Unbroken Disguise

The group ended up staying in Oreburgh for about a week in total. Ash’s Pokemon needed the time to heal up properly, and N was glad to see that Aipom had fully recovered and Turtwig was looking much better. While the crack in his shell couldn’t be completely fixed until he evolved, it was barely noticeable after Nurse Joy and her team of healers had had a go at it. The browning had been replaced by fresh green, and the missing leaf on his head had grown back.

That’s not to say that he wasn’t still upset about the fact that the Pokemon had sustained those injuries at all, but he didn’t think he was going to convince all trainers to give up their way of life so easily. Ash’s reasoning, and supposedly the League’s, did have some sort of logic behind it, even if he found it disturbing. Even if he found his own future plans disturbing…

But his discontent with the state of the world was pushed out of his mind when he was reminded of another unpleasant truth that had been revealed to him.

The utterly ridiculous way that Sinnoh had their Gyms set up.

They had travelled through the Oreburgh Gate once more, and he found his second trip in the caverns to be just as unpleasant as the first. Now making their way down route 203 in reverse, he could at least busy himself with the scenery. He wasn’t quite sure of the details, but Brock, who was apparently the only one that could be trusted with a map out of the other humans in their group, had said something about people taking different paths depending on which direction they were heading in.

It seemed a bit odd to him, but he supposed that even the routes in Unova had their oddities.

While this meant that he unfortunately didn’t get the chance to see his Cubone friend once more, at least for now, he could at least content himself with the fact that he was getting to see new Pokemon that apparently didn’t frequent the areas he had already been to.

Case in point, the Pachirisu that Dawn was keeping herself occupied with. A small white thing with blue stripes and a tail bigger than its body, the one feature that stuck out was the yellow cheek pouches. With how much Pokemon of other types differed, he found it odd that so many Electric types shared that feature. Emolga, Pikachu, Pachirisu… at this rate he wouldn’t be surprised to learn that it was even more common than that.

Although… perhaps “keeping herself occupied” was a bit of an overstatement. The blue haired girl had been sitting down a few feet away from it for a while now, just staring at it. Even if she couldn’t understand the Pokemon’s replies, you would think that she’d at least try talking to it. Staring at a Pokemon like some sort of creep wasn’t exactly a great way to make new friends.

And then she tried to catch it.

How disappointing.

Especially since she was doing such a poor job of it. Pachirisu was practically running circles arou- actually, make that literally running circles around her team. It was far too fast for Piplup or Buneary to catch up with.

“Uh, N?” Mimikyu spoke up from his shoulder.

“Yes?”

“I think ya might wanna back off a bit.”

Taking his friend’s word for it, he started backing away, leaving his travelling companions to their fate. “Would you mind telling me why I’m doing this?”

“Well, if memory serves, then Pachirisu learn-”

The little ghost’s words were cut off by giant arcs of electricity sprouting off in all directions from the small Electric type. And since they were currently in an empty field… his group found themselves serving as lightning rods.

Luckily for them, Pachirisu seemed to be treating this whole scenario as a game, and they were only lightly shocked.

“...Discharge… Are they gonna be alright?” Mimikyu asked with a bit of concern in his voice.

The humans hit by the attack probably weren’t at any risk of dying, seeing as Pachirisu had held back massively, but that sort of shock probably wasn’t good for their hearts.

“We should probably have them get checked out when we reach Jubilife, just to be safe.”

The duo watched on as the group recovered, and Dawn managed to catch the tired out Pokemon.

“Ash mentioned that he didn’t get along with Pikachu when they first met, right? Surely he and Brock are familiar with the dangers associated with Electric types.”

“...I cer’ainly hope so.”

Was she really cut out for this whole coordinator thing?

Ever since she started, which, admittedly wasn’t actually that long ago, she’d kept reassuring herself that things would work out because she needed them to. She couldn’t be a failure. Not with the reputation her mom had. What would people think if a woman like that raised a loser?

But moments like this really made her doubt her capabilities. Saying “no need to worry” didn’t actually make her worries go away.

Pachirisu was a perfect Pokemon for contests. Small, cute, flashy attacks, what more could a girl ask for?

Compatibility, apparently.

Ash and Brock seemed convinced that things were working out well between them, but it definitely didn’t feel that way. Just the capture had been a struggle, and then training had been a disaster! Somehow training Pachirisu to use its moves in a way more fitting for contests had turned into a chase across the entire field involving not only the rest of her team, but also all of Ash’s team as well! And even with his help, they’d only reigned the Electric type in because it had exhausted itself.

All the while, N watched on with disapproving eyes.

Maybe she needed to release Pachirisu. Dragging it along on a journey with her wouldn’t really be fair to either of them if this is all either of them would get out of it.

But was she ready to accept that?

Not really, but what was she meant to do! She was out of her depth here, and she didn’t know who to turn to.

Ash was super nice, but the way he thought just didn’t make sense to her. He’d try to reassure her, but probably just say something about “being Pachirisu’s friend” that didn’t actually help her at all.

Brock was more experienced, and could probably give her more practical advice, but he had such a… he reminded her of her mother. In the way that he acted at least. Always trying to mother hen her… she was supposed to be on her journey! Striking out on her own! …even if she was travelling with a group… but still! She didn’t need a constant play by play of every battle! She had eyes and a Pokedex! She didn’t think he meant for it to come off like he thought she was some stupid kid, but it felt that way.

And if she struck those two off of the list…

Well, that only left N, didn’t it? The scary guy… who could talk to Pokemon.

That sort of made it obvious, didn’t it? And he didn’t seem to like her, so he wouldn’t lie and tell her it would all work out just to spare her feelings…

She didn’t feel prepared for this at all. But she needed to do it.

“...and I still don’t understand the difference between ‘wa’ and ‘ga’.” N lamented.

“‘Wa’ is used for emphasis.” Mimikyu replied.

“But what about this sentence right here!” N rebutted, pointing to a line in their textbook. “Aren’t they using ‘ga’ for emphasis in this line?”

“I… well, you see…” Mimikyu let out a sigh of defeat. “I mean, I typically use ‘wa’ after whatever subject would go at the start of the sen’ance, like ‘watashi wa’, ‘kare wa’, or whatever. Then I use ‘ga’ at the next point where one of ‘em is necessary…I dunno, man. They seem ta use ‘em interchangeably sometimes, I dunno how they expect people ta learn their stupid-”

“Hey, N? Could we talk?”

It seemed Dawn wanted to interrupt their study time, and given the fact that her dumb language was giving him a headache, he seriously considered just telling her no and ignoring her. But… this would give him more practical experience with it, maybe even clarify it for him since he was paying attention to it now.

“...sure. What do you want to talk about?” Now that he thought about it, it was strange for her to be approaching him. It’s not that they didn’t talk to each other at all, kind of hard to manage that with so few people in the group, but she seemed troubled and he fully expected to be the last person she went to with any problems she might have.

“It’s… well… it’s about Pachirisu.” She held a pokeball up between them, presumably the one containing the Electric type.

Assuming she was just struggling to find the words rather than playing some stupid game where he was supposed to guess the problem, he gave her a moment.

“I…” even after thinking, she stumbled over her words. “Do you think I should just release it?”

Now that was a good way to get his attention. “Release it?”

“It’s just… I don’t know what I’m doing. I only just started my journey, and things have worked out pretty well with Piplup and Buneary so far, but Pachirisu just… I feel totally clueless when dealing with it. You saw what happened. I get that problems pop up from time to time, but if that’s how a simple training session turns out… am I really fit to be Pachirisu’s trainer? Pachirisu seems like it would be happy to just run around all day, and if it were to travel with me…”

Well color him surprised. Perhaps he was making a positive impact on the world already! To think that a young trainer was considering voluntarily giving up their Pokemon…

“‘Ave ya asked for Pachirisu’s opinion?” Mimikyu chimed in.

Dawn just blinked at the little fairy. “Sorry, are you talking to me? I can’t understand you.”

Mimikyu sighed, reaching for a pen, but N stopped him. He did raise a good point after all, the least N could do was translate.

“He was wondering if you’d asked what Pachirisu thought of the matter.”

“I, well…” her stuttering made the answer rather obvious. “I was sort of hoping you might help me with that, since you can understand Pokemon…”

Sometimes he wondered if certain people saw him as anything other than a translator. But good behavior should be rewarded.

“I suppose I can do that. But Dawn…” he paused to consider how to phrase it for a naive child, “I want you to know… that it’s a very kind thing for you to do, considering what’s best for your Pokemon like this. There are a lot of trainers who consider what they themselves want, and go no further than that. They ignore the desires of the Pokemon with them…sometimes even their pain and suffering…”

“You mean like that jerk, Paul?” Dawn interrupted, a frown on her face.

“...I can’t say that I know the specifics of his situation, but that’s probably a safe assumption. In any case, regardless of what Pachirisu has to say, you should know that thinking about things like this, seriously considering letting a Pokemon go back into the wild just because it might be better for them… if all trainers were like that, I think the world would be a better place.” Perhaps if all trainers had a similar mindset, his goals would not be necessary. One could only dream.

Dawn blushed at the praise and let Pachirisu out of its ball.

With a yawn and a stretch, it only took a moment for the Pokemon to start scurrying around them.

“Are we playing again?! Last time was fun! I got to run and zap and run and dodge and run-” on and on the Electric type went, apparently quite the chatterbox. The high pitched, feminine voice was almost to the point of being grating, but not quite.

“That’s… interestin’.” Mimikyu commented. “I s’pose that sorta personality fits, in a way… but doesn’ she know Discharge? That should be a high level move an’ this seems a bit… childish…”

“Childish?!” The Pokemon stopped in front of N and Mimikyu. “Who are you calling childish? I’m probably older than you!”

“Is that so…?” Mimikyu replied, more confused than anything.

“I can understand why you’d be confused, what with my youthful appearance and beautiful, well maintained fur, but I’m actually… you know what, nevermind. Call me childish all you’d like. Your insults mean nothing to me. I’ll just have to show you up in the next game! I’ll run and dodge and run and-” off she went again, descending into a word salad that contained “run” far more than it should.

With Pachirisu’s appearance and demeanor, he struggled to tell if she was young and trying to put up an act of maturity, or old and trying to appear more youthful. In either case, she was failing at some level, and that just made sorting out the truth of the matter all the more confusing.

“Pachirisu.” N tried to rein her back in.

The Pokemon stopped in front of him. “Yes? Oh! You’re the human that understands Pokemon! Hey, how do-”

“Pachirisu.” He stopped her before she could get going again.”Dawn wants to have a serious talk with you.”

“A serious talk? So we’re not playing?” Her mood seemed to dampen at that realization, but she plopped down making herself comfortable on top of her tail. “Alright. What are we talking about?”

N nodded to Dawn, hoping that she would take the lead.

“Pachirisu… I’m thinking about releasing you.”

“Releasing me? Didn’t you already do that? I’m out of the ball right now?”

“Permanently.” N interrupted. “She means letting you go back into the wild. Not letting you out of your ball temporarily.”

“Oh…” Pachirisu turned towards Dawn, tilting her head to the side. “Why?” N repeated the question for her in League language.

“Pachirisu… you like to run and run… but I’m trying to be a coordinator. That means performing, and practicing acts, and some battling… and when I tried to get you to train with me, well, you caused some problems. I just… don’t think we have the same goals, and it might be better if we went our separate ways.”

“Huh? You mean we weren’t playing? Why didn’t you just say so?”

N, Dawn, and Mimikyu were left a bit confused by that.

“What do you mean?” Her trainer asked. “I let you out so we could do some training and-”

“But you didn’t say that! You just let me out! I thought we were playing! You never said anything about training!”

Mimikyu let out a deep sigh that N felt on a spiritual level, before turning back to their textbook, apparently done with the conversation. N translated for Dawn.

“Wait, you mean… but…” the young trainer stumbled over herself.

“Pachirisu.” N decided to get to the heart of the matter. “Am I correct in concluding that you’re perfectly fine with Dawn as a trainer, and that the incident earlier was caused by her not clarifying that you were training instead of… playing?”

“Hmmm… yep! That sounds about right!”

Dawn’s blush returned, and she quickly returned Pachirisu. She looked caught between relief that she wouldn’t have to release her Pokemon, and immense embarrassment over the situation. “I… um… thank you?” She cringed.

“Dawn.” N sighed. “Just… let’s forget this happened.”

All too eager to take that offer, she quickly ran off, presumably to actually get some training in with her new Pokemon.

“That was stupid.” N replayed the conversation in his head. “...and I still don’t know the difference between ‘wa’ and ‘ga’.” N sighed.

“Look, maybe there’s an example somewhere in ‘ere. Go to the glossary or somethin’.” Mimikyu began flipping through the pages.

Their question would go unanswered.

Jubilife shouldn’t be too much further away. N found himself wondering if the path they were on would converge with the one they’d taken eastward, or if it led to a different gate into the city that he hadn’t noticed during his first time there.

There wasn’t much else to focus on, walking down the trail like this. Or was it up the trail, since they were on the incline of a hill? The lack of Pokemon in the area had left him bored enough to be seriously considering such things.

As they began to approach the crest of the hill, the lush green grass started to give way to flowers, and they found themselves approaching a house. People living outside of established settlements wasn’t exactly common, but it wasn’t so rare that he found himself surprised to see it either.

What was surprising was the shadow that passed over them.

When the group looked up, they saw the underbelly of a huge blue Pokemon with four legs, a long tail, and great red wings. One of the few Pokemon that weren’t native to Unova, and yet N was familiar with all the same.

“A Salamence…” Mimikyu whispered from his shoulder.

But what would a Pokemon like that be doing here?

“Woah! Someone’s riding it!” Ash pointed out.

He was right. It was hard to make them out from where they stood, but there was a figure dressed in all black with their legs around the dragon’s neck.

“Salamence… Salamence… why does that seem…” Mimikyu seemed to be struggling to remember something, but that fell to the wayside as they watched the Pokemon land just in front of the house before them, the trainer hoping off to… speak to the owner? There was a Pokemon with her that seemed vaguely familiar, but N didn’t quite recognize it. Green, with a flowing white dress, and a red crest jutting out from the chest.

The trainer in black released yet another unfamiliar Pokemon. Quite obviously a Bug type, it’s red and black striped body was carried on purple and yellow legs. As soon as it had fully materialized, the bug bound the home owner to a nearby tree with what looked to be a String Shot.

Not a friendly conversation then.

“She needs help!” Brock shouted out, and the group rushed off ahead of him, Ash in the lead. N made to join them, but an unnatural shiver ran down his spine.

He felt fear.

Though their opponent having a Salamence on their side was indeed something that worried him, he had felt this enough times to know it was the work of his friend. This was odd though. It had been quite some time since the little ghost had let the terror leak out this badly, not counting the time he’d purposefully used it against team Rocket. Probably not since Cynthia’s sudden arrival, though this paled in comparison to that occurrence.

“Mimikyu? What’s wrong?”

“I-I… it’s nothing… w-we need to catch up to them!”

The little fairy tried to play it off, but there was no hiding that quiver in his voice.

For some reason, Mimikyu was genuinely afraid.