["RISE AND SHINE PEOPLE, TIME TO GET TO WORK!"]
With a reluctant effort, I opened my eyes and pried myself away from the comforting embrace of sleep. The sound of an annoyingly familiar voice was prompting me to get up. All around me, the sounds of disgruntled groaning from the other sleepers filled the room. Sheesh, we have to get up at this hour every day and people still complain about it. Granted I can understand not wanting to wake up. But still, there's no use complaining about something that you've been doing and will continue to do for some time. While the most of bunkmates were still trying to convince themselves to get out from underneath the covers, I was making my way to the lockers with the other people who were used to the schedule. Now the men's locker room was just down the hall from the men's sleeping quarters. Even so, at this hour, walking down a cold hallway wearing only your sleepwear made for a very brisk walk.
Thankfully, the locker room itself was at least moderately warm, so we could strip down without dying of hypothermia. Shower time for a single person had to be five minutes or less, as per regulations. It helped cut down costs and get everyone on duty in an efficient manner. It also kept people from sitting in the shower for twenty minutes while ten people were waiting. I stripped down and headed for the nearest open shower, oh thank goodness the water was warm. Occasionally one of the showers wouldn't produce warm water and that made for a very jarring morning. Once I'd cleaned myself off, (and in only four minutes by the way), I dried my body and hair hurriedly and walked back to my locker. I spent almost twice as long drying myself off as I did taking that shower, funny how that works (it's mostly the hair). But once I was completely dry I finally started putting on my uniform. Black pants, a black shirt with a big red R plastered over it, grey cloves, grey boots, a bandana, and finally a black cap.
In case you haven't figured it out by now, I'm a grunt for Team Rocket.
Eating breakfast in the cafeteria is like looking over a sea of disappointment. The tables are lined with men and women who are (mostly) in their late twenties or early thirties. Most of them are failed Pokémon Trainers who joined Team Rocket because they were bitter. I guess after losing to so many kids who were better with Pokémon than them, they liked the idea of taking Pokémon away from them. For whatever reason it was, it left me in an awkward position, I was only seventeen years old, and I would turn eighteen in two months. When I first joined a year ago, they would look at me with a sense of bitterness, as if I had no right to be there because I still had my youth. And it always seemed like they knew that I had a different reason for being here than the rest of them, and they wanted to know what it was. To be honest, I don't have any real special reason for joining, no dark past or traumatic events, I simply joined Team Rocket because I wanted to take the road less traveled. Before I joined, I met many people who tried to train on their own, only to be defeated by some kid with a pokedex. So I decided to join Team Rocket, (even though I heard they were disbanded 20 years ago by a kid with a pokedex). Since I don't have enough luck to obtain a pokedex of my own, I would just have to use a different resource, the Team Rocket database.
After my ten minute breakfast, (regulated breakfast time is actually an hour, I just eat fast) I immediately reported to the head of my old unit, Captain Joseph. Joseph wasn't really high on the pecking order, he over saw a decent chunk of the labor division, but he wasn't an admin or anything. He was respected enough, though most people got annoyed whenever he started fawning over his rattata. I got along with the guy, never spoke to him much outside of taking orders, but he and I shared a laugh here and there. The reason I was reporting to him was because I was picking up some papers I needed him to sign. Specifically, unit transfer papers. After a year in Team Rocket, I had finally earned my promotion thanks to a successful mission and a few good words from Captain Joseph. After I got those papers back and properly filed, I would be transferred to the battle division. In Team Rocket, there are four main divisions, intel, research and development, labor, and battle. The labor division is the lowest of the low, the only members of the labor division are people whose rank isn't high enough for authorized pokémon use. The duties of the labor division are just to do the hands on jobs that aren't worth using pokémon for. That was the division I was a part of, until today.
After I retrieved the paper work and said proper goodbyes to Captain Morgan, I took my identification and transfer paper work to the intel division to have it properly filed. From the way I described it, it must sound like it didn't take long to get this all done, well unfortunately this whole process took me three hours. It didn't help that intel and labor were so far apart, or that intel makes you fill out several forms before even letting you in to the building. Even so, I managed to get my transfer cleared, as of that moment, I was now a member of Team Rocket's battle division. Now when I transferred into battle division, I was given only level one pokémon authorization, meaning I was allowed to keep only one pokémon. Any other Pokémon caught were to be brought back and sent off into Team Rocket's storehouses, where they would be sorted for either: battle, release, breeding, or research. I wasn't even allowed to choose my first Pokémon, intel would look over my records and assign a Pokémon to me.
I reported to the front office of the battle division, it was there that I would receive my pokémon. The woman at the desk looked less interested in my job than I did, she didn't even look up from her computer when she asked:
["Name?"]
["Oh, Briar Yoruha."] I replied
She held out her hand and said ["ID card."]
I pulled out the piece of plastic and handed it to her. Within seconds she had completely read my file, the transfer information and the Pokémon Intel had chosen for me. She closed my file and opened a different program, she typed in a code and I heard sounds coming from the wall to right of her desk. She looked back up at me and said
["Your Pokémon is in that hatch on the wall over there."] Then she returned to her computer and didn't say anything else.
I walked over to the hatch on the wall and opened it, inside was a simple pokeball. I picked up the ball, it felt so strange in my hands, and it had only been a year and half since I last held one, but it still felt like the first time. Well, I decided to take a look and see just who had been assigned to me, probably a zubat or something, intel never liked to give their best to newbies. I tossed the pokeball slightly into the air and out popped a small grey Pokémon on all fours, it had a fluffy tail and pointed ears. I recognized this Pokémon instantly, it was a poochyena. The little guy looked up at me with a curious expression and I returned the emotion. I looked back to the woman at the desk.
["I think there's been some sort of mistake."] I said
["Why's that?"] She grimaced
"[This is a poochyena.]" I replied
["So?"]
["We're in Kanto, there are rarely ever poochyena found in Kanto."] I explained
["Well, that's what Intel assigned you, do you want to file a complaint?"] The look in both of our eyes said neither of us wanted to do that.
["No, Poochyena is fine, just an odd choice,"] after my response, she went back to her computer and I looked back at my new partner. I sank down to my knees to get closer to its eye level, ["alright, pal, starting today, you and I are gonna be partners, so let's get along."]
I held out my hand half-heartedly, only to be pleasantly surprised when the little guy put his paw in my hand. Admittedly it was one of the most adorable things I had ever seen.
["Okay, it may not be how a lot of guys work around her but I'm going to give you a nickname. How about…. Yena?"]
Okay, okay so it wasn't exactly original, but really, who looks at a Pokémon and names it something normal and unrelated, like Tim? Yena looked at me with the same curious look, as if he didn't care about his name too much.
"Alright, Yena it is." I pet him behind the ears and he yipped excitedly, yeah I definitely lucked out here, I could feel my disinterest and sarcasm leaving me. The second I put Yena back in his pokeball it all came flooding back though. I might have joined Team Rocket of my own volition, but it didn't stop me from hating everything around me.
Except Yena, of course.
I met my new commanding officer soon after receiving Yena, didn't catch his name, didn't really need to, you could tell him apart because of his ridiculously purple hair. The man seemed very proud of it, despite how bad of a dye job it was. I barely had any time to move my things from Labor to Battle before he called me and a few others in for a mission. I stood beside 4 other members of the battle division with only level one authorization like me. Our purple haired commanding officer gave us our mission. Apparently a shipment of pokémon being sent from Viridian to Celadon had run into some difficulties and lost about half of the cargo near Mount Moon. The Pokémon weren't that high level, but they were mostly foreign pokémon, meaning that if people saw them then they would know of our shipping routes. Our mission was to find and catch all of the Pokémon that had escaped from the shipment. We were each given a list of the escaped pokémon, and 30 empty pokeballs each. The current Rocket base we were located to the west of Cerulean City, meaning it would only take us about half a day to reach Mount Moon. We listened to the rest of purple hair's directions and then made way to the vehicles nearby.
The assigned grunts didn't really speak to me, or each other for that matter, it seemed like they were all rookies to the Battle division as well. Chances were that this mission gave the higher ups a chance to test the skills of newbies. When we arrived at Mount Moon, we immediately summoned our Pokémon. As I expected, the grunts each had basic Kanto pokémon, including zubat, paras, rattata, and spearow. I was the only one with a foreign partner pokémon, I still don't understand why that was.
We split up and began searching for the missing pokémon. Yena and I searched around the mountain itself, looking for any pokémon that might have climbed up there. While we were searching I took the opportunity to check Yena's level and moves. Yena was level seven, and as expected, he knew tackle, howl, and sand attack, all standard for a poochyena of his level. However, I was shocked to find he knew a fourth move, and an unconventional one at that. For some reason, Yena knew thunder fang. I had heard that there were pokémon out there who inherited skills and abilities from their parents and could execute them flawlessly at birth, Yena must have been one of those pokémon.
On Mount Moon, Yena and I managed to find and capture five of the missing pokémon, well technically, we only captured four of them, and the fifth was a pokémon called pawniard. We didn't find it, it found us, it never fought back, it didn't try to run, and all it did was watch us. Honestly it was a little creepy. We scoured that mountain side for anymore of the missing Pokémon but found none of them, however, to say our trek on Mount Moon ended there would be a huge lie.
The second it came into view, I grabbed Yena and dove behind a nearby tree. Luckily we were quiet enough for it not to hear us, that or it thought we weren't worth worrying about. It was almost surreal to see there. Not just because it was not of Kanto, but because it wasn't on the list of missing Pokémon either. Yena and I had come across a level forty four wild metang on Mount Moon. It was at this time I remembered one of Team Rocket's most important rules, "Complete the mission above all else, but don't waste an opportunity to capture valuable Pokémon." Battling the other Pokémon we needed to capture had raised Yena's level to level 9, but it still left us at a huge disadvantage against that metang. I sat behind that tree, wracking my brain to formulate a plan to capture this rare prey before me, but nothing reasonable came to mind. Even if I somehow got all the Pokémon I retrieved to follow my instructions, there was no way we could take down that metang before it took us down. I looked over at it, metang, a strong steel and psychic type Pokémon from Hoenn, its metal shell looked like it could take an explosion head on. Yena's attack would deal so little damage that metang wouldn't even notice. With that thought in mind, I finally came up with a plan.
Was I doing something stupid? Some would say yes. Did I have a plan? Of course. Was it one of the most terrifying experiences in my life? Most certainly. I gave orders to Yena and left my cover, the metang nearby noticed me and stared me down, these things were supposed to me incredibly intelligent, their minds were like super computers, if so, it was probably analyzing me. I didn't seem like much of a threat to it, so it turned away from me, disinterested. I needed its attention, it was essential to the plan. So I picked up a stone and chucked it at the metang, it bounced off of its left appendage. It looked back at me, then it looked away again, disinterested still. So I threw another rock at it, it looked back to me, slightly annoyed, but then looked away again, so I threw yet another rock at it, like the others, it bounced off of the metang. It tried to ignore me, hoping that I would stop on my own, but I continued to hurl rocks at it until, with a swift attack, the next stone I threw broke in midair. I recognized the nature of the attack it had used, bullet punch. The metang looked at me menacingly, as if breaking that rock was a warning that I should stop or else it would not hesitate to hurt me. I chucked another rock and it hit the metang right between the eyes.
Now seeing a pokémon angry is something every trainer has probably seen at some point. However, seeing a pokémon royally pissed was undoubtedly an uncommon sight, one I was privy to. It made a beeline for me, glowing energy surrounding its head, I dove out of the way and it charged past me. I heard the sound of a falling tree and turned to see the metang had knocked down the 20 foot tree I had been standing in front of with its zen headbutt. I didn't waste a second the instant that I saw what it was capable of, I scurried up another tree and watched the metang from up on its branches. If it tried to use zen headbutt again I would have a chance to jump for another tree, so I felt as though I was fairly safe. Sadly the genius figured that out too, so instead of using zen headbutt, it riddled the trunk of the tree with bullet punches. The shaking prevented me from getting the footing I needed and I fell with the tree once the metang's bullet punches had punched all the way through. I jumped from the branches as best as I could and rolled along the ground, I probably bruised a few things but otherwise, I was fine. I collected myself and looked up, what I found was the Metang, holding one of its claws in the air above me. It was giving me one last chance to apologize, to beg for forgiveness, to show it I was sorry. I picked up a rock and chucked it at its face.
Now as uncommon a sight as it was, there were a decent amount of trainers who had seen a pokémon that was royally pissed. However, there was even less trainers who had seen pokémon that were absolutely livid. Pokémon whose bodies were burning with anger, I was one of them. For a few seconds metang's face went murderously dark, and in those few seconds, I jumped away from that spot. Good thing I did too, because just before I got out of there, the spot I was in was no more. Instead, there was a crater created by metang's devastating meteor mash. I think it was safe to say that I had thoroughly grabbed metang's attention, perfect. Mmetang's defense was solid, we had no hope of defeating it in a head on battle, Yena's attacks were so weak that we wouldn't make a noticeable dent when we attacked. So we split the job, I distracted metang while Yena repeatedly used tackle on it, the attacks did so little damage that metang didn't notice that it was being attacked. I checked metang's current health, good it was low enough that we were able to launch phase 2.
["Yena! Switch to thunder fang!"] I yelled.
The Metang felt a jolt from behind. It didn't deal much more damage than tackle did, and we lost our sense of stealth, Yena was now known to metang. metang prepared to hit Yena with meteor mash when another rock came sailing from behind and bounced off it. It remembered its anger towards me and decided to use that meteor mash on me instead, but another jolt from behind broke its focus. It was starting to get annoyed with Yena, but I had to keep its anger focused on me until it finally worked.
Eventually, the metang used its brain to figure out that I was trying to keep it from attacking Yena, and it prepared to deal with him. It raised its claw and I cried for Yena to get away. That's when the metang's claw froze mid attack. A spark of electricity ran along its body while it was frozen, it was paralyzed! Yes! The purpose of thunder fang was to try and paralyze metang while adding some extra points of damage to it. I prayed to whatever all powerful pokémon ruled the universe and hurled a pokeball at it. The ball shook furiously three times, the pause between every shake made my heart skip a beat. Finally, the ball stopped shaking and it clicked. I looked at Yena excitedly and shouted:
["We did it!"]
Yena bolted to me and jumped into my arms, licking my face as I praised him.
I returned to my associates with the Pokémon I found, I didn't tell them about the metang, I figured they didn't need to know. Of course I didn't try to keep the thing either, the second I was able to I brought it to the woman at the front desk of the battle division, her eyes actually opened fully in shock. She seemed at a loss for words as she silently logged in my capture.
Although small and barely livable, the battle division members received their own rooms, there was a bed, a toilet and a dresser, nothing more. I changed out of my Team Rocket uniform and into my sleepwear. I would have to get the uniform cleaned, it was covered in dirt and possibly some of my blood, I couldn't tell. But that was something to be saved for tomorrow, for now, I was exhausted, and I needed to sleep. I threw myself on my bed, planting my head face first into my pillow, but as tired as I was, I couldn't sleep. I looked up at my dresser, sitting atop it was Yena's pokeball. I stared at it for two minutes before I reached over and picked it up, I let him out of the ball and he sat on the floor, that same curious expression on his face. I patted my bed and he jumped up onto it, he curled up beside me and closed his eyes. His fur was so soft and comfortable, and geez, he was so warm. Those were the last thoughts I had before I drifted into sleep beside Yena, my Pokémon.