Trevor awoke to the smell of smoke, the scent jolting him upright with a startled, high-pitched squeak. His panicked breaths eventually slowed as he allowed himself to finally relax, his blurry vision gradually beginning to clear. It was all a dream after all, albeit a strangely realistic-feeling one. He wasn't a Meowth. He was never in some strange golden forest he had never seen before. There were no giant Pokémon trying to kill him.

Trevor was barely allowed to settle down before a wide-eyed Scorbunny suddenly appeared in front of him, her bright, yellow eyes flashing with excitement. "Finally, you're awake! It's been a whole day, you know. You sure do love to sleep!"

Trevor let out another terror-filled scream before erupting into a violent coughing fit, clutching his chest as he recoiled in pain.

"Hey, hey, hey, calm down! It's alright, okay?! I'm not gonna hurt you." The concerned Scorbunny took a step backwards, awkwardly holding her palms out. "You're safe now. You're in my home. I mean, it's not much, but you'll definitely be safe here."

"You...you can talk?" Trevor managed to rasp after some effort, staring at the Scorbunny with wide, hysterical eyes.

"Uh, 'course I can talk."

Trevor continued to sit silently, looking towards the Scorbunny with a wild look of disbelief as his mind raced to find some kind of explanation for why a Pokémon was talking to him. The Scorbunny, on the other end, began to fidget uncomfortably. "What did I manage to drag in?" She thought to herself.

After what seemed like hours of uncomfortable silence between the pair, the Scorbunny decided that she could take it no longer. "The name's Aiden," she hastily blurted out in the most reassuring voice she could muster. "What's yours?"

Trevor didn't answer. Instead, he looked down and saw a mass of sand-colored fur covered in bandages. He shakily raised his hands up to his widening eyes and found a familiar set of brown paws staring him back. It hurt to move; even the process of sitting up caused him to wince slightly. Vivid memories of the hostile Riolu shot themselves directly into his mind.

"So that Riolu, or...whatever that was...wasn't just a dream." he defeatedly inflected, the surreal reality of the situation finally beginning to sink in.

His large, charcoal black pupils darted frantically as he made an effort to analyze his surroundings. He was in a hut of some kind - small, wooden, and spherical in shape. Various necessities were scattered across the floor: a cozy-looking straw nest, a massive tree stump used as a makeshift table, even a little metal stove with a lidded pot on top. Trevor himself was laying on a foot-wide log used as a creative, if not slightly uncomfortable sofa. Slumped on the right side of the curved walls was a battered punching bag, ash-black and covered in footprints. While the house was far from tidy and unlike anything Trevor had ever seen, he couldn't deny that there was something about the messy interior that felt distinctly homely.

His attention drifted towards the walls, which were adorned with posters depicting Pokémon in heroic poses and scenarios. One illustration which stood out to Trevor showed a heroic looking Lucario posing confidently atop the peak of a snowy mountain. His long, white robe flowed impressively behind him as the Pokémon looked forwards with a stoic expression. Under the engrossing scene was tagline which read, "YOU TOO CAN BECOME A LEGEND! BECOME AN EXPLORER TODAY!"

"Hellooooo?" The Scorbunny waved a paw in front of Trevor's eyes, abruptly pulling him from his inner thoughts. "You still there? What's your name?"

"Trephor. No, Trevor!" he corrected swiftly. "Sorry."

Aiden stared at Trevor with squinting eyes and an overall look of exasperation before suddenly letting out a light chuckle. "You're weird. I mean, I've never met anybody who outright screamed upon seeing me. Then blanked on their name for a solid minute before getting it wrong."

Trevor's face turned a bright shade of red. "I- I'm so sorry, I'm just not used to...all of this."

"Hey, it's all good - there's nothing to be sorry about! All that matters is that you're safe now."

Aiden flashed a wide, buck toothed smile. Trevor felt his muscles relax instinctively.

"Besides, after that blow you took earlier, it's pretty fair to assume that your mind would be pretty scrambled. A direct force palm to the chest? While you're a normal type? That's gotta hurt; you're pretty lucky that I was around to save you from that crawler."

Trevor remained silent, slowly nodding as if he wasn't completely clueless as to anything she was saying.

"What were you doing back there, anyway?"

"Where?" Trevor asked before even being allowed the opportunity to thank her for saving him.

"Duh. In the Dawnbreak Woods, of course. The area where you got knocked out yesterday? It's a pretty dangerous dungeon to go in alone, and without a bag or any items, no less. You've got guts, I'll give you that."

"Yeah, I guess," was all Trevor could say as he struggled to comprehend the words being rapidly fired from Aiden's mouth. He felt as if he was moving through thick molasses, trying to keep up with Aiden's lightning-fast way of speaking.

"Wait, if you don't have any badges or teammates... you're not a part of a team, are you?" Aiden's bright, orange eyes seemed to glow in anticipation as she asked, eagerly awaiting an answer with bated breath.

"N-no, I guess not." Trevor stuttered tentatively.

"Thendoyouwannaformanexplorerteam?!" Aiden suddenly responded, propelling her nose mere inches away from his. She asked the question so blindingly fast to the point where Trevor ended up having to replay the utterance in his head a few times before its meaning managed to sink in. Aiden took his stunned silence as him internally debating her offer.

"C'mon, you gotta! I mean, if you're confident enough to take on the woods, then rising up the ranks'll be a cinch with us combined. It'll be fun, think about it! Being on an explorer team means that we'll go on a ton of amazing, heart-pounding adventures! We'll discover new, unexplored lands and acquire vast amounts of riches that other Pokémon can only dream of! If you want, you can even move in with me! This house isn't much, but it's got...personality! And windows! So c'mon, please?!"

Trevor tilted his head in confusion as to what being an explorer entailed. Aiden, in her excitement, interpreted the gesture as a nod.

"YEAH! FINALLY!" Aiden hollered, leaping several feet in the air. "Thank you, oh thank you, you won't regret this! Together, we'll become the best explorer team anyone's ever seen! Just you wait! Oh man, we should apply today! Or maybe tomorrow, how long is that office open again? Whatever - when we ace the entry, we can start taking on jobs! We'll start off small of course, but we can grow stronger and rank up and explore new frontiers and make new friends and find new teammates, maybe even join a guild and..."

As Aiden continued to pace rapidly around the house, absentmindedly continuing her seemingly never-ending tirade, Trevor tried his best to assess the abyss of a situation he had just been thrust into.

"I don't really know what I'm getting into," Trevor thought to himself, "I don't know anything about why I've become a Meowth or why I've been transported into this odd world filled with talking Pokémon, some of which want to kill me."

He looked into Aiden's bright yellow eyes which shimmered with hope as she struck a confident pose.

"...Being an explorer or whatever probably won't be so bad. It sounds amazing, in fact, with the way Aiden's describing it. And what choice do I have anyways? It's not as if I have anywhere or anyone to return to, and I definitely don't want to run into creatures like that Riolu again if I can help it. I...I just have to trust that Aiden will keep me safe."

"Oh, right, your injury," Aiden suddenly recalled, turning her head towards Trevor's bandage-covered body. "Eat this, it'll make you feel better. You must be pretty hungry anyways, being asleep for an entire day and all."

She handed him a plump, round fruit which sat slightly larger than Trevor's palm. Its blue, sturdy exterior was coarse to the touch and spotted with tiny, oval shaped seeds. Despite the fruit's incredibly plain appearance, the mere sight of it caused Trevor to salivate uncontrollably as his stomach began to rumble uncontrollably. The taste was simultaneously sweet and sour, spicy and mild, pungent and dry; Trevor felt a sense of rejuvenation coarse throughout his entire body as he chewed, swallowed, then swiftly bit off another chunk.

"This...this is amazing," Trevor said while chewing, his mind swimming in a blue-colored sea of ecstasy. "I've never had anything this good before!"

"It's called an Oran Berry," Aiden said, grinning at Trevor's look of contentment as he greedily devoured half of the fruit in a matter of seconds. "Guess they don't have them wherever you're from. It's not much, but it should help you heal up in time for the exam. You're just lucky that I stepped in when I did - another blow like that and it'd be at least a week in the infirmary for sure!"

Trevor didn't question what this "exam" was, preferring to focus all his attention on devouring the final few chunks of the berry which still remained.

"Where are you from, by the way?" Aiden eventually asked, "I don't think I've ever seen you around here before."

Trevor tried looking for an answer but couldn't think of one. As far as he was concerned, he only had one answer he could possibly respond with.

"I don't really know how to say this, but, you see, I'm not really a Pokémon. Well, I guess I am now, but I was a human beforehand. I come from a world where humans and Pokémon coexist, but was transformed into a Meowth and was somehow transported to the woods you found me in. I know it probably sounds crazy, but...uh..."

Aiden's eyes widened, her mouth agape in sheer disbelief as she began staring at Trevor with a stupefied, almost scared expression. At once, Trevor found himself wishing that he had stayed silent; he could almost feel her bright eyes boring a hole directly into his very being. Luckily, it wasn't long before Aiden suddenly burst out into an abrupt bout of laughter.

"Man, that's good. You actually almost had me! It's good to see you've got a sense of humor at least!" Aiden pulled the metal pot from her stove and forcefully heaved it onto her table. Upon closer inspection, Trevor found that it was filled with blackened curry mixed with a sea of slightly burnt carrots. "Now let's eat already! We need to mark this occasion with a big ol' feast!"

The pair speedily ate the curry, Aiden cheerily talking in between bites as Trevor silently listened. He couldn't help but feel a sense of contentment while observing Aiden excitedly rave about their future together as proper teammates; every word she uttered dripped with a clear, earnest passion towards her dream to become a great explorer. Trevor found himself feeling somewhat envious.

As the rays of the sun gave way to darkness and after the pair decided to turn in for the night, the image of Aiden's horrified reaction upon upon hearing the word "human" filled Trevor's mind as he laid in bed, trying in vain to fall asleep. The image clung to his brain like a tumor amidst a myriad of unanswered questions regarding why he was turned into a human and for what purpose he was sent to this world. His head continued to spin with an endless barrage of doubt and uncertainty before he gradually became enveloped by drowsiness, slowly falling into uneasy sleep.