Larry looked between the two women with a dumbfounded expression, but it didn’t take long before it dawned on him who this person was. The same colored hair, Asian looks, the woman's similar build, and her overly familiar behavior only led him to one conclusion.
‘Is this her mom? Her Dad said that Valerie would live with someone else…’ He eyed the woman with suspicion, the fact that she’d been called Michelle instead of Mom was slightly telling as to the nature of their relationship.
“Oh, it’s been such a long time since we’ve seen each other!” Michelle swooned, “How long has it been, a year or two?”
Valerie's weak smile shrunk just a touch, “It’s been 10 months, I think…” She was working overtime to tolerate the woman.
She quickly corrected, keeping an arm around her daughter's shoulder as she nodded along, “Right, right. 10 months, that IS a long time!” The woman stunk heavily of perfume on Larry's sensitive Pokemon nose. She began to regale her daughter, “And what a meeting this is, being able to watch your daughter in a Pokémon battle! Just listen to this-”
Michelle dramatically threw a hand onto her forehead, “Oh, the rangers called me yesterday, they told me my lovely daughter was involved in some sort of accident, and at Mt. Silver of all places!” She paused for dramatic effect.
“Right,” Valerie, said daughter acknowledged with furrowed brows, urging her to continue, “And?”
“And of course, I immediately called Gustav, I told him, ‘I have to go there!’ and he, ever the charmer, ordered a flight over here right away!” The mention of her mother's new husband made Valerie flinch, but the woman's self-absorbed story continued without any acknowledgment of her daughter.
“So I am here now!” She tapped herself on the chest enthusiastically and ruffled Valerie’s hair with the arm on her shoulder, “Your mama is bringing you with her! With Drew out of commission, me and Gustav will be housing you for the time being!”
“Ggggrrrreat…” Valerie strained out, accentuating the T at the end.
Her mother's theatrics finally paused as Michelle's gaze turned down to her daughter's feet, “Oh~, and who is this little critter right here?” She lowered herself to get a proper look at Larry before smooshing in his cheeks as she let out a squeal of excitement, “Eek, isn't he just the cutest?!”
The woman gave off a grunt of exertion as she tried to lift Larry, a fruitless endeavor at his weight, “Oomph, he is heavy! What are you feeding this little guy?”
“That's Larvitar, I caught him at Mt. Silver… I think he eats rocks…” Valerie mumbled along, clearly uncomfortable with her mother's energetic act, “Say hi to my mom, Larvitar.”
Larry gave a quick wave to the woman, equally as enchanted by her appearance and behavior as his trainer, ‘Wow, I’ve only known her for a minute at most and I already can’t stand her…’
“Well, he looks lovely!” Michelle nodded towards Valerie, her smile going slightly wooden, “Is your father up yet? We’ll need to discuss your living arrangements.”
Valerie bristled at the mention of her father, but calmed down when Larry put a hand on her leg, “I talked to him today, he should still be up.”
Michelle was already walking as she announced, “Alright then, let’s visit him!”
…
To not attract any more attention, Larry was recalled into his Pokeball, which was then shrunken down and stuffed into Valerie's pocket. It was a weird feeling to be inside someone's pocket. For one, you never truly know how much lint is in your pocket until you look inside, and Larry was getting a full-frontal view. Luckily for his sanity, Pokeballs were airtight.
Once they were back inside Drew’s hospital room, Larry was released with a simple apology, “Sorry Larvitar. I’ll get myself a belt for Pokeballs if you want. Felt like the ball was about to slip out of my pocket any second.”
Turning back to the girl's family, Larry found Drew looking like he was being held at gunpoint the way he was looking at Michelle. He stuttered out a greeting, “M-Michelle…W-What are you doing here?”
Michelle for her part looked stoic, addressing Drew like she was talking to a death-row inmate getting the electric chair, “Drew, its good to see you as well.”
“Y-Yeah, so what brings you here?” He seemed fearful of the woman's entire existence, looking at her like he was expecting a knife or other weapon to be pulled on him.
“I got a call from the police, Valerie’s guardian is in hospital and unable to care for her, custody of her needs to be transferred to an able-bodied adult in her family.” She pointed down at herself with a flourish, “Here I am.”
“Oh,” Drew's eyes inspected Michelle's entire body, “Yeah, that makes sense.”
He turned introspective as the trio waited for his next sentence. “Are you alright with this?” Drew looked at Michelle.
“Of course,” Michelle nodded, entirely unconcerned, “Me and Gustav have got more than enough space to care for her back in Viridian. I’d love to have her around.”
Valerie's gaze was focused entirely on her feet as she sat in the corner of the room, she looked uncomfortable. To calm her nerves, Larry hugged himself close to her feet, happy to use his newborn adorableness to calm a girl forced to experience her custody battle live in front of her.
“Is that so…” Drew seemed accepting, yet unhappy. His face contorted as he let the idea run through his mind, he grumbled to himself, “I still don’t like you, Michelle.”
“I’d rather be back in Viridian too,” She nodded seriously.
He looked over to Valerie, “What about you?”
Her gaze finally traveled up and Larry could see the girl seriously thinking about her choice of words, unsure if she should prioritize her feelings or bear with it.
“I…I-I’ll go with Mom.” She decided with a weak smile, “You just go ahead and heal up, Dad.”
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
“You’re right…” Drew agreed with her opinion, but he still didn’t like it.
“Haah…You know I don’t have anybody else who could look after Valerie…” The words seemed to deal physical pain to the man as he said them, “Please, you take her in for now. Once I’m all healed up I’ll come take her off your hands again.”
“Sure thing!” Michelle turned, all smiles as the two decided on the arrangement. Valerie's demeanor had only soured during their discussion, Michelle strutted to the door as she urged Valerie to follow her “Let’s get us some Lunch, why don’t we Val?”
…
Larry was once again recalled into his Pokeball for his privacy as the mother and daughter duo made way for the Pokecenter cafeteria again.
He had laid down inside his Pokeball, they seemed to be able to filter out most of the movements and noises of the outside world if a Pokemon or trainer wished so. For now, though, Larry wanted to support Valerie, so he’d kept an eye on the idle conversation between mother and daughter. She was his key back into Mt. Silver after all.
His presence wasn’t going to help in any way during their talks, he’d only known the girl for around a day anyway, ‘Though if Valerie needs emotional support, I hope she’ll call me…’
Since he’d met Valerie, a lot about his life had changed. He’d been caught, normally a thing of concern, but due to Valerie's opinion on the matter he’d been lucky enough to be free if he chose so.
An amazing coincidence had saved his life and in a second case of chance, said trainer had no qualms about keeping him to herself. Truly, Larry felt nothing but fortunate in his misfortune of being caught. There was the big elephant, or well, Copperajah in the room he needed to address, does he want to stay with Valerie? Does he want to stay with a trainer or go back to being wild?
‘I liked the freedom of exploring Mt. Silver, but it was dangerous, I didn’t sit still at a single point, all because I wanted to get out of the caves.’ He posited, ‘But why did I want to outside of Mt. Silver? I did hate the insides of the cave, but the real reason was that I wanted to finally DO something with my second shot at life, not just rot away in a cave. I couldn’t waste away in there, I need to see the world!’
If the idea was to go see the world, then he could try and do it himself. There was just one caveat, most of what he knew about Pokemon revolved around what had been shown in the franchise, which focused on humans. His entire knowledge was built on trainers and the society surrounding them.
And if that was the case, why should he not try and be a trainer’s Pokemon? Valerie has already shown herself to be a great girl, smart, remorseful, mature, and way more intelligent than others her age. She was a shoo-in for a good trainer to be with, ‘And she is just such a nice girl! I really kind of do want to help her in whatever way I can, be it emotional support in a custody battle or as her ace in a Pokemon Trainer.’
He’d come to a decision, ‘I’ll give being a trainer Pokemon a good try, but first we go back to Mt. Silver.’
Thinking of the caves, brought him back to the present, his mom and their promise to meet back up in Mt. Silver once she’d fought Moltres, ‘She’s saved my life multiple times by now…I owe it to my mom to go back and look for her, I am still her son after all!’
His mother's condition was still unknown, but Larry could only pray to whatever god, be it Arceus or someone else, and hope that she wasn’t dead. He wasn’t sure how he’d manage if she was actually dead, he’d just have to find out soon enough.
With his mind finally set, Larry had a plan on what to do, ‘Alright! Look for Mom, stay with Valerie, and become the strongest Pokemon ever!’ It wasn’t all planned out yet, but Larry already felt giddy. He dreamt a bit to himself, ‘Maybe the two of them could be friends? I could go back to Mt. Silver from time to time between traveling to show her my progress. Hehe, that’d be nice.’
Soon enough, he was once again released in the cafeteria to eat a late lunch. Between all the family drama and Pokemon rights concerns still on Larry's mind, there was one thing that was for sure, he was feeling a bit peckish.
…
On his third bowl already, Larry could feel Michelle's bulging eyes on him as he chomped away at the PokeChow, “How much can he fit in there?!”
“He’s a growing boy,” Valerie excused, “The Center wrote that he’s at most a few months old.”
“Wow.” Michelle seemed surprised by the idea but didn’t seem to care enough to pry. Larry was relieved to be dining on her mother's dime, it meant he didn’t need to feel ashamed to be draining a teenager's pocket money anymore.
During their lunch, Michelle had divulged a lot of details about her life. She worked in an office in Viridian City and her new husband Gustav ran a wonderful flower shop in which they’d met. The two were still very much in love, by how much the mother talked about the man, raving about how amazing of a person he was. Another detail that surprised Larry was, that Michelle never was much of a trainer. She had never gone on a journey and she didn’t keep any Pokemon close to her. It made Larry realize that the entire world didn’t revolve around Pokemon.
Valerie kept a respectful distance from her mother and kept a protective hand near Larry as they ate their late lunch. He didn’t know what she expected the woman to do to him, but the more her mother opened her mouth, the less he tolerated her presence. She was loud, brash, overly familiar, and self-centered, at times her shrill laughter even seemed to echo through the entire cafeteria. Larry felt lucky he had a Pokeball to escape to when it became too much, it made him fear for Valerie in the coming days.
Just as she was about to answer her mother, Valerie's phone rang, “Oh! Sorry, I’ll take this…”
“Hello? Oh, hey! Yes, I’m in the cafeteria right now. I’ll- Oh, alright. See you.” Her call was over before it could properly begin.
“Who was that?” Michelle asked.
“It was the rangers, the ranger who was going to escort me to Mt. Silver is here,” Valerie explained apologetically.
“Huh?” Her mother looked confused, “Take you to Mt. Silver? Didn’t you just come from there?”
“Yeah, I’m taking Larvitar back there to look for him Mom, and to get a police interview.” Valerie pet his horn for effect.
“Wha- Valerie-”
“Are you Valerie Riston?” A ranger in a flight helmet marched up to them assertively.
“That’s me!” She rose and grabbed her backpack, slinging it over her shoulder with a smile on her face, clearly happy to be freed from her mother's clutches.
“We have a busy schedule, you ready?” The ranger asked.
“Sure thing, let's go.” She agreed readily, recalling Larry with his consent and following after the ranger dutifully.
“What? Valerie?” Michelle rose from her seat as well and followed after the two, “What’s going on?”
“Don’t worry, Michelle.” She spoke diplomatically, with a sly grin on her face, “I’ll be back soon.”
“Huh? What does that mean? And I told you to just call me mom- Wait! Don’t just run away!” Michelle followed after them out of the Center and into a square.
Outside, a gigantic Fearow waited for the two, with a riding harness strapped onto its back. When the ranger returned it lowered itself and allowed the two to climb onto its back.
Her mother blurted out tons of questions as she approached the Flying-Type, “What will you be doing over there? Are you going on-”
“CAAAW!!” Fearow screeched a warning when she got too close.
“Eeek!” She squealed in fear and fell backward onto the plaster square.
Valerie let out a chuckle watching the woman fall while being strapped into the seat. She finally answered, “Sorry Michelle, but I guess you’ll have to ask Dad.”
“Vale-” A heavy beat of Fearow wings interrupted Michelle's verbal onslaught once again and the two took off into the sky.
Once they’d taken off, the ranger talked, “It seems I came at a bad time.” She raised the visor covering her eyes and Maxie smiled back at her.
“Haha! No, you came at the perfect time!” As they flew away Valerie felt herself begin to break out in honest laughter. Even Larry felt a bit of schadenfreude inside his Pokeball, seeing the girl's mother bluster around helplessly.
