I Sting (Pokemon Poison Type Specialist)

Virah woke up to the feeling of something heavy pressing up against her chest. She tilted her head downward and looked on over to her chest, and there she saw something both strange and familiar.

She opened her mouth to talk only to realize that she was now paralyzed, an attempt to shake her head followed which sadly yielded no result.

With nothing better to do, she lay there and faced the serpentine form of one of Arceus' creations, she didn't know the name of this particular Legendary, though she was familiar with its shape.

The being's serpentine body, six finger-like wings, bladed head, and crimson gaze had left an impression the first time she saw them and Virah thought they wouldn't be leaving the back of her mind anytime soon.

She and the Legendary stared at each other in silence, before the Pokemon roared and Virah flinched awake.

The poison specialist stared at the ceiling, confused and dazed, Virah raised a hand to caress her cheek, the skin felt cold to the touch, tender. Soft.

"… What was that?"

The better question, she thought, would be why was that. She wasn't sure what the Legendary was trying to say by appearing to her like it did just now and now she was confused.

Actually, was it even trying to say anything? Or did it just feel like visiting her with no ulterior motive?

Virah honestly wasn't sure.

She pushed herself out of bed and proceeded to continue with her morning routine. Virah was fully dressed and clean by the time she got out of her room, she checked her pockets for her necessities and then headed for the cafeteria.

The wait didn't take long and her breakfast, which consisted of the usual meat, protein, dairy, and bread was quickly gobbled up by her, she then went to the nursery to grab her team.

As she left, she swiped her trainer card on the scanner by the door to pay for her team's food and then left the center.

As always, she was the first to reach National Park and with both Whitney and Grene being an hour away from arriving, Virah went on to do her standard physical warm up, but not before instructing her team on what they will be doing for training.

"Jet, just leave the pile of stuff on the ground next to the bench alright?" Her Zubat nodded before flying off to start his search, "and Nitro, please watch over my bag,"

"Bee-Beedrill," Nitro patted his thorax with his drill while nodding in reassurance, "Beedrill, Beedrill,"

"Thanks, I'll count on you to keep it safe then," Virah nodded in approval before starting her morning run.

Virah noticed that it didn't take her long to leave Nitro's general vicinity and moments after that, she saw that her running speed had, for some reason, considerably increased.

Instead of feeling happy about her sudden recovery, Virah just felt confused.

Was this because of her Aura or was it because of that Legendary's sudden visit? She was sure that the serpentine Pokemon didn't do anything to her other than stare in an oddly aggressive way but maybe not?..

Virah frowned, but curiosity quickly overtook her and she picked up her pace, further increasing her speed.

Her surroundings became a blur as she extended the reach of her gait, and she went from doing a simple jog to a sprint. She knew that running like this was a bad idea, especially since her legs had somehow "miraculously" recovered.

But she also knew that atrophied legs don't just heal overnight, and that goes double after all the running and jumping she did yesterday.

Eventually, she found herself slowing down, she controlled her breathing and stabilized it, taking in slow, big gulps of air instead of hasty smaller breaths.

As she went back to jogging, Virah checked on herself, she focused on the feeling of aching that came from her legs and realized that the burn wasn't as much as she expected, her knees also didn't hurt, not as much as they did the last few days at least.

All in all, it was… strange. Really strange.

Virah sat on a bench and gave herself some time to think, she bit her lip as the adrenaline in her system died down, tilting her head to the left allowed her to see two trainers, one being a camper and the other a youngster, battling each other.

Between the two were their Pokemon, a Pineco and a Ratata, both were waiting for orders, they were also glaring at each other the same way their silent trainers did.

Virah glanced over to the group of kids surrounding the two and crossed her arms, 'a friendly spar?'

Or was it more than that?

Virah shook her head and turned away, her thoughts slowly drifted from wanting to know more about the battle to her strange rate of recovery.

Humans usually don't recover this quickly, and she wanted to say it was because of the Legendary she saw this morning but that sounded a bit too farfetched so she concluded that it must've been because of her Aura.

Unfortunately for her, she didn't know a lot about the side effects of using Aura daily and since Grene wasn't here, she wouldn't be able to access the martial artist's books related to the subject so she had no choice but put everything at the back of her head.

'Or… maybe not?' Virah found herself staring at the battle again, 'what do Poison Types have that other Pokemon don't?'

That was a neat question, if not a common one amongst trainers.

Virah put some thought into it and after a moment or two, concluded that Poison Types didn't really have any proper way of recovering during battle and healing wasn't the answer she was looking for.

Instead, she found herself thinking about the type's natural immunity to being poisoned, which in hindsight, seemed rather obvious.

'Is it because my body ignores the side effects of medicine?' Virah frowned, that didn't sound right, most meds are poison, so that meant that her Aura would nullify everything, not just the side effects.

'Or, maybe… it's because my Aura helps in boosting my immune system?'

That also didn't sound right, especially since Virah assumed that Poison Types resisted poison because of their biology, and also that as a whole, poison resistance mostly had nothing to do with the immune system.

'Okay so what is it then?'

Was it really because of the Legendary? Really? But why?

Virah concluded that it didn't matter, and that despite having answer for the reason behind why it would heal her, she felt more accepting of the mystery because a Legendary did it.

Really, why would she even question something like that?

Virah shook her head and got up, she was about to continue with her jog when she saw that the two trainers had still not done anything.

Curious, Virah found herself walking over to the group, one of the kids was quick to notice her and when he pointed at her, they started whispering at each other and before long, everyone around the battle court is focusing on her.

She waved in greeting, "do you two need a referee?"

"N-no?" The youngster stammered.

Virah tilted her head, "hm?" Now she was confused, "then what are you standing around for?"

"Well wanted to fight but Owen doesn't want to bet anything!" The camper pointed at the youngster, who crossed his arms in a huff.

"It's because of I didn't want Bert to lose money when he loses!" The now named Owen retorted.

"Didn't you say earlier that it was because your mother didn't give you any money yet?" A girl from the group beyond the court said, her tone laced with curiosity.

"Y-yeah but also it's because I don't want Bert to lose money! I was just bluffing! That's all!" Owen doubled down.

"Uhuh…" Virah trailed off, she shook her head, causing her pony tail to sway back and forth.

This was clearly going nowhere so she waved to the group, "well, good luck to the two of you, if you two still need a referee if I pass by again later don't be afraid to call me okay?"

Both kids- really, they were only 2 - 3 years younger than her, - nodded and Virah decided to leave them be, continuing on with her physical exercise.

She looked up and saw a familiar Zubat in the distance, she waved, and Jet quickly flew away.

Virah smiled, glad that her Pokemon was watching over her in case of a battle.