Stray 1

Stray

Chapter One
Full Heal



How do I start this?

The forest both soothes and frightens me.  I can’t briefly explain why that is, but I should probably start by saying that my entire life has revolved around this one specific forest.

When I was young – maybe two or three, I can’t remember – my family moved us from Sinnoh to a jurisdiction just outside of Fiore, west of Lyra Forest to be more specific, but not actually a part of it.  The area was sanctioned off.

Bramble Forest belonged to no specific region, technically.  However, it was often watched by the Pokemon League Association (PLA) of Sinnoh and the Fiore Ranger Union (FRU), due to its population of bug typed Pokemon which contributed to its generally strange atmosphere that researchers seemed to gravitate to.  This was exactly the reason my parents moved us all there.

I didn’t remember any time in Floaroma before the move, but my sister keeps telling me that my mother had to keep me inside since they thought I had a reaction to the flowers.  For as long as I can remember, I’ve never had any sort of allergy to any fauna, so when she told me I just took her word for it.

My mother was a semi-popular trainer in her youth in Sinnoh.  She didn’t stand out for her beauty or personality, according to her, but for her gimmick.  She was one of the few trainers to train nothing but shiny Pokemon.  Though she never made it to the League (only achieving about six badges), she gained the attention of the media and became a minor symbol for shiny hunters.  This is what attracted my father to her.

He’s a researcher, and at the time, was fresh out of the academy, which meant he had no money and no particularly interesting research that others hadn’t talked about already in better detail.  Somehow though, he was able to get an interview with my mother, and was able to secure a two week period to study her Pokemon.  After a few days, he ended up finding her more interesting.

They hit it off right away.  When she announced her engagement to him, her career hit the pavement.  Apparently, girls in the limelight were more popular when they were single, even though she claimed she wasn’t famous because of her looks.  In any case, she didn’t care.  Probably due to the royalties she was receiving from the various endorsements and connections she had with the Sinnoh branch of the PLA.

After they married, they moved to Floaroma.  My mother continued to stay in contact with the PLA as a means to secure some income: talk shows, lectures, motivational speaking, as well as the occasion exhibition match.  My father continued research on shiny Pokemon for the good part of four years before hitting a brick wall.  Turns out, you can’t research something you have trouble finding.  I guess my mother was just lucky to find so many of them for her team.

Somewhere in their marriage, they had my sister, Sky, and then a good seven years later, they had me – Clay.  I wasn’t expected, so obviously, I was labeled as the “surprise.”  At some point after that is when we moved away from Sinnoh.

There are no towns of any sort in Bramble Forest.  There are research hubs, which act as homes for Pokemon researchers and what few rank 10 rangers had been stationed there, as well as two depot stations on opposite ends of the woods, one owned by the PLA and the other by the FRU.  The PLA was there so researchers could alert them of any unusual and dangerous activities the Pokemon might be eliciting, and the FRU was there to make sure no trainers were capturing the wild life.

While Sinnoh (nor Fiore) took responsibility for Bramble Forest, it was agreed upon to keep the location a “no-capture zone” until researcher and ranger findings could conclude it a safe haven for general exploration.  At the time of my family’s move, the PLA considered it a grade 4 – hazardous, but not completely life threatening.

From the official statement: “An area that is deemed unsafe for trainer or ranger alike.  Only authorized personnel sanctioned by the Pokemon League Association or regional Ranger Union may enter for a prolonged period of time.  Thank you for your cooperation.”

I’ll save you the trouble: yes, it’s going to hit a grade 5 at some point in this story, but we’ll get to that eventually.

Our home was on the west end of the forest, as close to the beach as we could make it.  My parents wanted Sky and I to enjoy our time there, so having a beach only about a half-hour walk away, as well as being close to the FRU depot station (which would act as our supply shop going forward), and plenty of beaten paths that made it easier to explore the forest and not get lost, made our “cramped” life a bit easier to manage.

It’s not like that mattered.  Our home was a very large self-sustaining cabin: two stories, three bedrooms, a closet library, a small office, a decently sized kitchen, as well as a very large living room with a glass screen door, that looked out onto two small houses in the back that could be used for any number of things.  My father turned one of them into a research facility, and my mother turned the other into a communications building of sorts.

The thick wood of the forest made outside lines difficult with standard methods, but my mother and all her connections with the Sinnoh PLA was able to procure some radio equipment before coming here, assuring us internet and access to the PLA servers, as well as full signal waves for Pokegears.  She also made sure to secure us a generator in the case of emergencies.

Schooling was handled by a kindly old woman at another hub about a mile south of us.  My father took Sky and I there every day during out younger days, and it’s where we learned our basic education.  I don’t miss those days.  Mrs. Cinch was just a krabby kind of woman.

For the first while of my life there, that was it.  I woke up, said bye to my mother, walked to school with my sister and father, where I’d play with some of the two or three other kids who were there to learn, and then I’d come home when my mother came to get us.  I don’t remember much of it since I was so young.

I do remember somewhat the event that set this whole thing off.  It was a peculiar one, and though it seems hazy, I recall most of it.

I was five at the time, and Sky and I had the day off from school.  My mother said they went out for a walk, while I stayed on the porch, with her inside, keeping me in eye view while chatting with some PLA rep about who knows what.

There was a commotion of some sort.  Didn’t know what.  I remember my mother rushing out of her office, dropping her Pokegear, as my sister ran crying from the forest.  Mom was almost hysterical, darting into the forest after making sure my sister was okay.  I think Sky hugged me, but I’m not sure.  My dad came back all bruised and scratched up.  We had to bring a nurse from the FRU station to check on him.

I remember my father talking with the nurse, as well as a representative of the Fiore Ranger Union.  He was scribbling something on a sheet of paper.  When I was older, my mother filled in the blanks.

He ended up being fine, but spoke of some sort of family of birds he hadn’t seen before.  He was handed a sheet of paper where he and Sky did their best to try and remember what they looked like.  When the drawing was done, the FRU rep took it, and came back a few days later with their findings.

Suddenly, my father was brimming with excitement, and both the PLA and FRU were knocking on his door for the same reason.

Alolan Pokemon, as it turned out.  The Rowlet family to be precise.  There was a whole family of them living in the Bramble Forest – about 12 of them, all siblings, no parents to be found.

This was big.  Alola’s Pokemon themselves were still under certain research to see if they were viable as trainer Pokemon.  The PLA and Alolan officials had been in talks for years over having them recognized as an official part of the league.  However, with the issues of Team Rocket in Johto a few months earlier, the PLA had become more strict in their investigations of new regions.  Unova was only then on a test basis at the time.

This was a big deal when I was younger, with a lot of politicians for and against the Alola region’s inclusion, mostly stemming on the usual political elements: economy, Pokemon species, race, tourism factors, etc. etc.  Of course, as we all know, Alola would eventually be recognized.  I just had no idea at the time how much of a big deal those discussions were.

The Rowlet family of Pokemon were only found in Alola, and with the political climate the way it was, it was nearly impossible for any researcher of any kind to get any sort of data on the species outside of Alola itself.  Factor in that the Rowlet family rarely travels cross-region, if ever.

Because of this, my mother was constantly on the phone with the PLA, while my father hammered out a deal with Fiore and the Ranger Union.  Both the PLA and FRU came to an agreement:  my father and mother were to study the Rowlet family and report any findings back to both the PLA and FRU.  This was meant to be kept a secret from Alolan officials for the time being, out of fear they might collect the birds or something.

I’ve always noticed that the PLA always overreacts to minor situations, and underreacts to the major ones.  I constantly have to wonder what the Elite Four of some of these regions are doing as their lands are getting ransacked by terrorists.

With research subjects secured, we were given more supplies, more equipment, and staffing.  My father was given two additional assistants, as well as a ranger as a means to capture the family for research purposes before releasing them back out into the wild.  This never happened as he got pretty badly wounded by the family’s patriarch about a month in and had to be rushed to an ER.

My mother was given a veteran as a means to help keep things under control, in the case the Rowlet family became hostile to humans.  He apparently didn’t do a very good job if the ranger my father was provided had to go to an ER.

These attacks were more often than not, as many of the researchers, as well as the veteran himself, came back with a few scratches just about every other day.  Eventually, they had to get a nurse to join the team, brought in from Fiore proper, to take care of them.  Luckily, shanty towns were made around the cabin, and my family was more than accommodating to allow them to use the building as they saw fit.

My sister was thirteen around that time, and couldn’t be schooled anymore.  Instead, she stayed at home while I continued going.  When I came home, I’d find her talking with the assistants, latching herself to one of the younger women in particular.  Then, one day after school, I found her with a Pokemon egg that the assistant had gifted her.  Eventually, it would hatch, and then she’d be given another egg.  And then another one.  A few months passed, and it was decided to send Sky away to a boarding academy.

She had picked up a knack for Pokemon breeding, and my parents thought it might be a good idea to send her someplace to specialize in that.  Sky was excited about it.  I was a little sad to see my sister go, but she was going to visit holidays and on her breaks.

As for me, outside of school, I spent my time trying to spy on my father’s research.  My first real taste of that was finding out just how sharp a Ratatta’s teeth really are.  I still have the scar to show off to others, I leave out the part about how I cried for a good hour afterwards.  Mom thought it was funny because Ratattas were rare in that forest, and wondered what I did to find one.

Dad would show me lots of photos of the Rowlet family though.  They looked so strange and different.  I had never seen bird types like that on TV or on the internet.  Some of them had funny shaped feathers, and there was even a great big one too.

It was weird.  No matter the season, the Rowlet family always stuck around.  It was very bizarre to see a bird species stay in one area, even during the cold winter months.  They were around a long time.

On my eighth birthday, after begging to be brought along for who knows how long, I finally got to see them.

My father kept me home from school that day, grabbing me tight by the hand and leading me into the forest, away from the beaten path.  His assistants and the veteran trainer moved ahead of us.  My mother even came, staying close to me and my father, with her shiny Dragonite out and ready.

“There they are!” my father whispered in an excited tone.

I had trouble seeing them at first; the forest’s trees reached so high and mighty.  But eventually I saw them – a group of eleven, sitting up, some of them sleeping up, but they were there.

“The bigger ones are called Dartrix,” my father explained to me.

They loomed over the smaller ones, acting like bigger brothers and sisters to them.  Their faces looked almost happy, but father and mother assured me that most of the attacks came from them, not from the patriarch.  I didn’t know what that word meant until I saw something rustle in the leaves at the base of the tree.

A pair of eyes, staring at me – or were they staring at my mother and father?  In any case, it crept its way out, showing itself as some sort of bird in a cloak.  I didn’t understand it.  It was bigger than me, and it looked ready to pounce.

Everyone cleared the way when it came out in the open.  It stepped around, checking for anything amiss, eventually coming to me and my parents.  It was curious.  What was this tiny thing they brought today?  It looked at me.  Got as close as it possibly could.  But not close enough…

My mother’s Dragonite was ready to attack if things got hairy.  I always considered him like a weirdly colored Pokemon uncle to me.  It was obvious from it and the bird’s face that they had had it in before.

Once the large bird had its fill of me, it cawed to its family.  Some of the Rowlet fluttered down, with all the Dartrix with them.  Only a few stayed in the trees, sleeping soundly.

“Decidueye,” was what my father called it.  This was the “patriarch” he was referring to.

It was strange.  Everyone was very careful around it, almost scared.  But to me, it reminded me of my super heroes I’d see in comics.  I thought it looked really cool.

I wasn’t allowed up close to any of them.  The Dartrix were very protective of their siblings, and the Decidueye was keen on putting any one of us down if it felt we were threatening the family – excuse me, parliament, as the correct PLA term is now.  And while this parliament of grass and flying type birds was an astonishment to the researchers, it was the Decidueye itself that puzzled them.

More time seemed to be on watching it then the younger evolutions.  It was the only one of the siblings that didn’t have a tag around it’s leg.  The Rowlet and Dartrix all had snazzy little tags with a number on them, but not the Decidueye.  If I had to guess, I don’t think it was a lack of trying on my parents and their team’s end.

I asked many questions.  Some to the point of probably annoying my parents.  But just as I had run out of questions to ask, a rustling up in the branches occurred.

Another Rowlet, stirred from it’s rest, fluttered down from the branches.  Maybe not fluttered.  Actually, it may have been floundering, now that I think about it.

“Heads up!” yelled one of the researchers.  “Number seven’s coming down!”

It was very sporadic, having no particular place to land.  The assistants and the veteran were quick to try and follow it, so they could corral it back to the rest of the parliament.  But what a birthday surprise it was when it landed right at my feet, tumbling into them even.

It stood up.  Were those leaves a bowtie?  I thought it was cutest thing.  Great big eyes looking right at me, wings folded to its side, and talons clawed onto the ground – number seven on it’s tag.  As this little ball of fluff stared up at me, I kept wandering if maybe it recognized me as a child too.

The adults were trying to get it to move back toward the others, but it didn’t budge.  It just stayed there looking at me, and I down to it.  I really wanted to pick it up, but knew my parents would kill me.

For a moment though, I looked up at the Decidueye.  It only looked at number seven with a strange glimpse of annoyance.  After a minute or so of the Rowlet not moving, the Decidueye came and collected it, jumping up to the branches and placing it there safely.  That was where my birthday adventure ended.

I was taken home; my mother was worried something else would happen, and didn’t want to jinx anything.  It was enough for me though.  I spent the rest of the day so excited that I got to see what no other kid in the region (outside of my sister) had seen.  I kept asking lots of questions, but eventually my parents no longer had the answers, and I was sent to bed.

There are a few things that make life strange.  Most of the time, it’s moments that define us, and make us into who we are.  The clichéd explanation, as it were.  I feel like that birthday with my parents and the Rowlet pariliament would have been enough to cement some sort of goal in minds of others.  But for me, it wasn’t that time.

It was the night after my birthday.

Eight year old me got up to use the bathroom and get a drink of water.  I went downstairs to the kitchen to get a glass, surprised that no one from the team was sleeping on the couch.  It was rare to see everyone sleeping in their tents.

As I got a glass from the cabinet, I heard the strangest of tapping sounds at the sliding glass door in the living room.  I thought my sleepy headedness was doing it to me, but it kept coming.  Maybe it was a researcher.  I walked over to the sliding door, and opened it without checking behind the blinds to see who it was.

I froze for a moment, not sure exactly what I was supposed to do.  There was a Rowlet on the porch, looking up at me with some sort of fascination.  I noticed a tag on its leg, and recognized it as number seven.

“Mom!  Dad!” I yelled upstairs.  The lights from their bedroom flickered on.  Dad came down first.

“Clay, what’s the matt…?”

He froze.  He saw the Rowlet on the porch, and gripped the railing on the stairs.

“Close the door,” he said wide eyed, in a deathly serious tone.

I don’t know why it took me so long to process his request.  Maybe I was still sleepy and confused, but by the time I grabbed the door handle, the Rowlet had jumped inside the house.

I looked down at it.  Dad didn’t want it inside the house.  I reached down and picked it up, ready to gently place it back outside.

“PUT IT DOWN!” he screamed.

It came so fast, I didn’t have time to recognize it had even happened at first.  The entire house shook as something rammed into it at a high speed.  The glass of the sliding door crashed and cracked all over.  I moved away, afraid it would shatter.  It was the least of my worries though as a mass of green and brown erupted through the blinds, splintering wood everywhere.  It’s movements were lightening quick, rushing behind me, and then circling itself around to target it’s prey.  By the time I realized it was the Decidueye, it had already fired a quill right into my shoulder.

I was eight.  I had no idea that there was a pain this great.  It coursed through my shoulder, spreading to my body, and eventually to my head, making everything blurry.  I suddenly started feeling drained.

Leach Seed.  I had only known of it from TV battles, and watching my mom fight against grass specific Pokemon trainers.  All I knew is that it hurt a Pokemon overtime while making the other Pokemon stronger, but I was always told that it wasn’t so bad that it didn’t hurt them that much.  At then I knew mother had lied to protect me from the truth.

Leach Seed – and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise – is indeed, painful.

For what I could perceive at the time, my mother’s Dragonite roared through the house, breaking everything in its path just to try to get a hold of the Decidueye.  My mother and father must have thought “to hell with the cabin” since a wild Pokemon battle was happening in our kitchen.  The intent was to pin it, and let the veteran trainer take care of it.

The whole camp was up by then.  Provisional Pokemon that the researchers were assigned before leaving Sinnoh were out in full force, and the veteran had all six of his out, putting all their effort into subduing the bird.  My mother and father were at my side, trying to wrestle the Rowlet out of my arms, that I clutched like a security blanket.  I was quickly losing lucidity of the situation.

But something was wrong.  For whatever reason, all the Pokemon fighting the Decidueye looked confused and frightful as they scattered around the house.  In fact, none of them seemed to escape the house.  Everyone’s attempts to bring them back failed for some reason.  I know now what it was, but back then, everyone was confused.

Finally, there was a loud screech that erupted from my arms.  The Rowlet shrieked and complained, not because it was trapped, but because it was trying to get the attention of its big brother.

The battlefield went silent, save for the small bird in my arms.

I hazily watched as the Rowlet attempted to reason with the Decidueye.  Everyone’s Pokemon was tired and worn.  The researchers and my parents were trying to recall them to their balls, and continued having trouble doing so.  And then there was the veteran, who had had enough, and was pointing a rifle at the now motionless patriarch of the Rowlet parliament.

It was obvious the veteran himself wasn’t aiming for shoot to kill.  All he wanted was enough to stun it.  After that, a well placed hyper beam by my mother’s Dragonite and the veteran’s Exploud would be enough to put the creature in it’s grave.

But it never happened.

I was falling out of reality about then.  I just remember the Rowlet being loosed out of my grip as I went away.  There were voices, and then total silence.

Full Restore is a very useful item that works on both Pokemon and human alike, although for a human the dosage is usually double or triple for any real effect to happen.  As it turned out from studying the Decidueye’s quill, it was a rather weak Leach Seed attached to it, meaning it used it mostly to slow down its opponents more than try to ebb at their health.  Still, it was powerful enough to keep me bedridden for two days.

My parents argued almost the entire time.  Me and the whole camp knew what they were talking about with how loud the screaming got.

Why did this happen?

Was it my fault or the camps?

What do they do with me now that it happened?

Should I be sent away?

None of these questions were ever answered.  They just kept going in circles.

A day after the attack happened, the camp continued their research without my father.  They brought back some grim news:  two of the parliament had gone missing, and the Decidueye was nowhere to be seen.  To make matters worse, two of the Rowlets had evolved into Dartrix and seemed to be preparing to flee as well.

Because of what happened, the parliament were leaving.  It didn’t surprise any of the team.  If anything, it was considered a sign.  They had been researching the group of Pokemon for a while by then, and the political atmosphere between Alola and the PLA had begun to soften considerably – though it would still be quite some time before they’d be recognized.

One of the research assistants left a week after the attack, taking everyone’s research with him to act as a representative for the camp to the PLA and FRU until my father could be freed up enough to go.  The other researcher went a month later when less than five of the parliament remained.

The camp was collapsed, and all the necessary parties were notified that field research had come to a conclusion.  Info had trickled to my mother from the PLA that the association admitted to the Alolan government of the Rowlet parliaments arrival in the Bramble Forest.  Interestingly enough, they weren’t upset that a native species of theirs was researched outside of their jurisdiction.  In fact, they were impressed, and wanted to meet my father and his team.

My mother let the PLA have it.  They had kept a secret for nothing, fearing it would have made the political climate worse for them.  She was quick to appear on radio shows and dismiss the current PLA CEOs and their actions.  It never turned into the scandal she had hoped for though.  I always thought that she tried to put the pressure on them because of me.  All it did was have the PLA cut most of her sources of income.

My father dismissed them as well, but in a more polite and super effective manner.  He apologized for the PLA, on live television, with Alolan officials in the same room.  It forced the PLA to go along with it.  My father’s name was somewhat known now, was in good standing with Alolan officials, and he was still considered freelance.  The PLA couldn’t touch him.

It sounds silly, or nonsensical, I know, but keep in mind I was still young at the time.  I didn’t know all the details surrounding what the PLA and the Alolan government or any of them were doing.  To me, it just sounded like adults being crybabies.

When my mother and the veteran trainer could no longer find any of the Rowlet parliament in the forest, they assumed that was the end of it.  The veteran was the last to go home.

You know, my mother never really liked him.  I wonder why?

It was coming close to my tenth birthday, and by then, the cabin had been fully repaired, with the FRU paying for the damages.

Though the PLA was still unmoving about the Bramble Forest and its use as a route for trainers, the FRU was happy with what they saw, and sanctioned it an intermediate zone for rangers – meaning a rank 10 ranger was able to pass through without the need of permission from the FRU.

I got to meet lots of rangers then – even kids who were tagging along with their siblings who shouldn’t have technically been there.  I didn’t really meet any new friends since they were passing by, but it was cool to see kids my age at least.

Sky was graduating soon, and said she was going to be home as soon as she was.  Apparently, she was sick of the city life in the Unova region and was ready to be with her family.  On the day of her return, we celebrated her graduation and my birthday at the same time.  Just the family.

She told us about what she learned, and all the new friends she made, and what happened that semester and her finals.  She graduated third in her class.  We were all very proud of her.

She was especially worried about me though.  She asked about my quill scar, and what happened and everything.  I did my best to tell her, but I didn’t remember as much then as I do now.  But it was still nice to see her so happy, and so worried about me too.

I went to bed well that night.  I had a happy dream about my family and our cabin as a boat.  We were sailing on the sea, my mother and father on the porch, as my sister was in the kitchen juggling Pokemon eggs.  All the while I sat by the sliding door, watching the waves in the distance, seeing all the shiny Magikarp splash a hundred feet into the air.

When I woke up, I greeted the sunny morning rays that came in through the window.

And then I froze.

“Dad!”  I yelled with fearful worry.

He rushed in.  I pointed toward the window.  He went wide eyed.

There on the sill, pecking on the glass, was a Rowlet, tagged with a number seven.