“Look, Em. Ol Machamp’s got a lot of spirit and I won’t contain it.”
He was dressed in a set of brown overalls with tools littering the many pockets and straps over his whole body as he stood over the shattered wreckage of a punching machine laying like a mangled corpse tossed onto Richard’s perfectly manicured lawn. Old outdated grey Pokeball symbols, worn down by decades of time and use, were still visible behind the few places where patch welds weren’t holding the thing together with hope and intuition. This wasn’t the first time Emil had put this thing back together, in fact it was the third in the last four months and Emil was finally beginning to understand why Silph Co. didn’t send him to the same site twice. It was for morale.
“I think Machamp needs something that can handle his ‘spirit’ better,” Emil said as he kicked over a metal plate and got a better look at the mechanical gore. “Unbelievable…”
“You better believe it!” Richard said, high-fiving two of old Machamp’s burly hands, hollering in delight.
“Oh, I believe that. But you won’t believe this,” he said as he dug around and started ratcheting a bent metal case loose from the chassis of the machine. It was held in by some dense springs and seemed to actually hang it there in suspension… that is, of course, until it was given the 20 finger dirt nap. The part came loose, dripping oil onto a rag that Emil held with the other hand like a doctor carefully extracting the heart from a donor corpse. He flipped open a bent panel on it with a little bit of effort, twisted a knob and shook his head in disbelief as several lights illuminated. “This thing still works.”
Richard looked down and picked up a crumpled metal plate from the twisted empty shell on the ground. “Em, you’re a machine of a tech, GOGOAT of nerds, but that thing is toast!” he shouted as he tossed the plate over his shoulder and into the empty concrete hole in the ground that would one day be his pool.
Emil smiled as it clattered in the pit. A real smile, not the fake one he put on for everyone else, and he patted the thing gently as he powered it back down. “Well, these old third generation Silph Co. machines got some spirit in them too, y’know? Your granddad knew a good thing when he saw it. They make the new stuff to be refined but its all so delicate; these fossils just won’t die. You know the company filed a lawsuit to end the warranty on these?”
“Are you saying?”
Emil nodded. “I can fix it.”
“Tauros shit you can. I bet you double pay.”
Emil grinned even more slyly, adjusting his glasses confidently. “And if I can upgrade it?”
“Then I’ll triple it, you madman.”
Emil and Richard had developed a friendship between men as old as time itself. Each had something the other needed, and eventually those little contracts turned into bets. It started when Emil one day watched Richard seething about needing to take on a loan to buy more equipment, carrying away some venerable hand-me-down gear into his shed to erode away until the sun burned out. Emil knew that it wasn’t really legal for him to moonlight-repair things on the side, but Emil needed money and Richard clearly needed things fixed.
He was tired of never having enough to enjoy his life, and the more time he spent at home from his stints at work with Richard, burning under the light of his generosity, the more he was beginning to realize he was spinning around on a Raticate wheel and only getting food pellets in return. So he offered to fix stuff for a tenth of the price of a new machine and a quarter the price for Silph co to send some OTHER nerd to do the same job. At first Emil started with the simple jobs, pocketing easy money as he opened panels, adjusted configurations, and re-calibrated the old beasts with some bootleg software he cobbled together himself. But then Richard started to doubt he could keep going and Emil simply wouldn’t stand for that; so deeper and deeper they delved into the Shed of Mishandled Machines like a pair of sophomoric necromancers robbing a tomb in Richard’s quest to find the one piece of ancient Silph Co. trash that Emil couldn’t reanimate with his cerebral tome of vocational black magic. This only pushed him to succeed; often cajoling Emil to work twice as hard on a repair than he would at his actual job.
The satisfaction of a fist full of tax-free cash was a powerful motivator, and the dumbfounded look on his rich friend was a bonus in and of itself. His car was paid off, his house was moving in that direction, he had his own growing collection of tools, and he was relishing in the feeling of freedom which only a pile of unspent cash could bring.
In fact, their friendship had taken on an additional dimension in those last couple weeks. There were some days where Richard called him over and Emil would show up in his mechanic’s dress only to find out that the lonely dude-bro just wanted to share a stiff drink with someone in his lavish pad after a long day of training. Turns out that when people only want to be around you as you’re winning it big, you get to experience eons of soul crushing loneliness outside the brief moments of glory that overwhelm you with satisfaction. Richard indifferently called him his, “hangover housecall,” which would have been immensely demeaning if it weren’t for the fact that every time he came over to shoot the shit Richard was sober as a Sirfetch’d.
His Pokemon were a pleasure too; more or less depending on how you looked at it...
The one he got to know the most was Ol’ Machamp, one of his dad’s mon. He was an enthusiastic battler, for sure, taking immense pride in every scar and new rippling strand of muscle he managed to stack onto his already monolithic limbs. Any mon his age would have begged to be benched or released ages ago, but every significant injury he took was just an excuse to boss around and train all the other mon on Richard’s lineup; done with delight and no small amount of skill. He was a real trainer’s backup and Emil could tell that Machamp was one of the cornerstones to Richard’s ‘castle.’
His Rhydon had almost as much spirit as Machamp, but the rest of what he missed in soul he made up for in RAGE. At least half of the broken machines in the shed, and almost all of the shattered windows on the block, were because of Rhydon’s tantrums. Emil had learned to get enough in shape to bail and jump over the fence when these started, but it was clear Richard had learned to control them somewhat. Rhydon came from his brother after he decided to give up battling, and some nasty habits were still needing undone it seemed.
Torterra, the other take-on from his brother, was a brute that could take a lot of punishment. Emil would have had more to say about the old gal if he had any reason to believe that anything else was going on upstairs at all. She would sit there and stare at the walls when not taking orders, and more recently at Emil with her hollow gaze, often forgetting to eat if Richard didn’t tell her to do so.
His youngest member was his Inceneroar. She had a lot of ambition, so much that she stacked bricks of it into a fortress of audacity that rivaled Richard’s own egotistical castle. Emil was no pokeglott but every fiber of her being oozed pride in her accomplishments, and when she monspoke at them both after a long training session or a battle he was pretty sure he could understand her bragging. As Emil checked the records her stats became more and more impressive as time dragged on, so he made sure to reinforce the training machines she used beyond recommended specifications.
The one he didn’t see very often was his Metagross. He learned that they were hatched from his Grandfathers’ Pokemon’s stock as a final gift before he ended up passing away on a tour in the Kalos region, but Emil could see there was a distressed relationship between the two. The fact that they had evolved so far so young was a testament to Richard’s respect for his grandfather’s legacy and yet the lumbering steel-type refused to share the same level of camaraderie as the other members of the team. When the training was over, when the battles were done, when the required song-and-Ponyta shows were through they would unceremoniously coop themselves up in their pokeball at the soonest opportunity. Every time Richard extended a kind hand to Metagross and they responded by melting away with red light into their confinement vessel, a strange sort of pain washed over him and Emil would work to distract him from it.
“Its a bet, meathead,” Emil said as he wrapped the component back up. “I’ll have it ready before I leave again.” He nodded at Richard’s Incineroar and she handily lifted him up and over the fence into his yard.
Richard cleared his throat, only now remembering something. “Mind holding off on that one?”
Emil laughed as he started walking towards his own tiny storage unit he had bought specifically to keep his growing mass of personal tools and spare parts. “Getting cold feet?”
He shook his head and scoffed. “Nah, I still bet you can’t bring that scrap back to life. Just, there’s something coming soon and I was wondering if we all could put it together instead of pay'n The Man to do the “some assembly required. Make it a real team effort, yknow!” he said as in the background Machamp started clapping his meaty palms together to encourage the rest of his lineup in starting up some laps.
Emil spun around on his heels. “Are you talking about the Filtration Assembly?”
Richard screwed his face up for a bit, then adjusted his shades with a cool smile. “Whatever the hell you just said, probably.”
“That’s gonna be a lot. Like a lot a lot. Everyone’s gonna need to lend a hand, proper setup for this is no joke, Richard.”
“And?”
Emil wandered back and forth on his own grass, like he often did when he started taking stock of everything that needed done to move some insurmountable mountain. “Gonna need a real hardcore high-torque impact wrench. Sealing kits...”
Richard folded his arms, waiting for the part he enjoyed. “And?”
“And…” Emil nodded with resolve after looking suspiciously side to side. “Gonna need to snag some schematics and soft from the warehouse when nobody’s looking. They expect self builders to screw up and call them back. I’m taking some risks, Richard. Real risks this time.”
Richard nodded one final time. “So?”
Emil folded his arms in return. “Full technician’s rate.”
He laughed out loud and slapped his knee. “I’d get that by having them do it.”
Emil shook his head. “Nah, there’s other fees on top they don’t tell you about… and I’m not moving anywhere anytime soon; pumps need constant maintenance. Ask the Mauville Aquarium to show you their pump expenses and you’ll see an accountant cry instead.”
Richard pursed his lips and pinched his chin in consideration. “Alright big guy, fine fine. You’re fair on your other rates. Think of it as an investment. Full rate….”
Emil waited for the part he expected.
“…if you don’t get soaking wet doing it.”
Emil cackled furiously and slapped his knee like he knew he’d won before the race had begun. “You got it, chief.”
Emil returned from his last deployment just a little later than expected. His mind was constantly twisted in paranoia as he walked around other sites and eventually home with his dexnav’s hard drive packed to bursting with maintenance software he most definitely was not supposed to be using for this purpose. At the end of it all he was tired all over, having done an extra two -day job hundreds of miles away in Kalos at a naval base with broken pumps in addition to his normally assigned route so he wouldn’t arouse suspicion. He also may or may not have sought out his dealer for something he never thought he’d need. A stimulant. Some Ninjask carapace extract. Not illegal per-se, but definitely not allowed to be ground up in a cheap blender, packed into little pills, and then taken like Tylenol.
Regardless of his massive workload, his shopping spree at the industrial hardware store, or the drive home the drugs carried him through. He had vigor to spare as he walked out into his backyard to see an assembled croesus of hydro-mechanical chaos, but he knew his body was on a rapidly ticking timer.
Emil was welcomed home with stacks of pipes, piles of burly-looking nuts and bolts, pallets of other miscellaneous components in un-labeled packaging, and one very heavy wooden crate with Richard perched on top of it in his silk pajamas. “You look like shit, Em,” he said to his friend as he watched him lurch into the yard through his sliding-glass door carrying bags of hardware.
Emil waved his hand in dismissal, like he had programmed himself to do with everyone that pointed out how brutally he pushed himself. “It’s always this way. I won’t die.”
Richard squinted at Emil as he called out all of his team members from their Pokeballs. “Why the hell don’t you go solo, man? That rag is wringing you dry.”
Emil rubbed his bloodshot eyes as he tossed the impact wrench and bags of sealant kits over the fence to be caught by Machamp and Incineroar. “Can’t, noncompete I sign every year. Even if I quit I’d be useless to anyone for ten years. I know someone that got caught for it and he’s not getting out of prison anytime soon.”
Richard hopped down and started prying open the crate with a metal bar. “Jeez, you didn’t tell me you were risking time in the Grey Bar Hotel for me.”
Emil barely considered it before he fell to his knees in front of the new tools and started putting them together. Then, without missing a beat he matter-of-factually said, “I’d have a chance in court. You’re a trainer for the League, right? Silph Co. founded the league, a lot of people forget that they own ‘em since they’ve been so hands off... if The Man said jump, league would ask how high.”
While Emil poured petrol into the tank of the industrial-grade impact wrench and started revving it up Richard held his chin like it was in a vice with a look of intense consideration. Then, after Emil started walking over to the pipes, counting them to compare the pile to the schematics on his dexnav, Richard’s serious face curled into a confident smile. “You don’t say. Ah, well. Let’s get to work, nerd. Stone Team! Em’s in charge.”
That was one of the most brutal days of work Emilio Malison had ever endured. He tried his best, but Richard could tell something was wrong beyond just him being overworked. Then he caught Emil popping several more pills to top himself off just before his hands had begun to shake. Richard knew right then and there the price his buddy had paid for his arcane knowledge. Even so, he also knew that it was a crappy idea to go interrupting one of Em’s weird technical trances he got into. He was going to need to pick a better time to go poking that kind of Ursaring. He knew what it looked like when someone was abusing. You couldn’t miss it once you’d lived the high life. Funny thing that, how two classes of society can be tied together by the same vices. The strength of Richard and his mon assembled the piping where it needed to go in a flash, and the whole lot of them carried the main pump assembly into the concrete building made specifically for it. From there they did miscellaneous heavy-lifting as Emil shook the tiredness from his eyes with the motor of his impact, covered his ears with a set of muffs, and started to drive all the nuts and bolts into place. As the sun was about to start setting, Richard got bored as he checked a schedule on his dexnav. “So, I didn’t mention this but, um…”
Emil wiped his brow as he heaved himself back up from the back access of the pump room. “yea?”
“She’s coming today.”
Emil stared at Richard like he threw some inhumane puzzle into a final university exam. It took long enough for him to respond that Richard finally leaned in and lowered his shades.
“Emil, you know…” he said, gesturing at all the pipes.
Suddenly the lights came on upstairs and Emil smiled. “Oh, jeez. We’re not getting any water brought in yet though.”
Richard was suddenly just as paralyzed with mental process.
Emil leaned in and pushed up his glasses. “Water Pokemon need water, Richard.”
“Distortion dammit! You little Snicket!”
Emil grinned and cackled like a drunk. “Whaaaat?”
“You knew this could be finished without water in it?”
Emil cackled louder. “Well, yeah man. You don’t put water in a pump ‘til it’s sealed and tested.”
Richard kicked a pile of bolts a few feet away as Emil and Richard’s mon all roared with laughter. His anger at loosing his bet was quashed however as a jet-black steel-plated military APC roared its way down the road and into Richard’s driveway, tearing up parts of the grass and invoking nervous onlooking eyes from all the other neighbors. Emil and Richard both squinted and held their glasses as a pair of grey-uniformed men with vicious-looking automatic rifles exited the vehicle with familiar young man from a couple hatches that opened after an ear-piercing pneumatic hiss. Each of them bore a prominent patch on their chests of an emerald green double helix separating the letters J and L. The third man, however, was dressed for success in one of the finest three-piece suits either of them had ever seen and carried himself with a confidence that shook the ground just as hard as his escort vehicle could.
“Richard, the hell are you getting this Pokemon from, the fucking Rockets?”
Richard rolled his shoulders and started marching towards the front of his property. “No… She’s from Apogee...”
Even in his tired state, Emil’s eyes grew wide with surprise. “Somehow that scares me even more,” he said and then plugged his dexnav into the pump’s electronic interface. “I’ll start installing the software to get this going. I’m still excited, wherever she came from.”
Richard walked up to the three men and held his hand out. “Tim!” he shouted as he clasped hands with the businessman and then pulled him into a raucous back-slapping hug. “Holy shit, bro! Look at you! I didn’t think you’d be delivering her personally. I’d ask if you got promoted, but I don’t need to look dumber than I already am.”
The man, who resembled Richard in all but his statuesque physique and was a little bit plump in the face with darker eyes, clapped him on the shoulders with a smile full of newly bleached teeth. “Apogee likes to promote from the white coats. Our CEO looses his mind when anyone over-sells and under-delivers. I’m not gonna complain, it beats scrubbing out the slurry tanks…” he said, the last bit leaving him slightly despondent. He shook his head and held his hand out to lead Richard to his own yard, masterfully owning the stage like any good salesman. “Looks like you’ve met the requirements I told you about. Good. No water, but you’ve got a few days before an inspector shows up.”
Richard thumbed back at Emil who was lazily leaning up against the pump room with a caffeinated drink in his hand. “Got a good support guy, don’t worry bro.”
“Good, good. Well. Let me get this out of the way then.” He cleared his throat and his face went very stoic. “Physical power – Grade 32. Agility – Grade 32. Endurance – Grade 32. Willpower – Grade 32…”
Richard nodded, “Yep, that’s what I ordered, Tim.”
Timothy Stone glared at him. “No salesman shit right now, listen close because it is a really big deal. Recovery Metabolism – Grade 32. Neurological Reflex – Grade 32! Ocular Acuity – Grade 32!”
Richard backed away a little bit as Timothy stared him in the eyes. “I don’t have any idea what those are, I didn’t…”
“I’m not done… For once in your life, Richard, just listen to me… Metabolic Peak – Grade 32! Pokemon Energy Density – Grade 32!”
He pulled a pure white Pokeball with unremarkable serial numbers and bar-codes along its sides from one of his pockets as he rattled on the specifications of Richard’s Pokemon, holding it in front of him as if he was holding a platter of caviar. “Intelligence – Grade 32! You wanted it all, you wanted the best we had… you said it in front of my boss, Richard… well, he fucking listened! On top of that, something got into him and that mutant pet of his and he took it personal; real personal.”
Richard tilted his head as he reached out for the Pokeball, holding it like a grenade with the pin pulled. “You’re saying all that like its a bad thing, Tim.”
“She’s a work of art, Richard, and now he’s bored with her she’s getting tossed at you. This strain isn’t available to the public, but the company sees you going to the Master League like grandpa and dad. So...this girl comes with some disclaimers.”
Richard flicked the lower switch on the Pokeball and it popped open with a crisp snap. The energy from the Apogee Pokeball sparkled white as it formed into shape. A shape he did not at all expect. From a distance Emil gazed at what was going on. He knew it was rude to interrupt a trainer meeting his Pokemon for the first time, but he still wanted to catch as much of this insane spectacle as he could.
“A… Vaporeon?” Emil said as the white energy began to coalesce into the oh-so-familiar silhouette.
Tim nodded and patiently waited as Richard’s face screwed up in confusion.
“Why’s it taking so long?”
“It’s a stasis ball, takes a minute… anyway, I’m sure you were expecting something bigger, more menacing? Oh, no no no. My boss got involved. Trust me, Richard. You got the best we could offer. Maybe a bit more. Here’s the disclaimer, this strain needs a lot of stimulation. A lot of enrichment and involvement from you.”
He nodded confidently and smacked his chest. “Ha! Look at my team, Tim. I keep them busy until they collapse.”
Tim shook his head again. “No, Richard. I mean mental stimulation. The last few test clutches from this strain had a tendency to go AWOL if they weren’t kept busy upstairs. The last thing I need is the mountain of paperwork that comes from sending a recovery strike-force to neutralize this...”
The white energy finally snapped in place and the Pokemon hidden within was unveiled.
Emil gasped and fell back against the wall. It was a Vaporeon all right, the Vaporeon of all Vaporeons. Like an anatomical textbook drawing was made manifest by a master painter and then brought to life by Arceus themself. Her silky blue aquatic skin was flawless and shimmered against the setting sunlight, her fins twitched curiously with spines that glistened like silken sheets carefully stitched onto silvery strings with ivory colored gemstones at their tips. An indomitable anima energized the spines along her back all the way back down along the muscular tail that she carefully wrapped around her flank in a polite perch. More than anything, though, Emil couldn’t help but catch a glimpse of her eyes as they captured the setting sun and swallowed it whole. They were a rich twilight that soaked in the world and consumed it as if all that she gazed upon was hers for the taking, and for a brief moment those eyes locked onto him.
In that moment he felt like a hapless mon of prey cornered in the woods.
His skin flushed red, his heart pounded in his chest, and he suddenly felt very awake without the aid of drugs and he had no idea why. She was unbelievable to behold. Whoever this guy’s boss was, he had indeed outdone himself. Emil knew this was the time that the two of them would meet each other, so he walked around the pump room and started finishing up his job while they did that so he could shake off the sudden feeling of shock he was attributing to him crashing from the drugs.
“Jiminy Kricketots, bro. Look at her!” he exclaimed as he stood with pride over his new prize, hands on his hips like a pirate that had just hauled a booty of jewels ashore.
Tim nodded with satisfaction. “I had a hand in her making too, take good care of her.”
Vaporeon finally shook the stasis from her head, the cold white blurriness giving way to the scene of a working class neighborhood with a mansion cancerously consuming the block. She surveyed in an instant and, like she was trained, accounted for every threat around her. 5 mon of unknown power and skill, nothing she was scared of one on one but in a group she was wary; not that she would let herself show it to anyone… man or mon. She looked up at Richard and read in his body language like a children’s book.
She turned her head back up at Tim with an unimpressed glower as her tail whipped around and made a snap in the air that caused the mercenaries behind Tim jump a little.
“This is Richard, Vaporeon. He will be your trainer from now on.” Tim said, gesturing to Richard. “He’s my brother, I promise he’s good people.”
Her gaze wandered between the two of them, then she sighed and nodded. “Vapee…” she vocalized, as if to say… ‘I suppose he will do.’
“We’re gonna crush it. CRUSH IT, Vaporeon! I can tell you’re made of tougher stuff. Welcome to Stone Castle. Welcome to Stone Team.”
She nodded, one eye lazily opening as she inspected the other Pokemon who were waving at her with uncontrolled excitement. Well, all except Torterra who didn’t do a whole lot other than stare. “Vaporeeon…” she exhaled slowly, sizing them all up as if they were going to jump her all at once in some violent test for her to prove herself to them. She listed back and forth, then eventually wandered over to them and let them inspect her. They asked her all sorts of questions that she could barely keep up with. A lot of them were boring what-moves-do-you-know these and what-can-you-beak-with-your-tail those and so she answered them on repeat as if she was taking some rote exam as she scanned the area, trying to spot something she was knew that she was missing.
Tim hugged Richard around the shoulders and handed him a massive roll of documents kept sealed in a hazy grey-glass cylinder, then started walking back to the vehicle. “She’ll warm up to you, promise. Anyway: she prefers Go to Chess, Salac Berry custard is her favorite food, and everything else is in here.”
Richard waved it off and smiled. “Not worried. I got a good support guy, remember? He’s king of nerds, I got some ideas for him and I think he’ll be able to help me with her too.”
“Love you, good luck.” Tim waved as he faced the other direction, being led away by the soldiers.
Richard spun around to start giving Vaporeon the grand tour of Stone Castle, but she had already begun skulking around the yard as soon as she quelled enough of the boorish tirade of questions for Team Stone to begin their end of day cool downs. She remembered someone else, she barely made them out before as her eyes were coming into focus and she wasn’t about to have any surprises as she took account of her domain. She found an old shed half-full with old mishappen Apogee hardware; some of it she even recognized, though she’d never seen the tech in such awful condition. She slithered around the outside of the house, not going in yet since that would soon be her den; she would make herself familiar with that when she was at ease. She stared down into the empty pool an nodded in approval, then nearby she spotted the pumphouse, hearing some ratcheting noises and a curse or two.
“Vap, vapee…” she chittered with the excitement of the pursuit as she stealthily worked her way around only to be greeted by a shut and locked door. Not to be defeated, she hopped around the back where some pipes were being worked into the building and found an gap. She clawed her way in with immense strength, pushing a few of the cables and thin pipes out of the way, busting some nuts and bolts free as she did so.
Emil, who was in the pump room making some final checks, glared at the dexnav in frustration when a torrent of errors suddenly erupted all over different sections of the pump. “You’re loco, damned thing, no way something came loose back there!” He moaned out loud in frustration. “I’m finishing this today if it kills me, dammit.”
He fell to his hands and his feet and started crawling. He was tired as hell and he wasn’t sure if he was going to be able to get up on his own once he found the issue, but he was committed now. He clumsily wormed his way behind the pipes with a flashlight in his mouth, jamming himself back there as far as he could to see the problem. Suddenly his face was smacked hard against a squishy bony mass that squealed in surprise and clawed at a pipe a few inches from his face in an instant, leaving three deep gashes in the metal. His chemistry-addled brain had no chance of keeping up and all he could do was stare in in shock as Vaporeon shuffled in closer to his face. The two of them nose to nose in the darkness and Emil couldn’t help himself gasping for a second time as he gawked at her in the poorly illuminated crevice.
Her eyes locked onto his. From afar they were like jewels being worn on the neck of a superstar. Up close they were purple-black gemstones that practically mesmerized you into an awe-inspired trance. His face was flush again, his heart pounded, and he was wondering yet again what this weird feeling he was having even WAS so intensely that he didn’t notice at all that he had an erection forming beneath his overalls. Her head tilted left, then it tilted right. Emil copied her instinctively, unsure what to even do.
He glanced up at the gashes in the metal and it was only then that Emil realized how much danger he was in. His chest shook in fear as he gasped out, “O..ooh. H-hi there… Vaporeon… Sorry for--”
Her paw touched his lips, gentle but firm and commanding. She giggled, booped his nose playfully, and then his whole world suddenly transformed into a torrent of spinning currents that vomited him out from behind the pump and bounced him around the walls like a bug being flushed down the drain.
Richard saw the top of the pump room begin gushing water and he ran as fast as he possibly could. “Oh shit! Em! Emil! Are you alright!” he shouted before then managing to force open the door.
He too was sent flying backwards from a torrent of water out onto the lawn. Emil landed on top of Richard, slumped over him like a pile of damp sweaters just pulled out of the washing machine. He coughed and spluttered, forcing water out of his own mouth, heaving water out of his lungs. “H..Holy shit!”
Richard slapped him on the shoulders, laughing uncontrollably at the absurdity of the situation. “It’s alright em, you won’t die. But something else is gonna piss you off.”
Vaporeon stood in the doorway of the pump room, brandishing an innocent playful smile that she barely obscured with her paw as she giggled hysterically as Emil scraped locks of hair off his face like a weeping willow caught in a rainstorm. “yea?”
Richard chuckled and gave him an energetic thumbs-up. “Looks like you lost the bet after all.”
Emil is a quiet man with a well kept secret; he has little to look forward to but even less to complain about as he works his life away and puts up with his obnoxious wealthy neighbor.
That is until a once-in-a-lifetime sequence of events threatens to upend everything he has, should he go for the catch.
