#omg look at the healthy boy oh so big and strong i bet he'll live a long amazing life tehee giggle

[mintypsii]

trying out new pen with some ace dooodllesssss HES SO MUCH FUN TO DRAW

[greentrickster]

Do you think Melli would start working at the Battle Subway?

I could imagine him watching Emmet and Ingo battle (and taking notes) and trying to improve.

Anon? Bless your eyes, I needed a dopamine-fueled ask for this AU!

In regards to your question, I don't think he works there, exactly, but, once he gets comfortable with the idea of trains, I think he joins the twins and hangs out in their car as an observer along with Ingo. It not only lets Melli learn about modern battles from watching Emmet and helps him by having someone familiar to explain it to him if he needs, but answering questions like this helps Ingo reacquaint himself with the necessary memories and speeds up the process for him.

Plus, they can all three do practice battles while they're waiting for trainers to show up, or have Melli keep an eye on the car while Emmet and Ingo do conductor stuff.

An unexpected positive of this is that it helps Melli get a new appreciation for just how integrated and normal pokemon are in this society. Like, one day a trainer makes it to the twins, and Melli looks up expecting to see some tough young trainer, and instead it's a little old lady with a handbasket of poffin and an Arcanine. To make matters even more surprising, instead of the usual shpeal, Emmet (and, after a moment, Ingo), are both all, "Oh, Granny Sophie, haven't seen you in awhile!"

Because, let's be real... there should be some truly terrifyingly strong elderly pokemon trainers running around this world, and I'd like to see more of them. You see someone over fifty running around with a pokemon team, they're either a complete noob finally living out their dreams or packing some of the toughest game you will ever face.

And Granny Sophie's just tittering, wasn't even planning to go battling, but she heard that the nice young man who'd gone missing had come back, and she just had to come see for herself, and who's this fellow over in the corner?

This fellow over in the corner is Melli, who is staring into space because he has a better scale for how tough Ingo, Emmet, and Gear Station are at this point, and this lady casually just went through all that to say hi. The future is kinda scary.

Then again, the future is also kinda amazing, because he'll have had at least one trainer who made it this far see the twins, then notice Melli's own skuntank, and completely derail because, "OMG, I love skuntanks? And this one is so nice, lookit him, it's a him right? Yeah, lookit him, lookit you you're so big and shiny, what a handsome boy, I bet your trainer brushes your fur all the time doesn't he? Doesn't he? You're such a boofer, you want pets, can he have pets? Pets for the good boy!" (huge sniff) "Oh yeah, that's that happy healthy skuntank musk! Aw~ your trainer takes such good care of you, doesn't he, you big grumpy boy?"

And Melli's standing there, kinda shell-shocked (his skuntank is also kinda shell-shocked but also of the mind, 'yeah I am pretty great, and so is my Warden, and I do deserve pets!'), like, "He's a skuntank...?"

"He's a baby and I love him!"

Melli is so confused, he's the only person he knows who likes skuntanks, this is a new experience for him.

Aaaaand I have some more to say about this, involving Elesa and voltorbs and Melli, but it's late, so I'mma put all that in a reblog after I've slept!

Thanks for the ask!