The next morning I woke up to Treecko shaking me. "Get up already, Pearl. I'm ready to start training."

I checked my watch. It said 5:04am. "Alright, Treecko. I'm up," I groaned. I got to my feet, and realized I must've been really tired last night. I was over by the cliff-face still. "Weird," I murmured to myself. I hefted my bag over my shoulders and followed Treecko back to their nests. There was a small circle in what could've been the center of the camp. "Is that for a fire?"

     "Yes, it is." Celebi flew over to me. "So we can cook. We don't need to eat like savages, especially with what we are going to do."

     I nodded and sat down near the fire circle. I pulled an apple from my bag and set the bag down. "What are we doing today? Combat, research, searching for places Time Gears were?" I took a bite of the apple.

     Treecko came and sat next to me. "Physical skills. Once we start stealing books or files from Dusknoir and Primal Dialga, we'll need all the physical skills we can learn. Such as strength, endurance, speed, stealth, and combat training. Combat training will be the warm up."

     "Wow," I said, surprised. "You're certainly organized. So training, research, then field work is the order of business? Sounds good. But what if they figure out what we are doing when we steal the books and files? Shouldn't we find the Time Gear locations before that so we can stay unnoticed longer?"

    Treecko shook his head. "No. We need all the information on Time Gears as possible, and we don't have the knowledge of their hiding places. This is the only way we can do this, Pearl."

    "What if we stole a map from them first? We would be able to pinpoint any location that sounds like it would hold one of the Gears."

     "Maybe, but we have to work on training first."

     "Alright," I conceded. Treecko and I stood up and faced each other. "So battle training then. What moves do you know, Treecko?"

    Treecko finally showed a small bit of emotion, he smirked. "You'll see, Pearl. I'm not going to go easy on you, you know."

    I smirked back, a look of determination in my eyes. "I'll live."

    With that, he deemed the battle started. He dug into the ground, and I stayed still. I waited till I could feel the ground vibrate beneath my feet before I darted out of the way.

    He came up, and for an instant, he seemed confused. That instant wasn't very long before he used Quick Attack on me, and slammed his tail into my side. True to his word, it wasn't a light hit. I grunted, and moved to the side; I couldn't stay in any one spot too long. Treecko prepared another Quick Attack, and this time I was better prepared. I knew the timing roughly, so I watched him carefully. Just as he was about to slam his tail into me again, I barely got out of his way by moving to the side of the attack by just a sliver. I felt the air rush past me, and a moment too late I realized two things. The first one was that I could have attacked by doing a backward round house kick, or any kind of kick if I were able to swing myself around quickly enough. The second part was the worse: I had my back facing him. Instinctively, I ducked down. The woosh of air was far too close for my liking, and once it passed, I twisted around while I stood up and faced Treecko in a fighting stance.

    "Impressive," Celebi commented. "But Sableye don't play nice."

    "Yet, we don't need to spend time healing after our training," I grunted back. Treecko watched with calculating eyes. I hadn't landed a hit on him, I needed to do that fast. All I had were my hands and feet, though, and Treecko had more moves along with his tail in addition to his hands and feet. For being small, that was one Pokémon to not underestimate. "They don't play nice, eh?" I remembered throwing the feint on J's airship, just a few months ago. Maybe the same tactic will work here... I threw a punch with my left hand, then round house kicked Treecko with my right foot when he was watching my hand. He tried jumping over my leg, but he was distracted for a heartbeat too many. His tail and legs got caught on my kick, which sent him spinning. He landed on his side, and laid there—he didn't get up. "Treecko?" No response. "Treecko?!" I went over to him quickly, and crouched down. That shouldn't have hurt him much, I only caught his legs and tail on my leg.

    Treecko suddenly opened an eye, jumped up, and slammed me with his tail. I noticed he liked using that as an attack. For a moment I saw stars. "Nice feint," he said, standing, "but mine's better." When the stars cleared from my eyes, I saw the glitter of challenge in his eyes as well a smirk on his face.

    I returned the look and got up. "I've got some work to do." I did notice, though, that I could take a Pokémon's attack like I did when I was a Pokémon myself. "Not as much as I had thought at first, but work that has to be done. That freaking tail of yours will leave me covered in bruises, Treecko!" I laughed.

     Celebi was nearby, and I figured she would laugh, too, but she was silent. She murmured something under her breath. Treecko noticed, too. "Celebi?"

     Celebi's eyes seemed unfocused, then she closed them. She made a gesture that Treecko obviously knew that I didn't. He turned to me and put a finger to his lips, and I understood. Someone's near—or something is, at least. I moved toward the moss-leaf nests, and as quietly as possible I moved them into and under the cover of the forest, in case we had to flee. I put my small bag under the bedding after grabbing a pocket-sized journal and a piece of charcoal, but not so much I wouldn't be able to find it again. When I came back out, I saw a small and quick thing that was purple. There was more, hidden from view, and they came out into the clearing.

     "Sableye," I breathed. Now I was glad I hadn't revealed my Ditto ability to anyone.

     "Weheheh. Dusknoir sends his regards, Treecko." The head Sableye turned his gem eyes on me. Even in this world of darkness, there was a menacing glint in his eyes. "And who are you? A human?"

     Since we hadn't done anything wrong yet, I decided to give them my full cooperation. I thought it was the best way to deter suspicion of me. "My name's Ruby. What's it to you?"

    "Heheheh," it said. That laugh was starting to get on my nerves. "Well, it seems the troublemakers have recruited a human. You know what the boss said, we need to teach the Treecko a lesson since he is so interested in watching us practice. Might as well include the other two, too."

    My eyes went wide. Time slowed, and a few things got processed in that time. First, I was still a bit sore from what would become bruises. Second, Treecko's watching the Sableye cost us this, and they didn't sound too keen on only teaching him and us a lesson. Thirdly, I was glad I gave them a fake name, since now we were in trouble.

     A Sableye jumped at me, and I moved out of the way of its claws just in time. It grabbed onto my hair, however, throwing its weight with this new advantage. "Grah!" I grunted, instinctively grabbing for my hair. It was hard to make the hair between my hands and my head not taut like it was between the Sableye and my hands, since it had the full momentum of the twenty or so pounds the Pokémon typically weighed. When it landed on the ground, it had long realized holding my hair was a good way to keep me relatively harmless. Its grip never faltered nor loosened. I, in this position, was bent over with the back of my head mostly facing the Sableye.

    "Weheheh!" He laughed, and all of a sudden I felt a Sableye jump onto my back. I grunted, since I never trained for holding up a twenty pound Pokémon on my back whilst bent over, already unbalanced by the first Sableye. "Humans are too easy. I wish we could fight more of your kind!" the one who held my hair laughed again.

    "Do you, now?" I said, practically growled, through gritted teeth. In an upside down view, I saw Treecko and Celebi doing quite a bit of damage to our attackers. Treecko was using Quick Attack to dodge their attacks, not as a move itself, and I remembered Sableye were ghost-type. Normal-type moves won't do damage to them. Will I do damage if I attack, or am I a normal-type by default because I am human? Time to find out. "You think because I'm not a Pokémon like you, I am harmless?" On the last word I let go of my hair with my right hand, and proceeded to punch the Sableye holding my hair in the stomach, hitting the breath out of him and making his grip slacken. The Sableye on my back sounded like he was using Hone Claws. Instead of trying to get him off by running around like a Torchic with her head cut off, I managed to jump into a sideways flip, still bent over, and land on my back. Or, to be more exact, on the Sableye.

     After a startled cry that turned into a grunt, a faint "Weheheh..." was what I could hear. I got up quickly because the other Sableye was already on his feet, using Hone Claws. Whatever move he was planning to use after, I had to get out of the way now unless I wanted to have claws ripping me to shreds.

    When Hone Claws was done, he did his creepy-weird laugh and his claws started to glow. From watching Persian all the time, I knew the move was Fury Swipes. It was also a move I didn't fancy knowing how it felt first-hand. Knowing how futile it would be, or look, I got into a standard fighting stance: my left foot in front of the other, fists at the ready in front of me. The thing was, even then, I had no plan to attack. Feints seemed to be more my thing, for the time being. "Come and get me, Sableye," I taunted. I noted how a few Pokémon moves were pretty useful and pretty easy to use by humans, like Taunt, Jump Kick, Tackle. Typically fighting- or normal-type moves, but moves nonetheless. "I dare you. You can't take me down."

    He did his laugh again, "Weheheh! You'll regret that," and came at me. I stood still like before, when Treecko used Quick Attack the second time, and I used the same maneuver, barely missing the claws. I remembered the mistake I made earlier, when I could've fought back after my dodge. I spun around, and did a roundhouse kick. The Sableye was already turned around, so I hit him in the face. A thrill of satisfaction and pride shot through me, but I knew it would be short lived.

    The reason wasn't what I had expected, however. When I looked over to see how Treecko and Celebi were doing, I noticed another Pokémon. My satisfaction vanished in that heartbeat. Adrenaline was still rushing through my veins. Celebi, Treecko, and the newcomer were watching me battle, along with a few Sableye Celebi and Treecko didn't get to knock out. It looked like they were watching me for a while, and I suddenly remembered that there was silence since my first taunt, the taunt where humans were weaker than Pokémon.

    That meant that the Pokémon onlookers watched as I punched the hair-grabbing Sableye, and then flipped onto the one that was on my back. They watched as I dodged, then did a quick comeback.

    "Good job, Ruby the human," the new Pokémon said, his voice regal and deep. He did a few claps that I couldn't figure out if it was mockery or sincere hatred hidden by an underestimation of my abilities. "Very impressive."

    I glanced at Treecko and Celebi for a heartbeat. Treecko had a scowl on his face. Celebi looked calm, but the look in her eyes was anger. After the glance I returned my attention to the newcomer. I felt relief go through me. Good thing we didn't do anything wrong, because Dusknoir has found us. I faced the Pokémon with defiance, and waited.

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And I am pleased to present, my PMD fanfic! I have been so excited to show you guys this, and I hope you guys enjoy!