A/N: This story is from my Wattpad acc, but I figured I would post it here too since I'm proud of it. Enjoy~
"Mom! I'm going out to play!"
The little blonde girl hopped down the steps to the living room, then began to skip towards the door. Exhausted after hours of cleaning, her mother gave a tired wave.
"Be back inside by seven, Bianca, you know Papa will flip if you're out too late."
Bianca didn't respond, a bad habit of hers, and instead threw open the front door with a bang. She almost didn't hear her mother call out to her right as she stepped outside,
"and don't forget to introduce yourself to the new neighbors!"
Bianca ran down the dirt road with a happy spring in her step. The heat of the summer sun made her smile brighten. In her new frilly orange top and white shorts, she felt like she could do anything. Her big, green beret fell over her eyes, and she pushed it back up with a giggle. She'd just taken in a breath to shout for her best friend, but he beat her to the punch.
"Bianca, you're late again!"
"Soooorry, Cheren!"
Cheren was a smart young boy with large glasses and short, black hair. Though he was six months younger than Bianca, he was more mature and organized than she could ever hope to be. Despite their differences, the two were fast friends.
That day, Cheren wore a red and white striped shirt, and basketball shorts down to his knees. His shoes were worn-in, but not necessarily dirty.
"We got a new neighbor yesterday," Cheren said stiffly, as if unsure how to continue.
"Mom says she has a daughter, and she's our age!" Bianca cried, clapping her hands.
"Yeah, I know, my mom told me that too."
They stared awkwardly at each other. Bianca, giddy to make a new friend, and Cheren, suspicious as always of the new kid. Bianca tried to look him in the eye, but he continued to stare analytically at the ground.
"What's wrong, Cheren? Aren't you excited about having a new friend?" Bianca's excitement quickly faded into concern as her friend didn't seem happy at all. He sighed, spinning around on his heel for a moment before responding.
"W-well... I am excited, but..." he adjusted his glasses, looking up to the front door of the new neighbor's house, "You know... she's a girl, so..."
"Oh-em-GEE!" Bianca shouted, cutting off Cheren completely, "You can't talk to girls, can you!? That's why you're so-"
"NO! Bianca, no, of course I can talk to girls!" His face now bright red, Cheren shoved his hands in his pockets. "I was going to say that because she's a girl, you'll leave me hanging to go do gross girly stuff!" Bianca seemed shocked by his outburst for a moment. After a few seconds of silence, her surprise broke into a smile, and she grabbed Cheren's shoulder.
"Cheren, you're being silly! We won't leave you behind to do gross girly stuff, you'll still be my best friend too!" Bianca let her arm drop to her side. She started to turn towards their new friend's house, taking slow steps up the path. Cheren reluctantly followed, their tiny footsteps leaving prints in the dirt.
They approached the dull green door side by side, and Bianca raised her hand to knock. Her knuckles made soft tapping sounds against the wood of the door. Voices could be heard from inside, calling out to someone. Then there was the thumping of small feet down the stairs, and the door finally creaked open.
The little girl who answered the door was no bigger than Bianca or Cheren themselves. She had poofy brown hair down to her shoulders, and bright blue eyes. She wore a white T-shirt with navy overalls. Her face didn't hold a lot of expression, she was definitely a quiet type.
"Hi! My name is Bianca! I'm nine years old, my favorite color is green, and I love Pokemon, and glitter, and new clothes, and— ooh! Also—"
Cheren smacked Bianca's shoulder, frowning at her. She stopped, bashfully looking away.
"What she's trying to say is that she— sorry, we want to be your friends."
The girl on the other side of the door blinked. For a moment, there was no response. She narrowed her eyes at Cheren.
"And what's your name?"
"... What-?" Cheren stammered, nearly forgetting his own name.
"What's your name? How old are you? What do you like?"
"I, uh..." Cheren scratched the back of his head, glancing at Bianca as a plea for help. He cleared his throat. "My name is Cheren, I'm eight, and I like Pokemon, books, and, uh... video games...?" His discomfort increased with each second that passed under the new girl's suspicious stare. Eventually, her squinted eyes returned to normal and she opened the door a little wider. She wiped her nose, looking at the two in front of her.
"I'm Hilda. Eight. Pokemon are cool. I have a Wii upstairs, we can play Mario Kart."
Bianca and Cheren both happily agreed, and Bianca used the time it took to walk inside and up the stairs to bombard Hilda with questions.
"When's your birthday?"
"October ninth."
"Oooh! You're still older than Cheren! Sorry, Cheri.~ What's your favorite color?"
"Purple."
"Where did you live before here?"
"Oreburgh City."
"Where's that?"
"Sinnoh region."
"Sounds fun!"
"Not really. The funnest thing there was a coal museum. Total snooze fest."
Cheren frowned. A coal museum didn't sound too bad to him.
"Umm... What's your favorite Pokémon type?"
"Water."
"Ooh! Do you fish?"
"No."
It was obvious that Hilda wasn't a very talkative person. She led the two up to her large bedroom, where boxes stood in stacks piled high. Cheren and Bianca looked around in wonder.
"That's a lot of boxes," muttered Cheren.
"Some of them go to different rooms," Hilda replied simply, stopping in the middle of the room.
A loud boom was heard outside, and the ground shook. The three looked out the window in surprise to see that black storm clouds had formed over the sky. A thunderstorm was coming fast.
"Those clouds look nasty..." Bianca whispered, edging closer to Cheren and Hilda. Another booming crack. The ground shook. The lights went out. Bianca screamed. Neither Cheren nor Hilda responded in any way. Bianca looked up from the floor.
Cheren and Hilda weren't moving, but they stared directly into her eyes. There was a third person there, a little boy about their age. He had long, tangled white hair and wore an orange shirt. A strange cube hung around his neck.
"N! What are you—"
Thunder. The ground shook harder. The stacks of boxes were no longer there, replaced by tall men in robes who seemed to grow bigger and bigger by the second. Hilda's home faded away, morphing into the crystal tiles and golden walls of a palace.
Faceless men and women in black uniforms came rushing out, pulling Hilda away. Bianca cried out to her, but she didn't answer. She just stared blankly into the distance. The cries of pokemon echoed and bounced off the walls, overwhelming Bianca's senses. The seven men above her were speaking, but she couldn't hear. She blocked out their voices, and tried to find Hilda, but she wasn't there anymore. Where did she go? The robed men reached out for her, their hands getting closer and closer...
Bianca woke with a start. She sat up, and reached over for the lamp on the bedside table. The light clicked on at her touch, and she looked around her room. She put on her glasses. The digital clock on the wall read 4:15. Grabbing her Xtransceiver off of the vanity, she headed off to the kitchen to think about the dream she just had.
As she walked passed, she heard her Stoutland huff.
"Come on, Lil, let's go outside."
Upon hearing the word 'outside', Stoutland's tail thumped against the floor. It stood up, stretched, and pranced towards the back door. Bianca let it out, and it went running out into the dirt.
The muggy smell from the outside told her that it had just rained. She called out for Stoutland to be careful of mud puddles, but stayed leaning on the door frame for a moment.
"Today is May twelfth," she whispered, "I turn nineteen in a month." Stating random truths was her best grounding technique, so she found. "My best friend Cheren turns nineteen on December twenty-eighth. He's a gym leader." She looked up at the starry sky, and swore she saw a bit of pink. "My other best friend, Hilda, will turn nineteen on October ninth. She's..." Bianca realized she didn't have another truth to say because she didn't know the truth. She sighed, and moved on. "Our friend N turned twenty last month, on the thirtieth. I didn't say anything because I don't know what he does now." She stood in another moment of silence, her arms folded over her t-shirt. "He likes ferris wheels, so maybe I should take a visit to Nimbasa..."
Stoutland came running back up to the door, ready to go inside. She stepped aside and let it in, then closed the door behind her. Bianca knelt down to wipe the dirt off of Stoutland's paws before letting it jump up onto the couch. Then, she left to brew a pot of coffee.
As she poured cream into her coffee, she suddenly had a thought. "Cross-transceiver," she said, "call Cheren." As she put the cream back into the fridge, she heard the watch's robotic voice.
"Calling Cheren..." It said, followed by several beeps. Bianca heard her friend pick up just as she took a sip of her coffee.
"Hello?" Cheren's voice was tired, but Bianca could tell she hadn't woken him up.
"Hey, Cheren," Bianca smiled, "long time no see."
"You're up early."
"Yeah," Bianca took another sip of coffee, "I wanted to ask you something."
Cheren laughed. "You woke up early just to ask me a question?"
"Well, no, but..." she frowned, her brow furrowing, "... Shut up. Anyways, can you meet me in the club room tomorrow?"
'Meet me in the club room' was something Bianca hadn't said in a long time. The club room referred to a place in the dreamyard, underneath the remnants of the tall structure that once stood there. She, Hilda, and Cheren would meet there almost nightly to tell each other about their separate journeys. She missed those nights.
"That's... a bit of a trip, but yeah. I can make it." Cheren didn't ask any questions. Bianca could practically see him just giving a polite nod in response to her request.
"Okay, I'll see you tomorrow," she said, "thank you."
"See you then."
Three beeps signaled the call disconnecting.