Pokéumans: re-lived part 1 "From parallel worlds" Chapter 9 "A new normal"“So, how did it go young pokéuman?” “…” The shiny toxtricity in front of me smiled warmly and cocked his eyebrow in curiosity. “Is there anything you need to talk about? I’m supposed to help you in these visits you know.” “Why didn’t my ability help me? I was destroyed back there, with everyone to watch… I-I didn’t even want this, any of this.” I pleaded. “How are you so sure it didn’t? Sure, just because you may have an advantage it doesn’t mean that you’ll automatically be good at something.” Kalled said. “But everyone’s supposed to be good at this… we’re pokemon, that’s all everyone seems to talk about a-and I don’t know but I thought maybe it was supposed to come naturally to me b-but-” Kalleq cut me off before I could continue rambling. “Ah, that’s not necessarily true, some pokemon are stronger than others in battle, sure, but that doesn’t mean every pokemon is meant for battle, some pokemon heal, some provide services and every pokemon has their own set of skills that make them useful, every single one.” Kalleq argued. “And what about toxtricity? Aren’t we supposed to be punks? Y’know, aggressive, tough, cruel fighters? I’m nothing like that and I don’t want to be like that!!!” I shouted, Kalleq’s smile seem to drop for a moment as he went lost in thought for a moment, he stayed quietly before speaking. “Well… I suppose you could say that about us.” He then took a deep breath. “But personally, between you and me, I never cared for it, I never cared for battle, for toughness or for any superficial aspects, I went through my own path, I may be a toxtricity, but I could be any other pokemon just as much! It doesn’t define me, and I don’t think it should you, I think… I think I understand what you’re going through young one, and frankly, if there are people out there like us who don’t put all of our value on our toughness or our ability to battle, then they’ll be the ones that will forget about the tournament the easiest.” I held my head down for a moment before looking up “Do… do you think there are others like that?” Kalleq chuckled. “There’s already two of us; there will always be more.” I couldn’t help but chuckle as well. “Yeah… I suppose you’re right.” “Till we meet again.” And with that, I woke up I woke up quietly, not a sound coming from the room allowing me to peacefully stretch and rub my eyes to be greeted by the artificial light of- WAIT! “What the- Where’s everyone?! What time is it? Did I miss breakfast or…” It didn’t take a lot for me to realise what had gone on, walking over to Demian’s alarm, the one that usually blasted at ultra-high volumes and woke everyone up, it was fully switched off, I also noticed everything else that could be shut off was shut off and every curtain and door and anything that could bring out light in the area was tampered with to ensure it did so as little as possible. “SHIT, SHIT, SHIT, I BETTER NOT HAVE MISSED BREAKFAST!!” I screamed as I ran down the halls, my worst fears only being confirmed as I didn’t bump into anyone while running at tiring speeds, telling me everyone had already left their dorms and were possibly even already at school, I walked down all the way to the cafeteria, to find it predictably empty... it was then my turn to run all the way back to the academy area, even if I knew I’d already miss my first class, but before I made it back to the stairs I bumped into a familiar figure. “Rodri?” I exclaimed, I stopped in my tracks almost like a car pressing the brakes at the last moment, causing me to fall face first into the chesnaught’s fluffy body, luckily it seemed like he had already noticed me, and I didn’t take him by surprise. “Hey Lex! I’m so glad to see you, wait, shouldn’t you be in class?” he asked, raising his eyebrow in a tinge of worry that he seemed to try (in vain) to mask his enthusiasm. “I-I know I’m happy to see you too but t-that’s the thing my arseholes roommates made me sleep in so I could miss my class…” At that point I couldn’t go on, I was too exhausted, and I had to put my hands on my knees and take a long minute to catch my breath. “Do you… have the time?” Rodri shrugged for a moment; he raised an arm to look at a small band he had on one of his spikes. “8:32, they definitely won’t be able to let you in class at this hour I’m afraid, you’ll have to wait until it’s 9.” He seemed to let out a guilty smile, showing off his large lower fangs in full glory… which I didn’t recall being right for a chesnaught but I didn’t want to give it much thought, I also noticed he displayed a new article of clothing, a golf cap. I sighed, Rodri decided to continue, seemingly realising I noticed his new attire he commented on it with a blush. “Oh, this was a gift by a… friend of mine, ahem, but regardless!” He said as he then shifted the topic to something that, unfortunately only made me feel worse. “While you’re waiting we can catch up on how you’ve been doing! I saw you in the tournament yesterday though I never got to found out how you did after it, I hope you enjoyed it at the very least!” I looked at him with the most dead inside expression I could muster. “I never want to enter a tournament ever again.” He stared at me with genuine shock, something which made me raise my eyebrow in confusion “W-w-what? Why?! What happened there!” “URGH!! I never even wanted to get in there in the first place!! I didn’t want to draw attention to myself, not after being lumped with all the delinquents and borderline criminals of the base!!! I know that stupid Demian signed me up to humiliate me and his stupid fucking plan worked and guess what!! It would’ve been ONE thing if I lost a battle, it’s another to make it to the second round without any motivation only to get absolutely decimated by a FAR more experienced fighter for EVERYBODY to see!! And all people will think is that I, a newbie who already has a bad reputation, has trouble with people and looks like someone who’d hold you at gunpoint on the street seemingly got cocky and arrogant and entered a serious competition without any training!!! T-t-they all p-probably think I deserve that h-humiliation, but I didn’t want any of this… a-anything.” I was at the verge of tears, but I forced myself to stop after I realised, I had been salivating and I didn’t want to risk releasing any potential acid or toxins, I took a deep breath and shifted to a neutral expression, wiping my tears as well, actions that felt all too familiar for me to do. “I… see.” Rodri spoke quietly, he didn’t seem to be in the mood to continue the conversation from that point. “I know full well you don’t trust him, a-and I’m pretty sure you don’t seem to like him at this point but, at the very least let the headmaster know about this, he’ll probably ignore it but that’s all I need, just… I need to stop thinking about this and head back to school.” I stated simply, the white-furred pokemon only nodded and left. I eventually made it back to class, luckily about time for the next one to begin, but it wasn’t any more pleasant than the rest of the day had been, the classmates weren’t even subtle with their murmurs and bickering, no doubt about the tournament, happening all over the classroom, several looked at me in disdain, others in preoccupation, but there was one exception, the Litleo that seemed to be my neighbour appeared disinterested at first, but as classes went on, I could notice him looking at me almost with an expression of pity? It… made me a bit curious as to what they felt, he didn’t seem like a bad person, but then again, he also hung out a lot with Raúl who I wasn’t looking forward to encountering in electric battle class. I could barely focus on any of the classes, despite waking up later it only made me feel even more exhausted and depressed, except however in social formation, where an interesting topic happened to be discussed: “We’ll be discussing the nature of Pokéumans, because yes, we are a lot more driven by instinct and our biology than humans, but it’s a completely normal part of us, a lot of us tend to feel wrong as humans because of how our behaviour is influenced by our physiology, but once our transformation happens most of us find ourselves comfortable with what we’re naturally wired for, you see a lot of fairy and psychic type pokemon at the medical staff, and that’s without even mentioning the amount of blisseys and audinos and comfeis that all flock to that job, but it’s in their nature, even when they were a human to gravitate towards helping and nurturing others, ground type pokemon are often a lot more comfortable in the sand, grass types enjoy the sun a lot more than other pokemon or humans, even individual species have their own patterns and behaviours that they naturally enjoy, cubones tend to be emotional and melancholic, and it’s something that comes naturally to them, alakazams tend to be intelligent and well spoken, so much so they’ve come across as arrogant to others in the past, but recent studies have shown that it is simply due to their brains being wired differently, and it’s normal for them, and it’s normal for you to, and what’s more, every single one of these abilities is helpful to our society.” The teacher explained. I scoffed, but I couldn’t help but wonder both through the same question that kept ringing in my mind then, What’s the use of “the punk pokemon”? All I’ve seen here is people be afraid or disgusted at me, and my own “kind” seems to do more harm than good. I swatted the thought away, surely this can’t be it, I’m not just naturally supposed to be rude and imprudent towards everyone and anything, I’m not gonna let myself be bound to what society has to say, especially Demian, we’re still human in the end and that’s what matters most! Only… was that really true? I had to catch my own thoughts right then and there, what if it is just natural for us? We’re another species, wouldn’t seeing this entirely through a human perspective be what pokextinction is doing? But then again maybe we shouldn’t let ourselves be controlled by our own instincts, we shouldn’t be told what to do, because that’s what they want. I had to put all of that on hold for the moment as I couldn’t reach a proper conclusion to that train of thought yet. Classes passed and I was surprised to see that even battle class was uneventful, for one Raúl decide to keep his distance which I found myself appreciating but also being intrigued by. By the time lunch rolled around I felt a sudden pang of hunger, I skipped breakfast sure but it still felt a lot stronger than it should, I considered briefly heading back to my dorm but I decided I should try to avoid confrontation especially when I’m this much on an empty stomach, I made it to the cafeteria with my supplies, fairly earlier than others, sat down in a table after being served a tray of breaded chicken, my favourite, it definitely lightened my mood and made me more approachable, I was about to finish when I was approached yet again by a familiar group of three. “Hey Lex.” Spoke the tatsugiri who seemed to lead the group, she was sporting a beanie with a cat themed design and a cute face, very different from her somber expression. “We wanted to apologise from what went on at the tournament, well, mainly Raúl.” The eelektrike rolled his eyes somewhat but did look rather upset at himself. “Look… I didn’t mean to shame you for your loss man, I just got curious about why you decided to participate in the first place and-“ “Raúl” Said Litleo. “Fine… fine, I’ll try not to pressure you further if that’s what you need, I’d like to apologize to Gael too but he mostly keeps to himself.” I couldn’t help but shrug. “I’ll let him know, I’m just tired at this point because I got signed up against my will but clearly no one’s going to realise that! But what do I care my reputation here was over from the moment I arrived.” I mused as I played with the little crumbs left over in my plate. “W-well in fairness you did have an unfair matchup and performed well on your first match, you did some unique things like using the English moves.” Whispered Litleo, looking away from the group, I couldn’t help but feel at ease, he was clearly the shier one of the group and I very much related, though it was definitely easier for him to appear as such compared to me and my grumpy old face. “I did also hear a lot of noise coming from your dorm the other day, they almost sounded like attacks?” Inquired Itzel “NO! W-well…” I didn’t really want them to get involved in something I’d inevitably want to learn how to deal with myself “It’s nothing you should be concerned with, I can deal.” “Well if you say so, but if you ever need somewhere to crash, we’re right in front of you.” I raised a brow, why were they all suddenly being so nice? They reminded me almost of how Gael acted when we first met, and like then I had no clue why that would even be the case, people see me as a bully now just by being alongside Demian and his associates, why did they behave differently? It was only Litleo who appeared to be amicable to me in class. “Well… I might actually, there’s some stuff going on today s-so mind if I-I… um, w-well, just for a few hours I think.” With that, the tatsugiri nodded and the group headed off to their own table and eventually the lunch period ended, when I made it back to my dorm, I looked over to the door in front of it, with a lot of nervousness, I knocked and I was allowed in, the atmosphere was tense for a bit and I was quiet, I stayed quiet even as everyone else slowly started to relax and ease off, chatting, playing stuff on the tv and generally hanging out while I simply stood in the corner, I couldn’t let myself relax, I had too much weigh in my mind, and eventually, after a slow hour, I left the dorm quietly and unnoticed. As I got out, I suddenly heard Gael’s familiar, albeit muffled, voice suddenly shout in what seemed to be pain, not having a moment to react, I practically banged the door’s touch activation open and I found Gael sitting alone on a bed, crying and holding his face in pain. “GAEL?! ARE YOU OK??!! WHAT’S WRONG?! ARE YOU HURT!!??!” I exclaimed, rushing to his aid as soon as I stepped foot inside. “L-Lex?!” Gael looked at me surprised, clearly he hadn’t noticed my arrival, and I saw it, a massive red bloody scar was present in his right eye, not only that, but similar scars were also present on his pincers, almost like sharp claws grotesquely piercing out of his body, his pincer tail was splatterd in blood as well, he also sported some shiny metal clips, one in his ear, two in his left wing. “What happened to you!! Did Demian hurt you?! Do you need to go to a hospital!!” I was practically grabbing him by the arm almost rushing him out of the dorm before he stopped me, clearly still agitated from whatever had been going on.“No!! No!! NO!!! No it’s just… It’s not blood it’s not anything painful it’s just… I think I might be developing hybrid traits, at the worst time possible…” The gliscor? Explained, as he was slowly start to find some composure. “Hybrid traits? Aren’t we already hybrids?” I asked, but before he could reply memories flashed in my mind, for a long while one could wonder how we could tell each other apart from others of the same species of pokemon and while people generally have different minor traits something that was common was for other pokemon to have certain aspects that set them out, that made them look like other pokemon, before I could continue my train of thought then, Gael shook his head and sniffled. “No, some pokemon well, it’s actually fairly common that, uh, we have traces of dna of separate species and combined that with our unstable combination of those genes and our human side, some of us develop mutations and develop traits of other pokemon we tend to favour… my second favourite pokemon is zangoose and well…” Gael started breaking down again. “I…I just sniff why now??? Why me??? Now I even look more predatory!!! I saw how you looked at me, I was covered in BLOOD, it may be a pattern but who’s gonna realise that?! It. Looks. Like. BLOOD!!!!” Gael continued to sob and I stood speechless, I found myself surprised yet also relating myself to him, I wanted to say something, but the part of me that was afraid of confrontation, of putting myself out there in fear of messing up was trying to suppress that urge like it always managed to do, and yet, there was something different this time that overpowered that urge, something that made me speak. “Gael… I’m sorry, I probably should’ve stood by your side today, you’ve been doing a lot for me all these days and I’ve been brushing it aside like it was nothing, I-I especially didn’t mean to ruin your cover with Demian, I let myself get carried away by my frustrations and well… I’m really sorry, and if it helps you… I don’t think you feel predatory, even with your new features, a-and I mean it!!! Whenever I see you smile I was at first surprised with how sharp your tooth were b-but it was honestly so sincere that it felt comforting, t-to me anyway, I never had that even as a human…” I looked away for a moment, feeling a little sheepish and, ashamed, to me it felt like I was doing more harm than good. “I-I want to be friends with you too y’know because… you’ve been so patient with me a-and I appreciate it like you have no idea and I r-really wish I was better at showing it!” To my surprise however, I saw Gael’s expression grow less weary, there almost seem to be a glinter of something in his eyes, admiration? Maybe? I didn’t allow myself to consider such possibility. “Y-you like my smile?” He asked shyly, I couldn’t help but chuckle “Y-yeah, honest! I actually think it’s a little ease-putting.” “W-wow… I never heard that from… anyone, I mean well, even I was trying to befriend you I’d never guessed you’d find me to be, well, assuring? I guess? I’m honestly not even sure I fully understand what you mean but I expected everyone would just see me as a hungry beast.” The gliscor sighed for a moment. “Especially now that I have claws shooting out of pincers, arceus, I look like an edgy internet OC, not helped by these stupid piercings Demian forced me to get… they both still feel painful, I had heard that developing hybrid traits is like a second transformation but experiencing it… it’s something else, it hurts, just like it hurts when I was first taken, when I was all alone.” “We’ve all been there, I’ve been there, you’re not alone, a-at least I’ll try to make sure of it, like you have for me, plus… I-I kinda like how the piercings look on you, n-not that you should keep them if they hurt or feel uncomfortable but you look cool, in an admirable way, not edgy or scary I think.” The gliscor grinned, in the same assuring way I described before he spoke with one single phrase. “sniff Thank you.” Gael sniffled once again, but quickly wiped away his tears (being careful not to accidentally hurt himself with his new claws) He then tackled me in a sudden glide-hug, which caused me to fall back into my bed, after we got up, we laughed and laughed, it was then I realised me and gael had truly something special, and that I should rightfully treasure it I just didn’t realise how special. “If I’m being honest, I’ve actually thought about getting a piercing myself, but my family wouldn’t even let me, not even an earring.” I commented “Really? Why’s that?” Gael asked, I rolled my eyes. “They thought it would look gay or some shit, it’s also why they don’t like getting me anything pink coloured even though it’s my favourite colour, it’s so stupid though like who cares if I’m gay!!” “Well… are you gay?” Inquired Gael curiously. “Nah, I just like pink man, and I’m just not really feeling like finding a girlfriend.” I commented “I see…” Gael added in a strange tone. “Well, neither am I.” A while after, someone knocked at our door, and slid a letter under it, we walked over and noticed it was from Rodri! “Huh… I think that might be for me.” I spoke “Did you get in trouble?” Gael ask with a much calmer than before twinge of worry “No, no, I think he might just want to see me, er…” I opened the card and excused myself to another part of the room to read it privately. To Lex I’m deeply sorry about what happened in the tournament, I offer my deepest condolences, and I hope it hasn’t brought you down, that said, I haven’t been able to keep your comment about having a dream messenger off my head, I feel like you might need some advice for training, I’m not saying you should enter a tournament again if you don’t want to be a battler, but it’s something to keep in mind, I’ll have to explain in more detail in person though, so please meet me at the cafeteria at 4pm, it should be vacant around that time so we should have enough privacy, with that out of the way, best of luck -Rodri “So… what does he want?” Asked Gael, I found myself thinking for a moment, should I tell him about my dream messenger? Even though I wanted to be better for Gael this time that sense of “inspiration” that kept me from taking the coward’s way out didn’t come, and I simply didn’t want to have to deal with a potential confrontation from telling a non prt member about this information. “He wants to meet up in the cafeteria at 4pm tomorrow, it’s just some… things we need to talk about.” “If you say so.” Gael spoke, we both decided to let the topic go and we focused on other things, we were talking about how we were doing at school when I ended up bringing up the topic of that day’s social formation topic “They were talking about the natures of pokemon and how they supposedly influence our behaviour, how cubones cry and alakazam seem arrogant and all that stuff, I’m oversimplifying but y’know.” I explained “I know what you mean, I also had a similar class, I scoffed at first in fairness but honestly? As time goes on, I’ve realised there’s unfortunately some truth to it, I can still get pretty aggressive and fierce at times, and I can’t deny how much I enjoy soaring through the air or burrowing myself in sand.” “Right… so what does that mean for me?” I asked, he looked at me in a slightly apologetic look. “Look man, I think it’s best if you just didn’t think about it, there will be stuff you can’t help but I’ve learned it’s best if you don’t just get carried away completely by what “feels right.” I merely nodded, we spent the rest of the day talking, up until Demian and Dylan returned, where the atmosphere immediately became thick, Demian almost tried to start a fight but with both Gael and I standing to challenge him Dylan ended up pulling him away, that didn’t me we were peaceful though as for what we couldn’t achieve physically we made up for it verbally, we practically argued with each other over the most minute things throughout the day, up until we were all too tired and dealing with massive headaches and we bitterly decided to call it a night. It took me a while to even feel a little restless, especially after being high on adrenaline and stress due to the arguments we had with our roommates, I found myself going back to Gael’s hybrid traits as a distraction, and then I slowly found myself going back to noticing several traits like these in other pokemon, Itzel I noticed seemed to have tiny little horns and blue and green spots all over, I wasn’t certain but they reminded me of a gastrodon? Raúl was a bit different, mainly sporting a greenish tint and slightly more translucent appearance to his skin, if I had to guess like of the reuniclus line but I wasn’t too sure, Litleo didn’t seem to sport any of this but, then again he was a base form pokemon, Rodri meanwhile had upside down fangs, and when I combined it with his general build, which wasn’t quite the one of a chesnaught, I realised he might have some emboar in him? I think I even noticed a red feather on his back, which was odd, eventually though, my eyes started feeling heavy and I drifted off. I was back in the cold northern-looking shore of the dream dimension, I was sitting holding my knees in my arms, waiting until I noticed him. “Young pokéuman?” Came from Kalleq’s voice, I turned over to look at the shiny toxtricity, I noticed however a new aspect about him, he was displaying a colourful necklace, lashes of several colours are hanging from his neck holding a large claw/tooth like figure. “I’m glad you appreciate this fine piece of jewlery, it was very important to the culture of my people when I lived among the living pokemon in your world.” “I… see, Kalleq.” Kalleq smiled. “I can sense you’re lamenting Lex, do not worry, I’m sure my culture still survives in the world in a certain way, the reason I’m showing you this is because I was able to feel your experiences in the woken world, it seems you’ve had a lot to think about?” I nodded. “Y-yeah um, you’re my ancestor, right? Do you happen to know anything about uh, that whole nature thing? What does that mean for us, f-for toxtricities?” “Don’t you remember what we talked about yesterday? It’s up to you to be your own self, and to be completely honest with you, you and I are very different people, you come from a culture much more developed in a way, millions of years past my time, there’s still a lot about you I’m still barely close to understanding, I have to rely on the connection I share with you to fully process it, but not only that, you’re way more than a pokemon, you’re a pokeuman, there’s a part of you that’s still human and still kicking as much as the part of you that is a toxtricity, and I even sense other parts too.” “Other parts? You mean I could potentially develop hybrid traits as well?” I asked. “Only time will tell, but what I’m getting at is that is that you aren’t just a pokemon, and you have greater potential that I or anyone from my time has, I can sense that you aren’t interested in battle but I still suggest you train your abilities, it will definitely help you in the future.” “But aren’t you supposed to help me with that?? I haven’t even gotten close at all to unlocking my ability?” I complained “And how are you so sure of that young pokeuman? I think you’ll find your ability will come more naturally to you than you think, it’s more like a great sense of determination that allows one to reach your goals easier.” The toxtricity put his hand on my shoulder. “But we’ll get there, I promise.” And with that, the space started glowing brightly white Once I got done with my default routine, which now included almost constantly getting into argument with Demian and Dylan whenever all 4 of us were in the room together, Eventually though time came for me too meet up with Rodri in the cafeteria, I grabbed the letter in case I needed anything from it and I walked on nervously not sure what to expect, encountering the green-shelled giant waving excitedly at me from a table. “Hey Lex!!! Glad you could make it.” I took a seat in front of the table. “What did you need me for?” I asked. “Well, first of all I’d like to say that I’m truly sorry about what happened in the tournament, still, looking over the footage of your matches I honestly feel like you’ve still shown a decent enough of initiative in your matches! Are you sure you really don’t want to become battler?” I groaned. “Ok, what’s this about? I really wasn’t that good in that tournament!! I had like, what, one good performance against a furret? Even I know that’s not impressive! if this is about the prt, I already told you I don’t want to be involved, look-“ “I get that! I get that!” Rodri interrupted. “I don’t want to suggest you do any of those things, you’ve made it clear to me before, but still, most pokeumans would not even come close to putting as well of a fight as you did this new into the base, I just need you to know that you can be a battler if you ever so chose to, you’ve got potential, heck, you’ve even got a dimensional messenger!! Surely that’s got to mean something for you! Lex… look, we’re all pokemon here, most of us tend to have an aspect of our lives we gravitate towards naturally, and I need you to understand something about me; even before I became a quilladin, I always wanted to be someone strong that could help protect others, but I never found the opportunity, because I struggled fitting in and I was alone, but then, when I became a quilladin, this need, this desire to help others who need to be protected, it became impossible to contain, it was then when I discovered who I really was, I found myself much more active, much more social, and I enjoyed it! It wasn’t like when I was a human at all, and then I evolved, I evolved and I realised more than anything I wanted to help the prt rescue other pokeumans so that they could be able to find their place in the world just like I did right in this base! Because despite all our problems, I still think there’s something special about being a pokeuman, and I know you have it in you as well, toxtricity or not.” We stood quietly for a moment. “Speaking of, anything new from that dream messenger of yours?” I thought for a moment. “Well… he did say I could use training more.” “Then I don’t see why it’s a bad idea after all!” Rodri excitedly spoke. “Look, this was nice and all but… maybe it’s just too early to tell? I-I really don’t want to have to think about any of this nature stuff I just… I just want to be myself.” “I never doubted that for one moment Lex, just think about it ok? It was hard enough getting some free time to talk to you about this, but I’ll try to make this a regular appearance, mainly because I am obliged to keep in touch in regards to your dream messenger.” The chesnaught explained before he stood up and left, not before smiling brightly. “I wish you good luck Lex, see ya!” “Wait, what about the headmaster?!” The chesnaught stopped in their tracks. “Huh?” “Y-you said you’d try to tell Nacho about getting signed up to the tournament unwillingly, h-how did that go?” “Oh I knew I had forgotten something! Look Lex, I’m gonna have to be direct with you here it… didn’t really go well he er, said it “was a claim that was hard to prove.” And that “it was a trivial matter.” I looked down in disappointment. “Right, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.” “And see… between you and me… I don’t respect Nacho at all, he’s full of prejudgements that cloud his ability to run the base competently, arceus knows how he got selected as headmaster, but the important thing is that he won’t be kind to people like you, and I won’t lie, I’ve come to not trust him to keep a pokeuman like you safe so… take care, Lex.” And with that warning out of the way, Rodri finally left the cafeteria I took on that information quietly for a moment, this had been possibly the most open Rodri had ever been with me, and I knew understood his thought process more, still, something about everyone’s suggestions to keep training rubbed him the wrong way… didn’t Kalleq suggest he had used his ability in the tournament? Maybe he didn’t realise it? He hoped it would keep developing naturally, otherwise… he’d really hate to be proven wrong after so much defiance. From then on, life at the base would become pretty routinary, I would head to school in the week, luckily after the next two tournaments it seemed like most of my reputation vanished, including that of the new kid, and most people simply chose to keep to themselves as I once again became the quiet kid, only with a record, my situation with my roommates… didn’t improve, our arguments would only get more heated to the point we’d occasionally get kicked out of our dorms, Gael and I tried to find things to do but it became difficult so we’d often just wait by, I tried to stick alongside him as much as possible and he’d do the same, but I do have to admit that I on occasion took my neighbour’s offer to crash at their dorm, Raúl mostly stopped bothering me in electric class, but we’d occasionally partner up quietly, I even got to know Litleo somewhat, occasionally partnering up with assignments, he was very shy, but we surprisingly got along, I think of the three I understood him the most, I didn’t get to know Itzel as well, but I’d regular meet up with them during lunch, where they would chat and I would unwittingly eavesdrop on them learning some of their personal details, Raúl came from ecatepec (no surprises there), Itzel’s parents both came from mainland china, but she was born and lived her whole life in Mexico, she’s also really into anime it seems, and Litleo meanwhile mainly kept to himself, he did fully decide to change his name to Litleo, he didn’t seem too sold on it but he mentioned he was very uncomfortable with his original name, so well decided to respect it, in general he didn’t seem to be much comfortable with his past life as a human as he was expected to be the man of the house in his family. With Rodri, I would continue “bumping” into him (very quickly though we’d both realise he was doing this on purpose and dropped the act.) and he’d continue to inquire as to what I was doing, it was a bit annoying but, I can’t say that I didn’t miss his presence, he was the person who rescued me into the base and there was something so genuinely honest and caring about his smile, he stopped pressuring me about tournaments which was appreciated and when I brought up arguing with my roommates, he became concerned immediately and later I’d find out he had tried to get me to transfer out of my dorm and had an argument with the headmaster, but I decided against it, I didn’t want to abandon Gael after all, which he eventually, albeit a little reluctantly agreed to, he’d also continue to hand me those weird flavoured but delicious water bottles from time to time. I’d continue meeting up with Kalleq, at first he was a little disappointed I didn’t seem to manifest my powers again, but he’d continue showing me around the dream dimension, he started showing me various different landscapes from what he claimed was the pokemon world, preserved in the dream dimension, some reminded me a lot of real world locations, I got to see the northern lights at some point and it was magical. Days would pass and I would grow accustomed to how life worked at the base, I got to see how festivities and special events worked around the base as the months passed, Halloween wasn’t very eventful, it isn’t exactly much of a big tradition here especially now that the whole point of dressing up as something you aren’t loses some weight when you aren’t a boring human, however day of the dead was different, the whole base the days prior was decked to the brim with paper decorations, cempasúchil covered the edges of the floors and walls, there was a vendor that walked through the halls giving out “pan de Muerto” for several days (which was delicious) and most importantly of all there was one giant altar in the main hall of the base, people came all over to pay their respects to all the various people they lost, it wasn’t just dead pokeumans though, a space on the altar was reserved to those pokéumans taken and brainwashed by pokextinction whom we couldn’t save in time, I couldn’t help but remember Alan, Lázaro and Yulian, the pokemon that accompanied me when I transformed, I realised the day was for them too, only their spirits weren’t able to accompany us as opposed to those that had died, so if anyone ever were to argue that lack of free will is preferable to death, I’d slap them in the face. Still, it was a bittersweet celebration, despite the negative context I couldn’t help myself but be taken in by the music and the gorgeous atmosphere, Aldo Ledesma, the announcer from the tournament also performed a gorgeous ballad in the middle of a kiosk located at the centre of the big plaza, all while the ceiling lit up in a way I couldn’t figure out simulating a beautiful, clear, starry night, I sat on the floor alongside Gael and we both took in our experiences as a Pokéuman, at the end of it all day of the dead was a big party and just because we were in the middle of a war, constantly experiencing casualties and loss, didn’t mean that we didn’t get to be happy, to be alive, plus the food that day was amazing, Gael even commented that I was starting to put on pounds. “Dude, I’m not making fun of you, but pokemon tend to have stronger metabolisms than humans, putting on pounds is significantly harder unless your species is already of a larger weight.” “A-ah shut up.” I called out in embarrassing. “I mean you don’t look… bad, just it’s a bit admirable in a curious way.” The next holiday I would get to discover as a pokéuman would be the Mexican revolution, only I would come to find out that the celebration had a different meaning to the pokéuman base: Gael and I had been discussing what to do with our holiday, Demian and Dylan seemed to have plans that probably involved going to the common floor to harass people and so we stood there figuring out how to make use of our miraculous time entirely for ourselves, that was then when an announcement rang throughout the base. “Attention pokéumans, for those who wish to attend the official celebrations for revolution and foundation day, the events will start soon at the auditorium, please enter at 2:30pm” “What’s that all about? Why is revolution day treated as a big deal like it was independence day?” I turned to Gael, who had become much more comfortable in his hybrid-like appearance and even chose to keep the piercings (though he got ones that looked less like tags). “Well because in a way this is our independence day, pokéumans came to be around the same time as the mexican revolution started since both were in 1910, but this base formed shortly after the revolution and is actually one of the oldest bases in the world! There’s a whole legend about one specific figure, you recall that hawlucha that was in the headmaster’s door?” I nodded, Gael grinned excitedly, clearly talking about something that properly interested him for once. “Well, he’s sort of seen as the main founder of the base, he’s known as “El noble de milpa alta.” (The noble of milpa alta) it was said that he was one of the many pokéumans to transform during the first wave, although some historians debate that and claim he came from some of the later ways, but regardless, his human name has been lost to time, but he chose to go by his species and by a wrestler-like alias, it is believed that he was the first person to round up other pokeumans and directly fought back against the growing pokextinction organization in Mexico, in fact.” Gael suddenly hopped from his bed, gliding briefly across the floor before grabbing a book hidden that was hastily left under the bed, on the cover was an artistic rendition of presumably the same hawlucha we are talking about, only he didn’t look like a normal hawlucha, he was slightly bigger and bulkier, had more feathers, but most of all wore an impressive, shimmering, black and gold mask that covered even his shoulders and chest, it was a majestic sight and I was awestruck. Gael looked over my shoulder with a big grin. “I know, right? Well, as I was saying, according to this and several other writings we have of the events that lead to the foundation of our base, it is said that he eventually headed to Japan and worked closely with the pokeuman organization headquarters, which definitely means he had to have gotten in contact with mew, although we don’t know much about his personal life, we owe everything here to him.” “Woah…” I exclaimed, amazed and with a large smile of my own. “that’s so cool!!! Hawlucha is actually my third favourite pokemon.” “Yeah, hawlucha is a great pokemon, I’d say I would’ve love to be one but I’m happy as a gliscor.” “You’d rather burrow yourself in sand than be a big cool luchador?” I stated jokingly “Hey I’m not the one drinking stagnated water!” Gael rebutted, I was confused, however. “What?! Ew!!! I’ve never done that?!!!” “Oh really? Then what were in all those water bottles you keep drinking?” “That was… that… oh… oh arceus no…” “Wait you didn’t know?!!” “I…” I was startled, speechless, unable to speak, wait those are the same thing. “…They do taste pretty good.” Gael just laughed. “Well, it’s normal and even healthy for you according to the pokedex.” “Really?” I asked slightly incredulously, he merely nodded. The next major holiday I got to experience was Christmas, which was a bit more mixed, not because of the experience itself, it just wasn’t a holiday that was that important to me and Gael, before the day actually came the base did something interesting by having it snow through most of December using the help of the base’s ice types, this was amazing for those of us who were new as we never really got to experience snow in our lives at all! It was… alright, I mean it never got too difficult to deal with anyway, there was also a giant tree covered with pokemon themed decorations and several gifts, in the last day of the school year we had a gift exchange, both for our regular class and our battle class, I was unfortunate enough to get Raúl for the battle class exchange so I had to ask Itzel and Litleo what I should get for the slightly translucent eel, it turned out to not be as complicated as I originally thought as I really just needed to find him some trading cards for a game I didn’t recognize, as for what I asked for the exchange, I just asked for replacement school supplies as I was never good at keeping them for more than a few months without losing them. During December, I had tried to sneak away from my other roommates, who seemed to be particularly insistent that very day, to watch the junior Eurovision song contest of 2022 live, since I didn’t have the privacy to do it at my dorm I tried to head to one of the computers at the library, borrowing some headphones so I wouldn’t distract anyone who was actually there to study, especially since I knew I would be there for a few hours, I had gotten into the event earlier in the year and had been following most of the season, but then a little something called turning into a pokéuman and ending up living in a hidden underground civilization with crappy roommates ended up kinda taking my attention away from the event, but I was still determined to finally watch it live, I had followed most of the songs already with my money being on Portugal and the UK though I was saddened by the fact I was likely unable to vote given our circumstances as- “Lex? What are you doing here?” Came from the voice of the only one of my roommates who didn’t make my life hell, Gael, who startled me and, had it not been for the fact I was in a library I would’ve let out a scream. “U-uh I was just watching stuff, there was this one thing I was planning on watching today a-and I needed to get away from Demian for a few hours.” “Really? What are you watching?” He asked in curiosity as he turned to look at my monitor, which was currently in the middle of Portugal’s performance. “Cool, is that a kid?” “O-oh yeah it’s the junior version of the Eurovision thing I talk to you about, it’s p-pretty cool they’ve got unique songs even if definitely for kids though I guess I am technically on the age range for it still but u-uh well it’s very niche and all-“ “Can I watch?” Gael asked, taking me by surprise. “O-o-oh, w-well sure I-I don’t know if it’s y-your thing b-b-b-but sure” Since I was wearing string headphones I merely gave the one in my other ear (don’t ask how it works for my horns I barely know myself, at the very least I can’t produce ear wax anymore) for him to put on his ear.” “So what country is next?” “Serbia, actually, they’re one of my favourites, it’s a slower song but I do like the melody and her voice i-it’s very sweet, unfortunately she got sick so this is a rehearsal but I hope it’s still going to sound good. I didn’t notice it myself as the song began, mainly because I was likewise captivated, but Gael had been taken in by the performance immediately, when I looked over at him he has sparks in his eyes like it was magic, from the beginning with the slow music-box style tune, to the first instrumental break with the strings speeding up the pace of the song and featuring a ballet dancer, then through the second instrumental with the trombone, and then through the end of the song, we both connected to the singer’s sweet vocals for the three minutes she got to sing, we didn’t know a lick of Serbian, but we were pretty sure we understood the message of the song after that, Armenia and Ukraine came later, and though we had an appreciation for the Ukrainian message of hope and strength during a war, something we could relate to very as pokéumans, none of the songs, even in the recap resonated with us as much as the melancholic Serbian ballet did. By the end of the year Gael and I were looking forward to the next editions of the adult and junior contest, together. The day before Christmas, or “Nochebuena” As it’s known over here had a lot of events prepared, a tv speech, some festivities and events, but the only truly important part for me was the main dinner, a HUGE, delicious meal where every pokéuman that was currently at the base, because of course, nurses and those stationed outside the base were unable to join in, were all in the cafeteria, from civilians to the PRT, I sat in a corner with Gael and the more reluctant Demian and Dylan, but I was able to spot and wave towards our neighbours and Rodri, separately, mouthing merry Christmas at them, a gesture they shared back and I was able to understand now that I got used to all the bodily quirks of pokéumans after all this time, the cooks were cooking frantically constantly adding new dishes, complements and desserts to the table, almost all of it was too delicious for anyone to leave unfinished, pretty much no food ended up wasted that day, my favourite of them all? Definitely the flan. New year’s had probably been the most surreal holiday of the bunch, with 2023 on the loom, there wasn’t much to for most of the day however they did announce that curfew would be extended all the way till 2am to celebrate the passing of the year, some people went to the main hall to celebrate, but most of us stayed in our dorms and watched the countdown on tv, which included me, Gael, and weirdly enough Demian and Dylan, and that’s what made it surreal, all four of us were hanging out in the couch, telling jokes and laughing along like we actually got along with each other, though I think it was mainly due to the fact that the dark types were absolutely HAMMERED with alcohol they definitely didn’t have legal access to, but there really wasn’t much we could do about it. I yawned as I sat alongside Gael, since his species was more nocturnal he was nowhere near as tired as I was so by the time the countdown ended I was leaning on his shoulder pretty much about to faint like I had lost another tournament, my final thoughts of 2022 were that, things may have changed a lot, and though at first I thought I would’ve just had to deal with high school and a post pandemic world and not a secret war between creatures of myth I was suddenly a part of, I was glad I at the very least had someone like the gliscor to live this wild adventure alongside with. I woke up the next year with little energy, though I wasn’t as bad as the pair of hungover dark types, Gael had been resting though clearly more due to his nocturnal tendencies than anything, I walked over to the bathroom to freshen up and check myself on the mirror, Gael was right, I was definitely putting up pounds yet something about it felt natural, as I splashed some water on my face I was greeted by a new sight on my amphibian chin. A small tuft of fur, half black and half white, seemingly grew overnight.Pokéumans: re-lived part 1 "From parallel worlds" Chapter 8 "The inevitable tournament episode"“Lex, you are a dream manifester.” An awkward silence followed the revelation, with neither of us being sure how to continue. “So… what does that mean?” I asked. Kalleq continued. “Right, of course to you this means nothing without an explanation, alas it is a complex subject, it’ll definitely take multiple dreams to explain fully.” “Oh…” I exclaimed, disappointed. “Is there a problem, Lex?” Kalleq asked. I let out a defeated groan. “It’s just… I’m just so tired of never understanding anything about myself, this is what? The billionth time I’ve been told I have some condition thing that no one bothers to properly explain to me what it even is!!!” “Patience young pokéuman, I see that your frustrations are valid though, I promise that I will do my best for this to go differently from all those previous experiences, and, while I won’t get to go into all the details right now, we can still start.” ahem . “So, you remember what I had told you about the dream dimension?” I nodded, intrigued yet cautious. “Well, as I had told you, all pokémon draw their power from it, moves, abilities, everything that you could think of, which, in the most literal of terms means everyone is a dream manifester in some form or another, of course this isn’t what we’re referring to when people use the term “dream manifester”, tell me, young pokéuman, remember the wishing stars from generation 9?” “The weird meteorite things that gave you dynamaxing energy?” I replied. “Yeah, but what does that have to do with the dream dimension?” The shiny tox continued, “Of course, it’s hard to draw the connection with what the games provided, however do you ever wondered why they’re called wishing stars? Well, it was said in my time that the powerful surge of dynamax energy was so great it could grant your heart’s desire, which wasn’t too far removed from the truth, you see, while to the average pokeuman dynamax only cause a boost in their physical powers and abilities, hence the growth in size, when the energy was first discovered it was essentially a surge of wild and rampant energy, energy that seemed to be specifically linked to willpower and desire from a “leakage” of the dream dimension, and so the pokémon who needed to contain and harness it, got the legendaries, you can assume which specifically, to give certain pokemon the ability to harness the “desiral” energy from the dream dimension that was linked with what would go on to become dynamax energy.” This ability to harness dynamax came with side effects though, suddenly these special pokemon found their natural abilities would grow stronger according to the specific needs of themselves or others, like a genie, but only limited to what they were able to already do, for example if a pokemon needed a specific type of water, like say ocean water, a water type pokemon with this power could produce it, this gave them the reputation of wish granters, though as time went on and your ability became more clear and defined it became less impressive, downgrading from wish granting to dream manifesting, which is close enough.” I was about to ask several questions, but once again I could feel myself starting to wake up at the worst time possible “I will continue to explain these next few days young pokéuman, I promise to you I’ll make sure that you understand the situation you find yourself in eventually… just remain patient, and as a favour, try not to tell anyone.” “You better…” I said, before nodding. And then everything got bright… I woke up yet again to loud music I was hardly fond of blasting across the room, as the first weekend of my life as a pokéuman, I would’ve liked to have had the time to reflect on all of the insane changes that my life has gone through on such a short span, only two weeks ago I was an average, unskilled and unimportant kid and now I’m a creature from the biggest media franchise in the world. Unfortunately, due to both the rigid schedule of my “new home”, and my purposefully upsetting choice of roommates, I did not have the time to properly dwell on these thoughts as I was almost practically forced into keeping up with the routine by a crazed obstagoon who seemed to almost enjoy making me suffer in the slightest way possible, but it at the very least seemed like the lessons from the previous days have stuck as he left me alone slightly more than usual, not without some threatening glares of course. The four of us misfits walked towards the cafeteria, Demian and Dylan in front, occasionally intentionally shoving or tormenting passing pokéumans, while Gael and I were at the back trying not to draw attention to ourselves and communicating through sticky notes, with Gael occasionally scaring off passing humans to keep up with the other two. I couldn’t help but notice that he always pushed me aside and extended his wings in front of me whenever he did though, so I asked in a sticky note: “- Hey so like are u trying to draw attention away from me or smth?” “- A little bit.” “- You’re doing a lot for me, y?” “Cuz it’s clear you’ve gone thru a lot.” I guess I should give back the favour at some point, he’s being too nice to me. I thought to myself. “- Well, I appreciate it a lot, but u rlly are doing too much for me lol.” “- Eh, its whatever really, just glad I’m no longer just stuck with these idiots, I think demian had something planned for today so you wanna go hang out in the common area or like watch smth in the dorm?” “- sure, whichever u want tbh.” With that we finished talking and enjoyed our breakfast, we once again sat in a corner with a bunch of other dark and poison type mons who interacted a lot with dylan and demian, gael and I mostly just stayed stoic and didn’t draw attention to ourselves, I had gotten fried eggs over tortillas with ketchup and a side of refried beans, gael meanwhile got scrambled eggs with hot sauce and veggies. …these were still chicken eggs right? After coming back to our dorms and an uneventful period of us not doing much with a lot of tension in the air due to the new awkward dynamic of the four of us, eventually Demian and Dylan would go on to leave us alone inside the dorm, we chatted for a bit and we considered watching something on tv but we found ourselves with a lot of social energy, possibly from the past few days of just talking and talking about our interests so passionately, so eventually not being one to abandon plans I decided to ask him to show me the common floor, which he gladly accepted to do. “I’d like to be that person who shows you around the whole base, or at least what’s allowed, but I don’t really tend to go many places myself, I mainly just go to the arcade to get videogames and occasionally other stores for treats.” Gael explained as he glided across the halls, we had at first walked leisurely but eventually our excitement got the better of us and I started having to run to catch up with him across the paths. pant pant “What areas are we not allowed to go to?” I asked, my curiosity spiking. “The poison gym already felt like an unauthorized zone already, what could be worse?” “No, it’s not forbidden because of that, it’s basically just large storage areas that keep all our materials we obtain and you have to work there to be able to enter there, basically anything that would already need security in the real world, this is like a city after all, sure it’s a little different but we still have to rely on making sure everything is running smoothly, we do get to save on producing energy and a lot of prime materials though so that’s a plus.” Gael continued as we turned in different directions. “Slow down a little!” I said half-jokingly, in truth it wasn’t horrible to be going in such a fast pace, just because I’m not active doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy going on a run, but obviously keeping up with a creature that can glide around in the wind isn’t terribly enjoyable. “A-and how does work uh… work here exactly? Is everyone assigned a role based on our species?” I then asked, Gael seemed to slow down somewhat to think about the answer, which helped me catch up. “Well… there’s no real currency here, just kind of a general level of trust, most shop owners here are given basic general records of all the pokeumans registered here, nothing too intrusive as far as I know though I can’t say I fully trust it given our headmaster.” Gael elaborated with a lamenting tone. “Yeah…” I shrugged. “He wasn’t exactly great when I met him.” “He’s not the only one…” Gael continued, “But, regardless, since there is no currency, jobs here are essentially volunteer work based on abilities, skill, and more than anything passion, or just interest, it all works surprisingly efficiently all things considered, you’ll also notice that a lot of the people working these kinds of jobs are either not much older than us and barely in their 20s, or the few people in the base who are fully over 30, doing things that they lost their chance to do as humans, this is usually as people in the middle tend to be in the prt but luckily for both of us it isn’t obligatory.” He smiled with his comforting toothy grin. “I’d like to continue playing videogames competitively, maybe take a job as a maths teacher too, who knows.” I couldn’t help but smile back, though much less noticeably, and nod in agreement. “Yeah, me too, even as a human I always knew I had teaching English as a safe job to always fall back on” “You seriously gotta help me with English, Lex.” We continued talking, eventually made it once again to the main hall, I won’t bore you with the details of explaining it again but it’ll be impossible to give it justice, since it was a Saturday there was this tianguis going on, which for those who aren’t Mexican is kinda like a bazar or a market that’s set out in the open usually on the weekend and they sell pretty much everything fairly cheaply, though I think in here they just had them showing off personal creations and giving them away purely through bargains and trades, the variety of pokemon all walking and going on their days like could also not be understated, from a swanna haggling a golisopod to a group of an ursaring a comfey and a magneton chatting while chowing down on some tacos and other street food, everyone was talking about different things “You should totally break up with him he’s not good for you-“ “You’re not participating in the tournament tomorrow?-” “This isn’t water you produced, right?-” “Nah, I’m too exhausted but I’m definitely gonna watch it-” “Can’t wait for them to reveal who’s participating in the tournament!!-” “I wish I was a fire type so I could make glass this good-.” it was magical in how mundane it all was. Eventually we made it to another section that had various little businesses and shops, like a mall in a way and we made it to the arcade, which also seemed to double as somewhat of a videogame library where people would pick up copies and return them once they were done with it, Gael talked to me about some of his favourite video games, even giving me a few recommendations especially after I mentioned I had a steam account that I only really used to play undertale, we checked a few of the actual arcades present, stayed there for a bit and then just kinda walked around to see what we could find, we went to a candy store, came across an accessory store, even though we don’t wear clothes it does seem like there’s a lot of pokemon who choose to still have something to set them apart, dyes, jewlery, hats, etc. were all decently commonplace in the pokemon we came across, at some point we both stopped chatting due to tiredness but we didn’t really notice as we were simply content being with each other, I did find out Gael’s species is nocturnal yet he prefers being active during the day, a weird oddity he has that he couldn’t explain well, but in his case it could’ve helped the tiredness. We passed near the showers and bathrooms, where I learned about the sand showers ground types used and lava showers, gael excused himself and told me he wanted to take a brief wash, and adviced to not follow given... yeah, I could probably get one shot by a grain of sand, so I waited outside with my own thoughts circling back to my dream messenger’s words. “I’m a dream manifester… apparently.” “Hey Lex! Didn’t think I would see you again so soon!” Came from a familiar, jovial voice that I immediately recognized and could feel myself relax with. “Oh, hey Rodri! Why are you in the common area?” I asked, getting reintroductions done with. “Oh, just trying to get a gift for someone, don’t worry about it too much buuuut since we’re both here we could talk, I really hope things haven’t been bothering you too much, you seem to be enjoying pokeuman life all things considered.” “Y-yeah, I manage.” I was very close to telling him about all the fun I was having with Gael despite it all and everything I had learned from Kalleq but decided against it, neither would’ve liked it… but it was starting to prove too much for me to keep to myself. surely Rodri is trustworthy enough for me to tell him something “W-w-well, there is one thing I forgot to mention from yesterday about the unusual stuff… thing…” I gulped nervously, not even being able to look in his direction before continuing, not allowing him to inquire further before I was finished. “I have a… dream messenger um… I’m not sure if you recognize what that is.” I answered, only to be met by a sudden chuckle. “Oh! That makes sense, I already kinda had a feeling.” Said Rodri. “W-huh?!” “Of course I know what dream messengers are!! They’re fairly common nowadays!! Heck, a pal back at the prt had one, y’ remember the talonflame that tried to rescue you? Yeah, Angel had a bit of a heart attack when he had to deal with that on top of turning into a bird!” Rodri laughed, I was perplexed, however. “W-wait, they’re common? How come I’ve not heard about them at all then!! Shouldn’t I be warned?!” “Well, we can’t really do anything to study or stop them, they sometimes show up, talk to one person and suddenly, boom! They end up getting involved in an important event, always to the benefit of pokeumans so they’ve definitely become trustworthy enough not to worry about them, they usually just give out basic guidance and warnings though it seems…” Rodri suddenly thought for a moment, shifting tone to a more curious one “Lex, from the moment I saw you in pke’s chambers I knew there was something special about you, and if you have a dream messenger then it only proves my theory further because you see, according to prt records back when dream messengers were a lot more unheard of, pokeumans meeting one was because they were usually the holder of a special power all the way from the time of the pokemon world.” I jumped internally, he’s this close to figuring it out. “Of course, it has been a long, LONG time since we’ve heard any records of a pokeuman with special powers, but… like I said, I KNOW there’s something different about you Lex, do you have a special power?” Rodri inquired. I wasn’t sure how to react, and I immediately felt like I told him too much, he seemed to take the facts I was a dream messenger well but… should I trust him about my dream manifester status as well? Kalleq wouldn’t want me to… and it’s not like Gael would think any differently if he himself knew. “No. I do not.” I answered, gritting my teeth in fear. “Will… will you tell the prt?” I asked, my arms were shaking at this point and though I wouldn’t notice it my mohawk was flaring up and letting out sparks everywhere, I was expecting the worst and for Rodri to tell me that he understood but had to tell the prt because of his responsibility even though he swore he didn’t want to and- “I’ll see what I can do.” Rodri answered in a serious and formal tone. “T-thanks.” I said. Rodri smiled softly, “Look, we’ll figure it out as it goes along… oh! Right, I almost forgot, nurse Angelina wanted you to have more of this.” He then said, before handing me another bottle that I immediately recognised as the drink they gave me while at the prt hospital, unfortunately, it came with a fully unlabeled plastic bottle, it looked almost like apple-flavoured cola (those who get it get it) I almost immediately chugged it down and finished it. “Well, I better get going, remember Lex, stay strong and I’ll try to help if you need it.” Rodri said, back to his normal approachable demeanour before walking to an accessory shop, around the same time Gael left the showers. “Was that Rodri?” He asked. “Yeah, but he didn’t do much.” I replied, hopefully trying to defuse any tension “Guh, he’s way too close to the headmaster for my liking.” Gael said as he shook of a little bit of the dust he still had left. I don’t think that sounds right for hi- My train of thought was interrumpted as I felt the warm particles of sand hitting me. “OW!! OW!! GOD- ARCEUS, WATCH IT!!!!” “Oh crap I’m sorry I’m sorry it’s just I’m not used to coming here with someone… let alone someone four times weak to ground.” I was furious, but I merely sighed in irritation. “Look it’s fine just… yeah really be careful next time, I’m gonna take a shower myself, I can do that right? Washing off dirtiness isn’t gonna make me feel sick because I need to be around garbage or whatever?” I asked, trying to not think about any of what had just transpired. Gael shrugged. “As far as I know, it’s just water and you’ll be fine, plus you’re part electric type, you’re not made out of grime or rubbish like a muk or a garbodor.” “Somehow that sounds like it should be offensive.” I commented before shrugging off myself and heading to the showers, and yep, they were perfectly normal showers, I headed into one and showered, yup, showers, for showering, showers. As I felt the water and soap wash over me, I couldn’t help but sing to myself as the songs I listen to that I often have stuck in my head somehow sounded a lot clearer than usual, more than the conversations happening in real life, again, almost like I was wearing headphones, that didn’t mean I didn’t catch some of the murmurs thrown around though. “You really think Miguel isn’t winning this tournament?” Came from an indescribable voice (all of them male because well, yeah.)“Look, I’m sorry but a year-long streak is too ridiculous for it to continue this long, I get that he’s becoming this base’s hero and he’s super badass and shit but he has to lose at some point, hell, we don’t even know who’s in the tournament yet!” Hmmm… they sure are mentioning this tournament a lot, first Rodri now... everyone? I thought to myself as I dried myself off, interestingly, it was here that I finally noticed that I can turn my mohawk off as I hit a bald spot while drying my head, guess that’s how I’m able to sleep without electrocuting anyone. I met back with Gael, who was sitting beside a piercings and tattoos store, we noticed each other and started to walk back to our dorms, eventually striking conversations again. “Where are demian and dylan anyway?” I asked, curious as to why we are allowed this much freedom. “I don’t really want to know but…” Gael continued. “Do you know why I wanted to show you around today? It’s a pre-tournament Saturday and so with the hype there are a lot of people preparing themselves to watch in on Sunday so they want to take care of as much as possible today, so a lot of businesses are active including Demian who I am not involved with, but I am aware of having some… shady deals.” The gliscor explained, I immediately caught what he meant. “Seriously? Even here? I guess I wouldn’t be made fun of for my surname if we didn’t.” I sighed and decided to switch topic. “Wait actually I’ve been hearing a lot about this tournament and what’s all that about? Is it like a sports thing or whatever and are there famous athletes that do pokemon battles?” “No actually.” Gael explained, “pretty much anyone can sign up but the reputation of the tough fights and the thrill of battle is what scares away total newbies from it, plus some people don’t make it even if they sign up, they’re actually about to announce the participants in like a few minutes or so.” “Right.” We cut our conversation short as we had arrived at our dorm and Demian had returned from whatever shit he was doing, Dylan wasn’t here though which was odd, neither of us bothered each other as shortly after we entered an announcement from headmaster Nacho himself suddenly blared. “Good afternoon pokéumans of the desert of the lions base, I shall now announce the accepted participants of our bi-weekly tournament of the 23rd of October 2022, first off is America Navarro the Vibrava. “Yo Gael ain’t her the hot chick who humiliated you in your ground type class?” Demian chuckled. “Shut up!” Calmly replied Gael, keeping up his facade though I could tell it had been a struggle this time. “Miguel Resendiz the Lucario,” continued the announcement. “Boooooo, who wants to see an overgrown dog beat up everyone for 20th time this year!!!” Shouted Demian as he took a swig of a coke bottle. That name rang a bell, I suddenly found myself reminded of the conversation, so this Lucario guy is a big deal? Typical… “Mateo Tenorio the Furret, Chucho Aparicio the Archen, Lex Mota the low-key Toxtricity.” “WHAT!!!” I jumped. “HUH??!?!?!” Gael shouted as he glided into the air in surprised Demian spat out his drink. “NO FUCKING WAY!!!!!! No no no I knew you were dumb but this dumb?!?!?! BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!” The obstagoon started laughing louder than a loudred like a maniac, drowning all the rest of the names announced. “Why did you sign up for the tournament?!!” Gael shouted at me. “I-I didn’t!!! I literally just found out about it today I swear!” I replied, adrenaline and confusion at max. “I-i-i…” Gael turned his head over to the hysteric obstagoon “Demian! Did you sign him into the tournament?!” “I wish I had!!” Laughed Demian. “Oh, Lex this is why you don’t cross me, you’re about to get what you deserve, ooh- imagine if they put you against that blue mutt it’s gonna be hilarious!” Gael and I looked at each other in worry, him briefly dropping the act, before we could add anything more we were suddenly interrupted by a knock to our door, all three of us rushed to open it with me surprisingly being able to squeeze to the front only to be greeted by the floating grin of- “Wassup Lex!! You’re entering the tournament too? Bro that’s pretty cocky for a newbie who sucks at charging your moves and can’t even- PHHMPH” a brown furred paw covered his mouth before he could continue. “Raúl!!” Screamed Itzel the tatsugiri as Litleo restrained Raúl who was desperately trying to break free. “Ugh, sorry Lex, we tried to stop him but-“ “HEY!!” Shouted Demian. “Get away from our fucking room, NOW!!!” the trio of pokemon ran back to their room but not before giving Demian a dirty look. Demian shut the door and turned his head with a murder-crazed grin towards me “You are going to be so dead tomorrow.” I looked at him in horror, I turned to Gael, not knowing what to do. “Well, I’m gonna go tell Dylan about this, Gael, you’re in charge of Lex for the moment.” The obstagoon said before leaving the dorm with a chuckle. “I-I can’t withdraw can i? not when the headmaster is involved…” “No, I don’t think you can, Nacho would never let you, if anything he’d probably take as much glee from it as Demian.” “Is he really that bad?” for some reason despite me not having any reason to disbelieve Gael I still found myself incredulous. “Maybe, I just really don’t like the guy, he hates any pokemon that looks dangerous and if he could he’d just let pokextinction deal with us, I remember I almost made it to the pokextinction base before I got rescued and I didn’t even get a full party…” “Yeah… things went hard for me as well, but I’d rather not talk about it.” I remembered how Alan never got rescued and well, he was turning into a dark type, he was also slightly older than everyone else in the facility. “It’s fine.” Said Gael somberly. “I’m starting to get sick of Demian, I know he’s the one who signed you up to this tournament to humiliate you and it’s just- GUH.” Gael hissed, literally, he hissed like a bug before catching himself. “Sorry, that was my pokemon side talking” “It’s fine, that’s probably normal for us now.” I said, letting Gael know I didn’t have a problem with that behaviour “I… don’t see why Demian would deny doing it though?” “Then Dylan probably did it for Demian, that stupid goblin, I don’t even know anything about him!!! He’s basically nothing more than Demian’s yes man I don’t even think he has a brain!! I’m just… I’m tired… I finally get along with someone normal and now he’s going to ruin your life, and probably mine right after because I just can’t take it anymore…” I approached my hand into his shoulder. “Do you wanna talk? I mean, I never planned on being viewed positively anyway so, who cares if some random toxtricity enters a tournament once and loses first round? And if things go better then great, it’s unlikely but we might as well y’know.” I spoke, smiling at him awkwardly. “You have a point.” Gael smiled back. “Again, sorry, it’s just been difficult, but if you’re gonna have no choice there I better try and help as much as I can.” “Right… so what exactly do you know about the tournament?” I asked. “Well, it has 4 rounds, round of 16, quarterfinals, semifinals, and a final, no matter how far you go you’re pretty much gonna lose the moment you fight Miguel the Lucario.” Gael explained “Is he really that strong? I overheard people talk about him a lot with really big claims.” Gael rolled his eyes. “Partly, he has won basically every tournament since he arrived earlier in the year, he’s got pretty much everyone kissing his feet and is treated like he’ll be the upcoming legend from the base of this generation though I think partly it’s because lucarios tend to be held on high regard due to many rumours regarding them, people keep treating them like they’re super rare even though like an eight of the base is Lucario.” “Huh… you’re right.” I found myself back to the times I’ve been outside the base with other pokemon, because while I mainly focused on the diverse amounts of species, on the back of my mind I did notice a lot of lucarios, there were male lucarios, female lucarios, shiny lucarios, oddly coloured lucarios, lucarios galore! “Still, no chance if you get him, it might honestly help you gain some sympathy if you end up facing him, hmmm, there are 16 participants, it’s all knockout rounds, unfortunately I couldn’t quite get all of them in the announcement… we’ll have to see tomorrow though I do have to ask one thing Lex.” “Huh?” “What’s with that eelektrik guy, he said he was also competing in the tournament, do you know him?” Gael asked curiously, by this point we were both sitting on the couch with gael swinging his tail around as it hovered near the floor. “He tries to talk to me during electric battle class but I-I really don’t care, apparently he’s our front door neighbour or whatever.” “Hmmm, could give you an advantage if you faced him since you’d likely be more familiar with his moves, your best bet could be facing a grass type, your worst bet besides mr. legend over here and I can fully witness to this, is America, you DON’T want to face her.” Gael elaborated, snapping his claw to emphasize his point. “Is she gonna shake off a sand bath harder?” I quipped. “Hey, I said sorry!” Gael and I laughed, it was a little jarring how one moment ago we were all so frustrated but, while I usually struggle going from one mood to another, in this case I didn’t feel uncomfortable, it was nice that we were able to lift each other up and I liked his company. The rest of the day passed, we had lunch and a light dinner cuz of the tournament and I went to bed thinking about all I’d gone through today. **I have a special power… maybe it’ll help me with the tournament? Rodri said dream messengers provide guidance so maybe Kalleq can help me with this, maybe this is what was meant to happen... ** “What seems to be troubling you young pokéuman?” I was back at the dream dimension, once again in that ethereal seemingly endless field landscape with my dream messenger standing in front of me. “Just… a lot of things happened today, and I think I might need your help with them, I found out some… interesting things.” I replied. “You see… I think you already know that I live with a bunch of bullies, and I believe one of them has signed me up to a tournament against my will and since I can’t really withdraw I was wondering...” “About your special powers?” “Yeah, actually, I-I told someone in the prt about our conversations and he told me dream messengers are apparently very common… I-I didn’t tell him about my powers though!!” I stated once I noticed kalleq’s surprised and worried expression as I explained. “H-he promised me he wouldn’t tell anyone, I hope.” “It’s understandable, a shame but within reason, and he’s not wrong, dream messengers have become somewhat of a casualty these days, of course, your powers do make our situation more special than that…” The shiny toxtrcity seemed to think for a moment. “I think you did well in confiding this with me, I can sense that you’re not a battler but luckily for you dream manifestation can help you during it, after all it’s little more than an enhancement to your normal abilities as is.” “Right, right, but I don’t even know how to channel this ability, I struggle with my own moves as is!” “Well, I don’t think I can promise to train you to a fully experienced fighter in just one night, especially with how short these dreams are, but I can give you one very important tip.” Kalleq said, I tilted my head in curiosity. “At the end of the day, your ability is all about desire, it’s about willpower and a need to fulfil something in specific, I can advice you to focus headfirst on every attack you want to pull off and not into something more abstract like just winning, probably try to strategize and figure out what you need the most for each battle.” He added. “Right, that… that just sounds like general battle strategy though.” I mentioned incredulously. Kalleq looked apologetic. “Right, right, it’s the best we can do under the circumstances, however it should still help you with your moves regardless, but if you want help with your powers specifically, I’d say pay attention to your hands.” I tilted my head again but eventually decided to turn my face at the palm of my hands, I could barely make out a blur before suddenly I was flashed by a bright white light waking me up. The next day started a bit differently from our usual routine, instead of being woken up by loud trashy music I was gently woken up by…. Demian? “Wake up sleepyhead, people are looking for you.” He said with a grin, Gael standing beside him with an unreadable expression. The door knocked and so I stood up, groggily, tried to make myself presentable as quickly as possible (the shower yesterday helped though) and opened the door to find a monferno and a watchog in front, tasked with leading me to train for the tournament, only I was allowed to go so I bid farewell to Gael and the others so they wouldn’t suspect anything. The duo of pokemon led me through a couple of hallways and stairs before eventually letting me inside a secretive door on the opposite end of the stadium room. Inside I found myself in a small training gym with all 16 participants chatting alongside each other, including… “Yoooo it’s Lex!!! About time he got here!” Came in from the voice I now found irritating of Raúl the eelektrik, immediately after everyone else started talking and mumbling with each other. “Is that the newbie?” “Has he even had a battle before?” “How long has he been in here?” “I’m from the prt I don’t even recall what search party got him.” It was uncomfortable, as I walked the whole way through the entrance eventually making it to a bench, everyone had stopped dead in their tracks to glare at me, in indescribable ways, aside from one who glared at me in a seemingly much more amicable, yet for different reasons terrifying manner. “Wassup man, I had no idea you’d enter a tournament this early?” said Raúl “Shut up, I was signed up here against my will.” I groaned, not wanting to keep up a conversation in this tense ambience. “Dude, relax, it’s my first tournament too, they wouldn’t have let you in anyway if you didn’t have a shot after all.” I rolled my eyes. “I can’t imagine why they’d do that otherwise.” I replied sarcastically. I sat down for a moment, until a sudden burst of fire buzzed right past me, or rather, one singular burst, one that looked almost like a bird of some kind, a pokemon? The bird flew for a bit, even startling Raúl before suddenly cycling back and landing on a new figure, a red and white crocodile with a face that looked like a skull and sparks of fire dripping from his mouth like saliva, it reminded me a lot of day of the dead for some reason. “Greetings, participating pokéumans.” the newcomer said. “The name’s Aldo Ledesma the Skeledirge as most of you will know already and I will be the announcer for today’s tournament! I’m happy to say I can finally reveal the full tournament bracket so you can see which of you will be facing who!” with that the bird, who I still couldn’t tell if it was its own pokemon or not suddenly pulled over a whiteboard which showed the details of every single round, practically every pokéuman here jumped and started shoving each other to get a close view of who would face who. I waited until the commotion calmed down to see myself. “First round: Lex Mota the Toxtricity vs Mateo Tenorio the Furret” FIRST ROUND!? My humiliation in front of arceus knows how many people will be the opener of the tournament??? I stared at the board in shock “Hey do you think we’re gonna get to face each other?” I suddenly found myself being asked by the same eelektrik. “I’m confident I’ll get to reach the semifinals, I’ve been training for a long while to finally enter this tournament!” I couldn’t even answer him, I was in complete distress, how the hell was I going to figure out a way to not utterly let myself be destroyed out there??? I can only hope I get some kind of miraculous beginner’s plot armor “Everyone, attention please.” Said the skeledirge, “Now I’m aware that many of you have been training for a long time now and we can even see a lot of tournament regulars today!! kudos especially to Mr. Miguel “the legend” for his spectacular performance throughout the year, and so, as a treat I managed to convince the organizers to let your closest friends of the base accompany you while you continue to train for a few hours!” As he finished speaking the doors to the training facility opened and in it came several familiar faces, from our neighbours Itzel the tatsugiri and Litleo the… litleo, who came presumably for Raúl, but way more importantly than them, Gael, who had by this point become the closest person I have in the whole base. “Gael!!” I waved at him excitedly (as best as I could show it) and he waved at me back once he spotted me, he showed his now characteristic toothy grin that despite it being supposed to be terrifying was nothing but comforting for me, we ran over to each other, but I accidentally tripped and fell on top of him in an accidental hug. “Gah!! Sorry man.” I said as I stood up and helped him get up as well, he apologized and we laughed it off, being too caught up in each other to notice the reactions we had gotten throughout the room, but most people were too caught up in the reunion with their friends either way. “So… I saw the announcement of the tournament bracket.” Gael said, this time with a much more worried expression. “I know, I’m gonna be absolutely destroyed in there and it’ll be the first thing everyone is going to see!!” I exclaimed in fear “Ehhh your chances aren’t too dead, a Furret may know dig but without STAB you could be fine with some luck, and your typings are neutral to each other, on account of dealing with a normal type that is.” “STAB?” I asked. “Oh uh, the bonus amount of damage you get when you perform an attack that shares a type with you.” Gael explained. “You didn’t know that was thing?” “Uhhh… no not really.” I replied, rubbing the back of my neck in embarrassment. “I just thought pokemon with a certain type just made them have more access to moves and effects of that type is all, I’m a bit clueless with the game mechanics.” “Oh, it’s fine, if you want I can help you train now that I’m here, I mean I’m an average battler myself, but I am enough of an expert in the pokemon gameplay that it has helped me a good amount.” The gliscor beamed with pride, I nodded and so for the next hour or two we went ahead discussing strategy, deciding just to focus on the current battle against my first opponent so that we at least went down in a fair and enjoyable, if a bit forgettable fight, I won’t bore you with the details (totally not because the author like his self-insert is also terrible at understanding game mechanics) but we also trained a few moves here and there, mainly cuz everyone else was doing it too, he was definitely a lot better about the theorical aspect of pokemon battles with his competitive knowledge but faltered a little in the practical, still, while he couldn’t help me charge up my moves fasters he recommended me to try to charge multiple moves at the same time to be more unpredictable and even create combo attacks, which definitely seemed interesting as I knew for a fact you can’t do those in game. Eventually though, the referee, a honedge, came to let us know that the tournament will start in 30 hours and so it was time for all the visitors to exit and get ready to watch the matches by the sidelines, meanwhile all of us got done training and were taken to the entrance of the field of the stadium, we could hear the crowd loudly chanting “10, 9, 8, 7” all of us were walking together quietly following various pokeuman officials, even Raúl was quiet for a change, suddenly we entered the field as the crowd reached one and several pyrotechnics burst and the skeledirge from before popped out of a platform covered in smoke and fireworks that he produced himself, several confetti canons shot up and the crowd went wild, the bird accompanying him flew around the stage in various impressive maneuvers before coming back and taking the form of a microphone that the fire croc quickly grabbed and tapped on lightly. “Hello!!? Let me hear you desert of the lions base!!!!!” he screamed to an adoring wild crowd located all across the stands, but despite that many people the skeledirge managed to be the complete center of attention, not helped by the extremely eye-catching outfit he was wearing, a white tuxedo that was glimmering with reflective light it almost seemed like it was producing its own with gold accents all over, in his suit collar there were various embroidered gems, which looking closely were shaped in various form such as a beetle, a lightning bolt, a spiral, and various others that I would come to realise represent all the pokemon types, and his bow tie was made to resemble a gold medal. “Welcome to our bi-weekly tournament everyone!! my name is Aldo Ledesma, and I will be your announcer for today!!!” The crowd went wild, chanting ALDO ALDO ALDO to the point where the fire type himself had to pause and wait before he could continue. “Heh, yes, thank you everyone but that’s enough about me because today, y’see today is all about the 16 pokeumans who signed up and were selected to duke it out in a pokemon battle!! we’ve got a few familiar faces, but some newcomers too! Will any of them surprise us? Well, we’re close to finding out, but first? Let’s get to know them some more, please, everyone, GIVE A ROUND OF APPLAUSE FOR OUR PARTICIPAAAAAAAAANTS!!!!!!!!!!” the announcer shouted with an almost singing-operatic intonation to his words, but before I could dwell on it I could see the pokeuman workers direct us to walk to the stage and take a position around the main platform, many of them waved at the stage, Raúl himself was shouting “WOOOOO” and waving his tail around in excitement, others however were a lot more calm, the Lucario I assumed to be Miguel (the only Lucario in the whole group in fairness) had a confident yet neutral expression that wasn’t easy to read, not with many people, so instead I focused on the audience, I tried to maintain a neutral expression as well, which I probably already had due to my appearance, and I quickly spotted the duo of the tatsugiri and litleo in the front row seats on one direction, I looked around in other directions before eventually spotting Gael way more in the back who merely waved at me, I was about to wave back until I noticed Demian and Dylan grinning at me evilly, with Demian simulating a slit throat gesture with his paw, even if I had his intelligence I would still get the message. We stood in position for a while as the announcer talked for some more and even performed a song I had never heard of before. Hmm, this must be an opening ceremony of some kind I found myself thinking, I couldn’t help myself but be happy about the performance, I do love a good show, which is probably the music loving tox part of me speaking, still looking around the whole place was littered with cameras, cameramen (mons?) and several pokeumans trying to avoid the direction of the cameras, looking up to the stands I noticed a few VIP sections, which included a lot of seemingly important pokeumans like headmaster Nacho and- oh it’s Rodri! He seemed very excited about the show and even waved at me as well! I also noticed a booth that seemed to be a commentators booth, quickly realising that this was all being broadcasted on tv, I couldn’t help but smile against myself, this was the only time I ever had some kind of media attention at all, not even appearing as an extra on any news or anything like that, this was a total first for me, then I realised that if things went really badly, then everyone tuning in would see it as well… Despite that turmoil, I still had a fun time in the show, but once it finished and several psychic types were dashing across the stage moving all the props with telekinesis and helping all the pokeuman performers exit the stage while trying to not get caught by any of the cameras, it came time for the first match to begin and I was not at all prepared, all the participants bar me and the furret had presumably gone back to the training grounds as we positioned each other on opposite sides of the stage. “Ladies and gentlemon of our beloved base! It’s finally time for our tournament to begin!!!” Another long period of the crowd going wild happened. “Our first battle will be between Mateo Tenorio the Furret, returning after a full month’s absence and newcomer not just to tournaments, but to the base as far as I’ve been told, give it up for Lex Mota the low-key toxtricity’s debut everybody!!!!” The crowd’s mixed reaction all blended into a singular noise that I wasn’t sure how to react with, I waved and even bowed politely and shyly, hoping that gave me a tolerable reaction to the audience at least, the referee from before motioned for us to get closer. “You may only use moves in battle, no maiming allowed, you may withdraw from battle, but try to give the audience a show, now, I want both of you to shake hands and begin once I slash the centre of the ground, that’ll be my signal for you to start the battle.” Both of us nodded, shook hands and then once again moved to the opposite area of the battlefield, I was nervous like I’ve never been before, but I tried to maintain my composure, I think I intimidated my opponent a little, which isn’t really something I was proud about. “READY?!!!!” the announcer shouted, we stood still. “BEGIN.” The skeledirge continued as the honedge slashed the ground in a perfect line in the middle of the arena. “SLAM!!!!” Shout the Furret almost immediately as he dashed across the stage before slamming into me with his long, long body, catching me off guard and making me fall on the floor. “AND IMMEDIATELY MATEO USES HIS STRONGEST MOVE AGAINST THE NEWCOMER, HOW WILL HIS OPPONENT RESPOND?!!?!” shouted Aldo. The Furret stood still for a moment as I composed myself, reading my improvised battle stance I used in battle class, I backed up on reflex before my opponent spoke. “Well? What are you waiting for, I want to see what you’ve got newbie.” “R-right!” I jumped nervously, I started charging an acid, something I still wasn’t able to speed up, but I instead shifted to a spark, keeping him up close before firing up the acid, causing him to be pushed a few meters back. “AND WOULD YOU BELIEVE IT FOLKS!! LEX STARTS OUT BY ATTACKING WITH A SPARK AND ACID MOVE IN RAPID SUCCESSION!!! COMPLETELY TAKING HIS OPPONENT BY SURPRISE, NOT BAD FOR A NEWBIE!!!” The announcer said, I couldn’t help but grin against my better judgement. “W-well since we’re both starting with our strongest attacks!” I shouted, the audience cheered. “WATER PULSE!!!!” said my opponent as he shot a rippling burst of water, I jumped out of the way, taking a slight beating from not being prepared and falling to the floor, but quickly standing up I can’t let myself be humiliated by my inexperience… god, I wish I could remember how battle mechanics worked in the games… I felt an unusual surge of energy but only for a moment, the furret growled. “AGILITY!!” he shouted before dashing across the arena and landing another slam, I shot a few acid sprays, at first missing but eventually hitting the ferret pokemon. Suddenly a memory flashed in an instant on my mind Furrets aren’t particularly strong pokemon, their special stats are pretty weak so if you could land a few acid sprays you could reasonably take them down with a thundershock or two I remember the advice I had gotten from Gael when we were training, I shot another successful acid spray as the furret tried to stand up. “I’m not done just yet!! AGILITY!!! SLAM!!” The furret shouted as he once again started speeding up across the arena before slamming me a couple of times with his tail and body, I was starting to feel exhaustion come over me but I didn’t want to give just yet… I charged and shot a few more acid sprays, but I couldn’t get them to last this time, my opponent had simply become too fast… oh right, duh!! Scary face can lower speed, a furret’s main strength is their speed, don’t underestimate the status moves. Do you just know this? I replied at the time. “SCARY FACE!!!” I exclaimed as I stared at the running furret who stopped dead in their tracks almost as if paralyzed by fear, with that, despite how tired and bruised I was, I smirked. “UNBELIEAVABLE EVERYONE, LOOKS LIKE LEX IS CALLING HIS MOVES IN ENGLISH INSTEAD OF SPANISH?! WILL HIS STRATEGY PAY OFF?!?!?” The announcer shouted at his birdophone. I gave out another scary face and charged an acid spray, but as I was about to let it out I strummed the protrusions on my chest and shouted “ACIDSHOCK!!!!” spitting out the acid and charging a thundershock at the same time. “AAAAAND LOOKS LIKE THIS IS THE FIRST COMBO ATTACK OF THE TOURNAMENT LADIES AND GENTLEMENT, THE DEFENSE LOWERING BOOST OF THE ACID SPRAY COMBINED WITH THE POWERFUL ATTACK OF THE THUNDERSHOCK MAY JUST PUT AN END TO THIS BATTLE!!!!!!” Both attacks hit the furret, causing him to fall to the floor in defeat, the referee floated nearby as the crowd started counting down the seconds until he fainted, for a moment it looked like it wouldn’t happen, my opponent almost stood up, but then electric sparks appeared throughout his body, he was paralyzed. “10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3… 2… 1…” “AND HE’S DONE IT!!!!! THE WINNER IS LEX!!!!!!!!” The crowd went wild, but I could feel the battle take its toll on me, I was panting heavily by this point and having never done something so extreme in this body, I quickly fainted as well. “So… how did it go?” Asked the familiar voice of my dream messenger “Huh?” I asked as I adjusted to my surroundings. “Just kidding, I already know, you’re a natural at this Lex.” Kalleq replied before I could do anything, he then winked before everything got bright once again…. “Ughhh… what happened?” I woke up in another familiar environment, one I quickly realised to be the common floor’s infirmary, I was once again in a hospital bed only instead of a small room it was a large one with several beds. “Yo Lex!!” Came from the voice of a familiar eelektrik laying on another hospital bed, beside him were Itzel and litleo. “Hi… um, what are you guys doing here?” “All the first round matches already finished, didn’t you realise?” Said Itzel. “Both you and Raúl made it past the first round, and he’s right, you did surprisingly well for someone so new to the base!!” “Calling your moves in English was a pretty good strategy, I think it threw him off…” Added the Litleo in a whisper. I was a little surprised at hearing that. “A-ah, really? I-i’m just happy I didn’t get squished really.” I answered, before any of the others could reply though a figure dashed rapidly through the air between other patients and visitors, a familiar greyish blur gliding through the room. “Gael!!” I smiled. huff huff “Sorry I didn’t get here earlier, it took a while to get out of Demian’s watch, you should’ve seen him he was so mad that you held your own as well as you did!!!” “A-ah, it’s fine I just woke up after all, did I really miss the rest of the first round?” I asked. “Huh? You just woke up? I didn’t think you were that exhausted from Mateo’s attacks.” Gael questioned “I don’t think he was fainted for that long I think he just fell asleep.” Commented Raúl. “No one asked you.” Growled Gael “Hey!!” Exclaimed both Itzel and Litleo “Dude, no need to get so defensive.” Replied Raúl “He was just trying to be nice.” Added the tatsugiri. “Look, whatever, I would’ve liked to at least been able to know how the other rounds went so I knew who I’m facing next, I wasn’t really looking to win anyway… just not get humiliated.” I said, attempting to defuse the tension in the room, particularly Gael who I didn’t want to get into a fight just because of me. “You didn’t miss much.” Explained Raúl. “From what I can tell, apart from me making it out of a super intense and cool battle against some archen-“ “You beat him in three strikes it really wasn’t all that.” Bitterly added Litleo. “Shut up he was tougher than he looked!!” Raúl blushed. “Anyway, yeah, others who made it include the lucario and the vibrava, to no one’s surprise.” Everyone, included Gael rolled their eyes at that comment. “The final’s probably going to be between those two…” Whispered the Litleo. “At least it’ll be an entertaining final.” Argued Itzel. “No it won’t, we know Miguel will beat her to a pulp.” Added Raúl, Gael looked like he was about to argue but instead crossed his arms and looked away and rolled his eyes, however, his eyes suddenly jumped open as he came to a realisation. “Wait!! America made it?!!?” Gael exclaimed with a worried tone “The vibrava?” asked Itzel. “Yeah, she was in the match just after Lex actually, she wiped the floor with her opponent.” “Oh no…” Gael exclaimed in shock, at first I didn’t understand why, until it hit me. “Wait, don’t tell me she’s my next opponent!!” I exclaimed “Why what’s… oh… OH!” Exclaimed Itzel “Well, there goes your stay in the tournament kid, and that’s only if things go well.” Raúl commented snarkily. “I was actually looking forward to facing you for a bit, oh well.” “RAÚL!!” exclaimed the other three people in the room. “Again!! No one asked you!!” Exclaimed Gael. “Hey it’s fine, what’s important is that you have fun, you’ll probably only get stronger by your next tournament and-“ Itzel tried to argue but I cut her off to vent my frustrations “Ughhh!! I don’t even want to be here!! I was signed up against my will!! I didn’t even need to make it past the first round in the first place!!” I placed the front of my head on the bed’s pillow to scream directly at it. “Why does this ALWAYS happen!!” “Lex?” Asked Gael, I turned over to look at him, he seemed genuinely apologetic but… none of this was his fault, he’s the person who was trying the most out of everyone here. “Look I’m sorry about this all… I’ll try to figure out a way to get back at Demian I swear-“ “It’s fine.” I simply responded. “No it isn’t!! Look, I swear to you that once all of this is done, I won’t keep standing up for Demian, not after this.” Exclaimed Gael, I merely sighed in response. “Let’s just get this over with” “-AND BEGIN!!!” Me and my opponent stood still for a moment, both of us looking directly at each other’s eyes, The vibrava had a fierce and brutal glare, not a malicious one, but a determined look that made it possibly more dangerous, I tried not to show nervousness, but it was impossible as everything was stacked against me, even with my muddled hearing I could still make out the occasional person chanting my name in the crowd, if people wanted me to be an underdog of the tournament, I was sad to disappoint. **Please… I just wish I’m not humiliated. ** Nothing, I decided enough was enough and I charged my strongest attack “SPAAAAAAARK!!!!!!!!!!” “SANDSTORM!!!!” She shouted, letting out a massive cloud of rapidly spinning sand and dust, which covered the arena in a flash and sent me flying and dragging to the floor as I could feel every little particle of dirt hit me in the most painful manner possible, it was like when Gael shook himself after the sand shower, but a million times worse. “Gah!! Argh!!” “AND LEX CHARGES IN WITH A SPARK LADIES AND GENTLEMON!!! A VERY ROOKIE MISTAKE BUT NOT LIKE IT MATTERED ANYWAY AS AMERICA CHARGES IN WITH A POWERFUL SANDSTORM!!! ONE THAT’LL SURELY HURT WITH THE TOXTRICITY’S DOUBLE WEAKNESS TO GROUND!! COULD WE GET SOME CAMERAS IN THERE?!?! PEOPLE AREN’T TUNING IN TO JUST SEE SAND!!!! WHAT ARE WE? THE MONTERREY BASE?!?!!” The announcer shouted. I tried to stand up, but every time I did another large burst of sand would force me down. I could see the silhouette of the vibrava approach, but it was far too hidden beneath the sand for me to make it out properly. I tried charging an acid spray, but before I could react I heard a voice shout “EARTHQUAKE” before suddenly the ground started shaking violently, making me even more vulnerable to the sandstorm attack, I was already falling victim to exhaustion again, but then I was struck by a crack on the ground approaching me at a velocity too fast to avoid, and I blacked out before I could even register it. “He’s awake!!”“Are you ok?” When I woke up I was greeted by four familiar faces in front of me, Gael and the trio of pokemon I kept stumbling across seemed to be arguing before noticing me stirring awake and looking at me in a mix of concern and surprise. “Lex…” Gael spoke. “I lost didn’t I? I lost a second round again?” I laughed to myself, I laughed angrily, tears fell from my eyes slowly as I did so. Gael didn’t respond, his expression was similar to when he was around Demian, the others looked awkwardly amongst themselves, almost a little guilty. “Why did you charge an electric move towards a ground type?!” Questioned Raúl. “That’s like the one thing you should know not to do as an electric ty-“ “NO ONE ASKED YOU RAÚL, FOR THE LAST TIME, REMEMBER I’M A GROUND TYPE TOO AND I COULD END YOU RIGHT THIS VERY MOMENT!!!” Exclaimed Gael, I could see Itzel get in Raúl’s defense trying to de-escalate the situation and an argument forming between the others but I didn’t care, I jumped out of bed and immediately started heading towards my room. “LEX!!” I ignored Gael and the nurses’ call, even someone else who’s voice I couldn’t recognize between all the commotion called me, I realised later down the line this would only make me look like a sore loser but I at that point had given up, the damage was done, I walked down from hallway to hallway, I was about to reach the stairs when I noticed a gliding figure following me. “Wait up!!!” Screamed Gael as he approached me, I was upset, but I was too tired and he was way too fast when he was gliding for me to make the effort in avoiding him. “Look, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have made a scene there, I just didn’t like how uncaring they were and-“ “It’s fine, it’s whatever, who cares anymore, what’s done is done, that bastard Demian’s plan was a success let’s just…” I sighed and panted, still tired from the battles. “I want to forget about this.” “Right, it’s just…” Gael suddenly launched himself into a hug. “I’m sorry, I really wanted to help you, there must’ve been something we could’ve done to stop this from going so badly!” I couldn’t help but chuckle a little despite it all, the way he hugged me reminded me of Ash’s gliscor in the anime, who was always a favourite of mine, immediately I felt a little better, more comfortable, tears were practically falling out of his eyes and I felt bad, because if there’s one person who had no fault in this disaster, it was him. “It’s fine Gael, I mean it, we did what we could it was just not something we could really change the outcome of.” I smiled and hugged him back, I even let out a few tears myself, truthfully I couldn’t help but be hopeful that in the end all of this would just be forgotten, it’s not like I planned to join a tournament ever again, and I’m sure everyone else had better things to spend thinking about. Gael seemed to take it well, I stayed in the hug with him for a bit before he eventually let go, much more composed and we walked to our dorm closely together. “Hey um… what was that about this happening before?” he asked. “Oh… right, it’s just that I once was made to enter this nation-wide maths contest where I made it past the first round several times despite never wanting to go or do well, I didn’t even study for any of them yet I would always fail to make it past the second round, the tournament reminded me of that… it just feels bad to be told you have potential but to squander it.” I spoke. “I’m sorry to hear that, I think I actually remember those contests, not even I made it actually, I didn’t realise you were actually good at maths.” Gael commented. “I never said that I was bad at them, I just cannot stand maths.” I explained, we stayed in silence closely for the rest of the walk, when we opened the door to it, we were greeted by a manic looking obstagoon and his lackey beside him, sporting both grins who looked even more manic than usual. “Well, well, WELL, lookie what we got here, finally crawling back to where you came from, all humbled and beat up.” The cruel dark type stated cruelly with an expression I was TIRED of seeing at this point, he sat on the couch with a relaxed position, he sat as if daring us to approach him- no, expecting us to approach him, but I ignore him, it took me all my willpower to do so but I ignored him as I walked to my bunk bed. “Oh you little shit, you little arrogant shit, haven’t you realised already? EVERYONE in this base already knows how worthless you are, they already saw how easily you were beaten down to a pulp, do you seriously think you’ve got any shot at standing up to me? ME? DO YOU EVEN REALISE HOW POWERFUL I AM?!! I’ve got connections ALL over the base in places you’re probably too scared, and that goes for the both of you, to even head to because you guys are worthless members of your species, wimps basically, there is something wrong with all of you!” He ranted, standing up from his couch and approaching us instead, we ignored him. “SERIOUSLY?!!? You’ve got nothing to say to that?!?! You guys are fucking mistakes!” “OH, THAT’S FUCKING IT!!!” I shouted, unable to take it anymore “SPARK!!!” I charged up an attack and lunged myself at him, crashing into his bunk bed, luckily we didn’t damage anything seriously but as we both crashed and then proceeded to fall on the floor, with Demian hitting himself in the head, when we both stood up we were controlled by our own anger and adrenaline, and he lunged at me with a powerful fury swipes attack “HOW!! FUCKING!! DARE!! YOU!! YOU LITTLE SHIT ARE GOING TO GET WHAT’S COMING TO YOU, I’M GOING TO END YOUR LIFE RIGHT NOW YOU ABOMINATION OF-“ “DEMIAN STOP!!” suddenly it was Gael who launched himself at Demian, putting himself in front of me and pushing him away from me, this took Demian completely by surprised as you could see an expression of shock on both him and Dylan’s face, the latter of whom finally got himself involved in the fight and started dragging Demian away from us before he kept hurting himself with fury swipes. “You… I knew it, I could see you were taking a liking to him, after all this time you… you choose to betray me? Heh, but I always knew you were nothing, you’re just as bad as him, if not worse, don’t think I don’t know what you are.” “I don’t care Demian!! I’m DONE with you!! You’ve been nothing but an idiotic pest to everyone in this base and you’ve ruined my life, I’m not gonna let you get away with ruining Lex’s!!!” Gael responded. The day went a lot more quietly after that, no one spoke at all, and we all went to bed before we knew it, I didn’t even bother trying to find out how the rest of the tournament went, I think the Lucario ended up winning anyhow, I cried myself to sleep, not even caring about who listened.Pokéumans re-lived part 1 "From parallel worlds" Chapter 5 "Welcome to the Desert of the lions pokéuman base"… Another vision. Once again I was in that empty void, I saw nothing, I heard nothing, I felt nothing. I was pretty sure I was dreaming. I could make out a figure, at first just a tiny pink blur, then a larger blur, then it slowly morphed shape into more of a silhouette. I could over time make out more details, like anothet colour, a blue, a familiar blue, a familiar shape, familiar patterns, familiar spikes, familiar- hang on. “You’re the toxtricity from those weird dreams.” I said calmly, I felt like I should’ve had a stronger reaction to this revelation yet I couldn’t bring myself to react in such a way, I didn’t even feel the words come out of my mouth, I simply heard them in my own voice. The toxtricity appeared to look into nothing, before eventually turning his sight to mine, or at least where I appeared to see from, I tried to look at my own body but couldn’t. The toxtricity examined and approached me, walking slowly, I tensed up a little, remembering how he had attacked me in all my other dreams, yet he didn’t, he only got closer, as he did I could tell he was very similar to my own toxtricity form, only there was pink where purple should be, he was shiny. “Hey.” He said. “You’re finally speaking?” I responded. The toxtricity seemed surprised at my reply, and with that my strange trance of calmness broke, I could feel myself blink, breathe, and move. It was as if I had snapped away from drowsily functioning on autopilot, I decided to get a look at my body now that I could react. “So you can hear and see me now? Look, Lex, there’s enough time, you need to-.” I looked at my hands before he could finish, and once I did, I woke up. “Gah!!” I woke up startled and not the best rested, once the initial energy from waking up dissipated once my mind cleared and I recalled my surroundings from what happened yesterday, I pretty much laid in bed mustering whatever energy I had left to at least uncover myself and sit up from bed to confirm it, eventually I managed to get up and yup, same hospital room as yesterday, and looks like I wasn’t alone. At the corner of the room sleeping on a small chair I could see none other than Rodri, the chesnaught Pokéuman who rescued me from pokextinction and is taking care of me, basically the reason why I’m here in the first place. ((God, I still can’t believe all of that I heard yesterday is true, but I also have a hard time doubting it either. Should I even be saying god still?)) I would think to myself until eventually I heard a noise the other pokéuman’s direction and turned to Rodri waking up. “Guhhh, oh hey er... Alex?” The thickly-armored pokémon said. “Lex, uhh close enough I guess.” “No no, it’s important to learn how people desire to be called for respect.” He stood up and brushed his fur and face in an attempt to look a little bit more decent. “If you’d like to know what time it is, I took the liberty of getting a temporary digital clock for your counter, it’s mine but you’ll be able to borrow it for these few days, you’re a bit late but it’s completely normal given your circumstances, plus there’s still about an hour left before your next session is scheduled.” I looked over at the clock. “10:37” was displayed on it. “Well.” Rodri interrupted. “We’ve still got some time left as you can see, and that brings me to the main reason I got here.” He said before going to the counter and reaching down to a small drawer where he pulled from a bunch of boxes. “Ere we go.” “I wanted to make sure you weren’t bored since unfortunately there’s not much to do for a civilian if you’re not on the lower floors, I mean you’ve seen the TV probably but it pretty much only has cable here, you can play videogames with it and at first that was what I was planning to bring but I quickly realised I wouldn’t be able to know what games you liked, in terms of videogames, well aside from pokémon, everyone here likes pokémon, still I decided to go for something easier to set up so I decided to bring a bunch of two player tabletop games! Given how there’s really only going to be two of us since the nurse can’t play, and I do still have stuff to do but I’ll promise to try and play something when I’m here.” Rodri explained, beaming with a smile on his face constantly as he talked, his energy and optimism could be felt throughout the room and I couldn’t help but feel happy and relaxed with him. “Thanks, Rodri.” I replied sheepishly. “Hey don’t mention it, really.” He responded with an even bigger smile. “So, we probably only have time to play a match of one of these for now, but we’ll have the rest of the day for the other, which one do you wanna start with? I’ve got Uno, Jenga, chess, checkers, guess who, battleship.” “Huh?” As he listed the various games there was one that stood out from the others, most were their regular, if a bit off brand, versions, however the guess who package look a lot more homemade, and in the box art instead of humans there were pokémon. It was a pokémon guess who. Rodri took to notice that I had fixated on the altered game. “Oh! Of course! Well since most of us are big pokémon fanatics we decided to make our own version of guess who to represent ourselves, rather than our human forms, it can bring bad memories sometimes... That’s besides the point however, so you want to play this one?” His explanation made sense, I nodded. “Sure, h-heck, it might even help me now that I’m probably going to see pokémon more than people- er, humans.” “Eh, don’t worry about it, one gets used to it, before you know it you’ll be able to tell tons of pokémon from the same species apart, trust me. Anyways, guess who it is then.” He responded as he set up the game, even with how easy it was to set up I was still surprised at how quickly Rodri put everything together, we played one round of the game, he had a blaziken and I had a delphox, interestingly the pokémon had human names alongside their species, I think the blaziken was called James or something like that, and guessing was interesting too as we often had to refer to non human body parts (does your character have wings?) or typing (are they a fire type) this actually made guessing easier though in the end neither of us got each other’s character right. As chesnaught was putting away the game the togekiss nurse show up. “Good morning Commander Palagot. Ah I see you’re awake as well.” She motioned towards me. “I’m just here to bring my patient breakfast and check up before he heads to his following session which I believe should be about... Now.” She then directed at Rodri, who responded but I wasn’t really invested in their conversation/discussion but on what I was brought to eat, it was simple chicken broth, yuck. She also brought that strange drink from yesterday, and like yesterday it was absolutely delicious, but I still don’t know what’s in it. By the time I finished my meal the nurse had left, I turned over at Rodri to find him looking away to nowhere for some reason as if he was avoiding looking at something, he then saw me though and as if caught changed his demeanour completely. “Oh! Well, we should be heading now.” He exclaimed nervously. “Why were you looking away like that?” I asked attempting to raise an eyebrow. Not exactly a developed skill of mine. “Oh, nothing important haha.” He said rubbing the back of his head. “I see... Um, do you know what was in that drink they gave me?” “Uhhh... No...... I do not.” He replied, nervously. I wasn’t willing to press further, I just sighed and walked the same route as yesterday to the hypno doctor’s office, this time the pokémon we came across tended to approach us more. “I’m telling you man, their defences were weaker than normal! I got in there far two easy.” Came from a rotom zipping past us in conversation with a Zoroark. “Alright, fine, I believe you. Oh! Hey there Rodri.” The zoroark said in a casual tone which contrasted with the rigid salute she was giving the chesnaught, the rotom also gave a slightly different salute, possibly related to his distinct physiology. “You guys really don’t have to do that.” The chesnaught chuckled as he made a stop to chat with the duo who seemed to know each other. The zoroark chuckled. “And I’m assuming the kid is the same from the mission.” She then said looking over at me. The rotom interrupted before any of us could reply “I-If what we heard is correct, he’s safe from basic pke brainwashing and experimentation, correct?” I gulped, Rodri seemed to notice my apprehensiveness and took control of the conversation. “Yup, I’m sure he’s all good, Lex, these are some of the prt members that I worked from the mission I rescued you from, and close friends.” He said turning to me, he then turned to the others. “We’re actually on our way to his next session so we’re in a bit of a rush, but I’ll catch up later.” Rodri smiled. “Right... well Lex, if you’re gonna keep hanging out with our goliath pal here you should probably get used to his relaxed punctuality, anyways, see ya Rodri.” And with that the zoroark and rotom left, I could only nod in reply. “Don’t listen to them, we’re mexicans, we don’t have a sense of punctuality, human or pokéuman.” Rodri said. “Right, right... Why did no one stop for conversation yesterday though?” Rodri raised an eyebrow “What do you mean?” “W-w-well I mean, w-we came across more pokéumans yesterday but most just looked, b-but they seemed to know you too.” Rodri was startled by my question, but he happily replied. “Well, people yesterday weren’t sure if you were fully trustworthy, and to an extent they still are but they now know that if you are brainwashed it’s at the very least on such a subconscious level that they cannot fault your conscious self, they pity you, somewhat.” “I see...” Rodri’s expression gloomed “Honestly, Lex? I wish you weren’t going through this, I trust fully well that you aren’t brainwashed and while I perfectly understand why we’re doing these check ups, I still feel bad that you couldn’t go live as a pokéuman immediately after having arrived here, this is a drastic change to our lives and you need to be around people your age and with your experiences to get through it, not stuck here in a hospital being treated as a potential security threat, I can only hope everything goes well and you’re able to put all this behind you, because you deserve to live as normal as a pokéuman is able to, not having to carry all this weight.” I could once again only nod in response, I was feeling the words of what he had explained, even if everything goes well, would I always be known as the former potential brainwashee? We eventually arrived at the office from yesterday, and once again we were greeted by the labcoat wearing Hypno, doctor Luis Rosales. “Ah, finally, come in both of you.” He said and we obeyed. The office was exactly as yesterday, online instead of having us sit down the hypno had us follow to the back where the strange machine was located behind a curtain, it seemed familiar and at first I couldn’t place it but I quickly remembered of a curious check-up I had as a kid, back when people started to suspect I was neurodivergent. “I hope you’ve had a good first day in our lovely base, despite the circumstances.” The pokéuman doctor said. “Oh yeah, it’s been nice.” I replied. As we arrived to a large machine on the wall with a small bed beside it, the hypno began introducing it. “This is a psychoencephalogram, a modified version of the electroencephalogram used in human medicine only this is to detect psychic energy rather than electric, our ability to channel different types allows us to make devices like these. It appears judging by your expression you’re somewhat with these.” “Oh yeah I remember having to go to one of these, don’t recall what for or what it did though.” I managed to explain as I sat down on the bed. The hypno continued. “Well, as you can probably guess this is what we’ll use for today’s session, we’ll hook up your head to this machine just like the human doctor most likely did, and then with it we’ll be able to get a read on your mind and trace any level of subconscious mind control, any questions?” “Yeah actually, um.” I raised my hand out of habit and quickly moved it back down. “Yeah so now that you mention the subconscious thing, aren’t I supposed to be unconscious when hooked up to this machine? I mean when I had the check up as a k-kid I was made to not sleep throughout the entire night so I could fall asleep for the check-up.” “You are correct.” Dr. Luis answered as he started waving his pendulum back and forth... Back and... Forth... “Now, given how you probably hadn’t have a good regular sleep cycle in that pokextinction base while your transformation progressed, we decided not to force you to stay up all night just for a short session, your body needs to rest properly, and luckily us hypnos are able to, help, shall we say, others fall asleep regardless of whether they’re able to, or want to.” The Hypno chuckled. “Do pardon my attitude, it’s in my nature to enjoy doing this as much as I hate, now, just relax, relax in your bed, breathe deep, in and out, and SLEEP.” ... Sleep... ... Huh? Another vision? What is... “Hu… N…..?” And then it stopped. “Lex?” “H-huh?” As I woke up and rubbed my eyes, I could make out the faces of Rodri and Doctor Luis staring directly at me. “The check-up’s done, Lex, Dr. Luis had you fall asleep with his pendulum and now woke you up.” Rodri explained. “Oh, um… How did it go then?” The hypno and the chesnaught turned to look at each other with a worried look. “Oh no, did it go badly?” I asked worried. “Far from it in fact, your sleep patterns, brainwaves and psychic energy remained completely normal at every point, at most we could detect an unusual spike for a fraction of a nanosecond, but it was too short and small to be significant.” The hypno answered, yet their expressions of concern remained intact. “However, that is unfortunately no less concerning, as much as it could mean that you’re in the clear, it could also mean that the conditioning, or even just any sort of experiment could be embedded deep, deep into your consciousness in unimaginable ways, with pokextinction one can never know.” He continued. “Well, regardless, the fact you seemed to be clear of pke’s mind control in both the previous and current test means you’ll only have to deal with one more, however this will be a very important test that, had you have shown any signs of brainwashing before, you actually wouldn’t have needed to go through as focus would’ve shifted to treating the conditioning, but since it didn’t this final test will be no longer focused on brainwashing, but on any kind of deep pke experimentation done to you as far as we’re able to detect, the results of the final test… could be anything, but it could also be another clear. I try to be hopeful but, do keep this in mind that even if just for the rest of the day, even if it’s a fluke, which hopefully it is, us pokéumans desperately need more of those, you’re right now a priority in the PRT’s research, this also means that instead of happening at this exact hour, the final test will be at the early hours in the morning, and it won’t be in my office but deep into our laboratory. Rodri, I trust well that you’ll be able to take care of him in the meantime and make sure he adjusts to what’s ahead of him.” I couldn’t even come close to comprehend all the information the hypno doctor was explaining, he said all of it with little to no breaths in-between at no point dropping eye contact while I couldn’t even remain in his direction. I could feel myself growing anxious at the prospect of the implications, I started breathing heavily and sweating and yet none of it, felt possible, it never felt like pokextinction had the time to experiment on me given what I know of the situation, but then again, one can never know with them it seems. Rodri’s expression of concern remained, and it was even more marked than before, he of course noticed my anxious state and tried to calm me down, seemingly understanding my own thought process. “Well, let’s not scare the kid just yet? It could like you said very well be a fluke, especially given the circumstances of his own conditioning, it’s very like he had just been placed in the chamber and he wasn’t even finished transforming so maybe that blocked the signal for him? And do you really think that a small outpost like the one we were in would’ve had the time to pull deep experiments like the ones the examination would suggest? I’m not doubting you doctor, I understand the concerns and I won’t stop it but I’m perfectly hopeful the kid simply went through a miracle.” Rodri argued, his optimism helping defuse the thickness of the air and helping me feel better as my breathing collected itself. The hypno argued back, “It’s not just a possible pokextinction experiment that we’re dealing with, it could be anything given our history across the bases of the globe, but I understand your concerns too, we promise we only have to do this as a formality than anything more and the chances of it being serious are very slim, still, such a perfect miracle is very unusual.” I cocked my head at the doctor’s second explanation, it seems he was keeping a lot of elements and details intentionally vague with no seeming reason and it was hard to follow. “Well, that should be all for now, see you two tomorrow at 5 am, rest well, young pokéuman.” The Hypno simply stated and with that we exited his office. “You’ll be ok, I’ll make sure of it.” Rodri immediately said once we were outside and walked a good way back, I wanted to believe him but there was a lot on my mind, we stopped occasionally with Rodri talking to some of his coworkers, some just there for him, but most were asking about my session, it seemed like word would spread about me here, whether I liked it or not. Eventually we made it to the hospital room again. “Well, we’re here...” Rodri said in a somewhat unsure tone. “I know how stressful it felt there, believe me, but I’m sure it’s going to turn out alright! And in case it doesn’t I’ll make sure you’re still able to live a normal life, because that’s what everyone deserves, ok?” He said from the doorway as I made my way to the bed. I smiled a little against myself. “Yeah, you’re right.” I said. He smiled as well “That’s the spirit, I’ll be a little busier today so you’ll mostly be by yourself but I’ll try to come back and accompany you as much as possible, I promise we’ll get to play more of the other games.” He said and with that he left. Rodri stuck to his word for the rest of the day, I would be left alone for most of the time, with the nurse occasionally showing up for small check ups and for meals, always giving me that strange drink that I never got told what it was of, but it was delicious and I chugged it every time. The times where Rodri showed up he stayed for a while and we were usually able to play a game or two, we managed to get through every game he brought and I even won battleship, Rodri won everything else though, specially chess and checkers, he says that he is a very good strategist and usually comes up with a lot of the plans for PRT missions, so I guess that’s why. At the end of the day though once we got through everything we ended up a little bored with not much to do. “What’s on the TV anyway.” I asked as I laid on the hospital bed with my hands on my stomach, I had to lay them in a way where the spikes on my wrist didn’t bother me to honestly I got used to them, having all this time to think it was weird how little it took to get used to my body, even the crazier stuff like my tail or my mohawk of pure electricity, which never seemed to shock anything, but I kinda figured everything was pokémon-proofed here. “Oh, just cable from the human world and a few channels from the base, hospital TVs are fairly limited compared to the ones in the dorms.” Rodri replied, relaxing on a couch, dangling his legs, I noticed how he always had to sit on a position where his shell didn’t disturb anything, which I can’t imagine would’ve been easy. “You talk of the base and the rest of the world as if we were from parallel worlds.” I chuckled. “Well I mean it practically feels that way, even as a high ranking PRT member who is given access to the overground for special missions we’re still very cut off from human society and we live like this for our whole lives, itself communication between bases is pretty weak compared to the connection human territories and countries have, I’ve heard it used to be better before the pke fragmentation but now practically everyone does their own thing without knowing much of what goes on outside.” “How many bases are there in Mexico?” I asked, curious about this new topic. “That’s gonna be something you’ll learn in your geography class once you have them, I’m not particularly good at geography myself, human or pokéuman.” Rodri admitted. “That’s a shame, I love geography and I’m quite good at it, it’d be interesting to know.” I said Rodri thought for a bit. “If there’s anything I can say is we definitely don’t have as many as the US does, like those guys have a base for almost every corner of their country.” “Because of course they do.” I added, then a question surged to my mind. “Wait, how do you go above ground without being noticed?” I asked Rodri, I realised there had to be away for them to hide and not get noticed as not only are pokémon sightings not really a thing but I was already made aware that seeing pokémon can cause civilians to become pokextinction sleeper agents. “Ah, right, I never explained that.” Rodri exclaimed as he reached to his back and pulled out a box. “With these.” He said as he opened it and revealed a silver ring. “This ring has the ability to disguise a pokéuman temporarily reverting them to their former human form, and how it would look had they remained human as they aged. Simply wear it on your finger or an equivalent and voilà, human in just a silver flash.” Rodri explained as he fiddled with the ring before putting it back in the box. I was about to open my mouth to ask the obvious question but he interrupted me “Now I know what you’re thinking, why don’t we give every pokéuman one of these so they can live normally? Unfortunately it doesn’t work like that, this ring is special and it cannot be mass produced for several reasons, from their main component being a super rare mineral that we on top of that have to keep hidden from pokextinction’s research and normal humans possibly discovering it by accident, it’s also the most complex technology we have, even for our standards, it’s so complicated that it cannot be made and forged by a machine and it has to be made by hand, only few of these are made a year, like I’m pretty sure the number is in single digits, most, practically all, are passed down or given away, including mine.” He said the mine on air quotes. “Oh...” I responded. “That’s a huge shame.” “Yeah... Only decently ranked PRT members are allowed these, some bases have these elite 4 things were they would get the four strongest pokémon in the base and give them a role where if you could beat them consecutively you’d get your own ring, but our base never did that as we always felt it was a waste of resources and personnel, since the elite 4 never really worked in the PRT and I have to agree it’s pretty pointless.” Rodri explained. I nodded with his explanation “Yeah that... Kinda seems like a dumb and risky system to be honest.” “That’s what I said! Anyway, yeah, that’s how we blend in the human world, in the mission we rescued you we had to disguise ourselves as a meetup between college aged young adults.” “I see.” I added. The conversation and later the day soon finished, and I went to sleep soon after. I woke up to a gentle yet persistent bleeping sound, however it took me a while for a single part of my body to respond. “Ugh... In a minute...” I turned off what I could now realise was the alarm as I was able to gain enough energy to stand up, even though I couldn’t open my eyes yet, whatever random dream I had was starting to fade from my memory, a welcome distinction from the previous vivid visions of the past weeks. “God what I would give to wake up well rested a single day.” With that complaint I plopped back into the bed, my continued rest wouldn’t last long however as the door opened with a familiar white bird-like shape entering. “Time to get up boy, I’ll bring you to your check-up as you most likely don’t wanna be like Rodri and arrive several minutes late-“ “Actually you won’t have to worry about that.” Came from a suddenly arriving voice, it was Rodri! “Well, this is a surprise, what made you suddenly decide to get up on time?” The togekiss asked the chesnaught. “Miss Angelina, I’ll have you know I can fully recognize my responsibilities and the level of importance each one has, if I need to get up on time, I will. Anyway, I’ll take care of Lex, he’s a lot more used to me guiding him I’m pretty sure.” Rodri continued. I smiled, I definitely trusted him more than the nurse who refused to tell me what she gave me to drink. “Very well, I’ll let you two be, I hope all goes well for both of you.” The nurse replied and left the room in a different direction, I walked towards Rodri and he looked at me with a warm expression before switching to a stern one. “This isn’t going to be easy for you, and you don’t have a choice on the matter, but I still want to make you are safe and as comfortable as possible, are you ready, for this?” He asked. I was about to nod, but I thought it over for a second. “I… d-don’t think so.” I ended up answering. “It’s fine.” He simply answered as he started to move and motioned for me to follow, at first we walked the same direction on the much darker hallways, clearly indicating the artificial sunlight wasn’t activated yet, but it wouldn’t be long till we started taking different turns until we eventually arrived at a small room guarded by a fierce looking, almost predatory pokemon, one that I couldn’t recognize, it looked to be draconic with mostly dark blue skin and light blue ice-like accents, said Pokémon simply looked at us before nodding and letting us in. Inside it was much clearer as the lights (regular ones) were on, and as we walked I saw a lot of pokéumans frantically moving across the hallways in every direction, through windows and doors I saw glimpses of some fairly indescribable stuff, strange machinery and research that most likely was not close to existing in the human world, and I couldn’t really make sense of any of it. One caught my attention in particular as it was more out in the open, almost as if purposefully being shown off like a science fair project, with a lunatone tending to it, and it wasn’t just me who seemed interest as Rodri also stopped to take a look. “Heh, check it out Lex, this is the original reason for the mission of your rescue.” He explained. “What’s all this?” I asked looking at the various test tubes, equipment and most of all tons and tons of notes and files. The lunatone, who had been listening to us responded to my musings. “This, young pokéuman, is our pokéuman base and our rivals at pokextinction’s top priority, G4L-R particles, particles of a special energy theorized to be involved with the hypothesized phenomenon known as dynamaxing, you might’ve heard about it, it was in the latest games.”“So that’s what it is…” I said to myself out loud. “Wait, so it’s real? Does that mean gigantamax could also-“ I couldn’t help myself, even if I actually wasn’t a fan of the gimmick in the games the fact I was a species who had access to one of these forms definitely made things more exciting for me. “Yes and no, like I said it’s highly hypothesized, but we haven’t been able to make any breakthrough yet, most of it is still just the piles of research and files we have.” The scientist explained. “Now, I would love to continue talking about all of this which we have certainly dedicated a lot of our proudest efforts to but I’m fully aware of where both of you are headed as I myself have been called to assist the both of you, so I know that you must be in a rush, I’ll catch up with you eventually, see you later then.” And with that, the lunatone headed to the opposite direction, Rodri and I continued to walk deeper and deeper into the laboratory until, in a less lit area we arrived at a door, Rodri looked at me, and then we entered. Greeting us inside was the very same hypno from the previous sessions, he wasn’t alone however, he was also accompanied by a large amount of other psychic pokéumans, too many to name. all working on various smaller monitors holding paperboards and most wore labcoats, it was a stereotypical scene. However, in contrast with that familiarity, the interior was very dark and underlit, compared to the usual whiteness of your typical labs, there were a few accents of artificial light and as I looked across the large room I could trace it back to a large tube-like machine, looked to be some sort of… well, I couldn’t really tell you, but it was very clear you were supposed to step inside of it, possibly a scanner? ((Indeed it is, young pokéuman)) . Suddenly rang inside my head, I looked around to hear where it came from before the voice rang again, much clearer. ((It’s me, Dr. Luis, i’m speaking to you through telepathy as you can probably tell, I’ve been reading your mind since you entered as we’re unfortunately forced to monitor the thoughts of anyone entering the room, including your chesnaught caretaker.)) the hypno communicated. Reacting to the voice out of reflex, I looked towards the direction where Rodri himself was and I could tell he also experienced what I just did, but he looked a lot more used to it than me. Dr. Luis cleared his throat and then spoke, without the telepathy. “Anyway, this is a deep scanner, one of the most advanced pieces of technology we have in this base, and by far the most complicated to use, to the point that, and I feel like it is important for you to know this information young pokéuman, we’ve never used it before, because we have never needed to beforehand.” Hearing that made me very nervous, knowing it was a scanner made it obvious what its purpose was for but, could we even know if it’s supposed to work? Suddenly the lunatone from earlier showed up right from behind us and spoke. “This device has been imported from an off-country base, correct? Even if we haven’t used it before we have enough trust in its production that we can assume it’s going to work just fine.” She added. “Exactly, Miss Vega. If this machine was considered too likely to have faults, we wouldn’t have spent so much of our resources on it." Rodri then added. “I myself oversaw when this machine was brought in not too long ago, so I do believe you don’t have anything to worry about, Lex.” He continued with a smile. “Regardless, Dr. Luis, please give us a quick explanation of what the machine is going to do.” Rodri then asked. “Well, in very simple terms, using our collective psychic energy to power and direct it it’s simply going to scan all the way into your DNA and basic biological composition for any detectable irregularity and distinction, this is so we could trace several things, brainwashing is one of them but since pke is also regularly known to make experiments to try and manipulate pokémon’s natural abilities beyond their limits to their advantage, the focus then of this machine is on detecting those experiments or, given your situation, any irregularity in you that could’ve caused pke to choose not to brainwash you, as unlikely as it is.” The yellow psychic type explained. “Now that explanations are over, please step inside the device so we can finally proceed.” “Yeah, let’s get this over with! we have places to be!!” Came from a random background voice, looking at the other psychic types in the room it was clear they were getting impatient from the explanations. “Yeah!! Let’s get on with it already” Came from another and several more. Rodri stepped in front of me and quickly got in the centre of the room, taking a much more commanding stance showing his position of authority and why he earned it “All of you quiet, give the kid a break, will ya? You all know why and how he got here and every single one of you understands you would act the exact same way if you were in his situation, becoming a pokéuman is a frightening thing and I expect all of you to make this as smooth of an experience as possible because right now that’s what all of us need the most, got it?” With that, the room fell silent, I couldn’t help but stand agasp after Rodri displayed such a commanding presence, it was admirable how he could balance respect and amicability so effortlessly. I realised, even with Rodri giving me space that it was not a good idea to waste time thinking despite my own habits, so I quickly approached the machine, it was a frightening experience, naturally it wasn’t the nicest looking thing to get inside of but it was fairly sleek, angular and modern. It was an eerie feeling, having to enter a machine that looked straight out of fiction, one can never really know what’s going to go on inside and it made me very apprehensive. The cell opened, I gulp, and slowly stepped inside and turned around, every single person in the room, from the Dr Luis the hypno, the lunatone, all the many other psychic types and Rodri, was looking into my direction from every corner. Then, in a flash of red light, probably indicating that the machine was ready, everyone turned away and started dispersing across the room focusing their psychic abilities to work on different areas of the room, seemingly in many different parts connected to the deep scanner. Then, I could feel a surge of energy rising through my body slowly, rising from the tip of my toes, through my tail and stomach, I forced myself to stay still throughout all of it not wanting to risk the possibility of disturbing it until eventually, after a very long and patient wait. I could sense the energy slowly vanish from my body, trying to get as best of a look at the rest of the room as possible without moving too much I could see many of the psychic types either working hard analysing the readings of several monitors and descriptors or channelling their psychic powers into the more mechanical looking parts of the machine, possibly powering it. Eventually however, the lights inside the glass dimmed, indicating it had finished, before the capsule opened however I could here a lot of loud murmurs discussing amongst each other from the scientist before Rodri and Dr. Luis had to calm everyone down, my hands trembled from worry, was this bad? Good? Too good? Eventually, once everyone appeared to quiet down, the glass opened, and I could walk out. I almost felt naked walking out of the tube-like structure to the cold sterile floor of the lab with a bunch of scientists directly staring at me. Rodri, taking charge, walked in front of everyone towards, motioning for the pokéuman in charge of this operation to follow. The hypno came forward, cleared his throat, looked over at his clipboard and began. “Well, Lex, I’m not sure how to begin, but just like in the previous sessions you appear to be clear of anything, congratulations.” “Wait, what? Really? Just like that?” I asked, completely and utterly bewildered, I could sense I was far from the only one who felt this way. “It does sound insane but, honestly, we’ve made it clear that you were only in pke’s chambers for a brief period of time, and I could always sense that there wasn’t any of their conditioning in you, I just knew it. The machine and everyone here did their job correctly and we now have the result we wanted, I don’t think any of us need to worry about this anymore than what is needed.” Rodri reassured everyone, putting one of his arms on my back and looking towards the crowd, there was a lot of force to his voice however, indicating than more than reassurance he was trying to avoid things getting out of control while trying to put up a kind and collected face, and getting the room to fall silent. One of the many scientists, a beldum, taking advantage of the silence used it as an opportunity to speak up. “If I may sir, this kind of feels like a waste of time and resources, no? couldn’t there have been less effort-consuming ways to achieve this? I mean this test required a complex machine that hadn’t been used before and almost all the PRT’s psychic personnel only for the results to prove completely negative.” This time it was the hypno who responded. “This young pokéuman arrived under unusual circumstances so it’s completely reasonable for his results to be unusual as well, he had cleared all previous detection tests so we have to use the deep scanner as one final confirmation, our base prides itself on our safety after all.” Suddenly several of the scientists started speaking up. “He cleared all previous tests!?” “No way, I don’t believe it!!” “Why were we not made aware of this?!!” “This should be public information!!!” “Absolutely not!!!” Rodri suddenly roared, startling everyone including myself before composing himself. “Sorry, sorry, but the reason we did not let anyone know of Lex’s results are both for his sake in confidentiality and because we do not want to cause a fuzz, in case of the very likely possibility that you are seeing right now mind you, that he’s completely clear of the brainwashing, because even with that confirmation for the general public outside of the PRT it will be impossible to avoid spreading and continuing rumours everyone, once again this base prides itself on the safety of its residents, which includes their reputation.” “That’s bullshit, you know how the headmaster is.” Came from another random voice. I couldn’t help but be curious at that, so I went to ask Rodri. “What does he mean? What’s with the headmaster?” “Hey look, don’t worry about this right now.” Rodri whispered over to me, he looked in the direction of the hypno for a moment, I was confused as to what was going on before it hit me. ((Oh! Mind reading)) The hypno then began speaking once again. “Everyone, you did a great job, you are now all dismissed, but it’s very important that you do not reveal anything about this event to the general public, this shall be kept as information confidential to the PRT, understood? We have full confirmation that our base’s security isn’t compromised, and that’s enough.” With that everyone started to leave, some with groans of annoyance, some with salutes in understanding, and some looked about to argue but gave it up. I was about to leave before I noticed Rodri wasn’t coming with me, so I walked back and found him having a discussion with doctor Luis. “The headmaster has to know about this, Rodri.” The hypno said. “Does he really have to?” Asked Rodri, who suddenly seemed worried and unsure. “Yes, look, I get your concerns, but he’s smart enough to not disclose Lex’s background to the public.” I jumped when he mentioned me by name. “But this means you’ll have to take him directly to the headmaster’s office, ok? Don’t draw attention to yourself and do not get sidetracked.” Rodri simply sighed in response. “Understood, doctor.” I decided not to speak up and make my presence known and waited for them outside the room until they finished, once they did Rodri took it upon himself to walk me back to my hospital room, it was clear time had passed as artificial sunlight started to light up the base. “How does it feel now that we’re done? You’ll finally able to become a proper citizen of our base!! Isn’t that exciting?!” He proclaimed, his enthusiasm seemed genuine all things considered. “Umm… not as good as I expected, Like I get why this had to happen, but it feels like it ended up being a bigger deal than I was made to believe.” I mentioned, walking beside him through the hallways of the base with a hunched over expression that was characteristic of my species. “Look, it’ll pass.” Rodri said as we arrived at the room. “They’ll forget about it in time, and it’ll be old news, especially given how you don’t plan on joining the PRT, don’t worry about it.” “Hmm…” I sat down on the bed, kicking my feet on the air as I processed all these events that were now over. “Well, in any case, what now?” “Oh well you’ll just have a few basic medical check-ups, measurements, blood samples, etc. nothing too major now, and then we’ll descend to meet with the headmaster at his office where he’ll register you to the base, sign you up for school, give you your schedule and assign you a dorm room that you will live in, the dorms are shared but, who knows, maybe you’ll like your roommates!” Rodri explained. I rubbed my shoulder in nervousness, which Rodri quickly took notice of. “Is everything all right? Look, don’t worry about the headmaster, Nacho might seem hard to deal with, but he’ll leave you alone, I’m sure.” There was a difference in his tone from his usual one, almost as if it were indicating that he himself felt unsure about what he had just stated, I wasn’t about to press this topic any longer, not after all these past few days. “It’s fine, I guess more than anything I’m worried about the blood samples than anything.” I didn’t lie, I absolutely cannot deal with syringes. The first few hours of the day came to pass, with several visits of the nurse taking me to all the basic check-ups I needed, Rodri was there to watch over me in all of them which was good particularly as the nurse was extremely far from gentle particularly when dealing with syringes, I will not miss her at all once I descend. By the time we were done it was around 4pm and we were getting ready to descend to the second floor of the building where the headmaster’s office would be, according to Rodri, we would be descending from an elevator directly into the office rather than into the “main hall” because of my unique circumstances of arrival. We arrived and then walked for a brief hallway before turning into an enormous set of doors, decorated with a complex mural depicting several pokémon, it appeared to be made out of materials such as cobblestone, marble and red pumice, though I could also see a little bit of... crystal sprinkled in, which made for a unique combination, the main pokémon depicted was a hawlucha, fitting for this base and this country, I couldn’t help but wonder how murals like these existed in other bases of other Mexican cities or even other countries. I was so caught up in my own mind that I didn’t notice Rodri speaking into a hailer, that is until I could hear the gates click open. Rodri looked at me before entering. “Come in, both of you.” Came from a very deep growly voice inside, I shivered. The inside of the office was fairly standard though it’s age clearly showed in the mismatching components and elements clearly telling of different periods and several rebuilds, no doubt related to the war situation, the most interesting aspect though would be the back wall behind the main desk, it had a fairly large door and around it there were several pictures of what I could tell as former headmasters and the current one. Said headmaster, currently sitting down on his desk was a Charizard, who was glancing at his computer and occasionally shifting into glancing at other documents of his before acknowledging us, I expected Rodri to introduce us, yet he seemed to somewhat paralyzed like I was, only with an unchanging smile. Eventually the charizard simply glanced at us from the side, snorted loudly letting up a puff of fiery smoke at our direction making us cough (though clearly Rodri had the stronger reaction, I’m assuming type matchups unless they’re somehow not a thing) and began to talk. “Stop gawking and make it quick.” I sat down on the chair facing towards the desk, I still expected Rodri to speak but I quickly realised he wasn’t gonna and out of fear I ended up speaking first. “S-so um, you’ve p-probably been briefed on our situation already so…” “Yes, I’m fully aware of how you got here, pokéuman, I’m perfectly aware of the very probable security breach we just got out of.” The Charizard interrupted as he directed his glare towards Rodri. Rodri seemed undeterred. “Well then, let’s just cut the chase, the kid’s gone through a lot Nacho, it’s a miracle that he’s here in perfect condition so go easy on him, k? just give him a home and I promise he won’t do anything; I mean look at him he’s totally inoffensive.” The Charizard then glared at me, he would not let go of his glare until he began speaking again with a disdainful tone. “My name is Ignacio Manriquez Bravo, Headmaster of the desert of the lions pokéuman base, that is my name and title, and you shall respect it and refer to me by it. Understood?” He spat in almost disgusted tone, he then snorted again. “A punk poison type like him? Inoffensive? A likely story, his miraculous condition is far too suspicious for our base to feel comfortable, you know I take our base’s security very seriously and I have perfectly rational reasons to be… apprehensive, towards the toxtricity you brought to us.” He continued before Rodri interrupting, dropping the uncomfortable smile that seemed stuck to him ever since we entered the office. “Hey, he deserves a space here as much as you or I do, everyone does, you know it full well, he doesn’t exactly have much of an alternative and, neither do we.” Rodri seemed to place a lot of emphasis on the last part of his sentence, which seemed to turn Ignacio around at least somewhat. The Charizard merely snorted again and shifted his direction to his computer. “Full name?” “Huh?” I exclaimed “Your full. Name, toxtricity.” The Charizard repeated now directing his eyes at me. I stammered a little before I gave him my full name. “Shortened name?” Rodri stepped in to explain what he meant. “We pokéumans tend to use shortened versions of our full names for our way of running things, I actually have three names, but you’ll mostly see me referred to as Rodri Palagot the chesnaught, a derivation of my first name, my first surname plus my species.” “O-oh, um… Lex Mota, not Alex, Lex, the er… t-toxtricity?” “Low-key toxtricity.” Added Ignacio. “We need specification for those with multiple forms.” He snorted and continued the impromptu interview. “Age?” “14” “Date of birth?” I gave him that info. “Male or Female?” “Male.” “Where do you come from?” “Uhhh, place of birth, raising or current, er, former residence?” I asked, all three options were varied. “Previous residence, federal entity and municipality/borough, given our lack of ties to the government all other information is trivial.” “A-ah, Mexico City, Azcapotzalco then.” “Current level of education?” “High school, first semester.” “Date of arrival?” “Umm…” Rodri once again came to my aid cutting me off. “I’ll handle this one, Saturday October 15th of 2022.” Rodri looked over at me and winked. The Charizard raised an eyebrow. “Yes… I suppose his true arrival will be kept secret to the base then.” “Only to non PRT members, sir.” Rodri responded. Ignacio typed a few more things, likely info he didn’t need me for before eventually going to a printer and bluntly handing me two pieces of paper. “Here is your schedule and calendar, you have been signed up for school starting tomorrow Wednesday to the group 5-AM, you’ll also have a calendar marking school and base activity for several different special events, you are also provided with a map of the three common levels of the base, which also has your assigned dormitory in it, your future roommates have been notified of your arrival.” I quickly looked at the map and saw “Room: 175.” Marked at the top of it Before I could look further, I felt it being snatched from my hands by a curious Rodri, who was darting his eyes across it until finding the dorm number and gasping in shock. “Ignacio, don’t you dare-“ “I have my reasons, and I believe given his… background it’s the perfect environment for him to reside in.” The Charizard cut him off. “I told you to go easy on him Ignacio!! The guy’s a kid and already a graver victim of pokextinction than most of us were when we arrived, I can’t believe you’d seriously belittle his situation so much to the point of-“ “I care for my base, not the feelings of one singular individual who can put our base’s hard-earned security into jeopardy with the slightest lack of carefulness, now let me do my job, you should be thankful I’m letting him stay here.” Rodri simply stopped talking but he clearly didn’t look too happy about the argument ended, the headmaster then turned over at me. “Now, where were we? You are now an official registered citizen of our base, head to your room for the rest of the day, and remember, young pokéuman, do not. Attempt. Anything, understood?” “R-r-right!!” I stuttered. “Good, you two are now dismissed from my office.” The headmaster concluded With that, Rodri and I quickly made our way out, as soon as we stepped outside of the office the large gates shut loudly, I looked over at Rodri who seemed very different from his usual cheerful self, but only for a second. “Well, glad that’s over. Now’s time for the good stuff!! Took longer than expected but oh well.” Rodri said, almost to no one in particular, with a shrug. “Wha- good stuff?? Huh??” I asked, completely confused and whiplashed after possibly going through one of the most stressful things in my life, which has a lot of competition. “Well, now that you’re a fully registered citizen, it’s only fair that you get a full tour of the base by yours truly?” Rodri exclaimed as he pointed to himself. “Now come on!! The sooner we start the better!!” He cheered as he motioned for me to start following outside.I followed him through several hallways, at first, they were all fairly monotone in their sleek metallic-ness, though I notice ther was a lot more emphasis on blue tones rather than the green of the PRT level above, they were also fairly modern looking, which contrasted with the early-mid 20th century looking mural from the headmaster’s office. It did not take long for me to start finding more life in the interior, suddenly as I ran and caught up with the chesnaught in front of me I started bumping into other pokéumans, a doublade, a flaafy, a ducklett, so many different species that looked nothing alike yet were all experiencing the same situation and were all once human, and then, I started seeing doors leading to multiple different places, some looked like shops, some like businesses, I could probably spot a few libraries or recreation areas all from simple stylized signs and doors. It was like a city! I was running in awe constantly turning from direction to direction, causing me to trip into even more pokémon, a heracross, a primeape, one that looked like a sinistea but different, and green. It was insane, fantastic, amazing! I lost Rodri for a moment but the figure of a running, excited and almost manic gargantuan plant-type wasn’t hard to spot even amongst the varied silhouettes of many different pokémon, especially once he slowed down to a stop. I stopped myself to catch my breath before Rodri traced his steps back to reach me. “We’re here.” “Huh?” Rodri smiled and walked up the continuing hall until suddenly entering a large space filled to the absolute brim with pokéumans. In it there were several objects including some fountains, several constructions mimicking landmarks and locations from Mexico City, with the walls of the space being filled with colourful murals and art of different styles all united under a common theme of pokémon, I could make out many entrances indicating more places and cultural centres. It was like a big strange cross between a mall, the zocalo, and a hall. Rodri followed me as I walked almost on autopilot through the hall, seeing all the various amounts of pokémon species that were all congregating in this large space, careful to avoid bumping into any of them but it was somewhat of a fruitless task with just the massive amount of them, but it was such a wonderous sight that I didn’t feel the usual fatigue I get when being on such large crowds, at least not yet. “You like it?” He asked once he was finally within audible reach. “W-where are we, Rodri?!” “This, is the main hall of our glorious pokéuman base, your new home.” He proclaimed. “It’s… unimaginable…” I said in awe. “I… probably should leave before I get exhausted, um… where would my dorm be?” Rodri’s expression shifted in an instant as I asked. “Oh no no no, we don’t need to get to your room just yet! It’s at the very bottom floor, just look at your map. Besides, we’ve still got the rest of the base to explore! You just got here after all.” He exclaimed, I however wasn’t excited at all by this point, it was starting to overwhelm me and I just wanted to rest after everything that had happened today. Rodri’s intensity quickly died down once he noticed my distress. “O-oh, sorry, look, I just want you to give you a proper introduction to the basic routes of the base, so you have less chances of getting lost once you have to navigate it by yourself, that’s all, I’m really sorry if it’s overwhelming you but I really need you to finish it, I promise I’ll try to make up for it by making the rest of the tour as relaxed and laid back as possible, ok?” I was not buying it, but I really just didn’t want to argue at that point, I felt tired. “Sounds like an excuse but ok.” Rodri held out his hand on my arm and tried to give me a softer comforting smile, it felt warm and genuine enough for me, so we simply decided to keep moving, this time at a more casual pace. And truth be told, after a while of calming down and settling in, plus with the new pace we were going I found myself really enjoying all the various locations, Rodri explained that the second floor was the recreational area, where cultural and commercial activities could be found and it was the area that resembled human cities the most, but also taking somewhat of a mall atmosphere like I myself suspected, and the locations we visited once we stopped rushing ourselves were much more interesting, we saw a stadium supposedly made to resemble the Estadio Azteca, but that could also easily accommodate for different grounds of different types, from indoor arenas to large outdoor-style venues, and even apparently an arena for pokémon battling! Rodri assured me I’d be guaranteed to see more of that in the future, it was fairly small in capacity however compared to standard stadiums but Rodri explained this was due to the small population of pokéumans. We also walked past the main auditorium that could hold the entire capacity of the base according to Rodri, where the headmaster and the PRT could speak and give out important announcements when needed, Rodri said I would definitely enter it someday. There were also opera and philharmonic-style concert halls and theaters, several cinemas, not of the usual brands you’d expect like cinemex or cinepolis but local pokéuman ones, like how my mother used to say cinemas were back in her day before they got monopolized. In fact, you could barely spot any kind of human brand or business, everything had a slightly similar feeling but its own, more genuine pokéuman flavour to it, it truly felt like a parallel world in a way. Walking back a bit we eventually found one of many large staircases used to descend across the floor being guarded by a strong looking nidoqueen. We descended to the third floor which as I looked at my map could figure out was the school level, and sure enough it definitely gave off the vibes of a large high school/university, only without any yard because we were all indoors, it was mostly hallways of classrooms which definitely brought back mixed memories from my years of school, there was also a small hospital, a large library, a few labs that were part of the standard classrooms, a large gymnasium but the part that intrigued me the most was the arena, which made me ask Rodri about it. “Check your schedule.” He replied. “Notice anything odd?” I checked my schedule and I found that almost all of the classes in it were fairly standard things, there was maths, spanish/literature, history, geography, P.E., English, various sciences and social formation, all mostly sprinkled either throughout the week or a few days, there was a single class however unlike any other, one that was present on every single day of the school week, and yet one that was completely unfamiliar to me: Battle class. “Battle class? Is this a pokéuman thing?” I asked as I turned my face from my schedule towards Rodri. “Indeed, as pokéumans all of us, no matter the species, have an innate instinct to battle that is important to us, from our moves to our abilities, it is something that we can’t ignore, and unlike humans who’s battling tends to be cruel and against human’s nature of cooperation, us pokéumans are much more attuned towards competition.” He clarified. “Of course, this isn’t the path that everyone’s going to take, and just as how maths can be the basis to plenty of things in the universe, but plenty of people as well don’t enjoy it, battling can’t be for everyone, but it’s still something that forms part of our standard education since to some degree it’s part of our nature.” He then added. I got stuck on his words on our nature, ((is it true? Am I destined for battle as well then? Or am I another exception)) Suddenly, another thought came to my head. “Rodri?” “Hm?” “W-what was the headmaster referring to, when he talked a-about my nature and background and type and… stuff.” Rodri seemed doubtful and calculative, there were points where he almost spoke up but clearly decided to think about it for a bit longer. “I’m afraid I wouldn’t be good at answering that, the responsibility is probably better suited to your biology lessons… and social formation.” He eventually settled on, rubbing the back of his head with his arm. “L-look don’t worry about it, things are going to be fine, let’s just continue with the tour! We’re… almost done.” He let out, seeming more like he was trying to convince himself than me. We eventually descended in a similar manner as before to the fourth and final floor, the dorms, this was by far the slowest, least interesting and quietest part of the tour, on occasion we’d walk past a pokéuman (a lotad, a litleo, etc.) but not much would really be said and by this point we already knew where things would be going, we did however spot a relatively large hospital, it seemed every floor, including the PRT level was equipped with one for obvious reasons. But beyond that it was just identical dorms. They were curious dorms as well, doors made of sparkling white crystal with a very futuristic digital panel alongside them and the dorm number above it, I’m guessing used to open and close the door and who knows what else, despite the repetitive environment it was still a wonder, and you’d occasionally find a few personal touches like objects or drawings in the dorms giving the rooms some amount of individuality, which was nice, it made it clear that living, breathing, thinking and loving people habituated them. I expected us to arrive at my dorm at any moment, yet we pretty much had to traverse the entire level for it and my legs were getting extremely sore for so much walking and I was starting to gasp, we were getting close to a final corner when suddenly Rodri walked in front of me, kneeled down to my level and spoke. “Hey, so, I just want you to remember now that I’m about to drop you off that… well…” It seemed he was having trouble finding the appropriate words to speak. “When I say things are going to be fine, I mean it, I know just by looking at you that you are capable of great things and so if anything happens, which is guaranteed not even as a pokéuman but just, as a person, don’t let it get to you, as corny as it sounds, ok?” I was a bit confused by the sudden talk, but I nodded. “Ok.” “Good, the third to last dorm is yours, I’d love to accompany you, but I think it’s best if you get a sense of your living space yourself, and I’ve kinda spent a lot more of extra time than I originally intended with this tour, so, I’m sure we’ll meet again, young tox.” He smiled. “Tox?” “Short for toxtricity, it’ll save you time.” “Oh, right, right, well, see ya then.” I told Rodri “Have a good day, Lex.” Rodri spoke and then he started walking back where we came from. I took a deep breath as I turned away and headed towards my dorm, it didn’t take long to find the correct door, third to last, like Rodri said, and I was eventually facing what I knew would be my new home for possibly the rest of my life, without even being sure of what was inside of it. “Well, here goes nothing.” I touched the screenpad, which beeped in recognition, I stood there waiting for a few seconds before the door opened and I was immediately greeted with the sight of an obstagoon with a mischievous and cruel grin, messy, almost wild fur and a malicious glint to his eyes. “Well, well, well.” The obstagoon was soon followed by a morgrem and a gliscor, all with similar appearances and attitudes. “Our new roomie, a toxtricity, the punk rock pokémon.” They came behind the obstagoon, clearly the leader of the group as they all glared at me with those grins. “Name’s Demian, and it looks like you’ll fit riiiight in to our little group~” the dark and normal type said, before letting out a sinister chuckle. “You better.”Pokéumans: Re-lived Part 1 "From parallel worlds" Chapter 4 "Rescued?"It was fairly early that Saturday. The sun hadn’t risen yet as people started arriving to the station, with the dense trees surrounding the area making it even more dark though the people didn’t mind nor care as long as they were hidden, some of them were residing in said station, whereas others came from their home in the nearby towns and cities. Spirits were relatively high after a visit from the director of the region’s main Pokextinction base, which also operated this station remotely. One of the people that had arrived was a scientist, his job was simply to take over research, particularly in pokextinction’s new top project and “principal” duties at the education centre of the station for the weekend, His life outside didn’t matter, his personal details didn’t matter, the job was what mattered. He arrived on a white ford, far from fancy, and registered inside as he got through the several security locks that were at the entrance typing code after code, inserting fingerprint after keycard, until eventually, it opened. The first thing he did was head into the main office. The nameless scientist quickly made sure to read through the updates and notes that the other nameless scientist who worked throughout the week left behind. He quickly took interest in how all but one of the transformees in progress had already moved onto the taming stage of their re-education process, even one that had been brought in the very same week. Beyond that though everything seemed to be going as normal, and by that he meant stale. It was frankly a little boring having nothing to do, all the transformees were still on their first stages of re-education or they had already completed it and were moved to other stations or even the main regional base as this one didn’t really require much pokéuman workforce, as he walked across the building eventually reaching the doors/pods he did take notice that the masquerain pokéuman was almost finished with the taming process, but the scientist would still have to wait a little more so the classrooms would remain empty for longer, oh well, not like there was much use for a masquerain. While walking through the base floor he ended up coming across the guard of this building, who as usual seemed to have a weird and honestly somewhat cruel enthusiasm for the treatment of the pokéumans, though not like he cared much, the guard could do whatever to the freaks so long as they were still alive to be studied on and re-educated. The scientist briefly checked up on the first and second floor, the first was empty and the second was more focused on research than re-education and since that wasn’t what his focus was, he paid little focus to it, he stroke small conversation with the other staff members there, including what he recognised to be the extraction team but that was that. Returning back to his office for what he’d assume to be the rest of the day at first he simply took notes and reports about the transformees but as there wasn’t much to update on he simply waited, the guard as usual pestered him and barged into his office for “security” when he knew it was really just to annoy him. However what was weird is that he only did it once, after he left he never came back and though at first the scientist was happy and didn’t think much of it, it didn’t take long for him g realise something was off and so, even though his survival instincts told him otherwise he grabbed a laser pistol for protection and exited his office to see what was going on. The building was eerily silent, more than usual, and the scientist felt a massive chill on his pine, keeping him almost paralysed but he continued on trying to look for the guard, he became even more nervous when he couldn’t find him anywhere despite the job of the guard being to literally patrol across the whole area. Even more scared but even more determined, the scientist walked upstairs to the first floor, the floor was mostly just classrooms for the second stage of re-education, teaching the tamed pokéumans all they needed to serve the pokextinction organisation, these classrooms currently were not being occupied though so they were just sitting there empty, locked and collecting dust, the scientist walked from classroom to classroom, and as he was close to not finding anything and thinking he was going insane he suddenly noticed a door who’s lock had been broken. The scientist by this point was completely petrified yet as he very slowly turned the knob open he was met with the unconscious body of the guard. Without looking away from the body and in a state of shock, the scientist moved his hands towards a communicator, trembling and shaking constantly almost dropping it, before slowly moving it towards his mouth and turning it on. Bzzt “Hello, extraction team of station 3? Can you read me? This is scientist #87 I have found the body of the guard unconscious inside one of the re-education classrooms which appears to have been unlocked forcibly, I believe there could be a hidden attacker in the facility.” He had already been agitated as he contacted the other people at the facility, but what they replied with only made his skin crawl worse than he had ever felt. “Are you sure? From what we can tell the guard is currently with us at the very moment.” The scientist dropped his communicator at that, he couldn’t think, he couldn’t rationalise himself, all he could think of at that moment was that he needed to get away and fast, as he ran downstairs his first thoughts were to head to his office, he was about to enter when suddenly a loud alarm sounded throughout that could only mean one thing, one horrible thing. The prt were attacking. A few unassuming cars drove through the highways in the outskirts of the city, in-between the borders of Mexico city and State of Mexico, as it was fairly early in the morning and the sun was only starting to rise traffic was low and most cars drove almost by themselves. One of these cars appeared to be like any other, in it, four friends, all in their twenties were heading to a large meet-up in the state, or at least that’s what they would say if asked by any onlooker. The people in that car were all fairly different from each other, from body type to fashion style, the driver was a fairly bulky dark-skinned man, with a little bit of heft and a little bit of muscle, and a little bit of beard, he also appeared to be the oldest one though not by much, he dressed pretty unassumingly all things considered, a simple pair of sweats and a hoodie, but seemed to be the most relaxed of the bunch as noted by his happy expression. The second one was by contrast the youngest of the group, the lankiest and the lightest skinned, he was blonde, looked to be around 19 and had by far the most energy as he was fidgeting a little on his seat, he wore glasses, shorts and a somewhat ironic Digimon shirt, his expression was slightly nervous and slightly excited. The third person, the only woman amongst the group sitting at the front right next to the driver was also fairly thin although had more of a swimmer build, she had short straight hair and had a slight alternative emo look to her as she wore a leather jacket, boots and jeans, a fully black shirt, several piercings and a red highlight on her hair, her expression was serious and slightly neutral. The fourth person had a similar thin yet athletic built, he wore a jean jacket, and a fairly average attire. He also had the most serious and frustrated expression of the bunch. They all seemed to be a diverse group, but one thing all of them had in common is, although in different positions, they all wore the same exact silver ring in their hands. The man in the jean jacket let out a groan of frustration before he suddenly spoke. “How much longer until we arrive? I’m getting impatient.” The driver replied. “Relax Diego, just because you failed your final exam doesn’t mean this meet up is going to go badly either.” One can’t be blamed for not noticing at first the weird, almost coded way the group spoke. Though it wasn’t the most subtle either. The girl then spoke. “Both of you better not try and pick up any girls while there, especially you Rodri, I know you have your habits.” She said as she turned to the driver Rodri seemed to flinch as she spoke, immediately he replied in a whisper and a tone completely different from how they were talking about before. “Do we really have to make that comparison Vale? It feels really inappropriate given they’re kids and all...” “It’s either that or getting found out y’know? I’m not the most comfortable with it either for obvious reasons.” Vale whispered in response. “Fine...” Rodri exhaled defeated before his mood slowly recovered. The lanky one decided then to speak up. “We probably should be careful, I heard the other class’ teacher is also going there.” Diego then exclaimed in shock “What?! Why didn’t you tell us until now Jaime?!?!” Jaime replied. “It was a rumour, it could always be wrong, they could’ve already left as well.” Diego sighed. “You better be wrong.” The car drove across the main road in-between wilderness, hills and the occasional buildings, before switching to smaller roads and eventually, as the four friends looked towards each other, nodded, and the girl fiddled with her ring, the car changed direction entirely from existing paths right into the forest. The car continued driving through the woods until deep enough to not be seen, the occupants once again looked at each other and nodded, before all of them exited the car, and then, one by one they all took their rings off, flashing a bright light that revealed four different Pokémon. Rodri became a Chesnaught, Vale became a Zoroark, Diego became a Gallade, and Jaime became a Rotom. They all looked at each other and the chesnaught spoke. “Ok everyone, you remember the plan right? We’re not far off from the pke station it’ll only take a bit of walking.” The rotom raised his arm-like limb. “Yes Jaime?” “I still don’t understand why you’re only here as backup and you can’t be brought in alongside Diego, you’re the strongest of all of us.” “Because.” Rodri replied. “This station’s main focus is the brainwashing and indoctrination process of captured transformers, they don’t wanna risk a possible breach by bringing pokéuman workers so they mostly use humans, having there suddenly be two pokéuman workers would arouse a lot of suspicion, and I may be the strongest but I’m the least qualified to sneak around, besides I’m the one that came up with the plan so, no biggie.” The rotom, Jaime, seemed to nod at that although it was clear he wasn’t 100% on board, but he trusted the chesnaught regardless. The group of pokémon walked through the forest for a good while, eventually spotting the clearing where the station was located, they hid behind the dense foliage watching around for the building they were looking for until... “Aha! There it is.” Rodri said pointing to the entrance of the largest building. As soon as he did the rotom quickly zipped around, the zoroark following closely behind, and entered into the digital security system of the entrance, it took a while for anything notable to happen but eventually the door opened and the zoroark headed inside, motioning for the gallade to follow, the gallade, right before entering put on grey contacts on his eyes, making him look like the brainwashed pokémon. It didn’t take long for the duo to find the guard, they took notice him immediately as he had just exited the scientist’s office. “Huh? Intruders!!! G-gah!!” Before he could alert anyone about the intruders he was swiftly and silently knocked out by the duo of agile pokémon, the Zoroark quickly used her illusion abilities to take the form of the unconscious guard and carried him around her arms, knowing that she had to hide him somewhere. “Urghh... Why are they always heavier than they seem?.” She muttered to herself. “Alright... If this is a brainwashing facility there’s most likely a bunch of rooms for the different stages, the brainwashing pods are too risky for us hmm... What else, what else.” The gallade spoke quietly. “There’s probably plenty of classrooms in here as well, usually they’re in the first floor and they’re mostly left unbothered without the threat of us falling to the brainwashing, we should see if any of them are empty.” “Got it.” Vale replied as she quickly climbed up the stairs with the gallade following, She prepared herself to cautiously sneak around and avoid being detected until she realised that all the classrooms were empty. “Weird... There’s nothing here.” Said the zoroark. “I suppose the pokémon they have are all only on their early brainwashing stage, still we should probably remain cautious as the extinctionists could walk down at any moment.” The disguised zoroark simply nodded as she quickly ran across the halls, eventually choosing a classroom located close to a corner where after a while of figuring out how to break the lock and having to break her illusion temporarily she eventually opened the door and left the unconscious body of the guard in. She quickly retook the form of the guard, eventually heading back to the stairs to get to the second floor, the one that had what they came here for. “Are you sure you won’t have any trouble making an illusion of the guard’s words? You only heard him speak like, two words.” Diego asked in a concerned whisper. “I made sure to train my best of my illusionary capabilities, don’t worry.” The zoroark responded using the guard’s voice. Neither of them spoke as they both arrived at the top floor, the gallade wearing a completely emotionless expression on him and the disguised zoroark trying her best to not draw attention to herself. They came across several scientist that paid them not mind, although they often seemed to give them odd looks, the group of infiltrators assumed it was due to the brainwashed pokemon following, they couldn’t have imagined that it was because the guard they impersonated wasn’t exactly known for being reserved. It took a good while as they had to do their best to avoid detection and they often hid from view for several minutes but they arrived in front of the door of the main laboratory, however before they could enter a scientist walked in front of them to stop them. “Hey what’s the big deal?” the “guard” asked “You know full well you’re not supposed to enter here.” The scientist responded. “But it’s my job to patrol across every part of this building!” “We don’t care, we’re not giving you the luxury of getting yourself involved with pokextinction’s top project. And where did you get that pokémon?” “He was transferred here to assist on the very same research, I was tasked to bringing it to you.” The scientist raised a cold eyebrow. “Shouldn’t that be the bottom floor scientist’s job?” “Excuse me?” the zoroark replied, having to use her illusions to disguise her surprise, suddenly before anyone else could say anything they were both interrupted by the scientist’s communicator going off. Bzzt “Hello, extraction team of station 3? Can you read me? This is scientist #87 I have found the body of the guard unconscious inside one of the re-education classrooms which appears to have been unlocked forcibly, I believe there could be a hidden attacker in the facility.” The zoroark and gallade internally screamed “Oh shit!” as they heard that “Are you sure? From what we can tell the guard is currently with us at the very moment.” The scientist replied on his end of the communicator as he glared at the “guard” in front of him. No words were needed as the zoroark dropped the illusion and the gallade removed his contacts and both charged at the scientist... Rodri had waited a while, he was admittedly a little bored but for the sake of his teammates he hoped they wouldn’t need his help, he knew missions like this were never going to be quick, especially one of such importance, it helped that being around trees and nature was in his element as a grass type. People always asked him why he seemed to always be so calm and happy most of the time despite his position, mostly the students at the base who looked up to him, truthfully he didn’t really think he was calm, but for the most part he simply wanted to be a good pokéuman and help others who needed it, if anyone needed someone to be there for him he would be that someone, he always liked to see a bit of himself on people. His daydreaming got suddenly interrupted by an alert from his communicator. “Rodri!! Diego and I have managed to gain access to the lab holding the files and particles we needed, but we’ve been discovered, there was a scientist working independently from the others we were not aware of, we request back up IMMEDIATELY, the whole station has been alerted already, get Jaime as well so that he isn’t discovered, over and out.” Came from the communicator Rodri smirked and ran as fast as he could to the entrance, he came across a few pokextinctionists on the way but he was strong enough to deal with them quickly, he eventually made it to the entrance and started whispering to the electronic lock. “Hey, Jaime, there’s been a change of plans so it’s best for you to get the hell out of here, I’ll barge in myself.” With that the chesnaught left the entrance, walked over to a wall of the building and crashed inside with a combination of rollout and spiky shield, breaking the wall inside. “Phew, a huevo.” He muttered to himself (I’m not translating that) as he entered and briefly collected himself before he started running through the hallways of the base floor. The pokéuman had ran through the halls of the extinctioist facility, often switching from a bipedal and quadrupedal stance depending on the space he was in. He had come across a few pokextinctionists who tried to fight him once the alarm turned on and they noticed him but even with their mighty tech they were no match for the raw strength of a Chesnaught. “We’ve managed to get a hold of the particles, and despite them being alerted and us originally believing the director was in the facility they haven’t made their presence known to us so it’s probably a good time for a retreat, we’ve got all the info we needed, over.” Came from the chesnaught’s hidden communicator. *“Understood, I’ll meet up soon but I’ll scout for any leftover info just in case, there’s only one hallway left and the bottom floor seems to be devoid of people.” Just as the Chesnaught said that, he was suddenly ambushed by a trembling scientist who tried to threaten him with a gun but was quickly put unconscious with a vine whip attack. “Be careful Rodri, don’t try to do anything you’re not supposed to.” Came from his communicator. “Don’t worry, I’ve got everything under control. Over and out.” With that the Chesnaught continued, he quickly realised the hallway he entered was none other than Pokextinction’s infamous education chambers, or rather, brainwashing chambers, as he looked throughout the windows of the many rooms he found identical sights in all of them. Several different pokémon, some blissfully smiling, some had an emotionless look, but all of them were in a still, pacified position as they were drenched in the purple light keeping them controlled and turning their eyes into a cold empty grey. “I can never get used to this no matter how many times I see it.” Rodri mumbled to himself, he was about to leave as he came across one final room on a corner where he suddenly stopped as he realised there was something different about the Pokémon inside. ”No way.” Inside the last room was a low-key toxtricity, he was in the same pacified position as everyone else and at first it didn’t seem like there was anything different from him over anyone else, but the chesnaught could see one vital difference he had over the other brainwashed pokémon. His eyes weren’t grey. Rodri could not believe it, he blinked in disbelief before eventually realising that he didn’t have enough time to be confused. He immediately broke the door open and, with his eyes closed, broke the purple light that was brainwashing the toxtricity, the toxtricity fell unconscious, clearly unable to handle a sudden stop to the attack on his mind, he looked to be somewhere around ten years younger than him, as usual. Rodri carried the toxtricity on his shoulder, careful not to impale him with his spikes, before grabbing his communicator and directing it at everyone. “Hey so... Slight change of plans hehe, don’t worry I’ll catch up soon.” “Rodri you did not.” “What have we kept telling you!!!” “Are you crazy?” “It’ll make sense once I get there, ok? Out.” Rodri closed his communicator as he looked over at the unconscious toxtricity he carried. “Well, whoever you are, you were very lucky right now, and something tells me there could be something special about you, I just know it.” ... “L... x...” “L.... X!” I stirred awake for a moment, but not enough to be conscious, I could make out a few unfamiliar voices. “Don’t do that ever again!!” “Just let me drive and take care of the toxtricity!!!!” “You realise how dangerous what you did...” Then it faded into the background .... ... A vision “L...x, c... you h.... me?” “You... m... ...cial th... y.. ..ow!” Huh? Suddenly everything got really bright... I woke up groggily in a completely unrecognisable yet familiar environment, however I felt extremely tired and drained, it took me a while to even open my eyes, then it took me a longer while to actually be able to move my body, I was probably in bed for an hour, I tried to remember what had last happened to me let’s see, I was captured by pokextinction, My transformation had almost finished, everyone else... Oh, right... An alarm sounded, a scientist grabbed me and sent me too a weird room and then everything just got blurry, a little painfully so, Like TV static. In-between everything, I heard bits and pieces of conversations surrounding me. “He’s awake!...” “Be careful in case he’s still conditioned...” “Wow, He must be tired...” Eventually I was able to fully sit up and look towards my surroundings, once again I woke up somewhere I didn’t know, but it was a much less hostile environment than the cages, I wouldn’t call it friendly though, it was still fairly monotone, only a lot lighter than the dull cold grey of pokextinction, I could also see a little bit of green and blue, but more than anything I noticed how I was in a bed, covered by a singular sheet that reminded me a lot of the ones in hospitals, looking around then the whole room appeared to be a hospital, a tiny desk surrounded me beside the bed, I could see a tiny tv in front of me beside an entrance into what I was assumed to be the bathroom, and curtains, lots and lots of curtains. but, where was I? “Finally able to stand up?” Came from a voice that just entered the room, as I looked over in its direction, I found myself with a fully formed togekiss wearing a nurse hat who looked to be an adult though I have zero idea how I was able to tell that. Despite all the craziness of last week I still couldn’t help but be shocked at the sight, but I knew there were more important stuff and whether I liked it or not I was getting used to this mess, and I would’ve rather ask questions than sit there with my mouth open. “W-where am I? Who are you? What’s going on?” Involuntarily left my mouth. “Easy there kid, you do not have the energy to make such questions so fast, everything will be answered eventually but for now keep yourself calm.” The togekiss replied with a tone of voice that made it clear she was the kind of nurse that was just plain done with everyone’s shit and was going to be a nightmare to be with, I groaned internally both at that realization and at her response, being familiar with this kind of nurse. “You’ll get your questions answered, provided your following check up goes well, and I don’t have the time to answer them so you’ll have to wait for your “rescuer” to get here.” The nurse continued as she then walked over to the door and opened it. “You can finally come in.” “Huh?” Suddenly, almost bursting from the entrance a chesnaught appeared, running quickly at my direction as he stared in amazement. “You’re awake! Are you ok? What’s your name? I’m Rodrigo Palagot, but you can just call me Rodri.” He said with a smile. The togekiss nurse quickly pulled the chesnaught away from me. “The same as it is for him goes to you, leave him alone until we know he’s completely okay.” “I’m sure he’s fine, his transformation still hadn’t finished when he was in the pod.” The chesnaught replied nonchalantly, it was a bit weird how casual he seemed to be, he felt almost naive in a way. “No but it was close to finishing and with pokextinction you never know.” I jumped a little at the mention of pokextinction, though I wasn’t exactly able to follow what they were talking about, it seemed like the chesnaught noticed. “Don’t worry kid, I’ll tell you what you need to know, you see, you are a pokéuman, a hybrid between pokémon and human, you were captured by pokextinction, an organisation that kidnaps pokéumans and-“ I interrupted. “I-i already know the basic stuff... If I’m right at least.” My voice trailed off into a whisper as the sentence went along due to slight nerves. The nurse nodded and then looked over at the chesnaught. “Rodri, you know full well you can’t tell him anything until we’re sure he’s safe and checked up.” “Alright fine.” He eventually said, accepting defeat. The nurse then turned over to me. “Now it does seem like your back spikes have finally grown meaning that your transformation has finalised and thus you can go have your check-up.” I quickly moved my hands to my back to check and even though I couldn’t see I could feel my back spikes and, more importantly, I could truly feel that I was now 100% low key form toxtricity. “It was weird how they decided to send you to the brainwashing chambers with your transformation unfinished, but I guess they were getting desperate given how the classrooms were empty.” Rodri mentioned “So I was right about the brainwashing...” I muttered out loud to myself. “This kid already knows a lot more than most, I do think it’s best that we start his check-up as soon as possible.” The chesnaught continued. “Fine.” The nurse replied bluntly as she motioned for me to get up and follow the chesnaught, we exited the room and walked through a few hallways and I immediately took notice of my surroundings. The area was still fairly sterile, but it was a lot less hostile than the pokextinction building, while that was like a horror movie, this was more closer to a subway or a school or a military base, the last comparison seemed the most appropriate as I walked around and could see green and blue tones all over the walls, even a few murals that definitely reminded me of the military bases my dad worked at, sometimes I would see framed pictures of seemingly important people, only they weren’t people but pokémon, fairly strong pokemon, I would as well occasionally bump into other still strong looking Pokémon walking around. A venusaur, a tyranitar, A talonflame, etc. Seriously, I’m already not surprised by the existence of real life pokémon but why and how?? The pokémon I bumped into all seemed to be fairly busy and a bit reserved when they looked at me, but they were totally open when they talked to Rodri, who seemed to be fairly respected here. I was starting to wonder where the chesnaught was leading me into until finally we arrived at a small office door. The chesnaught knocked. “Hey, Luis, the patient’s here.” “Come in.” Came from inside as the door opened, when we walked in I quickly saw a fairly typical hospital office, fairly similar to the ones I’m used to going at the military hospitals my family takes me. Including a desk with two chairs, a bunch of equipment at the back and a hospital bed in the front of the desk, but what took my attention the most was the labcoat wearing hypno that was on the desk.” “Good afternoon, I am Doctor Luis Rosales, pokéuman neurologist and specialist in mind alteration. I’ve been made aware of your situation and I will be in charge of your mental check-ups for lingering brainwashing, I would like to elaborate more but unfortunately for security concerns I am unable to until we conclude the first check up.” I was a bit confused though I was kinda making a little sense of it given my theory but I decided against saying anything anyway. The chesnaught then spoke. “It seems from the time he was in pokextinction he already knows a few things here and there so I’m sure he understands.” I nodded although it was more a half truth than anything. “Very well, now then Rodri, you said you found him in pke’s brainwashing chambers on your mission from yesterday with his eyes still having his natural colour and his transformation unfinished right?” The pokémon in a labcoat asked. I thought to myself. “Uh huh, I noticed quickly that his eyes weren’t gray despite being in the chamber, then as I got him out I realised he still had patches of skin where he now has his spikes.” Rodri replied. “I see.” The Hypno took a few notes. “Then I shall begin, and do not worry, none of the check-ups will hurt.” With that the hypno closed his eyes and pointed his pendulum at me, at first I thought he would swing it but instead it stood still as a pinkish purple aura glew from it, a few minutes passed and it suddenly stopped and the doctor reopened his eyes. “Very unusual, I couldn’t feel a single trace of the brainwashing. Hmm. Young toxtricity, you don’t mind if ask you a few questions?” I nodded. “Very well, what is the last thing you remember dreaming about?” Um... I quickly had to think as I wasn’t good at remembering my dreams, I first came to the weird voice I heard before I woke up on the hospital bed but I wasn’t sure if that counts as a full dream so I answered with the last dream I had with my transformation.” “I... Dreamt, a day before I started transforming, that I was a toxtricity in the middle of a war I believe...” The hypno seemed a little bit surprised at that “Interesting... Very interesting...” “What are the questions for?” “I’ll explain once we’re done, What was the last thing you remember before waking up here?” “Umm... I was trapped in a cage by pokextinction... I noticed the guard that usually checks up on hadn’t appeared for a while, then suddenly a scientist came over, dragged me from my cage outside of the room and i realised alarms were blaring all over, the scientist then dragged me to a weird room and then I...” I tried recalling what was after but once again I had that weird feeling of static from before. “I... I don’t remember, it’s fuzzy.” The hypno’s tone got serious after my reply. “Fuzzy how, elaborate.” “I-i dunno, it’s a bit like static? I guess? It kinda makes my head hurt a little. The doctor cocked his eyebrow hearing that. “Really? That’s weird, you didn’t feel a soothing sensation?” It was my turn to be confused. “...No? Far from it honestly.” “Amazing...” I could hear both the hypno and the chesnaught mutter as the hypno quickly began writing more notes again. “Do you remember seeing a purple light?” “No.” They hypno suddenly turned to the chesnaught. “Do you remember seeing a purple light on his pod?” “I’m pretty sure I watched it filtered through the window, when i broke in I closed my eyes and immediately broke the lightbulb regardless of if I was right or not.” “Hmm...” the hypno was lost in thought. “Can I... Ask now?” “Ah, forgive me, of course, I will first answer you anything related to this session and Rodri here will later take care of answering any general questions, your first check up went extraordinarily well, if there’s any brainwashing lingering on you, which seems very unlikely so far, it would be rooted so deep in your subconscious that the base sees you currently as under your own will, and thus, considered safe, we will still have to do a few more advanced tests in the following days but if they go as well as this one, you’ll be good to go very soon.” With that explanation I was slowly starting to make a little bit more sense of what was going on, and most of my questions were general but I still had a few things to question about. “How exactly does this brainwashing work?” The hypno thought for a little bit before replying. “Well there are many different types, the most standard, which seemed to be the one you were experiencing is the full brainwashing that they do to almost all the pokéumans they capture and most humans subconsciously, this is caused by exposure to a purple light and the most notable symptoms are the subject losing total and complete emotion and eyes turning a grey colour if they have them, with an almost zombie-like devotion for pokextinction. There is also a version of this brainwashing that is much more subtle but much more fragile, it keeps your eyes and normal colour and doesn’t make you a completely mindless drone, but it does manipulate your emotions, particularly focusing on your aggression to align you with pokextinction’s ideals, this first check-up was to detect these two kinds of brainwashing as they tend to be the most common, and as you can tell, you seem to be clear of both of them.” I nodded, somewhat following the hypno’s explanation. The hypno however, seemed to take note of my lingering confusion and spoke after taking a deep breath. “Alas, it is clear to me that you still need to understand the full picture to fully grasp my explanation, Rodri I’ll let you do the honours, I’ll see you at my office tomorrow at this exact hour Mr.... Oh, right, what was your name? We don’t need your full name yet, just however people refer to you.” I gulped before answering, it almost seemed like the hypno had read my mind as I usually answer my full name when asked, although now that I think about it it’s entirely plausible. “Lex.” We arrived back at the hospital room, the nurse wasn’t there at the moment but I knew well she would come back from time to time, it’s not like I had never been at a hospital before, but the circumstances were definitely far, FAR, from the ordinary. Rodri walked fairly leisurely as we arrived. “This is going to be where you’ll stay for the next few days until we conclude your check ups, after that you’ll be able to descend to the bottom floors alongside everyone else, I was honestly surprised at how well the first check-up went for you, if that rate continues which I very much hope it does you’ll be out of here maybe next Tuesday!!” He explained in a cheerful tone. Despite his best efforts it was impossible for me to follow along with anything he said, I clearly did not have context for anything of what he was going on about, bottom floor? Everyone else? What did he even meant by that? Where even were we? I felt sunlight in the doctor’s office but there was something odd about it. And despite all of these questions running through my head I didn’t focus on any of them, I instead focused on one I had since I was in the middle of my transformation that was sitting on the back of my mind for days. And I could finally ask it. “Are my parents brainwashed, Rodri?” I looked over at the chesnaught, and I could tell he had an expression of surprise, as if he expected any of the questions I had circulating through my head except for the one I ended up asking, he took a few seconds to compose himself before a lot less confidently replying: “W-well you see... Ok, listen, I know you’re tired of this and just want answers but there’s one very important thing I must tell you before I can answer any of your questions.” I think he could see how disappointed I was at hearing that, he continued. “Look, it’s a long story, literally, I have to tell you a whole story to get the general concept of what you’re dealing with, every transformee hears this story when they arrive here, although, speaking of, you seemed to know a little bit of us from polextinction.” His normal, happy and somewhat carefree expression shifted to a very stern stare that just had the slightest thing of worry. “Did they tell you the story of pokéumans?” I was taken back by his sudden and drastic shift in demeanour. “N-no, another transformee told me we were pokeumans and we were kidnapped by polextinction and that was pretty much it, he said he heard it from someone who had a failed rescue attempt.” I answered with nervousness. “We... Er, I still have not a single idea as to why any of this is going on.” The chesnaught’s demeanour seemed to brighten up with relief at that Phew “alright, here goes, I’m about to tell you, the story of how us pokéumans came to be, like I said, it’s very long, and it comes in three parts, all of it is true no matter how crazy it may seem, believe me, I thought it was insane too, you might want to sit down for this.” I nodded along, sat down on the bed and awaited him to start telling this story... Yet he didn’t. “Just... Just give me a minute, I’m trying to make sure I don’t miss any details.” “Oh, fair enough.” I replied, Rodri seemed to focus for a bit before breathing in and out and beginning: “It was a long time ago, after the age of the dinosaurs but before the age of the humans, creatures known as pokémon came to be, no one is certain as to how beyond what’s known of the legendary pokémon, but they came to be and they were the most intelligent species on the planet at that point.” I opened my mouth in surprise before he continued. “These pokémon, with their diverse and supernatural abilities to control the elements adapted to any and all environments and were smart enough to build a civilization that advanced a lot faster than ours, this, is called the lost era as it has been completely erased from history. These times were mostly marked by happiness, as pokémon fighting was part of their nature and not something used for conflict, so wars were uncommon. Eventually, after a few centuries humanity began to evolve from the Neanderthals. The original pokémon were very cautious about them, some saw them as dangerous, others were simply curious, the natural reaction to anything unknown. The pokémon realised though that these humans were not as advanced as them, and so they decided to help them, to some degree, they created an almost magical kind of mineral that could non-permanently change their form into a human’s, under these guises the pokémon well... They mixed with the humans, starting families and sharing their knowledge so they could develop together. And things went well at first! However, as time went on, the humans, who grew smarter thanks to the pokemon ended up becoming more... Devious, they started subjugating the original Pokémon, forcing them to obey the humans, getting treated as inferior, in response pokémon started rebelling, and soon enough it was an all out war. Families were torn apart, everyone was hurt or killed from either side, eventually, after many, many years the pokémon couldn’t take it anymore, so they called upon the legendaries and decided to leave the humans alone to their own devices, erasing all trace of their existence. How, you may ask? Well, it was a great effort, the ground types dug up fossils and bones and anything that could be buried, any single record of their existance of any kind was taken away, utilizing uxie, beheeyem and any pokémon with power over the mind they created a massive memory wipe to all humans, making sure they remembered nothing, and regressing them back to a previous stage, essentially undoing all their influence as far as it was possible for them. Every single legendary, including some we don’t even know about yet combined their powers to open a magic wormhole into a new dimension, and overtime, every single pokémon crossed to the other side. They did however agree to keep a legendary in this dimension to keep an eye on the humans, who would eventually evolve all on their own, this duty ended up falling to the holder of the dna of all pokémon, Mew. This does not explain why we exist yet however, but it is what you must understand first before anything else, now we move onto part two of this story. For millions of years mew wandered the earth hidden amongst the humans, secretly watching them grow and develop as we normally did, however, despite her best efforts, one can only stay hidden so much for so long, and in the year 1910 her total secrecy came to an end. You see there was this scientist, who was a genius and years ahead of his time period, yet was forced because of it to work almost entirely in secret, he was stationed on south america on an expedition through the Guyanan jungle, when he suddenly found a little, unusual, pink hair, that seemed to belong to no species known yet, and possessed unusual properties as far as they could investigate, this scientist quickly took this mysterious single hair on an island where he and a team of scientists worked, you see this scientist had been researching cloning and was actually close to a big break, a machine that could create a full clone from the tiniest piece of DNA and he decided to use this hair from a mysterious specimen as a test subject, trying to recreate whatever creature it belonged to. Unfortunately, something went wrong with the machine, and there was a nuclear reaction that shook the whole world, kinda like Chernobyl, but even more intense, this one however had unusual effects on the populace, you see, despite erasing themselves completely from history some of the pokémon’s influence simply couldn’t be undone, with the humans still carrying a gene leftover from their pokémon ancestors, this gene had laid dormant and undetected up until now, but when the invisible reaction circled through the earth it awoke, and many humans from every continent, of every background started to transform into pokémon. Creating what we know as pokéumans Back to the scientist, as his island was the closest to the genetic shockwave, it ended up evaporating in the explosion from the world, alongside the workers in it, the scientist, who was the closest to the reaction actually survived, but, his gene was altered, not turning into an ordinary pokémon but into a Mewtwo, a completely new being coming from the mutations of mew and the scientist’s own DNA, this change left him insane as he was bombarded with all the knowledge that was kept away from the humans about the lost era at once, he gained so much power and intelligence and suddenly he wanted nothing more than to take over the world. Taking the name of Mr. X. Mr. X quickly took notice of all the other humans changing into pokémon, and his advanced brain hell bent on conquest very quickly created a plan, using the human’s fear of the unknown and lesser knowledge he wandered across the earth recruiting horrified humans and manipulating them, making them think he wanted to cure or even get rid of these strange new creatures, and thus pokextinction was formed, eventually, by his own psychic abilities and manipulating a few pokéumans as well he ended up turning practically the entire human race into sleeper agents, ready to capture any pokéuman at the sight of their transformation, and erasing everyone’s memory of the shockwave and of his previous human life as well to make sure he was never challenged. Mew would obviously take notice of what was going on and she quickly developed a counterplan to fight Mr. X, rounding up all the transforming pokéumans, most of whom were children on their early teens as it appeared that the gene manifested the strongest during puberty, rescuing a few of the pokéumans Mr. X kidnapped and began the pokéuman organisation headquartered in Japan, an organisation who’s goals are to help rescue new pokéumans and give them a new home after the previous one had been taken away from them, develop their natural abilities and, if possible, train them to combat the pokextinction threat, it varies from base to base, but here we try to give them as much of a choice as possible. Mew also decided to try and let the world be aware of us in a subtle way, eventually taking a human alias and developing what you now know as the pokémon games and eventually the pokémon franchise, you probably recognise who I’m talking about, this also helped future transformees get a glimpse of their hidden true self and get them ready for what they will become with information about their species, notice how huge pokémon got after its release? It’s because a lot of people saw some of themselves subconsciously on the many creatures they discovered on their videogame consoles, usually a sign of being a pokéuman is being a devoted fan of pokémon and feeling an almost personal connection with a specific pokémon, that being the one they transform into. This facilitates us and pokextinction to locate transformees so they can attempt to kidnap them and we can attempt to rescue them. Anyway, all of this became the status quo to this day, a war has been fought in secret hidden from all of humanity between pokéumans and pokextinction, pokéumans hide in bases usually underground across every corner of the world, right know you are in the top floor of one of them, the Base Pokeumana Desierto de los leones (In english: Desert of the lions pokéumans base), located in the national park of the same name here in Mexico city. Pokextinction meanwhile prefers to have several facilities organised by a local branch that rivals a nearby pokéuman base, the branch that kidnapped you was the Base Lider de Pokextinción CDMX (In english: Mexico city Pokextinction Leader base) You were specifically brought in and rescued from their main re-education facility.” Rodri said the last part with air quotes. “The only kind of agreement both organisations have is to keep this war a secret from the rest of humanity, neither side affiliated at least directly with any organisation of the human world, we’re not working with the government and pke, aka pokextinction aren’t working with the cartel for example. And to ensure this secrecy given the amount of people who normally would suddenly go missing from the world and be taken from their families to never be seen again, pokextinction prepares exact clones of every single person possible, using the DNA they take of the transformees they kidnap and we pokéumans are forced to let them do their thing, as we are unable to reveal ourselves to the world, it would be too dangerous, this means that above there’s a clone of you and a clone of me who are continuing our lives from where we left off.” ((So that’s what happened to my family...)) I thought to myself. “But we’re still not done yet! Time for the third and final part of this story, 100 years after the beginning of the war, and more specifically 12 years ago something insane happened. Mr. X went missing, eventually declared dead. The full details of what happened are unknown, even after all this time, there’s been many rumours of what ended up going on, most say that he was defeated by an unknown pokémon of equal power to Mr. X, some say from new york, there were even reports of portals allegedly going to the pokémon dimension opening in several bases, particularly in the United States.” ((Because of course there were there)) I thought to myself. “No one really knows what truly went on, Mew and the pokéuman who is said to have defeated Mr. X’s whereabouts are unknown, the pokéuman headquarters and the new York base suspected to be involved became increasingly secretive and private, no one being able to communicate with them, and thus all we have is incomplete rumours. But one thing is for sure and that is Mr. X’s reign was over. The war, however, isn’t. It has been going on for too long at this point and Mr. X’s impact was simply too great to be undone so we just... Kept fighting. Pke, after the fall of their leader, ended up fragmented into disorganised pieces, every base by themselves, some continued the rivalries they had earned with the local pku bases, some tried to continue the original mission, which as human values changed slowly shifted from eradicating us to taming us to keep humanity safe, while some strayed from it drastically, they even say there have been pokéuman and pokextinction bases that worked together and made truces since then. Although evidently you can tell the base that kidnapped you wasn’t one of them.And now you know the story of pokéumans Lex, you are one of us.” Rodri took a deep breath after telling the whole story. “I will leave you with a few minutes to process all of this information as I know from experience that you’re going to need it, once you’re done, I will let you ask any questions you want and I’ll try my best to answer them for you, I hope most of the basic ones were covered in this backstory.” I could not believe a word of what I had just heard, but then again nothing was surprising anymore, I had been slowly introduced in the past week to all of this universe and this story pretty much was the missing piece that I needed for everything to click and make sense, I guess it’s easier to process this way rather than find everything out all at once, and I was perfectly content to take this story as fact, don’t get me wrong there were holes and a few questions left to answer, but nothing too different to what’s normal when talking about history in such a condensed way, especially with such a large time frame. In the end I was able to collect my thoughts and I was feeling bittersweet, I understood this was a complicated situation but then again from his explanation it seemed like it was this way for everyone else, and I had proof of it with Alan and Lázaro and Yulian... If only they could’ve made it here. I only had one question to ask now. “Rodri?” “Mhm?” “I’ll never see them again, ever, will I?” I didn’t have to specify who I meant by them for Rodri to nod in response. “I’m sorry.” I was a devastated and didn’t protest when he came to hug me, it was a horrible feeling, especially knowing I had basically been replaced with a clone and they would never realise that I had lost them forever, but frankly I already accepted this a while ago in worse circumstances. I tried to change topic and signal a little bit to the chesnaught to stop the hug. “So um... This base, you said we were underground?” “Oh! Yeah, you’re right now in the first floor of the desert of the lions pokéuman base, hidden deep underneath the woods, this is the largest and oldest base in all of Mexico, we take pokéumans from all over the valley of Mexico and nearby.” He suddenly exclaimed, bursting with energy. “If you’re wondering how we manage to live underground like this, well, us pokéumans are good at coming up with new inventions and ingenious solutions to our problems, we’ve already figured out a completely healthy alternative to sunlight, which is what you felt in Luis’ office and it helps me a lot as a grass type!” Rodri was quiet for a bit, seemingly realised he had gone a bit off topic from where he started before continuing. “Usually, you’d be in a civil hospital the floor below but due to the circumstances of your rescue we had to keep you on the top floor.” “The top floor?” I asked. “Yup, this floor is dedicated exclusively to the PRTs affairs. The remaining floors are for recreation, education, and housing.” “PRT... Wait, that’s another thing I heard from when I was at the pke base!” Rodri smiled in surprise. “From your transformee friend like you said, I assume.” “I... yeah, he didn’t know what exactly it meant.” Rodri chuckled. “Don’t worry, I was going to explain to you anyway.” “The PRT are essentially a global military for pokéumans, when we talk about the pokéuman organisation as a whole we usually refer to the PRT.” He explained. “The name stands for Pokéuman Rescue Troop. (In spanish: tropa de rescate pokeumana.)” “It’s essentially the force that takes care of rescuing pokéumans from pokextinction and combating them and is the main line of defence of pokéuman bases, not every pokéuman has to join but most choose to do so, and I was one of them, I am actually chief commander of this base myself, pretty much the highest rank below the headmaster.” He said very casually, as if he had no idea he sounded like he was bragging. “Um... I think I’ll pass on joining that.” I said, not fond of the idea of joining the pokémon equivalent of the military Rodri simply chuckled and said it was alright, from then on the rest of the day passed, Rodri exited the room shortly after this conversation ended, as because of his important position he was often busy taking care of his job and overseeing the PRT, but often came back at brief intervals to check on me and continue explaining basic things about pokéuman society and just in general have a chat, though sometimes a random PRT member would barge in and interrupt him because he was needed somewhere, but he always made sure to come back and finish, he didn’t seem to struggle keeping up with either responsibility which was admirable. Rodri explained to me stuff like what the headmaster was: essentially the leaders of every pokéuman base and a weird hybrid between heads of state/government and school headmasters, he also explained to me that if everything went well with my check-ups, I would meet him soon to officially get registered as a resident there, he unusually didn’t want to elaborate when I asked him about who this base’s headmaster was, however. The nurse also came to the room on occasions, usually when Rodri wasn’t there but not every time so I had a few moments alone, her visits were a lot less remarkable, she really just brought me trays of food, mostly human food that she said would help me adjust to the great changes in my biology, but with every tray she brought a glass of water that I couldn’t recognise the flavour of, and whenever I asked she would just say “Try it.” She definitely reminded me of my grandma, who was also a military nurse funnily enough. I was apprehensive at first but eventually after I tried it, I found that it was delicious! It was a very hard to describe flavour, strong, potent but good weirdly enough, she still refused to tell me what it was though. Rodri kept conversing with me whenever he could, telling a few personal details like age, where we came from, etc. And other facts about each other like how he was an honorary elite PRT member, explaining what that meant, or giving me the details of the mission where he rescued me from pokextinction, apparently, they were looking to take info from pke that could be related to the dynamax phenomenon from the sword and shield games, I could’ve asked for more details but I didn’t really feel the need to. He also told me that mega evolution is a thing, not that it meant anything for either of us. At some point, clearly a lot later in the day we both ended up talking about the beginning of our transformations and how we were first kidnapped, apparently Rodri transformed the day after the X and Y games released and as soon as he evolved his chespin into quilladin, he grew a quilladin’s nose. “Yeah... Not the most flattering first sign, but it was essentially that or a sudden rapid gain of weight.” he explained, rubbing the back of his head a little in embarrassment. His rescue attempt seemed to do a lot better than mine, though, he even claimed to hold his own against pke, again, it didn’t seem to occur to him that it sounded like he was bragging, he said it so innocently. Once he finished telling his story I could see him starting to tear up thinking of his human life. He made no effort to hold it in and I tried my best to console him, I approached my hand slowly but he moved it away. “No, don’t worry, this is only natural.” He said as he cheered up a little. He then surprised me with what he followed with. “Hey Lex? Do me a favour.” “H-huh?” “Don’t try to hide your feelings, I’m sure you most likely miss them too, and it hurts, a lot, because being a pokéuman is losing everything to never have a chance of getting it back, even the smallest thing you took for granted, it’s not just losing your families and home, it’s being unable to go to that restaurant you liked, or to the neighbourhood you grew up in, or have any of the experiences of life you had so commonly before, taking a walk on the streets, going to big events, any belonging you had no matter how important to you is gone, you. Lose. Everything. You are cut off from everything and no one, trust me, not a single person is able to handle that much loss. Everyone here experiences the same thing and you wanna know what we do with that knowledge? We empathise with each other, and we work together to ensure we all get the best we can in this shitty situation we are forced to live in. So believe me when I say you have no reason to try and pretend this hasn’t affected you, or that it’s not continuing to affect you, I don’t even know if it’s possible to get over something like this, all we can do then is stick together now more than ever, that’s what being a pokéuman is.” Rodri said. His breath was shaky and emotional but he had a fire in his speech that was admirable, you can tell he meant it, you can tell he was passionate and you can tell why he was such a high importance PRT member from it, it reminded me of Alan’s speech too, they both essentially came to the same conclusion, I couldn’t help but smile and tear up a bit as well. Almost as if he read my mind, Rodri spoke. “I really wish we could’ve helped those friends of yours, but unfortunately despite it being our main mission we aren’t always able to rescue everyone, and it always crushes us to know we failed in our mission to help our new generation. But we really can’t afford to dwell on that as much as it hurts, instead we should focus on those we could save against all odds, like you, Lex.” I was a little flustered at that description of me. “R-right, I suppose...” “Well, it’s getting late.” Rodri said as he stood up and walked over to the exit. “I would love to stay and watch over you for the night, but I’ve got things to do, even at this hour, plus I think you’re old enough to sleep by yourself.” “I guess, I’m not an adult though.” I replied. “You’re not a child either.” Rodri argued. “Besides, with how low our life expectancy as pokéumans is you’d be seen as an adult for most responsibilities give or take already.” He said as he opened the door. “you would only be a year away from joining the PRT.” And with that, he left and shut off the lights. I decided to head to sleep soon after, though not before messing around with the single bedsheet I was wearing, it was a little cold, but I was tired enough for it to not bother me, it had been an interesting past couple of days, that’s for sure, despite everything, I was kinda glad it was all over to a degree, at least for now, as my consciousness fade there was one leftover thought crossing my mind. “So humans and pokémon had se-.”