The two slept as the sun rose over the trees. It shined bright and disturbed the slumber of dad. With a quiet grumble he slowly arose as Lu continued his snooze.

With Lu still sound asleep on the sofa, dad arose to cook breakfast. He rubbed the stubble on his face as he thought of a tasty breakfast. With an idea in his head he started to cook, serving a nice hearty breakfast for them both gave him a nice fuzzy feeling. When it was time to serve the food, Lu was already awake and sitting on the dining room table when dad turned to put the food down.

"You sit on the chair, not the table," he lightly scolded. Lu responded with a nod and a quiet, "Oh," before he sat on a chair. His arms outstretched on the table. "Good morning, Louis! Are you ready for eggs and bacon?" Lu's tail wagged as he sniffed loudly, his gaze drifted from dad to the stove. He pointed to the stove as he asked, "Eggs?" "Bacon," was all dad said as he turned back to breakfast. "What I like to do is fry the eggs in the bacon grease…"

Months passed as dad gave Louis a general education. As he learned to walk, he was taught to talk among other things. Usually before dad left to work. The two were content. It was during a dip in a relatively nearby lake when Lu randomly asked, "Dad, why do we wear clothes?" The trees around them tried to hold on to the few green leaves that they still had; the discarded orange, brown, and yellow scattered across the forest floor. Dad took a deep breath as he mulled over potential answers. "Well… you see…" he started, but instead found himself fumbling his words until he coherently spoke, "why are you asking anyway?" Lu powered on and said, "well you always wear specific clothes before you leave to do your job, why bother?" Dad mulled over his answers as he spoke, cautiously saying "Well… clothes are comfortable… and they have pockets… and I wear what I wear to be harder to spot when I work." Louis incredulously raised a brow to dad's series of answers, and he followed up with "But… all the time? I can always see you clearly!"

Dad was one to raise a brow this time to Lu's reply. "What does that mean?"

"Well…" Lu explained as he smiled with pride, chipper to be able to be the one giving the answers. "I know what your aura looks like-"

Quickly dad raised a hand to pull back on the metaphorical reigns of Lu's answer. "What does it look like?"

"It ah… kind of spikes out and coils as it moves…" Lu started to explain, but once again was interrupted. "You can use that reliably now?" dad asked as he crossed his arms with a knowing smirk.

"I like to play with it in the shower…" Lu admitted with embarrassment. This new brought a revelation to dad, who quickly interrupted Lu to accuse "Is that why you're in there for so long?" Lu nodded gently as he added an addendum to his confirmation. "I mean I'm still kind of getting used to it… so as I was saying-" the last part of his thought he quickly and loudly said in an attempt to pre-emptively interrupt dad before he could do the same to him. "I can always see you. So… why bother?" he continued.

"Well Lu… every little bit helps." he said as he kneeled down to give Lu a pat on the head, but still he wasn't satisfied with this answer. "Then… why is it needed at home?" Dad sighed as Lu's persistence wore at him slightly. "You see… the body is self-cleaning to a degree…" he started, Lu staring with a slight smile as he listened. However, that smile slowly faded as the details became more and more graphic. His smile had become a full-on grimace as dad had come around to the ending of his explanation. "That's gross!" Lu exclaimed as he grabbed at his dreads. "Dad, I need more clothes! I can't keep wearing my robe, it's probably fiiilllthyyy!" With a quiet mutter, dad tries to roll back his damage done as he covered his face with his hand. "Lu… you wash yourself, right?"

"Uh… yeah."

"And your robe gets washed, right?'

"Yeah?"

"So… what's the issue?"

Lu looked at dad as if he grew a second head as he frantically shouted "I haven't been wearing underwear the entire time, DAD!"

All dad could do was rest his face in his hand as the realization that their talk wasn't without consequence fully sunk in. "So… you don't want me to throw you into the lake anymore?"

"Not without swim shorts!" Lu loudly exclaimed as he looked dad in the eyes with a pleading expression. He looked back with equal plead to his face as he tried to convince Lu to stay.

"We just got here! Do you really want to go RIGHT this instant?" he asked with a slight whine to his voice, to which Lu responded with an eager and desperate series of nods. Dad's sigh was louder as his nose crinkled and mouth frowned, surrendering to Lu and his irrational need. Once properly dressed, the two hiked back home and went straight to dad's truck.

From there the two endured a two-hour drive to the only nearby city. The skyline of said city was so big, it could be seen from behind the trees after only an hour of travel. The densely packed buildings dwarfed everything around them, the tallest of which was round and in the center of every other building. It looked much like a polygonal needle, due to the building becoming narrower within sections as opposed to gradually over distance. All of the buildings except that one had blinking lights on them, and animated signs that couldn't be fully seen from behind the trees. They were quite colorful, and Lu shifted in his seat in the back of the big pickup, trying to achieve a better glimpse at these dancing images from behind the obstructive foliage.

Soon though, the densely packed trees gave way to homes. Lu was staring at the people and Pokémon wandering around the suburbs beyond the dividing fence on either side of the highway as the truck barreled on through. As traffic became more and more dense, the presence of foliage became less and less prevalent. Even the grass gave way to organized street planning and proper sidewalks. The homes were quite nice despite this. Each home looked like the ones they saw earlier in the trip, but better and sometimes bigger. The homes lessened in quality the further in they went, but the homes seemed to house multiple families, looking completely different from the other homes they saw earlier. As they went in further Lu noticed the near-total absence of grass, and only areas of trees. Everything was so foreign, even the air felt different... this immensely excited Lu! Instead of trees there were street lights and lamps all over the place! All of these forms of modern convenience clashed beautifully; the greys, blacks, and light-blues were just as nice as the greens and browns of the forest back home! Dad navigated the truck over to a large mall on the outskirts of the towering cityscape proper and he parked the truck. As soon as the engine was turned off, Lu leaped from the truck and he slammed the truck door closed before running over to dad.

"Dad, why have you never taken me here?!" he asked, beaming with energy as he looked around at everything as fast as he could. Before he could spin around too fast, dad placed his hand on Louis' head to gently pat it, trying to calm him down. "Because you're quite young. Also, you run so fast I'm afraid you'll run off and get lost!" He teased Lu with a playful smirk and raised eyebrow as the two's eyes met.

"Nuh uh! I'll aalllwwaayys find you!" Lu said as he happily reached out a hand for dad to grab. Through the permanently open doors of the mall's dedicated Poké-mart, one could see right behind the entire row of registers was an aisle perpendicular, unceremoniously displaying all sorts of potions, elixirs, and all kinds of medicine any trainer could need occupying the entire wall facing the entrance. This aisle, roughly about six feet in height with multiple shelves showed hints of multiple aisles that reach the ceiling, much like warehouse storage. With Lu's hand in his, dad led Lu into the Poké-mart, and almost as soon as they went through the automatic doors, Lu tugged his hand free and ran towards a random aisle. Dad's perplexed expression from this random gesture, especially after what Louis just said prompted him to return with a shameful frown and a telepathic apology. However, before dad could get in any form of 'I told you so.', an employee made her way from a nearby aisle and quickly greeted them both.

"What a cute little scamp! Hey! I'm Sarah!" she said in a pleasantly rehearsed tone complete with a smile and wave, but before dad could introduce himself, she continued on to say something more genuine than her practiced greeting line from before. "Don't tell me… you're a Pokémon hunter and you're looking for clothing for your little helper here, aren't you?" she asked as she bent over Lu to tussle his left dread. "We understand the need to hide the more… fluorescent colors of your hunting Pokémon. However, riolu and lucario are not very common, so I'm afraid to tell you that we don't have gear for either of them!" Dad just stood agape as Lu enjoyed his petting, even wagging his tail and tilting his head for her hand. Sarah eventually caught her eager mistake when she looked back up to dad and quickly stood back up, flustered as she tried to correct herself. "I-I'm ssoooo sorry sir! I got a little too excited there!" she said before she nervously chuckled. Dad chuckled alongside her, wanting to calm her down. "Heh… so… I'm Aldo… and this here in the robe is Louis!" Upon being introduced, Louis waved as he said "Hello Sarah!" who then immediately swooned over his greeting. "Oh my gosh he can talk!? That is ssooo cute!" she gushed before dad snapped his fingers to get her attention again.

As she laughed nervously yet again, Lu turned his head to contemplate her words as dad snapped his fingers to get her attention. "Please focus… we aren't here for hunting gear, we are here for regular clothes."

"'Regular clothes?' You mean like costumes?" she asked as she put a finger to her chin to think. "Oh! Spoiling the guy, are ya?" she asked as her eyes narrowed with a sneaky grin. Her smile turned apologetic as she explained: "I'm sorry to say that since Riolu and Lucario are both exotic Pokémon, there isn't a demand for clothing that fits them. The only thing we have that will fit him are our generic one-size-fits-all canine booties. Anything beyond that will require a specialty store." With a simple twist of her torso, she pointed towards the far side of the store as she instructed "Our store organizes apparel by zoology; canines are the aisle by the wall. If you need anything else please don't hesitate to ask! Have a wonderful day, sir!"

Lu thought about Sarah's comments as they walked back to the exit. Why was it cute that I knew how to talk? Spoil me how? As the two reached the exit, Lu tugged at dad's arm gently to get his attention. "Dad… why was I cute knowing how to talk?" he asked the instant their eyes met. The slight frown to Lu's mouth let dad know that this wasn't going to have a punch line. "Not a lot of Pokémon know how to speak english."

"Why?"

"For one reason or another… they just don't bother learning. They only learn how to talk from other Pokémon"

This answer only confused Lu, who tilted his head in response. "So… what language do they learn?"

Dad sighed as he tried to think of an appropriate answer. Silently, he placed a hand on Lu's head as he calmly said "They learn whatever language it is they are taught in the wild."

"What if they are raised with humans?"

"Well… somehow they start understanding all Pokémon. I don't know why."

"So… what you're saying is that I'm awesome!?" he asked with a cheerful tail wag and ecstatic beam. This happy line of thinking left dad smiling, although because of relief. "Yeah buddy, you're the best!" he exclaimed before he grabbed him by the hand and walked towards the exit, but Lu somehow managed to hold dad from leaving.

"What's wrong?" he calmly asked as he kneeled down to Lu's eye level. "They said that they had shoes that fit me." Lu said in a matter-of-fact tone as he pointed back into the store. "You wanted shoes too?" dad asked with hesitation, which was answered by eager nodding from the little guy. "If I'm getting clothes, I may as well get shoes too." He said as he practically dragged dad back into the store. Lu hurried them both towards the aisle Sarah mentioned. Past the shelves that were in the center laid an unobstructed view of the rest of the store, revealing isles that went from the floor to the ceiling much like a warehouse; Lu caught on this design as he looked around, these aisles were not nearly as flashy as the center aisle that blocked it. That aisle proudly displayed pictures of the wares it carried and even about other wares on the other side of itself. The attention-grabbing bright white of the shelves out front made the rest of the wood and steel of the other aisles appear very drab. On a second look around himself, Lu noticed that the kids, teens, and their Pokémon did not go past that aisle. He felt like such a cool kid, going where only the grown-ups went!

Lu once again let go of dad's hand to have a look around every shelf in the first aisle of this special zone, although he would be sure to push dad forward after he looked around a section of shelf. Despite his search, it was dad who found the boots that Lu looked for ever so eagerly. Unlike the other products, they hung from the steel supports of the shelves within cheap plastic packaging. Dad took one off a hook and he examined the 4 pack of boots. They seemed to be made with quadrupeds in mind, but every boot looked and when felt through the packaging was made from the same rubbery-cloth as the boot next to it. Lu stared in awe of the boots, which dad frowned in disapproval towards. He leaned toward Lu to hand him the boots, which he took eagerly to feel.

"Do you… really want that?" dad asked as he stood back up. Lu beamed the hardest he could as the plastic crinkled under his roaming digits. "Why wouldn't I? There's 8 pairs of boots!" he responded as he started grabbing at the paper folded over and stapled to the plastic. He was quickly stopped by dad before he could tear into anything. "It's… cheap." dad said, with a brow raised in confusion, which contrasted Lu's eager smile complete with wide eyes. "There aren't any others though! Not here at least."

Dad just fumbled his words as he tried to come up with reasons why Lu shouldn't want these boots, but it proved futile as Lu just held on to the package, reassuring dad how he would be careful with the boots and take care of them. With a defeated sigh, dad caved in once more, and Lu quickly tore open the package to get to the first pack of boots. The few people around them stared. Dad realized that their eyes were fixated onto the odd visage of an incredibly buff old man arguing with a child pokémon in a dark brown robe. Their gaze moved onto him once the two stopped though, and he could feel their eyes silently judging them both. Lu looked around at everyone as he used aura, a little nervous from so many staring people looking at them both.

With a quick 'Excuse me.', dad signaled Lu to follow him as they headed back towards the entrance, however before they could round the bend, a middle-aged man that was watching the two gently placed a hand on dad's shoulder as he said "He won't be a good hunting dog if you treat him like that." and as quickly as the hand was placed on, it was removed as he continued on with his own business as dad tried to mutter "That's not why I'm… here…". He just shrugged the guy off though as he turned back to leave the store, Lu relaxing as they headed to a self-check-out register. Lu had already donned a pair of his boots, stretching side to side with awe as he watched his boots stay tight against his legs, each paw pad comfortably resting into its own sole, even the pads that he doesn't stand on. His elation spread to dad, who slowly smiled as he felt Lu's joy. As they headed back into the parking lot, Lu was quick to tug at dad's hand as he called out "Dad! Daaaad!". Dad looked down to his little energetic bundle of joy eagerly calling for his attention, and he answered "Yes?"

"Where did you get my robe?" Lu asked as he bounced in place.

"Right there." He said, pointing to the section of mall outcropping relatively near-by that read 'Trainer Couture'.

"Why don't we just get clothes there?" he asked as he started to grab and pull dad there by his arm.

"You'll settle for anything, huh?" dad asked with a cocked eyebrow and amused smile. He started to chuckle when Lu replied with "Yep!" as the two continued on and into the store.

From the outside, it had automatic doors that worked. Once inside, one could see a cool color scheme of blue and white, mannequins at the entrances, and a busy atmosphere of people walking this way and that. A distinct lack of pokémon was also noticed. The few pokémon that were there were small enough to fit inside of a purse or hoodie or were there with a child. This didn't bother Lu any, who eagerly followed dad upstairs. The mannequins on the second floor were smaller and had vehicles and cute pokémon decorating the walls. Clearly, this floor was dedicated to children and younger. On the far-left wall was pajamas and other nightwear for kids, and along that wall was a rack of robes like the one Lu is wearing. Dad points to the rack and he says with a smile "This is exactly where I got your robe." as Lu's eyes widened, comparing his robe to the others. His robe faded with time, but it was still one of these for sure. "I'm wearing THAT robe!" he exclaimed with a pointing finer and wagging tail. Dad just chuckled as he said "Yep… you sure are… now go look around for something else you want." He said as the sound of footsteps could be heard. Both the sound of Lu's soft pitter-patter, and the sound of heels approaching. When he turned towards the noise he saw a woman, blonde hair in her blue uniform standing at attention in the middle of the aisle.

"Hello, sir, do you need help?" she politely asked as she looked up to meet his gaze.

"No thank you miss… Lindsey. I'm quite alright." He politely responded with a genuine smile.

"I think you need help." She responded in her same polite tone as before, a little grin expanded her smile as they talked.

"Excuse me?" dad said, his eyebrows furrowed to her brash behavior.

"Yeah… you seem to be confusing that riolu." She said, her polite voice held throughout her chat. "He's going to think that he's people if you treat him like that, and he's going to have a baaaaad time with other pokémon." As dad opened his mouth to rebut, Lindsey was quick to speak over him saying "It doesn't matter how lonely you are, you're going to ruin that riolu's life treating him like a human child." After her diatribe, Lindsey paused for a few seconds as dad frowned, his immeasurable displeasure and annoyance towards the rude employee peeking through a semi-squinted eye. After a few seconds of staring, Lindsey finally spoke. "Will that be all?" she asked in a disgustingly sweet tone.

"Who's your manager?" was dad's only reply, his tone calm yet rife with discontent. "Have a good day, sir." was Lindsey's last reply, a rather smug smirk subtly formed on her mouth as her words left her lips before she walked away... It was at this time Lu came by, barely holding a basket with a few hoodies, plain t-shirts, cargo pants and shorts. He shifted through it and noticed that all the clothes were solid colors, not a design to be seen. "You didn't want anything with pictures?" dad asked as he shifted the contents around. "Nah." Was Lu's simple reply. "The graphic designs were very babyish… I didn't like any." Amazed by Lu's use of big words, dad leaned down to pet him, but he started to talk at the same time he was being pet. "So… who was that?" Lu asked as his smile faded away. "Her aura was mean... was she being mean?"

Dad just gave Lu a little smile and a thumbs up as he said "Yeah, but daddy took care of her… lets find a changing room and see if any of this actually fits you." before he started to lead Lu forward. Many of the kids they passed by would steal glances before they continued their own way or would point out how cool that riolu was. Lu kept an omniscient eye out for Lindsey without paying attention to much else. Dad's answer did indeed comfort, but he read from dad's aura that she got under his skin regardless. Dad noticed Lu's constant spacing out and constant rising then falling dreds between trying on articles of clothing. "Are you ok?" dad asked after all the clothes were put back into the basket to leave. "She's waiting outside." Lu telepathically warned dad. He let out a sigh before he whispered "Don't let her distract you from your fun. You were spacing out so much I thought you were getting bored." He said as he lifted the basket up. "Come on, lets get out of here."

As they exited the dressing room to the registers, they were stopped just past the exit by Lindsey, who didn't give dad any room to get past without knocking into her. Her same eager and chipper smile betrayed her intentions, as she opened with "Hello again, sir! I see that you still need help!" as she looked him in the eyes. Her gaze drifted down towards Lu, who stared back with a serious scowl and furrowed brows. She kneeled to pet him as she opened her mouth, but his sudden step backwards broke her concentration. "Come here, little guy!" she cooed, as dad kept a close eye on them. He hadn't seen Lu like this before, and curiosity bettered his judgement of intervening. Lindsey took an awkward crouched step towards Lu to pet him, but this time Lu batted her hand away as he sternly demanded "Don't touch me." Lindsey didn't falter and again she reached her hand out to stroke his ear. This time, Lu smacked her hand away as he screamed "I SAID NO!" and the sound of silence filled the entire floor. Curious kids, parents, and the pokémon that accompanied them both turned their head in alarm and curiosity towards the shout. Lindsey was quick to stand up the instant Lu screamed.

Quickly, dad stood between the two as Lu gave Lindsey the meanest of glares he could muster: a full frown and narrowed eyes as he stared unflinching at her. The three stood in an awkward silence; Lu staring up into the depths of her soul from behind dad's leg as dad stared down into her eyes, Lindsey with her head turned away towards the aisles with her eyes focused on dad. Before long, a fresh-faced mall-cop in a neatly ironed uniform cautiously entered the scene with a pokéball in hand. "What's going on here?" he demanded more than he asked. He looked over all three of them, and quickly Lindsey started stammering out "Th-th-the riolu just screamed out loud for no reason!" to the mall cop, identified by a yellow ID tag as Mark on his left pectoral. "I heard a child scream." Mark retorted as he looked around, which Lu quickly responded to with "Th-that… was me…", his voice suddenly shaken and eyes watery. He breathed heavily, on the brink of tears as he looked into Mark's eyes. "S-she was touching me… and I didn't like it… s-so I said no… b-b-but she kept touching me anyway s-s-so I screamed then dad came and-" Lu started, but was quickly interrupted by Lindsey who quickly assumed a position between the two and Mark to loudly protest "This little shit is lying!" but mark sighed as he put his pokéball back onto his belt. "Lindsey… you've gotten warnings about harassing customers before, but this time I have to take you to your boss."

"What? Why?" she asked with sass in her voice as she fixed her hair in an attempt to keep a level head. "You know why." was all Mark said as he crossed his arms and raised an expectant brow towards her. She seemed to lose her regained composure as she exclaimed "Since when have we listened to a pokémon?!" which just received a serious toned reply from Mark. "We are skeptical of biased translators, but this time the pokémon knows english. I HAVE to treat it like any other report." Once he finished his statement, he turned towards dad and said "I'm so sorry this happened sir. If you can wait here-" until dad interrupted him by saying "No-no its fine. As long as she gets in some kind of trouble we'll be fine." he assured the enthusiastic mall-cop before they turned to Lu. He still sniffed every so often as he held dad by his pant leg. As Mark turned to Lindsey, Lu quickly looked up to dad and gave a thumbs up with a big goofy smile before just as quickly burying his head back into dad's pant leg.

Lindsey only caught a glimpse of Lu's thumbs up, but it was all she needed to righteously announce "HE'S FAKING IT! LOOK!" upon deaf ears. Mark apologized as he escorted Lindsey out of the store and into the mall proper as she kept loudly saying expletives about how they both had to have planned this. When dad turned his attention from the spectacle of Lindsey metaphorically digging her grave deeper back towards Lu, he noticed that he was fully dressed in a black hoodie, rubberish boots, and blue shorts; his old robe in the large basket where both articles of clothing used to be. "How do I look?" he asked as he flipped the hood up and over his head, covering his eyes with the hood as his tail wagged a mile a minute. "Like a cool dude, but I think we're gonna have a talk during the car ride home." Lu's tail stopped wagging as he moaned "Aaawwwwww whhyyy? She was being mean." To which dad replied with an amused smile "I know… it's gonna be a short talk."

After dad paid for the clothes, the two left the department store the way they came and had returned to the truck. As dad promised, he brought up what had happened in the store to Lu as he merged onto the highway. "You handled that quite well… but please don't rely on deception like that. You might cause permanent trouble for someone who doesn't deserve it." Lu just tilted his head in response to dad's diatribe. "Huh?" he asked as he flipped his hood up and over his head. "I thought you wanted her in trouble?" he asked as he played with the strings on his hoodie. Dad just shrugged as he said "Yes I did, but I don't want to have her lose her job. Your acting could have cost her that." Lu looked back at the city as they drove, or at least the best that he could from the passenger-side window. "You thought I was a good actor?" Lu asked, eyes wide with awe from what he perceived to be a compliment. "I mean… you did great until you broke character."

"I didn't want you to be worried." Was Lu's answer as he turned his head to face him with a genuine smile.

"I'll admit I was a little worried-" he started, but then quickly cut off his train of thought by saying "Louis!" loudly. Once Lu was fully focused on him, he continued his previous talk. "Don't be a manipulator. You'll lose friends that way." were dad's final stern words on the subject matter, and Lu nodded silently at dad before turning his head forward, letting the strings go before silence befell the two.

When he took a good look out of the windshield, he realized just how much time had passed. The excitement of getting his own set of clothes and being inside most of the day made him miss most of the sunlight; although most of the time spent was travelling to the city. They drove into the sunset, and as they left the city, Lu noticed a sign saying 'You are now leaving Stardust City. Starman awaits for you!' Lu turned his head to dad before turning to try to look at the sign behind them. "Did I miss that sign earlier?" he asked as he pressed his head against the window, but only managed to look quite silly from his fruitless attempt. "Yeah, you did. Put your seatbelt on!" dad barked as he turned to realize Lu's lack of a seatbelt.

He clicked the belt into place before he turned to dad with a smile and twinkle to his eye as he said "So… how do people act?"