Weapons, Chapter Forty-Nine

 “Stopping in Fuschia?” Keyare asked, slowing to circle the city.

 I glanced at Kyirin, who was hovering over my shoulder. “Yes.”

 She smirked and bobbed before us as Keyare dived towards the pokécentre.

 It was late and the streets were filled with people heading home from work, heading out for meals, to meet people. Keyare roared once to warn them we were coming in, and a space cleared in front of the centre.

 I slid off unsteadily and stretched out my legs, leaning on his side.

 “Will they still be here?” He reached his head back to nuzzle at me.

 “I don’t know.” I caught at his snout and stroked him. “But chances are they’ll know where they are, if it’s not here.”

 Keyare nodded and together we entered the centre. We caused a bit of a blockage at the door, on account of Keyare’s size and his unwillingness to leave my side, but we got in without too much hassle, and without too many people obviously staring at us.

 Chances are I wasn’t the most interesting thing they’d seen today, anyway. People have a lot more relevant things to discuss.

 Although my feet were very cold, what with still wearing sandals. I needed to see about a proper pair of shoes before too long.

 “Hello, I was wondering–”

 “You’re Ax Katri, aren’t you?” The nurse cut me off before I got very far.

 “I… yes.” I nodded, trying not to stare at him too much.

 “Your brother took your pokémon for you. The pikachu is not fit to battle anymore.”

 “She’s not – what? Why?”

 “I’m sure that would be better heard from your brother.”

 I bit my lip and glanced to Keyare. “No. Tell me now.”

 “Well, if you’re sure…” He entered something into his computer and gestured for me to follow him away from the desk as another nurse came to take his place.

 I followed, Keyare close on my heels as he took us into a side room. So clearly they thought I was not going to react well to this. I’d done my reacting badly.

 “Your pikachu… the battle she was injured in, it was vicious?”

 I nodded. “I wasn’t… quite myself.”

 Keyare snorted.

 “I know it’s bad.”

 “Do you know how bad it is?”

 “I can guess.” I folded my arms and leant back against Keyare.

 “Your pikachu is unable to use electric moves because her tail was torn clean off. She might be able to battle with other type moves, but her balance will be off.”

 I gripped elbows in hands, gritting my teeth, and fought against the surge of wild intensity that near had me to my knees.

 Her tail. Oh, Arceus.

 Keyare was growling, his tail going low.

 Oh, Kera.

 “Are… you alright?” The nurse held out a hand to me, frowning.

 I waved him away. “Thank you. I’m fine. You said my brother took her? I’ll just… I’ll go and find them.” I left the room and the centre, Keyare behind me almost drooping over my shoulder.

 I stopped outside the building and scratched his chin, then turned to hug him. “I’m sorry,” I said, voice muffled.

 “It’s not me you need to apologise to,” he growled.

 Then my feet weren’t touching the ground and I held onto him even tighter, not looking down. “Keyare!”

 He had an arm around me, making sure I wouldn’t fall. The flight was wild, but brief. He landed roughly in the street in front of my brother’s house, and pushed me towards the door.

 “Go.”

 I stepped back, and he looked away before I could catch his eyes. “You be ok out here?”

  “Go and find Kera,” he snapped, pushing me forward again.

 I nodded and stepped towards the door, not looking back.

 On the step I hesitated, hand raised to the bell. I’d been gone a long time… Keyare growled behind me, and I rang the doorbell.

 The door swung open to reveal Lex, as if he’d been standing there already. He blinked as he saw me, glancing behind me to Keyare and Kyirin. “Oh. You’re back.”

 “Yes.” I searched his face, wanting him to show something… more. He was oddly stone faced. Not that I knew him particularly well anymore.

 He stepped back. “Come on in.”

 I followed him through into the sitting room, where Kera was sitting huddled on my bag.

 “Kera…”

 She looked up, ears flicking miserably. “You’re back.”

 “Yes. Kera, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean–” I started across the room to her.

 She jumped from her perch to the table on all fours, and I tried not to stare at the stub of a tail that was all she had left. “You didn’t mean what? To leave me here? To just desert us without warning?”

 I halted where I was.

 “If you’re actually going to train us, call us your team, then you’ve got to take us with you! Three weeks, and not a single thunders-cursed word!”

 “I’m sorry,” I whispered, when she stopped for breath. “I really didn’t – I wasn’t thinking. And then I was scared.”

 “Scared of what?”

 “Of this. Of – of me. Of what I’d do.”

 “Because, of course, what you tried to do was so much more sensible.” Kyirin had, of course, followed us back in.

 Lex shot her a look. “What does she mean?”

 I gritted my teeth and stepped over to retrieve her pokéball from my bag and finally, finally get her out of the way.

 “Ax?” Lex looked at me as I shoved it deep into my bag. “What did you try to do?”

 “Hm.” I turned around, back to the bookshelves. “I got another badge.”

 “Ax. What did you try to do?” Kera turned to look up at me, stance unrelaxed.

 I sighed and rubbed my face. “Tried to steal the badge,” I muttered.

 “What?” Lex laughed. “You’re not serious.”

 “I – I wasn’t thinking straight. I went to Saffron. And you know – he never wanted to go there. Said they couldn’t know about him, about us. And the gym’s psychic type. So I thought – I could go in, steal the badge and get out. I’d have it for the league without battling them.”

 Lex shook his head, and I sat down against the bookshelves. “Wow. That’s… quite a leap to make.”

 “Stealing from psychics. How far did that get you?” Kera sat back, grooming an ear.

 “Not very. But I do have the badge.”

 “Stolen?”

 “No! I won it. In a battle. With the gym leader.” I shook my head, remembering that.

 “So… two more to go?”

 I nodded. “Assuming my team still feel like staying with me.”

 “Hm.” Kera wrinkled her nose. “Well, you did run out on Echer and me…”

 “And got your tail–” I cut off, gesturing at her.

 “I should’ve been more careful about battling that clam.”

 “You – what?” I looked up at her. “I shouldn’t’ve challenged him.”

 “Nah, I shouldn’t’ve got so close. I had a type advantage and no need to start hitting him with my tail.”

 “So…” I rested my head on my knees. “Oh, I have no idea.”

 “Basically,” Kera said, and then I felt her weight on my arm, “I have things to learn about battling as well. It’s not a one way thing, with you yelling all the things for us to follow. We have to use our own sense as well.” She licked my ear. “And it was pretty clear that you weren’t yourself there.”

 “I… thanks. I think.”

 “Don’t get me wrong, I’m still going to eat you for deserting us. But not about the battle.” She bit my ear for emphasis.

 I yelped and shook her off, and she landed on the floor.

 Lex watched us, a small smile playing around his mouth. “So… you tried to steal a gym badge. Do anything else while you were away?”

 “Learnt a little bit of Aikido? Mostly how to fall.” I shrugged, and the pokéballs in my pocket rolled out. “Oh, and I got a new pokémon. Not sure what it is.”

 Kera jumped down, wobbled, recovered, and then nosed at the unscuffed pokéball. “Going to find out what it is, then?”

 “Maybe later. I should probably apologise to the rest of the team as well.” I scooped them all back up, rolled them into the top of my bag and started to push myself upright against the bookshelf.

 “Well, if you want to do that, I’ll start on cooking tea.” Lex smiled and stood up.

 I let out my team – Keyare, Keysorkin, Keyethin, and Echer – in their scrappy backyard, which Lex had called a garden. It didn’t deserve the name. There was room enough to let them all out, no grass on the ground, and an ill-made fence to separate it from the ones surrounding it.

 My trio of starters already knew what was going on, or what had gone on. I’d told them while we were on Saffron. There was just Echer that didn’t know, and as I released him, I backed up against the wall of the house, trying not to act as scared as I was.

 “Hi, Echer.”

 It wasn’t that I thought he’d go for me, but…

 “So. You’re back.” He turned to look at me, folding his arms. “When were you going to let us know?”

 “I wasn’t going to be gone for that long.”

 “But you were.”

 “I was.”

 He grunted. “And I suppose you got another gym badge while you were at it?”

 “I… what?”

 “You always do these things without us.” He narrowed his eyes at the starter trio. “Though you had them, didn’t you?”

 “Well… yes.”

 “Hm.”

 I almost flinched and then didn’t, and looked up at him. “You’re… taking this ok-ish.”

 “I do the next gym.”

 “Uh – actually, I think Keysorkin’s better suited to it.” I gestured to her.

 “The one after, then.”

 I had no idea what the one after was, but… Echer hadn’t really done much battling since Surge. “Fine. That keep you happy?”

 “For the moment, I suppose it’ll have to do.” He sat down. “Now, tell us just what went on while you left us here.”

 “Though… first, let’s see what the pokémon is.” Keyethin extended a vine and pulled the pokéball from my pocket. “This isn’t Kyirin, is it?”

 “No, I left her pokéball inside.” I shook my head, taking the pokéball from his vine. “This is something I got from Hyder.”

 “Oh?” Keysorkin sat awkwardly, pulling her arms inside her shell.

 “Yeah… for beating the gym.” I shrugged. “Well – here goes.” I released the pokémon.

 A bipedal pokémon, mostly tan with a few purple markings – around the waist in a sort of flexible skirt-like way – and across the feet most noticeably – and larger hands that it clenched into fists as it dropped into a ready stance, looking around.

 “Nothing to fight here,” I said, holding my hands up. “Hyder gave you to me.”

 “Yes. I felt the transfer of allegiance.” It relaxed slightly, but continually shot wary glances around the rest of my team.

 The transfer… oh. When I got it registered, in the pokécentre. “Right. Do you… have a name?”

 “’Chan Abyssine.”

 Chan Abyssine… “We’ll just stick with Abyssine, ok?” I pulled my pokédex out of my bag to scan the pokémon.

 “Hitmonchan, the Punching Pokémon. This pokémon punches in a corkscrew fashion. It can punch its way through a concrete wall in the same way as a drill.” It went on to list his gender, height, weight, and moves, but thankfully on silent.

 I read through the list quickly and nodded. “Right… well, this is the team.” I looked up, after shoving the pokédex back into my bag, and gestured around. “Keysorkin, Keyethin, Keyare, Echer, and Kera.”

 Abyssine nodded briefly to each of them in turn.

 “We’ll be heading for the seafoam isles soon, to battle for a gym badge. Keysorkin, it’ll be your fight.”

 She bowed her head, excited clapping echoing out of her shell.

 “Echer, you will be back up, but I don’t think it’ll be needed.”

 “Thanks,” he snorted.

 “That’s more a judgement on ‘Sorkin’s battling skills than yours.”

 He nodded, rolling his eyes.

 I laughed quietly at him. “And then after that we’ll only have one gym and the league to get over.”

 Abyssine listened to all this with a slight frown, but didn’t say anything.

 “Abyssine… confused?” I asked. “You can just say.”

 “It isn’t my place,” he replied automatically. “But I seem to have joined you very late in your journey.”

 “Yes, well…” I looked to the side and down. “The team’s been a little fragmented. But this is us, now.”

 “What about–” Keyethin started, and was hushed by Keyare.

 Abyssine tilted his head, but didn’t say anything.

 “Right.” I rubbed at my eyes. “I am getting proper shoes, we are staying the night, then we are leaving. Clear?”

 One by one, they all nodded.

 “Excellent.” I reached back towards the house. “I shall see you all tomorrow, then. Get some rest. Don’t bully Abyssine too much.”

 Echer grunted and stepped over to greet Abyssine as I ducked indoors, Kera at my heels.