A/N: This is kinda a passion project I've been wanting to do for a while, because Croagunk, Brock, and their relationship with each other is amazing, and I just wanted to explore it.
Life was boring. It always had been, and Croagunk was starting to think it always would be.
Every single day felt the same. Even when new, exciting things happened, Croagunk's boredom didn't change. He wasn't really sure if boredom was even the right word, but nothing and nobody caught his interest, and it was making him tired. He really didn't know what else to call it.
He'd felt like this for as long as he could remember. He'd tried traveling to new places. He'd left the marshes he was born in and traveled to far away marshlands, just because he hoped that a change of scenery was all he needed to stop this boredom. It helped for a little bit, because there were new pokémon to challenge and fight. It wasn't long before the novelty wore off and the other pokémon of the swamp stopped challenging him.
Eventually he left the marsh and went to the forest. It was a brand new terrain, and had even more new pokémon to interact with and challenge. In the forest, there were also people. A lot more than there were in either of the marshes. Croagunk was used to the occasional visitor, but not the constant traffic. People were a lot more interesting than pokémon.
At least, Croagunk had thought that people were interesting, but then he realized that they all acted the same around him, with very little deviation. People were disgusted, scared, and confused by him. There were a lot of scoffs and mutters aimed his way, and a lot of trainers would try to battle him. It wasn't even because they wanted to catch him, they just thought that he would make a good opponent.
People looked at him, and they saw either a threat or an enemy. He didn't understand it. He was good at fighting, but he wasn't as aggressive as other pokémon were. Maybe he just looked scary, and that's why he started looking at his reflection. He was trying to see just what everybody else saw when they looked at him. He wanted to understand, because then maybe he could do something to change it, just so he wouldn't get the same reactions over and over again.
He tried to do whatever he could think of to break up the monotony. Sometimes he would find builders or other construction workers who wanted some additional work. They were confused as to why a wild pokémon would want to help them, but they would eventually agree. He was given work to focus on for a few days at a time. It was still boring, but at least it was something.
The workers would always give him something to repay him. Usually it was pokémon treats, which he liked, but didn't exactly love, so he would find a baby pokémon and passed it off to them instead. Sometimes though the workers would pay him with money. Maybe they assumed he had a trainer, maybe they were just so used to paying with money that they didn't think about the fact that a pokémon didn't need any. It didn't really matter why Croagunk was given the money, he kept it.
One day he wanted a change, so he went to the small market in the forest. He was so desperate for something new that he wanted to try eating human food, just to see if that would do something, anything, to make this boredom go away, even just a little.
Croagunk hadn't seen pokémon in stores without their trainers, but he didn't see any rules about it, so he just let himself in. He looked at the food, browsing the shelves, trying to think of what he wanted. He could feel the eyes of the shoppers and store owners, but he ignored them. It wasn't anything he wasn't used to. People always seemed to be watching him for one reason or another.
Croagunk looked for a long time before he grabbed a sandwich, some bitter juice, and a package of cookies. He didn't really like sweet berries, but maybe he would like sweets if it was like this. He brought the food to the counter. The worker was confused, but when Croagunk put money on the counter they shrugged and let him leave with his purchases.
Croagunk sat just outside the small mart and ate his breakfast. It was…fine. It tasted different from the food he was used to. He didn't really like it more or less than wild berries and nuts, it was just food, and eating it did nothing to improve or worsen his mood.
He didn't have any other plans for the day, and he couldn't be bothered to go somewhere else, so Croagunk just stayed in front of the store. He felt like he was waiting for something, but he didn't know what. That anticipation for something more was all he felt other than that ever-present boredom.
He sat, and waited, and then finally he noticed something new. At first he thought it was just another shopper, grumbling to themselves about needing to go to the store. He wouldn't normally spare them a glance, but he saw the shopper out of the corner of his eye, and he felt interest spark in him when he saw that it was a meowth.
A pokémon, dressed up like a human, standing on two legs when they should be on all fours. The meowth also talked, and it was walking out of the store by itself, unaccompanied by a trainer. Croagunk knew that he had just gone shopping on his own, but he'd always been really weird. He'd never seen other pokémon as weird as him.
He was curious and intrigued, and it was more than he had felt in a long time. Croagunk didn't know if this curiosity would be satisfied, but he didn't want to just let it go. He stood up and started following the meowth, even speeding up to keep up with it.
The meowth was panicked as it tried to flee from him, but lots of people and pokémon were scared of him. Croagunk couldn't be bothered to stop what he was doing every single time somebody was scared of him. He'd never do anything. Not that he did anything in the first place, but at least that was his own choice.
The meowth's destination was not what Croagunk expected. He went into a building that had been abandoned last time he'd seen it. There were two humans there, wearing clothes that made them look even more ridiculous than the meowth.
This should be an interesting situation. It was a talking meowth, and humans that were clearly up to something, but Croagunk didn't feel anything but that familiar boredom. It was disappointing. He'd come here for something new, and instead he got called a weirdo and stared at like he was a freak just because the trainers had never seen a Croagunk before. That kind of thing happened every day. Even the novelty of the talking meowth had faded, because it was clear that it acted like a normal person.
He wanted something new. Was that really too much to ask?
He didn't really like these humans. They acted just like everybody else, and then thought that he was the rude one just because he thought they were boring. One of them even dared to get in his space. Croagunk's business was his own, and he didn't let anybody get away with crowding him. He put that human in his place with a quick poison jab, just as a warning, though if he tried it again then he wouldn't go so easy on him.
Croagunk had been planning on leaving and finding something else to do, but the woman with the long red hair said that she had a way to keep him from getting bored. He decided to stick around, just to see. Who knows, maybe she'd be able to accomplish what he couldn't and finally give him something to care about.
The humans wanted him to do battles for them. He didn't exactly have fun with battling, but he felt something when he fought, like he was satisfying a deep hunger that he didn't notice until he started feeding into it.
None of the pokémon he fought posed a challenge, but it gave him something to do. It was better than nothing. Not by a lot, but something was better than nothing.
Battle after battle he fought whatever pokémon he was told to. They all melded together, and he was starting to get bored all over again. Things changed up just a little bit when two more challengers came in before he had even finished his current battle. He wouldn't get a break.
He beat the sandslash only too easily, though his second battle was a little harder. The scizor was able to get a good hit on him, and he'd needed a long moment to catch his breath and get back to his feet.
Maybe being knocked down should have counted as a loss, but he got back up and continued the fight. It probably wasn't fair, but Croagunk had never cared about fighting fair. If he was battling, his goal was to win, no matter how it happened.
He was given a break after the second battle, but he didn't get to rest. The humans he was battling for didn't seem to want anything to do with him, so Croagunk didn't sit with them as they stopped for lunch. He stepped outside instead and just watched as the younger humans played, laughed, and made lunch.
They looked like they were having fun, and he didn't like how unfair it was. Every day he had to fight to just have something to even catch his interest. These kids weren't even doing anything special, and yet they were having fun. What were they doing that he wasn't?
The younger kids didn't notice him, but as Croagunk watched them he soon felt somebody else watching him. He shifted his gaze towards the older boy who was making lunch. Croagunk thought he'd heard one of the younger kids call him 'Brock'.
"Hey, Croagunk." Brock looked confused, but he sounded completely normal. There was none of that disgust or stiff fear that he was used to hearing from people when they rarely talked to him. Brock addressed him like he was anybody else. It wasn't something that Croagunk was used to. It was nice.
Brock went back to making his food, but Croagunk continued to watch him. Every few minutes the human would turn to look at him, still looking as confused as ever, but he didn't talk to him more. Eventually Brock's food was done. He dished up some food for his friends, as well as their pokémon. What surprised Croagunk was that Brock took his food, as well as a plate of pokéfood, and approached him instead of joining his friends.
"Are you hungry?" Brock asked. He offered the food. Croagunk just stared at him. Brock knelt and pushed the pokéfood towards him. "You should eat something. You battled hard, and you're just going to battle more after lunch. You need food."
Croagunk had never had people who cared about what he did. It was weird and he didn't know how to react to it. Brock was waiting for him, so Croagunk started munching on the food. Just that simple action seemed to satisfy the boy. He sat down near Croagunk, though he didn't crowd him.
They just sat there in silence for several minutes, watching each other and eating. Brock cleared his throat. "You're really strong." The boy commented. "It looked like you could battle without your trainer's help."
Croagunk huffed and turned his head. Jessie, or Princess Powerzone, or whatever her name actually was, wasn't his trainer. He didn't have a trainer at all, but if he did it definitely wouldn't be her. Of course he could battle without her. She wasn't doing anything except giving commands that he only obeyed if it was convenient for him.
"Do you like battling?" Brock asked. "It doesn't really seem fair that she's working you so hard. Doing so many battles in a row without a real break can be hard on anybody, no matter how strong they are."
Brock gave him a small smile. "Sorry. I'm sure Princess Powerzone is a great trainer, I just get really worried about pokémon. I want to be sure that everybody's taken care of. You're strong, but no offense, you just don't seem very happy to me."
He wasn't happy. He wasn't sad. He was always bored and felt nothing at all. Brock was far from the first person to comment on him not looking happy, but every other time people just didn't want him to look so creepy. Brock just sounded concerned.
He was worried about him. Why? Brock didn't even know him. Croagunk wasn't upset about it, just confused.
Far too soon the lunch break ended. Brock's friend was eager for a battle, so it was time to fight again. He had thought that his break was good enough, because the other two fights hadn't been too hard, but the boy's aipom hit him right where the scizor before had, and it hit him multiple times. The first hit was rough, but he could fight through it. The next hit was too much, and Croagunk didn't just get his air knocked out of him, but he fainted.
He really wasn't out for long, maybe just a minute, but when he regained consciousness the first thing he noticed was that the room was a lot brighter, and somehow a lot noisier. He sat up, cringing at the bruised feeling on his face. Looking around it looked like he had missed a lot. There was Brock and the other kids, looking shocked and a little angry. They were all looking to the sky, and when Croagunk followed their gaze he saw the humans that he'd been battling for.
The kids were calling them Team Rocket, and it looked like they were flying away, taking dozens of pokéballs away with them. The pokéballs they'd been given by the trainers that had lost to Croagunk. And now it was clear that they weren't intending to give them back.
Team Rocket were thieves, and they'd used Croagunk to make their job easier. He'd known they were up to something, but he hadn't thought it would be this.
Team Rocket started to fly away, leaving Croagunk behind. He didn't mind being alone, but he hated it when he was left like this. It didn't happen often, because he rarely let himself get close to others, but whenever he did this was always the result. He was pushed away or left behind, and each time it stung more than the last.
He didn't understand why. He was a strong pokémon. He could offer protection. He could battle for people, like he'd been doing for Team Rocket. He could lift and break things, like he did for the construction workers. He could be useful, so why didn't anybody want him to stay around? Did they really look at him with so much disgust that even what he could offer couldn't make his presence worth it?
The kids chased after Team Rocket to get the pokémon back. Croagunk hadn't had any intention of following them. The kids wouldn't work with him, because they probably thought he'd worked with Team Rocket. He'd been dragged into this theft, and now he wanted nothing to do with it. He was going to walk away and try to find a way to get rid of the feeling of abandonment. He shouldn't feel this way. He hadn't even liked Team Rocket. It shouldn't matter to him if they'd left him behind, but it did, apparently, and he hated it.
The kids ran off to save the pokémon, not even sparing him a second glance…except for Brock. The boy faltered and turned to look back at him. For a moment Brock seemed to forget about the other pokémon, but that look of concern was still on his face. Was he concerned about Croagunk?
Before he could figure out the feeling, Brock's expression fell to one that meant he was weirded out, and then he continued after his friends and didn't look back again. Croagunk knew he shouldn't think too much about the way that Brock had paused and looked his way, but…but…
The tightness in Croagunk's chest grew stronger. It felt warm, and though it didn't overpower the sting of being left behind, it made it seem not so bad. Croagunk liked Brock much more than he liked Team Rocket, and he liked the way the trainer made him feel too. He wanted more of it. Feeling just a little ridiculous, and not knowing what he was doing, Croagunk followed the kids.
He lingered back and watched the kids launch Team Rocket away with seemingly no effort at all. Either Team Rocket was really incompetent, the kids were really strong, or this was something that they were just used to doing. Considering how familiar they all seemed with each other, Croagunk thought that the latter was the case.
He wanted to go up to Brock. He wanted to be near him, but he stopped himself. The boy had made that weird face towards him before running after his friends, and they'd taken down Team Rocket very quickly. What if they thought that Croagunk was still with them and attacked him too?
He was still sore, and wasn't in the mood for a battle, and he really didn't think that fighting the kids, even to defend himself, was a good way to get them to warm up to him. Most people were creeped out by Croagunk, but this was one group of kids who he couldn't even blame for it. Team Rocket had stolen their pokémon, and for all the kids knew, he had been a part of that plot.
He wanted to step up to them, but instead Croagunk found himself taking a step back. It would be risky to Brock, hoping for a second chance and the chance to stay at his side, just to find out more about what exactly he was feeling. Normally, Croagunk could handle a little risk just to have the chance to feel something more than the empty boredom that he was plagued with, but not today. He was still feeling a mild ache from being left behind by Team Rocket, and he cared about Brock's opinion much more than theirs. He couldn't handle even the possibility of being rejected by Brock, but he wasn't ready to forget about him either.
Croagunk looked towards where Team Rocket had gone flying. If Brock wasn't going to trust him because of the work he'd done with them, maybe if he went after them and stopped them from doing the same kind of thing all over again, then he could show the trainer that he could be trusted.
Maybe then he'd be allowed to go with Brock, and he'd be able to pursue that warm feeling that he didn't understand.
Forgetting all about his soreness from the battles, Croagunk went after the villains. Now he had a goal. He was still bored, but having something to do would hopefully distract him slightly from that emptiness. He didn't know if Brock would take him, even if he proved himself. And even if Brock did let him tag along, he knew it didn't guarantee that it would fix his problems with boredom, but at least he had a hope to work towards. It was more than he normally had.
As Croagunk walked away, he didn't notice Brock looking over his shoulder after him with that same look of concern that he'd had before.