For now, Larry had a trainer. They had agreed to work together, in order to find out his mother's fate. Having to follow a girl around felt weird, but he also disliked being stuffed inside a Pokeball. So for now, Larry followed Valerie on foot, walking through the Pokecenter just next to her.

  Nurses and Pokecenter staff were milling about like ants in an anthill, not even giving the two of them a glance. The two of them walked out into the lounge, where trainers and other Pokemon owners relaxed, lounged, or played with their Pokemon.

  Larry eyed the front of the center as they entered, it had an automatic glass door, ‘I could run away right now, couldn’t I?’

  Nurse Joy smiled and waved towards Valerie with a lovely smile, and Valerie smiled back weakly. The two of them seemingly did not want to bother each other any more than they already had.

  Valerie squatted down next to Larry, patting him on the head affectionately, “For today, I’ll call up the rangers and get that expedition into Mt. Silver arranged, then I’ll finally get some sleep.” Larry nodded back, “Alright, let’s go to my room.”

  Walking through the front lounge of the center, all eyes fell on the two of them as they walked past. Most trainers had probably never seen a Pseudo-Legendary before, leading to a lot of hushed whispers and phones being pointed at them.

  Having been a shut-in for most of his first life and a cave resident for most of his second one, Larry wasn’t used to so many eyes on him. He grabbed at Valerie's pant leg anxiously as they walked, in turn, she slowed down a bit for him to follow.

  They entered an elevator and when the doors closed, Larry breathed a sigh of relief. Next to him, Valerie yawned as the door closed, “Haah, I’m going to be so glad once I finally get to sleep…”

  The elevator released them on a floor with tons of individual rooms, what Larry could only assume to be the hotel part of the Pokecenters. He had known that in the anime, Pokecenters bring far more to the table than a simple hospital for Pokemon, they were accommodation, health clinic, shop, and much more, all in one package, specifically built for trainers in the region.

  ‘I guess Pokecenters take after the anime here. I wonder how the cities look…’ Larry hadn’t had the pleasure yet of looking at much of Human-Pokemon society. From the amount of people and the size of the Pokecenter lobby though, he could guess that the cities were quite a bit bigger than in the games.

  Valerie unlocked the door to her room with some sort of card, and after a beep or confirmation, the door unlocked, “C’mon in.”

  Larry entered and glanced around curiously, the room looked like a simple dorm, a bed stood against the middle of the left wall, the right side had a simple office desk and a wardrobe built into its wall, and a large window was on the opposite side of the door. The right side had another door, probably a bathroom of some sort. It was very simply designed, but even in its simplicity, it didn’t look cheap.

  While Larry checked the nooks and crannies of their room, Valerie started a call on her mobile phone.

  “Hello, Maxine? Yeah, it's me. Yeah. I’m doing alright, still concerned for Dad, he’s still out after the operation. How is the search in Mt. Silver going? Did you find anything yet? Yeah? Yeah? Mhm.” Larry listened to her call, unable to hear the other side completely over the phone's dinky earpiece, the only thing he could make out was a muddled incoherent muttering from the speaker.

  After the pleasantries, they began to talk seriously, “Um, you heard about that Pokemon I caught? Yeah, a Larvitar. Thanks. Yeah.” Valerie had a conflicted look on her face, but she continued anyway, “Ok, look, I think he might have something to do with the situation.” The voice on the other became hurried, “Can you- Wait, let me finish. Can you help us get inside the cave? Larvitar wants back inside there for some reason.”

  Larry started to sweat a bit at the girl's utter earnestness, ‘If that was me, I’d have just kept my mouth shut. What does she get out of this?’

  The other side of the phone went quiet for a moment, before it came back, “Yeah? Yeah? Ok? Mhm. I can do that, but what about Larvitar? Let me ask him.”

  She covered the phone's microphone with her hand and turned down to Larry, “The rangers and police want to meet you,” She sighed out, “they probably want to ask you some questions too. Are you alright with that?”

  ‘From the way she’d just ranted to me about the way the police had treated her, I don’t really want to. But I do still need to see what happened to Mom in the end, I have a promise…’ Larry nodded back, unsure of how exactly else he’d be able to get there. Before she could turn back to the phone, Larry also motioned to his ear, urging her to put it onto speaker.

  “Huh?” The girl looked between him and the phone curiously, before she blushed as she realized what he meant, “Oh yeah, you probably want to hear too. Sorry, I am kind of out of it.”

  She quickly turned the phone to speakerphone before she continued, “He agreed.”

  The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

  “Great, so we’ll get a ranger over to the center and he’ll fly you two over here. Before you go in we’ll let one of the police over here interview your Pokemon, the place is swarming with them right now. After that, we can go ahead and check the inside of Mt. Silver far more efficiently with a local resident around.”

  The girl's haggard looks grew into a smile as she realized something, “Does that mean I would get another day as a ranger then?”

  Maxie on the other side of the phone laughed, “Haha, a day as a ranger? You’re a Pokemon trainer now, aren’t you? The police gave you your license and everything, so I don’t think you need that anymore. Now the only thing you’ll need is to go do your circuit. Congrats, by the way.”

  Valerie stopped in her tracks and eyed Larry as he stood on the ground next to her, “Oh yeah. I guess you’re right, thanks. Sorry Maxie, I haven’t slept yet.”

  “Huh, how long have you been awake then?”

  “About 50 hours soon, I think. Couldn’t sleep the night before I went to the ranger station.” Valerie replied sheepishly.

  “What the-!” Maxie balked, “Girl, go to sleep! We can talk about this later!”

  “Yeah, sorry. I kind of owed this to Larvitar though… I’ll get some sleep now though.”

  “Goodnight, Val! And send a get well soon from me to your dad when he wakes up!”

  “I will, night.” Valerie hung up on the device and practically fell backward into bed. Larry wanted to remind her to change out of the dirty clothes, but she was already asleep, ‘Wow, she’s out like a light. I don’t think I could go to sleep that quickly.’

  He prodded at her feet, which still hung down from the bed, but the girl was absolutely conked out, ‘Well, I had a good night's rest. I guess I’ll look around a bit and then sleep some more as well.’

  Larry checked the room for any hidden secrets or other noteworthy things but found absolutely nothing in his search. The girl's story of only being transported to the center just half a day or so beforehand definitely checked out, if her haggard looks and drowsy disposition hadn’t been trustworthy enough for Larry.

  Eyeing his trainer, Larry stewed in his thoughts for a moment, ‘Valerie doesn’t seem that untrustworthy, though she doesn’t seem to see me as much as anything other than a Pokemon she accidentally caught.’ The entire situation was a bit of a mess, the girl's father was still not awake after a life-saving operation and the girl itself had the responsibility of an entire second living being in her possession under her. Even sleep-deprived and almost delirious the girl had still kept up a facade of normalcy, he had to commend her for that.

  ‘Guess I’ll let her have her sleep for now.’ Valerie had turned in her sleep, somehow managing to spin herself up in the blanket while lying the wrong way on the bed. Her legs still hung off of the side, so Larry snuck up close and undid the girl's laces to remove her dirty shoes.

  He set them down in a tray near the door, ‘A little thank you for saving my life.’

  He made himself comfortable on the ground, pulling one of the head pillows off the bed since Valerie wasn’t using them anyway, and then laid down on top of it. Even with his naps from before, sleep got to him quickly enough.

  …

  In the end, Larry didn’t sleep for long, he woke up in the morning refreshed and did some simple Type-Energy exercises. He coursed the energies inside him throughout his body and felt himself become invigorated, the exercises woke him up and got him energized for the day. Unfortunately for Larry, there was nothing in here to get energized about.

  The room didn’t have a television and the most interesting thing in the room was the window, which unfortunately for Larry was too far up for him to get a good look out of.

  In his curiosity, Larry rolled the office chair away from its desk and rolled it to the window, all as quiet as he could, not wanting to wake Valerie.

  “Hnngh!” It was a hard climb for him, but in the end, he managed to get on top of the chair.

  Outside of the window, human civilization stared back at Larry. An asphalt street ran in a straight line toward the horizon on the left and right, and a few simple houses and concrete buildings stood along the street near the Pokecenter. To the right, was a large brick building behind which a large mountain curved upwards.

  Just straight forwards, a simple brick gatehouse stood, beyond which was a downhill section on which a few small houses were built. Beyond the houses, in the distance, the ocean could be seen just at the edge of the horizon.

  ‘Woah!’ Larry stared in wide-eyed awe at his first view of human civilization, ‘That red building with the mountain behind it… Is that the league reception? Valerie told me we were still somewhat near Mt. Silver so it’s gotta be, right?’

  Larry enjoyed the view, watching as humans and Pokemon lingered in the streets or walked from building to building with purpose. He almost slipped off of his seat when a trainer on a gigantic Pigeotto shot past his window and landed in front of the Pokemon Center with grace he never expected himself to be able to replicate.

  He had been living in this world for something close to a month soon and only now, staring out of the window of a Pokemon Center did the amazing adventure he’d just gone on begin to sink in. He’d been literally reborn, learned to live as a Pokemon, managed to find new friends and family in his second life, and then promptly lost those connections. Yet, even in his misfortune, he’d managed to be saved and found an entirely new side of this world.

  Sure, he could be a negative Nancy and talk about being ‘enslaved by the horrible humans’ but the more time Larry spent with Valerie, the more he realized the two of them weren’t a prisoner and captor, but more acquaintances by circumstance. From the way she talked about him, Valerie didn’t want anything more to do with him than he did with her. It felt weird in its own way, the girl was nice to be around, but she had seemingly put up a wall between the two of them, not wanting to get attached because she felt like she had stolen his former life from him and needed to get him back to his old life.

  Valerie started to slowly stir awake around 10 hours later, in the middle of the day. “Mmm… Gmmrning…” Looking more like a zombie, she gave a greeting that sounded more like a grunt of exertion than actual words as she stumbled into the bathroom, not even sparing him a glance.

  Larry hopped off of the office chair with finesse, ‘Let’s see what this day has to offer.’