In Your Head; A Pokemon Sword and Shield Tale

(Prologue)

The silhouette of your partner was shaky behind you in this part of the Slumbering Weald. You and your Zoroark weren't even halfway into the woods when the fog had grown thick and grey, seeming to envelop the trees and plants around you, and threatening to swallow you with it. The grey haze felt like it was closing in, and for a moment, as you were walking, thought it just might. Your hopes were already not too high, as you kept looking over your shoulder at your partner. She was lumbering a ways behind you, staring absentmindedly at the ground. One foot after the other, she slowly followed your path, her eyes seeming unfocused and distant. Every now and again you slowed your pace to make sure she kept up, despite the creeps that the fog was giving you. 

"C'mon, girl..." you cood softly to the shape behind you. "We're getting there. Just a little farther, I promise." At this rate, you weren't even sure that she was hearing you. This strange behavior had been lasting too long now, and you felt guilty for not trying to do something sooner about it. At the same time, though, you didn't exactly know what there even WAS to do about it. 

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A few weeks ago, you remembered that she had woken you up one night, shaking your arm quietly. You'd groaned and opened your eyes, not expecting what you were going to see. You'd maybe even expected it to be Bede before Zoroark, as you hadn't recalled her waking you up before. She normally made herself comfortable on either her bed next to yours or the couch in the other room. You quickly sat up, half of the sleep immediately vanishing from your tired eyes as you reached to put a hand on her arm. A sound escaped her. Something like a whimper. 

"What's the matter, sweetheart?" you asked her. She'd waited not another second before crawling over you and onto the bed. You felt the shifting weight carefully settle next to you, taking a few turns before curling herself up into a big lump of hair beside you. For a second, you huffed, as you had a twin size bed in this apartment and not enough room for a whole other you-sized creature in this bed, but another second later your expression softened. It had only been about a week or two since she'd evolved. She was probably still getting adjusted to being your size when she used to be about mid thigh level. Sometimes you could tell she missed being small and able to curl up in your lap. You reached out gently in the dark and found her head within her mess of hair, feeling her relax at your touch. Though she tried to hide it, you thought you felt a slight shudder in her breathing.

"Bad dream..?"

"Aaaarrk..." was her response, no louder than a whisper in the silence of your room. Despite waking you up in the dead middle of the night, she sounded more tired than yourself. Or less tired and more drained. Like it wasn't her first time. 

"Feel free to stay here," You reassured her, getting comfortable again. "That's what I'm here for." You quietly ran the back of your knuckles over her head and lightly scratched behind one of her ears. She seemed to relax, her body puffing slightly before letting out a big long sigh,  her body melting down into the blankets. You smiled and rolled back over again, letting yourself quietly drift back to sleep. 

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Thinking of that night bothered you a little more now than it did that first night. It wouldn't have bothered you, had you not known she'd repeat this action almost night after night afterwards, almost like clockwork. Some nights her shakes of your arm seemed more urgent than others. Some nights you didn't even notice her climb in with you while others she startled you so bad that you scared her. It had been almost two weeks into this when you finally decided to pay a visit to Professor Sonia and Professor Hop, hoping they'd have some answers to her recurring nightmares. It had started to affect her in the day. She became almost narcoleptic in that time, dozing off seemingly at random at wherever she happened to be at the time. She grew noticeably more irritable, waving you off whenever you asked if she was feeling okay. Refused to come with you the last time you wanted to go visit Bede for the day. At her very worst, her fur had started to look dull and unkempt, her eyes tired, and she'd even started refusing to eat.