Gawd Dawnet

Cautiously, he made his way to the corner of the building, and peeked around it. The first time he didn’t get a proper look, and so he had to check again. His eyes were surely playing tricks on him, that wasn’t Dawn, was it…? He checked the stranger for any signs of not being the person he suspected, and found none.

It was Dawn. How amusing. She’d certainly grown since the last time they’d seen each other, and it was likely that she wouldn’t recognise him at all in his new grunt attire. He came into her field of vision holding a small bottle and with the other hand in his new turquoise hair. Unless she’d paid particularly close attention to his face there was no way she she would be able to make the link between him as a grunt and him as a Commander.

Reaching back he thumbed across various buttons before pressing one, the doors behind Dawn slamming shut. He hardly needed to do anything after, his gyms Mediums following their lines to a ‘T’.

“We welcome you, Dawn of Sinnoh, to Ecruteak City’s gym. You have the honor of facing the grandson of Kanto’s Elite Four member Agatha, Mortimer: The Mystic Seer of the Future. Where Fantina may have failed to defeat you, Morty shall succeed and show you the true terror of ghost pokemon. We know why you are here. We know what you seek, and just as you do we know that you must earn it. Prepare yourself girl, for you will not be leaving anytime soon.”

Morty smiled, shivering slightly. The frail voices of his Medium’s all speaking at once could still make him feel nervous from time to time and he was their gym leader. He could only imagine what Dawn was feeling. But if her goals where true, as Morty saw they were, then she wouldn’t give up.

Making a small sigh she looked down at the electric type which then began to make some steps to lead the way into the gym sniffing about the floor. "Guess it's all or nothing then... though Mortimer?..." The bluentte mumbled following slowly after her pokemon, but for Arceuses sake did they really have to have a completely pitch black gym, the atmosphere was pretty creepy though but once you go into the distortion world... you just get pretty tolerant of these things, though the doors slamming was an unexpected trick. 

Luxray suddenly stopped sniffing the air again before it's nose scrunched up and it made a loud displeased roar, that incense was definitely something it wasn't liking! Starting to quicken the pace it headed on forward until it suddenly felt no flooring under it's paws and it tumbled forward while his trainer had quickly picked up on his help and grabbed a hold of his tail. "Luxray it just said you could fall down I know you can understand people!" The luxray responded with another yelp as the poor girl desperately tried to hold the huge feline up, finally getting it's footing it rolled back nearly knocking over it's saviour.

"Now this time lets take this slowly huh I get you want to battle but if you fall down this is going to make this a hell of a lot longer Luxray!" Getting back up onto his paws Luxray shook it's fur and started to lead the way while some sparks flickered off it's fur it never was a patient pokemon after all. "Quit the fussing we will get there evtentually... Hear that morttera-ma..-.... Morty! We are going to get to you eventually don't get too comfy!"

He listened to her plea, and how she was searching the grimy, sketchy city for her little, blue Nidoran. Looker pondered his thoughts, retracing his steps as he thought about seeing the little creature. He frowned when nothing appeared to show up, and he responded, “I do apologize, for I have not seen your little companion anywhere in the area. I will, however, aid you in your search, for I have no other work to accomplish…” 

Her Infernape tilted it's head a little at the other fire type, the pokemon had no idea how to feel about the other type, in general it just wasn't very good with other pokemon. "Looks like you got some new friends with you since the last time we met, all I knew of back then was that Croagunk of yours" 

Folding her arms the bluenette started pondering on where exactly they could go looking next while her fire type started to wander round a bit keeping a fair distance fromt he other pokemon. where would a little nidoran even run off to any ways?.... "You got any scents there boy?" she asked with a pleading look as she stared down at the Houndoom which was sniffing about the place. 

Steven is busy looking in a mirror now.  Hes checking if any hairs are standing up on his head, if his suit is all nice and tidy, along with his sassy gay tie.  And once he figured that all was fine, regarding his looks and if he was dressed appropriately, he turned to Dawn.  Now he is getting a good look at her, and she seems a little familiar.  But he cant exactly say why or for what reason he believes this.  So instead he says nothing about it just yet and gives her a slight nod.

“Its a pleasure to meet you, you can just call me… Steven.  No Mr. Stone or anything like that.  Mr. Stone is my father’s name, alright?”  He jokes, and then pauses for a moment to think.  ”Hm— Well you see,  dont really go grocery shopping.  I swear, at some point in my life I was living off instant ramen, just because I was too lazy to learn how to cook.  Not exactly healthy.  Theres a nice little cafe that serves breakfast though, my treat, okay little lady?”

She then just settled on pushing that thought way off to the side before she offended him or something, she can always bring up while they were already out any ways. Better not to lecture somebody on their lifestyle while in their own house, and if they got a long good enough she could always ask to teach him something basic so she could rest easy knowing somebody was actually eating.

As the conversation changes over, she gets her composure back, listening with a clueless smile as… compliments start coming up. Wait what. The brunette looks to her Sawsbuck, whose happily enjoying the pets with a wiggle or two of her tail.

Thanks for the help, mama.

One hand goes up to rub at the back of her neck, the other waving half-heartedly to stave off the praise. She’s used to getting compliments about her Pokemon, not herself!]

You think…? I mean—! Thanks a ton, but— [Oh gosh.]

Y’know, I’m not sure why your complimenting me! I mean, your hair’s really pretty, too. It’s super thick, right? It looks it!

…

[Hm…

Absent-mindedly, she takes a look at Dawn’s hairstyle - or rather, what she can see of it from under the hat, and works to try and mimic it a little bit. Two portions in the front, take some stuff from them and pull it back…]

Kinda like this?

[Keeping a hand to hold the pulled strands behind her, she glances back over to the smaller girl for approval.]

"But yeah it is pretty thick, it's probably something I got from my mum though, I plan on growing it to be really long eventually though, just now I think with all the running around it would be a little hard to well... manage? Especially with pokemon like 'him'" the bluenette then glanced down at the Luxray which was amusing itself by watching people who passed by, it had given up on it's current company and looked for new people to amuse it. Honestly sometimes...

Still petting the soft grass type it took a fair amount of willpower for Dawn to keep her attention on the other trainer, she was just easily, well it wasn't really a short attention span, just, easily distracted?

"Yeah, you got this already! Just one little thing" On that note she finally left the Sawsbuck along and took off her hat and gently placed it over the brunettes head. "All done! It really suits yo- oh! since it won't take too long buying some supplies you could show me where the nearest clothes store is right?" and watch out there Whitlea she isn't going to leave you alone until you agree.

[Which he tries not to show. Riley might not be very highbrow, but he has pride. He offers a weak puff of a laugh in his throat and palms his neck for a moment - fixing his hat in the process, since his nap fussed it - before answering her question.]

No, no… As far as I can tell, you’ve read me right. Napping isn’t a hobby of mine. I’m actually glad you woke me up, otherwise I probably would’ve been out here the rest of the day.

[The guardian rolls one of his shoulders unconsciously, testing for stiffness or pain. If he’s been asleep for too long, surely there’d be signs. Grass stuck to the back of his jacket, muscle tension, something.]

[And things seem fine so far, so he’ll go off of that for now.]

Like you, I’ve been improving. Or— I should say I’ve been trying to improve, I think. It’s kind of hard to measure progress sometimes.

[Riley glances ahead over the rest of the scenery, quietly musing about this and that.]

I spent the day helping Riolu, for the most part. I wanted to help him with his sensory skills, so the three of us - that is, Riolu, Lucario, and me - spent the entire day in the caves.

I should have called it quits a few hours ago, but he was making progress. [It was a poor call on his part, but it was exciting! Anyone can relate, right? That feeling where you’re so close, and a few minutes will definitely be enough to get it right— Only they’re not.]

Not a very professional move on my part. On the positive side, he did improve! It wasn’t a waste, at least. But everyone was exhausted as a result.

…

At least she could relate though, it felt better to know that even Riley ends up going overboard when training a pokemon, though with her it was with her now not so little Gabite. "You keep staying in them caves all day your going to end up going as blind as a zubat Riley" The bluenette then made a small laugh, you would think by now she would learn to let up the teasing on him a little.

"But jokes aside if you think it worked then it's worth it, the amount of times I went a little overboard with my pokemon is kinda ridiculous but sometimes you just get a little too excited, especially when they are going to evolve soon, you just end up working overtime"

"Though promise not to do it too much, I don't know if I can be here to wake you up if you decide to go napping in the middle of route again"

“Well, I am from the Unnova region. We’re a bit of a quiet region you could say..Though, I’ve heard of your home, you had quite alot of trouble with a group by the name of Galactic I believe? That Cyrus fellow, he was..interesting, to say the least.”

"Yeah Team Galatic was their name, I guess news really travels or something huh? Though interesting would be putting it a little too nicely when it comes to him of all people..." She mumbled, in case it wasn't obvious, you couldn't exactly call her a huge fan, the entire thing was just touchy ground.

Shaking off the tense feeling she had she nodded her head at Ghetsis trying to put the polite smile back on, not like it was this guys fault she had to deal with them after all. "Oh no it's not intruding, it's always better to do anything when you have somebody else with you, it's sad to be lonely in a place like this" She responded before staring up at the staircase, guess it's going to be a long climb huh?

Really? He gave you that much trouble from day one? [The man chuckles into his wrist, kneeling lakeside next to the two.]

I suppose that’s one way to find out what you’ve signed up for, then, isn’t it? No surprises or devious revelations down the road.

[This girl’s leading quite the adventurous life. Good for her! That’s the whole point of the journey - anyone who can make a true story out of it, intentionally or not, gains benefit from it.]

…

[The champion chuckles, realizing something.]

I haven’t really said much about myself at all, have I? Forgive me, Dawn. I’ve been so fascinated by everything you’ve said that I entirely neglected to do my part. You’ve just been telling your life’s story to a total stranger.

That doesn’t do me any favors, I’d think.

[At least he can make fun of himself.]

"Oh you don't need to apologize I think that's more of my fault, talking is just erm... a little toooo natural for me or something, but It would be a lie if I said I don't mind not hearing about you!" ...though giving her the freedom to ask anything she likes huh?... she might be keeping him here a pretty long time.

[He smiled slightly over at how easily her Staraptor and Pikachu made friends. Pikachu sure was the friendly one, so it really wasn’t too hard for him to grab more friends along there journey. Seriously Pikachu had tons, and Red could barely handle a small handful. But he could see himself getting along with her. Nice enough to help him out of the muk at least!]

[He dusted at his pants once more and flicked at a heavier piece of mud that continued to stick to his pants. Ah, maybe he should find some point to change them out.]

[Oh!… Should pay attention a bit. His mind was a bit all over the place at the moment.]

.. Haven’t heard of it really. Strange name for it too. [He repeated Wooper in his name over and over. Seriously, its a silly name. Guess he’ll have to see what kind of Pokemon it is.]

"Though I haven't caught one yet so erm, excuse the lack of information the pokedex, I am sure we can update it together soon enough though!" Might as well make the point clear before he asks right? If he was even bothered by the huge blank spots in where the pokemon's information should be on the thing.

"When it stops raining it's a little hard to find one but eventually the odd one or two will start coming out and using rain dance, since they started living here it's been a marsh because of them, guess you could say they did some redecorating here or something... can't say I am fond of their taste though."