Episode 28: Bibarel's advice
"So, there are three major gyms left in Sinnoh," JJ began, much to his own surprise. To him, it only felt like he, Brittany, and Niko had arrived in the region a day ago. "Which is surprising," He finally said. "They are in Canalave City, Snowpoint City, and Sunyshore City."
"Well, which one is closer?" Niko asked.
"Sunyshore. Canalave is far to the west, Snowpoint far to the north, and Sunyshore far to the east, where we are. But…the Pokémon League location is usually just north of Sunyshore, so maybe we should save that one for last," JJ said, looking at the map.
"Maybe Canalave first, then? If we're far to the south, it will take a while to get to Snowpoint," Niko said, eyeing the map upside down. "Lauren, how does that sound?"
"Err, fine, I suppose," She admitted.
"Just fine? That's your home. Shouldn't you be excited?"
"Oh, yeah! Yeah, I am excited!" She said, putting on a grin. Niko saw through it, but chose not to press her on the topic. At least, not in public. "Anyways, the gym leader there—Byron—is pretty tough. He uses steel types."
"Great…" Niko said, remembering his battle against another steel type gym leader, Jasmine, back in Kanto. "That'll be great."
Lauren was the one eyeing him carefully this time. "Are you sure you're okay with this?"
"Huh? Oh, yeah, of course I am!" Niko said in a mock defensive tone. "Anyways, what would be the quickest way there?"
"Well," JJ said, looking at the map. "If we got west and north along route 212, we'll hit Hearthome City. From there, we continue west some more until we hit Oreburgh City, then Jubilife City, and then across a large river to Canalave City."
"Oh, and maybe Jubilife City is having another Pokémon Contest!" Brittany finally said. She had been quiet throughout most of their lunch, watching the other three speak amongst themselves.
"Hopefully!" Lauren said with an earnest smile. "And you're sure to win it this time!" Brittany nodded in agreement.
"Then it's settled! Off to Canalave!" Niko said with a clap. The other three nodded in agreement, and after lunch they went to get more supplies for the road ahead. This time, Niko found a mango drink to share with his pokémon, while JJ bought some more berries and other supplies with which he would cook up food for the pokémon.
Their first day on the road towards Canalave City began in the rain. Like their journey to Veilstone City, the group found themselves wading through more rain. Only this time, it was in a swampy environment, with the ground transformed into soft mud. Occasionally one of them would slip, which certainly looked entertaining for the others, but not for the victim. JJ seemed to take it the worst, as he was also trying to carry togepi, and him falling in the mud could have seriously hurt the baby pokémon, in his view.
Eventually they found a small inlet in a large hill just off the beaten, muddy path, from which they could rest for the night. JJ—still feeling the slight pain in his rear from the slip he took earlier, set to cooking dinner with growlithe and azumarill as his assistants, while the other three set up the rest of their small camp and trained.
Niko and Lauren took turns with their pokémon, due to limited space, while Brittany stood out in the rain with hers. She wanted to work with wartortle and spheal in preparation for their next contest in Jubilife City. Wartortle was trying to learn a move called aqua tail, and the brunette figured that he might have some success trying to learn it in the rain. Meanwhile, spheal was simply practicing his own moves, trying to get ice ball and aurora beam to produce brighter and stronger performances.
Lauren was trying to help roselia learn a couple of different moves. One of them was grasswhistle, where the thorn pokémon would practice using a small blade of grass and blow into it, creating a soothing melody with the intention of putting pokémon to sleep. The other move was toxic spikes, which proved to be far more difficult.
Niko, on the other hand, was focusing specifically on turtwig this time. The tiny leaf pokémon was attempting to learn the move energy ball, which took more time than he had anticipated. They spent much of that night trying to get it to work, practicing up until midnight when Niko collapsed on his sleeping bag.
"Turtwig, let's just give it another try some other time, alright?" Niko said. "Come on, go to bed," He said. Turtwig nodded and walked over to his trainer, setting down next to Niko and falling asleep.
However, in the middle of the night, after the rain had stopped, turtwig got back up and walked out into the swampy fields to continue trying. Turning back to look at Niko, the tiny leaf hesitated, but continued walking away.
He walked for several minutes before reaching the edge of a lake. Sitting on his hind legs, turtwig observed the environment around him. It wasn't as muddy or swamp-like as before. No, it was more serene than he had imagined. Eventually, he got back up and made another attempt at energy ball.
The way niko was imagining it, turtwig would simply call upon the forces of nature to provide it with energy, similar to how tangela learned ancientpower. Turtwig tried this a few times, but ultimately failed each time. It continued doing this until it heard a rustling in the bushes behind it. A bibarel popped out and waddled over to turtwig.
The two pokémon looked at each other for a moment before turtwig continued with his training, the beaver pokémon watching intently. After a few more unsuccessful tries, bibarel tapped turtwig on the back to get his attention.
"Bi. Biba, biba bibarel," The beaver said. What're you trying to do?
Turtwig frowned a little. I'm trying to learn a new move, what does it look like?
Nothing at all, Bibarel replied. What move?
My trainer calls it 'energy ball,' whatever that means. Turtwig replied, eying bibarel with suspicion.
Oh! Bibarel said with surprise. I saw something using that once. Looked kinda like you, actually, but just a little bigger and with bushes on his back. Somehow, the bushes began glowing when he used the move. I don't know why, but they did. Maybe try that.
But I don't have bushes on my back…right? Turtwig asked, unsure of what to make of bibarel's advice.
Then try using that thing on your head.
Oh, you mean the seedling? Bibarel nodded. Alright, here goes nothing. Turtwig closed his eyes, trying to concentrate as much energy into his seedling as possible. He suddenly felt a rush of power coursing through his body. Opening his mouth, he launched a small sphere of pure energy from his mouth. Woah…
Bibarel nodded approvingly. That's it! Try it again! Turtwig nodded, doing it once more, only trying to hold in the energy for a moment before releasing it. This wasn't as successful, but he was producing the energy ball. Good, good!
Say, Turtwig said, why are you here?
Bibarel laughed. Just heard something near my home. Wanted to make sure you weren't something dangerous.
Turtwig smiled. Well, I appreciate the help. And my trainer, Niko, certainly will too.
Well, you're clearly ambitious, that's for sure. Your trainer will appreciate that more than you realize. Trust me. Bibarel then got back on all fours and waddled away, back into the bushes towards its home, leaving turtwig there to continue practicing.
"Hey, Niko," Lauren asked as the two were sitting down for breakfast, "Have you ever heard of a move called 'dream eater?'"
"Yeah, why?" Niko asked, his mouth half-full of bacon.
"Okay, first off, don't do that," Lauren said in a scolding tone. "And second, well, haunter can learn it, but I'm not quite sure how to teach a move like that. Have you ever had to?"
Niko nodded. "Yeah, with my noctowl. It wasn't easy at all, just ask Brittany and JJ. They saw how long it took us to figure it out."
Brittany nodded. "Noctowl struggled a lot with it, but maybe that's because it's also a bird, not a ghost. Haunter might have an easier time with it," Brittany then looked around in slight confusion, provoking Niko and Lauren to study her curiously. "Where's turtwig? Wasn't he sleeping with you last night, Niko?"
Oh, no…Niko said. I thought I put him in his pokéball last night. Oh no. Oh no no no. "I don't know…I forgot that I left him out to sleep with me. Where the hell did he go?" Niko got up and started looking around the immediate area before summoning staravia from his pokéball. "Hey buddy, turtwig's gone missing, can you help us find him?"
Staravia nodded, flying off into the gray, cloudy sky above in search of his teammate. Meanwhile, Niko summoned luxio and piplup and asked them to help in their search. Lauren and Brittany also went into the forest to look for turtwig, leaving JJ to tend to the campsite.
Niko rushed through the forest, trying not to slip on any undried mud underneath him. Weaving through trees and over various-sized rocks, he eventually reached a clearing near a river where he found a large, green and orange pokémon with two large bushes sleeping by the river. Pulling out his pokédex, he examined the pokémon, who looked oddly familiar:
"Grotle, the grove pokémon. Grass type. It knows where pure water wells up. It carries fellow pokémon there on its back."
Niko watched as the grotle got up. It was rather large, roughly half Niko's height. It had green skin with an orange shell that ran from the tip of its short tail along its back and over its head. On each side of its back were two medium-sized bushes with a brown streak that looked like dirt running in between them. Oddly enough, when the grotle sat up and looked over at Niko, it seemed to recognize him.
The grotle ran over and tackled Niko to the ground, much to his fear and surprise. "Woah! What the hell!? What do you want?"
He suddenly heard laughing behind him. Craning his neck behind and above him, he saw Lauren, Brittany, staravia, piplup, and luxio all standing there, looking at him.
"Niko…that's turtwig!" She said, holding out her pokédex to show turtwig's evolution line.
Niko looked up at grotle, who slowly got off of him, and then back at the pokédex. "But…how?"
Grotle turned to a nearby tree as his bushes began to glow a bright green color. Suddenly, a ball of energy erupted from his mouth and crashed into the tree.
"It learned energy ball, too!" Brittany said with surprise.
Lauren ran over to hug Niko, "Whatever you did, it worked," She then kissed him on the cheek.
"I…I didn't do anything, though," Niko said. "But I'm really happy—and proud—of you, grotle. Really."
Grotle turned to Niko and nodded, a tear welling up in his right eye. He blinked quickly and the tear disappeared, but Niko and Lauren both noticed it.
Grotle's teammates were certainly excited about this new evolution, as piplup jumped onto grotle's back, close to the front, and staravia perched itself between the bushes. The grove pokémon happily walked back in the direction of the campsite, with Niko, Brittany, Lauren, and luxio following beside and behind him.
"I wonder, though," Niko said out loud, "how grotle managed to learn energy ball. When we practiced it didn't seem like he was making any progress. But, either way, I'm really glad you did. Now we're going to crush the Canalave gym, all of us!" He said, pumping his fist into the air. His four pokémon all responded as well with cheers of their own. Grotle, on the other hand, smirked as he thought of the bibarel's help. Without the beaver, he wouldn't have mastered energy ball, nor evolved. The more he thought about it, the more he wished he could thank the bibarel, since through that help he made his best friend and trainer happy, which is all that mattered to grotle.
"Wow!" JJ said upon observing grotle carrying two of his teammates. "So, I guess you found turtwig…?"
"Grotle, actually, but yeah," Niko responded with a satisfied grin. He pat grotle's back. "And somehow he learned energy ball!"
JJ nodded approvingly. "Well, let's quit dilly-dallying and get a move on! I have everything packed up, but we really need to make up some time if we're going to get to Canalave City any faster."
The other three ran over to grab their bags and continue their journey northwestward towards Hearthome City, the first stop on their long trip to Canalave City in the west.
On the way, Niko allowed his pokémon to walk alongside him, which wasn't a usual occurrence, particularly when the group needed to get to their destination in a hurry. However, Niko made an exception this time. As they were walking down near the river where grotle evolved, the grove pokémon noticed a bibarel swimming in the river. The beaver waved to grotle and his friends, all of whom responded in kind.
"Bibarels are kinda cool, aren't they?" JJ said as he showed togepi the beaver pokémon. Togepi nodded as she waved eagerly to the bibarel, who waved back gingerly before turning to grotle and nodding. Grotle nodded back, responding to their tacit conversation.
"Gro! Grot grotle!" He yelled out. Thank you for everything.
"Biba! Bibbib bibarel!" It was my pleasure, friend.
Author's note: Okay, to be honest, including bibarel was completely random. I chose a pokemon that is naturally found on that route, and bibarel sounded good enough. There is nothing about its personality or abilities that relates to giving advice. Rather, the advice itself was more important than the messenger of it. It was important in helping turtwig think outside of the box. I also liked trying out the whole "pokemon talking to one another" thing. I believe i've done it before in some way or another. It allows me to go more in depth with each pokemon's characteristics, which admittedly a weak point in my writing, I think (among other things). I'm rambling now. I hope you enjoyed!
