Whitney's Team:

Miltank

Loudred

Jigglypuff

Noctowl

The New Normal – 7-7 – INTERLUDE – Whitney

Although they had decided to visit the Safari Zone, they had chosen to take the slower, but more scenic route to get there. The views were too good to pass up on, and they really needed the break anyways. So the three of them simply took their time to explore and see the many fantastic sights of Johto.

And what a sight it was.

If Whitney were to list every single thing that awed and wowed her during her slow trip towards the Safari Zone, she'd never be able to stop. But instead, she'd chosen to stick to the truly memorable moments during her texts to her family.

One of the major highlights was easily Ecruteak City. It was a city that just radiated with culture and history; and everything there seemed to be steeped in tradition. Kanto had Fuschia City and their ninjas, of course, but in Whitney's opinion, Ecruteak was the far more interesting and awe-inspiring sight.

And that wasn't even including the Kimono girls. Ninjas were cool and all, but the Kimono girls were something completely special. There was just this unmistakable feeling of tranquillity whenever they performed their dance. Even Janine, despite her best attempts to hide it, was impressed, to her unsuccessfully hidden shame.

Whitney had to spend quite a while telling Janine that it was okay to think a different city was cooler than your own. Arceus - for the better half of her life she had to live with the fact that she was born to the one city that had nothing really special going for it besides some water shows.

At least she heard that her brother was changing things up now. Maybe Cerulean City would feel very different when she went back home? That would be cool.

Aside from Ecruteak though, the other really cool place to visit for her was Olivine. She was most certainly being biased, but she was very interested in seeing the place where her brother fought off all those Team Rocket grunts.

She and her friends had even posed next to the small plaque that was built next to the ramp that her brother had stood on as he fended off the hordes of Team Rocket Pokémon, honouring the charitable donation made by both him and Giovanni. She giggled pretty hard as she sent him the photo.

This was also one of those times where she was very glad she looked nothing like her brother; her brother was unsurprisingly very respected here and she didn't want to get swarmed by those trying to thank her in her brother's place.

She appreciated praise, but not when it was unearned.

While they were there, Sabrina suddenly asked a very interesting question. She asked HOW they would have defended the ramp with their Pokémon if it was them. This turned out to be quite the enlightening moment for the three of them, for different reasons.

Even if they assumed that their Pokémon were all at the Elite level, like John's were, they understood that they would have struggled to hold the ramp like that. In Whitney's case, against THAT many Pokémon, she simply didn't have enough hard hitters that could sweep through a horde like that.

Yes, Loudred could evolve into an Exploud and get stronger, but she really needed another Pokémon that could fulfil the role of a heavy hitter on her team. Likewise for her friends, they also realized they needed to make some changes too. Sabrina recognized that she needed another Pokémon that could really hold the line as a frontliner, aside from her newly caught Slowpoke, and Janine needed a Pokémon that could actually brawl without relying on evasion, as you couldn't rely on dodging when you were outnumbered to this extent.

Whitney was glad that everyone took these revelations positively and used them as goals to strive towards. Even with her limited experience as a trainer, she felt that always being to look ahead and stay optimistic was always one of the traits of a good trainer.

Anyways, after all their travels throughout the western half of Johto, they had finally arrived at the Johto Safari Zone. But instead of going inside, they decided to make camp just outside like so many other trainers have done.

According to what John had told her, which was corroborated by what she read online, the Safari Zone was a little bit of a scam. 500 Pokédollars was not the most expensive entrance fee, especially not after their Gym winnings and their own personal wealth, but considering that even catching a single Pokémon inside the Safari Zone couldn't be guaranteed before your time was over? That sounded like a quick way to lose all your money for very little gain.

So instead, they did the smarter thing and camped outside in the designated camping area where many of the Pokémon that you could catch in the Safari Zone could also be found. The campsite was specifically built there to accommodate the extra trainers that frequently came to the Safari Zone in order to prevent them from overcrowding the Pokécenter. That way, they could escape paying the entrance fee and they'd also be able to catch the Pokémon at their leisure, without having to worry about any time limits.

It was a bit of a loophole, but no one seemed to be doing anything about it. So they didn't bother caring about it either.

And with a Pokéshop, Pokécenter, and a food store nearby, they could stay here forever if they so choose. And for the better half of a week, that's what they did. They even had public showers that, while not ideal, meant that they could at least stay clean during their stay here.

At first, they just spent time looking around, seeing what kinds of Pokémon were available and in what quantities. The internet helped, but there was nothing like seeing and getting a feel for it yourselves.

And there were quite a few Pokémon that drew their collective interest. Whitney wanted a Tauros, Sabrina a Girafarig, and Janine a Nidoran of either gender. They were all Pokémon that, after their realizations at Olivine, they felt could hope round off and better balance their teams.

And after sufficient scouting and some simple training sessions with their Pokémon to ensure that their skills didn't decay, they all set off individually to find and hopefully catch their desired Pokémon.

Whitney had set off to the west of the Safari gate, near the forests. She had seen a couple of Tauros hanging around that area the previous day, so she hoped that she could hopefully persuade one to join.

She had done her research and knew that wild Tauros, as in ones that weren't bred specifically for farming, were a lot bulkier and ornerier than their domestic counterparts. Both very useful traits when it came to battling.

Unfortunately, her enthusiasm to seek out a Tauros did not translate into any tangible gains. After spending what was likely the better half of an afternoon slowly and carefully trudging her way through the forest, she couldn't find a single Tauros. Oh, she found a couple of other rare Pokémon like a Vulpix and Hoppip, and a Pineco almost knocked her on the head, but no Tauros.

She had even released her Miltank as both as an obstacle remover as well as a show of strength to hopefully attract a Tauros, but no luck. They had either hidden away or had left the area.

After giving it a few more hours, she eventually headed back to her camp. Despite her failure, she didn't let herself become disappointed; it was only the first real day of searching after all. And they had plenty of time anyways.

As she returned to their campsite, it was already late in the evening, and Sabrina and Janine were already back and cooking up some food.

"No luck." Sabrina said as a statement before she could, then frowned as Sabrina realized she must have instinctively read Whitney's mind again. Whitney didn't mind this time.

"No luck." Whitney repeated as she settled down with the two of them. She took a whiff of herself and scrunched her nose; she really needed to shower.

"I didn't find anything either." Sabrina remarked, trying to comfort her. "Only Janine got lucky."

"You did?!" Whitney exclaimed excitedly as she turned to her friend, "What did you get?! Come on, show!"

With some hesitance, Janine withdrew a Pokéball and threw it, releasing a small figure next to her.

"Nido? Ran?" The little female thing squeaked adorably, causing Whitney to squee happily.

"She's so cute!" She almost ran over to hug the small Pokémon, but a reminder of how bad she smelt stopped her in her tracks. Ew.

"Found her near the bridge trying to fetch some water." Janine explained, trying but failing to keep a smile from forming on her face, "She seemed shy at first, but I managed to persuade her after releasing my Ariados. Apparently, my Ariados was the strongest thing she had ever seen here, and she wanted to join because of that."

Whitney didn't find that surprising; it was a common enough occurrence. Strength was something most Pokémon aspired to have, and Janine was certainly far from a 'common' trainer.

As it was already getting late, they ended their cooing over Janine's new Pokémon early as Whitney quickly went to clean herself off before returning for a nice, relaxing dinner, only after which they all were tucked in to sleep in their sleeping bags. The very next day, the three of them went back on the hunt again, only this time Janine was looking to train up her newly caught Nidoran on a few easy battles.

Unfortunately, luck was not on Whitney's side once again. After a full day of drudgery, all she had to show for it was a few glimpses of a small herd of Tauros before they ran off too far for Whitney to catch up on them.

The next day went even worse. She had managed to finally catch up to a Tauros, and had gotten her Miltank to try to talk to him in order to convince him to join the team. But the Tauros simply snorted at her, before running off to rejoin the herd. The Tauros didn't even spare her a glance as he galloped off.

At this point, Whitney was getting pretty disappointed. She was beginning to suspect that the Tauros living here just weren't interested in joining up with a trainer. They probably were content with living within their herds and did not want to separate from them.

Her disappointment must have been fairly obvious because Sabrina immediately wrapped an arm around her shoulder as she sat down for dinner.

"It's not your fault." She tried to comfort, but all Whitney let out was a sigh.

"…Thanks, Sabie, I know." She said, unable to keep the tone of defeat out of her voice, "There was nothing I could have done...Still, I WAS pretty excited to catch a Tauros. I guess you don't always get lucky."

"Try again tomorrow?" Janine suggested, awkwardly trying not to bring up her own successes into the conversation.

But Whitney shook her head, "No…I don't think these Tauros are interested in joining up with anyone. Maybe I'll just follow one of you tomorrow or something. Wish you luck that way."

The conversation fell silent at that. Whitney frowned as she never intended to make things awkward like that. She tried to revive the conversation, but Janine spoke up before she did.

"What do you girls all want to do in the future?" She asked suddenly.

Sabrina shot her a weird look, "Succeed my parents at the Gym. Like you would." She replied as if it was obvious.

Janine blushed, "That's…I meant what do you want to do BEFORE that? Would you want to challenge the Indigo Conference?"

Whitney blinked. She hadn't really thought of that. She always wanted to be as great of a trainer as her brother, but she didn't really think about how'd she reach that. She had just been focused on training up her Pokémon to be as powerful as they could be.

But DID she want to challenge the Indigo Conference? She had a good understanding of her brother's and Karen's strength and knew she was nowhere close to reaching them. It would take far more than a year for her to be a worthy opponent for them.

"…It would be good to try." She replied eventually, "I don't really have anything better to do. We probably won't get very far, but I'm sure we'll learn a lot from the experience."

Sabrina nodded, "I agree. We might have had success with the Gyms so far, but we struggled against your father, Janine, and he was only the 5th Badge. We definitely won't get that far in the Indigo Conference, but we will get stronger from our struggles."

"That's a good plan." Janine replied, and the three of them collectively agreed to give it a shot.

"Then what do you two plan to do after getting all the badges?" Janine asked again, "I assume Sabrina is going to help out at her Gym, same as me, but what about you Whitney?"

Whitney frowned again as she thought over the question. Once again, she hadn't considered it. And it was a good question too; if she wanted to keep up her training then she'd need to secure some sort of income if she didn't want to rely on her parents or brother's money. She'd need a job or some form of steady income if she wanted to sustain her training.

The problem was she didn't know where that money would come from.

And then suddenly, Sabrina dropped the perfect answer for her. "Why don't you work at a Gym? One of ours?"

It was like something had clicked in place in her brain. "THAT'S PERFECT!" She shouted out excitedly, "That would be so nice if we could work together! And that way, we can stay in close contact! Oh, and maybe I can rotate from your Gym to Janine's every once in a while! That way I can spend time with both of you!"

Janine held a finger up to her chin, "…I don't think Father would mind. He has expressed…interest in you as a trainer. I think he would be happy to see you work there, assuming you can meet his high expectations and standards."

"I think similarly." Sabrina joined in. "I know my parents would be very happy to have you. They were very happy to meet you as my friend. They thought you could take care of me." Sabrina blushed a little at the confession, "They should have no problem accepting you."

Whitney grinned as she pulled the both of them into a tight hug, squeezing them in appreciation. "Thanks girls! I'm so excited to work as a Gym Trainer. It's going to be so different working on the other side of things."

She wondered what kind of Gym Trainer she'd be. Would she be like one of those nice ones that were always helpful and gave out tips whenever she defeated someone? Or would she try to be as strong as possible to forcefully encourage trainers to do better?

Before she could lose herself in her thoughts, she felt a sudden force grabbing hold of her as she was forcefully separated from her friends.

"You stink." Sabrina said, using her psychic powers to hold her at arm's length while she held her nose with the other. Janine, the traitor, was nodding alongside her.

Whitney pouted, "You hugged me first! So I thought it'd be okay!" But her arguments apparently fell on deaf ears. Grumbling, she went to clean herself off before eventually settling down for the night, her earlier disappointments long forgotten. She went to sleep dreaming of happy thoughts as she imagined what she would be like as a Gym Trainer.

The next day, she had her friends rock-paper-scissors to decide who'd she join. A quick victory later, which she was pretty sure that Sabrina got by cheating, she followed after Sabrina in her hunt for a Girafarig.

Sabrina had explained to her that she had found a few lazing about near the edges of the forest, which is where they were headed to now. Sabrina hoped that, by following the tracks, she'd hopefully be led to where the Girafarig were idly grazing about and get an opportunity to catch one of them.

They walked slowly, but carefully, as they made their way there. Both of them had a Pokémon out, their Miltank and Kadabra respectively, both as a demonstration of their skills and potential as a trainer while also serving as a display of force to scare off the weaker Pokémon from harassing them.

After an unknown amount of time walking silently, Sabrina suddenly halted and held out a hand to stop Whitney.

"Something's wrong." She whispered as her eyes glowed slightly, a tell-tale sign that she was using her Psychic powers.

Whitney's eyes darted around as well, trying to find out what was wrong. But all she could see was more of the same, a dense forest with a few Weedle and Caterpie minding their own business. She didn't know what the fuss was about.

But before she could ask Sabrina, she suddenly grabbed hold of Whitney's arm before dashing towards a small opening in the trees. Taken by surprise, Whitney nearly tripped over a fallen twig as she was dragged along by Sabrina.

"W-What's going on?!" She asked Sabrina, her panic rising at her sudden movement. Behind them, Miltank was hovering over protectively as she too scanned the surroundings.

"A fight." Was Sabrina's answer as the entered the clearing. And sure enough, Whitney was met with the sight of a pair of Girafarig huddled close to each other as they were stared down by a herd of angry Tauros. They were slowly backing away while their horns flashed with the occasional burst of Psychic energy, trying to deter the Tauros away.

It wasn't working. The Tauros, as if in sync, all let out a dismissive snort as they stepped forwards, inching ever closer to the retreating Girafarig. The pair of Girafarig, despite appearing strong, were no match when completely outnumbered by Tauros like this.

And then suddenly, a Tauros charged forwards. This began a domino effect where all the other Tauros quickly joined in, forming a small stampede that descended upon the pair of Girafarig.

Without even thinking about it, both Sabrina and her charged in, their Pokémon quickly following after her, as they went to protect the Girafarig from the mini avalanche of Tauros. Not needing to utter a command, the lead Tauros was forcefully halted in its tracks as a powerful Psychic slammed into him, knocking him out of his charge and causing him to fall over.

However, as the Tauros was in the very front, as soon as it fell over, this caused the other Tauros that were charging forwards behind him to trip over his fallen figure, causing a cascading effect that practically broke the charge in one fell swoop.

Not wanting Sabrina to do all the work, she quickly commanded Miltank to join in.

"Rush in, Mitank! Help them out!"

With a bellowing moo, Miltank rushed into the fray and, in a whirlwind of disciplined violence, assisted Kadabra in knocking out the many fallen Tauros that scattered around the clearing. Within mere seconds, and a whole lot of fists and blasts of Psychic to the face, the entire herd of Tauros had been knocked out, with nary a scratch on any of their Pokémon.

"Phew. That was a lucky hit, Sabrina. Who knew they'd fall over like that?" Whitney said as she wiped some sweat off her brow.

"I did." Sabrina said matter-of-factly, but Whitney was familiar enough with her to tell that she was being smug about it.

Rolling her eyes at Sabrina's antics, Whitney decided to ignore her for the moment as she went to check up on the pair of Girafarig.

"You doing okay?" She asked the two of them. They both nodded at her, causing Whitney to smile, "That's good. That wasn't a very fair fight of them. Why were the Tauros after you two anyways?"

"Giraf! Far! Girafarig!" One of the Girafarig explained, with the other nodding along in agreement. She didn't understand what they were saying, but fortunately she had Miltank to play translator.

"Mil. Tank. Tank." Miltank translated to her, basically explaining that the Tauros were getting ornery and were looking for a fight. And amongst the Pokémon that lived here, the Girafarig were really the only ones that could put up a fair fight against them.

"Girafarig! Giraf!" The same Girafarig explained, to which Miltank helpfully translated that they were testing out their Psychic powers before they accidentally caught the Tauros' attention, leading to the situation they saw.

"I see. So that was what I detected yesterday and earlier." Sabrina commented as she walked over, "I figured I was tracking the both of you through your latent Psychic energies."

"Giraf? Far?" The quieter of the two Girafarig's suddenly spoke up, looking at Sabrina.

"Yes." Sabrina nodded, with Kadabra helping her with the translations mentally, "Kadabra is my Pokémon."

"Girafarig? Farig? Far?" The same Girafarig asked, staring intently at her Kadabra. Instead of replying, Sabrina simply shot the Girafarig a smile, before releasing her full team of Psychics into the clearing.

Her Xatu, Staryu, and Slowpoke emerged from their balls, immediately greeting the two Girafarig with a small show of Psychic power.

"Girafarig! Girafarig!" The quieter Girafarig started to say excitedly, nudging at the other Girafarig as it pointed towards Sabrina and her team. But the other Girafarig shook its head.

"Giraf! Girafarig! Far!" Instead, it gestured towards Whitney and her Miltank with its head. In a sudden bout of great luck, Miltank translated for Whitney that they both had been looking to get stronger, and realized they had to try to tie themselves to a trainer in order to do so. And both of them were suitably impressed by the duo's display of power, as well as their kindness for immediately rushing in to help them out, that they wished to grow as strong as them.

But now, they disagreed with who to join.

From what Miltank explained, the quieter Girafarig wanted to join Sabrina, because it believed that Psychic power was the dominant way of getting stronger. However, the more talkative one wanted to join Whitney, because it was awed by the strength of Miltank and believed that physicality was the more dominant way of gaining strength. Yet, neither wanted to be separated from the other, at least not for long periods of time.

Realizing that there was a simple solution to the problem, Whitney stepped in before an argument could break out.

"How about you just join the both of us? One each?" She suggested, "Me and Sabrina are really close friends, so if you're worried that you'll be separated, you won't be. Even if you can't always be together, I promise that Sabrina and I will visit each other often, so you won't ever leave each other side for long. I swear!" And to emphasize her closeness to Sabrina, she quickly wrapped her in a big hug as she squeezed her friend tight.

Sabrina let out a squawk of protest, but ultimately let it happen. She was too used to Whitney's antics at this point.

The two Girafarig fell silent at her proposal, both of them staring at each other as they exchanged a silent message psychically. After a moment, they seemed to nod in agreement, before they both turned to their respective trainers.

"Giraf? Girafarig?" They asked the both of them in sync, requesting to join their team.

With a happy smile on her face, Whitney held out a Pokéball and simply allowed the Girafarig to capture itself. In the corner of her eye, she saw the other Girafarig disappear in the same red light as hers did. Not a second later, the Pokéball snapped shut, marking the success of their latest capture.

It wasn't a Tauros, but Whitney was very happy with her new capture nonetheless. It seems like her luck had returned after all.

A.N. Double Girafarig get! One for Sabrina and Whitney each! I'm not going to be coy and try to hide where I'm going with this; Whitney's going to be following in the footsteps of her brother soon enough with her own evolutions! Not for some time, though.

This chapter has been BETAed by Allute! Thanks man! And to anyone who wants to support me, please check out my p atreon at CartecTNN where you can read 8 advanced chapters! Thanks to those who have supported me already!