Pokémon
Fire Red and Leaf Green
Chapter
Eight: Putting Blue in his Place
        Red, Blue, Leaf and I were
finally on our way to Cerulean City, where we would get our next badges! Being
the youngest, I got tired and hungry pretty quick, so we all stopped in a
bright little forest for a picnic. “Yum!” exclaimed Red, stuffing his face.
“I’m sure glad my mom gave me these peanut-butter sandwiches to pack for my
journey!” I poured the lemonade I had bought at Pewter City for everyone.
“Whoa!” said Leaf. “Thanks, Yellow! For a second, I thought we had nothing to
drink!” I smiled. “Don’t mention it!” Then, I took a sip of mine. It was really
sweet. Red sent out Charmy, his Charmander, and his Pidgey. Leaf sent out her
newly-evolved Metapod and her starter, Squirt the Squirtle. Blue also called
out his Pokémon, Geo the Geodude, and Bulba, his Bulbasaur. Pika, my Pikachu,
was already on my shoulder, as usual. Then, Leaf filled up the bowls with
Pokémon Food from the PokéMart. We all smiled. “Dig in, guys!”

        With that, all of our
little buddies started munching away at their long-awaited lunch. They deserved
it, too. They worked really hard to get us our first badges! By the time we were
all happily stuffed, the four of us lay down on the meadow next to the forest
we had our picnic in. Head-to-head, we were on our backs, staring at the sun.
Meanwhile, our Pokémon were in the vicinity of the forest, playing with a
branch they had discovered on our way over. We all sighed. Red patted his
stomach. “That was delicious!” Leaf nodded in agreement. “Yeah…” The next few
moments were silent, and we were all just tiredly gazing at the sky. We all
sighed. The moment felt somewhat… sacred. I don’t know why, but it was. Very,
very special. And I was pretty sure we all felt it. Something special was about
to happen, and it was about to come from Leaf. That’s what it felt like. She
inched a tad closer to Red, who, to my dismay, blushed a little.  I had interest in him. Oh, well, my disguise
would prevent any of that happening, anyway. It was a hard life. Leaf smiled.
She gently held his hand. “Red…” And, then Blue let out an enormous belch. I
was slightly relieved, yet still sorry for Leaf. It was pretty obvious what was
coming next. Blue didn’t seem to be catching on. Annoyed, Leaf flat-out slapped
him in the face, got up, and walked away in a huff. “So immature,” she
muttered, followed by a lot of salty sailor talk I’d rather not mention.

        Blue frowned and yelled at
Leaf. “What did I do this time? You can’t get mad at me for existing!” This
seemed to annoy her more. “Shut up.” She walked away. Blue fell back on the
grass next to Red and I, and muttered to himself. Red and I just looked at each
other and shrugged. Red got up and dusted his jeans. “I’m going to… go talk to
Leaf. I think she was trying to… tell me something.” He turned his cap
backwards and dashed into the woods.

        My heart sank. Blue’s
belch didn’t seem to be enough. I was ashamed of myself, though, for thinking
like that. I helplessly plopped my head back on the grass. I tried to think
positive and look for the bright side of the whole thing. At least Leaf, who
was by then one of my best friends, was happy. But then, the negative side kept
on haunting me. I was depressed, and there was nothing I could do. In fact, I
was so upset that I even wished I wasn’t born with the gift of healing Pokémon and
reading their thoughts. It was why I disguised a boy in the first place. So
Team Rocket wouldn’t hunt me down. But thinking like that made me even more
ashamed of myself. To cut a long story short, I was really messed up. I even
shed a tear or two. Blue stared at me and tried to hold his laughter.
“Somethin’ up?”

        Then, all my sadness and
jealousy immediately turned to anger. This had to be the last time Blue ticked
me off, and I had to make it clear to him. I focused all my anger and might
into my firmly tightened fist, and delivered a brutal punch to his face,
finally putting him in his place. His pupils became smaller, and he didn’t know
how to react. “What the-“ BAM! I sent him crashing to the ground, leaving him
speechless. He rubbed his badly bruised cheek and stared at me in shock. He got
up and backed off a step or two. Then, he stopped himself and frowned. “No.
Future champion Blue is not some sort of coward. You’ll pay for this, punk!” He
ran toward me, raising his fist in the air and yelling. I ducked just in time,
and his fist shot right above my head. Then, unfortunately, all that sadness
and jealousy that had turned to anger changed once more, this time into fear.
“Sorry, B-blue! I-“ He threw the picnic table aside, still walking over to me.
“What did you just call me?” he said, growing angrier and raising his fist once
more. I was cornered now, against a thick-trunked tree.

        “Blue!” I retorted. “I
called you Blue. You’re not my master. You’re a moron.” He growled, and it was
lights out for me.  I remember waking up
to find a worried Red. He seemed relieved. “Yellow!” he smiled, giving me a
hug. “You’re alright!” I felt an ice pack on my left eye. “Ouch.” Red sat back
down. “What happened?” I took a deep breath and told him everything. The only
thing I left out was my jealousy of him and Leaf. He still thought I was a boy.
In fact, Leaf was the only one who knew. She had met be three years before,
after all. Red looked surprised. “Gosh… I never knew Blue was so… brutal.” I
felt bad. “It was my fault though. I started the fight.” He made a confused
face. “Um… why?” Busted! I had to think of something else fast. “I, uh, was
thinking of… my parents, and… he laughed at me for shedding a tear.” He got up.
“Oh. Well, get better soon. I’m going to go talk to Leaf.” I looked back at the
sky as he walked away. Blue’s whereabouts were beyond me, and I liked it better
that way. I felt myself get drowsy, and took a little nap before we were ready
to get going again. I couldn’t think of how the four of us could travel as a
group anymore. I pushed the thought aside for awhile, it was for the best.
Then, I dozed off.