Chapter Thirty-One - Tippy-Taps

Choco woke up to a tippy-tapping sound from somewhere below him, and the faint grunts of an annoyed pokemon. They were familiar annoyed grunts.

Blinking, Choco shifted on the spot. He was wedged in next to Broccoli, but she had rolled over and was sleeping spread out across the bed while making faint little 'me me me' sounds. He yawned and almost went back to sleep when he heard an "Azu!" from below.

Rubbing at his eyes, Choco sat up, then crawled to the edge of the bed. He stuck his head off the side and looked down. The room was dark, but it was very slowly getting to be lighter as the sun started to turn the sky towards a paler blue.

The darkness made it all the easier to see that there was some light coming from under the bed.

They had bunk beds, which Broccoli confirmed was the best kind of bed. There was one above (theirs) and one below (Jazz's). Jazz didn't sleep with her pokemon because Bellsprout got 'grabby' when they slept, and Sage was a ghost who liked to haunt the pokemon centre overnight.

Choco rolled off the side of the bed and fell all the way down to the floor, landing with a soft pat on his paws. He tilted his head to the side a little to see under the bottom bunk, and that's where he discovered Azurill.

The little blue fish was staring back at him, looking very guilty.

On the floor in front of her was Jazz's human square thing, the one with the videos on it and the buttons. "Bun, buneary?" What are you doing?

"Azu." Nothing.

Choco blinked, a little more awake now, and continued to stare. Eventually, Azurill shifted from side to side and kicked the machine with one of her little round feet. It barely moved.

"Azurill, azu azu! Rill," she said with a pout. I wanted to use this, but I can't.

He grinned. "Buneary, bun bun." Probably fish proof.

A Water gun smacked him right in the face, and he spluttered. "Bun!" Hey!

"Azu! Azurill. Az azu!" Be quiet. If you're just going to be stupid, then go away.

Choco wiped at his face, then grumbled as he walked under the bed and squeezed himself in next to Azurill. He poked at Jazz's phone, and the screen lit up. "Buneary." It's working.

"Azurill." I know that. She rolled her eyes next to him. She'd stolen that expression from Jazz, just like she'd stolen Jazz's phone.

Choco decided not to lord over Azurill because he had little paw-hands that could use the screen and she was stuck having to stomp on it. The machine still confused him. There were little symbols that did things when pressed, but he didn't know what they meant. A lot of them had pokeball shapes, and a few looked like pokemon-shaped icons, but he couldn't figure out the rest.

He hadn't discovered how to understand human scribbles yet, though Broccoli said that he could learn if he wanted. She'd read him some of the thin paper books they had in those racks by the pokemon centre door. They had pictures and lots of scribbles just like these.

"Bun, buneary," he said with a shrug. Sorry, I can't figure it out.

"Azu," she complained.

There were some noises above as Broccoli stretched and came awake. Azurill and Choco looked at each other.

And then the phone exploded.

Choco jumped, forgetting that he was under the bed, and Azurill fired off a full-power Water Gun that splashed across the phone, the floor, and the underside of the bed.

The phone continued to explode... or rather, it made a loud ringing noise.

Oh, he'd heard this before.

"Urgh," Jazz grumbled. "Where's phone?"

Buneary picked up the phone and wiped it across his tummy fluff to dry in, then he kicked it out from under the bed.

He and Azurill huddled close as Jazz's hand came down a bit later and patted the ground, eventually landing on the phone and touching something to turn off the noise. The arm stayed there, dangling lazily as Jazz refused to get up.

"Good morning!" Broccoli said. "Oh? Azurill? Choco? Where are you?"

Choco looked to Azurill, then they both snuck out from under the bed a bit before Broccoli's head popped out from the top bunk.

"There you are! Ready for breakfast? We've got a big day today!"

"Bun!"

"Azu!"

"Urgh," Jazz added at the end, but she still got up and rubbed at her face. Choco and Azurill made sure to hurry Broccoli along before Jazz noticed anything. He heard her muttering just as they left the room. "Why is my phone wet? What... why are my apps all shifted? Was I hacked?"

Breakfast was nice. The pokemon centre had a different menu than the one in that big city they'd been in, with pancakes with real berries for breakfast, served by a chansey with a big pink apron that Broccoli hugged in thanks.

After a taste of her pancakes, Choco gave her a hug too.

Then they went outside for early morning training. "Now that we're a little more stationary, at least for the morning, I figured we should do some real training," Broccoli said. "Choco, let's start with you!"

"Bun!" he agreed with a serious nod. He put on his game face and curled his ears in.

"I saw you move super-duper quick yesterday when Azurill was grabbed by those seagull-looking pokemon! That was very cool!"

He nodded. Yeah, he was.

"So! Let's work on mastering that trick! Moving that fast has got to be super useful in a fight, and even out of fights. It can be a dodge, and a way to get in close to attack. We can see if you can use that move to gain some height too, it'll let you fight in three dimensions. But I don't want you to give up on training your Cleaning magic! Actually, I think we're getting to the point where we can even start to branch out towards fireballs!"

"Bun, buneary!" Heck yeah!

Broccoli laughed, then turned her attention onto Azurill. "Azurill... did you want to fight too? You don't have to, not if you don't want."

Azrull thought about it, but only for a little bit. "Azu! Azurill rill." I want to learn.

"Okay then. We'll keep up the Cleaning-magic training. I think Jazz might be right about having you focus on magic for now, but we can do a bit of physical training too. We want you to grow up to be big and strong, right?"

"Azu!"

Broccoli leaned down and gave them both pats on the head. "Alright, let's get this started, then!"

The next hour or so was a lot of exercise for Choco. Broccoli ended up running into the pokemon centre and borrowing a small pad with sticky notes. She ran around the yard at the back and placed them on trees and on the fence in a few spots.

His job was to zip around as quick as he could while firing a Clean Ball (they ended up naming the move!) whenever he was close to one of the notes. Doing both things took all of his concentration.

Azurill laughed at him a lot whenever he tripped himself up, but he was getting better by the end.

Her training, in the meantime, was to fight Broccoli. Azurill spent almost the entire hour bouncing up and whipping her tail around to smack Broccoli's open palm as hard as she could. After five hits, Broccoli and Azurill sat down and they'd train on turning type energy into Cleaning-type energy. It was harder for Azurill who barely knew how to control the Water-type energy she could summon up with her Water Gun.

Jazz came around too and had Bellsprout continue to practice Acid while Sage tried to get a sense of the Poison-type stuff. It looked like it was slow going. Sometimes Jazz had Sage use Hypnosis on Bellsprout, and it worked every time. It looked like she was hoping that Bellsprout would grow a resistance to that kind of move, but it wasn't working so well.

"Okay," Jazz said as she used a pokeball to recall both of her pokemon. "That's enough of that. I'm going to get the chansey to wake Bellsprout up and check him over, then we should get going."

"Alright," Broccoli said as she stood up. She was soaked from weak Water Guns, but didn't seem to mind overly much.

"Oh, and here," Jazz said. She reached into a pocket and pulled out two little pokeballs that soon grew much bigger. She underhanded them to Broccoli who caught them out of the air. "Get your team into those, and make sure they're registered with the nurse. Don't lose them!"

"Oh, pokeballs. Wait, didn't I get some when I registered as a trainer?"

Jazz stared, then groaned into her closed hands.

Choco watched as Broccoli looked at the pokeballs and frowned a little. He hopped over and nudged her with an ear. "Bun, buneary?" Is that mine?

"If you want. Jazz made sense, but I don't want to force you guys. And I'd much rather have my friends out and about with me than stuck in a ball. That just feels wrong!"

Choco nodded. He didn't know what being inside of a pokeball felt like, but he didn't think it would be that bad. Bellsprout and Sage didn't complain, so he wouldn't either! Besides, it might be useful if they had to hide, or run, or even fight.

He nodded, showing off how brave he was. "Bun!" Let's go!

Broccoli grinned, then leaned way down and gave his forehead a smooch. He pouted to cover up the warmth in his cheeks. "Thanks Choco, you're the best."

Dang right he was!

***