Pewter City was, by and large, a village that had a museum in it and so qualified to be described as 'cultural', which the government considered to go badly together with 'village'.

Nobody had told me this, but it was not difficult to guess. There were only a token few houses, and the amount of people around was minimal. Those that were around, were more around than actually, well, there.

So far, I'd met only two people in the streets, and neither of them were really city people, or anywhere near cultural. One of them had looked like a haystack who'd decided to do a healthy jog every morning, and as such had dislodged more than he had actually lost - most of what he had lost, he'd lost from the top. He'd walked around in a tiny patch of pinky-toe-height grass, and poured what smelled like used drain cleaner on it, while telling me (he had to shout) that it kept wild Pokémon away.

I thought silently that it kept absolutely everything away, including corpses and his own toenails, and then ran.

The other person I had met, well, he wasn't of the sort that was easy to unmeet. I had been on my way out of the city, and he'd stopped me. I had tried to walk back into the city, and he'd stopped me. Now he was leering down at me while chewing on a straw, hands pulling the trouser straps wide out from his flannel-covered chest. He also appeared to be chewing gum, and how he managed to do three things with his mouth at once I couldn't figure out.

"Hay there," he said, in a voice that could oil hinges, "yer new to this town, ain'tcha?"

" 'm that, yes," I said, a bit quietly, but I tried to be polite.

"Well, yannow what new folks do when they come here?"

Pausing a bit, I shook my head, hoping that he didn't, either.

"Well, see, we got a lot of things to do here, yannow." He waggled his eyebrows at a breakneck speed. "I'll take ya on a tour, what d'ya say to that?"

I had an ominous feeling about this, so I opened my mouth to tell him no, but didn't get further than "I fink-" before he cut me off.

"That's the spirit! Come on, yer with the Piuter Power Pete now." Grabbing my arm, he pulled, and started heading off right towards the spot where the other crazy person was. But my mind was suddenly on something else.

"Pewter... Power Pete?"

"That's my name," he said, and somehow managed to make his black and yellow teeth glint in the sunlight when he grinned. "I'm the one and only Power Pete, and don'tcha forget it!"

I was reasonably certain that I wouldn't. Before even a minute had passed, I was standing outside the grassy patch again, hand clutched over my nose to stop the dramatic stink entering it. Pete called out, "Hiya, Crazy Clem!"

"Well, blow me if it ain't Peabrain Pete! How ya doin', pal?"

The other sagged, I noted, and looked very much disappointed at the nickname. "It ain't Peabrain, ya numbnut, it's Power Pete!" He waved a fist, but it wasn't in anger as much as an overly theatrical gesture.

"Really, now? Well, then I ain't bein' Crazy Clem anymore. I wanna be Coolidge Clem!"

I tried to retreat, but the man's grip was like a vice, so instead I subtly attempted to indicate that this wasn't really a tour. And that they were shouting loudly at each other even though they were barely six feet apart.

"What's Coolidge mean, Clem?" he said, not paying any notice.

"Darned if I know," came the response. "Who's yer friend?"

"Darned if I know," mirrored Pete. "I'm takin' it on a tour of the city!" A bit taken aback, I grumbled at him calling me an 'it'.

Clem called back: "Well, best of luck to ya! Don't do anythin' I wouldn't!"

And as Pete led me away, I reflected that Clem's words of goodbye didn't really restrict Pete from doing things. People who pour acid on their toes could be capable of anything.

"Clem's a real chum," Pete explained to me, as he took me over to the shop and pointed at it. He looked taller now, somehow, and his denim pants seemed to be making a spirited attempt at escaping upwards: The button of the trousers seemed to be above the one on his belly.

I didn't say anything, but he did. "That's the shop, or as they call 'em in them fine languages, a strapping boo-teak. Y'ain't been in there, have ya?"

"... 'll do it later, mist'r Power Pete," I mumbled back, after a short pause. "An' I've been in th' Pokemon centre, mist'r..."

He stopped in the act of leading me to the latter, and instead leered down at me again. "Yer that acue-ainted, are ya? Well, it sure makes my job easier. To the muse-yum!"

Once again I was bodily pulled along, fumbling my steps, as he took me up north towards the building. It sprawled - the people who made the museum had clearly wanted to make up for the town's lack of size. In fact, unless I was completely mistaken, all the other buildings in Pewter could comfortably have lived inside the main construct with one bedroom each, and there was another, slightly smaller, house poking out from the museum's side, bringing its size from 'huge' to 'gargantuan'.*

I stood outside, next to Pete, who was admiring the place with his straps while his straw hat-wearing head poked back so far it was almost upside down.

"A visit's worth it, yannow," he said, and his voice swelled with pride; so did his chest. "I hear they got the finest arr-chie-loggy-cal things in that place."

The way he'd worded himself wasn't very reassuring. "Um, sorry, mist'r Pete... You've heard they've got them, or you've seenthem?"

"Never been there myswelf," he shrugged. "The people at the door want to take money from me, fifty of them, to go in, and I ain't got that sort of cash."

No, you wouldn't, I thought to myself.

"Anything... um... else I ought to know about th'museum, mist'r Pete?"

"Not a thing. I dannow them, so there ain't a reason in the world why ya should!" The man withdrew his thumbs, causing a slap as the elastic strings hit his shirt. "But there's one more place ya got to visit! Walk this way," he said and turned around, gesturing vividly.

"Can't I jus' go an'-"

"Now, that's not real grayt-ee-tewd, is it? Right this way here."

I sighed, then picked up the pace, keeping track of his foundering figure as it made its way towards a building set out of view from both the town's entrances - a natural ridge of mountain hid it from any visitor's eyes in all directions except from the museum itself. There was a small building there, and I had to admit that it had style. It lay in the bottom of a pool of stone, and had ornate carvings on several surrounding pillars that held up the roof, which extended beyond the walls themselves.

There was also a small balcony. A young man - I corrected myself, a young gentleman, because regular men tend to be less hatted - was sitting there in a well-fitted tweed suit, with the jacket hanging over the backrest of his chair. He had a monocle, and was patting on a pipe, the smoke of which would have to be bothering the butler right behind him.

He was even drinking tea, pinching the cup's handle between two gloved fingers while the fifth stood out like a lightning rod. All in all, it was the most respectable house and man I'd ever seen, and this I was certain of, even if I hadn't seen any before.

Pete spoke up as we stood a bit to the left of the building. "Now here's the gym! Ain't many people know of it, so I keep tellin' 'em when they pass by."

"Why?" I asked, curious but still dreading what would come next.

"Why, ya gotta challenge the leader, don'tcha? I know yer a trainer, ya got Poké Balls on ya, so ya gotta go in there and beat him!" He beamed down at me, and pulled out the straps again.

"But I don' wanna go 'nto gyms, mist'r Pete," came my response, a bit meekly. I'd been afraid this would be next.

"Nonsense," said Power Pete, slapping my back with a bony hand. "All trainers gotta! Now ya go in there and show him!"

And, just like that, he turned and strutted away while whistling merrily. Before I knew it, he'd disappeared.

I glanced down at the alleged gym again. The young gentleman had only just taken notice of me, I saw, because he was standing up and preparing to shout out a few words.

But I didn't hear a word of what he said, because I had just realised something, and was staring horrified at the place where Pete had been just a short while ago.

The reason he'd vanished from view was that he'd walked straight through a sheer wall of stone.

-

* I had started with 'G' in the dictionary and came as far as 'gastronome' before I gave up. This was one of the words I liked.