8 and a half years old

The espeons are throwing me in the air as I see a really tall man approach slowly.

"So you're the one they were talking about."

I adopt a fighting stance, but the espeons run toward him. He starts talking to them and weirdly they seem to understand. He has a wild beard. His skin is amber, looks like he is around 25 and has soft green eyes. He also has two long braids siding each side of of his face. A pendant was around his neck. It was depicting 4 lines starting from the same point had lines heading in all the cardinal directions that turned into spirals. Each line was done differently. One had what seemed like small lines all over, one had leaves, the other one was wiggly line with droplets on his sides and the last one was a zigzag line with small points.

"Oh, you're their friends too." I say slightly jealous of the attention he's getting.

I thought I was the only one who bonded with them. Kinda made me feel special.

"Thanks for being a superb friend to them."

He looks at me with such kindness that it makes me feel really good inside.

"Thank you, but they are better friends to me. They literally saved me!"

"Yeah, they're the greatest, but so did you."

"I don't understand."

"The food you're bringing them allowed them to live better then they could have now the little eevee will grow bigger and stronger then its parents. You see this huge forest?"

"Yeah."

"It used to be even more tremendous. The pollution and industrialisation is making fruit trees less fecund and now that the forest is of what it used to be. The combination of the smaller territory and the now sparse fertility has caused sustenance to become much more scarce whilst having an equivalent amount of pokemon. The consequences are quite dismal. Draconian measures will need to be taken in order to fix it."

"We'll need dragons?" I say excited.

"No, haha! I mean they could help, but draconian means drastic."

"Oh!" I pause. "I really didn't know any of that."

"A lot of people have become insensitive, that's why. Those who do know think they are powerless to stop it, but we are never powerless. Plus we have pokemons, he points out at Beggsy."

She does a little happy sound.

"Oh, she's not my pokemon."

"Then what is she?"

"She's more… my friend."

Beggsy smiles weakly.

"Woaw, I really like you."

I'm not sure I really deserve the praise. Me and Beggsy are friends, but I was mostly saying that because she's not a pokemon I want in my team. To change the convo I ask:

"Do you know what you're gonna do?"

"Yeah, the hardest thing, come out of the shadows."

He waves in his direction.

"Come with me."

We go to the cave. It gets darker and darker.

"It's okay guys, it's me and some friends."

A really tall ampharos starts lighting the cave from the corner. I see an elaborate gym, where many fighting pokemon are training is machops, pawmi and tyrogues being taught by a hitmonlee. Is it the same one? As if he could read my mind, he said:

"Yes, this is the very same one."

"I don't see riolu, is he… ?"

At the same time a huge noise echoes in the cave. We go deeper in the cave where a chain of lightbulbs guides through the small corridor. Until we arrive to a really big room the ceiling is so high, it looks like a basketball gymnasium. There is see a machamp making electricity appear on its fist, jumping and punching a very high target. Riolu is completely fine, but misses the target by a bit. Riolu sees me and comes rushing to me. He puts a hand on its chest and bow its head. I bow my head as well.

"Thank you for saving me!" i turn to the man.

"He says thank you as well."

"Could you ask him why it's thanking me?"

"Apparently you taught him about type effectiveness. Here's why he's training to be able to hit them."

Suddenly a tyrogue come in the arms of Hitmonlee.

"Roy!" the man says. "Be careful with high jump kick. Try to practice it outside where the ground is soft."

He places his hand on Tyrogue. The tyrogue jumps out of Hitmonlee's hands all healed up.

"Woaw you can do that?"

"Yeah."

"I'm so jealous."

"Haha, now Roy, have you learned your lesson."

It looks at riolu and defies it. Riolu comes by by side.

"I think they wanna spar. He chose you for this battle."

I look at Beggsy and she cheers me on.

"I have never done this."

"that's okay just trust riolu."

Riolu starts posing to show its own strength.

"Alright!"

I quickly look at its move set.

"The battle wil be a battle between two. It will end as soon as pokemon is too hurt, immobilized or has fainted. Ready?"

"Ready!"

Tyrogue use fake out then low kick.

the tyrogue moves so fast I can barely notice it. Riolu falls on the ground.

"Riolu, force palm."

It gets up and does the move. Tyrogue jumps to back away, but isn't ready for riolu's full leap.

"Nice! then metal claw."

"Protect."

"Alright, we got him! Use feint."

it goes behind him and hits him with it.

"Okay metal claw!" i scream out.

"Use brick break on its hands."

it hits right on its hand

"Again!" he screams out.

He hits him on his body now.

"Rio, dont move okay?"

It looks at me mid dodge, it nods and takes the brick break fully on, but he does not fall. It raises its head to look at its target and starts the move before I even say it:

"Alright, counter."

Riolu punches in the middle of the stomach throwing in the air then falling on the ground knocking him out. Riolu runs towards me as tyrogue wakes back up. It comes to high five me. Beggsy celebrates with us.

"You were so good! You barely needed me. Thanks for letting me be part of this!"

Riolu does a happy roar.

"You were part of this." the man says. "Although he knows how strong it is, you being there really matters. I thought battles battles were the vanity of man, but some pokemon want to get stronger. The motivation to persevere with a good trainer with strategies and knowledge, makes it stronger than it could ever be. Battles are great as long as the pokemon is respected."

"Well, I definitely have a lot of respect for this little guy."

"That's great! I think it's time to go. It's getting late."

He heals both pokemon. He screams "Grotto" and a Garchomp comes out. That is so awesome. It's my first time seeing one in real life. It's huge. It flies out of the cave and brings me to the entrance of the forest.

"Try not to go too deep in the woods. The deeper you go, the more you might encounter some of the bad guys you encountered previously."

"Okay."

Definitely still gonna go. He pauses.

"Can I ask you why you only mentioned Beggsy to the police?"

"Well I thought if I mentioned any of the wild ones, more poachers might come along."

"Hmmm. That was pretty astute! My name is Seru by the way."

"Nice, mine's Ze."

"Nice to meet you Ze and take care!"

He flies off in the distance.