Chapter Twenty-Three - Big and Fluffy and Huggable

Buneary... no, Choco—that was right, he had a whole name now, all to his own, one to strike fear in the hearts of his adversaries and let them know that he was to be taken seriously!—woke up with a huge yawn. He stretched his paws out in every direction until they trembled, then snuggled back into sleep.

He wasn't sure about this whole tent thing at first. It had taken Jazz and Broccoli and him a whole hour to set it up, and by the time they were done the sun was set and the wind was picking up, which made it much harder to hold the tent down.

In his opinion, the best rest someone could get out in the open fields and little patches of woodlands around here was in a nice, comfy hole.

A few minutes of digging was all it would take, and then they could snuggle up together in the earth with each other's body heat to stay warm.

Not that this was all that bad. He blinked awake as he heard Broccoli shifting. She was awake too, then? They'd set down a thick blanket onto the ground of the tent, and both girls had their own thinner blanket for warmth. At some point they'd obviously squished together because that was ideal for staying warm.

Choco, being the smart buneary he was, cuddled in the spot between the two, where it was maximally warm.

"Okay," Broccoli said tiredly. "Time to get up."

"Un," he disagreed.

The sun wasn't even up outside. He knew, because the tent's walls weren't all that thick, and they let in some of that early morning blue-ness.

But Broccoli didn't listen and sat up. She combed a hand through her hair, licked a palm and used that to arrange her ears a little better, then she shivered. A glowing energy surrounded her for a moment, and Choco felt much cleaner when it passed. "Jazz, time to wakey-wakey," Broccoli said.

Jazz mumbled something, then rolled over onto her back. "What time?"

"It's... morning time," Broccoli said. "Come on, we should do our morning stuff."

"Urgh," Jazz complained, but she did as Broccoli said.

Soon they were out of the tent. Jazz and Broccoli were back in their usual human clothes, and Choco was put in charge of folding the blankets while Jazz cooked and Broccoli started to undo the tent. It had to be folded in a specific way to fit into the little tube-bag it came in.

There had been instructions in a little booklet.

The wind had been strong last night, and those instructions were probably back in Violet City by now.

Broccoli did her best, with Choco helping where he could. By the time they managed to shove the tent back into its bag... with a lot of effort, Jazz had finished lighting a small fire and had opened a can of soup into a pot atop the flames. "We have veggie soup and bread that's not hard yet," Jazz said.

"That'll do," Broccoli said as she sat down on the ground. Choco was charged with moving around and picking up any trash they might have dropped. Broccoli said that the best way to camp was to not leave any signs that they'd camped at all.

He wasn't sure if that would work, what with the firepit they'd dug out and lined with rocks, or the holes for the tent pegs, but it wasn't going to be too obvious that they were here.

"What's the plan for today?" Broccoli asked. "Walk all day?"

"Hmm, no, that'd be nice for speed, but I plan on arriving to Azalea strong enough to take on their gym challenge in one go without pause. Which means we need to get stronger between now and then. That's... six, maybe seven more days of travelling to go up a whole badge level."

"Is that hard?" Broccoli asked.

"Each badge level should be about twice as hard as the previous," Jazz said. "But not quite. I think that there are... roadblocks? Like... gyms one to four are more about having a good team and a solid understanding of things, then five and up are about knowing how to battle well. So our second gym will probably be about... hmm, I don't know."

"We'll find out when we get there!" Broccoli said.

Choco nodded. "Bun bun!" he agreed.

"Well, whatever. We'll be fine, I think. Buneary, Choco, is a Normal-type, so no special interactions with the bugs there. I'll have more work ahead of me. Bellsprout's Grass-type moves will suffer, but Poison-type should be fine. Sage will be an ace in this one, I think. But, not at the level we're at!"

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"We need to get stronger, then?" Broccoli asked.

"Ideally, yeah," Jazz said. "Which is why I think we should do daily training. We can do a bit in the morning, then count our walking and travelling as exercise, then a second set in the evening. I think... move training in the morning, then theoretical stuff in the evening?"

"I can do that," Broccoli said. "Do we want to spar?"

"My team against yours?" Jazz asked.

Choco perked up. He hadn't fought Bellsprout in days, and now he had an answer to Sage's ghostly-ness. According to Broccoli, Cleaning-type was super strong against Ghost-type. "Bun?"

"No, I was thinking Choco and Bellsprout and Sage against me," Broccoli said. "It'll be a nice way to start the morning off!"

"Uh... you know what, sure," Jazz said. She grinned, and Choco had the impression that Broccoli might have made a mistake. "But we should also think about move practice. Bellsprout needs to improve with his whips, wraps, and I want him to learn how to use Acid at some point. Sage needs more practice with Poison-type energy if he's ever going to learn moves like Venoshock, and I desperately want him to learn Hex... somehow."

Broccoli nodded. "I think Choco should learn how to move faster. He seems to be a good physical fighter. Of course, he also needs to learn more Cleaning magic and eventually Fire magic too. For fireballs."

"I'm still positive that buneary can't learn that, but you do you," Jazz said.

Soon, soup was poured into little tin bowls. Choco got his own, much smaller bowl. He took a sip, then recoiled as it burned his lips.

Broccoli chuckled. "It's hot, silly. Blow across it first."

He looked at her as she blew across the top of her soup, sending the vapours rising from it curling away.

He tried the same, but mostly just ended up making pbtpbtpbt sounds over his soup.

A few minutes later they were fed and ready. Jazz released Bellsprout and Sage, and the two wandered about the camp for a bit before standing at attention. It was time, it seemed, to get on with the fighting.

"Maybe we'll just do this every other day," Broccoli said with a smile as she bounced on the spot and then stretched. "It'll be good training for everyone, I think!"

"Uh-huh," Jazz said. She went to stand behind her pokemon, and after a pause, Choco joined Bellsprout and Sage. This felt a little unfair, three of them against one human. What if he hurt Broccoli? Humans were all squishy and weak an—

Broccoli punched her arms to the side, and a big gust of glowing energy made the grass bend away from her, then smiled as a dozen small balls of fire hissed into being all around her. "Ready!" she said.

"Uh," Jazz said. "You know that Bellsprout is weak to fire, right?"

"Bell! Bellsprouuut!" This is not wiggly!

"And Sage is scared of your.... Cleaning magic stuff."

"Gas!"

Broccoli blinked. "I thought that I might use everyone's weakness against them. To make them stronger?"

"That doesn't seem fair, what's Choco's weakness, then?" Jazz asked.

Broccoli sniffed. "He's ticklish. I know exactly where to poke!" She made little grabby gestures with her hands and Choco gasped. No! That was... that was a betrayal!

"How about we just do normal move training instead?" Jazz asked. "We're a few hours from the nearest pokemon centre, and I don't wanna risk it."

"Oh, okay," Broccoli said. "Well, that's okay too!"

What followed was an hour and a bit of practice. Broccoli had Choco sit on her lap and make little balls of Cleaning magic that he sent out as quickly as he could until he felt too tired to continue. Then they did some very light 'sparring' which involved him jumping up and tapping Broccoli's palm with a kick, paw-strike, or ear-smack while Broccoli ducked and weaved.

The sun was up, and morning was in full swing when they decided to take off. Broccoli let him ride on her head for now, but that soon ended when they discovered a field surrounded by a wooden fence.

Within was a flock of white puffy pokemon with conical blue faces. "Oh my gosh!" Broccoli gasp. "Jazz! What are those?"

"Mareep?" Jazz asked as she looked at the pokemon in the field. "They're pretty common. People raise them for their wool."

"Jazz... I don't think you understand this, but I need to hug one of those if it's the last thing I do."

***