THE TRAINER ACT
In the year of 1994, it was duly decreed by the Honorable and Most Noble Indigo League that the minimum age required to become a pokemon trainer would be lowered from Sixteen-And-Three-Months to Ten Years Old.
Parents cried. Ten-year-olds all over the world rejoiced. Teachers in their classrooms silently planned after-school parties. The Pokemon Center staff silently planned their funerals. And of course, the second question circling everyone's minds (The first being "What is this world coming to?") was "Who would be crazy enough to make that legal?!"
And so, on April the Twenty-first, 1995, Pokemon Gear Stores all over the world were flooded by rambunctious ten and eleven and twelve-year-olds, all trying to get their hands on their very own Trainer Merch that had been produced just for the occasion. When stores all over Kanto and Johto sold out, they were then flooded with annoyed parents arriving to pick up their tantrum-throwing children.
Trainer Lance of Indigo Plateau, who had (Along with the other three members of the Elite Four) grudgingly been pressured into legalizing the act by the current Champion, woke up to find a crowd of kindergarteners noisily protesting and waving signs outside the Pokemon League's doors. A quick Poke-net search revealed that they were from the newly-formed Trainers Below Ten movement, which sought to legalize pokemon training for kids of all ages. Lance briefly grimaced at the idea of the combined power of preschoolers and Pokemon unleashed upon the world, then left his quarters to have a word with the Pokemon Champion.
This, of course, was nothing compared to the swarm of children that appeared outside Pokemon daycares and providers on the Day all new trainers received their licenses. Poor Professor Oak, who was supposed to be supervising the whole thing, couldn't quite keep up, and it all descended into chaos.
Some kids got one pokemon. Some kids got three pokemon. A few kids inexplicably got their hands on six or more, and wouldn't share with the others. A boy named Ash Ketchum slept in that day, and got no pokemon at all. He'd been up watching Pokemon Battle Championships all night long.
And then living hell was unleashed upon the Kanto Region.
Every day, more and more reports flooded in – Danny had blown a (Thankfully empty) Pokemon Center to bits with his voltorb; Melissa had used all three evolution stones on her eevee at once and had practically killed the poor thing; Annie had somehow brushed her pokemon to death; Melvin had forgotten to feed his pikachu for three days and had gotten on its bad side – The only voice loud enough to contest the endless swarm of reports flooding in was the Trainers Below Ten movement screaming at the top of their lungs that all those reports were false and fabricated by an Adultist Trainer Conspiracy.
Lance woke up a month later and found that the line of protesting kids now went back halfway down Victory Road. This was promptly followed by five minutes of head banging and an impulse to throttle the absolutely useless Pokemon Champion.
And then there was the debacle of Pokemon battles. Most Gyms had burned out completely over the next couple of days, and had taken to handing out the badges to anyone who didn't specifically request a battle (When a well-meaning trainer had requested a One-on-One battle from the Celadon Gym, Erika's narcolepsy took hold of her almost instantly, and her assistants immediately began bawling their eyes out. The trainer quickly realized this was a bad time and left.). A few gyms (Notably the one on Cinnabar Island and both gyms in Saffron City) barred their doors to anyone who hadn't 'proved their worth,' much to the anger of Trainers Under Ten, who labeled the gyms as 'Adultist.'
Most gyms weren't as lucky. In November, the Vermilion City Times showcased a hilarious picture of Gym Leader L.T. Surge being chased around his own gym by two girls with batons and a Pichu, and half the volunteers in the Cerulean Gym had to be admitted to the nearest hospital mid-December after a particularly stupid trainer had electrified the water in the gym. Surge would later state that he was 'posing for the camera', and the Waterflower family declined to comment.
Daycares and Pokemon Centers suddenly found themselves flooded with abandoned and discarded pokemon, 'dropped off' by trainers once they had outgrown their cuteness and usefulness. This led to widespread outrage, various resignations from the Pokemon Center staff, and ignored calls from irate parents, and from then on, no matter what Trainers Under Ten screamed at people, The Trainer Act was now controversial and frowned upon.
When Lance threw open the curtains of his bedroom in early February, he was met with the crazed face of a five-year-old girl, pounding against the window and waving a sign that said, "Kids under Ten are people too!" Which didn't make any sense at all, because his room was five floors and a cliff above the ground.
Then that fact hit him in the face. The protesters now stretched past Victory Road and covered the entirety of Route 23, and somehow they were all protesting on top of each other, and there was a literal mountain of protesters right outside his window, all waving signs like crazed aipoms…
Lance's head exploded. And then he called the police. And yelled at the Pokemon Champion for an hour. And booked therapy appointments for himself. He was done with this circus.
At this point, most trainers who were in their teens and hadn't cheated their way through Kanto were finally getting to the point where they could challenge the Indigo League and say they made it there fairly. The Elite Four and the Pokemon Champion (Who had a grand total of seventeen years of age under his belt) had prepared extra well this year to fight their way through thousands of ten-year-old children.
They, of course, hadn't prepared to fight their way through thousands of ten-year-old children at once.
Which is what happened.
As soon as the gates to the Pokemon League opened (Lance only had a second to tell his colleagues that a mountain of Anti-League Protesters were just outside), children seemed to spill in from every corner of the room, some waving signs, others waving poke-balls, still others waving pokemon, and all of them screaming at the top of their lungs…
Poor Lorelei, who had to face everyone at the gate, was trampled without a second thought.
Bruno and Agatha didn't fare much better. Lance had left his letter of resignation on the Pokemon Champion's desk and snuck out the back, so he was spared the unspeakable horrors of thousands of shoe bottoms.
Sadly, the media would later report, The Pokemon Champion had not made it through the day due to a new phenomenon scientists were dubbing 'Trainer Swarming.'
In his bedroom in Pallet Town, Ash Ketchum ignored the horrified cries of his mother and decided that the Pokemon Championships of 1995 could not get any more awesome. He made it a point to set his alarm to maximum this year.
The next day, space outside the confetti-covered gates of the Pokemon League (one incredibly loud and rowdy trainer had declared a 'party,' and so a party there was) got even more crowded, as innumerable parents arrived to forcibly take their children home. The children did not go quietly.
On April the Twenty-First, 1996, what was left of the Indigo League duly announced that The Trainer Act was being rescinded, and the legal age for Pokemon training was now being raised from Ten Years to Sixteen-And-Three-Months again.
Ten-Year-Olds cried. Parents all over the world rejoiced. Pokemon Center Staff planned after-closing parties. Teachers all over the world planned their funerals. All was right in Kanto again.
And then it was learned that Trainers Under Ten had set up an underground trafficking route for preschoolers to go to Hoenn, where underage training was allowed, and the world descended into madness again.
