"What?" Ithica yelped. She blinked at them, and then at the ball in her hands.

"What do you think you're doing with those Pokemon?" the first one demanded. He took a step towards them, one hand reaching for the single pokeball on his belt. "Answer me!"

"Nope." That was pretty much Mel's first reaction, and she threw the ball at him. It hit him in the head and then there was a flash of red as it released a Pokémon. And, sometime later, Mel was going to freak out about that too. For now she was too generally freaked to stuff anything else in. So she just grabbed Ithica and ran.

Ithica threw the ball she was holding, as well, and took off with Melinda.

"What the actual fuck?" she gasped as they ducked back into the storage room they'd come from.

"I have no idea," Mel said, panting a little as she picked up balls and threw them into the hallway. "But this should be a good distraction."

From the hallway she heard some roaring and very angry Pokémon sounds. Yup, definitely a good distraction. Time to go now.

"Dear god they sound angry," Ithica murmured. She grabbed some pokeballs as well, and threw them into the hall. She jumped when the building rattled a bit. "Thinking we should get out of here!"

"Way ahead of you!" Mel had one last ball in hand as she ran out of the room. A few of the Pokémon were fleeing the building, and she followed them, since she had no idea where she was going.

Ithica shrieked when she stepped on a pokeball and nearly fell, but she managed to catch herself and scooped up the ball as she went, following Melinda and the freed pokemon out of the building. In the back of her mind, she marveled a little at how many rare pokemon there were around her, but mostly she just focused on running and not freaking out.

Once they were outside, a lot of the Pokémon went off their own separate ways. Mel finally let out the last Pokémon from the ball in her hand, blinking a little at the Larvesta.

"Alright, time to go," she muttered, making shooing motions at the Pokémon. It wasn't very fast, and she could hear stuff going on back in the building.

The Larvesta looked at her in return and then nudged its pokeball at her, clearly wanting her to pick it up again. If this human was good enough to let it go, then it wanted to stay with her.

Ithica looked at the pokeball she'd brought out with her. She almost didn't want to release whatever was inside, because who knew if any of this would last long enough for her to catch anything on her own? But she did end up releasing the pokemon and dropping the ball on the ground. A Dratini shook itself and looked at her, and she waved a hand at it.

"Go on," she said. "You're free, go before they get you again."

Mel hesitated for a moment before she nodded and picked up the Pokeball. "If you're sure," she agreed, holding out the ball to give the Larvesta one more chance to refuse.

The Dratini trilled and pushed the ball back towards her so she'd pick it up. She seemed a good person, and Dratini in general liked people, so this seemed a good person to go with.

Larvesta nodded once and spouted some fire from its horns. It was sure.

Ithica blinked.

"Wait, you want to come with me?" she asked, looking at the Dratini.

Mel nodded slowly and recalled the Larvesta. "Okay, time to get going."

Dratini nodded and trilled again, nosing the ball to recall itself back to the Pokeball.

There were some distant shouts behind them, and Ithica snapped up the pokeball with Dratini in it.

"We should probably move," she said to Mel. "I have no idea where we might even possibly be, and we need to find a town."

"Yup, time to go," Mel agreed, keeping hold of the Pokeball for now and starting to walk. If the shouts got any louder she'd start running, but for now walking was okay.

Ithica held Dratini's pokeball with a grip that was tighter than strictly necessary, and scrambled to keep up with Mel. The forest around them got quieter as they got away from the Rocket building.

"Okay," she finally said, breaking the silence. "So I don't think I'm dreaming, and I still have no idea what's going on. These are real Pokemon, in real pokeballs, and those were real Team Rocket and none of it makes any sense."

"Not even a little," Mel agreed, looking shaken still. "Nothing here makes any kind of sense. Like how did we get here? Will this even last? Is it some strange virtual reality drug-induced shared coma?"

"I have no idea about any of it," Ithica replied. "Last thing I remember, we were playing Go at the mall and the app crashed."

"Yeah that's pretty much what I remember too." Mel frowned. "I really, really don't have an explanation for this. Which is scary."

Ithica was quiet for a moment.

"Let's run with it," she said suddenly, looking at Mel. "I mean, for real, let's roll wth this. We have Pokemon. We're obviously in a world where they exist. Let's make our way to a town and become trainers."

Mel considered for a moment before she shrugged.

"Sure, why not. We've each got one already, might as well keep collecting them."

"I think there's some sort of test, to get a trainer's license," Ithica mused. "We'll have to find out when we find a town." She looked around, trying to figure out what direction they needed to go in.

"Right." Mel was quiet for a moment. "Well, I guess first order of business is finding a road. Or a person who can show us to a road who is not crazed and potentially homicidal. I guess for now just pick a direction?"

"Sounds like as good a plan as any," Ithica said, nodding. She looked around and pointed towards where the trees seemed a bit thinner, the opposite direction from which they came. "That way?"

"Sure, sounds good." Mel started walking. She had no idea where she'd end up, but she'd be somewhere else, which was better than here.

It was dark by the time Ithica was able to finally see some lights in the distance. She was sticking close to Mel, especially once she could hear the nocturnal Pokemon in the forest around them start to wake up, and there were some she just did not want to encounter before she knew what she was doing.

"Hey, I think I see a town," she said to Mel, pointing at a couple points of light through the trees.