[Fin] Songs around the campfire

[TawnyAngel]

Taavi took the medal carefully and held it in both one hand, brushing his fingertips over the graven letters. "Wow Lin, that's amazing," he said softly, looking up at his companion with a little smile and reaching up to tuck his hair behind his ear again. "You must be very proud... err... I mean, you should be. If you're not I mean." He handed the medal back carefully and quietly resolved to learn more about the KSO, it seemed to him that they were very different from anything found in any other league region.

"Oh!" Taavi straightened up abruptly and turned back to his sausages which were now just the perfectly right side of a little burned on the outside. "Sausages are ready!" he announced, making a bit of space on the big flat rock for his small frying pan and setting it down. "They'll be really hot right now so be careful," he said to the assembled group in general as he cut a slice of cheese for himself, placed it in a roll, and then dug in his bag for the bottle of hot sauce. "And if anyone likes their food spicy there's this!" he said, giving it a wave to illustrate.

Valour looked over when food was announced but he wasn't hungry, and he didn't really like cooked meat anyway. He turned back to Gregson and inspected him through both eyes again. <>  

[Gwennythe]

<< A /detective/ book!>> Gregson declared, rather proudly, either unwilling to acknowledge or admit, or just not aware, that said detective book featured an ' Inspector Gregson' only as a minor supporting character.
Gregson also tried to 'play it cool' and not let on that he was rather excited at the prospect of getting a cooked sausage.

"Hm. I guess I am." Lin smiled, pleased with the praise "I mean, I've never gotten to do anything like be a ranger or something cool like that, but I helped out, at least. And I'll help out again one day. I want Rocket gone. Completely gone." He watched as Taavi went about finishing up with the food, and declaring it ready, before grinning at the offer of hot sauce.
"I'm liking you more and more."

Loro and Acorn both surged forward a little, waving leaves and paws, clamoring to be given sausages, while Jeeves just waited patiently; his younger team mates were welcome to get some first.  

[TawnyAngel]

Heeeeeeeeee, Lin liked him! Taavi grinned, and once he'd finished pouring some over the cheese on his roll, he put the bottle of sauce down with the rest of the food. "Um, thanks, you too! I mean ah," he ducked his head a little awkwardly. "I came here not knowing anyone so... it's nice to make a friend?" Was that okay? He thought that was okay, yes, Lin was nice and they seemed to understand one another pretty well so far even though he was being his awkward self and falling over what he was trying to say.

Anyway! Taavi cut two of the sausages in half and gave a half to Loro, half or Acorn, and offered half to Jeeves once the first two had accepted them. Half a sausage was probably too much for small pokemon like them but if they didn't eat all of the offering, well, Taavi was not precious about food and was happy to finish it up. In the meantime however... it sounded like Lin didn't want sausages, but if he took two then there were still two there anyway if he did. If not there were still rolls and cheese he could have.  

[Gwennythe]

"Yeah. Always good to make a new friend." Lin agreed.
He certainly didn't want any sausages, but he did take some cheese and cram it into some bread, forming a really crude sandwich.

"Eeeeeeh!" Declared Acorn happily as she was given a half a sausage and started munching on it right away, holding it between two paws with a very pleased expression on her face.

Loro took it a lot more quietly, nibbling it gently and clearly a much slower eater than the rodent pokémon.

Jeeves even dipped his head and offered a 'Sni' in thanks, before using his vines to spring himself up and onto Lin's shoulder without much effort.
He ate his sausage right there next to Lin's face, much to the boy's distaste, but lack of any real protest.

Lin did raise his cheese sandwich though.
"Especially a new friend who offers you a meal."  

[TawnyAngel]

Definitely not a meat eater; Taavi filed this away in his mind under 'important things to know', he didn't want to offend Lin with a future offer to a steakhouse or something. Not that he could afford to go to a steakhouse, but still.

"Glad to share!" Taavi replied with a smile as he put a pair of sausages into his roll. "Food tastes better with people to share it with anyway." He did share food with Valour sometimes - sort of - but usually it was Valour eating first when he made the kill, and him eating later when he'd cooked some of it. It was kind of nice to eat the same things as other people at the same time then, he supposed. Lack of breakfast was still a small worry in his mind but it was fading as he tucked into his dinner; he'd deal with that problem tomorrow. It was summer afterall, there were things to be foraged and Valour would find him food if he asked... maybe after Lin left though.  

[Gwennythe]

Lin nodded his head to show he agreed, went to speak, remembered that wasn't polite, and chewed and swallowed until he felt he could speak in a more civilized manner; after all, it wasn't just him and Jeeves, and the others now, he didn't want to look /entirely/ more savage than he already did, living in the woods, in front of Taavi and Valour.

"It certainly does. And bread and cheese... Yesterday's dinner, for me, were some bluk berries and mushrooms. I don't cook much."  

[TawnyAngel]

"Really? I love cooking!" Taavi replied with a smile and a shrug. "Whether I've bought it or foraged, or bringing the two together...." He shrugged again. "I just enjoy it I guess, so long as it's not raining!" It really did sound like Lin more or less lived off the land though, that had to be hard especially in the winter when there was less to be found. Would it be rude to ask?... Probably not, no, taking an interest was good! "So how do you get by out here? I mean, I know how to find things to eat but it can't be easy to forage for everything." With Valour he could probably do it but without a skilled hunter to provide meat? Maybe Lin had winter stores, or sold or traded things in town to cover what he couldn't find.  

[Gwennythe]

"Friends. Uh. Mostly. Sometimes we do some odd jobs in town to earn a bit to tide us over too. This last winter I stayed with Ray; you know, the friend I mentioned? Well, I met her during the winter really, than just sort of stayed on with her." Lin certainly didn't seem to mind talking about it. "I do like cooked food," he elaborated "but I'm wary of fire. A little. I mean. It's usually pretty much necessity out here, but I seldom use one for cooking unless it's a colder season."  

[TawnyAngel]

Taavi munched his dinner and nodded along as Lin spoke, all of that made sense. "Mmfh," he said as he swallowed, "caution around fire's sensible. Campers who aren't careful cause all kinds of trouble; we had a few fires near my station in Hoenn started by campfires that somebody didn't pay enough attention to, or didn't put out properly. Nobody ever got hurt luckily but if we hadn't caught them in time it could have been nasty." Things like that had always made him think he should find a water pokemon to join him and Valour but he'd never found the right one. Maybe one day though, and a fire type too... and that could easily get out of hand.  

[Gwennythe]

Lin shuddered at the thought of fires spreading, taking hold in the forest he liked to roam...
Thoughts like that often made -him- feel he should get a water type, but he'd hardly really met any that weren't with a trainer already...
Plus there was the lack of access to a reliable pokéball source; all of his pokéballs were apricorn-based, bought from people in the trade.

Maybe one day he'd stumble across on at a stream or something, and see if he could talk it into hanging out with him...

"Types too. All of my lot, save Gregson there, have a weakness to it..." He shuddered again; he hadn't liked how /easy/ Jeeves had been beaten by fire in the past...  

[TawnyAngel]

He could well be wrong of course but it seemed to Taavi that Lin was a bit more than just wary of fire. It would be rude and invasive to say that to somebody he'd just met though and so he tucked the thought away for possible future reference, it might matter one day.

"As it's just me and Valour I'm pretty wary of types he'd weak to," Taavi said instead, wiping stray hot sauce off his lips with a finger as discreetly as possible. "And, I don't know if your experiences are the same, but I've usually found you have more to worry about from pokemon who have trainers who just don't know what they're doing... or who actually have bad intentions. If a wild pokemon's hostile you're probably somewhere you shouldn't be, or it's somewhere it shouldn't be and needs guiding home!"  

[Gwennythe]

"Ah. Uh. Electricity... and uh... Ice... Rock?" Lin queried, somewhat eagerly, with an embarrassed shrug. "I didn't have quite the trainer's education most people seem to have. I've been learning as I go though."

He nodded then, thoughtfully chewing a bite of a cheese sandwich.
"I've never personally had any real probably with a wild pokémon, even living out here like I do, but I know someone who ran afoul of a," He thought back, what was it she'd said "a houndoom... I think..."

He shook his head.
"Most of the pokémon I come across either pay me no mind, flee out of the way, or," he gestured toward Moriko grazing nearby, encompassing his smaller friends into the gesture, with the exception of Jeeves "choose to come along and hang out with me. Some of them have balls but Gregson's the only one I ever actually -caught-.. I think he's okay with that."  

[TawnyAngel]

Taavi said 'mmh!' around a mouthful of food and nodded encouragingly. "That's right," he said once he'd swallowed, "and resistant to grass and bug, and immune to ghost and ground under normal circumstances. I've never caught a pokemon at all," he grinned and shook his head with a shrug, "but, well, most pokemon seem to be okay with it from what I can tell? But people can ask now!" Taavi's eyes lit up with enthusiasm, tinged with wistfulness. "I hope it'll happen to me once I've been here a while."  

[Gwennythe]

Lin listened with interest; he wasn't surprised to hear about the resistance to grass... Perhaps due to experience with Pidgey or the like...

"Immune to ghost and ground?" That gave a rise of his eyebrows; it was interesting to learn these things.

"Oh, yes. That must be interesting... I mean, I've heard tale but I've not found myself able to understand anything, well, beyond the usual level," Lin grinned sheepishly- he felt like Jeeves and he 'talked' all the time, he'd just never verbally 'heard' him... "but I suppose the types I come across are limited a little."  

[TawnyAngel]

"Uh-hu," Taavi nodded again. "Flying types are immune to ground so long as they're not roosting or pulled down by a gravity effect. Normal types can't be damaged by ghost attacks and normal attacks can't damage ghosts. And I know what you mean," Taavi waved his roll around, managing not to lose any of the contents by some miracle, "I mean, I know what Valour means even if I don't know what he says. I'd like to really understand though, have a conversation...." Taavi looked over at his avian friend - still in conversation with Gregson - and then shrugged and looked back at Lin. "But I don't know how typing works in that way. Nobody does yet as far as I know. Even if I never get to understand him though it would be amazing to talk to any pokemon type."