Searching Far and Wide - 146

Teams:

Pierce Lawson:

- Narcissa, Beedrill

- Orion, Onix

- Cygnus, Kadabra

- Bellatrix, Gyarados (Shiny)

- Andromeda, Vaporeon

- Regulus, Meowth

- Sirius, Yamper

Lillian Dale:

- Root, Ivysaur

- Talon, Spearow

- Gem, Geodude

- Star, Cleffa

- Cinder, Vulpix

Route 7 VIII

Pierce felt his body shiver as the bitterness of his coffee shocked his system awake.

It was going to be a good hour before he felt like a person, but fortunately most of his pokemon weren’t like that. They were up and ready to work on stuff right after breakfast. Pierce couldn’t relate, most days, but he did manage to muster enough will to help them get started with their day before going back to fully waking himself up. It was still a work on progress at that point, but that wasn’t really a concern.

Not like he had anything pressing to do. Sure, he could use that extra time studying or practicing Psychic Arts or trying to get a hold of aura usage or any number of things. However, he didn’t have to do any of that. Those were things that he chose to do on a daily basis, so it was really not that much of an issue to just… not, even if it made him feel like he was being lazy.

It was what it was, so he took another sip and took a deep breath in.

“How’s the leg going?” he asked, making Houndoom shift beside him. “Any issues? Because it’s kind of important to know if you have any,” he added. He then turned his head to look at the Dark type, who seemed to have done the same, meeting his gaze evenly and barking. “Good to know,” he replied with a satisfied nod.

And that was that. They settled into silence once more… or relative silence, really, considering everyone was training around them and they weren’t particularly quiet about it. It was kind of funny though, that the second loudest – after Orion with Earth Power, understandably – were the smallest, youngest members of their group. Sirius and Houndour, to be exact, were making quite the ruckus while training Play Rough and Foul Play respectively.

Now, the latter could have been taught by Houndoom and Cygnus both, really, but they’d all unanimously decided that it’d be better for him to train with Sirius. It was more that it’d be more fun, admittedly, since they were both children and they both would enjoy themselves playing with each other while trying to grasp the moves. It wasn’t like Pierce was champing at the bit to get the yamper to learn his move as soon as possible, after all.

His team looked pretty solid to him in regards to tackling Celadon whenever he got there. He’d still be a nervous mess when it came to it, he knew, but Pierce was more confident than he had been in any of the other Gyms. Celadon wasn’t known to be particularly hard, after all, even when taken at a high number of badges, so… Yeah, maybe he’d finally tackle a Challenge without panicking?

That’d be nice.

“Do you think they are actually making progress?” he asked, taking another sip of his coffee. Good thing he’d almost finished it already, because it was getting cold and that only made it worse. Pierce might have spent too long getting everything ready and the team training, he supposed. Then again, maybe it was the fact that he’d prepared himself a second cup with the same water and been too lazy to reheat it.

Houndoom barked something unsure.

“Yeah, me neither,” he replied with a chuckle. “They’re definitely having fun though,” he added and that was an easy agreement for the Dark type.

Speaking of, the older Dark type was having a hard time relaxing, he was noticing. Not that he blamed her, at all, but it was obvious and it made him want to do something about it. The problem was that Pierce wasn’t sure what he could do. Dark types weren’t known to be particularly easy to deal with on a good day, nevermind when they were in a situation such as Houndoom’s.

The funny thing was that she wasn’t worried for herself, nor was she worried about him as a human or about wild pokemon or about random things that might spook her. No, Pierce had noticed that her mood got brought down at specific times and they all had to do with her son. Like at that moment, even though she seemed fairly laid-back during their exchange, her eyes barely strayed away from Houndour for moments, seconds. She stared at him at random times, usually when the little dog was doing something other than just standing around and looking perfectly nice and healthy.

She was worried for her son, evidently, and Pierce could hardly blame her for that either.

If anything, he found that very humbling and very admirable. ‘Nothing like a mother’s love, huh?’ he thought, feeling a little subdued himself all of a sudden. He was, after all, reminded of his mother and his grandmother, both women had about as much claim to having raised him as the other, so both came to his mind with the topic. He wondered if they were doing ok, not for the first time. He wondered how they were dealing with whatever had happened on their side of the whole mess that had landed him in the Pokemon world.

Hopefully, they were already moving on, just like he was.

‘God, I miss them,’ he thought, taking a deep breath in and letting it out slowly.

“He’s fine,” he reassured after he finished his coffee. He reached for her head, petting her between her horns in as reassuring a way as he could. “We’ll be here to take care of him until you can take care of him yourself,” he said and Houndoom huffed something that sounded suspiciously self-deprecating to Pierce’s ears. “You’ll do fine. What happened wasn’t your fault. You had bad luck and that was that. I’ve seen your Flamethrower, after all. You can take care of yourself and him.”

That seemed to do the trick, if only a little bit, because Houndoom straightened a little and barked a response.

“That’s more like it,” he said with a grin.

[}-o-{]

“Maybe I’m getting the hang of this,” Pierce thought out loud after taking a few bites from his meal. Sure, it was simple, but he imagined he could be excused for that considering the state of his arm. The food had turned out surprisingly well though, even though he was no chef and he was working with like, one and a half hands. He really might just be getting the hang of it, he supposed. “I should probably get better at cooking in general though,” he mused then, bringing the fork to his mouth once more.

Traveling as he was, especially without someone else to take care of cooking, he really should get better at it. However, that was more time that he wouldn’t be able to use for the other ten things he needed to focus on. As it was, he already felt like he was getting stretched thin. He really didn’t have the time to be cooking great meals, especially when they were just for himself. The simple things he was making would have to be enough, he supposed.

Shame that.

Maybe he could look for a traveling companion that was good at cooking and other such things? That was an amusing thought, if nothing else. The picture of himself, sitting across a table and questioning someone like it was a job interview crossed his mind. Hell, the thought of actually hiring someone to help him out even sounded appealing, but alas, that wasn’t really an option.

Not only because it sounded ridiculously lazy of him, but also because his economic situation wasn’t what one would call stable.

With some time, Pierce might go back to a point in which he’d have more money than he knew what to do with, but that wasn’t the case just yet. He could leave nonsense ideas for when they even had a snowball’s chance in hell, if that ever happened. He couldn’t really afford to entertain them with the current set of circumstances. ‘Maybe I’m exaggerating because of the arm,’ he thought wryly, setting down his fork and scratching at the top of his cast with his good hand.

‘Just two more days, that’s it,’ he told himself. That was all that he needed before being able to take the cast off and forget all about broken bones and what a pain in the ass it was to be one-handed. He’d be able to go back to normal after that, cooking wouldn’t be as much of a chore and neither would be setting up or taking down camp.

Pierce would finally go back to being a fully functional guy and he couldn't wait, truly. Especially considering how many pokemon he had to take care of and all the things he needed to get done. Having two working hands would be a great boon to improving the admittedly kind of overwhelming situation. Everything would get a little bit easier and that was enough to make him yearn for it.

“Feeling dramatic, are we, Protector Voice?” Cygnus said and Pierce proceeded to flood their connection with annoyance. “So sensitive.” His kadabra had woken up in a mood, just like he had, evidently. Maybe he was salty that Fire Punch training hadn’t gone well. “That is not it,” the Psychic type denied vehemently.

Which meant that was definitely it.

So, Pierce resolutely ignored the powerful mental roll of eyes his pokemon sent him and focused back on his meal. There were better things to focus on rather than teasing his pokemon and pondering stupid ideas, he guessed. Like what path they were going to take that day. He had, after all, half a mind to go through the wilder parts of Route 7, but a part of him wanted to do the opposite and get back on the beaten path.

It’d be safer, for one, and they kind of needed that with Houndoom and Houndour with them. Although, there was the fact that they’d come across more people that way and that could carry its own problems with the Dark types. Still, it was worth considering that it’d be easier for the Rangers to find them if they were closer to the road and Pierce kind of liked that idea. It’d make things easier whether they dropped by that day or one of the next ones to question Houndoom in regards to the trap…

‘Decisions, decisions,’ he mused idly as he considered both options.

Maybe the right answer was to-

“Wh-?” he half-exclaimed, pushed forward as something climbed on his back. Looking over his shoulder, he caught a glimpse of cream color and the sharp claws on his shirt and- “Regulus,” he hissed. He glared over his shoulder, but he couldn’t quite land the look since his cat pokemon had gotten on his back and shoulders in a way that didn’t let him look directly at the Normal type. Unfortunate that, since he was pretty sure his glare was particularly effective then and there. “What are you doing?” he asked eventually, realizing that he was getting nowhere.

The meowth hissed something at him that didn’t really help him understand. When he glanced around though, he noticed Sirius and Houndour by his side, looking up at the meowth. Seeing that, Pierce had only one thing to say on the matter, with a flat look and weary eyes.

“What did you two do?” he asked, unimpressed and even less so when they tried to look innocent. “Someone doesn’t want to get any pokeblocks, apparently,” he added and even Regulus seemed to stiffen at that. “You three better start explaining yourselves, or it’ll be plain kibble for all of you until tomorrow morning,” he told them and they all immediately started barking and meowing wildly.

He was pretty sure they were also trying to throw each other under the bus, rather adamantly at that.

“You’d be right, Protector-Voice,” Cygnus confirmed, sounding amused.

Pierce just sighed.

“Remind me to make sure the next pokemon we pick up is capable of being an adult, Cygnus. Having only Andromeda and Houndoom be reasonable is getting rather tiring,” he commented, getting commiserating sighs from both of the aforementioned reasonable pokemon.

“Sure thi-” the kadabra started before pausing. “I hate you.”

Pierce just grinned.

[}-o-{]

‘Well, this is awkward,’ he thought wryly as he watched Bellatrix struggle against her current opponent.

To be fair to her though, most of her moves were close range, so someone that didn’t really allow her to use those freely was a counter on their own. Still, there was something a little funny about a kingler holding off a gyarados. Although, in their defense, the kingler was one tough cookie to fight. He had very strong melee capabilities, for one, which was the reason why Bellatrix couldn’t quite get up close and get a Crunch, an Ice Fang or even a Tackle in. For another, he was really fast, so the gyarados’ attempts at using Brine and Bulldoze had… mixed results, to be generous.

“Bubble Beam!” their opponent called.

“Move,” Pierce responded with. Simple and effective, since Bella could move fairly well despite her size. All those sessions of dancing had paid off in a very surprising way. A secondary benefit at best, to be sure, but if it worked, it worked. “Brine,” he called, already knowing the whole thing would be a struggle.

He was learning that Bella was far from catching up to the likes of Narcissa and Cygnus. Even Orion and Andromeda, if push came to shove. The gyarados had power, there was no doubt about that, and her size was an advantage of its own too. However, she lacked in plenty of areas, like skill and experience.

Because the moment something could withstand her attacks and punch back, she crumbled like a sand castle. She wasn’t a battle machine like Narcissa, after all, nor was she a cool-headed soldier like Cygnus. She was, despite how she looked, surprisingly fragile, mentality-wise. At least, she was when she wasn’t going full angry sea serpent on their opponent, something that Pierce was very reluctant to encourage.

He’d rather Bellatrix stay in control, and she’d even agreed, even if she was unhappy with her fighting capabilities as they were. She’d get better with time though, Pierce was sure. She just needed to keep at it, get some experience and grow comfortable with battling and she’d be a beast.

Still, there was a difference between that and just letting her get beat up.

“We surrender,” he called eventually, feeling more than a little ashamed and frustrated. Not for Bellatrix’s performance nor his own, but because he was just then cutting off his “channeling” and he knew his pokemon was very much feeling those things. He’d have to help her with that, but first- “Here,” he said, walking up to their opponent and handing them the bet money. “Good match. That’s one scary tough kingler you have there,” he commented, trying to be as good a sport as he could manage.

He knew, after all, how mood-ruining a sore loser could be and he didn’t want to be that guy, no matter how bad he – and his pokemon, most importantly – felt because of the loss.

“Thanks,” their opponent said, looking very pleased with himself and his pokemon. As he should be, Pierce would admit. “She looks scary, but she’s just a kid, huh? Just like you said,” he added, glancing over to the sulking Bellatrix. ‘A viewer, huh?’ Pierce realized immediately, since he had not, in fact, said anything like that in the short conversation pre-battle.

“She’ll get there,” he replied with a grin. “Good luck out there, yeah? I’m gonna comfort the big noodle and get back on the road. Still a long way to go.”

“Sure, I don’t want to keep you. Looking forward to the next video,” the guy told him, grinning widely. Pierce watched then, a little amused and bemused, how the man kind of rushed back to his traveling companions and they started animatedly talking to one another. Apparently, they’d recorded the battle and he’d not be surprised if they uploaded that. He hoped there wouldn’t be too many bad comments in regards to Bellatrix.

That’d suck.

“Hey, big girl, you did great,” he called then, turning towards the river where the aforementioned gyarados waited, still pouting and looking rather downtrodden. She shot him a very disbelieving look at his words, borderline angry even. “You did. You can’t win all battles. That’s just how it is. Ask Narcissa, or Cygnus, or anyone else,” he reassured, reaching with his good hand and smiling when she “discreetly” leaned closer for him to pet her.

All the same, the sea noodle proceeded to grumble and whine at him. She was obviously unhappy with the loss, but maybe it also had to do with the fact that it hadn’t been a particularly graceful loss either. He could totally understand that, yes, but there was nothing either of them could do. Sometimes you won, sometimes you lost, and the same applied to winning spectacularly and losing embarrassingly.

“Come on, don’t be like that. You’ll get better the more you fight,” he comforted, leaning forward and resting his forehead against her crest as he whispered the worst softly. “You like fighting, yeah?” he asked, like he did every so often to make sure his pokemon did, in fact, want to keep battling. When she immediately gave her affirmative answer, he grinned. “Then we’ll keep going. You’ll be a terror in no time. An adorable terror, but a terror nonetheless,” he told her.

He was pretty sure “adorable terror” was an oxymoron, but he was also sure that Bellatrix wouldn’t care one bit about that.

Sure enough, the more he spoke, the better the Water type felt, so he kept going after that. It was always tough to deal with a loss, especially with how proud and motivated his team was. However, it was also something that reminded him to keep improving himself, because his team needed him at his best too.

So that maybe, one day, their losses would be fewer and the victories more abundant.

[}-o-{]

“So, yeah, I should be able to teleport there as soon as the Rangers come to check on Houndoom,” he finished explaining, feeling a little guilty. “From what I was told, it should be tomorrow or the day after at the latest. I’m to call them tomorrow if they’re not here, even,” he added.

Because the day was ending and he’d gotten no message announcing the visit of a Ranger to ask for Houndoom’s testimony or whatever. So, he imagined the next day was more likely to be the day they came around. He was kind of hoping it’d be, at least, because if there was a delay or something, that’d be inconvenient.

Not that he minded keeping the Dark type family of two company, not at all, but-

“I’ll do my best to keep the school calm, shouldn’t be a problem,” Misty reassured him. “They are getting antsy, but nothing I can’t handle yet,” she added and he nodded before remembering that they couldn’t, in fact, see him. It was unfortunate that having the Dark types with him didn’t really let him teleport back to the sanctuary. He could catch them and release them later, but that was just asking for a lot of issues that weren’t that bad, in the grand scheme of things, but he’d still rather not deal with.

Wild pokemon were supposed to stay in the wild if at all possible and there were a lot of laws and regulations encouraging that.

Sure, Pierce wasn’t quite sure how much of that applied when they were basically acting as captured pokemon at the moment, traveling with him. However, there was probably still enough of a difference for them and they were acting more wild than if they dropped by the sanctuary or a city, he supposed. Inconvenient and all, Pierce would just have to trust that the system had pokemon’s best interests at heart.

Which was not something he’d have done back in his old world, at least not as blindly, but things were different in the Pokemon world. He’d seen enough to have more faith in the Pokemon world’s humanity than his own. There were still pieces of shit, evidently, but overall, society was a lot better by the looks of things. So, he felt like he could trust the League and the government.

‘Still feels very odd to do though, not gonna lie,’ he mused wryly.

“Thanks, Misty,” he replied, focusing back on the conversation at hand. “How’s the sanctuary as a whole though?”

“Progressing as expected, maybe even better than,” Grace answered, and he heard her tidying up a stack of paper sheets. “More and more is being moved to the main building as construction advances. It’s not pretty, but it’ll do for the moment. We can improve on things later down the line.”

“Function over looks. I can agree with that,” he said, getting a pleased and maybe slightly relieved hum from the other side of the line. “So, nothing I should be concerned about?”

“No, sir. But I do get the concern. Things have been going surprisingly well, I’ll admit,” Grace told him, and he wondered if maybe she was a Psychic too or something because it was like she’d read his mind. He was honestly expecting some kind of setback somewhere. Things had been going smoothly for a while, really. “Other than a few concerns that I’ve dealt with myself in your stead, nothing of note. I’ll be sending you the specifics via text, if it’s all the same to you, sir. That way you can check them yourself and verify that things are going as you wish.”

“Thank you, Grace. I’ll do that,” he said, but he was confident that she’d likely done everything exactly as he would have, if not better. Sometimes Pierce had to wonder if it wouldn’t be better to make her the boss, really. She was much better at the whole decision-making thing. Then again, she could be a little too business-minded at times, so he guessed he was there to balance things out a little.

He could do that much, at least.

“Okay, so, I have a few notes I’ll need one of you to pass to the kitchens, but other than that-” he started before pausing and blinking when his pokegear started vibrating. “Wait… Oh, I got a message from the Rangers. Seems like it’s today,” he commented. “Talk to you two later, alright? I’ll deal with this as fast as I can.”

“Of course, sir.”

“Sure thing!”

And with that, he hung up and checked that, indeed, he’d gotten a request for a prompt response. They wanted to know when he’d get the message and when he’d be turning on his emergency beacon, after all. So, writing down a quick reply, he proceeded to do just that. A quick mental command had Cygnus herding everyone back and calming all of them down. The most important was getting Houndoom and Houndour to come and sit by him, since they were – the former most of all – the ones that the Rangers would be dropping by to check on.

Some quick reassurances and encouragement, with petting and snacks included, had both of the Dark types relatively calm, if a little antsy. Hopefully the interview would go well and they could all go on with their lives. That’s what he thought, at least, but maybe he’d overestimated the speed at which the Rangers would drop by, or maybe they had underestimated how quickly he could reply to their message and be ready?

Either way, it was a good few minutes later that they saw the flash of Teleport.

“Oh, good, I thought there’d been a delay,” Pierce commented, turning with a grin that quickly turned into confusion… and then he paled. Because standing there wasn’t someone in Ranger clothing. No, they were wearing mostly black, but the one splash of color they showed only added to the concerning look.

Because it was a bright red R.

“Sorry for the delay,” the man said, a smirk on his expression. “We had to get everything ready.”

And then, more flashes came, all around their clearing. 

[} Chapter End {]

Hey guys! How’s it going?

Mornings suck, cooking with one hand is (understandably) hard, battling is difficult and the visit from the Rockets was unexpected. All in all though, a day in the life of Pierce Lawson. Nothing too exciting, but it can’t all be, right?

Why are you looking at me like that?

Anyway, I hope you guys enjoyed the chapter.

Discord Link: discord.gg/UTDransjJZ

Random Question: What’s the color of one piece of clothing you’re wearing? I have a brownish green t-shirt on.

See you.