"Vul?" Tanna stops her stride and turns her head. She caught a familiar scent from behind them; the Fennekin from Littleroot.
"Hm? What is it, Tanna?" Rose stops and glances behind her, noticing the hesitant boy from Birch's lab. Thank goodness, he's alright… She thinks to herself. She wouldn't say it out loud, but she was worried about her fellow fire-fox trainer, especially with the jerk that put him down still wandering around. He didn't give up, he made it all the way to the next city and kept going. That'll show their not-so-friendly neighborhood jerk.
"Vulpix! Vul, Vulpix!" Tanna cries out a happy greeting to her fellow fox type.
"Tanna—" Rose quickly bends down and scoops her fox into her arms. It doesn't look like Zachry wanted to be noticed, much less called out. She turns to face the wandering trainer and flashes him an encouraging smile. No words, just a smile, a nod of approval, and a short lived wave. With that, the windows of communication are opened, but the male trainer is under no obligation to say anything if he doesn't want to.
"Let's get going, he'll come along if he wants to." She whispers to her Vulpix before turning back around and continuing down the path. Kiba makes a quiet, pleading growl of confusion and tilts his head, questioning what that was all about.
"He's our friend." Rose explains. Was friend too strong a word? She didn't think so. When people have such similar dreams and goals (and a shared love of fire fox pokemon), they're bound to be friends. Speaking of friends…they never did run into Barc again. Did he pass them when they took their route 103 detour? She doesn't mind, Shura was well worth the time it took to capture, although she's tempted to travel for a bit after dark in order to make up for the lost time. Falling behind the others isn't acceptable.
"It went that way!"
"No, it went this way!"
The shouts of two separate voices brought Rose out of her thoughts. She turns her head towards the noise and sees a youngster scurrying out from a grove of trees. His eyes lock onto her, and he points at her accusingly. "Maybe she saw it!"
Before Rose can ask what it is she might have seen, another youngster comes bounding towards her. "Have you seen a Ralts around here?" He yells, despite being more than close enough for Rose to hear if he spoke normally.
"Not just any Ralts, stupid!" The first Youngster swats the second in the back of the head. "A blue one. Have you seen it?"
"A blue Ralts?" Rose repeats.
"Yeah, blue, like your hair." The first youngster points again. "We caught it in a snare, but it teleported away from us."
Rose cringes slightly at the thought. A snare's an awfully cruel way to trap a Pokémon. "No, I haven't seen any blue Ralts'."
"Oh, okay." The second youngster nods. "Well, if you see it, tell us. It's ours."
"How can it belong to both of ours?" The first younger asked. "It'll be mine, 'cause the snare was my idea."
"So?!" The second yelled. "It was my idea to go check it! I saw it first!" The two exchange glares for a few seconds before the first youngster snaps his head back to Rose. He takes note of the Pokémon in her arms and deduces that she must be a trainer, thus she'll know who has the rights to the Ralts.
"Hey, Lady!" Again with the yelling when speaking would suffice… "I should get the Ralts, right?"
"No!" The second youngster shoves his friend. "Tell him it's mine!"
Rose glares. She's had enough of this, clearly neither of the two are fit to be handling Pokémon yet. "I don't think either one of you deserve to have it, not the way you're acting." If she wasn't holding Tanna she would put her hands on her hips, or wag her finger at them. Instead, she holds the fox a little closer to her chest. "And I think you should be ashamed for acting like this."
Both boys seem highly offended, and abandon their argument in order to gang up on the blue haired trainer. "You would say that." The first accuses. "Girls don't know anything about training Pokémon right."
"Yeah!" The second joins in. "I bet all you care about is making your Pokémon pretty! You don't know how to make them strong!"
Kiba growls at the two youngster's, his fur prickling upward as tiny sparks begin to zap from his mouth.
"It's okay, Kiba." Rose cuts her gaze from the boys and smiles down at her little hyena. "Let's just keep going, okay?"
Kiba looks up to his trainer for a few seconds. While displeased, the electricity fades from his teeth and he nods.
"See?! You're afraid to fight!" The second youngster accuses.
"Fight with what? Neither of you have Pokémon." If they had them, they would have called on them by now.
Both boys fall silent for several seconds. She's right, neither of their parents would let them have Pokémon yet, hence setting traps in hopes of grabbing one. "The Ralts is mine." The first finally mutters.
"It is not!" The second snaps, giving the first another shove. Rose is quickly forgotten as the two begin to bicker between each other once again.
Rose takes this time to continue forward, cutting a wide path around the yelling youngsters and continuing down the path. "It's okay." She repeats once they're far enough away from the two, and she can hear herself think again. "You all trust me as your trainer, that's what matters." The opinions of two high-strung youngsters hold no weight. They'll learn, in time.
A glimmer of light appears in their path, growing in size before taking the shape of a Ralts—not just any Ralts, the blue Ralts! Rose stops again, this time wide eyed. It really is blue, and it gave off a beautiful glimmer when it appeared. It's really beautiful…
"Ralt Ralts." The little fairy cheers, then giggles, one little hand pressed to her lips as she does so, the other pointing to the path Rose had come from. It seems to be laughing at the boys.
"You saw that, huh?" Rose asks. Ralts must have been hiding away, keeping an eye on those boys since it escaped their net.
"Ral-Ralts." The little fairy nods. She looks at Rose in an approving manner. While she couldn't communicate it to the trainer, she had been watching her since Poochyena led her and the Pokemaniac to the hidden Bulbasaur. She gave off pleasant emotions, and this intrigued the Ralts enough to follow her. After the way Rose dealt with her pursuers, Ralts decided to reveal herself. "Ralt." Again she uses her hands, using one to point to the fox in Rose's arms, and the other to herself. "Ralts." She makes a beckoning 'come here' motion with her outstretched hand.
"You want something from Tanna?" Rose asks, uncertain.
"Ralts!" The fairy nods, continuing her little hand motion. There's a playfulness in her smirk that helps Rose to understand.
"You want to battle Tanna."
"Ral-Ralts!" The shiny Pokémon cheers.
"You wanna battle, Tanna?" Rose asks the Pokémon in her arms.
"Vul PIX!" Tanna says strongly, then leaps out of Rose's arms.
Rose's heart begins beating frantically, so much so that she can feel it in her chest. This is a shiny Pokémon. People search for years and never find a Pokémon this rare. If she messes up the chance to catch this Ralts, she'll never have another chance…so she can't mess this up. Play it careful. "Tanna, use energy ball!"
The green energy collects in Vulpix's mouth, forming a large sphere before shooting towards the fairy type.
While her beam was charging, Ralts began creating three purple balls of energy. As the green sphere shot towards her, she released the three: One shoots directly at the energy ball, the energies colliding against one another and blowing apart before hitting their targets, while the other two hurtle towards Tanna from separate directions.
"Tanna, jump up!"
The little fox does as she's told; leaping into the air, causing the two psyshock-orbs to smash into one another. It worked! "Now use-!" It was too late; while Tanna was busy dodging Ralt's psyshock, the fairy had called forth her magical leaf attack. The multi-colored leaves shoot for Tanna in mid-air, pelting the target and pushing her backwards.
After the impact Tanna lands gracefully on the ground. Magical Leaf might have made a direct hit, but it was still a grass type move, Tanna was hardly fazed.
"You're a tricky one." Rose compliments, which makes the Ralts smile. Alright then; time to step things up a notch. "Tanna, show Ralts your will-o-wisp!"
The blue flames collect in a circle around the Ralts, which looks in every direction for an escape. The only way to evade is to jump, but that thought comes to the fairy too late, the blue flames engulf her, leaving the searing burn behind. Ralts cringes at the pain, but smirks as its ability kicks in: A red heat forms around Vulpix—then vanishes, leaving Ralts terribly confused.
"Synchronize." Rose grins. "But fire types are immune to burn! Now Tanna, hex!"
Tanna's eyes begin to glow their eerie red as the energy collects over her head, while Ralts prepares its psyshock again. The large energy once more collides with the three smaller energy orbs—but this time the ghostly energy powers right past them. Gaining such power from the target having a burn, Hex is quite the unstoppable force, and unlike when the Vulpix used it on Poochyena, this attack hits for super effective damage. The energy smashes into the Ralts, sending its body forced backward. The little fairy manages to keep standing, though its back is slouched, and it once more cringes from the burn that continues to chip away at its healthy.
Ralts is down for the count, but it continues on. Another attack should do it…but another Hex could really hurt the shiny Pokémon. Something light should be just enough… "Extrasensory!"
The golden energy collects in Tanna's mouth. With a powerful cry she shoots the multicolored ray straight for Ralts. Exhausted from the heavy hit of the Hex, and pained from the continuing burn, Ralts doesn't have the energy left to dodge the beam. It hits, and the little fairy is forced to the ground.
"This should do it…" Rose whispers, more to encourage herself than anything. She takes another Friend Ball from her bag and throws it towards the Shiny creature. She can feel her body shaking with anticipation as the ball shakes…
