Shosanna and I had been walking in the cave for a few hours; her granbull had been showed its extensive abilities against the native pokemon. He was slow, but more than made up for it with his overwhelming power. The pink dog had the electric,fire,and ice fang attacks and a fairy move capable of making a machoke go flying into the tunnels like a football.

The middle aged woman had rarely spoken to me and instead opted to have conversations with Jackal whom she got along much better with. Jack had already healed due to a combination of time and a wealth of healing items. Shosanna wasn't very fond of me because of my treatment of Jackal, and simply ignored most of my comments.

"Oh,so your move spectrum isn't up to par with what you wish it was." The lucario nodded in agreement. The conversations had been very one sided through my point of few. She understood him perfectly however with his telekinetic powers.

"Well I think I could fix that for you…" she fished into her purse, pulling out a yellow CD case with disc's varying in color and having small words written on them. "Ah here we are," she said withdrawing a disk with the word flash cannon on it and the Gym Leaders name Teresa scribbled on it. "If I could see your Lucario's pokeball please." The old woman duly asked.

"Why?" I asked her wondering what she was going to do with it.

"It is a Tutoring Disc, or TC for short. They used to be called Technical Machines when I was a kid. You insert this disc," the lady said, showcasing the shiny silver disc. "Into the top slot above the release button." Demonstrating with one of her poke balls she held up. "You put this thing in and then after a few seconds, the disc will eject, but if the TC was an older model, like the ones they sold when I was a child. It will shatter." She handed me the disc to try out. I followed her directions and after a few seconds the orb sparked and the pokeball released the TM. He had just learned the new move Flash Cannon. A quick summary of what the move did was written below the name for it. 'The user gathers all of its light energy and releases it in one shot'. Of course I didn't need the summary because Jack had already demonstrated the attack towards the machoke.

She's cool; I'd rather be trained by her anyday, since you're not doing a very bang up job. Jackal said telepathically.

"Fuck you; I'm doing a great job. I got you to stop being an asshole didn't I?" I replied to his insult.

You are the asshole. I got a burn scar on my face because of your punk ass. He rushed up to me trying to make me flinch. It failed.

"Back off or i'll do it again." I said flatly towards his attempt at dominance.

Whatever, you should've used that deodorant on yourself . He glared at me for a few moments, but ultimately he stepped down.

"Keep talking, hopefully Shosanna trades me that granbull for you." I insulted the scar faced lucario.

Hopefully you trade your cowardice in for a pair of testicles.

"Listen, there are things in this cave that can fry our brains with a thought, and they don't like loud noices." Shosanna interrupted, her voice crawled down to a whisper.

"SHIT!" I screamed as we all slipped down a muddy trench. The farther we fell into the hole,the less light came into our view. We splashed into a pool of mud.

Where the hell are we? Jackal asked us telepathically, but he wasn't expecting an answer as he probably sensed we were as clueless as him.

Shosanna returned her granbull; it was very difficult for the small pink bulldog to trudge in the deep mud. She however replaced him with her crobat, Alucard if I remember correctly.

"Alucard can use echolocation to and he'll notify us if there is trouble." She informed us. slowly easing the tension of the group.

A large splash rose from the water and Alucard started to screech dramatically. "Look out!" I yelled, putting my fist up ready for a fight, just then I remembered the gun that nameless man had given me and I pulled it out. Nothing emerged from the water but we stayed on guard. I could see Jack tense as he was sensing the aura of the creatures around him he couldn't see, but could feel their bodies moving.

It's reptilian… he told us. Maybe quagsire or serperior? He asked us seriously. He let his telepathy reach both of us for convenience.

"No it can't be quagsire, they only hunt fish. And serperior only hunts in clear water." She dismissed his idea.

"Maybe swampert? We are in the mud." I chipped in what I thought it was.

"That's a good guess, it's definitely a possibility." She said under her breathe. The woman dug two things out of her waterproof bag, a short machete and a flashlight. She turned on the torch and unsheathed the machete. The light source brightened the large catacombs. Large steep slopes reached higher into the darkness then I could see; the river was seemingly endless. The farther we went, the deeper the water got; going as high as a bit below waist length. The cave stretched and bent different ways and on the ceiling a host of zubat rested. Sitting on the surface a group of woopers' and poliwag hopped, clearly this was a growing ecosystem of pokémon, making it even better for an apex predator to roam dominantly in the mud river.

"Do you have a- oh." She interrupted herself when she saw my lowered revolver.

"You must've gotten that from the red-headed guy in the center, huh?" The veteran trainer rhetorically asked; already knowing my answer. "You do know that if that man committed a crime with that pistol you'll be a suspect right?" She asked with a look that made her look like she thought I was stupid.

"Yeah,I realized that but I might as well keep it. You know how expensive guns are these days? I couldn't afford a legal one if I tried." I told her. Small talk wouldn't be seen as practical in the eyes of most people, but one gets quite bored when walking through a seemingly endless pitch black tavern.

"You're very ignorant about a lot of things. Didn't you have siblings to tell you anything?" She asked me.

"I did have some brothers and a sister, but they never had time to teach me. I barely ever talked to them." I . "Speaking of a semi-family, what is your team anyway, I mean you are a runner up for champion so I'd imagine you're a beast."

"Thanks for the compliment, but I've been training for over 22 years and I think I have more than 100 league quality fully trained Pokémon on deck ready to go at any time." She informed me, seemingly bragging at her accomplishment. "On hand though, I have a newly evolved dragonite in her ball. Her name is Ursula and you know Alucard of course, the granbulls name is Lockjaw by the way and he's the oldest in my party. I also have a charizard named-"she stopped when we saw a large floating, approximately 10 foot long blue amphibian with a red crest running down its back.

Oh shit! Jack warned us. He shot an attack at the unmoving creature, but the move harmlessly bounced off of the hard scales of the creature, barely affecting it. But it did do some good, it actually flipped the creature over, letting us find out that the monstrous thing was a feraligatr.

"I think it's dead." I surveyed the creature up and down; the amphibian was paler than the average members of its species. The eyes were rolled to the back of its head and its mouth hung open. Emerging through the water, I saw a smaller, much smaller version of the feraligatr. The baby little totodile was growling and snapping at us, I guessed that the large carcass was the totodile's mother.

"It's okay sweetie, come here." The champion trainer showcased her skills with pokémon; luring in the totodile. It stopped snapping and swam over to her. Alucard flew over to Shosanna and sent a dark blue ghostly ray at the blue amphibian in front of her; the bat obviously had experience with this sort of thing, but the totodile growled and shot a string of water at it, the crobat maneuvered past it easily and kept shooting the rays at the totodile. However the little alligator kept diving into the muddy pool narrowly dodging the beams..

"Hey, what are you trying to do?" I asked Shosanna wondering what her plan was.

"I'm gonna catch it obviously." She answered. Finally the confusion ray hit home; the baby totodile splashed wildly; biting the air and scratching at the water. The alligator jumped on my chest and bit my upper arm, drawing blood from the appendage.

"Goddamnit!"I tore the baby amphibian off of my arm and threw it into the water sending the totodile diving headfirst in the water.

"Wait, totodile's can't breathe under water dumbass!" she yelled, plunging her arms in the murky water after the totodile and scooping it up in her grasp. "It's okay baby." She cuddled up to the cold blooded creature and tried to reassure it, the little water type responded by biting her fingers, she yelped in pain tossed it at me.

Wait,I'll just tell it to stop before you wind up breaking its neck. Jack suggested telepathically I held the Pokémon at arm's length ensuring it couldn't bite my neck or face. Jackal focused his powers and used his aura translating skills to clear the language barrier.

No, no, no let me GO! Get out of here I'm trying to save my mommy! She's sick and she can't move. The totodile screamed hysterically at me. Chomping at the air wildly and squirming in my grasp.

Who's gonna feed me and care for me!? You guys are just gonna eat me and my mom's gonna be in trouble if I'm not here to help! He cried and judging by his voice, he must've barely even been a year and a half old.

"Calm down! nobody's going to eat you; we just got lost in here and were trying to figure out how to escape."I explained.

I'd hate to tell you this, but your mom ain't comin back. She's dead. Jackal said bluntly. He ignored the screaming gator in his presence.

"But look at it this way; come with us and we can take care of you." I told him while simultaneously glaring down at the harsh lucario.

I don't want you I want my mommy! He yelled louder giving me a headache with his ear piercing voice.

Look you little fucker, she's dead. Do I need to spell it out for you or what? She'll stay dead until you're dead and you won't notice anymore! Now Ace asked you if you wanted to come with us and we'll give you one more chance, now come with us or stay here and rot. He asked the totodile frustratedly.

I don't wanna die like momma so let me come with you, but I don't like that big dog thing so make him leave. The baby amphibian demanded. However said lucario crossed his arms and frowned.

"Fine, but you do know what it's like to be a trained Pokémon though right?" I asked the tiny Pokémon.

You guys make pokemon like me big and strong. The totodile said excitedly. Obviously his attention span wasn't the greatest, but he was cute to say the least, especially for a future monstrous beast.

Well, maybe that's not exactly right. But I guess that's as close as you'll get. The totodile explained enthusiastically.

"That is amazing. I'm sure Ace would love to train you." She picked up the totodile and held it high.

"Wait what? I thought you wanted him?" I denied the offer of keeping the totodile. While I could admit that if I had a feraligatr it would be fantastically powerful, but having Jackal was already a handful. I couldn't even trust the lucario outside of his pokeball while I was sleeping, let alone when I was awake.

"Well I can't keep him! I already have an illegal amount of Pokémon as it is! Plus if you had it you could beat the next gym easily and fly through the rest of the league with a feraligatr." The veteran trainer made a point and which eventually coaxed me into taking the little beast.

"So what's your name?" I asked the totodile.

I can't translate his name into human language easily, the closest thing to it would probably be something along the lines of Lagoon. Jackal informed.

Lagoon was a good pokemon. He was one of my favorites for a long time. But good things don't last to long, goddamnit, I just can't have nice things, can I?