Xeno was crossing his legs while sitting in the air. As he held a Joltik in a psychic hold, he spoke. “Since the class is over, I would like for you to explain everything in detail. Why do you have a newborn wild Pokémon with you? And why I’m getting a weird energy reading from it?”
“So um…” Claire started, there was no way out of this, they were so caught. Claire sighed and looked at the small spider. “I’m sorry John…”
John looked away and scoffed. “I knew we would be getting in trouble for this…” The psychic ladybug looked at John in wonder as the yellowish-green Joltik looked back at him with a bit of disgust before sighing. “So um… I am a human…”
The Orbeetle’s mouth went agape for a bit before looking away for a brief second. “Are you really telling the truth small Joltik? That is a really bold claim any Pokémon can make here.” John nodded. “Hm… I guess some things about you really back up what you say… do you mind if I check your memories to see if you are saying the truth?”
The trio of students looked at themselves with frowns on their faces as John stammered while flailing his limbs wildly in the air. “Wait, wait, wait! Read my mind? Isn’t this like an invasion of privacy or something?”
“Just a quick check, I won’t go in too deep into your mind.” John looked away, thinking if it was a really good idea for a space-looking bug to look into his memories. “So… could I?” It took a moment before the shiny Joltik slowly nodded. “Alright then, close your eyes.” John did as he said and Xeno closed his eyes as well.
“So did John tell him about himself or about his past?” Taro whispered to Claire and she thought about it.
“Well… he said that he was no hero and uh… that he was an adult before being born again. And I guess you know about his fear, right?”
Taro and Amy nodded and they looked back on the two bugs.
Xeno had successfully entered John’s mind.
When psychic types enter a person’s head, their mind makes a link and a mental figure of the psychic type appears on the other person’s head. In this case, the Orbeetle had made a mental apparition in John’s mind, meaning that he can roam around his memories like a third party that saw what the other person experienced from a distance. However, he could get close to the people inside someone’s memories, but they would never notice him there.
At first, when Xeno entered the Joltik’s head, he would’ve expected it to be a lot more empty, but instead, it was filled with stuff that he didn’t expect. He looked around the place, he was in some weird street at night. However, this street wasn’t any street he recognized from either Burgroth or Xander Cage, he would know since he has a really good memory.
The ladybug started hearing voices, so he looked to the source of it and found four creatures he had only seen in pictures on the internet… humans. They were four males, it seems like they were chatting about something. Xeno didn’t eavesdrop since that wasn’t really necessary, he got what he needed.
The Orbeetle was about to leave before he spotted two other humans going in the direction of the four, however, one of these people had a mask covering their mouth and the other had some kind of helmet covering their head. The other humans looked at the two in nervousness when one of them pulled out some kind of black rectangular object with a hole in the front and pointed at one of the four.
Suddenly, one of them, a man with blonde hair and blue eyes acted fast and punched one of the attackers in the face-
Bang!
Xeno fell on the ground along with John, losing control of his levitation for a moment. The teens ran to check on them in worry.
“John! Mr. Xeno! Are you okay!?”
“What happened!? You guys suddenly yelled and fell!”
“Any of you need healing?”
Xeno was the first one to sit up after putting a claw on his head, John getting up right after. “Don’t worry kids, we are both…” He glanced at John for a second. “Alright…”
“Ugh…” John looked at Xeno with a grimace. “Is that proof enough…?”
Xeno looked at the small spider, pity covering his whole expression. “… yes it is.” The teacher hesitated in speaking more but did it anyways. “Hey listen… if you ever need, I can… indicate a therapist for you if that’s alright.”
John looked down and muttered. “I’m fine…” Claire looked at John a bit in worry, what did they see there?
The Orbeetle started floating again and looked at the three students. “I have a question for you three. Which of you are responsible for taking care of him?”
Claire raised her paw. “I am, my family also knows about him.”
“Great, then I have a suggestion.” The teacher crossed his arms. “You could have John apply for Obelisk High.” The students looked at him, looking for confirmation. “Yes, since it will be quite hard to hide someone due to the nature of Pokémon, you could make him a student here so you don’t have to worry about that anymore.”
“But… what if the director doesn’t agree? He’s a wild Pokémon…” Amy said looking away.
“That Houndour of your class is a wild Pokémon, isn’t he?” The students raised a metaphorical eyebrow at him. “Oh, you didn’t know? Ah well, at least you get the point, besides I bet the director won’t mind a new application at the beginning of the cycle, wouldn’t he?”
Taro thought about it. “Yeah, I guess he wouldn’t…”
“Well, you decided between yourselves, I got another class to teach.” Xeno started floating away. “See you next week kids.”
This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.
The students watched as their teacher floated away and they turned back to each other. “So what do you two think…?” Claire asked the spiky mouse and the hedgehog.
“Well, I think it’s a really good suggestion.” The spiky mouse said. “Think about it, you won’t need to hide John anymore and he could actually participate in classes without any worry of the teachers catching him.”
The hedgehog nodded. “And what’s better, he could get his status changed from a wild Pokémon to a transitioning Pokémon. Then the civilized Pokémon would treat him better rather than a snack all of the time.”
“Yeah, you guys are right!” Claire nodded then turned to the Joltik. “What do you think John?”
John looked up at them. He thought about it a bit but ultimately decided. “Yes, I’d honestly like not being seen as some sort of food all the time.”
“Then it’s decided!” Claire beamed and the group nodded smiling.
----------------------------------------
“What an interesting day…” Xenophanes said as he entered the teacher’s office.
It was an interesting day indeed. Asuri invited the school to visit their gallery of wonderful technology and advancements, he met a human and saw how he died, that was unexpected for sure. Why did he show that memory anyways? To prove a point? Point taken then.
He sat on his desk that was on the left of the room. He’d need to write the usual report of class, but… his mind wasn’t really feeling like it after that scene he had to witness. Hell, he almost lost track of the other class since his mind kept coming back to that. “John Kennedy, huh…? The fate of that poor human was rather cruel in my opinion… and now he’s probably here to save the world from some threat that he doesn’t even know about.” He rested the front of his head on his arm as he started thinking… before the door opened revealing a Porygon-Z.
“Good afternoon Mr. [aliens! They have come to destroy the world!!!!]” He said as he floated to the middle of the room looking at the Orbeetle.
“Morning to you too Mr. Zeta…”
The normal type tilted his floating head. “What’s wrong? You don’t look so [Gucci]. Some class was a hassle to deal with?”
“It’s not that.” He was debating if he should tell him the truth. That human disappearance streak going around the continent is a bit too much to tell the identity of a human to any Pokémon. But Zetamon was nice mon, even though those glitches that keep happening to him make him look a bit crazy.
“Then what is it?”
Xenophanes sighed. “I um… met a human today here at the school. Apparently, a trio of students were hiding him.” The Porygon-Z had a frown on his face as he looked away. It seemed like he was hiding something. “What? I can read your mind you know.”
Zetamon sighed and looked at Xeno. “So um… I might’ve known about him as well…” The Orbeetle raised his head. “He… kinda helped the kids [shredding and tearing everything apart] in the Jingle-Jungle Woods.”
“… Who else knows about him?”
“Ms. [Owl Lady.]”
The Orbeetle assumed that was the Decidueye teacher. He sighed. “Fine, I’ll be straight with you… I saw his last memory of his human life.” Zeta perked up at that. “He was out with his friends until suddenly two other humans came that didn’t look friendly. He attacked one of them and died because of it.”
The Porygon-Z crossed his nubs. “How did he die?”
“… I don’t know, one of those two shady humans in his memory pulled out what seemed like a weapon. Maybe that’s what the loud bang sound was…”
“Sheesh, now I feel bad for him.”
Xenophanes nodded. “After that, I suggested that he applies for the school. I don’t if they’ll accept or not, but we’ll see next week if we’ll get a new student.”
The Porygon-Z did his best expression of a grin without a mouth. “Can’t wait to see what can human knowledge do in my classes. After all, they did help build computers and cellphones, am I right?”
“That they did.” He agreed and Zetamon floated to his desk. The Porygon-Z was right, humans were smart, and whatever it is to be in John’s way in the future, he would overcome it as all the other humans in the past did. He could only hope that for such a small bug in a big world…
----------------------------------------
Claire, Taro, Amy, and John were on the bus on the way back home. The group was chatting normally until the Togedemaru came up with an idea. “John?” The Joltik looked at Taro. “So, I’ve been thinking if… you could come to my house tomorrow since it’s Saturday tomorrow, Claire and Amy could come too.”
John tilted his head and asked. “Why?”
“Well, since you have a lot of knowledge about the computers Asuri made, we can crack its secrets together, and figure out how the internet works and see if there are really humans on the other side of the screen. How does that sound? I got a pretty slick computer back home as well!”
John thought about it. He couldn’t check it before the bug teacher caught them, but since he would have more time on a private computer, he would have a lot of time to check it and plan ahead. “Sounds like a good plan to me.” The Joltik looked at Claire. “Claire, are you free tomorrow?”
“Unfortunately no… I got a battle class tomorrow.” The Vulpix answered a bit sadly before smiling again. “But I can take you there if you want.” She looked at Taro. “Mind showing me where you live?”
“No biggie.” The spiky mouse got his phone out of… somewhere and tapped on it with his small paws, then after a few taps he put his phone on his fur pockets on his back. “Done, the coordinates are in your DMs!” He grinned as Claire tilted her head in confusion. "Oh, it stands for Direct Messages, just something I gathered on my time on the internet."
“Oh, I see. Thanks, Taro.”
‘Wow, they already have each other’s contacts? Man, if I saw a rodent ever say DM back in my old life, I would've thought I was high or drunk.’ John thought surprised as the bus stopped shaking, Koraidon having stopped. Claire, John, and Elsa said their goodbyes and entered their house.
After taking their uniforms off, Claire took out her phone and opened her Instagram app. She put the phone close to John as she used it. “So you were saying that all of these accounts are humans?”
John swiped the screen up, seeing lots of the usual recommendations for Instagram pictures. Selfies, photography, art, some videos… it was literally normal Instagram. “… How did you not notice this before…?”
“Uh… I never used it until now…” The Vulpix said looking away sheepishly. “I wasn’t like… looking forward towards this whole internet stuff.”
The Joltik looked at Claire unamused. “You would totally be into it if you knew there were humans in it all along…” Claire laughed a bit sheepishly. “But yeah, these are humans… but now the real question is… how would someone respond if we show them ourselves…”
“What do you mean by that?”
“There is one thing that all humans fear, and that’s the unknown.” John explained. “They don’t know who we are, or what we are. That means, what if something otherworldly appears on their screen?”
“So… are you saying…”
“Yes, tomorrow for one of the tests of the internet, let’s call a human!” He said, a bit excited at the thought of talking to someone human again, even though it’s been almost four days in this world.
Claire was wagging her tails excitedly, her eyes glistening at the thought of talking to another human, but this time in their original form! “So can we do it now!?”
“No… I think it’s best to wait for tomorrow, this will be a part of the tests of the social media.”
“Aw, man… I can’t go because of the battle classes…” Claire whimpered like a sad dog.
John just thought how cute that looked if he wasn’t intimidated by the fact of being way smaller than her. “Hey look, how about uh… you and I call one of my human friends after I come back from Taro’s house?”
She gasped. “For real!?” John nodded before getting hugged like a plushy by the fox. “Thank you so much, John! This is why we’re the bestest of best friends!”
‘We’ve known each other for basically four days…' John thought before the excitement died down and Claire released him. He saw her smiling at him before he cracked a smile as best as a bug could. ‘But at least you are pretty nice in my opinion.’
“So… should we train until mom comes home?”
“Yes, let’s train a little.” With that, John jumped onto Claire’s back and she dashed towards the door to the backyard.