vs Jigglypuff

It was a lovely spring morning. Pidgeys were chirping, and the sun was shining down on Route Three, the dirt road out of Pewter City, which was currently being traveled only by Leaf. Lass had told her that she'd needed to buy something in Pewter. According to the blue-skirted girl, Leaf wouldn't be too far when she caught up... it had to be a much longer path than it seemed to be.

A little boy walked up to Leaf. "Hi! I like shorts!"

Leaf blinked. "Um... that's nice..." She walked off.

"HEY!" Leaf jumped, startled by the boy's yelling right behind her. "What do you think you're doing, walking away from a battle?" Leaf turned around and saw that the boy had sent out an Ekans. Grumbling, she sent out Metapod...

---

"What's wrong with you? You're not wearing shorts!"

Seven battles later, Leaf was growing more and more annoyed by the little short-wearing brats. They always told her something about the great euphoria that was wearing shorts and inexplicably battled her... worst of all, there weren't any bushes large enough for her to change into the ones in her bag so they'd leave her alone. The only thing to do was to battle them... As Metapod defeated another Ekans, something inside of it began to glow. The glowing thing forced its way out of Metapod's lifeless shell and stopped shining, revealing itself to be a purple-bodied butterfly with red eyes and black and white wings.

"Wow! A Butterfree already?" Lass had finally caught up to Leaf, wearing, much to her chagrin, denim shorts. Leaf was about to say something to the other girl, but never got the chance as Lass suddenly ran off, screaming what sounded like "Jigglypuuuuuff!!" as she chased a pink Pokemon. It watched with huge eyes as Lass pounced... and jumped away just as it would've been caught, leaving Lass to land on the ground. The girl got up, dusting herself off, and turned to face Leaf, yelling, "What are you waiting for? Help me catch that Jigglypuff!"

"Uh... why don't you just use a Pokemon?" Embarrassed by Leaf's statement of the obvious, Lass released Peach from its Pokeball and began the pursuit.

As soon as she had vanished behind a few trees, a boy- the same one from Viridian Forest, actually- came out from behind the bushes right next to them. He looked at Lass's retreating figure and laughed, taking another of his Super Balls out of a pocket inside his jacket. Something told Leaf it held the Jigglypuff from before; he didn't seem to be very particular about what kinds of Pokemon he caught.

To her surprise, he released it- sure enough, it was the Balloon Pokemon- and pulled out a small, red device. There was a blue crystal on its left side, and a beam of light shot from it, scanning Jigglypuff. The light winked out, and the red thing beeped, obviously finished. The boy did something else, but Leaf couldn't tell what it was from where she was watching. Satisfied, he put his little toy in his pants pocket and dropped the Super Ball.

Just then, Lass chose to make her ill-timed reappearance, and the boy stomped on the Super Ball twice, crushing it, and fled.

"Did I miss something?" Leaf shook her head. Lass then noticed Jigglypuff staring after the boy, gasped, and threw a Pokeball without delay, capturing it. "You're mine!"

---

A few minutes later, the two trainers had reached a Pokemon Center, where, to Leaf's surprise, a middle-aged man operated the restoration machine, not a Nurse Joy. After being asked about this anomaly by Leaf, Lass answered, "Really? That's the first time I've noticed that... come to think of it, there wasn't one in Lavender Town, either." She then looked over at the television, which was currently on a news channel covering a recent Team Rocket attack on some bank, and she fell into an odd trance, ending their conversation.

As they waited, Leaf looked outside, where the massive Mount Moon loomed over the building. Her eyes traveled from the highest of its peaks to its base, where she saw a girl clad in a skintight black jumpsuit with short sleeves heading towards the huge, rocky mountain. Her skin was pale, and her strangely worn shoulder-length brown hair dull and matted, not to mention the tattered gloves worn on her hands, the only things she wore that weren't completely black. A homeless person, maybe? She walked toward the wall of the cave...

...and, to Leaf's amazement, passed right through it, simply vanishing into it like she was walking through tall grass. Halfway through, for some reason, she stopped and turned around. The reason was made clear when she amazingly picked Leaf out of the small crowd at the Pokemon Center, looking straight at her with cold, blue eyes. She then walked into the cave, never breaking eye contact until she'd vanished completely.

The man shut the machine off, and Lass nudged Leaf to get her reacquainted with reality. "Excuse me, but your Pokemon are fully healed," he said, setting a tray of Pokeballs on the counter.

Lass smiled and thanked him as she took her Pokemon, and Leaf did the same, her voice shaking after seeing the strange girl...

---

Sheesh, compared to the two other chapters I've done recently, this is really short (and boring, in my opinion)... but it serves its purpose in a way only a setup chapter can.

There's a reason for the 'only major cities have Nurse Joys' law, and... I'll probably tell you later. For now, have a nice week!