I am in no way, shape, or form affiliated with any of the companies that had to do with the creation of Pokémon, e.g. Nintendo or Game Freak. I simply wanted to use the creatures and logic that they created to come up with a story of my own.
With that said, not all of the logic in this will be 100% accurate. For instance, I may say that some pokémon can use a move that it normally can't. Even then, I will try to make sure that these exceptions make some sense so that you hopefully won't be scratching your head thinking, "How does that work?"
Alright, formalities aside, I hope you enjoy the first chapter. Let the journey begin!
The land outside the regions, known as Ligni, is an unruly place. It is not what some may expect of forbidden lands, which may be vast deserts devoid of anything living. Quite the contrary, this land is filled to the brim with life. However, the beings that reside there are powerful, and beyond control. Granted there are some like this that lie within the regions between cities and towns, but those are few and far between, where outside they are far more abundant.
Over time, a small group formed, comprised of those that headed for Ligni to test this, "theory." An even smaller group is comprised of those who actually returned. These survivors tried to warn society about the dangers of the outside lands, and often times they were heard. Yet, the curiosity of the mind often overwhelms the fear of the unknown, leading some to still attempt to brave these wilds.
Where there are those that leave, however, there are also those that come in. It is not unheard of that some of these beings from the outside would end up seeing some of the outskirts of civilization. If they did, they would most likely simply observe, before wandering back to the lands from which they came. That, or they would wreak havoc in the area, before being taken down or driven away by the league that holds responsibility over the land it ended up in. Most of the time, these encounters would end in the latter, but the leagues would not hesitate to resort to the former if necessary.
Yet sometimes, those from Ligni will stay. It's a minority of a minority, but some from the outside have seen our civilization and decided to stay with us. This leads to some speculation about the minds of us compared to those considered feral. Some are of the opinion that beings are born either with or without a conscience, and that most of those that are born without one live outside of society. Others believe that the mind of every single being is civilized in its own way. They think it is simply a matter of what they choose, where some decide on staying with the order of the wild, while the rest join our society, where we worked to make our own order.
Chapter 1: Another Day in Paradise
Darkness. All I could see was black, like I was in an empty void. I couldn't feel anything either. All I could do was listen, and hear... whispers. They had no origin, as if they were coming from everywhere around me. Perhaps they were trying to say something, but it sounded as if even the murmur I heard would barely come out. Then, a jolt jarred me, and the whispers began to fade, leaving me feeling a growing aching pain.
The smell hit me first, and that's all I needed to tell me to keep my eyes shut. It was a small detail, but it told me I was awake, and if I wanted to get an idea of my surroundings before starting the inevitable, I would have to try to keep them unaware of my consciousness. At that, scent never really gave much away, and this time was the same as any other. The air was still, and seemed to be a mix between must and sterile, as if the room hadn't been used in a while, but had just been cleaned hastily before having me thrown in.
Knowing that was all I could get out of smell, I opened my eyes slowly, and very slightly, still trying to keep them oblivious. It was a limited view, but I could gather what the rest of the view looked like before even seeing it. The walls and floor were bland, with white stone and tile respectively, which stretched out for a few yards ahead of me, but at least thirty yards off to my right. The room was somewhat lit by a little light coming from holes in the walls near the ceiling, which made just enough light to allow the room to be considered dim. Wires were strung on the wall like they were just thrown there, all leading to the back wall, where they joined together at a stationary silver orb in the center. With this, I could only guess that out of my view was some wall with tinted glass, and a metal slab off to the side.
Another jolt burned through me, and I groaned, then started to stir. At the same moment, a familiar emotionless voice filled with static came from the other end of the room, where I guessed I had missed a speaker.
"Up now!"
I started to get up slowly. I was nearly on my feet when another shock tensed my muscles and made me fall again.
"Faster!"
I started to get up again, this time obviously quicker, since I didn't want my insides to be barbecued any more than they already had. While doing this, annoyance and anger flared up inside me. I was mostly annoyed with myself, considering this same thing had happened multiple times before. It was just that I wasn't thinking. That being said, I still definitely held some anger towards my… "caretakers," for it. I was going to get up anyway, so weren't they just making it take longer?
I finally stood up fully after a few seconds, though I was unsteady. They didn't notice, or, most likely, care at all, as they immediately started speaking when they saw I was simply standing.
"Begin test DPM0096. U-3, fire dark pulse towards target on back wall. Hold for thirty seconds."
"Glad I took a quick look around then," I thought to myself. I shook my head and steadied myself, catching a quick glance behind me. I wasn't surprised to see a tinted window, and a slab of metal implanted in the wall off to the left, which I always assumed to be a door, despite never seeing it open.
Looking back, I took my stance to limit being knocked back, then started to build the energy in my maw. Once I felt I had enough, I opened it and let loose a slow and steady ray of concentrated dark rings towards the target. I was able to keep it for a few seconds, before, yet again, I was shocked and sent down to the floor for the third time. Still not a record, though. Not by a long shot.
"Make it stronger!"
At this point I was on the verge of screaming from rage, that's how much these things infuriated me. Remembering what they would do to me if I did that, however, made me keep my mouth shut. Thinking about that, however, just made me angrier, and I kept that emotion as I began to build up the energy for the pulse again. Once again, I released it, this time faster and more concentrated, and they must have been satisfied, as I wasn't sent to the floor again five seconds in.
Ten seconds in, however, I thought, "Wait… why only thirty seconds…?"
Fifteen more seconds passed, and they started to count down from five, to make sure I knew to stop.
"Five… four… three… two… one. Cease pulse."
"I wonder what would happen if I..."
...
"Comply!"
I could barely make out what they said, but I could only guess what they meant when I saw some of my hair stand on end, and heard a faint crack. I heard them try to say something else through the speaker, but that, along with the low-pitched screeching of the dark pulse, sounded like they were far away. Through all this, I could just make out a very slight humming coming from the back of the room, and it was growing higher pitched and louder.
That was before a bright flash lit the room up, and I was sent flying back into the wall behind me as a loud booming filled the room, even with my impaired hearing. My vision was completely white as I landed on the floor, and at that point everything seemed to be going in slow motion.
I blinked a few times to try to get my vision to recover, before noticing it wasn't even my vision at all. Looking to the side, the room was still there, albeit blurry, but in the back of the room where the orb once stood, there was now a bright light pouring into the room, nearly blinding me.
There was a faint ringing, which I figured was my hearing, as I slowly got up from my side with little difficulty, and started to move towards the back of the room, curious as to what happened exactly. I constantly blinked and squinted while I walked back, trying to straighten out my blurry vision.
As I got closer to the back wall, my eyes started to adjust to the light, though it was definitely taking a while. Once I got to where I guessed the orb used to be, I found a small pile of rubble leading into where the wall should've been, but what was then a gaping hole. Through it, I could only make out bright colors, including orange and blue being blended together.
When I walked through the hole, I was still unable to clearly see anything, so I started to walk slowly away from the room behind me, allowing my eyesight to adjust. Once it did, I made out a gravel path, which I was now standing on, stretching out to my right and left, then disappearing behind a corner. It was a few feet wide, and behind that stood multiple yards of orange earth. This lead up to a stone wall, which was about ten feet tall and topped with wire, which also stretched out of view on either side. Looking behind me, what I had thought to be a wall showed me that the room I was in, and maybe even the entire complex, was hidden under a similarly-colored orange-red cliff.
Then, sirens started to sound, though to me it sounded more like a muffled high-pitched beeping. Still, it told me all I needed to know, as I turned and quickly started off for the wall.
As I drew nearer, I tried looking around at any point that I could possibly use to get over it. Stopping a few yards before it, I looked to my left and right. Finding nothing, I grew frustrated and kicked a pebble, which then bounced off the wall and landed on the ground behind me. It took me a minute to get my thoughts sorted out, but seeing that helped me start to formulate a plan in my head.
Still scanning my surroundings, I tried to be absolutely sure that there was nothing that could help, until I noticed figures moving towards me out of the corner of my eye. Looking towards them, I was just able to make out pink, green, and yellow figures before turning away. They were no doubt trying to hypnotize me, but I wasn't losing this chance. Not to something as stupid as looking at a psychic that probably knew hypnosis, at least. I knew that I didn't have much time before they closed the gap between me and them, so I began to build up energy yet again.
Even then, I was trying to keep an eye on what they were trying to do, since I figured they knew I wouldn't look at them purposefully. I was glad I did, because it let me see a storm of slightly transparent blue bubbles, no doubt yawn, trying to get me to sleep. I needed to build up as much energy as I could, so I just waited. Moving would interrupt some of my concentration, so I couldn't really afford trying to run.
It took a few seconds, but once they got near enough to me, I finally started to move to dodge the ones I could see out of the corner of my eye. After a few seconds of jumping and weaving, however, one just caught me in the corner of my face, at which point I just thought, "Screw it." I would have a minute or so of consciousness, and I was going to use it.
I jumped as high into the air as possible going towards the wall, which still stood a few feet away, then flipped, looking behind myself and towards the ground. Using the energy I had been building up, I launched an overpowered dark pulse towards the ground, which pulled up a cloud of dust as it hit. At the same time, it launched me just high enough to clear the wall, though I felt something catch my right leg, which I simply assumed to be the wire.
I looked over where I was headed now, and if I hadn't already been in the air, I probably would have jumped. Below me was a deep valley, with what I assumed to be a river flowing through the center, and there was yet another cliff on the other side. Panicking, I quickly built up a small burst of energy and released one more pulse against the wall I just cleared, trying to at least propel myself to land in the stream below. I held it for a second or two, then let it go and dove straight down.
Slowly, the world around me began to get clearer. I could hear the wind rushing past my ears as I plummeted into the valley. Aches and pains followed, and I winced as I started to feel all the damage I had done to myself, which I had neglected to notice in the rush. I let that, along with the oncoming effects of yawn, carry me to unconsciousness as I was submerged in the flowing water.
That was the day I finally escaped the hell I had lived in for so long.
Calling that place anything but hell would be complimenting it. Calling it a laboratory wouldn't make sense since most don't torture test subjects into submission. For the same reason, calling it a prison wouldn't make any sense either. It all seemed to be based on the concept of pushing the subject to the edge physically, and to an extent, emotionally. Only somewhat though, since it wasn't like they were trying too hard to get me to like them. The only thing that place and a prison might hold in common is the meals, but that's just about all I can think of.
I say for so long, but I don't really know how long I was there for. It could have been a year, or ten. It was definitely at least a year though, but I couldn't say anything more than that considering days are kind of hard to count when you're always in an enclosed room. As for what I was before then, again I don't know. I have little fragments, or what I call fabrications. Things that seem like I was there, but were so different from what I lived with for so long that they didn't seem real. One of them involved a hilly area, covered in grass, with trees in the background, and a brilliant blue sky. I could see figures moving about, and hear laughter, but all of the figures themselves were blurry. That, and another one, where I was looking out over a heavy blanket of trees, watching the sky slowly turn from a deep red to black as the sun set over the horizon, leaning on a figure whose orange hair I could see flowing in a light breeze. Again, though, I can't make out who they are, no matter how hard I try to see them out of the corner of my eye. Getting out there did end up showing me that they were at least somewhat plausible since there were actually trees and grass. Not that I didn't believe they existed, but I was more unsure than anything, as I had never actually seen them before.
When I woke up that next night, it was probably the worst start I've ever had after waking up. It wasn't bad because of the darkness though. No, that was fine. What was terrible was the excruciating pain I was in when I woke up, with all the scratches and bruises I accumulated from flowing down rapids, along with what I made out to be the gash in my back left leg I must have gotten from the wire fence. I was barely able to crawl back to the river, but I did for a few reasons. First off, it ended up cooling me off, easing some of the many aches and pains I had. Along with that, I figured it would end up being a lot easier swimming downstream than walking in that state, and to an extent, it was, since I only really had to keep my head above the water. Plus, I am not a particular fan of the feeling of dried blood on my fur.
I floated down the river for a while, before being beached again at daybreak, where I ended up resting. That next day was a lot easier to deal with, though it was still no easy task. Topping off my injuries and disorientation, a few trees were felled when two pokémon ended up coming for me, trying to take me back to the facility no doubt. Looking back at that, though, it wasn't very much compared to some of the other things I would end up doing to try to get them off my tail. Yet they still kept coming, and sometimes they would come with stronger members, or just more of them to try to overwhelm me. Unlucky for them, I learned very quickly what I needed to do to keep myself out there.
One of these things was that wild pokémon don't have a little silver band or mark on any of their legs or arms. That just told me what I could avoid easily, and when I wouldn't have to worry about something turning around and then sprinting to catch me.
Another one came about a month or two in, and it did a great deal to help me figure out where I would need to go so I wouldn't run into them. It had to do with the energy in my system, where I could feel it flow through. It was normally equal flow, but every now and then some would stop on one side. In some situations, I would be ambushed from that direction, which I started to notice. A bit of trial and error later, and I knew I could use it to get away from them.
Food was probably my most hard learned lesson. I ended poisoning myself at least a dozen times within those first two weeks. Of the things I learned, most berries are fine to eat, but grass and leaves aren't. Even long after leaving that area, though, I still found new things that would leave me sick to the stomach the next day.
Now, I barely ended up hunting. I thought about it for a while, and I just decided it wasn't the most efficient way to get food. First of all, it just wastes time trying to take down the prey to eat it, and it would leave a mess that would tell my pursuers that I was there, making it easier to follow me. Besides, picking berries off of a plant that can't move is much easier. Well, most plants don't move, but some grass types are really good at camouflage. With that said, I did end up having to hunt a few times in areas that were less abundant in fruit-bearing plants.
Even with all this, it was still absolutely worth finally getting to leave the place. Sure, it ended leaving me a few scars and a lot of getting extremely sick, but that just taught me what to do and what not to do. Along with that, I also got to see a lot of great sights that I never would've thought possible previously. Different types of land, from the valley I jumped into to start it all, to lush meadows full of plant life. Sure, it would be brief, since I didn't have much time to stand around observing, but it was just one more thing that made me almost happy to be out there. Of course, this is opposed to doing a test, being put unconscious, then doing another test, being put unconscious, and so on. That, and being punished for having one little mistake, or even just not doing something the way they wanted it done. Basically, doing anything but being back there would've made me happy.
Time was something I learned as well. Days passing by with light and dark was a new concept to me, but I quickly grew accustomed to it, and started to count the weeks and months that went by. I wouldn't know exactly how much time had passed, but it would give me a vague idea at least.
I found myself in the void again, with the whispers surrounding me. As I was out there, running as far as I could to get away, they've gotten louder. They were still whispers, don't get me wrong, but I didn't have to try listening to know they were there. I have no idea what that means, and I still can't make out anything, if it's any words at all. Only did the fading of them tell me that I was slowly waking up, with a dull ache, and the feeling of flowing cool air.
Slowly sitting up, I opened my eyes to no change. I started to concentrate on my rings to give them a slightly silver glow, which allowed me to see the cave outside the indent in the wall I ended up resting in.
I got to my feet, and jumped out onto the main floor of the cave, feeling the cool, smooth stone against my paws as I stretched out. I found the darkness of the caves to be quite comforting, and the draw of energy was much fainter through the stone, which I assumed meant it would be harder to find me when I was in one. That's why I always tried to spend as much necessary time in them as possible.
Once I finished stretching, I started to walk up the slope of the cave. It gradually began to get lighter, and in compensation, I dimmed down my rings. Only when I turned around a corner and squinted to try to adjust to the light did I entirely kill them off. I didn't like the idea of being the equivalent of a lighthouse, basically screaming out, "Hey! Listen! I'm over here!" It was dawn, so it would get brighter, but it wasn't light yet, and I didn't like the idea of taking any chances.
Stepping out of the mouth of the cave, I took in my surroundings. A wall of trees blocked my sight all around, even above the hill just behind me, and a small stream lay off to the left. There were also some red berries on bushes a little off to the right. Areas like this, I had found out, were very convenient for what I needed, but were also far from common. If I found areas like this after most a days worth of running, then I would most likely spend time in them. If it meant I would lose too much time, however, I would only spend a short break there before continuing on.
I made my way over to the berry bush, and then bit one off. After devouring a few, I walked over to the stream and had a drink of water. After that, I looked at my reflection in the flowing water, above the occasional magikarp or feebas. I could see the grayish-silver rings on my head and ears, along with my seemingly glowing cyan eyes, contrasting the dark teal of my fur. I never realized how out of place I was back then, though I never did particularly care about appearance.
Turning around, I took a few steps away from the river and sat down. I began to concentrate on the energy flowing through my body. My other senses went dull as I did this, which was apparent mostly because the sound of the stream behind me lost its volume. A slight pull, like a magnet, stopped the energy in the front of the system, clumping it there. With that, my eyes shot open, and I quickly turned and took off over the river.
"Just another day in paradise," I thought to myself as I started maneuvering through the dense forest.
A/N
And that's it for chapter one of a project I hope you, as well as I, come to like. I appreciate the chance you gave me for this, and I hope I didn't disappoint. This is my first project I'm trying to commit to, so I have no idea how this is going to go, but I really hope I don't abandon/forget about this, because I've put quite a few hours into coming up with this story already.
Okay, so onto answering a few questions some of you may be having. This is not any world that the anime or games has seen, period. I am attempting to make the world for this work entirely original, which means there will be what I consider to be original names, backstory, etc. The theme for names is a mix, though, because coming up with mineral names/atmosphere layers to name things after can be a bit of a pain. A, "lesson," taken from some mysterious page will be at the beginning of these first few chapters, and while I doubt it'll make it into the later ones, it may stick. This chapter's doesn't serve the most important purpose, but gives an introduction to the concept.
So, that's about all that should be within the questions category that I can think of. If you have anything else you want clarified, within reason of course, I will be glad to respond and answer. The rest from here is mostly going to be me talking about the process of getting this to what it is now.
Firstly, this is far from the first draft I've made, and is probably the third or fourth at this point. Technically, my first one was uploaded to WattPad when the idea was fresh in my head, but looking back at it a month later, I thought it was far from my best work. I went back to the drawing board, and was stuck there for the next summer, adding on a bit more at a time between my playing games, and feeling sorry over myself as I realized that I was doing literally nothing productive. Writing up a new draft, I liked it a lot more, and then wrote another one, edited it, and here we are. Edit: This is revision two at this point, where a few things got deleted, some things added, so it could be draft four, but I still count it as three.
Just because I wanted to doesn't mean that was the only reason. I did want to get this out, and that is my main reason for writing this now, but when I started, there were a lot of, I'll just say, unfortunate events going on in the lives of people around me, and I wanted to try to say that I helped some people, even if that would only be by some small bit of entertainment that put a smile on someone's face. Also, I was procrastinating way too much at that point, and I needed more of a reason than, "I wanna do it." I need to prove to myself that I can finish something that I start, especially something this long-term. Took me throwing my fears out the window to upload this, but hey, I got here right?
Schedule is an interesting topic, because when I first wrote all this up, I had as much time as I would ever want, considering it was summer. Now, though, I'm hitting school full force, and am going to need to balance this and schoolwork. Also, procrastination, as mentioned before… I'm not going to make any promises, especially since it took this long for me to get the first chapter out, but I'll do my best to make sure it doesn't take too long. Edit: Heh, second one took four extra months, and I even had the first draft finished by the time I uploaded this...
Anyways, I hope this was a good enough start! This is my first project I'm attempting to turn into something meaningful, so I may be a bit touchy on the subject, but I am open to any feedback or criticism that you may have. I'm still figuring out my, "style," of writing, so the way information is presented is almost certainly bound to change from here on out. Hope you enjoyed, and see you next chapter! Edit: two chapters from now… hopefully it doesn't take as long next time.
(Too many hopes? Yeah. Way too many. Also, way too long of a note… sorry?)
~Univen