The Epic of Cynthia

Chapter 2 - Looking For Home

Disclaimer: I do not own Pokémon or these characters.

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Cynthia opened her eyes drearily, waking up due to a light prodding. Cynthia slowly sat up, and looked at Gible.
"Gible, how long was I out for?" She asked. The dragon lifted five of it's six fingers.
"Five hours!?" Cynthia exclaimed, "I need to go, everyone will be needlessly worrying about me!"

As she stood, she noticed Gible was nodding off, and her eyes widened.
"You haven't slept at all, have you?" Gible reluctantly nodded. Cynthia smiled, touched by the dragon's worry.
"It's okay, I can carry you to my village, and once we're accounted for and feeling better, we can go looking for your parents!" Gible growled in worry at her.
"Don't worry, your parents wouldn't hurt me! They'd see you with me and be so happy to have you back they wouldn't lay a claw on me!" Gible couldn't argue against this, so she simply huffed and let herself be picked up by the determined Cynthia.

"Wow, you're lighter than I expected!" Cynthia chuckled. Gible rolled her eyes, and Cynthia walked out of the cave. The storm had dissipated, and now it was night time. The forest was illuminated by the brightness of the stars and the moon. The treetops and ground was covered in snow, reflecting the brightness of the stars back into the sky.

"Okay, we just have to walk through the forest and get back to the village! We can do this!" She began to trudge through the snow, on high alert for any dangerous Pokémon. Fortunately, no packs of sneasel or houndour suddenly appeared, so for now she an Gible was safe.

The Pokémon around her were keeping a wary eye on her, probably due to the future powerhouse nestled in her arms. Gible noticed this as well and let out a short bark. The Pokémon watching them instantly relaxed, and went back to scavenging any food left over from the storm.
"What did you say to them?" Cynthia asked.
"Gib. Gible Gible." Cynthia caught on to the gist of it and laughed.

After walking back towards the village for a while, Cynthia heard a call of "Cynthia!" Picking up her pace, she ran towards the noise, before spotting her grandmother, looking around in worry.
"Grandma!" Cynthia yelled, and her grandmother snapped her eyes on her and breathed a massive sigh of relief.

"Cynthia! Thank goodness! I've been worried sick looking for you." Her grandmother admonished, as Cynthia jogged up to her. Her eyes widened as she saw the Pokémon buried in her arms.
"Cynthia, is that a?"
"Yup! It's a Gible! She's really sweet." A scoff came from Gible, "And tomorrow we're going to find her parents!"

Her grandmother closed her eyes and breathed out, before looking back at Cynthia with an unreadable expression.
"You do realise how dangerous the Gible line is Cynthia?" She asked.
"Of course I do! But Gible here is super protective of me. She would never harm me." Cynthia swears she sees Gible blush out of the corner of her eye.

"Forget it, let's head back to the village and discuss your punishment for nearly giving me a heart attack!" Cynthia and Gible gulped. Despite having never met the woman before, the tone of voice she used told Gible that she meant business. Following her grandmother, Cynthia walked back to the village in complete silence, not daring to open her mouth in case of an angry comment from her grandmother.

Finally arriving at the village, Cynthia winced at the state the small town was in. Multiple houses had tiles missing from their ceiling, and one house even had a tree sticking out the side of it. Said house was currently surrounded by villagers and Pokémon, worriedly discussing on how to remove the tree.

"Wow, it was that bad?" Cynthia asked. Her grandma sighed, before looking around the village.
"It was a rough storm. Thankfully nobody was seriously injured." Cynthia was about to open her mouth, but Grandma intercepted the question.
"And yes, the ruins are fine. Only a large pile of snow blocked the entrance." Cynthia let out a sigh of relief, and continued walking to her Grandmother's house.