Love Lost, Chapter 12b: Communiques, concluded.
#24 of Love Lost
Love Lost, Chapter 12b: Communiques, concluded.
The rhythmic noise of waves sloshing ashore roused Carlos. He found himself snoozing in a small hut with no recollection of how he got there. He emerged and glanced around, seeing little else but a vast expanse of beach and ocean beneath a clear sky, bright with moon- and star-light. Near the horizon, he spotted torches and outlines of a few more huts like the one now behind him. The walk was long across soft, tiring sand. When he arrived he joined with what seemed to be at least five dozen tourists, splashing in the water, taking photographs of themselves, and putting on the sort of spectacle that well-funded vacation travelers put on. Someone shouted about dolphins coming around again, whatever those were. A small building up the beach's incline suggested a place to sit and rest, but Carlos never reached it.
"Sir, you don't look like you are one of our guests or a resident of this island. May I see your ticket?"
That thing again. Carlos produced it, and the man turned him about, practically shoving him back toward the shore. "You, Sir, are nowhere near punctual enough to maintain your position, if that is your intent. Now, go mingle until your boat arrives so no one will notice that you're joining the fun mid-way."
Carlos mingled for two hours. It was inane and boring. On a boat for two hours more, he tried in vain to rest again, impossible due to the interference of his new "friends" and their desire for discourse.
Moored at the docks of the big island, Carlos followed the throng as they moved onto land, presumably toward reserved rooms in nearby hotels. Carlos's head felt like mushroom soup left out beneath scorching sun, but he knew for sure that he had no reservations, or for that matter, any idea where the "big island" was on the face of the planet or what its name might be. He glanced at a few signs. Most seemed to be in a foreign language, but some of the words seemed distantly familiar, and sounding a few out reminded him of his great grandmother for some reason.
"Hey, Buddy!" A stranger approached. "You look like you could use a drink."
"There are a few things I could use right now."
The stranger laughed. "There's a little open-air bar near here, a few blocks that way. They'll give you a freebie if you've been a customer at its sister location. All you gotta do is tell the bartender the name of that place."
"And how would I know that?"
"You need a hint? Okay, both names start with the same name." The stranger chuckled and walked away.
Carlos followed his advice and came upon what had to be the place. A dark-skinned, muscular man stood behind it; he clearly was both bartender and bouncer. No longer bearing any weight, Carlos's feet delighted as he slipped onto a stool, and the relief almost made him fail to recognize when the bartender spoke to him.
"Welcome to Sabrina's By-The-Sea, mon! What can I get ya'?"
--on he was lying in a pokecenter treatment room. Sam opened his eyes and saw yellow and red again, but lit from behind--well, actually, above. That was a matter of orientation, and Sam was not yet certain of his own.
"Sam," those warm colors spoke, "you're going to be okay."
The sceptile tried to rise, but a throbbing migraine discouraged him.
Burner pulled him up into a somewhat seated position. "Do you remember what happened?"
Sam ignored the question and struggled to focus on looking at Burner's face and recognizing to whom it belonged.
"You were running down the sidewalk. I turned a corner, and you were coming at me. I didn't realize it was you, and I did a blaze-kick to defend myself. I hit you really hard; I didn't mean to hurt you again, Sam. I brought you here for help, but they said you need to be balled and rejuvenated to start feeling right unless you want to rest up for a few days."
Sam rolled out of his cot, being half caught by Burner as he failed to land on both of his feet. Re-aligned, he waved off the attendants who asked if he was sure he felt up to leaving, and slowly exited the pokecenter, Burner in tow. They began walking home, but Sam took a small detour when they neared Rennin Park. Sam climbed up onto the concrete bench and turned about, dragging his heavy tail across its surface. Burner sat beside him, curious if Sam was not fit to complete their trip home.
"Why do we do it? Why do we do what they tell us? Zero-point-eight per capita in Rennin, more in some towns, fewer in others, and rising steadily everywhere. We all choose to do what we're told. If you'd asked me why two years ago, I would've said it's because our masters are our family, or because they give us food and shelter. But that isn't always true. You saw them this summer. Some of those pokemon attack as soon as the red glow fades and don't stop slashing until they're balled again. And those... those are the ones described as properly and professionally trained. That is the ideal--their ideal--of us, of what we ought to be."
"Some pokemon and their trainers are like that. But not many. Most of the ones we saw--"
Sam interrupted Burner with a vitriolic hiss. "Most of them were kids and their pets. Like ourselves. Have you watched the serious League competitions on T.V.? The higher you go, the more of them are like that. No, not all. But," Sam raised a pointing claw, "there is an indifference up there. It makes sense; you're there to fight, not to compare who gives their pokemon the softest cot or the tastiest supper. Ultimately, though, a competitive pokemon's life is weighed in terms of speed and power, not happiness or fulfillment."
"I'm happy, and I feel fulfilled when I fight, win or lose. Maybe they are happy and fulfilled, too."
"Maybe. In a small way. Because they have small lives. Whatever number of square meters are contained within the arena du jour's ring, that's the size of it. If the only world you know is a white circle, and the only authority figure you know praises you for hitting anything that stands within it, whatever feeling that brings would be all you would understand as happy or fulfilling, and that would be all you would have... and have left to lose."
Burner struggled to fully follow Sam's monologue. "You've been thinking about this a lot."
"This was before you and Grace moved in. There was a garage sale a couple blocks from the house. I'd found a few coins on the ground and decided to spend them. There were a bunch of old, dusty books in a box. Frankie and Li'l Sis were learning words on T.V.; we all understand basic verbal commands, and I inherited the thing so I could read a little already, but seeing those shows inspired me. And, maybe I was a little jealous of them. Anyway, I dug around in the box and flipped through every book in it. Most were dedicated to a single subject each, and those didn't interest me. One was different, though. The index had dozens of names; each had written an article in the book. When I flipped through its pages, I wanted to know what all of those people were saying. So I bought that book, brought it home, and started teaching myself to read it. It talked about strange people, strange places, ancient legends. It talked about why people do what they do, or at least what they think is the reason why. Yes; I've been thinking about this a lot."
Burner stood and pulled Sam from the bench, keeping him balanced until he found his own center of gravity. "It's very late. We should be home."
"Home. Tell me something about yours." The sounds Sam made changed dramatically. "In our language, not theirs. I would like to know what it is like to have a home where 'Trainer' does not name a stranger who replaced someone you once loved."
Grace bolted upright. Her vision struggled briefly, accommodating a bright spotlight above her that at first made much of her own flesh appear blindingly white. She looked around hoping to identify her surroundings, which was not anything but shadow encircling a round metal table she now sat upon. She slid off of it and started wandering around. The floor was smooth and featureless and the light above seemed to follow her about. She noticed a slight incline anywhere she walked. Realizing the potential importance of not losing her bearings, she chose a direction leading from the table and continued straight ahead. She tried to feel for emotional presence; there was something but it was faint and its location was not clear. Struggling to figure out in which direction she felt it most strongly and paying no attention to her negligible surroundings, she stumbled. A broad metal rail had tripped her up. Already halfway over it, she climbed across, noting that she could not levitate to make that task easier. She continued on into the darkness until she reached a large metal barrier, taller than she stood. She hopped and reached upward, trying to grasp its edge, but could not touch it. A groove in the barrier seemed to be designed to impede her, as to reach the edge she had to throw her body flush against the barrier, but doing so caused her ventral node to catch in the groove. She turned sideways and attempted a few times more, even getting one digit over the edge for a moment. Tired from a physical exertion she was unaccustomed to, Grace sat and leaned against the wall. She looked up at the light. Really, it was an array of lights. She did not want to see them anymore. She closed her eyes and focused only on the sensation. While it did not seem meaningfully stronger in any direction, there was one direction that it seemed weaker, and she decided to investigate it.
Following along the wall she found it to eventually bulge outward from its seemingly flat surface, projecting deep into the darkness. Continuing along, she came to an embedded double door that she pried open with moderate effort. The interior looked something like a space ship in a speculative fiction film, filled with blinking lights and strange components that hummed. She walked around the ring-shaped hallway twice before deciding on what she thought must be its most important part and started pushing things that she thought were buttons. Two shiny metal handles on each side of the panel seemed useful for holding on to, since they featured knurled grips. She strained to grasp them, their spacing being almost as wide as her own wing-span, and once securely held, she pulled her lower body up and kicked one of the solid glass components in the face of the panel again and again and again. She did not know why doing that seemed like a good idea.
The light that followed her to the door turned red. So did everything else. The light began to brighten. A strange voice called out to her. "Von kono cikikyaa egz!" it shouted. She turned to see who else was in this strange place, but could recognize nothing but a vague form as the red light grew too bright to tolerate. She closed her eyes. Through her eyelids, still the light was bright. She released the grips and covered her eyes to protect them from the glow. Soon, faint ambient sounds surrounded her, as did a distinct scent of garlic and pepper. Tentatively, she lowered her hands and opened her eyes.
"Rainier and Guests, your table is ready." A maitre d' beckoned her to follow. She looked to her right. Joe was there, a young man about his mid, maybe late, twenties and dressed quite nicely. That did not seem odd. What did seem odd was when he captured her arm with his own. It was not blue. It was not even green. It was lighter and paler than Joe's, but a similar flesh tone, nonetheless. She looked down. She was dressed nicely too, but she was missing a significant accessory: her sensory horns. Her eyes widened as she ogled her alien chest before realizing how doing so must look to others and she snapped her vision forward. The maitre d' began dealing menus to a round wooden table. Joe drew a seat out for her. She sat as he seated himself, again at her right, and turned with a start as a towering man in a vest sat at her left. It was well tailored but struggled to accommodate his flexible yet taut form. His flesh was almost coppery, like someone who worked many hard hours beneath the sun, and he had a pronounced and striking profile. He looked at Grace in response to her reaction. She smiled meekly, and he smiled broadly. At that moment, a pair of arms wrapped them both. Their owner, a petite woman with amber eyes and hair tied into a loose ponytail by a blue ribbon, kissed Grace on her cheek and the other on his lips before releasing them and taking a seat to the latter's left. A glance to the right showed Grace three more guests taking their seats, but all attention was drawn away from the table and toward a vocal outburst.
"I don't have to be on the list!" A tall woman wearing a violet dress and an elaborate hat shoved aside the maitre d' that obstructed her path. With a strutting walk that made her wild deep crimson hair--which seemed to straighten out and curl up with each step--turbulently swirl in the air she sliced through, the woman approached Grace's table--stealing a spare chair from a neighboring party--and made room for herself, bullying aside a lithe and exotic-looking woman, who was the third of the three most recent additions, against the man seated to her left, who was until that moment engrossed in a book. The maitre d' had followed behind the brash one, but since none at the table vocally objected, he instead intended to bother the first of the three about his loud shirt's failure to comply with the restaurant's dress code. That choice only made things worse as the man pointed at the violet dress woman's hat, nodded, and put on a ball cap of his own.
"R.J.! So glad you could make it," said the violet dress woman to a man approaching her table from the other side. She roughly kicked out a chair beside herself for him, almost knocking it over.
"So disappointed you could, too," said James, looking older and somewhat weathered, as he accepted the remaining seat between his antagonist and the blue ribbon.
"Never change." She turned away from James and toward the meek girl, whom she shouted through and made to cringe. "Waiter! Need a ninth place setting if you can count that high!"
Moments later, a waiter appeared with a setting and began taking orders around the table.
After placing her request, the blue ribbon called across to the man with the book. "Have you figured out whodunit yet?"
He turned a page. "This is not that kind of book, but the part I am reading now was done by Heilbroner." The waiter took his order.
"Huh. I've never heard of him. Well, guys; this is it. I'm not insulting present company, but I'll be happy to walk inside my house and spend some time with absolutely nobody around." The blue ribbon nudged the vest and whispered, "One exception."
He blushed even redder than his normal skin tone.
"No offense taken," said Joe, "these last couple weeks have had us all on edge."
Conversation stayed light and floated around the table freely. Grace took a knife and used its blade to examine her reflection. It was strange, seeing herself with a tangible nose and round, crinkly ears. She finally saw enough and looked up. James had left.
"Where's Dad?" she asked.
Everyone seemed surprised, as though he had vanished or was never there--except for the woman in the violet dress, "Maybe he finally took my advice and decided to have some fun. Maybe he went swimming." She turned to the meek woman, curling her upper lip into a subtle ripple. "You like to swim, go check the pool." With a strangely serpentine motion, the girl left her seat and walked away, dragging her ivory-toned dress's long, colorfully accented train behind herself.
As though on cue, their food arrived. The vest's long right arm easily reached across the table for a salt shaker. The remaining members of the party dined enthusiastically. Except Grace, that is.
"Isn't it kind of rude of us to carelessly dig in like this? They aren't back yet, her food's getting cold sitting here and Dad's must be in the kitchen under a lamp."
The man with the book hesitated as he brought a chunk of his fruit-laden salad to his mouth with a fork and glanced around at the others.
The violet dress woman dunked some fancy bread into a warm cheese sauce, and then used it as a pointer, flicking a glob of sauce in the process. "What you suggest is some sort of starvation pact." She took a bite and licked her bright red lips as they formed a crooked smile. "Umm. Good stuff. I guess that's one way to join 'em, though; assuming the worst."
"Please don't," entreated the blue ribbon.
Grace turned to her right. "Joe, aren't you worried?"
"Of course I am, but we already discussed this."
Grace frowned. "What? No, we haven't. It just happened not five minutes ago!"
The strong right arm gripped Grace's shoulder. "Please, calm down. You're getting mixed up again."
Grace scowled and pushed her chair away from the table, having to duck out from beneath his reach. "Look, I'm going to try to find them."
The ball cap grunted, "Who?"
"Who? I'm going to find... her; she was sitting between you two," Grace pointed at the man with the book and the woman in the violet dress. There really wasn't a gap, or a chair, or a place setting between them, now. Grace realized this and squinted. "Uh, huh, and Dad. I'm going to find Dad." Grace turned and paced toward the door. As she passed into the lobby she bumped into the protruding belly of a portly man with gray tufted hair. He wore an eye patch, and his other eye appeared to be suffering a subconjunctival hemorrhage. She somewhat bounced off of his body, which did not budge when they collided.
He laughed with a deep, cold reverberation. "You have. Now what?"
Grace straightened her dress and stared into his eye.
He pulled on a fine gold chain, revealing a pocket watch, whose face he checked briefly. "Maybe you'll know next time." He replaced his timepiece, turned away from Grace, and walked into the dining area.
Grace followed behind as he vanished around the corner, but when she looked around it herself, he was gone. Slowly she exited the restaurant. She found no city beyond its doors; just darkness, an array of spotlights above, and a faint figure ahead of her. Grace walked toward it, noting a gentle incline as she stepped forward.
The meek woman stood alone.
Grace spoke to her softly. "Uh, ma'am, are you okay?"
"No."
"Can I help?"
"No."
"Do you--"
"No!" The girl darted into the darkness. As she exited the light, like her image the sound of her foot-falls ceased to exist.
Grace turned around and returned to the front doors of the restaurant. It was now locked shut. She looked up at the array of lights, and at the restaurant again. In a second it had become instead a large round structure with a pair of sliding doors. She pried them open again and entered. The round, circular hallway was unchanged in either direction. Echoing around, she heard a crunching, banging sound. Approaching it, she saw what she thought was some sort of control panel. Before it, a gardevoir, green of flesh, struggling to suspend herself from two metal grips that reached down from the ceiling, kicked at a strange object with all her might. "Hey," Grace asked, but the other did not seem to hear her. It kicked again, and the object cracked and fell apart. Everything became red and bright. "Wait... tell me, who are you?" she shouted. The other gardevoir turned to face her, but squinted and recoiled as the red light became too bright to bear. Grace did the same immediately after.
"Are you okay?" The glow had faded. Grace opened her eyes. She was surrounded by busy people whose collective thoughts and emotions felt like a dull, noisy static. She also felt a warm hand grasp one of her own. "Are you okay? If you want to leave now, that's fine; I know you hate being around people, especially in groups. I'm just happy you came to see me off."
"Liar!" she thought to herself, for she could feel the desperation in his soul for her to stay, even if they had only--
"Platform C, red line to Hexyloxy Harbor, arriving on-time in nine minutes. Platform B..."
--nine minutes left. She was uncertain what to say to her companion. She was uncertain who he was. Attempting to solve both problems by asking, she found she could not speak. She tried, but each syllable was a struggle and came out distorted. Her reaction to that discovery was interrupted as he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her into an embrace. She dreaded what she knew was going to happen. Most people who saw it ignored it, as most did not care. It was not as objectionable as it had been, to most. But there were a few. Their gaze would fixate when they noticed the human and the pokemon holding each other in a more-than-friendly way. They would not stop walking, but it was as if her ability locked on to every one and clung to their thoughts till they walked out of range. Soon, it was all she could feel, overpowering the sensation of comfort she felt from the man who held her in his arms.
Another announcement came over the speakers, prompting them to rise and to head for Platform C. He held her hand to help lift her from the bench they were seated upon, and did not let go until his train stopped, released its passengers, and new travelers were asked to board. He took a half-step but could not go further. Not without letting go. "I don't want to leave you," he admitted with half of a breath. She still could not speak, all that came out was a mangled noise that seemed to confuse him, so she pulled him back to her, her chest node pressing against his ribs.
She used telepathy. "Stay."
She could feel it. He was ready to agree. He was going to quit giving excuses about why he had to leave her. He was about to prove that she was wrong all along. He was looking distantly over her shoulder. She turned to see where he was looking, but over the chaotic crowd, nothing appeared to be worth looking at. She tried to feel from him what he was paying attention to, but she was quickly losing contact. His hand slipped from her grasp. She turned back. He was gone.
Public address speakers spoke in stereophonic sound, as they surrounded her at various distances. "Final boarding at Platform C, red line to Hexyloxy Harbor. Platform A, evening commuter loop arriving on-time in thirteen minutes." She worked slowly through the moderately-dense crowd, slowly because she did not know where she was headed, and slowly because few would yield to her passage.
"Get back in your ball!" an anonymous voice chided as someone with plenty of space to pass by bumped into her anyway. Someone else nearby wondered why the laws against stray animals were not being enforced. She wove her way to a vending machine in an alcove away from most of the traffic, near where he glanced before he left. Nothing seemed worth looking at, except for a tiny paper crane perched on top of a square metal garbage bin, next to some garbage that someone was too indifferent about to actually put through any of the bin's four openings. Turning around, she faced the machine again. She did not know how it worked, but she could force it to operate telekinetically. It had to look legitimate, though. She did not have any of the things that would make it go, but she brought her hand to one of the slots a few times as if she were putting in the little round shiny things while she sensed its mechanisms. Grace felt a little shameful and dirty doing this, but she must have forgotten her purse. She tapped the button featuring an orange can, keeping up appearances. The machine resisted her--its parts were plated with silver, including the bin that held its coins, but she could still teleport them within the mechanism. One of the larger coins she teleported to the top of the coin shaft and let to fall; a few times, fooling the device into believing that it had been compensated.
A man in a uniform approached her as the machine rumbled. She felt his presence and his intention. The soda fell just in time. She withdrew it and turned around. "Saa!" she shouted, pretending to be startled by the officer. Holding the can in front of her face and lowering her eyes, she struggled to speak their language. "Foh--mai--maas--tugh."
The officer squinted a little. "Then get it to him and stay close. No unaccompanied pokemon in the terminal. Do you understand me?"
She immediately nodded and cast herself adrift in the crowd until she found an exit, broad double doors that only a few people seemed to be using. In fact, two. The first she did not clearly see behind the many people mulling about, but that person apparently had to force the doors open. The second she got a better look at, since she beat Grace to the door by only a few seconds. She wore a pretty white dress with long, dark blue gloves. She seemed to stop at the door and look around before she stepped through them. Grace wondered what was wrong with the doors as she stepped up to them. When the motion sensor above them failed and she pried them open, she saw what.
She heard a sound of something being bashed, and a voice asking who someone was. Everything was glowing red, brighter and brighter, such that by the time the woman in the dress and whoever entered before her could have been seen, nothing could be seen at all but red glow.
When the glow faded, she found herself in a strange bedroom, standing before a full body mirror. Once more she was wearing the dress she wore to dinner, but this time she was a gardevoir. That changed the fit slightly, especially because of her horns. She looked at her arms. Her flesh was a ghostly white and a striking blue, as it should be, but according to her reflection, her colored skin was green. Instead of a can of orange soda, both held a purse.
A strange voice called from another room, seemingly from beyond the mirror. "Hurry up, thirteen minutes or we'll be late." Grace squinted at her incorrect reflection, which squinted right back.
"Why are you green?" she asked.
"Why are you blue?" it replied.
Grace stepped forward and reached toward her mirror. The other did likewise. "Are you me?"
"No," it answered with a look of slight disbelief.
"Are you my--"
"No," it answered with assertion.
"Then, who?"
"This is so strange. I've got to be hallucinating." The reflection turned away and shouted through the room's opened door, "Did you slip something into my dinner? Something I'm not really supposed to eat?"
The distant voice called back with a hint of concern. "Of course not! Are you feeling sick? Do you think you need a doctor?"
"No, I'm probably just imagining things. I'll meet you in the car."
The voice acknowledged.
Grace straightened her dress as her reflection did too. She could not help but to do it.
The green one smirked. "It's bad enough I'm blue in my dreams, but now I'm pretending it while I'm awake." The reflection swung her arm out to adjust the strap on her purse. It was a snazzy green that complemented her skin's hue and made Grace wonder what her reflection's ball looked like. Grace's arm swung out too, of course, and for a brief moment, her hand and forearm vanished from her sight; the missing part left her with a phantom pain that felt frozen to the bone and burned to a crisp at the same time. She clutched it with an expression of agony when reappeared a split second later, as her reflection brought her own arm within a line of sight through the mirror again.
"Whoa," said the reflection. "I guess you can't exist outside of my mirror. You have my sympathy so don't hate me for this, but I've got to go now."
Grace's body was already moving itself to match her reflection's pose when it turned and walked away. Although the room around her seemed normal, a sensation of obliteration passed across Grace's body like a tidal wave as it was drawn into a stride that stepped out of the mirrored universe.
The pain stopped as she collapsed and rolled on sparse grass and soft soil. She opened her eyes and looked up through a canopy of trees, some of which showed signs of damage, as though their limbs had been torn off. She stood slowly and looked around. An invisible trail begged her to follow it into the bushes. She came upon a green-skinned gardevoir, bleeding profusely.
She did not have to ask who it was to be certain. "M... Mom?" Grace turned the gardevoir over. "Oh, Mom!"
The green gardevoir reached up with weak arms and gripped Grace as well as they could as she knelt and took hold of her.
"I'm sorry," she whispered in her native tongue against Grace's gills, too enervated to establish telepathy. "I made a mistake. I should have trusted the man, but that night, I felt only his surface." She fell limp.
Grace supported her mother's weight before herself with her own trembling arms. "Mom, what do you mean? James?"
"I decided I would never trust any of them again, after what happened. I didn't even trust the boy, really, but I trusted you would take care of yourself when the time came. I should have taken the time to probe him, and see his inner self. I'll always re--" Her voice faded away.
"Mom! No, don't, you didn't do anything wrong," Grace panicked as her mother's eyes drifted and closed. "No! Don't leave me again!" Tearfully, she began to collapse. Her surroundings changed into a multicolored slurry of indistinct forms. Her arms closed together as the body they clutched ceased to exist. Smoothly, she rolled forward and sideways onto her back. Her dorsal node dug into the sand. Beach sand.
She opened her eyes, the sun was high and bright, but blocked by a bright white face cloaked in an inky black shadow, as if no ambient light reflected on it. It was as contradictory as it was tremendous.
"You've come too far again. Why?" it asked.
Grace recalled the last time that she heard this voice. "Wh... who are you?"
"No, you are not her. But you ask questions with her voice. Why?"
"I don't know. I don't know what you're talking about."
The creature raised a gigantic arm and wiggled its bulky fingers. Grace was lifted from the sands and levitated with great force against a tree at the edge of the island's forest, her dorsal horn cutting a gash into its fibrous trunk.
Joe awoke to the sound of a thud and a grunt--having slept on the couch to get away from his bed-mate who had been muttering in her sleep and flailing about all night long--and ran into his bedroom. Grace was pressed flat against the poster on the wall above his bed, her face contorted with some sort of strain.
A piercing psychic power emanating from the creature felt to Grace like it was crushing her brain into a singular point. Finally, it released her, letting her fall from the tree and onto the sand again.
"My apology, and condolences," it said, stepping backwards before turning about, splashing a wave of sand across Grace and everything else nearby as its tail whipped across the beach's surface, and flying off over and then into the ocean.
Grace was too weakened to lift herself off of the sand, but felt someone helping her to rise.
"Grace! Can you hear me?"
She opened her eyes. She was in Joe's bedroom, being helped by Joe. Burner leaned in through the doorway.
"Grace?"
She got up onto her knees and pulled Joe into a hug. "I don't know what that was, but I'm glad to be back."
Something purple sank through the ceiling in a pose that suggested it had been taking a siesta. Even its hat was tilted forward, although it flipped back into its normal position once the something quit descending. "That, I tell you, was the most delicious fifteen-hour nightmare I have ever been able to feast on. Look at these!" Marianne jiggled her necklace, glowing with a white so bright that glancing at them would cause a visual after-image. "Overloaded to be honest, and just by being close. If I'd tapped in it probably would've killed me. Sorta. I might have to go pick some fights in the forest before I get fat."
"Going away sounds good. You should do that," Grace chided.
Marianne shrugged with a grunt and floated back upward.
Burner saw no way to immediately help and prepared to withdraw. "I was going to make lunch. Interested?"
"Yes!" replied both Joe and Grace. They got up and on their feet. Joe noticed the hole punched into his wall by Grace's dorsal horn when she was pressed against it.
"I assume at least one of you has a good explanation for that?" James now stood in Joe's doorway.
"Not really," replied both Joe and Grace.
"Okay. This is your own home you're wrecking, and your own to repair. Remember that." James looked down and away as he turned and left for the kitchen to give the rooster a hand.
"Well of course, Small Fry; I get an e-mail every time there's activity on your account; one of the perks of being a mover and shaker in the industry." Ulysses put his T.D. on speaker-phone and snapped it back onto his belt before continuing to inspect a rapidash stallion that he was being offered. "Yeah, and I saw the video too. I don't get it. You and Sam were like peas in a pod, excuse me--simmer down, boy. I want to go for a ride and I want to keep my eyebrows." The stallion lowered its mane flames while Ulysses slung a saddle across its back. Percival related an accurate account of what led to he and Sam's first altercation. "You really did that to him? Then it's good he hit you; you had that coming." Ulysses mounted the stallion. "Listen to me, boy, because I've worked with all types. If you want to go down the path of a successful trainer and earn a C-Class licensing, you're going to have to come to terms with a few facts. One of those is that most C-Class trainers don't have their first pokemon in their active roster. That said, Sam is a good pokemon with a lot of potential, but you won't make him a better fighter by bullying him. You'll make him a bitter fighter, and you don't want that." The stallion was becoming annoyed at both being delayed and at Percival's voice coming through the T.D.'s speaker. "No, hush up and listen, I know you won a local on a technicality. That doesn't mean anything. Straighten your ass out and be the trainer he needs, not the trainer you see winning tournaments on television. Now, I'm working, and you should be too." Ulysses hung up and told the stallion beneath him to show him just how fast he could go without flaring up.
Keys jingled as a woman jammed one into a mail office box. A dragonite, the small facility's resident and only staffer, looked through the hole when she looked inside, and asked if she needed any stamps. Declining, she withdrew the single piece of mail in her box: a post card featuring a typical resort beach photograph and the words, "Wish you were here." Flipping it over, it read simply, "I want to apologize."
She tore it into four pieces and cast them into a waste bin as she left. "You damn well should."
A guard at the gate halted Alice.
She stood as straight and tall as her body allowed. "Hello, I'm here for a prisoner visitation."
"The only pokemon allowed inside are members of our guard staff."
"The Chief said it would be okay if I came today at just this time. Please, tell me he wasn't lying to me. Please."
The guard picked up his radio and, after some discussion and escalation to higher officials, allowed her to enter the grounds.
Prisoners inside were being let to lunch, but a guard picked one out of the line and took him aside, suggesting that he sacrifice his mid-day meal to deal with an issue that had come up. He agreed. Led into the visitation room, he sat behind a transparent plastic partition and wondered who would come to see him, and why outside of the normal visitation hours. He rose from his seat and leaned with his palms against the plastic when the reason walked in.
It skipped toward him with a smile and placed its paws to the plastic, too.
"Allie? You've--"
"Found happiness."
They took seats and mostly Prisoner H1432 listened to his Allie's beautiful voice as she told him about how she found a wonderful mate and a caring family, how she used the skills he had taught her to find employment and conduct her affairs, and that one of the contingency plans they had discussed seemed to be working toward its desired end.
"I'm sure I saw you last Halloween, on television. I liked your costume. And how you phrased what you said."
Alice squirmed with delight. "It's a rule: never reveal a weakness you cannot protect. They didn't test it, fortunately, but I would rather someone throw a ball at me and fail than suspect I was an unclaimed inheritance."
"About that. My T.D. is still in my safe deposit in the bank. If you want to trade yourself and truly become a part of your new family, you can."
Alice whimpered faintly. "I'll have to think about that. I like having no trainer." Her ears twitched and her sensors splayed. "No, not that I don't like you; I love you, Daddy, but--"
"But, you don't want to give up your freedom."
She nodded.
"Good. Never give it up. Everything I tried to teach you was so you would have as much as you could get. Do think about trading yourself to them, but only if it will give you more freedom to enjoy and more happiness to share with them."
A guard standing in a corner called out. "Time's up!"
Alice glanced at a clock while another guard came behind Prisoner H1432. "But, I was promised twenty minutes. It's only been ten!"
"You're only in here according to The Chief's pleasure, and he said you only paid for half of your time."
Prisoner H1432 stood and asked, "Paid?" as his guard led him away.
Alice climbed onto the table and leaned against the plastic. The guard on her side strode up to pull her away. "I love you Daddy!" she shouted, tearing up.
"No more tears, Allie. You still have one duty left: make the world a better--" The door closed behind the guard after the prisoner was removed.
Prisoner H1432 re-joined the population as they were returning to their cells after their meal. Prisoner W3917 recognized the guard that brought him back. He liked to be bribed with a pack of smokes from time to time.