On a personal level, Zoey didn't think that the Foreboding Forest was too bad of a place. She found it actually to be quite the appealing place to live in. The young woman especially liked all the purple color some of the leaves had taken on. It was a little chilly under all of those trees, but she didn't mind, neither did the local fruit trees. There were plenty of berries growing around, but almost none were ripe, given the current season. Plus they had passed a little creek earlier, meaning this place had everything she would need to survive. Maybe she could hire some local pokémon to help her build a new house someday.
But these things had to wait. For now, she and her two young companions were busy looking for another pokémon, who got lost in this forest. Cid was walking to her left, while the local Snivy stayed to her right. The eevee mentally noted that the grass-type appeared to be in a somewhat cheerful mood, despite the fact that her classmate was lost in this forest.
"Oh, what's this?" Snivy ran towards whatever she had spotted before she even finished that sentence.
"Hey! What did I tell you about staying together?!" Zoey shouted, but the grass-type just kept running. Letting out a small growl, Zoey ran after the younger pokémon. After a second of being surprised, Cid quickly followed the two female pokémon. Luckily for him, he didn't have to run very far or else he would have had trouble catching up with his tiny legs. It turned out that the thing which caught Snivy's attention was some kind of blue, round thing.
"Look at this! It's a Petrify Orb!" She held the item up proudly. However, Cid could see that Zoey was not as enthusiastic about the found object.
"What part of stay with me didn't you understand?" Zoey growled at the smaller pokémon. For her part, Snivy didn't look at all bothered. She had a smile on her face when she looked over to the angry normal-type.
"Come on, I didn't run that far. Besides, look what I found!" Snivy held the Petrify Orb over to Zoey.
"Yeah, you found an ambush!" The eevee shouted like she wanted to get the attention of someone else. Before any of the two children could ask what that had been all about, they both heard the sounds of nearby bushes rustling. To the surprise of both children, two furfrous stepped out of those bushes, both looking agitated, yet at the same time confused.
"W-w-waah!" Snivy exclaimed in shock. "Where did they come from?!"
("They were hiding in the bushes! This really looks like an ambush!") Cid thought to himself, panicking.
"Hey! How did you know we were hiding here?" One of the furfrous asked.
"Eh… ever heard of the term bathing?" Zoey asked with a tilted head, before putting a paw in front of her nose. "'Because I could smell you three miles against the wind."
"Snrk." Snivy held both paws in front of her mouth in order to suppress a laugh that threatened to escape.
"Are you saying what I think you're saying?" the second furfrou growled.
In response, Zoey just gave the pokémon that had spoken to her a deadpan stare. "Wow, how many brain cells did it cost you to figure this one out?" Apparently, that ticked the two pokémon off. The dog-like pokémon snarled at Zoey and began charging at their fellow normal-type. Snivy and Cid automatically took each a step back, getting very close to Zoey in the process. The eevee couldn't help but roll her eyes. She quickly snatched the Petrify Orb from Snivy and activated it.
While Zoey never figured out how they actually worked, she at least remembered how to use one. Quickly she snatched the orb out of Snivy's paw and activated the tiny button built inside, by pressing the entire blue orb into the ground. The result was two white "sparks" escaping the blue item and hitting each of the furfrous in mid-charge. This resulted in the two pokémon awkwardly falling to the ground. One had all of its four paws outstretched as he landed in the grass, while the other one looked like he was halfway done curling up into a ball.
The bodies of the two pokémon skidded across the ground until they came to a halt right in front of Cid and Snivy respectively.
"Wow, so this is what happens when you use a Petrify Orb," Snivy said while looking down on the twitching furfrou in front of her. Cid was less curious as to how the orb worked. Instead, he was more interested in getting some distance between himself and the shivering furfrou. Ignoring the children for the moment, Zoey got herself into position and shot a shadow ball at each of her opponents. As soon as the balls connected with the bodies of the two furfrous, the effect of the Petrify Orb was canceled. But that didn't mean anything. The two enemy pokémon got sent flying across the woods and when their bodies hit the ground. Neither got up afterward.
"Wow…" Snivy breathed out. "You took them out with just one attack each," she spoke in awe.
"And you're going to be my next target, if you plan on leaving my side again," Zoey growled dangerously. The two kids spun around and found the aforementioned eevee glaring at the grass-type, who in return felt a bead of sweat rolling down the back of her head.
"I...uh… I'm sorry?"
Everyone present could tell that Zoey wasn't buying it. However, instead of berating the child, the adult let out a sigh and gave the child a light push. "Look, that's exactly why I want you to stay close to me. Don't do it again and we won't have any trouble."
"Alright." Snivy nodded, letting out a sigh of relief, as she was not getting shouted at.
"Still, that was a pretty dumb idea of theirs. Setting up an ambush by using a Petrify Orb." Zoey couldn't help but laugh at the stupidity of the two furfrous, while walking through the forest, Snivy at Cid once again at her sides. While they were walking, Cid had a question for his caretaker.
"Uh… Zoey?"
"Yeah?" she looked down on the former human.
"How did you know those two were waiting for us? Did you really smell them?" he asked.
In response, she scrunched up her face. "I can still smell them."
"Say what?!" Cid explained in disbelief. "It wasn't a joke."
"Nope." The eevee shook her head. "Us eevees belong to the family of fox-pokémon. Fox- and dog-pokémon have excellent noses. Though there are a lot of times, I wish I would have ended up as a charmander or a bulbasaur."
"Why's that?" Snivy asked curiously. "I wish I could have a nose like yours."
"You don't," Zoey deadpanned. "Do you know how it is to smell every single rotten fruit in a two-mile radius? Not to mention how every single scent just mashes together sometimes, making it not only hard to distinguish what is what, but it turns out to be actually worse than the school toilets back at home, something I always thought to be impossible."
Cid felt a shudder running down his spine. Despite not being able to remember much of his previous life, his body was instinctively reacting to the prospect of going into a school bathroom.
"Come on, it can't be that bad," Snivy argued. "I mean, you can use your nose and see if someone is hiding behind a tree."
"Well, it's not bad all the time," Zoey conceded. "It really depends on where you're at the time and how the weather is. Summer is surprisingly annoying what with everyone sweating bullets all the time."
"Okay, I think I get you." The young grass-type imagined for a brief moment smelling everyone's sweat and it was not a pleasant imagination.
"So, do you smell any other pokémon at the moment?" Cid asked with a weary voice.
"All the time," Zoey replied with a wave of her paw. She was particularly looking up a specific tree. Snivy and Cid followed her gaze, but couldn't see anyone sitting in the branches. "Smelling something isn't hard. The tough part is to tell how close a pokémon is, where they are, where they have been and so and so forth. The only reason I could even tell what those two had planned was because they really need a bath."
Snivy snorted at those words.
"Wait! Does that mean you can sniff out Goomy in this forest?!" the young cyndaquil exclaimed. Snivy's eyes widened in realization. "Hey, that's right! With your nose finding Goomy should be a breeze!"
But to the dismay of the two children, Zoey shook her head, a sad expression on her face. "I'm not that good with distinguishing smells, especially not from an unknown distance. Besides, I haven't even met a goomy before. I don't know how they smell."
"Oh…" The two children looked down at their feet, disappointed.
"Hey, come on you two." Zoey tapped each of the children lightly on the head. "Goomy won't find herself in this forest. Let's go."
Without even looking, the adult went ahead, expecting the two children to follow her. Said children looked at each other briefly, before following.
("Zoey is powerful.") Cid mentally noted. ("She just knocked out those two pokémon like it was nothing for her.")
There was no distinctive path to follow in the Foreboding Forest, so Zoey tried to remember the way she walked by looking out for visual clues. Those could be an odd looking branch, a fallen tree, roots sticking out of the ground or even a tree that just happened to be taller than the others. One such visual clue turned out to be a rock that was grown over with moss. However, the stone wasn't really what interested Zoey, but rather the pokémon sitting on the rock. It was a Taillow and as soon as it saw the group, it attacked.
Originally Zoey had opened her mouth to speak to the pokémon, however seeing as the flying-type was on the attack, she figured, she might as well charge a shadow ball. Before she could adequately execute the attack, a set of green vines flew past her and snatched the taillow's wings. Zoey slowly closed her mouth and watched with interest, as the flying-type crashed to the ground.
"ARGH! Let go you little-AAAAAAHHH!" Before the enemy pokémon could say whatever she, the voice indicated it was a she, had to say, Snivy lifted the Flying-type into the sky and with a "fierce" (read cute) battlecry she turned her entire body around. With Taillow still being tied up to the vines, she got smashed into a nearby tree, letting out a scream of pain.
"Not bad. So much for type advantage," Zoey praised Snivy, who looked quite proud of herself.
"Hehe, no flying-type can keep up with me," the grass-type proclaimed.
"Grrrr!" To this day Zoey still wasn't sure how a bird was able to growl with just a beak.
"Oh oh…" she heard Cid mumble beside her.
"You'll pay for that!" the female taillow shouted and charged directly at Snivy. Once again the grass-type tried to intercept the oncoming attack, only this time Taillow was prepared and dodged the attack mid-flight. Not wanting to endanger the children unnecessarily, Zoey executed a Quick Attack and met the flying-type midway. Being the stronger pokémon, the eevee managed to send the taillow flying the way it came. The bird-like pokémon hit the ground and didn't look like she would get up anytime soon.
"Wow! You took her out in just one hit!" Snivy exclaimed
"Ow…." Taillow moaned, her eyes seemingly turning into swirls.
"Is she okay?" Cid asked with worry in his voice.
"She'll be fine. Pokémon living in the wild are tough. Taillows especially are usually hard to keep down for longer than five minutes," the normal-type explained. "Come on."
The forest became denser from this point onward. More often than not either Cid or Snivy needed to leave Zoey's side for a brief moment in order to wander around a tree or two. Sometimes a couple of bushes would get in their way. Cid and Snivy always went around them, while Zoey walked straight through them, not minding all the leaves, branches and occasionally small berries getting stuck on her fur. She made a mental note to take a quick bath later.
As it just so happened the trio of pokémon made it towards a clearing, however, they weren't alone. A flock of Spritzees was resting in the nearby trees, some even down at the ground. The fairy-types were eagerly chatting with each other, talking about all kinds of things. The trio could make out things like the weather, preferred flying routes, an annoying Stunky bothering someone and much more. All of the conversations came to a stop when the flock noticed the newcomers.
Cid and Snivy immediately tensed up, when they saw just how many pokémon were in the clearing.
"Th-th-that's a lot of flying-types…" Snivy stuttered, getting nervous.
"Fairy-types," Zoey corrected almost automatically.
"M-m-m-maybe we should go?" Cid offered, hiding behind the normal-type.
"What's up?" Zoey greeted the flock with a lazy salute. "We're looking for a little kid, a Goomy who is lost in this forest. Did you happen to see her?" the normal-type asked the flock.
The fairy-types looked at each other for a couple of seconds, some of them quietly murmuring to each other.
"Are you sure this is a good idea?" Snivy whispered to Zoey.
"Asking questions never hurt anyone," the normal-type whispered back.
"You're looking for a goomy?" one of the spritzees asked. This one was sitting on a high branch.
"Yep," Zoey nodded.
"Are you an exploration team?" another one, sitting on the ground.
"Nope," Zoey shook her head. "We just heard a goomy got lost here and decided to help."
("Exploration Team?") Cid repeated inside his mind.
"If you're not an exploration team, why are you helping another pokémon?" one of the younger fairy-types asked.
"Because it's the right thing to do," Zoey spoke in a deadpan tone. "Why would I need to be part of an exploration team to help other pokémon?" she asked.
"You're weird," a spritzee commented.
"Hey, that's not nice," Snivy spoke to the fairy-type who made that comment. "Why do you want to know if we're part of an exploration team anyways?" the grass-type asked.
"Duh! Now we know you're easy pickings!" As if on cue, every single spritzee got airborne and headed straight for the trio of pokémon. Cid and Snivy screamed in panic and tried to run away. In the process, the two stumbled over each other's feet and landed on the ground. The two turned their heads and could only stare in horror at the oncoming fairy-types.
Zoey in the meantime was less than impressed. ("A hundred weak pokémon are still a hundred weak pokémon.") she thought to herself.
"GET LOST!" she shouted on top of her lungs. Her voice echoed throughout the entire forest and all of the sudden the incoming spritzees got hit by an invisible blast. Out of control, the fairy-types got thrown into the opposite direction, hitting trees, branches and whatever was on the ground in the process. A multitude of moans and groans could be heard throughout the clearing. The grass and fire-type had their jaws on the ground, as they watched their savior walking up towards one of the wannabe attackers and whispering something to him or her.
"I'm not part of an exploration team," Zoey whispered, discreetly showing off the badge under her scarf. Spritzee's eyes widened in shock when she saw the golden badge under it. "I am part of a rescue team," the eevee clarified, still whispering. "My name is Zoey and I'm the leader of Team Stardust. And trust me, you don't want to get on my bad side."
Having said her piece, the former female human turned around and casually trotted back to the two kids. She couldn't suppress the self-satisfactory smirk that formed across her mouth when she saw how the two children were staring at her awestruck. She stopped right in front of them and helped them to get up from the ground. Once Snivy was back on her own two feet, she immediately started prancing around Zoey.
"Wow! That was awesome! What was that?! How did you do that?! I mean one moment they were- and the other you were- mmmmph!"
"Easy there, kiddo." The normal-type had put her paw on the Grass-type's mouth, already seeing how long this rant was going to be. "That was my Echoing Voice attack. It hurts more the more I use it. My throat included," the adult explained, after which she took her paw out. "It's nothing special, really."
"Nothing special!?" Both children shouted in disbelief.
"You just took out ALL of those pokémon like it was nothing!" Snivy exclaimed.
"Eh… they weren't expecting that attack. I just took them off guard."
Multiple groans could be heard in the background, as the bird-like fairy-types tried to get away, emphasize on they tried. Some of them managed to roll around by pushing themselves of said ground with their tiny wings.
"No way, I don't believe this!" Snivy shouted. "You are like super strong!"
"Hehe, thanks. Anyways, let's forget about these guys-"
"Nuh-uh!" The grass-type interrupted the normal-type. "I wanna know! I wanna know! How did you get so strong? Where did you learn that attack? Can I learn that attack?"
While Zoey found herself bombarded with questions by the young grass-type, Cid was still staring at all of the fairy-types trying to pick each other up.
("She… she did all of this with just her voice.") The former human thought to himself. ("She doesn't even look she brought a sweat. Come to think of it, Zoey did manage to hold her own against those three Beheeyem.")
"Do you fight a lot?" Cid asked aloud, perfectly interrupting whatever Zoey and Snivy had been talking about. The question visibly caught the eevee off guard and she needed a moment to gather her thoughts.
"Often? Well… it depends, really."
"Depends?" the fire-type echoed. "On what?"
"Er…" the adult looked to the side. "Mostly whether the pokémon in the area are aggressive or not. I wander around a lot, so I see lots of different places and meet lots of different pokémon. And as you have just seen, not all of them are nice."
Zoey looked over to the "monster room" she cleared so quickly.
"Wow! You sound you're an explorer!" Snivy exclaimed, hopping up and down excitedly.
"Haha, I guess you can say that. But I'm not part of a guild or something." Her smile turned into a thrown all of a sudden. "Those chumps always demand 90% of the money you make from doing exploration jobs. Anyway, I'm more a traveler who wants to see the world. I do the occasional odd job here and there. From time to time I do help out exploration teams, that's true."
"Wow…" Snivy's eyes appeared to be shining like pearls bathed in the sunlight. "That's so awesome…"
("That's the same way Caterpie looked at me after Pikachu and I saved him. Hm, I wonder how the little guy is doing.")
"Anyways, we really need to get back on track. Goomy is still missing and the longer we stand around and do nothing, the higher the risk is that Goomy wanders into some… uncomfortable company."
Being reminded that there was a pokémon out there the trio was out to safe, the two children put their curiosity about Zoey's strength aside, though they certainly did not forget about it. In fact, for the rest of their trip, it would be on the two children's minds. Luckily they didn't encounter anymore pokémon on the way, aside from the one they were looking for. It happened a couple of minutes after their encounter with the flock of spritzees. Zoey, all of the sudden, stopped, holding her paw up.
"What is it?" Snivy asked, looking up curiously.
Instead of answering directly, Zoey started to sniff the air, her face hardening.
"Do you smell something?" Cid asked curiously.
"Something...maybe someone…" Zoey said more to herself than to the others. "Get ready. I smell something just up ahead. It could be another pokémon ready to attack us."
After hearing, this Cid immediately became antsy, while Snivy started rubbing his paws. "Cool! There's this one attack I've wanted to try out for some time."
Zoey and Cid gave Snivy a look. The normal-type shrugged after a moment and walked ahead. "Wait until I give you the ok. We don't know what we're up against. With any luck, it will be something that can actually put up a fight…" Zoey muttered the last part to herself, not realizing that the children were close enough to hear her small complaint. None of the two found the opportunity to question her, however, as the normal-type walked ahead at quite the pace. The two other pokémon followed as quickly as they could until they finally were by Zoey's side once again.
Zoey didn't stop walking until the pokémon she had sniffed out came into sight. Her stance relaxed immediately when she saw that it was a goomy standing in the middle of a clearing, right next to a… piece of paper?
"Goomy!" Snivy exclaimed
"Ah!" The Goomy let out a shriek and wobbled backward, cowering in fear. She didn't even look up to the new arrivals, else she would have noticed that one of the pokémon was her classmate.
"Hey, don't worry Goomy. It's me, Snivy." The grass-type walked right in front of her classmate, as she spoke. Carefully, very carefully, Goomy opened one of her eyes.
"H-huh? S-snivy?" Goomy whispered hopefully. "Is that really you?"
"Sure, it's me! Who else would I be?" Snivy asked sarcastically.
"W-why are you here?" the dragon-type asked.
"Silly, we're here to help you," Zoey said and made her presence known.
"What?" Goomy looked past her classmate and finally noticed the two other pokémon. One was apparently a child around her age, a cyndaquil. It was curiously looking at the paper Pancham had prepared for her to write her name on. The other pokémon, an eevee, who looked like she was an adult. She was approaching Goomy slowly, with a kind smile plastered on her face.
"Really? You- You're here to help me? Oh… oooohhhh… WAHAAAAAAAAAAAAA! I was so scared!"
The floodgates were opened and Goomy started crying a metaphorical river in front of the trio. Zoey came closer to the dragon-type and slowly wrapped her legs around the child, before pressing Goomy against her fur. Said fur got covered in sticky slime, but the former human ignored this little inconvenience for the sake of comforting the child.
"Shh, shh, there, there. Everything is going to be alright." Zoey spoke in a comforting tone, while slowly rubbing circles around Goomy's back.
"Wow. It must have taken her a lot of courage to come all the way here on her own," Cid said to Snivy.
"Yeah, you're right. I didn't know Goomy is so tough." Snivy, all of the sudden, had found something admirable about her classmate. "I gotta step up my game or else she's gonna show me up in front of the entire class!"
"Uh… sure…"
Cid returned his attention towards the piece of paper lying on the ground, on which the name "Goomy" was spelled out in shaky writing. The former human didn't notice it earlier, but the letters the pokémon used were actually footprints. He had no idea how he could read those things, but he accepted the convenience nevertheless. Just like he accepted the convenience of Zoey saving him and believing him that he was a human… he just noticed how convenient everything was, given the kind of situation he was in.
"What's this?" Snivy asked, coming up right next to the cyndaquil. "Huh? A piece of paper? And something's written on it. Goomy?" The grass-type looked over at her classmate in wonder. "Did she write this? Why?"
"I don't know," Cid replied. "Should we take it with us?"
"I guess it can't hurt," Snivy shrugged and rolled the paper up, before stuffing it under her small arm. The two children then turned to Zoey, who was still comforting the shivering Goomy. The dragon-type wasn't crying anymore, but muffled sobs could be still heard coming from the young pokémon.
"Don't worry, sweetie. I will bring you home," the eevee cooed, allowing the girl to soak her fur with tears and a little bit of slime.
XXX
It took a little while for Goomy to calm down. When she did, the four pokémon started to make the journey back to the forest's entrance. Goomy herself walked so close to Zoey that she was at all times touching the normal-type's leg. Cid and Snivy were walking on Zoey's other side with Cid looking not so good anymore.
"Hey, are you alright?" Snivy asked the fire-type, seeing him wobble a little on his feet. In response, Cid let out a hearty yawn.
"Sorry," he mumbled. "I'm feeling kind of tired."
"Oh."
"That's no surprise," Zoey spoke up. "We were wandering all day yesterday, plus the time it took us to arrive in Serene Village. Wait a minute, guys. Let's stop for just a second."
Everybody did as they were told, looking curiously over to the adult pokémon. Zoey took off her bag and started rummaging through it. "Good thing I bothered to go to the Kecleon Shop. Here we go." The former female human tossed three apples out of the bag, each fruit landing perfectly in front of one of the children.
"Apples?" Goomy wondered out loud.
"Yeah," Zoey took out a clear gummi for herself, handling it in her right paw. "It won't do any of us any good if you pass out from hunger now. Eat up kids."
"Wow, thanks!" Snivy exclaimed and started munching on her apple. Cid wordlessly followed, his stomach feeling considerably empty right now.
"Um… thank you very much, madam," Goomy thanked the adult.
"Oh right, I never told you my name," Zoey realized and put a paw on her forehead. "I'm Zoey. And the little guy over here," she gestured over to the cyndaquil "is Cid. And you already know Snivy."
Goomy nodded. "Thank you again," she mumbled.
"No problem." Zoey gave the dragon-type a light pat on the head. "You're probably exhausted too after today, right?"
"Mhm." Goomy nodded again and slowly started eating the fruit she had been given. Zoey herself quickly munched down the gummi she got for herself.
("Not sure if this is supposed to increase my IQ, but it's way tastier than I remember. I knew I should have gotten more than just one of those.")
While the children were busy eating their food, Zoey kept an eye out for any pokémon that might get some ideas. However, while she definitely smelled other pokémon, none of them bothered coming out of their hiding places. There was a good chance they had heard about the little stunt she pulled of earlier with all the spritzees and were now actively avoiding her. Zoey was okay with that. It was fairly obvious that none of the local pokémon stood a chance against her in battle. It was still a little weird to her. Her last real fight had been years ago and yet here she was just as strong, if not stronger before she faced Rayquaza. She could only guess the reason she was in peak physical condition, was due to Arceus somehow interfering. Who knew what limits this pokémon really had?
"Ah, that was good!" Snivy exclaimed, rubbing over her belly.
"I feel much better," Goomy agreed.
Cid merely nodded and looked satisfied. Zoey gave each of the children a once over, before nodding in satisfaction. "Alright, then let's get out of here. It's getting late already and the last thing we want to have is your parents chewing all of us out. Let's go."
XXX
Zoey was actually surprised to see that Pancham, Shelmet and Deerling were still waiting for all of them at the entrance of the forest. She at least expected the two bullies to high-tail out once Snivy, Cid and she disappeared into the forest.
"Y-you actually made it back?!" Pancham shouted surprised. However, he immediately shut his own trap, once he saw Zoey giving him and Shelmet the stink eye. She walked towards the two children, who both involuntarily took a step backward.
"Now then, you two, give me one good reason why I shouldn't tell your parents about what happened today."
"W-WHAAAT?!" The small Fighting-type exclaimed.
"Y-you can't do that! Our parents will get super mad at us," the bug-type whimpered.
"Not as mad as I am right now!" Zoey shouted.
"Aaahhh!" The two children quickly huddled together, quivering in fear.
"P-please don't hurt us! It was just a joke!" Pancham cried.
"A joke that almost got your classmate injured!" Zoey shouted even louder. "Think about it! If I hadn't shown up, what do you think would have happened to Goomy?! We met some nasty pokémon in there, who don't care whether they're hurting children or not! What do you think would have happened?!"
"AAAAAAAHHHH! We're sorry!" Shelmet wailed, tears streaming down his face.
"Are you really?" Zoey scoffed, her voice toning down a little. She lowered her head so that she could look each of the two children directly into the eyes. "Listen closely, you two. If you're really sorry, you won't pull off any more stunts like that. As long as you two can restrain yourselves, I just might forget this ever happened."
"H-huh? R-really?" Pancham asked, a bit of hope entering his voice.
"However!"
"Aaah!"
"If I do here you two doing something like this again, your parents will be the least of your worries, understood?! Now, get lost!"
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" Pancham and Shelmet ran like Darkrai himself was chasing after them. Zoey watched them go for a while until they were out of eyesight. Turning around, she found that the other four kids were looking at her with a clear mixture of fear and ever so slight respect. Deerling quickly managed to catch herself and cleared her throat, getting everyone's attention.
"I am truly sorry about them, miss. Those two tend to overdo it from time to time," Deerling explained, to which Zoey let out another scoff.
"Don't apologize for them," the adult told the child and turned her head towards Goomy, who was still shaking a little. "Kids like them need a metaphorical slap in the face to get that what they're doing is wrong."
"Meta...what now?" Snivy asked.
"Metaphorical. Symbolic speech, like "overwhelmed with joy" or "you're the light of my life." Or in my case, instead of slapping those two" Zoey gestured with her head where the other two children had run of to "I shouted at them so loud, I might as well have hit them."
"Uh...okay?" It was clear that Snivy didn't get the explanation. Deerling looked like she had some kind of idea, as well as Cid, but Goomy appeared to be lost too.
"Anyways, we better get Goomy home. If my internal clock is correct, the sun will set relatively soon."
Hearing this, Deerling immediately walked up to Goomy. "I can bring Goomy home if that's alright."
"Is it alright with you?" Zoey asked Goomy, who nodded.
"Y-yes. Thank you again, Miss Zoey."
"Heh, you're welcome, kid. Now go home. And don't listen to anything those two say. It's not worth the trouble."
After saying goodbye one more time, Deerling and Goomy headed back to Serene village. Once they were gone, Snivy stretched out her arms and let out a cry of joy.
"Woooheee! Now that's what I call an adventure! That was totally awesome!"
Cid didn't agree but didn't outright disagree either. "I'm just glad Goomy is safe."
"Yeah," Zoey let out a sigh. "It is sad, really. That those pokémon in there are ready to attack children for no apparent reason." ("Then again, humans are still way worse.") "Let's go back to village. I have a ton of letters to write until morning, plus I really need a bath. Wasn't there a river nearby?"
"You're going to bath in a cold river?" Snivy asked in disbelief.
"Cold? Have you ever gotten hit with an ice beam head on? That's cold."
So after getting herself cleaned with a five-minute bath in the river, Zoey escorted the two children back to the village. Snivy was jumping up and down in joy all the time, saying how awesome of an adventure she had had. As soon as they arrived at the village, the sun had already started setting, just like Zoey had predicted, Snivy announced: "I better get home to pops. He tends to get really cranky when I'm late for dinner. Thank you for taking you with me today, miss."
"Thank you for helping out today. Me and Cid will be around town for some time, so see you another time."
"Definitely." Snivy turned her attention to Cid. "I had fun today! We have to do that again sometime! See ya!" And before Cid could give a reply, Snivy was gone. Cid looked after her for a second, before he felt the need to yawn again.
"Oh dear," Zoey gave the former human a pat on the back. "How about you hit the hay early today? You have been through a lot these past two days."
"Mhm." Cid nodded, leaning himself against the normal-type. Zoey guided the child all the way back to the café. The adult led her charge up some stairs onto a second floor, where there were three doors lined up in a hallway. Two of those doors led to rooms for potential guests and the last was occupied by the owner and her child. Zoey opened Cid into the first room, closest to the stairs. The room itself was nothing special. Two straw beds, two buckets filled with fresh water, a desk with two chairs in front of the window, some plants for decoration and finally a map of Serene Village and the overall area was hanging from the wall.
"We'll be staying here for the time being," Zoey explained to the fire-type, who obviously had trouble staying awake, yet somehow managed to pull it off. "Kangaskhan told me a few things before you showed up. One of those things she told me about is that there's a school in this village. Now, I know from personal experience school isn't the nicest place to be, but I thought you should give it a shot. Even if we don't stay here forever, it would be a good idea for you to learn a little bit about this world."
("I guess I can't really argue with that logic.") Cid thought to himself.
"Another important thing is that there is a police station a little outside the village. After I dropped you off at school tomorrow, I'm gonna head there immediately and tell the sheriffs about the Beheeyem. The faster we can get them locked up, the better."
Cid involuntary shuddered at the mention of those three pokémon. He didn't want to imagine what would have happened if Zoey didn't show up.
"Now then, let's get you to bed."
The adult pokémon took herself the liberty to properly tuck the cyndaquil into the straw bed. By the time she was done, the young child was already fast asleep. As she stood there above the small, fragile pokémon and former human, Zoey could only shake her head.
"What the fuck were you thinking, Arceus? When I get my hands on you, I'm gonna give you the beatdown of your eternal life." The normal-type let out a sigh. "I better get back to those letters. Writing with your mouth isn't exactly easy. Damn it, Arceus, why am I not a psychic type? Or something with hands?"
With that being said, Zoey sneaked out of the room she rented for herself and Cid, closing the door as silently as possible.