Recruiting Octillery
"I swear, these waves are extra rough today," Darcey complained, stomping indignantly to shore with her board in hand, having just been thrown off on her umpteenth attempt to catch a wave.
"You're losing your focus," Aiyami called cooley, adjusting herself on the lounge chair where she lay safely out of splash range.
"No, it's more than that, something's... really off," Darcey insisted, looking back out to the waves. "It's different than when I practiced yesterday. It's like... every time I start to get my bearings, something knocks the board around from under me."
"Yeah, the water." Aiyami returned to her sunbathing. Darcey sighed.
"I guess." Aiyami must have been right. It wasn't like she'd seen anything in the water shaking her board from underneath her. She was about to go again when she noticed the waterline was beginning to slurp back.
"That's a big wave incoming," she noted aloud, watching from a distance. "Hey, Aiyami?"
"It's just water," the older woman called back without looking.
"Yeah but, it's BIG," Darcey emphasized again, still watching the wall build.
"It's okay, you got this." Aiyami still wasn't looking.
"Um, Aiyami? You might want to... Move!" Darcey, realizing she was too close to escape it now, preemptively dove into the wave before it crashed into her. Oblivious Aiyami, on the other hand, who had previously been more than a safe distance up shore, was shocked with a cold spray of saltwater.
"Yak!" She sputtered, leaping to her feet and looking down over her soaked clothes. Meanwhile, Darcey surfaced a distance away, the recoil of the wave having dragged her out a bit.
"You okay?" She called, paddling back. All six of their Pokemon who had previously been playing even further up shore came galloping back to check on their partners.
"Yeah, everyone's good," Aiyami called back. "Where'd that come from?!"
"I don't know!" Darcey started kicking harder to propel her to shore more quickly. Oddly though, feel that she was making any better progress than before. In fact, she felt like she was being dragged backwards. Aiyami noticed too.
"Darcey? Y'okay?"
"Brggh!" Darcey's mouth filled with water as she tried to answer, as something coiled around her ankle and dragged her down.
"DARCEY!" Aiyami tore off her blouse in one clean motion, bolting for the water. In a panic, the Pokemon followed suit, Darcey's own water pokemon ironically lagging as the slowest of the bunch. Before anyone could dive in, Darcey resurfaced, dangling from her ankle by the tentacle of a not-so-happy Octillery.
Darcey was the most mortified, not by her near-drowning experience, but wondering how big this octillery must be to be able to hoist her up... only to come face to face with a standard looking, two foot octopus. "Huh," she muttered aloud before being flung further than she'd have thought possible of the creature. Aiyami rushed to break her fall.
"You okay?" Aiyami hoisted her to her feet.
"Yeah, I'm fine." Darcey brushed herself off, and stepped into her trainer's position behind Bully and the rest of her team, who'd just caught up.
"Bon! I choose you!"
"Smeargle!" the shiny pokemon cried, leaping to the front of the pack.
"Stay behind me," Aiyami instinctively directed Darcey, forgetting she was already there.
The octillery hovered on a self-maintaining fountain of water, and angrily shrieked, sending out an explosive attack with its cry. Darcey braced herself, Bully using Wide Guard to shield them.
"Bon, sketch!" Aiyami commanded, as the smeargle mimicked its attack and cancelled out incoming waves. Aiyami noticably stiffened for a momement, but snapped out of it and continued.
"Bully, keep covering us, okay?" Darcey knew they didn't have much time before Wide Guard's accuracy fell and started berating them, so quickly she gathered Tympole and Wiltbur behind her. "Wiltbur, I need you to sneak around, okay? You can walk on the sea floor, get under it! Rymm, you're with me, start bubble-beaming to keep its attention!"
"Tym!" Rymm confidently nodded.
"Cor?!" Wiltbur wilted.
"Please, buddy, we're counting on you!" Darcey didn't give him time to think it over before scooting him on his way behind some rocks. He could stay out of sight around them until he returned to the water. She did her best to keep her attention on the battle at hand, occasionally stealing glances to catch the tips of Wiltbur's coral horns poking above the rocks. It only took him about five minutes to circle the long way around to Octillery, but it was the longest five minutes of Darcey's life. The moment she caught sight of his ghostly glowing form beneath Octillery's fountain, she yelled, "WILTBUR! Use Flail!" Instantly, the corsola's horns grew, shapelessly flapping and flailing in the hopes of hitting something. Probably with his eyes shut too, though it was hard to tell from under the water. Octillery was greeted by six ghostly tendrils slapping it from all sides like its own tentacles, effectively distracting it. One combined blow from all the pokemon, even one of Wiltbur's coincidentally synced flails, knocked the octillery off back into the water. Aiyami rushed to a better vantage point on the rocks Wiltbur just slipped behind, to see the Octillery hastily retreating down shore.
"HEY! Get back here! We weren't done!"
"Let it go, Aiyami, it's not our problem anymore," Darcey sighed, retrieving Wiltbur from the water.
"No, just some poor sucker on a farther beach," Aiyami grunted.
"I think we chased it off. It'll probably be fine." Darcey picked up her board. "Come on, wanna walk home? I think I'm done practicing today."
"Yeah, okay," Aiyami agreed, kicking the sand as she sulked after their lost opponent.
"You hit it pretty hard," Darcey sympathetically assured, "I doubt we'll be seeing any more of that Octillery."
"It's the same Octillery, it's got to be," Aiyami shoved a newspaper in Darcey's face as they met up in the square. Darcey winced, as she'd read the story at home too. Reports had been coming in about a wild Octillery travelling east down the shoreline, wreaking havoc on public beaches. It was coming from the same direction Darcey and Aiyami had encountered their Octillery a few days before. It couldn't have been just a coincidence.
"Yeah, I guess you were right," she sheepishly scratched her neck with the one hand she had free- Wiltbur was snuggled comfortably in the other.
"I knew we should've finished the battle there and then! Ugh, I should've gone after it," Aiyami growled, throwing her hands up.
"We didn't know it would cause such a havoc! Who knew one octillery could be so destructive?"
"I did," Aiyami sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose. She seemed more frustrated at herself. "When I had Bon sketch it's attacks, I realized it was using psychic type moves."
"Psychic?" Darcey repeated in amazement. "Well, Octilleries do know a few psychic moves..."
"No, not just psybeam or psychic. It was using a LOT of psychic moves. Like it was an actual psychic type or something. I bet that's how it kept that fountain of water to hoist itself up, too."
"That's why you froze for a second when you were fighting it," Darcey realized.
"Did not," Aiyami jeered, playfully elbowing her. "Anyway," she shook off their conversation, "to the Adoption Center, huh?" The pair had been walking for a while through the populated townsquare, and were approaching the local pokemon rescue shelter.
"Yeah! Michal thought we could use some extra help getting the ranch back in order, and said he trusted me to pick out new partner!"
"Nice," Aiyami smiled, fondly fiddling with her own partners pokeballs. Perhaps she'd find her own new addition to their team.
Finally approaching the building, Darcey quickly dipped into the lobby, Aiyami close behind. The caretaker, a kindly but talkative older gentleman, barely gave them a chance to come in before eyeing Aiyami's paper and exclaiming, "You hear they caught that obnoxious pest?"
"Octillery?" Both Aiyami and Darcey cried in sync.
"Sure did! Couple o' officers brought it in this mornin'," he tipped his hat, and pointed almost proudly back at a psychic-proof cage containing a grumpy, dejected Octillery. Sure enough, it was the same one they'd encountered days before. Darcey audibly squealed, and excitedly danced in place, clutching Wiltbur close to her chest. Her eyes shone and a smile peeled widely across her face.
"Don't even think about it," Aiyami warned roughly.
"I'll take it!" Darcey excitedly burst.
"The mischief maker?" the gentleman exclaimed.
"No. No way. You aren't serious," Aiyami denied.
"CORS!" Wiltbur exclaimed, squirming anxiously before retreating to its pokeball. Darcey just returned his ball to its spot on her belt.
"Yes, please! I'll fill out the forms and any security release you need!" She had already danced up to the counter. The old man raised his eyebrows, shrugged haplessly and reached under his desk for the paperwork.
"Why that one? You haven't even seen what other pokemon they have. Shouldn't you pick a big, strong pokemon to carry supplies?" Aiyami desperately begged.
"Just look at its face, Aiyami! It's so sad! I can't just leave it here! Besides, it's plenty strong! You saw how hard it flung me at the beach," she giggled.
"You know the bugger?" The man inquired, sliding over forms.
"We're old acquaintances!" Darcey smiled. "And it'll be great, our pokemon already know each other."
"That's because we fought it after it attacked you," Aiyami grit her teeth.
"Water under the bridge," Darcey shrugged, carelessly prancing back to the Octillery's enclosure. It seemed as surprised to see her again as the rest of them. "Hey, friend, remember me? We met at the beach a few days ago. I think we got off on the wrong tentacle. I feel really bad about what happened after you left, we must've scared you off towards the people-beaches. But it's okay, you can come back to the ranch with us!" Darcey opened the cage and offered an empty pokeball with an outstretched arm and warm smile. Aiyami visibly facepalmed. The caretaker just watched in shocked wonder, jaw actually dropping when the Octillery cautiously welcomed itself into the pokeball.
"Well, I'll be..." he muttered. Darcey just turned proudly to her friend, releasing the Octillery into her arms.
"See? We're great buddies now!" Aiyami and the Octillery locked eyes, glaring at each other.
"Yeah... great buddies..."