“Come on Aubrey! You can do it!” Gio cheered wildly at the top of his lungs. He was standing on a fallen log and looking on in delight as his older sister engaged a wild Chikorita in a fight. Aubrey had been having a difficult time fighting Chikorita for a while now since she was using her dad’s Salazzle and it ignored the commands that she was giving more than half the time. After a long and frustrating fight, Chikorita was finally starting to slow down though, but only because Salazzle had been hit by a few stray moves from the little plant Pokémon and was starting to get annoyed with it.

“Use Flame Burst!” Aubrey snarled for the hundredth time, sighing in relief as Salazzle finally listened to her and spat a flaming missile right at Chikorita. It was too slow to dodge the screaming fireball and wailed in anguish after taking it straight to the face. Chikorita charged forward with the last of her energy but Salazzle hopped to the side, flicking its tail out and slamming Chikorita across the open field and into the nearest tree. It promptly collapsed into a heap after being knocked unconscious.

Gio held his breath expectantly as Aubrey took off her pack to look for a Pokéball. He overheard her grunting in frustration as she struggled to find one underneath all of the other items she had brought for their camping trip.

Today marked the third day that he and his sister had been in the Ilex Forest, and now that his sister was finally about to catch her own Pokémon they would be able to leave and go home. He loved his older sister, but he was tired of sleeping in the tent next to her and eating the bland food that she cooked over the fire. He missed his own bed, and the air conditioning, and the yummy food that he got to eat at home everyday. Though most of all, he missed his mom. He missed the lullabies she would sing and the bedtime stories she would tell. He didn’t care that he was ten now - sleeping in the dark forest without his mom was scary and he was ready to go home.

The only good thing about not being at home was being away from Dad. Gio thought his father was mean, and he hadn’t missed his dad at all the past few days. Dad had all but dumped Gio and Aubrey out here in the woods and told the two of them not to come home until they had handled their business. Gio smiled again now that their business seemed to be finally done and he was going to go home.

He was about to call out to his sister, but whipped his head about quickly and looked behind him as the wind blew stray leaves across his face, as it whispered through the heart of the forest. Goosebumps erupted across his arms and he whimpered at the sound of seemingly faint soft voices that spoke on the wind as it rustled the leaves of the surrounding trees.

Run. Run far away, the cacophony of whispers told him.

Gio had been hearing strange sounds ever since he entered the forest and had tried his best to ignore them, but this was the first time the voices were loud enough to understand what they were saying.

With his heart hammering away in his chest, he jumped down from the log and started to run over to where his sister was. She hadn’t let him get close to the fight, but now the fight was over and he didn’t want to be by himself with whatever was out there. He looked over at the collapsed Chikorita as he made his way to his sister and gasped in horror as he saw Salazzle stalking on all-fours over towards the still unconscious Pokémon. “Aubrey, hurry up!”

Aubrey looked up and Gio heard her curse as she saw what he was screaming about. She dumped the contents of her pack onto the forest floor and grabbed the Pokéball that had been all the way at the bottom. She hurled it across the clearing, sighing in relief as Chikorita was enveloped inside, leaving Salazzle to pounce on empty air a moment later. It whipped its purple eyes about and hissed nastily at Aubrey, then charged straight at her and her brother. Aubrey waited until the last possible second, then recalled it to its Pokéball right before it jumped up to attack her.

She collapsed to the ground exhausted and shaking. I guess it’s true what they say: Pokémon do take on the personalities of their trainers.

Gio ran over to his sister and jumped on top of her giving her a big hug of relief now that their escapade was finally over. “You did it sis! You caught a Pokémon.”

“Thank the Mother,” Gio smiled as Aubrey rubbed his back gently. “Now we don’t have to use Dad’s Salazzle anymore. That thing has a nasty temper.”

“Yeah, she’s scary,” Gio agreed. “Can we finally go home now that you caught a Pokémon? This forest is scary and I don’t want to be here anymore.”

“I wish,” Aubrey squeezed Gio tightly. “I’m ready to go home too. But we still have one more thing to do before we can go home. Dad won’t let us come back until it’s done.”

“What do you still have to do?” Gio asked his sister. “Is it going to take as long as catching Chikorita did?”

“Actually, you’re the one that still has something to do,” Aubrey looked at him wistfully. Gio wondered why it looked like she was on the verge of tears. “I’m sorry…”

“Sorry for what?” Gio grinned happily. “What do I have to do?”

Aubrey shook her head. “You’ll see later. Come on, we need to move.”

Aubrey collected all of her belongings, repacked her backpack, and beckoned for Gio to follow after her. They set off through the forest, Gio humming softly to himself as they walked in a seemingly random direction. The hours crept along slowly and still Aubrey showed no signs of slowing down or resting; Gio was starting to get tired but he didn’t want his sister to think that he couldn’t keep up.

Run away, he shivered as the voices called out to him again. Leave this place while you still can.

He whipped his head around looking for the owner of the voice. The dense canopy of leaves and trees completely blacked out the sun though and he could barely see more than a few meters in front of him. He blushed when he looked up and saw that his sister had stopped to wait for him with a scowl on her face.

“What’s wrong?” Aubrey asked. “Do you need to take a break?”

“I heard voices. It sounded like someone was whispering to me,” Gio found himself feeling foolish for even saying it aloud. He shivered again despite himself and jogged over to where his sister was waiting for him.

“I didn’t hear anything, Gio,” Aubrey told him. He saw that she still gave a cursory glance around, trying to strain her eyes and peer through the trees. “We’re in the middle of the forest; no one knows we’re out here.”

“The voices didn’t sound human,” Gio shuddered. “It sounded like one voice was whispering at the same time that a bunch of other voices were. It sounded weird sis, do you think it could have been a Pokémon?”

“No, Gio,” Aubrey sighed as she tried to keep her temper in check. “Pokémon don’t talk, don’t be stupid. It was probably just a trick of the wind or something. Now come on, this place is creepier than Dad’s Salazzle - we’re almost done in here.”

Gio scrambled to keep up with his sister who had taken off without waiting to see if he was following or not. They walked on for a bit more until Aubrey halted and threw out a hand stopping Gio in his tracks. They had walked into a small clearing, the moon was casting its silvery light, and Gio saw some underbrush ahead of their position that was rustling. He clenched his hands to keep them from trembling, but sighed in relief when a Caterpie popped its head out from the brush and began worming its way across the moonlit meadow. Plenty of wild Pokémon were known to be temperamental, but Caterpie wasn’t one of them; the little green worm was probably just looking for a safe place to sleep for the night like he and his sister should have been doing.

Aubrey unclipped the Pokéball that housed Chikorita from her belt and got ready to toss it but shook her head and instead called out Salazzle even though she had said earlier she wasn’t planning to rely on it anymore. The wicked lizard hissed in fury when it spied the two siblings but Aubrey silenced it with her next words.

“The Caterpie is for Gio,” Aubrey told Salazzle. “Weaken it for him - you know what to do.”

Gio was certain that he misheard his sister when she said that the Pokémon was for him. Afterall, he wasn’t old enough to have his own Pokémon yet. Aubrey had just caught her first Pokémon and she was already fifteen. Salazzle slinked silently across the poorly lit meadow, surprising the Caterpie with a vicious slap of the tail that sent the poor worm hurtling across the meadow where it collapsed in agony. Aubrey recalled the poison lizard to its Pokéball and Gio watched on in wonder as Aubrey began to rummage through her pack again. Was she looking for a Pokéball for him to use after all?

Run! Run! The wind whispered to him a third time.

“Do you hear the voices?” Gio asked his sister even though he already knew the answer to his question.

“No, Gio! For the last time, there’s nothing there!” Aubrey snarled. She stood up and walked over to her brother who was waiting expectantly for the Pokéball that Aubrey was about to hand to him.

She held out a knife instead.

“Kill it,” Aubrey nodded over at the Caterpie that was thrashing in agony on the ground.

“W-What?” Gio stammered out, refusing to believe that his sister was ordering him to do something so horrible. Sure Aubrey could be a little mean sometimes and she had a temper, but she would never make him do something like this.

“Kill it. Now,” She ordered him firmly.

“I don’t -” Gio started to say before he felt an explosion of pain knock him down to the dirt. His cheek felt like it was on fire and tears started to leak from his eyes. His sister had just hit him!

“Stand up right now,” Aubrey trembled, fighting back the fury that was evident in her voice.

“Why are you making me do this? I don’t want to hurt it!” Gio pleaded with his sister. “Do Mom and Dad know -”

“Don’t mention that fucking bastard in front of me, Gio!” Aubrey yelled. “Why do you think we’re out here in the first place! Do you know what dad said to me?”

Gio tried his hardest to blink back the tears and he shook his head as he stared numbly at the ground.

“He said that I should leave you out here if you can’t man up and do it,” Gio looked up at his trembling sister and was surprised to see that she was crying too. “That heartless bastard would sooner abandon his own kids than see them turn out to be weaklings. I’m doing this for you, Gio; so that you can go home. Now stand up and take the knife or don’t even think about leaving this place! Dad will do horrible things to you if you can’t do this!”

“Aubrey, I can’t!” Gio wept. The wind began to swirl all around him, causing his cheek to throb in pain. “I don’t want to do this! Please don’t make me!”

“Do you want to go home or not Gio!” Aubrey yelled at him. How could she not hear the uproar that was swirling around them? “Do you want to go home and see Mom? Do this and then we can leave this horrible forest.”

Gio wiped away the tears from his eyes and stood up.

Run, the wind whispered in his ears.

He grabbed the knife from Aubrey’s hand with trembling fingers.

Run! The wind whipped about his head.

He walked over to where Caterpie lay on the ground screeching in pain. His hands were shaking violently as he knelt in the grass beside it.

RUN! The wind screamed in desperation.

“Be quiet!” Gio yelled, bringing the knife down and sinking the blade up to its hilt into soft flesh. Caterpie’s screeches ceased immediately.

Gio looked on in fascination as blood began to trickle from the wound; he pulled the knife from the body, blinking in surprise at the taste of copper in his mouth from the spatter of warm blood that hit his face.

He rammed the knife back into the corpse again, opening a new cut and giggling to himself as more blood poured out. Again and again he slammed the blade into the body of the helpless bug, mutilating it beyond recognition. The scent of blood tinged the air, gore and viscera covering his hands as he reached his blood soaked fingers down into the lifeless corpse. His mind was racing and his breathing came labored as his fingers clawed around, prying the Pokémon apart so he could see what it looked like on the inside. He held his breath as his fingers touched the Pokémon's heart, still faintly -

“It’s done,” Aubrey spoke softly from somewhere far away, her voice bringing Gio back to his senses.

“Did I do good, sis?” He giggled. He turned around and wondered why Aubrey was crying when he had done exactly what she asked him to do.

“No,” his sister replied. “Now come on, we need to leave this forest.”

Gio looked down at the mess of red on the ground in front of him; he was slow to stand but eventually did, reluctantly holding the knife out to his sister.

“It’s yours now,” she shook her head. “I have my own.”

He smiled happily to himself, not bothering to wipe the crimson from the blade before slipping it through his belt loops. Aubrey started walking towards the edge of the clearing beckoning for Gio to follow her. He closed his eyes and wiped the blood from his face, taking a deep breath and savoring the scent of blood still hanging about the otherwise crisp night air. He hoped that he and his sister would find more Pokémon as they made their way out of the forest.

As he followed Aubrey out of the clearing and back beneath the boughs of the trees, Gio noticed that he couldn’t hear the wind anymore.

Silence at last.