Three years ago:
Inyssa grit her teeth, dragging her feet through the blanket of snow under her. The roar of the blizzard was all she could hear now. Cold bit into her skin like needles, but even that wasn't enough to dull the pain blooming all throughout her body with every step she took. She blinked rapidly, sight blurry, only the fluorescent lights visible to her in the night, looking like will o' wisps as they danced around... or maybe it was just her vision that swam. Even then, she kept going. There, at the end of the street, there, inside that house, behind that door...
Help. She just… she just needed a little help. A few bandages and bags with ice, maybe some painkillers, a comfortable bed and a warm meal… When had she last eaten something? Yesterday morning? A rich, savory scent wafted toward her nose, impossibly. Her stomach grumbled and she had to stop herself from drooling.
Yeah, she just needed a bit of help. Just…
"P-please…" Her voice came out broken and desperate. "Someone… H-help…"
The door was right there. A few more steps, a stretch of her arm and she would-
The sudden light hit her square in the face, and she was blinded.
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Inyssa had believed that training her Pokemon couldn't be too hard considering her talent, but as her Bidoof flew in her direction and hit her in the stomach, throwing her back on her butt, she realized it might be a tad more complicated than first assumed.
Flying above them both was a small bird Pokemon, flapping his wings aggressively. She had encountered the Starly almost at the entrance of Sandgem Town, and figured it would be a great chance to both train Bertha and catch a new companion. She hadn't considered that the little bugger would be so tough, however.
"Ugh... come on Bertha, get up! We got him on the ropes!" she growled, struggling to get to her feet; she was covered in dirt and her vision was partly obscured by her hat. Great, already got my new coat dirty, she thought.
The Bidoof turned to look at her, legs trembling, and made sounds of pain that might have been slightly exaggerated. With her head she pointed at Inyssa's belt, where Enma's Pokeball resided.
Inyssa shook her head. "He can't help you with this. We are a team, but we also have to be strong individually if we're to challenge the Gym leaders." She tried to form a reassuring smile. "I know you can do this Bertha, because you are my Bidoof and there is not a single Pokemon I can't achieve victory with!"
Bertha seemed to gain strength from her trainer's words, and with renewed determination she turned toward the aggressive Starly. The bird Pokemon shrieked and threw himself against the Bidoof, who did the same. Their heads clashed together, but Bidoof's attack was more powerful and pushed Starly back with enough force to send him to the ground. His strength left him as he fell unconscious.
"See? Told you we could win." Inyssa approached the Bidoof and patted her on the head; the small Pokemon was hurt all over her body but was still smiling. "You earned your rest, great job."
She returned her to her ball and sighed, relieved. She could've probably defeated the Starly with much more ease if she'd used Enma, but she needed to build confidence in the other members of her team if she wanted them to get stronger. From her bag she grabbed another Pokeball and threw it at the unconscious Starly without paying much attention. It wiggled thrice, as it did, and then locked itself with a digital beep.
She grabbed the Pokeball and examined it closely. "Starly, eh? Very good attackers, quite fast and with access to a myriad of moves. I'm sure you'll be a great addition, and I think I'll call you... Steven," she smiled, satisfied with the name as she put the ball in her belt.
With that particular obstacle out of the way she finally made her way to Sandgem Town's entrance. A huge, wooden sign rested atop two thick pillars along the path, announcing the town's name and some of the most important facilities that one could find there, like the Pokemon Center, the Laboratory and the Trainer School; the latter two of which she was more interested in.
Inyssa strolled through the small town, in part looking for Barry, but also just taking a minute to admire her surroundings. It was quiet, much more than Twinleaf ever was even without her friend causing a ruckus. The houses and buildings seemed much older than anything she'd seen, most of them made of sturdy rock and obsidian instead of bricks and cement. The town felt ancient and still, to a strange degree. It was beautiful, but daunting.
After about ten minutes of walking she finally found the lab, which seemed to be one of the only modern buildings around, to the extent that it looked completely out of place. To her surprise the porch was surrounded by a field of flowers, and at the side there was a small mailbox with the name Rowan engraved in it. Were it not for that she'd think the house belonged to some old, kind lady.
She waited in front of the door, readying herself to enter. She'd already met the professor once, but he was still a very intimidating man; she had to make a good impression this time.
A plan that went out the window when Rowan himself opened the door and found her standing in front of it like some sort of stalker. She froze, as the man stopped and looked at her sternly.
"Oh-shit. I-I mean... H-hi, professor!"
Rowan let out a sigh that shook his mustache. "Hello there, Inyssa. What did I tell you about profanities before?" He kept talking before she had a chance to answer. "In any case, I've been waiting for you and your friend, though I expected you later tonight at the earliest."
"Oh, yeah... well what can I say." She glanced to the side, avoiding the man's gaze. "I was just... so excited to start my journey. I couldn't wait."
Rowan stared, as if sensing something was off. Luckily, he seemed to realize that there was no point in pressing the issue, so he changed the subject.
"Nevertheless, I'm on my way toward the Trainer School right now." He glanced north. "Your friend Barry stopped by half an hour ago, but he left before I could give him his Pokedex."
"He does tend to do that. So he went to the Trainer School?"
"Indeed, as soon as I mentioned it he started jumping in place and saying something about challenging all the students." He stroked his mustache contemplatively. "Before I knew it he was already gone. Lucas went looking for him, but I had to arrange some papers before following."
"Well, I could accompany you if you want, sir. I'll make sure to scold Barry for being so disrespectful, too." She tried to sound offended by her friend's actions, although she also considered defeating the school's students for experience. "I could carry your briefcase as well, it may be a long way to the Trainer school."
"Thank you for the offer Inyssa, but I'm not that old yet." He smiled , though it was hard to see due to the mustache. "However I'd like you to come with me, that way I can give both of you a Pokedex so you can officially start your journey." He straightened his hat, and closed the door behind him. "Alright then, let's get going. We should finish this whole ordeal before the sun goes down."
The sky was starting to darken by the time they arrived, though they probably still had an hour at least before night finally set in. As they approached Inyssa noticed that the Trainer School looked more like the other buildings in the city; an old, worn building that still had a lustrous appearance to it.
The inside looked much more modern, however; the first floor was a huge room divided by a wall; and in the center of it there was a small battle arena. An honestly staggering amount of kids surrounded the place, yelling and making surprised sounds at something that neither of them could see from where they were.
Rowan narrowed his eyes, "This place isn't usually so loud."
From the pile of kids emerged Lucas, gasping for air as he made his way towards them. His weird beret was covering part of his face and his cheeks were red as tomatoes. Inyssa thought that he looked kind of cute that way.
"Professor! I'm here." He adjusted himself and bowed to the old man. "I'm sorry sir, I told him it wouldn't be a good idea and he should have gone back to the lab, but he just wouldn't listen to me!"
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Inyssa snorted, "Gee, I wonder who he's talking about."
"Calm down Lucas." Rowan placed a hand on his shoulder, reassuringly. "Tell me what's happening."
"It's Barry, sir! He challenged all the students and..."
The boy was cut off by the sound of something crashing into the nearest wall. Everyone turned to see a small, orange Pokemon laying unconscious at the other side of the arena. Above the beaten Buizel there was a Starly, proudly flapping her wings and flying around the room. She looked hurt, but apparently not enough to stop her from fighting.
"Yeah, take that!" Barry's voice resonated from the center of the room. "Good job Paulette! That's the fifth Pokemon in a row!"
Inyssa pushed aside everyone near her, trying to get closer. When she made her way to the middle of the arena she saw her friend laughing at a poor trainer who must have been around their age. Next to him Pedri was resting after what must have been quite a number of battles.
"So? Is that all?" he asked the crowd, smiling from ear to ear. "Is there another best trainer from this school?"
All the younger students started clapping and yelling, while the older, defeated ones stood silently, glaring daggers at Barry.
She approached him, smiling, and put a hand on his shoulder, "Man, if this is what we're facing then this journey's gonna be easy."
"Oh! Oh, hey Niss did you see that?" Barry jumped excitedly after realizing she was there, and pointed at the boy he just beat. "That was just training for our next fight! Sorry I didn't leave any of them for you."
"Eh, I wasn't interested in fighting these losers anyway." She lied, shrugging. "Though I'm happy to see you're taking this rivalry seriously."
Before they could keep yapping at each other, Rowan cleared his throat, making everyone nearby shut up and look at him. The man congratulated Barry and urged the rest of the students to go back to class, and Inyssa was surprised that they all listened to him without second thought. The man must command a lot of reputation around town, she thought.
"Well well, I have to say I'm impressed." He addressed Barry after the four of them were left alone. "Although disrupting class to challenge my students is something I would usually be cross about, I'll turn a blind eye to it this time, as a sign of my patronage."
Barry looked down, blushing, "Oh, yeah... sorry about that. I was just so excited when I heard there were a lot of trainers like me here."
"It's understandable," Rowan nodded. "However, you left before I could give you your Pokedex and credentials. But now that you're both here, we can finally proceed with that. Lucas, if you may..."
Inyssa's heart jumped a bit, and she could see that Barry was just as excited as she was. She couldn't believe it; she knew that they both already had Pokemon, but getting a Pokedex and trainer card was the true proof that they were embarking on the League Challenge. Lucas looked around in his backpack and took out a small, square laptop as he approached them.
"Alright then, now that I'm not being trampled by a bunch of kids..." He glanced at Barry, more jokingly than mad. "I can now legitimize you as official trainers of Sinnoh. Let's see here..."
He took out a couple red, electronic devices from his backpack, what Inyssa assumed were their Pokedex, and connected them both to the jacks on the laptop. He typed on it for a while, setting them up with their personal information.
"Your Pokedex will serve as your most important source of information while traveling the region," Rowan explained. "It will give you data on any kind of Pokemon you may encounter; including types, moves and behavior. Anything you could use for making your battles easier."
"And you can also surf the internet and play games with it," Lucas added. "Alright, that should be it. Now to register your trainer IDs. Let's see, Paladino and Daw... wait... what?" He stopped and narrowed his eyes, mouth slightly open.
The professor twitched his mustache and looked down at him, "Is there something wrong, Lucas?"
Barry and Inyssa looked at each other, hearts in their throats. Did they do something wrong? Were they not going to get their Pokedex? Her stomach revolted at the thought of it.
"It's just... there's someone else here on the records besides them." Lucas squinted. "Another Dawn, by the name of... Shadi," he pronounced it slowly as his mouth fell and his eyes opened wide. "No way..."
Inyssa's breathing hitched, a cold sharp as needles stabbing her insides. Beside her, both Barry and Rowan fell completely silent..
She tried to speak, to tell Lucas that it must be a strange coincidence, but her mouth was completely dry. The boy didn't even notice her expression, he was staring directly at the screen of his computer.
"I can't believe it, I knew your last name sounded familiar!" He smiled excitedly. "Shadi Dawn... She was that famous trainer, the Queen of Cinders, wasn't she? The one that defeated the Elite Four a couple years back, I saw it on the news! She must be your sister, righ-?"
He looked up at her, and his smile disapeared as soon as their eyes met. Inyssa's glare stung him like fire. She didn't realize what she looked like, nor the fact that she was breathing heavily or that she was clenching her fists so much she was hurting herself. Behind her, Barry was doing gestures at Lucas telling him to stop talking, and Rowan was avoiding everyone's eyes. The entire room filled with silence, until Lucas spoke again.
"I... uhm... I'm sorry, did I..." His body language clearly said he wanted to get as far from Inyssa as possible. "I didn't mean to..."
Inyssa's opened her mouth to speak, and what came out was more poison than words. "Its fine. Can I have my Pokedex now?" She extended her hand in a way that said that it wasn't a request.
Lucas finished updating the devices and handed them over in complete silence. Inyssa simply put it inside her bag and adjusted her hat, foolishly trying to act like nothing was wrong.
"I'll be going now," she said, voice as sharp as a knife. "It was a pleasure, professor. I'll head to Jubilife tomorrow; I hope we can meet again."
She was the first to leave for once. She could feel their eyes on the back of her head, but she didn't care. Only half paying attention she threw her backpack on her shoulder and started heading for the Pokemon Center. The three people left in the room were deathly quiet, until Lucas spoke again.
"What... happened? Did I do something wrong?" he looked at Rowan worriedly.
"Don't worry about it Lucas, you couldn't have known." The voice of the man was low, and his gaze was distant. "Shadi Dawn... she used to be my student, and I was her patron, just like I am for Barry and Inyssa."
"But why did she get like that when I said her name? Is she..." He stopped himself. "Is she... dead?"
"We don't know." For the first time Barry spoke, voice devoid of its usual energy. "She disappeared almost three years ago ago when she was training on Victory Road for a rematch against the Champion. No one's heard of her since. It's kind of a touchy subject for Niss, that's why she... reacted that way."
Barry didn't seem annoyed with Lucas, though it was clear that he wasn't happy about what had happened.
"But... how? She was one of the greatest trainers of the region, who could have...?"
"No one knows," sighed Rowan, "and no one has a theory about what happened either. One of my best students..." he looked at the distance, lost in thought. "In any case, you probably shouldn't mention her in Inyssa's presence."
Lucas lowered his head, a sour feeling growing in his chest, "I'm sorry. I had no idea..."
"Hey, it's okay man," Barry attempted to smile and gave the boy a pat on the shoulder. "It's like the professor said, you couldn't have known about it." He started heading towards the door. "I should go find her. And..."
He chuckled sadly at himself. And stay by her side this time, he thought. Probably should've figured out that one earlier.
And with that he exited the room, his usual cheery demeanor completely absent.
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It was the dead of night by the time Inyssa reached the Pokemon Center. She'd been walking for almost an hour, gaze lost and wandering without paying much attention to the path ahead. She was so distracted she had tumbled and crashed on signs a couple times, which didn't help with her terrible mood.
Why did it always happen? Every time she was having a good time and just forgetting about everything someone had to mention her family and ruin her day. Was it because she was trying so hard to get away from it? No, that made no sense, she was just being stupid. She had to stop being so mopey all the time, it was unbecoming of the future Champion.
The Pokemon Center couldn't be too far away now. She forced herself to smile; she would get a delicious meal, she would have a full night's sleep in a comfy bed and tomorrow she would make her way to Jubilife, and no sad thoughts or insensitive nerds would get in the way of th-
A sudden, unnatural shiver ran down the length of her body. She stopped in her tracks and looked all around, shaken out of her thoughts by a chill she could have sworn wasn't there before. Wasn't it warm a few minutes ago? She doubted the temperature dropped that quickly h...
Here...
Wait, she thought, looking to her right and left again to confirm. Yeah, that's the Pokemon Center over there. I almost went the exact opposite direction.
She rolled her eyes at her own carelessness and, forgetting about the sudden chill, started walking down the length of the street, hands in her pockets.
Barely a few yards from where she was, she noticed something; at the foot of one of the windows of a nearby dark house was what seemed like a small red pile, which happened to be moving. Inyssa knelt in front of it, her curiosity getting the better of her, and tried to identify what it was amidst the darkness.
"Oh, what the hell..."
What looked like a pile to her was in fact a Pokemon. She was the size of her backpack and had a red tint all over her body, with two huge black eyebrows. The Kricketot was curled up in a ball, trembling and presumably trying to sleep in the cold. Her body was covered in scratches and other injuries, as if she'd been in a really ugly battle recently.
"What happened to you?" She extended a hand over the Pokemon but she recoiled from the touch, growling with the little strength she had. "Who did this?"
A shimmer caught her eye. At the side of the Kricketot two pieces of metal lay, covered in dirt. Inyssa picked them up; they appeared to be the two halves of a broken Pokeball. She held them in her hands, eyes narrowed and heat going up to her face. She knew exactly what it meant; this Pokemon had been abandoned.
Determined, she took off her coat and put it around the Kricketot, trying to keep her warm. She kept growling weakly, trying to get away from what she must have thought was someone who wanted to hurt her.
Inyssa struggled with keeping her on her arms on top of the chilling cold covering her entire body. "It's okay, please stop moving. I need to get you to the nurse, you're badly injured."
She didn't know if the Kricketot could hear her, but whether it was because she was running out of energy or because she decided to trust her, the Pokemon stopped moving. Inyssa could feel her breathing as heavy and irregular, and from up close her injuries looked even worse. She grit her teeth, horrified. Who could have done something like this?
"I am not going to hurt you," she said, voice full of determination. "I'll get you fixed up, you need to trust me."
The Kricketot slowly opened her eyes, staring directly at Inyssa. They were a pale, muddy green, and they emitted a warmth that reminded her of someone, of times long gone.
"In the meantime, you'll need a nickname." She gave the poor Pokemon her best friendly smile, which wasn't anything to write home about. "How about Shadi? I think it fits you."