Pokèmon: Blood Red

An Asset Out of Containment

They arrived at the pokemon center approximately 3 minutes after they left route 117. Verdanturf was a small quiet town, with a rather feeble population of only 25 at most. Despite this, the town would seem to be one of the most pleasant stays a traveler could have: a lovely aroma of grass and flowers filled the air, the quiet only broken by the soothing calls of its residential pokémon. Wild pokémon roamed freely about, living in harmony with the townspeople. A few children played outside, laughing joyfully as their parents watched over them. A lone boy stood in front of a house, seemingly basking in the light, a simple pleasure.
The sliding door of the pokémon center opened, welcoming 3 discontented travelers and a pokémon. "Welcome to the pokémon center, how may I-" The nurse at the counter stopped her cordial greeting abruptly, "Oh my..." The pink haired nurse rushed from behind the counter and made her way towards Bryan. She examined his arm at a slight distance as to not get blood on her white nurses outfit. His wound had continued to bleed, though significantly less due to Kaylee's wrapping. She took him by his left arm and urged him foreward, "Follow me, I'll get you fixed right up." He nodded and obliged, his eyes beginning to look sunken from pain. "I'll take your pokemon as well," she said, "if they need to be healed." Bryan collected his 6 pokéballs and handed them over to the nurse. She laid them inside her fanny pack.
"Oh, hey," Jaden said, remembering the battle, "mine too." He handed her 5 pokéballs as well, and she once again stored them in her fanny pack. "Thank you," Jaden said with a smile. The nurse smiled back, turned around, and led Bryan into a room labeled patients in red. Once inside, she released the pokémon from their balls and laid them in white comfortable hospital beds, where they awaited the care of one of the many jubilant Chansey who were eager to help. She then turned her attention towards Bryan's bloodied arm, and began to unravel the makeshift tourniquet.

Jaden took a seat at the table in the leftmost corner of the pokécenter, across from the patients room. Kaylee scooched in next to him and let out a sigh of relief. Blaziken sat on the other side, eyes closed and feet propped up comfortably on the table. Jaden could never tell if he actually slept when his eyes were closed, if he ever slept at all.
"Jaden!" Kaylee suddenly yelled, her eyes sparkling with excitement.
"Hmm?"
"I totally forgot, the contest hall is here in Verdanturf! RIGHT here!" She trembled with excitement, leaping out of her seat and swaying her arms gracefully. She hummed jubilantly while practicing her performance routine, one arm in front of the other, than back again, with graceful steps, topped off with more smooth hand gestures, a sway, and a bow. Jaden watched her closely, then turned away, feeling embarrassed for staring. "Oooooo, Bonnie, come on out!" She said excitedly, reaching for a pokéball. It opened up, revealing a lopunny. "I present to you, Bonnie the eloquent," she said in a mock fancy accent, followed by a curtsey. Bonnie repeated the curtsey. Jaden made small quiet, supposedly fancy, claps, softly tapping one hand on the other.
"Ma-a-a-a-a-a-gnificent!" Jaden said voluptuously, closing his eyes, sticking his nose into the air, and lowering his mouth as to look enlightened, "Simply marvelous."
Kaylee turned toward Blaziken. "Oh, maaaaaybe we could give Blaziken a cute little bow!" She jeered playfully yet conspicuously serious, "It'd be so cute! The judges would just eat you up!" Blaziken opened his eyes, stood up, and walked out the door. Jaden and Kaylee broke out laughing.
The infirmary door opened, and Bryan stepped out, followed closely by the nurse, who closed the door shut behind her. Bryan sat in Blaziken's now unoccupied seat, his expression dead, and his eyes more sunken than before.
"Your pokémon should be healed in 10 minutes at the most," the informed with a cordial smile.
"Look," Bryan said plainly, lifting his newly bandaged arm, "I'm all fixed up." He lowered his arm back down to the table.
"That's great!" Kaylee said optimistically, "that it's been treated, I mean."
"I feel terrible though..." Bryan said feebly, "Why... why did Manectric BITE me...? I always thought I was a good trainer, I thought that my pokemon trusted me... trusted me like I trusted them." Bryan let out a weak cough. Jaden began to speak, but couldn't find the words. "He must hate me... or is it a she? Awww, I don't even KNOW!" He cried in anger, banging his right arm against the table and immediately flailing in pain, searching for something to hit, but finding nothing suitable.
"It's a girl" the nurse chimed in.
"DANGIT!" He yelled.
"Bryan, it's ok," Jaden finally said, "he'll... she'll get used to you over time, trust me." He paused and took a breath. Bryan let out another cough, which he covered with his arm. He examined his arm and gave a curious squint. "Are you ok?" Jaden asked slowly.
"Yeah, yeah I'm good" he said, nodding to reconfirm his answer.
"Trust me," he continued, "I honestly haven't done so we'll training my own pokémon... I would always rely on Blaziken, thinking he could always pull me through, and he has, but because of that, I... I guess I haven't paid enough attention to my other pokémon..." his speech slowed. "I think they're finally warming up to me, I think." He said rather solemnly. After a few silent seconds his expression radically changed. "But you know what? I'm not gonna give up until they're drowning in attention, hear me? DROWNING IN IT!" He bellowed determinately, "and you won't stop either, right?" He stood up, hands on the table, staring Bryan straight in the eyes.
"Right," he said with a chuckle, looking to the side, "yeah... and you know what else?" He now stood too. "I'm not going to quit training until I beat that Blaziken of yours!" Blaziken threw a glare at Bryan through the glass window, and then returned to leaning against the glass with his eyes closed, proving himself too cool to be "eaten up by the judges". "The next we meet, that Blaziken 'll be on his knees weeping!" A thump came from Blaziken's window.
"You're on then!" Jaden said haughtily. Bryan suddenly let out a violent cough, spraying blood across the table before he could cover his mouth. Jaden, Kaylee, and Bonnie stepped back.
"Bryan!" Kaylee yelled in suprise.
"I... don't..." He forced out of his mouth. He began to stumble, then fell to the floor. The nurse quickly ran over too him, bending down and seeing that he lay unconscious.
"I - I don't know what's wrong with him," the nurse said frantically, "he's isn't bleeding out..." Jaden rushed in front of Bryan to get a better look at him. He had no idea what to do. Twice now he sat helpless as someone needed help, as Bryan needed help. Jaden didn't know what to do, no he couldn't do anything right? Jaden's face tensed up in confused anger. Bryan's eyes suddenly creeped open, each separately from each other. He began to stand, though unsteadily. The nurse backed up a step. Bonnie's stature changed drastically, now in a fighting stance, staring at the struggling Bryan intensely, her long ears twitching.
"Bryan, oh man...," Jaden sighed in relief, "we thought-" Bryan suddenly lunged himself at Jaden with an unholy sound he had never heard protrude from a human's mouth. The girls shrieked as Bryan grabbed Jadens chest and arm and forced him to the ground.
"Bryan!" He grunted, "what d'ya think your-" Jaden grabbed Bryan's shoulder attempting to throw him off, but he persisted and attempted to bite at Jaden's face, clicking it's teeth multiple times. Jaden caught a glace at Bryan's eyes before he grabbed his forehead in attempt to stop him from biting him.
"Bonnie! Get Bryan off of him!" Kaylee shouted in distress. Bonnie's knee instantly forced itself into Bryan's stomach, as if she had already been in motion, sending him flying into the marble reception counter. His body snapped, and he lay quiet on the cold floor.
"Bonnie..." Kaylee started, "you didn't have to..." She lost her own trail of words. The nurse moved towards the limp body rather carelessly , laying her finger on his neck.
"There's still a faint pulse," she said slowly, shaken. Jaden remained on the ground, eyes wide with confusion and fear, and breathing violently. He turned his head slowly in Bryan's direction.
"His eyes," he choked out, "they were like his manectric's eyes... They had no pupils, just like his manectric's eyes."
"Do you think," Kaylee paused, thinking over the question before she asked it, "Do you think the manectric had whatever he had?"
"More like he got what that manectric had," Jaden realized, "when it bit him." Jaden stood up slowly but surely.
"Well," the nurse added, still shaken, "Bites and scratches are the two most likely methods for transferring diseases to other hosts...but a disease... that does this?" She looked back at Bryan, "I don't know what exactly this thing is, or what it means."
"Who the heck did he get that manectric from?" Kaylee asked, knowing no-one in the room knew the answer.
Jaden's heart stopped. "The manectric."
Kaylee and the nurse both looked at him, Kylee's eyes growing wide.
"How many other pokemon were in that room?" Kaylee asked uneasily."
"26," the nurse stated, "32, including the Chansey nurses." Quiet flooded the room. Jaden held his breath, his heart pounding so loud he feared it would deafen him. He took step towards the infirmary. His foot as silent as air. He took another step, slowly lifting his arm, ready to clutch the door handle. Silence permeated every crack like a dense humid fog. He grabbed the handle slowly, wrapping each finger around the cold metal bar. He began to pull. The creaking of the door shattered the silence, creating a new fog of anxiety, every decibel murder to the psyche. Jaden swung open the door, and stood frozen. Kylee gasped, and the nurse simply covered her mouth in utter shock. All throughout the room lay bloody mutilated chansey. The smell of blood rushed like a wave over them, and Jaden had to withhold from vomiting. Blood lay splattered all over the floor and walls like a painted masterpiece of carnage. Only 4 identifiable chansey remained in the room, along with a bloody zigzagoon, 2 nuzleaf, and what seemed to be a swellow, though it was hard to tell.
"What happened...?" The nurse whispered from behind her hands, tears welling up in her eyes.
"I've never seen- " Kaylee started, but then looked away.
Jaden looked down at his feet and saw his linoone, lifeless and more red than brown. Jaden bit his lip, and tears filled his eyes. "They're gone," he whimpered, "but I didn't, I didn't get a chance..." Tears rolled down his eyes. "I didn't give them my attention..." He whispered to himself. He grabbed his hair in unbridled frustration "I JUST THREW THEM INTO BATTLE LIKE THEY WERE NOTHING TO ME!" He screamed at the ground, his tears mixing with the blood spilled across the floor. He look at his linoone one more time. "Linoone. Sabley. Wailmer... PLEASE FORGIVE ME!" Linoone had no reply. Kaylee stood horrified at Jaden's grief. She reached to touch his shoulder, but her arm never made it. He sobbed; no words could escape his mouth. Kaylee looked away, ashamed at her inability to comfort Jaden. Kaylee's eye caught something to the right of the room.
"The rest of them," she said, slowly pointing towards the right of the infirmary room, "escaped." Jaden lifted his eyes to see an emergency door exit. It was open.
A sudden blood-curtling scream from outside pierced the air, erasing any previous preoccupations from their attention. That horrid sound resonated in Jaden's soul for the rest of his existence.

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