Faller, Noun: Someone Experiencing Interesting Times: - Chapter 17/Interlude 1

“Rock Tomb!” Her Trainer called, the wry note of his voice making it crystal clear that he knew how much of a formality it was. After all, her only other ranged move was Fairy Wind, and well.

Skarmory.

Nothing to do but grit her teeth and power through it. This battle had been chosen specifically because of their mutual lack of any real options to manage a one-hit KO on the opposing party for the purposes of practice. Her battle with Eevee more than showed her that no matter her relative level of power, experience was king. The fox-cat had shown her what she should aspire to, the heights she should attempt to reach, and by her creator would she reach that point on the mountain that was her self-assigned rival’s personal power and keep climbing.

Rock Type energy flowed through her as she shaped a sextet of boulders, the constructs briefly hovering at her side before they were sent flying with a flex of the selfsame energy that had made them.

“Steel Wing, knock them away!” 

Her steel-feathered opponent responded to the command from his trainer with seemingly no pause. In near synchronization with her trainer’s order - “Fastball!” - Esmeraldina slammed her right foot into the ground in the same moment she infused said ground with Type Energy. With a spin of her head, her false jaw slammed into the relatively small fragment of a Rock Tomb.

Given that her opponent was currently busy frantically deflecting the original salvo of rocks with wings of shining Steel, it was perhaps no surprise that the “fastball” slipped right through Skarmoy’s guard and sent the bird tumbling towards the ground.

“Growl and get ready for a nasty melee.” Neil ordered, his voice not raising any louder than it needed to be for her to hear, but the words themselves coming out in a rapidfire barrage. 

Chirping her approval more than issuing any distinct words, Esmeraldina took a deep breath and Growled. A distorted cry echoed across the battlefield, Skarmory visibly shuddering even as he managed to stabilize his altitude.

“Steel Wing on Mawile!” Once more, Skarmory’s trainer attempted to retake the initiative. With a shrill screech of agreement, the metallic bird dove towards Esmeraldina. A satisfied smirk briefly pulled across her face as she met Neil’s eyes, his own lips pulled into a rictus grin like she had learned they did whenever he got an adrenaline high, “Bite, catch it.”

Too late did her opponent realize that this was exactly what she and Neil wanted, a frantic command from Skarmory’s trainer coming far too late to have any effect. In fact, his call of “It’s a trap!” only served to confuse her metallic foe, wings of Steel that could have caused no small amount of damage to her deftly avoided thanks to the bird’s momentary distraction.

Her false-jaw clamped shut around Skarmory, the bird squawking in panic as Dark ravaged his body. Before long, it was over. Her foe had no true way to escape while she was very, very firmly not letting him go. He didn’t have the leverage to utilize any of the tricks he could have potentially used, after all.

At which point, well, “Fire Fang.”

Before she could execute the command, another voice interjected. “I forfeit!”

Canceling the buildup for Fire she’d been preparing, Esmeraldina chirped, opened her false jaw, and let the bird free. Bowing respectfully towards her opponent for the day - one the bird returned - she gleefully ran towards her trainer and demanded her pats.

She’d worked hard, damnit. She deserved this.

Thankfully, her Trainer understood the debt he owed her and pampered as was right and proper. He even brought out the metal-bristle brush to give her false-jaw’s scales a nice working over, removing all the dust and dirt from slinging around those Rock Tombs. 

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It was surprising how much you could learn from the humblest of odd jobs. Sure, on the face of it, lugging around crates to and from a small time merchant’s ship - more of a boat the guy used to tour the archipelago and ferry some goods around - was just busywork only good to build muscle. That was before you realized how much bodily control and technique you needed to figure out a crate’s weight distribution, adjust yourself to it, and make a decent time getting it to the right place without anything falling. A fair bit of forethought went into it too since you didn’t want to stack the crates into an unstable mess liable to tip over into a very expensive crash, either.

There was the extra bonus that Mawile and him were picking up some idle tips from other dockhands, language barrier permitting. It was a pretty even mix of muscular pokemon with thumbs and humans, so they both were getting something out of it without any need of pantomime.

On top of all of that, the pay was somewhat decent for what was essentially going to amount to an hour or two of work. He was even getting to practice communicating with Mawile out of a battle situation here. Interpreting his Starter Pokemon’s chirps, body language, and other vocalizations wasn’t easy without a supercharged bond doing all of the legwork, but by God - Arceus, same thing - Neil was going to get there eventually.

Especially given the examples he’d been given.

With all that was going through his mind, perhaps he shouldn’t have been all that surprised that this particular odd job hadn’t taken all that long. Before long, he’d confirmed that the money the man had promised was in his new bank account, and he was on his way to the next - He’d set aside a chunk of today to just do some random odd jobs that would help him and Mawile acclimate to each other in a more professional setting. Given he was also going on his Journey soonish, it served the dual purpose of letting him save up for some of the nicer amenities and the nest egg that Raiko had recommended he keep tucked away as a safety net given Pokemon Battle wagers.

Sure, you could skip on those in friendly matches and were banned on explicit spars for obvious reasons, but otherwise? Best to have a rainy day fund in case of a losing streak. Especially if you were going on a Journey and may be away from a League-sponsored place where the government would foot the bill for basic meals and medical needs.

His new friend was also just insanely paranoid about money, if he had to wager a guess. At least, by this world’s standards as far as he could surmise, she was simply sensible by his homeworld’s. But, hey, he had promised not to pry unless invited to and he would stick to that.

“Alright, that’s that. Now onto the job you’ve actually been looking forward to.” Neil snorted as he patted Esmeraldina’s head.

Off to work helping backstage in the Contest Hall they were. Those guys always needed more hands to make sure all the props and costumes were properly organized and ready to go.