"Perry!" Delaney cried as the oshawott collapsed. The purrloin was too fast for the sea otter pokemon to keep up with, something Delaney had realized too late. "Are you okay?" The oshawott lifted his head and nodded in an attempt to calm down his trainer, but still ultimately couldn't get up. Delaney reached for his pokéball on her belt and recalled him. She reached into her pocket to grab money for N, but the green-haired trainer was already walking away. Delaney ran, reaching her opponent in only a few strides. "Wait, N! I owe you money! If you'll just wait a minute..."

He looked surprised that she had bothered to run after him. "It's not necessary, Christa. Was that your first battle?"

"With Oshawott, yes," she answered, and then realized what she had said. Delaney Caldwell was no stranger to battles, but Christa White was. "I mean, yes. It was."

"Then consider it practice," he said simply. "I hope to see you again." And with that, he strode off easily, the prize money he had rightfully earned still in Delaney's pocket.

He was an odd one, that N.

Disappointed at losing her first battle in Unova, Delaney began to head back to the Pokemon Center for the night. She fully planned on leaving Perry with whatever nurse was on duty for the night and grabbing a small bite to eat in the cafeteria, if it was even still open. Then she would head on up to her room for a well-deserved sleep. After all, it had been a long, crazy day.

It was still somewhat dark when Delaney woke up in yet another bed in yet another room. This one was a little bit bigger than the one in Nuvema Town, though the sheets were a little bit scratchy and the blanket a little too thin. Delaney couldn't say she cared, though- it wasn't Nuvema Town and that was truly all that mattered at the moment. There was still not enough room for Perry, so the oshawott was curled up in the small armchair next to the door. He wasn't nearly awake as his trainer, who had sprung out of bed with renewed zeal, despite how early it was. Surely everyone else in the center was still sleeping, except maybe the perpetually peppy nurse.

A glimpse at the clock didn't deter Delaney though. "Perry! Wake up!" she said in a sing-song voice. She grabbed her running shoes, ignoring as always the fact that the laces were badly fraying and the rubber on the outside of the shoe was beginning to peel off, and began to put them on. From his spot on the armchair, Perry lazily opened one eye and looked at the brunette as if she had gone insane. "We're going training!" she told him as she tied the left shoe. "I'm sure most other trainers are still asleep, so that gives you time to spar with some of the wild pokemon."

The oshawott still didn't move, other than to close the one eye he had opened. "Seriously, Perry, wake up. If we're going to do this whole journey thing, we're going to need to train. It was stupid of me to keep you from battling. I'm sure with a little more experience, you would've won yesterday." She stood up and grabbed her trainer bag from the nightstand. "You're not going to lose again though! Delaney Caldwell does not lose…" The brunette paused and thought for a moment. "And neither does Christa White."

She reached inside of her bag and grabbed Perry's pokéball. "I guess you can sleep inside of here for a little while longer until we get to the next route," she muttered, recalling the water pokemon. Wherever that was. It certainly was going to be interesting trying to find her way to the next city when she had absolutely no semblance of where she was going. Still doing her best to not look in any mirrors, Delaney did a last quick glance around the room, making sure she hadn't left any of her few possessions behind. At this point, everything she had was crucial to her journey.

The nurse on duty informed Delaney that she wanted to go north. The path to Striaton was fairly simple, she had said. Considering the fact that Delaney had somehow gotten lost in the simple route that connected Nuvema and Accumula, though, she took the woman's word with a grain of salt. Fairly easy usually meant the exact opposite for someone as directionally challenged as Delaney. Despite the brunette's hesitation, she headed off in the direction that the nurse had told her to go.

She felt more than a little triumphant when she reached a guard house, where the guard on duty was far less awake than Delaney herself. Their bright electronic marquees and large screen TVs made the small building far more interesting than any guard house Delaney had seen in Sinnoh. She passed through with a smile to the man on duty, though she only got a sleepy nod in return.

And then? Bam, wilderness.

The early morning air was slightly chilly in autumn, though Delaney wasn't sure if that was what was giving her goosebumps. There wasn't a single other person in sight, and even the wild pokemon were few and far between. She took a few steps forward, the grass rustling under her feet. She looked around eagerly, though she wasn't totally sure what she was looking for. Maybe one of those cats that the boy yesterday had used… Purrloin?

But alas, there was nothing.

Of course, it was just like in Sinnoh- whenever she was looking for pokemon or actually wanted to battle, she could find no opponent, but when she was in a hurry or just didn't feel like battling, she was swarmed. She reached in her bag and pulled out Perry's pokeball and then pushed the button to release him. Within a few seconds, the oshawott was standing in front of her, yawning. He glanced around lazily for an opponent and, upon finding no one, gave Delaney a confused look. "I thought you might want to help me look for some pokemon to battle," she explained.

Perry looked up at her and blinked twice. Apparently with that last statement, she had confirmed her status as 'crazy'. She wandered further into the grass, mentally pleading for any (yes, any) pokemon to come out so that Perry could battle. Not only could Perry defend them both upon gaining strength, but it would be good for them to work as a team and bond or whatever- Perry still wasn't exactly her biggest fan.

A rustling in the grass.

Delaney turned her head quickly, but the only thing behind her was Perry, who was still giving her that damn look. "I don't see anything, do you, Perry?"

"I really hope you're not waiting for an answer," a snarky voice rang out. Delaney's eyes widened as a girl with short neon green hair stepped out from behind a tree. She looked oddly familiar to the brunette. "I thought you were scared." As she came closer, Delaney realized that despite the fact that she was a couple inches taller than the girl, she was rather intimidated- maybe it was her harsh red eyes and perpetual scowl. She was wearing a pink spaghetti strap tank top with ruffles on the bust, pink shorts and brown strappy sandals, but Delaney could tell that this was no girly girl that could be taken lightly.

"How long have you been here?" Delaney asked, frowning slightly. Had she been watching Delaney? Had she just appeared? All she had heard was one rustle in the grass. She couldn't have been there too long… right?

"Long enough to hear you babbling," the girl said with a roll of her eyes.

Delaney had never been one to be outright mean to people she didn't know. She really didn't like conversing with strangers at all, actually- trying to figure out what to say to people she didn't know gave her anxiety. Instead of responding with the same attitude she was being given, Delaney opted to be friendly instead. Kill them with kindness, right? "I'm Christa," she said with a smile, sticking her hand out to shake the girl's. The girl raised her eyebrows and just stared at Delaney's hand until it was clear she was not going to get a handshake and a greeting. Delaney returned her hand to its place by her side. "Are you a trainer as well?"

"You could say that," the girl responded with a slight smirk. "Why, you wanna battle? I'm pretty sure you're gonna lose, but I'll still give you the pleasure of battling my pokemon… As long as you don't cry. I hate kids that get whiny when they lose."

Shit. She was probably right. They still hadn't battled another pokemon since that N guy. Still, if by some chance Perry did win, there would be some experience for them to go off of and maybe Perry would be the teensiest bit happier after getting to experience success.

Or you know, this angry-looking girl could let out Cresselia or some shit like that. It would be just Delaney's luck.

"I would love to battle you," Delaney said with the most pleasant smile she could muster, despite the fact that really, she didn't. She hated battling when she didn't know for sure she could win, always had.

Or had she really? The post-Galactic Delaney had developed that attitude, yes, but back in the day, she had been a platinum-haired novice who had battled anyone and everyone she could. Those were the days- back when traveling had been fun and the world hadn't yet been placed on her shoulders. Maybe now that she was journeying again, she needed to take a page out of Delaney Caldwell's book and find the joy in training and battling again.

Or you know, just deal with it and continue with this sham of a journey because she had to.

Or maybe both. Regardless, she had to battle this girl, here and now, all major life and attitude decisions pending. The hostile-looking girl with fiery red eyes was looking at her like she had gone nuts. She tapped her foot impatiently. "I don't have all day. Are we gonna battle or what?"

Without Delaney so much as noticing, her opponent had released a small tan pokemon, a puppy with shaggy hair and bright, happy eyes. Though Delaney wasn't sure what it was called, she had seen them while en route to Accumula Town. She had avoided them then, and she could kick herself for that now- if she had battled then, she would know what she was up against now. Oh, and she probably could've beaten that weird N kid as well.

Damn. Avoidance did not pay off in Unova.

Oh well, at least the girl hadn't had her pokemon begin the fight while Delaney was spacing out. Delaney grinned at Perry, who also probably thought his trainer had lost her mind sometime between the previous night and the current morning, between waking up so early, her random rambling and now her space cadet persona. "Okay, Perry, you ready? Let's win this!"

"Yeah, you try that," the girl snarkily replied with a roll of her eyes. "Lilly, let's start this off right with a solid tackle!"

Delaney smirked, momentarily forgetting that in Unova, she was a novice trainer with a battle record of 0-1. "Dodge that puppy, Perry!" she yelled cheerfully. Unfortunately, though, the energetic pokemon was quite a bit faster than Perry and the small otter was unable to dodge the tackle, which seemed to hit quite hard.

Yeah, it was time to rethink how she was doing things.

"So speed isn't your strong suit, Perry…" she muttered to herself. The oshawott looked at her with an absolute duh look, as if to say,you think? "Well, if you can't hit them fast, hit them hard, right? Perry, you tackle that dog thing back!"

"Dog thing?" the girl repeated with a raised eyebrow. "You mean lillipup? Either you're dumber than I thought or you're not from around here."

Delaney ignored the girl. Agreeing to either of those things could lead to bad things for Christa White. Instead of getting into a sparring match with the girl, she concentrated on Perry, who had hit the lillipup, though not with the same amount of force. The pokemon had obviously been trained more than Perry had, but that didn't mean all hope was lost.

After all, Delaney Caldwell didn't lose, right?

"Chimchar, jump up on top of that rock!" A girl with wide violet eyes and hair so blonde it was nearly white stood on the edge of the battlefield of Oreburgh Gym. The leader, a red-haired boy named Roark, had a gleam in his eye said this battle was all but won, but Delaney Christa Caldwell absolutely refused to lose. Of course, she could just train and battle Roark again if she lost, but she had already trained so hard for this! She couldn't lose!

Unfortunately, Quackers, a lethargic psyduck she had encountered near the entrance of Oreburgh City, and Samuel, the fiercely competitive Shinx that she had met outside of Jubilife that she had loved from the get-go due to his contagious spark (excuse the electric pokemon pun), had already been knocked out by Roark's team of rock-types (two of whom were also ground-types, unfortunately for Samuel). All that was left so far was Delaney's chimchar, a pokemon who was originally given to her father from Professor Rowan for his trophy garden because of its comparatively weak fire power- up until Delaney begged her father to let her train it and learned that its strength was in its attack, and Roark's cranidos, who seemed to have the upper hand in this battle. After all, it had a type advantage, it was at a higher level and Chimchar was weakened from the geodude that Roark had sent out before his final pokemon.

"It has short arms, Chimchar! If you can just get out of its reach, you might be able to let him tire himself out! Climb up that rock wall! Climb as high as you can!" So it was unorthodox. Delaney had a slim chance of winning using traditional methods, so maybe if she got creative…

"Cranidos, don't let this monkey outsmart you!" Roark shouted, clearly shocked. "Headbutt the wall! Try to knock it down!"

"Just keep a tight grip on the rocks," Delaney called to her chimchar. "Try to use ember, if you can blow the flames without letting go. If you feel your grip loosening, just focus on staying up there where that cranidos can't get you!"

That. That was precisely what she needed, and what she had begun to lack- creativity.

Back before she had become any sort of powerful, when she had often been on the bad end of type match-ups, she had been forced to resort to some truly odd tactics to winning matches. Logic said she shouldn't have been able to beat Roark's cranidos with Blitzkrieg, who was then an unnamed chimchar, but she had. There was no reason why this battle had to be a typical battle between two newbie trainers, where the pokemon who had just a little bit more training was the victor ninety-five percent of the time because of a smidge increase in attack power. Just like back then, logic seemed to state that this haughty girl's lillipup should probably beat Perry.

But there was not a chance in hell that Delaney was going to let that happen.

"Lilly, you're stronger than that oshawott. A couple more tackles and the win is all yours!" Lilly, who was a hair slower after being hit by Perry, was otherwise merry and yipped happily at her trainer. Apparently the taste of victory was sweet. She charged full force towards the small otter, ready to tackle him with all her might again.

"Perry, we're not going to let that happen!" Delaney called out to the oshawott, who was looking a little worse for the wear (and slightly discouraged, at that). "Remember what you did when you were battling that purrloin thing yesterday? How you blocked it with your shell? Do that again!"

At first, Perry seemed puzzled as to what his crazy trainer meant, but then he seemed to recall using his shell as a shield to stop Purrloin from scratching it the day before. As Lilly got uncomfortably close to him, Perry grabbed the shell once again and raised it to defend him before the lillipup could get in another devastating tackle. Lilly crashed into the shell face first and crumbled to the ground, though only for a second. Perry fell backwards from the force of the attack, though he was unharmed, which was more than one could say for Lilly. The lillipup wasn't so much as hurt as she was shocked, though Delaney was sure her face was at least slightly hurt.

"This is your chance, Perry!" Delaney called out with a giant grin. Her opponent's eyes widened as she realized that her victory was not yet definite. "Your tackle may not be as strong, but that lillipup is distracted and I'm sure you can get in a solid tackle before it gets up!"

The disenchanted, dull look in Perry's eyes had been replaced with a sparkle as it hurled its small body at Lilly. Talk about adding insult to injury- the oshawott had tackled the lillipup with more force than anybody expected and though both Delaney and Lilly's trainer stood quietly for a few moments, waiting for the lillipup to get back up, she didn't.

"We won," Delaney muttered to herself, a bit disbelievingly. "Perry," she said, growing more and more excitedly, raising her voice. "We won. Perry, you did it!" For the first time since arriving in Unova, Delaney was truly excited. She had forgotten exactly how thrilling it was to win a battle you thought you were going to lose.

Her opponent, though, was experiencing how it was to lose a battle you thought you were going to win. Her lips were pressed tightly together in irritation, though Delaney had heard her tell Lilly that she wasn't mad when she recalled the puppy pokemon. After recalling Perry, Delaney walked over to the girl and extended her hand once again to congratulate her for a good battle.

Again, the girl just glared at Delaney's hand as if the brunette were holding out a fish or something to her instead of offering her a cordial handshake and after a few awkward seconds, Delaney recalled her hand, her face flushing in embarrassment. Maybe she just wasn't a handshake person. "I hope we battle again sometime," Delaney said with a small forced smile. Seriously, why was this girl so damn rude?

"I've got to admit, that was a halfway decent strategy," she said, lips still pursed. "You have some potential. Just don't expect to win next time. Cream Megami doesn't lose, especially not to little girls like you." And with that, she walked off back in the direction of Accumula Town, head held high.

The thing about starting your day off early was that it seemed extra-long when the day was done. Not that it would've been a short day, anyways, given the hard, long day of training that Delaney and her pokemon had just gone through. Finally, there was a guardhouse in sight, and it was almost time for the day to end. Delaney was sure she wasn't the only one grateful; Perry and her new lillipup, Charlie, had put in a rough day of training against both trainers and wild pokemon. On the plus side, Delaney was pretty sure that they were fairly well-prepared against the other trainers in the area. Perry still wasn't very fast, but Charlie was pretty speedy if he felt threatened. The biggest issue with the lillipup so far was that he completely and utterly lacked focus.

To Delaney's surprise, her bag began to ring as she took her first step inside the guardhouse. She wondered briefly if she had set off some sort of security alarm, but then realized it was her crosstransceiver- it had been such a long time since it had rang that Delaney had almost forgotten what it sounded like. She picked it up and answered before looking to see who was calling.

Bad move number one, Caldwell.

The face of Lydia White filled the screen. Delaney's first instinct was to hang up. "Wait, hear me out," the woman said quickly, realizing what Delaney's intentions were. "I have-"

Yeah, Delaney Christa Caldwell definitely didn't give a shit. She placed the crosstransceiver back in her bag after clicking off the power. After waving to the guard, she continued on her merry way to Striaton City, all smiles and happiness despite her exhaustion. She was going to have an awesome sleep that night.

"Christa!" she heard somebody yell behind her. No way… The brunette spun around, only to find Lydia running through the door of the guardhouse.

"How did you get here so fast?" Christa asked, puzzled.

"I was already almost to this guardhouse when I called," she explained. Delaney really had nothing to say to that, and so she turned around and began to walk away.

"I know you're mad," Lydia said in a small voice. Delaney stopped where she stood. "But I wasn't trying to say that I didn't think you could be a trainer. You've obviously proven yourself. I just thought you might want to get used to being here first. This isn't exactly Sinnoh."

"Really," Delaney said sarcastically. "I had no idea." Again, she turned on her heel and began to walk away from the woman. "Save it, Lydia."

"Will you please stop acting like such a damn child?" Lydia snapped, angry for the first time since Delaney had arrived in Unova. "I came here to bring you a few things." She set down a large canvas bag that Delaney hadn't even noticed she had been carrying. "There are two more sets of your clothes in here. There's also a map of the Unova region in here, since you have no idea where you're going." Lydia was clearly seething. Delaney was more than a little shocked, seeing as how she had never seen the woman anything less than desperately cheerful. "And, uh, I talked to Aurea- Professor Juniper. I had to do quite a bit of pleading, but I finally talked her into a pokedex. I had to promise her you would fill it up as you travelled, so if that's not too much of a bother, I'd appreciate if you did that."

Delaney's eyes widened. Even travelling around Sinnoh, she had never had a pokedex- apparently she hadn't ranked quite high enough with Professor Rowan to get one. Very few trainers had a pokedex, and most of the ones that did were quite wealthy. Delaney's father could have afforded to get her one if she had made it clear that she had wanted one, but it had never been one of her priorities. Now that she was in Unova, where she knew nothing about any of the pokemon, though, it seemed like it would be a lot more useful.

And somehow, Lydia had scored her one.

Delaney hadn't even realized how much she wanted the pokedex until it was right there in front of her but still, she couldn't take it. Theoretically, gifts from your parents were to be appreciated, but Delaney had been making it clear since her arrival that she didn't consider Lydia to be a parental figure- more like an unwanted roommate. "I can't take that, Lydia," she said flatly.

"Yes, you can," the woman said sternly, narrowing her violet eyes. "You can even pretend it's a gift from the professor, not me, if that makes you feel better." The tall, thin woman began to walk away from the bag and back through the door of the guardhouse. Delaney felt a twinge of guilt in her stomach. Lydia had come all this way with a super nice gift and Delaney had completely blown her off. Yes, she had been a shitty mother for the vast majority of Delaney's life, but she was trying now- and Delaney wasn't making things easy for her. For some reason, the look in Lydia's eyes reminded her of her father telling her right before she left for Unova that he didn't know how to help her anymore.

Before walking out of the guardhouse, Lydia turned back and offered Delaney a small smile, as if acknowledging her guilt. Maybe making Delaney feel like an ungrateful bitch was her intention- who knew? Regardless, that was definitely the result of her anger. "Remember, honey, if you need to, you can always come home."

And just like that, she was gone.

Delaney took a few steps towards the bag and then picked it up, swallowing hard. If she could just go home, life would be so much easier. She would be back in that giant bedroom, enveloped in a large down-filled comforter. She would never get out of that queen-sized bed and if she did, it would be to give her father a huge hug and beg him to never make her go through anything like this again. She would train her pokemon like they deserved to be trained every single day, and maybe leave for the Battle Frontier. She would check out boys with Dax and gossip with him about everybody they knew. She would even rematch the gym leaders when they asked.

But that wasn't possible anymore. Delaney had to accept the fact that not only was she in a new place, but she was living a new life. Delaney Caldwell, the platinum-haired trainer that had so gleefully challenged gyms and climbed to the top of the trainer heap, was no longer in service. Christa White was who she had to be now, and she could either reluctantly train in a place she hated or make the best of it and rock Unova like she had rocked Sinnoh.

And you know, if she was going to be in Unova, there were worse places to call home than a nice little house with a woman who not only brought her clean clothes, but a map so she wouldn't get lost… and a pokedex. Maybe Lydia wasn't the best mother, but she at least deserved better than Delaney's denial of her existence.

For a final time, Delaney turned on her heel and walked through the guardhouse, and when she went through that door, she was at last in Striaton City. Instead of being excited, though, she was quite, quite sad.

Author's Note (6/02/14): So I genuinely meant to have this up at the end of last week, but I had family unexpectedly come into town (meaning that everyone else knew and I didn't know until I had to go drive out to the airport) and that changed my plans a bit. So bam, Monday morning. You can expect updates from me on Saturdays starting now- we'll go with Saturdays since I start a new position this week and I don't know the hours yet. And since this was kind of a short one, yes, I'll be updating this week on Saturday.

A million and one thank yous as always to my amazing beta Noteleks, and also to Maddiepink5 for the character of Cream. Though I've gotten rid of most of the OCs that were in the original, there are a couple that are staying that worked into the revamped storyline exceptionally well.

Also thank you to you! For reading! That's exciting stuff for me!