Pokemon Fight Back

Well, it's been long enough since I've written the last chapter (that being chapter 1/2). Either way, I worked myself into a nice misery today, as you can probably guess, that's when I do my best writing. Get all them aggressions out on paper. Makes the story more interesting, eases my mind. Good all around. Well, enough blathering on about nothing, let's cram the current ideas in my head into the next chapter. As for putting the warning at the start of chapters, piss on that from now on. If ya haven't figured that out from the past 9 chapters, then open your friggin' eyes. And besides, there's no specific gore in this chapter... it's setting up for chapter 11, which I have large plans for. I would have tossed it onto this file too, but this chapter is already 9 pages long. I wanna break it up a little. So, without further ado:

Chapter 10: The Questioning

After a rather restless sleep, Jane awoke to the sounds of Eric tripping out of bed.

"Son of a bitch, that hurt!", said Eric as he untangled his foot from the covers which it was still wrapped in.

"And a good morning to you too.", said Jane sarcastically.

"Ahh, you can cram it with pinecones Jane.", said Eric, getting up. "You didn't just club your knee onto hardwood flooring and thwack your funny bone on the corner of the fucking bed."

"Ya got the funny bone too?", said Jane, almost laughing.

"I'll be good in a couple minutes.", said Eric. "Just let me hobble over to the dining room and get some food in me.

"Hold up.", said Jane. "Lemme get outta bed here and come with."

After Jane crawled out of her bed, they wandered over to the dining area and sat down. Eric ordered a stack of four pancakes (extra butter), while Jane only ordered a small toast.

"What, you on a diet now or something?", asked Eric, looking at Jane's pathetically small slice of toast.

"I'm not too hungry.", said Jane, nibbling at the crust of her toast. She had a queasy feeling in her stomach awaiting the police to eventually ask them about the murder. Her mind was still reeling with various excuses as to where she was at that time.

"Suit yourself.", said Eric, pouring an unusually large amount of maple syrup on his pancakes. The syrup was nearly dripping off the side of the plate.

"You sure you got enough syrup on there?", asked Jane.

"I don't like dry pancakes.", said Eric, digging into the pile. "Usually, bought pancakes have to be floating in syrup for them to have any taste."

"I'll bet, oh ye connoisseur of pancakes.", said Jane.

"Hey, I've eaten pancakes from most of the towns we've gone to so far.", replied Eric.

"Yeah, yeah.", said Jane, taking a bigger bite out of her toast.

After about 20 minutes of random smalltalk, Eric managed to finish his plate of pancakes. They wandered over to the Pokemon fighting deck and looked for some more challengers. After Eric beat the tar out of one trainer, another one challenged him before he could heal his up and managed to eke out a victory. Jane just stood by watching, working out the kinks in what would be her excuse. *

"Oh, come on you fucking prick!", shouted Eric. "It just ain't sportsmanlike to battle with someone before they can heal."

"Hell, it snags me a couple more victories this way.", said the trainer. "And it's 'Bill', to you. You might as well know who you were bested by."

"I challenge you to a rematch right after we heal, jackass.", said Eric, headed for the healing table.

"Pfft, yeah right.", said Bill. "If your guys were at full health, I'd be slaughtered." Here, just so there's no hard feelings, I'll give ya the HM cut.", he began suddenly. "Some kid couldn't afford to pay me for his loss and gave me this thing. I already have it.", he finished, tossing Eric the HM. **

"If I ever run into you again, I'll rip your head off and ram sugar down your throat.", said Eric, picking up the HM that had landed in front of him. "Then, I'll bury you under a fucking anthill and burn what's left of your corpse after a month.", shouted Eric, extremely angry by this point. By then, however, Bill had wandered off in search of another person who had just finished a fight.

"Go easy there Eric.", said Jane.

"He virtually cheated.", said Eric, starting off towards the healing table.

"Yeah, but whaddya want?", asked Jane. "In a crowd of trainers, you're always bound to run into an asshole or two along the way."

"Bah.", said Eric. "Remind me to kill him and anyone who looks like him."

"I'll try.", said Jane sarcastically.

As Eric had his pokeballs returned fully healed, he noticed that the police were beginning to question the trainers about yesterday.

"Looks like the Feds are finally trying to solve the murder.", said Eric.

"Huh?", said Jane, looking around nervously.

"Hope they catch that freak.", continued Eric. "It just ain't safe on this ship any more with him around."

"Yeah... yeah.", said Jane. "Let's go sit at a table until they come to question us." Jane was hardly able to stand any more. Her legs where shaking in nervousness and she didn't want to give herself away. As they made their way to a table, Jane began to calm her nerves by ordering a large, ice-cold coke and slowly sipping at it. It was just too bad that the bar didn't open today, as the ship would be docking in several hours.

After about ten minutes, the police arrived at their table.

"How's the cruise going kids?", said the first officer.

"Not bad.", said Eric casually. "Except that some of those asshole trainers tend to bend the rules to get a victory out of you."

"Couple of unfair trainers on here?", asked the second officer.

"Yeah. He challenged me while my Pokemon were weak.", replied Eric. "Bill, I think his name was."

Jane nearly gasped in shock. She had forgotten to heal her pokeballs. The blood would still be on Pinsir. She had all morning to simply give her pokeballs to the attendant at the healing desk, but she had been concentrating on what she would say to the police instead. Her stomach churned at the thought of how her stupid mistake may get her arrested for manslaughter.

"You always find someone to ruin your vacation.", continued the second officer.

"Getting to the point...", started the first officer. "Can you tell us what you were doing between 1:00 and 1:30 yesterday afternoon?"

"Sure.", said Eric. "I was lying in my bed at the time, half asleep."

"At 1:00 in the afternoon?", asked the second officer.

"I didn't sleep well the night before.", continued Eric. "The waves were getting to me."

"I see.", said the first officer. "And can anyone vouch for your whereabouts?"

"Well, Jane woke me up at about 1:40 or so.", replied Eric. "I think a room attendant may have walked in to clean up a little. Not sure 'bout that one though... I was half asleep."

"That'll do.", said the first officer, seeming appeased at the answer.

The first officer then turned towards Jane. The second officer was still writing what Eric had said in a little notepad.

"And you Miss.", started the first officer. "What were you doing between 1:00 and 1:30 yesterday afternoon?"

"I was battling with other trainers at the time.", replied Jane. She was trying to look as cool as possible, even though her heart was pounding in her chest. She simply took another sip of coke and her heart began to settle down.

"Mm-hmm.", mumbled the second officer. "Did you manage to get the name of any of the trainers that you fought?"

"No, sorry.", said Jane. She had thought of all of the details and had answers to all of the questions she thought they would ask. So far, all was going to plan.

"Although.", continued Jane quickly, "The attendant at the healing table might be able to vouch for my whereabouts."

"Yeah.", said the first officer. "Most of the answers we're getting are for the healing table guy."

"Somehow doubt that he'll be able to remember everyone that went to heal their Pokemon though.", said the second officer.

"Yeah.", replied the first officer. "This case might not be solved too terrible quickly."

"Too bad.", said Jane.

"Oh, and can we see your bags for a minute?", asked the first officer.

"Huh, sure.", said Eric, tossing his bag onto the table. Jane however was a little more hesitant. If they opened her pokeballs, they would obviously see that Pinsir was covered in blood. However, she couldn't just keep her bag from the police. That would definitely give her away. She quickly tossed her bag onto the table as well.

The officers each opened one of the bags and glanced around inside of them, pawing through the items. The second officer began to take Jane's pokeballs out of her bag and place them on the table, along side other various items from her bag (comb, makeup kit, empty sprite can, pen, etc, etc). Jane's heart nearly stopped. She would be caught for sure. She began to shuffle her legs into a position such that she could bolt from the table if they began to open the pokeballs. She had planned that if this were to happen, she would dive off the side of the ship and try to swim underwater in hopes of escaping.

"Clean.", said the second officer suddenly, beginning to put her items back into her bag. "You want the sprite can?"

"Huh?", said Jane surprised. She couldn't believe that she might make it out of this alright.

"No, no, toss it.", replied Jane, taking another large sip from her near-empty coke.

"Heh, figured that.", he finished, tossing the pokeballs as well as her other items back into the bag. He closed it up and handed it back to her, crumpling the sprite can in his hand. "The other guy clean?", he asked his partner.

"Nothing.", replied the first officer, finishing his search.

"What were you hoping to find?", asked Eric, taking his bag off of the table again.

"Any blood stains, items that may belong to the cashier, anything unusual.", replied the second officer.

"Ah. Well, hope you find something.", finished Eric. "You know, he might have abandoned ship or something too."

"Yeah, that's one of our main worries.", said the first officer, starting to walk to the next trainer.

"Have a nice cruise.", said the second officer, following the first.

Jane just sat there, staring into nothing, thinking of how close she had come. If she had jumped up to run when he had removed the pokeballs, she would probably be sent to the chair by now. ***

"As much cruise as there is left.", said Eric.

"What time is it?", said Jane suddenly, wanting to get of the ship as soon as possible.

"Bout 11:30.", said Eric. "We should be able to see land soon." ****

As the ship docked back at Vermillion city, Eric and Jane gathered their things from the room. As they walked back to the pokecenter in town, Jane quickly healed her pokeballs, not wanting to make the same mistake twice. Eric, taking no notice, flopped down onto the couch and began to relax. He released all of his pokeballs to let his Pokemon run around for a while. After the healing was done, Jane did the same, and was happy to see that Pinsir had come out clean as a whistle.

"Suppose I should give something this HM at one point or another.", said Eric, holding up the HM. "I think you need it to get to this town's gym."

"I don't think it's a good skill.", said Jane. "I'd toss it to some random Pokemon in the computer."

"Good plan.", said Eric, getting up. "I'll toss it onto... say... one of the Nidorans."

Eric got his male Nidoran's pokeball and got it to learn Cut. He tossed it into his backpack and withdrew all of his other Pokemon. He kept out his Florin, Pikachu, and tossed the rest in (except for the Nidoran of course). He then withdrew his female Nidoran as well, thinking that since they were ground type, and the gym leader used electric Pokemon, they would stand a good chance.

"Got a gameplan there Eric?", asked Jane, seeing him shuffle around his pokeballs.

"I'm going to ground the tar out of this gym leader.", said Eric, holding up his second Nidoran. "They may not be very leveled up, but what can't hit them can't hurt them."

"I'm sure.", said Jane. "I think Florin's also pretty resistant to electric, being plant type."

"I know.", said Eric smiling. "I'm gonna devastate that place."

As he looked at his watch, he saw that it was only about 3:00 in the afternoon, but his energy was shot from the cruise. He figured that he didn't sleep quite as good as he figured on that second night. Deciding to call it a day, we wandered up to his room to watch TV for a while. Jane followed after gathering her Pokemon, wondering if the murder would be on the news. As they turned on the TV, and waited through about 5 minutes of commercials, the news came on.

"Well, I'm guessing that the murder's gonna be in there.", said Eric. "Damn that was pretty fucked up. Hope I don't have nightmares. Good thing I didn't get that good a look."

"Yeah, yeah...", said Jane. "Let's see what their conclusion is."

The reporter was already talking to the police on the television. It turns out the police had no clues as to where the murderer went, and assumed they had dove overboard the night of the murder. They had found noone who looked specifically suspicious, and were still scouring the ship for clues. After the show ended, they decided to wander out for a bite to eat. As they left the pokecenter, they heard a familiar voice from behind them.

"Leaving so soon?", said Kris.

"Hey Kris.", said Eric. "What brings you into this neck of the woods?"

"I was going to go on the cruise too, but arrived about ten minutes too late. The ship had already left.", replied Kris.

"Woah.", said Jane. "That kinda sucks."

"To put it mildly, yeah.", said Kris. "Anyway, I plan to take the next ship out. The captain is a friend of Uncle Gene's, so he was able to swing me in for free."

"Uncle Gene?", said Eric, thinking the name was familiar.

"Eugene Pine... professor Pine.", sighed Kris.

"Oh, right, right, right.", said Eric. "Sounds pretty sweet."

"I just hope nothing happens like on your cruise.", said Kris.

"Yeah, that was pretty bad.", replied Jane nervously.

"Yeah...", said Eric. "That would definitely be under my definition of 'bad things'."

"Either way.", continued Jane, not wanting to talk about it any more. "We gotta head out now."

"Yeah, another ship is leaving in an hour.", said Kris. "See ya later." *****

With that, Eric and Jane wandered off to the nearest A&W for some frosty-mug rootbeer and a couple mozzaburgers (extra mayo, as per usual). After mulling around for a little bit, they wandered back to the pokecenter for the night. Tomorrow, they would head out to defeat the next gym.

* : Heck, if this were real life, that'd be how I'd fight. I always say, 'whatever advantage you can find, use it.'

** : Yeah, you don't quite get it this way, but why would the captain be battling with Pokemon or pissing around doing nothing anyway? He's gotta be running the ship at all times here. In the game, they say he's seasick. Who ever heard of a seasick captain? Honestly!

*** : Well hey, I'd go rough on murderers too if I was in charge of the police. And since I am in this story, let 'em fry.

**** : In the game, the ship is always at dock when you go on it. I mean, what the heck is the fun of that? If I go on a cruise, I want it to do just that... cruise. Not 'sit like a rock by the shore and bump against the dock all night'.

***** : Normally, Eric's rival would battle him. But that was Jerry. Jerry was an asshole. This is Kris, who seems like not so much of an asshole. Either way, he's got plans in the future to make him seem much more like the rival you all have come to know and hate. Just wait for a while. We probably won't see him for a while. Team Ricochet however...

Will Jane be able to keep the secret for much longer? Will Eric be able to take the next gym? Why wasn't there any gore in this chapter (read the starting paragraph jackass)? Will Kris one day battle them? Will Team Ricochet find their way into the picture soon? Answers to the brunt of them either in the opening paragraph of this chapter, or in the next couple.

Kabutroid