farawayplace | Ohritori Vacation!

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pc: ken (kenfrompokemon)

Ohritori Vacation!

[This morning, if you tune in to Ken's Pokemon Talk on the radio, you'll probably hear him announce the program will be on break for the next two weeks while he goes on vacation! And as soon as the program ends, he hops on a boat and is off to Ohritori Island.]

A. GATEWAY PORT

[You can see him arriving at Gateway Port in Turnbloom City, looking pale as he weakly hobbles off a boat and immediately falls onto his knees and hands on the pier, taking deep breaths and looking like he's been suffering from seasickness for the entire journey.]

It's finally over...! Ohritori Island, I'm so glad to see you...

B. POKEMON CENTER

[Once he's rested from his journey, he'll be sitting at the cafe in the Pokemon Center with an ice tea, glancing around somewhat restlessly. A green Ledyba is sitting at his table, eating Berry slices. Spotting you, Ken will smile and wave.

Excuse me, can I ask you a question?

C. ROUTE 1

[Later, Ken can be seen at Route 1 with his Cubburn. He'll find Professor Banyan's laboratory, he'll just wander near it for a while, glancing at the house sometimes like he's trying to gather the courage to approach. Eventually, he'll go up to the door, raise his hand to knock... then hesitates, lowering his hand again. His Cubburn looks up at him with a whine, and Ken sighs.]

I'll do it, just give me a moment...

D. WILDCARD

[Ken can also be seen wandering all around Ohritori Island during his vacation! He doesn't visit the more dangerous places deep in the caves or the forests, but he'll be checking out the tourist spots. Theater Hall, Stardust Beach, the different farms on Gilterrace Town, Route 2 and Route 3; and the Wildflower Cape. Meet him however you want! Also, feel free to recognize his voice from radio!]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[So Gold is here that often... Good to know. Ken can meet him pretty easily then.]

I just wanted to talk to him, that's all... Er, I haven't seen a Sandslash like that before. Could you tell me about it?

[Curiosity over a new Pokemon won over getting information about his brother! Meanwhile, Ledyba's burrowing down the front of Ken's top to hide. Ken barely pays it any mind, used to it.]

I don't see why not! Flamesplash here has been one of my companions for... Well, a long time. Don't worry, she's very nice.

[Flamesplash makes a happy noise and keeps eating her ice cream.]

She's not technically a Fire-type, despite her appearance. Have you ever heard of a Randomizer? It's a machine that resets a timeline to a certain point and changes things -- scrambles them up, if you will. Flamesplash here and I are randomized. So she has a different appearance and different abilities from a baseline Sandslash.

I'm sure she's nice! My Ledyba's just shy around strangers and, well, fire.

[Not fire-types in general, just the ones that are on fire.]

Huh... I've never heard of that, no. So she's really not a Fire-type? She's a regular Nihonian... Or rather, Kantonian Sandslash? She just had her abilities... replaced?

[Time travel? Timeline manipulation? That's way more than Ken expected to get from a talk about Pokemon... But it's new informations about Pokemon, so he'll need to find out more!]

Did every Sandslash in your world get their abilities changed like this, or did different Sandslash get different abilities?

That's right. Later models of Randomizer did change types as well, but what happened to us was the first one. [She nods along.] All Sandslash turned out about the same, though we did end up helping to fix the timeline and most things in the world went back to normal. We're just remnants, if you will.

Later models? This happened more than once?

[Okay, this is a lot to handle. Time travel aside, Ken decides to just focus on the Pokemon for now. That's something he knows about.]

So... Other Sandslash in your world went back to normal. Does that mean yours is the only one of her kind left, or were there other remnants too?

As far as I know. Only a few humans and Pokémon retained the changes -- we had to stabilize the timeline while still keeping us around. I haven't seen another Sandslash like her ever since. Most people around here just assume my partners are regional variants.

Oh... So she's the only one of her kind left? Must be lonely.

[Ken gives Sandsplash a sympathetic look.]

Could I pet her? And if yes, where's a safe spot? With Fire-types, I know I have to be wary of their body temperature, but I'm not sure how to pet a Ground-type that happens to be on fire...

Speaking of regional variants, do you know what happened to Alolan Sandslash in your world when this... event, I guess, happened?

[Flamesplash nods to Alice, and she turns back to Ken.]

She says yes! The head should be fine, just be aware of the flames. She probably won't burn you, but it's always good to be cautious. As for your question, I didn't get to see them myself. The Randomizer did most likely spread that far -- it was active for approximately three years, that should've gotten the whole world roped into it -- but I was working in the field in Kanto, trying to study it and find a way to stabilize it.

[Ken cautiously pets Flamesplash's head! It does feel like a regular Sandslash, just warmer because ofthe fire. It's intriguing meeting a Pokemon with features completely outside its type.]

Right, I guess you wouldn't have time to look into how every Pokemon in the world was affected... I just hope Alolan Sandslash were all right. Did you see any other Pokemon that got... randomized to have skills strong against their type? Another ice-type with fire features, or something like that. How did they fare?

[Sure, there's ice/fire types like Galarian Darmanitan in Zen mode, and grass/fire types like Scovillain, but the Randomized Pokemon sound like they're more unstable, without the right types for their abilities. Ken wonders what "types" even mean in the face of these kinds of mutations. Mutation is probably not the right word, but then what is the right word? It's fascinating.]

Some! And some that came out very lucky, like Surskit being immune to electricity! Though that part didn't last when they evolved, as my Masquerain could tell you.

Oh, that's lucky for them. But they can evolve out of it too... It really is random, huh!

[Ken notices Alice didn't answer the question about how they fare, and assumes he doesn't want to know. Yeah, if the results are gruesome Ken actually would rather not know.]

Anyway, it sounds kind of... fascinating! Pokemon with natural abilities completely outside of their type... I feel like any researchers who focus on Pokemon types could have a field day with that! Or maybe they'd get frustrated and end up having to redefine what Pokemon types are...

It was that, for sure! That was my first real field research project, anyway, when I started travelling when I was 11. Once I found out things weren't meant to be this way, I had to learn more.

[Well, there was more to it, but she's scared the poor man enough today.]

Even without tampering like the use of a Randomizer, different timelines and worlds often have fascinating differences, don't you find?

Oh, you're a researcher? That's awesome! I'd love to learn more about your research sometime. Have you published it anywhere?

Yeah, I'll say! For example, my world has a lot of Pokemon most other worlds have, but they're all native to Ultern! Though, they have different names here.

[Speaking of names...]

Actually, I think we've forgotten to introduce ourselves! I'm Ken!

Oh, that's right! I introduced Flamesplash, but not myself!

[Alice finishes her ice cream and inclines her head.]

Nice to meet you. I'm Alice Smith. I haven't put anything out in this world, but I've got plenty of notes and papers on the go in my lab on Ohritori Island!

Nice to meet you, Alice! I hope to see you publish something, maybe in the local Pokemon magazines! I'm a frequent reader of those, since Ultern always gets Pokemon researchers from all around the world drifting here.

Oh, I'm a radio DJ, by the way! I talk about Pokemon on Chura Radio, so I'm always looking out for new knowledge about Pokemon.

Fascinating! It sounds like fun to me. Chura's a great place for that, isn't it? There's so much nature and Pokémon habitat.

I'm sure it is! But honestly, I'm not really much for field research myself. I just read other people's research and study it!

Really? I suppose it isn't for everyone. To tell you the truth, the journey I set out on when I was a kid was really more studying and field work than gym challenging. Not that I wasn't also doing that.

Oh, that's nostalgic... I never challenged any Gyms when I went on a journey as a kid, myself! In my world, there aren't as many Gyms as most worlds have. So when I was a kid, the closest Gyms were all the way in Kanto, and I just never made it that far from home.

I liked catching Pokemon more than training them, anyway, so I usually just ended up releasing the Pokemon I caught back into nature. And then I got into reading about Pokemon and gathering information about them... By the time they built a Gym closer to my home, I wasn't really interested anymore, haha!

[Alice winces for half a second when he mentions release, and Flamesplash looks concerned, but they both shake it off. Of course release is literal there. Even in their own world, it hasn't meant death for a long time, not since OLDEN turned the PC into a paradise. At least... not for most. So Ken's telling the truth, and he deserves better.]

Sometimes that happens! I've had to do a lot of different things, even ran a Gym for a while in place of its Leader due to extenuating circumstances, but science is still my main passion. People say I got it from my dad, but he was a PC admin and an inventor. Not so much into the cataloguing and study of Pokémon. You know?

[Ken looks surprised by the reaction. Did he say something wrong? But if Alice is moving on, maybe he shouldn't pry... But it is bothering him a little. He pastes a smile on anyway, deciding to ignore it.]

Yeah, it sounds like your dad and you have different interests, but they still fall under the same umbrella of science... So I'd say you might've inherited the passion for knowledge anyway!

I suppose you're right. I hope that's all I inherited. ...Well, that and the ice cream. He loved it too, but I'd better not turn out lactose intolerant like he did.

[She waves it off and looks around.]

What about you? What made you like radio so much?

Hey, I've had some good ice cream that turned out to be lactose-free, so I'm sure you could manage either way!

[Ken will just assume that ominous "I hope that's all I inherited" was just about the ice cream! He's a positive thinker.]

Heh, well, we didn't really have internet when I was a kid, so we had to find ways to amuse ourselves, you know? And I was from a small town, so there wasn't much to do if you didn't feel like playing outside. So I ended up listening to the radio a lot! And sometimes, when playing outside, I'd pretend to be a radio announcer for the smaller kids in the neighborhood to "call in."

So you're in the field you always wanted, too! That's always good to see. You mentioned you were from somewhere near Kanto?

Yeah, I got really lucky! I managed to get a job interview at the radio back home, and they hired me right away!

That's right, I'm from Johto. Technically, I'm from the Nihon Region, but Johto's a part of it, and people from other worlds tend to recognize Johto better than Nihon. You're from Kanto, right?

[Or so he assumes from how she mentioned she did field research in Kanto.]

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