Episode 01 – Quit Blipbugging Me!
kibigo
Delinquent
- Location
- Inland Northwest, United States
- Pronouns
- she/her
To Be A… Pokémon Challenger!
Summary
Cashmere Lane aims to win the Wedgehurst Tournament and gain an endorsement for the Galar Gym Challenge. Red Dunn finds herself somehow joining along for the ride.
An original pokémon journey, set 7¾ years after the events of Pokémon Sword & Pokémon Shield. Reader commentary / reviews welcome, although note that I am a very stubborn person at times.
An original pokémon journey, set 7¾ years after the events of Pokémon Sword & Pokémon Shield. Reader commentary / reviews welcome
Relationship to Canon
As stated above, 7¾ years after the fact. Primarily based on the games and, to a lesser extent, Pokémon: Twilight Wings. Gloria is present, not Victor. Characters and pokémon will be drawn from both Sword and Shield.
Because the story takes place so long after canon, you will find some characters in different roles than they had in the games. There will be ships. Nevertheless, this is an OC‐centric fic.
Because the story takes place so long after canon, you will find some characters in different roles than they had in the games. There will be ships. Nevertheless, this is an OC‐centric fic.
Content Advisories
This is a slow burn between a trans woman and a cis lesbian, so if you aren’t emotionally prepared for that, maybe give this fic a pass.
This fic is aimed at (somewhat) mature audiences. You should expect the following :—
This fic is aimed at (somewhat) mature audiences. You should expect the following :—
- Gay and trans themes.
- Folks having to deal with homophobia, transphobia, prejudice against rural folk, and general bigotry.
- Lots of swearing. Crude language, potentially of a sexual nature.
- While there will not be graphic depictions of sex, People Will Have It. They May Talk About It. You Will Know It Happened.
- Politics, in the sense that any fic about a trans woman in a region inspired by England will necessarily be about politics.
There is a dog pokémon which doesn’t receive a treat.
It’s unlikely to contain anything which you wouldn’t encounter in the halls of an American public school, or between the pages of Teen Vogue. Still, some reader discretion is advised.
The above notwithstanding, most of the time it will be pretty tame teen‐rated content (with swearing, did I mention that?).
Individual postings may have additional content advisories. If they do, I will attempt to make the content skippable.
Update Schedule
I write a new episode roughly every four weeks. There’s a bit of an initial backlog: I also publish to A·O·3, and the first few episodes have already been posted there. So I’ll be updating somewhat more frequently here until the two are in sync.
Episode 01
Quit Blipbugging Me!
Stretching for miles north of the mysterious Slumbering Weald, Southern Galar was in many ways the agricultural heart of the region. There wasn’t much for the passing tourist—no urban centres, dynamax spots, or rare and exciting pokémon—but there instead rolled field after field of lush farmland, small towns with farmers’ markets, and sheep—so many sheep.
Of these small southern towns, one clearly outshone the rest in terms of reputation. This came in the form of successive Pokémon League Champions, and they were three in number :— Leon, Gloria, and Hop, each having risen seemingly out of nowhere, and each becoming in their own time one of the youngest, and most successful, pokémon trainers the League had ever seen. Now, Leon oversaw operations at the grand Wyndon Battle Tower, and Gloria was busy nurturing the Galar Pokémon School into something which might compete with those of other regions. As for Hop—Hop was still Champion, for the third year in a row.
Were it not for these towering giants, the successes of one Shepherd Lane from Postwick might have seemed extraordinary: Only in his mid‐twenties, he ranked consistently among the top dozen or so trainers in the League, and he’d held Hop to a single pokémon in the most recent Championship match. Alas, Gloria and Leon had already retired by that age. But, it wasn’t that Shepherd particularly wanted to be Champion, as his Postwick predecessors had, even if he still gave every battle his all. No: He wanted to found a Gym.
Because the truth was that despite Postwick’s recent successes in the field of competitive pokémon battling, the Southern Galar region remained a desert for opportunity or resources for aspiring pokémon trainers. The numbers simply didn’t add up when it came to investing in a gym there, the League had determined. Plus, it had no dynamax power source—the ratings were bad enough with Spikemuth in that respect. And, it was out of the way: Few challengers would want to travel all the way to Wedgehurst when there were eight perfectly good gyms they might challenge already elsewhere in Galar. Wedgehurst folk had… a reputation, after all. They wore wool there, instead of cotton, and they didn’t enunciate their consonants right.
Thankfully, wot with the past three Champions all speaking it, the prestige of Southern Galarian dialect was on the rise.
Mere talk would not be enough to sway the Pokémon League, however. They needed to see results: some manner of evidence that the recent successes of two notable Postwick families were more than just a fluke. And Shepherd Lane, himself, needed experience administrating pokémon battles, if he was to someday manage his own Gym. And so, he schemed to host a tournament, to be held in Wedgehurst prior to the start of the Championship season, the prize being an endorsement to compete in the renowned Gym Challenge (and thus, potentially, the Champion Cup) from none other than himself. Posters were posted, and word was spread, and it was by this manner that the news first befell the ears of one Bonnie Dunn.
Ms Dunn was no pokémon trainer—no, far from it. It was all she could manage just keeping the family Yamper in line as she went around for groceries. Yet, the posters visible about the Wedgehurst marketplace gave her an idea, and before she returned home she stopped by the Pokémon Centre and purchased from the counter a single case of pokéballs.
She intended these for her daughter. Miss Red Dunn was 23 years of age, living at home, and, by her mother’s estimations, making approximately zero progress towards anything which might be considered “having a normal life”. It didn’t bother Bonnie as much as it might’ve—she knew that Postwick was not exactly a land of opportunity for someone who’d left for Motostoke fresh out of secondary school with big dreams, and returned a trans woman saddled with university debt—but it didn’t seem healthy, to her middle‐aged motherly mind, for a young person like that to be spending all of her time indoors. Red wasn’t a pokémon trainer, either, but now, and with this upcoming tournament, perhaps it was time.
Hoping to convince her daughter of such, she adopted a cheery demeanour when she arrived home. ‘Red, darling?’ she called. ‘Come join me in the dining room; I’ve a gift for you.’
The young woman in question emerged slowly from her room, her copper hair slightly tousled, and her visage looking for all the world very tired. Her hands had lodged themselves firmly in her hoodie jacket’s front pockets, and she came to stand awkwardly near the table, addressing her mother with some combination of skepticism and distrust. ‘Yeah?’ she inquired, surveying the pile of groceries suspiciously, and finding there nothing particularly present‐shaped among them.
‘Here it is!’ Her mother reached into her basket with altogether too much enthusiasm and pulled out the tin, passing it over. Red took one look at it and groaned, the complimentary premier ball staring up at her through the plastic window in the top. This wasn’t the shape of a present, but the form of an expectation.
She shoved the tin into her jacket pocket—it didn’t quite fit; the edge stuck out awkwardly—fully intending to stash it in her desk for all eternity without ever tearing off the thin plastic wrap which enclosed it. ‘What’s this for, then?’ she asked.
‘Well, I just heard that they’re going to be holding a pokémon tournament down in Wedgehurst in just a couple months’ time! And—’
‘…Mum,’ Red interrupted. She sighed. She didn’t have the stuff to be a pokémon trainer: She didn’t even remotely pass as a woman, to start off, much less a Model or Beauty or any of the other trainer classes available to adults of the female gender. And maintaining a competitive edge in pokémon battling would require submitting herself to the eyes of countless strangers, in the middle of the wilderness, at every juncture assumed to be masculine, forever treated like a person that it physically pained her to be. It wasn’t a sport which many trans people excelled in.
The only question, in her mind, was how one might explain that in a way that one’s cisgender mum might actually understand.
‘Look, I don’t care if you compete or not,’ Mum Dunn said, thankfully saving her the effort. ‘But don’t you think it’s high time you caught a pokémon of your own? Or… Were you just planning on borrowing Yamper every time you want to venture outside of town, for the rest of your life?’
And, she did have a point there, although Red loathed to admit it. Wot with wild pokémon roaming about, looking for fights, taking a partner pokémon alongside when travelling the routes of Galar was a simple matter of safety. (To say nothing of the Wild Area—although, Red had little reason to ever venture there.) Of course, she had always taken Yamper, provided Mum didn’t have any other business, and the pokémon in Southern Galar were by‐and‐large half‐domesticated anyway, so long as you stayed out of the Weald. Nevertheless, at 23 even she had to admit that relying on the family pokémon was starting to get a bit old. Nothing against the scamp.
‘…I’ll think about it,’ Red said, finally. ‘But don’t you go expecting me to take off on any grand pokémon journeys, or anything like that! Even if I should happen to catch something, we’re not all from Postwick wandering spirits.’
‘Heavens know, I’m not,’ Bonnie replied, relieved by her daughter’s concession. ‘Wouldn’t hurt for you to leave the house every once in a while, though. Make some friends.’
Red groaned and headed back to her room, closing the door a bit more abruptly than she properly needed to. Bonnie shook her head at Yamper, who was staring up at the table with a hopeful look. ‘No,’ she said. ‘I didn’t bring home a present for you.’
Of these small southern towns, one clearly outshone the rest in terms of reputation. This came in the form of successive Pokémon League Champions, and they were three in number :— Leon, Gloria, and Hop, each having risen seemingly out of nowhere, and each becoming in their own time one of the youngest, and most successful, pokémon trainers the League had ever seen. Now, Leon oversaw operations at the grand Wyndon Battle Tower, and Gloria was busy nurturing the Galar Pokémon School into something which might compete with those of other regions. As for Hop—Hop was still Champion, for the third year in a row.
Were it not for these towering giants, the successes of one Shepherd Lane from Postwick might have seemed extraordinary: Only in his mid‐twenties, he ranked consistently among the top dozen or so trainers in the League, and he’d held Hop to a single pokémon in the most recent Championship match. Alas, Gloria and Leon had already retired by that age. But, it wasn’t that Shepherd particularly wanted to be Champion, as his Postwick predecessors had, even if he still gave every battle his all. No: He wanted to found a Gym.
Because the truth was that despite Postwick’s recent successes in the field of competitive pokémon battling, the Southern Galar region remained a desert for opportunity or resources for aspiring pokémon trainers. The numbers simply didn’t add up when it came to investing in a gym there, the League had determined. Plus, it had no dynamax power source—the ratings were bad enough with Spikemuth in that respect. And, it was out of the way: Few challengers would want to travel all the way to Wedgehurst when there were eight perfectly good gyms they might challenge already elsewhere in Galar. Wedgehurst folk had… a reputation, after all. They wore wool there, instead of cotton, and they didn’t enunciate their consonants right.
Thankfully, wot with the past three Champions all speaking it, the prestige of Southern Galarian dialect was on the rise.
Mere talk would not be enough to sway the Pokémon League, however. They needed to see results: some manner of evidence that the recent successes of two notable Postwick families were more than just a fluke. And Shepherd Lane, himself, needed experience administrating pokémon battles, if he was to someday manage his own Gym. And so, he schemed to host a tournament, to be held in Wedgehurst prior to the start of the Championship season, the prize being an endorsement to compete in the renowned Gym Challenge (and thus, potentially, the Champion Cup) from none other than himself. Posters were posted, and word was spread, and it was by this manner that the news first befell the ears of one Bonnie Dunn.
Ms Dunn was no pokémon trainer—no, far from it. It was all she could manage just keeping the family Yamper in line as she went around for groceries. Yet, the posters visible about the Wedgehurst marketplace gave her an idea, and before she returned home she stopped by the Pokémon Centre and purchased from the counter a single case of pokéballs.
She intended these for her daughter. Miss Red Dunn was 23 years of age, living at home, and, by her mother’s estimations, making approximately zero progress towards anything which might be considered “having a normal life”. It didn’t bother Bonnie as much as it might’ve—she knew that Postwick was not exactly a land of opportunity for someone who’d left for Motostoke fresh out of secondary school with big dreams, and returned a trans woman saddled with university debt—but it didn’t seem healthy, to her middle‐aged motherly mind, for a young person like that to be spending all of her time indoors. Red wasn’t a pokémon trainer, either, but now, and with this upcoming tournament, perhaps it was time.
Hoping to convince her daughter of such, she adopted a cheery demeanour when she arrived home. ‘Red, darling?’ she called. ‘Come join me in the dining room; I’ve a gift for you.’
The young woman in question emerged slowly from her room, her copper hair slightly tousled, and her visage looking for all the world very tired. Her hands had lodged themselves firmly in her hoodie jacket’s front pockets, and she came to stand awkwardly near the table, addressing her mother with some combination of skepticism and distrust. ‘Yeah?’ she inquired, surveying the pile of groceries suspiciously, and finding there nothing particularly present‐shaped among them.
‘Here it is!’ Her mother reached into her basket with altogether too much enthusiasm and pulled out the tin, passing it over. Red took one look at it and groaned, the complimentary premier ball staring up at her through the plastic window in the top. This wasn’t the shape of a present, but the form of an expectation.
She shoved the tin into her jacket pocket—it didn’t quite fit; the edge stuck out awkwardly—fully intending to stash it in her desk for all eternity without ever tearing off the thin plastic wrap which enclosed it. ‘What’s this for, then?’ she asked.
‘Well, I just heard that they’re going to be holding a pokémon tournament down in Wedgehurst in just a couple months’ time! And—’
‘…Mum,’ Red interrupted. She sighed. She didn’t have the stuff to be a pokémon trainer: She didn’t even remotely pass as a woman, to start off, much less a Model or Beauty or any of the other trainer classes available to adults of the female gender. And maintaining a competitive edge in pokémon battling would require submitting herself to the eyes of countless strangers, in the middle of the wilderness, at every juncture assumed to be masculine, forever treated like a person that it physically pained her to be. It wasn’t a sport which many trans people excelled in.
The only question, in her mind, was how one might explain that in a way that one’s cisgender mum might actually understand.
‘Look, I don’t care if you compete or not,’ Mum Dunn said, thankfully saving her the effort. ‘But don’t you think it’s high time you caught a pokémon of your own? Or… Were you just planning on borrowing Yamper every time you want to venture outside of town, for the rest of your life?’
And, she did have a point there, although Red loathed to admit it. Wot with wild pokémon roaming about, looking for fights, taking a partner pokémon alongside when travelling the routes of Galar was a simple matter of safety. (To say nothing of the Wild Area—although, Red had little reason to ever venture there.) Of course, she had always taken Yamper, provided Mum didn’t have any other business, and the pokémon in Southern Galar were by‐and‐large half‐domesticated anyway, so long as you stayed out of the Weald. Nevertheless, at 23 even she had to admit that relying on the family pokémon was starting to get a bit old. Nothing against the scamp.
‘…I’ll think about it,’ Red said, finally. ‘But don’t you go expecting me to take off on any grand pokémon journeys, or anything like that! Even if I should happen to catch something, we’re not all from Postwick wandering spirits.’
‘Heavens know, I’m not,’ Bonnie replied, relieved by her daughter’s concession. ‘Wouldn’t hurt for you to leave the house every once in a while, though. Make some friends.’
Red groaned and headed back to her room, closing the door a bit more abruptly than she properly needed to. Bonnie shook her head at Yamper, who was staring up at the table with a hopeful look. ‘No,’ she said. ‘I didn’t bring home a present for you.’
As it happened, Red Dunn did a great deal more than just think about catching a pokémon—she researched it extensively. The mechanics of the art were plainly straightforward :— bring the pokéball to size; activate the capture lock; throw. Some species have an evolutive preference for stronger trainers; you can awe them with a battle, bribe them with food, or try to impress them with an artful throw or expensive pokéball. Fail, and they’ll break free. The more common varieties—bugs, for example—made for an easier catch. And that made for a simple enough task, in itself: Red could encounter larva pokémon just by stepping out into the garden.
She hadn’t intended to do anything so soon, but there was a tin eating a hole in her pocket, and nobody could say whether she would even be successful. Her brain rationalized her eagerness as strategic: Blipbug was hardly a competitive pokémon, and by catching one, she could appease her mum’s request while denying her further ambitions in a single stroke. And besides, she hadn’t anything better to do that evening (or most). So, Red did slice open the thin plastic wrap on the tin, pop it open on her desk, and select from within a single pokéball. Not the premier, of course—she didn’t want to waste that on a pokémon she wasn’t sure she would catch and wasn’t sure she wanted to keep—but an ordinary, traditional, red‐and‐white model. She let it expand to full size in her palm, felt the weight of it, then placed it into her jacket pocket, where the tin used to be, stepping out into the cool dusk springtime air.
There existed a stillness to the evenings that one encountered in Postwick which was difficult—if not impossible—to replicate in any other locale in Galar. The air, cool and dry; the sky, calm and clear; the stars, slowly puncturing holes in the expanding dark canvas above, free as these parts were from the light pollution wot plagued the northern regions. All was silent but for the soft hum of sevenspots, the occasional Bug Buzz as one fended off a tinybird looking for an evening snack, and the sleepy wooing of the sheep a few fields over as they settled down for the night. It made for a calming ambiance, one which Red had grown up with—and one which she now appreciated, because it helped to take the edge off of her nerves.
She’d already spotted her first larva, perched on the edge of the patio, watching her inquisitively. It really was nothing special, in no way different than the countless other larvae she had witnessed (or almost stepped on) through the course of her life. There was nothing unique about this one’s markings; nothing was different about the knowing reflection of houselights against its large, unblinking eyes. Not even its tiny yawn was especially cuter than other larval yawns—that was what Red told herself, as her fingers brushed the smooth surface of her pokéball. But it felt different, standing there. She drew out her hand, and it was shaking slightly. The larva didn’t say a word.
She tossed the pokéball.
Red’s aim was off—horribly. She had never been the athletic type, growing up; having no aspirations towards being a trainer, it wasn’t as though she had been practicing throws. The larva’s eyes watched the trajectory of the orb as it sailed uselessly over its head and landed softly in the grass. This was a new phenomenon for the Blipbug: It had never witnessed a pokéball before—and certainly not one tossed so haphazardly. It cast a wary eye back at the human who’d tossed it—were they angry? and would they start throwing more things?—before sauntering off to investigate.
One tiny larval foot prodded the mysterious orb experimentally. The capture lock activated in an instant, and, with a concerned expression—was there any other way for a Blipbug to look?—the pokémon was sucked inside.
The light on the front of the pokéball glowed faintly, then faded. There was a soft clicking noise, accompanied by a chime. The silence of Postwick set in, absolute and deafening.
Blipbug was caught, and by its own unwitting devices.
Red let out a short laugh. She walked over to the pokéball, and—somewhat hesitantly—picked it up off the ground. It was warm to the touch; faintly damp from the grass. In her other hand, she pulled out her Rotom Phone, and fired up the Pokédex app to see more information about what exactly she had just caught.
It was only staring at this screen, with its vast array of informations and metrics, that Red realized that she actually had very little understanding of what she had just done. She had just caught a pokémon. She was now responsible for the livelihood and wellbeing of a pokémon. She had no idea what the fuck that meant.
With the last rays of sunlight fading over the horizon, her day’s research had only just begun.
Red made it back to her room quietly—closing the door behind her, to keep Yamper out—and then released Blipbug from its pokéball. It alighted on the floor near her desk, and she let the pokéball rest on the wooden surface. ‘Alright,’ she said, and Blipbug listened curiously to her human mouth‐sounds. ‘We ought to be partners now, so it’s our responsibility to get to know one another, yeah?’
Blipbug stared at her for a few seconds more, and then it begin climbing its way up her leg—almost toppling her. It was heavier than she’d expected: over a stone. Gathering information from its surroundings using its hairs… right. Well, Red supposed that was one way.
She preferred the Internet. Waddling over to her computer like a drunken gulp, she sat down at her desk and flicked the monitor on. Intrigued by the sudden onset of light, Blipbug crawled down her arm and pressed its face to the screen. ‘No, love,’ Red said, picking it up and placing it at a safer distance, on her shoulder. ‘You’ll damage those Compound Eyes of yours if you do that.’
It seemed content enough to stay there and watch the moving images on the screen.
‘So… Infestation does recurring damage and prevents a pokémon from fleeing?’ Red muttered to herself, browsing the wiki page. ‘That sounds like it might be useful when trying to capture wild pokémon. If that were something I was interested in—which it’s not.’ She didn’t have to turn her head to know that her pokémon was staring at her, its usual worried expression on its face. ‘Don’t give me that look. It seems it’s pretty rare for a wild Blipbug to know that move—I guess you are a tad unique, after all.’
She got a small “blip!” in response, and she leaned her head to one side, kissing Blipbug with her cheek. ‘And Struggle Bug… lowers special·attack. I guess you don’t learn any other moves until you evolve. You have the smarts, but not the stature, huh?’
‘Blip!’
‘Alright, well, fortunately for you, it doesn’t look like you’ll have to wait for too long.’ Red yawned and adjusted her glasses. ‘Now, let’s see about that ability of yours…’
The pair weren’t the only ones pulling a late night. Down the road, across a field, and in a tidy and well‐kept farmhouse, a woman named Cashmere Lane was busy packing her bags. Beside her was a sheep pokémon—her sheep pokémon, she asserted; they’d been friends since it’d hatched from an egg and nobody else here gave a damn. Wooloo’s ability was Run Away, and that was exactly what Cash asserted she wasn’t doing, even as she took advantage of the cover of night to sneak illicit things into her sack :— food, potions, pokéballs. Her parents were asleep—they’d be up early to tend the farm—and her brother wasn’t home, busy organizing for the tournament in Wedgehurst. So there was nobody to stand in her way. Wooloo bleated a soft woo, and she shushed it—but a Wooloo’s woo was hardly suspicious behaviour here; their farm held several dozen of them. Still, she recalled it into its pokéball—if only so that it would finally get some rest.
She wasn’t running away from home: That was the thought she kept repeating in her head. True, she may have been a lesbian, and her father might have been a true dyed·in·the·wool conservative; yes, he’d made it quite clear on numerous occasions that he expected nothing from her but that she manage the farm and marry a well·to·do lad, and yes, she had told him in no uncertain terms that that was simply not going to happen; absolutely, her home life was a heaping pile of sheepshit because of it. But she was an adult fucking woman, about to embark on a perfectly ordinary pokémon journey, and she was doing so of her own volition. She was not some kind of LGBT runaway. If she were a sheep, she wouldn’t be a Wooloo but a Dubwool, and her ability wouldn’t be Run Away but Steadfast.
That was what she told herself, but her abscondence was nevertheless far from legitimized. Not that she needed anyone’s approval, clearly—but here she was packing her bags in the middle of the night. So perhaps there was some credence to the idea. She was definitely escaping.
Yet, she knew, the hard part wouldn’t be leaving, but staying away. After all, Cash, despite her nickname, had never exactly been flush with the stuff. And here she was a homeschooled country girl from fucking Postwick, a woman whose skills began and ended with life on the sheepfarm, fat lot of good that would do anywhere else. There had only ever been one real path out of Postwick, and that was pokémon battling: That was what her brother hand done, and Hop before him, and Gloria before him, and Leon before her. That was the magic ingredient to Postwick trainers which the media confounded over and couldn’t understand. Fear of coming back.
Nobody ever came back. Well, not nobody—Cashmere knew of one person who’d left Postwick and then returned voluntarily—but that was Red Dunn, and she was a special case. She’d heard all about that story through the grapevine (which was to say, snide comments over the breakfast table by her pa): The Postwick lad who had come back a lass, now a complete waste to society living out of her bedroom with her ma. As it happened, she might be the key to Cash’s victory.
All Cash needed was a League endorsement: That was all it took, and she would never have to come home again. But her father didn’t approve of her battling, and her brother wouldn’t just hand one out to anybody who asked. She needed to win that Wedgehurst tournament and force his hand.
And she needed to do it in secret—if she was to have any hope of success.
‘—afternoon, Ms Dunn. Hope I’m not disturbing you.’
The voices filtered into Red’s room through the closed door. Blearily, she sat up and rubbed her eyes, then searched for her glasses. Blipbug was already up, examining the contents of her closet with great interest.
‘Of course not, Cash!’ her mother replied. ‘Come right on in; it’s been ages!’
Cash… That would be Cashmere Lane, then: Shepherd’s younger sister. She and Red had been childhood friends, in the way that youth in small towns were often obligated to be—but they hadn’t spoken since the latter had left for University, so Red wondered what she could possibly be doing on her doorstep now. Knowing her family, and considering that when they’d last met Red had still identified as a lad, she also wondered if she might be better off pretending to be sleeping yet.
Cash’s voice shattered any hope that she might be there on account of some manner of neighbourly interaction with Red’s mum. ‘Is Red around?’ she asked. ‘I’ve a favour to ask of her and was hoping we could speak in private.’
‘Is she ever not, is the more pertinent question,’ Bonnie remarked, glancing back at Red’s closed door. ‘But I’m not sure she’s up yet—yes, I know it’s almost noon.’
But Cashmere’s pointed use of the feminine pronoun had already decided the question in Red’s mind. ‘I’m awake!’ she called out to them. ‘Just give me a second!’ She tugged off her pyjama bottoms, and dug around the room for some actual trousers. ‘Be out in a bit!’ After spotting some which appeared clean and wrinkle·free, she quickly buttoned them on. ‘C’mon, Blip. People to meet.’
Blipbug’s inquisitive eyes watched her as she hoisted it up onto her shoulder.
The duo emerged a moment later. Mum and Cash were already sat in the sitting room—in a picture of hospitality, the former had already set out tea and scones. Red, famished from slumber, helped herself to both. ‘Mum. Cash,’ she said, taking a seat and nodding to each of them in turn. ‘Blipbug.’
Bonnie smiled to see the pokémon, but made no comment. Taking a hint, she retired to the garden patio to give the younger ones some space. Red noticed a full sack was set beside Cash’s chair, and wondered if she was about to set out, or return. She took another bite of scone.
Cashmere waited until after Ms Dunn was out of earshot before she spoke. ‘Hey, Red, long time no see, huh?’ she said, giving her a very awkward smile. ‘How’s life been treating ya?’
‘Oh, you know,’ Red replied, which was Postwick slang for “pretty shite, but at least I’ve a roof overhead, yeah?” Cash nodded and tapped her chest solemnly.
‘I feel that,’ she said, ‘Right here. In my soul. How was the, uh, university?’
‘Didn’t kill me,’ Red remarked. That was about the highest praise she could give it.
‘Had to be better than here, though, right?’ That drew a sigh from Red: As if there were any way to quantify the differing struggles of being closeted in a small town and being out and lonely in a big city! Cash rolled her eyes. ‘Look, you had to go clubbing at least once, yeah?’
‘It was Motostoke, not Wyndon, Cash.’ Red had never quite made friends with any of the ladies at school, and it wasn’t exactly her cup of tea going clubbing with the lads. So, she’d typically declined that.
‘Well, pardon my homeschooled arse for not knowing the difference!’ Cash exclaimed. ‘Look, I’m sorry for not staying in touch, but I was jealous, alright? My brother left, you left, and I got left behind. And it was… because I was a woman, right? So then I heard you came out, and I was just so insanely jealous—not because of that—but because you were able to do so from… far away. Where·as, when my pa found out I was a lesbian, it was with me stood right there in front of him.’ She gave a long exhale, then recentred herself. ‘So anyway. That’s why I never reached out after you returned. Even though… I feel like us Postwick lasses ought to stick together, after all. Now that I’m sitting here, and you’re sat there, I… I dunno. Feel like I maybe let you down.’
‘You didn’t,’ Red said, quickly trying to re·assure. ‘I mean… I never expected anything.’
‘Thanks, Red, that makes me feel all better.’ Cash snorted. ‘In any case. Enough of that moping. You look cute, today.’
‘Cash.’ Red was blushing and she knew it, but she tried to counter it with a stern countenance. ‘You said you had a favour for me?’
‘That’s right; I’m buttering you up!’ Cash sipped her tea. ‘Don’t be such a damper. You hear about that tournament my brother is holding down in Wedgehurst?’
‘I’m not entering,’ Red asserted immediately. ‘I may have a Blipbug on my shoulder, but I am not a pokémon trainer.’
‘Perfect! Cock on,’ Cash replied. ‘Be a tad awkward if you were. Thing is, I’d like to.’ She sighed and glanced out the window—it was another beautiful Postwick day. ‘But if my brother were to find out, it could be troublesome, you know? I mean, he’s gonna badger me with all these questions about my pokémon and about my training, and—I’d rather the whole thing just be a surprise, you know?’
‘Okay? So use an alias.’ That solution seemed simple enough. ‘There’s plenty of trainers wot battle under a stage·name.’
‘Sure thing I’ll use an alias, Looker. That’s not the fucking point.’ Cash tapped her foot impatiently. ‘Because when my brother runs his eyes down the roster and sees a 23‐year‐old Beauty from Postwick… Dunno if you’ve noticed, love, but there ain’t exactly a whole lot of young women hanging around this town. There’s really only two people it could be.’
‘Ah.’
‘I need you to pretend to be me,’ Cash admitted, finally. ‘Just, drop some hints to your mum or whoever that you’re thinking of competing, and—you know Postwick; word gets around. If my brother comes around and asks, spin him a good yarn, y’know?’
‘You don’t think they’ll find it odd I’m not out training?’ Red asked. Blipbug had migrated from her shoulder to the top of her head, and it was giving Cashmere quite the staredown. She glared right back at it. ‘And, since when have you been a pokémon trainer, anyway? Last I heard, you thought pokémon training was boys’ stuff, and all you had to your name was a Wooloo.’
‘Yes, well.’ There was a pokéball on Cash’s hip, and her hand subconsciously touched it at the mention of her partner’s name. ‘There’s plenty of time before the tournament begins to catch more pokémon. I just… Look, Red, I need to get out of here. I didn’t get to go away to college or whatever; this League endorsement is my big chance. I just want my fair shot. I know this is a hassle for you, but… the victory pot is ₱85,000. So long as I get my endorsement, I’d be happy to split the cheque.’
Now, ₱42,500 wasn’t exactly a fortune, but it was nothing to sneeze at either. Of course, seeing that amount depended on Cash actually winning, and with only a Wooloo and a few months, that didn’t seem bloody likely. Red sighed, and reached up to pat Blipbug on its head. ‘What do you think, buddy?’ she asked.
It gave her hand a worried stare.
‘… Alright,’ Red conceded, finally. ‘Blipbug has some concerns, but we’ll do it. But you’d better win.’
Cashmere exhaled visibly, then smiled and nodded. ‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘That’s the plan. Thanks.’ She rose from her seat. ‘I’ll get out of your hair. But, Red… If you need me for anything, come and find me on Route 2, okay? Let’s not be strangers this go·around.’
‘… Okay. Best of luck,’ Red replied, and she saw Cash to the door. ‘Hey, Cashmere,’ she added, as an afterthought. ‘… Are you really registering as a Beauty?’
Cash winked at her—and Red gulped. The title wasn’t inaccurate. ‘Wooloo’s a normaltype, love,’ she said. Then she turned, and Red watched as she walked off down the lane. It was an unexpected visit, with unexpected consequences: They had been friends, once, but Cash was a different person than she remembered. The two might be better off starting at square one.
‘So, I see you caught yourself a Blipbug,’ Mum said, standing behind her, evidently having caught on that their guest had gone. Red stepped backwards from the doorframe and closed the door. ‘That didn’t take long.’
‘Yeah, last night …’ Red replied, allowing herself a deep breath. Well, here went nothing. ‘You know, I thought some more about what you said, and … I think I might try going for that tournament, after all.’
Cashmere adjusted her pack, standing at the top of Route 1, looking down at the town of Wedgehurst, below. She released Wooloo from its pokéball. ‘Okay, buddy,’ she said. ‘I know you’ve never really left the farm before, but there’s a whole big world out there. You ready to explore it with me?’
Wooloo bleated softly. It didn’t seem entirely sure.
While every Pokémon game has the player begin their journey in a small town, I think Sword & Shield manage this par excellence. I found the rural setting of Southern Galar to be very familiar and welcoming—there are farms! And livestock! It’s not just a suburb of a larger city!—and I hope I did it justice here. I think that the geographical and cultural differences across the Galar region are really interesting—and something which most fanfics don’t bother getting into. (I’m also disappointed in the amount of OC Galar fanfiction in general!) My hope is to use this series to shine a little light on the region, and better help people appreciate its unique charms.
