"Zephyr, wake up! Zephyr! ZEPHYR!"
"Ok, I'm up, I'm up." I grumble as I climb out of bed. "Why'd you wake me up so early, Mom?"
"Do you even remember what today is?" she replied. My eyes flew wide open as I realized what would be happening today.
"Of course! My 11th birthday!" I shouted in excitement.
"And the day you get your first Pokémon!" my mom said, just in case I hadn't practically been counting the seconds until I could get my very own Pokémon and go out on the island challenge (which I had). "I'll let you get dressed, then you can head over to Iki Town and meet up with your friends!" My friends Hau, Lillie and I had made a vow to each other that we would wait until the others had turned 11 to get our first Pokémon. Me and Lillie had the same birthday and Hau was older than us by 2 days, so today we would all be starting the island challenge together today. I couldn't wait!
I quickly got dressed in a blue t-shirt and black shorts, and then went in to the living room to say goodbye to my mom.
"Bye, sweetie! Remember, if you ever need to rest, just come back home! Have a great time!" she said, waving at me from the kitchen.
"Bye Mom! I will!" I said, waving back and stepping out onto our front porch. I then sprinted off towards Route 1, eager to get to Iki Town and finally get my first Pokémon. But when I got close to one of the grass patches on the way, a Yungoos popped out and jumped at me! I dodged, but it jumped again and knocked me over. Just as it was about to pounce, three blurs of color came out of nowhere and bumped it back into the grass! And it turned out that the three blurs were actually Rowlet, Litten, and Popplio, the three Pokémon that Alolan trainers could choose as their first! They started messing around, with Rowlet and Litten playing tag and Popplio making water bubbles to throw at them. I laughed, thinking that maybe one day I would have all three of these Pokémon and that they would play like this. But my daydreaming was cut short by a voice from behind me.
"Seems like you met the starters!" my friend Professor Kukui chuckled.
"Yup, they saved me from that Yungoos!" I said, glad that they had come when they did.
"Well, now that you've met them, why not pick one of them?" Kukui reasoned. I stared at him, not fully comprehending what he meant. "You mean…like…for my first Pokémon?" I said, still not quite believing it.
"Well, they seem to like you, and you're already here, so why not?"
I couldn't believe it. After all those years of waiting and waiting and waiting, I was finally going to have my first ever Pokémon partner!
"Alright! You see, I already decided which one I was going to get a long time ago." I explained. "And that one is….ROWLET!" I picked up the small, perfectly round Grass-type owl and held it up. It smiled and said "Koo koo!"
"Alright, cool!" Professor Kukui said as he handed a small Pokéball and some coins. "That's Rowlet's Pokéball, and here's some pocket money to get you started". "Thanks!" I said, and ran off through the grass and towards Iki Town.