Episode 9: A journey through Rusturf


"What are you guys even doing every night?" Milk asked me as we sat around the unlit fire pit. "I mean, for the rest of us it just looks like the two of you are just sitting across from each other in silence."

I opened my mouth to argue, only to realize that she kind of had a point. Nikki and I really did look like we weren't doing a lot. At least, not to anyone without psychic powers. A category that I would have placed Nikki in up until last night.

Every night since we left the city behind, Nikki and I had spent a good portion of the night trying to unlock his psychic power. Mostly by speaking to him telepathically and hoping that he could figure out how to speak back.

While we hadn't made any noticeable progress for the first two days, we had made a breakthrough last night. After giving Nikki another telepathic message, Nikki had concentrated and I was sure I heard the barest hint of a whisper. A whisper that sounded a lot like Nikki's voice.

Sure I couldn't tell what the heck he said, and it was like a single word long, Nikki had managed to unlock his telepathy! I was sure of it, I had made sure to keep a close eye on Nikki's lips and those things hadn't moved a muscle.

Nikki himself had been unsure, thinking that I had just imagined it.

"Hey we made some good progress," I protested in spite of the rolled eyes that Milk was giving me. She had been in the 'you imagined it camp' that had formed yesterday alongside Nikki, Laura, and Doduo.

At least Oddish and Shroomish believed in the me who believed in Nikki.

"Listen Brook, just because you're excited to see Nikki unlock psychic powers, and wow that still feels strange to say out loud. What was I saying?"

"Something about me being excited,"

"Oh right, thanks. Just because you're excited to see Nikki unlock psychic power, doesn't mean that you can get ahead of yourself."

"Fine," I said as I crossed my arms and leaned back. Not too far back of course, didn't want to fall back and look like an idiot. A problem that Milk didn't have to worry about as she had planted her other jaw in the ground behind her and was using it as a backrest. "But I can't wait until Nikki and I are having full conversations in our heads."

Milk narrowed her eyes and I started getting worried that this was going to turn into a thing.

The sound of a portal opening behind me interrupted us, giving me a perfect excuse to change the subject.

"Oh hey Shroomish," I said as I tossed my head back.

Shroomish blinked before looking around our new dwelling.

"Still can't believe we got this place. It's going to take a while to get used to this kind of thing,"

This kind of thing being our new 'common room', as Nikki called it. Apparently, that crazy looking girl that took Nikki's pokédex had added a feature that allowed all of Nikki's pokémon to interact.

So basically the three of us all had a cool clubhouse now.

"So what are you two doing with this place?" Shroomish asked. Made sense, he had used this place the least.

"I've mostly been using it for endurance training." Milk rubbed her legs, almost making me giggle. I had walked in on Milk running laps around the room. She hadn't noticed me when I came in and I managed to keep myself out of her sight until she stopped.

The look on her face when she realized that I had been there the whole time had been hilarious.

"I've been just doing my normal training," I explained, "This place has some more options than my own pokéball, so it's pretty fun."

"I see,"

We all sat around the unlit fire pit for a little bit before Milk broke the silence.

"Hey Brook,"

"Yeah?"

"What does your training look like? Now that I think about it, I've never actually seen it,"

"I guess I can show you guys," I jumped off the seat and walked over to one of the walls. The room responded to my thoughts as moving targets appeared on the wall.

I opened myself up to the sea of power around me. The power around here was typical for a calm forest like this one. That is, strangely chaotic at first glance yet orderly when one saw from a bigger perspective.

The power flowed into me through my crests, filling me to the brim and activating my internal reserves.

I took aim and fired off confusion after confusion at the moving targets. I was getting pretty good at this little exercise, I barely missed any of targets this time around.

Once the last of the moving targets got blasted to pieces, it got replaced by a large boulder. I focused my power into both arms and then fused the two clumps into a lone ball in front of me. I pushed it forward as the force pushed the boulder back.

"Impressive," Shroomish commented as he waddled up to the boulder. He inspected the mark that the last confusion had made and nodded.

"Yeah, really impressive," Milk said with a smug look on her face. "So, how long until Nikki can do this too?"


"I can't believe that you're still actually wearing that, it's been three days already."

"Hey I, think I'm making some good progress. At least I think I am." I said as I touched the psychic necklace that I had worn since we had set out from Rustboro.

It had been three days since we left Rustboro behind us. After beating Roxanne, I had gone back to the pokécenter and spent the rest of the day waiting for everyone to recover. I still remembered the conversation I had with May later that night before she set off back to Littleroot.

"Sorry about before," She said after making sure that the two of us were alone. "Should have been more subtle about telling you."

"May, what has you so freaked out, what do you know."

"I can't go into detail here, but Nikki, I need you to do me a giant favor."

"What is it," I asked, despite a part of me dreading an answer.

"Don't trust anyone,"

She left, her message clear. Later when Laura had asked me what we had talked about, I told her,

"Personal family stuff, nothing to worry about."

Of course, that particular lie didn't mean that I wasn't going to contact May's dad the second I got to Verdanturf Town. With any luck, he would know what was going on with May. And even If he didn't at least he would know and would be able to keep an eye on her.

Not only that, but Wally was waiting for us. I had contacted Brendan right before leaving Rustboro, and Wally was apparently waiting for me to help out with Brook's empathy sense.

Of course, before I could do any of that, I needed to make it to Verdanturf. We had left Rustboro behind us and after three days of walking, we were almost to Rusturf Tunnel. Once we did, it would take a few hours to go through before we emerged on the other side.

"Okay if you say so," Laura said, looking unimpressed and unconvinced. "So how's the new pokédex?"

I reached into my new dex holder and took out my now heavily modified pokédex. Not only was the software on it brand new and accurate for once, but it had tons of new features. Some of it, like the pokémon sketcher, I wasn't expecting to get much use out of.

Now the portable pokécenter on the other hand…

"How long until we stop for the day?" Brook said from the new common room that she shared with Vimilky and Shroomish. She sounded steamed about something.

I held up my pokédex so that it would be a little easier for Brook to see me.

"Might take a while. There's a small inn at the entrance of the tunnel. If we keep going at this pace, we should make it right after dark,"

"That long?"

"Hey no complaining. You never know, maybe the change in scenery will help in our practice,"

"I guess," I could somehow tell she was pouting. "Well then hurry up!"

I shook my head and returned the pokédex to its holder.

"Brook getting impatient?" Laura smiled and leaned forward.

"How'd you guess?" I replied with a sigh.

"I have my ways," She rolled her eyes. "Plus it's either that or you lost your mind and started talking to your pokédex."

"Well that wouldn't be too crazy," I told her as I remembered something I read a few weeks ago. "I heard that there was some lab somewhere that was working on a way to house a porygon in a dex as a form of A.I. Something about giving the dex the ability to adapt and making it more responsive."

"That sounds pretty cool, they have any idea when that's going to be available to the public," Laura said with a gleam in her eye.

"No idea. I think the article implied that this it was one of those dex models that was going to stay a research tool," I held up my hands. "So there's a chance that the answer is never."

Laura pouted, making an expression that probably matched the one on Brook's face.

A little while later, our quite forest stroll was interrupted by what sounded like someone either fighting or training. I gave Laura a look that she replied to with a shrug.

We approached slowly, careful to not be noticed.

"Okay rose, let's try this one more time!" We heard a voice say followed by a cute sounding meow. We poked our heads out of the bush just as the voice said, "Rose, use charge beam.

A rush of electricity sailed right above us missing us.

And when I said miss, I meant such a close shave that both of our hair was standing on end.

"Oh my gosh, are you two okay?" A girl my age wearing pink overalls ran over to us looking pretty guilty. "I am so sorry, I was just out here practicing with my Skitty here," she pointed downwards to the little pink cat who was trying to not look at us for some reason.

"Its fine," I told her as I tried to tame my hair. "It's not like you hit us or anything."

"Yeah, no offense, but that could have gone a lot worse for us," Laura pointed out as she tried to fix her own hair. A trial that she was having quite a bit of an issue with.

"I am just so sorry, please forgive me."

"It's fine, uh, what's your name?" I asked, getting ready to make my move.

"Oh, it's Carol."

"Good to meet you Carol, my name's Nicholas and this is Laura." I gave a mental fist pump at finally being able to introduce myself with my real name."

"So what are you doing out here anyway?" Laura asked, looking at the Skitty with curiosity.

The girl suddenly seemed to inflate with pride as she stood up straight and puffed her chest out.

"Rose and I are out here training to fight some rowdy wild pokémon who made the mistake of thinking that my family's inn would make a fun place to cause havoc."

I thought back to the travel guide to the area on my pokénav. Specifically the part about campsites and other rest locations.

"Would this be the Rusturf inn at the mouth of the tunnel?"

"Yeah, how'd you know?" Her eyes narrowed and she took a step back.

"Because it's the only inn between Rustboro and Verdanturf," I pointed out. She pursed her lips together and took a step forward, canceling out the step back from before. "We were actually on our way there now. We were hoping to make it there before dark,"

"Oh, so your customers." She clapped her hands together as her Skitty suddenly jumped onto her shoulder. "Rose and I were pretty much done training for the day anyway. I can you guys to the inn myself if you want. I even know a shortcut."

"I have a bad feeling about this, and I don't know why," Brook commented to me telepathically.

"Well if you think so then," I uncrippled her pokéball from my breast pocket and clicked the side button as Carol asked Laura who I was talking to. Laura just told her to wait and see as the pokéball expanded. There was a clicking sound as Brook was transferred from the common room back into her own pokéball.

I clicked it and Brook appeared on my shoulder.

"Why don't you walk with us then?"

"I have a made a terrible mistake," Brook said as she starred off in the distance.

"Oh a Ralts, those are pretty rare," Carol beamed, "And they're so cute too,"

"Thanks," I told her as I rubbed the top of Brook's head with my finger. "She was actually my starter."

The girl's Skitty noticed the new pokémon and meowed something at Brook. Brook then replied with a series of trills and squeaks. What followed was a quick conversation between the two that left all three of us trainers in the dark.

Finally, the conversation came to an end, and not a happy one if the fearful look on Brook's face was any indication.

"So what was that about?"

"The girl gets lost easily. We follow her shortcut and make it at midnight."

"Hey, are you actually talking to your Ralts?" Carol said sounding mystified. "Is she telling you what she was talking to my Skitty about?"

"Yes," I said simply. "It's something a lot of psychic types can do with their trainers. The really strong ones can even talk to all humans and teach their trainers how to talk psychically too."

"That's so cool." Carol squeed. "So… what were they talking about? Rose here always says something to the pokémon of the trainers I meet and I've always wondered what it what that she was saying."

I glanced down at Brook who glared at me.

"Tell her, I want to get to the inn early."

"Apparently your Skitty warned her that you get lost super easily and we'll get to the Inn at midnight if we follow you."

"Rose!" She exclaimed at her Skitty who looked like she was on the verge of laughter. "Is that what you always tell everyone when you meet them?"

The Skitty just gave up and burst out into laughter.

Carol puffed up her cheeks and huffed, looking away from her pokémon.

"She's exaggerating," Carol claimed. "I can get you to the inn no problem."

"Don't do it guys!" Brook panicked.

"Don't worry Brook. I mean think about it. She lives in the inn so she has to know the local area," I explained rationally. "I'm sure that her Skitty's just messing around."

"Yeah, I'm sure we'll be fine," Laura said.

"Oh thank you guys," Carol said with a sniff. "I promise you guys that we'll make it to the inn with time to spare."


Four hours had passed since we had met Carol and Rose. In these four hours, I had learned one thing.

Rose had in no way exaggerated when she said that Carol would get us lost on the way to the inn.

"Are we there yet?" I asked Nikki for the third time since the sun had gone down.

"That is a great question Brook. Just give me a second to ask our guide." Nikki said as he walked up to Carol who had heard the entirety of Nikki's half of the conversation. "So my Ralts wants to know…"

"We're almost there," Carol said for the fifth time now, sounding increasingly nervous.

"Have we passed by that tree before?" Laura said in a cheeky voice. "Because I'm pretty sure that we've passed by that tree before."

"Okay, now you're just messing with…"

She was cut off by the sound of loud screaming coming from up ahead.

"These punks again?" Carol said as she broke into a run.

"Well," I told Nikki. "What are you waiting for?"

"Right," Nikki broke out into a run, Laura following right after him. I narrowed my eyes and got ready to jump into action.

Carol stopped right past the break in the trees. I saw Rose jump off and ran forward. Nikki reached the spot next to Carol and we both saw chaos.

The good news was that we had reached the inn. The bad news was that the inn was getting swarmed by what looked like a gang of small screaming pink pokémon.

"Would you get out of here?" Rose yelled as she slammed into one of them.

"It's Rose," One of them pointed at her.

"We can take her!"

"Yeah, let's take her down,"

Three of the pink Pokémon charged at Rose, looking ready to attack.

First Milk doesn't believe me when I tell her about Nikki's progress. Then we get sidetracked by Carol getting us lost. Now we were getting interrupted by these idiots causing a huge mess. All in all, I had to say…

"I am done with these freaking distractions!" I boosted off Nikki's shoulder before he could say anything. My eyes locked onto the three pink pokémon attacking Rose and took aim. Three psychic blasts shot out from my arm and three psychic blasts hit home.

"Oh you don't have to bother, I have this handled,"

"Anyone else wants some!" I yelled as I pointed my arms around at the gang that was starting gather around Rose and I.

"Nicholas, you don't have to help us." I head Carol plead. "This is our inn and you're soon to be paying customers. Let us take care of this kind of thing."

I looked back and shot Nikki a glare.

"Don't you dare take this from me,"

"Carol, I don't think that's happening." He wisely said."

"Who's this kid?" One of the pink pokémon that I didn't attack asked another one next to it.

"No idea," the other replied. "Let's just take her down like we usually do with Rose."

The pink pokémon formed a half ring in front of me and breathed in, getting ready to scream at me.

"Not today," I pointed downwards and boosted upwards just a blast of sound exploded out of them and towards me. They were pretty loud for such tiny things. Well, it's not like size was any indication of power. I mean, look at me.

I took aim at one of the pink pokémon in particular and open fired with all I had. The pink pokémon went flying back as I landed where he had been standing. I stretched my arms outwards and blasted both of the pink pokémon on either side of me.

"Rose," Carol said, sounding a bit shaky. "Use charge beam,"

I took note at which of the pink pokémon she was taking aim at and noticed that one of the idiots was running up from behind her.

"Oh no you don't!" I boosted towards him, shifting in the air so that I would collide into him feet first. The psychic boosted kick sent the pink pokémon to the floor. If he knew what was good for him, he wouldn't get back up.

"Carol, what is the meaning of this?" I heard an older human say as he approached with another human. "You know you shouldn't be making a guest help out with this kind of thing."

I ran up to another of the punks and blasted him with a confusion from point blank range. It helped that he had closed his eyes to protect them from the flash from Rose's charge beam.

"Actually, I think it might be best to just let her be," Nikki explained as I grabbed one of the pink pokémon by the ears and tried something new. I threw him over my shoulder and shot him right into one of his buddies. "I think she's working through some stuff."

By the time Rose and I were done, all eight of the screaming pokémon were on the floor, groaning in well-deserved pain.

"Looks like the new girl's pretty tough," One of the idiots said as he got to his feet. "Everyone, fall back for now!"

They all slowly got back to their feet and made a break for it.

"Yeah you all better run," I screamed as the small pink pokémon ran off into the woods. "We did pretty well, didn't we Rose?"

"You know you didn't have to step in right? I had it handled."

I walked up to Rose, purposefully getting into her personal space. The Skitty backed up a bit in response, so I put my hand on her shoulder to keep her still.

"Rose, this has been a long and annoying day and taking care of these idiots has been the best stress relief I could ask for."

"If you say so, but if these guys came back at some point during your stay, please allow Carol and I do deal with them."

"If I'm relaxed at the time, then sure."

"And if you're not?" I glanced over at Nikki who was busy talking to the older humans from before.

"I make no promises," I told Rose as I walked back over to Nikki.


Following Brook's enthusiastic handling of the inn's Whismur problem, Carol's parents had no issue with letting us stay at their inn.

After unpacking and enjoying a hot bath, we joined the family for dinner in a large dining room downstairs. I bit into and savored the stir-fry the family had made. It wasn't often that I got to stay in a real Inn like this, so I was going to take the chance to enjoy it.

"So how long have you guys had trouble with those Whismur?" Laura asked as she took a bite from her food.

"It's been happening for a while now actually," Carol explained as she set down some extra napkins for us. "A few weeks ago, someone or something managed to rile up and organize the Whismur from the nearby cave."

"Any idea on what it could be?" Laura asked again as I enjoyed my food and listen in on the conversation.

"My best guess is a weirdly smart Loudred or Exploud. Other than that, I have no idea."

"Carol, come help with the dishes," Carol's mother called from the kitchen.

"Yes Mom," She called back, "I'm going to leave you guys to enjoy your food. Just call if you need anything," She waved as she went back into the kitchens.

"You thinking what I'm thinking?" Brook asked from the smaller table meant for pokémon next to our own. She was eating from a good spread of pokémon food, baked goods and veggies alongside Vimilky, Shroomish, Dodo, and Oddish.

"That it kind of reminds you of those Masquerain from the day we met?" I said in-between bites, "Yeah same here. I'll contact Brendan later tonight. Hopefully, he's found something out by now."

"Masquerain? What's that all about?"

"Oh right we never did tell you Brook and I met did we?"

"Yeah, I don't think we ever told her," Brook said as she chewed her food.

I suddenly realized another advantage to telepathic communication. I subtly sped up my eating to get to my psychic training just a little bit sooner.

We kept on eating as I told Laura the story of how Brook and I met. By the time we had had our fill of food, Laura was filled in on the story of how Brook and I met.

"A squad of wild Masquerain and now a gang of wild Whismur, something weird is going on in Hoenn," Laura commented. "Though I have to say, it was really brave of you to save Brook the way you did. Most people wouldn't have done the same,"

"That's why you're the best!" Brook commented from the table.

"Thanks' Brook. So yeah that's the story of how Brook and I met." I told her as I put my plate forward, full to the brim. We let Carol know we were done and we were soon shooed out of the inn's dining room so that Carol could clean up.

With that all taken care off, we retreated to the common area next to the dining room. We had apparently appeared during a bit of an offseason, so most of the guest were already in their room. The only other person here was an older gentleman who sat in the corner reading a book while wearing a darkish suit.

In short what I would probably look like in forty years or so.

But cracks about my sense of style aside, it was time to train with Brook. It felt a little strange to have the pokémon training the trainer, but I had gotten used to it pretty quick.

Of course, if I said that the training being for psychic powers didn't help, I would be lying.

I picked Brook up before sitting down on the main couch. "You ready to do this?"

"You know I am," She responded as I set her down on the table in front of me. We both brought our legs up so that we sat crossed legged. We looked into each other's eyes, synching our breathing.

"Close your eyes," I followed Brook's instruction. "The link I'm making between us is stronger than the one I normally make. Try to follow it back to me."

I pictured the room around us, the unimportant parts blurred out. And by that, I meant everything and everyone but Brook and I. The two of us were the only things that still looked clear. Between the two of us was what looked like a green road. I floated down and landed on the green road. Behind me was a giant version of myself, still sitting on the couch. In front, was a… much larger version of Brook.

This was how we normally did our training. The bridge wasn't real, I knew that. It was a metaphor given shape, a representation of the telepathically link that Brook opened between us whenever she spoke to me. I was still far from being able to forge my own connections, but learning to use Brook's connection to send my own message would be a good first step.

The trick, of course, was that the connection Brook made was already unstable as it was. Sending a message both ways was a good way to make it even more unstable.

I still hadn't figured out how to get the message across before the connection collapsed. Last night I had gotten pretty close, but I still didn't make it.

In my hand was the message I wanted to give Brook. It took the form of a small sphere of light.

"You're getting closer, I can feel it," Brook's voice came from all around me. However, it was loudest from the direction of the larger Brook.

I walked towards Brook on the green road. But as I walked, the road around me began to crumble. When I made it a quarter way the guard rails crumbled away. At halfway, the edges of the road began leaving. By three quarters, all I had left was a thin strip. I had to walk by putting one foot in front of the other, the one wide road now a tightrope.

Brook was just in arm's reach, all I had to do was get a little closer. Just a little closer and I would be done.

But it too far, but maybe I could still get my message across. I looked down at the sentiment I was holding in my hand and threw it as hard as I could at Brook.

"I heard that!" Brook called out. "You tried to say something that starts with a 'Br-' sound right?"

I had. The message I had tried to get across was just a single word. Brook's name, it felt like a fitting first message.

"Let's try that again," She said as the bridge reformed. I stood in front of my giant self, the road around us fully repaired. I formed the message in my hand once more.

Walking hadn't done me any good. The bridge had broken away far too quickly. No, I had to try something different. Something a bit faster.

I held the message to close to me and took off running.

The bridge around me started to break away like before but I was advancing much faster.

It felt strange, running in the mindscape. No matter how hard I ran, how fast I moved my legs, I felt the same. My legs never tired, and my breath never labored. I mean, I guess it made sense. This wasn't my real body, so of course, it didn't have its real limitations.

I could do anything…

I ran even faster, picking up the pace. I was going at speeds that I had never managed in reality, speeds that I couldn't achieve.

The large Brook laid before me and this time I didn't need to throw the message. I collided into Brook, home free. I laughed as the message dissolved into Brook, and the world faded away as she broke the connection.

"Brook, you picked my name," She said emotionally. Even if she had managed to hide her state in her mental voice, her face betrayed her.

Her cheeks were red, matching her eyes which had the barest hint of tears. She had one hand over her mouth, blocking some but not all of the little squeaks she was making.

"Well," I started, "Looks like I'm a psychic now."

"That's right," Brook told me. "But you still have a long way to go,"

"So I'm confused, did they do like, anything at all."

"Apparently. Most of the psychic training has been like this, to be honest. An extended period of silence followed by the two of the acting like something really deep and meaningful happened."

Both Brook and I jumped in surprise. I had forgotten that we had had an audience and judging by her reaction, so had Brook.

Off to the side, Carol and Laura had apparently been watching us the whole time.

"So how did it go this time? You make any progress?" Laura asked, sounding bored.

"Actually, yeah I did," I told her as I subtly reached downwards for my pokédex. "I even managed to send Brook a telepathic message."

I had no idea why May's friend had installed a camera on my pokédex, but that didn't mean I wasn't going to use it. I brought the dex up just in time to catch Laura's reaction.

In the photo, her eyes were wide and her mouth was gaping open. It was the exact reaction I had been hoping to catch.

"No way!" Carol leaned in, her eyes sparkling. "Did you really manage to talk to your Ralts? That's so cool!"

"Yeah, I mean all I managed to get across was her name. I still have a long way to go but yeah, I managed to talk to Brook telepathically."

And there it was, I had said the words out loud and now they were real. I had talked to Brook telepathically, I was a psychic.

I'm a psychic?

I'm a psychic.

I'm a psychic!

"Okay we get it," Laura said while holding back a laugh. "You're a psychic, you don't have to keep saying it like that."

My cheeks lit up. I hadn't realized I had been saying that out loud.

"Sorry about that," I said as I tried to look away.

"It's fine, I'd probably be freaking out too," Laura reassured me.

Carol, who apparently had the free time to talk to us, had joined us while I had been busy training with Brook. They had spent most of their time just talking according to them.

"By the way, there's something I've been wondering," I said as I set my drink down on the table. "Rose is a Skitty, a normal type right?"

"That's right," Carol said as she patted Rose's head. The Skitty preened under the affection and let out a spoiled purr.

"Well then, how can she use charge beam?"

"Oh I got my hands on a charge beam Technical Machine," I rolled my eyes. Carol had given me an answer, but not the one I wanted or meant.

"That's not what I meant. I mean yeah, you used a Technical Machine to teach her but I what I meant was how does a normal type use an electric attack?"

"That is a good question," Laura looked up and put her hand on her chin. "Most Electric types have the ability to generate and store electrical charges because they have special organs to store them. And well, Skitty doesn't really have one of those. At least, I don't think they do."

"Oh, well I'm not really completely sure, but I think it has something to do with static electricity in her fur or something."

"Static electricity?" That sounded insane. "How the heck does static electricity make a giant laser beam?"

"No idea," Carol shrugged while giving me smug grin. "But hey if it works, it works. Right Rose?"

Rose meowed something that made Brook chuckle.

I raised an eyebrow at Brook.

"Do I even want to know what she said?" Brook laughed and shook her head.

"You know," Carol stopped petting Rose and narrowed her eyes at the cat instead. "Now I'm not sure I want to know what my pokémon are saying."

"I would say it's worth it," I said as I rubbed the top of Brook's head. "Want to try one more time before bed?"

"You know it," Brook gave me infectious grin. "We'll make a psychic out of you if it's the last thing I do!"

I crossed my leg and closed my eyes as Brook forged the connection between us once more.


The morning after our night in the inn found Nikki and I outside by the side off the building. In the distance I could see the entrance to the tunnel that we would be going through later today.

We were finally going to be able to talk to The friend that Brendan had that had said that he would help me with my empathy sense. Nikki had even called him earlier today to let him know that we would be arriving later that day. Apparently, there was a small chance that he would be able to head into the tunnel to meet us halfway through.

Of course, that was for later. For now, Nikki and I were going to spend some time to try to learn a new move.

Magical leaf was weird move, at least for me. It was a grass type move that was powered by psychic energy. I reached into the sea of power and linked to the trees around me. I pulled a small swarm of leaves and floated them in the air above me. I allowed the sea of power to flood into the leaves, making them glow green.

I brought my arms down.

All of the leaves turned so that the pointy ends faced forward. The leaves shoot forward, impaling themselves into the spot of the ground that I had aimed at. After a split-second, the leaves burst with a small blast.

"Nice job Brook," Nikki congratulated me as he walked over to inspect the damage. I shut off my connection to the sea and then followed after him.

The ground had been filled with a ton of shallow holes from the leaves. It looked like I had this move done pat.

"Looks like you did some damage Brook. This move checker thing is pretty handy." Nikki said as he read something off his new pokédex. "You sure you don't want to try and learn lucky chant? It looks like it could come in handy."

I shook my head. A move that makes me slightly luckier, what was the point of that? Better to just learn a ton of attacking moves. The only exception I made was for teleport, and I normally used that to get in position to use an attacking move anyway.

"You know a little bit of luck on our side wouldn't hurt," Nikki said as he grabbed a stick and started to smooth out the dirt. We had promised to leave the area mostly like how we left it. That meant cleaning up and smoothing out the dirk after we were done.

"You guys having a good time?" Nikki and I jumped as Carol suddenly appeared behind us. Our surprise must have in turn surprised her because she suddenly freaked out and covered her mouth with her hands.

"Oh I am so sorry, did I startle you two?"

"You did," Nikki admitted as he recovered. "Don't worry, it's fine. I'm okay."

Rose rolled her eyes at her trainer. "Well, you did come out here to ask them for a practice battle. At least you have the element of surprise figured out."

"A practice battle" I crossed my arms and gave Rose an intrigued eye. I leaned back and put on my usual confident smile. "Bring it on, I could use a bit of practice myself."

"What's going on Brook," Nikki asked, looking unprepared for a practice battle. Too bad, we were going to have one anyway.

"Why don't you ask her that?" I said while laughing as I pointed towards Carol. The inn girl suddenly started blushing and gave Rose a dirty look.

"Okay, so Carol, what's going on?"

"I keep forgetting that Rose can pass stuff to your Ralts who can pass stuff to you," Carol sighed as she picked Rose off her shoulder. "I never noticed just how mouthy you are,"

"Hey, I may be mouthy, but you still wuve me," I had to stop myself from cringing from that line.

"I am so happy for and envious of that both of our humans didn't have to hear you say that," I deadpanned.

"So do I want to…?"

"No, you don't," I cut Nikki off before he could find out.

"So yeah I wanted to ask you for a quick practice battle if you aren't too busy of course." Carol finally explained.

"Sure I guess, but are you sure that you have the time?" I rolled my eyes as Nikki sandbagged.

"I have most of the early hours of the day free to myself. My parents don't really put me to work until around midday. Plus part of my chores is training Rose to deal with whatever issues the inn has to deal with,"

"You mean like the Whismur gang that was causing trouble yesterday?"

"That's right, and with how Brook handled them yesterday, I figured that Rose could really benefit from sparring with her."

Nikki couldn't really argue with that and soon enough we were looking across from each other on an open field of to the side of the inn.

"You two ready for this,"

"We were born ready," Rose meowed confidently

"Get ready because you guys are in for it now," Rose's trainer said, matching her confidence with her own. I liked it, gave me the feeling that I was in for a good match. "Mind if I make the first move?"

"Go right ahead," Nikki said as he dug his heel into the ground. "Brook, get ready to dodge whatever they throw at you,"

"Rose, start things off with a double slap!"

Rose charged at me as I stood in place, getting ready to boost out of the way. Rose dug her back foot and spun in place, her tail swinging right at me. The pink club like tail sailed through the air and I was suddenly struck by a stray thought.

I took a simple step to the side and leaned back as the tail swung above my head. Rose spun back sending her tail at me again, this time low to the ground. I simply jumped over it that time. Rose spun one final time and I did an overdramatic lean back to avoid it.

If this was the fastest Rose could go, there was no way for her to hit me with her move.

"Hey stop doing that," She whined as she stepped back.

"Nah, I don't think I will," I taunted.

"You're Skitty is kind of slow, you should work on that," Brook commentated as Rose growled at me.

"I'm sorry am I getting under your fur?" I asked Rose as I casually readjusted my green bandanna. It was an unneeded question, her bared teeth and lowered eyebrows told me all I needed to know.

"Not sure what she's saying, but don't let it get to you Rose," Carol said trying to get control of this battle. "Give her a tackle attack."

"With pleasure," Rose said as she charged right at me. I spread out my stance, and with only a little guilt, jumped up. I filliped forward and landed my hands on Rose's head. Before she could react, I pushed off and completed the flip, landing perfectly on my feet.

"Feel like trying that again?"

"You are really annoying to fight against you know that?" Rose told me.

"Alright Brook, enough defense. Show them a confusion."

"Rose, dodge," I took aim, activating my psychic powers for the first time for the entire fight. I let out a bolt of psychic power. The green-tinted distortion flew through the air towards Rose, who jumped to the side. I readjusted my aim and fired a second one at where Rose would land.

The bolt detonated on Rose, sending her flying.

"Rose!" Carol cried out as Rose skidded across the ground. "Are you okay?"

"I think I'm fine," Rose squeaked out, "Nothing hurts that bad,"

"Okay Rose, use charge beam,"

Rose started crackling with electricity all along her fur. She let out a cry as the electricity started forming into a ball in front of her.

"Brook, use confusion at full power!" I placed both of my arms out and channel energy into both arms. The power flowed into both arms and then fused into a single sphere.

Rose shot out a blast of electricity as I pushed my own blast forward.

The two forces met in the center, clashing for a little bit before the electricity split as my bolt of psychic power forced its way through. Rose didn't even have time to dodge this time. She took the hit and flew back at Carol.

"Rose!" Carol caught Rose and then cradled her in her arms.

"Okay, so now some stuff hurts that bad," Rose grumbled as she nestled into Carol's arms.

"I think we're done here," Nikki said as he scratched his cheek. "She okay?"

Rose pocked her head out let out a melodramatic cry.

"Oh, the pain, the agony, everything is unbearable pain. Carol, I was so happy that I was your pokémon. Please, move on and forget me," She suddenly collapsed in Carol's arms.

Carol, to her credit, just rolled her eyes.

"She's fine," she said. Looks like this wasn't the first time she had done something like this. "So how did we do?"

"Considering that Brook is my most powerful pokémon, pretty well," Nikki said generously. "I think your best path is to work on her speed. Is Rose had been fast enough to land those hits, this fight would have gone done completely differently."

I had to admit that Nikki had a point. For as much raw destructive power as I had at my fingertips, I still couldn't take much of a hit. During the fight with Nosepass, one rock throw had left me hanging on by a thread.

"Yeah if you got me with that tail, you might have been able to capitalize and take the win," I told Rose, who was still pretending to be dead. In spite of the fact that I could clearly see that her chest was still rising and falling.

We gave them a few more tips before heading back inside. Laura was ready to go and so were we. We ate a quick lunch, said our goodbyes and headed off to the Rusturf Tunnel.


Rusturf Tunnel was a new experience for me. I had never actually been inside a tunnel like this before. The closest I had gotten to was granite cave, and we had decided to go over that one instead.

"You know, it's a lot flatter and smoother then I thought it would be," I commented as I used the flashlight function of my pokédex.

"Well it is an artificial cave meant for travelers," Laura figured. "It'd be weirder if it wasn't all smooth and stuff."

"Yeah but this floor is perfectly leveled, like, how did they do that?"

"Machines probably," Brook said from her spot on my shoulder. "That's how you humans usually do stuff,"

"Okay yeah you both have a point," I admitted as I spotted something in the distance. Or better said a bunch of somethings. "What is that?" I said as I lifted my pokédex flashlight to illuminate what I expected to be a bunch of rocks.

It was not a bunch of rocks.

No instead the small shapes turned out to be the squad of Whismur that Brook had fought yesterday, plus some friends.

And by some friends, I meant that there was maybe triple to quadruple the number of Whismur plus a Loudred all in front of us.

"This could be trouble," I said aloud to no one in particular as the mob glared at us.

"Yeah, I may actually get a little tired," Brook boosted, but I could tell that it was a false bravado by her worried gaze.

The Loudred came forward, pushing their way through the crowd of Whismur. The larger pokémon started to say something before all the Whismur said something in unison.

"Translation?" I requested Brook,

"He's mad we messed with his crew,"

"But you're the only one who messed with his crew!"

"How was I supposed to know that they had a full crew?"

The Loudred yelled something else and again all of the Whismur called out in unison. They all started advancing as a group, crowding each other as they tried to squeeze through the narrow tunnel. The ones on the edges had it the roughest, their bodies getting pushed against the flat stone walls.

I suddenly got an idea. The wind was blowing away from us and towards the approaching mob and with how narrow this tunnel was, I had the perfect way to get through this. I reached down to my pocket and grabbed one of the pokéballs there.

"Shroomish, use stun spore on as many as you can," I said as I tossed the ball forward and Shroomish appeared on the stone floor in front of me. He pointed his head downwards as a cloud of orange spores approached the mob.

The ones in the front didn't stand a chance. The spores wafted over them, landing on their bodies and making a crackling sound on contact. The ones at the front of the mob were frozen in place, keeping the ones behind from advancing. Sure it would have been nice to paralyze all of them, but the group I got was fine.

"Okay Brook, now follow up with a confusion to send them packing," Brook jumped off my shoulder and held both of her hands out in front of her. I could see her horns glow green in the dim light of the cave as she formed that volleyball sized sphere that she'd taken to using recently.

Although with the way it collided into the group of Whismur, maybe a bowling ball would have been the better comparison. The Whismur at the front of the group went flying back, sending the rest of the group in an unorganized heap on the floor. Also unlike the stun spore, the confusion had managed to get the whole group.

"Hey Nikki," Laura said as she poked my shoulder.

"Yeah Laura?"

"I think you might have messed up a little,"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, you used stun spore to freeze the ones in the front right? And how that kept the ones in the back from advancing forward?"

"Yeah," I replied, not knowing where she was going with this?

"Well I'm pretty sure that confusion loosed them up," She said as she pointed at the mob. The stunned ones were still on the floor, except for the Loudred for had apparently already recovered from the paralysis.

He looked a little miffed, with his harsh glare and clenched fists. He said something I couldn't make out and several of the Whismur came forward, forming a line from one edge of the wall to the other.

"They're getting ready to attack," Brook explained as I made out all of the pokémon breathing in and getting ready to use their trademark scream.

"Shroomish, return," I said as I returned Shroomish as fast as possible and reclipped him to my pocket.

"Nikki?" Laura sounded concerned, which made we wonder if she knew anything about Whismur.

"Run!" I grabbed Laura's hand, not wanting to risk the Kanto native not knowing whismur's preferred method of attack. It was a good thing that she just ran without asking for much of an explanation because soon afterward the cavern exploded with noise.

Now normally a move like uproar isn't that strong, but with so many Whismur doing it at once, the attack looked a lot stronger than normal. The fact that we were in a narrow tunnel that concentrated the sound didn't help either.

As the sound waves reached us, I had to let go of Laura's hand. I put my hands up to cover my ears and kept running, hoping that Laura would do the same. Brook was doing the same, using her limited telekinesis to plant her feet into my shoulder so she could use both of her hands. It hurt my shoulder a little but nowhere near as much as it would hurt Brook if she fell off my shoulder so I ignored the pain.

A source of light from up ahead pulled me out of my thoughts. I remembered that we had passed by a side exit that led the old path over the mountain a little while ago. It looked like we had found a way to get out of this tunnel.

I made a hard left as we reached the split. I ran past the small natural chamber that connected the manmade cave to the outside and exited the mountain entirely.

I leaned forward, trying to catch my breath. Brook did the same, putting one hand on my head for leverage. Next to me, I saw Laura tossing her head back and putting her arms around the back of her head.

"Don't… lean… makes it… harder… to recover…" She said in-between gasps for air. "Also… deep breaths… not short…"

Brook and I took her advice, and after a few seconds, we did indeed feel a little better. It helped that by leaving the cave we had done either one of two things. If the Loudred and his Whismur gang felt as though the cave was their territory, then we had escaped them. We would have to contact someone from the region and report this kind of thing, but hopefully, we personally had seen the last of them.

Of course, if they did keep chasing us then running out here had done something else. It was a lot easier for us to fight in a big open area like this then the cramped little cave. Too many of my fighting strategies required a large open area to work properly. Something that I would have to fix in the future. As the sounds of the mob neared from inside the cave, it looked like we were going to be fighting.

"Shroomish, Vimilky, come out," I unclipped both of their pokéballs and tossed them. Both of the pokémon appeared in front of me, the two leaving a small space between them. Brook jumped forward, taking up the middle spot.

Laura called out Doduo and Oddish, the two of them taking a spot off to the side. We had five on our side and too many on the other side. I was sure we'd be fine.

Loudred exited from the cave leading the rest of the mob. Instead of the angry glare he had given us earlier, he looked amused, like he had just won.

Loudred said something to our pokémon, and I saw all five of them blank.

"Brook, what happened?" I asked just as Loudred yelled something. It wasn't the sound based attack from like from before. Instead, it sounded more like a general call. The call passed, and a few moments later the bushes behind us started rustling.

I turned and looked behind me. I gulped as more Whismur appeared from the bushes. They all narrowed their eyes and walked out into the clearing, surrounding us.

"That, that's what's happening," Rook said as Shroomish and Vimilky ran back to me to face off against the new group behind us.

The situation had just gone from too many to way too many.

The Loudred said something that must have been the sign to charge because all of the Whismur suddenly started running at us.

"Okay everyone, get ready!"

Now normally in this kind of situation, each individual enemy would be weak enough to go down in a hit or two. That would make this an even fight despite our numeric disadvantage. That's how it usually went in action movies anyway.

However as the fight started, it became clear that our pokémon were not action movie characters.

Doduo used his heads to snap at Whismur that got too close, using his feet to kick any that got too brave. However he only had two heads and two legs, so the when he got jumped n by five Whismur at once, he went down pretty quickly.

Shroomish tried to keep his distance, using stun spore and bullet seed to support Vimilky. However, even Vimilky couldn't take the whole group. A small group ran at Shroomish and he got overwhelmed before I could do a thing.

Oddish had almost the same thing happen to her, only she had the misfortune off not having bullet seed, so her ranged options were much worse. Overwhelmed before Laura could do a thing.

Vimilky did the second best out of all of them. The steel type was resistant to every attack the Whismur had. She managed to take down a few of them with her other jaw while ignoring any attack they threw at her.

However, the Whismur said something among themselves before a group of almost ten of them charged Vimilky. She hit a few of them but the rest grabbed her and piled on. Vimilky was tanky, but she wasn't physically strong enough to fight with seven opponents hanging onto her. She went down as the Whismur started what would be the long process of applying a death by a thousand cuts.

And Brook…

Brook was jumping all around the battlefield, using a combination of boosted jumps, boosted dashes and the rare teleport, and holding her own.

She landed on one of the Whismur before boosting off, hitting the one she was standing on with a confusion. She landed in front of another Whismur and goaded them into attacking. Whismur screamed and Brook teleported, making the Whismur hit the one that had been behind Brook. Brook, who had teleported behind the Whismur that had tried to attack her, blasted the Whismur in the back and threw them into the other Whismur. She smirked before boosting away from another Whismur that had charged at her.

As she boosted through the air, letting out a volley of confusions while in midair, I was struck with a realization.

Brook was in fact, an action movie character.

But even action movie characters could lose. And with all of our other pokémon getting recalled into their pokéballs, Brook was on her own with barely any of the Whismur taken down. Loudred was standing near the back, watching the fight with a savage grin, looking pretty full of himself.

Laura and I huddled closer as the Whismur surrounded us. Even with our backs to each other, it was pretty clear that we had no chance.

"Looks like I got here just in time,"

A flash of purple light ran in a circle around the two of us. All of the Whismur that had surrounded us were sent flying back. The flash dashed towards where Brook was, all of the Whismur in its path getting batted aside.

Brook landed after blasting one of the Whismur as the purple flash stopped behind her.

Standing behind Brook was a much larger pokémon. A tall, green and white pokémon with arm blades and wearing a necklace with a green and pink gem. A Gallade wearing a megastone, and the only Gallade with a megastone I knew of was the partner of…

"Wally!" I called out as I looked towards the entrance of the cave. Standing there was the tall green haired teen with a pendant in his hand.

"Hey there Nicholas, sorry it took me so long. It looks like you two needed some help,"

Now I could have said something like, 'no we had it handled' or 'I guess you could help out a bit'. Pretend I was some sort of cool hero kid that kept cool under any situation.

"Yes please, help would be good. We will take all the help."

"Sounds good, Gallade, show them what you can do,"

"Brook follow his lead,"

Gallade and Brook stood back to back, looking ready to take on the rest of the mob.