InuYasha Fan Fiction / Cowboy Bebop Fan Fiction / Dragon Half Fan Fiction / Pokemon Fan Fiction / Pokemon Fan Fiction / Tenchi Muyo Fan Fiction / Hellsing Fan Fiction / Crossover Fan Fiction / Words Worth Fan Fiction / Battle Angel Alita Fan Fiction ❯ On the Run ❯ Misdemeanors ( Chapter 17 )

'…' Thought

Chapter 16: Misdemeanors

"The kid's dangerous Mariska, you've got to see that."

"He's only dangerous if you mess with his pokegirls John. I seem to remember you breaking a perp's nose when he made a pass at me."

"Yeah but I didn't cut his head off or put him in a hospital."

"Whatever," Mariska said as John pulled their car up in front of the pokecenter. Having a car was rare, and the fact that detectives were issued one was a big reason a lot cops tried to become one. "Still, the kid didn't do anything to the Joy and she could have sunk them."

"So far he's only hurt other humans, you think he doesn't like hurting pokegirls?"

"Well a Joy is pretty harmless," she said as she climbed out of the car, "Maybe he didn't see her as a threat."

"Or maybe one of his pokegirls knocked her out before he could go psycho-boy on her."

"For a human you have a dim view of your own species," the Hound said as she followed her tamer/partner into the pokecenter.

The pokecenter had returned to normalcy following the robbery, as the only one in the city it couldn't afford to remain closed for long. A dozen tamers and pet owners filled the waiting area, some simply holding pokeballs but a few had their girls out and sitting with them. It was easy to tell the tamers from the pet owners, the pet owners all looked well kept and decent, a few even had on suits but to a man the tamers looked like they hadn't had a bath or a shave in weeks, and they probably hadn't.

John flashed his badge at the girl standing behind the desk. "Is Sarah in today?" he asked.

"Oh Sarah?" the girl chirped as John tucked his badge back away. "She's been on light duty since the robbery, she's upstairs in the recovery rooms. Do you want me to call her for you?"

"No that's fine, we'll go up and talk to her."

"Ok, just be careful," the girl said as they headed up the stairs.

"Light duty huh, I thought Joy's were supposed to be more upbeat then that," John said quietly as they climbed the stairs.

"She's probably beating herself up for getting jumped," Mariska said.

Several storerooms lined the hallway at the top of the stairs but then they passed two rooms on opposite sides of the hall where many large humming machines each held a pokeball, and then they came to the normal recovery rooms. Sometimes a pokegirl's injuries were such that it was more advantageous to keep her out of her pokeball while she recovered, other times her owner just had enough cash and enough sentiment to want to keep them out. Whatever the reason every pokecenter had several human style hospital rooms and in one was where they found the Nurse Joy named Sarah.

"Don't worry Mr. Danes, your Surfmelon will be fine, she just needs a few days of rest outside her pokeball," Sarah assured a man who was sitting beside a light green pokegirl's bed. John and Mariska waited for her to finish. When she exited the room she noticed the two police officers waiting outside and she quickly closed the door. "Can I help you?"

"Your Sarah correct, you were here when the center was robbed."

"Yes," she said hesitantly.

"I'm detective Meloni this is Mariska, we have a few questions for you."

"I already told the last detectives everything I remember," the Joy said nervously.

"We know, we just want to double check a few things for ourselves," Mariska assured her. "Sometimes they miss things you know?"

"Ok," the Joy said.

"Now what exactly happened when you found the thief, what did he do, how did he act?" John asked.

"Well....I heard some noise downstairs, I didn't think much of it so I just went down to see what it was. When I got down there I saw the door to the dispensary was open, I looked inside and I just saw him, sitting there with that gun in his hands. Those things are illegal right?"

"Yes, very," John said.

"He was just crouching there watching the two pokegirls in the cage. One of them was a cat type I think. I said they shouldn't be in there and that's when they all turned to me."

"Why'd you say that, why not just call the police?" Mariska asked.

"I don't know," the Joy said. "I just saw them there and they weren't supposed to be in there...I...I don't really know why I said it. I'm sorry"

"No, it's fine," John assured her. "Go on."

"Well they all just turned and looked at me. The man, he didn't really look mad, he just...he looked surprised, like I wasn't supposed to be there. He grabbed me, drug me into the room and held me down."

Mariska believed her, there were very few pokegirls that a human could genuinely overpower, Joys were one of those few. "You told the last detectives that he pointed a gun at you," Mariska said.

"He didn't really point a gun at me, he hung the big one over his shoulder when he pulled me in. He, he pulled out a little one when he held me down, he never pointed it at me, I don't think he did," the pink haired nurse said.

"How was he acting, how did he behave?" John asked.

"Well he wasn't really mad, he just told me that if I kept quiet I'd been fine...I believed him."

"So he never got really violent?" Mariska asked.

"No...not really," Sarah answered. "But I don't know what he did after I was knocked out."

John nodded in understanding and looked over at his partner. When she didn't have anything more to ask he told the Nurse Joy, "Thanks for going over this with us again, we'll let you get back to work."

Back out front as they climbed back into their car Mariska said to her partner, "I told you he wasn't dangerous unless you were a threat."

"I still don't buy it," John muttered as they drove off.

*****************************

"Ugghhh, I hate that stupid thing," Faye said as she solidified out of the red beam of her pokeball.

"Yeah well deal with it. I walked into that hotel with three girls, I'd hate to have to explain why I walked out with sixteen."

Faye busied herself straightening out her yellow top and trying to get her red suspenders back in place. "Well you could have explained six."

Nikolas looked at the girls around him in the alley across from the hotel, his sisters Isabella and Edora, and Washu had all been out of their balls the whole time. He'd let Faye, Sango, and Gally out in case they ran into any trouble. "Probably but if somebody comes snooping around I'd like the hotel to only be able to say they had some kid with two Titmice and a little human type come through."

Faye huffed and began smoothing out the fur on the backs of her ears.

"Come on, we've got a couple of stops to make before we get out of here," Nikolas said.

"And what would those be?" Washu asked.

"A tamer's store to get some supplies, food and stuff, it's near the local ranch, I wanna stop there and see about getting rid of these two," Nikolas held up the two pokeballs holding the Naga and the Billie they had found in the woods.

The store and the ranch were easy enough to find, the ranch stuck out like a sore thumb, in the middle of dozens of two and three story high office buildings its four meter high walls and single double gate stood drew your attention immediately.

Stopping across the street Nikolas pulled a wad of credits out of his pocket and handed them to Washu. "Take the girls over to the store, buy anything you think we might need. I'll go take care of these two on my own."

"We wanna go with you," Isabella and Edora both complained.

"No both of you go with Washu, the last time you were around a ranch it didn't end well."

"Come on, do as your brother says," Washu said as she pulled on backs of two Titmice's dresses. She may have been their size but Washu was able to easily pull them along. Nikolas' stern look eventually convinced them to do as he said.

Washu led the group towards the supply store while Nikolas headed for the entrance to the ranch.

"I'll stay out here and keep an eye on Nikolas," Gally said as they got closer to the store.

"I will too," Sango said.

Washu paused at the entrance to the store and thought about it for a moment. "Fine, but Sango?"

"Yes?"

"Don't let her punch anyone while you're out here," Washu said with a smirk before ducking into the store with the twins and Faye in tow.

Gally growled and took a menacing step towards the door but Sango's hand on her shoulder restrained her. "She's the alpha you know, one of them, and you did hit Nikolas."

"It was an accident," Gally said as she leaned against the side of the building.

Sango sat down on a crate beside Gally and straightened out her pastel colored kimono before answering. "Yes it was, and if he was normal you would have killed him."

"But he isn't, and I didn't."

"No, but that's not the point. Besides, it was rather funny."

"Oh shut up," Gally said offhandedly as she watched her tamer approaching the entrance to the ranch.

As Nikolas was approaching the ranch Gally watched a pair of humans exit it. The male of the pair looked like he'd been drug through the mud for a kilometer and the red headed female didn't look much better. In short they looked like a typical pair of tamers. Nikolas headed towards them at the same time the man released some cat-type pokegirl from her ball. Gally couldn't make out much detail but the blue haired black furred girl didn't look that highly evolved. Nikolas caught their attention and they talked animatedly for a few minutes. Finally Nikolas handed over a pair of pokeballs and the girl handed him a wad of bills.

"Well that looked easy enough," Sango commented.

"Yeah....I wonder how he unloaded them so fast," Gally murmured as her eyes narrowed.

"That's not our problem, but I'll make sure that Washu and them hurry up none the less," Sango said, before heading inside the store.

Gally met Nikolas half way back to the store and matched pace beside him. "How did you get rid of them so fast?"

"What?" Nikolas asked.

"You unloaded a Naga and a Billie on the first people you ran into, what did you tell them?"

"You think I cheated them?" Nikolas asked his pokegirl.

"Yes," Gally said bluntly.

Nikolas looked down at the diminutive girl beside him. Her black bobbed hair gave her a harmless air but her blue eyes were dead serious. "No I didn't cheat them, if anything I cheat myself."

"I find that hard to believe."

"You don't trust me?"

"You didn't exactly buy most of us legally."

"Touche'. If you must know I got a whopping fifteen hundred credits, for both of them," Nikolas said. He offered the sheaf of credits to Gally as proof and she snatched them out of his hand.

Where she had expected a wad of hundreds Gally found only ten and fifty denominations of credits. "I guess you were telling the truth. Even feral that Naga was worth at least three thousand..."

"More like four..."

"...and to the right person that Billie would be worth a good ten."

"Uggh, don't remind me."

"Don't you think they'll get suspicious?" Gally asked.

Nikolas shrugged. "I hope so. As is they got themselves a pair of feral pokegirls, one's a good strong fighter and the other's worth a bundle to the right people. They can claim they caught both of them which will help their tamer ratings and they can sell them off to a ranch for a hell of a lot more than they bought them for. They'll check and see that the girls aren't stolen and when it comes back negative it'll be in their best interests to just keep quiet about it and play along."

"You're betting that they aren't good Samaritans," Gally pointed out.

"Trust me, at heart, people are all assholes in it for themselves."

"Like you."

"Cute," Nikolas drawled.

In the shop they found the rest of the girls already checking out, a pile of food and a few odds and ends on the counter.

"Find everything?" Nikolas asked.

"Yes, we did," Washu replied testily as she paid the clerk for the food. The clerk gave Nikolas a questioning glance but made nothing else of Washu's excess of attitude with her tamer, collared pokegirls tended to get away with more.

Nikolas smiled. He hadn't really noticed it, probably because Washu's mass of red hair obscured most of her neck, but now he did, Washu still had on the collar she had taken with her last night.

With the clerk paid and the extra food stuffed away in their backpacks the group headed outside. Nikolas paused to consult his pokedex to figure the fastest way out of town. While he was consulting the pocket sized computer Faye caught his attention. Gally and Sango were scanning the area but seemed to be doing it more out of habit than anything but Faye's eyes were wide open, searching like she expected to see someone, at least until her eyes caught some movement down the street. She squinted and then her eyes flew open wide. "Let's get going!"

"What?" Nikolas muttered. He started to turn to see what had startled Faye but Washu "Eep"'d and started shoving him down the alley between the store and the ranch.

"Let's hurry up, we're wasting time," Washu snapped.

Nikolas caught a glimpse of two men hustling towards the alley, both of them looked pissed. "What the hell did you two do yesterday!?"

"Nothing!" Washu and Faye said in unison. The rest of the girls followed after them quickly.

Nikolas stopped fighting and let Faye lead them through several different alleys and side streets. After a half dozen turns he was thoroughly lost but Faye seemed to know exactly where she was going. A few times she would stop, her ears twisting about independent of each other while she looked at her surroundings only to take off again a moment later with perfect surety.

Unfortunately the men Faye seemed to be trying to avoid knew the area better and as they turned a corner they ran right into them.

One of the men caught Faye by the shoulder as she bounced off of him. Nikolas wasn't a small person by any means but both of these two guys made him feel like his was six years old. Both looked to be about middle aged and both were dressed in a nice collared shirt and a pair of dress slacks but neither of them looked like they belonged in them. The one holding Faye's shoulder was the younger of the two and he looked like he was enjoying the surprise on their faces. The other one, the older one with a deep scar across his left cheek just looked pissed.

Faye recovered from the shock of running into them quickly and shook off the younger man's restraining hand easily but Nikolas still did his best to take a menacing half step towards the man, who was at least a head taller than him, and said, "Hey! Let her go."

"That one belong to you?" the older man growled in a voice that was reminiscent of rocks in a tumbler.

"There's the other one," the younger man said as he pointed towards Washu.

"Yeah they belong to me, now get out of our way." Nikolas could feel the solid weight of his pistols in the small of his back but he couldn't think of a way to go for them without making it obvious what he was doing. These two oozed trouble.

"Not until we get out money back!" the younger exclaimed before the elder put a hand on his shoulder and pulled him back.

"What money?" Nikolas asked but he had a feeling where this was headed.

"The money red and purple there stole from us."

"Don't blame your bad luck on us!" Faye snapped.

"Nobody's that unlucky you little bitch," the younger man snarled.

"What the hell are you talking about?" Nikolas asked.

"Those little pokewhores cheated us at dice, told us they were minding the table while you were away then they cheated us out of all our money!"

"We want it back, all of it, now," the elder said.

From his tone Nikolas got the impression that he was used to people doing as he told them and the feeling that even if they got their money back it wasn't going to end there. He saw his sisters slowly fading back behind him, Faye, and Washu while Gally and Sango drifted towards the sides of the alley. There wasn't much room to maneuver in the alley but he figured it wouldn't hurt for the girls to try and flank them as much as possible. "You lost, fair and square," Nikolas said.

"Fair!? Fuck you asshole! There wasn't nothin' fair about it!" the younger man exploded.

Again the elder put a restraining hand on his shoulder. "Look kid, we need that money, so just give it back to us and we can all go on about our day, alright?"

Nikolas recalled the three grand in credits Washu had handed over to him that morning in the hotel, she had claimed they had made it honestly but he'd doubted her then, he doubted her even more now. Giving the two thugs, that seemed to be the best word for them in his mind, their money back might make the problem go away but then again three thousand credits would but a lot of food and he didn't have any way to make more credits at the moment, honestly at least. He also hated sore losers. "You shouldn't gamble if you can't afford to lose."

"Listen you little shit, give us the money, now!" the older thug snarled.

"Go to hell."

For someone of his size the younger man moved fast, his fist lashed out and caught Nikolas across the jaw before anyone had a chance to do anything about it.

For the first time in his life Nikolas was able to appreciate the fact that nobody was holding back when they hit him. All his life he'd figured that people were either pulling their punches or were just sissies, but now as the young thugs fist crashed into his jaw he realized that they never had been, he just didn't perceive it as that hard a hit, but regardless of how he perceived the impact the blow still had enough force to spin Nikolas around and down to one knee, the young criminal's perceptions be damn.

The young thug was rearing back to deliver a kick to the downed tamer in front of him when the impossible happened. Gally hit him.

Even before Mao's little temper tantrum a tame pokegirl striking a human was unheard of, and was punishable by a level five taming cycle. After it, well the idea of a tame pokegirl attacking a person terrified all of humanity, feral's were one thing, they were animals, you expected it, but a tame pokegirl. Tame pokegirls were supposed to be under control, harmless slaves. With an economy built on the backs of pokegirls and one in almost every home the very idea that a tame girl could lash out against a person shook the very foundations of society. If the pokegirl who did the attacking was just put down that would have been a restrained response, even in the Orange League it wouldn't have been uncommon for not only the pokegirl who attacked a person to be put down but to see all of her harem sisters subjected to a level five taming cycle and her tamer's license revoked, permanently. In some Leagues the entire harem would be put down and the tamer thrown in jail. The thought that one of this little punk's pokegirls might do anything besides get in the way never crossed either of the thug's minds.

It was now foremost in the elder one's mind as he watched his young protege ricochet off the wall of the building he was standing next to and go crashing into a pile of garbage cans. When he turned back he saw the now kneeling kid pointing a gun at his face. They'd bitten off way more than they had expected too.

Gally's little outburst had given Nikolas the chance he needed to get his hands on one of his pistols, the one he now had pointed directly between the standing thug's eyes. "You're not getting your money back."

The well dressed man threw his hands up and started to back away until his eyes came up and caught sight of something at the other end of the alley.

Since Gally and Sango were now within arm's reach of the pacified man Nikolas risked a look back. Running up the alley were a pair of uniformed police officers and an Officer Jenny.

"Shit!" Nikolas yelled. His exclamation caused all of them to follow his line of sight back and a chorus of similar curses erupted from all of them.

"All of you, stay where you are!" One of the officers yelled.

"Fuck that!" Nikolas said as he hopped back up to both feet. "Run!"

The police officers were too far away to do anything but watch as the tamer and his pokegirls bolted down the alley and turned the corner. In passing one of the girls shoved the man they'd been holding hostage aside, hard enough to lift him off of his feet and into a wall. They gave chase as best they could but the tamer had too much of a head start and quickly lost them.

***********************

"Learn anything new?" the lieutenant asked as John and Mariska walked back into the office.

"Not really," John replied, he didn't buy into his pokegirl's theory just yet so he wasn't going to offer anything to that effect up just yet.

"Well this might interest you," he said as he handed a piece of paper over. "This just happened this morning. Some patrol officers over in Tigit spotted a tamer holding up one of the locals. The tamer wasn't that interesting looking but he had a purple Catgirl and a red head with him along with two Titmice and a couple of near humans with him."

John scanned the report quickly and handed it over to his partner. "He got away?"

"He had a big lead apparently, the locals started canvasing the area but the two bozo's that got held up refuse to press charges or even give a description of the tamer."

"This is our guy!" Mariska exclaimed.

"Sir we..."

The lieutenant held up his hand. "I know, get moving, but I want you to check in daily and keep me up to speed. If I know what's going on I can try to smooth things over with the locals before you get there."

"Thank you sir," Mariska said and then she had to hurry after her tamer who was already half way to the door.

******************************

"That little bitch!" the younger exclaimed as he held the ice pack to the side of his face.

"Shut up Mick, you're lucky she didn't kill you."

Mick groaned and sat up. Their "office" at the back of the restaurant consisted of the booth they were sitting at. "What are we gonna do man, that three k was Jerry's cut for the month. If he doesn't get his money he's gonna come all the way down here from Sluton and kick our asses."

"He'll just kick your ass, he'll probably throw me in a pit full of Psidykes. I'm the one that convinced him to expand to here and now we're about to tell him some little bastard and his pokebitches conned us out of his cut."

"I thought we could make more you know, take those little whores for a ride and send him four or five instead of three, I'm sorry Bill."

Bill waved it off. "I should have stopped you, Jerry would have been a lot happier with three than he would with none."

"What are we gonna do?"

Bill took a sip from the glass in front of him while he pondered what to do. "They couldn't have gotten to far yet right?"

"Yeah."

"Yeah...so I know a guy, tracker, I can get him to help find that prick, and he won't get in our face about what we do when we find him either so long as we pay him."

"Great but what are we gonna pay him with, we're broke."

"If that kid's got our three he's bound to have more. I'll promise Rick half of whatever the kid's carrying above the three. Even if it's just that pistol he was packing, that thing's gotta be worth five or eight alone."

"Yeah but what about it, he's got a gun, we don't. We don't even have any pokegirls yet, we ain't saved up the money."

"Don't worry, Rick has a couple, and a couple things we can use to level the field."

"Excellent, let's get going."

"Yes," Bill sneered, "let's."

Nikolas' Girls

Nina - Catgirl

Washu - Supe-Bra Genius

Ceres - Vampire

Isabella - Titmouse

Edora - Titmouse

Mihoshi - Bunnygirl

Gally - Gunnm

Faye - Cheshire

Mink - Dracona

Sango - Kunochi

Delta - Youma

Ivy - Boobisaur

Harley - Ocelolita

Kaya - Wildcat