Valerie kept her father company as they waited, they woke up at six in the morning and the drive to work had taken them around thirty minutes. So including morning prep, they had started on their four-hour drive around seven. It was still winter, but around the base of Mt. Silver, it was warm enough for there to be no visible ice or snow, only a slight bit of morning dew was still running over the plants away from the clearing, slowly being evaporated by the clear sun in the sky.

  A groaning scream penetrated the serene quiet of the mountain vista as Valerie gingerly pulled away her father's uniform which had been sitting on the area containing the burn. The uniform and undershirt hadn’t melted, but the burn area had clearly somewhat adhered to the clothing.

  “Uhhn…” Drew let out another groan as he lay on the dirt ground. Valerie had helped him get his uniform off of him, peeling the polyester undershirt off of his burnt back like the skin off of a banana in a display that almost forced the cereal she had in the morning back up.

  Her father's entire back looked more like a disused wall, whose paint was beginning to chip off, ranging from a rosy pink to an inflamed red. Patches of skin had ripped themselves off of her father's back as she had peeled off his uniform.

  “A-And now?” She had a first aid kid neatly placed next to her, which she had found in the backpack Drew had shucked onto her. She didn’t like the situation, but her father was in trouble and she would see him through it.

  “Clean, Huff…, the burn with cool water…” Drew said through clenched teeth.

  Valerie picked up a small water bottle she’d taken with her on the trip and began pouring its contents over her father's back, the second the water hit his back though, Drew let out another groaning cry, before he fought out another sentence.

  “Make a compress…Ugh…Cold water on cloth!”

  “I-, I uh,” Valerie looked at the bottle, now empty, “W-We don’t have any water anymore…”

  “Mmrgh! There’s water nearby…It’ll have to do…” Drew forced out, “Go look…for it…”

  “Is-Is that safe?!” Valerie hadn’t stepped foot on any Routes before so the idea of leaving her dad's side was a terrifying prospect.

  “Powerful Pokemon scare away weaker ones…” Drew stated between labored beats, “...that rockslide and Pokemon probably scared everything away, hopefully…”

  Valerie waited for more, not hoping for that sentence to end on a hopefully, but it seemed that that was everything she was getting. She raised herself off the ground and put on the backpack, “Alright Dad. I’ll go look for some water.”

  “Take Buddy with you,” Drew stated as he nodded in his Pokemon's direction, “He’ll protect you. Go on Buddy.”

  “Sla! Sla!” Buddy seemed less than enthused to leave his trainer's side, but after some more encouragement relented.

  “I’ll be back in fifteen minutes tops!” Valerie announced, “You stay still, ok?”

  Drew waved a hand in her general direction before wincing, “I’ll be fine, just need to wait for the rangers.”

  “Alright…” Valerie turned down to her childhood friend as she listened to the sound of rushing water in the distance., “Let's go, Buddy.”

  “Sla!”

  …

  Valerie stalked through the brush on the side of Mt. Silver, her head whirled every which way, looking for any Pokemon that might attack her as she advanced towards the sound of rushing water. Her hands felt clammy and her throat felt parched as she squinted her eyes in an attempt to investigate a suspicious-looking branch, high up in a tree.

  “Sla!

  “Eep! Don’t scare me like that Buddy!” Valerie admonished her father's Pokemon as she put a hand on its head.

  Sandslash looked up at her like she was stupid, Pokemon had far shaper senses than any trainer and he knew there weren’t any wild Pokemon nearby simply by how quiet it was around here. Buddy gave off a huff of arrogance before he continued towards the water source.

  “Ah, wait!” Valerie followed after Buddy quickly.

  The scenery soon turned more wild, as the foliage on the ground seemed to increase the further away Valerie strayed from the Route. Where the grass had once been just up to her ankles, it now began to go up to her shins and then finally her knees. Valerie felt fortunate to be wearing the orange ranger uniform now, as her previous attire of shorts and a simple T-shirt would have been far too little for this kind of environment.

  The trees also became far denser away from the route, going from a spare sprawl, where trees only seemed to grow every ten meters or so apart from one another to a dense grouping in which it seemed that every inch of forest floor was taken up by some form of plant life.

  Her father’s Sandslash maneuvered through the foliage expertly, weaving along the paths that other Pokemon had taken with practiced ease. His daughter meanwhile supported herself on the bark of multiple trees as she almost faceplanted on another patch of wet grass. Her uniform already looked like she had fallen over multiple times, even though she had somehow kept upright until now. Her favorite pair of sneakers were ruined, caked in mud, with loose blades of grass stuck all over them and sopping wet down to her socks. She’d just have to hope she wouldn’t be out here much longer.

  Valerie didn’t just look harried, she felt wiped as well. Living on a diet of ready-made meals and packaged food due to her father's occupation didn’t exactly lead to a healthy body. Her hobbies of sitting in front of a TV and staying at home didn’t quite help with that realization. She fought to catch her breath as she leaned against another tree, she had almost slipped into a few fissures that had broken up in between the brush, but Sandslash had been kind enough to alert her beforehand.

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  “Huff…Huff…Haah! I’m not even fifteen minutes away from Dad! Why the hell are there so many plants here?!” With her dad not here to scold her, Valerie had no obligations to any swear jars in the world, so she let her frustrations be known, “Buddy, that waters got to be close by now right?”

  “Sla!”

  “I don’t know what the means!” Val admonished herself, feeling slightly stupid for even asking. Sandslash didn’t seem to care as he only accelerated, forcing Valerie to speed up her advancement as well. She cut through the brush more violently, smashing her feet through bushes and plants alike as she used trees left and right as support, “Not so fast!”

  For a second, she squinted as she forced her upper body past a particularly tall plant, her advancing foot found nothing but air as she continued forward though, “Woah!” In a last-ditch effort, she tried to grab onto something in front of her only to find nothing but air.

  Valerie tumbled downhill, managing to roll herself onto her side at the last second. Landing on a bank of gravel, she rolled to a stop right next to Sandslash, who stood before her triumphantly in front of a calm river of water.

  Brushing off stray pebbles from her completely ruined uniform uselessly, Valerie glared at her father's Pokemon reproachfully as she raised herself, “Buddy, please warn me next time. That could’ve hurt!”

  “Sla! Sla!” Sandslash pointed at her bottle of water insistently, seemingly not caring much for her struggles. He had other concerns, most pressingly, his trainer was still far from healthy back on the Route.

  “Fine, Fine. Let’s get some water and go back to Dad.” Valerie knelt next to the pristinely clear river of water, it was so incredibly clear she could even see her haggard reflection on the surface of the moving water. She quickly washed off her face and hands from any dirt she might’ve gotten on them and started filling up some bottles with water.

  “Sand! Sla! Slash!” Once the first bottle was full, her father's Pokemon was already tugging on her sleeve in the hopes of getting back to her father. She rummaged through the backpack, brushing aside empty Pokeballs and other ranger equipment, before pulling out another empty bottle, “Buddy, we might need more water, so let's fill up more bottles.”

  Buddy acquiesced and let her fill a second bottle, she gingerly placed the bottle in the river and watched as it filled up with water. Her eyes wandered along the banks of the river, jagged pieces of fresh dirt hung on its edges and further up the river, Valerie could see multiple trees had fallen over the low bank of the river, with their roots violently ripped straight out of the ground.

  ‘So this river is only running here because of the earthquake?’ Valerie thought absentmindedly as her gaze transfixed on the river. Sandslash was already tugging on her arm, but her mind was elsewhere. Whatever had happened in Mt. Silver had destroyed so much of the environment that entirely new channels of water had been created, it was a terrifying prospect to her. Being covered by her dad had made the entire ordeal far less dramatic than she expected, now she kind of wished she could’ve seen the Pokemon that had exited Mt. Silver back there.

  A speck of green in the water further of the stream caught her eyes, she squinted in the hopes of identifying the thing. She didn’t have to wait long though, as the thing was slowly floating towards her. She stood and capped off the second water bottle before depositing it inside her backpack, still keeping her eyes trained on the thing..

  As the speck got closer, Valerie could finally make out some details. The thing floated around helplessly in the stream, what she at first thought was some kind of bush or other foliage of some kind turned out to be a Pokemon! The thing was seemingly unconscious if not already dead, but its head just barely floated above the water so Valerie guessed unconscious. It was built stoutly, with rough olive-green skin covering almost its entire body, a large, dull horn protruded from its head, and its stomach was covered by a large red diamond-shaped shell of some sort.

  Valeries heart constricted at the sight, the poor thing was floating helplessly in a river. Who knows what had happened to it? Considering it was floating in a river that hadn’t existed for more than half an hour by now, it must’ve gotten caught in the river during the earthquake.

  “Wait a sec, Buddy.” Valerie turned to the Pokemon who was practically dragging her with him by now, “You see that Pokemon over there in the water?”

  Sandslash didn’t care much for her concerns, only giving the river a passing glance before he continued to drag on Valerie, “Slash! Slash!”

  “C’mon Buddy, Let go for a second! I gotta get that thing out of the water!” Valerie freed herself from the razor-sharp claws and rushed back closer to the river. She put a foot into the clear river water as the Pokemon approached and was almost swept off of her feet by the current, “Woah!”

  Buddy, ever the hydrophobic Ground-Type stayed on the bank just next to the stream and admonished her efforts, “Sand! Slash! Sa!”

  “Buddy, I know wild Pokemon are dangerous and you want to get back to Dad,” She rolled her eyes defiantly as she got into a ready stance to catch the unconscious Pokemon, “but it's knocked out. I’ll literally just put it on the bank so it doesn’t get carried down the river and then we’ll be going back to Dad, alright?”

  Her father’s Pokemon looked conflicted, but Valerie didn’t have time to keep an eye on him, the Pokemon was floating straight towards her. Like an umpire at a baseball game, she squatted down and readied herself by spreading her arms out for the thing.

  She finally managed to catch the Pokemon in her arms and immediately got bowled over by the thing, yet she persisted, gripping the creature in her arms as she crashed into the water, uniform, backpack, and all.

  Rolling ass-over backward with the thing in her arms, Valerie came to a stop after two entire rolls with the thing in her arms, this Pokemon was heavy.

  “Paah! This thing has some heft!” She cried out as she cleared wet hair from her face, still sitting in the ice-cold river, “Let’s get you out of the water!”

  The Pokemon wasn’t just heavy for its size, it must’ve been heavier than her by how much she strained to get the thing out of the water, “Hnng! C’mon Buddy help me out here!”

  She put a hand in front of its mouth and checked if it was breathing, but she didn’t feel any sort of air movement on her arm, “Oh no…Please, Buddy, help me out here! I don’t think this Pokemon is breathing!”

  Instead of helping, Sandslash simply huffed haughty, turned its head to the side, and crossed its claws over each other in clear denial, “Slash!”

  Valerie glared at Buddy for a second before she had an idea, “I know!” She looked through her backpack, luckily the insides weren’t completely ruined as the thing was watertight. “Aha!” Her hand emerged with a Pokeball in its grip, “Let’s get this thing to a Pokemon Center! They can help it better than we can!”

  She tapped the ball on the thing's forehead and it disappeared in a flash of red light. The Pokeball didn’t even wiggle in her hand to confirm a catch, instead, it simply gave off a satisfying click!

  She dropped the ball in another compartment of her backpack and waded out of the stream and back over to Sandslash, “Alright, let's get back to Dad!”

  “Slash!”