MID: So I was thinking how much I fucking hate Cianwood.

LAKE: Come to Olivine. We have beaches.

MID: You do realize the majority of Cianwood is beach

LAKE: XD I know.

LAKE: But seriously

LAKE: I'm thinking of moving out of my Dad's place.

MID: Is that a hint?

LAKE: I'm probably going to need a roommate, and you said you wanted to work somewhere where you have plenty of opportunity to work on you comic book.

MID: it's a graphic novel

LAKE: Sure.

LAKE: But I heard there was a daycare center hiring near Goldenrod.

LAKE: You in?

MID: hell yes.

"He had better not have missed the boat."

Lake paced back and forth across the dock, her footsteps loud on the wooden planks below. An apathetic looking Vulpix yawned and scowled as he watched his trainer oscillate in front of him.

"I mean, what if he forgot he was coming today?"

"Vul."

"But what if his alarm didn't go off? Or his Riolu didn't wake him?"

"Vul."

"But what if –"

"Vul."

"Is that really all you have to say?!"

The fire fox's ear twitched and his tails swished with irritation. "Vul, vul pix!"

The brunette sighed and flopped down beside her Pokémon. "I know, I know… Sorry, Renard."

Renard made a sound similar to a tsk and turned his head away towards the bay. His ears pricked up suddenly and he leapt to his feet. "Pix!"

Lake looked up in time to see a ferry disappear behind the dock house. She pushed herself up and brushed the bits of salt and sand from her hands and pants. She was grinning widely as she pushed her lilac framed glasses higher up the bridge of her nose. "This is so exciting! Are you excited, Renard?"

The fox bit the inside of his cheek and turned his nose up in the other direction. Lake rolled her eyes at him. "You're never excited. I don't even know why I bothered asking you."

The door of the dock house opened, startling a few Wingull into flight. One by one, passengers began pouring out onto the dock. A few would stop to release a Pokémon or two from their poke balls before traveling down the dock towards the shore.

"Ra!" A Riolu leapt out through the door, turning back to wait for its trainer. A tall, lanky man followed, chuckling down at his Pokémon. "I'm coming, Cain, chill out." He readjusted the bag on his shoulder and began scanning the dock. Lake waved to draw his attention. The Riolu ran forward in excitement, agilely dodging through the crowd of trainers. He pounced towards the brunette, who threw her arms open and clumsily caught him, losing her balance and stumbling back. She chuckled. "Hello, Cain. It's nice to meet you too." She hugged the Pokémon close.

"Rio! Ri, Rio!" The fighting type grinned ear-to-ear as he jumped back down to the dock and scampered to his master's side.

He was a bit different than she had expected him to look. His skin clung tightly to his bones, which made it difficult to determine which dark patches were facial hair and which were shadows from his gauntness. His kipsie hat cast an even darker shadow over his dark eyes, which hid behind black framed glasses. Combined with the long coat he wore, he could only be described as 'sketchy as fuck'. "You're Lake, I take it?"

The girl nodded. "And you're Mid, I take it?"

"Chris, actually."

"Nope, you're Mid."

He laughed. "Fine. Shall we go?"

"This isn't what they advertised."

The daycare center was in fact not what had been advertised in the hiring message. The house was in shambles; a few windows were cracked or completely broken, while the rest were covered in a layer of dust, and a few of the wooden shutters hung loosely from their hinges. The paint on the walls and fence was patchy and peeling, appearing in some places to have been clawed off by a raging Pokémon. The roof was similarly patchy, with shingles missing and scattered around the yard. The entire plot of land on which the center resided was overgrown with shrubs, trees and grass, and vines engulfed a quarter of the house. Sitting out front was a For Sale sign, which looked as filthy and withered as the house itself.

Mid let out a long sigh through clenched teeth as he dropped his bag to his feet to scratch the sweat from the back of his neck. "Well fuck."

"Riii…" The Riolu surveyed the area with as much disappointment as his master.

Lake dropped her bag and marched up to the front door, grasping the handle and pulling. The hinges creaked and hesitated before the door finally surrendered to an irritated yank, scooting open loudly. She wedged herself between the door and its frame and pushed it all the way open. "Whelp, looks like we need to fix the door…" she said as she dusted her hands clean.

"You can't seriously be considering buy this place still," Mid said. "I mean, just look!" He gave the mailbox by which he stood a gently push, and it toppled over. "This place isn't even safe!"

"It just needs a bit of work, is all. Come on, Me-man, where's your sense of adventure?"

He pointed down at the mailbox he had just broken. "Right fucking there!"

Lake rolled her eyes and turned to enter the house. The inside was dark and gloomy; luminous specks of dust floated in large clouds through what little light passed managed to infiltrate the nearly opaque windows. The paint peeled on the inside just as badly as it did on the exterior. Lake took a step forward, but then hesitated with a shudder and reached for the poke ball in her belt pouch. Her Noctowl appeared before her from a beam of red light. "Orilly, check for ghosts, please."

"Hoo!" The owl Pokémon's eyes began to glow and she took off, circling around the main room and disappearing down the halls. She returned shortly afterwards and with a hoot landed and began preening her feathers.

The brunette leaned back to shout out the door only to notice that Mid had taken their bags up to the porch and was standing about a foot behind her. "Fuck, don't scare me like that."

"Sorry, shoulda said something, I guess."

"Well, the good news is, no ghosts."

Mid took off his hat to ruffle his long unruly hair. "Well thank Arceus for that! That was my biggest fear."

Lake glared at him, unamused, until he just scoffed. "You know what I mean. Look, the inside looks just as shitty as the outside. How the fuck are we supposed to fix this place up?"

Lake noticed a light switch by the door, and she flicked it on. The lights flickered before the fluorescents finally kicked in, lighting up the entire room. "Look, the lights still work!"

"Lake, are you even listening to me?"

She began to investigate the room, followed closely by her Vulpix. Mid stood in the doorway, glaring into the room with disgust as his Riolu ran past him to help the girl. The front of the room contained a desk and a few tables, but down the hall into the back was the main part of the house. A couch, recliner, and a couple of cupboards were covered in sheets in what appeared to be the living room, and in the kitchen a few pots and pans hung above a dusty stove. Within the bedroom (there was only one), the queen sized bed consisted of only a mattress and a frame, and the dresser was covered with a sheet just as the furniture in the living room had been.

"Only one bed," Lake said, frowning. "Guess we gotta share it then."

"Not that I'm complaining about having the opportunity to sleep with you or anything, but this seriously can't work."

"Mid." The shorter trainer turned and sat down on the bed, looking up at her friend. "Just look around. Yeah, sure this place needs some work." A scoff from the man made her pause to let out a sigh. "Okay, okay, a lot of work. But just look. We basically have everything we need to live. I'm sure the owner will lend us some tools; he seems like a nice enough guy. Plus we have our Pokémon to help us out."

"What the hell are a Riolu, a Larvitar, a Shuckle, a Noctowl and a Vulpix going to do?!"

Renard growl and shot an ember up in the air in Mid's direction. "Renard, don't do that!" his trainer scolded. The fox suppressed a growl before curling up and scowling down at his feet.

Mid sighed. "Okay… Just… How much do you think it will cost to fix this place?"

Lake bit her lip. "I dunno. It might be expensive." Seeing that her partner was about to protest, she hastily added, "But all new business ventures are!" He looked very unconvinced. "Pleeeeease? What if I promise to reimburse your investment in case of failure?"

Mid crossed his arms and stared down at the girl, trying to determine how seriously she was. After a few moments, he sighed. "We'd better call the owner then…"

"YES! Thank you, Me-man!" Lake leapt from the bed and threw her arms around him, hugging him tightly and nuzzling against his chest. He rolled his eyes and patted her head. "But remember, you have to clean it, and walk it, and feed it, and—" He was cut off by the sound of shattering glass coming from the front of the house. Lake looked down to summon her Vulpix but was surprised to see that Renard was no longer there.

"The hell was that?" Mid walked briskly out of the room, followed by Lake and Cain. In the foyer they found one of the windows shattered, a bit of purple bolts of energy dancing across the jagged edges of glass. "Orilly, what happened?!" There was a hoot from behind them, proving that the owl Pokémon had been in the back room the entire time. Lake ran through the front door in time to see her Vulpix shooting a spray of embers towards the fence. They landed just short of fence, setting the grass ablaze. Lake sprinted over to the flames and stamped them out before they spread. "Dammit, Renard, what the hell is your problem?!"

The fire fox snarled into the shrubbery on the other side of the fence, his mouth glowing from another ember heating up. Lake scooped up her Pokémon and hugged him close. "What's gotten into you?" He growled for a bit, but eventually his anger subsided to a simmering glare.

Mid ran down from the porch. "Just got off the phone with Mr. Gold. He's on his way." He turned to look at the charred patch of grass and the furious Vulpix. "The hell happened here?"

"I dunno. Renard just flipped out. I thought maybe Orilly had broken the window with a shadow ball, but—"

"Orilly was in the back. I let her out when you went into the bedroom."

"I know." She held her Pokémon close to her, staring off in the direction Renard had raged. There were a few moments of silence before Mid placed his hand on her shoulder, startling her out of her daze. "Are you sure you still want to buy this place?"

Lake stared up at him, chewing on her lip as she pondered that thought. Finally, she smiled and nodded.

"And you're all set," Mr. Gold said as he stacked his papers flush. "I really appreciate you guys picking this place up so quickly. Ever since Grandma passed, Granddad has been… well, pretty bad. He closed down the daycare, and just completely let this place go."

"It's ok. When we saw your ad, we expected it to be functioning, though." Lake shifted nervously. "We were surprised to find it… neglected…"

"Ah, yes… sorry about that…"

Mid cleared his throat, scratching his face. "Just one thing. Earlier today, the house was attacked by a Pokémon."

"Oh? What kind?"

"Well, we don't know," Lake explained. "We were in the back when we heard a crash, and when we got back, the window was broken. My Noctowl knows shadow ball, so I know what that looks like."

Mr. Gold ran his fingers through his black hair. "Granddad never had a Pokémon like that, as far as I know. It might be a straggler Pokémon that has made its home here while the house was empty. Which reminds me—" he went to a green truck in which he had arrived and popped open the trunk. He withdrew a large glass container and set it down to collect another. Inside both sat an egg, one cream colored with rosy spots, the other a cloudy grey. "Shortly after Granddad died, I came here to make sure everything was ok. When I checked the egg infirmary, there were a bunch of spoiled Pokémon eggs. These were the only two that survived." He smiled apologetically. "I'm often busy with work, so I don't have the time to raise a couple babies. I figured you two would make better use out of them."

Lake took the container housing the spotted egg from the man, holding it close to her chest and observing its fragile contents. "What will it hatch into?"

"I believe these two came from a trainer who was visiting from Hoenn. I had contacted him to see if he wanted them, but he didn't seem to care either way. If I'm not mistaken…" he picked up the container with the grey egg. "Ah, yes. This is a Castform, I believe." He nodded in Lake's direction. "That should be a Spinda."

Lake's hazel eyes lit up in excitement. "A Spinda?! I love Spinda!" She smiled and nuzzled the glass dome. "Ahh, I wonder what it will look like… Will it have a mask of spots or maybe a heart on its forehead…"

Mid chuckled. "I would love to have a Castform, to be honest. They're cute, and having a Pokémon that can affect the weather would be useful."

Mr. Gold smiled and passed the egg chamber over to Mid. "Thank you so much for taking them. It was really devastating when I saw that so many eggs had rotted…" He turned away, a forlorn look on his face. Lake and Mid shared an uncomfortable look. The man coughed, and smiled apologetically again. "Well, that should be it. If you need any other help, you have my number. Just be sure to give me some time, since I'll be travelling from New Bark."

"We will," Lake said with a grin, resting her chin on top of dome of the egg chamber.

"Yeah, and thanks again," Mid said with a nod.

They waved goodbye to Mr. Gold as he climbed into his truck and drove away down route 34. When he was out of sight, Mid sighed. "I can't believe you talked me into this."

"Aww, c'mon. It'll be worth it."

"For you, maybe. How the hell am I supposed to work on my novel if I'm constantly busy with this dump?"

Lake surveyed the area with a quick glance. "Meh. It should be fine. It'll be a lot of work at first, but once it's fixed up, you can work desk duty and I'll take care of the Pokémon. Then you'll have plenty of time!"

Mid sighed again. "Fine. But what now?"

Lake smiled. "Now we get to work!"