Outside in Cynthia’s and Caroline’s modest sized lawn, Ethan stood across from Girafarig as Lucian leaned up against a nearby wall, watching on with intrigue and a little mirth. Cynthia and Caroline had retreated inside to go over their notes, because Ethan had been pulling his hair out for the last fifteen minutes.
“You know you’re a Girafarig, two heads and all? Right?” Ethan asked, a frustration in his tone from his patience being strained.
Girafarig was either messing with him, immune to his empathetic whims, or—and he’d hate to say it—an idiot.
“Giraf!” Girafarig nodded, the same smile fastened on her face like nothing was amiss.
“And that’s your second head, right?” Ethan pointed to her tail, which also stared at him but with a focus eerily keen. It even snapped its jaws a few times like one of those chain-chompas from Mario.
“Giraf!” Girafrig nodded once again, smiling wider as she pranced a bit.
Ethan rapidly nodded, agreeing and feeling like they were getting somewhere as he leaned closer to get his point across. “And you’re going to learn Twin Beam, which fires two beams. You need it to evolve. That’s what you want, right? To evolve?”
“Giraf giraf giiiirraaaf!~!” Girafarig grew excited and practically hopped from joy, nodding along to her jumps. The tail even nodded!
He cautiously carried on… “So, like I've explained… your second head will need to shoot one of the beams. Because it’s TWIN BEAM! Twin as in two… Understand?”
And as he feared, Girafarig instantly stopped, tilted her head at him in confusion, then looked around for her ‘second head’. “Gir?”
That was what finally broke Lucian, as he burst into an uproarious laugh at Ethan’s expense. Ethan turned to the man and gave the best stink eye he could manage. “Maybe you can offer a little bit of help with your pokemon?”
Lucian shook his head. “You’re the tutor. It’s not my place to step in…”
Ethan was about to give up, when Lucian’s eyes brightened into a flush purple. A second later, Girafarig’s did the same. A few seconds passed, then Lucian waved Ethan onwards. “Try again.”
“I’m starting to not want to.” Ethan murmured, but then turned and spoke to Girafarig. “Your tail, that acts on its own… you need to shoot one of the beams from that and your mouth.” Ethan looked into the beast’s eyes. “Do. You. Understand. What. I. Am. Telling. You?”
Girafarig smiled innocently and nodded happily. Ethan, still dubious of her claim, then moved onto the move itself. “It’s a psychic move, so you should have no problems learning it. It is not a strong move, but it strikes twice—Twin beam. Get it?”
The horse-giraffe pranced about and nodded, saying she understood clearly. Ethan didn’t believe it one bit. “It’s a beam, like a laser… Do you know what those are?” After another happy nod, he carried on. “Go ahead and use your psychic energy, keep it tight and like a beam then. If you want to be an extra special girl, then you can try to use it from your head and your othe—I mean, tail at the same time. Got it?”
Girafarig focused and started doing… something? She was indeed shooting something, but it looked more like a Psybeam. Ethan had the feeling that Girafarig thought her tail was just a tail that was often called a head. He didn’t think the giraffe even realized that it acted on its own sometimes. Maybe she thought she herself made it do what it did?
“That’s your Psybeam, it’s a beam, but not the beam we want.” Lucian called out, finally vocally helping now that things were underway. He pushed off the wall and walked right up to his pokemon, then grabbed its feisty tail like it wasn’t a threat. The tail-head lunged at his hand, but he simply grabbed it by the base before it could get the job done. That left it unable to do much.
“Ethan, come talk to this one while she’s distracted.” Lucian waved him forward.
Ethan warily stepped behind the giraffe, which filled him with the same fear as walking directly behind a horse. The black tail chittered and snapped its jaw with a fury as it was being literally man-handled. When the beady eyes locked onto Ethan, it turned its anger towards him, yet Lucian held it in place.
“How about you try to use Psybeam as well? Maybe that’s all Twin Beam really is?” Ethan offered, yet the tail didn’t seem to register the words. He looked up to the back of the main head as Girafarig used another Psybeam, a thinner one which looked… surprisingly like the Twin Beam he remembered and envisioned.
“Girafarig… Can you tell your tail to copy you?” Ethan tried, hoping in his heart that this would be the weirdest and fastest tutoring he’d ever done.
“Raf!” Girafarig finished her beam, then tilted her head backwards in an unnatural angle. It looked like the poor thing broke her neck by how it bent back. She looked at her tail practically upside down then spoke some words, which seemed to mollify the giga-angry tail somewhat.
Lucian swiftly let go of the base of the tail, as it was mildly distracted, and they both watched as the two heads stared at each other in the most awkward silent conversation known to man and poke kind…
“What are they—” Ethan was cut off as Girafarig shot her newly minted beam straight at her tail, and the tail reacted by shooting one of its own at the main head. The two beams met in a clash of purple and white like two dueling wizards… then the purple faded, leaving only the white of evolution.
Girafarig was a smaller pokemon, the size of a pony—not quite as large as a horse. That quickly changed as her body and neck grew and grew. The body practically doubled—nearly tripled in size. The neck stretched and stretched, as well as grew thicker and adorned four ‘horns’ with black bulbs up top.
The white light of evolution flashed a final bright burst, then revealed the newly minted Farigiraf who stood nearly ten feet tall. Now, she was in proper giraffe shape.
“Idiot savant?” Were the first words to christen the evolution, which came straight from Ethan’s dumbfounded mouth.
Lucian lightly swatted him upside the head for the remark about his pokemon, then strode in front of the now extremely happy Farigiraf. It was cute when the pony sized pokemon pranced and danced in joy, it was kind of frightening when the new ten foot tall pokemon did it. She whipped her neck about like a pasta noodle, playing with her new very long neck.
Lucian and Farigiraf had a psychic conversation, and Ethan noticed as he walked in front of the new huge pokemon the ‘hood’ covering the head, which used to be the former tail. The beady black eyes watched him move as the head within the hood spoke with Lucian… then the mouth closed…
The hood slowly closed its mouth, hiding the main head within and looked about, as if controlling the body.
Ethan turned and left… He’d seen enough weird shit for the day.
—--------------------------------------
Walking around Celestic Town by himself was very different than when he walked around or arrived with Cynthia. Sure, he still got a few looks about being ‘the guy’ Cynthia showed up with, but not everyone had seen that. There were a handful of trainers, kids in their late teens mostly, who stood out more than he did that grabbed most of the attention.
He wasn’t going anywhere specifically, just wandering around taking in the sights.
Unlike Eterna City, which boasted nicely paved roads and was more mountainous than he’d like, Celestic Town was full of a fantasy feel. Grass littered between cobblestone walkways and the rustic style homes and close-knit community made him feel wildly out of place—almost as if he was on a vacation to a faraway country. The wild pokemon were also different from Eteran City.
Eterna City, from what he gathered, was more urban. Glameow and Rattata prowled or scurried within the shadows. This town had others. Some of them were even familiar from the forest, if not directly by Berry Falls.
“Beee?” Came the slow moan of a Bibarel, who sat on his butt by the side of the road without a worry in the world. It questioned the shadow that loomed overhead, Ethan’s shadow.
“Hello.” He greeted the pokemon as he looked about for if it had a trainer. It was quite rare to see evolved pokemon in the wild, in his experience.
Bibarel leaned over to grab one of the many chewed up logs next to it, then began to gnaw. He wasn’t sure if they were there specifically for the pokemon, or if the pokemon had gotten into someone’s firewood supply. The wood was too far gone to make out.
Seeing as the pokemon ignored him, or was too simple or busy to interact, Ethan gave the pokemon a pat on the head and moved onto another familiar pokemon.
Off in a small pond—and he meant, small, as it was a little more than a fairly deep puddle ten feet in diameter—a trio of bright blue Wooper whooped and splashed to their hearts content. They must have felt his curiosity, as all three perked up and turned to face him as he exited the small path. “Woop!” “WOOOOP!” “Wooper!”
One of the Wooper began to wiggle, burying itself into the mud beneath the water, practically disappearing from sight. The other two Woopers stared at him with open mouths, their frilly axolotl gills twitching, curious as to why a weird human was watching them. “Would you like some berries?” Ethan offered, holding out two Orans.
The two Wooper didn’t move for a second, then one began to bury himself like the first. The third and final Wooper waddled out of the water as Ethan placed a berry on the ground for it. Woopers didn’t have arms, so watching the pokemon kowtow before him to suck up the berry into its mouth was pretty comical. It swiftly backed away, like most wild animals after taking a treat from a human, then followed suit with their friends, going into the mud.
Moving on, Ethan found a very small park with two benches and let out Pachirisu and Pichu to climb the trees that housed many Pidgey, Starly, and even a singular Spearow. It was the first time he’d ever seen a Spearow, and it looked just as sharp and predatory as he’d imagined. Many of the birds fluttered away as Pachirisu and Pichu climbed the trees. Two electric strangers were probably too scary for the wild flying types to handle. Surprisingly, he didn’t spot any Caterpy, Weedle, or Wurmple around, like he expected. Those bugs littered Eterna Forest and were in every other tree you came across.
Ethan sat there and watched his two pokemon explore a bit and just… relaxed. It’d been a long time since he relaxed somewhere that wasn’t Berry Falls. Often, he found himself thinking about what his life would be like if he never went back to the clearing that started it all. Berry Falls was his home now, and being away from it for extended periods of time made him worry. Did he miss potential customers by leaving every so often? He hoped not, but the thought was always there.
Business had been slow, to put it kindly. It was practically non-existent past the first wave of visitors he had so many months ago. Girafarig aside, he reality enjoyed tutoring pokemon, but it seemed tutoring wasn’t a very good field to make a living in. He’d like to breed pokemon, but the moral implications and difficulty in finding pairs to breed was troublesome. The type of pokemon also mattered a lot, as people often only wanted to buy rare or popular pokemon, such as Eevee or regional starters.
If he begged, he was sure that he could get a pair of Eevee or something that people would like, but it felt wrong to ask for it after all the assistance everyone had already given him. He wanted this to be something he himself did. Cynthia already meddled in it by bringing up the Indeedee, which he wasn’t even sure he would accept yet…
His life was starting to pick up, and wild and wondrous things happened every other week…
…
…..
……
Maybe going on a mini-journey, since work was so slow, wasn’t such a bad idea.