Renny: As I'm writing this, there haven't been any reviews for the fanfic at all. Hopefully by the time I finish, it'll have at least one or two- I'm hoping to get this to the level of Redemption, y'know!
Green: . . . But Faith isn't even from the pokemon world, how can she get redemption like I did in that fic?
Renny: I mean, with the same amount of reviews and chapters and such.
Green: Ah. Makes more sense, I guess?
Renny: It does, don't worry. Anyway . . . I noticed that the last chapter appears to have only gotten nine pages. Normally I'd be able to write at least ten, eleven, twelve, even more if I can for a starting chapter. Then again . . . it is a starting chapter, and I'm hoping this one's gonna be longer, if I can help it.
Green: You explain things a lot, don't you?
Renny: That I do. Disclaimer!
Green: Renny doesn't own pokemon.
Renny: On with the show!
OOOOOO
Record 49- Dracos
Not much is known about the humanoid species known as Dracos. We do, however, know that these strange creatures are like humans. But they possess 'extra' limbs such as the wings, tails and ears of dragons, so we summarize that Dracos are in fact the hybrid off-spring of dragons and humans, but we do not know how long ago these creatures were created.
What we do know about them is that many prefer to live in mountainous places, or forests and sea caves. They possess the ability to use their ears, wings and tails perfectly as if they were birds, so we realise that these 'extra' limbs are not just for show. It is not known whether or not Dracos can breathe fire or scream as if they were full dragons.
The name 'Draco' comes from the Latin word meaning 'dragon'. The full name of these creatures is in fact Pueri Draco, meaning 'Dragon Children'. Over time this name was shortened to 'Draco', and we currently understand that the Dracos themselves refer to themselves as this.
Despite actually being Dracos, these creatures do not seem to know their own true origins. However, humans and Dracos alike usually use the assumption that they are the spawn of dragons and humans from days long past the world.
Dracos are also very thick-skinned, which is why many make their homes in rocky places like mountains. One such example of this is the huge colony living up on a huge, cold winter-like mountain known as the Winter's Garden. It is not known whether or not these Dracos ever come down the mountain to mingle with the human town at the foot of the mountain, bordered by a forest.
Because Dracos have such thick skin, they cannot be hurt as humans would. For example, a fall that may break a human's bone could easily just bruise a Draco mildly. They also possess healing abilities far beyond anything that humans have seen, and example being that for a human, a wound may heal within a few weeks, while for a Draco this could happen in days or minutes, depending on the Draco itself.
Another strange ability that Dracos seem to have is the ability to speak with certain animals. As with the rate of healing, this differs from each Draco- each one understands a different species of animal. However, as many do not leave their homes for much of their lives, many Dracos do not seem to find the animal they can speak with.
This Record may be incomplete, and as such it is open for information to be written.
Previous / Next
oooo
"Another world, huh?"
By now Faith had somewhat gotten used to the little Skitty following her around. She was still a bit . . . well, in shock, she could say, to see a real life pokemon, but whatever.
The long grass was what Faith assumed was the grass in the games where wild pokemon lived, but so far she'd only seen Skitty. So maybe it was different in real life, for these guys?
"Yeah." Faith nodded. Skitty had taken up a perch on her shoulder, and if she was planning on staying there, Faith may have to charge berries for residence or something.
"So, lemme get this straight . . ." Skitty said. "You're from another world entirely, where pokemon don't exist and there are things called animals that don't have any abilities or anything. You're also a human-ish thing called a Draco, and you're not actually a pokemon at all. You was sucked into a portal thingy and was spat out into this world. Right?"
"Yeah, pretty much." Faith shrugged.
She didn't expect the meant-to-be-a-pixel-thing Skitty to fall off her shoulder, laughing so hard she was crying. Faith paused to watch for a while, as the small kitten-like creature rolled in the tall grass and flattened some strands along the way.
"W-wow, you're insane!" Skitty cried, banging the ground with her paws. "I-I never thought I'd meet a pokemon who was insane, but you- you're hilarious!"
" . . . Says the thing who shouldn't even exist."
"Ah-hah, you're funny." Skitty gasped. She stood up slowly, stumbling a little because of her lost breath when she'd laughed, and Faith quickly held out her tail to steady the tiny kitten.
"Moving on . . . where are we?" Faith asked, finally getting to the question she'd been dying to ask for Stars-know-how-long.
"Oh, the humans call this root one-oh-one or something, but we pokemon refer to it as Little Path. Because it's a small forest path, you know?" Skitty answered.
Root one-oh-one? Route 101, Faith assumed she meant. That meant she was in Hoenn or whatever the games called it, which would certainly explain Skitty's presence. But not her presence in this Route- Lily had told her that Skitty lived on Route 116.
So why was this one in the first Route of the region?
Faith was just about to ask her that, despite all the pokemon's teasing about her being insane or whatever, when the Skitty suddenly stopped in her tracks.
"What now?" Faith sighed. She'd stopped several times, every single time had been to pee or 'the other thing'.
"I think we're near the human place." Skitty tilted her head a little, and blinked.
"You can tell?"
"Well yeah, pokemon use sense of smell if they can. You have a nose, use it!" Skitty huffed.
Wow, she looked adorable when she was mad.
"I'm not a- you know what? I'm sick of telling you otherwise." Faith muttered. "I just hope no one else tries to mistake me for a pokemon."
"Whatever you say, Miss."
"Faith."
"Ah-huh."
They kept walking, even though Skitty suddenly started insisting they don't go near the town- Littleroot town, if Faith could remember properly.
"I don't think we should go anywhere near humans, they try and catch us you know! And I don't wanna be caught!"
"I thought pokemon wanted to be caught?" Faith stopped in her tracks. She had assumed that was why the wild pokemon in the games and the anime stepped into a Trainer's path- to get caught and be trained.
"Uh, most do. Not me, though!" Skitty said proudly. "I prefer to stay wild, cus it's more fun. Trainer's are the entire reason I can't go back to my own Path, you know. I hate them."
Right . . . well, if owning and playing the card game made Faith a Trainer of sorts, that meant Skitty hated her too. And Faith was all-too used to others hating her for the stupidest of reasons.
Well, she did have three human friends, and she knew a lot about thier culture and stuff- that was considered . . . unlike a Draco, so she'd been labelled as a freak.
Too bad her mouth didn't connect with her brain fast enough.
"You know, I guess technically I'm a Trainer." she mused.
Skitty turned to stare at her.
" . . . How can a pokemon be a Trainer?" was the only thing she said.
"I'm not a pokemon, I'm a Draco, I'm not even from this world!" Faith snapped. "Get that into your little skull, okay?"
"Yeah. Sure. And I'm a Taillow."
Okay, Faith gave up. For now anyway.
"Hey wait where are- NO DON'T GO NEAR THE HUMAN PLAAAAACE!"
Faith found herself being tripped up by the little kitten, and the only thing that saved her from face-planting on the ground was her tail automatically wrapping around a tree branch low enough for the tail to reach. Faith pulled herself back up and stared down at the Skitty, unimpressed.
"You could have killed me!" Faith snapped.
"Uh, this grass is springy, I don't think so." Skitty told her.
Faith huffed and crossed her arms. "I mean, what if something had been there? Like . . . some idiot had left a shard of glass there, or some kind of deadly weapon or something, and I'd fallen on it? You wanna feel responsible for killing me?"
"What's a shard of glass?"
Faith deadpanned and walked on.
"NO DON'T-"
Skitty froze when they came out of the bushes into what Faith assumed was Littleroot town, but she still wasn't entirely certain. Thorn said that there was always some kind of sign that said what town or Route or city or whatever the place was, so Faith decided to go and find one.
Cael had said that the most likely place for a sign telling you what town/Route/city you were in was probably near one of the entrances to the place, in some cases the only entrance. So, that meant she had to go and find the entrance to 'Littleroot'.
With a panicking pink kitten on her tail.
Yay.
"Would you shut up already?" Faisth demanded harshly, keeping her voice down. Even if she wanted to get to a town, she didn't really want to get into trouble- if a pokemon mistook her for a pokemon, then a human would mistake her for one as well, and in the anime pokemon never spoke (except for the Meowth, that was different).
"Hey, you might wanna get caught and be enslaved by horrible monsters who force us to fight to the death for their amusement, but I'd rather stay wild and free!" Skitty whispered back.
"Wow, you really hate humans, huh?"
"You think?"
Despite not wanting to stay with her, Skitty seemed reluctant to leave. So she stayed, for whatever reason (maybe she was worried about a 'fellow pokemon') and sneaked around with Faith until they finally found the entrance to the town.
"Huh. So we are in Littleroot." Faith muttered.
She noticed a human walking by, and, just before he spotted her, she dived into the bush nearby. Skitty seemed to freeze, so Faith grabbed her by the tail and yanked her in too.
"I thought you wanted to come here?" Skitty whispered, as the human passed by.
"Yeah, to find out where I am." Faith answered.
"I told you!"
"You told me the pokemon version, I needed the human version because it's what I actually understand."
Skitty grumbled, while Faith kept an eye on the human as he paused just a few feet away from the bush. He seemed a little bit . . . well, large, if that's what humans called it (though since she lived on a mountain where food wasn't exactly in full spring, she couldn't really judge). Then she recognised him.
It was that guy that gave you your starter in the games- one of them anyway. What was the name for the one in Hoenn? Professor . . . he was named after a tree . . . Birch, that was it! Lily said he was a field researcher, so maybe he was going out to research stuff in the wild?
" . . . May?" the man suddenly called. "If you're there, would you come out please? I know you still like playing in the trees, but you do know Brendan's been looking for you?"
May?
The girl that was with Ash when he'd gone through Hoenn? Granted, Faith hadn't seen much of the Hoenn season (she had seen the entire Sinnoh one and some of the Kanto one, however), but she knew enough to know who May was. A Coordinator, and a pretty damn good one at that.
Did that mean she was in the anime? But this Brendan had never even been mentioned in the anime at all, and as far as Faith could tell, he never would be.
So . . . maybe she was in the games, instead. Or just some random world where all characters lived together, but whatever.
Faith just hoped Birch didn't get the idea to look into the bushes.
"Professor Birch?"
The large-ish man turned around to another patch of bush, and spotted May. She looked like the one from the anime, but didn't sound like her- she sounded a little older, not ten . . . uh, years was it? Human winters were so confusing. Maybe she was the same amount of winters as Faith, even.
"Oh, there you are!" Birch exclaimed, smiling. "I could have sworn you were over there . . ."
"Probably just some wild pokemon, Zigzagoons or something. What does Brendan want?" May asked.
"He said it was about your starters- which one you'd be choosing." Birch told her. "Three pokemon, three choices, but he does want to discuss it just in case he chooses the pokemon you want."
"Hey, I'm just gonna choose whichever pokemon likes me."
"So, you're letting the pokemon choose?"
"Yep!"
Their voices faded as the two humans walked away, and when they were finally out of sight, Faith beat her wings and propelled herself out of the bush.
"Watch the wings!" Skitty cried, tumbling out.
Faith didn't listen.
"Starters . . .?" she murmured.
"Uh, yeah, apparently some humans breed pokemon to give to other humans as their first pokemon. Disgusting, but that's their issue, not mine." Skitty muttered.
"Torchic, Mudkip and Treecko, right?"
"How am I meant to know?"
"Cool. Hey, May said she was gonna let the pokemon choose, so doesn't that make her a good Trainer?" Faith asked the little kitten, who sat down heavily, cleaning her paw.
"To me, all Trainers are bad. They might start out nice and kind and all that, but then they see that your species isn't really that powerful and they turn bad. They start wanting you to do impossible stuff." Skitty explained. "Then they chuck you out like rubbish when you can't do it."
"You sound like that's happened to you." Faith said. Maybe that explained Skitty's hatred? Faith was just beginning to get a bit sympathetic when-
"Maybe it did, maybe it didn't, but I'm not telling you." Skitty said, sticking her nose into the air.
And then suddenly all sympathy was gone and things were back to how they were five minutes ago.
But hearing about the whole 'starters' thing kinda made Faith want to see if she could get a starter too. What? She might as well do something while she was stuck in this world, and besides, she hadn't got the first clue what happened to that Cludiant card she'd been holding when she'd been sucked into the portal-tunnel.
Maybe she could go on a journey to find it? It would certainly give her a good reason other than 'I just felt like it'.
But first she'd need to find Birch and his lab.
Since Littleroot obviously wasn't going to be the same as it was in the games (Lily described it as having literally three buildings and very few residents, while here it seemed to be a heck of a lot bigger) that meant Faith would have to continue to be sneaky.
And also possibly try to do just that with Skitty whining the whole way.
"Maybe I should try it." Faith said, saying the first thing that came into her head.
"Try what?" Skitty sounded incredibly wary.
"Getting a starter."
"Okay, I'll bite- why?" Skitty demanded.
Faith turned to her, and kneeled down so she didn't have to crane her neck down to see the kitten properly.
"Like I said, I'm not from this world- and the thing that brought me here has disappeared from my own hands, so-"
"Maybe you dropped it?"
"I don't think so; Dracos don't drop anything in their hands when they're in mid-flight. That's a proven fact!" Faith grinned. "So the only explanation is that the card that brought me here- the Cludiant card- has disappeared somehow. So, what I'm trying to say is this: I want to go on an adventure to see if I can find it!"
"Why the heck can't you just do this whole thing without getting a starter?" Skitty cried shrilly.
"Because I'm not a pokemon and therefore I can't really defend myself against animals who shoot fire and ice at me!" Faith exclaimed.
"You have wings. And a tail." Skitty said flatly.
"Which may or may not be useless against a twenty-eight foot dragon whose rage can level an entire city." Faith shrugged. "Among other creatures."
It was true, while her wings and tail could be claimed as weapons of sorts, they would be utterly useless if her opponent only got pissed off. She'd seen a Gyarados in the anime, and it had been so powerful it sank a ship and called several others who proceeded to try and murder Ash, his friends, and Team Rocket.
Faith really didn't want to meet one and become it's food.
So, pokemon were her only defense here because it was an unknown world to her, partly anyway.
" . . . You're set on this, aren't you?" Skitty sighed. " . . . Fine then, I'll come too."
"Wait what?" Now that honestly surprised Faith.
"Yeah, I hate humans and Trainers, but you're not human, so I guess you can't really be that bad of a Trainer. And if you say you're not a pokemon, yet you can understand me, that means you won't turn bad, right? So . . . I don't exactly believe you about the whole 'from another world thing' but at least you won't turn bad." Skitty told her firmly. "So . . . I'll help you out as best as I can."
"Does that mean you'll go into a pokeball too?" Faith asked cautiously. "Because if I do become a Trainer and you wanna be my pokemon, you'd kinda need one."
"I know." Skitty muttered, looking away grumpily. Then she narrowed her eyes and peered up at Faith. "Let's compromise- I'll get caught by you if, and this is a pretty big if, you become a Trainer. But I refuse to stay inside of a pokeball, understand?"
So, Skitty was basically offering to be her Pikachu. Sweet.
"Sure, I was gonna let any pokemon I caught be out anyway, if they wanted." Faith shrugged.
"Oh!" Skitty blinked, or seemed to blink. "Then . . . alright then, thanks. Now . . . how are we gonna do this? Get your . . . starter . . . hopefully without alerting half the humans in this place to our presence?"
"Be sneaky? I certainly can't fly over this place, that'd draw too much attention. A human with wings, a tail and dragon ears? They'd go nuts." Faith mused.
"Well if you 'pretend' you're a pokemon-"
"No."
"Well, this one is really weird." Skitty muttered. "Doesn't know she's a pokemon, doesn't wanna even pretend."
"Excuse me?"
"Nothing."
oooo
They ended up darting from one building to the other, which was hard because, unlike the town which was at the foot of Winter's Garden, not one of the houses was even linked with another by some strange rock the humans called 'bricks' or something.
Faith tried not to understand it, because it only confused her.
It was strange- the amount of things she knew about the human world mostly centred around pokemon or things connected to it- like the TV, for instance. What? If she wanted to watch the anime, she had to know what a TV even was and how to work it! Also, the internet helped, but she hadn't the foggiest idea how to work a computer, and always had to have one of her human friends operate it for her.
Anyway, they darted from one building to the next.
Some, she found, were actually things humans called 'shops' (obviously Dracos had no need for 'shops' because, well, they didn't use the green thin-tree stuff they called money, heck most didn't even know what money was) and the rest were just homes for the humans.
"What does the lab look like?" Skitty asked, resting on her shoulder. Obviously her little legs couldn't keep up, so she'd just opted to sit on Faith's shoulder for the time being.
"It's . . . bigger than the other buildings?" Faith would have shrugged, but she didn't want to risk dislodging Skitty from her shoulder.
"You mean you don't know."
"Hey, like I said, I don't know much about the humans. I only know what my friends told and showed me."
"Which apparently wasn't much, but if they didn't freak out about a talking poke-"
"I am not a pokemon."
"Ah-huh."
She continued darting for a while longer, until they finally came near to a larger building that seemed to be apart from all other buildings. This was probably the lab, Faith assumed.
"Think we're here." she whispered, just as she noticed Birch and May walking out the front door.
"Yeah, great." Skitty answered faintly.
" . . . Don't see anyone around. Do you?"
"Uh, no?"
"You're not looking are you."
"Why would I?"
"Nevermind."
There didn't seem to be any other humans around besides these two, so Faith stepped out into the light. Which turned out to be a bad idea.
Both humans reacted with shock, then interest, as if they were witnessing the birth of some new and special species. Faith guessed that maybe they technically were, because to them, like Skitty, she was a pokemon. Hah. No.
"S'up?" she greeted them, a hand up. Something Lily had taught her, to stop others from being so damn terrified of her.
This only seemed to confuse the humans.
"I never heard of a pokemon called Sup." May muttered to Birch, but Faith pricked her ears a little and heard it.
And promptly lost her temper.
"That's 'cus I'm not a pokemon, idiot." Faith snapped.
Birch and May jumped, and stared at her in complete shock. Great, she'd just made contact and she'd blown any chance of having a pleasant conversation. Nice going.
"P-pokemon don't talk, right?" May shakily asked. "They don't . . . all they say is their names, and make sounds, right?"
"Wrong." Faith heard Skitty mutter, from where she was currently clinging onto her back. "We do speak, you stupid humans just can't understand our language."
"My shy little friend says pokemon speak, but not in the same language as you lot." Faith translated helpfully.
Claws dug into her back, but Faith ignored it because the pain was pretty much just as if she'd accidently brushed against a sharp bit of grass too quickly. Basically, near-non-existant.
"Then why are you speaking, Dragon?" Birch asked. Faith could tell he was holding back panic and fear, probably because of May, who was completely freaking out so much she couldn't do much except for stand there looking like a gaping fish.
"I'm not a pokemon," Faith explained. "I'm a Draco."
"Is that a new species of poke-"
"Do I need to sing it in a song and dance and then spell it on a piece of bloody paper? I. Am. Not. A. Pokemon." Faith snapped.
"Yes, alright." Birch didn't look like he believed her, but he wasn't keeping back the panic much anymore because it was going away.
May still looked like she was gonna piss herself.
"Look, this is a nice setting and all, but I'd like to go inside and discuss it." Faith said. "So, if you wouldn't mind?"
"Um, yes, of course."
oooo
Faith had to say something about these humans.
They were . . . well, much more open-minded than Skitty.
Speaking of, it had taken almost ten minutes to get her into the building, let alone the living room which Birch called a lounge for some reason, and when Faith had finally managed it, it had only been under the promise that she would take Skitty's training and life much more seriously than any other pokemon she would 'enslave and force to fight to the death'.
But anyway.
Brendan had joined them after a few seconds of meant-to-be a hushed argument from the actual lab room where Birch did all his sciency stuff, but of course with Faith's ears she could choose between not hearing and just casually listening.
And so Faith had explained her story. And, shocking her because of the way Skitty reacted, they had believed her.
Mostly.
The only thing they found weird was the fact that there was no such thing as pokemon in her world except for games and cards and cartoons called animes and stuff. Understandable, because Faith still had a hard time believing that the pokemon world even existed. But she'd deal, for now at least.
"It certainly explains how you can speak to both us and pokemon." Birch shrugged, when she'd asked why.
"I don't 'speak' to them." Faith said, irritably. "I understand what she says, that's about it. And they understand you just fine, how do you think they take orders from you?"
"I'd rather not do that!" Skitty called, from where she was now trying to wrap herself in Faith's tail fins, as a barrier between her and the humans.
"Ah-huh."
"Don't steal my words!"
Those technically weren't even words, just sounds, but Faith let her have that small illusion.
"So what's it like living in a mountain?" Brendan asked. It seemed he was more interested in the landscape and how things looked in her world rather than the fact there was another world to begin with.
Maybe he wanted to be a . . . what was the word Cael had once used? It wasn't gardener . . . something to do with land and scrapes. Landscraper, that's it! Or was it landscaper . . .
Anyway.
"What's it like living on the ground?" Faith retorted. "The mountain's pretty much all I've known, so I wouldn't be able to describe it to you unless you could describe living in these buildings, on the ground."
"Fair enough." Brendan shrugged, grinning.
"You mentioned wanting to go on a journey to find this Cludiant card?" Birch brought them back to the main topic.
"Oh, yeah. I was thinking, right, Dracos don't normally lose their grip on something in mid-air, so maybe it was taken away from me somehow. I thought maybe I could see if I could find it." Faith said, and as she explained it to the humans, she suddenly realised how stupid the idea was.
Finding a card in a massive region? What was that phrase Thorn had once used, when the four of them had tried to find a mountain lion on Winter's Garden . . . 'Finding a needle in a haystack'. Obviously they found the lion eventually (the idea had been that maybe Faith's animal had been mountain lions, but, sadly, no) and it turned out to be the friendliest predetor on the planet. Or mountain, whichever came first.
But still, it seemed so silly now that she had a chance to actually think about it.
"Are you sure that's a good idea?" May asked. "I mean . . . well, let's say you do it, get a pokemon starter and go around the region. People would think you're insane, if they didn't freak out first. And then there's the fact that it's one single, tiny little card, and you wanna look for it in Hoenn? This is a pretty big region, you know."
As far as Faith knew, May wasn't a mind-reader. But she seemed like one, having literally said everything that Faith was thinking, only a little bit more . . . well, as if she was speaking to a hatchling who didn't know the difference between a mouse and a rabbit.
"May, be nice." Birch murmured. He spoke up a bit. "Though she does have a point, Faith."
"Yep, I figured." Faith sighed. "But . . . there has to be something I can do right? I mean . . ."
"Maybe . . . maybe Steven might know?" Brendan said hesitantly.
"You mean Steven Stone the Champion?" May was suddenly like a little giggly girl, like how Lily got when some guy she 'knew' was on the TV (Cael and Thorn explained how she didn't literally know them, she just knew their faces well).
"Well, he does enjoy this kind of stuff." Birch mused. "Though he leans more towards the rock aspect of the myths and legends and such. He may actually know something, if you ask. However . . ."
Faith pricked her ears, curious.
"He is a little . . . arrogant. Hard to speak to, if you catch my meaning." Birch explained.
"No, not really." And it all went right over her head.
"Basically he's an ass." May bluntly told her.
"May!" Birch cried, looking incredibly offended. "I'm so sorry, Faith, she does this often."
"Dad, she does it all the time, not 'often'." Brendan said.
"Damn straight I do!" May cheered.
They moved off that a little while later, getting back on track. Birch suggested that Faith could go and see Steven Stone's father, Joseph Stone, to see if he could shed any light on the matter to start off with. Mostly because Birch didn't want Faith to get exposed to any sort of 'arrogance' that Steven had, whatever that meant (May said Birch didn't want her to pick up on his asshole-ish-ness).
Joseph, apparently mostly referred to as Mr Stone, worked in the Devon Co. building in Rustboro city, which was a few days' travel away from Littleroot on foot.
"I can fly, you know." Faith told him flatly.
"That would be nice, but how would he feel if a human with dragon wings landed in front of his building?" Birch asked.
" . . . Fair play, I guess."
So walking it was. Birch also decided to be nice and suggest that Faith be given a starter, some pokeballs and a pokedex, which saved her the trouble of asking and looking like she was desperate to be a Trainer even though she wasn't even human or pokemon.
And then came the hard part.
May had already made her decision- the Treecko had taken a shine to her, whatever that phrase meant, which suited her perfectly because she apparently loved to play in the trees (Birch said this while laughing, which confused Faith- what was wrong with playing in trees?).
So that left Mudkip and Torchic. While, as a Draco, she probably would have been more inclined to choose the Torchic, Faith actually felt more drawn to the little Mudkip who seemed too adorable for words.
The young Draco was literally about to say 'can I have a look at the Mudkip' when the Torchic suddenly puffed up, looking offended beyond belief, and then promptly jumped into her arms.
Well.
Okay then.
Faith was then given the Torchic's pokeball, along with five others, one of which she used on Skitty (who set herself free no less than a second later). Then she was shown how to work a pokedex.
"This feature shows the data of each pokemon you capture, such as their natures, level, HP or Hit Points, their stats, abilities, and the way the moves work in contests." Birch explained.
"Contest?" Faith blinked. "You actually have them? Wow, I thought that was an anime thing . . ."
"What?"
"Nothing."
"It sounds like you're interested, so how about you try entering the contest in Slateport?" Brendan suggested, holding the Mudkip he'd happily accepted (claimed he wanted the Mudkip to begin with, which made sense because, if Faith remembered right, it was Ground/Water).
" . . . Soon as I figure out what that means, yeah, sure."
Birch went on explaining how to get to a pokemon's pokedex data, and a few other things too- including a nickname feature that Faith wasn't really bothered about.
And also Trainer rules.
"You have rules?" Faith frowned, then almost slapped herself- of course they had rules! Trainer weren't above the law, obviously.
"Yes, of course." Birch nodded. "The first one is no killing another Trainer's pokemon on purpose. If it was an accident, you'd get a fine, but if it was on purpose, you'd be jailed for life."
"What's jail?" both Skitty and Faith asked at the same time. Though Skitty asked Faith and, when she saw Faith had no idea, resigned to looking to the humans for answers.
"It's . . . a holding place for bad humans." Birch tried to explain further, but it was still confusing.
"Why would you hold all the bad people in a place where they can talk to each other and plan and learn how to do other bad stuff and all that?" Faith demanded.
"You know, she does have a point. Why do we do that?" Brendan wondered.
"Good question. I'll ask the law enforcement at some point." Birch frowned. "Anyway, the other Trainer rules."
Faith waited eagerly.
"The second is that you can't catch more than one pokemon per Route." Birch explained.
"Uh, why?" As far as Faith knew, in the games anyway, you could catch as many pokemon you wanted in a single Route and onwards.
"Because idiots kept catching powerful pokemon, or ones who'd evolve into powerful pokemon, leaving the weaker ones to rot and in most cases overpopulate. There's a reason some pokemon are hard to find in the wild." May spoke up. "Bastards should have thought about what they were doing to the pokemon's numbers before they went and caught everything in sight."
"May." Birch hissed. "But . . . she's not wrong. Before the law was introduced, Trainers mostly went after pokemon who had better power, an example being Aron or Shroomish. Both evolve into powerful pokemon, so now both are rare in the wild, even in their natural habitats. Some make this law a little different, for fun. I knew this one Trainer who called himself Ruby, and he decided to only catch the first thing he saw in any Route. Some decide to only catch pokemon they haven't already caught. But at least this rule makes Trainers appreciate the pokemon they catch much better."
"It certainly does for me." Faith murmured. That meant she couldn't catch some of the pokemon she liked from the same Route, but so long as she wouldn't get sent to this 'jail' place, she was fine.
He then went on to explain some other rules, like how stealing a pokemon that already belonged to somemone else was illegal and wouldn't work anyway because the pokemon already had a pokeball, and also how stealing in general was a big no-no. Also how a challenge couldn't be refused unless you either had no pokemon conscious, or the ones you had were too badly injured. Or dead, in a few rare cases.
Birch also told her about a law that had been in place since almost the very beginning, from when the Gyms started up.
"You can't use HMs unless you have the Badges needed for it." Birch explained. "I'm not entirely sure how this works, but say you have the HM for Cut. You'd need one Badge to make it work, and if you try without even a single Badge, then you're breaking the law. The Association find out somehow, and you get arrested. Besides, the HM wouldn't work anyway."
" . . . I think I might have actually gotten that."
A second passed.
"Nope, nevermind, it's gone." Faith said. "But I need a certain number of Badges to use certain HMs, that I understand fine. Just leave the technical stuff out."
"Of course."
He explained a few other things, such as the rules for a battle (which were obviously different to the card game) and went over the type web in case Faith didn't know it properly (which she technically didn't since the anime tended to ignore this a lot, as Thorn loved to point out).
And then May challenged Faith to a battle.
By the law she'd literally just learned, she couldn't refuse because she had two very capable pokemon with her. But because May only had one, her starter, Faith decided to only use her Torchic.
So they made their way out of the lab, the back way was used because of Faith, and Birch led them to a clearing in the forest surrounding Littleroot town.
Faith was getting a bit sad, remembering the card battles she and her friends had (less than a few hours ago, in fact) when Torchic loudly announced he wanted a nickname.
Once Faith got over the shock of being able to understand two species of pokemon (because a Draco's ability to understand species was just limited to one, and Skitty and Torchic were completely different species altogether) she blinked and realised that Skitty seemed to share this want, but didn't seem to want to speak up.
"Both of you?" Faith checked.
The two tiny pokemon, a pink kitten and a fire-breathing chicken, nodded.
"Uh, alright . . . What would you like me to call you?" Faith asked.
"You mean you'll let us choose?" Torchic asked. He blinked, seeming a bit shocked, and then he grinned. "I'll be Torch!"
"You want part of your species name to be your name." Faith said.
"It sounds awesome, alright?" Torchic huffed. "Besides, when I evolve, it'll just be that much more awesome because I can shout some motto like . . . TIME TO TORCH THIS PLACE!"
Faith winced at the volume, and then decided that, yeah, it was a pretty cool name for a pokemon. So she carefully typed the name into the pokedex nickname function thingy, and then he was called Torch.
"Alright, what about you?" Faith asked, as Torch swooned over his new name.
"Uh . . . good question." Skitty blinked. "Didn't really think about it, I just kinda wanted one, you know? Same as Crazy McNuggets over there."
"Be nice." Faith said, even though she was grinning. "Hey . . . how about Skittles?"
"You mean the name you gave the card?" Skitty sounded shocked, as if Faith was suggesting she eat her own tail or something. "No way! I couldn't!"
"You seemed to like the name," Faith shrugged. "So why not?"
"Because . . . well, the way you looked at it, before." Skitty explained. "It was like it was something precious."
"It . . . kind of is, but . . . the name isn't really as precious to me as the card itself is." Faith told her. "So I don't mind if you use it."
" . . . Alright then. Just one question." Skitty said.
"Yeah?"
"What are Skittles?"
OOOOOO
Renny: Next chapter will be the battle, I swear. I just needed to name the two of them fast, otherwise I would have gone crazy calling them Skitty and Torchic for the next fifty chapters.
Green: You're gonna have that many?
Renny: This might do, if it takes this long to get to the two rival battles. Yes, there will be two, Brendan gets his chance to shine.
Green: Another question- you said this was gonna be in the manga world, but then suddenly you go and change the world to game, and you've got May and Brendan. Why?
Renny: Uh, well, I found I couldn't remember much about the RS Arc in the manga, so I basically just went 'oh wait, why the hell should I? I can do what I want, it's my own damn fanfic!' and then things just went on from there.
Green: Fair play.
Renny: I'm also eager to get to Faith's two other catches, who are coming up hopefully either next chapter or the one after, depending on how long the two battles last. Anyway! I'll put up the profiles of each pokemon currently in Faith's team each chapter, or I hope I can, and show you their natures and remind you what pokemon they are, because I'm gonna attempt a rotation team.
Skitty- Female, Quirky, Skittles
Torchic- Male, Naughty, Torch
Renny: That's how I wrote the data down in my notes, so it's gonna be how I write it down here. Anyway! I did try to keep as close to the natures as possible, but I'm probably gonna end up deviating a lot.
Green: Yeah, you did that with some of my team in Redemption, and Red and Blue's teams too.
Renny: Not by much, just enough so that I could make their personalities work. Read and review!