21/05/2018 - 02:30 PM

I was in my accounting class at the time, focusing on the Cash Flow exercises we had to do. The stream of music coming from my headphones was interrupted by someone calling me.

"Hey there."

Startled, I looked up to see a stranger standing in front of me. I wasn't able to tell what gender they were; their facial features were sharp and elegant which were framed in long fair white hair. Their eyes were a piercing golden colour and they wore a pure white three-piece suit. This figure had a sort of ghostly, elven beauty to them.

"Nice to meet you." The figure said smiling politely, "My name isn't important, but I have a business proposal to offer." After focusing on the figure's baritone voice, I decided that the person was probably male.

"Uh…" I glanced away from the figure for a moment and… it's gone. The classroom, the tables, my peers, my teacher, the table in front of me, they all disappeared. "Uh, Um… the f…? What's going on?" What was left in its wake was a sea of the night sky; only much more vivid than any night sky I've seen. More than just the sparse glitter of stars, there were spirals of galactic entities. It looked like an artistic interpretation of outer space. "Where the hell is everyone?!"

"Oh, have I alarmed you? I do apologise. Rest assured nothing has happened to you or your friends in your home dimension."

"Uh…" I was speechless, yet a million thoughts were racing through my head, each fighting to be said.

Home dimension? Is this guy some sci-fi fantasy nutcase? Am I dreaming? Wait no, it's not a dream because of the fact that I'm questioning it. If this isn't a dream am I in danger? There's nowhere to run, should I fight? No, this guy is probably too powerful, I mean, he made all this happen. How did he even do that? Is he some kind of deity? Deity…?

A single, terrifying thought won out over all the others and it made my stomach drop. I asked, "Am I… d-dead?"

"Oh no, no, no." The elven man exclaimed slightly flustered. "This isn't the afterlife. This is a pocket dimension that exists parallel to your universe. Your universe is currently frozen in time and your consciousness is here. Your real body is completely intact."

Far more quickly than before, I responded, "How do I know you're telling the truth?"

"Oh… Ah… Oh! I can put you back in your dimension for a couple seconds and I'll bring you back, that okay with you?"

"Uh… sure." Can't hurt I gue-


Then as if it was a smash cut in a movie, I was back at my desk. My teacher to the left of me, and a friend to my right. It was only after I started hearing it again that I realised that my music had also stopped when I went to that "pocket dimension." It was Space Oddity by David Bowie, which seemed a bit too coincidental for comfort. "There's something wrong. Can you hear me Major Tom? Can you hear me -?"


Then I was back in front of the white man. Nope, I can't hear you ground control. Weirdly, my headphones were still in my ears, but they weren't connected to my iPad. They weren't connected to anything.

As I put my headphones and the pencil I was holding into my right pocket, the man asked, "Do you trust me now?"

Well, not really… but he's far more powerful than me. Maybe I should just go along with it for now? "You… mentioned a proposal of some sorts, could you… elaborate?"

"Ah good, you've calmed down." His eyes almost literally began to light up. "So, I have this hobby of watching people going on adventures. Unfortunately, with the way the earth is completely mapped out and the lack of space program funding, the last great adventure I saw was James Cameron's submarine jaunt. Thus, I am beset by an utter lack of good material."

Out of material? Wait, is he insinuating I go on some epic quest somewhere?! Hell no! "Okay, I have two questions… Why don't you just watch, read or play something like - I don't know - One Piece? I hear that's a good adventure manga slash anime."

The man in white let out an over exaggerated sigh. "No, it has to actually happen in a four-dimensional space. Not - I'm not having this conversation again. Human fiction is just not good enough." In a change of mood so quick it nearly gave me whiplash, he then politely asked, "What's your other question?"

"Oh, uh…" Clearly being a deity must mean not being interested in what humans find engaging. "Why me and not someone else? I mean I'm still in high school." I pointed at the logo on my uniform which was on the left side of my chest. My navy-blue school sweater had the sky-blue monochromatic logo of a tree.

"The reason I have approached you is simple: You wish your life could be different. Perfectly normal, by the way. Escape fantasies are a natural part of life these days. However, what I am offering you is an actual chance of escape. Or, at the very least a break." His eyes were lighting up again.

Do I want an escape? I thought to myself. I'm perfectly content with how my life is going so far. I'm happy, I have a loving family, I'm enjoying school, in fact, Year Twelve has been the best year of school so far for me. I mean, I've definitely daydreamed about a lot of different situations I'd like to see myself in, and some of those would be really cool. No, I don't want to leave home, I love my life and leaving would just be too homesickness inducing… I guess I'll hear him out to hopefully not piss him off.

I asked, "Why are you offering me this?" I felt the question leave my mouth with a heavy undertone of what I was thinking, but luckily, I don't think he caught on.

"Like I said, I am running out of good material. I want to see a story of adventure and excitement. This is impossible in the world I'm in charge of. So! If you accept my proposal, what I'm going to do is send you to an entirely different world! Specifically: The world of Pokémon!"

"P-Pokémon?!" Effing Pokémon? Yes! Please! "You mean the video game series? I thought you- "

"Yes, the video game. And the show and the books and the toys and the card game and- you know what I mean."

"Mate, have you seen my room? There's Pokémon stuff everywhere." I started to laugh. "Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha, I was seriously considering turning down your offer before you said that. Hah, but why aren't you watching - "

"Why send someone from your world to the world of Pokémon instead of following someone already there?" He finished my question. "Because this way is much more fun." He shrugged. "Here's how it works: If you accept you stay in the world of Pokémon for ten years. During that time, time is stopped in your home universe. Magic Treehouse style. After the ten years are up, I offer you a few choices, including going home."

"I uh… don't know what Magic Treehouse is… But I guess it makes sense." He frowned at my response. "Hey, I don't have the omniscience of a god." There was a vacuum of silence as his golden eyes stared right through me.

"Now," the man finally said, filling the emptiness of soundless torture. "the world of Pokémon is actually rather dangerous, what with the feral creatures of unimaginable power and the roving gangs of criminals that are often pursuing some horrible cause and must be stopped. Therefore, I'm going to give you a budget. Use this budget to buy some supplies and skills before your adventure begins."

"Budget? You sure this isn't just Accounting?" The man in white handed me sheets of grey paper with blue text. At the top, it said Pokémon Trainer CYOA. "Oh C.Y.O.A., I know how these things work."

"This budget won't help you at all once you start your new life, so spend it all now." I grabbed my pencil and as it hovered over the form in front of me, I froze. The man asked, "What's wrong?"

I looked back up at him. "Would it be possible to say goodbye to my family first? I know they won't know I'm gone but… I'll miss them."

The man stared at me, much more sympathetically than before. He sighed a sombre breath. "I'll let you spend the rest of the day in your world, then after midnight, I'll bring you back. During that time, make sure you fill that out."

I simply said, "sure."


22/05/2018

I lay in bed, brain-dead from the big day I had. I finished my Media portfolio, had our last small choir practice before our House Music performance next week. But most of all; That elven man. He wants me to go to the Pokémon world. That excitement had festered in the back of my mind all day. Yet, I still doubted if what happened was real, but the grey pieces of paper I had in my hand afterward were definitive proof that I was there, wherever "there" was.

I looked at the clock, it was two minutes past twelve. I lay there wondering if he was telling the truth, or that perhaps he had forgotten about me, or maybe he got someone who was more deserving of the opportunity to go to the Pokémon world.

I held the grey sheets of paper in my hand. I couldn't read it in the pitch-black of my room, but I somehow managed to find the time to fill it out through all the homework, extra-curricular activities and possibly the final amount of time I had with my family.

My brother and I had a long session of Super Smash Bros. for WiiU together, and I had a long hug with both my parents before heading to bed.

I eventually decided to give up waiting and decided to try and get some sleep asleep, even if the promise to go to the Pokémon world was all in my head, tomorrow was going to be another big day.


I awoke in front of the man in white. "Are you ready Jack?" He asked.

"Yep." I replied.

"Great! Let me take a look at your sheet." The slips of grey paper materialised in a flash of golden light in the man's hand. "How did you like my random number generators?"

"Well, I got Sinnoh and an age close to my current one so that was good."

"No, I meant the presentation. What did you think of that?"

"Well, it was sort of unnerving to see a moving roulette wheel on a piece of paper, aside from that, it was cool."

"Hm?" The man exclaimed after looking at the next sheet. "I didn't think that Pokémon was common."

"It has a twenty percent encounter rate in the morning at Route 209, I checked."

"I see. Are there any specifications you want with your starter that wasn't on the sheet?"

"I… think being too specific would be a bit… is immoral the right word? What can I choose?"

"Nature, gender, and Ability if they have two regular ones."

"If the Nature can subtract the attack stat like Timid or Calm, that would be best, and Trace for the Ability."

"Ah, so you aren't going for… right. All set, you meet her soon after you've jumped. Oh, and before I forget, when you land, all your items will be nearby, and you'll be keeping everything you're wearing."

I looked down to see my uniform instead of the pyjamas I was wearing to bed. There was a black leather Colorado wallet in my left pocket. Inside it had one dollar and fifty cents in Australian coins, a USB, a debit card, a year-old student card with a picture of me and my birthdate on it, a Myki card, an EB World level 1 card and two photos. One photo with my brother in our first sibling school photo from ten years ago. The other a photo of me cosplaying poorly as Okabe Rintarou from Steins;Gate and a friend cosplaying as a maid character from an anime I didn't know of. In my other pocket were the headphones and pencil that I put there earlier.

Suddenly, a purple spinning vortex expanded before me. I couldn't see what was behind it. The man said, "Just jump in there and you'll off to a different dimension. Put on a good show for me, will you?" He was beaming.

"Will do!" I cracked my knuckles. "Time to breach the Steins Gate."

"Really?"

"What? When else am I going to get the opportunity to travel to different dimensions or world lines?"

"After ten years."

"But then I'll either forget or think of something different."

He stared at me in indignant silence, which was suddenly broken by an uncharacteristic snort. "Hehe! Oh, this is gonna be fun."

"How so?"

"It's going to be fun seeing you meet new people and their reactions to you."

"Okay… So, do I just go through the portal or-"

"Yes, go through the portal."

"Alright."

I ran, and then I jumped.