Interlude - Dirty Old Town
"Ye know what, Ad, I'm a-proud te be Townie!" Robert was ranting, as if this were news. "We built this bloody region! Where'd the steel fer the Magnet Train come from, eh?"
"Ah," Adam Cook replied gloomily. There was a chorus of agreement from along the bar. They were all tradesman and small-time businessmen – their margins were slim at the best of times. His brother-in-law was feeling the squeeze, they all were. Bills were rising, but their incomes sure as hell weren't. Nobody talked about it, so the stress came out in town pride.
Sometimes, in the privacy of his head, he thought the Weepinbell was a dive. It was already tatty when Forrest had taken it over back in '98. It was better than some of those yuppie joints he'd seen, but … the threadbare carpets sticky with beer, the garish gambling machines, the dingy lighting, and the less said about the bogs these days the better. The Weepinbell was a dirty pub. Mulberry was a dirty old town, they all knew it. There were better places to live, better places to make your way in the world.
"Over now to the Orange Crew," the TV chattered. "Let's take a look at a decisive defeat for Rudy with Joshua Cook's merciless -"
"Here, Mandy, turn that over," Edric Smith said to the barmaid.
"Hang on, that's my son, that is!" Adam objected.
The coverage went right to a clip of Josh's magnemite flattening Rudy's electabuzz.
"Lot of power in that little bastard," someone commented.
"How many Badges does he have now?"
"Four," Adam said.
"After three months?" Edric said. "Well, I suppose he'll mek himself useful eventually."
"Oi! He's already got a degree!" Adam retorted. "He'd going te the Ranger Academy in September!"
"Oh, right, Joshie Cook a Pokémon Ranger!" Edric sneered. "When will he be dropping outta the Academy?"
"You something about my boy, Smith?"
His brother-in-law recognised the deceptively calm tone in his voice.
"Well, ye know, he might read a book about it," Edric continued. "In Kalosian -"
There was a sudden moment of confused action and shouting and flailing violence. Five men were on their feet, bar stools were flung over, Adam's pint was splashed across the bar top. Robert managed to grab him before he laid Edric out. Two men were holding an angry and lager-flecked Smith.
"Say it again, Smith! Say it again!"
"Ad, Ad, come on. Walk it off. Walk it off," Robert urged. Adam didn't look in the least mollified, but he wouldn't hit a restrained man either. He let himself be dragged from the pub.
The night was on the muggy side. Mulberry Town's nightly orange glow hung around the horizon like a sodium dawn. A street light even burned by the canalside, reflecting a dismal yellow glare off the water. There never was a proper night in this town, Adam thought.
"This ay over, Rob!" Adam growled.
"Let it go, Ad."
"Let it go," Adam grumbled. "Josh has got a brain. he's got an education. He's got options! Of course he's tekkin a while. In the end he'll do better things than I ever did, mark my words!"
"Tell me this, Ad – do ye really believe that?"
"Of course, I bloody do! Yow'm a dad tell me ye dow think the same about your Graham!"
"Josh ay a dad."
"What's that got te do with the price o' coal?"
"Have you ever actually told him that?"