was gone.