The Great Story of Professor Berkeley Larch
Chapter One
The Beginning
()()()
Sinnoh
200 kilometers outside of the Sinnoh National Air Force Base
Screaming above the wilderness, two jet pilots were completing their practice run of the most recent jet plane developed in Sinnoh, the Pidgeotto F-20.
"This is Red Leader, reporting in. Are we cleared for landing?"
"Yes," replied ground control. "You should be landing in approximately 1 minute, three seconds. Wait, what's that?"
A strange, vaguely plane-shaped object had appeared on the radar.
"What is it?" Asked Red Leader.
"It's…a plane of some sort! And its going at supersonic speeds!"
"Is it one of ours?"
"I've never seen anything like it! Its too small to be manned, and the wings have a really weird shape! Do you have visual?"
"No, I don't see anything."
"How could you not see it? Its coming up right next to you!"
"Is it clo…?" Asked Red Leader, but his question was interrupted in a horrible manner. Whatever the object was, it had managed to slice the entire plane clean in half, along with its pilot.
"We lost Red Leader!" Shouted the controller. "Red Two, get the hell out of there!"
Red Two desperately swerved his aircraft to the left, but it was no use. The unknown object swerved left, just as he did, and sliced off an entire wing with ease. The craft swerved violently out of control, and hit the ground, causing an explosion that would make Michael Bay blush.
"We've lost signal on the bogey," Said the controller, shocked at this recent turn of events.
Meanwhile, near the crash, a man wearing a pinstripe suit, shadowed by the bright conflagration smiled cruelly…
()()()
The Residence of Professor Larch
The Next day
Professor Berkeley F. Larch is truly a unique individual. Generally regarded as a biological genius, though extremely absent-minded. For example, he constantly forgets his middle name. He also occasionally forgets his Pokemon's names, generally just stuttering out random nonsense that does not even vaguely resemble any syllable in them. He is also unique in the sense that his only clothes are lab coats, and nothing else.
But enough about Larch's forgetfulness and dressing habits. After eating dinner from his new, vastly improved thermonuclear microwave, free of any radioactive hazards, he sat down to watch the evening news.
He picked up the remote, switched on the TV, and switched to the KNN, or Kanto News Network, to see what was happening in the world.
"In other news," Said the newscaster, a beautiful women of about twenty-five, "A training exercise in the Sinnoh Air Force went awry today, when a structural failure occured, and two recent planes fell apart. The government has assured us that the design is being reviewed, and this shouldn't happen with the next series of planes." It then cut to an interview with the radar director, talking about what had happened during the training exercise, and some reasons the planes didn't work . It then cut to some other footage, caught by a bystander, that the government didn't actually know existed. The planes were flying normally, when, BOOM, they literally fell apart. The person recording it screamed, dropped the camera, and started running away, before it cut off. Professor Larch thought that something was off, though, in the way it fell apart, and rewound the footage. He paused at the moment of truth, and saw a strange distortion, shaped like something Larch knew well. He said only one word:
"Latias."
()()()
In all of Kanto, only two people have ever managed to successfully capture a legendary. One is Professor Larch, who managed to, after three months of tracking, catch a Shaymin for the purposes of scientific study. The other one is a more typical trainer, John Mathers, who managed to, in one month, capture a Latias. Larch had occasionally talked with him, but they were acquaintances more than anything else.
When Larch saw the outline of the attacker, he immediately grew suspicious. He had made the decision to ask him a few questions.
The house was like any other, nothing special at all, really. Except for the fact that it contained an obscenely powerful psychic dragon thing, that is.
He knocked on the door, humming a tuneless song to himself. Eventually, a tall, passably built man opened the door. He was, more or less, unremarkable. Larch didn't notice, and
"Excuse me, sir?" Asked John, politely.
"Hm? Oh, I didn't notice you opened the door, I apologize. May I come in?"
"Uh, I guess. What do you want?"
"Well, I saw on the news that two jet planes were recently destroyed by an unknown aircraft, that closely resembled a Latias. Care to explain?"
Larch's wild claim was an incredible offense to John's moral integrity, and he burst into a rage-filled tirade against him.
"What! How could you have the nerve to even insinuate that I would abuse this power! You moronic jackass!"
"I wasn't accusing you of anything, my good sir!"
"Okay, okay, I apologize. But I didn't do it!"
"Then perhaps somebody else stole it?"
"Impossible. The PokeBall is on a time lock. Every day, it changes, and even if it was the right time, you still need the ten-digit passcode, which only I know."
"I see. Perhaps it was just a rogue, then. Sorry to bother you!"
After Larch left, John closed the door, and muttered to himself, "Weirdo."
()()()
Having determined that John was a dead end, Larch set to work on his automatic translation device, his greatest invention yet. After two years of study, he realized that the Pokemon language was not based on syllables, like English, but on enunciation of syllables. By connecting his device to a remote computer, he could understand exactly what a given Pokemon was saying, instead of guessing after knowing them for a while.
"Alright, what remains here?"
In fact, very little remained. All he had to do was weld on the cover, and it would be ready to put in his ear.
"Oh, I didn't realize I was so far ahead." he said, pleased.
He picked up a welding torch, and set to work on attaching the cover to the device. Just ten minutes later, he was done.
"Yes!" He cried with ecstasy. "My masterpiece is complete! Rembrandt, get in here, I must test this!"
Rembrandt is what Larch chose to name his Smeargle when he first caught him, because Rembrandt was his favorite Renaissance artist. I would hope that you know what a Smeargle looks like, if you're browsing this section, but if not, it could best be described as a bipedal beagle, with a few key differences: its coloration is off white, with a few brown rings near the wrists, it appears to be wearing a beret, and its tail is effectively a paintbrush.
Eventually, he walked in, curious as to what Larch was on about this time.
"I finished it!" He said, putting the device in his ear. "Go ahead, say something!"
"Uh…what are you talking about?" Said Rembrandt.
"Yes!" Yelled Larch. "It works perfectly!"
"What is it?"
"This is a translation device. I can now understand you with perfect clarity!"
"Oh. Well, now you can really annoy me."
It turns out that Rembrandt thought Larch was an idiot.
()()()
Later…
Undisclosed Location
"Well, John, thank you very much for allowing me to borrow your Latias." Said a man, the same man outside the Air Force base.
"You're quite welcome…uh, what was your name again?"
"That doesn't matter, John. And neither do you."
"What?"
Suddenly, with no warning, hundreds of black tentacles erupted from the mysterious person's back, and grabbed John.
"I said, you don't matter to me anymore."
The dark appendages tore John apart in an instant, before his body could even register pain.
"However, I will keep the Latias for myself."
()()()
Well, this is certainly going to be quite interesting. Review, favorite, I don't care, just show that you like it so far!