Rhyhorn's third attempt at Thunder Bolt hit our one and only bike, right in the center, and completely destroyed it! "The bike's extra crispy!" I shrieked, stunned by Rhyhorn's raw attack power.
Of course, Paul immediately scolded him. "You could've at least tried to avoid the bike!!"
Rhyhorn whimpered and began weeping crocodile tears.
My hand struck Paul upside the head. "Don't yell at my Pokémon, you ass!" I then scratched underneath Rhyhorn's chin. The Pokémon purred at the contact and kicked his back foot like a dog. "Sweet Rhyhorn, don't listen to a word he says. Accidents happen. A little walking never hurt anyone anyhow." Then, I shot a glare in Paul's direction. "I thought you didn't even like riding bikes?"
He pouted like a child. "Like it or not, it beats walking."
"Well, buy a bike in the next town."
"No, I really shouldn't. We can't afford it."
"Then, quit complaining! Now, Rhyhorn, what do you say we call it for your electric training? We shouldn't push too far. We'll work on your aim another time, but at least now you're able to produce a lightning bolt and launch it."
Rhyhorn agreed.
That gave Paul the chance to finally ask the one question on his mind:
"Hey, if you're done with Rhyhorn, how's about teaching the others?"
I stared at Paul, a bit shocked that he so bluntly asked for my help. "What? You mean Thunder Bolt?"
"Or any electric attack," he replied. "It'd be useful for them to know, no doubt. I don't have any Electric-types, but if I had Pokémon who could use electric attacks, we'd have better coverage. You think you could teach some of my Pokémon?"
"Well, I can, but without an ability like Lightning Rod, it'll be much harder."
"Why's that?"
"Because without that safeguard against the high voltage, they'll most likely shock themselves a few times during the learning process. That also leads to a slight risk of inducing paralysis."
"That's alright."
I shot him a look. "Why don't you ask the Pokémon if they're alright with that, too?"
"Fine." Paul turned to his—slightly smaller—collection of Pokémon. "Who wants to learn Electric-type attacks?"
Torterra felt indifferent, though he couldn't learn the move even if he wanted, and neither could any of the other Grass-types. Tauros and Primeape also couldn't care less. And it was a hard pass from Fearow, Dodrio, and all Water-types, with the sole exception of Gyarados. He seemed eager to add another deadly weapon to his collection of attacks.
"And Gyarados has already been hit by a Thunder Bolt, so he may actually have an easier time replicating that energy," I noted. When Gyarados glared at me, I quickly apologized for bringing up the incident that led to his capture.
Kadabra could learn how to use Shock Wave instead of Thunder Bolt, and he could do it fairly easily with his psychic abilities.
"What about any of the Eevee?" asked Paul. "At least one must be capable."
"Not unless they evolve into Jolteon."
"Huh?! Well, we have Thunder Stones, don't we?"
"Not we. Me, and I have a few. One is for Pikachu in case she ever changes her mind. The others are extras, but no way in hell am I giving you either of them so you can force anyone to evolve."
"Oh, come on. Evolving one of the Eevee would give me a guaranteed Electric-type attacker."
"I said no! You know how I feel about that."
"I do, but... Here. Eevee!" Hearing her name, the smaller of his two Eevee skipped over to us. "Tell me something. Do you want to evolve into a Jolteon? It's really simple. All you need to do is touch a Thunder Stone. Like this."
He suddenly jerked me close and rifled through my bag.
"Hey! Get out of there!"
"I just need a—"
A flurry of Shadow Balls hit Paul in the face, knocking him over.
Papa Eevee, the shiny one, pulled his little girl into a hug while growling at Paul.
"See? I'm not the only one who feels that way about forcing an evolution. Plus, personally, I think Eevee could use some more training and battle experience before she evolves. What do you think?" Papa Eevee agreed with my statement.
Paul sat up. "I just would like a genuine Electric-type attacker on my team."
"Don't be so impatient, Paul. You'll just have to live with Gyarados and Kadabra until we can find some Electric-types. Maybe we'll get lucky and stumble across an abandoned power plant or something?"
"Yeah, but..." Suddenly, Nidorino dashed over and barked to interrupt Paul. He stared at his trainer with wide, purple eyes and ears held back like he was pleading. "Huh? You want to learn an Electric attack, too?"
The Poison Pin Pokémon vigorously nodded his head.
"Wow. You're sure motivated. I like that. But can Nidorino learn electric attacks?"
"I know Nidoking can. Let's see. Dex."
"All members of the Nidoran evolution line are capable of learning Thunder Bolt."
"All members?" Nidorina had just walked up beside us, and I cast her an excitable look upon hearing the information. "That means you can learn it, too. Wanna give it a try?" She blinked once, smiled, and nodded.
Nidorino suddenly sized her up, proclaiming that he would learn it faster than her.
She responded in kind, ready to give it her all.
Their competitiveness thrilled me. "Nothing like a good rivalry to get you—AH!" A gentle hand appeared out of nowhere and gripped my shoulder, causing my legs to launch me ten feet into the air.
Haunter applauded upon witnessing the reaction he'd hoped for.
"Don't... Don't do that, Haunter..."
Ignoring my shakiness, he floated closer to my face and explained how he also wanted to participate in our special training.
"Really...? You, too?"
Haunter shook his head so much it nearly fell off.
"Alright, alright. You can learn, too." I rose up and brushed the dirt off my clothes. "So, how many students do I have now?"
"Five," answered Paul. He and the five chosen ones gazed at me with watery, puppy-dog eyes. "So, please? Teach them?"
I took a deep breath. On the exhale, I let my shoulders roll forward; I knew I'd have my work cut out for me. "Fine. I'll do it."
"Yes!" Paul cheered together with the Pokémon.
"BUT! Hang on! Don't get too excited just yet. We can't start the training right now."
"Huh?! Why the hell not?!"
"Well, if we're going to do some electric training with this many Pokémon, we need to stock up on extra potions and paralyze heals just in case. We're gonna need them. Desperately, as it's a guarantee that someone will get hurt."
"You've got a point." Paul sighed. "So, in other words, we can't start until we reach the next town."
"Uh-huh. Sorry."
He sighed again, this time with much more of a dramatic flare. "Fine. As long as I don't have a choice in the matter. You heard her, guys. So, until then, I think that wraps up the training for right now."
They all begrudgingly agreed to wait.
"In that case," I began, "who wants to splash in the water before we have to go?!"
Everyone aside from Paul, Torterra, and all Fire-types joined me in the water.
★
Our little troop set out on the road not too long after the training session concluded. We packed up camp with the help of our massive Pokémon collection; we needed all hands on deck since one of our goals was to reach Saffron as quickly as possible. However, without a bike, it would already take us a lot longer than we initially predicted.
Paul acted bitter because of it. He was extremely impatient to get on with the show.
I, on the other hand, savored the extra time to absorb the sights.
Two kinds of people, I suppose.
Moving as fast as our feet could carry us, we arrived at the next town just after seven o'clock. The sun had already tucked itself in for the night, so if it wasn't for the dim light of the moon—plus the glow of my two Electric-types—I would've guessed we ended up in the middle of nowhere.
"Well, there it is," announced Paul as we reached a fork in the road. The dirt trail split apart, one branch disappearing into the trees ahead and the other connecting us to a cluster of tiny houses surrounded by rice paddy fields. "Mossgreen Village."
I counted all the buildings on one hand.
"There's, like, nine houses total. No, wait...there's a couple on the outskirts, but still that's not very many. What's the population here?"
"According to the guidebook," he flipped through the pages, "twenty."
The wind got knocked out of my lungs. "Twenty?!"
"Yep. It also says that due to the tiny population, there's no Pokémon Center here."
"Huh? That's ridiculous! What do they expect travelers like us to do about medicine and supplies, then? And you still planned on calling Reggie, right?"
"It says there's a medicine shop in town that is stocked with homemade remedies available for purchase. As for calling my brother, I'm sure someone would allow the use of their phone if we just ask nicely. Though I can't imagine they'd be willing at this hour. There's no way the medicine shop would be open either."
I rubbed my head. "That's just great."
Paul shrugged. "Nothing we can do, so no point complaining." He stowed away the guidebook and examined our surroundings, glancing up at the moon for a moment. "Why don't we find a spot nearby to camp? We can check out the village in the morning."
"Sounds good. Any suggestions?"
Pikachu called to us from a break in the treeline. When we joined her, we found a lone tree sitting on a grassy hill. It overlooked the rest of the forest, and a murmuring creek that glittered underneath the moonlight.
"Nice find, Pikachu."
We settled down around the tree. Paul, Eevee, and Pikachu replenished our water supply while Charmeleon and Growlithe started a fire. I heated up two portions of leftover curry over the roaring flames, and then left Luxio in charge of the pot while I prepared all Pokémon food. We had dinner ready by the time the others returned from the stream.
After we ate and cleaned up, it was bedtime.
The Pokémon bundled together in one massive dogpile; Psyduck was the unfortunate creature at the bottom. Some retreated to their Poké Balls for the night, and the flyers roosted up in Torterra's tree, but the rest fell asleep on a gigantic blanket.
Being a wonderful guard Pokémon, Gyarados curled up around the gang. He dipped his tail into the water, splashed a little on the fire to snuff it out, and then closed his eyes to drift off to dreamland. His snores startled a few of the smaller Pokémon, but eventually even he went quiet as a mouse.
"That didn't take long," noted Paul from atop Torterra's back.
"What did you expect? You worked them to death." I sat beside Paul. Luxio hopped over, settled between us, and rested his head on my leg, with Dratini, Pikachu, and Eevee falling asleep nearby. The sight made me grin. "Guess we both did."
"It wasn't that bad. They'll get used to it. They're just slackers right now."
"Quit saying that. The Pokémon are working super hard and you know it. Right, big guy?" I rubbed the grassy patch just underneath me. Torterra responded with a rumbling noise emanating from his colossal body. "Not sure if that was a response or a snore..."
After shrugging, Paul laid back with his arms behind his head and stared up at the stars.
I mimicked him.
We remained quiet for a while, listening to the sounds of the night and the snores of our sleeping Pokémon battalion. I couldn't fall asleep as easily, though. There were too many thoughts in my head, so I couldn't relax.
I also couldn't resist teasing Paul, who only had eyes for the sky.
"I didn't take you to be a stargazer."
"I'm not. But, what else is there to look at?" He sounded a little irritated.
"Hey, hey, calm down. I'm not judging. I do it, too. Far too much."
"Really? Know any constellations?"
I thought about it for a moment, focusing a little harder on the twinkling lights above us. "I can see Ursa Minor from here."
"Where?"
"Right above you. See the seven stars? There's the bowl, and the handle."
"Oh yeah. And there's Ursa Major above it, facing the opposite direction."
"Those ones are the easiest to spot. They look like Teddiursa and Ursaring. They say that if a crescent moon shines on Teddiursa's forehead, those who see it will have really good dreams. Neat, huh?"
He groaned. "It's just like you to picture the constellations as Pokémon."
"Who doesn't picture constellations as Pokémon? Apart from you, I suppose, since it requires imagination and the ability to have fun."
"Hey, I know how to have fun!"
I raised my brow. "You do?"
He frowned and said, "That hurts a little, you know," and then pointed to the sky. "Want some proof? Look at the stars in between Teddiursa and Ursaring."
"Yeah? What about them?"
"They form a line from west to east, encircling Teddiursa and then curving back, and then there's a small group of four stars. See it?"
"Think so."
"You're terrible at this. Here." He grabbed my hand and tugged it around, using my own finger as a pointer to help me spot the pattern he described. "It forms a sort of serpentine figure, doesn't it?"
While trying to ignore the weird tingling sensation on my skin, I nodded. "Yeah. It does."
"It's named the Draco constellation, but I always called it a Milotic. Doesn't it look like one?"
"Wow! It does! You're totally right!"
Paul emitted a triumphant laugh. "See? Told you."
"Fine. I'll never doubt you again, Paul. For the rest of the night, anyway."
"Thanks..."
"What about that one above Ursaring? That's the Leo constellation, but what does it look like to you?"
"A...cat? No..."
"A Luxray!" we exclaimed at once.
Torterra twitched upon hearing our outburst, and calmly bellowed at us to shut up.
"Ack...! Sorry," apologized his trainer.
I giggled, inched closer to Paul, and whispered, "That's one of my favorites."
He rolled his eyes at me and whispered back, "I would've never guessed."
"The one next to it, too. Cancer, which looks like a Krabby. And the Gemini twins look like Latios and Latias, although..." Torterra's leaves blocked a portion of the constellation. "You can't see part of it from here."
"Big deal. Not like we can move Torterra."
I sat up, staring at Torterra's tree, and the tree towering above us all.
"No. But we can move."
"What do you...?" His eyes widened when I hopped off Torterra's back. "Where are you going?"
"Shhh! Don't wake everyone up!"
I stalked over to the tree. A branch sat just above my head. From there, the tree possessed branches spaced about a foot apart from each other, making this an ideal climbing tree. The hardest part would definitely be getting up into the tree in the first place.
"What are you doing?" whispered Paul as he came to my side.
"Getting a better view." I swung my arms forward, then back. When I swung them forward again, my legs launched me off the ground. Jumping as high as a five-foot tall girl could jump, I secured both hands around the branch and pulled myself up onto it. "There. One branch down. I'm gonna keep..." My voice trailed off as I saw Paul with his back turned to me. "What's wrong?"
"You," his ears turned red, even in the moonlight, "shouldn't be climbing with a skirt on..."
I pursed my lips and folded my arms. "You know, if you're that much of a perv, then you should've realized by now I'm wearing shorts underneath. You creeps always know where to look, apparently, so I've taken precautions."
"Those aren't shorts. They're briefs, which means they're still...you know..."
"Panties?" I tried not to laugh when he shuddered. "Why are you freaking out so much when I say it? Is it because you're really a pervert, like secretly?"
"Quit that! I'm not a perv!" His face glowed like Rudolph's nose. "There may be short, disgusting, purple-haired perverts with nothing else on their mind somewhere out there in the vast universe, but I'm not one of them."
"Then, why are you so weird about it?"
"Because," he still felt awkward about facing my direction, "I just...don't think it's right."
"Quit whining." I scrambled onto the second branch. "I'm a girl. I wear skirts. I climb trees. I climb trees while wearing skirts." Then, the next. "Don't like it? I don't really care." And the next. "Now, either come with me or go sit down and wait. I'll be back in a bit." And the next, and the next, and the next. "But you're gonna miss out."
Paul groaned to himself before making for the first branch and attempting to hoist himself up. "You should know I'm not the best tree climber."
"Me neither," I said to someone I could barely see amongst the foliage. "Just don't fall."
"Thanks for the advice. How are you so fast, anyway? Was your father Tarzan?"
A laugh bubbled out of me. "No. It's just lots of practice, though I'd say my biggest credit would be a lack of hesitation. I just keep moving, from one branch to the next without looking down."
"How are you not more careful? One wrong move and you could—"
The conversation distracted Paul, which caused him to accidentally put too much stress on the current branch. It snapped, and he fell. But before he could fall too far, I swung back down and grabbed his arm.
"Fall?" I smirked. "You should take your own advice, Paul."
He looked very embarrassed again. "Shut up."
Laughing, I pulled him onto a sturdy branch near mine.
With my instructions, Paul fell into a steady rhythm of moving from branch to branch. I followed behind just in case he slipped or broke any branches again, but thankfully he didn't. He got the hang of it rather quickly.
Together, we scaled the tree all the way to the top. Paul and I popped our heads through the canopy, coming face-to-face with a pitch-black blanket stretching for miles and miles. Twinkling stars covered every square inch, each one giving off a very unique and beautiful light.
"Now, that's a much better view." I carefully settled myself on a sturdy branch, propping one foot against the tree trunk to keep me stable. "Nothing to stop that remote light from moving within grasp."
"Wow!" Paul's jaw fell open. His eyes bulged. He slowly took a spot on a neighboring branch, all eyes glued to the glittering lights above our heads. "I don't think I've ever gotten this close."
"Didn't you ever climb rooftops or telephone poles?"
He shook his head.
"What kind of life have you been living, then?"
"A normal one." He grinned at me. "I guess that's not what you've been living, huh?"
"No." The light left my eyes as I looked away from him. "Guess not..."
Paul watched my mood as it took a sharp turn and spiraled into the ground. He wanted to fix it. "So," he loudly cleared his throat, "you were talking about the Gemini twins looking like Latios and Latias?"
"Right!" I scanned the sky and found the star cluster. "If you stare at them long enough, you can see the two dragons. They're holding hands and flying across the night sky. The Eon Pokémon belonged to some of my favorite stories when I was little. They say that blah blah blah..."
Paul stopped listening the moment I perked up.
Phew.
My frown disappeared about as quickly as it appeared.
That's better.
"...and they're super cool! Don't you think?" I continued, unaware of Paul's loss of focus.
At the last possible second, he realized I had asked him a question and snapped back to reality. "Y-Yeah, yeah they are super cool! I agree!" His eyes quickly went back to the sky. He hoped to find another constellation and keep the conversation moving forward. "Oh! There's Aries!"
I noted the floating ram. "How'd you find that one so fast?"
"Any guesses?"
"Are you an Aries?"
"Sure am. Born on the third of April."
"Well, now that you mention it, you are rather moody, short-tempered, stubborn, and impatient," I smirked, and then I playfully tapped a finger to my chin. "Am I forgetting anything else?"
"How about intelligent? Brave? Cool."
"Impossible." I touched a hand to my cheek. "That's Prince Charming."
"Hey! I'm way cooler than that knight in shining armor, and I'll prove it to you...!" He froze up, bit his lip, and wondered when he'd finally learn to process his words before just blurting them out as loud as possible.
"It..." Turning red, I quickly pulled my eyes away from his. "It's not like you need to prove anything to me... I couldn't care less which one of you is cooler..."
"I...I didn't..." He also looked away.
The awkwardness caused a slight pause in our stargazing.
Until Paul swallowed back the lump in his throat and asked, "What about you?"
I turned my head. "What about me?"
He gestured to the sky. "What are you?"
My lips parted. "Oh." I looked at the sky for a moment, wondering if I should just give a straight answer. Nah, where's the fun in that? A part of me wanted to turn it into a game, so I replied in a teasing manner, "Mmm... Any guesses?"
"You want me to guess?"
"Well, you did call yourself intelligent just a moment ago." I rested my chin in my hand and smiled at him. "So prove it, Prince Charming."
Now, it was Paul's turn to blush, and he turned red as fire. "Fine..." He blinked up at the sky. I could see his thoughts and all potential options racing across his mind. There were only twelve, after all. Not too many. "You're not an Aries, too, are you?"
"No."
"Ok. That's one down. Uh, Aquarius?"
"Nope."
He lifted a brow. "Really? You're not stubborn, sarcastic, or incredibly impulsive, because last I checked—"
"No!" I flicked a twig at him and then crossed my arms with a huff. "Guess again."
"How about Sagittarius?"
"No dice."
He scratched his head. "This is gonna take forever. Just tell me already."
"No way. Don't throw in the towel after two tries! Figure it out."
"How about a hint? One hint, and I'll figure it out from there. I promise."
I considered, but I shook my head. "No. You don't need a hint..."
"Oh, come on. Quit—"
"Because you're an Aries," I continued. His mouth snapped shut. "So you'll figure it out pretty easily."
"I will."
"Yep."
"Oh. Well, alright." He put a hand to his chin. "I'll figure it out if I'm an Aries. What could it be...?" A loud yawn cut off his muttering, and he rubbed his eyes. "We should start heading back down. It's really late, and we're getting up early."
"Yeah. Alright. You first."
He yawned again as he moved to begin climbing. "But seriously, you won't tell..."
I realized too late that he shifted too far onto my branch. "Wait, Paul! Don't put your hand there—!"
Our branches both snapped.