On the boat to Kalos…
After lunch, I wandered around the boat. I saw a game room containing slot machines and card games. Walking in, I saw that there was a door that led to a room with video games. But since I was old enough to use the slot machines and participate in card games, I decided I'd try my hand at them.
I saw blackjack, Johto Hold 'Em, and even Spades. I stopped, observing it for a minute. No partners, unlike a normal game. I might play that, after I'm done looking at other games. I saw a flip card game, played on a touch screen table. It was called "Voltorb Flip". It was simple enough—you got a hint of how many were in each row and column, and had to avoid flipping a voltorb card. Sinnoh Roulette... all sorts of betting games. I could do some damage here; all this is math. Card counting and rules of probability. I'll avoid slot machines; they're too unpredictable. Sinnoh Roulette was similar.
I'll start with Voltorb Flip; then move on to Spades. It'll be interesting to play a slightly different version. I sat down at one of the empty Voltorb Flip tables.
"Hell, young man. What's your name?" the guy on the other side asked.
"I like to be called N."
"Okay, N. this game is simple enough. You bet an amount of money, and then you have to find all of the twos and threes while avoiding a Voltorb card. The twos and threes will double and triple your money; the Voltorbs will cause you to lose it all. There are also cards with the amount of one on them. They neither increase nor decrease your money," he explained.
Just like I thought. "Okay, I'll play. Is there a minimum starting amount?"
"Ten pokedollars."
I laid down fifteen, which was half of what I had left after buying my ticket. Then, I pressed the 'Start' button. The five-by-five grid popped up, all cards facedown. In the five rows, there was one in the first, three in the second, four in the third, two in the fourth, and three in the fifth. In the columns, from left to right, there was four, two, three, three, and one. I stared at the setup. Thinking carefully, I tapped the screen to flip a card in the first row. The hidden number was one. I slowly continued, finding all of the twos and threes. After finishing the first level, the man told me that there were eight levels, total. I decided to work my way through them, betting half of my money each time. In the end, I had won every game, and stacked up quite a bit of money.
After collecting it, I played a few games of Spades. I lost the first game, but I didn't lose much money. The second and third games, I got a better hand, and was able to collect the most books. And, with that, I quit, not wanting to win too much more money—I didn't have a lot of real-world experience, thanks to Ghetsis, but I knew winning too much would be suspicious.
I strolled into the game room for younger people, and saw many different arcade games. There was a couple where two or four people would fight (not with pokemon), a couple of racing ones, and some where you'd guide a jigglypuff through a maze, keeping it away from multiple gengar.
Wanting to waste some more time before I went and ate supper, I decided to play one of the other games. I inserted some change into the machine, and let the balls roll down. I got a few decent scores, but nowhere close to the high score. I gave the tickets I had gathered to a few different children before I left.
I remember there being a few games at the amusement park that you had to pay extra for. You'd have to knock down bottles or race little electric cars. If you won, you could choose from a variety of different candies or pokedolls, depending on how well you did. I had seen multiple guys play them, and got a pokedoll for their girlfriend after they won. I remembered how I had wanted to do it for Hilda. Something had held me back from that, though. What, I don't know. I guess I had been too shy.
I ate a fast supper, and went back to my cabin, glad that we were halfway to Kalos. However, I was also nervous. I was beginning to wonder if Hilda had heard about Team Plasma coming back. If she had, did she blame me? Did she think I had betrayed her, by not having them totally disband? I thought they had broken up after I left, so I hadn't done anything. I stood up and started pacing back and forth. Had she stopped trying to find me, just wanting to keep me a distant memory?
I stopped in the middle of my pacing. I will find her, and I know how I'll be able to show her my regret. I had somewhat betrayed her by leaving so suddenly, without much of an explanation.
So I walked to my bag, fishing through it. I pulled out the pocket knife I had packed. Walking over to the mirror, I pulled out the blade. Carefully placing it between my hair and the bottom of my neck, I started sawing the dull blade through my hair. Then, I let the cut off ponytail drop to the floor. The ends of my hair were messy, falling just past the tops of my shoulders. I didn't try to even it out; I would just make more of a mess of it. I snapped the blade back into its closed position, putting it on the counter.
Picking the sawed off part of my hair up off the floor, I walked out of my cabin and back to the decks. I stood on the back of the ship, alone. I watched how the waves were disrupted by the path of the boat. Taking a deep breath, I tossed the ponytail overboard. Soon after it hit the waves, it disappeared.
Back in my cabin, I laid on the bed, not taking the time to remove any of my clothing. Before I knew it, I had fallen asleep.
At the Pokecenter…
My night had been a restless one. After having to tell the story of why I was looking for Natural, all of the old memories had resurfaced. I had tossed and turned, my mind going 500 miles a minute.
It's been four days since I had refused the title of champion, happy with just being a part of the Hall of Fame. We were wandering through the amusement park, looking at all the new stalls people had set up. I bought some bracelets at one, liking how they reminded me of Natural's. He had found a better buy, though. A stall with nothing but different types of cameras, he found one that had self-developing film. He bought it, and got two extra rolls of film.
All of the pictures from the roller coaster rides were funny, especially the one in the middle of a loop. Everyone's hair hanging upside down, our faces slightly flushed from all of the blood rushing to them. Natural's usual ponytail had fallen out. Right-side-up, we all looked like we had been shocked by a pikachu.
After that ride, Bianca and Cheren had gone to eat. Well, Cheren was getting a ginger ale to calm his stomach. Natural and I decided to ride the ferriswheel again. At first, we had been sitting on opposite sides of the carriage. Then, he moved over to my side, and shot two pictures of us together.
Looking back, I should've known that something fishy was going on. Why would we need a picture of each other if we would be able to see each other often? The next few days, we all hung out in Nuevma Town. Bianca had spent the night at my house after we had gotten back from the amusement park, talking out boys and pokemon.
Waking up that day, I was devastated when I saw Natural's letter. I had run outside, banging on Cheren's door, waking up everyone in the house. After seeing he wasn't there, I checked with Bianca, and then Professor Juniper. He wasn't in Nuevma town anymore. I ran back into my house, throwing on my clothes. Moma had stopped me before I could get back outside, though. Explaining the situation to her is what made me break down into tears. That was the day I had put on his necklace, never taking it off.
After that, I spent two more weeks in Nuevama town, after helping some dude who called himself 'Looker'. After I had finished helping him, he mentioned something about how Natural had been spotted in another region. Hearing that, I had run home, explaining the situation to my mom. I told her I was going to go and look for him. She wanted to object, but she said she knew she couldn't stop me. I spent the rest of the day with Bianca and Cheren, packing up and leaving for the Sinnoh region the next day.
Kalos was interesting so far, but it would've been better with Natural by my side. I got ready for the day on autopilot, not really paying attention to anyone. I planned on challenging the gym today, so I was thinking of strategies to use. Then, May came up and asked if I wanted their help finding Natural. Smiling, I accepted their help and, then let them know that I wanted to challenge the gym today.
After that, they decided they'd like to try their hand at it, too. We spent the next hour planning out which team would be the best. I was sad that I couldn't use my samurott, but Clemont was an electric type gym leader. So, I chose my whimsicott, my umbreon, my krokorok, my boldore, and I had chespin in my party, so that he could gain some experience (thank you, lucky egg).
May had her sceptile, a linoone, an absol, a stunfisk, and her jolteon. Brendan's team was similar, with a blaziken instead of a sceptile and a leafeon instead of a jolteon. Maybe the team similarities had something to do with them being a couple. Wally had a gallade, an espeon, a swampert, a metagross, and a camerupt.
After a few warm-up battles, we healed ourpokemon and headed to the gym.
I'm sorry about cutting N's hair. :/ I really liked his long hair, but I also like the idea of him doing that tradition because of how he felt like he had betrayed someone. I'm also sorry if the timing of the chapters are strange... This chaper is N's day on the boat, and Hilda's first full day with our Hoenn trio. it'll be easier to tell once all of the group is together. -Sigh-
Anyway, the battle will be in the next chapter. I had originally planned on having the battle at a later time, so I haven't written it yet, and I need practice since this will be the first one I've written.
I'll have it out soon, though! :)
