Gilderoy Lockhart and the Legend of Victini
A Harry Potter / Pokémon Story
Note: As I am neither neither Rowling or one of her licensees, or a licensee of the Pokémon Company, this is hardly an authorized tale, nor one that is likely to ever be authorized, due to the unorthodox nature of it. Yet, for all that, it is a tale with a life of its own, which stole into my mind and demanded to be written. And as one knows, I've always had a weakness for a tale…
Summary: In the wake of his disappearance from the Chamber of Secrets, most in the Wizarding World remember the late Gilderoy Lockhart as a fraud. A pitiful, fame-obsessed man who stole the achievements of others for his own, and fittingly met his end when a stolen wand exploded in his grasp. Few remember the boy he once was, the child consumed with the desire to become the very best, like no one ever was. Even fewer remember the young Ravenclaw who worked and studied alone, throwing himself into his schoolwork with a passion few had ever seen – until the day he simply stopped, broken by the bitter realization that he wasn't good enough. That he would never be good enough - that even on his best day, he would never be more than merely above average. And none would have suspected that in the moment of his undoing, what little remained of the boy cried out for a second chance – or that worlds away, that wish would be granted.
Prologue
The mystery of what exactly happened that day in the Dreamyard, or the Pokémon Energy Laboratory, as it was once called, would never truly be solved, despite a thorough investigation by some of the greatest scientific minds of the Pokémon world. It would simply be filed away with other age-old mysteries, like why Nidorina (and Nidoqueen) could not breed, why fossilized Magikarp specimens appeared significantly more powerful than current representatives of the species, or how and why new subspecies of Pokémon (like Klink, which only began to appear a century ago) came into being.
At first, the citizens of Striaton City – and most of the Unova region – were gravely concerned over what could have caused the catastrophe that destroyed the region's premier research facility and killed all but three of the scientists working within, but within months, it became clear that no quick answers would be found.
Theories, of course, abounded, mostly focusing on the immense explosion that had been felt throughout Unova, as people were wont to do.
Had the distant Devon Corporation sabotaged the Dream Mist project, given that a limitless source of clean energy could be quite the rival to their own Infinity Energy (which, like the fabled Ultimate Weapon of Kalos, was powered by the life force of Pokémon)?
Had the research being conducted in the Dreamyard stirred up a dormant pocket of the Dragon Force which had powered the Kingdom of the Vale in the legends of Unova?
Had one of the lab technicians, lacking sleep or experience, committed some seemingly trivial error which had eventually caused a massive containment breach?
The only person who came close to understanding the truth of the matter was a young scientist by the name of Dr. Vivian Makomo, one of the fortunate three to have survived the disaster. As a rising expert on Dream Mist, she knew full well that its core property was that it materialized the wishes of those around it. Thus, she speculated that the impure evil thoughts and desires of those associated with the project – the raw greed and ambition of the project's funders, the arrogance of some of the project leads in parceling out credit for bits of the research & the frustration and envy of those subordinate to them, and the fact that some thought an endless source of power might make for a useful weapon – had corrupted the Mist.
That in short, the destruction of the facility was what they – collectively and unconsciously – had wished for.
…not that she went public with her thoughts, or even mentioned them to the investigators – even to her close friend Aurea Juniper, as blaming the dead in the absence of any clear evidence of fault would have been a good way to ruin her career before it had truly begun.
Already, the stigma of having been affiliated with the failed project at all would keep many companies – or universities, for that matter – from even considering hiring her. There was no need to make matters worse by angering the relatives of the deceased, especially when what she suspected would not be believed, nor could be conclusively proven.
So, in the long days following the Dreamyard Catastrophe, while she looked for employment, Dr. Makomo turned her thoughts to the man who had saved her and her two colleagues. An unfamiliar man with no Pokémon who the media was already calling the Hero of Striaton City, who had allegedly witnessed the disaster and rushed inside, heedless of the risk to himself, to see if there were anyone still alive.
…her recollections of what exactly had happened in the wake of the explosion were fuzzy, given that she'd suffered a rather bad concussion, but what she remembered didn't quite match up with the news reports.
She remembered a man – quite a handsome one – saving her, yes, but he hadn't come from outside. No…he'd stepped out of the black mists at ground zero of the explosion, and had stopped short as he looked around, as if he couldn't believe his eyes.
Not that she could blame him.
The ruined laboratory had been a scene of carnage and destruction, with fire and death and twisted metal everywhere. All around her, the building – what remained of it – had begun to collapse, as secondary explosions shook the structure apart.
The last thing she'd seen before she passed out from pain and loss of blood was the man breathing in the mist, a strange expression sliding over his features.
Who he was, how he'd gotten there – she didn't know these things, and didn't really care, although she certainly had her suspicions.
After all, if the Dream Mist had brought about disaster by realizing the unspoken desires of those all around her, perhaps it had heard the small, desperate plea she'd made in the wake of everything, and granted her wish.
To be saved. For someone to save her. To be given another chance.
The wish humans always made, the hope they always bore, even in the darkest of times, whether they'd admit it or not, no matter how capable they thought themselves to be.
Here too, she was correct, for her plea had been heard – and a savior had come forth, if perhaps the most unlikely one possible.
In the days to come, when his exploits had become famous throughout all of Unova, people would speculate as to where he had come from, what he had done before becoming a trainer, how he found the courage to stand against Team Plasma and all the other foes he faced – though they found that the answers he gave changed every time he was asked.
But whatever answer he gave, and whatever he claimed to be, Dr. Vivian Makomo, or Fennel, as she was sometimes called, would always remember him as her savior, the mistborn hero who had saved her from what would have otherwise been certain death.
His name, as would eventually be known throughout the Pokémon World, was Gilderoy Lockhart.
This is his story.