Alice groaned as she came to. “What happened?” she groggily muttered. Last she remembered, she had been talking to Jonathan, after cheering him up from his failure to catch her...again. Sighing slightly at the feeling of guilt, she quickly pushed it down. She knew what she was getting into when she decided to take up the mantle of Phantom Thief Fox 5 years ago, but it still didn’t stop her from feeling guilty about lying to her best and oldest friend. Shaking her head, she got up...only to fall over again as her center of gravity felt...off for some reason. Opening her eyes, and allowing them to focus, she looked down at her hands to find...a pair of small paws. “Wait...what?!” she gaped, before giving herself a look over. Not only was her body now MUCH smaller than it used to be, but she was covered in black/slate gray fur, with a few tufts of red fur on her paws. She also noticed that she now had a tail, and a quick look into a conveniently placed puddle nearby gave her a good look of her new body. She was a Zorua. A Zorua wearing a pair of reading glasses. And just like any other rational person would do in this situation, she screamed. Screamed bloody murder, loud enough to scare away the birds…
She kept screaming for a good minute, until she finally started calming down, albeit with hyperventilating breaths. “Okay. Calm down. Think cool, act like you’re Fox right now...oh who am I kidding. Where the hell am I, and why the hell am I a Zorua?!” she screamed, before flopping down on her belly. “This is the worst…” she sighed. While she didn’t mind being a Zorua too much, since she had always found the little fox Pokemon to be adorable, she was more worried about where she was, where her team was, and HOW she ended up a Zorua in the first place.
In another part of the woods, another person found himself in a similar position. “WHAT THE HELL?!” was the shout that came from a Riolu, before he flopped back down onto his back. Sighing to himself again, he raised his paw to see the silver bracelet that was on his right wrist. At least that was still there. Jonathan would have hated to lose something that he had gotten as a gift. Sitting back up, he was still trying to wrap his head around the fact that A) he’s now in some forest that he had never seen before, and B) he’s a Riolu now. After a few moments, he sighed and got back on his feet. “No use worrying about it at this point. First things first, I gotta either find Heat and the others, or find civilization. Whichever happens first…” he muttered before walking off.
“Finally,” Alice sighed in relief at her discovery: a pathway. Not wasting any time, she immediately followed it, heading straight for wherever it lead. Fortunately, it wasn’t a long walk, as soon she neared the entrance of what looked like a city. However, before she walked in, a thought occurred to her. ”Hold on a minute here. I’m a Zorua now. A Pokemon, and a rather rare one at that. That means…” she thought for a moment, then gulped at the realization, and promptly ducked into some nearby bushes.
Poking her head out of the bush, she thought about how she was supposed to get into the city WITHOUT being seen, as she did not feel like learning first hand what the inside of a Pokeball looked like. As she thought about it, the answer that came to her made her want to smack herself. Illusions. With that in mind, she closed her eyes, and concentrated, hoping that her new body would do the rest…
"I can’t believe this is actually working…" she mentally sweat dropped, one side of her baffled by the fact that her choice of disguise worked, while another side of her was berating herself for the admittedly...pathetic choice of disguise. A cardboard box. That’s right, Alice Maximilion, heiress to the long line of Phantom Thief Fox, and master of disguise, had picked a cardboard box for a disguise. “My grandparents, and all my ancestors must be rolling in their graves right now…”
Shaking her head at the absurdity of it all, she instead focused on what was really weird about this city. Everywhere she looked, there wasn’t a single human in sight. Instead, all she saw were these weird, multicolored Ponyta, minus the flaming manes, with some of them having wings, while others had horns like a Rapidash, but smaller, and less...pointy. Another thing she noticed was that they CLEARLY weren’t used to dealing with Pokemon, if the fact that a good number of them were running around like Torchics without heads from some of the more...intimidating Pokemon was any indication. Ignoring the panicking Ponyta-things, Alice instead focused more on maintaining her ‘disguise’. Walking into another alleyway, she decided that it would be best to lay low for now, as the last thing she wanted to do was get caught up in the craziness going on in the streets. However, any plans that she might have formulated were abruptly cut short when someone finally noticed her ‘disguise’.
“Hm? What’s this?” an elderly female voice said in surprise.
When Alice turned to the source of the voice, she blinked in surprise, before berating herself for not paying attention, as she’d had her illusion walk right into a hoof, which was now sticking through the non-existent cardboard. The next thing she knew, a pair of hooves reached into her illusion, and lifted her off the ground, causing her to lose the illusion in the process. From her now airborne position, she could see clearly who or what she was dealing with. It was two more of the strange Ponyta, one normal looking one, and one with wings, with both of them giving her the impression of an elderly couple, the winged mare somehow holding her in her hoof despite not actually having fingers. The stallion had grayish-green (Army green) fur, and a black mane, with gray stripes going through it from old age. His eyes were soft light-brown color, and on his flank was a mark that looked like six playing cards (from left to right: A Joker, Aces of Clubs, Spades, Hearts, and Diamonds, and another Joker) with a magician’s top hat in the background. The mare on the other hand had dark blue fur, and a cyan colored mane with gray stripes running through it from old age. She had sharp orange-yellow eyes, and a mark on her flank depicting what she could best describe as a tornado thunderstorm.
There was an awkward silence, before the mare said, “Dear Celestia, its adorable!” she squealed, before pulling Alice into a near bone crushing hug.
The stallion chuckled as he watched his wife’s antics, knowing that she had a weakness for cute animals, though the fact that this fox was clearly one of the strange animals that had suddenly appeared made him just a little cautious. “Now dear, I think you should put it down. After all, not only does it not appreciate being crushed, it might be dangerous,” he said, though he was mentally laughing at the idea too.
The mare released her from the hug (Alice breathed in a huge gulp of air at this point), before turning to her husband. “Nonsense. How could you possibly look at a face like this and say that it's dangerous?” she chuckled, before holding up the Zorua for her husband to see.
Alice on her part weighed her options. On one hand, knowing people like this mare, if her husband let her have her way, she’d likely find herself their pet, and likely be subjected to more bone crushing hugs. On the other hand, it also meant that she would likely get a place to stay until she could at least sort things out. Thinking about it for a moment, she decided that she would rather have some place to stay rather than try to live off the street. Besides, worse come to worse, she could always either run away later, or show them that she’s intelligent enough to understand them. With that in mind, she immediately put on her best puppy eyes look she could muster, and shortly after, the mare holding her joined in as well
The stallion’s eye twitched at the now weapons grade eyes he was seeing, and like all others subjected to such a sight, his resistance was completely obliterated. “Alright, alright,” he chuckled. “You’re right. There’s no way anything this cute could be dangerous,” he said, which caused Alice to snicker slightly, as it was clear that these two had never dealt with Pokemon before.
“Of course I’m right. I’m your wife,” his wife chuckled, before looking at Alice. “Hi there little fella. I’m Quick Storm, and the stiff over here is my husband, Sleight Hoof. What’s your name?” she said, though she chuckled slightly when Sleight Hoof playfully elbowed her with his hoof for the ‘stiff’ comment.
“My name’s Alice,” Alice said, but what she said came out as “Zorua”.
“Zorua? Well isn’t that a cute little name. How would you like to come with us? You must not have anywhere to go if you were hiding under that...actually what was that? It looked like a cardboard box, but my hoof went right through it,” Quick Storm said.
“Looked like an illusion to me,” Sleight Hoof idly commented. “Maybe the little fellas got some magic in it.”
“Well either way, would you like to come with us?” she asked. Alice thought about it again for a moment, then nodded her consent.
“Alright then, hold on,” Quick Storm said, before placing Alice on her back, her wings unfolding to make something akin to railings for her to hang on to.
At the same time, near the outskirts of town, Jonathan had finally found his way into civilization...and quickly found himself staring. “Oookay, something tells me I’m not in Kalos anymore,” he mumbled. All through the town before him, were a bunch of strange Ponyta-like creatures, as well as various Pokemon, but not a single human in sight. What more, it was clear that the Ponyta-like creatures were NOT accustomed to the Pokemon, considering a LOT of them were running away. “Well, I’d better see what I can do,” he muttered, before walking into the city.
“Okay, this is not as easy as I hoped,” Jonathan groaned. He had tried to help one of the Ponyta-like creatures, but he ended up getting kicked down an alleyway, since it seems that they could not understand him at all. Fortunately, being a Riolu now his body was notably sturdier than his human body, so while it had hurt, nothing was broken. With that in mind, he tried to calm down the Pokemon, and fortunately, that was met with better results, as he found that he could understand them now. Currently, he was sitting on the roof of one of the buildings, watching the Ponyta things below, while several Pokemon were still in the streets (he idly noticed some of them seemed to be deliberately chasing the Ponyta things). Sighing slightly, he was just about to lie back down, when he noticed something down in the alleyways, or rather, someone down in the alleyway. “Is that…?” he blinked, before jumping down into the alley. True enough, what he found was a very familiar Combusken. “Heat?”
The Combusken turned around, before blinking in surprise. “Do I know you?” he asked.
Jonathan was slightly taken aback, but he couldn’t really blame him for it, since humans didn’t just suddenly turn into Pokemon...at least not normally. “Heat...its me. Its...Jonathan,” he said.
Heat just gave the Riolu an odd look, before bursting out laughing. “You’re kidding, right? There’s no way you’re Jonathan. Not only are you just a kid, but Jonathan is a Human, and you’re a Riolu.”
“...I got you as my starter 9 years ago. Back then, you acted like you had about as much brains as a sack of hammers, though you sure had plenty of power. After all, we’re not allowed to set foot within 15 feet of Viola’s Gym after you nearly torched it,” Jonathan deadpanned.
Heat’s beak looked ready to fall off by the time Jonathan was finished. “Okay...I believe you. Now how and why are you a Riolu?”
Jonathan just shrugged. “Sorry buddy, but that’s the 1 million Poke dollar question. Seriously, last thing I remember is talking to Alice, then blacking out, and when I woke up, I’m a Riolu.”
An awkward silence descended on them for a moment. “So...what now?” Heat asked.
Jonathan was about to answer, when the sky suddenly darkened. Looking up, he saw dark clouds that he could have sworn weren’t there before. However, that still served to answer the question. “For now, I say we find some cover. We can worry about other things later,” Jonathan said, to which Heat nodded in agreement, as the two of them ran for cover.
“Nice place you got here,” Alice commented in awe as she looked up at the large house, which was a borderline mansion at the edge of town.
“Why thank you,” Sleight Hoof said, having gotten the gist of what she said based on her tone and expression, which was clearly awe. “It took us a year to get built, but it was worth it. Safe too, considering that its far away from the swamps,” he started, before looking around and adding, “Though...I guess that didn’t do much against you guys,” he finished, as he noticed a large number of Grass and Bug types running around the gardens.
Seeing this, Quick Storm sighed. “We’ll deal with them tomorrow. For now, they’re not ruining anything, so I suppose we can leave them be for a night.”
Entering the mansion, the three of them were greeted by a modest group of servants, all of which were quick to inform the couple about the small...issue about the Pokemon. Fortunately, it seemed only small Pokemon had gotten in, and most of them were relatively harmless. Heck, some of the maids had asked if they could keep some of them as pets, to which Quick Storm allowed, before showing Alice to them. ”Oh crap…” Alice thought glumly, before she was practically smothered.
Half an hour later saw Quick Storm and Sleight Hoof at the dinner table along with the servants preparing for dinner. As the ponies dug into their meals, Alice was on the floor, looking at her dinner awkwardly. On one hand, she was thankful that they had been able to provide some meat, since she was pretty sure that Zorua had a slightly more carnivorous diet, even if they were actually omnivores. But on the other hand...it was served in a dog bowl. Looking back at the ponies who were eating an assortment of vegetarian dishes, she then turned to the other Pokemon that had been taken in as pets, and noted that they were eating with just as much gusto. Shrugging again, she quickly started to dig in to her meal, especially since she just realized that she hadn’t eaten anything since she got here, and that was this morning.
An hour or so after dinner, Alice found herself curling into the small basket that had been covered in cushion to serve as her bed. While she was still getting used to being treated like a pet, she figured it was better than being on the street, especially considering the rain that was pouring outside. As she dozed off, the last thoughts she had were thoughts of wonder and worry, as she didn’t know where her team was, as well as wondering if Jonathan had also come to this strange land, and if he was in a similar predicament as her.