Episode 1
"What're you doing Grey?"
The voice came from above his right shoulder. Grey turned his head to see past the side of his hood. He looked up to face the voice.
"Knowing when I'm licked, Puce" He said, standing up from the ground. He walked up the embankment away from the ravine.
"Whattaya mean?" Puce asked.
He watched Grey take a few more steps up the hill, stop, cough, and begin the search through his jacket for any remaining cigarettes. Grey was 10 years older than Puce, a tall, lean, 23 year-old. The two had met a week before when Grey had walked into Puce's mother's store to buy some repellant. Puce had seen the two pokeballs clipped on Grey's belt and knew immediately he was a trainer. He wore neither the uniform of the fishermen down at the docks who often traded their goldeen and magikarp meat at the shop, nor the helmets of the Pewter City miners who's moon stones brought interesting trades in the market. Travelers were common in Viridian City but trainers were not, nor were they welcome.
"Sucker's been down there for 16 hours now" Grey said, stretching his arms over his head, then back down, cracking his back.
Puce turned and peered into the deep waters of the pool below him. A few bubbles made their way to the surface.
"What is it?" Puce asked, taking a few weary steps back, up and out of the ravine.
"Feraligatr. Big one too, from what I could see"
"What?! Are you serious?!" Puce screamed, a mixture of fear and excitement stirred in him.
"Mmhmm" Grey started, "old woman on the edge of the forrest said some kind of monster was eating her Mareep. I tracked him down here, caught a glimpse of his tail before he went completely under water."
Grey turned to his left, "Roger, come on buddy we're packin' it up."
The nearby bushes parted, revealing a very large Primeape emerging from the trees. In his right hand was a knot of rope and Puce noticed for the first time the long rope that ran down the ravine and into the water. As Roger pulled in the line Puce could see a grappling hook covered in a thick red substance. Grey walked over and picked it up.
"Yep" he sighed, "took it clean off the line. He's smart."
"What is that?" asked Puce.
"Miltank, bought the meat yesterday. Forty pounds of it too, lucky it was old when I got it, knocked the price off half. Still, that stuff's not cheap."
"Grrrmph!" Roger snorted.
He let out a squeal and walked towards the tree line and sat down under a large oak. Puce noticed how broad his stance was. Most Primeapes are muscular, athletic pokemon but Roger was big even by their standards. He stood nearly five feet tall and his hands hung like large dumb-bells on either side of his wide shoulders . The coarse hair that covered his body was a dark grey color with a large bald spot under his left ear from an encounter with a Magmar in his youth. However, his most obvious feature was the scar across his right eye he had lost to a Rhyhorn during a tournament a few years ago. His body was a patchwork of battle scars, each marking a memory, a reminder of wisdom earned the hard way. Win or loss, the experience was etched on his skin in a permanent framework that told unspoken lessons with every cut, bruise and burn. Roger leaned back against the tree, crossed his arms and relaxed into a nap.
"It's a shame." Grey said, looking down one more time into the water. "I really would've liked to catch a Feraligtr."
"You're just gonna leave'em down there?" Puce asked. "After all that time?"
"Shyea" Grey answered with a smirk, "especially after all that time. He's been down there for so long, definitely has himself a cave. And If "'he's" actually a "she" and there's eggs down there it's definitely not worth it. You're a damn fool to tangle with an angry mother and it's even more useless to try and train one."
"Also, me and Roger are starving and apparently I've just been feeding him the whole time." He said holding up the grappling hook.
Grey looked down, lit another cigarette and turned around to face the trees. He smiled again.
"You really wanna be a trainer Puce?" He asked.
Puce had asked Grey the day they met if he would teach him to train pokemon. Grey had refused until Puce agreed to provide bread from his mother's store for Roger and himself everyday while he was in town. Puce nodded, he watched Grey blow a stream of smoke into the air. Grey turned, squinted in the sun and said,
"Then the first thing you gotta learn is how to lose."