#anyway there's so much i could say about meowth but i think it's already been said

[front-facing-pokemon]

[yamujiburo]

Why I Love Hanamusa

I get this question very frequently but have never given a really in depth, definitive answer. All just kinda implied through my comics and spread out asks. So here's this I guess! Long post ahead:

First, as a Pokémon fan in her mid 20s, I love seeing a ship where the characters are both in their mid/late 20s. Already, they’re much more relatable to me and my current experiences. Most Pokémon ships are between preteens, which can be cute but ultimately don’t interest me as much as they used to when I was a kid myself. Not enough to get super invested in and draw a lot of fanart for anyways haha.

I’ll also start by saying that canon doesn’t always influence whether or not I’ll ship something. I’m much more drawn to potential. Could the characters work together? Do their personalities work together in a nice way? I feel like this so much of fanon is anyways. Especially with queer relationships because they’re rarely depicted in the first place. A lot of the context for these ships is usually up to the fans to piece together or make up in general. And that’s the fun part to me!

Jessie and Delia have only met in the anime a handful of times. Any interaction they’ve had has either been pleasant, or just a typical Team Rocket interaction, with Delia dismissing them/not seeing them as a threat. Already a great jumping off point for me since, truly, they don’t have any actual beef or true, ill feelings towards each other. It’s not TOO out of the realm of possibility for them to potentially fall for each other. “But Jessie chased Delia’s son around trying to steal his Pokémon!” That’s where that dismissive and aloof attitude that Delia has comes into play. I’ll go more into Delia’s whole deal a bit later but I do think this aspect of her personality is a large reason why this ship can work. It’s not that she doesn’t care that Jessie has a bad past, but she can tell that, on the inside, Jessie’s a good person. And, in a scenario where Jessie is trying to become a better person, is forgiving enough to give her a shot. I feel like this is such a solid foundation for a ship. A character who has done wrong but is trying to be better and another character who is willing to help them be better. A classic dynamic!

It’s not just one-sided though; where Jessie is the only one benefitting and learning from the relationship. I believe Delia could get a lot out of being with someone like Jessie. To understand why, I think it’s important to know these characters’ respective backstories.

Jessie is an orphan/foster child who grew up in poverty. Her mother Miyamoto (from The Birth of Mewtwo) was a Team Rocket operative herself, who went on a mission to find Mew. In order to do this, she had to leave Jessie when she was just a toddler. Unfortunately, Miyamoto went MIA on her mission leaving Jessie to more or less fend for herself. Jessie went through life with zero stability, evident by her MANY different careers and constant moving around. It’s implied in the show that she went from foster home to foster home, and later in life tried being an idol, weather girl, florist, wine connoisseur, actress, most notably a nurse and finally a Team Rocket field agent. And even while in Team Rocket, she, James and Meowth were always doing odd jobs to get by. We see that Jessie used to be a sweet kid, and even adult, but the world and her circumstances repeatedly did her dirty, leading her to become the character we know today. Hot tempered, mean, selfish, etc. But despite this, her soft side does still shine through for the people and Pokémon she cares about. She is incredibly loyal.

Delia, unbeknownst to a lot of fans, also had a rough past (see Pocket Monsters: The Animation). Like Jessie, she had a lot of dreams and aspirations like wanting to be a model and even a trainer. But when she was 10, her mother didn’t let her, telling her that she had to stay home and learn to run the family restaurant (she’s an only child). Delia’s father left her and her mother to be a trainer, and never returned. When she was 18, she married Ash’s father and became pregnant shortly after. But right after Ash was born, he also set off to be a Pokémon trainer. And soon after that, her mother passed away, leaving Delia with just the restaurant and baby Ash. This gives so much context to Delia’s attitude in the show. We see that Delia is pained whenever Ash leaves on a journey, but she never shows that pain to anyone. ESPECIALLY Ash. She’s very quick to shoo him off when he shows any sign of wanting to go on another journey and even when he returns home, she acts more excited to see Pikachu than him almost every time. Without all this backstory, it’s easy to just read this as a funny gag, BUT with context, I think it really shows how quickly Delia shuts down and detaches in order to not confront her own feelings. She’s afraid of losing people and getting hurt again.

All that said, I think Jessie and Delia provide each other with EXACTLY what the other needs. 

Aside from becoming rich and famous, Jessie’s biggest aspiration is to get married. In my opinion, this is more so an underlying want for love and stability. There is no one more stable in the show than Delia. Delia’s lived in Pallet her whole life, she’s worked at the same restaurant since she was young and she is always there when Ash comes back home. She has all the love, patience and stability Jessie needs and craves. While forgiving, Delia’s not stupid and can keep Jessie in check. Delia’s also just an angel, which I feel, would make Jessie want to be better. And on top of all this, on more of a surface level, Delia’s a chef and excellent cook. She shows love through cooking and Jessie, who grew up poor, regularly starving and eating snow, happily receives that love. Jessie’s able to live a happy and healthy life with someone like Delia.

Delia, as stated, is very stable. Likely pretty monotonous and solitary, especially living in such a small town like Pallet. This isn’t a bad thing but it’s a little sad when you consider that Delia also had dreams of traveling, being a model and a trainer. She had to give up so many dreams in order to fulfill her duties as a restaurant owner and mother. And even now, when Ash is off on his journey, she feels the need to always be home and be that stable pillar, leaving behind any ambitions she had, thinking it’s too late for her (she’s only 29 btw). But then along comes Jessie, dangerous, passionate, an absolute firecracker. Someone who’s whole life has been about chasing dreams and either, never giving up on them or finding a new dream to chase. Upon learning about Delia’s past aspirations, I could see Jessie pushing her towards them, letting her know that life’s too short and she has nothing to lose from trying. On top of this, Jessie’s also loyal. She, James and Meowth are depicted as doing anything for anyone who gives them food or shows them kindness. Delia does both so there’s no way Jessie would leave her. This fulfills an essential need for Delia, who is afraid of the people in her life leaving her.

There’s so much potential for mutual growth and learning between these two and I adore that. They compliment each other, they help each other and they bring out the best qualities in one another.

I’m not really sure how to end this and I could truly talk about them even more but I don’t want this to be tooooo long haha. OH I could end it with maybe the most funny aspect of this ship that I've brushed over and also what drew me to it in the first place. Jessie. As Ash’s stepmom. THE END.

[jhynka]

- aib boys as pokemon trainers

characters: chishiya, niragi, and arisu

genre: headcannons, fluff

synopsis: how the aib boys would be as trainers

cw: mentions of death, unedited

an: My brother's been watching pokemon masters again and I've been replaying shield and let's go so why not make a crossover? anyway, depending on how this goes and if people like this concept, i will be making one for the girls! happy reading!

SHUNTARO CHISHIYA

Psychic and Ice type trainer

His starter pokemon is obviously a Froakie, now an over powered Greninja

His team consists of Greninja, Espeon, Vanillux, Frillish (who he sometimes switches out with Solosis), a Galarian Meowth, and a mighty Kadabra.

He completed two of his Pokedexes in his first 3 years of being a trainer.

Treats his pokemon team like a sports team. he’s the coach and he trains his pokemon to be the best.

One day, he last the Pokeball containing Espeon when it was still an Eevee, he retraced his steps so far that he ended up getting lost in a forest. When he found the Pokeball, Team Rocket was already there, trying to take his Eevee. He fought them so hard that even though he got a few injuries, nevertheless he won. Letting his Eevee out, he celebrated internally, and little did he know, the Eevee was two seconds away from evolving.

Even though Greninja was his starter, his little Espeon will always be his favorite.

SUGURU NIRAGI

Fire type trainer (oops)

The team he built contains Torracat, Charizard (evolves into the Y form to be specific), Cinderace, Blaziken, Litleo, and Houndoom

Keeping things simple, he only catches fire type pokemon with a dash of fighting types.

He has huge respect for his pokemon, they're the ones fighting, not him. When they are all out of their Pokeballs, he treats them like his best friends and always takes care of them.

When in battle, he makes sure to always burn his opponent on the first move.

HATES grass-type trainers and grass-type pokemon in general. He thinks of them as useless since they're weak against most types.

His amazing pokemon story as a trainer would be when he first got his Litten in high school. The Litten he received HATED him at first. Every time he would try and train it, it would always end up with him having cat scratches all over him. It was only until his bullies at school approached him with their pokemon and tried t attack him. The Pokeball in his pocket opened by itself revealing the Litten, and Fire Fang’ed those kids back to their mommies.

from then on. he realized the problem was the Pokeball, and that he can't just be too bossy over the Litten, since it had a mind of its own as well. Every night after that, he would sleep next to the Litten like his very own companion throughout his journey.

RYOHEI ARISU

Fighting and Electric type trainer

his team has Gallade, Lucario, Luxio, Pancham, Togedemaru, and Marshadow

As the dedicated trainer he is, he’s completed 4 of his Pokedexes in just a year of training. It was mostly because he loved to collect regular pokemon and always trained them to get their evolutions instead of catching an already evolved pokemon.

Treats his pokemon like his pets, always handing out treats, playing and buying them new toys, and eating with them.

He always battles with a balance of fun and strategy. He loves to knock out the opponent on the first move, and when they switch out their pokemon, he paralyzes them.

Never uses a normal Pokeball due to his laziness, even though he’s broke, he will never buy a Pokeball. Rest assured that he’s stocked up on Great and Luxury balls.

Talking about being stocked up, he has EVERYTHING. when I say everything I mean it. He often goes away from the city for a long time to collect new pokemon. Potions, poke dolls, repellents, you name it he has it.

His Bulbasaur that he received as he started died due to some failure in its organs. That death was something instead of being grieved too much, took it as a lesson in life on how every living thing could die at any moment. He used this lesson to always spend time with the people he loves and makes sure that all his pokemon know how much he loves each and one of them, no matter how many times they fail in battle, his pokemon will always be his best friends no matter what.

[lumenflowered]

⏳

"You can't be much older than my girls," says Gascoigne, his voice a low and gravelly growl.

"That depends," Mallory says carefully, leaning on the shaft of her own axe. "How old are your girls?"

"How old are you?"

Mallory inhales sharply. What the hell, it probably can't hurt just to tell someone her age, and Gascoigne seems... trustworthy enough. More trustworthy than most of Yharnam, anyway.

"Twenty," she says. Barely.

"You're older than you sound." Gascoigne hums noncommittally. "Not by much."

She sighs. "Thanks?"

The other Hunter chuckles—and Mallory finds herself struck by the fact, for the first time in a long time, that she never knew her own father. He died, she knows, not long before she was born, in an accident her mom always insisted was nobody's fault.

(She doesn't know if her mom was being truthful, now, or if she was just trying to make a little girl feel better about something that couldn't be changed. She misses her mom.)

By the time she and Gascoigne part ways, one Cleric Beast felled and Mallory with several new tricks to try out while wielding her axe, she finds herself wishing—hoping, really—that her own father had been like Gascoigne. Quiet but strong, bursting at the seams with love for his family.

She regrets thinking that when their paths cross next. When she's forced to put an end to the beast he becomes not far from where his wife lies dead already.

...Some time later, Mallory finds her way back to the world she was born in, and she doesn't do so alone. Some time after that, the friend she'd managed to take home with her finds herself befriending a Meowth who is downright massive, bites hard, and is loyal to a fault.

When Dee asks her for help coming up with a nickname for that Meowth, there's an obvious enough answer.

"So who was this Gascoigne?" the Meowth asks, eyeing Mallory with trepidation after Dee has fallen asleep.

"A Hunter," Mallory says.

"That... tells me nothing."

Probably for the best.

"A friend," she settles on instead. "A friend for another world who cared, maybe too much, and that was his downfall."

Mallory can hear the beginning of a growl in the Meowth's words when he says, "I don't like the sound of that."

"He deserved better. They all deserved better." Mallory sighs. "There's nothing I can do about that now. But if Dee continues to ask me for names, then I'll keep supplying her with names meant to honor those we left behind."

"Like Djura?" pipes up the little Zubat named for a particularly annoying old man with a gatling gun.

Mallory snorts. "Djura's still alive, actually! At least, he was the last time I saw him. Haven't checked recently. Find it hard to believe anything short of another Hunter could kill that man, though, and there weren't exactly a lot of those left."

"She thought of my name on her own," says Flora the Bulbasaur, making an observation that Mallory kind of wishes she wouldn't. "Am I named for someone? Or something?"

Mallory remembers—

—being grabbed, being taken, being held in a way that made her skin crawl—

—knowing with a certainty she'd never had before that this is how she'll take Gehrman's place, that she'll never get home if she doesn't resist—

—resisting, resisting, resisting—

"Miss Mallory?" Flora asks, far more polite than her namesake had ever been. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine," Mallory lies, shifting the body she'll never be all that used to uncomfortably. "Flora was... Flora was a god, I think. The one that created Dee."

The god she killed. Well, one of the gods she killed.

"Oh." This Flora's eyes are wide. "That's..."

"You said was," Gascoigne says, tail flicking back and forth from where he's loafed on the ground. "Gods can die?"

"Gods can be killed," Mallory says.

She decides not to mention to the team that she'd done precisely that only to be forced into this one's place. They've probably been told enough unbelievable things today already.

Instead, she nods to Gascoigne and she continues, "Your namesake was a good man. I wouldn't have gotten far at all without him."

And technically—technically—that's true.

[waheelawhisperer]

I dig V7!Yang's bomber jacket and could *generally* roll with the coveralls, but that Vernal-callback garter & pokey-looking belt buckle still make me wanna mash the equivalent of a button keeping Meowth from evolving to Persian. Yeah, yeah, asymmetry, but there's plenty of that with her mitts & Blake-kerchief. Speaking of, that catsuit really did need a zipper around the midsection, not on every other edge of her coat.

Okay I guess it's time to finally explain why the Atlas outfits fucking bother me so much

Putting it under the cut so people who don't want to read criticism don't have to

I'll go into detail about the little things in a second, but the main issue I have is that they just do not make sense for fieldwork in the cold. Yeah, I know it's anime, I don't expect perfectly practical outfits at all times, but the series explicitly emphasizes the danger of the Solitas cold, so it bugs me that the outfits the characters wear, including the trained and experienced Atlesian Huntsmen (ffs Clover where are your sleeves), do not reflect the debilitating effects of being unprotected against the elements. If the threat of the cold wasn't specifically a plot point, I'd be more willing to handwave the outfits not being good at protecting against it and just assume Aura limited the effects of the temperature or something, but that's not the case. The way they actually set things up just makes the characters look stupid.

If you want to argue that a lot of the Atlas Volumes take place in Atlas/Mantle, which is temperature-controlled and thus they don't need heavy protective clothing, then fine, but that doesn't change the fact that Team RWBY and their allies are regularly participating in operations outside that safe zone. I imagine it would take extra modeling/rigging and so on, but you can solve the problem well enough by giving them jackets or something to throw on once they leave the safety of the city and it's artificial heating. Either that or just don't make the cold a goddamn issue in the first place. It wouldn't be the weirdest thing the show has asked us to accept, and the rules surrounding Aura are vague enough that they could easily explain it away.

Anyway, I'll cover the outfits on an individual level now. Let's start with Yang and go in reverse order.

I gotta say, Yang is the type of woman who could look good in a burlap sack, so it's amazing to me that I've never really been a fan of any of her canon outfits. I've always found the shades of brown the character designers love to stick her into be pretty drab and dull, especially since they changed the color of her hair from the brighter gold it used to be to the honey-blonde it is now. Really wish they'd made more use of her color (yellow), she's the brightest of the bunch and needs something to make her pop. I would ascend straight to heaven if they gave her Blake's colors, too - let her have some more purple or black in her outfits.

Anyway, I wouldn't even think this is a bad outfit for Yang if not for the context. It's not amazing, but it fits what's established as her style, and I just love women in pants and jackets. The problem is that she's wearing this outfit in Solitas. This outfit has a fucking thigh window in sub-freezing temperatures, temperatures already established to be deadly by the narrative. I can begrudgingly accept the cleavage, both because showing cleavage is kind of Yang's thing and something the people designing her looks have made an essential part of her aesthetic and because Yang's boobies are very important to me, but the thigh window breaks my suspension of disbelief (to be honest, I wouldn't have even minded if they had covered up the tiddy (shocking, I know). There are plenty of ways to remind us Yang's a bombshell without showing lots of skin). This outfit would've been fine in Vale or Anima tbh even if the thigh window still just fundamentally looks dumb to me.

Blake's outfit just sucks. It's the worst of the bunch. Between the dumb boob socks, the zippers that do literally fucking nothing, and the way she has to wear an adult diaper into combat, this is just so ass. She looks like she ripped off a Square Enix character or something. You're not in a JRPG, honey, wear something that makes sense.

This is so disappointing after her amazing Mistral outfit.

Also, I don't like the short hair at all, but that's more of a personal preference thing. Please let her grow it out again. Please.

I don't mind Weiss's outfit too much besides the stupid fucking belts, if we're being honest. It's not really practical for cold-weather operations, but it's good enough by the standards of anime outfits in general and this series in particular. Not a fan of the little boob window since they're in Solitas, but I can accept it because I've known people who wear shorts in sub-freezing temperatures and Weiss is a native of Atlas. I'm willing to handwave her lack of protective clothing based on the fact that she grew up in this environment and is thus likely to be more used to the cold.

Also, I don't know how her hair suddenly doubled in volume to create that monstrosity of a braid, but whatever. I think she actually looks pretty cute with the new bangs.

Ruby's is my favorite overall. It's not truly cold-weather gear, but it's not so egregiously unsuitable for the environment that it breaks my suspension of disbelief. She manages to look like she's growing up without showing off skin, the new hairstyle is nice, and there's nothing about her Atlas look that really makes me go "ugh, why?", unlike any of her teammates.

[robotlesbianjavert]

THE Top 5 List Of All Time

okay per @stillness-in-green's question. and something really important that i'm sure ALL of my lovely fans, yes you i am talking about you and blowing you so many kisses, are dying to know. my Top 5 Gay Little Henchmen.

house cleaning first i'm excluding spinner and spinaraki from this list just because i've given spinner a lot of attention the past few weeks and have already extolled his virtues as a gay little henchman and how i think he really embodies this trope and he's so special to me i wanna cry about him like every day oh my god. oh my god. but that would be unfair considering the intensity of my current feelings (that have been consistent the last three years eyyy) anyways here's the rest of the list.

5. okay i will be honest this guy does not really count except fully on a technicality and bc of how much i love him. but enrico poggi from the stravaganza series now this is very much like, a junior high/middle school kind of series. but enrico is such a great dynamic character who spends like the first half of the series being a big opportunistic skeezy lackey tormented by the mysterious disappearance of his lackey and then the latter half of the series being like okay yeah i can work for the protagonist. and by the end has wholeheartedly devoted himself to the main character. and like he's significantly less homoerotic than a little henchman should be but he's a spy assassin who's squeamish and is good with kids and great with horses and will eat everyone's food and he's a good lil henchman with a full character arc and i love him on want him on my list. he could gay up a lil if i tried.

4. i said i wouldn't include spinner BUT DIDN'T SAY SHIT ABOUT ANY OTHER BNHA CHARACTER NYEH HEH HEH. it's really hard choosing between like redestro (to shigaraki) and trumpet (to redestro) and nemoto (to overhaul) but ultimately i have to give the bnha crown to ujiko for his devotions to AFO, primarily for plot impact and relationship longevity, but also because ujiko is sooooooo cute about AFO it makes me weep a little bit. for real.

3. isaac from castlevania 2017 eeeeyyyyyyyy now i never actually finished castlevania. because i got really lazy. but isaac was an immediate favourite and i know the scope of his character arc after the fact after losing dracula and it's so charming so charming. i've heard the "all so fucking rude" line it's BRILLIANT and also the idea of a henchman having to figure himself out after losing his boss..........groundbreaking. i need to finish the series one day or get the isaac supercut. only thing is that he should be shorter. but i persist.

2. soundwave babyyyyyyyy. specifically g1 and prime continuities, and to my understanding parts of the comics (idw series specifically - never got in depth with it but i know soundwave had Great Loyalty in it). from what i understand earthspark has fantastic divorced megatron/soundwave energy to it as well, though i am still heavily debating with myself how much i should watch it for myself. now soundwave doesn't get as much love as he SHOULD but his unwavering devotion to megatron and the decepticon cause.........the way that can so easily be shattered.........when the series lets soundwave be extra competent in an especially sexy way....... magic. also could be smaller but in g1 he turns into a tape deck, prime a skinny lil stealth jet, it works

before i reveal my number one i wanna give some quick special shout outs. harry/uma is not gay even though they both carry some energy. i've never actually watched disney's the descendants in their entirety but i did watch all the harry/uma scenes and it's good. it's a good ship. ummmm commander peepers, i never actually watched wander over yonder but i saw this guy around a bunch and immediately loved him from the start he's so tiny and such a go getter :) uhhh okay meowth doesn't count unless you read into his "fantasies about giovanni" era which is whatever but he is the blueprint for my love for henchmen overall and also just tiny fellows who range from antagonistic to just annoying. and gay lil henchmen are a subset of that.

and a different shout out to izzy hands from our flag means death. i am aware about the discourse surrounding the character i have read a lot of different meta from different perspectives and i got some context for various arguments. and i have decided that izzy hands is a great example of a gay little henchman even if stede is really hard for me to get past when trying to watch the show. i wanna know him so bad but it's difficult when i have to glaze past the main character.

AND NOW NUMBER ONE IS.........DRUM ROLLLLLLLL.........

gus grav from bakugan: new vestroia real kota fans KNOW THIS ABOUT ME this is the guy that really cracked me for the gay evil little henchman. is he from a good series. no. are he and spectra well-written characters. no. but he has such luscious hair and put his coat over spectra like a blanket and he tried to show spectra the joy of juiceboxes and he went on the run with him and he tried to fight a guy who insulted spectra despite being told not to and DIED for it but didn't actually die he just showed up again and previously spectra had a sad moment about gus not being around and when gus shows up again spectra is like "wow about time" or whatever. listen i had a lot of feelings about gus being "killed off" and then just unceremoniously brought back and then in a latter series when he shows up with spectra as a good guy with a new outfit BUT I CAN'T SEE THE OUTFIT IN ITS ENTIRETY? also the episode where he tries to fight a guy for spectra and dies, he disguises himself by tying his hair back and wearing a lil waiters outfit and putting on glasses AND AGAIN, CAN'T SEE THE FIT IN FULL, WILDLY HOMOPHOBIC. gus was really one of those characters that clicked hard with me despite everything and ignited my mind like few others could. of course this was also during my naive teenage years so i was also shipping him with his boss' younger sister but i stand by that and still think it would be funny. but gus grav was the first time in my memory that i went "wow. homoerotic devotion to the point of obsession and self-destruction is kind of sexy." and for that he will always be so special and influential to me.

[adobe-outdesign]

What are your thoughts on hisuian arcanine?

I have a lot of thoughts about Hisuian Arcanine, but I'll start off by saying that I like it a lot. In fact, I actually like it better than the original Arcanine (which I already liked), if for no other reason that the prominent lion dog theme is much more visually interesting than just a large regular dog.

There's also some really nice things going on in the design in general. The bright red looks great and really shows off the fire-typing, the way the fur looks like curled smoke is perfect, and even the way the fur on the front paws is drawn seems to be a reference to Arcanine's beta design, (which was just known as "wing", because you know, it had wings on its legs):

Admittedly, I did expect it to gain a few more lion dog features--lip markings, longer fangs, ect--but that's not a big deal, and what we got still looks solid. The artwork has also been improved on, with a much more dynamic pose. Overall, good stuff.

With that said however, there are a few things visually that don’t gel with me, the biggest thing being the colors.

Don't get me wrong; the red looks great against the dark grey and it really helps the design pop. However, the thing about regionals is that there's a careful balancing act between not making it look to similar to the original (Alolan Meowth) and not making it look completely unrelated (Galarian Meowth). Now don't get me wrong: sometimes different colors can help make regionals more visually distinct, and there are some Hisuian designs that I think could actually use a palette change.

However, Hisian Growlithe already has a different palette than regular Growlithe, being more red and white instead of orange and cream. Because H. Arcanine already changes a ton about the design, this palette would've been enough on its own. By making the mane--the part of the design that changed most--dark, it pushes the design a bit too far away from the original line. To show what I mean, here's a quick mockup of it with the red and white palette next to OG Arcanine:

It's still very visually distinct, but now doesn't look quite so disconnected.

And speaking of which, it also looks disconnected from Hisuian Growlithe because of this. Why does the mane suddenly change colors instead of just staying consistent? If you're going to make the mane dark, at least do so across the board (original on left):

Also, if you must keep the grey, at least make it darker, both to match the stripes and to add contrast. Like this (original on left):

The muzzle also feels like it should've been red and the inside of the ears should've been pink like the mouth, but that's not as big of a deal.

Like I said, the grey looks great, and symbolically fits with statues, the rock typing, volcanic ash, ect. But it could've been kept in a different way: just make the white the default and the grey the shiny. Have your cake and eat it too.

Anyway, aside from the colors, the horns look weirdly tacked on. I thought that they would get bigger and more craggy at this stage to reflect the rock-typing, but instead it just... adds two very small ones. Either do something with them or drop them, but this isn't quite working as-is.

Additionally, the eyebrows have a weird shape to them. I think they were referencing lion dogs' eyebrows, but the diamond shape of the forehead creates some unpleasant negative space compared to the original, which had the shape around the eyes reflected by the ear shape. Just make the entire forehead grey.

And finally, considering that lion dogs have curly manes, H. Growlithe has a curly mane, and half of H. Arcanine's mane is curly, it feels like the mane should've had more curls to it instead of mostly being straight "petals". You can have large curls and still retain the layered look and red inside marks, so I don't know why they felt the need to change the style there. Not to mention the same diamond shape shows up again in the front fur in a way that looks very unnatural and doesn't quite flow right.

As a whole, Hisuian Arcanine has a really striking and elegant design with a lot of good thematic elements and thought put into it; it's just the colors that aren't quite working. But even with that said, I'd still consider it a worthy successor to the original.

[buttmuncher91]

a lot of advanceshippers love to say such bs about Drew even to this day. Drew is not my favorite character & it’s fine to prefer advanceshipping over contestshipping and I kinda like advanceshipping , but some of the things they say are ridiculous! This is not bashing on all advanceshippers or advanceshipping in general, this is just some quotes (not exact) I’ve seen that I’ve had problems with.

”Drew is a jerk! Ash would treat her right!“

Both would treat her just fine! Drew watches out for her & tells her when Harley is tricking her, saved her friends & brother when she was busy, saves her friends, cheers her up when she’s down, & they both calmly talk to each other when alone.

Besides, there are some things to point Ash being a jerk to her too! Ash yelled at her because he was butthurt he had no boat to get his next gym badge & skips out on watching some of her contest when May even watches him battle regular trainers.

And it’s not like May is an innocent angel herself. She yelled at Ash & Drew for no reason, had her torchic attack Ash, & forced Ash to agree to let her travel with him by bringing up her bike.

I know May & Ash have developed a lot sense than, but so has Drew & y’all are just stuck viewing him how he reacted at the beginning.

”May hates Drew & loves ash!“

She doesnt hate Drew. At the very worst, she sees him as a friend & has seen him that way by “Who, What, When, Where, Wynut.” Like I said we seen them talk a lot when they run into each other & heck, she even ditched the group, including Ash as he was talking to her, to talk to Drew when she saw Drew. So tell me again how she loves Ash way more than Drew lol!

And in ”Spontaneous Combustion“ May blushes at Drew after he waved and walked off. May never blushed around Ash, even when some weird couple accused her of being Ash’s lover. And there was nothing in that scene that indicates her getting red met something else. She wasn’t sick, doesn’t look mad, didn’t do anything embarrassing, etc... so it looks as if she really likes Drew.

”Drew is a flirts with any girl & would cheat on May, but Ash would never cheat on her!”

You people have nothing to back this up. Drew had fangirls gushing all over him? May being Norman‘s daughter and probably because she’s referred to as hoenn princess, has a lot of fanboys! In fact, Ash is more likely to cheat on May then Drew dispite him being oblivious, as Drew showed 0 interest in his fangirls & ran from them. If he was such a flirt, he wouldn’t run from fan girls, but would try & you know, FLIRT with them. Drew also showed 0 interest for other girls, & only teases May. You advanceshipper fanbrats (not saying all advanceshippers are fanbrats just the advanceshippers who think this) only pretend he is to make up reasons for May to reject Drew.

”He only likes May for her rack, & wouldn’t care for her if it was flat!“

Talk about reaching. Drew only stares at her FACE! He never stared at them, & the anime gave her chest 0 focus. He isn’t just some creeper. Despite not being interested in her, he treated Breanna nicely & she was flat. He may just have puppy love/a crush on her, but saying he’s just trying to win her because of her rack is complete bs!

”Think about it, Drew & May would make ugly babies!”

Based on what? Cuz Drew has green hair? As someone whose least favorite color is green (okay, okay dark/forest green is pretty), I think this is a stupid claim. Even with a weird hair color, there’s a chance the child could be cute, & really beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Hair color is NOT even close to a huge factor to what separates not ugly to ugly. And they don’t have to make babies if they do get together. They can just choose to adopt to help out those who need a home or just happily be with each other with no children at all.

”Drew is in less episodes with May than Ash, so advanceshipping is better & will be canon!”

🤦‍♀️Misty has the most screen time with ash. By this cruddy ”logic,” Misty & ash (so far) are canon. Yes, misty has much more screen time with ash than May. Misty had all of Kanto, Orange Islands, AND Jhoto with ash... as well as a cameo with ash in Hoenn, and TWO separate cameos in Alola. And at this point, May could have spent more time with Drew. It’s been 4 regions that Ash hasn’t even thought of 1 of her Pokémon after all this time. I’m no pokeshipper, but let’s be real here.

And most of the time Ash & May are on screen, it’s them focusing on their goals/Pokémon. They cheer & encourage each other too, but it’s mostly friendship stuff. Could something happen later on between them to spark love? Sure. But nothing in the anime ever pointed to that. And you can literally say that with Ash and... ANYONE! Like Ash could grow up, met back up with Roxie & they could fall for each other.

When Drew appears on screen, you mostly see hard evidence for contestshipping, weather on Drew’s side, May’s side, or both. Yes, there’s evidence on BOTH sides that they like each other. At best, advanceshipping looks one-sided on May’s side. And even then, it mostly looked that way in the beginning of AG. There’s way more evidence that May likes Drew & vice vesa than with ash & May, even with “less contestshipping hints!“ A lot of hints for shippings are overblown. Not just advanceshipping hints, but poke/pearl/negai(actually never mind, negai is under looked & over hated)/amour/etc... are over blown & it’s just ash being his usual nice/childish self. With Drew, it’s obvious he likes her as how he constantly stares at her, teases her, gives her red roses (& says they’re for beutifly), etc... While I think I covered how May likes Drew enough already. And yes, this could just be a kiddy crush for the both of them, but in the end there’s still harder evidence that Drew & May like each other.

Plus there are a lot of canon fictIonal couples who had less screen time with each other than other characters. Naruhina, ichihime, Hinny, gochi, etc...

“Drew never saves May’s life, unlike Ash!”

So? May never even tried to saved Ash, like she did with Drew!

Ash has also saved: Angie (who has a more confirmed crush on ash), Dawn, Pikachu (3x I can think of), Chinchar, Lillie (or at least attempts to help a lot of times), Celiebi, Erika’s Gloom, Serena, Misty’s sisters Pokémon, a ton of CotDs & their Pokémon...

And what of those who saved Ash? Misty, Sabrina’s... family photographer, Gary, Iris, Clemont’s father, Zeroara dude, a ton of officer jennys, Pikachu, a lapras, Paul, Drew (ya keep on hating him if it werent for him Ash Brock and Max would probably be dead in that crate Jessie, James & Meowth trapped them in so not even advanceshipping could happen).

“Rivals can’t be dating!”

Where did you get this bs? Even in the pokeani IN THE AG SERIES this has been proven false. Watch Pasificlog Jam again. Who put you in charge of how couples should work anyways? If a writer wants to have rivals hookup in their story, than they have that freedom to have the rivals hookup regardless how upset you get over it.

“Ash & May kissed in a banned episode, so advanceshipping is canon not contestshipping!”

Come on guys, they’re 10. The anime creators aren’t gonna have two 10 yr olds kiss on the lips. Its really creepy some person came up with this. No, it’s not creepy cuz I don’t like advaceshipping (I actually like some aspects of it). Again, it’s creepy because they’re 10. If they were like 13+ yrs old, it‘d be okay, but NOT 10. Plus, even Japan is very sensitive when having kissing on the lips happen with kid shows. Even with adults, they censor it/show something else as the kiss happens & just imply it happened. Expecally how they view kissing on the lips in the first place, they ain’t having 2 ten year olds kiss.

And there would be NOTHING to imply that they where going to kiss. Around this time this episode that they kissed claimed to happen (episode 357), Ash & co. where heading to fortree. Nothing ever was implied from the both of them even want to kiss each other. They just where supportive friends of each other with no hinting there where secret feelings or developing feelings from ether of them. Theres also nothing beyond that episode that implied the kiss happened. Because if it did actually happen, I’m sure something like that would impact the next few episodes, but nope no mention of any kiss nor do ash & May act any differently around each other in 358 and beyond. So even if it did happen, it was going to more than likely sink the ship, like it was some akaward thing they did because they were “under the mistletoe“ & afterwards just agreed to be friends & forget about it. The pokemon anime was always about friendship, adventure, and Pokemon themselves, never romance.

Also episode 357 is “Take This House and Shuppet!” not “A Kiss Under the Mistletoe!“ The Japanese episode is the same as the English barring names & episode number.

Were do you get such a sorce for this info? “my friend’s japanese friend who talked to the director of the AG anime & saw it!” or some other ridiculous unreliable garbage like that? Give me actual sources with interviews from the writers talking about this supposed banned episode. Bet you can’t, unless it’s fake & unreliable. If it existed, it would have floated up by someone from Japan. After All, even if for 20 mins that episode should’ve existed if it was just banned. Like “Electric Soldier Porygon” was banned completely & only aired one time in Japan. However, there are places that you can watch the episode despite it being completely banned due to putting a lot of children in the hospital from seizures. That was older than the supposed advanceshipping kiss episode as ’Electric Soldier Porygon’ is a Original Series episode in Kanto the 38th episode. No one can find this supposed advanceshipping episode nor is it even listed in the banned episode list. It should be harder to find this older banned episode than it should be to find this supposed banned kiss episode.

“Why should May choose Drew over Ash? Ash is like a literal god!”

What? Yes, he’s befriended every legendary & come back though poketears, save the world so many times, has arua abilities (he rarely uses), & whatever else, but it’s not like he seems that BA or whatever. Ash not aging seems over focused on, when in reality NO ONE is aging. It took him 7 regions to win 1 league (a questionable one at that), can’t remember Pokémon he seen before & sometimes forgets what he learned, & needs saved by others sometimes. Some god, can’t even rescue himself. Besides, who knows what Drew has done on his adventures. Drew has also saved Ash, Brock, & Max from trouble, isn’t Drew awesome saving someone ”like a god!”? Drew also has beat him in a battle as well, is that y’all’s problem?

And where is Ash’s voice in all this? It’s like this in all this anti-Drew bs. “Drew is just this terrible creature who possesses all 7 deadly sins & is the creation of Giratina & thus May hates & so does everyone else! However... blessed by Arceus himself, we all just know not dense Ash Ketchem is waiting to sweep May off her feet & save her from the demonic spawn that is Drew who is lusting after her bewbs😡” (<-original ideas, do not steal jkjk). Like there’s NOTHING to indicate ash wants her. And do you think this of May as well? Like do y‘all think May is just this perfect, sweetest, most divine woman in the pokeani that only Ash “blessed by Arceus“ is the only guy that should be blessed by such an angel? 🤣

Look, I like Ash & I like May. But even with my favorite characters I wouldn’t go as far as to think so highly of them that it makes Helga’s obsession with Arnold look like nothing. And just because Ash is more amazing with more feets & whatever, doesn’t mean May has to love ash or that Ash has to choose may because Drew doesn’t measure up to him.🤷‍♀️ Just think about it, should Timmy’s mom go with Dinkleburg? After all, he is smarter than Timmy’s dad, has more money & is more successful than he is. And Wandesemo is more popular, not stupid, & mostly competent unlike Casmo. Should Wanda dump Casmo for him? Of course i understand wanting the best person to end with you’re favorite character. But that’s not how love works & in the long run isn’t fair to both Ash & May (& Drew, but I know you haters don’t care about that).

[adventures-on-foster-island]

Adoption Application Recieved!

Name: Rowan Mackinnon

Age: 19

Region, city/route... or describe the climate you live in: Wedgehurt in Galar.

Home size: ground floor and first floor aswell as a garden and a large patch of land owned around our house. About 200 miles.

Other people or Pokémon in your home: In the house it is me and my partner. We live with a Munchlax, Galvantula, Zoura, and a Vulpix. I’m hoping to get them someone to play with.

Also Noibat occasionally goes in the house because he feels safest here.

How many hours are you away from home per week for school/work? I am in part time college which is 4-6hours two times a week and i work at the farm which is around the house anyway. My partner is a ranger and the land around us is classed as protected so they work nearby to the house and usually at home if others are around too.

Any allergies or aversions? Im allergic to galarian Meowths and I want to avoid Pokémon who don't live in Galar, including the Isle of Armour.

Tell me about yourself, and what your goals for you and your new Pokémon are, as well as anything else you think I should know.

I run a small wild farm. Pokémon come and go as they please, however I do breed Pokémon from time to time. I make sure their homes are perfect for them. My farm has various different areas Pokémon find perfect to live in. I also have a enclosed garden I can use for the new friend so they can get use to other Pokémon around outside. They will have access inside as well. After that, I'll allow them free range of the outdoors. Though, I'll check on how their doing, and we have shelters for Pokémon as well as tracking chips for all Pokémon in case of any issues.

Alright Rowan, I'm happy to inform you that due to your property size and your partner's status as a Ranger, you're eligible to adopt two Pokémon if you'd like to. The two spoke over the phone, and decided it would be best to bring the two most promising candidates to Rowan's farm to make sure they like all their new friends, including the small herd and a few Lotad on the farm.

Ellisa woke early this morning to prepare for a trip to Galar. Her mom and siblings came to watch the Island for the day. Dusk, her Drifblim, was saddled with a hanging basket for the passengers, who were waiting patiently to go to their potential new home.

"Alright kids, load up. We have a long flight to Galar ahead of us." A nervous Galarian Ponyta colt stepped cautiously into the basket, followed by a relaxed flowering Lotad, who then asked to be picked up. Pearl, Ellisa’s Gardevoir, wearing a back pack, obliged the little plant, and closed the gate behind them. Ellisa had offered to put the Pokémon in balls for the trip, but they wanted to see the sights on the way. There's no better way to sight see than from a Drifblim, Ellisa thought. As the basket rose from the ground, Ponyta let out a whine, and stamped his feet lightly, getting used to the change in elevation. Ellisa pet his head and soothed him until he seemed more comfortable.

Most of the journey was over the ocean, although the coasts of Johto and Sinnoh were visible for some time as the group traveled north. Lotad looked with bright eyes over Snowpoint city, having never seen snow before.

"Just wait until we pass over the Crown Tundra little guy, It's absolutely beautiful." Indeed, his excitement increased as we flew lower over the tundra. Snowflakes landed on both Pokémon, causing little squeals of joy. Soon enough, Wedgehurst was visible over the horizon.

"Rowan said his farm was just outside Wedgehurst. We should see it soon." As Ellisa finished her sentence, she saw the river that cuts through the field and disappears into the forest. Several Ponyta and Mudbray galloped through the patches of short and tall grass, the river was alive with water type Pokémon, and a beautiful garden with a green house decorated the land. A lilly pond sat in the garden, and the distant figures of a person and their partner Zoroark were the last things Ellisa noticed before looking for a place to land. She settled on a patch of short grass near the pond, and Dusk slowly floated towards the ground.

Rowan walked over to the group, releasing their Gardevoir in case any extra help was needed. A Sylveon followed closely behind him wearing a little diabetic alert vest.

"Morning! Hope your journey was pleasant. These are Nyx, Opheila, and Serena." Rowan greeted as he pointed to each Pokémon, before scratching Serena's head and ribbons. "The other Lotad are in the pond at the moment, and I'm sure you saw the herd." Rowan extended his hand to shake, which Ellisa took excitedly in her grasp.

"The journey was lovely. I think the youngsters enjoyed the experience as a whole. I have a service Pokémon named Nyx as well!" She pulled a ball out of her bag and released an Umbreon, who nuzzled into Ellisa’s leg. "She helps me with anxiety and ADHD, along with my boy Pan, an Espeon who stayed at the island today. You have a lovely property." Pearl put down the Lotad, who stretched out his legs and sniffed the dirt. The Ponyta looked eagerly at Ellisa, waiting to be told he could go for a run with the others.

"He can go off if you're alright with it, I'll just make sure they're in eye sight and that Nyx is nearby since the others do as she says. There shouldn't be any problems." The breeder smiled and made sure that his treat bag was secure. "We can give you a tour of the place."

"Run along little one. Have fun, but don't go too far okay?" Ellisa pat his back for reassurance, and he took off clumsily after the herd. "You too Lotad," she knelt to talk to him, "Can you get to the pond by yourself?" He nodded happily and started his waddle to meet new friends. "I would love that! It would give those two some time to get to know the others, and make sure they all get along."

Serena got up and curled his ribbons round Rowan's arm. Nyx wondered off to the herd, and Rowan turned to Opheila. "Make sure Flowers doesn't stay out of the pool for too long, and keep a eye on them all for me, please, Opheila." The Gardevoir nodded and headed off toward the pond. Ellisa told Dusk to rest up, returning them to their ball.

The, now smaller, group began their tour around the farm. As they left the garden, Rowan turned to Ellisa, "I've been meaning to ask you if there was anything special I should know about those two."

"Lotad's bloom attracts Combee, but they don't bother him. He's super easy going, and will do any favor you ask of him, which can get him stepped on. Ponyta has a lot of energy. He's still really young, only four months, but runs like a mad man. Otherwise, I assume since you already have some members of both of these species, that you can take care of them just fine."

Rowan grinned shyly and rubbed the back of their head, "Yeah, I've been tending to these Pokémon for a while. I think this Lotad will get along well with one of ours. We've nicknamed him 'Flowers' because he likes flowers so much that we catch him wandering away from the pond. We've been planting flowers around it to encourage him to stay, but a flowering friend may do the trick. Also, that's good to know! I've been trying to get Combee here for ages."

"If you want Combee, I recommend replacing some of this grass," Ellisa gestured around at the surrounding land, "with clover. Your herd will love it as well, and it doesn't grow as tall, limiting up-keep. Lotad is also nearly at the age of maturity, meaning you could cross breed him to have more flowering variants to attract more Combee if you wanted."

Nyx whined and nudged Ellisa’s leg. The caretaker reached down to touch her, realizing that her partner was cold. Pearl picked up on what was happening instantly, and dug through her bag for a jacket, helping Ellisa put it on the dark type. As the group continued their tour, they came upon a building.

"These are the stables, but I'm having another built on the opposite side of the field that will be more open and airy for summer. My partner and I have been looking into Pokémon safe natural foods, including more kinds of grasses, since we'd like to give them the best possible lives. Thank you for recommending clover, I'll be sure to get some."

The group began to circle back around to the pond when Rowan remembered something. "Oh I almost forgot to mention, a friend of mine recommended you to me. It's Noire, she adopted a Houndoom from you named Violette."

Ellisa's eyes widened in surprise. "I didn't know you and Noire knew eachother! What a small world. Her and my line of work are similar, you know? I mean, her's is more on the educational side, but we have the same goal. I was so happy to adopt out Violette to her. They make a good team."

"Yeah, we met through another friend of mine who is a ghost type breeder, since they used to work together on ghost type education. I was actually thinking about taking your breeding suggestion with Lotad and using the baby variants to teach people about grass type variants so that maybe someone else won't make the same mistake as this one's previous trainer, thinking that they are sick. I've always loved grass types, and Lotad are an old favorite of mine, but I've never had a flowering one before. This is an exciting change."

As they approached the pond, Ellisa could see that the herd had stopped to take a drink from the pond and rest. They seemed to get along great with their newest member, who was playfully nibbling one of the Mudbray. Rowan's Zoroark, Nyx, was nearby, leaning against a tree as they kept a watchful eye. Opheila sat with her feet in the pond, smiling happily. As they got closer, Ellisa saw the Lotad variant floating calmly in front of her as another stared in awe at his water lily, seemingly entranced by it. Ellisa got a little sad, knowing that she would have to say good bye to these two, but also knew that they had found their perfect forever homes and would be happiest here.

Rowan brought Ellisa out of her contemplation, asking, "Can people adopt again? These two are such a perfect fit for our home, and since we have so much space we would love to help out more abandoned Pokémon."

"You'll need to catch these two in a Pokéball today to register them to your ID, and we will have to have a visit again in six months to check on everything, but since your property is so large you'll be able to adopt more at that time. You could even become a transfer site for foster Pokémon that the facility can't care for, such as ice types during the spring and summer months or very large Pokémon that the island can't support. I'll keep your adoption application on file to make the process smoother next time."

While filling out the paperwork, Rowan and their partner Raven decided on Clurichaurn as a name for the Ponyta. They also offered Lotad a few names to pick from, with Opheila as a translator, and he chose Kaj. Ellisa said goodbye to everyone, wishing the two she was leaving good luck in their new home, before releasing Dusk once again for the flight back home.

@poke-breeder-rowan

[bearmyshielf]

(Based on the phanthop au created by the lovely @roseltheteacup and @alittlewriter ! Hope you dont mind me doing this, but your au made me sad so I had to write something. Now it’s 1 AM, so off to sleep I go!)

—-

Phantump, the stump Pokemon. According to old tales, these Pokémon are stumps possessed by the spirits of children who died while lost in the forest.

—-

He likes his new trainer.

Lee is kind, and gentle, and he smiles like everything will be alright, now that he’s here. Lee doesn’t mind holding his hand, or peeling the crusts off his sandwiches, buys him chocolate ice cream and cookies and when the skies are clear, brings him to see the stars.

(Back in the forest, it had been dark, so dark. What sunlight he had seen was the little streams of gold that would peek through the leaves on good days, and darkness so complete it frightened him every other day. He had wandered, not knowing what he was missing, what he needed to find, just that he needed to find something. He had memorized every blade of tall grass. He had climbed every tree. He learned how to hide, how to keep quiet, how to make himself small. He learned what was safe to eat and wasn’t, how to see in the dark. He learned how to survive in a forest that seemed intent on swallowing him alive, and he had to do it alone.)

With Lee, he’s never alone. His trainer is always always there, a presence larger than life and just a smile bright as the sun. Lee takes him everywhere, and tells jokes, and makes curry just the way he likes it whenever he wants, wherever they are.

(Colorful mushrooms lighting up hidden paths and rocky mountains with gravel underfoot and the smell of salt by the ocean and rolling meadows filled with Woolos and clouds drifting by a giant window fat and lazy and gem encrusted walls and warm water and and and-

And Lee. He’s there. He’s always always there.)

—-

The first time he sees Lee battle, it’s at the very top of a tower that reaches the clouds.

He doesn’t recognize the other trainer, but they look scary, with the determined looking scowl tugging on their lips and the sharp look in their eyes. A part of him wants to curl up and hide, find a crevice and make himself small, the way he did back in the forest when the bigger Pokemon went by. He doesn’t though. Lee is right there, and he wants to be brave.

The fight is short. The fight is brutal. He watches, agape, as Charizard grows large, larger than any tree he’d ever seen, any pokemon he’d ever meet. He watches as the battle ends in a flash of orange fire, the ends of his leaves warming up as it rushes by.

The battle ends. His awe does not end with it.

Later, they make camp next to Lake Outrage, and Lee has gone to gather some berries. It’s just him and the rest of the team. He gives the others a friendly wave before he floats over to where Lee has left his things, hunting for the red and white balls that he’s always seen trainers with. It isn’t hard to find one, buried under strange pictures and a folded cape. He lifts it and chortles with glee, the sound echoing a hundred times over as he tosses it up and catches it again.

(He remembers the way Lee had done it, powerful arcs and deliberate movements. He remembers how he had felt- like his breath had been stolen- like there’s a sharp ache somewhere inside him, a dull throbbing that won’t go away, heat and ice making his vision blur. It hurt, but in a good way, and he wants that. He’s sure he does.)

It’s hard to imitate his trainer, but he tries, heaves the ball up to his chest and starts to turn around. He gets dizzy soon enough, and does that mean it’s time to let go? He does, and stumbles in midair as the ball leaves his hands to curve upwards gracefully and land on the grass some distance away.

Next to it, Lee, who drops the berries and plates he’s been holding, who’s hands rise up to cover his eyes as the dishes shatter, a thousand little shards sent in all directions. He watches, paralyzed, as his trainer’s shoulders tremble, like they’re caught in their own internal earthquake.

He rushes over, dives into Lee’s chest and clings to his shirt. Lee doesn’t hesistate- his hands come down to cradle him against their chest, shaking, shaking, shaking. He feels something drip on his branches and makes a low crooning noise, a rumbling purr he’d seen Meowths do to comfort their trainers, until Lee’s hands aren’t trembling so much and his shoulders art still.

Lee exhales. It’s a shaky, hollow sound, like someone has torn out his soul, and he never wants them to sound like that again, never, never again. He swears that, even as the rest of the team comes close and Charizard’s wings spread to curl around them.

(Later on he tries to pick up the shards left on the grass, but Lee stops him with red rimmed eyes. “It’s fine.” They murmur as he watches sadly. “You’ll cut yourself; let me do it.)

—-

“Phan?” He asks, confused. Lee smiles at him, pats the air next to him. They’re in the town with budews sleeping in the gardens and a large house nearby, looming.

(He doesn’t like that house. The last time Lee had brought him there, he had felt small: he had felt afraid, and alone, like he was back in the woods and all he could see were shadows. He had run away, and Lee had tore open the countryside looking for him, until his voice cracked and his shouts became whispers. He came back eventually, and Lee had hugged him so fiercely as they begged him to never leave like that again. It took five days before Lee could speak without coughing up blood. Five days of worry and guilt, and the knowledge that his trainer cared enough to look for him, to push himself that far. He doesn’t know why, but he feels like no one’s ever done that for him before.)

“I have someone for you to meet.” Lee smiles. There’s no stumble to their voice. He floats over, confused, as they continue. “Look, here they come now.”

He looks at the direction Lee is pointing and sees a Dubwool, being led by a woman with a shock of orange hair and followed by a Yamper. He looks at Lee, even more confused, but then the Dubwool tackles him.

There’s a commotion and flurry of movement around him, but his vision is filled with white wool and bright eyes, gleaming. The Dubwool nuzzles him, mindful of their horns. It’s you. They say, their voice trailing off to a celebratory bleat. It’s you! You’re back! You finally came back!

He wants to ask who they’re talking about. He wants to ask if they’ve met. Instead, he says nothing at all, as he buries his face in their coarse wool and wonders why this all feels so familiar.

—-

He’s been with Lee for three months when another new face appears.

The trainer looks young, and he doesn’t know them but- he feels like he should, for some reason. They look at him with wide wet eyes and it feels familiar, the way the Pokemon Lee had introduced him to had all felt familiar, like the woman with orange hair had felt familiar. Like it was something he’s forgotten, something he’d witnessed once in a dream.

“...Hey.” They whisper cautiously, picking at the edge of their sleeves with their nails. They’re still watching him with those wide wide eyes, huge and terrified. “Is it really you? Hop?”

That’s his name. He knows that at least, had been there when Lee called him that for the first time. He gives a shrill giggle, and they smile. He thinks that it’s a good expression on them.

“I thought I would never see you again.” The trainer’s lips wobble, and they use their hand to rub at the corners of their eyes. “We didn’t even get to say goodbye, yknow? I didn’t even notice you were gone, not until Leon did.”

He doesn’t understand what they’re trying to say. But he notices the way they’ve begun to curl inwards, eyes on the ground as they struggled to breathe. He knows what that means.

(He doesn’t know this trainer, with their sad smiles and shaking voice, but he knows already that he cant stand to see them cry.)

He floats forward as their eyes begin to droop, the weight of their tears pulling the edges down.

“And I stole your dream even though I didn’t really want to be champion, and I never said anything to you, and I didn’t look for you, I didn’t try and find you-“ they suck in a noisy breath, ribs rattling. “I was so happy to be number one I forgot about you, even though you were always there when I needed you, and I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry-“

He noses his way into their arms, as their frame is wracked with heavy sobs that seem to take everything out of them. “I’m sorry-“ They croak, voice cracking, and repeat. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry- Hop, I’m sorry.“

He doesn’t know what they’re apologizing for, but he decides he’s forgiven them for it. He buries his face into the crook of their neck and listens to the apologies whistling out from between their teeth.

—-

He’s watching his trainer battle his rival and he feels something like pride, something a little more bittersweet- he watches them trade blows and something in him rings hollow, like a strike against an empty glass of water.

“I’ve never met a Phantump before.” The little girl next to him says. He cocks his head. “There’s never been any near Hammerlocke. And anyway, you’re the only one that has purple leaves.”

Was he? He bats at the purple foliage peeking out of his stump, wondering. Maybe that made him special. The girl watches him through the corner of her eyes.

“Though, we’ve met before, haven’t we? I asked your friend to deliver a letter for me. You were there too. You helped.” She smiles and smiles and keeps smiling, but she’s gone perfectly still.

He blinks in confusion.

“I never thanked you for that.”

She reaches out and pats him on the side of his head, and still confused, he lets her. “It’s not too late for you. You have got to remember.”

“Hey!” Lee calls from below. He turns to look at him: he’s flushed and grinning from victory, as his rival sighs over their rotom phone. “Come on, let’s go!”

He begins to follow his trainer, but not before sparing one more look behind him.

The little girl is not there.

—-

There’s a trainer waving a feathered stick around.

He floats over to investigate, the chiming of the bell alluring despite himself. The trainer chuckles as he bats at the toy, arms moving to and fro to attack it.

“I heard who you are.” The Trainer mutters as the toy begins to slow. Their eyes stay locked on him. “I heard it from the Champion. You’re Hop, aren’t you?”

That’s his name, so he nods. The trainer huffs out a brittle laugh, looking away and running a hand through his mess of unruly curls.

“...It was my fault.”

They don’t wait for him to understand. They barrel on, the words leaving them in a rush.

“You- you were ten. I was ten. Shit, we were stupid little kids, and I... I said that to you, and you disappeared, and I’m so fucking sorry for that. It was my fault.” They sigh. “What I did was unforgivable.”

He watches as they fiddle with the collar of their pink shirt, unable to meet his eyes. For some reason, he feels a stab of deja vu.

“Just... I’m glad you’re happy now, at least.”

—-

In the end, all it takes is a realization.

He’s sitting in Lee’s help and the thought strikes him how many friends he has now; how many memories shared. He’s sitting on Lee’s lap and all he feels is safe: all he feels is content.

(He thinks of the familiar Pokemon and the trainer with huge eyes and everyone else he had met, and he thinks of lonely days in a wood filled with fog and thinks that he is happy with what he has now.)

“I love you.” He hears Lee whisper as they poke at the fire, and he- he wants to respond.

(He’s warm and safe and happy, surrounded by companions, watching the stars twinkle overhead, and he’s never felt farther than his origins before: like the years he had spent in those woods never happened, like he never had to learn how to be small and safe. The darkness seems so far away, with the campfire spitting embers into the distance. He’s here, and he’s happy, and it feels like a dream come true.)

“Love you too Lee.” He whispers, actually whispers, with a voice that isn’t a chorus of screams, and-

-something in his soul slides right into place, and clicks.

(He isn’t lost anymore.)

[askkrenko]

Krenko’s Guide to Pokemon: Meowth Line

THAT’S RIGHT!

DESIGN:  

Meowth’s basic design is very reminiscent of the classic “Lucky Cat,” but wearing its coin as a headdress rather than holding it. Also, Meowth is slimmer, lankier, and more active.  It’s a simple design, but it looks good, even if it’s obviously ‘generic cat.’

Alolan Meowth takes that design and makes it extra sassy, which is great. Meowth always had personality, but Alolan Meowth just has more of it. It’s still the lucky money cat, but now it knows it’s cool. Alolan Meowth is behind the gym smoking cigarettes. And your mom told you not to hang out with him but you’re going to anyway.

Look at that guy. He’s not rich because he’s lucky. He’s rich because he’s shoplifting non-stop. 

And then there’s Galarian Meowth.

Galarian Meowth will fuck you up. It’s still clearly a Meowth, but it’s feral rather than pampered, hard and tough, with an excess of fur, and rather than having a gold coin, its coin is hard iron. It’s not there for luxury, it’s there to make weapons and armor out of.  Galarian Meowth is one of my favorite regional forms, though it does beg the question of when a regional form should start counting as a different Pokemon altogether. Meowth evolves into Persian in Kanto and Alola, and I gotta say... I don’t like Persian. It’s just a cat. It does cat things. It’s boring, it’s uninteresting, and while the forehead gem is something, it doesn’t really feel like a natural evolution of Meowth’s coin as it would if it were more distinctly gem-like instead of just being round.  Giving the gem a proper cut could’ve gone a long way here, and yes, that detail would have been hard to show in the first game, but just making it diamond-shape instead of round would’ve screamed “What once was gold is now a ruby.”  Losing the coloration on its feet and tail is a problem, too. It just looks so bland compared to Meowth.   Also, going from a biped to a quadruped seems kind of like a downgrade. 

Alolan Persian is... worse. Sorry, I have nothing good to say about it design-wise. It just looks like an uglier, stupider version of Persian. The color shift is fine, but it now has a fat face and that’s it. Also it’s more of a jerk somehow. Meowth to Persian is one of the worst evolution downgrades in Pokemon. I could respect Persian as its own Pokemon, but it’s hard to respect it as “evolved form of Money Cat.”

On the other hand... Perrserker is the greatest thing ever.  It looks like a stronger, tougher form of Galarian Meowth, with its Iron headpiece turning into a full helmet, and its claws combining into something sword-like. It is an angry, viking, dwarf cat, and it just looks like what Galarian Meowth should turn into. Everything about its design builds off Meowth, except it trades some of its goofiness and scrappiness for looking like it’s seriously ready to go to war.

The final Meowth form is Gigantimax Meowth which... is funny. Look, it’s not a good design, it’s not a reasonable design, and Meowth shouldn’t even really have a Gigantimax Form, but longcat is long, and that’s hilarious, so I’m just going to give it a pass. EVOLUTIONS:  You know what I love seeing? All three Meowth forms evolve at level 28. That’s it. It’s great. No muss no fuss.  Now, there is room for a third form in there, but we’ll get to whether it needs it later.  A baby version of Meowth was designed for gen 1 and slated for gen 2, but it was cut both times, which is good because Meowth is early game enough that there’s no need for a pokemon that’s just Meowth but weaker. G-Max Meowth exists, and it’s honestly the best example of a gimmick G-Max. While a lot of weak G-Max pokemon just have no use, G-Max Meowth’s special move, G-Max Gold Rush, just spits out coins, up to 99,999 each battle. I gotta say, I’ve used G-Max Meowth, not for competetive battles, but to fill up my pockets with dosh late game.

TYPING:  Kantonian Persian is a Normal type, whcih means Immunity to Ghost, Weakness to Fighting, and not strong against anything while being resisted by both Rock and Steel. It’s just not a strong type, and it’s mostly good for bulky, defensive Pokemon that get a lot more out of only having one weakness than they lose from not having any type coverage. Persian is not that Pokemon. Alolan Persian is Dark type, which is generally better. Three weaknesses, two resistances, and an immunity, though it’s only super effective against two types and resisted by three.  It’s fine overall, but nothing special. Perrserker is a Steel type. Steel is the best type in the game, bar none. Ten resistances and one immunity just makes any Steel Pokemon with stats that matter hard to kill. And it’s coverage isn’t that bad, super effective on three types and resisted by four.  STATS:  Persian and Alolan Persian have 5 sub-par stats and good speed. The thing is, speed 115 may be a lot, but when you’re attacking at 70 (Kantonian) or special attacking at 75 (Alolan), going first isn’t enough to win the day.  Perrserker, on the other hand, eschews speed in favor of having 110 attack and significantly higher Defense than Persian. While its stat total is the same 440, having high defense and Steel Type means it can take hits far better, and its high attack stat means getting hit by Perrserker actually hurts. ABILITIES:  Kantonian Persian has limber (immunity to paralysis) and Unnerve (opponent can’t eat berries) but it’s strongest ability is Technician. Technician increases the base power of moves of 60 power or less by 50%, meaning Bite is suddenly better than Crunch and Theif’s suddenly an actual attack and... uhh... ... umm...  This ability would be a lot better if Persian had more attacks at 60 power. Well, it buffs Fake out from 40 to 60 at least, and free damage is free damage. Alolan Persian also gets Technician, but isn’t any better with it. It’s hidden ability, Rattled, increases its speed if it’s hit by a Bug, Ghost, or Dark move or if an opponent uses Intimidate on it, which is... mediocre. Weak to Ghost and with poor defenses, that’ll likely just kill it, though it does resist Dark... But its speed is already high enough that an ability that sometimes raises its speed isn’t going very far.

Its final ability,  Fur Coat, gives it actual competence. Fur Coat doubles its defense. That’s it.  Going from base 60 defense to base 120 defense is huge, even before factoring in defense from IVs, EVs, etcetera.  This is the only ability worth having on Alolan Persian. Comparatively, the other two abilities are nothing. And this isn’t even the Hidden Ability. Perrserker has three abilities, two of which are very similar. Its first ability, Battle Armor, protects it from Critical Hits. It’s not fancy, and it is decent, but the other two options are simply better.  Tough Claws increases the power of all of Perrserker’s attacks that make contact by 30%, which is frankly a lot of them, while Steely Spirit increases the power of its Steel Type moves by 50%. Obviously, it’s only going to have one Steel attack in a normal build, and as this is Iron Head, it will gain the boost from Tough Claws as well... So here it’s more of a meta question which you want: The strongest STAB attack possibly with an effective base 120 Iron Head, or more power spread out on your other moves.

MOVES: Kantonian Persian has slightly higher Attack than Special Attack, but not by much, so the fact that it learns Nasty Plot means there’s incentive to build it as a Special Attacker.  Alolan Persian always wants to be a Special Attacker.

Even with Technician, Persian’s attack lineup just isn’t great. It can use Fake Out for free STAB damage, which is nice, but after that, a physical build is relying on Body Slam for its STAB damage, which isn’t exactly the best, though the chance to paralyze is nice. Then for coverage, Bite and Play Rough are options, as is Gunk Shot, but there’s really nothing special going on here.  U-Turn allows a hit with the switch, but it’s still only a 70 power hit. Persian did have some better attacks, like Double-Edge and Return, in previous generations, but those are currently missing from its lineup.  All in all, Persian’s moveset doesn’t really do anything physically.  For Special Attacking, Persian can learn Nasty Plot.  The only Special move it gets via level-up is Power Gem, which is pretty poor unless you really need the coverage. On Kantonian Persian, Hyper Voice is your STAB Special, while Alolan uses Dark Pulse.   For special attacks, Shadow Ball and Thunderbolt add some nice coverage, and Technician can turn Icy Wind into an actual attack.  Persian can also learn Foul Play, which is a solid, if sometimes unreliable, Dark Attack that doesn’t require investment in the Attack stat. Alolan Persian can get Parting Shot, which reduces the enemy’s Attack and Special Attack before switching out. With its speed, this will often mean weakening an attack before your other Pokemon takes it. Honestly, I think most of what I’d want to do with a Persian would just be to annoy the opponent and get in some free damage. Fake Out, Foul Play, U-Turn or Parting Shot, and Body Slam or Dark Pulse in case staying in seems reasonable.  With Persian’s Speed, Fake Out and U-Turn/Parting Shot will often just be two free hits every time you have to switch Pokemon. Perrserker, on the other hand, is a physical attacker with physical attacks. Iron Head is its obvious Steel attack. U-Turn is U-Turn, I don’t think I need to keep justifying ‘get a hit in when switching’ except here it’s ‘with an actual attack stat and maybe an ability to do +30% damage.’  Close Combat offers some great coverage and a lot of raw power, and Seed Bomb, Gunk Shot, and Play Rough are all great attacks, too. 

And if you’re feeling cocky, Perrserker can get Swords Dance. On the other hand, if you’re feeling worried, Amnesia plugs Perrserker’s low Special Defense to let it tank longer. 

Generally, I think Iron Head, U-Turn, Close Combat, and whatever other move you need for coverage on your team is the way you want to go.

And if it’s 2v2, hey, Perrserker gets Fake Out, too. OVERALL:  Kantonian Persian is a very weak Pokemon, with abilities that don’t help it and a move pool that isn’t really built for anything. Alolan Persian is a lot better, primarily thanks to Fur Coat, but also by having Parting Shot with high speed, allowing it to repeatedly mess with enemies.  But they’re also both really stupid pokemon that are just ‘lawl I’m a cat’ and don’t have anything interesting in their designs even though the Meowths are so cool. Perrserker’s all around solid and exactly where it needs to be. Its already high attack is bolstered by a +Attack pair of abilities, its high Defense stat is bolstered by Steel type, so it can hold its own without trying anything tricky just as long as nobody sets it on fire.  Or knows Earth Power. It does not fare well against Earth Power.

[twotwinks]

Bulbasaur, Meowth, Mewtwo, Luvdisc, Uxie, Whimsicott, and Volcarona!

HI ROCH THANK U FOR SENDING ILU SO MANY

also i foolishly thought i’d actually be able to answer this the night that you sent it in bed but NO i had to go and make it too INVOLVED dkjlhdfjh

[and then it took even LONGER because i wanted one (1) specific picture off of my Switch but i had my Switch in airplane mode looking for SHINY TAUROS and i only just now found it after two weeks dkjhdkh]

Bulbasaur: What is the first Pokémon game you ever owned?

Sword! Definitely worth it, I think, given I now have over 400 hours of play on my main save file khdfkhdfjk

Meowth: Which evil organization is your favorite?

Ok so I haven’t quite finished their storyline yet (Necrozma is mean ;~;) but I really like Team Skull! Sure some of them seem to be complete jerkwads but for the most part they just seem like a bunch of dorks who are trying to figure out what it means to be growing up in a society that they think views them as failures. All of their raps and rhymes and puns always make me giggle. Also Plumeria is the best big sister, 10/10 would like to get a hug from her.

Mewtwo: Who is your most powerful Pokémon?

SKELLY. HE IS A GOOD DRAGON BOY AND HE LOVES ME VERY MUCH.

Luvdisc: Do you ship anything?

Raihan has two hands and he’s using one of them to hold Leon’s hand and the other to hold Piers’s hand. Also Sonia and Nessa are girlfriends. And then thanks to Masters we’ve got Nanu and Grimsley who are totally my gay uncles and I still think Rosa and Maylene would be cute (I am pretty sure Rosa just falls in love with any pretty girl that crosses her line of sight though dkjhdhk). Sometimes I can be talked into protag/rival ships like Red/Blue and Victor/Hop but I tend to view most of those as more queerplatonic than romantic. Same with Musashi and Kojiro from the anime, like they’re cute together romantically in theory but I also just see them as a family alongside Nyarth and Sonans and all their other Pokémon. I’m here for the found family folks.

Uxie: What is something you wish would be added to the games?

So something that I think you actually came up with, which is items/ribbons/etc that your Pokémon have actually being displayed on their in-game models. I just think it would make for a cute bit of customization, especially when it comes to playing with other people, because then everybody will be able to distinguish Their Mew. Also for the love of god just give us pronoun options. They’ve already improved a lot using “What do you look like?” instead of “Are you a boy or a girl?” but your choice still gets inevitably reflected in he/him or she/her pronouns. Ideally (and this goes for all games, not just Pokémon) I’d like to see a screen where you can type out the different conjugations of your pronouns yourself, which will allow for full customization and ultimately more inclusiveness than just offering a precooked selection that might not go beyond they/them or xe/xir if we’re lucky. (I mean, if Stellaris can let you specify the plural and other intricacies of your alien species name then by god they can do the same for pronouns.) And also even though I think this was just supposed to be ONE THING I am also gonna say we really need auto sort options for Pokémon boxes. Like yeah the search function is great and very specific but do you know how much easier and less time-consuming it would be to just press a button that says “Arrange Pokémon by Pokédex number” than having to individually organize 960 Pokémon by hand across 32 boxes (which is what I’m doing now and it sucks).

Whimsicott: Do you own any Pokémon plushies? If so, which ones?

YOU ARE NOW ALL FORCED TO BEHOLD ME AND MY WOOLOO.

Guys seriously it is so round and soft and perfect for stimming and last time I was on a long car trip I was all drowsy from taking Dramamine and I passed out holding its little hoof I love it so much. As soon as I get the right color yarn I’m gonna crochet it a lil chain to match the friendship bracelet Hop gave his Wooloo.

Volcarona: Which champion is your favorite?

Okay so turns out I am not super familiar with very many champions djkhdfhk and I don’t think Kukui and Hau count so I guess I’m forced to say Leon by default? I know a lot of people really like Cynthia and she seems nice and everything but I don’t really have a huge emotional attachment to her? Iris is probably a close second though, she seems full of energy and super cute and fun. But Leon is also just a compelling character in general though, like if you think about it, he’s literally never lost a Pokémon battle in his life, and we can assume he’s been the Champion now for A While, since he became a trainer at 10 (I know whether or not the game protags are actually 10 is Hotly Debated but I’m going with Bulbapedia on this one) and now seems to be probably in his early 20s, and then he gets kicked to the curb by his little brother’s next door neighbor that he only met about a month ago. When you face him in the Battle Tower you can tell how much this has actually gotten to him, he’s never learned how to handle defeat because he’s never had to deal with it before. He very rarely saw his family as Champion because he was so involved with his training and other responsibilities, so it’s quite likely that he pretty much grew up completely separated from them. All he’s known for the last decade is being Champion and nothing else. Does he even know how to function outside of the world of the Pokémon League? I’d wager no, since he immediately turns around and sets up not only the Battle Tower but also the Galarian Star Tournament. The man has no idea what to do with himself if he’s not focused on Pokémon battles. I’d also wager that he’s neurodivergent too, which probably just exacerbated his struggles dealing with defeat and accepting such a big life change. It wouldn’t surprise me if this is why he struggled to maintain a friendship with Sonia when they were kids too, he probably ended up more focused on the Gym Challenge and put their friendship on pause without really meaning to, and Sonia, being a little kid who was seeing her friend and rival get lots of attention while she was struggling to keep up, could easily have ended up taking Leon ignoring her personally. Even now we see him struggle to interact with her, he has no idea how to introduce her to the player at the beginning of the game, probably because he’s still struggling to figure out what type of relationship they have when in his mind they’re still friends just like they were as kids but clearly Sonia doesn’t seem to agree. Also, words are hard, and add that to trying to understand if he’s still friends with Sonia, and we get the stellar awkwardness that is “Oh yeah, that’s Sonia. I like her cooking.” He’s trying to say “Sonia is a Good and my friend and I want you to like her so here’s a Good Thing about her” but without stepping on her toes because he’s not actually sure they’re still friends. And then it only ends up ticking her off anyway so he still doesn’t win. Anyway that’s probably enough rambling for now fdkhjfdhk I just have many Thoughts about the SwSh characters and they never get talked about because so many people seem to hate the games for some reason so I see an opportunity and I pounce on it

Send me Pokémon!

[aurumacadicus]

Second part of the Pokemon AU! Many thanks to @digdipper09 for her art (and for her tears) I’ve tagged it long post so blacklist it if you want lol

--

Steve is too sick to sign up to get a Pokemon.

“I’ll wait for you,” Bucky offers, but knows that Steve will not accept. They’ve heard Steve’s ma say he might not ever be healthy enough to go on adventures like a normal kid. “I’ll send you tons of postcards.”

“Thanks, Buck,” Steve says, and then coughs, breath rattling in his chest.

Bucky goes off and gets his Pokedex and a Charmander, and Steve waves him off, doing a good job of keeping how bitter he is about it to himself. He wishes he could go with him. Wishes he could get a Pokemon and go out and do battle. Wishes he wasn’t born so broken.

Steve spends a lot of time after Bucky leaves sulking. Bucky had been his only friend, really, and with him gone, he doesn’t have many people to talk to. He also doesn’t have a lot he can do by himself. When Bucky had been there, Steve’s ma had trusted him to make sure Steve didn’t overdo it too much. With him gone, Steve has to admit he’s gotten a little reckless.

Still, he eventually gets so annoying that his ma snaps, “Fine! Go out and catch your death and prove me right!”

Later, they’ll both feel guilty and apologize. But now, Steve takes the out he’s given and stomps out of the house. He goes into town and buys a loaf of bread he knows his ma likes so he can take it home to her later as an apology, then decides that if he’s in for a penny, he might as well go in for a pound and go to the river. He’s not supposed to go to the river, because the damp aggravates his asthma, but Bucky’s not here and Steve doesn’t feel good anyway, so off he goes.

They’re putting in a new bridge to the city, because the old one got flooded too often and people couldn’t get to the hospital. Steve hadn’t really known what that entailed. There are lots of big machines up and down the banks of the river, all cold and dark because work had ended for the day a few hours ago. The banks of the river are all ground up and muddy from the machines’ wheels, from being dug up to put in support beams, from the feet of dozens of workers tromping across it.

There are crushed nests visible. Since Blastoise buried their eggs, no one had known about the nests until it was too late.

“Poor little guys,” Steve whispers, and coughs. They were already building a protected wetland further up the river, though, trying to make it appealing enough that the Blastoise would nest there instead of anywhere that might be developed later.

He stumbles upon a couple of nests that aren’t too badly ruined, and he takes pause. Some of the eggs are broken, but some of them aren’t. If he leaves them, they’ll surely be run over or trod on. He hesitates before pulling the bread out of the bag he’d been given, wrapping it in his sweater so it won’t get dirty. Then he shovels some sand into the bag, carefully picking through the eggs and grabbing whichever ones look whole, six or seven eggs in total. He shovels more sand in on top of them, then grabs his sweater and hustles home, feeling like a thief.

There’s an old sandbox behind the house, something the previous owners had bought and left behind because they couldn’t be bothered to take it with them. Sarah had covered it up to keep the wild Meowth from pooping in it. Steve waits until after his ma has gone to bed to sneak out with the bag of eggs, carefully lifting the tarp to examine his supplies. He decides to make it as much like the river as possible, grabbing a bucket and wetting the sand before he digs out a hole. He puts the eggs in carefully and smooths the sand back over them. He wets the sand one more time before carefully covering the sand with the tarp again.

“I think I’ll go to the library today,” Steve says the next morning, and Sarah spews her tea in surprise.

The book he finds about Blastoise isn’t very helpful. It mostly focuses on Blastoise who live by the ocean. ‘Dr. Stark should really have expanded his horizons,’ Steve thinks accusingly as he dumps water on the eggs again.

“Steve,” Sarah asks tiredly a few weeks later. “Why is Mr. McMeniman telling me that you’re going out in the middle of the night and watering the sand?”

“I found some Squirtle eggs by the river and thought they might hatch,” Steve admits.

Sarah looks angry for a moment, but then she just looks sad. “Will you be okay if they don’t?”

“Eventually,” Steve says.

Sarah puts her hand on his head. “Well. Water the eggs before bed then. I don’t want you catching a cold.”

Steve catches a cold three days later. He watches from the window as his ma dumps water on the eggs for him before and after work.

Only one egg hatches. It’s the one he hadn’t been sure about, an egg with the finest crack along the top of the egg. The Squirtle is positively tiny. It curls up in his hands, wet and small, eyes still shut. Steve’s hands shake a little. He carries the Squirtle into the house and calls his ma.

“There’s an old eyedropper in the medicine cabinet,” Sarah says, and then, “Go slow. It’ll stop eating when it’s full. All babies do. I’ll get it proper food on my way home.”

Steve warms some juice from the fridge up and feeds it to Squirtle drop-by-drop. Squirtle is ravenous and doesn’t stop eating for several minutes. When it’s finished, it curls up in Steve’s hands again, and he holds it until his ma gets home.

Aside from being perhaps the tiniest Squirtle anyone in town had ever seen, Squirtle thrives. It opens its eyes after three days, starts crawling around the next day, and then a week later skips walking to run instead, and doesn’t stop moving until it’s time for bed--or until Steve coughs, breath rattling in his chest, and then it curls up against him wherever it can reach, preferably in his hands so that it can spread its little arms across his breast, as if to try and soothe the ache inside it. Steve has to admit that the first time it happens, the tears in his eyes are not entirely from pain and frustration.

Squirtle grows slowly, but what he lacks in size, he makes up for in spirit.

“He sounds like you,” Bucky says once Steve has finally stopped babbling about his new Pokemon. “All heart and a whole lot of aggression issues to go with it.”

Steve opens his mouth, then closes it again, shrugging. Bucky hadn’t been the first to make the comparison. He feels Squirtle crawling up his leg and reaches down to help him up.

“Holy shit, is that it?!” Bucky blurts out. “That’s so tiny! Steve,” he says seriously. “I will die for him.”

“Squirtle!” Squirtle gasps in affront, and sprays a stream of water at the screen.

“Shit,” Steve mumbles, before Nurse Joy shouts and chases him out of the center.

Sarah, tired of Steve and Squirtle getting into trouble, finally caves to Steve’s begging and signs him up for a martial arts class. She despairs when that first day she starts getting spammed at work with texts. She hadn’t expected Steve to get kicked out so soon. So she’s very surprised to pull out her phone and find picture after picture of Steve and Squirtle carefully practicing katas together, Squirtle balanced atop Steve’s head. “Fuck,” she whispers, clutching her chest.

Steve is thirteen when Sarah finally decides to let him go compete in the conferences. Squirtle is still small but he’s grown some, and they’ve been working on his water gun and bubble beam. And they’d taken their martial arts very seriously--Squirtle may lack the strength to back up a headbutt or tackle, but he’s become very good at repelling attacks.

No one really takes them seriously, but that’s okay. No one’s ever really taken them seriously. It just gives them the upperhand, which Squirtle and Steve take shameless advantage of. Steve is only sad that he doesn’t get a picture of the other trainer’s face the first time Squirtle sweeps the legs out from under a Nidoran twice his size and then blasts her with a bubble beam.

Steve meets people on his journey, people who don’t look at him and think ‘how cute’ or ‘poor guy.’

People like Tony, who’s followed closely by a Meowth he calls Max. Max wears a hat. It’s cute. Tony’s cute too, but Steve tries not to think about that. Tony’s really smart and knows a lot about Pokemon. He thinks about that instead.

“He could probably do with some shellfish enriching his diet,” Tony says of Squirtle, who had not appreciated being poked and prodded, but every time he’d opened his mouth to use water gun or bubble beam, Max had appeared from behind Tony’s leg, face impassive to Steve’s gaze but apparently threatening to Squirtle. “Most health food stores will have powdered Shellder shells on offer. You could try sprinkling a little of that on top of Squirtle’s food. If nothing else, it’ll help strengthen his shell!”

Steve is pretty sure he’s in love even as he says, “Okay.” He knows for certain he is when Tony promises that they’ll definitely meet again when they’re at the top of their fields. Tony’s the only person who’s never doubted him.

He meets Bruce, too, a boy with an Eevee. They’re being harassed by a group of Rattata, and Squirtle makes quick work of them with his bubble beam. Bruce thanks them. He’s quiet, and his Eevee is shy, but they both look at Squirtle warily, which automatically puts them in Squirtle’s good books.

“Thanks for the berries, Bruce,” Steve says as he tucks them into a safe pouch in his bag. “You really didn’t have to, though.”

“Well, you guys did get us out of a pinch,” Bruce replies, lifting his phone to take a picture of the tiny Squirtle.

Squirtle notices, but instead of getting angry, he poses atop of Steve’s head. Bruce snorts.

After that, he meets an older boy named Thor, who has a Pikachu, and like an idiot he challenges him to a battle.

“What the hell? No,” Thor chokes out, bemused.

“That’s probably for the best,” Steve admits, and grabs up his Squirtle before he can try and push the issue. It’s really a good thing Thor refused―they would have gotten their asses handed to them by the electric Pokemon.

He’s even more grateful that Thor refused when they hear a frantic, “Move! Move! Get out of the way!” and Thor gets slammed into by a Tauros that doesn’t quite come to a stop fast enough.

“Thor,” a girl Steve learns is named Jane gasps.

“This is fine,” Thor wheezes. He doesn’t get up off the ground for a while though.

Jane is really cool. Steve likes her.

Steve and Squirtle meet a boy named Clint, too, who has a Pidgey that does incredible tricks. Steve buys Clint a sandwich and they sit and eat them while Pidgey and Squirtle scuffle in the dirt. Steve waits to make sure they’re not actually battling and are just playing with each other before he begins to eat.

“So you do this every day? You don’t ever think about battling?” Steve asks, watching as Pidgey begins scratching at the dirt and smiling when Squirtle copies him.

“I mean, I get pretty good money off of it, so I don’t see a reason to,” Clint says thoughtfully. “And besides, catching Pokemon sounds hard. I didn’t really catch Pidgey. I just found him in a trap and rescued him.”

Steve scowls. He’s heard of people trapping Pidgey and putting them down because they were considered a nuisance, but he didn’t think it was okay. “I’m glad you could help him, Clint.”

“Me too,” Clint admits. “It was getting kind of lonely all on my own. ...Is…” He pauses, letting his hands rest against his lap, incredulous. “Is my Pidgey teaching your Squirtle how to use sand attack?”

Steve jerks his gaze back to the Pokemon to see Pidgey blowing sand up with his powerful wings, then turning to watch as Squirtle plants his front feet into the dirt and begins kicking dust up with his back feet. Yes. Pidgey is indeed teaching Squirtle how to use sand attack.

“What the fuck,” Clint breathes with a slightly hysterical giggle.

Steve sighs and continued eating his sandwich. He drops some money in Clint’s bucket as he leaves when he knows Clint isn’t looking. Clint and Pidgey are good at what they do, and he thinks Clint needs to eat more. He figures his ma won’t mind.

Steve catches other Pokemon on his journey collecting badges. Spearow first, and he doesn’t know who it surprises more―him or the Spearow. But Spearow is just as aggressive as Squirtle, and when they’re not butting heads, they get along well. He catches a Jigglypuff next, and this time he’s certain because he surprised the Jigglypuff by not falling asleep as she sang; he’s almost deaf in one ear from his illnesses, so her lullaby didn’t affect him. She’s not aggressive, so much, but if Squirtle and Spearow annoy her, she has no problem double-slapping them.

Steve finds Scyther right after, he assumes, it has been exiled from its swarm. It had been injured badly, but Steve had captured it and immediately taken it to a Pokemon Center. Scyther is pretty aloof until it sees he and Squirtle faithfully practicing their katas in the morning, and slowly warms up to Steve as it practices with them. Scyther proves its loyalty by beating the absolute shit out of a Mankey that steals the bag of berries Bruce had given them. Steve catches it mostly out of pity because wow, Scyther didn’t need to go that far. He also catches a Rhydon just by… throwing a pokeball at it? It had been in the middle of the road, and Steve hadn’t wanted to go tromping through the grass on one side or the stream on the other, so he’d just… chucked a pokeball? And caught it? He doesn’t really know how to feel about that.

Steve is just passing through a forest on his way to Vermillion City when he stumbles across a girl, and a lake, and a Magikarp. The girl has bruises on her arms, and a split lip, and ballet shoes on her feet that do nothing to protect her against the cold, or the wet rocks that the Magikarp is leaving at her feet. Steve’s ma had always told him not to get his feet wet.

“Here,” he says gently, offering her a pair of socks that his ma had made for him. They’re wool. They’ll keep the chill off even if they get wet. “So you don’t catch cold.”

The girl stares up at him, distrusting, and Steve is sort of scared of her for a minute, but then Magikarp drops one of the rocks on her toes and she lets out a startled ‘ow!’ before her eyes begin to fill with tears. She doesn’t cry though, just tightens her jaw and swallows it down. Squirtle seems to take offense to this, pops out of Steve’s hood with an angry ‘Squirtle squirt!’ and dives onto Magikarp. He bounces off harmlessly into the water. Magikarp does not look as if it noticed, just dives back under the surface. Steve purses his lips and wonders why this is his life.

“Can I see?” he asks instead of lamenting why his Squirtle is so full of vinegar. “I don’t want you walking around on a broken toe.”

The girl is still distrusting, but she’s staring at his Squirtle, and eventually offers him her foot. Steve unlaces the slipper and carefully pulls it off of her foot, examining it. Her big toe is a little red, and it’ll probably bruise, but she’s already curling her toes as if to check whether they’re broken for herself. Steve feels up and down her foot for good measure. Nothing feels wrong, and she doesn’t flinch except for toe. The only thing he doesn’t like is that it feels really cold. Steve puts the wool sock on her before she can argue.

“It’s important that your feet stay warm,” Steve promises her, handing her the other sock. “Or you could get sick, and then you wouldn’t be able to come see your friend.”

Magikarp surfaces with another rock. Squirtle begins yelling at it loudly. Steve and the girl watch as Magikarp sets the rock down and then rolls it the rest of the way to shore, so it doesn’t accidentally drop it on her again. Squirtle nods firmly and gives the Magikarp a pat. The Magikarp does not seem to notice this either.

“Your Squirtle’s really small,” the girl says after a moment.

“Yeah,” Steve agrees, watching as Magikarp dives again and Squirtle paddles around on the surface. “He’s gotten bigger, though. He used to be really tiny.”

“He looks like he gets into a lot of trouble,” the girl continues.

Steve laughs, rubbing the back of his head. “Well, I get into a lot of trouble, too. But we take care of each other, so I think it’s okay.” He smiles, leaning back on his hands. “I saved Squirtle when he was just an egg. I think Squirtle’s saved my life a few times, too. Who knows what I’d be doing if I didn’t have him?”

“You don’t think less of him even though he’s really small?” the girl asks.

Steve doesn’t take offense. She’s young, and she’s probably sheltered. He hasn’t seen anyone else out here, after all. He glances at the bruises on her arms before looking back at Squirtle. “I guess I was lucky, because people have always thought less of me, too. I used to be really sickly and small, too. But Squirtle… Squirtle showed me that if you’re determined, you can do anything your mind is set to. I didn’t have to be ‘that sick kid.’ As long as I knew my limits, I could do anything. Sometimes it takes me longer to do things than other people, because I have to take more breaks and stuff, but I get them done, and that’s what matters.”

“Oh,” the girl says, and picks up one of the rocks, examining it. Then she turns and looks back up at him. “What is it that you’re doing?”

“I’m getting badges for the tournament,” Steve says, and pulls out the box he’s keeping his badges in. “I’ve already earned the Boulder and Cascade badges. I’m on my way to Vermillion City to get the Thunder badge now.”

The girl stares at his badges for a long time before looking up at him. “You and Squirtle are really small, but you’ve won badges,” she says slowly.

“I think you could win badges too, if you wanted to,” Steve replies gently. “You can go on adventures and win badges no problem.”

The girl looks thoughtful, returning to looking at the rock she was holding. After a minute she hands it to him. “You can have this one. I only like the red ones.”

“Huh?” Steve says dumbly, and takes the rock. It looks like a rock? But then he turns it over and sees a shard of blue so vivid that it knocks the breath out of him. “Oh. Thanks.”

“You’re welcome,” the girl says, and picks up another rock to examine it. “You should go before it gets dark.”

“What about you?” Steve asks, concerned.

“I know this forest,” she replies, shrugging.

Steve frowns, but she looks unconcerned. He worries about her, because of the bruises, and the split lip, but he gets the feeling that insisting he go home with her will do more harm than good.

He also gets the feeling that she has no problem with making sure he doesn’t follow her, either.

“Okay,” he says, standing up and dusting his pants off. “Hand-wash those socks, okay? Otherwise they’ll shrink.”

“Alright,” the girl says, setting the rock to the side and picking up another one, clearly dismissing him.

“It was nice meeting you,” Steve says as he scoops Squirtle up. “I hope to see you at the stadium someday.”

The girl just nods. Steve takes it at the dismal it is and leaves. He hopes she’ll be okay. He’ll mention it at the next Pokemon Center, he thinks. He hopes his ma won’t be too mad about the socks. He was kind of outgrowing them, anyway.

[popculturebuffet]

Prince of Wishful Thinking: A Tom Lucitor Retrospective and Character Study: Part 1: Firey Little Shit

Star Vs the Forces of Evil is a .. complicated subject for me. When it started it was somewhat hit and miss but the premise was intresting: Star Butterfly is a magical princess, having just got her families ancestral wand.. and a few days later, or a jumpcut in the actual episode later materials revealed the actual time span, sets everything on fire and is sent to earth. There she meets best friend and, to my delight that eventually turned into “OH GOD JUST END THIS WILL THEY OR WON’T THEY SHIT ALREADY” I haven’t seen since the likes of Ross and Rachel that warrants it’s own damn article, and gets into various shenanigans while battling a gang of “monsters”, a general term for most non-mewmans  on Mewni, lead by a spoiled king, Ludo, who wants the wand. 

Things got turned on their head quickly, as “Mewnipendance Day’ revealed that the Mewmans (Humans in all but name really) took mewni by force, using magic to cast the monsters into poverty, which as the series and “Magic Book of Spells” would reveal, caused a cycle of death and bloodshed with no defendants. It changed the show for the better, as the plot, while heavy handed is a necessary one given these prejduice filled times we live in and how well it’s crafted. And it’s into the show slowly coming into it’s own a new character was introduced: He had been announced by the crew in the show’s press junket was in the title but took most of season 1 to show up... and he’d end up being one of the sho’ws saving graces as it dived into bullshit and go through one of the most through character arcs of the show. HIs name was Tom Lucitor, Star’s obsessive demon Ex-Boyfriend, and this is his story.

THE MAGIC BOOK OF SPELLS

Before we get there though, we have to take at rip down side material mountain... this time to the Magical Book of Spells. The Book of Spells was a real life verison of a book we’d seen in the show itself that recorded the previous queens of Mewni’s spells and held Glossarcyk, a magical being who assited the queens throughout the decades. The real version was used to tell each of the Queens, even the three we see on screen’s stories.. star included. As such it not only gives us some, if sadly not enough, more of his actual relationship with star pre-series, but also the full background on his kingdom’s relationship with hers. See while the Butterflies control the majority of mewni, their Kingdom isn’t endless and there are half a dozen others, most of which aren’t really that fleshed out. But The Lucitor’s are somewhat of an exception: The Lucitors rule the underworld, basically Mewni’s hell where all sorts of skeletons, demons and ghouls exist. You know funny little ghouls. 

I had to. Anyways the Lucitor kingdom also has Mewmans, due to some demons kidnapping a bunch years ago. Whoops.

Despite you know, kidnapping a bunch of their people, the Lucitors and Butterflies ended up close allies. This is thanks to the efforts of Mewni’s ambassador, Jushtin who was supposed to be Mewni’s first King to wield the wand... but his mom was pressured into having a sister. Said sister Solaria, to not mince words, was a genocidal monster who slowly descended into madness and tried to kill all monsters declaring outright war on them, but things were tense at first and they needed allies. So the Lucitors, along with the Cloud Kingdom of the Pony Heads which are exactly what they sound like, helped turn the tide. So things were cool for a few decades, and then we get to the reign of Rhina the Riddled. Rhina, who the book all but says is aromantic and likely asexual as well, was shoved into an arranged marriage with John Roachely, a second cousin who had no impact on the Lucitor side of the Genepool whatsoever and thus Star and Tom aren’t really related at all. I bring this up only because if I don’t tackle the incest allegations, someone will try and use that against me. I’d say i’m being paranoid but i’ve seen the rabid shippers use far less to attack Tom, so no. Rhina, to make things go smoother, cast a spell to make her love him.... it didn’t work longterm and, to get him to leave her, cast a heart break spell on him.. which LITERALLY broke his heart, and thus she was left a widow and the demons were not happy about her you know, whoopsie daisy murdering one of them likely set up with her a bridge between both sides and soured things for a while. Now you may all be asking: “Kay, intresting.. but what’s all this game of thrones but with flying pony heads, so better game of thrones, stuff gotta do with tom?” Well wait no more. Luckily for me, Star has a section in the book, and thus she spills the tea on her first metting with Tom. The two met at the Silver Bell Ball, an annual ball where the royalty of Mewni gather and the princes and princesses all dance once each as a good will gesture. The reason I went through the Rhina stuff is I’m guessing Star, who attended the ball every year according to the book and likely since at least she was old enough to dance, didn’t meet Tom earlier because his parents hadn’t been on good enough terms to bring him till he was 13, and River and Moon, Star’s parents, had succeeded in winning them over. The book nor the series dosen’t outright say this but given what we see later and what we have, it’s what i’m going with. We’ll get more into Tom’s personality when we get to his first in series appearance, but being a charming young man, and the first person her age at the ball Star found remotely attractive, they quickly set up a date for the boardwalk in the underworld for Cornshakes, because Mewni loves corn as much as I love Galarian Meowth. He looks so adorably homeless. But naturally if a snowball can’t last in hell, a shake can’t either, but even melted corn can’t ruin their good time and Tom even buys star a gift. I bring this up because said gift is star’s signiture devil horn headband. (Though Star is quick to announce she isn’t one of those annoying people who comes back from a trip thinking their a local). A real steal too at 14.99 or your second born’s soul. Most demons go for the first born, it’s a classy change of pace. The two eventually end up making it official, and star even gets a helpful pamphelt about Demons’ love of mascera, their anger and their tendency to tell their mom’s everything... the latter two will actually be really important as we go. But due to Tom’s anger as we’ll find out, the two end up breaking up and frustratingly we don’t learn the exacts just star was sad.. and that said depression lead to said kingdom distruction and the rest of the series. And since I covered the premise of the series above we can basically scoot right onto Tom’s first apperance.

BLOOD MOON BALL

Before this ep, Tom made a small cameo in another ep when her magic mirror, basically portrayed as working as a person sized video phone, accidently called him when she said call Mom. As a nice little bit of foreshadowing Tom flew into a rage at her preparing to hang up on him , even though it was a wrong number and they’d been broken up for a few   months at this point. But it’d be an agonizing wait for Tom. I was curious about the character, given not much had been revealed, I missed the episode with his cameo, and the animatic for BMB’s first scene was released months before the episode came out and was really funny and intresting. Said scene has Tom making one hell of an entrance, landing from the sky in a cool carriage with a skeletal horse, floating in and catching eyes and floating up to Star’s desk in class to ask her out with the moon.

Star.. has no interest and shoves tom, hilarious as while they just cut to the front of school, she had to have been mildly shoving him all the way from her class up a hallway, and outside. And passing Jackie, marco’s crush I bring up because why not and Janna, Star’s future close friend who we’ll get to more later, since he did earlier and they now have to go from oggling tom to wondering what the hell their seeing. She also tells him to take his dead horse back, which leads to one of my faviorite gags of the series  as said horse says “Wait, I was dead” and later, mid conversation about her going to said Ball, randomly interjects with “why didn’t you tell me I was dead?” That poor poor horse. You should come live with me. I don’t have a car, I could use a skeletal horse and I would tell you if you were dead man. Hit me up. But Tom tries to convince star he’s changed, he’s got an anger managment bunny, a counselor Brian (voiced by my guy Stephen Root, who you may better know as the voice of Bill Dautrive, the mayor in Amphibia or Bud Gleeful), and he’s doing fine.. then Marco goes and Karate chops his hand off, thinkign he was a danger. Tom gets really angry, to Star’s horror, which tells me she saw this sort of thing a LOT: tom getting this level of pissed at someone and likely leveling either them or everything around them. Thankfully Brian calms him down and Star introduces them and Tom , like the gentleman he is , gives her a bell to take her to the ball and time to think. Star, impressed by him calming down and trying, takes him up on it over Marco’s objections and worries about her safety, including the amasingly radar busting line “Never go with a predator to a second location” and the dance is on. As it turned out, Tom toned things down, ,less death and murder and more prom, to try and impress her and is annoyed when Star turns down his corsage.. which is a live spider. Which i’m generous to her on because spiders scare the shit out of me unless their pokemon. Seriously look at this sweetheart:

Who could be terrified of that face? Such a sweetie. Anyways, Tom is angry about it and his anger only increases when he wants to dunk himself and star in unicorn blood.. because while on earth dumping blood on someone makes them go on a psychic rampage you brought on yourselves, in the underworld is just a teen dance thing. But since one of Star’s best friend is a unicorn, something Tom has no excuse for not knowing as Pony is close to her and a princess in her own right and he had to have met her in his months dating star, and gets pissy over.. and star catches him having to pet his therapy bunny over it and walks off annoyed to get some punch.

And it’s with this Tom’s problems become apparent: He has charm, grace.. but he isn’t really TRYING to change, nor does he see WHY Star hates his anger. Sure he has a counsler, he has coping mechanisms things that would actually HELP him get better.. if he WANTED to. He dosen’t want to control his temper, he dosen’t want to get better he just wants Star back, and that’s why it’s not working: He’s making an effort, but it’s for the wrong reasons and without trying to tackle the root of his issues. He’s just trying to take the easiest way out, which is a problem that will crop up again next time. His second one is easier to illustrate when his plan becomes clear: turns out there’s a magical binding curse thing, it was clarified more in Season 4 but I feel no reason to leave it vauge here, and tom wants to bind his and Star’s souls together forever. He later admits he assumed she knew about that going in.. but it still dosen’t excuse his actions entirely and brings us to that flaw I was building towards: He’s selfish. He changed the ball to impress star, he shoved a corsage on her she didn’t one, got ANGRY, visably angry, at her turning down something he shoudl’ve known just by having dated her before would be a non-starter and worst of all he wanted to bind her to him forever without asking, just assuming she agreed by going. Star can be selfish at this stage too, especially this early on.. but underneath it she cares about people, even if she sometimes goes about it in the same fashion tom does here, she comes from a good place. Really both of this seems to come from them being royalty: both have had privlage their entire life and been insulated from a lot of things.. and Tom being raised in an environment where anger is normal and he gets whatever he wants from two loving parents and an army of servants, probably meant he never HAD to think of anyone else and as the series goes on, never had any friends except a Dog that we never see and probably sadly died. My theroy is Little Lord Fooleroy got ran over by Deatruk, the truck what runs over people, but i’m stupid like that. This winds up costing Tom his soul binding thing as Marco in disguise, being goaded by.. something that’s never remotely explained seriously what exactly the fuck was that creepy deep voice to crash the ball, ends up dancing with her. Shippers squeed, this was probably used in a jillion AMV’s.. and Tom naturally is pissssseeeed and ready to flambe Marco... until star takes him out with zero effort. They go home, Star berates Marco for not trusting her , end of episode.. oh and they speak in unison for a quick gag but i’m sure that won’t be important. As you can probably see her Tom was origianlly supposed to be a recurring pain in the backside for our heroes, showing up to win back Star, pull some “Nice Guy” Crap and then get his ass kicked most likely.. but after the end of Season 1, it was a fairly short season, the writers for whatever reason, and for the better decided to have Tom slowly change a bit.. but since him becoming a better person would be abrubt he has to do one lass dickhole thing first...

MR CANDLE CARES

And now we’ve come to Tom’s worst act, the thing that had he not fixed it the way he had at the end, made him an outright villain. Star and Marco have meetings with the new guidance counselor, who gives eveyrone else great career trajectories but for Star and Marco? Star gets a rather overbearing lecture on how she has to be queen when she grows up and probably shoudln’t date Marco and should be picking a future husband, ewwww, and Marco gets the unitetinonally, given Tom probably knows only about enough about earth to concot this scheme, offensive career path as janitor.. for an honor roll student with a bunch of extracurriculars. Yeah but Tom’s accidental racisim aside, while what he did to Marco was petty , what he’s trying to do to Star is creepy, basically using someone else to gaslight her into trying to get back together with him. But as noted above, Tom is selfish and as I haven’t noted yet he lacks some empathy.. so instead his advice sends Star spiraling not helped by her mother, Moon, basically telling her she has no choice in being queen and being happy dosen’t matter.. because Moon was kind of a dick at this stage. So while star gets a punk makeover and prepares to do something terrible to prevent her miserable future, Marco decides to confront candle and, as I didn’t even try to hide, Tom is behind this. Granted Tom wasn’t great at hiding it either, it’s just star was understandably concerned about her future and too distracted by that to pick up on how weirdly intrested Mr.Candle was in her dating life. But no i’ts Tom who is, and Marco baits him by pretending he and star are “Smooch Buddies”.. something the trailers for Season 2, and this episode was pretty early, used as a bait and switch, but I’m okay with it as most could probably tell something was up by the delivery. Naturally this proves to be a terrible idea, and i’d say it’s the dumbest thing Marco ever did if Season 3 didn’t take a sledgehammer to his character, but that’s an essay for another day, and Tom takes Marco back to his place to murder him... but Marco stands strong and Tom challenges him to a battle to the death, with Marco choosing ping-poing. Tom naturally destroys him.. but Marco uses the game to point some things out: After calling tom out for bascially cheating, since his powers give him the upper hand, Tom talks about Star doing the same, basically making up her own rules as soon as she looses. Marco then uses this to make tom see what a butt he’s been: The ping pong thing is just another example of how Star functions, doing whatever she wants and going her own way. It’s why being forced down the path of queen scares her so much, it’s responsiblity and rules and no fun as far as she can tell with no benifits. It’s why she rebels so much.. she can’t be told what to do.. which Marco makes Tom realize means he can’t control her, nor would he want to, and that he’s made a huge mistake. Tom forgoes killing Marco, and the two rush to star who’s on the edge of cutting of a mermaid’s tail to prevent her from ever being queen.. but just can’t do it. Star can be selfish, the above cheating shows that.. but she’s a good person deep down. Tom admits what he did.. and throughly apologizes for it, agreeing basically to let Star go and stop trying to force her back with him. Star does punch him for good measure, deservedly so, but they part on good terms and Marco reassures Star when she’s Queen she can rule her way, and they hug.. and notably Tom dosen’t get the least bit upset. Mr.Candle Cares is a good second ep. I’ve made no bones about how this is the worst thing Tom did: The controlling stuff at the ball was just selfish, the blood moon thing while not GREAT was asbent minded selfishness. This... it nearly broke star and ruined her future. However it comes from the same place as Blood Moon and his reaction at the end shows he simply didn’t consider star’s feelings.. and likely realize he HADN’T been. it wasn’t Marco’s fault they weren’t together, it was Tom’. While the Apology is a minor thing, it’s still a step in the right direction. As I said had he NOT backed away here he probably never would’ve gotten better or even if he tried, gone so far in trying to get star back he couldn’t walk it back. Here he hit his lowest point.. but thanks to Marco, he had a chance to turn it around before it was too late and grow as a person. This is where Tom gets compelling: he goes from a spoiled selfish douchey rich kid, to someone who clearly WANTS to be better, but has issue, social and otherwise, that make it an uphill battle. And with that we get to tom’s penultimate apperance for Season 2, and his last full one...

Friendenemies:

Tom shows up again and while Star tries to shoo him off before she has to get the shooing broom, Tom reveals he’s not there for Star but Marco. See he feels bad about you know, trying to kill him twice and wants to take Star’s Marco out tonight he’s gonna show him what he’s all about, he’s gonna get jacked up on some cheap champagne and let the good times all roll out. Marco understandably does not want a night out with a guy who was creepy to his best friend and tried murdering him twice, so Tom uses a bribe: tickets to the Mackie Hand, a martial artist that Marco is a huge fan of, film festival that Marco failed to get tickets to. With some encouragment from Star, who while not wanting to date Tom sees he’s genuinely making an effort, Marco agrees They hang out in Tom’s carriage which goes by tardis logic, if only, and to the creator’s credit, just so, and the two soon bond, finding a shared love of both Mackie Hand and the pop band love sentence, and Marco genuinely earns tom’s respect when some shades wearing piles of smug challenge our heroes, which Tom now counts as at this point, to a race, Marco agrees... then has them do nothing while the idiots speed up and get arrested and we get the blessed image above. The good times get interrupted though when it’s time for the marathon but tom locks him inside. And no this isn’t the start of some angry makeouts, as it turns out this was part of tom’s anger management therapy, but once again his propensity for the easy way out means he fails at it and burns up the tickets.. but Marco is more upset that Tom lied to him and pretended to be his friend and like mackie hand, though the love sentence thing was real> The whole thing plays more like a breakup than the end of a blossming friendship, which ties into how this episode got people shipping Marco and Tom with each other.. and rightfully so. While I don’t really ship it myself, I can see why as it has great chemstry and a great dynamic. Tom’s behavior here is part of why I say he has social issues, something I can relate to as a cave troll living in my mother’s basement: Tom dosen’t seem to have any real friends. Oh sure he can charm people, he has servants, two loving parents, and a screeching grandpa whose on the wall of my own personal heroes along with Ric Flair, My Mother, Stan Lee, Peter David, Rebecca Sugar and many more, but he dosen’t have FRIENDS. Star seems to be his first relationship and the first thing resembling a true friend he had, so while his behavior was a tad creepy it makes sense why he clung to her. And that shows here: He tries superfically bonding with marco, faking an intrest, giving him gifts, partying.. but it’s both forming a genunine connection over something, Love Sentence, and just sharing some memories that ended up making them friends. But yeah after Marco sings a sad pop ballad, or part of one. Tom decides to do a three point grand romantic gesture and raises Mackie Hand from the dead, and when Mackie isn’t allowed into his own film festival he fights the ticket guy and tom and marco watch and while they say they hate each other, the two’s friendship is forged. Marco finally has a friend outside of two doofuses and .. does Janna count? I dunno. She’s less of a friend and more of a gremlin who steals his things constantly while being actual friends with his bestie. Before we close out this leg there’s one final episode for season 2 with Tom in it to cover and dive into: Naysaya.

Naysaya comes literally just before the mid-season finale and Tom sadly disappears for the rest of the season, though he’ll be back and in greater numbers  in Season 3. I’m not covering it full because it’s not a full on tom episode, he only has a short cameo, but he is important to it and his one brief bit shows off his  character. In short Marco is finally asking out Jackie Lynn Thomas, his crush and a great character in her own right who sadly all but vanished from the show shortly into season 3 after something we’ll get to in passing next time, but got some great closure and was revealed to be Pansexual, so good for her. Marco had been building up to this for the last two seasons: first realizing thanks to time shenanigans he never made a move, then actually talking to her, and then not only telling her how he felt but realizing he didn’t know her but he’d like to. So now he’s ready to ask her out but every time he tries, written or spoken, it comes out as his most embarrassing secrets before the little neck tumor man comes out up there and does it for him. Thanks to Janna, local roustabout mentioned above, who after teasing Marco as is her usual response to anything with him, uses her knowledge of the spooky oooky to find out what that thing is: a Naysya, a curse born creature that spills it’s target’s most embarrassing secrets at whoever they try to court. Naturally, given Tom was an insanley jealous ball of asshole until a few episodes ago, it’s his fault though showing his slow growth, while he’s entirely suprised Marco asked no one out since the ball, says the guy who did two schemes and a shenanigan trying ot get star back, he’s also sorry and assumed it’d worn off or he would’ve told him sooner, and tells him how: he has to let all his insecurities out> Marco nearly withdraws over this due to being 90% insecurity, but eventually buckles down and tells jackie every embrassing thing about  him and.. it works. Naysaya leaves and he and Jackie go out on a group date. And with that Tom is gone for a while but he, and this retrospective will be back.  I owe a huge debt of grattitude to @jess-the-vampire​, a dear friend, and wish her a happy belated birthday. She was a willing and helpful resource and worth a follow. And if you want more stuff like this, comics reviews, and what have you, feel free to follow or comisson me. Until next time, keep the home fires burning. 

[its-whitetomorrow]

Old interview but better translation from Dogasu now

The goofy Rocket trio that we all know and love become serious "villains" for a while there, didn't they?

Hayashibara:  That was like a boot camp for the three of us. We had to calmly think "So wait, we were actually evil this whole time?" It was really lonely. It would have been one thing if they were these cold-hearted roles from the very beginning but to change things mid-way like that was too much.

Inuyama:  It didn't feel right for Nyarth to deliver these ultra serious lines so a lot of the time he would just kind of shut his mouth and not say anything. It really was a test because up until then Nyarth had been brimming with human-ness.

Miki:  The Rocket trio is connected to each other thanks to their kindness. I'm glad that training we went through clarified that for us.

They are unique human beings connected to each other but they’re also proper criminals when the narrative calls for it. It wasn’t a “training,” it was PLOT and DIRECT ASSIGNMENT FROM THE BOSS the characters been pursuing for ages (apart from their unique Pikachu objective).

So yeah, you just don’t like serious roles and it isn’t fun when you’re told to play them after all these years... which is hubris... but seriously, YES, you were actually evil this whole time! They are villains who steal other people’s Pokemon et cetera, not even anti-heroes for the most part though sometimes they are and it’s truly amazing

Funny how it isn’t a problem when Nyarth delivers serious lines about capturing Pikachu or Pokemon of the day to please Sakaki... but it was in Best Wishes when they spoke about *different* kinds of schemes. Also, what’s the entire issue with BW!Meowth in particular anyway? I thought it was cool he had a bigger part in the motto and during monologues... but what do I know...

BONUS:

If they changed to the black uniforms then they could live more comfortably and wouldn't have to sleep outside, sure. But that's not what they're after. They just want to contribute to their Boss, no matter their current situation.

White uniforms mean individuality but the world doesn’t end if they play James Bond in black ones for a month. They are allowed to change clothes and their white colors don’t mean “clowns and good guys in disguise,” they can still live “comfortably” and rise in ranks in their white uniforms (if they’re achiving criminal results). But that’s not what they’re after? How so? Because contributing to their boss means results. LITERALLY, THAT’S WHAT THIS SENTENCE MEANS. Unless they’re supposed to be lazy wage thiefs who pretend they want results but then they’re just having fun... just fun... but that’s not Team Rocket of course, they’re supposed to be hard-working, not lazy. Just because things didn’t really work out for them in the past series doesn’t mean they can’t change their approach and learn from their failures.

Yeah, I can’t help but think the contradictory circumstances that plagued Team Rocket in XY and sometimes SM are completely in-line with VAs’ mindset here... perhaps even influenced by it... but what if contrbuting to their boss means a better standing with Sakaki and change of status quo? Huh, what about this? Wake up, it has already happened! This means they’ll no longer sleep outside as long as they’re in his good graces because they receive their paycheck, and the show doesn’t seem interested in degrading them back - because that would be boring, old and devoid of opportunities. Speaking of opportunities...

right after this interview --> BOOM, we get all of this

Yeah, must have been a shock to them, but I’m not sad :D

Memories from Best Wishes? Well, mine are just fine!

The universe really does seem to work in strange ways sometimes...

[oops-prow-did-it-again]

Pokémon Retold: Ultra Sun - Chapter 12 (Witch Hunt)

Pokémon Retold: Ultra Sun on FFN

Pokémon Retold: Ultra Sun on AO3

Pokémon Retold (series) on AO3

Child of Unova on AO3

Consider tipping/supporting/commissioning me on Patreon? :3

Heeey look I'm alive, though I'm gonna go dark for those 2 weeks after tomorrow, I'm sorryy

In other news, if you read my Black and Black 2 stories, you'll maybe remember that there was a dude named Taven in them. As I mentioned before, Taven is actually an OC from a friend of mine, ClumsyReaper. They've been writing out Taven's story in more detail over on Archive of Our Own under the title 'Child of Unova,' though their penname is also ClumsyReaper over there. Feel free to give it a read! Taven's story seems like it's going to take a more nuanced look on Pokemon White's version of events by focusing on worldbuilding more so than the events of the game, such as how the gym leaders and League function.

Saying that to say, my version of Taven is set in a different universe from his version - so you'll notice some key differences between them if you do check it out. You'll also notice some other cool parallels between his world and mine, too, such as the existence of certain characters. Anyway, it's not that long and you should check it out :)

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Waiting alone outside of the Verdant Cavern was far from comfortable for Lillie. She occasionally checked on Nebby in her bag, bouncing her leg impatiently as she waited for Elio, Hau, and Selene to finish with their trial (much to Nebby's vocal displeasure). Captain Ilima's trial was simple enough, not to mention Verdant Cavern wasn't that large, so she hoped that meant they would be done soon… Surveying the route just beyond the entrance to it, she could just make out the edge of a Pokémon Center, but otherwise, it was lush, grassy path with the odd berry tree dotting the landscape. She knew the cliff beyond the Pokémon Center overlooked the sea, but the scent of saltwater on the lively breeze was lost on her, as she had long since grown accustomed to it.

Of course, nothing seemed capable of going right for her, and so within just a few minutes, a familiar duo of Skull members crested the shallow hill leading to Verdant Cavern's entrance. She froze, and it seemed they initially intended to just keep walking, but one spotted her out the corner of his eye and gestured with a nod of his head in her direction. His buddy scoffed and rolled his shoulders, then started to walk away, as if totally uninterested in a confrontation with her. Lillie couldn't help but smirk, wondering if he had been the one she had sprayed… Truthfully, she didn't remember what he had looked like, not that there was really much information to go off, considering the masks and hats they wore. Ultimately, the first of the duo snatched his friend by the shoulder, steering him in her direction as he trotted over to her.

"What do you want?" Lillie icily asked once they were within earshot, her muscles taut and poised to act on a moment's notice. Although she personally just found the Skull grunts irritating on the worst of days, she had to brace herself in case they decided to exact some revenge for her actions the day before. She tried hard not to let perceptions blind her to what people were capable of. She had learned quite a while ago people could surprise one in the worst of ways.

Based on the first's voice, they were, in fact, the same grunts she had accosted the day before. "Ay, homie," the first joked upon his approach, "you in a better mood today?"

The other hung back decisively, mutinously shooting glares between his friend and Lillie. She had to admit, that made her smile some, a sinisterly fake smile. That was because they were amusing her, but truthfully, she didn't know why they had even taken such a shine to her the day before. Sure, she looked familiar to 'someone they had taken in,' but even then, what would they care? That was what put her so on edge about their approach the day before, and it was still bothering her then. Her smile wasn't the only fakeness going on. Indeed, she was certain their friendliness was as false as it came. It had to be.

"Yeah, I'm feeling better today," she taunted him. With a voice dripping in degrading sarcasm, she musingly asked, "Why? Are you boys not finished with little ole' me yet~?" At least most of the time, the Skull Gang seemed rather harmless. It was only their leader, Guzma, Lillie had heard one needed to be worried about. It wasn't like they knew about Nebby, and otherwise she wasn't packing any pokémon, so she wasn't fearing any thievery like the grunts were known to do. Of course, she didn't let that soften her guard; it was just all she could do to keep a lid on her nerves. She wouldn't hesitate to spray them both down or bolt into the Verdant Cavern for cover if need be, sacred trial ground be damned. Oh, she thought she was clever for already thinking ways out of her predicament before anything had even happened.

The first opened his mouth like he wanted to jeer at her again, but he and his friend abruptly tensed and then whipped their heads to look over their shoulders. "You see that?" he asked his friend in Alolan, sounding so different from the jesting tone he'd used seconds ago.

"See what? I heard somethin', but…"

"Look, see that bush? The hell was that?"

They both lowered their knees slightly, bent in a way that suggested they were ready to run, too. Their unease was contagious, as Lillie slowly slunk off her rock and craned her neck to look over their shoulders, feeling an almost primal need to group with the Skull men. Strength in numbers and all of that. For a breathless second, she saw nothing out of the ordinary, but just as she went to return to her rock and snidely call them a couple of scared Meowth, a horrifyingly familiar figure took shape inches away from the Skull grunts.

A gleaming, silver and navy suit that hid a surly man's expression beneath a set of opaque goggles materialized, gazing firmly at Lillie, and the two Skull grunts wasted no time in fleeing the scene, shouting to each other in panicked Alolan. Yet, just before vanishing over the hill, one of them paused to peer over his shoulder at her. His blue eyes were wide and fearful, but in the end, he jerked his head from side to side and bolted after his friend. Even as she locked up in terror, Lillie couldn't blame them for their cowardice. This wasn't their battle, and for people that could regularly be assaulted for daring to show their faces outside of Po Town, it wasn't like they didn't have reason to fear the man in his otherworldly getup… Still, she had to wonder why he had bothered to stop and look back at her at all…

Shaking her head vigorously to refocus her attention on the suited man ahead of her, Lillie narrowed her eyes at him. She recognized him right away, as well as his colleague who poked her head out from behind him. They were the same two people that had tried to assist the various Aether Foundation employees in capturing her during her original escape with Nebby. They were just as terrifying as she remembered, just as mysterious… and how on Earth had they just appeared like that from nowhere?!

"Did we scare them off, Dulse?" Zossie asked quizzically. Before Dulse had a chance to respond to her, she pouted and whined, "Aw, I don't mean to scare anybody!"

"Zossie, focus!" Dulse hissed at her, though he was staring squarely at Lillie. "Lillie Rae Aether, we need to discuss something with you immediately. We have wasted enough time trying to locate you on these islands through trial and error in pinpointing Cosmog's signature. We have no more time to waste."

Lillie took a step backward, chancing a rapid glance to the Verdant Cavern's entrance behind her. When she looked back on Dulse and Zossie, she found they had fanned out in front of her; Zossie, with her arms clasped deceivingly politely behind her back, smiled uncertainly, while Dulse had his arms planted firmly at his sides, what little she could see of his expression blank. Not that Lillie paid much mind to their body language, as she was searching for a way out of this confrontation with them. She didn't know what they were, what they wanted with Cosmog or the Aether Foundation, but she knew they were bad news. Her options then had dwindled down to just one: flee into the sacred Verdant Cavern.

"I can see you are distressed," Dulse commented flatly. The way his mouth move made Lillie falter for a moment. She had thought before that the pale, blue over their faces had been a bodysuit, but as she watched him speak… She realized that she could see into his mouth. Gaping in horror, she realized the pale blueness was just their skin. She whipped her gaze to Zossie, noticing she was the same. "Lillie Rae Aether, we do not wish any harm upon you. Cosmog is a potential harbinger of destruction to your world and ours, and so we must—"

"Shut up!" Lillie spat, bristling in almost feral fear. "I don't care! I don't care about what you or what my mother wants!" She was dimly aware of the way Zossie lunged forward to try to grab her bag as she whirled around to dart into the Verdant Cavern, running as fast as her feet would carry her. She heard Nebby mewl pathetically from within her bag as it bounced against her hip, but she didn't have the luxury of being kind to him in that moment.

Inside the cavern, she noticed that shafts of light occasionally penetrated the murkiness through holes in the ceiling, and that dens and fallen logs dotted the upward incline of the mossy, overgrown cave. It smelled musty, like a mix of saltwater and grass, and the floor was damp underfoot. Glancing fervently around to try to spot Elio, Hau, and Selene, she cursed under her breath when she heard the distant cry of a Gumshoos and deduced that they must have already descended into the Totem Gumshoos' den. Deciding that a hollowed-out cove beneath a fallen log would have to do, she scurried inside and wrenched open her bag. She immediately grabbed Nebby, holding him down, as she thrashed the rest of her bag's contents, letting out a puff of relieved air when she found her heavy duty repel spray. It was a special blend, made specifically by the Aether Foundation, that staved off wild pokémon no matter what pokémon the person was using. Part of their humanities initiative by making the world a safer place for non-trainers, she thought bitterly. It was a nice thought, but the knowledge that Aether had created it and would get credit for the patent was outright depressing, considering all she knew about them.

Squashing down her misgivings about it, she sprayed the repel, and apologetically frowned at Nebby as he recoiled from her grasp, flaring his little arms. "I'm sorry, I know, it smells bad and you really don't deserve this…" she mouthed at him, capping her spray, stuffing it in the bag, then zipping it shut once more. Sighing to herself, she realized she was trembling in fright, leaning her head back against the stony wall behind her. Closing her eyes and biting her lower lip, fighting off the nauseating wave of fear and despair, she whispered, "Neither of us deserve this…"

She hoped the rotten log in front of her would protect her from Dulse and Zossie's prying eyes.

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"Good Arceus on a stick, why is it so big and so mean?" Elio blustered as he backpedaled away from the oversized, glowing Gumshoos hissing at him and his Litten. They had been fighting it for quite a bit at that point, and it was still just as wily and furious as ever. Despite Elio's obvious uncertainty, his Litten looked completely unfazed and, in fact, invigorated by the opponent ahead of it. The dark fur of its back was puffed up and its eyes blazed intensely as it yowled back at the Gumshoos, undaunted. In fact, a faint red glow surrounded the Litten, bringing some light into the shadowy den. There were a few shafts of light coming from the roof to light up the mossy stone that surrounded them, but it was much, much darker there than it had been in the rest of the Verdant Cavern… "Uh… Litten, Ember… on the… Gumshoos, right?"

Hau was more reserved, ordering Popper to attack in Alolan. Selene found she couldn't quite make out where the words began or ended in his native tongue, due to the way he spoke so fluidly, not to mention how it sounded like he was almost… singing, with the melodic way the words rolled off his tongue. Still, it was obvious what he was asking Popper to do based on the attacks that it issued. This time, a simple Water Gun, based on the jet of water Popper blasted the Gumshoos with. After the Gumshoos reeled from the hit and furiously snapped its teeth after Popper in retaliation, Hau offered some crooning words of encouragement to his partner, pumping a fist excitedly. He almost acted like an entirely different person in battle.

Selene, on the other hand, was scrambling to try to find out what moves her Rowlet could use on her Rotom Dex. She knew Leafage was an option, but was there anything else it could use that would be useful? As she withdrew the device from her pocket, though, it wriggled free of her grasp and a robotic voice asked her what she wanted to know, the round, blue eyes of the Rotom blinking at her innocently. "What else can my Rowlet use?" Selene asked breathlessly, irritated that she couldn't just scroll through the device normally. Somehow, even though the Rotom Dex started spouting off move names at her, it felt as if it were slower. Elio's Litten bought her some time by firing off the Ember it had been building in its throat.

Although she had enjoyed her battle with Hau in Iki Town, she had to admit, facing this angry Gumshoos, easily twice her size and pulsing with an otherworldly glow, she was feeling anything but joy. It had dawned on her, as the battle progressed, and as the Gumshoos bellowed in a way that shook the walls and floor, that they had essentially loped their way into a wild pokémon's den unsure if they could actually defeat it or not. What would happen if they failed? Sure, Captain Ilima had said that, traditionally, challengers would have to wait a day to face the trial again, but why was that? Selene had thought before it was to give the pokémon in the trial a chance to rest, but now she was wondering if it was instead to ensure the challengers were okay and able to face the trial again… Her eyes locked onto the Gumshoos' sharp, jagged teeth protruding from its jaws, and she swallowed hard in the beginnings of a panic. How on Earth could anyone have faced this thing alone? she thought desperately. After a point, she just growled and shook her head, waving the Rotom Dex off, "Ugh, Rowlet, just use Leafage on it!"

As her Rowlet dove off her head and at the Gumshoos, its body cloaking in leaves and tendrils, a Yungoos scurried from the shadows around the edge of the den. Hau had Popper attack it so that Rowlet was uninterrupted, but when Rowlet did barrel into the Gumshoos, he bounced off hilariously like a soccer ball. Flailing his wings annoyedly, he caught himself before he hit the ground, all the while, the Gumshoos did little more than shake its head in irritation.

"Right," Selene almost laughed to herself, "I forgot that Rowlet doesn't seem all that attack-oriented…" Floundering for what to do next, she almost slumped in relief when the Gumshoos suddenly stood to its back legs and stepped a few paces back, twitching its head as if trying to hear something in the distance. The Yungoos at its side hissed and abruptly dove into a crevice in the rocks surrounding them, vanishing as quickly as it had appeared.

"Move!" Hau exclaimed suddenly, snatching Popper in his arms, and jumping to the far right of the cavern. Selene and Elio exchanged a bewildered look, and then followed, waving their arms for their Litten and Rowlet to come with. Almost as soon as they retreated, the Gumshoos crashed forward on all fours with a hefty thud against the floor, and scurried out of its den, down the hill that led back toward the main passage of the Verdant Cavern.

There was a short stretch of silence before Elio finally fractured it. "So, uh… what just happened? Did we win?" He and Selene both turned quizzical expressions on Hau. Elio's Litten hissed after the Gumshoos, but didn't give chase, while Selene's Rowlet reclaimed his throne atop her head and started to preen himself. She just rolled her eyes at him.

"What am I going to do with you?" Selene teasingly asked her Rowlet in Kantonian, scratching his side gingerly.

Focusing back on Hau, disturbed was the only way Selene could describe his face as he peered unblinkingly after where the Gumshoos had gone. Without answering them, he clutched Popper a little more tightly to his chest and then carefully picked his way forward, stepping lightly, like how Selene had seen pokémon in nature documentaries do when they were listening for a threat. It jarred her, almost, to see how instinctive his reaction and movements were… how practiced they were. Unnerved, she crept after him and whispered at last, "Hau…? What's going on…?"

He flinched and shushed her, then pressed forward some more before his shoulders slacked. "Sorry," he puffed, "Totem…" Frustrated, he snapped his fingers and couldn't seem to find the words to explain what he wanted to say. Suddenly, Selene's Rotom Dex zipped ahead of her and hovered between her and Hau.

"I can help!" it buzzed in a monotone statement, waving its little arms. "Hau! Just speak in Alolan, and then I'll translate!"

"You can do that?" Selene asked dubiously. "How…?" Then, she paused. Her mouth fell open. "Wait, wait, wait a second, are you just—did you just—are you speaking to me? Like, in my language, like you understand me?"

"You pick up a lot as a digital Ghost-type in this place," her Rotom retorted in an eerily playful tone. "And this thing's speaker lets me speak! I guess that's why it has that name…"

"I've never heard of Rotom talking even when they take over things that have speakers," Elio hoarsely muttered, barely above a whisper, reflecting Selene's shock. "So, what—"

"Well, who wants to yap to Kanto-Johto people that are gonna experiment on me for days?" Rotom taunted. "Anyway," the floating device whirled around to face Hau, "go on! What's going on with the Totem? Don't be shy! You look like you've seen a ghost!" Her Rotom then issued a few bzzrts! that sounded uncomfortably like laughter. Selene didn't know whether to be amazed at how intelligent the Rotom seemed to truly be, or whether to be horrified at learning it was possibly even more intelligent than her or any other human.

Hau suspiciously narrowed his eyes at the Rotom Dex, but begrudgingly started to speak, anyway. Once he was done, he stroked Popper's head and tensed even more when the Rotom Dex repeated his words in perfect Galarish. Selene might have thought his reaction was amusing if she didn't feel like reacting the same way.

"Totems only flee battles when their trial site needs guarding, so that means someone that shouldn't be within it is inside, or worse, the trial site is being damaged in some way!" With another bzzrt!, the Rotom Dex hovered close to Selene. "The Totem will only return to battle after it's protected the trial site!"

"What would mess with a trial site? Or… who?" Elio sounded much more concerned than Selene had expected. She had to stop from groaning as she soon figured out why. "I mean, Lillie was out there… Would Lillie coming inside do it? Why would she go inside, though?" He abruptly darted ahead of Hau (much to his chagrin), and worriedly glanced between him and Selene. "Would the Gumshoos hurt her if she went inside?"

Hau bit his lower lip and then looked down. After he mumbled something, Selene's Rotom Dex piped in with, "I don't know, he said! Zzzzrt!"

"Yeah, screw that. Something's wrong," Elio hissed. "C'mon, Macho, let's go!" With a wave at his Litten, he bounded down the slope leading back into Verdant Cavern's main passage. His Litten's fur fluffed out all over again and it raced after him.

"Macho?" Hau echoed the nickname. "What that mean?"

"Not important right now," Selene answered, perhaps more abrasively than she should have, but she was too busy scrambling after her brother to think too hard about how she spoke to Hau right then (though she had certainly internally rolled her eyes at the nickname since it seemed based on Lillie's taunting names that she would call Elio, and considering he hadn't used it yet in the battle, he must have just decided on the name). Totem or trial site or not, she was not about to let her brother throw himself at that behemoth of a Gumshoos on his own. Her Rowlet took flight once she started to run and flew at her side, flapping tiny, adorable wings rapidly to keep up with her as she skidded down the slope.