Chapter Seventy-Two - Orientation

Oran stared at Choco and silently wished she was a Fire-type pokemon. That way there was at least a chance that her look might light the furball's butt on fire.

Not that he'd notice. At the moment Choco was sighing wistfully while Lolo the stupid ugly meany did some stretches nearby. She had her lips stained by Choco's berry, the shameless bunny.

The worst thing was that from the moment she arrived, Choco had basically stopped training. Just that morning he was going on and on about being stronger than any of the pokemon here. Now he was bouncing across the training room in a hurry to fetch the lopunny a bottle of water.

That wasn't how he was supposed to train Quick Attack!

"Oran?" Broccoli asked, and she looked up from her glaring to see Broccoli coming over. The lopunny's trainer was crossing the room towards his pokemon, probably to pick her up or something. "We'll be heading out in a bit. We're checking out that contest thing today, remember?"

"Ma," she agreed.

Broccoli paused, then looked between her and Choco before she squatted down to be closer to Oran's height. "Are you envious? Of Lolo, I mean."

Oran gasped. "Rill, rill!" No, never! She wasn't envious of that... woman. Or even jealous of Choco's attention.

"Are you sure?" Broccoli asked. "It's okay to be a little upset when your best friend won't pay you as much attention."

Oran huffed, but before answering with her own voice, she reached into her pouch and pulled out her poke phone. Some things were just... better when communicated over words. There was gravitas in words, there was weight.

So she opened the text app, made sure it was set on big letter mode on the keyboard, and she very carefully typed in her response while the phone rested on the floor before her. Once she was done she picked it up and turned it towards Broccoli to read.

'Lol. Lmao.' the screen read.

Broccoli smiled, then patted Oran on the head. "You're cute," she declared before Oran was scooped off the ground and tossed into the air. She only had a bit of time to flail around before Broccoli caught her and hugged her close. "Let's go pick up Choco, huh?"

Oran nodded, then carefully put the pokephone back in its pouch.

They grabbed Choco, who was quickly relocated to his spot atop Broccoli's head. He was trying really hard to look cool about it, and the fact that he was trying so hard made it infinitely less cool, something that Oran reminded him of the moment they were out of the training room.

"Buneary un bun!" I'm not lame!

"Ma ma rill." Yes you are.

Broccoli just hummed a happy little tune as she bounced along with the both of them. They went upstairs to the main floor of the pokemon centre where the rest of their friends were waiting. Jazz didn't like training in the big room as much. She said it was too crowded for her to train with her Poison-type moves, so she booked a smaller training room to practice in. And Tabitha.. Did her own thing?

Oran wasn't sure how her pokemon trained, but it seemed to involve a lot of sitting and thinking really hard, which felt like a very silly way to train. You couldn't think big muscles into being. Did Tabitha not know that?

"Hi guys!" Broccoli said. "Is everybun ready?"

"Everyone," Jazz corrected. "Don't try to get us in on your overly cute stuff."

"It's not cute," Broccoli argued. "It's friendly and inclusive. Everybun is both gender and age neutral."

"So is everyone?" Jazz asked.

"Yes well... mine's more fun to say." Broccoli grinned wide. "You could even say that it's more bun to say."

Jazz didn't look amused, but Oran was. She opened her phone, still with the same message on it, replaced the periods with lots of exclamation marks, then turned it around for Jazz to see.

Jazz read the message, then rolled her eyes. "I think one day you're going to look back and regret teaching Oran how to text."

Broccoli just smiled and shook her head. "No, I don't think so. It's an important skill, knowing how to read. Ah, even if I cheat a little."

"What's that mean?"

"Nevermind! So, we're going to the contest thing?" Broccoli asked.

"We are," Tabitha said as she joined them properly. She was dressed in her usual all-white outfit, though it seemed cleaner than it had been, and her hair was all wet.

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Had she showered? Oran couldn't remember the last time she'd cleaned herself. There was always so much Cleaning magic around that it felt like a waste of time.

"To be clear, this isn't a contest but the orientation to the contest. Goldenrod holds three contests across the year at varying levels of difficulty and with various rewards. These more or less coincide with the cricut, but opposite, which is normal for the contest circuit as far as I'm aware. Though they are even less popular in Kanto than they are here."

They started on their way out of the pokemon centre. "What do you mean they run opposite to the circuit?" Broccoli asked.

"The circuit is, obviously, the run for all eight badges that newer trainers take before the championship league at the end of the year," Tabitha said. "The contests can't compete with the league for viewership. Besides, contests have far more sponsors and rely more on viewership, so instead of ending the contest at the same time as the league, they run in the opposite direction. The biggest, most important contest occurs a month after the end of the league circuit. Then the mid-tier contests are next, followed by the amateur. Near the end of the year, right before the end of the circuit is when you have the absolute beginner-level contests."

Oran blinked and tried to keep all of that in her head, but she could feel the information leaking out of her ears already. It was too much. Though it was also pretty typical of Tabitha to go on a rant.

"So, today is orientation for the beginner level contest?" Broccoli asked.

"Amateur, actually," Jazz said. "The beginner level is... really beginner. We're talking little kids with their first ratata. Amateur is for... well, us, I guess. A bit more competition but still catering to the easier side of things."

"That sounds nice," Broccoli said. "So are we going to participate?"

Jazz hummed and rubbed at her chin. "I don't know. I might be a little tempted to give it a try. There's so little representation for Poison-types out there. But my pokemon still have a long way to go, and the kinds of moves and such that work in a contest are flashy, which would mean training in a whole different style."

"I also think that participating in a contest would be difficult for me," Tabitha said. "Also, with only two pokemon, I might be at a slight disadvantage. Psychic types generally express power in more subtle ways. I can imagine that working in some respects for a contest, but... as Jazz said, it's not a flashy or visually impressive style."

"I see," Broccoli said. "Both of your pokemon are Water-types though, that could work?"

"I suppose. But I've mostly been focusing their training on their psychic aspects with only some work going into their Water-type movesets."

"Hmm hmm." Broccoli squeezed Oran a little harder as she thought, which was nice, it was like extra hugs. "I think we could do a good show, depending on what it looks like. Choco has lots of nice ranged moves, and Oran has been getting really good with her Water-type moves as well!"

"Good control is paramount for this kind of thing," Tabitha agreed.

Oran just smugged smugly. It would be nice to win something like a contest, to prove that she was the bestest.

And it would make Choco look silly, possibly in front of Lolo. She grinned. That would be extra nice, like berry bits on ice cream.

...

She kind of wanted ice cream now.

But it was too late to ask, because they'd made it to the contest hall. It was a big blue building just a bit away from the huge radio tower. Big signs hung out front, and Oran had only just sounded out 'contest' in her head when they slipped into the building.

Inside were lots of people and even more pokemon, most of them milling around, but they were slowly being directed into another room with lots of seats and a big stage. Somehow, everything felt... unfinished here. Decorations were only partially up, and there were stacks of chairs to one side and pallets with things on the other.

Was this the right place?

A woman jumped onto the stage, accompanied by a big meowth. "Find some seats everyone! The orientation will be starting in ten!"

Well, she supposed it wasn't the wrong place then.

***