'You found him!' Finnick's excited voice drew me out of my sleep.

I noticed that the sun was shining bright and high in the sky. Crap, I haven't gotten up so late in a while. It actually felt good.

'Sorry, I actually meant to find you when you didn't come back last night, but I fell asleep,' Finnick was saying, somewhat sheepishly.

I waved his apology away with a yawn.

'He doesn't seem so grumpy,' Finnick commented, looking at Neo who was lying on the tree above.

Neo wasn't exactly happy at being woken up so abruptly, and he conveyed that with the exact grumpiness Finnick was talking about at us. Finnick wasn't bothered though. I wasn't sure anything bothered him. He was just so… friendly. He insisted on saying hi to everyone we met on the Route, though most of them only wanted a battle, which he was also happy to oblige. I suspect that this actually substitute for his lack of training during our travels. Having many Pokemon battles is also a way to train Pokemon, just different from the drills I do with mine.

'He's alright,' I told Finnick.

'That's great!' He grinned; and started on breakfast.

The smell of cooking food eventually woke up Lexy, who in turn woke everyone up, which was actually only Barbeque. Honestly, I don't know if I can sleep with only Lexy to protect me. He probably would be still asleep while I was being eaten by some wild Pokemon. Maybe Neo can guard me? His scythes should be enough to scare everyone off. I thought about buying a translator for him. Now that I thought about it, Finnick didn't have any translator, but yet he seemed to be able to communicate with them.

'Hey Finnick, how do you understand your Pokemon?' I picked up a can from my bag.

'What do you mean?' He asked, tossing me the can opener. 'I just do, once you get to a special sort of place with them, you'll understand.'

After a meal of spam with croissant, we set out back on the path. I think one of the best perks of travelling faster instead of off-roading and training has to be that we eat better food. We didn't have to rely on so much ramen and canned food. As we step out onto the path, intending to continue down the obscure path, we ran smack into a girl.

'Hey, watch it!' She said, dusting herself off.

'I'm sorry, are you alright?' Finnick asked genuinely.

'Oh, uh I, don't worry about it.' She stammered out.

I sigh in exasperation. She is one of THOSE girls. The ones that turn girly and flirty when Finnick smiled at them. We had met about a million of them. I guess I can see why, blonde hair, bronze tan and killer smile. But it was quickly turning annoying.

'You going to Rustboro? Don't bother going down there, it's a dead end.' She was telling Finnick.

'You're going to Rustboro too? Do you want to join us?' Finnick offered.

My eyebrow shot up as I jam my cap back on my head. Oh, this is new. He didn't bother offering any other people. Or maybe none of them were lost, I couldn't tell.

'Sure, you sure your girlfriend there wouldn't mind?' The girl jerked her head at me.

Gee, what did I ever do to her? Lexy, who was out at that point in time, didn't seem to like her and had took to sticking out his tongue at her whenever she wasn't looking. At least he wasn't stealing my cap. Speaking of which, she didn't seem to be scared of Lexy. What was the point of having a large dinosaur out then, if no one is going to be scared by Lexy?

Finnick finished convincing the girl that we were not in a relationship, and she agreed to join us. And she was considerably warmer towards me. The girl's name was Anna Castor and she was on the way to challenge the Rustboro gym for her second badge as well. Finnick seemed to find this interesting and tried to get both of us to bond over this common thing between us. I grudgingly admit that the girl was not bad, she had a Combusken named Chip and a Corphish named Cammie, both of whom looked well trained. I asked if she was planning to have a C team, to which she shot me a derisive look.

'Come on guys,' Finnick pleaded.

I sighed and agreed to be civilized, while she snorted, before agreeing when Finnick turn his puppy eyes on her.

It took us 3 days of turning and exasperation to get out of the forest from then; and another 2 days before we cleared Route 104. By then, we had done some solid bonding; Snappy was actually another cheeky git outside of battle. Needless to say, Snappy and Lexy hit off when it's their rotation with an almost maniacal glee. And Anna was much nicer. She was, really, an entertaining girl when she was not frowning or scowling. We hit the gym first thing when we reached town, to find out that the next free appointment was about three weeks away.

'Great!' Anna declared. 'Gives me time to find and train a third Pokemon.'

Right, she only has two on her. A second challenge allows us to register three Pokemons. While it is possible to register only two, three would be our safest bet, as we were going up against three Pokemons each. We also sorted out our sleeping arrangement at the Pokemon Center. Anna and I were rooming together, not wanting to chance the fact that we would be paired with a stranger. The Center apparently has very strict rules against opposite sex rooming, which doesn't really stop Finnick from being in our room most of the time anyway.

'Hey, there's really nothing between you and Finnick?' Anna said one evening, her feet propped up on the wall. I shook my head. 'Then who are you texting like every night?'

'I… no, no one, really. Wait, you think I'm texting him every night?' I sat up on my bed. 'Anna! He literally just left our room!'

Anna gave a sheepish shrug, or the equivalent of one as she laid on her bed. 'Well, he's good looking. And you guys are travelling together.' She trailed off.

'No, we're just friends, really.' I paused, then adding as an afterthought. 'Ok, he did save me once.'

'Oh, really?' Anna sat up at this and I recounted to her the story of how I first met Lexy, and then Finnick.

'You know, could it be that the explosion scared off all the Pokemons in the area?' She mused after I finished.

We had spent the past week scouring up and down the paths in Route 115, but we hardly see any Pokemon. Those we found were low leveled Taillows I knew Anna was getting frustrated, as our gym battle draws closer.

'Maybe you're right,' I said. 'Maybe they are all deep inside the forest. But it has been like 2? 3 months?'

'I don't know. But can we go check tomorrow, please?' Anna pleaded.

'Ok, let's ask Finnick tomorrow.'

Finnick, as it turns out, declined to join us.

'You guys go ahead,' He told us. 'I'll be training at the clearing we found yesterday, not too far from the main path. If you are in trouble, you know where to find me.'

So Anna and I set out into the forest, Chip and Lexy trailing behind us. The forest, which was alive with chirps of bird Pokemons and yips of Zigzagoons during the school field trip, was eerily silent. There was not even a rustle of leaf save for the crunch of our shoes on the forest floor littered with dry leaves and branches. After hours of fruitless search, we settled down for a late lunch. Lexy was extremely restless and I sent him off to hunt while the rest of us ate. Now that there were almost no Pokemon, the forest was teeming with ripe berries that burst into a kaleidoscope of flavours in our mouth. I was popping one of the sweet ones into my mouth when Lexy returned.

'Cloud!' He announced, dropping a familiar blue bird with white fluffy wings into our midst. The wings look suspiciously like someone, or a very large blue dinosaur, had taken a chunk of fluff out.

'Not good for eating,' He added, though he seemed very pleased with himself.

'Lexy! It's dead!' Anna exclaimed.

It did looked dead, as it lay on the ground, unmoving. At least it wasn't a Taillow or a Zigzagoon

'Where did you find that, Lexy?' I asked, thinking that if there's one, there could be more.

'There,' He pointed vaguely into a section of the forest we haven't explored.

'You're right,' I told Anna. 'The Pokemon are deeper into the forest. I wonder why?'

Just then, while we were busy discussing which section we should explore next, the Swablu jumped up and flapped its wings, trying to take flight. It only managed to fly a few paces before its injured wings made it crash.

'It's alive!' Anna exclaimed.

There was a comical moment where we, including the Swablu, stared at each other. The moment broke, and the Swablu gave a squawk before hopping up and dashing into the forest.

'Combusken!' The yellow chicken shrieked, chasing after it, claws waving in the air.

We grabbed our bags dashed after the both of them. The Swablu lead us on a tour of the forest, past a tangle of trees, a beautiful lake, a place filled with what seemed like only vines. It annoyingly fast and hard to catch, even though it couldn't fly. I wondered how Lexy managed to catch it in the first place.

'Swablu, wait!' Anna cried out, for about the millionth time.

The Swablu came to a screeching halt. At first, I thought it was actually going to listen to Anna. Then I realized something had spooked it. I looked around and realized that we were in a denser part of the forest Anna, who was trying to convince the Swablu, wasn't concerned with that.

'We are not going to hurt you,' Anna was saying in a placating voice.

'Blu? Blu!' Swablu demanded.

'I don't eat friends.' Lexy snorted, saying as though it was the most obvious thing in the world.

'Blu! Swablu! Swa! Blu!' The blue bird seemed very agitated.

I have absolutely no idea what the Swablu was on about. It seemed like none of the Pokemon understood it too. Maybe that was some sort of Pokemon hysteria.

'Come on, Swablu,' Anna was still trying to convince the bird. 'I'll take care of you. And we will train to be the very best! You'll be a strong Altaria and you can hit anyone who bites you.'

'Combusken!' Chip added, glaring at Lexy.

Lexy sputtered in protest, then decide to busy himself with stealing my cap. Strangely though, I never heard that she wanted a Swablu. I guess she was that desperate for a third Pokemon. Anyway, Altaria will be a good addition to her team. Actually it'll be a good addition to any team. But after chasing it for about like half the entire forest, I wasn't too keen on having an annoying bird.

Swablu finally decide that we are not going to hurt it, or maybe it just wanted to hit Lexy. But it hopped to Anna, who had a Pokeball waiting. With a beep that signalled Swablu is captured, Anna punch the air triumphantly.

'Yes! Ok, let's get back. I can't wait to train with it.' Anna had a grin on her face.

'Not because you want to see Finnick?' I teased.

She was shoving me when we heart the crunch of footsteps coming from deeper in the denser forest.

We looked at each other, wondering who could be in this deep in the forest.

'I'm telling ya, I heard something,' Said a familiar reedy voice.

'Hide!' I whispered, pushing Anna.

'What?!' She said as I scrambled up the tree. 'I don't know how to climb trees!'

'Shhh' I shushed her, holding out my hand to help her up. 'Here.'

I pulled her up just as two familiar figure stepped into view. With no time to go any higher, we squatted at the lowest branch of the tree, well concealed by the thick foliage. Far off into the distance, I spot a glimpse of what looked like a rundown warehouse.

'Who are they?' Anna mouthed.

'Bad people,' I mouthed back, turning my attention to the two men below.

'What?' Anna mouthed.

It was clear that she couldn't read lips.

'Later,' I mouthed, waving my arms to communicate my point across.

'You better hope there's something,' Scarface growled, his sneer as ugly as ever. 'Boss wants to move out tonight. We are supposed to be preparing. He ain't happy about that escaped Bagon.'

Escaped Bagon! That must be Lexy. I turned to Lexy, whose face had morphed into a snarl. I quietly touched his shoulder.

'Bah! There's nothing.' Scarface spat on the ground 'We got all the good Pokemon already, there's nothing left in this godforsaken place.'

'But…' Stickman stuttered.

'Let's go,' Scarface said with force.

After they left, Anna and I climbed down.

'What's going on? Who are they?' Anna demanded.

'I don't know,' I told Anna. 'Remember Meteor Falls? These must be their gang of poachers and they must have got a ton of illegal Pokemon. We need to save them!'

'Wait,' Anna caught my wrist as I was about to follow them. She cut me off as I was about to protest. 'Let's go to the police. They are professionals, they'll know how to deal with poachers.'

Realising she's right, I let her pull me back the direction we came from. On the way out of the forest, we found Finnick and told him about the poachers. He agreed that the best course of action was to inform the authorities and we hurried back to the city.

At Rustboro, Anna went to the Pokemon Center to treat her newly caught Swablu while Finnick and I rushed down to the police station.

'Ok,' The officer at the station said. He had a streak of blue hair and I wondered if that's some sort of violation. 'Thank you for telling us. Please fill in this form with your particulars.'

I quickly filled in and signed the form. Why does the Pokemon League have so many forms? There was like a form for basically everything.

'Thank you, you may go now.' The officer told us as I handed in my form.

'Wait that's it?' I asked.

'Yes,' The officer raised his eyebrow. 'I will inform the proper people.'

'You mean the League?'

'Yes, the League.' He said, sounding like the league wasn't who he was referring to in the first place. 'They'll be here in a few hours.'

'A few hours?! That's not fast enough! And don't you need the location of the place?' I really don't know why I was shouting.

'Calm down, miss.' He said sharply. 'We will need time to coordinate the HSFs. And we will pull the location from your Pokedex.'

'Wait, you can do that? Feels like a massive invasion of privacy.'

'Yes, the League reserves the right to any information on your Pokedex. It says so in the terms & conditions.'

'Nobody reads them!'

'That's enough, miss. We thank you for this valuable information. But that's all you can do.' He said, with a note of finality in his voice.

I let myself me ushered out by Finnick, where we met Anna by the Pokemon Center.

'What do you mean they are not going to arrest them?!' Anna burst out; and I'm glad that I wasn't the only one feeling this way.

'They are, just in a few hours.' Finnick said in a placating tone, smiling at people in the Pokemon Center giving us weird looks.

'But they are going to move the Pokemons TONIGHT. That could mean tonight 7pm. Which is in, oh my god, an hours' time.' Anna checked the clock on the wall.

'We should go and save the Pokemons. We are Pokemon Trainers now! What's a couple of poachers?' I suggested.

'We? But we are just beginners. They are not even involving the HEARTs in this. It's going to be a big operation.' Finnick said.

'Ah,' I said, holding out my Pokedex with a smile. 'But my brother is not. He has 8 badges. And he is in Rustboro right now at the gym, probably studying the Pokemon.'