Ralph
Route 25, Monday May 20th
After such an intense very beginning to the journey, Ralph didn't feel particularly encouraged to enter the forest anymore. Instead, she and Sandsy stuck to the well traveled road. It would take them to Cerulean faster, even if she wouldn't meet as many wild pokémon as all the other Cape trainers likely would. Sandsy didn't seem to mind. He looked to be in good spirits as he waggled on beside her.
Suddenly, he stopped and listened with his small ears though. Ralph followed his line of sight and noticed another trainer further ahead on the forest-lined road, barely visible behind some trees. He seemed to be... Sad? Oh, man. This early into the journey? Ralph rolled her eyes as she kept walking. Perhaps he wouldn't notice her, and just...
Nope, Sandsy was not on her wavelength at all right now. He walked right up to the sad boy and tugged the leg of his pants carefully. Curse that little considerate rat, Ralph thought as the boy turned around to reveal a sobbing face. He blinked down at the yellow mouse before realizing it had a trainer and looking up at her instead. Well, she couldn't just leave him there now, could she? He didn't look old at all. Was he really thirteen? He reminded her a lot of her little brother. Aw, shit. Yea, that did it.
"Hey there," she said with a sigh she couldn't completely hide. "What's wrong?"
"I'm not..." the boy tried, but was interrupted by a hulking noise from his throat.
"Try again," Ralph said with a forced smile.
"I don't think my starter pokémon likes me."
"Why not?"
"I... I just lost our first battle. I'm such a bad trainer!" More hulking, and some tears.
Ralph raised an eyebrow. "That's fine," she said bluntly.
"Fine?" he abruptly glanced up at her, almost a bit offended looking.
"Yeah? You lost a battle. Maybe you'll win the next one. Or maybe you'll need to figure out why you keep losing, and practice to improve your weaknesses. This is what they taught us in the school, isn't it?"
He seemed to consider that for a moment. "B-but... My pokémon, won't she be sorry that she had to start with such a weak trainer?"
Ralph met Sandsy's gaze for a second before answering. She crouched down to his level and pet his head, which he affectionately seemed to approve of. He really was kind of cute, this mouse. One day she'd make him deadly strong as well as cute.
"Look, what's your name? And where's your pokémon now?"
"I'm Finn. Penny is in her pokéball."
"Can I meet her?"
"Okay..." the boy said and released a spunky looking Tangela from its confinements. But before they could say hello to it, something moved quickly in the bushes behind the boy. Sandsy saw it first, and leapt forward with his claws at the ready, as Ralph pulled a bewildered Finn away.
From the leafage crawled two angry worms. They shot toxic stares at Penny and Finn in particular.
"Weedle?" Ralph noted, a bit confused about their attitude.
"Oh no, they followed us here!" Finn exclaimed and moved to stand behind Ralph. "We tried to capture them earlier, but they poisoned Penny so I had to run off to safety and treat her... It was so embarrassing!"
The Weedle let out some kind of gurgling hissing noise, and Sandsy responded with raising his claws higher and standing his ground in the ditch by the road. Tangela didn't do much other than glance back and forth between the foes and her coward of a trainer.
"Listen, kid," Ralph said and pushed him away from clinging onto her. "If you fall over, do you really just keep lying around on the ground? You retreated, now you're healed, so let's battle them again."
"Let... Let
us battle them?" Finn repeated, blinking up at her and then at Tangela. "You mean, together with you?"
"Yea, it wasn't a fair fight, was it? Two against one. You're the cowards!" she added with extra tone towards the hissing worms near the bushes. "Sandsy, let's team up with Tangela."
Sandsy nodded and backed off a little so he stood next to the grass type. She looked overwhelmed, almost like her trainer right now. Seemed to Ralph like they were a pretty good match overall.
"Make the first move, and we'll follow your example, alright?"
"Alright!" Finn said, suddenly energized, although streaks from tears were still plainly visible on his cheeks. "Penny, use Constrict!"
Tangela lashed out with vines and managed to grab and squeeze one of the bugs, although, the other one dodged.
"Sandsy, Scratch the one that is constricted!" Ralph ordered.
Sandshrew jumped forwards and landed a flawless Scratch on the worm, although it shook it loose from Tangela's relatively weak vines. But the other Weedle had snuck up behind and now retaliated by casting String Shot onto Tangela. The slimy thread constricted the grass type better than her vines had the bug before.
"Sandsy, get some cover with Sand Attack!"
He tossed up some sand from the ground into the face of the Weedle he had just scratched.
"You should retaliate now," Ralph said, nudging Finn in the ribs.
"Uh... Right! Sleep Powder, Penny!" he called out.
Tangela could very well use that move even when being covered in slimy web. She shook her body violently, releasing spores that made the closest Weedle very drowsy very fast.
"Well done!" Ralph exclaimed. "Sandsy, Scratch on the one close to Tangela!"
He carried out the attack, slicing the Weedle hard over its wormy body. Between that and the Sleep Powder, the weak bug was almost down for the count now.
"It's getting tired!" Finn shouted. "Should I capture it?"
"Go for it," Ralph said, and couldn't stop a smile from leaking out onto her lips.
As Finn prepared to toss the ball, however, the other - possibly angrier - Weedle attacked the distracted Sandsy from behind. The Poison Sting hit him hard, and it seemed like it rapidly managed to make him sick as well.
"Oh no!" Finn exclaimed, halting his action.
"Don't worry about us! Capture your Weedle!" Ralph commanded.
Finn swallowed hard and turned back to Tangela and the bug near her. "Penny, use Constrict again!"
She did so, and the extra squeeze seemed to make Weedle give in to the drowziness at last. Finn tossed his pokéball, and the Weedle was caught without much ado.
In the meantime Ralph had rushed up to Sandsy. She bent down and confirmed his worsening state, while the second Weedle hissed in the background, seemingly coming around for a new strike. "We'll have to finish this quickly, then," she said as calmly as she could manage, to her pokémon. Then she stood back up and backed off. "You know what a bug's worst natural enemy is?"
"A bird?" Finn suggested behind her.
Weedle raised its stinger under the leaves of the bushes and started crawling faster towards the ditch where Sandsy was breathing heavily.
"A really big rock," Ralph answered. "Rock Slide!"
Sandsy mustered all the power he had left, to make this most difficult of his moves work. In the nick of time, two rocks formed over his head and were dropped right atop of the approaching Weedle before its attack could reach him. There wasn't much question about it now. The second bug had definitely fainted under that.
Ralph let out a breath she didn't know she had been holding. "Or two rocks, I guess."
Finn laughed, all traces of sobbing gone at last. "Hey! I caught a Weedle!" he cheered. "We caught one!" he added and crouched to hug his now happy Tangela heartily.
Ralph nodded with another smile she couldn't stop. But her own pokémon wasn't quite as happy right now. "I'm sorry, partner," she said as she returned him to his pokéball.
"Oh, I have medicine! I only used some of it to get the poison out of Penny," Finn said positively. "I'll share it with you as a thanks for helping me out!"
"Thanks, kid," Ralph said, quite relieved. She hadn't packed any antidotes herself, stupidly, and didn't feel like going back to the academy already and risk meeting her sister again...
"What about Weedle?" Finn inquired with a raised eyebrow, nodding towards the mess of bug and conjured rocks by the side of the road now.
"Oh, it'll be fine for sure. Wild pokémon have their own ways to heal. Especially angry ones," Ralph shrugged.
"Aren't you going to capture it?"
Ralph blinked at that. She hadn't even considered it. But... "Yeah, why not, really?"
One pokéball toss later, and there was very little struggle before the ball 'pinged' to signal that the capture was complete. She picked the ball up and felt it in her hand. This was the first pokémon she had caught on her own. A very angry little worm. She hoped that could be put to good use.
"So, what are you going to do now?" Finn asked her and poked her arm with something.
She glanced down at the shorter boy and realized it was an antidote. Thankful, she took it and put it in her bag, for imminent use when they put some distance between themselves and this battlespot.
"Travel to challenge all the gym leaders, of course," she replied as if it was the most natural thing in the world. "Aren't you?"
"I don't think so," he said, to her surprise, and he actually didn't look very sad about it. "I need more training. I will train together with Penny and Weedle at the Cape College for another year. You're not in my class, so you must be older, right? So you waited another year before you journeyed, right?"
"Well, that wasn't... Well yeah, but..."
"So I can do that too! I don't think it's a bad thing. I shouldn't have gone already. I know that now. But I'm not feeling sad about it! I just know that I have to work on my weaknesses. So that I'll get back up when I fall, next year!"
He looked so cheerful and motivated that Ralph didn't have the heart to comment anything that might put him down. Or anything at all, really. It was all very cringy. But he really did remind her of her little brother, except maybe dumber.
"Good luck, kid," she said with a small wave, and a nod towards the Tangela, before she kept walking down the road of Route 25.