[A/N: The - - - indicate journal entries.]



- - - Dear journal,
My name's Misty.  I'm fourteen and under much stress.  In fact, the only reason why I'm writing in this stupid thing is because my friend thinks it will do good for me and my "suppressed emotions".  I'm tried, but the thought about how I will never see my best friend again... It still depresses me no matter what I do.  
Oh my god.. I'm crying again.  I hate this.  I usually never cry, now it's the only way I can sleep at night.  
Crap.  I just broke another pencil..  I hate this stupid journal.  I want to..  I want to rip it. - - -


Brock heard a rather large crash coming from Misty's room.


- - - Brock just came in.  He didn't even knock.  I think I hate him, too.  Ah, I shouldn't think like this..  It's not good for me, I know.  He saw me crying.  I hate that too.  He wasn't at all mad at all about the lamp I broke...   Aw shit, that's my lamp.  Now I have to clean it up..  again..  

My room's a mess.  I broke anything needed to be broken already.  Brock had to save what he could before I totaled everything.  I was just too mad.  I think I still may be upset.

When Brock came in, he saw what I wrote.  I would have stopped him if I wasn't too busy crying.  He told me to explain why I'm mad as well as what I feel in this dumb journal.  I screamed at him and he left.  I'm tired of screaming...

Okay, so you want to know why I'm mad?  I might tear this up later, but if I could just write this, maybe I'll feel better.  Or.. that's what they promised.. - - -



:Flashback:

"Whatever you see or hear, stay here."

"No!  Don't even think about it!"

"I have to, Misty!  It's the only way!"

"But it can't be...  You can't do this, Ash, you're too young!"

"Don't tell me what I can't do!"

"Please let me go instead!"

"I can't!  I have to, I'm the only one allowed to!"

"Stop being so damn persistent!  You're gonna get killed!!"

"It's better than everyone else dying!"

"No!  Stop!"

"It's too late, Misty..."  

"So, you've decided now, have you?  Then, it is settled."  Said the deep, majestic voice that bellowed from the clouds from above.   The bright flash consumed him whole.  The earth rocked and shuttered with the sudden explosion.   Everyone screamed, except for Ash.  It happened so quickly and ended just as quickly.  

Misty felt her heart snap in two as a simple shred of his jacket fell across her shoulder, not daring to look up from the squealing Togepi in her arms.  Something warm and wet splattered across the side of her face.  Blood.  And it wasn't hers.


:End Flashback:


"All because he wanted to save the world... again..."  She mumbled, feeling her heart wrench.  "Well, it was either me or him...but..."

Misty jumped as her pencil jar suddenly tipped over.  The many pencils splattered out onto the floor near her feet, some broken from the fall.  She cursed quietly under her breath and leaned over to pick them up.  In the process, a tiny black feather invaded her view and fluttered in the air then landed directly on the back of her pencil-filled hand.   She shook it off, but before it landed to the floor, it swift-turned in the air and landed on her hand again.  Angrily, she grumbled at it and shook it away again and removed her arm, setting the pencils on back into the jar she had quickly turned over.

She closed the black and white splattered journal with a sigh.  
'It's so hot..'  she thought, twirling the butterscotch candy around her tongue, 'I need some water or something...'

After hiding the journal underneath her pillow, she skipped to Brock's kitchen.  She fetched a tall glass from a squeaky cabinet and filled it half-way with water.  She turned the faucet as well as her heel as she headed back to her room with the glass in hand.

With another sigh, she sat down on her bed and switched her almost-beaten radio from CD to radio-mode and the light beat of "where is the love" filled the room.

The pillows felt so good...  Especially when you haven't had any sleep for a long time.  

She closed her eyes, feeling the soft sunlight that intruded through the open window lightly warm her feet.  It wasn't long before she fell asleep.





Misty woke suddenly, a small bead of sweat trickled down her chin.  It was a nightmare.. that's all.  The room looked incredibly dark; the sun must've gone down already.  Everything seemed a bit blurry and she rubbed her eyes, trying to adjust her vision.   'How long was I asleep?'  she thought.

Just when she began to realize that the music playing as she fell asleep was strangely missing, she felt a light, tickly feeling on her left knee.  She jerked it upwards in shock to see a rather large black feather spring through the air and settle on her other knee.   She sat up and brushed it off.

Suddenly, the door began to creak as it was slowly pushed open.  Misty gasped at the sound and felt her pulse react to the fear that had suddenly caught her throat.  The door stopped opening about an inch or two.  Misty shakily got off her bed.   The walk to the creepy door seemed everlasting as her suspicion stretched whatever fear possessed her.  As she reached it, her hand made its way to the doorknob, but that's when she froze, as if forgetting what to do next.  

The door jerked open another inch, causing her to scream, and a tiny black feather wafted into her room, uninvited, and landed on her nose.  She blew it off and closed the door, humored.

But when she turned around, there was Ash, sitting on her bed, his back to her.  He had the large black feather in one hand.

"A-Ash?  Ash?!"

He didn't move, she noticed, not an inch.  So, she tried again.

"Ash, I thought you were dead!"

At the instant she began to jog to the bed, the room stretch itself and she felt as if she was running in place.  Eventually, she was moving, and that was when he spoke.

"Stop."

He slowly turned around, revealing his pale, torn face with a purplish blood that dribbled down the side of his face.  His eyes were red and glossy as well as filled with tears.  His hair was tinted grey from what looked like dust.  Misty tried to scream, but no sound left her mouth in the moment of panic.

"I'm not dead."  He said slowly, standing up from the bed, "Everyone just thinks that I am..."  

Misty gulped.  "Well... h-have you looked in a mirror recently?"  She motioned to the mirror in the far corner of her room.  He looked a bit surprised and turned around to look in the mirror.  "What's wrong?"  He asked.

Misty gasped when he turned around to face her again.  "Oh my god..."  Ash looked like Ash.

Suddenly, he was in front of her, gripping her shoulders harshly.  "You have to find me Misty!  Whatever it takes, you have to find me!  No matter what!  Find me!!"  Hundreds of sienna colored vines abruptly shot forth from her floor and rapidly twisted around his body, snaking around his neck and shoulders and arms.   His body shook with struggle but the deadly vines continued to wreath around his legs.  With an assuring smile, he timidly traced the large black feather down her cheek before the hellish vines swallowed him up entirely into the ground in an instant second.   "Find me!!!"



For the second time, her eyes opened, slowly but surely.  She shuddered at the cold in the room.  Brock must have left on the air conditioning too high before he went to bed...  Suddenly, she noticed that her left hand wasn't as unoccupied as it usually was.   She froze, unable to scream.  Something was in her hand and she couldn't see it.  No, something wasn't in it, someone was holding it.  

Instantly, she jerked her hand away and the feeling disappeared just as quickly.  She whimpered when she opened it, though.  There was a tiny black feather.