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Accidental Sinnoh Chapter 5

Visually Impaired And Definitely An Illiterate

Nothing much happened after I named Russ, well, Russ. I changed into my new clothes and watched the TV for a bit – even though I can't understand any text on the TV – and headed to bed. There was another single bed beside mine but Russ for some reason decided to sleep on the floor. I didn't think much of it, however.

I didn't know what happened to Ryna and where she went since I dozed off while she was still in the room.

The next day, I woke up to the sound of the doorbell ringing and you can probably notice a pattern which is that the doorbell is basically my alarm clock at this point. Slowly, I dragged myself out of my bed. There, sitting at the table and sleeping, was Ryna.

I didn't know how much she trusted me to the point that she is willing to sleep with her back towards a fucking alien but it was enough for me to know that she wasn't acting friendly towards me this entire time. Honestly, it's- I felt nice. Really, it felt really great.

Upon hearing the doorbell, she woke up and slowly got up to answer the door. I was still sitting at the side of the bed when our eyes met.

"Oh, good morning… I should probably answer the door." She slowly began to walk towards the door before I cut her off in the process.

"No, actually let me do it. It's probably my spectacles," I said as I approach the door.

As I was doing that, I thought to myself, "No, surely this is not my spectacles, right? It's only been a day- No- not even a day. It's been mere hours! Surely this is someone else."

When I opened the door, it has come to my realisation that my prediction was wrong. Not, the spectacles part – I didn't know that yet – but rather the 'someone' part because guess what? There's a fucking bird at my front door! It was grey and white, with a little pointy thing on its head which is red on the tip of it. To say that this bird is big is an understatement. This bird is HUGE. It's at least my height. On top of that, it was wearing a bag on its back – the type of bag you'd see used by the mailmen on motorcycles or whatever they are called.

"Raptor?" It said.

"Oh… hello. Do you need anything?" I asked it. It then began to vigorously flap its wings, presumably to get the bag off its back as it was struggling so I decided to help it out. We succeeded in the end however there were some bird feathers on the floor.

"Tor." It said, bowing at me. I simply assumed it was saying 'Thank you'. "Oh my god. Bro's a gentleman."

It then opened the bag with its beak and pulled out a small parcel. I took it and then it dipped its head in and took out a notepad and dipped its head in again and pulled out a pen.

"Fuck, what do I do?" Luckily for me, Ryna came to the rescue.

"What's this?" With the notepad and the pen in my right hand and the parcel in the other, I turned around to see Ryna, behind me and leaning on the door.

"Yea… I think this is a parcel…? I don't know for who, though."

"Can you give me that notepad for a bit?" I handed her the notepad and she began scanning it.

"Oh, it's for you, Ben."

"What do I do with this?"

"You just have to sign… there…" She pointed towards the bottom of the page.

"My signature?"

"You have one of those? I mean- Yeah…"

I sighed feeling the drowsiness lingering in my head still. I held the notepad close to my eyes to have a better look at it and took the pen.

The pen slipped out of my sweaty hands. I yelped but I managed to catch it before it fell. "Ah- sorry. Where was I?" I said before taking my time to sign the notepad.

The moment I was done, the bird took the notepad and pen back and put them back into the bag. It then pulled out a small electronic device and pecked a few buttons on it. The buttons were visibly worn down from the amount of pecking it received. A small beep could be heard and it put it back into the bag. It put the bag back on itself however without that much trouble.

"Raptor." It said again and bowed. "Thank you?" I reciprocated the bow and it waddled off into the distance.

I looked at the small parcel which was covered in paper and judging from how it feels in my hand, I can tell that there was bubble wrap inside of it. I walked back into the room with my eyes stuck still stuck on the parcel. The door closed shut behind me.

"What's this…" I muttered to myself.

"Your spectacles," Ryna said as she sat back down on the chair.

"What?" I looked at her, not understanding what she meant.

"The parcel… it's your spectacles."

"How did you-"

"I looked at the address… it's your name and address… so I guess it's for you."

"Oh…" I mean, she did have a point. I didn't know what else to say. I slowly ripped open the paper and the bubble wrappings and opened the box. There, placed neatly inside, was a hard black rectangular casing. I held it and felt some kind of fabric-y material all around.

Opening the case, a pair of spectacles was placed inside with transparent plastic packaging containing the microfiber cloth (probably) placed in the gap between the spectacles' legs (are those what they're called?) and the lens.

I took out the spectacles and put them on.

For a second there, I thought I saw heaven.

"How does it feel?" Ryna asked.

"By golly, I'm seeing our Lord and saviour, Jesus Christ."

"Wha-"

"Ryna, it feels fantastic. How does it look? Do I look like a businessman?" I asked her.

"Honestly, you look more cute than professional to me. Don't get me wrong, it looks great on you. It's almost as if it's always meant to be."

I looked at her and we made eye contact. We just stared at each other for a good few seconds before I decide to look away, feeling a little awkward about it.

"Well, I'm glad you like it," she said, trying to break the awkwardness. "I do. I really do."

"What was that Pokemon anyway?" I asked. It definitely looked familiar but I don't where I saw it first.

"That was a Staraptor. A pretty big one, actually."

"Ah, got it."

I was grinning from ear to ear but it soon faded when Ryna said, "Since you can see properly now, I think it's time for you to learn the basics of the language we speak."

I sighed. "Can I at least take a shower first or eat for that matter? It's like…" I looked at the numberless clock on the wall which is the only feasible way I can tell the time. It was about… "Half past nine…"

"Ya know what? Good idea. I'm going to go back to my plac-"

"Wait. I'm just making sure. I want to ask you, have you- wait, that's not the right word. Hold on, let me rephrase this. Did you sleep here last night, specifically at the desk?"

"Look, it's a long way to my apartment, alright."

"I'm not mad or anything, I'm just confirming something."

"Hm… sure…" she said sceptically. "Anyway, I'm going to go back to my place and… Look just stay here, alright? I'll be right back, give me about 40, 50 minutes, maybe?"

"Sure…" Ryna picked got up, picked up her bag and left the room soon after, shutting the door behind her. As soon as she left, I locked the door, took my towel and headed straight for the bathroom.

I stood there in the shower for what felt like forever just letting the warm water run down my body. I even sang in the shower, something I haven't done in a while. After I was done, I put on my new clothes and went back into the living room if you want to call it that.

I turned on the TV and tried to find something to watch but as usual, I can't understand any of the text. I sighed and turned it off again. Why do I keep forgetting this?

The silence was slowly killing me so I decided to turn on the TV once again and watched the news. While I can't read anything, I can still hear and understand what the people are saying.

"With the League Season finally over, Professor Rowan of Sandgem Town encourages future young trainers to do their best in the STT-Triple-One-Five and for those who make it, the SPT-Triple-Two-Five examinations coming this February."*

"The what exam again?"

To be quite frank with you, I wasn't paying much attention to it. I sort of zoned out in the middle of the statement so I didn't catch some of the things they said.

"Bro there's literally nothing to watch! All the shows fucking suck here!" I let out all my frustration.

That burst of frustration also resulted in Russ waking up and as a matter of fact, I didn't even realise that it was still sleeping this entire time. I simply forgot that he exists.

"...Rio…?"

"Oh- Sorry about that. You should come and sit with me on the bed. C'mon." I patted the bed and called him over.

Russ stretched and waddled over to the side of the bed. The only part of him that was visible to me was his ears and part of his head. This was criminally cute.

And I'm was resisting the urge to squeeze his ears.

He climbed the side of the bed and I scooted over to make room for him. Even though the bed was a 'single bed', there was still plenty of room for activities. What you count as activities is… out of the question, we don't talk about it.

Anyway, it got under the blanket and I didn't know what it was doing down there but it rolled and moved around a bit.

"Russ, what the hell are you doing down there?" It moved around more for a solid 30 seconds before it poked its head out. We chilled and watched TV although it was still awkward as hell and I wasn't paying much attention to the TV itself.

A few minutes later, the doorbell rang.

"Russ, can you go grab the door for me, please?" Russ got out of bed and I too did the same.

I saw him as he struggled to open the door. He got frustrated and started turning the door handle and pulling on it vigorously before I stopped it in the process. "Wait! Russ. Stop. Let me do it."

Russ looked disappointed in himself which I thought was weird and… pretty dramatic since it was just a door. "Sorry…"

"Russ, why are you so er… apologetic?"

The doorbell rang again, this time twice.

"Oh- Shit-"

I hastily swung the swing bar open and tried to open the door. The door didn't budge, however, and I started doing what Russ did earlier; forcefully pulling on the door handle.

I then realised that the lock below the door handle wasn't unlocked so I unlocked it and open the door.

Behind the door was an impatient Ryna.

"Ah! You took forever!" She said. "Oh, sorry about that. I was… busy. Uh… did you not get the room key?" I said, trying to make an excuse for my own stupidity and beaming her another question.

"Uh… no. Ah, forget about it. I'm here at the end of the day." She showed me a paper bag with boxes inside. "I got breakfast for all of us and some books for you."

"Oh, nice! Come on, Russ. Let's eat."

She handed me a paper bag full of books and a box of food and I thanked her right after. "So, now that you have food and books, maybe you can learn a useful skill today or if not today, the near future."

"I think I can- I hope I can," I said, looking over the books she brought.

Ryna looked up at me and said, "You'll manage. Alright, let's eat." She then opened another box of food and looked at it to make sure that she was giving the right food to Russ. He received the box and smiled at her. "You're welcome." I heard Ryna say.

After several minutes of eating, I was sitting at the desk with a pen in my hand and a pile of books sitting just beside me. The entire time, all I ever thought was, "I think I'm ready to learn."

"Alright, Ben. Are you ready for this?"

"Y- Yeah?" I said, not sounding very confident and ready for that matter.

She took the topmost book from the pile and slapped it in front of me. "We're gonna be here for a long time."

I put on my glasses and opened the book. The moment I did that, however, I knew I was already lost. "How the fuck do I start? It's gibberish!"

"Hey, 4 years old children read this."

"You could at least guide me. Come on."

"That's true but I want to… You know what, I'm just going to give you a hint; you're not on the right page. That's the introduction. You should see a table of all the letters."

I flipped to the second page and sure enough, there was indeed a table. I was still pretty much lost at first but I came up with an ingenious solution which was to count the number of letters there are in the table. When I counted it all, the amount was exactly 26. My plan had worked which means that there's a possibility – I'm not saying it is but it is a possibility – that this is just the alphabet that I'm very much familiar with. If this is the case, my life would be so much easier.

The letters themselves look like greek letters. One of which looked like a pitchfork. Another one looked like a mouth with a tongue sticking out of it.

A hand patted my shoulder and I heard Ryna say, "Let's start shall we?"

Turns out my assumptions were absolutely right, that's for sure. The individual letters DO correspond to the letters of the familiar alphabet. Even the order is the same.

Ryna was as shocked as I am – which was only just – when we found out that it was just a simple cypher. Now that my work was cut in half, now all I need to do is memorise and learn to write it.

It was a long and arduous task but with the help of Ryna, I was able to catch on with the letters although I was reading words slowly and needed to refer to the table once in a while. In addition to that, I still can't write them… yet. I'm still not familiar with numbers and don't get me started on punctuation, symbols and grammar. This will really take time, eh? I'll leave that for tomorrow or something.

For the entire time, Russ was standing on an ottoman next to me. For some reason, he looked mesmerized by what I was reading. I smiled and pet him every now and then to make sure that he knows that I appreciate his company.

Time has been passing slowly for me. I swear I've been learning for six hours straight but when I looked at the clock, it was barely 1 in the afternoon! To put that into perspective, I started at around 10:30 in the morning. I decided to stop there. I kid you not, I had to get a cup of coffee and by the end of the 'lesson', I was completely burnt out.

"Yeah… I think I'm gonna stop there…" I said as I put my head down on the table.

"You've done enough for today. I didn't think you'd be so invested in learning this. Why don't you take a break? Take a nap, maybe?" She asked me. The latter sounds very tempting to me.

"I have to survive, Ryna. I'm just gonna take a nap…"

She simply smiled at me. "Russ, why don't we leave Ben alone for a while?"

Russ gave her a nod and hopped off the bed. He waddled towards her and she lifted him up.

"Let's go, buddy." I smiled at them. "I'll see you guys later."

The door closed soon after.

I took off my glasses and I went and took a nap.

When I awoke, it was already late in the evening. I opened and looked out the window and saw the sun slowly setting. It was a breathtaking sight. I took a moment to breathe in the cold fresh air and appreciate the beauty of the Sinnohan sunset. There, I was left pondering to myself about the language barrier and how I was to overcome this. It definitely wasn't easy and it definitely won't be brief but I'm sure I'll get through, right? It was like going back to pre-school but now, I actually have a slight clue on what to do. After all, how can I run without learning how to walk or crawl for that matter?

The hotel door beeped and opened.

"We're back!" Before I can turn around, I felt something hug my leg which gave me a mini heart attack. "I got you something!"

Oh. It's just Russ… and Ryna.

Russ held out a popsicle which I thought was weird since it is already stupid cold, not sure why anyone would want ice cream at this time of year and at this time of day but I appreciated it nonetheless. I knelt down and patted its head. "You're nice." It simply smiled at me. I went ahead and put the popsicle in the mini-fridge since I wasn't feeling it at the moment.

"Oh and Ben? I got us dinner- Wait. Why is this still here? Don't tell me you haven't had lunch."

"There's lunch?"

"Have you been sleeping this entire time?"

"Uh… yeah…?"

"No wonder. You need to take better care of yourself! Come on, let's eat."

We all sat down and had a nice dinner. After eating, I decided to go out and take a walk with Russ – if he wanted to – to clear my mind. I took a nice shower before putting on another set of clothes consisting of a black T-shirt, jean pants and my beige hoodie.

"Ryna, do they not provide laundry bags?" I said as I scoured through the closet.

"Do they not?"

I sighed, "Ya know what, forget it. I'm going to deal with that tomorrow."

"Oh, and by the way, there's a laundromat not far from here if you want to clean your clothes."

"S- sure… I'll do that tomorrow... Russ, do you want to come with me?" Russ's ear perked up. The Riolu jumped off the chair and started running towards me. "I want to come!" it said like the little child it was.

"Alright, then. Let's go."

I put on my shoe and we headed out the door to start our walk around the area. The sky was lit up with stars and the night sky was beautiful. The two of us talked about random things, particularly about what Russ and Ryna did – which took them about four hours – and had a great time. One thing is for sure, Russ seemed to open up more to me whereas before, it was always silent. I didn't know what Ryna did to Russ to make it like this. For all I know, she'd probably sold Russ and got me another Riolu that I might mistake for Russ.

Another thing I want to point out is that Sandgem Town is not as small as what they interpret in the games – just a couple of buildings – but rather an actual town however it isn't as big to the point that you have to get a car. Walking is perfectly feasible here which I actually had no complaints with.

A couple of minutes of exploring the town went by and I was thirsty and so was Russ so we made our way to the same convenience store I went to two days prior. Coincidentally, the same convenience store clerk was there. We both said our greetings and Russ probably did too since the clerk greeted it too.

I went straight for the fridge and picked a random drink. Reading the label, it took me a solid 10 seconds to find out that it was just green tea. Now that I thought about it, I should've found that out from the pictures of leaves around the actual can.

I took out another can for Russ and made my way to the cashier. She scanned my stuff and we talked for a bit. I paid for it with the only bill I had and I was praying that I have enough money. She gave me back 6-dollar bills and I stopped holding back my breath.

I took the two cans of drink and gave one to Russ. Not long after, we said our goodbyes and left the store.

I opened the can and drank it and I have to admit, it was pretty good, actually. Looking down at Russ, I saw that he was having trouble opening the can. While it was cute, I actually felt bad for him since he was starting to get frustrated.

"Russ, let me help you out."

Russ handed me the can and I opened the can for it.

"Thanks, master!" I froze. It simply stared at me with a smile and I stared back. "Did bro just call me 'master'?"

"UHHH…" That 'UHHH…' went on for a solid five seconds since I didn't really know how to respond to that. Never have I ever been called a master, not even as a joke. "Please just call me Ben. You ain't my slave and I am not a slave owner. It feels weird being called a master."

"Sorry. Thanks, Ben!"

"There we go." I gave him a thumbs up. He only smiled at me like he always has been.

The door unlocked with a beep and a click, creaking faintly while making way for Russ and I to walk inside.

"We're back."

Ryna quickly turned to us. "Oh- Ah, Ben, good news! You're getting your stuff back!"Russ ran up towards her. "How's your trip with Ben?" she asked.

The door shuts behind me as I froze at her words. For the past months, I thought my stuff was gone. Destroyed and turned to dust but now, I get to see them again. I didn't realise how happy I was until I collected my own thoughts and actually started talking again.

"Are you for real?" The entire time, I was holding myself from absolutely grinning from ear to ear.

"It was a tedious task, like, a lot of negotiations happened. They still don't trust you with them but I assured them the you'll be fine so I trust you to not do anything stupid."

I sighed, "...That's… fair enough, I guess…"

AN:

What's up guys, back with another chapter. Left y'all with a cliffhanger there, eh?

To be honest, I don't really know what to say in this author's note. One thing is for sure, this chapter was sort of meant to be a filler chapter. Also, a Christmas chapter coming this Christmas is likely so… I wouldn't say to expect it but I'm also saying to expect it.

Still in consideration but now, it's more likely.

Anyway, enjoy your next 24 hours!

Always living in your walls,

- Exotic

Word count: 3928 words (Story only)

Date of creation: 30th November 2022, 1:35 a.m

Date of completion: 6th December 2022, 10:11 p.m