"Model Behavior"

Author's Note: I did not create the world of Pokémon, the creatures within it, nor the basic concept of it. I did, however, create the characters in this story and would like to be asked permission if you wish to use them. This is the first time I have written in a very long time and look forward to reading your insight on the text. I'm a lot older now, but my interest in Pokémon has not changed. Thank you.

Words cannot quite describe how I was feeling at that particular moment.

I knew that I was alive, though I didn't exactly feel that way. There was this vague sensation of floating, high above the canopy of the verdant green forest, yet also a sensation of sinking, plummeting to untold depths. Oddly enough, I could still hear voices all around me, though none quite as clear as hers.

"Endure," she said.

Perhaps this is what she was referring to. But as it had only been a dream, there was no way to be entirely sure. Perhaps, instead, there was a greater meaning attached to her words, her looks, and her expression. Some dreams are meant to be taken literally and others are not and I asked myself why did it have to be so hard to choose.

Outside the realm of negative space, I could hear the forest burgeoning with life all around me. A cacophony of greetings, grunts, and growls combined to create an enchanting melody. That was what was making me float, I soon understood. As for the other voice, her voice, that was the resistance.

I was caught in the middle of a conflict, but I didn't know which side to take. Should I follow that woman or should I continue to float? All that I knew was that this middle state could no longer be an option. Viciously I began to tear at my hair. A low growl rose from the pit of my stomach, filling the air with a savage and terrific noise.

I had to get out of this dream!

It was driving me insane!

"Pa! (One!)"

Higher, my legs flailed in all directions as I rose higher and higher.

"Chi! (Two!)"

Higher, strands of white hair fell without touching ground.

"Ri! (Three!)"

Higher, my eyes darted in all directions before finally rolling back in my head.

Darkness.

"PACHA! (GO!)"

No more floating.

My body jolted awake.

I bolted upright.

My eyes were open.

I could see.

Large, glittering eyes peered back at me, growing with excitement. They were set upon a round, white face. Cherubic. It was meticulously white, no signs of dinginess or laziness in it its upkeep. Pure. At the apple of its cheeks were gray circles. The pokémon cradled its face with its tiny little arms, looking at me with a look of surprise that bordered on stupefaction. It was so close, so undeniably close; moving closer by with each labored breath that I took. Too close.

"AHHHHHHHHH!" I screamed.

"PACHAAAAAAAA!" it cried.

"MURRRRRRRRR!"

The earth seemed to trembled and leaves began to fall from the trees. The white pokémon scattered, clutching its ears in agony. I lay there on the ground, rolling back and forth, praying that Whismur would put an end to all of this commotion.

"PLEASE!" I begged, my voice cracking with emotion. I'd had enough. I just wanted it all to be over once and for all. I placed the right side of my head down onto the rock and mashed my ear shut with my other free hand. It helped to alleviate the infernal noise that surrounded me, though not by much.

The ground began to tremble even more. Yet oddly enough, with my right ear pressed to the rock, the vibrations began to take on a different allure. It seemed as though the vibrations were getting stronger and stronger. How could that be? Whismur's voice had a peak, and I was pretty sure that he had reached it. It had to be something else. I pressed my ear down harder onto the slate and really tried to hone in on it. The vibrations were evenly spaced out, yet building in intensity. It could only mean one thing.

Something was coming for us.

Whismur had stopped screaming.

I flipped myself onto my back just into to see a flash of blinding light. It was the sun being reflected off the skin of a small, but highly agitated and beastly-looking pokémon that, at the moment, was reared up on its powerful hind legs. Saliva dripped from the sharp canines that lined its bright pink tongue. Whismur cowered before it, so frightened that it could barely produce more than a squeak as it gawked at the steel-plated pokémon standing before it. The pokémon, which by then I had recognized to be a Lairon, had a look of contempt in its icy blue eyes as it sized up the cowering Whismur before.

"Whismur! Don't just stand there and shiver. DO SOMETHING!" I cried. This pokémon meant business and after just waking up from Whismur's pound attack, being electrocuted by an impish little Pachirisu, and rendered partially deaf in one ear by Whismur's cries, never before had returning the the mansion sounded so appealing.

"Pound!"

Whismur hesitated for a moment and turned to look at me.

"Do it NOW!" I growled.

I guess that was just the push that he needed, for as soon as I had uttered the words, he leaped into the air with that glowing little arm of his and brought it crashing down upon Lairon's head.

Lairon blinked.

Oh shit. It didn't have any effect on him.

Lairon stood up on its hind legs once more and then fell bought her forelegs down with such incredible might, that the slate shelf upon which we were all resting, developed a long deep fissure. I yelped as my body began to slide toward the middle of the rock, where water from the pool beneath the waterfall had begun to fill in. I quickly turned onto my stomach and desperately clawed for a firm grip to keep myself from going into the water. With a waterfall like that, there was bound to be a strong undercurrent. That water was the last place where I wanted to be.

When I had finally latched onto a decent piece of rock, I heard a loud thump and before I knew it, Lairon's penetrating eyes were bearing right into mine. I felt the blood drain out of my face as my hand lost grip of the rock I had previously been holding onto.

"LAIR!" it cried as it opened its massive jaws and leaned forward. I closed my eyes, half-expecting for it to bite my bloody head off. But it didn't. I felt its jaws clamp around my arm instead. I pushed my head up from the water, wondering why I hadn't just been detached from my arm. To my surprise, and utter delight, I could barely feel Lairon's teeth as it hoisted me back onto level ground. It was almost as if it was painstakingly trying not to amputate me.

Once I was out of the water, I barely could breathe a sigh of relief before it had, in one adept movement, forced me on top of it very bony, and uncomfortable, back.

"Mur! Whis mur!" Whismur protested, still stranded on the other island of slate.

Lairon whirled around so fast that I almost was flung back into the water. Then, with one mighty breath, it let out the most blood-curdling roar that I had ever heard. I watched in horror and Whismur leapt off of the island and dove through a patch of bushes. He never turned back.

I then proceeded to be dragged off to somewhere behind the waterfall, all while thinking how Whismur could have been scared off by a roar when he was supposed to be Soundproof.

Darkness all around me. The cave smelled wet, saturated with minerals and natural gases. I could still faintly hear the crashing of the waterfall as it fell into the pool of water below, yet I did not know exactly how far I was from it at the time.

Lairon and I hadn't been walking for a very long time before we reached this space. Once we had arrived, she gently shoved me from her back and up against a wall of the cave whose perspiration mingled with my own on the back of my shirt. Strangely, it felt somewhat refreshing for the day had grown hot under midday sun.

Once I was settled, the familiar though startling blue eyes disappeared from sight. I had thought that maybe it would be a good time to make my getaway though something told me that that wouldn't be the smartest thing to do. Not so soon, anyways. I had to wait for my opportunity.

So I waited and waited and waited some more, wondering how long I would remain in that cave, and also wondering if anyone would care enough to come search for me.

My mind flashed back to Whismur. The fool. What was he thinking, trying to protect me from a Lairon? Granted, I had asked him to defend me, but in retrospect, it wasn't the most intelligent way of handling things. I should have remembered that normal-type attacks had no effect on rock-type pokémon, much less on steel-types. That much should have been common sense. Oh well, desperate circumstances called for desperate measures.

I supposed that there was something endearing and vaguely touching about his effort. It was the first time that he had done something that I had asked him to do, which was a great feat in and of itself. Maybe it was the foreshadowing of a future glorious relationship between trainer and pokémon in the future.

"Humph," I huffed, coming to terms with what had really just gone down. When Lairon had roared, Whismur ran away screaming bloody murder. Who knew when—much less, if—he would return?

Maybe it was for the best.

A low grumbling in the distance snapped me back to reality.

Lairon was on its way back.

Oh joy!

"Lair ron!" it exclaimed. And then, as if she had summoned it out of thin air, another pair of ice blue eyes appeared in the darkness, causing me to leap back, and thus, bump my head against the bumpy cave wall. After muttering a jumble of curses to myself, I rubbed the sore part of my head. It had taken quite the beating that day.

The new pair of eyes were smaller than Lairon's. A lot smaller. And, much to my surprise, they seemed a bit kinder as well. Still, there was something in the way that they hardly ever blinked that produced a sinking feeling in my stomach. I nervously shifted my weight as the eyes drew closer. When I felt the cold metal brush against my skin, a high-pitched yelp escaped my lips. The eyes then flew back a few feet before, after a few hesitant blinks, they began their approach once more. This time, when the pokémon nudged my hand, I felt something small...and fleshy.

"Aron!"

Was it offering me a small animal to eat?

In the dark I could feel my left eyebrow raising in confusion as I accepted the gift. I had fully intended on just discarding the poor thing, but after a few awkward moments of staring from both Lairon and Aron, I decided to suck it up and eat whatever the thing was if it was the only way to appease them.

After taking a deep breath, I tossed it into my mouth and began to chew. Much to my surprise, the flesh burst quite easily under the pressure of my teeth and oozed the most delightful juice. A fruity juice.

Aron had given me a berry to eat!

"Thank you!" I said, not wanting to seem unappreciative. The berry had hit the spot pretty well as my throat was rather parched from all the excitement of the day.

Without any notice, Aron leap into my lap and savagely began to lick and nuzzle me, an odd combination of cold and hot. Unfortunately, I was almost suffocating under the weight of his tiny body. For something that was little over a foot tall, I estimated, he must have weighed as much as I did at the time. When I looked back up into the darkness of the cave, I could see a large pair of eyes staring back at me.

They seemed to have softened.

It was at the moment that I had realized that Lairon was the mother of this Aron. And as Aron clamored in my lap for my affection, I could gradually feel something breaking down inside of me. It was a strange emotion, one that I hadn't felt since my sisters were still very young.

Then suddenly, Aron's armor didn't feel so cold. I could feel his heart rapidly beating beneath his flesh. His blue eyes peered into mine and instead off wanting to shudder and look the other way, I felt drawn to them. Quite frankly, I couldn't take my eyes away from them.

We remained thus for quite some time, almost forgetting that there was another pokémon in the room. How selfish it was of us to not let Lairon join in on our mirth!

But when we finally turned our attention away from one another, we realized that there was nobody else to give it to.

Lairon was gone and we were all alone.

Together.

A shield of tumbling water was all that separated us from the hollows of the cave and the endless expanse of the Luminescent Forest. I reached forward and let the fresh, cold water pelt my open palm, splashing my face in the process. I looked down at Aron, who also happened to be looking up at me. I smiled as if to say "let's go", and we both sidestepped our way around the waterfall.

Together.

"There she is!"

It took some time for my eyes to adjust to harshness of pure, unfiltered light but when they did, I could see what appeared to be a veritable searching party of trainers, their pokémon, and, of course, cameramen. Oh! how I loved the cameramen.

Aron cowered behind my legs as people started to close in on us, looks of concern and befuddlement in their eyes. Some of them even held outstretched arms before me, though I brushed them all away. Who did they think I was?

"You're scaring Aron," I scolded them as I tried to make my way away from the waterfall.

"Delphine," someone cried, though this time it was a more familiar voice. I whirled around to see where it was coming from. Immediately, Lucie appeared with Whismur clutched tightly in her arms. "You had me worried sick, girl! Where ya been?" She immediately dumped Whismur into my arms and swooped me up in a tight embrace. I couldn't help but feel a bit uncomfortable: I had never been this close to Whismur, except when he had rocked my jaw. I had never hugged Lucie either.

I couldn't help but notice how delightfully squishy Whismur was though.

Lucie's lips were pressed into a tight line. Lines of worry etched into her forehead as she searched my blank expression for an answer. Before I could mumble a response, she was already at my feet reaching to stroke Aron's head. "Who's this little cutie?"

"Air!" he squealed as he clamped his jaws dangerously close to Lucie's chipped fingernails. She immediately recoiled from the tiny pokémon and nervously scratched the back of her head, all while saying, "He's a feisty lil thang, ain't he?"

As if intending to contradict what she had just said, Aron immediately began to tug at my sock and whine. Whismur gazed at him with a look of surprise.

"Whismur...whis mur mur rrr," he told Aron.

Aron began to growl.

Whismur shivered.

Lucie looked from one pokémon to the other. "It looks like lil Aron there wants ya to pick 'em up. Delphine! I don't think much likes you holding Whismur and not him!"

I rolled my eyes. "But he's heavier than I am!" I then sat Whismur onto the ground next to Aron, he discretely bumped into him as he went to rub against my leg.

Lucie giggled before turning back to the crowd that had gathered around us. It seemed that always happened whenever something interesting had happened to me. "Well, seems to me that Delphine is doin' quite all right for herself and she's got a brand new Aron too. Y'all can just go on y'all merry way now."

What happened next reminded me a lot of the days when I would come attend the grand premiere of an overly hyped-up movie and the paparazzi would swarm all over me. Normally I would selectively answer a couple of questions and then politely smile and dismiss the other ones, but this time I had no such intentions.

"What happened?"

"What's in the cave?"

"How did you catch an Aron?"

"I want one!"

"Why was Whismur alone?"

"Are those real?"

Me, Lucie, and my two pokémon had already begun to make our way back to the mansion, but I couldn't resist a sudden urge to put all of the questions to an end. With one compact twirl, I turned to face my interrogators. They all seemed to pitch forward a bit, ready to hang onto every word. I could almost see notepads in some of their hands. I stated the words softly, though deliberately so that everyone could hear:

"I'll never tell."

And with that, I turned to rejoin Lucie and the others.

I had had enough adventure for one day.

The next day, overcome by a sudden urge to actually do what I had come to that house for, I found myself running on a treadmill with Aron and Whismur on smaller treadmills by my side. Although I was naturally thin, I was no stranger to some good, old-fashioned physical fitness. Part of the reason why I had been so successful at booking jobs was very much because of my body, which was still soft and feminine, yet toned. I was no waif.

Aron seemed to gallop tirelessly on the gray track of the machine. As he was still very young, he still had countless amounts of energy to spare. Whismur, on the other hand, was not faring so well and I had had to turn down the speed on more than one occasion. The machine was running him instead of the other way around.

"Whismur, I know that your body isn't really suited for speed, but that doesn't mean that you can't make it that way," I told him as I struggled to catch my breath during my full-out sprint.

"Mur," he groaned as his posture sunk and he began to drift towards the end of the treadmill, before finally falling backwards onto the cold, gym floor with swirls in his eyes.

"Aron air!" Aron exclaimed in what was vaguely reminiscent of a giggle. He turned to face Whismur and then blew him a raspberry.

"Whismur," he puffed, too exhausted to muster enough courage to come up with a decent comeback. I had slightly noticed a sort of rivalry between them but failed to give it much attention. A little competition never hurt anyone. Maybe it would push them both over the edge.

Once the rolling carpet of the treadmill began to slow for the cool-down period, I grabbed my water bottle and guzzled it until I had quenched my thirst. Then, stepping down from the treadmill, I produced two bowls from my gym bag and poured some water into them. They eagerly gulped down the water. Aron rubbed up against my leg and I reached down to pat him on the head. Whismur remained off to the side.

"Let's go practice a few attacks!"

With that, we headed off to one of the numerous training rooms in the gym facility. The room itself wasn't excessively large, yet spacious enough to allow for a variety of different pokémon to comfortably practice their moves in. After dabbing the perspiration from my forehead with a towel, I squared Aron and Whismur off from one another. Aron looked ready to pounce as he scraped the ground with his tiny hind leg. Whismur, just stood there, his little arms waving in the air, as if to tell me that he didn't want to battle.

"Whismur, this is the only way that I can see what you're capable of. After that whole fiasco with Aron's mom yesterday, I'm convinced that we have our work cut out for us."

Whismur winced at my words.

Aron turned back to me with a wink.

"Now," I said, standing up tall and pointing at Aron. "Use tackle attack! And you, Whismur, show me what you would do that could stop Aron in his tracks!"

Immediately, Aron took off galloping towards Whismur, his body a tiny, silver blur. He was strikingly fast, something that I had not doubted after seeing him on the treadmill; he closed the distance between he and Whismur in little to no time.

I tensed up. "Whismur, don't just stand there!"

But apparently, Whismur had other plans. He shot up into the air just before Aron could barrel into him. While still in the air, he held his arms out, evenly-spaced apart. A small purple and black orb began to form in the center of the space. I stood there in awe as Whismur launched the orb—a Shadow Ball—at Aron, who had turned just in time to get hit square in the face by the attack. His skidded back several feet, his little body tumbling over and over again.

I stood there almost horrified, wondering when he would ever stop rolling. But after a few seconds or so, I realized that he wasn't just reeling from the blow. He seemed to right himself as he cut a wide arc around the battlefield. Right away, it sunk in that he was using a Rollout attack.

With breakneck speed, he crashed into Whismur and sent him flying into the air. Whismur landed on the ground with a loud thud and I took a step forward, thinking that it was over. But when I saw Whismur struggle to his feet, I knew that he wasn't down for the count. Not just yet, anyways.

Aron continued to roll across the the floor, intending to battle until Whismur was knocked out for good. Whismur stood there, waiting for him to get closer.

"What could he possibly be doing?" I wondered out loud.

Within seconds, Aron was three feet away from colliding into Whismur. Then, in one swift movement, Whismur threw up his arms and let out one loud, acute scream. A wave of energy shot through the air, causing Aron to roll out of his attack. He stood there, eyes widened. Petrified.

"Whismur just used an Astonish attack," I grinned. This was unbelievable.

Without waiting for Aron to snap out of his stupor, Whismur leaped forward with a glowing arm. He connected dead-on with Aron's face, sending him flying backwards. Aron landed on his back, legs in the air. Dazed.

I coughed.

"Whismur?"

I didn't know what to say. I was absolutely at a loss for words as I headed over to where the two pokémon were standing. Whismur's body heaved with each ragged breath as he glared at the fainted baby pokémon, who had begun to cry with heavy sobs from the pain. Without thinking, I rushed over to Aron's side and cradled his head in my lap.

"Aww, Aron. It's ok. Don't cry! You did so great!" I cooed while rocking back and forth.

"Mur," Whismur murmured, his ear drooping ever so slightly.

Aron proved to be quite inconsolable at the moment. All that I could do was comfort him as he expressed the disappointment of losing his first battle. But Aron was a resilient little thing and before long, his tears subsided and we began to pack up our things. We'd had enough training for the day. What we all need was some rest and relaxation.

As I went to open the door to exit from the training room, I realized the doorknob was no longer there and collided into whatever was obstructing the entrance.

"You're not going anywhere until I defeat you and your loser pokémon!" A shrill voice demanded.

I didn't have to look up to know that it was Minerva.