LATE for PracTice: An Allie Bunson Short-Story

Morning in Shanghai, China. As usual, the city is waking up, with swells of people getting up and making their way through traffic for work and their daily errands. Cars are honking and traffic is at a standstill, not even a golf cart of a billionaire can make it through (We are looking at you, Kermit McFrog). Having some peace from the noise is a condo on the top floor of a massive complex building. Tucked in her bed, nice and comfy, is a small fire-type rabbit, still in her pajamas. Allie Bunson, star midfielder for the Shanghai Dragons, and contender for the cutest player in the SSL. Still sound asleep, she holds her favourite stuffed rabbit named "Blue" in her hands. Her alarm reads "8:43am." Normally, her practices are scheduled for around 9am. Her alarm hadn't gone off.

In the kitchen of her condo, some of her friends have already gathered for breakfast. With bowls of coffee, milk, and juice, six Pokemon are there. The dark-type couple of Ruby the Zorua and Darkshade the Umbreon sit. There is a small Zorua lying next to Ruby. They have a newborn, Apollo is his name. He leans against his mom's fur while she has some coffee. Across from her are her sister-in-law, Candie the Sylveon, and her "significant Otter" Oshawott. Finally, there's Zip the Electrike having some juice and Cookie the Fidough.

"Hey, have you seen Allie yet this morning?" The Oshawott asks. "Normally she'd eat before us."

"I don't think I heard her alarm?" Ruby rubs her eyes with her paw. "Then again, Apollo did wake us up last night."

"Does Allie have practice?" Zip barks.

"Let me check." The Umbreon looks at the calendar placed on their fridge. Allie has printed a schedule for the season, marking down the games for both the Majors along with each round of the SSL Cup. This week she's expecting to face Romana, a rival of Shanghai and, as expected, marked on the calender. "Morning Practice."

"Not again. . ." The Umbreon sighs.

The water-type hops down. "Guess I need to get her up again."

"Ruff!" The Fidough barks.

"Yeah, honey, Cookie is right." The Sylveon, Candie, for once, is the voice of reason. "If you try, we'd have to use a revive on her. . . AGAIN."

The group of Pokemon hear the pitter patter of feet as Vicky walks into the kitchen. She has a piece of paper in her mouth. She places it down and looks up.

"Candiiie, Ossshyy, Wooby, Dark Dark, where's Allwee?" She pouts. "I want to show her my art."

"I think she slept past her alarm, kiddo. . . again." Ruby groans.

"Awwie need to be up!" The Eevee rushes down the hallway and headbutts Allies door open. The Scorbunny is still sound asleep, holding her plush as the Eevee hops on the bed and "boops" her nose with her paw.

"Awwie!"

"Nch..." Allie groans as she tosses.

"Awwie! You sweepy head!"

Sitting up finally, Allie rubs her eyes with her paws.

"Uh, hey Lass. What are you doing?"

"You sweep in!"

"I did?" Allie looks at her alarm clock to see it is almost 9am. She's expected on the pitch in about 15 minutes.

"OH SHI-" Covering her mouth, she tries not to swear in front of a kid. She hops out of bed and rushes to get changed.

-Several minutes later-

After rushing to give herself a quick sand bath (do not mix fire-types with water), Allie has changed into her gear already, shorts, and a practice kit with her number 3 on it, still having her plush in her hand. Seeing her run out, the other Pokemon chuckle.

"Late again, Allie?" Darkshade smirks as Allie grabs an oran berry and quickly munches down on it.

"I don't want to be late, Coach Slippy is going to make me run laps like when I ate too many oranges at have time. . ."

"Good luck then." Ruby winks while her son yelps out and waves his paw towards Allie.

On her patio deck, Noodles the Dragonite is finishing his morning tea. Early in the season, he loves sitting outside to take in the Shanghai skyline. Allie slides the door open and pants.

"Noodles, lad. . ." She catches her breath. "I need a quick fly to The Den. . . Real quick."

"Again?" Noodles asks and Allie nods her head quickly. The Dragon type gulps his tea and grabs his harness he uses for when the Pokemon want to fly around with him. He gets down on his four claws after he straps it in.

"Well, hop in then."

Allie climbs up the dragon's back and buckles herself in. The Dragonite hops up and flaps his small, but surprisingly strong, wings and flies out. Normally by car it'd be a 20 minute drive to the stadium. . . at night when there's barely any traffic. But she's on a tight deadline. Even in the air, she's going to be cutting it close.

"Do you mind going faster?" The Scourbunny asks.

"I just finished my tea, sorry, I'm waking up."

Allie scratches the back of her head. "Uh. . . I may have five minutes to get there."

"Why didn't you say so? Hold on to your bow, Allie, I'm going Extreme Speed."

Noodles warns his passenger as Allie puts her paws on her head to hold her bow in place. The Dragonite charges up, and zooms forward at a high speed. Allie lets out a scream.

. . .

An old Chinese couple sits next to their window of their high-rise appartment, sipping their morning tea. The older gentleman looks out the window and hears the faint scream of Allie as Noodles zooms past.

"AAAAH!"

His wife appears unbothered, looking at the television screen. He taps his partner on the shoulder.

"Dear, I just saw a rabbit and a Dragon outside of the window!"

Without turning her head, she sighs.

"You're seeing things again, Bo."

The old man grumbles.

"You never believe me-"

. . .

In the stadium, the team is slowly getting ready for their warm-ups. Just one rabbit short. The Den is empty, no fans, and some of the coaches already are bringing out some cones for some drills. The season's early, so they're still fine-tuning their squad. Takechi, as expected, is already practicing his penalty kicks against the back-up keeper. Slippy looks around at center pitch.

"Another great day for practice. . ." He does a head-count and even between the reserves and the main squad. He's one person short. "Wait where's Allie-"

Right on cue, he hear's the scream of Allie as Noodles zooms into the open air of the stadium. Even with his "extreme" velocity, the expert flying Dragonite stops himself before the pitch, flapping his wings up and landing on his feet.

Allie stops her screaming, seeing she has landed safely.

"Glad to see you made it, Allie. Hi again, Noodles." Slippy the Frog smirks as Allie unbuckles herself from her friend's harness.

"Howdy, Coach. I got your star player right here." Noodles smirks as Allie looks embarrassed.

"Alarm didn't go off again, hehe, sorry."

Allie hops down and stretches here legs. "But I'm ready!"

Coach McFrog looks at Allie and notices she has a blue rabbit plush in her paw still.

"Is that a new try-out?"

"-Oh."

Allie looks at her stuffed animal. "Sorry, Blue tagged along." She gives her plush to the coach. "Mind taking care of her for practice?"

Slippy smirks and puts the rabbit plush on his shoulder. "Guess you're assistant coach for the day?"

Slippy blows his whistle while Noodles flies over to the sidelines, enjoying his "free viewing" as Shanghai's practice begins as expected, without any more hitches than normal.