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When he first awoke in a body not of his own, he, like any normal person, freaked the hell out. He was very sure he was not supposed to not a tail, claws not scales. Thankfully, he had the power of meta-knowledge on his side so he was surely gonna have a fun time trapped here, right?
Right?
Yeah, apparently not.
Now stuck in a body with few similarities to his human form, he and his brothers must now traverse through the cosmos, meeting friends and foes alike, all the while, being under the watchful eye of deities far beyond their comprehension.
He guessed he just had to wing it. How hard could it really be?
This story is rated T for teen, each chapter will have a warning of potential triggers at the top in case it contains things that might disturb someone.
Also, Chp 1 and 2 are currently undergoing revision.
Things to note:
This fic is, as the summary entails, will be of three brothers, Human-turned-Pokémon, being sent into the anime world.
The main world, and yes, I mean main world, will be set in the anime-verse, there will be arcs and specials that will be set in a custom world, either one of my own creations or one of the various ones available in media.
That being said, this is my first fic being rewritten and revamped, a lot of time have been poured into this fic, nearly a year spent refining my characters and worlds.
This story is a massive one, one that will tie in and be referenced in other non-Pokémon stories of mine. (which I haven't actually written yet, but I already have general ideas for them)
You can read the first version of this fic in FFN by Shinigami Gojira. (Be warned, the first version is a clear example of how bad I was and how I've improved over the years, meaning that it is a horrible, inconsistency-filled story littered with plotholes)
A/N: Revising chp 1 and 2. You can read this if you want but beware of terrible-quality-ville (At least it's better than the original so eh)
Mild Language
***
A shaggy-haired man wearing a dirty white sleeveless shirt and a pair of green trousers strode into the dark, not bothering to switch on the lights as he took a sip of his coffee on his right hand.
His feet kicked against random metal pieces and devices on the floor as he made his way to his desk that held his computer.
His computer was a simple set up; three decent-sized monitors, a keyboard, wireless speakers and a wireless mouse on the right. It was admittedly a little rare to have a physical computer around here rather than a holographic set but he'd rather have the ability to hear the sounds of keys tapping and feeling a more solid form under his fingers than anything too fancy.
Althoygh, it was probably due to nostalgia than any excuses he could come up with.
The man snorted. Then there were also the various complaints he got from Sarah, though most of them were usually about how she was worried that something might damage it than anything too serious.
Tch, as if anything could harm his computer after all the upgrades he added to this baby.
He placed his mug beside the monitor and turned it on, muttering, "Okay, time for some good 'ol computer shit, Briggs-y boy."
The light from the monitor made his mug glowed like a firefly, the number '679' on it rippling similar to a ripple in a pond.
Briggs opened up a folder labelled 'Work Things' and got to typing.
His fingers moved with a speed and grace that one would expect from years of repeated actions. Occasionally, he took sips from his mug of coffee and although he knew caffeine wouldn't do much to help him. Twas, the benefit of having a body literally built to suit his needs, he'd mostly drank it for the taste anyway.
Minutes into his work, he paused, eyes blinking at the screen in bewilderment. "Is this?"
He rubbed his eyes and casted a magical spell that brought up a holographic projection in front of him.
He gaped in visible surprise before his face quickly shifted into a smirk of amusement. "No way. So that's where the Champion's Sol went. Hah!"
The sounds of footsteps made him turn away from the monitor, he glanced behind him, seeing a lean blonde girl wearing a blue sports bra and a pair of brown shorts walking towards him.
She held a smirk on her face with her arms crossed. Her eyes held their gaze on him for a second before trailing on the things on the floor. "Hey, Briggs. Still being the most messy adorable idiot in this sector, aren't you?"
Briggs chuckled, shrugging. "Not sure about the idiot part but get this, Sarah."
"Get what?" Sarah stood beside him, eyes glancing at the monitor for a second. "You got something new in store for the gang?"
"That too but this is something more important."
"More important than your machines?" she said, raising a brow. Now that was surprising.
"It's the Champion's Sol," he said, pausing for dramatic effect. "It's back."
"It's back?" Sarah muttered, eyes wide. "Holy shit."
"I know."
"Where is it?" She leaned down to get a better look on his computer.
Briggs shook his head at her impatience before clicking and typing something into his computer. He stood up, moving away and allowing her to see. "It's, as you can see, in one of the blander parts of the Infini-verse, a couple of multiverses away from us to be exact."
"You think Fhsop's gonna bring 'em somewhere?" she said, glancing back at him.
"Don't doubt it. Especially with the censorship on his name… again." Briggs rolled his eyes with a sigh
Sarah snorted, playfully punching his arm. "You think we're in–"
"Maybe." He shrugged before perking up with a smile on his face. "Come on, let's go tell the others and prepare the test."
A dangerous grin appeared on the blonde's face as she rubbed her hands together. "Ooh, do you think they'll allow me to throw in some 'special' things into the test?"
"It's probably best you don't scar them, Sarry," Briggs remarked, an amused grin on his face. "Besides if what Crude's said is correct, I've already got an idea for what we could throw at them."
"I love the sound of that." She giggled.
It was a beautiful morning, the sun was shining, the flowers were blooming. The Pokémon were wide awake in the morning sun and ready for another day of surviving and battling.
There comes a time where a person officially becomes a trainer, and that day usually comes around the age of ten.
It was a bright and beautiful day in Pallet Town when five trainers, one who was the grandson of the friendly Professor Oak, and another, an aspiring young boy with the name of Ash Ketchum, were about to take their first steps Into the world of Pokémon.
But this story won't be focusing on the tale of Ash Ketchum and his dreams of being a Pokémon Master, nor will it be of Gary's or the other trainers'.
Rather our story starts on Route 1.
The route filled with basic and common Pokémon, many trainers had starters that came from this route but our characters were a bit… different from the rest.
Three unconscious Pokémon laid on a bed of grass, their bodies twitching in pain and their groans being the only signs of life.
The first one awoke with a miserable-sounding groan.
"Uh, oh God, what in the hell hit me?" The orange Pokémon clutched his head, trying to dull the headache that screeched at his mind.
Ugh… my fricking head… He rubbed his temples, getting the pain to recede slightly. He shivered at the weird feeling of his fingers and opened his eyes, hissing a bit at the pain from the sudden assault of light.
Recovering from the pain, he narrowed his eyes and was met with an unbelievable sight.
He blinked once then twice and then a third one for good measure.
He looked down at his fingers, or more accurately, his claws. He flexed his claws, extending and retracting them with a curious gaze.
"What am I?" he paused, looking down at his yellow underbelly, orange limbs and turning around, spotting a familiar flaming tail. He paled. "I'm orange… oh God, I'm a Charmander, aren't I?"
He gulped, and if he was still human he'd be sweating bullets. "Oh God, okay, okay. Th-this has to be a dream, right? I'm not actually a-"
No, no, calm down, June. There's gotta be a perfectly reasonable answer for this, he wasn't actually a Charmander. He wasn't actually in the Pokémon world and he was definitely not a Pokémon. Nope. This was all just a dream… all just a dream…
Just a dream. He told himself. He remembered himself falling asleep on his mattress and that was about it so this was probably a dream...
Or he fricking died! He could've contracted some impossible-to-cure disease in his sleep and this was him being in a coma and he was close to dying and... and...
Okay, calm down. He wasn't dead... probably. This could be the result of drugs and hallucinations. Maybe this was a result of drugs being injected into him when he was in a coma.
But then again, everything felt too vivid and his mind was clear, not at all the cloudy fogginess he imagined it'd be.
So that left one thing. This was a dream.
This wasn't real, he reasoned. There was just one way he knew that could prove that this was all just a dream.
He brought his right claw close to his chest, breathing heavily from the nerves building in him… actually he was starting to have second thoughts about this, maybe he shouldn't be–
"Chocolate bologna! Goddamn, these things are sharp," he shouted, pressing a claw against the small cut in his chest.
He froze, coming to a cold realisation. Oh God… he felt pain. He shouldn't be feeling pain in a dream, so that meant…
Oh no, this was not real, there was no way he was in the Pokémon world, he just couldn't.
But when faced with the evidence in the form of the orange claw in his vision and Mother Nature surrounding him, he couldn't deny it any longer.
His heartbeat quickened and his body was shaking. "Oh no, no no no, there's no way. I can't be here, that's just impossible! I can't have gone insane, right?"
You're already talking to yourself! That's like step one for going insane!
He shook his head, trying to clench his inner demons with a deep breath. "Okay, you're a Charmander in the Pokémon world, you've kept your memories but that doesn't mean you don't have a chance of being in Mystery Dungeon or the anime, God I hope this isn't the manga."
Despite having never read a single page, he still knew of how brutal the manga could get through mentions and references in videos.
"If you're in the anime world, then that'll be fine, just gotta watch out for Ash and you won't die from any legendary shenanigans. Haha, that sounds easy enough, right?" he shook his head, slapping his reptilian cheek and flinching at the unfamiliarity of his body.
Note to self, stop talking to yourself. Note two, scales are weird.
Before he had the chance to think about his situation any longer, a groan to his right alerted him.
June snapped to his right, seeing a yellow rodent, a Pikachu, stirring and speaking, "Ah, my head, what the hell did you do?"
He couldn't stop himself from responding to the familiar voice. "Me? What did I do? I wasn't the one that turned us into Pokémon!"
"Pokémon? What are you-" His younger brother stopped upon meeting his appearance. "You're a Pokémon… why are you a Pokémon?"
"In case you haven't noticed, dummy, you're a Pokémon too, a Pikachu to be exact."
"I am?" The Pikachu looked down at his body, a shocked expression making its way on his face. "Huh, I am."
"Really? That's the best you can come up with? Not 'Holy crap, I'm not human' or 'Pokémon are real?', just a simple 'huh'?" June's eyes twitched at his brother's dismissal tone.
"Hey, you know I don't like doing weird things like you!" the Pikachu protested, jabbing a finger at the Charmander.
June deadpanned, claws moving in front of him like he couldn't believe the Pikachu. "Even the revelation of being a Pikachu isn't enough to elicit a more shocked response, Ane?"
"What? Of course, I'm shocked." Ane glanced at his paws. "It's just– Does this mean I have to walk on four now?"
"That's what you're worried about?" Really? Being in a different body wasn't the worrying part? Walking on fours couldn't possibly compare to having to adjust to this new body.
Ane, not seeing the reason for such a reaction, simply shrugged in response.
Before they could continue, another groan cut them off. "Can you two shut up, my head hurts way too much to hear you argue."
"Quil? You're-"
"A Pokémon, I know. I heard you two loud and clear." Quil made a move to get up, giving his older brothers a strange sight in a bipedal Bulbasaur.
"Uh, you're a Bulbasaur, dude," June said, bluntly.
"Huh? Oh." Quil dropped to all fours, blinking at the feeling of grass beneath his feet. "Okay, this is gonna be weird."
"Tell me about it, these scales are gonna take a while to get used to." June shivered. Way more than just a while.
"Well, look on the bright side, you'll no longer feel hot 'cause you're a Fire-type now," Ane said.
"I guess." June puckered in his lips, letting out a quiet hiss as he rubbed an arm. This is so weird.
Not aware of his big brother's mental crisis, Quil glanced around, trying to make sense of his surroundings. "So any clues on where we are?"
"Not at all." June shrugged before pointing a finger in front of them. "Maybe that path will lead us somewhere."
"Well, what are we waiting for? Let's go!" Ane shouted, getting Quil to follow him.
"Hey, wait! We don't even know where it leads! Damn it, guys!"
A hooded figure floated in the sky, his arms crossed and his cloak flowing in the morning breeze.
He gave the three a silent glance, inspecting each of them with a slight nod.
"So that's the Champion, my so-called 'creator'?" He didn't sound impressed at seeing the teen Pokémon.
A voice that sounded ethereal without any discerning tone that made it sound male or female, spoke in a dull monotone that somehow contained a playful, almost mischievous vibe.
Yup, he may not look like much but hey, neither did the others.
"I guess you're right, Briggs never did look like anything but a regular person." He shook his head. "I still don't get why I'm wearing this though, isn't the point of my being here is to test them?"
It's to make the reveal feel more dramatic.
A spark of lightning and confetti burst in front of the hooded man, eliciting a chuckle from him.
"I'll play along, 'Master'," He didn't quite sound used to saying that word. He pointed at his cloak with a disdainful sneer. "Perhaps you could make this red? You know that's my favourite colour."
Black just draws more attention. Now go! I'll help you get started if you need to.
"Nah, I'm confident I can think of something," he said, sounding a bit surprised at the Celestial Being offering help.
It was quite unusual for them to offer help without asking for anything in return.
You know that's not true, Cosmo may not appreciate my humour in acting like a common god. At least I don't ask too much.
"Tell that to Briggs and the others." The hooded man snorted.
Pft, they love the adventures I send them on, trust me,I would know.
He guessed the Celestial Being was correct in that regard, none of their demands or favours were too demanding.
Try not to go overboard, I expect a full report by the end of the day.
"Can't you just use your omniscience to know about it? You know I'm trash at writing reports."
And that's why I'll need you to write it.
After all, one can't learn when an all-powerful being held their hand through everything.
"Cosmo-damn it," he muttered, snapping his fingers and disappearing in a flash.
The disembodied voice only chuckled at his ire.
Let's see how it will end this time.
"Pallet Town, three hundred metres south," June readout, looking at the large sign in front of them.
The sign was actually written in Japanese and while they were surprised at their sudden proficiency in the language, that shock wasn't as world-breaking as being turned into a fictional creature and then sent into said fictional creature's world, so they were quick to recover.
June's eyes moved to the tall grass around them, he took in the clouds moving above as well as the trees on the outskirts of the field. There was also a tree on their right along with a berry bush.
He grimaced at seeing the absolute monstrous height of the tree. But the grimace was swiftly replaced by a smirk as his eyes sparkled at a sudden thought.
Hey, this could actually be pretty cool. He had a Pokémon's body. His brothers were here and he still had his memories. If he could talk like a normal person, there was a chance he could do something amazing in this world.
Oh yes, he could use this opportunity well and become the gre–
"Three hundred metres? That's gonna take forever!" Ane moaned, cutting off June's train of thought.
"Oh, quit your whining, you could use the exercise." June scoffed, jabbing at the yellow rodent's belly. "You look exactly like Ash's Pikachu did back in season one."
That should teach him for making him lose his thoughts.
Ane growled, his fur bristling at the insult. "At least I don't have to worry about burning down a whole town with my tail!"
He glared at the Pikachu, baring his sharp teeth in an ugly snarl. So that was how he was gonna play this. Fine. "At least I can burn someone! You can't even electrocute anyone!"
"You wanna say that to my face!" Ane growled, paws balling into fists.
"I already did!"
The two butted heads, sparks flaring in between their glares.
"Hey, you guys mind doing that later, someone's coming." Quil cut in, grabbing the two's attention away from each other.
"Someone's here?" June asked, head turning around quickly.
"Who is it?" Ane questioned.
Quil answered with a quiet point to his left, causing the two of them to turn towards the direction shown.
Just below the hill, they could see a young boy dragging a Pikachu with a long string of rope.
The boy wore a red cap and a green backpack, he also wore a blue jacket with a black shirt underneath and a pair of jeans.
He was huffing and puffing from the exertion and struggle in pulling the unamused rodent up the hill.
"Hey, do we think we should-" Ane started but was cut off.
Nope. He wasn't going to deal with this just yet. "Hell no, we are so not interfering with this." June pushed the two of them into a nearby bush.
The two landed onto their bellies, dazed from the fall.
Ane recovered and snarled. "Hey, what was that-"
"Shh!" June hissed, grabbing his tail and taking care to not cause a forest fire.
Once he secured his tail, he peered through the bush to look at the arriving kid.
After a few minutes of hiding, the boy passed by them and got out of sight, and after making sure the boy couldn't hear them. June got out of the bush and dusted himself with a sigh of relief. "That was close."
Ane came out with an annoyed expression on his face. "What was that for?"
"What? Oh, sorry. I just wanted to make sure we don't change canon too much."
That was a lie. He honestly couldn't care less if he changed canon. He just didn't want to let Ash capture any of them.
Quil glanced at him and raised a brow. "What makes you think that will happen?"
"Butterfly effect," he said with a 'matter of fact' tone.
"Butterfly effect?" The two chorused.
Goddamn it, he was going to have to explain it, wasn't he? Whatever.
"Look, almost every single fanfic I've read that had a person not supposed to be here, which by the way is like ninety-nine percent of them, had canon AKA the main timeline changed. If we mess with Ash so early, we might change something that could spell the end of this world," June said. "'Cause we all know how Ash is like when it comes to legendaries. If we can, we should get home as soon as possible. I don't want to be the one responsible for the death of millions." Despite what he said, June was pretty sure that people wouldn't die if he did change something. Not like he was going to do anything too bad to this world anyway.
"Yikes, when you put it like that…" Ane murmured, eyes trailing to the tree next to them.
"We should probably find Professor Oak…" Quil suggested, his eyes darting to the path behind the sign.
"Yes, we should," June said with a smirk.
This was going to be so fun.
The local professor of Pallet Town was a man past his prime, but still brimming with energy and enthusiasm for knowledge.
Samuel Oak, also known as Professor Oak, was a man in his mid-fifties. He was known for being the first to create the pokédex, a revolutionary device that contained information of every known Pokémon in existence.
He wore a white coat over his red T-shirt and a pair of long pants. The old man walked to his recliner chair, hoping to use his free time to catch up on some reading.
Earlier, he had the pleasure of sending not only his grandson but four other trainers with great potential, out into the wonderful world of Pokémon.
He took a sip of his cup of coffee, a book held in his right hand and his legs put up as his body relaxed on a recliner chair.
Two trainers to note were his grandson and Ash Ketchum, the son of his close friend, Delia Ketchum.
His grandson, Gary Oak, was a young boy with a knack for all things Pokémon, and although his attitude and personality still had much left to be desired, his rivalry with Ash would surely bring great things out of both of them.
Ash Ketchum was an interesting boy, his love of Pokémon rivalled that of Oak's, and though he had a rough start with his starter, there was potential for them to have a bond greater than anyone could imagine.
He turned over a new page, the calm pattering sounds of rain soothed the old man as he read the book published by one of his friends.
Minutes passed with the occasional rumble of thunder, nothing came to interrupt the old man from his free time.
Then, there was something that irked the professor, sounds of footsteps and a soft mumbling of 'Ow's could be heard alongside the rain.
Oak raised a brow, wondering if it was a kid that had hurt themselves in the rain.
He got up from his chair and made it to the front door, hearing the voices more clearly though muffled.
"Is this it?"
"Yeah, ow, if I can remember properly- ow, this is Professor Oak's- ow, lab."
"Well, what are we waiting for? Ring the doorbell."
Oak was curious about what lied behind his door, the three voices weren't familiar in any way, though that could be easily explained through foreigners as they'd mentioned they were trying to find his lab.
He opened the door, expecting to see three teens or kids behind it but he was met with nothing. Nothing but the cold chills of the rainy breeze.
He looked around, trying to find whoever would prank him in such weather.
"Hey, um, Professor Oak, we're down here."
Oak glanced down. They must've been younger than he thought.
He blinked and after pausing and rubbing his eyes to make sure he wasn't seeing things.
His mouth gaped open like a flopping Magikarp on land.
What made him react like this?
Well, if it was just three young kids, he would've scolded them before bringing them in.
If it was a bunch of Pokémon seeking shelter, he would've happily let them in.
But neither of them were the cause of his disbelief and shock.
Standing in front of him were three Pokémon, a yellow rodent, Pikachu, an orange reptilian Fire-type, Charmander and a frog-like dinosaur, Bulbasaur, but those weren't what shocked him, you see.
It was the fact that they were talking! Like humans!
It was quite a rare sight to behold, one talking Pokémon was rare enough but three of them? That was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
But then, the Charmander made a gesture that explained it all.
The Charmander snapped its claws, pointing at him with a smug look. "See? Told ya this was his lab."
"Yeah, yeah. I don't care," The Pikachu scoffed. "Just wait till he hears our story."
The Charmander winced. "Right, it's gonna sound crazy, crap."
Oak didn't pay much attention to the rest of their conversation, instead he was fixated on the Charmander who snapped his claws at him like a human.
These weren't ordinary Pokémon, were they? They could talk and they knew how to do human things. Granted, Pokémon could also learn these things if they wanted to but these three's behaviours were akin to kids or teens.
Oak couldn't believe this. He rarely had the opportunity to meet actual humans that got turned to Pokémon! This was so exciting, so wonderful. He could learn so much from th–
"HI, professor, would you mind letting us in?" The Bulbasaur asked.
At the mention of his profession, Oak snapped out of his trance and said with a shaky smile, "Yes, yes. Come in, you three must be cold out there."
"Thanks, Professor Oak," The Charmander said, sounding giddy.
The Pikachu came in without saying a word, eyes narrowed at the Charmander with barely-hidden irritation.
The Bulbasaur gave him a pleasant nod in return.
Professor Oak closed the door behind him, glancing at the three with thinly-concealed glee.
He had a feeling today wasn't gonna be quite a normal day after all.
I finished reading the first chapter and this is something that caught my interest in a snap! It's unique and funny and the pacing of the story feels like it is well balanced! Though there are some rough edges on some of the sentences, some being too short, but that's something that can be easily fixed!
You could try a sentence structure like this one: "Uh, oh God... what in the hell hit me?" The orange Pokemon clutched his head, trying to dull the headache that screeched at his mind. The pain receded and he rubbed his eyes, noting the dry, scaly feeling of his fingers gracing his eyelids.
Standing in front of him were three Pokémon, a yellow rodent, Pikachu, an orange reptilian Fire-type, Charmander and a frog-like dinosaur, Bulbasaur, but those weren't what shocked him, you see.
It was the fact that they were talking! Like humans!
It was quite a rare sight to behold, one talking Pokémon was rare enough but three of them? That was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
But then, the Charmander made a gesture that explained it all.
The Charmander snapped its claws, pointing at him with a smug look. "See? Told ya this was his lab."
"Yeah, yeah. I don't care," The Pikachu scoffed. "Just wait till he hears our story."
The Charmander winced. "Right, it's gonna sound crazy, crap."
Standing in front of him were three Pokemon. A yellow rodent, Pikachu, an orange reptilian Fire-type, Charmander and a frog-like Dinosaur, Bulbasur. But those weren't what shocked him, you see. It was the fact that they were talking! Like humans! It was quite a rare sight to behold, one talking Pokemon was rare enough but three of them? That was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
Also, you can try adding and changing some words and things in a sentence to avoid repeating some words:
It was the fact that they were talking! Like humans! This was quite a rare sight to behold. One talking Pokemon was already rare enough for him, but witnessing not one, but three more talking Pokemon? That was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity!
It doesn't hurt to try and cobble up a few paragraphs or more, though this could just be your writing style? Regardless, I do hope that my samples help you with your future writings!
As for the self-insert dialogues, are they highlighted in Bold text? Or are they an entirely different set of characters? I was a bit confused when I got to that part, but not enough to throw me off my reading focus
As always, keep up the good work! I am excited for what comes next with the revised Chapter 2!
As for the self-insert dialogues, are they highlighted in Bold text? Or are they an entirely different set of characters? I was a bit confused when I got to that part, but not enough to throw me off my reading focus
The self-insert is actually June, sorry if that's not clear. I'm not very good at writing in first person, which is kinda why June was the focus for most of the chapter.
The bold text is a Celestial Being speaking (or a person/creature with godlike powers like Arceus or Satan), as the bold text without quotations represents their power in speaking almost like the narrator/narration.
Mild Language, Mentions of Blood and Broken Bones (i.e bent wing and crushed spine) and Sexual Jokes present.
***
The sounds of footsteps tapping against the porcelain floor accompanied the pattering rain, they walked to a green couch next to a coffee table and on the wall opposite of the couch was a large flat-screen TV.
The three brothers gave the plain white walls a short glance, their eyes trailing over the shelves full of loose bolts, books and random machineries.
"Do you three want any drinks?" asked the professor, getting their attention. "I've purchased some chamomile tea for a friend of mine but I wouldn't mind sharing some with you three. I do have other types of tea if chamomile isn't something you prefer."
The Pikachu and Bulbasaur scooched closer to the Charmander, using his tail flame to dry themselves.
"It's okay, Professor Oak," the Charmander said, an awry smile on his face, "We don't need anything special. None of us really like tea so some water would be perfectly fine."
Oak nodded. "If you insist."
He made a move to the kitchen before being stopped by a proclamation from June, who stood on the couch pointed a claw at the old man.
"Hey, Oak. We should probably give you our names, seeing as, well, it's common courtesy and the whole you-letting-us-seek-shelter and all," June said, shrugging. "We also have a request for you if you don't mind us asking."
Before Oak could say that it wasn't required and he was happy to help one in need, June jabbed himself with a claw, wincing a bit from the accidental stab.
"My name's June and these two are my brothers, Ane and Quil. We would like to ask you to help us get back to our world."
Professor Oak blinked, he was not expecting to hear that from the Fire-type.
Claiming to be from another world? That explained their soft accents.
And it felt like June had wanted to say more but refrained from doing so. Oak only hoped that it wasn't going to be too outlandish.
That chamomile tea could definitely help in whatever was about to occur.
The three brothers stared back at the professor, a pregnant silence loomed over them.
Oak took in a breath and drank from his cup of tea, already he could feel the effects of June's request churning in his mind.
"You're saying… you're from a world that had no Pokémon, yet you know of Pokémon because it was a massively popular franchise that spanned multiple video games, cartoons and books, and you're not sure of how or why you were turned into Pokémon. So you expected that I would know of something that might've done this to you."
The professor closed his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose and humming in thought.
"Yes, I know it sounds like I'm on a major acid trip, and I know it sounded unbelievable but rest assured professor, I'm a hundred percent being honest with you," June said, silently pleading for the professor to believe him.
Oak had trouble denying the sincerity the young teen displayed when speaking of his story, but he still wasn't totally on board with the teen.
He set his cup of tea onto the table and stood up. "I'll need to get some equipment to verify your claims. I'll need more than just words to be convinced."
June nodded and said with a small grin, "Okay, Oak. Whatever it'll take to believe us."
Oak nodded, leaving the room without another word.
Once the old man had left their sight. June let out a quiet thrill of excitement. "I can't believe it! We're in Professor Oak's lab, the Professor Oak! Only going to Konoha and Capsule Corp could beat something like this!"
Ane stared at him blankly while Quil didn't look phased by his brother's fangirling, acting like this was just another day as he focused on something else.
June flushed at the looks, he crossed his arms and harrumphed, "What? You can't tell me you're not in the least bit excited about being here."
The two's expressions didn't change, prompting June to try and find a way to dissolve his self-induced awkwardness.
He glanced around the room, taking note of the portraits of Pokémon, Professor Oak and a young boy, as well as the shelves of books around. Then, a small weird spot of darkness caught his attention.
June raised a scaly brow at the dark spot. It wasn't as if the spot was dark because it wasn't well-lit, hell, it was the complete opposite. The space around the dark spot was bright and illuminated by a nearby lamp, so it was strange to see that specific spot devoid of light.
But what was strange about the dark spot wasn't because it was roughly the size of a human head but that it also seemed to be absorbing the light around it, almost like a small black hole.
June blinked, the dark spot still quite visible in his vision. He pointed at the spot, saying, "Hey, do you two see that?"
Ane curiously glanced at where his brother was pointing before speaking dully. "Yeah, that's a-a pretty cool corner, bro. Wow, it's so… wall-ish."
What? June turned back to the previously dark spot, now meeting a plain-looking illuminated wall. It was as if he had imagined the black-hole like object. "No, what? Where did it-"
June shook his head, teeth-gritting. "You know what? I don't care enough to open that can of worms."
Ane raised a brow at his brother before shrugging without another thought.
Professor Oak came back with a small device in his right hand and a Poké ball on his left.
He set the Poké ball onto the table and pointed the device at them.
The device was small and shaped like a remote and aside from a few buttons there weren't many notable features on the device.
"What's that?" Ane asked, his brow furrowed as he looked at the device.
"This is a piece of technology that was built to identify, gather data, and verify the claims of a person that had reportedly arrived in our world via Ultra Wormholes," Oak said, pressing a few buttons on the device.
A cyan light construct formed above the device, spawning a small holographic keyboard and a big monitor.
"Do you three know what Ultra Wormholes are?" he asked as the big screen showed a place of darkness with various stars and floating rocks in it.
"Yeah, a bit. They were introduced in a fairly recent game with I think Ultra Beasts. I never actually played those games because I don't have the console, but I think they were pretty disliked by the community when they were first introduced."
He only remembered a strange bipedal bug-person, and… was the jacked mosquito-man an Ultra Beast? He wasn't sure.
"So you're saying your understanding of Ultra Wormholes is limited?"
"Yup." June nodded.
"Well, that's fine," Oak said, typing on the keyboard and switching the scene into showing a big bright colourful hole with a ring of light surrounding it. "Ultra Wormholes are essentially gateways to a place called Ultra Space. Ultra Space is a place between universes and other worlds. Every time something passes through Ultra Space, they leave a residue that can be tracked by this device."
"Ah, I get what you're saying." June looked at the remote in recognition. "If we have these 'residues', you can tell if we're speaking the truth!"
"Precisely and not only that. I can also send these samples to the Fallers Help Society, FHS for short, and they can work on finding a way home for you."
"Awesome!" June exclaimed, pumping his fist into the air.
June was so glad he didn't have to seek out Arceus or Palkia to get home, he wasn't sure he'd be a good trainer and so he was thankful Professor Oak had a solution readily available.
Professor Oak typed on the holographic keyboard before pressing a button. "Get ready."
A translucent ray of yellow light flashed over them, scanning them from head to toe, or in Quil's case, bulb to paw.
The professor hummed, his eyes narrowed at seeing the results. "This is… strange," he murmured.
Although the professor was quiet, Ane's new ears gave him a better range of hearing and he asked, "What's wrong?"
"Is something the matter?" June questioned, he was a bit nervous at what the professor had to say.
Professor Oak tapped on a few buttons and typed on the keyboard once more, but whatever he was expecting didn't come forth as he said, "This can't be right. Did I break something?
"What if I-no no, the results are still the same. How about…"
Whatever the professor was rambling they couldn't hear properly, save for the occasional 'Am I doing this correctly?' and 'Uh, technology is confusing'.
After a few minutes of tweaking and rambling, the professor let out a defeated sigh. "This doesn't make sense."
"What doesn't, professor?" June asked, raising a scaly brow.
The professor gave the three a glance before allowing them to see the screen.
Three dark silhouettes of their shapes were on the screen and moving around the silhouettes were blue wavy lines. The wavy lines moved slowly and looked to be going into their bodies.
"I'm gonna say what's on our minds and ask." Ane pointed at the screen. "What the hell is that?"
"That, Ane, is your Aura signature, or rather, your lack of Aura. The blue wavy lines show the Aura in the air and as you can see, your bodies seem to be absorbing Aura. If I show you an example, like…"
The three silhouettes were gone and in place was a silhouette of a bipedal canine-like creature with big ear-like appendages on its head.
Aside from the shape difference, the wavy lines around the silhouette were seeping out of the creature rather than going into it. Not only that, the silhouette had a light blue glow emanating from its stomach, limbs and head.
"Take a look at this Pokémon here, a Lucario, you can see how there's a blue substance around its abdomen, arms, legs, and head. This is what we call, Aura. Aura is an energy source that is present in all living things: Pokémon, human beings, plants and the like all contain Aura. From the results I've gathered on your bodies, you three have no Aura whatsoever, and what's even weirder is that your bodies were absorbing the Aura around you. This is a strange phenomenon, as that's something only Pokémon with life-draining moves can do, for example, Leech Seed, Giga Drain can absorb other Auras. Though yours is still strange as you seem to be absorbing the Aura in the air."
June took a moment to organise the information given. "So what does that mean? Us absorbing the Aura in the air, I mean."
Oak rubbed his temples, taking a sip from his cup of tea. "I don't know, I don't think anyone knows what this means. Because this situation has never happened before. If we're going by all known laws of Aura, you three shouldn't be alive and yet…"
"So does that mean we're Aura-less zombies?" Ane said, frantically looking around his body in a frightful search for any rotting bits.
"No, but I do have a couple of theories on what this could mean for you three.
"As you three have stated, your home has no Pokémon so I'm going to assume that means your world's inhabitants do not have Auras. Theory number one details that your bodies are slowly getting accustomed to the Aura in our world, hence your bodies absorbing the Aura in the air. This could mean that over time you could gain the ability to use Aura like a Pokémon despite having the mind of a human. Other humans that have turned to Pokémon have weaker signatures than even baby Pokémon so most of them cannot use any moves aside from weak, basic attacks like Ember, Water Gun, Confusion and etcetera.
"Theory two, overexposure to something your bodies aren't used to. This one is much more lethal because if your bodies absorb Aura too quickly and your bodies can't adapt in time, you will wither away and die. Symptoms similar to overexposure to ammonia and mercury could transpire before you expire."
The three paled at that particular theory, hoping that wasn't what awaited them.
"Ho-how can we tell which is our fate?" June stuttered, he was horrified at the thought of going out in such a painful way.
"The problem is that we can't," Oak said, gravely. "As I said before, this situation is very peculiar and unique. I'm not sure what could happen, only time will tell."
"Well, that's reassuring." Ane rolled his eyes.
June gulped, feeling his nerves slowly creeping into his mind.
Quil looked between his two brothers before saying, "What about us going home? That could save us from an uncertain fate, right?"
Professor Oak grimaced. "Yes, about that."
He changed the image on the screen, a clear picture of the three now hovered in front of them.
"This image was supposed to show us Ultra Space residues which we could then collect with another device that can help you search for your home but as you can see…"
"There's nothing…" Quil trailed off, wincing at the implication.
June squeaked out a groan. "Anything else that could go wrong? Red losing to Blue? Ash never meeting Pikachu? Digimon starts spawning? Argh, how are we gonna get back home?"
"Arceus?" Ane suggested, an amused smile appearing upon seeing the look on his brother's face.
"Oh right, Arceus exists." June face-palmed. How could he have forgotten about the god of Pokémon? "Professor, how long do you think it'll take us to find Arceus?"
Oak winced at the name. "I don't want to seem like the bearer of bad news, but Arceus hasn't been seen for centuries. In fact, the last witness report was recorded back when Poké balls were still mostly made from apricorns. Others have tried for decades and failed, but if you think you'll have a better chance at finding Arceus, I'm not gonna stop you."
Decades? Jeez, we really have our work cut out for us. That and combined with the unknown that was their life expectancy, June felt a bit disheartened (though really, a bit was an understatement).
He shook his head and slammed his fist into a claw, a fire igniting in his eyes. "All right! Let's do it! Let's become trainers and find Arceus, we'll ask him for help and if he doesn't want to help us, we'll beat him up and force him to."
"Yeah!" Ane and Quil chorused, pumping their paws into the air.
Oak chuckled awkwardly at their antics. "Well, if you really want to be trainers then let's start, shall we?"
"Ooh~ we can do it now? Like, no test needed?" June said, sounding like he was barely keeping his excitement in.
Better to be determined and excited than let his head get stuck in the unknown, right?
"There is a test, but I'm sure you three could pass them," Oak leaned in and whispered. "Between the four of us, I could probably convince the higher-ups to let you experience being trainers for a few weeks before the test. Unless something comes up and we can safely secure what will happen, I can pull some strings and get one of my Pokémon to keep an eye on you during your pre-test journey."
He gestured to the ball on the table. It wiggled in response, and Oak smiled upon seeing their elated features.
He clapped his hands together. "Well, let's get to it, shall we? Follow me!"
"This is gonna be so aweso- Ack! You little rat!" June rubbed his shoulder, wincing at the punch Ane had thrown his way.
Ane shrugged and rolled his eyes. "Let's just go."
The three stood by the door to the outside world, where they waited for the professor to be finished with his work.
June whistled a harmonic tune, unknowingly wagging his tail like a dog.
Ane gave his brother's tail a curious gaze before looking back to his own, he concentrated on moving his tail and after a while, he gave up with a sigh when it didn't yield any positive results.
Quil was staring at the space around them but wasn't really looking at anything, he seemed to be really out of it as evident with the unfocused expression on his face.
The three stopped whatever they were doing when the sounds of footsteps drew near.
"Good news!" Oak exclaimed, stepping into the room with a pokédex and a handful of Poké balls. "I have spoken with the higher-ups and they've agreed to let you three start your journey before your tests."
"Sweet!"
"However, the places you can go will be limited to designated and regularly patrolled routes and paths, straying from these paths will result in an immediate suspension of your journey and you'll have to pass your tests before starting your journey. That being said, the tests will begin in a month, you'll be able to retake them once a month if you fail. Of course, this means you'll have to wait another month to retake it so I advise you to take some time to study when you get the chance."
"Okay, got it, professor." June nodded. Studying about Pokémon? This was going to be so much fun!
After a moment without another response, June narrowed his eyes before elbowing Ane and poking Quil.
Ane rolled his eyes. "Got it, professor."
Quil snapped back to reality with a head shake. "Got it, professor."
Oak nodded. "Your trainer cards will be sent to you by a local Nurse Joy when you're done with your tests, each trainer card will possess your personal information, your sponsor and can act as a credit card."
"Sponsor?"
"Yes, your games didn't go into that detail?"
June shook his head before a spark of understanding shot through him. "Ah, I get it, so that's where the money for food and other things come from."
Oak nodded before a frown crept onto his face. "Now, unfortunately, I don't have a spare bag in stock so you'll have to buy one in Viridian City."
"That's fine, Oak. You're already helping us way more than you should." June reassured with a grin.
"Nonsense," Oak said, shaking his head. "It is my duty as a professor to help aspiring trainers and make sure they're prepared for the Pokémon world."
June wasn't sure what to say to that so he stayed quiet, silently looking at the pokédex in the old man's hand.
"Anyway, coming back on track. This device is a pokédex, I'm sure you already know what this can do, so I'll be brief. It is essential to a trainer as it not only acts as an encyclopedia for Pokémon, their behaviour, health and potential moves they can learn. It can also record videos and sounds, connect to the internet, communicate with people and can act as an extra trainer card in case you lose your physical ones."
The professor handed the machine and Poké balls to the small Fire-type.
June's gaze was immediately latched on the device and the balls in his claws.
A soft giddy giggle escaped his mouth and he thanked the professor. "We'll see you in Viridian City, professor."
Oak nodded with a smile. "Do take good care of yourself, and good luck."
"Bye!" June said, stepping out of the building with his brothers and into the shining sun.
The afternoon sun peeked out of the clouds, its warm rays shining down on the trio.
June basked in the sun, his new body absolutely loving the heat.
Ane wasn't as expressive as he trotted beside his brothers with a neutral expression.
Quil was still looking unfocused. June wasn't sure what his deal was but he didn't really care, he was too excited about the prospect of being a trainer!
Halfway to Route 1, June put a little bounce in his steps as he held the pokédex firmly in his grasp.
"This is so awesome! We're officia- no, scratch that, almost trainers. This is so cool! I have an actual pokédex in my han- er, claws and a bunch of Poké balls!"
"Yeah, it's pretty cool," Ane agreed, with a rather tame nod.
"Isn't it a bit strange that we don't have starters?" Quil asked.
"I guess, but it's not like Route 1 is all that dangerous, I mean there's only Rattatas, Pidgeys and Spearows around, and as long as we don't provoke any of them, I'm sure we can catch a few of them and make them our friends." June shrugged.
"I guess you're right, but who should we catch?" Quil inquired.
"Not sure, I want your guys' opinions before catching some, especially if theory one is the path we're heading, 'cause learning how to breathe fire would be pretty damn cool."
"Hm…" Ane tapped his chin in thought. "There's Pidgeys, Spearows and Rattatas around, but none of them seem really good, especially since Brock's the Rock-type gym, right?"
"Yes, but if the anime goes as planned, it'll be his dad… Flint, I think," June said, racking his brain for any more information he could remember. "I'm not sure what team he would have, but it's probably gonna be a Geodude or an Onix, could be different. Who knows. I'll have to do some research once we get to Viridian City."
"An Onix? Damn, we sure got our work cut out for us."
"Why are we even trying to get badges? Shouldn't we be looking for Arceus?" Quil asked.
"Eh, why not have some fun before looking for the Pokémon God?" June shrugged before shaking his head, a fire burning in his eyes. "Just imagine before we go home, us being the champions of Kanto. The top percentage of the world. The toughest of the tough. The greatest of the great. With you by my side, the friends we make, the fights and adventures we would experience. Could you imagine what we could do for this world? The changes we could cause?"
"Wait, I thought you said you didn't want to change canon?" Ane said, seeing a contradiction to his earlier hesitation.
"Yeah sure, but I honestly doubt our encounter with Professor Oak won't change canon," June snapped his claws, bringing his arms back as if grasping a giant invisible orb. "If the timeline is already changing, then being the strongest can open up a lot of pathways for us, and allow us to dictate change itself. Plus, I would love for once to have the ability to be something akin to God, could you imagine the things I could do now that I'm a Pokémon? All the chaos that could be had if I became that strong?"
"Err…" Quil glanced at Ane, gesturing to the Pikachu to do something.
Ane caught on and nodded. "Right, the things you could do if we don't die, of course. I don't think world domination should be one of our priorities without knowing if we'd die or not."
June's eyes widened and he raised a scaly brow. "You really think I'd want world domination?" he asked, wondering if his brothers thought he was an insane maniac. Stifling a chuckle, he said, dismissively, "Nah, that's too much work, and I'm like eighty percent sure we won't die."
He waved a claw at them. "Anyway, back on topic. I'm saying we should get a Pidgeot, I remember a Dex entry stating that it can fly faster than sound. That'd be really important for travel."
Ane nodded. "How about a Spearow or… Fearow, was it? Aren't they pretty strong?"
"If they're like the ones that chased Ash…" June shuddered. "Yeah, I don't think it'd be a good idea to have such a volatile creature as a starter."
"Well, we all know how we feel about Rattatas," Ane said, blandly.
"Tch, Rattatas," Quil muttered, chuckling. "You think that rats would be more useful for attacking people but nah, they're like one of the weakest things out there. Only useful for grinding experience or exploiting Pickup."
"Well, I'm not sure about the Pickup comment but yeah, they're pretty useless." June nodded as they passed through a familiar path.
The winds blew and rustled the tall grass, the sun shone down onto the earth. The trio walked through the tall grass before June paused in his steps.
"Hey, do you two hear that?"
Sounds of something scurrying in the grass cut through the quiet atmosphere of the field, it wasn't loud but there was a lot of repetition in it. Then the sounds drew nearer and they felt a sense of dread wash over them.
Fearing the worst, June faced the two. "Guys, I think we should run-"
Two rodents, about half their height, jumped out of the tall grass.
Their purple fur bristled and their teeth bared, their eyes narrowed in clear anger.
The one to the left growled. "You starters always think yourselves special. Always picking on our kind and treating us like punching bags with your trainers."
The one on the right snarled. "Let's see how you'd fare without your trainers to direct you."
June gulped, voice cracking from the stress. "O-okay, there's only two of them. I think we can-"
A particularly strong gust of wind blew open a patch of grass, showing half a dozen more Rattatas hidden in the grass.
"Nope! Screw this! I'm running!" Ane shouted, disappearing into the grass.
"Yup, I'm gone too! See you!" Quil followed suit, running as fast as he could.
"H-hey! Don't leave me behind!" June cursed, rushing after them and starting the chase.
June grunted and pulled himself against a log, his scales covered in dirt and muck.
He panted and groaned, propping himself against the log. "That could've gone better."
"I'll… say," Ane panted, leaning against the log, his fur dripping wet with mud from the time he'd slipped into a puddle.
"Ow, I can't believe that worked," Quil said, sitting next to his brothers with a tired sigh.
They sat in silence, taking their time to recover from the incident.
"I'm telling ya. In a few months, we'd all be laughing at this with whoever we catch, I'm calling it." June exclaimed, albeit with less vigour than usual.
"Not gonna argue with that," Ane said, his voice a bit strained from his attempts of cleaning himself. "God, how do dogs handle being this dirty. I can't even get the feeling of mud out of my fur, it's so damn uncomfortable."
June let out a sigh of relief. "Next time we're in a route. Never insult any Pokémon that could potentially murder us when we don't have anything to back us up."
Quil nodded, wincing a bit from the surprise that one Rattata had left him with.
June got up and stretched, loosening his joints and huffing. "All right, guys. This may have been worse than expected but we still have daylight to kill. We're not leaving this place until we get a Pidgey."
Ane groaned. "Can't we just do it tomorrow?"
"Nope." June shook his head, his voice firm and daring. "I don't care what happens but we're not leaving till we get a Pokémon."
Another groan escaped Ane's lips. "Oh, come on!"
June rolled his eyes in clear irritation at his brother's laziness. "You can continue your whining if you want, I'm still not leaving."
"Fine." Ane relented, it wasn't like he could do much to discourage his brother when he was acting like this.
"Great!" June clapped. "Well? Let's get going, time's a-wastin'."
Ane and Quil begrudgingly obliged, and the search began.
Hours passed, the sun was now only a few meters above the horizon. The sky turned a warm orange, the dark clouds have dispersed an hour ago, leaving clouds the same warm orange as the sky.
The trees swayed in the evening sun, whistling a quiet, calm tone.
An orange fist planted itself into a tree, violently shaking with frustration.
A guttural shout cut through the quiet atmosphere, utterly terrifying some Pokémon from the sheer emotions present in the voice.
"This is just great! Absolutely fan-flipping-tastic! We still have nothing!" June cried out before pulling his fist away, ignoring the roaring pain in his claw. "How hard is it to find a God damned bird!"
His tail flame flared up, growing in intensity and size. It glowed a bright orange and could break anyone near him into a sweat.
"Apparently they're rare," Ane muttered, feeling a bit annoyed at their luck. "A bunch of small birds, common as hell they say. Tch, I like to show them what's not as rare, my fricking fists!"
Quil grumbled some incoherent gibberish but it was clear that he was also frustrated at their lack of results.
Going back to the Charmander, he was currently screaming censored profanities at the sky. "Why you little fish sucking piece of paper, pencil-neck trash can…"
Ane took in a breath and allowed himself to the treat that was his brother's ramblings.
If Ane had to be honest, he always enjoyed listening to the creative not-actually-profanities profanities his brother could come up with. It was something he'd loved doing whenever he pissed his brother off.
Now, why were they so mad? You may ask yourself this question.
And indeed it seemed pretty petty for them to be angry and hateful at their results but keep in mind that June, Ane and Quil had spent hours searching, they had looked into every nook and cranny of the route, but for whatever reason, they couldn't find the Pokémon they were looking for.
Not in the sky, trees or even little dens and holes in the ground.
It was only natural that they'd be a bit frustrated at their fortune.
The sounds of swaying grass and footsteps alerted Ane, causing him to break his amused stare at his brother's ramblings.
Quil looked at where the sounds had come from and immediately backed away, a frightful look on his face.
Ane turned to his left, seeing a hooded man walking towards them. He narrowed his eyes at the man in suspicion, his stance lowered in the case of a fight.
"... this absolutely garbage luck! If you were a person, I'd punch you so hard you'll-"
June noticed a shadow looming over him and cut himself off with a flush. "I-er- you-uh didn't see that, right?" He turned around and faced the hooded man though his eyes were mainly focused on the man's feet, feeling a little more than a bit embarrassed at his little outburst.
The hooded man grinned and spoke in a voice that gave him chills. "Oh, I wouldn't say I saw you, merely heard you."
What the? Wh-why does he sound lik-like me? June backed away from the man, his head slowly lifting but dreading to see the man.
The man chuckled, bringing a hand up to muffle them. "Well, aren't you a sight for sore eyes? You wouldn't happen to remember your own creation, do you?"
Creation? My creation? What is he talking about?
The man shook his head, an amused grin on his face as he placed his hands around the base of his hood. "Of course, you wouldn't remember, but I do."
He pulled his hood down, and June felt his heart drop.
Red hair, a brighter shade than anything they have ever seen trailed down to the top of his neck. It was a dangerous shade of red that creepily resembled blood.
Then there were his golden eyes that held an eerie glow in them. They looked so unnatural but they were something that would immediately grab your attention and never let go.
And finally, his face. A spitting image of June's human form, his nose, his cheeks and down to his stupid smug grin that June was so fond of using.
June's eyes widened in shock, his mouth opened wide akin to a fish gasping for air, he was at an absolute loss for words.
The man suddenly burst into laughter, startling the three as he fell onto his back, but upon taking a closer look, you could see that the man's body never touched the ground. He cackled loudly and clutched his stomach, apparently, he had found their reactions more than entertaining.
June seemed to have found his voice but whatever he wanted to say came out as stutters, "How did- what- you're-"
"Floating?" The man had recovered from his bout of laughter and slowly hovered higher into the air.
He floated over to the three, a grin on his face. "Oh man, that's priceless. The looks on your faces were amazing. If only Jenn was here to see them." He snickered, poking each of them on the nose.
Ane growled and tried attacking the man, clearly, he was annoyed at the man's antics. "Who the hell are you and why do you look like my brother?"
"Who am I?" The man giggled, ignoring the blow and bringing his feet down to earth. "What a fantastic question!" He cleared his throat with an exaggerated cough.
"You see my dear creator and hm… do I call you two my uncles or brothers… eh, anywho, I am known throughout many worlds, universes and multiverses by many names, some not so teen-friendly (so let's just skip those), and some were just plain rude, but my friends usually called me Crude." He bowed down, his left hand held out to the side and his right hand, now possessing a hat, pressed against his abdomen.
He tossed the hat away and it disappeared in a flash of light. Crude clicked his tongue and poked his chin with a finger. "And as for your other question… let's just say it's not for the faint of heart and leave it at that, shall we?"
June gulped, calming down his nerves as he glared at the man. "Whoever you are-"
"Crude."
"Whatever. Leave us alone, we don't want to have any involvement in… whatever the hell you want."
"Oh, you wound me so." Crude clutched his chest where his heart would be before proceeding to lay on his back, a rose now held in his palms. "Dear creator. Won't you at least hear me out?"
"No, hell no, I'm not-"
"Even if doing so, would help you in your Pokémon hunt?" Crude wagged his eyebrows for effect, his irises illuminating a bit brighter.
June paused and closed his mouth, his face scrunching in thought.
He was actually thinking of it! Now that's a surprising turn of events!
Ane looked at his brother in disbelief. Was he really gonna be making a deal with… whatever Crude was?
Quil mumbled, "No no. He's actually thinking of it. Oh no noo..."
Crude flew towards the small Fire-type, his body weaving through the air like he was underwater.
He made eye contact with June, his golden irises meeting June's brown. "Just imagine, not one, not three, hell not even five, but two! Two incredibly rare Pokémon at your fingertips!"
"And." Crude clapped his hands, a devilish smirk crawled onto his face as he pointed to the sky, fingers snapping as the air around them bled a dark red.
An oval hole came into existence, a swirl of colours and warped space caught June's eyes, putting him into a trance as he focused on the portal.
"All you have to do is complete a few of my… tasks." He held out a hand which was bathed in an unholy green fire, waiting for the seal to end the deal.
Two rare Pokémon? And all I have to do is complete his tasks? June shook his head, turning his eyes to the hand in front of him.
He glanced at the hand nervously then to his doppelganger's face.
He hoped he didn't make the wrong choice by doing this.
Steeling his breath, he glared at Crude, batting the hand away. "Hell no, you really think I'd make a deal with a devil? Fat chance!"
Crude chuckled deeply, his voice sending shivers down their spines.
He pulled his hand away, changed the sky back to normal and smiled.
But the smile wasn't a normal one nor was it anything smug or amused.
No, it was one that sent chills down June's spine. It was one that he dreaded the most.
"I like the way you act, Creator. You're smarter than I give you credit for. Definitely the best choice you could pick for your brothers."
His eyes glinted a cruel shine. "But you never had any choice to begin with."
Ane's eyes widened, feeling the ground beneath him disappear. He dropped like a stone, the last thing he saw was his panicking brother before vanishing along with Quil.
June gasped and turned, an animalistic growl escaped his lips. "Where did you send them! You-you demon!"
Crude snorted, leaning away from a punch sent his way. "I am so much worse than a demon." He snapped his fingers, locking June in place.
June froze. His body shaking and his muscles tensed but no matter what he did, he couldn't get his body to obey.
He struggled against his invisible confines, desperation and distraught clear in his eyes as he tried.
He tried with all of his might but could only move an inch before slumping in fatigue.
Crude poked his nose, a cruel giggle permeating the coming dusk of the night. "See you later!"
June's vision turned black and he felt himself slipping into the earth.
It was a quiet night in the forest of Troublewood. The stars were shining bright and proudly, sitting and twinkling in the night sky.
The moon, a big bright ball of luminance, complemented the peaceful night along with its beautiful constellations.
A small village of sorts could be found in a natural clearing of Troublewood. Its buildings made with crudely-melded thatch and wood. The village had roughly a dozen buildings with the same design. A thatch roof, a few open windows and walls made of the wood of the oak around the village.
Peering inside one of these buildings, a small cyan-and-black-furred cub was seen laying on a bed of grass. Its wide yellow eyes brimming with energy and delight as it curled into a ball.
A bigger black-maned quadraped blew out a small torch on the wall, its long legs trotting towards its young.
"Mama! Mama!" the young Shinx cried out, excitedly. Its forelegs waving wildly to grasp its mother.
The Luxio leaned in and nuzzled the cub, a soft smile on her face. "What is it, my dear? Would you like to hear the story of your father's bravery again?"
The Shinx giggled at the tickling sensation around its small body. It licked its mother's nose, its star-shaped tail wagging furiously. "No, mama. I wanna hear how Evie defeated that evil bad guy!"
An amused grin worked its way onto the Luxio's face. "Really now? You know that story's only reserved for big strong Pokémon."
"But mama! I'm big and strong! See?" The Shinx's face scrunched up in concentration, a grunt escaping its lips as a small sparkle of electricity grazed its whiskers.
The electricity fizzled out and the cub collapsed onto the bed, panting for air. It recovered quickly and bounced on the tips of its feet. "See? See? I can use Spark! I'm strong!"
The Luxio shook her head, giggling at the antics of her young. She placed a paw on her young's head, ruffling its fuzzy mane. "If you say so, Shez. Now pay attention."
Stars shone in Shez's eyes, its tail wagging happily as it became enraptured in its mother's tales.
"It all started several moons ago..."
The night was clear of clouds and the moon loomed ominously over the Pokémon present.
"Perry! Where is he?" a brown quadraped shouted, her posture low and her fur bristled. Stains of red and splinters littered her coat.
"Evie! Fall back! Rower and I've already got the Pokémon secure! You can't go at this alone!" a large bird Pokémon shouted, limping towards her and leaning against a tree that towered a two-storey building, its wings bloody and bruised, and one of them bent at an unnatural angle.
Evie growled back, her eyes glowing with fury. "No! He's alone and there's no one left to stop us! We won't get another chance at this!"
"You're barely even standing! Fall back! We'll have another chance to-"
"No! I'm not letting him harm any more innocent Pokémon! If you're not going to help then I'll- Aah!" A blue aura covered her body as she was flung several meters to the east, sending her crashing into several boulders and smashing them into bits.
"Evie!" Perry screamed in dismay as a blue aura surrounded him.
An agonising scream erupted from his throat with sickening crunches being heard as the aura crushed him.
The brown fox rushed back to the scene, her breaths heavy and labored, and her body was covered in grime and bruises. She cancelled the aura around her friend with an energy ball of darkness.
A deep chuckle emanated around her, its disembodied voice seemingly coming from all sides as she stared helplessly at her battered friend.
The chuckle broke into a full-on cackle, cracking and intensifying by the minute as Evie came to her friend's aid, desperately trying to mend his broken body.
"Come on, come on. Stay with me, Perry. I can't lose another one," she muttered, sending pulses of energy into him.
Before she could finish her attempts at healing the broken bird, she was flung away once more, crashing into the maple trees behind her.
Evie groaned, laying in the shattered remains of the trees. Blood dripped from her head and onto the burnt grass of the clearing.
A bipedal reddish-orange-furred Pokémon teleported above her, its black claws reaching out in a grasping motion as a blue aura covered the scruff on Evie's neck.
"You really had me going there!" the creature exclaimed, its words crackling with bouts of insane giggling. "You really thought you could wrestle out of my control and dethrone me! Haha! Nothing can beat me! Nothing! You-you think you could- but-but as you can see!"
Its eyes were bloodshot, its irises shrinking and growing as it levelled a glare at her, teeth bared as it prepared for the finishing blow. "You couldn't. You can't! No one can! None of you will take me away! I'll always be in control!"
Her throat clenched, the pressure around her neck tightened and clouds of darkness dawned on her sight, her forelegs moving up to clutch her neck and she struggled against the powerful Psychic.
The soft pale glow of the moon bathed her in its light as she-
The mother paused, giving her cub a wary glance and frowned.
Shez's tail wagged, its eyes wide and curious. "Then what happened, mama?"
The frown was replaced by a soft smile, the Luxio giggled. "I think it's well past your bedtime, dear."
The Shinx groaned and whined, "Aw, mama! I wanna hear what happened next, please mama!"
The mother shook her head. "We can hear the next part tomorrow, my little Shinx. Your mama needs some rest for the harvest tomorrow."
Shez grumbled, crossing its forelegs as its mother grabbed the Shinx by its scruff.
The mother placed her child on the bed of grass, nuzzling the Pokémon affectionately. "Sleep well, dearie."
Although Shez wanted to hear more of the story, it was feeling rather tired.
It yawned, eyelids drooping. "Night, mama."
A small smile crawled onto the Luxio's face as her eyes softened. She diverted her gaze from her child to a nearby window, her eyes taking in the quiet, peaceful night.
She couldn't believe how lovely the night was, and how at ease it put her.
It was strange. She never thought that the night could be so relaxing. She never thought that she no longer had to hide. That she could watch her child grow without fear, without the stress and dangers.
I wished you were here, honey... The Luxio stared at the stars above, grimly. A small frown creeping onto her face. Everyone here is so friendly, and... and I missed you... so much, my dear. Our child... our child is so free-spirited, he takes so much from you...
Tears threatened to spill but she held on, refusing to let them drop. The warmth of her child's body snuggling closer reminded her of the reality, her present, her friends, her baby's future.
She shut her eyes and curled around her cub, allowing herself to drift away.
She wouldn't let everyone's hard work be wasted, their suffering and hopes were what made this possible.
Perry. Rower. The local healers.
Evie.
All of them were heroes. Saviours of Troublewood.
She felt herself slip into the realm of unconsciousness, her mind supplying her with sweet dreams after months of disbelief and restless nights of torment from her own thoughts.
On this starry night, in a shack made of thatch and oak wood, was a brown fox-like Pokémon, slightly over a meter tall with long brown ears. She had fur around her neck, similar in shape and colour to a normal Eevee's, except there was a red stain smeared across the front part of her neck fur.
Her legs were long and elegant, her tail was a big bushy ball of fluff and was the length of half her body size.
She yawned quietly, turning her soft gaze to her little sister.
Her little sister was a smaller fox that had fur as dark as a chasm. Her eyelids were a bright red, in contrast to her dark fur. This red was also found between her eyes, in the middle of her neck fur similar to her sister's, and on her paws.
She had a bright smile on her face as she bounced to her bed made of grass. She yawned, eyelids drooping and body curling into a ball. "G'night, Evie."
Evie muttered softly, her voice smooth and soothing. "Sleep well, Zeal."
She planted a kiss on the Zorua's flame-shaped mane, lovingly nuzzling the kit.
The Tricky Fox Pokémon drifted to sleep, a contented smile gracing her sleeping features.
Evie pulled away with a small smile. Her eyes moved towards an open window, taking in the scenery outside with a sigh.
She glanced back at her sister in-all-but-blood, a frown crept onto her face as she trotted out of the door.
The moonlight shone down on her, her eyes glinting in the night glow.
Her paws touched the dirt ground, taking her into a pathway only known to her.
The pathway wasn't anything special or eye-catching, in fact, there was no way to actually tell whether there was a path to begin with.
It was only something Evie knew and remembered because she had frequented this path for years.
She walked through the familiar line of apple trees, its leaves full of freshly-grown fruits. She walked past the overgrown bush to her left and took her time to appreciate the quiet night.
It had been a few months since the decisive blow against the tyrant. At the time, she was happy when she no longer had to worry about her sister's safety, ecstatic that everyone else could live a peaceful life once again.
She was overjoyed that no one had to live through what she had to.
But after a few weeks of repetitive training, helping the locals settle into peace. The repetitiveness of a peaceful life got through her and she was feeling… tired, bored of her life and unmotivated.
She didn't know what she wanted to do with her life anymore.
She had spent her entire life training, fighting, and hiding. The stress and pressure of that past life was something she hated but it was all she knew at the time.
Evie couldn't believe she was feeling those emotions at first, they were so selfish, so… unlike her.
But she couldn't deny that she had missed the fighting, her blood rushing and pumping along with the adrenaline, the stress and pressure of failures.
She tried for months to bottle those feelings away. She knew it wasn't healthy to hide her emotions but she didn't know what else she could do.
Nowadays when she came to her secluded place, she'd spent hours thinking, sometimes even spending the entire night wishing for things to change, wishing she could experience what it felt like to be alive again.
She arrived at an open field, a small river to her right that extended to another section of the forest.
Her gait was slow and methodical, her ears drooped down as she sat beside the river.
A heavy sigh escaped her lips as she gazed into the waters, her reflection staring back at her.
Those amber eyes revealed everything she held deep inside, things she'd rather hide and keep secret than to ever tell anyone.
Evie touched the river with her paw, distorting the image and causing ripples that stretched to the edge of the river.
She knew what she was thinking was selfish and greedy. She wanted everyone to suffer once more just to satisfy her boredom!
She hated that! Hated the dull path her life had taken! Hated that she was even thinking of making people suffer!
She was so selfish! She didn't deserve the power or recognition the locals had given her!
She didn't deserve this happy ending! Why should she? She couldn't even save her. Save him.
She growled, teeth-gritting in anger and she glared at her reflection. "Why couldn't you just stay happy!"
She punched her reflection, splashing herself wet and distorting the image once more.
Evie heaved a breath, feeling her anger being replaced by a more sombre tone.
She slumped to the ground, her fur sticking close to her skin. "Why were you so weak when you should've saved them?"
Why? Why couldn't she have saved them?
Why wasn't she strong when it mattered…
Tears streamed down her cheeks, staining her fur with her regrets.
None of them could ever understand her.
Not Perry. Not Rower.
Not even her sister could understand the anguish she'd experienced those nights.
Evie sucked in a deep breath, her sniffles quiet and slow. She recited the breathing exercises a friendly Chansey had taught her, getting her body to calm itself from her emotional outburst.
She gazed back into the river, splashing herself with its waters and glaring at her reflection.
Weakness. She hated being weak. She couldn't-shouldn't show weakness. She was strong now, much stronger than she ever was.
Nothing in this forest could rival her.
Not Perry. Not Rower.
Not even Dragon-types.
No one could stand up to her and she will make sure her sister experiences the life she'd never wanted.
Evie stood up and shook herself dry, ready to go back home and get some rest.
She couldn't believe she had spent an hour feeling sorry for herself. This place used to be somewhere she'd enjoy spending time in, but she had dirtied that image with her sorrows.
She shook her head, ridding herself of those thoughts. They were becoming more consistent over the past months, she hated them.
Then as soon as she took a step forward, she noticed a strange light across the field.
Evie quirked a brow, staring at the light in the dark forest intently. A fire? No, there's no smoke. Maybe a Ghost-type? No, it'd be purple if it's a ghost.
What was going on? Why was there light at a time like this? She was sure there wasn't anyone living there yet unless Perry decided to change something without telling her.
She shook her head. It's probably nothing, maybe some kids decided to camp out.
But she wasn't convinced with that weak excuse, there were too many things wrong with that.
The longer she stared at the light, the worse her thoughts got.
Di-did a human learn of his defeat? Did another Fire-type escape its trainer?
She gulped, suddenly that light felt more sinister.
If it was a human, she could easily deal with them, even if she had to reveal herself.
She could hopefully reason with them or drive them off if diplomacy failed. And if push comes to shove, she could kill them and let the humans blame the deceased tyrant.
That thought made her stomach churn, she didn't like the idea of killing another sapient being, even if it was a human.
But what she didn't understand was how a human could've gotten here.
Perry had informed her that their war was still raging, and that had only been a few days ago, so unless this was just a straggler, she couldn't imagine them being too dangerous.
Evie took in a breath. Let's hope this is just a Fire-type. She could easily handle another Pokémon, a human was another can of worms she didn't want to deal with.
Her leg muscles tensed up before she ran off in a burst of speed, arriving at the other side in less than a minute.
She slowed down her approach, her head turning slowly and her eyes scanning every inch and detail of the place.
Before she knew it, she reached a dead-end in the form of a cliff, the forest was broken off by a river leading to a waterfall to her right and there was a grove of berry trees to her left.
She looked around, ears swivelling to listen for any unnatural sounds.
Thankfully, she didn't take much time to locate the light, having vision that rivalled a Pidgeot's definitely helped in that regard.
Her pace was quiet and quick, her body leaned down as she stealthily made her way forward.
The light brought her to a small clearing, an orange Pokémon laying unconscious in the centre.
The familiarity of the Pokémon made her heart sink.
Orange scales. Tail flame. Reptilian shape.
Those were features she knew were present in the ever-present 'starters' for beginning trainers.
A Charmander, a powerful drake-like Pokémon that can grow into the monstrously powerful and agile Charizard. A Pokémon that by all means shouldn't be here.
Not alone at least.
A brief moment of alertness swept over her, her eyes quickly darting around for any signs of humans.
Although she couldn't see any, she didn't dare let her guard down.
There was no way a human would leave a Charmander of all things here. They were too popular among beginners to be abandoned here.
Troublewood was notorious to humans because of the tyrant, who had succeeded in making the forest restricted for all trainers, even the aces and elites.
So unless they'd heard of the tyrant's defeat (which should be impossible since the humans were still at war), this meant there was either a lost human around or there was something stronger and more popular than a Charmander.
Her paw touched something soft and scaly, a pained groan coming from below her.
She jerked her paw away, mentally scolding herself for not paying attention to her surroundings.
Evie gave the Charmander a once-over, noting the small yellow flames of the Fire-type's tail.
It's a young one. Or at least a weak one.
She remembered hearing that most Fire-types' flames had colours depending on their strength, it wasn't always accurate but it provided a general feel for their health.
A weak or young Fire-type had flames either small or yellow. A standard or adolescent Fire-type would have orange flames with tinges of red while a strong or Fire-type in adulthood would have red flames with orange sparks in them.
She shook her head, snapping herself away from her thoughts and back into the Charmander's eyes…
Oh… shit.
Darkness…
Pain…
Wait, this feels familia-
He groaned in agony at the feeling of something stepping on him.
God, why?
He took in a breath, trying to dull his throbbing head.
Deep breaths. Take in deep breaths, June.
He slowly opened his eyes, thankful that they didn't immediately get assaulted, and rubbed his eyes.
He blinked.
The Pokémon blinked.
A silent wave brushed over them, an unofficial staring contest had begun between them.
June processed the strange Pokémon in front of him and did what anybody normal would do in his situation.
He screamed.
Very loudly.
And if anyone asked. Yes, he did scream like a little girl.
And no, he did not regret doing so and felt justified screaming.
June squirmed under the Pokémon's body, his body crashing into the limbs of the creature as he desperately tried escaping the grip the Pokémon had on him.
He managed to get his claws out of the death grip and shielded his face with them.
"Ah! Don't eat me!"
His eyes were shut tight, his breathing quick and shallow. His heart jumping faster than it had ever jumped.
He waited for what felt like an eternity before peeking open an eye, puzzled at the lack of attack.
He saw the fox-like Pokémon glancing down at him, an amused grin on its face.
The Pokémon snorted, sounding quite feminine as it said, "You think Pokémon eat each other?"
"Th-they don't?" he stuttered out, involuntary wincing at the off chance that it was a ploy.
The strange fox Pokémon shook its head. "Of course not. I'm not sure what the humans had been teaching you but Pokémon cannibalism is very rare even amongst desperate Pokémon. Though it does give another reason on why Perry hates humans other than…" June couldn't quite hear the last words as it'd murmured them quieter than a talking ant.
June chuckled nervously. "Oh, hoh… really? That's um, interesting…" he coughed to get its attention, his eyes trailing down the fox's body, a small grin cracked his nervous expression. "Would you mind getting off me, please? It's, uh, rather uncomfortable and I don't want strangers to stumble onto us and think we're about to… get down and dirty…"
Its cheeks flared up and its head slowly moved down, its irises shrunk to pinpricks as it took in the position they were in.
It stood above him, pinning him down with its powerful paws, and if its voice was a hint, it was probably female too. Thus, making their position look even more uncomfortable and awkward.
It blushed, an awkward cough escaping its lips. The Pokémon got off him and stood a few meters away, shaking its head to rid its blush.
June dusted himself off and sat on his haunches, his nerves calming down as he faced the Pokémon with a victorious grin. "Nice to meetcha… I'm June."
Its blush faded and it let out an exaggerated cough before introducing itself with a slight nod. "My name is Evie."
"Sweet name, would you mind if I ask where we are?" he asked, glancing at his surroundings.
Trees, wood, grass, and bushes. He was in a forest it seems.
During his sweep, he noticed the strange Pokémon's shoulders visibly sagged in relief and he quirked a brow at that action.
"You're in Troublewood," she said.
He quirked a scaly brow, his eyes displaying his confusion to the world. "Troublewood?" Where in the hell is that?
June hummed in thought, eyes shut tightly. He couldn't for the life of him remember anywhere named 'Troublewood'.
Is this an anime-only thing? Maybe Troublewood is from the manga?
He wasn't very knowledgeable about the anime if he had to be honest, he'd only watched the time when Ash was in Unova and a bit of Alola.
He glanced at the strange Pokémon, trying to read her face. She doesn't seem to be lying.
Although now that he was thinking of it. His earlier state of panic had made him treat her like an unknown creature, but now that he had a clearer mind. He realised that the Pokémon in front of him really was an unknown creature.
She was bigger than him by a pretty margin, about twice his height. Her body resembled a fox but she had similarities to one of his favourites. Two long brown ears, the fur around her neck and a brown bushy tail similar to an Eevee. She also had a small white-coloured mane that trailed down to her neck fur.
It looked like someone decided to make Eevee a baby Pokémon and decided that this Pokémon in front of him was its adult form.
He really wished he had his pokédex with him (he had stuffed it along with the Poké balls in Quil's bulb for protection). He could've at least looked up on how Eevees look like in this reality rather than using the games as a reference.
"Hey, um, what exactly are you, Evie? I haven't seen a Pokémon like you before."
"Like I haven't heard of that before," she muttered with an eye roll. "I'm an Eevee. Got that? Other Pokémon had asked me that before and it's very frustrating when none of them believes me... Tch, just because I look different doesn't mean I'm not an Eevee."
A small scowl graced her vulpine features.
So it's not only me that thinks she isn't an Eevee.
He gave her a narrowed glance, wondering whether it'd be a good idea to try and get more information out of her.
He shrugged and proceeded without a second thought. "Sorry Evie, but I gotta agree with whoever said that, you don't look like an Eevee especially since you're… a bit bigger than normal."
She gained an offended look as she glared at him, her fur puffing in slight anger. "Are you calling me fat?"
"Wh-what?" he paled, stuttering over his words as he now realised how that had sounded, and with how sensitive a girl could be about their weight, he chuckled nervously, scratching the back of his head. "No, I-uh you're not-uh-"
He winced, his mind firing up ideas in quick succession to recover from this ordeal. "You're-uh pretty for your age?"
She gave him a deadpan glare. "I'm sixteen."
He paled. She's only a year older than me? Crapcrapcrap… I'm dead. Quick! Think of something!
His eyes fell onto hers as he felt his body move forward. He was an inch away from her face, his breath touching her cheeks. Evie blinked in surprise, jerking back from the sudden closeness.
"You're the most beautiful thing I've ever laid my eyes on."
June's face blanked and he felt his cheeks warming up. The hell did I just say?
That was not something he'd expected to come out of his mouth.
Neither did Evie apparently as she felt her cheeks heat up at the sudden compliment and their close proximity.
No one had said they'd like how she looked before.
Evie did what any awkward teen would in this situation, and pushed him away, her cheeks reddening and voice cracking, "Look, um, how about we just drop this… thing."
June perked up and backed away with a sigh of relief. I can't believe that worked.
While he mentally congratulated himself at his quick (and embarrassing) thinking, he missed Evie's inquiry of him.
He soon realised that mistake and turned to her. "Um, would you mind repeating that?"
Evie suppressed the temptation to express her ire. "I said, how did you escape your trainer?"
"Escape my what now?" He held up a claw when she opened her mouth to repeat herself. "No, no, I heard ya. What the hell do you mean escape my trainer?"
"E-exactly what I mean?" She was confused by his question, she decided that it was better to clarify what she meant. "Your typing isn't exactly found in the wild anymore. The same goes for Psychic, Steel and Fairies. The humans deemed your typing too dangerous to be left in the wild and... well, captured all of you."
What? "That's ridiculous. There's no way something like that could happen."
Evie shrugged as if she didn't care whether he believed her or not.
All Fire-types, Psychic and etcetera being captured? That was impossible. There's no way regular people could just capture an entire species that could breathe fire, even if this was the Pokémon world…
Wait a second, that Crude person, doppelganger, clone, whatever created a portal.
Did that mean…
I'm in another world! And not the one I was in earlier. He froze in shock at the revelation. How did he send me to another world? Could he have sent me back to my world?
Whoever that Crude guy was, his doppelganger, alternate self or his creation?
Eh, whatever he was, he was apparently strong enough to open portals to other universes, fly, conjure up items from thin air. All of which looked like a simple party trick for him.
June felt bile setting in his throat. A dreadful thought came to him.
He could've killed us without any problems…
He shoved that thought deep into the abyss he called a mind and hid it behind several mental locks.
He gulped, a quiet mumble of nonsense coming out of him.
"... everyone felt when I get too deep in my thoughts? For Arceus' sake, now I feel bad for them." He heard the 'Eevee' mutter under her breath.
Ignoring the Pokémon's remark, he thought back to what Crude had said.
If it wasn't our deaths, then what could he have wanted? Tasks… what did he mean by that? Do I have to do something to help Evie? She does fit the bill for rare Pokémon, but that's only one.
He hummed in thought. I'll probably meet the second one later. And then, there's the issue of my brothers, where did he take them? Do we each have a separate task? If so, that explains why I'm not with them.
He snapped his claws, a look of recognition fired up in his eyes. "I think I get it, now."
The only problem now was getting Evie to believe him.
He didn't have any proof to back his, admittedly, insane-sounding claims of being human, coupled with the 'not-from-this-universe' spiel. That would make it even harder to believe.
He mentally sighed. Welp, it's not like I got anything to lose by telling the truth. The worst that could happen is her laughing at me, right?
Taking in a deep breath, June faced Evie once more, his brown eyes staring deeply into her ambers. "Look, Evie. If you really want me to explain myself, I want you to know that I am being a hundred percent honest when I'm saying this, so please consider what I'm saying before dismissing them."
She sighed, not looking very confident about his wording. "Alright, I'll listen."
He grinned and talked. He talked about his arrival, his shock at being in a foreign body, him being forced here by his doppelganger.
"... and here I am. In an unknown place, with a… whatever you are, and separated from my brothers. Please, Evie. I know what I said sounds ridiculous but please, please believe me."
He looked at her to gauge her reaction though her face was stoic and expressionless, so he couldn't tell what she was thinking.
She eventually let out a long drawn-out sigh. "So, this is what it's about. Perry was right… fuck… he was right about him."
She snarled, stomping the dirt below her with a growl before shaking her head. "Poké balls really do control our minds… shit, now I have to deal with a mentally unstable Fire-type."
Controlling minds? What the hell is she talking about?Am I in a dark universe?
That was beyond terrifying if it was true, and he didn't think it was, he hoped it wasn't true. He knew he wasn't strong enough to deal with any worldwide messes, so it must be about Evie, right?
He remembered that the man had promised him an adventure and tasks completion, not any world-saving shenanigans.
So it had to be about Evie, it just had to be.
She wasn't a Pokémon that he knew, and while Sword and Shield was close to being released, he would have definitely known if a new Eeveelution was announced.
June was snapped out of his trance as a blue orb covered his sight.
His eyes crossed to properly view the object, it was small, round and shaped like an Oran Berry and beneath it was a brown paw that trailed down to the right foreleg of the 'Eevee'.
"Eat this," she said, "You'll have a lot waiting for you when we go to my home."
That tone didn't leave much room for objections so he took the gifted berry without a word, his peripheral catching a glimpse of her shoving more into her neck fur.
Definitely not an Eevee, but she's similar to one.
He glanced at the berry in hand, his mind wandering a bit as he realised that he didn't feel a bit hungry despite having not eaten anything since the night before he turned.
Not thinking too much about it, he tore into the fruit. The berry was… something, that was all he could say. He couldn't really describe the taste other than that it was an acquired taste, one that he didn't yet have.
He turned to face the strange Pokémon who simply gestured to him with a head nod.
"Let's go. I need to get some sleep after tonight," she said.
June complied and followed.
In the silence that permeated their walk, a previous detail sprung into his mind and June couldn't stop the words from coming out.
"Evie the Eevee, how creative."
A feminine groan sliced through the silence, expressing exactly what Evie thought about that comment.
hi! I noticed you were new to the forums, and I was hoping to give you a read/review a bit earlier, but I ended up getting caught up in things. welcome, though, and I hope you're having a good time!
Overall the premise strikes me as a really interesting one: the trainers are usually the protagonists of a Pokemon story, and usually people get isekai'd into the shoes of a protagonist--but what happens when they end up in the bodies of someone who's not traditionally the main character? I admit I'm curious that their first goal here is to be trainers, since that begs a lot of questions about what it means for a pokemon to be a pokemon trainer, you know? Can they talk to pokemon since they themselves are pokemon? Will their relationship with their pokemon be different as a result, or will they take conscious measures to distance themselves from their pokemon so that the trainer/pokemon dynamic still seems distinct? I think in general isekai stories have a lot of allure as far as blank slates go, since you get to play with the idea of what a set of characters would do in a world where they don't really have any personal investment/stakes, so I'm really curious how this will play off the idea of Charmander, Bulbasaur, and Pikachu trying to become trainers in their own right.
I also like how they're three brothers here--each of them feels like a distinct character in how they react to the world, but you get the benefit of some familiarity with one another, which is useful in a story where literally nothing else is known or familiar.
The tone is nicely snappy, and I think the scene-setting is pretty interesting here, with jumps between a sort of undisclosed meta-universe-beyond-our-heroes and then back to regular narration. I'm reminded a little of Douglas Adams, where there's scene cuts to things beyond our protagonist's understanding that, while completely unknown to the protagonist, provide a little insight/humor for what's actually happening to the protagonists in the "main" story, who are lamenting their fate with meta knowledge like the butterfly affect or that they've never done drugs, lol. I admit it's a little hard to keep track of these two storylines, to know to what extent it's important who/how Sarah is, or why the number 679 is important (honedge?), but first chapters aren't really for answering questions 100%, so I get that! I also liked the main "intro" to the anime world as it's told in terms of what the story isn't; it's a fun stylistic choice that makes things really intriguing without necessarily tipping your hand about what the story is, but it doesn't last long enough so as to be confusing or anything.
It's a bit personal preference here (alongside with the pacing note above), so feel free to take with a grain of salt, but I think sometimes there's a bit too much drawing from visual medium--"Location: Unknown/World: Unknown" doesn't really feel necessary when the resulting scene makes it pretty clear that it's happening in an unknown, almost meta location within a very vast multiverse. But that's just me!
A bit of deja vu for me tonight, so some recs if you're interested in browsing around the forums--if you like the idea of siblings being yeeted into another world and trying to find their way around (one of them is even a charmander!), you might enjoy ArielDiancie's Rescuer's of Light. Overall, the more comedic tone and jumping in with meta fics reminded me of a lot of fics by The Walrein--you might enjoy Sword n' Shield Shorts (a collection of short stories about people poking holes in the logic of Sword and Shield), The Butterfree Effect (which is, shockingly, about the butterfly effect), or Professor Birch's Last Day on Earth (featuring a professor getting trolled by talking pokemon).
Thanks for sharing, and I hope you enjoy your time on the forums!
I'm glad you enjoyed it, kint and a kind hello to you too! I'm definitely enjoying my time here though I'm still trying to overcome my social anxiety in talking with the community. (which I think I'm making decent progress with)
And yes, I understand there's a ton of things to be answered but rest assured, most of them will probably be answered. (That and me trying to answer them now will result in some spoilers)
But there are some questions here that I can answer.
I admit it's a little hard to keep track of these two storylines, to know to what extent it's important who/how Sarah is, or why the number 679 is important (honedge?), but first chapters aren't really for answering questions 100%, so I get that! I also liked the main "intro" to the anime world as it's told in terms of what the story isn't; it's a fun stylistic choice that makes things really intriguing without necessarily tipping your hand about what the story is, but it doesn't last long enough so as to be confusing or anything.
The number 679 is referring to 'The Champion's Sol', as in Briggs was the 679th Champion.
These two characters aren't going to be super involved in this story's plot, they're mostly here to provide insight on the larger multiverses/my other stories (that I haven't really gotten to creating yet). You may see them from time to time but they won't interact with the MCs for a long (and I mean long) while.
They're not in the Pokémon world and they were never born or brought into the Pokémon world, so take that into your consideration.
They're part of a much wider... for the lack of a better term, world.
Hi Shini! I really enjoyed playing Mafia with you on the forums, so I figured I'd stop by and see what sort of fics you were writing. Seems like a really interesting project for sure! It's got the trappings of an isekai-style fic, with our protagonists being taken out of their own world and tossed into the Poke-verse, but with a twist or three. First off, there's some body-swapping going on; it's not just a simple "take human from one location and plop 'em in another". But then, things aren't as straightforward as they seem either, with overseeing deities and coffee-drinking observers from another 'verse. I can't say I have any kind of experience with this style of fic, so I honestly have no idea what to expect going forward.
What I can expect is a lot of tongue-in-cheek humor both from our three protagonists, as well as the narrator/internal monologue. Lots of meta knowledge going on here, like June's knowledge of all 'verses pokemon. (I got a good chuckle out of the "I hope this isn't the manga" line) Some really interesting commentary, too, on real-world knowledge of fanfic protagonists meddling in the affairs of canon characters. I cracked up again at the three of them diving into a bush to stay out of Ash's early-anime path of destruction (watch out for angry spearows!) What starts out as any good Kanto journey does quickly turns on its head as it's shown the brothers-turned-pokemon can talk to humans, and the humans understand them! Poor Prof Oak just wanted a peaceful afternoon after shoveling his jerkwad grandson (what was his name again??) out the door, but now he's got a whole other crazy set of events dumped on his lap.
I appreciate how the brothers all have wildly different reactions to discovering their predicament. June seems to be the "leader" of the bunch, first to wake, most bothered and self-aware of the bunch (at least for now). Ane and Quil taking things a lot better than their other brother, with varying levels of wtf going on.
Lots of little "easter eggs" in terms of meta knowledge being brought into this world via the three brothers. Jokes about first season anime fat pikachu style, Ash running into legendaries all the time (though I hope the brothers realize they've got less than an episode left to run into Ho-oh!), it's all really cheeky and fun.
There's a lot of vagueness going on with all things not-poke centric, like Briggs and his monitor viewing friend, and the cloaked figure and his bold-talking deity buddy. I'd expect some of that to be explained in due time, but as it stands now so early in the fic, there's not a lot I can say to that other than general curiosity as to what it all means.
Looks like you've got quite an adventure shaping up on your plate! Welcome to the forums and I look forward to where the adventure is heading!
I'm glad you enjoyed it, Pano! And I enjoyed our time in Mafia too.
There are definitely gonna be a lot of surprises and many things I'm excited for. And I hope you'll be as excited as I am for them.
I love to see how all of you will react to the crazy things I've planned for this series. I hope you all have a splendid day and take care of yourselves!
Merry Blitzmas
Disclaimer: This is mostly stream-of-consciousness thoughts. Take it as you will.
1
-Not going to lie, while I also used to label locations at the start of scenes, I’ve soured on the practice. You should establish the setting and time within the narration itself.
-Similarly, stopping the fic to just tell me Sarah’s backstory then spend a couple of sentences describing what she’s wearing does suck me out of things. I believe it’s usually better to try and weave this sort of stuff in more organically? Like, show her strong headed demeanor through her actions. And her dialogue alone suggests she’s chummy with Briggs, pointing toward the friendship piece.
-Already we have a multiverse that I guess these two can just monitor from… wherever? Intriguing. Makes me wish I could’ve seen more of the technology, but I guess that’s part of the mystery of this? My guess is they’ve “played” Pokemon (the game) and that’s where they have their knowledge from.
-June and Ane are… unusual choices for male protagonist names. I honestly thought they were ladies or nonbinary at first. Kinda continued to do so, actually, unless the narration pointed out otherwise.
-There are a lot of cheeky meta nods to the various canon, particularly the anime, and I see June’s even calling out pokemon fan fics. It’s cute, though speaking from experience I caution going too heavily on the meta angle because it can get stale.
-So, is there a time travel component to this, too? We have the isekai, but the Butterfly Effect typically is a time travel thing.
2
-Oooh I’d love it if Ultra Wormholes played a role and, theoretically, Solgaleo, Lunala, and/or Necrozma could show up in some capacity.
-Also personal preference, but not a fan of making aura a proper noun here. Feels like it’s trying to give it unneeded emphasis, like game dialogue highlighting particularly important words.
-So, as pokemon, they’re gonna be trainers? Does this mean they can’t use moves? Is their level of sapience different from the normal pokemon of the world? Lot of disturbing implications this could bring up and I’m not sure if that’s intentional. [nervous laugh]
-It’s funny how casual they are about finding Arceus but, like, with all of June’s meta knowledge, why hasn’t she brought up the fact they’re in the complete wrong region to search for them? You would think they’d need to make plans to get to Sinnoh. That would also help with avoiding important characters and causing any paradoxes.
-... oh, I guess they’re saying screw canon. Aaaaand it looks like the pokemon have the same level of sapience. So, like, they’re as smart and perceptive as humans? Again, for me, personally, that brings up some potentially disturbing implications for the whole trainer-pokemon relationship.
-Crude is so “Mwa ha ha, I’m so eviiiiil” it physically hurts. I’m… not sure if that was intentional.
-Like before, I’m… not really sure why we’re getting this infodump about the new place. It brings the story pace crashing to a halt, in my opinion.
Overall, the world-hopping stuff is interesting. But there are a lot of mechanistic things holding it back for me, personally. On the narration front, you can’t seem to decide if you want a third-person limited, with June as the primary POV character, or third-person omniscient where the narrator is a separate character who knows everything about the setting and characters. You flip flop between them, like when you go into Troublewood’s backstory, and it messes with the pacing and perception for me. What adds to this confusion is that you frequently treat characters’ thoughts as internal dialogue. It can be cute, but I personally tend to think it’s more effective when used less often.
Similarly, there aren't a lot of actual setting descriptions to go off of. I have no real idea what Troublewood actually looks like, for example. And I noticed a lot of comma splices, too, especially in your dialogue. Essentially, you’re creating run-on sentences by using lots of commas instead of separating them out with periods.
My biggest suggestion is to find a willing beta reader to help with some of this stuff. Otherwise, if you want a glimpse at another TR author whose fic draws inspiration from the tones of the anime, I’d check out Tetra’s Legendary Adventures.
Hi Ambyssin, and thanks for the feedback! Now this is something that I'll take into consideration. (I was hoping for someone to take my story apart and tell me what I can do better)
Not going to lie, while I also used to label locations at the start of scenes, I’ve soured on the practice. You should establish the setting and time within the narration itself
The labelling thing, if I had to be honest, I sorta came up with at the last moment. It wasn't necessary but I just wanted to get my point across for the readers. It's tacky and I don't really use it for much except for what's given above, and mostly for my benefit in remembering where and what the world is.
Similarly, stopping the fic to just tell me Sarah’s backstory then spend a couple of sentences describing what she’s wearing does suck me out of things. I believe it’s usually better to try and weave this sort of stuff in more organically? Like, show her strong headed demeanor through her actions. And her dialogue alone suggests she’s chummy with Briggs, pointing toward the friendship piece.
I agree with your assessment but I wanted to delve a bit into their back story without infringing on the main plot. Because any scenes containing them (in this story at least) will be very vague and they won't really do much. They'll play a bigger role in my other fics or whenever I can get over my laziness to write their own stories.
Already we have a multiverse that I guess these two can just monitor from… wherever? Intriguing. Makes me wish I could’ve seen more of the technology, but I guess that’s part of the mystery of this? My guess is they’ve “played” Pokemon (the game) and that’s where they have their knowledge from.
June and Ane are… unusual choices for male protagonist names. I honestly thought they were ladies or nonbinary at first. Kinda continued to do so, actually, unless the narration pointed out otherwise.
There are a lot of cheeky meta nods to the various canon, particularly the anime, and I see June’s even calling out pokemon fan fics. It’s cute, though speaking from experience I caution going too heavily on the meta angle because it can get stale
Also personal preference, but not a fan of making aura a proper noun here. Feels like it’s trying to give it unneeded emphasis, like game dialogue highlighting particularly important words.
So, as pokemon, they’re gonna be trainers? Does this mean they can’t use moves? Is their level of sapience different from the normal pokemon of the world? Lot of disturbing implications this could bring up and I’m not sure if that's intentional. [nervous laughter]
(In all seriousness though, I'll delve more into the relationship of the anime world later on, and the level of sapience will come into factor in the other worlds I've made)
It’s funny how casual they are about finding Arceus but, like, with all of June’s meta knowledge, why hasn’t she brought up the fact they’re in the complete wrong region to search for them? You would think they’d need to make plans to get to Sinnoh. That would also help with avoiding important characters and causing any paradoxes.
Casual is how I act, most of the time. And with how I think of things, I'd probably forget that little detail and just want to chalk it upto a... 'Maybe we can find Arceus anywhere rather than just Sinnoh'
oh, I guess they’re saying screw canon. Aaaaand it looks like the pokemon have the same level of sapience. So, like, they’re as smart and perceptive as humans? Again, for me, personally, that brings up some potentially disturbing implications for the whole trainer-pokemon relationship.
Yeah sorry, I wasn't quite sure whether dumping that info would've be a good thing. And I was questioning myself during that whole ordeal.
But then I was like 'Eh, screw this. Let's just effing do it.' I'll try to dial down on the infodump and make the future dumps a bit more palatable and natural.
Overall, the world-hopping stuff is interesting. But there are a lot of mechanistic things holding it back for me, personally. On the narration front, you can’t seem to decide if you want a third-person limited, with June as the primary POV character, or third-person omniscient where the narrator is a separate character who knows everything about the setting and characters. You flip flop between them, like when you go into Troublewood’s backstory, and it messes with the pacing and perception for me. What adds to this confusion is that you frequently treat characters’ thoughts as internal dialogue. It can be cute, but I personally tend to think it’s more effective when used less often
I'm glad you like the world-hopping aspect. I always wanted to try something like this after reading and watching various things similar to it.
The narration is something I'll look into, I was worried about the switches in Chapter 2 but after like almost ten different revisions and rewrites, I just wanted it to be done with and get to the juicy bits of the arc.
Similarly, there aren't a lot of actual setting descriptions to go off of. I have no real idea what Troublewood actually looks like, for example. And I noticed a lot of comma splices, too, especially in your dialogue. Essentially, you’re creating run-on sentences by using lots of commas instead of separating them out with periods.
My biggest suggestion is to find a willing beta reader to help with some of this stuff. Otherwise, if you want a glimpse at another TR author whose fic draws inspiration from the tones of the anime, I’d check out Tetra’s Legendary Adventures.
I always wanted to find a beta reader to help me but talking to someone and doing so, is so damn hard. I'll try to overcome my anxiety and hopefully work up the courage to ask someone.
Sure. I'm always yearning to read more and learn from others.
Anyway, I appreciate you taking the time to write this. Especially since most of my knowledge from all things Ultra stem from your fic (considering that they play a pretty a big role in Guiding Light), the internet and my own interpretation.
I've read through both chapters, simply because I can. That is an interesting concept you have here, characters switching between universes multiple times.
Right out the gate, I have to admit I feel a bit disheartened by the main cast, and if that tints the tone of my review, I'm sorry. I don't know if you know how awful they come off as. I have not seen a single positive trait in either June, Quil or Ane. I hate them. At first I was hesitant to go so hard on them, because you might not be aware of it, but the way you wrote Evie (when she was alone) and the Luxio and her cub was waaay beyond what I got with these three entitled jerks.
Seeing how the Ratattas kicked their asses right after they made an incredibly xenophobic remark shows me that you are at least partially aware and plan for some character development down the line, which is good. But then some of their behavior is played off as funny and anime-y, which is worrying.
The scene between Evie and June was so uncomfy. Not only was the sex-joke creepy af and pretty unwarranted (Also, Evie, a battle-hardened badass getting flustered and putting up with June's shit seems to break character a bit), he also outright saw her as an object in multiple ways (questmarker and loot at the same time) and dismissed her statements about her identity twice (she said she's an eevee, he doesn't believe it and later acts like she's an abomination). It was at this point that my cringe at a preteen's stupidity turned into sadness. Because that was just one sting after the next. (Yeah, he claim's that he's 16 but he acts like an 8 year old)
Then the concept of them becoming trainers... well, Amby already remarked on how bad of an implication that is. And honestly, by the time they left Oak's lab, I found myself wishing they'd just get caught and have to grind in cockfights they don't want to participate in to get a bit of a reality check.
As much as I like a good meta joke (and I laughed at plenty of them here), I always come to hate characters with meta-knowledge because they are just so incredibly arrogant. So I would veer very much on the side of caution on how you want to use those going further. It's not that June wasn't unlikeable enough already.
The writing in chapter 1 was still a bit wonky, but I think I caught most of the things and pointed them out in the linequotes. Chapter 2 shows significant improvement in this regard.
I liked the character of Evie a lot. She seems miles more mature, and her conflict about wanting action after her revolt was successful is an interesting one. She is right that it is selfish and cruel, but if those are her feelings, they have to be addressed.
I also liked Crude. He is so over the top evil and fruity, it just hurts. He's Bloodsteel the Hedgehog levels of cringe, and I love seeing these concepts taken seriously. It makes for some good comedy while also reminding me of... well, being young and dumb.
I've read that this is your second version of this story. Like, wow, kudos for tackling a rewriting! That shows some real dedication to the course. Thanks for the read and keep it up :)
No, no, June. There's gotta be a perfectly reasonable answer for this, you're not actually a Charmander, you're probably just hallucinating, maybe you're on a massive acid trip, right now and-
Of course, that wasn't true, the last thing he remembered was falling asleep on his bed, and he was certain he had never done drugs before.
First sentence is missing a verb. It should be "The local professor of Pallet Town was a man past his prime"
Second sentence slips into present simple.
How can the walls be plain and then stuffed with shelves at the same time? I get that the walls behind the shelves are plain, but those wouldn't be the first things they'd notice, no?
"Do you three want any drinks?" asked the professor, getting their attention. "I've purchased some chamomile tea for a friend of mine but I wouldn't mind sharing some with you three. I do have other types of tea if chamomile isn't something you prefer."
Would Prof Oak offer any random pokemon that waddled into his lab a tea? Wouldn't a bowl of water or some pokefood be more appropriate? Going by anime-logic, what Oak does here is kinda if I offered a talking parrot a mug of tea?
June raised a scaly brow at the dark spot. It wasn't as if the spot was dark because it wasn't well-lit, hell, it was the complete opposite. The space around the dark spot was bright and illuminated by a nearby lamp, so it was strange to see that specific spot devoid of light.
Dude. It's a drill-hole in the wall. It ain't that mystifying.
Jokes aside, it would maybe help to specify how large this spot was. Because I totally read it as a drill-hole.
"Take a look at this Pokémon here, a Lucario, you can see how there's a blue substance around its abdomen, arms, legs, and head. This is what we call, Aura. Aura is an energy source that is present in all living things: Pokémon, human beings, plants and the like all contain Aura. From the results I've gathered on your bodies, you three have no Aura whatsoever, and what's even weirder is that your bodies were absorbing the Aura around you. This is a strange phenomenon, as that's something only Pokémon with life-draining moves can do, for example, Leech Seed, Giga Drain can absorb other Auras. Though yours is still strange as you seem to be absorbing the Aura in the air."
They are antimatter. They slowly kill everything they come into contact with. A renowned Professor, who, yk, STUDIES pokemon, shouldn't let them walk free.
"As you three have stated, your home has no Pokémon so I'm going to assume that means your world's inhabitants do not have Auras. Theory number one details that your bodies are slowly getting accustomed to the Aura in our world, hence your bodies absorbing the Aura in the air. This could mean that over time you could gain the ability to use Aura like a Pokémon despite having the mind of a human. Other humans that have turned to Pokémon have weaker signatures than even baby Pokémon so most of them cannot use any moves aside from weak, basic attacks like Ember, Water Gun, Confusion and etcetera.
"Theory two, overexposure to something your bodies aren't used to. This one is much more lethal because if your bodies absorb Aura too quickly and your bodies can't adapt in time, you will wither away and die. Symptoms similar to overexposure to ammonia and mercury could transpire before you expire."
None of those make sense. They are in a body native to this plane, their consciousness has been transferred. And since they state that they were humans before, it's also not like they are pokemon that come from a pokemon-world without aura.
"Oh right, Arceus exists." June face-palmed. How could he have forgotten about the god of Pokémon? "Professor, how long do you think it'll take us to find Arceus?"
"There is a test, but I'm sure you three could pass them," Oak leaned in and whispered. "Between the four of us, I could probably convince the higher-ups to let you experience being trainers for a few weeks before the test. Unless something comes up and we can safely secure what will happen, I can pull some strings and get one of my Pokémon to keep an eye on you during your pre-test journey."
This is not how you guarantee safety! Why would Oak let these three aliens go around without testing their knowledge, but kids who grew up all their life around pokemon have to???
I would love for once to have the ability to be something akin to God, could you imagine the things I could do now that I'm a Pokémon? All the chaos that could be had if I became that strong?"
Now, why were they so mad? You may ask yourself this question.
And indeed it seemed pretty petty for them to be angry and hateful at their results but keep in mind that June, Ane and Quil had spent hours searching, they had looked into every nook and cranny of the route, but for whatever reason, they couldn't find the Pokémon they were looking for.
Not in the sky, trees or even little dens and holes in the ground.
It was only natural that they'd be a bit frustrated at their fortune.
Okay, now this sounds kinda patronising? The narrator is established as 3rd omniscient, but so far they haven't turned to the audience directly. And this feels like the narrator breaks the narration just to tell me to shut up about any inconsistencies or questions I might have regarding the characters' behaviour.
It was strange. She never thought that the night could be so relaxing. She never thought that she no longer had to hide. That she could watch her child grow without fear, without the stress and dangers.
The strange fox pokémon shook its head. "Of course not. I'm not sure what the humans had been teaching you but Pokémon cannibalism is very rare even amongst desperate Pokémon. Though it does give another reason on why Perry hates humans, well other than…" June couldn't quite hear the last words as it'd murmured them quieter than a talking ant.
June chuckled nervously. "Oh, hoh… really? That's um, interesting…" he coughed to get her attention, his eyes trailing down the fox's body, a small grin cracked his nervous expression. "Would you mind getting off me, please? It's, uh, rather uncomfortable and I don't want strangers to stumble onto us and think we're about to… get down and dirty…"
Its cheeks flared up and its head slowly moved down, its irises shrunk to pinpricks as it took in the position they were in.
It stood above him, pinning him down with its powerful paws, and if its voice was a hint, it was probably female too. Thus, making their position look even more uncomfortable and awkward.
This feels extremely awkward and uncomfortable to read. It's one of the oldest anime tropes in existence and not a single living creature would actually act this way.
"Hey, um, what exactly are you, Evie? I haven't seen a Pokémon like you before."
"Like I haven't heard of that before," she muttered with an eye roll. "I'm an Eevee. Got that? Other Pokémon had asked me that before and it's very frustrating when none of them believes me... Tch, just because I look different doesn't mean I'm not an Eevee."
A small scowl graced her vulpine features.
So it's not only me that thinks she isn't an Eevee.
He gave her a narrowed glance, wondering whether it'd be a good idea to try and get more information out of her.
He shrugged and proceeded without a second thought. "Sorry Evie, but I gotta agree with whoever said that, you don't look like an Eevee especially since you're… a bit bigger than normal."
He paled. She's only a year older than me? Crapcrapcrap… I'm dead. Quick! Think of something!
His eyes fell onto hers as he felt his body move forward. He was an inch away from her face, his breath touching her cheeks. Evie blinked in surprise, jerking back from the sudden closeness.
"You're the most beautiful thing I've ever laid my eyes on."
That was beyond terrifying if it was true, and he didn't think it was, he hoped it wasn't true. He knew he wasn't strong enough to deal with any worldwide messes, so it must be about Evie, right?
He remembered that the man had promised him an adventure and tasks completion, not any world-saving shenanigans.
Hi there! Glad you enjoyed the read and I loved how you feel about three main brothers' characters. I mainly threw some of my and my own brothers' personalities, mix them in a cup and removed the filter which is why they can seem likable to some and downright annoying to others.
Loving the way you expressed what you liked and disliked about this fic, and I can understand the corcern.
Right out the gate, I have to admit I feel a bit disheartened by the main cast, and if that tints the tone of my review, I'm sorry. I don't know if you know how awful they come off as. I have not seen a single positive trait in either June, Quil or Ane. I hate them. At first I was hesitant to go so hard on them, because you might not be aware of it, but the way you wrote Evie (when she was alone) and the Luxio and her cub was waaay beyond what I got with these three entitled jerks.
Sorry you have to feel like that, but it's fine. I'm not looking to please everyone with the trio's early personalities anyway. I wanted June to be like me when I was 15 but without any filters which is kinda why he's so gosh darn arrogant and annoying.
The other characters have a ton of characterisation done since I like to think of them as having completed their own journey while these three haven't yet, so they have a lot of incoming things to deal with.
Seeing how the Ratattas kicked their asses right after they made an incredibly xenophobic remark shows me that you are at least partially aware and plan for some character development down the line, which is good. But then some of their behavior is played off as funny and anime-y, which is worrying.
Planning for a lot of things that can break their perspectives on the world. They're still learning about how they fit in the world and sibling talk can be the worst thing you'd see from them ('cause there's a lot of messed up things I joke about with my brothers that I don't talk about in public).
The scene between Evie and June was so uncomfy. Not only was the sex-joke creepy af and pretty unwarranted (Also, Evie, a battle-hardened badass getting flustered and putting up with June's shit seems to break character a bit), he also outright saw her as an object in multiple ways (questmarker and loot at the same time) and dismissed her statements about her identity twice (she said she's an eevee, he doesn't believe it and later acts like she's an abomination). It was at this point that my cringe at a preteen's stupidity turned into sadness. Because that was just one sting after the next. (Yeah, he claim's that he's 16 but he acts like an 8 year old)
Then the concept of them becoming trainers... well, Amby already remarked on how bad of an implication that is. And honestly, by the time they left Oak's lab, I found myself wishing they'd just get caught and have to grind in cockfights they don't want to participate in to get a bit of a reality check.
Definitely understand how this can make you feel. I've seen some comments on how this'll work, and I intend to explain it once they come back to the anime world.
As much as I like a good meta joke (and I laughed at plenty of them here), I always come to hate characters with meta-knowledge because they are just so incredibly arrogant. So I would veer very much on the side of caution on how you want to use those going further. It's not that June wasn't unlikeable enough already.
Meta-knowledge won't really come into effect too much, since this June was from a time where he'd only played two main-series game and watched the Black&White anime.
And I'm definitely trying to lace his arrogance pretty early, just to shatter them later on. (especially with the kind of crazy things that'll happen in the second arc/and an interesting antagonist being mentioned later on)
The writing in chapter 1 was still a bit wonky, but I think I caught most of the things and pointed them out in the linequotes. Chapter 2 shows significant improvement in this regard.
I know that chapter 1 wasn't the greatest but I was trying to see what sort of feedback I'd get. Chapter 2 was improved with the advice from these reviews.
liked the character of Evie a lot. She seems miles more mature, and her conflict about wanting action after her revolt was successful is an interesting one. She is right that it is selfish and cruel, but if those are her feelings, they have to be addressed.
I'm glad you like her as much as I do. She has a ton of character development that'd happened offscreen due to the fact that she could literally have her own spin-off. (if I ever get the time to write said spin-off, of course.)
I also liked Crude. He is so over the top evil and fruity, it just hurts. He's Bloodsteel the Hedgehog levels of cringe, and I love seeing these concepts taken seriously. It makes for some good comedy while also reminding me of... well, being young and dumb.
Glad you like his cringy persona, I plan to go pretty far in showing off how he annoys everyone and there's a lot to talk about when it comes to this guy, I've planned for a ton of layers of things for him
First sentence is missing a verb. It should be "The local professor of Pallet Town was a man past his prime"
Second sentence slips into present simple.
Would Prof Oak offer any random pokemon that waddled into his lab a tea? Wouldn't a bowl of water or some pokefood be more appropriate? Going by anime-logic, what Oak does here is kinda if I offered a talking parrot a mug of tea?
Dude. It's a drill-hole in the wall. It ain't that mystifying.
Jokes aside, it would maybe help to specify how large this spot was. Because I totally read it as a drill-hole
They are antimatter. They slowly kill everything they come into contact with. A renowned Professor, who, yk, STUDIES pokemon, shouldn't let them walk free.
Well, considering that they haven't exploded the earth yet, I think they're fine... (also that's not how antimatter works. Things become nukes when anti meets normal)
None of those make sense. They are in a body native to this plane, their consciousness has been transferred. And since they state that they were humans before, it's also not like they are pokemon that come from a pokemon-world without aura.
This is not how you guarantee safety! Why would Oak let these three aliens go around without testing their knowledge, but kids who grew up all their life around pokemon have to???
Okay, now this sounds kinda patronising? The narrator is established as 3rd omniscient, but so far they haven't turned to the audience directly. And this feels like the narrator breaks the narration just to tell me to shut up about any inconsistencies or questions I might have regarding the characters' behaviour.
This feels extremely awkward and uncomfortable to read. It's one of the oldest anime tropes in existence and not a single living creature would actually act this way.
If you think of a Pokémon wanting and thinking like someone that's LGBT+, then I guess you could see it like that. I didn't think this could be read like that.
Yup, good to know this sentence made you feel that. I tried to hammer in the arrogance of his character pretty early just so I could break it into pieces in the next chapter.
Also since I'm a doofus and forgot to answer one more reply: The food issue here will probably be explored later, maybe not. But I can say that the Pokémon IN Troublewood don't eat each other. They have, I guess you could say 'Protein Berries' for that
I've read that this is your second version of this story. Like, wow, kudos for tackling a rewriting! That shows some real dedication to the course. Thanks for the read and keep it up :)
This is absolutely not going to be a normal day, is it.
I wonder what the significance of the number 679 is. And who is the Champion, and what is their Sol?
I'm having a very hard time visualizing this place, maybe you could describe it in more detail? Unless that was intentional.
Ooooooooh, looks like this is going to be a multiverse story!
Also having trouble visualizing Route 1. Maybe you could describe the landscape a bit more, like maybe there's a tree casting a shadow on the group?
And here we have our first protagonist, in reasonable surprise and shock. And oh boy, he doesn't have any amnesia. That's going to be interesting.
I really like how you include his thoughts in the narration!
I like the nod to the manga, it's always nice to see it referenced.
Looks like we have three protagonists! And the other two are much less shocked at being Pokemon than the Charmander. I wonder if a Squirtle is going to join the group at some point to complete the starter quartet?
Oh boy, so one of them is this "Champion". I wonder what this hooded figure wants with them, and how the "Champion" created him?
Ooooh, so they're in the anime world. I'm interested to see how that'll impact things.
Heh, yeah, things would probably massively change if they interacted with Ash.
And these three are able to be understood by humans. Oak is almost definitely going to be very intrigued by that.
I love Oak's shock at meeting talking Pokemon.
Heh, nice title drop.
That was great! I'm really intrigued by the setup you have here, and the character dynamic between the three Pokemon is fun. My favorite part is them meeting Professor Oak.
I look forward to reading more! Thank you for writing this!
G'day, Bench! I'm glad you enjoyed it! Things are gonna get pretty hectic in the future and I'm happy to see that you're joining me on this crazy adventure.
Looks like we have three protagonists! And the other two are much less shocked at being Pokemon than the Charmander. I wonder if a Squirtle is going to join the group at some point to complete the starter quartet?
I'm pretty sure they're all their own starters. /hj
Yeah, Oak meeting some Pokemon who used to be humans from another world where Pokemon is a franchise of fiction, and then those Pokemon becoming trainers, definitely sounds like it's going to change the anime canon quite a bit.
I wonder what other trainers will think when they run into these three?
I am immensely intrigued by Crude.
Oooooh, Troublewood seems really interesting! Looks like Pokemon have their own societies in this world!
Huh, looks like this Pokemon doesn't like humans, and there's apparently a human war happening.
Oh boy, looks like this Pokemon doesn't believe June. That's going to be interesting.
Overall, I really enjoyed this chapter! Lots of worldbuilding happening, and I'm excited to see where it goes!
Hello! I'm here for catnip, and currently looking at the first two chapters of the story. I did read this a while back when catching up the first time, but I took a quick skim to refresh myself here.
It seems like right off the bat the story throws a premise with a huge scope at us, from people talking about a "champion" returning (and I assume not the kind you get by winning the League) to a full-blown isekai to disembodied voices talking about lofty decisions. It's the kind of thing I'd expect from say, a large PMD fantasy, except this is set in the trainer world instead. And the possibilities from that, especially the unique situation you've set up here, are very intriguing. I'm not entirely sure what story this is going to pan out into yet, but I'm definitely interested to see how pokemon traveling all on their own in this world work, and what kind of adventures these three (four, with Evie in the picture? Or just two groups for the next while?) are going to have.
In practice, I do think there are a couple of things that could be tidied up. One example is the prose's tendency to kind of just.... tell us things, instead of properly showing us; this is to say that there's a lot of one-liners in your prose that just tell us something's happening rather than describing it. This leaves a lot up to the imagination, and this means that your readers will get less of a vivid picture of what's going on in your story. Now, this isn't always bad! There should absolutely be a balance, and you might just be geared to write leaner prose. But I think it's worth looking at points where you can ease in some more description. A line like the one I've plucked below is a good example of a place where you could stand to describe more, because there's a lot happening here.
I think the characterization and dialogue here could also use a bit of work; one of my thoughts when reading was that Oak seemed to be rather out of character here. And in general, I notice points where the characters sometimes just seem to spout things, but those things don't really sound natural; they sound like exposition. see: a lot of Oak's lecture about UB's, Aura, etc. In general I feel like the characterization is a bit one-note and rigid here--characters have traits to discern each other on a surface level, but it should go deeper than that. It should feel like they have personas that influence what they say from the ground up, and the only characters I would say really have that at the moment are Evie and Crude. I think this is something to think on for future chapters; envisioning yourself as this character and then trying to flesh their past, internal monologue, temperament out, and so on might give them a lot of unspoken depth here.
Plot hopes....
It seems like these three got snatched off the path before their journey could even begin, which is disappointing. I think seeing a journeyfic-type structure with this new setup added to the picture would be a really interesting idea, and I also want to see more of the broad worldbuilding you have set up here. Any world where sponsors are willing to sponsor pokemon as their own trainers has to have some juicy stuff lying about. Of course, the story has pivoted into introducting people such as Evie and Crude, which I also think are interesting in their own right. It looks like we'll be hanging out with Evie for the near future, at least since June has been the POV character thus far, but I'm interested to learn more about what Crude is. The current theory I'm sticking with, especially given that he calls June his "creator" is that he was some kind of fictional character that gained sentience and decided he was going to wreak havoc on his creators for a change. He certainly seems to be the one who pulled them in here, and he obviously has Terrible Power at that. Can't wait to see more of him.
Overall, I'd say this is.... unique, if nothing else. It's a mishmash of well... everything, with a lot of potential to turn out in several interesting ways. It's too early to tell just where it'll go yet, but I'll be interested to see the result!
Technically USUM are the most recent ones, their time-lines are around late 2018 and early 2019. (That doesn't mean I'll stray away from Gen 8, LA and 9 though. It'll be fun to see how Gen 9 messes with my worldbuilding)
I'm not entirely sure what story this is going to pan out into yet, but I'm definitely interested to see how pokemon traveling all on their own in this world work, and what kind of adventures these three (four, with Evie in the picture? Or just two groups for the next while?) are going to have.
In practice, I do think there are a couple of things that could be tidied up. One example is the prose's tendency to kind of just.... tell us things, instead of properly showing us; this is to say that there's a lot of one-liners in your prose that just tell us something's happening rather than describing it. This leaves a lot up to the imagination, and this means that your readers will get less of a vivid picture of what's going on in your story. Now, this isn't always bad! There should absolutely be a balance, and you might just be geared to write leaner prose. But I think it's worth looking at points where you can ease in some more description. A line like the one I've plucked below is a good example of a place where you could stand to describe more, because there's a lot happening here.
Heh heh, oh yeah, I can definitely see the problems in the first 2 chapters. I'll get around to re-editing them either when I'm done with the first arc or whenever I feel like it.
think the characterization and dialogue here could also use a bit of work; one of my thoughts when reading was that Oak seemed to be rather out of character here. And in general, I notice points where the characters sometimes just seem to spout things, but those things don't really sound natural; they sound like exposition. see: a lot of Oak's lecture about UB's, Aura, etc. In general I feel like the characterization is a bit one-note and rigid here--characters have traits to discern each other on a surface level, but it should go deeper than that. It should feel like they have personas that influence what they say from the ground up, and the only characters I would say really have that at the moment are Evie and Crude. I think this is something to think on for future chapters; envisioning yourself as this character and then trying to flesh their past, internal monologue, temperament out, and so on might give them a lot of unspoken depth here
Overall, I'd say this is.... unique, if nothing else. It's a mishmash of well... everything, with a lot of potential to turn out in several interesting ways. It's too early to tell just where it'll go yet, but I'll be interested to see the result!
Sometimes, I think to myself that there just may be too many things going on. But then again, it's extremely fun to write something this large scale and I love a good challenge.
Nice to see that this peaked your interest and I'm glad to have you join me on this crazy adventure.
Take care, you two. Have a great rest of your day!
Major thanks to SparklingEspeon and The Silver Tux for beta-ing this chapter
In the dead of the night, the full moon shone brilliantly on the lush forest below. Trees towered over the young and fine saplings beneath them. Their leaves rustled in the midnight breeze, producing a gentle song throughout the woods. Bushes and flowers grew among the ginormous roots, and the fruits on the trees gleamed under the light of the moon.
A big shadow soared through the night sky, momentarily blocking the moon from view. The shadow was on closer inspection, a big flock of bird Pokémon flying in a certain direction. Two Pokémon were stationed in the front, guiding the flock towards their objective.
The front left Pokémon was a small bird with brown feathers on its back, head and tail. Cream-yellow feathers covered its underbelly and the lower parts of its wings. It had powerful eyes that allowed it to see for miles. The Pokémon had small talons and a peach beak for self-defence. This particular specimen, however, had a head crest of red feathers similar to its evolved form, and was thus easily distinguishable from its peers.
To its right was another bird Pokémon, but its physique was noticeably different from the Pidgey. Its feathers were a darker shade of brown and only covered its head and tail. Similar to the Pidgey, its underside was also covered in cream-yellow feathers. Black feathers covered its back, and its wings were pinkish-red and ended in lighter tips. Its beak was a bit jagged, and with this particular Spearow, on its right eye and down its cheek was a small straight scar.
The Spearow poked her partner's wing, gesturing behind her with a head tilt. "Check on the flock, Feath. They're getting a bit too rowdy for my taste."
Feath nodded. "Sure thin', Spar."
Spar flew a few metres forward, allowing Feath to take her place. He flew high into the sky before clearing his throat and gathering the flock's attention.
"Alright, everybody. I understand that some of y'all are getting restless." Feath swept his eyes over the flock, taking in the reactions of his subordinates.
"Understatement of my life," someone muttered.
Ignoring that comment, Feath continued to speak. "But rest assured, we're all doing this for a good cause. Perry has never misled us before and we have to have faith in him."
A gale of wind blew by them and Feath paused, allowing them a moment to take in his words.
"Then, why aren't we told about the objective of the mission? And why are we up so late?"
Feath's gaze landed on the one who spoke, it was the same voice as before, but it had grown increasingly irritated and louder. A larger bird, about twice Feath's height hovered in the middle. His red head crest flowed in the wind, and his red-yellow tail feathers helped in stabilizing his flight. The expression on Feath remained the same and he said, "That'll be explained in due time, Gray. Be patient."
"Patient?" Gray cried out, nearly smacking a nearby Pidgey with his wing. "We're going to an unknown location with unknown goals! What sort of leader would be keeping the objective of the mission secret?"
He heaved a breath, looking at everyone around him. The various Spearows and Pidgeys were all staring at him in surprise. "What? You can't tell me you don't think this isn't suspicious, can you?"
The flock murmured amongst themselves. Feath glanced at Spar who merely shrugged and muttered some words to him.
Feath quirked a brow at the given orders before shaking his head, shrugging. "If you say so, hon."
He interrupted the flock's murmuring with a powerful gust of wind, turning their attention towards him. He cleared his throat. "Alright, in response to the… questions of the flock. Spar has given me permission to speak of the mission's details, but she will have a talk with Gray about his loyalty to our leaders."
Gray's face reddened and he turned to retreat from the stares but in doing so, he had forgotten about his body's size and a couple of Pidgeys had gotten caught in the crossfire.
The Pidgeys cried out in shock, and Gray was left tangled in a pile of feathers.
"Ah, I see now so that's why you were actin' all weird and like," Feath mused, a spark of recognition flashed through his eyes. "You're still sufferin' from the aftereffects of evolution, aren't 'cha?"
Gray untangled himself and let his head drop, blocking the rest from seeing his blushing face. "Yeah… this body is… um, still taking a toll on me."
Feath chuckled, flying over to him and putting a wing on his back. "It's alright then, everybody reacts to evolution differently. I know some folks haven't taken it as well as others. Change can certainly be a strange thing, but the power of evolution will be worth the troubles."
"I sure hope so," Gray mumbled, although still not entirely convinced by the words, he still felt a bit better after some reassurance.
Feath chuckled, patting his back before cocking his head forward, showing off his head crest. "As y'all can see, I'm pretty close to evolving myself. So know that I'll have to join ya sometime in the future."
Feath flew in front of the Pidgeotto, spreading his wings and bowing. "Now, I'm sorry that we have to bring you out when you haven't adjusted to your new body, Gray. Spar and I needed the extra firepower for this mission and you were a clear choice."
Gray blinked and he lifted his head, his eyes gazing into the smaller bird with curiosity. "Extra firepower?"
Feath smiled, his wings beating as he flew back to his previous spot. "Of course, why else do you think we have such a big flock for the mission?"
Spar made her way beside him, a crude smirk making its way on her face. "There's a reason why we didn't tell you the objective, soldiers. After all, none of you would have volunteered for this mission if we did so."
A murmur broke out in the flock and everyone whispered amongst each other, wondering what she'd meant.
Spar's voice cut through the murmuring. "Does the name 'Zeal' ring any bells? I bet some of you already know who she is, but for the rest that doesn't. Then I'm pretty sure you've at least heard of her sister."
Her eyes glinted in the moonlight as she flew upwards, her wings beating slowly and menacingly. "After all, she was the one that freed us from The Tyrant in the first place."
Gray's breath got caught in his throat, the effects of the shocking revelation hitting him. The others weren't looking so well either as looks of realisation dawned on them and their faces turned to horrified shock.
"Now don't you all run away! There's a reason why we didn't tell you the mission," Spar shouted, stopping them in their tracks. "A potential threat has been discovered and with it, a path of destruction is inevitable. The capture of Zeal the Zorua is vital in ensuring the safety of our citizens. Now, I know we all heard of the stories and rumours of how Evie took The Tyrant and I don't blame you for wanting to run away. But the safety of Troublewood resides on your decision, so choose wisely."
Spar gave the group a short glance, seeing the resolve returning in their eyes. She nodded, giving them an approving smile. "Alright then! If none of you wants to leave then let's get to it!"
"Let's do it! For Perry! For Rower! And for the safety of Troublewood!" Feath exclaimed.
"For the safety of Troublewood!"
The grass swished under the moving bodies of the two. Walking through a game trail, they arrived at an open field. The sounds of flowing water greeted them on their left and the stars above twinkled in delight.
Evie's ears were pressed against her skull as she trotted towards the river, her teeth gritting and movements heavy.
June trailed behind her, a toothy grin on his face. "So-"
"Shut it." She sneered, her tail flicking against the dirt.
Ignoring the teen, she crouched and gulped down mouthfuls of water. The water gushed down her throat, its cool, refreshing sensation doing nothing to calm her ire. She growled and wiped her mouth, splashing some water at the Fire-type in another attempt to silence him.
June ignored the water dripping off of him and spoke once more, his voice still containing the same high-pitched enthusiasm as before.
"But-"
She cut him off with a snarl, stomping her paws into the dirt. "Whatever you have to say will not and won't ever be anything worthwhile. If you have nothing but stupid jokes, asinine comments and delusional claims then I want you to shut the fuck up! You got that?" The words came out sounding like a growl, her eyes narrowed and burned with rage. "Arceus, you're the most obnoxious Pokémon I've ever met. Do you even know how you sound when you speak?"
She was clearly at her limits and June knew it. His constant pestering was finally showing progress. He smirked and moved in for the kill, his flame lighting up and his tail swaying in the grass. He stepped forward, arms raised in a shrugging motion. "Well, of course, I know how I sound like. Have you seen the things I've been through? Besides, I just wanted to ask a question. It's the least you could do for me."
"The least I could do?" she said, her voice low and her teeth bared. Her fur puffed up in anger and her tail swung low and slow. "The least I could do is nothing. I have nothing to gain for housing you. I could've left you there to rot. If you weren't so pathetic, I would've thought you'd be a danger. The locals certainly would, they wouldn't have cared even if you weren't anything like him."
His breath hitched and he silently pondered over his actions. He hadn't planned for her to snap at him like this. He wondered whether he should stop before things got too hot for him. But on the other hand, this was the opportunity he had been waiting for. If he wanted to get any clues on how this place worked, this was the best moment to do so. An opportunity like this probably wouldn't come any sooner either.
He shrugged lazily, letting his eyes wander over her body as the cool night breeze rushed at him from the east. "Look, Evie. I don't know who this guy is and why you hate him so much, he's probably not as bad as you make him out to be, but whatever. I just wanna know why this place is so dark and gritty–"
Her eyes hardened into a glare and his breaths became laboured. His eyes were forcibly locked onto hers and he found it hard to divert his gaze.
She prowled towards him, a low rumble escaping her throat. June shrank under the glare, his breath caught in his throat.
"You have no idea," she muttered, her voice coming out in growls. Although she was quiet, her voice sounded much clearer than before. "No idea how much he ruined this place. The Pokémon here, my sister, my friends. They all suffered in fear. Every day, every night. I-we had to break our bodies… ration our food… hide for hours...days...months even... That life killed dozens of innocent Pokémon. For years, I had to hear so many children cry for their deceased parents, parents who could no longer comfort them, embrace them and tell them they're loved. Do you… do you know how that felt? To have your loved ones suddenly snatched away because you couldn't do anything… because you were too weak? Do you spend days dreaming for their warmth, only to meet the cold, harsh reality of the truth? Do you wake up every day crying but you wouldn't allow yourself to grieve because everyone was depending on you… be-because they expected you… expected you to win…" She croaked, her voice low and sounding broken. Her teary eyes no longer met him as her head drooped in an attempt to hide her tears.
Evie shuddered violently and shook her head, forcing herself to glare at the Fire-type despite her blurred vision. "Do you… Do you understand how that felt… to always live in constant fear? Do you understand what it was like to… to think that at any time… your loved ones could die? That you're afraid you couldn't save them?" she said between sniffles, her tears flowing down her cheeks and dampening her fur.
"Well, do you?" She snarled, her eyes a mix of despair and rage, she sounded like she was on the verge of breaking down but refrained from doing so.
His eyes lingered on her teary ones, and he found it hard to keep eye contact. His eyes fell to the ground and he fidgeted, his left claw grasping his right arm.
A blanket of guilt and repressed thoughts overwhelmed him and his words came out slow and quiet. "I… I… no… I… I don't..."
Evie scoffed, bringing up a paw to rub her bloodshot eyes. "Figures," she mumbled. "What was I thinking? Talking to a fool, an insane Arceus-damned Pokémon? Some hero you turned out to be."
She laughed a sour and bitter sound, and it made him wince. She turned around and said with a low growl, "Come on, let's just go."
Her footsteps were quiet and soft, barely noticeable in the nighttime breeze but to him, it was all he could hear.
Thoughts sprang onto his mind, things that he'd always kept at bay with the sound of his voice and his brothers. They were crushing him, squashing him and forcing him into a corner.
He grimaced and kept his eyes to the ground. The glisten of the river caught his eye, and he found himself lost in the sea of stars. The stars were always something he'd enjoy watching. There was something above their sparkle and mystery that made him yearn for them, yearn for the secrets they held.
But as he stared at the unfamiliar sky, his mind was brought back to the cold harsh reality of his situation.
He glanced back at the retreating figure of the vixen, his mouth working before his brain.
"No. Evie. I… I know exactly what it's like to lose someone… I… I know what it's like to… to… to blame myself… to think that I could've– should've done something!" He didn't mean to yell, he didn't mean to say that. He didn't… he couldn't stop it from coming out.
She paused in her steps, ears lowering momentarily before she shook her head. "Then… then you should know what it's like to hate yourself."
Hate myself… Her words struck a chord and he found it hard to deny them. Why had it sounded so true?
June grimaced and walked towards her, a claw gripping an arm as he trailed behind her in silence.
A doleful ambience followed their tracks, their soft and quiet steps accompanying them as they passed a line of apple trees. The trunks of the trees were firm and thick, and along the branches were small flowers, red apples and abundant leaves. More trees stretched to the end of his vision, there were maybe a few bushes and overgrown roots here and there but for the most part, it looked like any other plain and normal forest.
It was scary how normal it looked, it was terrifying how it reminded him of the one near his home, how it made him imagine the sounds of birds chirping, the roosters cackling in the dawn. He couldn't believe he was missing his home. The thoughts… they made him long for home, he didn't like them. He didn't like how they made him question everything he did, they made him wonder if he could even survive out here without Evie, it made him question whether she'd forgive him after what he did.
Why? Why did he act like that? Why was he so… so annoying… and so childish?
Of course, he knew the answer why.
He kicked a pebble in his path, sighing as it collided with a nearby tree. He was an idiot. He knew that. He thought he had a chance to be something, something important in a world that was so different from his. He thought he could emulate those happy-go-lucky characters in the shows he'd watched.
He thought he could make friends like them. He thought he could ignore everyone's feelings about him because they weren't real. He didn't want to think they were real. But as his mind pondered over Evie's words, the image of her teary face flashed into his mind, reminding him that they were real.
Those Rattatas he insulted.
Professor Oak who helped them even when it didn't make sense for him to do so.
They were all real living beings with their own lives, they had experiences like real people… and he thought he was better than them because of what? Because he was real and they were supposed to be fictional?
His actions had consequences but he chose to ignore them because he thought he was supposed to be someone important. Someone that was supposed to do something in this– in these two worlds.
Was he just an accident? Why did Crude attack him if he was? God, he didn't know…
Evie was correct, he didn't know anything… he didn't know if he could accept his new life… there were too many… too many things that had happened… he didn't want to think about them… he didn't want to think about how his words could have affected the people around him…
They weren't real…
But they were… they were as real as him… and… and…
He didn't think it would all blow up in his face. He didn't think his words could harm someone like Evie. He didn't think a couple of words could hurt her.
He let out a long and slow breath, his mind being clouded and weighted down by more of his thoughts and regrets.
He should apologise to her. She… didn't need someone like him to disturb her… if she wasn't enjoying his presence then he should leave.
He could find his brothers himself and not be a bother to anyone–
His thoughts were cut off by a crunch below his feet. He glanced down and lifted his left foot before shaking the broken twig away.
Sighing, he shook his head, trying to rid those thoughts as he glanced around. Strangely enough, Evie was nowhere near him.
June paused, eyes wandering around the forest, thinking she'd already left him. He felt a strange sense of relief when he found her standing still, a few metres behind him.
Her eyes were fixated on something to his left and he noticed them widening in shock and disbelief before she staggered to the left in visible hesitation.
Quirking a curious brow, he wondered what had gotten into her and decided to see for himself what got her so shocked.
June blinked, stopping himself from going further as he thought to himself. No, I shouldn't. She… I'll just be a bother.
His eyes hesitantly trailed over to her and the sight before her let him know why she looked so despaired.
A destructive display of burnt and shredded thatch smeared across the field. Several pieces of shredded planks of wood were scattered all over the place. Signs of a struggle were present in the grooves in the dirt, and the displaced grass and leaves. The smell of copper was also present in the air and as he glanced around the destruction he could see small patches of blood pooling around sliced and shredded wood.
Evie stumbled forward, her movements slow and unfocused. He could see her gaze falling onto a small wooden carving.
June's eyes fell to his feet, not wanting to see the reactions of the Pokémon. He held his breath. No. I should just leave… I'll only make things worse. I don't have to be here. She can handle things herself. I'll… I'll only get in her way.
But as he turned his body, his gaze lingered on the crying fox. She looked so small… so vulnerable…
He couldn't… he didn't want to leave her alone… it wasn't right to leave someone in despair alone.
Not when he could help.
He made his decision with a heavy breath.
He hesitantly put a foot forward, and then another and before he knew it, he was standing beside her.
He moved a claw, his movement freezing for a second before the sniffles from the vixen tore him away from his fear. He shook his head and placed a claw on her, rubbing her back in an uncertain pattern. He wasn't quite sure what he was supposed to do to calm a person on the verge of a breakdown but he knew that having someone to at least listen to them or keep them company was a good start.
But when his claw grazed her soft fur, his mind screamed at him.
The vixen flinched under his touch, something fell out of her grasp but June couldn't see what it was as his vision was quickly covered by a sea of brown.
She turned around, faster than he could blink and pinned him down. He winced at the sudden pressure on his shoulders as he fell onto the ground, his back hurting from the harsh impact.
With her teeth bared and eyes turning into slits, she glared at him, her voice coming out with a scary rumble. "You! You did this, didn't you? You- your humans set you up to this! You thought you could sneak away and leave me crying! You-you took her away!"
The force on his shoulders intensified and he felt his body being pushed into the dirt. He tried to open his mouth to say it wasn't him, to say that he didn't know who this 'her' was but he was cut off by a powerful stomp, leaving his chest screeching in pain.
"Where is she!" With each word, she pushed him deeper into the ground, eliciting more pained groans from the downed Charmander.
Evie growled, noticing the flame on his tail flickering. She channelled some of her energy into him, healing him in a matter of seconds.
She grabbed him with her tail, a scowl making its way on her face as she lifted him by the neck. A small blue wavy orb came to existence in front of her mouth, its size and luminosity growing slowly as she shouted, "Tell me where Zeal is! Or I'll show you how I took down that monster!"
June fell limply in her grasp, his mind struggling to comprehend the pain, the relief and her words all at the same time.
"Last chance!" The blue orb shone dangerously, almost reaching its maximum size before–
"I'm… I'm sorry!" June cried out, his claws clutching hard on the fur of her tail. "I'm sorry for being such a jerk! I'm sorry for what I said! I'm sorry for everything I did! Please… I'm sorry…"
She stared at the Charmander for a moment, her tail tensing around his neck and the orb wavering.
Shaking her head with a scoff, she unwrapped her tail from him, leaving him in favour of returning to the fallen item.
His body plummeted onto the ground with a 'Thud'. June took a moment to breathe as he tried to remove his near-death experience from his mind.
It wasn't working.
He tried a different approach.
Standing up straight, he closed his eyes and breathed evenly, making sure to keep his mind empty before he thought of– Screaming Pain!
He shook his head, his breaths becoming erratic as images of those– Teeth Bari–
No, he didn't want to think of them. It was okay, he was fine… he was not fine… he was fine… he was fine…
Ignore those thoughts… you're fine. You're okay… you're great… His breaths steadied and he looked back towards the vixen, her body was crouched down and she was fiddling with something he couldn't see.
He winced, his mind still screaming at him, and he grasped his left arm with a claw, stuttering out, "H-hey… Evie–"
"Go away," she said, her gaze still hanging on the item in her paws.
June tried again, his voice wavering a bit. "B-but–"
"But what? You're gonna say that everything I worked for was for nought? That I'm next in the line of Pokémon you're gonna enslave?"
"No." He walked towards her, stopping when she turned to glare at him. The glare lasted longer than he liked but he didn't dare lose eye contact.
She shook her head, releasing a sigh with her eyes half-lidded. "Then leave," she said, leaving no room for arguments.
Leave, huh? No, I'll have to help you. You need this… "You need this," he muttered.
She needed help.
He shook his head and treaded forward, rubbing an arm and speaking with a soft wince, "Look, I know we got off the wrong foot… and I said some things that I shouldn't have. I didn't… I didn't think you'd react like that." His right claw scratched against his scales, creating a sizzling sound as he chewed on his words. "Look… I… I wasn't sure what to think when I saw you. You– Pokémon were fictional to me, and the shock wasn't something I wanted to deal with… I didn't… I thought… l-look, I thought that I could be someone special… I thought if I acted like those heroes on the shows I've watched, I could get friends like them. I wanted to make people smile like they've always done for me."
June bit the bottom of his lips, his feet shuffling on the dirt. "When my brothers and I got here… I didn't know what to think when I wasn't human anymore. It was… I was scared… I thought I was going insane… but then… then I realised that this was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, I realised I could use this chance to live a cool life before going home. I-I thought this was a chance for me to show my stuff, to show how great I could be if I put my mind to it… but I… I only used it as an excuse to act selfishly. I treated others like toys for my amusement and… and I wanted to see what reactions I could get if I acted like a total douche."
He took in a breath as he played with his claws. "Look, I just want to say I'm sorry. I'm sorry for treating you like you're an object. I'm sorry for disregarding your feelings. I'm sorry for everything I said."
Evie stared at him for a moment before sighing. Her eyes trailed down to the ground and her paws fiddled with a small wooden carving that held vague similarities to a fox.
She didn't respond and June crossed his arms, left claw tapping against his right elbow. His eyes darted around the destructive scene, looking at it and back at the fox with a nervous shameful stare.
I'm gonna make this right.
He let his arms fall to his side and clenched a claw. The cool breeze blew by him as his eyes glossed over the ruined building.
He didn't care if he had nothing to do with this. He will make this right, he will stand by her side, no matter what.
Gray panted, his wings flapping slowly and taking an ample amount of effort to move.
He placed the fox down and flew a bit forward, almost stumbling over his talons when he landed, his chest was hurting and covered in cuts and bruises.
Feath landed behind him, taking in the cavernous walls of their home with a deep breath. "Alright, everybody. Take some time to recuperate, Spar and I'll bring her to Perry and Rower."
Gray limped away with the rest of the flock. Some of them had injured wings or broken talons and only a few had left the fight unscathed.
While the flock made their way back, Spar and Feath lifted the downed kit by her scruff, their injuries were minimal compared to the others.
The Zorua was much heavier than they expected and it took some effort to take off.
They flew deeper into the cave, primitive torches lined the walls, lighting up their dark homes.
Arriving at a section of five tunnels, they went to the rightmost tunnel, making their way towards their leaders' base of operations. The tunnel was much shorter than the main entrance, about a quarter of its height and a third of its width. But the tunnel was rather massive regardless as it could just about fit in two Onixes at once. The tunnel shared the same walls as the main entrance, they were a rough composite of granite and diorite, creating a weird mix of white and grey.
Halfway through the tunnel, the two's speed had slowed down considerably and eventually one of them needed a break.
Feath leaned against the rocky wall, his feathery body drenched in sweat.
Spar landed beside him, poking the Pidgey with a wing. "Losing your touch, Feath? You must be getting old," Spar teased with a sly smirk.
Feath took in a breath, retaliating with a tired grin. "If I'm old, then you must be ancient, sugar cube."
Spar flushed, jabbing a wing at him. "I'm only a year older than you. You prick."
Feath took the hit with a chuckle. "Definitely feelin' the love here, hon."
"Tch." She crossed her wings and turned away from the Pidgey.
"Heh." He chuckled, nuzzling up to her and plucking off a couple of damaged feathers. Spar's face reddened at the contact but she didn't do anything to stop him.
When he was done, she let out a breath and said, "You're done now? Ready to see them?"
Feath nodded and chuckled at her expression. "Of course, sweetie."
A small smile wormed its way onto her beak as they flew silently deeper into the tunnel.
They arrived at an open area with two-metre-long stalactites that could pierce through even the hardest Golem, covering the ceiling. However, before they could go more than a metre in, they were stopped by two large figures.
Recognising the two, they stopped to place Zeal gently onto the basalt floor and landed beside each other. They dipped their heads low and bowed.
The bigger of the two landed before them, his head crest trailing onto the floor. "Rise," the Pidgeot commanded with a voice that reeked of power.
Feath and Spar rose from their positions and glanced at one another before looking at their leaders.
"We have completed your mission, Perry and Rower." Spar spoke with a respectful tone.
Feath nodded firmly, staring at the two with admiration.
Perry nodded, his strong gaze looking over the two, scanning them with a keen eye. "You're dismissed."
Feath and Spar bowed once more, both chorusing, "We are thankful for your love."
Perry lowered his head, watching them closely before releasing a sigh when they were out of sight. He glanced at the unconscious Zorua, grimacing at the visible wounds on the Pokémon.
"Perry, let's go. We can't keep him waiting," Rower said, nudging him with his beak. The Fearow briefly glanced at the downed vixen, guilt flashing onto his face for a split second.
Perry nodded, casting an apologetic glance at the fox. "Okay, let's… let's go."
Rower lifted the Zorua gently in his talons and took off with Perry beside him.
They arrived at a smaller section of the cave, it was like a small room in size alone, barely enough to fit four human adults at once. Two grassy beds were on their right with all sorts of berries littered everywhere on the ground.
This was their bedroom, it was rather simple and barren but they liked it, it brought them peace and comfort whenever they needed time to relax and cool off.
But a sudden addition had ruined that notion.
A human with blindingly red hair laid on the ceiling, acting as if defying gravity was a casual trick.
The man had a leg over another, and wore a red T-shirt with the picture of a white-haired female face smiling on it, he also wore a pair of blue shorts. He silently flipped a page in his book, seemingly unaware of Perry's wrathful glare.
Rower draped a wing over Perry, advising him to think before lashing out.
Although still shaking with rage, Perry took in a breath to calm himself and shouted, "Alright, human. We've done your dirty deed, let them go!"
Crude closed his book and snapped his fingers, causing the book to disappear.
He directed a disinterested eye at them, sighing as he fell onto the ground.
"Seems like you did it, bravo," he said, his voice flat and boring as he picked himself up with a gentle nudge of his magic. "Well, take a pick then."
He waved a hand, a spiral of warped space opened up in front of them, showing a small group of Pokémon sitting in a circle. They didn't seem to notice the onlookers as they chattered amongst one another, terror and worry clear on their faces.
"Take a pick?" Rower mumbled in confusion, his eyes narrowing at the human.
Perry quickly realised Crude’s ploy. He growled. "You… you tricked us."
Crude shrugged, his irises glowing a dull light. "Not really. I've blatantly stated the terms of the deal, and even told you to ask questions. So really, it's your fault."
Perry bristled with fury and glared daggers at the man. "Our fault? You kidnapped our friends, and you say this is our fault?"
Crude let out an annoyed breath, rubbing his temples with another sigh. "Look, I don't care about you, your feelings or what you think of me. So can you please stop shouting profanities at me, they're so bland and unoriginal."
"Profanities?" Perry gasped.
"Yeah, mind reading isn't as hard as you think it is." Crude shrugged. "If you want the others to be free then you'll have to do another little quest for me."
Rower frowned, glancing at his glowering friend while keeping his wing on Perry to prevent him from doing anything reckless.
"You'll pay for this, human." Perry seethed, his talons digging into the basalt floor.
"Yeah, yeah. I heard it all before." The human waved and curled up his right hand, wrapping the Zorua in a purple glow before snapping her away in a thin cloud of smoke.
"Make your choice and I'll give you your next assignment." He pointed back at the portal in front of them.
The pale glow of the moon shone through the heavy clouds above, coating the field below in a soft white. Evie stared at the carving in her paws, a lone tear slipping down her face before an orange body got into her sight.
"Come on, Eves. There's no time to cry, we can do this!" he said, claws gesturing to her right. "There are clues around here that can help us track her down. Don't lose hope!"
"Don't call me that," she muttered, her eyes still focused on the carving as she sighed. "What's the point? I couldn't even protect her… if I didn't leave her alone, she'd still be here, safe and sound instead of Arceus knows where."
It was her fault.
June slammed a fist into an opened claw, exclaiming, "Come on! She's still somewhere in this forest! You can't give up!"
Her selfishness caused this.
"Evie! Come on, we can do this together! We can find her!"
I did this.
"Eves-"
"Just shut up!" she roared, cutting him off. "I'm sick of..." She closed her eyes, not noticing him jumping back with widened eyes. "... of hearing your voice… just… just leave me alone… please… "
He didn't say another word and left her.
Evie shrank deeper into the ground, her ears drooping as she poked the statue below her. I killed her. I got her killed because of my selfish thoughts… because I couldn't stay happy… she's gone because I wasn't happy…
The sounds of feet shuffling and thatch tearing rang behind her but she ignored them.
Mom… I'm sorry for failing you… I couldn't keep her safe…
Huffs and grunts accompanied her thoughts, but her mind was too preoccupied to take note of them.
Zeal… "I'm… I'm sorry…" Her tears fell onto the carving, staining it as a memory flashed into her mind.
"Evie."
The gushing wind had caressed the looming trees, the winds playing an ominous tune as a Zoroark, her mother had gazed into her eyes.
Her mother caressed Evie's cheek slowly as her lips fell into a frown. She shook her head before putting her claws on the small Eevee's shoulders.
Evie blinked, her shoulders aching a bit from the strong grip and her breathing hitched at hearing her mother's quiet voice. "Is-is something wrong?"
Her mother nodded, the light of the moon illuminating the grimace on her face. "I need you to take her egg and run away. Run as far as you can, please."
"Run?" Evie muttered, shaking her head and staring at her mother in disbelief. "No, mo-mom. I can help you! Please! I'm strong! You know I can help!"
Evie didn't want to run. Not again. Never again.
She learned so much from her mother, she wanted to help, she needed to help. She didn't want to run.
She couldn't run!
Her mother shook her head, her eyes tearing up as she choked out, "Please, Evie. Take care… take care of her. He's coming. There's no time to argue, I won't be able to protect you if he arrives. Please run…"
Evie jerked back in shock, the sight of her crying mother was something that'd be etched in her mind forever.
Gulping down her reluctance, she nodded with bleary eyes, head turning slightly to see the cave behind her." O-okay, mom. I'll–"
Her body was pulled forward, her vision clouding up with black fur and the warmth of her mother piercing through the cold night air.
Evie melted into the hug, paws holding onto her mother's arms like she was going to vanish the moment Evie let go.
There were faint sounds of gushing winds and wingbeats drawing near before her mother pulled away from the hug.
The world around them darkened as the sounds grew closer, her mother turned her head away, her voice firm and laced with conviction.
"Leave, Evie." Her mother glared at the sky, shadows loomed in the night sky. "Take care of her and run! Run as far as you can!"
Evie gave her mother one last glance before she closed her eyes and ran. Tears dripped down her face with each step she took.
"Stay safe, Evie," her mother had said and it was the last thing Evie had heard of her before she had vanished deeper into the cave.
"Stay safe."
She lost her grip on the carving and she slumped into the dirt, her miserable cries echoing through the quiet night.
"Why? Why was I so selfish," she stuttered out, burying herself deeper into her neck fur, sogging her cream-white fur with her regrets. "Why couldn't I have just stayed happy! Why couldn't I have just enjoyed the happy ending when I could!" She launched a ball of green energy into the air, her head dropping down just before she could see the explosion.
The shock wave boomed through the area, blowing and swaying the grass and trees in a mile-wide radius.
Her eyes were shut and she didn't face the carving on the ground. It didn't feel right to have that when she couldn't even save its owner. When she couldn't save Be–
"Hey, um Evie?" June's voice snapped her back to reality and she was reminded of the fact that he existed.
She groaned. "What?"
"I, uh found something that could help you find your sister," he said and Evie could practically hear him fidgeting behind her.
She sighed and turned around, deciding to humour him so she could get him to shut up and leave. "Fine. What is i–"
Evie blinked, staring at the Charmander covered in soot and broken pieces of thatch. In his right claw was something that made Evie rub her eyes to ensure that she wasn't seeing things.
It was a feather, a vibrant red feather longer than his arm.
But more importantly, it was– "A Pidgeotto feather."
June raised a brow, glancing at the feather with thinly-concealed interest.
Evie took a step back. There was no way it was a Pidgeotto's feather. The only Pidgey flock around here was Perry's, there was no way he'd take her.
Or was there?
Evie chewed on the bottom part of her lips. "There must be a reason for this," she murmured.
Turning towards the east, she disappeared in a blur of speed, completely missing the former human's surprised yelp and cry of "What the?"
The wind ruffled her fur, blowing and whipping her mane back onto her face as her long and swift strides brought her closer to her destination. She leapt from tree branch to tree branch, knowing the most optimal route to Perry's cave. The path below was overgrown and barricaded by thickets of bushes and roots so it wasn't like she had many options.
Her eyes narrowed and her mind was fixated on the image of the Pidgeotto feather. Evie couldn't believe it. She didn't want to believe it.
A Pidgeotto feather near her now-ruined home? That couldn't have just been a coincidence. It just couldn't have.
Perry. He had something to do with this. There was little doubt in her mind that Zeal was taken by him.
But why? Why would he take her? Did he need Zeal for something?
If he did, then why didn't he tell her? Why go through all the trouble to destroy her home if all he needed was Zeal? It didn't make sense to her.
Was Perry afraid that Evie would reject him if she knew that he'd be putting Zeal in danger? That was a possibility, albeit illogical.
… but that still didn't explain the blood. When she ran off and over the pool of blood, she smelled and sensed multiple bits of different Auras. It was fresh and held a crude mixture of multiple Pidgeys, Spearows and her sister's.
Why? Why would they hurt Zeal if they just needed to bring her to Perry? Why would they destroy her home? It didn't make sense for them to hurt Zeal unless they had to…
Evie froze, her claws digging into a thick branch. She turned around, her ears twitching at a faint sound.
The Charmander! That 'human'!
Shit, she couldn't believe she had left him alone.
Fuuucckkk.
He was her responsibility and she had completely forgotten about him. Arceus damn it. Hopefully, he hadn't burnt anything down.
Crouching down, she leapt back to her previous direction, hurriedly making her way to where she left him.
She dashed from branch to branch, her eyes quickly taking in her surroundings. Nothing but the same trees, bushes and grass, nothing too out of the ordinary.
A minute in and she saw a speck of light, waving and burning brightly. Her heart sank when she spotted another light close to the speck.
Conjuring a weak Water Gun, she jumped off the branch and landed without any grace, blasting the burning bush with a beam of water.
She growled, turning towards the Charmander sprawled on the ground. "What the fuck were you doing?"
June groaned, a claw clutching his head. "Head… spinning… fire… too hot.. ugh… need to help… "
She raised a brow. What was wrong with him? What in Arceus' mane happened when she left?
She narrowed her eyes at the dazed Charmander, her Aura sensing flaring to life when she stepped forward.
By the gods, she had never felt something so strange and distraught in her life. While his Aura had caught her eye when she'd first sensed it, she had ignored it and figured it was only her lack of experience at play as she could never seem to get her range to more than a meter far.
But now that she was standing in front of him again and could think clearly, she remembered why she had dismissed it in the first place.
What was once an empty and cold vacuum, was now a weird and broken mix of lukewarm and half-full liquid-like substance. That wasn't mentioning the fact that his body was absorbing the Aura around him; although it was much slower and less intensive than before.
… hmm, strange Aura. Claims of being human and from another universe… had he been telling the truth?
If he truly was a human, it'd explain why he didn't seem used to his body and why he wasn't as insane as The Tyrant.
She shook her head. No. There was no way it was true.
Being human? She scoffed, walking her way towards the downed Charmander.
Although… it wouldn't be the strangest thing that had happened in her life.
She sighed, trotting closer to the downed lizard. "You're lucky I came back for you," she muttered, pouring some energy into her ears and hardening them. She clanged her ears together, creating a sound akin to bells ringing and directed it at the Pokémon.
The effects were near-instant and he looked way better than she'd first seen him.
She held the Heal Bell a little longer before releasing the move. She swivelled her ears a bit, she could never get over how it felt whenever she had to use that move.
June slowly got onto his feet, blinking as he faced her. "Evie? What are yo– oh. Oh crap, I didn't just…" He paled at seeing the burnt bush behind her. "Oh no, I did… Evie, I- I did not do that on purpose."
Really? That was what he was going with? An accident? She mentally scoffed.
If only using Heal Bell didn't require her to cleanse herself from negative emotions, she really wanted to give him a tongue lashing for what he did.
Evie sighed, facing him with a quirked brow. "Why did you burn down that bush, June?"
She barely caught him flinching at her inquiry as he chuckled nervously and scratched his cheek. "I, uh… don't know?" he hissed and bit his tongue, releasing another sharp hiss as one of his eyes closed in pain. "Ow… I uh, I don't know how I even did that. I was just running after you and I think I got dizzy, and then there was something building under my throat. I opened my mouth and fell to the ground. I don't know what happened, honest!"
Did she hear that right? He spat flames because he was overexerting himself? How did that work? Fuck, she wished she knew more about Fire-types.
She shook her head. Whatever, she didn't need to know much about him to know that he shouldn't be left alone.
Evie turned her attention to him, her eyes glaring into the Charmander. "Come along now, June. We–"
"Wait wait, you're giving me a second chance?" he said, perking up slightly with a sliver of hope in his eyes. He then took a step back and rubbed the nape of his neck with a nervous chuckle. "Well, I mean, if that's fine with you. Then sure, I'll come and help you."
Evie took a step forward, using her height to loom over the Charmander. Her eyes bored into him and she said, "I'm not asking for your help, June. I'm asking for you to not burn down the forest while I'm gone, and it's clear to me that won't be happening."
She didn't say more and he didn't need more words to understand. He flinched and deflated, his eyes losing their brightness as he muttered, "Right… I'm sorry…" His eyes were suddenly more interested in the ground than her.
He stood for a quiet second before shaking his head and facing her, a forced grin coming onto his face. "Okay, so where do we go?"
She tried to ignore the sudden change of behaviour but he must've noticed something as he chewed on his bottom lip and opened his mouth to speak.
She didn't let him though and instead she bent down, beckoning him with a cold look. "Get on. I don't want you burning down the forest while we're walking."
"Huh? What? G-get on? You mean riding you?" His grin fell and he scratched his cheek. "That doesn't seem safe."
"It's either that or I'll drag you with my tail."
June gulped, taking in a breath as he stepped forward. "O-okay, ju-just don't go too fast. I-I don't think I can, um handle your speed, Evie."
He made his way towards her and she allowed him to get on her. When she felt that he was secured, she stood to her full height.
Two scaly arms wrapped around her neck a bit too tight but it wasn't strong enough to hurt her so she didn't mind.
"Oh jeez, this is a little scary," he said, chuckling to himself. "Let me just… okay, wow she's softer than I thought. Okay, alright I think I got it."
She glanced at him for a moment before shaking her head. She burst into a blinding speed, eliciting a shocked cry from the former human.
She slowed down a bit when she felt his claws slipping off her neck fur and allowed him a breather before disappearing once again into another speedy dash.
It didn't take long before they'd arrived in front of a ginormous cave, the familiarity of the sight reminding Evie of her mission.
The weight on her back disappeared and she heard a 'Thud' beside her. She turned around, raising a brow.
The Charmander was on the ground and was slowly making his way onto his knees with a queasy look on his face. "Ugh… I think I'm gonna barf." He gripped his head, taking in breaths to quell his apparent nausea.
Evie silently stared at him for a solid second before deciding to ease his nausea with a quick Heal Bell.
A strange sense of relief flowed into him, June blinked, a confused but thankful look on his face.
Evie bobbed her head, gesturing to the cave behind her.
He stared at her for a moment before nodding hesitantly, following her as she turned and trotted into the cave.
