Hi there everyone. First off, I don't own Pokemon. This statement goes for every chapter. Next, this is a REWRITE of Red Moon, a story I started in tandem with Delu's Red Tide. It was never finished and I literally hadn't updated in 4 years for multiple reasons, but you're not here to hear about those, eh? Enjoy the story.
You can expect weekly updates.
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Prologue:
The copy of Pokemon Emerald rested in my hand and I grinned, taking the stairs two at a time to get to my system faster. In preparation I had plugged the system in before I left earlier that day. Quickly popping out Ruby with a tilted smile I put Emerald in in it's place. "I'll have to get around to completing Ruby later." I mumbled to myself, kicking my legs up on the desk.
I was already taken by the opening, nodding slightly as I button mashed through Birch's opening sequence. It was something I had seen many times over with the amount of times I had restarted Ruby. Still a little more interesting than the opening to Diamond in my opinion.
I checked the screen, raising an eyebrow at seeing the costume change on Brendan and liking it after a few seconds. Let's see now, character name... I really never used my own name but felt like it this time around. R-Y-A-N. That about covered the introduction, and I pressed start.
Everything went quiet as I clicked A a few more times to get past Birch, the edges of my sight growing darker without raising alarm in me. Slowly my vision seemed to pull back and then I couldn't see the screen anymore.
As I fell through the darkness I caught a sound of voices. "NO! We're … him... plan B ri... Do I... ow!"
The voice made no sense then pain rocked me and my mind faded into unconsciousness.
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Chapter 1:
I jolted and gasped, letting out a groan of pain. My whole body ached and I couldn't remember why. Sunlight was streaming across my face as I ran my hands over the sheets, sure I could find my cell phone or a game system that would have the time. I definitely didn't have a wall clock visible from the bed. Finding nothing I slowly sat up, my body giving a groan of protest.
I rubbed a hand across my eyes, then stared. I could see my hand clearly, and everything beyond it. I was in a small room. A desk pressed into the opposite side, the edge pushed against the cream colored walls. A laptop sat on top of it, and a jacket rested over the chair. Past the end of the bed was a closet door, slightly ajar. A small mirror hung between the closet and the door out.
I pushed myself up, not caring that I was somewhere strange at all. All I cared about was the fact that I could see! My eyes worked perfectly, I was no longer so near sighted that my hand before my face was blurry.
I stood and looked down at myself. I was wearing a pair of black pajama bottoms and a white t-shirt. I ran my hand down the material, feeling the mesh type fabric smoothly against my fingers. The shirt was cotton, slightly rough after the feeling of the pants.
Looking up, I thought quickly about where I was and what had happened. Maybe I had had slight amnesia. A laser eye surgery appointment had been scheduled for a week after the last thing I remembered, and I could have gotten it, be spending the month before my twentieth birthday at a friend's, and have hit my head or something.
Yes, that's it. Nothing is wrong, just a little bump to the noggin after some exercise to explain the pain. I'll remember everything soon enough. I sat at the desk, looking through the pile of papers. The one on top was titled Vesicular Stomatitis. I picked the packet up and flipped through it.
The paper talked about a disease that affected Pokemon and sounded very similar to rabies to me. Violent, foaming mouth, etc. Moving into the next section, which covered the leagues parameters on catching wild Pokemon in this time of crisis. It seemed that capture was limited to the first one seen in each area, and breaking this law was highly punishable.
Chuckling, I set the paper down. Aiden must have written this, it sounds as highly scientific as usual, I thought, I must have asked him to write it for a new fan fiction or something. Maybe we are writing a colab?
I walked over to the closet, shutting the door before I checked the mirror. I stared, This can't... What the. My thoughts started to run in circles. In the mirror was a kid, early teens or maybe a little older than ten. He looked like me, the brown eyes having a small bit of green near the edges. The skin was slightly pale, having a small tan from little sun. But the hair! The hair was white! Leaning in I gasped, seeing that that wasn't exactly true. It was more a really really light brown and had white streaks running through it.
I almost laughed, then I almost sobbed. Something was definitely wrong here, but I wouldn't panic. I breathed deeply, trying to think. All the ideas I had were off, my logic failing to explain how I was nine years younger, and with white hair to boot!
Slowly my heart slowed and I slumped into the desk chair, just letting my head be clear for a few minutes. It seemed as if I could float away as I lulled myself.
Eventually, I stood, again examining the face in the mirror. The boy that stared back was me. Or what I had looked like when I was younger, minus the white hair. I slipped the closet door open and looked at the clothes hanging there. There were a couple pairs of pants and a couple shirts. The pants were weird, to say the least. They seemed to be some sort of canvas that had an extra pair of short looking thing sewn onto them.
The shirts were much better, an orange half circle/line pattern on the front and the rest being black. A collar rose from the material, giving the clothing a hint of class.
I quickly dressed, ignoring the pair of fingerless gloves and instead sticking them in a wide pocket. A pair of shoes sat before the door out along with a green sling backpack. I put both on and walked out of the room, shutting the door behind me.
The hall I was in had three other doors and a window, the other direction leading to the stairs. The first floor was very neat and clean, and I appreciated the orderly look. The kitchen was through an arch to the back, a breakfast bar in the opened wall. Other than that, there was a table with four chairs around it.
It all looked very simple to me, and I walked back through the kitchen, making my way to the back door. Slipping out was easy, the door swinging quietly behind me. The backyard was grass for a little bit before a dirt road crossed it, leading away into a town. It was a very small little town in the country, only a few other houses. Three buildings rose to the north, and to my left there was a small lake. The buildings were very straight forward, two looking like convenience stores with a red and blue roof. The last was a bit away, the look making it seem like a hospital, because it was bigger.
Trees surrounded the town for the most part, the dirt road leading out to either direction. I sat against the house and watched clouds skid by. It was maybe six in the morning, and very little was going on.
As I sat there a man walked into town, a small brown and white dog trailing behind him. He walked past the blue and red roofed buildings, then turned toward the house I was sitting outside.
As he came closer I gasped. Following behind him was a POKEMON! It had looked like a dog from a distance, but now I could see it was a Zigzagoon, one of my favorite Pokemon. I watched the small thing run in zigzags behind the man, sometimes going farther and looking at things closely.
My mind turned back to the papers I had found in the room, then back to my new emerald game. It all clicked and I felt like puking. I had fallen into my game and could be a trainer! It was either that or I was crazy, and the drugs at the psych ward were giving me lucid dreams.
I preferred the first.
And the papers. They were so scientific because they were actually documents, not something made up. Which also meant that the world I was now in was going through a bad time with the disease and limits on trainers.
"Ryan! You ready to go?"
The voice caught me off guard and I looked up, locking eyes with the man before it clicked that I was being talked to. My mind was sluggish and fuzzy as I had trouble recognizing my own name. I nodded, somewhat confused as to what I was ready for.
He waved me up, and I did so, approaching the man.
"What? No hug for your Dad?"
I was startled again, and obliged while I took in his looks. He was very plain looking, brown hair and eyes, tanned skin, yet not very memorable. After he let me go I knelt down, running a hand over the Zigzagoon that had come with the man. I wished that I had a Zigzagoon, even though there was a fifty percent chance that it was all a dream.
"Zig." said the small creature, grunting past something in his mouth. I reached down and it dropped a small bottle filled with a dark yellow liquid into my hand.
"An antidote, that'll come in handy." the man, my dad, said. I slipped the small spray into a side pocket on my pack and stood up. The man quickly dragged me to the town exit, and I was glad that it seemed he wasn't going to give me a lecture on everything, like they usually did in the games. Ahead the route was very... standard... Trees rose to either side, ledges filled the area, and trainers waited in the tall grass. I was dragged with my heels literally forming ruts. We were moving so fast that by the time trainers challenged him, we were out of earshot and I dared not try to start walking for fear of falling.
A wild Pokemon jumped in front of us and stood its ground. It was a small Lotad, mostly blocking our path. I thought we would stop, but the man proved me wrong by keeping a steady pace.
"Ziggy! Headbutt!" he yelled, and the Zigzagoon raced ahead, smashing the small thing out of our way.
I felt my stomach drop as I heard a crunch. A small tear was in the thing's forehead, bone protruding slightly. The blood mixed with a slightly gray liquid, and I felt like puking.
It was dead.
This world was different in many ways from the game so far. But here was the biggest. Pokemon died. I breathed deep as the man drug me through Oldale. Before it had been hard to think of him as a Dad, but now it was impossible. The guy was a lunatic.
He babbled cheerfully, obviously thinking nothing of what he had done, as we flew past the four buildings in Oldale. As we approached route 101, if I remember correctly, and I grew apprehensive again.
Ahead would be two bad things. Either my 'dad' would run into another wild Pokemon in the grass, or we would go over the ledges. They really weren't that bad looking, maybe three feet high, but going over any of them at this speed would hurt.
I was right.
The landing was hard, and went mostly on my right wrist, as the man was still holding my left arm tight. I gasped at the pain but quickly straightened, falling into the being dragged pose as I waved my wrist, making sure it wasn't broken.
Littleroot Town was ahead, three buildings making it up. I wondered at this, questioning how the Pokemon Company could call three buildings a town. Sure, one of 'ems a lab, but there were only two houses and some homeless people wandering around. At least I think they're homeless, I mean there are two families that actually live here, and if this is following the games, then the rest live nowhere or the woods or something.
I hit myself mentally, to stop myself thinking so hard when we stopped at the lab. I sighed as the man let me go, rubbing both of my wrists to relieve the pain in both.
"Here we are, the lab. Go on in and get your Pokemon."
All I could do was stare in shock as the man walked away. I was getting a Pokemon! A region starter, it looked like, and I couldn't wait. I stopped myself from going in though. This man, who claimed to be a father, was walking away instead of watching his child get a Pokemon.
I watched the man stomp away cheerily and shuddered when I saw the ground under him. There were small drag marks where I had been dragged and even a few footprints when I had been able to run between the dragging. That was it. Only my footprints were there. Whatever my dad was, he didn't leave a single mark.