Cruise Adventures

    Tohopka stood on the top deck of the cruise liner she had managed to book a vacation on, her paws over the railing in such a way that she would be in no danger falling over the side of the boat. She had decided to take a cruise that lasted about a week, wanting to take a small break from her rescue work. She had saved up enough money for this cruise by doing loads of A rank and S rank missions that paid well and when she had saved enough, she had booked her room. It was only the second day of the cruise and she felt like she was living the life. She adored getting the chance to do something like this. Being able to look out at the ocean, getting to travel to entirely new areas… It was something that Toho had always liked doing, there was no denying that. 

    After a couple more minutes of staring out at the ocean, Toho moved her dark paws down onto the deck. Padding over to the elevator, she pressed the down button and when the elevator had arrived at its destination, Tohopka entered when the silver doors opened and she pressed the button for the lobby. The doors shutting, with the dark Vulpix inside turning around to face the doors. WIth a slight jerk, she felt herself going downwards, downwards until the doors opened again. With the lobby revealed, Tohopka stepped out of the elevator and into the lobby. She was supposed to meet one of her friends here, a Houndoom by the name of Rondo. Though, by the looks of it, it seemed as if Toho’s companion wasn’t here at the lobby just yet.. She didn’t mind waiting though.

    Tohopka noticed an empty bench. No one else sat there so why not wait there for Rondo? It only made sense to her. She padded over to where the bench was, sitting down on one of the comfortable cushions. She decided to rest her eyes for a few seconds while she waited for her friend. Resting herself up for a few wouldn’t hurt much, would it? What felt like just a few seconds was actually the time for Rondo to get there. Feeling someone shaking her by the shoulder, the dark fox like Pokemon opened her eyes and looked towards the person shaking her. It was Rondo and she realized that she must’ve dozed off a little while she waited. A small little mistake on her part but nothing too major. At least she got to rest a slight bit before she met up with her friend.

    “Hey, Ron,” Toho said with a smile of greeting towards her friend. She sounded a slight bit drowsy from her little nap. Her friend smiled back at her before he responded with his own greeting.

    “Hello, Toho,” He chuckled, finding it a little bit amusing that his friend fell asleep while waiting for him. But then he continued. “Sorry if I’m a bit late, I had to do a little bit of reorganizing in my room. Nothing too major but it had to be done. It was kinda messy thanks to yesterday’s activities… you know, safety protocol and everything? Yeah, it got kinda hectic when that happened.”

    Both of the canines laughed when he said that. Safety protocol reviews in cruise ships were surprising when it came to people doing their normal activities around the ship but it was necessary to do at the start of every venture. The liner companies didn’t want their reputations to be stained by deaths  and injuries due to an accident. And to both of the Pokemon talking about it, it was understandable. Having a bad reputation wasn’t the best when it came to any point of view. Business, rescue, and just in general, no one wanted to have a bad reputation.

    “Well, anyway, how about we go and find where we have our dinners scheduled tonight? Like, find the location of the restaurants and everything? It’s good to know where everything is before we go, you know?” Tohopka suggested. She had already known the location of the first diner she had gone to the previous night, called The Lotus Bloom. SInce the two had different dinner schedules, Rondo would be going to The Lotus Bloom while Tohopka went to Fantasia, the second of the four dinner restaurants on the ship The other two were The Greek Leaf and Ruby Pond. Fantasia was more of an Italian style restaurant, The Lotus Bloom and Ruby Pond being steakhouses, and The Greek Leaf being, well, Greek. There was a buffet that served breakfast and lunch called the Top-Deck Canteen and as its name implied, it was on the top deck, on the opposite side of where the elevator area that Tohopka had gone to for getting to the lobby. There was also continental breakfast and normal lunch/dinner menus for room service. It was pretty nice in Tohopka’s opinion.

    “Yeah, let’s go do that. How about we find The Lotus Bloom first?” Rondo asked, giving Toho a smirk. He didn’t mind if the Vulpix objected to his suggestion but he would just have to listen to what she had to say. 

    “Yeah, let’s go do that. I know where it is because I went there last night,” Tohopka said with her own sly grin. She got up, walking in the direction of The Lotus Bloom, twitching her tails as if she was beckoning for Rondo to follow her to the restaurant. He did and the two made their way to the steakhouse. Once they got there, the Houndoom took a look inside, finding the restaurant to be based on a pond with lily pads and it had floral decorations in the shape of lotus flowers. It was a nice sight, pleasing to the eye. After talking a little bit about the restaurant, the duo decided to go and try and find Fantasia, since neither of them went there the previous night. Going back to the main lobby, Tohopka paused for a second to suggest something.

    “How about we get ourselves a map?” She suggested, nodding over to a booth that had a container with maps of the lobby, where all of the restaurants were. “We could use it to find the other restaurants. How about it?”

    “Sure. It definitely would be a big help for both of us to have one of those things,” Rondo said with a small laugh and they both started to head over to the booth, grabbing one map each. Tohopka opened hers and located Fantasia and started to lead Rondo to where it was. Once they got there, they peered inside like they did with The Lotus Bloom and found Fantasia was based on space and magic. An oddly nice combination. After a little more conversation and saying their goodbyes, the two parted ways for the time being, leaving Tohopka to do her own thing. She sighed.

    “Well.. I guess I should head back to my room for a bit,” Tohopka sighed, starting to walk back to her room. She suspected that she should get a little bit of shut-eye before the afternoon ended. There were plenty of activities coming up in the next couple of days on the ship. It was only the second day of the journey so why not? Once Tohopka got to her room, which was on the floor directly below the lobby, took out her room key and opened up the door, closing it behind her once she was inside. Laying down on her bed, she didn’t seem to care that she didn’t take off her Power Band, she closed her eyes and drifted off into a slumber for the rest of the afternoon until dinnertime...