A/N: Yes, I know it's been awhile. You may just have to live with it since it could happen again. Anyways, I hope you enjoy.

Disclaimer: I don't own Pocket Monsters.

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Legends on Earth: Chapter Five: Shopin' Distress
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Kirby hadn’t realized how late he had stayed up until he woke up. He was just settling in a dream about a genie and some sort of twisting ladder. He didn’t really understand it, but at least it wasn’t a nightmare after all he went through. He started feeling like he was being shaken. He woke up and opened his eyes with some irritation. He saw Espeon nudging him, looking for her breakfast.

“Eeesss’,” he moaned, “it’s too early.” He pulled the cover over his eyes to block out the light.

“The sun is already halfway to its highpoint,” the girl, Aile, told him.

“What?” he asked, too tired to figure out the conversion from the lugia’s measure of time.

Espeon walked over to Kirby’s pile of stuff. She grabbed his pokégear from the pile in her mouth and brought it over to him. Pulling back the covers, she showed it to him. It took a little while for his eyes to adjust, but when they did he read the time.

“9:45?” he said, sitting up, “How did that happen? I’m guessing you’re pretty hungry then, huh Es’?”

“Es, Es-pe,” she said nodding.

“Alright; just hold on a sec’.” Kirby got up and walked over to his stuff. Rummaging around in it, he pulled out a box.

“What’s in there?” Aile asked, peering over his shoulder.

“Biscuits; that sound good to you?”

“To me?”

“Yeah, I’m assuming you need to eat. I don’t know when you last ate as a lugia, but I know you haven’t eaten as a human,” he explained, turning to face her, “And you’ve been a human for almost a day.”

“Uh, yeah, I guess I am hungry,” she said, feeling her stomach grumbling.

“Good. Biscuits it is then!”

He opened up the box and set it on the ground. Espeon immediately ran over and grabbed a biscuit from the box. Taking it to Kirby’s sleeping bag, she set it down and started to eat it.

“Help yourself,” Kirby said with a sigh, watching Espeon eat.

Kirby grabbed a biscuit for himself. Sitting on a log, he started eating. He watched as Aile tentatively picked up a biscuit out of the box. She looked it over, examining it closely. She even sniffed it a couple times.

“It won’t hurt you,” Kirby told her.

She looked over at him and asked, “You wouldn’t happen to have any fish?”

“I’m sorry to say that I’m fresh out,” he responded with a smile, “Just try it.”

She looked back at the biscuit in her hand. Taking one more smell, she bit off a tiny bit of it. She chewed on it for a little while as she judged it.

Kirby waited until she had swallowed before asking, “Well?”

“What?”

“How was it?”

“It’s a little bland,” Aile responded.

“Bland, you say? What is it, not salty enough?” he joked.

“Huh?” She looked confused at the remark.

“Nothing. At least you’ll eat it, right?”

Aile nodded and finished the biscuit. She grabbed another from the box and was about to eat it but had a second thought. Looking over at Kirby, she asked, “Do you mind?”

“Of course not,” Kirby told her, “Go right ahead.”

She started eating it, a little slower this time. Sitting down next to Kirby, she sighed. “So, what do we do next?” she asked worriedly.

“Well, first we get you some clothes.”

She smiled a little. “Then what?”

“Umm… I’m not really sure.”

“Oh…” Aile said, looking down. She seemed like she was going to cry.

Not sure what else to do, Kirby put his arm around her and said, “We’ll figure something out. Don’t worry. You can travel with me for awhile and we’ll try to come up with something.”

“That doesn’t sound very promising,” she muttered.

“I know, but I’m tired right now and can’t come up with anything better. Look, Aile, just believe me when I say that you’ll be okay,” he reassured her.

“I do, but will I be okay as a human or okay as a lugia?”

“We’ll find out what happened to you and how to fix it; we just need to find a lead. For now though, let’s get you some clothes. I saw a shop further up the beach. Let’s go.”

They packed up their stuff to leave. More accurately, Kirby packed up his stuff. Espeon and Aile mostly just watched. Kirby rolled up the sleeping bags and put them away. He then grabbed the usual supplies and put them in his pockets. These included his pokégear, empty pokéballs, his wallet, and a super potion, just in case. The pokégear was the default black color since he didn’t want to bother getting a colored shell for it. His wallet featured some generalized stats on the three Kanto starters that were more for show then actual reference. It was really for little kids, but Kirby kept it because it worked.

Putting on his backpack, Kirby said, “Okay, all set. You guys ready?”

“As much as I can be,” Aile said, while Espeon just ran up to Kirby in response.

“Then let’s head to the shop.”

They started walking along the beach. They were heading in the direction of town, but the shop was closer to the beach than the city. As they walked, they decided to talk.

“So, what about you?” Aile asked Kirby.

“What about me?”

“Well, I feel like I don’t know anything about you. Where do you come from? What have you done before? Stuff like that.”

“If you’re really that curious, I guess I’ll tell you,” he began with an intrigued smile. “I grew up just south of the gym in Cerulean City. I started my journey when I was almost eleven with Espeon here. Because I started late in the season, it would have been too hard to catch up in the Indigo League. Instead, I went to the Orange Islands to compete there. I managed to make it to the championship, but I only got to the second round. After that I went back home for a little bit to rest. Then I went to New Bark Town so I could register for the league here. I’ve been competing at the gyms here, since.”

“That’s nice,” Aile said with some distraction.

“Well if you aren’t that interested…”

“No, it’s just that, I really don’t understand most of what you just said. All I got was that you started journeying at eleven with Espeon and that you went to the Orange Islands.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. Do you want me to try and explain it to you?” Kirby offered.

“That’s okay, I don’t really need to understand it.”

“Very well. Looks like we’re here, anyways.”

They had arrived in front of a relatively small building. It was dressed up to look like a beach shack, with driftwood paneling and palm tree frond roof. It was obviously fake, however, as there were no palm trees in miles. Also, some of the wood paneling had come off to reveal the brick underneath.

As they walked in, a guy with long blonde hair that fell over his eyes greeted them. He was wearing red shorts and a white tank top. On his feet he wore a pair of brown sandals. He was sitting behind the single checkout and had been previously reading a surfing magazine.

“Welcome to Austin’s Surf & Sand,” he called to them, “the most totally awesome place in Johto! How could I help a dude and dudette such as yourselves?”

“Um, yes,” Kirby said, “My friend here needs some clothes.”

“Like, what happened to the old ones, dude?”

“Well, um… She was… She was taking a shower after, uh… after swimming and, um… some- some sort of jerk went and stole her clothes.”

“Uh-huh,” the guy said skeptically, “Look, dude, like, I don’t care what you, like, do in private, but, like, stealing this innocent dudette’s threads… That’s, like, so totally not cool.”

Kirby looked at the man in disbelief. “What? No!” he said defensively.

“Whatever, dude,” the man, who Kirby saw on his nametag was the Austin, said shaking his head. He then addressed Aile, saying, “The clothing section is, like, over there. We, like, don’t have much of a selection of, like, regular clothes, but go ahead and, like, take a look. I’ll, like, totally make sure this dude pays for it. Is that, like, okay with you, dudette.”

Aile, who had been having some trouble following what Austin had been saying, nodded a couple times before answering, “Um, like, yes, thank you. Let’s go, like, Kirby.”

Kirby gave an annoyed look at her, but waited until he was out of Austin’s earshot before saying, “Thanks a lot, Aile.”

“You’re, like, welcome, but for, like, what?”

Kirby sighed at her misinterpretation of his sarcasm. “Nevermind. And could you stop talking li- in that way?”

“How, like, come, Kirby, like?” she asked, confused.

“Because it’s annoying.”

“But, like, you didn’t say, like, anything to that, like, guy,” she argued.

“He can’t help it; you can.”

“Oh, fine, but you don’t have to be so mean about it,” she said pouting.

“Sorry, I didn’t get much sleep and it’s making me get irritated easily.”

“Alright,” she responded. As they arrived at the clothing section, she looked around and asked, “Now, what should we get?”

Kirby started explaining to her, “Well, it looks like they don’t have any underwear, so we should get a bathing suit to supplement them. Then you’ll also need to get a shirt, some sort of pants or skirt or something, and some shoes. Though they probably only have sandals. So, why don’t we look around and you can pick out what you like.”

“O…kay,” she said, still a little confused. They walked around the section, looking at the designs of the items. Aile ended up picking out a silver two-pieced bathing suit that had blue stripes on the sides. The shorts she chose were white khakis that had frayed legs to give the impression that they were originally pants that had had the legs cut short. Her shirt was gray and had a chest pocket with Silver Island’s silver-wing logo on it. They also managed to find her a pair of black sandals that fit.

She held all of her stuff in her arms as Kirby directed her to the changing room. “Now go in there and get dressed,” he told her.

Aile looked into the dressing room and then looked back at Kirby, saying, “But, I don’t know how to.”

“What do you mean?” Kirby questioned worriedly.

“I was a lugia, remember? I didn’t wear clothes.”

“Be careful about how loud you talk about being a you-know-what,” he cautioned her, “It could get you in trouble. Now, what do you expect me to do about your clothes problem?”

“I was wondering if you could, you know, help me.”

“Help you get dressed?” Kirby said in shock.

Aile just nodded.

“No! No, no, no, no, no. That is not going to happen!”

“Why not?” she asked, her eyes watering from Kirby’s sudden harshness.

“Because you’ll… be naked, and I’ll… see you naked,” Kirby tried to explain.

“So?” she asked, clearly not understanding.

“‘So?’ So, I’m a guy, and… you’re a girl… Plus, that Austin guy already thinks I’m weird.” Kirby looked at her unconvinced face and blurted out, “And I’ll see you naked!”

“Please Kirby?”

“But- but-” He was dragged into the dressing room by Aile before he could get anything out.

“Come on,” she told him as she shut the door, “and if it’s really that much of a problem then don’t look.”

(-o-)(-o-) A few awkward moments later… (-o-)(-o-)

Kirby and Aile were walking from the clothing section. Aile had her new clothes on, and was holding the tags in her hand. Kirby had a distraught look on his face.

“I mean, who puts a mirror on the ceiling?” Kirby exclaimed, “What possible reason could someone have to put one there?”

“Oh, relax,” Aile told him.

“Relax? How can I relax? I saw you naked!”

“I was only half naked. I was wearing the bottom part of the bathing suit, remember?”

“I’m trying not to remember right now.”

“Besides,” she added, “you’ve seen me naked before.”

“That was different. You needed help, and I didn’t really notice.”

“Whatever,” she said.

They arrived back at the checkout. There, they noticed that Espeon had fallen asleep on the counter. Behind the desk sat a rather annoyed looking Austin.

“Dude, like, your espeon is, like, totally sleeping on my, like, counter. I think it’s, like, totally scaring away, like, all my customers, which is, like, so totally not awesome,” he complained to Kirby.

Kirby looked around the empty store and asked, “What customers?”

“Like, exactly, dude. Exactly,” he replied while nodding. “Look, are you, like, going to return it or, like, what, dude?”

“Well, the thing is, Es’ doesn’t go in her pokéball.”

“Dude, do you, like, think that, like, just because I’m, like, a surfer and not, like, a pokémon trainer, that I, like, don’t know that all pokémon, like, go in pokéballs?”

“But… not all pokémon do, and my espeon is one of them,” Kirby tried to convince him.

“Just get it off, now!” Austin practically yelled, waking up Espeon. Espeon, who was rather irritated at being woken up, then proceeded to launch a psybeam at Austin. He was thrown back a little, falling out of his chair.

“Es’!” Kirby called. “You’re not helping.”

“Es es-pe,” she defended, “Es-pe peon.” She jumped down off the counter and sat next to Kirby.

“Whatever. How is he?” Kirby asked Aile, who had kneeled down next to Austin.

“I think he’s waking up,” she responded as Austin opened his eyes. “Hello, Mr. Austin.”

“Are you, like, the angel dudette that’s, like, gonna bring me to Surfer Heaven?” the dazed storeowner asked.

“No, I came here to buy clothes. Don’t you remember?”

“Oh sweet angel dudette of death, like, don’t take me yet. At least let me, like, die surfing.”

Kirby was becoming frustrated with this. He walked over to the guy and yelled, “Hey! You’re not dying. Just get up and let us pay so that we can leave.”

Austin rubbed his eyes a couple times and stood up, only to become dizzy and sit down in his chair. After a little bit of rest, he finally said, “Dude, like, what were you, like, trying to do, like, kill me?”

Kirby sighed before saying, “Look, could you just check us out?”

“Yeah, like, sure, dude.” He politely asked Aile for the tags, and then added up the prices on a calculator. “Like, that’ll be 5,000 pokéyen, like, plus tax.”

“How much is the tax?” Kirby asked while pulling out his wallet.

“Like, it’s 500 to that little dudette that’s, like, standing next to you.”

“What? What kind of tax is that?”

“It’s, like, a pervert tax.”

“What?! But, I’m not a-” Kirby stopped, seeing that the guy wasn’t swayed. “Fine, here’s your money,” he said giving Austin some bills. Turning to Aile, he gave her some coins. “And here’s yours.”

“Ooh, they’re so shiny and pretty,” Aile said happily.

“Yes, yes, of course they are,” Kirby told her with little enthusiasm. Then, to Austin, he asked, “Are we done?”

“Totally, dude, totally.” Turning to Aile, he added, “If he, like, gives you anymore trouble, like, totally feel free to, like, call me.” He handed her a business card with his pokégear number on it. She took it, though she didn’t know what to do with it, and thanked him. Kirby just rolled his eyes and started walking out.

Aile followed after him, calling back, “Bye, Mr. Austin. See you again.”

Walking out into the sunlight, Kirby let out a sigh. “Finally, I’m done with that place.”

Aile came out behind him and said, “That was fun!”

“Fun for you, maybe,” Kirby responded. “We should teach you some lessens in humanity. There are some things that you need to know. Which reminds me: can I have my money back? Aile? Aile?” Kirby turned around to see that Aile was no longer standing behind him and was now running up the beach towards the city. “Aile?! What the heck are you doing?” he asked, knowing she couldn’t hear him. He then started running after her, Espeon right behind him.