“So Dr.
Solans couldn’t sleep because you were giving him those nightmares every night?”
Under the faintly yellow glow of a desk lamp, a shifting shadow was cast against the wall.
Sitting at his desk, Nathan Hale idly turned over a strange, pitch-black stone.
It was uneven and covered in bumps and ridges.
He didn’t know much about rocks, let alone fossils, but even he could tell that this particular stone had been around for quite some time.
Most likely, it was the “interesting rock” Dr.
Solans had mentioned finding.
What Dr.
Solans didn’t know was that a Gastly had been sleeping inside it.
“Ko-gee~~”
Gastly seemed to be in an excellent mood.
It nodded enthusiastically while cheerfully circling Nathan Hale, occasionally pulling all sorts of bizarre faces.
“So…
you might be a Pokémon from decades, centuries, or even more than a thousand years ago?”
“Ko-gee?”
That long?
Gastly clearly didn’t understand the significance.
After all, it had been asleep the entire time.
If Dr.
Solans hadn’t dug it out, it might have remained asleep indefinitely.
It had long since forgotten why it had been sleeping inside the stone in the first place, as well as anything it remembered from before falling asleep.
That also explained why it had never tasted instant noodles before and why it was so curious about everything in Nathan Hale’s apartment.
“Amnesia?”
Nathan Hale had at least some experience with that subject.
He pulled the neatly folded blanket from the sofa and draped it over himself.
For some reason, he felt a little cold.
Maybe it was because there was a Ghost-type Pokémon in the room.
“Wait!”
Nathan Hale suddenly realized something.
His expression became strange.
Or perhaps more accurately, stiff.
He slowly raised his head like a machine and rubbed his cheek, which had already dried.
“Doesn’t that mean you might not have brushed your teeth for a thousand years?”
“Ko-gee…”
Gastly: (ˊo oˋ)
Nathan Hale: “…”
The next second—
A faint purplish tint suddenly spread across Nathan Hale’s face.
“Ko-gee!”
Gastly cried out in surprise, staring at him.
Nathan Hale clearly noticed that something was wrong with him too.
He smacked his lips and muttered,
“As I thought…
I’ve been poisoned?”
Its saliva is poisonous?
Gastly wasn’t just a Ghost-type Pokémon.
It was a dual-type Pokémon, Ghost- and Poison-type.
Nathan Hale simply hadn’t expected that getting licked once would be enough to poison him.
After all, Gastly didn’t have many Poison-type moves available to it at this stage.
“Looks like you’ve got quite a talent for Poison-type attacks…”
Nathan Hale’s lips were already beginning to pale.
“Ko-gee, ko-gee!
Ko-gee, ko-gee!”
Gastly flew frantically around him, looking anxious and completely at a loss.
What do I do?!
What do I do?!
“Don’t panic.”
Nathan Hale remained surprisingly calm.
“Since it’s your poison, you should be able to control it.
Try pulling it back.”
“Ko-gee?”
Pull it back?
How?
I don’t know!
Is he going to die?
He is, isn’t he?!
Nathan Hale didn’t possess the legendary Super Rookie’s absurd constitution, but he could tell that his body was merely uncomfortable.
He wasn’t anywhere near dying.
Even if Gastly couldn’t control the poison, he could always go to a Pokémon Center for treatment.
So he remained relatively composed.
“Think about how it felt when you licked me just now,” Nathan Hale said again.
“Ko-gee…”
Perhaps because Nathan Hale remained calm, and because there wasn’t the slightest hint of blame in either his expression or his voice, Gastly actually began to settle down.
“Good.
Stay calm.
Once you can stay calm, you’ll be able to—”
Slurp—
Nathan Hale didn’t finish his sentence before another long crimson tongue suddenly licked across his face.
“…Well, that’s actually pretty good.”
Wiping the saliva off his face, Nathan Hale forced the corners of his mouth upward as though trying to reassure himself.
But he soon realized that the discomfort he’d felt earlier seemed to have eased considerably.
His eyes lit up slightly.
Under Gastly’s hopeful yet anxious gaze, he nodded firmly.
“It works.”
“Ko-gee!!”
Gastly cried out excitedly.
Then it narrowed its eyes, smacked its lips, licked its tongue, and slowly drifted toward Nathan Hale.
A sinister—
“Ke-ke-ke-ke…”
—laughter escaped it.
“That’s enough!
E-enough!
Don’t wipe your saliva all over my clothes, you little menace!”
A few minutes later.
Nathan Hale sat shirtless on a small stool on the balcony, a washbasin in front of him as he vigorously scrubbed his clothes with an utterly speechless expression.
Gastly floated innocently nearby, looking exactly like a child who’d just done something wrong.
“Ko-gee.”
It obediently apologized.
Not only because it had gotten carried away earlier and couldn’t stop licking him, but also because it had accidentally poisoned him in the first place.
Nathan Hale stopped scrubbing.
He raised his palm, still covered in white suds, and gently patted the black mist surrounding Gastly.
“It’s fine.
From now on, we’re friends and partners…”
Friends?
Partners?
Gastly stared at him.
Its large white eyes seemed to sparkle like stars.
“…Family.”
Nathan Hale finished the sentence.
“Ko-gee…” Gastly murmured, as though savoring those words.
Raise a Gastly, huh?
Looking at the black mist around Gastly, which was now swirling excitedly, Nathan Hale thought from the bottom of his heart,
Actually…
that wouldn’t be so bad.
His smile widened.
A rare hint of mischief flickered through his eyes.
He flicked his finger.
Pfft!
A blob of white foam landed squarely on Gastly’s face.
That finally snapped Gastly out of its reverie.
“KO-GEE!!”
It let out an indignant cry and charged straight at Nathan Hale.
“Stop!
Stop, stop, stop!
We’re going to fall!”
BANG!
No matter how light Gastly was, there was no way it could ignore the slippery combination of balcony tiles and soapy foam.
The human and Pokémon crashed solidly onto the floor.
The washbasin beside them was knocked over as well.
White foam scattered through the air.
And then—
The first faint rays of dawn pierced the night sky.
Like a drop of ink spreading across rice paper, the morning light slowly bloomed across the horizon, carrying with it a sense of joy.
Crystalline soap bubbles refracted the light into dazzling colors, reflecting two smiling faces.
Yawning incessantly and sporting dark circles under his eyes, Nathan Hale returned to the Pokémon Psychology Counseling Office at school to slack off—
Ahem.
To work.
Dr.
Solans was already nowhere to be seen, while the blanket had been neatly folded and placed to one side.
Taking another nap immediately after arriving wouldn’t be a wise choice.
Although hardly anyone ever visited the counseling office and school hadn’t officially started yet, being caught sleeping would still leave a poor impression.
Waiting until noon and using “I overslept during my lunch break” as an excuse to catch up on sleep was clearly the better option.
In this regard, Nathan Hale had plenty of experience.
The coffee grinder whirred noisily as Nathan Hale prepared to make himself a cup of coffee first.
At that moment, Gastly floated out from inside his clothes.
“Ko-gee?”
It stared curiously at the Onix coffee grinder.
Nathan Hale smiled.
“Want a cup?”
“Ko-gee, ko-gee!”
After a brief hesitation, Gastly nodded vigorously.
Before long, two cups of rich espresso were sitting on the desk.
Nathan Hale opened his computer and took a small sip.
The bitter flavor jolted his taste buds, followed by a lingering sweetness that gave him a slight boost of energy.
Gastly, meanwhile, stared hesitantly at the pitch-black liquid in front of it.
It sniffed it.
It circled around the cup several times.
But it couldn’t bring itself to take a sip.
It looked at Nathan Hale.
“Ko-gee?”
Is this stuff really drinkable?
It smells pretty good…
but why does it look so suspicious?
Nathan Hale didn’t answer.
He simply took another sip to demonstrate.
Only then did Gastly finally make up its mind.
It extended its long tongue and cautiously licked the coffee.
It was thinking about the bowl of instant noodles from last night.
But the next second—
“KO-GEE!!”
The moment Gastly tasted the coffee, its entire gaseous body began trembling as though it had been electrocuted.
It stared at Nathan Hale in horror as if he’d just revealed himself to be a monster.
How can you drink something this bitter?!
Nathan Hale laughed.
“Don’t like it?
That’s quite a reaction.
Looks like you’re not a fan of bitter things.”
Gastly’s gaseous body writhed as it desperately pawed at its tongue, as though trying to scrape the bitter taste away.
Its voice came out sounding almost tearful.
“Ko-gee—”
I don’t want this tongue anymore!
Nathan Hale couldn’t help laughing.
With a teasing grin, he said,
“Drink it a few more times and you’ll get used to it.”
Gastly wasn’t falling for that trick this time.
It shook its head frantically.
It treated the cup of coffee like a natural enemy and went out of its way to avoid it.
Nathan Hale shook his head and stopped teasing it.
He opened a file on the computer and quickly created a table.
Once Gastly had recovered from its traumatic coffee experience, he said,
“Gastly, let me get a better understanding of your abilities.
What moves do you know?”
If he wanted to raise a Pokémon properly, understanding it was the first step.
Only then could he make a detailed training plan.
“Ko-gee.”
As long as he doesn’t make me drink coffee, anything goes.
The black mist around Gastly rippled.
Just then, the rhythmic click-clack of high heels sounded from the hallway.
Tap.
Tap.
Tap.
The footsteps grew closer.
Nathan Hale and Gastly exchanged a glance.
Nathan Hale immediately returned Gastly to its Poké Ball.
A moment later, there was a knock on the door.
“Nathan Hale, have you seen Dr.
Solans?”
A tall, beautiful woman with long black hair pushed open the door and stepped inside.
She was Cai Zi, a professor in the Pokémon Breeding department.
“Uh…
no, I haven’t.”
Nathan Hale answered honestly.
“That’s strange.
I saw him in the cafeteria earlier.
How did he disappear again so quickly?”
Cai Zi puffed out her cheeks and muttered to herself.
“What happened?”
Nathan Hale rubbed his temples twice and asked.
“Isn’t today the freshman registration day?
Dr.
Solans was supposed to come help, but now he’s suddenly vanished.
All the professors have already been assigned their tasks.
Where am I supposed to find someone to take over for him…?”
Freshman registration day?
Today?
Nathan Hale froze.
No wonder there had seemed to be so many more cars at the school entrance that morning.
Suddenly—
He got a very bad feeling.
Sure enough, when he looked up, he found Cai Zi gazing at him with bright, hopeful eyes.
“Nathan Hale, could you fill in for him for a little while?”