The rest of the day I traveled as far as I could. My endurance had gotten better, drawing off of my Pokemon who were destined to overtake me in all ways. The singing we did as we jogged forward was more diverse than before, country music with Famous Friends, Counting Stars representing pop rock, even Catchy Song from the Lego Movie.
As always either Puff or I lead the chorus and traded back and forth, learning from each other. With the singing as a distraction, we kept jogging farther and farther until someone needed a break. Everyone but me had some biological or move bullshit working to help them but I was no slouch either. Running was something I always had done, be it training or for my life.
At some point though, I felt some wind lifting me up and pushing at my back. It was clear that Puff was working on her tailwind while singing such vibrant and lively songs. Sing wouldn't work with these songs as it was, but I had an idea to adjust it that I was itching to try. See, the core part of why sing works is this runic mechanism that causes sleepiness. If I could change the base sleepiness to another feeling, then I think we could run all night.
Fly intermittently unleashed powerful sparks, trying to destroy the trees on the side of the path. Her move structures were getting gradually smaller, adding some extra ones when she had space on her body to add more. She also howled to the sun as loudly as she could for her favorite chorus parts.
I could feel them growing and had a slight feeling on how they were feeling. I was getting closer to them as we enjoyed the lack of problems and our traveling went uninterrupted for the whole day. Anything violent had probably gotten forced farther away but Ian and I kept a look out for such things.
While we were walking once, Spritzee fluttered down from where he was flying. He was the one struggling to keep up the most to the point that I considered carrying him instead. Touching him was not going to work as I hadn't been able to do anything about the dark energy controlling my emotions. Every time I tried to move it or even touch the clump ended in a sharp pain like my whole body suddenly loosing circulation, so I had to come up with something else.
In the end, he used fairy wind on himself to help him along. Puff worked on expanding her tailwind and making a real wind stream out of it and had some success. Sin even tried teaching him focus energy to get him to go faster and Ian trying to reverse his energy draining touch with destiny bond. Everyone tried helping him as best they could, not only while singing but also while practicing themselves.
Everyone except my pupper that is, who rarely looked back to make sure we were still there and was blissfully leading us to who knows where along route 11. The old red brick road seemingly stretched over the horizon with plenty of berry bushes right off the route. The trees were still the same variety, I think, all woody like with dark green pine needles being their only differentiator.
I saw Puff show Spritzee agility and this demonstration reminded me that Fly had no setup moves. That would change, as in addition to shooting electricity at trees, I told Puff to also teach the electric type at the same time as Spritzee.
It was after we broke for lunch that anything happened. Sin beat up and killed a Paras and Fly did the same. I held Ian back instead of letting him go kill whole squad of Buneary or something. Lately, we had a lot of leftover meat that I had gave to wild Pokemon back in Darklauf. I wanted others to get used to hunting as well and stop wasting as much food. I watched as well as Fly paralyzed the poor bug completely and electrocuted it until it was already cooked. Some brave Pokemon were checking us out, but a Bewear carrying lots of berries showed up and they all cleared out. It had two Stufful following it and it even brought a picnic blanket.
What I noticed was the macho brace wrapped around its left arm. It was obviously a trained and released Pokemon, strong too, so I went over to give it some roasted mushrooms as a gift. It awkwardly handed me some berries which I offered to Puff. She had her own that we had foraged from the plenty planted around the path but she didn't say no, filling her stomach to contentment and having leftovers she sneakily stuffed in my backpack.
The Stuffels wandered over to us under their parent's watchful, and creepy, gaze. Fly tried sniffing one and got smacked in the face. I rose to recall her, but the Stuffel was the one whining instead, seemingly apologizing.
Fly wasn't sure how to handle this situation, too young herself, so she accepted the apology and went on to play with the normal type. The other one sniffed at my stuff and crawled all over me which was when I noticed it wore an everstone on a collar. It crawled into my lap, earning a jealous gaze from my pup. She ran over with her new friend and demands were made all around for pets and scratches and I was willing to offer such. All the while I kept glancing at the macho brace. The brace was an item that increased strength and I kind of wanted it. I stayed for lunch longer than I wanted to and finally broached the question when the dad finished eating.
"Um, I'm not sure how to ask this but is there a way I could get you to give me your brace there? I can trade for it or do something for you but it would be a big help in my journey" I looked uncomfortably into the Bewear's eyes as he stared at me for a solid minute.
Right when I was about to apologize he said something which Ian translated "He seems to want a break from his kids. Says he'll give the brace to us if we watch these two for a week."
"Is that alright? I mean giving your children to strangers you just met?" I asked, more assured. Another string of Be and wears later and a threat was translated.
"Says that if you did anything, he'd find you. Haha, guy's got the right idea" Ian laughed.
"I wouldn't do anything, I promise. But if you want them back in a week should we stay here or can we meet up somewhere else? I would like to earn that macho brace if I can but I also want to continue on" it would not be worth a week's effort staying here just for one item. Heck, if I did great on this next badge I could get it for 900 points if the other gyms were anything to go off.
Another blank stare later and he put his hand on my shoulder. "He'll find us. Haaaaa he says don't you worry. This guy's a riot" Ian was loving the dark humor at work.
The Stuffel's squealed in delight and their dad walked off only to return seconds later with a leather satchel filled with berries. When I looked closer it had a name scratched into the nice bag, Ken Lauders.
He handed the satchel to me and walked off again, apparently ready to take his time off parenting. Bewear spoke a little louder as he walked away and Ian translated one last time as the Stuffels swarmed over me.
It took Ian longer to stop laughing this time, the whole time the three Pokemon acting like children jumped all over me and I was manhandled into giving them rides. Puff was doing something with my pokedex for some reason, aiming its...wait the pokedex has a camera!
Before I could smile for Puff who was taking pictures of me Ian settled down "He said, 'Do better than the last guy' hahaha good luck there kid. This old soldier is rooting for you!" He lowered his voice to a growl when he imitated Bewear.
I wasn't very convinced he was as he laughed out loud again at how threatened my life could become if I somehow messed up this simple task. There were some Murkrow who joined him who he proceeded to fury cutter them into fainting "Only I get to laugh at him alright chumps?"
Maybe he did have my back after all.
A camera clicked loudly and I got whacked in the knee such that it rattled into my other knee hard. Ian laughed more, floating over to Puff who didn't have my back at all. She was using the noise of the camera taking a picture to make the very strong fighting types attack me out of surprise and reflex. After a couple more loud clicks, one of them whined and rolled onto its back which caused the other two to do the same.
"Don't you dare Fly" I warned before she imitated them.
