Bully Beatdown

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The day was a dark one in the Shadowhue Forest, although that wasn't anything special for this place. The thick cover of leaves, twigs and branches on the tall trees almost completely blocked out the sun, only a few rays of sunlight broke through the blanket of darkness, illuminating the area and creating tiny bright spots on the forest ground. As they partially lit up the omnipresent shadows, the resulting lights of various tones and hues made the forest look almost surreal. And through this surreal forest, a lone figure wandered. It was wearing a black cloak with a hood, so its features weren't discernible. However, as it moved on its path, it didn't make a single sound, not leaving a single twig in its wake.
The only sounds were a soft wind rustling the leaves and a strange mumbling, apparently coming from the figure. While it was difficult to understand, single phrases might be heard by anyone nearby.
"...why..."
"...deserve this..."
"...have I done..."
"...traitors..."
"...fear and hate..."
"...I was right...they were right..."

Nick slowly rose up once more. After regaining himself, he turned right back to the Timburr. This was just getting ridiculous. The bird had to find a way to break through those defenses. Wait a second, break through. That's it! The bird charged towards the Timburr. He was actually pretty fast. The fighting type noticed and smirked rather cockily. This looked like it was just gonna be another failed move on Nick's part. Nick got his wing ready for some sort of punch, and the Timburr got his log ready to block, just like Nick wanted.

As the bird's wing hit the log, the log broke. Not only that. A whole chunk of the wood came off. The log was now in three nearly equally sized pieces, one of which was momentarily in the fighting type's face. When it fell to the ground, the Timburr showed much frustration, now shaking with it. He shouted at the top of his lungs. "THAT TOOK ME MONTHS TO MAKE YOU RUNT!!!" The Timburr swung one of the remaining pieces of wood at the bird. It was a hit. Nicholas was sent back a few feet, laying on his back. Nick was down, but was he out? Well, that would be known later. Until that time, the Timburr's primary weapon was broken, giving William an advantage of sorts.

Seeing, what basically was the Timburr's only means to keep him at a distance shattered on the ground, William decided to take that opportunity.
Since the Timburr was constantly closing its eyes while coughing, Hypnosis wouldn't be able to work, so he instead charged forward,directly hitting the Timburr with Lick, causing it to alternate between disgusted shivering and a hacking cough.
The paralysis had not appeared this time, but the move still caused some damage. William was certain, that their adversary wouldn't be able to keep this up much longer.

The Timburr continued to cough for a while. In the mean time, Nicholas slowly rose to his feet. After a little heavy breathing from taking such a heavy hit, the Delibird got another wrapped up box from who knows where and threw it at the Timburr With his shield broken, and himself distracted, the bully failed to defend himself. The box exploded on contact, sending the Fighting type Pokemon flying a few feet and falling to the ground, laying face up.

Since the Fighting type didn't seem to get up anymore, William concluded, that they had won. All, that was left to do, was for it to be taken to the police and everything would finally be over.
"I guess we did it, Nick...now you can hand it to the police and get your reward. Congratulations. I guess, from here on you can do this on your own, so it's time to say farewell."
The Gastly didn't know, what to feel, being both happy, that the mission was over and sad for reasons he didn't understand. Thus an expressionless mask covered his face as he spoke.

The bird looked back to William for a moment, looking for an excuse, any excuses. "W-wait... umm... I'm not really that strong... and my wings hurt... I don't think I can take him there myself... Do you think... you could help?" He looked up to the Gastly, smiling with hope in his eyes. His emotional mask was pretty dang small.

"Well...I'm spectral...I can't even touch it, much less carry it all the way back. And even if I could...there are...reasons preventing me from doing so. You'll have to do this without me, Nick."
William failed to understand, why the Delibird actually thought, that William would be of help.
Since he hadn't really seen that many Pokémon lately, the Gastly completely failed to read Nick's emotions.

And, denied. Well, the bird tried at least. "O-oh... ok..." His head hung low for a moment. "Well, if it's ok... I really want to see you again. Can I come and visit sometime? I mean, if you would rather just stay alone... I guess I can try to just stay away from now on... but only if you want me to." Nicholas looked to William and gave a very weak smile, hoping to get a positive response. There really weren't many Pokemon that were all that nice to him and he hoped to keep as many of those as he could in his life.

"Uh...I'll doubt, that you'll be able to find me, but sure...I guess. The area I live in is surrounded by trees standing close enough to one another however, so that getting through there without being a Ghost type would be impossible. It helps to fend off the wild Pokémon. Even the branches are too close together to allow anything to pass through, but should you see me somewhere, feel free to say hello..."
William couldn't believe, what he was hearing. That Delibird actually wanted to...visit him?
Too confused to say anything else, William just floated in midair, failing to continue the conversation.

The bird smiled with a huge smile. it was so large that it made a Gengar's mouth look small... figuratively speaking of course. Nick would hug the Gastly right now if he wasn't surrounded by toxic gas. "S-so, what do you like to eat? I-I mean, it's not like I think you need help with finding food or anything like that, but I just thought I could maybe get some food you never had before so you could try it." The avian smiled shyly.

For about a minute William was just floating in place, staring into the air dumbfounded. He had certainly not expected that question. Finally, he managed to partially recover, stammering:
"U-uh...thakns, but I doubt you'd be able to find anything. My species gets their nutrition by draining the energy of things around them mostly. That, and eating other Pokemon's dreams, although I haven't learned that attack yet. Anyways, it would all be things, that you wouldn't be able to get. Still thanks for the offer, though..."
And now Nick wanted to give him a present?! The only presents the Gastly had ever recieved before, usually were of the Dark, Ghost and Psychic types, so William didn't know how to react at all.

The bird looked understandably surprised. It's hard for most Pokemon to imagine how one eats such things, and it doesn't seem possible from most standpoints. "...That... um... ok." He thought for a moment. "W-well, is there... anything... you like at all? Like... something that looks pretty to you... or something?" He tried to ponder what kinds of gifts he could give. He could try and make ceramics, but he's never been good at that. Maybe he could try and make a snowman? Nah, Will probably wouldn't like it much, besides, those melt.

"Thanks, but you don't need to give me anything. I am not a Pokémon of many needs, all I could require I already have. You should save that energy of yours, you might need it for your next mission. I don't know much about them, but those I have experienced were rather tiring. There doesn't appear to be much room for free time in the schedule of a guild member, so you might want to structure your time more efficiently than to try and give gifts to random strangers. Maybe train a bit. Practice survival skills."
William couldn't believe it at all, but over the course of this mission, he had somehow...grown to like the little bird. While he would never admit it, he actually cared for Nick.
"Just don't get hurt...that would be the best gift you could make..."

The avian looked just a tiny bit saddened with Will's response. The smile on his face had faded ever so slightly. "W-well... I know you don't need anything... but that doesn't mean there isn't something you'd like to have... b-but... I guess you're right. Maybe I should train more. I am... kinda easy to hurt." He gave a nod to William's finishing statement. "Ok, I-i'll try and be more careful from now on." With that, one more thought came to the bird's mind. "W-william... I know you said you can't help much... but do you think you could come with me... just to the edge of the forest?"

"I guess I don't have that much of a choice there, do I?", William rethorically asked.
"Very well...let us go then. As we both have come to experience today, these woods are not a pleasant place to be in, at least in my opinion, so getting you out of here might just be a sensible idea.
If my predictions aren't off too far, we should be relatively close, actually. So, we should get going.
Should night fall, this area usually gets pitch black and then it's even less of a safe place to be in.
Just follow me...the edge of the forest should be in this direction."

After a short and uneventful journey through the shadows of the forest, the trees were getting fewer and fewer, the sunlight was flooding the area and the duo had reached the edge of the forest.

"So I guess this is it...", William muttered.
"I guess you can find the way back from here yourself. I bid you farewell and may you always stay safe on your journeys. 'till we meet again...friend..."

The bird perked up with the ghost's response. "R-really? Thanks!" He was kind of curious to a statment William had said, but dragging a Timburr was sort of distracting the bird. He still couldn't help but look at William from time to time. What about William was so scary the all those Pokemon hated him? Sure, there were those fangs, but lots of Pokemon have fangs. The poison gass wasn't much of an excuse either. There's a Pokemon made out of toxic sludge. Nobody chases them with torches and pitch forks. No matter which way the avain looked at it, it just didn't make sense. Eventually, the two reached the end of the woods. Nichalos was a little tired. He was used to travel by flight, not by foot. Even in this clearing, if Nick wanted to take this Timburr with him, he had to walk.That didn't sound fun, but he had to go for it. If nothing else, he at least knew his way. "Yeah, I can find home from here. Thank you. I'll try and visit you soon. Bye" He gave the ghost a smile and a wave of his wing before he started to head off to the guild.