Chapter 2
“Bond with him closely,” he said. “And you’ll have a strong fighter.”
Red thought about the words of Oak five years later as he stuffed his backpack with the last potion he could get his hands on. After fitting it in with his cantine, he slung the strap of the yellow bag over his shoulder. He looked down to see Cinder looking up at him intensely, a mix of excitement and fear in his eyes. Red turned to see his mother’s expression was similar but it had no excitement in it. Only fear.
“Are you sure there’s nothing I can do to make you stay?” she asked, her black hair unkempt and not in its usual bun. “Please?”
“I told you,” he said. “There’s nothing here for me. No friends or adults want me since I can’t compare to Dad. Blue taunts me every day, Green barely wants to talk to me...even you can’t tell me anything except how I can improve to be more like my father. Just like all the kids here.”
“But it’s dangerous out there!” she yelled. “I think I read a statistic that said half of all trainers die when they go into the wild! If you-”
“You wanted me to be like my father and now you complain when I try to?!” Red yelled.
His mother looked like she was about to cry, her eyes watering. Red rolled his eyes before looking down at his Charmander. He then gestured for Cinder to follow as they walked to the door. Just as he opened the door, Red stood in the doorway for a moment to let the faint sunlight of early morning in.
“I’ll be champion the next time you see me,” he said. “Mark my words.”
He left with Cinder at his side as they walked down toward Professor Oak’s lab. While Red usually would keep his head down so he didn’t have to look anyone in the eyes, there was no one out at this time of day as it was still mostly dark. It wasn’t long before walking through the short cut grass to find the wide, flat roofed, whitish gray building near the edge of town.
When Red opened the door to the lab he found the lab had assistants at tables or looking at Pokemon. There were shelves of books and Pokeballs to the sides as well as more than a dozen computers. Most everyone was wearing a labcoat and carried a clipboard. At the very back was the town hero, Samuel Oak.
“I won’t miss coming here,” Cinder said as they walked down to the end of the lab. “Everyone just examines us Pokemon like we’re specimens, barely treating us like we have feelings. Only one who respected us was Oak.”
When they reached the end of the lab was the professor standing in front of a table with fishnet bags of Pokeballs and other, unfamiliar devices. Beside him was Blue and Green as the two held hands. Green was giggling while Blue’s face was not far from her ear, obviously whispering something she found amusing into it. The Squirtle and Bulbasaur given to them were staring up with perplexed expressions, confused at their way of affection. The sight of the ring on Green’s finger made Red’s heart sink as he was reminded she was Blue’s fiance.
When I come back as a champion, we’ll see who she likes. He thought. My classmates who made fun of me...They’ll all change their tune once they see how strong I am.
When Blue saw him he leered at him while Green looked exasperated at his presence.
“Finally,” Blue said. “We’ve been waiting forever.”
“It’s only been ten minutes,” his grandfather said. “I waited for everyone to wake up. But now that you are all gathered here…”
He gestured to the Pokeballs and rectangular devices on the table.
“I’d like for you to take these,” Professor Oak said. “One bag each.”
The three fifteen year olds took a bag of Pokeballs from the table. Red looked in the bags to find there were five capsule devices in each one. After untying the bag and unloading them Red pressed the button in the middle of each ball to minimize. He then placed the miniaturized Pokeballs along his waist as the middle of them was fixed with an adhesive that would help them to cling to surfaces.
“Thanks gramps,” Blue said. “These will be useful for my battle with Brock.”
“The Rock-type specialist of Pewter City?” Oak asked. “You’ll have to trek through Viridian Forest before you can challenge him.”
“I know,” his grandson replied. “But the Viridian City leader is just too tough for a new trainer. Brock will be a good warm up from here on out.”
“That’s my grandson,” the professor said. “Confident, but cautious.”
“Blue’s hoping to become the highest ranked soldier in the Kanto military,” Blue’s Squirtle said. “Says we’ll be regarded as warriors beyond comparison.”
He then turned to Red.
“Will you also be taking the gym challenge, Red?” he said. “You’ve spoken about your interest in it before. Because if you intend to...please be careful.”
His already hard expression darkened with a steely glare. The gym challenge of Kanto was not a light thing to take on at all.There were two types of trainers: local, also called domestic trainers, and military trainers. The latter’s job was to control the wild Pokemon population by preventing them from interfering with human civilization and providing Pokemon for important economic purposes. They were usually not terribly strong and would often engage in crime but were necessary as the sort of blue collar worker of Pokemon training.
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Red, Blue and Green had acted that way for the five years since the professor had given them their Pokemon, beating back swarms of Pokemon that threatened Viridian or Pallet. However, considering the latter two were better at maintaining calm under pressure than him they were significantly better at such a task. Pidgeotto threatened to snatch humans away and Rattatta would attack groups of people traveling Route.
Military trainers, on the other hand, were superpowers of the trainer world. The gym leaders and elite four were amongst them as they were powerful trainers who held some amount of political power as they weren’t just people who put on a show for their audiences. They were employed as military leaders to use their battle hardened Pokemon in battle as they trained their Pokemon to be the strongest possible tools of war. Each gym leader and elite four was assigned a specific type to specialize in.
If a trainer was confident enough that they could defeat a gym leader it wasn’t just a sporting event the masses paid money to see. It was to see if there was a trainer that was more capable than a gym leader and if they defeated the gym leader. They’d immediately be offered a position as trainer in the military. The more gym leaders one defeated the higher their rank, salary and authority they’d have. However, traveling all over the region and catching Pokemon from various places was incredibly dangerous. While the exact percentage was unknown, it was certain that around three-fourths of the trainers that attempted the Kanto gym challenge died before attaining the eighth and final badge.
However, if a trainer managed to defeat all eight gym leaders in the region they then could take on the elite four, the strongest trainers in the Kanto military whose training regimen made the gym leaders look light in comparison. The elite four didn’t have time to take on every single new trainer’s request so you’d have to prove yourself before being able to battle them. But if you managed to beat one, you would replace them as the new elite four member.
Red’s father, Lance, was the strongest member of the four so everyone expected him to be as good as his father from a young age. From childhood, Lance had a certain sway over Pokemon that allowed him to gain control over them fairly easily and every in Pallet clamored to see if his son would have the same talent.
However, Blue seemed to be closer to Lance in ability to battle using Pokemon than he ever could. The boy was a town hero as many times as he’d saved people from wild Pokemon with his expertise. However, with the Pokeballs that Professor Oak was offering the three of them to begin their careers as trainers, Red was aiming to be the champion of Kanto, the strongest trainer there was.
Once I defeat my father they’ll be worshiping the ground I walk when I come back. He thought. Everyone will think it a crime they way they mocked me once I surpass Lance.
“Yeah,” Red said. “In fact…I’ll be so strong that Blue will wonder how he ever thought he could compete with me.”
Green sighed while Blue chuckled.
“Yeah, that’ll be the day,” he retorted.
Red waved goodbye before walking toward the door with Cinder following him. Blue smirked as he walked behind the trainer, going the same way.
“Wait, Red, Blue!” Professor Oak said.
He turned back and walked back toward the professor as the other boy did the same. The professor took one of the red, rectangular devices with a blue glass eyepiece on the table and held it up. He pressed a button on it to open it up to reveal it had a screen with a keypad.
“This,” he said. “Is my latest invention. A Pokedex.”
“A what?” Blue asked.
“It has data of all Pokemon that my team of researchers and interns have collected,” he said. “It’s compiled, all information of every known Pokemon in Kanto we could get since we’ve studied every Pokemon that we’ve got our hands on. However, there is information that is either non-existant or very scarce. My interns are too busy with their duties here at the lab to go out and catch as many Pokemon as possible. Besides, travelling all across the region is dangerous and my interns...can’t be paid enough for that. Isn’t that right, Green?”
The girl smiled and shrugged her shoulders. Green had been helping the professor out with his research for a while now, sometimes accompanying his interns on treks outside of Pallet Town. While Blue and Red had told the professor that their desire was to become the strongest trainers in all of Kanto, Green wanted to catch as many Pokemon as possible. She didn’t perceive them as living weapons like Red and Blue did but as genuinely fascinating creatures. It was expected that she would take a path different from the two of them.
“Yeah,” she said. “It can be...dangerous. Wild Pokemon...highway trainers and all that...but I’ll catch one of each Pokemon in Kanto nonetheless. You can count on me if not for those two knuckleheads.”
He and Blue glanced at each other nervously before Red looked back at the professor.
“So what you’re saying is…,” Red said. “You want us to catch one of every known Pokemon in the Kanto continent?”
“Not just that,” the professor said. “I want you to write in detail everything you can about Pokemon in the wild. In that way you might find out something new. But more so than that I want you to catch Pokemon that are not listed in the Pokedex. Those that are not listed in the Pokemon encyclopedia are not necessarily because no one’s ever found them, but because I was never able to get my hands on them because they were too difficult to attain. I want you to gather them for me, send the Pokemon you catch to me through the PC system and write your own conclusions you find of these Pokemon. For example, I haven’t been able to study a Machamp because they’re too aggressive and strong for most to handle. Or Cubone and Marowak since they only live in graveyards and hide themselves well.”
“But how many Pokemon are there in Kanto?” Red asked.
The professor smiled.
“Good question,” he said. “More than one hundred forty, possibly one hundred fifty.”
“Possibly?” Blue asked.
“Yes,” the professor stated. “There are mythical Pokemon that are only whispered of, so rare they only exist in legends. Such as…”
The professor’s expression became passionate.
“The legendary Mew,” he said. “I always wanted to see it. If you could catch it I’d be grateful to study such a rare jewel of a specimen.”
Red had also heard of Mew. Apparently, it was a Pokemon claimed to have been seen by people but no evidence supported their claims. It was said to be a mirage or hallucination, much like the three legendary birds that controlled the weather.
“But won’t it be difficult to catch all those Pokemon with just five Pokeballs?” Blue asked.
“That’s where I help you,” the professor said. “Catch me Pokemon, even Pokemon already recorded as I need to study individual specimens, every month and I’ll send you money. This way you can pay for your traveling expenses and buy new supplies. You don’t think I’d just give you Pokemon and pokeballs out of generosity, do you? You can undertake the gym challenge and I’ll support you so long as you aid my research. So, what do you all say?”
“I want to catch one of every Pokemon there is!” Green shouted. “It’s my life’s dream!”
“I guess I can do that,” Blue said. “Won’t be any skin off my bones.”
Red nodded.
To be the first person in Kanto to catch one of each Pokemon in the region. He thought. That will make me a hero for sure.