Pokémon: Out of the Woods | A Galar, Unova & Sinnoh Fanfiction

Chapter 74: Lies

Heather returned to Bede's cottage a few minute before Jamie. She left Hessie at Craving Books. Rex had already paid for a night in a B&B and they didn't want to impose on the Gym Leader, so they agreed to meet again in Circhester. Heather planned to set out that night. Armed with Sonia's app, she had another reason to hurry on.

Pluto was already cooking dinner. It smelled deliciously exotic and spicy. Bede would probably feel the same way about it as Perry felt about his mild Galarian food. Prior to Victor's death, he might have complained, but he didn't. Someone he barely knew was going out of their way to be kind to him and he appreciated it.

The mounds of garlic fried rice and vegetables simmered in lashings of spicy sauce were more than anyone and all their Pokémon could possibly eat. Bede's Pokémon already prepared containers for leftovers, but after a brief break, when Heather and Pluto packed their bags, he returned to the table and finished his food, even though it had gone cold. Bede couldn't help commenting then.

'Are you fed enough at home, Pluto?'

'No... not really...'

'That's unacceptable. You shouldn't stand for it. If you never return, it will be your family's own fault. You musn't allow them to make you feel bad.'

'I won't...'

Until he stayed with Bede, Pluto had no idea what a standard portion was. He sometimes ate more than he was served in the castle when he was out in the wilds, but he felt guilty about it. There, in a normal home, people ate that much every day. The appetite he felt bad about was normal, but he and his Pokémon were especially hungry now they knew they could eat without judgement.

'Well... we gotta go.'

Heather hugged Tansy and Nashira. Pluto shook Bede's hand and thanked him for his hospitality. Jamie could have returned to the lab then, but Bede enjoyed silence as much as he did, so he stayed. Besides, Nashira was his granddaughter. Perry wouldn't call Jamie his father, but he didn't want him to watch Nashira from a painful distance. He didn't mind him calling her what she was: his first grandchild.

Perry never came back that night. He texted Tansy to say he was busy being a genius and translating the Original Book. Tansy didn't need Jamie to tell her that he was actually struggling. She already knew. No-one without experience was such a genius that they could immediately translate an ancient text into their second language.

Before Heather and Pluto left Ballonlea, she cycled after Wyrdeer all the way across the city to the suburb of Short Munchon. He had a football game to play. Other than Pokémon battles, she had never attended a sports game before. The 'field' was nothing like the high school football fields of Orre. It was a dejected stretch of artificial grass, also used by cricket, rounders and rugby teams, with folding chairs for the audience. There was no budget to keep mushrooms out of real grass.

The rounders team was apparently the most important. Their logo was all over the changing rooms. Even though it was a football game, there was more rounders memorabilia for sale than Short Munchon F.C. merchandise. There was still a long queue. Pluto was bemused when Heather joined it. He couldn't imagine that she wanted anything, but as Amber once emptied the stall at the first of Trip's gridiron football games she attended, Heather bought every piece of football merchandise and a rounders bat. Pluto's Braviary took most of it back to Bede's cottage. She couldn't carry it all and didn't need it on her adventure. Jamie, Bede and Tansy were equally baffled by the bags that Braviary delivered, but Bede folded the clothes and stowed it all in a suitcase for Heather anyway.

Even the coach didn't look like Heather expected him to. He was a portly, bearded old man in jeans and a Dirty Dolls t-shirt. She watched him closely, wondering if he was surreptitiously indoctrinating Pluto through football, but he clearly wasn't. His teammates and opponents were equally normal. The small crowd cheered and chanted louder than any crowd in Orre. They were regular people excited to see their kids and friends playing football. There was no sign of Team Plasma anywhere.