Chapter 1: Waking Up to Reality

3rd person POV.

"Uuuuuuhhh my head."

The face of a young boy grimaced in pain as a hand shot up to grasp the side of his head.

Bleary vermillion eyes blinked open as the boy tried to gather his bearings.

The black pupils of his eyes narrowed into a draconic slit as he came into focus.

"Gah!"

A grunt of pain escaped his parched and cracked lips as his mind cleared enough for the other pains in his body to register.

"What the fuck is going on?"

He blinked his eyes and looked down before he sucked in a breath of air at the sight of his left shoulder and upper arm steaming from a bright red looking burn.

The skin was burned off in sections showing the muscle underneath as blood, dry and fresh mixed over the wounds and scabbed over.

"Is this…my arm..?"

The more he looked at the burnt skin the more the pain registered as he realized it wasn't just his shoulder and arm but his neck and face was hurting as well.

His breathing started to quicken as the rush of pain and confusion was making him panic.

"What's… whats going on? Who am I? Where am I?"

He started hyperventilating and looking around with wild eyes before a string of memory was pulled to the front of his mind.

"Stay calm son. Remember, in the midst of chaos and movement, you must stay calm. A calm mind can be the deciding factor between victory and defeat."

The memory came and went like a flash but the words stuck true and the boy grasped onto the thought like a life line.

He shut his eyes, put his hand on his chest, and took deep breaths to slow down and emptied his mind to forget the pain.

Minutes passed as he struggled to calm before with a final deep and shuddering breath, his heart rate calmed and he opened his eyes once more.

1st person POV:

'*Pheeww*, stay calm. Ignore the pain, understand my situation.'

My mind was a mess of memories that only served to confuse me but certain things flashed by multiple times.

Faces, ideas, words, they all flowed by and began forming fragments of memories that I could process.

A man.

'My father?'

I couldn't recall his face but he was a short and stocky man.

He was… a Marine. A retired U.S. marine.

A single parent after my mother passed.

His taught me many things including how to remain calm whenever I panicked.

'I was… in college? Yes, yeah, I was in school.'

My father wanted me to join the military after I finished my education.

'He was a good man.'

A second memory flashed by of a different man, smiling with a goofy look at me.

He was tall and thin and wearing a pair of gardening gloves while his shirt had dirt over it.

'Wait… this is my father? Two dad's? What is this California? No… they, both are my blood parents…how..'

Broken memories, pieces of them were trying to connect as one dragged another to the front of my mind like a web.

'My father… a botanist… studied the connection between Pokemon and plant life…..wait…Pokemon?'

I almost gasped in agony as that single thought brought on a wave of other broken memory fragments.

'This… I'm a child? I was… my parents are Pokemon researchers… my mother researched….space? distortion? I can't remember.'

The memories kept flashing by.

'Am I a child or a college student?'

Two sets of broken memories, one of a child with loving parents and another as a young adult with a single parent.

'Name…what is my name?'

My head pounded but I was desperate for a name.

I wanted to know who I was.

What was happening.

But I couldn't remember.

The names weren't coming.

Not my own or the ones of anyone else in the memories.

I grunted in annoyance and balled up my fists.

'Fine, no name. What and where am I?'

I looked down at my body.

My short limbs and small torso.

'I'm definitely a child. How old I can't tell.'

I looked around the area I sat.

I was in some dark place.

The walls and floors were a mix of wood and metal.

My eyes could make out the shapes of crates and…cages? Around my spot.

It was hard to see what they were as tarps were covering them.

There was a slight movement to the floor that I recalled.

'Water? Ship. I'm on a ship!... why am I on a ship?'

I shook my head before grimacing as the pain flared up again from my action.

'*Tsss…* let's not do that again.'

I looked to my sides and saw scorch marks on the metal ground.

'What happened here? What happened to me?'

The question lit the spark of a gunpowder keg as my mind flashed again.

More memory fragments flashing by.

'I… didn't I… I fell? No, that was the first set of memories.

I died from a fall. I was rock climbing in the mountains with some friends when a rusted anchor snapped off the wall and dropped me.

I was between anchors when it happened and it was too fast.

I was caught off guard and fell. I can't remember what happened after that.

I recall…. Darkness?'

It was hard to describe the feeling but it wasn't bad per say. Something dark but comforting.

'Is that what death felt like?'

My mind flashed as the second pair of memories hit me.

'I… my parents… we went to an island. My mother… she was looking for something…'

My eyes flashed as the image of a glowing amber crystal popped up.

'Right! The crystal. My mother came for it. Said it was sending out a signal her machines could pick up. She put it in a case but I wanted to see it again so I took it out and put it in my pocket.'

A memory of me smiling childishly as I played with the glowing crystal came to me.

My hand moved to my pocket but nothing was there.

I frowned at that but ignored it and moved on.

'We… right, poachers. Pirates. Bad guys. They surrounded us. We were captured after a fight. Brought into this ship and to this place before ending up in a cage.'

The memory cut off and flashed to another that had me almost shout in fear but I froze in terror instead.

Fire.

"Mom…"

"*Tsk* you don't want to cooperate huh? Slugma, kill the brat. Flamethrower."

"Wait!" "Stop!"

Two forms tried to reach me but only one made it and covered the right side of my body.

I remember screaming.

My own and my mothers.

And then it went dark.

The flames were all I could remember seeing before it went dark.

I shivered as the memory finished and had to take a few minutes to calm myself once more.

'I died again. Why am I alive?'

The thought nagged at me but I shook my head.

'Forget it. I'll think about it later.

I'm on the pirates ship, they killed me.'

I looked around but didn't see any other bodies.

'Maybe my parents lived to.'

Despite the memories, the emotional attachments weren't there.

I wasn't the child, neither was I the college student.

I was… something else.

Still, I wouldn't want to see the parents of my child memories hurt.

My mind flashed to times training with my military father.

He taught me of survival and combat early on with hopes to instill discipline and strength for my future in the military.

I was no expert in any field, but at least I had an assortment of basic skills.

'I need to get out of here. Try to find the child's parents if I can. Escape is my main priority.'

I looked at my burnt shoulder again and experimentally tried to move it before wincing.

'I'm injured. Limited in what I can do. The burns have scabbed over already. Do people in this world heal so fast? Something for later.

I need to move; I don't know how long I've been laying here but someone is bound to come clean up. They wouldn't leave a corpse around too long. But if they think I'm dead that means no one is looking for me.

Good. But I'm still injured. What do I do?'

I was in the hold and there was no windows to see outside. I couldn't tell if we were at sea or not but considering where I am, I couldn't have been down here long.

A slight sound reached my ears and I paused my thinking.

A whimper.

My eyes turned toward the direction and I whispered.

"Hello?"

Another whimper responded.

With an effort, I got to my feat unsteadily and followed the sound to a crate nearby.

Putting my ear to the tarp, I heard a third whimper, this time a bit quieter.

I gulped and lifted the tarp before looking in.

Three pairs of eyes stared back at me.

I blinked at the sight and put two and two together.

'Right. Pokemon, pirate/poacher ship, crates with tarps.

These aren't crates. They are cages.'

Three pairs of intelligent eyes looked at me from inside a metal cage.

A quadrupled, brown furred, fox and cat mix.

I recognized them from both lives.

A trio of Eevee.

I tossed the tarp to the side gently as to not spook them and crouched down.

I opened my mouth to speak but paused.

'This is a weird feeling. My first set of memories recognizes this as fiction while my second says this is normal.'

I shook my head and pushed such thoughts aside. I don't have time for such things.

'There are Pokemon in front of my eyes. Recognize my reality and deal with it.'

I looked at the Eevee silently staring at me and coughed.

"*cough*..um… hi."

Two of them growled at me in response.

'Right. Let's just ignore the Pokemon part and treat this like any other animal. Imagine it's just a house cat and you don't want to get clawed.'

I loved animals in both my lives, I could handle this.

I sat down to lower my height and leaned against the cages.

"Hey little guys."

I stuck my hand in the cage slowly and spoke softly.

The Eevee on the left opened its mouth and a soft voice came out.

"Ee."

It walked forward a few steps while the other two didn't move but looked ready to attack at any sudden move.

The first one approached my hand and sniffed it.

I didn't move for a minute before moving my hand slowly under its watchful gaze and scratched under its chin.

It's eyes closed as a happy sound responded.

"Eev."

I took that as a good sign and moved around its head, scratching it's cheeks, forehead, and behind it's ears.

"Yeah, you're a good little guy right?"

The Eevee narrowed its eyes and nipped at my finger but I didn't pull back.

It's bite didn't break my skin; it was just a warning.

If you show fear at that moment you lose ground.

"Uh… little girl?"

"Eev."

The girl nodded her head and went back to rubbing her head in my palm.

I chuckled at the action.

She was a clever little one.

The other two seeing the seen approached carefully and I stopped petting the first one, much to her annoyed look, and let the other two smell my hand.

The process repeated and I had three eevee's trying to get my single hands attention.

It was cute but my arm was hurting from stretching into the cage.

I pulled back for a moment.

"Just a second."

I found the latch for the cage and opened it.

The three Eevee scrambled out and I sat down so they could surround me and I didn't have to stretch out.

I could even use my other hand to a minor degree.

I didn't want to move too much and aggravate my burns.

Two of them, the ones who were growling at me, rolled over and I rubbed their bellies.

""Eeeee.""

I chuckled at the sight. The two who were so on guard were quickly captured by my scratching technique trained on dozens of cats and dogs.

The first Eevee however was sitting on my left and looking at my burns.

"Eev."

I moved a hand to rub her head making her purr into it.

'Huh, so they purr.'

"It's ok girl, I'll be fine."

She pushed my hand down with a reluctant look and looked back at my wound before approaching and sniffing it.

Her eyes held a great degree of intelligence and I was reminded that Pokemon were not simple animals but intelligent thinking beings.

She put her paw on the edge of my burn and I winced slightly before I saw her paw glow in a slight pink light.

Something warm entered my arm from her touch and traveled through my body but nothing happened.

"What was that?"

I gave her a look but she had already turned away and jumped into my lap to lay down.

I looked at my arm and didn't see anything different so I shrugged and ignored it for now.

As much as I truly loved this fluffy moment, we had to move.

"Girls, look at me."

The three turned my way but one growled.

"Ok, you're a boy."

"Ee."

I nodded.

Two girls and a boy.

"Ok, you three, you know where we are right?"

The three growled slightly and I nodded again.

"Good. The pirates caught me just like you. They did this to me."

I pointed at my burns and they nodded their little heads.

"We have to escape. I don't know how many there are or how big the ship is. We should still be at an island though. We need help."

I pointed to all the tarp covered cages around us.

"We need more help, and we need to move fast. Can you help me convince more Pokemon to escape?"

The three looked at each other before the one on my lap answered.

"Eevee."

The other two nodded at her call.

""Ee.""

I took that as affirmation.

"Thank you."

The three rubbed against me and I laughed before I stood up with some effort.

I moved to another cage with three new hopefully useful helpers along for the ride.

The next tarp I tore off revealed a Ponyta sleeping.

My eyes widened slightly at the flames and I froze for a moment.

Two of the eevee's didn't seem to notice and moved closer to shake the Pokemon.

The lead one looked up at me with curious eyes and I looked back before I breathed deep and pushed down my panic.

'Do I have a trauma to fire now? Take deep breaths and focus, panicking won't help. I can deal with such things when I'm safe.'

"Eev."

I reached down and scratched her head.

"I'm fine girl, let's focus."

She looked at me again before nodding and we turned to the Ponyta. It wasn't moving even with two Eevee jumping on it.

"Why isn't is waking up?"

The first Eevee got my attention by pulling on my pants.

"What is it girl?"

She raised a paw and pointed to my side.

"Eev."

I followed her paw and saw another cage.

"You want me to try a different one?"

She nodded and I shrugged.

I shuffled over to the next cage but before I could pull the tarp Eevee stopped me.

"Ee!"

I paused and looked at her pointing at a different cage.

"Ok… you want me to follow you."

"Eev."

I followed her through a few cages while she smelled around before we approached a different one.

"Ee."

She pointed at it and I moved forward.

'I hope whoever this is can help us.'

I pulled off the tarp and paused at the sight.

"Sllloowww."

My eye twitched and I turned to Eevee.

"A Slowbro? Really?"

Eevee ignored me and walked up to the caged Slowbro who was laying down seemingly without a care but with open eyes.

"Ee. Eev. Ee."

"Brrooo."

The two began having some kind of discussion while I just awkwardly stood there.

Eevee pointed a paw at me mid talk and I gave a small wave to the Slowbro before they ignored me and kept talking.

Eventually the little Eevee slapped the Slowbro's head with a paw and the Slowbro stood up.

The Eevee nodded her head seemingly satisfied and shot me a smile before pointing at the lock and I got the message.

I opened the cage and the Slowbro shambled out.

It shot me a wary look before we both followed Eevee back to her siblings still trying to wake up the Ponyta.

They seemingly got tired and just laid on its back panting.

It was a cute sight.

The two ambled back to us and began complaining to the head Eevee while she rose her head proudly and pointed at Slowbro.

"Eev!"

Slowbro moved forward and a pink pulse came off his body before the Ponyta stirred and woke up.

I understood then.

'So the Pokemon are kept sedated. I wonder why they didn't just use pokeballs.'

I got some vague idea that you're not able to do that from my second set of memories but I wasn't sure why.

Eevee stepped forward and spoke to the Ponyta and got its agreement to join if I understood poke speech well enough before we moved on.

After Ponyta, the cycle continued.

Like the Eevee and Slowbro, a few were awake while most were asleep. I took it as either their inherent abilities, some kind of move, or perhaps they were just strong against status effects.

Ponyta ripped off the tarp, Slowbro wakes up the Pokemon, Eevee speaks to them, and I'm instructed to open a cage or not depending on if they agree or not.

Honestly I felt like I got delegated from the revolution leader to the human monkey with opposable thumbs.

Our team of six became seven, ten, twenty, and by the time we hit thirty, it was getting hard to keep the noise down.

On one hand, it was really cool for me to see so many new types of Pokemon, and on the other I was just speechless at the ability of this pirate gang.

If the knowledge I have wasn't wrong from the games in my first memory set, and the real world in my second, then there were Pokemon from Kanto, Johto, Hoenn, Sinnoh, and Unova in this room.

I didn't see anything from the other regions but the five alone I saw means this ship had been going for a long time or the world of Pokemon isn't so clear and cut as what I once believed.

'I'm working on broken memories of the games on one side and the broken memories of a young child's knowledge on the other, I'm sure I have some large knowledge gaps here.'

The process continued until we hit thirty eight, and that's when things hit the fan.

The door to the hold was pushed open loudly as two voices rang out.

"Damn it, why do we have to clean up the damn corpse. It's the captain who killed the kid!"

"Yeah, yeah, just shut up and let's finish before we end up as the corpses."

Two goons walked in and froze at the sight of almost forty pairs of eyes staring at them awake and out of cages.

"….."

No one moved for a moment before I slowly lifted a hand.

"Uhh…hi?"

The goons blinked at the sight of me before their hands rose to their belts where I could see pokeballs sitting.

'Think fast man!'

Acting on instinct, my good hand grabbed the nearest thing, which happened to be the head of an Emolga who had been minding his own business, and I yeeted it at the goons.

"YEET!"

"Eeeemmmmmooolll!"

I shouted for good measure.

The shout adds power to the yeet.

Never mind the fact that two grown men had frozen like deer in headlights at the rapidly approaching form of a flying electric squirrel.

And then I fell face first in pain from my burns being pulled on while shouts and electric sparks were shooting out from the other side of the room.

"Ah my face! Get it off! Get it off!"

"Gah! It bit my nuts!"

"EMOL!"

A large discharge of electricity burst out before the room fell silent once more.

"Ee."

Eevee brushed up against my head in worry but I just sent her a smile.

"I'm fine girl, just a bit of pain."

She looked at me before turning, having the good grace to hit me with her tail lightly before poking Slowbro and pointing a paw at me.

I could see the narrowed eyes of the Pokemon that wasn't happy with what it was told before it seemed to shrink under Eevee's stare and made a move.

A pink pulse hit me and I gasped.

It was a weird feeling of duality.

On one hand my pain noticeably decreased while on the other my stamina dropped hard.

"Ooohhh, I feel like I pulled two or three all-nighters in a row."

I wasn't really sure what was worth it more. The pain or the lack of energy.

'So this is what a healing pulse feels like huh? I guess Pokemon have a lot more stamina then humans.'

Eevee pushed up against me again and clapped her paws together before I felt some energy come back to me like I chugged an energy drink and I shook my head.

"Wo there girl, your throwing me for a loop."

"Ee!"

I chuckled at her and rubbed her head while getting a happy smile in return before I took a look at my burns.

'Damn, Pokemon moves are crazy.'

My wounds looked less like fresh third degree burns and more like they had been healing for a week or two already.

It wasn't healed but it was much better than before.

'At least I can move now.'

I experimentally moved my arm and neck and while the pain was strong, I could move around a bit more.

"Good, I can work with this. Thanks girl, and you to Slowbro."

"Ee."

"Slow."

One nodded in joy while the other practically grunted.

Unfortunately not everyone was as interesting in waiting around.

A few of the more wild and angry Pokemon seemed to pick up speed at the sight of two fallen pirates and charged forward.

And that's when all hell broke loose as Pokemon took off through the door.

Almost immediately sounds of destruction, shaking, and screams started sounding out.

Only the eevee's stuck around me as even the Slowbro shambled on into the hallways.

"Ee."

""Eev!""

I looked down at the three urging me to get a move on and nodded.

"Let's make sure no one else is stuck in a cage. I think we will need all the help we can get."

My vague memories told me there were dozens of pirates.

Chapter end.

Coming soon: Chapter 2: The Escape.