garbagechild | 004. [Video/Action for Rocket HQ]

_{[There are plenty of newborn Pokemon that enter the world squalling or cooing.]

[This one entered with a whole lot of growling and then nearly took somebody's finger off.]

[The little Deino on the screen, which happens to have a faintly-sparkling green coat rather than the customary blue, is yanking and worrying at the end of one of the scarves that its trainer had received for Christmas as well as the egg it had just hatched from. It's been in the world outside its eggshell for about five minutes and it's already filled with fury at the fact that this long soft thing exists in its general vicinity.]

[Wrath is thrilled.]

[He turns to the camera (which is presumably held by his Kangaskhan) proudly, apparently unconcerned that the tiny dino-dragon is nearly tugging the scarf right off of him.]}

The rock turned into a sparkling animal!

Her name is Mad.

Mad likes to bite.

_{[... A little like her trainer, actually. They also share the same hairdo aesthetic. This is clearly a match made in heaven.]}

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Why?

How else will she get people to leave her alone when she doesn't want to be touched?

Biting works better than most other things.

Or that's what I'VE found, anyway.

_{[... Yeah.]}

[That is not a healthy coping mechanism. Phoenix tries to phrase this as carefully as he can. This child seems...odd.]

She could always growl, or use her body language. For you, if you were to tell someone "no, don't touch me!", I'm sure they would listen. And if they don't, well, then they're probably not a very nice person.

[Or they're just invasive.]

Oh. Really?

That doesn't usually work.

Biting is much better.

I think I'll stick with that.

_{[... Yeah, Phoenix, Wrath has literally never experienced the phenomenon of being able to set his own personal boundaries and have them respected without enforcing them with physical violence. Such a thing sounds odd and quaint!]}

Generally, yes.

[Well that's a little upsetting. Phoenix feels a big sort of empathy for the poor kid. He doesn't know what sort of upbringing could have constituted that kind of worldview, but his lawyer dad instincts are already going a little haywire.]

It doesn't sound like you've been around very nice people.

_{[He takes a moment to think about that.]}

... No, I guess not.

Most people aren't very nice.

That's the thing about people.

_{[He says this... very matter-of-factly.]}

Maybe so. There ARE still some good people out there, though; I've seen them for myself.

Have you met any here? Good people, that is.

[He, uh. Really hopes so.]

Hm.

I guess I've met some nice people.

I'm not so good at counting yet... at least five.

Five nice people.

_{[Actually, he's met more than five nice people. It's just that he only has five fingers on each hand to count with, you see.]}

[Well, that could be...worse.]

Five isn't bad. Five is something, right?

[Gotta appreciate the...little things! Yes. Definitely.]

Five is good!

Five is a big number.

Five is better than four, and four is better than none, right?

I hope you'll meet lots of nice people here. Even more than five.

004. [Video/Action for Rocket HQ]

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