Chapter 61
Virah was breathing hard by the time they reached the Pokemon center to get her Pokemon, and her state was something that Whitney did not fail to mention, "hey, are you sure you're okay?"
"Y-yes," Virah replied with a wheeze, she stopped and inhaled a lungful of air, "I know it looks like I got tired after crossing the road but I walked down three flights of stairs back at the hospital before you guys came so…" she looked down in guilt, "… yeah."
"You're pushing yourself, is what you're trying to say," Grene responded.
Virah reluctantly shook her head, "no, it's just- I know I can do it, and me walking around like this also builds up the muscles I've lost while recovering so it's necessary for me to do it,"
"Fine," Whitney crossed her arms and huffed, "but if you collapse while walking then you're going to have to actually take breaks from time to time, got that?"
"Sure," Virah put on a strained smile, "thank,"
"Yeah… just don't- just make sure that you actually take care of yourself instead of just letting your body decay or whatever," Whitney shook her head.
"I know how to do that just fine," Virah turned away from her friends to hide her smile, "you can count on me to do that,"
"Good," Grene replied and Virah saw the martial artist's reflection on a nearby window nod… then they met gazes and she looked away, face red.
"Uh… ar-are we going?" She stammered, "I think I'm fine now,"
"Let's go!" Whitney replied followed by her excitedly walking forward. Virah ran after the pinkette and when she caught up, Whitney slowed down and gave her a concerned look, "don't worry about your Pokemon by the way, they're fine,"
"I'm not," Virah shook her head for emphasis, "I know that Nitro and Jet are tough and besides, the nurse joy watching over me told me that since they were poison types, they were barely affected by the disease,"
"That's good…" Whitney trailed off, "but isn't your Aura like, also based off of poison?"
"I think it's different," Virah replied, "I'm not exactly immune to poison the same way Beedrills and Oddishes are since that kind of resistance is inherent in their biology," she explained, "I can just handle it better than most other people,"
"Oh…" Whitney murmured, "so if you weren't, you know- if you didn't have that-"
"I would have been fine," Virah shook her head, "I just wouldn't recover as quickly as I did, maybe I would have needed to delay my circuit by a month or two if that was the case,"
Whitney sighed in relief, "that's good…"
The pinkette turned her eyes forward and eyed the inside of the Pokemon center once the sliding doors opened for them, she hummed, "I'll go take a number, just wait here for me okay?"
Virah slowly nodded, "sure… and thanks,"
Whitney smiled and nodded and Virah went on to sit down on a bench with Grene, once they were comfortable, Virah inspected the pristine lobby of the center and realized that if ever she decided to become a nurse joy in the future, working in this kind of environment wouldn't be so bad.
It was quite spacious, with the benches meant to accommodate humans being bolted to the walls instead of being placed at the center of the room, which was mostly taken up by Pokemon who were playing, sleeping, or just lazing about.
Wicked, Whitney's Teddiursa, was spotted going around and playing rough with a few of her peers and Virah observed the Normal Type calmly while taking mental notes of the Pokemon's behavioral patterns.
"Are you really okay?" Grene suddenly asked, prompting Virah to shoot her a confused yet expectant look. The martial artist sighed, "you walked like your legs couldn't carry your weight earlier,"
"You noticed huh?" Virah smiled sheepishly, "yeah, my legs feel like they've gone through a few hours worth of exercise but it's fine, they're not really that tired, if they were, I would have fallen down already,"
"Hmmm… you're right," Grene said, "it's probably the side effects of being in bed for so long,"
"Muscular atrophy," Virah said to Grene's nod, "I'll be fine, I just need to keep walking, I'll tell you guys when it's time for us to take a break,"
"Mhmm." Grene replied.
What followed was a bout of silence, Whitney came back a little while after that and all three of them waited for their number to get called out, which honestly didn't take too long.
When it was finally their turn, they walked up, took Nitro and Jet's Pokeball from nurse joy while thanking her, and then they headed towards the park where Virah then proceeded to release her Pokemon to do a check up on their health.
"Okay," Virah eyed Nitro, who hovered slightly off the ground while eyeing her in concern, "I'm fine, as you both see,"
Nitro and Jet called out their names in response, Virah smiled, "I'm glad that you're both okay," she said, "but I want to make sure okay?"
Her Pokemon nodded and Virah took that as a gesture of agreement from the two and without wasting anymore time, she walked next to her Pokemon to start their check up.
Starting with Nitro, "huh," Virah said as she placed her trainer's bag down on the ground, "the size of your drills grew?"
She narrowed her eyes and slowly, she walked backward and asked Whitney to stand next to her Beedrill, the pinkette did so and Virah observed the differences in their size. Her eyes widened in surprise when she realized that Nitro had apparently gotten a growth spurt.
"Nitro's bigger than before," Virah pointed out.
"He is?" Whitney looked at the Beedrill and tilted her head, "I don't think he got bigger?"
"It's barely noticeable-" mostly because he had just finished recovering, "- but it's there,"
Virah hummed and checked on her Zubat and yep, Jet also had a sudden growth spurt.
She tilted her head, "just what kind of disease infected us?"
"Maybe you're just seeing things?" Grene said, "maybe your Pokemon shrunk in size like you?"
"No, they definitely got bigger," Virah shook her head, "that's not really important right now though and I'll probably just measure their height and weight more thoroughly after this but for now, I'll go check on them,"
Once again, Virah neared her Pokemon, took note of the fact that she should start critically inspecting their height and weight, and then proceeded on their check up.
Starting with Nitro- Virah lifted her Beedrill's leg and inspected the chitin that covered the limb as a protective carapace, she squeezed it to check its toughness via touch and hummed.
"It's… not stronger than before," which is disappointing since she thought that with Nitro's growth spurt, his carapace would also get tougher, "but that's fine, it'll probably grow stronger over time,"
Next she checked his stinger, then his drill, which as expected, were sharp and as hard as metal, "Iron has done wonders for these things," Virah commented as she stopped moved behind Nitro to check on his wings, "these are less transparent than before,"
Which wasn't a bad thing apparently, since according to her notes- which has little to no information on Beedrill wings as a whole, a mistake she'll sought to correct, - the Beedrills in her broods which had foggy wings were better flyers overall, it's also a sign of the wing's toughness.
She wrote down the current transparency of Nitro's wings and moved on to check his eyes, which were both clear and reflective, she grabbed a napkin from her handbag and wiped them clear.
"Hmm… your Sniper ability is doing well," she nodded and finished the rest of the check up; she checked Nitro's fur on his abdomen, followed by his legs, then his mouth, and finally, his antennae, all of them weren't damage and looked to be quite healthy.
After Nitro, she went on to do a check up on Jet which, as expected, went as smoothly as the last one, Jet's fur was as smooth as ever, his ears were cleaned, his tail felt fibrous when squeezed, and his leathery wings were stretchy and rubber-like.
Next up was his mouth, and much like Nitro's drills and stinger, Jet's fangs had grown considerably since his last check up.
"Should I also give you Iron Jet?" Virah casually asked as she checked on the Zubat's saliva, the numbing properties were still there, and she wasn't really sure about it but she had a feeling that the effect had gotten stronger than before.
"Zwubhat." Jet replied, "Zwubhat."
"Yeah, I'll take note of that," Virah nodded, "Iron should make your fangs stronger," she said, "but maybe this is just the effect of the disease, so I'll just keep watch for now,"
"Zwubhat." Jet replied.