My encounter with the Lucario definitely warped my view of the universe. I never in a million years thought that I would ever come face to face with such a creature. However, after overcoming the initial strangeness of it, the several behemoth-sized birds in front of me just didn't seem that unusual.

Am I really getting used to this place?

No, it must have had to do with something else. It could have been the sleep deprival. It also could have been the mad dash after to the Lucario or maybe it was the multiple times I was shot at on the way that put me in a state of shock. On second thought, it was probably a combination of both.

So in short terms, I was too bruised, mentally scarred and exhausted to notice how relatively strange fifteen foot tall birds were. In fact, I didn't even shrug when they paired me up with a "pilot" of one of the birds to make the return journey to Canalave.

The trip back to Canalave City was mostly uneventful, as the sky had already become dark as the sun fell behind the cityscape we were flying to. They gave Jake some anaesthetic which helped lessen his pain to the point where he could be stable enough to be flown out. The injuries he sustained were not life-threatening and loss of blood was quickly prevented via proper medical bandages applied quickly enough after the incident. This was unlike the Lucario who was basically being kept alive by a device that could fit in my hand.

I knew she was okay, mentally. Jake previously explained that when a pokemon was inside one of these balls, the physical form of them was converted into something else, therefore making the pokemon inside not aware of its physical state until it is healed. He couldn't explain it further to me and just simply said it was one of the anomalies found on the isles, but I found it to be somewhat disturbing, knowing that someone's life could be captured within something the size of my fist.

I would make good use of the release function on the pokeball as soon as I able after she was looked after. In the meantime, I cradled her pokeball as if I was carrying her helpless body. I kept my hand firmly attached to the ball as we flew through the air.

The dark outline of the city appeared on the horizon. Most of the lights in the city were out, save the pokemon center and several homes. The average tranquility of the city calmed my nerves a bit and took my focus away from the topic of pokeballs.

My pilot pressed his free hand to his flying cap and depressed a miniature button to the side of his ear and shouted a few incomprehensible words out loud. I couldn't understand him due to the noise of the air moving past my face. For a second, I thought that he was talking to me but then I realized that what he was using was a two-way radio.

He turned to face me, taking his gaze off of where we were going. The bird obviously had the intelligence to correct its flightpath if something unexpected happened. "We are going to be landing soon." he shouted, directly at me so that I could hear him. "The flight leader says that your friend Jake is going to be taken to a hospital, but you're going to be taken to the pokemon centre because Charles says you have an injured pokemon."

I nodded, as I didn't have the energy to yell back at the pilot even though he was only inches from me. He understood what I was indicating and spoke a few more words into the microphone then promptly held out his right hand to the side like a cycler signalling a turn.

We split off with the rest of the flight like the way a fighter jet would pull away from its squadron, except we were moving only around forty miles an hour. The bird turned off on its side and made a slight helix in its descent, streaking across the night with precise accuracy to our destination. A large "P" encircled by a large white ring marked out a landing pad on top of the two storey building.

The Pidgeot soared closer and closer to its target. For a second I got the feeling that we were going to crash straight into the landing pad until (to my relief), the bird started to stop itself. Its wings came back into a sail shape capturing and holding the air back from flowing through its feathers. It was a magnificent sight, the bird putting all of its effort into moving its wings in reverse to decelerate. It held it's talons out to catch the tar of the roof, indenting slightly into the material that I could guess was designed to be used for situations like this.

The mighty avian had completely stopped moving forward by the time it came to a stop on top of the building, hovering slightly as it finally came to a rest. It remained very still, waiting for us to disembark.

"Here we are." the pilot informed me, as he hopped off the back of his bird and stood right next to it. "I hope you weren't sick at all during the trip." he probably noticed my less than perfect state.

"Not at all, I've actually flown before." I replied truthfully, omitting the fact that I had flown aboard a jet and not a flying animal. "I'm just really tired. I..."

He cut me off "Just hold on a sec." He pressed his finger against the switch on his helm for a few seconds. After staring blankly into space for a few moments, he took his pressure off of the button. "Sorry about that, they just said that my squad has just reported in at the hospital and I'm supposed to get over there."

"Then I won't keep you." I replied. I guess they had other things to take care of. It was a good thing too, as I was way too drowsy to continue a decent conversation. "Just say thanks to everyone when you get there, I don't think we could have gotten out of that without you guys."

"I'll be sure to tell them." he replied, running his hand across the bird's head absentmindedly. The bird responded by rubbing its beak against the guard's arm, showing affection. The bird reminded me of a horse a bit when it interacted with the human. The man smiled. "You might want to move out of the way when we take off."

Right, the bird's wing beats would have knocked me right over if I had been standing in the same spot I had been standing since I arrived. I slowly backed up towards the edge of the landing pad, away from the downdraft that would soon be created. The man stood by and kept holding his bird that is until I had moved enough for him to lift off. He knew he had to get going and took his hand off to put his goggles on.

"Until next time." he shouted, as the bird began to move its giant wings backwards and forwards, creating enough thrust to get its entire body and its passenger airborne. It was a magnificent sight, seeing such companionship between such different types of creatures. Both relied upon each other so greatly and from the brief glimpse I had into their life, I saw that they were attached to each other.

Perhaps not everyone here is cruel to pokemon.

I watched as the two of them flew off and slowly disappeared into the night, flying off to the city hospital and then to wherever.

The stairs were a challenge for me. Of course I was completely sober, but having not slept in felt like ages left me with poor motor control and very diminutive muscle strength which was as just as bad as being intoxicated. I practically fell down the stairs, barely keeping myself upright using the hand rails. It was a good thing the door at the bottom could be pushed open from the stairwell so that I could just open it with a light bodycheck rather than fiddle with a doorknob.

The room was the same as I had left it earlier in the day when I went with Jake to pick up his father's pokemon. The marble floors, the vaulted ceiling opening onto the second floor which I had bypassed were all unchanged. Even the nurse working the front desk was the same. The only difference was the lack of pokemon trainers populating the foyer. The nurse looked up from a magazine, shocked that I had come at such a late hour.

"Can I help you sir?" she asked, surprised. I sluggishly approached the front desk, hoping that I could walk in a straight line with my eyelids automatically shutting themselves trying to tell the rest of my body that they had had enough.

"Can I help you?" the nurse repeated, as I came nearer to where she was seated. I eventually reached the desk, though just barely.

The nurse changed tactics. "Are you alright? Should I call an ambulance? Is everything alright?" she began to grow panicked.

"It's okay." I assured. "Just really...tired." I struggled to say the next words clearly, not slurring my words together. "Take her." I said handing over the pokeball to the attendant.

"Your pokemon needs to be healed right?" she asked, trying to see what was really wrong with me, not buying my story of being tired but at the same time trying to be accommodating to me.

"Yes." I gasped.

"Are you sure you are okay?" she asked, worried. She skilfully took the pokeball and attached it to a large machine that looked like one-hour photo developer. I would learn later it was used for taking care of pokemon when they were returned to their balls.

"Yes, I'm sure." I replied slowly, now keeping myself propped up by holding on to the counter with both hands.

Suddenly, the room started to get darker, clouding my vision. It was like my eyes were closed but I knew they were being held above my irises by my willpower to stay awake. At least I thought they were...

Why is she running towards me?

I found myself collapsing under my own body weight, unable to stay up any longer.

When you are this tired, marble feels like the softest bed in the world.

Light appeared suddenly, flooding my field of vision with a yellowish-red colour. I recognized the glow as the morning sun piercing through my eyelids.

Was it morning already?

My rest was definitely not long enough; in fact it was almost non-existent.

I need to start getting more sleep.

I knew that just by lying there with my eyes shut wasn't going to constitute sleeping, so reluctantly I opened my eyes slowly, adjusting to the light. The light wasn't the sun, or even a normal incandescent, but one from a harsh, pure white fluorescent tube.

I didn't remember hitting the rock hard floor and I certainly didn't remember falling asleep on the surface either. The nurse must have left me there overnight, though she did have the decency to cover me with one of those standard issue hospital blankets and wedge a pillow between my head and the floor. For that, I was grateful.

Looking up and rubbing my head at the same time, I noticed that no-one was there. No mysterious strangers, no Jake and not even the nurse. All that was there was a row of black chairs, the ones you would normally find in a hospital waiting room.

Is anyone here?

It wasn't a millisecond after I thought that before my question was answered with a flutter of small wings and a small jump off of one of the chairs.

...

My Natu emitted another one of his emotional bursts, this one a mixture of laughter and something that was almost a "Hello".

"...And good morning to you." I replied back to the bird, happy to see him again. The little finch returned with a chirp instead of telepathy. The little exchange helped make me forget about my lack of sleep.

"I see someone is up." said a voice.

Who said that?

I couldn't see anything from my position on the floor, so I slowly raised myself bracing myself against one of the chairs. My finch while I did this, scaled up my shirt sleeve and onto my shoulder keeping a grip on me. It already felt natural having him sitting there, it felt calming. Most likely it was because of his mind speech which was always a nice presence in any situation.

I looked around the room, but all that I saw was just empty space. The reception area was still vacated, which was kind of odd as I thought that the people who stayed here at the hotel would be up by now. I guess I was wrong.

"Hey, over here!" the voice called again. It was coming from the desk, the desk that I had dropped off the Lucario the night before. I instantly recognized the person talking to me as the nurse. I still didn't know her name.

"Hello." I replied, not knowing what else to say. I walked slowly over to where she was seated.

"I see you slept through the night." She stated, looking blankly across the room fixated on one particular corner of the room, while idly eating some cereal "I thought you wouldn't."

"Really, I was so exhausted I couldn't imagine not sleeping."

She looked at me inquisitively. "Is that the reason why you collapsed, you were just tired?"

"Yes, I guess so."

She looked really relieved. "I thought that you had passed out because you were drunk or something. I almost took you to a hospital you know, that was until I got done reading your blood samples..." she tried to keep the last words of her sentence to the lowest possible volume.

Wait! My blood samples?

"What, how?"

"Well, after you passed out, I had to find out what happened to you didn't I?"

"So you just flipped me over and started drawing blood from me?" I asked, somewhat annoyed and at the same time surprised.

"Exactly, and when you didn't wake up when I took the samples I knew that something was wrong. But, the samples came back negative; I knew I wasn't dealing with a drug or alcohol case."

"Oh, I didn't know I gave off that vibe." I replied, raising an eyebrow.

She chuckled. "In this profession we can't take any chances." She took another bite of her cereal, and then looked up suddenly. "Oh, I almost forgot to tell you. One of those policemen came looking for you earlier today, and I said you were sleeping. He said he would come back later. Do you know who I'm talking about?"

"Yeah, I think so." It was probably Charles, the leader of the squadron that had come to pick up Jake and I. He had said he would meet up with me today to discuss how to get us to Jubilife.

"Good, 'cause he's going to be back any time now." She outstretched her arm and stole a glance at her wristwatch. I wondered what time it said on that watch, it must have been around six in the morning, before the centre opened and before the crowds would have moved in.

"So, how did..." I was about to ask how I ended up on the chairs, but then was cut off. "Hold on for a second." the nurse interrupted quickly, with a mouth full of bran flakes. She grabbed a remote control and hit the mute button, making the flat screen television across the room burst into sound. "Sorry, this only comes on once a morning."

"It's okay." I needed a break anyways to get my stuff in order for when the Air Servicemen came back.

A musical interlude played overlapping the graphic display that flooded the forty inches of screen. There was a male voice that eventually rose over the music. "This is Vulpix News, the most news in the morning." A logo appeared on the screen. Two searchlights illuminated the words "Vulpix News" which was suspended over what looked like a movie studio.

Now that was too funny!

Wow, I couldn't believe they were able to get syndicated here. I guess all they needed to do was modify the logo to fit the word "Vulpix" and not "Fox", and just report on local news. I chuckled a bit at the thought.

"Why are you laughing? This is terrible?" exclaimed the nurse from across the room.

The news anchor was now on the screen, reading off the latest reports. "It has been confirmed that there has been four more victims of yesterday's suspected arson attack at the Olivine Port Authority."

Oh...

"I was actually laughing at something totally unrelated." She looked at me with one of those 'oh really...' looks. "I swear."

"...the building was gutted by fire, as an uncontrolled inferno caused the roof to collapse before rescue workers could reach the inside." The newscaster changed papers and shuffled them into a stack. "This is just in; the national minister of education has been reported missing by his family today."

That was the same person that was authorizing the Polytechnic.

"Can you turn up this for a second?" I asked, interested in what was going on. This could be serious.

"Oh, now you're paying attention to the news..." she retorted, raising the volume on the television set.

The announcer was now much louder, giving me a better understanding of what he was saying. "Yes, James Monroe has been confirmed to have not shown up at this yesterday's scheduled cabinet meeting at the national parliament as hoped by his immediate family. He hasn't been seen in over half a week and is considered to still be missing. His wife has refused to comment."

A new image appeared on the screen, replacing the one of the newscaster with one of stock footage. "These are messages from earlier in the week when popular protests took control of the main streets of Slateport City in the Hoenn Nation." Flag bearing protestors marched up in large numbers of the main drag of the city. Some carried signs that called for the resignation of the government. Some signs simply said "Get out foreigners!" and rubbish like that. One unifying theme though of all of the individuals was the general anger.

"The protests were organized by the PFLA or the 'People's Freedom and Liberty Organization'. The organization has been criticized recently for its almost militant support for isolationism and for harsher crackdowns on foreign imported goods that they claim are simply stolen domestic goods that have been rebranded by members of organized crime syndicates."

I snorted loudly.

"I know." the nurse replied, agreeing with my retort. "These people are such idiots, yet they almost won in the last election. They call for the isolation of our nation, but they don't realize that the people outside of our borders are people just as much as we are. They aren't pirates hiding from the law on some obscure island chain. All they are doing is..." she trailed off. "I'm drawing a blank, I can't think of why they would be doing something like this."

"I one hundred per cent agree." Ignorance breeds hatred and ignorance can only be combated through knowledge. What these people needed desperately was the influx of outside knowledge.

"What are we agreeing on?" asked someone. Both of us turned to look at who had joined our conversation. It was a policeman from the Sinnoh Air Guard. It was Charles.

"It's that whole mess over foreigners again." replied the nurse, casually.

Charles sighed. "I guess it can't be helped." he said lowly.

What was that supposed to mean?

"Anyways, I've come to talk to David in private, can you excuse us for a moment?" he asked, but might has well have stated as no one in the right mind would have said no to a request like that from a military officer.

"Sure, the room you requested is right down the hall and right across from the stairs."

"Thanks." he replied as he took a set of keys from the receptionist. "Right this way David." he pointed down the hall that we were to travel down.

The room was dimly lit. Small beams of light managed to seep through the murky yellow tint that had grown over the light bulb in the many years of being in such a damp and cold environment. The area was stacked from floor to ceiling with boxes containing different types of medical supplies. Odd names graced the front of the crates like "Parylz Heals 40 count".

"Take a seat, the faster we can get through this, the faster we can get out of here." he motioned to an old set of folding chairs and a small cards table.

"I take it you're here to interrogate me about what happened yesterday." I supposed, sitting down.

"Right-o." he replied, taking out a small clipboard and pen. "So you are David Wilson, male, five foot ten, native of Sinnoh and born in Jubilife City?" he looked up from his information inquisitively.

"Yes, it's all correct." The questionnaire reminded me of the one that I needed to fill out to get my owner's licence.

"Good, good. All of the information your friend gave us is correct then." he started. "Now to get into what happened yesterday. I already got from Jake that you stopped for a few minutes at around twenty to seven. Shortly afterwards you were assaulted by an unknown assailant. By 6:45, you had left the place where the shooting first occurred to assist another person who had been caught in the same attack. We arrived at 7:03 exactly, probably scaring off what we believe is the perpetrators. Is this all correct?"

"As far as I can tell." I answered truthfully.

"Have you been off any of the islands at any time?"

"No, but if I was why would I tell you?"

"Hey, I'm just reading off of the paper. I've never had to do this before." he chuckled. "Actually all of these questions are just rubbish anyways. I'm just going to ask you some of my own questions know. Is that alright?"

"Sure, go ahead and shoot."

"Okay, the most important question I have to ask is did you catch a glimpse of your assailant when you were away from your accomplice Jake? We already asked him, and he has denied you seeing anything when you were with him."

"No, I really didn't see anything at all. I could hear where the shots were coming from though."

"Yeah, Brennan has already given us that information and gave us the direction of the gunfire. Are you sure you don't have any other information of value?"

I really didn't have anything else to tell the man, I was for the most part blocked off from seeing anyone else by either a ditch or a log. As for the rest of the time, I was too concerned about my own survival to notice many details. Perhaps the Lucario saw something. She might be able to help them sketch a mugshot of the guy.

"I don't, but you might want to ask that Lucario that was also involved."

He laughed. "Sorry, we can't accept testimony from non-humans. It's too unreliable."

That really annoyed me. Why did he have to be such a bigot? "That's ridiculous, the Lucario has eyes, she can speak and from what I can tell has at least near-human intelligence."

"Still, the Lucario is just an animal." he rolled his eyes at me like a teenager explaining to his younger brother that Santa didn't actually exist.

"But then so are we."

"What do you mean?"

"Well what defines us as Human? Is it the body shape, the eyes, the language? If so Lucarios count as humans. Or if in reverse, we count as animals."

"But we live civilized, in cities. We create our environment. We pave the way for our own existence. We have mastered all other species and have created our own reality."

"But didn't we at one point live in caves, in fear of other animals. Weren't our ancestors that lived as hunters and gatherers in fear of larger predators?"

"We weren't as intelligent back then."

"We were not? Homo sapiens have been around long before civilization." there was a long pause before I started again. "Regardless of what we are, it is irrelevant. We know that we are intelligent. It is a question of if we are willing to accept that we are not the only ones with intelligence on this planet."

A beeping noise interrupted me. "Hold on for a second." Charles told me abruptly. He pressed his hand up against the side of his hat like the other pilot had done to listen in on the radio signals coming from another person in his squad. "Uh huh... Uh huh... Got it, thanks Jeff." he took his appendage off of his helm and placed it back on the table. After talking briefly with the person on the other radio set, the room's atmosphere seemed to grow colder. The man known as Charles seemed to change somehow.

"Something serious has come up. I have to inform you that it is illegal to lie when interviewed by a member of the Sinnoh National Police Force." he said coldly. "It has come to my attention that you have been lying to me this whole time."

"Now what was I lying about?"

"I've just discovered that you are not in fact born within the borders of the United Island's jurisdiction. Weren't you?"

Now something like this was not supposed to happen. I was supposed to be able to walk into the country without a hitch. I knew this was impossible without Jake helping me remember my back story and make sure I didn't mess up my Sinnoh information when talking to the natives. Though, even if I screwed up the police were not supposed to get involved. They were not supposed to know. If they did, they would detain me for being an illegally landed immigrant.

"Weren't you?" he repeated, angrier this time when he said those words. It was almost as if he was getting back at me for pseudo-winning the argument over human intelligence.

"I'm David Wilson, and I was born seventeen years ago at the Jubilife regional hospital. I still live there." I listed off my personal information like a captured soldier repeating his name and id number.

He leaned closer to me, keeping his eyes fixed on me. "You and I both know that is a lie. The government never lies and their information on you is in conflict with your description of yourself." Oh great, the government was supposed to be on my side. Was it now trying to sabotage the operation?

"I am telling you the truth."

"LIAR!" he slammed his fist on the table, the Natu on my shoulder let out a frightened burst of energy. He slowly regained his calmness, moving inches away from my face, so close that I could see a pin identifying him with the group opposed to ceasing isolationism.

Damn, this was bad luck.

"I'm taking you into custody." he said slowly. I knew he was trying to intimidate me into being arrested, but I knew I wasn't going that easily.

"Hold on." I said slyly. "I have my ID on me; just give me a sec okay." I moved my hand into my pants pocket and drew out my owner's card, showing my face and personal information. I threw it over to him, quickly. "I think you will find my papers are clearly in order."

"This doesn't tell me where you live. Where is your home, you immigrant?" he shot back at me, trying to catch me on something only a resident would know.

"Jubilife City." I said, quickly.

"It says your address is located within a commercial district."

"I live at a collegiate there, in the dorms."

"...And not with your parents..."

"Correct."

"Where are they?"

"I don't have to tell you that." I quipped.

His eyes narrowed. He knew that he had no right to detain me and I knew that as well. A small smile graced my face.

"You can't really keep me here? Correct?" I asked. "You have no evidence to charge me with anything and I have sufficient identification on me to prove that I was born here."

He mumbled something incoherently, not wanting to concede defeat.

"...And I can go correct?" I repeated the last word of the phrase at the same pitch as I did in the previous sentence, accentuating the fact that I wanted him to agree like with the statement before.

"Yes." he muttered through clenched teeth. "Here's your freaking identification." he threw the card onto the table with an audible thud.

I retrieved it and was about to leave when I heard his voice say something to me. "I just want you to know that you are treading water. Any time now you are going to fall beneath the water and no one here is going to save you, especially not the air guard. We won't help you the next time someone tries to force you to leave. So I suggest you leave on your own free will."

I looked back on him. I couldn't tell if he was threatening me or what else it was, but it was cold-hearted. It was the kind of hatred that sends shivers down your spine and makes you unsure of your footing. "I don't need your advice."

I left him in there, to his thoughts about me, about the world and about himself. I still kind of felt bad for him though. It wasn't his fault that he didn't know about the rest of the world. To him, all the people who didn't live in the United Islands were just a bunch of lawless criminals who wanted to leech off of the country that he risked his life for everyday.

He didn't follow me up the stairs right away and I continued by myself back up to the reception desk in the centre's main room, all the while wishing that I could ask Jake as to what would become of our journey after the past two day's events. I didn't know what to do. I would have to wait till I could ask him at the hospital if it was safe to keep marching to the polytechnic.

"Well, here is your Lucario, properly looked after." the nurse handed me the pokeball that I reluctantly captured the creature in the night before. I was lost in thought, not even making eye contact. "Is there something wrong?"

"No, nothing's wrong." I said, slowly looking up from my hands to acknowledge the nurse. She wore a smile on her face, though was slight broken due to me looking dejected. Her expression made me smile as well, albeit a bit weaker than hers. "I've just had a rough couple of days." I couldn't really explain what had just transpired.

"Just let me know if you need anything." she replied, kindly.

"I'll be fine." I said back, sincerely. "I just want to thank you for helping me last night."

"It's all in a day's work." she laughed. A small red light came on above the desk, encased in a small wire cage it began to flash. "Which reminds me, I have to get back to work. It appears another pokemon needs my help."

"I won't keep you then."

"See you again sometime." she replied, running back towards the back of the centre, probably looking after another person in need of medical help.

We are a strange species. Often we are good and often we easily be convinced to do wrong by others. I was always a firm believer in the good humanity can do, in how ordinary people can help others for purposes other than satisfying their own needs, but now I was quickly finding out just how bad people could get if you pushed them.

Sinnoh was a land of contrast. Many people here cared and took care of their pokemon, for instance the policeman who flew me here was very kind to his bird. Though at the same time, many are not respected the way they should. There are many here that want change, want openness and freedom while some fear and despise it.

I knew the good outweighed the bad. It had to. That's why I decided at that moment that I would stay in this newfound country. No matter how many people tried to silence me. I knew that every time something like what happened yesterday happened again, there would always be someone to help me out and if anyone needed help I would be there for them. Whoever they were.

Walking out of the building, I knew that this would just be the first encounter of both sides of this odd phenomenon known as humanity.