I stand at his side. He faces another person. A person like him. I see the hated red and white balls attached on the other's belt, and I feel anger surge through me like the electricity does sometimes. I hate the red-and-white balls. I told the boy this, and now I walk free. But I am not free. The boy points. "Go, Pikachu!" I walk out obediently. Once I refused, and he tried to throw me where he wanted me to go. Now I go where he tells me. I don't want to be thrown. The other grabs a hate ball and throws it. I wonder what it feels like inside a hate ball. I was in one, a long time ago, and I don't like to remember it. It's very dark. Very dark, and very quiet. I wonder if the Brother inside the hate ball can feel the ball being thrown. I wonder if the Brother hates being thrown as much as I do. The ball bursts open with a cracking noise, and a flash of red light that hurts my eyes. A Brother forms. I recognize it. A plant Brother. I wonder what the Others have named it. "Go, Weepinbell!" the other cries. Oh. I remember hearing that name before. The name isn't very pretty. I wonder if the plant Brother likes being called that. I have gotten used to being 'Peek-a-choo'. I wonder if the plant Brother has gotten used to being a 'Wee-penn-bell'. The boy yells. I hate when he yells. He yells, "Pikachu, Thundershock!" I know that word. He says it to me when he wants me to use my Small Electric Hurt-Maker. I've done it so many times. The 'Thunn-dur-shok', the 'Thunn-dur-bult', the 'Thunn-dur-wayve'. Many times. When I use my Hurt-Makers, I always feel tired. And when I use my Hurt-Makers, the Brother always makes a Hurt-Maker back, and that hurts very very much. But I don't like being hurt. So I don't use the Hurt-Maker today. The boy doesn't know what to do. He yells "Pikachu, Thundershock!" louder, but I still don't 'Thunn-dur-shok'. "Boy, when will you understand how I feel?" I say back to the boy. I want to yell like the boy yells, but I hate when the boy yells, so I don't. The boy sighs. "Come on, Pikachu," he says, "what's the matter with you? Thundershock!" "NO!" I cry. It has been inside me so long, I almost don't know how to let it out. But I let it out now. How I feel. How I like being caught. "You carry us with you, like a slave in your pocket. You use us to gain your own satisfaction, your own fame. We fight our Brothers, to please you. You who hold the hate balls. You who captured us. You who hold us. And never let us go. "But that is not all that hurts us. You who hurt us think we like you, that we enjoy our lives. That running free, with our family and our friends, with our kind, and then having that taken away, is good. That you can steal us from that to hold us in red-and-white balls, and to make us fight, to make us Hurt, Hurt our Brothers, and Hurt ourselves. "I've done it so long. I thought that not fighting it would make it better. But it only makes it worse. The first day I saw you, boy, I almost died from the Brothers. The Speer-ohs. In their anger to fight back against you, they almost killed me. A Brother. "That is what we have come to." I let everything free, in words, not in Thunn-dur-shok. I fight back, in words, not in Skratch Ah-takk. I face the boy, and I tell him. "I refuse now, boy. I have tried to be your friend, to make you understand. But you will not listen. I tell you words, words of pain and fear, but you hear them as praise. As love. "But I will not Hurt another again! I demand my freedom!" My voice lowers. I feel a prickling in my eyes. I blink, and my eyelids are wet. "I demand my life back." The boy, he stares at me for a long time. I think that he has listened. I think that I can be free now. Then I see the blankness in his eyes. Then I hear him say, "Pikachu, Thundershock! You can do it, I know you can!" And I can't stand it. Too much frustration. Too much pain. Too much sadness. It hurts too much.
"PIIIIIKAAAACHUUUUUUUUU!!" There was an incredible flash of light, and the clearing filled with electricity. The little yellow Pokémon crouched in the middle of it, eyes squeezed shut, mouth turned down in a little frown as it emitted fantastic waves of high voltage.
I open my eyes. The frustration has been let out. Now will the boy notice? Now will the boy understand? "Great job, Pikachu! I knew you could!" The words are cruel. All too late, I see the boy standing there, grinning foolishly. Then I see the Brother. The Wee-penn-bell. Charred from Shok, and lying almost dead in front of me. The person across from the boy pulls out a hate ball and sucks the Brother in. Without a word. Without a change of expression. I look at the boy, smiling at me. I look at the hate balls, lined up in a row on his belt. I look at myself, not confined, but unable to be any less free than is possible. I look at the blackened ground. I shut my eyes; the prickling is back. "I'm sorry, Brother." But nobody can hear me.
