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CHAPTER IX

A GHOST IN CLATTERMORE (PART 2)

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(-o-)

“Growlithe, trap it with Fire Spin!” shouted an officer. His Growlithe blew out a torrent of spiraling flames that lit up the night sky but completely missed their target.

Our target.

It moved through the air like it owned it. Weaving tight turns and darting about with an incredible effortlessness.

When we’d told Drowzee and Natu to hunt the ghost, they had led us out into the middle of the street and let out immediate cries of agitation. Drowzee had kept perking his snout up into the air as Natu hopped impatiently on the spot.

When we eventually got the hint, we looked up and spotted a faint form circling the skies above us. It flew in wide circles, leaving a trail that disappeared rapidly. Sometimes, it swooped all the way down and vanished behind buildings only to resurface from another side. It repeated this action enough times for people to take notice.

It was coming to eleven O’clock, and that was still early for pokémon trainers it seemed.

We heard excited cries around the surrounding neighborhood, and watched trainers come out of the woodwork to get a glimpse of the wacky flying-type pokémon that was diving through the air and zipping through the streets of Clattermore under the cover of the night.

A trainer pulled out a pokéball and let out a large Pidgeot in a brilliant surge of light, smiling wide as he latched himself to its back.

“Fly, Gales!”

The Pidgeot, spread its huge wings wide and pushed off the ground with a single beat, blowing some on-lookers with a gust of wind.

“Chase it down!” the trainer commanded before the Pidgeot fluttered powerfully, lifting into the sky and zooming after the unknown flying-type.

“Aw, crud!” cursed the officer. “Lead it away from town! Don’t go wrecking any buildings, y’hear?!” he bellowed, but I don’t think Pidgeot’s trainer heard him.

Other trainers brought out their pokéballs and chittered excitedly.

“That’s got to be a legendary!” one hissed.

“I’ve got to see this!” another said, as he took off, sprinting in the direction the Pidgeot had flown. Soon, every trainer in the area was giving chase. There was one that brought out his Kingler, a massive crab pokémon, and sat on its back, grabbing the horn-like protrusions from its exoskeleton shell for support. They darted down the street with surprising speed, Kingler’s spindly legs moving like engine pistons and clitter-clattering on the pavement.

“See you boys later!” a young female trainer said with a wave as she bounded after them with a Butterfree latched on her back, beating its wings with every hop the girl made. It looked like she was on the surface of the moon, and I watched open-mouthed at the sights unfolding before me. How had we never thought of using Butterfree like that back in the village? … Trainers were surely a different breed.

“Dude!” Charli barked beside me. I snapped my head toward him.

“What should we do?!” Natu flapped to his head, chirping loudly.

All other trainers were pulling further away. I gazed at Drowzee and felt in my jean pocket for his pokéball.

“Let’s go!” I grinned and pointed the ball at Drowzee, who let out a cry before he was reabsorbed that left me somewhat confused. He might’ve been trying to say something, and I cut him off.

Whatever it was though, it would have to wait. If any of those trainers caught our target, I doubted they’d willingly hand it over, and I wasn’t confident we could beat them in battle. We had to be the ones to catch it first!

I found myself laughing as Charli and I raced down the street after the clamoring mob of trainers and their pokémon.

I was only able to run for a few minutes before getting a throbbing stitch in my gut that made me have to stop. Heavy, panting breaths left my lungs as I clutched at my knees for support.

“What? Are you really that tired?”

I frowned at Charli amidst my panting. He had always been a fast runner, but he hadn’t even broken a sweat.

“What the hell? Are you not?”

His Natu was eyes-closed, perched atop his head. I held my breath and cocked my head at her slightly. Though it was faint, could see her body’s outline glow from this angle. She was probably tracking the target.

“Come on, Tom!” Charli grabbed my arm and pulled, but I only managed a few paces of jogging before the stitch panged in my gut once more.

“Oh my god!” Charli cried. “Might as well let Drowzee out then!”

I took in a deep breath. “You go on ahead! Go!” I shooed him away. Charli hopped about on the spot, breathing lightly, reluctant to leave me behind.

“We need to be the ones to catch it!” I wheezed.

“Right!” Charli agreed and began stepping away from me. “Follow behind me! I might need your help!”

I made a fist and beat lightly at my gut, then gave him a thumbs up. “I’ll be there.”

He took off and left me feeling like a middle-aged man with arthritis.

“Drowzee…” I panted, taking him back out. As soon as he surged from the pokéball, a twinkling light was in his eyes and he zapped me with a flashing, psychic spark.

I yelped out in sudden shock, and my blind eye began to itch furiously. Terror seized me for a moment at the thought that he had turned on me, and I cowered, withdrawing into myself and covering my head with my arms. One, two, three seconds passed, and when no follow-up came, I peeked. He was glowing with a baby-blue outline, feeling at the air with his snout.

The stitch in my gut had vanished and I felt like I could sprint through Victory Road and back. A burst of terror-infused adrenaline could do that to you.

“What was that for?” I said in a whisper.

Drowzee whined and the glow around him grew. This time, I watched it spread through the air like a hazy vapor until it reached me, giving the strangest feeling that I could only describe as a buzzing coolness. The psychic vapor clung around me, compressing and giving me the same glowing silhouette that Drowzee had.

Like it had been in Arbok’s forest, I felt a foreign presence nudge into my thoughts. With an amazing sense of vividness, my mind travelled down the road where Charli and other trainers had rushed on by. I pictured each of them giving chase; The boy cutting through the wind on his Pidgeot; the other on his Kingler, lifting its heavy pincer up like a flag and clattering along at top speed; and a few others, who like Charli, were either carrying their pokémon, or running with them side-by-side.

Then my mind was guided to another. It was the girl with Butterfree latched on her back, giving her pixie-like wings and bounding across weightlessly, like a breeze of air.

Drowzee let out a loud, staticky, trumpeting cry and I turned to him, opened mouthed in disbelief.

He was hopping slightly up and down, each time higher than the last, each time lighter than the last. He had become buoyant. He spared me a flick of a glance before pushing off in the direction of Charli and the other trainers. Like Butterfree’s trainer, he breezed through the air and landed over ten yards away, turning back to me and letting out another cry.

I understood.

The next step I took was dreamlike. I was as light as a dandilion seed. So light in fact, that I stumbled and staggered like a baby learning to walk.

Drowzee gave an irritated cry, and I felt my mind nudged with a scene of the trainers again, followed by an unsettling image of large, round, predatory eyes of a creature I could not recognize.

I took another step, this time steadier. I did not know for sure, but I had a feeling that Drowzee was trying to warn me. Trying to warn me that the trainers were in danger.

Wind rushed past my ears as I leapt forward, and every beat of my heart felt like fireworks spreading throughout my body. Total exhilaration.

Drowzee did not wait for me to land. He bounded ahead, skimming over the ground and I pushed of after him the moment my foot hit the ground.

“Drowzee!” I yelled with joy. He didn’t look back. “Is this what you were trying to tell me?”

He let out a shrill cry and the widest smiled formed across my face. We were covering more than a dozen yards a second, and though I had no clue how long Drowzee could keep this up, the strain on my part was almost non-existent.

A few late night by-standers ogled as we breezed on through, craning their heads as the pair of us glided over the ground, gleaming with blue outlines. If I had known Drowzee could move like this… I now saw no need to ever put him back in his pokéball in the wild. He was faster than the fastest man, and I was almost embarrassed at how much I had underestimated him. Perhaps listening to Professor Cid and Lenn had skewed my perception.

Going by the professor’s words, I had been under the impression that Drowzee was weak and untrained, a wimp in battle. Lenn only exacerbated it when he mentioned it being ‘painfully obvious’ that they were pokémon geared merely towards lab-work.

I saw now that none of that was actually true. Neither for Drowzee, nor for Natu. I didn’t know what the professor told them before he handed them over to us, but I could not have asked for a better partner for this mission. Even though it was only our second day together, it felt more like a week. So much had happened and I could already feel myself growing attached to him. Returning him to the professor was not something I was looking forward to, and I wasn’t just thinking that because I was leaping through the air like a superhero!

Moving like this, we swept through to the outskirts in a matter of minutes. A few story-high residential buildings stood between us and routes that led to the wilderness. We had managed to keep track of the others due to the loud racket the bunch of trainers and their pokémon made. Not only that, but Pidgeot and the Unknown Pokémon were still engaged in a perilous-looking dance of arial acrobatics. I picked up the pace and kept up right behind Drowzee.

We spotted a trainer, sprawled on the ground and heaving for air, and a Doduo beside him, both its heads bobbing forwards and back, looking around as if it was waiting but itching to continue the chase. I came to a stop beside him and called out to Drowzee, who had not stopped.

The trainer craned his head over to me for a moment, gave me a baffled frown, and lowered it back down, covering his face with an arm.

“Why are you glowing?” he said between a panting breath.

“Are you alright?” I approached and stood over him.

He panted some more. “Yeah… yeah…”

Besides a small grimace and a pale face, he looked fine. Doduo bobbed towards me and Drowzee, a long jump away, gave a warning cry. Doduo whipped both heads to him gave a harsh, avian cry of its own.

The trainer hoisted himself up on his elbows, looking somewhat concerned. “You’re not challenging me to a battle, are you?” he said, suddenly serious.

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“No!” I waved my hand fast and dismissively. “I just thought you might be hurt.”

The boy let himself fall back to the ground with a sigh. “Good,” he said, then took a gulp of air. “I have a bad feeling about that pokémon. It screeched at me as it dove past, and it felt like I’d been hit by a truck…”

“Did you see what it was?”

After a few moments, the boy blinked slowly and shook his head. “It was too dark to tell… but the way it flew… it was like nothing I’ve ever seen…”

I nodded. The little he’d said was enough to convince me beyond all doubt that our target was a high-level pokémon, just like Arbok had been, and Charli was out there, going after it without me to back him up.

“Alright, take care!” I said and bounded over to Drowzee, who whined impatiently and blew out sharply through his snout as he whirled around and carried onwards.

A barrage of lights shot out simultaneously into the sky ahead of us, bending like thread-thin rainbows and converging at the peak of their rise. There was a small, illuminating flash where the beams met, and the unknown pokemon’s shadowy form was seen zipping out of sight, back into the dark. The piercing cry of the trainer’s Pidgeot could also be heard.

That was Natu’s Arrest attack, which meant that Charli had already engaged it.

How did he get there so fast?

I increased my pace and Drowzee immediately matched it. We were whizzing over the ground with every push of our feet when suddenly, he came to such an abrupt stop, that I stumbled and fell, rolling on my side several times before coming to a stop. To my astonishment, it barely hurt. Being light as a feather was awesome.

Drowzee was staring into space, slowly turning his head as though he was tracking something with his eyes. He began purring, and I felt my body stiffen and become heavy again. A bright yellowy psychic light sparkled only a few inches from his face, and he kept slightly turning, adjusting his aim. With a ringing cry and a sharp, backward tilt of his head, the psychic energy exploded into a hundred strands of light, shooting into the sky almost directly above us.

A tingling wave of goosebumps ran through me as Drowzee’s cry echoed in the air, filaments of light curving and meandering up into the sky like a hundred little rivers.

I watched as the unknown shadowy pokémon spread its wings to break mid-flight, letting out a haunting howl. A loud, cooing howl.

A Noctowl? I thought, though I had never heard one howl for so long or so loud.

A blast of smoky shade burst ahead of it, and the shadow bird, still dragging from its momentum, beat its wings once and shot forwards into it. Drowzee’s filaments of light shot through like beams through a cloud, and I gasped involuntarily when the pokémon burst out of the murky haze on the other side, completely evading Drowzee’s powerful and impeccably aimed Arrest.

Pidgeot and his trainer weren’t so lucky. The great bird, a bright contrast to the one being hunted, screeched and swerved tightly to one side but could not avoid flying into several psychic-type filaments. Its wings fluttered violently as the filaments began to coil around it.

“No!” I cried, horrified. There was a trainer on its back, and a fall from that height… I made to dash in the direction they were falling but my body was heavy again. I looked down at myself and my glowing outline was nowhere to be seen, then at Drowzee and he too, was normal once more.

“Drowzee!!!” I yelled, intending him to put it back on, but I winced inwardly. It would be of no use. Even if he did, I had already lost too many seconds. It was too late. He produced a miserable whine and we both stared at the ensnared Pidgeot dropping like a meteorite toward the ground.

We had just killed someone.

The shadow bird’s howl whistled through the sky mockingly, as if it said: You need to try better than that!

I swallowed hard, my mind numb, then, slowly, I began walking. Walking away, back towards Clattermore. Images of the trainer’s face, smiling as he jumped on his pokémon’s plumed back replayed in my mind, along with flashes of the morbid scene I would find if I dared to look for him.

Capturing the target had suddenly lost meaning. Someone’s blood was on my hands. Drowzee was my responsibility. My partner. It was my fault.

This mission, these targets…

The bird had only been toying with us. Arbok too, had spared us out of some mysterious whim. Had either of them decided to attack, people and perhaps even pokémon were sure to die. We were out of our depths.

“Tomas!”

I spun around slowly and expressionlessly. Charli was jogging toward me and Drowzee, smiling, completely ignorant. When he got close, his brows creased into a frown.

“Why aren’t you chasing it?”

I looked down in fear and guilt. Natu hopped from his head and onto my shoulder, chirping in my ear. I flinched and grabbed her, then cradled her in my arms. “Charli…”

“What?”

I turned my gaze up at him, his expression open-eyed and expectant. “Pidgeot… the trainer…” I muttered. “Did you not see?”

“No, I did, I did see… so what?”

My mouth parted open slightly as I looked for the words.

“Ohhhh,” Charli breathed. “What, you think they’re dead, is that it?”

My heart fluttered with hope. “They fell!”

“Bro!” Charli cried out with a smile. He slapped my shoulder. “That was a super wicked Arrest, but it only has full effect on Ghost-types, remember? I’m sure those guys are fine. Let’s go!” He jogged a few paces away and Natu flapped from my arms and back to his head. I remained where I was. Drowzee stepped closer to me, giving whimpering whines. I had the impression that he was trying to apologize, and although he had not really done anything wrong, I found myself feeling slightly reproachful. I did not pat his head or offer him any comforting words.

“If you’re so sure,” I said, “I need to be also. I need to see.”

Charli replied, “But the target! It’s getting away!”

Two trainers approached. The girl with the Butterfree and another running with a Machop next to him. They stopped next to us looking here and there as if they were searching for a clue.

“Where’d it go?” The Machop trainer said, huffing slightly.

Charli and I remained silent. Charli because he probably didn’t want the competition, and me because I just couldn’t care at the moment.

“They don’t know…” the Butterfree girl replied on our behalf. “They’re down and out…”

“You wish, Maery Poppins!” Charli retorted.

The girl laughed rosily as she leapt away to continue the hunt. The boy growled and dashed off after her with his Machop following stride-for-stride.

“Come on then!” Charli said, starting towards the direction where Pidgeot fell and beckoning me with a hand. I recalled Drowzee back to his pokéball and made off after Charli.

We walked in a beeline for more than five minutes, onto a grassy field covered with tall bunny-tail thickets and heard the grumbling words of the trainer, cursing to himself. I broke out in a cold sweat of relief. We plied open a thicket and there they were, trainer and Pidgeot, both alive and kicking.

“See?!” Charli said irritably, gesturing at them like he was unveiling a new zoo exhibit.

The trainer shot us a cold glance, then carried on walking around the massive, roosting Pidgeot with a high-grade potion in hand.

“Come here to mock me?” he said without looking.

I walked closer, feeling eternally grateful that I wouldn’t have to live with somebody’s death on my conscience. “You’re alright…”

He turned his face to me sourly. “It got away,” he growled. “Some idiot attacked us from below.” He spat on the ground and shook his head. “Thank God her tail feathers weren’t tied up too, or the landing would’ve seriously hurt.”

I stared at him in awe. Trainers were definitely something else.

Charli was tapping his foot impatiently, but he kept glancing at the Pidgeot with interest.

“Is there something you want?” the trainer said to me when he noticed my staring.

“He thought you were dead,” Charli said absently, still checking the Pidgeot out. The trainer blew out through pursed lips as if the idea was ridiculous.

“Without Gust, we might have come close.”

“What level is it?” Charli said with a nod. The trainer gave him a slow glance and replied, “She.”

“Ah, what level is she?” Charli quickly corrected.

The trainer sprayed some potion near the Pidgeot’s chest and dabbed it with a glossy handkerchief. “Level forty or so…” He gave Natu, atop Charli’s head a quick glance but didn’t bother to ask in turn.

With such a level, no wonder he had been so quick to chase. Charli whistled and took a step closer. Pidgeot, whose eyes had been closed up until this point, opened them slowly and lifted her head, which even from her roosting position, towered a whole foot over our own. She eyed Charli calmly and a deep, soft sound could be heard whining within its head.

Natu hopped once atop Charli’s head and chirped loudly. Pidgeot blinked slowly and turned her eyes to mine, and I felt an overwhelming presence bear down on me. Her piercing eyes sent a cold chill that flushed around my temples. My blind eye itched and I put a hand to it.

“It was you?” the trainer said suddenly, turning from his pokémon. “Your Drowzee shot those lights?”

What the hell was going on…

“I - … What do you mean?”

“The white Drowzee… I know it’s yours. I saw you back in town with it.” He dropped the potion and walked up to me. “It attacked us didn’t it…” He grabbed me by the scruff of my fleece. I didn’t react, only stared with giddiness as he, a guy little older than me, held me tightly at arm’s length.

“Hey!” Charli began, but a whistling whine from Pidgeot made him hesitate, and her eyes bore at him with a feline intensity. The trainer ignored him and kept looking at me from one eye to the other.

“Drowzee was aiming at the other pokémon,” I said, breathing heavy, nervous breaths. “He didn’t mean to hit you with it.”

The trainer held on to me, studying my face with a smirk. “What move was that?”

Words rushed out of me before I had time to think. “I don’t know. His owner taught it to him…” I exhaled through flared nostrils. Some part of me rebelling against the feeling of powerlessness. I grabbed his wrist with my hand and held on tightly.

“He didn’t know… Drowzee didn’t know.”

“Blah!” the trainer spat, shoving me away. “He didn’t know? You didn’t know!

“Do everyone a favor and return him to his trainer. You’ll end up getting somebody killed…”

I felt a muddled mix of anger and shame, and the corners of my lips quivered involuntarily. I wanted to hit him, but he was right. His Pidgeot looked on with a keen eye.

“You flew into it!” Charli cried. “You were chasing that thing, and you flew into it! It’s not his fault!”

“Are you daft?” the trainer replied. “Why would he order an attack when you all clearly knew I was chasing it?”

He didn’t know that Arrest would have completely subdued the shadowy bird pokémon, and I was sure that try to explain it to him now would be pointless.

“Well - !” Charli faltered.

“You’re not even trainers, are you? I can tell…”

Charli put a hand on my shoulder and shoved me along, back towards town. “You need some flying lessons!”

The trainer eyed him blankly and said, “Gales… screech at him.”

Pidgeot rose on its legs and spread its wings open. Her trainer put fingers to his ears, and the great bird screamed so loud, that my eardrums rang with pain. Charli and I fell to the ground, both hands to our heads.

We stood up quickly once it stopped, Natu chirping and squawking frantically, and I reached for Drowzee’s pokéball in my pocket.

“You’ll need hearing lessons if you keep talking,” the trainer warned and clicked his tongue. My hand grasped the pokéball tightly, but I did not pull it out.

Charli wanted to say something, but it was lost somewhere in his throat.

We walked away, but now, I was almost disappointed that the guy had not broken a bone from the fall.

We got back to town, back to the inn and Charli crashed on his bed as Natu flapped over to her spot on the wardrobe. I sat down quietly at the foot of mine, reflecting on what Pidgeot’s trainer had said. You’ll end up getting somebody killed…

I wasn’t cut out for this. That was the simple truth.

I undressed, remaining only in my boxer shorts and holding my pokéball in hand. I stared at it for a moment, remembering how Professor Cid had held it out to me. You do accept the task, don’t you, Mr Tomas?

An image of my comatose grandmother flashed in my mind, and it opened the floodgates to old memories of Kakuna Village. Gran introducing me to a young Glee and teaching me how harmless the Oddish was. Her taking me on walks around the village, showing me everything there was to see. Her homely smile as she served my breakfast, my lunch, my dinner. Her reading of bedtime stories until I turned ten and told her not to anymore. Her picking me from school in the early months when I was new, always bringing with her a tiny box of cereals for me to munch on.

I released Drowzee from his ball and Charli opened a tired eye. He flopped onto his belly and reached down to his bag on the floor, pulling out the Tracking Tool.

Drowzee nuzzled at my hand, and I squatted in front of him. “You did good Drowzee, don’t worry.” He purred happily and it made me smile.

Shove it, I thought. That trainer could shove it. They could all shove it.

I wasn’t here for any of them. I was here for Gran. I was here for my village.

“Aww,” Charli moped. “It isn’t in range anymore… We’ll have to go after the other one. We didn’t even get to see what it was.”

I got in bed and under the blankets. “Hey, do you wanna hear the coolest thing ever?”

He raised his brows and glanced at me with a mild interest.

I went on to tell him about my psychic-sprint, and he went full bonkers, mentioning how he thought that Natu had tampered with his running too. It only made too much sense now. He had run from town to the outskirts without breaking a sweat, and now I had a good idea how.

“The professor isn’t getting her back, I’ve decided. Even if I have to run away from home.” He had leaned back on bed, facing the ceiling pensively.

“You’re really serious?” I turned to him. “That’s stealing.”

Charli shifted under his sheets and yawned. “It won’t be if Natu agrees. She should be out in nature where she can feel the wind, not locked up in some lab. I bet she likes me more than the professor already.”

I turned back to the ceiling. “You’re actually mad.”

Charli let out another yawn and switched off his night-lamp. “I wanna be the very best…” he sang to himself as he nestled into his bed. “Night!”

“G’night…”

I stared at the ceiling, listening to Drowzee purring softly and wondering just what kind of day tomorrow would be.

Be certain.

The professor’s words sprang into my head out of the blue, but the timing was uncanny.

Tomorrow would be better.

(-x-)