Narrator

As we watch that wretched Sableye pass out of Castle Draclugia, a couple of thoughts come to my mind.

What a sorry sight that was!

Let's follow him.

You know, he's a lot older than most people would guess. If I had to venture one, I'd say both of them are about the same age. Granted, one of them does actually age more slowly than the other (or used to), but that's not my point. All I care about are numbers right now, and those are probably on par with each other. If you were to ask me, I wouldn't be able to come up with a convincing reason as to why I mentioned their ages at all, honestly. I just thought it was an interesting piece of information. Make of it what you will. They have other things in common besides their age, I think. I'm not really going to tell you what these things are, because as of right now, they'd just be rumors. Rumors are never a good thing to encourage or create, as one merchant guild leader found out not too long ago. You might not notice unless you were paying attention, but she actually does have feelings! A lot of them, in fact. You're most likely a simple paying customer, so she has no real need to show herself as anything but a merchant. I wish I could have been a bit closer to that conversation, but alas! Vampires don't get along with our type too well, they say we interfere with their... their everything, really. Our inherent natures tend to clash no matter what we do, so we must respectfully agree to go our own ways. That's going a bit off track though, my apologies. Anyway, any closer and she may have detected me, and eavesdropping is a rather hard thing to explain away. You understand, right? I had to be satisfied with looking in through a window, even if the view it offered was rather pitiful. Ah, I almost lost him while writing this! I really should pay better attention to the outside world more, but that really isn't my forte. My "thing", if you will. There I go again, actually. Time to catch up to him! Not too close though, of course.

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I don't normally do this, you know. Oh, don't get me wrong, I meant to say I don't normally follow... him. You'd have to be a bit touched in the head to think stalking him a good idea. At least, that used to be the requirement. He's changed a bit over the years. For the better, I believe, but who am I to judge? I've only been watching him for decades. Well, not him, specifically. He is quite unique and intriguing, yes, but I am aware of the dangers of tunnel vision. Best to keep an eye on everything you can, lest you be caught off guard. While he is generally intriguing, that is not the case tonight. As we speak, you and I, he appears to be wandering about the village. I wouldn't... quite say he was looking for something, although I could understand how someone could make that assumption. If I am completely wrong and he is indeed on the hunt, I don't believe he knows what he's looking for. That last bit can be said with confidence only because he does this nearly every night. I know that if I had been searching for as long as he has been, I would have found whatever it was long ago, I assure you. Would you like to know the funny part? He's actually the most talkative during this time of night, yet every Pokemon runs when they spot him! Well, that's not quite true. I've talked to him before, but only after he caught me doing the very stalking I'm currently engaged in! He didn't even mind that I was spying on him, which was a relief. Didn't even ask me why I was doing it. Strange fellow indeed. We ended up talking for quite some time, about many things. I'm currently writing a book about some of them, which I'm sure will be finished in the near future.

I'll leave him be, as I should start my search before it gets too late. Unlike him, I know what I'm looking for. Unfortunate, vulnerable Pokemon. They're the easiest prey to catch, you know.

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Our narrator's search for a suitable Pokemon has proven to be a success, and in a rather short amount of time! That isn't really a surprise; Sorbet's rampage has left many homeless. Suitable living conditions are being offered free of charge at Merlot's castle, but, understandably, not all Pokemon are comfortable with being near her. Some have chosen to rebuild their old homes, and some have chosen to brave the wilderness of the woods outside of Tao Village. The latter are usually the ones found by our narrator. Tonight's catch seemed to be a Dratini! He quickly called out to catch her attention, but not before making sure no one was around to interfere.

"Young miss, are you quite all right?"

The sudden appearance of a predator in the middle of night would normally shock most Pokemon, and this Dratini was no exception. She had initially thought her new house (which was actually just a crudely constructed tent made of rocks and branches. They have no limbs, you know.) would serve her well as a temporary shelter, but at this point in time it felt like a cage with only one way out: forward. Forward. The direction in which the predator was located.

Gotta sound confident, maybe he'll leave.

Gathering up what little resolve she had, she demonstrated just how confident she truly was.

"Ah, um, I-I'm fine, thank you!" She hoped that he would accept this response and go on his merry way, but there was no such luck tonight. She was cold and hungry, and this was obvious to him. He stepped forward, and soon enough he was too close for her to flee; he had taken that opportunity away while she (naively) took the time to respond to him. She felt a bit angry at her own foolishness, then came to a rather grim realization.

He's done this before.

That thought didn't do much to reassure her. She accidentally looked into his eyes and became filled with indecision. Should she fight him? Try to flee? The answer to both of these questions was no. Fighting would only prolong the inevitable, and fleeing would be an exercise in futility. He had four legs, she had none. Should she plead for him to spare her? No, again. That would only make her seem like an even easier target than she currently was. All that was left for her to do was-

"Miss? Are you sure you're all right? You seem terrified! Is there anything I can do to help?"

His repeated question caused her to snap out of her trance. She realized she had been staring at him during that whole thought process, and he still managed to walk right up to her without her noticing. She had been too distracted by thinking of things she could do when she should have been paying attention to the threat in front of her. Why couldn't she focus on him?

Help? He's not going to.. What? Isn't he going to eat me?

"Goodness, no, why would I want to do a thing like that?" He recoiled in shock as he said this, but she wasn't sure if he was being completely serious. One could never tell with his type, and he did sound a bit sarcastic. She shied away from him, further sliding back into her small tent, not in fear but rather in embarrassment upon realizing she had spoke those last thoughts out loud. Fear does things like that, sometimes. She looked at him again, now not quite sure what to think.

"It's cold out tonight, isn't it?" He inched a bit closer, returning her stare with a cheerful look. She liked that look, for some reason.

It is cold out, she thought. Normally it wouldn't bother her, but it did tonight. Maybe it was the scare she just went through.

"It also sounds as if it will rain soon. A rather bad combination, wouldn't you agree?" He moved a little closer. She didn't notice.

She agreed. She wished she had her old house back, but wishing doesn't really make things happen. She would have gone with him right there and then, but the cry of a far-off Hoothoot startled her, making her break his gaze and think about the danger she was in.

"What say you accompany me to my house, just for the night? It wouldn't sit right with me to know that someone as lovely as you will be sitting out here in the cold rain! I'll get a fire going, and I have plenty of extra bedding. I'll have a stew cooking, as well. How about it?"

He smiled as he said this, and it was almost convincing. Or maybe it was genuine and she was just being paranoid. At any rate, it would be nice to sleep in a real bed again, and she was hungry. Maybe he was actually interested in the welfare of a stranger like her. Or maybe he wanted to finish her off where no one would see. She decided not to take that risk.

"Um, I don't mean to offend, but I really am all right.. I do thank you for your offer, really. I was just about to head to sleep." She hoped that he would take the hint. He didn't.

"You don't have to be so paranoid, you know. I would never dream of harming anyone. Especially not a beauty like you, my dear girl."

He crouched down to eye level as he said this, and she caught his gaze again. Any doubts she had about him melted away, and she didn't care to wonder why. Maybe he wasn't so bad after all.

It was very cold now, and she was very hungry, and it was starting to rain. She was having a hard time focusing on much of anything while looking at him, and the promise of a fire, a bed, and a stew was too much.

She agreed to go with him.

---

She couldn't remember the journey to his house. How long did it even take? She couldn't remember that, either. Where was she? His house, supposedly. She didn't know where his house was, though. She wondered if she would be able to find her way back home in the morning. If morning ever came for her, that is. She hoped it would. Why did she come here in the first place? Her stomach growled, and she remembered why. She felt a little more at ease when she detected the scent of a soup cooking from somewhere in the back of his house. He wasn't lying about the food, at least. The door closed behind her, and she felt him brush against her as he walked by. His house wasn't that small, but the majority of space had been taken up by piles of books strewn about the floor. She spotted his bed, and it looked very inviting. Maybe she'd take a short nap while he tended to his soup. That sounded like a good idea. She was awakened by the sound of a bowl of soup being placed on a small wooden table in the middle of the room, and by the aroma it gave off. She was very hungry, and eager to find out if the taste lived up to her expectations. It did. He seemed pleased by her approval of the food, and let her finish before he decided to talk again.

"Tell me, would you happen to know of any stories? I'm a bit of a writer, and I'm always looking for more tales to put in my books."

Another smile. She felt like she could talk to him about anything, and she didn't want to let him down. He did go through all this trouble for her, even though she didn't ask him to. Trouble is, the only real stories she knew of were childhood fairy tales. She had quite a few stories she made up herself, but she didn't know if those were quite what he was looking for. She told them anyway, and was pleased to discover that he enjoyed them. After a while, she ran out of stories to tell and energy to tell them with. The fear she felt had been replaced with gratitude, and she wondered why she ever doubted him in the first place. The initial confrontation had frightened her, yes, but that was hardly his fault. Did she even know his name? No, she had neglected to ask him, although he did ask for hers. She would get his name in the morning, for right now all she had on her mind was sleep. Settling down in the bed she had napped in earlier, she thanked him again and went out like a light. While he was mildly amused she had gone to sleep so quickly after getting into his bed, he was a bit disappointed she had run out of stories to tell him. She was exceedingly competent at telling stories, which was a delight. As a bonus, he wasn't familiar with any of the stories she told him, which was extremely rare. The notes he took would serve to help him remember them later, when he would start to compile them into a book for all to read. That would be done later, though. Right now, she was out of stories and fast asleep, and that was all that mattered. There would be no more stories from her, which made him a bit sad. Nothing left to do but that, though. He crept closer to the bed, taking great care to make sure he didn't wake her.

---

She awoke to the feeling of her tail being pulled.

"Hey, wake up."

She didn't want to wake up, the bed she was in was warm. She yawned and turned over, hoping whoever it was would leave her alone.

"Hey!" Another pull. "I need to leave soon, you should get up and have some of the leftover soup."

Soup? Right. She had that last night, and it was pretty good. That Ninetales gave her some.

The Ninetales?

She got up in a flash once she realized she was not in her house, and was, most importantly, alone with that creepy fox.

"I knew you could do it! That wasn't so hard, right?" He looked at her with a cheery expression as he said this, and she couldn't tell if he was making fun of her or just being sarcastic. Probably the latter. While certainly weird, he didn't appear to be malicious. Not as malicious as he was acting last night, at least. Besides, a bad heart couldn't cook good soup. Well, probably not. She just made that up, but it sounded correct, and that was all that mattered. Anyway, she-

thwump

A paw landing on the top of her head broke her from her daydream, which was also about the same time she realized she was daydreaming. Bad habit.

Shaking his paw off of her head, she intended to give him a piece of her mind for being so.. weird last night, but found she was unable to. It was those damned eyes of his. She couldn't seem to think of much when she looked at them. Or do much. They were the reason she was convinced into following him to his house last night. She would have never agreed to such a thing in a normal state of mind.

As he tapped her again, he realized why she was having such a hard time not acting like a scarecrow.

"I forgot about that. It's been quite some time since I've had a guest over!" He closed his eyes, and her head felt much clearer. That grin of his remained, though. "Is this better?" He began to hum to himself, slightly swaying back and forth. It was almost cute. Not cute enough to dissuade her from nearly shouting at him.

"Why did you have me come here? Furthermore, why in the world did you have to do.. whatever it is you did last night to get me to follow you?" She put on her best annoyed face, and, even though his eyes were closed, hoped he could feel the intensity of her stare. It's best that his eyes were closed, really. It's rather difficult for a Dratini to appear intimidating, they usually end up looking adorable. He stopped humming.

"Hm? I thought you knew. Didn't you stay up for the better part of the night to tell me your stories? Some of them were pretty good, and it would be a shame if they were never put into a book." He walked over to the fireplace at the far end of the room and extinguished it with his tails. The room immediately dimmed, but other than that remained perfectly visible. The sun had already begun to rise and was letting a small amount of light in through the curtained windows.

She looked around as he tended to the soup pot hanging above the remnants of the fire and realized he had a lot of books laying about.. could he have written all of them? Yes, he did. She remembered now, he told her he'd been a writer for.. quite some time? He didn't tell her a number. Come to think of it, he didn't tell her much of anything. His answer didn't make much sense, either. How could he have known she had stories? She felt that he was being a bit deceitful, and that annoyed her.

"That's ridiculous! You expect me to believe you just followed the trail of a story with your nose to my home? That you just.. magically knew I could entertain you all night?"

He kept his grin, breaking it only to make a face as he tasted the leftover soup. "I don't expect you to believe anything, but, yes! I knew you had stories I hadn't heard of yet, and I wanted to write them down. As for my methods, would you have come with me any other way? Be honest, now."

She shook her head, still angry. "Of course not! Who would want go with you? Do you have any idea how you came off? I thought you were going to eat me!" His eyebrows raised at that remark. "Why couldn't you have just left me alone!?"

With his eyebrows lowering and grin fading, he appeared to consider her questions for a bit. He didn't give her an answer she wanted to hear. "I can still eat you, you know. This soup isn't nearly as good as I'd like it to be." She backed up a bit, startled. "You're all alone in this room with me, and I don't believe you have any more stories to tell." He opened his eyes and started to move towards her, smiling, all teeth.

She couldn't move or struggle, it was those eyes again. As he drew closer, she figured at least her stories would live on. He didn't seem to be lying about writing them down into a book.. she just wished she could have read it. She closed her eyes and waited for the inevitable.

Then she heard laughter, and opened her eyes. He was laying on the floor, laughing! Really? Was everything just a huge joke to him? Tears started to blur her vision.

"What is your PROBLEM!? Do you have any idea, just how, how-"

He stopped laughing and looked at her, but this time her thoughts remained clear. "Ah! I didn't mean to make you cry. That line about you being eaten was too ridiculous, I couldn't resist."

He seemed genuinely apologetic, or at least, she thought so. She couldn't quite tell what he was thinking; he kept that infuriating cheerful expression on at all times.

---

She sniffed, still angry. He seemed to consider her for a moment, then stood up and went back to the table that held the book. He opened it and gestured to her with his tails. "Would you like to see your stories? I altered them slightly to make them a bit more.. substantial? I don't think I detracted too much from the original message, but you can be the judge, if you'd like."

She got a bit less angry. She did want to see what became of the tales she told, but.. She approached the table hastily and scanned the pages, furrowing her brows at random intervals to give the illusion of comprehension as she looked at his handwriting. After a while, she ended up at blank pages of the book and realized it wasn't done being written in. She wanted to read it when it was complete.

"Well? Did I mangle the stories beyond all comprehension? Could you tell they were still yours?" He got closer to her with each question until he was pressed up against her, his eyes full of hope.

She didn't know how to say it any other way. "I don't know how to read."

Whatever light was in his eyes died out, and she could physically feel his disappointment. It seemed to branch out from him and hit her like a wave, and she was suddenly just as sad as he was. His grin was gone, and his cheerful expression now looked rather.. well, not cheerful at all.

"Ah. I'm sorry to have kept you." He slumped down, head resting atop the book. "If you head out the door and head south for a while, you'll eventually end up at your house." His tails briefly pointed in the direction she should head before falling back down to the ground.

She felt a bit sorry for him. Even though she was scared half to death by him just a bit ago, he did give her a (rather good) meal, and a place to stay in return for doing something she enjoyed doing anyway. Plus, he was a writer, and she always loved the idea of being one. That was just a dream of hers though, as she lacked the ability to read. Or the ability to hold any kind of writing instrument, having no hands and all.

The aura of depression coming from him was maddening, yes, but the silence was far worse coming from him. She tried to get him to talk, or at least do something other than mope sadly on the table.

"Hey, someday, when I learn how to, I'll come back and read your books." One of his ears flicked, but he remained silent. "I'll take you up on being a judge on how well you interpreted my stories, all right?"

No response. His ears flicked again, but she wasn't sure if that really meant anything.

"I'll be going now. Thank you for the soup, and thank you for writing my stories down. I've, well, always liked the idea of being a writer, but, you know. Thanks." She was just about to head towards the door when she heard a.. snicker? She looked back. He was standing up, and he was wearing that stupid grin again. Was the depression just an act?

He pulled on her tail, and his face took on a slightly sinister tone. "Where do you think you're going to learn how to read? I've seen your house, it was a pile of sticks. You live nowhere near civilization! Do you expect me to wait forever for you to come back? Maybe I should eat you after all." He smiled again, but she knew better now.

"If you eat me, I'll never read your books, and you'll never know if you.. what was it, mangled my stories beyond comprehension? You said I could be the judge, and I'm going to take you up on that offer."

He seemed to consider her comeback. Briefly. "You have a good point. I will just have to wait until after I receive your judgment to eat you. Is that acceptable?" She hoped he wasn't being serious, but given how many times he'd tricked her in the past few minutes..

"Sure. You should wait a bit longer than that, though. I'd like to read all of these books.. I've never actually read one." She looked around the room again, unable to count just how many of them lay scattered about. "That may take some time, as you seem to have quite a bit stockpiled here."

He laughed. "You have no idea! This isn't all of them, I have a basement and an attic full of dusty old notes and journals, some even older than I am."

That last statement reminded her that she knew next to nothing about him.

"Just how old is that, anyway? You haven't told me a thing about yourself, other than how you like to write, and how you make bad jokes about wanting to eat me. What is your name? Actually, do you even know my name? Are we really just complete strangers?"

He shrugged. "I wouldn't say complete strangers, as we did spend last night together. We even slept in the same bed."

She blinked. "Did you really..?"

More laughter from him. "I only have one bed. Did you think I was going to sleep on the floor? Anyway, as for your other questions.. I don't know for sure how old I am, as it doesn't really matter to us. To me, at least. I also don't need your name to write your stories down, although now that you mention it, I should credit you for being the source."

She couldn't hide her joy when she heard that last bit of info. "Would you really? I mean, I've never had my name written down before, much less written down as a story teller!"

He cocked his head to the side, obviously amused at how happy she was. "Sure. Tell you what, why don't I take the day off from work? I'll start teaching you how to read. I can't help you with writing, you'll have to figure something out yourself."

She would finally be taught how to read? Her day was turning out better than she could have hoped for. Granted, the bar was set pretty low, as she started the day hoping she could simply escape his house without getting turned into soup.

He poked her, and she realized she was caught daydreaming again. "By the way, what is a Dratini doing out here, so far away from the sea? Don't tell me you were blown here by that blizzard." She brushed his paw away again.

"Hah, no. I, uh, left the sea not too long ago. I wasn't really content with living there. You see, I love telling stories, and the other Pokemon there liked hearing them, but I was getting bored with just telling the stories. I wanted to read them as well, but.. we can't really.. have books.. in the water, so.. long story short, I decided to live on land. I figured I'd have a better chance of learning how to read here rather than back out there." She glared at him. "Unless you were just kidding about teaching me how to read."

He sniffed the air, seemingly ignoring that last part. "Ahh.. that's why I was able to find you so easily last night. I was wondering why you smelled so strongly of stories. I consider myself lucky to find someone who knows even a single one that I haven't already heard of."

Smelling like.. stories? Whatever, he was probably just being weird again. Weird and evasive. She pressed him again.

"Well? Did you really mean what you said about teaching me how to read, or do you intend to make me cry again?" For a brief moment she thought his composure broke, but she couldn't tell if it was just her imagination.

"I wouldn't dream of making someone cry over the prospect of learning! Heaven knows there are already so little Pokemon who willingly read! You're pretty much my find of the century, and I don't intend to let you leave here easily."

She blushed. He seemed kind of nice, when he wasn't tricking her. Or scaring her half to death. Or being weird. Or dodging her questions. He was still doing that last one, which was slightly annoying. She was going to say something about it, but he spoke before she could.

"Before we get started, there's one thing I need from you." He said nothing more, instead choosing to look at her inquisitively. She simply stared at him for a few moments, wondering what he could want before finally realizing it.

She told him her name, and he told her his. He was weird, but definitely not malevolent, and she could deal with that. They spent the day together.