Pokemon Ranger: The Hero of Oblivia

Spoilers.

"Hmm...? Again?" Scratchy said, sounding groggy. "Kid, you sure are chatty today."

"Yeah, yeah. Where's Smooth?"

As if to answer my question, I heard a very faint yawn.

"Alright, that answers that." I grumbled. "You were both wide awake two hours ago!"

"Yes, but everyone needs to close their eyes every once in a while. Judging by what I'm picking up, you're not in the position to lecture me on my sleeping patterns." Scratchy said, sounding rather crabby.

"How do you know about my sleep schedule? Have you been spying on me?" I demanded, stomping my foot on the creaky hard wood floor.

"It all has to do with the strain of our telepathic connection. When you don't get enough sleep, it starts to sound a little choppy, for lack of a better word." Scratchy said. "If I'm recalling this correctly, we've already had a conversation similar to this already."

"Well, I need your help. It's about the Hero of Oblivia, I think."

Well, if Scratchy and Smooth were having a hard time staying awake, that statement sure woke them up faster than any cup of coffee.

"Well, um, then..." Scratchy started to trail off.

Then Smooth spoke, "Don't expect us to tell you much. If we give something away too early, Celebi would be quite angry at us. 'Absolutely no spoilers', I think she said."

"Wait, first of all, you know Celebi?" I questioned with a frown. "Second of all, you can speak to her?"

"... Shit." Scratchy grumbled.

I tapped my foot on the dusty floor. "Well?"

"Spoilers." Smooth said simply, and left it at that.

I grumbled something under my breath before remembering the reason I had summoned them in the first place. "What do you know of a girl named Eden?" I asked.

"Oh, Lugia's kid." Scratchy simply said. "Yeah, I think she died a few years back. I think that struck a nerve with Lugia. Haven't seen her at all since the kid's unfortunate death."

That statement piqued my interest. "Death?"

"Yeah, y'know... Things are born, they live, and then they stop. Death." Scratchy said. "I'm pretty sure you should be familiar with the concept by now, kid."

"That's not what I meant and you know it, Scratchy." I said.

"I never know with your kind, kid. But you heard me right. Lugia was pretty messed up after the kid was gone, too. Haven't heard or seen from her since." Scratchy said. "Must still be mourning, even after all of this time."

"Mind your tongue," Smooth warned. "Remember Celebi and her insistance about not giving our Lady any hints."

"What's so bad about hints?" I asked, putting my hands on my hips.

"You are an intelligent girl, young one." Smooth said. "You would, no doubt, decode everything in a heartbeat and that could mean trouble."

"You're supposed to find your answers through experience and time, not because you found a way to cop out of it." Scratchy agreed.

"But it would save so much time!" I argued.

"Yes, but your inexperience and stubborn will would also set us back a lot." Scratchy shot back. "Besides, we're only vaguely aware of how deep our link is with you. Celebi seems to know more than she lets on, but she doesn't divulge any information that she gathers."

"Well, I'm still very skeptical about how you know Celebi. Or how you could even talk to her in the first place. And don't think I missed how you avoided answering my question!" Or how you completely sidestepped my question regarding Eden's fate.

I heard someone coming down the stairs. "Well, I'm sorry there, Princess! I couldn't very well hear you from upstairs!" I heard Ben huff. "And what's this about Celebi?"

I jumped, startled at his sudden appearance, and cursed myself for my decision to talk out loud. Scratchy snickered and Smooth yawned, probably hoping that he would be able to regain a little of the sleep he had been desperately trying to get.

"We'll leave you to your little friend, kiddo." Scratchy said, not even trying to hide his amusement from Summer about the interruption.

They can both be such assholes.

"Oi! We heard that!" Scratchy said.

Good, I was hoping you'd say that. Now stay out of my thoughts until I call you again. Having you probe through my personal thoughts is unsettling, to say the least.

They must've left because now my mind felt an absence where they had been. Huh, I was able to feel the fact that they had left this time. That's weird.

I turned to Ben. "I was saying that I hoped you weren't going to use that Celebi soap on the floors up there! I wanted to keep that one."

Ben shrugged. "Nah, I didn't use it. I'm not touching your soap collection until we run out of the old lady soap. It smells like a nursing home upstairs, I swear." He said. "Anyways, did you find anything worthwile down here?"

I looked around. "I found that novel the Pokemon were trying to reenact." I said. "And I gotta say, the book was better."

Ben smiled. "What was it called?"

"Prepare yourself." I warned him. "It was called 'A Ghastly Discovery'."

"You've gotta be lying." Ben said, his grin widening.

I shook my head. "Oh, you wish I was lying," I said, picking up the novel off of the stack I had left it on and showed him. He flipped through the book, starting to read part of it.

Ben stood still for a minute and I was actually concerned that I hadn't heard anything out of him. Then I noticed that his shoulders were shaking before this incredible laugh just erupted out of him.

"This is so beautiful," Ben said as he managed to catch his breath.

I was still just looking at him, trying to process the fact that Ben just laughed and I suddenly had the urge to make him again laugh because I had to make sure that laugh actually came from him.

But I managed to tear my eyes away from Ben's beaming face to bury my face in a book, suddenly wanting to think about anything but how that laugh gave me chills.

Headcanon that Ben laughs like Cryaotic when he finds something extremely funny. And that Summer just freezes up because "I don't know how to process this."