“No way anyone’s peeping on you,” Rena knew it wasn’t good to heat the coals for that topic, but he couldn’t let Regan get the last word in it. Even if his remark wasn’t all that great. Regan changes her focus from the group to the sky for something, but quickly returns and continues the conversation. Rena paused to think about Regan’s question. Now that the thought arose, Rena had never seen many rangers, let alone with pokeballs on hand.

“Maybe only high-ranking rangers get Pokeballs? I haven’t really seen many with them, so it’s probably that.” He replied, but was cut off at the very end by the senior rangers. It was time to pledge allegiance, or in other words, become a real ranger. He reached for the styler in his back pocket and slipped it out with extreme ease. Like everyone else he jousted it to the sky. 

This was it. The girl recited the vow, and Rena followed suit. “[i]I solemnly swear, from this point onward, to be courageous and fight the forces of evil,[/i]” The tension in his voice wavered half-way through the pledge. “[i]to not let any emotions or personal interests get in the way of my duty, and to protect the innocent; people or Pokemon.[/i]” With the vow finished, Rena made sure that his arm was straight to the sky.

From the ranger’s own styler, a wave of light swept through the clearing, igniting all the trainees’ own stylers. The object reverberated with a strong shock, coursing through Rena’s body. He instinctively brought his arm down and grasped it with his free hand. It took almost all his willpower to not drop it and for not dropping it, he mentally rewarded himself. Without thinking about it he returned to the position again with a wide smirk. The ranger shortly continued her speech. “[i]The vibration signifies that you are all registered rangers; only you can use your own styler. Keep this in mind if you wanna live. So when you use them you just twirl 'em in a circular path...[/i]” A [i]registered ranger[/i]. Rena was now one of those. He mouthed the words over and over again, barely being able to contain his excitement.

Moving towards a bulletin board in the heart of the clearing, the ranger continued; “[i]These are some fairly easy missions you are expected to accomplish. As easy as ranger missions get, anyways. You leave in a few hours, so until then do whatever. Meet at the docks at sundown. The painted numbers on the bungalows are the same to the numbers of your squads, so have fun figuring that out. Alright, everyone, dismissed.[/i]” Rena inched his way closer towards the front of the group as he put his styler back into his pocket. He churned over the fact that he wasn’t sure which ‘number’ his group was. Being called last, it would probably be the highest number painted.

	Rena started his way over towards the bungalows to put his luggage away and explore his new homes, but he stopped dead in his tracks when he noticed people turning around. He wasn’t particularly concerned about what was going on until he started to register what was wrong. Number 1, everyone went silent. Number 2, everyone was turned towards the issue. Number 3, there was a lurking figure quickly fading into visibility. Number 4, there was a rookie standing in the path of it.

	He took a instinctual step backwards as the figure revealed itself to be a Dusknoir. Rena had never seen one before but he had read about them in books. Unless they were on your side, they weren’t something you wanted to be against. Not without protection like this. As it approached the horde of humans it produced a heavy static sound, which almost brought Rena to his knees. For whatever reason the frequency resounded painfully through his head. 

The sound soon dissolved into nothing but a moment of silence. Rena forced himself back into a stable stand and observed the scene. There, on the ground motionless, was the only causality. The unfortunate soul who was too close to the beast and now laid without a pulse. It took Rena a brief moment to fully realise what had just happened. His face contorted into a mixture of fear and pain. Someone just died. Someone was now dead. They just had their first casualty.