"Hey... You alright there?"
The words were faint as I was shaken awake. Everything hurt, nothing felt as it should. And worst of all, I couldn't remember shit. Not even my own name.
"Miss? Are you... awake?"
The voice lacked even a distant familiarity. I managed to, albeit with a bit of difficulty, pull myself together and focus. Focus on the sounds around me, on the things I could feel, as I opened my eyes. I must have moved a bit in doing so, as the voice spoke again, now clearer.
"Oh, thank Arceus, you're not dead!"
I managed to stand up, glancing around for the source of the voice. Looking around, I quickly realized I was in a forest, and I saw an Absol at a bit of a distance, but... no one else. Was I imagining someone talking to me? But then, the most surprising situation possible happened.
"You okay, miss? Judging from the position you were in, you weren't taking a nap there."
The Absol talked. And I could tell what she - I assumed it was a she, at least - was saying. This made me stumble back, although I tripped over myself in the process.
"Is something wrong?" The Absol tilted her head. But I was at a loss for words, and I just glanced around. Something caught my eye in the water, however, as I was doing so. Ignoring the Absol, who was again asking if something was wrong, I turned to face the pond. This proved to be a bad choice, though.
Staring back at me through the pond was what... seemed like a Vulpix? But yet something looked off. Instead of red, the fur was white. The tuft of fur on its head looked more like a cloud than three individual curls, too. But with no sign of a human there, it was pretty obvious that this Vulpix was me... even if I had no clue how it was possible. At least that explained how I could understand the Absol...
"Okay, I'm kind of getting annoyed with this silent treatment. Are you going to answer me anytime soon?" The Absol huffed from behind me. I tried to turn to face her, but being aware of having four paws, it was a lot harder to maneuver than I would have thought. Instead, I simply tripped over myself again, and sighed before finally answering.
"I-I'm fine." was my response. It was far from the truth, though. How could I be fine with no memories of who I was, no name to call myself, and a completely unfamiliar body?
However, the dark-type seemed to buy it. "Well, that's good. Do you have any clue what happened for you to end up out here, though?" I shook my head at that, not even knowing where here was. Before I could say that, though, she was talking again. "That's too bad. Well, my name's Echo." She introduced herself. "What's yours?"
I hesitated, but she didn't interrupt, so I took my chance to talk. "I... don't remember. I can't remember anything..." I said quietly, leaving out my knowledge of being human before.
Regardless, Echo was surprised by this. "You don't remember anything at all?" She, well, echoed. "But you've got to at least remember something, right?" I shook my head, but once again didn't get the chance to speak. "Well, uh, don't take this the wrong way, but you certainly look odd. You're a... white Vulpix, it looks like... I've seen a ton of Vulpixes, and never one that looked like you. Do you know why that is, at least?"
"No, I don't." I frowned. "As far as I know, I should be red, like normal Vulpixes..." Both the Absol and I were stumped by this, it seemed, but she was quicker to talk again.
"Well, Vulpix," I flinched at being called this, but she didn't seem to notice. "I guess us wondering about this won't solve anything. I assume, if you have no memories, you probably don't have anywhere to go, either?"
I simply shook my head again. "No, I don't think I do..."
"In that case, I don't mind giving you a place to stay." Echo offered. "I'm not one to be rude if someone's in need of help in some form."
The offer made me smile. "I guess so... nothing better I can really go with, is there?" I laughed awkwardly. "No idea how safe this forest is..."
The Dark-type wasted no time. "Well, come on!" She started walking away, presumably leading me to her place. I tried to follow, but tripped over myself for the third time. Dammit, why couldn't I at least have been a bipedal Pokemon? That would have been a lot fairer. Echo turned to face me. "Need some help?" She laughed, coming back over to me.
I nodded. "Yeah... My paws don't seem to want to work with me..." It wasn't a lie, at least. I didn't know how to use them. But at that, Echo just laughed again.
"Well, here we go, then. Been a while since I had to do this..." She walked up beside me, and picked me up by the scruff of my neck with her mouth, which, to my surprise, made me go limp. She spoke again, but her voice was muffled now with me being held like this and I couldn't tell what she was saying. She started walking, and despite how embarrassed I was to be held like how a Ninetales would carry her kit, it was either that or spend an eternity figuring out walking here in the forest, so I stayed quiet.
It wasn't a long walk before we arrived to Echo's place, as evidenced by the muffled "We're here!" from her. The larger Pokemon carried me in and to a room with one bed in it, and set me down on the bed. "Man, your body is cold, Vulpix..." She shivered before continuing. "I wasn't expecting that. But anyway, this is the guest room... It's getting late, you should get some rest." I had in fact noticed the sun starting to set as we got here, so I nodded, but didn't say anything.
With that, Echo left the room, presumably to go to her room. I let my paws collapse from under me to lay down, before ending up lost in my thoughts. Where am I? Who am I? Why am I a Pokemon? What happened to me? Those kinds of thoughts raced through my mind. But there was one single thought that was nagging me the most.
How come I'm here?