Pokémon Scarlet

Chapter 1: You Really Want to Know?

(Gina Ikeda)

Gina Ikeda pushed open the door of the Viridian City Pokémon Center and was greeted by a fresh breath of carefully conditioned air. She breathed a sigh of relief and mopped her forehead with one sleeve of her jacket, which was tied around her waist. She had taken it off hours ago and it was still way too freaking hot, even for summer.

Gina had turned thirteen the past June, but honestly didn't feel much older than she had when she first started out on her Pokémon journey. To be truthful, she hadn't gotten any closer to her goal after joining up with Gav, Kaylee, Beth and Victoria's "Rocket Thwarting" team, as they playfully called it. For the past eight months she had spent her time training her team, helping Edith with the breeding grounds, and doing odd jobs for Gav and the others when they actually needed her, which was still seldom. She didn't regret it, but the trainer's ambition she could not ignore had returned full force.

She had just left on a training expedition of her own to—hopefully—persuade her borderline Charmander into a full-fledged Charmeleon, but the stubborn guy didn't seem willing to evolve. Although it was true that the two of them had grown infinitely closer over the year they had known each other, there was still an undeniable difference between what Charmander wanted to do and what Gina wanted to do. The difference between then and now, though, was that they were willing to compromise.

Running a hand over her tightly woven braid and swinging it over her shoulder, Gina shrugged out of her backpack and reveled in the cold air. She'd only been out on her own for a week or so, and she already missed her friends. It was a little sad, but there it was. Now for one of the first times since she'd met them she was fending for herself and her own dream the way she'd originally intended to those many months ago when she had left Pallet Town.

One of the major things on Gina's mind was returning to Pallet. It had been a full year since she'd seen her mom and everyone else, and she was very eager to visit. For now though, she needed to check into a room.

Forcing herself to move forward and out from under the direct flow of the air conditioning vent, Gina headed toward the registrar and only got about halfway there.

Gina usually had a decently level head, even if she'd pretend to be angry with her friends when they were all teasing each other. Jason had rubbed off on her a little and she could definitely have her outspoken and impulsive moments. Still, Gina felt, for the most part, that she could control herself—except in very rare circumstances.

There was one of those very rare circumstances, sitting at a booth in the lobby, slouched over with his head in his hands and looking like utter crap. Rust-colored hair, which had grown slightly longer than she remembered, was spilling out between his long fingers. His hunched-over posture positively radiated tension. It was Amaris Drake, looking so very un-Amaris Drake-ish that Gina froze in her tracks and stared.

Oh, yes—if there was one person that would always be able to work Gina up into a frenzy of wild, irrational anger, it was Amaris. The two of them had not met since before Gina had even reached Edith's cottage in the forest. She had to admit, he occasionally popped into her mind, but for the most part she had thought of him quite infrequently. Rivalry was popular in Kanto, possibly because of all the legends about the rivals Red and Blue who had fought each other and worked one other up to practically unbeatable levels. In spite of this, she had not missed her rival. She hated how she always compared herself to him and hated even more how he always seemed to know it. The two of them were oil and water.

And yet he looked so utterly miserable right now. He seemed truly unaware of his surroundings, openly emoting his state of mind with abandon to the people around him. Gina wondered if he even remembered where he was. The Amaris Drake she knew would never let himself look affected by anything in front of anyone. She had no way of knowing if he even showed this side to his uncle or not.

Gina stood there for a while. She looked to the receptionist, who was fanning herself with a call slip. She looked into the hallway of the Center, back towards the little rows of doors, and calculated the likelihood of never running into him in spite of the fact that they would both be rooming here. Then she looked back at Amaris, who had still not moved. He looked sort of pale, not at all like the tan, freckly teen she had seen just eight months ago.

Insanely, Gina found herself walking over to him. Every ounce of her common sense and hard-earned level headedness was urging her to just turn around, check herself into a room, and get some shuteye. Maybe he's on his way out. Maybe he'll be gone in the morning, the voice tried, using every bit of persuasion it knew how. Just leave him be and he'll never know you were here and you won't have to put up with him at all.

Gina had sat down across from Amaris by this point, and was fully expecting, and bracing herself for, a sarcasm onslaught possibly followed by nasty whiplash. When nothing came she glanced up at the slumped boy and realized that he appeared to be half-asleep and hadn't noticed her arrival yet.

Well, isn't this awkward, Gina thought to herself, shifting in her seat uncomfortably and putting her hands on her lap. Glancing around edgily she noticed that a passerby was looking at the two of them strangely, as if Gina had put Amaris to sleep by talking too much. Gina glanced sharply at the stranger and he turned away. She cleared her throat.

That one got his attention. The reddish head snapped up and strangely dark eyes glanced wildly around before settling hazily on Gina's face. It seemed to take him a few seconds to comprehend what he was seeing. Then his blank expression turned into one of cool disinterest. It was so typical Amaris that Gina almost fell over right then and there.

"Oh, it's you."

"Nice to see you, too." Gina cut right to the chase, worried that he might abruptly challenge her to a battle and eliminate her chance to do her good deed. "What's up?"

"Bug off." Amaris propped his elbows on the table and interlocked his fingers in front of his nose and mouth, supporting his head against his hands. The body language was screaming, "leave me alone" and Gina almost winced. Okay, so that hadn't worked. She should have known that Amaris would never be conned into a talk against his will. He seemed to know that she was asking him in undertones, "What's wrong?"

She tried a new strategy. This was now a challenge. "You look like you haven't slept in about a month."

Absolute silence was her only response. Apparently he wasn't going to repeat himself, but the message was still clear. Bad vibes aside, Gina took notice of the abrupt change his appearance had taken since the last time she'd seen him. She had previously thought him pale, but now she realized it was much more than that. His skin was a sickly, almost scary shade, and it only served to offer more contrast to the enormous dark circles beneath his teal eyes. Even the teal was looking more and more like murky gray than anything else. Gina figured it was because his eyes were half-lidded in a cold, unamused expression. The Center lights were simply not hitting them right, but the effect was eerie nonetheless. It looked like he had lost weight, and not in a good way. The overall conclusion: he looked like hell. Gina was actually concerned now.

Amaris had yet to comment at all on her last statement, though, and it was starting to burn at her. Only Amaris would know how much she hated to be ignored, since only Amaris ever ignored her enough to see the profound effect it had on her. Concerned or not, Gina paused for a moment and wondered exactly why she was trying to strike up a conversation with the single most frustrating boy in the universe.

"Look, could you maybe not be difficult just once in your life and tell me what's wrong?" It hadn't come out too harsh—in fact, it was just the right amount of harsh that Gina had been looking for.

The question he asked next took her off guard from her momentary high of confrontation. "And exactly why do you care all of the sudden?"

Gina bristled. "I don't. But, it's going to bug me if I don't find out now." She paused and crossed her arms stubbornly over her chest, glancing off to the left and refusing to look at him. "Believe me, it's purely selfish."

There was more silence. Gina was just about ready to get up, throw her hands in the air and leave when she noticed something very, very disturbing. She wasn't sure why she hadn't seen it before, but now it seemed painfully obvious. Red was lining Amaris' eyes, in addition to the bruised-looking purple flesh below them. He'd been crying—a lot, from the looks of it—and recently.

All thoughts of abandoning this challenge left her. Stunned into silence, Gina clamped down on her childish indignation and tried to force it away. Something about seeing a trace of actual, human emotion on her infallible rival shook her to the core. Amaris had always worked as smoothly and ruthlessly as a well-oiled machine, even when they were very young children together. To see him actually on the same level with her, and the rest of their hotheaded, emotionally wrung-out species had a profound and not at all pleasant effect on her that she couldn't quite place.

"Amaris?" she asked, and the second the word was out she knew that she'd uttered it too softly and gently. Sure enough, he shot his icy gaze to her a moment before snapping it away again. He leaned suddenly back against the booth and turned his head away from her entirely. Gina noticed that part of his scalp near his hairline was pink, probably from where he'd been clutching at his hair. She was getting more and more uncomfortable by the second, and the urge to get up and walk away was growing every moment. It was hard to stop herself from acting on it.

"Amaris, I just want to know what's going on." She cut him off before he could deny that there was a problem in the first place. "And don't you say 'nothing.' It's pretty obvious." Tough love (minus the affection) had always been predominant in their odd relationship, and this no-nonsense approach felt the most natural to her. "I promise I'll leave you alone if you just tell me. I won't bother you and I'll go check into a room and sleep all day."

He smiled a terrible, bitter smile and leaned his head back against the booth seat. The fluorescent lighting finally hit those teal eyes and revealed their true color, but it also spilled into the bags beneath them and made him appear gaunt and frightening.

"You really want to know?"

She nodded once. She hadn't expected it to work, but that wasn't even half the reason that she managed to choke on the very air she was breathing.

"Uncle is dead. And it wasn't an accident, either."

After struggling to relearn the art of breathing, Gina finally managed to stutter out, "Your—what?" It was not her most intelligent line, but her brain had seceded into shock.

"You heard me. Now get the hell out of my face." Amaris made to get up and leave, but Gina was too quick for him, leaping out of her side of the booth and blocking him into his with her body.

"When?" was all she asked.

Amaris was being very strange. He was antagonizing and vindictive one moment then strangely aloof and apathetic the next. He seemed to go through one of his aloof stages, but the bitterness was more potent than ever. "About a month ago." He paused, and then laughed. It was a horrible, strained sound that shot shivers up and down Gina's arms. "You know, you're quite deft at calculating the length of insomnia. Ever consider dropping the Master bit and going into psychiatry?" He smiled at her in a half-sarcastic, half-desperate way. He seemed a little bit crazy, and Gina could hardly blame him. If he hadn't gotten much sleep in the past month, she was amazed he was still coherent at all. "Now I've told you. You said you would leave me alone. So get."

So they were back to the antagonizing, vindictive mode. Gina steeled herself and was about to try her hand at logic and reason when he abruptly stood up and pushed roughly past her, making a beeline for the Center door. Starting into a primitive and oddly maternal instinct, Gina ran after him. It was unnecessary since he wasn't trying all that hard to outpace her, and she caught up with him right outside the door. She grabbed him by the shoulder to turn him around, which was a bit awkward since he'd successfully shot up at least six or seven inches higher than her over the years.

"Amaris, no way are you going to wander around on your own! What if they find out you're on to them and come back to finish the job?"

For a moment Amaris just stared at her as if she had Weedles crawling out of her ears. "You sound like something out of one of those crappy mystery murder novels."

"Amaris, look—" she took a deep breath to steady herself. Her heart was racing and she could feel the adrenaline coursing through her, making her jittery and shaky. Her previous heat-induced exhaustion was gone. "Just, come back in the Center with me, ok? We'll sit down, maybe order some drinks and just—just sit," she said lamely. "We don't even have to talk. Okay?"

Amaris gave her one of the coldest, deadliest glares she'd ever received. If she ever needed a photograph to perfectly encompass the word "hostile," all she had to do was snap a picture now.

Surprising her for the umpteenth time that day, Amaris deflated and said, "Fine." She didn't wait for him to change his mind. Holding the door, she ushered him inside and followed him closely, noting dully that the little silver bell that normally hung over the door must have fallen off. The swinging metal was entirely silent.

"I hadn't been to Pallet Town in a long time, and I'm not too proud to say I'd been out of contact with Uncle for quite a while."

Somehow Gina had gotten the stoic boy talking again. Sure, it had taken about an hour, many debate matches and long, awkward silences, but she'd finally worn him down. Gina was famous for her obstinance and Amaris had seen the futility in his struggle eventually. He was proud, sure, but his pride was no match for her stubbornness.

"About how long?" she asked.

"A month, maybe."

Gina was surprised. She somehow hadn't expected Amaris to be a familial person, but the truth was that Amaris' idea of "quite a while" was her idea of being pretty good in her pen-pal duties.

"I decided to come home for a visit the very same day I got the call from the police. In fact," he continued, smiling that bitter smile as he reminisced, "I'd just started to leave the Pokémon Center at Fuchsia City when the nurse flagged me down and said I had an urgent phone call. Apparently the police had been trying to get a hold of my number for a few days."

Gina shuddered. She was almost afraid to ask, so she was glad when she didn't have to.

"Then they told me someone had broken into uncle's lab. I saw the place, it's in shambles. They said he had been reported missing a few days before. But, what really got me, Gina, was that it was only reported a few days before that. You know my uncle—he holed himself up for weeks sometimes, and even the assistants knew not to bug him. Makes me wonder. How long was he really missing?"

A knot of chilly dread sank into Gina's gut even though she knew the ending. There was something about Amaris' distant teal gaze and the grave quality in his soft voice that made her thrill in horror as he abruptly ended the tale much sooner than she'd expected.

"They found his body a week later near the the shore."

Gina's spine jolted in terror and then stopped abruptly, causing her body to go numb. She took a very deep, very silent breath, afraid to make any noise. Amaris' hand was resting on the table between them and in a moment of utter impulse she reached out to it.

He jerked at her touch as if it hurt him. "I don't want your pity, Gina. You said to tell you, and I did. Don't treat me like a grieving three-year old."

Gina retraced her arm, trying to keep her dignity, and murmured, "Not all gestures stem from pity." Then, as an afterthought, "And sadness isn't weakness."

"What are you, a fortune cookie?" he snarled, getting up abruptly from their table. His wooden chair scraped abrasively against the linoleum. "And I'm not sad—I'm just really, goddamn, pissed. Whoever's behind this is going to pay."

The second half had been genuine, and Gina didn't doubt him for a second. The first half, though… that had been a truly transparent attempt at covering the truth, and both of them knew it. Gina said nothing and closed her eyes. She regretted saying anything to him about emotions, and regretted trying to offer him physical comfort even more. What had she been thinking? This was not Jason, or Orion. She would need every ounce of her strength and patience to deal with this time bomb of a situation.

"Amaris, stay with me."

"I'm tired, Gina, and I'm going to go to sleep whether you like it or not."

"That's not what I meant," she said, opening her eyes and fixing them unwaveringly on his. They battled silently for a moment, neither of them blinking, before she continued. "I mean stay in the same place as me, for a while. Sleep however much you want, but don't leave here. I'm not letting you go anywhere if I'm not with you."

"What the hell are you getting at? You trying to play Mommy for me, Gina? Huh? Is that it?" Amaris had never been affected by anything she said in his entire life, and yet suddenly she knew she had him pressed up against a corner and he couldn't get out any other way but by lashing out like a trapped animal. "Well, I don't want you to be my mom. So don't try to be. I'll leave whenever I damn well feel like it."

"No," she said. She was going to try to explain it to him, to logic it out, but she knew it wouldn't work the way he was now. So instead she went quiet and continued her staring contest with him. They waged their silent war for a few more minutes before Amaris looked down and away, getting up and stalking decisively across the floor and down the hall.

"Whatever," he said. "Do whatever the hell you want."

Even after he had gone, Gina sat rigid in her seat, eyes fixed on the place he had been. Her body seemed unable to react. Professor Drake was gone. From the sounds of it, he had been murdered. She hadn't really been able to think about her personal reaction to the news since the situation with Amaris had been predominant in her mind, but now she was letting it sink in. Her mind conjured up his image: the kind, quirky man with the same rusty auburn hair as Amaris and the same teal eyes, smiling at her from behind wire-rim glasses and telling her not to forget about Pallet while she explored the world. He was always such a nice person, polite, considerate, caring, eccentric in a wonderful way. She remembered his rumpled ties, and the way he could never seem to answer a video-call without some kind of technological struggle. The universe felt emptier now that he was no longer a part of it.

And how must Amaris feel, then? She asked herself, struck anew by towering waves of sorrow and empathy. His only family, since he was a baby. He's only fourteen years old. Or is he even fourteen yet? Is he still thirteen, like me? No, his birthday was back in December, so—

Very suddenly her shock-induced, pointless train of thought was cut off. A steel clamp seemed to click loose around her midsection and Gina slouched backwards into her chair and finally allowed herself to cry.

The next morning Gina woke with a start. She wasn't at all surprised to see that she had overslept, as she had conveniently forgotten to set the alarm on her Dex. Scrambling out of bed and yanking on yesterday's pair of jeans, she flung the door open and raced out into the lobby, one thought circling through her head: He'd better not be gone!

Gina skidded into the Pokémon Center's lobby, her socked feet sliding wildly on the newly cleaned floors. Amaris didn't seem to be there. The woman at the front desk was observing her with concern.

"Is... something wrong?" she asked, sliding her glasses down her nose and putting away a crossword puzzle magazine.

"I—oh, hey," Gina said, an idea coming to her as she jogged over to the desk. "Could you tell me, by any chance, if a guy by the name of Amaris Drake is still checked into the—"

"Paranoid, I see." The drawling voice from behind her caused half of Gina's body to freeze in alarm and the other half to jolt, giving her the effect of someone experiencing an epileptic episode. Whirling around, she came face to face with her rival—or, face to neck, as the height difference was even more pronounced the closer they stood to each other. She managed to mutter, "Never mind, thank you," at the woman who was surveying them with interest.

"So." Gina said, moving around Amaris and heading over to an empty set of chairs. "You didn't leave, I see."

"No," Amaris sighed out sarcastically, rolling his eyes. "I'm not really here right now. I'm merely a figment of your imagination."

"Ew," Gina said, wrinkling her nose. "Bad imagination," she scolded it.

Amaris actually cracked a wan smile at that and sat down across from her. He looked sleepy and placid, and she hoped it was because he'd actually been to bed last night. His hair was slightly rumpled, but it did look as if he'd washed his face and bothered to upkeep his general hygiene, for which Gina was immensely grateful. A passing waiter who was carrying a pile of dishes stopped to survey them. "Would you like something to drink, kids?"

"A large coffee, black," Amaris said, and glanced at Gina in question.

"I'll take the same," she said. Gina had found that once she got over the flavor, the hot beverage was one of the only ways she could overcome her hatred of the mornings. Caffeine shots were now her friends, even if they would never aid her in growing taller.

The two sat in awkward silence for a couple of moments. Gina found it sad that when they weren't antagonizing each other they had absolutely nothing to say. That made her vaguely note that Amaris wasn't picking on her yet.

As if she'd summoned the comment from her mere thought: "Gina, are those the same pants you were wearing yesterday?"

Gina blinked and glanced down at her blue jeans with the tell-tale tear in the right knee. "Uh… no," she joked, smirking and dusting them off. "You see, I love the rough-trail look so much that I do this to all my pairs."

"Or it could be that you can't function enough to walk," Amaris said, folding his arms over his chest. "I still remember graduation."

"'Course you do," Gina said, rolling her eyes. There was always one kid who tripped or stumbled at graduation, and from their graduating class, that kid had been Gina.

The waiter brought over their coffees and the two set upon them with gusto. Gina thought to herself as she sipped her beverage. She wasn't entirely sure what she was going to do with Amaris. She wasn't even sure if he had silently agreed to yesterday's terms of sticking together, or if he had just wound up staying at this particular Center for one more night. I wouldn't be at all surprised if he got up and walked out right now, she thought blandly to herself.

One thing was for sure: Amaris would not stand for this idle banter of theirs much longer. He just wasn't the type to waste time. He'd want to go off and seek his justice solo, and the idea of him wandering around on his own made her fidget. Gina had to motivate him not to run off alone, somehow—but what exactly did she have to offer that he couldn't find just as easily anywhere else?

Well, let's see, she thought sarcastically. I'm not an outstanding trainer, I only just started on my journey again after who knows how long, and I just so happen to be living with a bunch of people in the forest who have dedicated their lives to outing Team Rocket, an organization that's supposed to be long dead.

That's when it hit her. She stopped drinking to avoid choking on hot liquid and put her mug down. Amaris would no doubt be looking for the people or person responsible for his uncle's probable-murder. Not many people would have the motive to kill harmless, sweet Professor Drake—not unless he had something they wanted, or knew something they didn't want him to know.

"Did you ever think that maybe it was Team Rocket?" Gina asked quietly, trying to sound as if the thought had just happened across her mind.

"What?" he asked, shaking his head and furrowing his brow. Gina realized that her comment had sounded entirely random and cleared her throat to start over.

"The people who… broke into your uncle's lab," she began, unsure of how to word it. "Did you think that Team Rocket might have been behind it?"

"Gina," Amaris said, rubbing the bridge of his nose with two fingers. "Two things. One, Team Rocket has been disbanded for roughly fifty years. Two, you don't have to avoid saying the words 'murdered' or 'dead.' You know it, I know it, and saying it out loud isn't going to make Uncle any more or less dead."

Gina was taken aback by his blunt realism for a second before she realized that it shouldn't have surprised her at all. That was Amaris, completely practical in every way, even about things that most people lost all practicality over. She would call it unnerving, but she would also call it strong.

"Team Rocket is alive and well, I'm sorry to say," she said, forging on. It was going to be so tricky, trying to keep secrets and reveal facts at the same time. "In fact, a few friends and I have… have reason to believe that their organization is, indeed, in fine working order. We've sort of been, following up on…"

Amaris was looking at her like she was speaking in tongues. He cut off her carefully censored sentence midway with, "You're kidding me."

"Afraid not," she said, suddenly feeling uncomfortable. She could always tell when Amaris was judging her, which, honestly, was often.

"So that's why you hadn't gotten any stronger, huh?" He snorted, shoving his half-drunk mug across the table and leaning back into the booth. "You've been playing spy mission on a group of criminals that doesn't exist. That's rich, Gina. Real rich."

Gina stood suddenly. "You know what, Amaris? You are the single most difficult person I've ever met! I'm trying to say that you can find out if someone is responsible for this! I'm not crazy, and I wouldn't lie to you about something this important. If it's not them then who is it? Did you know your uncle to have any enemies, Amaris? Riddle me that."

To be honest, Amaris looked surprised and just a tad bit sheepish. At any rate, he answered the question. "No, he didn't have enemies."

"All he had was information, right? Look," she sat back down and leaned closer. "I know you won't believe that TR is up and running, but I can show you. I just need to make a phone call and clear it with my friends. They don't trust easy, and they've got good reason. A lot of them—a lot of them have stories kind of like yours, now. Weird stuff happening, things not adding up… tell me, what was the police response like?

"Essentially nonexistent," Amaris said, his chest rising and falling a little faster. Gina closed her eyes, struggling not to start crying. That would lose her this debate, which could be so important to Amaris and to finding justice for the professor.

"Are… are they looking for a killer, or did they just chalk it up to an accident?"

Amaris was quiet for an indeterminable amount of time. Gina wondered if she'd fried all the circuits in his brain from information overload. Finally, he clenched his fists on the table, and, in a surprisingly shaky voice, said, "No. They say he killed himself."

She was temporarily put out of commission by the utter idiocy of that assumption. The police really thought Professor Drake, easily the happiest person in Pallet, would commit suicide out in the middle of the ocean? They really thought someone like the professor, who was so enraptured with the nuances and delicacies of life in general, would kill himself in the first place?

No, Gina thought bitterly, a flame of white-hot anger growing at her center. They don't think that he would kill himself. But they're terrified to admit what it might mean if he didn't. They either don't want to, or are being stopped from admitting the truth.

This had been Gav and Victoria's depressing conclusion a few months back. With ten pairs of eyes reading over Gav and Kaylee's data from years of research, the conclusion had been simple. If a bunch of teens could deduce that something was wrong, and no rumors or speculation appeared in the media at all, something was being blocked. Either the police were honestly turning a blind eye to the rising string of crime in Kanto and the strangeness of the disappearances and deaths, or something was preventing them from reporting it to the newspapers and TV stations. The idea had always been a terrifying one to Gina, but she was slowly growing used to this strange new world she had discovered with the others.

Amaris was shaking, and Gina moved to sit down next to him. They'd never sat side-by-side before, and the position was awkward. Amaris was clamping his hands against the edge of the table, probably in an attempt to get them to stop trembling, but to no avail.

Gina wasn't sure what else to do. She was afraid that if she tried to get an arm around his shoulders, or any other sign of friendly comfort, he would explode.

"Gina," he said softly. He seemed to be trying to work himself up to something the rough equivalent of climbing a mountain. "I…" There was another pause during which he convulsively swallowed and looked away. "… Want you to take me to those friends of yours. I'd really like to ask them some questions."

Gina could barely contain herself. Her first impulse had been to leap up and holler at the ceiling, perhaps pumping her fist in the air and breaking out into a little victory dance right there on the tabletop. Needless to say that would have been inappropriate. Instead she solemnly nodded before noticing that Amaris wasn't facing her and therefore couldn't see it. She cleared her throat and said, "Of course. We can leave whenever you want."

"How about right now?" Amaris said, getting to his feet abruptly. Gina scrambled out of his way and stood awkwardly at the side of the table. "And Gina?"

She had turned away to walk to her room to pack, but now regarded him again. "Yes?"

"You had better not be pulling my leg."

Author's Note: Welcome to Scarlet! Major, major love to my readers who came back :) Those of you who read but don't review, I love you too. I'd love your input if you have the time!