Story Notes:
Yoy for disclamers. All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.Yawn. At least now I can't be sued by people who find joy in pages of dullness, i.e lawyers.
Prologue
They were in an empty field, with a clear sunny sky, somewhere near route 104, the fem ralts observed. And, what was even better was that her 6 foot 'Master James', as he liked to be known, had found another opponent, and as usual started boasting about how great his salamence was, running his hands through his brown hair. He didn't deserve to be a master, not even a trainer, because he acted like he was 5 years younger than his actual age, 15. Recently, she and the fem riolu she was walking with had constantly been sent out for double battles, and lost almost immediately. But it wasn't as though it was their fault, the ralts mused, it was because their 'Masters', always giving all his love and care to his salamence, and ignored the other two completely, not calling them by their proper names (not even giving them proper names), just known as things, neglecting to train them, give them their own pokéballs, heal them after they fainted in battle, even feed them sometimes. Maybe if they were shiny pokémon that she had heard about, they would get treated better, but they weren't jut an average ralts and riolu. Her and the riolu just seemed to get in the way of salamence's 'superb attacks', or were ignored like the useless birthday presents they apparently were. The only reason they stuck with him was because they had nowhere else to go, and were too weak to survive in the wild on their own. But they had become good friends, united against James' behaviour.
"All right! Two on two! Let's go!" James stood at one end of the clear field and the other trainer stood at the other, readying his pokéballs.
" Go! Ralts! Riolu! Even you two could beat this guy!" James shouted at them. Sighing, they moved forward to meet their newest opponent, who slowly took from his belt and tossed a pair of pokéballs in front of him, and the traditional spark of light revealed a machamp and a raticate.
"This is going to be a short match." the other trainer said calmly, oblivious to James' laughing, but watching the riolu shudder in fear of how strong the machamp looked.
"Haha! I agree! But do you really think you're going to win? My things both have type advantages!" James laughed. "Well come on then, what are you waiting for? Ralts! Use confusion on that machamp! Riolu, karate chop that raticate!"
Both pokémon carried out their respective moves quickly, but the machamp just stood still and didn't look like it felt anything from ralts' attack and the raticate just moved out of the way of riolus attack, and just stared at riolu as it waited for a command, so the riolu moved back next to ralts, awaiting another command from her shocked trainer.
"I think we should stop this battle, your pokémon are far too weak to defeat mine." the trainer said.
"No way! It's not over yet!" James replied angrily.
"Are you sure? This will probably hurt them a lot. " the trainer said confidently.
" Yes! I'll let you start, just because you think you're sooo strong."
" If you insist. Raticate, use a quick attack on that ralts, and machamp, use cross chop on the riolu. Sorry to have to do this." the trainer said unhappily, speaking to riolu and ralts, and turning his back.
Ralts was rammed before she even had time to blink, sliding painfully across the thick grass, and lay, struggling to get up, before just collapsing and breathing heavily, even though it was a weak attack. But riolu suffered a much worse fate, as the machamp jumped quickly to her, crossed all four arms and chopped at her head, smashing her into the ground, and creating a small indent in the ground. Before she fainted, she swore she heard several bones crack and realised why the trainer had turned around: to not have to watch the overkill on his enemies.
"DAMN IT! Alright, I suppose they are cool pokémon you got there. My useless things didn't stand a chance!" James shouted in a mix of wonder and anger. "Okay, you won, here are the winnings."
The trainer looked at the money, and recalled his pokémon. He then looked straight into James' eyes and said angrily, "You know, that was terrible. I just severely hurt your pokémon and possibly broke some bones in your riolu, and all you can think about is how strong my machamp and raticate were and how much money to give away? You really need to take better care of your pokémon; you haven't even looked at them yet. Keep your money, jerk. The least you can do is get those poor 'things' as you call them to a center. Right now."
The trainer walked away, leaving a shocked James to stand in his wake. Who was he to tell James what to do? Idiot. But he did have a point; he couldn't carry these all the time. James had half a mind to get salamence out and flame the guy just calmly walking away. Instead, he walked over to his sorry state of pokémon, and grabbed them both by their necks, earning a scream of pain from ralts, and an unhealthy shudder from the unconscious riolu. He clutched them hard in one hand, to try and get rid of his anger. He got out a pokéball with his other, and tossed it in the air.
"Go, salamence!"
The majestic dragon appeared with a proud roar, sending pokémon for a mile around scurrying away in fear. The ralts started choking in his grip, so he slackened his hold on them, allowing them to breathe. The dragon looked left and right unhappily, and realised he had been called out for transport with a low growl of unhappiness.
While still clutching the other pokémon, they started flying to Rustboro city. While he was flying on salamence, James took a closer look a his riolu, and realised that the pathetic things' left arm was facing the opposite way to what it should, right down to the paw.
Ouch.
**********
They landed, and James took his time thanking salamence for the ride, and giving him a treat from his backpack, before returning him to his pokéball. He then walked into the huge pokémon center, looking for a moment at the assorted trainers, and walked right up to nurse joy.
"Hello, how can we-" Nurse Joy started, but James interrupted her.
"Yeah, yeah, let's get to the point. I want you to heal these two worthless things, and my salamence. And be quick, will you? I'm in a bad mood and don't want to be kept waiting. Go on, jog on!" James said in an annoyed tone, dumping both pokémon on the counter and salamence's pokéball.
"Yes, SIR. It will be done soo- god! What's happened to your riolu? We have to get it sorted right away! And your ralts! You stay here, all right? Hey, chansey! Give me a hand with this will you?"
A chansey quickly bounded over and got the ralts on a stretcher while Nurse Joy put riolu on another stretcher. James couldn't see what all the fuss was about- sure the riolu looked kind of bad, and the ralts wasn't that good either, but there shouldn't be that much of a fuss, it's not as though they meant anything to him.
After three hours of waiting and reading old Pokémon PAL magazines, Nurse Joy hurried over to him and said to him, " Sir, are these pokémon registered to you? I can't seem to find their pokéball, so can you give theirs to me please? They'll both be fine, there's no lasting damage, the only reason your riolu will be fine is because of how quick you got here, and we were able to just patch her up while the bones were in a correct position. Also, they seem to have ticks in them, can you tell when you last wash-"
"Ticks? Ew. They're not mine, I suppose the only reason they stick with me is because they can't survive in the wild. Hey, is my salamence ready, I'd really like to go soon." James said, getting up. "And do me a favour and register the losers to me, will ya? Thanks, you're a doll. Chop chop!" This remark was well worth a raised eyebrow from Nurse Joy.
"Of course, sir. Just a moment please." The venom of a snake ice cream could not have been chillier. Joy left, and returned five minutes later with two pokéballs, handing them to James, who grinned.
"Can you come with me to see your pokémon now please, sir?" It didn't take much to realise she was thinking something along the lines of, 'What a GIT! Why I oughtta...' And swearing that the various kiddies in the center really shouldn't hear.
Joy led James through the center to a room filled with sick pokémon, narrowly avoiding a growlithe's flailing legs, and guided him to his sleeping pokémon, who both smelt of cinnamon scented shampoo and who both looked absolutely pristine. The riolu's fur even gleamed. Joy then handed him the balls, and told him to get the pokémon to touch the button in the center. Without warning, James enlarged the balls and rapped both pokémon on the head with them, effectively withdrawing them to their pokéballs.
James turned and said "Great. Now these losers belong to me. I'll be going now. Thanks so much for the three-hour wait and the really awful magazines that were outdated by about a decade. See ya!"
He turned and after ten minutes of being lost in the center finally managed to escape outside. He moved to the side of the center, between two large buildings, and he threw his two brand new pokéballs in the air, as well as salamence's, and with a flash of light all three pokémon stood looking at him, and he picked up the ball he had dropped.
"Look at these, ralts! You too, riolu! These are your brand new balls!" he said happily, without any movement or response from the recently injured pokémon. "Salamence, I want you to do me a favour. Destroy these, will you? Cheers."
James threw the new pokéballs in the air, and salamence took aim and sent a flamethrower at them both, utterly incinerating them in the process, leaving a few remnants of ash in the air, putting James in mind of ashes to ashes.
"Now I want you to take me veeery seriously, you two." James said seriously, withdrawing salamence with a 'ping'. "You are not mine. You never were, or never will be mine. You've lost the last 15 battles in a row for me, and just now I had to wait in a crappy center with crappy magazines for crappy pokémon, and nearly had my ear bitten off by someone else's chatot. I am not happy. And you are not mine. All I think of you now as being is a liability, possibly to drag another trainer down with you. Enjoy the rest of your lives, though I doubt they'll last that long. C ya!"
With that, James walked away, to the gym, leaving a limping ralts and an aching riolu in the middle of a crossroads, looking rather desolate and lost in a brand new city.
*********************
They hobbled through the city, riolu's tail getting all kinds of dirt off the floor, and eventually managed to get themselves out of the bustling city, and into grass again, on a trodden through path, and saw the sea, where they could drink. They hobbled over to the deserted beach, and began to drink the salty water, looking quite pathetic in the process, and just sat there for a while, neither of them speaking to each other, the wind blowing sand into their faces.
After a while, a young human came onto the beach, looking depressed, and not just because of the sand in his eyes, and noticed the bedraggled pair. He walked over to them, looking slightly happier, but because he looked like James, both pokémon shrunk away from him in fear.
"Hey, hey, i'm not going to hurt you, you don't have to be scared of me." the human said reassuringly. "I'm just here to help."
Rea-lly? Sure? This worried sounding voice came from nowhere. This got the human looking left and right, searching for the speaker, until looking back at ralts and understanding.
"Oh, you're a psychic type aren't you? Yes i'm sure; I don't mean to harm either of you."
'Un-der-stand I? Good! Ha-ats your namm?' The ralts said, speaking inside the human's brain, and getting a chuckle.
"Me? I'm Tom. Nice to meet you. What are your names? By the way, I think you meant ' what's your name?' back there." Tom said, chuckling.
The ralts frowned, or at least changed the front of its head. 'Is hard to learn nu lan-gu-age. We have no names, I or that rio-lu.' Upon mention of its species, the riolu drew slightly forwards, still looking fearful.
"Hey, i've already said, i'm not going to hurt you, so you can stop looking so scared." Tom said to the Riolu. "Why are you on your own, do you have no home or something?"
The two pokémon conversed for a while in their own language, and while they were talking, rats observed the trainer. He looked around 16, had a couple of spots, brown hair and eyes, and was wearing a blue t-shirt with matching jeans. One thing he did have was a kind body language, but she couldn't find out more about him just by staring at him. From Tom's perspective, they seemed to come to the conclusion about whether to trust this 'Tom' or not. The Riolu bounded forward to him and said "Ri!" in a high and cheery voice, apparently hoping him to understand her as well.
"Sorry, the only reason I can understand ralts is because it..he..she? What are you both? Anyway, ralts is psychic, that's why I can understand.. it."
The pokémon chatted rapidly in their own language again, and the ralts said to him slowly; 'Rio-lu want name for we. We both girls. We know each oth-er for long time.'
"Er. Good? By the way, just say, or think the words altogether. "
'Altoge-ther?'
" Erm, yeah. Keep practicing. Why are you alone, and if you're wild, how did you learn to.. think in other people's minds?"
'Other shoe... trainer get rid of us, because he said we weak.' At this, Tom felt a chill in the air, like there was a chill in the air. It made him feel angrier than he ought to have done, but he just swallowed his emotions and replied, as calmly as he could.
"Jeez, cruel guy. I hate trainers like that. I would take you to my place but.. I don't have a place to go anymore. I guess we have nowhere to go together." At this, the riolu started squeaking at him quickly. "What, did I say something wrong?"
The pokémon started chatting quickly in their own language again, starting to make Tom feel a bit left out, like the ralts was a middleman. While they chatted (ten minutes on end, just like women in a hairdressers) he turned his back to them, and looked up at the sky, and took the time to worry about his own problems, the sand blowing in his eyes. His last remaining relative had just died, thanks to alcohol abuse, and he had been given all the money his parents had saved up for his recent 16th birthday, from the local Devon people. He didn't fancy going to a social home for some random old person to just pick him up saying, 'Yes, he's got nice kidneys, lovely and springy, I like those, and they'll do.' It was either that, or get a job and live in a cardboard box and write an autobiography about life on the streets, or, well..
'Rio-lu wants to know if you could become our own... shoe? Sorry, trainer.' The hopeful voice snapped him out of his thoughts like a rattata trap, and he couldn't really think of 'life of a man in a cardboard box' to be that great. There was only so much to say about banana peels. Plus, he'd always watched the battles in the park, but never really thought of actually having his own. Challenge the pokémon league? He had nothing better to do. So, feeling impulsive, he said..
"Er." Not the best acceptance speech. So, rather desperately, he said "But I don't know how to be a trainer! Or what food you eat or.. water you drink, or how much to train, or HOW to train, or..."
'First,' the ralts interrupted 'We see a tree-man. Our old trainer called him Birch. Before that though, you have to give us names. Please.' Tom couldn't really resist the ralts' voice, but summoned up courage.
"Er, how about we make a deal. I'll be your trainer if you teach me your language. You'll learn mine as well while we travel. But don't expect anything great from me, I've only just started. Although I was in trainers' school for a while, but what is this, a resumé?"
'Fine. Names?' Tom sensed frustration in the voice.
"Why do you want names so badly anyway?" He asked curiously.
'Err, we've never been given any before, and were just known as things. You can't help but feel a little rej.. rejec.. left out. That's now office-ally a secret. Can we have our names now?' The ralts and the riolu stared at him forcefully.
"Ooook then. Lemme think..." He looked up at the sky, as though expecting a name in cloud form. Failing that, he looked at another cloud and started thinking, waiting for the saviour cloud. Instead, he found himself thinking of a silver lining, and looked out towards the sea, and started looking at a gold horizon...
"How about.. Sylva.. and Golde?" Tom asked tentatively.
'Dibs on Sylva.' The ralts thought quickly. The riolu didn't look like she minded being called Golde. Golde smiled, and added a "Rio!" that sounded sort of happy. Tom grinned, and started muttering.
"Okay now first thing, Sylva is limping, and Golde is in pain.. so we go to the pokémon center! They'll give up free balls as well!" Tom turned, and realised he had been talking to himself. "Uhh, piggyback?"
'We'll go on yo-you're back, but we aren't pigs.' Sylva said in her version of an annoyed tone. Golde nodded.
Tom sighed. "Why do you have to take everything seriously? Let's go."
He hoisted the girls onto his shoulders, and started walking back to Rustboro, while Sylva filled Tom in about the pokémon language. Tom found himself drifting away from the conversation.
What he had been expecting was a long and harrowing journey, full of thrills and trials and new friends, and rivals, and so on. Not a language lesson. As they neared Rustboro, he started thinking about the good things of the life he had left behind... the small house, the lack of money...
'Are you even listening?'
"Yes, Miss Sylva." He replied, yawning. This earned him a thwack on the back of his head and a giggle from Golde. He staggered, and looked at Sylva, who smiled sweetly and thought to him, 'That'll teach you not to pay attention.'
It was going to be a loooong journey.Chapter End Notes:Wow, hadn't realised I'd do five pages with things I just came up with in my head.
As an old friend once said to me: when in doubt, trust the deranged pineapples. If anyone knows what he meant, let me know in the review.
This is my first story, so please do read and review! And please don't just put things like THIS STORY SUUUUUUUUUUXXX BAAAD. Unless it does. If so, not in so many... capital letters.
Thanks for reading:
The parado
"All right! Two on two! Let's go!" James stood at one end of the clear field and the other trainer stood at the other, readying his pokéballs.
" Go! Ralts! Riolu! Even you two could beat this guy!" James shouted at them. Sighing, they moved forward to meet their newest opponent, who slowly took from his belt and tossed a pair of pokéballs in front of him, and the traditional spark of light revealed a machamp and a raticate.
"This is going to be a short match." the other trainer said calmly, oblivious to James' laughing, but watching the riolu shudder in fear of how strong the machamp looked.
"Haha! I agree! But do you really think you're going to win? My things both have type advantages!" James laughed. "Well come on then, what are you waiting for? Ralts! Use confusion on that machamp! Riolu, karate chop that raticate!"
Both pokémon carried out their respective moves quickly, but the machamp just stood still and didn't look like it felt anything from ralts' attack and the raticate just moved out of the way of riolus attack, and just stared at riolu as it waited for a command, so the riolu moved back next to ralts, awaiting another command from her shocked trainer.
"I think we should stop this battle, your pokémon are far too weak to defeat mine." the trainer said.
"No way! It's not over yet!" James replied angrily.
"Are you sure? This will probably hurt them a lot. " the trainer said confidently.
" Yes! I'll let you start, just because you think you're sooo strong."
" If you insist. Raticate, use a quick attack on that ralts, and machamp, use cross chop on the riolu. Sorry to have to do this." the trainer said unhappily, speaking to riolu and ralts, and turning his back.
Ralts was rammed before she even had time to blink, sliding painfully across the thick grass, and lay, struggling to get up, before just collapsing and breathing heavily, even though it was a weak attack. But riolu suffered a much worse fate, as the machamp jumped quickly to her, crossed all four arms and chopped at her head, smashing her into the ground, and creating a small indent in the ground. Before she fainted, she swore she heard several bones crack and realised why the trainer had turned around: to not have to watch the overkill on his enemies.
"DAMN IT! Alright, I suppose they are cool pokémon you got there. My useless things didn't stand a chance!" James shouted in a mix of wonder and anger. "Okay, you won, here are the winnings."
The trainer looked at the money, and recalled his pokémon. He then looked straight into James' eyes and said angrily, "You know, that was terrible. I just severely hurt your pokémon and possibly broke some bones in your riolu, and all you can think about is how strong my machamp and raticate were and how much money to give away? You really need to take better care of your pokémon; you haven't even looked at them yet. Keep your money, jerk. The least you can do is get those poor 'things' as you call them to a center. Right now."
The trainer walked away, leaving a shocked James to stand in his wake. Who was he to tell James what to do? Idiot. But he did have a point; he couldn't carry these all the time. James had half a mind to get salamence out and flame the guy just calmly walking away. Instead, he walked over to his sorry state of pokémon, and grabbed them both by their necks, earning a scream of pain from ralts, and an unhealthy shudder from the unconscious riolu. He clutched them hard in one hand, to try and get rid of his anger. He got out a pokéball with his other, and tossed it in the air.
"Go, salamence!"
The majestic dragon appeared with a proud roar, sending pokémon for a mile around scurrying away in fear. The ralts started choking in his grip, so he slackened his hold on them, allowing them to breathe. The dragon looked left and right unhappily, and realised he had been called out for transport with a low growl of unhappiness.
While still clutching the other pokémon, they started flying to Rustboro city. While he was flying on salamence, James took a closer look a his riolu, and realised that the pathetic things' left arm was facing the opposite way to what it should, right down to the paw.
Ouch.
**********
They landed, and James took his time thanking salamence for the ride, and giving him a treat from his backpack, before returning him to his pokéball. He then walked into the huge pokémon center, looking for a moment at the assorted trainers, and walked right up to nurse joy.
"Hello, how can we-" Nurse Joy started, but James interrupted her.
"Yeah, yeah, let's get to the point. I want you to heal these two worthless things, and my salamence. And be quick, will you? I'm in a bad mood and don't want to be kept waiting. Go on, jog on!" James said in an annoyed tone, dumping both pokémon on the counter and salamence's pokéball.
"Yes, SIR. It will be done soo- god! What's happened to your riolu? We have to get it sorted right away! And your ralts! You stay here, all right? Hey, chansey! Give me a hand with this will you?"
A chansey quickly bounded over and got the ralts on a stretcher while Nurse Joy put riolu on another stretcher. James couldn't see what all the fuss was about- sure the riolu looked kind of bad, and the ralts wasn't that good either, but there shouldn't be that much of a fuss, it's not as though they meant anything to him.
After three hours of waiting and reading old Pokémon PAL magazines, Nurse Joy hurried over to him and said to him, " Sir, are these pokémon registered to you? I can't seem to find their pokéball, so can you give theirs to me please? They'll both be fine, there's no lasting damage, the only reason your riolu will be fine is because of how quick you got here, and we were able to just patch her up while the bones were in a correct position. Also, they seem to have ticks in them, can you tell when you last wash-"
"Ticks? Ew. They're not mine, I suppose the only reason they stick with me is because they can't survive in the wild. Hey, is my salamence ready, I'd really like to go soon." James said, getting up. "And do me a favour and register the losers to me, will ya? Thanks, you're a doll. Chop chop!" This remark was well worth a raised eyebrow from Nurse Joy.
"Of course, sir. Just a moment please." The venom of a snake ice cream could not have been chillier. Joy left, and returned five minutes later with two pokéballs, handing them to James, who grinned.
"Can you come with me to see your pokémon now please, sir?" It didn't take much to realise she was thinking something along the lines of, 'What a GIT! Why I oughtta...' And swearing that the various kiddies in the center really shouldn't hear.
Joy led James through the center to a room filled with sick pokémon, narrowly avoiding a growlithe's flailing legs, and guided him to his sleeping pokémon, who both smelt of cinnamon scented shampoo and who both looked absolutely pristine. The riolu's fur even gleamed. Joy then handed him the balls, and told him to get the pokémon to touch the button in the center. Without warning, James enlarged the balls and rapped both pokémon on the head with them, effectively withdrawing them to their pokéballs.
James turned and said "Great. Now these losers belong to me. I'll be going now. Thanks so much for the three-hour wait and the really awful magazines that were outdated by about a decade. See ya!"
He turned and after ten minutes of being lost in the center finally managed to escape outside. He moved to the side of the center, between two large buildings, and he threw his two brand new pokéballs in the air, as well as salamence's, and with a flash of light all three pokémon stood looking at him, and he picked up the ball he had dropped.
"Look at these, ralts! You too, riolu! These are your brand new balls!" he said happily, without any movement or response from the recently injured pokémon. "Salamence, I want you to do me a favour. Destroy these, will you? Cheers."
James threw the new pokéballs in the air, and salamence took aim and sent a flamethrower at them both, utterly incinerating them in the process, leaving a few remnants of ash in the air, putting James in mind of ashes to ashes.
"Now I want you to take me veeery seriously, you two." James said seriously, withdrawing salamence with a 'ping'. "You are not mine. You never were, or never will be mine. You've lost the last 15 battles in a row for me, and just now I had to wait in a crappy center with crappy magazines for crappy pokémon, and nearly had my ear bitten off by someone else's chatot. I am not happy. And you are not mine. All I think of you now as being is a liability, possibly to drag another trainer down with you. Enjoy the rest of your lives, though I doubt they'll last that long. C ya!"
With that, James walked away, to the gym, leaving a limping ralts and an aching riolu in the middle of a crossroads, looking rather desolate and lost in a brand new city.
*********************
They hobbled through the city, riolu's tail getting all kinds of dirt off the floor, and eventually managed to get themselves out of the bustling city, and into grass again, on a trodden through path, and saw the sea, where they could drink. They hobbled over to the deserted beach, and began to drink the salty water, looking quite pathetic in the process, and just sat there for a while, neither of them speaking to each other, the wind blowing sand into their faces.
After a while, a young human came onto the beach, looking depressed, and not just because of the sand in his eyes, and noticed the bedraggled pair. He walked over to them, looking slightly happier, but because he looked like James, both pokémon shrunk away from him in fear.
"Hey, hey, i'm not going to hurt you, you don't have to be scared of me." the human said reassuringly. "I'm just here to help."
Rea-lly? Sure? This worried sounding voice came from nowhere. This got the human looking left and right, searching for the speaker, until looking back at ralts and understanding.
"Oh, you're a psychic type aren't you? Yes i'm sure; I don't mean to harm either of you."
'Un-der-stand I? Good! Ha-ats your namm?' The ralts said, speaking inside the human's brain, and getting a chuckle.
"Me? I'm Tom. Nice to meet you. What are your names? By the way, I think you meant ' what's your name?' back there." Tom said, chuckling.
The ralts frowned, or at least changed the front of its head. 'Is hard to learn nu lan-gu-age. We have no names, I or that rio-lu.' Upon mention of its species, the riolu drew slightly forwards, still looking fearful.
"Hey, i've already said, i'm not going to hurt you, so you can stop looking so scared." Tom said to the Riolu. "Why are you on your own, do you have no home or something?"
The two pokémon conversed for a while in their own language, and while they were talking, rats observed the trainer. He looked around 16, had a couple of spots, brown hair and eyes, and was wearing a blue t-shirt with matching jeans. One thing he did have was a kind body language, but she couldn't find out more about him just by staring at him. From Tom's perspective, they seemed to come to the conclusion about whether to trust this 'Tom' or not. The Riolu bounded forward to him and said "Ri!" in a high and cheery voice, apparently hoping him to understand her as well.
"Sorry, the only reason I can understand ralts is because it..he..she? What are you both? Anyway, ralts is psychic, that's why I can understand.. it."
The pokémon chatted rapidly in their own language again, and the ralts said to him slowly; 'Rio-lu want name for we. We both girls. We know each oth-er for long time.'
"Er. Good? By the way, just say, or think the words altogether. "
'Altoge-ther?'
" Erm, yeah. Keep practicing. Why are you alone, and if you're wild, how did you learn to.. think in other people's minds?"
'Other shoe... trainer get rid of us, because he said we weak.' At this, Tom felt a chill in the air, like there was a chill in the air. It made him feel angrier than he ought to have done, but he just swallowed his emotions and replied, as calmly as he could.
"Jeez, cruel guy. I hate trainers like that. I would take you to my place but.. I don't have a place to go anymore. I guess we have nowhere to go together." At this, the riolu started squeaking at him quickly. "What, did I say something wrong?"
The pokémon started chatting quickly in their own language again, starting to make Tom feel a bit left out, like the ralts was a middleman. While they chatted (ten minutes on end, just like women in a hairdressers) he turned his back to them, and looked up at the sky, and took the time to worry about his own problems, the sand blowing in his eyes. His last remaining relative had just died, thanks to alcohol abuse, and he had been given all the money his parents had saved up for his recent 16th birthday, from the local Devon people. He didn't fancy going to a social home for some random old person to just pick him up saying, 'Yes, he's got nice kidneys, lovely and springy, I like those, and they'll do.' It was either that, or get a job and live in a cardboard box and write an autobiography about life on the streets, or, well..
'Rio-lu wants to know if you could become our own... shoe? Sorry, trainer.' The hopeful voice snapped him out of his thoughts like a rattata trap, and he couldn't really think of 'life of a man in a cardboard box' to be that great. There was only so much to say about banana peels. Plus, he'd always watched the battles in the park, but never really thought of actually having his own. Challenge the pokémon league? He had nothing better to do. So, feeling impulsive, he said..
"Er." Not the best acceptance speech. So, rather desperately, he said "But I don't know how to be a trainer! Or what food you eat or.. water you drink, or how much to train, or HOW to train, or..."
'First,' the ralts interrupted 'We see a tree-man. Our old trainer called him Birch. Before that though, you have to give us names. Please.' Tom couldn't really resist the ralts' voice, but summoned up courage.
"Er, how about we make a deal. I'll be your trainer if you teach me your language. You'll learn mine as well while we travel. But don't expect anything great from me, I've only just started. Although I was in trainers' school for a while, but what is this, a resumé?"
'Fine. Names?' Tom sensed frustration in the voice.
"Why do you want names so badly anyway?" He asked curiously.
'Err, we've never been given any before, and were just known as things. You can't help but feel a little rej.. rejec.. left out. That's now office-ally a secret. Can we have our names now?' The ralts and the riolu stared at him forcefully.
"Ooook then. Lemme think..." He looked up at the sky, as though expecting a name in cloud form. Failing that, he looked at another cloud and started thinking, waiting for the saviour cloud. Instead, he found himself thinking of a silver lining, and looked out towards the sea, and started looking at a gold horizon...
"How about.. Sylva.. and Golde?" Tom asked tentatively.
'Dibs on Sylva.' The ralts thought quickly. The riolu didn't look like she minded being called Golde. Golde smiled, and added a "Rio!" that sounded sort of happy. Tom grinned, and started muttering.
"Okay now first thing, Sylva is limping, and Golde is in pain.. so we go to the pokémon center! They'll give up free balls as well!" Tom turned, and realised he had been talking to himself. "Uhh, piggyback?"
'We'll go on yo-you're back, but we aren't pigs.' Sylva said in her version of an annoyed tone. Golde nodded.
Tom sighed. "Why do you have to take everything seriously? Let's go."
He hoisted the girls onto his shoulders, and started walking back to Rustboro, while Sylva filled Tom in about the pokémon language. Tom found himself drifting away from the conversation.
What he had been expecting was a long and harrowing journey, full of thrills and trials and new friends, and rivals, and so on. Not a language lesson. As they neared Rustboro, he started thinking about the good things of the life he had left behind... the small house, the lack of money...
'Are you even listening?'
"Yes, Miss Sylva." He replied, yawning. This earned him a thwack on the back of his head and a giggle from Golde. He staggered, and looked at Sylva, who smiled sweetly and thought to him, 'That'll teach you not to pay attention.'
It was going to be a loooong journey.Chapter End Notes:Wow, hadn't realised I'd do five pages with things I just came up with in my head.
As an old friend once said to me: when in doubt, trust the deranged pineapples. If anyone knows what he meant, let me know in the review.
This is my first story, so please do read and review! And please don't just put things like THIS STORY SUUUUUUUUUUXXX BAAAD. Unless it does. If so, not in so many... capital letters.
Thanks for reading:
The parado