And unfortunately, that initial wish of Damian not wanting to meet a Ferroseed would return to bite him rather hard in the ass. It didn’t take him too long to blink before he heard a noise—a particularly all too familiar whistling noise before something landed with a sharp thudding impact near his feet.

“Whoa, holy shit! What in the name of—“ he began to blurt out, before looking up just in time to see that there was a Ferroseed—exactly what he was hoping to fucking avoid—make its presence known, spinning and shredding the nearby undergrowth it had come out of.

“Nope, no, no, no way!” Damian said, quickly turning around and putting as much distance as he could between himself and the dual-type; he still hadn’t gotten over the trauma of almost getting caught in the line of fire of the damned things when one decided to just randomly Self-Destruct and cause a big fat mess in the forests near Castelia when he’d gone to Pinwheel Forest with Mike to look for a certain Pokémon one of their other friends was searching for (but had no luck in finding).

He didn’t know how far he’d run, but there was absolutely no way he was going to deal with that shenaniganery. Definitely not. No way in hell.

Nope.

He didn’t know how fast or how far he’d run, but he was determined to put as much space between himself and that freakin’ Ferroseed as much as possible. There was no way in hell he was going to let himself get caught once again in another explosion of shrapnel—and as he’d come to slump near a tree trunk, he thought he heard a particularly distinct exploding noise reach his ears.

“Knew it, knew it, knew it,” he gasped out, bent over double to catch his breath. “Fuckin’ hate those things to the end of the world…” he continued to himself, blinking a few times as white dots danced around his field of vision. Not until he’d managed to take several more deep breaths and regain a sense of balance did he manage to straighten out—and then he heard something.

Although this time it was much softer to the ears; and a whole hell of a lot more pleasant!

At the same time, though, he’d gotten homesick because of the sight of the Skitty. Native to Hoenn, and definitely one of his older sister Catherine’s favorites, he sighed.

“Sadly, no, little one… I can’t take you with me,” he said with a sigh as the Normal-type continued to approach him, but came to a stop as Damian held out his hand. “You’re too cute, and I’m a man on a mission… I hope you understand…”

And with those words he turned around and left the Skitty alone.

Not too long after he’d left the Skitty to its own devices, Damian continued to wander around the Safari. Would he have enough time to find what he was looking for at this point? He certainly hoped so.

Eventually, he’d come across a flower field… and among the flowers, there was something shuffling along, making clicking, clanking noises as it went and picking flowers. He’d almost turned around and left had he not recognized what it was on sight—it was a Golett. He knew that they were the closest to ‘golems’ that existed in the Pokéverse, but at the same time their evolved form were definitely capable of flight…

Awesome flight, that is.

He then idled for a bit, silently joining the Golett as it was picking some flowers. Shame there’s no sunflowers around here… he thought to himself with a frown, but all the same picking some flowers he could make into a flower crown. A smile crossed his lips at the countless times he’d made flower crowns for Mike and his boyfriend’s younger brother—and while he’d get relentlessly teased for it by both, he didn’t mind it at all.

It didn’t take too long before the Golett noticed him; and panicked. It had dropped the flowers it had gathered so far; but Damian just continued to watch it silently, blinking—before handing his own bunch of wildflowers to the Golett to take. He was hoping he’d be able to at least touch it via his strange ability, but for some reason there wasn’t a possible way for him to communicate with Ghost-types.

Well, Loki was the one exception to that rule so far. So far.

He was considering bringing out the Sableye so at least the Golett wouldn’t be frightened off, but he wanted this to be special. Slowly, he continued picking more flowers; before eventually finding enough he could make use out of and then sitting down near the flower patch. The dual-type continued to watch the human curiously, before Damian started whistling softly as he began to weave the flowers together into a crown.

The crown wasn’t for him, though…

As he slowly but surely worked on the little ‘project’, he kept on casting curious looks at the Pokémon, hoping that it would wander closer to where he was. He then continued to bunch the wildflowers together, before realizing that he was out of flowers. A disappointed sigh then escaped his lips, before another bunch of flowers were suddenly dropped in his lap—where had they come from?

Looking up, he saw that the Golett had wandered close enough and had found the original bunch of flowers that it had dropped, before shuffling over to where Damian was working and giving the human the flowers it had found. “Hm? You… oh, thank you,” he said softly in the Golett’s direction before taking the small bouquet. “Are you sure?” he asked the dual-type for confirmation.

After hearing a clanking noise and watching the dual-type nod its head, he then continued with his flower crown project—and once he was done, instead of placing it on his head, Damian then moved over to place it atop the Golett’s head. “I made it for you, not for myself… how does it look?” he asked the Pokémon, waiting for it to answer.

Slowly, but surely the Golett then twirled around, before seemingly dancing in his direction.

“You like it?” he continued, before the Golett nodded once again, this time picking more flowers and giving them to him; before gesturing to the crown on its head.

“You… you want me to make one for myself?” he asked, unsure.

Another nod from the Golett.

“I… I can do that,” he said quickly, getting to work. Never mind if his fingers were getting pricked and all that, but soon a second flower crown was completed, and this time Damian placed it atop his own head.

“Now we match… doesn’t it look nice?” he continued in that same soft voice; which got him another nod from the Golett. “I… I can make more for you, you know. Are… I know it’s pretty lonely for you out here. I have another Ghost-type you can talk to,” he added, before quickly sending his Sableye out in a flash of red light. Loki looked up at him, confused, before looking at the Golett.

“Go on, talk to him,” he said—letting the Sableye do its thing. Before it headed forward, Loki poked Damian’s pocket, before gesturing to one of the Safari balls.

“You sure?” he asked the Sableye; getting a nod from him.

After passing over one of the three Safari balls he had with him, the other Ghost-type then approached the Golett, who was now looking at Damian curiously. While he could hear most of the conversation (thanks to Loki, at least) by the end of it the Golett then poked at the Safari ball, letting the beam of red light absorb it…

After the Safari ball wiggled twice, it came to a stop—and that was when the Sableye took its cue to roll it towards Damian. Once he’d caught the incoming occupied Safari ball, he then dropped it down his pocket—before feeling the fine hairs on the back of his neck stand up.

“Eyes up, Loki… something’s coming,” he said, looking around the area intently.

And from the looks of things, it wasn’t going to go peacefully. It took a few moments before the Tynamo made its presence known, attacking Damian directly with a Spark the moment it fell out of the tree where it had been hiding.

“Ow! What the hell?” he yelped, quickly touching the top of his head as he felt an electrical jolt surge through his body for the briefest of moments before the squiggly fish dropped down in front of him. “That hurt,” he said with a grumpy huff, before the Sableye saw it.

“Go on, Loki, do your thing… ugh, ow, that hurt,” he continued to grumble, as the Tynamo picked itself up before spotting the Sableye—and quickly coming in for another Spark attack. Instead, the dual-type then sank down into the ground using Shadow Sneak to escape the incoming attack. As the Electric-type landed in what used to be a flower patch, it then did an about-face before charging again at the Sableye, who’d re-emerged from another path of shadows—only for the dual-type to suddenly fire off a powerful flash of light coming from its red core.

As the Power Gem attack smacked into the Tynamo, the Sableye disappeared again, before suddenly flashing a sinister light in the Electric-type’s direction, catching it in the middle with a Confuse Ray status change. “That should keep it confused for a while! Do what you have to, but be careful!” he called out to the Sableye, who nodded before cackling as it used Shadow Sneak once more to hide itself from view.

A few moments later it re-emerged from the shadows and slammed into it with another Power Gem attack, blasting the tiny squiggly fish away from where it was floundering around, confused and unsure of what the hell to do. It then chased the Tynamo down and used Shadow Claw on it a few moments later as the Tynamo continued to try and find its bearings, before blasting it again with another Power Gem attack.

The tiny squiggle fish flew away again; before the Sableye chased after it one more time and batted it back in Damian’s direction with one more Power Gem; causing him to toss a second Safari ball to catch the Tynamo in mid-air before it fell on the dirt once more.

“Gee, Loki, try to calm down?” he said to his companion as the Sableye began to chuckle irreverently at what he’d done.

He’d left the Sableye to deal with the second Safari ball, because right then and there he’d happened to trip over a…something alive.

Something wet, squishy, and definitely pissed the hell off!

“What the…?!” he blurted out as he picked himself up, seeing the spiky little thing that… wait, why was it wet? Quickly taking out his Pokédex, he then pointed it at the strange thing, and almost burst out laughing at the Dex entry the thing had. “How’d a Pyukumuku like this end up all the way out here? Oh, right…” he said to himself, before quickly pocketing the Pokédex and then walking over to where it was.

It was a good thing he was wearing gloves, because if he wasn’t, it would’ve felt incredibly gross. And squishy, and icky, and all manner of slimy and disgusting in one go! “Okay… Loki! Keep an eye on that Safari ball, I’ll be right back!” he shouted at the Sableye, who nodded and kept its eyes on the Safari ball that had the Tynamo he’d fought with earlier, before Damian broke out into a run, holding the Pyukumuku with both hands.

It took him sometime to find a nearby watering hole that looked deep enough, and with what strength he could muster, quickly chucked the Water-type back into the depths, hearing a loud splashing noise the moment the Pyukumuku hit the water.

What he didn’t realize was that when this particular Pokémon had found a spot they liked, they would always return to it no matter how many times they were tossed back into the water!

Damian was a few paces away from the flower field when his center of gravity and field of vision suddenly changed and he found himself literally kissing the dirt. What the hell had he tripped on?! Blinking, he then looked around for the offending object that had tripped him over…

…and was hit with an ironic case of déjà vu.

“Wait a second, I thought I already got you…” he began to muse, before quickly picking himself up and pointing the Pokédex at the Pyukumuku again, and then groaning because this particular Pokémon didn’t have any differential markers that set males of the species apart from females.

In either case, he knew that these things had to be in the water, so hoping that Loki wouldn’t lose his temper at him for taking so long, he grabbed the second Pyukumuku with both hands and then made a second mad dash towards the direction he’d come from, finding the watering hole yet again. He thought he saw another person tossing something that looked suspiciously like a Pyukumuku into the water as well, and then Damian could only sigh.

Looks like these things are a problem! He thought before lobbing his arms back as best as he could and tossing the second Water-type back into the watering hole, hoping that it stayed there this time! Now that the deed was done, he then retraced his steps back to the flower field; he knew he had a lot of explaining to do once Loki saw him looking so harassed…