The 'Chu Brothers: A New World

Chapter 12: Human Gestures, Meet Abby

12/30/19

1:00 pm

Fruit Forest

"I feel like Chatot hates me."

The two jobs he gave our group this morning was Sentry Duty—since Diglett and Loudred are on break right now—and the monthly gathering of berries in Fruit Forest—a nearby, one-floor mystery dungeon. Before I had the chance of going with Cord to Sentry Duty, he already assigned Cord and Chris to do that, leaving me and Abby to do the berry job.

So far, we've worked about three hours since we left the guild.

"Lucas, I'm not sure forcing you to do another job does not mean Chatot hates you." Abby looked at me before shaking a tree.

Some berries fell, ranging from a Cheri Berry to Sitrus Berries. It was my job to catch them before they landed on the ground and place them in the large bag we took with us. It was a great way to test my reaction timing, but I was too stubborn to admit that.

I moved to the right to catch two Oran Berries, then moved to the right. "I know that, but I would probably know more Sentry Duty than your brother would know." I caught a Sitrus Berry, placed the three berries in the bag, and turned to Abby. "No offense."

"None taken. Watch out!"

I looked up to see one Pecha Berry splat onto my face. Abby looked at me after she heard the noise and started snickering at me.

"Not funny."

"You got to admit, it looks funny when you look at yourself." At a nearby pond, I took a glance at my face. Pink goo was all around my face, with some seeds nearing my nose.

I admit, I got a kick out of myself.

"This looks stupid." I wiped off the splatted Pecha Berry and placed it on the ground next to the lake. I looked at Abby. "Can we take a break? I'm exhausted."

"Fine." Abby went to me and got two Big Apples she packed in the bag earlier. She gave one of the Big Apples to me and started eating the other one.

I understand why they called it a Big Apple. This thing was probably twice—if not three times—as big as a regular apple. Taking a bite, I started to eat my way around the entire apple until the only the stem and seeds remained of the Big Apple.

Meanwhile, Abby only has eaten about half the apple looking depressed about something. "Something up?" I asked still swallowing the last pieces of the Big Apple.

Abby looked at me with a frown. "I have two things to talk to you about."

I got confused with her saying that. "What things?"

"Well, the first one is about the thing that Cord called 'Turbo Boost.'"

'Oh, boy.' I'm still feeling shaken up from that Bisharp fight yesterday. Maybe it could be the aftereffects of Turbo Boost, but I'm not sure if I'm going to get the answer why.

"What about Turbo Boost?"

Abby explained the effects I had just before I tried to attack Bisharp—the spike in energy, electric sparks, and the change in eye color. I didn't even realize any of this was happening because I was focusing too hard on trying to defeat Bisharp. "And I'm wondering," Abby finished, "do you think we can try to activate that again?"

I scoffed. "That's going to be damn near impossible."

"How so?"

"I've only done Turbo Boost once. And I don't even know how I activated it in the first place."