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Pokémon The Curious and the Shiny

unrepentantAuthor

A cat that writes stories.
Location
UK
Pronouns
they/she
Partners
  1. purrloin-salem
  2. sneasel-dusk
  3. luz-companion
  4. brisa-companion
  5. meowth-laura
  6. delphox-jesse
  7. mewtwo
  8. zeraora
Hey Nebby! I'm glad to finally be leaving a comment on TCATS, it's about time.

This is a pretty strong opening chapter — I have a sense of Shine's character and an investment in seeing him get the answers (and peace) he needs, the setting feels fuller for having the kind of details I really appreciate (I want to hear about the Kalosian national debt!), and there's an intriguing mystery to uncover to which there are multiple levels of uncertainty. The xenofiction angle, of course, is always a great way to hook me in. I'd intended to read this in any case, but if I'd happened upon it on my own I'd definitely be taking an interest.

Other, specific things I liked include the entirety of Bauble's presence in the chapter. For all her fluency, she's absolutely still a total bird, and I love it. She was a mischievous delight to have around and the interactions between her and Shine made me happy. I also really enjoyed the oddly melancholic sense of place at times; the mantine cries bringing Shine back to the presence stood out as a nice moment. The prose and dialogue are both very solid, and props to you for maintaining distinct voices for each character. I do wonder why speech from pokémon characters has to be italicised if it's in English, though. Don't really get that. Also, I found that the depressive mode in which we meet Shine is well executed. It was familiar to me and sympathetic without being overblown, nice job. Overall, a pleasure to read.

I have only one particular criticism (save for the confusion about the italicisation), which is to say that Shine's internal narration habitually explains the givens of his life to me, particularly his relationships with human characters. It's perfectly valid and legitimate, as he's considering his relationship to them and these are plausibly his thought processes, but it does feel very like opening chapter exposition to me. There's no easy fix for that, and it didn't spoil the reading experience, I just really wanted to find something to pick you up on! You should be very proud of this, I think.

Seeya next chapter~
 

cynsh

full-time quilava
Location
Deepden
Pronouns
he/him
Partners
  1. quilava
Review time! I’ll start with talking generally about the first two chapters, then go into more minor details.

So, on a macro level I really don’t have a lot to criticise. The writing is very solid – the right balance between ‘purple’ and ‘beige’, if you will. As someone who is pretty picky about prose, that is very much appreciated!

I thought the first chapter was an excellent opener. It was quite long, but did well to establish what Shine’s life is like, as well as this world in general – I don’t read many non-PMD stories so I’m never sure what worldbuilding decisions are unusual or canon. I really liked your use of newspaper stories to give insight here, the headlines were very nice. The scene at the dragon farm would be my favourite though. Just a really cool setting, and the details regarding Adele wearing flight gear, and the preparations in getting Accendare ready for flight, were just a couple of things that really help paint a picture of the setting. And of course, leaving the town at the end of the chapter gives a good hook for what’s to come.

Chapter two was a little slower, given it was primarily Shine trying, mostly unsuccessfully, to find clues on Curio’s whereabouts. I didn’t mind the slow pace too much, as it helped establish Dendemille as a place. The characters involved were all well-written and entertaining enough. Still, I wonder if it needed to take quite so long for Shine to meet Barley, since the latter part of the chapter is the most pivotal.

I feel a bit confused as to how the food situation works here. Humans eat pokémon, if tepig rashers are anything to go by. There are also ‘feral’ pokémon (who I assume are also the ones eaten), such as the leafeon in chapter two, but I’m not sure exactly how they’re different from pokémon like Shine, other than being a bit rougher and not so well-spoken. Maybe I’m just jumping the gun on that and it’ll be explained in time.

Other smaller things I noticed:

  • I thought Shine’s x-ray vision was something non-canon, until I looked it up just to check. Huh. What a badass pokémon.
  • A couple of typos in chapter 2: on ‘queue’ and ‘agianst’ (I’m sorry)
  • Not sure why the leafeon felt the need to conjure an arrow with grass rather than just pointing that way with a paw, lol
  • What is a ‘Sirknight’? Referred to at the end of chapter 2.
  • A pokepad… not sure how I feel about that name. If it’s a special machine for dealing with one’s pokémon, sure, but it sounded just like a regular laptop, in which case the name doesn’t really make sense. There were also a couple of pokémon-ised turns of phrase I noticed, like blowing a Razz berry. I dunno, these things stick out like a sore thumb to me – if it were my choice I’d find a different phrase that didn’t require a pokémon world substitution.
Given the length of this story, I can’t promise that I’ll catch up. And if I do, reviews will probably be very infrequent. But we’ll see. It’s certainly a solid opening. Ciao!
 

Adamhuarts

Mew specialist
Partners
  1. mew-adam
  2. celebi-shiny
  3. roserade-adam
REVIEW FOR CHAPTERS 4 AND 5

I had said before I'd get back into this fic, and I decided to follow up on that today since I virtually have nothing better to do. I've decided to be reading and reviewing two chapters at a time for my dailies.

To start things off, my memory of the past three chapters is a bit hazy, but thankfully the interactions in the two chapters I read helped fill in most of the blanks. The Sudowoodo story in the beginning of the fourth chapter was quite eerie and intriguing, like my Chad Sudowoodo boi didn't just go down but instead made a warning call and had a grand death like some pirate King.

You also did well in writing Curio and Shine's interactions. They truly felt like very old friends having an awkward conversation, but things got quite tense when Curio questioned him for leaving her behind before. I'm surprised the GeL events happened only five years prior to the fic. I'd been under the impression it was at least a decade ago or longer, though this explains why the events are still fresh in Shine's mind... Well as fresh a it can get with his boundless amnesia.

I liked Shine and Barley's warm up scene in the fifth chapter. It was cool seeing Shine look deep into his heart and remembering his training. Barley is also a very lovely and kind fellow to Shine and I look forward to seeing more of him.

Curio and Shine's battle was a pretty short one, though I appreciate that it did what it had to do and wasn't stretched to be as shonen anime as possible. I did make an audible ouchie ouch when Curio broke Shine's ribs with a punch. Thankfully he was fixed right back up later.

The fact that Curio had a trainer in the past is news to me, and it does explain why she was so apprehensive to learn that Shine was Tony's pokemon. It was intriguing seeing their different experiences with trainers clashing. Curio was tied down by her trainer, whereas Shine was liberated by his. It was reassuring seeing Curio forgive Shine for what he did in the past. I honestly thought this would be a subplot that'd go on for chapters, so I'm glad they didn't spend the next ten chapters hating each other or something. The last scene there was wholesome as hell.

This marks the furthest I've ever read into this fic in all my past readings. Everything from here is new to me. You've already told me a lot about future plot events anyway, but I'm more here to get the greater context and also enjoy this fic's greatest strength: the well written character interactions.
 

Adamhuarts

Mew specialist
Partners
  1. mew-adam
  2. celebi-shiny
  3. roserade-adam
REVIEW FOR CHAPTERS 6 AND 7

Decided to pick this story back up again this morning. Chapter 6 was pretty short, but sweet. I chuckled when Barley and Shine were exchanging their 'Diancord' handles. CongressofDunsparces and Childish Gambi—I mean Audino sound funny as hell.

The little world building tid bit there that also references your Galar fics was nice, though unless one knows those things are explained in elaborated upon in other fics, they might be disappointed if they keep waiting for it to be explained later in this fic but never happens. Thankfully fanfics are available for free and one doesn't need to spend money to get the full story of this fic's universe.

The next chapter was longer and we finally return to the dragon ranch. It was cool seeing the way Shine was explaining the differences between human and pokemon speak, and fairly informative too. We also once again get to see the contrast between Shine and Curios preferred teaching methods. Shine gets all technical and methodical about it, while Curio just lets her students naturally learn as they go along.

I'm fairly mixed about the way Shine was reacting to the fact that the dragons in the ranch are fed live prey. Like in our world there could be pushback against that sort of thing if humans were fed live chickens in droves, but here dragons would've been hunting live prey in the wild all of the time anyway. Though on that note, I also wonder why the dragons aren't just feed regular meat instead of live prey. Is it to simulate their natural hunting habits in the wild? But we don't exactly see that happen with lions in zoos, and nature reserves are not ranch equivalents. In any case, this feels like a hole you wouldn't want to dig since either in the wild or the ranch, the dragons would still be killing and hunting pokemon that are sapient regardless.
 

Adamhuarts

Mew specialist
Partners
  1. mew-adam
  2. celebi-shiny
  3. roserade-adam
CHAPTER 8 REVIEW

Man, Curio really doesn't like trainers lol. Though the chapter began with a heartwarming reunion between Tony and Shine, I was still glad Tony was pretty chill about the whole thing. I was worried he'd at least be bothered Shine took some money, or he'd wonder what happened to Shine's collar. Tony is a pretty honest to good guy. I wanna be like Tony. Let's all be Tony.

The chapter felt a bit tense when Curio wasn't even hiding her disdain for Tony lmao, but that's just Curio being Curio, and it makes sense she's acted like that because of her past. Man, I know you've already told me a lot about her, but I wonder just how much baggage she's constantly holding back and living with for that matter. At least she came to accept that Tony isn't a bad person, and the interview seems to be going pretty well. So far anyway.
 

windskull

Bidoof Fan
Staff
Partners
  1. sneasel-nip
  2. bidoof
  3. absol
  4. kirlia
  5. windskull-bidoof
  6. little-guy-windskull
  7. purugly
  8. mawile
Hey Neb, just dropping a quick review on chapters 9 through 11!

As a general note, before I break my thoughts on the individual chapters down, I think you did a great job with this framing device. In most cases, I’d be hesitant to call a transition from first to third person good, but it transitions and works surprisingly well for the type of story you’re telling.

9
This chapter does a great job of setting up the family dynamic. You have a caring mom, the kind but somewhat aloof older brother, cute (if sometimes annoying) younger siblings. And the distant dad. From the bits and pieces, I’ve gathered from seeing you talk about your fic in the discord, I have a feeling I’ll have stuff to say about him in due time, though I don’t have much right now. But what I will say is that this line, in particular, is really telling about Curio’s relationship with her dad, in my opinion:

Dad threw me without warning, dropping me onto the hard ground. You know, because dropping me down onto a jagged surface was apparently a good idea.

I don’t have a lot to say about this chapter in general, but I like it, as I’m sure it sets up a lot of Curio’s coming journey.

(Also, the art is adorable)

10
Another thing I really like is that the chapters actually feel like interview segments. The opening section of this chapter really drives that feeling home. It feels like the response to a single interview question. And the next one feels like it was a followup, of sorts.

In this section (and the next) it makes it even more clear that Trunks is like. Really being a better authority figure and taking up raising his younger siblings more than his dad. He seems like he’s got a lot on his shoulders, tbh.

Again, the encounter with the human and the way her dad reacts feels like it’s really setting up for how she is in the present day, and makes you curious as to what happened between then and the present day to lead to the way she feels about things now.

11
I… don’t really have a lot to say about 11. It builds more upon the family dynamics I mentioned before, with Trunks getting his feelings out with the help of a bit of alcohol. It was a fun chapter I just… don’t really have much to say for it than I already did.

These chapters felt a bit shorter than the others, but it also feels like that was by design, playing into the interview segments. At the same time, it feels like you’re taking things at a leisurely pace, here, and I can’t help but wonder how long it will take for Curio to finally get off that island, and what might happen with her family before she gets out of there. Will hopefully check back in a reasonable amount of time to review the next segment of chapters.
 

NebulaDreams

Ace Trainer
Partners
  1. luxray
  2. hypno
So... it's been a while since I last came back to TCATS, almost a year. It's been a bit of a rocky journey, since I expected to transition smoothly into original writing, only for it to be a lot harder than I expected. So I branched out with different kinds of writing, including shorter fics in the interim, and I hoped to get back into TCATS during NaNoWriMo to write Part 2 of the fic. Turns out that didn't go as planned either, so here we are.

I've been stuck on how to post the latter half of Part 1 for a while. After thinking on it, though, I've decided to just go with the story I have while polishing it up in a few places. That and by doing this, I hope I'll get unstuck with writing future chapters. I hope to post every week, all the way up to chapter 38, which is the last one I wrote for TCATS pre-hiatus.

Chapter 18: First Day's Daze

The Growth Arc

Having grown up on the island, especially as spring came in, I saw a lot of colours. Blue, green, yellow, brown, more blue, for my family of course, and all its different mixtures in the sky. Since I saw those same colours for so long, I was startled whenever something unnatural came onto the island, like a metallic boat, for instance.

Now take that and apply it to a closed room with only bright lights above to illuminate anything. Without the sun, I couldn’t tell whether it was day or night, and unlike the sun, the ceiling lights gave off a cold, yellow glow, bouncing off of featureless, white walls. That's where I found myself the first thing after I got out of the Pokeball, with Azzy and his companion by my side. All I saw in front of me were long corridors where a couple of humans in white coats waited. I squeezed Azzy’s paw tightly as he led me through these halls.

To sum it up, they basically gave me the pre-treatment before I entered GeL for real, and let me tell you, being handled by strangers as a wild Riolu wasn’t fun. I got taken to some sort of wetroom where they put me in a bath and gently washed me down. I probably needed it as a wild Riolu, but getting touched and brushed by a glove-wearing human for the first time was, as you can imagine, stressful.

They dried me off eventually and I reunited with Azzy, who kept his grip on my paw. That gradually reassured me, but, well…

I won’t mince words here – getting a vaccine for the first time sucked, especially because of the needles. Sure, they gradually eased me into it and the actual injection was painless, but going through that already threw me off balance before I even got the chance to see all of GeL.

So, yeah, I’d rather sit on a Pawniard’s head than do that again. But now I can properly zoom in a little on what GeL was like.

After I went through that ordeal, Azzy led me to the security door where a Machamp stood, whose four arms took me by surprise. He was clearly a Pokemon, yet he wore a uniform like that of a human, with black security clothing and even shoes. How many Pokemon could you say really need shoes, if any clothes at all? My curiosity got the better of me and I tiptoed to try and get eye contact. He leered at me.

“One of the new subjects, huh?” he said. “Of course, they had to fulfill their token Riolu quota.”

I had no idea what he was talking about, but one question still burned on my tongue.

“Um, why do you need the four arms? Aren’t two enough?”

“Why do you need just two arms?” he teased in the same tone. Wow, what a warm welcome. Before I could call him out on it, though, Azzy groaned.

“Now, now, Henry. We don’t need you winding up our students.”

"Whatever, just messin’. So, everything done, bath, vaccine, what have you?”

I reluctantly nodded.

“Okay, nice and simple. The sooner we get this out of the way, the sooner I can get back to my reruns.” He fiddled with parts of the door before squeezing the handle. "Abandon hope, ye who enter--”

“Henry!” Azzy growled, gathering bubbles in his paw.

“Okay, okay, I’ll stop.” He cleared his throat. “Anyway, welcome to GeL!"

He opened the door, bringing the first flashes of colour into the previously bleak insides of the building. The walls were painted all sorts of colours, green, yellow, you name it, with all sorts of bright patterns adorning them. Both humans and Pokemon walked through the corridors, carrying themselves as if they had important business to take care of. Then, Azzy took my paw and walked me in alongside his human partner. The door closed behind us.

"Well," Azzy said, "This is it. We'll show you around soon enough once you've met everybody."

I cocked my head. "Everybody?"

"Yes. It'll be good to know all the Pokemon you'll be staying with, after all. So, are you ready?"

Butterfree swarmed in my stomach. Truth be told, I wasn't sure if I was ready to meet any more strangers yet. It sounds weird saying that now, considering I barely have a problem with it as a Lucario. Hell, one motto I go by is that a stranger's just a friend you haven't met. Or maybe I stole it from some show. Anyway, considering all I had before then was my family, being dropped in to stay with Pokemon I hadn't met before was new to me. Then, I remembered how desperate I was to get off the island in the first place, so I took a deep breath and told myself I was excited instead of nervous.

"Yeah, let's go,” I said, putting on a brave face for Azzy.

Paw in paw, he led me through the various corridors of the place, each drenched in different colours, until I caught a glimpse of leaf-green from behind a glass door. The excitement in my stomach worked itself up to my chest as we walked up. The door opened for us, bringing a cool breeze into the stuffy building, and revealed a forest-like area with many different trees forming a wall around the room. Well, room wasn't quite the right word. It felt so natural that it didn't feel like one at all. Hell, I couldn't even see the ceiling as that looked like the sky as well.

I looked down and true to Azzy's word, there were many Pokemon of different shapes and sizes doing various things in one spot. Some of them mingled with one another. Some swam in shallow ponds. There were also a few that were entirely on their own, one on land, sitting with their back turned to us, and one perched on a branch. Azzy patted my shoulder and smiled.

"These are most of the Pokemon you'll get to know. There will be more on the way. After we've got everybody in, we'll show you all around, alright?"

I nodded, and Azzy bowed before turning his back to me and heading towards the corridor.

"Wait!" I called for his attention. "Where are you going?"

"I have to take care of a few things, but I’ll be back soon. Have fun."

With that, he walked away, and I looked to all the new faces who were looking at me.

Okay, this might get a little confusing, so bear with me. There were a lot of Pokemon there I didn't exactly know the names of at the time, so for now, let's call them by their species names. I know Shine probably briefed you on who they were, but this is gonna be a headache for you if I rattle off everybody's life story one by one. We cool?

Anyway, the group of new Pokemon stared in silence. The forest-like area was strangely silent, only interrupted by the lone Starly that occasionally chirped from atop of the tree. Even the two Pokemon that swam, Buizel and Bidoof, rested their chins on the bank to look at me. I wasn't sure how to break the ice myself, that tingling sensation churning my stomach. Then mercifully, the Lickitung stepped forward.

"So you're our new arrival, huh?" he said, and gave me his paw. "It's nice to meet you. I'm a Lickitung, although you can call me Basil."

Thankful to see another friendly face, I smiled and gave my paw to him as well. A moment passed. Then he gently took the other paw and shook ours together.

"You're usually supposed to shake it in return." Some of the other Pokemon chuckled in the background. I would've flushed red if I could.

"Sorry. I can't say I have a name either."

"It's no biggie," he said, "I'm sure we'll come up with one together at some point. Now, I'm sure everybody would like to get to know you, so why don't you tell us how you got here?"

"What, now?" I said.

"If you wouldn't mind."

Clearly, he had more experience than I did when it came to these situations. I glanced at the other Pokemon for a bit, who waited in anticipation. I didn't know if I should've told them what I was doing there, but I figured I had little else to do, so I might as well have embraced the moment. So I brought up bits about my upbringing, to which, Buizel splashed around excitedly in the pond, to the Bidoof's annoyance.

"Ooh, you lived on an island? Coooool!"

"Not really," I said. "It was kinda boring."

"How?" He cocked his head. "You had the sea all around you!"

I just shrugged and continued, getting to the point where I almost drowned and met Azzy.

"That was foolish, swimming to your doom," the Abra said. "Was it not?"

Before I had any sort of reaction, Basil held his paw up. "Now, now, let's keep it friendly, alright?"

Abra flicked a claw at him like the fopp he was. I have a lot of interesting stuff to say about him later, let’s put it that way.

Anyway, I continued, up until the point Mom released me from the Pokeball Dad trapped me in and let me come here.

"Aw," Ponyta said, "Your mom must've really cared for you."

"Well," I said, rubbing my head, "Yeah. Wouldn't yours?"

Ponyta shook her head. "I lost mine."

Those words hit me like a kick to the nads. Not that I have any, but still, what do you say to something like that? I know now that a lot of Pokemon didn't have the same lucky upbringing as I did, but back then, it was new to me. I wrung my paws together, trying to find something to say to reassure her. All that came out though was a simple "Oh." She didn't reply back.

"Smooth," Sneasel said. This time, Basil extended his large tongue and licked him across the face. “Ugh, gross!”

"Anyway,” Basil said, “I'm sure you'll understand that everyone came here due to all sorts of circumstances. Don't feel bad because yours is different from theirs."

I just nodded. I didn't really feel like talking much after that, so I sat down and stared at my feet. My chest felt hollow. Back home, I could've teased the hell out of my brothers with ease, but here, I was pretty much at the mercy of everyone else. Some seemed to have it worse than others, like Sneasel, who had several scars across his body, so I didn't want to imagine what he could've done to me if I pissed him off, especially with those claws of his.

My gaze wandered off to the rest of the room where that lone Pokemon sat away from the group, staring at the trees. He about as small as me, except he had a smoother body. Since Basil was so welcoming to me before, I figured I'd go up to the lonely Pokemon to give him a helping hand too. I gingerly padded over to him and stood behind his back.

"Hey," I said, "you alright?"

He slowly turned to me. I smiled, only for it to turn upside down when I actually saw his face. His eyes stared through me, looking so wide, I swore they were about to pop out. Something about his stare in particular could've turned you to stone, probably literally. It was like he had some sort of curse. I caught a glimpse of the various purple splotches around his face before he turned his head back to the scenery.

My heart raced. I took a few paces back, only to run back to the gang and hug Basil, as I had no one else to latch onto.

"Hey there," he said, "what's wrong?"

"Wha-what the heck's with that guy?"

"Oh." Basil frowned. "I would just leave him be for now. I can tell he's been through a lot."

"He creeps me out," Sneasel said, "There’s some psycho **** going on, or something like that."

Basil leered at him at the mention of that word. I didn’t know what it meant yet, but he said it in human, so just imagine that sound the TV makes when someone swears.

Ignoring that, I glanced at the creature again. "What is he, anyway?"

Well," Basil said, "He's known as a Cubone. His type usually wears the skulls of their mothers on their head."

"What?" I said, practically white with shock. "Wha-why would they do that, that's so messed up! If someone wore the skull of Mama like that, I’d be scared to death!"

"Well, it’s not every mon’s cup of tea, but they usually do it as a memento of those who've passed on."

“Ahem,” Abra chimed in, “you know that is just a myth.”

“Well, perhaps it is just a rumour. Still--” Basil turned his head to the maskless Cubone from far away--"why he doesn't have it is a mystery to us."

"Let's leave it that way," Sneasel said. "He probably pushed that broad down a cliff or some ****."

“Now, now,” Basil scolded, “that’s not a nice word to say. You want to set an example with the humans, don’t you?”

“Shaddup,” he said, picking at his ears with a claw, “you’re not my da—”

Cubone rushed in out of the blue and tackled Sneasel, bashing him over the head with a mini Bone Club. Basil tried to push him away to no avail, while the rest, me included, stared on.

“Okay, okay, I’m sorry!” Sneasel screamed. “I take it back! Just stop! Please!”

Cubone stopped attacking, and he went back to his own spot as if nothing happened. Sneasel was left nursing a few bumps on his head, sulking on the floor. And I just stood there, not knowing what the hell to do. It was my first time seeing a proper fight off the island. Well, as proper as one-sided blows to the head could be, but still.

“Are you alright?” Basil said, offering him a paw. Sneasel stared at it for a moment before he took it, scoffing.

“Ngh, I’ve been through worse.”

They dropped the issue and everything went back to normal, so that gave me time to calm my nerves. I even swam in the pond alongside the two other Pokemon, which felt nice and shallow. Not as cold as the ocean was, if anything, it felt warm. Kind of like it was heated from underneath. Anyway, the next two to come were a Happiny and an Aipom, who Basil babysat as well, although they weren't as receptive to tell their stories as I was. They got on well besides that, and it didn't take long for them to settle in and play with each other. I just watched from the pond, still not feeling accustomed to Pokemon etiquette yet, if that was even a thing. Then lastly, a Shinx came along as well.

This is where you come into the picture, Shine. You know, it's kind of funny looking back at it now. I didn't know you as well as I do now, but my first impression of you wasn't that great to begin with. No offence.

(None taken.)

Anyway, you limped over to Basil, and when he tried to introduce himself to you, you started sobbing and sat in a spot on your own far from everybody else. I don't blame you for how you acted back then, as I'll talk about that at some point later, but when I saw you, crying out of the blue, it kind of reminded me of Stumpy and how he would start wailing sometimes. Part of me felt annoyed, like I usually was around him whenever he had an outburst, but another part of me wanted to come towards you and hold you.

I was stuck between two boulders of thought and didn't know how to squeeze out, so I just sat and looked at you. You curled up into a ball and bathed in what seemed to be the sunlight. I swear you were glowing. Nevertheless, I watched until the other mediators came in, all sorts of evolved Pokemon, as well as Azzy, who gestured me to follow him. All of the Pokemon in the room flocked to their own mediators, even the solitary Pokemon like you, the Starly, the Sneasel, and that Cubone. Then they led us out of the room in single file, with Azzy taking my paw in his.

"Are we on tour now?" I asked.

"Yes, we'll walk you through most of the areas on this floor, and after we've had our meeting, we'll call it a day."

I followed the rest in a line as they led us through the various parts of the facility. Firstly, there were the classrooms, which we only got a small peek of since we wouldn't be needing to use them yet. I guess instead of the usual set up in human schools where you had desks and chairs to sit on, we had beanbags and cute little tables to sit around. It looked more like a place you'd sit all your stuffed toys on for a tea party than somewhere you'd learn a bunch of useless trivia. Then there was the gym, filled with all sorts of equipment I didn't know the purpose of. The Machop in our group must've known what they were about since he was jumping for joy in that room. The library was off limits for now, which the Abra complained about, but nothing else came from that.

I might as well skim through the rest as it was a lot to take in at once. The Lounge Room, Infirmary, Kitchen and Bathroom was next. You can probably guess what their purposes were. Then there were the offices, which again, were off limits. That's probably gonna sound quite redundant soon. And finally, there was the meeting hall, opened with a set of double doors unlike the rest. You know something's important when it has two doors instead of one, for whatever reason.

We were led in one line to our seats on one side of the room while the other was occupied. There were these humans in white coats, who looked at us with wide-eyed interest. I felt my heart beating again, as their eyes tracked us all the way to our seats. I tried to ignore them, staring at the front while we waited. Everybody else around me chatted amongst themselves. Once everybody settled in, Azzy sat beside me while the Shinx was in front, looking left to right. His mediator, a Manectric, nuzzled close to him, keeping him occupied. A part of me still wanted to reach out to him, but I decided against it. Everyone went silent as one member of staff spoke into the microphone, another mediator by his side.

"Everyone, may I have your attention please," he said, which I heard through the mediator's Pokemon tongue. "We'd like to thank you all for coming to this facility, man, woman and Pokemon alike, and we hope all of you will make the most of your time here. But I'll let the leader speak for himself, so may I present to you, our Director, Lawrence Cartwright, and Assistant Director, Lucy Labelle."

The two speakers stepped aside and held out a hand to the right of the stage. An old man propped himself up on his cane, walking slowly, but with determination in his gait. A Gardevoir floated closely behind him, strangely enough, wearing a frilled dress that flowed behind her. You know, for a Pokemon, she totally owned that look. I couldn't even imagine myself in a dress, let alone want to wear one.

The director's shoes clattered with each step he took on the hard floor, echoing throughout the room. Then, he stood up on top of the podium, his Gardevoir by his side, and a smile emerged from his wrinkled face.

"Humans and Pokemon alike," they spoke in their respective tongues, in perfect unison, "welcome to our project, Gestalt Learning. We have brought you all here to take part in this experiment to contribute to a better society." The two of them held their hands up, as if shaping the whole world under their palms. "Imagine it. Human and Pokemon in league with one another. To perform the same tasks as one another. To change the world with one another. To create a better future with one another. We see so much potential with both of you, and sadly, we see that this potential is not being used." Their arms drooped, and they clasped their hands together.

"For far too long, the trainer system has trapped everyone in this rusting machine that only spins to create wealth for the rich at the expense of everyone else. Trainers go out into the expanding world at an early age only to pursue a hollow dream of gaining a fake Championship title left from the ashes of the Elite Four. Pokemon are bound to these trainers for no other reason other than sustenance and a purpose in life. Sure, we cannot ignore the fighting instincts of you Pokemon, but a fight-life balance can be achieved. Pokemon and humans can truly learn to co-exist with one another, if enough time is spent on their education. That is why all of you are here."

They pointed at all of us in the room.

"All of you, humans and Pokemon are full of life and brimming with hope. You will all work with each other as equals, not as master and servant. For you humans, we will ensure you'll work closely with these Pokemon, and reward you dearly for your contributions to the future. You will be renowned all around in your respective fields of science. As for you Pokemon, we will accompany you every step of the way to make sure your talents are cultivated here. You will be able to achieve anything you set your mind to, and after your leave, you'll be able to put those skills into practice to travel the world, build a career, become famous, and anything else you will yourself to do. The choice is yours."

They put their arms down and joined hands. "For the next five years, we will do everything in our power to ensure your studies are fruitful. You will follow a program that caters to your needs, as well as help you to make the most of your time here. As we are Gestalt Learning, we believe every part plays a fundamental role to your education. For now, however, we shall pass on the torch to our Class Coordinators." They bowed. The humans on the other side were the first to clap. Although I didn't know what use it did, I clapped along anyway, as the Pokemon they were able to did so, while the rest howled in the air.

Really, they could've said anything and I could've believed it. If they said it was possible to shoot rockets out of our arses, we probably would've tried to do it. Even though I didn't understand what half those words meant at the time, since we all know you're smarter by default if you use big words in place of simpler ones, there was something about the way they said them as well as their tones of voice that sold me on it. After all, I made the choice to go there, and I didn't regret it. For the most part.

Lucy, the Gardevoir, helped the director leave the stage while another human/Pokemon duo entered. They didn't say a lot that was too important to rattle off at the top of my head, but basically, they ran down how the 5 years would be divided up into several syllabuses: a mix of learning the same skills human children would be taught, including how to speak which was my main focus, and fighting, which would serve as an outlet for our instincts and teach us how to defend ourselves as well as work with trainers if we chose to. Of course, there was the boring stuff like all the rules they went through. With each word uttered, my head bobbed up and down, struggling to keep my eyes open. They sure took their sweet time on pointless crap. Something squeezed my sides, jolting me awake.

"What the--"

The Aipom snickered from behind, who covered his mouth with his tail in an attempt to muffle his laughter.

"Hey," I whispered, "keep your paws to yourself."

"Couldn't help it, sorry," he said, then narrowed his eyes. "Still, he doesn't shut up, does he?"

I shook my head. Although I didn't agree with his grabby nature, we found something else to share between us. He grinned and held out his paw-like tail to me.

"You seem cool. We can be friends, right?"

Other than Basil, he was the only Pokemon that gave me such a gesture that day, so I smiled back to him and offered a paw in return. He snatched it away.

“Psyche! Too slow!”

I just shrugged and turned back to the guy's lecture. Something told me I had to get used to his antics.

Thankfully, the guy shut his trap and we were told to gather up into three groups of six. We would stay with each other for the rest of our course there. There were those who came from trainers or lived in domestic areas. There were those who were born in GeL. And then, there was us, the wild urchins. There was me, the Ponyta, the Cubone, the Buizel, and the Aipom. Except someone was missing. When we were sorted, I asked one of the mediators why there were only five of us, only to be told the other member wasn't ready yet. You'll find out about that later.

After that, Azzy picked me up and we exited the hall in one neat line, going back to the cafeteria to be greeted with many different bowls and plates of food. Sandwiches, berries, meat pellets, you name it. I drooled, as the rest probably did, and if you know anything about how Pokemon eat, provided you haven't been living beneath a bridge for all of your life, it was chaos in there. By the end of it, in the mess we made, we had eaten our fill, and were set to fall into a food coma not long after. After we were all done, we were led into the corridors again only to be broken off into our respective groups. Us wild Pokemon would be staying in the same garden we met everybody else in.

When we got there, the ceiling was black instead of blue, filled with twinkling stars and a rind of a moon. Our mediators wished us good night and each of us found a spot to sleep in. I myself gathered a pile of leaves and curled up into it. I slowly drifted away, sure to fall into slumber. Then I found myself on the island again, listening to one of Mom's stories with the rest. Trunks was there, listening intently. Stumpy was there, curling up against a tree. Twig was there, chewing on a twig. Figures. And Dad was probably somewhere hidden, listening in private. After her story was over, I went over to hug Mom, only to touch the air. I found myself in the garden again with a bunch of strangers.
 
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canisaries

you should've known the price of evil
Location
Stovokor
Pronouns
she/her
Partners
  1. inkay-shirlee
  2. houndoom-elliot
  3. yamask-joanna
  4. shuppet
  5. deerling-andre
I'm back again! And about time, too. I'd been considering moving over to FFnet to continue for a while, but never found the proper moment, but now that the story's continuing here, I've got no excuse. Chapter 18, here I go.

I got taken to some sort of wetroom where they put me in a bath and gently washed me down. I probably needed it as a wild Riolu, but getting touched and brushed by a glove-wearing human for the first time was, as you can imagine, stressful.

GeL security footage of Curio being bathed

I won’t mince words here – getting a vaccine for the first time sucked, especially because of the needles. Sure, they gradually eased me into it and the actual injection was painless, but going through that already threw me off balance before I even got the chance to see all of GeL.

GeL security footage of Curio getting her vaccine

“Um, why do you need the four arms? Aren’t two enough?”

oh my god curio you can't just ask people why they have four arms

Hell, one motto I go by is that a stranger's just a friend you haven't met. Or maybe I stole it from some show.

you can't slip that reference by me you son of a bitch

It does strike me as strangely friendly for Curio, from what I remember about her character... but it's also been a loooong time since I read the previous 17 chapters, so I may be remembering things in disproportion.

Paw in paw, he led me through the various corridors of the place, each drenched in different colours, until I caught a glimpse of leaf-green from behind a glass door. The excitement in my stomach worked itself up to my chest as we walked up. It opened for us, bringing a cool breeze into the stuffy building, and revealed a forest-like area with many different trees forming a wall around the room.

It took me a couple of reads to notice what the "it" in the bolded part referred to.

I'm not completely sure how I'm meant to visualize the trees - are they so dense that they form a wall by themselves, or is it more of a saying and they're just arranged like a fence?

"Wait!" I called for his attention, "where're you going?"

Dialogue punctuation seems off here?

"It's nice to meet you. I'm a Lickitung, although you can call me Basil."
"That was foolish, swimming to your doom," the Abra said. "Was it not?"
Well," Basil said, "He's known as a Cubone.

the crew.....

Anyway, you limped over to Basil, and when he tried to introduce himself to you, you started sobbing and sat in a spot on your own far from everybody else.

mood tbh

even the solitary Pokemon like you, the Starly the Sneasel and that Cubone.

Missing comma here?

The humans on the other side were the first to clap, Although I didn't know what use it did,

Comma in place of period.

We would stay each other for the rest of our course there.

Stay *with each other?

When we were sorted, I asked one of the mediators why there were only five of us, only to be told the other member wasn't ready yet. You'll find out about that later.

we haven't unlocked that fighter yet

---

General Thoughts

This definitely pulled off that "first day of school" feeling well. While I don't remember mine, the presentation definitely reminded me of those I'd be subject to in elementary, wondering why the hell they were important and why anyone would care. It's also interesting to see that Gel indeed isn't that kind of scary sterile lab place one normally expects from a shady facility behind traumatic memories, but seems like what a learning center for mon basically would be. It makes the mystery all the more mysterious, as we can't possibly guess what would be so bad about this place yet.

As deducible from my quote comment, I also see that I'll soon be learning firsthand about those character's I've heard be referenced - most of all M and Abraxas. Excited to see what the buzz is about. Ready to hate Abraxas.

While this chapter does neatly package that aforementioned "first day of school", it did feel somewhat... idk, suboptimally structured? The drama is mostly at the center of the chapter, while it typically does best towards the end. The presentation, while providing welcomed exposition, didn't feel very dramatic due to the kids' lack of understanding and interest. The dream on which the chapter ends is nicely bittersweet, but I think it could have been expanded a little to make the ending not so sudden.

Anyway, good read, interested to see where this goes next. Glad to be back.
 

NebulaDreams

Ace Trainer
Partners
  1. luxray
  2. hypno
Chapter 19. First Fight or Flight

(So, I’m going to start asking some questions, just to structure this interview a little. Is that fine?)

Yeah, Tony, knock yourself out.

(Alright. When you started your schedule, what were the first few lessons like? Did you find an early interest in learning human speech?)

Well, how interesting do you think it is to listen to some blue rabbit repeating the alphabet several times over, then making you do the same thing? Not very. A lot of it was just going into the basic mechanics of pronunciation. How do you make that into a story? Wouldn’t this bomb if this was a film?

(Yes, but what about the mechanics of Pokemon speech, and how do they relate to you learning about human speech? This would help us understand your difficulties.)

Oh, so you want to get technical, huh? Well, I can’t really say I’m the best Mon for that sort of thing. Shine is a better teacher than me in that sense. But I can offer my input here, plus what I learned from them.

When you first speak, as a Pokemon, you don’t really think about the sounds you’re making. Our roars and cries may seem like gibberish to your untrained ears, no offence, but those same roars and cries have many different variations, and with that, many different words and meanings. My best bet is there are over 1,000 ways to roar as a Lucario, each having their own set of meanings. ‘Reror’ might mean something like ‘hello’, while ‘rorora’ might mean something like ‘go away’. If we had more time, I would go through each 1,000 plus of those roars with you, one by one.

Just kidding. But seriously, if we went through every little sound change to try and figure out what they all meant, you’d sooner gouge out your ears with an icepick. Then again, that’s the kind of thing linguists get their rocks off to. That’s why it’s so hard to try and explain it, because it ain’t something you can fully pick apart, it’s something you feel, just like learning in your language. You start babbling as a baby and then you work your way up to sounding less drunk the older you get as you begin to understand what the adults around you are actually saying. It all comes with experience. The more complex the meaning of the sentence, the more words you start to string along. Unfortunately for us, our speech sounds garbled as each sound that conveys meaning is bunched up together, like atoms in a cell, or some other sciencey crap like that. That’s not something you can translate to humans so easily, if at all. Itwouldbelikeifitalkedlikethisallthetime. See what I mean?

But in any case, the first lessons in speech just covered the basic crap, like sounds and whatnot. All 17 of us were sat around a classroom, huddled close together, while the human students took notes at the back. I tried not to notice them too much, since whenever I turned towards them, they would look the other way, face buried in their notebook. Azzy, formally known as the Language Specialist, held a piece of chalk in front of a board. Whenever he wrote, it often squeaked, making my ears twitch.

For each sound Azzy broke down, he wrote its letter on the chalkboard, starting with ‘a’, or ‘ae’ as it sounds, and made us repeat it. When he wrote down the first letter, I raised my paw.

“What’s that?”

“Oh,” Azzy said, “This is the letter ‘a’, or ‘ah’, as we pronounce it here.”

“What’s a letter?” A few chuckles came around me. Most noticeably, Abra burst into laughter, bashing his fist against the floor.

Right now, this probably sounds really stupid, even coming from me. Another thing you have to understand though is that sounds are one thing, but symbols are another. There’s one Kalosan guy with this name I can’t pronounce, who had this picture of a Leppa berry with text at the beginning saying ‘This is not a Leppa’. When you first look at it, you wonder what the heck the guy was smoking when he made it, but when you look at it closely, you realise that it’s in fact, not a berry, it’s a picture of a berry. Two completely different things, but easily confused for each other as the meaning is concrete. You can eat berries, after all. When you try to pair a sound with this abstract symbol, though, at first, you can’t see the meaning in that symbol. As such, it just looks like a random squiggle. Not exactly something you can sink your teeth into and taste.

“You fool,” Abra said, “you don’t even have a clue on what a letter is!”

In response, Azzy threw his piece of chalk at Abra. It bounced off him with a great thwacking sound, and even I felt it when Abra nursed at his head.

“That’s one thing I won’t have in this class. Remember everyone’s experience levels are different. Just because it seems natural for you doesn’t mean everybody thinks the same way, got it?”

Abra rubbed his yellow dome and sighed.

“Yes, sir.”

“Right. That’s actually a good question, young Riolu. Now...”

He explained what those letters and symbols were, going off on a tangent for a bit. I noticed Abra was levitating, while Aipom harassed a Buneary by pulling on her ears playfully. The others seemed to take a passive interest though, leaning closer to listen. When that was over, I just nodded, not wanting to show my ignorance as I still couldn’t put two and two together. At least, not in front of that yellow bastard again.

(So, what other lessons did you have?)

Oh, well, quite a few actually. We had our paws full with activities from that day forward, basically.

For starters, there were the gym sessions we had, which involved a set of physical exercises to do for a certain period of time, like working on running and endurance in one day, then stretches and aerobics the next.

Those sessions were led by a Medicham called Reggie, who clearly looked too enthusiastic for what he was doing. Each time he told us to do a rep of push ups or whatever the equivalent was for the non-bipedal Pokemon, his voice echoed in the closed-off gym space and he'd pump his fists in the air all the time. It wasn't my style, honestly, cause it seemed like he was performing something like a magic show for an audience who stared at their phones the entire time, but at least the Machop was into it.

He'd also cheer us on, saying we did a great job whenever we got through one of the reps, although he ignored some of the other Pokemon, like the Shinx who stayed tucked away in the corner of the room, without fail, for every session. Occasionally, Reggie interrupted his lesson to try and convince him to come along, but that didn't seem to work. Whenever that happened, the rest of the Pokemon would huddle around me and stare at the scene.

"What's he doing?" Sneasel said.

"Mmph," the skull-less Cubone huffed, the first syllable I heard from him so far. "Weak."

"Aw, c'mon," the Pachirisu said, standing up while he combed his tail, "He's been like this for, like, forever. He's just scared, that's all."

"Oh yeah?" Sneasel said, raising a claw to him. "What's there to be scared of in this place?"

"I dunno," Pachirisu said, his tail drooping, "but maybe he'll come ‘round later and tell me."

After a while, Reggie just gave up and ran back to us, preparing to give us another jazzercise session or whatever they called it. That's when Aipom waved his tail in the air.

"Whazzup?" Reggie said. If he fit the bill of anyone resembling a human, he probably would’ve been the beach bum that did a lot of illicit deals in his minivan. Don’t ask me how I know that.

"Um, I like these lessons, teach," Aipom said, "but when are we gonna learn to fight? Wouldn't that be good for exercise?"

Honestly, I didn't question that until he brought it up, but from my position, I never needed to fight for my own life. Though I didn't know what everybody's pasts were, since he was part of our wild brat pack, I guessed he must've had a few scrapes in his life so far. Reggie just smiled.

"It’s cool, dude. When everyone’s fallen into one groove, then we can start fighting, you dig?"

Aipom jumped up and down with enthusiasm. "B-But can't we just do one teensy fight? I feel like I wanna prove myself already!"

Reggie stroked his pink head. "Well, it might not be on the schedule, but it’s no biggie. Who do you want to pick as a partner, though?"

"You, duh!" he said, pointing his tail at the confused teacher.

"Woah there, I like your zest, dude, but that’s a little too spicy for me. Why not someone your own size?"

"Aw." I detected a drop of energy in his aura, but he turned around and grinned at us regardless, waving his tail from side to side as he decided who to pick in the circle.

"Ooh, ooh, ooh," Buizel said, "pick me!"

"Yeah, in your dreams," Sneasel said. "Whaddya gonna do, bubble him to death?"

"I'm always open," Basil the Lickitung said. "I don’t mind a little scrape here and there."

"Nah," Aipom said, "I know you're quite good already, plus that tongue kinda gives me bad vibes. How about I pick..."

He stopped and pointed his tail at myself, keeping it raised for a few seconds before dumb little me got the hint.

"Me? Why?"

"No reason. Well, I kinda heard you didn't do a lotta fighting on that island, so you're gonna be easy for me."

That got me riled up already. "Um, okay?"

"Cool, it’s settled!" Reggie said, and told everyone to clear out the way for us two to battle.

So, I kind of ended up getting in a fight by accident. I don't know how it happened, but it was the first time I ever fought another Pokemon outside of my family. That means teach droned on, going on about technique and proper fighting etiquette and yadda yadda yadda. In hindsight, I guess it was like a tutorial level in a role playing game, or something, like that series on the handheld thing. You know what I mean, don't you, Tony?

(Not really.)

What, did you never play that game before?

(No, I played outside for most of my childhood. Now I mostly play in the space of an office cubicle.)

Okay then, sucks to be you, I guess. I only went through a phase of it myself when I stole some random guy's DS that one time. I don't really like it since my paws aren't used to that sort of thing, but it's like having your first encounter with some random Pokemon terrorising the professor in the tall grass, and having to teach your own Pokemon how to fight for the first time. Except we’re the Pokemon, ha.

So the stage was set. Aipom bounced on the balls of his feet while I stood in an awkward, indecisive stance, not really sure how to initiate the fight.

"Go, Aipom!" Buizel said. "Go! Go!"

"Whatever," Sneasel said. "My money's on this minx."

"What's money?"

"Forget it."

He sprang forward first, paws splayed out preparing to scratch. I gasped and rolled to the side, dodging. He followed, however, and I bounced backwards, avoiding each swipe. I dodged and rolled, but he kept coming at me, unrelenting. My heart pounded. If I didn't make a move then, that probably would've been it. I sensed an opening below where his legs stood unprotected, and swiped down with a kick. It connected, knocking him flat on his tail-end. A mix of cheers followed. I breathed a sigh of relief when I heard that. It was like I was at the centre of the stage, and the rest of the spectating Pokemon were my fans. Yeah, sounds awfully conceited, I know.

"C'mon, idiot!" Sneasel said, "Kick 'im while he's down!"

"Not cool, dude!" Reggie said. "This fight must be fair, you dig? Wait for him to get up!"

"Shaddup!" he said, "What sense does that make? She’d be dead if this was a real battle, you ****!"

"H-hey, don’t talk to me like that!"

I watched as the two bickered, which went on long enough to distract me from the fight. When I tried to move my leg next, it wouldn’t budge. The Aipom's tail wrapped around my paw, and swung upward. The world around me turned upside down. My arms desperately flailed in the air in an attempt to get a hold on my surroundings. I don't know how far I was off the ground, but I braced myself, preparing for the worst.

Call it divine intervention or whatever other crap, but when I hit the floor, I rolled forward and broke my fall. Perhaps it was just muscle memory after falling off the treetops on the island a certain amount of times. I'd call it cat-like reflexes if I were close to being a cat-type, so I'll settle for Riolu-like reflexes for now.

More cheers followed. With each time that happened, I got more and more into a groove. It was that battle rush in my blood before I even knew what to call those instincts. I sprang back to my feet and focused on the Aipom, who looked confused, but nevertheless guarded for the next attack. Running forward, I tried to look for an opening wherever Aipom was unprotected. His tail acted as a shield for the rest of his body, with his paws raised in front of him for extra protection.

The only thing that wasn't covered, however, was his face, so you can imagine I went to town on that. I made a fist with my paws, swiped forward, and bam, right in his sniffer.

My punch made a satisfying slapping sound which echoed in the air, before Aipom crashed backwards and rolled over a couple of times before stopping. More cheers. I pumped my fist in the air, having my little moment of triumph before I saw what happened to his face. Red all over, basically, like he got splattered with a Tamato berry. I immediately rushed to his side, shaking him gently. He wouldn’t budge, sending chills down my spine.

"Oh jeez!" I said. "Uh, Aipom guy, can you hear me. Hello? Hello!"

Reggie tapped my shoulder. He looked down and gazed at the scene like he was looking at a piece of bread that popped out of the toaster, if that analogy makes sense.

"Well, I say you got him. Cool."

"Cool?" I said, shaking Aipom's body, "I just killed him, there's nothing cool about this! Please get help, help!"

Yeah, I might’ve been a bit of a drama queen – of course, Aipom was still breathing. It took me a few seconds before I saw his chest puff up and down, and laid close to him, looking for any sign I didn't hurt him too bad.

"I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to--"

"Fine," he croaked, trying to push me away. "Ugh, my nose..."

I breathed a sigh of relief, and managed to calm down before I heard the other Pokemon talking amongst themselves.

"What's she thinking?" Sneasel said. "Was she dropped as an egg or something?"

"The fool," Abra said. "She clearly hasn't been in many fights."

"She did a good job," Ponyta said. "Isn't that enough?"

To my mercy, Reggie stepped in and stopped them, calling off the lesson early and letting everybody else leave, aside from me. Aipom lifted himself off the ground and glared at me before he left.

The pink clown-looking guy knelt to my level and put his paws on my shoulders. In that gaze of his, I saw the same benevolent gaze Trunks used to give me whenever he gave one of his pep talks.

"Hey, girl," he said, "I get it, you’re not used to this."

"I don't understand," I said, nearly whispering. "Why did he make me fight him? Why does anyone have to fight anyone?"

"Why does anyone do anything? Just cuz, I guess. I get he wanted to prove himself though, so there’s your reason."

"But his face! You must've seen how badly I messed that up. What's gonna happen to him? What if I get in trouble for it?"

"Us Pokemon heal quickly, you dig?”

"But why, though? I know it happens a lot in the wild and stuff, but I heard a bit about trainers and how we're taught to fight for them. What's the point in that?"

The Medicham hummed to himself, looking for the right answer, when he shrugged and shot me a smirk.

“I dunno, I didn’t regret the time I spent with my first trainer, since I got to, well, train my body. And with that, my mind as well. Once you’ve fought enough times though, and learn more about the world, you can find that out for yourself. Until then, just chill out. You have us watching your back to stop your from seriously hurting anyone, plus you’ve got restraint, so you’re way ahead a lot of Pokemon already. You get me?”

I looked to the side at the splotch of blood on the floor. As much as it was painful dealing that sort of damage on another Pokemon, it could've easily been me as well, plus at that point, I trusted the teacher enough to take stock in his words. Finally, I nodded, and he gave me a pat on the back.

"Cool. I’d get back to that blue guy now."

I smiled once more before leaving the gym with Azzy. The day kind of veered off from there. I returned to our garden base and rested for a bit, gazing at what I thought was the sunlight. It definitely felt real anyway, and as the rays gently shined on my face. Everyone else was there aside from Aipom, who I presumed was healing up somewhere else. It was like being back home. Almost. Then, something blocked my view – the skull-less Cubone.

"Mmhh," he mumbled in a deep voice.

"Um, hi?" I said.

“Strong." He stopped to bow towards me. "Good fight."

"Well, thanks?" I guess it was flattering to hear that, but it rang hollow for me, since it came across like he thanked me just for breathing.

He wandered off to his usual spot where he gazed at the wall, and I just returned to my nap, ignoring the foreboding aura that came off from him. A few hours must've passed since the sky turned a dark orange, and at last, Aipom came in, looking as soft as the day he came in. When he caught my gaze, he leered at me before jumping atop a tree to sulk. His aura radiated sadness and frustration, and it wasn't hard to see why. I beat him purely by chance, and getting the stuffing beat out of you by an inexperienced runt like me mustn't have been nice. A part of me knew approaching him at this point probably wouldn't end well, but again, paw in Combee's nest.

I rose and dug my claws into the tree bark, climbing to the top not long after. Truth be told, it was a little anti-climactic, as I was used to the trees being so tall back home, but whatever. I perched onto a branch beside him and waited for him to notice me. A moment passed and nothing happened. You could've cut the tension in that room with a claw. When it became apparent he wasn't in the mood to talk, I made the first move.

"Um, hi again. I'm sorry about earlier."

He looked once with a sorrowful expression, like that of a kicked Lillipup, and turned back to the scenery.

"It was my first proper fight, I wasn't really expecting to win. It just sorta happened. That punch looked really painful, though, I didn't mean to go that far."

"Eh.” He shrugged. "I've had worse."

Knowing he was from the wild as well, I put two and two together.

"It must've been really rough out there, in the wild, I mean. It sounds so different from how I was brought up, you know. If you wanna talk to me about that, I'd be interested."

"No you wouldn't," he said. "You'd just think I'm weak, like everybody else does. You proved that today by winning."

"No I don't. And who's everybody else?"

"My parents, for starters." His voice dropped, although he spoke more clearly that time. Anger boomed from his aura. "I can't hold my own in a fight. For that, they thought about leaving me to die all the time until these guys came along, then they just offered me up to them. Didn't say goodbye. Doesn't that just scream weak to you?"

Knowing the rules of nature better now than I did back then, with how unpredictable, harsh and indifferent it can be, I could see why he'd think that. Still, when I heard him talk about himself that way, like the way Trunks did sometimes, I squeezed his paws with mine and leaned in close to the point my muzzle touched his face.

"Who cares?" I said. "I didn't come here knowin' everything, and that's why I left home, so I could learn somethin'. We've got all the time to get stronger, so what's the point of worrying?"

"That Cubone over there." He tilted his head towards the meditating brute, who was too far away to listen in on us. "He looks at me all the time like I just peed all over his berries."

"Ew. Again, who cares? I don't. Just focus on what you wanna do."

"I want to get stronger."

"Fine then. Do that, but, don't compare yourself to others, or me, you got it?"

He hummed to himself, and silence followed as he considered what to say for a moment. It wasn't the awkward silence like before, but a comfortable silence, like the fog cleared up between us. His aura definitely radiated more positive energy anyway. Finally, he turned to me and smiled, shaking my paws, like in the friendly sort of manner Basil drilled me on before.

"Yeah. I get that. I'll try not to think on it too much."

We held paws for a little while. And a while longer. Perhaps a little too long. I shook them gently, trying to get out of his grasp, when he grinned widely and shoved at my chest. I went flying off the tree and fell to the floor, tail first. He scurried down soon after and pointed his tail at me.

"Haha!" he chuckled. "Now we're even!"

I laughed along with him, as I sensed that playful energy, and he helped me up. From there, we started talking about little details of our own pasts, from the sort of Pokemon he met that occasionally gave him solace from his parents, to the sort of pranks he’d play on his siblings, like luring them into a hole in the ground covered with leaves. He got something slung at him as payback – I needn’t mention what. I laughed and cringed at the same time. I didn’t talk much about myself; I just listened and commented along with him. When it came time to go for dinner in the cafeteria, we ate together. When we settled down for the night in that same room, we nuzzled close to each other, feeling each other's warmth and just enjoying our company. He was the first real friend I had there, and he was a cool guy all throughout.

Still, my ass was a bit sore from that fall, but you win some, you lose some.

The week pretty much flew by as we had our basic lessons for one portion of the day and exercise in the other. Time didn't really exist there, since even with the garden there, it was pretty much a vacuum in the rest of facility, and not having an actual concept of time yet didn't help matters. Having Aipom there to talk to and sometimes cause mischief with made the days pass much quicker. It wasn't a far cry from the times when Stumpy and I used to explore the island together, although he had less of a tendency to cry and moan whenever things didn't go his way. So it was fairly busy for that period, and when we had our day off at the end of it, we were playing in the garden together when another mediator came in holding some sort of device. Without a word, they handed it over and told me to put it to my ear. I waited until I heard a familiar voice from the other side.

"Hello, miss Riolu!" It was Azzy.

"Oh, hi! Wait, what're you doing in there? What is this thing anyway? Did you get sucked in?"

"I'm still here. I'm just on a phone, which allows you to talk through long distances. I’m no Rotom, after all."

I paused, trying to figure out what he meant by that, but kept on topic. "Why not talk to me here?"

"Because I have a surprise for you." I heard distant voices from far off, and stood there, wandering what they were until somebody else took over.

"Can you hear me, dearie?"

"Mama!" I jumped for joy. "How are you getting this?"

"This Azumarill visited the island and is with us at the moment. We’re enjoying his company so far. The kids love him – they keep asking him to blow bubbles their way. But how are you anyway? How have your studies been?"

"Well, we've only started, mama, so nothing too special, but we've learned what letters are and stuff! We'll be learning how to speak soon!"

"That sounds great, dearie. They sound like they've got a lot in store for you already." I heard shouting from the other side, one in a whining tone and one in a much younger tone. "Oh, let me pass you onto your brothers."

"Hey, hey!" Stumpy was on the other side now. "How are things?"

"Good."

"I'm missin' you, you know. It ain't the same having this guy pushin' me on that swing."

"Hiiiiii!" Twig beamed from the other side.

"Hello, sis," Trunks said. "It's been a while, so it's nice to be with you again."

"Yeah, of course!"

"Have you done any more drawing lately?"

"Um, I dunno." All of that slipped my mind. During my time there so far, I didn't even think about holding a crayon again, since everything else went so fast, but when Trunks brought it up, I found a part of myself yearning to make a mess on the sketchpad again. I hadn't even mentioned it to anyone else yet.

"Well, I'm sure they've kept you busy so far with other things, but still, keep going at it. I don't want to see you drop it so soon."

"Sure thing, bro."

A beat. I half expected Dad, or rather, Liam to be on the other side as well, but no matter how long I listened, I couldn't feel his presence there.

"Where's, um, Dad?"

"Oh." Trunks' tone dropped severely. I could tell what he was thinking even through the disembodied voice. "I'll let Mom answer that."

He said something too far off for me to hear, then I heard Mom's voice again.

"Alright then," she said. "Things between me and Liam aren't great. We've been apart for quite some time now. We didn't want to see each other, so we split the island in half, so he has his side and my side. We agreed to share the lake, but we know when not to bother each other."

I remembered the times we had before I left, how Dad would always talk down to us, how he tore up my drawings, and how he used me as soccer practice. I didn't forgive him for that yet, but it didn't give me any pleasure to hear about Mom and Dad not being the same. A pang of guilt nestled in my gut.

"The kids are allowed to talk to him whenever they want, but of course, they hang out with me more. Whenever they get the chance to go, he barely talks at all. I worry about him sometimes, but it's for the best."

"That sounds really lonely. Mama, is it my fault?"

"What do you mean?

"That things turned out so bad between you?"

"Don't be silly, dearie. You had nothing to do with it. He’s just a grumpy, bitter Mon, that's all."

Even though my bad experiences with him still lingered on, I longed to hear his voice, just so I could take another piece of my old home back with me.

"Can I talk to him?"

"Well, the Azumarill wanted to help, but he tried to approach Liam, he just threw a bit of his aura at him, so I guess he wants to be left alone for now."

"Oh."

"But never mind that. It's lovely hearing your voice again, dearie. I'd love to talk with you all day, but I guess you'll have your paws full again soon. I hope you've made friends, at least."

"Yeah, of course!" I said, looking to Aipom, who hung lazily off a nearby branch, "We're having a lot of fun already!"

"Great! Are there more Riolu there, or is it just you?"

"Just me."

"I see. Well then, it's been wonderful talking to you, dearie, but I think I'll hand you back to this Azumarill for now. We'll talk again soon enough. Everyone, say goodbye for your sister!"

They all cheered me on to say goodbye, and I did the same, until all sound on the other end cut off completely. The mediator took the phone back, and I was left by myself in the garden grinning like an idiot, at least, until Aipom came along, tilting his head.

"Do you talk to yourself a lot? Ain’t that a sign of madness?"

"What?" I wondered what he meant, until it occurred to me he might not have known what a phone was. I mean, I certainly didn't until it happened. "I spoke to my family. They were so happy to talk to me."

I stared him down for a while as he looked quite glum, then came up to him and held his paw. "I'm sorry. I know things weren't alright on your end."

He shook his head. "I won't hafta deal with them again. But whatever, if you're happy, then same goes for me. It's nice for you to have a family that cares, anyway."

And so, the week ended with me having a good night's sleep, and going off to dream about me and my family together again. Instead of simply longing for them through a distant past, they were happy memories where I felt closer than ever to them than before. I couldn't quite remember each of their faces, but their voices were enough for me to get the picture. I must've slept like a baby, at least until we had to wake up early again to face another day.
 
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canisaries

you should've known the price of evil
Location
Stovokor
Pronouns
she/her
Partners
  1. inkay-shirlee
  2. houndoom-elliot
  3. yamask-joanna
  4. shuppet
  5. deerling-andre
Chapter 19

Our roars and cries may seem like gibberish to your untrained ears, no offence, but those same roars and cries have many different variations, and with that, many different words and meanings.
Unfortunately for us, our speech sounds garbled as each sound that conveys meaning is bunched up together, like atoms in a cell, or some other sciencey crap like that. That’s not something you can translate to humans so easily, if at all. Itwouldbelikeifitalkedlikethisallthetime. See what I mean?

pokemon language confirmed tonal and agglutinative.

Anyway, this does still make me wonder the same thing as I did way back, which is how the Pokémon all seem to share a common language. Especially when the description here seems to talk specifically about how Lucario communicate. I did like to hear all this, but the leeway with realism gets narrower the more a fantastical element is explained. Consequently, the question I brought up begins to feel more and more like a bridge you'll have to cross at some point.

For each sound Azzy broke down, he wrote its letter on the chalkboard, starting with ‘a’, or ‘ae’ as it sounds, and made us repeat it. When he wrote down the first letter, I raised my paw.

“What’s that?”

“Oh,” Azzy said, “This is the letter ‘a’, or ‘ah’, as we pronounce it here.”

This threw me a bit off, but I'm guessing Curio is talking about how the letter's name is said and Azzy is talking about the phoneme it corresponds to. Although in English you can have "a" correspond to like 5 different vowels sounds, too, so... but then again, I wasn't thought English as a first language, so I don't actually know how the specifics of teaching alphabet might go.

In any case, "ae" is more ambiguous to me than, for example, "ay", so I didn't know how to read it at first.

For starters, there were the gym sessions we had, which involved a set of physical exercises to do for a certain period of time

THE FITNESSGRAM PACER TEST IS A MULTISTAGE AEROBIC CAPACITY TEST THAT

As you can imagine, it doesn't translate that well to the Pokemon who couldn't stand on their hind legs, so I got a kick out of seeing the Bidoof fall on his ass, amongst other things.
Each time he told us to do a rep of push ups or whatever the equivalent was for the non-bipedal Pokemon,

Somewhat mixed messages here with quadrupedal mon doing moves meant for bipedals at one point but quadrupedal versions the next.

Those sessions were led by a Medicham called Reggie

I watched you like a hawk, waiting for you to make him say the line. You did not, but I can tell you wanted to.

After a while, Reggie just gave up and ran back to us, preparing to give us another jazzercise session or whatever they called it.

Z U M B A

"No reason. Well, I kinda heard you didn't do a lotta fighting on that island, so you're gonna be easy for me."

rüde

I only went through a phase of it myself when I stole some random guy's DS that one time.

unrealistic, she did not call it a "nintendo" without specifying which console because EVERYONE I KNEW GROWING UP DID THAT AND IT DROVE ME CRAZY

while I stood halfway still and in between my stance,

I've read this like five times and I'm still not sure what it's saying. Like, I think I get the idea but I don't know how to properly parse this.

"What's money?"

Money can be exchanged for goods and services.
I'm fairly certain I've made this joke before but I don't care.

Red all over, basically, like he got splattered with a Tomate.

Tamato? Or are you going for another tomato-like Berry?

Reggie tapped my shoulder, who looked down and gazed at the scene like he was looking at a piece of bread that popped out of the toaster.

"Who" refers to... Reggie here, right? It just looks like it points at "my shoulder", which really makes no sense.

"Cool?" I said, shaking Aipom's body, "I just killed him, there's nothing cool about this! Please get help, help!"

chapter 20: curio goes to pokemon jail for monslaughter

"She did a good job," Ponyta said. "Isn't that enough?"

I like the stealth-kinship that these two have.

"Alright then," she said. "Things between me and Liam aren't great. We've been apart for quite some time now. We didn't want to see each other, so we split the island in half, so he has his side and my side. We agreed to share the lake, but we know when not to bother each other."

Now your father and I have decided

That we're going our separate ways...

and how he used me as soccer practise.

HACCY SACC
no but I do have a nitpick: practise is a verb while practice is the noun, right?

The kids are allowed to talk to him whenever they went,

*want?

I stared him down for a while as he looked quite glum, when I came up to him and held his paw.

*then? Or this is some rarer sentence structure I'm not familiar with.

---

Fighting certainly seems a lot more serious in a more grounded setting like this... which means mon's natural affinity for it is a bit disturbing. But I suppose that is still a much better alternative to mon not liking fighting but being forced to by humans.

Good to see Curio befriend that Aipom and expand her comfort zone. Lovely for her to get to talk with her family again, too. It feels a bit unrelated to the rest of the chapter, but I can't really think of a way to better connect it myself. I'm thinking I'm gonna relax on structure and pacing in general as I think demanding a fantastic structure from each chapter or even most chapters in a fic this long is just unreasonable.

On a last note, I like the touch of ending this chapter with another dream of her family. It's like a progress stop. Or something.
 

NebulaDreams

Ace Trainer
Partners
  1. luxray
  2. hypno
Chapter 20: Showtime, In More Ways Than One
(So, when did you start properly learning to speak the human tongue?)

Actually, we made progress on it not long after the first week ended. That was around the time we learned to fight as well, and learn other things such as how to tell the time and how to add numbers up together, although I bombed at both of them at first. It's a lot to talk about at once, though, so what do you wanna know?

(The speaking lessons, please.)

Alright then. I mean, we basically touched on more of what I talked about before, like how human sounds are different in meaning to what we say in our own language. The week before with Azzy was just finding out what all the possible sounds were and how to connect them to letters. After a while, I learned how to connect the two together, but when Azzy started his next round of lessons, he started talking about words. He'd write them out on that cringe-inducing chalkboard again, would break down each of the sounds used in it, and tell us to repeat it.

I had trouble with that at first, since words were a mouthful compared to the single sounds I was used to doing, but take my word for it, I got better. I don’t care to go through it in huge length since Shine could probably do that. One thing that really helped though, believe it or not, was watching the actual Pokemon show, which they found a way to tie into our lessons. Aw, this takes me back. I know you never played the games, but did you watch the series, at least?

(When I was 7, I think. That was when it first started, with Ash in Kanto.)

Yeah, now you're on my level. So, it's been a while since I've seen it, and now I remember it, it's nothing special. I wouldn't go out of my way to watch it again. But parts of it are stuck in my head from when I'd watch those episodes in the AV room, sitting with Aipom and all that, sitting in those comfy beanbags around the TV. A human would operate the remote and flick through several channels before tuning into Pokemon: Diamond and Pearl. Soon enough, I was hooked. I loved the bright colours and the art, except they were moving pictures. When I think about it now, the time it must've taken to do that must've been insane.

I say moving pictures like I'm a caveman or something, but that’s what they are. Not to get too nerdy, unlike one Pokemon I know sitting in this room right now, but film or animation is just a series of frames cobbled together, 24 times a second, with voices and music to bind it all into one package. And the music as well. I sat through the opening theme, and even though I couldn't understand it yet, I hummed along with the tune, as did some of the other Pokemon watching it. Even Shinx paid attention and wasn't sulking in a corner like usual.

But yeah, we must've watched the first episode where Dawn, that girl trainer or something, tried to find her way to the professor's lab and ended up bumping into the wrong places. Again, we couldn't understand her fully yet, but we got the gist of what was happening, which was enough. Then Ash came on screen on a boat with the Pikachu, and I was waiting for that yellow sparkster to speak, but he never did. Instead, he repeated his name over and over again, and so, it sounded like complete gibberish. It felt really weird, so I raised my hand up when it happened to try and find out why, but the show kept going and wouldn't stop. I gave up after a while, plus my classmates gave me weird looks, so I sat through the rest of the episode with my mouth zipped shut.

There were some battles along the way with other Pokemon, which got me excited, and as it ran, I understood more and more of what they said. Only certain words and phrases, mind you, but the one catchphrase we got familiar with was "I choose you!". But after the big fight, Ash, Pikachu and Dawn eventually banded together, along with that pervy guy as well, but anyway, the episode ended and the credits rolled, so they turned off the TV soon after. We all clapped and asked for more, but that was it for now, and so, they led us back to our bases. I caught Azzy's attention before he left the garden again.

"Yes, miss Riolu. I saw you wanted to ask something during the show."

"Yeah. Pikachu's really weird. And the other Pokemon. They keep saying their names all the time and I can't understand it. Am I just being thick?"

He shook his head.

"It's something the series does. While the human characters are voiced by humans, for whatever reason, the Pokemon are voiced by humans too."

"But why? Wouldn't it be better to have Pokemon talking like Pokemon so we could all get it?"

He patted his ears — his aura radiated a nervous energy. I take it he didn't want to answer that.

"Well, the show is aimed for humans for all ages, but you still understood what was going on, didn't you?"

I nodded. "I'm starting to understand humans better now too!"

"That's good then. Well, have a good day."

He just left, and it was me in that garden again, still mulling over those questions I asked. Mostly about why they didn't hire Pokemon to voice their own characters, but I never got the answer to that, but knowing more about the world now, I can guess. There aren't many Pokemon actors, and while you see them in a lot of films shot on camera, for a show like that which is all drawn, it's not needed at all. A lot of shows or movies aren't made for Pokemon in mind, just for humans who actually have time for art and can talk with their wallets, apparently. What money is there to be had in that industry with us dumb Pokemon in there?

(People did kick up a fuss about the Pokemon not voicing their own roles after enough time. Oh, sorry, can I intervene again?)

As long as it’s not about Lucario dying because of a tree again, Shine, then you’re golden.

(Thanks. Trainers and their Pokemon actors formed a union and started pestering the team for requests, and eventually, they hired Pokemon actors to speak for the Origins and Generations specials, which I guess is a step in the right direction. Of course, it didn’t make much of a difference since they just spoke in unsubtitled grunts and shrieks, but oh well. Again, sorry for interrupting.)

No, it's fine. See, this guy knows. Anyway, I'm getting off topic. I could literally talk about it for ages, but you get the idea. It was a slow learning process, where we alternated between learning to speak like humans and listen to humans. In a few weeks, we could understand entire sentences, and once we digested that information, we understood what the humans around us were saying all along.

(That’s good to hear. So, you mentioned bombing other lessons. What did you learn?)

Eh, just maths and basic stuff. If you ever went through grade school, you’d know it’s something along the lines of that, so there’s not much to say. My biggest crime was not paying attention, so there’s that. Before I forget, though, after I saw that show, that inspired me to pick up my set of crayons again and draw. So I got my belongings out from the locker and remembered all the characters I saw from it. Humans like Ash seemed too complicated for me to draw at that moment, but Pokemon like Pikachu had simpler shapes, so I sat by a tree and ended up drawing that guy, starting with the head and drawing the rest of the body from there.

Again, it wasn't very good, as the first result literally looked like a lump of cheese with eyes, but that didn't stop me, as I drew him again and again, until I got a feel for how to draw him correctly. Since my paws weren't used to making such tiny movements, the lines all looked wobbly, but at least it resembled something like a living thing. I didn't stop there though, and kept doodling until Aipom butted in, hanging upside down from a branch above.

"Whatcha doing?”

I gasped and hid the paper behind my back.

"N-nothing."

"That's not nothing, I saw what you were drawing!"

"Oh," I said, shrinking up into a little ball, "it sucks, doesn't it?"

"Are you kidding?" he said, and leapt off the tree. "That's awesome! I could never do something like that!"

I sat up, breathing a sigh of relief, and flipped back to the page I last drew on.

"Thanks. I wish I could draw better, though."

"Still looks awesome! I don't know why you'd hide it!"

"Well," I said, "Papa didn't like me drawing. He was kind of a jerk about it."

"I thought you said your family was alright."

"Papa is—“ I don’t know what I would’ve said — I was still processing what happened on the island. “He had a lot to deal with. His trainer left him, so he's still kinda upset about that."

"Kind of like my Dad was." He sat down beside me. "He'd never shut up about it either, talking about how he won this battle or fought this big Pokemon, and I was always like, just cram it, old mon!"

"Wish I said that to Papa too.”

"Yeah. Keep doing your thing, though. Don’t mind me."

So we just hung out together, with Aipom acting as my second pair of eyes while I drew more faces, eventually moving onto Ash and Dawn despite my reluctance earlier. He wouldn't say much, but I forgot my current troubles with the lessons at that time and felt at ease with him around. It was nice to have someone by your side who wouldn't judge you, although I yearned for someone to correct my mistakes and help improve my craft. At one point, that Cubone passed us by and stopped to stare at my work.

I didn’t know what to think or how he’d react. I’m not sure he even knew what I was doing at the time, but he kept his eyes on the page. I tried to pretend he wasn’t there. Then—

He grabbed the sketchpad, and snatched it off my paws, along with the pink crayon for Dawn’s skirt.

I yelped, not knowing how to react, when Aipom ran after him. He tried to swat Cubone with his tail when he hissed back, hunched over the sketchpad as he scribbled furiously at the book. This probably wasn’t the right time to think that, but I hoped he wasn’t drawing over my hard work.

Aipom stood there, tail swishing in case he needed to attack again. I stood up, about to go over there and sort it out myself when the Cubone came back, handing me the sketchpad once more in one piece. He grunted and returned to his spot, staring at the wall.

Once Aipom was at ease again, he returned to my side, still keeping an eye on that lone Pokemon.

“What’s his problem, huh?” He groaned. “Sorry I couldn’t get it back for you before he messed it up.”

I looked at the page before me. There was a massive pink mark in the middle of the pad, scratched in crayon to the point the paper was warped. At least he used a fresh page instead of doodling over mine, but I stared at the drawing, trying to make heads or tails out of it.

“Is that a star or a…” I started. It kind of looked like a flower when I narrowed my eyes at it.

“Ah, it probably doesn’t mean anything,” Aipom said with a shrug. “Now forget about that weird guy and get back to your stuff. Oh! Are you gonna make those two humans kiss?”

“Wha—” I turned the page to Ash and Dawn, drawn together in crayon like two stick figures with ketchup and blueberries smeared all over them. “Ew, gross!”

I tackled him to the floor, though he tackled back as strongly as I did. From there, we just play-fought until the next bell rang. You know, I kind of miss those moments where I could just waste away the time without thinking about anything else. But oh well.

I got another call some time after, and honestly, there wasn’t much to say. It was just the usual small talk — they were still happy to hear me and Dad was still off somewhere else. Then Trunks came into the picture:

“Hello, sis,” he said, “Have you been keeping with your studies recently?”

I gulped. I didn't want him to know I wasn't paying attention in class, so I tried to bluff my way out. "Yeah, I've been learning a lot!"

"Such as?"

"Well, things like adding other things together, and stuff?"

"Really? Two plus five equals what?"

"Wait, what?"

"Answer me, two plus five equals?"

I drew a blank. Trust me, this sounds really stupid now, but from my view, numbers were much more foreign to me than letters. I tried to come up with answers in my head, but no matter what, I couldn't put two and two together, or two and five in this case. I gave up and sighed.

"Sorry, bro," I said, lowering my voice, "I wanna do better, but I can't wrap my head around it. It's not like letters, you know."

He took a deep breath, making the receiver crackle a bit. "That's fine. There's still time to learn, plus things are a bit trickier with us than it is with humans. I'm really sorry if I sounded annoyed, still, I just want you to do well."

I could still tell he was disappointed, but I gulped down my guilt nonetheless. "I know. Well, thanks."

"You're welcome. Just keep attacking it and eventually you'll understand. Shall I pass you back to Mom?”

“Yeah!”

So that was that. I didn’t want to disappoint him next time, so after the call ended, I wanted to attend the classes with a new found focus. I would learn all I could and make his efforts pay off in a month.

(You mentioned you started battling around the same time you started learning basic literacy and numeracy skills. What did those entail?)

Well, it was alright at first, at least when we were still learning. We were in the battle arena for the first time, separate from the gym, so when I entered, I stood by the door, mouth agape at the sheer size of it. How practical it all was, I couldn't say. But from surface to ceiling, it was spacious, and there was an indented dome in the roof where the windows were, with light radiating through the glass and giving the ceiling a disco-ball effect.

It did make me wonder where the hell we actually were, since the building must've stuck out like a sore thumb outside with something this huge, and for something apparently so secret. There were separate arenas in the room, set up like stages for each of us to practice in, and the layouts in some of them were different, not unlike the battle coliseums I'd see in that show.

The mediators didn't stress the technical stuff at first and let us duke it out in pairs. They sorted our groups into three rows, grouped into those from the wild, those from domestic areas, and those born in GeL, and were told to pick our partner from any of the other teams except ours.

"Aw,” Aipom said with a frown, “I was hopin' to go with you again.”

"Can't be helped, I guess."

My attention was drawn to the Pachirisu from the GeL group. He chatted with the moist-eyed Shinx, nuzzling close to him, and from what I can imagine, whispered reassuring compliments into his ear. Unfortunately, when he turned to us, he made the first move and went to Ponyta as a partner. I didn't really know what to do after that, so I thought I'd pick the luck of the draw. I watched everybody else pick their own partners. Aipom ended up going with Buneary, the girl he'd often tease in class, so that was off the table. By the end of it, there was only me and the blue guy left. I approached him, and before I could raise my paw up to say hi, he flinched and buried his head in his paws, whimpering. Again, that gave off a familiar vibe to my sulking brother. Part of me wanted to tell him to shut up, but another part of me wanted to hug him.

Since this wasn't going anywhere anytime soon, plus Reggie was giving me the stink eye, I slowly went to embrace Shinx. He stopped shaking underneath my paw, so I started petting him, and eventually, he bloomed from his shrivelled up ball of fur and looked at me, wide-eyed, tears streaming down his face. When my aura honed in on his feelings, they radiated, to my surprise, nothing. Just emptiness inside. It wasn't deeply sorrowful or afraid, or anything. All it gave off was the loneliest feeling I'd ever experienced so far. How to describe it? It was like he never had anyone in the world before to care for him up until that moment, and as it turned out, it wouldn't be too far off.

Isn’t that right, Shine? I don’t know if you remember, but I don’t want to steal the spotlight from you, since it’s your story too.

(I-I’m not ready yet. Sorry.)

Alright, no sweat. So anyway...

"Don't mean to rush you," Reggie said, “but we'll be sparring soon, got me?"

Talk about a moment killer. Anyway, I let go and led Shinx to an open spot in the wide room. We stood a few paces apart, ready to start, but he sat down, looking like his deflated self again. I approached him, trying to reassure him with more ear scritches.

"Are you alright?" I said. "Don't you wanna fight?"

No response. He looked at me sadly, and I sighed, hiding my frustration with a friendly smile.

"Look, I'm not really used to this that much either. My family didn't make me do that much fighting, unless you count play-fights, but you know, you and me are kinda the same here. I dunno what you're going through exactly, but I feel outta place looking at all these Pokemon and their fiery attacks and fancy spells and whatnot. I kinda suck at channelling my aura to attack at the moment. But I socked that Aipom in the jaw, so that balances out, I guess."

Still no response. He looked less miserable, so that seemed like a step in the right direction. I stepped back and knelt down to him, gently caressing his face.

"You don't have to say much, that's fine. To be honest, I'm getting a little sick of that Abra yammering on all the time, so I could take a break from that. But we're still supposed to spar, so we should get started soon. Can you do that for me?"

Shinx looked to the other Pokemon duking it out in the right side of the room. They were all doing their own thing while we were still fence-sitting. I shook him gently, not wanting to urge him too suddenly to join the fight.

"Well?"

Finally, he looked back and nodded. I dried his eyes and shifted to a battle stance not too far away. He followed suit and stood on all fours. At last, Shinx looked like the fierce lion cub he was born to be. Still, pity got the better of me, and I pointed at him.

"You know, I haven't actually seen what you can do yet. You can make the first move."

Shinx took a deep breath and started charging up something, making the light dance around his head like a halo. I braced myself for what was to come, expecting nothing more than a light tap on the head. Big mistake. He shot a jolt of electricity at my belly, sending me backward. I lay on the floor in a trance, jerking my body up and down like I was possessed. It stopped after a few seconds, but as I rose to my knees, the air around me felt a little different, somehow. I put a paw on my chest, catching my breath.

"W-wow," I said, "That'll teach me to underestimate you, huh?"

My classmates laughed from behind. Nearby, Pachirisu and Aipom stopped their match while they pointed at my face.

"Come on guys," I said, "What's so funny about this?"

They said nothing and just snickered like idiots. I rubbed my head in frustration, only to feel nothing but fluff. My fur stuck out in the air like a cloud of cotton candy.

After that initial shock, har har, we had a bit of a song and dance, which involved me playfully slapping him across the face, since punching didn't seem in good taste, and he'd shoot more bolts of electricity my way, which I tried to dodge. Most attempts weren't successful, so I ended up flopping around like a Magikarp half the time, but at least it was harmless. The one time I managed to dodge must've been completely by accident. Either that or he missed and hit another poor sod in the background, but I dunno. But after a while, we were both tuckered out, so we sat out together to take a breather. All things considered, Shinx warmed up to me quickly, nuzzling my side while I watched the rest battle. He was still as silent as death, but we didn't really need to speak. It was just nice to feel I was there for him after that much heartache on his end.

That moment of peace got cut short when we heard screams on one of the stages. It came from the Munchlax, while his Cubone partner beat him over the head with a bone-like stick. It wasn't the friendly match we were told to perform, I mean, the guy really went at it. He pinned the Munchlax —who begged him to stop— to the floor and just whacked him on the head, over and over, all with this look in his eyes. Even though we were far away, that gaze was vengeful and gave the same impression my Dad gave off sometimes, except more blank rather than angry. There were little splotches of blood on the floor around Munchlax's head. We hugged each other for comfort, feeling Shinx’s static course through me.

Thankfully, Reggie stepped in before there could be any more carnage and separated the two by picking up Cubone by his tail. It didn't stop there since he flailed in his grasp, but couldn't get free.

"Hey, chill out, mon! This isn't the wild, you don't need to go that far!"

Cubone continued screeching. Reggie closed his eyes and emitted a purple energy which pulsed through his paw. Eventually, Cubone stopped struggling altogether and gradually fell asleep. The Medicham lifted him up and cradled him in his arms, looking at him with a sorrowful expression until he tended to Munchlax, whose bloodied head had several nasty egg-sized bumps.

"Just lay there, mon. It's all chill now. You'll be healed up soon, yeah?"

Munchlax nodded before slumping to the floor, knocked out cold.

So, that went well. After that, Reggie called the lesson quits and me and Shinx went our separate ways for that day, returning to our own rooms. It was me and Aipom in the garden again, where we sat by the pond with Buizel in there and Ponyta resting by the bank to collect our thoughts. Of course, Cubone was absent.

"What the heck was that?" Aipom asked. "I thought there was something wrong with him, but not like that!"

"Yeah," Buizel said, "he was so scary!"

"Such a shame," Ponyta said, "I wanted to see that happen."

We all shot her questioning looks.

"You wanted to see that?" Aipom said. "Why, did you want a fight to break out between them?"

"Oh, sorry," she said, blowing smoke out of her nostrils, "I meant, I wish I saw what was wrong between them before the fight."

"Ah, okay, that's slightly less creepy. I mean, I knew that guy was gonna pop off at some point."

I hummed to myself, considering the fight again, and a chill washed over me when I realised something.

"He's gonna come back here, right?" I said. "What happens then?"

"I dunno," Aipom said. "We'll avoid him as usual, but this time, we'll make sure to stay out of trouble. And if he decides to start a fight, we'll all look out for each other, won't we?"

A collective nod.

"If he comes anywhere near me—" Buizel started, splashing the water with a punch—"I'll make him eat my bubbles!”

"No offense," Aipom said, "but I don't think those little pockets of air will help very much."

"Then I'll punch him in the face!"

"That's kinda better."

So that was the highlight of that day, if you could call a Munchlax getting the stuffing beaten out of him a highlight. A few days later, Cubone returned to his spot in the garden and just kept to himself. We all made sure to stay as far away from him as possible in that room, which I kind of regret now, but you'll find out why later. So anyway, weeks passed without much excitement, and were either spent with me sparring with Shinx, who still never uttered any words, or keeping my head raised to pay attention to the numerous classes on addition and subtraction when we weren’t learning the human tongue. Then for the third time, I got the family call.

"Hello, dearie," Mom said. I heard shuddering and sniffling on the other end, as well as the sound of crackling, bringing both cold and warmth to the call.

“Hey, mama. Is, um, everything fine?”

“Oh, yeah, of course! It’s gotten chilly all of a sudden. Your brothers are just huddled around the campfire. It is late autumn, so it is to be expected. We’ll be fine.”

We did spend one winter on the island before, and although that was cold, it hadn’t snowed, so the food supply wasn’t exactly short.

"Anyway,” she said, “how have you been?"

"Well, things kinda went crazy. There's this Cubone in our group who isn't friendly at all, so we've been dealing with him, but other than that, things are kinda the same."

"Unfriendly in what way?"

"He almost killed a Munchlax not too long ago."

"Well then, that's not good, is it? I hope you're alright after that!"

"Yeah, I'm fine. I'm helping a Shinx with his battles. He always seems lonely in class and never talks, so I wanna be there for him whenever I can."

"Good to hear, dearie." I sensed her motherly smile through the receiver, if that makes sense. She passed me onto my younger brothers, who were always excited to say hello over the phone, even as Stumpy apparently had a cold, and then to Trunks.

"Hello sis," he said, "I hope you've kept up with your studies this time around."

“Well, yeah!” I said. “I ain’t gonna fall asleep in class again after last time!”

“Sounds good. Then, what’s four plus nine?”

“Thirteen!”

“Very good. Have you learned multiplication and division yet?”

“Eh, no. I don’t think we’ve gotten that far. Sorry, bro.”

“No, no, that’s great. I wouldn’t expect them to go to that yet, from what I know about the school system. I’m glad the last call influenced you in some way.”

I smiled. It was really gratifying to hear I’d improved, coming from his words. We talked idly some more, but then, we stopped as Mom and Dad started shouting at each other. It was hard to make out what they were ranting about, but it was the first time in a while I heard his voice, which put me on edge. Eventually, their argument devolved into simple yelling, and the sound bumped and crackled with a series of random noises, which I took as a sign it was being passed around. Dad's voice was no longer there.

"Dearie," Mom said, voice lowered, "Lia— I mean, Dad wants to talk to you. Is that alright?"

My heart stopped. After all that song and dance about keeping me away, he finally wanted to talk. Although dread nestled in my gut, I wanted to catch up with him, and hoped that he wasn’t still salty about me leaving the island.

"Yeah. Please."

"Alright," she took another deep breath. "Well, I'll hand you back to Azzy for now. I'll probably speak to you soon, and as usual, I love you. Bye."

"I love you too." The phone went dead on the other end. I understood there would be another call soon after, so I sat and waited, breathing in and out, in and out.

Words can't easily describe the awkwardness of that situation. If I can compare it to a human situation right now, it would probably be like going out with a day trip with your separated dad to go for drinks, only for him to dump you at the corner of the bar while he was off talking to his group of friends at a far-off table, and whatnot. I think I saw that in a movie, though I don't remember which one, but it's the sort of awkwardness that only comes from long silences and broken families. Waiting in that garden while everyone stayed silent as well only added to it, a presence I tried to ignore.

Thankfully, the phone rang again and I held it to my ear once more.

"Um, hello," he said. His voice was hoarse — much deeper than before.

"Hi." I waited for his turn, but there was a long pause in between then. It would've been the perfect moment for Cricketune to start chirping.

"How are things?"

"Uh, oh yeah, they're good."

Another pause. And then, aside from more deep breaths on the other end, long, drawn out silence. He'd never been good at talking, even on the island, so this wasn't unexpected, but having lived through the situation before it, it was getting nigh unbearable. That gave me time to really sit and digest what he did, and how he acted in general, and how emotionally constipated he was most of the time when he wasn't angry. If only aura could've reached through phone signals, that would've helped. These thoughts, along with the growing silence was the perfect catalyst to brew up a storm within me. I clutched the phone and took a deep breath.

"Dad. You wanted to talk to me, so just spit it out.”

“What?” His tone was more severe, like his usual self. “Don’t talk back to me like tha—”

“No.” I couldn’t believe myself. My heart pounded like crazy and my tongue felt dry, but I was really doing this. “I'm sick of you shutting me out all the time. You always did, even when I was back home. You wouldn't listen, you'd rarely make sure we were ever okay, you almost never spent time with any of us, it was just Mama doing it all. Why? What did I do to deserve any of it, or bro, or anyone else? Just say something, please!"

Rage boiled inside me, to the point I almost pitched the phone across the room. I stopped myself by pacing back and forth. They brought out emotions I never knew, and never would've expressed in front of Dad, but when he became a disembodied voice, that gave me the push to let everything out I'd crammed in up until that point.

I still wanted closure, though — hanging up on him would’ve only made things worse for me. So I held my breath and waited, and waited until he sighed on the other end.

"I apologise, pup.” His voice dropped. “I never should have treated you the way I did. Being alone has given me time to think, and looking back, there were many things I wish I could have done in a different way."

"Like what? Say it in front of me."

"Like, tearing up your drawings. I knew those were important to you — I just let my emotions get in the way. And kicking you. And not listening to you. I should not have made you feel powerless to talk."

"And bro, as well. He'd talk about you a lot, you know, he wanted to be like you, and you treated him pretty much the same way."

"I know I did. I just wanted him to be strong, for all of you, like I never..." He trailed off. "Anyway, that's not the point."

"What is the point then, huh?"

"Point is, he, well..." He lowered his voice even further down, sounding like a ghost. "I am paying the price for that. He doesn't look at me like I used to. Those eyes are always somewhere else whenever he comes with the rest to speak to me. That means I’ve failed."

More silence. I breathed in and out, calmer now I managed to squeeze that info out of him, but some things still felt unresolved between us. The fact I still left the island was the big Donphan in the room. And then another question arose from within.

“You know we have the power of aura and all?” I said. “You could’ve listened to what we were thinking, right? That’s what happens when you grow up to be a Lucario, isn’t it? Then why didn’t you listen to us?”

Another sigh. “I shut them out. They were there, but I pushed them away. That’s why I spent so long being so distant from all of you. I’m especially sorry for that. I could’ve been there for you.”

I took another deep breath. That brought some more closure, at least.

"So," he said, sounding brighter, "how is it over there? Are you safe? Are you keeping strong?"

"Yeah, of course. They're looking after me a lot. I'm training my body all the time, so I'm always on the go, and I've made a few friends already. I hope that's what you wanted to hear."

"Yes it is. I'm glad you made the decision to go there. I still wouldn't have allowed it, but it's a bit too late to complain now. It seems like you’re in good hands."

"Thank you. Is that all?" To be honest, as nice as it was talking to him and airing out our dirty coats, I wanted to get off the phone as soon as possible, so I could sit and decide whether or not to forgive him. Not just for me, but for the rest of my family as well. I waited again for his reply.

"Really, I just wanted to say," he said, exhaling, "I love you."

Another uncomfortable break followed. Then, he started sobbing.

"I never got to say that while you were still here."

More weeps followed, and the phone went dead quiet. That final silence lasted for a long time, even after I handed the phone back. I sat there, carrying his confessions and his sudden emotional outburst with me all throughout the rest of the day, and into the night, where I dreamed of him pushing me up in the air on that tire swing.

That’s the last time I ever spoke to him.
 
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