Harry sat up suddenly, jerking awake from a deep sleep. Beside him Bolt squirmed away from Harry's movement, pushing his face further into the dirt. Where were they? What time was it? Why—

Just as instantaneously as he woke up Harry remembered the events of the past day. He remembered his teacher's lesson, he remembered Dudley's reaction to it, and he remembered his mad sprint out of Little Whinging with Bolt by his side. As his brain fully woke up so too did his body. His legs screamed in agony, and he could feel the scratches that were carved all over his body by the barbed wire fence as if they were made of fire.

He forced himself to take off the backpack he'd slept on the night before, aching, and robotically sifted through the pockets until he found the contents of Aunt Petunia's medicine cabinet. He found one that said pain relief and took four at once in a dry swallow. His hacking woke up Bolt, who startled and looked around for danger.

About an hour or so later they were on their way. Harry, despite knowing that rations were limited, had allowed himself and Bolt a full breakfast (or, based on the position of the sun, lunch) before setting out. They'd gorged themselves on berries of all shapes and sizes and a full water bottle each as Harry wrapped gauze over his wounds. Now, with full stomachs and somewhat healed bodies, they were beginning their journey down the road, with no idea how long it would take to get there, or, for that matter, where 'there' was.

"We're free, Bolt. That's what's important." The boy told his friend as it whimpered slightly from the bruises on the pads of its feet. Harry glanced back at the fence and as he stared at the wheat fields behind it he felt the full weight of Dudley, Aunt Petunia, Uncle Vernon, and all the other residents and customs of Little Whinging lift off of him. He grinned, uncontrolled and broad, for the first time in his memory. "We're free."

It took two days for the scenery to change. Prior to that the sparse trees scattered in dirt and clover on either side of the chipped and faded grey asphalt road had begun to blend together in the eyes of the boy, seemingly as similar as the houses of Little Whinging. The pair had survived as well as they could on what few resources Harry had managed to gather, and scrounged when it wasn't enough. Harry was never more thankful for delaying the trip as long as he had—in the intervening years he'd learned many survival tips, like how to start a fire or recognize edible plants, that became invaluable as he and Bolt went forward. Nonetheless, it was difficult for the two to go through the woods obviously outside of Little Whinging and still not see any Pokemon, and humans, any sign of non-plant life at all.

But, finally, just as he'd begun to despair his earlier decision to leave for all that it was necessary, Bolt saw something in the distance. He yelped from his position well ahead of Harry, at the very crest of a large and gently sloped hill that the road bent over, and darted back, nearly vibrating with happiness. He grabbed lightly at the bottom of one of Harry's pant legs and tried to tug the boy forward.

"All right, all right." Harry laughed. He picked up the pace, but Bolt wanted him to go still faster. Finally Harry got close enough and near enough that he could see it—there, far in the distance, was tall broad grass. It stretched from one end of the horizon to the other, a vibrant blatant green, and stood about the height of Harry's chest, just as had been described in the Okoku book. In front of it was a massive sign, just barely visible from his distance—"Okoku Region". Harry shouted and ran forward, with Bolt nipping at his heels, just as excited as Harry was.

As they neared the mass of green Harry slowed again. The road stopped here, fading into two dirt lines exactly the width of the average tire and evenly spaced apart, worn somewhat down from infrequent travel. Small shoots of grass had sprouted in the packed dirt, uncaring of the possible danger of a future car.

About five meters away from the meadow Harry stopped altogether. Bolt stopped beside him and cocked his head in confusion.

"What's… what do you… do you think… do you think we're near Pokemon?" Harry finally breathed out, trying to not be too eager. The idea of Pokemon had in some ways become his salvation—Bolt, his dreams, the book: they were all centered on Pokemon. The idea that he was close to more than one of them felt so surreal that he simply couldn't believe that he might actually meet another, not after all the good the first had brought.

Bolt moved forwards a few steps and started sniffing. Finally he turned to the left, staring straight at an otherwise unremarkable patch of grass. Just as Harry was about to ask what he scented the patch moved. Another second passed and then without warning a Rattata, mentioned in "Deadly Pokemon" as being harbingers of disease, darted out, headed straight for an acorn dropped from one of the trees. The second it grabbed the food it spun around and darted right back into the thick foliage. Harry laughed.

"Come on, Bolt! We've made it to Okoku!"

The two friends dove into the grass headfirst, ready for anything it could throw at them. It took the rest of the day until they'd crossed the first field of grass. They'd stumbled across wild Pokemon only a few times, but when the initially tense Pokemon saw Bolt they relaxed. While a number still wanted to fight, they also didn't chase Harry and Bolt when they took off to avoid battle.

It wasn't a perfect system, and Harry was sure that at least some of the Pokemon's behaviors were based off of something Bolt said or did that Harry didn't notice or simply couldn't interpret, but it worked. They stayed safe as they continued to venture deeper and deeper into Okoku territory. As the evening was beginning to change to dusk, though, that changed.

They'd just stumbled out of the grass into a small clearing just as the sun began to set. Harry, tired, had lain down and Bolt had curled up into a ball next to him. The little boy wrapped a protective hand around Bolt and closed his eyes, ready for a good night's sleep, when the tiny body next to him suddenly shifted and began to growl. Harry sat up, terrified that a large Pokemon had decided that the two were its next meal, or worse, that somehow the Little Whinging Police had found them all the way out here—a fear which had plagued him since they'd left his relative's house. He turned, fighting between the need to know and the want to not, and looked to where Bolt was staring. There, straight across the clearing, was a massive body, over two times larger than the grass to its back. The being was entirely shrouded in black: there wasn't enough sunlight for any features to be discerned. The mass moved towards Harry and the boy screamed, voice shrill and loud against the silence of the fading day.

Was this it? Was all his effort, his work, his struggles about to be made meaningless?

Was this the end?