"No—!"
Ryan woke with a start, gasping for breath as he hurriedly sat up. The Umbreon whom had been curled up asleep on his chest let out a yelp of surprise as he was suddenly flung onto the mattress.
He was in his room in the Pokémon Centre. No eyes glaring in the darkness. No computerised screeches. Sunlight shone dimly through the curtains, indicating that it was morning already.
It was just a dream… thank Arceus.
"Sorry, Jay," he said quietly, reaching over to pet the dark-type. The Pokémon just let out a quiet mumble at his ears being scratched, simply having curled up once more as if he wanted to go back to sleep.
Ryan cast a glance over at the clock on the wall. It was only 7:00AM – that was earlier than he usually got up even on a school day, but after having a dream like that he didn't fancy trying to sleep again. He didn't want to end up seeing that creature again.
After the encounter with that thing yesterday, Nate had showed him the way out of the forest before vanishing somewhere within the trees once more, having assured him that Lucas would recover from the injury soon enough. The man hadn't been how Ryan had envisioned the region's champion at all. Sure, he certainly had an air of strength about him, as did his Pokémon. But Ryan had met former champions of Unova before – his mother was one of them, even though she'd only been the champion for less than a year, as she'd told him, and he'd met Alder a few times already on his journey. They all seemed pretty nice, and he expected as much from someone with such a strong bond with their Pokémon that they'd manage to be the strongest in the region, but there was something different about Nate. He wasn't entirely sure what it was, but he'd expected the champion to look a little more… healthy?
Ryan had soon headed back to Nimbasa City after that, seeking the surroundings of people and real Pokémon after running into the creature in the forest. They'd been to see the musical despite the boy having doubts that he'd enjoy it, but watching people and Pokémon perform together was actually a rather breathtaking experience. The Pokémon in the show had been especially dedicated to learning their lines despite the fact that people couldn't understand them – the musical was entertainment for the Pokémon watching it as well as the people. Either way, Jay had seemed most interested in the special effects on the stage, and Mariana had run to hide under Ryan's seat when the bad guy of the show started addressing the audience.
Deciding he might as well get up now that he was awake, Ryan quietly made his way across the room, trying not to wake any of the other Pokémon. Jay had curled up on the pillow now that it was no longer occupied. There was a double sofa in the room as well, half of which was entirely taken up by Axle. Charlotte seemed to have a likening for sleeping on the sofa arms, claiming it was like lying on a really soft tree branch, and somehow she never fell off despite how often she looked in danger of doing so. Mariana seemed to prefer to just take one of the cushions and place it on the ground nearby before making herself comfortable there instead.
After closing the bathroom door as silently as he could, it didn't take long to get changed out of his pyjamas and into a new set of clothes. He'd been wearing the old ones far longer than his mother would have allowed him to back at home, and as much as he hated the idea of having to do chores while he was travelling, he was going to have to wash them so he could wear them again soon. Thankfully there were washing machines in the lower floors of the Pokémon Centre so he wouldn't have to do it by hand.
Thinking about his mother, however, he soon found himself pulling the hairbrush out of his bag. If there was one thing Ryan hated, it was brushing his hair – and he wasn't too fond of other people doing it for him either, seeing as how much it hurt when they did. But he had to admit, he was starting to look even scruffier than usual after travelling for more than a week.
A muffled tapping at the door caught his attention, and he opened it quietly, met with a concerned-looking Dewott. She opened her mouth to speak, but before she could make a sound Ryan placed an index finger on his lips, signalling to be silent as he pointed to the sleeping Pokémon with his other hand. Pulling the door back slightly so there was enough room for the creature to slip through, he closed it behind them.
"Sorry, didn't wanna wake them." He apologised, trying to keep his voice low. Jay did sometimes have a habit of being grumpy when something woke him – and judging by the death glare Charlotte had thrown him the last time he tried to wake her up, he wasn't the only one.
"You're up really early," Mariana pointed out, her gaze fleeting between him and the sink.
"Couldn't get back to sleep," Ryan shrugged simply, not wanting to explain his nightmare to the most nervous one of the whole team. Placing the brush aside for now, he carefully lifted her up onto the counter, turning on both taps and putting the plug in the sink.
"Oh, okay."Seeming to settle for that as a decent enough answer, she crouched down and reached one paw into the water. Being a water-type, Mariana seemed to have developed a fascination for sinks, showers and any other household device that could seemingly make water appear out of nowhere. Once the basin was half full Ryan switched off the taps, leaving the surface to slowly settle until the Pokémon waded into it. She was just the right size to be able to take a bath in the sink as long as it wasn't too full. They'd learnt that one the hard way a few days ago.
Unlike Jay who'd make a fuss if he tried to clean him, Mariana liked the water and was more than capable of bathing herself, so Ryan left her to it, instead working on trying to get the stubborn knots out of his hair. It wasn't quite as difficult as he'd expected – and Touko was right; it did feel nicer when his hair wasn't a mess. Perhaps he should brush it more often.
"Did you really meet the champion?" the water-type asked as she climbed back onto the counter, dripping water onto it but resisting the need to shake herself dry. Ryan had gotten soaked the last time she did that.
Grabbing one of the unused towels from the rack on the wall, Ryan handed it to her before pulling out the plug to drain the sink. "Yeah, we saw him out in the forest yesterday."
"What was he like? Did his Pokémon look really strong?"
"Pretty strong, I guess," he shrugged. Due to everything that had happened yesterday, the thought of battling Nate hadn't really crossed his mind. They had a long way to go if they were going to be able to stand up to the strength of his Pokémon. The league was the ultimate goal of their journey, after all. "And I guess he seemed pretty nice. He's really… optimistic."
"He sounds like a good person. I guess that's why he's the champion." Her voice was muffled by the towel as she tried to dry her fur – that was something she still needed practice with. She'd almost got herself tangled up in the fuzzy material. Ryan wondered whether he should help her, but she soon reappeared from the towel looking like a giant ball of fuzz. Catching her reflection in the mirror, she swiftly tried to flatten down her ruffled fur.
"I think he's been the champion for quite a while. He said nobody's taken the title from him for fourteen years," Ryan recalled. "That means nobody's been able to beat him since before I was even born. We're gonna have to get a lot stronger if we're going to challenge him."
The gym leader was dragged out of sleep by the sound of knocking on her front door. Very loud knocking. Unless someone was trying to break her door down, there was only one person that could be. It took a lot of effort to groggily drag herself out of bed, casting a quick glance at the mirror before deciding that it probably wasn't worth spending the time to sort out her bedhead or else the visitor might actually end up breaking down the door. Besides, she knew who it was, and they wouldn't mind if she looked like her Emolga had tried to style her hair again.
Rubbing at her eyes, she made her way to the front door – which was still being assaulted – and yanked it open, fixing the visitor with a fierce glare.
Elesa had never really been a morning person.
Skyla, having been friends with her for over twenty years now, was more than used to that. "Elesa! Did you get the message from Cheren too?"
"What message?" she mumbled, still half asleep. Granted, she had received a call from the younger gym leader even earlier that morning, but she'd just given him some very stern words about calling her at 6:30AM and then hung up. Was she supposed to have waited for an important message? That was his fault for waking her so early.
"Didn't he give you the message? He said to try and keep people away from Lostlorn Forest. I'd have thought he would have called you first…"
Oops. Maybe that was why he'd called at such a ridiculous time – for Elesa, at least. "Alright, fine. Any reason why?"
"He didn't say much. Just that there was something dangerous there. And…" the redhead shuffled her feet. "I think I heard something when I was at Lentimas Town last night. I don't know if it's connected or if I was just imagining it, but…"
Elesa let out a tired sigh, opening the door wider. She was still trying to rub the sleep from her eyes. "Come in. If we're going to have a serious conversation at this hour, I need some coffee."
After an hour of doing nothing, Ryan had eventually got bored enough to want to get the laundry task out of the way. Jay had been reluctant to leave the pillow at first, but at the risk of being left behind while everyone else got breakfast, he was soon looking as energetic as ever.
As they ate, a television on the centre's wall was displaying the news. They'd turned the sound up slightly so that people would be able to hear what they were saying over the chatter of people and Pokémon.
"Due to instructions from the league, people are advised to avoid the Lostlorn Forest area for safety reasons. No further information has been disclosed to the public."
Ryan almost choked on his cereal. Was that because of the thing they'd seen there yesterday?
"How do they get those people in that box?" Charlotte questioned.
"It's an image," Axle muttered from beneath the table. Jay had taken an interest in the larger bowl of food the dragon had having finished his own breakfast, and the Fraxure let out a warning growl to try and keep him away, pulling the bowl closer to him.
"I'm hungry!" the dark-type whined.
"Jay, you only just had breakfast," Ryan stated, something he seemed to be saying a lot these days.
"He's just being a baby," Charlotte tutted, hopping down from the chair she'd been sitting on to reach her own bowl on the table. "Don't be scared of the big tough dragon." She swiped a pawful of Axle's food.
"Hey!" he snapped, trying to swat her away but wasn't fast enough.
"Now, now, sharing is caring!" she grinned, patting his head with her free paw and earning an irritated snarl as she stuffed the food into her mouth.
Shortly after, they headed back out into the city, Mariana and Axle inside their capsules once more as they didn't like the crowds. Ryan knew they could go and challenge the gym, but he still had the feeling they weren't quite ready. All of the gym battles he'd had so far had been incredibly close – was that something that training could help, or was that just the way those battles were?
Either way, he wanted to put off that battle as long as he could for now. At least he knew what type the gym leader was, even if they didn't have anything to counter it. At the very least, he knew not to make Mariana battle electric-type Pokémon.
They'd explored and battled trainers on Route 16 yesterday, so the logical thing today would be to head the opposite way, to Route 5. It looked quite similar to the other route, both sides lined with forest and grass where there would likely be a plentiful of wild Pokémon. A few shop-style caravans were set up at the side of the road, some selling various trinkets and others with a lot of baked food on display. Street performers played further down the street, almost drowning out the beeping of a reversing garbage truck nearby.
"Eww, it stinks here!" Jay pawed at his nose, as if that was supposed to solve the problem.
At least it'll stop him from smelling the food and getting hungry again, Ryan thought silently. "Don't worry, Jay, they'll be gone soon." The refuge collectors had just come to do as their namesake, collecting the bags which had been left behind the caravans. "Some of the people watching the performances look like trainers. Maybe we can battle them when they're done."
"Yay! Battles!" Needless to say, the Umbreon's attitude could certainly change quickly.
Charlotte glanced behind her as they walked along. "Hey, Ryan? Why are they putting that Pokémon in the truck?"
"Huh?" He followed her glance. One of the refuge collectors was walking across the path, carrying another bag and preparing to throw it into the back of the garbage truck.
Except this bag looked slightly different from the others. At first glance it seemed like it was torn in a few places, but now that he looked, that wasn't the contents spilling out the sides – those were arms.
That wasn't an ordinary bag of trash. If he didn't do something, it was going to get crushed in the back of the van.
"Wait, stop!" he shouted, startling Jay as he ran towards the man. "That's not garbage! That's a Pokémon!"