[attr="class","spiral"]Hey there fellas! The last few weeks have been really difficult for me for a number of reasons, and my ability to post has been delayed as a result! Between election anxiety, family drama, and the onset of my seasonal depression I need some time to get back into normalish vibes. I'm not leaving or anything, but I need like another week to screw my head on straight! I'm going to try to pre-write all my posts within that week so I can hop back into the fun on . . . let's say November 25th.

Thanks for your patience! Love you guys!

AFFECTED CHARACTERS: BERNICE ALBERS @klara LILLIAN GLASS

[attr="class","spiral"]Leaving home got her started and Slateport got her fired up, but Birdie can't help but think this little retreat into the country has been perhaps the most important leg of her journey so far. Meeting people. Helping people. Training. She's been able to do it all!

In truth, it's kind of hard to think of leaving. Especially with her garden back in Littleroot. But she has to! She wants to!

For the first time in her life she can say with certainty that she's feeling confident as she continues her slow march back to the docks off of Petalburg City. A little bit of slow living has her itching to get back into the fast lane!

She goes running onto Route 102, then, and does her best to soak in the fresh air flooding her lungs while it's still around. No time to waste!

[attr="class","spiral"]"Okay! Let's do this!" Birdie shouts into the mall as stores shutter for the evening and lights dim all around, "This thief isn't gonna know what hit 'em!"

She stands proudly before the fountain as she makes her declaration to the open air. Confidence! She needs to be confident! And confidence means volume! If she just shouts about how good this is going to work out she can will it to go that way! Even if she is kind of worried . . .

The last time she took a job like this she was more than a little outclassed by the threat. That Beheeyem, she later learned it was a good deal stronger than her pokemon, as if the way it slapped Bubbie around wasn't enough to make that clear. If it's another opponent on that level has she really grown fast enough to put up a fight?

"No! No thinking! Just doing! We're gonna do it, Drifter!" she shouts over her anxieties. It helps put a dent in them, but seems to do nothing but annoy her Murkrow. He's never worried like this, so all her shouting does is give him a headache. He voices his complaints by digging his talons into her shoulder a bit harder than necessary.

"Ah! Fuck! Dude!"

[attr="class","spiral"]Her excitement holds strong through the introduction of the other trainer's next pokemon. An . . . uh . . . yeah! Eevee! She can remember a cousin of hers that was obsessed with the things. Though she can't remember it having a dragon-type evolution. Maybe it's something only veteran trainers can bring out?

"Nice to meet you, Eevee!" she shouts with a wave. Birdie's bouncing with anticipation at this point. What's he going to do with Eevee? A demonstration? Maybe talk more about the bonds he has with his pokemon? Her head is spinning with possibilities when it's brought to an abrupt stop by reality. She blinks a few times as the enthusiasm runs out of her like water from a punctured bucket.

"B-battle?" she asks, voice now too soft to so much as register against the strong voice of the man instructing her. It feels like things might be moving a bit fast. She just lost a battle like ten minutes ago against someone way worse than this guy, this doesn't seem fair. She wants to object. Like, really wants to object.

But then, as if reading her mind, he nips the complaint in the bud.

Confidence. She's never really had it, and she definitely doesn't have it right now, but if she's going to do this whole adventure thing she should at least try to fix that, right? Especially around this veteran trainer who's compared her to champions.

If he can have that much confidence in her so quickly she has to be able to muster up at least a little, right?

So she roars.

"Raaaaaaaah!" she shouts after the Eevee's example, "Raaaaaaaaaaah!!" she shouts again after Mateo's coaching.

"Raaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!" she roars for real, one last time, and immediately after returns her Dewpider.

"C'mon Drifter! We're gonna do this!" she's practically screaming in the middle of this public square at this point, but she doesn't care. And it seems to almost do something for Drifter. Without complaint he struts over to a position in front of her.

[attr="class","spiral"]"Uh, no, like . . . Birdie's fine! I like Birdie now!" she practically shouts, voice stuck in its pitched up place out of embarrassment, "Sorry, uh, Bernice is, uh, it's complicated."

Birdie fidgets in place while speaking. It's impossible not to. She squirms in her squatted position, her sweaty hand wrapped up in her shirt while her other runs over it in a sloppy attempt to dry it. Oh boy this sucks!

"Yeah, I guess, maybe I overreacted. It's just, uh, like, I don't want you thinking I'm some sweaty loser or whatever haha," almost immediately she pushes into her next sentence, "That's not to say that you, like, are one for sweating I, uh, aw man."

It's lucky for Birdie that the other girl knows how to push a conversation forward. It's also lucky for her, for once, that Drifter is such a little shit. The two graces come together in a beautiful way.

"Ah, something sweet sounds great! I'll definitely take you up on -- Drifter!" she goes from calming down to absolutely squealing again at the sight of her Murkrow. Now completely fed up with being ignored he's moved from posturing to genuinely starting to peck and take swipes with his talons at the Lucario. That's not cool! That's so not cool! Birdie abandons their conversation to quickly scoop him up in her arms.

Immediately he gives her a few more scratches on her arms for the effort.

"Sorry! Uh! I think this dude needs a break!" she shouts over his fussing -- a mess of caws and flapping wings and beak clicks. She starts backing back towards their basket of berries with a weird half-bow.

"Um! I think I should probably just turn in my berries and head out! But I definitely want to go to that bakery!" the urgency of handling Drifter gives her enough adrenaline to speak clearly as she starts to make her exit. He makes sure she doesn't run out by planting his beak in her throat.

"Guhk!"

[attr="class","spiral"]For the second time Birdie is comforted by a gentle hand, and for the second time it works. Something about such casual, friendly contact just instantly puts her at ease. She can't help but bashfully grin back at the other trainer's praise.

His words are something she hadn't realized she was lacking until now. Encouragement from someone else. Encouragement, and empathy, and even a little bit of confidence. She's not sure she buys the comparisons to a league champion, but to have someone listen to her and affirm her feelings . . . it's almost enough to choke her up. Almost. She sniffs hard through her nose to push that embarrassing feeling down and nods into the hand on her head.

"Thanks," she practically whispers between one of the man's phrases and the next.

The more he speaks the more Birdie can feel something in her revving up. Worries and anxieties she only recognized in passing are brought to the surface and quelled. About her lack of direction, about her uncertain passions, about her fear of failure. As they're stripped away they're replaced by energy. Desire. Being cool and reliable like a pokemon is the start but now she wouldn't mind living up to all the promise this man sees in her, too.

When he promises to help her find her way she's practically fit to burst.

"I'm ready, sir!" she practically shouts, eyes beaming.

[attr="class","spiral"]Okay, so maybe her partner is a bit icy, but at least she's got some passion! Birdie can't help but be a bit amazed at the turnaround in energy between her lackluster "greeting" and her sudden leap into action to find the Wooloo. It's really something else!

"Uh, nothing, I guess!" she replies to the other girl's question before looking down at Dozer again, "C'mon buddy, you heard her! No time to waste! Let's follow 'em!"

She doesn't give her Cufant much choice once she makes the suggestion. Her partner isn't exactly waiting for her as she follows her, uh, lizard . . . thing . . . so Birdie can't keep moving at the anxious pace her pokemon was keeping up until now. And that's a good thing! He needs to build confidence!

So as she tears off after her partner, Dozer tears off after her -- anxiously trumpeting every few steps.

[attr="class","spiral"]Contrary to earlier, when the man's words pushed her into begrudging silence with their truth, the deriding of her mindset and general mockery this time around actually makes Birdie really mad! Her face goes red as he openly laughs at her and (despite her diminutive height and lack of physical strength) her hands tighten into little fists as he takes jabs at her age and perspective.

Of course she knows pokemon are for more than just battling! Of course she knows what a coordinator is! What does he know? She's feeling ornery by the time he brings the conversation to a place she can re-enter. The words about staying home especially strike a bad chord in her chest.

"What home?" she snaps, biting back harder than intended, "What do you know about the options I had?"

There's a real petulant quality to the way she replies, but it's not the only thing there. The insipid whining from earlier is supported by more genuine anger brought on by honest offense. Still, it's reined back by the time she opens her mouth again. Already the momentarily stoked fire is settling back to a passive blaze.

"Sure I don't know much about being a trainer, but it was the only thing I could think of for a reason," she says, staring at the ground and kicking at it with her worn sneakers. She takes a breath then. The man asked her another specific question it's about time she answer it. She looks to Drifter for a second before she does.

"I like pokemon for how tough they are, and how it, like, just comes naturally to them to be cool and self-sufficient. At least that was the start of it," she looks up from the ground to look at the veteran trainer as she speaks, "I thought maybe if I became a strong trainer I could help them and they could help me, or whatever."

[attr="class","spiral"]It's a bit of a bummer to once again be met by a cold shoulder. As much as she loves these ranch jobs she can't say she enjoys this coincidental constant within them. Still, it gives Birdie a second to look after Dozer. While she waits for the other girl to respond to her in some way she crouches down to pet the top of her Cufant's head. He gives a few soft trumpets through his trunk at the attention.

"See, it's not so bad out here," she murmurs to him, taking her other hand and stroking his cheek. He still seems kind of nervous, but at least doesn't go back to hugging her legs when she stands back up. Though the look from their partner for the day does make him reconsider that decision.

"The trees . . ." she echoes, finally seeing the stomped down grass that leads out from the broken fence, "Uh, how many? I think it was, uh, five? Yeah, he said five I'm pretty sure." It's probably not the confident answer her partner was hoping for but with all the old man's rambling it was kind of hard to catch the important facts and parse them from the chatter. Especially when someone got him all worked up by ignoring him before she go there.

[attr="class","spiral"]"That sucks. I mean, the not meeting your great grandmother bit, not, like, being named after her," Birdie isn't sure how much sympathy that actually deserves (she never met her great grandmother either, how many people do?) but probably some right?

"Birdie isn't actually my name name, my name's Bernice, but nobody calls me that," she matches Avery here, speaking and regretting speaking at the same time as she stumbles into oversharing territory, "Birdie's like, a nickname, but also kind of like an insult? But I turned it into a nickname so it's all good."

Oh man her hand is really sweating now.

"Lilycove? That's a coastal city, right? Totally! I'll totally come visit some time," it's around the end of this sentence that she feels her hand slip just right in Avery's grip to realize they are still shaking hands and that her hand is kind of a mess. Losing perhaps the last bit of composure she could claim to have here, Birdie quickly yanks her hand out of the other girl's -- a very easy process given the ample lubrication they've both provided.

"Oh man, my bad, I'm so gross!" she practically whines before smothering her hand in her shirt. Noticing how sweaty her hand is gets her face going, too.

Drifter is unbothered by these shenanigans, instead zeroing in on the Lucario that refuses to take his bait. He scratches at the ground with his talons before flapping his wings a bit and jutting his head forward. Little, agitated caws slip out between beak clicks.

[attr="class","spiral"]Avery's blushing has Birdie blushing too in short order, and while it may have been Avery's hand that was sweaty on contact it's undoubtedly both of their hands that are sweating as Birdie turns the momentary handhold into a handshake.

"Uh, no, don't sweat it! I didn't, like, give you a lot of chance to, right?" Birdie replies, once again finding herself looking the girl in the eyes before quickly picking a different spot of the face to stare at (the eyebrows this time), "Avery is a really, pretty, name too."

She fumbles her compliment to the other girl's name a little, but means it genuinely. Already she's repeating it in her head over and over, connecting it to the smell of flowers; and this sweaty handshake that should probably stop about now, but has faded into the background for Birdie.

"And running a daycare, that's really cool!" she goes on, "That makes a lot of sense, I can totally see it."

While Birdie falls all over herself, Drifter moves from in front of the girls to in front of Avery's pokemon. His attention wanders as the spotlight leaves him -- the staring Lucario hasn't go unnoticed and the Murkrow wants it to know. He fluffs his feathers a little bit and snaps his beak a couple times as he approaches.

[attr="class","spiral"]Drifter seems more than happy to soak up the praise. It's weird for Birdie to look at, to see him almost peppy in the face of the other girl's comments. He plucks up a bit more of the feed before cawing loudly in appreciation.

"Yeah, you really seem to know your stuff," Birdie says, finding it hard to avoid fidgeting in place. There's an awkwardness that hit her a few moments ago that she can't seem to shake. Embarrassment maybe? She doesn't know and hopes maybe not standing around like a doofus might help.

She lowers herself to the ground next to the knowledgeable stranger, squatting beside her and in front of Drifter. Instantly the faint scent of flowers hits her. It catches Birdie a little off guard. She'd been assuming the smell was the flowering berries up until just now. That awkward feeling grows a little bit when she realizes it was coming from this girl.

Before she can get too into analyzing the feeling, though, the girl's pokemon arrive. Their interaction is sweet and she can't help looking at Drifter in the moment following it. He clicks his beak and narrows his eyes a bit at her scrutiny. Birdie narrows hers in reply before turning her attention back to the other girl.

"Uh, anyway, um," god what is with her today, "I'm Birdie, by the way."

She extends one of her hands (previously tucked between her knees) as she speaks -- after wiping it a half dozen times on her pantleg.