Yellow P.O.V.

Battle Group A. Why me, world whyyyyy. I just hope it doesn't end like last time, in P.E.

My safest bet is battling with Blue. My second safest is Silver, who Blue affirms is trustworthy, and my last resort is Green, but I just don't trust Green as much as Blue or Silver. Unlucky for me, our coach just happens to be Chuck. According to Green, Chuck chooses pairs and doesn't listen to complaints. Oh no…

"LISTEN UP KIDDOS!" Chuck blares. "TODAY WE HAVE SOME NEW KIDS!"

Uh-oh.

"WE GOT AMARILLO HERE" he points to me "AND EMERALD."

"Emerald?" Crystal's eyes widen. "Emerald?"

"Crys!" a voice comes from a boy with a crazy hairdo and wearing a baggy green shirt and blue pants.

"Rald!" Crystal runs over and hugs Emerald. "Did you enroll here?"

"Yea!" Emerald nods, hugging Crystal too.

"ALRIGHTIES!" Chuck booms, separating Emerald and Crystal. "TODAY WE'RE FIGHTING SINGLE BATTLES." Then he pulls a paper out of his pocket and continues. "GREEN, YOU'RE WITH RED. BLUE, YOU'RE WITH SILVER."

Uh-oh.

"RUBY, YOU'RE WITH EMERALD AND GOLD, YOU'RE WITH SAPPHIRE."

So I'm with Crystal? Well, that's better than being with the boys I suppose…

Sure enough: "AND AMARILLO, YOU'RE WITH CRYSTAL."

"WE'LL START OFF WITH GREEN AND RED. OTHER PEOPLE, SIT WITH YOUR PARTNER ON THESE BENCHES." Chuck points to the small benches, fit for only two, each bench having at least 3 feet in between.

Crystal gives Emerald one last hug before leaving and dragging me off to our bench.

I sigh. There's no way out, is there?

I know that this battle will take a fairly long time, so I decide to look away. I hate battling when it's not necessary. Crystal notices me looking away.

"What's the problem?" she asks.

"I hate pokemon battling. I hate pokemon getting hurt," I respond.

Crystal scrunches her eyebrows. Uh-oh, that's a bad sign right? Did I just lose a friend?

"Huh. I wonder how you got so high then," Crystal mutters, her forehead creasing even more.

I sigh. "Probably has something to do with my guardian."

Crystal's eyes raise questionably and her mouth opens, before it closes again.

"What?" I ask. "What were you going to ask?"

"Why call your guardian your guardian instead of mom or something," Crystal blurts out before slapping her mouth with both of her hands. "Shorry!" she says through her hands.

I bite my lip. "I lost my mother and father," I quietly tell Crystal.

Her eyes widen. "OhmygoshI'msosorry!" she hugs me. "I work for an orphanage and-" Her voice falters.

My own eyes widen. "Oh…"

From there, we chat about children and how to help them out and everything.

Silver P.O.V.

"NEXT! BLUE AND SILVER!"

I glance over at Blue, and she nods slightly, confirming that she will be the winner of this match. I nod back, confirming I will purposely lose to her, and we walk up to the arena.

Long story short: we battle, I purposely lose with my Pokémon fake-fainting (a skill we both trained into our Pokémon a long time ago along with playing dead), my fangirls boo, Blue's fanboys cheer (seriously, how did they manage to get inside this private training session?), and we sit back down for the final round.

Just then, my stomach slightly growls, and I curse in my head as the ground rumbles beneath my feet, metals buried beneath the earth straining for the surface as my magnet talent goes haywire, heating up my hands to the point of painfulness.

Darn it, darn it! Why can't my talent have gone the weak way? I quickly disappear into the shadows, ghost along the wall, and fast-walk until I reach the mini forest. There's even more metals here, but the year-count tree's gouges aren't just to count the years. If you know where to look, there's a little metal lockbox filled with necessities and food buried between its roots—and I need food badly, or my talent will go wild.

Seriously, why can't it have gone dormant instead? Every time I'm sleep-deprived or food-deprived, my talent for summoning metals acts up slightly or gets slightly weaker. If I'm majorly sleep-deprived or food-deprived—which I am, since I didn't have dinner yesterday, skipped breakfast, and ignored lunch—my talent can act up big time. Or it could go dormant. It was supposed to go dormant! I glare at the tree, kick a root, and summon the metal lockbox with my haywire powers. It nearly hits me in the face as it rockets out of the ground. I quickly open the box, still scowling, take out its food, and eat it all up.

When I go back to class…everyone's gone! Except for Blue, that is.