The Eyes of a Persian, The Ears of a Growlithe
By: Froggie
Alternate Dimension series #3
Disclaimer: I don't own Pokémon or Team Rocket or any of the show stuff.
Rating: PG-13 (scary stuff in here, nothing gross though)
Note: In a dimension where Team Rocket does human experiments, James and Cassidy are taken, Butch and Jessi try to rescue them.
The Eyes of a Persian, The Ears of a Growlithe
James was just sitting innocently by the fire, trying to work up the courage to say something to Jessi along the lines of 'sorry'. She'd just had a fit at him about something or other and hit him. He was sitting there trying to figure out how to make her happy again.
But how could he say, all at once, 'I'm sorry for whatever it was I did and I'm sorry for anything I ever did and I love you and I'll kill myself if I can't just grab you and kiss you soon...'?
James shook his head slightly when the band on his wrist started to vibrate slightly. A shiver ran through him and he yanked his glove off to look at it.
It was the standard experimentation bracelet every member of Team Rocket was given, male or female. If it started vibrating and the small gem embedded in it glowed, it meant it was your time to sacrifice for the good of the Team.
To sacrifice yourself forcibly so they could conduct experiments on you.
James's bracelet was vibrating and the gem was glowing.
"No..." he gasped, face going white and ice cold, and Jessi looked up at him irritably.
"What is it, James?" she asked, then caught sight of him staring at the bracelet on his wrist. She went dead white too.
"No..." James gasped again, and Jessi grabbed his hand, yanking him over towards her. She tried to pull it off his hand.
"Get it off, get it off, please Jess, get it off..." James was moaning. If the bracelet was off, Team Rocket couldn't track them anymore and James could escape. The skin under the bracelet was getting red from her pulling.
"Okay, James, we have to go!" she said, yanking him to his feet by his hand and running off into the bush. They'd lost Meowth the year before from this, since the Team's Pokémon were subject too, and Jessi wasn't about to lose her other partner.
At another campfire a very similar thing was happening. The only difference was that Butch and Cassidy were closer to Team Rocket Headquarters, and the Rocket Experimentation Force (REF), who tracked down and dragged away people who were 'sacrificing', came and grabbed Cassidy before Butch even had a chance to try to pull her bracelet off.
James couldn't breathe. He was ice cold with terror. They could hear the REF coming to get him, they weren't far away
"This is for the good of the Team. Come out." they called, pushing through the wet bushes trying to find Jessi and James. She had him down in the grass, her body close beside his, her hand lightly over his mouth. They had dropped from exhaustion after running for close to an hour, and now the only chance they had was that the REF would give up. Of course, that wasn't likely. They'd only been hiding like this for ten minutes, and Giovanni would probably just use one of the REF if they came back empty-handed. There wasn't any way one of the REF would let himself be experimented on as long as James was still alive to be caught. They were almost as cold as Giovanni was.
"Boss, I've got them." they heard suddenly, as one of the REF pushed the bushes back, grinning.
They all stepped around, reaching down, grabbing James from Jessi and pulling him away.
"Jessi, Jessi, help me!" he wailed in terror. Jessi tried to run to him but another of the REF had her by the arms. He let her go, dropping her on her stomach in the wet grass when they were far enough away that she couldn't hear James screaming for her anymore. The REF officer made a crooked grin and a short, barking laugh.
"Report to Headquarters for reassignment." he said, walking off into the bushes.
Jessi buried her head in her arms, face in the grass, and screamed silently, her heart twisting like a knife in her chest.
Butch sat in the chair facing the desk, silent, eyes downcast to look at his knees. He was unusually quiet, even for Butch.
The door opened, and he looked up, his brown eyes skewing over to see who was coming into Giovanni's office. It was Jessi, the brat who'd gotten him into jail about a year before. He tried to work up hate for her, but he was too numb from losing Cassidy to even dislike the girl. Especially since she had swollen eyes and a red face and looked like she'd been crying for the past two days since the last call for people to go to the Rocket Labs. James must have been one of the others called.
Besides his Cassidy.
Butch almost wished he was a girl so he could cry like that. As it was, he was the mighty unemotional Butch and had to bottle it up until he was numb.
"You two will be reassigned as partners." Giovanni said coldly, his face shadowed in darkness still. Butch wondered if he felt anything at all about sentencing basically innocent people to death in the Team Rocket Laboratories. Probably not.
"Sure." Butch said tossing his blue-green hair, trying to be nonchalant. Jessi was silent.
"You will continue Jessi and James's previous assignment, to capture the Pikachu of Ash Ketchum." Giovanni ordered. Jessi flinched at the mention of her partner. Butch stared at his knees again.
"You're dismissed. Here are your new uniforms." Giovanni finished, swiveling his chair to look at a wall of screens behind him, patting his Persian's head. Butch picked up the box with the uniforms in it and followed Jessi out the door.
They changed into the grey uniforms, which fit perfectly and looked exactly like Jessi's previous uniform, except grey. They headed out of Headquarters to find Ash and Pikachu. Jessi started crying again softly. Butch, a little unsure of what to do, put a hand out on her shoulder to try and offer some comfort. She shook it off almost angrily.
"I know how you feel." he said, his voice more hoarse than usual, "I miss my Cass as much as you miss James."
"James..." Jessi moaned so softly Butch almost couldn't hear it.
"I'm sorry." Butch said softly. Suddenly Jessi got angry.
"Sorry?! Why are we sorry? This is so stupid! Why are we sorry?! Why are we only sorry?! Why don't we go back there and *do* something? Why don't we go back there and get them *out* of there?!" she shouted, stopping, facing him and screaming with tears running down her face, shaking a fist like she was going to belt him.
Butch backed up. He wasn't used to a girl who would actually hit him. Cassidy had always said she 'wasn't a little pushover' but she'd never actually hit Butch, just like he would never have hit her. Butch struggled with his face, trying to keep it straight. He couldn't let it show how much it hurt to think about Cass.
"Why?" Jessi whispered, her tears gone.
"There is no reason." Butch said softly, "So why *don't* we go back there and get them?" he asked, looking up from the ground into Jessi's blue eyes. She stared back at him, and he pushed his blue-green hair out of his face.
"Right." they said at the same time, and interlocked their arms in a unified determination to rescue their partners.
"Kay, Butch, you wait there. I'll head in and tell Giovanni that we caught Pikachu and we have to take him down to Team Rocket Laboratories. He'll give me a pass and then we can get in and get Cass and James."
"Sounds like a plan. I'll meet you by the Labs." he said, walking as nonchalantly as possible down to the Labs. She watched as he settled into a bench by the door.
Jessi walked into the Headquarters and requested an audience with Giovanni. His secretary let Jessi in and she stepped up to the desk.
"Sir." she said nervously. He turned on the chair, face still shadowed.
"What is it, Jessi?" he asked.
"Sir...we caught the Pikachu and we need a pass to get into Team Rocket Laboratories so we can drop it off there." she said, trying not to allow her nerves to show through her voice.
"You want to rescue your friend James, don't you?" Giovanni asked, moving forward, light shining on his face. Jessi gasped, because she could now see that both his eyes were covered by a pale blue layer of...something...his eyes looked dead. Giovanni was completely blind.
"N-no...sir..." she stuttered.
"Don't lie to me, Jessi. I can tell when people are lying. I can hear it in their voices!" Giovanni replied, stepping forward and taking hold of her arm, "I suggest you drop this line of reasoning and just go out on your assignment."
"No. I can't." she said
"I suddenly feel the need to bring one more in for experimentation. Poor Butch, losing two partners in four days..."
"No..." Jessi gasped, "It's not right! You can't just do that to people!"
"It's for the good of the Team, Jessi. When our experiments finally go through, we'll know how to make our agents perfect, to have the eyes of a Persian, or the ears of a Growlithe...no one will ever beat us again! Don't you see Jessi? Even I, the leader of the Team, have allowed myself to be experimented on. Even I have sacrificed for the good of all."
"It's still not right." Jessi whispered. Giovanni called the REF.
"This girl's time has come." Giovanni said cruelly.
"You can't just sentence an innocent person to death like this!" Jessi screamed at him. Giovanni smiled.
"Yes, I can."
Butch saw them dragging Jessi down the hill to the Team Rocket Laboratories, and quickly ducked into the bushes to avoid being caught. It was all up to him, now.
They threw her on a cold cement floor and she squeezed her eyes shut for a moment.
"Jessi? Jessi, is that you?" asked a familiar voice. She opened her eyes and looked up to see Cassidy staring at her from her purple eyes, her bright hair messy and a large black bruise on her cheekbone. She was chained to the wall and she'd been beaten on a bit.
"Yeah." Jessi said, sweeping her eyes around the room. At first she didn't see James and she was scared. Had they already killed him?
"He's over there. In the corner." Cassidy said sadly. Jessi saw him then, huddled in a dark corner, hugging his knees against his chest, his wide green eyes even bigger than usual and glazed. He was staring at the wall behind Jessi, not really seeing her. His face was covered in bruises and various little bleeding cuts.
"James?" Jessi said, moving towards him, still calling him. He didn't look up or respond at all. Cassidy sighed.
"He won't answer, they messed with his ears, Jess. He's deaf, he can't hear you. He hasn't spoken or moved for over a day." Cassidy said sadly, using her usual run- on sentences.
"What?" Jessi said softly. James was staring at the floor. He still hadn't seen her. She stared at him with tears in her eyes. He looked so vulnerable that way.
She walked over to him and knelt in front of him, running a hand in front of his eyes. He started, jumped and looked up at her for a moment. She watched the tears fill his eyes and he buried his face into her chest and cried. She gently stroked his hair and back, comforting him without words. He couldn't hear them anyway.
'The eyes of a Persian and the ears of a Growlithe.' she remembered Giovanni saying. Yeah right. Even if they *did* find perfection, it wasn't worth it.
Butch crouched by the door, waiting for the next scientist to leave the building for a coffee break. There was one who looked kind of unobservant, yep. This was his chance.
Butch ran in the door behind the scientist, who was digging in his lab coat pocket and holding the door open with his foot.
He was in.
Now he just had to find Jessi, James and his Cassidy.
He stalked down the halls peeking into various rooms and finally saw Cassidy's bright orange hair. She looked okay. But Jessi was crouched in front of James, who had his head buried in her chest. Butch raised his eyebrows, kind of surprised Jessi wasn't belting him for having his face there.
He tried the door and it was, of course, locked. Butch resisted the urge to swear. Cass had been trying to get him to quit his swearing for quite a while.
Butch prowled around, trying to find keys, and finally found a set hanging on a post on the wall. He pulled them down, trying not to make any noise, and crept back to the door. He stuck key after key in the lock and none worked. He tried not to swear again when the very last key he tried worked. He casually swung the heavy door open.
"Have no fear, Butch is here." he said quietly.
"Butch!" Cass said happily. He grinned at her and then tried every key on the ring on her chains. Again, the last one he tried worked.
She brought her arms forward, wincing as the blood rushed back into her muscles. Butch hugged her.
Then it occurred to him that he could hear muffled sobs from where Jessi and James were sitting.
"What happened?" Butch asked.
"James...well, he's deaf." Cass said, lowering her beautiful eyes.
"Are *you* all right?" Butch asked her, running the edge of his bare thumb down her jawbone. She smiled up at him.
"I'm just fine. They did stuff to him first, because he wouldn't quit trying to get away. I told him to calm down because I was sure you two wouldn't just let us get experimented on...but he wouldn't quit. He wanted Jessi so bad..." Cass explained, her smile disappearing.
Butch looked over at the other two members of Team Rocket again. Jessi had her cheek on James's hair and was rocking gently. James's sobs were calming.
"Jess, we've gotta go." Butch said softly. Jessi nodded and tapped James's shoulder softly.
"James, we gotta go." she said, smiling at him comfortingly, and he stared at her in utter confusion. Her face softened from its usual hard smile and she jerked her head at the door. James ran his glove under his nose and stood. Jessi took his hand and led him to the door.
They sneaked out without much trouble, Jessi commenting on how easy it was.
It wasn't.
Just as they were leaving the compound they sprung an alarm. Instantly REF started pouring out of Headquarters and Team Rocket Labs. They started running headlong towards the forest, but James kept falling behind because he couldn't tell exactly what was going on. He couldn't hear the REF coming up behind him. Cassidy kept falling behind too, because her legs and arms were asleep, not fully recovered, and she hadn't eaten recently.
"Jessi! Up there!" Butch yelled suddenly and Jessi looked up to see a low- hanging tree branch. She nodded at Cassidy, the branch then at Butch, who swung around, understanding her perfectly, grabbing Cassidy around the waist and hoisting her up into the branch. They were just over the crest of a hill and the REF couldn't see them.
Jessi grabbed James's hand and dragged him to the branch and Butch helped her get him up into the tree. Like a gentleman, Butch helped her up and then Butch dragged himself into the branches, tired.
Jessi and Butch helped the other two up the tree into the very top, and they sat there waiting, wondering if their camoflage of thick, leafy, green branches would be enough to shelter them. Butch took off his black jacket so Jess could pull it over her conspicuous red hair.
They waited...
This time the hiding worked and they escaped the REF who were sent after them. The last thing they heard was Giovanni, who had followed his goons after them, screaming into the forest.
"You're fired if you can't sacrifice for the good of the Team!"
Well, everyone but James heard it.
When they got out of the tree and out of their Team Rocket uniforms and into normal clothes, they walked to the nearest town. They rented a hotel room with some money James had cached away somewhere from his parents, washed up, and took James to the doctor.
His deafness was permanent, but he was almost beyond feeling.
He only cried for a little while.
Two weeks later they were on their way to the next city. They'd talked it over and decided never to go back to Team Rocket. They were on the way to the next Pokémon gym so they could start getting badges for themselves, legitimately.
They sat around the fire together, talking, still a little quiet and sad from what had happened, although more contented than they had been two weeks earlier. Jessi and Cassidy were doing each other's makeup, Butch was cooking and James was lying on his stomach on one of the sleeping bags studying a book on Sign Language they'd stolen from a library, his bare feet in the air. He was still sick inside from what had happened to him, and he still hadn't told anyone the details, but he was getting a little closer to complete recovery.
It had helped when he'd taken a pad of paper about a week after the...Team Rocket Labs situation...and written with a shaking hand that he loved Jessi, and it had helped even more when she told him that she felt the same way.
"So, do you want to travel together?" Cassidy asked Jessi as she applied some mascara to Jessi's eyelashes.
"I definitely think so. We actually make a better team than I thought we did last time we met." Cassidy replied.
"I think so too." Butch said, looking at Jessi, "You and me managed to actually accomplish something, and I know me and Cass make a good team." he finished, looking over at Cassidy with a feral smile. She grinned back. They'd admitted their feelings toward each other a long time before they'd met with Jessi and James the first time.
James was watching them like a hawk, reading lips as much as possible.
"Travel together?" he asked in a halting voice. Jessi was forcing him to use his voice, hoping that since he hadn't been born deaf would remember how to use his mouth even though he couldn't hear what he was saying. She had explained all this by simply stating that she 'loved James's voice'.
Jessi nodded at him and caught his eye. She smiled and he smiled back at her. He pointed to his eye, crossed his arms over his chest and pointed at her. 'I love you.'
She pointed to James and held up two fingers. 'You too.' An affirmation of how she felt.
It didn't matter if he was deaf. They could communicate on a deeper level.
"You know, I feel kind of bad leaving that place behind the way it was. You know, Giovanni's just gonna keep doing that to people." Butch said, sounding a little sad.
"Well," Jessi replied, her eyes haunted, "What else can we do?"
Author's Note: Feedback, I live on it! (frogwoman_66@hotmail.com)
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