Gallade was giving me much to think about and it was difficult trying to wrap my head around it all. He told me it was okay, that the world had too many moving parts to understand it fully, especially for a kid. I rebutted that I wasn’t a kid, and he surprised me by agreeing.
This kind of reflection shows you truly are taking your first steps into adulthood. Though I would advise not to try and grow too fast. Have fun exploring the magic of childhood. It becomes more difficult when you’re older, and everyone expects you to act sensibly. Thinking back on it, I wish I had spent more time as a Kirlia. The things I could get away with back then!
He was a pleasant Pokémon to talk to, to the point that I didn’t even find the telepathy weird. Ultimately, however, I was brought back to the mundane one step after the other. The moisture in the air was condensing into a thick fog, and the chill made it hard to breathe. I had to drag Flaaffy out of her cosy slumber to light the way with Flash. The light didn’t gather in her wool anymore, instead, it shone like a torch from the ball on her tail. It did nothing for the cold though, and when it had killed all conversation and put everyone (except, perhaps, Baltazar – that guy’s spirit was unsnappable) in a sour mood, Kurt brought out Snebby to travel alongside us. The relief was immediate. It was like having a moving radiator, or fireplace beside us. When Clair asked rather pointedly, and in this one instance I was on her side, why he hadn’t taken her out before, he said he was worried about starting fires. I found that thought a little silly. The place was far too wet for anything to catch, and Sunny was keeping a close eye on things with her team. The other reason he gave, which soon became very noticeable, was that we had to reduce our pace significantly. Snebby was slow.
Partly because of this, and partly because the weather only got worse as time passed, we made little progress on the first day. We stopped early, hoping it would clear up by the next morning, and the early rest would give us energy to make up for lost time.
To my surprise, Luca and her friends were adept at setting up tents and were already eating canned food, heated on Snebby, while we were still putting pegs into the ground. It annoyed me to no end, and by the way Clair returned my dirty looks with a smug expression, she was well aware of it.
On our side of the camp, Kurt was on cooking duty. It was something he liked doing. He liked his spice. Admittedly, I wasn’t usually the biggest fan, but it was good to heat my stomach. After dinner, the rest of us split off to do our own thing. I should have probably been studying like Darren, but I’d been itching to draw the forest all day. Despite stopping early, the long winter nights were already noticeable and there was a gloominess to the shadows contrasting with the bright lights of Flaaffy and Snebby that I just had to get down on paper. I sat at a corner of the camp so as to capture all of it.
Casting my gaze around, I took in the entirety of our group. Snebby was in the centre of everything, acting as a living bonfire. She was cool like that. Rebecca and Sarah had rolled a few logs around her, and on one side they sat with Clair playing a card game. They seemed to be in a good mood now that they were fed and warm. Their Pokémon were drifting around them. I was familiar with Clair’s team already – her Eevee, Vivi, and Watty, the dreaded Wattrel. I hadn’t noticed Watty coming out, she had kept him in his ball for the walk, and seeing him was unpleasant, to say the least. I didn’t have fond memories of my battle against him, no matter what the result. It was only because there was a fair distance between us that I managed to keep from reacting physically. Rebecca had her Spritzee on her lap, massaging his Cotton Candy body with one hand. Sarah’s Cutiefly was buzzing about, almost too small to see from where I was. Neither Pokémon looked battle-ready, and from what I heard, both had lost in the first round in Rondo. It was pretty clear neither Rebecca nor Sarah were serious about being trainers. It wasn’t uncommon for young adults to use the circuit as an excuse to spend a year travelling, only putting a token effort into the Pokémon side of things. I knew that, but I still had mixed feelings seeing them before me.
Luca, nearby but not playing cards, looked more awkward. She had, now that I thought about it, looked off all day. I didn’t know the dynamics of her group before, but it seemed strange that she barely spoke to her friends, instead dedicating all her time to Buzzkill, throwing a stick for him to catch midair, and other exercises between work and play which she could do on the trail. She avoided eye contact with pretty much everyone in the group, and unlike the chatty version of herself I’d met before, she stayed quiet for the most part.
On the other side of Snebby, we were a more disparate bunch. Darren and Sunny had secluded themselves to their respective tents, though only Sunny had the door closed. From within, the rusty sound of her harmonica rang out, interspersed with the fainter, tinnier noise of her phone speakers playing the tune she was learning.
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Splitting the camp in two, Baltazar sat surrounded by his team and boy what a team it was. Gallade and Mienshao were relaxing, Gallade with his usual poise, and Mienshao somehow looking like water made flesh, her body flowing, every movement a wave. Much more bubbly, a Pawmot bounced around them, his orange fur crackling with electricity. Taking care of their more energetic member, an Infernape steered him away from disturbing the rest of the camp. The fire ape could toss Pawmot around like a beach ball and they both enjoyed the exercise. The most impressive, or at least intimidating, was standing behind Baltazar. His arms crossed and snout pulled into a silent growl, an Urshifu glared at everything and everyone. The Pokémon looked like a boxer with thick grey-black fur. He wasn’t a Pokémon I ever expected to meet. I had only glanced at his page on the Webdex and put him out of my mind until now. In my defence, studying more about him was impossible. They were only found in one corner of a small island off the coast of Galar and nobody there seemed to have seen fit to update the information on the site.
As I finished adding the details to the centre of the sketch, I moved on to the edges. It was mostly dark, with tree branches forming claws around the campsite. I could see some Pokémon approaching every so often. Ariados were common, and Caterpie ever-present. Other bug and a selection of grass types were also peeking out of the darkness. None of them came closer than the outer ring illuminated by Flaaffy. It was a rare Pokémon that would attack nine trainers alone. It was what had kept us safe during the day too, with only one instance of a Pinser acting hostile. A well-aimed Flamethrower from Pixie had scared it away without much trouble.
Our strategy paid off the next day. It was still cold, but dry, which made the whole expedition more cheerful. There was a lot more mingling going on too, with the notable exceptions of Luca, Sunny and I, the first two because of past drama baggage, and me because I was not a social Beautifly, and I had no desire to be one either. Even if I tried to ignore it, however, the Sunny-Luca thing was bothering me. I’d had fights with my brothers before, a lot of them, but they were quick to flare up, and quick to die down. The longest I’d ever ‘fought’ with someone was that time with Darren, and even then, we weren’t so much upset at each other, as it was just awkward. I didn’t know how to deal with the tension hanging over our group, and wondered how the rest of them could be chatting and laughing as if it didn’t exist.
On top of everything else, Watty was out, and he was the type to fly wherever he pleased. Unlike Caviar, who had learned to not come too close to me, Watty liked swooping across the procession, passing me by less than a metre. Try as I might, I could not help but flinch every time he did. I was sure people had noticed by the third or fourth time he did.
All this to say, I was in my usual sulky mood, trapped in my own head and not paying any attention to what was going on around me. What happened specifically, I learned not much later. Curt, honking cries had begun to ring out around us for some time. Half of us, the sensible ones, were alert and silent, knowing what the noise was and hoping to pass by without stirring trouble. I, as mentioned, was not sensible, and plainly, neither was Clair. In the quiet that had befallen us, she thought it would be a good idea to sneak up behind me and throw Watty right in my face.
I screamed and lashed out. I might have hit something with my fist and everyone else erupted simultaneously.
“The hell is wrong with you?” yelled Luca at Clair.
“Ow, it’s just a joke, calm down,” said Clair rubbing her jaw.
“Calla! Are you okay?” asked Sunny placing a hand on my shoulder.
Things escalated when Flaaffy, angrier than I’d ever seen her, struck Watty with a Thunder Shock. It was utterly harmless, of course, he had Volt Absorb, but the damage was done. Vivi retaliated, jumping at Flaaffy, fangs bared. Infernape, Baltazar’s choice of partner for the day, came between them stopping the fight. The relief was temporary. The wild Pokémon cries raised a notch and a fury of Primeape and Mankey descended on us, stinking and shrieking.
The balls of rage flung themselves at us through the trees like cannonballs. The stench of unclean, tangled fur invaded my nostrils and drool spluttering from their snouts splattered over my face. Their stubby arms and legs were even more frightening, bulging with pure muscle, veins about to burst.
“Run!” said Baltazar, the rest of his team materialising before him. He didn’t need to give the order, my legs working overtime to escape the fury. Flaaffy began lagging behind. I returned her despite her protest, she wasn’t enough to fight all the attackers. Speed was more important. I was hardly aware of Sunny running alongside me when ten Primeape cut in front of the path before us. We swerved off-road, crashing through the undergrowth. Infernape just about kept them away enough for us to keep going.
We fled until my lungs burned out and I tripped, a knot in my throat and legs too weak to stand back up. I lay face down on the earth and twigs breathing heavily. Fortunately, it seemed we had escaped most of the fury, and Infernape was able to keep the rest at bay. Something felt wrong with that. My brain was too fuzzy to form coherent thoughts, but as regained some control over my heart rate, I clearly remembered reading that Primeape simply do not give up a chase. Lifting my head, I understood why. Sunny, Luca, and Clair were the only humans with me. At some point, we had split off from the rest.
