Chapter 2 – Caught!
“Zzzzz Zzzzz Zzzzz Clink* Zzzzz Zzzzz Clink* Zzzzzzz Thud!*”
“Grandpa…!?”
………. No wait he can just walk in.
Trying to find the source of my sleep deprivation I open up my bedroom window and spot a redhead looking for another pebble to throw.
“Flannie… what are you doing?”
“We are going to get caught! Grandpa arrived today on his Rapidash. He came back early this morning and is sleeping off his saddle sores but, when he’s rested enough to make his rounds, we’ll be growlithe chow!”
“First of all… calm down. Did you have breakfast yet?”
“No, but…”
“Come inside and have breakfast with me and my little sister, but please keep it down Grandma works through the night making Cookie dough batches and she gets cranky when forced out of bed too early.”
I walk through the hallway and opened the front door letting Flannery in the house. Next, I entered the kitchen and started preparing for breakfast My sister was a heavy sleeper and my usual tactic to get her out of bed early was the smell of food. My secret recipe for baked banana oatmeal usually got everyone out of bed early. As the smells started drafting out of the oven, I noticed Flannery standing behind me with a wad of saliva dribbling out of her mouth.
“Hold on its not ready yet.”
“Gulp…!?”
“So, how’s Numsy liking the gym? Has he already made friends with the other Pokémon?”
“Uhm… The situation has been stabilized mostly.”
“What has he been doing this time?”
“He’s been flinging mud at the other Pokémon!”
“Oh, so he’s been working hard even outside of our training sessions good.”
“What did you say!?”
“Ahem, I mean I’ll be sure to give him a scolding when we go see him later today.”
Since my deal with Flannery last week, I’ve come to pick up Numsy from the gym’s stable every day and working on his moves behind the local sand baths. I was trying to get Numsy to learn Mud-Slap, but it was a work in progress our accuracy and power was way off. Me and Numsy volunteered to shovel sand for the owner’s customers and in the process, I hoped to familiarize him with ground-type energy. The owner’s Quagsire figured out what we were doing and started giving helpful pointers to Numsy. With the guidance of an experienced fellow ground-type, I am sure we can pull it off in a few more days.
“Brother is the food ready?”
Like clockwork the smell of food has lured Zinnia out of bed and into the the kitchen.
“Not yet, why don’t you make nice with my friend Flannery? She’s having breakfast with us today.”
The two just now seemed to notice the other’s presence.
“It’s a lie my brother isn’t capable of making friends!?”
“Ooof!”
‘No mercy huh?’ I wasn’t the most socially adept guy out there even in my previous life, but I can totally make friends! Relationships are like houseplants that require constant upkeep or else they wither and die. I just don’t have the time for them working in the store in addition to taking care of Zinnia and training Numsy!
“You never told me you had a sister!? It’s not possible with a face like yours being related to a cutie like her!”
‘Why are all the women in my life cruel and callous with their words?’
“She is! Just you wait when I grow up all the women will be swooning over me! Stop looking at me with those pitying gazes!”
At that moment the oven made a beeping sound notifying me the baked banana oatmeal was ready. After I fished the hot oven tray out and plated up the table Flannery immediately started devouring while the rest of us waited for our breakfast to cool.
“Uhmm… Flannie how come you are not getting burned?”
“This is hot? ‘S nothing compared to some of the gym’s slugma.”
Me and Zinnie watched her fascinated at the speed she consumed her scalding plate of food. Is she a fire-type? It does explain her bright crimson hair. No wait I am a red head myself and I get burned pretty easily. In fact, most of the people in Lavaridge are natural red heads Zinnia and a few migrants being the noticeable exception. ‘Maybe it’s due to environmental influences...?’ As my mind is trying to wrap itself around this mystery I get pinched by my sister.
“Brother wake up you’re spacing out again.”
“You are right sorry let’s finish eating quickly. I’ll walk you to school afterwards.”
While Zinnia showed Flannery her room. I packed up my little sister’s boxed lunch for her to eat during recess. Leftovers from breakfast, a carton of milk and a whole banana. Our little group of three made its way over to the local trainer’s school. Unlike me Flannery still had a year of compulsory education to undertake despite being one year older than me. Flannery was mostly homeschooled. Her grandfather hiring some fancy private teacher. The only time she had to physically show up at school was during exams and field tests.
After dropping off Zinnia we make our way to the Lavaridge gym. Flannery obviously still nervous about the whole ordeal.
“It’ll be fine Flannie if Numsy gets kicked out I’ll just keep him somewhere else.”
“That’s not the problem Egon! Grandpa might take away my television rights. I wanted to watch the next Ever Grande Conference.”
“Fine if Mr. Moore still hasn’t noticed yet we’ll smuggle Numsy out.”
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This time we enter the gym through a side entrance Flannery has the key to. All the Numel and Camerupt are kept inside a picket fence enclosure to the side of the gym. Lowering the chances of us getting discovered even more.
“Numsy! Come here boy.”
A single Numel looked up from the herd and started racing towards me. The picketed fence wasn’t high enough to be an obstacle, so Numsy jumped over it and crashed into my body.
“That’s a strong body slam Numsy! And you are already getting bigger as well.”
“Num Num!”
“Unfortunately, Mr. Moore is back from his business trip, so we need to sneak out quietly this time, okay?”
“Num.”
“No need for that you can just stay here for a while.”
Me and Numsy jolted at the sound of an unfamiliar voice. While Flannery had a defeated expression on her face. We turn around and standing behind us is a bespectacled old man wearing traditional clothing.
“Good morning, Mr. Moore. Me and Numsy here heard about the great facilities you have for fire type Pokémon. After expressing our desire to witness the gym, Flannery here graciously agreed to give us a tour.”
“Num!”
“What a well-spoken youngster and I see you are already familiar with our Numel habitat. How about I show you the entire gym?”
As I was conversing with Mr. Moore Flannery was trying to sneakily get away.
“Where are you going granddaughter? When inviting friends, it is important to personally ensure your guests feel welcome.”
“Yes, Grandpa…”
“You know gyms do have support staff running the facility especially when the leader is gone. My on-staff ranger told me we suddenly had one extra Numel in the compound. He noticed it while cleaning up the pens a week ago.”
“Sorry sir, I didn’t want to lose Numsy, and we were afraid that a ranger would notice him and relocate him back into the wild.”
“Have you asked your grandparents for permission to catch him? I know them they’re good people and wouldn’t say no without a good reason.”
“They told me that I had to wait until I could afford my own poké ball. Since I am not old enough to get a job, I would have to save up my allowance for a year to afford a Poké ball.”
Mr. Moore had a contemplating expression on his face. At the same time Flannery was giving him the puppy dog eyes.
“Hmm… Okay, this is what we are going to do. I will personally catch this Numel with my own Poké ball and register him as a gym Pokémon. At the same time, you will work here part-time. If you show that you are responsible enough to take care of him, I’ll fill in the paperwork to make Numsy your official starting Pokémon.”
“Thanks a lot Mr. Moore me and Numsy will work hard to meet your expectations!”
“Num!”
“Good, and as for you Flannery no TV for two weeks”
“Nooooo!”
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A week later
Working for a gym is not as glamorous as I imagined. Most of my time was spent cleaning up but not after Pokémon. Humans especially trainers that go hiking through the various ecological wonders in Hoenn don’t tend to mind a little mud on their boots and often forget to clean up before entering the gym. Fire type Pokémon are actually really hygienic since they don’t void their bowels in the traditional sense. They expunge any excess carbohydrates, fats and nitrogen in a cloud of ash and if they are active battlers they don’t even have to, since most of the gym trainers liberally make use of moves like smog and smokescreen to keep challengers on their toes.
One of my other tasks is to help feed the fire types that like to graze in the open field next to the gym. The gym had two species of Pokémon that liked to munch on raw plant fiber Ponyta and Numel. Of course, this wasn’t enough because the Pokémon in this gym were used for battling purposes, so their feed got supplemented with berries and vitamin supplements. I wasn’t allowed into the volcano yet for obvious reasons. The numerous Slugma and a couple of Magby were taken care of by the more seasoned personnel.
There were two members of staff that were basically in charge whenever Mr. Moore was away on Elite Four duties. Keegan who was responsible for teaching the gym’s younger Pokémon and trainers about fire hazard safety and Eli the local ranger on staff who patrols the surrounding areas, his job was very diverse ranging from rescue operations to being a liaison between humans and the local wild Pokémon. Numsy and me being new got to receive a crash course from Keegan.
“So, the first thing you need when practicing fire type moves with your Pokémon is flame resistant gear. The reason why you didn’t start right away with these lessons was that we had none in your size. We have aspiring trainers undergo this test before letting them work with our fire-types. Because Pokémon can innately perceive intent from another living being. What this means in practical terms is that they understand what humans are trying to convey right out of the egg but also when overexcited trainers give out instructions the Pokémon might get confused and let their flame burn hotter than intentional causing fire incidents. Let out your Numel and order it to use ember at these practice targets the goal is for the flames to be cold enough not to set these hay bales on fire.”
“Okay Numsy use ember on the targets and try to make your fire as cold as possible.”
This exercise wasn’t as much of a problem for me. On the inside I wasn’t an excitable child. After the second try me and Numsy got it down squat. I could tell Keegan was surprised at our quick progress the man having cleared his work schedule for the bigger part of the afternoon expecting us to take a while. Afterwards I just shadowed him around for a bit. Keegan’s work was pretty interesting his Magmar helped him out by flash firing hardwood in a pit kiln. The resulting briquettes would be sold to restaurants, herbalist shops and trainers for a pretty penny.
Next me and Numsy went back to the sand baths. Numsy had taken Quagsire as his Master in ground type moves having perfected his Mud-Slap. We were eager to learn what move we would be able to learn next.
“Quaaaag”
“What did the master tell you Numsy?”
“Num Num!”
Excitedly Numsy started rooting around in the sand.
“Ohhh he’s going to teach you dig next!”
I take out a paper bag filled with lava cookies.
“Please accept this offering for your effort in teaching no good disciples like us master Quagsire.”
“Quaaaagsire”
Dig was a super useful if ever we decided to go spelunking in caves not to mention the battle applications being able to dodge moves in a pinch. The rest of the afternoon me and Numsy dug holes for customers to sleep in. ‘Wait… were we being taken advantage of?’
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After dropping off Numsy at the gym. I headed towards the local trainer’s school to pick up Zinnia. While walking I was considering my plans for the future. The meteoroid that would head for our planet in a decade or so. In the games Zinnia got made lorekeeper of the Draconids after the previous one a girl named Aster died in a tragedy.
Zinnia ended up doing all kinds of dangerous stuff. Infiltrating and providing team magma and aqua with the means to wake up the ancient Pokémon in a bid to lure Rayquaza back. Breaking into secure facilities and destroying a certain dimensional device and stealing keystones from powerful trainers.
To avoid this future all I had to do was make sure that Aster didn’t die prematurely. Her death was caused by the Devon corporation and the League association’s hairbrained plan to capture Rayquaza and pillage the Draconids’ stash of keystones. Aster didn’t survive that confrontation. But she did designate Zinnia her successor before her death. So, at some point I was expecting my sister’s biological father to return and invite her into the tribe within the next few years.
‘What a mess… too big for a boy and his numel to solve. Guess I’ll have to become accomplished enough to make people listen to me.’
The bell rang and school kids started pouring out of the school gates. Zinnia was leading a group of loveable ruffians. Whenever Zinnia entered a clique, she always somehow ended up being the leader. I guess that kind of natural charisma was what is required to train prideful dragon-type Pokémon.
“This is my big brother! Isn’t he cool?”
“Not as cool as my big sister! She’s already a trainer and has two badges.”
“Now now I bet his sister and me are both equally cool, how about you say goodbye to your little friends so we can go back home in time for dinner.”
“…I take it back your sister is probably cooler.”
‘This brat…!’
We got back home and after dinner I had her start getting ready for bed.
“Next week is bring your family’s Pokémon to school day. But Grandpa and Grandma don’t have Pokémon.”
“That’s okay I’ll let you bring Numsy with you to school. He’s very well behaved and loves making new friends.”
“I know Grandpa used to be a trainer what happened to his Pokémon?”
Oh dear, explaining the concept of death to a 5-year-old girl is not something I am mentally prepared for. Guess I’ll have to do the copout move.
“Grandpa’s old Arcanine retired to live at a farm somewhere in Johto. Now he gets to spend his time chasing around mareep and scaring off rowdy houndour.”
“Now how about another story?”