"Hey Red!" Yelled a particularly chippy voice. One I certainly recognized.
I nodded my head towards him. "Barry. I see you're still waiting. That three minute window was pretty tough."
His face lit up. "You're telling me! It takes way more than three minutes to get up in the morning. It's especially hard when I have to worry about a wild Ursaring tearing down my tent in the middle of the night. Plus I've never been good at sleeping anywhere but my own bed."
I guess I could relate to some of that. "Well you shouldn't worry about any wild Pokémon sneaking into camp in the middle of the night. The rangers have constant vigilance on the area with psychic types, and they have a patrol out there to take care of anything that gets too close. Ranger Layton is one of the ones they put out on patrol, if that eases your mind."
Barry's mouth hung open. "Oh my god that's so cool! His Sceptile is awesome. And his Weavile has such sharp claws! I can barely even see it when they move. They're so fast! And have you seen how quick Ranger Layton is?! When he was showing us how to spot a Pineco, one of them exploded out, shooting all of its stingers all over, but he caught at least a dozen out of the air in an instant! It was the coolest thing I've ever seen!" His face shone with enthusiasm.
So his speedy specialization actually showed in his aura. I guess if he couldn't process at insane speeds, he wouldn't have been able to train his Pokémon very well. At a certain point they would have begun to outspeed his perception speed, and he wouldn't be able to actually help train them anymore. At least not very well.
I turned as I heard somebody walking up. "Alright, one hour is up! So you all are finally allowed to start. Well, besides Red and Hugh. You two are just going to your next station."
Norton and his Alakazam's eyes glowed pink, preparing to teleport all of us.
Would we all be going to the same place?
I immediately flinched as the temperature rose a couple degrees.
I looked around to see a Magmortar standing behind me. The large fire type had flames billowing along its shoulders. Its arms were lowered, but I could tell that it could incinerate the entire area by merely raising one of its arms and shooting a blast from its cannons.
"Holy shit!"
I turned to who yelled, and saw Barry backpedaling away from the Magmortar, only to panic and drop on his ass as he encountered another fire type in the other direction.
The Rapidash stood tall, easily over 5 feet at the shoulder. Its head turned down towards us. The flames on its back shone and danced in the wind. Its horn glistened, the white ceramic material looked sharp enough to easily puncture anything with just a flick of its head. It raised its forelegs and neighed, kicking its feet around while they were in the air. The ground shook a bit as it dropped back down.
There was another rookie next to me. He had a black t-shirt and sweatpants. He had three pokeballs at his waist. To his credit, he stared the Rapidash down.
Although I'm not sure if that was a good idea. Eye contact and pokemon was hit or miss. I think Dragons smite you on the spot if you make eye contact.
"Alright kiddos. Circle around. Your job at this station is to be able to make fire. Not all of us are lucky enough to have a fire type. And fire can be essential in the wild. But before that we've got to run through some scenarios. Because as useful as fire is, it can also be the most dangerous thing in the wild."
I turned to the Ranger who spoke. He was burly. At least 6 fit tall. His arms were crossed as he looked at us.
"Names." He spat out.
"Red."
"Barry."
"Hughey."
The Ranger didn't seem like he was listening. This very well might have just been so the rookies would know each other's names. And then could ask each other for help later, rather than asking the Ranger.
"Okay. Red. You're stranded in the wild. The sun's set, so the chill starts to creep in. What do you do?"
I looked back at him, perplexed. I feel like this was a trick question. Clearly this was the fire station. That was obviously the answer he wanted me to give. So do I go with the answer he clearly wants me to give? Or should I try to come up with something else? Since it's probably a trick question, it would make sense to come up with a different answer instead. But then it might seem like I dodged the question. And he clearly wants to segue into the lesson by me getting this question wrong.
"Hello? Is your head filled with rocks? This isn't that hard buddy." The Ranger spat out, clearly unimpressed with me overthinking this too much.
"Okay, well I want to say not to make a fire, since I think that would just attract wild pokemon. But it seems like you really want me to say to start a fire. So I guess I'd start a fire." I returned, deadpan.
The Ranger's eyes glazed over while I spoke. All until my final sentence. "HA! Now the wild pokemon can spot you from miles away. You'll be attracting nasties from Kanto to Galar with that stupid decision."
Yep, he definitely didn't hear anything I said.
The Ranger continued. "Now I know what you're thinking? But how am I gonna get all comfy and toasty for sleepy bye time?" The Ranger dramatically pouted. "Welcome to the wild you little shits. If you can't protect yourself from every single predator possible, you sleep cold. And even if you think that you can, you sleep cold anyway. You never know what you're gonna find out there."
The Ranger turned his stink eye back at me. "Any of you got a fire type?"
I nodded. "Yep. A Charmander."
The Ranger scowled. "Didn't ask. You keep that lizard in its pokeball at night. No matter what. That thing's a beacon with its tail flame. Anyone else?"
I feel like this guy was all over the place. He pretends he hates me, but still gives good advice.
Black t-shirt kid, Hughey, raised his hand. "I've also got one." Apparently he didn't want to share which one since the Ranger chewed me out for it.
However, the Ranger just decided to move on. "Okay so say you're cooking out during the day, preparing meals by smoking out your meats or something. What do you do after?"
Hughey looked at me perplexed. The Ranger had asked if anybody else had fire types, and immediately moved on without acknowledging that he had said yes. Either this Ranger was just a grade A jackass, or he had lost a couple marbles somewhere down the line.
Barry spoke up. "Oh I know this one. You've got to cover the fire with dirt so it doesn't keep smoking."
The Ranger nodded. "Exactly, if you were dumb enough to make your fire where your camp is, that smoke trail is a beacon for anything from Hoenn to Galar that you're there. And some nasties are smart enough to remember where the smoke was coming from, and return later at night."
Okay, so ignoring the fact that the Ranger made the same analogy but with Hoenn instead of Kanto, that was a little terrifying. I hadn't thought about the fact that these hunters had memory. Or at least the fact that they could critically think enough to not attack immediately, and actually wait until you thought you were safe.
"Now, here are your tools. Make a fire. Don't use your fire types. If you get one going, show me and I'll check you off."
The Ranger tossed three plastic baggies forward, each with a bundle of goodies, and we proceeded to find spots on the ground where we would start fires.
There were some dry wood scraps, some rocks, a knife, and various other materials that could be used to make a fire.
Honestly I think it would have made more sense if this station had all of those things available, and you had to learn how to make fire with every single one of them. I feel like if you actually needed to make a fire in the wild, and you couldn't use a fire type, than you also wouldn't have your choice material to make a fire. And being able to make fire with the only things you had available would be more difficult. So actually learning how to do every single one would make sure you have your bases covered in case you actually did get stuck in that emergency scenario.
Regardless, I clacked the flint and steel together onto the dry kindling, and blew on it a bit. In no time I had a fire going.
Hughey looked over from where he was rubbing two sticks together. "Woah how'd you do that?!"
I resisted the urge to facepalm. Were there even two sticks in the baggie we got? Or did he grab the two nearest twigs he could find after he got confused by how many options he had.
"I'm sure if you rub a little harder you'll get there buddy."
Hughey smiled and returned to rubbing the sticks together with renewed vigor.
The Ranger checked me off, and I proceeded to say the magic words and get teleported. As I left I saw a Flareon running through the trees nearby. It had several twigs in its mouth. Before I could think about it I was somewhere else.
~~Starfall~~
~~Starfall~~
The fire roared in the middle of the camp. The Rangers were laughing, looking a lot looser than they had the last couple nights. While Captain Siba had been tanking somewhat close to an entire barrel of beer a night, the other Rangers had been more uptight.
The fiery idiot was wrestling Siba in a sandpit that Terrence's Rhyperior made. Siba handily pinned him with ease, despite having downed a metric ton of beer beforehand.
Since this was the last night here, with everything now out of the way, the Rangers could really let loose. It was like the weight had been lifted out of all of their shoulders. They now knew all the rookies to some degree, and everyone was generally more comfortable around each other.
Tomorrow morning we would all head back to Champion's Hold, and go our separate ways.
It was weird to think that I might not ever see any of these people again.
I looked around at everyone nearby and thought back to what all I did today. After the fire training with Ranger Oslo, I'd been sent to the Incense/Repellant station.
This one was headed by Terrence, the electric trainer. He'd shown how several herbs and plants, as well as other materials, could be mushed together to make incense or repellant. He'd explained how different pokemon are attracted and dissuaded by different things. Some pokemon hunt by smell, so powders or wax incense to be burned would be ideal for them. Repels could be smells that are dangerous, like certain poisons or pokemon, or generally just an unknown scent. However, while more skittish pokemon would be scared off by unknown scents, more predatory pokemon could be attracted to it due to their curiosity and natural danger cataloging. To pass this station I had to use given herbs, crush them up, and mush them together in the right proportions to make a smell that would be attractive to certain pokemon. My specific batch had fireweed, which grew near Volcarona nests, and made a smell that enticed fire types.
From there I'd gone on to the rope station, where Ranger Layton had shown how to make rope out of vines and twine. He showed how certain trees have bark that could be stripped down and thinned out and tied together. To pass the station I had to make a small net with all the proper knots.
I looked over to see Ranger Layton arm wrestling Tristan with a dozen spectators surrounding them. It didn't look like Tristan was trying very hard. I'd seen how strong he could be, and as fast as Layton was, he wouldn't be able to compete in raw power.
I wonder who would win in a real fight? Speed and power went hand and hand. Both had plenty of both, while both had their respective specialty. However, Layton might have an edge in sheer speed. And the fact he used weapons would let him ignore his lacking strength. But Tristan also had Oblivion, so it would be a proper duel.
Either way, that brought me to my next station. Weapons. This one was Ranger Terrence. He'd talked about how to make makeshift weapons in the wild. If you had a natural adamantine, in his words, you could have that pokemon form proper blades to use. So you could use a rock, ground, or steel type to make the actual blade, and then fashion it with rope to a stick to form the rest of the weapon. Spears, scythes, hammers, any sort of ranged weapon with a makeshift end. Daggers were fine, but keeping your distance was a good general rule if something had claws and you were a blood water balloon. Not everyone was fast enough to dodge everything, or tanky enough to live through a single attack. He had demonstrated by having his Rhyperior and Aggron both pull rock and metal out of the ground, and form spear heads. To pass the station, I'd had to properly fasten the spear head to a pole with twine. Ranger Terrence had also given some good advice on the side. He demonstrated how to properly put poison or sleep powder onto a blade or arrow.
This was probably my favorite station. I'd have to try and catch a steel type in the future. Maybe then I'd be able to make some swords of my own.
Then there was the final station. This station was all about wild pokemon encounters. So this was the most information dense station there was. In fact it was more of a full on lecture than an actual station. This was headed by Rangers Barlan and Morrison. Ranger Barlan had a team of water types. Ranger Morrison didn't have any of his ghost types out, but I could still remember his pokemon vividly from his storytelling the other night. They'd talked about how you need to pay attention to many different kinds of senses. While humans predominantly used sight, that wasn't the case for pokemon. Many hunted with scent, or with sound. So knowing to avoid a predator's scent, hearing, or sight, would be very important for avoiding certain things. They talked about standard ambushing patterns, and how to look for shadows. Certain pokemon hunt in packs, while others are lone wolves. They gave tips like using a pokedex to fake the roar of something big. A good go to was Onix. Nearly everything was terrified of Onix. However, in places like the Forest, some pokemon might not recognize an Onix roar at all. Which again, could be good or bad depending on what pokemon was hearing it.
There was so much complexity with how to approach any encounter. It was both terrifying and exciting.
Overall, I'd learned a lot today from the different stations. Again, since I was going back to Champions Hold tomorrow, I'm not sure how much any of this would actually help me. But I do plan on going back into the wild again at some point. So I do need to do my best to try and commit this all to memory.