A/N: I'm back.. and with more Sianne's Story than ever before! Huzzah! ...Or you could just go read the new chapter of AOTCS 'cause it's funnier. Whatever.

Dedication: To My three babies; Swablu, Marill and Pikachu. You guys are the cutest!

Disclaimer: If I owned the legal rights to Pokémon, I'd make Diamond and Pearl hurry up and come the pie out!

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Sianne's Story
By Dannichu
Instead of going downstairs, I re-attached Sianne's Safari Ball, then took out Souriee's ball and send him out so I could ask him the same question. Luckily for me, Souriee's past was much easier to talk about.

"It was great! I was born in the Zone with my brothers and sisters, and we were great friends. One by one we were caught by trainers, but it wasn't bad to be taken away, since being taken by a trainer was like you humans leaving home, especially since some Pokémon regard it as an honor to be trained under a human. I was the last one of us all to be captured." He said proudly.

"And your brothers and sisters… could they swim?"

"Oh, no! I was special like that. My mom said I was at least. I used to watch the Golduck and Seaking swimming in the lake all the times, so I tried it. After the first few times of nearly drowning, I managed to swim a few feet. But I love swimming! It's so fun! You're, like, almost weightless!"

I was reminded strongly of Terra, before something else struck me.

"Hey Souriee?"

"Yeah?" he said, looking up.

"You know that Thunderstone I got yesterday?"

"Yeah…?"

"Well, I could use it to evolve you, and you could become a Raichu!"

"You mean, like the painting we say yesterday?"

"A lot like that, yes."

"Wow! So will I just be bigger, or will I be faster or better at swimming? We didn't talk much about it."

"Well, you'll change physically, and your body will probably better at swimming than it is now, with better muscles and so on. But I warn you – you'll change mentally too."

"Mentally? How?"

"Well, for a lot of Pokémon it makes them more serious about battling, some become more intelligent while some become aggressive. Some don't change at all. It really varies. But," I said extremely seriously, looking him right in the eyes, "once you change, you can never change back."

"But it'll make me better at swimming?"

"Probably."

"And it's unlikely that my mind will change for the worse?"

I considered this. Did my definition of 'worse' mean 'less hyper'? I decided it didn't, since I loved Souriee's personality, but it was doubtful he would change much.

"Very unlikely."

"Well then," he said his eyes glazed over slightly, and I knew he was thinking about the Raichu picture. "I wouldn't mind. Have you asked Sianne about this?"

"Yeah, and she doesn't want to. So if you want me to give you the Thunderstone, just say so."

"Hmm… I think… erm… Yeah!"

"Really? Do you want to do it now?" I asked, a little shocked.

"Yeah!" he replied enthusiastically.

I was about to hand him the stone when all of a sudden, a sharp ringing sounded; making us both flinch. It took me a few seconds to realize what the noise was. "That's the fire alarm" Souriee said.

"Right." I replied. "I'll evolve you later. You'd best return for now."

I recalled the Pikachu into his ball and hastily grabbed all the other balls lying on my bedroom floor. I shoved them into my pack and then made my way downstairs and outside the Center, the alarm bell shattering my eardrums and people panicking.

"We apologize for the inconvenience." Nurse Joy said over a loudspeaker. "The fire alarm was set off by a Magmar placing their flame directly over the alarm. We would like to take this opportunity to remind you all that almost everything in the rooms are non-flammable, and you need not fear someone letting out their Flareon or Combusken in their room. However, it is appreciated if those trainers with Pokémon with an external flame could refrain from releasing them inside the Center, in order to prevent a repeat of this morning." She paused, catching her breath. "Thank you."

I rolled my eyes, but didn't say anything or complain; the Pokémon Centers were such a welcome luxury after spending so long camping out and plus it was free. Not to mention that it was for everyone's safety that we were all evacuated. I waited until the stream of annoyed trainers had subsided befire making my way back up to my room. Once there, forgetting about Souriee's evolution, I sat on the bed and thought about everything Sianne had said.

After thinking for about an hour, I sat up, discovering that my neck was a tad achy from lying in an odd position for so long as well as finding tears running down my face. It was odd that I hadn't realized them before as there were to wet patches on the bedcover, as well as having the top of my ears and some of my hair damp, too. I quickly rubbed my eyes and twisted my neck around a bit, trying to get the circulation back into my head. I them looked at the six balls that were lying at the top of my open bag. I needed someone to talk to. The person who I always would talk to about this kind of thing, my friend Sarah, was currently in Johto with a broken leg after an accident in Oore. But that didn't mean I couldn't talk to one of my Pokémon about it; I regarded them just as much as my friends as any human. Species didn't matter; even language didn't prove a barrier between us.

Souriee was out, since I wasn't sure he would understand about Sianne's past, since he seemed to have had a great time in the Safari Zone. While Terra was great to talk to about other things, the last thing I needed telling was that is was insignificant in the wide universe or a long-winded philosophical rant. Luke, bless him, would do everything within his power to make her feel better, but that wouldn't help me resolve the problem of her forgetting her past, and no matter how hard he tried, he wouldn't be able to treat her the same afterwards. Russell… well, I wasn't sure about Russell. I rarely actually talked one-to-one to Russell, and hadn't shared any problems with him, so I wasn't all that sure about he would react. But, try as he might, he wasn't he most understanding Pokémon. Not that he didn't care; he could just sometimes be oblivious to other people's feelings and ignore them. I would never say his heart wasn't in the right place, but he could walk past an orphaned Cleffa by the roadside if he was looking for a Super Potion. It wasn't that he didn't care, he just wouldn't notice. That left Sarah. I had known Sarah the longest out of all my Hoenn Pokémon, and I knew she was a great friend who I could share things with. She also sometimes appeared to not notice other people's feelings, like Russell, but she would have to be really distracted by something to do so. I decided that Sarah would be the best one to talk to. She and Sianne seemed to get on all right; she and Souriee had gotten off to a bit of a bumpy start, but I think they resolved that on our walk to the beach. And even though I felt a little guilty about telling someone all about her past when she had only just told me, I needed help from someone to know what to do about it. So I decided Sarah would be the best one. I took her Pokéball in my hand and sent her out in a flash of white light. She appeared on the bed, which dipped slightly upon her weight suddenly appearing on it, causing her to lose her balance and fall over, bouncing a bit in a prone position. She sat up, shook her head and then looked at me. "Hi." she said embarrassedly. "I meant to do that."

I attempted to raise an eyebrow at her, but failed, making my expression look plain weird. We stared at each other for a few seconds before both cracking up laughing.

"It's not my fault I can't raise just one eyebrow!" I said between laughs.

"That's that you were doing? I thought you were doing a Nosepass impression!" Sarah hooted, falling over backwards again.

I pretended to hit her over the head. "Oh shut up." I grinned, one that she returned. I wondered why I didn't think of bringing out Sarah to begin with, I knew I could share pretty much anything with her. This brought me back to reality quickly, reminding me of why I called her out in the first place.

"Hey Sarah, I need to talk to you." I said, stopping laughing.

"Oh, okay." she said, picking herself up, walking over to the side of the bed and sitting on the edge, just like I was, only she swung her legs to and fro, since hers didn't touch the floor.

"It's about Sianne." I told her, not a trace of humor on my face any longer.

"What about her?" Sarah said, noticing the tone of my voice and giving me her full attention. I took a deep breath and told her everything Sianne had said to me, omitting nothing. I guess I should have felt guilty about telling Sianne's life story to someone straight after she had trusted the weight of her past with me, but the weight was incredible, and I needed to share it with someone. Once I had finished, Sarah's face looked traumatized.

"Oh pie… I'm so glad I came straight to you… I don't even know what it's like to be wild, but I'm sure glad I never was if poor Sianne's previous experience was like that!"

"It's terrible isn't it?"

"Yeah… but why did you tell me this? Did she say you could tell me?"

"Well… actually, I didn't ask her. But I don't want her to know that I told you, I just need your help in helping her in letting go of her past. I think that's the best thing for her."

"Yeah, you're right." Sarah said, nodding sympathetically, putting one of her fins on my back. "She already got rid of some of it by telling it to you."

"It seemed to take a lot out of her…" I said dubiously.

"It took quite a bit out of you, too. And I'm sure that were I to tell it to someone else, it would drain me a bit too. And I'm not nearly as connected to her as you, her trainer, are."

"I guess…"

"What did Souriee say?" Sarah asked suddenly.

"What?"

"You said you asked Sianne about evolving. Have you asked Souriee yet?"

"Yeah, I did, right after my conversation with Sianne."

"Well?" she asked, full of anticipation

"He wants to." I confirmed.

"That's great! You'll have a Raichu!"

"Well, I don't mind what he is, so long as he's happy."

"Well, obviously. Not many trainers would have respected my decision not to evolve, and could easily force a poor Pokémon like Pikachu to evolve against its will. It's a lot like the Scyther problem; there's less of them since people evolve them into Scizor straight away, many even before talking it over to them!"

"I never knew that; how'd you know?" I asked. Even though I made a point to treat my Pokémon as equals, I sometimes couldn't help treating them, not as inferior, but as younger. For example, I sometimes foolishly thought that Sarah didn't know anything I didn't, since she had been with me ever since she hatched from her egg.

"Me? Oh, Terra told me once."

"It's terrible." I said, disgust in my voice.

"I know. Poor Porygon, Gloom and Poliwhirl…"

"Imagine having to change without being given so much as a choice…"