-Merging Reality-

Quickly glancing away from the television and onto his iPhone, Rio had the subtlest of smiles on his face as the credits of an all too familiar show played. It just brought back so much memories, it was so nostalgic. He would admit though, the first seasons were way better than what they were showing now. How long they were able to keep it going, he was just amazed by it. The same show he watched religiously growing up was having the same effect on his little brother as it did him.

"Woaaa! I was Pokémon were real! It would be just so awesome." A little kid on the floor squealed as he rolled over and jumped up to face his older brother who did his best to seem disinterested, just sprawled out on the couch on his phone. The little boy appeared no older than seven years old and was wearing a bright red and orange Charizard t-shirt. Even from a distance, one could instantly tell they were brothers. They both had black, shiny, slightly curly hair in the same falling-over-to-right, part faux hawk, part plain old messy hairstyle. Both had the same shade of light brown eyes, their faces virtually identical. If one compared a photo of Rio of when he was seven to his brother now, not even their parents could tell the difference 100%. It was a little freakish for Rio how similar they appeared.

"Come on don't tell me you where on your phone the whole time, you promised you would watch it with me! Don't go back on your word" Rio was a little taken back by his brother. He may have been only seven but at times he spoke like someone way beyond his years.

"No, yeah, I watched it, it was alright."

"Liar."

In reality, Rio did actually watch the whole show, though he wouldn't admit to such a thing. It was just the same old Ash Ketchum travelling through some new region except with different people this time. He was a little disappointed to see that there would be no Brock but oh well. That guy needed to get laid and fast though since it was a kid's show and all, there was no chance of that ever happening. Rio pondered a little during the show as to how it would be like to meet a real life Brock. Whether he'd be completely freaked out, creeped out, in awe of, or pissing himself laughing, he had absolutely no idea. It would be interesting to say the least, though he'd have so much pity for the guy.

"Juli, come on, I'm here aren't I?" He responded to his little brother who just sighed and got out his DS and continued playing Pokémon Black. Seriously, his little brother was addicted to it, in his room was filled with posters of different Legendaries and species.

"Fine. But it would be cool if it were real." Juli mumbled just loud enough for Rio to hear.

It was true, if Pokémon were real, life would be just so much more awesome. Whilst he wasn't as addicted to it as his little brother was, Rio enjoyed playing it and watching old re-runs of the first seasons of the anime from time to time, and even enjoyed reading his fair share of fanfic about it. He had actually thought about this recently and had a dream about it a night or two ago which kinda scared Rio a little. Maybe he should take a break from it for awhile, you know, and study for tests or something.

"Well Juli, if Pokémon were real, what sort of trainer would you be?" Rio asked Juli, not wanting to have his little bro be in a bad mood. It instantly worked too as Juli put down his DS and jumped back up in an instant.

"A fire trainer of course! Fire Pokémon are the best!"

Rio let out a soft chuckle at his little brother's response. In every generation, every game his little brother would play, Juli would always, always with no hesitation, pick the fire starter straight away. Well he was probably the influence for it anyways. Just before his brother started playing it, Rio was going through a 'Fire-type phase', as he liked to call it. His little brother would watch him play and then just started picking the fire types from then on. Simple as that and it stuck with him whilst Rio had moved on from fire to dragon to flying. Now he was more or less a mixture of the two whilst leaning more towards flying type. Just the ability to fly anywhere in the world intrigued him so much, he began to fall in love with them.

"Yeah thought you would say that, typical. Though if Pokémon were real, it would be really cool. I wouldn't be going to school and doing homework and instead travelling the world and exploring and battling other people." Rio stated with a soft sigh.

"YEAH! Exactly! No more evil teachers!" Juli excitedly exclaimed.

Rio chuckled yet again and turned back to his phone. He hadn't realized this but for some reason he was searching through the app store for pokédexes. Why? He had no idea, he didn't have any use for it. If his friends saw that on his phone, he would not hear the end of it but still, it seemed kinda cool to him. If pokemon were real, he wouldn't be using a pokédex, he would be using his iPhone. It seemed more convenient and sleeker and better looking. Maybe an iPhone with the infused technology of both machines but no, that wouldn't be available for years, decades really, if human and Pokémon technology did really exist.

It was later that evening when Rio went for his usual little run through their local park when he first spotted it. There was quite the gathering of different small brown and grey birds around the trees. Not that it seemed too out of place but it just, the birds had something off about them. Rio was forced to double take on one of the branches higher up and he couldn't believe it.

The size of the bird was considerably greater of the others and appeared very similar to one of the smaller brown birds although its size still wasn't all that big. Yet, for a bird, especially ones around these suburban parts, it was big. If weren't for the fact that he knew that this way real life and there was no way Pokémon existed, Rio swore he had just seen a Pidgeotto, the pre-evolution of one of his favourite Pokémon, a Pidgeot. He must of have just being seeing things he decided as he jogged past and out of the park. There was no way he could accept the sight his eyes showed him. It was just a regular bird, more than a few Pokémon were indeed based after real animals after all.

He couldn't shake it from his mind though the entire trip back home. It was so real yet surreal, kinda like the dream he had, although, with different Pokémon.

Once he got home, Rio didn't exactly know how to react in the situation that he was presented with. His mother was in the kitchen, looking extremely pale and breathing slowly and deeply whilst Juli just danced around cheerfully and excitedly, beaming a giant grin that could not be removed even with plastic surgery.

"What... Happened?" He let out slowly with a pause in between, giving him time to survey the household to see if anything was out of place.

"We just saw a giant... purple rat" Rio's mother stated as she collected herself, fighting the urge to cuss in front of her youngest son. No, she wasn't one of those mothers and she had to set a good example to her kids.

"Mum, how many times do I have to tell you? It's called a Rattata! And! And! Rio, I SAW A REAL POKEMON!"

Rio remained silent and just stared at him wide-eyed, as if in shock. Had this been any other day and he would of just laughed it off and told his brother he was crazy and that t Pokémon weren't real, no matter how hard he wished or how cool it would be. You know? Like any other normal 16 year old would probably say. Though since what he saw in the park, he wasn't too sure and it all felt like some crazy, screwed up dream like the last one he had.

"Ugh... I'm just going to go to my room" Rio released those words from his mouth finally after remaining silent for a moment or so. He wasn't going to respond to what his family had just said, he was just feeling all too insane. It couldn't possibly be true. Could it really?

Flopping onto the bed, Rio just stared up at his ceiling as he inserted two headphones into his ear, one in each and pressed play on a random song on his phone. He wanted to clear his mind, let it be completely blank so he could rest but it was no use, it was going a million miles an hour, as the saying goes.

Sitting up, Rio caught in the corner of his eyes, his laptop sleeping peacefully on his desk, as if it was perfectly were it belonged. Well a little research never hurt anybody... well except for a few movies. Well maybe a lot of movies but you get the picture, he was curious. Firing it up as he brought it over onto his bed, Rio felt crazy but there was no one around seeing what he was doing, he needed something to put his mind at rest.

After searching online for around half an hour, Rio was ready to give up, kicking himself for believing for a moment that Pokémon may be real. There was nothing, absolutely nothing about it anywhere until he stumbled across a little link redirecting him to some blog. The latest entry had the today's date on it and as he continued to read on, his eyes widened and he was forced to separate himself from the screen. It started off with the blogger rambling on about his feelings how crap things were with something or another but towards the end, it just hit him.

"So now I'm starting to feel a little insane and such but I think, no I'm certain I saw a Pokémon in real life today. It was right in front of me and I touched it before it ran away. There's no doubt in my mind, I saw a real life Bellsprout. As crazy as it sounds, I think Pokemon are in fact, real. I wonder if this has happened to anyone else or am I in fact going crazy? "

The blog continued on for a little longer but Rio could read no longer. Someone else had seen Pokémon; he wasn't the only one crazy in the world. Scrolling down, Rio noticed there was quite the number of comments, around 20 or so. Whilst most consisted of calling the blogger crazy amongst a mixture of colourful profanities and insults, there were a few that agreed with him or her. They posted that they had also seen a Pokémon or several Pokémon in a couple of occasions, along with what they had seen. One claimed they saw a group of Bidoof near a river, another said a Sentret and Caterpie, someone else said a Spearow and a Zigzagoon and the last person said a family of Patrat.

A couple things that he noticed were that were a mixture of Pokémon from all the different regions and that these were all really just common Pokémon. Pokémon that were ok when you caught once but just got annoying as hell when you tried searching in tall grass for that one poke and they just kept on popping up every single time. He was surprised to see no one had seen a Zubat yet though, that could just mean no one had gone cave exploring lately.

Rio decided to sign up for the blog. He might as well as comment to say what other Pokémon he had seen. Reflecting back, he tried to remember what he had exactly seen. He knew he saw a Pidgeotto and also several Pidgey. The gray birds he wasn't sure but he remembered there were two different gray birds. Wondering what they could have been, Rio's mind clicked. Pidove and Starly. Three different birds from three different regions. Perhaps Rio should consider himself lucky. They were even flying types as well, his favourite type.

The next thing he had trouble with was thinking of a username. He wanted something cool and not just any random thing that popped into his head. It had to say something about him but he wasn't sure what. A whole ten minutes had passed without Rio typing a single letter into the box provided for the username. As he began thinking about things he liked and things that might describe him, Rio's mind began to make connections. His three favourite types? Fire, Dragon and mainly Flying types. Perhaps he could make something out of those three words? Within the minute, Rio was off filling in the rest of the appropriate information with his new username finally decided: FireDragonfly.

Relieved to see his name not taken and his account all set up, Rio returned to the blog to see a couple more comments posted, not that they had seen any Pokémon and just voiced their opinions of how "retarded" the blogger was. Seriously was all these people did just stalk blogs and hate on them? Sheesh.

Scrolling up for a moment to remember the blogger's name, Rio began to type up his comment.

"Hey CauselessManiac08, I also thought I was going crazy but like a few others I have also seen Pokemon in real life. Though this feels like a dream or that I'm just hallucinating like crazy, I also feel that it is all real as well. But in my nearby park, I encountered several Pidgey, Starly and Pidove . I also saw one Pidgeotto. Yet since I believed I was going crazy I let them be, but I know I saw them. When I returned home, I was also shocked to discover that my mum and lil bro had also seen a Rattata. Just what is going on?"

Confident with his little message, Rio closed his laptop after it sent and just laid back down on his bed, placing his laptop on the floor. This was a lot to take in if it was true after all, and had for some reason or another, exhausted him. Too much freaky things happening for one day. Rio decided it would be best just to sleep it off and deal with it in the morning. Yes, just sleep on it, he would deal with it in the morning, when he had the energy to. Besides, he needed to give time for the internet people to reply.

A/N: Well I just basically wanted to give my go at what it would be like if pokemon suddenly appeared in real life. Thank you for reading if you have! Feedback, criticisms, what you liked what you didn't like all welcome, I would like to know what people think of it!