The Kalos Journey

Coraline looked at Jeremy with one eyebrow raised. "Cafés huh... Well my personal favorite is down behind the clock tower which has always been here," she mused aloud, pointing to the northwest sector of the town. "It's about 95 paces due thataway. Follow me," she added, dropping her arm and taking a few strides in the direction she had been pointing in. Mercy bounded along behind her; the tiny fox seemed to prefer walking to a piggyback ride.

"Alright sounds good," Jeremy said. He began to follow Coraline towards the café with Aleron still in his arms.

While they were walking Aleron looked around the town and also took some time to observe Mercy. He had grown up with the little fox and knew that she could cause a lot of trouble, so he was being cautious by keeping a weary eye on her.

Jeremy walked a little faster so that he was walking next to Coraline, "So what exactly are you planning on doing while you travel?" he asked her.

Coraline looked pensive for a moment. "Well, I'm not really sure to be quite honest. Challenging the Kalos League seems to be the way to go, although I never really saw myself doing that kind of thing before." she finally responded. "I figured I'd probably figure it out as I go along... Plus, I should really get Mercy's opinion too. We're in the long haul together, might as well figure it out together."

Mercy grinned upon hearing her new name spoken, and genuinely smiled as her new trainer's words. She felt happy to know that the girl was going to great lengths to make sure they had a fair say in the matter.

"Oh! That's the cafe up there." Coraline suddenly exclaimed, pointing about forty paces ahead of them.

((I'm having a shit evening. Best I'm doing at this point.))

"Oh okay," Jeremy said, he was kind of shocked that Coraline didn't know what she wanted to do because he had always known since he was young that he wanted to be a master rollerblader. He then looked ahead at the cafe when Coraline pointed it out. It was a small cafe that had a couple of tables sitting outside. It looked like a good enough place with good food, and it was exactly what Jeremy was looking for when he said he didn't want a 'tourist' attraction.

Aleron looked up at he cafe and smiled, he wanted something to eat and this cafe looked like the perfect place to get food.

The cafe itself was rather empty; it was a weird time of day and not many people were looking to eat any form of meal. The few patrons who had assembled in the small establishment were lightly sipping at assorted drinks. A few of them had finger food, but not much to judge the place from.

"Their best item is without a doubt the Whipped Dream Expresso," Coraline commented. "Everybody knows it; no one does coffee better on this side of Kalos."

Mercy scratched behind her ear with her hind leg; she had never really heard of coffee before so it didn't particularly strike her fancy. Which may have been a good thing.

Jeremy looked around at the small cafe when they were inside. There were a few customers and they all had some kind of drink and snack. It was definitely the perfect place to have his first meal on his pokemon journey. "Sound's good," he said as he took a seat at an open table, "I will have to give that a try then." Once Jeremy was sitting down he placed Aleron on the table so that he wouldn't be bound to Jeremy's grasp while they ate.

Mercy hopped up on the table by her own accord, leaving Coraline to take her own seat. She didn't even need the menu sitting in front of her; she knew the whole thing by heart already. A server came by soon after the group arrived to take their order.

"I'll have the house special with Cinnamon, please," Coraline responded automatically, as if she was programmed to say the words. The "house special" just happened to be the afore-mentioned coffee drink. "And... What do you want, Mercy?"

Mercy was surveying the menu when Coraline asked her what she wanted. After only a moment of consideration, Mercy pointed to an item on the menu with her paw and waved her tail happily.

"And... one of those, please," Coraline said to the waiter. She leaned back into her chair a bit and opened the floor to Jeremy, waiting for him to place his order.

Jeremy had to quickly look at a menu in order to figure out what he was going to order. He wasn't able to look fast enough before the waitress asked him for his order. He then said, "Um... I guess I'll have a Whipped Dream Espresso that I've heard so much about." he said. He then handed the menu to their waitress once she took their orders and went back to the kitchen. Jeremy then leaned in close to Aleron and said, "Don't worry, I'll split it with you." he said. Aleron smiled at the thought of having something to drink. He wasn't necessarily thirst, but he really wanted to try a human drink.

"So, you never told me anything about your dream." Coraline pointed out as the server went away. She reached over and scratch Mercy's ears cautiously, just to see how she's react. Mercy couldn't remember the last time she had gotten scratched behind the ears; she hopped into Coraline's lapped and begged her to keep scratching. Coraline giggled at the Fennekin's pleading face and took the hint. "Why do you want to go on an adventure with pokemon? Taking on the league, or something else?"

Jeremy made a little scoff when Coraline asked if he was going to go after the league, "Please," he said, "People who defeat the pokemon league are too main stream ((hipster to THE EXTREME!!)). Plus they are only in the news for about a month, and then their forgotten. I plan on doing something way more news worthy." Jeremy then leaned back and put his feet on the table, "I, am going to be the worlds greatest rollerblader. That way eveyone will always know my name." he said.

Coraline failed to stifle back a little "pfft" of her own. She had a silly little grin on her face before opening her mouth to speak.

"Rollerblading king of the world, huh? That's a title with prestige that'll totally outlast those silly champions and their month-long reigns of terror. Yep, rollerblading." Coraline proceeded to chortle and rub her forehead with her hands. "Don't get me wrong, your dream is awesome and adorable, but I don't know if I'm buying that EVERYBODY is going to ALWAYS remember the greatest rollerblader ever off the top of their heads. Or helmets, if you prefer."

"Well let me ask you this," Jeremy said, he getting slightly annoyed but he was trying to keep a grin on his face. "How often have you heard about somebody who was world renowned for their skills in Rollerblading?" Jeremy thanks the waitress as she brought then their orders. "Nobody has been renowned for something like that. So that when I'm first, I'll always be remembered for it."

"Well if you're going to fight from that angle, what about Korrina?" Coraline interjected promptly, nodding a sign of thanks towards the waitress. She grabbed the small teaspoon on the side of her dairy little saucer and stirred the drink a bit before bringing it to her lips. "She's huge as both a Gym Leader AND a rollerblader."

Mercy sniffed at the sweet-smelling cup that was placed in front of her; taking a few experimental laps at the strange beverage.

Jeremy was obviously very annoyed at the mention of Korrina's name. But he just scoffed and looked out the window of the cafe, "Please, Korrina's nothing. Rollerblading for her is just a hobby. She's not truly committed like I am." he said.

Since Jeremey wasn't holding his drink, Aleron took a sniff and took a small sniff of the cup. He looked discussed with the drink and placed it down and wiped his fur to try and remove it's taste from his lips.

Ooc: You got to Holy Cross High school right?

Mercy ingested her drink with immeasurable enthusiasm, temporarily unaware of the others at the table. She only occasionally stopped to clean the fur on her face with her tounge, then went straight back to consuming the delicious treat.

Coraline sipped at her coffee with a slight grin; she could see Jeremey getting flustered in his argument. More than anything though, she was enjoying the feeling of having genuine fun for the first time in a long while; the feeling that had long eluded her grasp. She set her coffee down and, catching herself slouching a bit, sat up a little straighter in her chair.

"Alright, alright; I guess I'll just have to wait and see you prove it to me then," Coraline conceded in a cease-fire manner. She was having fun, but she didn't want to keep pushing and pushing. "What got you so into rollerblading anyways?"

"When I was a kid I was given a pair of them as a birthday gift from my cousin," Jeremy said, "She taught me how to skate and I have just always loved it." he said. ((Jeremy has an odd relationship with Korrina. If you mention her name, he gets pissed, if he calls her his cousin he has no problems)) "And as I got older I learned more tricks, got new and better skates, and so on." Jeremy then looked at his watch to make sure that they still had time to meet Shauna and Caleb at the correct time.

"Interesting..." Coraline mused, noting Jeremy's strange behaviors. She also checked the time, and decided that they were doing fine. She would never get a chance to finish her statement however, as something strange began to happen.

Mercy's eyelids and tail twitched. It seemed that the drink she had ordered was... caffinated. "Kin- kin, kiiiiiin!!" She began to bark, sounding different from how she had before.

(Well, crap. Never noticed this never posted.)

As Mercy began to have a different bark, Aleron began to worry and started to tug on Jeremy's shirt and point nervously at Mercy, "Ches... Ches," he said. He was beginning to show large amounts of worry on his face as he looked at Mercy.

"Um... is Mercy okay?" Jeremy asked, all of the tugging that Aleron was doing on his shirt was causing Jeremy to worry about Mercy as well.

Mercy hopped off the table and started running laps around the table like crazy, barking unintelligible nonsense. Coraline blinked. She wasn't sure what just happened.

"Umm... So I guess this her other personality?" Coraline guessed. She remained rather cool-headed through the ordeal. She stood up and got in Mercy's way, causing the Fennekin to crash into her legs and stop. Mercy looked at Coraline. Coraline looked at Mercy. Mercy randomly jumped up and latched on to Coraline's hand with her jaws. "OUCH! That hurts!" Coraline yelped in pain. She tossed some money on the table and struggled for the exit, all the while fighting to detach Mercy from her hand.

"Uh... I guess so," Jeremy said in confusion. He didn't really understand what was going on with Mercy. He understood that Calem and Shauna said that she had a personality disorder, but he had no idea that this was what they meant. As Coraline quickly tried to get out of the cafe, Aleron quickly chased after and jumped up trying to grab on onto Mercy. Observably he was trying to help get the small fox pokemon off of Coraline. However he wasn't able to jump high enough to grab a hold of Mercy. As Jeremy chased after Coraline who was frantically trying to remove Mercy from her hand, he grabbed hold of Coraline's arm with one hand and grabbed Mercy with his other hand. "Okay hold still you too, this probably needs a delicate touch." He then calmly began trying to remove Mercy from Coraline's hand.

Mercy finally let to of Coraline's hand... Only to latch right on to Jeremy's. She bit the stranger a lot harder; obviously less playful and more aggressive towards the less familiar trainer. Coraline grabbed Mercy firmly yet gently around her body so that she didn't fall to the ground and do more damage to Jeremy's hand.

"Mercy, stop! You're going to hurt him!" Coraline exclaimed as she tried to coax Mercy into releasing her grip.

When Mercy suddenly switched from biting Coraline's hand and latched onto Jeremy's, Jeremy went into a miniature rampage. "ARCEUS ******," he shouted at the top of his lungs. "You dang fox get off of me!" he then started to wave his arm around in a frantic attempt to get Mercy to let go of his hand. All the while Aleron was watching with worry on his face while his master was being bitten by Mercy. Aleron would have tried to grab Mercy, but Jeremy was shaking his arm too frantically for Aleron to even attempt grabbing the fox.

"No, wait-!" Coraline cried as Jeremy flew into his rampage, but it was too late. Mercy's retractable claws were at full extention, Coraline was too close from holding her, and the rigorous shaking from Jeremy wasn't making things any better. Coraline's jaw was suddenly caught by the claws of Mercy's back paw, and as the tiny fox was shaken upwards the claws dragged all the way up Coraline's face and over her cheek, leaving a three cuts that ended just below Coraline's left eye. Coraline wasn't sure what happened; her adrenaline was numbing out the pain of the wound as it began to leak blood. "...okay Jeremy, will you COOL IT WITH MY MENTALLY UNSTABLE POKEMON?!" Coraline shouted firmly, still only vaguely aware of a tiny stinging sensation on her face.

Even while flailing his arms around with Mercy still holding tight to his hand, Jeremy heard Coraline's shout and tried his best to calm down. He stopped flailing his arms around and held out his hand that Mercy had grabbed a hold of and tried to stand still. "Okay okay!" he shouted loudly still, "Just get her off of me!" he said. Aleron was watching worriedly while all of the chaos unfolded. He had gotten used to this kind of thing happening back in the lab before him and Mercy had been taken out into the outside world.

Coraline walked over to Jeremy and grabbed Mercy, trying to coax her off his hand. "Drop it," Coraline said with a stern look. Mercy glanced back at her defiantly and at first refused to let go, but upon seeing the blood and the cuts on Coraline's face something began to change inside Mercy and she finally released her grip. Mercy blinked and looked around confusedly, which Coraline took to mean she had gone back to her calmer, kinder personality.

"Okay," Coraline sighed, "we might need to come up with another name for your other personality. Because that was the opposite of merciful." The Fennekin looked up at her sheepishly; then suddenly her eyes grew wide. Coraline smiled at her reassuringly, but noticed by her pokemon's face that something was amiss. "Hey... Why does my face sting so much......." Coraline asked, suddenly realizing her face was burning up with sting. She shifted Mercy over to one arm and touched her cheek with her hand, brought her hand down into her field of vision, saw the blood, and promptly fainted.