David stood still in the centre of the now deserted street.

A man with dark indigo hair staggered towards him. A Voyant. A Psychic.

The locals of Fuchsia gathered in the alleys, and at the edges of the road, watching them.

David should have been doing something. Running, protesting, even just stepping out of the distressed psychic’s way.

He should have been, but in that moment all he felt was confusion.

How? How had they tracked him down so fast? He'd arrived in Fuchsia only a couple of hours ago. Was it his licence? Had Louis been a plant? How had they found him on this street? Had they been following him through the city?

Why? Why were the locals stepping out of the man’s way? Why were they letting him go unimpeded? He thought the locals would hate the Voyants. Why did the psychic look so rough? So unfocused? Why was he now focused on David?

The psychic continued to stagger towards him in what seemed to be slow motion. A look of relief on his face, eyes clearing up.

David's confusion started to turn. First to fear, a spike in his heart as he realised this could be the end of the road. They wouldn’t let him escape as easily this time. Not after he slipped away from Aodhan.

The fear didn’t last long. It was an old fear, and blunted by time. Instead it churned inside him, darkening until an ember grew from the darkness. Anger. He got angry, and the anger grew with each step the psychic took towards him. How dare they have a spark of hope in their eyes as they planned on crushing David’s hope.

David’s hand fell to Cloudburst’s pokeball, slipping it out of the sling he wore around his neck. The scratched metal vibrated beneath his fingers, sending pulses up the muscles in his arms. She was preparing for a fight too. She felt his anger, and she was ready. He stood his ground.

David locked eyes with the Voyant. There was no running now.

Sweat slipped down the man’s brow and it seemed to drain the life from the man’s eyes. His shoulders rose, hackles raised. The man hunched and shifted his path. His hands never rose from where they were held above his belt and three pokeballs. He drew closer.

David steadied his stance, shifting his feet until they were shoulder width.

The Voyant staggered on past him, eyes unfocused.

David was surprised but he remained ready, turning to track the psychic as he went.

The Voyant didn’t turn, just continued to stumble down the street. With each step the locals parted, slipping out of his path to stare him down from the sides of the street. With each step the locals filled in behind him, creating a bubble around the struggling man. Before long the bubble left David behind. Crowds of people with bright hair engulfed him, blocking his view of the Voyant.

David should have been grateful or relieved. He should have taken that as a sign to make himself scarce. He should have, but in that moment all that anger burned away and confusion came rushing back.

‘What? What the hell just happened?’

He relaxed his stance. Pidgey’s pokeball stilled, though a sense of eagerness remained.

‘He just walked past? Not one word?’

Pidgey’s ball shook a little, confusion evident. David had no answers. He brought the pokeball up to his mouth, talking into it like he would a phone.

“I don’t know,” He whispered. All he had were questions “I.. I think I need to check though. Stay ready.”

He came to Fuchsia to avoid the Voyants. If they were going to be a problem here he needed to know. His adrenaline was high. He felt charged. After a deep breath, he followed the psychic down the street.

David tried to stay reasonably far back as he followed the Voyant. He’d never tailed anyone before, and this was a psychic he was tailing, so it wasn’t like it was enough to stay out of sight, but he tried to stay hidden in the crowd anyway. It wasn’t difficult to follow the psychic. The giant bubble that the locals made around them was hard to miss.

Now that he wasn’t in the middle of the bubble, David could see how it formed and in detail how the locals were reacting. There wasn’t anyone shouting or ringing a bell to warn of the Voyant’s presence, instead it was the silence that did most of the work. A rolling lack of sound that caught up with each person, engulfing them and twisting them to its purpose.

That or every local was better at spotting the figures running on the roof than David was.

He never got a good look at the figures on the roofs, they only appeared for brief flashes, ducking behind the ridges before popping up again twenty metres ahead. At first he thought they could be Pokemon, but the figures were too humanoid in shape for that. The runners never descended to the street or passed any signals that David could detect. They just followed the Voyant. It left David with more questions.

The expressions on the locals at the tailend of the bubble were mixed. There was annoyance, it took time to file to the side of the road to let the psychic past. There was fear, some of the pedestrians left the street afterwards with darting eyes, and their possessions clutched tight. Mostly however, there was cold anger. Eyes narrowed as mouths drew a thin line. No, anger wasn’t right. It wasn’t as active as that. This was a steadier, deeper feeling. It was hate. The locals hated this psychic. They didn’t spit on him as he passed, they didn’t shout or yell. Instead, they stepped to the side and they stared.

It was chilling.

The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

David followed the struggling Voyant through the crowds to the edge of the city. As they neared the outskirts, the density of the crowd fell, and he needed to stay further back. It wasn't an issue as the emptier streets made it easier to see the Voyant.

The man staggered out of the city and into the trees. Another man met him there, and after sharing a few short words, they disappeared in a twist of pink.

David waited there for five minutes to check if they would return, but they didn’t. He walked back through the city, locating a market and the local library, both closed, on the way.

At the end of the trip, he wasn’t as worried about the Voyants as he had been before. It seemed his thoughts were correct, and he was safe from them here in Fuchsia.

He was, however, a little more worried about the locals now.

-.-

David noticed the second the pokeball moved.

He dived for it, knocking Pidgey over as he did. She squawked, spreading her wings out at him in anger after she’d righted herself.

“Sorry,” David apologised, cradling the pokeball in one hand. There was no need for his impatience, but after two hours of sitting in the dark on the cold ground and staring at the pokeball he was getting desperate for something to do.

While the sun was up they had trained. It was an awkward training session. Neither he, nor Pidgey were used to having unfamiliar spectators and space was at a premium in the training grounds with all the battles being fought around them. That was several hours ago though, and now the training grounds were near empty. There was maybe four other people on the wide field aside from David, and all were busy with their own things rather than seeking out battles.

Pidgey let out a slow squawk at him, and hid her head under a wing, but she did settle down.

David turned his attention back to the pokeball. Back to his new Pokemon. He double checked his preparations before clicking the round button.

Light flashed, illuminating their surroundings. David opened his eyes to see his second Pokemon for the second time.

The Pokemon twitched side to side, scanning the area with its big red eyes that seemed even larger today. The twin red orbs took up the majority of his Pokemon’s face and were as big as melons. Its antennae, white stalks with a bulb at the top, swayed back and forth.

It still looked like a giant purple bee without wings to him.

“Hello,” David said slowly. He wasn’t sure how the Pokemon was going to react to its new surroundings or to him. “It’s good to see you again. We’re in a city now, don’t worry-”

The Pokemon spun away from him.

David tensed, readying to click the pokeball if it tried to flee. He didn’t know the penalties for setting a Pokemon free in the city. It likely wasn't much given how many wild Pokemon he saw scavenging, but he didn’t want to find out.

The Pokemon didn’t move though, it just stood twitching slightly while its antennae swayed.

“Eh.. I guess you can look that way?”

No response.

Biting his lip, he decided to carry on. “We’re in Fuchsia city right now. This is a training ground and we’re staying in a campsite across the road.”

The Pokemon spun once more, not towards him but facing another area of the training grounds.

David frowned at it. Was it mentioning a city? But that didn’t make sense, it wasn’t like the Pokemon could understand him. So why? He followed the Pokemon’s gaze down the grounds. There was nothing going on there. A trainer and their Ekans were practising some drills. He looked back at the first direction they had stared at. Another trainer and their Pokemon were there, taking a break after some training.

“Is it the other Pokemon?” He asked. “Don’t worry about them. They are friendly- they won’t disturb us anyway. You don’t have to worry about them.”

His fuzzy purple Pokemon didn’t turn back.

“Right.” It was a setback, he had to admit that. It was hard to train a Pokemon when you couldn’t even get them to look at you, but he had thought of this. “I wanted to get to know you a bit, and do some training, but first I thought you might be hungry.”

With that David took out his secret weapon. It was a pouch of Normal type food. Nothing special, just the standard stuff. He’d checked out the Bug type foods earlier, which were thankfully cheaper than the Flying type variety, but that was when he’d run into an issue.

He didn’t know if this Pokemon was a herbivore, carnivore or an omnivore.

Most caterpillars back home were herbivores, and he thought it was the same for moths and butterflies, but this was a Pokemon. A Pokemon with pincers.

The pokemart’s Bug food was separated by diet, and he did not know his Pokemons.

David shook the sachet at his Pokemon, and it spun back to him. It took a step towards him.

“Easy,” David said, gently setting the sachet down.

The Pokemon scurried forward as soon as he stepped back, descending on the sachet.

“Omnivore then,” David murmured as the sachet disappeared under the Pokemon. It didn’t eat like Pidgey. She pecked at her food, with a sort of grace when said food wasn’t a spicy berry. This Pokemon seemed to throw itself at the food mouth first. Still, voracious or not he was surprised when it stood back up only a few seconds later.

“Wow, you were hungry wer-” David paused, taking in the sight.

A bar of food lay untouched on the ground. The Pokemon had eaten the wrapper off the sachet and left all the contents behind.

“Or not.” He finished. “A herbivore then.”

His new Pokemon twitched, clearly wishing to turn around again, but still hungry.

“Don’t worry, I have something for you anyway.” With that he walked back to his backpack and retrieved the last of their berry supplies - half a Cheri berry. It wasn’t much but it’d do for now. There was also a stack of sachet wrappers and other compostable bits, but he needed that to start fires, and he got the impression it wasn’t exactly healthy for a Pokemon to eat.

Twin red eyes followed his every move, there and back. Once more David set the berry on the ground and let the Pokemon scurry up to it. This time it seemed more reluctant to eat the food, but a few seconds later the half berry was gone.

David took the time to collect up the uneaten contents of the Normal type sachet and store in it an old wrapper. Hopefully Pidgey would be willing to have it as a snack tomorrow.

The Pokemon’s eyes tracked him the entire time.

“I’ve no more food today, but I’ll find better stuff tomorrow, I promise.”

It made no sign of hearing him, just continued to watch.

David walked over to Pidgey and gave her a nudge. Hopefully she’d understood some of what they talked about earlier.

She gave him a tired chirp, but she did stand up. With her moving, he turned to his new Pokemon. It was still watching them.

“Yesterday- this morning, we talked about battling. Fighting other Pokemon. If you want to do that, we need to train and I need to know what you can do before we start that. I figured the best way of seeing that is for you to fight Cloudburst.”

The fuzzy Pokemon showed no sign of understanding.

David looked at Pidgey.

She let out a slow put-upon squawk and hopped over to the Pokemon. They began to talk, a series of chirps and trills. After a few seconds they turned and hopped and walked away together.

“Good,” David said with a smile. “Progress.”

The two Pokemon didn’t wait for him.

“I hope,” he muttered under his breath.

Grabbing their two pokeballs, he jogged after them.