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Jessie chewed absently on her nails, staring at the book in her lap. Page forty-two. She had been on page forty-two for almost fifteen minutes. That wasn't to say she hadn't read it - her eyes had read the words almost seven times over already. It was really a matter of her brain not processing the information. Page forty-two.
Behind her, out of her line of vision, Jessie was aware of James' presence. He was sitting on the bed, tapping his fingers on the wooden table to his right. Jessie grit her teeth as he let out a gusty sigh, the tapping growing steadily louder. The bed springs shifted slightly under his movement, making very soft, barely noticeable squeaking noises.
Jessie noticed.
She let out a deep sigh and shifted her weight in the uncomfortable wooden chair, focusing back on her book. Page forty-two. Above her, the dim light source swung back and fourth, causing shadows to dance along the walls. The room seemed to creak and groan, the sound of heavy footsteps above adding to the cacophony. Creak. Groan. Tap. Squeak. Sigh. Tap. Tap. Tap. Jessie shifted again, grinding her back teeth together. Page forty-two. Page forty-two.
With a shout, Jessie hurled the book across the room, feeling oddly satisfied as it slammed into the wall and bounced off, landing roughly on the floor, its pages skewed. She was out of her chair, staring at it, her chest heaving up and down with deep, slightly hysterical breaths. James sat up on the bed in alarm, his eyes wide. He quickly swung his feet off the bed and walked over to Jessie's side, putting his hands on her shoulders. She was forced to tear her eyes off her fallen book and looked wildly at James. She almost considered yelling at him, but didn't. Instead, she leaned forward in an embrace, burying her head in his shoulder, almost sobbing.
James patted her back awkwardly, slightly confused. "Jessie...?" he began cautiously. With a sudden movement, Jessie pushed herself out of James' embrace and stalked back over to the desk, collapsing down in the chair, a scowl on her face. James crossed his arms over his chest and took a reflexive step backwards. He knew this face.
"I hate this boat!" Jessie shouted abruptly. "I hate being trapped in this cabin. Why won't the damn rain STOP?" James opened his mouth to reply but was cut off. "I mean, couldn't The Boss splurge just a little bit on us and get us a flight into the Western Continent?" continued the angry red-head, pounding her fist on the table. "It's not as though he doesn't have any money. But oh, no. He decided, 'Let's let them take a boat. Boat's are cheap and there really isn't that much of a rush. We're just dealing with a psychopathic serial killer!'" she seethed, standing up, starting to pace the cabin's length. "Okay, maybe the boat wouldn't have been so bad, but..."
"Ship," James said quietly. Jessie spun on her heal and glared at him. James' cringed.
"What?"
"It's a ship," James explained. "Boats are smaller."
"I don't give a damn what it is!" Jessie practically yelled, getting right up in James' face. "All that matters to me is that were on a floating wooden thing, in the water, it's been raining for all three days we've been on it, and we're stuck in this tiny cabin! I'm sick of reading, I've mentally sung every show tune I know, I don't want to play cards, the sounds on this ship are driving me nuts, and if I have to eat one more disgusting meal prepared by that cook in the other room, I'm going to be violently ill! If I don't figure out something to do, I swear, I'll---"
Jessie was cut off as James leaned forward and delivered a very powerful kiss. His arms wrapped around her, the only sound in the room being the occasional creak of the ship as it swayed in the storm. Jessie was stunned for a moment, her eyes going wide, her body tense. It took a few seconds for her to relax, then her body molded against his and her eyes closed. After a few moments, they pulled apart.
"Uh," Jessie said intelligently, blinking rapidly. James smiled at her, his eyes twinkling, his expression mischievous.
"Well, since we're no longer interested in reading and since we're out of show tunes, that doesn't leave us with many options," James began, shrugging his shoulders slightly. Jessie shook her head a few times to clear it, then echoed James' expression.
"You know what?" Jessie replied, hooking her arms behind James's neck. "I think I just got an idea of what we can do."
"Thank you, thank you," Ryo said, standing up and bowing to his appreciative audience.
"Every time I try to make one of those, it always crashes nose-first to the ground," the green-haired computer whiz said with a shake of her head. Ryo walked over to the bed and flopped down next to Reece.
"It takes practice," he explained. "When I was younger, I used to spend a lot of time in this old abandoned paper factory by our house. I had plenty of time and plenty of resources to practice making those to my heart's content."
"And your parents didn't mind that you spent all your time in an abandoned factory?"
Ryo shook his head. "It was just my Dad, then. He doesn't care much of what I do anymore."
"That's kinda sad," Reece replied with a frown.
"Oh, it's not like that," Ryo said hurriedly, sitting up. "I just never cause him any trouble so, sometimes, he hardly notices me. After Mom died, Dad was really sad." Ryo frowned and bit his lip before continuing. "I didn't want to make it any harder on him, so I just decided to stay out of his way. I think he's coping better these days."
"That's good." Reece let out a gusty sigh. "You're really lucky, you know?"
"How's that?" Ryo asked, tilting his head to the side.
"I don't have any parents," Reece replied. "Well, I have parents, of course, but I don't know who they are. My mother gave me up for adoption when I was a baby." Reece began absently picking at the thin quilt on the bed. "I lived in an orphanage my whole life until I was recruited by Team Rocket." She sniffed and shook her head, smiling ruefully. "Every foster home they put me in sent me back saying I was 'too smart for my own good.' Adults don't like it when you're more intelligent than they are."
Ryo laughed and put an arm around her shoulder. "Well, they don't know what a wonderful, kind, brilliant package they passed up."
Reece blushed and then started laughing, too. "Well, Team Rocket obviously thought I was a great package." She paused, wrinkling her nose. "Did that sound right?" Ryo shrugged.
"I don't know. What do you think Meowth?" asked the young man, turning to face the pokémon. "Do you think Team Rocket got a good package?"
"Team Rocket only accepts good packages," the cat replied with a grin. "Of course, sometimes the best wrapped packages have a rotten core, like two renegade Team Rocket members who shall not be mentioned."
Ryo and Reece nodded. With a sigh, Reece leaned back on the bed and stared at the ceiling. "This is boring. Not that I think talking to you guys is dull or anything," she quickly amended, "but you have to admit - three days is a long time to be stuck below decks."
"Well," Ryo said as he also leaned back on the bed, "we could always go above decks and take our chances of getting washed out to sea."
"I don't think The Boss would approve of that," Reece replied, looking over at her friend with a grin.
"No, he wouldn't," Meowth said shortly, not looking up from his papers.
"What are you doing, Meowth?" Reece said after a moment of silence. She sat up and walked over to the desk, her face alight with curiosity. "Anything I could help with?"
Meowth looked up at the young girl. "I hate to dash your hopes, but I really need to do this alone. I'm working on the supply list we're going to need for this little mission." The cat pokémon sighed and rubbed his head. "It's really hard to plan for a mission like this. I know we're going to need equipment for tracking the guy and eventually, taking care of him, one way or another. But, there's hotel costs to figure in, unless we end up camping, plus renting the surveillance equipment and the weapons we'll need - it's a planning nightmare."
"You shouldn't have to do that all alone. I mean, Ryo and I may not be experienced enough to help you, but I'm sure Jessie and James could." Meowth snorted.
"Yeah, right. Like I'd trust those two financial disaster areas with any of the books." Meowth muttered something about a Jacuzzi as he turned back to the books, tapping his pencil on the ledger. "Besides," Meowth continued, "I'm sure those two are... otherwise occupied at the moment. Like you said Reece, three days is a long time to be stuck below decks."
"What do you --- Oh!" Reece put her hand over her mouth as her eyes went wide, her cheeks blushing. Then she scowled. "Meowth!" Behind her, Ryo started laughing.
"You're probably right, Meowth. I haven't heard a sound from their room in over an hour." The blond seemed about to say more when the ship suddenly lurched to the side, knocking Reece off her feet onto the floor. A loud CRACK resounded, the ship continuing to list sideways.
"We... we hit something!" Reece gasped, trying to stand up. "I think the ship is sinking!"
Meowth snorted again. "Figures." He slipped the books into a waterproof carrying case, then into his backpack. Slinging the burden onto his shoulders, he turned to look as Ryo helped Reece to her feet. "Get your stuff," the cat told them. "Make sure it's all waterproof. You two don't have any pokémon, right?" They nodded. "Good. Stay in this room. I'll go get Jessie and James." The cat shook his head as he walked out the door. "Figures," he muttered again. "I hate boats."
Meowth and Reece were working on setting up a large plastic tarp they had found as a sort of tent covering for the raft. At the rate the rain was coming down, they would be underwater in a mater of hours. Jessie grabbed one of the plastic buckets Ryo has spotted on their way to the life rafts and helped James and the young boy bail out the water gathering in the bottom of the raft. After what seemed like an eternity, Meowth let out a triumphant shout as he and Reece managed to mount the tarp on an oar in the middle. Gesturing his orders to the others, they all got under the tarp and tied it down to the sides of the raft. Jessie breathed a sigh of relief as she gazed up, seeing the water roll down the side of the tarp, into the ocean.
"Well," she said a pleasantly as possible, trying to get comfortable in the inch and a half deep sea water in the bottom of the raft, "this trip has certainly turned out to be more interesting than I thought it would." Meowth sniffed and muttered something obscene under his breath.
"Do you think anyone with find us?" Reece asked, her teeth chattering together. They were all shivering with the cold, the rain having been frigid.
"An ocean liner that big will easily be missed when it doesn't come into port," James replied with a sneeze. "And with this giant blue tarp over our bright yellow life raft, they're bound to see us."
"And if they don't," Jessie added, "we can always use the tarp as a sail to get us somewhere. They won't be able to rescue us right away, not in this storm." James sneezed again and they all clustered closer together, trying to find warmth. Jessie looked over at Ryo, who had a thoughtful expression on his face. Even though he was just as wet as the rest of them, he wasn't shivering and didn't seem the least bit cold.
"You okay, Ryo?" she asked, fearing he might have hypothermia. The young blond blinked rapidly and shook himself out of his silent revelry. He turned his brilliant blue-gray eyes to Jessie and for some reason, she felt a little warmer.
"I'm alright, Jessie," Ryo replied hastily. "I was just wondering what we hit."
"Probably and underwater island," James said. "It couldn't have been a reef - we're were still four days from the Western Continent and there are no islands around here. We're too far south for icebergs."
"Www-with our luck, we p-p-p-probably ran into some k-k-k-kind of super-r-r-r rare p-p-pokémon," Meowth moaned, shaking so hard he could hardly see. His fur was soaked completely through. "P-p-p-probably k-k-killed it, t-t-t-t-too." Ryo reached down and swept the shaking pokémon in to his lap, wrapping his arms around him to try to warm him up. All of them huddled around Meowth, preparing to wait out the storm.
Meowth sat on the side of the raft, staring down into the water. So far, he had managed to catch a few fish to keep them fed. They had semi-cooked them over James' lighter. It wasn't delicious, but it was edible. Reece was sitting next to her, her arms over her chest, looking extremely embarrassed.
"Relax, Reece," Jessie said softly. The green-haired computer whiz blushed harder.
"I wish our clothes would hurry up and dry," she replied with a gesture to said articles of clothing draped over the side of the raft. Her voice was desperate and panicky. "I don't like sitting around in my underwear!"
"Doesn't bother me too much," Jessie said with a smirk, sitting up to run an approving eye over James' mostly naked form. He was clothed only in a pair of cotton boxer shorts, leaning against the 'mast' with his hands folded behind his head, his eyes closed. His philosophy was pretty much the same as Jessie's - when you're sitting mostly naked in a life raft in the middle of the ocean, the best thing you can do is sunbathe. "And you have to admit, Ryo isn't half-bad either," Jessie continued, glancing over at the blond. He too was clothed in an attire similar to James. Ryo was perched on the side of the boat with a pair of binoculars, trying to spot land or another ship. Jessie stifled a laugh as Reece blushed even harder.
His skin was now a rather pleasing bronze, which Jessie said was very appealing on him. He didn't mind the sun, really. It was the fish and the lack of interesting surroundings he could do without. He checked the ropes on the sail for the fourth time that day before going to sit next to a nicely tanned Jessie.
"Out of show tunes?" he asked her with a grin. Jessie lifted an eyebrow as she turned to look at him, a smile on her face.
"Unfortunately, yes," replied the redhead, "but given present company, I don't think our former solution will work." She turned to look at Reece and Ryo who were playing a game of Gin Rummy. They had to play without sevens and threes because two cards from each of those sets had been blown overboard and were now floating somewhere in the ocean. Meowth was making a sculpture out of the leftover fish bones they had collected. Jessie had been tinkering with the water purifier that came in the survival kit located on the raft, trying to figure out exactly how it worked. Everyone had warned her that if she broke it, they'd toss her into the water and leave her there.
James pulled Jessie into his lap and wrapped his arms around her. "I know, I know." He sighed deeply. "I think I'm ready to be rescued, now. Playing castaway gets kinda old after the second day or so."
"Hmmm," Jessie replied, snaking an arm around his shoulder. "Then we should probably signal that ship over there."
Everyone in the boat sat up and looked at Jessie, who casually pointed in the direction of a large, sturdy looking ocean liner that had just appeared over the horizon. James, Reece, and Meowth all jumped up and started shouting and waving their arms, signaling to the ship. Ryo walked over to Jessie and sat down next to her, a weak smile on his face.
"The Western Continent, here we come," he said softly, his tone almost sad. Jessie looked at him curiously, but Ryo said nothing, just stared at the approaching boat.