Kukui's Curse

Chapter Five-A Storm Approaches

"Thank you for letting us stay with you while the storm passes," Kukui told Moon's mother.  The storm had come in even harder than imagined, and it wasn't safe for Kukui and Lillie to stay in their home right on the ocean.

"You make yourself right at home," she kindly sang to Kukui with a smile.  "I'll make you a nice bed on the couch.  It really is comfortable, I sleep on it all the time!"

"You can sleep with me, Lillie," Moon offered, "it'll be your first sleepover!"

"Oh, I don't know, I hate to impose—"

"Well, then I want you to impose!  This is your official imposeitation!  Come on, we can do hair and makeup and nails and watch movies and—"

"Okay, okay," Lillie laughed.  "You're starting to sound like Hau!  Fine, I'll do it."  Moon grabbed Lillie by the hand and dragged her into the bedroom, but not before Lillie snatched up her duffel bag.  With a soft click, Moon shut and locked the door.

"Alright," she explained, kicking on her white noise machine that sat by the door before flopping down onto the bed onto her stomach.  Lillie gently sat next to her and listened to her soft words.  "Tell me about Kukui.  What's up with him?  Why did you run away like that?"

"I didn't imagine the Lycanrock thing, Moon, I thought it was an old wive's tale.  Look," she whispered through a trembling voice, shakily pulling a huge stack of composition books and folders out of her bag to show to her best friend.

"Lillie, you wrote all of this in, like, two days."

"Yeah?"

"That's sort of obsessive, don't you think?"

"Moon, I'm serious," she whimpered, grabbing one of the books from her.  "Look!  Look right here!"  Moon grabbed the book and grunted in pain when her huge bat perched down on her shoulders, snuggling up gently into her wings.  Lunala's loud purrs made Moon's body vibrate and her words came out shaky as if she were speaking into a fan.

"8:25 PM: Daddy snapped.  He lost his temper.  He hates me.  He hates me.  He broke the table.  It broke in half.  His eyes.  Yellow.  Help."

"Here," she whimpered out through her trembling, handing her a new book.

"1:19 AM: Lycanrock spotted mauling dartrix.  Not acting like a normal Lycanrock.  He has long, black hair like a human might instead of white.  I will investigate soon.  Lillie, you're freaking out, this is an obsession."

"Let me have it then," she snapped, and Moon put her hands up defensively.

"Okay, I guess."

"It's him," she whimpered, grabbing Moon's shoulders and Lunala's feet.  "It's my dad, he's the wolf!"

"Your dad?"

"Kukui!  The professor!"

"You didn't tell me he was your—"

"Not now, Moon!"  Lillie shook her head and looked to the door, pulling Moon into a hug.  "He isn't himself."

"He was covered in blood yesterday when he was looking for you."  Lillie robotically pulled away from Moon and looked down to her notebook, flipping open frantically to the next blank page and shakily writing down what she had heard.

"Blood," she whispered, and Moon gently scooted back to her headboard to get away from the girl while she was having her breakdown.  This was worse than the weather outside—there was a hurricane in her bedroom.  "Blood."

—————

"I haven't heard a peep from them all evening," Moon's mother commented, giving Kukui a cup of coffee.  He shrugged and smiled at her.

"Probably a girl thing, yeah?"

"Probably."  She pulled Meowth into her lap, who batted his little paw at Rockruff with a hiss.  Rockruff growled at him, and Kukui looked down at the little fluffy dog in his hands.

"Hey now," he scolded, and Rockruff lunged at the Meowth while biting and snarling.  Kukui held his hand out to let Rockruff bite him instead, and he cringed as he drew blood.  "What's wrong with you?  Go on now, on the floor!"  Rockruff whimpered and hopped down to the floor, snuggling up to Kukui's feet.

"Do you need a bandage, dear?"

"No, I'm fine," he winced, trying to play it off as nothing.  Blood gushed from his palm and the top of his hand and he held it close to himself.

"It doesn't look fine," she demanded, standing to her feet.  "I'll be right back, you just sit here and hold it."  As she walked away, Kukui realized that it wasn't the bite wound that hurt.  It was his veins that were shot with a terrible amount of pain.  This seemed to be happening a lot recently, including sweating profusely and having a craving for food he had never tasted and couldn't put his finger on.  His ears began to ring and his head pounded, but finally, the woman closed the bathroom door and it stopped.  "Here we go!"

He breathed heavily as the headache faltered, but he nodded and swallowed to her as he tried to play it off.  "Thanks."  As she pulled out the supplies to wrap up his hand, which was much larger than her own, she sang a little song to herself.

"Big sting, okay?"

"Sting?"  The woman poured rubbing alcohol over the wound and he yelped in pain.  This made his veins hurt even worse, and his vision became blurry even behind his glasses.  It was only a few seconds before the pain escaped his body and his vision returned, where he breathed heavily and looked down at her.  She still sang and paid no attention.

"He got you pretty bad, didn't he?"

"Yeah, I suppose so," he panted, wiping sweat from his head with his free hand.  He looked around nervously before a knock at the door made him jump.

"Who could that be," she sighed, tying the bandage off before going to the door.

"We have an emergency at the Pokémon Center.  Can you help tonight?"

"Joy, the storm is coming in and I'm housing the professor and his assistant tonight, it's really not a good time."

"It's fine," Kukui quickly blurted out.  "I'll take care of everything here."

"Thank you, Professor, but really, I couldn't ask you to do that for me—"

"You don't have to ask, because I'm doing it!  There's some hurt Pokémon, and you need to help Joy.  Right?"  She looked to Joy and the nurse nodded frantically, holding her hat down to her head against the hard winds.

"I appreciate this, Professor."

"No problem, auntie," he told her with a smile, and the sweet lady grabbed her cardigan before running with Joy against the storm to the Pokémon Center down the road.  Kukui closed and locked the door, and the pain returned as he let his back slide down the wall.