Language Barriers
by Otte, who giggled all the way through writing this

Hoothoot were not extraordinary, rare or powerful and he knew it. Problem was, he couldn't resist the urge to dance and sing upon capturing the round owl Pokemon.

"I caught it! I caught it!" Gold squealed. Jacob 'Gold' Goldon jumped up and down like an over-excited schoolgirl, holding his yellow cap to his head with a hand. The tuft of dark blue hair that stuck out from the cap's front bobbed up and down as he celebrated his victory. He scooped up his Cyndaquil, who squealed and thrashed to be free of the eccentric 10-year-old's grasp. Giving the fire Pokemon a squeeze, he found himself quickly the victim of a burst of heat from the fuzzy mole's back.

"Ow!" he shouted, dropping the navy and yellow Pokemon, whose squinted eyes drove a hard glare into Gold's face. Gold cocked his head to the side in confusion. What was the matter with him. Scooping up the cooling-down pokeball from the grass beside him he held it to the fire-pokemon's eye level.

"I caught a Hoothoot, Cyndaquil. What's the matter?" Gold asked. At the last 'I caught a Hoothoot, Cyndaquil' Cyndaquil's back burst into flames and he squeaked in an especially high-pitched way, putting his stubby front paws to the dry ground below him and arching his back like a cat. With the long snout pointed up at the boy, the little Pokemon looked rather comical as opposed to intimidating. Gold shrugged and reclined against the trunk of a rather small oak tree, tossing aside any curiosity for the Cyndaquil's peculiar behaviour he may have had. Cyndaquil bristled visibly but he chose to ignore it. What was with the little guy today? He was fine five minutes ago. Ah…maybe he was a bit hurt from the battle with the Hoothoot. The big-eyed creature's beak looked pretty sharp. He smiled at Cyndaquil.

"Here, maybe a potion will help you," he said as he dug out a small white and purple spray bottle from his sandy-coloured backpack. Cyndaquil made a weird growling noise and hung his head. Gold paused, puzzled.

"Oh come on, it's alright. Nothing wrong with it…look," he said and pulled back his red sleeve to spray a bit of the potion onto his arm. Cyndaquil started to move towards him, paused and then say back and smiled at the boy. Gold smiled back, seeing he was beginning to get the Cyndaquil to pay attention. He cringed as the cold sting of the spray his arm and then pushed the arm forward to the Cyndaquil's snout to prove there was nothing wrong with it. He cringed at the slow, jerky movement of his bones and looked down in horror to see the skin where he had sprayed the potion turn blue-ish and pimply.

"Oh sweet Mew!" he barked and then started to pour items out of his backpack in a panic, turning his back to the Pokemon.

He smiled as Cyndaquil whined in concern. He was so sweet.

Cinder was not impressed by Trainer's unbelievable stupidity. Aside from called her a 'he' for two days and counting, he had shouted out commands for attacks she had no idea how to use yet and kept asking her when she was going to evolve. For Mew's sake, she didn't ask him when he was going to hit puberty. Well, she had given him that as a rhetorical question for an answer once but he seemed to take that as 'soon'.

She panted and wiped sweat from her brow as Trainer danced around his new capture proudly, she wondered vaguely if this was some creepy human ritual Trainer had adopted for this particular time. She rubbed her leg, where the Hoothoot's little talons had raked through her fur and into her flesh. It stung a bit, but nothing she couldn't patch up with the right leaves and berries juices.

"I caught it! I caught it!" Trainer chanted in a high-pitched voice which practically had Cinder's ears bleeding. She could only see Trainer's pimply ankles rising up and down and his yellow (what was the kid's obsession with yellow?) trainers hit the dirty ground but it was enough to tell that this high-pitched shriek was one of glee, not of some form of possession, pain, anger or insanity. Well, perhaps insanity. But she doubted he was anything more than an idiot of the highest calibre.

"Yargh!" she screamed as Trainer scooped her up in his meaty, large fingers and she thrashed violently, tiny claws digging into Trainer's pink-ish flesh. The young human only squeezed Cinder in response and Cinder couldn't resist letting a little ember loose to burn away some of that red coat that Trainer was wearing.

"Ow!" he shouted and thankfully dropped her. She landed in a ball and rolled away, uncurling with a sigh of relief. She glowered up at Trainer's horrified face. Idiot. He caught it? Oh so he was the one to fight tooth, claw and fire with the blasted owl to the weaken the silly round featherball enough so he could taste victory? Jeez, how's that for under-appreciation, huh?

"I caught a Hoothoot, Cyndaquil." There he goes with the species names again. She had soon realised that trainers didn't have any name after meeting Trainer. She squeaked and arched her back, letting loose a blast of flames to show her annoyance Trainer's lack of gratitude, drowning out what the boy said next. Trainer shrugged it off and decided to just sit and distract himself. A habit Cinder had been quick to realise. What was with humans? Instead of dealing with anything they'd move their shoulders up and down and then sit around on their bums doing nothing.

"Here, maybe a potion will help you," he said as he grabbed something out of the weird yellow (again, what was with the yellow?) shell he carried on his back. He held a weird purple and white bottle, she recognised it as a potion from the labs, and showed it to her as if she was blind or extremely stupid.

"I don't need that…oh you're hopeless…" she sighed and hung her head in despair.

"Oh come on, it's alright. Nothing wrong with it…look," he said and pulled back the sleeve of his coat to spray a bit of the potion onto his skin. Cinder was about to jump forward to stop him – humans had a horrible reaction to the stuff – but then paused. Why not? If he was stupid enough…ah well. Vengeance is sweet, even if you didn't really execute it. She leaned back and smirked to herself.

"Oh sweet Mew!" he screamed after a few minutes of watching the reaction and then tipped out the assorted contents of his shell to find something to counter it.

She giggled sadistically as Trainer panicked. He was so stupid.