Chapter 55; Ranch tasks
Tails was twisting and turning in his sleep. The question of the previous day was lingering in his mind.
After the team set camp for the night, he had then discuss everything they had on Sonic and Raichu's lightning phenomenon or as Tails decided to call it, their quirk.
"Admit it" Knuckles had teased him "you picked it up from that anime you've been watching lately. About those heroes".
"Hehe. You got me" Tails had admitted scratching his head.
They had discussed it for a long time the previous night, mostly having Sonic recall all the times they had activated it and what it granted him. Sonic said that it was mostly activated when his bond with Raichu was challenged during some of his hardest fights. Giovanni and Mike were two prime examples. But the thing was even though it seemed they had grown in power, speed or even rejuvenated themselves, none of those scenarios was the case.
In all honesty the only effect their quirk seemed to have so far is a psychological one. Boosting their confidence and reducing their opponent's.
Tails heavily doubted that was the only effect. There had to be more. But at the moment they had neither a way to test any other possible effects on Sonic and Raichu, nor the time.
Tails' phone had received a notification that possible rocket activity was near Olivine city, but nothing confirmed. This meant they had to keep going so they would be nearby in case something did happen.
Sonic woke up from Tails' constant twisting. He immediately knew what was happening. Tails usually slept like a log.
"Tails…" he yawned before fully realizing it was Tails who accidentally woke him up "don't tell me you didn't get any sleep".
"I couldn't. I don't need sleep. I need answers. Your quirk doesn't make any sense".
"Lol. My quirk, you lose your sleep over it. Best math I have ever heard".
"Doesn't it bother you? Like at all?"
"It does. But can I or you do anything about it right now? Or in the near future?"
"… No" Tails admitted.
"See? Nothing we can do at the moment. Don't lose your sleep like that pal" Sonic advised his friend.
"I have an idea though. Or more like… a crazy and probably pointless lead we can check out to try and explain your quirk".
Sonic was intrigued.
"What's your idea?"
Tails motioned that they go outside so as not to disturb Knuckles' sleep. Once out of the tent, he began explaining.
"That quirk was probably born when Raichu evolved. Raichu evolved the night you first fought Zapdos. Or to be more accurate when you got zapped by Zapdos and its desire to protect you just like you protected it, caused it to evolve in that unique way".
"I'm not sure I'm following you. We know all that so what are you getting at?"
"Zapdos did something to you that night. It must have somehow changed you. I don't know how but whatever your quirk is, your entire connection is probably Raichu's natural electricity and the electricity that coursed through your body that night somehow getting entangled. This is the only explanation I can find".
Sonic was shocked at the level of analysis Tails had put into that theory.
"Ok. So Zapdos somehow was a catalyst for the creation of that bond. What does that have to do with figuring its internal workings out?"
"I theorize that electricity of Zapdos' caliber is a way we can explore that connection further. But as we have already surmised, looking for a Zapdos or even calling Mike to us isn't a viable option. We're on the clock, so we have no time for experiments. Unless of course we had access to another legendary of electricity that we could try using while on our journey. And one that I apparently am already somehow familiar with".
Sonic put two and two together almost instantly.
"So you want us to pursue Raikou?"
"I know it's crazy. But I can't stop thinking about it. What if Raikou could somehow be a test for Raichu. Help us understand and unlock more of your quirk? Can you even imagine the possibilities?"
Sonic thought about it. The idea was indeed tempting but searching for Raikou sounded like a whole lot of trouble over a huge if.
"How can we be sure that my quirk" Sonic managed to hold a laugh "will reveal something new if Raichu and Raikou were to fight?"
"We can't" Tails admitted "which is why this a crazy idea".
Sonic thought about it for a moment.
"Look. Currently we have bigger problems that my quirk. Let's focus on the present. If nothing changes by the time we are done with team rocket and the league, we can try looking for Raikou. You never know. We might encounter it at some point in our journey".
Tails smiled "that would be nice".
Eventually Knuckles woke up as well. Tails told him his plan and Knuckles was quick to point out not only the if anything would change by encountering Raikou, as well as deeming the plan of chasing the beasts a wild goose chase.
If those beasts didn't want to be found they wouldn't be found.
After a quick breakfast the team was on the move again, heading for Olivine city.
Throughout the way they were challenged by several passing trainers who Sonic and Knuckles took turns beating. Their teams were slowly growing stronger and stronger.
During that time, Tails was in the phone again, talking with Cosmo, with a huge smile etched upon his face.
Sonic was happy to see his friend happy like that but at the same time a question had rooted in his mind.
"Tails tends to overthink things sometimes but why would he lose his sleep over my quirk?"
That was new. Tails had been troubled by science riddles several times but never lost sleep over them.
After a while the right side of their path was barred by a fence.
"Could this be a ranch?" Sonic wondered aloud.
"Let's go check. Maybe they're selling supplies. We're close to running low" Knuckles warned his teammates.
The three kept on their way heading for the ranch entrance. Halfway there, Tails noticed something strange. A pokemon was lying face down on the grass.
"Guys are you seeing this?" he asked worried.
"I see it but what is it?" Sonic wondered.
"Is it sleeping?" Knuckles wondered too while putting his hand on his forehead , covering his eyes and squinted to get a batter look.
"It doesn't look to just be sleeping. It might need help!" Tails surmised and jumped over the fence.
"Tails wait!"
Tails rushed to the pokemon. Upon approaching he noticed it to be slightly moving indicating it was sleeping. Sighing in relief he turned to return it his friends.
Tails had only taken two steps towards his friends before he felt the ground rumbling. He looked around confused and saw it.
A huge pink ball rolling his way.
"WHAT THE..!" he yelled before jumping out of the way.
The ball passed right by him but simply made a large arc and was once again rolling his way.
"HELP!" Tails screamed at his friends as he started running for dear life to avoid getting run over.
Sonic and Knuckles looked at each other confused. All Tails had to do was take a sharp turn so that whatever that ball was would miss him. Taking a look at the ball next, they both were quick to identify it.
"Oh great that thing again" Sonic was less than happy to see another Miltank.
Jumping over the fence he shouted to Tails to bait the Miltank towards him. Tails responded by almost running into Sonic.
Once Tails had passed by him, Sonic called out his hitmontop and had it use fake out in order for it to lose focus and stop rolling.
Miltank, immediately after being hit by fake out, lost its focus and ended up uncurling mid-air and crashing face down.
The sleeping Miltank was awakened by all the commotion and was instantly fearful for the other Miltank. Using rollout, it rushed to its side with Sonic, Tails and th arriving Knuckles worried if the Miltank they had forced to a halt was ok.
And of course they were not the only ones.
"Abby! Daisy!" a female voice screamed.
Team Sonic were suddenly on the receiving end of a huge shovel wielded by a woman dressed in farmer clothes.
"What are you doing to my Miltanks you delinquents!"
"Wait this is a misunderstanding!" Tails tried to explain while avoiding strikes from the shovel.
"Ma'am" Sonic tried to say as well "we saw one of your Miltanks and thought…"
"To have some fun by tipping them?!"
"No we just…" was all Knuckles managed to say before the farm lady got him, striking him with the shovel so hard he was knocked almost unconscious.
"Knuckles!" Tails was shocked.
"That was your warning. Now get out of here!" the farm lady said aiming the shovel at Tails.
"Ma'am one of your Miltank's was face down in the grass. We thought it needed help" Sonic managed to say before Tails got the end of the shovel on the head as well.
The farm lady sized them up then relented.
"I see. Lack of context. Abby just likes to sleep face down. She wasn't in danger".
Sonic and Tails sighed in relief as Tails checked on the downed Knuckles.
"Knuckles you ok?"
"He'll be fine. Our friend is one tough knucklehead" Sonic joked as Knuckles groaned getting up rubbing his head in pain.
"Very… argh… funny" Knuckles groaned.
"Ma'am we're very, very sorry for this misunderstanding. Is there anything we can do to make it right?" Tails offered.
The farm lady considered the offer for a moment.
"Well you did cause a ruckus. But… if you three do one job for me and my husband, we will let you go without trouble".
Sonic was about to object, fearing the possibility team rocket pulled something in Olivine city, but when the word trouble was spoken he kept quiet. He wasn't about to give detective Looker even the most unimportant reason to have him arrested.
"Ok… and what would that job be ma'am?" he tested the waters.
"One whole day of manual labor. You will help me and my husband around the farm. That is unless you want me to call the sheriff".
"A day?! That's…" Knuckles tried to object before being elbowed by Tails and not very gently either.
"Alright what would you first have us do?" Sonic asked half-
heartedly.
"Follow me. My husband will give you three delinquents chores to do".
As the three friends followed her towards the cottage close to the entrance of the farm, Knuckles wasn't very pleased with Tails for not only earning them a full day of unpaid manual labor but also for the bump in the head.
The farm lady's husband was confused to see his wife return from checking on the Miltanks with three young trainees. He even laughed at the whole misunderstanding before being convinced by his wife to have the three delinquents learn a good lesson. He immediately tasked each of the three friends with a chore.
Sonic was tasked with collecting the ponyta and rapidash for feeding, Tails with helping with the crop harvesting and Knuckles with carrying heavy bales of hay outside for the ponyta and rapidash Sonic would bring back for feeding.
Funniest part was that was Knuckles' task would normally be the hardest for the average Joe but for someone of his strength it was child's play. And therefore in a sense of poetic justice Tails ended up with the hardest chore. Crop harvesting was a very lengthy an exhausting chore without the use of machinery. Which was also something the farm lady strictly forbade them, especially Tails when she realize just how tech savvy he was.
Having no outs, team Sonic got to work. Sonic left to find the ponyta and the rapidash who were spread thin throughout the pastures and the fields, Tails followed the farmer to the crop fields to start the harvesting and Knuckles followed the farm lady to the barn to start carrying out the bales of hay.
Right away team Sonic encountered issues. The bales of hay were large and so heavy that even Knuckles had trouble carrying them, the crop field was so wide that Tails knew it would take him days to harvest the crops without any tech and the ponyta and rapidash wouldn't let Sonic approach them to guide them to the barn so they could be fed.
In the span of half an hour, Sonic had nearly exhausted himself chasing the horse pokemon, Tails was ready to collapse and had barely collected 5© of the crops and Knuckles couldn't even complete his task before Sonic actually brought the horse pokemon back so they could start getting fed.
The team met up for 5 minutes to get some water before they completely collapsed. The sun was also not helping.
"What's taking you so long with those horses?" Knuckles said cranky because of the bump on his head.
"Those damn horses are just too fast. And very distrustful" Sonic said wiping the sweat off his forehead.
"She must have sized us up upon meeting. Harvesting all the crops in that field without any tech? That's not possible".
"Well on the bright side we agreed to only one day of manual labor so she will have to let us go by the evening".
"I think it more likely she will find some loophole to keep us here unless we complete at least one task" Knuckles spoke his mind while rubbing his head.
"There's got to be some easier way to complete our tasks" Tails paced back and forth.
"You mean your tasks" Knuckles corrected him "mine is done from a certain point of view".
"Knuckles you're not helping" Sonic came out a little extra sassy.
Eventually the farm lady had them get back to work before they could come up with a solution. Knuckles was back to waiting by the barn for Sonic to get his task done, Tails back at the crop fields and Sonic back to chasing the horse pokemon.
Again neither the ponyta nor the rapidash trusted Sonic. They kept running away.
While chasing them Sonic noticed one was a bit bigger than the rest and the other ones seemed to treat it as their leader.
"Maybe if we caught it we could get the rest to follow. But how?" he concluded now having a target but still no way to get said target.
Tails wasn't having any more luck either. The field seemed literally endless.
"There's got to be a quicker way to harvest. But what's a way to do it without tech?"
He looked around and noticed the farmer who was nearby using a scythe to harvest the crops.
A scythe.
"THAT'S IT!" Tails' triumphant yell echoed throughout the field momentarily confusing Knuckles and Sonic.
Walking out of the crops and into an open area, Tails took out one of his pokeballs while taking a deep breath. He had trained with scyther but didn't know if they were ok with each other, at least enough to help him get the job done without ruining the crops ir worse, cutting someone open.
He sent out scyther.
The bug and flying type looked around into the wide open field and was immediately disappointed. It wanted to slash something very badly.
Of course when Tails called out to it, it contemplated slashing him to calm its instincts but seeing he was still holding the poke ball, it simply flew a bit further away uninterested.
"Hey scyther?" Tails asked hesitantly "do you feel like using your scythes?"
Scyther perked up at this. The fox was reading its mind.
But if course it had to take it the wrong way. Jumping at the opportunity it started trying to slash Tails.
"WOAH WOAH WAIT!" he screamed as he dodged "not me!"
Scyther halted. Tails wasn't expecting obedience but nevertheless showed scyther the farmer who was using the scythe to harvest the crops.
"What do you say? Care to harvest those crops till you can't slash anymore?"
Scyther couldn't have asked for a better task. Immediately getting to work, it started slashing at the crops, which was launched upwards momentarily. Tails used the bag he was given to collect them as they fell though found it hard to keep up with Scyther's insane cutting speed.
Knuckles was using his binoculars to observe this from the barn's entrance and who impressed by Tails' thinking outside the box.
Shifting his gaze to Sonic however he witnessed him sitting on the grass as close as he could to the alpha rapidash trying to ambush it.
He failed and the rapidash raced away.
Sonic slammed his fist on the ground. That rapidash just wouldn't be caught.
For a moment he wished he could be as fast as it. And then he remembered the two times he moved like a blur to intercept Entei from attacking Raichu.
And then he recalled the speed he had managed to manifest when racing up the stairs during the Greenfield incident.
"Physical enhancement is part of my bond with Raichu. We might not know the trigger but it won't hurt to try".
He called it out.
"Buddy I need your help. That rapidash" he said pointing at the alpha "we need to catch it. Not catch it for the team but keep up with it. And I will need your help for that".
"Raichu rai" Raichu cried out eager to help.
Sonic smiled.
The two got ready to dash off.
"When I tell you, use quick attack ok?"
"Rai".
The two observed the alpha rapidash and slowly started walking towards it without breaking their stance.
Eventually the alpha rapidash notice them and made a break for it.
"Now! Quick attack!"
Raichu put pressure on its back paws ready to use the move. At the same time, bolts of electricity crackled from Sonic's shoes like spiders. The two moved like a blur at the same time.
Sonic couldn't believe the sensation. The speed, the air hitting his face, the adrenaline. It was almost addicting. Feeling an urge, he moved his hands to point backwards, taking an aerodynamic shape.
Steadily the two started catching up to the rapidash until they were right next to it.
"Now! Slam into it!"
Raichu tackled rapidash while at the same time, Sonic jumped on it. The rapidash lost its balance for a while and by the time it regained it, Sonic was riding on its back, though he almost fell off twice.
"That was a good run" he said petting it on the neck "but that's enough. It's lunchtime. Call your herd so they can eat".
The rapidash obeyed. The other rapidash as well as the ponyta followed it to the barn where Knuckles was waiting with a mountain of hay waiting to be eaten.
Tails too had managed to finish his task at the same time, collecting a total of 5 bags of crops before scyther got tired and demanded a berry before retreating into its poke ball to rest.
Both the farmer and his wife where very impressed with the unexpected speed with which team Sonic accomplished their respective tasks and the farm lady admitted she had set those tasks to exhaust them as a sort of payback for attacking that Miltank but their ability to think on their feet, outside of their comfort zone and with such speed on top of the rest.
Having kept their end of the bargain team Sonic were free to go, but the farmer couple insisted they repay their service by inviting them to lunch. Team Sonic were starving and Knuckles specifically had mentioned their supplies were running short so they agreed.
During lunch, they were asked by the farmer couple what brought them to Johto in the first place. Sonic determining it wouldn't hurt, explained they were after team rocket which led to him being identified as the hero of Kanto.
The farmer couple did have some interesting information for them. 2 days ago a truck stopped to buy some moomoo milk from them and the driver was yelling to the passenger to hurry up as the shipment they were supposed to deliver was behind schedule. The farm lady had also noticed on the back of the truck a device that resembled a mix or a lightning rod and a generator. She also saw a few boxes in the back with a big R drawn on them.
Team Sonic looked at each other now more sure than ever. Team rocket was indeed preparing something near Olivine city. And they would stop it.
Later after thanking the farm couple for the delicious lunch and buying supplies from them despite the insistence from the farmers to take it for free, the three heroes went on their way again, each step bringing them closer not only to another confrontation with team rocket but also to a major upgrade for one of the three in a way none of them could ever possibly imagine.