Review response section:
This time without a review, but I want to inform you that Generation IX, alongside Paldea region, will be included in this fic for a sake of not changing the core story of Pokemon Journeys too much.
Plus, I decided to change the Fic from having three main characters to four, I hope you don't mind.
Anyways, here is the next chapter.
"Sooo, where are we going now?" Koume asked, as she walked down from the prom on the boarding footbridge and stood on the suprisingly long and wide pier, holding both of her bags with a minor help from Buneary who granted additional lift for her left arm.
"Here's a neat part." Sushil smiled, taking two of his pokeballs and releasing a pair consisting of Talonflame and Swanna in front of them. "We won't be going, but flying. So how about you pick your friend for a ride?"
"... You look really preety under the Sun, may I ride on you?" Koume asked after a while of thinking, walking up to Swanna, which chirped happly.
"Jokes on you, the two are married. So if you ask them for the offspring to take ofr yourself, she's picking one because you ride on her. That's a solution they came up with at least" Sushil laughed, taking his position on top of passively disapproving Talonflame.
"Oh really? I didn't know." Koume said while two bird pokemon went upwards, beginning their flight.
"It's only natural. But sorry for the fact that you're not even five hours in and I'm already getting to the pokemon genetics." Sushil responded, looking forward at the previously seen by them steel dome that rised high above the water level despite the limited eyesight of the travelers.
"It's fine, really." She responded with polite smile and tightening her frontal grip on Buneary, who had not the best time with standing still while enduring speed not much lower when compared to her distance to the ground level. "But, how many of them do you have?"
"How many of what?"
"Pokemon. I mean, you already showed five and gave me sixth."
"I have nine hundred of them if I'm not mistaken-?"
"How many?!" Koume exclaimed, shocked so much that Swanna grumbled from the shaking given to her back.
"You know, the dome we're flying towards is mine... And to all poor pokemon who I brought from all regions I have been in." Sushil explained, handing Talonflame a set of fishsticks in a meanwhile.
"Poor pokemon?" Koume asked again, looking back at her Buneary which nodded in akward manner. "But they are so cool! Who wouldn't want them?"
"Someone who sees one better in his opinion." Sushil said with sorrow tone, making her flinch. "Every pokemon trainer can carry six pokemon at maximum with himself, those who aren't fitting in the team are either left alone, released back to the wild or neglected in favor of their replacements. And don't even start me on situations when trainer is abusive or they have a run in with stornger, more aggressive pokemon, angry mob or just poachers."
"... Oh, I understand." Koume said relucantly, looking down at Buneary who only turned around and rested herself head face-down on her chest in silence.
"This Buneary was for example abandoned by her trainer who all of a sudde. decided to specialize in Ghost-typed pokemon. And I don't think I need to tell you that you aren't holding a ghost now." Sushil paused, even feeling the akwardness of telling the truth on his own, only slightly brightening up when they flew past the last mountain and found themselves on a direct line towards the steel dome they saw earlier, now with glass on top of it and wooden double doors on the front. "But just so you know, pokemon really know when the trainer loves them. However, they are just as bad in knowing when he doesn't... Or worse."
"Makes sense if put in that way..." Koume sighed, looking down at Buneary for another time with hollow eyes as if she had her motivation to living sucked away. "It reminds me of mine school for some reason."
"Intense pressure for success, worse treatment for less competetive and excuses about natural selection of talent?" Sushil asked her, patting Talonflame on the neck before he and Swanna began to slowly descend down towards the unordinary building.
"In a way, yes." Koume responded, brought back to paying attention by Buneary, who gave her a warm hug. "The fact that they silently allowed to bullying a student for what was essentially caused by dangerous weather is just that."
"Strange that you spoke this part in third person." Sushil commented, giving her a curious glare.
"The point is, it wasn't just me. The rest of mine crew also got bullied into changing schools because of that." Koume said, her voice carrying a note of anguished anger.
"Collective responsibility? That's..." Sushil paused, clearly lost for words. "... Something stupid for sure."
"I know, right? And I won't get into the stigma they left on us afterwards." Koume added, somehow still keeping control over her body.
"And no school in Japan accepted you in because of being a student who cost her school a National Championship?" Sushil asked, piecing new information with the old one at the back of his head like a refined puzzle collector.
"Exacly, otherwise I wouldn't need to look for a school abroad or accept your offer." Koume responded, looking forward at the incoming building on a somewhat distant seashore. "I didn't even thought where I was going back there, you know?"
"Now I do." Sushil commented, trying to lighten up the mood. "But now you're here, in a society that preferes individual skill alongside the social ones."
"Heheh, I trust you that this is a such." Koume responded as the two birds they rided upon landed in front of the doors who up close happen to be sized for at least four cars to go in and out at once. "But what is your deal, exacly? I haven't heard about it so far."
"Sponsoring for teaming up with me, I'll explain it later on." Sushil responded as the two came down from their pokemon and approached the doors who were opened widely form the inside by a somewhat short humanoid creature with rocky red skin and white judogi on himself. "Glad to see you again Throh, now hold this." He added, handing a bag of doritos to him.
"That's a pokemon, right?" Koume asked, walking up to new encounter and shaking hand with it out of kindness.
"Yes, he wanted to be a butler for a sake of throwing unwanted guests out in the open." Sushil added as the group walked inside to a wide, V-shaped corridor that ended with a wide grassland and the doors behind them were closed. "And yes, he is a pokemon."
"Humanoidal pokemon, sounds about right." Koume nodded as they walked forward up to the edge of the grassland, where they witnessed what looked like a all-over-the-world part in a recreational parks.
"I needed an enviroment suitable for all pokemon, so I made one with their unmeasurable help." Sushil pointed out, spreading widely his hands and allowing Koume to step forward while Talonflame and Swanna flew up and right towards their nest located in a side of a short, rocky and steep hill. "By the end of this park are our bedrooms, storage rooms and about anything people and pokemon need to live together." He added before the two moved forward across the variety of bioms with the luggage and greetings from nearly limitless variety of pokemon living in there.
"Wooow, I am actually curious to see who they all are and what they can do..." Koume said, now herself being lost for words with astonishment caused by what the place had to offer for her.
"And you'll be granted the access to it whenever you need it." Sushil responded, handing her a smartphone with what seemed to be a red Rotom-inspired etui in it. "Call it a Rotom-phone, althrough it is your business phone by usage. It has in-built pokedex with all the pokemon in the world known so far. On top of that, it has a contact with me and everything else you'd expect from a new and not used smartphone." He added
"Ehm, sure, I never thought I'd get one in my life." Koume responded with undisguised shyness, suprised by another gift given to her.
After that exchange of words, they walked for next five to six minutes in silence and all the way up to the slightly curved row of building that were looking like a cubes of black granite on the outside.
"This is my bedroom?" Koume asked, slightly unsure about the while ordeal while Sushil casually walked up to one of them and opened the door.
"Yes it is, but let's not be discouraged by a first look please." He responsed with casual tone before the two walked inside.
The bedroom itself wasn't exacly special: three meter tall white walls and ceiling, white tiles on the floor, large window at the opposite side, king sized bed with a single white armchair chair and a dining table in front of it to the left and wide line consisting of single wall kitchen, multiple stone shelves, two oak wood warderobes and a large desk under the window with the sunlight going down directly at it to the right. All of which being given unusually convienient arrangement of electrical sockets.
"Quite a large one." Koume commented, placing the sport bag on the ground and then taking two steps forward before spinning twice on her toes. "How did you manage to affort it all?"
"Pokemon and right skills." Sushil responded, already busy with petting an icy-white pangolin, who happen to walk after them into the room.
"Oh, who's that?" Koume asked, walking up to the two and taking out her business phone to scan it.
"Aloan Sandshrew. Its ice-covered body lets it slide across the ground with bullet-like speed, sending its enemies flying when it hits them." Phone spoke up in a robotic tone, showcasing her a picture of said pokemon alongside the written text it just spoke up.
"Whoa, sounds cool." Koume said with partial astonishment before sitting down in front of him and allowing Buneary to hug him. "Why are you here, little friend?" She asked while two pokemon exchanged few grunts and other animalistic voices after which Buneary turned towards Sushil and began making excentric movements.
"He wants to go on a adventure, it seems that there haven't been enough visitors to take every overly curious pokemon from here to see the world." Sushil responded, nodding at the wiggling movements of Buneary. "So, do you want to take him?"
"... Sure thing. He seems to be a good boy." Koume nodded, allowing a very happy Sandshrew to run up to her and deliever a hug.
"Oh right, I almost forgot." Sushil added, taking out six metalic balls with red top, white bottom and a shiny lining between two halves that had a button on it's middle. "These are pokeballs, they are used to storage pokemon in as comfourtable way as possible by previoisly shrinking them. I'm sure you saw them when I had this fight on the ship." He added, handing them to her.
"I guess that's about right." Koume said, not having enough time for both Buneary and Aloan Sandshrew to jump towards them, press their buttons and getting swallowed inside of them with a pink mist surrounding them. "Oh, didn't expect them to do it themselves." She added before both balls wiggled three times and send out flashing start afterwards.
"If the pokeball throws out these stars, then it means you suceedes with catching your pokemon, even if against his will." Sushil explained while Koume stood up from the floor. "You can catch them even against their will if you weaken them enough prior to that. And before you ask, I'm telling you this so you're gonna be prepared for the eventual future." He added as they both left the room and went outside, where two pokemon were visibly waiting for them.
"Who are you?" Koume asked herself, opting to scan the pair with the Rotom-phone. One of them was a chubby ball with puppy eyes, light blue back and white bottom, second one looking like an orange, oversized ant with round body and oversized head equiped in zigzagged jaw.
"Spheal. It crosses the oceans by rolling itself on drifting ice. Fluffy fur keeps it warm when the temperature is below freezing... Trapinch. As it digs through the sand, its giant jaws crush any rocks that obstruct its path. It builds a funnel-shaped nest." Rotom-phome recitated his programmed formula while two pokemon approached Koume slowly with stars in their eyes.
"They seem to like you way more than others." Sushil commented while Koume slowly took out two of her pokeballs and placed them in front of approaching duo.
"Do you really want to come with me?" She asked them with enough genuity in her voice to make Sushil flinch.
"Ack, ack!" Spheal squeaked, flapping towards in a akward way before hitting the pokeball and getting caught.
"Kraaaak!" Trapinch cried, also walking forward to the pokeball, touching it with his jaw and also being taken in by the pink mist.
"Heheh, I never thought I'd be so happy over such small thing." Koume sobbed, picking both pokeballs from the ground and putting them back inside her pocket.
"Still sad about the accident?" Sushil asked, placing his hand on her shoulder in a supportive manner.
"Yes, I didn't even got time to thank Miho for saving me or to apologise to her for what happened there..." She responded, looking down on the ground with two small tears holding at her pupils.
"Oh right, I didn't heard about that detail." Sushil responded, turning his supportive pat into a full hug. "But I promise you'll be able to tell her that, I do." He added while all four pokemon she caught opted for simultanious escape from their pokeballs and began hugging her legs in a more or less akward way.
"Thank you, really..." Koume sobbed lightly, calming herself down with nearly hyperventilating way of breathing. "Didn't expected you to have such patience."
"No problem, I need you. And they think the same." Sushil added, pointing down at four pokemon who looked at her with worried faces.
"You... Need me?" She asked, suprised by his explaination. "For what?"
"To carry my legacy into places where it would be a burden for me." Sushil responded, looking up towards the mountainous area of his preserve area. "Now let's go upwards, you still have two pokemon to get." He added before Koume took her team back into her pokeballs and followed after him.
(Ten minutes later)
"So, this is their nest?" Koume asked as they walked up to the ring made out of sawdust, grass and other ears obtainable in grasslands, where Talonflame and Swanna stood behind a light-blue bird that resembled a tall duckling.
"Ducklett. These bird Pokémon are excellent divers. They swim around in the water eating their favorite food--peat moss." Rotom-phone informed her while pokemon in question got pushed by it's parents, akwardly walking forward towards them.
"Kreee!/Kraaa!" Two bigger pokemon screeched, encouraging their child to walk forward and be accepted.
"Kwaa! Kwaaa..." Ducklett quacked, making his wings shine in a white, flashy light for a short time.
"So he inherited Steel Wing after you? He'll do absolutely fine, I'm sure." Sushil commented, looking at Talonflame with respect while Koume took Ducklett in her arms and cuddled him to herself.
"Are you shy? Or maybe you want to stay?" Koume asked him, earning few sąd quacks in response followed up by a forceless smack of wing on her side.
"He doesn't believe in himself and Steel Wing is the only thing he knows, and even then he isn't capable of using it." Sushil said, making her look up at him with suprised face. "You know, if you work with them for long enough you'll began noticing things, especially since they all seem perfectly capable of understanding human languages."
"Oh, right." Koume corrected herself before taking out her fifth pokeball and looking back at Ducklett. "I'm not strong too, you know? I can't make my hands shine like you can to your wings." She added, taking out a second pokeball and releasing her Buneary, who immidieately run up to Ducklett and hug him from behind. "I promise I'll do everything I can to help you with that, but I can't do it without your help." She added, making him burst into tears and slap her pokeball with his wing, getting captured in a mere second after entering it.
"That was quite fast." Sushil commented, looking at Koume with a visible cold sweat on his face.
"Is something wrong?" She asked him, hearing his tone turn to worried.
"I just realised that someone very special has feeding time." He responded, turning around and looking up at the hillside, where a fluffy animal with brown fur disturbed by massive ammount of scars and bruises alongside Y-shaped letter run sideways left and right, shadow-fighting against several stone boulders who then got either sliced in parts with shining, white tail or just smashed by a brute force of four small legs and repeated series of headbutts that all together combined in a series of brutal, powerful attacks.
"What's wrong with him?" Koume asked, scanning the angressive pokemon.
"Eevee. Thanks to its unstable genetic makeup, this special Pokémon conceals many different possible evolutions." Rotom-phone said, while Koume say said pokemon turn around and reveal an extremly big X-patterned scars on both of it's eyes, while it's mouth was dropping saliva on the ground.
"Oh... Are all of them so agressive?" Koume asked out loud, looking in worry as said pokemon walked up into the higher part of the mountain, ploughing the rockside with his shining tail like plough does to the farming field in a time of sowing. "And why he doesn't have this white fur at the end of his tail and around the neck?"
"No, most of them are actually playful creatures." Sushil responded, taking few steps back towards her. "But this one is an absolute brute. Just so you know, when I found him he was busy literally going for the heads of poachers who previously catched and tortured him by cutting off his white fur and other messes up stuff." He paused, waiting for Koume to nod in understanding after the initial shock. "Even I have a bad time with getting close to him alone, nevermind the everyday care. That's why I don't think you should try helping him."
"Are you sure?"
"Koume, he kills as a warning. And I wouldn't forgive myself for letting you die because of mine overexaggerated charity."
"... Still, I believe we both should give him a chance. Isolation isn't going to help him." She insisted, making him sigh with a mix of anxiety and disappointment on his face.
" Fine, I guess I wasn't good enough alone." Sushil said after a while of silence, turning around to Talonflame and Swanna. "Can we ask for a ride to the top please?"
(Five minutes later)
"This is the place." Sushil said as he and Koume stood in a front of a short, wide and extremly dark cave while their transport waited behind them with patience.
"... I don't think I can do it alone." Koume added, taking all five of her pokeballs and releasing her whole team of five in front of her. "But you will help me, right?" She asked, looking down at her group which cheered happly to encourage her.
"They will. And if something goes wrong I'm here." Sushil added, smiling weakly before the two nodded in mutual understanding and Koume's group walked inside the cave.
"It's very dark in here, anyone has a light source?" She asked, seeing the endless shade inside that didn't allow her to see a thing.
"Sire thing!" Sushil responded first, taking out a backpack-sized stationary lamp and directing it's light at the cave, nearly instantly illuminating the whole place with a severly wounded Eevee at the end of it.
"Grarrr! Warrrrrr!" Pokemon growled, making Ducklett and Buneary back down behind Koume.
"... What moves he has?" Koume asked while Spheal, Trapinch and Sandshrew stood in front of her with anticipation.
"Growl, Iron Tail, Bite and Last Resort." Sushil responded, giving away needed informations while Aloan Sandshrew created a mist on front of his group, allowing Buneary and Ducklett to join them back.
"Wrrrr! Wryyyyyyyy!" Two more roars were heaed from the end of the cave, signalising that Eevee became more agressive.
"Here it comes, get ready everyone." Koume commanded, to which her whole team obeyed and preparing their own attacks. Buneary charged up her Quick Attack, Sandshrew made for himself Powder Snow, Spheal charged up the Water Gun in his mouth, Trapinch gritted his teeth and Ducklett opted for set up that would allow him to make a quick dash in any direction.
"Hrrrrrr..." A suprisingly low-pitched snarl came out from Eevee's mouth before it began slowlu walking forward with his tail taking the white, sparky shine and rising above him like an antenna.
"Wait for it..." Koume repeated her command, sweat drop going down her face while her team remained still in front of her with more or less composure left in them.
"Harghhhh!" Eevee roared again, walking to his right in an attempt to flank them.
"Mrrr!" A muffled growl suprised them, as a small white, mushroom-shaped creature jumped in front of him with determined look on it's eyes.
"Morelull, use Flash!" Sushil shouted, which was followed by three mushroom caps of the pokemon illuminanting with white and yellow colours, blinding the Eevee completley.
"WRYYYYYYYYYY!" Small pokemon roared, rushing forward with his shining tail and attempting to slice his opponent in half.
"Pfft!" Spheal spitted out, hitting him with the Water Gun and sending him into the side of the cave so hard that he shaped a small hole in it.
"Hah!" Aloan Sandshrew cried joyously, standing between the rest of his group and agressive Eevee who instantly stood up and spitted some salve on the ground.
"Eevee!" Brown pokemon roared it's name as it leaped froward with exposed teeth, only to be hit in the face by Powder Snow and landing in front of Buneary, who then double kicked him away between Trapinch and Ducklett, who then proceeded to bite him in the exposed lower jaw and pat him with a wing respectively.
"Okay, okay, that's enough." Koume spoke up, taking the two away from furiously shaking Eevee. "But thanks for the help nothenless."
"No issue, just an obligation." Sushil responded, walking up to Eevee and looking him in the eyes. "Yup, he still wants to kill us but doesn't seem to be capable of moving." He added, before both of them looked at his torso.
"Should it be this red?" Koume asked, seeing a distinctive diffrence between his old scars and bruised body.
"Not sure, let's take him into a better place while he isn't a threat." Sushil nodded, nodding to her as she picked him up onto her arms. "Talonflame! Swanna! I need your help one again!"
(Half an hour later)
"How is he doing?" Koume asked, as she entered the cubical room and saw Eevee furiously hitting all points and spaces of the titanium cage he was placed in.
"Better, at least physically." Sushil responded, looking down from behind the operational table with a pair of pokemon known as Spritzee on his sides looking towards raging pokemon with worry. "He's still enraged and with no awareness of what's happening around him." He added, not even hiding the sorrow resignation in his voice.
"... Poor thing." Koume sighed, walking up to the cage that now began to move by a barely seenable distances left and right. "Maybe he'll be happy when we find his parents? He clearly doesn't want to be here." She wondered, crouching in front of the cage and held it at the top so it wouldn't start flying around.
"Reee..." Eevee scowled, ending his tantrum attack and sitting down at the side of the cage, looking at Koume with his bleeding eyes.
"The point is, and I don't say this lightly..." Sushil began, lowering his body onto the desk with a serious glare. "They were got by the poachers too and sold to new owners with no hope of family reunion. That's at least what comes out from the reports."
"Reports?" Koume asked, looking back at Eevee, who began to cry so hard that a mix of tears, blood and unidentified dark substance began to escape the cage between the bars.
"You know, since I give people pokemon from here I need to keep up the business, which leds to paperwork and becoming a prisoner of your own dreamed job." Sushil said before standing up from the chair and walking up to her. "Poaching is legally forbidden in here, but executed with results about average when compared to the rest of the world."
"Oh, it all makes sense now." Koume nodded, looking back at Eevee who managed to hold back his bloody tears and blandly stared at her as if he accepted his death. "He just misses his parents and resorts to anger because he thinks that being weak made them separated, right?" She commented, catching an eye contact with the him, who moved his head up and stared at her in suprise.
"And full transparency here, I was dumb to just grab you like a hero and take away without your consent to my place." Sushil spoke up, taking a face of deserved defeat. "I apologise and don't ask for apology in return, everyone thinks about the savior and not the saved..." He added, pushing his wisdom to just talk bad about himself.
"Hee?" Eevee asked, nearly coughing as Sushil took his phone and pressed the remote button which lowered the bars around the cage and allow him to walk up to Koume and rest his head on her lap, where he git after a swift jump upwards.
"I think he's fine now." Koume smiled, picking rest of her team up so they could enjoy the collective hugging session. "I am quite suprised it went so fast tho..."
"I guess playfulness is genetical thing in his species." Sushil nodded, looking at the happy bunch making quite a mess from Koume's clothes. "But don't take it as granted. After all, it's just a theory... Right?"
