My Fire-Psycho Type
Written 30-May-19
Prelude
January the twenty-eighth, two thousand nineteen. Exactly one month after the premier of 'The Big but not Bad Wolf!', a play from a special kind of theatre that my manager and I worked at: our gimmick was to cast wild pokemon. In that play, there was a rather 'unusual' actor that my employer, Marten, had a mood about.
Imagine, you're maneuvering a rickety passenger van through roundabouts and there's a Welsh guy in the passenger seat. The souls of GM's factory workers are rattling the plastic in anger. Also, you must check the rear-view at least every two seconds to make sure that mangy critter in the back row isn't trying to bite the door hinge off. Your passenger is also peaking at that critter, but there's no dread on his face! He's having a look somewhere between indifference and amusement. You know that look means you're about to be saddled with a bunch of bullshit.
That was me exactly one month ago.
"What are you thinking," I asked.
"You think the salvation army accepts live donations?"
"They'd put it in a storage bin at best." We used 'it' and 'they' so we didn't get attached to the wildlife. The noise of the jittery dashboard and the moaning from that pokemon in the back kept amplifying. "I'd rather see it go to a nature reserve."
"Mate, we live in Missoula! And if we sent it to another state, the Fish and Wildlife Service would wonder why it's fucking bald, see that it wound up in our theatre, and put us in shackles!" He was completely right and I hated it. The best thing about Montana was also the worst: there's absolutely nothing out here. "It'd be dead in the first snowstorm and I've got an ice-type at home," Marten continued. "Seems we're in a corner."
Around the next bend, the Pokecenter revealed itself from around a block of buildings. That is when Marten slammed his hand on my shoulder. I slammed the van into park just as hard and snapped at him.
"Woah, hold up! That animal is making the van smell like rotten gasoline! I'm not about to put up with that for the rest of my life!"
His reply came with a delighted smile. "Relax, you don't need to. Take it in, let its fur grow, and release em' when you're done."
"What about my job?!"
"The start of the year is always slow. I'll put you on paid leave till' April." At that point I knew I lost. Marten was determined to have me rehabilitate the creature. "I'll also dial Nurse Joy for you since it's your first pokemon. She'll have all the info you need!"
And before I could open the door, Pokemart coupons flooded my lap.
So here I am, a month later. Today is my appointment.
BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!
I raised my arm and slapped my hand all over the nightstand until it smacked the snooze button on my phone. My bed was nestled in the back-left corner right by a freezing window. It aint the biggest bedroom; I think the floorplan said 400 sq ft? The specifics didn't matter. I rose out of the bed like zombie and stumbled forward to the bathroom. I wiped my eyes as the golden lights revealed the man ahead of me. Around 30 years old, dressed in frumpy PJs. His afro was all lumpy and his 'friendly muttonchops' looked awful. I dug into my medicine cabinet for a shaver when one of the lights blew out. Clearly, I wasn't meant to use any of my grooming skills.
I dropped the faulty bulb in a trashcan nearby and took a deep breath. There was only one more thing to do before driving to the Pokecenter: put on something warm. I turned around and unhooked an old red bathrobe.
…
I reached in my pocket for a lollipop in here, the robe I mean. The smell of antiseptics never made me feel any kind of positive. As soon as I parted the glass doors to the Pokecenter, Nurse Joy hurried from her desk to a private room, then rushed back. By the time I came up to her desk, she presented nine pages of yellow notebook paper to me. Suddenly, I shattered my lollipop!
The words! They were all fuzzy and noodly, like a fog came between me and the page! I wiped my eyes for the second time this morning, hoping my vision would clear. Thank goodness the nurse's face still looked sharp! Her cheeks were flushed, and she had a rare worry in her eyes.
"What is all of this," I asked while shaking her papers around.
"A list of all the pokemon's requirements, starting with its medication." Nurse Joy did all her 'iting' for a separate reason: HIPAA.
"What medication?"
She curtly nodded at the mess in my hands. "This is on the brochure."
Our eyes had a fight, flicking from each other's to the papers. "I can't read hieroglyphics."
"I'm sorry if they're not written well enough for you. Hm!" What did they feed this nurse? Every other sentence sent her into the same narrow-eyed hands-on-hips-I'm-mad-at-you-stance. As she ranted, I flipped through the pages, squinting so that the horrible letters couldn't leap out the page and tear my eyes out. Soon she counted off her hands. Whatever she was doing looked important, so I started to listen.
"One of them is glucosamine, another is antibiotics, then a sleep pill, another for bipolar type 1, and the ones in the sheets are…to kill their appetite! Do NOT give them ANY extra medications! And they must get it ALL at 9 am DAILY!"
They oughta feed this nurse a chill pill.
"Oh, one last thing," she said. "The patient may be unpredictable around this time of year. For both your and their safety, remain at least 30 feet apart."
"How am I supposed to do anything staying a telephone pole away?"
"Just go with it!"
Was she insane? Before I could speak, her gloved hand plopped an icy aluminum pokeball into mine. Its hinges were almost eaten by rust; the cold exterior felt as though it had been machined with concrete slabs. The faded red stripe still had the company's famed holographic stamp.
'PRODUCT OF DEVON CO. PROUDLY MADE IN THE USA. COPYRIGHT'
I squinted and felt at the area, but the year was illegible. The nurse went into another spiel. "You can get their medicine at a pharmacy as well. There is also the PC if they need to stay overnight."
Did she expect me to have spare pokeballs? She knew I didn't come here for fun. I came here because pitting a bunch of animals together caused fights!
"Nurse, the premier ball?"
"Legally, I am not allowed to distribute Pokéballs."
I furrowed my brow. This city led me through circles and speed bumps for an average Pokemart that was always flooded with the same stuff. The only other one took four hours to reach by car. I recollected myself, thinking about all the pills.
"She's bipolar right?" Nurse Joy nodded. "And you said 'type one'?"
"Its mood is as predictable as the weather, but they have known me for years and we have never had an accident. Promise me that you'll be patient with them."
"I promise."
"Great!" The nurse clapped, summoning my rescue from a hall to the left. She was a Delphox.
She carried a milk crate with medication in it. Her hospital gown looked like it hung off a hanger instead of her shoulders. The fur in her ears didn't resemble fire, just frizzled hair hastily chopped up with a scalpel. The bags under the starter's eyes were so bad they looked like two black eyes.
"All their bones healed successfully," Nurse Joy said. "If you do not put them in any storage mediums for long, it should only take two months for their fluff to come back. The Pokecenter is available 24/7. Good luck, Dante!"
I fumbled with the ancient pokeball for a moment and recalled the vulpine. Her milk crate hit the ground as hard as reality hit me. I, Dante, was forced to try and tame a pyromaniac, armed only with ancient texts and some leftover candy. Here goes.
…
The front door made a squeaky laugh as I kicked it open. My living room was sort of a makeshift theater, but the important parts were the suede couch and the 4k!
Oh right, I've got a pokemon now.
I guess the study area is helpful sometimes. It is basically a dusty office desk hidden in the corner. I sat down, picked up a notebook, and laid ink to paper.
Page 1, Day 1: Description
'Delphox, the fox pok-eh-mon and the evolved form of Fennekin! Delphox can blah blah blah! I wasted three minutes deciphering a poor man's pokedex entry! It was stuff like this that made me suspicious of that nurse.
I placed my pen back on the desk and swiveled in my chair some. My hallway served as a spine to my little abode, connecting every room in the home. Now it stared me in the face, daring me to reach my arm back and chuck the pokeball all the way to my bedroom like an MLB player. I didn't do that, rather, I took a deep breath and rolled the ball some ways ahead of me. The humanoid erupted from a flash of light. Her gown slipped off her shoulders immediately.
She stood about five and a half feet tall. Her physique resembled that of a svelte woman's but was well past its expiration date; her carbon skin hanged limply around the rough bends and folds of her aching joints. Seeing her brought a tear to my eye and botox to the mind. The Delphox whipped her head around, caught a glimpse of me, and snapped her fingers. All that remained of the former actor was a plume of fire and smoke.
Welp, show's over.
Except a faint beeping kept sounding in my ears...My phone! I forgot it by the sink; the noise of my eight o' clock alarm banging at my eardrums! I sprinted down the hall, swung open the bedroom door, and halted. The pokemon shook under the left side of my comforter. Wishing to make a good first impression, I slowly reached my hand down to my side and offered something that helped me out when I was in a funk: toffee flavored lollipops!
"Want one?"
Her panting became deathly-quick! Nurse Joy yelled at me in the back of my head like a sports coach! `Hey! Dante, you MUST help them cope with their stress! NOW or I WILL call Officer Jenny!' Sorry nurse, but you said it yourself: stay away!
``Look at what the cat dragged in!``
The Delphox put a tiny ball of heat my brain and gave me a hallucination of her 'voice'. It carried the intonation of a seductress and the sneer of mob boss. I tightened my grip on the pokeball and swung back around.
I couldn't hold my nose tight enough! My bedroom smelled like melting plastic! And that pokemon! She swirled tongues with her own reflection! I scolded the Delphox, but instead of acknowledging me, she stumbled like someone hit her, falling over, passing out, and urinating on herself.
...
After processing what the hell just happened, I carried the Delphox into the bathtub. Looking around, I found out where that smell came from. A trail of smoke leaked from where my phone's battery used to be.
I tossed it next to the bulb.