In the stark blackness that made up Timothy's mind, his nightmares roamed free within the confines of his unconscious mind. Bloody muzzle hounds and vicious predators of his own creation terrorized the entirety of his mind. He was lost in his own little twisted wonderland, and he could only wait till the figments of his imagination would stop their assault on his brain.

This went on for some time, until, to put it simply, he woke up. It was a plain white room, which much he could see even in his heavily disoriented state. As he tried to sit up, he gave a low groan and placed a hand on his bandaged head. This was something he hadn't known. As he finally got into a sitting position, he sighed and leaned back onto a pillow. He had many questions, but first things first. Where was he?

The room wasn't solely occupied by the ginger fellow, as he could he the light breathing of someone sleeping beside him. Rather, behind the curtain that separated their sides of the room. I quick rundown of the facts that he played in his head allowed him to come to the conclusion that he was in a hospital. Timothy: 1, everyone else: Nada. There was a small window one his side of the room, and from his restricted angle, Timothy could make out some basic landmarks that made him jump to the reasonable conclusion that he was in Viridian city. This was quite the distance from the border to Johto.

As much as doing triage helped him make sense of his situation, it only served to raise more questions than it answered. He remembered blacking out, but he assumed that was the end. And even if he hadn't died there, why wasn't he at the border station? Being in Viridian was his main source of worry. What had happened that was so bad that he wasn't at the station. He wasn't able to ponder these questions for much longer, as the nurse strolled into the room then. She gave a short gasp at the sight of Timothy sitting up, then rushed back out the room. He could hear plainly "Doctor, he's awake!" Outside the room

Timothy groaned from the yelling, his head pounding. He felt like someone swung a spade at his head. Which was actually fairly probable. With no guns, you'd be surprised at the ways people to kill each other. Shovels, knives, hell, some people brought out some old swords. Timothy was fairly sure he'd seen some people from his squad pick up bones to sword fight for fun. Though the Cubone they got them from wasn't pleased to see them with its collection. That earned a little giggle from the ginger, looking back on better times.

Unfortunately, that seemed to wake up the other occupant of the room. The man sleeping next to Timothy stirred in his slumber, and groggily sat up in his bed. Or that's what it looked like the shadow was doing through the curtain. Timothy wasn't sure what he was doing exactly, just making guesses at this point. Though he wouldn't have to after the mystery man pulled the curtain back.

He was a tan man, and most likely taller than Timothy, though most people were. He had muscles, not the lean things that Timothy had. They weren't exactly bulging, but you could tell that he was strong from the way he carried himself. He had dark amber eyes, which were full of laughter and joy. He had a grin on his face, with deep laugh lines carved into his face. He looked like the type of person that'd make you laugh if looked at him for too long, or if you started a conversation with him he'd honestly try to be interested in what you were talking about. He was good people, Timothy was sure of that much.

He studied Timothy over, making the ginger feel pretty self-conscious for a couple of moments. He must look a mess, with a bandaged head and who knows how many else injuries he hadn't noticed. But his fears were put to rest when the man offered a hand to him. "The name's Benny. How ya doing?" Timothy took the hand, shaking it with as much strength he could muster in his in his depleted condition.

"Not feeling too well, but I suppose I'll be fine. You feeling alright?" He answered briskly, pushing up his glasses. The man pointed to his bandaged chest, still grinning, either from pride or the fact that he had a battle scar. "My wound is healing up pretty good, so I think I'm doing great. Especially since I'm not, you know, dead. I think that and the fact that I smacked down an Ekans that came at me is great. They thought the wound was infected for a while so- Ah crap, I've been talking on and on and haven't even bothered to learn your name. "

He was right on the talking front. The ginger hadn't ever seen anyone talk as fast and much as Benny had, but he was a good guy. "Timothy. Timothy Dax." He answered back. Benny, satisfied that his answer was answered, opened his mouth to get back to what he was conversing about. He was stopped thankfully by the doctor coming into the room. He looked at Benny and Timothy, writing something on his clipboard. He spoke to Benny first, doing his own sort of triage. "Private Hamlin, you're free to go-"

The tan man's eternal grin grew wider and he slipped out of his bed, already half dressed. He must have known that today was the day he got out, and prepared thusly. He grabbed his shirt, gave a salute to both Timothy and the doctor, and ran out of the room with a laugh, leaving both men flabbergasted. Benny was not known for tact, or patience.

"He's um…Interesting." Timothy spoke, breaking the awkward silence between them. The doctor looked over at him, giving a soft smile at the remark.

"…And you'll be released tomorrow…" The doctor frowned, knowing Benny will be back when the nurses won't allow him to leave. He then turned to Tim with a forced smile. "Yes, he's one of our army cases, like yourself. We found it simpler to hold the both of you in the same room, mostly for clerical reasons."

"Ah. Mind telling me what happened to me?"

The doctor's face darkened at the question, and he looked down at the clipboard in his hands. "Mr. Dax, you were attacked on the border by a Johtoan squad. As of four days ago, Kanto is at war with Johto." And Timothy's face showed all the signs of the panic he was feeling internally. The first thing blurted out of his mouth was probably not the brightest thing he could've said in that situation.

"I was out for four days?!"

"…Besides your minor concussion, we see no reason to not let you go. No brain damage, no other injuries as far as we can see. You're being redeployed back into a platoon in Viridian city. You're free to go."

This was a severe lack of information as far was Timothy was concerned. How in the hell were they at war with Johto?! Neither side had efficient means to fight, besides sending hordes of soldiers at each other in mass killing fields. And after the casualties of the last conflict, no one on either side wanted that. Suddenly, something clicked within the back of his mind. When the Johto troops attacked his squad, they were using, Pokémon. Everything fell into place soon after that.

"Sir…how exactly are we fighting?" The doctor sighed, his eyes meeting the gingers.

"Ever heard of the Silph Company?" Tim nodded, raising an eyebrow in confusion.

"Doesn't answer my question, but yeah, I've heard about them. Aren't they some technology company or something?"

"Yes, something along those lines. They've created a device, or at least a prototype, that allows for the capturing of Pokémon." Which sounded like something straight out of a novel to Tim, but he kept his comments internal. At least for the moment.

"Are you serious?! And what, we're just going to go capture monsters? There's a reason people don't go into forests at night, sir, and that's because they never come out. Monsters, that's the military's solution?"

"Well if we don't do something, Johto will have no qualms about using their own prototypes to steamroll over us! Face it kid, we're out of options here! It's been sixty years, and hell, our guns don't work. Our cannons don't work. Bombs don't even blow up when they hit the ground! It's them or us, and I'm proud our leaders are choosing us!" The doctor snapped, catching the ginger off guard. He hadn't quite expected that from the quiet man.

"War at any costs, huh?"

"Do we even have a choice, ?"

And as much as he wanted to deny the logic, he knew he had to accept it. Some wars are fought with soldiers. This one was going to be fought with monsters.