Nurse Joy of the Viridian City Pokécentre parked her bike at the side of the Route 17 and dismounted. She removed the holdall from the back of the bicycle and climbed over the fence separating the road from the wilderness, scrambling down an embankment into a meadow. A flock of startled Pidgeys took to flight from the tall grass and she ducked low, pausing to allow tranquillity to return to the area after the human intrusion.

It was remarkable to think such a pristine area existed just metres from Route 17. Cyclists whizzed past, none noticing nature’s bounty. But for all its seemingly untouched beauty, this was a managed landscape. Humans kept a close eye on the wildlife here to hold it in balance, ensuring no one particular breed of pokémon disrupted the harmony, though it was a task that demanded teams of pokéxperts and pokécologists to monitor.

In earlier years, it would have required people stomping around the undergrowth with their scientific instruments, making all sorts of noise and scaring half of the wildlife to death! Thankfully technology had since advanced. The invention of the Silph Suit by Silph Co. meant scientists like her could study pokémon up close and personal in their natural habitats without them ever even realising.

With a check back to the road for any leering bikers, she unzipped the holdall and stripped her nurse uniform.

There’d been reports of dead Magikarp floating downstream. She knew there were Pikachu warrens in the riverbank across the meadow, and that they would often dip their tails in the water to hunt, zapping any fish that swap past. She wanted to check they weren't feeding or breeding out of control.

The Silph Suit, despite its advancement and eye-watering cost, largely resembled a diving wetsuit. Indeed, its least-technical-yet-most-effective aspect was the thick skin of neoprene and latex, which covered almost the entire body of a human, and which was coloured and moulded to replicate a particular species of pokémon. With its pointed, floppy ears, this suit had bee created to approximate the silhouette of a young Pikachu - far from perfect but, concealed within thick undergrowth, she could get within arm’s reach of a Pikachu before it became any the wiser. The tight elasticated material also sealed around her armpits, muting the human smell that could give her away downwind.

She wiggled one bare foot into the tight yellow leg of the suit, worming it in. Then the other. Where it bunched up, she tugged at it until there was enough material spare to stretch it up over her full, shapely rear. That was the hardest part - once over those two humps, it slid up her tight abdomen with ease. Her fingers wriggled into the tight gloves. Lastly she drew the elasticated cowl up over her head and snapped it into place. The rubbery rodent ears bounced and jiggled merrily up above, making her head wobble with the inertia whenever she turned her head.

But yellow and ratshaped or not, she was still 5 feet tall. Even a blind pikachu would spot that discrepancy. That was where the real brilliance of the Silph Suit came into play. With a twist of one chest-mounted nozzle, the latex sealed about her and began to contract. Gradually the world grew larger. Where before she could see over the top of the grasses, now they reached her shoulder and eventually, when she stopped shrinking at precisely the height of an 11-inch tall Pikachu female, they towered above her.

She prayed the Pidgeys circling back around didn't mistake her for a tasty vermin to snack on. The grasses loomed like a forest, providing safety from the skies, though the risk of Ekans attacks. She was just mustering the courage to venture in when she remembered the final piece - the pheromone-laced tail for masking her scent! She returned to the holdall, clambered inside it, and retrieved the tail of yellow fur. It shrank as she slotted it into the modulor tail-mount upon her latex-clad rear.

Happy that everything was in place, she sank down on all fours and crawled into the dim green underworld of the grasses. She scampered her way across the meadow with the well practised gait of a rodent until she reached the river. There she retrieved a notepad from a pocket of the Silph Suit and hunkered down to observe.

A dozen warrens dotted the mud of the riverbank. It formed a habitat for what she counted to be no less than thirty Pikachus and twice as many juvenile Pichus. Fishbones littered the entrances. The crafty little creatures scurried hither and thither, dragging stunned fish from the water to be eaten.

They paid her little attention. In this light, she was merely a gangly-looking member of their colony.

“Time to check your mating,” she muttered to herself. Clearly they were doing well, judging by the quantity of Pichu. She counted a large harem of females, many pregnant, and a smaller number of large males in rutting season. One specimen mounted a female, driving its cock deep into the squealing animal.

It was then that something warm and wet pressed against her rear end. With a yelp, she twisted her head around, and found himself looking up at the largest specimen of Pikachu masculinity she’d yet seen. It stood two-feet-tall, over twice her height and many more times her current weight. It nudged at her again. The nostrils of its inquisitive, prying snout opened wide as it inhaled her scent.

“Go away,” she hissed. The male cocked its head briefly at the human words before continuing to nuzzle her ass. She loved all animals equally, but this thing was starting to try her patience. “Get lost! I’m not a Pikachu.” She wiggled her pheromone-scented tail back and forth, trying to move her rear end away from its questing snout, but that only seemed to enticed it further. Its tail lashed excitedly in time with her own.

Its intentions were made plain as it trilled an unmistakeable mating cry. “Don’t think you’re putting a Pichu egg in me,” she hissed fiercely, hoping her tone would convey her meaning if her words didn’t. Whether it understood her or not, it evidently didn’t care. It moved to climb on her back. She kicked back at it, her foot contacting surprisingly thick musculature beneath the yellow fuzz. Sparks crackling off it. She gulped. The latex Silph Suit could insulate against minor jolts but a full lightning bolt from a male of this size would be dangerous, especially if angered. As politely as she could, she commenced a hurried scramble away back into the grass.

The moment she turned away, the rodent’s furry underbelly pressed down on her back. The weight of the male specimen pinned her to the soil.