Chapter 9
6 months. 6 months. The chicks are 6 months old.
The Articuno, Zapdos, and Moltres are 2 feet smaller than full size. The Ho-Oh is 4 1/2 feet under full
size, and the Lugia is 8 1/2 feet smaller than full size. Their weights are growing remarkably fast.
Christina was standing in the corner of one of the play rooms, watching a Hoothoot and an Abra
practicing their battle skills while feeding the Ho-Oh some Pokemon treats. It gobbled them up in a
second.
"Hey, catch!" Christina yelled as she tossed one up in the air.
"Oh!" screamed the chick as it clumsily sprang up and snapped the treat from mid air. It was too young
to fly, (they all were) for its flight feathers were half grown, but it tried to flap them in vain as it
jumped. It got the treat anyway, it jumped a little more higher than the others.
The Ho-Oh was 7 1/2 feet tall, making it taller than Christina (that's why she was standing, silly!). But
she, Jake, and I could tend them easily, for they were still kinda babies. But they were getting more
independent and we didn't have to watch them as much.
Jake was sitting in his little "office" with his boombox blaring heavy metal rock music at very high
decibels. You could hear it from the other side of the breeding center, and some of the staff were
complaining.
I walked in to see him with the Articuno. The ice bird chick sat there, mezmerized.
"Hi, Dave," greeted Jake.
"Hi," I replied.
"You wanna see something cool?" he asked.
"Sure."
"Arti. Articuno cuno," sqwaked the Articuno.
"Okay, okay," I calmed it down a little.
Jake then told me that the music on his boombox was actually from a tape. He rewound it to around the
beginning, and waited.
About 45 seconds into the song, the person singing the song went,
"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAH YEAH YEAH!!!!!!!" really loudly.
Jake gave Articuno a little hand signal and when those words were on the tape, screamed and flapped
its wings.
"Umm...very...original...," I commented.
"Like it?" asked Jake.
"I already commented!" I splurted.
"Ohh," Mumbled Jake.
"Uno!" shouted the Articuno.
We both laughed.
I walked over to where the Lugia was. It was swimming in the Magikarp and Gyarados tank. The tank
was pretty large and a whopping 36 feet deep, to fit the fairly large number of fish in it and also to fit
the size of the Gyaradoses.
Over the past few months, the three of us trained the Lugia to honk on command. It wasn't traumatized
for life, as we first thought. I watched as it tried a really lousy but legitamate Aero Blast on a young
Gyarados who evolved at a fairly early age. (It was one of the fastest evolutions we ever had at the
Saffron breeding center.) The Gyarados submitted and swam to the other side of the pool. The Lugia
squawked in victory.
I stepped over to the edge of the pool. Lugia swam up to me.
"Lu gia lugia!" it chirped.
"Alright," I said, stroking it on its head.
It spotted the bag of Pokemon treats that I lazily stuffed into my pocket. Its eyes brightened up and
jumped out. It was over 8 feet tall, and looked down at me.
"LUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!" it screeched as it tried to remove the bag of treats with its wing.
"Hey, you doofus! Stop it!" I shouted.
At hearing my words, the chick slumped its head down and made a low noise in its throat at me calling
it a doofus.
"Umm, sorry," I moaned as I gave it a treat. The Lugia instantly brightened up, ate the treat out of my
hand, and jumped back into the water.
"Okay, want another one?" I asked it.
The Bird nodded its head and splashed a little bit of water around with its wing and tail. (Probably the
reason why its acting a little smarter than the other chicks, I don't know. Probably because its psychic.)
"Alrighty, HONK!" I ordered.
"Honk! Arr-onk!" the Lugia obeyed.
"Good birdy! Here's your treat!" I exclaimed as I threw a Pokemon treat into the water. It sank like a
stone, and then the Lugia darted underwater after it, ate it down there, and came back up. I petted it,
and then left the room.
I went over to the cage where the Zapdos and Moltres were roosting together. They both picked their
little heads up, and ran over to me.
"Molt!"
"Zap!"
"Here, I'll let you out," I told them as I opened the cage door and let them out. I led them down to the
main aviary.
"Go practice some of your attacks. They're getting better every time. Go for it!" I encouraged.
The Zapdos and Moltres looked at me with thoughtful eyes, and then strutted around looking for a
Pokemon to battle. The Moltres disturbed a Pidgeotto.
"Pidgeooooo," the Pidgeotto squawked.
"Tres!" the Moltres hollered.
The two bird Pokemon stood in front of eack other, stared at each other, and then took to battle. The
Pidgeotto, being able to fly, flew up and did a Whirlwind on Moltres. The Moltres, only able to jump
while clumsily flapping its wings, got swept a little into a bush. It kinda set a small branch on fire, but
then smoldered it. It then did a Fire Spin full force at the Pidgeotto. The bird some feathers scorched,
gave up, and flapped up to the nearest small tree. I petted the Moltres on the back and told it that it did
a good job.
The Zapdos, on the other hand, was challenging a Fearow. It Thundershocked like mad, and the
Fearow was getting pretty weak. Fearow then Drill Pecked as best as it could, only to recieve another
one back from Zapdos. This double Drill Pecking lasted for another minute, and then the Fearow was
knocked out. The Zapdos looked at it and screeched.
I congratulated them and then went to tend a Pichu, which was constantly tugging at my shirt.