The next fifteen months passed slowly. Ran spent his time working for Kurt and the Charcoal Kiln on weekdays, forays into Ilex Forest and the area immediately surrounding Azalea Town slowly growing bolder, whilst spending his evenings and weekends preparing for his eventual journey. This ensured his days were always filled productively, but his rather monotonous day jobs hardly made the time pass quickly.

At least the time spent working with Ekans flew by, his starter progressing slowly but measurably over the course of their training. To keep track of said progress, Ran spent a lot of time researching, taking notes of known training methods before having to scratch most of his notes out when the reality his limited means posed, asserted itself on his ambitious flights of fancy. Still, he’d eventually worked out a decent system to measure a number of physical baselines.

Unfortunately, where progress had been both significant and consistent at first, Ekans’ growth had noticeably slowed over the past months. For a moment, Ran had hoped that this might indicate an impending evolution, but although Ekans had shed twice since being captured, each time increasing noticeably in both size and weight, he showed none of the physical markers Ran’s extensive notes mentioned as reliable indicators of approaching evolution.

Thus, the unappealing conclusion he’d come to was that they were reaching the limits of what their current training could amount to. With almost nine months left until he’d receive his CGC - Common Gym Challenge license - and set out on his journey, he had limited options available, outside of battling, that’d allow him to push Ekans further.

So he had run the numbers, with Spencer, who had become a valued friend and training partner on the weekends and who’d be his traveling companion in the future, double checking them just to be safe. They’d come to the conclusion that Ran’s savings allowed for two distinctive solutions to the risk of stagnation.

Firstly, he had enough saved up to order a few specialized training items, such as weighted resistance bands and grip strength springs. This would likely allow Ekans to pick up right where his training had started dropping off, and guarantee he’d be well beyond what anyone would expect from an unsponsored rookie’s starter when they set out in nine months. Spencer was heavily in favor of the idea, even offering to chip in on the cost of purchase, as long as he’d also get to use the acquired items once he got a Pokémon that could make better use of them than Bunker the Pineco could.

But Ran had opted for a second path, which Spencer had only grudgingly acknowledged as equally plausible. If his only current pokémon couldn’t progress much further under the circumstances, Ran would just have to expand his roster, so that Ekans would have team members to train alongside and compete with.

Thanks to Kurt’s generosity, Ran was in possession of both a Level Ball and a Friend Ball. This, combined with some very careful budgeting, should make it possible for him to add two new pokémon to his roster, assuming he was realistic in his goals. An Onix, for example, would bankrupt him in a matter of days.

The ensuing discussion with Spencer had been particularly heated, as they’d disagreed quite strongly on who Ran’s two additions should be.

Ran had initially expected Spencer to sulk when he’d announced his intent to go for two new team members over the purchase of expensive training equipment. But Spencer hadn’t even blinked, merely expressing his personal disagreement before immediately pivoting towards suggesting Slowpoke and Poliwag as the best possible options for Ran’s team. The swiftness with which he’d moved on had caught Ran flat footed at first, rendering him mute long enough for Spencer to start extolling the virtues of the suggested water-type pair.

He’d argued that between Hypnosis and Yawn, they’d be the perfect additions for the initial stages of their shared journey. Additionally, with both being water-types, they’d give Ran a leg up with Gym Leader Walter, perhaps to the point that the old man might offer some training or some other form of support. It was a tempting proposition, as the backing of the Gym Leader, even if not in the form of a sponsorship, held a lot of weight. But after a moment’s hesitation, Ran had held firm in his decision.

He’d firmly reminded Spencer of Ekans’ poison typing, pointing out the lacking synergy between his starter and the pair of Slowpoke and Poliwag. It’d stopped Spencer’s enthusiastic planning for a while, as the conversation had derailed into the merits of specializing in a type compared to building a generalist team.

Ran was firmly convinced that specializing in a single type was the better option. It was the more challenging path by far, with each type presenting distinctive weaknesses to any aspiring specialist, but for those that managed it, the reward was great. After all, it was a commonly accepted fact that a type-specialists’ pokémon could eventually reach a higher skill ceiling, than those of a generalist.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

Spencer disagreed firmly, stressing the benefits of a generalist approach: the easier availability of team members, the option of having a type advantage against any challenger, the lack of any opponent that could ‘hard counter’ your team, the speed boost offered by a dedicated ‘mobility’ pokémon and finally the ability to tailor build your team for the first few gyms on your journey. It was the more common path amongst rookies with good reason, as the odds of success were substantially better for those just starting out.

Neither of them disputed the other’s arguments, but the value they ascribed to each argument clearly differed. Spencer strongly urged Ran to go for a generalist team, to ensure their first months would be a success, but Ran for his part was firm in his decision. When his friend finally realized that he wouldn’t be swayed from specializing in a single type, Spencer returned the conversation to its earlier topic.

He once more suggested Ran capture a Poliwag and a Slowpoke, arguing that water-types offered a lot of upside and would make for a fine, versatile specialization whilst scoring him some points around town as well. Caught off guard by Spencer’s insistence, Ran had merely tapped Ekans pokéball insistently, reminding his friend of his starter’s existence.

The next few minutes had seen things devolve from a debate to a heated argument to an outright fight. Spencer first callously suggested that Ran merely keep Ekans around until he had five water-types, before retiring, releasing or selling the poison-type to clear a spot on his team for a sixth water-type. Ran furiously shut that avenue down, angrily insisting that he’d stick with his starter no matter what Spencer thought he could suggest.

Spencer hadn’t seemed to realize just how angry his dismissiveness was making Ran, as he’d then suggested that Ran could keep Ekans around as moral support, whilst eventually having his future ‘more useful’ pokémon do the bulk of the work. That hadn’t sat with Ran any better, as he angrily questioned how Spencer would feel if he were to speak about Bunker in the same way.

Unlike Ran however, Spencer hadn’t gotten angry at all, merely shrugging before stating that in his long term plan, Bunker would serve a purpose on Spencer’s eventual team as his designated Explosion-user. Ran was so baffled by Spencer’s callous response, that he couldn’t immediately muster a response. With Ran unresponsive, Spencer seemingly assumed that he was getting through to the other boy, as he asserted that Bunker would at least have value on his eventual conference team, unlike Ran’s Ekans, who Ran would be better off dumping for a team member with more potential.

When Ran had finally mustered a response, it hadn’t been a particularly well-argued one, with anger dominating his actions and muddling his recollection of the fight. All he knew for sure was that he’d ended things by storming off angrily, leaving an unapologetic Spencer behind.

They hadn’t spoken for two weeks following that debacle, with Ran waiting for an apology and Spencer unwilling to offer one. This had left Ran stuck without his sounding board, but he’d soldiered on regardless, now even more firm in his decision out of sheer stubbornness if nothing else. In short order, he’d listed the poison-types he was confident he’d have access to and summed up their pros and cons.

In total, he had four realistic options, all of them present in Ilex Forest: Weedle, Spinarak, Oddish and Zubat.

Immediately, he disqualified Weedle from the running. Though Beedrill was a fierce battler, the entire line was notoriously fragile and Kakuna in particular was hellish to train. That, plus its bug-typing, reminding Ran both of Bugsy and Spencer, whom he was currently less than fond of, was more than enough for Ran to hardly spare it any thought.

Initially, purely for its bug-typing, he was inclined to eliminate Spinarak just as swiftly as Weedle. Still, doing his due diligence, he did note a few positive points down as well. Spinarak’s webs offered a lot of versatility, its ability to slow down opponents offering an interesting tool none of Ran’s other options could match.

Next was Oddish, one of the three grass-poison types native to Indigo. Its spores offered a great ability to apply status effects and its ability to learn the full Absorb-line of self-healing moves gave it great staying power in a fight, if utilized properly. Unfortunately, it had little actual power and was desperately slow, leaving it especially vulnerable to opportunistic flying- and fire-types.

Finally, the only choice Ran immediately locked in without giving it much of a second thought, was Zubat. The only true poison-flying type in all of Indigo, the many challenges that came with training the notoriously skittish and fragile Zubat would simply have to be surmounted. To Ran’s mind, aspiring poison-specialist that he was, the sheer mobility offered by the Zubat-line, combined with the readymade answer it offered to his chosen typing’s weakness to ground-types, essentially made it a must-have.

For his second slot, though Oddish initially appealed to him more than Spinarak, he eventually opted for the bug-type after all. It was a slightly negative choice, as rather than being convinced by Spinarak’s positives, Ran found he simply couldn’t settle for an Oddish as his grass-type. If he wanted to become a great and powerful specialist, he’d need the best of the best. Which meant he’d eventually need a Bulbasaur. It was extremely unlikely he’d actually manage that particular feat, with the Bulbasaur-line being Kanto-native, rare, protected and ludicrously expensive, but settling for an Oddish right at the start felt too much like admitting defeat.

Thus, his choices made, Ran set out into Ilex Forest late one Friday evening, Ekans by his side and two empty pokéballs on his belt.