Episode 48: A lesson in zen
"Prinplup, metal claw! Cranidos, try to dodge!" Niko directed as he watched his two pokémon duke it out on the beach. The penguin pokémon burst forward, claws glowing bright gray as he attempted to slash at the headbutt pokémon. Fortunately, cranidos managed to evade the first iteration of metal claw, but in his initial excitement didn't react fast enough to prinplup's sharp claws lightly slashing across him. Upon impact cranidos fell backwards into the sand. Sighing, Niko walked over to the little dinosaur and pat him on his shiny red head.
In the aftermath of Brittany's win at the Grand Festival, the group stuck around Lake Valor, since as Top Coordinator Brittany had to conduct interviews and meet with other past winners, from Sinnoh and abroad. For the few days that they were there, she would come back to Hotel Grand Lake mentally and physically exhausted, refusing to talk much with anyone. As a fellow introvert, Brittany's social battery was constantly being depleted.
"I just want this to be over!" She said as she lay down on her bed. "I don't want to talk to other people anymore! Ugh!" She said before quieting down for the rest of the night.
After leaving Lake Valor, the group continued eastwards towards Sunyshore City, where Niko and Lauren would compete for their final gym badge in Sinnoh. It was perfect timing, as a matter of fact: The Pokémon League was in two weeks, and so as winter quickly turned to spring they travelled along route 222, which consisted primarily of beach. According to JJ, the trek would only take a couple of days, but Niko and Lauren wanted to spend a lot of that time training for what would likely be the most difficult gym for both of them.
It was then that Niko decided he needed to continue training cranidos, as he intended to use the headbutt pokémon in the Pokémon League. It wasn't that cranidos wasn't excited—he was the most enthusiastic pokémon on Niko's team. The problem was he wasn't as battle-hardened as the other four. And he decided to spend most of his time having his pokémon compete against one another. This tactic worked most of the time, and he was feeling proud of it.
Lauren, on the other hand, was feeling more confident about her battling skills then ever. Even though she lost to Brittany in the Grand Festival, she was very proud of her placement—top 4—and even more proud of her pokémon for giving it their best. As far as moves were concerned, she didn't have much more to teach them. Rather, she wanted them to focus on speed and evasion, which Fay's old tactic of jumping left and right helped with.
There was one problem she was facing: she wanted to catch a sixth pokémon. While there are no rules against not having a full team, it is highly recommended, since most trainers will show up to the Pokémon League with one. Niko—who had plenty of reserve pokémon back in Kanto—didn't have this kind of problem, and told Lauren that, if worse came to worse, she could borrow one of his provided, of course, that the pokémon was willing. Niko was confident that they would be.
Despite this offer, though, Lauren wanted to catch one of her own. And so during their journey towards Sunyshore City, she was keeping an eye out for any wild pokémon. She and JJ even checked the pokédex to look up local pokémon, but none of them seemed interesting enough to Lauren.
"It's alright, cranidos. We'll get it next time." Niko said, helping the rock type back onto his feet. Cranidos looked down in shame, wanting nothing more than to please his trainer. Out of anger, he ran towards prinplup with a headbutt. Niko, however, briefly noticed a blue spark strike across cranidos' shiny red head. "Cranidos! Stop that!" Niko said as prinplup halted the dinosaur with his claws. "Look, buddy, I know you're upset. But let's just try again tomorrow, alright?"
Cranidos nodded, turning around and walking back to the camp, where JJ had just made some rawst berry poffins—cranidos' favorite. He sat down next to torterra and luxray, who had just woken up from a nap and were getting ready to start training with Niko. So as they got up, JJ's shroomish and growlithe replaced them and sat with cranidos instead.
"Cranidos really enjoys travelling, doesn't he?" JJ remarked to Niko as he trudged through the sand with umbreon at his side.
"Can you blame him, though? He was revived from a rock. He never had a home. Or at least, not one that he could remember…" Niko replied, wondering if cranidos had any memory of life before he was fossilized. "He also loves battling."
"That's because he's still very young. Only a couple of months old. He has a lot of energy. And since you're basically his parent, he looks up to you a lot, and wants to be his very best around you."
Niko nodded. This certainly wasn't the first time his pokémon admired him like a child would for their parent. Magnemite, aron, and snorunt all did when they were first caught, and even after they evolved. Of course, magnemite was the only one that seemed remotely infantile, but regardless, their mannerisms were similar to cranidos' in some ways, minus the excessive energy.
He then turned to torterra and luxray, who were both ready to do some training. Luxray was easy—Niko wanted him to work specifically on his release for discharge. Torterra, however, was more challenging. Since his evolution at Spear Pillar, torterra has had more difficulty moving around. He got significantly larger and heavier, which was more of an adjustment than either he or Niko had expected. With that said, Niko took the new challenge with pride, trying to convince torterra that this evolution would make him stronger, as he would be a more defensive pokémon with long-range moves.
One of these moves was earthquake which, for obvious reasons, Niko chose not to practice, instead saving that for the Sunyshore Gym and the Pokémon League. Instead, he wanted to work on improving torterra's bite move and making it more like a "crunch" move. This didn't seem too hard, as the continent pokémon's jaw got much stronger with evolution. The challenge here was it was too strong. One time, torterra and cranidos were practicing against one another. After dodging an energy ball, cranidos went in for a headbutt. Torterra took the opportunity to try using crunch, and he succeeded. Cranidos yelped out in pain—which, given how hard cranidos' head was, is impressive—and ran over to Niko. After the practice battle, cranidos was indicating that he had a headache from torterra's attack.
"Alright, torterra. When we use crunch, don't go that hard this time, alright?" Niko asked, turning to prinplup, who volunteered to help his teammate practice. "Prinplup, use metal claw!"
The two pokémon kept at this for some time. Meanwhile, Lauren was off several yards away training with glaceon and lopunny. The rabbit pokémon was trying to learn hi jump kick—a move it doesn't naturally learn—with limited success. Glaceon, on the other hand, was simply practicing the moves that she already knew. As a still relatively new pokémon to battling, both she and Lauren wanted to see some improvement. And during their trek to Sunyshore, they began to see results.
It was evening on the beach, and most of the group and their pokémon had gone to bed. The only ones up were Niko, Lauren, cranidos, and Brittany's pikachu, who was simply enjoying looked at the bright moon above. The couple was sitting on a towel, watching the waves ebb and flow while cranidos was running around, dodging imaginary attacks left and right.
"All of your pokémon seem to have one thing in common," Lauren finally said.
"What's that?"
"Determination to do better."
Niko chuckled. "Yeah, I suppose so. The exception was my numel, who didn't want to do much of anything. But he's an incredible fighter."
Lauren turned to her boyfriend and smiled. "That's because he's smug, probably. He knows he's strong, so he doesn't have to train." Niko nodded again. "Will I get to meet all of your pokémon one day?"
"Oh, of course you will! And they'll love you. Actually, I want to use some of them at the Pokémon League this time. Obviously, I don't plan on catching any more pokémon—unless one just seemed like a good match for me—so I will probably have to use my others. But some of them haven't gotten a chance to battle competitively in a couple of years. But of course you can meet them." Niko turned to Lauren and smiled, the moonlight shining on opposite sides of their face.
"That reminds me…" Lauren said. "I should be looking for another pokémon."
"You'll find one. I know you will." Niko said, placing his hand on her leg. They looked at each other for a few more moments before locking lips.
Meanwhile, cranidos continued running around. Occasionally while he was practicing his evasion abilities, he felt the top of his head spark with energy. Whenever it happened, he felt calm, as if he were meditating (Niko had mentioned meditation before, but cranidos had no idea what it was, only that it was a way to calm down). Eventually he lost track of where he was. Looking around, he couldn't find Niko or the camp anywhere. Puzzled, he started walking back in the direction he came from.
That's when he saw something quite unusual.
Sitting on a rock out in the water—maybe ten feet out—was a rather tall pokémon with a gray shell on its head. Cranidos curiously eyed the strange pokémon, noticing its shiny pink skin and a spiny ruff with alternating red and white stripes. The shell was gray with two horns, one on each side, and a red gem in the center. The entire time, it was casually observing the small dinosaur.
"Crani?" Cranidos asked. The strange pokémon leapt off of its rock and waded through the water onto the beach. After approaching cranidos with its single-digit hands behind its back, it reached up and pointed at the shell on its head.
Suddenly, to cranidos' surprise, the shell began to glow a bright, light blue color. The pokémon then lowered its head and charged forward. Cranidos, out of habit, leapt to the right to successfully evade. The pokémon then stopped its assault, raising its head back up and turning back towards cranidos. For a moment, the two stared each other down.
The pokémon then moved towards cranidos, who attempted to run away before feeling a pink hand touch its head. The pokémon then pointed to cranidos' head, and then its own, causing it to glow once more.
Suddenly, cranidos seemed to understand. The strange pokémon was trying to teach it something. Then the headbutt pokémon remembered feeling a brief rush of energy to his head, and tried to calm down momentarily, lowering his heart rate and breathing. Moments later, he began to feel the rush of energy once more. He looked up at the strange pokémon, who nodded approvingly.
"Cranidos! Cranidos!?" Niko's voice said in the distance. Cranidos turned his head to the right to see his trainer and Lauren walking around with flashlights and Brittany's pikachu, who was lighting up the area around them as well. "Hey! There you are!" Niko said, breaking into a run. Cranidos did the same, and in no time the two were reunited. "Buddy, don't go off running away like that. I know, you're excited about getting stronger and faster, but next time, stay close to me, alright?"
Cranidos nodded before calming himself down again, trying to replicate the move he just learned. When he felt himself succeeding, he opened his eyes to see Niko looking at him with surprise. Cranidos also noticed his face was colored a light blue from the glow.
"What's this move?" Niko asked, turning to Lauren, only to find his girlfriend eying the strange pokémon.
"More like, what's this pokémon?" Lauren asked curiously. She pulled out her pokédex:
"Slowking, the royal pokémon. Water and psychic type. Being bitten by shellder gave it intelligence comparable to that of award-winning scientists."
"WOW." Lauren said, thoroughly impressed. "Niko…I found it. I found the pokémon that I want to catch."
Niko tilted his head. "You barely know anything about it, though!" Niko said.
"So? I have a feeling about it. Haven't you had that before?"
"Well…" Niko said, thinking about it. He, in fact, had, and then nodded. "Alright then, go for it."
Lauren was about to ask pikachu if she wouldn't mind battling the slowking, until the royal pokémon shook its head. "Wait, why not?"
Slowking didn't respond, instead turning away and walking off. It didn't even give a parting glance to cranidos, who tried to run after it, only to feel a sudden throbbing in his head, which forced him to halt his advances.
The following morning, Niko and Lauren explained the events of the previous night to Brittany and JJ. Both were curious by slowking's behavior, but after doing some research, JJ found that the move cranidos had learned was zen headbutt.
"From the looks of it, that must've been what slowking was doing with cranidos. Teaching it zen headbutt. Is that correct, buddy?" Niko asked. Cranidos nodded happily. "Well, guess we should keep going, then." He said, throwing his bag around his shoulders and beginning to walk off. When he realized he was the only one, Niko turned back around to see Lauren looking in the opposite direction. "What's up, Lauren?"
"I think I see slowking walking towards us…" She said.
She was right: slowking was indeed approaching them at a casual pace. Eventually, it broke into a run, with its shell glowing bright blue and its hands still behind its back. It was also running directly for Lauren, who quickly dove to the right and summoned lopunny.
"Lopunny, agility and thunderpunch!" She commanded, standing back up and shaking the dirt off of her clothes. The rabbit pokémon obliged, darting forward and slamming its fist into slowking's shell, knocking the royal pokémon to the ground. Without hesitation, slowking then lurched its head towards lopunny, slamming the left horn into the normal type and knocking her backwards. Slowking then, using its red gem, conjured a water pulse and shot it at lopunny's face: a direct hit. "Thunderpunch again!"
Lopunny lobbed another electrified fist at slowking, who retaliated with zen headbutt, driving its shell into lopunny's fist and, with incredible strength, driving the rabbit pokémon backwards through the sand.
"High jump kick!" She commanded, thrusting her hand into the air. Lopunny ended her attack before ducking to the left to dodge slowking. She then jumped into the air and brought her right foot down on slowking's back, knocking the royal pokémon forward towards Lauren. Energized, the blue-haired trainer opened up an empty pokéball and tossed it at slowking. The royal pokémon began to glow red before transferring into the pokéball. The red and white ball fell to the ground and wiggled a few times before ultimately clicking.
Lauren bent down and picked up the ball, lopunny standing by her side. "Looks like you did catch it." Niko said with a wink.
She looked up and smiled at her boyfriend. "I think it wanted me to catch it. Otherwise it wouldn't have found us." Lauren then opened up the pokéball, sending out her newly caught slowking. The royal pokémon towered over her, but looked down with a friendly smile all the same. "Welcome to the team. My name is Lauren. And I'm trying to win all eight Sinnoh gym badges. Are you with me?"
Slowking nodded in a sagely manner before smiling down at its new trainer.
