Its legs grow strong while it chases after its parent. It runs in fields and mountains all day.

8

Chevy did as he said he would by trying to introduce me to the other fire poke'mon I knew.

Slugma and Torkoal only blinked at me.

A pair of ADHD Torchic twittered to me a bit about warm bellies and huffing before getting distracted by a pretty rock, a crooked feather on one's back, an unfortunate grasshopper that had wondered too close to the fire area, food? You have food? Are we hungry?

My only straight answer came from a heavy-lidded Numel: "No. I suck at teaching and you smell weird."

The Ponyta, which I'd actually been a little excited for, ended up being the most disappointing of them all.

She laughed at me.

"How pathetic! How old are you? Oh, that's priceless. Slow, ugly, stinky, and useless! Oh, this is rich."

Chevy didn't even try to push me into asking her again.

"We get new poke'mon all the time," he said. "Just wait, we'll find somebody."

But I didn't have forever.

I knew because I'd overheard Carlos's phone calls to other breeders, asking for advice on encouraging shy or otherwise disinterested poke'mon. I had heard more than one mention of 'artificial insemination.'

Thus, I ran.

I made laps around whichever side of the pasture I had been put in for the day. We were returned to our balls to sleep at night, something which I was quickly growing used to, especially since the inside of my poke'ball quickly took on my scent. But first thing in the morning, after I had eaten my unappetizing bowl of meat flavored kibble, I'd set off, starting at a jog, then to an all out sprint. I'd run till I couldn't breathe, collapse, wait until I could stand again, then set off once more. My morning passed in fire and spit from my hanging tongue. Pokemon really were disgusting.

It was my first day all over again. The poke'mon stared, completely flummoxed. But as the morning wore on, they grew bored, and went back to whatever amused them. Ponyta actually ran beside me for a bit, if only to laugh at how slow I was and show off her own speed.

A few times I caught Carlos standing at the gate, gaping alongside his dog.

At lunch he had to bring over my food, as I hadn't gotten up from where I'd collapsed in the grass, hoping the chill of the earth could cool me.

"What's gotten into you, girl?" he asked as he set my bowl beside me.

What, never seen a poke'mon train themselves? I thought, but of course they didn't. That's why there were poke'mon trainers in the first place.

His hand patted my side, an unwelcome addition of heat.

"You gonna be okay? I got you something new to eat today. I know you don't care for the dry stuff."

I rolled to my stomach, images of fresh fruit or even a loaf of bread flitting through my head.

Lounging against the side, like a fat man in a sauna, sat a thick, raw steak.

I stopped panting long enough to take a sniff, the scent of dead-thing-juice making my mouth water far more than it should.

I sighed. And, reminding myself that I was carnivorous now, I leaned forward and took a nip off the side.

The familiar flavor of meat burst across my tongue, except intensified and multiplied as a steak had never been. I somehow forgot that it still dripped with blood and dug my teeth into it, wondering if I'd gone mad. Next thing I knew the steak was gone and I had the most deep seated satisfaction settled in my gut and couldn't seem to stop licking my lips.

Carlos was beaming.

"That a girl," he rubbed my bangs between my ears. "Get some meat on those bones. You're too skinny as it is."

"Thank you," I said, nuzzling his hand since I knew all he heard was "Ninetales."

But he knew all the same. "You're welcome."

When he turned to take the bowl away, Chevy appeared in his place.

He lay down across from me, the long grass tickling into his dark fur.

"You are by far the oddest poke'mon I have ever met," he said. "No offense."

I just shrugged. I wasn't technically human in the first place, but he didn't need to know that. Or, rather, he'd most likely not believe me, or worse, start to avoid me like all the others. They already knew something was off.

He rested his head on his paws and, for a while, we just hung out, listening to the breeze rustle through the leaves and the occasional cries of the other poke'mon. Occasionally I'd hear the familiar gossipy "pi pi pi" of conspiring Pikachu and Pichirisu. I rolled onto my favorite position of my back, leaving two tails out from beneath me to sweep over my tucked back legs and stomach.

I ached. I'd never run so much in my life. An exhausted daze laid over me, weighing my eyelids, fed by the soothing white noise of life around me.

'—I've never had to resort to artificial insemination before. Isn't it a bit intrusive?'

I snapped out of a doze, rolling back onto my feet. Chevy's head jerked up at my sudden movement.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"I should get back to running," but even as I stood, I stumbled, my legs protesting from the abuse.

Chevy stiffened in alarm. "Haven't you done enough?"

"I have to get stronger."

"Not instantly you won't!" He stood, lips curling back, though it was phenomenally less intimidating than Houndoom or even the wild Mightyena. "Back down with you. No good will come out of you breaking yourself."

"Carlos can just take me to a poke'mon center, can't he? That's how trainers can level mash all day, can't they?"

When his jaw dropped open and he stared, I knew I'd said something especially weird.

"Level mash?" he repeated, then shook his head. "Look, the nearest poke'mon center is an hour's drive away—"

"That medicine, then, I think I saw a few super potions. He can just spray it on me—" I should be running already. My shaking legs were stalling. I was stalling. "—and I can get on my merry way—"

"Stop it!" He barked, actually barked, turning my ears down. "You do that and he'll just keep you in your ball. He already thinks there's something wrong with you, you don't need to encourage him!"

That gave me pause. "He…what does he think is wrong with me?" Besides the fact that I wasn't actually a Ninetales.

Chevy hesitated. "Well, I…I don't understand all of it. But from what I've been able to hear...he was talking about something wrong with your body. Something that would screw with your mind and also show up in the color of your fur."

Ah. "So he thinks I have a genetic disorder."

He gawked. "Yeah, yeah that was the word. Genetic—how by Arceus…you really do understand humans, don't you?"

I sighed, but allowed myself to fall back to the ground. I didn't have much of a choice.

"Clearer than I get most poke'mon," I said, truthfully. "And him thinking I'm sick is the least of my worries, which is why I have to run. I have to get out of here, Chevy."

"I don't see what running around in circles has to do with getting out, and even if it did you don't honestly think you can defy the link to your poke'ball, do you?"

That caught me. "Link? Is that why poke'mon can't leave their trainers even if they want to? I've always wondered."

"You mean you don't know?"

"I was caught in the wild, you know."

"But still, you're parents…" but something like understanding was dawning on his canine face. "That's it. That's why you're so…you didn't have parents, did you? Nobody. But then how did you survive—I just assumed you started out human born and…"

I didn't know how to answer that, and since I both didn't want to lie to him and didn't want to deal with the hassle of keeping up with said lie, I said nothing, hoping he'd just fill in the blanks himself.

After a time of waiting, his ears pointed high and his head cocked to the side, he finally came to the conclusion that I wasn't going to talk and said, "Even if you got strong enough to survive well enough on your own, your poke'ball link will call you back, or at the very least stop you from going a certain distance. It's more or less a leash. A leash on your spirit."

Since the spirit was by far not a part of science, I highly doubted that was the story behind the technology of the poke'ball. But, then, it wasn't like I had ever looked too far into it. And it was the poke'mon's side of the story that most affected me.

And there was always a chance the mystical 'poke'ball link' wouldn't apply to me.

"But besides that," said Chevy, slowly, as though he treaded on careful ground. "It…isn't right."

"Like…morally right?"

"Such words…" he said, before shaking his head, as though shaking off a thought. "Yes. We…Arceus, you really don't know anything. About anything. But you're so intelligent and know things like gen-tic disorder and…where did you come from, Mayleen? Were you really born in the wild?"

Time to steer this conversation elsewhere. "Could you go back to why it isn't right? What, will I be a bad per-er, poke'mon if I run from my poke'ball or something?"

"Yes, uh. Gosh, this is so weird…" but then all the awe gave way to a grim determination. "But I will teach you, so it's okay now. Just tell me what you do know. No, wait, that won't work, you don't even know what you don't. Okay, so basics. Do you know Arceus?"

"Uh…creator poke'mon? Basically god of everything?"

He chuckled. "I should have figured. That's how humans think of him. But no, Arceus is only god of poke'mon. The humans have their own god, one that has, either through their own will or by the forgetful nature of humans, been forgotten."

"And what does he have to do with Arceus?"

"Why, everything." Chevy opened his mouth in a small doggy grin. "The human god Aria was Arceus's trainer. It is because of them that Arceus became a god at all."

Author's Note: Gall, my cat stinks.