Dark Days of ‘Ladriel

Story #3

The Rocket Incident

Disclaimer: I’m a fanfic writer. By very definition, a fanfic is the manipulation of *someone else’s* creation into your very own story format because you’re a hopeless plebe who molds your entire life around said creation. My darling creators of Pokemon, you have no reason to sue, because I’m your hypnotized follower, and the following story is an expression of my never-ending love and devotion for this lovely children’s show! J

Rating: PG, probably.

Author’s Note: I thought this one up while I was having trouble sleeping one night. I’m kinda an insomniac.

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Jessie and James were sitting with their backs against a rather large tree trunk, waiting for Ash-tachi to come their way. Meowth had assured them that they would most certainly take this route to the city, as he had spent the last month calculating the patterns that they wandered around forests in…Jessie and James had discussed the possibility that the cat had *way* too much time on his hands. Meowth had said that they would pass by this tree within an hour. That was five hours ago.

"What is Meowth *doing* up there?" moaned Jessie. Craning her neck, she peered up through the overhanging branches to try to get a look at Meowth.

"Probably still waiting to execute the plan," sighed James.

"Remind me to squash him next time he decides to play mathematician," Jessie growled, softly beating her head against the trunk of the tree in frustration.

James didn’t respond. His eyes had glazed over, and he was staring listlessly at the patch of dirt in front of him.

CRACK!!!

The utterly boring atmosphere was broken by a loud snapping noise somewhere to the right of the two. Terrified, they flew into each others’ arms. Both squeezed their eyes tightly shut, not wanting to see whatever monstrosity was coming their way.

"What is it, James?" Jessie wailed hysterically.

"I don’t know, Jessie, but we’re going to die!" moaned James.

Meowth heaved a heavy and exasperated sigh, but neither of the terrified partners paid him any heed. They were just too terribly afraid of…a snapping noise.

After a few intense moments of fear-hugging, James hazarded a glance at the world around him. When he saw nothing, he turned to face Jessie.

"Do you think it’s gone, Jess?"

"I…I think so, James…" said Jessie, turning to look at James—and finding herself staring into his *gorgeous* emerald eyes, almost touching noses with him. She was completely transfixed, absolutely unable to move.

James was in exactly the same position as she was, and hardly noticed when Meowth leapt out of the tree and stood on their shoulders between their faces, doing his best to push their heads apart.

"Snap out of it, you two! I hear the twerps coming!" Meowth’s efforts were completely put to waste. As soon as he removed himself from his position between the two, their heads just snapped back to the way that they had been earlier, and the paralyzed staring continued. Meowth shook his head and smacked his forehead with a paw. "Eesh. Looks like I’m going to have to do this myself… Oh, who am I kidding? I don’t really even have a plan, despite what I’ve been telling these two…whatever they are, over here…"

So Meowth padded over to meet the twerps, who were just coming into sight. Brock was holding a map, looking confused. Misty had Togepi enfolded protectively in her arms, as usual, and Ash was looking ridiculous with Pikachu sprawled out on his head.

"Hello," said Meowth gloomily.

"You can’t have my Pikachu!" Ash screamed automatically.

"Phoo. I’m not in the mood for stealing your pokemon," Meowth sighed. "Jessie and James are acting screwy again."

"Huh?" All three twerps uttered the all-too-familiar syllable and looked over at Jessie and James to see just what Meowth meant. They were still frozen in their embrace, staring at each other nose-to-nose.

Ash, as usual, was absolutely clueless. "What are they *doing*?"

"I have an idea…" said Brock.

Meowth sighed again. "They won’t snap out of it! I think they’ve gone catatonic or something!"

"What’s cat-a-tom-lik?" Ash stammered.

"Never mind," Misty muttered.

Meowth and the twerps continued to stare at Jessie and James, dumbfounded. All of a sudden, it seemed that the trance was broken, and the two un-catatonic Team Rocket members lunged for each other. Considering that they were already nearly touching noses, it really wasn’t much of a lunge.

"Ash! You’re too young and immature to see this!" screamed Misty, thrusting out one of her hands to cover the uber-twerp’s eyes. That done, she gazed at the two madly kissing partners dreamily. "Though it *is* the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen!" Brock fell over. Meowth buried his head in his paws and started crying. Caught up in her starry-eyed gushing, Misty unconsciously removed her hand from Ash’s eyes in order to clasp both hands beneath her chin fondly. Ash’s eyes widened as his sight was restored to him. After a moment of stunned silence on his part, he threw back his head and screamed bloody murder.

It was as if the scream somehow returned Jessie and James to the real world. In complete synchronicity, they sprang away from each other and landed on their feet, trying their best not to look as disheveled as they truly were.

"What are you twerps doing here?" cried Jessie, blushing furiously.

"And what are you staring at?" James’ blush was just as brilliant as Jessie’s, if not more so.

The four spectators each produced extremely huge sweat drops. There was a moment of uncomfortable silence, until Jessie and James (in unison, of course) decided to break it.

"Well, we’re going to steal your Pikachu!" they cried at once. With that, they launched into the all-too-familiar motto, blushes never fading throughout the entire thing.

"You can’t have my Pikachu!" Ash screamed again, too caught up in twerpish defiance to realize just how awkward the situation felt.

"Arbok, go!"

"Wheezing, go!"

"Pikachu, thunder—wha..?" Ash stared, bewildered, at the people he was *supposed* to be battling. They were in an impressive lip-lock *again*, and certainly looked like they didn’t want to be disturbed for such petty things as pokemon battles. All this excessive exposure to affection-showing was just too much for his tiny brain to handle, and he fainted dead away. Brock ran off crying, wailing something about his "chances being ruined", and Misty was again frozen in her "isn’t it so sweet" position. Chances were, she would stay like that until Jessie and James decided to end their little make-out session.

"Charrrbok," sighed Arbok. (Well, the storm finally broke.)

"Wheez." (Yep.)

"Pikachu piKA!" said Pikachu. (This is going to be a while, isn’t it?)

"You bet it is. Oh, my virgin eyes!" Meowth moaned.

"Wheeezing wheez." (So, who’s up for some poker?)

"Bok!" (I am!)

"Pika pi!" (Count me in!)

Meowth sighed. "I guess it’ll take my mind off this…monstrosity," he said, hazarding a glance in his partners’ direction. They were lying on the ground, now…

"Toge! Toge!" squeaked Togepi, removing itself from Misty’s arms and toddling over. (I wanna play! I wanna play!)

"CharrrrrBOK Char." (You’re too young to gamble, kid.)

Togepi’s lower lip quivered, and it began to cry loudly. "Priiiiiiiiiii! Priiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!"

Pikachu sighed. "Pika pika." (Go Fish it is.)

"Hear that, kid? You can play."

Togepi stopped crying immediately. "Toge! Toge!" (Yay! Yay!)

"Wheez wheezing wheez," said Wheezing, gesturing at Jessie and James. (You know, someone really oughtta time this.)

"Chu pika pikachu!" Pikachu said brightly, holding up a stop-watch. (I already am!)

Meowth looked up from shuffling the cards to see what the time on it was. "Five minutes and thirty-two seconds? I bet ten bucks they kiss for an hour, at least."

"Bok! Charrrrbok char char bok!" (You’re on! I say two hours!)

"Pika pika pikachu!" Pikachu eyed Togepi nervously. (You guys, the baby!)

Wheezing shot some sludge at Pikachu. "Wheez wheez wheezing. Wheezing! Wheez!" (You’re just a wimp like your trainer. The kid doesn’t even know what we’re doing! And I say five hours.)

"Toge! Toge!" chirped Togepi, bouncing up and down. (Go fish! Go fish!)

"Bok?" (See?)

"Pi…pika ka chu. Pika chu pika…" Pikachu looked from pokemon to pokemon with a twinkle in his eye. "Pika pika?" (Well…I guess you’re right about Togepi. And as for the bet… Anybody know what the kissing world record is?)

***One Week Later***

After days upon days of being around the smooching Rockets, Ash had finally learned to cope. He no longer fainted immediately upon coming to, and was now busy waving his hand in front of Misty’s face, attempting to snap her out of her enchanted trance. He had tried to cart Pikachu, Togepi, and Misty off so that he could continue on his goody-goody pokemon journey, but Misty wouldn’t be budged and Pikachu said he was waiting to win a bet. Togepi had made some noises, and Meowth had said that the little egg pokemon wanted to play Go Fish with Team Rocket's pokemon some more. So Ash was stuck here until Jessie and James stopped kissing. Luckily, Brock was kind enough to go get food from town every so often to make sure that no one starved. He had even managed to find an intravenous line that he could hook Misty up to. Jessie and James would not be disturbed, so it seemed that they would have to fend for themselves as far as food went.

"Pika pika," said Pikachu, handing Meowth a pile of cards. (Your turn to deal.)

"I’m sick of this! All we’ve been doing for an entire week is play Go Fish!" Meowth began furiously scratching the deck of cards, tearing them to useless shreds.

"Wheeeeeez…" sighed Wheezing. (I think you win the bet, Pikachu…)

"CharrrrrBOK," said Arbok. (This is inhuman.)

"I wonder what would happen if I started throwing rocks at them," mused Meowth.

"Pika pika. Pikachu pika kachu chu pika KA!" (Don’t try it. All right, you guys, hand over the cash, I’ve won the bet!)

There was some grumbling from the other pokemon, but each handed Pikachu ten bucks. Pikachu immediately leapt up and began bouncing around wildly, screaming "I’m rich! I’m rich!" in pokemon language. The Team Rocket pokemon stared wide-eyed at the unusual spectacle, and Togepi chirped.

It seemed that Pikachu’s monetary fit was enough to *finally* break Jessie and James apart. They both stood up and brushed themselves off, then leaned against a tree to catch their breath.

"I want a doughnut," James said. "I’m starving."

"Literally," said Jessie. "Let’s eat."

Without another word, they turned and headed into town. The Team Rocket pokemon glanced at the twerps (Misty was wondering why she had an I.V. in her arm), shrugged, and rushed off to catch up to their masters.

Ash stared after the retreating Rockets for a moment, then shook his head. There was just no understanding some people…

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So! Do I think of really weird things when insomnia strikes, or was it unbearably normal? Was it great, or was it horrible? Come on, people, I haven’t had one positive comment *or* one flame since I’ve entered the fanfiction business. Give me some input! hawkley_iv_prez@yahoo.com