Fear. The gust of wind. That's all I felt for who knows how long. I finally woke up from my slumber. I'm still on top of the mountain where I fought that trainer. I manage to flip onto my back, despite freezing. I look up at the stars. There's no one. I couldn't even call out one of my Pokémon. They all fainted during battle.
Suddenly, I heard voices. It was an unfamiliar teenage voice, as well as some urgent voices.
"They said he was up here!" said a boy's voice. I see someone come up onto the summit. I could faintly make out who it was. From the blurry vision I had, he had spiked orange hair curving off the side of his head. He had a grey jacket and tan jeans.
"Yo, I found him!" he yelled down the mountain. He kneeled down next to me and checked my pulse. He shivered when he touched my wrist. "Oh man, you are freezing. Hold on, kiddo, help is comin'!"
I see some paramedics come up the hill with who seems like Lance, as well as his Dragonite.
My vision fades to black once more.
...
Hop's POV
My hand was aching. I had been writing down notes for the past three hours on the Legendary Beasts of Johto. Entei, Raikou, and Suicune. Sonia gave me this assignment a few weeks ago, to get all the information I could find of nearly every legendary Pokémon. She was on a vacation to the Alola region with Magnolia. I dropped my pen and looked at my watch. It was past midnight. I sighed. I went to pick up my pen, but I heard a small clatter below my chair. I looked down and saw that my pen had rolled over to the couch. I sigh and reluctantly get up, and grab the pen. I walk back to my chair, and sit down.
I wrote for a good fifteen minutes, when I felt a hand on my shoulder, scaring the living daylights out of me. I jump out of my chair and fall to the ground. I look up and see Lee.
"Woah, you alright, Hop?" he asks, kneeling down and helping me up. He pulls me to my feet, and I brush off my lab coat with my hands.
"Yeah, I'm fine, except for the part where you decided to scare me to death instead of knock." I scoff. I pick up my pen. Lee chuckles.
"Are you seriously working this late again?" he asks.
"It's Sonia. She's been nagging me to take notes on legendary Pokémon, so that's what I've been doing for the past..." I stop, and look at my watch, then back at Lee. "eight hours..."
"Hop, you should get home and rest. This should wait until tomorrow." he said, his tone changing.
"No, I need to get this done!" I exclaim, picking my chair back up. I put it back where it was, but Leon stops me.
"Hop, I'm serious. Let's go home. I'll contact Sonia. Don't wait for me. Tell Mom I'll be there soon." my older bro said. I guess there was no arguing with him. I put down my pen and grabbed my bag, and walked out of the lab. It was the only building in Wedgehurst with lights on. I closed the door and started walking home. I made it to my house, and opened the door. My mother heard me from the kitchen, and she ran over to me and put her hands on my shoulders.
"Hop! I've been worried sick! Have you been working late shifts at the lab?" she asks, frantic. I brush out of her grip and walk upstairs. I walk up the stairs, and once I reach the next floor, I walk into my room, and drop my bag on the floor, and then sit down on my bed. My mother comes up and stands in the doorway.
"Hop, please. I'm worried." she says.
I let out a long exhale, and I start talking.
"Sonia's been having me work late at the lab, researching legendary Pokémon. I don't want to disappoint her." I say, not facing her. I look at the picture of Isaac and I, when we first started our adventure. Scorbunny and Grookey with us. "Isaac has it so much easier than me. He battles challengers every day, one by one. That could've been me." I say. I could feel the tears in my eyes. My mom sat down next to me. She rubbed my arm, trying to comfort me.
"Honey, Isaac also has all those meetings to attend with Leon, so in a way, he has the same job as you. You and your best friend are learning from adults. You're learning from Sonia, and Isaac is learning from Leon. Now, why don't you get some rest?" she asks. "I can practically feel how tired you are."
I nod and take off my lab coat, and hang it on my rack. My mom exits my room and closes the door. I fall back onto my pillow, and shut off my lamp. I knew I shouldn't do anything more to tire myself out, but I couldn't help myself. I grabbed my phone off my desk and sat up. I opened the news, and there was nothing new. I scrolled through the news, but it was all boring stuff. I opened my messages, and decided to text Isaac.
H: Hey, bro. How's the Champ life treating you? Tired from meetings?
No response for about two minutes. Strange. Isaac normally responds to any message he gets within thirty seconds. I shoot him another text.
H: You there?
At that moment, I get a new notification. When I read the headline, it sent a jolt up my back and I sat up instantly.
Galar Champion's disappearance remains a mystery.
What?! Isaac disappeared?! I open my messages and frantically tap the letters on the keyboard.
H: Isaac? Are you alright?! People say you disappeared!
No response. I grunt under my breath, and get off of my bed, and stand up. I dig into my coat pocket, and find an invention I made. A circular device. I put a tracker inside of Isaac's cap. He can be a bit reckless at times. I turn it on and see that the tracker was far south of here. In another region, from the looks of it. I grab my jacket, my blue one, and carefully sneak out of my room. I sneak past my parents room, and head downstairs. I open the door outside, and suddenly Purrloin trots in. She goes to her spot on the couch and starts sleeping. I step outside and close the door. I take out a pokeball and summon Corviknight. I get onto him and we were about to take off, when I heard Lee.
"Hop, where are you going?" he asks, in a quiet tone. I look at him, and he has a distressed look on his face.
I don't respond and instead tell Corviknight to take off, and when we launch into the air, I can hear Leon screaming after me. I didn't care. I had to see my best friend.
...Hours later..

Corviknight flew for a good three hours. I started to drift off, but I couldn't fall asleep. The tracker finally got in range. In Johto. That's ironic. It was up top of some mountain. I told Corviknight to fly up there, and I regretted that. I instantly started getting colder and colder. I told Corviknight to land and once the armored bird landed I dismounted him and returned him to his pokeball.
"Isaac! Where are you?!" I yell out. No response. I run further up the hill, when I see a shape up ahead. I release Zamazenta and he focuses in on the shape.
"Zamazenta, be ready with Crunch." I say, lowly.
The Shield Pokémon snarled.
The shape got closer, and I realized it was Zacian.
"Zacian!" I yell out. The Sword Pokémon runs up to us. She whimpers and gestures behind her.  "You want us to follow you?" I ask. She nods and we follow her to a cave, where there were about four people gathered around a campfire.
Two paramedics, as well as Lance, the Indigo League Champion, and a boy who looked a few years older than me. I saw Isaac, asleep or knocked out next to the campfire.
"Isaac!" I yell out. The people in the cave look up at me. I dash into the cave and slide on my knees down to my best friend.
"What the what? Where did you come from?" The boy asked.
"What have you done to him?" I demand. Zamazenta and Zacian follow me in, but Lance starts speaking.
"I take it you are Hop?" he asks.
"You've got that right." I say. I check Isaac's pulse, and thank Arceus he was still breathing.
"What happened?" I ask. I stand up.
"Your friend traveled up Mount Silver for some strange reason. We received an anonymous tip that he was freezing on the summit of the mountain. We got up here as soon as we could." the boy said.
"You're Blue, aren't you? The Kanto Champion?" I ask.
"Hey, nice eye, but anyways, Isaac is still recovering from the cold, and suddenly this blue wolf Pokémon popped out. It snarled at all of us, protecting him. We eventually came to the point where we were all trying to help him." Blue said.
"Her name is Zacian." I say, bluntly.
"Wait, what?" Lance asks.
"Zacian and Zamazenta, the Legendary wolves of Galar. They were myths before we discovered them."
"Why don't you sit down and tell us your story, from the beginning?" Lance asks.
"The whole thing? From when Isaac and I started our journey? That's a long time." I say, rubbing the back of my head.
"We have time. This blizzard isn't going anywhere anytime soon." Blue says.
I shrug and sit down on the cave floor, and I start my story from the beginning...

Isaac's POV.
Air. I needed it. I sat up and took a desperate deep breath. Once I regain my bearings, I stand up. I was in an empty plain, with shallow water beneath me, only up to the soles of my shoes. The sky had a red tint in it, reflecting off the water. It was almost as if it was some nuclear fallout.
I take a look around, and no one is around, and there's nothing for miles.
I turn back around, and see a figure standing about five yards away.
It was the kid from the summit of the mountain.
He was looking toward the ground, with one hand on the brim of his cap, between his thumb and index finger, and he had a pokeball in hand.
I back up in shock.
"Who are you?" I ask.
No response.
"Hey, I'm talking to you!" I yell.
Still no response. The only thing he did was put away the pokeball, and walk further up to me. He stopped about four feet in front of me, and held out some kind of rock. He mumbles something I couldn't understand.
"Who are you?" I ask again. He simply looks up a little, revealing a brown eye, before a bright flash consumes me.

I wake up in a cave, and my vision is all blurry. I sit up and put a hand on my head. I hear Hop.
"Isaac! You okay?" I can hear him say.
"Not exactly." I say, I sit up and rub my eyes, and then look around, letting my arms go limp. I see Hop, Lance, Zacian, and Zamazenta around me. As well as another person.
"You've been out for a long time, kid." the mysterious boy says.
"Blue's right." Hop said. Blue? That was his name?
"How long?" I ask.
"Five hours, at the least." Lance said. I'd been knocked out for that long?
I tried to sit up, but every part of me suddenly burst in pain.
"Agh!"
"Your body is suffering from shock. You won't be able to move properly for a while." one of the paramedics said.
"Hop, grab the pokeballs from my bag. Make sure my team is alright." I say. Hop nods and grabs my bag, opening it and taking out five pokeballs. One by one, each of them release form their pokeballs, only with a twist. They are all knocked out cold. Cinderace, Charizard, Lucario, Sylveon, and Boltund.
"Hop, grab the revives in my bag and the Full Restores."
Hop proceeds to revive each of my team members, but I suddenly remember what happens whenever Lucario recovers from a knockout blow.
"Hop! Get back!" I say. Hop just sprayed the Full Restore onto Lucario, and in not even a second, Lucario's eyes snap open, and he grabs Hop by the collar and flips backward, landing on his feet, and holding a green bone made of energy over Hop's throat. That was the new move I taught him a while ago in exchange for Earthquake. Bone Rush.
"Lucario! It's alright!" I yell out. I still can't move.
Lucario softly growls, and the bone fades. He lets Hop go, and sinks to his knees, holding a paw to his head. Sylveon trots over to him and wraps a feeler around his wrist, comforting him.
"Thanks, Sylveon." I say. The Intertwining Pokemon smiled, and Lucario looked at all of us.
Isaac? Hop? What happened?
"Long story short, after we battled that person at the top of the mountain, we all went out cold. That's when Lance and Blue found us. We've been in this cave ever since, waiting for this blizzard to pass." I say. Lucario looks behind him, seeing the raging blizzard outside.
Very well. Are we all alright now?
"Yeah, thanks to Hop." I say.
Lucario sits down next to me, and his expression turns to that of a worried guardian.
Your body is not responding to your brain's commands.
"Yeah, after being in that blizzard for so long, I'm kinda frozen. So we're gonna be here a while." I say. I call out to the others. "Hey! You guys good over there?" My other Pokémon look back to me and nod.
Well, do we have any past times?
"Not really, no." Blue says,
"And I just told everyone about how our journey began and where you beat Lee, but that's about it."
The fire suddenly started crackling.
"There's no more wood for miles, so we'll have to find another way to stay warm." Lance said.
"That's not a problem. Blaze, you mind?" I ask. Blaze walks over to the fire and lets out a little Flamethrower on the wood, setting it ablaze once again.
"I should've known you were gonna pull something like that." Hop chuckled.
"We should all get some sleep." Hop said. "If you guys feel cold, Zacian and Zamazenta would be more than happy to keep you warm."
The two wolves happily howled outside.
After a few more minutes, we all found a comfortable position, and drifted off to sleep.

Lucario's POV.
I waited until everyone was asleep. I stood up, and looked around. Everyone was sound asleep. Hop was snoring. I carefully step over him, and walk outside. The blizzard is still raging. Zacian and Zamazenta are sound asleep as well. I carefully trot around them, and take a good look at my surroundings. Mount Silver was definitely big. I jump up onto the rock face. I climb and climb.
Isaac originally found me in the Giant's Cap, where it was always snowing. I prefer cold environments. It's where I excel in battling. I reach the summit of the small mountain, and take in the cold breeze. I form a Bone Rush and smash it into the ground. I put four more into the ground, forming a circle. I kneel down in the radius of the circle, and close my eyes. This is a regimen I use for honing my mind.
After about an hour, I stand back up and open my eyes, feeling my skills sharpen. I backflip off of the mountain, landing back at the entrance of the cave.
I walk into the cave, but I have the sense that I'm being watched.

Isaacs POV
Over the course of the next day, we made it back to Galar. My mother and Hop's mother, as well as Leon and Sonia, were all worried sick. The citizens of Galar were happy for our return, but to this day, I still don't know who that guy was at the top of the mountain...