In the games, the Center is a pretty much instantaneous fix for whatever damage or status effects that your Pokemon has taken. This makes sense, given it’s a game mechanic and probably the one that the entire game is based around, but that rather changes when the Centers are real. Instead of being an instant fix, it’s more like accelerated healing.
As far as I could tell, leafing through the pamphlets in the waiting room that explained more or less the process of healing a Pokemon, it was a function of Pokeball technology. While the Pokemon was in an energy state, the Pokeball itself was connected to machinery that could influence them inside the ball and gradually revert damage of all kinds. This could, apparently, flush all sorts of toxins and ill effects from the body of the Pokemon themselves, while healing any wounds that they’d acquired in the process.
I traced my finger down the page, Blake grooming Mika’s fur next to me. The bolthund looked like she was experiencing pure euphoria, pressing into the brush with eyes closed. It was actually rather adorable, except for the sparks of static electricity that occasionally danced across her fur, the brush interacting with her internal charge. Blake, however, seemed to be well used to it, and seemed to know exactly when to pull his hands away to avoid a nasty shock. If anything, it seemed almost to be a game between the two of them, a race between Blake’s reactions and the static.
We’d been in the waiting room for maybe an hour or two. Drake had been somewhere in the back the entire time, and I’d been far too anxious to actually go up and ask about him. I figured that, given how worn down he’d been, it would take real time to get him back into shape. At this point, however, I was stuck between the usual refractory time that I figured exhaustion and wounds to take, and the instant healing of the games. Which was why I’d started picking up the informational pamphlets.
“Does it normally take this long?” I finally asked.
Blake looked at me, then jumped as he didn’t pull his hands away and Mika shocked him. He frowned at her mischievous expression, poking her in the nose before turning his attention back to me.
“About this, yeah. Extreme fatigue takes fifteen, thirty minutes. A flesh wound, maybe an hour. A broken bone is an overnight thing.”
Which was an incredible amount of recovery, given that a broken bone could lay you up for a month or more back home. Still, I found that I really disliked being apart from Drake for any extended period of time, and I wasn’t particularly having fun sitting here in this hospital lobby waiting for him. I’d never particularly disliked hospitals, precisely, but sitting here and waiting for somebody felt like tempting the universe to throw medical complications at me for the sake of some metaphysical plot. Which really was paranoid nonsense of the highest order, but given that this was Pokemon, I didn’t think that being paranoid about potential plot beats was too far out of line. If this was an episode, I would wager money that Team Rocket would be bumbling around trying to steal Pokemon in the background, or something to that effect.
I finally put the pamphlet down with a sigh. As interesting as it was to read about medical technology here and its frankly wonderful advantages, I just couldn’t focus on the words. The letters seemed to float off the page, and I realized that I’d read the same paragraph about three different times without actually absorbing its content.
The lobby had calmed down and somewhat emptied itself out since I’d arrived. If I had to guess, then I must have arrived during some kind of rush hour, most likely caused by a large number of trainers fighting various Gym trainers to various degrees of success. It was late enough in the day now that the number of Gym battles, won and lost, had tapered off to nearly nothing, leaving the lobby much quieter than the chaos that I’d arrived to. I eyed the nurse at the front desk, attempting to gauge whether they were unoccupied enough for me to justify approaching them and taking up some time asking after Drake.
“You know, I don’t think you were this nervous in the lead up to the Gym battle.” Blake commented idly, Mika settling at his feet as he leaned forwards, elbows on his knees.
“Being fair, I thought it would just be a low-stakes fight against a Gym trainer.” I muttered back.
“And how wrong we both were.” Blake said in return. “Still, the observation holds.”
I grimaced.
“I don’t deal very well with just sitting here and doing nothing. If I had something to do, that would be quite different, but as it is? All I’ve got is sitting here and dwelling on the fact that Drake isn’t.”
I couldn’t help but toss a couple of stereotypical tropes around my head. If this were a medical drama, this would be the time when a distressed doctor informed me of a complication or an unforeseen injury, or something. As ridiculous as it was to try and bend a generalized awareness of the tropes of medical dramas to real life, anxiety wasn’t generally known as the most logical of things.
I twitched as Mika set her head on my knee, blinking down at her in surprise. I glanced over at Blake, who was wearing a small smile on his face and pointedly looking straight forwards. I let out a breath, then set my hand on the Electric type’s head and started petting. As ever, it was difficult to overstate the positive effects of contact with an animal… or a Pokemon, in this case. I let out a long breath as I ran my fingers through Mika’s fur, stroking her ears and petting her head.
I was expecting more electrical shocks, at least static from the action, but there wasn’t much forthcoming. I got a shock or two, but it wasn’t any more significant than I would get just from scuffing my socks on carpet. To my surprise, I found Mika’s fur to be somewhat thicker and fluffier than it looked, and less the velvet-like fuzz that bolthund looked to have in the games. It was soft and well brushed, and I realized that Blake must put quite a bit of effort into Mika’s care and grooming. I found a sort of appreciation for that, as I thought Mika very much deserved it.
“You would not believe how hard it was to get her to stop leaping into people’s laps after she evolved.” Blake commented. Mika poked out her tongue and gave him the stink eye, which he returned with raised eyebrows and not a hint of shame. “Yes, I’m talking about you. You knew very well you weren’t a little yamper anymore, but you were just as insistent about getting in people’s laps as you were before your evolution.” He gave me a long-suffering look. “Maybe it was accidental at the beginning, but I know that it was just to mess with me later on.”
Mika rolled her eyes in response and huffed through her nose, clearly entirely dismissive of the patently untrue accusations being leveled against her. She then unabashedly shoved her head back under my hands, clearly searching for more petting. I let out a small chuckle and went back to giving her attention.
“Feeling better?”
I nodded. “Yeah.” I stroked Mika’s ear. “I don’t suppose that you had a stint as a therapy Pokemon, did you?”
She huffed in amusement, and Blake smiled.
“Unless she’s been sneaking away from me and therapy-ing people when my back is turned, no- she’s just like this.”
I let out a breath, ruffling Mika’s headfur as the dog Pokemon eyed me, probably trying to figure out if she could make a move to lie on my legs despite Blake being right there. Settling in to wait without the interference of anxiety was a lot easier, though it didn’t particularly make me less impatient. Thinking about it, I realized that I was somewhat eager to get on the road, though I wasn’t quite sure why.
Was I eager to reach Sandgem? I supposed. Rowan wouldn’t be able to do anything about my nonexistent amnesia, but I wasn’t going there for that. Certainly, that was the excuse, but I was thinking about the fact that he was the Professor of the region- from my research, that was a relatively high position. Specifically, each region had a Pokemon Professor, who oversaw research and development in the region and was the foremost expert in Pokemon in a general sort of sense. Researchers were subordinate to them, in a technical sense, and approval for funding for research projects and compensation for Pokemon trainers assisting with field research flowed through them.
Foremost expert in Pokemon. The Professors practically hand-selected the protagonists of the various games, excluding the few that they didn’t, of course. Still… if I was determined to actually become a Pokemon trainer of note, training under the direction of a Professor seemed to me an excellent way to start. With Rowan’s assistance, provided he was willing to give it, I had little doubt that I could push harder and farther than I would be able to on my own. The contingencies and various plans that Drake and I had come up with, with Blake’s help of course, were stopgaps. I’d based a lot of my planning on guesswork, Blake’s advice, and what I’d observed of various battles in the training arenas.
It wouldn’t be enough to just guess and hope. If I wanted to actually reach the halls of power, the peaks that towered far above me, I needed more than assumptions and half-remembered things from the games and anime. I owed it to Drake to try for the best that I could, if I was actually dedicated to this path. And what was the Pokemon Professor if not the best person in the region for exactly this?
I was shaken from my thoughts as Mika licked my hand. I twitched, then looked up to see one of the nurses approaching us, clipboard in one hand and Pokeball in the other. I felt my stomach clench, then breathed in and out, calming myself. I doubted that anything was seriously wrong, and I didn’t particularly care what my anxiety was trying to whisper to me.
“Hi. Cam, right? No last name?” The nurse said when he reached us, glancing down at the clipboard for confirmation and frowning at it. Probably something that I should get fixed at some juncture.
“Yeah, that’s me. Is that-?”
I pointed at the Pokeball in his hand, and he nodded, holding it out. I pushed down my initial urge to snatch it out of his hand, instead carefully taking it from him and palming the sphere of metal. It was warm against my fingers, and I held it close.
“We put him through a full battery of tests and a recovery procedure. We didn’t note any major injuries, though there were some minor oddities…” He cleared his throat. “I’m afraid that, outside of a basic series of tests from a Center in Vinewood, we don’t have any medical records for him.”
I blinked and frowned, looking up at him. “Is that normal?”
He shook his head. “Usually, we’d have the data from a capture, and the initial checkup that would happen before the official registration of a Pokemon to someone’s team. How did you run across him? Did you-?” I shook my head.
“No, he was in Vinewood’s Center when I met him. He already had a Pokeball- I was told that he’d been abandoned there a month prior by the nurse in charge, Alice.” I glanced at Drake’s ball, my fingers tight around it, then looked back up at the nurse in concern. “Is there an issue with that?”
“Well… not as such?” He rubbed the back of his neck with his free hand. “This happens sometimes when someone comes in with a foreign Pokemon, from somewhere like Alola, where the traditions are different and people don’t usually do the same checkup process. The records might also have been lost or deleted, but I’m not sure about that. There are poochyena in the region- somewhat rare, but they’re here. I can’t tell his region of origin, however, not without the records to indicate it, and the Pokeball didn’t record any.”
I stroked my thumb over the lid of Drake’s Pokeball. I’d assumed that Drake had come from the Eastern side of the region, given that there were supposedly a few packs of poochyena and mightyena there. But if there was no recorded origin for him… what did that mean? Did that mean that there wasn’t a capture record? I didn’t even have enough information to guess, and I doubted that Drake could tell me even if he wanted to, or knew. For all I knew…
“If he was an egg that was being cared for by a trainer…” I mused. The nurse hummed.
“Maybe. It’s not uncommon that Pokemon raised from an egg by a trainer don’t have proper documentation because of the circumstances of them joining the trainer’s team.” He shrugged. “Still. I can see the signs of longer term training than what you could’ve given him, so surely he must’ve seen the inside of a Pokecenter at some point. I can’t guess when that would’ve been, with no records to indicate it, but unless the previous trainer was some rich kid with their own recovery machines…”
I paused, thinking about it. Some entitled rich kid, maybe with their own private medical team and trainers, picks up a Pokemon generally associated with punks as a way of rebelling against their parents? I suppose that it could work, as a theory, but it… just didn’t fit. Drake had been deeply attached to his previous trainer, enough to sit in a window for a month waiting for them to come back. Clearly there was something there, I just didn’t know what it was and couldn’t just ask Drake about it.
“I guess there’s not really a point to speculating.” I concluded, reluctantly, then nodded to the nurse. “Thank you.”
“No problem. Have a good day.” He did a very shallow bow, then briskly turned and walked back towards the counter, where a somewhat disheveled looking Chancey was attempting to handle a trainer with a team of excited dog Pokemon.
The moment he was gone, I hit the Pokeball’s button. The ball popped, a red jet of energy splashing against the tiled Pokecenter floor. Drake coalesced out of the energy, standing and shaking his fur out, and I felt relief wash through me. It wasn’t as if I’d expected anything to happen to him, per say, it was just… I suppose that I wasn’t precisely fond of being separated from him. Given the relieved look he gave me the moment that he realized I was there, I thought the feeling was mutual.
“Hey. Yeah, I’m happy to see you, too.” I whispered, Drake stepping up to my legs and rubbing against my shins. I leaned forwards, stroking his head, and he nosed against my hand and gave a pointed look in the direction of the exit. I let out a little huff of laughter. “Yeah, yeah, I get it- I’m not any more eager to stick around than you are.”
I pushed myself to my feet, Mika doing a quick examination of Drake that he tolerated, and Blake followed suit. I saw his hands gently touch each of his Pokeballs, and I wondered if that was a habit or something more practical. Given that he appeared to be paying no mind to it, I figured that it was the former, rather than the latter. Surprisingly enough, with Drake, I understood the sentiment, though my instinct was more wanting to pet him. Making sure that he was there, more than anything, and drawing comfort from the fact that he was.
Drake stuck by me as we moved towards the exit, keeping a somewhat wary eye on anybody that got too close. Made me wonder if those trainers had made him a bit paranoid about strangers, really. Mika, on the other hand, had a consistent cycle: she’d walk away because something interesting attracted her attention, or to look somewhere that she couldn’t see, then would cycle back to Blake’s side before being distracted again. It was faintly amusing to me that Drake, being presumably younger, definitely smaller, and a whole evolution less than the Electric type was the more mature of the two. She even tried to convince Drake to investigate some things with her, though the hyena never got very far before casting a concerned eye back in my direction and coming back.
Honestly, I felt touched by the concern. It was honestly nice to have a reminder that he cared, just soothing to see it. I hummed to myself, wondering at the fact that my hackles had been raised that much from not that long apart from him. Seemed like I was having quite the overstated reaction to something so small, and I felt a tick of concern at the back of my mind at that. Were we becoming codependent?
I bit my lip and looked down at Drake, who returned my gaze with a curious one. Was that something that we needed to talk about? Was it something we needed to address? Probably. I didn’t imagine that it was healthy for either of us to have such a strong reaction to being apart, even for such a short time. Did Pokemon psychologists exist? … would I really be willing to talk to them, even if I was right?
Drake nudged my leg, curiosity turning to concern at the expression of contemplation on my face. I turned it over in my head for a second, then gripped my tongue between my teeth, pushing it from my mind.
“Don’t worry about it right now,” I said to him about the hustle of the Center lobby. “Just something I’m thinking about. Poke me about it later, okay?”
He looked somewhat reluctant to let the topic drop just like that, but my offer to talk about it later seemed to mollify him. He nodded, though he gave me a pointed look that promised we’d be discussing this again later.
“What are you, my mom?” I groused at him playfully. He simply huffed dramatically, raising his nose in the air. I couldn’t help but smile at the display, which I supposed was the point.
“That was adorable.” I twitched and half-turned in surprise, causing Blake to let out a laugh. “Oh, come on, that was a compliment!”
Drake and I exchanged a look of suffering.
“I’m reconsidering letting you come along.”
“Oh, come off it, I was only joking!”
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Last minute prep turned out to be about as hectic as trying to prep for camping back home. Though instead of the rush to ensure that I had everything and that nothing that I needed would be left out of the car, this time I was packing with very limited space and weight in mind. Without a vehicle to carry it all, anything I brought with me would have to be carried by Drake or myself.
I found out from Blake that it wasn’t typical for most trainers to keep their Pokemon out of their balls for long, let alone semi-permanently. Certainly explained why the harnesses had been so cheap from the surplus, as most trainers wouldn’t have a use for them. Given our particular situation, however, this gave me… somewhat more carrying capacity than your average trainer that didn’t have the high-tier spatial compression bags that wealthier or sponsored trainers had. Drake was, after all, still relatively small, even if he had the strength to carry quite a bit.
I hummed something to myself as I tightened the straps, checking to make sure that a number of bags were securely fastened where they couldn’t fall off. I’d considered a replacement for my own pack, and finally admitted to myself that I just didn’t have the budget to do so. If I was going to replace the still slightly berry stained hiking backpack, then it was going to be an upgrade in all accounts. Switching it out for something that was basically the same in terms of carrying capacity except without the stains seemed like something of a waste. More money to spend on more important things, I supposed.
I patted Drake’s side, and the little hyena stretched and shifted, briefly shaking himself while I watched closely. Satisfied that the bags wouldn’t be going anywhere and that the harness was properly secured, I gave him a nod, which he acknowledged with a flick of his ear.
With that done, I did my customary final sweep of the room that I’d gotten above the Pokecenter. Under the beds, the sheets, the pillows, check the drawers… I’d never left something behind in a hotel room before, and I wasn’t looking to start. I confirmed that I’d left nothing behind or dropped any objects behind anything in the small single bed room, I hiked the pack up and paused, staring at the TV stand.
Generally, this was the part of the stay where you left a tip for the custodians. Generally considered good form to do so back home, but was that even a practice here? It wasn’t like a restaurant, where I could just watch the other patrons to see what was generally accepted procedure. Honestly, coming to think of it, I wasn’t sure if there was any kind of tipping culture in this respect in the slightest. Or, at least, it might not be anything like what I was familiar with.
Pokecenters were not for profit organizations. Research dictated that they got the vast majority of their funding from the League, which, in turn, drew huge amounts of revenue from local governments, trainer licensing, event ticket prices, even merchandising. Thus, the employees at a Center were a mix of volunteers and paid professionals, depending on the department. Thus… tipping? Not so sure.
Your average trainer had to book a room at a Center, much like any temporary accommodation, but only active trainers could. This was why there were near as many elderly trainers as middle aged; much cheaper way to travel. As an affiliate, I received an additional percent off the top of the price of the room, but I still had to pay for it. And having rooms such as these required the staff to maintain them, so at minimum custodians, maids. But if the Centers were not for profit, and many of the workers were volunteers of some degree, then what-?
I was interrupted in the middle of my considerations by a cold nose to my ankle. I looked down to see Drake giving me a curious and somewhat impatient look, wondering why we weren’t moving on already. I smiled apologetically, leaning down more to his level.
“Hey. Sorry. Just trying to figure out something about paying for the room. They don’t exactly have signs laying this stuff out, y’know?” I lowered my voice to a mutter, more to myself than to him. “Would be a lot simpler if they did.”
Drake’s curiosity morphed into exasperation. Before I could ask, he huffed, stepping to my side and slapping his paw against the side of my leg, right where my Pokenav was. I gave him a bewildered look for a moment, then blinked and grimaced, my hand going over my eyes.
“Yeah, I getcha. Thanks, I guess I was being stupid.”
Drake huffed, sitting down and watching me. I stood up, slipping the phone out of my pocket and opening it up. The exact search that I’d wanted to make was the third option that popped up, and the first link said plenty. Tipping was definitely a thing that was done in hotels, and specifically a thing in hotels here in Sinnoh, but not so much in Centers. Custodial staff in Centers were composed of volunteers and Pokemon, and thus… Well, that answered my question well enough. I gave Drake a nod, the Dark type nodding back and moving towards the door, where he eyed the handle with something close to hatred.
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“Can’t reach it?” Drake growled. “Well, don’t worry about it, it’ll happen sooner or later. Mightyena are, what-” I held a hand out at my waist. “Yay? You’ll be plenty tall, then.”
From the way he sighed, I got the idea that he wished it was sooner rather than later, but he accepted what I said. We stepped out into the corridor, and I glanced back through the door one last time, feeling somewhat awkward about not leaving money behind. Just one of those things you get used to, right? Not… that I really had any physical cash, anyway.
Checking out was done at a smaller desk tucked into a back corner of the Center, dedicated to managing the lodging portions of the facility. They didn’t ask for the cheap little RFID card they’d handed me as a room key, so I figured that it was much like back home, where they were individually not worth enough to bother asking for back. Turning the plastic card over in my fingers as I walked towards the exit, I noted that it specifically stated the location of the Center. I hummed as I slipped it into one of the pockets of my badge and ID case, before putting it back into my bag. I’d had quite a collection of these hotel room key cards back home… maybe this was the beginning of a new one?
“Alright,” I said to Drake, above the noise of the street we found ourselves on, just outside the Pokecenter. “How about we find the hottest meal any place in this city serves, huh?”
In an instant, Drake’s expression changed from impatient to ecstatic. He practically danced a circle around me, probably the least reserved I’d ever seen him be, before finally ending up in front of me. His tail was a blur behind him, and he looked up at me with wide, excited eyes.
“Well, I did promise, didn’t I? And you…” I leaned down and ruffled his ears. “You did amazing. So, let’s go.”
Drake out and out barked, prompting a grin from me. With that, we set off into the streets of Hearthome, looking for the highest rated spicy dish we could find.
----------------------------------------
We crossed much of the town, and I found myself rather grateful for our little self-assigned quest, as it let us explore the nooks and crannies really looking for a place that could sate our interests. I forewent the map function on my Nav, instead navigating by a combination of guesswork and following Drake’s nose. It led us from place to place, examining menus and asking questions, slowly narrowing it down further and further.
Most places didn’t sell dishes with a rating of more than two or three of what I found out to be spelon berries. Dishes hotter than that were usually reserved for either the rare Pokemon that could stand the straight-up heat, or Fire types. Thus, hyper spicy things were the speciality of just a few smaller restaurants that inhabited some of the cracks and crags of the city. We tracked rumours and word of mouth, directed by things that this or that person had heard.
Supposedly, there was a very specific restaurant that wasn’t included in maps and sites like that. The only ways to get in were by invitation, by someone vouching for you, or by… Well, there were a lot of rumours about it. An air of mystery surrounded the place; incredibly strong trainers, rare Fire types to those that proved themselves, or just a very exclusive restaurant. Apparently, the place had been in the same family potentially for centuries. Some said that they’d owned the place near back to when Hearthome was just a village of a few traditional Sinnohan houses, a few centuries back.
“So, what, they’re all… Gym leaders, or…?” I trailed off.
The trainer across the counter I was leaning against shook her head, green cap shading her eyes.
“No- at least, not most of them. They've just had Fire-types as long as anybody can remember, think there’s even something about them in the Hearthome history museum, if you’re interested in that sort of thing. Even had a few Fire Masters in their time.”
I hummed in thought, looking over to where Drake and her leafeon were having a quick mock battle, my little hyena rapidly dodging a series of grass blades. He broke through the line of them, closing to close quarters, then stopping before seeming to explain something to the dejected Grass type.
“Wouldn’t expect a Grass-type specialist to know where a Fire-type hangout is.”
She snorted. “Eh, maybe. Most wouldn’t tangle with specialists that have Pokemon their specialization is weak against. Me? I think the best way to deal with a weakness is to face it, head on.” She offered me a hand and a grin. “Mirra.” I took it, returning a smile of my own.
“Cam.” I released it as Drake and his opponent squared off again for another round. “Maybe you’d be willing to lead the two of us there?”
“Hrm.” Mirra scratched the back of her neck, contemplated how much was left of her drink, then glanced at our Pokemon. She shrugged. “Hell, might as well. You’re the first trainer today- guy or girl- that’s stepped up not looking for a battle, a date, or the former with the latter on the line. Just about done here, anyway.”
She glanced across the dirt lot in front of the small bar, and I followed her gaze to where an incredibly angry-looking grovyle was beating the hell out of a growlithe. The poor fire puppy was panicking, trying to make distance wherever they could and throw fire every time they had the chance, and it was patently obvious from here it wasn’t working. I breathed out as I watched the grovyle’s frankly beautiful footwork, practically dancing around, under, or over every time even a lick of fire came their way.
“Your ace?” I asked, not bothering to hide my reaction.
“Mmyeah. Got him from Birch, in Hoenn, ‘bout a year ago or so. Tore our way through much of the Leaders ‘till we hit Flannery, stopped us like a brick wall. Figured that we should go abroad, figure out what we were doing wrong, then come back and finish.”
“Hoenn, huh? I should’ve guessed from the starter. Steven Stone is the champion, there, right?”
She bobbed her head. “Yeah. Barely anybody beats the guy, but me? I want to be one of ‘em.”
I breathed out, thinking about Steven’s lineup. It was a pretty significant fight in the games, but here, I’d have no doubt that he could roll me if I had thirty of Drake without getting out of bed. It was weird to think that he was probably younger than me, given that I’d played Emerald back when Steven had been older in the game than I was. But, I suppose that could be applied to Ash as well, if he was here in the region. I winced at that thought, glancing around the open area, then relaxed as a blue-vested trainer failed to appear. Dangerous thoughts, those.
Mirra pushed herself to her feet, draining the last of her beer, then slammed the glass down on the counter and waved to the grovyle and leafeon. The former tsk’d, releasing his poor prey from a latticework of vines, while the leafeon bowed their head to Drake and trotted over. She recalled her leafeon, the grovyle falling into step with her as she walked towards the lot’s street exit. Drake, for his part, matched his steps to mine.
“What do you think of her Pokemon?” I asked him. He nodded, something like respect in his eyes. “I agree. They’re experienced, way more than we are, though I’d guess… less than Blake? Figure about five or so badges, real career trainer. The leafeon was probably her newest team member.”
Drake tilted his head back in thought, eyes tracing over the three Pokeballs at her waist, before he nodded in agreement. I hadn’t seen her third Pokemon, but I had to admit that I was curious. What drives someone to add the team members they do? What’s the logic? I’d always gone for a generalist team that covered as many types as possible, but now I found myself with Dark and nothing else. The Internet, or the Pokeworld’s version of it, could only answer so many questions. If I wanted to figure out what I was doing, I needed to talk to more people like her, people who knew what they were about and had some amount of experience. And, hey, here I am, being led to a trainer family’s place of business by somebody with experience.
We left the little battlebar I’d found her in behind, exiting into a relatively thin side street. Unlike the main roads of concrete, this was composed primarily of layered brick, giving it an ancient feeling. Given the local architecture, and the fact that the place we just left claimed to have been a battle bar for centuries at minimum, I had guessed that Drake and I had found our way to the older sections of the city. The narrowness of the street hinted at a time when the best, if not the only, way to get around was on Pokemon back- perhaps a cart at most. Architecture mixed with attempts at modernization, and I could really feel the Japanese influences here. The doors were more often than not sliding, and the tile roofs tilted upwards towards the sky.
I suppose that it made sense that the place would be in, for lack of a better term, oldtown Hearthome. For a place with such history, I doubted they would have moved to something that others would call more modern. It brought to mind some pubs that had been in one place for a thousand years, or places of business in Japan back home that I’d read about, doing business out of the same building since the Edo period or farther back. There was a pure sense of age in every structure that was wildly different from the same feelings one received from western buildings, and I found my head constantly swiveling as I followed Mirra through the narrow streets and alleys. I wondered how long humans had lived in this region, how old some of the buildings were.
I was so distracted by my surroundings that I didn’t notice Mirra had stopped until I practically ran into her back. At the last moment, I managed to swerve around her and to her side, making it look like something that was entirely intentional and not me almost bouncing right off of her because I was spacing out. From the distinctly amused look that Drake gave me, though, I don’t think I entirely got away with it.
“Well, this’d be it.” She said, crossing her arms. I turned to look, and inhaled.
If the buildings around me had looked old, this place looked positively ancient. It brought to mind some Japanese Shinto temples I’d seen, old wood and columns and stone making a structure that looked as if it had been pulled through time from an earlier age. Kanji, painted in faint gold, adorned the wooden gate that formed an entrance farther into the structure. A number of what looked to be paper seals were pasted around the entrance, some weathered, others looking practically fresh.
To either side of the gateway stood huge stone statues- houndoom, I realized, looking at them closer. The statues had been carved with detail and affection, but it was obvious that that had been many years ago. Touches of green moss decorated the stonework, here and there and especially among the crevices. Portions of both had been worn smoother by rain and the passage of time, rain staining lines where the water had flowed across the stone. They had both been carved as if they were standing guard, sitting on large stones, but looking closer I realized that there was no seam between the paws and the small boulders they sat on. As I looked closer, I realized that the paws had been practically smoothed until they shone dully in the afternoon light. Visitors rubbing them for luck, maybe?
Mirra strode through the gates without real hesitation, though I noticed her fingers brush over the paws of one of the statues. I paused, watching her walk forwards, then turned to the statue. The paw was smoothed and shining gently, no moss to speak off polluting its surface. This was a world where gods and spirits existed, so… somewhat reverently, I brushed my own fingers over the stone paw. Drake watched me quietly, bowing his head in respect to the statues before passing between them. Supposing that that was all that was needed, I followed my partner.
The gates let out into a courtyard of some description, though it was closer in appearance to a garden. Carefully curated patches of bamboo and trees mixed in with patches of sand, which itself had been thoroughly raked with perfectly ordered lines. To the left, a wooden bridge painted red crossed a small pond lined with rocks, the occasional flash of orange and white scales visible under the water’s surface. The Pokemon world’s version of a koi pond? Goldeens, I’d guess? Hell, maybe even actual koi. To my right, a small gravel path wound through the sand to the side of the building in front of me. I eyed a large stone lantern that occupied a spot in the center of a larger patch of sand and large rocks, some memory of a Ghost type that liked to mimic the pieces of art trickling into the back of my head. This lantern, however, was as ancient and aged as the statues out front- even more so, given that it looked as if it was less carefully maintained. I shared a look with Drake, who shrugged his small shoulders, and I decided to ignore it. I doubted that a Ghost type would be welcome to linger in the front area of a place like this unless it was benign.
Down a cobbled path, a large building rose up in front of me. The piece of land that it was contained in was outlined with a wooden wall, tall and patterned between red paint and dark wood with the occasional patch of bamboo or tall tree, blocking out a view of the city outside. If it wasn’t for the multi-storied nature of some of the buildings around it, one couldn’t be faulted for thinking that it was isolated and alone. I could easily imagine this place being a temple in some secluded pocket of Japanese countryside, perhaps in some mountains.
Looking closer, I realized that I could recognize small compromises with the modern world mixed in with the much older architecture. Here, there was a slightly rusted dish tucked into part of the roof, and I could spy the silver of EMT piping under the eaves of the roof. If the building was as old as it appeared, electricity being added to it would’ve been an ad-hoc thing, something stapled onto an existing structure that hadn’t been designed for it.
Mirra hadn’t hesitated, as I had. Her grovyle was already standing at the front door of the place, and she was halfway up the wooden front steps. She turned back to look at me, giving me a grin and jerking her head towards the door. I nodded in return, stepping forwards, and she made a satisfied noise.
I climbed the steps, coming to a stop at the top of them, Drake staying close to my legs and looking around curiously. Mirra’s grovyle was contemplating something hanging from the ceiling next to what was obviously the main doors- a rope. It was obviously old, though it had been shielded from the elements and repaired. Red strands were woven with the occasional strip of golden wire, knotted at regular intervals and reaching near to the ground. Was that so shorter Pokemon could reach it, if they wanted? Regardless, Mirra’s grovyle took the rope in his claws, tugging it once.
From deep inside the structure came a deep tolling, catching me somewhat off guard. I’d expected something light or electronic, though in retrospect, a larger bell made far more sense. Before I could ask a question, the thick wooden doors swung wide open, and a person stepped out.
They were wearing a kimono, primarily made of black silk. Highlights in the form of flame patterns outlined the sleeves and were scattered in patterns like starbursts across the fabric. As I looked closer, I could see how the red, orange, and yellow that made up the flames shimmered and flickered slightly in the light, giving the illusion of actual flames every time they moved. All in all, it was a piece of art that no doubt cost more money than I’d ever held at one time, unless silk was a lot easier to farm here. Which, given that Bug types could probably produce as much string on demand as needed, might very well be the case.
The person- a young woman with a shock of black hair tied back on her head- had walked through the doors imperiously, arms folded in her sleeves. In her wake stalked a shadow, a hellhound made real- a houndoom, the horned dog flicking its tail and huffing out a small tongue of flame as it examined each of us in turn. She gave me a speculative look, eyes tracing up my form, lingering on the yellow rings stitched onto the shoulders of my hoodie. When she glanced over and saw Mirra, however, her face split in a wide grin, and the imperious and disciplined person that had walked out vanished in an instant.
“Mirra! You didn’t tell me you were back in town!”
“Yeah, I didn't want to make you feel inadequate by my mere presence.” The Grass-type trainer said, a confident grin stretching across her face. “Might throw off your whole game, and then- poof! Your family’s rep, down the drain.”
“Oh, you do not want grandmother hearing you said that, she’s already bad enough after the last time you managed to stall one of her team. She was so steamed, pun intended, that the next three trainers left with their tails between their legs without even a fight. Nobody did the Trial for a month! She had to take a short vacation just to calm down- pretty sure she’ll pop a blood vessel once she figures out you’re back and you brought your grass-demons with you.”
The two of them gave a short bow, though I could tell it was less formality and more a playful greeting between friends, given how they only went down about halfway and were grinning the entire time. With Mirra properly greeted, she turned a speculative eye to me.
“So. Who’s your friend, then?”
“Ah… I’m Cam. This is Drake.” I replied, gesturing to Drake, who dipped his head respectfully. The houndoom at her side eyes us both in turn, before huffing another small tongue of flame dismissively.
“Hm. You’re not recognized.” Some of the formality leaked back into her expression, and she turned her head to Mirra, who was conspicuously lacking her constant grin. “You will vouch for him, Trainer Mirra?”
“I will.” Her mouth twitched upwards. “Worse comes to worse, I hand his ass to him myself. He’s good, for a one, but he ain’t that good.”
“Single rank? With one Pokemon?” She glanced down, taking a much closer look at Drake. “One rank with a Dark type Pokemon as your starter. My, you are a brave one.” She raised her eyebrows. “Did you come to take the Trial, then?”
“Ah, no?” I was decidedly uncertain about this situation. “Drake and I- well, we came here at the end of a little quest, trying to find the hottest food this city has. He’s got a taste for it, and, well… I did promise.”
Her shoulders slumped a little, and I thought that she actually seemed just a little disappointed. A moment later, however, her shoulders came back up and her smile returned.
“Well, food we can certainly do! And Nighty seems to like you just fine, so if Mirra vouches for you, you’re probably alright.” I opened my mouth to say something, and she interrupted me with a finger jabbed into my chest. “Though if you try to start something or start taunting the Pokemon, I reserve the right to put you out on your ass even before Mirra can do it. Is that clear?”
I swallowed and nodded, not particularly eager to piss off the powerful Fire-specialist in their own territory, with the rest of their family no doubt ready to crawl out of the woodwork and squish me like a bug. Or, well, a Bug type.
“Good! Come on, I’ll take you to the bar, and we’ll have my aunt cook you something that’ll satisfy that Pokemon of yours.”
She spun on a dime, marching into the building with the houndoom strutting with their head held high right on her heels. I gave Mirra a hesitant look, but she merely gave me a crooked grin and followed the Fire specialist, her grovyle right behind her. At this point, I figured that I didn’t have much of a choice; it’d be rude to come all this way and just walk off, wouldn’t it? With a sigh, Drake and I followed her through the doors.
When we were through, two small Pokemon- houndour, I realized- stepped up from their posts at either side of the doorway. With their tiny mouths, they gripped small ropes attached to the bottom of the doors and pulled them closed, before returning to their spots and laying down. One of them yawned, and my fingers twitched as I resisted the urge to slip out my Pokenav and take a picture. If I’d known hellhounds could be so cute… I twitched, dropping that thought as I realized that the two other trainers were still walking away. I picked up the pace, catching up to them before they could round a corner and lose me.
We were led through a hallway decorated in a spartan sort of manner. The support beams were adorned with intricate carvings, depicting a variety of people and houndour in many different poses and situations. Occasionally, there would be an intricate painting, strokes of brush on canvas depicting a scene of battle, or individuals. Occasional displays of weapons, and, interestingly, a display case that was filled with clear stones that seemed to shine with a light from within. Looking closer, I realized that it wasn’t an illusion, the stones acting as tiny lanterns. A spark in the center of the clear crystal flickered and undulated, providing faint light, and the number of stones in the cabinet meant that it was well-lit inside without any evidence of lighting.
“Fire stones.” I murmured.
“Yeah. Family’s stock.” Came a voice at my elbow.
I twitched, spinning, finding myself staring down at a boy. Long, dark hair hung down practically to his shoulders, covering one eye as he stared up at me. A small houndour sat dutifully at his feet, looking up at me with an innocent sort of curiosity, and occasionally glancing at Drake.
“S-sorry, you, uh… you scared me.”
I glanced around, suddenly concerned- I’d lost Mirra and her… friend, while I’d been distracted with the display case. The kid folded his arms.
“What, are you some kinda thief? You’re pretty bad at this, if so.”
“No! I was just- I was following Mirra and…” I frowned, realizing that the other girl had entirely forgotten to introduce herself.
“Mirra?” His face twitched. “What’d she bring you in for?”
“I was looking for food?”
He actually looked distinctly relieved, motioning with his hand.
“Alright. C’mon.”
He walked off down the corridor, his houndour pausing for a moment to look back at Drake again before following him.
“Well,” I said lowly to Drake, “Following the kid is a better idea than wandering around this place at random, at least.”
Drake chuffed his agreement, and we fell into step behind the much shorter figure.
He led us around another corner, then to a pair of rice paper and wood sliding doors. He grasped one, pulling it aside, and stepped through. I followed along, then paused on the other side.
We’d been led into a large, open area, ringed with a covered area. A few people were scattered here and there with a variety of Fire types, though the biggest group was a number of people with coal-black hair. Houndours and houndooms hung around the table, each standing close to a family member that seemed close in age to what their evolutionary age would suggest. Three children were running around the table, chasing each other as they did, three houndour yapping excitedly at their feet. The kid that had led me here grimaced, and I felt a moment of kinship with him- I didn’t particularly harbour any kind of love for loud social situations like this, either.
“Kazuma! There you are!” A scrawny figure marched up to us, frowning at him, then at me. “Who’s this? I don’t recognize him. What’s your business!?”
I held up my hands, completely taken off-guard by the sudden grilling. At least when the kid- Kazuma- found me, he’d not really been interrogative. Before I could answer, though, the girl from before spoke up.
“Cam! There you are, we’d been wondering!” She gave the guy that’d accosted me a frown. “Shota, don’t be so harsh on him.”
“But, Natsuki, you can’t be too careful-” He gave me a suspicious squint, only to jump when she flicked the side of his head. “Ow!”
“He’s fine, Shota, he came in with Mirra. Besides, it’s not as if he’s going to do anything with everybody here.”
The now-named Shota grumbled to himself, eyeing me with obvious suspicion before he finally, reluctantly, walked off and back towards the tables that had what I guessed to be his family. Natsuki watched him go, then gave Kazuma a smile.
“Thanks for showing him the way, we would’ve had to search the whole place otherwise.”
Kazuma simply shrugged, sliding his hands into the pockets of his shorts. He walked stepped back through the door we’d just come through, his houndour pausing a moment to look at Drake and let out a soft whine before following him reluctantly. The sliding door slid home with a soft clack, and Natsuki turned her attention back to me, her smile shifting a little.
“Sorry about that. Mirra tends to occupy most of my attention, and my family can be a little intense.”
“Don’t… worry about it. I mean, I’m here, so… no harm done?” I ventured.
Natsuki laughed, then gestured for me to follow her as she walked back towards her family’s table. Looking over, I realized that Mirra was mixed in with the tight knot of coal-black hair, the green of her hat standing out like a sore thumb. An older woman with iron gray hair was staring daggers at her, but she was grinning right back. To the side of the older woman, who I guessed was Natsuki’s grandmother, stood a huge mass of black and white.
Her houndoom was… big. They towered over every other example of their species at or around the table, a scattering of scars and white fur doing little to downplay their excessive size and frankly imperious gaze. I felt my fingers flex a little as I watched them sweep their gaze across the table- across their domain, a domain they obviously shared with their partner, in spite of both of their obvious age. If there was an alpha or a matriarch among the hellhounds, this was obviously them. As I watched, their ears twitched and they seemed to sense my attention, looking straight at me and pinning me in place.
Time seemed to slow, even stop, for a bare moment. The gaze of the giant hellhound felt like the crushing weight of the ocean, measuring me, examining me. A single paw reached up to nudge their partner, the older woman glancing to them before her gaze immediately settled on me as well. Instead of being lighter, it felt even heavier, the both of them sizing me up together. Calculation flashed across the woman’s face, steel untarnished by the rigors of time. In a moment, I knew that I was face to face with someone who was far, far out of my league. I hated eye contact, and here I was, making some of the worst eye contact that I’d ever made. I very much wanted to break it…
… No. No, I’d- not today. Not today, when I’d fought Fantina, when I’d proved that I’d earned the first badge sitting in my badge case. I felt Drake’s presence at my side, staring up at the both of them in defiance, and I steeled myself, returning their gaze no matter how uncomfortable it was. Because after all I’d done today, like hell I was going to let myself be so easily cowed by just a glance.
Something in the houndoom’s face turned, from calculating examination to approval. The grandmother’s gaze shifted as well- and with that, the spell was broken.
“- Cam?”
I jumped slightly in place, turning my head to Natsuki, who was giving me a look of slight concern. I smiled apologetically, flexing my hands and sending a glance back to the grandmother and her houndoom, neither of whom were looking at me anymore.
“Ah, sorry, I… spaced out there, for a moment. What did you say?”
“Oh! I’d just asked you how you met Mirra.”
“Battlebar.” I said simply. “I’d heard about this place- or rumours about it, anyway- from a number of different people while I was asking around about the spiciest food in town. She was one of the trainers that I’d happened to ask, and the last one, as it turned out. She led me here, and that’s that. Said something about…” I scrunched up my face in concentration, trying to remember the exact words that she’d used. “That I’d been… the first trainer that hadn’t hit her up for a date or a battle? I’d just been honestly looking for directions, and I think she was amused enough by the change of script that she decided to humour me.”
“Hottest food, huh?” She said, quietly. “Well, I guess we can certainly do that for the two of you, if you want.” Immediately, Drake was at her feet, giving her the biggest set of puppy eyes that I’d ever seen. She laughed. “Alright, alright, I get the picture! Come on, we’ll get you a sample of the hottest thing we have, and we’ll see how that makes you feel, alright?”
Drake practically danced in place, all smiles and radiating happiness, then followed along with Natsuki towards a sort of wooden sushi bar, where a woman with crossed arms was arguing with a wildly gesticulating man with sunburned cheeks. Feeling distinctly awkward, having been left alone in a room full of people that I didn’t know and an acquaintance I’d just met, I gravitated towards where Mirra was grinning as she spoke with the thin guy from before- Shota, if I remembered correctly.
“You were always a troublemaker, but bringing in some random trainer off the street, especially one with-?”
“Shotaaaaa, my man, you’re not forgetting the other half of your Pokemon’s typing, are you?”
He flushed, sputtering indignantly. “I certainly am not! There’s a difference between a perfectly innocent houndoom and a poochyena!”
“And nobody outside these walls would agree with you on that distinction.” Mirra said, putting her hands behind her head and leaning her chair back on two legs.
“Put those legs on the floor, you’re not a child!”
“I dunno,” said one of the women to another, “he certainly acts like she is.”
“I heard that!” he pointed a finger in the direction of the woman, and flushed as the rest of them laughed.
“Cam!” Mirra waved me over, setting her chair back on the floor and pulling out the chair next to here. “C’mere, siddown!”
“Don’t just invite him-!”
Given how the rest of them were either regarding Shota and Mirra with amusement or me with curiosity, I took the invitation, settling down into the chair and pulling myself up to the table. Absolutely devastated that he wasn’t seeing support from his family members, Shota turned to what was obviously his last hope regarding me.
“G-grannie-”
He stopped when the grandmother held up a single hand. All of them went silent, turning their attention to her, as she turned her attention once again to me.
“Now.”
Her voice reminded me of her Pokemon partner- aged, but not just unbowed, but holding clear command. Not in the manner of someone who believed that being louder made them more listened to, but of someone who was the clear authority. Someone who knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that their word would be followed.
If she ordered all the fish in the pond to leap out of the water and attack somebody, I thought to myself, they just might.
And then I recalled that this was the Pokemon world, and such a response was the expected result rather than something actually incredible. Well, whatever, it’d happen anyway.
“Mirra has managed to say a little about you. She says that you’re a strong trainer, that you have the heart of one as well as the Pokemon. And I can see for myself that your poochyena is well cared for- and that the two of you have a strong bond. She has also said that you came searching for us entirely to reward your poochyena with good food.” The edge of her lips curved upwards slightly. “Is all this true?”
“... Yes, ma’am.” I said, being clear as I could be.
Her gaze settled on me again, though there wasn’t the sheer weight of before, of a trainer sizing up a potential threat. This time, when she took my measure, she examined the whole of me before nodding once.
“I believe you’re perfectly truthful. A valuable trait in this and any age, and especially for one who chose to travel with a Dark type as their first- and only- Pokemon. My partner-” the hellhound at her side nuzzled her shoulder- “not only agrees with this sentiment, but seems to be quite intrigued by you. I must say, Mirra, it’s an interesting one you found out there.”
She shrugged, smiling and leaning back in her chair again, bringing in a whole new brace of spluttering from Shinta.
“Well, grannie, I certainly live to please.”
She chuckled. “What a brat you are. Still.” Her gaze turned back to me, the rest of her family following. “You are… interesting. Perhaps you could help an old woman with a small errand?”
I heard an inhale of breath, but when I turned to the rest of the family, they seemed to be paying only passing attention. Many were speaking amongst themselves quietly again.
“Well…” I glanced towards the sushi bar, where Drake was scarfing down something in a small bowl- much to the consternation of the man, and the amusement of Natsuki. “I guess, since Drake’s busy, I’ve got a little time.”
She nodded, a pleased expression coming over her face. “Excellent. Then, be a gentleman and help an old woman up, wouldn’t you? These old bones aren’t what they used to be.”
I nodded, pushing myself to my feet and moving around to her side, gently taking her hand and helping her up. I thought I felt gazes on my back, but whenever I turned towards the rest of the family, they were all focused on eachother or the food in front of them. I bit my lip, then followed along with the older woman as she led me towards one of the sliding doors.
“Drake, I’ll be right back, alright?”
He flicked his ear at me to indicate he’d heard, then buried his muzzle in a second bowl of… whatever it was. I nodded in return, and then pushed the sliding door and helped her through, before stepping through myself and closing it behind us.
I couldn’t help but feel that something more was going on here, even as I helped her down a hallway. Whatever it was, I supposed that I’d just have to discover for myself.