NOVEL WEB Chapter 12: Getting harder
They trained like that for a week. Rattata shored up his strong points even further and Joey finally had a baseline established for Metapod. It was an interesting challenge to train such an immobile Pokemon immediately after having trained a Pokemon completely reliant on their speed.
Where Rattata had Quick Attack to deal damage and to manoeuvre, Metapod had Harden to mitigate damage and to shore up her defences.
Rattata could use Detect to dodge ranged attacks? Metapod could block them quite decently with String Shot.
The only point that the two Pokemon intersected on was their use of a biting attack.
Hyper Fang was becoming an incredibly deadly weapon, while Bug Bite would make all enemies think twice before they engaged Metapod in a melee from the front.
The biggest issue naturally remained the fact that Metapod could not move. If she could have just been a tiny bit mobile, then she would become a dangerous adversary.
However, currently, the only possibility was to pull herself along terrain with String Shot, or if the opponents were dumb enough to not detach the String Shot which was being used to bring them closer to the Bug Bite.
Like a harpoon, kind of.
Not like there had been any enemies of course. While Joey had started saving in preparation for his trip to Celadon, wanting to afford as many TMs as possible, he hadn't been challenging any trainers. It would have been a good source of income, but only if he'd used Rattata. The money was worth less than making his new team member feel included, however, so he'd decided to focus on training.
All in all, it had also been an important time in which he'd integrated the temperamental bug-type into his team. She and Rattata had now slept in the same room, ate together, watched battle reviews together and all sorts of bonding activities. They were essentially good colleagues, on their way to becoming friends.
A few frantic squeaks made Joey look towards his two Pokemon training, seeing once again the common scene of Rattata encased in a ball of String Shot, being pulled towards Metapod whose mouth was glowing with bug-type energy. Joey rolled his eyes and recalled his starter, the rat dematerializing from inside the cocoon and reappearing outside right next to it.
A trick he'd figured out after cutting out the rat manually a few too many times. "Good job," he praised. "Considering you couldn't stay out of the ball for half an hour at the beginning of the week, one hour is probably as good as we're going to get."
This sounded like a plan to change the training regimen, which didn't escape Metapod, who had been looking up into the sky with a distinct feeling of pride at once again having trumped the rat.
"Me, me, meta?" she questioned and slowly turned towards Joey.
"We're going to have a meeting with the poison TE specialist today. I think it's as good a benchmark as any to shift up our training plan. Rattata has perhaps gotten the most out of Detect that he can currently," Joey explained, pointing to the exhausted starter whose eyes were clearly under strain from all the fighting TE being channelled through them.
"And you," he started, turning back to the Metapod, "should really start working on reeling in opponents and flying towards them with String Shot. This past week has done wonders in the efficiency with which you discharge and shape the material, now it's time to start making it into a real threat when we consider Bug Bite as a part of your repertoire. We might even go battle some trainers soon," he said tentatively, feeling that Metapod would at least be good enough to beat some youngsters.
The Bug Bite did damage, the Harden worked and the use of String Shot had gone from proficient to straight-out artistic. One week of focused training would do that to anyone, especially to a relatively young Pokemon still in the developmental stage of their recent evolution.
"Metapod," the bug said proudly. Joey curiously noted that she looked bigger than she had at the start of the week. She was eating a lot, and using up all that material equally as fast. Perhaps some of that went into growing larger?
Had anyone ever tried to see if a Metapod would grow if evolution was suspended? Intentionally, that was, ignoring the incompetents who evolved their Caterpie but couldn't go to the butterfree stage yet with their amount of badges.
Joey shook his head. "Anyway, I'll recall you both now and go to the Pokecentre. We wouldn't want to be late, after all." He recalled both his 'mon and stepped out of the training square, which he was alone in today.
Mia hadn't been able to make it, having some previous engagements with her parents. It was in times like these that Joey was really grateful for being an orphan. He didn't know how he would have managed two overly concerned adults running after him babbling about his welfare and forcing him to attend family activities.
He imagined the scenes in his head and cringed. 'No Joey, no training ghost-type energy unsupervised until you're well on your journey, you have to be careful with things like that. You can't stay up late watching battles just because it's educational, that won't prevent your eyes from becoming square. No son of mine will be a youngster, do you know that trainers statistically end up getting more sponsorships?'
"Horrible," he muttered as he exited the training area only to find himself facing an eerily similar scene.
Just like how Michael had caught him once exiting a gate to challenge him to a battle… Leaning against the wall and throwing a Pokeball up and down in his hand. Well, he was now facing a brown-haired boy in a karate gi doing the same thing.
"I've been trying to find you all week," Hitoshi started with a strained smirk. "I thought you were supposed to be a 'losing battles in the public fields' enthusiast? Too scared to show your face after you cheated your way to the badge?" he demanded, some anger seeping into his tone.
Joey for his part simply tilted his head. "Excuse me, do I know you?"
Hitoshi ran red in the face and jumped in front of Joey so that he was blocking the cobbled road leading back to the city proper. The tall buildings stretched up high above him, making the boy seem insignificant and small, which he was.
"No one disrespects fighting types like that on my watch! I challenge you to a battle!"
It all just sounded like flies buzzing to Joey, but he generally would have accepted the challenge, curious to find out what specific counter-strategy had been worked out against Rattata.
But he had an appointment. "Can we do it next week? I kinda have stuff going on tbh," Joey replied while theatrically picking at his ear with a pinky.
Hitoshi, if possible, ran even more red in the face, starting to look mightily like his starter.
"Face me like a man!" he shouted. The kid could really be grateful that the street was empty since people didn't like to train that much on Sundays.
"Bro, take the no," Joey said, also starting to get annoyed at the circumstances. Why were men always so pushy? He wondered, before sighing as Hitoshi released a Pokemon onto the floor, revealing a Tyrogue which took on a fighting stance against Joey.
"That's illegal, you dumbass," the youngster mumbled, before letting ghost energy seep through his body. Not enough to be noticeable, but enough to create a discomforting aura. "Next Sunday, 6pm, fields," he said to the now slightly pale Hitoshi and the uncomfortable-looking Tyrogue.
Joey understood why they were uncomfortable. His voice was raspy when infused with distortion, and held a strange laughing and echoing quality. He turned around and walked back to where he'd come from, disappearing into the first shadow once he was out of sight.
He reappeared elsewhere.
An abandoned alleyway a few dozen metres away, empty, thankfully, other than the Meowth that took one look at him from where it was foraging in the trash and ran away.
For all that Saffron was a city that had a high quality of life, it was nice to see that some dirty alleyways still existed. Normalised the whole thing somewhat. And while it was dark and sometimes grungy, it never smelled like urine, which Joey took as a personal win. He exited the alley and started walking towards the Pokecentre, letting go of the distortion and becoming fully human again.
He wondered why the city was so empty today, noting that even on the main street now. He barely passed more than a dozen people per minute. A pathetic amount for a city this big. He looked up at the sky, blue and sunny and realised why everyone was gone.
School children were on one of their two-week long vacations since two days ago, which meant that their parents had likely taken them on some sort of trip. Either to Celadon to do some shopping, see some traditional dance, or to Vermillion, to have a day at the sea.
Joey considered his own life. Rest was only taken as a necessary function in between sessions of training his Pokemon, widening their horizons, and some personal improvement. Vacations didn't exist. And weekends were just another day.
Everything for just one goal.
To be the best.
He wondered how life felt to the ambitionless. Those common existences who just floated from hobby to hobby, job to job, relationship to relationship. Trying to find meaning in following the current. Like jellyfish.
He couldn't remember how it felt, it was all just a distant memory by now.
Despite all the claims people made about how valuable a common existence could be.
How fulfilling.
Joey couldn't really make himself believe that anything of value had been lost.
He kept walking.
-/-
The cool air of the Pokecentre hit him like a slap in the face when he entered the building, and it was only then that he realised how hot it had grown to be outside. He'd gotten used to ignoring the small uncomfortable aspects of daily life. Those that affected his so-called physical body.
The centre was busier than the city surrounding it. Trainers generally took time off in the winter, when the season was on break. Joey nodded to some people he knew as he made his way to the counter where he greeted nurse Joy. She wasn't attending to anyone at the moment so there wasn't a line.
"You're a bit early," the pink-haired woman said with a smile but nevertheless led him into the backrooms. Towards the same lounge, he'd been "interrogated" in by the rangers.
"Being on time is being late," Joey replied easily. "Busy week?" he asked.
She shook her head. "Not as much as it looks like. Trainers like to stay at Pokecentre's in big cities for at least a week as they prepare for the gym. Well, serious ones at least."
"I too find functioning showers incredibly attractive," Joey joked.
"Ugh, some of the people that come in here," the nurse said while rolling her eyes. "They would really profit from having a water-type. Or two."
Joey sniffed the air, noting that they were approaching something quite smelly. He narrowed his eyes at the nurse who didn't seem to react.
"Is one of those legendary trainers waiting for us in the lounge?" he asked and saw as she cracked a grin and shook her head.
They entered the lounge and the smell intensified. It was like a mixture of rotting garbage, human faeces and puke. Utterly disgusting. Joey stealthily channelled some distortion into his nose, disintegrating the appendage and leaving behind only a gaseous illusion of one. His respect for Nurse Joy grew as the woman refused to pull a face, despite not having the advantages Joey had. Presumably.
Nurse Joy were as beautiful as they were mysterious.
"The person I'm supposed to meet isn't here yet?" he asked curiously as he looked around the lounge, plush armchairs and coffee tables, and plants. There was no one here. But if so, where was the smell coming from? He could still sense it, abstractly. It just didn't bother him.
Nurse Joy frowned. "That's odd, I thought they already arrived," she said and looked around as if a person would magically appear.
Something was off, Joey felt, but he just couldn't pin down what. While Nurse Joey continued standing there, looking around in confusion, he started making his way to where the smell was coming from. It seemed to be originating from the furthest corner of the room. Right next to a potted palm tree. He stalked towards the source, but couldn't find anything.
"Have we had any Muk, or Grimer infestations in Saffron recently?" he asked aloud while he continued looking around. Under chairs, under sofas, and between the floorboards.
"Not that I can remember. Saffron is usually very removed from such things. Muk, Wheezing, Arbok, they usually never appear around here" Nurse Joy said with a shake of her head. "Thankfully you were the one who met the one at the south gate. It could have turned really badly. How did you manage to kill it, by the way?" she asked.
Joey froze and let a possibility tumble around his head, before letting it out. There were a lot of possible reasons why the room stank to all hell. But the likeliest was the presence of a Grimer or a Muk. However, those slimy beasts weren't easy to hide. But, they did know how to use Minimize, which was a move that worked exactly the way it sounded.
"I guess we can stop searching, for the source of the smell and the person who's coming," he concluded, throwing a sideways glance at the nurse.
"What do you mean?" she asked while tilting her head.
"I mean, that you're the person I'm supposed to meet," Joey said.
The woman shook her head. "What are you talking about, Joey? I'm a nurse, not a poison-type expert."
"Nurse Joy would never have left the reception unmanned for longer than a minute and I didn't see you call on a replacement. She knows perfectly well I'm capable of waiting in a room on my own, so she would have left with the instruction for me to wait once we came here and found nobody. Also, from what I know, she doesn't have the information that I killed the Arbok. And most importantly. She wouldn't care how I did it," Joey rationalised with narrow eyes. In most other situations his hand would have gone to his poke-ball. However, if the poison-type expert was who he suspected they were, then his best bet if the situation turned sideways would just be to Shadow Sneak out of there.
"If I'm not Nurse Joy, then who am I?" the person said, cutely putting a finger to their chin as if trying to ponder on their own identity.
"You could be anyone, really, but the only person I know who fits the description is Koga, the gym leader of Fuchsia. That or one of his gym-trainers," Joey said boldly.
"Well done," the nurse suddenly said in a manly voice, which was disconcerting as fuck and made Joey frown. The person wearing the woman's face put up a hand to their face and gripped with all fingers, before pulling off the entirety of their face, and their body. The dramatic gesture revealed a serious-looking man in a purple ninja outfit with an orange scarf covering the lower side of their face. He looked to be around thirty and going by his dark green hair it was definitely Koga. In his right hand, he held a Ditto, which he promptly recalled back into a Pokeball.
"What gave me away?" he asked without any particular curiosity.
"The Grimer or Muk hiding in this room with a maxed-out minimize," Joey said. "I already noted that you weren't Nurse Joy, but there being such an iconic poison-type in the room narrowed down who I was dealing with. It's not a Pokemon many people train. I'm sure there are others out there with disguise capabilities and poison types, but you're the only person I know by name, ergo, my only possible guess. It helps that you're probably the foremost poison expert in the region."
"Decent reasoning," the man said as he elegantly sat down on one of the chairs. The motion was fluid. Disgustingly so. Almost as if the man was made out of gelatine given form, rather than blood and bones.
"You made a lot of mistakes, naturally. But you're young."
"What did I screw up?" Joey asked. Wondering about why the man was being so nice. From what he remembered he had a reputation as a hard-ass. Maybe it helped that Joey looked, and was twelve years old. It likely gave him some allowances others wouldn't get.
"The moment you saw me not organising a replacement for the reception you should have been on high alert. It's supposed to always be manned. Similarly, if you'd looked around better you would have seen through the windows that all the treatment rooms were empty, thus the smell couldn't have been from a Grimer or Muk currently being healed. However, you still just walked into a room possibly containing one and started looking for it. They're not always benign Pokemon and a muk can smother a person even unintentionally," the man explained. "You also didn't call for help the moment you realised you were in a room with an unknown intent on deceiving you, and who was blocking the only exit." He closed his eyes. "I guess allowances can be made considering you're distorted. Hard to nail down a ghost," he said, causing Joey to tense.
"Yeah, well. I don't have any reason at the moment to suspect that anyone is coming for me, so I haven't gone full paranoid yet."
"Foolish," Koga replied. "It is exactly at times like these that you are the most vulnerable, when you don't know if there's a threat or not."
"They autopsied the Arbok, didn't they?" Joey asked with a grimace. "It's how you know I'm distorted. The shadow ball that killed it."
The ninja nodded. "It is the first and most logical conclusion. No matter how odd it may sound to some. None of your Pokemon know the move. The ranger who crash-landed on the corpse did not report any other presence. The fact you're not physically retching at the smell is the last piece of the puzzle. I strongly suspected, you confirmed. It's one of the reasons why I provisionally accepted this task."
"It does seem a bit high profile for a gym leader to go to another city and help a youngster evolve their Metapod," Joey mused. "Although, maybe you were already here in the first place, doing something else."
"Perhaps, but my role gives me access to a designated Alakazam whose only job is to teleport me where I want to go. It makes any assumptions you make moot," the man said with a smirk.
Joey rolled his eyes. It was extremely obvious that Koga had been pulled to Saffron to investigate, or at least to consult on the Arbok issue. It didn't matter, however. He'd been expecting some egg-head that studied poison types, this was much better.
"I'm not ungrateful," Joey said with a shrug, refocusing on the actual topic at hand. "I couldn't have asked for a more competent expert, so I guess I'm glad I shadow-balled that Arbok in the end," he mused.
Koga slowly blinked, idly recalling the Muk in a flash of red from where it had been hidden. "You're not bothered about this being known?" he asked.
"I'm gonna be the champion one day, small stuff like this doesn't really matter. Also, there is a psychic girl in Saffron who holds powers magnitudes more deep and alarming than my own. The only reason why she would be able to run around freely as she is and I wouldn't is if there was some sort of bias at play against ghost TE affected people. However, considering the rich tradition of training ghosts in Lavender Town, one of our most culturally significant and revered landmarks; in addition to Agatha being our strongest elite four currently, I don't really think I have anything to be worried about," Joey explained.
Koga kept a calm face throughout all of this but had a rather frustrated air about him.
Once the youngster was done the man completed a large exhale. "You base your decision-making off of assumptions," he critiqued.
"Hey, I'm twelve, if you're looking for a philosophical debate on epistemological methodology you should probably talk to someone else," Joey retorted.
He liked playing the child card every now and again. While he could have retorted to Koga that every belief, no matter how empirically proven, was just an assumption, as humans did not in fact know if their minds remained uninfluenced by some sort of evil god-like entity, he didn't feel like going into that at the moment.
Koga would have likely argued that if this theoretical entity existed it would be so powerful that one couldn't go against it anyway, and thus one was only left in believing that the world was what it portrayed itself to be. He then would have added that due diligence in information gathering increased the likelihood of correct information, and thus decreased the risk factor of decisions made on this information.
Joey's tongue-in-cheek argument would have been that due diligence in information gathering hit a point of low return at some point and that the time could have been better invested in training one's Pokemon. Simple power often made up for bad decision-making.
Anyway, at the end of the day, Koga would have concluded that Joey was precocious and would learn once he got bitten in the ass, while Joey would conclude that the assumption he had about Koga being a hard-ass was correct.
"Perhaps," the man muttered. "Regardless, I'm here to discuss your Metapod." He seemed to think for a second. "It's been concluded that poison-type energy is best suited for degrading the Everstone in your Metapod's stomach. I did initially suggest simply making the Metapod throw up, but we determined from the initial scans that the Everstone was lodged too deep for that. A psychic Pokemon can't simply teleport it out due to the issues involved in Metapod's bug-typing, so this is indeed the easiest solution."
"Butterfree can learn poison powder at some point, and it doesn't gain a poison typing upon evolving. There must be some predilection towards the type. In fact, almost all bug-type Pokemon can learn poison moves," Joey mused.
"That makes it easier of course," Koga agreed. "Additionally Metapod are quite similar in structure to Kakuna. The only real difference between the two is that the former is preparing to develop some slight psychic potential while the latter is not."
The man pulled out a small see-through case with a disk within, from somewhere. His sleeve? "Do you know how technical machines work?"
Joey nodded. "Memories and impressions from a Pokemon using the move given digital form. They're bound by a bunch of electrode connectors as they use it. The equipment records the brain waves and the energy fluctuations before the scientists in charge manually encode that information into readable software."
The gym leader looked at him blankly for a few seconds, without speaking, before nodding.
"You probably also know why that same process doesn't work on a Pokemon just cycling around the TE they are proficient in." He stated, but waited as if it were a question.
The youngster furrowed his brows while he thought. He leaned back in his chair and scratched at his chin. "Moves are emblematic, symbolic and shared between different species. They are essentially already a piece of mental software. Two different Pokemon using the same move will structurally result in the same thing. Also, moves are changes to the status quo when they are used, whereas using type energy is just as natural as breathing. I assume the first issue would be that moves create a change in the brain waves and the energy that is easier to detect than just exerting TE. The second is that a move is already technically a mental construct, making it easier to convert that to digital form. TE simply is, and worst of all, one's usage of it can be very individual."
"Wouldn't it be impressive if one could convert into a technical machine the way a champion-level Pokemon uses their type energy to strengthen their body? It's not necessarily that they use more energy, it's that they become better at it. In terms of the quantity of energy available, it wouldn't be an issue," Koga suggested, causing Joey to snort.
"Let me guess what happened when the egg-heads at Silph tried that one out. They probably took a Rattata, since they're the most disposable and their normal typing makes everything a bit more predictable. They took the TE mastery off a Snorlax or something. Big and impressive, they'd love it. They loaded the information onto the Rattata and the sudden increase in TE usage quality made all of its muscles, tendons and bones just break under the pressure."
"Explode," Koga corrected in a neutral tone. "All of its muscles, tendons, and bones exploded. Along with its head for that matter."
"Awesome," Joey deadpanned, trying not to imagine the scene in his mind. Rattata's Pokeball at his belt shook a bit, seeming slightly nervous. He calmly gripped it trying to convey to his Pokemon that he'd never allow that to be done to him. "But I imagine there's a loophole, or else you wouldn't be telling me all of this while holding that," he said and pointed to the technical machine. It had a glint of purple.
"What can be done in terms of technical machines and type energy is to record as crude a possible usage to introduce a Pokemon to typing they are unfamiliar with. This already happens with the standard machines as they teach a move and the energy necessary to use it. Essentially, it's a step back, so naturally, these sorts of things aren't being produced."
"Custom make," Joey muttered, before grinning. "I love free healthcare. Can't imagine going without it."
Koga gave him a queer look. "All healthcare is free, it's the definition of healthcare," he said. Then he shook his head to refocus on the topic. "Anyway, there are still risks involved in using such a machine. We took the energy usage mastery off of the weakest Weedle we could find in Viridian forest, but incompatibility could still cause physical harm. We would be forcing the development of a type-energy at an evolutionary stage where it's not supposed to happen yet."
"How high is the risk exactly?" Joey asked warily.
"Death? Zero," Koga replied. "Injuries necessitating a longer recovery period? Not inconsequential."
Joey furrowed his brows. "I'll have to ask Metapod. She's smart enough to understand which risk makes it not worth it for her to evolve."
"The possibility of your Pokemon needing longer to recover is small. Shouldn't you be making this decision as its trainer?" Koga asked coldly, leaning forward and putting his chin on his hands.
Joey looked at him with the look he reserved for particularly dumb children. "No?" he stated, with a tone that implied that the gym leader was stupid for asking.
"Good." The man nodded. "Anyway, Shed Skin lowers the probability of issues occurring, and we developed an acclimatisation method which should further reduce risk." A purple marble-looking thing fell out of the man's sleeve. About the size of an apple.
"This is a Toxic Orb, whichever Pokemon holds it, becomes poisoned," he explained. "It should acclimatize Metapod to poison-type energy, while its Shed Skin should prevent the damage from becoming too bad. Perhaps it will develop the ability to use poison-type energy just from this alone."
Joey crossed his arms. "So, first we make Metapod hold the Toxic Orb, it would be preferable if she didn't swallow it this time. Then after a while, we use the TM and make her meditate on introducing poison TE to the area where the stone is?" he asked.
"No, she will use the machine under my supervision and the supervision of the poison-type energy mentor which I have assigned to the case. The goal is to produce poison-type energy in the stomach and degrade the stone" Koga corrected.
"I assume I should keep a logbook of developments?"
Koga blinked slowly, twice, before shaking his head, and then nodding it. "Yes, that would be helpful. The league would transcribe it and put it into the internal database for such cases. There are likely some professors who would find the attempt interesting and it might help future poison-type experts to develop new methods."
"There's a database for TE research?" Joey asked, genuinely surprised he hadn't heard about this. All of his looking into the topic had happened through public forums and reading books.
"Yes, trainers generally gain access to such material after the 8th badge. It's restricted so that civilians and beginners don't blow themselves up trying to teach moves like Explosion or Thunder. However, all of the results end up in books anyway. I thought that was public knowledge," the man muttered with a constipated look on his face.
"Maybe I slept through that class. But I'd definitely appreciate having access to that," Joey muttered. "I know that research is always decades ahead of published literature."
"You'll have to wait until your 8th badge. Or prove your maturity with your own contribution to the archive," Koga said undaunted by the non-straightforward question.
"Alright, so should we get started with the Toxic Orb?" Joey asked, lightly touching Metapod's Pokeball at his belt.
Koga nodded. "Send out your Pokemon and let's have it touch the Toxic Orb. It's important to do this under supervision the first time in case something goes wrong. I have antidotes at hand for the worst case, and Nurse Joy is on standby."
The green crescent-shaped bug Pokemon on the floor of the lounge, excitedly shouting its name as it appeared. Joey addressed her. "The situation is simple. Before we can use a technical machine to help you learn to wield poison-type TE we need to first acclimatise you to the feeling of being poisoned," Joey explained. Metapod, for all that she could not nod, nodded. "It's simple really, we'll keep poisoning you until you can handle it better. Shed Skin, your ability, should mostly take care of that, but otherwise, we have antidotes. I don't know how long this step will take, but it doesn't matter in the end, does it, since we have to go through it anyway."
"MetaMetapod!" the Pokemon agreed loudly, at the same time as Koga said,
"Three months on average to get a decent immunity. Seven poisonings a day."
"You heard the man," Joey said as he stretched out a hand he'd covered in cloth for the Toxic Orb. Koga unceremoniously gave it to him. "Just don't swallow this one," the youngster said with a laugh and handed the orb to his Pokemon, who blushed but opened her mouth to gently bite down on the orb.
It looked kind of dumb, just having a Metapod with a purple shiny ball in its mouth getting stared at by one adult man dressed like an actual ninja, and one youngster. Thankfully they didn't have to wait too long as purple veins of poison quickly spread out from the point of contact, Metapod's mouth, to the rest of the body, until they criss-crossed the whole carapace. Joey quietly removed the Toxic Orb and watched as Metapod's face strained at the pain she must have been feeling. However, to her credit, she didn't cry out once during the one minute it took for her Shed Skin to get rid of the poisoning effect, the purple veins slowly receding back where they'd come from.
"Seems to work," Joey said and looked up. But Koga was gone as if he'd never been there. Noticing a note and some antidotes on the table he stashed away the latter and read the former.
Seven times a day minimum, call me in three months
XX XXXX XXXXX XXX (Share this number with anyone and I'm sending out my personal team when you come to Fuchsia)
Koga
"Can't quite decide if it's cringe or cool to be a grown-ass man and still be running around dressed like a ninja," the youngster muttered as he got up to leave the Pokecentre.
"Come on Metapod, let's poison you a bit more somewhere else."
"Metapod!"