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Ch 68 - Adapt
🕑 Added 2023-12-06 12:51:55 +0000 UTCIt was a windy day. Branches swayed. Leaves swished.
Down below in the forest, David felt very little of that. The occasional gust penetrated the weaved trunks to reach him, but at that point even a mighty gale was weakened to a wheezy gasp. He was glad to be back in the trees after so long in the city and then the plains around it. It wasn’t even midday yet and he’d already found a source of water - a narrow stream gurgling as it trickled down a mossy path. Even better than the water was the Oran berry bush beside it.
Three Oddish guarded the bush and while they had no objections to him sipping from the stream and filling his canteen, they grew less hospitable when he approached the berry bush.
Cloudburst had no such issues. The three Oddish scattered when she appeared and announced her name, much to her dismay. David nearly laughed as she called ‘Pidgey?’ after them forlorn.
Pidgey was not so enthused about the forest. More than once David caught her staring up at the canopy as a strong squall rattled the leafy roof above. While David was enjoying the shelter after how exposed the plains had been, Pidgey seemed to be missing the open sky. She wasn’t flying as much either choosing to hop by David’s side or go for short, quick bursts of flight where she wove through the trees at a pace that made David’s eyes widen and his feet move quicker in preparation for a collision.
All that said, Cloudburst wasn’t complai-
“Pidgey!”
David stopped, lowering his stance and readying himself. “What is it?”
She hopped a little to the side, flexing her wings but saying nothing else.
David waited with her, scanning their surroundings but not making any other moves. Was it another Pokemon? Usually Pidgey or he would divert their path if they detected something, but here in amongst the trees it was harder to notice Pokemon so far in advance.
Cloudburst chirped and began to hop forward again.
David followed warily as she led them slightly to the left from their previous path. She hadn’t given the all clear yet.
The shifting of leaves above became disquieting. Instead of a relaxing sound they were now a mask for a predator’s approach. The trunks that had been a safety net became ambush points. The soft grass below
“Pidge.”
With a flap of her wings, Cloudburst took flight. She lazily glided around the next few trees and disappeared from view.
David jogged to follow. Around the same trees, a small glade appeared. The grass grew longer here, not the waist high grass from the plains but thick, knee height blades that folded over themselves from the weight. On the right hand side a section had been further pressed down into the imprint of a tent. Pidgey was poking at a circle burnt into the ground a few metres from the pressed grass. It was an old campsite.
“Is it still warm?” David asked as he walked up beside Pidgey.
She scratched at the burnt soil idly.
He knelt down beside her and touched the ash. The dust felt pleasant against his finger. “Warmer than the ground. They might have stayed here last night or the day before.”
Pidgey chirped and stepped forward, fully sinking her talons into the lightly warm ash.
David brushed his hand off and stood up. They hadn’t run into anyone yet. They’d seen a few travellers from afar on the plains but none of them made any sign of wanting to meet up. David was fine with that. A little peace after Celadon was fine with him.
A few minutes later, Pidgey hopped out of the ash and joined David at the edge of the glade. They headed back into the woods, now with David watching the trees warily and Pidgey a little more relaxed.
-.-
“Now, I want you to know this is not a punishment.”
Pidgey stared back at him blindly.
“And it’s not about what happened earlier either,” David waved his hands. “And if you want to stop at anytim-”
Pidgey squawked and took to the air.
David groaned and stood up. He was regretting this decision already. They might be running low on training methods, but it couldn’t be too bad to really make sure they’d perfected the basics.
Pidgey squawked louder, weaving through the trees. A light beige haze had formed around her.
David clapped and shook himself. Right. No time to second guess himself. He picked up the first stick from a pile beside him. Pulling his arm back, he flicked it forward, sending the branch heads over tails and into.. a tree four metres from Pidgey.
Cloudburst cawed, her amusement clear.
David rubbed his eyes and picked up the next stick. It was what? Two? Three weeks since he had protested Sarah’s training method for Rattata. Now here he was throwing sticks not stones at Pidgey.
Training Tackle mid-flight was an obvious step forward for her battles. It would allow Pidgey more flexibility and give her a counter to the range attacks. Poison Stings were a problem but not one that could knock her out of the sky. David was sure Moves that could would soon appear. Coming close to the mountains in particular it was Rock type Moves - super effective against Pidgey, that disturbed his thoughts.
The issue for him only arose when it came to popping Pidgey’s Tackle bubble-shield. He wasn’t quick enough to catch her while flying and having her run into his attacks kind of defeated the purpose. She seemed to think it was simple, picking the popping stick up in her beak and tossing it at him to demonstrate.
Now, as David tried to throw sticks to hit a moving target, it was more complicated in many ways.
He missed his second attempt. Cloudburst laughed again. He wanted to remind her of the many clearings in the grove she’d left torn asunder while practising Cannon.
David hit her with his third. The Tackle popped and the stick fell back to the ground. Thrown back by the force of the pop, Pidgey did the same. With a light shrill, she fell two metres to the ground in a flapping mess as she tried to regain her balance.
David rushed over, but by the time he arrived Pidgey was already upright and fussing over her ruffled feathers.
“Maybe that’s enough for today,” David said, more than happy to stop here. They could go back to working on Peck. It would be a nice relaxing way to end the day.
Pidgey let out an awful squawk and abandoned her feathers to take to the air once more.
David groaned and walked back to his pile of sticks. She had far too much energy today. Something his second attempt at catching a Caterpie was likely to blame for.
The Bug Pokemon had been minding its own business, chomping away at a Mago berry when David and Pidgey spotted it and the bush. The Caterpie fled instantly, abandoning its pink and yellow pepper shaped treat in a mad scramble for the trees.
David attempted to hold Pidgey back during the battle that followed, asking her to hold back so he could make an attempt to capture the Pokemon. She couldn’t. One of them had lunch. David gave up on all his Butterfree hopes.
Not that he’d entirely given up on his plans. He still needed to catch another Pokemon. Butterfree wasn’t the only Bug-Flying type. David could remember others - including one with dangerous looking stingers. He hadn’t seen any Weedles yet, but Fuchsia was a Poison type gym. There had to be some nearby.
David threw another stick, his aim had only gotten marginally better, but the gaps between hits gave both him and Pidgey time to recover. She needed it more than he did, a hit still nearly guaranteed a fall for her, but David hated that it was him causing those falls.
The stick spun as it flew through the air and David winced. This one was going to hit, clipping Pidgey’s right wing or her body at the least.
The Tackle popped and David blinked his eyes. He frowned and double checked.
Pidgey let out a low confused squawk, circling back to look at where the stick now rested against a tree as well. Her Tackle had popped, but the stick had missed? How?
David’s eyes narrowed. “Do that again.”
-.-
“Well shit.”
Cloudburst chirped beside him.
After another long day of hiking through the woods they’d finally reached the mountain ridge. And what a sight it was. Smooth brown rock jutted from the earth, cutting through the soft loamy grass like a knife and streaking up to the sky. There was no real break or divide between the two different terrains, just a sudden cliff, forcing the trees to grow their canopy lopsided. It was quite a sight, made even more so by the face roughly carved into the stone.
The face wasn’t professionally carved - far from it. The left eye was lopsided, a good three or so metres below the right and the upper lip was about twice as thick as the lower. The less said about the nose and its.. nostrils? the better.
“Pi.”
“Yeah,” David said, shaking his head. It was not a good depiction. It barely looked human.
Wait.
He crouched down and picked up a rock. With a now practised arm - Pidgey’s flight Tackle training was doing him wonders, David threw the stone to crack against the rock face below the face carved into the rock.
The stone echoed as it fell.
Pidgey let out a low squawk, now focused on him.
David rubbed his neck. “Just checking.” How was he to know if this world had giant Geodudes?
Pidgey cawed and took flight, heading over to a small campsite carved into the base of the mountain. Whoever carved the face had also made a nice area for a camp.
David whistled as he followed after her. With how clean the campsite looked they would be in for an easy night. Then it would be a straight shot south, following the ridge to the bridge to Fuchsia.
When he reached the flattened stone of the campsite, Pidgey was staring up at the face again.
“What do you think?” David asked, shoulders crying with relief as he set his backpack down. “Will you carve a picture of my face someday?” He had no doubt this was done by a Pokemon. No heavy machinery was making it this far into the woods, and no human dedicated to such a large project would do it so.. roughly.
“Gey!” Cloudburst turned away from the rock face and hopped to the side of the stone basin to pick up a small branch. She hopped back and dropped it at his feet.
“Right. Training.” David rolled his neck. “Shall we see if you can do that thing again?"
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Like to sign.
Thanks to Jacob@ for setting me back on the right track for this. A more chill chapter this week.
