Lost forever. Mara lay on the ground, curled up into a ball. She shuddered with sobs, her mind a panicked fugue of fears. She would be attacked and eaten, no one would find her body, her parents would be devastated when they couldn't find her. Or would they be angry? What if they hated her for running away and never coming home? Would they stop loving her? Would they even bother to look for her, to find her body, to have a funeral, to ever speak about her again? These thoughts brought on another fit of sobs. As she condemned herself to abandonment, another rush of tears dripped onto the grass.
A twig snapped. Mara's head jerked up, crying ceased, body completely still. Her eyes searched desperately for the source of the noise, but she couldn't risk moving. For a long moment, she sat there, completely frozen. At last she slowly turned her head, expecting to stare her death in the face.
But there was nothing. Mara stood, wiping her wet, snot covered face with one sleeve. Primal fear had erased her imagined worries, and now that the danger had passed, her original curiosity came rushing back. For the first time, she studied the glade, and after a moment, declared it the most beautiful thing she had ever seen. Grass rippled peacefully in the fall breeze, and she could see the leaves on the oaks in the forest beginning to flush red. Wildflowers clung stubbornly to the last vestiges of summer, erupting from the ground in explosions of red, purple and orange. In the center of it all sat a bubbling spring, filled with leafy green plants and smooth, round stones that sparkled beneath the crystal clear water.
Mara wandered to the edge of the spring, flinging off her shoes and plunking her feet into the cool water. Worries completely forgotten, she kicked droplets into the air, watching the tiny rainbows that they made before splashing back into the pool. The plants swirled peacefully in the little eddies that she made, their emerald leaves dancing little underwater pirouettes. She glanced lazily around the clearing, and her eyes fixed on something round nestled in the grass on the other side of the glade. Her eyes widened as she realized what it was. Apparently, she had not been alone in the glade after all.
There, nestled snugly in the grass, lay a small egg. Mara stood and cautiously stepped toward the egg. But suddenly, remembering the danger, she stopped, dropping to the ground and curling her head between her knees. But when no raging Pokémon mothers came rushing in to protect their baby, she picked herself off the ground and glanced around sheepishly as though to make sure that no one was watching.
After five minutes of tip-toeing and evasive maneuvering, Mara finally reached the egg. She still stood two feet away, her muscles spring-loaded, eyes wide with fear and excitement. After checking over her shoulder one more time, she reached out a hand, palm flat, fingers outstretched. She took a deep breath, and after a moment's hesitation, touched her fingers to the egg's smooth shell.
The egg was cool, and yet somehow seemed to radiate an inner fire. She could sense the tiny creature inside, feel its heartbeat, could almost see the blood pulsing through its tiny veins, and imagined the electricity that sparked in its brain. From a distance, she had almost thought that it was a rock, but now, touching it as she was, it was impossible to ignore the powerful force that it exuded. And yet, it seemed so vulnerable, with no means of defense save for a thin, fragile shell. It seemed unfair to Mara that the creature's fate was in the hands of such a weak wall. There were no stones to protect this little one, no turrets or steel gates. It was all alone in the world, and she couldn't help but feel sorry for it.
She couldn't just leave it there alone, where it would grow cold and weak, or where something could crush its brittle shell underfoot. Mara's newfound sympathy for the egg wrestled with the ten years of warnings from her parents, teachers and friends. "It'll hatch, and then where will you be?" asked her logical side, "you can't just teach a giant, vicious animal to behave in a tiny house in the city. And besides, the police will arrest you and throw you in jail. And they'll kill the Pokémon, too. You're better off leaving it here to die a quiet and painless death." But her parents hadn't felt the tiny life inside the egg. They hadn't seen how helpless and alone it was. She couldn't just leave it there to die. And what if it hatched? It obviously didn't have a family. It would be born into a cruel and heartless world, and with no one to teach it how to survive, it would probably die in minutes anyway. Both sides of her roared back and forth at each other, both determined to find an argument to silence the other.
All through her internal bickering, Mara kept both hands firmly on the egg, feeling the warmth, the life, which pulsed from the egg. The creature's tiny pulse weakened the resolve of her sensible side, and in the end, the warmth dissolved its arguments, warnings and fears. Ignoring the laws that she would break and the danger that would she put herself in, Mara seized the egg with both hands, wrapping it in her shirt and slipping the bundle into her backpack. Pushing her doubts aside, she shouldered her pack and, determination renewed, began her search for a road home.