They'd gotten an early start that morning, setting out from, well, whatever city it was that they had slept in the night before. It had been a nameless city, a quiet city, one that hardly merited a second glance, but it had been pleasant all the same. The small group had been well-rested and well-fed at the small bed-and-breakfast they'd stayed at, and, ever since leaving the small inn, their spirits had been high. In fact, their spirits had been, and still were, very high. The weather had been very pleasant thus far and, despite a tension in the
air that Misty figured was just the presence of oncoming rain, it looked to stay that way. The whole world seemed to be in an exceptionally good mood, and the three friends traveling down the winding dirt road were no exception. Misty had been humming to herself cheerfully when she first noticed the girl. The road they had started down that morning had been remarkably untrafficked all day, which had suited the friends just fine: their own company was enough for them. As an added bonus, Ash had been in such a good mood that he'd even refrained from griping about
the lack of Pokémon to catch so far. At any rate, the group hadn't yet run into anybody that day, (not even Team Rocket, which was such an abnormality in itself that it was best not thinking about it,) and so the distant figure caught Misty's eye almost immediately. "Hold on a second, Ash," she murmured to her younger friend. The boy glanced at her curiously. She motioned ahead of them with a discreet nod of her head. "Do you think maybe she's waiting for us?" Ash peered at the distant figure with the complete
and utterly tactless blatancy that only Ash Ketchum can pull off. "I don't see why she would be," he shrugged. Then he froze. "Unless it's Team Rocket!" He paused, then shook his head. "Nah. Well, I dunno. Their disguises are always so good. What do you think, Pikachu?" Pikachu only murmured a disgruntled "Chu" and flipped over. It had been dozing on Ash's backpack all morning, and wasn't about to be roused to answer inane questions. "She looks cute!" Brock exclaimed with glee.
"She looks young," Misty added pointedly, glancing at her friend. "Don't get your hopes up, Brock." Brock looked at her, and then, glancing away, muttered something along the lines of, "Age doesn't matter in the face of true love." "What do you think she's looking at?" Ash asked curiously as they slowly approached the girl. He had been, of course, staring straight at her, (the poor boy was devoid of any forms of discretion), but now he followed the
line of the girl's gaze straight up. "Do you think maybe there are any Pokémon up there?" He made a fist. "I'm gonna catch a Pidgeotto!" "You already have a Pidgeotto, and quit staring at her! That's so obvious, and so rude." Misty frowned. "You have no social skills, Ash Ketchum." "I do too! Pikachu, tell her I do too!" "… ka…" "Ooh, look! She is cute!"
Misty smacked both of her friends in the arms. "Hush up, you two! She might hear us!" "Ow!" "Geez, Misty, that…" They were almost upon her now. The group fell silent. The girl was young. In fact, if her size was any way to judge her age, she was even younger than Misty. She was a slight little thing, with porcelain white
skin and a small and delicate face. Her hair was slate blue, and she wore it in two messy buns. Her clothing was a little bit odd, but it seemed appropriate in some vague way. Her loose tank-top and knee-length skirt were torn and travel-worn. Her vest was stained at the hem, and patched heavily in the back. Loose pieces of shabby fabric hung around her wrists and ankles; she wore standard hiking boots, however scuffed they were, on her feet. Her outfit looked dirty and wrinkled, as if she'd been wearing it for quite some time, and, though its prevalent color was at
one time what looked to be an icy blue, it had faded to an inconspicuous grey. She was, at the moment, staring vacantly at the sky, but as the travelers approached her, her gaze dropped to settle on the three of them. She heaved a sort of sigh. Her eyes were deep and dark, and they betrayed a something in her, a weariness that a girl as young as she should not have to be familiar with. Her eyes said that she was older than time. Her eyes said she had witnessed too many things. Things that a child of her
theoretical age should not have ever been exposed to. "Oooh! Pretty girl!" Brock launched himself at her. Her tired eyes widened in shock, and she jumped into the air, a good three feet. Brock missed her completely, soaring through open air and coming to a crash-landing in a pile of bushes about four feet away. The girl landed, crouching, in the same spot she had jumped from. "Wow!" Ash said vapidly. "How did you jump like that?"
"Hi," she said, completely ignoring the question. Her voice was thin, and it hummed with an alien sort of tension. "I have to ask you something." "Is it about Pokémon?" Brock asked eagerly, crawling out of the bushes behind her. He made his way to her side. "I'm the leading authority on Pokémon!" He tried to look as intellectual as possible. Misty covered her eyes and groaned. "Er." The girl didn't answer for a moment, looking at Brock incredulously
"No," she said finally, shaking her head a little. "I have to… um. Ask you a favor." "Sure, anything!" Brock assured, while simultaneously Misty asked suspiciously, "What kind of favor?" The girl, decidedly ignoring the older boy at her side, turned to Misty. "It's not such much of a favor, really. I…" She paused. "I have a gift for you three," she decided finally, looking the other girl straight in the eye. Ash blinked. "Okay. Will it help my training? People
are always giving me TMs and and fishing poles and stuff. In fact, once -" Misty shot him a Look, and he shut up. She turned back to the girl. "I don't think we want it." Her mother always had told her daughters not to accept things from strangers. Actually, her mother had always directed this helpful piece of advice to her three older daughters rather than her less-important youngest, but it was nevertheless valid instruction. Besides, Misty decided, there was just something weird about this girl.
Something she wasn't sure she wanted to get mixed up in. Unfortunately, hormone-crazed boys don't always rationalize the same way as sane human beings. "No, we do! I'll take it!" Brock held out his hands enthusiastically. Ash, for once in his life, said nothing. Instead, he stole a quick look at Misty, who had crossed her arms decisively. The girl, meanwhile, looked rather taken aback.
"But… you don't understand! I'm trying to give you a gift! You'll benefit, not me!" She raised an eyebrow and frowned at Brock. "And could you be standing any closer?" "It depends. Do you want me to be?" Brock grinned and nudged her. The girl emitted a little moan of frustration and closed her eyes momentarily to massage her temples. As she did, her eyelids sparkled with what looked to be some kind of glittery blue eye shadow. Misty suddenly felt a pang of jealousy; she'd always been
a (closet) fan of make-up, but a life on the road gave her little chance to wear it. Brock seemed to have noticed it too, and was lapsing into his usual vegetable-like state. (Then again, that might have just been a side effect of his crash-landing earlier.) "Okay. Please." She opened her eyes again. "Would you at least look at them?" Misty was still officially weirded out, and she was opening her mouth to say "No way, goodbye," when Ash noticed the look on her face and sighed. He knew what that
look meant. Misty had made up her mind about something yet again. Sometimes he wondered what they missed out on because of her stubbornness. Misty saw his reaction out of the corner of her eye, and felt something jolt in her stomach. She hesitated. "Well," she finally said, and Ash looked at her questioningly. "I guess it won't hurt to look at it." Ash's jaw dropped, but the girl didn't notice. She heaved a relieved sigh. "Geez. Good. Thank you. Look at them, you mean," she corrected, her hand
plunging into her pocket as she spoke. It emerged in a little fist, from which dangled… Brock had been focusing on impressing the girl, Ash had been in shock from Misty's sudden change of mood, and Misty had been trying her best to ignore Ash's staring at her, but now they all focused on what the girl was holding. From her fist trailed down four separate strings of leather, on which hung four separate amulets. They swung lazily in the air, and though the sun was unusually bright, they didn't catch the light at all; though their colors were different and obvious, they were
all muted and dull. The three friends all blinked in horrified amazement. Pikachu sneezed in its sleep. "Yep," the girl said, and she shoved them back in her pocket. The three trainers jumped. "What're you doing?" Misty asked shrilly, despite herself. "Oh. I thought you didn't want them." The girl's eyes shone briefly with the remnants of what had once been a very roguish spirit. Misty's
eyebrows twitched in a hint of a frown, though, and the girl pulled them back out rather hurriedly. "These are for you. If you want them, that is." She looked as if she wanted to be a great deal more sarcastic, but didn't want to risk pissing the redheaded girl off any more than she already was. Ash leaned forward to get a better look. "What are they?" His voice was soft and slow in his wonderment. The girl looked at him, and then touched one of the stones lightly, completely ignoring his question. "So, do
you want them?" There was a second of silence. Then, with an almost audible popping noise, the three snapped back to reality. "Hey, anything for a girl like you!" "I wanted them before. It was Misty who didn't." "You shut up, Ash Ketchum! You're too trusting, anyway!" The girl sighed, feeling that she had better
things to be doing with her time. "If you want them, then take them." Three hands reached out instinctively. The girl jumped back in alarm. "But," she continued quickly. "You can only take one each. And you have to choose…" She paused for lack of a better word. "Wisely," she finally finished lamely. "What are they?" Ash repeated, his attention fixated once again on the flat discs of stone.
The girl shrugged. Misty leaned in for a better look. The four amulets swung back and forth, however slightly, and she was having trouble focusing on just one. The stone discs were small, no larger than the size of a quarter, and they looked smooth, as if they'd been worn down by years and years of erosion. (Actually, the water-trainer reasoned, more as if they'd been worn down by a few minutes on a belt sander in whatever factory that must have produced these.)
"Wait a minute…" She reached out and caught one curiously. It was cool between her fingers. She turned it over. "Look at this…" One side of the small disc was smooth, but the other was covered in an intricate design, carved right into the stone. It looked to her to be a jumbled mess; she couldn't make heads or tails of the design. "Cool…" Ash said slowly, his head close to hers. The amulet
she held was a light blue in color; she let go of it and let it swing alongside its brothers. The others were a deep green, a dusky purple, and a red… She looked closer at the red one. There was something there… "Look at this green one," Brock suddenly spoke. "It's a Bulbasaur." "Huh?" His two younger friends looked over. Brock was holding the green amulet between his thumb and forefinger. "See the carvings? It's a Bulbasaur." He glanced at them
sideways. "Don't tell me you don't see it." Misty and Ash both leaned in, and it was like the jumble of lines was twisting before their very eyes, shifting, to form something, something perfectly clear, something obvious and familiar… It was a carving of Bulbasaur, though done in a strange style: almost Aztecan, the carved picture portrayed the Pokémon possibly performing Vine Whip, or at least an attack like it. "That's really neat!" Ash chirped,
and at the words, Brock's face twitched just a little, as if the word 'neat' didn't do this Bulbasaur depiction justice. But the only person who noticed was the strange girl who glanced away immediately, despite the faint smile that plied at her lips. Misty and Ash had turned back to the remaining amulets, leaving the green one safely between Brock's fingers. Though something at the back of her mind reminded that she was a water trainer, that she should be looking at the blue amulet, Misty went back to studying the red one. She focused on the carvings. She
still couldn't quite see what they formed, but just barely. It was like a word on the tip of her tongue: she could see it, it was there, and she just had to look a little longer before it could come clear… "Hey! Look at this!" Ash excitedly waved a hand in front of her face, severing her eye contact with the red stone. Misty blinked. It took a great deal of effort on her part to not kill Ash. She took a deep breath and counted to ten. Ash, meanwhile, was tapping the
blue amulet elatedly. "It's a Squirtle!" he cried. "It's a Squirtle!" He shook Brock by the shoulder. "Look, Brock, do you see the Squirtle?" "Huh?" Brock looked up from the green stone. "Uh, sure, Ash." He turned back to the Bulbasaur amulet. "This is really cool…" His voice trailed off. "Look, Misty, look! Look at the Squirtle!" He thrust the stone in her face, the pale girl still holding it protectively by the leather string. Misty glanced at it, and the same
shifting happened as before, she began to see the semblance of a turtle on the small disk of stone, and then she batted his hand away. "That's really neat, Ash," she said supportively, wishing he would leave her alone so that she could work out the mystery of the red amulet. Boys could be so inconsiderate. Ash smiled proudly. "This is so cool." He held the stone close to his face and studied it carefully. Misty rolled her eyes and leaned in closer to the two remaining amulets.
The pale girl, meanwhile, was getting pretty tired of standing and holding these amulets like a jewelry display, but she continued to wait as patiently as she could manage. As much as she hated to be on the receiving end of it for once, she knew that there was to be no rushing these sorts of things. She took another look at the sky, jiggled her leg edgily, and turned back to the three people clustered around the four necklaces. "If it's continuing in the same strain," Ash mused, "then I guess that one's probably a
Charmander." He nodded towards the red amulet. "Noooo," Misty said slowly, her eyes boring into the red stone. "It's not the right color of red for that…" "I don't know, Misty," Brock interjected. "It does make sense, you have to admit." He nodded sagely. "No…. I… don't…" She leaned in closer. And then something clicked. Her
eyes shot open. "HA!" Misty jumped up, both arms raised above her head. "You're wrong! You're wrong! It's a Vulpix! That there is a Vulpix!" She thrust a finger in Ash's face. "Not a Charmander! Not a Charmander! You're wrong! I'm right!" Ash colored slightly. "Whatever." He looked quickly at the amulet. "Yeah, so what?" He crossed his arms sulkily. Misty smiled tiredly. It had actually taken a lot out of her to decipher the picture, but now that she had, she felt so unbelievably triumphant. And
the carving was so wonderful… a seated Vulpix, in the same style as the other two, surrounded by its tails, a wreath of fire encircling it all. She loved it. It was incredible. The pale girl smiled despite herself. "Well, then, I guess you know which -" "No, not yet. I still have to figure out the purple one." Ash sat down determinedly and looked intently at the last amulet. The pale, blue-haired girl had exhibited a great deal of patience under the circumstances,
but she'd finally fun out of it. With a flick of her wrist, her hand enclosed around the four stones. "Look, it's not important, okay? I don't have the time for this." She sighed. "Just pick already. Shouldn't it be easy?" "I don't know." Ash shrugged indecisively. "Well, come on! I mean, you'd get the Squ-" She stopped in mid-word as a reprimand sounded loudly in her head. It said, quite plainly, that it wasn't her job to be choosing for these people. "Yeah, yeah, whatever." She rolled her eyes. "Well, hurry up and
pick," she told the three friends, and let the four stones fall back out of her hand. Misty's hand strayed automatically to the red amulet. It collided with Brock's on the way there. "Huh?" She put her hands on her hips. "Just what do you think you're doing?" "Oh. Well. Ash took the Bulbasaur, and since I have a Vulpix, I guess I just figured that I should take this one." He shrugged, looking more than a little confused.
"Ash?" Misty whirled around. "Why'd you take the Bulbasaur one?" Ash looked up at her distractedly, holding the green amulet a little away from himself. "Oh. Well." Misty would have thought the words 'déjŕ vu' if she hadn't been so distressed. "Um. Well, I figured you'd want the blue one," the boy continued, "seeing as how you like water and that kinda stuff. And I have a
Bulbasaur, and Brock has a Vulpix, so I guess…" He trailed off, looking lost. "Oh. Well." Misty bit her lip. "I guess I'll just take this water amulet, then." She reached out hesitantly, her hand hovering over the red stone, before she closed it around the blue one. Brock, in turn, took the red amulet, looking at it disappointedly. The blue-haired girl blinked. "Um… are you sure you all made the right choice?" The three trainers sighed mournfully. "Yes," they
chorused glumly. "It's only logical," Brock added halfheartedly. "After all, I am going to be the world's great water-trainer." Misty's shoulders drooped. "So I guess it just stands to reason…" "Yeah," Ash piped up unenthusiastically. "Logic is important in Pokémon strategy. The best trainers can tell you that…." He trailed off. The girl looked very unconvinced. "Are you sure this is
what you want?" She paused. "Are you positive?" She looked at them all very blankly. "Wink wink," she said flatly, not believing the sheer stupidity of these three people. Ash shrugged, shoving the green amulet into his pocket, feeling disheartened and thinking about the loads of other free gifts he'd gotten in the past, presents that had rocked so much more than this piece of crap. "I guess." The little girl shook her head in defeat. "Okay. Whatever." She paused. "Wait a second." She held up the
purple amulet. "What about this one?" Brock shrugged. "There's only three of us here," he said dispiritedly. Maybe six minutes earlier, he would have offered to eat it for her, if it would have made her laugh. Now he didn't care much. He was currently feeling an incredibly crushing disappointment, but hey: what could you do? The girl's shoulders sagged. "No way." She sighed. "I don't deserve this." "I'm sorry," Ash said mildly, though he was
beginning to feel impatient, and something about this girl was starting to grate on his nerves. "Well, I've got to become the world's greatest Pokémon master, so I guess I'd better be off." He started off down the road grumpily, wondering why whoever was in charge of this wacky world had seen fit to waste his time like that on such a nice morning. "Hold on a second!" the girl shouted after him, fed-up. "This isn't my fault! I don't know why she messed up like this, but she did, and now we have to deal with it." She did a little half-skip to catch up to the boy. Ash stopped
disconcertedly. "What on earth are you talking about?" Misty asked incredulously, fully regretting her decision to stop and talk to this girl. "Wait." The girl met Ash's gaze desperately. Then her eyes centered on something slightly past him. "Hey. Look. We can give it to that thing." She pointed to Ash's back. "Huh?" Ash looked behind him, but he couldn't see anything. "What thing?"
"That thing. Your Pikachu." The girl looked as if a great weight had suddenly dropped off her shoulders. "Let your Pikachu wear it." "Pikachu?" The boy's face brightened momentarily. "Hey, good idea!" He jiggled his backpack gently. "Pikachu, wake up! She has a present!" Misty rolled her eyes and muttered something highly inappropriate. Pikachu blinked its eyes blearily. "Ka?" The girl
leaped forward and fastened the chain securely around the Pokémon's neck. "PI!" It jumped a foot in the air, startled. The girl, in turn, darted backwards, in an attempt to avoid any sort of electrical attack the Pokémon might send her way. "Don't scare him!" Ash cried protectively, cradling his Pokémon in his arms. "He might shock me," he added in a whisper. The blue-haired girl apparently wasn't listening. She was looking at the sky again. When the
boy spoke, she looked back down, distractedly. "Hmm? Still here?" She arched an eyebrow. "Come on, Ash!" Brock set off down the road sullenly, his squinty eyes looking a tad more frowny than usual. Misty followed melancholically, feeling as though she'd forgotten something, unable to place just as to what it was. Ash hazarded one last look at the girl, who met his gaze with a blank, eerily calm look. And then he followed his friends. None of them looked back, not that it mattered: watching the trio set off into the horizon, the girl turned and whispered something to the
wind. And then a slight breeze swept across the road, and she was gone.
