A/N: Well, this shall be my first story on here. I must admit, I'm not particularly happy with this chapter, but hopefully things shall pick up later. (And if I come back to this in the morning and find that I hate it, well, I'll just start my editing early.) There aren't really any plans for the story itself, I just know what Colton's team is going to be and what general ideas I probably want to explore. So far, there aren't any real warnings on this, just a vague maybe for violence in the future chapters. I will caution that, due to my interest in the Legendaries and the way that they'd probably shape people's beliefs, there will be discussion of religion and atheism in the Pokemon world. None of this is meant to reflect my actual beliefs, or anyone else's, since I do think that religion would be rather different in a universe with creatures like the Legendary Pokemon. That being said, this will not be a story about the Legendaries, beyond maybe a sub-plot or two. Updates will definitely vary in size (I'll have a lower limit of 1,000 words, but no idea where my upper limit is going to end up being) and how long they take, but I promise to never completely abandon this story unless something happens to me that prevents me from completing it. My plans are pretty much to get it out there, then come back later and edit what I do not doubt will be a mess.
In that way, I welcome reviews of any kind, especially ones that point put things I should fix. Am I making serious grammatical errors? Are all of my characters dull and unlikable? Did I create serious plot holes? Please inform me! That being said, I will not beg for reviews beyond this, so that was my last r&r request.
Same with the disclaimer: I do not own Pokemon or its characters in any way, form, or fashion beyond some bought merchandise, all rights go to the creators, and they always will for every chapter that I write.
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In his dreams, he was already a Pokemon Master. When he strutted out to the massive coliseum that he had seen only from watching battles tournaments on television, the crowd was cheering him and booing his opponent. The day was always absolutely perfect, but he also always had a cape that required a much stronger wind to flutter in such a dramatic way. Almost everything was consistent, with the exception of his opponents and his teams. Sometimes he would be facing opposite a random stranger, who would break from cold arrogance to sweating nervousness by the time their first Pokemon was knocked out. Occasionally he was facing a Gym Leader, or a member of the Elite Four, or even the Champion at one point. Mostly he faced off against Noah, or Julie, or Marisa. Noah would start out as infuriatingly relaxed as ever, and he'd send out a Snorlax since it was as lazy as him, but then Colton would release his Blastoise and beat it in one hit! Or Julie would be cockier than all of his other nameless opponents, but then his Charizard would outfly her Dragonite and send it slamming unconscious to the ground! Or even Marisa, who acted all smart and haughty, would send out an Alakazam due to it being the only thing that could keep up with her fast words and huge ego, and even it would be too weak to stand up to his Venusaur's Solar Beam! And after that they all would only have really weak Pokemon, but he would send out progressively rarer and more exotic Pokemon just to show off. By the end of the curbstomp battle they would be crying in the dust and he would be laughing in victory while the crowd chanted his name.
A majority of children who wished to become trainers had dreams like this, embarrassed as most of them were to admit it in the morning. A vast majority of them would never be able to achieve this goal, normally due to family circumstances leaving them unable or unwilling to go far from home, or the receiving of weak starters that gave them none of the crucial advantages that they would need if they weren't supremely talented in training. Only a select few had the privilege of being gifted with one of the official starters, and less than a handful of those didn't have some sort of family connections.
One of the otherwise few perks about living in Pallet Town was that Colton's family almost automatically gained those connections by way of being neighbors with Professor Oak himself.
Colton's dreams seemed all the more real with his future assured in such a way, and as he approached his tenth birthday they grew more frequent until every night he was living them. Soon he knew every scenario his mind came up with by heart, and he would daydream with memories of them during school. The teacher always caught him, since the class was so small, but since Noah tended to fall asleep as well she was always distracted by the other boy and forgot to give Colton any sort of real punishment. On those days when Noah asked to trade parts of his lame lunch Colton was a little more generous with his candy. That was the only time he acted in such a way, though, for even Noah had been caught up in the competitive spirit sweeping over the four children. Their other two classmates, Frank and Heidi, wouldn't be going on training journeys like the rest of the class, since Frank wanted to get a proper education and Heidi would become an apprentice for the Doduo mail system when she turned 13.
That was good for them, because it meant that Colton never really bothered with thoughts about smashing their self-esteem into the dust. Instead, he liked to think of them cheering him on, and sometimes Heidi coming in while riding a Doduo and asking him on a date with her. She was really pretty and nice, and he liked her so much more than the other girls. Of course, he would have to impress her if he wanted to be the one to win her affections, so he would release a Dodrio and they'd go off to some picnic or whatever on top of that.
Colton always slept later with those dreams, they were so nice. He never wanted to wake up from them. They caused him to be late for school, and he would waste the entire day away with thoughts of his love for Heidi, but really, he was just planning ahead what he would do once he achieved fame and fortune. Not surprisingly, he never really had a plan on how exactly he was going to achieve that fame and fortune. He would just choose a starter (which one, he still wasn't sure) and go off to his effortless adventure. No one could claim that he wasn't a dreamer, but no one could claim that he was being especially grand in those dreams, either. At least he never claimed that he was going to meet or capture Legendaries, although that was more due to how he had been raised rather than his lack of ambition. All the older folk shook their heads when his parents denied the existence of the Great Trios.
That didn't matter anymore, Colton was sure that he would find plenty of people that thought like he did, and then there wouldn't be anyone left to give him funny looks. And this would start tomorrow, too!
It took him far too long to fall asleep on his last night ever of being 9 years old. The excitement was far too much for him! Instead he clutched his stuffed Seel closer to his chest and tried to decide which starter he would choose. Of course he would get first pick, he'd arrive at the lab before the others for sure. His rivals had already chosen which Pokemon they wanted, so maybe he'd take one just to spite them. There were two Charmander reserved, so he might as well not bother since Julie would get one for sure, but he knew that Noah would want a Squirtle and Marisa a Bulbasaur. Ooh, he should take the Bulbasaur, he disliked Marisa more and knew that she'd hate having a Charmander as her starter…
When he finally drifted off, he dreamt of beating Marisa's Charizard with his Venusaur despite the type disadvantage. Afterwards Noah and Julie came to him and begged that he forgive them for ever being mean to him, and he would choose them as members of his Elite Four before sweeping Heidi off her feet and riding off into the sunset on a Dragonite.
The next morning, he woke up to see that he had forgotten to set his alarm clock, and that it was already mid-morning, over an hour past when Oak's lab opened for the day.