A/N: I rather enjoyed writing the previous chapter, even though it may have seemed a bit boring since it was just in the lab. But I did enjoy writing that little bit of… foreshadowing, if that's the right word? 'Foreshadowing' is usually a reference to something that hasn't happened yet. Is it still called foreshadowing when the thing it is referencing is a prequel? The prequel hasn't been written yet though, but I do have some ideas for it. Of course, if I end up writing it, it won't be happening for a while, since I don't want to be focusing on two stories at once, even if they are set in the same world. I look forward to writing it, but that won't be for a while, so let's not get ahead of ourselves.
Unfortunately, we have one more short, boring chapter where Kris is still in New Bark Town, but I promise the next chapter will be coming very soon! Maybe even later today if I write as fast as I hope to.
Disclaimer: I don't own Pokemon.
"Hi, Kris, how was the Professor? I thought you might be helping out a bit longer." Mum said when I walked into the house.
"Um… yeah, he didn't really need me anymore." Well, it's not a total lie. I finished my errand and now he doesn't need my help anymore.
"Oh, okay. Still, I thought you'd stay longer. You've told me you love hanging out there and talking to the Professor or reading his books."
I shrugged, trying to dismiss the topic. "Need any help with dinner?" Why am I changing the subject? I need to tell her I'm leaving! Wait, Kris, be reasonable. I don't have to leave right away. I should have dinner with Mum tonight and then leave tomorrow.
"Well, I'm cooking your favourite tonight. I'm guessing you want to help mash the potatoes?"
"Oh, yeah, okay!" I wasn't expecting that. It's not often she cooks my favourite when it's not my birthday or some other special occasion. "Hold on, I'm just going to put my bag in my room." I ran upstairs to my room and put down my bag. I opened it up and looked at what I now had. Two berries (one from a tree near Cherrygrove and one from the man who lives on Route 30 who gave me a berry from his tree), a potion from Professor Elm's assistant and… six Pokeballs. One was Chikorita's, the other five were empty ones Professor Elm's assistant gave me. But they all looked the same. I knew I had to do something to tell the balls apart. I picked up each one and tried releasing Chikorita until I found the right one.
"Chiko!"
"Shhh!" I shushed her. "Mum doesn't know I have you yet, so keep quiet for now, okay?" I whispered. She nodded. Now that I knew which ball hers was, I sat it off to the side, away from the others for now. Then, feeling a wave of creativity hit me, I rummaged through some stuff and found the make-your-own-stickers kit I got for a birthday years ago. Basically, they're plain white stickers that you can draw on. I grabbed a green highlighter and used it to give a small sticker a green background. Then, with a black pen, I drew the silhouette of a leaf, like the one of Chikorita's Pokeball. Then finally, I peeled off the sticker and stuck it onto the Pokeball. Perfect. Now I'll always know this one is Chikorita's.
I looked around the room and realised Chikorita was still out, watching me with fascination. "Okay, I think you should go back in your ball now." I told her. I hesitated for a moment before saying, "Or… would you prefer to stay here in my room." She nodded, remembering I had told her to be quiet. "Okay. You can stay out of your ball but only if you promise me you'll be quiet and stay in this room unless I come back and tell you that you can leave the room. Promise?" Another nod. "…Okay. I'll be back a bit later."
I headed downstairs and helped with dinner. Eventually, dinner was ready. Before we sat down to eat, I excused myself, saying I needed to go to the bathroom so I could go check on Chikorita. Well, it wasn't really a lie, I did need to go, but I also stopped off in my room on the way back. She was fine and had stayed put like I told her to. But I realised I was going to have to tell Mum about her. Sooner, rather than later. Also, Chikorita hasn't eaten since before I got her. She must be hungry. And I don't have any Pokemon food! I suppose after I tell Mum about her I could go to the lab and ask Professor Elm if he could spare some? No, I couldn't do that. Well, there's probably going to be leftovers from dinner, maybe she'll be able to eat that? So, with that idea in mind, I went back down to eat dinner with Mum.
"So, how was the Professor?" Mum asked as we sat down to eat.
"…Fine." I answered.
"You helped him out with something, right? Anything interesting?"
"No, not really. Just some simple tasks like usual."
"Really? When he told me he needed your help, he made it sound important."
"He makes everything sound important. Remember last time there was an 'emergency'?" I made air quotes at the word 'emergency', since that was what he had called it. "It turned out he'd forgotten the password to his email. I had to show him the 'forgot password' option."
"Oh, right. With the silly things he does, sometimes you forget he's really quite an expert." We continued eating in silence for a while. I ate fast, since it was my favourite meal: sausages, mashed potato, some pumpkin and an assortment of small vegetables such as peas, corn and small pieces of broccoli. With gravy all over everything, of course. I never understood why some kids don't like vegetables. And where did that stereotype about kids hating broccoli come from? I like broccoli. I don't care for brussel sprouts though. But of course, the best part of this meal in the mashed potato. And the gravy just makes it even better. And if I get a piece of a sausage, cover it in mashed potato and then cover that in gravy… amazingness in one mouthful! Mum ate a bit slower than I did. Eventually, though, she was almost finished, while I had slowed down and was almost full. "You know, I know." Mum suddenly said with a smile.
"Know what?" I asked, as if I'd forgotten about everything that happened today. I was too busy eating more mashed potato. I'm running out of gravy on my plate. Maybe I should pour on a bit more? I think there's more in the jug. Oh yeah, and what's Mum talking about?
"Oh, about your little trip to Route 30. Where's your little friend, anyway?" Oh no.
"How do you know about… Mum I'm sorry, I didn't mean to lie to you. Well, I mean, I knew I was lying, I just, I don't know, didn't want to tell you about it? I know, that's not a good reason for lying."
"Yeah, yeah." Mum waved it off as if it wasn't important. "So, where is he? Or she? How was your errand? Did you have to battle wild Pokemon along the way?"
"Yeah, I battled some wild Pokemon in the tall grass. And it was actually so much fun, and – wait, aren't you mad?"
"Well, for one thing, you didn't really lie. I knew you'd be helping the Professor."
"Yeah but you thought I'd be with him. Not over on Route 30 battling wild Pokemon on my own."
"There's nothing wrong with that. There's no rules against you battling, you are over ten. And I'm sure Professor Elm wouldn't have given you a Pokemon is he didn't think you could handle it."
"How did you know?" I had to ask. I figured she must have noticed it in my voice when I called her before I left New Bark Town. Mother's intuition or something like that. Or maybe I'm just a terrible liar.
"The police were going around town asking everyone if they knew anything about some red-haired boy who stole from the lab. I went to the lab to see if you and Professor Elm were okay, assuming you were there with him when it happened. But he told me he'd sent you out on an errand to see Mr. Pokemon on Route 30."
"Yeah, apparently Mr. Pokemon had found an egg which he believes to be a Pokemon egg. He wanted me to bring it back to Professor Elm for him." I grew more excited telling Mum about this. "And Professor Oak was there, too! And he gave me a Pokedex! And when I got back to the lab, Professor Elm suggested that I…" Come on, just say it. Just tell her. "That I go and challenge the gyms. That would mean leaving home and travelling Johto to go to all eight gyms. I hope you're okay with it, because I really think that I want to try it."
"You know, when you were little, I thought you'd be obsessed with Pokemon like the other kids. I guess I just had this strange stereotype in my head of a kid who leaves home as soon as they're ten and never looks back, excited to start a journey with Pokemon. It wasn't until you turned ten that I started to see you for who you really were. You weren't rushing off to get a Pokemon. You were happy living here and you didn't want to leave."
"Not at first, no." I agreed. "But now I'm starting to feel like I do want to leave. Not to completely change who I am and never look back, but rather to discover who I am now. It's not that I want to leave you, but I feel like… this something I need to try."
"I understand. You should go, have an adventure. And if it doesn't work out, if you discover that who you are is someone who doesn't want to travel with Pokemon all the time, well, you can always stop and come home." Mum smiled. "But I know you won't."
"You don't know that. I don't know if I can do this. All I know is that I want to try."
"Then try. That's all you need to do. Just do your best and work hard alongside your Pokemon. Speaking of which, where is he? Or she?"
"She." I clarified. "You wanna meet her?"
"I'm done anyway." Mum said, picking up her plate and standing up.
"So am I." Hearing this, she took my plate as well as hers to the bench where containers to pack leftover were waiting. Mum always made way too much so we would always have leftovers. "Oh, Chikorita! Come down here!" I called out, loud enough for her to hear me from my room. I head the pitter-patter of light footsteps on the stairs before seeing her bound into the room.
"Chiko!" She ran over to me, but then, seeing Mum, moved to stand behind me.
"It's okay, Chikorita, that's my Mum. She's nice." I bent down and pat her head.
"Chiko?" She stepped forwards towards Mum, who bent down and slowly reached out and pat her on the head.
"I think I'm going to quickly go next door to the lab and ask Professor Elm what I should give her to eat. I may have to ask him if I could take some of the Pokemon food he has, since I haven't bought any. I could give him the money to cover for it."
"Good idea." I ran up to my room to grab the pocket money I'd saved up. I went out the house and towards the lab, but before I could walk in, I looked down and noticed a little someone beside my feet. "Chikorita! You followed me?"
"Chiko!"
"Well, thanks for wanting to stay with me, I guess. Just make sure I know where you are next time." I went into the lab, Chikorita still following behind me.
"Oh, hi Kris." Professor Elm said. "I figured you wouldn't be leaving straight away."
"I think I'll leave tomorrow morning." I told him. "Anyway, Chikorita hasn't eaten since I got her, and I don't have any Pokemon food at home. Do you think you could give me some? I could cover the cost of it."
"Why didn't I think of that? I should have given you some earlier." He went to a cupboard and pulled out two packets. "Each of these packets should be enough for one meal. Here. Give her one tonight and keep the other for the morning."
"How much does Pokemon food usually cost?"
"Not too much, I suppose. You'll be earning money from battling, so I'm sure you'll have enough along your travels. These packets cost 500P each."
"Here," I dug through my pocket money and found 1000P. "Thank you. Come on, Chikorita." I took the packets of food and went back to my house. I opened one and poured the contents into a bowl and put it on the floor. Mum had packed up the leftovers into a container.
"How about you take this with you when you leave tomorrow? Then you won't have to spend money on tomorrow's lunch. Surely a Pokemon Centre would have a microwave you could use to heat it up?"
"Probably." Though, when I thought about it, I realised I had no idea what most of a Pokemon Centre looked like. I'd only been in the reception room and hadn't looked at the restaurant area or the hotel area. But they'd probably have a microwave I could use.
I decided to spend some time looking at the Pokedex. I figured out how to check the list Professor Elm had shown me, where only Chikorita and Cyndaquil's entries were shown. I figured out how to check information on Chikorita, showing a list of attacks she would know. I found a sort of glossary, explaining what certain items do which a trainer might have. I went back to Chikorita's page on the list and read everything that was there. It said, 'It loves to bask in the sunlight. It uses the leaf on its head to seek out warm places.' I smiled. I loved learning about my new friend.
Finally, I led Chikorita back up to my room. I found a blanket and cushion and built a makeshift bed on the floor for Chikorita. It wasn't that late, but I felt like going to bed. I wanted to get up early tomorrow morning.
"Right after breakfast, Chikorita. That's when we'll leave. And we'll eat breakfast as soon as we get up. Well… right, we would still say goodbye to Mum before we go."
"Chiko," She wandered around the room before sitting down on the blanket on the floor. I went through my drawers to find some pyjamas. I grabbed a comfy pair of light pink shorts and a purple top. I changed into them and took my hair out of the ponytails. I laid down in bed and closed my eyes.
"Goodnight, Chikorita."
A/N: Now that I've been writing some more trainer battles, (keep in mind I like to have a few chapters in reserve and so I've written a bit more than what has been uploaded) I have a question for you guys. Of course, I've been trying to keep the story as detailed as I can. I mean, if you saw a sentence like, 'I walked through Route 30, battling a few trainers along the way until I reached Route 31.' You'd probably think, 'that's not very detailed, those battles should actually be written about.' If I write about every single battle with every random NPC, it could get a bit boring and repetitive. It's the same kind of problem with the wild battles. I tried to write a few wild battles, but really, if you were playing the game, you'd probably get into more wild battles than Kris did, but you wouldn't want to read about all of those battles. It's the same reason why you see wild battles edited out in let's plays, and why people in a let's play grind offscreen. Wild battles are boring and repetitive, so I won't be writing many of them now that there are going to be trainers challenging Kris along the routes. It's the trainer battles I'm not sure what to do with. Of course, I'm going to be writing important battles in detail, like rival battles and gym battles, but what should I do with all of the meaningless NPCs that don't add much to the story? I don't want it to look like I'm rushing through the story, but I don't want to write every little detail of every trainer battle, so I need to find some middle ground. Any advice about that would be great because I've been currently trying to write the battles on Route 30.
In case it wasn't explained properly, her Pokedex has a bit more to it than the one in the game. Her Pokedex basically works as the pause menu. I figured, if we get to check item descriptions in the bag if we don't know what something does, she should be able to do the same, which is why her Pokedex has a glossary for her. Plus, it shows her party screen. And the Pokedex shows a lot more information on Pokemon than the one in the game does, such as a list of what moves a Pokemon can learn.
Oh, and by the way, don't even bother to ask me what Pokemon those sausages they had for dinner were made of. I don't know, I don't want to try and explain that. Basically, I just wanted to give Kris my favourite meal.
And I always wondered why they never bother to address the fact that Pokeballs look the same. How do trainers tell them apart? In the games it isn't mentioned at all. In the anime, Ash seems to remember exactly which is which, probably because he has them in a specific order on his belt. And then there's one of my favourite of Ash's rivals, Ritchie, who puts stickers on his Pokeballs to tell them apart, so that's where I got that idea.
Also, fun fact, I was originally going to name this chapter something along the lines of 'The Calm Before the Real Adventure Begins,' because that's exactly what this chapter is, a calm moment of rest before she leaves home in the morning. But there must be a character limit because it wouldn't let me type all of that, so I settled for just 'The Calm.' But there you go, that's the meaning behind that name in case you were wondering.
Anyway, as always, thanks for reading, and I always love getting reviews. See you in the next chapter where Kris finally starts to make her way to Violet City (and finally considers herself to be a trainer).
