I'm pretty sure that if you want to demonstrate intelligence, the easiest way is to tap out Fibonacci numbers. Even if the listener doesn't realize that's specifically what you're doing, it would be pretty obvious it's not random. They might assume a trainer taught you, but it should open the door to more communication pretty quickly.
 
Mawile can write. See here:
Forgot about that. Thanks for the reminder.

I'm pretty sure that if you want to demonstrate intelligence, the easiest way is to tap out Fibonacci numbers. Even if the listener doesn't realize that's specifically what you're doing, it would be pretty obvious it's not random. They might assume a trainer taught you, but it should open the door to more communication pretty quickly.
Flairile didn't want to demonstrate intelligence, she just wanted to ask for the bag. Asking for a pencil and paper should have been sufficient by itself but the girl just breezed past it. More people would recognize the first half dozen prime numbers than the Fibonacci sequence, and both are patterns that can be taught by rote as tricks, but I get the impression that short of breaking out Riverdance, she wouldn't have clued in that tapping her foot was anything other than impatience, and she'd still manage to misinterpret it.

Demonstrating her intelligence was at most a side concern, and probably something she won't be so eager to reveal once she has a chance to think about it.
 
As I move up to a nearby crosswalk and stop to check for oncoming cars — not that this city even seems to have any, oddly enough — I notice several nearby pedestrians watching me, openly gawking at the tiny Pokemon passing through their midst.
Let's face it: cars would be impractical in a crowded city, where it's usually more convenient to walk/bike or take a taxi/train anyway. Plus no traffic jams, less air pollution, less noise pollution, no rented parking spots, less roadkill, etc. I do expect some vehicles out and about, but not many.

I quickly refocus my gaze forward, doing my best to avoid making eye contact with any of them.
Following the basics of trainer-to-trainer interactions. If you don't want to battle, don't grab attention. If you don't want attention, don't meet their eyes.

I shift my focus to the poster I noticed before. According to it, this place's so-called Adventure Bags are now new and improved, capable of carrying even more items than before... regardless of their size of weight?
I wonder what the size limit is. It would be funny to see Mawile flip the bag upside-down and shake, burying herself in a mountain of supplies that is collectively 100x bigger than the bag itself.

For a moment I consider simply going inside, grabbing a bag, and silently pleading with the nearest cashier to let me have it. However, while the technique of simply looking and acting cute has been working pretty well to get me food so far, a piece of dessert or a small free sample is a rather different proposition from what's probably a decently expensive piece of traveling equipment, especially since there's no obvious reason that I, a Pokemon, would want/need it. I don't think that strategy's going to work here.
Maybe try bartering? Just, like, use Trick and leave a cupcake in the bag's place. Yup, that's definitely how equivalent exchange works. :V

"Hey now, no Fake Tears. You'll make the floors all wet, and I'll be the one who ends up having to clean them up."
Trying to fool someone who deals with Pokemon-related goods maybe wasn't the smartest move... On the bright side, you can still spite her by spilling Fake Tears all over the store.

I've seen way too many pretend tantrums from my own partner at this point to not recognize a fake cry from a real one.
Guess you'll need to work on making your crying seem more authentic, then!

Wait, what? What is the connection between those two statements? I think I've made it pretty clear by now that I can understand her, and people talk to wild Pokemon all the time in the show. Why would she call that crazy?
Yeah, I agree with Mawile here: What the heck was that supposed to mean? Does Kiara think she was just hallucinating the whole conversation or something?

Kiara steps away from the counter, and I hear a door open somewhere behind it, probably to some sort of back room.
Quick, her back is turned! Now's your chance to Sweet Kiss her and run off with the bag!

After a surprisingly long time spent doing... something, Kiara steps away from me, allowing the feather-light pressure of the scarf to settle just behind my skull. Placing one hand on her chin, she tilts her head and seems to appraise me for a moment, then nods in apparent satisfaction.
And just like that, your Coolness went up. Or Cuteness, whatever. Honestly, it's a nice accessory even if it doesn't have Contest appeal. Thanks, Kiara.

Super Hero Mawile? Is that what this is leading to? Save a few people, make some money, keep doing it to buy the bag?
"Jubilife's Vagabond Mawile: She's here to save the day, as long as you have cash!"

Alternatively, she can help Looker on his quest to stop the baddies.
 
Wait, those bags are all physical right? With a subspace for items?

What if you turn the bags...inside out?

Would it disappear into its own subspace, and potentially cause Palkia to descend and try to find who the fuck just bent space?
 
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huh. Wonder what that's about?
I don't know what the place you're from is like, but house fires don't seem all that unusual to me, so that's what I'd expect in your situation.
The way you pointed it out makes me assume you'll check it out though.

Would it disappear into its own subspace, and potentially cause Palkia to descend and try to find who the fuck just bent space?
A Bag-of-Summon-Palkia does sound useful right now.
 
Wait, those bags are all physical right? With a subspace for items?

What if you turn the bags...inside out?

Would it disappear into its own subspace, and potentially cause Palkia to descend and try to find who the fuck just bent space?
The same as with a Bag of Holding, I recon. With it inside out, the inside is now the outside and the outside is now the inside, so the universe is now inside the bag. Naturally, this puts it over the bag's limits, causing it to tear and dump all of its contents into the Astral Plane. Palkia is then left holding the empty bag.

Yeah, I agree with Mawile here: What the heck was that supposed to mean? Does Kiara think she was just hallucinating the whole conversation or something?
While Paul was well aware that even wild Pokemon could typically get at least the general gist of what people said to them, an understanding of human language thorough enough to actually communicate back implied a higher level of comprehension than he honestly liked.
(Thanks to lermilo for the link)
Wild Pokemon only barely understand human speech. Having a conversation with one is like my Grandfather talking to his cat. (Yes, the cat answered. Yes, it was hilarious. No, neither of them would do it if they knew anyone was listening.)

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I don't know what the place you're from is like, but house fires don't seem all that unusual to me, so that's what I'd expect in your situation.
The way you pointed it out makes me assume you'll check it out though.

A Bag-of-Summon-Palkia does sound useful right now.
Fire trucks also respond to traffic accidents and around here they also have their own ambulance that has the same general look and markings. The only constant is that when they are out and about you know that someone is having a bad day.

A Bag-of-Summon-Annoyed-Palkia sounds like asking for trouble.

Chimchar what did you do?
He's still balled, so unless he's learned a very interesting new trick it wasn't him. And Flairile can vouch for him.
 
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Would it disappear into its own subspace, and potentially cause Palkia to descend and try to find who the fuck just bent space?

No that would just break the bag.

But pity the fool who thought to use it to store pokeballs.


As to the matter of intelligence, all pokemon in this story are sapient.
If humans haven't figured that out, then there is some kind of memetic effect blocking them, because it's rather obvious when the pokemon can straight up understand human speech and sometimes even learn it.
 
If humans haven't figured that out, then there is some kind of memetic effect blocking them, because it's rather obvious when the pokemon can straight up understand human speech and sometimes even learn it.
learning to speak it seems to be incredibly uncommon, to the point where many likely dismiss it or consider them exceptions, and learning to understand human doesn't really show the humans your sapience in ways most would care to notice.
 
learning to speak it seems to be incredibly uncommon, to the point where many likely dismiss it or consider them exceptions, and learning to understand human doesn't really show the humans your sapience in ways most would care to notice.
Not really.

Imagine if your dog reacted intelligently to your words. Not in a "I understand the general gist" kind of way, but in a "I understood everything you said and understand the more complex meanings behind it as well" sense.

There is no way people wouldn't notice. And it's not like everyone needs to notice by themselfs. Just enough to draw attention to it.

That's not even getting into the fact that yes, the scientists and training experts would notice instantly.
 
Not really.

Imagine if your dog reacted intelligently to your words. Not in a "I understand the general gist" kind of way, but in a "I understood everything you said and understand the more complex meanings behind it as well" sense.

There is no way people wouldn't notice. And it's not like everyone needs to notice by themselfs. Just enough to draw attention to it.

That's not even getting into the fact that yes, the scientists and training experts would notice instantly.
i'm not sure how many reactions can be distinctly noticed as the ladder instead of the former, especially since most wild pokemon probably won't be doing the latter - you seem to be assuming they all know the language by default instead of having to learn it.

and, the way humans tend to be, most probably won't know or accept it if they can't tell it themselves.
 
i'm not sure how many reactions can be distinctly noticed as the ladder instead of the former, especially since most wild pokemon probably won't be doing the latter - you seem to be assuming they all know the language by default instead of having to learn it.

and, the way humans tend to be, most probably won't know or accept it if they can't tell it themselves.
Listen. We in our universe have studied the intelegence of the other animals to an insane degree. And anything displaying complicated problem solving even more so. We have tried to teach primates to type (to some success).

Now imagine if experiments like that lead to the monkey writing up a novel. You catch my drift? There is no way for humanity to miss this once science rolls into town, and few before then.

Even an everyday person can tell that something is up if your dog manages to comprehend a statement like "if A happens do B, unless C has also happend in wicht case do D, but if C happens without A do both at once".

And if you think no one ever says anything complicated to pets than you seriously underestimate peoples tendency to talk to their pets.

Also again, since it's easily provable once you are aware of it, all that is needed for a handfull or maybe even just one person to figure it out. That not happening is so silly that I could only explain it via legendary shenenigans, not that that isn't a likely solution (hence mind whammy field from earlier).
 
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There is also some chance that poke-mans are different from hu-mans. They might just be really really terrible at noticing some things(like disguises, for example). I mean, trading in their ability to figure out that the thing clearly and coherently talking to them is actually capable of speech, in exchange for the ability to casually invent lossless and reliably reversible matter-to-energy conversion in their bronze-age equivalent might be worth it, especailly if they also get to buff their compassion to the point that having such a fialing doesn't prevent them from being decent to the people which they can't recognise as people.
 
There is also some chance that poke-mans are different from hu-mans. They might just be really really terrible at noticing some things(like disguises, for example). I mean, trading in their ability to figure out that the thing clearly and coherently talking to them is actually capable of speech, in exchange for the ability to casually invent lossless and reliably reversible matter-to-energy conversion in their bronze-age equivalent might be worth it, especailly if they also get to buff their compassion to the point that having such a fialing doesn't prevent them from being decent to the people which they can't recognise as people.
Hmmm that is true, especially considering that we see the humans pull a lot of nonsense that no human as we know them ever could, like tanking lightning storms and being no worse for the wear or punching through boulders.
 
Listen. We in our universe have studied the intelegence of the other animals to an insane degree. And anything displaying complicated problem solving even more so. We have tried to teach primates to type (to some success).

Now imagine if experiments like that lead to the monkey writing up a fucking novel. You catch my drift? There is no way for humanity to miss this once science rolls into town, and few before then.

Even an everyday person can tell that something is up if your dog manages to comprehend a statement like "if A happens do B, unless C has also happend in wicht case do D, but if C happens without A do both at once".

And if you think no one ever says anything complicated to pets than you seriously underestimate peoples tendency to talk to their pets.

Also again, since it's easily provable once you are aware of it, all that is needed for a handfull or maybe even just one person to figure it out. That not happening is so silly that I could only explain it via legendary shenenigans, not that that isn't a likely solution (hence mind whammy field from earlier).
you're still overestimating humanity a fair bit here - there are people who don't except even that apes can be taught sign and typing. people have a bad habit of underestimating the intelligence of other creatures. and of not listening to scientists, for that matter. in addition, in order for people to find out, that requires it to be communicated to the masses, who often remain ignorant out of apathy.
 
you're still overestimating humanity a fair bit here - there are people who don't except even that apes can be taught sign and typing. people have a bad habit of underestimating the intelligence of other creatures. and of not listening to scientists, for that matter. in addition, in order for people to find out, that requires it to be communicated to the masses, who often remain ignorant out of apathy.
Convincing humans to anthropomorphize things is super easy, which is why animism is so common. It takes active training to convince people not to do that.

Which, mind you, isn't an unreasonable thing to have happen here. There was at one point a major view in psychology that you shouldn't anthropomorphize humans, so ignoring intelligent behavior in pokemon is well within the bounds of plausibility.
 
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