Hey guys! Sorry for the delay (even though I heard the Secret Santa deadline got moved back), but I have done a Christmas oneshot! This is the time I've written Rocketshipping and generally written Jessie and James' characters, so I really hope I did well with this one!
This Secret Santa gift is for Rocket Girl. I saw on the form that she likes Rocketshipping and so I decided that I'd attempt a Rocketshipping oneshot! Even though it could probably be more Rocketshippy, I really wanted to capture that whole togetherness and family feel you get with Team Rocket and how they always stick together.
So I hope that all of you (especially Rocket Girl) enjoy this oneshot.
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James’ POV
Every year was the same. It starts out with New Year’s fireworks. Jessie, Meowth and I blast off again. The twerps have all the idea celebrations such as Easter, Birthdays, and Christmas… while every day for Team Rocket holds the same fate.
We’d all get frustrated with it. Sometimes we’d argue and other days we’re starving and completely broke. The worst has happened too: I’d lose a bottle cap from my collection.
When its days like these, I wonder if we even have what it takes to impress the boss with our capture of some more Pokemon. But nothing ever works out.
Why is it that when good luck never comes our way that Jessie, Meowth and I stick together and continue to seek it?
“James, if you’re just about done having some internal monologue or something, we have to get back to work. Meowth’s idea of a good plan to capture Pikachu seems completely stupid,” Jessie interrupted my thoughts, compelling me to think up some new thoughts.
“Hey, my plan is so not stupid!” Meowth protested, but Jessie ignored him. She focused her attention on me with those sapphire eyes. What idea could possibly work? I began to wonder if we’ve even tried every plan possible. We must’ve.
Plus it’s Christmas, can’t we take a break? Even if we disrupted the twerps’ Christmas, which is always a good thing, the twerps always beat us somehow and that will spoil our Christmas. “Jessie, it’s Christmas. For once, can we take a break from thinking about twerps and think about us three all spending time together. I miss the normal Christmas days I used to have.”
She glared at me sourly. I thought she was going to complain and lecture me but a new thought struck her mind. “Capturing Pikachu would make for a great Christmas Day, don’t you agree?”
“And what do you mean ‘used to have’?!” Meowth jumped in before Jessie could continue talking. “I think our Christmases are fine, anyhow.”
Jessie pointed a finger at me. “Or are you suggesting you want to go back and spend Christmas with your family? That also means spending Christmas with Jessibelle, doesn’t it?”
Okay, she got me there. I am not going to face Jessibelle again. It’s been one too many times. I won’t marry her. Is that why I stayed with Team Rocket? Just to run away from someone I feared? That… is a sucky way of thinking about it.
My partners-in-crime exchanged looks before Jessie rummaged into her bag and pulled out a piece of paper. “I wasn’t going to show you this letter, but I suppose I should.”
Letter? I took the page from her hand and looked at it.
Dear James,
We would like you to come home for Christmas. You haven’t done so in years and we miss you very much. We have lots of scrumptious food, a cosy bed, a loving family and lots of wonderful presents waiting here for you. You know where our house is. Let us know if you’re going to come.
Love,
Your parents.
PS – if you don’t come, your fiancée Jessibelle will be very upset and we’ll all have to hunt you down and get on with that wedding, which has been delayed for far too long.
The invitation sounded good, until they mentioned Jessibelle. But either way, it seems I’ll have to marry her, whether I like it or not. If I go, sure I’ll get all this nice stuff but I will also have to face her. But if I don’t go, then her and my parents will all come after me, all disappointed in me.
I have the worst luck ever. Something like this might make me forget about that bottle cap from that drink that stopped selling over a decade ago anymore that I lost. It might. It is a challenge to top that one. That bottle cap was my favourite one too…
“Man, if you look at his face! Do ya still want to visit your family and have a normal Christmas after all?” Meowth asked me, snatching the letter off me and tearing it to shreds with his claws.
“A Christmas where Jessibelle’s involved isn’t a normal Christmas!” I replied, followed by a heavy sigh.
“So you’re not going?” Jessie smirked. “Excellent, now let’s get back to plans to do with catchi-”
“This is so not fantabulous!” I cut her off, grabbing at my hair with worry. What should I do? It’s easy enough to say ‘not go, avoid it’, but then my family and scary fiancée will all come after me and there’s no way I can beauty sleep with the thoughts of them searching for me embedded in my mind.
Meowth and Jessie stared at me, unsure how to react. Neither was really born with the ability to know when to sympathise, I guess.
I stood tall and told them that I’m going to think over things. Walking away from the campsite we had set up after crash-landing the night before, I tried to think of the options I had.
1) I could just attend the Christmas get-together and leave before anything marriage-related bops up.
2) Not go and just hope they can’t find me.
3) Blast off again, that’s something I can definitely do well.
4) Kill Jessibelle. Hm, very tempting option.
5) Marry someone else. I don’t think that’s possible, who on earth would marry me?
6) Catch Pikachu. But that won’t help the crisis.
7) Find some new bottle caps to cheer me up.
8) Consult Jessie and Meowth about what to do and maybe, just maybe they’ll have a brilliant idea about how to solve this problem.
All these options. Which one shall I do? Well, option #7 obviously, I’d be mental not to. But what should I do? I don’t know about Meowth giving good advice, all he’s dealt with in the whole life department is rejection with that whole ‘Meowzie’ incident. The only other person who has had some life experiences is Jessie.
Funny how we all came together to escape from our previous lifestyles. Was it just our fates intertwining? Some sort of miracle? We were all drawn to one another and something about being part of Team Rocket and being with Jessie... and Meowth compelled me to stay. And I never wanted to this one lucky moment to go away.
I wanted to stay with Team Rocket. But I couldn’t stand the idea of my previous lifestyle hunting me down, sucking me back in. Marrying Jessibelle is the worst thing I could possibly do. Not just because I didn’t love her, but any marriage, anything that took me away from me continuing on with the strange luck of being in Team Rocket was something I just couldn’t face.
Going back would be the giving up kind of route, wouldn’t it? I’m just making a big deal over nothing, right? But one can’t think that if they haven’t ever been in my shoes and lived my life.
I really need some bottle caps, my brain’s going haywire. I haven’t felt like this in a long time. Despite all the bad luck I get, there was some ray of sunshine to it all. Never were there people who despite everything that happens, we can all stick together and keep hoping for a cloud with a silver lining.
“Are you done there?” a voice interrupted my thoughts. “Sheesh, you haven’t taken such a long time to have some depressing alone time since that incident where you lost your entire bottle cap collection!”
“At least you found it in the end! It somehow got caught up with your stuff...” I smiled at the memory. But she didn’t know how it ended up there and when I realised I left it there, I knew why.
Ages ago, I remembered when Meowth and Jessie were having some argument over something to do with social lives – something weird that I couldn’t remember and was forced to be the judge of. Jessie mentioned something that while I couldn’t recall what it was, I felt compelled to check out what she was taking about. Something about a small book that reminded her of important things.
So when everyone was asleep and I was not, I decided to look through Jessie’s stuff. At that stage in my life, I was going through a phase of always keeping my bottle cap collection with me, so I kept it close as I looked through. Somehow, I must’ve overlooked putting the collection somewhere amongst her stuff and as I packed it away so she didn’t know I went through her things.
That little notebook had things stuck inside. She even stuck in her favourite from amongst my bottle caps, damn it but turning each page was like looking into her mind. Jessie was one of those aggressive types who never really showed her softer side. I guess I’m one of the lucky people to know that side of her.
I even remember seeing that she kept the first photo taken of us, Jessie, Meowth and me, as a team. We all looked pretty weird in that photo. My attempt at a fabulous smile was off, Jessie’s hair was messy and Meowth wasn’t taking the photo seriously and just pulled some cheesy, goofy-looking grin but that photo was the first amongst many things I’d experienced as being part of Team Rocket.
“You know that going back to see the family would mean I’d be making some others happy, right? And nobody would be disappointed in me anymore, right? Going back would mean that I’ll be facing up to my fears, right?”
Jessie raised an eyebrow at me and sighed, probably realising that now is not the time to lecture me about why it is a great idea to bother the twerps on Christmas and make another sad attempt at catching Pikachu once and for all. “Don’t start thinking that your family are the only ones you can’t have disappointed. Team Rocket wouldn’t be complete with you gone.”
She had a point. “I’m just thinking of myself again, aren’t I?” I mumbled. She punched my shoulder, inflicting a lot of pain on me. “Owww! What was that for?”
“For being a moron. So what if your parents are disappointed? Coming into Team Rocket is enough! What more could you possibly do? How low can we sink? As a team, as long as we’re Team Rocket, there are no limits we can’t reach! So what about your parents? So what if they’re threatening to hunt you down? The police are after us. Jessibelle is still after you. We’re Team Rocket, we escape everything!” Jessie stood up and struck a determined pose. She pointed a finger at me. “Tell me, what do you think would happen if we didn’t blast off?”
“...We wouldn’t have to endure harsh landings anymore?” She punched my other shoulder for that.
“Wrong! We would have to go through Thunderbolt after Thunderbolt! Pikachu would just keep on electrocuting us! And then the police would arrive! And we’d be captured! Sure, blasting off is a defeat but it’s also a winning scenario because it gives us another shot at capturing Pokémon and all that! We are the reason that ‘If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again’ exists!”
“I think we take that saying too far!”
“Team Rocket always takes things too far, stupid!”
Jessie is the type of person who had an answer for everything. Even though she was kind of telling me off right now, it made me feel better. Team Rocket was all about sticking together through the good times and the bad. No matter what happens, we all stick together.
“Jessie, you sure are brilliant sometimes...” I grinned, also standing up. I ignored her response of ‘Of course! I’m always brilliant!’ and said we should get back to Meowth as he’s probably bothered by us ditching him for such a long time. “After all, there is so much scheming to do and I’ve been missing out all day!”
Jessie suddenly reached out and glomped me. “I’ve been missing out on your scheming too! Glad to have ya back!” She then released me from the glomp and placed her hands on her hips. “Now don’t expect me to be this nice too often, okay? I got to keep up my reputation as the beautiful yet truly evil villain who shall someday be queen of the world!”
I chuckled. I know what to expect. Jessie just wouldn’t be Jessie if she got too affectionate and loving. And if she was like that, I wouldn’t feel right. Jessie is fine the way she is.
We both walked back to the campsite and Meowth immediately leapt up and told me off straight away. “How dare you think of going to visit your family! What kind of idiot visits his family for Christmas? Honestly, Christmas is all about getting the goods and that’s what we’re supposed to be focused on!” Same old Meowth, always going straight to the plot.
“I know!” I protested. “I’m just about to speak up about this idea I had to capture Pikachu!”
“But what about that whole family thing?” Meowth shot me a look of confusion, his voice calming down a little.
“What about it?” Jessie interjected before I could answer. “He’d much rather hang out with us!”
I grinned, nodding in agreement. It couldn’t be any more truthful. There isn’t anyone I’d rather spend Christmas with. There’s no one I’d rather kill time with. I love being part of Team Rocket. I love Jessie. I love Meowth. I love our Pokémon. They are my true family and I’ll continue to, through thick and thin, endure everything that comes at us. And some day, Jessibelle will give up on me and find a new fiancée, and hey, maybe I’ll get a different fiancée too.
But only with Team Rocket’s support.
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I hope you guys enjoyed it. A review would be nice. :3 I really hope you liked this, Rocket Girl!
This Secret Santa gift is for Rocket Girl. I saw on the form that she likes Rocketshipping and so I decided that I'd attempt a Rocketshipping oneshot! Even though it could probably be more Rocketshippy, I really wanted to capture that whole togetherness and family feel you get with Team Rocket and how they always stick together.
So I hope that all of you (especially Rocket Girl) enjoy this oneshot.
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James’ POV
Every year was the same. It starts out with New Year’s fireworks. Jessie, Meowth and I blast off again. The twerps have all the idea celebrations such as Easter, Birthdays, and Christmas… while every day for Team Rocket holds the same fate.
We’d all get frustrated with it. Sometimes we’d argue and other days we’re starving and completely broke. The worst has happened too: I’d lose a bottle cap from my collection.
When its days like these, I wonder if we even have what it takes to impress the boss with our capture of some more Pokemon. But nothing ever works out.
Why is it that when good luck never comes our way that Jessie, Meowth and I stick together and continue to seek it?
“James, if you’re just about done having some internal monologue or something, we have to get back to work. Meowth’s idea of a good plan to capture Pikachu seems completely stupid,” Jessie interrupted my thoughts, compelling me to think up some new thoughts.
“Hey, my plan is so not stupid!” Meowth protested, but Jessie ignored him. She focused her attention on me with those sapphire eyes. What idea could possibly work? I began to wonder if we’ve even tried every plan possible. We must’ve.
Plus it’s Christmas, can’t we take a break? Even if we disrupted the twerps’ Christmas, which is always a good thing, the twerps always beat us somehow and that will spoil our Christmas. “Jessie, it’s Christmas. For once, can we take a break from thinking about twerps and think about us three all spending time together. I miss the normal Christmas days I used to have.”
She glared at me sourly. I thought she was going to complain and lecture me but a new thought struck her mind. “Capturing Pikachu would make for a great Christmas Day, don’t you agree?”
“And what do you mean ‘used to have’?!” Meowth jumped in before Jessie could continue talking. “I think our Christmases are fine, anyhow.”
Jessie pointed a finger at me. “Or are you suggesting you want to go back and spend Christmas with your family? That also means spending Christmas with Jessibelle, doesn’t it?”
Okay, she got me there. I am not going to face Jessibelle again. It’s been one too many times. I won’t marry her. Is that why I stayed with Team Rocket? Just to run away from someone I feared? That… is a sucky way of thinking about it.
My partners-in-crime exchanged looks before Jessie rummaged into her bag and pulled out a piece of paper. “I wasn’t going to show you this letter, but I suppose I should.”
Letter? I took the page from her hand and looked at it.
Dear James,
We would like you to come home for Christmas. You haven’t done so in years and we miss you very much. We have lots of scrumptious food, a cosy bed, a loving family and lots of wonderful presents waiting here for you. You know where our house is. Let us know if you’re going to come.
Love,
Your parents.
PS – if you don’t come, your fiancée Jessibelle will be very upset and we’ll all have to hunt you down and get on with that wedding, which has been delayed for far too long.
The invitation sounded good, until they mentioned Jessibelle. But either way, it seems I’ll have to marry her, whether I like it or not. If I go, sure I’ll get all this nice stuff but I will also have to face her. But if I don’t go, then her and my parents will all come after me, all disappointed in me.
I have the worst luck ever. Something like this might make me forget about that bottle cap from that drink that stopped selling over a decade ago anymore that I lost. It might. It is a challenge to top that one. That bottle cap was my favourite one too…
“Man, if you look at his face! Do ya still want to visit your family and have a normal Christmas after all?” Meowth asked me, snatching the letter off me and tearing it to shreds with his claws.
“A Christmas where Jessibelle’s involved isn’t a normal Christmas!” I replied, followed by a heavy sigh.
“So you’re not going?” Jessie smirked. “Excellent, now let’s get back to plans to do with catchi-”
“This is so not fantabulous!” I cut her off, grabbing at my hair with worry. What should I do? It’s easy enough to say ‘not go, avoid it’, but then my family and scary fiancée will all come after me and there’s no way I can beauty sleep with the thoughts of them searching for me embedded in my mind.
Meowth and Jessie stared at me, unsure how to react. Neither was really born with the ability to know when to sympathise, I guess.
I stood tall and told them that I’m going to think over things. Walking away from the campsite we had set up after crash-landing the night before, I tried to think of the options I had.
1) I could just attend the Christmas get-together and leave before anything marriage-related bops up.
2) Not go and just hope they can’t find me.
3) Blast off again, that’s something I can definitely do well.
4) Kill Jessibelle. Hm, very tempting option.
5) Marry someone else. I don’t think that’s possible, who on earth would marry me?
6) Catch Pikachu. But that won’t help the crisis.
7) Find some new bottle caps to cheer me up.
8) Consult Jessie and Meowth about what to do and maybe, just maybe they’ll have a brilliant idea about how to solve this problem.
All these options. Which one shall I do? Well, option #7 obviously, I’d be mental not to. But what should I do? I don’t know about Meowth giving good advice, all he’s dealt with in the whole life department is rejection with that whole ‘Meowzie’ incident. The only other person who has had some life experiences is Jessie.
Funny how we all came together to escape from our previous lifestyles. Was it just our fates intertwining? Some sort of miracle? We were all drawn to one another and something about being part of Team Rocket and being with Jessie... and Meowth compelled me to stay. And I never wanted to this one lucky moment to go away.
I wanted to stay with Team Rocket. But I couldn’t stand the idea of my previous lifestyle hunting me down, sucking me back in. Marrying Jessibelle is the worst thing I could possibly do. Not just because I didn’t love her, but any marriage, anything that took me away from me continuing on with the strange luck of being in Team Rocket was something I just couldn’t face.
Going back would be the giving up kind of route, wouldn’t it? I’m just making a big deal over nothing, right? But one can’t think that if they haven’t ever been in my shoes and lived my life.
I really need some bottle caps, my brain’s going haywire. I haven’t felt like this in a long time. Despite all the bad luck I get, there was some ray of sunshine to it all. Never were there people who despite everything that happens, we can all stick together and keep hoping for a cloud with a silver lining.
“Are you done there?” a voice interrupted my thoughts. “Sheesh, you haven’t taken such a long time to have some depressing alone time since that incident where you lost your entire bottle cap collection!”
“At least you found it in the end! It somehow got caught up with your stuff...” I smiled at the memory. But she didn’t know how it ended up there and when I realised I left it there, I knew why.
Ages ago, I remembered when Meowth and Jessie were having some argument over something to do with social lives – something weird that I couldn’t remember and was forced to be the judge of. Jessie mentioned something that while I couldn’t recall what it was, I felt compelled to check out what she was taking about. Something about a small book that reminded her of important things.
So when everyone was asleep and I was not, I decided to look through Jessie’s stuff. At that stage in my life, I was going through a phase of always keeping my bottle cap collection with me, so I kept it close as I looked through. Somehow, I must’ve overlooked putting the collection somewhere amongst her stuff and as I packed it away so she didn’t know I went through her things.
That little notebook had things stuck inside. She even stuck in her favourite from amongst my bottle caps, damn it but turning each page was like looking into her mind. Jessie was one of those aggressive types who never really showed her softer side. I guess I’m one of the lucky people to know that side of her.
I even remember seeing that she kept the first photo taken of us, Jessie, Meowth and me, as a team. We all looked pretty weird in that photo. My attempt at a fabulous smile was off, Jessie’s hair was messy and Meowth wasn’t taking the photo seriously and just pulled some cheesy, goofy-looking grin but that photo was the first amongst many things I’d experienced as being part of Team Rocket.
“You know that going back to see the family would mean I’d be making some others happy, right? And nobody would be disappointed in me anymore, right? Going back would mean that I’ll be facing up to my fears, right?”
Jessie raised an eyebrow at me and sighed, probably realising that now is not the time to lecture me about why it is a great idea to bother the twerps on Christmas and make another sad attempt at catching Pikachu once and for all. “Don’t start thinking that your family are the only ones you can’t have disappointed. Team Rocket wouldn’t be complete with you gone.”
She had a point. “I’m just thinking of myself again, aren’t I?” I mumbled. She punched my shoulder, inflicting a lot of pain on me. “Owww! What was that for?”
“For being a moron. So what if your parents are disappointed? Coming into Team Rocket is enough! What more could you possibly do? How low can we sink? As a team, as long as we’re Team Rocket, there are no limits we can’t reach! So what about your parents? So what if they’re threatening to hunt you down? The police are after us. Jessibelle is still after you. We’re Team Rocket, we escape everything!” Jessie stood up and struck a determined pose. She pointed a finger at me. “Tell me, what do you think would happen if we didn’t blast off?”
“...We wouldn’t have to endure harsh landings anymore?” She punched my other shoulder for that.
“Wrong! We would have to go through Thunderbolt after Thunderbolt! Pikachu would just keep on electrocuting us! And then the police would arrive! And we’d be captured! Sure, blasting off is a defeat but it’s also a winning scenario because it gives us another shot at capturing Pokémon and all that! We are the reason that ‘If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again’ exists!”
“I think we take that saying too far!”
“Team Rocket always takes things too far, stupid!”
Jessie is the type of person who had an answer for everything. Even though she was kind of telling me off right now, it made me feel better. Team Rocket was all about sticking together through the good times and the bad. No matter what happens, we all stick together.
“Jessie, you sure are brilliant sometimes...” I grinned, also standing up. I ignored her response of ‘Of course! I’m always brilliant!’ and said we should get back to Meowth as he’s probably bothered by us ditching him for such a long time. “After all, there is so much scheming to do and I’ve been missing out all day!”
Jessie suddenly reached out and glomped me. “I’ve been missing out on your scheming too! Glad to have ya back!” She then released me from the glomp and placed her hands on her hips. “Now don’t expect me to be this nice too often, okay? I got to keep up my reputation as the beautiful yet truly evil villain who shall someday be queen of the world!”
I chuckled. I know what to expect. Jessie just wouldn’t be Jessie if she got too affectionate and loving. And if she was like that, I wouldn’t feel right. Jessie is fine the way she is.
We both walked back to the campsite and Meowth immediately leapt up and told me off straight away. “How dare you think of going to visit your family! What kind of idiot visits his family for Christmas? Honestly, Christmas is all about getting the goods and that’s what we’re supposed to be focused on!” Same old Meowth, always going straight to the plot.
“I know!” I protested. “I’m just about to speak up about this idea I had to capture Pikachu!”
“But what about that whole family thing?” Meowth shot me a look of confusion, his voice calming down a little.
“What about it?” Jessie interjected before I could answer. “He’d much rather hang out with us!”
I grinned, nodding in agreement. It couldn’t be any more truthful. There isn’t anyone I’d rather spend Christmas with. There’s no one I’d rather kill time with. I love being part of Team Rocket. I love Jessie. I love Meowth. I love our Pokémon. They are my true family and I’ll continue to, through thick and thin, endure everything that comes at us. And some day, Jessibelle will give up on me and find a new fiancée, and hey, maybe I’ll get a different fiancée too.
But only with Team Rocket’s support.
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I hope you guys enjoyed it. A review would be nice. :3 I really hope you liked this, Rocket Girl!
) I also liked that you included his love of bottle caps. That's something the anime should focus more on. My favorite part was when Jessie glomped him.