Giovanni

Several years ago…

"Brat boy!" As a child, I would often hear her screaming these words down the hallways of our large house. Generally, she was perfectly justified in her accusations. I was a brat. But it wasn't as though I went looking for trouble… it just had a knack for finding me.

My twin brother Giuseppe and I were naturally inquisitive young boys and highly competitive. We would spend nights fighting back sleep and planning operations or testing theories, then come the morning we would execute them. Like for instance, when we flooded the wine cellar, just so that we could orchestrate a navy assault with our toy sail boats. Another time while our parents were at a function one evening, we snuck into the garages and 'borrowed' my father's Rolls Royce. Sharing the driver's seat, my brother used books to help him reach the pedals while I steered. Unfortunately, due to Mother becoming sick that evening, our parents decided to come home early. I distinctly remember making eye contact with my father as we passed them on the street and in that moment knew of the belting we were in for when we got home…

Both of my parents were prominent figures in the business world. My father was a good and honest man who was always involved in some form of charity or cause. My mother, on the other hand, was an ambitious, backbiting woman, who resented my father's generous ways. I recall the fights they would have when they thought my brother and I were sleeping. Mother would go screaming down the halls of our mansion and Father would calmly walk on after her. But these differences set aside, we functioned as a family.

Then one day it all changed.

Giuseppe and I were barely ten when Father decided to take us along on one of his business trips so that we could start to learn about this company of his that we would one day inherit. We piled into his helicopter and took off, keeping low to the ground so that we could watch the green scenery that rushed us by. Only half an hour into the flight there was a malfunction, gears locked up and the blades suddenly ceased to rotate. I recall the blaring alarms and startled cries that came from Father and the pilot. Then all at once there was an explosion. I still remember every detail the feeling of falling as I found myself thrown from the helicopter. It felt like I was falling for hours, though in reality it was only a matter of seconds. My body seemed to slip into a state of relaxation as I watched the ground that came rushing up to meet me…

I woke in hospital several weeks later when the surgeons brought me out of an induced coma. I'd broken almost every bone in my body, but I was alive. It had been a miracle… a second chance I'd been granted that had not been extended to my father or my brother. They both perished in the explosion and I'd even missed their funerals. The doctors seemed adamant I would not walk again, and for a long time I fell into a heavy state of depression. I would not eat, I would not leave my room. I would allow for the maids to wheel my chair to the window and there I spent days on end just gazing out over the gardens. It didn't help ether that my mother, in her own way of coping, completely absorbed herself in the running of the company so she was never around. I was truly alone.

One day I received a visitor - my father's sister, Agatha. Concerned for my wellbeing, she took an interest in me and helped me to recover from my loss. Even then she was already a strong Pokémon trainer and also put these methods to use on me, teaching me to teach myself how to walk… and eventually run again. She taught me that to survive in this world I needed to be strong. By the time I was fourteen, I was an agile and active boy once again. A fighter and determined to follow in my aunt's footsteps to become a Pokémon trainer… a Master.

Unbothered by my ideals, my mother barely acknowledged my request. So come the beginning of the training season, Agatha took me to a friend of hers - a young Pokémon trainer and researcher who resided in the small town of Pallet, just south of Viridian. That day I was promptly signed into the registry and given my first Pokémon.

The beginning of my journey was not easy, however. Determined and full of ideals, I set out on foot from Pallet and headed north only to find myself chased and attacked by a swarm of aggressive Spearow. They chased me well into a wooded area and I lost my way, tripping on a rock and tumbling several metres down an embankment into a river.

I lost everything I owned to that river excluding my Pokémon, and suffering terribly from a sprained ankle, it took me four days of wandering the wilderness to finally reach Viridian City.

I chose not to let the ordeal dampen my determination however, viewing it as only a minor setback on my journey. From then on I travelled from region to region for four years until one night I was contacted by one of my father's lawyers. He told me it had been in my father's will for me to inherit his company when I turned twenty one, but only once I learnt how it worked. That night I journeyed home in order to finish my schooling and - at the request of my mother - find work with the company, starting at the bottom.

Naturally, it didn't take me long to advance in the business which, in my father's absence, had now moved into more shady areas of dealing. The company became known as Team Rocket.

Unfortunately, my advancements also brought on hostility from my mother who was adamant that she would keep what she felt was rightfully hers. When my twenty first birthday came, she promptly refused to hand it over, insisting that this was her creation and now only a mere echo of what my father's company had been once. Needless to say, we became less than civil with one other and for several years I stood by and watched as the woman gradually siphoned the businesses earnings into her own back pocket. Within a year, what was left of my inheritance would become obsolete.

With a wife to care for and a family to plan, she left me with no chose but to act.

Eventually, she came to see things my way…