I wake up. "oh my gosh! I'm late for my explorer initiation test!" My brother Pyro walks in as I'm putting on my cracked goggles. "Dude, hurry." "I AM!" I snap back. ______later______ "Sorry I'm late!" I say exhausted, running into an open courtyard like area, with cadets in formation. Flame, an arcanine, and member of team dim sun walks towards me and yells, "YOU SHOULD BE SORRY, PUNK! YOU'RE REM-" He gets cut off by the team dim sun leader, Ray, who happens to be a raichu. "Flame, cut it out. He's only five minutes late, and I'm sure that this fella had a good reason." He looks at me. "What's ya name?"He says. "B- Bolt." I say nervously. Ray walks away and gets to the front of the training grounds with a chalkboard and explains the test. "You will randomly get chosen into a team. Spend an hour to get to know each other..." his face suddenly goes serious. "Or you'll regret it." He becomes cheerful again. "Anyway, there will be 10 golden rings scattered around in a dungeon. Once a team brings a ring back to me, they pass. The rest fail. Now, squad 1..." "psst! Hey dude!" I turn around to see a lucario, with a serious face. "Your aura seems strong." "What?" I say. You know that we don't pick our te-" "squad 24... Kidd the rhyperior... Raven the pidgeoto... Bolt the Jolteon... and spike the lucario" The lucario points to himself with his thumb and says, "that's me." A male rhyperior and a female pidgeoto move towards us. "Hi, i'm raven." The pidgeoto says. The rhyperior walks up close and hugs all of us. "What- *gasp* is happening?" I say getting squeezed. The rhyperior lets go. "Sorry. I just got excited. I'm Kidd." He says. I speak. "It's okay. Anyway... first we need roles. One lookout. One strategist. One powerhouse. And one-" "LEADER!" Spike interrupts. "I'M LEADER!" I sigh. "No leader. Last one is ring holder." Raven then chimes in, "I'll be strategist." Kidd flexes his muscles. "I'll be powerhouse." I look at spike. His face turns shocked. "Wait, no. I'm not being scout!" "Spike, you're a lucario. You can sense aura. Plus, ring holder will be the main target." "Fine..." he says. "Guys. We still have 50 minutes left to get ready." (Lapis's POV) "Lapis!" My brother Espeo yells from the other room. "What?!" I yell back. "Where's the instant ramen?" He asks. I say, "I ate it." "What?" "I ate it." "Wait one sec." He walks into my room as I'm writing in my ideas book. He asks, "What did you say? I couldn't hear you well from the kitchen." "I ate it." I say. "Ok. Guess we're ordering from pokedash." I hear a knock on my door. I open the door to see a vaporeon."Lapis! It's been so long!" "Hey, Sapphire!" "I heard that the senior cadets are about to do their initiation test!" "I don't know..." "come on. There might be some cute cadets." My face lights up. "Okay!" I turn on the streaming service to see teams scattered, chatting. "Oh, man. It hasn't started yet." Sapphire said. Suddenly, she starts to grin. "Let's sneak into there. It'll be fun." "W- wha?" My face is full of shock. She runs out the door with my wrist in her paw. Espeo yells to me as I struggle to stay on my feet as I'm basically being dragged, "Mexican or Chinese?!" (Bolt's pov) "Stop hugging me!" Spike exclaims as me and raven are laughing. I say "super effective!" Ray walks up to us. "Already bonding, are we?" He looks at Kidd and spike. "You know there are obstacles in the dungeon, right?" We freeze. "What?" He walks away. "Time's up!" He says at the chalkboard. _____later______ "3! 2! 1! Go!" Our team takes the middle tunnel. "This way." Spike says feeling the aura of the place. We see a mightyena. "Cadets. You need to go through me to continue." I panic. "We didn't practice any combo moves!" Kidd steps up and earthquakes the mightyena. "There." As we continue through the tunnel, another group meets us. "Get them!" A charizard yells to his team. Our team quickly beats them and makes them faint. "Okay. Let's keep going." I say. _________________ Throughout the dungeon we meet with other teams and beat them. We also get stopped a lot because of me. _________________ "We're here!" I say enthusiastically. "Took us a while. Sorry for my bladder problems, guys." Spike yells, "Look! The ring!" He walks towards it. Raven catches him by the arm, but it's too late. *trip* "owww" spike says in a net. I get him out. "Let me try." I step ahead and grab the ring. "Man. It's big enough to be a bracelet." I put it on my wrist. I'm going to treat it like one. Suddenly, I hear a rock get kicked. (Lapis's pov) "Why are we in the dungeon?" I whisper to sapphire. "Come on. It'll be fine." She says. As me and sapphire continue through one of the tunnels, we pass by a fainted team. "Somemon's been here. Let's leave." "No." Sapphire says bluntly. _____________ "Look. A team." Sapphire tells me. I look and then I see a lucario in a net, a pidgeoto with a wing on her face, a rhyperior fidgeting with his fingers, and a Jolteon. As we get closer, I accidentally kick a rock. (Bolt's pov) "Who's there?!" I say, ready to fight. 1st, a vaporeon walks out. "You don't look like you're a cadehhhhh..." my voice trails off as I see a glaceon walk from behind the boulder. I smack myself on the cheek. "My name's Sapphire and this is lapis." The vaporeon says. "We wandered in here." I sigh. "I guess we need to bring one more thing out of the dungeon safely." I then whisper to spike, "I'm freaking out so hard right now." Suddenly we hear a slam. "Hello, cutie." The charizard from earlier walks behind lapis. She doesn't move. Then, the charizard's squad walks in. "Are you ready guys?" He asks his team. I tell my teammates. "Guys, I have an idea." Spike steps forward. "How about we charge at them?" He says. "Spike, those two are in danger." The charizard then says, "give us the ring." Spike charges forward. "No!" The charizard puts his claws around lapis's neck. "Uh uh uh." The charizard says. Spike keeps charging. The charizard laughs. "Guess I need to-" "STOP!"I yell. "You and me. Right now." The charizard takes off his grip. "Okay... let's go." He starts with flamethrower. I dodge it and go for a thunder punch. He grabs it. "Wha?" He slams me to the ground. I can barely move. "Owwww." I get out of his grip and go for another thunder punch. The charizard says, "predictable." I go under his legs and put all my power into it. "Yah!" The charizard goes down. Kidd finishes off the rest of the charizard's team. "Lapis, is it, right?" (Lapis's pov) "Y- yeah." I say to the Jolteon who, now that I think about it, is very handsome. "My name's bolt."he says. Sapphire hugs me. "I'm so sorry for dragging you into this." "It's okay." I say. As we head out of the dungeon I think to myself. ^i think I like that Jolteon^ (Bolt's pov) We make it to Ray. Ray says, "Hello, bolt. I see that two new mons are with you" sapphire starts to talk. "hi, I'm sapphire and this is-" "I'm lapis." Lapis says. Ray says. "Congrats! You are the last team to make it! And since you also saved these two young ladies, you get something special!" He looks at us. Kid steps up. "Bolt should have it." Raven chimes in. "Yeah!" Finally, spike reluctantly says, "I- I guess bolt should have it." I look at my team in amazement. Ray takes my goggles off my head and puts his on my head. "Congrats. You're an explorer." (Flame's pov) I watch that bastard Ray talk with those stupid kids. ^Soon. Soon I will take my rightful place^ End of chapter 1
