Who, me? No, I haven't been distracted by playing Y. No, not at all. O_O

Polaris–Ponyta, Tsuki–Serperior, Mamoru–Samurott, Tlaloc-Braviary, Carrara – Liepard, Croatan - Whirlipede

Black City Flu

"I'd rather go to White Forest," I sighed as Polaris and Tauros carried us east towards Black City.

"You've said that five times," Hari said. He looked highly amused at my whining, because we liked to accuse him of being annoying (seriously though, some of his habits drive me crazy).

I laughed. "No. Maybe three."

Off to the side, my other Pokémon were following along. Tsuki and Mamoru had evolved into their final evolutions – Serperior and Samurott. I grinned. It was always exciting to have Pokémon evolve, no matter how often it happened. Even more so since I actually experienced it.

Abruptly, I lost my balance. I lurched to the side and nearly fell off Polaris's back. I quickly reached forward and balanced myself against her neck. The lurching sensation faded, and everything felt normal again.

What happened? Polaris asked, looking back at me, confused.

I blinked, feeling rather bewildered. A faint headache seemed to be coming on. "Ah, it's nothing." I realized that she had stopped moving. "Go ahead. We should be at the city before dinner time, right?"

In less than half an hour, Black City came into view. Which was a relief, because my headache hadn't gone away. I was tired and wanted to get to the Pokémon Center.

We stopped when we reached the outskirts of the city. I dismounted, and the moment my feet touched the ground, my knees nearly buckled. I staggered sideways and Croatan braced against my knees to steady me. It took several seconds for the strange dizziness to back off.

"Thanks," I huffed, patting him.

Carrara came up and sniffed me. You know, you don't seem too hot. Are you feeling okay?

"I-I dunno." The dizziness, which hadn't completely receded, started to swirl up again, along with the pain in my head. I stumbled and Carrara bit down on the hem of my shirt to keep me from wobbling away.

"Are you okay?" Ben asked, hurrying over. Hari came after him. Most of the Pokémon moved aside to let them near.

As my vision started to blur, I began to get scared. "Hey, Ben?" I reached out for Ben's shoulder. It felt unusually low, until I realized that it was Hari that I had grabbed. He blinked at me, looking a bit confused and concerned.

Each pulse throbbed in my head. I squinted and glanced up to where Ben was standing beside Hari. He looked really worried. I was breathing rather hard, and the ground felt like it was swaying beneath my feet like the deck of a ship.

"Can we find the Pokémon Center?" I murmured. "You know, I feel kinda….."

…

Cara!

….

…

….

….

I slowly opened my eyes. There was a ceiling above me. I was inside. How had I gotten inside?

What happened?

I lifted my head and felt the headache stab into my skull. Nausea punched me in the chest and I quickly lowered my head again, breathing hard.

Right. We had been outside the city, and I felt sick. But then what? It was hard to think. My thoughts felt thick and slow, like honey.

I must have passed out. I'd heard that you don't always remember passing out. That must be what happened. But why? I'd never passed out before, unless there was a very good reason. Was it because I was sick? But how could I have gotten so sick so fast? I'd felt fine an hour before we arrived at the city.

What time was it anyway? Where was I? And where was everyone else?

I glanced around, feeling rather dim. Things looked a bit blurry still, and it took a while to register what I was seeing. I must have been in a doctor's office.

"Cara!"

I glanced around, and the abrupt movement made my head swim. When my vision cleared Hari was standing beside my bed, grinning.

"You're up!"

I nodded vaguely. "What happened?"

Hari cocked his head. "Well, when we stopped, you fell over. Ben caught you, and Polaris carried you to the hospital. They said you're sick. Something kinda like a flu, maybe? I never seen ya like this before."

"I've never been like this." It was hard even talking. "Never been this sick."

"I've got your Pokéballs," Hari assured me. "I wanted to let at least one of your Pokémon stay out with you. They wanted that too, cause they were really worried. But the doctor didn't want any Pokémon in here. Which is just stupid!"

I nodded.

"They didn't even want to let Gro in!" He gestured to Gro, who was curled at the foot of my bed. I'd barely even noticed him there.

"Where's Ben?"

"He's at his appointment. He wanted to stay, but we figured that you wouldn't want him to miss his appointment. He waited with you until he had to leave."

"Wait… how long have I been out of it?"

"All night and all morning. Lunch was a while ago."

I raised a hand to my head. Was it possible to feel worse than I had after the big battle on Naratay? Despite getting thoroughly bashed up in that fight, this seemed worse. That was exterior stuff. This pain was eating into my head.

"I wanted to go and get some stuff to make medicine for you," Hari continued. "But there's nothing in this stinky city. And Ben asked me to wait with you until he got back. So, once he's back I'll leave the city and go look around."

"Thanks, Hari. That would be nice." Having grown up in the woods, Hari knew how to use herbs and berries to mix all sorts of cures. I didn't really like taking pills, or anything, since I had no idea what was in them. I almost trusted Hari's weird potions more than what the doctor here might give me. They never had side-effects, except for weird flavors and textures.

As if he could read my thoughts, Hari said, "The doctor's gonna check in soon. He said he had some medicine for you."

I grimaced. "Yeah." I decided not to ask if they'd done anything else to me while I was unconscious. "I'm up now. So if you want, you can go look for that medicine stuff."

Hari considered this. "You don't mind me leaving you? Ben said I should wait."

"I know. But right now I'd rather have you make a magic potion, or something, so I can get out of here."

Hari grinned and nodded. "Okay. I'll be back in a while then! I'm not sure how long it will take to find everything."

He dashed out of the room and Gro followed.

Moving very slowly, I propped myself up against the back of the bed. A nurse brought me some water and said that the doctor would come in a couple minutes. Which probably meant 20 minutes.

My mind ran over strange, disjointed thoughts, which didn't make much sense in hindsight. I thought about what N said, about people not wanting to offer a Pokémon its freedom, in case it really did leave.

See, I thought in annoyance. My Pokémon are worried about me. They care about me, and they wouldn't leave. I started thinking about the other things he'd said, and how I could counter them, if we ever ran into each other again.

I looked out the little window that faced the street. It must have been on a side street, because there weren't many care and very few people.

At that moment, someone passed by on the street. A guy with a white shirt and green hair.

I sat bolt upright. It was him! What on earth was he doing here?

I didn't wait for my vision to clear, but threw my sheet off and placed my bare feet against the cold hospital floor. Suddenly I was very angry, and all reason was gone. I moved across the room in a drunken wobble and shoved open the window. I dragged myself outside and dropped down to the street. I glanced back and forth and thought I saw a flash of green disappear around the corner. I started hobbling towards it, and then broke into an unsteady jog. Around one corner, and then another. When I finally stopped, I saw that I was in a deserted back-alley lined with dumpsters and covered in a faint layer of greenish-yellow algae scum.

It was a dead end.

And of course I had no idea how I'd gotten here, or where N was. Had I even seen the guy at all? Had I just imagined it?

I turned around, and suddenly all my strength drained away. My back crashed against the wall of the building and I slowly slid to the ground, shivering, my head reeling and throbbing.

I slowly reached for my belt. But my Pokéballs weren't there. They were with Hari. And he was outside of the city, crashing around the forest. Ben's Pokémon were certainly in their Pokéballs, where they wouldn't be able to get Ben's attention.

My head was propped against the mildewy dumpster. It smelled horrible, and I wanted to move. But the moment I shifted, everything went blurry again, followed by darkness.

…

"Is she homeless, or something?"

My head jolted and I saw the outline of two people passing by.

"W-wait," I croaked. But they pretended not to hear and hurried on. I was alone again.

I dropped my head, and it throbbed again, making me wince with every beat.

Eventually I heard a faint shuffling, and then something brushed against my side. My arm moved by itself, and my hand rested on something. I glanced over to see a Pokémon. A Mienfoo. It had come up beside me, and looked like it was about to pick my pocket.

I don't have anything, I said telepathically, although that wasn't much easier than speaking. My head was still so fuzzy.

Mienfoo cocked her head.

I need your help, I said. I need you to bring someone. My friends are here… I'm supposed to be in the hospital…

Mienfoo stared at me a moment longer, and then turned and dashed away. She'd abandoned me too.

My head fell back down and I passed out again.

…

The next thing I felt was a hand on my shoulder. But I could barely focus even on that. I couldn't even look up to see the face of the person.

"Hey, are you okay?"

The words sounded faint and rather echoey. All I could do was give a little moan in reply.

He took my arm and pulled me away from the wall. I slumped forward like some rag doll. I was dragged around until I felt myself lifted up. The person had lifted me on his back. He moved slowly, apparently having trouble carrying another person.

I caught the bleary outline of Mienfoo. So, she had gone for help after all.

From the opposite corner of my eye, I saw the guy's hair. Green hair.

…

When I woke up again, I was back in my hospital room.

Ben and Hari had returned to fine me missing. Let's just say that they and the doctor were all furious at me for sneaking out. I mean, some random person had carried me in off the streets, covered in dirt and scum and smelling like a dumpster. I didn't say that I probably knew the person, because he'd snuck away before Ben and Hari had met him.

The only remaining clue I had of my excursion was Mienfoo. Hari had coaxed her to stay, and for that I was glad.

She said she'd been abandoned by her human and had been living off the streets for several months, usually stealing what she needed. It took some persuasion, but she finally agreed to accompany me, and took on the name Lanfan. From that little she was able to tell me, I learned that the guy who had rescued me – the one I'd seen out my window- was indeed N. Which made me wonder if he was following us.

"Polaris told me why Cara's sick," Hari said once all the doctors had cleared off for a bit. "Since Cara's telepathic, she's more sensitive than most people to thoughts and emotions."

"Right," Ben and I said together.

I only felt slightly better, by the way.

Hari continued. "And Black City is known as the City of Greed."

Ben nodded.

"So that means that there's lots of mean nasty people and thoughts flying all over the place."

"So," I continued, "Polaris thinks that I picked up on all that negative energy?"

Hari nodded. "She said it made your immune system vulnerable. So when you had a cold coming on, it hit you harder than it normally would have."

I groaned. "Ugh. That sucks."

"I'm glad I don't have telepathy," Ben said. "This city stinks, but at least I was able to get through my meeting fine. I guess we'd better leave as soon as possible?"

"Please," I pleaded. "Anything to make this stop."

"I've got something." Hari grinned and help out a large glass. It was full to the brim of some sort of smoothie. The worst-looking smoothie I'd seen in my life. It was a murky sludge-color with a yellow sort of scum floating on the top.

Ben and I both leaned away, horrified.

"You got that from the dumpsters," I exclaimed.

Hari looked shocked and a little hurt. "I did not! It took me a couple hours to find all the ingredients. I had to ask a bunch of wild Pokémon for help."

I stared at the liquid. I wanted to throw the glass out the window. "You've got to be kidding. You want me to drink that."

"Yeah."

I looked at him, pleadingly. "But… I mean… will it make me feel better?"

"Yeah. A lot."

"Do I have to?"

"Yes."

I took the glass and stared at the scummy foam on the top. I glanced at Hari, who nodded encouragingly.

I took a deep breath and held it, chugging as much of the stuff as I could. I could barely swallow it.

"Oh, God," I gasped when I finally had to come up for breath. "This stuff tastes like… like Camerupt barf!"

It was an amazing feat of will power to drink it all.

Except that I felt better almost immediately, despite the lingering flavor and texture in my mouth. It took several glasses of water to rinse most of it away. But by then my head was already starting to clear.

"Well," I said, "I guess I should know better than to question Hari's medicine. You should open a clinic someday. For both people and Pokémon."

Hari beamed.