Mister Patel clapped his hands to get the attention of the kids who had been milling about after the latest battles drew to a halt. "Well, I hope that everyone got a feel for how things can go as a trainer trying to give commands, especially those of you who branched out into unfamiliar Pokémon." His eyes roamed over the kids, smiling encouragingly at them in turn. "It's a situation you'll find yourself in time and time again as you advance as trainers! Unless you're going to merely keep your first choice as your only Pokémon, learning to adapt to new Pokémon will be an important skill for you all to grow familiar with. And many of you showed improvement in coordination and understanding with your partners even during these few battles. Good job, everyone!"

The kids looked pleased with the day overall, even those who hadn't performed as well as their peers. Everyone had gotten at least one win under their belts, even the bug-catcher boy with the Caterpie. With their energy, even as they were listening to the elderly man speak, many were playing around with their Pokémon partners after a day of cooperation. "Now, after a brief talk with my co-judge here, I believe that I promised a prize for whoever had the most battle wins. As the only pair with only a single loss, Annabelle and Ditto have won our little contest. Catch!"

Without missing a beat, the old man plucked a Pokéball off his belt and lobbed it in a gentle underhand throw toward Annabelle, who frantically swatted at it with both hands, bobbling it in the air briefly before she secured it. With a wide grin, she held the Pokéball aloft over her head in a pose reminiscent of the videogame stereotype of acquiring a new item. "Yes! We won after all! Thank you, Ditto! You handled some of those fights practically by yourself, I couldn't have done it without you!"

"Now that you have a Pokéball, all you need to do is get a proper belt for it and you'll look like a real professional trainer in no time!" One of the other boys called out in an excited tone. I was glad to see that none of them seemed to be envious or throwing a tantrum that someone else won. Even Johnathan merely looked indifferent, rather than upset at being effectively taken out of the competition due to his tantrum and missing a round of battling as he swapped partners.

Annabelle laughed and spent a few moments trying different various poses, looking like she was going to throw out the Pokéball, before she eventually calmed down enough to merely tuck it into her bag and put it away. I was glad she was so excited about it, and it made it hard not to grin seeing how much energy she was displaying after finding out she won.

As much as it felt like the battles themselves were so quick, waiting for all of them to finish and allowing appropriate downtime for berries to aid recovery and for the Pokémon to regain their stamina between each bout meant that it was now well in the afternoon. The battling portion had drawn to a close, and the kids were winding down and getting ready to head out it seemed. Annabelle gave me a cheer and a wave on the way out, as many of the others did the same to their partners. Mister Patel and the students followed Bibarel back out front, and I couldn't help but notice Mable sigh after they were out of sight.

"Those kids are such a handful, even on normal visits. That was a lot of action for one day." Mable dropped her attention toward me, "Are you happy, you little instigator? You got to battle like you wanted!" I flashed a thumbs-up and grinned, and she merely shook her head at me. "It was a good idea, but I don't think I can handle doing that very often!" She turned away, and I was forcibly distracted by a firm 'whap' of a wing against the back of my head.

I turned around and glowered at Pidgey, who I knew had to be the culprit. "What was that for?"

"I'm jealous! I only got to fight a little bit, but you got to keep fighting all day!"

"Well that's not my fault! Besides, that kid was a jerk to you, did you really want to keep battling with him?"

"I suppose you're right. I didn't like that as much as when we do our sparring. I'm not sure I like battling like that. With a trainer, I mean. I like the idea of getting better, but it's not the same when I have someone trying to tell me what to do all the time!" Pidgey nestled down onto the ground and preened her feathers with a huff that came across as pouting. "I like being in charge of my own battles! Otherwise how am I gonna get better, just listening to someone else all the time?"

I sat down next to her and pondered the remark, uncertain what I should say. To an extent, I agreed with her. There were moments in battle where I hadn't been totally prepared and Annabelle's calling out to me had been useful, but would I need that assistance if I practiced more and had more battle experience? It was wanting to have your cake and eat it too, wanting the positive benefits associated with a trainer without having to deal with the inconvenient fact that I would be expected to generally do what I was told. "It's best when we're sparring, isn't it? We're in charge of when we want to battle, when we've had enough and want to stop, and we're improving together." I remarked, getting a nod from her.

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"Yeah. I don't know, I've been here a year longer than the other Pidgey, and I'm feeling a little stifled."

"Cooped up?" I added on with a grin, getting another wing-slap for my troubles.

"Don't start that, I'm being serious. Things are nice here on the pasture but it's so... so... boring! The most exciting thing was starting to spar with you, because almost no one around here is interested in battling each other or practicing! Today was the first time in ages any of the other Pokémon wanted to battle at all and I had to sit out part of it just because someone didn't want me to battle with them! It's frustrating!"

"Well, you know I'm gonna be willing to spar with you, right? We're friends! And I enjoy battling with you." I retorted, bumping up against her side in a gentle nudge.

She tipped her head aside and peeked at me, just barely, like she was watching me from the corner of her eye as she replied in a quiet voice, "Yeah, but you aren't gonna be around forever, are you?"

That stopped me dead. She had a point. I had initially stopped here because I felt like I didn't know what to do, and everything was so new and overwhelming. Latching onto Bibarel had seemed like a lifeline at the time. Now, though? Now I was starting to feel 'settled in', and to a degree that I wasn't sure I liked. I mean, I did like it here, but almost too much. I felt like I had gotten too comfortable, too settled into the daily routine of this sleepy little slice of relaxing paradise. I wanted to have an adventure, didn't I? But this place had been so... overwhelmingly welcoming and cozy that it was like a warm blanket I didn't want to crawl out of.

"You're right. Honestly, I hadn't realized it yet, but I think I'm feeling a little bit cooped up here, too. Not like I'm trapped, but like... it's so nice that it just pulls you in until you just don't want to leave." It almost felt like a betrayal, talking about a place like this in any sort of negative way, but it rang true to me. I had lost the excitement I had when I first got here, in exchange for a cozy sense of security. I had tossed away danger, for the most part, but thinking back on it... some of the times I had felt the most alive had been in the moments that things were going wrong. The frantic battle against an intruding Scyther was something I wasn't ever going to be able to forget. Or the near-kidnapping that happened afterward, though I could have lived without that part. Still, even that was something that made my pulse quicken, thinking back on.

"This place is amazing, don't get me wrong, but I think it's bad for me. And maybe it's bad for you too? Or maybe we're just bad for it? Don't get me wrong, I think it's amazing here, but... you know, neither of us is going to really reach a peak of what we might be able to achieve if we hang around here forever. You said that you were sticking around because you wanted to evolve before you went back out again, right?"

Pidgey nodded her head, staring at me more directly, with surprising intensity, and I continued on before I could lose my nerve again. "So, if you still want to do that, I can keep trying to battle with you and we can practice. You'll evolve at some point, but it'll probably be hard to evolve in a place like this, without any real challenge. It could take a lot longer. I still want to have an adventure, and I always thought that it'd be a bad idea to try and do it by myself. I figured I needed to find a trainer to be able to have my back, but after the trial run with the kids, I don't know how long it'd take me to find a trainer that I'd be happy with. Both of us are just sitting around and hesitating, waiting for something that we don't know how long it'll take to happen. So, well. Why don't we team up? We already get along, and we can go on an adventure together, and... just take a little risk on it?"

She stared at me for a moment, before swatting me with a wing again.

I ducked my head down, frowning at her. "Ow! What was that one for?"

Looking away, she grumbled a quiet response. "For being dumb. Like I would let you go out and do all the fun stuff without bringing me along. We should try and come up with a real plan and be a little bit prepared, first, but I think I've had enough of this place. I think I've been waiting around long enough, too. You're right. I see the same Pokémon every day, do the same stuff over and over again, not really getting anywhere. An adventure sounds... nice. A little scary. But an exciting kind of a little scary." She laughed, and I nodded.

"Yeah. You're right. And that's why I was hesitating about doing anything by myself. Still, it's not like we have to rush out into the darkness tonight or anything. Plus, I should say goodbye to Bibarel and Mable at the very least! But, I think we shouldn't wait too long, too. After all, I don't want to get caught up making excuses again."

"We can always come back if anything went wrong, right?"

"I mean, yeah. I guess we could." Hopefully it wouldn't come to that. It'd be pretty embarrassing to have this big declaration of adventure and making a show of leaving only to turn around and wind up right back on the doorstep here. That, and I didn't want to think about the various ways things could go so wrong we wouldn't be able to. I didn't want to lose my nerve all over again.

"Well, we can talk more about this later. This is a pretty big decision, and I want to at least make it with a clear head. After all that battling and this... kind of heavy conversation, I think I could use a nap." I remarked, getting an amused laugh in return.

"Ah yes, naps, truly the mark of an adventurous spirit."

"Shut up."

"Make me."

Yeah. With someone like this watching my back, what could go wrong? Forget later, I was having second thoughts right now.