Despite the fact that he has traveled all of Pokemon regions except Kalos, he still didn't like hiking. He didn't mind traveling, but not for such a treacherously long time. Stephen looked up through the dark treetops, where the sun still lay high in the sky. They ahd left this morning, and haven't stopped at all to rest.
"How much longer till we break?" Stephen asked, arm limp from carrying his shield for so long. He wiped his forehead of sweat with his free hand and looked up to see two disappointed ponies. "What? Why the long faces?" Stephen said with a small smile.
"Stephen," Swift Gale stepped forward. "The Everfree Forest isn't exactly as safe place to just sit and rest for a while." High Marks nodded, and the pegasus continued. "Many monsters can attack us at any moment's notice as we speak., and there's a good chance that we might not even recognize the creature. Ponies stay away from here with good reason."
"With that said," Facade said with a bored tone. "Can we continue? I'd rather not stay idle in such a supposedly hostile area." We all agreed with that and kept walking.
"Don't worry Stephen," Swift Gale called from the front. "Once we find a good clearing in green, we'll take a breather." Stephen sighed, and kept walking. He heard galloping catching up from behind him. He looked down and saw Facade at his side.
"Having trouble with that shield?" asked the Changeling. Stephen reluctantly nodded. It was a light enough load, but began to be more of a burden as time went on. "There's a button in that little circle in the design. try that." Then his trot slowed as he returned to his position in line. Stephen look at his shield and slapped his hand on the middle of the logo. HE felt like he had just hit a small metal button. In seconds, the shield began to spiral inwards like an Omanyte shell until it was nothing more than a bracelet with a Pokeball design on it; it looked like a watch.
"That's pretty cool," Stephen admitted. He took a second to look at the minimized shield, then continued walking. He hadn't realized that Gale and Marks had stopped just ahead. Stephen brought his voice to a whisper and asked the pegasus guard," What's going on?" She only responded by pointing to a mass of fur, or rather, masses of fur.
"Manticores," Swift Gale finally answered. "And they seem to be asleep. Don't do anything stupid and there won't be any problems." The troop kept moving, although quite slowly so as to avoid excess noise. Stephen regarded the sharp scorpion's tail and the reddish-brown bat wings that each manticore had. He was quite sure that the guards could handle them if need be, but really hoped that the lion hybrids would just lay there asleep until - SNAP!
All movement had ceased, and the quadrupeds of the group looked to the human who had made the sound. Stephen looked down and saw that his sneaker had just broken through quite a large branch. The group looked back at the manticores; one growl in its sleep, but did not make any effort to wake up and confront them. Stephen mouthed a sincere Sorry and decided to pay attention more to his feet as they walked past the predators.
That whole time, Stephen could feel like someone was watching him, as if they were some strong presence looming over him and watching every move. He glanced up and saw only the canopy of the Everfree Forest, and shrugged it off; probably a bird or something. The group trekked on through the forest for another half hour before deciding to rest for the day at a clearing by a lake.
"Ok, Stephen." Swift Gale called back to the tiring human. "We're setting up camp here, you can rest for a bit." Stephen felt relieved as he sat down on the ground and tried to relax after the walk. He though he was safe until Gale spoke up again to say, "Now go help High Marks get some fire wood." The Trainer shot the pegasus guard a glare before grudgingly rising to his feet and joining the aforementioned unicorn by some fallen branches.
"These branches are too long and thick to carry back on our own." The Lieutenant magically lifted a small axe to Stephen, who grasped it with reluctance. "Just cut them down into manageable sizes so we can carry them to the camp site." The two started to cut down the branches, but High Marks left after about ten minutes, leaving Stephen with much more to go.
"Seriously?" Stephen called back irritated. "Am I not getting any help around here?"
"Build up your strength, dude. You don't have magic like a Unicorn, nor can you fly naturally like a Pegasus,and you sure as hell don't have the strength of an Earth Pony," Swift Gale cantered over to say. "If you're gonna just rely on your Poke-whatevers to fight every battle for you here, then your not gonna last that long. What would you do if you're stuck without them? What would you do?"
"I... uh..." Stephen was caught off guard by the question. "Try to negotiate and avoid the fight? And they're called Pokemon." He resumed the assigned work.
"What if your opponent is charging at you in a fit of rage?" The pegasus countered. The Trainer hesitated. "Look, I understand that those battles were how your kind settled things, but here, if you get attacked you have to be able to defend yourself. Have you ever been in a fight without your Pokemon before?"
"Well, there was one time..." Stephen began. "There was a bully and-"
"Say no more!" Swift interrupted him. "Your bully was-" Stephen cut her off then.
"It wasn't my bully." Stephen corrected. "It was Bill's bully." Swift Gale was now confused, but Stephen continued. "Bill is one of my best friends, and we've known each other since we were young. We were always the smarter ones in the class, but Bill was always smarter. He would go on to be the valedictorian of his researcher's university. We were both pretty nerdy though." The Trainer closed his eyes to remember the old days. "We would play cards and pretend we were super Trainers from the morning cartoons. However, Bill would constantly be hounded by this bully named Brucie." Swiift Gale chose this time to speak up.
"What was he like?" she asked. "This 'Brucie' character."
"Well," Stephen answered. "He's not that big, and he realized he wasn't that threatening, so he decided to build up a little gang. But that's much later on. He would scare Bill into forking over lunch money and homework and test answers. I didn't know this at the time, and Bill wouldn't say anything. Until one day I saw Brucie pushing Bill over, and the latter started crying, and I decided to act."
"Doesn't exactly seem like you, to be honest." Swift commented, smirking. "Where were your Pokemon?"
"I was seven," the human replied. "I found Nova the next year, so I relied on other things to settle issues. Anyway, I happened to knock Brucie to the ground and started beating my fists at his covered face. He got a black eye and swollen nose, as well as a burning hatred for me, which is why he began taunting me until I completely destroyed him in every battle he challenged me to. But yeah, that was it."
"So..." Swift Gale leaned in with an irritated tone "The only kind of physical hand-to-hand combat was some playground bully skirmish?"
"Well," Stephen thought about it. "Yeah, pretty much."
Swift Gale's hoof met her face. "So you technically have no fighting experience whatsoever." She concluded.
"Yup." The human looked down at the remaining branches; he had finally finished cutting a good amount of wood for the fire to go through the night. Swift Gale picked up some using her wings, and Stephen picked the rest up in his arms. The two put the wood down in the small stone and wood fireplace Corporal Mirror was making. Stephen turned to go to the lake and wash his face until thwack! A piece of the cut firewood had been launched through the air with precision and hit Stephen's back. He looked back to see Swift Gale juggling another piece of firewood in her hooves, not trying to be innocent at all. High Marks and Facade just watched with amusement.
"The hell, Gale?" Stephen yelled. "Are we seriously gonna do this right now?"
"It's Commander Gale to you!" Her voice was now full of authority. "And if we're gonna get you to toughen up, we should start now! Starting with some strength training!"
"Oh..." Stephen gulped. "Crap."