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"Between Ordinary Birds"

By Kjorteo Kalante

March 18, 2014

Inspired by Twitch Plays Pokemon and by "Ordinary Bird" by XieRH

My second encounter with aaabaaajss wasn't anything like I had expected. Then again, the first hadn't been, either.

When we had first met, I was but a Pidgey, still in daycare. He and his team had already defeated the Pokemon League by then. He had finished his story, triumphantly, and become a legend for it. By contrast, I was a young nobody whose story hadn't even yet begun. Any grown Pidgeot would have been a giant in my unevolved eyes, but I had somehow found myself before Bird Jesus himself. I was in awe.

He had dispelled every illusion I had held about him, though. He was not a God, nor was he a hero; he was merely an ordinary bird like me, who just happened to fight for a cause that he supported, alongside friends in whom he believed.

His words hadn't made my journey any easier, but they had freed me from his shadow. I still struggled, faced countless defeats, lost dear friends, and felt the coldness of the world, but whatever stories arose from my battles, I at least knew that they were mine.

When aaabaaajss found me again, he found a bird that had hardened, matured, and evolved. Experience had turned me into a Pidgeot, like him. Before, I had looked up to him, both figuratively and literally. Now, I had grown enough to match his frame and his stature. As heretical as the idea would have seemed to my younger self, I found myself looking straight ahead when I looked at him; my gaze was level with his.

He had come in the night. AJ, my trainer, was still trying in vain to rest. As he tossed and turned fitfully, and his other Pokemon slept in their balls, I alone stood guard over the team.

Had I been younger and more naive, I'd have found it an honor to be in the presence of my idol, especially after my team had just helped won the Pokemon League Championship. Would aaabaaajss be proud of what this former Pidgey had accomplished, how far he had come?

The time wherein I worried about such things had passed, though. Instead, after the world had stripped away my illusions, I had learned to replace them with mistrust. I now regarded aaabaaajss with suspicion, as if he were a burglar, come to do us harm. He was a servant of Lord Helix and the trainer Red, after all, and both of us knew that Red was AJ's true target. For all I knew, aaabaaajss had come to disrupt Red's would-be challengers, and to put down the enemies of his Lord.

aaabaaajss regarded me silently. He paced a slow circle around me, inspecting me, seeing what I had become. I held still, trying to give him as little information as possible, but for the fact that I was keeping my guard up.

He took a step back, and smiled, as if in approval.

Suddenly, he threw his wings open, and thrust his beak toward the sky. In my younger days, I'd have assumed he was striking a pose, and I'd have focused on the majesty of it all. As a grown Pidgeot, though, I knew better.

Whirlwind.

He was preparing to summon a Whirlwind, to blow me away to who knows where. I moved to counter him, but then I realized something.

He was scouting me.

He wasn't going to hurt me, at least not seriously. If that were his intention, he'd have opened with a faster, more damaging attack. Instead, he had left himself open, because he wanted to see what I would do. Or, perhaps more importantly, what I could do.

I resolved not to give him the satisfaction. I could have hit him first, while he was still charging, but I didn't want him to know I could do that. I could have flown out of the way, could have dodged his attack and retaliated with my own, but I didn't want him to know I could do that, either.

There was less harm in simply taking the Whirlwind. I knew he wasn't truly out to hurt me, after all, and the long-term goal was more important. As humiliating as it was to lose, it was preferable to giving up information that Red could use later.

I didn't move. I dug my talons into the ground.

The winds hit me at full force.

My talons didn't help at all; the chunks of ground into which I had dug came up with me.

I fell backward into thin, rapidly blowing air, but not for long. Rather than whisking me off to some faraway spot, the winds smashed me against a nearby tree. They then continued to blow, hard enough to compress me against the trunk, like an insect caught between a shoe and the ground. For a moment, it became hard to breathe.

Then, as suddenly as the storm had started, it ended. Finally free, I fell to the ground.

Shakily, I stood back up. I felt unsteady, and even wobbled, but I remained upright. I had to. There was one thing I did want aaabaaajss to know. One thing I did want his scouting to uncover. One thing I never wanted Red's team never to forget: that I still stood. That aaabaaajss used Whirlwind, but BBBBBD was unaffected.

"You've grown," aaabaaajss said. Those were the first words he spoke since he had arrived.

I remained silent, at least at first. "You must be disappointed in me," I eventually answered.

He tilted his head. "Why is that?"

I was quiet again. I opened my beak, but I found myself unable to put my explanation into words.

"Because you turned on me?" he asked. "Because the Pidgey who revered me, and whom I advised, grew up to oppose my master?"

A part of me wanted to lower my head and shut my eyes, to avert my gaze in shame, but I resisted. What cause did I have to regret my actions? Because of him? He was no more a messiah than I was. This was not a showdown between a hero and a star-struck admirer. This was a conflict between ordinary birds.

"I'm proud of you," he said.

That surprised me, and caught my attention. I had expected him to say any number of things, but not that. I looked at him quizzically.

"You're strong, now," he explained. "You believe in your cause, and you don't waver in the face of adversity. I'm sorry that you've seen so much hardship--including the fact that, should your trainer challenge mine, I will have to oppose you with all my strength. I'm sorry that you must endure the world like this. However, I am proud of how you have endured it."

I lowered my gaze. For a moment, I thought of everything I had been through, everything with which I had struggled. For every badge our team and trainer had earned--and there were a great many, by this point--there had been just as many setbacks and losses. We had failed, repeatedly, before finally succeeding. We had lost dear friends, and with them, our innocence, but we ensured that those losses were not in vain.

We had always pressed on, though. aaabaaajss was right; I believed in my cause. The world needed liberation from its superstitions, and freedom from its rulers. No Gods, No Kings, Only Mon.

I looked up at aaabaaajss again. He met my determined stare with one of support.

"We fight for opposing causes, but I am not your enemy," he said. "In fact, I would be honored to call you a friend."

I blinked. "You? Honored? Me?"

He nodded. "Perhaps someday, when this is all over and if we both survive, we can take to the skies together. You can fly, right?"

I knew better than to answer. He knew that I knew, and smirked.

"I would like that," I admitted. "Just ... to enjoy the life ordinary birds are supposed to have. I've never been able ... it would be nice." I shook my head, and scowled. "That is, after we defeat you, of course."

aaabaaajss laughed. "Of course. I'll be waiting for you, as will the others. We expect great things from you."

With that, he spread his wings, flew upward, and was gone.