Disclaimer: Pokemon, I don't own it.
I said the next update would be pokemon and I remain true to my word.
For fans of this story, important author's note below.
In the eyes of many of his fellow trainers, Elijah was nothing more than a disgrace to the proud tradition of Pokémon training. He was not a typical trainer, or at least, he was not the right kind of typical trainer. There were the trainers who wanted to become famous, the trainers who wanted adventure and the trainers who viewed and treated each new Pokémon they caught as a friend. Elijah belonged to the class of trainer that was not in the trainer business for friendship, adventure or fame. Elijah belonged to the trainer class that was only in it, to win it, provided there was a hefty sum of prize money at the end.
Elijah had just turned ten when he realized that there was a whole Pokémon training world out there and, this was the important part, he could make money in it. Money was the magic word to Elijah. His sister did the best she could but Elijah was aware, now more than ever, of the consequences and toll his sister's job took out of her. She was tired all the time; exhausted was really the word for it and she never really smiled any more. Elijah vowed to get a job himself so that his sister wouldn't have to work so hard or worry so much. But he was too young to go work at a normal pay-rate job, and no store in the town would hire him given the social stigma attached to his sister and by extension himself as well. That was why, when he figured out how exactly Pokémon battles worked, especially in regards to winners and losers, he considered it the best day ever. And not just because it was the day he became a Pokémon trainer.
That day, was his tenth birthday. His sister had managed to arrange to have the day off. Traditionally, his sister would try to have his birthday free, so that she could spend all day with him. A rare treat for Elijah. If it was a school day, she called him in sick and the three, for Channeler was always included, would sleep in late on the mattress that served as their bed, then go out to the cheap diner for brunch. During the afternoon, if tips had been particularly good that week, Elijah might be allowed to pick a new toy or book from the small store downtown, if the tips hadn't been good, then the three walked home and lazed about watching cartoons together and eating ice cream. And so the day would go. This past birthday his sister had walked with him down to the local police station, and stood by proudly as he had filled out the forms to register both himself as a trainer and Channeler as his starter Pokémon.
The important revelation came on the way back. One of Elijah's schoolmates had challenged him to a battle with his shiny new geodude. Undoubtedly Elijah had been challenged because as everyone knew, Abra only had one attack, teleport, making Elijah and Channeler easy prey for experience. However, while it was true that wild abra only knew teleport, Channeler was not a wild abra. He was an abra from the kanto game corner and the game corner would not have had an ordinary every day abra as the grand prize. And so, two lessons were learned that day. The first, of never underestimating your opponent, even if he was the poor social outcast, came when the geodude went down after an onslaught of ice punches. And the second came when the new trainer recalled his geodude and grudgingly held out a small wad of money to Elijah.
Elijah, bewildered, accepted the cash, which while not a lot, was still more than Elijah himself had ever handled. His sister explained to him that on losing a battle with another trainer, the loser was required to give the winner exactly half of the cash they had on them. It was like another world had opened before him. As the other trainer jogged off to the Pokémon center, Elijah had tried to give his winnings to his sister. But she had refused, saying that it was his birthday, and he and Channeler had won the money, so they should spend it on something for themselves. Elijah spent the money on an empty greatball, the beginnings of a plan already in his head.
Later that night, as his sister slept soundly beside him and Channeler lay against his side, Elijah pulled out the thick information packet given to him with his trainer license and began to read. Originally he had planned to not go on a trainer journey. Buying clothes, gear and supplies for the journey would be costly, as well as having money sent to him to continue buying food, and other necessities, and he would be gone from home for who knew how long. Elijah had elected to stay at home to keep his sister company and to not cause her more worry or stress than necessary. But now he was starting to re-think his decision. By the time the grey light of the early morning lit the small apartment room, Elijah had a plan. He would go out and be a traveling trainer. Trainers fought battles and winning battles meant getting money. Money, which would be sent home to his sister, and then she wouldn't have to work so hard and be sad all the time. Genius! Of course winning small trainer battles wasn't good enough in the long term. He planned to enter tournaments. Tournaments always had good cash prizes, even for those who only made the top three and maybe even one day he could qualify for a gym trainer position. But to get that far, he would need a team of six Pokémon, all the badges in order to qualify for more advanced and therefore more expensive tournaments and he would need a lot of training. But first things were first.
He broke the news about changing his mind and becoming a traveling trainer to his sister over breakfast. Elijah had expected a reaction of course; he had just not expected this particular reaction. Elijah had expected his sister to be upset, angry, annoyed, any number of negative emotions in fact, he had prepared arguments and counter arguments. He had not expected her to smile so wide it hurt just looking at her and then envelope him in a bone crushing hug with tears gathering at the corners of her eyes. This obviously confused Elijah at first, but when his sister pulled back from the over enthusiastic hug, she saw his face and laughed, ruffling his hair.
"I thought you were going to stay behind because of me," She explained, still smiling. "As much as I'm going to miss you, I want you to go out and do something normal kids do Eli." Elijah was only ever Eli for her. "You'll meet kids your own age, who aren't from around here. And well, I never got the chance to go on my own journey, you'll just have to call and write often so I can live it out through you. Deal?" Elijah had nodded, still slightly shell-shocked. He was further shocked and touched when his sister walked him down to the bank later that morning and showed him the account she had secretly been putting a tiny bit of money in here and there over the years. An account just for him, so that he could buy food and supplies and have a space to store his own money.
"It's just for you Eli." She said, as they picked out basic supplies, Channeler hanging on Elijah's back like a baby chimchar, fast asleep. "I was going to transfer it over to you when you turned eighteen if you stayed home. But this will see you off and through a good first part if you budget correctly, and I know you know how to do that." Elijah had been flustered in his own way, reflexively smoothing down the bangs that hung over his dark eyes with a slight blush on his cheeks. His sister had only laughed, reaching out to ruffle his hair again. "What kind of guardian would I be if I didn't do this for you?" She had said, smiling fondly down at him as they left the last store, Elijah's arms full of their purchases and 'what kind of brother would I be, if I didn't do this for you?' running through his head.
Elijah spent one last night at home and left early the next morning. All the other new trainers had already gone and it was just his sister to see him off. She hugged him, kissed him on the cheek, stroked Channeler's head fondly and then stepped back. "Good luck Elijah, and remember I'm very proud of you. Don't forget to write." Elijah nodded, not quite trusting himself to speak, and with Channeler once again clinging to his back, turned around and walked out of the village and into the world of Pokémon training.
Ah-ha, you guys caught me in a pretty awkward place. Originally I had not planned to continue this, like at all. But when submitting what I intended to be the first and only chapter, I forgot to click the story complete button. Whoops. And then you crazy readers had to favorite, comment and story alert didn't you? Be honest. It was because of the strippers wasn't it? I got more first view clicks on this baby than any of my other stories at the time. Back on track, I wrote out this second piece because I felt bad. I even have a third piece written a little bit.
But here's the thing guys: I'm a very bad author. Not as in writing bad, but I get distracted easily. I have upwards of five or six fanfiction projects I'm working on, not all of them will get finished or see the light of the internet. What I'm trying to say is, don't expect too much. I don't have any big plans for Elijah. At most I'll cover him catching a few pokemon, and then cover how he wound up in the Gym leader race. But I just don't have a really good plot line for him and I don't want to fall into the generic follow the OC through the trainer journey story. I'm bad at planning out novel length stories, I'm a short story, sprinter type writer. So I'm trying to plan this out as snap-shots. Maybe five in total. We'll see how it goes.
~Illusion-Factory