Video

[heribbon]

[Mami smiled at the camera, her Budew bouncing in her arms making sure she's seen.]

I feel I should introduce myself. I'm Mami Tomoe, and this little one is Fiore. I do hope we can get alo-Fiore!

[She laughed as the baby pokemon batted the Pokegear out of her hand. The screen showed the sky for a moment before being picked back up by the girl.]

Sorry about that. Fiore's a little bit excited.

Comments

[rambling_runner]

Hey there Mami! Name's Ash. And this is one of my own Pokemon, Diarmuid!

[ And given he's in the middle of a mountain judging by the scenery int he background, he couldn't just retrieve her and show her off to Mami. At his side instead is a Gallade, the forementioned Diarmuid, who folded an arm in front of himself and bowed to the screen politely when he's introduced. He spoke telepathically. ]

Hello.
Are you new here?

[heribbon]

It's nice to meet you Ash, Diarmuid. I am new, yes. This is my first day actually. I'm trying to walk to a different town right now. [But she couldn't find a clear path.] Preferably one with a market and a library.

[Fiore wiggled at the bottom of the screen and chirped happily. She wanted to say hi too.]

[rambling_runner]

A good market and a library...hold up let me think. [ As Ash mentally went over Johto, Diarmuid smiled and waved to Fiore ]

Hello to you as well.

[ Ash snapped his fingers ] Right! Okay, so your Gear should have a map function on it, right? If you look over it, there's a couple of places I can think of that might catch your eye. For a market, Goldenrod's the place to be, no question. It's the biggest city so it's market has a lot of stuff you won't find in the smaller towns.

For libraries, I can't say I really stopped and looked for those, but I know that Violet City has the Sprout Tower and Ecruteak has the other one...gah, I can't remember it's name. But they're both run by monks who have lots of old texts lying around, so that could be interesting if you're into that!

[heribbon]

[Wait, does it?] .... Of course! I will definitely have to check those places out. Thank you.

[She's itching to write information she's learning here down already, as well as learning more.]

Have you been traveling in Johto then?

[rambling_runner]

I have been yeah. I actually got a house over in Olivine, but I wanted a change of scenery. So me and some of my mons are heading towards Blackthorn, to take on the gym over there. But I woke up in New Bark, same as you have I'm guessing.

[heribbon]

[She is looking at her map for city name references.]

That's a bit of a trip isn't it? But you'll [please hold while she looks some things up] have all eight Johto badges then, right?

And yes, that is where I started. I'm hoping Cherrygrove will be bigger.

[rambling_runner]

Yeah, I already went to Cianwood to get that badge. Plus I'm meeting up with a friend at Mahogany, so we'll head towards Blackthorn together. It's always better to travel with a buddy.

Cherrygrove's a bit bigger. I think Violet's the first sort of actual city you reach when you head out from New Bark.

[heribbon]

Traveling with a buddy would be fun.....[She sighed]

Violet's even longer away though, so I hope Cherrygrove will be a nice place to get further aquanted with this world before I move on.

[rambling_runner]

Oh yeah it's certainly not a bad place! Just that if you're looking for somewhere really busy, then it's not it.

But still, there's some cool Pokemon you can catch around there. Man, I remember, I'm pretty sure there's some kind of cave around that part of town where I caught my Rockruff and my Noibat. They've both evolved now and they're both great with me, even if Carmilla - the bat - can be all haughty and won't do shit unless I give her some berries to bribe her.

[heribbon]

Rockruff and Noibat? [She assumed they were pokemon too.]

I may have to see if I can find any pokemon that I want to join me there then.

A lot of people seem to have trouble with their pokemon though, don't they? [Quieter] Pokemon are hard to train, then?

[rambling_runner]

It depends on their personality. Same with people, you know? Someone might be eager to learn and to fight; someone else might be stubborn and demand you prove yourself to em, and others might not want to be battlers at all.

Diarmuid here actually approached me. He's cool with battling; hell, Gallades are known for being expert swordsmen and for having amazing manners.

[heribbon]

I see. You're quite knowledgeable.

I think I'd like to respect a pokemon's wishes if they didn't want to fight. [She knew how hard fighting daily could be after all.]

I wonder if pokemon not wanting to be caught and pokemon wanting a trainer to prove themselves are able to be easily told apart...

[rambling_runner]

Nah, I wouldn't say I'm knowledgeable! I've just, been here for a while now. [ He sheepishly ruffled his hair. ]

And sometimes not always. But sometimes they just wanna be pets too. I've got a Pikachu; they're really cute, I'll send you a pic of him actually; he doesn't like to fight. But he loves going on runs with me over the rooftops, so we do that together instead. Hold up-

[ Mami will receive a picture after a slight delay. It showed Ash with an adorable Pikachu on his shoulder, the pair sitting on the edge of a roof just as sunset was coming in. ]

[heribbon]

Oh my! He is adorable!

I'm glad you were able to bond over something then. I hope I'll be able to find something I like to do with my pokemon that isn't battling. I don't want their lives to be only fighting. [There was definitely something she wasn't saying here.]

Maybe I'll try running too.

[rambling_runner]

Pokemon enjoy all sorts of things so I'm sure you'll find something! They really do have like, strong personalities. They're basically people in that regard. Hell, I got Pokemon that like to cause mischief - you gotta look out for those ones! - some who like to collect stuff, some who like to be lazy or relax by the beach, some who like to dance or sing... man I gotta tell you how I got my Jigglypuff actually-

[ Quick, divert him before he launches into a story! ]

[heribbon]

[So many types of personalities to consider! It was a bit overwhelming for a girl who's so used to being on her own. Not that she'd mention that at all. It might show on her face though.]

Please tell me.

[Nope, no diversions from Mami.]

[rambling_runner]

[ Story time! Ash got himself comfortable and began to talk. He was quite animated, hands gesturing as he told his story. Diarmuid half rolled his eyes but in a clearly fond way. He was used to how Ash went on by now, and found it endearing. ]

Okay so! Me and my buddy Noctis, we went to this place called the Safari Zone. It's like a nature reserve, where you can go to all these different environments and catch Pokemon. There's stuff like a beach, a desert area, a wooded area, so there's a huge variety of Pokemon around! And you're not allowed to take your Pokemon in to fight em, so you've only got yourself and some Pokeballs to catch em - actually no wait, they give you some rocks too and some bait, I didn't use the rocks cos. I ain't gonna bet he guy who throws a rock at a Pokemon, that's just wrong.

Anyway! We were walking through when this Jigglypuff appears. They're these pink, round Pokemon with really big eyes. Turns out, they're well known for their ability to sing too. So we got this Jigglypuff in front of us. And brings to sing. If we try to bypass him, he gets so mad and gets right in our way and just, outright shouts. So he's clearly after something from us. I threw a few pokeballs but he broke out of them, and then sang at me. Normally their song puts a person to sleep, but he threw in some of his other moves to keep knocking me wide awake. He still wouldn't just get in a pokeball though, even after I said he sounded awesome!

Eventually I got frustrated and like, sang back at him. First it was just putting a few notes to me calling him a little shit, but he was like, judging it. So I tried actually singing to him. After that, then he stayed in a pokeball when I threw one. So basically, my Jigglypuff refused to be captured until I proved I could sing just as well as he could. And he still demands we do vocal training each week; it works out since I'm big on singing myself, but he won't do anything my friend asks of him.

[heribbon]

[Mami listened to the entire thing, apparently attentively.]

Oh my. That pokemon sounds like quite the character! I'm glad you were able to prove yourself to him eventually.

[She wasn't going to say anything, but she hoped that she would be able to have stories like that with her pokemon.]

But yeah, it seems a bit weird to ask you to throw rocks at a pokemon....

[rambling_runner]

Like I said, I didn't do that! But, that's the kind of thing that can happen when you meet certain Pokemon out there. I've got a bunch of other Pokemon who are just as big or quirky in character. It'd be great to introduce to some of em.

[ Not all. He doesn't want Mami to be scared by some of his more mischievous or outright boisterous and destructive Pokemon. SUCH AS AN TINTREACH. ]