Lost in their Past

Chapter 56:- The Ride with Charlus

"Bitch?"

"Sorry," she playfully hit her head, "it's something the kids are saying these days."

"I assure you, neither I nor anyone is saying that," he pulled apart, "hey, how is this for our first fight?"

He was slowly starting to back away, Serena didn't like it.

"What?"

A grin showed up on his face, "You snore at night."

"You!" Serena said but by this time, Ash had bolted away into the corridor, "boy, never let him change."

"That's my seat, bitch." Said Charlus Oak, much to Ash's amazement who was getting ready to pilot the jet.

"What?" Said Ash, bewildered, thinking of the time Serena had used the exact words. I was wrong, he thought, people are saying it. "What type of language is that?"

"The cool one," Charlus pushed him aside, "also English."

"It's not the cool one," Ash took the seat of the copilot.

"It is, that's what the cool kids are saying these days."

Ash frowned, remembering the similar conversation he had with Serena. "A, it's not and B, that's not what they're saying."

"Whatev's,"

"You mean 'whatever'?"

Charlus scoffed, "Take a cold shower, grandpa."

"I'm sorry, but are you high?"

Though the brunet shook his head, Ash still wasn't convinced. Yesterday, Gary's father had been downright depressing but currently, it felt as if he was trying hard to regain his lost youth.

And he was failing spectacularly.

Even though Charlus was behaving the opposite of how he'd been yesterday, there was one thing that hadn't changed.

He still refused to look at him.

"So..." said Ash, "what will happen if we don't find Spencer at Citadark?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean... it's just a guess, right? So what happens if we don't find him?"

"We will," he was confident.

"But what if we don't?"

"I said we will."

Ash sighed, the sternness in his voice reminded him of the time he'd crossed path with Brandon the Pyramid King.

"But let's say that we don't."

The brunet groaned in frustration. "Cool your jets, Red, I said we will."

Red, thought the raven-haired trainer, does he think I'm my father?

Charlus grinned his teeth in embarrassment. It was easy to confuse Ash with James, they did look extraordinarily similar. They had the same built, the same face, and the same eyes. One might've thought he was his carbon copy.

Ash isn't James, he thought bitterly, James is dead... I killed him.

"Red... he is my father, right?"

Charlus didn't answer. Was, he thought bitterly.

"My mother tells me you were friends with him," he continued despite the obvious grunts from Charlus, "says you were closer than brothers."

Well, he's as clueless as James was, he wondered.

"I'm friends with your son too," he kept on talking, "we're pretty close too, maybe as close as you two were... maybe even closer."

That was the moment that compelled Charlus to break his vow of silence. He broke into a laugh out of Ash's silliness.

"You're not half the friends we were, James was my kin, my brother. While you two..." he broke into a laugh yet again.

The raven-haired couldn't help but feel offended. Sure, he and Gary had their ups and downs but that was what was beautiful about their friendship.
They'd learn to evolve.

"You don't know anything—"

"I know plenty," said Charlus, "you battled each other in the Silver Conference and the Indigo Plateau."

Ash didn't ask how he knew that.

"So?"

"It means that you valued competition more than friendship. Red and I never did that."

Ash scoffed, "So you're telling me, you never battled my father?"

The brunet shook his head. "Till this day I don't know who was a better trainer, we vowed never to battle each other ever. That's why I didn't participate in Indigo Plateau and he didn't in Silver Conference."

"So you didn't fight each other, that doesn't prove anything."

"Kid, it proves everything." In the heat of the moment, Charlus faced Ash.

However the brunet didn't see Ash, he saw James. James fucking Raider. His brother, his friend, and his biggest mistake. He couldn't help but picture their last moment together.

The fight and the verbal abuse.

'I wish you were dead!' His words echoed in his mind.

Charlus shook the feeling off his shoulders.

"Says you, I mean we have—"

"Let me make this clear," the brunet interrupted him mid-sentence, "I was friends with your father, I'm not friends with you."

"What—"

"I know you're trying to do, so just stop it. You're not Red, you'll never be James."

He's high, thought Ash.

"Have you ever seen me?" He said in an obvious voice.

Charlus scoffed. "You just have his looks, they don't matter. James was... he was the biggest champion anyone had ever seen."

Ash didn't want to sound like an egotistical lunatic but he couldn't help but contradict Charlus's statement.

"I'm a Pokemon master," he said, "I inherited his talent."

The brunet scoffed yet again, "James won the Indigo Plateau when he was ten years old and you couldn't even get your own Charizard under control."

"You saw my match?"

Charlus's jaw dropped open, he was in the stands when Ash and Gary came of age. Cheering them in secret. He could've met them in person but he chose not to, he didn't want to be seen.

Especially not at Indigo League.

"Eyes ahead," he changed the topic of their conversation, "we're gonna land pretty soon."