-Chapter Two-

I slowly woke from my deep slumber to the sound of Cinccino's heartbeat. She must have made it out of her pokeball sometime during the night. She was such a sweet pokemon. I couldn't help but sleepily grin as she stirred in her sleep, her soft fur brushing against my cheek. She had curled up beside my head, and her front paws, which could double as hands as times, were entangled in my crazy, wavy hair, and her feet rested lightly on my neck.

And then the quiet was broken with a scream. Some sort of blood-curdling scream that sent chills up my spine. It was no battle cry of a pokemon or even a scream of joy. This definitely came from a human, and, by the sounds of it, that human was in pain. Though the scream was blood-curdling, it was pitched low enough so that I knew that it belonged to a man.

Without taking time to slip out of my knee-length silk nightgown, I ran out of the door after grabbing my pokeballs. I counted just to make sure I had them all. One- Serperior. Two- Reshiram. Three- Cinccino. And four- Zebstrika. I was so relieved that I had gathered them all, not that I had ever forgotten a pokeball. Half-way down the stairs that led to the first floor of the pokemon center, I tripped and fell, tumbling down to the very bottom step. It didn't faze me a bit; I kept on running. As I burst out of the center's doors, I noticed that Cinccino was frantically holding onto my head. She let out a few panicked squeaks before she actually said something that I could distinguish.

"He's around the corner. I hear uneven breathing, limping footsteps, and…" My beloved pokemon stopped for a moment, as if she was hearing something that she didn't recognize. "Something's dripping on the ground." She pointed her paw, and, somehow, I saw where she was pointing in my peripheral vision. I headed straight for the corner she'd gestured to.

No sooner had I turned the corner than when I saw someone on the ground. He was holding onto the wall for dear life, as if that was the only thing that was helping him stay up and walking- it probably was. A black robe shrouded his face and figure from me, but, I could see the darker wet spots on the garment that surrounded a rip in it. Behind the rip in the fabric, I could see the wet skin that no doubt belonged to a man. The ribbon of skin that shown beneath the fabric was covered in blood as well, but beneath the crimson liquid, I could distinguish that the skin's tone was somewhere between being pale or tan.

I had no clue why I was taking in all these details. Was I insane? I should have been helping him, but it seemed as if time had stopped before my very eyes.

He looked up, and, though I couldn't see his eyes, his mouth tilted upward in the ghost of a smile. "I knew someone would come…" Blood trickled out from the corners of his mouth, and that must have set my plan to help him in motion, because, before I could even register what I was doing, I found myself at his side, supporting his weight with my shoulder. He wrapped his arm around my shoulders in an effort to support himself, but he let out a moan as he did so. Who was this man? Why was I helping him? He could have been faking.

Some part of me ignored all of those doubts. He was not faking. I heard something dripping onto the concrete. Was someone peeing nearby? No. I looked to the source of noise, which was a crimson pool forming near the man's feet. Blood was dripping from his wound onto the ground. Now I knew what Cinccino was talking about when she said she heard something dripping. I was so caught up in helping that I almost didn't hear Cinccino barking orders at me.

"The wound's bleeding too much! Sit him down, put pressure on the wound, and don't let him strain himself!" Her shrill voice nearly deafened me. Strangely enough, I could have sworn that the man I was helping almost tilted his head towards Cinccino, almost as if he understood her as much as I did.

Of course, he was probably just freaked out that my pokemon was almost screaming at me.

I did as Cinccino said, setting the man down gently, noticing that he was a good deal taller than me, and tore off the bottom strip of his black robe, pressing it tightly against the wound that was forming a crimson pool around his body. What had happened to him?

He seemed conscious enough to press the makeshift bandage to his wound, so I thought of asking him. No. I would tell him. Maybe giving him a command would push him to live.

"Press the cloth on your wound. I'm going to go get help," I said, getting up to leave. When I turned around, I felt a hand wrap around my ankle. Chills went up my spine as I realized that the reason that his hand was warm and wet was because it was soaked in his own blood.

"I don't want you to leave. Don't let me die alone." I turned to face the man on the ground. The man that was about to die. Tears sprung in my eyes. I'd never witness someone die. I didn't want to witness someone dying.

I wasn't going to let him die.

He loosened his grip, and, feeling as if something bad would happen if I left him, I threw Reshiram's pokeball into the air, and he was released out of it. For some strange reason, he almost looked satisfied.

"Reshiram, please take us home. If you mess around, he'll die, so…" Tears began streaming down my face at an unbelievable rate. "Please take us straight home, and hurry!" I almost yelled the last sentence, praying to whoever was listening that my pokemon wouldn't screw me over with some bull crap like he did when he flew me to Accumula town in the first place.

Reshiram nodded, and nudged the man onto his back with a bit of assistance from me. I clenched and unclenched my fists in the hem of my shorts as Reshiram flew us home. Cinccino purred against my ear, trying to calm me down.

"He'll be okay," she tried to convince me. "He'll be just fine."

No matter how hard Cincinno tried, I still worried that this man that I'd mysteriously come upon was going to die on Reshiram's back.