Welcome to Gaia! ::

Looking up from his menu Takamaru was startled to see a boy with a lush Green hair color, his own deep silver bangs fell across his face as if on cue, ok, so he wasn't that startled by the boys hair color. Takamaru watched as the boy passed out his pokemon's food to there respective owner.

"Yes it does, defense is a rather important stat in my perspective, escpecialy for steel type pokemon" he said then looked down at Spike and lancer, "As well as for soon to be steel type pokemon. And as for my trainer status, Yes i am. what gave it away?" he asked swinging his Bangs out of his eyes as he placed the menu down, a good-humored-though-mocking grin laid down upon his face. His three pokemon began to devour the food, they all seemed to enjoy the food, even Iron hide which was surprising because he's usually rather picky about whom he lets feed him.

"I can tell. My job is to see what kinds of different tastes people have, and your flavor is definitely that of a trainer."

Cilan lowered the now empty tray to in front of his waist. "So then are you here for a gym battle? You may want to wait until your pokemon have time to digest their food."

“Whom? I’m sorry, but you are mistaken,” Cilan told Takamaru as he lowered his tray to his side and softly smiled. The waiter held up three fingers. “The Striaton Gym has three gym leaders. Which one you battle is dependant on what pokemon you choose to battle with.”

His eyes roamed to Takamaru’s pokemon, still in the middle of dining. “I see you’ve got a Karrablast, a Drillbur and an Aron. Which one of these pokemon are you planning to use?”

((Only got nine days to battle Cress, Takamaru.))

Luckily Henrietta wasn't out for long. She woke up in the break room across some lined up chairs. She sat up and the towel over her fell. Her sweater had been removed leaving her spaghetti strap tank, and two nasty bruises showing.

"Those look nasty," Genie said from across the room as she looked at one of the waitress dresses. "What happened?"

Henrietta looked off to the side. She didn't want to answer, so she remained silent.

"It's fine if you don't want to say. Here, you think this fits?" she said as she crossed the room and handed Henrietta the dress. Henrietta stood up and held it against herself and, sure enough, the size was fine.

And a trip to the bathroom later, Henrietta was dressed up like a waitress, big old poofy shoulders and all.

"Come on," Genie said as she lead Henrietta toward the dining area, "I'll train you."

The basics of being a waitress was not something Henrietta was used to. First and foremost, being friendly. Make eye contact, smile, and be friendly. Your tip usually reflected one of two things, customer service, and attractiveness. Henrietta wasn't confident in the latter, and the prior seemed even more impossible.

The process was simple, though. Get a customer, or a group of them, when they come in. Ask them how many are at their table, take the menus, lead them to a table with enough space, and tell them you'll be right with them. Prepare to go get drinks, take first orders, take drinks, take food orders, wait for food to finish, take food, and then check up on customers every five to ten minutes.

The entire process could take up to an hour. If you had more than one customer, longer. Genie said normally they took it easy on new people, but Henrietta owed a debt so she'd be 'worked to the bone'.

Two tables after Genie helped her out. So, this would be her second hour.

The first customer came in, just one guy. Henrietta approached and awkwardly smiled and looked passed his head and said, "t-table for one?"

"Yeah," the guy said and Henrietta grabbed the menu.

To the table they went and Henrietta repeated what Genie had said before, to speed up the process, "d-do you know what you want, o-or would you like some time first?"

"Some time, thank you."

Henrietta nodded and quickly fled.

"Good work!" Genie said as Henrietta went into the kitchen area.

"Th-thank you," Henrietta said and she lowered her head.

"Don't look, but he was staring the whole time you walked away."

"H-hum?"

"Yup, I bet he likes your hair. Must think you're cute."

Henrietta resisted the urge to look and busied herself doing other things.

"What's with the hair, anyways?"

"D-dumb decision," Henrietta looked over at Genie. "I-it's not important."

"But it sounds so interesting."

Henrietta shook her head and Genie sighed and slumped her shoulders but didn't press.

And a minute later Henrietta was back at the table. This time she payed attention to the guy. Indeed he did seem interested, if not a little weird.

"So may I ask your name?" he said after Henrietta had jotted down his order.

"H-hum?"

"Your name?"

"H-henrietta."

"That's an interesting name. They call me M-, well, actually, now they call me Doctor Altiena," he said and he offered his hand to shake. Henrietta hesitantly complied but had a little bit of trouble retrieving her hand. And then he kissed it and Henrietta tugged it away.

"Sorry."

"H-hum," Henrietta looked around and saw customers by the door and said, "I-i need to go."

When she returned she handed the order over to the cook and sighed and slumped down against the wall.

"A creep, eh?" Genie asked and Henrietta nodded.

"Well, luckily he'll be gone hours before you leave. That's how it usually works, anyways."

Henrietta nodded again and sighed.

"You don't talk much."

"H-hum..."

A moment of silence.

"He smells..."

"Hm?" Genie cocked a brow.

"The guy. He smells."

"Smells?"

Henrietta nodded.

"Like what?" Genie asked.

"I don't know.. There's a hint of cabbage, though."

"Heh, odd."

Henrietta, for the rest of the doctor's duration there, was given a few small mercies. She lacked any means of contact, so when the man asked, she was able to decline honestly. And soon he left and Henrietta returned to the kitchen and was awarded with a break.

"Just fifteen minutes, don't go over it," Genie said and Henrietta nodded.

***

And soon she sat outside of the back door. 10:00 A.M., she'd woken up around 7:-something, and started her morning off to a pretty bad start.

But now she could get some things done.

First and foremost, the gym wasn't anywhere near wild Pokemon so Henrietta had to make do. First the case of Melty.

"Hit him with Incinerate," Henrietta told Darumi.

"Daru!" the Pokemon refused.

"Please," Henrietta said and Darumi looked at Melty, sighed and then blasted the fire/ghost type.

And Melty cackled powerfully.

"There aren't any wild Pokemon around, so you'll have to focus on your training, the one we did with Chili. First, do you have any new techniques?" Henrietta asked.

And Melty released a dark image, something frightening and Henrietta fell back in fear.

Yes, an attack that manifested as something to fear. In Henrietta's case, it would be the person who unnerved her the most.

"H-hum, scary. We'll call that scary blast."

New name for Night Shade.

"And then we have the two other attacks. Ignite, when you create that big smog explosion," Henrietta said as she held up one finger, "and flame thrower." Which was obvious.

"Use flamethrower, just shoot it into the sky. Same training as before," she said and Melty nodded and complied and the powerful flame shot into the air.

Then came Darumi and Socant.

"Yesterday we ran into a snag with our battle with Wayne. Socant is small enough to get onto targets, but roll out hurts what we can do. I have an idea, though. Darumi, roll out."

Darumi complied.

"Socant, climb on but move into the center of his form."

And Socant barely managed this thanks to the speed of roll out.

And then came the obvious problem. "Darumi, Incinerate, Socant, avoid it!"

The roll out's internal area exploded into flames and Henrietta struggled to see it but she managed to catch Socant on Darumi's side.

"Roll onto the side, crush him," Henrietta said and Darumi complied but the action ruined roll out and Socant managed to escape.

"Haha!" Henrietta jumped happily and made her way to her Pokemon. Socant stood victoriously on top of Darumi.

"Alright, Darumi, same training as Melty. Socant, come here," she said.

Darumi obeyed and tried to compete with Melty for flame size, but it was no contest who was stronger.

"You don't need a lot of room, which makes this perfect. When it comes to that strategy it works unless our opponent is literally a ball. That psychic type before, though, we could probably beat him if you could get inside of his bubble. I think we should train your jaw to be able to bite through it. You wouldn't need to get through much, just enough to drain him from the inside.

So Henrietta spent the next few minutes gathering tiny twigs and she handed them to Socant for him to work on biting through.

And while her Pokemon trained, Henrietta sat against the wall next to the back door and sighed.

"Here," Genie said as she arrived and laid a plate with a slice of pie on it and a glass of water next to it.

"H-hum?"

"You haven't eaten at all, have you?"

Henrietta nodded.

"So eat up."

"A-are you sure?"

Genie nodded.

Henrietta hesitantly complied.

"You're a lot more sociable with your Pokemon. Is it cause they're just like pets to you?" Genie asked.

Henrietta stared at the plate.

"Hm?"

"I-i don't know."

Genie giggle. "No biggie! Pokemon aren't people, so it's okay to see them as something less."

"N-no, th-that's not true!"

"But isn't that what you're doing?"

"I-i, h-hum..." Henrietta sighed.

"I'll see you inside in five, have fun." Genie was off with a giggle and a "don't dwell on it!"

The next two hours passed by in a flash and soon Henrietta was leaving the job. Her sweater was still soaked, and to be fair, she'd actually forgotten about the bruises as the day had progressed and the pain had faded, so as she left Striaton Gym it was in her tank, bruises showing.

A hand caught her wrist.

"Hey!" Dr. Altiena was there, holding her wrist. Two hours after he'd left.

Henrietta's hand fell onto the handle of her shinai.

"Are you free?"

"H-hum, I should train."

"Train? Hey, what's with those bruises. Did someone hurt you?"

"N-nothing, i-it's nothing."

"Hey, if someone's hurting you, I'll take care of them."

Henrietta pulled at her arm to get free but his grip tightened.

And that was enough of that. Henrietta's other hand flew to her shinai and grabbed it and she pulled the shinai free of captivity and twisted her arm free and spun around and entered stance and faced the doctor.

"W-whoa!" the man stumbled backward. "I'm just trying to help!"

Henrietta was silent. Everytime she said something she got berated or laughed at. People only took her seriously if she didn't say anything. If she looked depressed, Kijin apologized. If she stumbled weakly, Avan agreed to call off an insane match, if she said nothing, Wayne didn't have a reason to laugh at her.

So she said nothing.

"Hey!" he reached a hand out and Henrietta struck his wrist.

"Ouch! Psychotic b***h!" he shouted and ran off.

Henrietta stood there for a bit longer before sheathing her shinai and carrying on. To the Pokemon center to heal her Pokemon, and then to the route to train.

Leaving the pokemon center with freshly healed Pokemon, Henrieta made her way to the route. She'd already battled on Route 2 and it was, to say it simply, weak. She'd conquered it, and it hadn't been enough to even hit Cress. So, she'd have to conquer another route.

On her way to route she spotted Wayne training in the water. She recalled their last encounter, he'd yelled at her to keep fighting. And then he went in to battle Chili, right?

Knowing him, he probably won.

Henrietta slumped her shoulders and carried on. Cute boy poked fun at her, it wasn't just outside of her normal to go out of her way to talk to him, it felt more like he wouldn't be interested.

So, the bruised up heroine pushed forward, toward route 3.

Henrietta was caught off guard. She'd seen him but she didn't expect anything. So as he approached she turned to face him and looked at his neck. He seemed cheerful, quite the opposite of how Henrietta felt.

"H-hello Wayne," she said.

He commented on his pants and Henrietta's eyes dropped and fell upon the Petilil and she shook her head. "H-hum.. I wouldn't do that. I-i'm just heading to route three to train."

Rematch?

"Y-you didn't win?" Henrietta asked. She'd honestly thought he would. Wayne was strong, as a trainer, and as a person. She looked at Petilil. So this Pokemon was going to be competing?

"I-i taught Melty some moves for the same reason," she said.