Card Captor Sakura Fan Fiction / Pokemon Fan Fiction / Pokemon Fan Fiction / Sailor Moon Fan Fiction / Utena, Revolutionary Girl Fan Fiction ❯ The Vortex ❯ Act 1: Children of Silph ( Chapter 1 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

VORTEX
Act 1: Children of Silph

"I know my past. I can see it from someone else's perspective, because I've become someone else. And yet, at the same time, I'm the same person.
I'm two people in one, but I'm one person. I was someone else... Now I'm me.
But who is that, anyway?"
~ The Journal of Tikiata

Tessa Hart was dead when the Vortex opened in her room, and the team from Silph came through. She'd been dead for a few hours. When her body was researched later, to see if there was something physically wrong that had killed her, they found absolutely nothing.
Maybe she just didn't see a point in living.
Her real family still remains a sort of mystery. As far as her parents know, she ran away from home, unable to deal with pressures from school, or maybe kidnapped. Maybe they're still looking for her. Maybe they didn't really care.
They used her blood and tissues for genetic research projects on level 8. It was about this time they were learning about genetic engineering, and the wonders of duplication.
Create another girl? Some doubted the idea. But a handful thought it was possible. This handful gathered together the money they could spare and used some funding to try.
And succeed.
Within a year, they had a thirteen year old adolescent to deal with.
She wasn't perfect, of course. Her eyes were green instead of blue. The levels of adrenaline were slightly higher than the original's (no matter, it just meant that she'd be a little more difficult to control), and she was slightly taller than she should have been. But these details were a few of the minor problems that had been expected; none of the major difficulties had shown up, meaning that the first try was successful, a rare moment in science history.
She was also, apparently, more prone to dyeing her hair black in the laboratory sinks.
"Dammit!" swore the man leading the operation, scrubbing at the sink with bleach. He could feel a chemical burn developing on his left arm. *And the other one had finally healed, too,* he thought sourly. *Tikiata's gonna regret this one...*
Sighing, he glanced at his watch.
*Assuming either security tracks her down or she returns to the lab some time soon...*
*
"Oh, he's cute," Tikiata - AKA Tiki - whispered to Lea, one of her best friends and few people she could socialize with safely in the building.
"Who, him?" Lea asked, motioning as casually as she could at someone across the cafeteria.
"Yeah!"
"Eh. A little too skinny and pale for my tastes." She glanced in another direction. "Ooh, but he's cute..."
Tiki followed Lea's line of vision. "Lea, for chrissakes, he's bleach blond, muscle-bound, and probably dumb as a box of rocks!" She made a face in his direction, even though he couldn't have seen her from her hiding spot. "I bet he's not supposed to really be here. I bet he was one of Silph's projects that they let out. Probably testing some kind of safer-than-steroids pill or something. They should put him back in his cage."
Lea laughed at her companions distaste for buff males, then fluttered her eyelashes mockingly and said, "I know."
Tiki grinned, and rolled her eyes. "Weirdo."
"Lab pet."
"Frizz for brains." She tugged Lea's long curls for effect.
"Good for nothing. You oughta go to the gym and work out, you're starting to get flabby."
"I am not, you- Eep!"
"What kind of insult is that? Ack!"
Tiki pulled Lea around a corner as one of the Silph armed guards walked by, scanning the crowd.
"In case you've forgotten, you moron, some of those guards aren't just keeping an eye out for skeevy people, or heading to the cafeteria for their breaks. They're looking for ME," She hissed.
Lea grinned. "Don't you feel like an escaped convict or something, hiding from them?" Tiki shot her a sarcastic smile.
"Do you wonder if you'll be punished like one if Daddy dear were to find out you not only don't return the lab experiments when you find them running loose, but are actually usually the one who's set them free in the first place?" Tiki shot, using the fact that Lea's (adopted) father was the Silph President.
Lea sweatdropped profusely.
"Okay, okay, I'll get better about being a lookout!"
A hand clamped down on both girls' shoulders, scaring them witless.
"Eep!" Both shrieked, thinking despairing thoughts.
"Sh! Honestly, do you both want to get caught?" Came a mocking response from behind.
"StormChaser, you friggin' bastard!" Tiki snapped, whirling around and punching him on the shoulder.
"Ow! Hey, come on! I was only kidding..." Tiki would probably never grow used to the high, feminine voice coming from his masculine body. It was more a sound you'd expect of a 40 year old woman.
"Fem," Tiki sighed resignedly.
"Whatever," her replied, mimicking her tone. "So what've you two done already today?"
"You mean done and gotten away with?" Lea corrected, smiling pleasantly.
A wicked grin played on Tiki's features. "Oh, yeah... Hey Lea, weren't we playing in the kitchen?"
Lea giggled, acquiring a similar grin. "Oh, yes, we were, and we tied the head chef's shoelaces together, then poured a large amount of his 'precious' creme sherry in a frying pan then turned the burner on high."
"How'd you get that close to the chef?" SC asked.
Tiki looked almost sorrowful, but the grin on her face gave her true thoughts away. "Oh, the true hazards of floor-level, empty cupboards." She burst into giggles, unable to contain herself.
"Hey, you kids!"
The three troublemakers froze in their tracks. "Shit," Tiki muttered. Despite the need to be serious, SC made an annoyed face and elbowed her.
"Don't swear."
"Get away from that doorway! You shouldn't be anywhere near there!"
"Huh?"
The trio turned and looked at the door label. In perfect unison, they read: "Basement."
Lea looked at Tiki and StormChaser cluelessly. "What's wrong with this doorway?" They all knew it was the way to the basement; who's brilliant idea it was to put it on the second floor they had no idea, but they'd gone down there (against rules) a million times. They hadn't seen anything major...
"I dunno what's wrong with it," Tiki muttered, "But Lea, dear, PLEASE let's not pick a fight with the armed guard about it?"
"Right." They turned their attention back to the guard.
"Sure thing! Wouldn't want to disobey Silph rules!" SC said, plastering on a smile. Tiki and Lea did the same, Lea muttering between her teeth "Even though I'M allowed to access every room in the building..."
"Not NOW, Lea, "Tiki hissed back.
The guard focused on Tiki.
"Hey... Aren't you the-"
Tiki blanched, and began sweatdropping, hurriedly saying, "Nope! We get confused all the time, but whoever you think I am, I'm not! BAI!" That said, she grabbed her companions' wrists and bolted down the hall at a phenomenal speed.
*
"That was close," Tiki muttered, breathing hard.
"No shit," SC replied sourly. Tiki elbowed him half-heartedly. "Don't swear." He rolled his eyes at her.
Lea, who'd been panting for air, froze suddenly. Tiki looked at her, mildly concerned.
"Lea?"
Lea's face broke into a wide grin, and she took off running down the hall. A moment later the sounds of "CRASH" and papers scattering rent the air, shortly followed by "J-Babe!"
"Jeez, Lea, get offa me!"
Tiki and SC looked at each other, and burst into laughter.
"Ohdear!" SC gasped out, making it sound like one word. "Josh just got pounced!"
Tiki tried to (and barely succeeded at) composing herself. "Come on, let's go pry her off."
The pair turned the corner Lea had taken, and struggled hard not to lose their calm expressions.
Lea certainly had pounced Josh. Him, and everything he'd been carrying. They were both buried in papers, pens, and various bits of research equipment.
"Oh... dear..." Tiki said, biting her lip to try and contain herself. "Josh, are you all right? Anything broken? Bones? Cartilage? Equipment?"
Though she intended the last suggestion to be directed at the lab equipment, she'd said it with bad timing. Lea, StormChaser, and Josh's eyes widened, almost bigger than their grins, and all were taken by a fit of giggles.
"I didn't mean it like that!" Tiki cried, waving her arms frantically.
"Oh, so you mean you don't care if I broke 'it'?" Josh said accusingly, mock hurt expressed on his face.
"Why should I?" She shot, acquiring a haughty air. "It's not like I'M going to use it."
This made her companions laugh even harder. She grinned like a jackal, obviously pleased with herself.
Josh suddenly looked serious, and glanced at his watch. "Oh crap, you guys, help me!" he said, panicking. "I've got to be in one of the labs across the building in 10 minutes! MY PAPERS ARE EVERYWHERE!"
Without a word, the four began collecting the mess together.
"J, it's gonna take a while to get this organized..." Tiki mumbled.
"Not too difficult," he replied. "I've started numbering my pages since the first.... Incident."
Lea blushed faintly. The first time she'd pounced him and knocked everything into disarray, it'd taken nearly an hour to organize everything again. Thankfully, the meeting he had been going to was much later, but he'd since decided to be more careful.
"Here!" SC said, handing Josh the large stack of papers he'd collected from the floor. "I think that's the last of it."
"And here's your equipment," Lea added, smirking as she set the lab equipment on top of the papers.
"All right, thanks!" he said hurriedly, "Bai!" And he was gone, down the hall.
StormChaser shook his head sadly. "This building is robbing that kid of his youth," he muttered, half scolding.
"It's not the building," Lea said, almost defensively. "The building's innocent. It's Daddy's closest underworkers, they're the ones in charge of employment."
"S' J-babe's fault, too," Tiki added. "He chose to use his amazing intelligence this way. And besides," She continued, half grinning. "The plus is that the pay is astronomical."
They all nodded their assent.
*
They spent the next two hours wandering around the Silph building, peeking into various laboratories or visiting with various people. When this got dull, they found the room Josh was having his meeting in and waited outside.
They didn't have to wait long. Just as Lea was about to get up and start making faces at him through the window in the door, the door itself flew open, and nearly smashed her face. Her indignance at such treatment (of both the building and herself) almost grew into a rage, and it took both Tiki and StormChaser to hold her mouth shut and hands down from the important looking businessman who'd rushed out.
Shortly following the decidedly annoyed business man came several more, and a few scientists of varying ages. As soon as the flow of people stopped, the trio bolted through the doorway.
"Josh!" Lea shrieked with joy.
"What?" he replied, obviously irritable.
"I found you!"
"Yes... you did..."
Tiki gave him a hard look. "The meeting sucked, didn't it?"
Josh looked at her in annoyance. "Yeah. What was your first clue?"
"Well, for starters the cranky looking business man who nearly sent Lea into next week with the door."
Josh rolled his eyes upward. "Giovanni... He's the guy who runs Rocket Co., Silph's competitor. He's trying to either get bigger than or buy Silph. He was annoyed because he couldn't get any information of the Silph Secret Projects out of us, so he up and left."
"Secret Projects?" Tiki said, blinking. "What secret projects?"
Josh couldn't help but smirk. "Like you. If he'd known there was one of our precious projects standing outside the door as he'd left, he probably wouldn't have rushed so much."
"God, he sounds like he's as bad as my sister on PMS," Lea muttered.
Josh grinned. "Worse. He makes your sister look like a saint." Lea's eyes widened.
Tiki stared at the wall thoughtfully. StormChaser took the opportunity to make smart comments.
"It's not melting, if that's what you're waiting for."
Tiki snapped out of her daze. "Huh? Oh, just thinking."
"Whatcha thinking?" "Does it hurt?"
Tiki glared at Lea, then replied, "I'm thinking we should go outside, relax in the sun, take our mind off things a bit."
Thus began the search for the exit.
*
Silph had two exit/entrances, both in the main lobby. Of course, there were multitudes of emergency exits, but those being for emergencies, most had an alarm rigged to it, and the few that didn't were difficult to find. Because they had Tiki with them, it would be extremely difficult to leave through the lobby. This is where the 'search' part comes in.
"How do we get to the roof?"
Another hour was spent jogging back and forth between stairways in the labyrinth known as Silph, with all it's dead ends and hidden stairs, secret rooms and constant back tracking. Finally, gasping for air, they found the last doorway up to the roof, climbed up, stumbled out, and collapsed into the pebbles that covered it, basking in the feeling of sunlight on their skin.
Tiki closed her eyes, inhaling deeply. The rooftop held hundreds- maybe thousands- of plants, and closest to her at the moment were the delightfully intoxicating jasmine flowers. She sighed happily.
"Boo."
"EEP!"
Tiki's eyes flew open in surprise to see none other than Lucky, the missing member of their crew.
"Lucky! Hi!"
"Hiya!" Replied the beaming girl. "What brings you this high in the sky?"
"A need to get out of that restricting building, stop and smell the flowers. You?"
Lucky stepped back as Tiki and the others stood up. "Working on my tan." She grinned, striking a pose. She was wearing an aqua bikini, and a few feet away was a chair one would normally expect to see by a pool...
"Lucky?" Lea asked. "Did you borrow the chair from the water recreation room in the gym?"
"Yep!"
Jaws dropped all around.
"That's on the first floor," SC muttered.
"19 floors down, 20 if you include the roof," Josh added.
"Uh huh! It took a while to get it up here."
"No, really?" Tiki said sarcastically.
"Lucky flipped her light brown hair, not quite catching the sarcasm. "Yup! Good thing I knew where the elevator was or it would have taken me longer."
The others facefaulted.
"Right..."
*
"We were so young and innocent, then. We didn't understand the purposes Silph had, or Rocket's intentions. We were trapped in our own world, having shut the door and locked the way out ourselves. But everything has to change sometime. And it's not always for the better."
~ The Journal of Lea Marie

Lea yawned groggily. It'd been three months since the first trip to the roof, and now she sat at her desk in one of the Silph classrooms. It was a huge room, separated into five different sections. Each day, the kids would rotate one class over, clockwise: Math, English, history/geography, science, and art.
Today, it was three hours in the Math corner.
Lea's head slammed into the table as it fell from her hand, which had been the only thing keeping it up. *I hate Mondays SPECIFICALLY for this reason,* she thought. She felt someone poke her in the back. Trying to be discreet, she leaned back in her chair, and whispered between her teeth, "Hi Maggie, what's up?"
"Not much, other than watching you develop bruises," Maggie whispered back, grinning. Lea's hand flew to her forehead.
"Am I really getting a bruise? Oh no!"
"Sh! I'm just kidding, relax, you're still clear. But you probably shouldn't do that again, just to be safe. Remember that one time when you did that?..."
"and I had a blue-green spot for a week..." Lea shook her head, trying to shake off the lingering embarrassment. "Yeah, that memory still comes up pretty clear. No repeats of that."
A large wad of paper suddenly smacked into the back of Maggie's head, and she turned to glare in the direction it'd come from. In the English corner, StormChaser was looking in her direction, face the depiction of mock "Hmm, gee, I wonder who did that?" She grinned at him, blushing faintly. Tiki, who was sitting on the other end of the Math corner, rolled her eyes at them; Lea just struggled to keep from giggling.
She turned back to her math notebook. It was only supposed to be used for class, which she almost obeyed, but the second half of it was full of stories. She flashbacked to the other evening, when her older sister caught her making up stories when she was supposed to be doing homework.
"LeaMarie, what are you doing?" She'd asked wearily.
"Nothing," Lea replied sweetly. "Absolutely nothing at all."
"Liar. You've got to finish your homework, Daddy's got high expectations of us and so does everyone else. We're the daughters of Silph's leader."
"I'm just his adopted daughter."
"You're still his child, you're still my sister, meaning I've still got to make sure you do you're work, and right now that's homework!" Big sister's flame-like hair was bristling with annoyance, and she looked fairly peeved.
"Okay," Lea replied in a small voice. Her sister's eyes softened, and she smoothed her hair out.
"I'm sorry," She said. "I'm just concerned about your well being. You know," she said, raising an eyebrow and smirking, "I know you socialize with Tikiata when it's not visiting time and after curfew."
Lea blushed, and tried to play dumb. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"Oh yes you do! You let her out of the lab and run around wreaking havoc on poor defenseless Silph workers. I think I heard the Chef calling you 'ze twin terrors mucking up zis fine estableeshment'," she said, mimicking the French accent. Lea cringed, causing her sister to add hastily, "But I think he meant it affectionately! So... What do you two do when you're out?"
"She sometimes lets herself out, you know," Lea muttered poutily.
"I know, those are the days you've been roombound and I have to keep an eye on you, and stuff STILL happens. Why do you think Dad gave up on thinking you were the one completely responsible? Anyway, what do you DO?"
"Talk, gossip-"
"About boys?"
"Duh.- I help her with homework, we go find the others and play... Lotsa stuff."
"So she gets out a lot, huh?"
Lea blushed again. "Yeah..."
"Tell me, do both of you set the lab animals free, or is that entirely you?"
"So I feel sorry for the poor Growlithes, okay? And I think Tiki feels sorry for the Meowths..."
Her sister grinned. "Just be careful. You almost got caught last time."
Lea looked at her suspiciously. "Have you been following me?"
"Editing security tapes, too."
"Sis, you're the best!"
"Lea Marie, PAY ATTENTION!" SCHMACK.
The ruler came down hard on her desk, snapping Lea from her reverie.
"Ack! Nani?!"
"You are not allowed to ignore the teacher!"
Lea pulled out the class rules book and flipped through it. "There's nothing in the rulebook that says I can't."
Tiki began snickering from her end of the room. A sharp look from the teacher, however, brought her back to attention, and she began copying notes down from the board.
Lea sat back in her chair, ignoring the rant her teacher was giving her.
*I can't WAIT until tomorrow,* she thought. *At least the English teacher isn't this batty.*
*
As soon as class was out, Lea grabbed Tiki and Maggie by the wrists and dragged them through the building to her dorm. Because of how demanding Silph jobs could be, many of the workers lived in the dorms with their families. Lea, being daughter of Silph's leader, was no exception; however, her family's dorm was huge, and made a wonderful place to hang out.
Lea unlocked the door, fumbling a little, tumbled in, dashed for her room and grabbed some street clothes, then made for the bathroom.
"If there was any doubt before, this proves it: It's Monday."
"Yup. She's only like this on Math days," Maggie replied. She grinned. "Good thing I know what I'm doing in that class, or both of you would be lost!"
Tiki pulled her eyelid down and stuck her tongue out at Maggie. "Bida!"
Lea listened to the present members of her study group as they shot meaningless insults back and forth at each other. She sighed, removing the annoying uniform she was wearing in favor of loose black jeans and a bright red tank top. She tied an equally bright red sweater around her waist, folded her uniform (thinking *I'll like this thing better tomorrow*) and opened the bathroom door.
"Snot head."
"Dirt for brains."
"Weirdo."
"Loser."
"Sorry excuse for a Magikarp."
"Witch."
"Thank you! Wannabe poser-chick."
Lea sighed again. "You two... someday you'll actually say something and regret it. Bathroom's free."
"So?" they chorused, then looking at each other, then at the bathroom, raced towards the door.
"DIBS!"
There was a 30 second push/shove contest through the bathroom door that Tiki won, and she changed into the street clothes she'd brought with her.
"Ready to set up for homework?" Lea asked Maggie.
"Not yet!" Maggie cried, sounding almost panicky.
"Ack! Why?"
"Because... I haven't changed yet! And SC's not here, and Josh isn't here-"
"Josh doesn't need to be here."
"Yeah, but sometimes he shows up. -Lucky's not here either."
"Right..."
The door to the bathroom opened just as the doorbell rang. Maggie bolted for the bathroom (muttering something like "He can't see me in my school uniform!") and Lea headed towards the front door.
"How much you wanna bet that's at least one of the people Maggie listed?" Tiki called after Lea.
Tiki was right; There stood Josh, SC, and Lucky.
"Let's break out the books!" Lucky jubilated as she entered, beaming the whole way down the hall to the Lea's room. SC grinned.
"You shoulda seen her bouncing down the hall. The one thing she likes more than school is studying, at least, during the school year."
"I know, she comes with a whole new set of rules in the summer," Lea muttered, grinning back.
"I figured I'd stop in, see if I could help," Josh said, stepping inside.
"Stop making excuses, you were bored, weren't you?" Lea said accusingly.
"Well... Yeah..."
"Come in, maybe you can help a couple hopeless math cases. SC might need some help with his English."
"I'll help with that!" Tiki called out. "Math's not due till next week!"
"She's got good hearing," Josh muttered.
"I know, isn't it annoying?" Lea replied softly, then yelled back "You aren't putting off your math, you take care of that first THEN you help him with English!"
"Fine..."
Lea pulled Josh into the kitchen, forcing him to help her gather together some food to bring in. She dropped a case of Coca Cola in his arms, picked up a few bags of Doritos, and headed back to her room.
"Ugh, I HATE math class!" Tiki was venting as they entered.
"Oh?" Lea said tentatively.
"Yes. It SUCKS. I don't get any of it!"
"That's what we're here for."
"Correction: That's what everyone BUT you is here for. You suck as bad at it as I do."
*Ooh, venom,* Lea thought. "Well, if I get something before you, I can tell you, all right?"
"Yeah, yeah...." Tiki said irritably. "I hate math any way."
"Then you feel free to continue hating it."
"I will."
And so they set in- though somewhat reluctantly- on their math books.
*
Smoke.
The air was full of it. Fires burned around her, someone crying, someone trying to find her-
The crying was from the child in her arms; no more than 3 or 4 years old. Her hair was in curls around her head, curling tighter than the smoke surrounding them. It was herself, in a sense; herself, ten or so years ago. But now, she had to rescue herself-
"Hoi! Where are you?" She heard someone calling her, or maybe calling to the wailing child. But the voice seemed to come from three different places at once. When she moved towards one, it faded out, and was suddenly coming from somewhere else.
Lea suddenly remembered this was a dream. She'd had it before. She knew she couldn't wake up yet, though, she had to save the child-
*Put her in the fire.*
"What?!"
This wasn't part of the dream before. This wasn't supposed to happen. Let herself burn?
*Put her in the fire.*
Lea's mind spun. That would kill her! She couldn't-
She had to.
Unhappily, she set the child among the flames. Little LeaMarie stopped crying, and smiled.
"Bai bai!" she said, waving a small, chubby hand at her.
And suddenly, Lea was awake.
*How... disturbing...* she thought.
A moment later, she was asleep, and the dream wasn't remembered in the morning.
*
"The four of us... We're different. We're like other kids, yeah, but at the same time, we're different. I dunno, something sets us apart. I think it has something to do with our guardians being pretty high up in the labwork here at Silph.
Unlike the other three, I'm male. I like hanging out with girls, and for some reason that sets me even further apart. They aren't so rough, and we do lots of cool stuff together without always getting dirty. But the other guys think it's weird...
Tough shit. I'm not changing for them."
~ The Journal of StormChaser

StormChaser closed his school book and left the science corner, then waited for Lea and Tiki.
"We're going to Maggie's dorm to give her the Art assignment," Lea said.
"Good afternoon to you too."
"Oh yeah.... Good afternoon," Lea replied, grinning. The grin faded quickly. "Now, to Maggie's!"
SC sighed. Maggie had caught something nasty earlier that week, and was staying in her dorm. Her Aunt was caring for her while her Dad worked, and was relying on Lea and Tiki for homework.
He followed Lea doggedly, half resisting; Maggie was cool, but he didn't want to catch whatever she had...
"I think I'll wait in the hall," he said, as they approached the door.
"Okay," Lea replied quickly, swinging in. Tiki hesitated a moment, then entered as well.
StormChaser sighed, leaning back against the wall. Idly, he wondered how messy his hair was. He began playing with it, trying to straighten it (though it really didn't need to be straightened), and wondered where the nearest mirror was.
"Hey, where do you suppose that freak is?"
"{snort}Which one? There's so many of them in our class."
StormChaser froze. It was a group of his male classmates that had what seemed to be some twisted personal vendetta against him that he didn't understand. He'd done nothing to them.
Then again, maybe that was the problem; the only guy he usually hung out with was Josh, who'd passed all the courses last year, and was now working instead of going to school. Learning through experience. Anyway, they now seemed to be looking for him, having lost interest in tormenting the wussy girls.
"The blond guy with the high voice who's always hanging out with girls."
That cinched it. They were looking for him, and now it was fight or flight. Quickly, he bolted inside of Maggie's dorm.
*Well, since I'm in here, I may as well go say hi...*
Even the regular dorms were fairly large; not nearly as large as Lea's, but they had two rooms, a kitchen, and a dining/living/TV room. Even so, it wasn't hard to find out which room the girls were in; they made a fairly large amount of noise.
"SC said he didn't want to come in. I think he's afraid of catching what you've got," StormChaser heard Lea saying.
"He's being a pansy, it's not like you're contagious any more," Tiki added.
"She isn't?" SC said, stepping in. The girls looked up in surprise.
"Nope!" Tiki said, recovering quickly. "What changed you're mind?"
"Those loser guys that keep picking on me."
"What?! Those bastards, Come on, let's go kick 'em!"
Maggie and Lea giggled at Tiki's enthusiasm to cause pain, and SC rolled his eyes and smiled.
There was a sudden loud "BOOM!" from outside, startling everyone.
"Storm," SC said instantly. As soon as it was out of his mouth, he began to doubt his suggestion, but Tiki, who'd gone to the window to check, affirmed his reaction with "It's RAINING!!! WOOHOO! Let's go up on the roof!"
She started a mad dash for the door, but Lea caught her and stopped her.
"Two things: Maggie may not be able to get out there, and those guys"- she said it like it was a vulgar word- "might still be looking for SC," she said seriously.
"I'm going to classes tomorrow, I'll be all right, and I can watch from the greenhouse instead of standing in the rain. It's got lots of flowers I can smell, and it'll be warm," Maggie said.
"And you and I would act as body guards, so if those guys start trouble we can kick 'em!"
Lea sighed reluctantly. "Okay. But I'm staying in the greenhouse with Maggie."
"Why?"
"Because rain is wet! And cold!"
Tiki suppressed her laughter as she dragged Lea out the door, Maggie and StormChaser following closely behind.
StormChaser helped Maggie into her powder blue rain coat, and grabbed an umbrella out of the umbrella rack for her. *Chivalry isn't dead,* he thought, smiling inwardly. Lea was out in the hall already, and Tiki was standing in the doorway chanting "Come on come on come on come on come ON!"
Finally, StormChaser assisted Maggie out the door. Just as she was closing and locking it, there was a call of "There's that freak!" from down the hall, and feet pounding towards them.
He suppressed a wave of panic, keeping it mostly in his stomach. Turning, SC saw a group of his classmates slowing in front of him and his companions. There were 4 of them; Maggie was in no condition to fight and he wasn't about to leave her there alone (plus he wasn't much for fighting, himself), that left Lea and Tiki with two each.
Easy win.
"And it looks like he's got his loser harem with him, too," another sneered.
"We're nobody's harem, you moron," Tiki snapped.
"Do you even know the meaning of that word?" Lea asked, obviously trying to hide a smile.
"You're just a couple of dumb girls," another one of the boys said.
Tiki and Lea's eyes glittered menacingly.
"Oh really?"
"Yeah!"
"Well you better be prepared to eat those words," Lea said, glancing at Tiki. Tiki nodded once, grinning.
"We're gonna kick you ass!"
The boys laughed at the challenge, but in 10 seconds regretted it. The two didn't look like much, but there's a reason you don't piss a girl off. They learned this after several nasty uppercuts, "bitch" slaps, and kicks to the stomach. Once they could breathe again, they took off running down the hall.
"C'mon," Tiki said, a little out of breath. "Let's get to the roof before they make up some bullshit to security about us starting a fight."
"Well, technically.... we did."
"Shut up, Lea. They were posing a threat to two defenseless people."
"I guess you're right. Once they were done tormenting SC, they'd attack Maggie."
"Okay, okay, Maggie and I aren't in the best of fighting condition, let's go now," SC said in exasperation. If this wasn't interrupted, they could debate about this for hours. "To the roof."
*
StormChaser smiled- no, beamed- as he spun in circles on the roof, looking up at the sky as the rain poured down. Between the sound of the rain hitting the pebble-covered roof and leaves of surrounding plants, his shoulders and his hair and his ears, he could hear Tiki shrieking and laughing with joy, calling to Lea and Maggie in the greenhouse, acting like a five year old. He could faintly hear her feet shifting in the gravel as she pranced (barefoot; she'd cut herself if she wasn't careful). But the thunder was loud, and the rush of the rain enveloping, and the world around him spun into oblivion, blurring, greying out. He imagined he was a tornado as he spun, causing destruction, creating a barren surface.
A void...
The gravel crunched and ground against itself as he collapsed, dizzy from spinning. StormChaser closed his eyes as the rain soaked into his uniform- which the three of them had forgotten to change out of- and cooled his skin. He felt the gravel shift as Tiki came closer. She was still for a moment, then poked him.
"Boo," she stated, giggled wildly, and dashed off between the rosebushes.
His eyes slowly closed as he thought, *It all fades out...*
*
His brother looked up in surprise when StormChaser entered the dorm some time later, quite soaked through.
"StormChaser-"
"I was on the roof. Where's uncle?" He asked, already guessing the answer.
"Working. Ready for dinner?"
"What is it?"
"Roast."
"Okay."
"Don't you wanna dry off first?"
"Oh yeah..." A little sheepishly, StormChaser walked to the bathroom, pulling a towel out of the cupboard. From there he went to his room, and found some street clothes, removed his wet uniform, and dried off, half relishing in the warmth of the towel, and put on the warm, dry clothes. He walked back out to the dining room, and sat down to eat.
*He's not really my brother,* he thought for the umteenth time. *Dad adopted me. Dad disappeared on the job. Big Brother named me, and Uncle provides for us. Even if he's never around...*
StormChaser suppressed a half-bored sigh, stabbing at his plate. *At least the food's good...*
He felt something bump the chair. Jumping slightly, he turned to look at the guilty party.
"Bowr?"
"AGH!"
"What is it?" his brother asked, as SC backed into a corner.
"There's a- a- a-" he pointed, shaking. his brother's face flushed.
"Oh no... Back to my room! Go!"
The beast crawled back to his room, tail between it's legs, while StormChaser climbed off the coffee table and returned to the table.
"You're as bad as Lea," he muttered. "No, worse. You release the genetic experiments, not the Captured for Testing."
"It reminded me of a pet..."
"Tell me, was it the ever- so- Growlithe eyes, or the Meowth like tail? Or how about the scales, did that set it off?"
"Oh shut up, so I've had a lot of pets. I felt sorry for it!"
"You shut up, you're the one with the animal rights complex!"
"I'll show you!-"
"Who'll show who?!"
"C'mere!"
"Agh!"
The brothers launched at each other, wrestling like there was no tomorrow, crashing into furniture of various sorts, not to mention the walls. Finally, SC broke free.
"Ha! So there!"
"You cheated!"
"How's that possible?"
"I dunno, but you did!"
"Whiner."
They looked at each other, blinked, then burst out laughing.
"Well that was pointless."
"Uh huh."
"What started that, again?"
"You and your pets."
"All right. They aren't THAT big a problem..."
"Yes they are."
"No they aren't."
"Are too."
"Are not!"
"Are too!"
"TAKE THAT!"
"OW!"
*
"School is important to me. My friends are important to me. My Mom is important to me. My looks are important to me.
These are the four most important things to me. They've all been there, listening or reassuring or being helpful in one way or another.
But sometimes, I wonder: What if I lost them?"
~ The Journal of Lucky

Lucky pulled her jacket closer around her; the fall weather was getting cooler, and it was starting to become obvious that T-Shirts would definitely be needing matching sweaters soon.
*Better bug mom about going shopping,* she thought absently.
Her adopted mother ranked fairly high in the building staff; one of the heads of Special Divisions, she was payed a lot of money to do her job. Somehow, her work had directly affected Tiki's 'second life', but Lucky couldn't be told the details.
Now the person in charge of Tiki's living establishment was one of her mother's friends, another man at the head of special divisions, but of the genetics sector. Lucky had often watched Tiki and him talking, or eating in the cafeteria. Tiki almost treated him like a father, and he almost treated her like a daughter. Almost.
Lucky shook her head, breaking that train of thought and going back to concentrating on her friends surrounding her. Tiki, Lea, SC, and Maggie were on the roof of the building with her for the fourth time that week, hiding on the other side of some large plant Lucky couldn't identify, leaning over the edge of the building and watching the sunset. Lea and Tiki had been discovered there the previous Monday leaning over the edge, spitting or pouring honey or dropping small pebbles and pennies down on any given victim below. SC had been the one to discover them there, and actually helped for a little while until they mysteriously ran out of honey (later, the boys known for tormenting him were found insanely sticky and surrounded by a cloud of small insects loving the sweet goo), and then the three looked out over the town of Saffron to the surronding areas, watching as the leaves turned and making comments and talking. Shortly after, Maggie and Lucky had arrived, exclaiming that they'd been looking for them for an hour. All was soon forgotten, though, as the whole group quickly became enchanted by the scenery. The plants on the roof (those with flowers, anyway) smelled delightful. The forests surrounding Saffron were changing colors, and the colors entranced the small party. Now, they spent the better part of their free time up there.
But as the sun was setting, Lucky decided to leave the roof top. She was getting too cold, and she wanted to swim.
"I'm going down to the gym!" she announced.
"We'll go with you!" Tiki and Lea chimed.
"I'm gonna swim."
"Okay, we'll go any way," Maggie said. She'd probably join Lucky in doing some laps, while Lea and Tiki would do a combination of laps and water attacks.
Since Lucky's discovery of the elevator that summer, they had used it on and off to get from the roof to where ever else they wanted to be in the building; today was one of those days. SC and Lucky discussed something they had to be doing during their classes (they were in the same grouping), while Maggie and Lea talked about a blond hulking guy they'd seen in the cafeteria, and Tiki stood there rolling her eyes at them.
In the locker room, Lucky pulled out an aqua swimsuit the same color as her bikini and a hair tie, and changed. In a matter of minutes, she and her companions were set to swim, Tiki in a dark green swim suit, Lea in a bright red one, and Maggie wearing orange, all with matching hair ties. That done, they took showers to rinse off the grit from the roof (or in Lucky's case, excess hair spray), and stepped out to the pool.
StormChaser was waiting for them.
"Josh is here, too," he said. "He was about to go into the pool as I was going into the locker room. I gave him fair warning you were coming," He said, grinning at Lea, who responded by sticking her tongue out at him.
"Wow, you two are really mature," Maggie commented, giggling.
Lucky stepped aside, and allowed her friends to pick at each other jokingly. She, however, wanted to swim.
She stepped up on to the diving block, and jumped in.
"Bloooshiiii..." the water rushed, as she made impact, as the bubbles rushed up and over her, as she began to move forward. It was considerably warm in the water, warmer than the roof. She heard a distant "blush, blush, blush, blush" as her remaining companions jumped in, noises varying. It sounded like someone (SC?) had cannonballed in, two (Tiki and Maggie?) had dived, and another (Lea?) had narrowly escaped a bellyflop. After that, it was almost perfectly quiet, excluding the few noises made as her friends swam or splashed.
She began a butterfly stroke; it was a stroke she needed more work at, and one of her least favorites. If she worked at it more, it would become easier, and then she'd actually start to like it...
Back and forth across the pool, 2...3...4 times. She didn't have to think that much, she could just feel the water rushing over her skin, tugging lightly on her pony tail.
End of 4th lap. Break. She floated in her lane on her back, ears and most of her body submerged, eyes closed. She could hear distant shouts and hoots of Lea attacking Josh, SC trying to pry them apart, and Maggie in one of the nearby lanes swimming laps. Tiki was probably swimming under water, using the butterfly kick to propel herself at unsuspecting victims, or just looking at the pool from the blue perspective.
Lucky curved backwards in the water like a lazy sea lion. As she moved deeper, the noise became softer.
This was the near silence she relished in. Water wrapping around her like a thin sheet, floating in what she could only guess limbo would feel like, everything different shades of blue...
She rose to the surface again, taking another breath, and diving under again.
*Mom's been getting so agitated lately,* she thought. *I wonder what's going on? She goes to work so early, and gets back to the dorm so late... Geez, she's been working herself too hard...* Up for air, down again. *I think a shopping trip is definitely in order. Maybe it'll help her relax. Go out, get some new shoes, some clothes, maybe some new earrings... and DEFINITELY a good meal. She's been looking too thin, lately...*
Lucky surfaced for air, then began swimming laps back and forth again. Now, she was going for speed. Back and forth across the pool, freestyle, backstroke, sidestroke, butterfly, breast stroke- as soon as she was done doing those, she did it again, 3 times. At the end of the 3rd, she slowed her pace, did it a fourth time, then stopped. She carefully swam over the lanes to the "play" area of the pool, where her friends were.
"Josh! Catch!"
Someone had found a beach ball.
"Ack! Don't throw it at ME, you moron, throw it at Josh!"
"Shut up, SC, the wind took it!"
"What wind?"
SPLOOSH.
"TIKI YOU SNOT HEAD!"
"It was funny, Lea. Besides, there's no wind in here. Moron."
"Sure there is!" StormChaser said. Everyone looked at him. "What? There might be..."
"I think it's just that Lea's aim sucks," Josh said.
"I agree!" Maggie chimed.
"You're all mean."
"Aw, Lea, don't pout," SC said. "My aim sucks, too."
Tiki's head surfaced just past the nose, she exhaled, inhaled, then sank down into the water again. Lucky watched the dark swimsuit approach Maggie as a new victim.
"Maggie, feet up!" Lucky called.
"Huh?" Maggie looked down, grinned, and brought her feet up just before Tiki made contact. Tiki surfaced.
"Okay, who gave me away?"
"No one. Maggie's a fine, upstanding citizen."
"Right. Whatever." Tiki sank down into the water until only her eyes were above the surface, and looked around. Maggie glared at her for a moment, then looked back up at the struggle between Josh, StormChaser, and Lea.
Lea had latched herself to Josh's neck. SC's arm was wedged between the two (his hand was starting to change colors, Maggie noted), and Josh had the "Why me?" look plastered to his face.
Lucky grinned at her friends. How she'd gotten mixed up with them she would never know...
Waitaminit, she did know.
It was their parents. Or family members, at least. Her mother, Tiki's father, Lea's sister, and SC's brother were all working closely in Special Divisions. The fact that Lea's dad was the Silph president probably helped a little, too.
That was the common bond. That, and being able to get along with each other so well. How it was that Maggie had shown up was still being questioned; She and Lea had been friends first. And Josh was Lea's (adopted) cousin.
Somehow, they'd all banded together, and they'd probably be together for ever.
"Who's ready to get out?" Tiki asked, obviously getting bored.
"I am," Lucky said. She was done with swimming for the day. No point in waiting for her fingers to prune up.
The two girls lead the way towards the locker room, soon followed by the other girls, and the boys to their own.
Grabbing the shampoo and conditioner from her locker, she stepped into the showers. The floor was slick, and everyone had slipped and bruised themselves at least once. *Someone really oughta put down rubber mats,* she thought. *Fewer accidents that way.*
She adjusted the water temperature to as close to comfortable as possible; It was a little warmer than she would've liked, but it was better than too cold. She stood under the water, felt it rush over her face, through her hair, over her tan skin.
Lucky snapped out of her water-induced reverie. She grabbed the shampoo bottle and squeezed an ample amount into her hand, and began to work it in, disliking the smell and adding "new shampoo brand" to her mental shopping list.
A while later, after dressing and saying goodbye to her companions, she was wandering the halls of the building aimlessly, absent mindedly thinking *Walking's good excersise* and wondering what her friends were up to, when she realized she was near her mother's lab.
*The one-way mirror,* something reminded her. She blinked in surprise. Her mother had told her once about it, and showed her inside, and even gone so far as to give her a key to it if she was ever interested in watching what her mother did.
Now, with that silent reminder, and the pressing urge to see her mom, she thought, *Why not?*
She unlocked the door, doublechecked the hallway to see if anyone was watching, then darted in.
The room was dark. The only light shining in was from the lab on the other side of the window. And in the lab stood her mother, 3 scientists, and the Silph president. Through a one-way speaker in the wall, she heard them talking.
"When will this be ready?" Lea's father asked.
"Soon," Lucky's mother replied. "Very soon. Hopefully, if we continue at this rate, by Christmas."
"And the GMAC's should be ready shortly after," added one of the others. "The prototype is nearly finished."
"Have we checked out the world the GenEx girl came from?"
"Yes," Another scientist replied., who Lucky identified as Tiki's father. *GenEx?* she thought. *Oh, GENetic EXperiment... I get it...*
He continued quickly with, "It appears to be a world similar to our own. However, Pokemon are completely nonexistent. They have no Rocket Company, or a variant as it appears. They've got lots of different companies, making some of the same stuff, and while some are more popular than others, none are 'on top of the pile', so to speak."
"Will the Children of Silph be safe there?"
"Yes, sir, they should be."
"Good."
"Sir?"
Lucky looked back to her mother, who's expression of intensity took her by suprise.
"Yes, what is it?"
"May I have permission to go through with the children, to help keep an eye on them?"
He looked at her in surprise, shook it off, and said, "We already have monitors. We don't need any more."
"Pardon my saying, sir, but I'd like to stay with my child."
Lucky watched, trying to shrug off a sense of impending doom. *What's going on?* she thought. *Why is all this happening?*
"You have a child?" he asked incredulously. "You're hardly old enough for that."
"She's not really mine, persay. I found her, abondoned, when she was little, and I sort've became her mother."
"How old is she?"
"13, sir."
"What?! You would've been 12 when you adopted her!"
"I had help, sir." She glanced in the direction of the third- and thus far, silent- scientist.
*SC's uncle,* Lucky thought, though she wasn't certain; She'd seen plenty of him several years ago, but almost never for the past 6. His appearance seemed to have changed dramatically. He looked.... Old. His hair was greying. His skin was wrinkled in the corners of his mouth and eyes.
"Either way, I can't let you go. We need you here. Your daughter will be in good hands."
"She'll be better in mine."
The President looked at the calmly defiant woman, obviously building up on verbal ammunition, then fired.
"She'll have no memory of you, it won't matter. The GMACs will keep her from remembering anything. To her, you won't exist. You'll have never existed."
Lucky sat there in shock, watching the argument.
*No mom? No memories? My life here, gone?* Her mind reeled.
"You know the age limits," he stated. "Under 15, manditory departure. 15- 20: Optional. 21 and up: restricted from leaving unless otherwise notified. Now, if you'll pardon me, I've got more important things to do than argue." With that, he left the room quickly, trying to escape further argument. Lucky heard his rush down the hall, and a faint *thud*; she snickered. He'd probably tripped over someone he hadn't seen coming.
"Don't worry," Tiki's dad said. "It probably won't even happen."
"But what if it does?"
"We'll worry about that later. Now let's make sure they'll have safe passage if something DOES happen."
That said, the four scientists returned to their work, leaving Lucky in a confused state of mind.
*I... I need to find the others...* she thought, stood up, and tore out of the room. *I need to be with someone...*
*
"I feel betrayed..."
~The journals of Tiki, Lea, StormChaser, and Lucky

February was mild. The holidays had passed without upset, and now everyone was growing restless.
"Ugh..." Tiki sighed with no small amount of exasperation from her spot- upside down- on the couch. "I am so BORED..."
"You aren't the only one," Lea muttered. She was glaring at the computer screen. It was plastered with images of cute boys, but she'd long since given up gazing at their beautiful features.
StormChaser was sprawled on the floor of Lea's dorm, looking vaguely like someone had shot him, and that had been his dying position. He almost sat up, got half way there, froze, and flopped down again. "Uhf."
Lucky looked at him a little blankly. "Was there any point to that?"
"Not really!" He chirped, facial expression not matching the cheery tone. "Just felt like it."
All four sighed simultaneously.
The door banged open suddenly, causing them to jump in alarm.
"All of you, on your feet! Nobody move!"
The kids looked at each other in mild confusion, but didn't stand up.
"Uh, what's going on?"
"How the hell should I know? Last I checked, security wasn't allowed in the living quarters."
The man in the doorway grinned. Lucky frowned inwardly. *Something's amiss here...*
"This isn't a security drill, little girls. This is a takeover!"
"HEY!! We aren't all female!" The girls yelled and pointed at StormChaser, who had also cried this and stood up with much indignance. They all glared meaningfully at the man in the doorway.
The stranger sweatdropped. "You're ruining the dramatic effect."
"Oops. Sorry! Carry on," SC said with almost alarming cheerfulness. His three friends facefaulted.
"Erhem, thank you." The mean grin returned, and he continued, "Rocket Co. is taking over this building! There's no escape from us!"
"Uhm..." Lea and Tiki glanced at each other.
"Why are you announcing this to a bunch of thirteen-"
"And fourteen!"
"Shut up Lea.- year olds? And why are you in the living establishment-"
"Instead of somewhere more... important?" Lea finished.
The silently proclaimed idiot in the doorway somehow managed to hide the sweatdrops forming on his brow and said, "I... need hostages to help repel attacks. Now, come with me and walk in front of me to the labs, now!"
The kids complied easily enough, but all were thinking along the same lines: Ditch the moron and find family.
"This guy's a real idiot," Lea whispered to Tiki.
"I know. The only reason he needs us is for a guide to the Labs."
"Think he realizes we're misleading him?"
"Nope. I'm guessing he thinks we're a bunch of obedient girls plus one obedient boy."
Lea barely supressed her laughter at the suggestion.
"Shut up, you two!"
"Yes sir," Tiki said, imitating a respectful tone. "I'll try and keep her from being a bad influence on my impressionable young mind."
StormChaser's eyes widened, and he clamped his hands over his mouth, Lucky struggled to keep a straight face, and Lea fairly burst out laughing.
"Grr... Where'd the rest of Team Rocket get to?" The man hissed, either ignoring or remaining oblivious to the children in front of him.
"If they're as bright as you, probably still on the other side of the building," Tiki muttered.
"ANYWAY..." Lucky said, "I think this is the secret project room."
"What's the project?"
"How should we know? It's a SECRET!" SC said, almost sounding like a small child.
"We're just a bunch of kids," Lucky added.
"Thanks, brats. Now, uh, you guard the door or something, and don't try anything funny!" He pulled out his ice gun for emphasis. "Got it?"
The four nodded, sweat dropping.
He opened the door and stepped inside, flicking on the light and posing with the gun in as threatening a position he could think of. "Nobody move! Huh?"
As soon as "Huh?" was out of his mouth, Lea flicked the light off and slammed the door shut, and Tiki locked the door with the maintenance keys she'd stolen from a janitor a few days earlier and had been carrying with her since.
"Think he gets nose bleeds from looking at girls' underwear?" Lucky asked.
"Dunno, but I'm afraid to find out. What inspired you to choose the women's laundry room?" Tiki asked.
"I was getting a little annoyed by him. I picked the closest room with an easy lock and the rest is history."
They heard a loud "BAM!" noise against the door, followed by another three.
"Lemme outta here, brats!"
"What do you think the pounding noise was?" Tiki asked Lea.
Lea grinned. "The moron probably shot the door. It's frozen shut, now, if he did."
There was a faint "tic" noise from within the room. "Oh my- aw dabbit, by nose is bleedig.."
The four high fived each other, all of them giggling. When they composed themselves, SC declared "Okay, down to the labs, we've gotta find our people!"
"I think I know where they are," Lucky stated, and took off running, with her friends shortly behind.
Tiki was gasping for air by the time they'd gotten to an elevator, three floors down. She didn't excersise much, and therefore wasn't up for such sudden physical activity. She absently wondered how much this was going to hurt the next day.
They all pounded on the button to go down to the labs.
"That oughta get it moving," Lea muttered.
"It's not moving fast enough," Tiki stated under her breath. "I can feel them coming. They're destroying everything in the building that they don't think is useful, and I can feel the vibrations through the floor and walls." She looked spitting mad.
SC gave his companion an odd look.
"Concentrate," she said, glaring at him from under her bangs. "If you concentrate, maybe you can feel it too."
Sighing, he tried.
And heard it. "Ack! She's right! It's not that far away!" He reached over, and almost began pounding the poor button some more, when the doors opened.
The four rushed in, and Lucky pushed the "close doors" button, just as all of them began hearing the raucous calls of destruction from Team Rocket.
StormChaser, now wanting to push a button, reached to push "8". Lea grabbed his wrist, used her other hand to reach into her bra, pull out a key, and stuck it in a small keyhole under the button panel. a door opened, and under it revealed another button panel identical to the buttons above. She guided his hand towards the 8 button on this panel, made him push, and released his hand.
Tiki gave her a quizzical look, but before she could ask Lea explained. "Only some people in Silph know about it, mostly heads of special projects. But Daddy gave me a key, just in case. I think he expected this..."
The back of the elevator opened just then. Tiki walked out, turned around, and said, "So where are we? I mean... it looks a lot like the rest of the building... Except the halls are narrower... Where is everyone?"
"It's a backhall. the doors are back doors to the important labs, namely yours," Lea replied.
"Which way?"
"That way."
"Let's go, then!"
"ACK!"
Tiki had grabbed Lea by the arm, and taken off down the hall. Lucky and StormChaser looked at each other, shrugged, and ran after them.
Lea slowed herself down, hoping Tiki would take a hint and let go. The hint was taken, and Tiki tore off down the hall, slowing a little infront of doorways so she could read the number. Finally, in front of one doorway, she stopped altogether, hurled herself at it, and burst in.
"Tiki!" a labworker- her father figure, Lea identified- cried.
"What the hell is going on?!" Tiki replied. Lea grinned, despite the seriousness of the situation. *She is so tactless sometimes...*
Lea had followed her through the doorway a moment later, only to find herself tightly enveloped in the arms of her sister.
"Lea! I was so worried!"
"Sis? What's happening?"
"Rocket's initiating a hostile takeover on Silph."
*Already knew that much...* she thought, though didn't mention it aloud. "They can't do that!"
Lea was released from the hug, and taken over to where her friends were now all sitting. She saw SC's brother and Lucky's mom standing with Tiki's dad a few feet away. She saw her sister go to join them, as she sat down with the others.
"We can't explain everything right now," Lucky's Mom said.
"We don't even know the whole of it ourselves," SC's brother continued.
"But I promise, someday, we'll tell you everything," Lea's sister said. The look of earnest on her face was having difficulty believing itself, and it was all too obvious.
"We have to get you out of here. All the Silph children have to. It's to keep you safe." Tiki's dad was obviously trying to hide his emotions, but she could tell that he, too, thought that was complete bull. "We have these things called GMACs: Genetic Memory Alteration Chips. It will manipulate your memory to forget your past, and give you a new one. You'll be put with a Silph family in the world Tiki originally came from until it's safer here again."
The four Children sat and stared in disbelief.
"You mean to tell me," Lea began, "That we're being seperated from our families just because some- some- ASSHOLE business man has control issues?!" Her voice had been rising steadily, and now she screamed, "YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME!!"
Tiki was sighing in frustration, muttering something under her breath. SC looked alarmed, jaw clenched and eyes wide, and whatever Lucky thought was well hidden.
Their respective caretakers approached each of them with a scalpel and GMAC, and took their hands, cutting into them to place the chip.
Tiki glared at the floor, refusing to acknowledge the pain in her left palm, or the man causing it.
"Dammit, dammit, dammit..." she muttered.
"Where'd you learn that colorful language, anyway?"
"You, after I'd dyed my hair in the sink again," she snarled.
"Oh."
Lea, on the other hand, was glaring malevolently at her sister.
"How dare you hide this from me?" She demanded.
"I had to, Lea. You've got to understand that."
"Well, now what are you going to do?"
"I'll figure it out and tell you later."
"How much later?"
"... I don't know."
"Ugh.... Dammit! That hurt!"
Her sister gave her a hard look. "Duh."
StormChaser wasn't glaring. The pain from his hand and feeling of deception in his heart far outweighed his anger. however, he WAS giving his brother the most forlorn and morose look he could muster.
"Stoppit. You're gonna make me feel guilty."
"Good."
Lucky looked and felt miserable. She'd known this was going to happen. She knew it was going to end like this. If only she'd just suggested leaving the building or something, or hiding until things had blown over a bit and they could escape... She felt boxed in by how she'd kept from talking, by how she'd betrayed her friends, how she'd betrayed herself. She kept trying to find some way out, maybe it still wasn't too late...
She was so wrapped up in her thoughts, she didn't feel the pain of the knife, or the chip being pushed in.
All this: Anger, bitterness, regret, doubt, was how the four began their trip into the other world.
As things slowly dimmed around them, Tiki muttered, "Every time I look at the scar on my hand I'm gonna think of you, ya know."
"You won't remember me."
"Yes she will," StormChaser argued, sounding like a child again. "We'll refuse to forget you."
"They ARE stubborn..." Lea's sister said, trying to hide the sadness in her voice with a little humor.
"That's true," Lucky's mom agreed, tears beginning to roll down her cheeks as Lucky fell asleep. It was a side effect of the chip: To make forgetting easier, it put you in a deep sleep while it burried your past in you subconscious and gave you a new one.
"Sis, you've gotta remember to get my notebooks and put them with me in the other place!" Lea started, jumping up in slight panic. "And my CDs, and my floppy disks-"
"Already done," she replied, pointing to one of four boxes. "All the stuff you might need is in there."
"Thanks... Oh, uhm, I think I'm gonna fall..." Lea tipped forward, narrowly missed being caught by her sister, and was gone.
"It's just us, now," SC said to Tiki.
"You're next," Tiki replied.
"Nuh- uh," he shot.
"Yuh huh! I always go last."
"Ergh.... You might be right..."
"What? No! Fight me on this one!"
"...How?..."
"I dunno... Sing with me."
"Okay... uh... I will remember you..."
Tiki felt a lump in her throat at the depressingly fitting song, and joined in.
"Will you remember me? Don't let your life pass you by.... weep not for the memory..."
As they got to the last word, SC's voice faded out. Tiki swallowed the sob building in her.
*I'm the only one left...*
"Tiki, it's just you now."
"I know." She thought for a moment, then continued, "It's like waiting to die. You know it's moments away. Your friends are gone, but you still wanna hold on a little longer because you're afraid of what will happen next, everyone's just standing there, waiting..." Suddenly, Tiki felt a wave of exhaustion wash over her. She couldn't hold out much longer-
"Dad, I swear I'm not gonna forgive you easily for this."
Having stated this aloud, Tiki curled up into a ball on the floor, and fell asleep.
*She called me... Dad...* That title, added on to everything that'd happened in the previous few minutes, broke the emotional barrier he'd built, and he turned away from the others, not wanting to show the tears coursing down his cheeks, despite the fact that the others were in the same state.
*
Tiki woke up to the sound of her alarm blaring talk radio in her ear. She moved lethargically, pushing various buttons on her alarm until, finally, it fell silent. She glared at the red numbers on the clock.
*5.30. Why the hell is my alarm going off at 5.30 am?*
It didn't make sense. This meant rational thought was necessary.
*Okay. It's August. Noted. It's a Wednesday. Noted. It's 5.30 in the morning, and the sun's coming up. Ooh.... pretty.... Erk, anyway... was I gonna watch the sunrise? No, I would've been up all night if I wanted to do that."
Then, like the sun, it dawned on her.
*School.*
This realized, she stumbled out of her room dazedly, more in a state of alarm than awake, her one driving thought being *CAFFEINE...*
*
StormChaser awoke himself at 5.15. He was hungry, and a dream had disturbed him, so why not get up?
He wandered into the kitchen in lavender pyjamas, fumbling around for food, and glanced at the calendar. His eyes widened.
"School?! How could I have forgotten that?! NICHOLAS!"
He ran to wake up his younger brother.
*
"-TAKE ADVICE FROM FOOLS/ PLAYING EVErying is cool..."
Lea only turned down the volume on her radio alarm; She liked the song that was playing. She glanced at the clock: 6.15. 15 minutes before she had to be out of bed and dressed. It was a school day, first day of ninth grade. She'd been 15 for 1 week, 4 days. She smiled inwardly. Tiki had probably forgotten what day it was. She could laugh at her for it later.
*What am I gonna wear?...* A little anxiety dragged her out of bed 10 minutes earlier than she would have liked so she could find clothes... Maybe a little makeup...
*
As soon as the alarm went off at 5.50, Lucky was up and out of bed.
"School! Woohoo!" She practically floated upstairs from the basement, tripping on the last step, stumbling and almost falling into the kitchen, and grabbed a banana and a glass of orange juice to start her day with.
"I'm joining track first thing, and the best way to begin that is with a healthy breakfast!"
The cheerful girl bounced through her household, waking her parents and alarming her cats.
*
It was noon. Something was happening in Tiki's room, something science itself was having a hard time explaining. It was a trans-dimensional vortex. Tiki's father stepped through, and looked around.
Pictures were taped to the walls of Tiki and her friends. he looked at all of them, studying how his daughter, his creation, had changed in the last several months.
He reminded himself what he was there for, and brought himself back to the task at hand. He looked around for the nearest notebook, and found one laying open on the bed. He wondered for a moment why it was out; It seemed to contain personal information... He glanced over at the door, saw it was closed, and upon testing it found that it was locked.
*That explains it... It's safer behind a locked door than just closed.*
Next step: Find a pen, and write the instructions. That was done easily. Now to leave...
He returned the way he came, leaving little out of place.
The plan was set. Now, for it to spring into action.
*
Tiki unlocked her door after a long first day. All she wanted to do was write in her notebook and go to sleep...
She flopped onto her bed, lifted the pen from it's position in the blankets-
"What the hell?!"
Someone elses handwriting was in her notebook.
She read the writing, then called Lea.
"LEA!! Someone's been in my ROOM!!"
"How? You lock your door."
"Trans- dimensional Vortex."
"What?"
"That's what the note said! And it says how to make one, too!"
"Oh... really?..."
"Come see! I've got proof! Proof, I tell you!"
"I'll get over there as soon as I can, sit tight."
*
It took three days to get it around to Lea, SC, and Lucky; Finally, on Saturday all four kids joined up at Tiki's house, and she was hopping with impatience.
"C'mon! Let's try it!" She demanded for the 10th time.
"OKAY! Fine! Let's do it!" SC said, irritated with the complaining.
With his consent added to Lea's, and Lucky having no way to back out, Tiki dragged them outside, and they began the process.
The version of the process was the "out of lab" version that had been discovered by four certain Silph workers; They'd tested various versions, and found this one to work the best, based on memory of the labwork they'd done. Most of the data had been destroyed before Team Rocket had completely taken over Silph, along with various other pieces of valuable information; anything to keep Rocket from abusing it.
This being out of lab work, they were going to need to use more... basic instruments.
Elements.
"Lea, call Fire, SC, call Air, Lucky, call Water. I'll call Earth."
"Is this really necessary?" Lucky asked, still resisting.
"Yes, now come on!"
They stood around a tree in Tiki's backyard; It was half dead. Literally. one half of the plant didn't grow, or have blossoms, or anything. It had died some how.
They all began concentrating on the elements Tiki had assigned. Then, the next step:
"FIRE." Lea's bold announcement was shortly followed by a blast of hot air, alarming the four. The tree's branches had burst into flames. Lea's eyes widened, but she didn't say or do anything else.
"WATER." Lucky's cry didn't make the fire stop; instead, they were now surrounded by a whirlpool of water, containing them in their circle around the tree.
"AIR." Now winds stirred, blowing on the flames, causing them to grow and spiral in the opposite direction of the water.
"EARTH." This call caused everything to stop spinning, freezing everything that was moving, making it all seem more solid and defined.
Then, unpredicted in the note from Tiki's notebook, a fifth call rang from their hearts and souls, a simple, calm "Spirit."
With that, everything crashed inwards toward the tree. The four now extremely alarmed children felt part of themselves fly towards the multicolored mass around them and the tree, then lash back, sending them all ten feet backwards. When they looked up, they saw something amazing.
It was like looking through a window. On the other side was a cityscape, full of large buildings, none of which any of them recognized. There was a bulletin board on a building, featuring something Lea and Tiki recognized almost instantly.
"Tiki, isn't that a..."
"...Pokemon?"
"But how?"
"I thought it was just a videogame that was also made into a cartoon...."
"Me too...."
They looked at each other.
"COOL!!"
Lucky reached towards it hesitantly, but as her hand neared, the image shuddered, rippling, then began shaking violently, then faded to the same swirling colors as the border, collapsed, and exploded, sending debris everywhere that the four could only feel in their souls. Lea felt it splatter inside her, causing her heart to pound and spirit to ache.
"That was.... Odd..." SC muttered, sounding like he'd been holding his breath.
"Yeah, but it was cool!" Tiki said, excitement building. "We've gotta find a way to stabilize it better, try again-"
"Not today, Tiki," Lea sighed, poking her friend in the side and making her squeak. "Not for a while. Don't you feel a little... I dunno, tired after doing that?"
Tiki paused for a moment, then said, "Now that you mention it... I guess so... I'm hungry."
Lea grinned at her best friend- someone she'd often referred to as a sister- and said, "Okay, let's go inside. I brought some recorded episodes of Pokemon, we can play the Pokemon Drinking game!"
"YAY!" all four cried.
"Ooh.... Don't we need Coke for that?" SC asked.
"Not a problem!" Tiki said. "I nagged mom into buying a twelve pack. Seeing as Lucky won't drink the soda, she can have milk or water or something and you and me and Lea can have Coke, okay? Okay!"
Tiki dashed into the house, friends hot on her heels.
*
The school year flew by. Before it seemed time to be, it was late May. At some point during that year (no one could remember when), the four had taken to calling themselves the Rocket Clan/Quartet/Four (it varied from day to day, week to week, and so on), after Team Rocket. Another thing no one could figure out; Somehow, they'd all become fans of the bad guys on Pokemon. Lea and Tiki had memorized the Team Rocket Motto in under a week, and would occaisionally try to remember Butch and Cassidy's motto (and usually fail.)
Now, Lea and Tiki were sitting in their rooms, on the phone. It was Labor Day weekend.
"Lea... I'm bored... and I'm hot..."
"I'd try and fix that, but I'm currently trying to remember how to move more than my jaw."
"Can you remember your locker com?"
"Uhm... barely."
"Okay." Tiki stared at her ceiling, jumped a little as she heard something scratching above it, realized it was just the bats above her attic room, and relaxed.
Then she got an idea.
"LEA! Let's go get ice cream!"
"Ack! Okay, where?"
"Saint Nick's Ice Cream Parlor, where else? Don't answer that."
"Okay. When?"
"Half an hour?"
"I'll go bug mom about it. Hang on."
"Okay, scream when you get back, I'm going to put some actual clothes on," Tiki said, glancing down at her oversized t-shirt and boxers.
"Okay."
Tiki dropped the phone, and began rummaging through the pile of clean laundry in front of her closet for a white t-shirt and her only pair of black shorts. *I need to get some more black shorts...*
She pulled off the clothes she was wearing, pulled on the clothes she'd found, pulled her hair back into a ponytail with a red scrunchy, and picked up the phone.
"You back?"
"What?" came a distant response.
"ARE YOU BACK?!"
"Almost, I decided to change too!"
"OKAY, SO DOES THAT MEAN YOU CAN GO?!"
"Yeah!"
"COOL!"
There was a rustle, then Lea speaking normally into the phone.
"Meet you there in about 20 minutes?"
"Sounds g-"
SHYAOOO.
"What the HELL was THAT?!" both girls cried. Tiki ran towards her back window and looked outside...
*To be continued....*

Next time on Vortex:
The Vortex seems to have opened itself, sending the main cast of Pokémon through to the world of the self-proclaimed "neo-Rockets"! Somehow, they need to help send the visitors back to their world before their parents ask too many questions! ^_^^_^^_~