Welcome to Gaia! ::

Shiro nodded. "It's part of their DNA. Like a caterpillar morphing into a butterfly. Designs they have as a caterpillar will carry over into their butterflyhood."

He turned back to the screen. "I'll let you find out in the future though what its evolved form will look like. No sense in spoiling surprises."

He grinned at them, then turned back to the tablet.

"How do people name them?" Andarien spoke up, cutting to the chase.

Shiro looked over at him. "Some people just call them by their species. Some people give them cutesy names. Some people ... well, there's no rule. It's like any pet. You can call it anything you want."

Andarien thought about that for a moment. "Um ... well ... it's an Eevee now, what will it be after it grows?"

Shiro looked at the screen. "There are ... seven possibilities," he said hesitantly. "Did you receive anything to direct its growth?"

"A collar!" Andarien beamed.

Shiro stared at him, not understanding what the significance was.

Shiro let out a low whistle. "Wow. Talk about going for power and intelligence here. But they'll make a good pair. So Andarien, if you want to name it after what it is and will be, its forms are Eevee and Umbreon. Otherwise-"

"Eon!"

Shiro blinked. "Eh?"

Andarien grinned. "I want to call him Eon! Because an eon is a really long time, right?"

Shiro nodded. "Yes ..."

"And we're going to be friends for a very long time!" Andarien beamed. "And it's like its name, too!"

Shiro turned his attention back to the tablet as Andarien started playing with Eon.

"Nothing external," he shrugged. "Though I guess that's not rare, for Pokemon. Of course, there is the traditional method of checking ..."

Andarien blinked at Shiro. "What's that mean?"

Shiro chuckled. "Nothing bad. Just turn it around so it's facing you."

Andarien did so, which of course meant that the Pokemon's backside was facing Shiro. Without hesitating, Shiro reached over the table and lifted the creature's tail.

"Male," he pronounced after only a moment, letting go of the tail and nodding in satisfaction.

Andarien was pleased. "You're a boy!" he announced to Eon as if it were somehow a miracle. Of course, he wasn't remembering that 9 out of 10 Eevees were male.

Shiro read through a bit of the information on his screen. "It says here they'll eat just about anything," he told Lin with a nod. "Berries are best, and fruit ... but anything they'll accept, they can eat."

"Nice and simple," Earendil smiled over at Lin.

"Well, Miyuki, Obaa-san tells me that you're learning about runes," Shiro grinned at her. "If you can master those preservation runes, you can take all you want and have fresh fruit the whole way."

"And vegetables?" Andarien asked, looking up from playing with his Eevee.

Shiro laughed. "And vegetables."

"Preservation runes, you mean?" Shiro asked, not sure if that was what Miyuki was asking about or not. "Well ... I should imagine they would be good for preserving just about anything. All kinds of foods and such ... probably flowers that you pick, too. With a good rune, I'm sure you'd even be able to keep things like milk fresh."

As he understood it, it would be as if time was standing still for the items affected by the rune.

"That's not nearly all of it," Shiro smiled, leaning back in his chair. "With runes, you can create portals, shields, barriers ... why don't we take a look through the library and see if we can't find a book on runes for you? Then you can learn even while we're traveling."

He stood and waited to see if Miyuki wanted to find the book.