Before anyone asks…no. There won't be Mega stuff for the entire run of this story. Live with the originals, you.

I encourage all readers to read, enjoy, and review.

Chapter 11: A Pokémon Cook

The sound of fireworks going off in the night sky startled Lucario from his reading. The Aura Pokémon blinked and lowered his book to see some bright lights coming from outside the second floor. Never one to be looking at that kind of event, Lucario could only blink blankly.

"They're starting to shoot fireworks at this hour," Chris told him as he appeared from the nearby stairs, holding two glasses with orange juice. "This is a very busy city so they won't stop shooting fireworks everywhere for at least two hours. Any longer than that and the police will get worried. But that happens when you live in a city full of proud Americans and…drunk people, I guess."

Lucario was told about how important it was today. Several days have passed, and July 4th arrived. It was a date to commemorate the independence of the humans that lived on the same soil Chris walked. The Aura Pokémon wasn't very interested on human history, but if Chris wanted him to see the fireworks, it would be a good distraction. When he saw the streaming lights falling down serenely from the sky, it did create a wide array of light patterns that faded away after imploding.

They were on the second floor, sitting down on a large couch that faced the terrace before them. They could have gone outside to step out, but Chris was paranoid someone outside would spot Lucario, though the place was too dark to see an imposing monster. From where they were sitting, they were perfectly shaded from eyes in the outside.

As Chris sat down next to Lucario and set down the glasses, he looked at the tall Pokémon. "It's probably going to be hard to remember for you, but…did you ever watch fireworks when you were in your world?" he asked worried, knowing that he never saw in-game fireworks taking place in Sinnoh.

"I'm afraid not," Lucario said, looking down at Chris. "The word sounds a little foreign to me…"

"Foreign?" Chris questioned. "You…you don't know a lot of words?"

"…" Lucario looked away in shame, as the different-colored lights illuminated the somewhat dark floor. "…No, I don't know too many words myself other than words to talk to someone and words related to fighting…and what I can do."

"That's very odd…" Chris muttered. "I thought you were a little more knowledgeable in that than what I've been teaching you."

"All this time, I've been following…um…what is the expression? Following the flow?" Lucario wondered. "Yes, I've been following the flow of the conversations we've had so I wouldn't look so clueless to you… I realize I'm not the social type as the rest of the world here is." He looked back at Chris. "I do lack so many important practices."

The teen looked away. "With an answer like that, it makes me wonder how the Pokémon in your world behave around others... I suppose they're just really wild animals waiting to be taught how to…fight," he said. "…Are Pokémon really that stereotypical? Do they just think about fighting?"

Lucario didn't know the answer to that question. There was a fatal memory problem he never brought up to Chris before, and that was how he didn't remember much about his "past life" when he was trapped inside the game. He believed he was a Pokémon owned by another trainer who wasn't Chris himself, and casually leaving that trainer out from him was not recommended. The Riolu inside his mind, though, clearly wanted to start anew rather than dwelling on memories that never happened. "I suppose so…b-but we do like our trainers," Lucario said, so unsure about the statement he made. "Only the Pokémon that are raised with care are the ones who don't fight all the time."

Chris could tell there was some hesitation there, yet the Pokémon's appearance was a little too intimidating to keep asking such hard questions. "…Do you?" Chris asked; his last question.

"…Me?" Lucario said once Chris stared up at him. "I… I've done some stuff with my trainer other than fighting."

Or perhaps he shouldn't stop asking questions there. Though it didn't look like it, Lucario felt he was being interrogated on a chair. "What kind of stuff?" Chris asked, smiling a bit in curiosity. "Ooh, tell me what stuff you've done with your trainer! Maybe I can do something similar with you to make you feel more at home here."

While the Riolu inside his mind glared rather fiercely for a cutesy creature, Lucario sweated bullets in a figurative sense.

It also made him wonder how in Arceus' name his subconscious managed to become a separate identity fully aware of his true feelings. It shouldn't even happen like that.

"We…we…" He had to make something up. Lying was such a cowardly act he disliked greatly, and so far he has been saying a fair amount of lies about how he felt about being in the real world. Another set of lies pilling up on top of those would crush him eventually, no matter if he was secretly a muscled Pokémon with a scrawny look. "We…played…played…" He closed his eyes and let his subconscious suggest anything just to get the question over with. It was a pretty bad idea for Lucario, as the Riolu barked happily a sweet-looking lie to embarrass himself. "…Hide-n-Seek." It was unavoidable to blush.

"…S-snrk," Chris suppressed a small snort. "H-hide-n-Seek? You?"

Inside his mind, Lucario growled furiously. "(Why would I ask for advice from you?!)" he told his troublemaking Riolu conscience, who didn't shiver in fear but laughed at his face. The Riolu laughing like that was a dead giveaway that Lucario wanted to chuckle at his own lie, but pride took over his outside face. "W-while I was a Riolu, I mean… (Oh Arceus, that's much better…)"

"O-oh, right," Chris said, his small snorts subsiding. "I just can't imagine such a large Lucario like you hiding behind a tree so simply… Did you have a lot of fun doing that when you were a little boy?"

He had to continue with the lie a little more, and he also needed to look convincing by forcing a smile that seemed to twitch. Chris noticed the twitching but dismissed it as just an embarrassing reaction. "A lot," Lucario said. "When I was smaller, my trainer would sneak up on me and pick me up by my arms. Then…we would roll around on the grass, laughing and rubbing our cheeks together." Albeit he was feeling way too embarrassed for saying such descriptions, he pressed on.

The Riolu felt silent, suddenly looking sad. He yearned to do that with Chris…

"That's…cute to imagine," Chris said, and Lucario never knew the teen wanted to do that with a Riolu, deep down in his own mind. "But then you evolved…"

"Yes," Lucario said, trying to look sad about the lie, but what he truly felt sad about was to never experience such memories as a young Riolu. "I grew so big and heavy that my trainer stopped playing with me, because I had grown mature and serious. Evolution is a way for Pokémon to reach adulthood faster, it seems…" There was something in him that told him his reasoning wasn't a lie at all. "And it was very brief." It truly was never there. "I had only been caught by her for three days only, and at the end of those three days, I was already a Lucario…" His memory was a mess of blank memories that never happened much. He couldn't even remember when he was a Riolu.

"…Wait, are you trying to say you had a very short childhood?" Chris asked. "(That makes me wonder how the in-game Riley took some time to hand over that Riolu to my in-game avatar…)"

"I…guess," Lucario said. And he was honest when he said, "I have no memories of my parents at all while I grew up before I got caught and evolved. I was born from an egg with my trainer holding me."

"No memories of your parents?"

"(…?)"

Lucario quickly picked up a strange, negative feeling from Chris's aura. It was a feeling of sorrow that pierced through his soul… In fact, it was so bad it was nagging Lucario's senses.

Then the sorrowful emotion went away very quickly before Lucario could have a chance to look more closely into it, not that he wanted to do it. "That's horrible…" Chris muttered. "You don't remember your parents?"

"That is the disadvantage a Pokémon has when they're taken away while they're in their eggs," Lucario explained. "But because we are born as naïve children, anybody close to us at the time of our birth is given the role of parents until we grow up and realize we never saw our real parents. I thought my trainer as my parent…and in less than a month or so I never cared about looking for my real parents." He sighed, feeling sad for not even considering looking for his parents. His false memories were just making things worse. "A childhood that lasted three days without ever knowing who your parents were… How morbid, isn't it?"

Chris mumbled. "Yes…" he muttered. "The whole adulthood method you Pokémon have is so messed up in that regard."

Lucario knew he was telling some true facts in his explanation. Albeit the memories of his trainer and other times were a lie, the other memories were true. Anything before those three days were a mystery and only Chris knew it most certainly had to do with Riley giving the Riolu egg to his in-game avatar. Chris couldn't bring himself to say that as it would be too confusing.

Mysteriously enough, Lucario felt an odd sense of nostalgia when he said those lies. Even the Riolu blinked in realization and cocked his head to side as if those lies were actually…

"It's like you skipped your childhood altogether," Chris added. "I did have a childhood that I never skipped, but you… Don't you want to have an opportunity to have a normal childhood?"

"It's too late," Lucario said. "I don't think like I used to. I only cared about fighting until…until I ended up here with no means to fight anybody, and I doubt the humans of your world can even stand a chance against someone like me."

"I hardly think any humans of your world can stand up against an evolved Pokémon," Chris retorted, "…and much less a juggernaut like you."

Lucario smiled a bit at the indirect compliment. He liked the "j" word. "In any case, I don't wish to go through childhood again, because I feel superior as a Lucario and it's technically impossible for a Pokémon to…'de-evolve.'"

The teen looked doubtful. "But if you could…would you?"

"De-evolve?"

"No. Have a chance to live a longer childhood if it was possible."

"Uh…" Lucario rubbed his chin, thinking hard about the possibility. The Riolu was beaming with glee at the idea and, much to his real self's chagrin, it occasionally said he wanted Chris in there. "…I…suppose. It's hard to go back to being a puny Riolu when you're this big and strong." Taking offense to that, the Riolu stuck out his tongue.

The house owner shrugged. "Are you drunk with your power or something?" he asked rhetorically before Lucario could answer. "Honestly now! You're some sort of Battle Maniac."

The Riolu nodded several times while Lucario stared blankly. "No, I'm not a Battle Maniac," he said. "I can do other stuff besides the stuff you've taught me. (He surely forgot I can sense auras.)"

"Okay then," Chris said, putting up a dull look. "Mention something that doesn't have to do with battle...or…" he got in deep thought, "…your aura senses."

"…" Lucario was cornered. "…" He looked to the sides, his red eyes not taking their focus on Chris's dull-looking eyes. As he tried hard to say something else, he eventually came to a dead end. "…It-it's not fair! You took down all my answers!" he complained.

The Aura Pokémon saw the teen smiling in victory. "See now? This is why you should expand your horizons beyond just fighting and meditating," he said. "Tomorrow, I'm introducing you to a new lesson now that you've learned to read faster at a normal reading speed. Congrats!"

Lucario looked down at the book on his lap. Days of hard training paid off nicely now that he was able to read words clearly without stopping. With the boring books of history done for (and his somewhat childish thoughts that he defeated the laughing words), he was now allowed to take on written stories that Chris stored in his room. The Aura Pokémon was interest to read "The Bean Trees," which was the book he was reading right now.

"Thank you," Lucario said. "Reading does have its benefits now that I understand the words as long as they don't sound too foreign."

"I knew you would get the hang of it soon," Chris said. "But I wonder if you can learn the next big thing tomorrow…" The teen looked outside to see the fireworks going off. He saw a watermelon pattern. "Oh! They're shooting fireworks with patterns now! Let's see them for a while longer."

Lucario blinked and fell silent as he watched the fireworks with Chris. He ended up enjoying seeing the different colors and patterns in the sky, and he greatly enjoyed the teen's company more than before. A bond was forming up between them, and the Riolu flailed his arms in happiness at the fact. The day he would admit his true opinions about the teenager were coming closer.

It was too soon. He needed more time to see if he could go back to his old world, and the thought of leaving Chris behind stung him so badly… Was making a strong attachment to a person other than his forgotten trainer a good idea? He pondered this as the fireworks went off all night long…

The next day…

"I'm teaching you how to cook."

It occurred to Lucario that this human was most likely insane without any doubt. No way would that beaming look not hide any dark motives. A motive then reared its head after those words were spoken clearly. Everything was too good to be true before that moment. He needed to make a run for it discretely in a smart way!

"…You can't be serious," Lucario responded as he stared down at a frying pan on top of an oven.

"Oh, I'm serious now," Chris said. "I can't have you seek out fruits outside once I go back to school."

So far, Lucario had no business to stay in the home's kitchen for longer than twenty seconds. It was a sacred place where steaks would come out and get delivered to his plate just to be mercilessly torn apart by his crazy strong fangs. To him, it was taboo to go in there to do anything else that wasn't putting dirty plates in the dishwasher. Getting close to a storage or machine of sorts would be bad news, and he felt pathetic to occasionally think about raiding the refrigerator at night to find meat without needing Chris's help. He was a highly carnivorous person.

The kitchen was a white, clean place in the house. It didn't look as fancy as the living room, or that was what Lucario thought, as he wasn't that good at evaluating interior decorating. He could only describe the kitchen as clean, with the floor under his feet barely reflecting his body as a large blue blur. On the south side, the way to the dining table next to the living room was located. On the west side, a large white refrigerator stood proudly leaning to the wall. On the east side, the dishwasher and the sink were located in front of a window looking outside the backyard's east portion. However, the north side seemed to be the busiest spot, as there were a multitude of drawers, small doors, and other small compartments on the floor and hanging on the walls on the sides of a large black oven. The central point of the kitchen meanwhile had a large kitchen table, possibly for multitasking.

"Go to school?" Lucario questioned. "You?"

Chris looked offended. "Why do you sound surprised? You've seen the diplomas I have hanging on my room's walls," he said. "What I don't have in brawn, I make it up with my brain a lot."

"Oh, sorry… I'm used to think Pokémon Trainers solely travel everywhere without ever attending school," Lucario said. "That's what little I can remember from my world."

"I'm not suicidal enough to go traveling the world inhabited by creatures that can potentially skin me alive rather than staying put in a single place…"

"I could travel with you for your protection," Lucario babbled for too much, gasping mentally at the atrocity he said and wishing he wasn't too blunt. The Riolu flailed his arms with glee.

Luckily, Chris didn't look too much into the simple statement. "There is no real point doing that in my world. I do plan to study to get into my desired job field...whatever that is. I'm still undecided about choosing my profession," he pointed out. "That's a topic for another day. Today, I'm teaching you how to cook some simple meals."

The last words alone made Lucario imagine the whole house burning down to the ground because of his reckless actions. He had to avoid this lesson at all costs to never come to that mentally scarring event. "I… Uh… Is this necessary?" Lucario asked, looking quite perplexed and restless. "Aren't you taking these lessons a little too far?"

There was a hollow but unsettling silence when the teen stared long at Lucario's face. "I can see hesitation when I look at your face," Chris said duly. This human is incredibly frightening, Lucario thought. He did not need sixth senses to perceive emotions. For a brief moment, he thought his aura abilities were there just to make up for his lack of social skills, meaning he was flawed. "Unfortunately, I did think far ahead in my life once you started settling in, and so I foresaw what would happen if I were to leave you here alone while I'm busy at High School. I'm not going to be here during the mornings, and the bus leaves pretty early, not giving me enough time to give you anything to eat."

This was the perfect moment to rebut the statements.

"I can go without eating each morning," Lucario said, forcing a stoic look. "Really, I don't need to be fed three times a day. I can do just fine with just two meals."

"You think so?" Chris said with a quizzical look as he looked at Lucario's stomach. "If you were a normal Lucario with the official height, I'd see how you wouldn't need to eat too much with such a skinny body…" Chris never knew that made Lucario slightly angry, as he was somewhat sensitive about his body shape. It was Lucario's secret wish to become a buff Pokémon; perhaps the first buff Lucario in history. Added with the fact the teen mentioned he had incredible strength, the Aura Pokémon did think he needed to look the part better with large biceps. "But look at you! You're a giant when we stand next to each other. Even taller than my dad, too. That stomach you have there is just as big as mine for sure so…you need to make it up by eating a little more food occasionally."

That was a pretty strong defense to justify the lesson, but Lucario needed to break down that wall without using physical strength. "I can try using my aura to detect people outside an-"

"Out of the question," Chris interrupted.

"Let me finish," Lucario said. "I told you I can sense auras. I can become familiar with the terrain and find fruit in a tree to eat without arising suspicion."

"…Out of the question," Chris repeated without considering. Lucario groaned mentally. "It's extremely risky. I can't have you running outside and let a single adult spot you. It would cause such a huge uproar if they saw you coming into my house. I'd have to deal with so many questions and then… No!" He strongly disagreed. "Can't you imagine how bad things would get?"

"I-I guess…" Lucario stuttered, and then there was a feeling of sadness emanating from Chris's aura. The Aura Pokémon couldn't bring himself to keep pushing his way out of the lesson if it meant the teen would get sad… If the lesson took place in the beginning, he would have pressed on regardless. Now, it was impossible to be selfish without making a person sad. "My stay here would get impossible to bear in that situation…"

"Exactly," Chris said. The emotion of sadness was going away, relieving Lucario. "I can probably have you eat leftovers every day, but just in case I ever forget to make you some food, you'll have to do it yourself."

Lucario stared at the frying pan with a hard look. He was quick to envision a hellfire exploding in the house by his own hands. From inside that inferno, he saw himself burning to the ground before the house collapsed on him, bellowing to the sky why he couldn't cook a piece of steak.

His assumed trainer saw the hard stare, which made him think about doing something else. "…But thinking again, letting you move on to the frying pan is just jumping the gun too soon. I don't want the house to be on fire because of you." While Lucario was impressed that Chris managed to get close to his nightmare, the teen put the frying pan away. The imaginary house suddenly was safe from fire. "We'll have to start with something much more basic, easier and less threatening… A sandwich!"

"What?" Lucario said, looking back at Chris. "A sandwich?"

"Yes. Come to think of it, I haven't even made you one from the beginning," Chris noted. "Do you want to learn how? It's very simple."

Lucario thought about the impossibility that was other trained Pokémon looking at him making food with human tools. They would laugh at his back and indirectly ask for a beating of their lives (unless they were Ghost-types, which Lucario couldn't even punch). There were no Pokémon around, but just a harmless human who wanted him to learn so much. And perhaps, learning how to make food while he was alone in the house would prove to be beneficial. Getting back on topic, he was embarrassed to say he didn't know what a sandwich was.

"It's got ham in it," Chris suddenly said, thinking Lucario was feeling hesitant about the easy task.

"I'm in," Lucario almost immediately replied, growling loudly at the Riolu in his mind who just giggled under his little blue hands at his little act of mischief. He really needed to put his cravings for meat under control, or else his species would look down on him…

Several minutes later, on top of the kitchen table, there were ingredients placed in front of the imposing Lucario, and he felt that those ingredients were friends with the letters that used to laugh at his face, seeing as he imagined the abhorrent piece of lettuce – a sickening vegetarian's food – pointing fingers at him… Why the hell was he imagining such things? Was his unconscious trying to make him look like a very childish person? He had to admit he was so stressed about his situation, so that was probably it. He needed support or else he would lose it…if he wasn't losing it already. Focus, he told himself.

"The most basic of all dishes there is," Chris said. "Even if you have large hands, it shouldn't be too difficult to even add mayonnaise to the bread."

Lucario took a moment to look at his hands. Compared to Chris's delicate, smaller hands and fingers, one finger from Lucario's hands would be enough to smother an entire hand. Though if he can hold forks perfectly, a butter knife wouldn't be that harder to hold. "Really, after comparing our hands' sizes, I feel like I am really too big," Lucario said.

"That's…true," Chris admitted. "I thought you'd measure under my chest area, but I'm the one who measures right below your chest…spike," he added when his eyes stopped at the somewhat large spike protruding from the aura wielder's chest. "Give me a few years and someday I'll get my head stabbed if I turn around the corner."

"Nonsense, Chris. I can prevent head-on collisions thanks to my aura senses warning me beforehand," Lucario explained. "I assure you my spikes won't ever hurt you in any gruesome way."

"Oh… That sounded very reassuring coming from you," Chris noted. "You are incredible," he muttered in a low tone that Lucario managed to hear clearly anyway. The Riolu beamed with glee at the small praise, though his older appearance had a blank look petrified on his face. "So then, let's start off with your first dish created by your own hands."

As some time passed by, Lucario wondered why he was doing this again. Wasn't his trainer's job to feed him and not make his own food? His trainer wasn't there with him, and it felt wrong to him for Chris to give him food when he wasn't that person. But still, he could go out and find food in trees, yet that idea was shot down for their own safety. Times really had changed so drastically in a brief moment, and he didn't know if he could adapt so quickly to his new environments. He pondered this as his blank mind mindlessly followed all of the steps Chris outlined for him to do to make his food at home.

Just as he was at the point where his body was acting on its own without his will to respond, a loud screeching sound came from his hands that snapped him out from his trance. Startled, he looked down at the cut tomato trapped in his left hand while the other hand was holding some kind of metal with a handle. The cold metal hadn't cut the tomato a second time. It was actually over his left hand…and it was shredded to pieces.

"M-my goodness…" Chris breathed out, Lucario becoming aware of what happened. "T-the knife you used… You were about to cut your hand, but…! The knife broke!"

Blinking, Lucario finally became fully aware of the situation, raising the strange metal to his eyes. The once firm-looking knife was mercilessly destroyed once it dared cut his hand's skin instead of leaving a deep bleeding wound. In fact, he had done three motions with it, and none of them managed to hurt him at all. "…Oh," was all Lucario said.

"…'Oh'? That's all?" Chris said, looking bewildered as he stared at Lucario. "My god, you could've hurt yourself so badly! I saw your hand moving the knife three times over the same spot, and that one knife is one of the sharpest ones I have…" Lucario stared down at the torn metal pieces sprinkled around the tomato over the cutting board. "I know you're a Steel-type Pokémon as well, but your hands don't really feel that hard to the touch."

"Huh…" Lucario felt like he wasn't in touch with the real world more than his mental thoughts. "Maybe I really am strong in all ways," he said, still looking stoic.

"No kidding… First super strength, now nigh invulnerability?" Chris said. "We only need to see how fast you are and then I'll classify you as an otherworldly being… Don't tell me you can fly as well. You'll be a demi god if you do."

Lucario didn't dislike the idea to having the power of flight. "No, I'm sure I can't fly," he said. "But as for speed…" The temptation to run around the house right there for some workout was definitely tempting. The Riolu looked pumped up as well.

"N-no, please no, not today," Chris blurted out quickly. "Today's a day to teach you how to cook, not to show off your moves for me." Even the Riolu had to look saddened for not showing off his moves. "Just…let me clean the table from those knife bits. I don't want steel to be mixed with your sandwich, unless Steel types can eat steel and metal."

"Of course they don't," Lucario dismissed, but he wasn't all sure about it. "…Well, at least not my species."

After clearing the cutting table from the metal pieces, Lucario put his head back to reality (as much as he could) and retried cutting the tomato, this time without decimating a second knife. Thankfully, the knife was spared, and a freshly cut tomato piece was ready. "Good," Chris said. "From here, things shouldn't make your body destroy anything else other than the sandwich."

Lucario stiffed a small glare. "I can be very delicate," he said.

"Tell that to the knife you killed delicately," Chris retorted. The Riolu groaned loudly and hunched over, but Lucario suppressed his deep growls as to not scare the teen.

Ten minutes later, Lucario had managed to create food of his own without having to pluck berries out from trees or kill large Tauros. Just as he wondered if Tauros were edible, he looked down on the harmless-looking sandwich. It actually looked appetizing, mostly because there was a square piece of ham sticking out from all edges, along with the tomato and lettuce pieces on top of the squared cheese hidden between the meat and lettuce. Because of size differences, the sandwich looked small compared to the towering monster in front of it. The point became clearer when Lucario picked it up with a hand. His hand could cover it completely and even hide it in a clenched fist.

"…Wow. I didn't think the sandwich would look that small on your hand," Chris muttered. "It almost looks like a snack instead of breakfast…"

The Aura Pokémon took a closer look at the sandwich. His nose quickly picked up the pork smell from the ham, which triggered his starving instincts to take a big bite (nearly a third) of the sandwich… The taste was pretty good. The ham mixed up with the cheese, and the lettuce and tomato were nice extras that blended well with the bread. This was better than eating the dreadful cereals he was forced to eat as punishment, and he could really see himself eating this many times in each day. "This is good," he said, but the Riolu said, "This is SOOOOOOOO good! I want more!"

"I know this sounds pretty weird, but…congrats for making your own food," Chris said, smiling a bit. "It wasn't as hard as you thought, did it?"

"It wasn't," Lucario said, and then he gave up to his hunger and started eating the sandwich until it was gone forever inside his body. He did lament how the experience was pretty brief, but he did swallow more than savoring the taste. Chris knew he had eaten it too fast.

"That went pretty fast…" Chris muttered. "I guess it'd be better if you ate two sandwiches instead."

Either Lucario had to agree that he needed more food or that he could manage with one serving. "…I want another one," Lucario said, giving up to his inner Riolu. "I'm still hungry."

The teen chuckled. "(Is he trying to look tough? He doesn't want to look so submissive.) Do you want me to make you one?" he offered. "You could try making another one without listening to me."

"I'll take your offer," Lucario said nodding. "Next time, though, I'll do it myself."

"Then I suppose you can make your food from now on," he said. Lucario stared down at him. "If you ever feel very hungry and you want to eat, go ahead. The kitchen will be open to you 24/7. Don't wait for me to make you food if you really want to eat… Well, eat breakfast. You still don't know how to make steaks."

The word "steak" was so imprinted in Lucario's mind that his mouth watered very fast just hearing it. Oh, if only he could do it himself without simply thinking about hunting animals. "I wanna learn how to make steaks!" the Riolu beamed with glee.

Then the gruesome image of the house burning down scared him away from being near a frying pan.

"Uh… It'll take a long while for me to know how to make steaks," Lucario admitted, feeling disappointed. "This involves fire from a machine. I wouldn't bear to know I caused an accident by burning down your house."

Chris shuddered. "I-it's not like you'll screw up that badly," he said. "Someday, you'll be able to use a frying pan expertly! Just maybe, I guess… Maybe you'll be better than I am."

"Better than you?" Lucario said. "I can't really see it. You serve good food. None of it has been bad…except for eating cereal every morning." He growled in disgust. "I am not drinking milk for a few more days."

"(Maybe I was too rough with that punishment? I still have a head on top of my shoulders…)" Chris thought, feeling alarmed. "Who knows? Besides having super skills, you could have a future as a chef."

"I still don't see it," he said defiantly.

"…Fine, then. You'll be an average cook, or chef. I don't know the difference between both," Chris said. "Anyway, I'll make you a sandwich myself. I'm giving you a glass with orange juice for a more complete meal." Juice was a very refreshing drink to Lucario; even better than drinking the gas-filled soda drinks he liked to drink on occasion. He wouldn't drink more than one soda just to keep his dignity, but fighting his meat cravings was another obstacle that was even harder to overcome.

When Lucario had left the kitchen, Chris got into thinking about the knife that broke. "(Just what is he?)" he thought. "(He can lift a bed and cut down tree trunks without struggling or looking exhausted, he can't feel pain when cutting himself accidentally… Are Pokémon really that strong?)" he wondered as he was now out of touch with the real world, his hands working by themselves on the next sandwich. "(Or is he a big exception? He has to be… I mean, this Lucario is abnormally huge and powerful, maybe even too powerful for his own good. I don't want to see him ever going on a rampage so things are nice as they are. Still…what is he? Why did this even happen in the first place?)" The answers to his troubling questions would probably never resurface under the current circumstances.

The rest of the day went by with Lucario making another memory to look back to. He clarified this nice event by nighttime when Chris was already sleeping, a small smile stuck on him as he breathed air. The Aura Pokémon looked down on the human, flashing a small smile of his own before looking out to the window. He expected fireworks to implode in the sky, though seeing the bright moon was more than enough.

He reflected on the skills he had learned thus far. Lucario knew how to read, how to use utensils, how to play video games, how to watch movies and even comment on them, how to make some food for himself, how to maintain the flowers outside, how to cut and store wood for Winter, how to take a shower… He knew so many Pokémon didn't know how to do all this. He was truly special, even more so when Chris told him he was incredibly strong.

His thoughts stopped at the word "strong."

Lucario blinked and looked back at Chris, and then he looked down at his body. Thinking back, he hadn't mastered how to use Aura Sphere. All this time, he hadn't done an appropriate training session to temper his body. Meditating had become very dull and he needed to do some workout badly. True, being told he was very strong felt reassuring, but Lucario was an overachiever when it came down to power. If he truly was the strongest, the only common goal was to become even stronger. No Pokémon would dare look at him funny if he managed to learn Aura Sphere and reach higher ranks.

But how could he do all that in this world with no Pokémon? Training was all he could do, but how? He needed to train now! Perhaps the dream of growing muscles wasn't totally impossible, but that was pretty far off. What could he use at home for workout? He needed some equipment but Chris lacked gym equipment, even dumbbells. He could probably replace something with what he needed and pretend it was…

…Lucario looked at the bed. Didn't Chris say it was one of the heaviest things in the house? The Aura Pokémon knew how to be careful. And maybe with Chris's body as added weight would make this work. Now, he could wake up early in the morning and start from there…

A small smile formed on his lips as he nodded to himself and went to sleep in his usual sitting position. Tomorrow was the day he would start his training schedule.

TO BE CONTINUED…

I think this chapter was a little too brief, but I also think that it was enough to make some good impressions about Lucario himself, as in, what he wishes to do the most.

So, expect the next chapter to be the start of his training regimes. It can only go downhill from there… Uh, I mean, uphill.

Please do review!