Maple continued her speech, segueing from the Pokemon Caller to clothes that she had in her hand. "Oh, and Riley," she started. "Your dad gave me this for you. It's your swimming outfit. You'll have to change into it when you're riding a Pokemon on the water. You can buy different pieces for your swimming outfit at most Fashion Shops, but your dad gave me this to give to you with Lapras. Inside that PokeBall in the middle of the Pokemon Caller is a small island where the Pokemon you can ride go until you want to ride them."
Riley nodded and tossed the Pokemon Caller into the air, catching it in one hand. "Great! Then I'm sure Lilly will meet you in Suncoast City."
Riley ran up to Vancine City's harbour, where he ran to the end of the boardwalk. Once he was there, he called Lapras, who let out its elegant cry as it splashed into the waters. Route 4 started right as soon as a Trainer entered the water off of Vancine City's boat harbour. Riley cruised over the waves with Lapras, but on his way there he encountered some trainers who were on small boats.
"Hey, youngster, care for a battle?" said one of the Trainers. He was a Sailor that was sitting on a red, tug-style boat. He had a white raincoat on, a matching raincap, and water-repellent pants. He had a curly brown beard and a huge smile as he sent out his Pokemon, Zipgill.
Riley's PokeDex read out to him, "Number 30, Zipgill. Water-type. The Fish Pokèmon. Zipgill's gills are protected by zippers that have the texture of plastic. When they close their eyes, their eyelids connect in a zig-zag, but because they don't have pull tabs, their eyelids cannot be zipped. They spend most of their time in slightly-populated areas, because they rely heavily on humans for food. "
It was a cute Pokemon that had a wave to its dorsal fin similar to a lot of modern hairstyles. But Riley immediately knew that Burndillo and Concealpillar would be weak to its Water-type moves. He sent out Pupsky, who landed on the boat that the Sailor was on. Pupsky jumped on Zipgill, attacking it with Bite. Zipgill used Bubble Beam, and Pupsky was blown off of it. Riley caught the little puppy Pokemon in his arms. He pet it and commanded it to use Tackle. Pupsky jumped out of Riley's arms and boosted through the air, hitting Zipgill, causing it to faint.
"Darn. I really thought I had the advantage there!" cried out the Sailor, forking over Riley's reward money.
Riley proceeded riding on Lapras' back. He looked around for a Water-type Pokemon that he could use, and he found one! It was actually a bird, and it was sitting in the sand on a tiny island.
"Wing!" the bird Pokemon cawed.
Riley sent Pupsky onto the sandy island, where it used Tackle on the bird! The bird looked disapprovingly at Pupsky, and used Talon Claw! It dislodged its feet from the sand it was sitting in and flapped its way over the puppy so that it could scratch it with its talons.
Pupsky attacked again with Tackle, and Riley threw a PokeBall at the Pokemon. In the meantime. One shake... Two shakes... Three shakes... The Pokemon was... Caught!
"Number 32, Darwing. Muddyfoot Form, one of Darwing's six forms. Flying- and Water-type. This shore-stationed form of Darwing are generally very introverted and tend to avoid their other forms. Muddyfoot Darwing often feed on shore-feeding Coralyte, though they enjoy the sweetness of berries as well. Their feet are webbed to allow them to be able to glide in the water, but they also have claws so they can pull their feet through thick mud and catch buried Pokèmon and vegetation."
Riley pet Darwing's beak, welcoming it to his team. As he continued along Route 4 on Lapras' back, he encountered another trainer.
"My name's Gala. My title's Swimmer! Some people would call swimming manually from Vancine City to Suncoast City a feat, but to me, it's just another step to Pokelympic status!"
Riley sent out his Muddyfoot Darwing, knowing it would be better for the water-based battles on this route.
"My three Coralyte will show you what's up!" Swimmer Gala shouted, sending out a red Pokemon that looked like a stationary turret, but in coral form.
Darwing immediately looked hungry, eyeing the Pokemon that it preyed on in the wild.
"Coralyte, attack Darwing with Hydro Pump!" Swimmer Gala ordered.
The mushroom-shaped Pokemon lowered its head, completely hiding its yellow eyes. When its head popped back up, it squirted out an extremely strong blast of water that sent Darwing almost to unconsciousness.
But Darwing held on, and Riley had it use Talon Claw, which made the low-level Coralyte faint!
Gala sent out another Pokemon of the same species as before, though this one was yellow and had chimney-like stalks that it was happily blowing bubbles from. It used Bubble on Darwing, but the bird didn't take much damage from it at all. Darwing used Peck, which caused the Yellow Coralyte to faint.
Finally, Gala sent out her Blue Coralyte. It was similar to the yellow one, but it had furs on its body and overall had a more sporadic form. Darwing went first, using Peck on it. The Coralyte tried to counter with Bubble, but it missed, only to have Darwing move in again with another Peck.
"Wow..." Swimmer Gala gasped. "I guess I gotta just keep swimming..."
Riley proceeded through the straight water-based route, where he stumbled on the shores of Suncoast City, one of the only places in Chinocko immune to snow year-round. He jumped onto the beach and sent Lapras back into its PokeBall in the Pokemon Caller.
He walked up the sandy shore, changing back into this regular outfit when he got back on land. Suncoast City was made of a bunch of houses on small islands in the lake that was underneath the city. Several bridges connected the islands together, and a beautiful waterfall is what fed the lake.
The first thing from the shore was the Pokemon Centre, which Riley was revealed to find. After stopping in there, Riley checked out the building across the bridge from the Pokemon Centre. "Hello there, stranger. Welcome into my humble little home. I only own this bottom floor. Upstairs is the second half of the apartment, which my brother lives in." Riley waved at the home's owner and headed upstairs to investigate. There was a Magikarp in a fish tank and a man in a pretty obviously-fake Huskowl suit was sitting on a couch in front of the tank, watching the fish bob around.
Riley tapped his shoulder. "Oh, hey. I'm a PokeManiac. Like my Huskowl Pokesuit? I got it from a really credible website."
Riley smiled, a little weirded out but willing to embrace new subcultures. He went onto the balcony of the home, where there was a bridge leading across to a home on an island that was taller than the rest. Halfway across the bridge was a set of three steps which Riley had to climb down to be on the level of the home that the bridge was leading to. He entered the window-covered house, seeing someone sitting on a bed in front of a TV that was mounted on the wall. Crazier, though, is that the wall was actually part of the cliff that the waterfall that fed into Suncoast's lake crashed down from. "Hey, my name's Nathan. Don't you just love the aesthetic of my home? Since 3/4 of my walls are nothing but windows, I get a great view of three directions."
Riley looked out said windows, and agreed that it was, indeed, a great view. But that wasn't what he was concerned about. He went to the east, where there was another bridge, though this one wasn't connected to the house itself, but rather the island it was on. He walked it, and found that a part of it to his left lead up the cliff and to the third layer of the city, but before doing that, he went forward. He was faced with another crossroads, so he turned right, which lead him to a three-storey tower-like building. He went inside, and found that there was a hallways that wrapped all the way around a square room. Making his way to the back side of the hall, he entered through the door of the room in the middle of the hall.
He waved at the person inside, a dark-skinned woman with a nice dress. "Hello, young one. I'm visiting from another region, and I decided to stay in this quaint little motel. It's got all of the tropical flair of a hotel with the peace and quite of a small motel. I'm from the Alola region, which is really hot, so I decided I'd start my vacation here in Suncoast City, where the climate isn't too cold."
Waving goodbye to the woman, he took the elevator in the hallway down a floor. It had the same layout as the floor above it, and Riley curiously entered the room. Inside, this time, was a woman with long, golden hair and a black jacket that tapered at the bottom into somewhat of a skirt.
"It's so relaxing to go somewhere warm after living somewhere so cold, you know? I'm from Sinnoh, which has a similar climate to Chinocko, if not slightly warmer. I came here to Suncoast City to relax from all the battling that me and my team have had demanded of us."
Riley smiled, he knew exactly who this trainer was. If only he could muster up the courage to speak to her...
"My poor Pokemon are just so exhausted, so I let them play in the pool on the first floor. I'm not worried about their safety because they're strong and clever enough to handle danger themselves."
Riley, then, went down to the first floor, which did indeed lead to a pool. It was the size of one of the motel's rooms, and indeed had Pokemon playing in it. Riley waved at the Pokemon, and the Pokemon that could waved back.
"Hi there," started the motel's manager. "I'm sorry, but we're out of empty rooms. I'm terribly sorry for the inconvenience, but I'm sure the other guests and their Pokemon would love to see you." The manager, who was wearing a tuxedo suit in the colour scheme of a Prinplup, smiled at Riley, and added. "As thanks for visiting, though, you can have this. The girl who checked in to the top floor gave it to me, but I want you to have it. It doesn't have any use, but it's a nice collector's item." He handed Riley a mysterious souvenir.
Riley smiled, taking it gratefully. With that, he went back up the elevator and exited onto the bridge on the top floor. From there, he followed the bridge to a stairway that lead to the top of the waterfall, which he climbed. There was an island in the middle of two rivers that converged to form the waterfall, and the two sides of the bridge also tapered in until they reached the island, which had a building on it that had a symbol of a PokeBall with a lightning bolt through it on two pillars in front of the door. Riley knew that this was the symbol for a Pokemon Gym, so he walked in, ready to take it on.
Once inside, he was bombarded with the smell of sand and earth. The Pokemon Gym's ceiling was really high, and Riley couldn't even see it if he didn't purposely look upward. In the middle of the gym was a huge sand pit, which had an astonish two-storey sand castle built into it.
"Hello there, friend," started a rather conventionally-attractive man behind a service desk, wearing nothing but shorts with a pattern of a strange foreign Pokemon that had a mouth that looked like a flower on them. "This is the Suncoast City Sand Centre, where kids, both in body and heart, come to fulfill their sand-structure dreams. The sand we use here is kept at the perfect moistness so that it can be built with without any hassle. However, this building is also Sandra's Pokemon Gym."