Adapt and Overcome.

Lotad squeezed its eyes shut as if it was scared.

Its body gleamed, a white coat of blinding light making it shudder but clench the ground. Its body stretched, grew-- and formed appendages, long arms and feet-- then dimmed out to its colours.

Now a light shade of green, its previous cobalt blue dawned into a light turquoise. The familiar yellow bill was now red, and in place of the webbed fingers Citrine expected, Lotty had red claws as fingers and toes.

She was the size of a human child, with a strange, sombrero-like lily pad as a hat.

Citrine watched, dazed-- then, was just overcome with emotion.

Tears of immense joy spilled from her eyes as she lunged at the newly-evolved Lombre, causing it to shriek in horror at the sudden affection.

But as Citrine's arms clasped around it, she was grimed all over in some slimy, mucous membrane-- honestly, she could only enjoy it for half a second before it was just horrifyingly nasty.

They burst into laughter, disgusting all over but this was amazing.

Scrambling their way into the Pokemon Center, receiving skeptic looks, Citrine asked for the way to the dorm showers.

ー

Lombre clunked clumsily with its new, overly long arms, finding it awkward to have Whismy and Wurmy be so much smaller now. But Wurmple crawled over the bigger Pokemon, finding itself comfortable on its head, and they had fun running around like that.

Whismu chased them around in circles across Citrine's feet as they walked, the girl giggling as she offmindedly warned them it was dangerous.

The evolution made Lotty uncomfortable, but Citrine adored how the other two were trying to act as they used to. Whismy and Wurmy then used Lotty as a shield in their indecipherable banters-- it seemed the evolution meant nothing changed to them after all.

They walked the road to Mauville joyfully.

The meadows were vast evergreen, flowers brimming in each corner as plain, green grass stretched beyond the eyes could see, lifting and sinking in little hills and valleys.

Across another stretch they would reach roads, and be right around Mauville-- the biggest and most developed town of Hoenn-- the town of trade, the bright and shiny city of fun, Mauville!

The journey was smooth for one girl, three Pokemon, and great weather.

But of course, things just didn't stay easy. Whismur was growing impatient.

It was the most active and rambunctious in Pokemon Battles, and it loved strength more than anyone else-- yet, he couldn't evolve.

Citrine witnessed him chasing after wild Electrike like he was a demon of hell, desperately defeating everyone with Rollout or Rock Smash or whatever was effective.

Citrine couldn't deny it was amusing, but it was acting too rash.

Whismur felt weak, and it didn't like that. 

ー

"It's cold tonight," Citrine realized, seeing her breath turn white as she exhaled-- no wonder her fingers felt a little numb. Pulling out a sweater from her backpack, she decided she would camp out here tonight, in an outcropping of numerous rocks.

Lombre sat down with a huff, and Wurmple, on its head, breathed out a similar sigh of exhaustion.

The three Pokemon scrambled around, Wurmple whipping up some string for bedding or pillows; Lombre hunting for firewood and food, and Whismur making a fireplace by pushing rocks around.

Citrine found herself watching the sun set toward the edge of the world. Sharp gusts of wind break through her hair-- one of her hair ties snapped, her heavy blonde hair cascading down in messy waves.

The gale ripped through her, dragging one foot off balance and forcing her to take a step back in balance.

The firewood in Lotty's hands were thrown out as it tripped, and one of Wurmple's freshly made pillows were carried right off.

A storm's coming, she realized almost immediately.

A bad one.

"Lotty, forget the firewood!" she snapped toward her Pokemon in a frenzy, scooping up the Berries on the ground and packing up, "Whismy, Uproar! Warn the Pokemon around us; Wurmy, gather the things, we're going to make a run for the town by dark!"