"I see…" I briefly heard. "…So then she was the one who got hurt because of that." My eyes felt heavy like lead or iron so I couldn't open my eyes. The next thing I heard was, "Her wounds were extensive. Just let her rest. I'm sure she'll wake up in the next few hours."

I opened my eyes to the sunrise. The room was lit up in oranges and pinks and I found that it was small and I was alone. The kitchen, the bedroom, and the dining area, and the family room, were all visible. This house was more like an apartment.

My backpack was in the dining area next to the bed. Slowly I sat up so I wouldn't make myself dizzy.

The door clicked open and shut and allowed in a Mienshao. Seeing me awake he smiled brightly and put her hands together.

"Hello. Did you save me?" I whispered as I tried to stand. Mienshao pushed me back on the bed. "Where are my pokemon?" I patted myself down and found only one pokeball and it turned out to be empty.

Mienshao pointed out the door and walked across the room back to the door and stuck his head out. Between Greninja and Decidueye it sounded like a stampede. Gengar was practically running for his life to get inside with Scizor right behind and practically pushing him out of the way. They tried to close the door but Greninja and Decidueye bulldozed them over and ran straight to me, chatting over each other and getting angry with the other for their questions.

I laughed. "I'm fine. I feel fine, anyway."

A man laughed and I turned my attention to him. He had bright orange hair and skin tanner than mine by a shade or two. "They've been worried about you," he took up my backpack and searched around in the tiny side pocket until he produced three more pokeballs and handed them to me.

"Thanks," I only called back Gengar and Scizor. "I'll reassure these two later. So, who are you so I can thank you properly?"

"My name is Lysandre."

"I'm Alessandra Nato. Thank you, Lysandre."

Lysandre tapped his chin. "Nato. Yes, your family is very famous, aren't they?"

"They are very controversial," I corrected politely. "I take it you aren't a fan either?"

"On the contrary I have some friends who are very big fans." Something about the way he said 'fans' made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end and I wasn't the only one who felt uneasy. Greninja and Decidueye stood between us as he approached. "Would you care to meet them? They'd certainly love to show you their works."

I looked at Greninja for an answer but all he gave me was an uneasy look. "I'm sorry but I must be going," I stood but Mienshao stood at our only exit, now looking a bit more menacing than before. His friendly attitude was gone.

"Please don't make this any harder than it has to be. I even gave you all of your pokemon and kept them from harm. If you truly want to thank me you'll come with me without a fight. I promise that nothing will happen to you or your pokemon if you do."

The room felt like it would close in around me at any given moment. I felt like I was tasked with an impossible decision. "Fine, I'll go. But, Greninja doesn't leave my side." I grabbed Greninja's webbed hand as if I were afraid he'd suddenly disappear.

"That's just fine with me."

I looked at Decidueye. "Sorry, I hope you don't mind." I held out the pokeball and called him back. The last look he gave was of hurt and a bit of anger.

I didn't pay attention to where we were going. I also didn't let go of Greninja's hand or my backpack the entire ride over to his lab. We didn't speak to each other or to Lysandre, who didn't seem to mind either way.

Four girls with futuristic visors on their eyes like futuristic glasses waited outside. Each of them greeted Lysandre but didn't acknowledge me. Greninja kept close to my side, so I probably didn't even need to continue to hold his hand but I did anyway.

The long hallway ended with a bigger man in front of the door. "You must be Alessandra Nato. My name is Xerosic, one of Team Flare's scientists."

I only stared at him with a hateful look. Greninja beside me didn't feel as stiff as I must've felt. He seemed calm and relaxed. I wished I could have his cool attitude.

"The other four girls behind you are, also, Team Flare's scientists," he continued slowly but seeing my disinterest he didn't bother with their names, "I think you'll find this very interesting and I would like your opinion. But I must warn you, the sight is not for the faint of heart."

I thought he was joking when he said that but when he opened the door and turned on the lights I realized it was no joke. Inside cages were pokemon in human flesh and human in pokemon flesh. Some of them had eyes that were way too big. Others were bleeding from their backs where the flower of ivysaur or venusaur had broken through. Others had rat-like skulls that shaped their heads. Some of them had blue, green, red, even yellow colored flesh tones. Their eyes were all of varying colors that no human or pokemon should have and it made me sick. Some of them were tall like humans and others had short or no limbs, forcing them to walk like a pokemon. One thing every one of these experiments had in common was that they were all groaning in pain.

I covered my mouth with my hand as if I could hold in the bile that burned my throat. My breathing stopped completely and all I heard for a moment was the beating of my own heart and the groaning of all of these unfortunate souls. Greninja was equally as horrified. I gulped down the bile.

"Shocked that I've come so far? It isn't easy, that's for sure, but I think I've made excellent progress over the years. We wanted to know what pokemon thought and teaching pokemon the human language, for the most part, has been disastrous. Only one out of every thousand have the ability to learn it. So, we thought, if we can't teach pokemon to talk we'll make some that can talk. They can help us with our cause-"

"And you're putting them in a lot of pain," I whispered. Anger rose instead of bile. "You idiot! Haven't you read anything my father and grandfather published?"

Xerosic adjusted his glasses. "Well yes…"

"Then you should know that pokemon DNA and ours are incompatible."

"Ah, and I disagree." He went to the middle of the room where a huge master console stood and he pressed some button that lit up a tube, which connected to the computer. Inside was the preserved body of a baby girl. "You see, we believe that more human-like pokemon, like Gengar or Gardevoir, have DNA structures closer to ours. However, we won't know that until she's nine months. We did have some success with a bulbasaur DNA but…well, lets just say the evolution was a bit harsh on the human body."

I had to turn away. "All of these…these…" what were they? Were they human? Were they pokemon? They were all in so much pain. This isn't living! Now I started to understand Clemont's fears.

"All I need to know is what to do to make them all livable."

"You want to know?" I chose my words carefully while I stared at Greninja's chest but not really seeing it. I was seeing my carefully chosen answers and every answer I wanted to give him that I would never say to his face. "You really want to know?" The energy of curiosity was radiating off of him. "You need to…you need to leave alone the creation of other beings, this isn't your domain this is Arceus' domain. Next, let all of these beings die. They are all in pain and the only one who has the power to meddle with life or death is Xerneas and Yveltal."

Xerosic chuckled. What was he chuckling for? "Xerneas, huh? Very well. I wonder if I can merge its DNA with ours then."

Good luck finding it, I thought bitterly. "Then you don't need me anymore, do you?"

"Maybe not now," Lysandre finally spoke up by the door. He was standing with the women that greeted him. "But we can't just let you walk out either."

Greninja stood in front of me defensively. Lysandre called out his pokemon, as did the rest of the scientists. We were surrounded by a mienshao, druddigon, bisharp, manectric, houndoom, and a malamar. "We won't get out of this unscathed," I warned Greninja. "Are you sure you wanna fight?"

He nodded, the adrenaline rush for battle twinkled brightly in his eyes, and he waited for my command.

"Well?" Lysandre was waiting for a command from me, expecting I'd tell my pokemon to back off.

"Decidueye, we need your help for this one!" Decidueye was pleased to finally be out of the ball. "Spirit shackle!"

Decidueye raised its leaf-string and shot an arrow at manectric's shadow. Greninja used his water shuriken to cut down bisharp. The two were an excellent team! I couldn't believe at how powerful Greninja was and I realized the power Decidueye had as well. Each attack was like a beautiful dance and the two worked together to bring down the dragon-type pokemon, druddigon, as well. While the two harmoniously battled I ran to the computer, tapping the keys rhythmically.

"Hey, what are you doing?" Xerosic scanned the computer before lifting me by my waist. I started to punch his arm. "Stop doing that! You'll ruin everything!"

Gengar popped out of his pokeball unwarranted and made no hesitation on using shadow ball on a human. Xerosic dropped me immediately as he staggered back. "Thanks, Gengar. Cover for me." I went back to tapping at the keys and, finally pulling down the lever at the end. Alarms blared and a warning popped up on the screen that I promptly ignored. Each cage was being opened, and the tube that housed the babe shut down as well. Whatever life support some of these beings were on turned off. I monitored the stats on the screen and the stats that were being monitored quickly dropped, except for the babe in the tube. "Strange," I whispered.

Behind me Gengar was chasing Xerosic and Decidueye and Greninja were becoming tired quickly. I needed to finish this but how?

I told the computer to flush out the tube and open it. This thing would have a birth today, it seemed.

Gengar's body hit my side and we collided with the ground pretty hard. My forehead hit the side of the console that controlled everything in the room. Warm blood trickled down the side of my face as I sat up and checked on Gengar. "Sorry, bud," I whispered after seeing that he didn't fare well and called him back to his pokeball. Decidueye and Greninja surrounded me, ready for another pokemon battle but they were panting relentlessly.

"Let's focus on getting out of here, you two." I stood slowly, gripping Decidueye's shoulder to steady myself. The two looked at each other and agreed on something that was never spoken. "What's going on?" There was a warning to my tone as Greninja picked me up. "Wait, what are you planning?" I struggled against him but it did me no good. An array of leaves whipped up in a storm from Decidueye. I stopped so the leaves wouldn't cut me and I closed my eyes against the storm but when I opened them again Greninja burst out of the doors to the outside world.

"Wait, what about Decidueye!" I tried to go over his shoulder but his hands steadied me on his shoulder. My chest felt hot with anger and I did the only thing I knew to do and hit the back of his head. "Let me go! I need to go back for Decidueye!" I screamed and cried.

Greninja finally let me down when we were deep enough in the forest and then he was forced to bear the wrath my hands let out on him, though he didn't seem to mind until I tried running past him and then he grabbed me around my waist and lifted me. He chatted in my ear calmly.

"Calm down, what do you mean calm down? You left Decidueye!"

While pinning me against him with one arm he used the other one to take out a pokeball from my pocket and open it. From it, Decidueye appeared, tired and looking very annoyed. Greninja finally let me go and I jumped on Decidueye, knocking us both over while I cried in his feathers. "Don't do that to me!" I yelled at him. "I thought we…" My nose was running faster than my tears were but it clumped his feathers the same way. Decidueye didn't move and didn't complain, he simply allowed me to cry for a long time. After a while Greninja helped me up. Decidueye had fallen asleep at some point without me even knowing it. I called him back into the pokeball. Greninja and I walked along the trail leading to the next town until just before dark.

"I'm sorry I didn't trust in you two, Greninja," I said when we stopped walking to set up camp. I wiped my nose with my sleeve. He helped me gather wood for a fire while I tried to get it started. My backpack sat between us like a wall. "I just…didn't want to lose another pokemon. And all I could think about was what would I do without him?" The fire finally started and Greninja piled the wood next to me and sat down. "He's been there with me through everything when I moved to Alola. I hatched him from an egg and I watched him grow and he's become fond of battling. We're…he's my best friend. I can't lose my best friend again."

Greninja sighed and looked up at the sky.

I wiped my eyes. "Do you remember when you were a Froakie?"

He nodded.

"Did you ever have a trainer or have you always been by yourself?"

He didn't answer or acknowledge the question. He snatched my backpack and climbed one of the trees to a branch he knew I couldn't reach.

"Hey! You can't avoid this question forever! I will find out eventually, you know, and when I do…" What could I do? I didn't know. I can't exactly take him away from his friends and his newfound family to be with me, the trainer who hasn't seen him for ten years.

Greninja took out the picture from one of the smaller pockets. "You'll be so dead if you destroy that picture!"

Oh yes, the picture that I shoved in my pocket must've been put back in my backpack when Lysandre helped us. Greninja dropped my backpack from the tree and stared at the picture.

I took out a few pokemon beans and put them in a bowl for him while I ate my sandwich. After a few hours he finally ventured down to check out the pokemon beans and carry them back up. I lay down on the hard dirt floor and hummed to myself. In the tree I heard Greninja whistling with a leaf the tune I hummed. I stopped humming to listen to it and it lulled me to sleep.