Chapter 9: Boiling Point

When Ash woke up, everything was a mixture of black and white. It was still dark out, but everything was now covered in a thin layer of glowing white snow, illuminated by the full moon directly above him. The air had grown much colder since he had fallen asleep, and Ash quickly found himself shivering, the fire having been put out by the snow long ago.

He brushed the snow off of his watch to check the time. 12:19 AM. They had fallen asleep at about 7 PM, so Brock had been keeping watch for five hours now. Ash figured he would switch off with Brock now, since he was already awake. Ash looked around to see Dawn and Pikachu blanketed by the sheet of snow, yet Brock was nowhere to be found.

Before he could wonder where he had gone, he heard a faint grunting sound behind him. He turned to see Brock hanging from a tree branch, lifting himself with his arms before letting himself descend again.

Brock noticed now that Ash had woken and was giving him a strange look. "What?" he asked.

"Brock, are...are you doing pull ups?" asked Ash, incredulously.

"Sure," replied Brock matter-of-factly, "why should running for my life keep me from getting out of shape?"

"Yeah, I suppose," said Ash, "but you're done for the night. I'm taking your watch shift, OK?"

Brock gave a chuckle as he released his grip from the tree branch. "Alright," said Brock, "if you say so." He walked over to where Ash was sleeping and lay down.

Ash, meanwhile, sat down opposite Brock, bringing with him the two garbage bags of supplies, which were beside Dawn. He removed everything from the bags and laid them out in front of him. Among the supplies were the two empty backpacks, three waist belts, hunting knives, wood axes, and two winter jackets (Ash was still wearing his), as well as other, smaller supplies.

He perused the loot, wondering how he should divvy up the supplies among each backpack. He started with the knives, putting one of each into a waist belt, one for each of them. He then took the two wood axes and put one in one of the empty backpacks, the other in his own. He would've put it in Brock's other backpack, but Ash thought it would be wrong to snoop in his and Dawn's backpacks.

Most of the supplies that were left on the ground now were smaller items; matches, batteries, flashlights, smaller things that would still prove to be important. He divided all of these supplies into three equally-sized piles, and then distributed each pile into a backpack; one pile into Ash's own backpack and the other two piles each going into one of the new backpacks.

Now that Ash was done with the supplies, now he went to gauge the current food and water supply. He had put this off until the end, since he didn't quite want to know how much food they had, in case it wasn't much. He grabbed the bags of food from Dawn's end and quietly dumped the cans of food onto the forest floor. Judging by the size of the pile, plus whatever Ash thought the others had in their backpacks, they had enough food for about three weeks, give or take. "Not long enough," thought Ash, remembering that the trip to Canalave would take at least four weeks. "We'll have to cut our meals," he thought, "probably to two meals a day, one for the other Pokemon. Oh, man…." He was devastated at the thought of cutting their daily meals, especially for the Pokemon; would they be able to handle it?

Ash moved on to the water bottles. Counting the empty ones, his own water bottle, and Dawn's and Brock's, which had been filled up two days prior, they had about a day and a half worth of water. They'd have to find some sort of stream, or a creek, Ash thought. That, or die of thirst in a week, tops. They were relatively close to Mt. Coronet, though, so couldn't they-

"I'm telling you, I think he went this way!"

Ash didn't even react before taking refuge behind a bush. He didn't dare look to see who it was. For all he knew, it was someone who was looking for them specifically. He had no choice but to listen to the voices and pray that neither Brock nor Dawn would wake up.

"How do you know?" said a voice, "we haven't even seen him!"

"That might've been his footprint back there!" said the first voice. This voice was deeper, gruffer than the other.

Ash heard the slap of flesh against flesh as a shout rang out. "Explain to me, then," shouted the second voice, "Why that's the only one we've seen for miles!"

He couldn't help it anymore; he simply had to see who was out there. He ever so slowly inched his head from behind the tree until his left eye protruded from behind it. Standing about a hundred feet off in the distance were four men. Ash couldn't tell what any of them looked like, but one of them seemed to glow in some sort of white jumpsuit, while the others wore dark grey ones. Ash immediately recognized those as Team Rocket uniforms. Three of them, including the one in the lighter jumpsuit, were shouting at each other, while the fourth seemed to have no interest in the squabble, leaning against a tree a few yards off.

"Wait a minute," shouted a third voice, "his footprint points that way, let's go in that direction and see what we find!" Ash saw a hand extend away from him, but from the corner of his eye he saw two blinking orbs. He turned to see Dawn, her eyes widened; obviously scared about the fact that Team Rocket was standing a mere hundred feet away from them.

Ash, trying to remain calm, moved his finger up to his mouth to signal Dawn to stay quiet. He looked around him, trying to find anything that might help them get out of this situation. He noticed next to his foot a small rock, no bigger than an acorn. He could use it as a distraction, he thought, and give them time to quietly flee.

He looked back over at Dawn, who had quietly gathered her bags and had woken Brock and Pikachu. He motioned to them to get their attention, and then signaled what he was going to do; he pointed to the rock in his hand, then made a small throwing motion, then pointed to the direction that they should run in. Dawn nodded, as did Brock. Pikachu climbed on Brock's back, taking hold of his backpack.

Ash took a deep breath and lobbed the rock in the Grunts' general direction, hoping it would fly past them and land on the ground past the Rockets. Thankfully, it did. Ash couldn't hear it land, but the Rockets must have been able to, because they stopped shouting at each other and immediately turned their heads toward the sound. As they walked toward it, the fourth grunt, who lagged in following the others, suddenly turned his head toward Ash.

Ash was practically a statue, his whole body still as he stared into the grunt's eyes. He was sure that the grunt was doing the same. Had he seen him? What about the others? The grunt continued to stare towards him for what seemed like a full minute to Ash." If you're gonna kill us, he thought, don't keep me waiting!"

The grunt didn't keep him waiting, but he didn't kill him, either. He simply turned in the direction that the other grunts had and walked off, disappearing in the darkness of the forest.

Ash didn't waste any time scooping up his supplies and throwing them back in the garbage bag. He'd have to resort them again, but if it kept them alive longer, he'd be willing to do it. "Run!" he hissed at Dawn and Brock, and they quickly got up and ran in the opposite direction that the grunts had gone, their bags hastily slung over their backs.

Ash wasn't sure how far they had run. He didn't even know what direction they had gone. For all he knew, they could be running from Canalave, and therefore making the trip that much longer. All he knew was that after only two minutes, Dawn was on the ground, gasping for breath. Brock was kneeling next to her, holding a bottle of water to her mouth.

Ash sighed and looked around at his new locale. They had left the firepit ring back at their old hideout, which was no longer safe to go back to. But Ash wasn't comfortable sleeping out in the open anymore. No, they had to be concealed, he thought.

"Dawn," he said, turning to her. She wasn't wheezing anymore, but she was taking large sips from the water bottle. "Do you think you can climb this tree? We need to stay hidden." He gave her an almost apologetic look.

Dawn nodded, looking ready to cry out of exhaustion and fear. "If you want," she said between breaths, "I can keep watch for the rest of the night."

"Hell no!" Ash immediately said, "You need to rest. I'll keep watch till morning."

Dawn didn't feel like putting up any sort of a fight, so she wordlessly climbed an adjacent tree and disappeared in the canopy as Brock did the same. Ash went over to Dawn's tree and climbed it, not willing to leave Dawn alone. He felt bad about leaving Brock out, but he'd be fine on his own. "Right?"

She had laid herself down on a wide branch, her back up against the tree itself. She was laying her blanket across her body as Ash said, "You okay?" Dawn turned toward to Ash and nodded, clearly not in the mood to talk. "Just try to sleep," Ash said, "you'll feel better in the morning."

Dawn closed her eyes as Ash climbed further up the tree. He found a branch big enough to support him, and sat down on it, Pikachu lying on his lap. The air was much cooler due to the elevated altitude, and Ash had only his jacket and his thin blanket to keep them warm. They did the job well, but Ash and Piakchu couldn't help but shiver.

He looked down at Dawn, who was about 15 or so feet below Ash's branch. Even from all the way up there, Ash could tell she was shivering from the stifling cold. He would be warm enough without his blanket, he thought, so he climbed down to Dawn and wordlessly covered her in his blanket before climbing back up to his own branch. When he got back to his branch, he looked down to see Dawn, who had cocooned herself in her second blanket, no longer shivering, sleep having finally overtaken her. "Good, Ash though, feeling just a little bit more proud of himself. He'd be colder, but at least Dawn would get to be warm.

He didn't know what to do with himself, now that he would be up for the rest of the night. On a whim, he decided to pull out his wallet, see what was in there. Ash first took notice of twenty dollars cash, which had been leftover from last week. "Might be useful," thought Ash, as he moved on to see what else he had left in there.

He pulled out his Trainer card, but right away Ash noticed something different. While normally having a bright red background, it had transitioned to a dark grey. A black square was completely covering Ash's picture, and all of his trainer information was gone. "What the hell?" Ash thought, "what happened to my Trainer Card?" He flipped it over to see that a wall of text had appeared on the back of the Card;

THIS TRAINER CARD HAS BEEN REVOKED AND THE TRAINER TO

WHICH THIS BELONGS, ASH KETCHUM, HAS BEEN FOUND

UNSUITABLE FOR CERTIFIED TRAINING IN ACCORDANCE WITH

SINNOH GOVERNMENT POLICIES.

Ash immediately recognized this as Team Rocket's work, since the Sinnoh Government was no longer in control. "Great," Ash thought, "just great!" He snapped his trainer card in two and threw it as far as he could, all while stifling his screams of rage. First Cyndaquil, then Dawn's arm, then Brock's ear, and now his Pokémon weren't even legally his?!

Pikachu licked Ash's cheek a few times, which made him feel better. He presumed that the same thing had happened to Dawn's Trainer Card, but decided not to bother her about it until morning. After all, she had been through enough today as it was. He put his wallet in his back pocket and simply stared at the wall of leaves that hid him.

For Jasper, breakfast consisted of 3 small, pre-wrapped sausage links and eggs, the same as the grunts had. It was nowhere the delicacies he was used to back at Rocket Headquarters, but he was adept to change. He was taking the whole wilderness survival thing quite well, even though he had never been a trainer.

Two of the grunts went foraging for any roaming trainers, leaving Jasper and one of the grunts by the fire they had used to make their meal (using a firepit ring that someone had left behind). This grunt was a quiet one, Jasper noticed, and he seemed pretty shift, too, as far as the average grunt went. He hadn't even met him until yesterday, when he first met his self-appointed search party. "Why did I pick this guy again?" he thought.

"Hey," said Jasper to the grunt, "could you tell me your name again?"

The grunt shot him an intimidating, almost menacing look. "Xander," he mumbled, before turning his head back to his meal. He didn't look at all interested in his food or in Jasper.

"Don't talk much, do you Xander?" said Jasper. "You've barely said a word since we left Hearthome!"

Xander slowly shook his head as he shoved a forkful of eggs into his mouth.

"Why is that?" asked Jasper, who was trying to figure what Xander's deal was. Xander simply shrugged as he scratched at his flaming red hair, also unusual for a grunt.

Jasper was going to say something else to Xander, but at that moment the other two grunts were running back to their fire, a slip of plastic in their hand. "Jasper, sir!" shouted one of the grunts, "you need to see this!"

Jasper took the slip of plastic from the grunts. It was awkwardly shaped, as if someone had torn it into pieces. There was nothing special about it – it was just grey plastic with a black tile of some sort on it.

"What the hell is this?" shouted Jasper, "it's just a useless hunk of plastic!"

"No, it's not!" said one of the grunts, "flip it over!" Xander still had his head lowered towards his food, which he had just finished.

Jasper flipped over the card, not expecting to find anything of interest despite the grunt's beliefs. What he found was a wall of text that, despite being cut off at various points, made Jasper grin wider than he ever had:

-EEN REVOKED AND THE TRAINER TO

-SH KETCHUM, HAS BEEN FOUND

-ED TRAINING IN ACCORDANCE WITH

-NMENT POLICIES

"Xander!" said Jasper, the anticipation beginning to overtake him, "Xander, look at this!" Xander eased his way over to the card Jasper was holding, raising his eyebrows when he read what was on it. "We're right on their heels!" said Jasper. Xander did nothing but return to cleaning the crumbs from his plate.

Not even Xander's subtleness could deter Jasper now, not when this kid was so close by. "Everyone!" he shouted, "get your stuff together, we're leaving now! Looks like we'll be home by sundown!"

"Brock, what's the plan for breakfast?" asked Ash the next morning.

"We need to get moving for a bit before anything," replied Brock, "I don't think it's a good idea to stay in one place for too long."

"Especially after what happened last night," chimed in Dawn.

"Pika piii", agreed Pikachu.

"Alright," said Ash. "Besides that, there's something else we need to talk about."

"Which is?" asked Dawn, the worry already beginning to mount in her voice.

"We need to cut down on our meals," Ash said. "Two meals a day, one for the Pokémon, except for Pikachu."

"Wait a minute," objected Dawn, "why is it that Pikachu doesn't only get one meal?"

"He's never in a Pokéball," Ash replied, "so he's just as active as we are. He needs the energy."

"BULLSHIT!" screamed Dawn, "all he does is sit on your shoulder all day, he doesn't need two meals!" Pikachu was hiding his head in Ash's backpack out of fright of Dawn's anger.

Even Ash was caught off guard by her fury. "Shhhh!" he hissed, "do you want anyone to hear us?"

Apparently Dawn did, because she only grew louder. "It's not fair!" she yelled, "first we're caught in some sick game of hide and seek, and now we can't even go on a full stomach?"

"We simply don't enough have food for the trip to Canalave," Ash calmly explained.

"Don't you see what the Empire's doing?" Dawn cried. "If they don't shoot us, they'll starve us out! They're trapping us in a corner, Ash, can't you see that?"

"Trapped sounds about right," a voice said. Horror instantly bleached Dawn's face, and Ash whipped to see the white jump suited grunt, the same one that he had seen the night before. He pointed a gun to Ash's chest. "Well," he said with a sly grin, "that was easy."

"Just you?" thought Ash, stepping in front of Dawn to protect her, "where's the rest of your-"

The other three grunts that he had seen last night emerged from behind the first, all of them pointing pistols at the trainers.

"Shit."