Several cracks echoed through the woods as three separate thick but short tree branches broke off their respective trunks. Rather than fall to the ground, however, they were surrounded by the faintest of blue glows, which almost couldn't be seen in the daylight, and slowly and gently floated towards a tiny pink airborne figure, floating stationary in the center of the woods.

Alex didn't dare move an inch, even to blink, lest he lose his concentration and drop the tree branches he had mentally pried from the trees. He brought the tree branches within a foot's distance from his body and forced them to orbit his body a single time. Alex grimaced as he then brought them all in front of his body, and mentally prepared to launch just one of the branches as a high speed projectile. Unfortunately for him, it didn't quite work the way he wanted it to. He succeeded in launching the center branch. In fact, it reached speeds high enough that it shattered into splinters on impact of a thick tree trunk. But in doing so, he momentarily lost his concentration and dropped the other two branches. "Shit," he cursed under his breath. He managed to catch them both before they could hit the ground and he took a breath to calm himself. Still mentally holding the branches, he spotted another loose branch and used his psychic powers to pry that one loose as well, bringing it to him like he did the other ones. He brought them in front of his body again, and with another breath and a grunt of exertion, he tried launching one of the branches again. It wasn't as hard as the last one, seeing as the branch shattered in half as opposed to in multiple pieces, but Alex was able to do it without his concentration faltering this time. Alex let a smirk loose and he quickly launched the other two branches in succession, both of which exploded on impact.

It had been over a week since he arrived back at his apartment. Mercifully, the power had come back on the morning after Alex managed to get back to his home. But unfortunately for him, everyone being stuck at home meant there was no way he could train at home without his roommate finding out what he was. Thankfully though, Alex was able to solve that problem very quickly when it came to mind. There were still several parks and wooded areas in the suburbs, some of which never got any substantial traffic even under normal circumstances, let alone the situation that the world was presently dealing with. Alex had ample time to simply travel to one of these locations and train in peace. Still, it did mean he was out in the open, so he had to be incredibly careful not to be seen and to be observant of his surroundings.

Alex's ears perked as he heard multiple footsteps out in the distance to his left. "...telling you, I heard something. This way." Alex's heart did a jump. 'Oh fuck. Alright, time to bail.' He quickly floated upwards at canopy level height and rapidly flew away from where he heard the voices and the footsteps. Alex eyed the trees, looking for a specific location. As soon as he was sure he was close enough to his destination, he floated downward into and below the trees again, spotting a nearby creek which he then followed downstream. He continued along until he found a small cranny in the rocks making up the creek. He quickly looked around, and after deciding it was safe, he ducked inside and willed himself back to his human form. He took a breath and slowly and carefully climbed out of the creek.

It had been getting much easier to use his psychic powers the more he practiced. Back when he first started training, there was no way he'd be able to pick up more than one object with his mind, let alone three at once, and then go on to launch them all separately with great power. He figured it taking little more than a week may just be because he's a mew, and therefore gifted with a natural talent by his very nature. Even so, he didn't have as much success attempting other techniques. Alex had attempted to figure out how to transform into other pokemon and use other types of attacks- mostly trying fire, electric, fighting, and normal- but found it was much more difficult to manage than his psychic abilities. Alex somewhat expected it, seeing as mews were pure psychic type and psychic moves would therefore come a lot more naturally to him. He was able to get better at using physical moves- he assumed he was using Mega Punch and Mega Kick. Or perhaps it was just Pound. It was a lot tougher to determine exactly what he was using than he thought- but as for other types, he wasn't able to conjure up more than a small static charge and a weak ember. Not even the move Ember. Just a brief weak glowing heat. So for the bulk of his training, Alex largely decided to focus on the basics before training other elemental attacks. But at least Alex knew it was possible. But then there was Transform. He did not know how to do that in the slightest. That in particular was frustrating to Alex, because he dedicated at least an hour of practice time towards trying to figure out that move each day, and he managed to make zero headway. At times, Alex was having such difficulty practicing anything that he wondered if it was this tough for him, even in spite of getting as proficient with his psychic powers as he had, how tough would it be for other pokemon by comparison. Especially for only a third of a month's worth of training.

"I wish I had more time in this spot than I got though, seeing as I was so rudely interrupted. What in the hell were those guys even doing there?" Alex muttered to himself. He let out a defeated sigh and started walking in the direction of his apartment complex. 'Guess that means I ought to find a different training spot. I mean hell, there's no way that anyone who's curious enough to go looking for something is going to see a bunch of shredded tree branches and not want to find who or what is doing that.' Alex let out an annoyed sigh and pulled out his phone. It was barely half past three. Alex shook his head and slipped it back into his pocket. He'd hoped that he would get at least four hours to train which would keep him occupied until dinner time. Sadly, that didn't seem to be the case. Alex briefly thought about finding another location immediately and continuing his training there, but he waved off the idea. 'Nah, I already had one close call today. Don't really feel like chancing a second on the same day, even if I find the perfect spot.' Alex grimaced as he stepped out of the forest's edge and into the blinding sunlight and the stifling heat. 'I suppose it was bound to happen at some point. Just kinda sucks that I have to move somewhere else so soon,' he lamented to himself.

Alex then felt something hard and rounded under his shoe, unlike the flat ground he was walking on. He stopped and lifted his foot to see what it was, half expecting it to just be a rock that had somehow made its way out of the wooded area. But it wasn't. Not one that Alex expected to see, at least. He raised an eyebrow and reached down to pick up the odd stone. It almost looked to him like obsidian. It had a similar glossy texture, but was somewhat opaque and slightly brighter purple in color. Interesting. Alex shrugged and slipped it into his pocket. Seemed like a neat stone, so why not?

Alex wiped away several beads of sweat that had collected on his forehead in the short amount of time he had been in the sun. "I swear, if we start getting cooler temperatures tomorrow, it won't be soon enough," Alex griped bitterly. He pulled out a small water bottle from his other pocket and downed half the bottle in a single swig. Something he discovered during his training was that pokemon, or at least he personally in his pokemon form, were a bit more resistant to the heat of the sun than humans were. It was a bit of an odd experience, but it made some sense, given how durable pokemon needed to be for their constant battling. And it definitely came in handy for him when he decided to train. Unfortunately for him, it wasn't really an advantage he could make use of at all times, for obvious reasons. Alex just gave a sigh and pressed onward.

It took him half an hour to reach his apartment from his former training spot, and by then, he was already drenched in sweat. He quickly downed the rest of his water bottle, wiped off the excess sweat on his head, took out his keys to let himself into his home. He let out a satisfied sigh when the cold blast of air surrounded his body. "Ugh, thank goodness," he muttered before shutting the door behind him.

"Hey, hun. I thought you said you weren't gonna be back until later?" Alex's roommate, Isaac, was sitting on the living room couch, typing away at his laptop.

"Yea, I was, but... holy fuck it's hot outside. I started feeling a bit sick, so I just turned around and headed back," Alex said tiredly, breathing slightly more heavily than normal. He kicked off his shoes, left them by the front door, and started towards his bedroom slowly.

"Oh shit, I'm sorry. You need me to get you anything?" Isaac asked looking up from his laptop with concern, and halfway shutting it.

Alex shrugged and opened up his bedroom door. "I guess another water bottle? But I think other than that, I'll be fine after laying down for a bit." Alex shuffled into his room, flicked on the switch to his ceiling fan, and ripped off his t shirt to cool down quicker. He then flopped unceremoniously into his bed and lay sprawled out on his back, staring at the ceiling. 'Ugh, even if I wasn't embellishing my tiredness, this is still a much needed rest. Maybe I'm still pushing myself a bit too hard with my training.' Alex let out a chuckle. 'Perhaps almost getting found out was a sign that I should cut back a little bit. Maybe shorter days, or every other day or something. Ah well.' Alex pulled out the dark purple stone from earlier. 'At least I found this neat rock. Though I dunno how much that makes up for-'

"Hey, I've got your water bottle... what's that you've got there?" Alex looked up at the sudden voice from his doorway. Isaac stepped inside and handed Alex a cold, unopened water bottle.

"Thanks, man. And this thing? I dunno. Found it on my jog. Looked cool, so I picked it up. Here, take a look if you want," Alex tossed the stone to Isaac with little warning. Luckily for Isaac, he was paying attention and caught it easily. Alex smirked and twisted off the cap of the water bottle. "Nice catch," he remarked before taking a few large gulps of water. 'Oh sweet nectar of the gods, this is good.'

Isaac studied the stone for a few moments before tossing it back to Alex, who bobbled it once before securing it in his hands. "Pretty neat. Kinda reminds me of the one I found some time ago, myself."

Alex raised an eyebrow while he was mid swallow and allowed himself a breath of air after taking several thirsty gulps. He screwed the cap back on and set it on his bedside table. "You found one just like this?" he asked, giving the stone a turn in his hand.

"Sorta. It has a similar glossy texture to it, but it's a lot more green than it is purple. Not quite as dark either." Isaac said, leaning against Alex's wall.

Alex nodded and made a sound indicating his interest in the stone. "Mind if I have a look see? If you have it on you, anyway."

Isaac shrugged and started towards the door. "I don't see why not. It's in my room though. Gimme a sec."

Alex took the time he was away to pull out his phone again. It was a quarter past four, but that hardly mattered to him right now. He wanted to see if he could access one of the pokemon reddit pages he used to frequent to see if it was online at last. The internet as a whole was finally starting to return to form, but any website even remotely pokemon related was another story entirely. They were much more difficult to access due to high volumes of traffic over what was essentially twenty four hours a day. Not terribly surprising, since pretty much anyone would be looking for any answers at all as to what in the hell has been going on in the past month- oh! "Yes, finally!" Alex had finally managed to load a pokemon page on reddit. He skimmed through some of the post titles to see what news he could gather. He didn't dare actually clicking on a link, lest he lose access to the page again. But a lot of the posts he found seemed to be stuff he already knew. Then his attention honed in on a title mentioning something about items. "Wait, what? What's that about...?"

"Here you go!" Isaac burst into Alex's room and practically chucked a green object at him.

"Wait, the fuck-?!" Alex had no time to react and fumbled both the stone and his phone and ended up dropping them both onto the ground, rather than on his bed. Alex gave a grunt of annoyance as Isaac started gleefully giggling, and picked up both his phone, and a dark green stone that Alex figured was the object Isaac threw. Alex looked at his phone screen to discover it was trying to load a web page. His heart fell. "Oh come on, don't tell me..." Alex opened up his tabs and found none of them were the pokemon reddit page. He must've accidentally clicked off the page when he was fumbling his phone. "Damn it, Isaac, I'd JUST reached a pokemon site that could've given me some info!" Alex griped at his roommate.

Isaac immediately stopped laughing and shied away shamefully with a slight grimace on his face. "Oh shit, I'm sorry, hun. I didn't realize you were even doing that."

Alex buried his head into one of his hands and took a breath, trying to calm himself, still holding onto his phone and the green stone in his other hand. "It's... alright, man. I know you didn't mean it." Neither said anything while Alex took a couple seconds to compose himself and lift his head back up to examine the stone. "So this is it, huh? Kinda neat."

"Yea, found it right next to a sidewalk as I was heading home the day of the incident. Thought it looked neat, and I enjoy oddly shaped or colored rocks, so... yea."

Alex, however, didn't pay much attention to Isaac's explanation outside of the first sentence he spoke. His eyes narrowed as he noticed something odd about the stone. It was slightly transparent and looked like there was a jagged yellow streak cutting through the inside of the stone. It looked and felt like glass, but... also felt very much like a rock. It was very peculiar. And yet it also seemed familiar in a way... "Hey Isaac? Does this look like anything to you?"

Isaac blinked at the very vague question. "How do you mean?"

"Well like anything you've seen before, any ideas on what it should be. I dunno, something similar to a... a description you've heard of. I don't know," Alex tried and failed to explain his though process.

Isaac raised an inquisitive eyebrow, getting the general idea on what he was asking. "I mean, not really. The closest thing I can think that this would relate to off the top of my head is obsidian, but it is way too green and translucent for that."

Alex made a disappointed grunt, but continued to study the stone anyway, hoping to come up with something. "Hmm... you said you found it on the way home after the incident, right?"

"Yea, by a sidewalk. It was in some sort of rock... planter... thing, that had a couple of trees growing from it."

Alex made a perplexed face at his roommate. "A what now?" he asked in a deadpan tone.

Isaac threw up his arms. "Well I don't know how else to describe it! Some sort of sidewalk garden someone planted with rocks instead of soil!"

Alex made an 'ah' face and continued studying the stone.

"Yea it was kinda weird. I thought it was a part of the rocks at first, but it was so out of place, I then thought it might've been some bulletproof glass from a car wreck, but there weren't any in the area," Isaac continued on, trying to save face from his description failure.

Alex, however, was hardly interested in any wording blunders at the moment and was more concerned with trying to figure out why the stone seemed so familiar. "Not to mention, this thing would've been far too thick to come from anyone's car window. Even if it were multiple layers of thick bulletproof glass," Alex muttered aloud, continuing on with Isaac's line of thinking.

Then Alex's mind honed in on a key detail. Isaac had found it on the way home after the incident. The pokemon incident. Alex's mind flashed back to the reddit post he was looking at before Isaac came back. It mentioned something about pokemon universe has items too. All of the sudden, the stone looked so much different in Alex's hand as he was almost entirely positive he was able to identify what it was. "No fucking way," he said aloud in a very forceful manner.

"What, what is it? Do you know what it is?" asked Isaac, startled by his roommates sudden reaction.

Alex pulled up his pokemon app on his phone and flipped to the items tab. There it is. He clicked on the icon of the object that most resembled the stone he was holding and compared the two images. Obviously there was bound to be some difference, seeing as one was more cartoony than the other, but other than that, the resemblance was striking. "Isaac... I think this may be a thunder stone."

Isaac was taken aback at Alex's comment. "A- wait, what? A thunder stone? The hell is that?"

"A thunder stone? You know, the evolution item? The thing you kinda need to evolve an eevee into a jolteon?" Alex explained, trying to keep as much snark out of his voice as possible.

Isaac did a double take. "A what- wait, you seriously think that thing is a thunder stone? That's ridiculous. Those things don't- mmh," Isaac cut himself off, seemingly thinking twice before saying something ridiculous, himself, given the circumstances. "W-well what makes you so sure it is one?"

Alex gave Isaac a stare. "Dude. Just look at it."

Isaac made a face, not catching on. "I am... so?"

Alex gave an irritated sigh. "The particular shade of green? The fact that there's a yellow freaking lightning bolt shaped line inside the thing? That's the textbook image of a thunder stone if I've ever seen one. C'mon man, you've played the games. You should know what it looks like."

Isaac narrowed his eyes. "Alex, the games I've played don't have images for any of the items. Remember?"

Alex grimaced and looked away. 'I can't believe I forgot about that.' "Y-yes, well... I mean you could've seen it on some website like bulbapedia or whatever. But anyway, that's not the point," Alex ended that train of thought quickly before Isaac could object any further, derailing the topic further than it already had been. "Take a look at this," Alex showed Isaac his phone, which currently displayed the image of a thunderstone. "I admit, it doesn't seem as obvious, since the yellow bolt in this stone is a lot more jagged sorta like a real life bolt, but I mean... the color, the shape, the the detail in the bolt- what other stone does that?"

Isaac's face seemed more and more perplexed as he shifted his attention back and forth between the stone and the image. "I mean, I could think of a couple stones or gems that do that," he hesitantly mumbled out loud.

"Okay fine, but would it really be randomly laying right by a sidewalk in plain view?" Alex asked with an eyebrow raise.

Isaac fixed his increasingly perplexed gaze on the green stone, as if trying to analyze it. "I... suppose not, no. I never really thought about it, but I don't know why something like this would just be laying there for days on end. Unless it..."

Alex finished Isaac's train of thought after he trailed off. "Unless it wasn't actually laying there until that day."

Isaac wordlessly and slowly took the thunderstone from Alex, who readily gave it back to him. He simply stared at the stone, which was glistening slightly in the sunlight that was pouring in from Alex's window, showing off the bright yellow streak inside the stone that was starting to look more and more like a real life lightning bolt the more the two studied it. "I... I really shouldn't be surprised that these things exist if pokemon do too, but goodness."

Alex nodded and started fiddling with the purple stone he had. "It sorta just makes everything feel real all over again, huh?"

"That's exactly it." Isaac studied the thunderstone for a few more seconds before giving a sigh and putting it in his pocket. He then noticed the stone Alex was fiddling with. "What do you think that is, then? Another one like it? A moon stone, perhaps?"

Alex looked down at the stone he was idly fiddling with and studied it a little bit closer. "Um... maybe? It wouldn't be a moon stone, though. Those are completely opaque in the games. If anything, it looks like it could potentially be a dusk stone, which is an evolution stone that showed up in Diamond and Pearl. But it's really tough to tell whether or not it actually is one, or if it's just some random rock. I mean, judging purely on the circumstances of me finding it, I'd say it's a dusk stone, but other than that, I really have no idea."

Isaac raised an eyebrow at his roommate. "Then what makes you so sure mine is a thunderstone?"

Alex rolled his eyes. "Isaac, c'mon. I know you haven't seen one before, but you have to admit, the thunderstone's appearance is VERY distinct."

Isaac pursed his lips. "Yea, I suppose you're right."

Alex continued to fiddle with the supposed dusk stone while he idly studied it. "I dunno about you, but I'm very interested to know just how many of the pokemon world items suddenly exist if the evolutionary stones do."

Isaac backed up a bit and leaned against Alex's door frame. "Just how many exist in the games anyway? You think there's gonna be any more danger of the world breaking than there already is with these items?"

Alex shook his head. "I really don't know, dude. I don't think so. The most any item can do in the games is boost a pokemon's attacking power by half. And pretty much all of them have some sort of cost or restriction. There are quite a few items though, so your guess is as good as mine if any of the others made it here as well."

Isaac slowly nodded, taking in the new information, then chuckled and shook his head.

Alex raised an eyebrow. "What's so funny?"

"It's just," Isaac briefly trailed off and cleared his throat before looking Alex in the eyes, "I know we haven't talked about pokemon often in the time we've known each other, but when we did, we were always relaxing and passing time. Just hanging out after school hours. And now here's another time we're discussing it, and... it's just- the whole- the entire feeling is just completely different. Before, we were having fun. Now, this is... this is real life. And it's a serious problem." Isaac turned so that his back was leaning against the wall, and looked up at the ceiling fan. "Never in my wildest dreams did I think something dear from my childhood would come back in the most unexpected way possible to haunt us all."

Alex started feeling downcast, himself, as Isaac let loose his thoughts. "We're gonna get through this, man. Humanity is going to find a way to adapt. Yea, things are never going to be exactly the same cuz let's face it, this is waaay too big a change to just ignore. But we're going to be able to go back to some semblance of normalcy. We always do," Alex spoke softly, trying to cheer not just his roommate up, but himself as well.

Isaac simply stared at Alex's ceiling fan for a few moments before letting loose a tired sigh. "I know you're right, hun. I really do. But I'm just wondering how long it's actually going to take. I mean, something like this is not just going to simply blow over overnight, you know. Especially with how they came to be."

Alex was unable to find anything to say to address Isaac's thoughts, much to his own dismay. He let his head sink into his pillow and brought his hands to his face, burying it in his palms. "Uuuggghh, I never thought I as a pokemon fan would be saying this, but I really wish this hadn't happened. This entire situation can go fuck itself," he muttered in a muffled but still audible tone.

Isaac glanced over at Alex and gave an amused scoff. "I hear ya there."

The room was silent for but a moment before Alex's phone started vibrating. Alex pulled his hands off his face and sat up to look at the screen. "Huh, my dad's calling."

Isaac stepped towards the doorway and out of Alex's room. "Say no more. I'll give you some privacy."

"Thanks, man." Alex picked up the phone, pressed the answer button, and brought it to his ear. "Hello?"

The familiar comforting voice of his father came through from his phone. "Hey kiddo. You holding up okay?"

Alex had to smile, despite himself. "Heh, well, as okay as I can be right now."

A chuckle from the other side. "Yea, there's a lot of that going around at the moment. But nothing serious happening with you?"

"Nah. It's been kinda quiet here, thankfully. Still can't do much, but it's definitely better than being in the middle of it all."

"Oh yea. I agree with that for sure."

Alex leaned back into his pillow again. "Yea... everything still going okay with you guys?"

"Well..," there was a brief pause from Alex's dad that made him raise an eyebrow before his dad continued, "your mom and I are still really confused. We tried asking your sister some things about pokemon, but she hasn't been playing video games as long or as often as you have."

Alex smirked. "I can't tell if that was another dig at me asking for every pokemon game or not."

A small stammer from his dad. "It- erm, it wasn't supposed to be. I know I joked around with you about that a lot before, but now I'm seriously asking for help." Alex's facial features softened as his dad continued. "You having all of those games mean you probably know the most when it comes to... pokemon, so would you be okay with coming over to give us a crash course on what we need to expect?"

"Um..." Alex sheepishly rubbed the back of his neck. Truthfully, he had been fully expecting this at some point. It still made it no less weird talking about pokemon with his parents. "Yea, sure. I can do that. When did you want to have me over?"

"Thanks, kiddo. Do you think tonight would be okay? Your mother was thinking about making lasagna for your troubles."

Alex grinned. "You had me at 'lasagna.' Yea, sure. Tonight is fine. I'll start heading over soon."

"Alright. Be safe on your way here. And if you need to, you can spend the night here so you don't have to walk home in the dark."

"You know, I might just take advantage of that. You sure it's okay, though?"

"Yes, Alex. I'm sure. You know our house is still your home too."

Alex sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. "I know, I know..."

"Alright, I'll see you soon. Be safe, okay?"

"I will. Love you, dad."

"Love you too."

"Bye."

"Bye."

Alex tapped the end call button and let his arm fall to the side with a sigh. He stared at the ceiling, getting a few extra seconds of rest, before grabbing the water bottle, taking another swig of water, and getting up from his bed. Alex quickly changed into a fresh set of clothes, slipped on his shoes, and grabbed a few things such as his phone charger and a few small toiletries to get him through the night. After getting fully prepared, he started towards the front door, passing Isaac as he went along. "Hey man, I'm going to my parents' place. They need help on the whole pokemon issue. I'm probably gonna stay the night too, just cuz it's gonna be way too dark for me to walk back when all is said and done."

"Alright, hun. Stay safe out there."

"I will." Alex walked outside and locked the door behind him. 'Hmm, now that I think about it, now might be a good time to scout out more training areas as I go along.' He pulled out his phone and began searching parks and forests near his location. As luck would have it, there happened to be one roughly on his route to his parents' place. It was a little out of the way of where he was going, but it was still close enough to where he could pop in, look around a little bit, and still make decent time to his parents' place. It was an easy decision to make. 'Alright, time to go exploring.'

Alex carefully stepped over a large fallen branch. He had found the park within an hour of walking. It seemed promising at first. It was a very heavily wooded area that could drown out various noises caused by training. Alex thought at first that it would be a great training spot. But then he realized it had a couple problems. First off, it was a park. Meaning people would naturally be attracted to it. Even if he went deep in the wooded areas a considerable distance away, it may still end up meaning the occasional person wandering in whichever direction he decided to train. Alex wasn't particularly willing to chance that. Even if he could work around that issue, however, he also couldn't find any obvious hiding spot for him to safely transform between forms. If he had to flee from someone, he would be in a lot more danger of being seen.

Alex gave a disappointed sigh. And it seemed like such a good training area too. 'Oh well. Maybe if I have literally no other options, I'll come back. But for right now, it's probably gonna have to be a no go.' Alex looked up at the trees and listened to the sounds. Even if he couldn't train here, it was still a beautiful place. A breeze passed through the trees and he was able to hear multiple leaves rustling and the crackling of weak branches out in the distance... along with the occasional car in the background. Despite it clashing with the sounds of nature, Alex still had to smile. The roads downtown might still be obstructed in some spots- annoyingly enough, a few of those spots are what's still trapping his car downtown- but he noticed the suburbs have been getting a lot better in the past couple days. At least when it came to clear roads.

Alex heard a few more branches snapping in the background. He frowned and looked in the direction that it came from. 'Hang on, that didn't sound like it was coming from the wind at all. What was...?' Alex held still, listening closely, but he could hear nothing anymore. Then another car passed in the distance. And with it, he heard more branch snapping. As well as... 'Was that an animal cry too?' Alex pursed his lips, wondering if he should just move on to his parents' house. But eventually, curiosity overpowered his common sense, and he slowly and carefully made his way towards the source of the sound.

It was difficult for Alex to pinpoint exactly where the sounds were coming from, largely because they were getting drowned out by surrounding noises, much to Alex's annoyance. But eventually he managed to make enough ground to where that detail was negligible. He started lowering himself more the closer he got to the source of the noise, hoping to keep himself hidden from view. The branch cracking was getting close. Alex also distinctly heard some sort of animal cry or grunt along with it. Although what it was, Alex really didn't know. He didn't have the most knowledge on animals to begin with. 'If it even is a regular animal to begin with. Hell, it could very well be a pokemon.'

Alex crept forward until he was right on top of the source of the sound. He found a few shrubs he could hide himself behind, and slowly and carefully, he raised his head up enough to get a look at the source of the noise. It was a small black fox with red fur highlights at the top of its head and its paws. It seemed to be breathing rather heavily. Alex's eyes widened as he recognized the fox right away. 'A zorua! I was right! It was a pokemon!'

The zorua was thankfully not focused on the direction Alex was in relative to it. Alex had a good side eye view of what it was doing. Which now that Alex got a closer look at it, didn't seem to be a lot. It was breathing heavily. Alex was worried it was going to pass out due to exhaustion. In fact, it looked to him like that's exactly what was happening. The zorua's eyes started to flutter, and it stumbled to the side slightly, breathing even heavier than before. 'Oh shit, whoever that is, they really don't look good. Maybe I ought to help-' before Alex could finish the thought in his mind, a strong gust of wind suddenly blew through the woods, almost knocking an unprepared Alex off his knees. But he managed to right himself before he lost his balance. Then he noticed something happening to the zorua. A swirling dark aura was enveloping the fox pokemon, whose eyes then shot back open, fixing upon a loose tree branch just within reach. The zorua rushed forward and struck the branch, snapping it on impact with ease. The zorua regained its footing, and gave a smirk, still breathing noticeably faster than normal, but not nearly as much as it been leading Alex to believe. Alex blinked in confusion. 'It was an act? But why would it need to...?' Alex thought back to the swirling dark aura he had managed to see just before the fox pokemon lashed out, then it dawned on him. "Oh, it's Faint Attack!"

Unfortunately for Alex, the realization led to a spoken thought at exactly the wrong time. The zorua's very obviously startled eyes shot towards Alex, who was unfortunately well within view of anything looking in his direction. It gave a loud yelp and made a lunge towards Alex. "AAAHHH, FUCK!" Alex's yelled loudly and his heart did a flip. His flight response kicked in and he tried to scramble away before he ended up getting hurt, but lost his footing and fell onto his back. Alex heard scrambling of paws on the other side of the shrubs, and it was only then did he realize that the zorua wasn't trying to lunge at him. It was trying to get away, and simply tripped on its own paws. Alex's eyes widened at the quick adrenaline filled realization. "Wait, wait, I'm sorry! I didn't mean to! You're a zorua, right?!" Alex yelled out on impulse.

Suddenly, the woods became still. A few tense seconds passed. Alex dare not move from the ground, and no moment came from any other living being, save for the occasional rustle of leaves in the wind. Alex tried calling out again. "That... that's what you are, right? A zorua. I recognize what you are cuz I play the games all the time. Look, I'm sorry for startling you. I was just passing through and I wondered what the noise you were making was. Honest."

Alex's heart was still pounding a mile a minute as he waited for a response. Or anything that let him know it was okay to move. Enough time passed to the point where Alex thought the fox pokemon was already long gone, but just as he was about to get back up, he heard soft footsteps getting closer to him slowly. Alex swallowed nervously as his heart sped back up, and the zorua emerged from the shrubs, eyeing Alex carefully. It let out a bark at Alex while keeping as much distance as possible. Alex opened his mouth to say something, but found himself at a loss for words. The zorua let out another bark in a more demanding tone, causing Alex to flinch. It seemed to want something. Maybe to know who Alex was? Alex cleared his voice and composed himself. "Hi. Um, look. I really am sorry for scaring you. I didn't mean anything by it. I was just curious. Um... my name is Alex. What's yours?" Alex asked, holding out his hand to the zorua.

The zorua flinched as Alex held out his hand, but made no movement to escape. It seemed to study Alex's hand, then Alex, with an apprehensive look. After a few moments, however, it seemed to relax. The zorua gave a sigh and closed its eyes. It became enveloped in a glowing white light Alex recognized as the light that appears when a pokemon changes to their human form. The light began to grow to the size of a person, until a young looking male with short black hair in a dark blue t shirt with a wolf in the middle, and tan khaki shorts, appeared from the light. He looked to be about Alex's age, possibly a year or two older. The young male held out his hand, which Alex accepted after a brief moment of hesitation, and the male helped Alex up to his feet.

The young male let out another breath, and with a soft voice, finally answered Alex's question. "My um... my name is Eli."

((Author's Note: Hey guys! Wow, this month was crazy. Between my new job, the election coming up, and my internet going dark for literal days [seriously. My provider decided to disconnect my internet for some reason without me saying so. No idea why they did that.] I wasn't entirely sure I'd be able to get this chapter out on time. But here it is! I'm personally proud of it, but I still feel like I can improve a bit. As usual, please let me know what y'all think! Thanks!))