With the knowledge that Dudley the PI owed him one (which to be honest Nils wasn't sure how reliable the man was), Nils cracked open the nearest exit that led topside and crawled out of the sewer, swiftly followed by Clarissa. Well, they'd done it; they'd found the source of that weird noise and solved the mystery of some missing people... maybe? Hopefully? Nils knew that Clarissa had sent information back to Professor Kapoc, and with Dudley already on the scene and involved there wasn't much left to do but leave it to the adults to sort out. Maybe in the future they could go back once they'd gotten stronger. Eventually he had to come back here anyway as he was pretty sure there was a gym in town, but it would be better to get some more experience first. But that was a thought for later.
Nils was rather chill while they walked through the city. He knew they both looked a mess and probably smelled even worse, but it was sort of funny to watch the people on the sidewalks part in front of them. No foot traffic to worry about, and he had an equally stinky friend by his side. His Pokemon were also all safe in their pokeballs, so he didn't need to worry much about them unless something happened on the way to the Pokemon Center... which nothing did, thankfully. Nils had been in the Pokemon Center just earlier, but even so once he and Clarissa arrived he took a moment to glance around. When he spotted Amelia waiting for them he smiled widely at her... until she choked on the stench wafting from her two fellow trainers. Then his smile turned apologetic.
"That bad?" he asked, fully aware that yes, it was that bad.
So bad, in fact, that the nurse ushered them to the back of the establishment and took no objections about it. Nils nodded at Clarissa when she waved to him, and then to Amelia when the younger girl followed after the older, and finally Nils himself passed his pokeballs to Nurse Joy over the counter before heading to the men's section of the more private rest areas. "My pokemon too, please. Thank you miss!"
In the accommodation area he found cots and single beds, shower stalls and a bath, sinks and even machines for washing and drying clothes. Plus complimentary towels along with tees and sweat pants while waiting for one's laundry. How convenient!
It wasn't much later that Nils emerged from the rear of the Pokemon Center washed and with his clothes freshened up too. It seemed that out of the three of Kapoc's trainers here, he'd been the first to finish. After reclaiming his pokemon from Nurse Joy and thanking her again, Nils tossed his backpack near one of the sofas in the front and plopped down to wait for Clarissa and Amelia. While he did, he released Tors from his pokeball. The mudbray was good as new now.
Nils pet the pokemon's head. "I'm glad you're alright, buddy."
Tors licked his hand, leaving a residue behind that was a mix of mud and saliva which Nils just laughed at and wiped on his pants. They'd barely lasted ten minutes clean.
Next order of business... teaching Tors that new move. Or rather letting him know to use that physical version over the special attack version. With his phone pulled from his pocket Nils looked around the UI for anything about the message it had displayed earlier during the battle. Eventually he found it, and with some fiddling Tors' moves were updated.
[ Swap Mud-Slap for Mudslide ]
And looking through his phone meant that Nils noticed the pokedex had updated a lot more since he'd last checked it. At least one of their fellow trainers had been making a lot of progress outside of the city! And... were those two more contacts he hadn't noticed before on his list? If they'd been added automatically, they were probably more of Kapoc's recruits. Maybe latecomers? Nils sent them both a text message:
To: Vivian @Goggy, Claris @Typical
hey hey! your number was in my phone. guessing you're trainers picked by prof. Kapoc? same here!
did you show up late or something? lol
since we didn't get to meet before, I'm saying hi now!
He considered also sending along the photo he'd sent to Amelia, but decided against it. Instead he forwarded the group photo that Faye had taken that same morning so that these two missing trainers could see what their co-workers (and competition!) looked like. While he was at it Nils also added Dudley's number to his contact list in case he lost the card. By then Clarissa and Amelia had returned, so Nils stood to greet them. The jacket he'd previously worn was tied around his waist now, leaving him in the cream colored long sleeve tunic and red undershirt, and his hair was no longer braided; instead it was a long, fluffy mane of brown, left loose for the moment while the last of it dried.
"Welcome back. Feels a lot better now, huh?" he greeted them with. The shower had definitely helped him, at least. "Now that we're all back together again, we can start out of the city whenever we're ready. I wanna swing by the Pokemart on the way out for a few more potions, though. As for what route we take..."
Nils brought up the photo of the painted map that he and Clarissa had seen in the mysterious cavern the fire puffs were in below the sewers for all of them to see, the one that showed the symbols over a few different cities. Two were very close by.
"Unless we wanna head off the beaten path and cut right through Lake Charity to Valstille, it's gonna be toward either Florasong or Stararbor. I wanna check out these little marks on the map and both towns have them, so either one's fine with me. Florasong's a little closer, though. What do you guys think?"
At that point Nils had noticed something else- no, someone else. A tall, blond boy, familiar looking not just because he had been with the others in Kapoc's lab earlier. This was the boy with the Cutiefly, if Nils recalled correctly. He did not, unfortunately, recall the other boy's name though. He had arrived too late to hear it and he hadn't introduced himself afterward. It wasn't like they were complete strangers though, and since the guy was here in the Pokemon Center hovering near them, Nils shot him a smile.
"Oh, hey hey. You coming with?" he asked Valerian, as simple as that.





