It turned out that the person who posted the job about Marill was the same guy who rented me a jet ski.

He was middle-aged, balding, and overweight. His outfit consisted of just a tank top and swim trunks, which revealed a little too much of the hair on his body. He sat on a stool reading a magazine inside of his shack shop right next to the commercial docks. He looked up at me when I came in. When he spoke his voice was gruff and worn out, like he had spent years smoking before finally quitting.

Also, he recognized me from before.

"You cleaned up nicely, kid. Surprised you ain't got yourself killed yet."

I raised my eyebrow. "What's that supposed to mean?"

He chuckled at my confusion, which sounded more like a hacking cough than laughter. "You went to Shoal Cave without a Pokémon. It's a wonder you haven't done something worse yet."

Vulpix stifled a laugh from next to me. She stuck her tongue out when I glared at her.

Not wanting to continue this line of discussion, I immediately tried to change the subject. "I'm here about your Marill problem. Is there anything you can tell me about it?"

The hacking laughter started back up again after I said that. "Hah! Like a newbie trainer like you can deal with a Marill that mean. Listen kid, two other newbie trainers more experienced than you tried to scare that Marill off this morning and only got fainted Pokémon to show for it. You're better off giving up and grabbing a new job so my posting can expire and I can escalate it to a Gym Trainer."

"Gym Trainer? I thought the job was posted in the Pokémon Center?" I asked.

"Bah, course a newbie like you doesn't know. Tough job warrants tougher trainers. You’ll be the third to fail. Give it a week and someone'll be down here from the Gym to scare it off."

I only had a week to catch Marill before someone else dealt with it. But me, failing this job?

I scoffed at his suggestion that I couldn't handle Marill. "I've taken dozens of jobs dealing with wild Pokémon and I only couldn’t handle one of them so far. I'm sure I can complete your job."

He closed his magazine and placed it on the counter. "Oh yeah, kid? What was the job you failed?"

I scratched the back of my head. "...I got scared by an Ariados when I expected a Spinarak."

I left the shop while the rental owner laughed at me. Vulpix tried to comfort me but she had to hold back her own laughter. After all, she heard my scream when I opened the door to reveal the massive spider in its web right in front of my face.

Going out to the area where the rentals were docked, I quickly saw our target. A round blue mouse the size of my head with massive curved ears, a white stomach, and a blue ball attached to the tip of a wiry tail sat on top of a bright red jet ski. Marill had its eyes closed, laying back as if it didn't have a care in the world.

"Hey Marill!" I shouted from a distance.

The Pokémon turned onto its side, away from me.

"Hey! I'm talking to you!"

It continued to rest, ignoring me.

I knelt down next to Vulpix and whispered a command in her ear.

"Listen girl, do you think you could give Marill a nice cool breeze?"

A cruel smile appeared on Vulpix's face and she sent out a weak Powder Snow attack. The area around Marill cooled down and clumps of snow stuck to its body.

"Tch."

Did it just 'Tch' me?

Vulpix stopped her attack when Marill stood up, the mouse still facing away from us. It turned around dramatically and revealed a deep scowl on its face. The look it gave us reminded me of the evil Togepi that appeared in the anime.

I wanted to give my pitch to convince Marill to join us but before I could speak even one word it disappeared in a sudden burst of water. I couldn't even react to its movements. A cry of pain echoed out as Marill had just slammed into Vulpix with Aqua Jet.

Panicking, I shouted commands to Vulpix.

"Catch it off guard with Tail Whip! Back off and slow it down!"

Following my instructions, Vulpix twisted slightly and snapped her tails down at Marill. The blue mouse leapt back before the tails could trip it and Vulpix jumped back as well. Mid-air, a sharp breeze of Icy Wind shot from Vulpix's mouth and hit Marill. It barely reacted but some frost formed on Marill's body. I took this opportunity to step back myself and create some distance to the battle.

Unlike Powder Snow, Icy Wind slowed down a Pokémon over time rather than causing the Pokémon to freeze. If the move hit the target, frost formed on the target's body and slowed metabolism to weaken how fast the Pokémon could move. I hoped the move would slow down Marill to let Vulpix create distance between them.

Unfortunately, Icy Wind had little effect on Marill. It rushed forward to Slam into Vulpix and she reflexively used Baby Doll Eyes to defend herself. Unfortunately, Marill's attack managed to continue through the charm, albeit with slightly less power.

Vulpix was knocked back and her body slid against the concrete. She tried to stand up but a stream of bubbles shot from Marill's mouth, impacting Vulpix with a Bubble Beam. The combined damage was too great and Vulpix fell down, unconscious. She only lasted three moves.

Marill snapped its attention to me, and I held my hands up to show I meant no threat. With another "Tch," Marill returned to its resting spot.

I went and picked up Vulpix. She reacted to my touch with a soft "’Pix" sound. I carried her back to the rental shop and administered a Potion. As soon as I arrived I saw that the shop owner had been standing in the doorway, watching me take on the Marill.

"Seems like you failed to scare it away after all,” he commented expressionlessly.

"I didn't scare it away, but that wasn't my goal anyway," I half-heartedly retorted, focusing on Vulpix instead.

The shop owner raised an eyebrow at that. I knelt down to help Vulpix stand on her feet. I knew she would prefer to walk to the Pokémon Center.

"That Marill sure is tough, eh girl?"

She nodded. "Vul!"

The shop owner continued to watch me. I glanced at him from my kneeling position to look him in the eye.

"I’ll take care of your Marill problem, but I’m not going to scare it away. I'm going to catch it."

The shop owner chuckled once more, and went back inside his shop. He waved a hand dismissively in response to what I said.

"It's your Pokémon's funeral kid, see if I care," he replied.

I stood up to let Vulpix lean on my leg and we slowly made our way back to the Pokémon Center.

After a brief checkup with Nurse Joy, Vulpix was cleared to come out with me. Nurse Joy admonished me for allowing an injured Pokémon to walk but I knew that it was a way to help heal Vulpix's injured pride.

According to Nurse Joy, Vulpix was okay to be around and about, but she wasn't to engage in battles until she got a night's rest. Pokémon had a vastly superior recovery time over humans and were exceedingly durable. Even if Vulpix had something like a cracked rib or broken limb, she would have been perfectly healthy within only a few days.

Luckily, Vulpix was in good enough health for move practice after she was released. I let her out of her Pokéball once we were on the practice field.

"So we lost that one."

"Vulpix."

"But I think we can win with a new secret weapon."

"Vul?"

"Aqua Jet lets Marill catch up to you with ease, and it's much stronger than you in close range fights. We need a counter to its strategy."

I reached into my backpack and pulled out a familiar journal. I flipped to the page I had marked with a sticky note and smiled when I reread the notes about the move.

"See, there's this new move I think you should learn..."

I decided to delay our departure from Mossdeep a few days while we handled Marill. With only a week left to catch it before the job escalated, Vulpix and I needed to focus on training.

Learning a new move was tough. Sometimes a Pokémon would have a spark of inspiration in a battle, but it generally required hard work to initially learn and battle experience to perfect.

We operated on a similar schedule to what we had before, but the difference was we did no jobs and spent time recovering each day. I had saved up a small pool of cash in preparation for Mauville, so I was able to use my savings to support us without income while we focused on training. We made sure to take time every morning to visit the rental shop to challenge Marill, but it beat us handily each time. That was fine, however. Winning wasn’t the objective: we challenged it to get used to its fighting style.

In the afternoons we trained Vulpix's new move while she recovered from the morning’s battle. We spent time reviewing what we learned about Marill’s combat capabilities and eventually we figured out how it fought.

It followed a straightforward strategy that never changed. It would first get close to its target with a burst of speed from Aqua Jet then used the momentum created by the move to follow up with a powerful Slam attack. It repeated that process until its opponent had fainted, or until it could easily finish off its opponent with Bubble Beam.

Vulpix's new move would be essential to counter this strategy and allow her to keep her distance in the future. It was a Normal Type move, which meant she had to get accustomed to using a new Type. Tail Whip didn't use Type energy like other moves so Normal Type moves were technically unfamiliar to her. Thankfully, Normal Type energy was the simplest Type energy to work with so she adapted quickly.

The move itself was a simple attacking move but with massive potential to be used as a utility move in battle. When I explained how her stay-at-range strategy would adapt to include the new move, Vulpix jumped up and down and rapidly wagged her tails in excitement. We both knew it would significantly improve her capabilities in battle.

On the fifth day of challenging Marill, Vulpix and I decided to finally go ahead with our plan. I splurged on a Dive Ball, which cost a ridiculous 1000 Pokédollars. I only had just over 3000 Pokédollars left afterwards, but it was worth the cost. If I was adding a new member to the team, I was going to do it in style. Pokéball choice was a lasting decision and there was no way I would have a strong Pokémon like Marill be caught in a basic Pokéball.

Vulpix and I returned to the rental shop that morning. The owner had started coming along with us each day to watch Vulpix be beaten.

"Can't say I don't respect your determination, but you really think today will be different?" he asked while walking alongside us.

I huffed in response. "I don't think it will be different, I know it will be different."

"Hah, nice line. You steal that from somewhere?"

I stopped paying attention to his rude remarks to focus on the upcoming battle. We rounded the corner of the shop and approached the usual location of the battle.

Marill was sitting on the same red jet ski waiting for us like it had on the previous days. It had taken to treating the jet ski like it was its own personal throne. Starting on the third day of our battles, Marill stayed conscious until we arrived to battle. It wouldn’t relax like it had when we first encountered it until it beat Vulpix. Of course, that would change today.

"Marill." I called out to it.

The Pokémon turned its body to face me.

"We're beating you today."

It scoffed.

Vulpix lowered her body into a ready stance. I also took a stance, clutching my fist and pointing a finger at it threateningly.

Hey, if I get to be a real-life Pokémon Trainer, I get to act as cheesy as I want.

With that, Marill smirked and disappeared in a familiar watery splash.

When Marill reappeared, the Pokémon was shocked to see its attack had missed its target. Looking around, it saw Vulpix off to the side, unharmed.

Shaking the shock out and releasing another unimpressed "Tch," Marill disappeared one more time as it used Aqua Jet to zoom towards Vulpix's position.

Vulpix's body glowed with Normal Type energy as she enhanced her entire body. Her legs snapped out as they moved at an increased speed. She dashed forward, leaving a trail of fading white light behind her.

That was the move we practiced for days for the sake of beating Marill. An extremely basic move, but perfect for increasing mobility. It was Quick Attack, one of the simplest Normal Type moves in existence, but one of the most useful. It let a Pokémon enhance its body to move at speeds it couldn't reach normally, which was perfect for both movement and dodging.

Aqua Jet operated similarly to Quick Attack, but rather than using Type Energy to enhance the body, the Pokémon released a burst of pressured water to propel the Pokémon in the opposite direction.

Marill had been using Aqua Jet to close in on Pokémon and overwhelm them in melee combat. Vulpix, being specialized in ranged attacks, would be defeated easily if a Pokémon got close. Since Marill could outspeed Vulpix, our solution was simple: match Marill's speed so it could never catch up.

I planned for Quick Attack to be key in Vulpix's future strategy. The Vulpix line excels at three things: elemental control, speed, and illusions. As an Alolan Vulpix, Vulpix wouldn’t be able to use illusions for defense until her mastery of Ice Type energy improved. For now, she was best at running away and using her ranged special moves from a distance. Quick Attack was perfect to help her fulfill that role.

And now that she had learned it, we were seeing the fruits of our labor.

Marill attempted to get close to Vulpix several more times. Vulpix simply moved out of the way with Quick Attack before Marill could reach her. I told Vulpix to refrain from attacking to infuriate Marill and cause it to make mistakes.

I watched as the blue ball of anger became a blue ball of rage as Vulpix continued to dodge. Eventually, Marill stopped its Aqua Jet bursts and aimed its mouth at Vulpix. When Marill released its Bubble Beam attack, Vulpix nimbly moved out of the way with yet another Quick Attack to cause the bubbles to completely miss.

Its attempt at attacking with Bubble Beam confirmed my suspicion. Marill focused on close combat fighting, so it never properly practiced its ability to fight at range. With so little practice with Bubble Beam, Marill was essentially unable to move as it had to stay still to power up and aim each usage of its attack before firing.

Vulpix, now with an easy target, began to release bursts of Icy Wind at my command. Our move practice meant that Vulpix had enough time to charge up and release Icy Wind between each use of Quick Attack. Vulpix could use both moves in the same amount of time it took Marill to use just Bubble Beam.

Marill didn't take much damage from Icy Wind, but the combined effect of the constant use of the move slowed it down. Soon, it wouldn't be able to resist Vulpix freezing it with Powder Snow and would give me a chance to convince it to join our team.

However, this was when our plan went into disarray. Marill turned out to have a secret weapon after all.

As Vulpix released another Icy Wind attack, Marill stopped preparing its Bubble Beam. I told Vulpix to back off and ready herself for whatever Marill was planning.

As we watched tensely, Marill paused. It took a moment, puffed up its chest, and...

It started to cry.

Vulpix cocked her head in confusion.

"...Vul, Vulpix?"

Marill turned away from Vulpix and plopped on the ground, hiding its tears from us.

I was a little stunned. I didn't expect Marill to throw a tantrum when the battle didn't go its way.

I motioned for Vulpix to stay back and carefully walked forward towards Marill.

"Hey, Marill."

It didn't respond.

I tried to walk around to see its face but it shifted to turn away from me, still seated. I continued to walk around it, and Marill continued to turn. When Marill turned to face Vulpix, Vulpix immediately broke eye contact with the Pokémon.

I knelt down beside it.

"Marill." I said, trying to get its attention.

It didn't respond.

"You know you can't just throw a tantrum when things don't go your way, right?"

It still didn't respond.

"Imagine what you're feeling right now, but for a bunch of different people. Your actions were causing other people a lot of similar feelings, and that wasn't right."

I saw its tiny shoulders droop almost imperceptibly.

"Look, Vulpix and I are training to get stronger. You can tell that right? After only a few days we went from being soundly defeated by you to defeating you right back."

Marill sniffed.

"Look, I know you're unhappy with losing, but you can fix that. Vulpix and I, we're going on a journey. We're going to challenge a lot of strong trainers and even stronger Pokémon to get stronger ourselves. I never got a chance to ask you before we started to battle, but do you want to come with us to get stronger?"

There were a few sniffles from Marill's face and Vulpix continued to try her best to look away. The rental owner just continued to watch, unfazed.

After a few more moments of waiting, Marill wiped its face and turned to look at me in the eye. It still had the same angry face as it did before but its eyes were puffy from crying. It stared at me for just a bit longer before finally nodding. I reached behind me and pulled out the Dive Ball I prepared for it.

"Just press the center button, and you’ll be caught. We can go to the Pokémon Center to make sure you’re okay after."

Marill didn't wait. It immediately touched the center of the Dive Ball with its paw and was sucked in. After a few shakes the ball dinged, signifying that after five days of training, Marill had finally been caught.

The rental owner took this moment to speak up.

"Well kid, you did it. You finally caught that horrible Marill scaring away all my customers. I'm so impressed, how about you go ahead and take that jet ski Marill liked so much with you?"

"Wait, really?" I shot up and looked at him in disbelief.

"Hahaha, no. You know how much those jet skis cost? I'm not insane, it was just a Marill, it's not that impressive. Follow me and stop with the dramatics, I'll get you your pay." The shop owner turned around and walked away to return to his shop.

I grumbled to myself and moved to follow.

"...didn't need to make a joke about that …I really wanted that jet ski."

I brought Marill back to the Pokémon Center to both report the job as finished and to have Nurse Joy give it a check up to make sure it was in perfect health. It wasn’t a long wait before Marill was returned to me.

“Everything looks fine to me. Marill is in perfect health. Make sure to treat her well!” Nurse Joy said when she handed back Marill’s Dive Ball.

“I will, Nurse Joy. Funds might be a bit strained but I can still support two Pokémon.”

I went to the left side of the room to do research on the public computers within the Pokémon Center. Vulpix and Marill were resting in their Pokéballs after the battle, which gave me time to think about my situation.

Training and raising Pokémon was expensive. I could earn a few thousand Pokédollars each week from focusing on jobs, but about a third of that just went into Vulpix’s meals, and even more of my budget went into paying the Pokémon Center for food and board just for myself. I could still afford to take care of two Pokémon if I completed jobs, but I wasn’t looking forward to how much I would need to pay just to live.

Pokémon were absolute monsters when it came to eating. Vulpix didn’t come up to my knee but she ate at least twice as much as I did for each meal. Cans of Pokémon food were theoretically enough to satisfy them, but that was only the bare minimum. In Vulpix’s case, she ate one and a half cans of Ice Type Pokémon food mixed with diced berries for each meal.

Berries were surprisingly cheap, relatively speaking. For an individual piece of fruit they were ungodly expensive, but compared to other items for taking care of Pokémon? Cheap.

Imagine paying $10 for an apple. Now imagine paying that same amount of money but the apple also cured all poisons, increased resistance to some diseases, and greatly improved the body’s metabolism when eaten regularly. That’s how beneficial berries were for Pokémon. The total costs of meals for Vulpix were the biggest portion of my budget, and that didn’t even account for additional amenities.

The Grooming Kit for Vulpix had cost me just under 100 Pokédollars, and the pricey shampoo that was included with it would need to be refilled before the end of the month, costing even more money. Luckily, I didn’t have to spend any extra money on toys since Vulpix adored the last remaining Pokédoll I still had from running through Shoal Cave. It wasn’t built to last but compared to how she acted in battles, it was easy to see that she took extra care to prevent damage to her beloved doll.

Now that I had Marill, I’d be lucky to have money to put away at the end of the day. I had already spent more savings than I'd like in the days it took to catch Marill, and I would now have to pay for an extra mouth to feed. I didn't even want to think of all the additional items I needed to buy to make sure she was taken care of properly. I didn’t have any sort of grooming kit for Marill, but hoped that natural oils would make sure her coat stayed healthy.

Wait, isn’t her coat hydrophobic? Does her fur even have natural oils? Ugh, I never needed to deal with this back when Pokémon was a simple RPG.

Since Marill was in her Pokéball when she was returned to me, I placed her ball into a slot in the computer tower under the desk to scan her capabilities. Marill was female and knew five moves: Defense Curl, Water Gun, Bubble Beam, Slam, and Aqua Jet. I was familiar with most of those moves, but she didn’t use either Defense Curl or Water Gun in the fight against Vulpix. I guess she never felt the need to use them. Marill also already learned how to use her first ability, Thick Fat, which gave her resistances to extreme temperatures and both Ice and Fire Type moves. Her second ability, Huge Power, was in the process of becoming functional and showed up on the PC as “developing.”

This was also a different aspect to training Pokémon in this world over the games. Pokémon could both have multiple abilities and learn as many moves as they were able to train. The consequence was that it was hard to practice all of them and it took time and effort to get a Pokémon to get their ability to work properly.

Since time was a limiting factor, most trainers only trained one ability and practiced a small number of moves. Pokémon would know more moves but only a small selection would be good enough to use in battle.

I looked at Marill’s known moves and saw the exact situation I had just thought of. Bubble Beam was a ranged Water Type stronger than Water Gun, so there wasn’t much reason to use Water Gun in a Pokémon battle. However, Water Gun converted a Pokémon’s internal energy into water, so it was useful to know how to use it for utility outside of battle. A lot of the unpopular moves from the games that were passed over due to a limited number of move slots were now worth learning since Pokémon could learn as many moves as they could remember.

I turned off the computer after scanning Marill and went to retire to my room for the night.

Despite my internal musings on funds, I now had to make a different decision. With Marill as part of the team, I now had the two Pokémon minimum to battle the local gym. I could wait about two months until the season started to tackle the gym, or I could move on.

Honestly, despite having the option, I still planned on leaving the island anyway. Mossdeep, as a city on the edge of Hoenn, didn’t have much going for it. Most of its development was to support the Space Center, and Vulpix and I had already visited all of the popular tourist spots. We would be bored if we stayed here.

Luckily, moving to a different city would technically increase our earning potential. Jobs in Mossdeep paid less than in other cities, so even accounting for the increased cost of living on the Hoenn mainland we would make more from taking jobs. Travel wouldn’t be much of an issue as, while severely reduced, I still had a nice little sum of savings that I planned to dip into to fund travel. It was just enough to reach Mauville if I cut back on my own meals. Feeding two Pokémon would reduce it far faster than I originally planned but it was reasonably doable.

With my increased monetary issues, I was determined now more than ever to get a sponsorship. If I beat a Gym Leader in a battle within the first few days of the League, and then quickly beat a second Gym Leader in a battle within the first month of the season, I would show I had the potential to be worth sponsoring. It wasn’t enough to specialize in the Fairy Type, I had to show I had the ability to go far to be worth the investment.

Most trainers didn't have to deal with sponsorship nonsense since they were generally funded by their parents or family. Since I planned on training a full team eventually, I needed to scrounge together every bit of wealth to support them. Having an allowance from some rich sponsor would go a long ways to my success.

I released Vulpix and Marill into my room to sleep for the night. Vulpix, now used to the amenities of civilization, immediately jumped on the bed and curled up to sleep. Marill just scoffed and walked in the bathroom, where I heard the bath turn on.

How did she know how to turn on the bath?

I walked in and saw that Marill had already turned off the water and the tub was partially filled up. She laid on her back with her eyes closed and floated on top of the thin layer of water. The oil-filled ball on the tip of her tail would help her stay afloat through the night. It seemed she wanted to sleep in the tub rather than the bed.

I walked out of the bathroom and shook my head in exasperation. Marill was behaving far outside my expectations. She adapted to being caught extremely quickly and that angry face she had when we battled her had never faded. It seemed to be her default expression.

I started to get ready for the night to go to bed early. The next ferry to Slateport would leave in the morning and I had plans to board it. With Marill caught and Vulpix trained, it was finally time to leave Mossdeep.