With my head still spinning, I brace myself for Leo's monologue that I'm sure is about to come.

  "What kind of reasoning do you even follow, mate?", Xander laughs, but comes in closer to stand with his friends.

  "First off, this is new, as I said, Donphan don't usually live in the caves", Leo's voice turns formal, "they tend to live in mountain terrains, usually making their burrows near mountain rivers".

  "Alright so, what does that mean?", Cassie questions.

  "A few things, actually", Leo says casually, "there are Donphans in the mountains above the tunnel, which means that they have most likely burrowed their way down here, it's probable that a part of the mountain river runs underground".

  "Oh, so basically, we discovered new Donphan habitat", Cassie concludes, with a clap of her hands. Her expression shifts in a second, from carelesness to unabridged excitment.

  "Perhaps, and that's huge in and of itself", Leo nods, satisfied that Cassie had figured out the importance of this discovery. "The second thing, as I said earlier, Donphan have a habit of crushing into walls, which actually makes tunnels like this one a terrible habitat for them", Leo points out, "they could bring the whole place down, closing it in on themselves, other pokemon, or even people passing by".

  "Oh", Cassie's expression changes into worry now, "well, we should let aunt Lydia know about this then".

  "We will", Leo stands up, mustering more confidence than I ever imagined he could, "we'll go down, find the Donphans, make the reports and send them to professor Lydia as soon as possible".

  "Uh, why not just tell her about it and let the researches do the work", Xander offers, "we are kind of in a hurry here, you know".

  "Because this is a journey, Xander", Cassie crosses her arms, giving him a firm look, "we have to do things like this, otherwise, what's the point".

  "I'd agree with you, Xander", Leo ignores her, "but Donphans live in heards, which usually include Phanpy as well, and I want to catch one for myslef, so we're going".

  "Oh, so now you make the decision, huh", Xander laughs.

  "Hey, I knew I wanted a ground type, and Phanpy is like a better Sandshrew", Leo shrugs it off, "besides, I kind of want to try doing some reasearch myself, so this is killing two birds with one stone".

  "Fine, but we're not bringing Rory, he might try throwing hands with Donphapns", Xander concludes.

  "Donphans have no hands", Leo notes.

  "Oh, no, you're not leaving Rory here alone", I chimme in, "I don't want to deal with that purple thing again".

  "We could split up", Cassie offers, "Leo and I can go down to look for the Donphan herd, and Rory and Xander can go further down the tunnel, we'll catch up eventually".

  "No way", Xander crosses his arms, "the two of you are not going anywhere without me".

  "We can take care of ourselves", Leo sighs.

  "I know, but I feel better when I have my eyes on you", Xander says firmly.

  "It's fine, we can all go", I sigh.

  "Rory, can you even stand up?", Cassie's voice is filled with worry.

  "Yeah", I rise up from the rock, immediately feeling a headache that seems to want me back on earth. "See", I say, shaking off the numbness from my body. I can make it until the pokemon center. I've seen worse.

  Besides, in case something happens to them, I'd be stuck alone in this tunnel, filled with magical animals that could apparently scream me to death.

  "Good, then we're all going", Leo says decisevly, heading down one of the side paths. Loudred went that way, I think to myself, not really too eager to go, but I follow them anyways.

  As soon as we stray from the marked path, the walls become more narrow, sharper. I have to watch my steps, as the cracks in the floor threaten to twist my ankle.

  I've already earned myself an aftereffects of a sonic shocks, another injury was the last thing I needed. Besides, my white shirt has grown dirty from falling to the ground, as did my pants.

  Surprisingly, that's something that helped me shift my focus from the growing pain. The fact that my clothes were dirty. I'd definitley have to wash them somehow when I reach the pokemon center. Otherwise, I'd be screwed to walk around in them for at least 3 more days. I didn't want that. The shirt and the pants still felt somewhat good on me, but that wouldn't last long. The underwear I had on had already started to feel itchy and uncomfortable, and it was only the matter of time the rest of my attire decided to follow.

  Strange enough, in a world filled with magical creatures, one thing I decided to focus on was something so mundane. But the issue like this was familiar, something I could deal with.

  Leo leads the way down the narrowing hallway, checking the walls every now and again, and noting in satisfaction each time he'd find the caving that would confirm a Donphan was here. The three of them lit flashlights, chasing away the darkness of the tunnel.

  It took us about 20 minutes, but we made it to a widening that looked like a room carved out in a cave. The walls were sharp and unforgiving, reaching high up, the sunlight streaming in from numerous openings in the ceiling.

  Turns out, Leo was right, there was an underground river here. I noticed the creatures lazily walking on its bank immediately.

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  A jolt of excitment runs through me when I realise they really do look like elephants. Rather small elephants, but elephants nonetheless.

  There were two kinds - the bigger ones were gray, with ebony tusks reaching from the sides of their mouth, and darkened skin plastered across their back that looked like a tire. The smaller ones are soft-blue, interrupted by red stripes placed on their ears and near the base of their snouts.

  We watch the creatures as they hang around the river, the blue ones carelessly running towards the water and filling up their snouts, only to shoot the stream upwards, making it rain.

  One of the big elephants curls up, and starts spinning, hitting into the wall with incredible might, the sound of the impact carrying all the way to us.

  Leo is definitely smart, I realise. Hits like that one were sure to bring the place down sooner or later.

  "So, uh, do we chase them away or exterminate them?", I ask carefully, counting heads already. There are around 10 big ones, and maybe 12 smaller elephants. Could we even deal with all of them?

  "No, absolutely not", Cassie screeches at me.

  "What do we do then", I says, grabbing my head. Her high-pitched voice doesn't bode well for my headache. "They'll have this place crumbling down in no time if we just leave them here".

  "Simple", Leo wipes out his pokedex, typing a few things in, "first we mark this place on the map, we count how big the herd is, then we send all the information to professor Lydia".

  "And I assume she alone can handle all these pokemon", I stop myself from calling them elephants out loud.

  "Of course not, she'll notify the Ranger's Association, they'll come to the field, extract and relocate the Donphans to a safer place", Leo says casually, still typing away on his device. "There, I marked this room on the tunnel plan, and I drew out the path", he concludes.

  "Great, so then, we count the Donphans?", Xander says, taking a step towards the herd.

  "Count them, see if there are any injured ones, get all the info that we can safely gather that might be significant", Leo notes, "don't walk in too close, we don't know how tame they are".

  "Come on now, Leo, they seem chill", Xander waves him off, making his way further down into the room.

  "Xander, don't be rush", Leo jumps to follow him.

  "Hey, you want to catch a Phanpy, right?", Xander jumps further from him, throwing him a mischevious smile, "we'd have to come closer for that anyways".

  "We don't have to be careless, though", Leo protests, but it's too late, the herd has already noticed them.

  They don't seem to care about us much, and I breathe the sigh of relief.

  "Hey", Cassie gently taps my shoulder, "are you alright?".

  "Yeah, I'm fine", I reassure her, even though my head is pulsing like I've been tased a 100 times in a row.

  "Leo's kind of into this kind of thing", she says quietly, "reasearch, ranger things, we kind of had to do it for him".

  "It's alright", I say unassumingly. Leo does seem like the type, and I can't help but wonder what kind of ideal he's chasing.

  Cassie said she wanted to be a magician. She didn't seem like much of one to me, maybe it was a lack of cards, top hats and swallow-tailed coats. Either way, I found understanding Leo much easier. A smart guy who wanted to do smart things. He fits the role.

  The two of us follow them down to where the Donphan are, and the pokemon let us walk amongst them uninterrupted. The few smaller ones curiously extend their snouts, and one even bumps it into Xander's leg, but nothing that would count as an attack.

  Cassie takes her pokedex out, and pokes my arm, gesturing for me to do the same.

  "Just in case you didn't know", she whispers over, "when you see a pokemon you can use your pokedex to scan it, and it will show you information on the species".

  She quickly opens the device pressing one of the buttons, and her screen flashes with a picture of the grey elephant, followed by a bunch of words. 'Donphan', I read. So that's the big one.

  "I actually didn't know it", I admit, repeating her action, but pointing it at one of the blue elephants. The screen immediately flashes with the information - Phanpy, that's the name of the creature. I don't really care to know much more than that, so I close the pokedex, giving Cassie a quick thank you. Now, at least, I will know what everything is called.

  Leo gathers up courage and kneels down to pet one of the Donphans. The pokemon lets him run his hand down it's back, and Leo seems ecstatic. "See, this is wahat I was talking about, Donphans like crushing into rocks, and sometimes, they cause rockslides in the mountains, and they end up burried in the rocks", his words come out like a swift current, "that's why the black skin on their backs is tougher, they evolved it over time so they can survive being hit by the rocks, classic case of evolutionary adaptation".

  "Alright, mister trivia master, are we counting these Donphan or not?", Xander laughs at him. He takes digs at his friend often, but in the end, I think he finds all of this endearing.

  "Sure, you can count the Donphans, and write the numbers down", Leo hurriedly stands up, "you two count the Phanpys, and I'll go check if there are any burrows with injured specimen, infants or eggs".

  "You're really thorough", I note shortly.

  "Of course I am", Leo flicks his ginger curls, as if he was showing off, "one does not become an expert by doing things carelessly".

  He's definitely one interesting dude. Though I have no idea what he means by 'becoming an expert'.

  I don't have to ask, as Leo dissapears to the far end of the room, searching the holes in the walls. So, I do the job I was assigned - count the Phanpys.

  Cassie's not of much help, as she decides to pet them instead of counting them. The task is not easy, since the blue elephants won't stop walking and rolling around, add to that my growing dizzines, I find myself starting anew every few moments.

  In the end, I manage to round up the number of Phanpys to 13. Just one more than my estimate.

  "9 Donphans", Xander states loudly.

  "13 Phanpys", I counter, happy that I have won by having a larger number.

  "Great, then write it down", Leo peeks his head out of one of the burrows to yell at us, "no eggs or injured specimen".

  "Fine, I'm writing that down as well", Xander yells back.

  "No, write that we didn't find any, so the rangers double-check it just in case", Leo points out.

  "Roger that", Xander responds, typing the information into the pokedex. I check mine, assuming he's writing all of this in some sort of notes app. I was right. The pokedex has the notes app. So this world has no cars or planes, but they have the notes app. Good to know.

  "Great", Leo runs up to us, "anyone has any idea what other info could be useful so we can put it into the report?".

  "You can write that these Phanpy are super cute", Cassie chukles, giving one of them a belly rub.

  "Good point, add that the specimens we encountered seemed to be tame and friendly towards us", Leo instructs with a nod.

  Maybe I should ask him to fill out my CV.

  "Done", Xander says, typing all of it into his notes.

  "This is going to be a godly report", Leo pumps his fists.

  "Hey, Leo, shouldn't I correct this to say that there are 12 Phanpys", Xander winks at him, "since you are about to catch one".

  "Uh", Leo's face grows red, "wait on that, maybe we should take the pictures first, you know, for reasearch purposes, finding a Donphan herd living in a cave is very rare, yes, the pictures are important here".

  "Take a picture of me with this baby right here", Cassie perks up, still rubbing her Phanpy.

  "I don't think that's beneficial to reasearch", Leo scrathes his head.

  "It's to let people know that they are friendly", Cassie points out.

  "Alright", Leo sighs, taking out his pokedex and pointing it towards Cassie. I take mine out as well, just to make sure, and truly, this thing has a working camera installed.

  "Alright, now to take pictures of the rest of them", Leo starts turning around in circles, rapidly snapping pictures of Donphans and Phanpys.

  "Alright, I don't think you need too many pictures", Xander places his hand on Leo's shoulder, "professor Lydia can handle that, you should get to the catching".

  "Right, right", Leo sighs, putting his pokedex away, "I was about to get to that".

  He takes a small stap back, looking at the herd, and I can see the colour draining from his face. "I'll do it", he mutters, "right now".