Virah walked over to a mirror and inspected her reflection.

In front of her stood a girl with caustic green hair and toxic purple eyes wearing a hoodie and ripped jeans, the bright green boots on her feet attracted attention too, she supposed, but not much.

On her hip hung a Pokeball, singular, and even though she failed to catch her second Pokemon last week, she had high hopes that would change starting today.

On the side of her person hung a handbag typically on the everyday female trainer, it was dark purple with crimson streaks. It is also something that she had recently bought, it was purchased just yesterday in fact.

It had been a rush, buying something like this, and Virah didn't dare think that she would have somehow managed to purchase a Trainer's Handbag with the Silph Co. brand for at least a few more months but she did, yesterday even- and it… felt a whole lot more anticlimactic than she was expecting.

The grind for it had been tedious, especially yesterday when she had spent her entire Sunday flying around Whitney's Pidgeot and going from battle plaza to battle plaza in hopes that she would find enough opponents to allow her to buy the bag.

“And all of that for what? 20,000 Pokedollars?” Virah said to herself with a pained smile.

Most kids her age hearing those words would have gotten them to gawk at her but then again, they'd also gawk at the standard bet that professional battlers put out on the daily, so Virah didn't think that this was all that special.

After buying the bag, she still had around 2,000 Pokedollars left and Virah thought that was a good starting budget for her journey, most kids often leave their homes with nothing more than 1000 and to double that made Virah feel happy in a way that she couldn't really describe.

She walked away from the public bathroom's mirror and out into the outside world.

Virah greeted the day with a smile on her face, glad that she was finally taking her first step in leaving the cesspits that life had left her in.

She knew that the journey out of this pit would be arduous, that it would leave her exhausted, battered, and whatever else that describes struggling but she was ready, and she would face everything head on.

She walked along the morning streets like she usually would, though this time around, she didn't make her way to Trainer's School, and instead, she headed straight for the guard post that led to Route 34, and there, she nodded at the uniformed guard watching over the place. He had a Growlithe as well as a Houndoom next to him, both were eyeing Virah curiously.

“Are you starting your journey today?” The guard asked as she passed him by.

Virah shook her head, “no, not today, but a month from now,”

His face perked up in realization, “ah, the ranger's exam, I remember that way back when I was a kid,” the guard laughed, “good luck!”

“Thank you!” Virah waved one last time to the fellow before getting out of the post and into the wilderness of Route 34.

Trainers were, as always, everpresent within the area, they milled about, minding their own business and doing whatever.

Some were just sitting around, relaxing while a rare few were searching the outskirts of the mapped out path for Pokemon- they wouldn't find any, that was something Virah was sure of, but maybe they would?

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Sunkern occasionally flew around here, or so she's heard.

Virah made her way deeper into the route until she reached a large gathering of children near one of the many entrances of Ilex Forest, teachers and rangers were around them, with the former's expressions looking stern as they lectured their students.

Virah was thankfully exempted from all of that and she managed to reach Whitney and Grene without fuss.

Whitney wore something between a ranger's gear and a casual outfit, she had a pink sleeveless vest over a maroon uniform as well as a light pink pair of boots and pants. She waved to Virah as she neared and noticing the gesture, Grene turned to face her.

Much like everyone else, Grene had decided to wear something more appropriate for staying within the forest and had discarded her martial robes in favor of something more functional; a T-shirt as well as jeans, she also had sneakers on, unlike Virah's and Whitney's boots.

The martial artist bowed, “Virah, it's good to see that you have your bag,”

Right next to her, Whitney looked on in confusion, “didn't we buy that thing together yesterday night?”

“... we did,” Grene stopped bowing and narrowed her eyes, “... I forgot,”

“Well you did look exhausted after everything,” Virah said with a sigh, “honestly you shouldn't have tried to train with a Hitmon Chan like that,”

“Agreed,” Whitney chimed with a nod. She then turned to Virah, “the handbag compliments your get up, it looks good,”

“It does,” Virah smiled, “thanks,”

Whitney looked her up and down, “I think the rangers will actually give you a good grade for bringing something like that into the exam,”

"They should, yeah,” Virah eyed the aforementioned rangers.

It was a barely hidden secret that the more prepared a trainer is for their journey, the more the rangers would encourage them to go out and do it. And to do that, they primarily use the method of giving students a high grade during their ranger's exam.

It is also well known that the rangers have a list of the things that can give an aspiring trainer higher grades.

Among them is the quality of someone's trainer's bag, which, depending on how good it is, will either yield a trainer more than half of the total grade or a quarter of it. Virah had a feeling that when the rangers see her bag and everything that came with it, they'd either give her the highest possible grade or something close to it.

It wouldn’t be below half, she was confident.

Virah turned away from the rangers meant to judge and more importantly, guard them during the exam and back to her friends, she scanned them both, wondering where their bags were.

She decided to voice it out instead of staying silent like an idiot, “where are your bags anyway?”

“Here,” Whitney took out a tiny handbag hidden underneath her vest and showed it to Virah, “it has a lot of space inside of it and the mouth can open wider than it's supposed to,”

“Ah,” Virah said dumbly, she turned to Grene who showed her the knapsack she pulled from her back, “huh, you picked a knapsack? Why?”

“I thought it was more convenient since it has a lot of pockets,” Virah looked at said pockets and nodded in empathy, “my knapsack has 4 more compared to the handbag's standard three,”

“It does, yeah,” Virah nodded in agreement while wondering why Grene needed so many pockets to begin with. Probably for her weird martial arts stuff. She's seen her friend carry around wooden sticks after all…

All three of them went on to do small talk as they waited for the exam to start and eventually, the wait got long enough that Virah had to separate from Whitney and Grene because the other two had been called by their parents.

She watched her friends go and talk to a man and woman wearing robes, as well as the current Goldenrod Gymleader and his wife, they looked… normal. And less lonely.

Virah sighed and looked away, she moved to another spot, one where she couldn't see the two interact with their family and coincidentally, she found herself going near a pair of rangers talking about things.

Virah listened in, curious as to what they could possibly have as topics and she learned that rangers commonly talked about patrol routes, dangerous Pokemon (mostly ones who have evolved into the last stages of their evolution line), and even Team Rocket.

That last one, Virah had learned that they were searching for the person responsible for allowing their fellow criminals to escape, they theorized that it was an Alakazam that teleported most of the grunts in the hideout and as Virah continued to listen in, she learned more about the situation with Team Rocket.

But then eventually the two rangers started talking about something a whole lot more personal for her- “that Beedrill nest did come out of nowhere yeah,”

Virah's blood ran cold once she heard that, because really, how many Beedrill nests just “come out of nowhere”? Rarer than one might think given that rangers work hard to make sure that the forests are free of them.

Her brood had moved out of the breeding center without her and Virah was proud of them for it but then she also didn't know where they were and now the rangers saw them and- Virah held Nitro's Pokeball for comfort and closed her eyes.

She continued listening in, “we're planning on wiping them out soon enough actually, uh, me-” names she didn't bother to care about and squad titles that passed her hazy hearing went on as Virah stomped near the two rangers, the one who had been talking, a middle-aged man with a clean shaven face, looked at her, “- do you want anything kid?”

“... I think I know something about Team Rocket.”

The two rangers eyed each other, and the other one- the one who had been listening to his friend drone on and on about names, - shrugged and the one who had addressed her turned to her again, “that's… a serious thing to say, are you sure-”

“Yes.” Virah cut him off. “I know something, it's- they called it a wormhole-”

The ranger's cough cut Virah off and she looked at the man, “follow us, if you can?” Virah nodded and tailed the two adults, once they were far enough, one of them spoke, his tone serious, “tell us what you know,”