Blazing the Competition - Pokémon SI

Chapter 31 – Size isn’t Everything.

“Numsy you’re giant!”

“Ruupt”

The crowd was suitably awed, it’s not everyday that you get to witness a Pokémon’s evolution live and in person. Shellder, who was already diminutive in size compared to my previously unevolved Numel, was now completely dwarfed. The battle was put to a halt, a common courtesy during evolutions that happened mid battle.

“Where am I going to put you? You can’t jump on my lap anymore, that's for sure. You’ll have to be the one giving the rides from now on.”

My newly evolved Camerupt was about six feet tall in height and that wasn’t even mentioning the rocky volcanoes on his back.

“Hey, did you get a feel for it?”

“Cam!”

One of the gym’s staff workers, knowing I’d be starting out on my journey with Numsy, gave me a crash course on proper husbandry if my Numel ever evolved as well as a few other things regarding camerupt physiology. That included the information that at the moment of evolution their species gained an instinctive knowledge of rock type TE and more specifically the move rockslide. After Numsy was done testing out his new body I addressed our competition.

“Thanks for waiting. Are you ready to finish this battle?”

“Like totally. We still won’t lose, right Shelly?”

“Sheeell!”

Her Shellder bravely stood against Numsy pushing through any pressure it must feel facing a Pokémon so much larger than it.

“Rock Slide!”

“Water Pulse!”

Our Pokémon clashed again but this time Numsy was faster. White rings of energy surrounded Numsy and he launched a barrage of large stones and boulders. Shellder was still in the middle of charging up its water pulse when the mollusk Pokémon was hit by the falling debris. Shellder’s clam-like shell closed up for a few seconds and reopened revealing its fainted occupant.

“Shellderrrr…”

“Shellder is unable to battle, Egon and Camerupt are the victors! The winner of this competition is Egon from Lavaridge town!”

I rushed up to Numsy for our customary victory rub down and to inspect for any issues that may have risen from having ballooned up to his massive size in the span of a single minute.

“Great job Numsy! Now, let me have a look at you.

"Hmm looking good, no obvious issues… Open your mouth and say aaaaah.”

His fur was all red and matted now much more difficult to maintain than his former short curly hairs. Not even mentioning the extra surface area.

‘I can’t even reach his back properly, how am I going to straighten out all that unruly fur. That means extra groomer expenses.’

Numsy gave me this mildly amused look. As if the fact that I was now smaller than him made him somehow more mature than me. No words needed to be said on his part. I lived with him for long enough to know what’s going on in that mind.

“Don’t think just because you are bigger than me now things are going to change! I am still the big brother of this relationship. Age is what matters not size!”

“Ruupt.”

“Like you would know how! Who is the one that has to feed and clean you? Not to mention wake you up when you are having nightmares. If you can do all that by yourself maybe, I’ll think about it.”

‘Seriously! Five minutes after evolving and he is already getting uppity.’

Despite how this might seem to onlookers. This was a common occurrence in newly evolved Pokémon. They didn’t just rapidly develop physically but also spiritually. Acting like rebellious teenagers was kind of the norm after evolving. In more extreme cases they might not even acknowledge their trainer’s authority anymore. However, deep down I knew that Numsy was just playing at being rebellious. Just to see if I would still treat him the same way and to gauge my reaction.

So, I did something I used to do to him whenever he made a mess of my bedroom floor.

“Pffffffffff!”

“Came!?”

“That’s right! I’ll blow in your nose again if you don’t show some manners!”

That seemed to do the trick. The look in his eyes quickly returned to its normal state.

“Come on, I need to go shake hands with our opponent, you say something nice to Shellder as well.”

It was customary for finalists to shake hands in Hoenn even at low brow little tournaments like this. Violet seemed patient enough to wait for me, probably understanding my need to settle things with Numsy. I approached her and offered my hand which she shook.

“Hey, your shellder almost got us with that whirlpool. It’s really well trained.”

“Like totally, your Pokémon is bitchin’ as well.”

“Rupt.”

“Sheeell.”

I couldn’t help but notice you are from Cerulean City, and you have a water type Pokémon with you. Might you perhaps be a trainer affiliated with their local gym?

“Bingo! My family runs the gym, like it’s totally rad but I felt like all cramped up over there so me and Shelly are on vacation with some of my girlfriends.”

“Well route 109 is a great choice. Though I do recommend checking out Sootopolis as well. It’s the place to be for water type trainers. They have this scuba dive tour over there where they let visiting trainers encounter all sorts of water type Pokémon.”

We left the Seashore House but not before cashing in our winnings; a six pack of any flavoring of soda cans that I wanted. I picked the obvious choice: sitrus berry with ginger extract. The soda cans in this world are more than just carbonated drinks, they actually had the ability to revitalize a Pokémon after it’s been fainted. so having these on me was a blessing in emergency situations. Not that I wasn’t planning on sneaking at least one out for a sip, sitrus berries are my favorite.

Numsy was back in his ball, cooling off from all the excitement, while I went to the Slateport Market, the best place to buy and sell goods in all of Hoenn. Slateport City was the place in Hoenn where all the interregional freight barges harbor first. Which makes the Slateport market the best place to find exotic goods on the cheap. Naturally I was here to stock up on supplies. I was fresh out and Numsy now being a camerupt would now require an even higher caloric intake. Camerupt weren’t all that hard to feed under normal circumstances being a species that could survive subsisting off of grains for the most part, but since mine was a battler, I had to feed him the good stuff. Rena was out of her ball surveying the various stalls for bargain prices. She was quite shrewd with money and since this market was always crowded it was good to have an extra pair of eyes looking for good deals. Even if that pair of eyes had a tendency to get distracted by the flash of jewelry.

“Pix Pix!”

“That’s too expensive Rena, we're here for food.”

“Vuuuul!”

“We are a tad low on funds... How about after a gym battle or two I’ll let you pick something out again?”

My offer of compromise seemed to do the trick, the little fox Pokémon huffing turning around and leading the way towards the nearest berry dealer. I couldn’t entirely fault Rena for liking shiny rocks. My eyes were also drawn to the dusk stone laying inside the glass casing on a velvet cushion. The price tag reads 12.000 pokédollars. Completely out of our budget of course and I’d seen cheaper in Unova.

‘Now if only I could convince Rena that darkish purple is her color.’

I wasn’t in that much of a rush to get a dusk stone for Orin. Firstly, he had to evolve into a lampent which wouldn’t take as long as my more living Pokémon, seeing as his growth is not constrained by biology. Secondly and the more important reason I felt it was essential to take evolution more gradually. Letting Orin experience the full breadth of what it felt like to be a litwick and a lampent before he assumed his final form would get him used to fighting with the tools he had on and keep him creative.

We skipped the gem salesman and went straight for the berry vendor. I was planning on buying a good amount of low to mid end priced berries and throwing in a handful of high end ones if the price was reasonable. Which in fact it was, the final price tag probably eased up since we were only two routes removed from the berry master’s farms.

“Hello little customer, what can I get you for today? The pecha berries are nice and ripe this season and our persim berries are freshest on the market.”

“What do you think Rena?”

I picked up my Vulpix and let her sniff the man’s produce. The ability to pick out berries was a skill she and Numsy managed to develop over the course of our journey. We wanted to avoid berries on the verge of spoiling and the ones who hadn’t ripened yet. There was a sort of middle ground where the berries were just ripe enough to make a good meal but not too ripened where they had to be consumed right away for fear of spoilage. I couldn’t trust Numsy to do this reliably without him failing to resist the urge to eat what was in front of his nose, especially since he just evolved. Rena wasn’t as food driven as my other Pokémon, so she made for a perfect partner in this venture.

“Pix Pix.”

“Too ripe… but the Orans are good?”

“Vuuuuul!”

“Okay, Give me forty orans. Twenty of each aspear and Rawst. Ten lum, bluk and wiki. Also add in five of those pinap, tamato and custap berries each.”

‘Thank you, Mr. Moore, for paying for all of this.’

Mr. Moore giving me carte blanche to use the gym’s card for food has really been a blessing so far. Making me able to afford major expenditures like my Xtransceiver and the flight ticket back home. I kind of felt bad taking advantage of his generosity, so I committed myself to paying him back at some point in the future.

“Here you go young man, is that all?”

“Do you also have some of the dry stuff? Grains, vitamin supplements and the like?”

After a bit of haggling, which was the norm for open markets like this one. Me and the salesman agreed upon a price we could both live with. I wasn’t the most adept at negotiating but at least I got the total price down somewhat.

‘Hmm next up is registering for the Pokémon league, and after that...’

As I was contemplating my next course of action my Xtransceiver went off. I looked at the screen and it was revealed to be an unknown number.

‘Strange, only a handful of people know my number. All of them are already registered in my contact list…’

Eventually deciding to accept the call I tapped the green button flashing on my screen. The face that appeared on screen was a scruffy looking one. The man clearly didn’t bother trying to look presentable, sharing features with those who have been stuck off route for long periods of time. What I did notice though were the similarities shared between the both of us. The same shade of hair and the thick eyebrows although his were even larger than mine due to the age difference. I recognized him from the posters and league advertisements spread all across Unovan cities. This person was Alder, the current reigning Champion of Unova.

‘Darn Shauntal! At least wait a while before deciding to give your boss my number! No… Calm down Egon, maybe he just wants to say hello.’

“Uhm… Hello there… What’s up?”

“Are you happy?”

‘Straight into the difficult part of the conversation…’

“Well… I am currently on a journey with my Pokémon team trying to qualify for the Ever Grande conference. We train, compete and sometimes goof off. What I am trying to say is… Yes, I am.”

“That’s good, When I was your age I only endlessly pursued strength, as does my son still. That our flawed mindset has not been passed on to you is a blessing. Shauntal told me you grew up in Lavaridge Town tell what was life like, growing up over there?”

“My mother dropped me off at my grandparents’ house shortly after I was born. Lavaridge is… a quiet town full of experienced people. There is lots of volcanic activity going on in the surrounding area, so fire types love it there. As do the tourists who come visit our local hot springs.”

“Any friends or hobbies?”

“I work at the local gym; I am pretty good friends with the gym leader’s daughter. That’s how I got started training fire types.”

“Fire types, my first partner was also a fire type…”

For a second the old man was trapped in his nostalgia before snapping out of it and readdressing me. In a more resolute tone.

“I want you to know that you’ll always be welcome here back in Unova. You have a little brother who would enjoy getting to know his new older sibling. Beyond that I want to make clear that I keep my private and professional life private. Not many people in Unova even know that I have a family, so you won’t have to worry about suddenly being subjected to the spotlight. I’ll be cheering you on of course and am buying all your gym match footage to show to little Benga. More than anything I want you to enjoy your first journey together with your Pokémon friends. Strength doesn’t last forever but those feelings will.”

“Sure, I’ll also be cheering you on too, gramps..”

“That makes me happy… Now, I won’t be wasting any more of your time. Having to listen to this old man ramble about the good old days. Go make a splash! And enjoy every second of making new memories with your partners.”

With that the geezer hung up on me.

‘This was emotionally exhausting, that’s why I prefer Pokémon over most people I guess…’

“You don’t like your new grandpa?”

“It’s not that… I am sure he’d make for a great grandfather figure. Just that I am already done with developing as a person… spiritually at least. I don’t really need any sort of parental figure. If he wanted to just be friends and hang out from time-to-time things would be so much simpler. For now, I just want to focus on what is directly ahead of us.”

I still needed a sixth member for my team since it was a no go to reveal Victini to the public. The earlier I caught another fire type the better. Lavaridge had plenty of slugma crawling around, but even if I had gotten over my innate fear of snail and slug Pokémon it just didn’t feel right with me to have one on my team. This being Hoenn my other options would be to ask for one of the gym’s Pokémon or chance the safari zone.

The first option wounded my pride as a trainer, not only relying on gym funds but also to plead for an extra Pokémon went a step too far for me. As for the second option…

Hoenn’s safari zone was basically a revolving door for foreign Pokémon. If rangers came across nonnative Pokémon they would be caught and swiftly relocated, eventually ending up inside that place. I had little to no knowledge of what kind of Pokémon were currently in there. The safari keepers didn’t keep a log for others to peruse. Seemingly convinced that a sense of wonder was important for the visiting experience.

‘Whatever, let’s just register first.’

Over at the Pokémon center*

“Welcome to the Pokémon center. How may I help you?”

“Yes, I’d like to register for the Evergrande conference.”

“Registering this late in the season... Are you sure you're up for the challenge, young man?” Just the travel times alone will make this extra challenging.”

“That’s okay I am sure that if I work fast enough, I’ll have enough time to qualify for the Hoenn league championship. I’ve already caught most of my team.”

“In that case, may I have your trainer’s license please? Also there are some forms you will have to fill out.”

I handed over my license and nurse Joy in return gave me a set of registration forums. It was mostly standard stuff like; emergency contact details, sponsorship details, a waiver of liability form and morbidly enough who gets responsibility for my Pokémon in the case of my death.

‘Arceus! Does that last one really need to be put in there? I’ll be perfectly safe as long as I have my team with me. I wasn’t planning to go off route in any case.’

After I was done filling in all those documents I handed them back over to nurse Joy, who after checking the legitimacy of my trainer’s license handed my ID back to me.

“All finished, I hope to see you competing in the Ever Grande Conference this year.”

“Nurse Joy, could I also book a room for tonight? Also, my Numel just evolved today, could you give him a once over and look to see if there were any complications?”

I left Numsy with nurse Joy and went to use the computers in the media room. I still had to fulfill a promise I made to someone important. After sitting down I logged on the official league website and looked up the contact details for the Fortree City gym. Apparently, they didn’t accept calls; the only thing listed was an email account.

Dear Gym staffer who reads this,

Recently I journeyed through Unova and while there I picked up competitively minded Tranquill on one of the routes. She challenged any passing trainer she could spot in the hopes of finding a partner, but sadly none were interested because her species is so common there. After being convinced by one of my own partners, I brought her along with me back to Hoenn. She is still looking for a trainer. Would anyone working at the Foretree gym be interested?

Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,

Egon from Lavaridge Town

P.s. I specialize in fire types otherwise I’d have caught her for myself in a heartbeat.

‘It’ll have to do. I hope this works.’

“Of course, it will! Tranquill is the best!”

After shutting down the computer I planned on doing something else that I have been staving off since the landing back in Hoenn.

“Let’s practice teleportation Tini!”

Moments later inside a center dorm room*

After using the technical machine on Victini I threw it away. These older models from Silph Co are one time use only. Not like my Sunny Day TM which I still had stuffed in one of my backpack's hidden compartments. Victini was doing some mental gymnastics to process the sudden influx of information while me and the rest of the team minus Numsy watched on with mild bemusement.

“Okay, according to this pamphlet short range teleportation is easier so let’s start with that. You need to strongly visualize the place where you want to teleport to. Hmmm… Try going from here to the adjoining bathroom.”

“Vi!” “Easy!”

Victini completely disappeared in an instant leaving only sparkles behind. To check to see if it worked, I opened the bathroom door to look for Victini. At quick glance was all it took to confirm she didn’t manage to get herself inside the bathroom.

“You guys, come help me look for Tini, she shouldn’t have gotten far.”

Just like that we got to work looking for our errant rabbit. Pokémon had much keener senses than humans and since my team was intimately familiar with this specific scent, I was hoping that Glove and Rena could find her before she got into any trouble. I was completely forgetting one fact before committing to this line of action. Teleportation didn’t leave any scent trails behind to follow. After twenty minutes of not finding her, I started freaking out.

‘What if she accidentally teleported herself inside someone’s home? Her cover will be blown, she’ll be captured, kidnapped and experimented upon! Her genetic material will be used to manufacture some kind of battle clone, which will eventually shake off the leash of its enslavers and try to take over the world!’

“Dar!”

“What is it, Glove?”

My Darmanitan was pointing its finger towards the backpack sitting at the other end of the room.

Somehow, every few seconds or so it wobbled a bit. Already growing suspicious I made my way over quietly moving on so as to not produce any sounds. Slowly I pulled down the zipper and my eyes leveled at large blue ones looking up at me playfully. Through some weird psychic type shenanigans instead of teleporting to the bathroom Victini managed to cram herself into the cooler box where I kept my freshly bought custap berries.

“…”

“…Woops😉”

“Tini...”

“Sorry! I was hungry. I was planning on going to the bathroom…”

“What am I going to do with you?”

I picked her up and placed her on my lap. Absentmindedly stroking her fluffy ears.

“You know I bought those custap berries for you right? Eventually you would have gotten to eat them. If you do it early you won’t have any to eat later, I am not going to buy any extra just for you. That’d be unfair for the rest of the team.”

“I only ate two.”

“Then you’ll have to be frugal with the remaining three. Until we get back to Lavaridge. Aside from that… congratulations with your first ever use of teleportation. I knew you could do it.

“I am amazing right?”

“Yep, I am especially proud of you for teaching flame charge to Numsy on your own initiative. That's what great team members do.”

It was getting dark outside. Today has been an eventful first day back in my home region. I was still suffering from jetlag. So, it’d be best to fix my sleeping schedule keeping a sharp mind for tomorrow’s trek through route 110.

Since I couldn’t afford to rent a bike, we would have to go through the tall grass to reach our destination. Entering the seaside cycling road without a bike is prohibited. Wild Pokémon tended to avoid the cycling road, and because of the relative safety it was the hang out spot for biker gangs. The gangs challenged passing trainers to Pokémon battles and if you didn’t accept, they’d block you from advancing. By the time authorities got word of these forced challenges it had become a permanent fixture of the cycling road. Biker battles being the main reason trainers visited the bridge. Also, the biker gangs did avoid pressing their luck, only targeting young trainers leaving children and the elderly in peace. I wasn’t as interested in battling those hooligans since I was once again on a tight schedule.

After practicing teleport some more with Victini I was reasonably sure she mastered short distance teleportation. I went back downstairs to the reception desk to retrieve Numsy from nurse Joy’s care. She informed that he was perfectly healthy and in great condition. She did caution me to not let him walk around the city unsupervised. Camerupt were slow to anger but if it did happen while I wasn’t there to return him to his ball the city council would hold me personally liable for any injuries and property damage caused by the species signature move eruption.

Technically speaking Numsy should be capable of performing that move with only little training, but I wasn’t stupid enough to let him do so while inside the confines of a city. Even on the routes you still had the danger of unintentionally hitting wild Pokémon or passing strangers. The magma shooting out of a camerupt could travel as far two miles out. The only actual safe place to practice would be at the Lavaridge gym. Mr. Moore had a special area solely for that purpose.

“Tomorrow, we set out for Mauville city through route 110 and after winning a dynamo badge, we’ll head back to Lavaridge. For now, let’s go to bed early. There is a 12-hour time zone difference between Hoenn and Unova so we need to go to sleep even if we don’t feel like it. Our bodies need time to adjust to a different time zone.”

After a quick shower I crept inside one of the bunk beds provided by the Pokémon center. All my other Pokémon either chose to rest inside their poké balls or sleep on top of the bed with me.

‘Normally Numsy would be laying on top of my feet. It’s weird that he’s now too big to sleep outside of his ball. Eh, hopefully he won’t get too lonely stuck inside of his ball all by himself…’