Cosmic Latte returned some time later. He'd been setting Ulqui on random wild pokemon, and laughing as they shattered their level 3 skulls against the might of Ulqui's immense defense. The fact that this thought rhymed snapped Latte out of his trance just before he would have fallen over a wall, which was nice. He'd decided to sneak past the old man and continue towards the forest. Latte was going to throw a Weedle at him. See, this would both distract the old man and probably harm him, so Latte was feeling pretty good as he sidled up the path. Latte was perhaps the only trainer on the planet that could sidle in any direction.
As he neared the old man's patrol line, he slowed down and produced from a pocket the Weedle he'd found. He didn't know why it even was where he found it, but it seemed to have a pretty big horn. This meant either: The Weedle was extra poisonous, which would be good; or: this particular Weedle had lots of female friends. Latte was pretty sure it was the former, but knew he'd need to wash his hands either way.
So, the next paragraph will be presented to you in the present tense, because won't that be exciting?
Safely around a corner, Latte draws his arm back and prepares to launch the Weedle at the old man's face. He focuses, and then sends Weedle flying towards its role as a decoy, noticing only too late that the old man was staring, wide awake, his eyes darting around their sockets. As the Weedle comes within an inch of his head, the old man spins in some zen like state and swats the Weedle from the air, sending it crashing to the ground. Latte's legs betray him and he runs out to the old man.
The old man looked him up and down, mostly up, and grinned a toothless grin. Latte looked at him and felt genuinely afraid for his safety. The old man almost seemed to be flickering... clearly, he'd replaced his coffee with red bull. Red Tauros. Whatever. (Latte had never understood why, for example, Pikachu was the 'mouse' pokemon. What the hell was a mouse? The only 'mice' were Pikachu, Raichu, and maybe Rattata and Ratticate. But they had 'rat' in the names, so they couldn't- wait, what the hell was a rat?) But the old man wasvibrating, almost, but while not moving at all... 'Hey, young'un, wanna see how to catch a pokemon?'
'Um, not really.' said Latte, sinking into his usual deadpan. 'I'm not an idiot, see.'
'Well, this is how! Listen up!'
And with that, Latte couldn't move. He was rooted to the spot, with a feeling going down to his very bones that he needed to get far, far away from this man. He felt like if he stayed that something bad was going to happen. That doesn't sound like a particularly potent statement alone, but coupled with an inability even to breathe and a man with his back turned to you, flickering, all the while giving off a feeling that if he turned around nothing would be there? Latte was watching this man acting out some bizarre, flickering charade with an insect, rooted to the spot and unable to look away, unable to move, unable to open his mouth. And Latte had to scream.