Chapter Five:
Best Laid Plans

Disclaimer: I do not own the series Pokémon. Like, at all. It and all its respectable characters are © to Game Freak and Satoshi Tajiri. However, all writing contents and semi-plots here are © to me; unless it is stated otherwise. All shows/ books/ video games/ songs that are mentioned in this chapter are all © to their respective owners, I do not own them.

Notes: Apologies for another delayed update. Last weekend I was out of town completely. Midterms are coming up, so my attention has also been diverted towards those this weekend. Glad I managed to drop this before Monday morning hit. I'm trying to remain on a Sunday update, in case it hasn't become apparent or noticeable!

Please, enjoy this new chapter!


"Things didn't go exactly as planned, but I'm not dead, so it's a win."
-Mark Watney, "The Martian" by Andy Weir


"What in the hell have you done?"

Norman knew what he was seeing, but he couldn't exactly believe it to be true. Two packs, each equal in size and gear, with what he assumed to be identical equipment and supplies packed inside. They sat side by side in Birch's office, innocuous and waiting…waiting for what, Norman had to wonder, although he had an inkling of an idea.

It was not an idea he was thrilled at entertaining.

He diverted his attention back on his old friend, having a hard time swallowing past the dry lump in his throat.

"Whatever do you mean, Norman?"

"Don't play innocent with me, Birch. It isn't becoming of you at all. What in the hell do you think you're doing?"

"I have two up-and-coming trainers who are going to embark on their journey, and soon I might add, so I thought I'd wrestle up some gear for the two of 'em."

"You never 'wrestle up' anything other than the required starter pokémon and some pokéballs for any trainers starting out."

"You forgot the pokédex."

Norman sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Of course. Because the pokédex is the central concern here."

"Actually, Norm…it kind of is."

Norman peeped his eyes open to peer up at Birch. His old friend looked less concerned with cracking wise and more for getting down to business now. Birch turned on his heel to grab something off his desk and revealed what it was: a newly enhanced, upgraded, updated pokédex.

"I don't have much luck with trainers reporting back to me with their pokédex progress. They're not obligated. It's not mandatory for them, it's not how the system's set up here. And I can't get back out there like I used to, like I'd like to, not when I'm stuck close to the home front like this all the time. Or I'm away at conferences and summits, presenting my research. I'd send Meryl or Jacob out in the field, but they're honestly hopeless with battling—"

"I'm going to guess that you have a point to all of this," Norman interjected impatiently. Birch smiled.

"All right, all right, no bullshit. You know I hate bullshitters and I hate bullshitting myself. The honest truth is…I think Brendan's been getting antsy lately. I think he's working himself up to ask if he can go out further, to help me with my research. But I also know he probably wants to go on a journey for his own sake, not just for mine." Birch chuckled. "And it's not exactly a secret that my assistants have been goading him into going for a while now, either."

"And the other pack?" Norman drawled. He really didn't like where this was going. It made his guts twist into all sorts of knots at the most likely of answers. As far as he knew, there were no children or young adults within Littleroot gearing up to start their journey. None that were qualified or interested in going, at the very least, none to his knowledge. Birch took in a deep breath, prepping himself.

"Shay should go as well."

A beat passed between them. Then, "Are you quite literally insane? She knows nothing about the world around us! She's a literal outsider of-of everything! Our way of life, about pokémon—the world over!"

"Exactly!" Birch exclaimed, beaming. Norman stared at him, flabbergasted. All the heat and fire in his argument was snuffed out like a candle in the face of a persistent breeze.

"I'm…I'm not following."

He didn't like that excited gleam in his friend's eyes. Not at all.

"Think about it; we have lived with pokémon all our lives. Lived and breathed the entire norms of experiencing them from the moment we were born. But Shay—she'll be experiencing it for the first time in her life. The whole world will be laid out at her feet! She'll get to experience the dazzle of battle, the thrill of discovering a new pokémon in a new region—"

"Are you planning to exploit her situation for your research?"

"What? No! Well…not really. Look—Brendan is going to be my control variable of this, and Shay—"

"Shay's supposed to be the experimental half of things?"

Birch wilted, much like a flowering plant in the face of a sweltering heatwave. "Stealing my thunder, man…but in a sense, yes. But you do realize that I'm not sending them out into the wilderness unprotected, right?"

"Giving Brendan a pokémon to start his own journey is one thing. He's learned how to battle, he's learned about pokémon in school, he knows this world better because he grew up in it, he was born into it. Shay, on the other hand, has no idea how to handle herself in a pokémon battle, trainer-conducted or wild!"

"Wrong. She does, Norman. I witnessed it just a few days ago. She was cool as a cucumber, completely in control! She handled Mudkip like a natural…although, she did mistake the little guy for Torchic, but I'm guessing she mistook the sigils on the pokéballs, because I had all three of the lab pokémon with me at the time…" Birch trailed off, then waved off his scattered thoughts. "Not the point. Look, the point is…I think she's got what it takes. Same as Brendan."

"That could have been a fluke. You can't base your judgement on just one chance encounter…"

"You didn't see what I saw, Norman. She handled herself like a professional, like she'd been doing it her whole life, like…like we did, when we were kids. I don't know how to explain it, but I think she's got what it takes. She's got that fire in her to go far. If you'd quit looking at her like the daughter you lost and stop trying to shield her from the world she's stuck in, you'd…"

Birch fell very quiet, realizing what he'd said. Norman found it difficult to speak, and instead glared icily at the man sitting across from him. Birch dropped his gaze, looking abashed and began to rub the back of his head.

"Sorry, man. That was uncalled for. I shouldn't have done that, I…I'm sorry. I didn't really mean that."

Norman didn't realize he'd clenched his fists at his sides so tightly until he had to forcible release the tension in his hands. He breathed slowly to calm himself, to soothe the heat and anger that was welling up in his chest and waited until he could talk without feeling the urge to yell until his throat hurt. There was quiet in the air that hung between them. For a whole minute, they said nothing to each other, waiting on the other to break the silence.

"I don't know what you think you see when we are seen together, but I know she isn't May. She will never be May. I lost my daughter, and Shay isn't some…replacement. She never will be. But I care about what happens to her, because if I don't, nobody else will."

"I know. I know. I…I crossed a line, Norman. But…we can't keep her holed up in this place for forever. She just doesn't strike me as the type who wants to just…sit around, waiting for a solution to come her way by chance."

Norman sighed heavily, can't help but smile at the other man's comment. "To be frank, I get that same feeling from her."

"See? I'm actually afraid that if we don't send her on her way with our blessing, she'll just up and go off on her own, supplies and protection be damned."

"Again…I get that same feeling." Norman conceded grudgingly, and he laughed. He almost couldn't believe he was laughing, not even five minutes before he just had white-hot rage flashing across his vision and coursing through his veins.

"So, I'm guessing it won't matter what protests I might have against this, you're going to go forward with sending her off?"

"No, no. It's ultimately her choice, but I think we both know what she's going to choose."

"What happens when I report this back to the League?"

Birch's mouth snapped shut, whatever smart ass remark he had lined up falling short. His smile vanished. A sour look took place of his previously optimistic one. Norman rolled a hand.

"I can't not report to them on her wellbeing. Steven's orders."

"Yeah, the orders of a man who hasn't dropped by once to check on her himself."

"Busy man. Humour me. What happens then?"

"By then, she'll hopefully already be well on her way. Nothing they can do, except pretend she's another person traveling with her team of faithful pokémon. Or, you know, they try to hunt her down, but I doubt they'd do that. It'd draw too much attention."

"It's not that simple."

Birch frowned. "Perhaps. But they don't know what she looks like, do they?"

Norman was silent at first. "No," he finally admitted. "They don't. I haven't provided them with much description, other than that she was a young woman in her mid-twenties. That could be anybody in their eyes. And that brings me to the next problem…how can we even register her as a trainer?"

To this, Birch beamed at him and that devious twinkle was back in his eyes. "I'm not exactly proud of this…"

Liar, thought Norman without an inkling of menace.

"But I know a couple of guys who do some…questionable work on the side of their day jobs and they could wrangle something up for her. They owe me a few favours. Figured I can cash one in for this. Should see her ID card come in sometime today."

Norman considered this, pondering over what else there could be that might come along and tear this entire thing apart. Birch seemed to read his mind on the matter and he laughed.

"Look, just leave all the details to me! I know the ins and outs of preparing a trainer for registration and getting them started on their journey. You just handle the pokémon battling. That's what you gym guys do best, isn't it?"

He wanted to refute Birch's words, but damn it all, the man was right. Any details Norman wasn't thinking of, Birch probably already has and had already taken care of it or was in the process of doing so. He probably had a way of squeaking everything through, right under the League's nose. On the one hand, he could report this all to the League, and to Steven, and put an end to it all. But on the other hand...he could feign ignorance. Turn a blind eye to it all. Say she up and left during his stay in Petalburg at the gym. And since there aren't many applicants who could potentially fill in his spot as gym leader, there was no way he could tenably close the gym down for a lengthy period of time or turn it over to someone else just to keep Shay under lock and key and watchful eye.

If Steven wanted that done, he'd either have to do it himself or have someone else do it for him. Norman couldn't, under a good conscious, turn his home into a prison, to keep Shay locked up. Just because she was one of the Appeared didn't mean she was any less human than he was.

Birch was eyeing him thoughtfully but there were tinges of nervous energy brimming just beneath the surface. Waiting. Lurking. Norman finally waved a dismissive hand at the man, a sign of his blessing, and Birch leapt to his feet in victory.

"You are not going to regret this!"

"I have a feeling I already do."

"No, no, see that's the beauty of it! I'll keep her here, for an extra two weeks. I'll get her up to speed on things—a crash course of the region, battling techniques—"

"You and I both know that you're a terrible battler," Norman interrupted. Birch simply gave him the stink eye.

"Not me personally, you idiot. Of course I'm not going to do that to her! I'd be setting her up for failure. I was going to refer her to instructional videos that would assist her in that department. Stuff that Roxanne helps make for the school over in Rustboro, those kinds of videos."

"Ah. Go on."

"Thank you. Anyway, after I get her at least somewhat prepared with camping etiquette and tips, information on pokémon centers and markets, go through her equipment and how to use it, all that jazz…I'd send her off by next Friday. I'll send Brendan sometime this week, give them some space between starting points."

"It's a lot of information to process in less than two weeks."

"You seem to think she's a helpless little wall flower who has no clue how to haul a pack around."

"I never said that."

"Well, she took my heavy-ass pack on her back when I twisted my ankle a few days back like a goddamn champ. She's done this before, she even admitted it when I asked her. Plus, her pack won't be as heavy as mine, so she'll be able to handle hers just fine."

Norman was mildly surprised to hear this. He crossed his arms and tapped his fingers along his bicep, still teetering on the edge of things. He was mostly concerned that things would fall apart before they even began. Yet, he couldn't help but feel himself becoming infected by Birch's optimism.

If this works…maybe she could go all the way. If she took on the League and came out on top, she'd be able to travel more easily…maybe she'd be able to make it home, or figure out a way to get everyone including herself back where they belong.

"All right. All right. I'll tell you what. I'll give you the time you need to bring her up to speed. I'll delay reporting anything to the League for a while. Give her a head start. But I want to be in on the loop of things."

"Of course. Unlike other starting trainers, I'm mandating Brendan to give me weekly reports, since he's somewhat of a pseudo-assistant, and since Shay's technically employed by me, I'll be mandating her to do the same. She'll get an x-transceiver, fresh off the market from Unova. It's nearly impossible to tamper with or break and gets fantastic reception even in the middle of a tropical storm out in the center of the damn ocean. Just wish I could've gotten one of those new Holo Casters from Kalos on such short notice. Maybe another time. Anyway, when she calls, I'll slip you updates when I get them."

Norman vaguely wondered why Birch wasn't giving Shay a PokéNav Plus but decided instead to trust Birch. He had his reasons for going out-of-region for this device. He just wasn't sure he was ready to ask him about it quite yet.

"Good…good. I…that's good."

Norman expelled a breath. Any other gripes he might have were growing far and few in between. He still wasn't quite sold on the idea…but neither was he not sold on the possibility that she may up and disappear without a trace into the world, going god knows where and doing god knows what. At least this way, he'd still have an eye on her.

He just hoped it would be enough to prepare her.


The world around her was a surreal muddle of mixed emotions. Her head was still spinning. From what emotion, she wasn't entirely satisfied in pinning it down with a solitary identity quite yet. It was all too fluid for her to get a grasp on, so she let it waver and settle of its own accord. She had no interest in going through her usual routine after work. She was still coming to grips that today was even her last actual working day.

A knock at the door startled her and she flew upright, jolted out of her thoughts. Norman stood in the open doorway, leaning on the frame.

"You okay? I called you down about five minutes ago."

"Oh. No, I…I mean, yeah, I'm fine. I'm just…" She let her words drift. Her usual wit had abandoned her. She sucked in a breath between clenched teeth. "Still processing what just happened today."

"Do you…remember anything about it?"

"Yes, I do, it's just…a lot."

It's what I wanted, wasn't it?

"And?"

"…you knew, didn't you? What he was planning to do."

Norman allowed a brief smile flicker across his face. "Something like that. Do you plan on accepting the challenge?"

It is what I wanted. I just didn't expect it to happen like this.

"Damn straight I am." Shay huffed stubbornly, feeling her resolve harden. "I appreciate you helping me, and Professor Birch too. But I just…don't want to sit on my ass, doing practically nothing to help my situation. Filing paperwork isn't going to get me closer to home, or get me an answer on how to get back."

"Do you think going out and roaming around the region will?"

Shay stared at him, dumbfounded at the sudden steel in Norman's voice. He was watching her sharply, his eyes missing nothing, a tension in his frame that she hadn't noticed until now. She suddenly felt like she was being stared down by one of her gunnery sergeants and it was…intimidating. She knew she had to consider her answer before presenting it.

"I don't…really know how to answer that," she started off honestly. "But maybe, if I get out there, I can do my own research and figure out—"

"Figure out what, exactly? The very thing that's been stumping several regions' worth of scientists and professors, the best and the brightest in the world?"

Shay clamped her mouth shut, startled at the biting tone. She wasn't long in snapping back, the stirrings of anger simmering beneath the surface.

"Well, then maybe I'll just kick everyone's ass in the League and after I'm Champion, I'll go wherever the fuck I please, no questions asked, please and thank you."

Norman stunned her by smiling instead of chastising her again. She blinked several times, as though she was seeing things and when she came to the conclusion that she was not, she simply stared.

"What's going on? Why're you smiling?"

"I just wanted to hear what you really thought. You have a habit of holding back."

"So…you wanted to hear me say that I wanted to kick your boss's ass? Are you amused by that or are you advocating the ass-kicking?"

"I'm advocating for you to be prepared for what's ahead and knowing what you want. It's going to take that kind of passion and commitment to move up the ranks and challenge the Elite Four, and our Champion. He isn't a pushover. He's been in that position for going on near ten years and counting. But, if you make it…you'd definitely have the leverage to go where you'd want to." He paused, canting his head to the side and shifting his weight from one leg to the other. "That would even mean diving headfirst into Sinnoh and all the troubles that they're experiencing."

"What happens if the Creation Trio—Palkia, Dialga, and Giratina—what if they get sealed away again? Aren't they the ones who could possibly send us back? All of us, who might have come here? And what about the people who have gone missing from here?"

All good questions, all without an answer. Norman didn't even have to verbally reply; it was all written on his face. Uncertainty. Contrition. Pity. He wouldn't even look at her directly, not anymore. Shay felt a lump growing at the back of her throat and her heart plummet at the crestfallen expression painting the older man's face. It lasted momentarily, and she forcibly swallowed back the despair that wanted to engulf her. She didn't have time feeling sorry for herself and Shay sure as shit didn't have time being pitied.

"I guess I'll have to work fast then, won't I?" She said at last, earning her an astonished stare at first, before it melted into quiet appraisal. Norman smiled.

"I suppose you will." His face grew stony once more, the air of seriousness wrapping around him once again, in the blink of an eye. "Birch told you what the rest of your next few weeks are going to be like, right?"

She recognized that their endearing moment together had come to pass, and it was back to business as usual. She nodded. "Yes. I have two weeks' worth of crash courses to get through. Pokémon battling and typing and care while on the road, first aid for them and myself, outdoor skills and utilizing tools. Basics for all that and a few other subjects."

"Good. And when you get back here, I expect you to continue studying." He motioned for her to follow him. Curious, she got up and padded after him. He led her downstairs to the living room, where he had a stack of books of various sizes sitting on the coffee table. She looked over the first title of the book on the very top of the stack: A Beginner's Guide to Battle Tactics by William Wake. It was glossy and smooth, bright with newness. The centerpiece photo was that of a Bulbasaur, a Charmander, and a Squirtle standing off against one another. The Bulbasaur was shooting Razor Leaf at the Squirtle; the Squirtle was letting loose a Water Gun at the Charmander; the Charmander was releasing a well-aimed Ember at the Bulbasaur.

Full circle.

She reached for the stack and began to file through the titles, skimming the back summaries. When she finished, she cradled the books to her chest. "I'll get started tonight."

"Good. It's a lot of material and some of it tends to be repetitive, so you can skim through a few of the chapters. And Birch will probably be breezing through some of the subjects as well, so you should dig a little deeper on them for further clarification and review."

Shay had to bite her tongue on the matter. There were some subjects that Professor Birch had outlined that she knew about already, and with some intimacy. Camping, for example, was one of them.

When she had been sixteen, in the middle of spring, she had taken an entire month off from high school to go camping through a youth program called Outward Bound up in northern Minnesota. It involved quite a number of things, including making a fire using wet firewood—and for nearly the entire month, it had rained and even snowed a couple times. She had learned how to carry a canoe weighing nearly as much as herself on her shoulders through portage trails. She learned the value of 'leave no trace' while using a camping site. Nearly two years after that, she returned to the same facility to endeavor in the dogsledding venture that they offered in the wintertime. That had been grueling as well, but an eye opener on cold weather survival. In both instances, she learned how to use a map as well as using land marks to travel by.

In the military, she had to strengthen her body further. She had learned to carry a pack that, much like the canoes, had weighed as much as she did. They had sent her to courses that dealt with first aid in the field including becoming CPR certified, field patches for injuries such as sucking chest wounds, applying tourniquets, field treatments for concussions, heat stroke, and splinting any broken limbs that feasibly can be splinted. Her map-reading skills were sharpened through boot camp and various courses she had been sent to, as were her land navigation skills through hands on experience.

She also knew how to use a knife for various situations. She knew how to fish and gather kindling and fallen branches for firewood. She knew that utilizing iodine tablets or droplets or boiling water were the best ways to purify it if she needed to drink water that wasn't bottled or from a tap.

Simple yet necessary basic skills when removed from polite society. She quietly reasoned it was better to get a refresher than to deny she needed any more information on the matter.

Shay thanked him for the information, shifting her hold on the books and retreated back to her room to get started on her reading.


"My brain hurts."

Shay felt exhaustion holding an iron grip over the confines of her brain…or was that just a headache? Or maybe it was both. Both. It was both. A cluster headache brought on by exhaustion.

Jacob cackled and shoved her thermos back into her hands. Delicious warmth spread through her fingers, her palms, up past her wrists and she shivered in delight when she took that first life-affirming sip.

"Mmmm. I think I love you."

"Awwww. I think that's the sweetest piece of sarcasm I've ever heard come out that smart mouth of yours. Truly, I'm honoured." Jacob said, placing a hand gently over his chest. Shay snorted at him.

"Damn straight you'd better be," Shay grinned as she slid her eyes closed. "And I was talking to the coffee, dearie. Not you. I actually dislike people on principle. Nothing personal."

"Yeah, you say that, and yet, I feel it was very personal." Jacob remarked. Shay shrugged, grinning behind her thermos as she brought it up to her lips again.

"Take it how you will." She said, leaning back in the chair she had claimed for her own in the interim while they waited for Professor Birch. She was seated at one of the empty lab desks. Meryl was already working at her desk, compiling a list of data. Or writing a report. Something.

Whatever it was she was doing, Meryl was hyper-focused. She had been excited to see Shay earlier when she had come in, offering her well-wishes and the like, but the moment she sat down to start work, that was that. Her attention had diverted to her work in earnest. Jacob, however, seemed to be taking a break, as he's been working through the night.

Shay, in the meantime, was enjoying the downtime. Every day for the past week, from the moment she came in to the moment she left, Birch had whisked Shay away to privately instruct her on the journey she was about to embark on.

Today was going to be her last day here.

Today she'd either be released to go off on her own…or she'd be kept for longer if she didn't meet Professor Birch's expectations.

The day before, she had taken a region-based test after all her instruction. It was the same test that most aspiring young adults in Hoenn, who after their formative years of learning in school, could take to gain their trainer's license. If she passed, she'd be guaranteed her ID card that would ensure her a passport through the region. If she didn't…she'd be stuck here. For how long, however, she couldn't say.

In preparation for that test, her last several days had been jam-packed with more information than she knew what to do with. She wasn't sure if she should be thankful or not that a good chunk of the data relayed to her she already knew from the games. Typing was simple enough to understand, as were the advantages they offered over others, and weaknesses that could be exploited. Her understanding from the games—which she no longer felt comfortable referring to as such—gave her an edge and helped speed things up. Professor Birch had been impressed and helped breeze things along, unknowing of her underlying beforehand knowledge. She sure as hell wasn't going to complain nor was she going to volunteer the insider secret either.

Whoever said video games were useless wastes of time could suck it, as far as Shay was concerned.

Birch did, however, have questions about her world when they were alone. Questions of how different things were in where she was from, what kind of creatures lived there, what life and technology were like, the environments and habitats…

So many probing inquiries interjected and peppered throughout conversation and lessons over the last two weeks. It got to the point where she had to politely steer conversation back to the task at hand, and decline answering his questions in full. He seemed to gather her intentions whenever she did this and would apologize after a while and withhold from asking any other questions. Even when he was bursting at the seams to ask, he managed to suppress himself for the most part, and so did she. It provided her with some amount of relief and kept her from becoming distracted.

Shay swiveled in her borrowed chair, sipping from her thermos.

"You nervous?"

She glanced over where Jacob had sat down. He was peering into a microscope on the table adjacent to her.

"Pins and needles. I'm sitting on them." She replied, trying not to let the wobble in her voice be too noticeable. She wanted to twitch and jitter in her seat, but somehow, found a way to keep herself from doing so. She was willing enough to thank her coffee and leave it at that. "Do you know when Professor Birch is supposed to get here or—"

Before she could even finish, the doors to the main laboratory floor burst open, and admitted the very man they were all waiting for. He had a manila envelope in hand as he strode through the doors. It had already been opened, but it was hard to get a read on Birch. His face was stony and serious; a complete reversal to how he normally appeared. Jacob and Meryl stood, and Shay did as well. She could barely hear anything, not above the rush of blood roaring in her ears, or the tap-dancing beat of her heart working its way up from her chest and into her throat. She kept wiping her sweaty palms on her thighs, but it did little to abate her how slick and clammy they were. She was nearly startled right out of her skin when Meryl placed a comforting hand on her shoulder.

"So? What's the verdict?"

Birch had sent off the results of her test as soon as she had finished, had pulled strings to get them graded overnight and sent back as quickly as possible. It paid well to have connections.

Professor Birch carefully extracted the results from within, reading over the text printed on the sheet. Even Jacob and Meryl were beginning to fidget alongside Shay.

"Professor? You're kinda leaving us in suspense here. How'd she do?" Meryl piped up. Birch glanced at her, then swept his gaze over the rest of them and lingered on Shay the longest. He slowly turned the paper in his hand around and handed it to her. Shay took it, unable to hide the quake in her hand and pulled it toward her. Jacob and Meryl crowded her, reading over her shoulder.

"Holy shit, you got a ninety-seven percent!?"

Shay lingered on that number. Ninety-seven percent, out of a hundred. They swam around behind her eyes as she closed them, and she didn't even protest as Meryl nicked the paper from her hands.

"This is amazing! You must have had incredible aptitude tests back in Kanto!"

"Yeah. Yeah, sure. Sure, I did," she found herself mumbling. When she opened her eyes, Birch's face had split into an open and cheery grin.

"Fantastic work. Just two weeks' worth of studying."

"Well, it shouldn't take a genius to know everything that's basic the world over," Meryl said with a smile. At this, when his assistants weren't looking and when Shay caught his eye, Birch winked conspiratorially at her. She had to fight from grinning too widely. After the round of congratulations were made, Birch swooped in once more, breaking into the circle and guided Shay towards the back of the main lab, where he had claimed a desk for himself. It was piled with reports, folders, books, and a myriad of loose sheets of paper all over the messy surface. He dropped his satchel on top of it all and swung her back around to a machine imbedded in the back wall of the lab.

The glossy screen hanging above them was dark at the moment, but Shay knew when the machine was turned on, the screen would light up with health status updates and conditions. At hip level, a sliding shelf could be pulled out from the innards of the tubing, and in the shelf was a metal cradle for pokéballs.

Birch pulled this shelf out, and nestled in the cradle, were the three pokéballs of the lab pokémon. Their sigils stood starkly out against the red finish: the yellow flame of Torchic, the blue water droplet of Mudkip, and lastly, the green leaf of Treeko.

"Now, I know the choice is ultimately up to you here, and don't let my opinion get in the way of that, but I think you have the best chemistry with Mudkip here. You did fantastic work with it the other day. But, if you feel like you'd work better with one of the other two…well, like I said. It'd be up to you."

Shay stared over the three pokéballs laid out in front of her, roving over each symbol carefully with her eyes. She frowned and turned back to Birch.

"I thought Brendan took one of these guys with him?"

"Oh, he most certainly did, but I managed to snag another one from one of the breeders I usually go through." He beamed at her. "But I'm not going to tell you which one. I'd rather leave it a surprise in case you two ever met up on the road and wanted to duke it out."

"Of course you wouldn't wanna ruin it." Shay sighed. Behind her, she heard Jacob and Meryl sniggering. They must have known which one Brendan had taken as well, but they wouldn't tell her either. It made her a little more apprehensive at simply not knowing. She went back to looking over the pokéballs, and tried to discern which one had been taken, but it was virtually impossible. They all gleamed under the fluorescent lighting, their red-and-white finish pristine and unmarred. The tiny sigils were the same as she remembered. There was nothing to suggest any of them had been picked by Brendan and then was replaced.

A minute passed her by when she finally reached for one of pokéballs and wrapped her fingers around its girth. It was already fully expanded, and she rubbed her fingers over the polished finish, her heart already trip hammering away. Her lips quirked upwards as she lifted the pokéball out of its cradle, her heart hammering away in frenzied excitement.

"All right. I choose this guy." She said as she pivoted. Birch took one look at the pokéball and beamed at her approvingly.

"Good choice."


It was not even ten in the morning before Shay was out on the road. She had made a pit stop at Norman's, to add in some of her personal belongings to her new pack. The only things she ended up leaving behind were her military-issued pack, her extra phone charger, her two green monsters, the miniature speaker, her folder filled with its messy sketches and blank sheets of paper and the spiral notebook. Everything else that hadn't been consumed, such as the pretzels or water, she brought along with. The hardest thing she had to leave behind were her computer and the external hard drive. On the one hand, she knew it would be foolhardy to take it with her. What if it broke? What if it short-circuited or needed repair? She couldn't very well take it in. It would lead to awkward questions, suspicions. Birch and Norman alike had been explicit: they needed her to not arouse suspicion of who she was, of how she was one of the Appeared.

She trusted Norman to look after her things in the interim of her absence.

After rearranging everything to accommodate the newly added inventory, she locked up Norman's house for the last time and took off down the road that led out of Littleroot.

When she came to the threshold that would bring her outside Littleroot, she stopped right along the border and stared down the road. Shay reached for the magnetic belt at her hips and tugged off the lone pokéball that sat there, tapped the button at its center and it immediately ballooned in her hand. Tossing it, the creature inside coalesced into being from light and energy.

Mudkip blinked several times in the mid-morning light and swept his gaze around until it landed on her. "Hey there, pal. You ready to go?"

"You…you chose me." He sounded more astonished than anything as he stared at her with his coal-black eyes.

"I did," Shay replied with a soft smile. "C'mon. You really think I'm gonna dump you for someone else? We kicked butt together that other day, didn't we?"

Mudkip considered this and when he was done, he nodded vigorously. The orange external gills along his cheeks bobbled most elastically as he did. "Yeah, we did, didn't we?"

"Great! Oh, and from now on, I'm going to call you…Keno. Sound good?"

Keno leapt in the air once, twice and his entire little body was wriggling in absolute excitement as a reply.

"Let's get going already!"


Notes: There is an explanation as to why Shay has an x-transceiver rather than a PokéNav Plus. It is a small piece of plot that will become apparent later on.

First team member is on board!

Pokémon: Keno the Mudkip, Level 5
Nature/Characteristic: Brave and Good Perseverance
Move Set
: Tackle, Growl, Water Gun