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gifPokéumans: re-lived part 1: "From parallel worlds" Chapter 7 "Routine"The hypno was busy doing fairly simple paperwork, filing and checking data either on the documents of his desk or on his pc, he wasn’t scheduled for his services for the rest of the day, so he decided to spend the time he had finishing extra work and studying personal matters. It was around 8pm, which only solidified his surprise when a knock came from the door of his office. ((Now who would come here so... Oh.)) The doctor thought to himself. “Come in, commander.” The door soon opened and a familiar chesnaught walked in casually in a friendly manner, yet one that also hid a hint of nervousness and seemed somewhat... unbalanced, as if carrying something. “Good evening doctor Luis. I hope you’re doing well after the morning’s test.” He said. “Yes, everything’s been in order and I’ve had time to focus on unfinished duties, oh and do sit down if you’d like, I know well you’re not just here to greet me and wish me well, an appreciated gesture as it is, I don’t need to use my mind reading abilities to suspect as to why...” Replied the hypno as he observed the chesnaught’s back, noticing the large object on top of his shell. “Now, would you care to explain why it appears that you returned from the civilian levels at far later hours than you should’ve? Beside your usual impunctuality, that is.” Rodri gave a nervous smile in response. “Hey… you don’t have to rub it in you know?” He didn’t fail to notice the hypno staring at the object on his shell, so he reluctantly sighed and explained himself. “I… alright, you see I wanted to make sure Lex adjusted to the base and so I decided to give him a little tour before taking him to his room because… well… he got room 175.” The hypno did a double take, but quickly composed himself. “Well… I did warn you about the headmaster.” “I guess I didn’t want to believe it, but he knows about what the kid has gone through!! He knows he needs help to adjust to the base! But he simply decided to lump him with our worst behaved students!!” Rodri complained, walking in circles across the office. “You do have to see it from his point of view.” The hypno mentioned trying to alleviate the chesnaught’s vivid emotions. “As biased as it is, this was a close breach of security that merely went miraculously in ways that weren’t in our control, and it was caused by your own recklessness, sir. Yes, I understand why you chose to act the way you did, I study the mind, there’s no need to attempt to convince me of it, but that also means I can get a sense to Ignacio’s actions as well.” The chesnaught looked frustrated for a moment and was close to retorting, but in the end decided to let it pass. “Well, I guess there’s no point in continuing to meander, I can tell you’re looking at my back, you see Luis, it was clear that Lex didn’t like the tour, I didn’t realise he wouldn’t enjoy having to deal with so many pokeumans all of a sudden and I think I overwhelmed him, so I hope to make it up to him as much as possible and I decided to buy him school supplies before arriving here, I’m planning to talk to his assigned teachers so that he’ll receive them on his desk.” The hypno raised an eyebrow. “And… is that all?” Rodri laughed nervously “Heheh, well… No.” Dr. Luis continued. “You plan on following him around the base in your free time to “check up on him” I know, it’s evident, my only concern now would be how nervous you are about it, it’s customary after all and you are his rescuer are you not?” Rodri looked to the side nervously, his composure shifted to a more worried and solemn expression. “Yes, well, I suppose so, but it wasn’t a normal rescue, the civilians may be told that but you know all of the PRT, including some who agree with the headmaster’s sentiments, know about Lex’s true circumstances of arrival, and I do worry it will look bad as the second in command of the base if I put my own time on a “security breach.” But I’m not gonna give up either because I know Lex is a good guy!! And I can’t help that I am still curious about his miraculous lack of brainwashing!!” The chesnaught gained more energy as he went on, explaining himself in detail and letting his emotions show. “When I first saw him in those horrid chambers, I knew there was something special about this toxtricity, and I do intend to figure out what it is.” The hypno put his elbows on the table and hands in front of his face. “In my professional opinion… I’ve already said what I can, I think it’s best that you discuss this with someone else in a personal level, like that miss… Ani? Was that her name? You two seem to be growing close, how are things with her?” “H-hey! Calm down!! we’re still just friends after all.” Rodri immediately responded, waving his hands in caution. “Still?” “W-well, I think it’s time I should be going, I have important matters to attend to after all.” The hypno chuckled. “If you say so, I could suggest getting Lex to join the PRT if you’re that curious about him, maybe after his first battle class tomorrow?” The chesnaught shook his head. “No, he’s made it clear he wants no part of it, and I want to make sure to respect his wishes.” He said as he opened the door of the office, but once he did, he froze, seemingly in thought. “Hmm…” “Is something the matter, sir?” Luis questioned, looking over to his chesnaught superior. “Nothing, nothing, just… thoughts, ideas. Well, have a good night doctor Luis!” Rodri finished before shutting the door to the office … I hated being here, I was getting sick of this stupid dark, empty void. “You must learn to be strong, young pokéuman.” Came from a voice, the toxtricity’s voice. I was frustrated, but for whatever reason I couldn’t bring myself to act in an aggressive way, it wasn’t worth it. “Just tell me who you are.” The toxtricity let out a warm and confident smile. “I am Kalleq, your dream messenger.” “Huh? W-what’s a dream messenger?” I asked. My frustration melting into curiosity. The other toxtricity let out a slight chuckle, amused. “Well on its most literal sense, it’s exactly as the name implies, messengers that come to you in dreams. Of course, what we actually are is an organisation of spirits who communicate with certain living pokeumans through the dream dimension. “Hold on... Dream dimension? An organisation? What for?” I asked, completely flabbergasted, eyes rapidly blinking as I struggled to process the information either out of tiredness or annoyance. “Woah, woah, easy with the questions. Kid.” Said Kalleq “You might’ve noticed that I’ve been trying to reach you for the past week, but unfortunately getting the dream dimension stable enough to have these conversations is very difficult, but, let me back up.” The shiny pokémon (was he even a pokéuman?) cleared his throat before continuing. The dream dimension is a special plane in our world created by our minds and our ability to think, to believe, to feel, it’s an entire world created by our mere consciousness, we think, therefore it is.” “Hmph, sure Descartes, but that makes no sense.” The logic sounded flimsy but after everything I’ve gone through I was willing to shut my brain up and roll with it. “Well, to be truthful, it’s hard to explain, and even harder to understand the dream dimension, but it’s related to all of us, every Pokémon and human, and of course, pokéuman. Every being capable of dreaming plays a part in creating this dimension, and every being gets to draw from it when they sleep, only they’re lead directly to the realm of chaos based on their own mind, but with the correct amount of training you can avoid getting swept up by the chaos and, well either have control of it, like when you have lucid dreams, or, reach here, the actual gateway of the dimension. The dream dimension is also where pokémon draw their power, of course it’s a lot more complicated with all the different specifications between moves, types, effects, etc.” The toxtricity explained. “So then... Are you like my consciousness or?” I asked, sorta starting to understand as best as it was possible. The toxtricity looked surprised. “Well, I guess I can’t blame you for assuming that but no, I was a living pokémon once, practically all of us were, you see, the dream dimension has connection to our spirits and what happens to us after we depart, I won’t go into detail, no spoilers after all.” “What, are you river song or something?” “No, but thanks for that bit of information.” He elaborated with a confident, somewhat cocky smirk. “being in your head seems to make me draw a lot of elements from your mind, anyway, I used to be a living person from the era of the original pokémon, and more over than that, I’m your ancestor, distant, of course.” My jaw dropped at that. “R...really?” “Yup.” He said. “This isn’t how it always is, but it is easier for spirits to contact relatives than full randos, although it fully doesn’t matter much, what matters is that my message is received, we act as somewhat of mentors, guiding people who we deem are going to be important in some way.” “We?” “The dream council.” He explained, suddenly the void started shining a bright, bright light seemingly coming from everywhere and nowhere. “And once again, time is not very favourable in the dream dimension, well, I’ll just end with this, there are many reasons why people are assigned dream messengers, several, hundreds even, but you, Lex?” He pointed towards me as he became less visible and faded into the shine. “You are more special than you know.” .... I woke up very badly rested, old habits die hard I suppose, I simply stayed in my bed without moving at all as despite having woken up the only part in my body that had any energy to act was my brain, nothing else willing to catch up, even my eyes, I thought on my dream, but frankly, I was starting to doubt it was true with how vague and confusing it was, especially with how tired I was, it wasn’t long before others woke up but I couldn’t catch who it was, that is until once again, the alarm from yesterday with that horrible banda music played again, just in case someone in the room was still asleep and forcing my body to respond by sitting up and rubbing my eyes, letting out a yawn. I could see everyone else getting up, Demian jumping aggressively from the top bunk and Gael gliding down to the floor, I went to the bathroom to freshen up, clean myself from any eye gunk or dirt, arceus know how toxic whatever my body produces is and I don’t want to find out. I left and was about to walk outside before I was forcefully pulled back by, who would’ve guessed, Demian. “EHEHEY- not so fast you little nature traitor, I’m not done with you yet just because of your little act of rebelliousness yesterday, now I know full well you’re not planning to join us, you’ve lost that chance anyhow, but I’ve figured out what the appropriate punishment for you will be.” He said with a malicious carnivorous grin, practically licking his lips at whatever he had in mind, I was undeterred however. “I can handle more of your attacks or whatever it is you’re capable of coming up with, which judging by your intelligence is not a lot, and if I’m not then you’d just be doing me a favour.” “Oh no, don’t you worry, the beatings will come later, but no, I have a plan that’s far, FAR more sinister than what you’d expect, appropriate for my typing isn’t it? I’m gonna make sure that you’re always going to stick with us no matter what, even if you’re not part of our gang I’m going to make sure EVERYONE thinks you are, and I’ll make sure everyone will despise you the most, because you’ve made a mistake in trying to defy me, and now I made the perfect punishment to make sure you regret it forever by ruining your reputation, killing your social life, FOREVER.” I couldn’t help but smirk, and chuckle, and laugh! I laughed like he had said the funniest joke ever, which threw everyone off, I could feel Gael and the morgrem looking over the entire discussion from the sidelines, Gael was worried and the morgrem had the same smirk as ever, but both, alongside Demian shifted to the same surprised expression that almost seemed like they were scared, even if for a moment. “I was worried I had underestimated you, I’m glad you’re as stupid as I thought.” “What is this?!” The obstagoon grabbing me growled. “You can’t ruin something that had no chance of happening!” I laughed. “And now you’re stuck with me.” “HIJO DE-“ “Stop, Demian.” As the obstagoon was about to charge an attack directly towards my face, before I could even react we were interrupted by someone I didn’t expect. Dylan, the morgrem, had ordered his leader in a loud blaring voice, completely unheard of from the usually quiet pokéuman. “Don’t waste your energy this early in the day.” And to my surprise, Demian listened, but it was clear his anger had not shifted one bit. “Gah, don’t think you’ve made me change my mind on what I plan for you, idiot.” He said through growled teeth. “I’m hungry and you made me waste time I could’ve used to get breakfast, next time you try to challenge me I will fuck you up good, te voy a madrear, you hear?” I just glared at him, he glared back, but quickly went on his way to the cafeteria, with the rest of us following, right as we exited the dorm room I could see Gael grab something of the corner of my eye but I was too agitated to try and figure out what. We made it to breakfast, once again it was packed to the brim with people, but Demian made sure to intimidate a few people sitting on a table forcing them to give us their space, and I could merely watch, it didn’t help that today’s menu was fairly bland, scrambled eggs of different kinds, molletes, chilaquiles, etc. I sat down to eat quietly, none of us really willing to have any kind of conversation, though it didn’t seem like Demian genuinely cared about it, though there would be times where occasionally another Pokémon, usually a dark type approached him and talked about stuff I’m pretty sure I was glad the loud conversations of the cafeteria made me unable to hear. As I was finishing my meal, I could feel something cold stick into my thigh, grabbing it turned out to be a sticky note that had “head to lunch directly from school, don’t go to the dorm to drop off your stuff I’ll try and see you there.” Written on it, at first, I wasn’t sure who had given me this but rapidly it clicked, and looking over confirmed it as I saw two things beside me, Gael and a pen, most likely the one he used to write the note, I grabbed the pen to reply “this u?” and he confirmed it with a nod. Demian however had then finished eating and made us go back to the dorm with him, forcing gael to carry the stuff he hadn’t finished with his claws, giving me the notes to hide from the obstagoon, eventually we made it back and split off to head to our own classes, to the dismay of Demian. I made it to my classroom, still slightly later than most of the other students who still noticed me with lingering stares as I arrived, I could make out a few unintelligible murmurs, I couldn’t help but worry that word about yesterday’s events had already spread. I started today with Spanish class, taught by a dewgong called Mr. Gustavo Ortega, interestingly for today’s class we focused briefly on pokéuman literature, starting from reimaginings of classic tales and popular folk stories within our universe, but occasionally name dropping a few original works I couldn’t recognize, but was intrigued by and I hoped I would learn more about in the future. Did you know apparently there’s a pokeuman equivalent to La Llorona? Some say she’s a water type froslass that was experimented on by pokextinction and lost her family, though granted it’s likely as much of an urban legend as the original tale. Next class became interesting as everyone, from every classroom was heading to battle class, this time poison battle class. Arriving to the correct arena wasn’t as welcoming as the day before, the door to the poison class was ridiculously blinded, it had the stylized symbol according to its type as all the other doors but it had several warnings for people who weren’t poison types, poison immune or heavily prepared, both in Spanish and English, the door was much harder to open, this one instead of a knob had the same locks as the dorm rooms, looking at a distance I could tell it wasn’t the only one, the fire one had it as well, I placed my palm on it and after a while of it scanning and responding, the door unlocked. I wasn’t sure what to expect but I had a lot of ideas and so I was very careful opening the door, I did not want whatever was kept inside that required such warnings to escape, and so when I entered I immediately shut the door not caring about how loud a noise it caused, only to find myself in front of another door. I facepalmed harshly, looking around I noticed that the room inbetween the two entrances weren’t very big but what space it had was mostly used by a bunch of air vents. “Of course, I should’ve realised they would have all these measures put in place, there’s probably some form of toxin inside that is kept in through these vents and the main gate!!” I stopped talking once I realised, I was rambling to myself. Truth be told, I was terrified heading inside, all my life I’ve passed through forbidden areas like these, were only qualified experts were supposed to enter lest you had a death wish, and suddenly I can just walk into these all fine and dandy because of my species? My nature? My mind still had trouble registering it, the cold room with the ventilation and my nervousness caused me to tremble as I finally I went inside the arena, and immediately I was greeted by a large purple haze across the massive room, a gas that was produced by a weird purple liquid that was collecting about in puddles looking almost like a swamp, puddles of toxic material that I couldn’t recognize, it looked to be fairly generic in nature, maybe this is the toxins us poison types produce? I could even see a few barrels of toxic waste in the corners of the arena, seemingly of the same stuff, the feelings I had inhaling the contaminated air weren’t too different from the feeling I had producing my acid spray, but what was different was the reaction I was having to the haze. My mind reacted in danger, it already knew I was not supposed to be here, at least under normal circumstances, and suddenly being exposed to poisoned oxygen it was screaming at me to get out, that it was dangerous, that I was getting sick. But my body reacted differently, it took in the air as it if it was the cleanest in the world, my mind was saying it smelled horrible, but my biology was saying it smelled great, my mind was raging that I was getting sick, poisoned, killed, but my body was actually healing, recuperating itself, this internal dissonance caused me to become disoriented, almost being unable to notice the swarm of poison type pokémon approaching me, with one particular figure at the front. A venusaur stood on its four legs in front of me. “It’s fine.” He spoke. “It happens to every new poison pokéuman, but your body will get used to it, in time your mind will figure out that this environment is healthy for you, right now we won’t do any physical training so you can sit down on the stands until you feel less sick while taking notes of our lesson. I nodded, carefully walking towards one of the stands in the sides of the room, truth be told the basic structure of the arena wasn’t too different from the electric classroom, it was still a large open, fairly rectangular room, with stands locating in the sides of the room. It was essentially the same design. I sat down on the stands with a chuckle, * The stands themselves were, not the cleanest, even a little corroded and aged, though I had to wonder if it was on purpose since a lot of poison types supposedly thrived on these kinds of ambiences, I mean there are several pokémon made out of pollution after all. The professor, introducing himself as Mr. Sergio Lopez, started talking about battle strategy, and, as someone who hadn’t played the games, I won’t lie, I found it a little difficult to keep up, I could get behind when he mentioned type match-ups, I particularly wanted to focus on my quad ground weakness, but by the time he moved to moves, abilities, how to combine them, how to work against other abilities it was all pretty much another language for me, I had fully underestimated how unprepared I was for pokémon battling, and I wasn’t even estimating much already. As the class went on, I was getting much more used to the tainted atmosphere, at least in practice, in concept I was still definitely not used to suddenly having to see this environment as beneficial. Beyond the physical qualities of the classroom though, the arena was strangely quiet, never did I have the chance or need to interact with any of the other students in the class, which there weren’t many, about like 7 people were in the arena scattered all over the stands all by themselves, yet unlike the electric class I couldn’t feel any hostility either, everyone simply chose to be on their own way and, it was unusual, but then again isn’t this what I want? We finished taking notes and the professor had us walk to the arena, summoning a bunch of dummies for us to fight, but unlike the electric class the professor gave us specific instructions for us, he had us first analyze what our strongest move was, in my case spark, and target it towards the dummy, then he had us work with poison moves, non-poison moves, status moves, etc. Eventually, the class came to an end, and I was pretty tired, all the students formed a very organized line, me at the back, and one by one left the room, standing at the space outside for a moment before the next one followed, I quickly realised it was very likely that we were being decontaminated so that we didn’t carry any dangerous elements outside the classroom, as my turn came I entered the space expecting a refreshing sensation but instead the “cleaning” procedure of spraying me with what I assumed was some form of disinfectant had me feel even weaker, draining my energy and only making me more tired. “Again, you’ll get used to it, don’t worry, it won’t do you too much harm, but if you ever feel ill, I recommend not assisting to poison class as the disinfecting is required for the rest of the base’s sake, but if you’re not well it will harm you significantly.” I did not respond out of exhaustion, I simply nodded and went on my way, but if I did, I probably would’ve expressed my sadness at having to essentially cause myself harm just to not be a hazard to anyone else, it really felt like my nature was more of a curse than anything. But… no, I couldn’t let myself think that, I’m still human, I still have the human part of pokéuman, I flashed back to when I was trapped by pokextinction, they saw us as inhuman, even when my transformation was only in my hands, we were already a lost cause, only… no, they are wrong, I knew it then and I know it now, to let myself think this is a mistake is to let them win, and I can’t let them win, for… them. With that mindset I felt a little better, and by better, I mean going from horrible to just kinda moping. I went back to my group’s classroom in time for history class, still taught by Mr. Izaguirre, which seemed to be going in chronological order so still discussing the prehispanic era, though we were getting close to the arrival of the Spanish to the Americas, boy would that be fun, can’t wait for the entire classroom to remember how stupid the cast system was, seriously, look it up and translate its names, it’s hilarious. Next up was P.E. I, and many others groaned as we realised we had yet another hour of physical activity not long after the first one, once again I had to walk all over to the gym, which looked very much like a human school gym. A large blastoise, who was expecting us in the middle of the year with a whistle collar on her neck and his arms on her hips, or at least as close as she can get, blastoise limbs aren’t very long after all. “ALRIGHT EVERYONE LISTEN HERE, SINCE I KNOW WE HAVE A NEW STUDENT I WILL INTRODUCE MYSELF AS COACH GISELA SOTO!!! BUT SINCE I KNOW HE’S ALREADY BEEN IN THE CLASS FOR A DAY I WON’T HAVE HIM INTRODUCE HIMSELF, SO I WANT YOU ALL TO START RUNNING 20 LAPS ACROSS THE GYM!!!!” And with that, with little time to process it we all began running in circles across the gym, it was obvious for me that my pokémon form had not changed at all how well I performed running, now I wasn’t the slowest but it was very clear that toxtricities were neither particularly fast or slow pokémon, not only that but my stamina was still as awful as ever, though I definitely felt like I had more energy than usual, I guess I hadn’t really ran much since I transformed that Saturday. As we all finished our laps, me being the last one to do so who was actually trying and not just walking around chatting with other people, and once everyone was done the coach continued by announcing that we would be playing dodgeball, which everyone was… interestingly excited for. Now dodgeball here is played fairly simply with cheap plastic balls that you can find at any toy store, not the seemingly sport specific balls that apparently hurt a lot and were used in the U.S. which meant that I did enjoy playing dodgeball, but people weren’t usually excited about it as people often preferred football than anything. At least that’s what I thought before we actually got to play. We formed teams, I got picked last, sounds cliché I know but I honestly didn’t care, and I noticed that the balls were completely different from the previous depictions I described, they looked sorta glass-like and were transparent in colour, suddenly, right before we could start the coach blew her whistle and began shouting. “ALRIGHT, SINCE WE HAVE A NEW STUDENT, I WOULD LIKE TO EXPLAIN THAT THIS IS A SPECIAL TYPE OF DODGEBALL, THESE BALLS GAIN SPECIAL EFFECTS FROM YOUR TYPES, AND SO YOU WILL HAVE TO PLAY DODGEBALL WITH KNOWLEDGE OF YOUR MATCH-UPS.” With that, she blew her whistle and the game began, I briefly raised my eyebrow wondering what coach Gisela meant by special effects, but I didn’t have the time to wonder it as I started making sure I avoided the incoming barrage of balls from the other team, luckily I had a special ability from my human self to blend into the background so much people didn’t notice me, so I simply did not get attacked at all, looking around I noticed the balls changing colours corresponding to the pokémon carrying them, and if they hit another pokémon I managed to notice the “special effects” coach talked about when a dark green ball suddenly grew vines on the pokémon it had hit, this made me curious as to what electric and poison type balls could do, but I unfortunately couldn’t land a single one, nor could I activate the poison ball. In the end I made it to the last 3, with the only pokéuman left in the opponent team being a quagsire who looked towards me, grabbed a ball, changed it to a dark brown colour… he threw it at me… It hit and exploded in a cloud of dust, and I was struggling to… to… s-stay c… conscious… I woke up as the bell rang for next class and everyone, but the coach had left the arena, the blastoise pokéuman approached me as I stoop up and handed me a few weird looking blue fruits. “Looks like you took quite the beating, eat these, they’re oran berries, you might’ve heard of them, I’ll let the students know to lay off using quad effective balls next time.” “T-thanks.” I became surprised at finding out the berries from the games were real, I guess they grow with pokéuman assistance, otherwise I can’t understand why we don’t just see them around overworld, and like in the games I ate them and immediately I felt myself recover from most of my injuries, though I still felt a lot of exhaustion and a little bit of aching across my body. I walked back to my classroom, definitely not almost forgetting my stuff on the gym. Maths passed by slowly, with me having an absolute venomous distaste for it throughout the hour, but, almost as if for consolation, English came, where I pretty much breezed through and even helped the teacher with her lesson with a few mistakes on the whiteboard, and like yesterday miss Isa was so surprised at my level that she could barely function through the class, I felt bad for her, it was clear I was likely the first student in a while to give a damn for her class. All classes eventually ended and listening to Gael’s advice from the morning, decided to head immediately to the cafeteria, which ended up meaning that I arrived early, avoiding a large queue and finding a completely empty table to sit on, it combined with having just came from an easy class meant that I was pretty happy, though unfortunately, I guess to balance out the food simply wasn’t it for me. They decided to go for local stuff, and by local I don’t mean Mexican food, Mexican food is great, possibly the best food of any country in the world, no I mean Mexico city food, which is 90% grease, often tastes horrible, and somehow has quesadillas without cheese. Since I knew I wouldn’t be able to go back in line, I got 4 large quesadillas, with cheese, still can’t believe I had to specify for it. I was served by the machoke server, completely forgetting I wanted to ask his name until it was too late and I had already sat down. I started eating, slowly watching and hearing the cafeteria get filled more and more with different pokéumans, all of them carrying loud conversations that all blended with each other into a blaring background notice, making me not notice the approaching murmur of a group of pokéumans approaching my table until one of them suddenly went. “Hey, you mind if I sit here?” came from an orange, sushi-like creature. At first, I wasn’t sure if it was directed at me, what with so many people being around, and even if it was, I would’ve liked to pretend it wasn’t, but one disadvantage of being a pokémon was what confirmed me as the intendent target. “You, The low-key toxtricity.” ((…Dammit.)) I thought, I reluctantly nodded, and I was surprised by finding both the eelektrike from yesterday and the litleo I had seen in my class sitting down alongside the pokéuman girl. “Hi!!” came from the sushi girl, “I’m Itzel Xie, I’m a tatsugiri by the way since you most likely don’t recognize my species, I heard they’ll add us for scarlet and violet though.” She explained energetically and cheerfully. my roommates told me about you, I’m guessing you’ve already met Raúl, and the Litleo’s name is Miguel.” “H… hi.” I said, looking down and subconsciously trying to ignore them. The girl continued. “So, is it true you leave with Demian and his gang? Man, and I thought we had it rough living in front of them.” She said with surprising sympathy. “Oh… um, well, I just got here, so.” “Right, right.” From then on, as crazy as it was to say, I pretty much stayed in silence for the rest of the lunch period overhearing the group’s conversation, or rather the eelektrik and tatsugari (?)’s conversations, with the quiet litleo very rarely chiming in himself. They didn’t feel like asking me anything from then on, I was simply there with them, it was awfully weird. Once I got done eating, I simply decided to say a quiet goodbye and leave towards my dorm. “Um… I’m done so I gotta… go.” “Woah… you really ate all that?” Said the eelektrik. “I don’t think I could even finish half of it.” I rolled my eyes. “Whatever, bye.” I went back to my dorm, still in shock for the unusually calm, yet still unwarranted social interaction. Unfortunately, things would get better as I arrived to the dorm room open and a very angry obstagoon standing in the doorway. “Where the fuck were you?” Demian asked. I rubbed my head front in frustration. “Lunch, it doesn’t matter to you anyway.” I was immediately hit with Demian’s fury swipes. “Don’t be stupid, I told you very clearly you were going to stick with me and my gang, and you did not return to the dorm after class, you disrespected me, and I told you I would beat the shit out of you if you did.” “What the fuck do you even know about respect?!” I got hit by fury swipes again. “SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!!” He screamed, before starting to drag me out of the room, still carrying my supplies, not even calling the rest of the gang with him, he dragged me all the way to the civilian level, even when walking upstairs which ended up in me getting several bruises across my body, once we arrived he locked eyes into the first “weak” pokemon he found, a munna, making sure they noticed him noticing them, Demian then started chasing them down several corridors until finding another corner to trap them in, still dragging me along painfully where he suddenly started attacking them, practically letting out his rage on them, once he was done and the poor munna looked to be at the border of fainting he grabbed them by their entire body and started speaking to them, directly at their face. “When you tell others about what just happened, which I know you will do because I know you’re a pathetic little snitch, you will make sure to include, that the toxtricity behind me also attacked you brutally, if you do that, I might consider sparing you for the rest of your pathetic future, understood.” I was horrified, but I wasn’t strong enough to intervene, and when the munna nodded, I couldn’t be mad given what she went through. Demian let the munna go and she ran away immediately, the obstagoon then looked at me with a demented grin, as if celebrating this event like it was a victory over me. Although knowing my luck, there’s a good chance it will be. Demian and I walked back to our dorm, I a few meters behind him, by the time I made it Demian had already gone off with Dylan and Gael approached me extremely concerned, practically leaping at me. “Dude, what happened? Where did you go? Why are you all beat up?”I sighed out of tiredness. “I had a fight with Demian when I got here from lunch, and then he dragged me into one of his attacks and made his victim put the blame on me to attempt to ruin my reputation.” “Wait, he literally dragged you all the way to the second floor!?” Gael asked, a great expression of shock marked across his face. “Yeah, that’s why I’m all bruised up.” “Oh arceus! I’m so sorry!! If I had known this would’ve happened I wouldn’t have told you to avoid returning to our dorm after class!! I’m really sorry I really hope you’re ok I’m sorry!!!” Gael pleaded with a sense of desperation that took me by surprise, if I didn’t assume better, I would almost think he was on the verge of tears. “Look, I’ll be fine, I’ll live, if this is simply going to keep happening, I might as well build an immunity to it, let’s just…” sigh “let’s not focus on it now that he’s gone, please, just forget about it.” “A-alright.” Gael said. “If you say so…” “Let’s just chat, or something… gah, ow!” I exclaimed as I attempted to sit down but I felt pain due to my bruises. “Are you really sure you’re ok?” “Yes, yes, i- gahh!... I just need to lay down for a bit, oof.” “Well…” he said. “I guess we could try and get to know each other a bit more while you recuperate, y’know if we want to be friends and all.” “Hmm… what do you have in mind?” “I don’t know, maybe just talking about stuff we like, tv shows, games, etc.” Gael glided up to the top of the bunkbed as we continued conversing “Um… I suppose.” “Is something wrong?” Gael said, hanging from the bed frame upside down like a bat, it was kinda cute. “Nothing, it’s just, I don’t really like talking about what I’m into…” I said in a half-mumble. “Why?” the gliscor asked. “It’s just… people never really know the stuff I like, and I usually end up isolated and made fun of.” “It can’t be that bad, can it?” “It can and it is.” “I’d still like to know.” I turned my body upside down and put my face on my pillow. “Hmmmph… maybe.” “I mean my interests aren’t that common either.” Gael said as he went back to laying on his bed. “Really?” I asked, very much incredulous. “Yeah! I don’t usually meet people who are into sonic.” “You like sonic?” “Y-yeah… I know it has bad fame, but I’ve liked it a lot since I was a kid. “Hmmm….” “I’m into videogames in general to be fair, mainly Nintendo and esports.” “Esports? Like official competitive stuff?”“Yeah! I think it’s cool, It would be honestly a dream of mine to participate in those but I was never able to develop the level.” He said, I understood, like I’ve mentioned before, videogames aren’t exactly very accessible here, though that doesn’t seem to affect king of fighter players. “I’m obviously also into pokémon, and I used to be interested in playing competitive but it’s a little pointless not that real battles are a thing, plus like every pokéuman is into pokémon so it’s not really special.” “You’d be surprised.” I said, remembering Lázaro. “Wait, you’re not into pokémon?” Gael asked, surprised. “Oh no! I definitely am, I’ve just encountered pokéumans who haven’t.” I said, hoping I didn’t have to elaborate remembering that my circumstances of arrival to the base was kept hidden. “Ohhh ok, I didn’t know there were pokéumans who weren’t pokémon fans, though I guess there are simply exceptions sometimes.” “mhm…” “Let’s see…” Gael continued, laying back down on his bed. “I’m also really into geography stuff; I like learning about other countries and their cultures, I actually do pretty well in geography class.” “Oh! Well… me too, I love learning especially about obscure countries and cultures in different backgrounds, I feel like I’m learning more about the world that way…” I smiled. “I can’t help but wonder how pokéuman bases like this one exist all over, because there are pokéumans in every part of the world and our base definitely feels very Mexican with it’s architecture and reference, I wonder how it is in like, Japan, or the UK, or Africa or Oceania.” “I wonder that too.” Gael replied. “Heck, I even wonder how other bases across the country are, this base definitely feels a lot like Mexico City, which is appropriate given how it’s the city it takes pokéumans from.” “It’s not just Mexico City.” Added Gael. “I’m actually from Toluca, and the base sits in the mountains in-between both cities.” “Oh, really?” I said, this time being the one to stand up over at his direction. “Yeah! This base takes from a fairly large area, I’m pretty sure the nearest base is in like Puebla or something, I’m not fully sure.” “Ohhh cool.” I replied. “I’m not actually from this area at all though, I’m from Guadalajara, but I moved to Mexico City in 2019.” “Really? You do have kind of an accent to be honest.” Gael chuckled. “Yeah, my father had to move because he’s part of the military and you know how it is, if anything it’s a miracle we don’t move more often.” I explained, Gael’s mood seemed to sour hearing this. “Yeah… I can understand, my dad was also part of the military, we never moved, but he did, so I mostly stayed with my mum alone.” He said. “Oh… that’s pretty bad.” “Mhm,” he continued. “And the brief times I did see him he was always very demanding and strict; he wanted me to join the military like him, but I made sure to tell him off every time.” “Oh, that’s horrible!! My parents were never like that, they were more understanding, especially as I also made it very clear that I never want to join that kind of life.” “I guess you were luckier than me… but, honestly I don’t think this matters now, I made my choice, my promise, and even right now as a pokéuman I’ll make sure I never have to join the PRT or fight in this war.” Gael said with a sudden determined energy rising through him. I couldn’t help but smile. “Heh, me too.” “Honestly? I can’t believe we have that in common, but I’m very happy about it.” “Yeah… so am I, I guess I kinda expect people to look at me weirdly if I say I want nothing to do with the PRT, so I’m glad I found someone that feels the same way as me, it… doesn’t happen often.” Gael suddenly glided down from his bed and stood in front of me, startling me a little. “GAH!!” “Oof, sorry about that, I just thought it was better if we continued talking this way.” Gael explained sheepishly. “Right, right.” “Anyway, well, if there’s one last thing, I could mention that I’m into, at least for the moment, it would probably be the Zelda franchise.” “Oh?” “Yeah… not exactly a popular thing but I enjoy it a lot and I’m very knowledgeable on the whole thing.” “I mean it’s still very recognizable, just not popular, still more than what I’m into.” “Hmm…” Gael seemed to think for a bit, as he sat down on the bed in front of me, which didn’t seem to be very comfortable as I could see him flinch at the disorganized and unclean sheets. “Well… what are you into that’s so obscure then? I’ve already told you two of my interests, so I think it’s only fair if you tell me two of yours.” I sighed. “I really don’t know… I don’t wanna sound like I’m being arrogant but you’re probably not going to recognize them.” “You wanna bet?” “Honestly? I’d be win, and I’d be confident about it, I’ve literally never met another person in this country that is into what I’m into but, fine, I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt… have you ever heard of doctor who?” “Ummm… the name’s vaguely familiar to me, I think.” Gael responded, clearly having to think deep about it. “I assumed so, and I doubt you know what Eurovision is in the slightest.” “Yeah no, I have no idea what that is.” Said Gael, sounding a little apologetic. I sighed, turning to the other side, still laying down on my bed. “Look, it doesn’t matter, I’m already used to is, I just don’t want to talk about it now, I’ve accepted that nobody is ever going to know about the stuff I love so I just want to drop it.” “I would like to know, though.” I turned back an attempted a raised eyebrow. “Seriously!! we already have so much in common, and you seem like an interesting person, I wouldn’t mind having you talk about it! I really wouldn’t! Because I really want to be friend with you Lex, and I want to understand you, I may not have any idea what those two things are but if it’s important to you and it means getting to know you then I’d be perfectly happy listening to you talking about it!!!” Gael exclaimed with a burst of excitement. I was conflicted, he sounded genuine but… could I trust him? I wanted to trust him, I wanted for his claims to be true, but, it’s never happened before, could I even be sure this would be possible? That someone is actually interested in all the different topics I have an unnecessary amount of knowledge about? I took a deep breath before responding. “hmm… if you say so.” “Look, how about this? We both take turns talking about random facts about our interests, and the other does their best to listen. We don’t have to get into each other’s topics but who knows, maybe we both gain an interest and we share even more stuff in common.” “I… alright.” And so, we began conversing for the rest of the evening, taking turns talking about the stuff we liked, mainly focusing on our two “main picks” as we ended up putting it, he talked about sonic, and Zelda and I talked about dr. who and Eurovision, and even though we had no clue about what the other was explaining, we both managed to follow, and we were each really comfortable explaining it to the other. “-nd so the doctor is able to regenerate itself after a fatal injury, this is why he’s so recast, but every incarnation of him has a different personality and is his own character who goes through their own arcs, giving different actors a time to shine, time lords are able to regenerate into anyone, regardless of race and gender.” I explained, waving my hands almost as if giving an invisible presentation “Ohh interesting.” Gael said. “M favourite incarnation is 12, sure, he doesn’t quite have the best stories on average but his actor, Peter Capaldi, a long-time fan like me is very clearly really passionate about it and always sells it, and he has a very unique charm and personality!!” “-o they’re not actually the same characters, unless the game is directly linked to a previous one like a sequel or whatever, all the links, zeldas and ganons are reincarnations, with link representing the triforce of courage, Zelda the triforce of wisdom, and ganon the triforce of power.” Explained Gael, much more composed than me but still grinning happily like an idiot, in an affectionate way. “I didn’t know that… is that why there are so many links in smash?” “Yeah, pretty much.” Sometimes we’d get pretty heated. “-nd they always claim that voting is rigged by politics, they always say oh everyone just votes for their neighbours on purpose because they hate us but like… no??? Countries and regions that share culture, languages, and music markets are o-of course going to lean towards each other, Irish people are going to vote for British music, Nordic countries naturally vote for each other, etc. It’s really not much more complicated than that!!” I ranted on about, often stuttering and having to collect my thoughts as I went on. “Dang…” Responded Gael “-nd like, most of the modern games just don’t get his character right!! he’s too flanderized, they literally made a rule that he wasn’t allowed to cry or emote in a way that wasn’t hero like or some crap, and this also affected characters like knuckles or shadow who often became pretty one-dimensional like, I like the boom cartoon, but they did both of them so dirty.” Gael complained about. “I thought knuckles was kinda funny there, couldn’t tell you about shadow though.” I responded. We spent the whole evening just talking, and talking, and talking about those 4 subjects, we talked in our dorms, in the queue for dinner, sitting in the floor at dinner, even with our mouths opened, so focused on our own little conversations we were we had no idea what the menu was. We kept talking until we simply got so exhausted from it, we literally needed to breathe. pant pant “Few… damn, that was long.” Said the gliscor “Yeah... pant but… well…” pant I was pretty flustered; I wasn’t used to talking about my interests let alone for this long. “I guess I did enjoy it, phew.” “Me too, I wouldn’t mind doing this another time, just uh… pant less exhaustingly.” “You can say that again.” “Hell… maybe I could even show you a little from it through the computer if you’d like…” Gael said, pointing his claws at each other like one would do their index fingers. “Sure, if… if I get to do it as well, though, how do you get access to it? I’m assuming websites are blocked off to avoid leaks or, something, anything the like.” “Oh well, it’s a complicated system, I don’t think I’d be able to explain it right now, we do have several streaming sites and consoles but unfortunately Demian likes to hog them for himself, which is a shame, I’ve been dying to play something for a while.” “That dick, though granted it’s not like I play much videogames in general, I honestly suck at them cuz of it, I struggled with plants vs zombies.” “What about pokémon?” “Too expensive, Nintendo.” I explained. “Hey speaking of, where does Demian go at these hours?” “Oh he just fucks off to the common area to hang around with other dark and poison types, including Dylan, honestly I just kinda leave him alone till he comes back at 11 for curfew… although, now that I think about it, we could start going there as well! there’s plenty to do, I’m pretty sure there is an arcade in there, like a proper arcade, actual games not just rigged claw machines and carnival prices, heck! I could even give you a tour if you’d like!” I quickly stopped him. “Ah- no need, I was given one when I arrived by Ro- my rescuer, is what I’m saying. Just before I got into this dorm, though it wasn’t a very detailed one.” “Well then, I could give you a more detailed tour of the common area, see all the different things we could do together!” I was a little unsure. “Um… if we don’t take too long that is.” “Oh of course, trust me, I don’t like going out and doing activities much either, but we should probably get out of the dorm as much as possible, I promise I won’t try and make it too tiring for the both of us.” “Well, alright then.” I smiled, then I yawned, it was getting late. “Good night, Lex, it was nice getting to know ya.” “Likewise, Gael, good night.” And with that, we both happily drifted off to dreamland. ... “Looks like we meet again, young pokéuman.” Came from the voice of the toxtricity, who slowly faded into existence. “Kalleq?” I asked, adjusting to the vision, instead of a fully empty void, this time it had a swarm of different shades of disorganised colours, hues of pink, purple and blue. The shiny toxtricity nodded, but didn’t speak. “Last time... W-w-what did you mean by more special than I knew?” I found myself asking. “Well, loads of things, some more literal and important than others, but, as your guardian I think it’s best that we both get to know each other before I can deliver my message, I can sense that you don’t trust me.” “And rightfully so, you’ve been appearing as short weird creepy visions and now suddenly you’re acting all wise and peaceful.” I retorted. “The act comes with the job, Lex.” He said. “As for the visions, it’s hard to stabilise the dream dimension which is why they were so short, it wasn’t exactly easy to reach you y’know? Luckily as we have more visits they slowly get longer and longer, but not too long of course, we wouldn’t want for you to sleep for a whole 24 hours now would we?” “I guess I have no way of disputing your claims...” “And yet you’re still skeptical, this is why I hope to use tonight’s visit to ensure you can trust me, so if you want to ask anything about me or who I was when I was alive, feel free to do so.” “Actually... Yeah, if you’re a spirit from the lost era, how come you look about my age? I’ve gone the point in my transformation where I can tell different pokéumans apart and you don’t look that older than me.” Kalleq smiled. “Because, as a spirit guardian, I imprint onto you, your emotions and your memories, and so you’re seeing me as somewhat of a mirror image to you, it’s not just in terms of appearance, I can understand things only you could and recall feelings you’ve had in the past, like for example, the embarrassment, yet comfort of talking to Gael about those TV shows you like so much.” “W-what the? Y-you can read my mind? H-how am I supposed to trust you then?” Kalleq sighed. “Like I said, I don’t read minds, mine just imprints on yours, it’s more of a side effect of being a messenger.” His demeanour grew more reserved and nervous, less like the confident facade he had been putting on. “Look... I’m sorry our introduction hasn’t been the best but, it is my duty to be your assigned guardian, s-so if you could just work with me for a little bit, I promise I won’t try to pry into your mind too much I just need to understand who you are so I can properly look after you and deliver your message, please?” He now said with a sense of desperation, which I was very keen to notice. “Are you new at this?” I asked. “Is this your first day or something?” “NO I- Ugh… f-fine, you got me, I’m not as wise and knowledgeable as I let on, b-but this isn’t some any old job!!! I-I can’t treat it like one!! I couldn’t help but feel a little more sympathetic now with his plight. “If this is so serious why’d they pick someone as… um, unexperienced as you? no offense.” “Because like I said, this isn’t some random job you get for experience, our messages are always serious, and since I am your ancestor, the reason you have the pokémon gene mind you, I was seen as the best candidate for the job regardless of my experience, a-and this is why I need for you to trust me before I can begin my job! because I need you to see me as someone you can listen to, otherwise, what’s stopping you from simply ignoring me? I can feel your emotions, you’re someone that really needs to be convinced, Lex.” I gasped in shock at first but later ended up turning my head down in awkwardness. “…Fine, you’re correct, but y’know? being honest is a good way to make me trust you so… thanks for that.” I replied. Kalleq seemed to calm down at this, smiling and stretching his arm towards me. “Then I’ll try to be more honest in the future.” I shook his hand, a little reluctant but I shrugged it off. Going back to his wiser and more confident persona, Kalleq continued. “So, is there anything you’d like to know about me? We’ve not got much time left but I’ve already prepared myself for any answers in case you ask.” I thought for a moment, having a little bit of trouble coming up with a question. “Um… I’m not sure, like I do want to ask questions about the pokémon times but I-I have no idea where to start at all!” Kalleq simply laughed gently, an expression that clashed with his toxtricity biology, his tired eyes and sharp mouth looked so happy and relaxed… is this what people saw when I was happy? I decided it was better not to think much of it out of respect. “Well, I guess I could start with a random “fun” fact as you seem to call it and you can work from it in the future, though probably not tonight as we only have so much time.” I nodded. “Sounds good to me, yeah.” “Well then, let me just tell you about a little something involving the pokémon language, unlike the games we didn’t communicate through animalistic cries, that much should be obvious, but we didn’t do like the anime where we spoke our names and everyone could simply understand us, no, we all had different languages that developed depending on the region, and these often mirror ancient versions of your current human languages, from Iberian vulgar latin to proto-germanic tongues close to old English.” “Woah…” Kalleq continued, proud of himself. “Now, my name in my language translates to “lightning” which is very fitting, yeah. But my people’s language is very close to proto-inuit vocabulary, with kalleq also being a Greenlandic name.” “Oh? Seriously? That’s really cool!!” I exclaimed. “I always had an interest in Greenland, seems like such a fascinating and unique country, I would’ve loved to go there some day.” Kalleq seemed surprised. “Really? Well, I can probably imagine why, if it’s like how my own region was, I’m sure it’s a beautiful place, though mind you, I’d be much more prepared for the temperatures than you.” “Meh, I’m sure I would have been fine, I’m usually good with cold, so much so I’m surprised I didn’t turn out to be a fire type.” “You have me to thank for that.” Said my dream messenger, suddenly the brightness that signified that the vision was ending arrived at the void once again. “Till we meet again, young pokéuman.” I woke up refreshed, something I had not experienced since that fateful Saturday. Today didn’t stand out much from all the previous days as I was starting to adjust to living at the base and I was starting to form a routine. Gael and I had to follow Demian and Dylan to breakfast, but we kept conversing secretly using the sticky notes and our pens. From then on class began and the only new class I had left was geography. That didn’t mean there weren’t any interesting new topics to study though, for starters: in history we already moved to the colonial period, which even though I had already studied before it was still interesting to revisit, although it’s still a shame that pokéuman history is still a long way to go from here. Geography then, was taught by, probably the most interesting pokémon appearance wise alongside our starmie teacher, a gigalith by the name of Bárbara Medel. Who seemed really passionate about her subject, clashing slightly with her harsh and rocky appearance, but it was interesting to see, it was here we found out that, though exact numbers are hard to come by, the country with the most pokéuman bases was china, which made sense, and I also managed to spot on a map a base located in my home city of Guadalajara, I couldn’t help but wonder how things would’ve been like had I transformed there. Unfortunately, however it was hard to focus as throughout class every single student seemed to focus on me, they whispered at each other while glancing at my direction, some looked at me with horror, others with disgust, and I even felt people throwing pieces of paper at my back all throughout every class. At first I wasn’t sure what it was but then I remember what Demian did yesterday, it was clear to me that the rumours were already spreading whether I liked it or not, and as more time passed I would be feeling the effects of my negative reputation even more, getting glares and paper balls thrown at was only the start.That said Maths and English went on as normal and in social formation we got a small explanation as to what the headmaster’s job was exactly, although it wasn’t really stuff we didn’t know already, we were still in the topic of legalities rather than ethics, which felt less interesting to me, though we did learn that since our base is much smaller in terms of population than a regular city, the parliament members and important ruling positions of certain sectors tended to be the same as the workers of that sectors, for example a lot of the cooks were part of the food managing department, a lot of the teachers were high in education sectors, etc. nepotism didn’t seem to be as common as in the human world, though I have to wonder how many people here have blood relation and how many choose to have kids, it was hard to dwell on it when you constantly had shit thrown at you breaking your train of thought, and it was getting to me as despite waking up well-rested my vision occasionally got blurry as if I was tired, but only really when I looked at both of my hands though, weird. Anyway, before all those classes though I had battle class, where I had to unfortunately confront two things. One being that it seemed like Wednesday wasn’t a fluke and just kinda having the students practice by themselves was this professor’s teaching style, which disappointed me and upset me, and two. Because today was the day I “promised”, mind the quotation marks, Raúl to have a spar. He greeted me pretty much instantly as I arrived, begging to have a battle, but I refused on the basis that I still hadn’t trained enough, he groaned but agreed to wait until the halfway point of the class, once we got there, we immediately walked to the most desolate part of the arena, which was still fairly small and crowded, and we got into position as well as we could. “How is a spar different than an ordinary battle?” I asked, Raúl had a prepared stance with his tail/body curled up kinda like a shrimp, but also as if he were preparing himself to launch himself, meanwhile I was standing around with my arms crossed still unsure about the situation. “Dude, it’s obvious.” He replied confidently, but his demeanour shifted once he noticed my expression grow frustrated. “R-really? No clue? Alright fine, we’re just going to use our moves towards each other but not at full force as usual, kinda like practicing karate and shit, I dunno let’s just begin.” I sighed for the billionth time in my life and improvised a battle stance, closing my fists and putting them in a closed, protective but also sorta-battle ready position. I took a deep breath and started charging a shock wave, using the same methods in my previous battle classes, I could feel myself generating the electricity for my attack until suddenly. “THUNDERBOLT!!!!!” I was hit by a sudden large bolt of lightning, sapping my energy and taking me completely by surprise. “Gah!!” When the attack was over, I could see the eelektrik levitating and moving around as he was in front of me. “Too slow!” He said as he hit me with another thunderbolt. “ARGH!!!” I recovered, I was fairly sure that electric types could resist themselves, especially given I was constantly producing harmless electricity, so either I was very weak or the eel pokéuman was a lot stronger than me since the attack definitely hit hard. I tried charging an acid spray, but I was hit by a: “DISCHARGE!!!” Which knocked me off my feet causing me to fall on my butt. “Ow…” I exclaimed as I slowly got up. “Bro, you need to learn to attack faster!!” Said Raúl. “Shut up.” I said in response, growing more and more irritated, I once again tried charging an attack, this time my spark which I was successful in starting but as I charged towards the eelektrik he dodged out of the way causing me to fall to the floor, then as I turned to my back he hit me with an acid that I actually did better at resisting. “Ow, wait, I didn’t know you had a poison move?” Raúl shrugged. “Meh, it’s pretty weak, I’m probably going to change it to a better move once I evolve.” He charged a thunderbolt, but I was able to dodge it in time and it slid past me. I started charging another acid spray, knowing he didn’t have a poison resistance like me, but I had to dodge several of his attacks once agains which didn’t allow me to charge, and I was even hit by a painful crunch. “OW!!! WHAT THE FUCK!!” “Hey don’t shout!!” Came from Raúl, I got even more frustrated that I ended up using scary face unintentionally, I knew it was a status move but its effect escaped me at the moment so I was praying that it would benefit me, I was lucky though as I noticed that Raúl’s movements and his ability to charge attacks was ever so slightly slower, and so I was finally able to land an acid spray from my throat, causing him to fall on his back for once. “Gah!! Oh, wow, that was powerful, but still not enough to beat me I’m afraid!!” He then with another thunderbolt I was narrowly unable to dodge that was immediately followed by another crunch I ended up blacking out. “Ughhh… What… happened?” I asked as my eyes fluttered open, and I adjusted to the light. “Looks like you experienced your first knockout, don’t worry, you’ll get used to it, here.” Came from the electivire teacher, handing me a weird candy bar, I ate it almost in one bite and I immediately felt a bunch of my energy restored. “I’m guessing that was probably a healing item of some sort… wait, shit! What time is it!?!?” I asked, suddenly noticing that everyone had already left the arena. “11:13, don’t worry, your professor knows you just had battle class and so he probably understands that you’ve been knocked out, don’t over exert yourself, also, your eelektrik friend wanted to let you know that he wants to meet you at lunch like yesterday.” ((Great…)) I thought to myself, I stood up and shook myself off before heading back to the classroom, where I had to deal with the rest of the classes I’ve already described. Once it was time for lunch, and still following Gael’s advice of not heading to the dorm immediately, I rolled my eyes and reluctantly took a seat on the same table as yesterday, expecting the group from that day to return, at least the food looked to be good, the menu was Italian and thus I grabbed three slices of wood-fired pizza and a large plate of pasta with a glass bottle of coke, one has to wonder how big that kitchen is if it can cook so many different dishes. It took a while, and I had already eaten a large chunk of the delicious pasta until I started hearing semi-familiar voices approaching the table I was sitting in. “So not mika then?” The tatsugiri pokéuman said, coming from a continuing conversation she was having with the other two. “Um… well I m-mean it… barely changes…” Responded the shy litleo. “Hey, look! It’s Lex!!” Exclaimed Raúl the eelektrik once he noticed me in the table, all three of them then turned over at my direction. “Oh! Hi there! Sorry we didn’t see you we were a little busy with something.” Said Itzel, the tatsugiri. “It’s whatever, I was almost done anyway.” “Are you always this early?” She asked. “I’m guessing so that he can stockpile a bunch of food, I mean look at that! Three slices!?!” Raúl continued. “Are you secretly a snorlax or something?” “Oh, lay off Raúl.” Spoke Itzel as all three of them sat down on the table with their own trays of food, notably smaller than mine. From then on, the conversation they had been having continued, and it was obvious enough that it was about the litleo who’s name I had currently forgotten trying to go with a nickname, I paid attention absentmindedly to them but without having any intention to participate in the discussion. “Do we know if you had a dad who got killed by an uncle to call you simba?” Raúl asked. “…shut up.” Said the Litleo in a whisper “Why not just go by your species name?” I found myself saying out loud without thinking, poking with my cutlery the last of my food. “Huh?” Exclaimed the litleo as he, and the other two pokéumans turned to look at me, startling me once I realized I had spoken too loudly. “O-oh… um, well, there are some people who go by their surnames and um, why would going by your species be any different? I-I mean unless there are other litleos I guess…” “No… you have a point.” Said the litleo, in an even quieter and softer voice than mine. “I’m pretty sure I’ve heard of other people doing that before, yeah!” Itzel exclaimed excitedly. “Sounds a little uncreative to me… but it’s your choice so I fully support it.” Said Raúl, taking a more empathetic tone of voice. “Y-yeah, well for now at least…” Litleo finished the conversation topic with a slight smile. Everyone else was in high spirits, and even I couldn’t help but smile after having helped with the fire pokéuman’s dilemma, even if I didn’t mean to participate, I had already finished my food so I was about to excuse myself and leave when suddenly- “Well, well, well, so this is where you’ve gone into.” Came from a voice behind me, a voice than even in the commotion of the mess hall I could so clearly recognize, me and many people more even in other tables as we found ourselves turning over in the direction of the hulking beast of an obstagoon that was Demian, with his lackeys Dylan and Gael behind him, the two dark types had a mischievous grin in their expression, but the gliscor looked over at me with a worried one. “What the hell are you doing hanging out with these weaklings?” the obstagoon said as he dragged me off the table and forced me to stand up. “And after having proven yourself yesterday? Just what exactly is it going on in your mind?” “Hey!! What are you doing here you big jerk!!!” Shouted itzel, suddenly jumping in-between me and the obstagoon, causing even more people to gain attention to our table, I could see Litleo moving closer towards Raúl terrified from the obstagoon. “It’s none of your business you pathetic wimp, you really think you can stand against me? You don’t even have limbs!! That’s laughable.” Said Demian. “I think you’ll find that I’m very strong AND I’m a dragon type, I wouldn’t go down in a fight easily.” “HAH! You think I wouldn’t have tried that if you really were worth my time? You live in front of us, you’re just so pathetic it’s not worth it at all, but you’re wasting my time, I didn’t come here for you, and I have no idea why you’re trying to defend this punk here.” “Sorry but no, I’m not just gonna sit here while you mess with the poor toxtricity, so leave him alone.” “POOR?!! AHAHAHA!!!!!” Demian cackled. “Are you even hearing yourself? Didn’t you hear how he mercilessly beat a useless little munna with me the other day? You’re really trying to defend another bully who’s exactly like me. My anger was boiling at this point and I couldn’t stop myself from responding. “BULLSHIT!!! YOU KNOW FULL WELL THAT’S BULLSHIT!!” “RAAAAAAAGGGH!!!! THAT’S IT I NEED YOU TO SHUT UP!!!!!” screamed the obstagoon as he charged an attack and was about to hit me when we were suddenly interrupted by none other than. “What’s going on here!?” Screamed a very familiar chesnaught, one who by making his presence known suddenly grabbed the attention of the entire cafeteria towards us, plenty of people suddenly started chattering loudly about the arriving pokéuman. “No way!!! It’s the commander!!” “I’ve heard of him he’s so cool!!” “What’s he doing in the common level?” “Whoa, he’s so strong.” “Let’s fucking go, he’ll show those jerks!!!” “Everybody calm down!!!” He ordered the classroom before looking at my direction and giving me a wink, I smiled happy that he was here and he could help me, though I was also wondering why he was here, especially with how recognized he seemed to be amongst people, I looked over at Demian, and I could see that he, Dylan and even Gael had grown terrified at the arrival of the hulking plant type. “W-w-why are you here?!!?!” Demian growled, but clearly scared and even trembling. “Am I not allowed to check up on the residents and students of our base? Then again, I guess I can’t ask you of all people what is and is allowed, we’re being lenient on you Demian, but there is a limit, and you are close to pushing it, now, you don’t want me to get the headmaster this time?” “Y-y-you wouldn’t!!!” Demian screamed, more in a plea than in a challenge like I expected. “Demian, you’re gonna leave me no choice, now I don’t want to see you harass other smaller pokéumans ever again, understood?” Rodri continued with his serious and professional demeanour. The obstagoon simply spat and motioned for Gael and Dylan to follow, leaving me be. “As for you Lex.” Rodri then said. “There is something I would like to discuss so you’re coming with me. I could physically cringe at the cafeteria’s “oooooh”s when Rodri made me follow him all the way to an empty hallway, reaching the dorms level. “Did I do something wrong?” “No! of course not! I know you and Demian pretty well and I’m very confident in knowing that you didn’t do what everyone’s been saying yesterday, but that’s not why I wanted to talk to you, really I just wanted to make sure you’ve been doing ok, which is the reason I walked down here, I hoped your roommates weren’t giving you much trouble but, well…” “It’s fine, I’ll learn to ignore them in time.” I said after a sigh, half lying to myself. “Hey! I’m sure things will get better.” Rodri claimed with a grin. “And if it’s too much, I will make sure to get the headmaster to transfer you somewhere else regardless of what it takes me I promise y-“ “No no no, really, it’s fine, I’m ok here, it’s just about getting used to it.” I said, remembering that although I would’ve preferred not to deal with Demian, I still had Gael. Rodri seemed a bit unsure but, in the end, accepted it. “Alright, well, apart from that, how’s pokéuman life been treating ya? everything good? Everything right? And I was getting happy.” I chuckled at the reference. Suddenly though switched his tone to be more interrogatory. “Is everything going normally? Or did anything… unusual happen?” Immediately I flashed to my dream messenger. “U-um… well…” Truth be told, I wasn’t sure if I should tell him about my dream messenger, even though Rodri was by far the pokéuman I could trust the most, would he even believe me? Would he even understand what I’m talking about? I wasn’t even too sure about what having a dream messenger meant. “N-no, not really, why?” I ended up responding nervously. Rodri raised an eyebrow at me, either disbelieving or just thinking I wasn’t sure, and his expression denoted less upset but rather… curious, but eventually just reverted to his usual demeanour. “Well… if you say so, say, how did it go in your first few battle classes? What moves did you get? It’s always an exciting rite of passage for new pokéumans.” “Oh, well, the professor told me I had good… power, I think? My attacks were powerful a-according to him, but he said I needed to work on charging them faster… um… let’s see I’ve got discha- no wait, thundershock, acid spray, scary face and spark.” Rodri thought for a moment. “Pretty normal for a newbie toxtricity I believe, although that part about your attacks being powerful intrigues me, though, really all that matters is that you worked hard, and speaking of battling, did you hear about the tournament that would happen on Sunday?” Rodri asked. “N-no, why?” “Well, I just though you could’ve been interested, that’s all.” “Um… in participating? Or…” “Oh! Not necessarily, no. you could just watch, most pokéumans enjoy it.” Rodri said, sounding excited for it himself “Hmm… I might pass, but we’ll see.” “Excellent!” he exclaimed, “Well, it was nice seeing you, unfortunately I still got a job to do, I really hope things get better for you man, I know there’s something special about you, I’m sure of it!” “T-thanks, I guess…” I said as Rodri walked back up to the PRT level while I walked down all the way to my dorm, which was empty by the time I arrived, though Demian, Gael and Dylan’s school materials were all in, indicating that they had already returned. I spent the time I was alone just browsing on the tv, curious about what it had, it had a variety of channels I was familiar with, both cable and satellite like canal 5, canal once, cartoon network, Disney xd, stuff like that. What’s weird though is that even though they were transmitting as usual, I accessed them through a menu more akin to those of smart tvs, I even found a weird channel called “Cadena Pokéumana DL” or in English “the Pokéuman DL network.” Or just CPDL for short. Since I’m assuming the acronym referred to our location. Clicking on it led me to several options, a streaming network, seemingly replacing any other site like Netflix, Prime or Disney-, a live channel dedicated to base news (for overworld news there were regular news channels and papers.) and an entertainment channel, which I’m assuming centered on shows, movies and sports. I was a little intrigued and browsed each one of them but none of them were noteworthy enough to point out, the news channel was like any news show but with a gabite and a camerupt talking about base menus, PRT mission news and- hey was that us on the news? “So today at lunch time we had a story that our base’s beloved commander Rodri Palagot the Chesnaught had been found breaking up a quarrel, between a known group of bullies leaded by Demian Pascual the Obstagoon, including a new member in the low-key toxtricity right there as you can see, and another group of pokéuman bystanders.” “Great.” I groaned to myself. “Not only will everyone now think I’m part of them for sure, but shouldn’t there be more important things to focus on for the news? This feels more like a school announcement than anything!” sigh “I guess this base is just to small to have stuff like this not draw attention.” I wasn’t in the mood to watch more pokéuman tv after this, so I ended up simply shutting my eyes and walking over to my bed, my mind briefly went to the tournament Rodri talked about, but it wasn’t something I found to be important at that moment. After a few hours, I heard the door opening, I startled awake before realising who it was that just entered. “Oh, it’s just you Gael.” I said before immediately laying back down in my bed. “Hey, sorry about the whole incident at lunch, I tried to distract him but I almost made it to obvious and I couldn’t stop it anymore.” “Don’t worry about it, I understand.” “Are you ok though? Because the last thing I saw from you was getting dragged by that Rodri to who knows what and I really hope nothing bad happened to you.” “Huh? Oh, no? He didn’t do anything.” “Really? Not even taking you to the headmaster?” “Nope, we just talked.” “Just talked?!” Gael exclaimed. “Wow, you’re lucky.” “Hm? Why’s that? Is there something wrong with Rodri?” “Not really... I just don’t like him much.” Gael confessed “Why’s that?” I asked, incredulous “I-i guess he’s just intimidating and he pretty much just sees me as part of Demian’s gang, I’m surprised he was nice to you, that little incident is going to cost us a lot.” I wanted to say it was fine, but given I had just seen that we got on the news it was impossible for me to commit to a lie like that. “Now where did I put the remote? I swear it was in its spot.” Gael mumbled to himself. “Oh! Sorry, I used it for a bit.” I said, handing the remote to him, from then on we somehow ended up talking about how internet and TV worked in pku. “Every site that has a chat is fully blocked an inaccessible, those that have the option to log in are simply used via sophisticated pokéuman VPNs to ensure we aren’t traced back, but for the sites that are fully blocked for the longest time we were simply unable to use them, but around the time of the pandemic an alternative was devised where we essentially created our own internet called the undernet.” Gael explained. “What’s like north Korea?” I asked, seeing the similarities.“Not quite, for starters ours is much more advanced and done out of necessity than because of a dictatorship, you see the undernet also secretly links itself with the existing internet but also createa it’s own unique and undetectable code, allowing for the creation of our own websites that also have the content of the existing ones!” Gael explained as he started booting up our pc. “For example, instead of YouTube we have PokeTube, creative name I know. But not only does it have a neat identical algorithm, for better or worse, but apart from containing original pokéuman content from all over, it also has every single video that exists on the original platform, so you can watch your favourite YouTubers if you want no biggy, it also has both human and pokéuman comments, you can only interact with the pokéuman ones though, the pokéuman ones are highlighted on blue and only appear on this site, it’s pretty much the same for most commonly used social networks, though for messaging sites like whatsapp or telegram we just use local ones fully.” “Whoa... That’s very interesting! And so advanced, I can’t imagine this would’ve been very easy to come up with or program.” “Ooh that’s the best part, I heard that although this was a foreign project the pokéuman who developed the undernet was a mexican!! And from this very base no less!! They plan on building him a statue.” “Wait for real?!?! That’s so cool!!!” “I KNOW RIGHT!!!!!” After that, we once again shifted topic our interests like yesterday, having access to the internet meant we now took turns showing each other videos about stuff we liked, Gael showed me a few Latin Spanish clips of sonic X, which was funny given how due to the location of the dub most characters shared voices with characters from avatar the last airbender, a few videos about Zelda, others about eSports that I had no chance of deciphering, and a funny fandub of the sonic games in English that I ended up understanding more than him, meanwhile after some convincing I ended up sharing some compilation videos with him about doctor who and Eurovision, mainly one about the doctor’s regenerations from first to twelve and another about every Eurovision winner, he actually seemed interested and watched both all the way through which I honestly had not expected, but then again I had done the same thing with all the stuff he showed me, we both even confessed to liking the owl hous and Steven universe, he told me he was a fan of a popular Chilean show called 31 minutes, and I confessed to also being into stuff like Ninjago and Power rangers, and to counteract to his incomprehensible esports enthusiasm (not because it was bad I’m just very videogame illiterate) I showed him a few football videos as I revealed to a big fan of the sport, but “Only in an international level though, I could not give a shit about club football and real Madrid and the liga MX and shit, but the stadiums are nice” his reactions at the matches were about the same as mine to the esports stuff. We left the pc and continued chatting to head to dinner, where like the news had said we ended up having several dessert options like crepes, lemon pies and, a personal favourite of mine, gorditas de nata, I pretty much just grabbed a handful of them and started tearing into them immediately, I love those delicious local treats, Gael looked a bit intimidated so I decided to tone it down but he told me he didn’t mind judging by how much I was enjoying and that, quote “I now understand why you’re that chubby.” I wasn’t sure how to feel at that remark, he didn’t seem to mean it as an insult. In the end, we both headed to our own beds in our shared bunkbed right around the time Gael said Demian would come back, we both said good night to each other, happy at the results of the day and drifted off to sleep... I was standing on top of a grassy field, completely flat, I couldn’t make anything else in the horizon, the view had an ethereal feel to it. “Hello, Lex, nice to see you again.” I turned over at the voice of my messenger. “Oh, hi Kalleq.” “Is something troubling you.” The spiritual toxtricity asked. I shook my head. “Nothing too major, just having to deal with crappy roommates., I’ll eventually just get used to them and tune them out, I’m sure.” “Very wise.” Said Kalleq. “I’m glad you’re in a fine mood otherwise, and I do hope things will get better and I will help you as much as I can, you have my word that you can have me as someone to confide in.” I smiled. “Thank you very much.” He smiled back before growing very serious. “Now unfortunately I cannot stick to the chit chat for tonight’s session, our time is shorter than usual, so there is something very important I must say to you.” “Is this about what you said about being special.” Kalleq nodded. “Yes.” “Lex there is something about you that makes you stand out even if you have only started developing yet, a special ability, something that will become very important to you and your life as a pokéuman.” “In the simplest way I can put it, Lex, you are a dream manifester.”

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