- Pronouns
- He/Him/Ey/Em
I think Mundane Clay is derived from the matrix rock where evolution stones (of any type) formed, but placer gem deposits would still be upstream of the corresponding silt beds.
Typechange Johto
- Thread starter E.I.G.
- Start date
-
- Tags
- pokemon sequel transformation
- Location
- Elsewhere
I'm wondering if this business with the Unown in the Ruins of Alph is leading towards this story's inciting incident. The story has been a fine read so far, but there hasn't been any real direction yet. Solid concept and characters, but no clear plot.
Comparing to your other work, Digital Storage Solutions also got off to slow start. While things certainly happened during the early chapters, I would argue that the true inciting incident there was the first appearance of Team Upload, whose actions precipitated—both directly and indirectly—all the events that followed.
Comparing to your other work, Digital Storage Solutions also got off to slow start. While things certainly happened during the early chapters, I would argue that the true inciting incident there was the first appearance of Team Upload, whose actions precipitated—both directly and indirectly—all the events that followed.
E.I.G.
Robo-Bird
- Pronouns
- It/They
Lobasalt is a new pokemon has been confirmed and Alexa has been acknowledged as a Legendary by the Unown, and I'm glad what the Unown are came across.
It is an understandable fear in context.
That is less common with Alexa and Charizard, but they are still a solid trainer and starter pair.
Thank you.
Mundane Clay... okay, I just double checked with the first story and @Happerry is correct, the original description is that the clay forms downstream from the stone deposits. The type of stones varies from site to site.
I'm going to need to correct that, thank you for pointing it out.
Ah, right.
On one hand this story isn't meant to feature some major threat that has to be stopped by Alexa and her team's powerset. This is a standard pokemon journey through a familiar but different land.
On the other, this is the start of a subplot that could grow notably larger depending on how things shake out.
This chapter did feature a scrapped idea to further that subplot, but one that I did not have enough material to fill out in the long term. After that we have a good bit of time before the next part of that subplot.
Next chapter is the other subplot that will fill the rest of the story, and one that impacts Alexa's place in the world just as much.
Still, let me know if you think that a mostly anime style plot development isn't enough.
Have any trainers captured an Unown, and then while doing trainer paperwork at a pokecenter had the Unown pop out of its ball to "halp" fill out the forms?
E.I.G.
Robo-Bird
- Pronouns
- It/They
Only in cases where they decide to try to get a partial or full alphabet, it takes a few for them to get truly unusual.
... something I actually did with Pokemon Silver as a kid. I had a lot of time where I could just play while my dad was taking apart buildings, and it was an interesting bit of grind at that point in my life. It has been a while, but I'm fairly sure I got the full set.
My real question is, are unown openly recognized as problematic enough that collecting a full alphabet is something that pokecenter systems have automatic flags for?
I recall in Digital Storage Solutions that there had never been any mentioned instances of Unown being stored in a box or a Box, and it has me wondering now if the reason was due to instabilities created by unown being unown and doing unown things.
E.I.G.
Robo-Bird
- Pronouns
- It/They
They are recognized as hazardous to get in numbers, but most places where you can get them have some form of on site security/authorization in order for a trainer to even enter for the chance to catch them.
So the flagging would happen before they even start to get caught, unless a new Thin Spot was found by the trainer, in which case that they found a new one at all is the bigger flag to add to their trainer card.
DSS actually has better ability to handle them than most storage systems, but that is because a Thin Spot where Unown are found are the physical pokemon-world equivalent of those distorted areas that the Addware was using for its world manipulation outside of its core world... with all the implications of that comparison, as they are technically the same sort of phenomenon.
So a Box Administrator Porygon, who can actively deal with those sorts of reality alterations, actually has a fairly good handle on how to keep Unown in line compared to the typical pokemon ranch, which will probably tell you to find a specialist facility after you get your third.
Vespikiln Revisited
E.I.G.
Robo-Bird
- Pronouns
- It/They
--- Vespikiln Revisited ---
The next day started with an appointment with a custom trainer supply store Alexa's father had chosen for her new bag. Supposedly the rather fancy looking extreme condition storage system was rated for use by Legendary pokemon in general, which sounded like it wasn't the kind of thing you could actually test, but Alexa couldn't be certain of that anymore after their encounter with the Unown.
"I'm planning on picking up some supplies of my own today," William said as he met them outside of the shop. "Do you want to come with me so we can coordinate, or should we both keep supplies separated for now?"
"We have a list of things we need to restock on too," Charizard said while Alexa took their new fire and toxin proofed bag and tested it against her Mephagic form now that they had finished with her Lobasalt shape. "But our funds are a bit tighter than we like. We can manage on our own, but it might be best if you don't plan on our supplies for help."
"We're going to get ours when I finish up with some Vespikiln clothes," Alexa admitted and started to rub the bag on her slimy back and through her flowing hair. "Those are the last set I'll really need. Apparently my Lobasalt stuff is fine with shards of rock too."
"And the more dangerous toxins aren't supposed to be any worse than your 'normal' ones, at least when it comes to cleaning off," Charizard joked with a huff of purple fumes from his current Poison/Flying type. "So we hopefully just need to clean the pack before we get stuff out of it. How is it looking so far?"
Alexa took the still empty bag and held it in front of her. The toxins from her body were slowly dripping off much more easily than her old tent had handled the stuff, but another issue occurred to her. "One of us is going to have to turn back to clean it off." She could technically use Water Gun on the more than waterproof bag, but hers was still a touch toxic.
"Just try, we're going to go over the entire thing inside and out before we put anything in," her Starter suggested. "I want to know if it really is properly waterproof. Especially if you decide to go underwater as a Lobasalt."
"True underwater capable bags aren't really worth the cost," William advised quickly. "You need to make an air bubble to open them without ruining stuff anyway, and it is generally a bad idea to travel fully underwater without that. For one thing I do not like wet fur, so if you travel that way it won't be with me."
"That is a solvable issue," Alexa said jokingly. "You can probably take the Water type fairly well, and that comes with fur or scales that work great with water."
"Probably a bit much of a joke for now, Alexa," Charizard cautioned her as she saw William pale notably. "I think your Water type is affecting you."
"Sorry," she apologized and then spat some water onto the bag. The toxin flowed off of it with that prompting, which was a good sign. "I guess I've gotten too used to this now."
"It's okay. Aquatic illusions can partially handle it, and I guess those can't be too far from what you do," William nervously reassured her as Charizard used Contagion Cure to return to his base types.
"Looks like it does clean how it is supposed to," Charizard said as he opened the bag carefully and inspected it more. "We should have Kingler clean it up the rest of the way before we transfer everything. I can easily handle hot water, but I'd like to know how well cold cleans it for general use."
"So when are you changing into the 'Vespikiln' form again?" William questioned as Alexa turned herself back and took the new bag from Charizard. "You said it lasts three days?"
"It does, which makes the latest thing my dad asked me to do kind of awkward for everyone in this city," she admitted with a glance over at the Gym. "Falkner wants to try it since it has wings, and I'm the only person around with any Chitin Powder."
Charizard flapped his wings with an amused growl that clearly said Falkner would love that a bit too much given his prior comments on the matter. "I think I have gotten that impression, Charizard," William sighed and turned to look at the Gym too. "That's going to happen before you get clothes isn't it?"
"I want to show him the change first, as a sort of last attempt to stop this other than working out a new form to test for him first," Alexa explained without any hope for the possibility. "He really wants to try being a Flying type himself, and that is the closest human form I currently know about."
---
Nurse Joy and Leader Falkner were already at the field where they had planned on doing this when Alexa and William arrived. "You seriously cannot wait for the planned downtime next week?" the Joy questioned Falkner. "I'm sure that Assistant Larch can just sell you some of the powder, and she could just demonstrate herself."
"I want to know if it works or not, and she is the only person I've been able to contact who actually wants to be a Vespikiln again that has used the powder before," Falkner answered, and then waved at Alexa and William. "Although that is partially because the ones who wanted to use it went into the wild and are really hard to contact."
"Wait, you aren't thinking about running the Gym as a Vespikiln are you?" Alexa had to question. "I had more than a week to get used to the difference between a human's defensive energy and a pokemon's before my Gym battle with you, and I still probably can't handle a super effective move being used around me yet."
"I know it took me a while to handle Fairy type moves, and Bug types weren't much better," William agreed. "Fighting was alright, those don't usually hit trainers."
"There, two trainers who agree with me on that," Nurse Joy stated bluntly, and Alexa remembered that this Joy had been a Mephagic before. "It takes time for most pokemon to be able to handle a Gym battle, and you probably will not be an exception."
"If downtime is really needed I can pull the start of it back a couple of days," Falkner tried to argue. "We haven't announced next week's yet, and the news just got out about Sprout Tower. I've had six trainers who called ahead about matches tell me they went through Dark Pass instead already, and I haven't re-filled those slots yet. It is just as easy to fit them in where I would have ended the downtime as it is for the next three days, and I've already done the three I have for today." Nurse Joy did not look happy with that idea, but nodded at it given three wasn't that many for a single day. With how well established Falkner was he probably could manage six or more each day this early in the League, although later on when higher Badge numbers were involved it would slow down as each fight got more intense. The fewer people that made it to those later stages made up for the reduced match count.
"Okay, so if we're doing this I am going to go first," Alexa said with a glance at the Gym Leader. "Mostly because you missed what a Vespikiln actually looks like, but also because I'm a little afraid you're just going to fly off and I'm the only one around with a Vespikiln trainer card to explain things."
"Fair," Falkner jokingly replied and nodded at her, and Alexa decided that meant it was bad enough that she would need her full team for this. Charizard first, who looked between her and Falkner before taking the new bag just to be safe, and then he sighed as she quickly let out the rest and grabbed a small jar of Chitin Powder. They had decided not to use vials for relatively quick use given the three day length, and there was no chance of Alexa risking a change of her own to fill the fragile spheres.
Once the powder was sprinkled over her Alexa felt her arms split into a second pair, her wings and abdomen grow, and as the rest of her body shifted she attempted to have her heat generation increase more slowly that the previous time. The still present burst of heat at the end of the change told her that she didn't quite succeed, but it felt closer to a smooth rise and this was only her first try. Before she did anything else Alexa found that she had to check her Fly HM pattern. A small amount of her now altered energy entered it as it always did, but unlike every time before the energy was properly converted by passing through her wings into Flying type energy, and then the now processed energy proceeded to fill out the functional parts of the pattern that made flying easier and helped keep a passenger safe.
"Good news, I can use Fly like this," she said mostly to her team. "Wow, being able to use that actually feels really good."
"Well, that sounds like an argument why we shouldn't use TMs," Kingler unhappily noted. "If it is that bad when they don't work, I'm not sure the easy moves are worth it."
"Okay, I might end up continuing to look for another option later on," Falkner said jokingly to attract her attention. "That one is a bit more buggy than I realized."
Alexa could not exactly glare at him for that, her eyes weren't made for that, but the rest of her team did manage to get the point across. "So, does that mean you aren't going to try? Because I still have to get some new clothes for this form," she dryly informed the Gym Leader.
"I've waited too long since finding out this was a thing for the first one being a Bug type to make me back out," Falkner replied, possibly a bit apologetically. "So, is it just getting sprinkled for this stuff? No hour long prep time for this one?"
Alexa nodded at that, and turned to look at Nurse Joy. "Does the rest of his Gym know how much a Vespikiln sheds? Because it is a lot, and I don't want to shut down the local Gym because it got turned into a hive of bee pokemon," she questioned as Charizard prepared the Pokedex to scan this possible change.
"How bad are we talking about?" Joy asked with a cautious look. "It wasn't that bad to clean up the scanner."
"William, translate for Kingler. She was able to help with the cleanup without getting changed," Charizard requested. "You've done it before, Alexa has not," her Starter explained when the other trainer gave him a look. "My parents looked into a proper translator, it isn't something you just do."
"Also I don't trust Alexa to translate that part properly," Kingler agreed quickly.
"Yeah, she's probably right about that. I was too busy trying to not make it worse," Alexa also had to agree. Then she noticed that the two humans had not followed the conversation. "We're getting someone to translate for Kingler, she did a lot of our cleanup because it doesn't work on her."
"On that front we do have a good number of local Bug types who have agreed to help with that," Joy complained more than explained. "What is the rest?"
Kingler did most of the explanation, and somehow that turned into a lesson in how to translate for a pokemon. Charizard was honestly right about it being harder to do than even Alexa had expected. There were several times that William had flinched badly at her attempts to keep up with Kingler, apparently some things couldn't be summarized the way she wanted to offhand. Then there were the small things Kingler did as a Kingler that Alexa could even understand as a human, which meant she forgot to translate them as much as they apparently needed to be.
"I'm not happy to say this, but we can handle that easily enough," Joy sighed, while Falkner just looked smug. "It honestly sounds a bit easier than the Toxin Contagion cleanup we've done before. That required a bit of effort to keep me from changing a third time, so we prepared for that scenario."
"Well, that is a concern that our team has not been as careful about," Bellossom said darkly to everyone who could understand pokemon. "With how all of us are becoming Poison types all the time now."
With that covered they had officially ran out of distractions to put it off, so Falkner got his attempt to use Chitin Powder. It quickly reacted with the Gym Leader, and he changed in about the same way Alexa had moments before, arms splitting before their eyes, skin hardened into fuzzy chitin, a large abdomen growing out the base of what once had been a spine. Although there were three obvious differences this time. The first being that he was more of a plain yellow color than fiery orange, the second was that he had dark blue bands that matched his former hair, and the most obvious was that his wings grew notably larger in proportion than hers with clear improved strength.
"Oh. That's what it looks like," Alexa said a bit uneasily at the sight of another human's change. It wasn't quite as comfortable to look at to her, to watch how familiar human shapes were converted into a pokemon's form was a bit more unusual at this point that having her human form be the one converted.
"Um, wasn't I supposed to have some fire?" Falkner then asked with an uneasy buzz. "Because I'm a bit more worried about the Fire types over there than I expected."
Alexa's Pokedex chimed in with an audible 'Bug/Flying type' at Charizard's prompting. "Yeah, I was wondering if it was going to work like that," her Starter commented on the result. "I think human-humans with types keep them as a secondary. Like with that Dark type during the Gym battle."
Falkner turned to Nurse Joy to see her reaction to that statement, and Alexa smothered a laugh at the sight of someone else not realizing the pokemon they just understood had not been speaking to the humans present. "Nurse Joy, is Falkner a natural Flying type?" Alexa asked to get the question part of it across, although William grumbled about it still being a poor way to handle translation.
Only, she might have gotten it entirely wrong because Nurse Joy did not seem to understand the question. "Did you go to a Pokemon Center to get a scan for that?" the older woman asked half sarcastically. "I barely know that I'm actually not-typed, and that's only because of the scans from my time as a Mephagic."
"You know, I think I forgot that dad used us to help calibrate his type scanners," Alexa had to admit. She personally had an unusually non-typed energy makeup. "But Charizard has suggested that a human with one might alter the result of a transformation that is still compatible."
"Um, humans can have the Flying type?" Falkner questioned cautiously. He hovered backwards a bit clearly did not want to get closer to Alexa or Charizard. "That is a real thing, not just a rumor?"
"Humans can have any type," Alexa answered slowly, unaware that it was new knowledge to the Gym Leader. "Um. Okay, so when we say that humans are 'typeless' it means we don't act like a pokemon or human that does have a type. Everything and everyone has typed energy, but we have different kinds of it in us. Most pokemon have one or two types with a lot of energy, but humans, um." She had to pause to consider how best to explain it. "Okay, so your typed energy is like a bag of different colored marbles. For pokemon they have a lot of one or two colors of marbles, and if you have a lot of marbles of one type you can use moves of that type really easily. So they have a natural selection pressure to keep a lot of just one or two kinds of marbles." Alexa sort of wished she was a Lobasalt, she might have been able to make some examples then. "Most humans can't use moves, so there isn't any pressure to have any specific kind of marbles. So most humans have a mixture of a lot of types that mostly cancel each other out."
"Pokemon have more than just their main typed energy as well," Joy added. "Mostly the Normal type, but there are a number of rare cases where diseases that typically afflict pokemon of one type are transmitted to a pokemon that has a lot of that type, but not enough for it to be expressed. Cases of third or even rarer fourth expressed types are typically temporary energy imbalances, but there have been individual pokemon who have three naturally."
"My mix is 45% Fire, 35% Flying, 10% Water, and the remaining 10% a bunch of others if anyone was curious," Charizard agreed with the nurse with a smug smile. "Found that out because I caught a Water type illness as a mander, and Alexa's dad checked for it specifically to keep her aware of the risk of those. That's why I'm curious if he was Flying type more than others, because we've already seen a Dark typed Human throw off one of these."
"Nurse Joy, is there a way to understand pokemon as a human? Because that Charizard is better spoken than some of my students," Falkner commented, possibly in an attempt to cut down on the parts that confused him.
"Translators are expensive and this one nearly had a Trainer Card of his own," Joy dryly replied.
"Please don't just say that, I don't exactly want that advertised," Alexa's Starter complained, and Alexa did her best to translate that important point.
---
Charizard had to admit that two Vespikiln shopping for clothes caused less problems than just one Mephagic or Lobasalt. Although there were some new issues from one of them being the local Gym Leader, who Charizard was fairly sure the city would need to send pokemon to find before the next three days were done. He planned on trying to warn Falkner's pokemon to keep an eye on their trainer, but admittedly Alexa wasn't entirely typical on how much she listened to her pokemon.
"So," William said to them in a way that the humans wouldn't understand. "What happens to your energy when you use those things to change types?"
"There are a few ways," Alexa started to explain in a buzz that also wasn't human. "To continue the earlier analogy with the marbles, you can temporarily convert some of the energy of one or more types to another like if you painted over the marbles with a different color."
"The paint wearing off would be the equivalent of the change wearing off," Charizard added with a smile at his trainer for keeping things between pokemon successfully. "That could also be replacing a current type or by mostly just changing the unfocused parts to the new type."
"Wait, we can just talk like pokemon like this?" Falkner questioned, and the Gym Leader did not pull off the trick and attracted the attention of the employees away from the sort of vest things they were currently attempting.
"You can practice that later," William sighed. "So, would a permanent type conversion be completely changed into the other color?"
"For that specific one yes," Alexa happily noted. "Although the other ones get a bit more complicated to use the analogy for. Another option would be something that gives a lot of a given type for a time period. That is like dumping some marbles of the new color into the bag." She paused for a moment. "Bellossom's doesn't even really work with the analogy. Capacitance gives the ability to build up Electric typed energy with electricity, and the pokemon turns back if they use all of the energy up before it fully becomes a part of them."
"So, we think we have something for the two of you," one of the employees said to them as if they had not been talking, which clearly shook Falkner from how badly he flinched at the interruption, but Charizard was happy to see Alexa just roll with. "It should work with both of your wing styles." The garment was most of the front of a vest, with the back replaced with a number of straps that would likely work around a Vespikiln's wings. "Although we usually sell these to more typical Bug types. Leader Falkner's typings won't be much of an issue, but the basic ones aren't as fireproof as a Fire type would need."
"That should be fine, I'm just happy to have something," Alexa agreed easily.
"Although we might need to test if that is human compatible," Charizard noted with a careful inspection of the garment. It looked to him like it could fit on Alexa's human body, which could cause problems with the transformation back.
William quickly passed along that warning to the employees, which made Charizard smile. It had taken direct exposure to how little Alexa needed a translation for some pokemon words to get the Dark typed trainer to understand that Alexa was not going to be a good translator herself.
The next day started with an appointment with a custom trainer supply store Alexa's father had chosen for her new bag. Supposedly the rather fancy looking extreme condition storage system was rated for use by Legendary pokemon in general, which sounded like it wasn't the kind of thing you could actually test, but Alexa couldn't be certain of that anymore after their encounter with the Unown.
"I'm planning on picking up some supplies of my own today," William said as he met them outside of the shop. "Do you want to come with me so we can coordinate, or should we both keep supplies separated for now?"
"We have a list of things we need to restock on too," Charizard said while Alexa took their new fire and toxin proofed bag and tested it against her Mephagic form now that they had finished with her Lobasalt shape. "But our funds are a bit tighter than we like. We can manage on our own, but it might be best if you don't plan on our supplies for help."
"We're going to get ours when I finish up with some Vespikiln clothes," Alexa admitted and started to rub the bag on her slimy back and through her flowing hair. "Those are the last set I'll really need. Apparently my Lobasalt stuff is fine with shards of rock too."
"And the more dangerous toxins aren't supposed to be any worse than your 'normal' ones, at least when it comes to cleaning off," Charizard joked with a huff of purple fumes from his current Poison/Flying type. "So we hopefully just need to clean the pack before we get stuff out of it. How is it looking so far?"
Alexa took the still empty bag and held it in front of her. The toxins from her body were slowly dripping off much more easily than her old tent had handled the stuff, but another issue occurred to her. "One of us is going to have to turn back to clean it off." She could technically use Water Gun on the more than waterproof bag, but hers was still a touch toxic.
"Just try, we're going to go over the entire thing inside and out before we put anything in," her Starter suggested. "I want to know if it really is properly waterproof. Especially if you decide to go underwater as a Lobasalt."
"True underwater capable bags aren't really worth the cost," William advised quickly. "You need to make an air bubble to open them without ruining stuff anyway, and it is generally a bad idea to travel fully underwater without that. For one thing I do not like wet fur, so if you travel that way it won't be with me."
"That is a solvable issue," Alexa said jokingly. "You can probably take the Water type fairly well, and that comes with fur or scales that work great with water."
"Probably a bit much of a joke for now, Alexa," Charizard cautioned her as she saw William pale notably. "I think your Water type is affecting you."
"Sorry," she apologized and then spat some water onto the bag. The toxin flowed off of it with that prompting, which was a good sign. "I guess I've gotten too used to this now."
"It's okay. Aquatic illusions can partially handle it, and I guess those can't be too far from what you do," William nervously reassured her as Charizard used Contagion Cure to return to his base types.
"Looks like it does clean how it is supposed to," Charizard said as he opened the bag carefully and inspected it more. "We should have Kingler clean it up the rest of the way before we transfer everything. I can easily handle hot water, but I'd like to know how well cold cleans it for general use."
"So when are you changing into the 'Vespikiln' form again?" William questioned as Alexa turned herself back and took the new bag from Charizard. "You said it lasts three days?"
"It does, which makes the latest thing my dad asked me to do kind of awkward for everyone in this city," she admitted with a glance over at the Gym. "Falkner wants to try it since it has wings, and I'm the only person around with any Chitin Powder."
Charizard flapped his wings with an amused growl that clearly said Falkner would love that a bit too much given his prior comments on the matter. "I think I have gotten that impression, Charizard," William sighed and turned to look at the Gym too. "That's going to happen before you get clothes isn't it?"
"I want to show him the change first, as a sort of last attempt to stop this other than working out a new form to test for him first," Alexa explained without any hope for the possibility. "He really wants to try being a Flying type himself, and that is the closest human form I currently know about."
---
Nurse Joy and Leader Falkner were already at the field where they had planned on doing this when Alexa and William arrived. "You seriously cannot wait for the planned downtime next week?" the Joy questioned Falkner. "I'm sure that Assistant Larch can just sell you some of the powder, and she could just demonstrate herself."
"I want to know if it works or not, and she is the only person I've been able to contact who actually wants to be a Vespikiln again that has used the powder before," Falkner answered, and then waved at Alexa and William. "Although that is partially because the ones who wanted to use it went into the wild and are really hard to contact."
"Wait, you aren't thinking about running the Gym as a Vespikiln are you?" Alexa had to question. "I had more than a week to get used to the difference between a human's defensive energy and a pokemon's before my Gym battle with you, and I still probably can't handle a super effective move being used around me yet."
"I know it took me a while to handle Fairy type moves, and Bug types weren't much better," William agreed. "Fighting was alright, those don't usually hit trainers."
"There, two trainers who agree with me on that," Nurse Joy stated bluntly, and Alexa remembered that this Joy had been a Mephagic before. "It takes time for most pokemon to be able to handle a Gym battle, and you probably will not be an exception."
"If downtime is really needed I can pull the start of it back a couple of days," Falkner tried to argue. "We haven't announced next week's yet, and the news just got out about Sprout Tower. I've had six trainers who called ahead about matches tell me they went through Dark Pass instead already, and I haven't re-filled those slots yet. It is just as easy to fit them in where I would have ended the downtime as it is for the next three days, and I've already done the three I have for today." Nurse Joy did not look happy with that idea, but nodded at it given three wasn't that many for a single day. With how well established Falkner was he probably could manage six or more each day this early in the League, although later on when higher Badge numbers were involved it would slow down as each fight got more intense. The fewer people that made it to those later stages made up for the reduced match count.
"Okay, so if we're doing this I am going to go first," Alexa said with a glance at the Gym Leader. "Mostly because you missed what a Vespikiln actually looks like, but also because I'm a little afraid you're just going to fly off and I'm the only one around with a Vespikiln trainer card to explain things."
"Fair," Falkner jokingly replied and nodded at her, and Alexa decided that meant it was bad enough that she would need her full team for this. Charizard first, who looked between her and Falkner before taking the new bag just to be safe, and then he sighed as she quickly let out the rest and grabbed a small jar of Chitin Powder. They had decided not to use vials for relatively quick use given the three day length, and there was no chance of Alexa risking a change of her own to fill the fragile spheres.
Once the powder was sprinkled over her Alexa felt her arms split into a second pair, her wings and abdomen grow, and as the rest of her body shifted she attempted to have her heat generation increase more slowly that the previous time. The still present burst of heat at the end of the change told her that she didn't quite succeed, but it felt closer to a smooth rise and this was only her first try. Before she did anything else Alexa found that she had to check her Fly HM pattern. A small amount of her now altered energy entered it as it always did, but unlike every time before the energy was properly converted by passing through her wings into Flying type energy, and then the now processed energy proceeded to fill out the functional parts of the pattern that made flying easier and helped keep a passenger safe.
"Good news, I can use Fly like this," she said mostly to her team. "Wow, being able to use that actually feels really good."
"Well, that sounds like an argument why we shouldn't use TMs," Kingler unhappily noted. "If it is that bad when they don't work, I'm not sure the easy moves are worth it."
"Okay, I might end up continuing to look for another option later on," Falkner said jokingly to attract her attention. "That one is a bit more buggy than I realized."
Alexa could not exactly glare at him for that, her eyes weren't made for that, but the rest of her team did manage to get the point across. "So, does that mean you aren't going to try? Because I still have to get some new clothes for this form," she dryly informed the Gym Leader.
"I've waited too long since finding out this was a thing for the first one being a Bug type to make me back out," Falkner replied, possibly a bit apologetically. "So, is it just getting sprinkled for this stuff? No hour long prep time for this one?"
Alexa nodded at that, and turned to look at Nurse Joy. "Does the rest of his Gym know how much a Vespikiln sheds? Because it is a lot, and I don't want to shut down the local Gym because it got turned into a hive of bee pokemon," she questioned as Charizard prepared the Pokedex to scan this possible change.
"How bad are we talking about?" Joy asked with a cautious look. "It wasn't that bad to clean up the scanner."
"William, translate for Kingler. She was able to help with the cleanup without getting changed," Charizard requested. "You've done it before, Alexa has not," her Starter explained when the other trainer gave him a look. "My parents looked into a proper translator, it isn't something you just do."
"Also I don't trust Alexa to translate that part properly," Kingler agreed quickly.
"Yeah, she's probably right about that. I was too busy trying to not make it worse," Alexa also had to agree. Then she noticed that the two humans had not followed the conversation. "We're getting someone to translate for Kingler, she did a lot of our cleanup because it doesn't work on her."
"On that front we do have a good number of local Bug types who have agreed to help with that," Joy complained more than explained. "What is the rest?"
Kingler did most of the explanation, and somehow that turned into a lesson in how to translate for a pokemon. Charizard was honestly right about it being harder to do than even Alexa had expected. There were several times that William had flinched badly at her attempts to keep up with Kingler, apparently some things couldn't be summarized the way she wanted to offhand. Then there were the small things Kingler did as a Kingler that Alexa could even understand as a human, which meant she forgot to translate them as much as they apparently needed to be.
"I'm not happy to say this, but we can handle that easily enough," Joy sighed, while Falkner just looked smug. "It honestly sounds a bit easier than the Toxin Contagion cleanup we've done before. That required a bit of effort to keep me from changing a third time, so we prepared for that scenario."
"Well, that is a concern that our team has not been as careful about," Bellossom said darkly to everyone who could understand pokemon. "With how all of us are becoming Poison types all the time now."
With that covered they had officially ran out of distractions to put it off, so Falkner got his attempt to use Chitin Powder. It quickly reacted with the Gym Leader, and he changed in about the same way Alexa had moments before, arms splitting before their eyes, skin hardened into fuzzy chitin, a large abdomen growing out the base of what once had been a spine. Although there were three obvious differences this time. The first being that he was more of a plain yellow color than fiery orange, the second was that he had dark blue bands that matched his former hair, and the most obvious was that his wings grew notably larger in proportion than hers with clear improved strength.
"Oh. That's what it looks like," Alexa said a bit uneasily at the sight of another human's change. It wasn't quite as comfortable to look at to her, to watch how familiar human shapes were converted into a pokemon's form was a bit more unusual at this point that having her human form be the one converted.
"Um, wasn't I supposed to have some fire?" Falkner then asked with an uneasy buzz. "Because I'm a bit more worried about the Fire types over there than I expected."
Alexa's Pokedex chimed in with an audible 'Bug/Flying type' at Charizard's prompting. "Yeah, I was wondering if it was going to work like that," her Starter commented on the result. "I think human-humans with types keep them as a secondary. Like with that Dark type during the Gym battle."
Falkner turned to Nurse Joy to see her reaction to that statement, and Alexa smothered a laugh at the sight of someone else not realizing the pokemon they just understood had not been speaking to the humans present. "Nurse Joy, is Falkner a natural Flying type?" Alexa asked to get the question part of it across, although William grumbled about it still being a poor way to handle translation.
Only, she might have gotten it entirely wrong because Nurse Joy did not seem to understand the question. "Did you go to a Pokemon Center to get a scan for that?" the older woman asked half sarcastically. "I barely know that I'm actually not-typed, and that's only because of the scans from my time as a Mephagic."
"You know, I think I forgot that dad used us to help calibrate his type scanners," Alexa had to admit. She personally had an unusually non-typed energy makeup. "But Charizard has suggested that a human with one might alter the result of a transformation that is still compatible."
"Um, humans can have the Flying type?" Falkner questioned cautiously. He hovered backwards a bit clearly did not want to get closer to Alexa or Charizard. "That is a real thing, not just a rumor?"
"Humans can have any type," Alexa answered slowly, unaware that it was new knowledge to the Gym Leader. "Um. Okay, so when we say that humans are 'typeless' it means we don't act like a pokemon or human that does have a type. Everything and everyone has typed energy, but we have different kinds of it in us. Most pokemon have one or two types with a lot of energy, but humans, um." She had to pause to consider how best to explain it. "Okay, so your typed energy is like a bag of different colored marbles. For pokemon they have a lot of one or two colors of marbles, and if you have a lot of marbles of one type you can use moves of that type really easily. So they have a natural selection pressure to keep a lot of just one or two kinds of marbles." Alexa sort of wished she was a Lobasalt, she might have been able to make some examples then. "Most humans can't use moves, so there isn't any pressure to have any specific kind of marbles. So most humans have a mixture of a lot of types that mostly cancel each other out."
"Pokemon have more than just their main typed energy as well," Joy added. "Mostly the Normal type, but there are a number of rare cases where diseases that typically afflict pokemon of one type are transmitted to a pokemon that has a lot of that type, but not enough for it to be expressed. Cases of third or even rarer fourth expressed types are typically temporary energy imbalances, but there have been individual pokemon who have three naturally."
"My mix is 45% Fire, 35% Flying, 10% Water, and the remaining 10% a bunch of others if anyone was curious," Charizard agreed with the nurse with a smug smile. "Found that out because I caught a Water type illness as a mander, and Alexa's dad checked for it specifically to keep her aware of the risk of those. That's why I'm curious if he was Flying type more than others, because we've already seen a Dark typed Human throw off one of these."
"Nurse Joy, is there a way to understand pokemon as a human? Because that Charizard is better spoken than some of my students," Falkner commented, possibly in an attempt to cut down on the parts that confused him.
"Translators are expensive and this one nearly had a Trainer Card of his own," Joy dryly replied.
"Please don't just say that, I don't exactly want that advertised," Alexa's Starter complained, and Alexa did her best to translate that important point.
---
Charizard had to admit that two Vespikiln shopping for clothes caused less problems than just one Mephagic or Lobasalt. Although there were some new issues from one of them being the local Gym Leader, who Charizard was fairly sure the city would need to send pokemon to find before the next three days were done. He planned on trying to warn Falkner's pokemon to keep an eye on their trainer, but admittedly Alexa wasn't entirely typical on how much she listened to her pokemon.
"So," William said to them in a way that the humans wouldn't understand. "What happens to your energy when you use those things to change types?"
"There are a few ways," Alexa started to explain in a buzz that also wasn't human. "To continue the earlier analogy with the marbles, you can temporarily convert some of the energy of one or more types to another like if you painted over the marbles with a different color."
"The paint wearing off would be the equivalent of the change wearing off," Charizard added with a smile at his trainer for keeping things between pokemon successfully. "That could also be replacing a current type or by mostly just changing the unfocused parts to the new type."
"Wait, we can just talk like pokemon like this?" Falkner questioned, and the Gym Leader did not pull off the trick and attracted the attention of the employees away from the sort of vest things they were currently attempting.
"You can practice that later," William sighed. "So, would a permanent type conversion be completely changed into the other color?"
"For that specific one yes," Alexa happily noted. "Although the other ones get a bit more complicated to use the analogy for. Another option would be something that gives a lot of a given type for a time period. That is like dumping some marbles of the new color into the bag." She paused for a moment. "Bellossom's doesn't even really work with the analogy. Capacitance gives the ability to build up Electric typed energy with electricity, and the pokemon turns back if they use all of the energy up before it fully becomes a part of them."
"So, we think we have something for the two of you," one of the employees said to them as if they had not been talking, which clearly shook Falkner from how badly he flinched at the interruption, but Charizard was happy to see Alexa just roll with. "It should work with both of your wing styles." The garment was most of the front of a vest, with the back replaced with a number of straps that would likely work around a Vespikiln's wings. "Although we usually sell these to more typical Bug types. Leader Falkner's typings won't be much of an issue, but the basic ones aren't as fireproof as a Fire type would need."
"That should be fine, I'm just happy to have something," Alexa agreed easily.
"Although we might need to test if that is human compatible," Charizard noted with a careful inspection of the garment. It looked to him like it could fit on Alexa's human body, which could cause problems with the transformation back.
William quickly passed along that warning to the employees, which made Charizard smile. It had taken direct exposure to how little Alexa needed a translation for some pokemon words to get the Dark typed trainer to understand that Alexa was not going to be a good translator herself.
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Alexa has had many experiences that most people don't get as a result of being a professor's kid. Even more due to the professor in question being a little more lax on safety than might be preferred. I love seeing her surprised at normal(ish) people not knowing things she thinks should be common knowledge because of it.
I love this analogy. Makes things fairly simple to visualize. Also, I just had the sudden image of Charizard reaching into a bag of marbles, grabbing a handful of Fire marbles, throwing them at an enemy and yelling "Flamethrower!" as they burst into flame midair.
Minor speciesism? Human conversations would usually be politely interrupted, but nobody thinks twice to interrupt the chattering Pokémon. Makes me think a bit, I don't know off hand if anyone has ever politely waited for a Pokémon to finish talking before changing the topic. If nothing else, an interesting example of how people react differently to you as a Pokémon than as a human, which might be something Falkner needs to consider now.
Somewhat ironic a problem to have, being too good at understanding a language so that you realize you don't know how to effectively translate it.
E.I.G.
Robo-Bird
- Pronouns
- It/They
It makes me really happy to see that being recognized. A core part of her character is that she is aware of things that the average trainer or pokemon is not, and I intend to continue to make that quite clear.
It took a bit of development to get to that one. I think it works the best out of all the options I have gone through to get it right, and it was nice to find a story relevant place to put the explanation.
Another thing I'm glad came across. Pokemon are typically not understood, and in many cases their conversations are fairly separate from what the humans present are doing.
It kind of says a lot about how common it is that the pokemon also didn't react to being interrupted as well.
I thought that was a nice little touch to Alexa's existing understanding of her team, and their efforts to make her understand. It also ties a bit into the first point about her having an atypical skill set, as most trainers haven't gone as far with understanding as what she considers "basic".
Unusual perspective due to unusual experience is something I love to see in stories. It's part of why I love your stories in particular, as you do it quite well in my opinion.
Sorry for the long reply. Let me know if I should spoiler it for length, as I believe spoilering it removes the easy-quote popup for text in spoiler boxes.
It didn't occur to me until now that the nature of typed energy technically also being creation energy means that, of course Zoroark illusions can have enough influence on reality to have a real effect on both the user and the environment, rather than just being a facade with some sensation manipulation to match the image to the viewer's senses.
The idea thatJim Gym leaders don't just do their own thing during open hours while waiting for people to show up.
People on the time crunch of a League Run actually call ahead while on the road and schedule appointments for gym battles based on projected arrival times, which makes sense considering multiple instances in Canon when gym leaders were just not there to be battled, or trained with, or anything...
It really hammers in that this is a world that is alive and full of people who have lived with and adapted to the concequenses of being alive in that world, no game-play convenience here... except for possible walk-in appointments, or "oh, hey Ash, you make the news so often I already penciled in an appointment a month ago for when I thought you would get here
"
Or is this just Alexa having lived with a unique sort of sinusitus/intestinal gas for years and transforming made the chronic cramping stop when the transformation released the pressure on her energy?
Unless...? Is William practiced enough at human-form Zoroark Illusion that his William-the-pokehuman counts-as actually human, all the way down?
Considering the absent minded nature of her father, I can definitely tell where Alexa got this inclination from, and can definitely tell that being a Professor's Daughter in no way helped this problem the way it would have for most scholar-born kids, because her dad would have accidentally encouraged it just by being himself.
...What's the story with Alexa's mother, anyhow? We know more about Charizard's home life now than we do Alexa's home life... Unless that information is back in the first story in the series? I haven't read the first one yet, I started with DSS because it was a premise that caught my eye.
So does that mean that water type has a personality to it, that orients its sense of humor toward... what, shifting and flowing to match expectations as the punchline?
It was already implied earlier that Zoroark can perform physical illusions and visual illusions and it seems clear to me that is Zoroark especially can perform illusions more real than other illusion capable pokemon, so much much so that a Zoroark illusion can get close enough to imitating a human that a Zoroark even imitate the dense core and non-expressive nature of a pokehuman soul.
It didn't occur to me until now that the nature of typed energy technically also being creation energy means that, of course Zoroark illusions can have enough influence on reality to have a real effect on both the user and the environment, rather than just being a facade with some sensation manipulation to match the image to the viewer's senses.
Very interesting world building tidbit here.
The idea that
People on the time crunch of a League Run actually call ahead while on the road and schedule appointments for gym battles based on projected arrival times, which makes sense considering multiple instances in Canon when gym leaders were just not there to be battled, or trained with, or anything...
It really hammers in that this is a world that is alive and full of people who have lived with and adapted to the concequenses of being alive in that world, no game-play convenience here... except for possible walk-in appointments, or "oh, hey Ash, you make the news so often I already penciled in an appointment a month ago for when I thought you would get here
"
Wait. Do Gym Leaders get a stipend pay per battle they service? Or is the limited slots more of a result of predicted recovery and stress capacity? Or is it simply just "our gym's business hours are from 9am to 5pm, and we allow each challenger to take up to X minutes to complete their challenge and give the gym leader Y minutes to prepare between challengers."
Let me know if I got this visual right: her abdomen grew larger into the honeycomb skirt, and her legs shrunk into the center honeycomb until they dissappear?
...should I be worried here about other people gaining an endorphin rush from transformations?
Or is this just Alexa having lived with a unique sort of sinusitus/intestinal gas for years and transforming made the chronic cramping stop when the transformation released the pressure on her energy?
Another fun world building bit, the "clothes maketh the man" concept being applied to pokemon. The implication of an unconscious culture wide idea of "if it's wearing clothes it has to be a person and if it's not then it probably isn't" sort of concept, and by person, I mean presumed civil/non-wild/"citizen" of a civilization somewhere.
What hour long preparation time? I don't recall anything like that among any of the transformation items so far. Is this a misconception on Falkner's part?
...How can you teach that? Isn't that just an applied empathy thing with a hint of Aura that slowly improves over time?
...That dark-type trainer was William. The Zoroark Pokémon with a trainer license.
Unless...? Is William practiced enough at human-form Zoroark Illusion that his William-the-pokehuman counts-as actually human, all the way down?
Oh, now I get the complaints. Alexa is the sort of person to be told "The Password Is Xiphius Gladius" and then say "The password is Swordfish".
Considering the absent minded nature of her father, I can definitely tell where Alexa got this inclination from, and can definitely tell that being a Professor's Daughter in no way helped this problem the way it would have for most scholar-born kids, because her dad would have accidentally encouraged it just by being himself.
...What's the story with Alexa's mother, anyhow? We know more about Charizard's home life now than we do Alexa's home life... Unless that information is back in the first story in the series? I haven't read the first one yet, I started with DSS because it was a premise that caught my eye.
Does speaking pokemon cause concepts to translate more comprehensively, since pikemon speech is less physical tones and vocal pronunciation, and almost entirely pokemon energy fields "talking" to eachother during the communication action, and that's even before actual Aura gets involved?
...Didn't the other chapter show that Alexa's transformation kept the clothes they were wearing as part of the transformation, and vice versa? There shouldn't be a problem, unless being "human sized" relative to Alexa's human form means that transformation thinks its exempt from being stored inside the detransforming process?
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E.I.G.
Robo-Bird
- Pronouns
- It/They
It seems fine to me, although other readers can comment if it is a bit much for them.
Type does have some impact on personality, but in this case it is mostly Alexa's easy access to the Water type or the ability to enjoy water in multiple forms that have made her think of it a bit too quickly as a solution.
There will be more details on the difference between a transformation and an illusion in the next chapter, which should make some things more clear about cases where the illusion is for one reason or another more physical than just a changed image.
Well, to a degree it is also spending time in towns after arriving before their matches. It is much rarer for a trainer to be in a town for only one day for a League, and if it does happen it is usually towards the end of the year's League when there is a time crunch before the tournament.
Mostly the second and third. A Gym only has so many pokemon available to their Leader for official matches, and only a subset can be used on a given Badge level fight. Early on in the League it is going to be all first Badge fights unless someone has decided to fly between a few Gyms in the first month, which probably would make a schedule conflict as the majority of Gym battles in a League are for the first three Badges.
That is about as far as most first time trainers get, with a much smaller number of them and multiple League trainers left. Those numbers drop more and more as the Badge number of the match rises, and the matches for those higher Badges take more pokemon and time for the Leaders.
Gyms also provide other services to the local area, which is where the majority of their funding comes from.
Vespikiln like the place you bake pottery, not Vespiqueen like the modern day pokemon. It is an OC pokemon that is more Beedril shaped only larger and without the hand-stingers and with a second set of arms.
It is a species that as far as anyone knows went extinct until humans found the hives again and started to get transformed by Chitin Powder once again.
Less endorphin rush, more "hey this doesn't hurt anymore". That is still a bit much, it wasn't outright painful, but it is an annoying long term problem that for once isn't bothering her.
Well, it at least says the pokemon is civilized enough to wear clothes without issue. The store they are buying from does not typically cater to what the employees would instantly call "people", but a pokemon in clothes would get more respect if they started talking than if they didn't have any.
Skipping to this one because it is going to be important, there has not been much about Alexa's mom yet, mostly because her father has been the more impactful parent on the topics of her life so far.
That said, I would really recommend reading Typechange before this fic, as it has some important details about the transformations and tests the team has already dealt with so far. It is only 74k words, which is not that much longer than this story has already gotten, and the threads also have the Cloud Gathering and Frostbite side stories. Cloud Gathering is one of my personal favorite fics that I have written, and it is relevant to your questions ahead. Frostbite was my first take on "Alexa turns into a pokemon", and while I won't continue that AU it did lead to a lot of this story.
This is where both Typechange and Cloud Gathering would help, as they both explain Stable Cloud in depth. That is Alexa's Flying type transformation item, which requires a pokemon or human to be in contact with the material for an entire hour before they change. Falkner has already tried it when the Cloud Gathering protagonist was in town, and discovered that Stable Cloud does not work for him. Which is kind of what set off this subplot.
I'm fairly sure in our world that translators don't just have to know both languages. I admittedly did not look it up, but it seems like something that takes training and skill to do effectively.
In that way I'm treating pokemon speech as the same as any language.
In Alexa's Gym battle against Falkner she was wearing a Dark type transformation item that made her a Dark typed human, and altered the effect of Magma Contagion on her to create a Fire/Dark typed Lobasalt.
In some ways yes, in others no. If the concept is already known by both parties it can be more easily conveyed even if they don't know the exact words, but if one doesn't know it would be more roughly understood.
In general an average pokemon, who due to lack of education is not well versed in human concepts, would sound either a bit simple or overly technical depending on the topic. The latter occurring when the pokemon describes something it understands how to do but not why doing that causes the result, or the common descriptors of the process.
Like an Electric type who goes into the details of what they do to a set of charges instead of using simpler terms for creating a shock.
Clothes that don't work with a destination form are converted with the body as it changes to that form, but those that work for both the original and the converted forms will remain afterwards. Alexa specifically has a set of belts and such that work for all four of her forms so far so she has somewhere to put stuff that won't get lost in the transformation.
Monster Forms and their Expenses
E.I.G.
Robo-Bird
- Pronouns
- It/They
--- Monster Forms and their Expenses ---
"How much food do you normally go through in a week for yourself?" William asked as they finally got a chance to get their shopping done. He was glad that Alexa's team had decided to get in touch with Falkner's before they let the Leader out of their sight, but it might have taken enough extra time that they wouldn't get everything today. "I know I ended up eating more when I started to use illusions for my human form all the time. It was a big surprise because I thought I was using them enough before, but it turns out there was a lot more times back home where I didn't use them at all than I thought."
The Vespikiln paused and adjusted her clothes, her new vest clearly still not familiar yet. "We went through a lot more of the mix I've been sharing with Charizard after I started using pokemon forms," Alexa admitted with a glance at one of the many people who were simply watching her. "I might have started eating that during my last League, and I don't actually know when."
Well, that told him she at least might have known she needed to buy more than before, even if she apparently was already sharing with a pokemon for some reason. "Alright, how about cleaning products?" William asked halfway automatically, before he realized something. "Uh, do you know what you use for your other forms yet?"
"Alexa already has far too many things to try for basically any question other than food and medical supplies. We have so many extra things for the other stuff that that part is already solved," Charizard jokingly complained.
"We can sell the extra if we really need to," Alexa buzzed with annoyance. "And we made some good money from what Falkner paid for the Chitin Powder jars."
William had overheard the payment for that mixture of jars and instruction on the form, and while it was a good bit more than the Gym match it was a bit of a concern to hear that it was 'good money' for the other trainer. Especially if it was the case that she didn't know what her supply expenses were going to be now. "Well, was there anything about your forms that got uncomfortable after a while?" he asked as the start of an attempt to narrow down what was and wasn't actually needed.
The answers to that question and his followups weren't very useful, but it at least let Charizard specify some of the extra things Alexa had purchased at the start of the League. Alexa knew that her fuzz did get dirty, but had about six different options that she had only started to try. Which was a drop in the bucket for how many options they had overall, and if William had not seen just how varied forms could get with Alexa's techniques he would very easily agree with her Starter about them being pure excess.
"It might be a good idea to try and keep that stuff on hand," he reluctantly admitted to the pair. "I'm not sure when I will get another Electric type so Dedenne can retire like he wants to, so I'm going to still keep the things I have for him."
"Well you better not be getting any more!" the mentioned pokemon said as the Electric/Fairy rodent emerged to sit on William's head. "Two Gym battles, William. You Promised me you would find an alternative to take over for me, and asked for just two Gym battles. We just used up one of those, and I would definitely prefer sooner rather than later to be done!" Dedenne then looked at the pair he was with. "Wait, where is the other trainer? I thought you found someone to help out this time."
"I'm right here," Alexa replied and gave Dedenne a look. William wasn't sure what kind of look, which was another thing to work out if he was going to travel with Alexa, but he hoped it wasn't going to get into a fight with his Fairy type. "Are you looking for a replacement Electric type, Fairy type, or both? Because if you have any pokemon that would like the Electric type I have a good option for that one."
"I like this one," Dedenne declared at that question. "She seems interesting. Where did you find a Legendary that decided to be a trainer?"
The visit to the Ruins of Alph made it hard to deny that he had in fact found one somehow. "She was just a human when I first met her," he hedged and Alexa nodded.
"Yeah, I'm using some odd items to change types, and they turn humans into pokemon forms," Alexa explained. "A lot of those are local legends because of how rare they are. This one is more of a sort-of-fossil form, but it once was sort of a legend for the area they lived."
Dedenne then gave the Vespikiln a careful look. "I see, and you can offer our team the ability to change into an Electric type?" the rodent questioned more respectfully than normal.
"It is one of the few possibly permanent options I have on hand. My Bellossom has decided to use it for that reason," Alexa confirmed, and with a glance at the other shoppers who had multiple pokemon out released the Grass/Electric type to demonstrate.
"Ah, Electric type questions?" Bellossom asked with a couple of smug sparks. "Or shopping questions?"
"I see," Dedenne said slowly, as if the Electric/Fairy pokemon was the one making a dangerous deal for once. "We will keep that in mind." Dedenne then skittered down back to his pokeball in a display of worry that William wasn't sure what to think of since it did not fit with the joking mention of 'liking' Alexa. The somewhat fey pokemon tended to be quick to make simple Deals, small things that didn't have much consequence if broken, but Dedenne had acted as if Alexa was offering the kind of major Deal that the pokemon avoided.
"Was that some sort of Fairy type sense going off?" Charizard questioned seriously. "Because you don't look like that was normal for him."
"I think he might have just assumed I was a stronger Legendary," Alexa buzzed unconvincingly. "We still don't have anything that says I'm more than a minor one at best. It is just a classification issue." Dedenne did not react to an Arcanine this way, but William also wanted to pretend that it wasn't a sign of something so he let it go.
---
"Any idea why the liquid metal care stuff is so much more expensive?" Alexa questioned with a tilted head as she inspected the first product of that kind she had actually found. Most of the common stuff actually was focused entirely on solid metal.
"Because there aren't any in any pokemon with that native to a region I have been to?" William more questioned than explained. "I'm surprised you actually found something outside of a specialty store. Is it really that important?"
"Rhydon and Heracross both have some most of the time to extend the duration of the transformations they prefer," Charizard explained for her. "Not to mention it is one of our best form options overall. The only one we use more is easy to get things for around here. Muk and other poison coated pokemon are fairly well known and have similar requirements."
"Although we have managed alright so far," Alexa admitted as she passed the box to her lower arms so she could get out the Pokedex to look up some of the claims the product made. "I just spotted this and hoped for a moment it would be useful. I want to try Mercury Contagion in this form tomorrow, and it would be nice to test something on me too." It was something she wanted to try before she was out of town, just in case Falkner or Nurse Joy did find out she needed a lot more trainer cards. "I'll need some help with illusion stuff if it works."
"Would it be like Rhydon or like Heracross?" William asked a bit nervously as she set the box down again. "Because there is a big range for that stuff from what you've told me so far."
"We don't know yet," Alexa said a bit distracted by what she had looked up. "I'm not sure this product is legitimate, it is talking about doing things that I've read are not good for actual Steel types, and our work on Mercury Contagion has made them look more risky instead of less. For one thing it promotes 'patina' which either means something different than what I think it does, or they are saying it makes it easier to rust."
"Wait, pass that over," William said quickly. "Golurk needs something that can do that and I've been having to get it shipped from back home. They need to maintain a good layer of it, or there can be some complications, and it is hard to get it right without help." Alexa rolled her head in an attempt to have the same result as rolling her eyes, and passed over the product. William flinched, but still smiled. "Oh, this brand. Well, it is better than nothing, and," He checked the price quickly. ",yeah that is still cheaper than what I have been paying to get some shipped here. Admittedly it isn't actually for liquid metal, it is a liquid metal based treatment that my friends back home joked couldn't actually explain that correctly, I guess they stocked it wrong."
Alexa buzzed with a bit of annoyance at how she still had not found something specific for her issues, but was glad it wasn't a waste of time to look over the item at least. "I'm going to need to do a lot more between towns to make up for the higher food budget. I still don't get how most trainers manage a full team of six," she complained with a glance at William. "Or even larger teams."
"It takes a bit more support than normal," William admitted with a clear frown. "The largest problem is that when you have a bigger team starting out your pokemon tend to not be in it for the long term. Dedenne is far from the first pokemon I've caught that has retired from my team, and getting the numbers back up has been an issue I've faced every League so far."
"Professional trainers tend to have a paying job and support system too," Charizard added. "My bio-parents told us some stories about how things are for our aunts and uncles. Most professionals start with their League team when they get the job, but end up changing out to other pokemon more interested in the job's specific work afterwards." Her Starter smirked at her. "So I might have tried to get ahead of that issue a bit by talking over things with the team about what they wanted."
"I'm pretty sure I worked out that you five are here for the long run when everyone chose new types to use," Alexa noted with an attempt to smile that probably did not work, her mandibles being spread out widely got a flinch from a nearby trainer. "Also it feels a bit like all of you got me into that part, instead of the other way around."
They quickly found the rest of the supplies they needed and went to the counter to finish their purchases. William and one cashier left for a moment to check on the details of their stock of the product Alexa had found while she handed her Vespikiln trainer card to the other in order to explain she was a trainer and pay with her League account. The standard banking service provided by the Pokemon League was honestly one of the bigger benefits that young trainers got from going on a League Run, and it didn't take much to maintain one even if you stopped being a professional trainer. Local banks in cities were more useful if you lived in one, as they were more flexible and had better services, but outside of big cities it wasn't uncommon for some people who didn't plan on leaving town for the long term to at least get far enough to register for an account.
The final supply tally was more expensive than Alexa wanted. Six more bags of food, a few replacements for the care items she had specifically used as a Vespikiln before, another box of the cheap vials, and some replacements for spent medical supplies all added up to more than what she had made earlier in the day from helping the Gym Leader. "Do you think we can find more trainers who would be interested in that kind of instruction?" she buzzed to Charizard as they left the store. "It might make us extra money."
"If we can find people. William's team would be the place to start there," her Starter quietly replied. "Although I think he would rather catch his own new Electric type. That's the real problem there, it is easier to just get a natural pokemon of a given type then to try and use our options to keep a pokemon a new type they need to learn to use."
"I want to at least try and convince him to try Mercury Contagion too," Alexa admitted. "But, I'm not sure if that is being too pushy about this stuff." It was something she wanted someone else to compare results with, but the natural pokemon-trainer had not seemed entirely comfortable with the idea before.
Then they both cut off as William returned from the back room with the cashier. "Good news, they also have the brand of that metal treatment that I usually get in stock," William happily declared with a smile. "A bit more cost than the other one, but still less than importing it myself."
---
Alexa looked over the training area they had been using since their arrival in Violet City. It was bare bones and basic, something that had no chance to change with how little her team had actually used it between the various trips to stores and other places to get things around for her new status as both a pokemon and a trainer. Today wasn't likely to mess up the area, but it would give her team a chance to meet all of William's that were present.
"Fire. Bug?" Golurk questioned with clear confusion. "Bug. Can. Be. Fire?"
"Don't strain yourself, Golurk. We found some of the treatment yesterday so we don't have to wait for the shipping time for once," William replied. "Also, yes, apparently Bug types can also be Fire types." He looked over the rest of his team. "Everyone else introduce yourselves while I handle that."
Chesnaught clearly didn't need to do that, so just stood there menacingly. Dedenne didn't even bother with that and simply returned himself. Carracosta looked like he wanted to ask a question, but the armored sea turtle pokemon didn't seem to know what to ask.
William's Scyther on the other hand actually spoke up. "So, uh, you're a human Bug type?" she questioned with a glance at the rest of Alexa's team. "Who is going to try and be Steel type today somehow?"
"A human Bug type," Alexa confirmed with emphasis on 'A'. "There is at least one other, but that is the result of a particular kind of food and it lasts an entire year so I'm not going to try that one."
"Wait, wait, there are more than one human Bug type forms?" Heracross questioned sharply, and the rest of Alexa's team gave a murmur of agreement bar Charizard.
"Alexa is specifically a Chitin Powder Bug type, the way you are currently using Mercury Contagion instead of Oxide Berry Jam," her Starter explained for her. "Same idea there. Different materials make different forms, even for humans. It isn't like some of us haven't changed at least as much as she has," Charizard added with a look directly at Heracross.
"Okay, that mostly explains things," Scyther replied with a thoughtful look on her face, and Alexa was a bit jealous at how the Bug/Flying type was better at being expressive. "Although what is with the look at the rodent pokemon there?"
"Heracross is currently sort of the opposite of what I am," Alexa answered to explain Charizard's point for the other team. "A Bug type that has become a mammal using one of our substances."
"Chesnaught, how many of them do things like that?" Carracosta asked, with a wary voice that was much younger than Alexa expected despite being told he was younger than most examples of a fossil species.
"Don't let the Charizard fool you-" Chesnaught started, but Alexa's Starter decided to drink a prepared bottle of Clearwater Geode water to make the point. "All of them. Every last member of that team including their trainer is a strange shapeshifter."
"Okay. Which one is the trainer?" the sea turtle followed up.
"Either the Vespikiln or the Charizard, I'm not entirely sure," Chesnaught complained a bit harshly.
"I only ever had the temporary card," Charizard smugly replied with a shift of his fins. "Only thing it is good for is a trainer account I've never used." There was a moment of silence as everyone considered that statement. "Well, I just remembered that I have a trainer account that my parents might have been putting money into. We have to check that if things get really bad." Alexa heard him grumble something about them telling him to 'get something nice for himself'.
"I am the official registered trainer," Alexa answered. "Who is now going to test what a Mercury Contagion does to my Vespikiln form." Charizard chuckled at that firm statement. "Charizard, you up for another round with the Pokedex."
"Starting to feel like it is his Pokedex," Kingler joked with a clack of claws. "So, are we all going Steel typed for a bit? I think everyone but you has tried it at this point."
"I'm not," Bellossom told them, and Alexa sighed at the side conversation.
Alexa passed her new bag to Charizard, took a vial of Mercury Contagion, and just used it on herself. Externally she could only see her entire color shift to silvery metal and her fuzz melt into a think liquid layer. Internally she felt herself melt down into something more similar to a Lobasalt than her normal Vespikiln form. "How different do I look?" she asked with a slightly wetter buzz.
"Steel/Fire now," Charizard commented. "I think you're as much a bee as Rhydon is a rhino." Given that Rhydon was currently a cloud-topiary-bird that was a bit exaggerated.
"Maybe try to mimic someone else?" the mentioned topiary pokemon suggested. "It just came naturally to me after I used that for this form."
William's illusion broke then. "Try my pokemon form, I want to see how well this mimicry works," the Zoroark requested.
Alexa considered that idea. Her body was mostly molten metal under the currently chitin like solidified outer layer, and she had an easy access to heat to melt that surface as well. She lowered herself to the ground, and only realized as she did so that she had not stopped flying during the change, then raised her internal temperature and tried to just let what came naturally happen as she focused on William's appearance.
The first thing Alexa did was melt and fuse her two pairs of arms back into one pair that she molded in a way very similar to changing claw styles on Lobasalt in order to match his own claws. Although it didn't feel quite like a change in her number of arms, more like she was holding them next to each other really closely. Then she used her wings and abdomen to mimic his large ponytail of hair, which felt a little odd as they didn't really seem to stop being those body parts as they shifted location and shape. Next she made her head and legs shift slightly to mimic his vulpine features, and finally she did something she only half understood to alter the coloration of her metallic surface. Her new vest didn't quite fit right, but it wasn't a concern for just a test of ability.
"She did it," Chesnaught said with shock, and that made Alexa look up and see the uniformly surprised expression on William and his entire team's faces.
"It wasn't hard," Alexa commented, and realized only after she said it that she had instinctively altered her voice closer to his at the same time. That was enough to shock her out of the slight effort to maintain that form, and cause her to flow back into a Vespikiln shape.
"Looks like most of us can use Acid Armor to at least some extent now," Kingler said about the method of Alexa's change. "Although I must admit I'd probably need to take out the Flame to get a form where all of me melts like that."
"I haven't been liquid yet," Heracross grumbled.
"If you can manage your human form it might help some with going into cities while you are 'stuck' as a Vespikiln," William slowly said after that. "You will still likely eat more, but it is better than just being a bee pokemon. I also have some illusion etiquette that you should know."
Alexa smiled, or at least tried to again as it didn't get a good reaction, at that. "That was the hopeful plan. I wanted to have that just in case Vespikiln ended up a problem for people," Alexa agreed and quickly set her mandibles back to their resting position. "Although, even though it wasn't hard it was tricky? I had to hold the shape, instead of just changing to a new shape."
"That sounds about right," Rhydon chirped to confirm that was his experience as well.
"I'm not sure what to think about the fact that you are more used to full transformations than using an illusion to change shape," William sighed and flashed into a Vespikiln shape. "The bit of effort to hold another form is normal... You have a lot of limbs right now, and going for different numbers of those is always tricky." That last sentence did not seem to have been the intended followup for the one before it, and William returned to Zoroark form after he finished. "Now I don't think I had a good idea what it feels like to actually change shape instead of using an illusion to do it, because that was a 'take a week to get used to it' number of extra limbs. You can just move after that big a change?"
"It takes a bit of work to move well, but it is easy enough to do what you can," Bellossom surprisingly answered. "I've had the worst luck there, and even then it hasn't been that I can't move easily as much as the way I moved was annoying. Losing track of where solid objects are is the worst part of the Ghost type."
"Eating everyone's life force is the worst part of that," Charizard strongly countered. "We aren't using that one again."
"Ghost is an option!" Chesnaught exclaimed. "How is the Ghost type an option!" William's Starter did not seem to actually be asking a question, just shouting in horror.
"It is rare even for these things, and basically all of them have the potential to be permanent," Alexa answered anyway. "We tried one, nobody that tried it liked it, so we aren't planning on trying again." She paused for a moment to consider how her own forms had worked so far. "The only way we're getting another Ghost type form is if one of my human based forms have it as a secondary type."
"Is there a problem with being a Ghost, Chesnaught?" Golurk asked more clearly than before. The automaton pokemon moved to clearly try and loom over William's Starter. "Not all Ghosts are the dead. This is still my first life."
"There is a problem with me being one!" Chesnaught said with wide fearful eyes.
"Chesnaught," Alexa firmly said to attract the frightened pokemon's attention. "We aren't going to use anything worse than a Soak attack on you without you agreeing to use it, and even that much is only if William and you both agree to help us train the move versions." Alexa could sympathize with the worry, but it was a bit more fear than she had expected to see.
"The Normal type as an option was bad enough," Chesnaught said a bit more calmly. "At least the Normal type doesn't open up the question 'did you just die?' when you become one."
"Just becoming a Ghost type doesn't mean you die either," William said with more certainty than Alexa expected. "You do remember my aunt who found that ancient Sinnoh mask?"
"She's why I'm freaking out! She went both and got stuck!" Chesnaught said in renewed fear. Which was a lot more understandable if there was a practical example.
"That is what natural Zoroark looked like way back when in Sinnoh," the other pokemon-trainer said in tired tone. "Alexa told you the Normal type wasn't easy to happen by accident too."
"I thought you guys were from the place where Ghost types could make you into Ghost types," Charizard commented thoughtfully, and reminded Alexa that it was the same region as the two type changing curses.
"Wait that's real?" William asked a bit too sharply. "I thought that was just one of those weird Ghost type jokes told by Gourgeist."
"I told you that 'trick' made me feel funny," Chesnaught said a bit faintly, and a lot paler. "Defense stripping moves don't only work on Ghost type moves."
Alexa looked over at her team. "I don't think today is a good day to ask if any of them want to try," she said quietly, and got a murmur of agreement back as some of William's team began to compare their own experiences with that particular type-changing move.
---
[Author's Note]
A bit more shopping and training worldbuilding, along with an introduction to more of William's team and a bit of illusion verses transformation.
"How much food do you normally go through in a week for yourself?" William asked as they finally got a chance to get their shopping done. He was glad that Alexa's team had decided to get in touch with Falkner's before they let the Leader out of their sight, but it might have taken enough extra time that they wouldn't get everything today. "I know I ended up eating more when I started to use illusions for my human form all the time. It was a big surprise because I thought I was using them enough before, but it turns out there was a lot more times back home where I didn't use them at all than I thought."
The Vespikiln paused and adjusted her clothes, her new vest clearly still not familiar yet. "We went through a lot more of the mix I've been sharing with Charizard after I started using pokemon forms," Alexa admitted with a glance at one of the many people who were simply watching her. "I might have started eating that during my last League, and I don't actually know when."
Well, that told him she at least might have known she needed to buy more than before, even if she apparently was already sharing with a pokemon for some reason. "Alright, how about cleaning products?" William asked halfway automatically, before he realized something. "Uh, do you know what you use for your other forms yet?"
"Alexa already has far too many things to try for basically any question other than food and medical supplies. We have so many extra things for the other stuff that that part is already solved," Charizard jokingly complained.
"We can sell the extra if we really need to," Alexa buzzed with annoyance. "And we made some good money from what Falkner paid for the Chitin Powder jars."
William had overheard the payment for that mixture of jars and instruction on the form, and while it was a good bit more than the Gym match it was a bit of a concern to hear that it was 'good money' for the other trainer. Especially if it was the case that she didn't know what her supply expenses were going to be now. "Well, was there anything about your forms that got uncomfortable after a while?" he asked as the start of an attempt to narrow down what was and wasn't actually needed.
The answers to that question and his followups weren't very useful, but it at least let Charizard specify some of the extra things Alexa had purchased at the start of the League. Alexa knew that her fuzz did get dirty, but had about six different options that she had only started to try. Which was a drop in the bucket for how many options they had overall, and if William had not seen just how varied forms could get with Alexa's techniques he would very easily agree with her Starter about them being pure excess.
"It might be a good idea to try and keep that stuff on hand," he reluctantly admitted to the pair. "I'm not sure when I will get another Electric type so Dedenne can retire like he wants to, so I'm going to still keep the things I have for him."
"Well you better not be getting any more!" the mentioned pokemon said as the Electric/Fairy rodent emerged to sit on William's head. "Two Gym battles, William. You Promised me you would find an alternative to take over for me, and asked for just two Gym battles. We just used up one of those, and I would definitely prefer sooner rather than later to be done!" Dedenne then looked at the pair he was with. "Wait, where is the other trainer? I thought you found someone to help out this time."
"I'm right here," Alexa replied and gave Dedenne a look. William wasn't sure what kind of look, which was another thing to work out if he was going to travel with Alexa, but he hoped it wasn't going to get into a fight with his Fairy type. "Are you looking for a replacement Electric type, Fairy type, or both? Because if you have any pokemon that would like the Electric type I have a good option for that one."
"I like this one," Dedenne declared at that question. "She seems interesting. Where did you find a Legendary that decided to be a trainer?"
The visit to the Ruins of Alph made it hard to deny that he had in fact found one somehow. "She was just a human when I first met her," he hedged and Alexa nodded.
"Yeah, I'm using some odd items to change types, and they turn humans into pokemon forms," Alexa explained. "A lot of those are local legends because of how rare they are. This one is more of a sort-of-fossil form, but it once was sort of a legend for the area they lived."
Dedenne then gave the Vespikiln a careful look. "I see, and you can offer our team the ability to change into an Electric type?" the rodent questioned more respectfully than normal.
"It is one of the few possibly permanent options I have on hand. My Bellossom has decided to use it for that reason," Alexa confirmed, and with a glance at the other shoppers who had multiple pokemon out released the Grass/Electric type to demonstrate.
"Ah, Electric type questions?" Bellossom asked with a couple of smug sparks. "Or shopping questions?"
"I see," Dedenne said slowly, as if the Electric/Fairy pokemon was the one making a dangerous deal for once. "We will keep that in mind." Dedenne then skittered down back to his pokeball in a display of worry that William wasn't sure what to think of since it did not fit with the joking mention of 'liking' Alexa. The somewhat fey pokemon tended to be quick to make simple Deals, small things that didn't have much consequence if broken, but Dedenne had acted as if Alexa was offering the kind of major Deal that the pokemon avoided.
"Was that some sort of Fairy type sense going off?" Charizard questioned seriously. "Because you don't look like that was normal for him."
"I think he might have just assumed I was a stronger Legendary," Alexa buzzed unconvincingly. "We still don't have anything that says I'm more than a minor one at best. It is just a classification issue." Dedenne did not react to an Arcanine this way, but William also wanted to pretend that it wasn't a sign of something so he let it go.
---
"Any idea why the liquid metal care stuff is so much more expensive?" Alexa questioned with a tilted head as she inspected the first product of that kind she had actually found. Most of the common stuff actually was focused entirely on solid metal.
"Because there aren't any in any pokemon with that native to a region I have been to?" William more questioned than explained. "I'm surprised you actually found something outside of a specialty store. Is it really that important?"
"Rhydon and Heracross both have some most of the time to extend the duration of the transformations they prefer," Charizard explained for her. "Not to mention it is one of our best form options overall. The only one we use more is easy to get things for around here. Muk and other poison coated pokemon are fairly well known and have similar requirements."
"Although we have managed alright so far," Alexa admitted as she passed the box to her lower arms so she could get out the Pokedex to look up some of the claims the product made. "I just spotted this and hoped for a moment it would be useful. I want to try Mercury Contagion in this form tomorrow, and it would be nice to test something on me too." It was something she wanted to try before she was out of town, just in case Falkner or Nurse Joy did find out she needed a lot more trainer cards. "I'll need some help with illusion stuff if it works."
"Would it be like Rhydon or like Heracross?" William asked a bit nervously as she set the box down again. "Because there is a big range for that stuff from what you've told me so far."
"We don't know yet," Alexa said a bit distracted by what she had looked up. "I'm not sure this product is legitimate, it is talking about doing things that I've read are not good for actual Steel types, and our work on Mercury Contagion has made them look more risky instead of less. For one thing it promotes 'patina' which either means something different than what I think it does, or they are saying it makes it easier to rust."
"Wait, pass that over," William said quickly. "Golurk needs something that can do that and I've been having to get it shipped from back home. They need to maintain a good layer of it, or there can be some complications, and it is hard to get it right without help." Alexa rolled her head in an attempt to have the same result as rolling her eyes, and passed over the product. William flinched, but still smiled. "Oh, this brand. Well, it is better than nothing, and," He checked the price quickly. ",yeah that is still cheaper than what I have been paying to get some shipped here. Admittedly it isn't actually for liquid metal, it is a liquid metal based treatment that my friends back home joked couldn't actually explain that correctly, I guess they stocked it wrong."
Alexa buzzed with a bit of annoyance at how she still had not found something specific for her issues, but was glad it wasn't a waste of time to look over the item at least. "I'm going to need to do a lot more between towns to make up for the higher food budget. I still don't get how most trainers manage a full team of six," she complained with a glance at William. "Or even larger teams."
"It takes a bit more support than normal," William admitted with a clear frown. "The largest problem is that when you have a bigger team starting out your pokemon tend to not be in it for the long term. Dedenne is far from the first pokemon I've caught that has retired from my team, and getting the numbers back up has been an issue I've faced every League so far."
"Professional trainers tend to have a paying job and support system too," Charizard added. "My bio-parents told us some stories about how things are for our aunts and uncles. Most professionals start with their League team when they get the job, but end up changing out to other pokemon more interested in the job's specific work afterwards." Her Starter smirked at her. "So I might have tried to get ahead of that issue a bit by talking over things with the team about what they wanted."
"I'm pretty sure I worked out that you five are here for the long run when everyone chose new types to use," Alexa noted with an attempt to smile that probably did not work, her mandibles being spread out widely got a flinch from a nearby trainer. "Also it feels a bit like all of you got me into that part, instead of the other way around."
They quickly found the rest of the supplies they needed and went to the counter to finish their purchases. William and one cashier left for a moment to check on the details of their stock of the product Alexa had found while she handed her Vespikiln trainer card to the other in order to explain she was a trainer and pay with her League account. The standard banking service provided by the Pokemon League was honestly one of the bigger benefits that young trainers got from going on a League Run, and it didn't take much to maintain one even if you stopped being a professional trainer. Local banks in cities were more useful if you lived in one, as they were more flexible and had better services, but outside of big cities it wasn't uncommon for some people who didn't plan on leaving town for the long term to at least get far enough to register for an account.
The final supply tally was more expensive than Alexa wanted. Six more bags of food, a few replacements for the care items she had specifically used as a Vespikiln before, another box of the cheap vials, and some replacements for spent medical supplies all added up to more than what she had made earlier in the day from helping the Gym Leader. "Do you think we can find more trainers who would be interested in that kind of instruction?" she buzzed to Charizard as they left the store. "It might make us extra money."
"If we can find people. William's team would be the place to start there," her Starter quietly replied. "Although I think he would rather catch his own new Electric type. That's the real problem there, it is easier to just get a natural pokemon of a given type then to try and use our options to keep a pokemon a new type they need to learn to use."
"I want to at least try and convince him to try Mercury Contagion too," Alexa admitted. "But, I'm not sure if that is being too pushy about this stuff." It was something she wanted someone else to compare results with, but the natural pokemon-trainer had not seemed entirely comfortable with the idea before.
Then they both cut off as William returned from the back room with the cashier. "Good news, they also have the brand of that metal treatment that I usually get in stock," William happily declared with a smile. "A bit more cost than the other one, but still less than importing it myself."
---
Alexa looked over the training area they had been using since their arrival in Violet City. It was bare bones and basic, something that had no chance to change with how little her team had actually used it between the various trips to stores and other places to get things around for her new status as both a pokemon and a trainer. Today wasn't likely to mess up the area, but it would give her team a chance to meet all of William's that were present.
"Fire. Bug?" Golurk questioned with clear confusion. "Bug. Can. Be. Fire?"
"Don't strain yourself, Golurk. We found some of the treatment yesterday so we don't have to wait for the shipping time for once," William replied. "Also, yes, apparently Bug types can also be Fire types." He looked over the rest of his team. "Everyone else introduce yourselves while I handle that."
Chesnaught clearly didn't need to do that, so just stood there menacingly. Dedenne didn't even bother with that and simply returned himself. Carracosta looked like he wanted to ask a question, but the armored sea turtle pokemon didn't seem to know what to ask.
William's Scyther on the other hand actually spoke up. "So, uh, you're a human Bug type?" she questioned with a glance at the rest of Alexa's team. "Who is going to try and be Steel type today somehow?"
"A human Bug type," Alexa confirmed with emphasis on 'A'. "There is at least one other, but that is the result of a particular kind of food and it lasts an entire year so I'm not going to try that one."
"Wait, wait, there are more than one human Bug type forms?" Heracross questioned sharply, and the rest of Alexa's team gave a murmur of agreement bar Charizard.
"Alexa is specifically a Chitin Powder Bug type, the way you are currently using Mercury Contagion instead of Oxide Berry Jam," her Starter explained for her. "Same idea there. Different materials make different forms, even for humans. It isn't like some of us haven't changed at least as much as she has," Charizard added with a look directly at Heracross.
"Okay, that mostly explains things," Scyther replied with a thoughtful look on her face, and Alexa was a bit jealous at how the Bug/Flying type was better at being expressive. "Although what is with the look at the rodent pokemon there?"
"Heracross is currently sort of the opposite of what I am," Alexa answered to explain Charizard's point for the other team. "A Bug type that has become a mammal using one of our substances."
"Chesnaught, how many of them do things like that?" Carracosta asked, with a wary voice that was much younger than Alexa expected despite being told he was younger than most examples of a fossil species.
"Don't let the Charizard fool you-" Chesnaught started, but Alexa's Starter decided to drink a prepared bottle of Clearwater Geode water to make the point. "All of them. Every last member of that team including their trainer is a strange shapeshifter."
"Okay. Which one is the trainer?" the sea turtle followed up.
"Either the Vespikiln or the Charizard, I'm not entirely sure," Chesnaught complained a bit harshly.
"I only ever had the temporary card," Charizard smugly replied with a shift of his fins. "Only thing it is good for is a trainer account I've never used." There was a moment of silence as everyone considered that statement. "Well, I just remembered that I have a trainer account that my parents might have been putting money into. We have to check that if things get really bad." Alexa heard him grumble something about them telling him to 'get something nice for himself'.
"I am the official registered trainer," Alexa answered. "Who is now going to test what a Mercury Contagion does to my Vespikiln form." Charizard chuckled at that firm statement. "Charizard, you up for another round with the Pokedex."
"Starting to feel like it is his Pokedex," Kingler joked with a clack of claws. "So, are we all going Steel typed for a bit? I think everyone but you has tried it at this point."
"I'm not," Bellossom told them, and Alexa sighed at the side conversation.
Alexa passed her new bag to Charizard, took a vial of Mercury Contagion, and just used it on herself. Externally she could only see her entire color shift to silvery metal and her fuzz melt into a think liquid layer. Internally she felt herself melt down into something more similar to a Lobasalt than her normal Vespikiln form. "How different do I look?" she asked with a slightly wetter buzz.
"Steel/Fire now," Charizard commented. "I think you're as much a bee as Rhydon is a rhino." Given that Rhydon was currently a cloud-topiary-bird that was a bit exaggerated.
"Maybe try to mimic someone else?" the mentioned topiary pokemon suggested. "It just came naturally to me after I used that for this form."
William's illusion broke then. "Try my pokemon form, I want to see how well this mimicry works," the Zoroark requested.
Alexa considered that idea. Her body was mostly molten metal under the currently chitin like solidified outer layer, and she had an easy access to heat to melt that surface as well. She lowered herself to the ground, and only realized as she did so that she had not stopped flying during the change, then raised her internal temperature and tried to just let what came naturally happen as she focused on William's appearance.
The first thing Alexa did was melt and fuse her two pairs of arms back into one pair that she molded in a way very similar to changing claw styles on Lobasalt in order to match his own claws. Although it didn't feel quite like a change in her number of arms, more like she was holding them next to each other really closely. Then she used her wings and abdomen to mimic his large ponytail of hair, which felt a little odd as they didn't really seem to stop being those body parts as they shifted location and shape. Next she made her head and legs shift slightly to mimic his vulpine features, and finally she did something she only half understood to alter the coloration of her metallic surface. Her new vest didn't quite fit right, but it wasn't a concern for just a test of ability.
"She did it," Chesnaught said with shock, and that made Alexa look up and see the uniformly surprised expression on William and his entire team's faces.
"It wasn't hard," Alexa commented, and realized only after she said it that she had instinctively altered her voice closer to his at the same time. That was enough to shock her out of the slight effort to maintain that form, and cause her to flow back into a Vespikiln shape.
"Looks like most of us can use Acid Armor to at least some extent now," Kingler said about the method of Alexa's change. "Although I must admit I'd probably need to take out the Flame to get a form where all of me melts like that."
"I haven't been liquid yet," Heracross grumbled.
"If you can manage your human form it might help some with going into cities while you are 'stuck' as a Vespikiln," William slowly said after that. "You will still likely eat more, but it is better than just being a bee pokemon. I also have some illusion etiquette that you should know."
Alexa smiled, or at least tried to again as it didn't get a good reaction, at that. "That was the hopeful plan. I wanted to have that just in case Vespikiln ended up a problem for people," Alexa agreed and quickly set her mandibles back to their resting position. "Although, even though it wasn't hard it was tricky? I had to hold the shape, instead of just changing to a new shape."
"That sounds about right," Rhydon chirped to confirm that was his experience as well.
"I'm not sure what to think about the fact that you are more used to full transformations than using an illusion to change shape," William sighed and flashed into a Vespikiln shape. "The bit of effort to hold another form is normal... You have a lot of limbs right now, and going for different numbers of those is always tricky." That last sentence did not seem to have been the intended followup for the one before it, and William returned to Zoroark form after he finished. "Now I don't think I had a good idea what it feels like to actually change shape instead of using an illusion to do it, because that was a 'take a week to get used to it' number of extra limbs. You can just move after that big a change?"
"It takes a bit of work to move well, but it is easy enough to do what you can," Bellossom surprisingly answered. "I've had the worst luck there, and even then it hasn't been that I can't move easily as much as the way I moved was annoying. Losing track of where solid objects are is the worst part of the Ghost type."
"Eating everyone's life force is the worst part of that," Charizard strongly countered. "We aren't using that one again."
"Ghost is an option!" Chesnaught exclaimed. "How is the Ghost type an option!" William's Starter did not seem to actually be asking a question, just shouting in horror.
"It is rare even for these things, and basically all of them have the potential to be permanent," Alexa answered anyway. "We tried one, nobody that tried it liked it, so we aren't planning on trying again." She paused for a moment to consider how her own forms had worked so far. "The only way we're getting another Ghost type form is if one of my human based forms have it as a secondary type."
"Is there a problem with being a Ghost, Chesnaught?" Golurk asked more clearly than before. The automaton pokemon moved to clearly try and loom over William's Starter. "Not all Ghosts are the dead. This is still my first life."
"There is a problem with me being one!" Chesnaught said with wide fearful eyes.
"Chesnaught," Alexa firmly said to attract the frightened pokemon's attention. "We aren't going to use anything worse than a Soak attack on you without you agreeing to use it, and even that much is only if William and you both agree to help us train the move versions." Alexa could sympathize with the worry, but it was a bit more fear than she had expected to see.
"The Normal type as an option was bad enough," Chesnaught said a bit more calmly. "At least the Normal type doesn't open up the question 'did you just die?' when you become one."
"Just becoming a Ghost type doesn't mean you die either," William said with more certainty than Alexa expected. "You do remember my aunt who found that ancient Sinnoh mask?"
"She's why I'm freaking out! She went both and got stuck!" Chesnaught said in renewed fear. Which was a lot more understandable if there was a practical example.
"That is what natural Zoroark looked like way back when in Sinnoh," the other pokemon-trainer said in tired tone. "Alexa told you the Normal type wasn't easy to happen by accident too."
"I thought you guys were from the place where Ghost types could make you into Ghost types," Charizard commented thoughtfully, and reminded Alexa that it was the same region as the two type changing curses.
"Wait that's real?" William asked a bit too sharply. "I thought that was just one of those weird Ghost type jokes told by Gourgeist."
"I told you that 'trick' made me feel funny," Chesnaught said a bit faintly, and a lot paler. "Defense stripping moves don't only work on Ghost type moves."
Alexa looked over at her team. "I don't think today is a good day to ask if any of them want to try," she said quietly, and got a murmur of agreement back as some of William's team began to compare their own experiences with that particular type-changing move.
---
[Author's Note]
A bit more shopping and training worldbuilding, along with an introduction to more of William's team and a bit of illusion verses transformation.
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Good chapter, if a bit uneventful. Always amusing to see new reactions to the crazy shenanigans that come up around Alexa. Chesnaught's fear of being type-changed makes a bit more sense now. And I find it very amusing that Chesnaught was apparently hit by a Gourgeist's Trick-Or-Treat and William didn't even realize what it actually did.
I'm not entirely clear on what this line was supposed to mean. Could you clear that up for me a bit?
Yes, practical examples do indeed make fears more understandable. So, does this mean William's aunt is permanently in Hisuian form? Or is that something that got unstuck eventually?
E.I.G.
Robo-Bird
- Pronouns
- It/They
Glad that worked out. As for that line, well the most notable effect they recognized of Trick-Or-Treat was that it made Ghost type moves hit her harder, so William mistook it for a defense cutting move.
As far as they know she is still like that with no known way to turn back. That doesn't mean it is impossible to do so, but it at least seems permanent for the moment.
Thank you, I'm glad to hear that.
The world building impression I get from this is:
1. The government would rather be seen as helpful and openly friendly to potential trainers if admittedly somewhat beleaguered and wasteful, rather than difficult and unapproachable if highly effective should a trainer earn its approval.
2. The legitimacy of government policy actions is inertia based, more than can be explained by natural occurring beuracatic intertia, things are a lot more loosely defined in the heat of the moment and necessary forms are backfilled as needed rather than direct line of confirmation being universally mandatory.
3. Becoming a pokemon trainer is officially regarded as a public service, in the minds of the policy makers the minimum target ratio of trainer owned pokemon to total human population is 4:1, with the ideal desired ratio being 2:1, to insure that enough human-allied pokemon and their trainers can act as a meaningful counterbalance to human urbanization and infrastructure buildout.
Internation Pokemon League and Governance
E.I.G.
Robo-Bird
- Pronouns
- It/They
So this is all good things to get. I only want to clarify that "government" is a complicated subject in my pokemon setting. The main one that matters overall is the International Pokemon League, but technically speaking it does not actually act as the government for most places.
What the League is concerned with is the interaction between humans and pokemon. This ranges from how wild pokemon are handled, how trainers operate, how pokemon are handled in civilization, and at the extreme end how to handle Legendary pokemon. To control those interactions they mostly regulate, support, and promote pokemon trainers.
When it comes to who to report a traveling pokemon trainer to the best option is the Pokemon League itself, as if they are a genuine trainer they will have registered with the League and entered into their system. Local laws will still apply to them, but the League will be concerned with the actions of the trainers registered to it.
In exchange for being under the control of the Pokemon League those trainers get a variety of benefits. A trainer ID gives them a bank account usable across most of the world in the modern day, access to communications support in Pokemon Centers and similar places, aid in emergencies they encounter, and recognition of their skills as they prove them.
That recognition is tied into, to be blunt, propaganda regarding being a trainer and how to interact with pokemon. TV shows, tournament broadcasts, and the like are all funded by the League to promote the idea of becoming a trainer, and treating pokemon well.
Now, the League's goals are focused on three things:
1. Finding Champion level trainers to deal with any Legendary pokemon issues, Gym Leaders to train new trainers and handle local pokemon issues, and the various support trainers that assist both of them. This is mostly done by promoting the League Tournament and the associated Journeys that new trainers take to get more powerful.
2. Increasing the pokemon-human interaction across the world to decrease the cases where disagreements between the two cause problems. This is accomplished by teaching trainers to interact with pokemon, and supporting industries where pokemon and humans can work together by creating humans who are familiar with working with pokemon.
3. Policing any human actions that upset or disrupt pokemon, pokemon trainers, or pokemon supported industry. This is in some ways part of the first option, but the League's control over pokemon crime is a major focus, and part of why it can be hard to separate their actions from local government, especially as they promote more aspects of daily life to include pokemon.
Ah, I see now. Now that line makes sense to me. Thanks for the clarification.
As far as that informational post goes, there's good worldbuilding there. I recognize bits of it from DSS's plot, and I always enjoy hearing more about the world characters live in.
As a somewhat more flippant take on it, it almost sounds like the League is just a big PR department.
E.I.G.
Robo-Bird
- Pronouns
- It/They
They do an awful lot to make it sound less terrible than that.
... although it is also partially "get our own living nukes to more actively prevent the ones we can't live with".
The PR part is fairly big, but when it comes to funding gained and spent most of it goes to supporting trainers. A dozen or so Champion teams aren't the cheapest thing to keep supplied, and that is just one part of an individual region's requirements.
I can't even imagine the financial and material costs involved in providing support during an "ongoing crisis management scenario" by a team of Champions.
There is no room for downtime when that sort of thing occurs: there is no guarantee the crisis spillover isn't straining the civilian suppliers just as badly as it is straining the League officials, and there may not even be enough Champions available to permit shift changes so any of them can get some goddamn sleep instead of being stuck with a 24/7 work schedule as though a hybrid profession of surgeon and soldier.
E.I.G.
Robo-Bird
- Pronouns
- It/They
That topic is kind of more related to the events of DSS, which covers something like that kind of situation, but trying to make things not get that bad (emphasis on "trying") is a major project for the League.
Le café des dieux
I imagine that every few years some clueless bean-counter complains about the extreme expense, and somebody has to set them down and point out the estimated insurance cost of a single time they've been called out in force, and they didn't show up.
Now I'm imagining the poor guys who have to explain some of the stranger requests said Champions have... "When the local coffee tweaker of a Champion asks for the $500 a bag coffee, the reason costs so much is because it's hand-picked by monks who have been doing it for centuries, from coffee bushes that are said to be blessed by a Celebi. Those beans are then roasted and fermented in a Shiny Shuckle shell for three months, just to make a single batch. As ludicrous as it seems, it's not because they're a deletant that can't drink normal coffee. No, it's because while it gives Aura users heart palpitations, it's also literally strong enough to let them see into the future and has enough raw octane to keep said Champion going for 60 hours straight without a wink of sleep. Which is why we keep it around for the bi-annual apocalypse."
Now I'm imagining the poor guys who have to explain some of the stranger requests said Champions have... "When the local coffee tweaker of a Champion asks for the $500 a bag coffee, the reason costs so much is because it's hand-picked by monks who have been doing it for centuries, from coffee bushes that are said to be blessed by a Celebi. Those beans are then roasted and fermented in a Shiny Shuckle shell for three months, just to make a single batch. As ludicrous as it seems, it's not because they're a deletant that can't drink normal coffee. No, it's because while it gives Aura users heart palpitations, it's also literally strong enough to let them see into the future and has enough raw octane to keep said Champion going for 60 hours straight without a wink of sleep. Which is why we keep it around for the bi-annual apocalypse."