Chapter 90: Chapter 90

“Nins! You’re back! I missed you so muchhh!” Beverly tackled her friend with a hug and lifted her up slightly. “And is this Tini? Oh my gosh you’re so big now!” The enthusiastic older girl let go of Nina and reached out for a hug with the Dragonair as well, who happily reciprocated by wrapping her up.

Nina smiled. “Yeah, he’s Nairy now. Good to see you too, Bev.”

Beverly blew out her tongue. “Lame! We really gotta work on your naming sense, Nins. Poor Nairy…” She gently caressed the Dragon’s cheeks and gave him a kiss.

“I don’t wanna hear that from someone who named her Gyarados Ryu. How edgy can you get?” Nina scoffed. “Anyway, I heard you’re up to no good? Spill it, what are you bitches planning this time?”

Beverly gasped. “My innocent little Nina is swearing! How could they?! Tell me, who corrupted my bestie? I’m gonna go over there and kick their ass!”

Nina rolled her eyes. “You did, you potty mouth. Now stop changing the subject and answer the question.”

Beverly grinned, looking like an idiot all wrapped up by Nairy. “Hehe… It’s gonna be great, Nins. I’ve worked out the perfect choreo for the two of us —”

“Nairy, squeeze her.” Before Beverly could even finish, Nina chimed in and ordered her partner to pass down divine punishment onto the capricious girl. “I told you Bev, I have no interest in performing as a mermaid.”

Beverly squeaked, desperately tapping at Nairy to stop before panting for breath. “I…Come on, Nins… It’s Misty and your uncle’s wedding! It’s just one time, please~ Everyone’s super excited about it. It’s the debut of the New Cerulean Sisters!”

Nina cocked an eyebrow. “I’m pretty sure the actual Cerulean Sisters are gonna take issue with that name.”

“Who cares about what those old hags think!” Beverly loudly exclaimed, only to be met with a hard fist to her head. “Ouch!” She yelped.

The culprit was Daisy who joined in at one point. “Who are you calling an old hag, you brat!” She then turned to Nina. “And Nina, you’re doing this no matter what. We’ve already made all the necessary preparations and reserved a time slot in the arena. It’s too late to have a change of plans now.”

Nina opened her mouth to protest, but before she could, Daisy had already walked off. Meanwhile, Beverly was rubbing her head and grinning at a mission accomplished.

“This is revenge for the cheer squad back in the conference isn’t it?” Nina asked. To which, her friend just responded by putting on an insufferably smug face. So she told Nairy to give her another tight squeeze as punishment.

***

“I’m practically tone deaf, Bev. I can’t sing, you’ve heard me in karaoke before.”

“It’ll be fine,” assured Beverly. “We’ll be pre-recording the audio track, just gotta lip sync. You think Misty and the others are actually singing while they’re flying around and whipping their bodies all over the place? A couple of vocal lessons with Ashley and a recording sesh in the booth and we’re good~”

Credits to Beverly, she had thought about Nina’s complete lack of talent in the performing arts. Even the choreography looked simple enough to follow; lots of twirls and mid air flips and Pokemon assisted shenanigans to make it look dynamic, but there was a pretty simple flow and rhythm to it. No complex, intricate pop star body movements, just lots of big and fast ones to mask the simplicity.

“I’m not wearing a bikini.” Nina stated. This was the one thing she was putting her foot down on.

Beverly snorted. “Of course, I’m not tasteless. This is a wedding. Gotta keep it classy. Aoi is designing something special for us. Think white leotard with lots of flowy laces. No idea how she’s gonna make it all work, but it’s Aoi, so no worries. Oh that reminds me, gotta take your measurements as well.”

Nina sighed in relief and nodded. Aoi owned her own boutique store in the Stretch that specialized in more conservative Disney princess-esque dresses, so Nina did trust in her to make something classy as Beverly said.

“What about Pokemon then, based on your terrible drawings, you’ll want Nairy… I’m seeing Josephine, of course. And Ryu? Are you sure about that?”

“Positive. And it’s not terrible! I had help from the twins. I’ll tell them you said that!”

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

Nina chuckled. “What about the twins by the way? Are they not being included?”

“Heh. Nope! It’s just us two besties against the world. This will be great, Nins. We’ll be rich and famous. Those old hags are gonna be yesterday’s news. From here on, it’s gonna be Beverly and Nina: Mermaid Duo Extraordinaire!”

Nina just tuned out the delusional ramblings of her friend and went over everything in her head once more. It did seem doable, the problem was the time frame. “We’ve got what? Two and half weeks of practice time, maybe? This is assuming we’ll want to take some break days in between — can’t wear ourselves out or injure something…”

The girl sighed in exasperation. “I don’t know if we’ll be able to make it in time. Why didn’t you tell me about this sooner?”

Beverly puffed up her cheeks in defiance. “Because I know you, Nins. If I told you beforehand, you’re gonna use that big brain of yours to Abra your way out of this. Well that ain’t happening! You’re in this whether you like it or not, just like Daisy said.”

Nina rolled her eyes at the assessment. Not that she was wrong, but Nina resented it regardless.

***

Nina laid herself down on the changing room bench. Feeling more exhausted than she’d ever been in her two lives. “I think I’d rather go a couple of rounds in the midterm’s obstacle course.”

The first practice session was a disaster, Beverly knew what she was doing since she devised the whole thing, but Nina was stumbling all over the place. Despite its simplicity, it was hard to catch the rhythm of the background music when you’re being spun around mid air at dizzying speeds by Psychic Pokemon. The dizziness and vertigo were a whole other beast as well.

Nina chewed Beverly out for refusing to use earpieces because “they were ugly”. Earpieces were important for live shows because they tuned out the outside world and kept the performers focused and on beat. Misty and the others didn’t need them only because they were already experienced mermaids who had been doing this for years.

In fact, the only reason why the ladies of Cerulean Gym were able to keep up with the Monthly Exhibit despite their busy schedule was because they have set routines that they just splice in and out with only minor adjustments each year to keep things from going stagnant. They have everything memorized by heart at this point.

The practice sessions they conducted regularly were more for the Pokemon than the humans, since it was a great way of keeping Pokemon in shape and train up new Gym Trainers and Pokemon. As evident by how skilled Nairy had become over the course of his time in the Gym.

In the end, they settled on a compromise by agreeing to wear earpieces decorated by Aoi to mask the equipment from the audience. Things were a bit smoother after that, though Nina’s complete lack of coordination could only improve so much with so little an addition.

“Good work out there. You’re abysmal, but you have the heart and that’s what counts. A bit more practice and you’ll be golden.”

Nina craned her neck to see who was speaking to her and found the blue haired figure of Violet looking down on her with a bottle of Shuckle juice in hand, which she pressed against the girl’s cheek.

“Here, drink this and get yourself cleaned up. You have a photoshoot in half an hour.” The woman continued.

Nina balked at Violet’s words. “A photoshoot! For what?! No one told me about this.”

Violet chuckled. “You’re the ringbearer, the star apprentice, and the groom’s one and only niece. Of course we’d want pictures of you for the promo. I even have a few sponsors lined up who want to use you for their children’s line of products.” She responded, before sighing.

“Honestly I would have liked to do this sooner, but you left early in the year before we had everything nailed down. Oh well, not to worry. My marketing people have predicted a residual three month post wedding hype trajectory, so there’s still plenty of money to be made.”

Nina’s eyes twitched at the audacity of this gold digging Meowth. “I hope I’m getting a cut of all this profit…” Nina said, amidst clenched teeth. She knew better than to argue against Violet’s desires when it came to money. So the least she could do was get something out of it.

Violet let out an amicable smile, one hiding sinister and conniving connotations. “Of course, my dear. But most of it will go towards funding the once in a lifetime wedding of your beloved uncle and esteemed mentor, I’m sure you understand…”

Nina sat up straight and pointed an accusing finger at the incarnation of greed standing before her. “Oh no you don’t! The wedding’s already fully funded by all the merch sales and advertising revenue, and you know it. This is all just about profit at this point!”

“You have no proof of that…”

After a series of heated back and forths, the two misers finally came to an agreement that neither of them were happy about. Which as far as Nina was concerned, was the mark of a good compromise.

So the girl did as she was told and went to take a hasty shower. She didn’t bother to groom herself since she’ll have to go through a stylist later on anyway.

“What in Arceus’s name is that?!” Nina exclaimed, gesturing towards the Teddiursa costume that was laid out in front of her.

Violet groaned, as if she just tasted something unpleasant. “It was Misty’s idea, since you’re going to be the ringbearer and all.”

Nina groaned along as well. “Urgh… Ring- ‘bear’ -er. Of course it was Misty! That woman loves her shitty puns.”

“Please don’t tell me you guys want me to walk down the aisle wearing that, right?” Nina pleaded, to which Violet simply shrugged indifferently.

“Whatever the bride wants, she gets,” said Violet, effectively putting an end to the girl’s complaints.

So Nina endured the humiliation and put on the outfit reluctantly. It was akin to a onesie, so the loose fit wasn’t an issue, complete with cute little bear paws attached to the end of the sleeves. Though thankfully, there were holes for her hands in between the paws and the sleeves, so she wouldn’t need to worry about fumbling her precious cargo during the actual wedding day.

In place of Teddiursa’s cute little round ears, they tied up Nina’s hair in twin buns and covered it with two little hair sack things, and had her wear a crescent moon tiara. Next, they painted the tip of her nose black to serve as the Pokemon’s precious little button nose.

The end result was actually pretty darn cute if Nina may say so herself. The makeup lady, and the photographer and his assistants were all swooning at the adorable little girl.

Meanwhile, Nina could see Violet’s pupils morphing into Pokedollar signs. “Pretty sure that’s Meowth’s gold coin thing on her forehead. Since when did Violet learn Payday?”

***

I'd like to take the chance to showcase the first ever fanart I received for this story!

image [https://i.imgur.com/CjGOkDJ.jpeg]

Look at it! Look at how good it looks! I've been starring at it at least once a day.

The artist's name is winterseeli on Tumblr and Winter_Sage on RR. Go check out their Tumblr page if you're so inclined.

https://www.tumblr.com/winterseeli/773394513349754880/one-of-newer-art-i-have-made-its-fan-art-of-a

I especially love the detail of having Nina wear the same tanktop as Leaf, the female protagonist of the FireRed and LeafGreen games. In fact, it's such a genius idea that I decided that little detail is going to be canon from now on.

Also, all the little stickers on the Pokeballs! >.<

Anyways, huge thanks to Winter for DM'ing me their work. I'm not on any of the social media platforms so I wouldn't even have known about it otherwise.

I do plan on commisioning art sometime in the future, but receiving fanart and commissioned art feels different, you know? One is a labour of love while the other is a business transaction. So I couldn't help but tear up a bit when I received that message.

Thank you all once again for reading my story.