This is my first attempt at seriously writing a furry-themed work. I'd appreciate any constructive criticisms or comments that any of you might have.

My burners flared as I whirled, flames trailing and gathering around my body in a small flame wheel. I grinned through the heat distorted air as the Espeon hurriedly broke off from her quick attack, veering off to the side to avoid my blaze. My paws skid on the gritty soil of the forest clearing as I rotated to face her, releasing a burst of fire from my lower burners, controlling the ember as it sped through the air after her. The lavender cat was just turning to confront me again at the base of a tree when she got a face full of fire, coughing through the smoke.

“Katsumi, swift!” The order cut through the clear, chilly morning air from the determined looking human girl standing tensely off to the side of the forest hollow. I winced, knowing that the attack was unavoidable. There was nothing I could do about it, so I just charged at the Espeon, Katsumi, as the starbursts of energy formed around her and shot towards me.

As I sped towards her in my own quick attack a flash of inspiration struck me. Just before the energy sparks struck me I twisted my body in a defensive curl so that the attack hit my tougher back coat. Before the pain had a chance to register, I flared my burners again, using the momentum from my twist and defense curl to quickly change my attack into a full-fledged flame wheel, barreling towards the surprised cat.

I faintly heard Katsumi’s trainer cry out a panicked order, but it was too late for the Espeon to do anything as I struck her mid-body. We tumbled together in a sandy mess of fire, singed fur and confusion across the clearing again. I quickly regained my feet and turned to try to catch Katsumi in my sights again. Suddenly, a debilitating and nauseating feeling crashed into my brain as I stumbled, sprawling onto the mercifully soft sand as the confusion attack struck me. Disoriented, I struggled to my feet, managing to turn around only to find the cat streaking towards me in yet another quick attack.

In my disordered mental state, I couldn’t organize my limbs and reflexes fast enough to ward her off with another flame wheel. At the last moment, I tried the throw a discouraging ember at her from the burners on my head. I had barely started to project the blaze when she crashed into me, my lowered head taking the brunt of the impact.

“Again Katsumi! Confusion!” the trainer shouted. The clarity of her voice shook my out of my bewilderment as I got to my feet again. This time, I was ready, and I raised my mental defenses before Katsumi’s attack could penetrate my mind again. I still had a trick or two that the trainer didn’t know of. The mental assault still hurt like a spiteful migraine, but it wasn’t nearly as bad as the one before.

Before the attack had even ended, I was rushing her again. A pulse of heat passed over me as I ran, all of my burners flaring, sending a powerful, roaring ember shooting towards Katsumi. Her attacks had drained me, and I was tired, but I wasn’t going to let the trainer win so easily, if at all. It wouldn’t do to leave her unimpressed, after all. The Espeon was still recovering from her mental projection and didn’t have time to snap back to reality, taking the burst of flame full on.

I wasn’t going to stop now. Pressing my temporary advantage, I hit her with a tackle and grabbed onto her, forcing her into a roll as I called upon my fire and turned our melee into a flaming ball. I was tired, but after my last assault, she would be too. Before we disengaged from each other, I flared my burners in an intense, oxygen consuming inferno. Without enough air to feed my flames, they quickly died out again, but not before a haze of smoke filled the area. Under the advantage of the smokescreen, I crept away, leaving Katsumi lost and bewildered in the thick haze.

I could have continued pressing, but the truth was that I was exhausted. The last series of attack was tiring on its own, and coupled with my injuries from Katsumi’s attacks, I could use the rest. Panting heavily, I disappeared behind a tree, where neither the trainer of Katsumi could see me. Quickly, I took stock of my situation. Despite the ferocity of her assaults, I wasn’t badly injured. Her more powerful attacks had been mental, and while draining, they didn’t leave me physically disadvantaged.

The smokescreen was clearing rapidly. Knowing that I should take the opportunity it presented me, I gathered my strength. I was too tired to build up the speed for a quick attack, but a tackle would do fine. Locating lavender fur near the middle of the clearing, I ran at her, intending to slam her while she was still wondering where I was.

Before I had even gotten close though, the trainer’s voice rang out. “Katsumi, behind you. Confusion!” The Espeon turned and her eerie white pupils glowed with psychic energy as the attack crashed down onto me. My assault quickly broke off as I tripped and sprawled down on the ground. In that moment though, I could see the damage I had done. Katsumi’s fur was burnt in several places, and she was scraped and bruised from our multiple encounters. I wasn’t any better off. If anything, I was worse. The last mental barrage had cost me dearly. I smiled grimly, as I struggled to my feet again. She was close to losing. I could feel it.

I wasn’t done yet. I managed to come to all fours, turning my head and leering dangerously at Katsumi. Her head snapped to look at me in inadvertent fear as her eyes widened, feeling the force of my glare. I still had my surprises, and I intended to take advantage of her shock. But before I could prepare my next blitz, a distinctive shape hit my back and the world flashed white as I felt space distort in a familiar, but long forgotten feeling. And then it was dark, the comforting void of rest and healing. But I wasn’t ready to give up yet. I wouldn’t be caught on the first pokeball the girl threw at me. That would be undignified. I called up my willpower and pushed, breaking through the artificially induced peace. I built my rage, my battle-fury, my determination into a fiery inferno, ripping apart the veils of the capsule universe I was in.

And I was back again, on the field, my legs trembling with fatigue, facing an astonished looking Espeon and an equally surprised trainer.

Any normal Pokémon would have given up. Any normal Pokémon would have surrendered to the spell of the pokeball, leaving behind the pain and the tiredness and the fight. But I was different. I would prove that I was different. I could feel the glint in my eyes. My anger was still with me, and with an awful finality. I reared up on my hind legs and cried out my challenge, feeling my burners flare with a great brilliance, a searing fire-storm. The massive ember roared past me, surely highlighting my silhouette in its intense, harsh light before it struck Katsumi, knocking her off her feet and sprawling on the forest floor. She remained, still for a second before her form ripped and dissolved, sucked back into her pokeball.

She deserved her rest. After all, she had fought well. Nobody had come so close to beating me before. Of course, this was my first time fighting against such a powerful trainer but her strength still merited respect. I, however, had business to take care of before I could have my rest. I raised my head and locked the girl-trainer in my eyes. For a moment, she seemed scared, but acted quickly, reaching into her bag and throwing another pokeball at me.

Once again, her quick thinking impressed me. But I wouldn’t be caught like that, after defeating her Espeon. The ball didn’t even seem to offer resistance as I broke through its persuasion. This close to victory, I wouldn’t even think of rest. I could see it in her eyes. She was impressed by my strength, but her admiration was overshadowed by her fear. Katsumi was her only Pokémon. Without her to protect her, she couldn’t defend herself.
She turned to run, but I reared up again and leered at her. It had the effect I wanted, the trainer freezing in her tracks, eyes wide in fear. A quick attack later and she was sent sprawling, as I stood over her.

The girl-trainer looked at me and asked in the human tongue, shakily, “What do you want? The others didn’t attack me after Katsumi lost…” She trailed off as I advanced on her, placing a paw on her belt. I turned to look into her eyes, and grinned, showing off my teeth. I lowered my nose, and her breath caught, expecting my sharp fangs to sink into her defenseless flesh. But I had no intent of hurting her. I touched my nose to the second pokeball she had attached lovingly to her belt, the one I knew she had been saving for the Cyndaquil she hoped to catch in these woods. As the world distorted and faded around me, I managed to catch a glimpse of her astonished expression. It was priceless.

One Week Earlier

The earthly smell of damp vegetation pervaded the area, hiding my scent as heavy rain poured down from the discontent sky. I ignored the unpleasant liquid trickling down my thick coat, crouching amongst the shadowed ferns and staring intently towards the miserable fire next to the road. From my higher vantage point on a crouching hill overlooking the path, I could see the distinctive silhouette of the split-tailed Espeon huddling dejectedly next to the equally sodden trainer. Dressed in the rather flimsy summer clothes of a female trainer, she clearly wasn’t expecting the sullen storm that was penetrating her thin clothing with ease. The weather changed fast in the mountains, as she now knew.

I studied the Espeon. She hadn’t noticed me yet, my psychic signature probably similar to any forest denizen hiding from the rain. If I continued trailing them for another day or so, she’d probably start wondering why a wild Pokémon was following her out of a normal territory’s range. She couldn’t know that the entire region, from the human town at the foothills to the lower reaches of the mountain could be considered mine.

This lofty valley was a haven for younger and weaker Pokémon starting out their lives. Older Pokémon usually left the region alone. They knew that the seemingly inexplicable truce was actually upheld by the considerable strength of the reclusive denizens of the chilly upper reaches of my home. As a more experienced battler I was, in a way, out of place. But I had no interest in forcefully staking out my claim on the valley. There was no challenge in it. I left the younger ones to their own affairs and in return, the lesser inhabitants didn’t enforce their boundaries on me. I had free passage throughout the region and in a roundabout way… the valley was mine.

But officially, I had my den and the unambitious territory that I had chosen. It was the only boundary that I enforced, and my neighbors were willing to respect it. They didn’t have any reason to challenge my strength, even if any could. I hadn’t chosen a prime, heavily contested territory. After all, with my unimpeded access, I wasn’t restricted to own hunting grounds. There was no need to be greedy, especially with greed likely resulting in me being smeared over the turf in a red stain by a denizen of the upper reaches upholding the truce. So unofficially, my territory was the region, as long as I respected those who officially claimed it.

When I was younger, the valley seemed to be the world. There were challengers to my territory, friends and enemies to maintain and watch. There was potential. But eventually my routines grew boring, and the potential faded as my strength grew. I knew I could leave. I was powerful enough to carve out a new territory in a more challenging region with my peers in strength. But I had no desire to climb the rungs of the societal ladder, knowing that at the top I’d find the same boredom that I had now, waiting. Also living in an unimaginatively named cave ambushing viciously powerful trainers heading towards the most viciously powerful trainers in the world had no appeal to me.

So I hadn’t left, waiting for some inspiration to come across me. I had trained myself my entire life since I had been able to battle, first against my fellow wildlings fighting for a territory, then against the fresh and green trainers out training their starters. I won, partly because I chose my battles, and eventually started fighting the slightly stronger trainers preying on the new blood. Eventually, even they didn’t present a challenge. After I evolved I travelled for a time to the cold heights of the mountain, asking for and receiving an apprenticeship under one of the peacekeepers of the region. The disturbingly powerful trainers chasing the rumors of a wild Cyndaquil also persuaded me to disappear from the area for a while. Time passed, and my mentor discharged me, telling me that it was time to figure out what it was I wanted in life before it was too late for me to take my chance.

And so I found myself here, crouching on a sodden hill watching a rather sullen duo struggle to maintain a fire on wet and green wood. Straining my ears, I could hear the girl-trainer talking glumly to the Espeon. “… no use… Why don’t you pile some wood by the fire… might dry out… go back to your ball… no threatening Pokémon”. The fragments of the one sided conversation drifted faintly to me over the dull roar of the falling rain. Clearly the girl hadn’t heard of the rather powerful Cyndaquil that previously had regularly defeated even the more powerful trainers, if she thought there weren’t any threatening Pokémon to a soft-skinned human like her. It was nice to see a trainer that was willing to save her Pokémon some misery and brave the loneliness of a stormy night alone though.

I watched the Espeon closely as some fallen debris from the storm took on a purple hue and levitated through the air towards the fire. I wasn’t interested in the special effects; they were nothing new to me. I was looking for, and found the lack of strain that indicated the Espeon was at least as powerful as I was, judging from the sizable branch bobbing comically through the air. Clearly the girl was a good trainer as well as a nice person. The Espeon was proof enough of the latter for me.
“Good job Katsumi. Return”, the trainer sighed watching the Espeon ripple and disappear into her ball. She stared at the ball for a moment, probably wishing she had a comfortable ball to disappear into as well.

With the Espeon gone, I could afford to get closer. Circling around to creep up behind her, I checked every step before committing my weight. It wouldn’t do to alert her to my presence with a snap of a broken twig. The familiar trees hid my approach. I was close now, close enough to hear the girl-trainer muttering to herself.

Pricking forward my ears, I caught the tail end of her one-sided conversation. “… miserable mountain weather. That Cyndaquil better be around”, she grumbled before sighing and sliding closer to the fire. The mention of my evolutionary species caught my attention. I was the only Cyndaquil around, before I evolved. To my knowledge I was the only one in my evolutionary chain around. And only one Cyndaquil in this region would be talked about in trainer’s circles.

So she must be here after me. Flattering, I supposed. Yet she clearly was expecting a younger version of me, less powerful and certainly not a match for her Espeon. This one would bear watching, but for now I would only watch. She would be up for a surprise when she saw me, evolved and powerful, but only in the location and time that I chose. Because she would see me, eventually. I would make certain of it.

Returning from my training up the mountain, I had revisited my old haunts, reestablished my den and territory, and quickly became bored. Without a decent challenge in the area, I had no desire to thrash children on their first training trips or even the human predators waiting for an unsuspecting greenling to drop into their line of sight. But something in me made me watch them, surveying the trainers that entered and exited the area. Perhaps something within me longed for the comfort of close company again. Perhaps…

Most of the trainers were clearly unsuitable, too fresh and inexperienced to deserve me. Some were much too powerful, just passing through the area on their lofty errands. Several were at the right stage in their training for me to be integrated into their team, but after watching them for a few days, I realized that they weren’t suitable. One trainer had all his attention taken with his team of six magnificently trained Pokémon. Another was a coordinator, and I had no desire to live a life of leisure. Some couldn’t care less about their Pokémon, seeing them as a means to an end. And others were obviously inept. For those trainers, I pitied their Pokémon, and wondered at the bonds the kept them together.

This girl… the girl-trainer. Perhaps she would be different. To have a loyal Espeon spoke for her kindness and of how well she cared for her Pokémon. And despite her unpreparedness for the mountain weather, she was managing well, managing to find the meager shelter and actually starting a fire. There would be time later to be tough with her, to see how she and her Espeon, Katsumi fared against a true challenge. Later, I would see how she coped with the harsh mountain terrain and the many faces of its weather. For now… I reached out with my flame sense towards her pitiful fire and gave it a boost, hearing the girl sigh in relief as the fire finally caught properly.

My reminiscing was interrupted by a flash of sound and noise, a dull roar after the quiet of the pokeball. The artificial smell of human metals and the distinctive sterile smell of a Pokémon center flooded my nose. I immediately felt the difference between my previously weakened state and the strength that flooded my limbs now. You couldn’t help but be impressed with human technology: I hadn’t felt so strong in years.

We were at a table in the reception hall of the Pokémon center, with seating areas for weary trainers and their Pokémon. From my distant memories I recalled that this indicated that we were in a Pokémon center situated away from a city, where trainers also required lodging for a night after days spent on a trail. I was standing on a table, with Katsumi was sitting on a human bench to my left, also recovered from her fight with me. In contrast to us, the girl was scruffy and dusty from the trail. She must have had quite a time running for the Pokémon since both Katsumi and I weren’t in any shape to battle anyone else after our battle. She was leaning against the padded back rest of her seat, tired, but obviously excited to meet the Quilava that had allowed himself to be caught after defeating her Espeon. Katsumi’s expression was curious, perhaps to meet the newcomer to her team. The girl was also curious, but happy and exhilarated at her “catch”.

So far, it seemed to be a good start. Katsumi didn’t hold anything against me from the battle, and the girl-trainer wasn’t angry at my surprise attack after the battle.

To my surprise, Katsumi initiated the conversation. “You fight well”, she acknowledged, her voice echoed by a psychic translation for the girl. “I’m Katsumi”, she said formally, before dropping the psychic translation. “But you already know that”, she added privately with a blink of amusement, letting on that she knew I had been watching them for the last few days. It also let me know that she was probably caught in the wild. Most Pokémon raised by humans from birth didn’t know that we wild Pokémon chose our trainers. A city raised Eevee would have warned the girl about me, otherwise.

As if to assert her wild upbringing, she reached her paw forward in the traditional forest greeting and placed it on the table. I reached my paw forward and placed it besides hers, leaving it there for a moment, before we both amiably withdrew. I was relieved that my impression of her being a rather friendly Espeon seemed correct, lacking the superior and jealous attitude that some of them carried. I could tell that she was trying her best to make me comfortable in the human setting with her familiar greetings. Not that it was necessary for someone like me.

Finally, the girl-trainer couldn’t seem to wait any longer, and said, “I’m Aislin”. Her voice was just as clear as it was during the battle, but it had lost the penetrating quality. Instead, it had given way to a quiet determination and, perhaps surprisingly, a subtle kindness. It was like winter’s last frost covering spring’s first flower, hiding warmth under its cold clarity. “You’ve led me on quite a chase there, but I got you eventually”, she said, smiling. Yet there was a lightly self-mocking tone to her voice that made me believe that she knew that I had “caught” her as much as she had “caught” me.

“During the battle I was wondering whether you’d be angry with me after I caught you.” I snorted derisively. The poor girl was probably pretty shocked when I beat her if she thought catching me was a foregone conclusion. “Yeah, I know,” she replied, laughing, “You weren’t quite the cute and harmless Cyndaquil I was expecting. That was quite a fight. At least I’m quite sure that you’re not angry at me though. It looked like I bit off a bit more than I could chew.”

I rose to my feet and stretched out my forelegs in an elegant imitation of a human bow. Aislin seemed taken aback by the quite human action from what appeared to be a wild Pokémon. Katsumi seemed intrigued, turning her head slightly to glance at me out of the corner of her eye. I smiled internally, making sure none of my smug delight at their surprise showed on my face. It wouldn’t do for them to know too much about me too fast. Though they had seen me battle, I still had quite a few surprises left for them.

Quite a few surprises indeed.