*Ding Dong*
"Welcome to the Goldenrod City Poke mart, The best and largest Poke mart in the Kanto region. Can I help you find anything today?"
"No thanks"
Ash pulls the brim of his cap tighter over his head in order to cover his face. The fluorescent lights of the Poke mart shine brightly overhead. Ash scans the room before he walks briskly over towards the elevators.
"The mart's awfully crowded today."
"Yea you'd think with all this rain that people would stay inside."
*Now arriving at the 1st floor*
The elevator doors open, allowing a sea of people to spill onto the floor. Once emptied Ash walks into the elevators behind the two gentlemen having a conversation.
"It probably has something to do with that Lance guy, I heard he was making a surprise appearance somewhere here in Goldenrod today."
The other gentlemen shakes his head, "Yeah probably, It's unfortunate though, you know with all this team rocket business going on lately," He leans in to whisper to the other gentlemen, "I heard the rocket gangsters have been recruiting kids from the slums to do their dirty work."
Both gentlemen look at Ash out of the corner of their eyes. His jacket and shirt are worn and faded. His pair of jeans has a hole above his right knee. Even the red in the hat he wears looks like a rich pink. The only thing that appears to have any value is the pokebelt brandishing 3 shiny pokeballs around his waist. They shine as the fluorescent lights above flicker for an instant.
The first gentlemen scrunches his nose, "It's because all these kids want to be Pokemon Masters nowadays, as if being a businessman isn't a respectable occupation."
He stands up straight and fixes his tie, "Folly and dreams I tell ya, Every one in a billion kids becomes a pokemon master and you know what happens to the rest?"
Suddenly the elevator stops. One of the gentlemen presses the buttons repeatedly.
"What the hell is going on here?"
The lights flicker violently before the entire elevator gets enveloped by a pitch deafening blackness.
Mechanical sounds can be heard echoing throughout the elevator as red emergency lights cut on illuminating the metal box with a red glow. The sound of a drill suddenly, can be heard coming from above.
The sparks provide little changes in light for the elevator, now echoing with life from the activity happening over head.
"What's going on here!" one of the gentlemen shrieks in terror as a large perfectly cut square piece of metal peels off the roof of the elevator.
A machoke pokes its head into the box, one hand peeling back the metal sheet the other hand reaching in the elevator.
Ash grabs the brim of his hat and turns it to the back as he smirks, "The rest of us chase the dream anyway."
He pulls a long black cable with a hook attached to it from his book bag and tosses one end to the machoke above. He walks over nonchalantly to one of the gentlemen and attaches the side with the hook to his belt loop.
"Hey what are you doing?!"
Ash puts his finger over his own lips, "Shhh"
Immediately the machoke pulls the man up into the darkness above the elevator. His voice shrieks as he disappears.
"Do you think you're going to get away with this? you've already been caught on camera You will..."
"Hey bro you going to talk all day or you wanna get shit done?" A human head protrudes through the hole in the elevator interrupting the gentlemen.
Ash looks up to the boy above, "Whatever just pull me up."
Ash reaches his hands up as machoke appears poking his head in the hole again. He reaches his arm out this time pulling Ash into the darkness.
"Wait you can't leave me here!" The gentleman yells through the hole.
The boy from before appears, "Go venonat!"
Venonat leaps acrobatically out of its pokeball from above. "Venonat, sleep powder." Venonat begins to shake as thick purple smoke appears through its pours. In moments the elevator is engulfed in a purple cloud.
The boy above brandishes his pokeball as venonat returns to his master device, "Smell ya later." The boy says before disappearing with the others.
The darkness above the elevator isn't as dark as it appeared, The red emergency lights lined the walls stretching all the way to the top of the tower like building.
Ash stuffs his clothes into a his bag and zips it up. He adjusts the black jumpsuit with a large R on the front of it that he is now wearing. His faded red hat still turned to the back on his head.
"Why don't you ever wear the hats they give us?" The other boy asks.
"So I can look ridiculous like you? come on Gary, you know the hat's lame right?"
Without waiting for an answer, Ash attaches a mechanical grappling hook to a gadget attached to the elevator cable, "See you on the 19th floor."
instantly, Ash ascends the cable. The red lights do a poor job as he disappears high up into the elevator shaft.
Gary tosses his black hat down the elevator shaft, "I didn't think it looked that bad." He shrugs his shoulders as he attaches his gadget to the elevator cable the same way that Ash did.
"Hey machoke you good with him?" Machoke hauls the now tied up gentleman over his shoulder. The gentlemen tries to yell through the ropes around his mouth but barely any sound comes out.
"Maaaa-choke" Gary nods at his Pokemon's confirmation as his device takes him soaring up the shaft. Machoke grabs the rope shortly after and begins pulling himself up following his master.
Ash stops at two metal elevator doors with the number 19 above them. He pulls out a pair of massive pliers and begins forcing them open.
The doors screech as they slowly seperate. Ash detaches himself from the device and leaps onto the 19th floor. The halls around him are filled with the same red glow from before.
He looks around for movement before he decides to reach for his pokebelt, "Let's go Poliwhirl." The water type pokemon lands smoothly as it is released from its pokeball.
They start to walk down the hall when they hear a screeching sound coming from behind them. Gary leaps through the elevator doors, sticking his landing like a gymnast. Shortly after machoke lands heavily behind him, appearing to shake the floor.
Gary and Ash look at each other, "Alright let's do this"
The two boys start running down the hall moving in unison. They moved through and around the floor as if they had done it many times before. They maneuvered into different hallways before their eyes could even register that a turn was coming up.
Suddenly a flash light appeared at the end of a hall they turned onto. The boys continued to run at the same pace as a figure emerged behind the light.
"Hey Goldenrod Mart security, hold it right there!"
The boys ignored the officer up ahead, "Poliwhirl, Karate Chop." Poliwhirl leaped from behind his master and fell the security guard easily. The party maneuvered around the officers body.
They continued moving through the hallways until they arrived at two large metal steal doors. They looked at the doors for a minute before Gary began to speak, "alright Machoke, bring him hear."
Machoke ruffly removed the gentlemen from his shoulders and kneeled him in front of his master. In the same ruff manner Gary grabbed the man and placed his face against a colorful patch in the wall next to the doors.
"Face scan complete, Welcome back Mister Sharp." The two large doors opened with fluidity, revealing a room that once again was illuminated by a red glow from the emergency lights.
Machoke picked the gentlemen back up as the group proceeded calmly into the room. The room was a large corporate office lobby. A large fish tank stood behind a long conference table. The red glow made the fish appear sinister.
"If I remember correctly, the safe is on the other side of the third door on the left." Gary said moving in the direction that he noted.
Ash stood next to the large window that spanned the entire length of the wall of the conference room. Rain repeatedly hit against the glass. A flash of lightening struck off in the distance.
"The rain is so powerful, don't you think so Poliwhirl."
"whirrlll" The pokemon responded happily.
Thunder echoed throughout the office room.
"Ashhhh" Gary's voice could be heard down the hallway.
Ash snapped out of his trance and went down the hall. When he entered the room Gary was placing the gentlemen's fingers against a refrigerator sized metal box inside the corner of a smaller office.
Ash looked around the office. The metal desk showed a picture of the gentlemen with his wife and three kids. In the back of his picture, there was a Marill appearing to be watering the bushes behind the family.
Ash's face frowned. He continued to look around the office room before finally looking in the direction of Gary.
An icy fog spilled out of the open metal box. Gary reached inside and pulled out a black metal brief case. He turned around to look at Ash, "Here it is."
Both of the boys smirked.
"Alright let's get out of here, they should be cutting the power on shortly."
Gary handed the metal briefcase to Ash who put it inside of his backpack as he released his venonat from its pokeball.
"Alright, venonat, sleep powder." shortly after the room was enveloped in the same purple cloud.
"Return" both boys said simultaneously as their Pokemon disappeared into their respective pokeballs.
The two boys returned the way they came until they got back to the elevator shaft.
"Yo, just leave the briefcase on the train when you head back to Pallet town. The grunts will probably already be on it." Gary said as he attached his device to the elevator line.
"Yea I know. Try not to look too suspicious walking out."
"Suspicious? I'm the grandson of the great professor Oak I'd look suspicious if people didn't notice me."
"yea whatever."
"Anyway I'll see you in school tomorrow, smell yea later."
Instantly Gary zipped down the elevator.
Ash waited a moment before he followed.
The elevator was still in the same place where they left it. Before he got to it, he opened one of the doors on the floor right above it. He changed back into his clothes and began walking towards the stairs.
"ladies and gentlemen if you would proceed calmly to the stairs, I assure you that everything is going to be fine." A security officer said waving his flashlight to the direction of the stairs.
Ash blended into the crowd as it moved down the stairs.
"Back up generators now cutting on." A mechanical voice echoed through the walls.
"Oh thank God, that red glow was scaring me." A women said as she walked in front of Ash down the steps.
The florescent lights shined brightly through the building again, blinding everyone who a been engrossed by the red glow of the emergency lights.
"Ladies, Ladies please, please excuse me I have to be leaving now before the storm gets worse."
"Gary take us with you, we want to see the Oak Pokemon Collection."
"I don't care about the Pokemon. Gary marry me, you're so cute and rich."
A sea of girls stood around Gary as his gaze aligned with Ash's. Gary winked at him.
Ash grabbed the brim of his hat and pulled it over his face with a smirk as he walked out of the mart door.
The rain outside continued to poor heavily. Ash kept his head down to avoid any one seeing him and the rain from getting onto his face.
*Smack*
Suddenly Ash bumped into something in his way, "Hey kid watch where you're going."
A large man wearing all black stood in front of Ash. Ash moved to the side only to find that there were several other large men forming a circle around an individual standing in the center.
The party continued moving as soon as Ash got out of the way. Ash focused his eyes on the individual in the center. The man in the middle was an average height. he wore an all black outfit with a black cape that moved as he walked. His spikey reddish hair provided a noticeable detail in the grey clouded air. Ash continued to look at the man until he walked inside of the Goldenrod Pokemart.
He began to continue walking when he heard a loud scream, "OMG, It's Lance the Dragon Trainer!"
Loud roars of excitement could be heard coming from the mart.
A flash of lightening sparked in the sky. Ash turned only his head back at the pokemart.
He adjusted his hat down and clenched his teeth as the sky exploded with a thunderous roar in the same instant.