CHAPTER 58

I readjusted my bag, shifting the weight to my non-wounded shoulder as we stepped out of the Pokemon Center. We were finally ready to make progress and get to Eterna city. The trip would take two days, although since we were a large group, it would probably end up being slightly longer, but I didn’t care. All I wanted was to get on the road. My need to get back to a city wasn’t as bad as Emilia’s, but I would be lying to myself if I didn’t admit that I missed living in one. I was a Jubilife girl through and through.

“Whew,” I said. “Let’s get this show on the road!”

“Someone’s excited,” Denzel said.

“I think we all want to get to the city,” Louis shrugged. “I can’t wait to get to my hotel suite.”

“I think we’re excited about very different things,” My friend added.

The first order of business was to pass through Eterna Lake. I had gone on it with Denzel and Cece before, but we hadn’t really gone that far. The truth was, the lake was enormous, and it would take at least four hours to get through. Of course, there was also the possibility of going around, but that would take longer, and since there wasn’t any danger, there was no reason to take the long road. Many trainers were fishing along the bridges, hoping to catch something good. Denzel theorized that most were probably hoping for a Tentacool for its poison typing to help against Gardenia. Even this far out, people were already preparing to face her.

“By the way,” Denzel started. “Shouldn’t Justin and Pauline be catching something? You guys only have two Pokemon.”

Pauline huffed and crossed her arms. “Nothing on this route interests me. I’ll see if there are any good Pokemon around the city itself.”

“Fair enough, I guess. What about you, Justin?” Denzel asked.

“Well, the truth is that there is a Pokemon I’m looking for, but it wouldn’t be the end of the world if I didn’t find it. It’s a Lotad.”

It took a few seconds for me to recall what the Pokemon looked like. A grass and water type would work alright for Gardenia, and it would be wonderful for future battles. All in all, I would call it a smart choice.

“Come on, we’ll help you find it. Do you know how it lives in the lake? Do you need a fishing rod? Denzel has one.” I asked, wanting to repay his help with Tangela.

“No, Lotad live along the surface,” Denzel said. “They float across the surface like lilypads, and they’ll be at shallower parts of the lake, next to the shoreline.”

“Well, there weren’t any next to the outpost,” Pauline shrugged.

“We’ll keep an eye out,” I said. “And, uh… Louis,” I continued, hesitating slightly. “Have you figured out what third Pokemon you’re getting?”

“Oh, it’ll be wonderful,” He replied, barely containing his smile. “Our breeders will be sending me a top-of-the-line Vulpix that hatched a few months ago. A perfect fit to win against Gardenia, wouldn’t you say?”

I frowned. I didn’t know enough about Vulpix to know if it would be uncontrollable, but I did know Ninetales were extremely rare. The usual Fire Stones that were found in stores and commonly mined weren’t enough to get a Ninetales. Only the best quality Fire Stones were able to get Vulpix to evolve— although with his money, I suppose that wouldn’t be a problem. I just hoped Louis wouldn’t rush into things and evolve it into a Ninetales too quickly. There were many bedtime stories read to kids that talked about the strong curses a vengeful Ninetales could inflict on a human.

“Well, I hope you know what you’re doing,” I just said. He seemed to have already arranged everything, and there was probably no way to change his mind. If he started talking about evolving it, I’d ask everybody to stage an intervention to stop him from getting himself killed.

“I actually wanted a Vulpix for a bit when I was first planning my team,” Denzel said. “Changed my mind when I heard about the curses and their vengeful nature though. Plus, I’d probably never be able to afford its evolution.”

Very smooth, dude, I thought with a slight smile. I looked at Eevee, who was perched on my friend’s shoulder as always. Thinking about Fire Stones made me curious as to what evolution he had chosen for the normal type. I supposed I would ask him later tonight when we set up camp.

We made it to the other end of the lake with no troubles. Denzel battled a trainer that specialized in water types and had one badge, but he wiped the floor with him thanks to Budew. The grass type just battered the kid’s Pokemon with Bullet Seed, even when they retreated under the surface of the water. The attack was powerful enough to pack a punch after being slowed by the lake.

“Let’s look for that Lotad now, shall we?” Cecilia said.

“Should we split up?” Justin asked. “Cover more ground?”

“That’s the sensible thing to do. I don’t want to waste too much time,” Emilia chimed in.

“You don’t have to help Emi. In fact, why don’t we both stay here and watch the others do all the work?” Pauline asked.

The girl smiled. “That seems like a great idea.”

I couldn’t help but be happy at how great Emi was doing again. The forest had for sure changed her, but at least she was having some degree of fun. Compared to how she was before, it was like night and day, and going through Eterna forest taught her to appreciate traveling in such a relatively low-risk area.

“If you didn’t want to help, you could have just said so, Pauline,” Justin sighed. “How are we splitting the groups?”

Denzel interjected immediately. “How about a girl group and a guy group?”

“How passé of you, Denzel,” Pauline said.

“That seems appropriate,” Justin nodded. “Louis?”

The blonde boy nodded, and the groups split. We agreed to catch the Pokemon for him if we found one, after which we’d hand it to him in Eterna city. There wasn’t a need for another Pokemon to trade, but these kinds of transactions had to be tracked by the League. I wiped my sweaty hands on my pants as I walked with Cece along the lake. The water gently crashed over the slightly sandy shore. From this angle, it was hard to believe that this was a lake and not the ocean.

“Ahem,” Cece coughed. “I… I have something to confess.”

My throat clogged up. “W—what is it?”

“The truth is… I have no idea what a Lotad looks like,” She said, staring at her feet. “I was too embarrassed to tell the others.”

My nervousness evaporated as fast as water thrown at the surface of the sun, and I started choking on my own saliva while laughing at the same time. I doubled over as Cece worriedly clapped my back.

“It’s not that hilarious, surely,” She said after I recovered. “I’ve never even heard of the Pokemon. I bet that they don’t live in Unova.”

“Uh, I’m pretty sure they live everywhere,” I said, still giggling. “Sorry, that just came out of nowhere. I’m pretty sure there was a Lotad at one of the Floaroma tournament battles too, if I remember correctly,” I said, before describing the Pokemon to her.

“Really?” She raised an eyebrow. “I probably wasn’t paying attention. I was nervous, you know? I was terrified I’d lose.”

“Well, now I know, but at the time, I didn’t. You just looked like your usual self.”

She stared at me intently. “What does my usual self look like?”

I fiddled my thumbs. “Um, I don’t know. Confident? Like you’re ready to take on the world, I guess.”

Cece brought a hand to her heart. “That’s good. That’s what I want people to think.”

I nodded sadly. I couldn’t imagine what it was like, to constantly have to mask your true self. “Hey, one day you’ll be able to look however you want,” I said, trying to cheer her up.

“Thank you,” She smiled gently. “You know, you and Denzel have been a great help to me. If I can repay you by whatever means, I’d like to give you—”

“No. No money,” I interrupted.

“But anything you could ask for would cost me practically nothing! Plus, I’d be using my father’s money on someone he disapproves of.”

“Nuh-uh,” I shook my head. “Just being friends is enough for me.”

The conversation paused for a few seconds before Cece let out a sigh. “Fine. But if you need anything, just ask. And I’ll still try to help in any way I can.”

“I’ll be fine. Now let’s find this Lotad! Hey, did you know they evolve into really good dancers called Ludicolo?”

“Huh?!” She exclaimed. “Those are where Ludicolo come from?!”

“Well, yeah.”

“Humilau city has this wonderful annual festival full of those, and they perform magnificent dances…”

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

In the end, we didn’t find any Lotad, so we decided to get back to Emilia and Pauline, who were lying down on the grass next to each other and talking. We joined them and waited for the boys to come back, and they did.

An entire two hours later, that was.

They were in a sorry state, all shivering and completely wet from head to toe.

“What happened?” I asked, standing up. “You need to dry yourselves!”

“Ugh,” Pauline groaned “I suppose we’ll have to set up camp early then?”

“Unless they want hypothermia, I would suggest so,” Cece said.

“Did you at least catch the damn thing?” Pauline asked.

Justin grinned and released a Lotad with a leaf on its head that looked larger than average. The Pokemon seemed quite friendly, at least. It struggled to walk as it approached us curiously. I grabbed my Pokedex and scanned it.

Lotad, the water weed Pokemon. Lotad is said to have dwelled on land before. However, this POKéMON is thought to have returned to water because the leaf on its head grew large and heavy. It now lives by floating atop the water. Its lilypad-like hat serves as a ferry to Pokémon that can’t swim, but if it doesn’t drink clean water for too long, its leaf withers and dies.

Type: Water, Grass

“I can certainly see the resemblance now,” Cece whispered to me. I held back a laugh.

“It took us a while to catch because it kept escaping deeper into the lake whenever we got too close,” Justin explained as he held his body. “I apologize for the delay.”.

“I tried blocking it in with Prinplup, but he isn’t the best swimmer,” Louis said.

“How can a water type not be a good swimmer?” Pauline snarked.

“I’ve raised him on land. He only swims in our swimming pools!” He answered defensively.

“Let’s just get a fire started and get these guys warmed up,” I sighed.

It looked like day one was a bust, but honestly, I was having a lot of fun.

——

Denzel and I stood away from camp and that giant tent that the group had started to use again. He released his Budew, who announced her presence with her habitual screech. The grass type looked at me disdainfully and turned toward Denzel in protest.

“What’s up with her today?” I asked, feeling slightly hurt.

“She’s just being…” Denzel trailed off before looking at Budew. “She’s doing great!”

“Did she just pressure you into lying?” I teased, grabbing my own Pokeball.

“Nah, Budew and I are always on the same page these days. Right Budew?”

“Bud!” The grass type yelled in protest.

I released angel from his Pokeball. Since we had set up camp already, I decided to ask Denzel for help to teach him to use Poison Powder and Stun Spore. Sure, these attacks would be useless against Gardenia’s own grass types, but I just wanted to get angel up to speed on all of his moves as fast as I could before focusing on improving a particular move. Tangela greeted me with his habitual vine touching.

“So, how are we doing this?” I asked.

“What? I thought you’d have a strategy worked out,” Denzel said.

“Huh? You’re the one that said you could help me!” I groaned.

He waited a few seconds before a smile split his face. “I’m just fucking with you.”

“You’re the worst.”

“So you said Tangela already knew the moves right?” My friend started, ignoring me. I nodded. “So all you need to do is get him to associate the verbal command with the move, so I figured I’d just have Budew use them next to him and hope he uses it too. When he does, you shout out the order.”

“Ah, yeah, that makes sense. I think Tangela will figure that one out.”

Tangela waded to Budew and touched her with some of his vines. She immediately pelted him with a weakened Bullet Seed, but he seemed not to mind. Budew screeched in annoyance, but she didn’t attack— a true mark of all the progress she had made. After fifteen seconds or so, Tangela finished his inspection and was ready to get to work.

“Alright, let’s stand back a bit. We don’t want to breathe in the spores,” My friend said. I nodded and followed him, and then he shouted out an order. “Alright, Budew, start with Stun Spore.”

Budew shook her entire body, diffusing yellow spores. Tangela looked at her curiously and shook his body as well, successfully using Stun Spore, albeit it looked weaker than Budew’s.

“That was Stun Spore, Tangela!” I yelled out. “S-t-u-n S-p-o-r-e!”

“Think he caught that?” Denzel asked.

“I hope so. Let’s try.”

I ordered Tangela to use the move, and he just looked at me before using Vine Whip on the ground.

“I think he’s worse than you described,” Denzel chuckled.

“Shut up. He’s trying his best!” I said. “That wasn’t it angel, but that was still a very good Vine Whip!”

Tangela squinted in a way that I had learned was a smile, and he used Vine Whip again. Even Budew looked puzzled, and she quietly stared at me while my Pokemon kept using Vine Whip over and over. I didn’t speak Pokemon, but I instinctively knew what that look meant.

You’re making me work with this?!

“Let’s start over,” I sighed. “He’ll figure it out eventually.”

“And then we have to do it with Poison Powder…” Denzel sighed.

——

An hour later, Tangela had made a lot of progress. He recognized Stun Spore and Poison Powder most of the time, and so he finally learned to respond to all of his moves. That meant I’d be able to work on my idea for a Vine Whip, Bind, and Mega Drain combo, although that would probably take weeks. The idea was to hit an enemy with Vine Whip and immediately have the vine wrap around it with Bind, after which angel could suck their energy with Mega Drain. Then, there was also the idea of getting him to dodge attacks with his vines, but that could come later. He’d be able to take a lot of hits in Eterna’s gym, and I wanted to focus on the other members of my team as well.

For Togetic, I wanted her to learn Double Edge, one of the most powerful normal type moves. In fact, it was so powerful that it inflicted some damage on the user. It wasn’t a priority for now, especially since I’d use her to fight long-distance against Gardenia, but it would be useful to counter quick, fragile flying types like Cece’s Fletchinder. What I did want for the gym, however, was the Thunder Wave TM. She was surprisingly able to learn the move, and it was one of the more affordable TMs. If I remembered correctly, the price was around… fifteen thousand pokedollars. I had around nine thousand on my trainer card right now, so I’d need to participate in a lot of battles to get there, and then I’d be broke, but it would be worth it. The move would be useful forever, even against highly skilled opponents that I’d face at the Conference if I got there.

Frillish would probably be my last resort against Gardenia, but I still wanted him at his best, and I had a strategy in mind if I had to use the water type. Of course, I had Poison Sting and Hex, but I wanted him to learn Acid Armor and Mist. First, Acid Armor would liquefy his body and do wonders against any physical grass moves. Mist would just make him harder to hit along with that.

For Elekid, I wanted him to learn Ice and Fire Punch. These would be the hardest to teach, because we had no base to work from. Where would the fire or the ice come from? That was something I’d have to figure out, but if I managed to get him to master those in time, he would quickly become the heavy lifter for the Gardenia battle.

I’d need to start working on all of those in Eterna city.

I walked up to Denzel, who was watching Buneary and Eevee play around. I smiled at the two normal types. Eevee had a real gift with other Pokemon since he seemingly got along with anyone extremely quickly, although the Pokemon could also be grumpy when he wasn’t in the mood.

“Hey,” I told Denzel. “Had a question for you.”

“Yeah?”

“I’ve been curious,” I whispered, not wanting to disturb his Pokemon. “I wondered what evolution you were picking for Eevee?”

The boy’s face froze before answering. He sighed. “I honestly don’t know. I want him to pick, but… he’s scared to pick, I think. Too many options.”

“Oh,” I said. “Sorry.”

“No, it’s fine,” He quickly said. “I mean, I’ve got to think about it someday, right? It’s not like he doesn’t want to evolve either,” He continued as he watched the normal type jump over Buneary. “I’ve asked him, and told him I would have been fine with that. He just doesn’t know what he wants, which is unusual.”

“Is it? Why?”

“Eevee’s just not like that,” Denzel sighed. “He always knows what he wants. He’s steadfast.”

We watched his Pokemon play in silence for a few seconds.

“But it’s not like I have to decide now. I mean, I won’t have the money to buy an evolutionary stone any time soon, and Eevee can hold himself back from evolving if he really doesn’t want to yet. As long as he’s giving it his all, I’ll support any decision he makes.”

“You’re a great trainer,” I softly said. “A lot of people would have just forced whatever they wanted onto their Pokemon.”

“I’d never forgive myself if I did that. I’ll give Eevee as much time as he needs.”

“And I’m sure he loves you for that.”

——

Later, I was forced to explain that I was going to sleep in my own tent to not wake the entire group up too early. I had forgotten that my friends had never actually known that I had nightmares because I had used Togetic’s power our entire time together.

“Are you sure you’re alright?” Justin asked me with concern. “Maybe sleeping in the company of people will help.”

“I wish I’d known about this sooner,” Cecilia said painfully.

“I’ll be fine, guys,” I said. “You guys just have a good night.”

“Don’t hesitate to call if you need someone,” Denzel clapped my shoulder. “We’re right there.”

Pauline crossed her arms. “If I ever see any of these Galactic guys, I’ll fuck them up. The fact that you can’t sleep pisses me off. No one should have to go through that.”

“Well, the right thing to do would be to call the League or the cops, but I appreciate that,” I smiled. “Thanks, everyone. Good night.”

I stepped into my tent and fell asleep. When I woke up screaming, Cece was there. I hurriedly climbed out of my sleeping bag.

“What’s wrong?” I asked. “Did something happen?”

“No, but I figured it would be nice to wake up to a familiar face. I wake up earlier than everyone else anyway.”

“I— Thank you. It really does. If I was alone right now, I’d probably still be trying to calm myself down.”

“I did say I would try to help in any way I could,” The girl smiled. “Why don’t we train while we wait for the others to wake up?”

“Gladly.”

——

On the third day, we finally reached Eterna city. The city’s aesthetic was completely different from Jubilife and Oreburgh. The roads were still paved with gray bricks instead of concrete, and there weren’t any skyscrapers in sight. Two huge stadiums towered in the distance that I recognized as the gym and one of the contest halls that Emilia was crazy about. The buildings had a rustic feeling to them, and vegetation was everywhere, although there was less of it than in Floaroma. Loud screams could be heard as we turned the corner to the Pokemon Center, and I was outraged at what I saw. People were… protesting, yelling loudly, and carrying signs with different slogans written on them.

“Down with the League’s tyranny!”

“Our memories are ours only!”

“Cynthia, step down!”

“What the hell?” I said, my voice trembling.

“They’re protesting the National Security Emergency Act,” Denzel grimaced. “This could spell trouble.”