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30/06/2007 – 11:00 AM

We had finally made it to Jubilife City. From afar it looked like Melbourne’s CBD, a bunch of tall buildings and such pressed against each other in a grid. Up close, it was a lot less populated than Melbourne, and almost no vehicles. The six of us headed straight to the Pokémon Centre. As we were about to enter, however, Lucas pulled me back and motioned towards a man who looked to be attempting to be comically sneaky behind a lamppost.

“That man,” he commented. “What is he doing?”

“I don’t know.” I lied. “Want to go ask him?”

I already knew the identity of the strange man, but only the way he introduced himself would be fit enough to describe it.

The two of us walked towards him, his back was turned to us.

Nervously, Lucas exclaimed, “Um…”

The man spun around immediately, “WHAAAT?!” he yelled, loud enough to wake up Elaine sleeping in my arms, with a start.

“Va!” She yelled, ‘Vavuvah!” then turned around in my arms and tried to go back to sleep.

He looked to be in his late thirties, he was thin and had simple brown hair. He wore a tan trench coat and was fairly thin. He looked a lot like David Tennant’s portrayal of the Doctor.

“How did you know?” he asked abrasively, and in a British accent, “How did you unmask me as a member of the International Police?!”

“Huh? What?” Lucas asked confuddled, “I beg your pardon? I was just making conversation…”

“…Heh.” The man overacted, “You claim you were only making conversation, do you?” He shot a finger at Lucas. “But, I know better not to believe that. No, no, no.”

Each sentence was punctuated with wild arm movement that was very reminiscent of Hououin Kyouma, from Steins;Gate.

“You recognised right away that I was someone extraordinary. That is why you spoke to me, is it not? Your power of observation is fearsome! Quite admirable, you are!”

He then toned down his monologue. “Now that my cover has been blown, let me introduce myself. I am a globe-trotting elite of the International Police. My name… Ah, no, I shall inform you only of my code name. My code name, it is Looker. It is what they all call me. Incidentally, is the saying, ‘Don’t be a thief!’ familiar to you?”

Lucas, finally given the opportunity to speak, shakily said, “Um… Yes?”

“Of course, Looker,” I commented.

“Yes, that is correct,” Looker said, implying that knowing a phrase is the right answer. “Taking what belongs to others is wrong. Unfortunately, there are apparently those who do not heed those words.”

He dropped his voice to a near whisper, “In Sinnoh, in fact, there are criminals stealing the Pokémon of others. I have, therefore, been on the lookout for characters arousing my suspicion.”

“You mean like -” I tried to say before I was interrupted.

“Incidentally, you are Trainers, yes? Perhaps you can make use of this?” he held out what looked like a blue smartphone.

“You can take it, Lucas,” I offered.

“I don’t think… Can you take it, please?”

“Okay, if you’re sure.”

“That Versus Recorder,” Looker explained, “it is a nifty device for recording a match. I obtained it because it is quite popular these days. But myself, I do not do Pokémon battling very often. It will be better in your hands.”

Looker looked a look across the surrounding area. That was an easy pun, don’t be proud of it.

“Also, I have a request. If you were to see me again, I ask you not talk to me, for I am on duty.” He turned to walk off, only to do a double take and turn back. “Actually, yes, yes, you may speak to me. You must. Not because I am lonely, no, no! You must inform me of bad guys! You must inform me of any happenings!” Then, he was off. He ran away from sight.

We stood there in silence for a while until Lucas commented. “Working for the International Police must be hard.”

“Yeah,” I agreed.

“Should we tell him about Team Rocket?”

“I don’t think so. Team Rocket is only dangerous when they’re not near Ash, and there are honestly much worse criminal orginisations out there. Have you heard about Team Magma or Team Aqua in Hoenn?”

“Oh, yeah. One tried to cause a worldwide drought, the other a worldwide flood, right? They were on the news not that long ago.”

“Yeah, either would have lead to a lot of civilian casualties. It’s groups like those two that the International Police are after, not those three bumbling idiots following us around.”

“I guess you’re right. Ash and his friends are really good at getting rid of them, even with new Pokémon. Even Dawn could do it. I could only hope that my team and I become that strong.”

“Hey, don’t sell yourself short. You haven’t lost a battle before, have you?”

“Well, no but-”

“And I reckon you could easily beat us in a battle. Elaine isn’t bulky enough to survive your attacks.” I lifted my Elaine loaded arms to emphasise.

“Yeah, but you make up for it with brains. You know so much more about Pokémon than all of us combined.”

“No, I don’t.”

“No you definitely do, I mean, you know all about Legendary Pokémon, type matchups, statistics, moves, I mean, only Brock knew that same type attack bonus was a thing until you brought it up.”

“But Brock knows the best way to take care of Pokémon on an emotional level, and Ash knows how to create unorthodox strategies in battle. I don’t have any practical experience with that.”

“Well, what I mean is… You’re all a lot better than I am.”

Woah. That’s some intense inferiority. That’s… not good. “Stop that, don’t be mean to yourself.”

“But-”

“No but’s, Lucas, let me talk to you for a moment. Remember what happened at Lake Verity? You had the single-minded intention of finding your sister. Nothing could have stopped you. You blistered your foot on how hard you ran, you ran faster than Barry. You have tremendous willpower when you set your mind to something. I’ve learned a lot about you over the past week, you’re a lot more than you give yourself credit for. You remind me of a character from an anime I’ve watched, it should be airing right now actually.”

“What do you mean by should be?”

S*** “Sorry, I meant it is airing. Weird slip of the tongue there.” Please don’t look too much into it.

“It sort of sounded like you’ve seen it before it went on TV.”

“Yeah, it did hehe.” Enforce the mistake, enforce the idea I made a mistake. “Anyway, I’m talking about Gurren Lagann. You know about it?”

“I’ve seen the name on TV guides, but other than that, not really.”

“Well, the main character, Simon, (pronounced see-mohn,) has an inferiority complex, so his older brother figure, Kamina, who actually looks to Simon as inspiration for his fighting spirit, has this quote. Don’t believe in yourself, believe in the me who believes in you. And I believe in you Lucas, you have a lot of potential waiting to be released.” I mean, you’re the protagonist of the games. It’s not Dawn since she’s the anime version, which leaves you to eventually become the Champion. Unless the Elf guy wants me to do it.

“What does that even mean?”

“It means that, if you ever think that you’re not good enough, just remember that I think that you can do it and that, as you’ve said, I’m a smart person. Because I know that you can do it, you’ll know you can do it too.”

Lucas had no rebuttal, he was silent and let his head fall downwards.

“Lucas?”

“Y-you’re seriously using anime quotes to cheer me up?”

“Well, yeah… I’m a massive nerd.”

“You’re a weird guy, J-Jack.” Lucas’s voice was shaky.

“Yeah, I know. Are you okay?”

“Y-yeah, I just- I can’t believe t-that I’m- You’re consoling me over something so stupid.”

“It’s not stupid Lucas. I’ve gone through the exact same things you’re feeling right now.”

“Y-you? Really?”

“Yeah, really. Last year, I was in school, and I was really struggling. I kept getting worse and worse marks. I felt I couldn’t do anything. But I got through that, and you can too.”

“But, I’m not like you.”

“Remember what I said?”

Lucas didn’t respond.

“C’mon, you remember, don’t you?”

“If you think I can do it… then I should believe in you, right?”

“That’s it. C’mon, the others are probably waiting for us.”

“Yeah.”

“You sure you don’t want this?” I held up the Vs. Recorder.

“Heh, I’m sure.”

11:45 AM

We decided to take a break until lunch, which the Pokémon Centre served for free to travelling Trainers. Free food? How the heck Pokémon Centres were funded. Luckily they had multiple public PC’s that could connect to the internet, meaning that I could do valuable research on all the things that weren’t covered in the original material. Things like funding, politics, laws, things that would be common knowledge if you were to live in the world of Pokémon, but are too boring or risque for kids.

Turns out that the organisation that runs things like the Ever Grande Conference, and the biggest sports firm in the world, lead a large scale funding campaign that paid for Pokémon Centres and Pokémon Gyms. It was in order to get more talent onto the scene and allow for Trainers to become stronger naturally. When I say biggest, they had a monopoly on the world. They paid Pokémarts to keep their stock cheap and putting your advertisements during their events was as expensive as America’s Superbowl for just one local conference. Battles featuring Champions, between themselves across regions and between upcoming talent were just as, if not more successful. The firm was named The Pokémon Company and had a subsidiary called Game Freak that made video games about Pokémon in order to teach kids how to battle and inspired them to become Trainers.

Some digging into The Pokémon Company’s website, I found a list of laws about being a Trainer. The laws were summarised before going into detail in a fifty-page document.

“In order to own a Pokémon, you must have an official Pokémon Trainer ID. This can be in the form of an official Pokédex, a physical card or one of the other forms. Details on page 9.

You can apply to receive a Trainer ID after you have reached the age of 10, or under the consent of a legal guardian before the age of 10. More info on page 13

If under the age of 10, all activities with Pokémon must be done either within a public area or supervised by a person 10 years or older with a Trainer ID.

No individual can carry more than 6 Pokémon at a time outside of their residential home, and a separate Pokémon Carer ID must be in your possession if you care for more than 6 Pokémon at a time. Otherwise, Pokémon must be given to a trusted Carer, this includes “Bill’s PC Box System.” Information on the definition of “carry” on page 14. Information on Carer ID application on page 38.

A Pokémon Breeder ID must be in your possession when running a business allowing for the breeding of Pok é mon. All businesses of such must be labeled accordingly. More information on page 31.

Unreasonable cruelty towards Pokémon will result in the loss of Pokémon Trainer IDs and all other associated IDs. This includes but is not limited to; abuse, assault, extreme conditions, prolonged confinement, sexual assault, slaughter, theft, and others detailed in pages 16 to 30.”

Everything except rule six made sense to me. It was way too vague. What constitutes assault and abuse when battling with them is so popular? So, I spent far longer than I would care to admit trying to go through all the legal jargon of fifteen pages. In the most basic of senses, it said you shouldn’t do anything that either the anime or games have portrayed the evil teams doing to Pokémon. What was really interesting was what counted as sexual assault. Apparently, if the Pokémon in question gave informed consent, it was entirely legal. You were allowed to have sex with Pokémon. Surely this is taboo, right? Not enough people would naturally want to copulate with this world’s version of animals to want to legalise it, the backlash alone would make The Pokémon Company want to make it all illegal just to keep appearances.

A Wikipedia article (the Internet had the same websites as my world, like Google and Facebook,) all about the relations between Pokémon and people linked to another article, which detailed that it was legalised during a movement similar to the sexual revolution in the 1960s. There were a lot of black and white photos of people protesting alongside bipedal human-like Pokémon, though there was the occasional mammalian quadruped or even a six-legged Bug-Type. Some of the protesting signs read phrases such as, “I can consent,” or “I love my Trainer.” A few of them quoted what I found out to be a relatively well-known folktale that I knew a copy of which was in the Canalave Library. “There once were Pokémon that married people. There once were people who married Pokémon. This was a normal thing because long ago people and Pokémon were the same.”

Yeah… I should lie down now. That’s a lot to take in.

12:30 PM

After lunch, Ash and Dawn decided to continue training at the Pokémon Centre for their upcoming Gym Battle and Contest respectively. Brock decided to stay back as well, he didn’t say why, but we all knew it was to gawk at the Nurse. All the head nurses of the Pokémon Centres all seemed identical, but Brock was adamant that there were slight differences in all of them, like different eyelash lengths. Brock’s nice, but he could sure as hell be creepy sometimes.

Lucas, Misty and I all decided to take in the sights of the large city. When we came across a wood-built structure that was labeled as a “Trainer School. Free Visitation for Trainers,”

I suggested we all check it out. “I’d like to test my knowledge,” I told the other two.

“Why do you need to test your knowledge when you know pretty much everything they can teach anyway?” Misty snarked.

“To flex my intellectual ego of course,” I replied.

“Right…”

“Hold on,” Lucas exclaimed, “Isn’t that Barry at the chalkboard?” He pointed to a blonde haired boy with a white and orange striped shirt.

“I think so,” I lied. “Don’t you have a parcel from his mum you need to give him?”

“Yeah, it’s in my bag.” He said as he walked through the doorway.

“Who’s Barry?” Misty asked.

“Lucas’s neighbour and friend.” Which I already knew would be here, because that’s where he was in the games.

“Hey, Lucas!” Barry said when he noticed his pal entering. “Oh, you brought your older friend and… is that his girlfriend.”

“What?!” Misty and I exclaimed.

“No, Barry,” Lucas explained. “She’s not Jack’s girlfriend, and her name is Misty.”

“But don’t all guys his age have girlfriends or something?”

“Barry, stop. You’re hurting my pride.” I cried.

“Anyway, did you come to study, too?” Barry asked. “I went ahead and memorized everything that was up on the blackboard. After all, it’s the Trainer’s job to avoid having their precious Pokémon hurt in battle, right?”

On the blackboard was some basic information about the five main status ailments you can inflict on a Pokémon. Poison, Burn, Paralysis, Sleep, and Frozen.

“I… I guess?” Lucas replied.

“So, Lucas, what brings you?”

“Well, your mom asked me to deliver something.” He said as he grabbed a box wrapped in brown paper from his bag.

“Huh? You’ve got something for me?” Barry asked.

“Yep, here you go.”

Barry took the parcel and carelessly ripped it open. “Score! It’s a Town Map!” He exclaimed. “Huh?! Why are there two in here?” he said as he held up two booklets. “I like it a lot, but I don’t need two. Here, Lucas, you take one!” He said as he shoved one of the booklets into Lucas’s hand.

“Is this kid always this… intense?” Misty asked.

“Yes,” I replied without hesitation.

Barry hummed as he flipped through his new booklet. “Well, according to the Town Map, I guess Oreburgh City is where I should be going next. There’s a Gym, so it’d be perfect for raising my Pokémon.”

“I guess so…” Lucas commented.

Barry pocketed his map. “Well, I’m on the road to becoming the greatest Trainer of all time!” Then he began to run towards the door beside us. “See you around!”

Before Barry was gone, however, I reached out and grabbed the back of his shirt. “Hold on a moment.”

“What the hell, man?!” Barry exclaimed. “Let go of me!”

“Before you run off, let me tell you something.”

“Alright, but if it’s a waste of my time, I’m fining you!”

“Dawn’s going to be performing in the Jubilife contest in two days. You should stay and watch it.”

“Contest? I mean I guess I could, but that would be wasting valuable time I could be spending training.”

“I don’t know, I think you could gain some valuable insight during the battle portion of it, you might find some of the strategies the Coordinators use could be useful in regular battles.”

“Huh. You make a good point. Alright, I’ll stay in Jubilife until the contest is over.”

“There’s a good boy.”

I let him go, and then he was off.

12:40 PM

“Alright, tell me about the Poisoned status.” The teacher instructed.

I replied, “The Poisoned status when inflicted drains the health of the Pokémon over time. The status cannot affect Poison-Types or Steel-Types. There are two types of being Poisoned. The regular kind and the Badly Poisoned kind. Being Badly Poisoned means that the Poison becomes more potent over time, and is thus far stronger the regular poison status. Moves that can inflict poison include Poison Gas, Poison Sting and I think Smog, correct me if I’m wrong. Moves that can inflict Badly Poisoned include Toxic, Poison Fang and two stacks of Toxic Spikes upon switch in. The item Toxic orb can also inflict Badly Poisoned to the holder. The status can actually be beneficial to certain Pokémon, such as when they have the ability Poison Heal which turns poison into being healed or the Guts ability which gives an attack boost when Poisoned. And with a Toxic Orb in the hand of a Pokémon who cannot be Poisoned or benefits it, you can combine it with a move like Trick or Switcharoo to give that item to the opponent, thus Badly Poisoning them. Some other combos you can do is combining the Poisoned Status with Leech Seed or Protect so that you can stall the opponent while they can’t do anything-”

“Stop, stop. You can stop now.”

“Did I say something wrong?”

“No. You clearly know everything and even more than I know about this area of study.”

“Wait… more than the entire curriculum?”

“Yes. At least in this case.”

“That can’t be true. Ask me anything about what you teach.”

“I… fine. What types does the Water-Type resist?”

“Fire, not Rock, Water, Ice, and I think Steel?”

“Right. What is the fastest move?”

“I was almost going to say Fake Out, but it’s Protect, Detect and other protecting moves like that.”

“What can trigger Pokémon Evolution?”

“Depending on the species, experience in battle, time of day, it’s friendliness with its Trainer, evolutionary stones such as Moon Stones and Dawn Stones, Trading, knowing a certain move, being in a magnetically charged location, holding them upside down, being with a specific different species of Pokémon.”

“Wait… hold upside down? What Pokémon would that be?”

“Inkay evolving into Malamar.”

“I’ve never heard of them.”

“Well they’re right here,” I said as I pulled them up on my Pokédex.

“Ugh… see what I mean, you know more than I do.”

But I knew all of this stuff before I took Savant. Sure, I might have been quicker on the draw, but how can the education system based around Pokémon, in the world of Pokémon, know less than someone who has never seen a real-life Pokémon until a bit over a week ago?

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