Welcome to Gaia! ::

Tristen would finally make his way into the class and get settled in, noting Fela hadn’t made it in quite yet. As he sat down, he’d start taking out his materials, ready for a class full of note taking, until he then noticed Fela making her way in. The twins were probably more of a handful today than normal. Tristen didn’t recall them being too much of an issue. At least she made it in before Mr. Jacq showed up. Though really, if anyone ended up coming in after Mr. Jacq, there’d have to be an issue, honestly. Case in point, Tristen watched as he stumbles in with a disorganized mess of papers in his arms. It was honestly a wonder, Tristen figured, that he was at least organized enough to even manage to give out the lesson as is. He probably wings it…

Tristen would then start taking notes on the lesson Mr. Jacq started to teach, almost immediately. A bit of a shock to Tristen, expecting at least some sort of lead-up as opposed to just jumping in head first into the lesson. Tristen would start taking notes, trying to listen close to the various mating habits of Talonflame, which Tristen would assume that would perhaps go for its lesser evolved species line. Hoppip went wherever the wind carried them. And the list went on. Tristen had to admit with how he was jumping to one Pokémon species to another, it all started to blend together somehow, which made Tristen go back over and stare at his notes in confusion for a second, only for him to realize that no, he got it right. For now at least. Then the homework assignment – find Vivillion, get a picture, then deduce if it is foraging or if it is in the process of looking for a mate. Tristen had to think for a moment. He didn’t notice any Vivillion down in Area One as long as he had been here. Were they rare in actuality? This might take a bit of research. He wondered he might have to start exploring the region a bit more now.

Once class was over, he’d wave goodbye to Fela, Camp, and Penny then started his way off for P.E. Probably presumably the easiest class of the day.

Tristen made his way off towards B, E, and Matteo, getting near them. A relay race? With their Pokémon? That was interesting, Tristen thought. He did wonder when this class was going to allow him to do things along side his Pokémon. But as Ms. Dendra spoke, explaining the ground rules, that left things rather interesting. Tristen thought for a moment – fortunately, save for a couple, he did have rather small Pokémon, but of those, one was a flying type, so Rookidee was a no go. He needed to get his Pokémon to coordinate, run back and forth with a baton. Though as he thought about it, Sprigatito was probably a no-go, still relatively young and probably wouldn’t understand too much as to what Tristen would get at right away. So, that sort of just left two Pokémon outright. Probably would have been the best choices, considering anyways…

Tristen was settled on his decision by the time Ms. Dendra finally made her way around to get Tristen ready. “Hey there Ms. Dendra.” Tristen said, taking out a couple of his Pokeballs and gave them a toss out. There on the grass, two small Pokémon as Ms. Dendra asked. As they materialized, Ms. Dendra would find rather exotic Pokémon as far as Paldea was concerned. First one, after it materialized onto the battlefield, had its antennae shoot straight up. New environment, new faces, why in the world is he here? “Easy, Wimpod. We’re getting some exercise today, okay?”

“Wiii-paaa…” Wimpod spoke up, scooting closer to Tristen. Something told him that he needed to get this exercise done sooner than later if it was possible. Tristen kneeled over to put the water-bug Pokémon at ease, giving a few strokes down its carapace, at least long enough for Wimpod to bring its antennae back down. The plus side, even naturally, Wimpod are absurdly fast without the need of Aqua Jet or anything of that sort. Then again, when an entire species are literally built to make a run for it to every shift of the tide, let alone sight of a potential predator, it would probably be a no wonder.

The other Pokémon, a black and red cat, sat down and started to clean himself. “What about you, Litten, ready to get some exercise?” There wouldn’t be too much of a reaction out of the cat, only a glance at Tristen then went back to cleaning himself. Typical cat. Tristen sighed, his solace is that at the least both of these Pokémon will listen to him. Probably need a little incentive, however, in this particular case. “Litten and Wimpod will be in the relay, Ms. Dendra.”

With his Pokémon signed up, he looked over towards the others. Some he wasn’t surprised to see, like B’s Pokémon, the Lokix and Daschbun, in particular. Others, he was caught a little off guard, like Matteo’s Pokémon. He didn’t imagine him ever having a Buizel nor a Lycanroc. He was left to wonder how long did he have those Pokémon. Must have been a while, at the very least in the Lycanroc’s case. It was probably a fortunate thing Tristen was here only to do a race and not to battle; Tristen didn’t see himself doing too well against much of these Pokémon otherwise.

Tristen would stay close by, making sure that at the very least Wimpod stayed at ease, but was trying to make sure that the Pokémon were paying attention to watch what they were supposed to do. “Alright, guys, see that? We’re going to try to do that as fast as we can. I’ll start, then Wimpod, you can run back to the start line from right there.” Tristen said to his Pokémon. “Then Litten, when Wimpod gets back with the baton, you then run the baton back to me. Then I will run the baton back. We’re going to try to do this as fast as we can, but we can’t use any of our attacks or anything like that. Just our regular running speed. No pressure, though, okay? You will do just fine. Just give it what you can, okay?”

“Mrrow.” “Wii-paaa.” The two of them spoke in reply.

When it finally became Tristen’s turn, he’d look down towards his two Pokémon. “Alright, you two. Right over there, okay? Just like we talked about. I’ll get to you as fast as I can. Remember, no attacks. Just run like normal.” He said to the two of them. His Pokémon ran off towards their positions, Wimpod down the track, Litten and Tristen at the starting line. When everyone was set, he got ready, waiting on Ms. Dendra’s word to go. Tristen was poised, then on the word go and the hard clap of the Hariyama’s giant hands went off, Tristen bolted from the start as hard as he could. No warm up, he was going his hardest running speed as fast as he could with the baton in hand. Tristen’s natural running speed was on full display, something that was pretty much let on the first day he was here as he was leaving everyone else at the time in the dust. At least up until Matteo had to show off his Agility. Tristen was going all out down the track, rushing for his Pokémon. Once he did, he slapped the baton on the back of Wimpod. “Alright, Wimpod! Go! Go! Go! Back to the starting line! Go to Litten! Go!”

“Wiii-paaaa!” Wimpod’s antennae shot straight up then like a shot the Wimpod scurried back down the track the way Tristen came from. In a way, it was almost comical how this thing was blazing a trail down the track. Many would probably accuse Tristen of cheating at this point, but no, this was Wimpod at its most frantic. When a species is in dire fear of effectively everything, the species either learns how to run really, really fast or fight really hard. Wimpods were clearly the former. “Wiii-paaa!” The bug Pokémon screeched down the track.

Once Wimpod made his way down the track, Litten was there back at the starting line, waiting. Wimpod came to a skidding stop, and Litten climbed up on the back of Wimpod, peeling the baton off of the Wimpod, then started to run back down the track. While Litten was faster than Tristen, if it was only due to it being a Pokémon versus a hybrid, he by no means had the scurrying speed that was Wimpod’s. The cat made its long strides, at least for it, down the track as it carried the baton in its mouth, trying to get to Tristen as fast as it could. “Come on, Litten! Almost there!” Tristen called out to his fire Pokémon. “You two are doing great!” The cat’s sprint made it to Tristen in what felt like a decent time at this point, but now, as the cat passed the baton into Tristen’s hand, it was up to Tristen to finish it up.

Tristen once again sprinted hard down the track as fast as he could, trying to get a strong finish. Tristen wasn’t sure just what his time was at this point; he was almost certain that Wimpod alone probably made sure that their combined times stayed relatively low. At this point, though, who knows. Tristen’s feet dug hard into the track, making every step look sort of like small leaps as he pushed his stride all the way back for the starting line and finally stop the clock. “Great job, you two! Litten! Come on back over here!” he then called out to his fire cat. Unlike the relay, there was nothing resembling trying to compete, or urgency. Instead of those long strides, the Litten just had pitter-patter trot, not exactly a walk, but not exactly a run either. Typical cat.

Fifty-one seconds, respectable, apparently, but no where close to the record. Matteo’s father, doing it all in 33 seconds. That would have meant that both he, and his Pokémon, would have had to had cleared every leg of the race in roughly eight seconds a piece. Tristen was left to wonder if they were running on a different rule set, like maybe the alleged “orange blitz” actually did have maybe Agility or Extremespeed. But that didn’t account for the Pokémon either. Tristen could only speculate at that point. But, on the plus side, at least there wasn’t any joykills in sudden Agility usage to outrun Tristen. Thanks Ms. Dendra, Tristen would think. Now that Tristen thought about it, he should try to get back to figuring it back out again. He may have had an idea as to use it, but it was still going to take work. Maybe this weekend? Probably.

With the rest of the students going on down the path, Tristen would give his thanks to his Litten and Wimpod, recalling them both back to their Pokeball, a notion Wimpod was more than ready to do. He’d then watch the other students finish up the track, noting that he actually did outrun Matteo and his Pokémon in particular, coming in a minute flat. Tristen wasn’t going to boast, but did take solace that it was what he thought. B was about what he expected, giving a bit of a cheer to B to encourage him to keep at it. After seeing Indi, Tristen grimaced out of a bit of pity to the poison type trainer. Another trip to the nurse’s office. After seeing how he was doing sit-ups, he was left to wonder if Indi actually realizes that the vape was not doing him any manner of justice.

The class was finally over and Tristen was getting set to get moving. Matteo would approach Tristen and the Manetric gave a nod. “Yea.” He said to the Growlithe hybrid. “Meet up at my dorm?” he then suggested, figuring that he didn’t want this sort of conversation any manner of public, or any interruptions that easily from anyone.

“Yea, sure.” Tristen said to Matteo, just before he went off. Enough time to put everything aside; but the look on his face just told Tristen this might not be pleasant as he’d like. But, this was where he was at. Anything to get everything to start on a clean slate again. Get a friend again. He was trying to extend that proverbial olive branch to allow Matteo to get all his grievances out. Truthfully, though, try as Tristen might throughout the day to get ready for such an encounter, he had the feeling that there was probably no being ready for it. Then again, Tristen hadn’t been in the right frame of mind either, or not like how he’d prefer. Throughout the day he’d worry about what the student populace would of thought of Tristen, and while it was rocky first thing in the morning, Tristen had to admit it wasn’t really…bad. That said, he has been expecting it. Something was bound to happen, he felt.

With a sigh, Tristen made his way off back for his dorm room, making his way through the hallways and off towards the dorm. It only took a few minutes to get from the courtyard to his dorm room. He made his way in, closing the door behind him then gave a sigh. Tristen sat his pack down on the desk then before he got started with anything else went to the window at his bedside, pulling the curtains apart and pulled the blinds up, letting the sunlight in, but more importantly to get a clear view of the window. He needed to be on a lookout for Vivillion, if that was in fact the bug that Fela and he had trained. He’d then go back to his pack for a second, taking out the Premier Ball and set it aside, just to be within reach.

There wasn’t too much more to do at this point. He’d take off his school uniform jacket, tossing it across his bed for the moment, following up with loosening his tie and taking it off of him, also tossing it on his bed. Tristen would then pull out his SNAG, checking the clock. He still had plenty of time. Stashing the SNAG once more, he’d go back to his pack and pulled out his school materials. He needed to at the very least try to get three pictures drawn up of a still life. As Tristen sat down, paper on his desk, he then started to realize something. He started to look around his dorm room, he had a odd realization. “……..I might need to decorate my dorm some…” Tristen said to himself. He might need to go elsewhere for a Still Life, perhaps.

Tristen in the time that he waited tried to get at least a little creative as to how to get a Still Life started. He didn’t really have the time to up and leave to go find something to draw. As he looked around, mind trying to piece something together, he’d put his pack on the desk with him, opening it up and sat a couple of his school books close by it. He then dug in his pack some more to pull out a couple more items, a Lure and Heavy ball, hastily putting them down nearby the other items, then prompted to just leave the bag open. Good enough. Tristen then sat back down and started to try to draw the items nearby, trying hard to take his time with it and not just scribble something on paper and call it art. He took his classes quite seriously. Much to his chagrin, however, as he started to draw the pack as he saw it, he sighed in a bit of irritation. Still didn’t look all that good. And he started to doubt the rest of the picture was going to fare much better.

Tristen perked up as the knock came to Tristen’s door. Sitting his pencil down, he got up from his chair, and quickly, albeit instinctively went back for his uniform jacket to cover himself back up more. But then as he reached for it, he remembered…everyone knows. No use hiding it. He shook his head and just made his way for the door. He opened it, seeing Matteo there with a box of treats in hand, a surprise, if nothing else. “Hey Matteo, come on in.” Tristen was left to wonder if he was still forcing himself to be nice. It was an appreciated gesture, all the same. The ‘toasties’ as they were called did smell pretty good as they sounded as Matteo described them. “That’s interesting. I’d like to give that a try.” He said, wondering if that was a Paldean food as well. He hadn’t anything like that back in Jhoto that he could recall, or at least anything that had something so spicy and something so cooling at the same time in one bite.

Once Matteo then took notice to Tristen’s dorm, Tristen couldn’t help but to sweat a bead. “Eheh…uh, no, its not that. I ended up getting enrolled in the academy suddenly, just right out of the blue so didn’t really have the time to actually bring anything with me, and I didn’t assume that I’d get a dorm at the time.” Tristen said. “Then from there, it was just me being too busy, from classwork during the day to helping Fela raise our science project Pokémon for Mr. Jacq’s class in the afternoon, never mind Team Star towards the end there. Then I had been out for over a couple of weeks and didn’t get back until yesterday. I honestly didn’t think about it until about a short bit ago while waiting on you when I was trying to figure out what to do for Mr. Hassel’s art homework.” Tristen admitted. “I might try to figure something out this weekend.”

Tristen would walk by Matteo and pulled his desk chair around. “Come on, have a sit.” He’d walk over back around his counter, going into his little mini fridge where he kept his minor amount of groceries, rummaging through it. Tristen sighed a little bit, trying to ease whatever nerves he had for this, he might as well just start. “I know you haven’t been too happy with me before the tournament, and I got the feeling that even past the Team Star stuff, there’s stuff you’re upset about still. I noticed that you kinda were trying to stop yourself from saying stuff when B and E got excited about me during lunch. I’m guessing you got a lot to get off your chest and I just wanted to give you the opportunity to let it out, maybe if there is anything you wanted to know, that I can tell you as much as I know. Get it all out there. I kinda don’t want a repeat of all of that around tournament time, let alone after that. I want to be a friend here. I’m all ears.” He’d lift his head up from back behind the counter to look back at Matteo, holding up a couple of Coca-Colas. “Drinks?” he said. Might as well offer something since Matteo brought the pastries.

Closing the fridge door, he’d walk back around the counter and walked to the edge of his bed, across from the chair he set out for Matteo and sat down, cracking open the canned soda as Matteo talked and pled his case. “Well, I didn’t come here intending to do that to anyone. I didn’t know anyone. In honesty, I kinda wondered if I was going to fit in and even up until Team Star’s attack, and while yea, B, E, Fela…Penny…Camp…Nemona…everyone were great and I could talk to them and all, there’s just that nagging feeling that…I kinda…felt like I didn’t belong. And its not because of anything they do or say. It’s weird. I haven’t been around people my age other than…two people. One of them is at best a bully, if not the super annoying bigger sister or something like that. Or better yet, kinda like how Gloria is to us. The other one…isn’t really ever around. I end up dealing with more adults than anything. I end up associating to adults real easy…probably why I manage to make friends with teachers and other staff like Ms. Picante.” Tristen said. “I’ve been told that I’m just not used to it, that I haven’t given it long enough. I’m…trying though. But after that whole Team Star stuff, if it weren’t for my parents, I probably wouldn’t have came back here to the academy. Not just for me feeling weird around everyone, though…it wasn’t helping.”

“There around the tournament, when you started acting like a jerk, I thought you did kinda need to be knocked down a peg. Like I said, I wouldn’t have bothered doing that tournament, or if I just had to, I probably wouldn’t have went in with that team I used, maybe probably a team that could put up a fight and see how far that I could get without outright throwing them under the bus. I had a little too much respect for my Pokémon to do that. But all the same, let my Pokémon get some exercise and stuff that wasn’t a ‘fate-of-the-world’ battle or something like that. But when those rumors happened, I had to make sure that I got to you and show you that you were wrong. Though I gotta admit, I got knocked down a peg too that day, and no, it wasn’t Nemona that did it. When I went in, the only one that I really expected to put up a fight was Nemona. Florian told me about how she was champion ranked or something like that, and apparently the only one in the region that was able to stand up to Nemona was…a Ms. Geeta? The chairlady person.” Tristen said, trying to piece his information together on the fly. At this point, he took a hard swig of the soda before continuing. “I found it a little crazy that there was someone in the region like that. But for anyone else, I kinda underestimated everyone here in this academy. With me being with Team Snagem, I ended up facing some of the toughest there is, my Pokémon got real strong for me as I did for them, I didn’t think that anything that anyone here could surprise me too much, even if they used Pokémon only native in Paldea, or stop Rampardos, Meinshao, or Dragonite until Nemona. And after the first round? Well…Indi didn’t exactly make for a compelling argument that day.” Tristen said. “It wasn’t until after the second round where I had to take a look again. Then B, man, B was tough. Then…well. You, at least up until Shelgon, anyways. Meinshao isn’t probably going to look at a Tauros the same way again, that’s for sure.”

At this point, it looked like Tristen’s dorm was a confessional all around, as far as the Manetric hybrid was concerned. “I didn’t do anything to try to replace you. I guess…” Tristen shrugged for a second, trying to find the words on how he felt. “…I wanted you to be better, too. Better than how you were up to that tournament. I wanted to help you do that. You know…be a friend.” Little did Matteo realize, for him to do that, Tristen had to take a page from his own father’s book: hit them where it’d hurt the worst. In Matteo’s case, his pride, then if able, build him back up to be better. “Maybe find a way that didn’t require you to see some of the stuff that I have because really…it’s…not great.”