Disclaimer: I don't own.

Special Thanks to: MJ and Shrey Fair for reviewing.

Please Note: Next chapter after this is short. This is standard in length. Sorry I did not update yesterday. Sick, but getting better. Oh, feel free to guess what the evil thing is.

I looked at the Nurse Joy and Chansey bent over me, both looking at me worriedly. The Devon Researcher had left me a Great Ball for use as thanks and wished me luck in finding my missing Combusken. I would not believe Thor to be dead, he was just missing. There was no way he could have died while I was knocked out.

"I need to find my Combusken," I said, pleading for the tenth time.

"You need to rest," the nurse said, her Chansey glaring at me for trying to get up. All my other Pokemon had been thoroughly checked through and were fine, now crowding around my bed to make sure I lived, according to them. Azul was pale in worry over Thor, while Sirius pouted at the fact that he lost his good friend. M did not react, as she usually is not very expressive with emotions in her blank face. Drake's Pokemon also looked worried, surprisingly even his miniature sadist of a Mudkip, Toru.

"Please, may I find him? I need him here. He's part of family," I begged the nurse.

"No," she sternly said, taking my blood with a needle in my arm. I glared at her and then, silenced myself.

As soon as both Nurse Joy and the Chansey left, I returned all my Pokemon, except Azul. She stood next to me, curiously, as I climbed out of bed and went to the open window. As a headstrong person, there was no way I would not escape from those confines of the hospital and not search for my missing Combusken. Azul frowned as she scanned the rim of my thoughts and said, in her telepathic way, "Mistress, this is dangerous. You are still in the intensive care unit."

"Do you want to find Thor or not?" I roughly asked her. She nodded eagerly and started to lift me telepathically off the sill and on to the ground below us. The alarms resonated as my body left the window sill, and we both paled, which still left me to wonder about how Pokemon do that. Azul accidentally dropped me out of fright once a nurse grabbed her by the arm, but I was nearly down then. She cast her Confusion attack on the nurse and jumped out into my arms, as I ran away in a Team Rocket style.

I saw the Devon researcher looking out to the north east portion of the city, which led out to Rustboro Cave. Once he saw me, the look of astonishment was etched on his face. I waved at him and walked over, and he asked, "How are you up?"

"I escaped my hospital prison. Now, where's the Aqua bastard." He winced at my choice of vocabulary and pointed to Rustboro Cave.

"Your Pokemon and the man headed that way, along with another kid from earlier," he said. I nodded and ran, and then realized what he said about another kid. Did he mean Reah?

We met up with several trainers along the road, and I had hidden my Poke-balls, indicating to them that I had no intention of battling. They were rather useless in directions, getting me lost for another thirty minutes in the thick grove of trees. I pushed away the branches with one hand and held on to my satchel with the other, until I came on to the entrance of the cave.

An old man waved me over and I ignored him and his rambling of his Peeko, whatever that was. Lepi and Toru appeared from their balls and glared at the man, as Toru bared his surprisingly sharpened fangs at the old man. So that's what he does at night…

I walked in thanks to my Pokemon's help and began to search my satchel once I heard a wild Pokemon inside of the cave. And then, I groaned, as I had dropped my Repels. Toru laughed and sprayed a wild Whismur into a wall. I did not even bother to check if it was alive or to scold Toru, as I was in a hurry and did not want to see it. As long as I did not see it, I did not have to catch it, if it survived.

A flash of red and cream caught my eye, along with blue and white. I saw the Aqua man backed to a corner of the wall, and, much to my surprise, an unharmed Thor following Drake's battle commands. The Poochyena on the floor that the Aqua man had used before was bleeding profusely from a gaping wound at its side, but was miraculously still alive.

"Get up, you stupid mutt," the Aqua man said, as Drake glared.

"Your Pokemon is in no condition to fight, and you still persist in pushing it. You truly are despicable. Thor, Double Kick." My Combusken nodded with a fierce look on his face, one that I had never seen before, and kicked the Aqua man in the chest, where we heard a sick, cracking sound of the man's arm breaking. The man screamed out in pain, but Thor did not kick him the second time, afraid of killing him. While he did deserve it, Drake and I could go to jail for it.

"Please, have mercy, don't kill me!" the Aqua pleaded, as both Thor and Drake looked at him, pitiless glares on their faces.

"You didn't have any on the innocent Wurmple," Drake said, spitting on the man cruelly like how the Aqua had done on Rojo's dead body.

"STOP!" I screamed, as I ran out of the rock that I was hiding. All three of them looked at me, as the badly injured Poochyena on the rocky hard floor whimpered. Both Toru and Lepi followed me, hiding behind me from what they saw. Had Drake really made my Thor a killing machine was the only thought that went on in my head as revealed myself.

"Lia, I wasn't going to kill him," Drake calmly assured, as Thor nodded gently, placing a talloned arm on my shoulder, while I was visibly shivering with what I had watched so far. It looked realistic enough.

"I was just going to make him apologize," Drake said, smiling. "You know that I do not believe in killing."

"But, what I saw…" I said. As both Thor and Drake were consoling me, the Aqua man headed out through the door and ran for freedom, forgetting his Poochyena behind in the midst of his escape. The fallen puppy whimpered and looked at us, shutting his eyes in pain.

"We have to get him to a Pokemon Center," I said, remembering what occurred to Sirius. Drake shook his head.

"Why not?" I asked him, about to pick up the Poochyena.

"He lost his will to live. Sirius had it still in him when he nearly died. This little one lost it through the abuse he received from the Aqua man."

"Who are you to decree if a Pokemon should live or die?" I asked him, scowling. He sighed.

"Look at the scars on his body. He has been through a lot. The fact that he is closing his eyes means that he wants peace. In death, let's just hope he finds it," he said, silently motioning to Thor to end the Poochyena's life. I protested to stop it, but the Poochyena opened his eyes and gave a sad smile, before Thor eased its pain by killing it with one simple, yet powerful punch to the back of the head, causing the nervous system to cease functioning. There was no blood from the punch, just a cracking noise, and then, stillness.

We buried the Poochyena and Drake made a short eulogy for it. I placed an Oran Berry from my satchel on the tiny mound of cave soil, as an offering, and we walked out together. What we never noticed was a tiny flash of a black light and a ghost of an oval form with black smoke behind it, which sort of resembled a Haunter from Kanto, but was not one, appear and laugh evilly.

Teams are the same in both Nuzlocke versions.