"That is the tenth lost in a row..." A teenage boy with shoulder length red hair sighed. He was sitting on a bench with his head down sulking. He was resting in the pokemon center in Violet city as he had lost to the gym leader Falkner, for his third time. It was late morning, the sun shining brightly though the windows of the building.

"I can't be that bad of a trainer right? I'm always trying my best to win." the boy whispered to himself. He glanced over at the TV and there was a commercial playing that had Professor Elm talking about the starter pokemon for new trainers. You simply had to go sign up in New Bark Town. It wasn't that far from here actually. He could go back and get one... but they might find out he ran from home. He couldn't risk it. Anything would be better than going back to live with that deadbeat dad of his.

He wiped his hands off on his blue jeans and stood up, hearing the alert that sounds to tell you that your pokemon are finished being treated. He crept his way to the counter and put his hands on the counter, while waiting for the nurse to come out.

"Your pokemon are all healed up." The nurse tells the boy as she walks up with a smile, putting the tray, holding his only pokemon mawile on the counter.

"Thanks, nurse joy." The teen told her. He grabbed his pokeball and started to walk away as nurse joy raised an eyebrow and stopped him. She'd seen him a lot lately and he always had a disgruntled look on his face. She tended to make it her job to not involve herself in other people's business, but she decided to make an exception this time. Something didn't seem right about him.

"Wait a minute." Nurse Joy called after the young trainer with a stern tone as she fixed him with a steady gaze. With a slight twitch of the eye he slowly turned around to look at the nurse, right into her blue eyes. He could tell she was being serious.

"Yes?" He asked her, trying his best not to sound annoyed. She was already cutting into his training time and it was pissing him off.

"Is everything ok? You've been coming here a lot recently. Are you in some kind of trouble?" He gave her the most fake smile he could muster.

"No, everything is fine. We're just having a tough time at Falkner's gym." He tried to smooth it out as fast as possible. He didn't need this right now. Why couldn't she just leave him alone?!

She lowered her eyes at him. Seems she didn't completely buy into what he was saying but didn't press any further.

"You know, you could always ask other trainers around here for advice. Also, I noticed that you have only one pokemon. Why not try to catch more? That usually makes things a lot easier than just trying to sweep with just one pokemon." The boy started clenching his fist as other random people nearby started to take notice. He needed to get out of here fast, as he was really getting pissed off now. Where does she get off butting into his business like this?! She should just shut up and fix my pokemon when I need it. That's what she's here for. The irate teen thought to himself. He decided it was best to bite his tongue for now as he didn't want to get any more attention than he already has.

Besides, even if he wanted to catch more pokemon, he couldn't because those cost money and he didn't have any. Seeing as he left without taking anything but the bare minimum. His father didn't leave any money around the house for him to steal so he was out of luck. At the very least he got free meals from the pokemon center but this nurse was already getting suspicious of him.

"That's a good idea, I think I'll give it try!" He blurted out as he quickly made his way out of the building before she could say another word.

As he left the building he started to run outside the city and into the nearby field on route 30, while he mumbled to himself, asking what was that nurse's problem to himself on the way. He headed deeper into the bushes and took a look around to make sure there wasn't anyone around.

"Come out Mawile." The teen called as he threw his pokeball into the air, and out came his loyal partner.

Mawile gave him a low-spirited smile. The red haired teen gave the pokemon a most cross look in return.

"If it wasn't for you..." he kicked the little pokemon to the ground "being so damn weak!" he continued his assault on the poor thing, as it started to cry.

"Shut up!" He fumed as he kicked his companion harder. His body was starting to shake from the anger and his mawile, shaking from fear.

"You are completely useless! Can't even beat a weak pidgey!" The red haired trainer screamed louder, stomping the poor thing. Mawile continued crying and whimpering in desperation, the sounds becoming muffled as he knelt to the ground and covered the pokemon's mouth, starting to choke it.

"You are going to win, you hear me? You are going to win no matter what... if you don't..." Mawile made small gagging noises as it gasped for air, flailing it's arms around. After a few seconds the sounds of struggling had stopped. It finally gave up. Losing strength in it's body, it fell limp with a soft thud.

He finally let go once he noticed it stopped moving and stood up, throwing a few pieces of pokemon food pellets on the ground. After laying there for a few pregnant moments and letting out a few coughs, mawile slowly crawled over and frantically ate all of it.

"Let's see some attacks."

Mawile looked up at him desperately, as if asking him to stop.

"What are you looking at huh?! You'll get more when you put in more work!" After staring at the ground for a minute and wiping it's face, mawile got up and weakly attacked a tree.

"Keep going and use more power! You call that an attack?! Do it harder!"

A few hours passed and it was already afternoon. After some more beatings he put mawile back into it's pokeball after it passed out from exhaustion. He wandered around, lost in thought for a while. There had to be a way to get stronger he thought to himself. Mawile was losing every single battle in spite of the training. What was he doing wrong exactly? But he was hungry, he need to get something to eat. Maybe afterward he'll find a trainer to battle.

–-

"Hey come on! I'm gonna leave you behind!" A boy yelled to me as he flew down the long flight of stairs. I was always impressed at how athletic he was. Everything was so easy for him. I quickly ran after him as fast as I could but lost my footing in my haste and tumbled down in a most ungraceful way. I made loud thumping sounds on my way down and he heard this, turning around and noticing me falling.

"Oh no, watch out!" He panicked as he threw himself on the carpet, skidding hard in front of the stairs to catch me like a baseball player. His shoulder length red hair had become frazzled, falling all around his face in a mess as I tumbled right into his arms and he winced as held me while standing back up.

"You okay?" The boy asked as he squeezed me tightly. He had bright red carpet burns on his arms from where he slid on the carpet. I gently placed my hand on his left arm without thinking and he winced. I looked back into his gray eyes with a doleful expression. He hurt himself to save me again...

A big goofy grin quickly appeared on his face, trying to hide how much it hurt. He would always do this. It didn't fool me anymore.

"It's nothing! Don't worry about it!" He exclaimed while making his way into the living room. I shook my head and wriggled free from his arms and dragged him into the bathroom. He kept saying how it's no big deal as I pulled him inside, but I wasn't having any of it.

His father was still gone from yesterday and his mother was still somewhere faraway according to his father. So it was up to me to take care of him. This is how it was most days. Just me and him alone in this house. I could tell Lyle was a bit lonely even if he never showed it.

I opened the cabinet below the sink and grabbed the first aid kit. I had the small boy sit on the stool in the room and hold out his arms. Luckily he was wearing a short sleeve dark blue shirt, so he didn't need to take it off. Then I grabbed the basin that was sitting next to the bathtub and turned on the faucet, filling it with cold water. This was also a good chance to wash my own hands.

"Come on Plum I'm fine. You don't need to do this." Always playing the tough and cool kid. I ignored him and brought the basin filled with cool water under his outstretched arms and raised it until they were submerged. He let out a small yowl as the burns were covered in cool water. Not such a tough kid now are you?

I kept him like this for ten minutes. But they weren't quiet as he told me about the things he learned in school today. He didn't have many friends and he would always say that I'm the only one who understands him. Which is funny since we can't actually talk to each other. But we did communicate easily enough.

It's already been a year since his father Walter found me in the middle of nowhere and brought me home with him. I don't remember anything before then. I was introduced to his son Lyle who took a shine to me almost right away. We became fast friends. Everyday we would play together after he got home from school. He didn't have a pokeball, so I had to stay in the house alone while I waited for him to come back. Even though they told me not to, I would follow him out anyway or sneak out sometimes to go play with a friend that I had made. Though that friend insisted that we were brother and sister. I played along to make him happy. I wanted to introduce him to Lyle but he insisted that he didn't want to interact with humans. I decided to respect his wishes.

I checked the clock in the room and the minute hand had moved ten marks. There were a lot of things I had to learn when I came to live here. Since his father wasn't home that often, I decided to learn a bunch of things to help Lyle. Telling time and first aid were just a few of them. Lyle was always hurting himself with his recklessness. I wanted to help him.

I took away the basin and dumped the water. Opening the first aid kit, I grabbed the burn ointment from inside. I took the cap off and smelled it to make sure. While I did learn how to read a little bit from Lyle, there were tons of words I couldn't quite make out yet. Reading was difficult. The talking part was practically impossible for me. We had to use a memory method of learning words.

Pressing the tube between both my hands, I squeezed out a line of the ointment on his arms. Then I gently rubbed it into his skin. It seemed to have a soothing effect as he didn't react as badly this time.

"That feels nice..." He sighed as he closed his eyes. I smiled at him and decided I wanted to give him a little reward. I quickly finished up, wiping my hands off on a towel and grabbed the cotton pads and bandages from the first aid kit. For each arm I placed cotton pads over the burns and wrapped them up in bandages. This wasn't the first time I had to do this, so I was already used to it. Lyle was watching me with wide eyes the whole time.

After I was done I smiled and lead him into the living room. The entire room was lit up in an orange hue from the sun. Looks like it was going to get dark soon.

I made him sit down in front of the sofa and wait with one of my firm death glares. He patiently waited while I ran upstairs to his room and grabbed his comb and brush. His reward was going to be me brushing and combing his hair. And maybe playing with it...

He almost never did it himself and it would be a complete disaster if I did nothing. I had to wonder why he kept it this long if he wasn't going to take proper care of it.

When I got back down, I jumped up on the couch behind him and patted him on the head for waiting patiently like a good boy. He complained that I was treating him like a baby, but he quickly shut up once I started to run my hands through his hair. From what I understood, it wasn't very common for male humans to have long hair like this. It was really soft and silky to the touch. It was also parted down the middle so it didn't cover his face. Truthfully, I really liked to play with his hair. Which is probably why I didn't mind fixing it for him all the time. And I had a feeling he liked it when I did it for him, which might be why he rarely did it himself.

I first grabbed the plastic comb with my right hand and slowly ran it through his tangled knots. I went even slower when I found a knot so as to not hurt him. Lyle was making content murmurs throughout this whole thing. After a few minutes of this, all the knots were out and I replaced the comb in my hand for the brush. I don't know what it was made of but it was slightly firm, but also pretty soft as well. A weird balance between the two. I ran my left hand throughout his hair again. There we go, now all it needs is a good brush.

I used a technique of first running though the hair with the brush softly, and then rubbing the area with my hand right after. I doubt this did anything better, but Lyle seemed to really like it. I continued like this quietly for a while, occasionally stopping to pull away a stray hair. I glanced down at his face, and he was already nodding off. I couldn't help but chuckle quietly at him. I decided to keep going until he was all the way asleep.

–-

I quickly awoke with a start. Where am I? I could swear I was just with Lyle in the den. Was all that a dream? I don't know, but it was dark. I could barely make anything out in front of me. There was a distinct moist and musky smell and the ground was made of solid granite. I tapped my foot against it to make sure. I then took a few steps forward into the darkness before crashing into something. I jumped back in surprise and extended my arms to feel it. It was hard and solid like the floor beneath me. It was just a wall. Don't freak out I told myself.

I glanced around again. The only thing I could make out was the shadowy and soupy silhouettes everywhere. They all blended together. Every so often I heard an echoing drip sound. Like a droplet of water falling in the distance in a cavern. Yes that's where I was. A cave. But how did I get here? How long have I been here? I tried to remember but my mind was blank.

I looked over my body. Just another shadowy silhouette due to the lack of lighting. I raised my right hand and placed it on the top of my head. After reaching around I felt something protruding out the top of it. I traced my hand along the protrusion, and felt an opening. It was rather long, I couldn't reach across the entire thing with my hand. It also had sharp fangs inside of it. It was like a mouth. That was on my head. I wonder if I could move it. I tried and the mouth slowly opened and closed. That was weird. This doesn't seem right. I moved my hand down the rest of my body. It was soft. But rather small. Almost like it was much smaller than I expected.

No wait, this felt familiar. Oh yes, I was inside a pokeball. My pokeball. The fabricated scenery around me told me as much. This time it was a cavern. It was so dark. Plus I was all alone. But everything was starting to come back. Lyle set the pokeball to a dark cave as a punishment. He was so angry from losing again that he beat me and made me train until I passed out. With barely any food.

I instantly started crying, remembering my dream. He's changed so much that the time from before was all but a dream now. He just keeps me inside here now and only lets me out to eat and fight. The tears just kept coming. I wiped my face over and over but they wouldn't stop. This was like a nightmare. I was trapped in here until Lyle decided to use me again. I couldn't even remember the last time he called me by my name.

Suddenly there was a voice echoing in the cave. It was Lyle. Before I even came out he was already calling an attack. Please... no more, I can't do this anymore...

I was suddenly surrounded by blinking light and felt something pulling on my body.

–-

"Go Mawile use bite!" Lyle yelled as he threw a pokeball. The small pokemon appeared in a state of confusion before realizing it's situation. It had tear stained cheeks but nobody seemed to notice. It slowly made it's way to it's opponent, a fairly small green gecko looking pokemon.

As the mawile approached it's target it waved the jaw like appendage on it's head to bite at it's opponent.

"Treecko! Dodge it!" Another young trainer yelled, this one with brown hair, wearing blue jean shorts and a white t-shirt. As the boy finished yelling his command his partner Treecko, easily dodged the attack aimed at it.

"Yeah! Now use pound!" The same trainer yelled right afterward while pointing at the mawile. The small gecko pokemon quickly made it's way over to the opposing mawile, who was stumbling from the missed bite attack. As he got closer the treecko leaped high into the air and slammed his tail on the head of his opponent who fell down, knocked out in one hit.

"Yes! I win again!" The brown haired boy screamed with enthusiasm, while jumping up and down.

"I can't believe I lost again..." The red haired trainer said as he fell to the ground, pounding his fist into the ground.

"Hey." The brown haired boy said as he pointed his finger at the red haired young man. He looked up and glared at the boy.

"That is one weak mawile man. I mean it's a steel type and it can't even take attacks it's supposed to be resistant against!" The boy said as he started to laugh. Lyle started growling.

"You should get rid of that weakling." The young trainer told the losing trainer as he started walking off with his treecko right behind him.

As soon as the boy was out of sight, the young man got to his feet and walked over to his defeated pokemon.

"Hey get up." the boy called to his pokemon but there was no response. The mawile appeared to be out cold.

"Hmph, return you weakling." The boy mumbled as he started to pull out a pokeball to call it back but then he stopped.

"That guy was right, you are a weakling and I should just leave you here. I might have better luck with one of professor elm's starter pokemon..." the red haired teen mumbled to himself as he put away his pokeball and proceeded to walk away, leaving the pokemon out cold on the field they were in.

–-

I slowly opened my eyes, feeling a sharp pain throughout my body. It felt like a train had hit me.

As the pain vanished, I managed to slowly pull myself to my feet. I started to get a good look at my surroundings and I noticed it was dark. I seem to be waking up in darkness a lot lately.

I rubbed my throbbing head, the pain making it's known return. I took another look around me and the more I looked around, the more I worried I got. This wasn't a cave, so I wasn't in my pokeball. I was in some kind of field. Lyle was nowhere to be found either.

I pulled my arms around me as I felt a cold breeze blow by. Did he just leave me here? I knew he was always saying he was going to abandon me, but I figured he was always just saying it to get me to try harder I suppose. Guess he wasn't lying.

I perked up a little, HA! What do I need him for? He only took care of me, grew up with me, fed me, and is everything I've ever known... but he also beat me, abused me, and yelled a lot...

It wasn't always like this. When he was little he was always so nice and caring, always playing with me.

Everything first began when he turned thirteen and started high school. And it only got worse from there. I knew how hard it was for him to learn the truth about his mother, that she was no longer alive. Coupled with his father slowly becoming a belligerent drunk.

I wanted to stay by his side and support him. I wanted to make him feel better.

But eventually it all became too much. He started to take everything out on me. All the anger, frustration and sorrow.

These last two years I just thought if I endured the abuse long enough and gave him as much kindness as I could muster, he could make it though the pain.

I was wrong.

I failed. I failed. I failed. I failed. I failed. I failed.

I FAILED TO HELP HIM!

And what did I get for all that patience and kindness? Nothing. I was used up and thrown away like a piece of trash. Did all the years we spent together mean nothing to him!?

I'm all alone in the dark and no one is coming for me. I'm all on my own now. I'm just a weak pokemon nobody cares about anymore.

Tears began to flood from my eyes again and I furiously wiped them, but it was no use. I couldn't stop crying. My emotions were already at a fever pitch, wanting to release everything that I've felt for these last two years.

I screamed into the darkness with everything I had.


Hi. This is the start of a rewrite that I'm doing for abandoned. You can read the first version if you like, but it's pretty bad I'm warning you. This was my attempt to make it better as you would call it. If it works out, great. If not, that's fine too. I was going to just wait until I finished everything but I wanted to gauge this first chapter at least.