The night was almost perfect. The trio was near the end of Route 204, heading into Floaroma Town. Though still chilly, there wasn't very much snow on the ground. Random clumps occasionally impeded their progress, but an absent-minded sidestep was enough to bypass them. For the most part, the brilliant green grass lit the way to the peaceful flower garden. It was a good thing that the grass was wet, however; the moonlight's reflection on the melted snow was one of the few things to give light in the open pathway. Nearing midnight, the trainers decided to press on until they reached their destination.

That doesn't mean they weren't having problems staying awake.

Dawn threw her head back to look at the gibbous moon through her tired eyes. "Shaymin's so lucky...She better realize that."

The green creature was fast asleep, held safely in Dawn's caring arms. Her wispy, gentle breathing could just scarcely be heard by her chauffeur.

Lucas had to rub his eyes every ten seconds simply to keep himself from falling over unconscious. "She is the Gratitude Pokémon..."

"Hey, Lucas...Can I ask you something?"

"We came this far, we are not stopping now."

"No, that's not it..." The girl's head fell to look at Shaymin. Since she was still jealous of the Pokémon's ability to sleep, she had to turn her head forward to keep her mind off that subject. "Do you think...I really should have made that trade back there?"

Lucas looked at Dawn for a moment. She didn't react, so he shifted his head back to the front as well. "Who cares? It was only your Turtwig, and you hardly had a chance to bond with it. You have Torterra. If you want another one, we'll find a Ditto, give the two to the Daycare in Solaceon, and wait for the thief that breaks in and hands free eggs to everybody."

"Yeah, but...I just sort of feel like I sold Torterra out, you know? I mean, it was his first child..." Once more, Dawn's head fell. She closed her eyes, in spite of the risk of falling asleep.

Lucas rested his hand on Dawn's shoulder. "Lighten up. It's not like the angel of death swooped through and took all the firstborns. You just traded Turtwig to somebody who really wanted one. And besides that, look what you got in return. I know that you wanted a Vulpix at one point in your life."

Dawn put on a shy, conscious-weary smile. "Yeah..."

"You'll feel better about it in the morning." Lucas checked his watch. The moment he did so, the clock turned to one minute past midnight. "...Or later today, rather."

"Ugh..." Dawn's head dropped. "So TIRED!" she screamed.

The cry scared away several bird Pokémon from their perch in the trees. Lucas nearly lost hearing in one ear, and Shaymin slowly woke up, too.

Lucas rubbed his damaged ear. "...Well, I'm awake."

"S-sorry..." Dawn gently stroked Shaymin on her cheek. "I'm sorry. Go back to sleep, okay?"

"Min..." She snuggled deeper into Dawn's warm coat and closed her eyes.

Lucas yawned. "I'd love to..."

Dawn groaned, but decided not to continue the conversation.

Another patience-testing half hour passed by. Finally, the team was at the very edge of a forest. They could see Floaroma Town in the very near distance.

"Salvation!" Lucas cried.

Excited about finding a Pokémon Center, thus a warm place to sleep for the night, the two picked up the pace. However, Dawn didn't make it another five steps before getting her foot caught under an unnoticeable tree root. With her mind shifted to other things, Dawn's grip on Shaymin loosened and the Pokémon went flying.

She slammed into a tree. Instead of sliding down, however, she stayed attached to one spot for some reason. "Shay...Min...!"

Lucas bent down to the ground. "Dawn, you all right?"

"Yeah, I'm fine..." Her shaky elbows pushed against the ground, slowly elevating her up. "Check on Shaymin."

The boy bounced from the ground and ran over to his animal partner. She was still stuck, and she was still crying in pain. "...Shaymin? What's wrong?"

"Min! Min!"

Lucas tugged at her. However, she still didn't come loose. He wrapped both hands around her tiny body and yanked her off of her strange perch. This earned a scream possibly louder than the one Dawn had given earlier. Though they were hard to see in the moonlight alone, actual tears were rolling down her face.

"Shaymin, c'mon, what's wrong?"

Dawn freed herself and ran over to the scene. "Did something happen?"

"Don't know..."

They shrugged. Lucas handed his Pokémon back to Dawn to carry before continuing on their way. Shaymin was constantly crying in agony, though it was dying down over time.

"Lucas, I think the nurse should look at Shaymin when we get there..."

"Yeah, definitely."

Time passed. They weren't anymore than five minutes away from the Center, and Shaymin's cries had gone from ear-blasting shouts to inaudible yelps.

Dawn turned her head back. "We covered alot of g--" She stopped talking, shortly followed by walking as well.

"Dawn?"

The girl stared at the ground she had walked on. Lining almost every inch of it in a straight path was glittering red liquid. Her head jerked back around to her arm. Her right arm sleeve, and even a little bit of her left was completely doused in heavy fluid. Her cherry red coatsleeve had turned a heavy maroon. Lastly, she checked the only source she could think of.

Taking a hold of Shaymin in her hand, Dawn looked at her underside. Shaymin's lower body was the most soaked thing of all. Everything was a fatal red, including her tiny legs.

The girl's eyes popped wide open. "Shaymin is bleeding, Lucas!"

"What?!" Lucas barely had to take a single look. "Come on, let's get to the Center!"

Being very much awake now, the two tore off for the largest building in the entire town.

"Joy!" Lucas shouted upon getting the door to the Pokémon Center to open. There was quite an incident the last time Lucas and Dawn were in Floaroma Town, so they were already well acquainted with the nurse. "We need help!"

The nurse, patiently waiting on the other side of a counter, gasped slightly. "What's wrong?"

Lucas's head fell. "It's Shaymin..."

Not a minute was spent explaining things more than necessary. After giving the nurse the run down, she took Shaymin from Dawn's hold and bolted into the back of the large building. She vanished into a side room, leaving a very tired and confused team of humans left behind.

Lucas's head wasn't very high. The silence wasn't helping any. Now that they had artifical light to work with, Dawn observed herself. Pretty much everything that was reasonable for it was atleast splattered with blood. Her tight, black pants had a few lines streaking down them. It would take a miracle to get all the blood out of her coat.

"She was...kinda beat up, wasn't she?"

"Yeah..." replied Lucas in the most unenthusiastic voice Dawn had ever heard him use.

Knowing it would not only be inappropriate, but possibly make the situation worse, Dawn slid her jacket off. Her navy blue sweatshirt was the next line of defense. Not much blood managed to get on this. "Lucas, I'm sor--"

Lucas spun on his heel. He leaned forward and crashed his eyes on Dawn's shoulder, blocking his view of everything in the empty building. Though he tried repressing them, a few chokes managed to break out.

Dawn instantly threw her arms around his back. She stroked it gently, unsure if he even felt it through all of his clothing. She rested her eyes inbetween Lucas's shoulder and neck. "It's okay...Baby, it's okay...C'mon..."

She was admittedly scared. The boy she held in her arms scarcely showed his feelings like this. She wasn't sure what to do, or say. When he didn't reply, the only thing she could do is talk through her heart.

"I'm sorry, Lucas. I'm going to be saying that for a very long time, because it's my fault. I screwed up horribly tonight. I was stupid for not noticing how wet my jacket was getting, and if I was smart, I would have held on to her tighter, and we wouldn't have even had to worry about it."

It was becoming harder to keep the tears inside for Lucas. His sobs became more common.

Dawn realized the error of her ways. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry, baby...We won't talk about that now. You're alright, Lucas, c'mon...She's alright. She's going to be alright..."

The night continued on without a word from the nurse. Two hours passed. Since then, Dawn and Lucas had moved to two chairs. The tears, which had finally calmed down with Lucas, started with Dawn. Covering her eyes from Lucas's view, she simply sat still and cried. Lucas rubbed her shoulder, watching her with his bloodshot eyes. There wasn't much else he could do at their current angle.

Finally, the nurse stepped back out. Before glancing around the main room, she shut the door behind her and heaved a small sigh.

The two trainers bounced out of their seats and ran over to the front desk. Dawn clung to Lucas's arm, scared of asking the question. Lucas was forced to do it.

"...Well?"

The nurse couldn't find the strength to look either of them in their obviously fearful eyes. "Shaymin...She...lost alot of blood." Dawn started choking harder, but tried to keep herself under control. Hearing her cry made Joy instinctively turn to the trainers. "I'm...sorry. Right now, she's...somewhat stable, I suppose. It's likely, however, that...she'll enter into shock soon. If it reaches that far, I'm afraid that I can't do very much to save her."

Dawn instantly quieted her crying. Joy spoke up again before either of them could question why.

"How did Shaymin get cut up so bad?"

Assuming she still needed the comforting, Lucas rubbed Dawn's arm. "Dawn took a flip and accidentally lost her hold on Shaymin...She went flying into a tree. Then got stuck there. It took alot more strength than you'd think to pull her off, so I'm guessing that something pierced through her. It was too dark to really see anything, though."

Joy bowed her head. "It was probably a poacher's tool..."

"Poacher?" Lucas echoed.

"There's been an outbreak of them around Floaroma recently. The Lake Guardian Mesprit's rumored to be around here right now, and I guess they want it. It's not right at all. At any rate, I'm sure you're both very tired. Please try to rest as well as you can for the night. I'll monitor Shaymin closely. I re--"

"Joy?" Dawn started off quietly. "Do Pokémon...and humans...have the same blood functions? There isn't a severe difference between the two, is there?"

Nurse Joy thought about the odd question for a minute. "...Well, no, I suppose not. Why do you ask?"

"My blood type is O...It can be given to any other blood type without a problem. Can't you take my blood and give it to Shaymin?"

"Oh, um," the nurse replied, too shocked to say much else. "Well, I..."

Lucas turned her so they could look each other in the eye. "Dawn, you hate needles..."

Dawn's eyes fell to the ground. "Yeah, I know I do..." They shifted back up. They were weak and confused, but they held a mysterious determination. "But I love Shaymin. More than I hate needles. We don't know how much time we have to work with, but we can assume that it's not much. I might be the only thing that can save Shaymin, and if I am, I'll do anything to do it." She kissed him on the cheek. "Especially since I'm the one that got us into this."

"Dawn, I-I'm not really sure..." Joy took a step back. "I've...never done a human-to-Pokémon blood transfusion before. If I screw up, I couldn't--"

Dawn turned to face Joy. "At the risk of killing your confidence further, you're our only hope. We don't have time to find another hospital, and we certanly don't have time to find a Pokémon with Shaymin's blood type. Please...atleast try. I know that you have to run some tests on me and everything first, which can take up to two hours by itself. We need to get started as soon as possible."

Joy scratched her cheek. "Y-you sure know your stuff, don't you?"

The girl chuckled as well as somebody could under the circumstances. "I've spent a bit of time reading about this and that..." She turned to Lucas. "The entire procedure could take well into the morning, and keeping you up any later will only add another thing for my conscience to ride on me about. It's already almost three in the morning. Please try to get atleast a little sleep, okay?"

Lucas nodded. He would have done anything in the world to stay with her, but if he was going to do nothing but be a bother, it wasn't worth it for anybody. "Good luck, Dawn." After returning her kiss, Lucas made himself scarce, disappearing into a side room where the beds were located.

Joy raised an eyebrow. "Are you sure you want to do this?"

A heavy yawn interrupted her answer. She spoke as soon as she was able to. "More sure than confirming a winning lottery ticket..."

"...All right. Let me call in some extra nurses and we'll get started."

--

The night seemed to disappear. Surprising himself greatly, Lucas had fallen asleep for a few hours. It was twenty-three minutes to seven when he stepped out of his bedroom and walked into the main lobby. His eyes instantly spotted Dawn sitting in a chair with a donated blanket thrown over her. She was completely unconscious, but came to when Lucas accidentally shouted her name.

Opening her eyes, she weakly glanced around the room. When she laid eyes on her comrade, she let out the weakest of smiles. "Hey..."

He was almost instantly at her side. "How'd it go? Why are you out here? When did--"

He was interrupted when Dawn's head crashed onto his shoulder. He glanced over and instantly noticed that she was out cold.

Joy, looking nearly as weary as Dawn, stepped into the room. In her arms was Shaymin, wrapped loosely with a smaller blanket. "Everything went fine. Shaymin's going to be perfectly fine."

Lucas smiled. It grew in size by the second. "...Thank you," he whispered, accepting his Pokémon from the nurse.

"Both Shaymin and Dawn might be weak for a few days. I'd recommend staying around Floaroma until they both recover one hundred percent."

Lucas nodded. The nurse left, leaving the three alone in the lobby.

The conscious trainer continued smiling. His best friend was in his lap. Someone even more important than that was on his shoulder. He couldn't really help a long-lasting grin.