Episode Fourteen: A Sad Eevee

The next patient I had to deal with was a distraught eevee named Everest. His trainer had left the hospital to pick up an egg from a day care centre. The trainer didn't say which one, but I'm guessing it's in Solaceon Town. That's the nearest one to Hearthome City. Hopefully she'll be back soon. Whilst Everest was healed of the physical cuts from the machine, Domino decided that Everest needed to stay for 24 hours. I think it was a good idea, Everest's trainer seemed to be one of those trainers who throw themselves into a battle as soon as their team is healed.

Everest mentioned before that he would have regular aches in the head and stomach that would stop him from resting. His trainer said that he was very overprotective and often get mood-swings. She also mentioned something about diarrhoea and fear that he would be released back into the wild.

Some patients tell me all sorts of things that happen while their trainer is away, whilst others remain quiet. A pokémon has no reason to lie, so I assume they're always telling the truth. Everest was one of the quiet ones, crawling into his bed to cry his eyes out.

I took one corner of the quilt and flipped it over. Everest began to run under the pillow. I looked at him under the pillow. I couldn't see his face because he was trying to wipe his tears with his tail.

"What's wrong Everest?" I asked.

"Why does everybody want me to change?" Everest sobbed. "They say I won't ever be able to impress Dahlia if I don't evolve."

Everest sounded so sweet and well spoken. I know how he feels, many eevees are stuck on what they want to evolve into, and there are some occasions where trainers evolved their eevee into something they didn't want to evolve into and that can cause some serious friction between that pokémon and the trainer. One mayor in Kanto was dismissed for abandoning a bulbasaur for not evolving.

"Who's Dahlia?"

"She was my childhood sweetheart when she was a skitty. When she evolved into a delcatty, Ruth took her to a day care centre for breeding. Dahlia's got lots of children now."

"Is Ruth your trainer?"

Everest nodded. "Dahlia is very strong and I'm very weak. Ruth tried to train me, but I wasn't good enough. I kept on fainting all the time. Ruth's left me now hasn't she?"

"Ruth said she was collecting an egg," I said. "She should be back shortly." I personally had no idea when Ruth would be back, but I had to try and give Everest some positive things. He started to remove his tail away from his eyes and stopped crying.

"I think Dahlia is happy with those partners..."

I just wanted to hug Everest so hard. The media is terrible at promoting favouritism and violence. I remember when I was working in Kanto there was lots of advertisements for Action Replay pills and even articles on how to make your own drugs. I swear the media drives people to illness sometimes.

Pokémon need rest after a battle. They need time to recover and some people go to pokémon centres to make it quick and easy. But that healing machine can only heal physical pain. It won't do a thing to depression or any other emotional trauma.

"When was the last time you've seen Dahlia then?"

"Not since she went to the centre," Everest replied. "I think that was about a month ago." A lady walked into the room. If was Everest's trainer, Ruth. She came back with a delcatty and a lot of eggs in her hand. Everest's eyes lit up as soon as he saw the delcatty. As the delcatty jumped on the bed, Everest hopped over to hug her. "DAHLIA!"

"So how has Everest gotten on?" Ruth asked.

"I am diagnosing him with PTSD," I told Ruth. "He has the common symptoms."

Ruth was gob-smacked. She almost dropped her eggs as her legs collided on the floor. "PTSD?"

"Post-traumatic Stress Disorder," I explained.

"So what will happen?" Ruth asked.

"We'll need to monitor Everest quite closely. We'll need to get rid of anything that might provoke Everest's trauma. We may have to prescribe antidepressants."

"This sounds serious," Ruth admitted. "So did you find out what kind of thing provoked it's trauma?"

"I've had a chat to Everest," I replied. "It seems Everest dose not enjoy battles very much. It might have made him reminded him of something devastating from the past. It also seems that seeing it's evolved forms causes Everest to go into a depression."

"Oh no," Ruth said. She slapped herself on the cheek. "I've been pressuring him to evolve into an espeon. I've always wanted one... Oh Everest I'm so sorry, I didn't know I was giving you pain."

Everest wasn't paying attention. He and Dahlia snuggled on top of the bed. The two of them were communicating well with each other. Ruth didn't understand what Everest and Dahlia were saying, but I could. She asked for my translations and when she found out what they where saying, she didn't feel so guilty.

"I don't want to evolve," Everest whispered into Dahlia's ear.

"Well I love you just the way you are," Dahlia responded as she licked Everest's ear.

I left the room with a smile on my face. I felt good about myself. I managed to make my patient happy.