Gap Year

[4 8 15 16 23 42]

Hi, I've written some fan fiction before, but this is my first time doing anything Pokémon so I'm a litter nervous about it haha. Once I start doing battles that might be obvious.

I feel like my writing style may have become a bit stilted since I haven't written anything for a while now. For example in the first chapter there's only one character doing anything, I feel like I don't have the hang of when to use her name and when to refer to her using pronouns. I'd like it if people could advise of whether I use too many/not enough commas. Any other criticism would be much appreciated as well.


Synopsis:

Joan recently graduated from schooling and decided wanted to travel the world before getting herself a job. She has always idolised professional Pokémon trainers and wished she could go on an adventure like them. But once an adventure finds her on her journey she soon grows a new respect for the trials they go through and the hard life they must lead.


I don't expect the fic will contain anything requiring a warning, except perhaps some sad parts. If this changes I'll post the warning on that chapter and edit this first post.


Chapter 1: A Real Adventure
Chapter 2: Reflection

 

[4 8 15 16 23 42]

Chapter 1: A Real Adventure

She had seen the silhouette of the radio tower from her cell. So she had been taken to Goldenrod after she was arrested, that much Joan knew immediately. From the time she spent in there she had gathered her bearings a bit more; the magnetic train tracks running above the city let her know which way was east. However now that she was out, running as far as she could before anyone noticed she was gone, she felt disoriented once again. It was an unfamiliar city, the middle of the night, and she couldn't think straight with all of the adrenaline in her system. Following her at her heels was her Umbreon, whose yellow patterns glowed slightly in the moonlight.

She thought she was heading south towards Ilex Forest where it would be easier to keep hidden, but either she was heading in the wrong direction or the city was much larger than she had imagined. It was no use, she needed to find somewhere to rest for a while before her legs collapsed. Joan turned into the next alleyway she came across, found her way behind some bins and sat down against the wall.

“Thanks, Mr. Brolly.” Joan said to her companion, reaching her hand out to pet his head. “you really helped me out back there.” Just then, she felt something hard with her wrist, and realised that Brolly had been carrying something in his mouth all this way. It was too dark to tell what it was, but she could guess. “Drop.” She told him. It was two separate object, both balls. She felt one of them with both of her hands and knew what they were. These weren't tennis balls or Pokémon toys. The weight and the depression around the equator made it clear that these were Pokéballs. One was Brolly's own and, with any luck, the other contained Joan's other partner Nia. It was such a relief to her that at last she hadn't lost absolutely everything. “Thank you.” she repeated.

Staying still for too long would be risky, she thought. The police would realise she's gone eventually, and above all else she was dressed in a mucky old prison uniform. A map she remembered seeing once put the towering department store in the south, so she might be able to get clothes from there on her way out of the city. That was if she didn't get caught immediately walking in dressed as the currently was, or if she had any money. Finding a change of clothes was the only option, so she needed to find some somehow.

Joan hadn't committed any crime, or at least none that she was aware of. She never did understand fully why she was arrested, from what she could gather there had been so many dangerous criminal gangs recently that there had been new laws introduced to deal with them. She certainly didn't expect to have had a trial any time soon, judging by the conversations she overheard the police having. She was free now, although she had certainly broken the law by escaping. It was too late to go back, stealing some clothes from somewhere looked like a reasonable decision at this point. Compared to whatever crime she was suspected of, it couldn't be that big of a deal. It made sense to her.

Joan went over the plan in her head. The department store was open 24 hours a day and would be too well-lit and have too much security to do anything there. Just then, the dim light emanating from Brolly's tail drew her attention to sign that was lying on the floor beside them. It was an advertisement for the various shops in the Goldenrod underground. Nothing much was of interest, except on the small floor plan it provided, there was something labelled as being behind the Pokémon salon. A photo booth, with fancy dress costumes provided if you wanted some fun pictures taken with your friends. That would be perfect! If she swapped her clothes there nobody might not even realise something was amiss. However as for which way the underground tunnels were, that was another question.

'South entrance' - it was difficult to read the sign in the darkness, Joan strained her eyes a bit more to make out the directions. It gave a street name, so now she only needed to find the location of that street. It shouldn't be too hard if she had indeed been heading south before. She stuck her head out into the main street, flinching slightly as her eyes adjusted to the bright lights illuminating the road.

“There's a street sign over there, I'll try to take a look. You've done enough Brolly. Come back, you can rest now.” Joan took a look at the two balls she was holding. One was the usual red and white pattern, which she knew contained Nia. Raising the other, a black ball with a red and gold circle at the pole, “return,” she stated, and the Pokémon retreated inside in a flash of red energy.

The signpost did point in the right direction. It even had one sign pointing towards the Forest, which was also welcome news. Joan hurried in the direction it pointed, looking for the entrance to the city's underground section. It wasn't hard for her to find, once she found the street. The lights were on indoors, so she had to be careful. It was late so it wasn't going to be busy, but that also meant she'd stand out if anyone decided to look her way. There would surely be some security in there as well, though hopefully not as many as the department store above ground. Joan gulped and determinedly headed for the door. Nobody was on the ground level at least, and she descended down the large staircase, keeping a grip on the railing as she went.

There were a few people in the tunnel. Joan wasn't quite sure what to make of them; she wasn't usually out so late, so anyone in this kind of crowd was bound to seem somewhat suspicious to her. She would surely look suspicious to them as well, she thought. She also knew that moving too fast would draw attention her way, but she couldn't dawdle either. As naturally as she could, she walked up the street. It was brightly lit and she felt the most self-conscious she had ever been in her life. All she needed to do was find the salon and get into the photo shop off to the side. It couldn't be far because the tunnel wasn't that long, and she could see the north staircase already. On the right edge of her field of view the front of the salon emerged, and around the corner from there she could see racks of fancy-dress costumes on display beside an array of photo booths. She hurried over and grabbed a couple of the costumes, and slipped into one of the available changing cubicles.

The trousers from the available Team Rocket costume could easily pass for normal clothes. For her top, she picked had picked up a policewoman's uniform and she removed the shirt from the rest of the clothes. As she changed, Joan looked at herself in the mirror. There was something quite unsettling about looking at herself. The situation she had got herself into felt unreal already, but seeing herself now, it hit her once more that this wasn't just a bad dream. She wasn't watching out of the eyes out of a complete stranger. It was all too much for her to think about, and now was the first time she'd stopped to think about it all. Should she just turn herself in? No, that would just make things worse again. She put on the shirt, and had difficulty buttoning up the front, as her hands were shaky with nerves. 'I'm not a bad person,' she thought, 'I'm just unlucky. I don't know what to do now but once I have time to think, I'll think.'

She was dressed. Had the situation been more normal she would have thought that she looked quite stylish. The blackness over her legs made them look long and thin, which she liked. The light blue tone of the shirt contrasted nicely with the trousers and was calming to look at, and it matched the colour of her eyes well. Seeing the collar accentuate her slender neck gave her the idea to tie her hair back, which she thought may help her go unrecognised. Her hair was auburn, shoulder-length, and slightly frizzy. Her hands worked their way back over her head a couple of times to catch it all, and tied it into a bun. She had no clips to help, but being neat and precise wasn't the aim. With her hair tied back, Joan could see more of her forehead than she was used to. Perhaps she should have looked out for hats among the costumes as well, she thought.

Now she needed to sneak her previous outfit back onto the rack with the others, so she put it over the same coat hanger as the Rocket uniform. She returned it together with the complete-looking police uniform. Luckily the costumes were free to wear, with the point of payment being the use the photo booth itself. Joan hurried out of the tunnels and emerged at the south entrance where she had first entered. It was starting to get brighter outside, so she knew she should get out of the city soon, and she still didn't have a better idea of where to go than Ilex Forest. She had two of her Pokémon with her who could protect her from wild Pokémon if needed, though they would still have to be cautious as they had no potions or any other medicine to speak of.

Joan was running again. Mr. Brolly was in his ball. The buildings were becoming more sparse. There she could see it: a clearing on what she thought must be Route 34, and beyond that a dense wood. She was going to make it, for now.

 

[Cutlerine]

This is mysterious – in a really good way. You capture the reader's attention pretty early on by leaving so much unspoken – and then you keep leaving it unspoken, right up to the end. The title gives one clue, which the synopsis makes a bit clearer, but by the time the chapter ends there really are still a lot more questions than answers: we don't know who Joan is, what species her second pokémon is, how she got into this situation, anything at all. And you make it work, too. It could be infuriating, done badly, but you do it well, and it comes off as intriguing instead.

I don't think you need to worry about the ratio of Joan to she or your comma usage, particularly; apart from one slightly dubious comma splice, I think all of that works fine.

It was too late to go back, stealing some clothes from somewhere looked like a reasonable decision at this point.

This is the splice, by the way – where you've joined two complete sentences together with a comma. It's not grammatically correct, but sometimes it works anyway, because very few grammatical rules can't be bent or broken under the right circumstances. In this case, however, it's a bit inelegant.

On a similar note, your dialogue punctuation could use a little work. When a line of dialogue ends with an attribution, like said, then it should end with a comma. If another line starts afterwards, then it needs to start with a capital letter, as a new sentence. Here's an example of what I mean – this―

“Thanks, Mr. Brolly.” Joan said to her companion, reaching her hand out to pet his head. “you really helped me out back there.”

―should go more like this:

“Thanks, Mr. Brolly,” Joan said to her companion, reaching her hand out to pet his head. “You really helped me out back there.”

Lines of dialogue do always need to start with capital letters, too. A line like this one―

Raising the other, a black ball with a red and gold circle at the pole, “return,” she stated, and the Pokémon retreated inside in a flash of red energy.

―don't quite work. It's difficult to do an inset line of dialogue in a sentence like that and keep the sentence both natural-sounding and readable; one option might be to rewrite it so there isn't a dialogue at all, like this:

Raising the other, a black ball with a red and gold circle at the pole, she ordered him to return, and the Pokémon retreated inside in a flash of red energy.

Or alternatively you might want to break it up into two sentences – really, the choice is yours; it's not a massive deal, but it does do a lot to make the story easier going for a reader.

But I think, if you look past these grammatical issues – and it's pretty easy to do so, really – then what you've got here is really pretty interesting. I don't know where it's going, and that's always an exciting way to begin, especially if you can sustain it to the end of a first chapter in such a way that I have an idea that it is going somewhere, even if I can't see where yet. Joan is an interesting character, too. You're quite economical with your description of her, but her thoughts and actions suggest someone simultaneously very resourceful and pretty naïve; she seems to get that she's in a risky situation, but like I get the sense that it's not quite real to her, like her understanding of this is mostly abstract. Brolly is a bit thinner, as pokémon characters sometimes are – you mentioned that this is your first pokémon fic, so in case you haven't thought of it, just having pokémon around, doing things and being active parts of the story, is often enough to give them a strong sense of personality in the same way that animals have personality.

But yeah! This is a cool start. I'll look forward to seeing what you're gonna do next with it!

 

[NebulaDreams]

Looking at the technical aspects of it, I didn’t notice an overuse of commas, then again, I might be biased since I put a lot of commas into my stuff, but my problem with the prose how much you use past perfect tense with phrases like ‘there had been’ and ‘to have had’. While technically correct, other forms of past tense would suffice here and make the language a bit less repetitive. This phrase in particular stood out to me as you use that form twice close to each other.

“...from what she could gather there had been so many dangerous criminal gangs recently that there had been new laws introduced to deal with them.”

I would suggest something like “there had been so many dangerous criminal gangs recently that new laws were introduced to deal with them”, just for the sake of flow.

Other than that, I found the story interesting and I like the misunderstood hero angle, but even with the synopsis I have no idea what’s going on. It starts rather abruptly with a paragraph that jumps from location to location without much of a transition between them, and we have no idea about what Joan did to get arrested. Even if Joan didn’t know what her crime was, briefly describing the events leading up to the arrest would’ve provided some clues. I would like to know more about how she ended up as a fugitive, but it very much feels like we’re being dumped into the middle of a story without the ‘how’ or ‘why’.

 

[4 8 15 16 23 42]

Thank you for taking the time to read

Looking at the technical aspects of it, I didn’t notice an overuse of commas, then again, I might be biased since I put a lot of commas into my stuff, but my problem with the prose how much you use past perfect tense with phrases like ‘there had been’ and ‘to have had’. While technically correct, other forms of past tense would suffice here and make the language a bit less repetitive. This phrase in particular stood out to me as you use that form twice close to each other.

“...from what she could gather there had been so many dangerous criminal gangs recently that there had been new laws introduced to deal with them.”

I would suggest something like “there had been so many dangerous criminal gangs recently that new laws were introduced to deal with them”, just for the sake of flow.

Other than that, I found the story interesting and I like the misunderstood hero angle, but even with the synopsis I have no idea what’s going on. It starts rather abruptly with a paragraph that jumps from location to location without much of a transition between them, and we have no idea about what Joan did to get arrested. Even if Joan didn’t know what her crime was, briefly describing the events leading up to the arrest would’ve provided some clues. I would like to know more about how she ended up as a fugitive, but it very much feels like we’re being dumped into the middle of a story without the ‘how’ or ‘why’.

Ah right, thanks. I'll try to avoid using confusing tenses going forwards. I think that might have gone along with the jumping from location to location thing you mentioned. I wanted to start the story in the middle of the action but with a little exposition of what she's running from.

I do have more ideas for backstory but when I write it out I'll be sure keep it separate in their own chapters rather than having it inline with what is happening "now".

This is mysterious – in a really good way. You capture the reader's attention pretty early on by leaving so much unspoken – and then you keep leaving it unspoken, right up to the end. The title gives one clue, which the synopsis makes a bit clearer, but by the time the chapter ends there really are still a lot more questions than answers: we don't know who Joan is, what species her second pokémon is, how she got into this situation, anything at all. And you make it work, too. It could be infuriating, done badly, but you do it well, and it comes off as intriguing instead.

I'm glad you like it. I hope I'm not leaving too much unspoken for what payoff there'll be, but I'll keep this in mind!

On a similar note, your dialogue punctuation could use a little work. When a line of dialogue ends with an attribution, like said, then it should end with a comma. If another line starts afterwards, then it needs to start with a capital letter, as a new sentence. Here's an example of what I mean – this―

Ah yeah, punctuation with regards to dialogue has always been the one that trips me up. Both things like when to use capitals after the closing quotation marks, especially with questions marks, and when commas go inside or outside the quotes. I've heard the latter might be a difference between British and American English which confuses me all the more. I'll pay closer attention from now on. (although I don't think there'll be much dialogue now until chapter 3)

But I think, if you look past these grammatical issues – and it's pretty easy to do so, really – then what you've got here is really pretty interesting. I don't know where it's going, and that's always an exciting way to begin, especially if you can sustain it to the end of a first chapter in such a way that I have an idea that it is going somewhere, even if I can't see where yet. Joan is an interesting character, too. You're quite economical with your description of her, but her thoughts and actions suggest someone simultaneously very resourceful and pretty naïve; she seems to get that she's in a risky situation, but like I get the sense that it's not quite real to her, like her understanding of this is mostly abstract. Brolly is a bit thinner, as pokémon characters sometimes are – you mentioned that this is your first pokémon fic, so in case you haven't thought of it, just having pokémon around, doing things and being active parts of the story, is often enough to give them a strong sense of personality in the same way that animals have personality.

I have characters ready for the Pokémon. We'll see if I can bring them out when they appear a bit more. I expect they'll still be a bit thinner than the human characters, as you said. I'm not accustomed to showing the personality of a character who can't speak.

 

[4 8 15 16 23 42]

Chapter 2: Reflection

A sign not too far ahead read 'Route 34' and had arrows pointing the way to the forest and back to the city. Joan was getting far enough out of the city that the lights from the buildings behind her weren't enough to illuminate the sign by itself, but the sun was just about showing over the hills in the east. There were also some glimmers of light coming from the field in front of her. A couple of tents were set up on the western side, lit up inside. Another light was visible opposite the tests – it looked like the beam from a torch. Joan could just about make out the figure holding the torch, they had a four legged Pokémon walking with them and were wearing a cap. Not taking any chances of this being a patrolling police officer, Joan just about managed to climb over a fence on her left, and fell into an adjacent field.

The other field was much emptier. There was no long grass and no campers could be seen either. Joan could run in a straight line quite easily, though the lack of cover made her a bit uneasy. She continued onwards.

About half way down the field, an object caught Joan's attention. She approached it and saw it was a trough separated into two halves. On one side was water and the other held a variety of fruits and seed. Joan got on her knees and picked up a few of the smaller items to fill her pockets as much as she could. Her pockets were surprisingly deep; if this was based on a real Team Rocket uniform then maybe it would make sense for there to be space for storing a little extra loot. Drinking the water wasn't something that appealed to Joan, it felt quite demeaning in a way but given the circumstances she deigned to have some of it. It wasn't the most appetising drink she'd had. There was a hint of rainwater in there along with some odd tastes Joan couldn't identify, and didn't much want to. It could have been dangerous if certain kinds poison type Pokémon had ever drank from there, but that thought only occurred to her after she finished taking her share. It was unlikely anyway, she thought.

Before getting back on her feet, Joan splashed her face with the water. It was refreshing enough for her, even if it was a bit mucky. She hurried on in the direction of the trees, and stopped once she reached the section of the fence closest to the forest path. She could see the policeman now, as it was bright enough to make out the blue of his uniform. He was walking in the opposite direction too, so she dragged herself back over the fence and onto Route 34 proper.

It wasn't far to Ilex Forest, and Joan scuttled across the rest of the route to get there in no time at all. She decided walking on the path through the woods itself might be risky. It wasn't likely that she'd be recognised by anyone in there she passeed, but she was thinking of the possibility of them being asked “have you seen this woman” once they got to Goldenrod. Instead she opted to walk between the trees a few metres away from the path to make it easier to hide. It was much slower for her to go this way; she stumbled a few times and at one point almost lost sight of the path. Despite the difficulty making her way on, she eventually saw a bright light ahead thinking she had reached the other side.

Approaching the light, it turned out to be a clearing illuminated by a beam of light that broke through the dense treetops. Floating in the light were particles of dust and small glowing bug Pokémon. The light fell squarely on top of a small wooden construction on the centre of the clearing. There was a certain magical feeling in the air; the light from above was almost celestial, and it was much brighter than would be expected. Joan had almost lost track of time but she knew it was still still somewhat early. If she hadn't known any better it might have made her think it was noon already.

Joan had read about this place in a travel guide about Johto. It was a shrine to the mythical Celebi. She would give a lot to borrow its time travelling abilities, to go back to the life she had before. If anything, the lush green atmosphere here was calming. Joan sat herself against a tree at the edge of the clearing, looking in. She emptied her pockets onto the grass in front of her and had a look at the berries she picked up. There were some she didn't recognise, so she placed them aside to leave behind. If she got them out of a Pokémon feeder they were probably edible, but it was better safe than sorry. She suspected some of them may actually have been apicorns, which she knew were common in this part of the world. Out of the few left she had some oran berries and sitrus berries, and one pecha berry.

These would have to do. Joan unclipped the two Pokéballs from her belt and looked at them. She decided not to feed them at the moment; that could wait. It was probably more important for them to rest in their balls. Joan did however start peeling an oran berry for herself and put the rest back in her pockets as best she could. She didn't know whether they'd need to ration what they had, or for how long.

Her Pokémon weren't raised for battle, she hoped they wouldn't have to suffer through much. Joan leaned back and rested her head against the tree. Mr. Brolly had done a lot already; he helped her escape the cell in the police station. He wasn't in his ball when she was first taken there, but even with that Joan knew he must have gone through a lot to find and then help her. Johto was as unfamiliar to him as it was for her.

Nia did a little more training than Brolly before the three left home on this journey. Joan expected Nia would be stronger and of more use in battle. The training was just a precaution in case they needed to defend themselves, the Pokémon weren't prepared for anything serious. Joan wasn't prepared either, she knew that she could have the strongest Pokémon in the world but with no real battle experience she could still lose.

Joan's mind came back to what she was going to do next, which was the most pressing issue, which she felt she was trying to avoid thinking about. She thought she could think of something when she had time like this to rest. She knew there wasn't turning back to Goldenrod, and that in the immediate future she would have to continue on to Azalea Town. She needed to decide what to do after that, and putting it off could cause even more problems later on. Joan ate another segment of oran and took a deep breath; she was trying to remember what she could of Johto geography. Azalea Town was on a peninsula, but she knew Goldenrod wasn't the only way in and out. There were some mountains, she thought, separating it from Violet City. It wasn't Mt. Silver, she knew that. She was going to get closer to Goldenrod City again before she could get too much further way. From there, the options she could think of were to go north towards the Lake of Rage, or to head for Kanto.

Joan was originally from Unova. That's where she wanted to get back to in the end. She was in over her head with her current situation. Even if it caught up with her, she could feel more comfortable there, with her family and friends to support her. Whichever way she decided to go, she would have to cross an ocean and a continent to get there. She stood up. Kanto was the better option. Even if she didn't know where to go from there, it was bound to have better connections than the places in Johto she felt safe visiting.

She threw the oran peel into the long grass between the trees, away from the clearing or the path through the forest, and continued on south. She had a closer look at the shrine first, since she had the chance. It was a bit bigger than her initial impression, and it had an opening on one side where some offerings had been left. There were a few 10 pokédollar coins, and what looked like precious stones. The idea occurred to Joan that she could take the money there since she would likely need some, but decided against it as it felt disrespectful.

Joan left the clearing and was once again making her way through the trees following the edges of the main path.

 

[Ambyssin]

Ch 1
There's nothing that struck me as off mechanistically speaking. The whole first chapter read really smoothly from start to finish. And I didn't find myself tripping up at any parts. I don't think you need to worry about that stuff if you just keep doing what you're doing. But let's move on to the meat of the intro. I like the minimalistic approach. I admit I'm the type who's iffy to really long chunks of narration, but I think you handle it well. You describe everything that's happening succinctly and paint a clear picture for me. And there's enough of a glimpse into what Joan's thinking to get some sense of the type of person she is, rather than being outright told how she works (or not being told anything at all and having to leave it up to my imagination). Starting the story off at such a tense moment leaves me with a lot of questions. But, it's to your credit that I find myself hoping to get some answers at some point.

Ch 2
I like the sense of loneliness you establish here at the beginning. It's certainly a far cry from how other trainer-centric stories I've read so far tend to go. It's quiet, but in this nice, tense sort of way that puts me on edge wondering if/when something's going to go wrong. That said, I'm a little bit iffy with that part about the water trough. Maybe this is nitpicky, but what's the point of having Joan worry about poison-type Pokémon residue, only to immediately dismiss the thought and then splash water on her face? It feels like either she should just throw caution into the wind completely, or panic after drinking it and noting the funny taste, and backing off. Especially since she discards some of the berries later on. I'm also of mixed opinions on the relatively vague descriptions of her Pokémon while they're still in their balls. Especially Nia, since we haven't even gotten an appearance from them yet. Is Nia supposed to be part of the big mystery?

That said, the ending bits about Unova definitely caught me off guard. And it's certainly raised a ton more questions for me. Here's to hoping they get answered. ^^

Just a couple of things I caught:

Another light was visible opposite the tests – it looked like the beam from a torch.

"Tents," I believe?

Joan just about managed to climb over a fence on her left, and fell into an adjacent field.

I think you meant to put "just barely" instead of "just about," because the latter is synonymous with almost, which would be more appropriate if Joan didn't succeed in climbing the fence.

Drinking the water wasn't something that appealed to Joan, it felt quite demeaning in a way but given the circumstances she deigned to have some of it.

This is two sentences that you spliced into one with a comma, like Cutlerine had mentioned before.

Approaching the light, it turned out to be a clearing illuminated by a beam of light that broke through the dense treetops

This reads a bit redundant to me. You're saying Joan approached some light, and discovered that it was light. I'd recommend changing one of the "lights."

 

[Chibi Pika]

An intriguing opening... So we've got a protagonist who was wrongfully arrested (and possibly framed?) You've got a pretty good atmosphere of suspense set up right off the bat as Joan stresses out about her situation, but immediately launches into planning what to do from now on (and her idea to hit the photo booth was pretty clever.) There's a lingering unease in the background as you, like her, wonder if she's going to be caught at any moment, especially since she makes a point of acknowledging that she's not much of a battler. I'm curious what Nia is and if there's a reason you haven't revealed its species yet. Looking forward to finding out more!

~Chibi~;249;;448;

 

[Cutlerine]

Well, the mystery doesn't get any lesser here, does it? I think I agree with Ambyssin on not really seeing the point of the secrecy about her pokémon, but perhaps there will turn out to be a reason for that – and really, other than that, I like the mystery. It's bleak and lonely and tense; I still don't know why all this is happening, but I'm quite enjoying being taken along on this strange little trip. When answers do come, they just raise more questions – okay, we learn, Joan's from Unova, but then of course we wonder what she's doing here and how things went so wrong. It's quite intriguing.

There are a few more comma splices in this chapter, like 'Her Pokémon weren't raised for battle, she hoped they wouldn't have to suffer through much' and 'The training was just a precaution in case they needed to defend themselves, the Pokémon weren't prepared for anything serious.' I can't quite make up my mind whether they're elegant or not, so, uh, possibly there's not much point in me pointing out that they're there, but I guess I've written this paragraph now so I'll stick by it.

Couple of little things I picked up on while reading:

It could have been dangerous if certain kinds poison type Pokémon had ever drank from there

I think you're missing an 'of' between 'kinds' and 'poison' there.

It wasn't likely that she'd be recognised by anyone in there she passeed

You've got an extra E in 'passed' there. Also, and this is a very minor point, I feel like the sentence would read more naturally if it went 'by anyone she passed in there', rather than 'by anyone in there she passed'.

Joan's mind came back to what she was going to do next, which was the most pressing issue, which she felt she was trying to avoid thinking about.

That reads a little oddly – maybe 'and which' would be better for that third part.

But on the whole, I like the chapter. It kind of makes good on the promise the first chapter held out, which was that things would be weird and difficult and full of questions, and it's definitely very distinctive – I haven't read many fics that have this kind of atmosphere, and this is a good example of that kind of fic, I think.