Ch. 7 A New Food Junkie

"Ow! Ow! Stop it, you little shit!" I shouted out as the Inkay kept Pecking at me. I hadn't even released it. It came out by itself and immediately attacked me awake. As it came in for another round of Pecks, I punched the side of its head and sent it careening into the edge of the bed frame. It squeaked out in pain and shakily rose back up. 

Instead of coming to Peck at me again, it flashed dim lights from the yellow spots on its…

"It was you!" I yelled in recognition, surprising the squid. "You were the one causing those headaches!"

As I said it, the headache from the other day came back in full force. It made me wary of the Pokémon, unnaturally feeling a sense of haziness in my head that prevented me from going after it despite my anger. Just as I began to calm down, it lunged forward to continue its merciless attack.

We went at it for a while, falling into a cycle of me getting a good whack in and then getting dazed on the spot by its flashing lights, only to be restarted as it launched another wave of attacks. After what felt like hours, I grabbed the Inkay and threw it away from me.

"Alright, enough!" I said, raising my hands up. Inkay was breathing very heavily and was barely able to keep itself an inch off the floor. I wasn't much better, with bleeding cuts and small gashes all over my body. It tried to start the next cycle, but I raised my hand in front of its face.

"I said stop! Hold up, man. I don't want to hurt you anymore," I said, causing it to float backwards, adding more distance between us before it rested on the floor. "You were following me since Santalune Forest, right?"

Its distrustful eyes never left mine, but it slowly nodded its head. Though that looked pretty comical considering its head was basically its whole body.

"Why?"

"Inkay!"

"..." I stared at it for a few seconds. "I don't know why I thought I would be able to understand, but I've no idea what you just said."

The Inkay rolled its eyes and sighed, before pointing at me with one of its white tentacles and then pointing at its mouth. I stared at it, completely at a loss of words. "You wanted to eat me?"

"Ink!" it cried out, nodding its whole body once again.

"Then why did you try to save me?" I asked, confusion in my voice.

"In?" it chirped, slightly tilting its body. "Kay, Ink. Inkay." As it talked, it motioned with both tentacles, ultimately going back to pointing at me and then its mouth.

"You wanted me for yourself? You saved me so you could eat me?" I asked, quickly receiving a confirmation. 

"What the fuck man," I said, sighing outloud. "Don't you have a group or clan to hunt with?

The Inkay looked at the floor, obviously very uncomfortable with the question, but quickly looked up in defiance. "Inkay!" it cried and once again launched forward with a glowing beak. Before it could land the attack, I swung down and hit it with a hammer fist punch. The Inkay yelled in pain and bounced off the floor coming back into the air where I was able to land a square punch on its face.

When it opened its eyes moments later, I called out to it. "Didn't I say enough? No more fighting. Can't even interact with my first Pokémon with almost getting killed in the process."

The Inkay stared at me with hate in its eyes. It would've been slightly intimidating, having a creature that could take your hits and kill you with enough effort stare at you menacingly. Unfortunately for it, both of our stomachs growled loudly. Very loudly. Its eyes widened and it looked away in what I could only guess to be embarrassment.

"Listen, I have a proposition for you," I said, earning distrustful eyes. "I can tell you're very hungry. I am too. If you really want, you can leave whenever you want. I'll release you from the ball and you can get back to your life in the wildlife. But first, join me for some breakfast. I'll order food for both of us. You can eat what you want, and if you decide you'd rather be one your own, then you can leave. But if the food is good and you enjoy having breakfast together… Well, let's worry about breakfast first."

It stared at me for an uncomfortably long time before nodding in agreement, its hunger probably pushing it to my side for this. I smiled in relief and picked up the phone in the room.

"Hello, this is Nurse Joy's desk. How may I help you?" I heard an unfamiliar voice. It was probably an assistant or intern covering the front desk while Nurse Joy was busy.

"Hi, this is Marco from room 314. I was wondering if it was possible to have food brought up to my room. My leg is a bit messed and Nurse Joy told me I needed to stay in bed while taking my medicine," I answered.

"Oh, let me see here," she replied. I heard the clicking and clacking of a keyboard for a few moments before she talked again. "You can have food sent to your room. All you'll need to do is call the canteen and place an order for your room. Is there anything else you need?"

"Actually, can you send a Chansey up?"

"... May I know why?"

"Um, the Pokémon I caught yesterday woke me up by attacking me and I may or may not have had to punch it several times in order to calm it down."

"..."

"Is that a yes on the Chansey?"

"Nurse Joy was right. Your calls are a headache," I heard her say with a sigh. "Chansey will be right up."

"Thank you."

"Please don't destroy the room any further, or hurt your Pokémon."

"I'll try no-."

*beep* *beep* *beep*

"Wow, she actually hung up on me," I said. "How rude."

I dialed up the number for the canteen and heard Nookie give an unenthused greeting on the phone. "Hey, Nookie. I was wondering if I can place an order for room 314."

"Sure," he replied. "How do you know my name? Almost no one pays attention to the clerks."

"I'm the Trainer that was joking around with you and Nadia the other day, Marco. The one that had the Pidgey parmesan for breakfast."

"Oh, you're that dude. Got it. What can I do for ya, my man?"

"I've got an Inkay here, and I don't actually know what it likes to eat. Just caught it recently. Any ideas?" I asked.

"Hmm," his voice became a bit warbled because of some static. "I know Inkays tend to eat other Pokémon, so probably something with meat. Psychic types tend to prefer foods packed with energy, so maybe something loaded with lots of carbs and fat?"

"Hmm, would the Pidgey parm fit that bill?"

"It sure does. Want Nadia to whip an order up?"

"Yes, please! I'll also do an order of the pulled Grumpig nachos. With everything, please."

"Oh, good choice. I'll ask Nadia to top it off with her secret sauce. That stuff's banging. It'll be up in about thirty minutes."

"Sweet, thanks man."

As soon as I hung up, I heard a knock on the door. "Come in," I called out. Chansey walked in, a look of disapproval growing to disappointment after seeing the state we were both in.

"Cha! Cha Chan," she called out before slapping both of us with a Heal Pulse. Quite literally, I might add. The ball of energy she normally infused gently into a wound was held tightly on her hand, the hand that was then used to slap both Inkay and my own face.

"Inkay!" it trilled out in anger, receiving a glare that made it back down.

"That hurt, ya know," I said, rubbing my face.

"Chansey," she said with a shrug before slamming the door as she walked out. I looked at Inkay, who was still staring at the door.

"Well, that was rude, wasn't it?" I asked it. Inkay kept staring at the door, though it did nod eventually. "Alright, well, food should be here in about twenty or so minutes. In the meantime, you can take a nap or something."

Inkay finally turned to look at me, giving me a weird look before it flew off to a corner and hid between some things on the kitchen counter. I shrugged, opting to leave it alone. I grabbed my phone, which somehow was able to charge itself overnight. It was an incredibly confusing experience to wake up to a fully charged device that was nearly dead the night before, but Pokémon are also incredibly confusing so I didn't give it any more attention. 

What I did pay attention to was the Team app on my phone. It showed a picture of Inkay with five more circles following it. The corner of the screen had a 'Box' option, which went to an empty screen with 30 dark circles. I exited the app and switched to the PokéDex app, showing that I had discovered a whopping one species, which happened to be the one I caught. Going back to the Team app, I clicked on Inkay's icon. It was able to show me his moves, his abilities, how many Trainer battles he's participated in, and when his last medical check-up was.

I switched to the Scan app next, mostly to satisfy my curiosity about what it did. It had a large button icon in the middle of the screen, the word 'SCAN' written in red blocky letters. I clicked it and pointed my phone at Inkay. A thin light illuminated the kitchen counter, causing Inkay to cry out in surprise.

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Inkay (Male): The Revolving Pokémon

It drains its opponent's will to fight by flashing lights from the spots on its head.

Abilities: Contrary, Infiltrator

Moves: Peck, Tackle, Hypnosis, Payback, Disable (Egg Move), Rain Dance (Egg Move)

Condition: Weak, Starving, Anxious

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"Huh, two abilities," I said. I wonder if that was common of all Pokémon? And those moves. Rain Dance? I didn't know that was an egg move. Hypnosis, Payback, Disable… Infiltrator would make good use of those. And Contrary with the possibility of getting Inkay to learn Superpower? Oh yeah, it's all coming together. But more importantly, Inkay is a male. So I guess I should probably stop referring to him as 'it.'

I looked up to see Inkay glaring at me. 'Tch, stupid, angry little shit squid,' I thought. 

By clicking on the moves, I was able to find descriptions of the moves and how they were supposed to look at different levels. Interestingly enough, there were only three levels of move mastery: Basic, Trained, and Mastered.

From what I could find online, there were three main differences between these levels. The first was, obviously, the strength of the move. Each level of move mastery had a certain range of strength. For Basic mastery, damaging moves just did enough damage to make it painful. It was relatively equal among all Pokémon whose moves were at the Basic stage. At the Trained level, damaging moves often left lingering damage that could stack up. Again, the amount of damage didn't really change among Pokémon whose moves were at this level. Mastered moves could lead to injuries that had good chances of complications like infections or permanent damage. Once at the Mastered level, the strength of a move scaled with the strength of a Pokémon. Pokémon with Mastered moves could do massive amounts of damage.

Of course, all of this depended on the overall difference in strength between Pokémon. I doubt Inkay could do much damage to Serena's Jolteon, even if he Mastered his moves. The concept of strength was similar for status moves like Toxic, Agility, or Protect. The higher the mastery, the more effective it was. 

The second difference was time. Basic moves, on average, took anywhere from six to twelve seconds to charge up and use. This might not sound like much, especially for Trainers that just started, but it left a huge opening for better trained Pokémon. Trained moves needed two to five seconds. This was generally where most Trainers were at. It gave ample time for a Pokémon to move around and get in position for an attack. Mastered moves, on the other hand, could be charged in under a second. This meant that battles on the Elite level were fast and hard to follow for those that were not accustomed to it. I saw a video yesterday where a Glameow was able to chain Fake Out, Iron Tail, Aerial Ace, and Sucker Punch in roughly three seconds, leading to its swift victory.

The third difference was energy usage. All moves needed energy to be used. From what I've read, Infinity Energy was the main type of energy here. It was converted into all of the different energy types. A Pokémon had to convert some of their Infinity Energy into Type Energy in order to use a move. Moves of the same type as a Pokémon were much easier to use as the Pokémon had an easier time converting Infinity Energy into that type. At the Basic stage, there was a lot of energy needed to use the moves, making them rather inefficient. This effect was more easily seen with exhausting moves like Hyper Beam. At this level, energy was also converted inefficiently. This led to Pokémon becoming exhausted quickly the more often they used untrained moves.

At the Trained stage, energy conversion was more efficient. They also typically needed less energy to achieve the same result. If a Pokémon could only use Water Gun six times at the Basic level, the Pokémon could use Water Gun fifteen or more times at the Trained level with the same amount of energy. Moves at the Mastered level needed minimal energy to be used. With the same Water Gun example, a Pokémon could use it at least dozens of times at the Mastered level. Each move had different energy requirements, but they all generally worked the same way.

Before I could continue reading about Pokémon moves, a knock on the door interrupted me. I called out for them to enter and saw someone with two bags of food. I asked the kitchen worker to put the food on the table, which he did without a word. Once he left, I limped over to the table. I wasn't really supposed to walk until the day after tomorrow, but I didn't want to stay in bed all day for a second day in a row. I was planning on at least visiting the canteen for lunch.

Inkay floated over, his two large tentacles moving around the food almost as if he was sniffing with his tentacles. That's… Odd? Is that how squids smell things normally? Well, Inkay looked pretty damn adorable for something that was trying to Peck me to death just 40 minutes earlier. Especially with the drool peeking out of his beak. 

"Alright," I said, gaining Inkay's excited but suspicious attention. I grabbed the two boxes and opened them, revealing the delicious fried Pidgey parm I had yesterday and some heavenly smelling nachos drowned in toppings. "The pasta and Pidgey is yours, and it is absolutely bussin', my guy. I have some nachos for myself. It's got cheese made from Miltank milk, topped with slow-cooked pulled Grumpig, chopped Cheri berries, and sour cream made from Dubwool milk. This sounds really good," I told him while staring at my food wide-eyed. I was seriously salivating from the delicious smells coming from the nachos. I looked at Inkay, who was looking at his food similarly. We looked at each other for a few seconds before nodding at each other and began devouring our food.

The nachos were amazing. The cheese was very rich and thick, with a sharp, smoky flavor that was enhanced by the spicy Cheri berry. The sour cream was very tangy and tart, perfect for the spiciness. The pulled Grumpig was tender and perfectly spiced, the juicy meat adding more complexity to the overall flavor of the dish. It was amazing. 

Based on the happy chirping and bouncing Inkay was doing, I'm guessing he was enjoying the pasta and fried Pidgey as well. After 15 minutes of chowing down, we both finished. We sat there in a bit of a food coma. I guess it's been a while since we both ate, particularly so for Inkay. He looked at me with a very content expression.

"Alright, Inkay. Was that delicious or was that delicious?" I asked. Inkay happily cried out in agreement, nodding his body in an adorable fashion. "Believe it or not, there are even more dishes that are just as good as what we just had. And I know one of the cooks that makes them."

At that revelation, Inkay stared at me with wide, wonder-filled eyes. I knew I had him hooked. "While we're here, we can continue eating like kings. But that'll only happen if you stick around. Are you up for that?"

"Inkay!" he said, obviously enraptured with the idea of more delicious food.

"However, if you're going to join me, we're gonna have to work hard. I've got no money here and we'll need to work together to get it. I think I also plan on battling the gyms. If I'm going to unlock my memories, I think I'll have to do quite a bit of traveling and soul searching. Traveling like that requires us to get stronger, and getting stronger requires hard work. We might not always have the most delicious food while we're out there, but I can promise that we will eat three meals a day. Plus snacks! So what do you say?"

Inkay stared at me for several seconds, making me think there was a chance of getting rejected. However, to my relief, he roared out in agreement. I guess the prospect of always having food and eating three meals a day was the best way to convince him. Good, cause there were a lot of things I needed to test before deciding on the best plan for him.

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A/N: Alright, we have our first interaction with Inkay. We know Ferroseed is on the way soon, and we have already voted on another team member. Here's today's 2-in-1 poll: What should we do an original regional variant or original evolution? Which of the two would be your pick (if you pick variant, which would you want and vice versa)?

Regional Variants:

Magby line

Zubat line

Original Evolution:

Jolteon 

Tropius