Tying Loose Ends

The trainer of the Spearow was cursing, he had just run around the tree in the chase, and found his Spearow knocked out, the other three boys paused their steps, then realized their mistake, "Rattata come back!"

The three called back their Ratatta, but only two returned.

"Damn it!"

Then, from under the treeline, Noah revealed himself with a smile, "It looks like the numbers are in our favor now."

Nathan clicked his tongue, "Fine, you win, we will let you go."

Noah shook his head, "You are mistaken, you can let us go, but I don't want you to leave either, but if you give me all your potions, then I don't mind leaving."

The muscular boy scoffed, "We don't have any food, and it's against the rules to take our other supplies, what can you do to me?"

Noah nodded, "Of course you are right, I can't loot your supplies, but there is nothing that says you can't give them to me."

"And why would I do that?"

With a wide smile, Noah commanded, "Top, Nath, Sar, knock the last two Rattatas out."

One of the boys shouted, "Stop! We already said we were leaving!"

"Yeah, there's no point in doing this!"

Top, Nath, and Sar exploded from the bushes and quickly Ko'd the two Rattata with their quick attacks.

Nathan just stood there with a frown afterward, "You've knocked our pokemon out, but how are you going to make us give up the potions?"

Without responding, Noah soon disappeared back into the bushes along with the three Rattata.

.

Once Noah was gone, Nathan looked around alertly, but nothing appeared, so he changed his actions, "Greg, where you at?"

"Over here, I just healed up pidgey."

"Alright, get over here, we are going to find those three pricks."

With one of their Ratatta in the lead, they used its sharp nose to track the three, but they couldn't catch up to them no matter what they tried, they had not eaten well since the event had started, and their stamina was running low.

Instead of following Noah's group, as well as some pleading to their leader, they decided to go back to hunting and, they began following the sounds of Rattata calls or pidgey squawks.

They soon came upon a lone Rattata that didn't seem to notice them.

Nathan smiled, "a Rattata, this is perfect!"

As Nathan and their group organized to take that Rattata down, suddenly the Rattata sped off into the bushes, "Everyone After it!"

A few seconds into their chase, the squawk of a defeated pidgey and Spearow sounded up ahead.

Through the shrubbery, the five boy eyes went wide, standing next to the downed spearow was none other than Noah, Ashley, and Mark.

Nathan spat, "What the hell is your problem?"

With a wry smile, Noah commanded, "Attack their Rattata's!"

After a short battle, Nath, Sar, and Top quickly overcame the three hungry and lower-leveled Rattata.

"Keep attacking the downed pokemon."

Two of the five boys began to beg, "Why are you doing this…"Then Nathan intervened, "Return your pokemon quick, then they won't be able to do anything!"

Noah smiled, "You will each give me one of your potions, or I will keep coming back"

Nathan was in disbelief, "We left you alone, why do you keep causing us problems?"

But he was met with a shrug, "I think we both know you chased us the moment you healed up and gathered together"

The four boys looked towards Nathan with worry, who then said, "Screw you, we aren't giving you a damn thing."

With a final shrug, Noah and his group walked off.

The boy with the spearow whispered to the one with the pidgey, "What's the point of being in a big group anyway? What's the point of a big group if we lose to a smaller one? How about me and you split off, they won't be able to follow all of us."

Nathan looked for a long time when Noah left, then turned back to his group, "Come on, let's go another way, we were split up, but we will be ready next time."

.

Top poked Noah's leg to get his attention, then scratched the soil five times.

Noah smiled, "Ah, they are splitting up already, how many of them?"

In response, Top dug into the ground twice with his paw.

"Are you certain?"

Top nodded, so Noah smiled and turned to his companions, "Alright, we are done here, let's get back to hunting."

Mark looked at Noah in confusion, "How will we get the potions from them then?"

"Ah... that, I was just fishing, whether they gave me some or not didn't matter, my goal was to have them split up, and that way they wouldn't have the chance to properly ambush us five versus three. "

Ashley thought for a moment, "How did you know they would split up?"

Noah only splayed his fingers, "I didn't, but it couldn't hurt to try, and either way our tactics would continue to weaken them, we may not be able to intentionally deal fatal blows, but that doesn't mean the attacks weren't accomplishing anything. Every use of a potion drains stamina, and they have nothing to eat, as long as we stayed downwind Top can accurately locate them, meaning we will know if they try to hunt, and if they can't eat, they will never recover."

Ashley furrowed her brows,, "That seems really… cruel"

Noah sighed as he stroked Top, "What if they recover and come for us again?"

Pausing for a moment, Ashley then reasoned, "They… might not."

.

With that done, the three hunted along with their rattata, and soon it was dark once more.

That night, while Ashley was already asleep in her tent. Mark was awake and poking the makeshift campfire which sent a few sparks up into the air, while next to him, sat Noah, "You've been quiet today, is something on your mind?"

"No, it's just." Mark tried to think of the right words with frustration, "It's really unfair isn't it?"

"What is?"

"Everything" Mark continued, "I don't want to join Team Rocket, I don't want to fight anyone, I just want to go back to how things were before they died… you don't want to do this either, do you?"

Noah stared at his own open hands for a long time, "You should get some sleep, Mark."

When Mark turned in for the night, Noah sat there a while longer, then as if he became tired of staring, he whispered, "I'm really the worst, if you and Ashley weren't here, I would have intercepted the two that split off, and that's because I'm almost positive they would have given me anything I wanted if I promised to leave them alone."

Noah sighed, and let his fingers curl into a fist, "Have I lost all my empathy within a few days in this new world? Is this who I really am?"

He let his hands go again as he looked up at the stars, "No, I still care about a lot of things, and if I want to keep those things I'm going to need to continue steeling my mind."

.

As night turned to day, the three set out for only a short while because they ran into an impasse.

"So this is the 'lake' they mentioned."

Mark and Ashley were surprised by the body of water in front of them, it was called a lake, but it looked more like an ocean than any lake they had seen.

Then again, there were no sandy beaches, but rather lots and lots of rocks as well as gravel. And the water was not salty.

Ashley looked down, "Do you think we can fish from it?"

"I hope so, I don't want to eat pokemon anymore."

Noah rubbed his forehead, I wouldn't mind trying, but what would we use as a hook?"

Mark smiled, with some cheer he regained, " Actually, I can make one, all I need is a knife, which we got, and" He pointed to a tall tree away from the shore, "and a bit of wood."

As Noah watched Mark whittle away at a hunk of oak, he asked "Anything I can do to help?"

Mark shook his head, so Noah sat down and continued to watch, he was interested in learning to make one himself.

"Where did you learn to make this?"

"My mother."

Noah didn't know what to say to that, so he just kept watching Marks hands craft the small piece, and soon it was made.

Inspecting the finished piece, Mark baited it with some raw meat, then tossed in the water while connected to some makeshift twine line.

Noah had the suspicion that catching anything might be difficult. He had this thought due to the fact that the whole island had no edible plants on it, and the Rockets wouldn't provide them with food. If you could get through the test without hunting pokemon, and instead through fishing, then it would defeat the purpose.

It turned out to be true when Mark's line sank, and couldn't be pulled up.

Scrunching his brows, Mark tried again with a new hook and line, but the result remained the same.

"Damn it, what is going on!"

Ashley seemed just as lost, but Noah had an idea, " How about adding a fishing bob to the lure?"

Mark's eyes lit up, "I'll try that!"

.

With the newly created fishing bob and lure thrown into the water, the three waited, then their eyes nearly popped out. From the depths, something large grabbed hold of the lure and dragged it down.

That day the three decided to never venture far into the lakewater.