Happy New Years Everyone! I am really liking how 2010 is going so far. I haven't had time to update over the holidays because I, and some of you, were enjoying it. I hope your New Years Resolution looks great, because it looks like a busier year for me.

Back to where things left off: I will continue to try updating normally, but there are no guarantees. Christmas may have passed for us but it's about to start for the Winthrops. Very rocky at that.

We spent what was left of Saturday and most of Sunday walking through the forest. As soon as the trees started to thin, we came across the road, and the next few days we walked the rugged path until we came across a diner on the outskirts of a port city that Latias said was named Olivine. We stopped at the diner and Dad got us something to eat and we finally sat down to rest.

"Who is this…Ely Morgan?" He asked. "If…you're willing to talk about him."

I put my fork down. "He's a scientist. He was in charge of the program that experimented on us. Everyone else just referred to him as Dr. Morgan."

'What does he want after all these years?' Latias asked.

"Revenge, maybe. That building that dad saved those teenagers from; he was in charge."

'But….he sent someone after me, not you,' She said.

"That's what throws me off," Dad stopped eating and clasped his hands. "It just doesn't make any sense. His goals then and his goals now don't add up. Whereas, Mateo and the guy that tried to capture Latias; their goals were alike. But he was sent out by Morgan."

'What are you thinking, Calvin?'

"This can't just be coincidence," He said. "Rayquaza said that he was captured by one person. That one person couldn't have been the guy we encountered."

"Actually, it could."

They both turned to me.

"That ball he used to capture Latias," I said. "It's not a normal pokéball, and it's twice as powerful as the Master Ball. It captures pokémon against their will and suppresses their energy so that there is hardly any struggle. It's virtually inescapable."

"Latias?"

'She's right,' She said. 'Honestly, I was trying my hardest to escape, but nothing worked."

"Rayquaza didn't even put up a fight." He said.

"So….what do we do?" I asked.

"We can't go back home yet," He said. "It's not safe. I mean we don't even know if that guy has even left yet, or called for backup. We're going to have to rough it for now."

I honestly didn't want to hear that response.

When we finished eating, we walked down the road and into town. I wanted so bad to go to the beach but unfortunately it wasn't a good time for relaxing, so I continued walking. We found a small inn by the seaside and got two rooms. We were all in need of some sleep, and even though it was midday I felt like I could sleep until tomorrow.

'Are you sure it's okay Molly?' Latias asked.

"Yes, we're in a secluded spot, you can transform if you want."

'Okay,' With a quick flash she had returned to her normal form. 'You should get some rest, you look tired.'

"What about you?"

'Ah, I'll be fine,' She said. 'I've had plenty of all-nighters in the past.'

"Okay," I fell back onto the bed and closed my eyes.

I opened my eyes again. I was lying in the middle of a cobblestone pathway, the midday sun shining bright over me. For some strange reason, I was wearing a white dress now. I got up, and called out for dad and Latias, but there was no visible sign of them. I ran a hand through my hair, and noticed that it had reverted to its original mahogany brown. It had to mean that I was dreaming, so I sighed in relief. I walked along the path for a while until the trees thinned and revealed a cliff. A boy was sitting on the edge, looking up at the sky. From this view, he was wearing a white jacket and matching shorts just like me. His hair, the majority of it tied behind his head with a rubber band, was black and smooth like mine. He finally noticed my presence and looked back.

"Um, hi," I said. White clothes, cobblestone pathway, and now this? There was definitely something special about this boy. For one, he looked my age. "Boy, this is the weirdest dream I've ever had."

I sat down next to him. He continued to stare at me. Looking back at him, he had a very vibrant complexion, almost obnoxious if stared at for too long. He had the most beautiful pair of blue eyes that unfortunately for me, started to remind me of Morgan again. Even the smallest aspects of my life couldn't be enjoyed because of him.

"My name's Molly."

He chuckled. "I know who you are."

"Then who are you?"

"A friend," He said. "Soon enough."

I touched his face. He started to blush. "What?"

"How do you know me?" I asked. "One part of my mind says that you're just my conscience talking to me, but the other says that you're…"

"I'm real?"

I sighed. "Yeah…but that can't be right."

"I guess not."

I rolled my eyes and turned away. I only ever did this to Latios, since he used to agree with me on every point. It made me frustrated, but somehow made us better friends. "Thanks for the short conver…" When I turned back, I was still staring into those same blue eyes, but now a new and horribly familiar face formed around them.

"Y-you…"

He ran a hand through my hair. Upon contact, it reverted to its aqua blue color.

"It's been a while, hasn't it?"

I jumped out of my sleep. I sat up, and turned on the light on the adjacent nightstand. Latias took advantage of the bed across from me, and was undisturbed from the glow of the light. Heavy sleeper, I guess. I turned the light back off and grabbed my shoes. I needed some fresh air; this wouldn't take long.

I stepped outside. Now that we were further up north and sitting right next to the ocean the climate had changed, and it was freezing outside. I didn't have anything to cover myself up in, so I crossed my arms and started to walk. Streetlights were on and were brightly lit. Most of the lights in the buildings were off; some were on, just for 24-hour convenience. I walked past them, and cut across to the boardwalk. Instead of a regular ray of light from the lighthouse, it sent out a strobe. I had thought that it was only for airplanes, but the docks were full so I guess ships' captains had no problem with it.

"Hey…" There was someone standing out on the beach. "Is that….DAD?" I yelled to him. He turned around, so I guess he recognized my voice.

"Molly?" He called back. "What are you doing up so early in the morning?"

I stepped down onto the beach. The sand was icy cold, even with my shoes on. I walked up to him. He was holding a cup of coffee in his hand, so he wasn't really cold.

"That doesn't excuse you either, dad."

"Guess not," He turned back to the ocean. "I couldn't sleep. Too much on my mind."

"Oh, well I had the weirdest dream," I said. "Or rather nightmare…I saw Morgan again."

"That's the first time in years," He looked at me again. "I was afraid this was going to happen."

"What?"

"Being exposed to this guy, or anything that has to do with him," He said. "You know a lot more about him than I do, and any time you think about him it reflects on your past and visualizes in your dreams. Hence the nightmares."

I rubbed my arms. Standing still next to the ocean with no warmth at all was freezing. I could almost feel the cold starting to burn now. Dad looked at me and took off his coat and wrapped it around me.

"Thanks."

He nodded. "I wonder how I'm going to explain this to Danielle when I get back."

"Can't you make something up?"

"No, unfortunately she's psychic," He said. "She sees straight through my lies."

There was that to take into consideration. Almost a week had gone by since we left unannounced and ended up in the situation we were in now. How was I going to explain this to my teachers as well?

"In the meantime, let's head back," He said. "We're both out here, and I don't like the thought of leaving Latias alone."

We walked back up to the street.

"Okay maybe I was exaggerating when I said we might have to rough it for a while," Dad said over breakfast the next morning. "It's been days, and no one's come looking for us."

'How can you be so sure Calvin?' Latias asked.

"Like this," I thought he was bluffing when he called Mismagius out, but it only made Latias and I jump back at her sudden and unexpected appearance. She hadn't aged like everyone else. She was a ghost, so she lived forever. Dad said that that was a great aspect about her and that it concerned the restaurant and the house, but that's all I heard.

"I called home yesterday and asked Mismagius to scout the area around the garden," He said. "Then I asked her to check the house and the restaurant. She didn't find anyone or anything, so they must've left."

"Or are hiding and are waiting to ambush us when we return," I said.

'Well we're going to have to go home sometime, I mean we can't stay away like this, people are worried about us,' That was true.

I sighed. "Okay, let's go home. To be honest, I am a little homesick."

I stepped outside with everyone else after breakfast. There was heavy overcast today, which probably held for rain later on. We needed a nice, secluded spot to teleport, and since there were no alleyways in this city we had to go back out into the forest and do it there. Latias nudged my shoulder.

"Hm?"

'You know, in the time that we've been traveling, I completely forgot about your tutoring,' She said.

"Oh…it's okay, I'll just make up for it with bookwork," We had a good laugh.

We stopped at the pokémon center. Dad decided to tell Dani from a distance instead of having her kill him up close. She had probably been working nonstop for the last week or so.

"Well…wish me luck," We crossed our fingers as he walked inside. After a few minutes of waiting afterwards, Latias turned to me.

'What do we do in the meantime?' She asked blatantly. I looked at her.

"I think we're expected to wait for…" I looked over her head and down the street, and to my shock, there he was again. The boy from my dream. He was kneeling down next to the side of a moving truck, petting a Bayleef. "That's not possible…"

'What's not possible?' She followed my line of sight and turned around to see what I was staring at. 'The boy…do you know him?'

"No, that's the thing," I said. "But I saw him in a dream I had last night."

'You had a dream about a boy you never saw?' I nodded. 'You know what this means.'

"No…I don't."

'It means that you two are destined to meet!'

I shrugged and we continued our stare. Yep, it was definitely him. He stood up and said something to the Bayleef, and the both of them walked down the street in the opposite direction.

'Do we wait until he comes back?'

"He probably won't be back soon and judging by dad's phone call," I looked through the glass. Dad was staring at Dani absent-mindedly, meaning that he had completely phased her out. "He'll be there for a while. Come on, let's go."

An hour later…

"…and Calvin, I need a few days off," Danielle said.

"I'll write it down."

She narrowed her eyes. "Can I have a raise?"

"Sure, and I'll hand you the deed to the restaurant while I'm at it." She groaned.

"Calvin, when am I going to get reimbursed?" She asked. "It's been really busy now that we're top choice for tourists."

"Danielle, it's the holiday season. Christmas is in two weeks, so why would I give you a vacation now?" She thought about it for a moment, and then started to smile.

"Oh by the way, I forgot to tell you," She picked up a notepad and began to read it. "Your mother called yesterday, she says to tell you that she's coming by this Christmas."

"No problem. Tell her that she's always welcome."

She nodded, and we said our goodbyes and hung up. My mother, Amanda Marcy Winthrop, is basically the backbone of my life. 23 years ago when I became a trainer, she was there at the front door waving me off. Dad was there, and unfortunately we didn't see eye to eye, but he was waving along with her. Many aspects of my life were reminiscent of her, such as my green thumb and the ability to cook to where I am now. She came by, that Christmas six years ago after our battle and gave us something different to think about. I still haven't gotten around to telling her that Danielle was now a Gardevoir because she asks from time to time, but I guess it's easy if I left her on the notion that I fired her…

I pushed the doors open and left the pokémon center. Mismagius was floating up against the wall, eyes closed and apparently asleep and Molly and Latias were nowhere to be found. My heart jumped.

"Mismagius!" I called to her. "Where are the girls?!"

She yawned nonchalantly and looked around, then became as frantic as I was.

"Okay, okay…calm down," I started to pace. "No one's looking for us…the inn's over there, and I'm here…they had to have gone in that direction," I pointed up the street, past a moving truck that was currently being packed. It was such a bad day to start moving, because it looked as if a large storm was coming in. "They couldn't have gone that far. Let's go, Mismagius!"

"Where did he go?" We followed the boy back into the forest. I guessed he was going for a walk and took the route. But somehow he must've noticed our presence and tried to lose us, and that he did. We looked around for him, but no luck. The sky had grown darker, which meant that rain was definitely on its way. I sighed and gave up. "Okay Latias. It doesn't make sense to keep up this search."

She poked her head out of a nearby tree. She had reverted to her true form to search from the sky, but there were too many trees to get a good view of the ground.

'So are we heading back?'

"Yeah…dad's phone call is probably over by now," I turned around and walked through the trees. "We should get back before he starts to get worried."

I pushed some shrubs aside and walked back out onto the path. Latias followed close behind. "Latias, do you think we were really destined to meet?"

'Well it has to be,' She said. 'He's your age, you saw him in your dream…there's a moving truck outside his house, maybe he's moving to Alto Mare…?'

"That's impossible," Well, if we were destined to meet then maybe we were supposed to stay close to each other. "Y-You really think so?"

'As sure as a…'

There was a pause.

"As sure as a what?" I turned around. "Latias, what is it?"

'I…I don't know…' She was clenching something very tightly in her paw. When she opened it, it looked as if there was some sort of dart stuck in the center, and it was empty. 'Everything's spinning…'

"Latias?" Her eyes closed and she fell into my arms, her sheer weight bringing me to the ground with her. "Latias?! What's wrong?"

"Can't send a boy to do a man's job…"

I looked up. Someone was walking towards us. I couldn't see his face from a distance, but as he got closer, I recognized him.

It was Morgan.

"No…unbelievable," He looked at me very closely. "Melinda…I can't forget the hair."

"Stay away from me," I said through gritted teeth.

"No intention of coming any closer," Looks like he learned something after our last encounter nine years ago. He was the only one in the way of my escape, and of all people he was trying to capture me, in one of those inescapable pokeballs. Well he did, but…somehow I escaped. I never knew why or how, but I knew who to take it out on. I scratched up his chest and bit his leg before stopping myself from killing him.

"She won't wake up anytime soon," He said. "That serum happens to be an extra powerful sedative."

I looked around. "You didn't come alone."

"Good eye." At least a dozen other men and women walked through the trees and surrounded us. They picked me up and restrained me, and then surrounded Latias.

"How did you find me?" I just had to know. There was absolutely no way that he knew where we were when we left Alto Mare.

He chuckled and waved another man over. To my surprise, it was the same one who initially attacked us.

"Kill her," He said. "And make it quick this time."

"With pleasure," He released his Infernape. Once he laid his eyes on me, he started snarling. "Go get her."

He didn't hesitate, and started running towards me. Once he gained enough momentum, he landed a sweeping fist on my chest, and sent me rolling back a couple feet. Seconds later, I started gripping my chest out of pain. I think that the hit broke some of my ribs. I grabbed the tree behind me and pulled myself to my feet, and then looked at Morgan. "You're…you're enjoying this, aren't you?"

"It pleases me to see you suffer, but I have other matters to attend," A helicopter's blades could be heard in the distance. Morgan nodded to the guy, and he ordered his Infernape to attack me again.

"Mismagius, Psybeam!"

A rainbow-colored beam shot over my head and hit the Infernape in his face, causing him to stumble backwards. Dad stepped in front of me.

"Molly, you're hurt," He whispered back to me. Then he turned back to Morgan. "That's the second time in the decade that you've hurt my daughter, Morgan."

"My hands are clean," Dad scoffed at that. "I'm done here," The helicopter appeared over the trees, and a rope dropped down, upon which it was attached to a stretcher that Latias was lying on.

"Latias!" He said. "Mismagius, use–" Before he could say it, the Infernape landed a fiery kick on his chest and he was thrown back into a tree. I gritted my teeth.

'I have to do something!' I didn't know this at first, but it was anger that drove me to become my other form. At first, I didn't understand what this meant and Morgan had it beaten into me. Now I had gained enough to officially say that this was enough. In a split second, I transformed into a Tyranitar. Before the Infernape could get a chance to react, I whiplashed him back into his owner and the two were knocked to the ground.

Morgan didn't seem too fazed by this, but Dad was still shocked every time I transformed. Not that size mattered anymore, since I now grew to a point where it no longer looked unbelievable, but this time it was different. I could see anger in his eyes now that he was face to face with the man who did this. "Dad, are you alright?"

"Yeah."

Latias was slowly being reeled up to the helicopter. I had one mind to cut the line, but once again this guy and his Infernape were in my way. He held two pokéballs in his hand. I knew the second one was a Dragonair but what was the third? "Dragonair, help your partner out and take care of this one."

"Molly!" I nodded to him, and he nodded back. He and Mismagius went after Morgan and his people, leaving me with this guy. Two advantages over me would've looked like a dead end battle, but I had something prepared if that was their only plan.

"Make her suffer," He said, and they ran after me.

The Infernape swung up onto a tree branch and then dropped down to try to kick me from the air. I blocked with both arms. When he landed, I spun my tail around again to try and trip him, but he saw it coming and caught it. With unbelievable strength, he picked me up and threw me into a cluster of trees with them being crushed beneath me like toothpicks. I quickly got up, and looked around. The two had disappeared. I looked around cautiously for a while, and then started to walk forward.

I walked for at least an hour, gripping my chest anytime I felt pain. That Infernape really hit me hard. The sky just kept getting darker, and lightning started becoming more and more frequent. These two had just disappeared, as if they were expecting me to let my guard down…even for just a second. I could feel them watching me, taunting me. After a while I finally got tired of it.

"Come on out!" I roared. "You can't expect to keep this up forever!"

Besides the thunder, it was only dead silence. I gritted my teeth. Latias was being taken away and dad was trying his best to defend her, and I was being toyed with in the middle of the forest. I felt so angry at the moment, that when I decided to roar to relieve it, something else happened.

I blinked. A cloud of dust had formed in front of me. When it cleared, a path of trees had been cleared and replaced with burnt remains and rubble, stretching on for at least a mile.

'Don't tell me that that was hyper beam?' A sudden loss of balance and lightheadedness suggested that it was. The next moment I ended up gasping for air.

"Exactly what I wanted you to do!"

A powerful jet of water hit me in the face, causing me to lose balance and fall back onto the ground, and just as I tried to get up, a leg came down on my chest with overwhelming force. This time the star wasn't able to reduce the damage inflicted, and I heard multiple cracks followed by waves of horrendous pain. I roared in agony.

"That's for Dr. Morgan," The Infernape said, smirking.

"Is she suffering?" A voice called. By the time it got closer, I had already figured out that it was their master. "I guess I won't be needing this one," He clipped the last remaining pokéball back onto his belt. "Storm's coming."

The Dragonair followed his master back into the forest. The Infernape, following his master, turned back to look at me.

"It's nothing personal," He said. "But you could use a good shower."

He hit me again, and in a split second, I blacked out. I reawakened hours later, to find that the sky had grown darker, and the winds had picked up. Suddenly, a drop of water landed on my nose. It burned for a bit, but that's small compared to what was going to happen next.

"No…no…please don't rain," Luck wasn't on my side today.

A few drops turned into a drizzle, and soon into a storm. I yelled in pain, but they proved useless against the winds and thunder. Soon it brought on a wave of drowsiness that would soon kill me if I didn't do something. My chest throbbed with pain, but I slowly got up. I fell twice before I finally made it to my feet and started to limp through the forest. My eyes were starting to get heavy. I would have transformed back into human form, but with these injuries I was afraid that it could be lethal, so I had to stay like this. The rain wasn't letting up.

I wasn't going to make it far. The path was at least an hour away, there just wasn't enough time for me to make it there….

Suddenly I heard a yell that caught my attention. I stopped, and looked up. To my right, there was a figure hunched up against a tree, almost as if looking at me. But that was all I saw. Stopping only made me rest and acknowledge the pain from the water, and I collapsed to the ground again. That same figure started to loom over me just as my surroundings blurred and went dark.