The two of us walked back to Pewter city. We passed the various trainers that I had defeated. Most of them seemed to avert their eyes. Was it out of shame? Or fear? Also, what were they all doing hanging around here? I know they were all waiting here endlessly to challenge and lose against me, but that’s over and done with now.

Don’t these people have places to be? They’re all kind of just loitering around pretending to be busy doing… well something.

“Hey, Ben, why is that girl glaring at you?”

Ah. She must be referring to Lass Janice. “She too thought I was sexually harassing her… Mistakenly” I gave Robin a pointed look. She simply looked away sheepishly.

Well to be honest, I can’t say the thought hasn’t crossed my mind. Robin was a teenage girl with some rather decent proportions. Her choice of attire, like most people in this game was a joke, but she had a pretty face and a dainty figure. I would not mind a bit, partaking in that particular feast.

Once Robin and I finally reached Pewter city, we stopped by the pokecenter to refresh our pokemon. My still full health Ivysaur’s PP and my newly acquired and still sleeping Nidoran’s health. And for Robin, her unconscious and now extra puffy Jiggly Puff.

While nurse joy mk2 went about her duties, I scanned the room and noticed that the other girl that normally hung out here with her own Jiggly puff was nowhere to be seen. All the other usual suspects were present here. Hmm. I wonder what happened to her, I’m sure Robin would have loved to meet her.

“Shall we?” I asked.

Robin nodded. And we left the pokecenter.

Standing outside, I waited patiently.

Very patiently.

However, Robin appeared to be stuck in thought. Seeing as how she wasn’t going to be leading us anywhere before I grew back to my original height, I went ahead and interrupted her.

“So, where can we go get some grub?”

She rubbed the back of her head in a cute very anime-like nervous gesture. “Ah. Thing is, I’m not actually sure.”

Figures.

“I mean, I’ve lived in Pewter city my whole life.”

But you only have a single Jigglypuff?

“But I’m not actually sure where we can go. For some reason I can’t think of any restaurants. I mean strange right? I lived here so long.” There was now a very deep and concerned frown on her face.

“Okay, that’s fine, where do you live then, we can get some food ther-” I asked, a normally obvious direction to go in such an otherwise strange situation and only realised too late the landmine I had just stepped on.

There are only like two fucking residential houses in Pewter city, there’s no way she actually has a home here!

“Oh right! Silly. We can just go to my home!” She responded chirpily, like a weight had been lifted off her shoulders.

I sighed in relief. Guess she does have a home here.

“I live-” Her eyes went wide. Oh shit.

“I live-” The look of confusion that sprouted on her face was fast morphing into one of consternation and then deep seeded doubt. “I live… here... in Pewter city. I have…. A house… It’s- Argh!” She suddenly bent her head down and clutched it in both hands.

She stumbled a bit, looking like she was about to faint from an insane migraine. I quickly grabbed her arm to steady her. She was still in pain though.

I patted her head gently in a half soothing but also half mocking manner. “There, there. It’s okay.”

It was an awkward gesture in hindsight, as I was a fair bit shorter than her. “Don’t worry your pretty little head over it.” No, like seriously, I mean it! Just now it explodes or something!

She calmed down after a moment and stood back up, looking at me through teary and seemingly hazy eyes. She seemed kind of out of it.

I sighed. I guess it’s back to mom's place then.

I grabbed a still very unstable Robin by the hand and led her back to the trail towards Viridian city. Honestly it was going to be difficult travelling all the way back there with a half delirious girl in tow. Also it kind of felt like I was abducting her for some reason. Hope I don’t run into officer Jenny, I secretly mused.

Halt!

Speak of the devil.

Before I could enter that silly structure that bounded Viridian forest, I was stopped by not one, but two officer Jenny androids!

“I’m sorry this area is currently off limits, the path ahead is dangerous.” It was a little weird actually, there was an echo on every word, since both Jenny’s were actually talking at the same time. I actually didn’t even know which one of them to face. Also it was kind of unnerving.

“So, why is it dangerous?”

“For some reason the local Caterpie and Butterfree population have gone berserk. They are fighting with the other pokemon and aggressively attacking and pursuing trainers. They also seem to be much higher level than normal.”

Hmm. That is weird. No event like this ever happened in the game. Well then again, you never got to abduct a pretty girl in the game either, so all’s fair I guess.

“I am afraid we cannot allow you into Viridian forest until the matter is resolved. We ask for your understanding in this matter of public safety.”

Well there was no helping it, I wasn’t about to find out what happens in this place when you disobey an officer of the law. Do they even have prisons? Maybe they just line you up for a firing squad of Blastoise.

I would have liked to argue that public safety should probably allow a person to be able to eat food when they are starving. But considering how clueless the local population seemed to be about matters of food in this place (exhibit {A}, behind me), I had even less doubt of a successful resolution with a bloody android in the same given setting.

So I let the matter drop and tried to figure out what to do next.

I would happily hunt a Rattata or a Pidgey and cook it at this point, if I had a fire pokemon on me. But I don’t. You don’t encounter fire pokemon until much later in the game. The only early game fire pokemon is your Charmander starter choice. And I was not about to find out what raw rat tastes like.

A dilemma indeed. My only recourse now is to try the pokeshop. Maybe they actually sell some food there. I mean I don’t remember the shelves stocking anything other than magazines, but they might even sell some pokemon food. I would happily eat poke pellets at this point.

Who knows, maybe I can even fill my stomach up on health potions. Not the best diet, I know, but it can’t possibly be un-healthy, right?

So with that I led a still groggy girl by hand, to the pokeshop. Entering the shop, the first thing I noticed was that the Magikarp conspiracy duo was still here. The second thing is this place was actually selling food!

Amidst pokeballs, pokemon pellets and magazines. There was at least one row of sealed and freshly seaweed wrapped onigiri. Or as the Americans would have you believe, ‘Jelly filled doughnuts’. The thing is, I’m quite sure they weren’t there before. Heck, I’m even sure the pokemon pellets are new.

Not that I was about to spend my not so hard earned money on food for my pokemon. They better hope there isn’t suddenly a pokemon hunger system cropping up in this game, otherwise they gonna starve to death and become food for me haha!

Without any hesitation, I bought the full row of rice sandwiches. This is the first food for purchase I’d seen so far and I was not taking any chances!

I led Robin back to the pokecenter as I remembered seeing some tables and chairs there.

Realising there were other NPC’s here, I instead led Robin up the escalator to the second floor, the one with all that linked and multiplayer stuff. You know the stuff nobody can use because we were all running the game in an emulator. At least I didn’t care much if these three ‘helper NPC’s’ heads exploded or not.

“Hello, I’m Taella-” I completely ignored Taella.

I helped Robin sit down and then handed her one of the rice balls. “Here, eat, it will make you feel better.” I think?

Robin smiled at me weakly and accepted the food. She began to nibble on it slowly, already looking a little more hale. I joined her quite eagerly. God’s I was hungry by now.

The onigiri had a pork and ginger filling. It tasted great, but I was once more reminded of that burning question about where the fuck the all the pig meat was coming from. I don’t remember ever seeing a gen-one pig pokemon.

We both finished up our meals, I of course had a second one despite them being quite large in the first place. What can I say, I was running on empty.

“You feeling a bit better now? You scared me for a moment there.”

“Sorry” Robin turned to face me and gave a bright smile.

I was actually taken aback. I had just been testing the waters there, but she seemed right as rain. I studied her face looking for any tell, any after effect, but she seemed to be back to her chipper old self, none the wiser.

“What?” She asked me with concern, “Is there something on my face?” She instinctively and more than a little uncouthly used her sleeve to wipe her mouth a little consciously.

Man these NPC’s used a lot of cliche anime lines.

“No, no, nothing of the sort, just making sure you’re actually alright.”

“Nope, I feel great. I feel like I haven’t had a good meal in ages!” She exclaimed rather excitedly. I decided not to comment on the fact that she’s probably never actually had a meal before, for sake of keeping her head intact.

“Well, that’s great. So what will you do now?” I once more tested waters.

“I-” She once more furrowed her brows. “I’m not sure.”

Oh boy, here we go again, maybe I should call nurse joy from down stairs ahead of time. Wait, can she even treat humans? Do they even have hospitals or 911 here?

“Was actually looking for a Jigglypuff in those bushes that you found your Nidoran in. I had heard that you could find them there.”

“But you already have one?”

“I knooooow. But they are soooo cute, right?” She said a little sheepishly.

She then deflated a bit. “But after seeing how easily you thrashed my Jigglypuff, I don’t think I should be wasting time collecting another one.”

“I’ll admit, having more than one of the same pokemon is normally not a very good idea.” I nodded sagely. “Variety is the spice of life!” I added, some shameless plagiarisation for good measure.

That got a giggle out of her at least.

“I actually would like to become a competent trainer.” She mused. “You are going to be travelling around quite a bit right? You seem like the type determined to become a great trainer.”

“Yeah. Something like that” I lied.

“Well, I would like to come with you. Honestly, your Ivysaur was impressive and you seem plenty experienced already as a trainer.”

I didn’t mention that the benchmark seems a tad on the low side in these parts.

“So I think it would be very good for me if I travelled with you for a bit.”

Ben couldn’t help but feel like there was something off about her offer, some reasoning he was missing, but honestly all he could see right now was: ‘Fuck yes, cute girl travelling companion!’

“Sure, I don’t mind.” Although he was a bit nervous about her mental state. It did not however seem like she remembered what had just happened, or perhaps her thoughts were somehow being steered away from it. Bloody A.I. PTSD or something.

Jigglypuff stared at the cold steel bars of the cell. His master was distraught and currently sitting in a corner hugging her knees despondently. He had never once seen her like this, it was honestly quite scary. He wished he could comfort her, but the best he could do was try to look cute. Unfortunately humans weren’t very clever, they couldn’t understand pokemon language.

He himself could understand enough human, to know that this place was called ‘Jail’.

Apparently this would affect something called her ‘permanent record’. The strange robot woman in the blue uniform had put them in here after Jigglypuff had sung such a pretty song! The nerve! Something about ‘disturbing the peace’. But his song is so peaceful that it even puts people to sleep!

He desperately wanted to sing to cheer up his master, but had a feeling it would not be very welcomed right now, given their present situation. These humans! Treating his master so poorly, she has never been anything but kind!

A strange new feeling was welling up inside him, something he had never felt before. It was a strange hot sensation inside his chest. It somehow begged to be let out. It only intensified, when he remembered how his master spoke about how her reputation was ruined. It made Jigglypuff, very, very… something, he wasn’t sure what yet, but it made him very something!