Chapter Nine - Sage Li's Busy Afternoon

Sage Li didn't always feel his age. After all, the life of a sage was calm and yet still required motion and movement, and it encouraged healthy eating. Even now, he spent a few hours each day in the gardens, tending to their little patch of managed nature, and playing with his oldest, best friends.

Sometimes, however, things happened which reminded him that he wasn't a spry young man any longer. Mostly this happened at the start of every circuit, where the entirety of Johto was swarmed by bright-eyed young trainers, just starting on their journey.

The circuit had started some three months ago, in early spring, so the majority of the youngest hopefuls from Violet City and New Bark and the other little towns in the vicinity had moved on already. It was slowly edging into the quieter moments.

Oh, there were some coming in now, searching for Falkner to get their second badge, but for the most part the city was quieting down.

The progress that young trainers made wasn't merely about the number of badges they collected. It was about personal growth as well.

In that light, he couldn't look down upon them too harshly.

The previous head sage of the Sprout Tower had started something when he encouraged every sage here to carry a few bellsprout to challenge newcomers with. They weren't a difficult fight, but they still gave trainers a bit of a challenge, something to work against and a reason to talk to the sages that were here.

Young hotheads wanted fights, and it was sometimes the only time to converse with them.

"Noctowl," said a figure in the boughs of a nearby tree.

Sage Li looked up, then smiled at his oldest friend. Noctowl was hidden in the darkness, eyes glowing faintly so that the sage could make him out against the darkness. Noctowl had been with him for... oh, fifty years now. The owl had turned white as well, and perhaps wasn't quite as fit as he once was.

Sage Li liked to spring a surprise on young challengers, taking out one of Noctowl's great-grandchildren to fight against the more hotheaded trainers. Noctowl himself... well, his fighting days were behind him.

"Noct," the owl said before turning his head towards the tower.

"Ah," the sage replied as he understood. They had guests.

He straightened his back with a satisfying pop, then flexed his bad knee a little. Time to see what this was all about. The sage picked up a walking stick, a gnarled staff shaped like an elongated bellsprout, and started his way towards the front.

What he found there were two young ladies and two young pokemon.

The first was quite familiar to him. Oh, he had never seen her before, but he'd seen a lifetime of trainers like her. Young, brash, masking an ocean of insecurity with a pool of confidence. She had a bellsprout by her side, which did amuse him.

The little bellsprout wiggled this way and that, beady eyes looking at the statues around the entranceway to the Sprout Tower. These were, of course, statues of bellsprout, so he had a right to be amused by them. He seemed lively, though perhaps not as strong as some. He still had a ways to go before reaching the next stage in his life, Sage Li determined.

The other girl was interesting. A round-faced, wide-eyed child that seemed to carry innocence around her like a cloak. She wore armour over a bright blue tunic and skirts, but no weapons. A strange choice of attire, but not as strange as the pair of ears on her head, or the... was that a buneary? Those were uncommon here.

"Greetings," he said with a nod.

"Hey," the hotheaded one said.

"Hello, mister," the other said with a bob of her head. The buneary bowed his own head too, mimicking his trainer with a serious call of his name. "How are you doing today?"

Sage Li chuckled. "I'm doing quite well," he said. And it was true. The weather was staying warm, the sun was masked by a few thin clouds that parted on occasion to warm him up. The wind was cool, the air smelled of flowers, and he had had a fantastic bowel movement this morning. Many little things to make for a light but fantastic day.

"We want to capture a gastly," the hotheaded girl said. She clenched her fists, then pointed to the tower. "I know there are some in there."

Li raised an eyebrow and was about to reprimand her when the other girl placed a hand on her friend's shoulder. "Sorry, mister, Jazz here is very excited and forgot her manners. My name is Broccoli Bunch, this is Jazz, this is Bellsprout, and this little guy is Buneary."

"A pleasure," he said as he cracked a little smile. "My name is Sage Li, of the Sprout Tower. And yes, we do have a couple of gastly haunting the tower, though they don't usually appear during the day."

"I'm going to be honest, I don't actually know what a gastly is, just that Jazz really wants to see one. I think she wants to become one's trainer?"

"Yeah," Jazz said. "I'm going to be a Poison-type master, and the gastly line is one of the best Poison-Type pokemon in the region."

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"I see," Sage Li said. He hadn't heard that particular reasoning in... ever. There were a few rare Ghost-Type experts out there, but they were extremely uncommon. There were generally four kinds of pokemon that required that their trainers be very careful, and which might bode ill on any and all if they weren't held on a tight leash. Dragon, Fairy, Ghost, and those rare pokemon whom most would consider legendaries.

The last was not truly a concern, the number of captured legendaries could be counted on one hand. Most were forces of nature that the League and anyone sensible would do well to avoid angering. Poison-type pokemon were... bothersome to keep as lifelong companions. His own weepinbell, bellsprout's evolution, could be a bit of a pain in that way, but they weren't a threat to their handlers.

The gastly of the Sprout Tower were pranksters and pests, but they were mostly harmless, if mean-spirited pokemon. A haunter, their evolution, took that a step further, and could be a threat. A gengar... was a danger to any and all that it didn't enjoy.

It was hard to understand the mind of a pokemon at times. Moreso the mind of a Ghost-type, whose allegiance to the living was fleeting and rare. "If you are to enter the Sprout Tower and remain overnight, then I will have certain requirements for you," he said.

The young Jazz fixed him with a glare. "What kind?" she asked.

"I wish merely to talk a little," he said. "Would you not spare an hour or two for an old man that wishes to spend a little time with the young? It helps me remember what it was like to not have knees that ached."

"We don't mind at all, Mister Sage Li," Broccoli said with a great big smile.

Ah, she, at least, was a kind-hearted soul. He was good at reading such things. A gift given to him by age and experience. Jazz... well, she was perhaps capable of such goodness as well. "Come, we will ascend the tower in the meanwhile. I will bring you to the second floor. The third is where you will find your ghost!"

"So, Mister Sage Li," Broccoli started.

He laughed. "It's just Sage Li, sage is my title."

"Oh! Thank you! Well, Sage Li, what's it like being a sage then? Do you live in the tower?"

"Oh no, I live in one of the buildings behind it. Though I do live on the tower grounds. The tower is... a monument, a space for us to study and reflect and train, but while it is important to our way of life, is it, at the end of the day, merely a building."

Broccoli was nodding along, her little buneary too, though he had the impression that the little pokemon wasn't quite keeping up.

Next to her, he could tell that Jazz was impatient. Hotheaded youth often were. They had yet to learn the value of moving slowly and speaking softly. They followed him into the tower, where other sages were calmly taking care of some things. The floor was being swept and a garden of bellsprouts were being led through some stretches near the back.

Li escorted his guests up the stairs, past a small group of middle aged tourists and into a space where mats were set on the floor next to an electric kettle. He had them sit, got some water, then started to prepare some tea for the three of them. "Tell me, miss Jazz, what makes you want a gastly so much?"

Jazz was quick to answer. "Gastly are incredible. Poison-type pokemon are the best, of course, but Ghost-type isn't too bad. The Ghost-typing actually gives gastly a huge boost. Lots of great immunities. Plus, gastly are gaseous, meaning that they can get into tight spaces and have plenty of potential for movement in battle."

"What about outside of fighting?" Broccoli asked her friend.

Sage Li brought his teacup to his lips, hiding his smile. Yes, that was what he meant to ask next. This Jazz girl was overly focused on battle and didn't pay any mind to what happened beyond that.

"What?" Jazz asked.

"What about outside of fighting?" Broccoli repeated. "Do gastlys? Gastlies? Do they make for good friends? Do you have what you need to take care of one? Why do you want one besides it being a Poison-type and it being good at fighting?"

Jazz stuttered for a moment before closing her hands into fists. "I... mostly want gastly because they're strong, or they have the potential to be," she admitted.

At least she wasn't lying.

"You know," he said. "Gastly are a pokemon that a lot of people look down on."

"I know," she said. It was almost a snap. "He's a Poison-type. All of us... all of them are looked down on. People are afraid of them. It's stupid. People don't understand how great Poison-type is!"

Sage Li smiled openly now. He had a lot to say about hotheaded youth, but the reality was also that for all of their brashness, it was nice to see some passion as well.

"The sun won't set for a few hours yet," he said. "When it does, I'll show you to the entrance to the third floor. There, you'll find the ghost you're looking for."

It would also, he reasoned rather secretly, be nice to have one less prankster ghost in their attic.

***