(Reboot) Pokemon: Beyond the Tall Grass

As Cerise finished showering, he wrapped a towel around his lower torso before walking out, a bit surprised to see Catia in their room. He eyed her for a moment, before his eyes rested upon her Vulpix, an eyebrow slightly raised. It still wasn't clear to Cerise how she'd gotten it in such a small amount of time. Normally, he wouldn't care, but considering how Vulpix didn't even come out during the day (According to Loka, anyway), he was quite suspicious.

Speaking of which... Where had Decoda even FOUND Chimecho? Where the heck were these people getting these Pokemon from??? Realizing he'd been standing still for some time, he walked over to his bed, reaching for his bag by the bedside. Finding a suitable change of clothes, he put the shirt on before heading back into the bathroom to put on his undergarments and pants, not wanting to do that sort of thing around Catia.

Decoda stammered as he tried to yell after her, trying to get her to come back and talk to them, but she was gone before he could get any real words out.  He hung out of the window for a moment, watching the dog Pokemon follow her onto the ground by some trees, before he turned back to Catia and Cerise, who he had forgotten was in the shower.

"Well, looks like we're not gonna see her tonight," he said as he sighed again.  He then apologized to Cerise, blushing and calling to him from outside the bathroom as he walked over to the tired and shy girl.

"Hey, sorry about that, man!  I totally forgot you were in there!  Eheheh, no hard feelings?" he shrugged as he turned his attention towards Catia, not bothering to yell at Chimecho, who only wanted to let him know something.

Mudkip stretched a little and scooted away from the edge of the bed, as if it was going to share some room with the little fire Pokemon.  It seemed to smile at it too, thinking it was adorable the way it mewed.  Chimecho joined them as it finished making sure that at least Catia was okay to trust with its telepathy, even though there was something it didn't like embedded into her personal aura...  Perhaps it was what Entei blessed her with...?  It slowly began to nod off to sleep by the head of Decoda's bed.

"Sorry I woke you up," Decoda apologized to Catia, scratching the back of his head.  "I just thought it would be nice for the Pokemon to listen too.  Then again, the PokeFlute is known for waking up Snorlax... not to say you or anybody else is a Snorlax, but it has that kind of mystical property about it!  Y-You get what I'm saying!" he finished, a little flustered now.

"Anyway, I thought I heard a little bit from you before my friend Chimecho opened the door - even if it was pretty quiet, it sounded like it fit," he said, sitting back on his bed and picking up the guitar once more.  "Do you, um, maybe wanna sing again?  You don't have to really, but I am curious.  I'm a singer myself, so I could start you off."  He flicked a few strings before playing the song again, but more quietly so he could hear speech.

Catia blinks as Fox slowly crawls out of her grasp and gives a quick and graceful leap to lie down next to Mudkip. It purrs as it curls up and closes it's eyes, waiting to hear its master's beautiful voice. Catia blushes a bit when Decoda asks her to sing again. As Decoda begins to strum on his guitar, reluctantly Catia begins to hum along with the tune before she finally lets her voice out. It was very clear and it had a kind of melodic ring to it that echoed all throughout the now quiet city. It takes her a moment to realize that she's let her voice out and she suddenly stops, her face turning red. "U-um....I-I've never sung with someone else before....b-but my mom did teach me a lullaby that she used to sing to me when I was little. I don't know if you'll be able to play but....if you want to hear it....well....you know...." She says, smiling and turning even more red.

(OOC: Curious....I've never seen this version of Catia blush like that from being with another musician type. Is Decoda feeling something for her or is that just me?)

((OOC: I think it might be too early to tell if anyone has any sort of romantic feelings for each other since they all did kind of just meet, but who knows, maybe down the road anyone could bond more and eventually get together? ))

Decoda swung his head back and forth to the gentle music.  It didn't sound bad at all, harmonizing pretty well with the soft tune of the guitar.  He was curious to see how she would do with a more aggressive melody, something more his style, but he wanted to do something peaceful for the night.  He stopped his playing to listen to her talk about the lullaby - that would be perfect before they got the sleep they all deserved!

"I don't see why you're so shy about it.  You've got a very nice voice," he smiled and looked around at the sleeping Pokemon for a moment.  How adorable they all were~

"I think they agree.  But what about this lullaby?  Does it have any accompaniment?" he asked, tapping lightly on his instrument.  "It doesn't have to, of course, but I don't think Cerise and I would mind for a listen.  You can start anytime."

While he never had coaching for his instrumental or vocal work, he had lots of time and energy to practice and hone his skills.  When it came to talking to people about their skills - unless it was a Jigglypuff, Wigglytuff, any other singing Pokemon - he would always try to give good advice on the matter.  Like Brock, he wanted to positively enforce all talents, especially the things he was good at.

Catia nods shyly when Decoda encourages her to sing a little bit more before they all went back to sleep.  "I have to apologize in advance if....I'm a little rusty....it's been a little while since I've sung this song."  She admits to Decoda, clearing her throat quietly before closing her eyes and concentrating on the lyrics to her song.

Then, she began to sing.

At this point, Cerise enters the room again, fully clothed again. Moving past Catia, he collapses onto his bed, his legs too sore to keep him up any longer. He'd heard some of the music that Decoda and Catia had been harmonizing on, but his mind was on other things. Those three beings from before... assuming they'd caused the explosion, what was their intent behind doing so? To spread disarray? Or something deeper? The young male closed his eyes in thought, his arms behind his head. Something deeper was going on here, but Cerise was in no position to fully understand the bigger picture. Could there be a connection to those renegade teams and the Resistance Erika was a part of? No... it was probably too early to try to draw connections like that. He'd have to investigate more. But considering what those three... things were capable of, he was a bit worried. Of course, he had a few tricks up his own sleeve, but nothing quite in that caliber...

He opened his eyes, looking down at Chespin, who had fallen asleep on the pile of Cerise's clothes. The trainer faintly smiled. At least Chespin was unharmed, and that was what mattered most. Actually, all of the trainer's Pokemon had made it out alright. Staring at the ceiling fan, Cerise's thoughts were scattered. Perhaps it would be better to set aside these thoughts for now and focus on things that were in his control. Like the Game Corner. Speaking of which...

Cerise reached down for his pack, searching for his coin case to count the coins he'd gotten that day. Before the explosion, he'd gathered a pretty decent amount, but combined with the coins he'd snatched from the other machines? He might be able to actually get a great prize! He began to count the coins he had.

Decoda and Catia sang and played music well into the night, and Cerise counted that he ended up with ~1100 Coins; a decent haul, even though he scrambled for a few of them. That didn't matter anymore. They were his earnings!

So on the melodic notes, Their first day as real trainers come to a close.

Good night, sweet trainers. May tomorrow bring more surprises!

(Catia fell asleep on the floor, cuddling Vulpix)

(Wow 21 pages later, Day One finally closes. THIS makes me happy.)

((MANY CONGRATTLES TO YOU, ADMIN LUNA!!))

Decoda got up the next day and got to the shower before anyone else could awaken, thanks to those morning jogs with the Pewter Gym crew that conditioned his body in such a way.  The bed was comfy enough for him to feel like he got an alright's night sleep, and after donning his pants and jacked once more, he began to put away his guitar and pester his two Pokemon awake.

"Hey Mudkip, Chimecho.  Time to get up."

"Kiiiiiiip," the mudfish yawned, and a soft morning jingle came from the psychic Pokemon.

"Good morning!" she said cheerfully, circling her friend.  Decoda chuckled and placed his hat upon his head, stringing his bangs through the loop in the back.  He then turned to Cerise, Chespin, Catia and her Vulpix, who had all spent the night there.

"Hey guys, I'll head down and grab some breakfast, take your time getting up," he said softly to them. He then headed out the door with his companions, case strapped to his back as usual.

"Now, what kind of grub can we grab for everybody?"

((( Yeah!! Let's keep going strong! )))

Cerise awoke to Chimecho's soft jingles and slowly opened his eyes, waving a hand at Decoda as the older trainer left the room. Cerise sat up in his bed, eyeing the coin case. He should probably eat first before hitting up the Corner again. He smiled to himself, knowing full well how addicted he'd gotten to the machines in such a short amount of time. He reached over to the nightstand to grab his glasses before wrapping his bandana around his untamed hair.

Not quite willing to go downstairs yet, Cerise stood slowly, stretching his arms as he did so. He walked over to the window, staring at the early morning sun with a grin on his face. He stood there for a moment, enjoying the warm air on his face. Feeling a familiar weight on his shoulder, he lifted a hand to his shoulder, high-fiving Chespin.

He walked back over to the bed, grabbing the coin case and his wallet before neatly folding the blankets and sheets he had slept in.

Loka made her way back to the pokemon center, returning Blitz and Sai back to their respective balls as she looked up at the open window of Cerise and Decoda's window. 

"Alright... Up we go!" she muttered to herself.

With a high jump and a bit of scaling up the side of the center, she pulled herself up and perched, perfectly balanced on the window sill.

"Good morning, comrades." she spoke, no one probably expecting her where she is.

Decoda had found some baked goods downstairs as relief breakfast for the injured or traumatized visitors.  Nurses, Chanseys and Blisseys roamed about, along with a few Officers asking people questions.  He made friendly banter with a Nurse Joy who offered him some croissants and cookies, and then took off back upstairs to deliver the goodies in his arms.  When he got back up, Chimecho opened the door for him and the three entered to find Cerise and Chespin up and at 'em and Loka in the window sill, staring in.

"Well, well, well," he chuckled in surprise, nearly dropping the pastries in his hands.  "Look who decided to join us~?"

He tossed her a large cookie and once he had Cerise's attention, passed him a croissant and cookie.  He saved one for himself and two cookies for his Pokemon.  He also put Catia's portion (3 cookies and a croissant) on a napkin on top of the dresser.

"They were giving these out for free, so I grabbed as much as I could." Then he noticed Cerise' coin case out. "You gonna hit the jackpot today, dude?" he jested with a grin, very much hoping for him to score big and get something cool from the Prize Counter.

Loka caught the cookie before it flew out the window, not messing up her balance in the slightest. 

"Thanks." she nodded.

Sai and Blitz let themselves out and sat in front of Loka, yawning. She split the cookie into three pieces and tossed two to her pokemon. She munched on her part and looked at her teammates.

"So what's the plan for today? We gonna leave Celadon? Or chill anotha' day."

Catia hears Decoda leave and Cerise get up so she slowly opens her eyes and sits up, yawning and stretching a bit.  After rubbing her eyes a bit, she notices Fox had gotten up and was pawing at her for food.  Giggling a little bit, she gets up and sits back onto Decoda's bed just as Loka gets to the window.  She smiles happily at her.  "Good morning Loka."  She greets the ex-ranger.  Realizing that she had left Fox's bottle in the girl's room, she gets up quickly with Fox in her arms and leaves to retrieve it from her bag.  After grabbing it, she sees that she has just enough food left for her this morning and makes a note to herself to run to the department store to stock up before they leave today.  Returning to the boy's room, she sits down on the bed and cradles Fox into her arms to feed her, just as Decoda had come back with a croissant and three cookies for her.  She smiles at him.  "Thanks Decoda.  I need to run to the department store today to get more food for Fox and my normal clothes need to be washed before we leave town.  I only have one more outfit to travel in besides this nightgown and I am not traveling in this for the rest of our adventure."  She tells Loka and the two boys.  After finishing feeding Fox, she gently puts the bottle aside and begins to eat her share of the breakfast stuff for that morning.  It wasn't much of course, but it was something after all!

"Haha, I was actually thinking about going back to the Corner later." Cerise replies to Decoda, splitting the croissant and cookie between himself and Chespin. Noticing that the halves of the cookie and croissant he'd just split were uneven, he shrugs before giving Chespin the larger pieces to eat. The trainer wasn't too hungry himself, but it would be better to have something in his system rather than nothing.

Now finished making the bed, Cerise also fluffs the pillows a bit, before grabbing the clothes pile Chespin had slept in overnight. He nodded to himself before putting the once again folded clothes into his bag, just recalling that he wanted to find a washer and dryer for his clothes. "Although, getting new clothes after yesterday's fiasco is also on my list."

((Artwork for the RP here!!))

"So it sounds like we're gonna be here for a little while longer, plenty of time for errand running and a little bit of gambling."

"Kip!" Mudkip shouted, finishing its cookie and shaking off the crumbs.

"I don't want to go back to that place, Decoda..." said Chimecho, only to her trainer.  He looked at her as he stuffed the rest of his pastry into his face.  He nodded and rolled his eyes slightly.  Especially after the events of yesterday, he figured she was afraid of that old creepy place behind the Game Corner and the Corner itself.  To be fair, if you were abandoned in a strange old place by your old trainer/abuser, would you want any sort of reminder of that awful area?  Probably not, and Decoda could sympathize with that feeling.  Even though he wanted to see Cerise win and he wasn't really comfortable going shopping in the women's department, he thought of another idea he could do in the meantime.

"Alright, so while you guys are doing that, I'll be roaming around town to see if I can find any more clues about what happened.  But I'll stay within proximity, just in case you guys need any help!" he added discretely.

Catia sighs at Decoda's suggestion. "Decoda, if you really want to know what was going on last night, why don't you ask the one who interacted with those three that had caused it?" She asks, a little annoyed that she wasn't asked first. She was the only one who interacted with them directly after all. It made the most sense. "I have to go and talk to the professor about it anyway so you might as well come run errands with me. And if you're lucky...." She blushes a bit. "Maybe....we can sing together again. I um....I liked it when we did that last night." She asks him, smiling sheepishly at him.

A bead of sweat dropped off his face as he wiped the crumbs away from his mouth.  He'd forgotten she was only one to fully interact with the mysterious trio.  Well, if he was going to get answers, it would be easiest to start with who and what was known.

"Right, right," he repeated, his eyes darting about awkwardly, a light blush quickly rising and fading within seconds.  "We can talk about that on the way to the department store. We also might be able to make a little travel money on the side if we do a show - I used to do those all the time when I didn't have anything big planned. It might be a good idea to help calm all the scared people involved with that, anyway. But only if you want to, Catia! I don't mind preforming solo, if you don't want to," he added quickly, putting up both his palms towards her as a sign of respectfully acknowledging her opinions.

"Then there's the subject of wanting the police to get involved with what little we know... Should we lie about what happened to us if we get asked by any of the Officers?" he questioned towards the whole group.

Catia blushes a deep red when asked to perform a show and she starts to shift anxiously.  "U-um....w-well I um....I don't know about doing a show....I'm not that great....b-but I would like the money at the same time....I just....I don't know...."  She stammers nervously.  Despite her tomboyish attitude and appearance, Catia seemed to have a rather shy side to her.  She reluctantly meets Decoda's gaze.  "I-I just....what would I sing though?  I don't know very many songs to be honest."  She admits, Fox staring at Cerise's Chespin for a while before tilting her head and mewing at it.

"It's not like we know much about what happened yesterday. Random explosion, mysterious people ran off. We could probably pin it on one of those renegade teams, honestly. I don't think anyone would question it too much." Cerise replied to Decoda as he finished his croissant. His gaze wanders about the room for a bit. "But it is a matter of concern for us..."

Finally, he looks over at Catia, eyes examining her intently. "Have you felt different at all since yesterday? What exactly did those three people say to you?"

Catia shifts nervously. "That boy....he kissed me on the forehead. I know you all saw that before they ran off. He....he said he gave me his blessing or something. Ever since then....I dunno. The only thing that I've really noticed is that my body has felt much warmer than usual. Not that Fox here minds a warmer sleeping buddy I'm sure." She says, grinning at Fox and scratching her behind her ears and causing her to mew in delight. She turns her attention back to Cerise. "I can tell you more but I really think I should get started with my errands today while we still have the time. You're welcome to come with me and Decoda shopping and such if you want. I have to speak with the professor about what happened too so coming with me would probably be the best way for you to figure out what happened." She tells Cerise. Turning towards the door, she glances back at Decoda. "I'm going to go and change. Wait for me downstairs okay? I'll be down as soon as I'm done I promise." She tells him with a quick wink before leaving to go and change her clothes.

Loka was still perched in the windowsill, watching this exchange. She turned around so she was facing out towards the city.


"I should prolly let ya'll change an' get ready." She spoke looking at them over her shoulder. "I should prolly do the same. ANYways, I'll meet y'all in the lobby, k?"

She hopped out the window and grabbed a drain pipe between the window of the boy's room and the window of the girl's room, swinging herself through the second window right as Catia opened the door to their room. She landed in a crouched position, then stood up, dusting herself off.

"Oh hey." she smiled a bit. "Fancy meetin' ya here! Imma grab a quick shower, If ya don't mind."

She walked into the bathroom and shut the door. By the time Catia finished picking her clothing and changing, Loka walked out of the bathroom, a towel wrapped around her as steam rose from her body; something that happened to Catia last night when she got her shower.

"Sorry, forgot somethin'." She went through her bag quick and grabbed a couple of new hair-bands before retreating into the bathroom again. She came back out in her usual clothing, which also looked fairly clean. Steam now rose from her hair as she naturally dried it.

Catia smiles as she finished putting on her clothing: jeans and a dark red half-shirt. Upon putting away her hat, Loka briefly sees a large scar on her back, now mostly covered by the dark red half-shirt as she lets her hair down and flips it a bit to let it come down more comfortably. She smiles at Loka as she sees her come out of the shower. "Was the water nice? I had to turn mine to almost full cold before it was comfortable for me to use." She asks her.

"I always shower cold." She replies, now putting on her eyepatch. (Yeah Catia saw her without it~) Before she put it on, Catia can see that there is nothing there. Her eye was literally missing. "My body temperature is naturally high, so Cold never bothers me."

Loka sees Caita's scar but doesn't pay too much attention to it; Everyone has scars. Wether they be physical or emotional. Loka had a lot of those too.

Catia sees Loka's missing eye and her expression suddenly grows serious. She sets Fox down and smiles at her. "Be a good girl and stay in your pokeball for now okay? Mommy needs to do something." She tells her, the Pokemon mewing in understanding before Catia puts Fox into her pokeball. Sighing, she turns back to Loka. "It was you who was crying last night wasn't it? And don't lie to me, someone's crying from the roof woke me last night." She says, her eyes turning soft as she sits onto her bed. "Before I go out and shop for things, I think we should stop keeping a few of our secrets to ourselves. And I don't just mean you....I have several of my own...." She says, a twinge of pain in her eyes.

Loka finished fixing her patch then looked up at Catia.

"...And what if it was?" she narrowed her eye dangerously. She didn't like where this was heading. "And what secrets? You only think I'm hidin' secrets is cuz yer too afraid to approach me outright!"

She crossed her arms, staring down Catia, much colder then she usually stares. Loka took a breath and uncrossed her arms, moving to the window. She gripped the windowsill so tightly, smoke started to rise from where she was holding. It seemed that the windowsill was close to catching on fire.