The Journey Continues

Finding Ketchum

A/N My friend sung this song so you have a legal obligation to listen to it in the background, dear readers.

After the break-time festivities came to a close, Gary made his way back to the classroom, where he would be having his next lesson, that being Biology. He figured that after Nemona flexed her popularity and that performer had showcased her talent that his little rally wouldn't hold much water in the election, but it didn't matter too much. After all, he was here to study, the playground games were just a little fun on the side.

On the way, he bumped into Ash in a T-junction of 2 hallways. He had come from down the other one leading away from the classroom. "Well well well Ashy-boy, what could have been so important that you weren't there to cheer me on in the rally?" Gary asked with a smirk.

Ash was left a bit startled at the encounter. He checked the time, it was already 12 minutes after class was supposed to have started. "You're a bit late, Gare-bear," he pointed out. "I was in the canteen."

"Gary Oak is never early, nor is he ever late. He arrives precisely when he means to," Gary retorted. "And of course Ash Ketchum would be late for class if it meant getting to enjoy some good food. That can't be the whole reason why you abandoned your best friend, though. Come, walk with me."

They started walking towards their lesson, both of course being in the STEM course. "It was actually meant to be a quick visit, believe it or not, but then I ran into a guy I had met a couple days ago. His name is Arven," Ash began explaining.

"What a name," Gary remarked.

"Yeah, so anyway, when we had met before we encountered this Pokémon that fell out of the sky. Apparently, it was his! Or his mother's, at least. I don't know exactly, there seems to be some complicated dynamic going on there."

"Must be quite the special bird."

"Looks more like a dragon than a bird," Ash revealed. "In any case, they ended up agreeing that it would be under better care if I took it with me. The mother's a professor doing research somewhere so she can't take it, and Arven doesn't seem to really want it."

"Wait, so you have the bird dragon?!" Gary exclaimed.

Ash nodded. "After these 2 hours we've got a lunch break, I'll show you it then," he promised as they came through the door to Mr. Jacq's Biology lesson. "Good morning, sir! Sorry we're late!" He greeted the professor.

Jacq looked at them and gave them a smile, "Welcome, you two. Luckily it's the first lesson, so you haven't missed much. Take a seat." They took a seat next to each other, towards the back.

"How did the rally go, anyway?" Ash whispered to his friend sitting beside him.

Gary shrugged, "I had fun with it. Don't think I'll win though," he chuckled. "Humanities put on a Pokémon performance, and Nemona started speaking Paldean. Not sure my impeccable charm alone can quite compete with that."

"A performance, huh? I wish I was there to see it now."

"Did you not wish you were there to see yours truly?" Gary fake-pouted.

"I can imagine exactly what you said."

"Sure you can," Gary scoffed.

This was about the time when Mr. Jacq wrapped up his introduction, and started on the subject matter of the lesson. "Now, one of the most fundamental aspects of a Pokémon's biology is their relationship to their typing. For most specimens, this is self-evident. For others, some more thought is required into why they possess a certain element. Take Sudowoodo, for example: to anyone not in the know, this Pokémon may be mistaken for a grass-type. This, however, isn't true - Sudowoodo's adapted its appearance to appear like a tree in order to fool potential predators, who, mistaking it for a grass-type, use fire, bug, flying or ice-type moves that end up not being effective, since in reality Sudowoodo is a rock-type. This type of evolutionary behaviour is called mimicry, and is used by thousands of creatures to blend in with their surroundings and confuse opponents..."