Thread: in living color

Hey, Bulbagarden I'm going to try a Pokemon fan fiction thing, bear with me on this.

I've been kinda working on this since August, I've posted some chapters elsewhere on the internet, but I think I'm just going to start posting it here, and only here and see what happens.

If you didn't read the tag, it is indeed "mature" so know what you're getting into by reading this.

Uhm, so anyway, here's the intro and chapter un.

---

PROLOGUE OR, "It could be there, but!"

Just a warning to you all, never let a rookie trainer in your van with a Fire-type Pokémon.

Trust me, I know what happens.

My name is Ethan Mackenzie and no, if my first sentence has led you to believe that this is some sort of fire safety PSA, then sorry I’ve misled you. If you really want to read something on fire safety I’m sure you can Google something.

Why you would want to? I don’t know, and honestly? I don’t care.

But if you really want to stick around, I promise you that what I’m about to tell you is a lot more interesting than Smokey Bear telling you “Remember, only YOU can prevent wildfires,” or some other shit.

This story is about the time my best friend and I became Pokémon trainers.

And yes, it does start with a car and a Fire-type Pokémon.

Well, kinda.

Actually it starts a little earlier than that. My friend Lyra and I were waiting for Dr. Elm at the Pokémon research lab in New Bark...

.:in living color:.

CHAPTER 1: PILOT OR, "Actually this gun is unloaded so..."

“Alright! Birthday present time!”

A tiny girl with brown hair grabbed the present off the counter and wildly began to shake it.

“Lyra! Please don’t... do that,” said a tall boy with black hair who rolled his eyes and grabbed the girls present out of her hands “Your birthday present was extremely expensive.”

“Rude,” The girl narrowed her eyebrows.

“Well fine then, break your gift. I’m not buying you a new one.” He said, handing the present back to her

Lyra snorted and started to tear off the paper.

“Ohmygosh- Ethan! You got me Pokégear?”

She ripped open the box and revealed the small mobile phone.
“In Atomic Purple too, you can see all the wires and shit!”
Lyra looked back up to Ethan “These things go for at least twenty thousand yen.”

“And now you understand why I didn’t want you shaking the box.”

Lyra nodded her head slowly, She turned her attention to the Pokégear she was holding.

“Thanks, bro, for the Pokégear. It’s really awesome, I’m going to be the coolest kid on the block now.”
Ethan took out his own(older and less awesome) Pokégear “We can be the coolest kids on the block together.”

“Sweet,” Lyra replied, and high-fived Ethan.

They laughed for a little bit before calming down. “So you’re probably going to want my number then, right?” Ethan said, copping a seat on the floor against the wall of the lab

“Dumb question, but yeah,” Lyra said, joining him.

“Can I see your phone for a sec?”

“Sure.” Lyra handed him her new phone, in which Ethan began to enter his number.

“Speaking of which, what service am I on?”

“J-PHONE.”

“J-PHONE? Really? That service sucks balls.”

Ethan rolled his eyes, “You can switch to a different carrier if you want, I’m still not paying for it.”

“Still?”

“Yes, Lyra, still.” Ethan handed her the phone. “Think of this as my incentive of trying to make you pay for your own stuff.”

“What?” Lyra knitted her eyebrows. “But why?”

“Why?” Ethan gave her one of his signature “I’m really fucking serious about this, Lyra” faces. “Because today is your seventeenth birthday and you can’t keep mooching off of me forever, I am not made of money.”

“But your Dad is,” Lyra mumbled.

“What?”

“Nothing!” Lyra covered herself up. “Just…” She sighed and looked down at the odd looking piece of technology. “I guess that means I’m going to have to get a job then right?”

“That movie rental store that I worked at is hiring,” Ethan smiled sincerely.

“Right.” She smiled weakly. “Maybe a job wouldn’t be that bad, right?”

“It really isn’t that bad,” Ethan remarked.

“Heh, okay I guess I w-”

“Hello you two!”

Ethan and Lyra stood back up and turned their attention to the scrawny man holding a small box that was walking down the stairs that went into the lab.

“Dr. Elm, hello!”

“Ah yes, nice to see you guys!” the professor said, setting
the box down on a lab table. Ethan and Lyra walked over there.

“Am I getting my Pokémon now?” Lyra said excitedly.
Elm raised an eyebrow. “Who says you're getting a Pokémon?”

“Oh, sorry I just thought-”

The professor smirked and opened the box. He took out three
Poké balls. Lyra began to screech.

“Ohmygosh, yes!” she screamed, right into Ethan’s ear.

“Not so loud!” Ethan whined, clasping his ear.

“Whoops, sorry dude.” She apologized before returning her attention to the professor.

“These guys are getting a bit too rambunctious for the lab. Ethan can back me up on this,” Elm stated. Ethan nodded his head in agreement.

“So I’m allowing you two to take one of these guys,” the professor continued. “I’m sure your Pokémon would like a friend wouldn’t they?”

“Me too?” Ethan said, surprised.

“Sure! You’ve been a loyal employee for a couple years, why not?”

Lyra turned to her friend and jumped up and down “Dude, we're getting free Pokémon!”

“Okay,” The professor turned his attention to the Poke Balls sitting on the table. “Lyra gets first pick.”

“I’ll take this guy!” Lyra exclaimed, grabbing for the Poke Ball with a fire sticker on it.

“Ah, so you want the Cyndaquil?” Elm nodded “Cyndaquil require patience to train, but I don’t think that really applies to you, since you’re not a trainer.”

“Yeah, cool.” Lyra ignored the professor and tossed the Poke Ball in the air, releasing a green and yellow porcupine-like Pokémon. Lyra walked up to her new Pokémon.

“Hey there little guy!” she said, while crouching down and meeting the Pokémon at its height. “I’m Lyra! How do you feel about the name Ki-”

The little Pokémon ignored Lyra and walked over to one of the other lab benches.

“Uh, Kiwi? What are you-”

As she said that, the little porcupine released a mini-Ember attack on the lab table, and set it on fire.

“Oh my god,” Lyra screamed “What are you doing!?”

The professor and Ethan looked at each other, and looked back at the burning table. They seemed used to it by now.

“I got this,” Ethan assured Lyra. He grabbed the Pokeball with a raindrop sticker and threw it up in the air. “Totodile, Water Gun.”

The Poke Ball dropped on the ground and released a small blue alligator.

The alligator listened to the boy’s command and released a small spray of water onto the burning table, putting it out.

The Cyndaquil pouted, his work had been undone again thanks to the Totodile. Life was tough for a pyromaniac with a Water-type Pokémon around.

And figuring that that boy adored that Totodile, he was sure he was going to choose her, meaning that she wasn’t going to be out of his hair.

Yet.

**

You know, in retrospect I probably should've told her more about that Cyndaquil.

Like tell her, “If Dr. Elm ever gives you a choice between the Cyndaquil or the Chikorita, choose the Chikorita. Because, sure he’s dumb as bricks, but at least he isn’t crazy.”

Granted, Kiwi’s is a lot less reckless now days, he’s fully evolved and has a family now. He still hates me though and will sometimes set my hair on fire because he’s still a fucking douche like that.

And Lyra still doesn’t do anything about it.

**

“So Ethan, I’m guessing you’re taking the Totodile then. Correct?”

“Yeah.” The Totodile walked over to Ethan and climbed up onto his shoulder. “You’re cool with the name Aqua right?”
The Totodile nodded in agreement.

“Pfft, Aqua? Dude that’s a terrible name,” Lyra complained. Kiwi had latched onto the girl’s head, which made Ethan worry a bit.

“Why is it so bad?” he asked.

Lyra walked back over to where Ethan and the Professor were standing. “It sounds so stereotypical for a Water-type.” She smirked. “Plus as shitty as it sounds, I wouldn’t be surprised if some dumb evil team named themselves Team Aqua or something.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Because then you’ll have two Pokémon named after evil teams.”
Ethan rolled his eyes “Yes, because what are the chances that of that happening?”

“Fifty bucks says it does.”

“Fine,” Ethan complied and they shook on it.

“You got mail!” A computer in the corner of the lab beeped.

“Ooooh!” The professor turned to the two teens, “This is really important! Sorry, I’ll be back in a sec,” he said, and he ran over to the computer.

The two stood there awkwardly before Ethan spoke up.

“Hey Lyra?”

“Yeah?”

Ethan sighed. “I think you should take Kiwi off your head.”

“Why, though?” she asked. “He seems to like it.” She reached for her new Pokémon and began to pet him.

“Fine then,” Ethan huffed. “Burn your hair off, see if I care.”

Lyra shrugged. “Whatever, I think I’ll be alright. He can’t be that bad.”

Ethan suppressed a laugh; she didn’t know what that Pokémon was capable of.

“Anyway, I can’t wait for you to meet Strawberry! He’s my Zubat.”

The Cyndaquil jumped at the word “Zubat.”

“Noooo! Don’t be like that! He doesn’t drink blood, he hates it!” she said as she picked up the poor, scared Fire Pokémon off her head.

“Alright!” the professor exclaimed as he walked back over from his desk. “So Ethan, I need you to run an errand for me.”

“Sure, where to?”

“Mr. Pokémon’s house, He has something for me and I can’t run out right now.” He gestured to his desk which was filled with papers and books. “I’m pretty busy right now.”

“Alright, no problem.” Ethan saluted the professor off and turned on his heel towards the door. “See you guys later.”

“Hey wait, I want to come!” Lyra exclaimed, running toward the door with Ethan.

Ethan shrugged his shoulders and grabbed his jacket off the coat rack.

What could possibly go wrong?

**

So I needed to become a Pokémon Trainer, and how else could I become one?

Steal a Pokémon of course.

It was November and I was freezing my ass off for eight hours sitting in a tree, right outside the Elm Pokémon Research Lab.
As heists go, this wasn’t the longest one I’ve ever done. But jeez, was it boring, and I didn’t even get the Pokémon I wanted.

I was left with Chikorita; my prize for waiting too long to steal one of Dr. Elm’s rare baby Pokémon.

My plan was just walk into the lab, take the Pokémon and get out of there before the professor noticed, since was he was a pretty spacy guy probably wouldn’t notice me. He would figure it out later when he couldn’t find the Pokémon. But by then I would have been long gone and he would have no idea where the captor had gone.

It was flawless, I was going to pull the perfect heist.

I just had to wait for when the professor was busy with something, and not paying attention to the Chikorita’s Poke Ball sitting on the table.

And it was going to work, until Ethan and Lyra ruined everything.

**

Ethan and Lyra stepped outside the lab. The lab was located in New Bark, a tiny town located at the most eastern part of Johto, bordering the nearby Kanto region. The community was new, about ten years old at the time.

It wasn’t very well known, but it’s location around a forest made it a prime location for Pokémon Research.

“Ugh, it’s freezing out here,” Lyra complained as she pulled on her gloves.

“Well it is November, what were you expecting?” Ethan asked.
Lyra shrugged as she walked over with Ethan towards his van. She thought about taking out Kiwi and using him to warm herself up a bit, but after seeing what happened in the lab, she thought she should adhere to Ethan’s warning about the thing.

She looked over at the forest that was near the west side of the lab- the trees that were cut down when the town was being built were just starting to grow back- and then she noticed him.

Some guy, sitting in the largest tree of the mini forest that faced the west side of the building. He had this oddly colored red hair and looked somewhat built. He sat on a branch with binoculars and a bag of Cheetos that he was stuffing in his mouth.

“Ethan, who’s that guy?” Lyra asked Ethan, pointing to the boy sitting in the tree.

“Him? I don’t know, he’s been watching the lab for like two weeks now,” Ethan stated. “I’m guessing he’s going to try to steal one of Elm’s Pokémon and hasn’t gotten the nerve to do so yet.”

“So you’re not going to do anything about it?”

“Nah,” Ethan said. “We’ve known about him for a while and I’m pretty sure he doesn’t know that. Also he’s probably not competent enough to pull it off.”

“Hmm,” she snapped her fingers “We should distract him somehow, it’ll be hilarious.”

Ethan nodded his head in agreement. “But how though?”

“Like this.” She climbed onto the roof of Ethan’s van and stood up. She cupped her hands and screamed over into the mini-forest:

“What’s up faggot, how are you doing?”

The boy jumped at Lyra’s yelling. He lost his balance on the branch and then fell over backwards out of the tree into some bushes.

“Hehe,” Lyra scrambled off of the van, where she was promptly high-fived by Ethan.

“Nice one,” he commented.

“Thanks,” she replied climbing into the front seat while Ethan walked around the front, taking the front seat.
They drove off onto route 29, laughing as the red-headed boy got out of the bushes and brushed himself off. “Well, you’re...uhm, jackasses!” He yelled back, knowing they couldn’t hear him, but it felt good anyway.

He shook his head and sighed. So they knew he was there the entire time then? That’s wonderful, two weeks of sitting in that tree for nothing.

The thing about this boy, Ethan and Lyra would learn much later the hard way, was that he was very impulsive, and never exactly thought through his plans. What he thought was a good idea at the time would later hurt him and others in the long run.

“You know what, I’ve waited way too long for this.” He pulled a handgun out of his jacket and marched up to the door.

It’s about damn time he got his Pokémon.

Lyra and I, with our new Pokemon, got into my van, which was this 1956 Volkswagen, so it was pretty damn old car. But it was in great condition. I found it when I was fourteen in the backlot of some used-car dealership in Goldenrod City when I was at one of those “Take Your Son/Daughter to Work Day” with my Dad.

My father convinced the owner to keep the car on the lot until I was able to save up enough money for it. The owner asked for around 1,300,000 yen (I think the owner may of upped the price because of my father.)

For about a year and a half I worked my ass off saving up money for the damn thing. I worked two jobs (at a video rental store in Cherrygrove and Dr. Elm’s lab running errands) and eventually I was able to buy it a couple months after I turned sixteen.

It was a glorious day for all. Tears were shed. Ships set sail.

As we drove off, Lyra asked me to put on the radio like she always does. Like usual, she would start complaining about how I don’t listen to the radio when I should. She would grab for the controls, changing it to whatever tickled her fancy at the moment, whether that be DJ Mary’s show out of Goldenrod or a music station where she would turn up the volume to maximum.
Which would pretty much annoy every car that had the misfortune of sitting behind us in traffic.

That day, she was in the mood for Christmas music. She changed the station to the contemporary hits station, who was playing Jingle Bell Rock or something.

**

Route 29 was a tiny route, compared to most that connected New Bark with the neighboring city of Cherrygrove.

Ethan drove for a bit before coming up to a 7-11 on the side of the road, where he stopped and got out.

“Why are we stopping?” Lyra asked, as she was petting Kiwi. He seemed to enjoy it.

“I’m starving,” Ethan replied. “I’m going in to get some coffee, do you want anything?”

“Nah, I’m good,” Lyra answered. “Though you should get something that’s actually food. Like a donut.”

“Sure, whatever,” Ethan mumbled as he went to take the keys out of the ignition; he was stopped by Lyra.

“Dude, it’s freezing out there. At least keep the heat on for me.”

Ethan rolled his eyes and took his hands off the keys. Sure, It’s not like she had a Fire-type Pokemon in her hands or anything that could keep her warm. He stepped out of the van, and walked over to the mini-mart.

Lyra propped her legs up on the dashboard and began to hum Feliz Navidad, as it was playing on the radio. She moved the yellow and green fire-type to the drivers seat.

“Kiwi, you are going to have such a great taste in music,” she grinned. The little Pokemon cocked his head to the side. He looked like as if he was saying “This is good music?” But the girl ignored him as she continued to sing-along with the song.

The Fire-type Pokemon shook his head and climbed into the back seats of the van to see if he could find something interesting. The girl was properly distracted by the music, so it’s not like she realized he was gone.

He took note of his surroundings, which were quite messy. But honestly what was he really expecting out of a teenage boy? He dug through some empty bags of chips, soda cans plus a pizza box. He also found some books that were filled with post-it notes annotating important parts, a copy of Mario Kart 64 and a couple baggies of what he was pretty sure wasn’t herbal medicine.

Kiwi thought about burning the boy’s pot stash, just to see what would happen. But his subconscious told him this probably wasn’t the time and place.

And annoying as his subconscious was, it was probably right. Why burn it now, when he could later when he was pissed off or depressed and really needed to get high or something?

Remembering where Ethan’s stash was for later, Kiwi walked back to the driver seat,(Lyra was playing around with her new phone, she didn’t even know he left.) And just as he took his seat the radio went quiet.

“Huh?” Lyra put her cell phone back in her bag. She leaned forward and twisted some knobs on the radio, it was still silent. “That’s weird,” she whispered. She sat back in her seat. “Must be broken I guess.”

Except it actually wasn’t.

The radio was working just fine, however it was tranmitting a noise that could not normally be heard by humans.

But could be heard perfectly fine a select species of Pokemon.
Specifically, Fire-type Pokemon.

Lyra looked over at her Cyndaquil, who looked very distressed.
“Hey Kiwi, what's wrong?” Lyra asked anxiously.

Kiwi had no idea what was going on. The radio was releasing such an awful noise, it felt like his head was burst out. He didn’t know what to d-

Wait.

He knew what he had to do.

He slowly moved his head so he was facing the radio, The only way to fix this was to kill that radio.

Kill it with fire.

Watch it burn.

“Dude, Kiwi, look at me if you’re okay,” Lyra said sternly.
As she said that, the Cyndaquil’s back ignited in flames and he released a Flamethrower attack on the radio, setting it on fire.

“Kiwi, what the hell!?” Lyra screamed. Panicking, she quickly began looking for something to put the fire out, but it was already too late as the flames began to spread from the radio to the dashboard.

Kiwi came to his senses, realizing what he had just done to Ethan’s van. He didn’t exactly know he felt proud of himself for both destroying the evil radio and also causing irreparable damage on the errand-boy’s car. Or fearing for his existence after all this was over.

Oh well what’s done is done.

Lyra and her Pokemon escaped from the car, and watched as the van succumbed to the flames.

“Ethan is going to kill me,” Lyra said under her breath.

Kiwi sat there, bored.

**

“So a large coffee, glazed donut and Swedish fish, alrighty then,” The cashier in the 7-11 rung up. “Your total is three hundred twelve yen.”

Ethan handed him the money, and handed the Swedish Fish to Aqua (Who’s had an obsession with the red gummy fish since birth.)

As he was picking up his coffee and donut the cashier stopped him. “Hey dude is that your van out there?”

“Yea,” Ethan replied, muffled from the donut currently in his mouth.

“It’s on fire.”

“Eh?”

“It’s on fire,” the cashier repeated.

Ethan spun around, to see his van engulfed in flames, with Lyra and Kiwi standing a decent distance away from it. The donut that was in his mouth dropped to the floor, as well as Aqua’s Swedish Fish spilled everywhere.

The cashier patted the poor boy on his back, “If you want another donut, it’s free of charge.”

Ethan was going to punch that cashier.

CHAPTER 2: THE FRESH PRINCE OF BEL-AIR OR, "Yo Mystery Machine, smell ya later!"


**

That’s it.

If was asked to describe my entire life in a nutshell I would say “A Psychopathic Cyndaquil killed my van” and then just walk away.

The person asking the question wouldn’t understand the answer but it would make perfect sense to me.

Lyra and I sat in the parking lot of 7-11 as what was left of the van was towed off to what was probably the dump. The place the manufacturers probably thought it would be by now. A destiny fulfilled.

To say I was furious was an understatement. To say I wasn’t ready to kill the devil-child Cyndaquil was a lie.

Lyra was quiet, sipping on some water she’d bought from the 7-11 after the van was murdered. She had returned Kiwi to his Poke Ball, probably for his own safety.

“Lyra?” I asked.

“Yes.”

I pinched the bridge of my nose “Can you tell me exactly what happened?”

She nodded her head.

She had explained that she was listening to Feliz Navidad and playing with her PokeGear when the radio had stopped working. She had tried to get it working again but gave up because she had thought it was broken. And then suddenly as the radio had died Kiwi had gone berserk, and set the radio on fire.

I honestly didn’t know what to say after that, part of me thought she was lying, but then knowing how much Kiwi disliked me and how insane he was, I kinda had to believe her.

“Listen Ethan. I am so sorry,” Lyra apologized. She had finished her water and now was crunching up the bottle in her hand. “If I knew how to control him better, maybe this wouldn’t have happened.”

“No, it’s fine... it’s okay, it’s not your fault,” I said. Though honestly I wasn’t really okay, and saying that didn’t make me feel better.

What I really wanted to do was lay down and cry, right there on the asphalt. That was 1,300,000 plus yen down the drain.

You can hear me practically screaming.

**

They sat there for awhile, it was around noon when Ethan got up and began walking towards the road.

“Ethan, where are you going?”

“Route 30.”

Ethan released Aqua from her Poke Ball and she promptly climbed up onto his shoulder.

Lyra raised an eyebrow. “You’re going to keep going?”

“Sure, why not?” Ethan responded in mock optimism. “It’s going to take me another two or so years to raise enough money to buy a new car so why not get started now?”

“Hmmm,” Lyra mumbled to herself. She had seen Ethan like this plenty of times before and every time he was like this, everything went wrong.

“So Ethan,” Lyra asked, strolling over to him. “How are you exactly going to do that without a car?”

“Well, Lyra.” Ethan turned around and gave her a grin. “The old fashioned way.”

“And what’s that?” she asked.

Ethan turned back towards the road. “Walking.”

“Uh...”

“Oh and I hope that little shit of a Pokemon likes to battle.” Ethan began marching down the road. “Route 30 is filled with Pokemon Trainers just dying to meet him.”

Lyra bit her lip and followed him.

**

So apparently if you have a Pokemon, you’re free game for any trainers you may happen to stumble upon.

Ethan stayed quiet as we walked through Cherrygrove City, it wasn’t a huge city as we were able to walk through it in about twenty minutes. But it had pretty much everything New Bark didn’t.

We arrived at the entrance of Route 30 around 1:30 in the afternoon. Ethan stopped walking and turned towards me.

“Lyra?” he asked

“Yes?”

Ethan turned himself and pointed towards a boy walking down the road. He had to be no more than twelve and wore a baseball hat. “Do you know who that is?”

“Uhm, why would I know who he is?” I said. Like I really cared about a boy walking down the road.

“He’s a Pokemon Trainer,” Ethan stated, as he began pushing me over to the boy.

“Ethan, what are you doing?” I was kinda scared at this point. Ethan was pretty pissed at me. Understandable, sure, but I didn’t quite know what he had in store for me.

“You’re going to battle that kid.”

“I’m what?”

He stopped pushing me. “Yes, you.” Once again he pointed towards the trainer. “Battle that kid.”

“I thought you were joking about that.” I said sheepishly.

“Lyra, do you think I’m joking?” He laughed, and then glared at me. “I am not fucking with you Lyra.”

“I’ve never battled before in my life! You’re expecting me to be able to fight this guy?” I squeaked.

“Well I’m not expecting you to win, that’s for sure.” Ethan said.

Whoa.

Oh no.

That was fucking bulllshit I remember thinking to myself, I could totally win if I wanted to. I turned to Ethan and shouted, “Well, watch me win,” and turned back around, walking towards the boy myself. I was getting pissed at him now. I don’t know if that was exactly the reaction he was looking for but he definitely got it. I looked back at him once, and he gave me this smug smile that made me even more mad.

The boy looked over at me “Hey you I-”

I grabbed the boy by his jacket and brought him down to eye level with me. He was only a little bit taller than me but whatever. “Fight me, asshole!” I screamed in his face.

Too dramatic? Oh well.

“Uh.... sure l-lady...?” He squeaked, he looked like he was about to piss his pants.

“Wonderful,” I said, letting go of his jacket.

The boy had stepped back a little bit, giving some space for our Pokemon to battle. “Go R-rattata!” the boy shouted throwing a Poke Ball up and releasing a purple rat creature.
“Go, Cyndaquil!” I did the same, throwing Kiwi’s Poke Ball in the air and releasing my monster. This was off to a good start.

Now what?

“Rattata, use Tackle!” the boy commanded, and the little rat began charging toward Kiwi and whammed it’s body into him.
Kiwi didn’t appreciate the Rattata’s attack and released a barrage of Ember attacks on it.

“Uhm, yeah! Cyndaquil, use Ember!” Kiwi didn’t exactly listen to me but he continued the attack anyway. Haha, oh man I was so adorable, back when I didn’t know what I was doing.

“Eeeep!” The Rattata squeaked, flinching in pain. Its fur was singed off on its leg, revealing the flesh underneath which was now beginning to swell up. “Haha, I burned your Rattata!” I laughed. I didn’t really know what I meant and I was kinda guessing from the fact I’ve only used Fire-type moves on the thing. But it was good right?

“Rattata, use Quick Attack!” The boy commanded. The purple rat struggled to move it’s swollen leg, but like the move is called, it was still able to move at a breakneck pace and it tackled Kiwi to the ground. Unlike the Tackle before, the Quick Attack seemed to do less damage.

“Cyndaquil, use Ember... again!” Lyra commanded. Though once again the command was useless and Kiwi began to spam the poor rat with Ember before I even finished my sentence. Eh, whatever. I was winning.

Kiwi was relentless in his attack, the poor Rattata couldn’t take it and succumbed to its burns. Well, it didn’t die or anything. It just got knocked out. Which was probably a good thing because Kiwi could've kept going.

“Yeah!” I shouted. That would show Ethan. The boy returned his Rattata to his Poke Ball and walked to me.

“Great job!” he smiled, shaking his head from side to side and taking his wallet out of his jacket. “You had no idea what you were doing, did you?”

“How about you shut the fuck up and don’t ruin this for me, Kid,” I responded back with a grin

The boy dropped the smile and shoved some yen in my face, along with a piece of paper.

“What’s this?” I asked.

“My number,” the boy said. He began walking backwards still facing me. “Call me when you actually know what you’re doing. I want a re-match then.” He turned back around and stomped off. “The name’s Joey by the way,” he shouted before leaving the route for good.

**

“Only sixty-four yen?” Lyra said. “Cheapskate.” She put the money into her own wallet and put it back in her bag.

“How much money do you think a kid his age even has?” Ethan remarked, strolling over to where Lyra was standing. “Plus it’s the least amount of money he can even payout according to the Pokemon League.”

“Hmm? What for?” She asked.

“Well,” Ethan began to explain “He probably doesn’t have any gym badges. The more badges you have, the more money you get.”

“Oh! So because he has no gym badges he probably has no money then right?”

“Correct.” He nodded his head. “Also, with gym badges you have the more money you have to give up if you lose.”

“That sucks,” Lyra said, crossing her arms. Then something had occurred to her. “Hey Ethan, why do you know all this stuff?”

“My sister’s a gym leader, remember?” He sighed. “And plus I was...” He scratched the back of his head, trying to come up with the right words. “Possibly looking into becoming a Pokemon trainer a couple years back.”

Lyra stood there shocked. “No way man, you said you didn’t want to become a Pokemon Trainer.”

“Sure, okay yeah.” He rolled his head from side to side. “I thought about doing it so I could earn some money to save up for the van but,” he shook his head and looked Lyra straight in the eye. “I was never going to be as good as my sister and the only way to make a living off of it is to become a Gym Leader, something I don’t want the responsibility of dealing with.”

Lyra nodded.

“Plus, it would mean I would have to drop out of school, and I wasn’t going to risk that,” he added.

“That, makes sense then,” Lyra mumbled.

There was a slight pause as Ethan and Lyra let everything sink in. “Alright. Lets keep going then,” Ethan stated. “I just want to get this done with.” He continued walking north with Lyra following.

Route 30 was a much longer route than 29, spanning about a three kilometer distance. There were a lot less trainers than Ethan exaggerated to be. They took turns fighting the trainers (who were mostly rookies from Violet or Cherrygrove) before reaching the northmost part of the of the route where Mr. Pokemon was located.

“Seriously, what kind of guy has the name Mr. Pokemon anyway?” Lyra asked, finishing off a poor Weedle with Kiwi using Ember on it.

“His name was originally Mr. Goldstein, but he changed it after Dr. Elm accidently described him as being ‘Mr. Pokemon,’” Ethan explained.

“So, I’m guessing he’s the kinda guy you don’t give ideas to.”

“Yep,” he responded, as they reached the door to Mr. Pokemon’s house. It was a log cabin that looked extremely warm and inviting after spending two hours fighting off monsters in the cold.

Ethan rang the doorbell. “Oh wait, I have more visitors coming, be right back!” a voice exclaimed from beyond the door and within a few seconds an older man in a suit and tie answered the door.

“Oh Ethan, hello! It’s nice to see you again,” the gentleman greeted.

“You too, Mr. Pokemon,” Ethan replied, shaking his hand. “Sorry I’m late, I had some issues getting here.”

“Oh, what happened?” the man asked.

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

---

laughs because i can never find a reasonable time (at least in my time zone) to update this thing.

also! about updates, i'm probably going to post chapters i've already have written everyday until i run out and from there i'll update when i have the time because being an IB student can be a bitch to your personal time.

crits are very much welcomed and highly appreciated!

CHAPTER 3: BILL NYE THE SCIENCE GUY OR, Ethan has no Social Life.

**

So I introduced Lyra to Mr. Pokemon and he let us into his house, which was filled with machines and computers. It was kinda a mini-lab if you think about it.

“Come over here you two, there something I need to show you!” he exclaimed, as he swiftly walked into another room.

“I’m frightened,” Lyra whispered to me.

“He’s just overly enthusiastic” I replied. Although I’m not gonna lie, I pretty much felt the same the first time I met him. Especially when you’re fifteen and you’re alone in the woods with a weird old man can be disconcerting.

Okay, just that sounds creepy now that I’ve type it out.

Anyway, he led us into another lab-like room. Another man who I didn’t recognize was sitting at a computer. He was looking at data and schematics of something; looking at it just hurt my head.

“Here it is!” Mr. Pokemon led us up to an incubator in the center of the room. Inside the incubator was an egg with red and blue triangles all over it.

“We believe this egg may hold a new species of Pokemon,” Mr. Pokemon explained. “And we need you to deliver it to Dr. Elm for us.”

“Alright,” I said. “What kind of Pokemon do you think it’ll hatch into?”

“Well,” the other man stood up from the computer and turned around, “we think it’ll probably hatch into a Normal-type Baby Pokemon.”

“Oh, that coo-” I was beginning to say before Lyra cut me off, she began to jump up and down.

“Hey I know that voice! You’re Dr. Oak, aren’t you?” she exclaimed. She almost looked like she was about to crap her pants. “You do a show on the radio right? Out of Goldenrod City?”

The professor had laughed. “Indeed,” he stated, walking over to the middle of the room. “In fact I was on my way to Goldenrod City to do a recording before I was asked by my friend here to help him with his research.”

“Awesome...” Lyra whispered. “You don’t actually care do you?” I asked, because when it came to Pokemon it wasn’t exactly a thing she cared about on a regular basis.

Except if you’re a Zubat named Strawberry, or a Porygon. But that’s a story for another time.

“Shut up, he’s a famous celebrity. Maybe I can get an autograph out of him,” she retorted.

I shrugged my shoulders, of course she would want to do that.

“Anyway,” I continued. “What makes you say it’s a baby Pokemon and not some regular Pokemon?”

“Oh so you know about baby Pokemon?” The professor asked.

“Yeah,” I replied. “I have been around Dr. Elm’s lab enough to know.”

The professor seemed curious, “So can you tell me what you know about baby Pokemon?”

“Sure,” I stepped over to the incubator a little more. “They are extremely rare in the wild, as by the time you find them they have already evolved into something stronger so they can survive better in the wild. Like how Pichu evolves into Pikachu.” The professor nodded his head. “So at this point the only known way to get a baby Pokemon is through breeding.”

“Correct!” The professor grinned, he walked over to the pedestal and took the egg off it. “We have gotten this egg by successfully breeding a Togekiss with a Ditto.”

“Togekiss?” Lyra had lost the conversation when I said “They.”
Pretty typical for her.

“Togekiss is an extremely rare Pokemon, it’s been classified as extinct in the wild for years now along with it’s pre evolution Togetic,” I explained. I returned my attention to Dr. Oak. “Where did you get the Togekiss? There are only like two or three in the world.”

“A young girl from the Sinnoh region approached us with her Togekiss and asked about the possibility of breeding it,” the professor answered.

“Ah, but since you didn’t have another Togekiss or Togetic... you had to use a Ditto then?”

“Yes,” Dr. Oak stated, looking at the egg. “Breeding through Ditto is very risky and about ninety percent of the time lead to unfertilized eggs.” He looked back up at me, “We got lucky with this one.”

I was actually really impressed. With all the years I spent hanging around Dr. Elm’s lab I’ve never actually seen something as huge as this, the prospect of a new Pokemon was amazing.

“So, how do you know that is may be a new Pokemon?” I asked.

“Another good question.” Dr. Oak said. “We’ve ran some ultrasounds on the egg to pick up on Pokemon that is growing inside. Come here for a second.” He walked back over to the computer (with us following) and brought up a hazy image of the ultrasound they had conducted. “See this?” he circled the Pokemon inside of the egg. “It’s in more of a spherical shape than a Togetic.” He brought up a different image. “This one was just taken before you guys came.” He pointed to another part of the image. “It’s lacking Togetic’s wings right here,” he said.

“Could it be that they haven’t developed yet?” I asked.

The professor shook his head. “The Pokemon in this egg is too far into development to grow wings.”

“So that’s what led you to believe this may be a new species altogether then, right?”

“Yes!” Mr. Pokemon spoke up. “And that’s why we want you to take this egg immediately to Dr. Elm.”

“So he can conduct more research then,” I said.

Dr. Oak nodded. “He is the world’s leading expert on Baby Pokemon, it only makes sense!” Mr. Pokemon added.

The professor handed me the egg, “Be careful now,” he added.
“Thank you, and I will.” I replied.

“Yuck, can you guys stop with all this biology crap?” Lyra exclaimed. “I hated that class in high school, and I still hate it now.” She walked back over to the professor and I. “C’mon dude, I don’t know if you forgot or not but it’s my birthday and I have cake back at my place.”

“Right,” I rolled my eyes and turned back to the professor.
“It was nice meeting you, sir.”

Dr. Oak nodded. I was about to turn around to leave before he asked, “Are you a boy or a girl?”

“Am I what?” A really weird question was probably going to warrant a really stupid answer from me.

“Sorry, I know you're a boy,” he said, turning back to his computer, entering something in. “Now, tell me your name, boy.”

“Ethan M-”

“I only need your first name!” he interrupted, entering what was probably my name into the computer.

“Alright, now click this,” he mumbled to himself. “Ah yes, done!” He walked from the computer over the coat rack and pulled out a red plastic thing.

That red plastic thing, weirdly enough, would change my entire world. Or ruin it. To be quite honest I’m not exactly sure if the Pokedex left a positive or negative impact on life.

He walked back over and and handed it to me. “This is the Pokedex,” he began to explain. “It is a high-tech encyclopedia developed by me, Dr. Rowan of the Sinnoh region, and Dr. Juniper of the Unova region in a collaboration for the Pokemon League.”

“Oh yeah, Dr. Elm told me about this thing,” I said. “You gave it to a couple trainers about three years ago as a test run and-”

“It failed? Yes, I know.” He interrupted me again and shook his head. “I entrusted those three to record data for me, instead they focused more on training their Pokemon than collecting data. Even my own grandson only collected fifty-six species of Pokemon before he gave up.”

“Oh you mean Green, right?” Lyra, who was eavesdropping on our conversation, said. “He’s definitely the hottest of the Kanto Gym Leaders, but not as good-looking as Red though.”

“I thought you were out of your Red phase,” I said

“No, I totally am. What am I, fourteen?” She began picking at her fingernails. “He’s still cute regardless.”

I couldn’t disagree with that.

“Sorry about that. Anyway, I’m guessing that you want me to collect data on Pokemon then?”

“Yes!” the professor said, seeming a little bit exasperated. “I think you have intuition, Ethan.” He looked me straight in the eye. “You can make the Pokedex project a success.”

I thought about it for a second.

“I can’t,” I said.

He seemed a little disappointed. “Why not?”

“Why?” I knew I was going to get pissed talking about it, but I kept it bottled up for now. “I have no money at the moment, and I need to focus on my job.” I handed the Pokedex back to him. “Can’t drop everything and do this silly little project.”

The professor looked down at the Pokedex and then back up to me. “What if I paid you?”

I was dumbstruck “You would?”

“Yeah, sure.” He laughed dryly. The other three trainers did it for free, and if I paid you maybe you’ll actually have some motivation to do it.”

“How much would you pay me?” I asked.

He stood silent for a second, doing some calculations in his head. “How about 12,000 yen per entry?”

12,000 yen? There has to be thousands of species of Pokemon out there. Getting paid that much per entry was crazy, sure I would have to catch a shit ton of Pokemon, but I could easily get enough money to buy myself another car, maybe an even better car. BMW anyone?

Okay maybe not a BMW, but another Volkwagen would be alright.

“Okay... sure?” I muttered.

Annnnd right there, if there was any real start to my adventure, it would probably be when I accepted Dr. Oak’s offer to complete the Pokedex.

“Yo Ethan,” Lyra shouted. “I’ve waiting for like thirteen billion years over here, lets go!”

“I’m coming!” I yelled back, turning back to the professor.
“I’m sorry for my friend, it was really nice meeting you.”

“You too Ethan!” the professor smiled. “I should really be going as well, I’m late for my recording.”

“Good bye!” I walked back over to where Lyra was complaining and said our farewells to Mr. Pokemon and left back to New Bark.

“So you’re a man on a mission now, right?” Lyra asked.

“I suppose I am,” I agreed.

“Hey, do you mind if I come with you?”

“Huh, why?”

“That thing you said earlier, about the gym badges,” she stated. “I need a way to earn money for that cell phone plan right? I guess I could try training Pokemon and earning money that way for now. Because god knows how long I would be able to stay in a job?”

I rolled my head from side to side. “Ehh..”

“Plus you saw me out there, I was on fire! Literally, me and Kiwi were scorching the competition. I think he’s finally starting to listen to me,” she added.

“I guess,” I shrugged. “Our motives are basically the same anyway.”

“Yesss!” She jumped and then hugged me. “You are the best friend, you know that?”

“Yeah.” Agreed, mostly because it was true.

So after all that, with my car destroyed, new Pokemon and a new job, it had been a pretty long day already and it was only four o’clock in the afternoon.

“Let’s head home and have some of that cak-RINNG” I began to say before my Pokegear cut me off.

“Who is it?” Lyra asked.

“Dr. Elm- Hello?” I picked up the phone.

“Yes hello, Ethan! We have a problem back here,” Dr. Elm said, sounding more stressed than usual.

“What happened?”

“Remember that red-head kid who's been watching us for the last couple weeks?”

My heart skipped a beat. “Oh my fucking god, he totally did not just-”

“I’m afraid he did, I didn’t realize he had a gun on him.” The professor laughed a little bit.

“You’re not hurt, are you?” I asked quickly.

“No, I’m alright. I don’t think the boy even loaded the gun.” he laughed. “I’ve called police and they’re already in the process of trying to find him.”

“I don’t know where you are right now but if you see him, give me a heads up, okay?”

“Right,” I replied “Which Pokemon did he take by the way?”

“Chikorita.”

I slapped my hand on my forehead. “Of course he did.”

“Sorry Ethan,” The professor muttered. “See you soon.”

“Yeah, see you,” And I hung up.

“What’s going on?” Lyra, who always seemed to be out of the loop.

“Remember that kid in the tree who’s been stalking us for the last couple weeks?”

“Yeah.”

“The bastard stole Chikorita.”

Lyra asked no more questions, I threw (not literally) my PokeGear, the Egg and my new Pokedex into Lyra’s bag and we both sprinted towards Cherrygrove City.

CHAPTER 4: EMERGENCY! OR, “Uhm, can you do me a favor and not call the police? Please? Okay so I’m guessing That’s a no...”

For trying to get back to New Bark “ASAP,” me and Ethan most certainly failed at it.

Half the time was me and Ethan running, the other half of the time was walking as fast as we could because, admittedly, we were not the best in shape of our lives back then.

“I swear to god if I get an asthma attack and die because of all this running I will personally come back as a ghost, find that red headed retard and scare him shitless everyday and night for the rest of his miserable existence,” I said, trying to catching my breath as we marched into Cherrygrove.

“Whoa, calm down there.” Ethan clutched his chest, gasping for breath. “There’s no need to haunt a psychopath for unintentionally killing you.”

“That’s politically correct,” I muttered, standing back straight.

“Well neither were you,” Ethan also straightened back up, and looked me in the eye. “Let’s just keep going, okay?”

“Agreed.” I looked around the city. It was already dark outside. It was probably about six in the evening. “It’s not so far now, thank god.”

We began walking down the hill that led into the city. “We should probably stop at the Pokémon Center before we leave.” Ethan added. “I don’t think Aqua or Kiwi’s going to make it all the way back to New Bark.”

The Pokémon center was about a ten minute walk from the top of the hill. It was this giant building with a red roof. You could not miss it if you tried.

We walked in and gave our Pokémon to the nice nurse at the reception counter. Ethan had to pay about five hundred yen to get our Pokémon healed since we weren’t Trainers. But with all the fighting they went through today, they deserved it.

“So how long does it take to get our Pokémon healed?” I asked, sipping on a smoothie. The Pokémon Center also had great food, government taxes never tasted so wonderful.

“About twenty minutes or so,” Ethan answered, taking a chug of his coffee. “Since we’re not trainers, we don’t get first priority.”

“Not yet,” I grinned.

Ethan smiled back. “Not yet, I suppose.”

Just then, the sign telling us when our Pokémon were healed blinked with Ethan’s name. “Oh, I guess they’re not busy tonight,” he said, getting up.

Who would've thought? The place was pretty much empty that night except for us and one other person who had come in after us.

“Here are your Pokémon back sir!” The nurse set Aqua’s and Kiwi’s Poke Ball’s down on the table. “We hope you come back soon!”

“Wow, that’s some black humor there miss,” I commented as Ethan gave me Kiwi’s Poke Ball.

The nurse shrugged. “After having to sit here for twelve straight hours a day healing Pokémon, you have to find ways to amuse yourself.”

“I like you,” Of people I aspire to be one day, The Pokémon Center nurse in Cherrygrove City is one of them.

“Thank you, and have a nice night!” The nurse waved us off, waiting for the next person to come in so she could continue the cycle once more.

We walked out of the Pokémon Center and headed east towards New Bark. It was about a forty-five minute walk by foot.

“So when we get back and figure out what’s going on, you’re coming back to my place for cake right?” I asked. After everything today I was kinda worried he would just say no or something, I mean I did unintentionally kill his car by not paying attention to what Kiwi was doing.

“Duh,” he responded. “And there better be pizza too.”

Whew, okay, so he wasn’t that mad at me. I could live with that. “Of course, what’s a party without pizza?”

“A stupid one of cour-Huh?”

As Ethan was trying to finish his sentence, a tall figure began running into the town from the east side. “What’s that?” Ethan had muttered, peering in closer to get a better look.
The figure continued to run, coming into the light of the one of the street lamps before stopping to catch his breath.

And it was him.

The boy who stole the Chikorita.

**

Okay, my memory of that day until that point was kinda blurry. But I remember this scene clearly.

So I took the Chikorita successfully, and was on the run from police. Something I wanted to avoid, but oh well.

I hid out in the woods until nightfall, and ran for the next city over as fast as I could. I was gonna do it, I was going to make it. The police weren’t going to catch me this time!

And then I decided it was a great idea to stop in the middle of a street lamp, that ruined any sort of cover I had.

Smart one, Silver.

And before I could even think about it, I was face to face with the one boy, who I would later find out was named Ethan.

“Hello again,” he grinned.

“Uh yeah, I don’t know you.” I tried talking my way out of this. I was not good with confrontations.

“Sure you do,” he laughed. “It’s not like you’ve been stalking Dr. Elm for the past two weeks.”

“I’m going to go now,” I said, about to make a run for it.

“Oh no you don’t. Totodile, Water Gun!” He ordered his Pokémon, who seemed to jump out of nowhere from the back of him and began to spray water into my face.

I didn’t know what I was doing but I grabbed for Paprika’s (which was what I named the Chikorita) Poke Ball. “Chikorita, use Tackle!” He popped out of the Poke Ball and slammed himself into the alligator Pokémon, pinning her to the ground.

“Urrg, Totodile use Rage!” he commanded the Totodile. The Water-type viciously growled at Paprika and thrashed until Paprika couldn’t hold her down anymore and released her from the ground.

Paprika wobbled back a bit before finding his balance.

“Chikorita, use Vine Whip!” I commanded. He turned his head towards me and cocked his head, looking very confused.

“Chikorita, use Vine Whip!” I repeated. Paprika continued to sit there looking at me funny.

Ethan pulled a tiny machine out of his coat pocket, which I would later find out was the Pokedex. He appeared to be looking up something.

“Chikorita doesn’t know Vine Whip, he’s too low of a level to do so,” he concluded, putting the Pokedex away. “Actually he doesn’t know any Grass-type moves.”

“Whoa, dude,” the girl, who was standing in the back of Ethan, spoke up. “The Pokedex can look up information on the Pokémon you’re battling?”

Ethan nodded his head, with a smug smile. “I found that out on the way back when I was battling the one chick who was wearing the really short skirt and freezing her ass off.”

He looked back at me, “If he did, you would have an edge on me. But since he doesn’t I would say we’re even.” He put the Pokedex back into his pocket. “Or maybe not since My Totodile is a higher level than Chikorita.”

Huh, well then.

I was screwed.

“Totodile, use Scratch!” Ethan commanded Aqua. She leaped toward Paprika and ran her claws across his torso. The attack ripped through his skin causing him to bleed out of his side. He stood there for a second before realizing he was in pain and succumbed to his injury.

The Totodile strolled back over to her trainer with a cocky look mimicking her own trainers. I returned Paprika to his Poke Ball as Ethan approached me.

“So are you going to give him back now?” he asked. “Dr. Elm may not press any charges if you give him back now; he’s pretty cool about that.”

And, do you know what? I was actually thinking about doing it. My plan was mostly ruined anyway so what was the point in continuing anyway?

But my subconscious told me again I could still pull this off, and once again my instinct overpowered me.

I reached into my pocket and grabbed some smoke bombs (a fugitive on the run is always prepared) as I began to create my illusion of surrender giving the Poke Ball back to Ethan.

“Nope,” I smiled, taking the Poke Ball back just before it was in Ethan’s hand, and I dropped the smoke bombs. “See you later assholes!” I yelled, running out of the smoke.

I wasn’t about to give up on this, what I was doing was way more important than they’d ever know.

Well, at least at the time.

**

The boy ran out of the smoke and behind a nearby building. “That was a close one,” he whispered to himself.

He looked out the side of the building to see if the smoke had cleared or not. When it did, the boy and the girl stood there in coughing fits, trying to get the smoke out of their lungs.

“Jesus christ,” Lyra shouted. “Forget about unintentional, that boy really is going to give me an asthma attack!” she clutched her mouth with her hand, trying not to breathe in the remnants of the smoke.

“Ugh, great, we lost him.” Ethan shook his head. “That’s wonderful.”

“He’s probably hiding behind one of the buildings over there,” Lyra mentioned, pointing to the buildings where the boy was indeed hiding.

The boy tighten himself up, and continued looking out the alleyway where he was standing from the corner of his eye.

“Are we going to go look for him?” she asked.

“Nah,” Ethan turned around to face the exit of the city, which was down another hill. “It’s getting late, and I’m getting tired of this bullshit.” He turned back towards Lyra “I just want to go home and have some pizza with my friend, is that okay?”

Lyra nodded. “Same.” They both began to descend down the hill when she looked down and noticed something on the ground.

“What's this?” Lyra said, picking up what was a plastic card off the ground.

She handed the card to Ethan who inspected it, “It’s his ID.” He stated, and the boy tensed up some more.

Shit! How could he have lost his ID? He was sure it wasn’t in his pockets earlier. How did it end up in-

Oh.

He just remembered he was carded by the cashier at the 7-11 he went to that morning. He must have put it in his pockets instead of his wallet. Seriously, who even bothers to check for ID anyway? Nobody! Nobody cares if the card you are using is yours or not.

Society was a terrible place.

Well, lucky for him, he made sure that ID was fake anyway. “The jokes on them!” he thought, chuckling to himself

“What does it say?” Lyra asked, tiptoeing to see. Ethan brought it down to her level. “It says this ID belongs to Beyonce.”

“Oh my god.”

The boy slammed his head against the brick wall he was leaning up against. There was no way in hell he could pass for the sassy and beautiful lead singer of Destiny’s Child, Beyonce Knowles.

Why did he think I was a good idea to put her name on his fake ID? He began crying silently to himself.

He was never going to be as pretty as her.

Ethan flipped the card over looking at it some more, “Yeah, just some standard Fake ID stuff. The horribly shitty name, the obligatory over twenty-one age.” He slipped the card into his pocket. “I’m guessing the rest of the information on this card is correct, I’m handing this into police as evidence when we get back to town.”

“Good idea,” Lyra agreed as they both headed toward the exit of the city to begin their long walk back home.
The boy slipped down the wall. He needed to get out of this city as quickly as possible. Despite thinking about that he ended up sitting there for a half hour in fear of what was to come.

**

They arrived back at the lab at approximately 7:42 pm, by then most of the police had left, leaving the professor with one last officer who was asking last minute questions.

“Sorry we’re late, professor,” Ethan said, marching through the front door into the lab with Lyra right behind.

“What happened out there?” the professor asked, somewhat relieved to see his errand-boy and friend. “I didn’t hear a car pull up.”

“Long story.” Ethan dug into his pockets and slapped the boy's fake ID on the table. “I think you may find this interesting, Officer.”

“This belongs to the boy?” The police officer questioned. “Where did you find this?”

“We met up with him in Cherrygrove, sir.” Ethan explained. “Unfortunately he threw some smoke bombs and ran away before we were able to get the Pokémon back.”

The police officer inspected the card. “Yeesh, Beyonce? He’s definitely not pretty enough.” He stared at the picture of the boy on the card. “Believe it or not, this young man does look familiar.”

“He does?” Ethan and Lyra asked in unison.

“Uh... yeah,” the officer scratched his head,and turned to the professor. “If I may, sir, use your computer for a second?”

“Feel free,” Dr. Elm replied as the officer walked over to the computer and sat down. Ethan, Lyra and Elm followed him over.

The officer brought up the internet and opened a page to a Johto-Kanto joint department of police site. He clicked on a link that brought him to page that was titled “Johto and Kanto Regions Top Ten Most Wanted.” He scrolled down the page and then clicked the link that was listed at number seven on the list.

This brought up a wanted poster, featuring a mugshot of the boy, albeit a bit younger looking and with shorter hair.

“His real name is unknown, but he goes by the name Silver,” the officer began to explain. “He was an executive of Team Rocket before it was disbanded three years ago.”

Ethan and Lyra dropped collective jaws. “He’s what!?”

“Yep,” the officer nodded his head. “Extremely dangerous, he’s a kid with a genius level IQ. He’s a professional Pokémon Trafficker who masterminded the Celadon Game Corner Operation when he was only fourteen years old.”

Ethan shook his head with his mouth still wide open. “That doesn’t sound like the kid we scared off a tree this morning.”

“And yet, he matches the descriptions you and Elm gave,” the police officer continued. “I had my suspicions when Dr. Elm here described a boy with unnaturally colored red-hair and a gun.” He shook his head. “When the media reported this case three years ago they automatically assumed that every Team Rocket member uses Pokémon as weapons, this however was untrue.”

He got up from the chair and began to pace around the room. “We investigated further and had found out that some members of Team Rocket preferred weapons such as conventional firearms over the use of Pokémon, Executive Silver included.”

“But why would he want to steal a Pokémon?” Ethan asked.
The officer shrugged. “I have no clue why he would.” He stopped pacing and sighed. “I probably should not tell you guys this, but right now we’re investigating a Team Rocket revival happening here in Johto.”

“What.”

The police officer continued: “This case with Silver seems unrelated to our investigation with Team Rocket.” The officer looked back up to Ethan and Lyra. “Thank you two for bringing this ID to me, this will be a big help to us.”

“No problem sir.” Lyra saluted the officer.

The officer grabbed a piece of blank paper and a pen off a lab table and began writing on it. “I gotta go now, but if you see anything else let me know.” And he handed the paper with his number on it.

“The name’s Officer Looker by the way,” and he grabbed his jacket off the coat rack and left the building.

“Huh, Looker,” Lyra said, tapping her fingers on the head of the chair. “That’s a weird name.”

**

“Okay, pick one.”

Lyra held up two game cartridges in my face, one of them looking like a legit copy of Mario Party the other one had Mario Party 2 written in all caps with Sharpie on the cartridge.

“Where did you even get a copy of that? That game doesn't even come out for another month.”

Lyra put the (totally legit) copy of Mario Party 2 in the console and booted it up. “I know somebody.” She paused for a second, “That knows somebody, that knows somebody that works at Nintendo.”

I shook my head “That person I’m guessing is Collins, right?”

Lyra nodded her head and sat down next to me.

“How many people does that kid have connections with?”

“Who knows man,” and we picked up our controllers.

And with that, Lyra’s birthday party turned into a night full of anger, regret, yelling, tears, bribery, two proposed Pokémon battles and one fist fight to be “taken outside, right here, right now.”

Mario Party is serious fucking business to us.

So all and all, after having my car destroyed and Chikorita being stolen.(Even though I could have totally gotten him back if I tried, but meh I was a lazy teenager who prioritized pizza over tracking that kid down, too much effort for that late at night.)I guess it wasn't the worse day of my life, I got a new job (Sort of) a new Pokemon, and this cake was delicious.

I was feeling pretty optimistic; Pokémon training was going to be freaking sweet. In which I actually mean money, money was pretty freaking sweet.

However, I kind of knew deep down things were probably going to get worse for me starting from here.

That’s why I say that my van being destroyed is a big turning point in my life. Which is silly because, like, this little girl I know put it for me best?

“If your car hadn't died… like it did, where would you be right now?”

After contemplating it for a while, the answer I gave to her was: “Well, I probably wouldn't know you." What I had said left her confused, and after a while she gave up trying to figure out what that meant.

While that's true, I probably would of never met Iris if I had never became a Pokémon trainer in the first place, The straight answer I should of given her was: “Well, I wouldn't have gotten you all into this mess.”

---

whoops, did i say everyday before my drafts run out? i got busy with school work sorry about that.

there should be more coming tomorrow then, thank u all for reading (kisses u all)

I just started reading this, but it's very enjoyable so far! I especially like the relationship between Lyra and Ethan and the detail through dialog that you describe. Very authentic and real. Great work!

keep up the good work. I'm excited to see where you go with this.

Originally Posted by Legacy

I just started reading this, but it's very enjoyable so far! I especially like the relationship between Lyra and Ethan and the detail through dialog that you describe. Very authentic and real. Great work!

keep up the good work. I'm excited to see where you go with this.

ahhh hey thanks! trying to make realtionships/dialogue realistic is one of my aims in this fanfic, glad to know i'm going in the right direction! (sorry for the late reply, i got busy.)

anyway, here's the next chapter!

---

CHAPTER 5: GREEN ACRES OR, "To be fair, I just thought it was cool looking."

“Sorry, I forgot to give this to you last night.” Ethan handed Dr. Elm the egg he was given by Mr. Pokémon and Dr. Oak before everything went to hell.

“Oh, the Togekiss egg!” The professor happily took the egg from Ethan and set it down in an incubator near his desk. “Thanks again for picking it up.”

“Not a problem, sir,” Ethan smiled. “Also, I’m resigning.”

Dr. Elm, who had taken a sip of his coffee as Ethan said “resigning,” spit it back out. “You’re what now?”

“I’m quitting.”

The professor set his coffee back down on the table, “Why exactly are you quitting? Don’t you need the job? I thought your car got totaled.”

“Actually I-” Ethan paused for a second as he realized what Elm had said. “You know about that?”

Elm scratched the back of his head. “Lyra came in earlier asking for a trainer’s license, and she may have mentioned it?”

Ethan rolled his eyes. “Well ‘totaled’ is an understatement.”

“So what exactly happened?”

“The Cyndaquil went berserk and set it on fire,”

“Ahhh, well. I’m sorry for your loss.” The professor walked over and patted Ethan on the back, causing him to cough a little bit.

“Nah, it’s alright. I got a new job anyway.” He grabbed his bag and pulled out the Pokédex from one of its pockets. “Dr. Oak gave me this last night and asked me to fill it out.”

“A Pokédex huh?” Elm said with a grinned. “You better be careful with it, there are only so many in the world.”

“I’d better,” Ethan replied, putting the Pokédex back in his bag. “Oak’s only paying me twelve thousand per entry for this and I cannot afford to lose this.”

“Twelve thousand per entry? That isn’t too bad actually.” Elm rubbed his chin. “And he’s paying you under the table for it too, Oak must have been getting really desperate.”

“No really?” Ethan smirked.

Elm got off the lab table he was sitting on and walked over to Ethan. “Anyway, it’s been a great couple years Ethan, and it’s sad to see you go. But can I see your license really quick?”

Ethan handed the professor his driver’s license. Elm walked over to his desk, opened up one of the drawers and took out a gold and silver colored Poke Ball sticker. “The one good thing about a driver’s license is that it can also double as a trainer’s license.” He stuck it on the front side underneath Ethan’s picture and info. “At least you still have a use for this until you get a new car.”

“Thanks.” Ethan put his driver/trainer’s license back in his wallet.” Hey, do you by any chance know where Lyra went off to?”

“No sorry I don-”

“I do,” a tiny voice spoke up.

Ethan and Elm turned their attention to a lab aide “Sup, Mrs. A,” Ethan greeted.

“Yes, hello Ethan.” The woman nodded. “My daughter said she was off to Route 29 to train her Pokémon a bit more.” She walked over to his desk and grabbed a tiny bottle off of her desk. “She was in such a rush to get out of here that she forgot to take the potion I was going to give to her.”

“I can take it to her,” Ethan said. “I’m heading that way myself, anyway.”

“That would be wonderful, Ethan.” Mrs. A handed the medicine to Ethan. “Thank you.”

Ethan nodded his head and began towards the door. “See you around.” Elm saluted her off and Mrs. A waved.

“Oh, and Ethan.” She stopped him before he walked out the door.

“Yes?”

“Please say good bye to your dad before you go.”

**

Ethan was really running late that day. I had thought I said “Meet me at Route 29 at 9:30. Be there or be a pussy” or something. It was already 10:48 and he still wasn’t there.

So I sat on the side of the road for a while, listening to the radio on my phone before it stopped working, again. I had such shit luck with radios during the course of those two months I was traveling around; I don’t even remember how many times it refused to cooperate with me.

I ended up exploring a little bit after that. I had found out from my dad that Route 29 was one of the few routes in Johto that didn’t constantly have trainers on it due to its location and obscurity. Than meant I was safe from being pulled into a random trainer battle.

Strawberry, my Zubat and Kiwi walked (or in Strawberry’s case flew) beside me, knocking out any random Pokémon we ran into.

Strawberry wasn’t used to the idea of battling yet, unlike Kiwi, who’d already been taking names the day before on Route 30. He was very frightened by the wild Pokémon and would hide behind my back whenever it was his turn to battle. But since the Pokémon on this route were pretty weak anyway, he had no problem taking them out.

I ended up walking all the way to the entrance of Route 46, which was at the north end of the route behind all of these trees and bushes. They tried connecting Route 29 and Route 46 around the same time they were building New Bark, but apparently it was too disruptive to the wildlife that they had to quit.

Which never stopped them before, but what’cha gonna do?

The only thing left of the failed attempt to build a road was a gatehouse that was overgrown with bushes and weeds and was in a terrible state of disrepair.

I had lived in New Bark for the past seven years of my life and not once had I ever gone back behind the gate house of Route 46. Sure, I’ve been up and down Route 29 countless times, but I always figured it was way too dangerous to go back there.

But hey, I had my Pokémon with me. It couldn’t be that dangerous. Unless they were referring to the area itself and not just the Pokémon, I dunno.

I opened the door to the gatehouse, which was half finished inside with only a counter for the receptionist built. But it didn’t look unstable, despite the damage outside.

I walked on through like most other gatehouses and went to the other side.

Route 46 was really tiny, well from what I could see personally. There was this huge ledge so I really couldn’t see the rest of the route.

“Well that was a waste of my time,” I had thought to myself before turning back around.

But before I began heading back to the gate, Kiwi began hissing at this one bush. “Huh, what is it Kiwi?” I asked. “Is it a Pokémon?”

Kiwi continued to hiss at it. He was waiting for me to give him a command to attack.

“Kiwi, use Tackle?” I told him, though I wasn’t really sure what he was trying to do.

He launched himself at the bush, and disappeared into it. The bush began shaking wildly before Kiwi knocked this really cute elephant Pokémon out of it.

And I mean really cute, I was pretty sure it was called a Phanpy or something. The Phanpy looked like it was about to wreck Kiwi for disturbing it’s sleep.

And I wanted it.

I mean c’mon. It was a Pokémon Trainer’s job to catch Pokémon! I remember reading that the more Pokémon you have on your team the better off you were when it came to battles. Which makes total sense, you could have one strong Pokémon but what happens when that Pokémon’s knocked out, right? You’re shit out of luck then.

I had this cool looking Poke Ball my mom had given to me a couple years ago as a gift. It was purple and had this M on it. I had taken it thinking it was a good idea to have some type of Poke Ball on hand just in case I ran into a Pokémon like Phanpy. It was the only one I had.

“Cyndaquil, use Tackle again!” I commanded. You have to weaken a Pokémon before you captured it, or it may break out of the Poke Ball. That was something I remember Ethan saying the night before when he was boasting about “How easy it was going to be to capture Pokémon,” and “How he was going to have the money in no time.”

The Phanpy came back strong, slamming itself into Kiwi with its own Tackle attack.

You know, I am just remembering how boring these first battles were. I was just going back and forth with Tackle. Jeez, let me just Hyper Beam something already.

(Actually that’s a really bad strategy, don’t do that.)

Kiwi had hit the Phanpy a couple more times before it looked like it was about to fall over. It looked like it was my chance to do this!

I took out the Poke Ball I had and chucked it at the Phanpy. The Pokémon was hit by a red light and sucked into it. The ball shook a couple times in one of the most nerve-wracking seven seconds of my life.

Finally the Poke Ball stopped shaking and clicked closed. The Phanpy wasn’t getting out now, it was mine.

“Yeah!”I shouted, running over to the Poke Ball. I had caught my first Pokémon. I didn’t realize I was going to catch it anyway because the Poke Ball I had used was actually a Master Ball.

Whoops.

**

I hated talking to my Dad, okay?

I didn’t even see him half of the time so what was the point in telling him that I was leaving, anyway? He probably wouldn’t have noticed that I had left.

But then something in my mind went, “You’ll never live with the guilt of never telling your Dad you’re leaving him.”

So there I was, sitting in my bedroom, trying to call my Dad’s office.

I was hoping he would be too busy to pick up, but of course that wasn’t going to happen.

I was also hoping that if I was stoned at the time it would help, but I’m pretty sure that was sleep deprivation telling me to do stupid things.

“Hello?” God dammit, he actually had picked up.

“Hi Dad,” I muttered. I didn’t want to do this, oh my god. Just kill me now. “How are you doing?”

“Ethan? I’m alright, and you?” Oh great, he was trying to sound like he actually cared.

“Fine, listen.” I tried getting to the point. “I’m not going to be home for a while.”

“Why?”

“Well,” I got up and began to pace the room a little bit. “I got a job. From that one professor in Kanto, Dr. Oak? He wants me to catch Pokémon for the Pokédex, and he’s paying me.”

My Dad was quiet for a second before saying: “Well, congrats son!”

Wow he seemed actually happy I was leaving. Wonderful, great, fantastic. I hated that guy.

“Thanks,” I responded, rolling my eyes. “Anyway I’m going to g-”

“Wait!” My Dad interrupted me. “Before you go, head to the garage and open the safe in there. The password is 4227.”

“Uh... Okay?”
That was a double take for me, I had walked by that safe everyday years prior and never thought anything of it, and now my dad was telling me to open it.

What could it be? Was my dad finally going to give in and give me a little cash? It was about time if that was the case.

“Just a little something for your adventure.” I could see him flashing one of his signature smiles that was plastered all over newspapers and magazines. “Good luck, and if you’re ever in Goldenrod you know where to find me!”

“Yeah, thanks. See ya.” I hung up and raced to the garage. This had to be something good. My dad has been holding out on me for the last sixteen-wait, almost seventeen- years of my life. “Please let it be money,” I remember repeating to myself on the way down.

And before you say it, no it wasn’t money. What was I even thinking? Of course it wasn’t going to be money. My Dad never did handouts to my sister and me. I wouldn’t find out until later why he didn’t give me money, but at that point I thought he was just trying to be a dick and I was immensely irate at him.

So I got down to the garage and went over to the safe, which was this huge thing that made up like half the right wall of the garage. I punched in the code and opened the heavy door.

At that point I had my hopes up it was money, only for them to immediately be crushed a second later.

And then, I didn’t know what to expect.

What was in the safe you’re wondering? Trainer supplies. Like medicine, Poke Balls, repellent, etc.

I could hear the angels descending and singing hallelujah as I opened it up. It was like a mini Poke Mart except everything was free for the taking,

So now you’re probably wondering. “Why does your dad have all of this shit anyway?”
Well, selling those kind of items is how exactly my father made his fortune.
Those Poke Marts you see when you walk into a Pokémon Center? Maybe you remember when they were separate buildings. My Dad owned those buildings (along with the ones in the Pokémon Centers now.) He cashed into the whole idea of “Pokémon Training” by selling supplies to trainers as cheaply as possible. By the time I was born my dad had effectively made a monopoly on the business, eating up almost all small businesses who sold the same exact items but for more money.

As you can tell, my dad had his haters. He was easily one of the richest men in the world but also one of the most polarizing.

Anyway, my dad had given my access to his ultimate stash, and I didn’t know what to think.

I had my hopes up that it was money, but items? I guess they were helpful. At least that means if I stock up on these, the less money I would have to spend in the long run, so I guess my dad was helping me a little bit.

I went in and started grabbing at everything I thought I would need. Poke Balls were the obvious choice. My dad had every kind of Poke ball in there, well, except Master Balls. Those things were pretty rare back then. My dad probably had a couple of them somewhere, but definitely not in here. I took a bunch of Full Restores so I could cut down on some space in my bag for later, and some revives. I also took some repels and ropes as well just in case me and Lyra needed to make a quick escape.

Once my bag was stuffed I closed up the safe and headed out through the garage door. It was a bit of a walk from there to the front gate, my house was pretty big. It was your standard mansion with the huge courtyard and the dozens of workers laboring in it, saying their hellos and goodbyes as you walk by even though you don’t know their names.

I was going to miss them, as far as I knew they were the only people who cared about me at that place.

CHAPTER 6: THE PRICE IS RIGHT OR, "This songs speaks to me Lyra you don't understand."

Ethan walked back out to Route 29, to where (hopefully) Lyra would be.

“Lyra!” he shouted. He was supposed to meet her there... at some point in the day? He wasn’t sure. He had left her house around 8 that morning, then headed back to his house and got totally stoned before realizing, “Oh shit I forgot to give that egg to Elm,” and then preceded to clumsily make his way to the lab, trying (and failing) to act as sober as possible.

He was dead tired when he left, so he wasn’t sure if Lyra had talked to him. He really hoped he hadn’t kept her waiting.

(Which he had.)

“Hello friend, you are finally here.”

Ethan spun around in the direction the voice was coming from. It was Lyra sitting up in a tree, with Kiwi, Strawberry and... another Pokemon?

“Hey,” Ethan waved at his friend. “Your mom gave me this Potion that you forgot back in the lab.” He took out his bag and began to dig around in it before pulling out the tiny purple bottle. “Not that it really matters since my da-”

“You are...” She interrupted him and took out her PokeGear to check the time “Five hours late.”

“Whoa, sorry I-”

Lyra and her Pokemon jumped down from the tree and strolled over to Ethan. She grabbed the Potion out of his hands and slipped it into her bag. “Thanks.”

“S’No problem,” Ethan muttered looking around a little bit before returning his attention back on his friend “Hmmm.” Lyra studied the boy. “You’re high right now, aren’t you?”

“Uh…” Ethan looked towards the ground; he was trying to make up an excuse. “I had things to do, deliver the egg to Elm, call my dad...”

“And when did you have time to smoke then?” she inquired, crossing her arms and raising an eyebrow. Jesus, she was not his mother.

“Well I-” Lyra interrupted his sentence and took out a chocolate-chip cookie from her pocket. “Do you want the cookie? You must be very hungry right now.” Lyra started making monkey sounds and waved it in front of his face.

Ethan rolled his eyes. Actually, he was pretty hungry right now, which was probably from a combination of not eating and pot. He slapped the cookie out of her hand. They watched the cookie as it fell to the ground.”

“Really dude? You could've just said no,” Lyra grumbled. “Now you’ve murdered a poor defenseless cookie.” The new Pokemon walked over and began to chew on the remnants of the fallen comrade. “Ewww Cantaloupe, that’s just gross.” Cantaloupe, as they were called, looked towards Lyra, blinked, and then continued to eat it.

“Cantaloupe?” Ethan asked, tilting his head.

“Yeah.” She picked up the Pokemon from the ground and showed it to Ethan. “She’s a Phanpy I found and caught on Route 46.” Lyra waved her up and down.

“Wha- You already caught a Pokemon?” Ethan looked dumbstruck.

“Yeah, I had a Poke Ball my mom gave me a couple years ago for Christmas, so I used it.” She gave Ethan a smug smile.

"How do you even know how to catch a Pokemon?" Ethan didn't really remember telling her how to.

Lyra was playing around with her phone, simply ignoring his question. "Hey, do you know the radio is broken on here?" she held the PokeGear up in the air to see if she could get another signal. "It was working earlier before you came, sheeeeesh!” She brought the phone back down to her level and raised an eyebrow at the boy “I am having the best of luck with radio’s these days I swear.”

"Lyra, are you ignoring me?" Ethan was starting to get annoyed.

"I overheard you last night talking about how easy it was to capture a Pokemon," she answered, continuing to wave her phone around to get a signal. “And you were right, it was pretty easy!”

Ethan stared at her, trying to think of what to do. “Well are you going to go catch some Pokemon or not, boy?”

“Uh, yeah, okay.” He spun around and walked over to the tall grass where most Pokemon hide in. “Hey do you even have any Poke Balls?” Lyra called over.

“I found some in my house!” he yelled over before walking into the grass. This was going to be so easy.

**

It wasn’t easy.

That Rattata was probably the fifteenth million Pokemon that had fled in the middle of battle. Ethan was about ready to pull his hair out. “Catching Pokemon would be easy!” He’d thought. “I’ll get a new car in no time!”

Yeah, right.

He sat back to back with Aqua on the side of the road, just outside the tall grass. What shit luck he was having today. Aqua tapped her foot on the ground. She was getting very impatient. If she accidentally knocked out the next Pokemon before Ethan could catch them she would not be surprised.

The Totodile turned around and tugged at her trainer’s jacket.

Ethan turned back around and looked at his Pokemon. Aqua bared her teeth; she looked immensely annoyed. “Sorry girl, I don’t know why they keep running,” Ethan muttered and petted her. “Usually, it’s not that hard to catch a Pokemon.” Well, at least it shouldn’t be.

“Still haven’t caught anything?” Lyra smirked, appearing from behind the grass. She was still trying to get her radio to work.

“No,” Ethan sighed and looked towards the ground. “They either run away or I knock them out before I can even catch them.” He then whipped his head right back up “I hate my life.”

“Hmm.” She sat herself next to Ethan. “Maybe you're just not cut out for this,” she said, taking out what was probably Cantaloupe’s Poke Ball and inspecting it. “I’m just having a hard time keeping the Pokemon around so I can catch it,” Ethan replied in his defense, turning a bit red.

“Huh, I know!” Lyra shot up and faced Ethan. “Maybe you should give me the Pokedex! Since I’ve actually, y’know, caught a Pokemon.” She narrowed her eyebrows and gave Ethan a smug look.

Ethan looked like a tomato now. “How about, Dr. Oak gave me the Pokedex and not you!”

Lyra giggled a bit. “Now you’re just getting jealous that I caught one and you didn’t!”

“I am not!”

“Are too!”

Lyra was laughing as she watch her friend get all riled up over this. Ethan was such a fun guy to watch get really frustrated. She really couldn’t help pissing him off sometimes just to see the reaction it gets from him. “Dude, calm down. You look like you’re burning up. It’s just a Pokemon.”

“I’m not burn- Huh.” Ethan’s face dropped, as that word had somehow triggered something in his brain. “Burn, burn. What can I…”

He paced around for a little bit before snapping his fingers. “Got it.”

“You got what now?” Lyra looked confused, mostly because she actually was.

“Burn, that’s a status condition.” Ethan explained. “If you inflict a status condition on a Pokemon while trying to catch one, the easier it is to catch it!” He slapped his forehead because the thought of not thinking about that before was ridiculous. He took out Aqua’s Poke Ball and returned her to it. “You deserve a bit of a break,”

He then grabbed another Poke Ball out of his bag and threw it up into the air, “You’re up Rocket.”
Out of the Poke Ball came a tiny little owl Pokemon who looked rather annoyed at the fact her sleep had been disturbed by her trainer, she flew over to Ethan’s shoulder, sat down on his shoulder closing her eyes again.

Ethan shook his head, he’d wake her up again when he needed her.

“How’s Rocket going to inflict a burn on a Pokemon exactly?” Lyra asked. “She’s not a Charizard.”

The HootHoot opened one eye and stared over at the girl before sighing and closing her eye once more.

“Well, she isn’t going to burn the Pokemon, Lyra.” Ethan made his way into the tall grass again while Lyra followed him “She knows Hypnosis, a move that can put Pokemon to sleep.”

“Oh,” Lyra nodded her head. “And because they’re asleep, they can’t defend themselves from attacks, or in this case Poke Balls.”

“Exactly” Ethan smiled. “Why did I not think of this before?”

“Because you’re a dumbass.”

“Thank you, Lyra.”

**

They walked around the tall grass for a while. Usually a Pokemon would've popped out by now and attacked, but for some reason they hadn’t. “This is weird,” Ethan muttered. “They were at least coming out before.” He looked over to Rocket who was on his shoulder and, at the moment, looking kind of uneasy. “Hey, are you okay girl?” He asked. The HootHoot shook her head from side to side and looked over to Lyra, who was, once again, playing with her Pokegear.

Lyra looked up at the two, “What?”

“Lyra, will you stop playing with your Pokegear? It’s bugging Rocket.” He asked.

“What?” Lyra raised her eyebrow. “How can me playing with my phone be annoying to a Pokemon?”

Rocket, who was starting to get annoyed at the girl, flew off Ethan’s shoulder and began pecking at her.

“Hey, Ethan! Control your Pokemon!” she shouted, trying to fend off the Flying-type Pokemon.

“Rocket!” Ethan rushed over and grabbed her off of Lyra. “Behave, okay?” Rocket began to thrash about in the boys arms before realizing that her effort was useless and calmed down.

“What’s wrong with you?” Ethan muttered. “You don’t usually act like this.”

“Hoo...” The owl Pokemon let out; she looked tired and sick. “You really don’t look okay,” he whispered, starting to worry.

Lyra, once again ignoring the two, continued to mess around with her phone. “Lyra, can you please stop?”

“I still don’t understand why my phone is annoying to your Pokemon!” She said, looking up. “My phone is not makin-”

As she said that, her phone began blasting Rock Lobster at full volume, scaring the shit out of both of them. “Lyra, turn down the volume!” Ethan screamed. Lyra quickly pressed the buttons to mute her phone.

They both stood there, distressed, and their heart rates skyrocketed. “Jesus christ,” Ethan said, exasperated. “Did you even pay attention to how loud the volume was?”

“No,” Lyra replied. She put away her PokeGear at long last.

Rocket began to squirm around in Ethan’s arms. “Huh?” He let go of her and she promptly flew back onto Ethan’s shoulder, looking much better than before. “See Lyra, your PokeGear was bugging her.”

Lyra rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. “Whatever, let’s just go catch your Pokemo-” As she said that, a Pidgey flew out of the grass and into her face. “Agggh, what the fuck?” she screamed, throwing the Pidgey off her face into Ethan’s direction. Finally, it was time.

“HootHoot, use Hypnosis!” Ethan commanded. Rocket flew off of his shoulder and began to stare down the Pidgey. The Pidgey took no heed to the attack and slammed itself into Rocket at full force. “I thought you said Hypnosis would work!” Lyra yelled over. “It doesn’t work all the time, Lyra!” he yelled back.

“HootHoot, use Peck!” Rocket flew into the Pidgey and began furiously pecking at it with her beak. The Pidgey slammed into the ground, losing much of it’s health from the attack. “I can’t do that anymore,” Ethan thought. “If I attack it one more time I risk knocking it out.” The HootHoot landed next to the wild Pidgey on the ground. She looked back at her trainer, waiting for the next move.

“HootHoot, use Hypnosis one more time!” Rocket once again began to stare the Pidgey down. The Pidgey stared back and then promptly fell asleep. “Perfect, that’s good Rocket.” Ethan took his bag and dug around in it before taking out a regular red and white Poke Ball. “Stay there, just in case it breaks free.”

Ethan threw the Poke Ball at the wild Pidgey. The Pidgey was sucked up into the ball with a red light. It began to shake around for an antagonizing five seconds before the lock clicked and the Pidgey was caught.

“Finally,” Ethan sighed heavily and walked towards the Poke Ball. He took out his Pokedex to record the information about it. The Pokedex gave a brief summary of what researchers already knew about it, including the species type, height and weight, and a description.

“That’s insane, bro,” Lyra muttered, looking over at the Pokedex. “I wish I got one.”

Ethan checked the other options in the entry. “Area” showed where the Pokemon could be caught in the region. (Which was all over the place, because Pidgey was an extremely common Pokemon.) “Cry” gave an 8-bit recording of what the Pokemon sounded like. Ethan wasn’t sure why he would need that option but it was pretty cool, he guessed. The “Print” option did presumably what it said, just hook it up to a computer printer and print out the entry. Another useless feature, since the data was transmitted automatically to Dr. Oak, but he didn’t rule out that he would use the printing feature in the future.

He slipped the Pokedex back into his bag and Rocket flew back over and took a seat on his shoulder once more, closed her eyes and took a nap until she was needed again. “Hey Lyra,” He threw his bag back on his back “Mmhm?” She nodded her head.

“Once I’m done catching the other Pokemon on this route, show me where you caught that Phanpy.”

**

“I’m so... hungry,” Ethan complained, sprawled out on the bottom bunk of the bed. He hadn’t eaten anything all day, smart idea on his part.

“Then go downstairs and get something to eat,” Lyra responded, focusing her attention on the TV. The Powerpuff Girls was playing.

They were at the Pokemon Center in Cherrygrove City, where they went to rent the room and stay the night. As long as the center wasn’t packed, renting a room at the Pokemon Center was pretty cheap for trainers.
“I’m going to die from starvation before I get down there,” Ethan mumbled into the pillow. “Can you do it for me?”

Lyra rolled her eyes and mumbled something along the lines of “You are a lazy white boy,” climbed down the ladder from the top bunk and left the room.

“Thank you dear,” Ethan said, face still in the pillow and raised his arm to wave back at her.

After she left, Ethan sat up on the bed. After that Pidgey he was able to catch about another three or so Pokemon (that included a Phanpy that had taken forever to find. And Lyra was able to find one on her first try? Bullshit!) before crashing for the night at the Pokemon Center. He kinda felt dizzy. He knew he should probably start eating better but when that would ever happen he didn’t know.

“Ugh,” he put his hand on his head trying to balance his field of vision and looked around the room. It was small, but basically a hotel room. It already was messy from all their stuff being laid around. There was a TV on the dresser that also sported a mirror. Right next to it was Lyra’s laptop which was charging. Of course she brought it, as far as he knew she was still working on that computer project with her friend. She wasn’t just going to drop it to go traveling, it was way too important to her.

He continued to scan the area; he also had his Pokedex charging right next to it. Right next to that were their Poke Balls. Currently, only Cantaloupe was out of her ball so she and Lyra could “Bond over watching television or something.” Just the usual red and white balls, there was nothing out of the ordinary ther-

“Wait a second.” Ethan looked closer at the pile of Poke Balls. There was a different colored one right in the middle. He got up and stumbled over to the dresser and picked up the unusual Poke Ball. It was a purple color with pink colored spots on it. It had a “M” right in the middle of it.

“A Master Ball?” Ethan thought. “Where did this come from?”

“Hey, I got you a box of pizza,” Lyra said as she came back into the room. “The food court was closing and that’s all they had left-” She stopped talking and looked at Ethan who was currently studying the Poke Ball she had used to catch Cantaloupe. “Dude what are you doing with Cantaloupe’s Poke Ball?” Ethan’s eyes grew wide and he slowly faced Lyra. “Lyra, do you have any idea what kind of Poke Ball this is?” He looked dumbfounded.

“Uh... no?” Lyra was kinda worried at the moment. Did she fuck up? She probably fucked up again, didn’t she? God, everything was her fault wasn’t it? Ethan shook his head and pinched the bridge of his nose. Yup, typical “Lyra screwed it up again” look. “It was a Poke Ball my mom got for me for Christmas like two years ago.” Ethan slapped his forehead.

“That she got from my father,” he said with an annoyed voice. He looked Lyra straight in the eye. “This is called a Master Ball.”

“Okay,”

They stood there awkwardly for a second staring at the purple Poke Ball.

“What now?”

“Huh?”

“Aren’t you going to explain it?”

He stood there for a second before realizing “Oh, oh yeah that’s right.”

Ethan stumbled back over to his bed with the Master Ball in hand and sat down. “My dad was a sponsor for this Silph Co. project a couple years back to design the ultimate Poke Ball… or something.”

Lyra took a seat next to him and opened the pizza box, “Here.”

“Thanks,” Ethan took a slice out as well as Lyra and he continued his drawn out explanation of the damn Poke Ball.

“This is what the project resulted in.”

“A piece of pizza?”

Ethan had meant to hold up the Master Ball, “Whoops.” and held the Master Ball up instead.

“Did you get high again or-“

“What? Fuck no. I left all my weed at home, I swear.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“And you have every right not to.” Lyra rolled her eyes.

“Anyway, the project resulted in this Poke Ball.” Ethan continued. “Out of 256 trial runs it had only failed to catch one Pokemon at full health.”

“Full health meaning?”

“The Pokemon was not attacked in anyway shape or form, not even with a status move.”

Lyra’s eyes widened. “That’s some cray shit bro.”

“Yep,” Ethan put the Master Ball down on the bed between them. “They are a hella expensive to make though, My Dad was given a couple of them as a thank-you gift for contributing to the project.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“So,” Lyra laughed and then mumbled “How much does one cost?”

“I don’t know,” Ethan laid his back on the bed. “Probably a couple thousand yen, give or take.”

“Aha…”

“Mmhm.”

They sat awkwardly again before Lyra spoke up.

“Uhm, what was the Pokemon what broke free during the trial test?”

“Do you expect me to know everything about the Master Ball?”

“No, no I uh…” She twiddled her thumbs and faced Ethan again “So hypothetically speaking…”

“Yea?”

“That Canta somehow broke free of the Master Ball even after being weakened…”

“Oh god.”

“How would you feel?”

Ethan sat back up and faced her “I’d probably laugh.”

“Really?”

“Sure.”

“So you’re not mad?”

He shrugged his shoulders and rolled his eyes. “Why would I be angry? It’s your Master Ball, do whatever you will with it, I’m not here to run your life.”

“Maybe to ruin it though…”

“Now that’s just rude.”

“Hah.”

Ethan picked the Master Ball back up and tossed to Lyra. “Now that you know what this is, if you ever come across one again, don’t use it on something as common as a Phanpy now, okay?”

“What would I use it on then?” Lyra said walking back over to the dresser to put the Poke Ball back with the others.

“Maybe a Legendary Pokemon?”

“That’s implying that I’ll even see one.”

“Who knows Akiyama,” Ethan grabbed for another piece of pizza and settled back on the headboard of the bed. “It’s a strange world we live in, you could say that-“

“Anything is possible? That’s oddly optimistic for you, Mackenzie.”

“Yeah,” He smiled. “I guess it is.”

IN LIVING COLOR PART ONE: THE END

---

ahaha, sorry for not updating. my school decided it was a great time to dump shit loads of work onto me, it wasnt fun.

my update schedules going to end up becoming really weird because of IB so sorry about that! ill update p much when my teachers arent breathing down my neck and whispering in my ear "u forgot to write that reflection emily." or s/t like that.

but anyway this is the end of part one! whoooo! as a gift for sticking with me this long u get art:

and the version that doesnt induce eye cancer upon seeing it:

fun fact: i was originally going to make ilc a webcomic but i dont have the time, patience or skill to really do it lmao

so yea here's to more updates soon!

(i hope)

(sighing)