Chapter 5: Stake Out 

"Ouch! That was my foot," I exclaimed, almost running into Anthony who was walking in front of me. Daniel had stepped on my foot, making me trip. 

"Well, you elbowed me in the gut and it was super effective," Daniel retorted. 

"Keep it down, you guys," Amanda said in a hushed tone. 

"Yeah, you're going to wake up the whole forest and I really don't feel like dealing with a swarm of Beedrill right now. You two are bad enough," Anthony added, sounding irritated. 

I gave Daniel a glare before turning to catch up to the others. Fenrir was leading the way and it wasn't too hard to follow the sounds of his loud, wet sniffing.  

We had ended up teleporting out here with the help of Felicity who had perfected disappearing and reappearing at will wherever she'd been before. Still, Amanda made sure we were a mile or so away from the thing Cloud and I had crashed into just in case it was really dangerous, hence the night time stroll through the forest. I'd been tripping over tree roots and bumping into an agitated Anthony the entire journey. 

"Can't Zuko walk with us and light the way?" I whined. 

"No, he'll give us away if the invisible thing can see." Anthony sighed impatiently. 

I frowned. "Well, if I break something before we get there I don't think anyone will be very happy with me." 

"Is anyone happy with you right now? You're being super annoying." Daniel poked me in the back. 

"Hey!" I sped up in my walking, trying to get away from his accusations, especially when his middle name was 'annoying'. He grabbed my arm and stepped in front of me so that I had to come to a halt. I could hardly make out his expression through the darkness even though we were only a foot apart.  

Daniel's eyes looked pretty soft, but besides that his face was blank. "I'm just telling the truth. What's up? You've been acting 'rampaging Primeape' crazy since this afternoon." 

I looked back at the others, who were farther ahead and wouldn't be able to hear if I said anything.  

Truthfully, a lot was up. My dad had yelled at me with a Dragon Rage-like anger. It had been super scary and it made me feel like he thought I was some five year old kid who didn't know how to handle herself. Cloud was still hurt and the invisible thing was probably still there. 

Daniel continued to stare at me and I knew he wouldn't let go of my arm until I said something, although I wasn't ready to tell anyone what had happened when I had talked to my parents a couple hours ago. I sighed. "I'm just really freaked out. I don't want anything bad to happen to anyone, you know? It's bad enough that Cloud's hurt and we could be walking into something way over our heads." 

"The mighty Emma, daughter of Ash Ketchum, is backing down?" Daniel's eyebrows shot up in shock. "You've got to be kidding me." 

My eyes flared at the mention of my father and I brushed past him, hitting his shoulder hard with mine. He didn't say anything, but kept pace with me. Daniel didn't understand what I was going through- my dad, angry with me over something I just couldn't comprehend, my Pokemon hurt, now back at Professor Gary's lab and unable to fly because I had to be so competitive. And if anything happened to us as while we explored the invisible "whatever" that not only proved me to be some wimpy kid like my dad thought, but my friends could get hurt as well. 

I cut off the thought firmly. I wouldn't let anything bad happen to the rest of my Pokemon or my friends. 

We caught up to Anthony and Amanda who had stopped at the edge of the trees, staring out at the grass where Cloud had fallen. It was a large plain, stretching for about a mile in each direction. It was pretty much in the middle of nowhere. 

Fenrir began lashing his tail angrily next to Amanda, who stroked his skin soothingly to calm him down. 

"What's wrong with Fenrir?" I whispered. 

"Something's there," Amanda answered. 

"Something bad," Anthony said darkly. 

We continued to look around the large expanse of grass. 

"Is it just me, or does it look like absolutely nothing is there?" Daniel sighed. 

"Should Fenrir and I go over and check the space out?" Amanda asked. 

"Um, wait one second." Daniel stood up straighter and pointed. "Look at that. The grass right there is dead." 

We peered through the trees, and, sure enough, there was a large patch of grass that was crushed and very wilted looking. 

"Fenrir and I will go over there." Amanda took matters into her own hands and started to stand up from kneeling, but the second she stood up we heard another voice. 

"Hurry up, Troy!" A woman barked. We all immediately lowered our bodies down so we wouldn't be seen. Fenrir began poking his head through the bush to see better, but Amanda reeled him back in. We couldn't see what was going on, but it was easy to hear the arguing. 

"Why do I have to carry everything?" A man yelled angrily back. 

"Because I'm a lady." I heard the smirk in her voice and wrinkled my nose in distaste. 

"You have an Ursaring who can do it for us," he said sullenly. 

"Yeah? Well, he's tired. And he hates you just as much as I do."  

"Whatever. Just get the door, will you? And make sure you lock it behind us," Troy grumbled. I heard him struggling with whatever he was carrying. Daniel and I stared at each other as we listened to the noise of a door opening.  

Unable to resist temptation, we both popped our heads up through a bush to stare at a blonde lady holding open a door. The strange thing was the door wasn't attached to anything. It looked like the door had just appeared out of thin air. 

When Troy walked through, he disappeared. The blonde followed him in, closing the door which disappeared as if it had never been there. 

Daniel swore, "Holy Shinx!" 

"Shh!" Amanda and Anthony urged him at the same time. 

"Did you see that?" Daniel grinned. 

"Yes, now shut up," I urged. 

He laughed. "Oooh, this is super cool. It's an invisible building!" 

"What?" I said blankly. 

"Where else would they have gone?" Daniel rolled his eyes at me like I was asking him what the answer to two plus two was.  

I looked at Amanda who shrugged. "I have no idea." 

"This is so weird. Do you guys run into crazy things like this all the time... literally?" Anthony asked. 

"Uh, not usually." I shuffled around, feeling awkward. 

"Don't be so modest, Em. We're always doing stuff like this." Daniel slapped me on the back. I winced. 

"Well, what do we do now?" Amanda asked. 

"I vote we go inside," Daniel said loudly. We all shushed him. 

"That seems a bit rash." Anthony backed up slightly.

Daniel let out an exasperated sound. "If you guys don't want to go, fine, but I am." 

He leapt over the bush and started walking stealthily towards the dead grass which I now realized was a high traffic area for feet. 

"Daniel, you idiot, wait up," I hissed, following. 

"I'm going to regret this," Anthony grumbled. Amanda followed silently, grudgingly, at the rear after returning Fenrir to his Poke Ball. 

Daniel was standing in front of the invisible.... whatever. 

"Now what?" I whispered. 

Daniel took a deep breath and reached a hand out hesitantly about waist high. Slowly, he extended his arm. His eyes lit. "Got it." 

Daniel's hand wrapped around a handle, which turned visible. The same door appeared, apparently made of cold steel. I cringed- it looked like a prison door. 

"Come on!" Daniel urged. We all followed him inside to find a musty... office?

Hi guys,

It's been awhile since I updated this story so here you go. How do you like it so far? Comments would be great :) 

Pokemon Question of the Day: What's your favorite type of Pokemon and why? 

Have an awesome day.

-Flips