Chapter 6: Friends

The next morning, Calem and I were walking up from the dungeons toward the Great Hall for breakfast, which felt like it was the first time in a long while that I had seen sunlight. Uxie, Azelf, and Mesprit were excited too, to my surprise, as well as Calem's, the trio liked watching all of the students in the dining hall and, during our class, would often choose various desks to sit on, and would usually end up changing places a few times during the length of the class.

However, my cheery mood was soon dampened by the sight of Umbridge, but I was happy to see that McGonagall was there too. Standing off to the side silently, I listened to their argument.

"Pardon me professor, but what exactly are you insinuating," Umbridge snapped, walking up the small set of stairs toward the Grand Staircase.

"I'm merely requesting that when it comes to my students, you conform to the prescribed disciplinary practices."

"So silly of me, but it sounds as if you're questioning my authority in my own classroom," Umbridge said sweetly, before taking another step up the stairs, "Minerva."

"Not at all Delores," McGonagall said, taking a step up the stairs as well, "merely your mediaeval methods."

Umbridge scoffed, "I'm sorry dear, but to question my practices is to question the Ministry and, by extension, the Minister himself. I am a tolerant woman, but the one thing I will not stand for is disloyalty."

McGonagall looked shocked by the words that had come out of Umbridge's mouth. "Disloyalty," McGonagall said in disbelief, taking a step down.

Umbridge took another step up before turning to the students that had gathered outside of the Great Hall. "Things at Hogwarts are far worse than I feared. Cornelius will want to take immediate action."

As she walked past me, Calem walked up behind me with a sigh. "Looks like we're screwed."

"Not necessarily," I said, turning to face him, "all we have to do is follow the rules. We haven't done anything wrong. Until then, we keep teaching these kids about Pokémon."

"Hey, isn't today the day that Dumbledore's bringing-"

"Oh Arceus, I completely forgot," I said, cutting off Calem, "we need to go and get them."

Racing down to the train station, Uxie, Azelf, and Mesprit following right behind, Calem and I could see Dumbledore standing with two younger people, a young man and a young woman. Smiling, I raced over to the two people who, upon closer inspection, were in their early twenties. "May! Brendan," I shouted. Dumbledore was smiling before he said farewell and walked toward the castle, leaving Calem and I to catch up with our friends.

The two trainers turned around, large grins spread across their faces. "Hey Serena," May said happily, "how are you?"

I shrugged, but smiled anyway, "could be better, but I'm glad you guys are here."

"To be honest," Brendan began, "I was kind of surprised when we heard that you and Calem had taken teaching positions. At a school in a different world no less."

"Do they really know nothing about Pokémon here," May asked.

"Not when we first got here," Calem responded, "most of the students here still don't know what a Pokémon is. We really don't have that many students in our class to begin with."

"That's a shame," May said sadly, "you would think that curiosity would get the better of a lot of the students and that would lead them to sign up for the class."

"I think that's why most of the kids in the class joined," Calem said, "I'm just surprised there aren't more."

"Well," I said, "why don't we head up to the castle? Then we can show you both around the school and then we can go over what we have planned for tomorrow."

"Sounds like a plan," Brendan said with a grin.

So the four of us, plus the Lake Trio, headed up the path that led to the large, but homey castle. "This place is amazing," May breathed out in awe.

"Isn't it," I asked, "I couldn't believe that I was going to be teaching here."

"Neither could I," Calem added.

"Oh please," I laughed, "you wouldn't be here unless I had dragged you along."

"That's not true," he shot back, "I would have tagged along anyway."

I rolled my eyes as May and Brendan laughed, following us into the castle and down the moving staircases. Every little detail seemed to amaze May and Brendan, which was understandable. None of this would have been able to exist unless a Pokémon was making everything move.

"So how'd you guys get end up getting a room in the basement," Brendan asked curiously.

"Technically it's a dungeon," I corrected, to which Brendan raised his hands in mock defeat, "and to be completely honest, I'm not exactly sure why our class is in the dungeons."

We soon reached the door that led to our offices. "I asked Dumbledore if he could have a cot in each of our rooms if he couldn't get extra beds. May, you're gonna be sharing my room and Brendan, you're gonna be sleeping in Calem's room."

"Okay, sounds good," May said, "but which room is which?"

"My room's through the door on the left and Calem's is through the door on the right."

Nodding, May and Brendan headed toward our rooms. I followed May into my room, Uxie, Azelf, nd Mesprit following right behind. "The bottom two drawers in the dresser are empty if you wanna use them."

Smiling, May thanked me and started placing her clothes into the empty drawers. Once she was unpacked, she looked up at me before hopping up on my bed. "It's been a while since we've seen each other," May said, patting the place next to her on the bed, "how've you been?"

"I've been doing okay," I said sitting down, "I'm sorry that I haven't really talked to any of you since we left for this place. It's just that, between classes and these three-"

"Say no more," May said, cutting me off, "I completely understand. Though, some of them have been getting pretty worried."

"Probably Leaf and Dawn the most right?"

May laughed, "obviously, they've always been the ones to worry."

"And Dawn's not even one of the oldest," I laughed.

"That's true, but we all care about the two of you," May smiled before continuing, "we're a family."

"A completely, and utterly, dysfunctional family."

May laughed before getting up, "come on. We have to talk to the boys about the lesson that we're gonna be participating in tomorrow."

I got up, made sure that the Lake Trio was comfortable on my bed for their nap, and quietly followed May out into the main area of our office. Once I had managed to quietly close the door behind me, I turned to find that Calem had hopped up on the edge of his desk while Brendan had pulled Calem's chair in front of Calem. May followed suit with the chair behind my desk while I sat on the edge of the desk.

"So," Brendan said, "what's the plan for tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow we want to demonstrate what a Pokémon battle would look like and what a contest performance would look like."

"So who's doing what," May inquired.

"I was thinking that the boys could handle demonstrating what a Pokémon battle would look like," I responded, "and then you and I could demonstrate a contest performance and a contest battle."

Brendan nodded, "sounds good."

"That's not bad," Calem agreed, "then they can get a feel for two different types of battling, even though the concept is pretty similar between the two battling styles."

"That was kind of my original idea," I confirmed, "since we want them to choose a path, so to speak, I want to give them a taste of what they're gonna be doing for the majority of our class. Even if they don't pick to become trainers, they're still gonna need to know how to battle."

May, Brendan, and Calem nodded in agreement. Calem looked at his Pokédex, checking the time before looking at the rest of us, "It's almost dinner time guys. Do you guys wanna head to the Great Hall and grab something and just head back down here?"

"Yeah, that's fine," May said.

Heading up the moving staircase, I could barely contain my excitement for tomorrow's demonstrations.

I hope you all liked this chapter! Thank you to all of those that have reviewed so far! Keep those reviews coming! Some of the other playable and non-playable characters may make appearances now and again throughout the story, just so you know. And, if you have any requests for Pokémon that you would like to see, then give me a character and the Pokémon (and a nickname if you want) that you would like to see them have. : )

**EDIT: One reviwer suggested that I should have an editor, so if anyone would like to act as my Beta, please comment or PM me if you are interested.

And to Fast Frank (Guest) - I have fixed Chapter 4 for you. I was going under the assumption that none of the student are currently interested enough in the course to even care about where their professors come from. But I hope that you like the small tidbit that I added to Chapter 4! : )

Characters & their Pokémon planned so far:

Serena: Delphox - Female (Kitsune), Ty OR Rex - Male (Tyrantrum), Meowstic - Female (Mojave)

Calem: Greninja - Male, Aurorus - Female

Brendan: Swampert - Male, Tropius - Male, Ludicolo - Male, Magcargo - Male

May: Blaziken - Female, Tropius - Female, Ludicolo - Male, Pelipper - Female

Harry Potter: Charmander - Male, Kangaskhan - Female, Zorua - Female, Poochyena - Male, Deerling - Male

Hermione Granger: Beldum - Genderless, Psyduck - Female, Fletchling - Female, Abra - Male, Venipede - Male

Ron Weasley: Shinx - Male, Litleo - Female(?)

Ginny Weasley: Torchic - Female

Fred Weasley: Plusle - Female

George Weasley: Minun - Male

Dean Thomas: Smeargle - Female

Seamus Finnigan: Vulpix - Male

Parvati Patil: Petilil - Female

Lavender Brown: Skitty - Female

Neville Longbottom: Bulbasaur - Female

Luna Lovegood: Lunatone - Genderless, Munna - Female

Cho Chang: Ducklett - Female, Wurmple - Female, Eevee - Female

Padma Patil: Natu - Male

Terry Boot: Murkrow - Male

Michael Corner - Spearow - Male

Anthony Goldstein - Hoothoot - Female

Ernie Macmillan: Aipom - Male

Hannah Abbott: Sentret - Female

Justin Finch-Fletchley: Chatot - Female

Susan Bones: Zigzagoon - Male

Zacharias Smith: Whismer - Male

Draco Malfoy: Snivy - Male

Vincent Crabbe: Geodude - Male

Gregory Goyle: Mankey - Male

Pansy Parkinson: Misdreavus - Female

Blaise Zabini: Ekans - Male

Madame Hooch (Flying Types): Pidgeotto - Male, Unfezant - Female

Hagrid (Dragon Types)

Professor Trelawney (Psychic Types)

Professor Sprout (Grass Types)

Professor Flitwick (Electric Types?)

Professor Snape (Poison Types)

Professor McGonagall (Normal Types): Ditto - Genderless, Eevee - Female

Professor Dumbledore (Miscellaneous Types?)

For Dumbledore, one of my friends suggested giving him legendary Pokémon, though I'm one the fence about that suggestion. Let me know what you guys think! : ) Thanks for reading!