Chapter 5

"La Puerta Dorada", the humans had called it. The Gallade decided that they must have been gravely mistaken.

There was no door, only a tall metal fence stretching from one end of the horizon to the other. There was no gold, unless one's vision was bad enough that "gold" and "dirt brown" looked identical. And thus there was certainly no golden door if the first two observations were correct.

The Gallade wiped his brow and moved the strap of his knapsack from one shoulder to the other. He looked around and was greeted with the same seemingly endless expanse of clay-brown dirt and scrubrush that had been a constant ever since he had set out on this journey. He had overheard the humans talking about the prospects of a better life up north, but under the oppressive sun and endless desert heat he could hardly discern the reason why they would be so eager to risk their lives.

Which brought the Gallade back to the iron-barred fence standing between him and his journey to the north. The black-painted fence stretched several stories into the air, and its image in the distance wavered slightly in the heat of the day. The Gallade momentarily considered turning back: there was certainly no shame in deciding that dying out in the desert lacked a certain dignity. On the other hand, the humans had said that this was one of the best ways to find a new start, and the Gallade had trouble believing that they were all mistaken. And if humans could do this, why couldn't he?

Pride won out over caution, and the Gallade continued until he reached the fence. He was too large to fit through the gaps between the bars, but he had no intention of trying to squeeze through them. In the blink of an eye reality was seemingly edited, placing the psychic type on the opposite side of the fence. He continued walking, leaving the ineffectual barrier behind.

The Gallade had not gotten far when his attention was suddenly drawn to a large cloud of dust in the distance. As it came closer the psychic Pokemon was able to make out a white-painted vehicle with green stripes at the cloud's vanguard, apparently the source of the dirt being kicked into the air. It suddenly occurred to the Gallade that it was also heading right for him.

He decided that it would be a good time to start running. He turned to flee, but found his body unwilling to obey. The truck was nearly upon him now, and it wasn't slowing down.

The Gallade felt a sinking dread in his stomach as he begged his body to move. Wake up, wake up, wake up…


"…Wake up!...Wake up!...Wake up!"

The Gallade lifted his head. The first thing his eyes saw was a small, pink egg-shaped Pokemon hopping up and down excitedly, chanting the same two words over and over. A small nurse hat was in turn bouncing up and down on her head out of sync with her movements, periodically revealing the small tuft of pink hair tied up into a ponytail beneath.

La niña? he asked. The Happiny didn't even break her tempo as she looked down on the now-awake Gallade.

"Oh!...You're!...Awake!" the Happiny said, pausing to catch her breath in between bounces. She had a voice that could give the listener cavities.

Could you…stop jumping on me?

The Happiny continued to bounce up and down for what seemed to be (to the Gallade) several agonizing eternities, her face scrunched up in thought as she debated the merits of not using a patient's colon as a trampoline. Suddenly, her faced snapped back to its default expression, a sort of bright ebullience that suggested that the entire Chansey species was in on a joke that the rest of the world wasn't.

"Okay!" she said, taking one final bounce off the Gallade's stomach to land on the floor below.

Now slightly more coherent and less focused on the pain in his stomach, the Gallade asked, Where am I?

"The Pokemon center!" the Happiny replied.

…Could you be more specific?

There was a long pause.

"Nope!" The tone of the Happiny's voice suggested that her ignorance in this area concerned her not in the least.

The Gallade moved to sit up so that he could regain eye contact with the small Pokemon, but found that his body refused to obey, held down by some unseen force. He lifted his head and discovered that several thick leather straps had been used to secure him to the bed that he was lying on.

La niña?

"Hm?"

Why am I strapped to the bed?

Another long pause. The Gallade thought he could make out the sound of her feet pitter pattering along the floor as she paced back and forth, the Happiny apparently lost in thought.

Eventually, she spoke. "Oh yeah, that's right! They couldn't find your Pokeball so they said you had to be strapped down in case you were…Randy?...no…wrapping?...no…um…rabid…yeah, that's it! Just sit tight and I'll ask somebody to—"

The Happiny--too busy listening to the sound of her own voice--walked right into the Gallade's left shin. She looked up in surprise, and the Gallade could almost see the Happiny struggle with the realization that the course of events had deviated far from her internal script.

A few moments passed before it occurred to the Gallade that an explanation was expected from him. I am psychic. I can teleport…you know this?

Tears welled up in the Happiny's eyes, and she began to sob uncontrollably. "Oh no!" she said in between pitiful wails, "I messed up again!"

The Gallade suddenly felt like he was not only out of his depth, but that he had managed to float his way out into the middle of the ocean and right into a school of bloodthirsty Sharpedo.

Do not cry…it is okay… the Gallade said, although what conviction was there was being overwhelmed by baffled confusion.

The Happiny's waterworks continued unabated. "No it's not! I was only supposed to check on you: if they think I let you go they'll ding me again!"

The Gallade could almost feel the watchful eyes of dozens of Sharpedo upon him. Is that bad?

She said nothing, but sniffled and nodded. The Gallade may have had many questions in need of an answer, but they suddenly found themselves taking a backseat to preventing the small pink Pokemon from going completely hysterical. He thought fast.

If you strap me back down to the bed and get someone to let me go…that will work?

Slowly, the tears subsided. "…I guess…"

A few minutes later, the Gallade found itself strapped down on the bed. He turned his head to the side to see the Happiny in much higher spirits, her earlier outburst apparently forgotten.

"I'll be back, 'kay?"

Alright.

I hope she does not forget, the Gallade thought as she bounded out of the room. Minutes later he received a more pressing thought.

I need to use el bano.


There was nothing particularly notable about the Pokemon center's kitchen, except that it had clearly been designed for users that were roughly three and a half feet tall. It shared the same design aesthetic as the rest of the center: namely lots of white interspersed with disturbingly clean metallic silver appliances. The only break in the visual monotony was the staggering array of pastel colors that made up the (Chansey-sized) chairs and tables in the dining area of the kitchen, indicating that whoever designed the room certainly did not wind up purchasing the furniture.

One of the Chansey—apparently what passed for the center's cook—hummed away tunelessly as she manipulated various pots and pans on the stove. Fortunately for the various people and Pokemon who passed through the center the Chansey's cooking was far better than her musical prowess, but for the currently ravenous Gallade—hunched awkwardly over a table that he was a foot too tall for as he eagerly shoveled food into his mouth--it wouldn't have mattered if she couldn't have made cereal without burning it. The Happiny watched him eat with a mixture of both nursely approval and awe.

One of the advantages of telepathic communication is the ability to carry on a conversation even when one's mouth is full. So, la niña…

The Happiny gave him a confused look. "Why do you keep calling me that? I'm not Nina, I'm Epi."

A pause, then, "You say 'Nina' funny too."

The Gallade considered explaining the nuances of a world with more than one language, but thought better of it. Instead he asked, how did I end up here?

Epi made her "thinking face," as the Gallade was beginning to call it. "I dunno," she said finally, "they didn't take me."

Why?

"They said it'd be too scary for a Happiny like me," she explained, taking on the mien of any child who has been told that they must be at least as tall as the cartoon lizard to ride the roller coaster, "but they told me what happened."

There was another pause and another thinking face.

"So they all went out to the place and they said that the sheriff was saying a lot of bad words…"


"This is a goddamn fiasco," the sheriff muttered.

A healthy portion of the town's police, firefighers and animal control officers had been roused to deal with what seemed to be a veritable infestation of Pokemon inside an old abandoned warehouse on the bad side of town. One building—abandoned the sheriff noted, grateful for the small miracle--was already burning, and it likely wouldn't be the only one if things got out of hand. The sheriff might have won his office by virtue of being the only one willing to take the job, but he was nevertheless politically savvy enough to realize that half the town burning on his watch would be detrimental to his long term career prospects.

The patrol car sitting between the sheriff and the warehouse served as an impromptu bulwark for the ad hoc command post. A pair of deputies were nearby spreading maps and building plans on a plank of plywood sitting on a small pile of cinder blocks that had found new purposes in life as a makeshift table. Things had not been going well from the start: they had had no idea anything was amiss until firefighters sent to extinguish a building in the area noticed Pokemon wandering about that were not native to this part of the country, and in a few cases not even the continent. They had been able to find the source of the infestation quickly enough, but any further attempts to do more than contain the problem had resulted in injured officers and a healthy monetary sum in destroyed equipment.

The sheriff looked out to the line of police cruisers nearer to the building, and grimaced as a gout of flame erupted from an irate fire Pokemon that had been skulking just outside the warehouse walls. He grimaced as one of the patrol cars was engulfed in the flames, the officers that had been sheltering behind it scattering in every direction.

A deputy ran up to him from behind, short on breath. "She's here."

The sheriff did not turn to acknowledge his subordinate, and his expression got progressively fouler as he watched the police cruiser burn. "Took her long enough. Did she fucking walk?"

"Why, yes I did."

The sheriff turned towards the female voice, his retort temporarily stymied by the sight of a middle-aged woman in a Pokemon center nurse uniform standing at the head of the largest group of Chansey he had ever seen gathered in one place.

To his credit, the sheriff recovered quickly. "We have hundreds of Pokemon threatening to run riot through the town and you're out taking a goddamn stroll!?"

The nurse gave him an apologetic look. "Never did take my driving test, and I never did think much of cars when I could ride a Pokemon instead… not that I would have been able to fit all these Chansey in a car."

The sheriff gave her a look that can only be described as the nonverbal equivalent of stupid bitch. "Ever heard of a pokeball?" he asked.

He received a blank stare in return. "NPL regulations forbid a trainer from carrying more than six occupied pokeballs at a time. As a representative I am required to follow league regulations at all times."

It is said that only in a crucible do people reveal who they really are, empty words forgotten as their actions come to the fore. All present were about to see the makeup of the sheriff's soul, and they were about to find out that his soul was a suitable substitute for road tar.

"Listen to me, you whore," he began, "there's too much on the goddamn line for you to be jacking off a bunch of corporate fat cats who pay for your little shop of fucking horrors and your pack of pink retards."

The nearby deputies looked nervously between the sheriff and the nurse, painfully cognizant of the disadvantages of a top-down command structure when the man on top snaps. Every Chansey present wore a nearly identical look of shocked horror.

The sheriff gestured to the burning cruiser as he continued, "That's 30 grand down the fucking drain because you were too busy dicking around. If things get any worse thanks to your idiocy God as my witness I will make sure that the only place you can work as a nurse is in the middle of God-forsaken Africa with all the other dog-fuckers!" He had been slowly advancing on her as he spoke until he was leering over her. "Do I make myself clear?"

The nurse regarded him with an eerie calm. Pokemon training and Pokemon medicine are no places for the timid, and she was accomplished in both.

She momentarily broke eye contact to speak to her retinue of Chansey. "Excuse me ladies," she asked politely, "would you mind covering your ears?"

Small Chansey arms flew up to cover eardrums with the sort of synchronicity that can only be found in army platoons.

The nurse turned back to the sheriff and began to explain that she had spent decades training and taking care of Pokemon that could as easily have ripped her in half as they could have blinked, and that she was therefore unmoved by the petty threats of a man who was too big for his britches. She furthermore explained (in a case of insight that reveals itself only when suffering the effects of sheer indignation) that if the sheriff had been halfway competent at his job hundreds of Pokemon might not have mysteriously appeared in a warehouse in an abandoned part of town known to be frequented by those of legally dubious incomes. The nurse further posited that his constituents might think less of him should anyone present reveal the sheriff's "enlightened" views on gender and race relations, and that if he was wise he would keep such considerations in mind especially since her assistance could mean the difference between accolades for his department or an uncomfortable look into his track record during his tenure in office.

This is a summary of what the nurse said. If run through most profanity filters, the exact transcript of what she spoke to the sheriff would result in what most people would interpret as an attempt to create a new writing system using only asterisks.

The nurse turned back to her Chansey with her hands over her ears. She removed them, and dozens of Chansey limbs followed.

"Let's get to work!" the nurse said cheerfully, and the Chansey all gave a chirp of acknowledgement as they marched towards the building as one body. They filtered around the sheriff like a rock in a stream but otherwise ignored him, the man standing stock still and white as a sheet.

The deputies watched the procession go, in awe of the utter precision of it all and what they had just borne witness to.

"That's one tough lady," one deputy finally said, "I mean, holy sh—"

The nurse managed to overhear him and interrupted. "Language, please!"


The bodies of the thugs lay cooling as their essence spilled out onto the floor below. Pokemon big and small, predator and prey, gentle and fierce, all were united by solidarity and common cause.

It lasted all of two minutes.

No one is quite sure how it started, but a likely answer is that a predatory Pokemon realized that it had been in a pokeball for quite a long time and that it was now ravenously hungry. It had likely taken notice of a Pokemon that it would normally eat in the wild and decided that said Pokemon would probably not miss that juicy-looking limb that coincidentally happened to be attached to its body. The prey Pokemon had likely objected quite vehemently to this, and a fight had broken out. And much like a bar fight others had joined in, not necessarily because they had any stake in it but because it would have been such a shame to let only a few have all the fun.

The Gallade ducked a flaming roundhouse delivered by a Blaziken who had chosen him as a target of convenience. He regained his balance just as the Blaziken used the momentum of its roundhouse foot to spin into a powerful back kick. There was a sickening keening wail of psychic energy as his mentally-reinforced arm blade barely deflected the blow.

This was not his kind of fight. The Gallade feared no foe and would not willingly shy from battle, but he vastly preferred one on one combat instead of free-for-all melees: he could hardly dodge without inadvertently stumbling into the path of another irate Pokemon, and the tendency of most of the Pokemon present to attack whatever was currently in front of them made using practiced feints nearly impossible.

Even as he fought to stay alive the Gallade's mind reached out, attempting to find the strange rat-like Pokemon who had seemingly disappeared when the melee started. With so many Pokemon in close quarters and in full fighting rage it was akin to discerning a certain voice in the middle of a yodeling convention.

The Gallade narrowly dodged a Flamethrower that the Blaziken spewed at him, and he could feel the heat wash across his body even as the licking flames passed to the side with barely inches to spare. An enraged cry indicated that the missed attack had inadvertently found a target, and the psychic type rolled to the side just as a badly singed Nidoking stormed towards the unwitting Blaziken with murder in its eyes. The Blaziken turned towards the interloper, its battle with the Gallade apparently forgotten.

The Gallade took the spare moment to catch his breath, the fight raging around him yet momentarily ignorant of his presence. He looked for any available escape route, and found between each one and himself a tide of enraged Pokemon obsessed with beating--for lack of a better term--the stupid out of each other. He could teleport but he would likely end up appearing in the middle of a scrum, and there was no other way short of flying to get past the creatures in his way. The Gallade gritted his teeth and prepared for a long, hard slog to freedom.

He was the first to hear it, likely because he was the only one who had not been fighting at that moment. A chorus of voices rang out over the din, singing a melody that somehow brought every Pokemon present out of its bloodlust and into as close a state of coherent thought that each species was capable of.

Humans that do not speak Pokemon often believe the songs of Pokemon contain phrases or words of power: how else, they reckon, can a Jigglypuff's song render a rampaging Gyarados as docile as a Flaaffy? This is a reasonable assumption. It is also completely wrong.

In truth, many Pokemon songs have no words, mainly because they need no words: words at their most powerful can merely make a man desire to strangle out the life of another man whose only crime was probably being born in the wrong place (this is hardly the accomplishment most laud it to be, mainly because most people are only a step or two away from strangling someone anyway). The most powerful of songs, on the other hand, can move the soul itself.

Chansey began to slowly filter in, each voice raised in a beautiful melody. Pokemon nearest the growing tide of pink flesh collapsed onto the floor in a dreamless slumber, and soon sleeping Pokemon radiated out from the ever-growing chorus like ripples from a stone tossed in the water.

The Gallade moved to run, to escape while he still had his chance, but he felt his limbs refuse to obey, immovable as granite blocks. He collapsed to his knees.

The chorus of Chansey advanced past him, paying him no more heed than a Steelix might pay witless Geodude underneath its great bulk. He watched them go, and then his world became black.


Glass pane doors got dirty fast, what with all the fingerprints and canine Pokemon who tended to rub their noses on them willy-nilly.

In absence of being able to go with the others, Epi had decided to make herself useful and take some window cleaner and a towel to the center's doors. Clean doors presented a welcoming image to road-worn and dusty trainers, she had been told. What she had not been told, however, is that she needed a stepladder so that trainers would feel welcome above their kneecaps.

Had it occurred to her to think of this, however, she would have likely and in admirable Chansey fashion declared it an unnecessary detail, arguing that the thought counted most. Chansey optimism was, in other words, the kind of mindset that allowed a man to fiddle while Rome burned around him and at the same time think that whatever was cooking smelled awfully good.

Nevertheless, the Happiny was currently disappointed, which was about as close as a Chansey-line Pokemon ever came to true sadness. "Maybe when you're bigger, Epione," the nurse had said in a kind voice that nevertheless brooked no room for disagreement. "Why don't you hold down the center while we're gone?"

Epi was pretty sure that the center wasn't going anywhere, seeing as how it had always remained in one place ever since she arrived. Nevertheless she kept an eye out for any signs of building movement even as she dutifully scrubbed at the inside of the doors. Soon enough she became engrossed in her scrubbing, lost to the world.

The world found her with a vengeance as she felt the sensation of the door giving way followed by the uncomfortable sensation of shoe leather meeting face. The Happiny's egg-shaped body saved her as she tumbled backwards and wound up rolling out of the way just as 100-odd pounds of person crashed to the floor where she had been scrubbing just moments before.

"Ow!" a female voice cried out

"Caroline!" came a male voice in reply to the first's distress. Epi watched from where she had rolled to the side as a Gardevoir suddenly materialized by the fallen girl and helped her to her feet, concern evident on her face. The Happiny recognized the Pokemon as the injured Gardevoir who had come into the Pokemon center not long ago.

"Watch where you're going!" the Happiny called out to the group who had just burst through the door in a voice offering helpful advice rather than demanding an apology.

The blonde hair girl turned towards the voice and looked in horror at the vague imprint of the underside of her shoe on the Happiny's front. "Oh no! Are you okay?"

Epi rubbed her front, and felt nothing that wouldn't heal. "Uh huh. Sorry for being in the way." Most Chansey would apologize to an assassin for being in the way of their bullet.

Epi felt a thought tug at the back of her mind, that somehow this event was important and that she had borne witness to it for a reason. "Hey," she began, "where did you go?"

"Uh…we've been here the entire time," the black-haired boy said, said hair slick with sweat. There were dark rings radiating outwards from the collar and armpits of his t-shirt.

Epi gave the group a critical look. "Then why are you out there?"

The boy shifted his weight nervously. "We, uh, went out the back door, to, uh…"

Get some fresh air, the Gardevoir added helpfully.

"Yeah, and when we, uh, tried to come back in the door was, uh, locked. So, uh, we came in the front," the boy finished lamely.

Epi looked at the group. One of the girl's overall straps had been tied into a makeshift knot. All of them looked dirty, and all of them looked like they had been sweating heavily.

Chansey know the definition of "lie." They believe it means to be horizontal on the ground.

"Oh, okay. Good night," Epi said. The trainers nodded at her and hurried towards the stairs.

The Happiny sighed, grabbed the discarded towel, and got back to work on the doors.

"They never told me about a back door," she pouted, "they never tell me anything here."


As an aside, the sheriff's tirade against the nurse happened to be caught by a patrol cruiser's dashboard camera. As is typical in the internet age, the video of said encountered soon enough found its way online, where it unsurprisingly became a major fiasco for the town's sheriff's department. As is typical the sheriff—family at his side—issued a tearful apology at a press conference, explaining that he was, in fact, deeply sorry for all the things he said (and that they were "a tragic error in judgment that have hurt many people") and that he truly, in his heart of hearts, loved all colors, creeds, and religions.

He resigned soon after. His replacement went on to have a successful multi-term career as sheriff of the force until he was caught soliciting sex from underage boys.

In American politics, this is known as "progress."


"…and that's where 'wax on, wax off' comes from!" Epi exclaimed. The two had just finished their meal and were meandering through the halls of the Pokemon center. The Gallade was content for the moment simply to stretch his legs and move around after being out for who knew how long, but he had to be mindful of not quickly outpacing his tiny companion.

There was an awkward silence as the Gallade tried to determine how the conversation had wandered from vulgar police officers to techniques for glass cleaning. I am…fairly certain that is not what I asked about, the Gallade finally said in the most charitable way he could think of.

The Happiny blinked. "Not washing windows? What was I supposed to be telling you about again?"

It…does not matter, I suppose, the Gallade sighed. The pair continued their aimless wandering through the halls, the only sound being the Gallade's footfalls and the occasional overheard chattering of a small group of Chansey in a nearby room. The Gallade felt it fortunate that Epi had decided to stay quiet long enough to let him think, but whether it was due to a sense of empathy or her not being able to come up with any other conversation topics was difficult to say.

The Gallade had sought, certainly enough. He just wasn't finding. Certainly he could go the rest of his life without knowing what exactly had occurred last night and who exactly (as well as what) that rat-like creature was, but his sense of curiosity refused to abide it. And that Gardevoir, the first of his species he had encountered in who knew how long…

The Gallade shook his head. Those thoughts weren't gentlemanly. Nevertheless, he wanted to know more, although he was trying to convince himself that it was his curiosity and not his libido doing the asking.

He had one last line of inquiry to fall back on, he realized. It likely wouldn't result in anything, he mused, but it wasn't as if he had anything else.

Epi.

"Hrm?"

Did a female Gardevoir come into the center? She and the rat had appeared to have been acquainted, and the Gallade surmised that she had to know something.

Epi thought for a few moments. "Um, one came in here with her trainer not too long ago."

I see.

"Yeah," Epi replied, about to show a fundamental lack of the importance of establishing context, "she had been shot or something."

Epi could feel a palpable psychic reverberation of horror and looked upwards to see the Gallade staring at her in shock. She was what?!

"Um…she got better." Contrary to the Happiny's expectations, this did not seem to assuage the larger Pokemon.

The Gallade's mind went over recent events over and over. The look of panic on her face, the rat-like Pokemon telling her to go…he should have gone along and helped protect her, but he had not and she had been injured. The very thought that his inaction had caused a maiden to come to harm caused the entire chivalrous core of his being to recoil in horror.

Epi watched as the Gallade's countenance turned grim. The psychic Pokemon knew that there was only one way to assuage this dishonor. The Gardevoir and her trainer…where are they now?

Another pause. "They left, I think."

The Gallade could feel his hope sink like a lead balloon even as he was filled with a sense of purpose. And you do not know where they went?

"No," Epi said sadly. Her face flickered as a thought suddenly clawed its way to the forefront of her mind. "But one of the Chansey might know!"


"The trainers that come through always talk about going to Reno," the Chansey at the front desk said, "I think that's where they're headed."

It had eventually occurred to Epi that the Chansey who would most likely know where the Gardevoir and her trainer had gone would probably the Chansey that was assigned to watch the lobby of the Pokemon center.This sounds like an impressive deduction when one considers that said Chansey would be witness to nearly every person or Pokemon that entered or left the building. It becomes considerably less impressive when one realizes that Epi only came to this conclusion when she had run out of other Chansey to ask.

The Gallade, while relieved to have a lead, nonetheless remained skeptical. Think?

"They didn't say where they were going," the Chansey conceded, "but trainers always talk about going there. Why not them?"

In his short time in their care the Gallade had learned to be wary of the one-penny-on-the-tracks-away-from-a-derailment Chansey train of thought: regardless, he could find little fault with her logic.

Muchos gracias, senoritas, the Gallade said, giving a polite bow. You have been gracious hosts, but now I must take my leave.

He made it several steps towards the front door before he heard, "excuse me, where are you going?"

He looked back at the Chansey, confusion evident on his face. I told you, I am leaving…this is not a problem?

The Chansey mirrored his look of confusion. "Who said you could leave?"

For reasons he would never be able to quite understand, the Gallade turned to Epi for help.

"Oh…" Epi finally said, "um, they told us not to let any of you go…I forget why, but…um…was it paperwork?"

"That was one of the reasons," the Chansey added helpfully.

What? When can I leave?

"Don't get upset," the Chansey said helpfully, "it'll only take a few weeks."

The Gallade could feel his one last chance about to slip through his fingers. I cannot wait that long, senorita.

"I'm sorry, but there's nothing I can do."

The very idea that he would have to be disrespectful to a female rankled him, but the Gallade realized he had no other choice. Forgive me, but I am leaving. He turned back towards the door and began walking.

The Chansey let out a shrill high note, causing the Gallade to momentarily stop in his tracks, and he felt a growing sense of apprehension as he heard doors fly open and distinctive footfalls pass through them. When he finally turned around he found himself facing down a veritable battalion of Chansey that had seemingly materialized out of thin air. What was even more disconcerting is that their normally jovial facial expressions had given way to nearly identical glares of stony determination. They watched passively as the Gallade's arm blades extended with a distinctive keek.

Please do not come any closer, the Gallade said, assuming a guarded fighting stance. I will have to do something that I will regret.

He could hear the Chansey that he had been speaking with from somewhere in the middle of the pack. "We are only doing what we're told. I'm sorry." There was no malice or threat in her voice, just genuine sadness at the turn recent events had taken.

The group began to advance. The Gallade spared a momentary glance at Epi, who looked back at him helplessly.

As am I.

The room was filled with a brilliant flash of light. The Chansey at the front of the pack cried out as their vision went white, the pure intensity of the flash causing temporary blindness. The room quickly found itself filled with the chattering of confused Chansey, their metaphorically well-oiled machine thrown into metaphorical chaos by the metaphorical spanner in the metaphorical works.

"What happened?"

"Where is he?"

"Ow, my foot!"

"Sorry!"

"It's okay!"

Those Chansey who had had enough of their kin between them and the Gallade to have been shielded from the Flash eventually managed to push their way to the front in the resulting confusion.

"Oh no, look!" one cried out. The Gallade had was in fact doing something he regretted, and that was running from a fight as fast as his legs would take him.

And he had a small, pink passenger clinging to one of his legs for dear life.

"After him!" another Chansey cried out. A tide of pink erupted from the doors of the Pokemon center, hot on the tail of the fleeing Pokemon.


The Gallade teleported again, only to find to his dismay that he arrived at his destination with Epi still firmly clamped to his leg. It was no good, he realized: her will to hold on was greater than his will to remove her, and he could ill afford the time it would take to stop and physically pry her off. He also noted that with a little more will the Happiny would probably wind up cutting off the circulation in his leg.

Let go! The Gallade yelled at her. His rational mind knew that it would do no good, but his rational mind was currently being gainsaid by the raw desperation that occurs when one is chased by a group of Chansey with the tenacity of a pack of starving wolves.

"No!" Epi replied, her voice shaking but firm. "I'm your nurse! If you run away I'll get dinged again!"

What is one ding? Please let go!

"I have a lot of dings!" Epi said, panic evident in her voice at the prospect. "I can't get any more dings!"

Their conversation was momentarily interrupted by the cries of the Chansey following him.

"Stop! In the name of love!"

"Otherwise we'll be very cross with you!"

"No dessert either!"

"And you can forget about movie night!"

"Wait! Isn't that too harsh?"

"…okay, you can have movie night. But no dessert, we mean it!"

"Yeah!" the Chansey said in unison.

The Gallade turned the corner at the nearest intersection, narrowly teleporting to avoid a car whose driver had not been paying much attention while making a right turn. Had the Gallade been paying attention to the vehicle afterwards he would have watched as the driver stopped in the middle of his offensive gesture, mouth agape as Chansey flowed around and, in some cases, over his vehicle.

The Gallade made turn after turn, but still the Chansey followed. The chivalrous part of him wanted to do little more than crawl in the deepest hole it could find and die of embarrassment at the fact he—a proud warrior and gentleman--was running from a group of Pokemon who thought "slaughter" was the misspelled plural of "laughter."

Another part of him realized that escaping would be all for naught if he did not know one very important detail.

Perdon, he called behind him, which way is Reno?

One of the Chansey behind him piped up. "Turn left and then go straight as the Murkrow flies!"

Gracias!

"You're welcome!"


Two old men sat in a dingy one-step-above-fast-food-open-24-hours restaurant that boasted of serving the best breakfast one had ever had for dinner. Since that doesn't really narrow anything down much it should also be noted that said old men dining in said restaurant happened to be relatively near to the events described above as they were taking place.

One of the men looked through the sports section of a newspaper with obvious disgust. "Pokemon trainers these days. What a bunch of spoiled brats. Listen to this: 'a Gyarados is nearly impossible to catch unless you come prepared with a healthy supply of Net Balls.' Feh!"

The old man dropped the paper back onto the table, as if its very existence disgusted him. His companion picked it up and looked at the source of disgust in question.

"Back in the old days we only had three types of Pokeballs: good, better and best," the second said, munching thoughtfully on a piece of bacon, "we got by just fine."

"Yep," replied the first. "Sissies these days won't even try to catch a damn Goldeen without some ridiculously colored pokeball in their packs. They don't know how easy they got it."

"I remember when the league only allowed the use of one hundred and…" the second thought aloud, now chewing deliberately on a piece of toast. "…something number of Pokemon. S'all you needed, really."

The first nodded sagely. "Ain't nothing you can't beat with a good Snorlax or Tauros at your side." His gaze wandered off into the distance witnessing times long past, but soon returned to the present. "These new trainers think you gotta have a Pokemon with lots of colors and shoots fire out its ass or you're not a real trainer. Those pantywaists don't know what it's like to fight a psychic without a bunch of dark and ghost types waiting to bail their stupid selves out either."

"Hrm," the second said. "They were pretty powerful back in the day though."

The first scoffed. "They bleed, same as anything else. Trainers these days just don't raise 'em right. If they did…eh?"

The two men turned to look out the window in time to see a flash of white, green and a hint of blue rush past. It was soon followed by a cacophonous wave of pink flesh. Such things have been known to bring awkward halts to conversations.

"Hey Joe…that ain't my mind playin' tricks on me?" the first said after some hesitation.

Joe looked at the other patrons, each staring out the window in stunned silence. "Don't think so, Willie."

"What was it that those Chansey were chasing, you reckon?"

Joe leaned back. "Saw one of 'em on Okinawa, I think. Japs called it an 'Erureido'."

It wasn't the name of any Pokemon Willie recognized, which meant that it was newfangled and thus open to criticism. "That's the problem with all these 'new' Pokemon," he said, "they ain't worth a God's damn."