After an indeterminate amount of time had passed, Jacob suddenly stopped feeling the strange half-existential state of the void, and began to have some actual feeling return to him. He felt like he was gently depressing something down. The ground was soft, and it almost felt kind of nice to be here. The smell of seawater lingered in the air and a few Wingull cried overhead. Jacob was on... a beach? Just then, after he figured he would stay there sleeping for awhile longer, he heard someone's voice call out to him. It was definitely not the voice from the void. It sounded older, and yet lighter. More feminine, perhaps. "Hey...! Hello? Are you okay? Please, you have to wake up! The voice sounded a little distant at first, hard to hear. Maybe that was just because Jacob was still half asleep, though...
Then, one of the icy waves had crashed against him. He jolted his eyes awake in an instant, and came face to face with a sky of various pinks and whi- No. That would be the Sylveon currently staring him directly in the face, practically piercing through him with those crystal blue eyes. "Oh my Arceus! Are you okay?" She cries again with a frown on her face. And, Jacob almost went back to fainting as soon as he saw her. Luckily though, he didn't. As soon as he opened his eyes, she sighed in relief, and extended a thin, silky ribbon to help him to his feet.
(A Sylveon? But, I can understand her just fine? What's going on?) He thought to himself, before looking down and realizing that yes, he was still an Eevee. He probably figured the fact he could understand her would be attributed to that... Luckily, he hadn't gotten wet from the ocean aside from the wave that had crashed into him. Taking a look around, the entire beach was bathed in a gentle orange glow. The sun was just over the water ahead, creating a rather picturesque vista that was definitely beautiful, he had actually had time to appreciate it.
Given Jacob was lost in his thoughts, he almost managed to forget about the Sylveon standing in front of him, who was now going on and on about him and the beach, even pacing around slightly.
"Oh, thank Arceus you're awake. I found you laying out here on the beach, and I was worried you might've already been gone, or swept out to sea, and it's dangerous, and it's getting late, and..." She continued on for a little bit, but Jacob didn't hear it. This Sylveon was talking about a mile for a minute and that headache was starting to come back.
Eventually though, she stopped herself and looked at him. "Oh, right! My name's Silver, what's yours?
"I'm... Jacob." He replied, still a little groggy from the whole experience. "Jacob, huh? That's an interesting name... Anyways, you were unconscious, and I figured I had to save you, right? I mean, anyone with a heart would. Especially to someone so young..." She explained, though trailed off at the end.
That, though, was a bit of a red flag. Young? Jacob wasn't young! He remembered he was at least... sixteen or seventeen as a human. And come to think of it, when he had introduced himself, he sounded only around seven or eight! Was this what it was like to a pre-evolved Pokémon?
"Anyways..." She said after a moment or two. "What happened that lead to you getting washed up on the beach like that?
Jacob frowned, and his ears instinctually flattened out. "I... I can't remember. I can't remember anything that's happened recently, actually..." He says, trying his hardest to rack his memories, but to little success. "I guess I washed up here at some point, but anything other than that is just a blur, really." He added as Silver looked him over, frowning herself as the ribbons fell limply to her sides.
"Oh, I see. Well, that does certainly compli-" She had gotten to saying, but they were promptly cutoff by a noise farther down the beach. There was a dark cave on the edge of it, and a few Pokémon down that way, namely Pyukumuku, Krabby, and the like were getting ready to have a battle. It looked like it was getting intense, quickly, and it would only be a matter of time before Jacob and Silver got roped into the mess with them.
"Really? Already? I guess it was to be expected. Come on, Jacob, we gotta get out of here. We can work out more details somewhere safe." She explained, quickly wrapping a ribbon around him and leading him to ramp just nearby.
Specifically, the ramp led up to... more land, really. It was paved with cobblestones and functioned as a nice, efficient way to get to the beach that certain beat the sheer cliff wall. Upon getting to the top, there was a traditional wooden arrow sign pointing off in a few directions. Pointing the way Jacob had come, it was labelled "Welcome to Paradise Beach!", though under it was a warning notice stamped with a symbol that resembled a black and silver sphere with a gold circle in the center. White wings were protruding from either side of the sphere. The warning read that the beach had been closed off to the general public due to numerous reports of thug sightings and disappearing Pokémon. Signed by the "Exploration Federation".
The sign pointed to something else dead ahead, labelled as Paradise Square. In fact, Jacob could practically see the square and hear Pokémon bustling through the town from there. A small, similarly stoned path was leading from the beach ramp to the square. To the left, the Cliffside continued, and to the right, it quickly lead off to a forest.
Posted between them was a map, stamped with a familiar symbol from the warning notice. Silver realized that Jacob had been eying both the sign and the map, and offered him a moment to take a closer look at it, now that they were out of the beach's danger zone.
It was... a curious map, to say the least. The beach they were on was the western coast. Which could easily be gathered by the sunset that was quickly lowering itself down the cliffs. Naturally, Paradise Square was listed a short ways away from it, but there were a few other details. A ravine somewhere north, a notable marked spring on the other side of it, plus a few other things. Various cave locations were marked, too, with one not being all that far from the square, even. However, one thing stood out. The eastern coast was labelled as having a mountain range. Jacob looked up, looked all around, as high and as far as he could see. There was... no mountain. Silver, assuming his confusion, explained.
"Don't worry about that map, it's super old. There's gotta be tons of cartographic errors on it, right?" She asked, drawing his attention away. That would definitely be something to remember for later...
Shrugging off that little moment, they hurried into the square. Despite the fact that it was getting late out, it was still decently busy, and various Pokémon roamed around, looking at stores and the like. It was at this point that Jacob froze. He was a human. Did anyone know? Could anyone know? He figured that, for now, it would probably be best to just follow along with Silver, and see how things played out. He didn't know how a town of Pokémon would react to a fellow Pokémon telling them he was a human.
In fact, there didn't seem to be a single human anywhere. Yet, these Pokémon had built up an entire society for themselves! That was somewhat unexpected, and only served another reason for him to not say anything about being a human yet. Silver, oblivious to the fact he was only half paying attention, began leading him down the main town road on a tour of the square.
Though, they hardly got anywhere when a paper had blown itself right into Jacob's face, breaking his mental concentration and snapping him back to reality. Taking the paper off, it was a wanted poster, similarly stamped with that symbol from the sign.
Smack in the center was a picture of a Houndoom. Scratch that, Jacob recognized it as a mega Houndoom. Definitely something not to mess with. He was purportedly the leader of some group calling themselves "Team Shade", and there was at least a hundred thousand Poké bounty on them. The crimes were listed as thievery, kidnapping, illegal use of Mega Evolution, evading arrest, operating a black market, preventing evolution, sabotaging exploration teams... The list went on, and on, and on.
"Oh! Would you mind if I took that?" Silver asked Jacob, hoping she didn't sound too rude about it. Jacob agreed, and handed it over, and she went on a bit of an explanation. You know, it's kind of a shame. More and more Pokémon are beginning to turn to thievery, becoming outlaws, and what have you. This whole island used to be so peaceful..." She said. "I'll explain more as we go, come on." She said, leading Jacob deeper into the square as they looked around.
The first building to jump out to Jacob was a mostly nondescript grey building made out of stone. There were sliding glass doors on front, and it looked like it lead to a very crowded lobby inside. Above the doors, on the center of the wall, that exact same emblem was emblazoned again. "This is the Exploration Federation building," Silver explained. "They handle everything Exploration Team related- though, since I guess you don't really know what those are... See, Pokémon have been acting weird, lately. A lot of them have turned to lives of crime or worse, and a lot of innocents are getting hurt by them. Things get stolen, Pokémon getting kidnapped and knocked unconscious around the place... It's terrible. But, since they didn't want to be entirely defenseless, Pokémon started forming Exploration Teams with each other. They're basically slightly more official vigilantes, really." She explained, looking at the poster.
Speaking of that poster, Jacob had seen dozens of things up on walls, blowing along the ground, etc. Was this really that bad of an issue?
"These posters are requests for teams out and about, for anyone seeking help. I've got my own team, it's called... Team Dream!" She shouted, striking a vaguely adventuresome pose, followed by awkward silence.
"I've been... having trouble getting off the ground." She sheepishly added, as they moved along from the Federation building.
There were a few other buildings of mild interest around, but only a few stuck out. One was this vaguely teepee looking tent set up with a Honchkrow standing outside of it. Silver looked over at it, and it nodded back. "That's Alak's tent. He's an Alakazam, and has a sort of psychic service where he'll read your mind for you. I guess it could be a scam, but a Psychic type with over five thousand I.Q. seems fairly trustworthy. He's also kind of a scholar and knows a lot of the myths and lores to the island. It's really kind of interesting, some of the stories..." She says.
They pass a few other things, a bank ran by a Felicity, a pair of stores run by Kecleon brothers, a Kangaskhan offering to store items in case of emergency, etc.
"...The most well known legend here, then, is that of The Barrier. Tales say that an extremely powerful Pokémon hides somewhere on the island, and is generating an illusory field that keeps this island hidden from anyone and anything outside of it, save for a couple islands on its periphery." She explains as they continue.
"It's kind of a good thing, though. Most of the Pokémon here can't tolerate humans, and having their lives ruined by somebody coming to the island, and... I don't want to think about it." She says. For a moment, she looked down, like she was ready to cry. She stopped in the street, even, before regaining herself and looking back to Jacob.
"Sorry about that. It's just... I remember humans, myself. Back when I was a mere Eevee like you, I can remember... My parents were taken by humans. They had been carried off in some small sphere, and gave themselves to save me. I spent so long crying over them." She said. "I'm not even from here. The night after that happened, even though it's so long ago now I can barely remember the details, I met some pale Pokémon with a yellow head. It offered me happiness, a world where I could live in peace without needing to worry about getting taken, myself, at every step of the way. I accepted without hesitation. The next morning, I woke up here." She said. After that, Silver mostly stayed quiet for the duration of the walk.
That was chilling. Jacob knew pretty much exactly what had happened to his parents, at least from what he could remember of being a human. He didn't dare reveal this information, and dared less reveal the fact he was a human now. The fact the island was apparently so anti-human despite appearing so cheery and upbeat was a little unsettling, actually.
So, he was a human, in the body of a Pokémon, on an unfamiliar island, and he had no chance of telling anyone of his human past. A hill and some more buildings loomed ahead, but Jacob dragged slightly behind Silver now, feeling a deep pit growing ever slowly in his stomach.