The snowstorm continued for another three days, much to my companions’ displeasure. They were eager and raring to go, but while the Rangers couldn’t technically stop us from leaving the cabin, they made it very clear that if we were to go out and get trapped again there would be consequences.

  Despite their dissatisfaction, I enjoyed the conversation and warmth of their fireplace.

  We were even joined by a couple other travellers that the Rangers rescued, thankfully it seemed like not many people were being trapped in the snow.

  While Ted, Lucas, and Kevin all fretted about the time schedules and itineraries, I sat down with the Rangers and talked with them, getting to know more about their life here out in the wilderness.

  “It’s not that bad.” Mulligan said one night. “We normally have shifts of about three to four months where we’re out in the wild, and when that’s done we rotate back to one of the cities to enjoy civilization again.”

  “Some people who are really out in the wilderness stay out there for half-a-year.” Sayla said. “But they’re the exceptions.”

  “What made you want to become a Ranger?” I asked after taking a sip of peppermint flavored hot chocolate.

  Sayla hummed thoughtfully.

  “My dad was one. He always talked about how much he loved the Rangers and what they did for people, so when I was old enough, I decided to volunteer as a Junior Ranger.”

  “A what?”

  “It’s like an after-school club for people who want to get out into nature.” She explained. “You learn how to tie knots, start campfires, identify plants and Pokémon, that kind of thing.”

  Oh, like Boy Scouts.

  “Well, it turned out that I took really well to the lessons, so once I graduated from high school, I applied to Ranger school.” Sayla shrugged. “They said yes, and that’s that.”

  I turned expectant eyes onto Mulligan, and he sighed.

  “Not much different here for me. Was a Junior Ranger in middle school, but I stopped going once I got to high school. Once I got out of school I went on a Journey, but only got three Badges before I stopped.”

  “Why did you, if you don’t mind me asking?”

  He let out another, heavier sigh, but Sayla elbowed him in the side.

  “Honestly? I got tired of it.”

  “He’s just lazy.”

  “No! Well, yes, but that’s besides the point. I just got tired of constantly moving from one place to the other without getting a chance to stop and take a breath. Some people are built for that kind of life, like your companions over there.”

  I turned to see Kevin, Lucas, and Ted huddled over a map.

  “But me? Nah. I was too used to sleeping in, taking it easy, and enjoying food that wasn’t travel rations. So I stopped on my journey and bummed around my parent’s house for a couple of years, working odd jobs.”

  “What changed?”

  Mulligan scratched the back of his head.

  “I won a scratch-off ticket, and my parents had always wanted to visit Sinnoh. They’d put up with me for a couple of years, so I figured I’d pay them back. Well, we came up here, and we had a great time. They’re over there talking about retiring, and how Sinnoh would be a nice change of pace from Hoenn, but I could tell they were hesitating because of me. Because I didn’t have a job. So, I looked around, and the Sinnoh Rangers were looking for more people.”

  “They’re always looking for more people.”

  “Not the point Sayla. Anyways, I figured “well, it’s the least I can do for my mom and dad,” so I applied. Didn’t even think I’d get in, but for some reason they decided I would be a good fit.”

  He shrugged. “Four years later, and here I am. Unable to sleep in, and more than half the time I end up eating trail rations anyways.”

  “What do your parents think?”

  “Oh they love it. They’re over in Sunnyshore, enjoying the beach in their retirement while I sit here and freeze in the cold.”

  “You love it, don’t deny it.”

  “I am going to deny it!”

  Sayla and Mulligan began squabbling, something they did often but it was always light-hearted, and I leaned back and thought.

  What am I going to do after my Journey?

  It had been on my mind more and more as we were forced to stay in the Ranger cabin. Without the constant momentum, I was starting to question what it was I actually wanted.

  Most people never finished their Journeys. They got a few badges, then called it quits and went to college, or got a job.

  But I had no work history, no education history, I only began existing in this world earlier this year.

  Could I even get a job? Who would hire me?

  I could keep travelling, get my Badges and use them as a passport to travel overseas. It was a tempting option, but I wouldn’t be able to keep it up forever. Even with all of the money I had gotten, it wouldn’t last forever, especially if I was moving from country to country.

  Keeping up a full team of six Pokémon would be tough on my finances as well. People like Ted could afford it because they were Lab Trainers, and could have their region’s Professor help look after their Pokémon, but they were likewise required to produce results.

  Ted was working on finding rare Pokémon and their habitats in coordination with Professor Birch; he had come to Sinnoh to begin with because somebody had found a Hisuian Sneasel egg. Switchback had been the driving factor for him to come here, and when Ted wasn’t training, he was writing field reports for Birch to publish.

  The discovery process had stalled out for him with the Grand Underground being restricted, which allowed him to focus on challenging the Gym circuit.

  Professor Rowan had assured me that my contributions regarding the history of Hisui and its Pokémon would be more than enough to keep me employed as a Lab Trainer for a while, but I felt bad about taking the money for what was relatively little work.

  All I’d done was tell him the events of a game, after all.

  He’d done far more for me than I ever could do for him.

  Plus if I was being honest with myself… I didn’t really want to keep travelling. Oh I certainly wanted to see the world and all of the Pokémon in it, but I wanted to actually experience those places - not just spend a couple of days there while I waited for a Gym Battle before moving on.

  But what did I-

  Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.

  “Alina!” Lucas called, jolting me out of my thoughts. “Can you come help us with this?”

  I sighed, and looked at the two Rangers. “If you’ll excuse me.” I said, standing up.

  “We’re trying to figure out which Pokémon would be the best for Kevin’s team - I think that an Avalugg might be good.”

  “Please,” Ted said. “The best Ice-type is clearly Mamoswine.”

  Smiling, I sat down with them and put my thoughts on the future aside for the moment.

  They could wait until tomorrow, at the least.

  /^\

  The ringing of an alarm was what woke me up.

  “Buh.” I mumbled into my pillow. “Muh. Five more minutes.”

  Unfortunately, whatever piece of technology was chirping didn’t stop, and I fumbled at my phone, jabbing at it with my fingers.

  But it didn’t stop ringing, because it was not the device in question.

  “Lucas.” I grumbled. “Turn off your phone.”

  “It’s not mine.” He said, still sleepy.

  “Ted?”

  “Nuh.”

  I frowned. “Kevin?”

  Kevin kept snoring, but I was pretty sure it wasn’t him either.

  Groaning, I pulled myself up to where I was sitting, and looked around blearily.

  Venus yowled sleepily at me in protest, her red eyes flicking open for a moment before closing again.

  While the Ranger Cabin was decently sized, it wasn’t big enough for all of us to sleep individually, and with other travelers coming and going, the four of us were squeezed into a single room. We had cots, thankfully, but it was still pretty barebones.

  I fumbled at my pile of gear underneath my bed, looking for whatever was making that infernal beeping noise.

  I eventually found it, and stared in confusion at the small Tamagotchi-like device.

  A picture of an egg was on the 8-bit screen, rocking back and forth, and I tried to figure out what it was trying to say.

  “Oh!” It was the baby monitor I’d gotten with my egg incubator, but why was it beeping?

  “Oh. Ohhhh shit Ted wake up!”

  “Uh?”

  I fell off of my bed, banging my knee, but I completely ignored the pain as I scrambled for my backpack. It was a bit awkward, but I managed to reach in and pull the incubator out.

  Venus let out a much louder yowl as she scrambled to stay on top of the bed.

  Sure enough, there was the Larvitar egg I’d rescued from the caves on Iron Island, rocking back and forth. Tiny cracks were starting to emerge on the pebbly surface.

  “No no no,” I whispered as I started to open the glass jar. “It’s too early! I’m not ready, and it’s way too cold for you out here!”

  The egg stopped shaking for a moment, almost as if the tiny creature inside had heard me. Then it started to shake even more violently, and soon slivers of eggshell began to fall off.

  “What’s going on?” Lucas said as he stared blankly at me. “Alina?”

  “It's Larvitar!”

  “Huh?”

  He turned his gaze to the egg, which I finally managed to pull out of its incubator.

  “Oh. Oh! Oh wow! Ted, Kevin, check this out!”

  Ted finally managed to pull himself into a sitting position and put his glasses on, looking at me with blank eyes.

  “This better be good.” He grumbled.

  “Egg!” I pointed.

  “Huh?”

  “What do I do? How do I do this?”

  The light started to come into his eyes, but Lucas got to my side first. Venus poked her head over the side of the bed, looking in suspicion at the sight.

  A big crack echoed through the room, and a chunk of shell clattered to the floor. There was a soft membrane underneath it, and I could see a shape pushing against it.

  “Should I help?” My hands hovered awkwardly over the opening.

  “No.” Ted said firmly. “Not unless it looks like it’s going to be unable to get out. You gotta let it do this on its own.”

  “Okay.”

  “Breath.” Lucas said from beside me.

  “What’s going on?” A knocking came at the door, and Ranger Sayla poked her head in. “Is everything okay?”

  “Egg!”

  “Oh wow! Look at that! Is this your first one?”

  “Yes!” I squeaked.

  “What kind?” She asked casually.

  “Larvitar.” Ted answered, as I was suddenly distracted with another chunk of egg coming loose.

  “Ohhh nice, don’t see those every day.”

  The shell finally cracked all the way open, and a stubby green arm pushed through the membrane. With an opening now available, the rest of the inner lining of the egg broke away as my Larvitar poked its head out into the outside world for the first time.

  The Larvitar opened its mouth and let out the tiniest roar.

  /^\

  There were, of course, complications with the egg hatching when it did.

  Like evolutions, it was preferred for a Trainer to be at a Pokémon Center when it hatched, just to make sure that everything went well.

  Just like evolutions, the likelihood of an egg hatching out in the wilderness was far greater than hatching in a city or town with an easily accessible Pokémon Center. It was still preferred to get the newly hatched Pokémon to a Center as soon as possible.

  Considering we were in the middle of a snowstorm, the fact that we were in a Ranger cabin was probably the next-best thing.

  The biggest issue that I had run into with my little Larvitar was the issue of food. Not any kind of actual food, between the supplies I had stocked up on and the surprisingly large stores of preserved food the Rangers kept on hand we had more than enough to keep a newly hatched Pokémon fed.

  No, the problem was the fact that this was a Larvitar.

  A freshly-hatched Larvitar was, as I soon found out, surprisingly light. Back in my old world there had always been jokes about how the anime characters were able to carry around a 160 pound Pokémon like it weighed nothing. But my little yet-to-be-named Larvitar wasn’t nearly so heavy.

  The reason was simple. Larvitar were supposed to be born underground, like how I had found mine in an abandoned mine, and then they would eat their way to the surface, consuming vast quantities of dirt and stone in the process. Once it had eaten enough - usually long after they had actually reached the surface, the Larvitar would then use the trace amounts of usable minerals in its diet to evolve into a Pupitar.

  But we were notably not underground, and my little Larvitar was hungry for more than just Poké Chow and Poffins.

  “Oof!” I grunted as I dug the shovel into the frozen earth, prying up more of the soil and tossing it onto the small pile by the Larvitar.

  She chirped happily, and grabbed another handful of dirt to stuff in her mouth.

  I stopped for a moment, wiping the sweat off of my brow. Snow was still coming down around me, but I had taken off all of my winter clothing except for a t-shirt. Wearing too many layers could actually kill in conditions like these if somebody was doing heavy labor - the sweat would soak into the fabric and when the cold winds came, the wet fabric would rapidly become dangerous.

  Kōjin was dozing nearby; when the snow piled up too much I would ask him to burn it away.

  “There’s got to be a better way to do this.” Kevin said from a fallen log nearby.

  “Do you have any ideas?” I panted. “Ranger Mulligan’s away with his Mamoswine, so we can’t get him to dig a bunch up. Ranger Sayla doesn’t have any Ground- or Rock-types, nor does anybody else in the cabin.”

  He frowned, but tilted his head in acknowledgement. “Fine. I guess. What are you even going to name it?”

  I sighed, leaning on the shovel as I took a little break.

  “Her.”

  “What?”

  “What am I going to name her.”

  “Oh. Sorry, I didn’t know you’d figured out her gender.”

  I shrugged. “Apparently the females have a more pronounced curve to the horn on their head.”

  Kevin squinted and cocked his head, staring at Larvitar.

  She noticed Kevin’s gaze and stared back, before putting another handful of dirt into her mouth.

  “I don’t see it.”

  “To be honest, neither do I. But that’s what the book says, so…” I shrugged again. “ Honestly, I’m torn on the name. I was thinking Godzilla or Gojira, but that’s a little on the nose.”

  “What?”

  “The originals were gender-neutral, you know.”

  He floundered. “What does that even mean?”

  “Then I was thinking Rex, but that’s the male form. Regina could work, but then I’d just think of Regina George.”

  Kevin stared at me as if I had two heads. “Are you okay? You’re not suffering from hypothermia are you?”

  “Tyra?”

  The Larvitar kept eating.

  “I could always shorten it… Goji? Jira?”

  At that my Larvitar stopped eating, looking up at me.

  “Oh? You like that? Jira?”

  Jira let out a tiny roar again, and the biggest smile crossed my face.

  “Seriously Alina, are you okay? What are you even talking about? Should I get the Rangers?”