Bridging The Gap; The Final Records In Unova: An Autobiography

Stress Comes In Threes

"Professor Oak!" I beamed at him through the video screen.

Professor Oak smiled at me wearily through the other side of the screen. "Ah, Gary, my boy! Good to see you!" He looked exhausted. His face held dark bags under his eyes, a darker version of the old, wrinkly skin around it.

I wondered just how old the professor actually was as I wore my excited, eager smile. "Hey, sir!" Stretched to the limit, my mouth broadened even wider.

Professor Oak seemed to be struggling just to smile as it faded slightly from his face but returned again. "I'll bet I know why you're smiling," Prof. Oak chuckled.

I laughed happily. "So, what do you think?" I asked him.

"Well, the Sawk you sent me was just great, but when the Archeops arrived, well, it was just simply unheard of!" Prof. Oak's voice got louder with excitement, his eyes lighting up, life seeming to return to his body.

"Sawk? I sent you a Sawk?!"

"Yes. It was sent to me about a week before Archeops," Prof. Oak nodded.

"Sawk..." I mumbled, thinking hard. I caught Archeops, and before that, my last caught Pokemon was... um... Tympole... I didn't capture anything after... "Row!" I burst out. Row gave me a Sawk? I pondered, remembering when the Fighting type Gym Leader tossed me a Poke Ball after I had defeated him in our Pokemon battle. Why did he give me a Sawk? I gasped as I remembered the Sawk that Row had captured while on Scrafty Walk.

Row and a wild Sawk had saved June and I from the rogue Scrafty on the mountaintop, and then Row had proceeded to capture the Sawk.

Is that the same Sawk? I wondered. Why would he give me that?

"Are you alright, Gary?" Prof. Oak asked.

I shook my head and looked into his dark eyes. "I'm okay," I managed to smile. "Sorry. I was given that Sawk by a Gym Leader, but I don't know why. I wasn't even told what Pokemon it was. I guess he gave me a Sawk!"

"Hmmmm. I see," Prof. Oak nodded, rubbing his chin. "Well, either way, these are both some great Pokemon. I know I wanted you to capture more Pokemon, but to think, an Archeops! This is simply astounding! What a discovery! How did you come across this rare find?"

My mouth hung open in the air and I paused, staring at Prof. Oak's face through the screen. I recalled the group of extinct Pokemon escaping from the hole in the cave wall of Twist Mountain. Shaking my head, I stared solemnly at Prof. Oak. "Well, we found it wild near Verdew Town, where I'm at right now."

"In the wild?" Prof. Oak questioned. "It's not unheard of to find Fossil Pokemon in the wild, but it's not common. My research will definitely benefit with this Pokemon. I want to run some tests on this Pokemon if you don't plan on using it."

"Oh, well, sure. I guess," I said uncertainly. To be honest, I had wanted to use Archeops. It's a freaking ancient Pokemon! I wanted to see it again! I wanted to touch it! I wanted to use it in battles and beat trainers with it! Though my promise had been to capture every last Pokemon in existence, I was so taken aback by the fact that I had actually managed to capture a Fossil Pokemon! "Can I see it at least?"

"Well, I would like to allow for that, but that's a bit difficult to accomplish at the moment," Prof. Oak answered with a tired sigh.

"Why's that?"

"Well, almost immediately after letting Archeops out of its Poke Ball, the Pokemon became very violent and erratic and flew about the lab in a fury. It's very confused and upset right now. Capturing an ancient Pokemon is very dangerous as its settings have to be very precise and comfortable for it, duplicating its original environment from how it used to be before the species was extinct in the first place. If their place of settling is disrupted in the slightest, it can lead to a deadly situation for both the Pokemon and whatever has upset it."