Patenting a TM

Ted had a very simple and stupid goal: create a Technical Move, get it patented, and make lots of money off the downloads.

The idea  was simple because the process was pretty straightforward: there was a whole section devoted to how TMs were patented in history class, and Ted was pretty sure that there was no one in mainland Hoenn (except for maybe the weird tree people in Fortree City) who didn't know about Rick Recebo; he was the man behind the patent of the most widely utilized and diversified Pokemon move on the planet, Take Down.

According to the textbook and his history teacher, Ms. Maxwell, after conceiving the concept for the move, Mr. Recebo had  mapped out its execution, recorded the steps on a tape recorder, and sent it (along with a grainy tape of his Linoone performing the move) to the newly-minted Hidden and Technical Move Trademark Office, where it still remained one of the most requested, purchased, and downloaded TMs in the world. Apparently, Rick Recebo had used the money to buy an island before he'd died, where he was buried on a high hill under a stand of palm trees.

Ted's idea was stupid — well, according to Mom, anyway — because Ted had no business wasting time trying to patent TMs when he was still misspelling the word "paragraph" on vocab tests. He was only nine years old, for Arceus' sake — maybe he could think about making up TMs when he proved he actually had the brains to get to and through college.

But no, Ted decided — there wasn't time to wait until he was an adult. He wanted money, and he wanted it now, and this was the easiest way to make it. Maybe Mom would be more appreciative of his initiative when he made bank and got them out of their crappy rental house in the urban trash heap otherwise known as Mauville City. Wasn't she the one always complaining about the bad economy? Well, he might've only been nine, but he wasn't blind. The bad economy was beginning to leech into his already-seedy neighborhood — he could see it in the eyes of the people who went by as he walked to school every morning. And hadn't there been a break-in two doors down three days ago?

So he started thinking.  He started scribbling. And instead of doing those stupid math problems Mr. Dixon assigned every night, he started creating blueprints of his new sensational Pokemon move, image by image, frame by frame. This step, then that step, then this step, then that... Sure, he kept getting awful grades on his homework, but this was arguably more important, wasn't it? After all, this was no Protect, or Hyper Beam, or Facade, or Rock Tomb. Like Take Down, this Pokemon move was going to be universal — any Pocket Monster of any shape, size, gender, or type could use it to their advantage, to turn the tide of the steepest of uphill battles.

Or so he tried to convince the principal when he was called down to the office...

Anyway, near the end of the week, Ted had a notebook filled with promising candidates. On Thursday after school, he decided to drop by the park to try some of them out. Unfortunately, he had to take the scenic route, as his usual path was blocked off by a wall of police cars and lights: another daylight robbery, this time at a hole-in-the-wall burger joint at the bottom of the hill. So the grimy little community park was burning orange in the sunset by the time he arrived.

But Demeter was still there, doing what she normally did when Ted came to visit: picking up trash inconsiderate civilians had dumped and coaxing the exhausted shrubbery into cheerful bloom. She was working on a line of downtrodden tulips when Ted arrived.

"Dem, I need your help." Quickly, he explained to her his plan: the simple premise, the luxurious rewards. "Just think: I could have my own island one day, just like Rick Recebo! And all I need is someone to help me perfect the move. I don't actually have a Pokemon, though, so you'll have to do. What do you say?"

The Budew was uncertain. Her vines were gathering up empty bottles and cigarette butts and slinking to the overflowing trash can, and she gazed towards the bin like she wanted to hide behind it.

"Thanks!" Ted said. "You and I are gonna be famous, Dem, just you wait. Think of this: when we get our mansion in Evergrande, I could get you your own little farm! Imagine that!"

That seemed to cheer Dem the Budew up a little, but not much, and certainly not when Ted actually began putting her through her paces. She was a squat little thing, and older than she looked — a lot older than Ted, in fact, and she certainly began to feel her age when her friend bid her to leap and spin and duck and dodge like a Roselia half her age. Quickly, Ted grew frustrated.

"No, no, no! Slide then jump, Dem! As in after! And go a little higher, it's... Higher than that!"

But it was no good: Granny Dem just wasn't up to the task of performing the world's most viral TM. As it grew dark, Ted plopped to the ground.

"If only you were a little more...stretchy," he growled, by which he meant limber. Dem became upset, and guilt flashed through him. Maybe she wasn't flexible, but she'd tried, at least. He patted her head. "Sorry, that was mean. You did your best. And maybe I need to make another move... I mean, after all, this TM is supposed to be universal. If a Budew can't do it, it doesn't count."

He went home, and after his mother yelled at him for making another zero on a homework assignment, he corralled himself into his room and went back to the drawing board. A Budew, he thought. What's a move that even a Budew can do?

He thought some more, drew out some more blueprints, and went to bed late. He was tired the next day at school, but cheered up when he went back to the community garden to show Dem his new ideas. That day, she was relocating a wilted fern from the sun into the shade of a nearby shrub.

"A spin!" He told his friend. "That's what we were missing. See?" He pointed to his detailed plan for the move, working name "Starstruck Strike". "Right here, just before the tackle. It'll help you build up speed. Let's try it!"

They practiced it three times, and by the end, Dem was seeing stars all right, as she'd gotten a little too ambitious during one twirl and threw out her poor back. After burying her beneath a mound of potting soil so that she could heal, Ted went home feeling frustrated.

"No spins," he told his messy room that night. "No charges. No tackle. No roundhouse kicks or high jumps or headbutts." He groaned as he pored through his notes. Creating a universal TM was harder than he'd thought! Harder than homework, even...

Speaking of which, by the end of the day Thursday, Ms. Maxwell was about ready to strangle him for only completing a few of the assignments for that week. He wound up in the principal's office again, and was threatened with "stern measures" if he didn't get his act together and start turning things in. What that meant, Ted was unsure, but they couldn't hit him, right? Not unless they wanted a lawsuit from his mother — it was 2019, for pity's sake.

Would they kick him out? That didn't worry him much either. School wouldn't be of much concern when he was chilling out on his own private island — heck, he could hire private tutors if he wanted, assuming he still desired to get a higher education. Once he and Mom were living in their five-story mansion, he would probably be too busy swimming in money to care.

However...that all hinged on him actually designing a working TM. Getting kicked out of school before then... Well, that would be a problem — school, after all, was where he got his lunch!

So grudgingly, Ted turned his attention back to his studies, to the detriment of his TM-drafting process — soon it was Monday again, and he'd barely spent five minutes trying to puzzle the kinks out of his Pokemon move. On Tuesday, he went to the community park feeling disappointed. Dem was feeling better today, and working on planting a sapling. Where she'd gotten the young tree was a mystery.

"I think I ran out of ideas," he admitted to his friend as he watched her work. "I tried thinking about it a little bit last night... But I dunno how to fix it."

She snuggled up to his side and patted his head with a vine. She felt bad for him — it wasn't often that she saw her optimistic friend so down. She gazed around the park, looking for something to cheer him up, and her eyes seized on her garden: it was a small affair, a tiny plot of soil that she'd recently overturned in preparation for planting new flowers, but she'd gotten a few things started in the corner. She hopped over and called out to him, and then indicated one of her successes.

Ted's face wrinkled. "What, you want me to eat that? What is it?" He came over and stooped beside her, inspecting the leafy green head of vegetation. "Is it a vegetable? Wait... Is that spinach?"

She nodded vigorously, and Ted reeled back. "Ew! I can't eat that! That's the stuff they're always giving us at school... And home!" His Mom loved spinach — she called it brain food, just the stuff to oil the gears upstairs and make those dendrites a little longer! (Whatever that meant.) She snuck it into their meals three times a week, loading freshly-steamed, wet piles of the green gunk on his plate and delighting in making him kick and scream and suffer at the dinner table until he ate every bite. He found them even less tolerable than her collards — at least she boiled those with bacon grease.

But what if she's right? What if a bunch of spinach oils your gears? Maybe it is brain food — maybe if you eat some, you'll think of a way to fix your TM! And certainly, he wanted that mansion and that private island a lot more than he didn't want to eat a bunch of spinach.

"Okay," he relented. "I'll eat some. Gimme."

Using her vines, Dem unloaded a good handful of baby spinach from her crop, and facilitated them into Ted's cupped hands. He scrunched his face up as he brought the greenery close, and tried not to think about the god-awful steamed slop his mother force-fed him as he loaded them up into his mouth. It went down hard — the spinach was about as appetizing as sunburnt grass.

But finally it was gone, and Ted scrunched his face down at Dem, waiting for a sudden, ingenious idea, for a miracle.

Ten minutes later, he was still staring.

"It didn't work!" He growled. "Stupid spinach. Should've known." Dem's vines began feeding more leaves into his palm, and he said, "Wait, no!"

The Budew drew back, frowning.

"I mean... What's the point? It isn't working, so—"

Dem disagreed — she harvested another small handful until the crop was bare, and then gave him an expectant look. Sourly, he swallowed it down, and it wasn't until he was wiping his lips clean of the veggie that he started to feel awake. Wide awake, as if he'd just woken up for the day and taken a nice, cleansing walk. He blinked several times, trying to decide whether or not he was imagining things, and decided he wasn't.

"I...I think it's working, Dem," he exclaimed. What else could account for this sudden acuity? "I mean, I don't have an idea yet... But I feel like I'm almost there. I feel like brainstorming!" He swung to his friend. "Do you have any more?"

Demeter looked apologetically at the barren crop of spinach, and Ted leapt to his feet. "Hey, that's no problem! There's a market nearby — they sell veggies. I bet they sell spinach! I'll go get some, then eat some more, and then maybe I'll get my idea!" He started for the path leading back to the Main Street, and then turned around. "You come too, Dem! As soon as I get my idea, I wanna try it out!"

Dem was uncertain: she didn't go far from the park these days, and certainly not out in the streets with those crazy humans and all their trash! But when Ted scooped her up and cradled her in his arms, she had little choice but to bounce along as he skipped down the path, winding through a maze of bushes before coming back out on the sidewalk lining the highway.

Aunt Anne's Neighborhood Market stood on the other side of a small junction, a ten minute walk from the park. Inside, it was cramped but clean — the floor was checkered tile, and there were three aisles: non-perishables, quick meal solutions, and then snacks. Freezers surrounded them in a blocky U-shape, with one entire side devoted to wine and beer; the fruits and veggies, on the other hand, were all stuffed within a single cooler, with fruit snacks up top, and packs of broccoli and hydroponic lettuce in bags along the bottom.

Ted waved at the cashier, a bespectacled lady with a nametag that said "Kathy" that offered Dem a spicy Poffin when they came in. Then they went to the back and perused the chilled veggies. He found a pack of baby spinach at the back and showed it to Dem for her approval. The tag said 1.25 Pokedollars. Ted did a quick calculation.

"Maybe we should get another pack," he said. "Mom gave me 5.00 Poke for lunch today, but you shoulda seen the slop they were serving, Dem! I can't believe they wanted us to eat it! Anyway, is there anything else in here that gives you special brain powers? What about seaweed? Or radishes? Or fennel?"

Dem nudged his leg, bringing his attention to a container stacked on a higher shelf. "Cherri Berries!" He exclaimed. "Ew, no! I swore I'd never eat those again!" His reaction had less to do with the actual taste of the berries, though, and the small fact that he'd nearly choked on a Cherri pit when he was much younger. That made him wonder though — the pits. Did Dem want to plant them in her garden?

He asked, and she nodded vigorously. He peered at the price — "SALE! 1.50 P!" — and caved. "Fine," he said, pulling the foremost container free from the freezer. "I don't know who's gonna be eating them, though, cause it sure ain't me!"

He turned, arms full of his healthy bounty, and headed for the counter with Dem skipping along beside him, looking happy. There was a man there, in a plaid jacket, wearing a black beanie. A Houndour stood at his booted feet, its lips curled back — it swung its head around and glowered at Ted and Dem when they approached. Dem hid behind Ted's leg.

"You deaf?" The man growled. "Or stupid?"

For a second, Ted thought the man was talking to him, but no — Kathy the cashier was staring from behind the counter as though a Haunter had just lunged out of the wall at her, forehead shining with sweat. One of her pale hands was on the counter, and it was shaking.

Ted frowned.

"Five seconds. You wanna start breathing out of your stomach?" The man shifted ever so slightly, and there was a flash of light, the sun reflecting off of a— Is that a gun?

A long, empty space passed between that thought and the next, but when the incredulity — not fear, not yet — came, it came swift and strong. You're kidding me! This was a scene straight out of a crime movie... Was this a hold-up? Here? Now? With him? But that only happens on TV! This isn't real, right? That's not a gun — it's a phone or something—

Kathy's eyes abruptly flashed to him, and the man in the black beanie swung around. All doubt evaporated — that was definitely, absolutely, for certain a gun in the man's hand, and the barrel was now pointed in Ted's direction, at Ted's head. The man that held it had a rough face, wrinkles and bags of flesh grizzled by spiky hair sticking out wildly in all directions. His eyes, blue steel, widened a fraction, and then hardened and went furiously cold. He swore.

"Stupid kid," he hissed. "Why couldn't you have stayed in the back?"

"Don't, please!" Kathy cried with abrupt hysteria. "I'll give you the money, I will, just please — let the boy go!"

"No one's going anywhere." There was a dangerous click — the gun's hammer being pulled firmly into place. The barrel came closer now, a widening, black window still aimed at Ted's forehead. "So what's it gonna be, punk? You gonna take your little friend and go sit quietly in the back? Or are you gonna cause a problem?"

He should've been scared, but for some reason he wasn't; for some reason, very stupid thoughts were going through Ted's head, thoughts about the bad neighborhood he lived in, thoughts about crime growing closer and closer to home, and how much he hated it; how much he wanted out of it, an out like a private island, and a giant mansion with no neighbors. Thoughts like, I wonder if I can get his gun... Maybe Dem can—

"Don't like that look on your face." There was a flash of indecision on the man's face, and then he turned to his Houndour. "Take care of 'em."

The Pokemon lurched forward, fangs stabbing down from his gums, bursts of fire shooting from his flared nostrils. Ted didn't know what was happening until Dem leapt in front of him, squeaking angrily. She was...defending him. From what? It won't really attack, right? The man didn't mean—

The Houndour paused in front of Dem, snarling, still breathing fire. Dem squeaked again, and Ted saw vines beginning to unfurl from her body, spread across the floor. The Houndour eyed them, then turned back to his master, who sneered.

"You afraid of that pipsqueak?" he said mockingly.

"Please," Kathy said, pained. "Don't shoot, just let me open the register—"

There was a black flash, and by the time Ted refocused on the Houndour, it had pounced, swiping Dem aside as easily as Ted might a soccer ball. The Budew hit the door of a cooler with a fantastic crash, punching straight through to the beer bottles beyond and sending glass shattering to the floor.

Ted didn't think, just acted: "Stop it! What do you think you're doing!" He hurled his bag of baby spinach at the Houndour, and then the Cherri Berries, which busted open against the Pokémon's skull and sent red missiles flying everywhere. The Houndour snarled and lunged, and Ted saw nothing more than a faceful of teeth and red fur before he slammed back against a shelf of chips, knocking it clear over and sending merchandise skittering across the floor.

"Enough!" Kathy screamed. "Leave him alone! Leave him—"

A gunshot. "Shut your mouth! Empty that drawer, or he'll do a lot worse!"

Here was the fear now, a black, poisonous, and burning thing in Ted's chest, in his head, pulling strangled screams out of his mouth. He wrestled with the Houndour on top of the chip rack, trying to get that ferocious, fire-breathing maw out of his face. He felt canines fasten into his shoulder, and the Pokemon shook him like a rag doll. His fingers clawed helplessly against the floor, and then his temple hit something hard. The inside of his head became a container of mixing paint, black and white, flashing and swirling, turning the world nonsensical. The pain in his shoulder grew worse, and he caught a flash of the Houndour's face — monstrous and cruel, with his teeth buried into Ted's shoulder up to—

Vines suddenly crept around the Houndour's throat, tightening like a garrote. The Houndour's eyes widened in surprise, and he abruptly released Ted and swung around furiously, fire streaming from his mouth. Behind him, Dem, beaten, bruised, and drenched in beer, was crawling out of the cooler onto a swarming minefield of glass and vines. The Houndour lunged, roaring...then yelped as he was snatched up into the air by his back foot, spiraling wildly towards the ceiling.

Ted squinted up at the Pokemon as it finally halted three feet from the ceiling...a ceiling now swathed in a layer of creeping tendrils. He snarled and twisted his head, but before he could breathe fire and burn away the green twine that had snatched him up, another leafy tendril lashed down and fastened around his snout, shutting his mouth more effectively than a muzzle. His eyes bulged, and he flailed as more vines came down from the ceiling, binding his limbs and torso until he was cocooned in creeper vine.

Dem wobbled over to Ted, squeaking wearily, just as the man at the counter turned back around. His eyes went to his suspended Houndour, and then down to Ted and Dem, and then back again — behind him, Kathy was still hurriedly stuffing cash into a plastic bag. A look of pure confusion came over him. "What the—"

He was so focused on his Houndour that he didn't notice the vines slithering across the ceiling above his head — like lightning, a flurry lashed down, one snatching the gun right out of his hand, and other whipping around his throat in a noose. The gagging sound that tore from his throat was pure horror — Ted felt his own breath leave him as the man was hauled into the air a yard above the floor, his feet knocking over a fruit stand and a basket of chocolate bars standing near the counter.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGHHHH," he said.

"Dem!" Ted rasped, struggling to his knees; the Budew was staring at the burglar, her wizened, sweet face hard with cruelty. "Dem! Stop! You'll hurt him!"

For three excruciating seconds, the Budew failed to see why that was a bad thing. This man had held a gun to Ted's head, and his Pokemon had attacked and bitten him. Didn't he deserve to suffer? But only when she looked upon Ted's desperate face did the sound of the man's struggles finally reach her. And what terrible sounds they were! Horrified, she released the human — he crashed fantastically to the ground, maybe even cracking his knees in the process, and landed flat on his face.

Several long moments passed, where Ted could only hear the sound of his own labored breathing. Eventually, Kathy crept from behind the counter and bent beside the man. She was still pale, and shakier than ever. She probed at the burglar's neck and looked up at Ted.

"Alive," she breathed.

Ted buckled in relief; behind him, the Houndour, still trapped at the ceiling, snarled furiously.

"Hold on," Kathy rasped. "I'm going to call the police." She glanced at Dem. "Can you tie him up?"

Dem turned away, shaky herself — Ted gathered her up in his arms and squeezed her. "It's all right," he said. "You let him go, it's fine. We just want to make sure he doesn't wake up and get away. Just a little rope, Dem, please."

Reluctantly, the Budew sent more vines Kathy's way, and they spun rapidly around the burglar, until it looked like he was trussed up in a green straightjacket. Kathy hurried back around the counter.

"Can you please keep an eye on them?" she asked. "The police will be here in a few minutes."

"Sure," Ted said wearily. The Houndour snarled again, and he glared up at the captured Pokemon. "I'd keep quiet if I were you. Else Dem might have to kick your butt a second time!"

By the time the cops arrived, the Houndour had passed out. The burglar, ironically, had awakened, and spat curses all the way to the police car. Ted wished to go home, but couldn't — the nasty bite on his shoulder was bleeding, and the cops had questions, for him, for Kathy. An ambulance arrived, and as one of the EMTs inspected his wound, a crowd gathered on the other side of the street, attracted to the blue-and-red flashing lights. His arm was bound, and someone determined that he needed a visit to the hospital. So he was loaded up into the ambulance and whisked away, sirens blaring. Dem, who also had bandages wrapped around her, pinned herself to his side all the way there. It was kind of exhilarating, kind of scary.

When they reached the Mauville City General Hospital, Ted and Dem were separated: he was taken to see a nice lady doctor, who assured him that Dem had been rushed away to the hospital's small Pokemon ICU. She took a look at his Houndour bite and then gave him a little something that made him sleepy and made the pain go away. He closed his eyes and slept for a while, and when he woke up, he had seventeen stitches in his shoulder, and his mom had arrived, breathing fire in a way only a panicked single mother could. Not at him, of course — at the cops, who were standing around, obviously waiting to hear his side of what had happened at Aunt Anne's Neighborhood Market. Unfortunately, they had to wait a little longer, as Mom kicked them out when he came to.

First, she was relieved, grateful, hugging him and weeping and praising Arceus. Then she was angry — everything was his fault, of course, and if he hadn't had about two dozen stitches holding the flesh of his shoulder together, she would be chasing him up and down the hall with a switch.

"You tried something, didn't you?" she said, somehow managing to cry and glower at the same time. "Did you try to run? Or say something smart? Why are you always getting yourself into trouble?"

"I didn't!" he protested. "He didn't like the way I looked at him — that's all, honest! And then he sicced his stupid Houndour on me, and he hurt Dem, so I had to fight back!"

"Dem? You mean Demeter? The Budew from the local park? What on earth was she doing with you?"

"Well, see, we were there to buy spinach—"

"Buy spinach? You? Why do you insist on lying to me, young man?"

"I'm not! We were buying spinach to help me brainstorm, so I could figure out a new TM to—"

"Sweet Arceus." Ted's mom tilted her head back and pinched her nose. "The TM? The TM? So it all boils down to that? You were at the scene of a robbery, got bitten, nearly got killed... All because of that stupid TM of yours?"

He ducked, sheepish. "W-well..." When she put it like that, it did sound a little...well, not smart.

She agreed, and spent the next ten to fifteen minutes explaining in great detail just how not smart and maybe even stupid he was for getting himself into such a mess. He tried a couple of times to interject to defend himself, but it was pointless — his mom was decompressing at this point, so he let her go, and thought about other things instead. Like Dem. Was she all right? She'd been hurt, too, when she'd gotten thrown into the beer case. Had the nurses in the Pokemon ICU healed her yet?

The cops finally had a chance to talk to him thirty minutes later, after the nurse came to check in. Their questions were pretty straightforward, and Ted answered as thoroughly as he could, but as the interview progressed, he grew increasingly worried about Dem. Something about recalling and describing the scuffle with the Houndour intensified his anxiety. So as soon as the interview concluded, Ted asked his mother if they could make a trip to the Pokemon ICU.

She was doubtful, of course, but after consulting the doctor, she decided he was well enough to take a walk, so they got up and made the journey to the other side of the building, and headed through a set of double-doors decorated with images of Chanseys and Pikachus. They checked with the nurse at the front, and after pulling something up on the computer, she led them down a hall and into a large chamber.

It was just like a greenhouse, complete with skylights and a floor crowded out by pots and giant containers filled with growing things, including small trees, shrubs, ferns, and of course lots and lots of flowers. Two lines of glass terrariums formed an aisle going from one wall to the other, and in each was an injured, recovering grass-type Pokemon: an Oddish sleeping here, a bandaged Turtwig lapping at a bowl of water there, a Bellsprout sunning itself beyond.

Dem was in a terrarium closest to the far wall, which had the biggest window letting in the most sun. She was buried up to her eyeballs in potting soil, and appeared to be sleeping in a circle of strong sunshine. Ted tapped hopefully on the glass, but she didn't respond.

According to the nurse, she was all right, but she would need to spend several days in the terrarium to fully heal. She was suffering from what would be akin to a broken back in a human — it wasn't bone or a spine that had suffered trauma, but something called a radicle, which had partially severed when she'd been thrown into the beer cooler. Luckily, grass-types could heal rather quickly from such things: all she needed was water, soil, sun, and time.

Ted was relieved to hear the news, but still felt terrible. His mom let him sit outside her terrarium for half an hour before they had to head back to check out, and as he watched her doze, he wondered if she was in pain. He cringed in guilt at the thought: she was so much smaller than him, yet she'd had to save him from both the Houndour and the burglar. All because of that stupid bag of baby spinach. And he hadn't even come up with a TM to make this all worth it!

Or...had he?

That night, when he went to sleep on a throbbing shoulder, he dreamed about the burglary again. The dream didn't go quite the way the actual event had — the burglar had a clown's nose, for example, and the Houndour licked Ted's face and begged to play fetch instead of attacking him — but Dem still tied them both up like she had in reality, and the sight of her covering the floor and ceiling with her vines and using them to trap her enemies was so acute that it woke Ted up, and set something ringing in his ears.

Jungle...

Jungle...

Jungle...

Jungle...J...

Jungle Ja...

He stared at his black bedroom wall, the words now blaring between his ears louder than the far-off sirens he could hear wailing outside. Yes, this was it. The idea the spinach had been building up inside his skull. It only took a hold-up, a Houndour bite, and seventeen stitches to knock it loose.

Demeter, use..!

He groped for the notebook he kept beside his bed, turned on the light, and began writing. He wrote explanations. Drew diagrams. Jotted down notes and points right up until it was actually time to wake up and get ready for school.

For the majority of the day, he was so excited that he could barely focus on anything else going on around him. (Not enough for his principal or teachers to get mad at him, though — he did his work, albeit a little blankly.) As soon as the final bell rang, he pelted through the doors and, instead of going home, made his way down to the hospital. It was a long twenty-minute walk, through a rougher part of the neighborhood and across several busy highways in the ugly heat, but he doubted anything about his seedy environment could dampen his enthusiasm today. Because this was it: this was what would pull him out of Mauville City, and get him and his mom that big house.

And it was all thanks to Dem!

When he reached the hospital, he checked into the Pokemon ICU and was granted an hour to visit Dem. He practically skipped down to the greenhouse, and when he reached her terrarium, she was awake, though still buried in soil. She looked very tired, but brightened when Ted waved at her.

"Dem!" He cried. "I figured it out! Our move! Jungle Jam!"

—

Move: Jungle Jam

Move Type: Physical, Grass

Description: The user takes full control of the surrounding environment by spreading out feelers, vines, or roots. These extensions of the user's body are used to manipulate and shape their surroundings to form traps, hazards, and choke points. In doing so, this move also strengthens moves such as Ingrain, Giga Drain, Grasswhistle, and even Solar Beam.

Inventor(s): Theodore Grant

Filing Date: December 14th, 2020

Value: 300,000 Pokedollars

Downloads Via the Hidden and Technical Move Trademark Office: 13,927 to date

—

(Pokemon Pearl Description)

Move: Jungle Jam

Type: Grass

Damage: 20 per turn

Description: The user manipulates their surroundings to attack the foe.

—

Created: August 10, 2020

Completed: December 19, 2020

Word Count: 5680