The universe became nothing but a gray, shifting fog rimmed in black. All sounds in it were dull and low and uniform, as though I was in a fishbowl while someone tapped the glass. And yet, I was never feeling pain. I'd been slowly growing numb after my collapse, and the more complete my neural deadness, the better I felt. This fishbowl world was relaxing, and continued to draw me deeper in as I watched it sway above me. I didn't know why, but however large the darkness grew around it, I was never completely engulfed, though I did nothing to fight against it.

Time had ceased to exist. I'll never know how long I resided in the quietly fluctuating gray-black universe.

When it finally changed, it was because to a sudden tipping of the water that was my brain. It lapped against the inside of my forehead, accompanied by sudden wave of nausea. I gagged, but there was nothing to come up.

Then, the mental puddle slapped back against the base of my skull, and with that, the world became still.

I simply stared into the haze. The darkness had subsided, perhaps scared away by the momentary shift, and was staying in firm place along the edges of my vision. I knew cold. I knew tingling in my shoulder. I knew nothing more.

Though I remained still, a blob of green emerged from the bottom of the haze. I blinked at it, slowly, and a low sound seemed to come from it. Some distant memory was trying to tell me what it was, but my mental capacity was still drowning in the fishbowl.

The feeling in my shoulder suddenly changed. Tingling morphed into a single roaring anguish, and I heard a sound like a creaking hinge exit my throat, tears springing into my eyes. The separate sensations combined to clear a thin layer of the haze on my perception. I became aware of my own labored breathing and the sweat on my skin—a warm topcoat over the permeating chill. Numbness, once gone, didn't completely return, and even though feeling was minimal, it was enough to bring pain back into my unappreciative grasp. I couldn't even think about trying to move; every muscle was pounding and heavy

So I continued to lie there, shoulder pulsating with pain, while the green blob continued to float above me. I kept my eyes on it, blinking purposefully, trying to push back the remains of the haze that pain hadn't cleared away. It made another sound, clearer this time, and a fact dully rose to the surface of my mind; a single bubble from the depths of fatigue.

"Reuniclus," I said in a cracked whisper.

And then my cheeks were stinging. Not strongly, but enough to make me wince, and I could feel the pinprick of discomfort running down my face in a line. At that same instant, a tangy liquid was filling my mouth and washing the dirt off my tongue. I swallowed it gratefully and without pause, the taste of it smacking me in the back of the nose. I could almost feel it splashing into my empty stomach. Where it landed, warmth came into existence and began to slowly radiate outward, climbing up my torso and down my legs and sweeping away weariness, layer by layer. I clung to whatever the source of the delicious, healing juice was, desperate for its continued effects to wash over me and lift the paralyzing weights from my muscles.

When I reached the end of the life-giving spring, I took a gasping breath. Nearly everything still hurt; my stomach and knee were burning, my shoulder was stiff and throbbing, and both cheeks hurt enough to make me fear smiling. But this was all the soreness of external damage. My legs hurt only on the outside, rather than pounding from the inside-out due to overuse, and—a wonderful relief—my head was coming down from the high of blood loss, at least to the point where I could think. As well as see the ceiling of wherever we were, hidden a great deal by the shadowed form of Reuniclus.

"Sitrus Berry Juice," I murmured, coherent enough now to remember the strong taste. I smiled at him, biting back a flinch. "Thank you."

He smiled back at me, but stayed where he was, his eyes searching my face. There was something expectant in his closeness, as though he wanted me to move or wanted himself to guess what else I needed, but neither seemed to be occurring. I wasn't tired to the point of being dazed, but I had still lost blood and was possessed by a lingering lethargy as though a high fever had just broken.

"I'm fine now," I assured him, which was, for the most part, true. "Drink some of that juice yourself, okay? I'll be up in a minute."

There was a moment of hesitation, and then he slowly floated out of view.

My eyes fell closed, then, though I didn't intend sleep, despite how easy I knew it would be to let it take me over. I made the world fall away from me until I was all that existed in the darkness, and I took a deep breath, fingers twitching at the stinging of my burned skin as it stretched over my ribs, then let it slowly out. I felt my memory beginning to rebuild itself from the ground up, replaying the preceding events before my eyes so that I might determine both where we were and where we might go next.

The blurry world I'd passed through meant nothing in terms of revealing location, but I recalled my short babbling while Reuniclus was lifting me, and guessed we'd finally found the cafeteria; this also explained the juice. Most likely, there was more where that came from, as well as more varieties of berries I could use. Once I found them, I could heal Reuniclus, too, as well as my own injuries. I'd have to go from there in terms of planning our next move, though. Neither of us could do anything now, as weak as we were, so I would just focus on putting us back together before I did anything else—indeed, at the moment, that was all I could do.

Well, I supposed, the one other thing I could do was sit up.

The tiled ceiling looked back at me dully as I opened my eyes and urged the first bit of movement into my neck. Moving up, my head swam a little, and my back and shoulders moaned in protest. Pain shot up the arm Simipour had bitten, and I placed all my weight on the uninjured one, which made it a little more bearable. However, my stomach could only hurt worse, as my new position made burned flesh fold over and rub burned flesh. I sucked it a breath, face contracting in discomfort, but eventually came to rest in a sitting position, relishing the feeling of cold tile beneath by freed palms. I was sweating mildly and breathing a little heavily, and my injured arm and stomach were pounding.

Reuniclus floated just past my feet, eyeing me over the empty bottle at his lips. He looked at me with eyes clear and sharp with the effects of the Sitrus Berries. Behind him, I saw metal carts with half-roofs made of plexi-glass pushed up against the wall. Tall, safe-like rectangles flanked them, and on the walls surrounding us were opaque doors with large, heavy metal handles and glass-front doors with tiny silver knobs. One of the large doors was open, a few bottles and boxes spilled on the floor near its entrance. So, we were in the kitchen.

I turned behind me and saw a door with large windows on either side. One of the carts was crushed up against it, and I felt my eyes widen. I faced Reuniclus, and he looked a little embarrassed.

"Think you could bring me some more berries, Reuniclus?" I asked, chuckling. "Pecha and Rawst. Do you know what they look like?"

He did. After a moment he returned from the open storage fridge with arms full of both, and dropped them into a rough pile before me, looking curious and eager.

I started with my arm which, I discovered, Reuniclus must have crudely wrapped in an apron. Large spots of crusted blood came off when I lifted the fabric, but there was plenty left all down my arm. I grimaced and asked for a wet towel…or six

By the time I was done cleaning my arm, three of them were stained a dark shade of pink. I tossed the last one to the side with the rest and got my first look at the wound. The punctures left weren't very deep, but there were a lot of them encircling the top and back of my shoulder, each one with a tiny well of red beginning to peek out of it. I wasted no time grabbing a Pecha berry, though Reuniclus, who had been observing quietly up until this point, made an inquisitive noise when I did.

I looked to him, grinning. "It disinfects," I explained, and split the skin of the berry with my nail; squeezed it so the pale-pink juice bubbled out of the cut and onto my arm.

I hissed when the juice made contact, sharp needles of pain emerging wherever the drops laded.

In an instant, Reuniclus was in front of me, looking worriedly at my burning shoulder, and then to me. I jumped back a little and stared into his eyes, startlingly close to mine and filled with concern. "Reuniclus, don't worry," I said, a little taken aback. "It hurts, but that means it's working. I'm alright now. It's okay."

He looked at me for another moment then gradually floated back, but remained fairly close. It made me feel a bit uneasy to see such sadness in his expression when it was directed at me, but I had to finish patching myself up.

Once the stinging had dimmed, I wiped the excess off with one of the remaining towels. Finally, employing Reuniclus' hands, I re-wrapped the wound, smiling at our handiwork and then at him, but he had looked away.

My smile faded while I watched him sway back and forth in the air, fidgeting with his arms and rubbing at his burn. "Hey, hey," I called gently. He looked back up at me with a sad, sheepish expression. "Don't mess with it, okay? Just wait a second." And I began the second momentous task of getting to my feet.

This proved to be less difficult than sitting up. The damage to my legs had been minimal, and they were fairly ready to cooperate. Changing height made my brain rock back a little in my head, and I staggered when I finally reached my feet, but, other than that, it was a fairly painless process. In fact, to be standing was actually a bit of a relief, since I hadn't stood completely upright since before I'd been handcuffed. Despite the ache in my shoulder and my stomach, I stretched towards the ceiling, and I reveled in it.

"Alright," I smiled at Reuniclus. "C'mere. Let's get you taken care of, huh?"

I picked up a few of the Rawst berries and walked over to the cart holding the door shut. I'd already found a fork and was using my uninjured arm to mash the berries when I finally felt him beside me, watching the tiny blue fruits combine into a pulpy, seedy mush.

"Give me your arm," I said, and he lifted it slowly into my vision.

For the first time, I saw his burn close up, and I grimaced. It looked like the surface of a toasted marshmallow, dark and blistering and dirty with dead skin and rubble. I still hadn't looked at my stomach yet, but I knew it couldn't be this bad. How he had managed to hide his pain for so long, I thought, looking at him through the corner of my eye, was something I would never know. That he had to at all made me feel a pang of guilt, and I looked away, flushing.

I first used the last of the towels to clean the surface of the burn, and then scooped a handful of Rawst berry pulp and began to rub the mash onto his skin.

A few moments of silence passed, and I reached a comfortable equilibrium with the monotonous motion of my fingers. He winced and let out a little whimper, and I hummed reassurances under my breath about the swiftness with which I'd be finished; his muscles tensed with discomfort, but he was otherwise silent after that.

At last, I was wrapping a towel around his arm. "Reuniclus," I began, tying off the fabric. "I…I know I never really asked, but I really appreciate all you've done for me. I'd still be back in my cell if it weren't for you, so…I just want to thank you for your help." I turned to him, smiling, and found him looking back at me with silent tears in his eyes.

"Hey, what's—?"

"Reu!" he cried, and cut me off by throwing his long arms around me.

Pain flared at the contact and the little tag in his ear smacked my cheek. "Reuniclus, what's the matter!"

"Cici!"

The voice of a child sounded in my head—it didn't come in from my ears; it sounded from within my head. I gasped.

"I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"

For a moment, I just stood there. I could feel tears soaking the skin on my shoulder. My eyes shifted to the cumbersome form pressing against me. "Reuniclus…is that you?"

He pulled back, but kept hold of my shoulders. "You saved me and you got hurt! I'm sorry, Cici! I'm sorry!"

Our eyes locked, his streaming tears and mine wide with shock. I'd learned long ago that psychic pokemon could communicate with telepathy, but this was the first time I'd experienced it. The voice of this pokemon was suddenly as startlingly human as it was sad; both were so strong it was almost painful. Suddenly I could hear the voice of the child in this large, ill-fitting body; hear the child that had been forced into maturity.

"No," I whispered and, finally able to lift it, put my hand on his forehead. "No, it's not your fault. Don't be sorry, please…"

"But…"

I shook my head. "You've done so much more for me, Reuniclus. You helped me get out of prison, you kept me safe after the battle; you even protected me, too, while we were fighting. Remember?"

Behind my eyes, I watched Simipour get blown back by Energy Ball, but I knew it was not my memory. Reuniclus nodded lightly.

"See? So there's no reason to be sorry. Helping each other is just what friends do. And that's what we are now, Reuniclus."

He was quiet again, inside and outside of his mind, and then a wide smile broke out across his face. For the second time, he embraced me, nuzzling my shoulder.

"Ow," I groaned, but suddenly it was like the dam on his mind broke open and my head was flooded with his memories.

I was first in a field, staring at a man in the same uniform as every other in this facility, save for the violet stripe on his shoulder. A pokeball flew from his hand, and then my vision was filled with a blinding red light, then cut instantly off by darkness as though I'd gone blind. Light came back in a violent flash of white and I was in what looked like an empty warehouse with a Zebstrika neighing loudly and pawing at the floor; a blue tag on its ear read H29. The motion of the ensuing battle was fast and dizzying, and it was almost impossible to tell what move was being used by whom and when it missed or when it hit. When it finally ended, the Zebstrika was on the ground, and then the world faded gradually back to black. I watched every battle after that speed past my eyes like the landscape out of a train window; I watched the intensity dwindle until I stopped using moves was floating high above the enemy pokemon and touching the top of the warehouse, laughter ringing in my ears. And then I was back on the floor, a man approaching me with a piercing gun. No more battles; only gazing down upon the pokemon below, waving and calling out to them before I tumbled down and was engulfed in black.

My head felt like it was going to burst but I couldn't cry out. I was mesmerized by what I saw because it was like I was experiencing it myself; I could see and hear and smell and feel everything so strongly it hurt.

But it didn't stop. One more image emerged from the blackness, completely different from everything I'd seen before.

I was soaring high above the world, propelling myself through the warm summer sun and looking down on forests and lakes and rainbow-colored fields. I danced with birds as we met in the air, skimmed the surface of the ocean with my hand, flew to the top of the highest tree and swung on the branches. And I was warm, and I was happy, and I was free to fly anywhere in the world, with no one who could force me to land.

And then it was over.

It was like my consciousness crash-landed back into my body. My muscles jerked and Reuniclus released me, frightened by my sudden motion. I stood, staring at him, head aching while drops of sweat beaded my skin. My breath was ragged as it passed my lips.

I just stared at him, mind reforming itself as the foreign memories cemented themselves into mine. "Reuniclus…"

He looked back at me, confused and hurt, while my heart thundered in my chest.

Then I was walking towards him, still dazed, and didn't stop until my face collided with his slick, lumpy forehead. I wrapped my arms around him, ignoring the pain in my shoulder, and murmured, "Reuniclus, I'm so sorry."

"Cici?" His voice was gentle, still baffled. "I thought we didn't have to be sorry."

I shook my head. Neither of us knew why I'd seen what I had—apparently, he hadn't even realized I'd seen it—but it couldn't be taken back, and suddenly, there was more weighing on my finding my parents and escaping this place then just my family's lives. I also had the lives of countless pokemon, just like Reuniclus, in my hands; pokemon with dreams and desires that the man on the intercom and his soldiers had crushed, turning them all into nothing more than the numbers on their tags.

Pulling away, I looked to the red plastic on his ear; K08 was etched into it.

K08. That was who Reuniclus was here: a letter and a number amidst a sea of more letters and numbers. No one else here knew what I did about him, and even if they did, they wouldn't have cared. As long as he was here, he'd be as trapped as I was—worse, I thought, remembering the guard's warning. After everything he'd done, if his memories gave me any insight into these people, he'd most likely never see the sun again.

I lifted my eyes and looked into his. I could feel my sadness giving way to rage as I clung to him.

"You're shaking…" he thought quietly.

"Reuniclus," I whispered fervently. "I know what you want more than anything in the world, and I promise I'll help you get it."

He gasped. "What?"

I smiled, "I can get you out of here, Reuniclus, and you'll never have to come back again. But I just need your help a little bit longer." I took one of his hands in both of mine and told him what I'd seen and what I needed. I told him in more detail why I'd released him from the pokeball and told him everything I knew about what we were getting into…which was very little. I could only say that somewhere was the leader of this organization, as well as my parents, and that I had to find them and take him down, no matter what. The only way I could do this, I said again, was with his help; I couldn't get anywhere on my own in a place filled with trainers.

"You don't like to battle," I said, tapping his temple. "I saw that. But if you'll battle with me just a little bit longer, I promise I'll set you free. Okay?"

I was reminded of the look he'd given me during the battle: the look of utter disbelief that had crossed it when I assured him he wouldn't be fighting alone. It was almost as funny as it was infuriating that being helped selflessly was so strange to him.

After a moment of this look, he nodded, smiling as he squished my hands between both of his.

"Helping each other is what friends do, right?"

"Thank you," I smiled back. "Thank you so much."

That was when I heard the laughter; rich and chilling and familiar, yet utterly foreign in the scene. I jumped, and then I froze.

"So this is where you went," said a voice.

I knew it immediately from the intercom, muffled now by the door. The same fear I'd felt in my prison was suddenly dripping down my spine. I hated it, but it came without warning and I couldn't escape it. I started shivering and, in my grasp, Reuniclus was, too.

My head turned to the door with agonizing slowness. "You…" I whispered.

"There are a few things I wish to discuss with you, Cicero," he told me, knocking lightly on the door. "I'll be waiting outside. Please, don't be long." And I could almost hear his deliberate footsteps moving away and into silent oblivion.

For a few seconds, I just stared at the door. Then the ice-water of fear suddenly began to boil and I let out a breath I hadn't realized I was holding and my dwindling rage came back in a rush of heat through my veins. He was here, at last, and I was ready.

And I was not alone.

"Reuniclus…"

I don't know if he saw it in my mind or found his own determination, but, before my eyes, the cart slid out from in front of the door.