Yes, you finally get to meet her this chapter. I'm not going to write too terribly much about her yet, because I want to get some feedback on the way that I'm developing her character, see if the way that she acts is the way in which you guys would like her to. Please review, people.

Soon after the travelers' tussle, the first signs of the coming dusk began to show themselves on the horizon and in the air. Through the trees of the forest through which they wondered, the forest-native bunny girl seemingly a lot more comfortable in such than was her human companion, shone the deep oranges and reds and purples and yellows of the sunset. Two pairs of eyes had turned upward to watch the spectacle, a display that was so beautiful it could have been hand-painted by Arceus himself just for their enjoyment. A peaceful quiet hung in the air as the sun finished its decent into the night sky, replaced soon thereafter by a crescent moon.

Following the fall of night, Ben and Delaney decided to set up camp, finding a suitable area that was somewhat close to what appeared to be either a large pond or a small lake, whose surface reflected the sliver of the moon that peeked out from behind wispy clouds. The melodic tone of Delaney's soothing voice humming drifted toward Ben as he began setting up the tent, and he turned his head to see what she was doing. As he was pitching the tent, it turned out, she was sitting on a tree stump, her feet swaying to and fro gently. Her hands were running the course of her left ear, and the action was strikingly similar to watching someone comb their hair. This, Ben supposed, was probably due to the fact that he knew some Lopunny wore their ears as though it was indeed their hair. The soft the fur that covered her audits faded into the hue of her hair. Ben blinked a handful of times after realizing that he had been staring, entirely transfixed. He shook his head and turned his attention back to setting up camp.

Once the tent was pitched, the fire was lit, the spit was positioned over top of it, and the sleeping bags were rolled out inside of the fabric tepee, Ben stepped back with his hands on his hips and admired his work. The sudden lack of any noise caused for Delaney to turn around from where she was seated, and noticed that the camp site was sufficiently made. She gave a small smile, and a quiet word of thanks to her companion for setting up that which she had no interest in doing. Dinner was quiet and peaceful, the roasted Tepig that Delaney had all but effortlessly caught and killed surprisingly delicious, and very similar to the taste of bacon.

After they had both finished eating, Ben and Delaney spent a while sitting across from one another staring into the fire. Ben, at this junction, was clad in loose-fitting athletic shorts in which he intended to sleep, and Delaney had changed into, from what he could tell, a long sleeping shirt that came down to about her thighs, which she sat in like it was a dress to preserve her modesty, as it could be assumed that she didn't have anything on her lower half. Ben was genuinely surprised by her ladylike mannerism. The way in which the fire danced across her face, casting shadows across her elegant features as it bounced energetically from side to side drew Ben's attention. He found himself staring, again.

She had kissed him… Why had she kissed him? She had called their smooch her 'prize' for having defeated him in the would-have-been training exercise that she had forced him through, but what was the purpose of stealing a kiss from him? It occurred to him that it could be the working of some ulterior motive, like when she had- Ben blushed and smiled a little at the memory of their experience in the shower. The redness in his cheeks was unlikely noticeable due to the similar color cast off by the fire, so he allowed himself a little larger smile, knowing it would be his own secret that he had decided that he enjoyed the attention that the Lopunny anthro had given him.

But…What if it wasn't so superficial? While he was gradually coming to terms with the inner workings of this new world, this new home outside of the Etherrealm, it occurred to Ben that he still had little to know knowledge of the relationships between people and Pokemon as species. Was it possible that she was attracted to him? It could be a side-effect of his potentially being the Messiah the worlds have been waiting for, but somehow he felt that she wasn't the type to go after the big and important people just because they were big and important. Hell… was it possible that he was attracted to her? He knew already, having come to terms fully, that he was attracted to her physically. But what about on a metaphysical level? Was he capable, or even willing to pursue a relationship with someone of a different species, of a completely different world? Then again…this was his world now too. There didn't seem to be any chance of going back unless he fulfilled whatever prophecy that Arceus had chosen him to be a part of.

Motion brought Ben back from his thoughts and he focused back in on the point which he had zoned out on: Delaney's nose. He blushed in embarrassment while assuring her that he hadn't been staring at her, and that he had just lost himself in his own thinking. Delaney smiled and nodded, assuring him that it was no big deal and that she had a tendency to do the same. An appreciative smiled was returned by the human, and this was followed by a nod of acknowledgement as well as a brief good night as Delaney said that she would be retiring. While he wasn't proud of it, Ben couldn't resist the urge to stare up the bottom of her shirt as she crawled into the tent. Her cute little cotton tail was peeking out of it, and he wasn't sure because the light faded by the tent, but she might have been wearing nude colored panties, but she might have been wearing nothing at all.

What had previously been a light, peaceful silence gradually became heavier after Delaney had gone to bed, and it occurred to Ben that, for all practical purposes, he was alone. He tried not to weird himself out, to keep himself from imagining noises and seeing movement where no such movement existed, but paranoia set in after not too long. He would have been able to uncomfortably assure himself that he was hallucinating had he begun seeing bushes rustle and trees lean in toward him all around him, but what made him nervous was more the striking simplicity of the pattern of hallucinations he was having. He saw movement in a straight line, as though something was sneaking through the brush surrounding the area in which they had made camp. Light flickered onto the bright green of the bushes every so often, but not enough to sufficiently illuminate it to reveal what was going on within. Ben could have sworn, however, that there was some kind of human or animalistic movement to the disturbances. He just couldn't shake the feeling. He leaned forward slightly, squinting at the place that he had seen the motion.

"Ben."

The sudden shattering of the quiet of the night made the human jump and almost cry out in alarm, but he managed to barely contain himself. The voice, the single word had come from somewhere to his left, a few feet away, just within earshot. The tone of the voice was a hushed whisper, one that was oddly familiar and that he believed at first might belong to someone he knew. After a few seconds of consideration, however, Ben realized that he didn't know the voice, just the accent. Or lack thereof, anyway. Listening to a Pokemon speak and interpreting it as English sounded funny to Ben. It was almost like hearing a nonnative speaker talk, one who knew the words and understood what they were trying to say but couldn't quite land something about the sentence; the inflection was off, the emphasis was on the wrong syllable, the pronunciation sounded hesitant. It was barely detectable and could be all but forgotten after having been surrounded by nothing but Pokemon for an extended period of time, but in comparison to a human it was never quite the same.

This voice, however, was almost certainly strikingly human, human male to be specific. When Ben turned his head, silhouetted against the dark of the surrounding treeline, seemingly unaffected by the light cast off by the fire and almost eerily and unnaturally dark was a figure, a humanoid- no. It was definitely human. Ben's chest suddenly felt tight, like he was having difficulty breathing. He hadn't come into contact with anyone of his own species since he had arrived in this world, and the possibility of doing so now was far too great a temptation to resist.

"Yes?" He whispered back, slowly rising from the log on which he had been sitting. He was slightly hunched over, staying in a somewhat athletic position just in case his safety was going to be compromised by this individual. He slowly drew near, only to see the figure concomitantly begin backing away. With a frown, Ben cast a gaze over his shoulder at the tent in which he knew Delaney would probably be fast asleep at this point, then followed, stepping through a bush that the shadow had seemed to phase through noiselessly, but yet rattled when Ben walked through it. An arm of the person beckoned toward him, encouraging him to continue following, to which Ben complied. He was led into a nearby clearing after a few minutes, and once he stepped into the middle of it, he realized that he had lost track of the person, and had only assumed that they hadn't turned. The covering of the trees, where it should have parted and provided ample natural light, was thick in this clearing, the branches of the trees surrounding the somewhat circular patch of grass reaching toward one another as though trying to take hold of one another.

Ben took in a deep breath, looking slowly around him, scanning the trees. Somewhere back behind where he had ended up, he could see the fire flickering faintly, and so he knew that he couldn't be too terribly far away from where he had originated. He was about to turn around and head back in the direction of the campsite, to chalk up this whole encounter as some stress-induced schizophrenic episode, when he saw movement out of the corner of his eye.

Pushing off of one of the trees closest to the clearing was a humanoid figure. It couldn't possibly have been the human that he was pursuing so fervently, partially because it didn't quite seem fully human, and partly because the human was male. This new silhouette, however, was strikingly, voluptuously female. The lighting available was at a minimum, but yet the figure was growing more evidently physically appealing as it drew nearer.

"Sorry I misled you," came a sultry voice that obviously belonged to the other individual. From the tone, however, she didn't sound very sorry at all. It sounded like she did something she would have regretted under different circumstances, but knew that it was in her own best interest. "I didn't think that you'd have shown up if a Dark type asked to talk to you all alone in the middle of the forest at night." Clearly, Ben had been correct about the figure belonging to a Pokemon.

Finally, the being drew near enough that Ben could perceive what it was. As though innately acquired knowledge was just surfacing for the first time, Ben instinctively knew that this creature whom he had never seen before was a Zoroark. The accents of red on her claws and throughout her flowing, silky hair were a dead giveaway. If it weren't for them, in fact, one could potentially mistake the Illusion Pokemon for a person, especially this one: She wore a full-length spandex bodysuit, one that unforgivingly hugged every contour of her body. A shred of moonlight, having fought its way through the canopy of branches above, reflected off of her modest-sized chest while she approached, drawing Ben's attention immediately. Once there, his eyes dragged slowly down and along her body, to the sashaying hips that seemed to move almost invitingly before back up to her eyes. It occurred to Ben that, based on his experiences with meeting new Pokemon as well as knowledge of the experiences of others, he was likely about to be killed, enslaved, or raped.

"I know what you're thinking, and no, you don't have to be concerned about your personal safety," she addressed him once she was within a comfortable range to speak with him. "Not your safety from me, anyway," she said more to herself than to him, eyes scanning the area behind him. Ben, however, was more interested in the Zoroark than was he what was going on behind her. He decided he was too quick to judge her species, as the missing muzzle and instead present normal human face could have easily implied that she was an anthro had he been paying closer attention.

While he had zoned out frowning at her, she had been looking him over. "So you're the fulfillment of the Prophecy?" She folded her arms over her chest, giving him the scrutinizing look that he had all but grown accostumed to. This continued for a few seconds before a shrug followed. "Whatever. Look, I'm on very strict orders from someone you aren't yet ready to meet, and I can't explain who or why. Not yet." She held out a hand that had the claws trademarked by her Pokemon half, in which there was a rolled up piece of paper. "Just take this. I've marked towns to go to, and I've marked towns to avoid. Abide by this map and you shouldn't fail our worlds."

Ben stared blankly after having taken what was apparently a map from the Zoroark. He had been thoroughly and completely confused a number of times since his Emergance, but this exchange certainly ranked up there on the list of weird things to have happen. "I have to go now. I'll keep in touch whenever I can. If you feel like you're being watched? You are. And not just by me." A pause. "Don't listen to thoughts that aren't yours." With that, the Zoroark turned and started walking away in the opposite direction of the camp site. "Don't follow me," she commanded over her shoulder, not even breaking stride. Ben found himself transfixed on the sight of the Dark type walking away. The skintight spandex provided little in the department of modesty. A slight blush rose to Ben's cheeks as he stared at the giant ass the Zoroark had. The tight material only accentuated it, making the perfectly bubbly butt look even more appealing.

But then he was alone again. With a map.

He looked down at the rolled-up map in his hand, blinking a few times. Was this...real? By far and away that was the most unlikely thing to have happened to him- since the Emergance, obviously. Maybe he was dreaming.

With a sigh, Ben shook his head and headed back toward camp. Upon arrival, he crawled into his sleeping bag, incapable of thinking of anything but the Zoroark. A cute, high-pitch noise came from the now-awake figure in the other sleeping bag. Now he had woken up Delaney.

Great.

Had to defer the end of this chapter to a colleague, so sorry if it's below par.

Please R and R, especially to tell me what you like, dislike, and want to see added or changed about the minimal interaction with Zoroark before I start including her more heavily in these chapters.

Arthenius