Thread: Picture Perfect {Ready for grade}

*Disclaimer* This story consists of a single, very long paragraph, so if lots of text makes you squint/puke/have spasms etc you've been warned. The reason for this is that it is difficult for me to edit this thread due to technical issues.

Picture Perfect

By Solid
After a long day at work there was nothing that John liked more then reclining all the way back in his easy chair and listening to Nat King Cole. The smooth, relaxing voice that washed over John was perfect for easing stress, which was a regular part of his job .You see, John was a poke photographer. He takes photographs of specific pokemon for specific clients on a daily basis. For the right price that is. "Hey, this isn't a cheap occupation" thought John. He owned a small studio in the city, but to help find those reclusive pokemon for his higher paying clients, John had moved to a house on the outskirts of town. The stressful part of his job was getting a request from every other guy for a "quick snapshot" of some legendary pokemon that may not even exist. "What nonsense. Why can't people take me seriously?" John thought. Suddenly as he was contemplating this, a small purple balloon, with two strings attached floated over and bumped him on the head. "Huh? Oh yeah, sorry. I forgot." The balloon then bounced up and down, letting out a airy "Flooooon" as it did so. This was John's Drifloon, Snipe. He walked over to a window, followed by the pokemon and opened it, stepping aside as Snipe fondly tugged at his hair before drifting outside and getting carried of by a gust of wind. "Make sure to focus the image as best you can! Time equals money, so Ill see you at 6:00 sharp!" Said John. Every evening Snipe would float around the country side with a special camera attached to it, snapping pictures of pokémon only seen at that time of day. However it would often take pictures of anything that moved, including cars, tumbleweeds and random people. As the sun dipped below the horizon, John went over to his chair and casually flicked on the tube. "Tomorrows weather will be mostly sunny, with some evening showers expected for the western half of the Johto region". "Hmm perfect weather for those pictures of those bug types at the national park" he thought. Hearing the weather report had, oddly enough, reminded John of his first day on the job, years earlier. It was actually in a glade not far from the old day care center a couple of miles from his house. Hey wait up Snipe! The balloon pokémon was floating far ahead, with John's equipment on its back. Jeese where did ya get all that energy from? I thought I'd have to drag you here. His first client had requested a picture of a rare shiny Shuppet that been sighted in this area. It was even more rare because it was outside of its native region of Hoenn. The client was also offering a large amount of cash, plus there was a reward from one of the local papers. If he put the two together, he could pay of his equipment, and still have plenty left over. The only problem was that his Drifloon was incredibly scared of the ghost type, odd since he was one. "So, you just want to get it over with as soon as possible huh? Well Ill get you a nice reward for your efforts, don't you worry pal" The pokemon stopped so fast that John barely had time to swerve the other way. They were now at the edge of Ilex forest, and could hear strange noises...like sheets drying in the wind. "Well that sounds like a Shuppet to me. What do you think Snipes? If the pokemon had herd him, it showed no response other then trembling. The forest was full of dark green trees, and showed little signs of life. A web stretching from one tree to another, or a old Beedrill hive lying on the floor of th forest. As John set up his equipment Snipes silently drifted further from the edge of the forest, until he and John were 100 feet apart. "Huh? Aww come on it won't be that bad" he said to the ghost afraid of ghosts. "All you have to do is lure the little fella out, and ill snap of a few pictures. Easy as pie!" But just at that moment the wind that had been gently blowing picked up immensely, causing Snipe to wrap its flimsy appendages on a nearby sapling. "Uh-oh, um Snipe stay like that and try using Tailwind to counteract these flurries. Hearing the command the pokemon obeyed by inhaling the air around it until it seemed it would burst, then explosively releasing it in one big blast. The wind stopped. "Yes! I wasn't actually sure that would work". As the Drifloon untied itself, the winds suddenly picked up again more violent then before, causing Snipe to hang on to the tree twice as hard. "Wait a second" thought John. "Snipe use Ominous Wind on that group of trees" said John pointing at the forest. Snipe reluctantly agreed by inhaling air again, this time with a purple mist forming around its body until he let loose with a blast of purple wind. It flew at the trees, stripping them of many leaves, even stopping the opposing wind. Hmm. I guess it was no- was as far as John got before the oddly colored puppet pokemon that they had been tracking jumped from the trees and sent a Night Shade towards the two. Ack! Quick use substitute! Snipe released his grip from the tree and glowed gently before sending out a duplicate, which absorbed the oncoming wave, then dissipated. "So it was you!" John said readying his camera for a couple quick shots. He might be able to get extra for battle scenes. The Shuppet responded by screeching at him. "Oww! My ears. Alright Snipe, give it a body slam! Though Snipe was deadly afraid of ghosts, he was no coward. He charged at the foe, John all the while taking pictures and giving support. As the two ghouls were about to make contact one of them, the Shuppet somehow sent a fist made of dark energy flying at Snipe. The Sucker Punch hit him hard, but still he had enough energy to hit his foe head on. The Shuppet then out of energy and ideas collapsed in a crumpled heap on the ground. "Whew that was intense". I even used up all the film on you guys." The Drifloon nodded ,tired from its battle. "I know you like being outside, but you should be in your pokeball to get some rest" he said as he returned the pokemon to the red and white capsule. John then looked at the fainted Shuppet. "I guess it would be wrong to just leave you here, you might get eaten after all! As he said this he pulled out the extra pokeball from his bag (he kept it for special encounters such as this) and pushed the little button releasing a flash of light and capturing the pokemon. A couple hours later, John was back in his newly purchased studio, and had faxed some of the pictures to his client and the newspaper editor, both of whom were thrilled (he also swindled a extra bit of monet out of them both, cha-ching!) to see such amazing results. In the end he got his money, a uber-rare pokemon, and a bit of a reputation thanks to newspaper. John was amazed he could remember all of this so clearly, and looked at his watch realizing nearly an hour had passed while he was reminiscing. "Wow I really should focus on the present" he said out loud. "The world might leave me behind". He then went to his bedroom, where Sasori the shiny Shuppet he had captured, and subsequently befriended was sleeping in the corner. "Time for me to sleep, and for you to wake" he said, as the Shuppet blinked its eyes and floated towards him. "Tomorrow will bring new clients, and maybe new adventures". Snorting at this ridiculous cliche John, drifted to sleep thinking of money to be made and his fond memories.
The next moment he was awakened by the sound Professor Oak's voice on his clock radio. "And that concludes our special broadcast on Ilex Forest." John groaned and glanced at the time-6:04. "Damn how does six o'clock come so soon" thought John rhetorically. He threw back the covers and stood up to stretch, seeing that Sasori was already back to his resting place. "You just sleep whenever you feel like it don't you?" Not waiting for a response, John stumbled to his bathroom and saw that his short blonde hair was the very definition of bed head, and with that jumped in the shower. After a couple of minutes with the hot water steaming up the room so that he could not see a foot in front of him, John remembered that he needed to let Snipe inside. Cursing as he grabbed a towel, John headed for his living room to open the window for hi buoyant friend. Pulling up the shades expecting to see a annoyed balloon, he was greeted only by the dead potted plants that he had tried growing. Confused he went to the other windows in his house, but was met with similar results. "That's weird" said John. "He must have gone to the studio" he said, as Snipe had done so on occasion before. Getting dressed ad eating a hurried breakfast, John got in his new-used car and turned the ignition. The radio crackled to life as the car got power bleating out this sentence fragment, "-really is a sight to behold, so if you've got any free time then you should come to the front gate of the forest and check ot out". "More about Ilex?" thought John. "Wonder what I'm missing..." As John drove to his small studio in Goldenrod, he scanned the radio stations listening for any hint as to what was going down in the forest. Pulling into his parking space at his studio,he looked around for Snipe, but he was nowhere in sight. John was starting to get worried now, but still had hope that his pokemon would show up later in the day. He noticed how empty the streets had been. He had passed barely five cars during his 15 minute drive, extremely strange since Goldenrod was the largest city in Johto. "I hope Stacey doesn't call in sick" thought John. In the years after his now famous shiny Shuppet pictures, he had been met with much success, and was able to hire an assistant for himself. Stacey was that assistant. She was medium height with black hair and numerous piercings. She was often late, and was usually sarcastic to the extreme, which annoyed John greatly since he was technically the boss. A stereotype rebel without a cause. When he went to unlock the door he was immediately surprised by the sign that he put up himself every morning staring him in the face. "We are OPEN!" it read. "Stacey, are you here?" He called thinking that if she had shown up early the sky would rain gold coins. "No I'm a thief who just happened to be polite enough to tell you in person that I'd robbed you" wad the response. "Wow your here on time. Impressive. Did you wake in the middle of the night and have an epiphany and realize: I get paid for a reason, not just to crack wise-ass remarks and be snide to potential clients. She gave him a cool stare and said "No, I just got back from Ilex forest and thought you'd appreciate it if I opened up shop. Guess not. "Hey can't I joke even a little?" said John "What's going on down there anyway?". Stacey gave him a look of genuine surprise. "You don't already know?" He gave her a blank stare before continuing. "Everyone's been talking about it! There was a mass migration of Drifloon and Drifblim to Ilex forest last night. Nobody knows why they're here, but I mean, isn't that what they do anyway? They drift around." "Seriously?!" exclaimed John "We have to get over there now!" Snipe didn't come home last night and I've been looking for him. He's got to be over there. He took out a pokeball from his bag and let out Sasori. The puppet released a yawn and looked at its trainer. "We're going down to Ilex forest to look for Snipe ok?" The Shuppet nodded in agreement and the three of them went to John's car. The drive to the forest was silent, except for John telling his present company about the special camera that Snipe was wearing. "That should make it easy to pick him out and Stacey? "What?" "You're going to be taking pictures of this little event. Who knows the price we can put on them eh? She rolled her eyes but nodded in agreement. As they reached they're destination John flashed his visitors pass to the attendant and they entered the forest. The sight that met them was breathtaking. Hundreds of purple balloon like bodies were floating high above the trees, some even yellow, all bouncing off of each other. "Amazing..." said John. "Quick get some pictures before we start looking for him." After the quick pics he and Sasori went in one direction while Stacey and her Hoothoot went the other in search of Snipe. After hours of fruitless searching John remembered that the special camera attached to Snipe had a remote activated feature meant for locating lost pokemon. He quickly pulled out the remote and pushed the button, only to hear a loud high pitched beeping right above him. The sheer closeness was enough to make him scream. Looking up he saw the camera stuck in a tree. "Crap!" Yelled John. "Now what?" He asked Sasori who had been sniffing the camera. Suddenly he floated upright and flew off through the forest. "Hey wait up" yelled John grabbing the camera and flowing him. After a couple minutes of chasing Sasori, he slowed down and came to a stop in a small clearing with a shrine in the middle of it. "Hey thanks for stopping finally. What made you come here?" asked John, wheezing. He looked up and saw a Drifloon. "Snipe?" he began until he was hushed by what was next to the balloon pokemon. It was Celibi. There right in front of him. "Camera!" his mind stuttered. But somehow taking a picture of this...for money...didn't seem right. So John just stood there staring in awe until he heard a flapping behind him. Outof the forest came Stacey and Hoothoot. "John, Hoothoot just went crazy all of a sudden and"...she was silenced by the mystical creature in front of her. And just as quickly as a leaf falling from a branch, Celibi was gone. "Was that..." "Yes." "Did you get a?" "No." For some reason she didn't ask him why he hadn't taken a picture. She just understood. Interrupting Johns train of thought was Snipe, for of course it was him. "Hey buddy, we've been looking for you all day!" "We finally found you." After the long trek back to the car John turned to Stacey and said, "I don't think we should tell anyone about...what we saw. She gave him a funny look and said "I think that chance encounter just might have changed you. I mean you didn't even take a picture." "Maybe it did...I don't know. But we'll see soon enough won't we" he said as the climbed in the car.
Later that night, while developing the days photos, John found something. A slightly blurry picture of what he knew was Celibi. It came from the camera strapped to Snipe. "Haha. You know me to well, old friend. But I think instead of selling this one...ill just keep it for myself." And he actually did.


Requested Pokemon: Shuppet
Category: Medium
Story length: 14471

This is my first Pokemon story (my second attempt at one.), though I have a little experience with writing, but being a Pokemon story its a little more difficult (but more fun :D). Feedback would be greatly appreciated.

Claimed for Grading. :)

Introduction:

After a long day at work there was nothing that John liked more then reclining all the way back in his easy chair and listening to Nat King Cole.

I thought that your introduction was pretty good, but I knew immediately that it was missing something that would definitely draw your readers into this story, even if they normally can't stand walls of text: it needed a strong hook.

Basically, a hook is an introduction that gets the reader interested in your story immediately. It usually causes them to ask themselves why the situation shown in the introduction came to pass, and they will continue reading in an attempt to answer that question. As an example, in your story, you could have started the story off showing John just as he discovered Celebi, and as he made the realization that it was, in fact, Celebi that he was staring at, you could flash to the point that you started the story off with in this version. This would cause the readers to think, "I wonder why he saw Celebi. Maybe I should keep reading to find out."

Practice using hooks to draw the readers in when you write in the future. If you master the creation of strong hooks, they will be a great aid to your story-writing ability.

Plot:
As he sits at home, John is reminded of his first photography job, in which he was asked to get some pictures of a shiny Shuppet. He makes his way to Ilex Forest, where he finds the Pokemon; it instigates a battle, and ends up being captured. John is then snapped back to reality, and he decides to go to sleep for the night. The next morning, John goes off to work as usual, but when he arrives, he is alerted by his assistant that a large migration of Drifloon occurred the night before. Incidentally, his own Drifloon hadn't shown up at his house, so he goes in search of it. They manage to find his Drifloon, and they also catch a glimpse of Celebi. The sight of the legendary time-traveler seems to change John, as he doesn't bother to photograph it, even though it would sell for a lot of money. He ends up with a photo anyway in the end, though.

Now, you did proliferate and expand the plot to include other things besides just "kid finds Pokemon, kid battles Pokemon, kid captures Pokemon", so I have to give you credit for that. However, the part of the story after John found the Shuppet didn't really have much of anything to do with the actual find and capture of the Shuppet itself, which made me wonder why he reminisced on his first mission at all.

In the future, it might be a good idea to link up your plot points and give them a central connecting point, instead of having the points only be connected at the convenience of the plot. It's not too big of a deal, but I think it would have made your story better.

Dialogue:
The sarcasm conveyed in the dialogue between Stacey and John was done well, because I could immediately tell that they are very cynical around each other when they began talking. I am bothered by something, though. From the comments made towards the end, I am to assume that John used to be a greedy person before he saw Celebi. The thing that I'm bothered about is that you didn't really convey this in John's dialogue; to me, he seemed like a decent enough guy until you brought up the fact that he was dreaming of money. In general, it's better to show that your characters have a certain personality via dialogue than tell the readers that they do through description, because doing so in dialogue gets the point across better. There's a balance that needs to be maintained between showing and telling, but this story showed personality almost entirely through telling, which was kind of off-putting.

Basically, work on showing your characters' personalities through dialogue in the future.

Grammar:
It was difficult to find grammatical errors here thanks to the formatting style, but I'll try to go over the ones I caught along the way anyway.

Make sure that, when you have access to better formatting, you give each new thought/paragraph or new speaker in dialogue a new line, double-spaced from the last paragraph. For example:

After a long day at work there was nothing that John liked more then reclining all the way back in his easy chair and listening to Nat King Cole. The smooth, relaxing voice that washed over John was perfect for easing stress, which was a regular part of his job .You see, John was a poke photographer. He takes photographs of specific pokemon for specific clients on a daily basis. For the right price that is.

"Hey, this isn't a cheap occupation" thought John.

When conveying thoughts, use either italics or single quotes. Make sure that you connect the quote to whatever modifier you're using appropriately, like so:

'Hmm perfect weather for those pictures of those bug types at the national park,' he thought.

"Thought" modifies the quote, so you'd end the quote with a comma, if the quote in question would normally end in a period. If the next sentence after the quote doesn't modify the quote, you'd end it in a period or other appropriate mark.

Lastly, if you have access to a Word processor at some point in the future, you should use it to check for any spelling or grammar errors, as it will point out the majority of them for you. I found a few misspellings and grammatically-incorrect sentences throughout the piece, so it might be a good idea to have a Word processor handy to help you proofread.

Detail and Description:
It was a bit difficult to visualize your story because you didn't really give too many details on the appearances of the characters or on their surroundings. Though anyone who has played the games should know what Goldenrod City and Ilex Forest look like, it's not a good idea to assume that everyone knows what it looks like, because it makes it difficult to visualize your characters in the situations that you put them in. Furthermore, while you gave some details on appearances, I felt that I didn't get enough information on how John looked to really visualize him in the situations he was in, so it would probably be a good idea to describe him a little more.

Otherwise, I felt that your details were adequately done. Keep in mind my suggestions, though, because you'll want to work on them for your future stories.

Battle:
All in all, I thought that the battle between Drifloon and Shuppet was kind of short, since each side only really got off a couple of moves. You'll want to make the battles longer and more action-packed in the future, because a long, detailed battle always earns high marks in the Grade. I felt that your details were adequate, but the length wasn't really there.

Body Slam normally wouldn't affect Shuppet, because it's a Normal-type move. That's kind of nitpicking, though.

Finally, you cannot explicitly state that you captured the Pokemon that you're targeting in your story; that is a matter left to the Graders. You can say that the Ball shook three times, and you can will it along as much as you want, but actually stating that you made the capture at any point in the story isn't really a good idea. You'll want to stay away from that in your future writing.

Length:
Shuppet is in the Medium category; the suggested length for Pokemon in this category is 10,000 to 20,000 characters. Your story is 14,471 characters, so it makes the cut.

Outcome:
Drum roll, please...

...

...Ker-poof!

Oh, no! The Pokemon broke free!

If you take out the capture part and edit your details accordingly, I think you'll be able to catch this Shuppet. Once you've done so, get my attention via PM, VM, or AIM, and I'll pass this.

Good luck!

Picture Perfect (revised)


Present

John stood speechless and in awe, his white-blonde shoulder length hair in his eyes as he looked on to the old wooden shrine in the middle of vividly alive clearing. There not ten feet from him was an incredible sight. It was the voice of the forest. It was Celibi.


24 hours previous...


After a long day at work there was nothing that John liked more then reclining all the way back in his easy chair and listening to Nat King Cole. The smooth, relaxing voice that washed over John was perfect for easing stress, which was a regular part of his job .You see, John was a poke photographer. He takes photographs of specific pokemon for specific clients on a daily basis. (For the right price that is. Hey, this isn't a cheap occupation!) thought John. He owned a small studio in the city, (smaller=less rent.) but to help find those reclusive pokemon for his higher paying clients, John had moved to a house on the outskirts of town. The stressful part of his job was getting a request from every other guy for a "quick snapshot" of some legendary pokemon that may not even exist. "What nonsense. Why can't people take me seriously?" John thought. Suddenly as he was contemplating this, a small purple balloon, with two strings attached floated over and bumped him on the head. "Huh? Oh yeah, sorry. I forgot." The balloon then bounced up and down, letting out a airy "Flooooon" as it did so. This was John's Drifloon, Snipe. He walked over to a window, followed by the pokemon and opened it, stepping aside as Snipe fondly tugged at his hair before drifting outside and getting carried of by a gust of wind. "Make sure to focus the image as best you can! Time equals money, so Ill see you at 6:00 sharp!" Said John. Every evening Snipe would float around the country side with a special camera attached to it, snapping pictures of pokémon only seen at that time of day. However it would often take pictures of anything that moved, including cars, tumbleweeds and random people. As the sun dipped below the horizon, John went over to his chair and casually flicked on the tube. "Tomorrows weather will be mostly sunny, with some evening showers expected for the western half of the Johto region". "Hmm perfect weather for those pictures of those bug types at the national park" he thought. Hearing the weather report had, oddly enough, reminded John of his first day on the job, years earlier. It was actually in a glade not far from the old day care center a couple of miles from his house.


Many years previous...


Hey wait up Snipe! The balloon pokémon was floating far ahead, with John's equipment on its back. Jeese where did ya get all that energy from? I thought I'd have to drag you here. His first client had requested a picture of a rare shiny Shuppet that been sighted in this area. It was even more rare because it was outside of its native region of Hoenn. The client was also offering a large amount of cash, plus there was a reward from one of the local papers. If he put the two together, he could pay of his equipment, and still have plenty left over. The only problem was that his Drifloon was incredibly scared of the ghost type, odd since he was one. "So, you just want to get it over with as soon as possible huh? Well Ill get you a nice reward for your efforts, don't you worry pal" The pokemon stopped so fast that John barely had time to swerve the other way. They were now at the edge of Ilex forest, and could hear strange noises...like sheets drying in the wind. "Well that sounds like a Shuppet to me. What do you think Snipes? If the pokemon had herd him, it showed no response other then trembling. The forest was full of dark green trees, and showed little signs of life. A web stretching from one tree to another, or a old Beedrill hive lying on the floor of th forest. As John set up his equipment Snipes silently drifted further from the edge of the forest, until he and John were 100 feet apart. "Huh? Aww come on it won't be that bad" he said to the ghost afraid of ghosts. "All you have to do is lure the little fella out, and ill snap of a few pictures. Easy as pie!" But just at that moment the wind that had been gently blowing picked up immensely, causing Snipe to wrap its flimsy appendages on a nearby sapling. "Uh-oh, um Snipe stay like that and try using Tailwind to counteract these flurries. Hearing the command the pokemon obeyed by inhaling the air around it until it seemed it would burst, then explosively releasing it in one big blast. The wind stopped. "Yes! I wasn't actually sure that would work". As the Drifloon untied itself, the winds suddenly picked up again more violent then before, causing Snipe to hang on to the tree twice as hard. "Wait a second" thought John. "Snipe use Ominous Wind on that group of trees" said John pointing at the forest. Snipe reluctantly agreed by inhaling air again, this time with a purple mist forming around its body until he let loose with a blast of purple wind. It flew at the trees, stripping them of many leaves, even stopping the opposing wind. "Hmm. I guess it was no-" was as far as John got before the oddly colored puppet pokemon that they had been tracking jumped from the trees and sent a glowing, pulsating Night Shade towards the two. "Ack! Quick use substitute!" Snipe released his grip from the tree and glowed gently before sending out a duplicate, which absorbed the oncoming wave, of dreadful energy, then dissipated. "So it was you!" John said readying his camera for a couple quick shots. He might be able to get extra for battle scenes. The Shuppet responded by taking a deep brwath and letting out a earsplitting screecy, which had visibly shaken Snipe. "Oww! My ears!" Alright Snipe, give it your most powerful...er, astonish?" Though Snipe was deadly afraid of ghosts, he was no coward. He charged at the foe, shrieking like a banshee all the while as took pictures and gave verbal support. As the two ghouls were about to make contact, the Shuppets eyes glowed briefly before somehow sending a large, fearsome looking fist made of dark energy flying directly at Snipe. The Sucker Punch hit him hard, but still he had enough energy to hit his foe head on. The Shuppet then out of ideas glowed darkly, with the faint illusion of a nail being pounded into it, collapsed in a broken and tattered heap on the ground. "Whew that was intense! I even used up all the film on the camera, you little moneymaker! Drifloon nodded, close to fainting from its opponents curse. "I know you like being outside, but you should be in your pokeball to get some rest." he said as he returned the pokemon to the red and white capsule. John then looked at the fainted Shuppet. "I guess it would be wrong to just leave you here, you might get eaten after all! As he said this he pulled out the extra pokeball from his bag (he kept it for special encounters such as this) and pushed the little button releasing a lustrous flash of light, absorbing the pokemon into pure energy. The ball shook weakly three times, just as Johns memory got fuzzy. (Did I capture that little guy? Maybe I sold him. Ill have to check Bills PC.) A couple hours later, John was back in his newly acquired studio, and had faxed some of the pictures to his client and the newspaper editor, both of whom were thrilled (he also swindled a extra bit of monet out of them both, cha-ching!) to see such amazing results. In the end he got his money, a returning (ans enthusiastic) client, and a bit of a reputation thanks to newspaper.


Forward some years, 24 hours before present...


John was amazed he could remember all of this so clearly, and looked at his watch realizing nearly an hour had passed while he was reminiscing. "Wow I really should focus on the present" he said out loud. "The world might leave me behind". He then went to his bedroom, where Sasori a Shuppet, different from the one he had photographed as it was normal colored, was sleeping in the corner. "Time for me to sleep, and for you to wake" he said, as the Shuppet blinked its eyes and floated towards him. "Tomorrow will bring new clients, and maybe new adventures". Snorting at this ridiculous cliche John, drifted to sleep thinking of money to be made and his fond memories.

What seemed like just minutes later he was awakened by the sound Professor Oak's voice on his clock radio. "And that concludes our special broadcast on Ilex Forest." John groaned and glanced at the time-6:04. "Damn how does six o'clock come so soon" thought John rhetorically. He threw back the covers and stood up to stretch, seeing that Sasori was already back to his resting place. "You just sleep whenever you feel like it don't you?" Not waiting for a response, John stumbled to his bathroom and saw that his short white-blonde hair was the very definition of bed head, and he had a bit of a stubble. With that he jumped in the shower. After a couple of minutes with the hot water steaming up the room so that he could not see a foot in front of him, John remembered that he needed to let Snipe inside. Cursing as he grabbed a towel, John headed for his living room to open the window for hi buoyant friend. Pulling up the shades expecting to see a annoyed balloon, he was greeted only by the dead potted plants (waste of money. Period.) he had tried growing. Confused he went to the other windows in his modestly sized house, but was met with similar results. "That's weird" said John. "He must have gone to the studio" he said, as Snipe had done so on occasion before. Getting dressed and eating a hurried breakfast of a imitation of brand name cereal , John got in his new-used car and turned the ignition. The radio crackled to life as the car got power bleating out this sentence fragment, "-really is a sight to behold, so if you've got any free time then you should come to the front gate of the forest and check ot out". "More about Ilex?" thought John as he drove past the many tall buildings, the radio tower and game corner included. "Wonder what I'm missing..." As John drove to his small studio in Goldenrod, he scanned the radio stations listening for any hint as to what was going down in the forest. Pulling into his parking space at his studio,he looked around for Snipe, but he was nowhere in sight. John was starting to get worried now, but still had hope that his pokemon would show up later in the day. He noticed how empty the streets had been. He had passed barely five cars during his 15 minute drive, extremely strange since Goldenrod was the largest city in Johto. "I hope Stacey doesn't call in sick" thought John. In the years after his now famous shiny Shuppet pictures, he had been met with much success, and was able to hire an assistant for himself. Stacey was that assistant. She was medium height with black hair and numerous piercings. She was often late, and was usually sarcastic to the extreme, which annoyed John greatly since he was technically the boss. A stereotype rebel without a cause. When he went to unlock the door he was immediately surprised by the sign that he put up himself every morning staring him in the face. "We are OPEN!" it read. Inside was a short reception counter, with a door leading to the back, and to the darkroom."Stacey, are you here?" He called thinking that if she had shown up early the sky would rain gold coins. "No I'm a thief who just happened to be polite enough to tell you in person that I'd robbed you" was the response. "Wow your here on time. Impressive. Did you wake in the middle of the night and have an epiphany and realize: I get paid for a reason, not just to crack wise-ass remarks and be snide to potential clients. She gave him a cool stare and said "No, I just got back from Ilex forest and thought you'd appreciate it if I opened up shop. Guess not. "Hey can't I joke even a little?" said John "What's going on down there anyway?". Stacey gave him a look of genuine surprise. "You don't already know?" He gave her a blank stare before continuing. "Everyone's been talking about it! There was a mass migration of Drifloon and Drifblim to Ilex forest last night. Nobody knows why they're here, but I mean, isn't that what they do anyway? They drift around." "Seriously?!" exclaimed John "We have to get over there now!" Snipe didn't come home last night and I've been looking for him. He's got to be over there. He took out a pokeball from his bag and let out Sasori. The puppet released a yawn and looked at its trainer. "We're going down to Ilex forest to look for Snipe ok?" The Shuppet nodded in agreement and the three of them went to John's car. The drive to the forest was silent, except for John telling his present company about the special camera that Snipe was wearing. "That should make it easy to pick him out and Stacey? "What?" "You're going to be taking pictures of this little event. Who knows the price we can put on them eh? She rolled her eyes but nodded in agreement. As they reached they're destination, a large foreboding gate John flashed his visitors pass to the attendant and they entered the forest. The sight that met them was breathtaking. Hundreds of purple balloon like bodies were floating high above the trees, some even yellow, all bouncing off of each other. "Amazing..." said John. "Quick get some pictures before we start looking for him, someone is bound to pay." After the quick pics he and Sasori went in one direction while Stacey and her Hoothoot went the other in search of Snipe. After hours of fruitless searching in the large maze-like forest, John remembered that the special camera attached to Snipe had a remote activated feature meant for locating lost pokemon. He quickly pulled out the remote and pushed the button, only to hear a loud high pitched beeping right above him. The sheer closeness was enough to make him scream. Looking up he saw the camera stuck in a tree. "Crap!" Yelled John. "Now what?" He asked Sasori who had been sniffing the camera. Suddenly he floated upright and flew off through the forest. "Hey wait up" yelled John grabbing the camera and flowing him. After a couple minutes of chasing Sasori, he slowed down and came to a stop in a small clearing with a shrine in the middle of it. "Hey thanks for stopping finally. What made you come here?" asked John, wheezing. He looked up and saw a Drifloon. "Snipe?" he began until he was hushed by what was next to the balloon pokemon. It was Celibi.


Present


There right in front of him was one of the rarest of the most secretive and rare of pokemon, yet all he could do was gush."Camera!" his mind finally stuttered. But somehow taking a picture of this...for money...didn't seem right (Am I crazy?No...I guess not.) So John just stood there staring in awe until he heard a flapping behind him. Out of the forest came Stacey and her Hoothoot. "John, Hoothoot just went crazy all of a sudden and"...she was silenced by the mystical green, creature floating in front of her. And just as quickly and gracefully as a leaf falling from a branch in autumn, Celibi was gone. "Was that..." "Yes." "Did you get a?" "No." For some reason she didn't ask him why he hadn't taken a picture. She just understood. Interrupting Johns train of thought was Snipe, for of course it was him. "Hey buddy, we've been looking for you all day!" "We finally found you." After the long trek back to the car John turned to Stacey and said, "I don't think we should tell anyone about...what we saw. Things like that aren't meant to be exploited. She gave him a funny look and said "I think that chance encounter just changed you, for the better. I mean you didn't even take a picture." "Maybe it did...I don't know. But we'll see soon enough won't we." he said as they climbed in the car.
Later that night, while developing the days photos, John found something. A slightly blurry picture of a small green plant like creature. It came from the camera strapped to Snipe. "Haha. You know me to well, old friend. But I think instead of selling this one...ill just keep it for myself." And he actually did.

I think most of the issues from you grade were addressed, so if I have forgotten any, please scold me accordingly.

Other than this:

Originally Posted by Neighborhood-Guest

Grammar:
Make sure that, when you have access to better formatting, you give each new thought/paragraph or new speaker in dialogue a new line, double-spaced from the last paragraph. For example:

After a long day at work there was nothing that John liked more then reclining all the way back in his easy chair and listening to Nat King Cole. The smooth, relaxing voice that washed over John was perfect for easing stress, which was a regular part of his job .You see, John was a poke photographer. He takes photographs of specific pokemon for specific clients on a daily basis. For the right price that is.

"Hey, this isn't a cheap occupation" thought John.

It looks fine to me. Also, you don't need to post the revised version below in the future; simply edit it into the original post, over the old version, and then post saying it has been revised.

So, without further ado...

Gotcha! Shuppet was caught!

Enjoy your catch!

Cool! Ill work on the grammar on my next tale, thanks!