Note: I suppose I forgot in the first and second one, but I wanna thank Celebi for giving me the idea for this story, whether intentionally or not ^_^

My school is a half-hour walk from my house at the very most, so I usually walk home every day. As the bell rang, signalling it was time to go, everyone bolted from their seats, not even stopping to say good afternoon to Mr Vaughan. I crouched at the bag rack, packing my homework and chattering with the other girls. Negin, a girl who usually places her bag next to mine, said excitedly, “I can’t believe it! Who’d of thought they were real!”

“Yeah,” I replied with a smile, “Let alone that year six will just be a trip around Australia!”

I removed my mobile-phone from my bag, put it in my pocket, and began the not-so-long journey home.

I was there by twenty past three. I messaged Mum to let her know, grabbed a few cookies and an apple for afternoon tea, and retreated to my room to do my homework. The Treecko was asleep in my bed, with the bottle of lemonade in its forepaw and the bowl of Nutri-Grain sitting empty on the floor. I smiled and took out my homework-book.

As time went by, the Treecko began to regain its strength. By late December, just after Christmas, we were good friends. It was restored to full health by then. And, much to my delight, on Christmas day, I caught it! That was the best Christmas gift of all. By my eleventh birthday on the tenth of January, it was quite strong. However, one thing still worried me. Where was Kate? During the earlier bits of the year, there had been rumours that she had been moving back to Western Australia, but I had come to disbelieve these because, if they were true, her parents were being very passive about it. Now, though, it seemed more than likely.

Finally, after much anticipation, the day came. My alarm went off at 6:15 as usual, and I staggered out of bed, yawning, as usual. I released Treecko, said good morning rather groggily and gave it its daily bowl of Nutri-Grain and its drink of lemonade, just in case. I woke my dad up, got dressed in a pair of bike shorts and a dark brown t-shirt which read in bright pink letters: ‘GIVE ME CHOCOLATE NOW!’ and left at 7:30. Treecko and I spent fifteen minutes training and practising attacks around the other kids til Steph arrived. “Hi!” she said brightly. Unlike me, she looked completely refreshed and ready to go, wearing a clean white pleated skirt and a yellow t-shirt. I laughed.

“Steph, I can assure you that that skirt won’t be white tonight when we go to sleep.”

“You’re probably right,” she shrugged. “My mum made me wear these.”

“Ohhh. Hey what kind of Pokemon did you catch?” I said eagerly.

“I found it in my backyard. Liklik, go!” She threw a pokeball and released a Lickitung. “Pretty cool, huh?”

“Yeah!”

“Wanna battle? We’ve got fifteen minutes, that should be enough.”

“Okay! Go, Treecko!” I pointed at the battle arena and Treecko jumped in.

“Liklik, go! Use supersonic!”

“Cover your ears, Treecko!” Treecko covered its ears; however, its knees began to buckle. “Hang in there, little pal!” I called. “Use quick attack!”

The attack was so fast Lickitung barely had time to react and, even though Treecko was less than half his size, the attack inflicted quite a lot of damage. Stephanie took the opportunity to use lick, which didn’t seem to inflict much damage but Treecko looked severely grossed out. We continued in this way for a few minutes, with Pokemon dodging and attacking but not so hard that they fainted. Finally Mr Vaughan, some other teachers from other schools, and the head of Education Queensland, arrived at 8:00 sharp. Mr Vaughan gathered up all the students from our school and hurriedly went over the rules again with us. It was interesting to see what other people had caught. Jacob, for example, had looked long and hard and found a Magikarp. At this I laughed hysterically; it was nice to know my worst enemy would have a difficult journey. I also felt sorry for the Magikarp itself. Rowena, a very pretty Sri Lankan girl with a good attitude, had caught a cute Caterpie, Josh had obviously gone for the toughest-looking Pokemon he could find and ended up with an Onix, and Meg had caught an adorable-looking Smoochum. Personally I thought my Treecko topped them all. Finally Mr Vaughan finished. “Okay guys,” he concluded. “Go for it!”