Disclaimer: I only own Row, everything else belongs to someone else!


EP 02: Beginning of Adventures!


Dinner was a normally quiet affair, between the pokémon sneaking snacks under the table and the constant noise of silverware hitting whatever the dishes were made of, it wasn't entirely unbearable.

Still, she was never one for complete silence, and this was bothering her far more than she'd like to admit…

"Mommy?" it probably wasn't the wisest choice she could have made that night. Only Arceus knew what her parents and Mr. Harts had talked about during that conference meeting. They'd left her home with her siblings after all, and hadn't said anything immediately upon coming home.

They'd just dispersed through the house, their mother making a beeline for the phone in the kitchen, and their father going out into the backyard to set something up. He'd called her out roughly an hour later, and then proceeded to explain how to set up a campfire. That had been fun, if only she hadn't almost burned both their eyebrows off on her first and third attempt.

The second and fourth had gone a little more smoothly, and at one point she'd even had the audacity to call in help from the neighbor's growlithe, who gladly complied in return for a friendly scratch behind the ears. He'd found it funny, and had even ruffled her hair a little, but then her sister had finally gotten dinner done, and they'd both had to come inside before they set any more of the backyard on fire.

And now… everything was just really, really quiet.

"Mommy."

"Mom!" She almost jumped out of her seat as Kirsten stepped in, almost knocking her plate off the table altogether as she glared at the woman sitting next to their father.

She blinked up, and looked at them as if she'd completely forgotten they were there.

'What is going on?'

"Mommy?"

"Oh, Row, sweetie, you really should stop with that. You're becoming a big girl now, you need to stop going by such…" Such what? Baby terms? What did it matter? Mommy was Mommy, Daddy was Daddy.

They knew what she meant when she said them, and it wasn't like that was their sole title when she spoke to them. Mom, mama, mommy, dad, daddy. All more or less interchangeable, and she used them all with varying levels of occurrence. It was really just whatever word came out of her mouth first. She had never had to nitpick before…

"Mommy, what's the matter?" she didn't mean to put such emphasis on it, but she had and it was far too late to back-pedal now.

"What do you mean?" She saw Matt frown out of the corner of her eye, and she knew what that meant. Her big brother didn't like their mother's oblivious act, and he might just start yelling. That wasn't a good idea with their father still in the room.

"Mom, you've been quiet, uncharacteristically so ever since you came back. What happened in that meeting?" The woman sighed, dark fingers fiddling with the pure white napkin she'd commandeered before sitting down.

"It's nothing, honest…"

"It's nothing my ass."

"Kirsten!"

"You guys come back from that meeting, and start acting weird! What happened?!"

"Kirsten, mind you language, your sister-!"

"Doesn't care! In case you haven't noticed, Dad's got the most creative vocabulary in the entire room! He swears around us all the time, do any of us look bothered by it?" the older girl sighed, dropping rather heavily into her seat before glaring at their mother. Did Kirsten always have to be so blunt? "Now what the hell is going on with you two?"


What could he say? That they were essentially sending their youngest away? That Row was going to become a pokémon trainer whether she liked the idea or not?

That the meeting was useless? That they'd talked themselves in circles for the better part of four hours and still hadn't come up with a solution? He didn't even like the solution they were currently stuck in.

They were throwing Row in the water and telling her to swim. Forcing such a little thing into a role she almost definitely wasn't prepared for. Shortcut cleverness and quick wit aside, Row was not pokémon trainer material. She could barely be held accountable for herself, let alone for six other additional little lives that would depend on her for everything, from proper training, to basic care and love.

He honestly wouldn't be shocked if he turned on the news one day to find that her corpse had been fished out of some gyarados infested river, because that would be just her luck.

But as his wife said, he needed to keep faith. Keep faith and pray, because if this didn't put Row into an extended state of shock, well then, freezing up was something he probably wouldn't have to worry about with her.

This wasn't even something he was a hundred percent behind. Hell, he wasn't even twenty percent behind it. They'd never had to do this with Matt and Kirsten.

But Matt and Kirsten were far more grounded than Row ever was. Row had several potential mental issues he hadn't quite been able to wrap his head around. The telltale signs in school that her teacher had noticed…

Row had attachment issues, plain and simple. Something not entirely crippling, save for the fact that it resulted in severe issues involving making connections with her classmates. They upset her once, maybe twice if she was feeling particularly gracious, and she just let them go. Let them slip right through her fingers without trying to fix anything. And it wasn't impossible to re-establish the connection, but Row's mercurial moods made it increasingly difficult for her to make and keep friends.

A psychiatrist, if they'd been present, probably would've pinned it on the constant traveling they'd done when the three of them had been younger. Moving around a lot did not foster deep, lasting connections after all, save for with one's immediate family.

But there hadn't been a trained psychiatrist, just a school counselor, and that person had been full of shit as far as he'd been concerned.

The truth of the matter was something entirely different, probably. But the teacher and counselor both had been too busy picking apart their daughter's behavior, to even think of considering her classmates.

His wife knew the truth of course, probably. Row told that woman almost everything. But neither had been inclined to say as much in that meeting. Too busy rolling their eyes and deciding that her teacher, as concerned as he was about her grades, was entirely too stupid to have a solution.

In all honesty, he didn't want Row walking the same dark path he had when he'd been around her age. The mistakes… the lies… the darkness.

He hadn't wanted any of that for her, and he'd made sure that they couldn't follow him after he'd finally managed to knock himself onto to the straight and narrow.

There were just some demons not worth facing.

"We're sending Row on a pokémon journey." And he almost chocked on his diet soda. Did she really have to be that frank?

Dead silence, not even a whimper. And that serene smile on her face? He made jokes about his wife going crazy sometimes, but in that moment, he actually believed she might've. Clearly she'd lost it at some point without warning him if she was going to break potentially stressful news like that.

"Wait, what?" Kirsten was the first to recover, if only because she was probably the most used to unexpected happenings. When trying to a make a battle pretty after all, some rather interesting outcomes were to be expected, if not entirely accounted for.

Row was next though her face had twisted into something that could not bode well for anyone currently at the table. And Matt… Matt actually looked ready to throttle his own mother, and it was an expression he could not stomach looking at for more than the second it took to actually register and find an emotion to pin to those narrowed brown eyes and clearly gritting teeth.

The clench of the fingers… In that moment, Matt was every bit his son, temper and all, and so reminiscent of when he'd been younger and just as easy to anger, just as volatile. It wasn't an easy thing to see, and he'd prefer if he never had to see it again.

"Matt, sit down and calm down before you hurt yourself." Or someone else, because that was just as likely to happen as well. He huffed like a tauros, turned a narrowed gaze at him, and it probably took all the respect the boy had for him to finally do as he was told and drop rather heavily into his seat.

His sister was less quick to snap her own gaping mouth shut, and she did so in such a way you could hear her teeth click together.

"Row's going on a pokémon journey?" was the final question that came tumbling out of her mouth. She visibly looked like she couldn't believe her own words, facial expression caught somewhere between confusion and genuine disbelief. "Since when? Row hasn't…"

"Since today, and I made the decision for her-?!" there was a slam, two hands coming down on the table and rattling the silverware and plates as Matt pushed himself up out of his chair with such speed he almost knocked the wooden structure over altogether. "Matt?"

"I can't believe you." And he watched as an angry teen that was far too much like his father stormed upstairs, leaving his food unfinished on the table. There was the faint, rather abrupt sound of a door slamming shut somewhere upstairs, and the room as a whole cascaded into absolute silence, half in disbelief and half in shock.

'Since when did Matt have such a temper?'

"Bear… Princess?" Both pokémon whimpered but came that little bit closer as Row broke the silence calling their names, picking up Matt's plate, and against her mother's own objections, began feeding her brother's left-overs to the two. They ate happily, glad to both have a distraction after that outburst and to being one as the twelve year old then proceeded to feed them what was left of her dinner as well.

"Row…"

"I'm done now. If I missed anything, feed it to Bear and Princess." She said, and she too disappeared, followed shortly after by her sister.

"Mine too!" Row would've probably gone to her room, if her sister hadn't caught her just outside the kitchen door, grabbing her by the shoulders and guiding her up the steps without a chance to object.

He knew where they going without having to ask or think too hard on the matter. Old habits die hard after all, and this had been something they'd always done when they were younger, before Matt and Kirsten had gotten their trainer's license and gone on their own respective journeys.

They'd had little meetings in Matt's room, talking about almost anything and everything. Matt would let Row sit in his lap, and then they'd play video games while Kirsten played the role of constantly changing traitor and ruin the game for whoever was currently in the lead. Or even wasn't.

The older girl took no prisoners after all.


"Matt, what the fuck was that down there?!" Kirsten swore as she stormed into the room, dragging Row in and slamming the door shut with her foot.

She made Row find a spot to sit, and eventually her baby sister did what she'd always done when they had been younger and one of them was having a bad day and it was rubbing off on her.

She clambered into Matt's lap as if she was four again, claiming another of the video games Matt had borrowed without asking first, and turned it on to finish whatever mission Matt had gotten stuck on prior to dinner.

Matt watched in silence for a couple of minutes, arms wrapped rather loosely around their sister, and Kirsten found herself taking a seat on the bed as well, leaning rather heavily against their older brother's back and just letting the rhythmic clicking of the buttons and the techno-babble background music wash over her.

Nostalgia did wonders for people's moods after all.

"I can't…" Matt finally said as Row finished whatever mission she'd been on in record breaking time, causing their brother to smile rather proudly into her hair, so different from their parents who'd always wanted a little more out of Row. So very different, because Matt didn't care if Row was a successful business woman, trainer, or a cashier at the local pokémart

He just wanted to see Row happy; regardless of what it was exactly that she was happy doing. It was why he'd gone behind their parents' back on her sixth birthday, bought a crap ton of yarn, and spent six hours tangling and detangling themselves learning how to do Cat's Cradle with her in his room. Then he'd gone the extra mile and looked up a video of how to do Jacob's ladder with her as well.

"You can't what?"

"Why would they do that? Row…"

"It's exciting, isn't it?"

"For you and me, but Row's never even been outside of town before. The most traveling she's done was when she was little, when we were little. And never outdoors. There was always a roof over our heads back then."

"Because our parents had more sense than to leave us outside where Row could wander off…"

"I wasn't that bad."

"Keep telling yourself that, Pipsqueak."

"Did they even ask you if you wanted to do this or not?"

"No."

"And what sense does our parents have again? Remind me?"

"Be glad Dad isn't up here right now… They're both too shocked at your yelling and slamming the table… What'd that poor table do to you anyways? It was just there."

"It stole my girlfriend." She blanched, looking at him like he'd lost his mind before finally figuring out a response to that.

"You don't have a girlfriend."

"Then it stole my boyfriend."

"Wait, you have a boyfriend?" Row questioned, and it took everything she had to not laugh right then and there. How could someone so brilliant be so oblivious sometimes?

"No, but you believed me." Matt had no qualms with making his own amusement known, and he laughed squeezing that tiny little thing just that little bit harder.

"I hate you."

"Love you too, Kiddo." She decided then she'd miss this, this easy understanding that came between the three of them. Row's complete acceptance and bafflingly contradictory naïveté, Matt's sense of humor and just plainly how he cared so easily, the banter, the wit they traded like they breathe air.

She was going to miss a lot.

'Arceus, Matt's right. What are our parents thinking?!' They… she didn't know what they could do to change their minds, their parents were so stubborn it was almost painful. And their mother clearly thought this was the answer.

There'd be no changing opinions. There'd be no debates to be had, no ifs, no ands, no buts. Row was going to be on her own out there in that crazy wilderness and the chances of her surviving, regardless of what their father did, was slim to none.

Row just wasn't cut out for the real world like that, not at nine, not at ten, and damn sure not at twelve.

'Would Row ever be ready?' She wasn't sure, but this could not be the only way to figure that out…

Couldn't, but her parents had made it, and there was nothing either her or Matt could do to change it.

"We're all fucked."

"Kirsten."

"You're just as bad so shut up."

"Must you cuss every time you feel like it?"

"Yes Rowie-dear," she mocked, a wide grin on her face. "It is a form of self-expression."

"I wonder how all those boys out there who think you're a princess would react if they found out their 'precious lady' swore worse than a sailor."

"Matt, shut up."

"Oh come on, you have to be a little curious."

"I don't even want to think about all those fan-boys. Dear Arceus, if I'd known I'd be getting stalkers I wouldn't have become a pokémon coordinator."

"But my big sis is a pretty princess."

"Row, you are really asking for a beating, aren't you?" They all burst into laughter, Row squealing as she lunged for the little shit of a brat in a half-hearted attempt at a noogie, only to miss her target entirely as Matt intervened and skillfully moved their little sister out of the way. "Traitor!"

"I will side with the little one until the miltank come home, I like being able to find my shoes thank you very much."

"Arceus-damnit!"

"I win!-Arceus!"

They'd all miss this…


Friday came far too quickly for anyone's liking, and Row found herself in staunch agreement as she clung to her brother's back, watching as her parents went through her finally-cleaned room making last minute additions to her backpack. Matt had his arm wrapped rather protectively around her shoulder, but she couldn't even bring herself to look at his angry, almost rebellious expression as she watched their father, mostly their father, pack away her clothes.

"Matt."

"Father." Father, not Dad, not Daddy. Father, in a bland, blunt tone that screamed of how angry he really was at the man.

Did they have to fight like that?

Their father sighed, expression caught between two emotions she couldn't possibly name so soon after seeing them.

"Mattias Wielder," and here Matt actually had the audacity to roll his eyes, 'How did he get away with that?!' "You need to let Row go get dressed."

"No, I don't."

"You do. Now go downstairs, your sister has breakfast ready."

"Which one, the one you're sending away, or the one…" She flinched, eyes wide as she watched Matt's cheek turn bright red. How long had it been since she'd last seen their father hit Matt for getting smart with him? Years? Matt was a lot older, and once they were passed a certain age, their father seemed to shelve his corporal punishments.

She hadn't seen him hit Matt in a long time. She'd thought Matt was too old.

Apparently not.

"Matt?" Matt didn't cry, not that she'd seen in a very long time. The tears were probably there, but Matt was the kind who liked to look strong, even if they weren't feeling it at the moment. He wouldn't cry in front of her, but that didn't mean he didn't want to. He was a bit of an idiot like that.

"It's… It's fine." 'No, it isn't. You're not okay with this at all, and I don't even…' What did one say in a situation like this? That everything would be okay? Don't worry, it'll all be fine?

She wasn't much of a liar, not normally. She didn't think she could make Matt believe those kinds of words no matter how often she said them.

What could she do?

"Row, get dressed, and make sure you're ready. We're leaving after breakfast."

"Okay." What else could she say?


She didn't want to be here.

Clad in a loose, long-sleeved shirt with a giant pokéball off to her left side and a gray lilac tank top underneath, and black leggings with a belt Kirsten had insisted she wear, and purple flats her sister had bought for her sometime during the week, apparently from a store that specialized in gear for pokémon trainers, she didn't feel nearly as confident as the older girl had said she looked. But at best, she prayed she didn't look too much like a target.

She wasn't sure what she'd do exactly if someone challenged her to a pokémon battle, and from what she could overhear from the ten-some kids littering the area and talking with each other, they were all a lot more into this whole thing than she herself was.

If her mother hadn't been standing off to the side, clad in full work regalia and eyeballing her in such a way that clearly stated that she had better stay within the building and not go gallivanting off into the city streets just outside the door, she very well might've done just that. As things currently stood though, she wasn't feeling anywhere near so brave, and so she'd pinned herself to a corner as far away from the other children as possible.

Most of them were ten years old from what she could drag out of her mother, but the rest all had ages varying from as young as eleven, to as old as fifteen in some cases. And there were a couple that had gotten special permission somehow, and were actually nine, and nowhere even close to the legal ten years.

Her mother said that they probably wouldn't make it very far, since they were so young, as if ten, eleven, and twelve wasn't young at all, but there'd been little comment to make on her part.

Someone thought they'd been ready for this, clearly, and from the way all of them were behaving, they were all in complete agreement.

If only she could be so confident.

"Alright kids, the professor's a little busy at the moment with a surprise meeting, so we'll just be going on ahead without them. " one of her mother's co-workers came in, clad in the same starch white coat her mother wore, giant pockets galore and pushing a rattling metal cart through the otherwise quiet lobby.

The other children immediately crowded around, abandoning the few parents who'd shown up to supervise, if nothing else. But she hung back, not nearly so comfortable in the clusterfuck of a mob as the female lab assistant seemed to be, and in no way as eager to get her starter as the other kids were.

There was a fight or two that broke out, nothing physical, but just as loud as several children argued over who got what starter, but it all died rather quickly as the lab assistant began explaining the pokéballs.

"Now, now, we've made sure that there is more than enough pokémon so that you all can get the starters you want. And since this is a special occasion, we're allowing you to choose pokémon from every region, not just the ones that are typically given out in this one." And then she went on to explain the pokémon the children would get to choose from, starting with the ever popular, and typically docile grass-types, to the slightly more challenging fire-types, and finally, onto the smooth and slightly cocky water-types.

Eighteen pokémon species total, and at least two of each kind so the fighting wouldn't get too bad. There was a bit of brawl over the charmanders though, as a few particularly confident boys tried and failed to get one, only to lose them to two girls who'd been far more polite and kind in picking them. And so they'd had to settle for a chimchar and what her brother had once told her was a tepig. One of them decided that fire-types probably weren't even really for him, so he went with an oshawott instead.

It all was more or less background noise for her though, and she quickly grew bored at watching them nitpick through the types. A pokémon was a pokémon, no matter the species, what did it matter whether they had a charmander or a froakie? They were all good pokémon, they just had to be trained.

She decided that she'd just wait for the other children to leave before taking whatever was left over. Maybe, if she was lucky, there wouldn't be one and she could just go home and put all of this behind her.

Her mother wouldn't be too mad if she just explored a little, right?

She shrugged and did so anyways, sliding rather quietly out of the room as her mother wound up having to intervene in yet another argument over starters, disappearing into one of the doorways and into the darker halls.


"Well shoe." Maybe this hadn't been her brightest idea, but between this and watching kids give each other black eyes over fire-types, this was probably the more entertaining of the two. That didn't change the fact that, while she wasn't completely so, she was still more or less lost.

'How does Mom even find her way around this place? It's a maze!' she thought, staring at a door she was fairly certain she'd passed five times now, at least. They all kind of looked the same, and none of them had any fancy plaques or signs to quite say what they were supposed to be for exactly, or where they were supposed to lead.

It didn't help at all that she had been trying to make Jacob's ladder from memory while she'd been walking, and kept having to start over because she couldn't remember how to get to the cat's whiskers shape.

'Speaking of…' She took a moment to focus back on the loop of string currently wrapped around most of her fingers, 'Okay, from step one; Pointer finger, pointer finger, drop both thumbs, grab the farthest string… and the two third closest… drop the pinkies… grab the second farthest with pinkies and drop the thumb this time?' "Oh!" she grinned, the cat's whiskers finally wrapped around her pinkies and thumbs, before grabbing one the strings with both thumbs and pulling, having to pause for a second to grab the two second closest to her own body before flipping her hands out to reveal the finished product. 'Jacob's ladder.' She undid it, before starting over from scratch again.

"Goomy?"

"Goomy?" she repeated in shock, her face contorted in a clear show of confusion before she turned around, string game entirely forgotten on her still tangled fingers. A streak of irrational panic and fear shot up her spine when her eyes landed on empty air, and she almost screamed bloody murder when that same noise sounded again.

"Goomy!"

"W-Who's there?" she called, looking around and only just now noticing the prevalent darkness surrounding her. "Hello?"

"Goomy!" she cried out in shock, flailing widely for a split second, before something came flying at her, blinding her completely and leaving her rather confused and frightened on the ground.

"Eck… ah…" she whimpered as whatever had attacked hopped down, nothing but a blur of purple and green as tears began to bead in her eyes. 'Don't cry… don't cry… don't cry!' she grimaced at herself as she wiped hurriedly at the tears before they could come out, taking a deep breath and beating herself up for crying at something scaring her of all things.

It hadn't even been anything even remotely threatening, just a strange, blob of a creature she faintly recognized from her brother's pokédex. What was so scary about that?

'Everything… everything was scary.' She frowned at that, eyes glued to the ground just before the creature and not quite focused on her surroundings until the pokémon in question shuffled a little closer.

"Goomy?" it tilted its head at her, all open concern and clear apologies. It was sorry, it felt guilty. No one felt ever felt guilty for making her feel bad, and this little thing especially shouldn't feel guilty for her.

"It's okay, I'm fine…" her voice trembled though, shaky still, and her throat with the lump lodged so determinedly into it. 'I won't cry!' "You just scared me a little." She smiled, probably a little wobbly and pet the creature on the head for reassurance.

It had just been an accident after all, and she wasn't going to hold it against the little creature when it clearly hadn't known any better.

"Goo?"

"See?" and she rubbed quickly at her face, making sure the tears were gone before smiling as brightly as she could at the little creature. "No tears, no frowny faces. Just smiles." The pokémon seemed to only tentatively believe that, but it was all she needed to go on. "My name's Row, what's yours?"

"Goo… Goomy."

"Goomy? That's what you're called?" It made sense, in a slightly literal way she wouldn't dare contemplate too thoroughly, less she burst into uncontrollable giggles. Who named a pokémon species 'Goomy' anyways?

'The little guy needs a better name.' She decided rather needlessly then, grinning in a way that probably would've put anyone who knew her better on edge. "Well, it's Gomu now." She said, the kind of surety that came with an answer that would not be questioned at all. The pokémon blinked at her in clear confusion for a good minute before it began hopping up and down, she herself unsure of whether it was in objection or celebration.

"Goomy!" was the only warning she got, right before it jumped at her face, obscuring her view once again. 'Oh… right, my glasses…' her mother would kill her if she ever found out, and she wasn't entirely sure how exactly she'd gotten out of the house without them, but she'd realized after a faint streak of panic that she didn't have them again, not having used them for the last week since she typically didn't wear them around the house unless she absolutely needed them.

She was near-sighted, but most of the things she did around the house were things she kept rather close to her face, so she usually didn't bother with them at all if she could help it.

"Agh! Ok, ok, I get it! You're excited…" she finally managed to get out as it finally hopped back down, smiling up at her as if she were its new best friend. 'Maybe I am.' She found herself grinning back, before she carefully picked herself up off the ground. She brushed herself to best of her ability, before shrugging when she decided it was too dark to rightly tell, and bending down to pick up Gomu so she could bring her new friend with her.

She probably wouldn't show him to her mother, or really leave the lab with the little guy. He wasn't a starter and he wasn't hers to keep after all, but at the very least she'd have somebody to be lost with, and in her opinion that was far better than being lost all alone.


"This is Jacob's ladder, see?" She questioned as she showed the pokémon how to perform the rather tricky yarn pattern. He wouldn't be able to do it himself without fingers, but he seemed to be a rather clever pokémon, so she figured if he ever wanted to try, he'd probably figure out a way to.

Lack of appropriate appendages be damned.

"It's a little simple, I guess, but it's fun and I like it. I've always called it Cat's Cradle as a whole, but I don't know if that's the general term or what." She explained, doing it again just because she could as they rounded a corner.

"Goomy?"

"My big brother helped me learn how, and I'm better at it than he is, but he's pretty good too. He says I'm better because I learn by watching and mimicking, and since this is a very a hands-on thing, I have an easier time of it than he does. But he's technical like that. There's my big sister Kirsten too, but she's more of a show off than a show-and-learn."

"Goomy!"

"I also have a dad and a mom, but I'm a bit mad at them right now…"

"Goo?"

"They're making me become a pokémon trainer because I failed in school a bunch… But I… I'm actually pretty scared."

"Goo..." it was a bit… different, admitting it aloud like that. And even stranger still to have someone actually listening to what she had to say, even if it was just a pokémon.

"I don't know if I'm ready for that. I mean, I'll have these other little pokémon that will depend on me, and I… I don't think I'd do very well at it."

"Goo-goomy!" but Gomu wasn't just a pokémon, was he? He was her new friend, and a great listener. Kind and actually pretty smart despite what her older brother had said about the species.

If he was her starter…

"Hey… Gomu?"

"Goo?"

"Row! There you are!" she winced, immediately panicking at the angry tone of the familiar voice, her mother appearing around the next corner and looking absolutely furious.

"M-Mama…"

"Row, what in the world were you thinking?! I take my eyes off you for a second, a second, and you wander off into the labs unsupervised without telling anyone! The other starters are almost gone, and here you are goofing off in the halls!"

"I'm sorry."

"Oh… just come on. The others are still waiting for you, as well as the professor." She'd forgotten about going back and getting a starter, even if she had been thinking about it a little. She'd thought she'd had time, but apparently she'd been very wrong.

"I'm sorry."


"Oh, there you are!" her mother sighed as they finally made it back, getting out of the maze of halls far quicker than it'd taken her to get lost, and arriving to a rather brilliant smile courtesy of her mother's boss.

"I'm so sorry about this…"

"Nonsense, better now than not at all, right?" they assured, and her mother smiled gratefully at the person before they turned to face her. "So you're Row, yes?"

She nodded, feeling a lot more shy than she normally would with a person she barely remembered. Where was Gomu? Where were her brother and sister? Why couldn't she hide behind her mother for once?

It would all be better than facing this person head on.

Certainly more comforting.

"I'm sorry, she's normally a lot more outgoing…"

"Anne, really, it's fine. Not everyone's always comfortable around people, and there is a bit of a crowd present. She's probably embarrassed." The professor gave her mother another reassuring smile before turning back to her. "Now, I believe you haven't pick a starter yet. Correct?" they waited for her to nod, before motioning to the metal cart. "Well, most are gone, but there are still a few left. Do you want me to go over them for you?"

"N-No…" no, she didn't, because she didn't want any of them. She really didn't care to be doing this at all. But no one was listening to her anyways, and no one had ever bothered to ask her own opinion on the matter.

"Goo?"

And dead silence ensued. Everyone turning their attention to the sudden noise that had cut through the silence once already. Her own eyes widened slightly and she couldn't help herself as she grinned. 'Gomu!' Relief flooded her system as she saw the familiar creature, thankful her new friend hadn't made himself quite so scarce when her mother had shown furious and angry at her for leaving.

"Oh, Goomy! What are you doing this far out? Normally you're with the other pokémon…"

"I want him." She interrupted rather loudly then, grinning as she rushed to pick up the pokémon in question, even as some of the other kids chuckled and laughed at her expense. She didn't care, and it didn't matter.

They could laugh and scoff their way out the building and till the miltank came home. Gomu would be her starter, no ifs, no ands, and no buts.

Her mother was less than thrilled, and about as equally amused at her choice though, and she looked about ready to wring her neck when she tried to object.

"But Row… Goomy is not a starter pokémon, and besides it's not…"

"No!" she wouldn't have it though. Gomu would be her starter, and she wasn't going to cooperate at all if she couldn't have him. "I want Gomu."

"Gomu…?" her mother questioned, but she ignored for the professor instead. In the end, reluctant as she was, they were to have the final say, since technically, Gomu was the labs and not hers.

'Yet, not mine yet.'

"Are you sure?" the professor asked, bending down so they were on her level for once, instead of the level of most adults. How many had done that?

She nodded, grinning and proud as she held a little tighter to the pokémon's soft body. "You understand that you'll be starting at a bit of a disadvantage, yes? Goomy, or… Gomu, as you've apparently decided, is not a typical starter, nor is he the strongest pokémon around."

"I want Gomu as my starter." They nodded, even if it wasn't a straight answer, and took her plain stubbornness for whatever it was worth in his eyes.

"Alright, and what do you think Gomu?" the pokémon in question nodded his head happily along, and the professor smiled at her before picking up a pokédex and handing it to her. "Well, alright then."

"But professor!"

"Anne, we signed her up for this, and the least we can do is let her have her pick. Even if it's not the typical starter, or the best choice for some. Clearly she thinks it is." Her mother sighed, frustration clear in her expression as she rubbed at her face, before stomping off to grab something red, white and round.

"Fine." The woman made sure to give an exaggerated frown though, just to show how displeased she was with this whole thing, before handing her the brown leather backpack she'd set down when she had first entered the building. "Here, and you better be taking this seriously."

"Yes ma'am." She nodded, pulling the bag over both shoulders, before taking Gomu's pokéball from one of the lab assistants, the squishy pokémon still in her arms.


They watched the rest of the children disperse, some pausing long enough to hug their parents, before leaving themselves, Row not quite sure where she wanted to go, and Gomu just happy to be along for the ride.

"Row…?" she frowned a little, turning to face her mother, not entirely sure of how she felt in that moment.

Angry? Sad? Scared? Happy?

She didn't know, and she wasn't about to nitpick her way through her own emotions. Her mother looked almost heartbroken though, as if she wasn't quite ready to let her go. 'Wasn't this her and Daddy's decision though? It was their idea.' She squeaked as her mother pulled her into a hug, tight and near inescapable, before she was finally let go.

"Be safe," her mother started with little warning, a broken smile on her face as she pulled her green hair into a fluffy ponytail at the top of her head. "Be careful, make sure to watch out when walking in really tall grass, and just keep an eye out for suspicious people. Don't talk to strangers too much, and by Arceus, check the map in your Poképad if you're not sure where you're going. Do you have your pokénav?"

"Yeah…"

"Then make sure to keep it charged… and call home, even if it's not often, alright?"

"O-Okay?" she wasn't sure… Could she do that when she still felt so angry with them both?

"Don't be afraid to ask your brother and sister for help and tips… Your dad loves you, even if he's terrible at saying it… And… and I love you too, so be careful." She breathed in loudly, lungs gasping for air from the sound of it, before bending down to look Gomu in the eye, giving the pokémon her best overprotective mother stare. "And you. I don't care if you are the weakest dragon-type known to the universe. You will keep my baby girl safe, understand?"

"Goom!" the pokémon nodded determinedly and she found herself grinning at her mother's approval of her friend.

"Take care, both of you." She finally said, before kissing her on the forehead, and waving.

She ran off with far more energy than she actually felt, still scared and still unsure of the future. But there was no going back at this point, and she wasn't entirely sure if she felt like she could even if she did have the option.

"We should go to Unova."

"Goom?"

"It's a bit far, and will probably take a while… but we should go there. I… I think it'd be fun… Don't you?"

"Goomy."

"Yeah, we'll go to Unova… And wherever else we please from there. And maybe we'll make new friends!"

Maybe this wouldn't be so bad.


A/N. So I've got three traveling companions and, as of yet, no rivals…

Anyways, in the next chapter we start off in Unova! How exciting! I hope you guys are enjoying the chapters so far, and thanks for reading! Please leave a review and see ya!