Swimming
A Clover Guild Story
By Vulpix-anon

Early morning. The sun was slowly creeping its way above the treetops, the air smelled crisp and clean, and sounds of life emanated from the wilderness all around us. My partner still seemed to be sleeping next to the remains of last night's campfire. And I, for some reason, was sitting at the edge of a lake. I looked down towards the water as it placidly rippled towards the face of the small ledge, broke against it, and rushed off to the sides to begin its trek anew. A vulpine snout peered back up at me. Even after almost a week spent in it, this new body still felt strange. Not bad, but certainly different, in both the obvious ways and several less obvious ones. A sudden shudder ran down my spine. I've never really had a phobia of water or anything, but - call it instincts or something - the sound of the waves was oddly unnerving.

Yet, I kept looking. Soon enough, heralded by the sound of a yawn, another reflection joined mine: feline, in cyan accented by electric yellow. A Shinx, to be precise. My partner - if I actually had the right to say that - and one of the first other pokemon I met in this world. She bent down to lap at the water, before sitting next to me. At the same time, the star-shaped tip of her tail glowed and shook in an odd pattern. "Morning. When did you get up?" she asked.

"Good morning. A little bit before sunrise," I responded, nodding sideways toward said feature of the landscape. "You were still sleeping, so I didn't want to wake you."

She focused generally on where I was looking, with a tilt of her head. "See something in there?"

"Huh?" I realized I had still been gazing, absentmindedly, across the waves. "Oh, no, I was just thinking. The water looks so clear. It's pretty, for something so seemingly dangerous. Like molten glass or mercury. Nice to look at, but bad to touch, or be submerged in." A nervous chuckle escaped from my mouth, as my ears pressed back against my head. "Slightly funny, for one of the most common substances in the world - er, at least in my world even if I'm not totally sure about this one - to be like that."

By contrast, Amelia seemed to, perhaps, be confused? Her head was still askew, and she regarded me with narrowed eyes and a half-open muzzle. "...what are you talking about?" she finally said. "Did someone tell you that? Honestly, I've never heard of a fire-type outright dying from merely touching water. Even the Charmander myth isn't entirely true, as far as I know."

"But, I mean, it's super-effective, right? Water. It feels like it would hurt. Should hurt." My tails unconsciously lashed behind me, responding to, or perhaps revealing, my fear. "Obviously it doesn't seem to be harmful all the time. I can drink just fine." Words lept out of my mouth like sparks from a fire, unrestrained. "But is there a minimum volume? Should I be worried about the rain? A bucket? Or just large bodies of water? It-"

"You can swim, right?"

The question caught me off guard. I paused, looking directly at her with my ears swiveled up again. "Well, yeah, but-" Without further warning, I felt a shove from behind me, and then the next thing I knew, I was in the lake. It took all my concentration just to force myself not to breathe while under the surface, to keep my eyes shut. My chest felt like it was burning. (Didn't it usually feel that hot?) And yet my limbs felt cooler than normal - surely a sign of my impending end. They flailed randomly with what seemed like no particular rhyme or reason. I was beginning to get faint, almost dizzy, and my fur prickled oddly. This submersion was causing a delirium which would inevitably lead to my demise! Yet, I didn't want to die. Perhaps an obvious fact, but still one worth mentioning. Even with closed eyes, I could see the light above me. I kicked rhythmically (almost like walking, but underwater), striving towards it. Finally, what seemed like an eon later (so really about half a minute or so at most), I broke past the surface, panting and gasping for air.

And.

Alive. Unharmed, even.

I had been tensed for an agony that existed nowhere but in my own head this whole time, conflating symptoms in a made-up hypochondria. It wasn't like I was any better of a swimmer than I had been as a human - perhaps even a bit worse - nor was it like I particularly wanted to repeat the experience more than necessary. It did feel uncomfortable, as if I was a lantern that had its hood tightly shut, preventing any light at all from escaping. But nothing so bad as the death or grievous injury that I had imagined this unexpected bath would result in.

As soon as I popped back up, Amelia looked down at me from her perch on the shore. Her eyes were wide for some reason, and her ears were raised, but both quickly returned to normal. "Are you ok? Not that bad, yeah?" she asked, with a slight smile creeping onto her muzzle.

"I could've used a bit more warning," I grumbled, finally conceding after a moment. "...but perhaps it isn't as bad as I assumed."

Amelia just nodded in response and stood to turn back towards our "camp", with her tail flicking out over the water. An idea crossed my mind and I acted upon it before I could hold myself up by thinking further. Paddling forward a little bit, I reached up to grab near the end of her tail with my teeth and tugged back on it with a twist of my head. (Agh, still not a great taste.) It wasn't nearly enough force to pull her in, not on its own. But it was enough to make her slip, accompanied by an abrupt yelp and a tensed body.

That proved to be enough.

Just before she hit the water, she suddenly went limp, fur glowing for a moment. Of course, she took to it much more elegantly than I had, surfacing after only a moment with a grimace on her muzzle. (Was it towards me, or just about what happened?) "Hey! What'd you do that for?"

"Payback for pushing me in. Even if it was helpful, I suppose." Despite the circumstances, I couldn't help but grin.

After a moment, she chuckled softly, responding, "Ok, fair." She turned again, glancing back suddenly before paddling off towards a more gently-sloped patch of shoreline.

I followed. There was no sense staying in here longer than necessary, after all. And just a couple of seconds later, I was happy to feel solid ground back under my paws. My fur was dripping wet, but even so, it had already started to feel dryer, and warmer too. On a whim, I started shaking my body back and forth in an imitation of what dogs do. Honestly, it felt natural to do and was an effective way of mostly drying myself. My internal fire handled the rest.

Suddenly, a gust of wind raced past, howling as it did. Perhaps today might be on the windier side? My partner - who was drying herself off a couple of paces away - shivered. I looked back over myself. (Would that be too much, after only knowing someone for a few days?) After a moment of hesitation, I trotted over and draped a few of my tails over her back. She didn't say anything, but her own tail flicked up, blinking off and on a few times.

I couldn't deny that this had been an...interesting detour, but we were finally ready to get geared back up and going. Onwards to the dungeon, then.