Sorry it took so long to upload. School is hell. Well, enjoy! Don't forget to review! –Allora Silverfield

"I know today has gone awry. Most of you are probably terrified. Many of you, confused. Some of you, angry. But the show must go on!"

Mrs. Price had taken us to a different building on campus. Officer Jenny had showed up with the police and firefighters. The water pokemon were putting out the wall fire and the police were calling students out of class for witness interviews. The news crew was already there, doing some story about the return of the "Notorious Team Rocket!"

I had already been interviewed. I told them all about the battle, starting from Carl's mistreatment of Savannah's meowth and ending with the scene of Mrs. Price standing in the archway of rubble by the school, her handsome pidgeot preening its feathers after using gust to rid the courtyard of smoke.

Now we were in another classroom. Eleven students were missing, including Carl. Ironically, they happened to all be friends of his. There were assumed to have gone with him and were now, along with Carl, labeled as thieves, criminals, and worst of all, Rockets.

Jessie was one of the ones missing. No surprise there.

Our pokemon were all in our pokeballs. The door to the classroom was being guarded by two houndoom as the police performed their investigation. Mrs. Price was giving a speech at the head of the classroom, reassuring us that the police would handle everything. She was also emphasizing the importance of continuing on with the career choosing ceremony today. Her words: "We cannot show any weakness!" This heroic statement had been met with looks full of uncertainty and skepticism. She decided to change the subject.

"I'm sure you are all shocked by my collection of pokemon," she said and smiled to herself. "But that is a story for another time." After the firefighters had arrived, she had sent out a blastoise to help them with the blaze from the wall. She had also sent out a blissey to help the chansey with the injured pokemon. All of us were wondering what else she had up her sleeve.

Team Rocket. Twenty years ago, they were supposedly disbanded by the famous Ash Ketchum, along with Teams Magma, Aqua, Galactic, and Plasma in the later years. Ash now lived at the peak of Mt. Silver, along with his extremely powerful Pokemon. That was what we had all been taught, anyway. Apparently… things had gotten out of hand again. According to Mrs. Price, for the last few years, there had been an increase in Rocket activity. The police knew that some recruitment had been going on, but they assumed it was few and far between. They had kept the information private, not wanting to alarm the public. No one would have ever guessed that eleven high school students would have been persuaded to join.

No one was sure if any of the other gangs had gotten back together and begun criminal activity again, but Mrs. Price said that we shouldn't worry about them; the most dangerous of the five was Rocket.

It was the perfect plan, really. Use these kids to take the hundreds of ready, eager, starter pokemon that were just sitting out in plain sight in a classroom. Lending them the weezing and alakazam for a quick getaway was no big deal. Now the Rockets had tons of starter pokemon, just waiting to be assigned to new grunts. Recruitment was sure to go up after this.

According to the police, Rocket had designed a new kind of pokeball; a kind that erased a pokemon's ability to sense right and wrong. The pokeball turned the pokemon into a mind-slave, giving its controller the ability to order the pokemon to do anything, even hurt itself. This allowed Rockets to turn any pokemon evil, not just ones they had raised from an early age. As soon as they were captured, their minds became blank. This was both astonishing and worrying, but nothing too twisted for an insane Rocket scientist to come up with. It was rumored that the scientists in Rocket were some of the smartest in the world.

Other information about new Rocket technology was minimal at best. The police were really struggling to find out more about their plans. There were rumors of the police even talking about seeking out the original Dex-holders, but the problem with that was most of them had retired and simply disappeared, along with their pokemon. Ash was the only one who's hiding spot was known, but only the Elite Four could manage to climb to the top of Mt. Silver. Besides, why would he want to help anyway? He had done his part. But, at the very least, the robbery of the school's starter pokemon was enough for them to officially announce the return of Team Rocket. Hopefully some of the Dex-holders would see the news and decide to help.

But, for now, it was time to choose our careers. Things went pretty smoothly; about one-fourth of our class (14 students) decided on becoming trainers, including Cali and me. We signed some papers and received our personalized bags, but were told not to open them until everybody had theirs.

Once we had all chosen, we could open our bags. Students around us began to tear open their packs and see what they had. Those who were to become contest enterers received accessories. The collectors received special pokeballs, such as dusk balls and repeat balls. The scientists received test tubes and syringes for drawing blood. Cali and I sat next to each other at a table, both of us eager to see what we had.

"You go first," I said to Cali. She didn't have to be told twice. She dumped the contents of the bag on the table. In front of us sat the standard items for a trainer: some super potions, a few revives, a Carbos, one rare candy, five pokeballs, and some antidotes and paralyze heals. But there were also several non-standard items. These were Cali's requested/assigned special items. One stood out above the rest.

Cali picked it up gingerly in her hand. It was a clear, orange rock that seemed to have a flame trapped inside. Whenever she twirled it, the light caught the stone at different angles and the flame seemed to dance.

"A fire stone," she whispered. As an aspiring trainer of fire pokemon, this was a priceless gift.

"That's awesome!" I said. There was another item on the table. It was a tin container of some sort. "What's that?"

Cali picked it up and popped the lid off. Inside there was a ton of Rawst Berries, a vulpix favorite. "I requested these," Cali said and giggled. I was sure Sam would love them.

There was also a Charcoal, which both of us knew about. It was an item that a pokemon could hold to increase the power of their fire type moves. Cali was particularly excited about that one.

There was one more item. It was a cookie, in a plastic bag. There was a sticky note on the bag that said "Lava Cookie". Cali raised her hand and Mrs. Price came walking over. "What can I help you girls with?" she asked.

"Um, we were wondering what a Lava Cookie is. Is it beneficial to fire pokemon somehow?" Cali asked. Mrs. Price smiled.

"A Lava Cookie is made from volcano ashes instead of flour. It heals any status problem of a pokemon, including confusion and infatuation." She looked at Cali. "I'm sure you can make great use of it."

"Oh, yes ma'am." Cali said pleased. She was looking at the cookie, turning it over and over in her hands. Mrs. Price smiled and shook her head. She moved on to the next table, asking if they needed help.

"Okay Allora, your turn." Cali said. I nodded. I was extremely anxious as to what I had in my bag. We put all of Cali's stuff back in her bag in the correct pockets, and then I dumped mine on the table.

We had the same basic things, pokeballs and potions and such. But my special items were different. The first one I noticed was a small bell with ribbons sticking off of it. I looked at it questioningly. Cali noticed my look and elaborated.

"That's a soothe bell," she said, gently taking the bell from me. "It increases the bond between a trainer and their pokemon if a pokemon holds it." She gave the bell a shake. A clear, resonating sound came from it and echoed throughout the room. The room became quiet as people listened to the bell chime. It was beautiful. Cali set it back on the table.

"It's funny that you got one of those," she said as the room grew noisy again. I looked at her, confused. She shrugged, "Well I guess not really when you think about it. I mean, two of eevee's evolutions are friendship based, so it makes sense."

I nodded. I hadn't really thought about what to evolve my pokemon into yet. I was going to let the decision kind of make itself. But I decided to keep that soothe bell in mind.

The next item on the table was a silk scarf. This was a hold item that increased the power of normal type moves. I smiled. Sunny would look good in this, I thought. Not to mention the fact that it would make quick attack that much stronger. I moved on to the third item.

It looked like a CD. It was round and white, and made of some kind of shiny metal engraved with some cryptic symbols. There was also a piece of tape with words on it on the outside of the CD's case. I immediately knew what it was. It was a TM! I was so excited, I had never seen one in real life before. Cali and I looked at it excitedly and I squinted to read the label.

"It says the move it teaches is return." I glanced at Cali. "Isn't that the one where the power increases depending on pokemon friendship?"

"Yeah." Cali said. She looked thoughtful. "You know, this Erik guy really seems to be saying something about friendship." She looked at me.

I shrugged. "Maybe he just likes umbreons?"

Cali laughed. "Don't forget espeons! Those are cuter!"

I laughed, but I was thinking. Maybe the Champion really was trying to tell me something. Maybe he thinks those two eevelutions are the strongest? I pushed that thought aside; I would worry about that later.

The last item looked like a stick. It had a button on the front of it though, and when I pushed it, the stick unfolded and became a pretty good looking fishing rod.

"I wonder how well this works." I said to Cali. She shrugged. I looked at the rod. It had another button, and when I pushed it, it neatly folded back up into a foot-sized stick. "It sure is compact," I smiled. "I like it."

I was about to put my stuff away when I noticed a little blue box with a note taped to it, lying on its side next to a super potion. I moved the potion over and picked up the box. I pulled the note off and looked at Cali. She looked back at me, and I could tell we were both wondering the same thing: What is this?

I opened the note and read:

I believe that you can make good use of these. You and your friend together are a sacred pair.

Friendship is the glue that holds people and pokemon together.

-Erik

"See? Friendship!" Cali exclaimed.

"It could still just be nothing," I said, though I myself was now convinced of the same thing; that Erik obviously wanted me to have the two friendship evolutions.

I moved my hand over to the box. Slowly, I raised the lid. Inside were two feathers. They were carefully placed in slots that were holding them in place. Cali and I looked at each other in wonder. I picked up the feather on the left.

It was heavier than I thought. This first feather was so shiny and sparkly that at certain angles the light that reflected off of it was so bright that it was hard to look at. It was white, but at certain angles miniature rainbows danced on it's surface. I carefully placed back in the grooves in the box and lifted out the other one.

This one was much lighter than the other one. It was smooth and matte colored. But it was so beautifully colored that it equaled the other in brilliance. It was a vibrant orange towards the bottom, fading to purple, blue, and green towards the top. When I looked closely at each strand that made up the feather, I could see that the orange that I at first thought was solid was actually white, yellow, red, and orange combined into an indiscernible but beautiful pattern.

I placed the second feather back in the box and we stared at them in awe. They were wonderful, captivating, beautiful. Cali broke the silence.

"Um… what are they?"

Good question. I had no idea what they were. All I knew was that they were important. Somehow. I could feel a type of aura coming from them. The silver feather felt calming, peaceful. When I touched it I could hear a faint, sad song. The song sounded like the mournful choruses of wailord in the ocean, mixed with an airy flute that floated over the song in soft, sad phrases.

The orange feather, however, was completely different. Its aura was of fierce loyalty and bravery. When my fingers graced its outline, I could hear drums playing in a steady, tribal rhythm, with a strange bird-like song occasionally piercing through the beat. When I touched the feathers I had a sense of purpose, but for what I did not know. I promised myself to research their significance and find out their purpose.

I looked at Cali and smiled. "This is just something else to add onto our to-do list while we travel the world." I closed the box containing the feathers. "I'm sure Erik had a reason to give us these feathers."

"Yes, but what did he mean about us being 'sacred'?" she asked. "This is so confusing…"

"We'll worry about it later." I said. I glanced at the clock; it was almost time to head home. It had been a very long day. "Come on, let's get our stuff together, I wanna go home."

We carefully put my things into the correct pockets of my bag. I made sure I had my Pokedex and both Noche and Sunny's balls. I had just slung my bag onto my shoulder when the bell rang. Cali and I walked out into the hallway, wading through the sea of students eager to get home and tell their parents about their eventful day.

"You there," I heard. I turned 180 degrees. Officer Jenny was headed my direction, her mightyena following close behind. She stopped and looked Cali and me up and down. Her big black dog sat at her feet, not taking its eyes off of me.

After a few awkward seconds of being studied, she nodded. "Are you Silverfield?" Her tone was sharp. I gulped and nodded. She faced Cali "And you, are you Fuega?" Cali looked away and nodded briskly. "Follow me," Officer Jenny said, and she made an abrupt about face and strut down the hallway. Cali and I exchanged looks, and then we followed.

Mew help me. What now?

I need some inboxed OC's for the coming chapters! This is your chance! My little brother can only come up with so many!