A small ray of sunshine shot into Quinn’s bloodshot eye as the sunrise peeked over the apartments across the street from the Pokemon center. He winced and adjusted his body in a plastic chair to avoid the annoyance. The chair was next to a toddler-sized bed that Phanpy rested in. Phanpy’s mini-trumpet snoring was not present as the elephant slept, breathing completely out of his mouth. Heavy bandages were not only used for the exterior of the wound but also clogged Phanpy’s trunk.
The doctor had explained that the blade had cut deep enough that it penetrated the nasal canal and added more complications to the surgery than expected. The doctor had praised Quinn for the use of the tourniquet as that was the only reason he had enough time to go in and stitch the entire wound. The praise bounced off Quinn, as all he could think about was how he hadn’t had a Pokeball to protect Phanpy and how much time he wasted lost on the streets of Havenwood.
The conversation with the doctor was the only event Quinn could remember somewhat clearly. The rest of the night was a blur of him getting a nurse to take Phanpy to an operating room and denying treatment for himself. The staff only let him stay in the center after he washed off the blood and vomit in a restroom sink. His pants still smelled and were likely permanently stained, but a nice lady gave him a promotional t-shirt with Nurse Joy and Chansey on it so he didn’t have to look like a complete caveman. The rest of the night was spent waiting by Phanpy’s side post-surgery. Quinn had to fight his body to stay awake, and it was a battle he won as fears of Phanpy choking plagued his mind. When he was not checking Phanpy’s airways, he debated with himself on what to do with the gym.
On one hand, he had already taken his leap of faith and committed to fixing up the gym, leaving his life in Ashford behind. The idea of potentially becoming a gym leader had made Quinn excited about the future for the first time since his mom passed. Coming up with 10,000 dollars was daunting, but not impossible if he could get the gym fixed up quickly enough. On the other hand, Phanpy almost died.
Aito’s story filled in too many gaps in the mystery that was how Paul ran the gym for it not to be true. Quinn didn’t know if he could handle someone like Aito looking over his shoulder as he tried to restore the Royal Gym. Even if Quinn got the money, fixed the gym, made it profitable, and became a gym leader, what would keep Raze from having a bad day and slicing their throats next time?
“Quinn, how is Phanpy holding up?”
Quinn looked away from Phanpy to see what he guessed was the world’s most jacked nurse walking into the room with a similarly muscular Hawlucha. The black man was a little shorter than him and wore green scrubs that didn’t do a good job of hiding the muscles under them. His twist curls and clean fade made Quinn doubt that he was in the Pokemon center and not an extra in some daytime medical drama.
“Umm… I think he’s okay,” Quinn took a second to answer the question as he wasn’t sure how the man knew his name.
“It’s Tyler. You knew it when you ran into the lobby.” Tyler went to the medical monitor next to Phanpy’s bed and started pushing buttons while Hawlucha checked Phanpy’s IV.
“Oh, sorry. It’s kind of been a blur.” Quinn rubbed his eyes.
“No kidding. This is the second time we’ve had this conversation. At least you didn’t call me Nurse Joy again,” Tyler flatly responded.
Quinn stifled a laugh at the polar opposite comparison his past self had come up with and tried to change the subject. “How does it look for Phanpy?”
“Minus the gnarly scar, he’ll pull through fine,” Tyler turned to look Quinn dead in the eyes. “But that doesn’t mean he wasn’t in major trouble. The amount of blood that he lost would have taken down a Tauros. You can’t just throw Phanpy into battles he isn’t ready for.” Hawlucha added gravity to the scolding with a glare of his own.
Quinn hung his head in shame as Tyler reminded him that he had lied to the doctor about what happened. “That wasn’t… supposed to happen.”
“What was supposed to happen?” Tyler raised his voice. “I see plenty of Pokemon come through here and Phanpy looks more ready to sit on some grandma’s lap than get on a battlefield. What? Did some guy clean your clock and then you made Phanpy try to avenge you or some crap?”
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Quinn got angry at the assertion that he would ever make Phanpy do anything. “Back off, I would never put Phanpy in danger!”
“Then what actually happened? Because this is way too clean of a cut to be from a Pokemon that Phanpy would have a chance against.” Tyler folded his arms.
Quinn didn’t want to deal with this until his head was out of its fog, but Tyler looked ready to call Pokemon Protective Services. “It wasn’t a Pokemon. It was a guy with a knife.”
At this, Hawlucha looked up at Tyler and let out three short chirps. Tyler glanced down at Hawlucha and then back at Quinn. “What was the guy’s name?”
“Doesn’t matter. It won’t happen again.”
“It does matter in Havenwood. You might not have a choice in it happening again. Who was it?”
“His name is Raze.”
Tyler cursed and paced around the room as Hawlucha squawked at the revelation. Quinn didn’t respond but started feeling more worried about Raze and Aito than he already was.
“Okay, I don’t know how much you know, but if you got on the wrong side of Raze then you need to skip town. Don’t go to the police, they’ll just let him know you snitched.”
Quinn gave out a defeated exhale at the news — one of his only options for getting help with Aito and Raze was already in their own pockets. “It was bad, but Aito called out Raze right away and made him give me his belt for the tourniquet.” Quinn tried to convince himself that his new life in Havenwood hadn’t completely gone up in flames.
Tyler’s and Hawlucha’s eyes got really wide. “Aito?”
Quinn nodded and Tyler resumed his earlier pacing with even more explicit vocabulary.
“Quinn, what do you know about Aito?”
“From your reaction and what he said last night, I’m pretty confident that Aito runs some gang.” Quinn tried to summarize without alluding to the deal he had with Aito.
“Not some gang. The gang — Saber. Saber has its hands in everything — business, politics, law enforcement… nothing happens in Havenwood without Aito’s blessing. He may rule from the shadows, but he still rules.” Tyler’s imposing stature was betrayed by his nervously tapping foot. “Two months ago, some other gang tried to move into West Havenwood and it was a bloodbath. We had 12 guys brought in that day and only two of them survived. The cops never even showed up to question the survivors. Word is that Raze led the slaughter and Aito gave him the west as a reward.”
Quinn’s hands had clammed up while listening. The thought of what Raze could do scared Quinn into telling Tyler what happened in the gym the night before. During Quinn’s retelling, Hawlucha shut the door.
Tyler digested the story, sat down next to Quinn, and took several seconds before responding. “That’s not good, but it isn’t as bad as I thought when you first said Raze attacked Phanpy. While Raze does rule through blood and fear, Aito doesn’t. If Aito is giving you a chance to come up with the money, then Raze won’t mess with that. You should consider skipping town still, but I don’t think you or Phanpy are in immediate danger.”
Tyler’s words logically made Quinn feel better, but his accelerated heart rate didn’t slow down. “How was I so naive? I knew Havenwood was more dangerous than Ashford, but I should’ve done more research. Instead, I’m now Saber’s chump.”
“I wish I didn’t know so much, but when enough of your boys join up with Saber, you hear a lot.” Tyler looked at the ground. Hawlucha put his hand on his knee in support. Quinn didn’t know how to respond so he remained silent.
“I thought you were a dirtball this whole night. I’m glad I was wrong. Havenwood isn’t for everyone. It might not seem like it, but Phanpy is going to be fine. He’ll need to rest up in the coming week, but Pokemon bounce back from much worse.” Tyler stood up from his chair and moved to the door. “I know how expensive center visits can be, so let me give you some advice. In 40 minutes, you and Phanpy will have been here for six hours. Check out before then or they’re going to slap you with a fee for an entire day’s stay. Also, if you can avoid it, don’t use their payment plan. It’ll end up costing double.”
“Okay. I’m going to need to save all the money I can.”
“Yeah, I didn’t need to hear about Aito to figure that out. Nobody comes into a Pokemon center looking like you and denies all medical attention.”
Quinn rubbed the back of his head. “I’ve been through worse.”
Tyler laughed, “Doubt that.” Hawlucha then pulled out a pamphlet from behind him and handed it to Quinn while putting a single talon up to his beak in a shushing manner, and walked out the door with Tyler.
Quinn smiled at the pamphlet which read, “Concussions: How to Take Them Head On.”