Chapter 77

When they got to the pokemon centre, surprisingly, Nurse Joy was already waiting for them, knowingly.

Jord handed over all the pokeballs he was carrying to her. It wasn't like a bit of care would hurt the rest of his pokemon with all the training they did. Granted, the one who probably needed it the most to recover from any possibly exhaustion was his Chansey, and even that was a stretch considering how much he hovered over the pink pokemon and fussed over her.

Pidgeot and Golem were a whole other matter, the damage they had taken, wasn't something that could quite so simply be taken care of by a short trip into the revitalisation machine.

They were released onto a pair of large stretchers and wheeled into the back of the hospital and taken to a private room to be examined and cared for.

Pidgeot, barely blinked, just sitting on the bed and allowed himself to be checked over, proud and dignified as ever, if not more so with how big he'd grown through evolution.

Apparently his wings were actually broken as well according to Nurse Joy, yet that just made the big bird puff his chest out even more proudly, and considering how badly Pidgeot was kicking the crap out of that Electivire, Hilda honestly couldn't blame it.

The problem though…was Golem. Despite the sheer amount of damage he had taken, the rock and ground type was already up and awake.

And absolutely disappointed in himself, so much so he'd retreated into his shell and hadn't come out yet.

"C'mon mate, don't take it so hard," Jord sat on the bed beside the massive spherical rock shell and thumped it with his hand to make sure his pokemon was listening, "It's only one loss, and it's more on me than you, I wasn't expecting him to pull some crazy crap like that railgun shit, I should have looked into that roided bitch better."

Golem remained silent within his shell.

Hilda watched him from the entrance of the room, leaning on the door frame. And she just kind of marvelled how he could go full on aggression with the likes of Surge and turn around and act all kind and comforting with his pokemon.

She heard foot steps coming from behind her and looked over her shoulder to see Nurse Joy making her way back, a harried look on her face, "That man…" she huffed, "What was he thinking going so hard on such a young trainer?"

"Do you mean Surge?" Hilda asked.

The pink haired nurse paused and nodded, before sighing, "Yes, that railgun attack is one of his trump cards, something that should really only be used in dire situations, it's something that took him years to create and why he went all the way to Alola to get a Geodude to raise up," she explained, "It's a combination of Stone Edge, Iron Defense and Shock Wave, not only is it dreadfully powerful, but it also basically cannot be dodged and can only be blocked, and then to go on and use explosion right after that? I don't know what drove him to such limits."

"I couldn't tell you," Hilda shrugged herself, "He and Jord just seemed to have a lot of friction from the get go, they couldn't go a second without basically squaring off against each other."

"That isn't an excuse, he's a grown man with a lot of responsibility," Nurse Joy rolled her eyes, "And Jord is a teenager even younger than most starting trainers, to lose his cool with just a boy is atrocious."

Well, she definitely wasn't wrong. Surge was way out of line. While he technically didn't break any rules, his attitude and the way he came at a newbie trainer wasn't befitting a gym leader, no matter how talented or smart mouthed that new trainer may be.

'…It was probably the small dick insults.' Hilda realised after a moment, while Surge was riled up by Jord initially, he didn't become full on aggressive until after Jord started attacking his 'manhood'.

"His Golem is still out of commission right now and probably won't be up for a few days, and his Electivire, usually so proud and strong, now it's practically cowering under the bed sheets in the room its in," Nurse Joy palmed her forehead with a groan, "I suppose I should just be thanking my lucky stars he didn't lose complete sense and start using his Z-move."

"Z-move?" Hilda asked, cocking her head to the side. She was going to let the nurse know exactly why Electivire was cowering away, but she heard something that peaked her interest, "What's that?" she'd never heard of the term before.

"Some kind of special techniques you can learn in Alola, one for each type I think," Nurse Joy shrugged, "Honestly, all I know is you need to go through some trial for each type of one on Alola and get something called a z-crystal to use them, but the attacks are absurdly powerful, that Electivire in there, when it uses Gigavolt Havoc with it, well, I've seen it bring down a Dragonite in a single hit."

"A Dragonite!?" Hilda's eyes widened and she choked. That was absurd! Even the weakest of Dragonite's were absolute monsters. There was a reason the species was one of the few pokemon that were listed under the 'pseudo-legendary' category. They had such incredible in born natural power, without any training at all that only the strongest of trainers could bring one down.

She supposed Jord did get lucky Surge didn't bust such a thing about. Then again, considering how little room to breathe Jord and Pidgeot were giving Surge and Electivire, perhaps he just couldn't get the chance to use it?

'That'll be something to look into in the future.' Hilda thought in interest, before grimacing.

…After she headed back home to help her cousin.

"Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a very proud birds wings to examine." Nurse Joy sighed, slipping passed Hilda and into the room.

The fluffy haired girls eyes drifted passed the nurse to Jord, still trying to coax Golem out of his shell. Despite what he said earlier, she was impressed with the way he took his first loss, and took the blame for it entirely on himself and didn't blame his pokemon at all.

He really did care them all greatly.

Her hand that was in her pocket came out and she opened it up, a small shrunken pokeball in her palm, she stared at it for a moment, before smiling forlornly and turning on her feet and leaving the room for now.

She walked through the halls for a bit, looking for a good place to do what she wanted, even found herself passing by a room with a familiar Electivire curled up under the covers of a bed and shook her head in sympathy.

The poor thing had been traumatized by Pidgeot.

And just a few doors down, she found an empty room which was perfect for what she needed.

She entered the room and closed the door behind her, before lifting the pokeball in her hand and releasing the pokemon within.

In a burst of light, her Snivy appeared before her, eyeing her coolly, arms crossed.

A few months ago, she would have winced at that expression, but she'd long since come to learn that was just how Snivy was.

"Sni?" the little grass type tilted her head to the side in askance.

"I'll be parting ways with Jord soon," she revealed and gave the grass type a small smile when she blinked up her her in surprise, "And I think you'd prefer to stay with him, wouldn't you?" no point beating around the bush, while she was very hesitant to give up a pokemon as rare as Snivy, it was better for her in the long run. And she knew at the very least, Jord would give Snivy what she wanted and take good care of her, just like he did with all his pokemon.

Snivy's eyes widened a bit, before falling back to their usual cool state, "Sni…Snivy." the grass type nodded lightly.

"I just wanted to let you know, that next time you're outside your pokeball, you won't be with me anymore," Hilda sighed sadly and crouched down, sweeping the grass type up into a hug, "I know I'm not the trainer you wanted, but still, I'll miss you."

"Sni…" Snivy sighed, and two vines emerged from her neck to wrap around Hilda and pat her on the back.

They stayed like that for a few minutes, before Hilda gathered herself and separated from the grass type, "This is goodbye for now Snivy," Hilda smiled down at her, "Though, I'll definitely see you a lot in the future I'm sure once I'm done helping Rosa and can track Jord down again."

"Sni!" Snivy smiled back and flashed her a small thumbs up with one of her tiny paws.

And then Hilda returned the grass type to her pokeball and let her shoulders slump. That was hard, really hard, and she had to resist the urge to let tears fall from her eyes.

And she wasn't anywhere near as close with Snivy as she was with her other pokemon. She never wanted to feel what it was like to part with her other pokemon.