The first couple of days after leaving Sandgem Town were thankfully very quiet, which was ideal for my still somewhat tense nerves.

We were taking Route 237 from Sandgem to Oreburgh, which wasn’t an actual route in the game. After some questioning of Professor Rowan, I learned that there were a number of both “Natural Routes,” such as most of the ones found in the games, and the “Paved Routes.” The Paved Routes were much more common than shown in the games, and connected most of the major cities and towns of the Sinnoh Region. They were also a lot safer, with fewer wild Pokémon that wandered around on them.

The route I was on actually reminded me a lot of a highway from my old world, big enough for trucks to move in-between the cities with plenty of room for walking on the side of the road. I didn’t actually see all that many trucks, or cars at all, and for the longest time it was just me and Venus.

I had been torn between taking Route 237 direct to Oreburgh, or going along Route 202 to Jubilife City, then cutting across to Oreburgh along Route 203. The former option hadn’t been present in the games, being on of the Paved Routes, but there was a part of me that wanted just to follow the path set in the games. That part was quickly overruled when I learned that the Oreburgh Gate, which was just a small cave in the game back home, was actually an entire cave system here.

I quickly decided that taking the nice, paved road would be much simpler, faster, and better for my health.

“At least this is a nicer experience than when I first got here.” I commented to Venus one afternoon as I was setting up camp, and got a questioning look in response.

“You see, back before we found each other I was just wandering around in the woods. I didn’t have a tent, or a campfire and stove, or even a sleeping bag.”

She cocked her head in the other direction, and I got the feeling that she didn’t see what was wrong with that.

“I’m not a Pokémon, I’m not used to living like that. Waking up with a Bidoof sleeping next to you and a rock under your back isn’t very comfortable, let me assure you. Plus I didn’t have hiking boots and my feet hurt.”

She rolled her eyes at me, then turned back to staring at the food cooking on the campfire. One of the things that I had been the most worried about was the peculiarities of meat in the Pokémon world. As it turns out, while there wasn’t a lot of actual meat that was eaten, the small bits that were did in fact come from Pokémon. The thing was, many Pokémon had parts of their body that could regenerate, such as the famous Slowpoke tails.

Instead of eating a lot of meat however, it turns out that most people just ate seafood instead.

I had been concerned about the ethics of eating fish Pokémon like Magikarp, but apparently there were just… normal fish that lived in the lakes, rivers, and oceans.

While Pokémon did eat other Pokémon, humans had avoided doing the same for a long time; it would be like eating your dog, but your dog was nearly as smart as you were. While regular animals had mostly been driven extinct by Pokémon on land, fish and other aquatic creatures had mostly avoided that same fate. I wasn’t exactly sure why, but the best explanations I had gotten argued that there was a lot more space for non-Pokémon could exist in the oceans and rivers as opposed to the limited land-area, where more powerful Pokémon took over the food chain.

Wait, did that mean that Team Magma had a point?

Thankfully, with the widespread reliance on fishing for meat, fishing rods weren’t particularly expensive, and I had dropped some of my rapidly dwindling funds on a cheap rod. The really fancy rods were way too expensive, but the regular fishing rods you’d find at a hardware store? It turns out that the price of them in the games was just another mechanic and a balancing issue, not something to be taken literally. Regular old earthworms served as bait, and while I did catch more than my fair share of Magikarp and other fish-like Pokémon, those were quickly released until I could find regular, non-intelligent fish.

“All I’m saying is that it was a lot tougher before you got here.”

Venus snorted in response, and apparently decided that her fish was done cooking, pulling the stick it was mounted on off of the fire and starting to nibble on the half-cooked meal.

I was honestly pretty happy, all things considered. The tent and sleeping bag had made camping much more comfortable, even if I wasn’t traveling quite as fast as I had originally thought I would be. My optimistic estimates had placed me arriving at Oreburgh City in about five days, but considering how slowly I was going it looked like it would actually be closer to seven or eight. Which was fine with me, I was just enjoying the time spent with Venus in the outdoors.

There wasn’t a perfect term to describe what I was feeling while I walked along the road, at least none that I was aware of. Instead it was more of a general sense of being connected to nature in a way that I hadn’t thought possible. The longer I spent in the Pokémon world, the more convinced I became that Earth had been too developed. There wasn’t the same sense of wonder or exploration, or even just an understanding of humanity's role in nature. We had paved over everything and called it progress, but here?

The world felt alive in a way that I had never experienced before.

Even the main road I was traveling on seemed to be built with nature, instead of over it. It wound its way around hills and next to rivers, not infringing on the landscape, but somehow managing to coexist alongside it.

Living off of the land, gathering Berries while Venus napped or ran around became some of the happiest memories of my life so far. As I eventually decided that my own fish were done cooking, I took them off the fire and put them on a plate next to some Pecha Berries I had found. Venus didn’t quite like them as much as I did, she preferred the more sour berries. For me though, the Pecha Berries tasted all the better, now that I was actually in a place to appreciate them for what they were.

Life, I considered as I ate my food thoughtfully, was good.

/^\

“Do you smell smoke?” I asked miserably from the quick tarp I had set up. “I think I smell smoke.”

The storm had swept down upon us quickly on the seventh day of traveling, and I had noticed the dark clouds coming up on the horizon just in time to set up the fly of my tent. It had honestly been very annoying since we were only about a couple hours out from the entrance to Oreburgh City, but I didn’t want to risk traveling in such bad weather. And I just didn’t like being rained on in general.

Of course with my luck the rain had been followed by thunder, and then lightning, and I was currently huddled underneath the tarp trying to remain as dry as possible. Some of the lightning strikes had gotten concerningly close, with one particular example having struck less than a mile away.

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I was not, to put it lightly, having a good time.

Then the smell that I had noticed grew stronger, and even Venus cocked her head in recognition.

“Yeah, that’s definitely smoke.”

Another flash of lightning and a peal of thunder nearly blinded me, but that only made the scent of smoke worse. It would be so simple to just stay huddled underneath the tarp and let the storm pass.

“Oh I hate this.” I groaned as I put my bag in the driest place I could find, which wasn’t easy. “Come on Venus! Somebody could be hurt.”

I sincerely doubted that there would be any humans out in the forests in this kind of weather, but this wasn’t Earth. If I had a chance to help a Pokémon and had let it go because I didn’t want to get wet… well I wouldn’t be able to look at myself in the mirror.

On a purely physical level however I immediately regretted leaving the tarp, since I was just about immediately soaked by the downpour.

“Venus!” I called, having to shout to be heard over the rain. “Can you figure out where it’s coming from?”

She stopped, immediately sitting down and putting her head up in the air, sniffing like a hunting dog. After what seemed like an eternity but could only have been a minute, her head snapped to her left and she jumped to her feet.

“Okay, let’s go!”

We set off deeper into the woods, and I began feeling very out of my depth. Trees that had once seemed so kind and inviting during the day loomed threateningly, and with every step I began to regret my decision a little more. The woods were dark without any sunlight streaming through the canopy, and intimidating, made even worse by the fact that I didn’t know what was out there.

I fished the Poké Gear out of my pocket and turned on its flashlight feature, which only illuminated the ground barely a foot or two in front of me.

So that’s why they have Pokémon use Flash in the games instead of anything else, their bulbs are awful.

Instead of trying to focus on the awful feeling of the rain on my skin and soaking my clothes, I tried to focus on what Pokémon I could catch that could learn Flash. I didn’t think Venus could learn it, but maybe if I caught another Pokémon? Or maybe a Fire-type would be nice, that way I could have a way to easily start campfires?

My mind wandered while I tried to avoid thinking about the sheer stupidity of wandering around in the woods in the middle of a thunderstorm, but the smell of smoke kept getting stronger and stronger as Venus led us deeper into the forest. After an incredibly tense few minutes, I could make out a light flickering in front of us, and gasped as the source of the smell became apparent.

A massive tree that could have rivaled redwoods in size had been struck by lightning, and was split down the middle to almost the ground. One half of the tree was on the ground from where the weight of the branches had pulled it down, while the other half was on fire. Smoke billowed out from the tree, and with horror I saw that there were Pokémon on the ground, obviously knocked out.

“Oh my god, it was a Combee hive.” I said, taking in the terrible sight.

There were still a few Combee left buzzing around, obviously disoriented and lashing out with their stingers at random. The reason for their confused aggression was lying on the ground in the middle of a bunch of other knocked out Combee – the hive’s Vespiquen was unconscious and unable to direct the swarm.

Of course most of them are unconscious! I realized in a flash of insight. Smoke knocks out bees!

At least that had been how it was back on Earth, but I was willing to bet that was what had happened to the majority of the hive.

I stared at the sight for a long moment, before being jolted out of my reverie by the groaning of the tree. There wasn’t much wood keeping the other half of the tree standing, and the passed-out Vespiquen and Combee were right in the way.

“It’s going to fall!” I called out to Venus, who was also looking on in horror. “Quick, help me try and get the Pokémon out of the way!”

Venus and I jumped into action and sprinted towards the unconscious Pokémon. Unfortunately that action drew the attention of the Combee who were still flying around, and they began to move towards me as the obvious threat to their queen.

That was at least, until Venus Growled, the sound catching the attention of most of the Combee and redirecting their flight paths.

“Don’t worry about me!” I called, and she looked stricken. “Don’t get stung! They’ll do more to you than to me, so focus on dodging right now!”

Reluctantly she turned her attention away from me and started dodging the angry Combee that were beginning to descend on her. She had bought me some time though, which I was incredibly grateful for.

I had just enough time to grab the Vespiquen underneath her arms and start dragging her out of the line of the falling tree, before the Combee started swarming again.

For being only about four feet tall, the Vespiquen was a lot heavier than I was expecting, and I wasn’t going as fast as I wanted to. The tree kept groaning and cracking under the heat of the fire and the looming Combee nearby didn’t make anything easier. While Venus was doing her best to keep them occupied, a few of them decided they would take on an easier target. One of them dive-bombed me, landing a hit with its stinger on my shoulder before darting away.

I swore as my back felt like it was on fire, but didn’t stop dragging the Vespiquen away from the tree. Another one dived down, and I just barely managed to twitch out of the way in time.

“Can’t you see I’m trying to help!” I shouted at the Combee. “If I don’t get her away from here, the tree will fall on her!”

Most of the Combee who were still awake didn’t seem to understand what I was saying, and another tried to sting me again. Incredibly though, another Combee smacked into it, sending it veering off course and buzzing angrily.

My savior turned to me, and bobbed up and down in the air.

“Thanks!” I called, though I didn’t really have the time to pay attention to what it was trying to tell me.

The Combee served as a guard of sorts, knocking away any of its fellows that tried to sting me, but I was under no illusions that it was doing it solely for my benefit. For some reason it hadn’t been affected as much by the smoke as the other Pokémon, and obviously realized that I was trying to help its queen instead of kidnapping.

Once I got the Vespiquen to a safe distance, which took a lot longer than I had wanted to, I dashed back towards the pile of unconscious Combee. As much as I wanted to take a break and relieve my back, burning with the exertion of hauling the Vespiquen and the stinger wound, there just simply wasn’t enough time.

“Good job Venus!” I shouted. “Keep it up!”

The Eevee was beginning to look more than a little ragged, her brown fur matted thanks to the rain and she was panting hard from running around so much. Her drooping tail did pick up a little bit, and her steps became a little lighter as I dashed by. Then she dodged a Combee’s stinger, and Tackled it into unconsciousness.

The rest of the Combee were much lighter and easier to carry, and I eventually figured out a way to carry three at a time by holding one under each arm, and a third in my hands. It was awkward, and I felt there was a risk of hurting them, but I figured that it would be better for them to get a little squished by my arms instead of a several ton tree.

When I was done, Venus staggered away from the still-burning tree, exhausted. She had managed to knock out all of the Combee that were still confused and enraged, and had helped me move the last few of the wild Pokémon, dragging them carefully with her mouth. Her ears and tail were completely limp, and I recalled her into her Poké Ball. She didn’t like being in there, but I figured she needed the rest for now.

It was just in time too, as once all of the Pokémon were out of the danger zone the tree let out a mighty groan, then cracked like a shot out of a cannon. With a dull rumble, the heavy wood finally gave in to the fire and the rest of the tree fell down, shaking the entire ground as it landed. A warm feeling spread through my chest as I realized I had made the right choice by coming to investigate. If Venus and I hadn’t dragged the Pokémon out of the way they would have been crushed by the branches. Even then the collapse was actually a lot closer than I would have liked since we were only about ten feet away from a particularly long branch turning us into goop.

With a sigh and a groan I laid down in the mud, uncaring of what it was doing to my clothes. My body ached, and for a minute I just stayed there, letting the rain fall on my face. Eventually I got up again, knowing that my work wasn’t done yet.

“Hey.” I said, prodding the Vespiquen. “Wake up?”

She was completely unconscious, and I didn’t have anything that could help her. Revives were far more expensive than my budget allowed, and I doubted that just a Potion would be able to wake her up. The only thing I could think of was…

“This is going to suck.”