Hey guys, as promised, here's chapter 3 of the story!

Sorry it took so long, school and writers block make a bad mix.

As for the next chapter, I'm afraid it's going to take a bit longer than this one did because I'm currently working on college applications and schoolwork and those are what I really need to focus on right now.

As always, please tell me what you think by reviewing the story, it really helps me out to get feedback from the readers.

Thanks again to Species Unknown for proofreading for me!

Enjoy!

Contrary to what the storybooks had led us to expect, the fulfillment of the wish was not instantaneous. Maybe Jirachi was back-logged with wishes at the time, maybe the stars weren't perfectly aligned, but for whatever reason the transformation the pair had unknowingly wished for was going to be late in arriving.

Meanwhile, the pokémon and trainer quickly looked around to see if their wish had come true, and to their collective disappointment, saw that it hadn't (or so they thought…). Still trying to hold on hope, the two waited a minute or two before finally conceding defeat.

"Why didn't it work!?" the two cried in their heads.

"Was there something else I was supposed to do?" Cameron continued, his sadness beginning to mix with anger. "Argh! Why does fate hate me so much!?"

Beside him, Ember was dealing with her own frustration "Nothing happened!" She internally yelled "There was no magic 'Poof!', no nice male suddenly appearing from the other side of the hill, it just got brighter a little from the star and everything went back to normal. Oh why does everyone else get to be happy but me!?" She raged.

Cameron, his own anger starting to become visible on his face, noticed that Ember also looked a bit upset and idly wondered what it was she had wished for. Not wanting for her to be upset as well, he tried to think of something to cheer the both of them up.

As he watched the Volbeats and Illumises light up the air like so many tiny lanterns, an idea struck him.

"Hey Ember, want to hike over to Starlight Lake?" the typhlosion mumbled a quick "Typh…", willing to do anything to get her mind off her crushing disappointment.

The two quietly walked down a faint side-trail to the large outcrop of trees that bordered the lake, both of them still silently analyzing the event that had happened a few minutes before and rattling their brains on what it was they had done wrong.

Those thoughts quickly vanished, however, when they got to the lake. Starlight Lake surely lived up to its namesake, as the stars reflected off its crystal surface like millions of shining diamonds.

"Man, this place looks so much more beautiful at night than it does in the day…..We really missed out all those other times we went here didn't we?" Cameron breathed.

Ember was too awe-struck to respond "The lake looks so breath-taking….and kind of romantic…", she quickly banished the later thought from her head, not wanting to remind herself of her most recent failure of finding any romance of her own.

Seeing his best friend's eyes get clouded in seemingly pained thought, the trainer inwardly sighed "Man, she still looks hung up on whatever it was she wished for…".

Going for Plan B, Cameron decided to have a little fun with her while they were here. He ran up to Ember and quickly poked her in the forehead, "Tag! You're it!" he yelled as he quickly ran away.

Ember, her stupor now broken, smiled as she quickly gave chase "Oh Cameron, you always know how to cheer me up!" she happily thought.

After a few minutes of running, Cameron was sure he'd lost her for a while and decided to take a short rest-break. Taking a look of his surroundings, he found that he was near a grassy terrace on the lake's coast that for some reason only had one tree growing on it. The trainer walked over to the tree and laid down underneath it, intending on catching a short nap.

The second after closing his eyes, however, Cameron heard a rustling sound from the branches above him. When he slowly opened his eyes, he was shocked to find Ember's sapphire eyes staring back down at him.

"Ahhhhhh!" he screamed as Ember pounced, cheering "Phlos, Ty, Phlos!" meaning "I got you!".

The typhlosion tackled her trainer to the ground and quickly started play-wrestling with him, but after a few minutes the two eventually got tired of it and slowly got up.

"Heh, how do you always find—"Cameron never finished his sentence as he slipped as he rose to his feet, tumbling off the edge of the terrace and falling the horrific distance of…..3 feet into the crystal water below.

Cameron quickly shot up out of the water "God, the waters freezing!" he yelled as he made his way to shore.

Seeing the worried look of concern on his friend's face when he finally made it back to the beach, he quickly assured her "Don't worry Ember, I'm fine, though a couple more seconds in that water and I would have turned into a frozen popsicle!".

Looking at her soaking-wet trainer, Ember couldn't contain herself and quickly broke out laughing and after a quick look at himself, Cameron swiftly joined in.

This is the moment where the wish made hours before finally kicked in, and in the mist of all their laughing, the two failed to notice the small hairs of cream-colored fur that had started growing on Cameron's arms.

The pair, still oblivious to Cameron's subtly changing form, got the rest of their laughs out of their systems and Cameron began the process of drying himself off and changing his clothes. Ember walked back into the forest to get some food for the two of them, their little game of hide-and-seek having worked up her appetite.

As Cameron started to take his wet clothes off he began to feel a strange itching sensation across his back. "Man, I hope a bunch of mosquitoes didn't bite me…." but when he put his hand back to scratch it, he didn't feel the mild leathery texture of his skin, nor did he feel the circular welt of a bug bite, instead he felt the smooth, soft sensation of Pokémon fur.

"What the hell?" he whispered as he continued to feel his back "How'd this happen? Did some water pokémon…? No, that can't be, water pokémon usually don't have fur…Then what can it be?" he wondered as he took off the rest of his clothes, knowing Ember was too far away to see him and that there were no people in the immediate area.

The trainer backed up towards the water to see the reflection of his back and was shocked to see tufts of blue fur rapidly growing across it and up his neck. He brought the hand he had been scratching his back with up to his face and saw that it was undergoing its own change, the palms of his hands becoming thick pads as the fingers extended a bit, his fingernails growing into razor-sharp claws.

"What the…..Argh!" he groaned as the changes progressed to his body as it slowly started to extend and gain a bit more muscle.

"Oh man, should I call for Ember? No- Argh! I don't….want to scare her….Oh god it's really starting to hurt…"

The trainer was soon overcome with a wave of nausea as he felt his internal organs start to re-arrange and change shape, a feeling he NEVER wanted to experience again. Cameron was nowhere near done, however, and the worst was yet to come.

Next, he watched the legs that he had been able to run so fast on shrink a little bit, becoming more haunch-like as they too were covered in the cream-colored fur that had already overtaken the entire front side of his body.

Tears streamed out of Cameron's eyes and he winched as his feet reformed into cream 3-digit claws to match his new legs.

"Oh god, the pain keeps getting worse…" he thought.

Suddenly, the trainer heard a loud "Crack!" from his chest and let out a blood-curdling scream at the pain that soon overwhelmed him.

Ember, too far away to hear the stifled moans and whimpers of her trainer, was currently picking berries out in the forest. "Hmmm…those Pecha berries look really ripe and tasty right now… I know! I'll give them to Cameron and we can have berry kabobs tonight!" she squealed.

Suddenly, her trainer's scream echoed across the forest. Her favorite treat immediately pushed from her thoughts, Ember dropped the berries and dashed off towards the scream.

"Cameron's in trouble! Oh god why did I just leave him there?"

When she arrived back at the terrace, Ember was greeted with a sight that made her blood run cold, her trainer was currently writhing in agony as his ribcage cracked and expanded to contain his new larger and stronger heart and lungs.

"What? How…?" she breathed, still trying to figure out what the hell was happening. Another cry of pain from Cameron immediately ended those thoughts, and her first reaction was to rush to his side and try to help him through the enormous amounts of pain he was obviously going through.

"Come on Cameron! Don't give up on me! I know you can do it!" she yelled.

Cameron opened his previously clenched-shut eyes to see his best friend standing beside him, and while he couldn't hear what Ember was saying, the very fact that she was there seemed to ease his pain a little.

The pain was getting increasingly worse however, and soon became so excruciating that Cameron was starting to contemplate just giving up and dying.

"It will be so easy…" he could hear a little voice inside his head tell him "just let go and all the pain will be over forever…" It was an idea that was becoming steadily more appealing by the second, but as he watched Ember's eyes fill with tears at watching her trainer's pain and not being able to help him, Cameron immediately pushed those thoughts aside.

"NO! If I give up, Ember will be left all alone in the world with nobody to turn to. That's already happened to her once, and I'm not going to let it happen again! Even if it feels like every cell in my body is dying in agony, even if my heart feels like it will explode from all the pain, I WILL NEVER ABANDON HER!" he roared inside his head as he pushed through the final changes, his resolve remaining strong as his neck grew thicker as his brown hair fell from his head, his ears growing larger and moving to the top of his head as his skull cracked and reformed into that of a typhlosion.

His jaws began to protrude outwards, his nose sinking into his upper jaw as they transformed into a rounded muzzle, his teeth growing sharp in his mouth, the changes eventually concluding as his eyes moved to the side of his head and his pupils became slitted, though his eyes retained their previous brown color.

Cameron's change was now complete but he still felt like it wasn't over yet, as he felt an enormous fiery pressure building up inside of him.

The pressure continued to increase in intensity until it eventually became too much.

"Hrauha…." I can't hold it in! "MUHRARAHAHAHHHHHH!" the new typhlosion roared as flames erupted from his back and shoulders, building to a blistering intensity.

The eruption also drained his last reserves of energy, and Cameron could only look at his best friend and whisper "Ember…." before collapsing face-first on the ground unconscious.

Still a bit shell-shocked from this sudden change of events, Ember slowly laid down next to her fainted trainer in a protective posture. "Why did this happen?" she thought before eventually falling asleep.

What's in store next for these two? Tune in next time to find out!