Chapter 15 – Run
He heard them before he saw them.
Voices. Low, two of them, coming from the tree line to the left. Not hikers wrong tone, too deliberate, the kind of voices that weren't trying to be heard but weren't being careful enough.
Deino had already stopped again.
Ryan put his hand on Deino's back without thinking. Stay. Just stay.
Two men stepped out from between the trees onto the path ahead of them. Older than Ryan, maybe late twenties, wearing the kind of clothes that were designed to not be remembered. One of them had a Pokeball already in his hand. The other was looking at Deino.
Not at Ryan. At Deino.
That specific look recognition. Not the curious look the boy in Jubilife had given him or the professional assessment of Rowan or Joy. This was something else. The look of someone who had seen this Pokemon before and had been looking for it.
Ryan's stomach dropped.
"That's him," the second one said. Quiet. Certain.
The first one was already throwing the ball.
A Golbat came out large, fast, wings snapping open with a crack that echoed off the trees. It didn't wait for a command. It went straight for Deino.
"DEINO MOVE"
Too slow. The Golbat hit him from above, claws first, driving him into the frozen ground hard enough that Ryan heard the impact. Deino scrambled but the Golbat was already on him, fast and heavy and clearly not fighting like a Pokemon in a trainer battle. This was different. This was the kind of fighting that didn't stop when the other Pokemon went down.
"Dragon Breath NOW"
Deino got it off a burst, ragged, not clean and the Golbat pulled back just enough. Deino got his feet under him. He was bleeding. A cut above one of his ears, dark against his scales, and he was holding his left side like something hurt there.
No No no no
"Piplup Bubble, the Golbat, GO"
Piplup was already moving, Bubble catching the Golbat across the wing and buying half a second. Ryan grabbed Deino just picked him up, both arms, Deino making a sharp sound of pain that went through Ryan like a knife and ran.
Not toward Sandgem. Away from the men first, into the trees, because Sandgem was behind them and they were between him and it and he couldn't think past that.
"HEY GO AFTER HIM "
Branches. Frozen ground. His boots slipping on something and nearly going down and catching himself on a tree trunk and keep going keep going keep GOING
Piplup was behind him somewhere, he could hear it, and the Golbat was he didn't know where the Golbat was and that was the worst part because he couldn't see behind him and Deino was heavy and warm against his chest and making small sounds that he couldn't think about right now he could NOT think about right now
He broke out of the trees on the other side onto open ground and turned south. Sandgem. Sandgem was south, forty minutes away, forty minutes at a run and he could feel Deino's blood on his jacket already warm and then cooling in the cold air.
"It's okay," he said, which was possibly the biggest lie he'd ever told. "It's okay, I've got you, just just stay with me"
Deino made a sound. Weak. Too weak.
Something broke open in Ryan's chest.
He ran.
The cold air came in and out of his lungs in ragged pulls and his legs were already burning and the pack on his back was too heavy and he couldn't put Deino down he couldn't put him down because what if he couldn't pick him back up what if
His mother had texted him the night he died. He'd seen the notification. Hadn't opened it. Had thought later, I'll read it later, I'll reply later, and then there had been no later and he had never he had never
Stop. Stop it. RUN.
Piplup appeared at his side, keeping pace, not making a sound. Just there. Running with him.
Twenty minutes. Maybe less if he didn't slow down.
Deino shifted in his arms and made that sound again and Ryan's throat closed completely.
"You're okay," he said, voice cracking on the last word. "You're I've got you, you're okay, just don't please don't"
He wasn't even sure what he was asking.
Don't leave. Don't be another thing that leaves.
His dad had left when he was nine. Packed a bag on a Tuesday morning and said he'd be back and wasn't. His mum had held it together for both of them for years, working double shifts, leaving notes on the fridge, sending texts he didn't always answer because he was tired or gaming or just not in the mood, and now she'd sent one and he would never know what it said and he couldn't
He was crying. Hadn't noticed when it started. The tears were cold on his face immediately in the winter air and he didn't stop running.
"I can't lose you," he said. Not to Deino specifically. To all of it. To the world that had taken everything and given him this this one thing, this one small blind Pokemon who had walked through a door because something had told him to and now even this was
The lights of Sandgem appeared over the rise ahead.
He ran harder.
His legs weren't working right anymore, something had gone wrong somewhere in the last twenty minutes, one of his knees burning with every stride, and his arms were shaking with the effort of holding Deino and his vision was blurring and he wasn't sure if that was the crying or something else
The first building. The edge of town. The path turning from frozen dirt to cobblestone under his boots.
"Help" His voice came out wrong, too quiet, not enough air behind it. He tried again. "HELP"
A trainer outside the Pokemon Center looked up. Saw him. Moved.
The Pokemon Center doors were right there and Ryan made it through them and Joy was already coming around the desk and he was saying something, he could hear himself saying something, but he wasn't sure what it was and Deino was in Joy's arms and Ryan's legs stopped working properly and the floor came up and
And then nothing.