Hello Friends,
I have frequented Bulbapedia for many years, but this is the first time I am posting a fanfic. I am encouraged by seeing the positive and constructive comments the community provides here and I thank you for taking some time to read my story. I have posted the first two chapters, since chapter 1 is on the shorter side.
Sincerely,
Profoak
EDIT: Thanks to comments from the readers, I have been able to make some improvements to my story. I hope you like them!
Prologue
It certainly didn’t begin as a sunny day. As I left my home that morning, I had taken a shallow confidence and cloudy skies with me to the arena. I was hopeful that rain might dampen the battlegrounds. In retrospect, it would have, had I been a little smarter.
I had made the long walk from the mill to Azalea Town many times before. I passed beneath the calming darkness of Ilex’s leaves and flowers until the shadows began to lengthen. As I exited the woods, I confirmed that the weather would be to my advantage. I hated exposing Slowking to harsh light. I felt an uneasy confidence; a welcome change from my general apprehension.
My father had been paying me to work with him since I turned 14. That was also the first year that I competed in Azalea’s annual tournament. He had given me the day off from work each of the last four years, but still paid me as if I had spent the day with him. Pop liked my Pokemon, I figured. Or at least he liked that I liked training them.
Pokemon was it. Some kids wanted to be firemen or astronauts, doctors or lawyers, movie stars or athletes; but ask any of them what they’d buy with that sweet lawyer paycheck and you’d better believe it was “a shiny Ninetales” or “a huge pool big enough for my Lapras.” Some of my friends really did dream big, but I admit I wanted it too. Every year I went down to that tournament with my team and a curiosity of what the first place trophy felt like.
I never would find out, but there was no doubt in my mind that the glory would feel better than any cold brass ever could. Each year I got a little bit closer, but I also understood the competition better. I learned everything from those trainers and as I examined my abilities, my Pokemon, my limits, I realized that I might not ever win. I might never feel the glory of victory like so many of the others had.
I couldn’t understand how the Victreebell was dealing so much damage to my Slowking. Slowking has always been...slow...but usually he stands a great chance against grass-types. Most of them are almost as slow as he is, not to mention a good psychic knocks the poisonous ones out. This Victreebell, though. This Victreebell was faster than any I had seen.
A lot of the kids in town have money, I was wracking my brain now. I heard they give their Pokemon lots of supplements to make them stronger. This was my last chance at winning this tournament. This was as close as I had ever come.
It’s not just the speed, I thought. Victreebell kept using this attack. The light shined so brightly in the sky and from its petals that I was forced to squint. Slowking was nearly blinded by the beams knocking it back. His defense against special moves likely kept him from being knocked out in one hit, but I still couldn’t figure out what was happening. Flash doesn’t do damage like this, but this CANNOT BE SOLARBEAM. Giving in, I squeezed my eyes tightly and looked away from the match.
After shaking the champion’s hand, I turned to visit the Pokemon center before leaving for home. The image of my place atop the victory podium had been replaced with one of me heading home to Pop, telling him that I had almost won again. I walked up to the counter to speak with the nurse, who was beaming as usual. Everything inside a Pokemon center is white. White counters, pearl tile, eggshell uniforms, and smiles filled with bleached teeth.
Maybe that’s why he stood out so much.
I noticed one man in a brown suit, dark crimson tie, and a matching pin on his left breast. It looked like a suit Pop would wear to church tomorrow: formal but not too fancy. He approached me and he reached out his neatly manicured hand.
“Nice match today, son.”
“Thank you, sir,” I mumbled. I realized I was staring at his brown loafers. They had laces so they probably weren’t loafers but to this day I don’t know what those are called. “I was still getting over the shock of my opponent’s strategy.”
“Sir,” the man chuckled. “There’s no need for that. My name’s Ricky. I’m a Pokemon battling coach over at Pallet Institute. I wonder, Alwyn, if you’ve ever considered going to college.”
CHAPTER 1
Classrooms always made me nervous. I had long believed that desks were specifically designed to make a student feel a certain way and, whatever that way was, I was definitely feeling it. The plastic chair curved out at my lower back, prodding me into an upright posture. I tried to rest my arms on top of the desk, but it was sunken so low that my elbows hovered as I attempted to hold my head up. The desk’s legs were uneven. I had pushed my weight to the back of my seat, leaving the front left leg to dangle above the tiled floor.
The room was almost completely silent; and all the lights were off. I could see that one switch was flipped on, but that was the extent of my willingness to investigate. Besides, my own voice was sarcastic, I’m just getting comfortable.
Sighing, I lowered my cheek into my palm. My haze was abruptly broken by a feeling of weightlessness, which was followed by the steely clank of my front-left leg smacking the classroom floor.
I sat completely still.
The sound bounced off the walls, searching for companionship in the emptiness. I feared that it would be alone forever, but in my intense concentration, I noticed the clank interacting with some other players. There was the scratching of pen and paper in front of me and the defiant chewing of gum behind. The community put me at ease. As much ease as can be had in that situation.
I craned my head in a not-so-subtle exploration of my classmates, but it was impossible to make out the faces around me. To my left near the front of the room a girl vigorously marked her open notebook--the pen scratcher. She was hunched over and her cap pulled low, as if she was hiding from someone.
Maybe she turned all those lights off.
An auburn ponytail poked out the back of her cap and reached down to the neckline of her red and white striped t-shirt. She was hunched over, but I could see that she was well built. If it weren’t for her hair and earrings, she might have passed for a boy about my size. I looked her over again.
A boy my size...with thicker arms. Much thicker.
As she raised her eyes from her work, I darted my gaze out the window behind her. It was too late; I caught a glance of her steely grey eyes. I exhaled as she ignored me and returned to her work.
Behind me reclined the girl’s apparent opposite, a tall boy who already had his feet up on a desk. He used his cap not to cover his head, but his face as he apparently dozed off. His dark curly hair formed a small afro that stuck out of the top of his mask. It was large enough that I wondered if he could fit the cap on his head if he wanted to. He wore a white button-down shirt and a green blazer. His slacks had recently been pressed; I guess he wasn’t into loafers, as he proudly placed brand-new sneakers atop the desk in front of him. His arms reached behind his back as he began to stretch. The only other movement I could see was the rising and falling of his chest as he hoped to drift back to his dreamland.
The third student sat to my right all the way against the wall. He was taller than me, but probably about my age. His plaid shirt was stained with grass and mud, and his jeans were probably one or two sizes too short. His straw-colored hair was a mess, but he ran his fingers through it once or twice, probably in hopes of being a bit more presentable. Like the other two, he was focused on the task at hand. In his case, the task wasn’t work or sleep, but the twirling of a pencil. I wondered if he was as nervous as I was. Footsteps coming from outside caught the room’s attention. Suddenly, the door crashed open.
“WHO was the FIRST one here?” The voice shouted into the darkened room. I shielded my eyes from the light forcing its way in through the doorway. I could vaguely make out the imposing shadow, but it didn’t take me long to figure out who was speaking.
“I was, sir.” The boy playing with the pencil looked up and raised his hand.
“MISTER Holt,” he replied gruffly, “can you please tell us why you chose only to turn on ONE of the lights?”
I recognized this man’s voice. Coach Gold and I had spoken briefly when he had offered me a scholarship to attend PI to join his Pokemon battling team. I dealt mostly with Ricky, who was one of his assistants. I was happy to work with Ricky since I quickly became intimidated by my new boss. My initial impression of the coach was about to be confirmed.
“Forget it,” he stormed to the light switches and threw them all into the on position. “I don’t care what your reason is. But can anyone. ANYONE. AT. ALL. tell me why none of you, upon walking into a dark room, chose to get up and do something about it?”
Save the buzzing of the lights, the room became completely silent. I held my breath and prayed that my seat would not tip.
“Apathy…laziness…complacency...timidity,” Coach Gold was writing on the board now. “These are the traits you have displayed this morning.” The first thing I noticed about Coach’s voice was his affinity for exaggerated annunciation. “You have all set a perfect example of what we will E-LIM-EN-ATE before our first match of the season.”
My eyes adjusted, and I could finally see my surroundings. I focused on Coach, who looked to be a little less than six feet tall, but stood perfectly straight up. His right arm reached way up to write as high on the board as possible, which stretched his red jacket above his waistline. I had seen Pokemon coaches before, but they were rarely dressed as well as Coach Gold. He wore a clean suit, completely crimson—like the color of the girl’s blazer. His shoes were white and polished as if he had waited until he walked into the building to put them on. His belt and shirt were also spotless and white, as to match his shoes. He carried a whistle, but it was tucked into his breast-pocket. I could only see it thanks to the thin white string that hung down. As he turned around, his necktie briefly swung before hanging straight down. It matched his suit, as well as the flag that hung in the school courtyard, and ended just touching the top of his belt.
“You will work HARD to meet my expectations or you will be gone. And sadly,” he sighed, catching his breath, “THIS is the bottom of the barrel right now. You won’t have anywhere else to go but home.” Coach’s expression was more measured now. He stopped huffing and stood still, making me even more wary than before. I sat up straighter than I had been, expecting a long speech and hoping not to draw the room’s attention. I thought for a moment about what my father was doing—and why I hadn’t chose to just stay at home and work with him.
I looked into Coach Gold’s eyes like I would have if Pop were lecturing me. His face was perfectly rectangular all the way up to his peppered grey and black hair. It was styled to go straight up, each strand standing at attention and ending at the exact same place. His voice expressed all his emotion, as only his mouth moved as he spoke. Wrinkles dug deep into his face as though he had been practicing the same facial motions for his entire life. His eyebrows, straight and silver, pointed slightly downward toward his nose, but everything else on Coach’s head was perfectly perpendicular to the rest.
“You have all been brought here for a reason. EACH of you is here to win Pokemon battles. This institute of higher learning wants you to win SO. BADLY. that they are willing to offer you their extremely expensive product, education, for FREE in order to do so.” He turned around and began writing again. A list was developing on the board behind him. “There is a great opportunity in front of you.” His voice wavered in rhythm with his darting arm. “I am counting on you to follow my instructions so that you may avoid squandering that opportunity.”
With those words, he placed his marker down, slowly. Coach turned around and walked to the exact center of the desk. He held his hands behind his back and feet spread apart.
“My name,” he boomed, “is COACH James Gold. I was born and raised in Viridian City. My strongest Pokemon is a CLEFABLE.”
As he began his next sentence, a loud chuckle escaped the teeth of the boy reclined in the back of the room. Every muscle in my body was deciding between sitting straighter than ever and turning completely around. The boy confirmed my fears before I could choose.
“I’m sorry COACH,” mocking the man at the front of the room. “You’re just acting all high and mighty and then…Clefable? What a joke.” He howled at the stone-faced man.
“Mister Atkins,” Coach Gold replied calmly. “We will discuss the discipline for your outburst later in a private setting. Rest assured you will regret the actions you have chosen.” Coach remained expressionless; his voice was unusually calm.
“For the sake of your TEAM—excuse me.” Coach paused, and then collected himself. “…your teammates, would you care to explain why you consider my Clefable to be a joke?”
“Well, boss,” the boy was standing up now, “I’ve studied Pokemon for a long time. I’ve had lunch with and picked the brains of some of this world’s best minds on the subject.” He was now walking up to the front of the classroom. “As you know, I grew up in the home of Silph’s greatest engineer.”
The boy stood right in front of Coach. Counting his hair, he was almost a foot taller than Coach Gold, though considerably thinner. His hat no longer covered his face, but dark sunglasses shaded his eyes. He looked down towards Coach, hoping to catch the man’s eye. Coach continued to look straight ahead.
“But it doesn’t take a genius to know that Clefable sucks as a battler. It’s just a bad version of Blissey, which is little more than a physical wall if trained properly.”
Coach finally tilted his head upward to speak with the boy he called “Mister Atkins.”
“Thank you.” He said, and then took one step to his left in order to address the class unobstructed.
“Mister Atkins has shown us that knowledge of Pokemon is valuable in determining the strengths and weaknesses of your opponent.” Coach spoke very slowly now, choosing his words carefully. “In light of his brief diatribe, I am now further aware of a number of his own strengths and weaknesses. At this time, I would be very happy to teach you all what I have learned from him and how any of you might use it in a Pokemon battle.”
Though Coach Gold was now addressing us all, the boy had not turned around. He had not moved at all.
“Unfortunately, I am confident that Mister Atkins will continue to abhor the classroom setting until further steps are taken. With that being said, we will all take a detour to the gym. Mister Atkins, you will choose one Pokemon to battle, and I imagine handily defeat, my Clefable. Please all of you gather your things and follow me.”
I have frequented Bulbapedia for many years, but this is the first time I am posting a fanfic. I am encouraged by seeing the positive and constructive comments the community provides here and I thank you for taking some time to read my story. I have posted the first two chapters, since chapter 1 is on the shorter side.
Sincerely,
Profoak
EDIT: Thanks to comments from the readers, I have been able to make some improvements to my story. I hope you like them!
Prologue
It certainly didn’t begin as a sunny day. As I left my home that morning, I had taken a shallow confidence and cloudy skies with me to the arena. I was hopeful that rain might dampen the battlegrounds. In retrospect, it would have, had I been a little smarter.
I had made the long walk from the mill to Azalea Town many times before. I passed beneath the calming darkness of Ilex’s leaves and flowers until the shadows began to lengthen. As I exited the woods, I confirmed that the weather would be to my advantage. I hated exposing Slowking to harsh light. I felt an uneasy confidence; a welcome change from my general apprehension.
My father had been paying me to work with him since I turned 14. That was also the first year that I competed in Azalea’s annual tournament. He had given me the day off from work each of the last four years, but still paid me as if I had spent the day with him. Pop liked my Pokemon, I figured. Or at least he liked that I liked training them.
Pokemon was it. Some kids wanted to be firemen or astronauts, doctors or lawyers, movie stars or athletes; but ask any of them what they’d buy with that sweet lawyer paycheck and you’d better believe it was “a shiny Ninetales” or “a huge pool big enough for my Lapras.” Some of my friends really did dream big, but I admit I wanted it too. Every year I went down to that tournament with my team and a curiosity of what the first place trophy felt like.
I never would find out, but there was no doubt in my mind that the glory would feel better than any cold brass ever could. Each year I got a little bit closer, but I also understood the competition better. I learned everything from those trainers and as I examined my abilities, my Pokemon, my limits, I realized that I might not ever win. I might never feel the glory of victory like so many of the others had.
I couldn’t understand how the Victreebell was dealing so much damage to my Slowking. Slowking has always been...slow...but usually he stands a great chance against grass-types. Most of them are almost as slow as he is, not to mention a good psychic knocks the poisonous ones out. This Victreebell, though. This Victreebell was faster than any I had seen.
A lot of the kids in town have money, I was wracking my brain now. I heard they give their Pokemon lots of supplements to make them stronger. This was my last chance at winning this tournament. This was as close as I had ever come.
It’s not just the speed, I thought. Victreebell kept using this attack. The light shined so brightly in the sky and from its petals that I was forced to squint. Slowking was nearly blinded by the beams knocking it back. His defense against special moves likely kept him from being knocked out in one hit, but I still couldn’t figure out what was happening. Flash doesn’t do damage like this, but this CANNOT BE SOLARBEAM. Giving in, I squeezed my eyes tightly and looked away from the match.
After shaking the champion’s hand, I turned to visit the Pokemon center before leaving for home. The image of my place atop the victory podium had been replaced with one of me heading home to Pop, telling him that I had almost won again. I walked up to the counter to speak with the nurse, who was beaming as usual. Everything inside a Pokemon center is white. White counters, pearl tile, eggshell uniforms, and smiles filled with bleached teeth.
Maybe that’s why he stood out so much.
I noticed one man in a brown suit, dark crimson tie, and a matching pin on his left breast. It looked like a suit Pop would wear to church tomorrow: formal but not too fancy. He approached me and he reached out his neatly manicured hand.
“Nice match today, son.”
“Thank you, sir,” I mumbled. I realized I was staring at his brown loafers. They had laces so they probably weren’t loafers but to this day I don’t know what those are called. “I was still getting over the shock of my opponent’s strategy.”
“Sir,” the man chuckled. “There’s no need for that. My name’s Ricky. I’m a Pokemon battling coach over at Pallet Institute. I wonder, Alwyn, if you’ve ever considered going to college.”
CHAPTER 1
Classrooms always made me nervous. I had long believed that desks were specifically designed to make a student feel a certain way and, whatever that way was, I was definitely feeling it. The plastic chair curved out at my lower back, prodding me into an upright posture. I tried to rest my arms on top of the desk, but it was sunken so low that my elbows hovered as I attempted to hold my head up. The desk’s legs were uneven. I had pushed my weight to the back of my seat, leaving the front left leg to dangle above the tiled floor.
The room was almost completely silent; and all the lights were off. I could see that one switch was flipped on, but that was the extent of my willingness to investigate. Besides, my own voice was sarcastic, I’m just getting comfortable.
Sighing, I lowered my cheek into my palm. My haze was abruptly broken by a feeling of weightlessness, which was followed by the steely clank of my front-left leg smacking the classroom floor.
I sat completely still.
The sound bounced off the walls, searching for companionship in the emptiness. I feared that it would be alone forever, but in my intense concentration, I noticed the clank interacting with some other players. There was the scratching of pen and paper in front of me and the defiant chewing of gum behind. The community put me at ease. As much ease as can be had in that situation.
I craned my head in a not-so-subtle exploration of my classmates, but it was impossible to make out the faces around me. To my left near the front of the room a girl vigorously marked her open notebook--the pen scratcher. She was hunched over and her cap pulled low, as if she was hiding from someone.
Maybe she turned all those lights off.
An auburn ponytail poked out the back of her cap and reached down to the neckline of her red and white striped t-shirt. She was hunched over, but I could see that she was well built. If it weren’t for her hair and earrings, she might have passed for a boy about my size. I looked her over again.
A boy my size...with thicker arms. Much thicker.
As she raised her eyes from her work, I darted my gaze out the window behind her. It was too late; I caught a glance of her steely grey eyes. I exhaled as she ignored me and returned to her work.
Behind me reclined the girl’s apparent opposite, a tall boy who already had his feet up on a desk. He used his cap not to cover his head, but his face as he apparently dozed off. His dark curly hair formed a small afro that stuck out of the top of his mask. It was large enough that I wondered if he could fit the cap on his head if he wanted to. He wore a white button-down shirt and a green blazer. His slacks had recently been pressed; I guess he wasn’t into loafers, as he proudly placed brand-new sneakers atop the desk in front of him. His arms reached behind his back as he began to stretch. The only other movement I could see was the rising and falling of his chest as he hoped to drift back to his dreamland.
The third student sat to my right all the way against the wall. He was taller than me, but probably about my age. His plaid shirt was stained with grass and mud, and his jeans were probably one or two sizes too short. His straw-colored hair was a mess, but he ran his fingers through it once or twice, probably in hopes of being a bit more presentable. Like the other two, he was focused on the task at hand. In his case, the task wasn’t work or sleep, but the twirling of a pencil. I wondered if he was as nervous as I was. Footsteps coming from outside caught the room’s attention. Suddenly, the door crashed open.
“WHO was the FIRST one here?” The voice shouted into the darkened room. I shielded my eyes from the light forcing its way in through the doorway. I could vaguely make out the imposing shadow, but it didn’t take me long to figure out who was speaking.
“I was, sir.” The boy playing with the pencil looked up and raised his hand.
“MISTER Holt,” he replied gruffly, “can you please tell us why you chose only to turn on ONE of the lights?”
I recognized this man’s voice. Coach Gold and I had spoken briefly when he had offered me a scholarship to attend PI to join his Pokemon battling team. I dealt mostly with Ricky, who was one of his assistants. I was happy to work with Ricky since I quickly became intimidated by my new boss. My initial impression of the coach was about to be confirmed.
“Forget it,” he stormed to the light switches and threw them all into the on position. “I don’t care what your reason is. But can anyone. ANYONE. AT. ALL. tell me why none of you, upon walking into a dark room, chose to get up and do something about it?”
Save the buzzing of the lights, the room became completely silent. I held my breath and prayed that my seat would not tip.
“Apathy…laziness…complacency...timidity,” Coach Gold was writing on the board now. “These are the traits you have displayed this morning.” The first thing I noticed about Coach’s voice was his affinity for exaggerated annunciation. “You have all set a perfect example of what we will E-LIM-EN-ATE before our first match of the season.”
My eyes adjusted, and I could finally see my surroundings. I focused on Coach, who looked to be a little less than six feet tall, but stood perfectly straight up. His right arm reached way up to write as high on the board as possible, which stretched his red jacket above his waistline. I had seen Pokemon coaches before, but they were rarely dressed as well as Coach Gold. He wore a clean suit, completely crimson—like the color of the girl’s blazer. His shoes were white and polished as if he had waited until he walked into the building to put them on. His belt and shirt were also spotless and white, as to match his shoes. He carried a whistle, but it was tucked into his breast-pocket. I could only see it thanks to the thin white string that hung down. As he turned around, his necktie briefly swung before hanging straight down. It matched his suit, as well as the flag that hung in the school courtyard, and ended just touching the top of his belt.
“You will work HARD to meet my expectations or you will be gone. And sadly,” he sighed, catching his breath, “THIS is the bottom of the barrel right now. You won’t have anywhere else to go but home.” Coach’s expression was more measured now. He stopped huffing and stood still, making me even more wary than before. I sat up straighter than I had been, expecting a long speech and hoping not to draw the room’s attention. I thought for a moment about what my father was doing—and why I hadn’t chose to just stay at home and work with him.
I looked into Coach Gold’s eyes like I would have if Pop were lecturing me. His face was perfectly rectangular all the way up to his peppered grey and black hair. It was styled to go straight up, each strand standing at attention and ending at the exact same place. His voice expressed all his emotion, as only his mouth moved as he spoke. Wrinkles dug deep into his face as though he had been practicing the same facial motions for his entire life. His eyebrows, straight and silver, pointed slightly downward toward his nose, but everything else on Coach’s head was perfectly perpendicular to the rest.
“You have all been brought here for a reason. EACH of you is here to win Pokemon battles. This institute of higher learning wants you to win SO. BADLY. that they are willing to offer you their extremely expensive product, education, for FREE in order to do so.” He turned around and began writing again. A list was developing on the board behind him. “There is a great opportunity in front of you.” His voice wavered in rhythm with his darting arm. “I am counting on you to follow my instructions so that you may avoid squandering that opportunity.”
With those words, he placed his marker down, slowly. Coach turned around and walked to the exact center of the desk. He held his hands behind his back and feet spread apart.
“My name,” he boomed, “is COACH James Gold. I was born and raised in Viridian City. My strongest Pokemon is a CLEFABLE.”
As he began his next sentence, a loud chuckle escaped the teeth of the boy reclined in the back of the room. Every muscle in my body was deciding between sitting straighter than ever and turning completely around. The boy confirmed my fears before I could choose.
“I’m sorry COACH,” mocking the man at the front of the room. “You’re just acting all high and mighty and then…Clefable? What a joke.” He howled at the stone-faced man.
“Mister Atkins,” Coach Gold replied calmly. “We will discuss the discipline for your outburst later in a private setting. Rest assured you will regret the actions you have chosen.” Coach remained expressionless; his voice was unusually calm.
“For the sake of your TEAM—excuse me.” Coach paused, and then collected himself. “…your teammates, would you care to explain why you consider my Clefable to be a joke?”
“Well, boss,” the boy was standing up now, “I’ve studied Pokemon for a long time. I’ve had lunch with and picked the brains of some of this world’s best minds on the subject.” He was now walking up to the front of the classroom. “As you know, I grew up in the home of Silph’s greatest engineer.”
The boy stood right in front of Coach. Counting his hair, he was almost a foot taller than Coach Gold, though considerably thinner. His hat no longer covered his face, but dark sunglasses shaded his eyes. He looked down towards Coach, hoping to catch the man’s eye. Coach continued to look straight ahead.
“But it doesn’t take a genius to know that Clefable sucks as a battler. It’s just a bad version of Blissey, which is little more than a physical wall if trained properly.”
Coach finally tilted his head upward to speak with the boy he called “Mister Atkins.”
“Thank you.” He said, and then took one step to his left in order to address the class unobstructed.
“Mister Atkins has shown us that knowledge of Pokemon is valuable in determining the strengths and weaknesses of your opponent.” Coach spoke very slowly now, choosing his words carefully. “In light of his brief diatribe, I am now further aware of a number of his own strengths and weaknesses. At this time, I would be very happy to teach you all what I have learned from him and how any of you might use it in a Pokemon battle.”
Though Coach Gold was now addressing us all, the boy had not turned around. He had not moved at all.
“Unfortunately, I am confident that Mister Atkins will continue to abhor the classroom setting until further steps are taken. With that being said, we will all take a detour to the gym. Mister Atkins, you will choose one Pokemon to battle, and I imagine handily defeat, my Clefable. Please all of you gather your things and follow me.”
Last edited:
