"Hey! Hey, are you alright?!"
Another voice graced her senses. One that was… much more energetic. And natural-sounding.
Her body was listening, at least, even if slightly begrudgingly. Still, something felt horribly amiss, something that wasn't making itself plainly obvious straight away.
"Mmm… a-ah… ngh…" the Rowlet groaned haplessly, stirring just a tiny bit.
"Hey! You're alive!"
"H-hmmm…?"
Two black eyes fluttered open and immediately were greeted with the sight of another set peering down into hers- yellow in color, belonging to a light blue head with two small bubbles around the nose… It was a Froakie.
"And awake!" the Froakie exclaimed exuberantly, a huge grin stretching over his face. "Goodness, I was worried! I was on my way out and you were just laid out on the sand here, not moving at all!"
Her eyes opened wide, and she was on her feet, her company hopping about her excitedly. She studied him. "Y-you… can talk…?"
He giggled. "Of course I can, silly! You're talking to me right now, aren't you~?"
One of his hands reached out and patted one of her wings as he laughed, to which the Rowlet let out another startled cry and scuttled back at being touched so suddenly by a complete stranger.
However, the Froakie was beaming. "Arceus above, you're soft and fluffy!" he exclaimed, looking enthralled. "Is the rest of you like that?! Can I see?!"
"NO!" was the perturbed answer, the fluffy feathers in question ruffling up. "W-who are you?! Where am I?! And what… what was that?!"
Her head began scanning the area again, then glanced up at the cliff. There was no wired beast to be seen, nothing else of any interest among the surroundings that consisted mostly of sand, rocks, and water under a peaceful sky… though still something didn't feel right.
The Froakie before her was quite a bit bigger than he should have been, at least, if he was looking her straight in the eye while still standing on the ground, though at the same time, the forest up above seemed quite a bit bigger even though she knew that simple greenery and trees were not supposed to dwarf her. But, while running through the forest, she definitely remembered her steps covering quite a bit more ground… Steps, not flaps…
She quickly scurried over to the water's edge to get a look at her reflection, and let out a distressed squawk just as fast.
"What is THIS?!" she cried, frantically flapping her wings and wiggling her feet as if to somehow swap them out for human arms and legs. "Why am I a Rowlet?!"
Her company hopped closer and giggled, watching her display with amused intrigue. "What are you worried for? Are you not supposed to be?"
"NO!" was the unhappy answer, her feathers standing on end in pure fright. "I… I'm a human! I'm…!"
The feathered one burst into tears and buried her face in her wings. The Froakie instantly became concerned and edged closer to her, again placing a hand on her. She didn't even seem to notice, or at the very least, was too perturbed to care.
"Oh, you think you're a human?" he mused, then glancing up at the rocky edges farther up above them, "Sheesh, you must've hit your head really hard…"
"I-it's true!" she exclaimed, peeking out through her feathers like a frightened child. "I'm a human! A human female, my name is Astrid, and… and…! O-oh, Arceus above, I can't remember anything else!"
Her company perked up. "Well, nice to meet ya, Astrid! I'm Arashi!"
"A-Arashi…?"
"Yup, that's me!"
Back to crying she went, her company still grinning haplessly as she bawled into her wings. "Oh, Arashi, this is terrible!"
He giggled, giving her a pat again. "Oh, I'm sure it is! Sheesh, we probably need a cleric to see if your skull isn't busted open on the inside, aha! You must've had a nasty fall, and now your mind is all messed up!"
"N-no!" she exclaimed again, peeking over her wings like a frightened child. "I-I mean, y-yes, but no!"
Arashi tilted his head to the side with a caring smile, still patting her wing. "Yes but no? What happened?"
Astrid shook her head a bit, trying to formulate some sort of a response that came out far more jumbled than she would've liked. "I d-don't remember much, just… I g-guess I was having this weird dream, but it wasn't actually a dream, where this disembodied voice was asking me a bunch of questions, and… and then I was up there in the forest, and th-this… this thing came at me…"
"Thing? What thing?"
She lowered her wings some more, though her gaze was locked on the ground. "Th-this tall glowing creature with a body made of wires… Y-you know what wires are, r-right…? Please tell me those exist here too and I'm not completely losing my mind..."
The Froakie couldn't help but to chuckle at her exasperation. "Those things you can tie other things together with and such? Yup!"
"W-well, its body was made of those, and it looked sorta like a human but not at all like a human, it didn't even have a face but just this glowing spiked ball where its head should've been, a-and…" She got even more flustered as she thought about it. "And its body was sparking with electricity like a lightning storm, then it started talking to me and chasing me, a-and…! And then it hit me with a bolt and knocked me out and I ended up down here!"
Arashi studied her intently, still wearing a countenance of excited intrigue. "Wow, really?! Sheesh! I've never heard of a Pokémon like that, so you must've gotten really lucky!" then, pausing for a second with a slightly awkward look, "Er, it was a Pokémon, right?"
Astrid fluffed her feathers out a bit, dusting herself off with her wings and shyly looking at Arashi. "I-I don't know; I've n-never seen anything quite like that, really… N-not that I can remember much of anything, but..."
Another chuckle, Arashi's hand going to her wing again. "Well, I haven't seen anything like that, either! And I've lived here my whole life, so it's probably safe to say that whatever it was is gone now, or else it would probably be down here if it really wanted you."
A sigh came from her beak, her feathers deflating. "Alright, well, if you live here, then w-where am I? C-can you tell me that?"
A beaming grin met her in return. "You're on Tranquil Beach, an outlier of Tranquil Town!"
"T-Tranquil Town…?"
"Yup! There's not a lot of action here, except for a few incidents lately of other Pokémon just… going crazy, but it's a pretty nice place!"
A bit of alarm crept into Astrid's expression, for those 'few incidents' didn't seem to bode well either. "G-going crazy…?"
"Yeah! Just a few days ago, a Rhydon came roaring up to the town's perimeter and tried to start a big fight, and once he got calmed down, he claimed to not remember much about what happened. Good thing my mom was in town; her Water Shuriken put a stop to the issues real quick, aha!"
At least it wasn't the sort of 'crazy' that she seemed to be enveloped in. Nonetheless, up her feathers went again, the little bird eyeing her company uneasily. "R-really…?"
"Yeah! Isn't it wild?!" Arashi was still chattering away, not at all bothered. "And, well, in the general area surrounding us, not too long ago there were a few rumored sightings of the wanted criminal Salem, but-!"
"WHAT?!" Astrid cut him off at the mention of such. "'Wanted criminal?!'"
"Yeah! She's this real shady figure- a Fennekin, I think she was… or maybe she had evolved…? Ah well, the sightings keep changing because she keeps messing with anyone who gets close, so no one knows for sure, aha!"
Astrid's feet skittered a few steps backwards. This Froakie was absolutely insane; he had to be. No one could possibly be that good-natured while talking about wanted criminals and unexplained rampages. She didn't like this, she didn't like this at all. "A-Arceus above, what have I gotten into here…" she whimpered, looking down at the ground. "Why is this happening… and why me?!"
Arashi's eyes drooped a little in concern and he hopped to her side again, the little avian still eyeing him. "Awww, you really are in a bad spot, aren't you?" the aquatic one cooed gently, studying her inquisitively.
Shyly, she nodded. "I don't remember anything important except my name and that I'm not supposed to be a Pokémon… I don't know how I got here, who was talking to me, what that abomination in the forest was, nothing…"
Her eyes started watering again, to which Arashi gave her wing another pat. "Well, hey, if you're so lost and upset, why don't you stay with me for a while? My house is right around the corner on the beach, and if that weird creature shows back up, my mom and dad will take care of it! Besides, if you got knocked out, you could probably use a nice place to rest!"
She gave him a timid look, still a bit unsure of the Pokémon in front of her. "B-but… you just met me. I just fell off a cliff on the beach and you're alright with taking me in…?"
He laughed. "Of course! Should I be afraid of you, Astrid~?"
She quickly shook her head, thinking she should've been the one afraid and not the other way around. "N-no…"
"Then c'mon! We'll take care of ya!"
She thought for a moment. She wasn't sure what to make of this new creature that seemed as bubbly in personality as the bubbles around his neck, but even so… there wasn't much choice. Being left alone in this strange new world seemed an even worse option than putting her trust in a complete stranger, and with the encounter of earlier… No, she wasn't going to chance it.
"A-alright," she answered mildly.
Arashi let out a cry of glee, throwing both arms around her in a hug, to which the Rowlet let out a startled squawk and ruffled up her feathers.
"YES! I have another friiieeeeeend nooooow~" the Froakie sang excitedly.
"H-hey! Don't you think that's a little much for someone you just met?!"
He let go. "Nope!"
In any case, Arashi set to hopping down the beach, still beaming with glee. Astrid brushed herself off, still in utter disbelief that she was going along with the status quo, but nonetheless she haplessly skittered away after him.
. . . . .
Meanwhile, however…
A certain someone else's gaze was fixed on a less-than-wonderful sight. On the beach, a Rowlet and a Froakie strolled along the coastline, one of them appearing to be much more chipper than the other.
'Tranquil Beach,' the locals called it. It was anything but tranquil. The moment the Rowlet took a dive over the edge, the terrain had become a problem. There was but one pathway down the steep rock faces, and having to run through the sprawling expanse of trees and to the forest's edge to find it in the first place took far too much time for one unfamiliar with the vicinity.
Then, on finally finding a way down to her, there she was- awake, fully functioning, and with someone else.
Running out to them- absolutely out of the question. Too much visibility.
Attacking them- absolutely not. Only Arceus, or whatever other legendary may have been watching, knew who else might show up.
The creature watching was as reluctant and flustered as could be. "Agh! This is terrible! Forgive me!" it protested to no one in particular, giving them one last glance and carefully darting back up the rock-carved pathway, quickly out of sight.
