Not much seemed out of the ordinary outside Nomad's Land. The sun was rising on the bed of snow, Lucario was rubbing his eyes as he exited the stuffy cave and sitting on top of a sleepy Raikou was the old master Red, keeping a stiff posture as always.
"Good morning, spikeless Lucario," Red said, his authoritarian voice making Raikou's head lift in attention, "I have been waiting for you."
"Yeah yeah," Lucario responded nonchalantly, getting far too comfortable hanging out with champions, "Listen, could we not go really far away this time?"
"Here, climb up on Raikou," Red continued while shuffling forward. Lucario looked at the hairy seat towards the unknown and sighed.
"There's, uh, a nice deserted spot just fifty feet that way," he said while pointing behind the caves. He hoped to avoid spending the next month returning to Nomad's Land from god knows where.
"No. Climb up," Red insisted with a gruff tone, and a stare that told of an old mule running out of patience. Raikou also tried to intimidate Lucario with a glare, but even a saber-toothed monstrosity could not compete with the ferocity of his master. Before he knew it, Lucario had eagerly taken his seat and they were riding off into the distance.
It was not a very long journey. Red was expertly handling his steed, but struggled with the violent motions more than the relatively young Brendan. Lucario swallowed hard as they came across a cliff in the snow, wondering if Red's deteriorating eyesight was about to lead them all to their doom. Indeed, it appeared as if the loyal Raikou was perfectly content with going over the edge had that been his master's wish, but one simple tap from Red and the mighty legendary stopped on a dime.
"Dismount, sit and drink," Red stated in a way which did not leave room for any objections. As Lucario stumbled off Raikou, Red opened a bag tied to the beast and handed him a blanket. It was made out of tough material and as Lucario put it down on the snow he could barely feel the cold seep through it. He tried sitting on it, and sorely wished he had owned something this amazing at insulation during all those cold nights he had slept in the wild.
Red set down two fancy-looking glasses in the snow, and when he finally sat down he was carrying a bottle of wine as well as several photos. Wondering what was with old people and perusing family albums, Lucario shook his head as Red filled both their glasses and looked at him expectantly.
"Sorry. I'm a recovering alcoholic," Lucario said bluntly. Red shrugged and Lucario felt assured that no amount of boredom at the hands of 60 year old holiday pictures would make him resort to the bottle.
"… Pokémon nowadays say the funniest things," Red mumbled to himself as he carefully arranged the photographs and finally held one up, "These are pictures from my personal collection. You may view them."
Half expecting the picture to show a suntanned Red on the beaches of Unova, it instead turned out to be a black and white picture of a woman, her back turned to the camera. To call her naked would not be entirely true, because she was wearing a set of silly fake ears on top of her head. Although speaking of her in the present tense felt a bit strange, the picture was grainy and rather worn and most likely from the wrong side of this century.
"Here, examine it carefully," Red said as he handed Lucario a different picture, "I took these myself. How does that make you feel?"
Same woman, different photo. This time she was reclining on a couch in a very suggestive pose, her one article of clothing out of view this time. To compensate for her head hanging behind the sofa, the rest of her far from unattractive nature was on full display.
"… Really, really uncomfortable?" Lucario muttered while shifting in his seat, feeling the cold creep up his back. Why was this happening? Red kept looking at him, waiting for some kind of reaction and Lucario was not sure he wanted to know just what he wanted to see.
Wordlessly, Red took back the photo from his palm and replaced it with another one. Lucario hesitated for a moment before he looked down.
It was the same woman, the same room and the same explicit nature. But this time, oh so different. Shock turned to bewilderment and then turned to rage, all in an instant. That very same instant, the picture crushed and crumpled up in Lucario's hand like a leaf caught between the railroad and a train. He felt his fangs reveal themselves and bite into his lower lip, showing the desperate grin of a dog being forced to take a bath.
"Why… Do you… Have these…" Lucario stammered in rage as he lifted a trembling hand towards Red, grabbing the collar of his jacket and trying to annihilate it with the force of a thousand suns. Beaming all of his hatred onto the surprisingly calm face of Red, he realizing the force of his fist could not accomplish this feat alone and slowly brought his second hand to join in.
"I'm lying. Simmer down," Red suddenly said as he put his hand against Lucario's, "Just seeing if you would react as Ethan would."
Lucario's features attempted to express surprise, which was hard considering both his eyes and mouth were already similar to that of someone trying to brush the teeth of an alligator with meat-flavored toothpaste. Red rubbed the puffy knuckles of Lucario's hands in a meticulously precise manner, and suddenly he felt them both relax as he exhaled.
"I merely found them in an old abandoned house," Red clarified as he eased the photo out of Lucario's now-open palm and slipped it back with the others, "Admirable, if you ask me. I hear supporting a child alone can be quite difficult."
"Do you… Have a habit of picking up random stuff off the ground…" Lucario huffed as he attempted to regain control of his breathing, still not getting a reasonable explanation as to why the old man would keep such horrible pictures. Knowing there was a whole stack of them made the glass of wine look very tempting.
Red was genuinely not surprised. When both his Masterball and most trusted Pokémon tell him something's human, it seems no more implausible than the time the rockets protected the headquarters of their terrorist organization with Raticate and Fearow.
"You always manage to amaze, Ethan… While I grew older, you became younger," Red exclaimed as he carefully examined the fighting-type with both reverence and the casual attitude commonly shared between co-workers, "Must I now believe there is a way to be reborn as a Pokémon? Could you show me how, or who to get in contact with?"
"Don't even think about it," Lucario replied as he humored the notion, not seeing a way leading further than asking a favor of someone who's stone dead. He shook his head to empathize and Red appeared predictably dejected.
"I see…" Red said as he quickly composed himself, sounding a little tired, "Seems I leave behind more than a few mysteries in this world."
Red nodded towards him before picking up his cup and slowly drinking it. Lucario held strong for a moment, but decided a little sip wouldn't hurt and followed suit. It had a dry taste to it which nipped his sore throat, but it was oh so much more delectable than the berry garbage he had been forced to endure for so long.
"I see you have taken the idea of Pokémon Mastery a bit too far…" Red stated after finishing his drink, "A pity I will not be around to see where it leads you."
He looked over at the horizon, then at Lucario, and then back to the horizon again. The empty stillness of the forest seemed like more of a companion than anyone else. He had never known Ethan that well to begin with, and now that he had possibly turned into a Pokémon there was even less to bind them together. Straightening himself, he decided to speak of what he had wanted to say all this time.
"I am the one who started all this, you know…" Red said, and let his mind wander to times long gone.
Child prodigy defeats the Elite Four… Boy wonder from Pallet Town conquers Kanto… Cascade Badge, Rainbow Badge, always with the badges of honor…
It all sounds so glorious on paper, but if only people knew the reality of it…
Many of us set off from Pallet Town that day, almost exactly fifty years ago. Professor Oak believed we showed promise in the field of Pokémon and wanted us to get real life experience, so he let each of us choose a Pokémon of our very own.
We had all wandered to Viridian City several times before, so that gave us no trouble whatsoever. Even Viridian Forest was a joke, nothing but Kakuna and Metapod that could barely even move, much less put up a fight.
But then… We finally made it to Pewter City, where the gym leader Brock resided… None of us made it past there. Ninten and his timid Charmander were crushed in an instant, even Sony and his overly confident Squirtle tasted bitter defeat. Their Pokémon had yet to learn any proper moves, scratching and tackling away at solid rock.
Me? Hahaha… Oak had given me a Pikachu. A Pokèmon he had caught that morning just outside his house, completely untamed and an unimaginable pain in the neck. He would not listen to me, no matter what. Brock barely even opened his beady little eyes as he trounced that untrained rodent in under a minute.
But… My rival… The boy you know as Blue…
He made it. With a perfectly assembled team of Pokémon with properly allocated strengths and few weaknesses, he defeated Brock like it was nothing and continued on his journey. My journey, the journey of all of us, to become the Pokémon Champion. Of course, being Oak's grandson he had gotten to start with the rarest Pokémon – An Eevee.
To say I was furious would be an understatement. My lifelong rival had beaten me and there was nothing I could do about it. My dreams of becoming a Pokémon Trainer were over. I packed my bags and turned back home, ready to pick up a shitty job at the PokéMart, supplying goods to real trainers.
I released my Pikachu in Viridian Forest. Felt he would fit in with the rest of the pathetic insects. He didn't even look back at me as he ran into a bush and disappeared. There I was, a small defenseless kid stuck in a forest filled with wild Pokémon. I didn't even care if they decided to rob me or eat me or whatever, I felt so down.
I knew I couldn't go home and face my mom like that. She told me she'd always be there if I decided to come home, but I still wanted to be a trainer so bad.
So I stayed in the forest. Watched Bug Catchers swim around their tiny pond, competing with Weedle and Rattata. They seemed perfectly content with playing around, or maybe they had their dreams crushed by the real world long ago. I laid on the ground as Caterpie crawled over me. They're slimy things, those Caterpie, but if you pull their horn the right way they tend to scurry off. Even had to run from swarms of angry Beedrill, whenever they came to pick up berries to bring home to their hidden hive.
After a few days, everything felt repetitive. But that is when I began to realize there was a pattern to it all. Soon, I could predict which of the Bug Catchers would win in a battle; it was all about whose Pokémon had the most experience. I was able to lure the Caterpie onto my body; all I had to do was sprinkle my jacket with crushed berries mixed with old leaves, not the ones freshly plucked. Even the Beedrill became painfully predictable, always moving when the sun was halfway up or halfway down as to avoid the heat.
I still carried a few Pokéballs in my bag. My first triumph in the fields of Pokémon is one where I didn't even need a Pokémon. I lured a Caterpie into a secluded pit and pushed down a large rock, nearly squashing the poor thing. Not the most eloquent method, of course, but I was not about to risk angering any overprotective Butterfree sibling in the area. As the tiny bug struggled to get out, I saw my chance and tried catching it. The first throw was poorly aimed, but the second sealed the deal.
Things got easier after that. I had learned much about the forest's Pokémon, and was able to exploit their shortcomings to the benefit of my Caterpie's experience pool and my own growing collection of Pokémon. It didn't take long until me and my army of bugs dominated the entire forest, the Bug Catchers crowning me the king of creepers.
Continuing to explore the forest for more bugs to add to my arsenal, I accidentally stumbled upon a familiar face. Or a familiar rat, more accurately. Next to a pond deep inside the forest was the Pikachu I had released, snoozing in the morning sun. It would have been easy to catch him off guard right there and then, but I knew that was not the way to do things. I had learned much since first starting out.
Threw a rock into the pond. It made a nice splash, and the Pikachu was back on his feet pretty quickly. He looked in my direction with surprise and caution, before growling lightly and getting ready to attack. Not a shred of love or care in his eyes, to him I was just another enemy.
Not a bad assessment, to be honest. I pulled out my first Pokéball and sent out a recently captured Butterfree. One important lesson in Flying-type weaknesses later, I sent out a much more basic Metapod. Strung down that Pikachu and then used a Weedle to poison him. He was just as reckless as when he had been my only Pokémon, and didn't realize he was about to faint from poison before it was too late.
I'll always remember what I told him that day. Mostly because Pikachu never let me forget it, resorting to my little speech whenever things looked bad. It is kind of… Cheesy though, and I'm sure you wouldn't…
Lucario looked at Red with squinted eyes. The old man appeared to be shifting in his seat.
"I mean, it is not entirely important to the story, so I doubt you would…" he started, before realizing he was making a fool out of himself. He had delved too deep into memory lane and forgotten that he was talking to a Pokémon which may or may not be Ethan. Knowing this might be his last chance, he cleared his throat and recalled the old speech.
"Oak caught you and gave you to me because you were weak! I got you and released you because I was weak!" Red said with a voice reminiscent of an old lady, "But now, I beat you and captured you because I'm strong! You are mine, and I will make you strong too! Together, I promise we'll be strong together!"
A smile spread across his face, and it was shared by Lucario. Watching such a dignified person imitate a small child was too hilarious to ignore.
"Haha, a promise I definitively kept. When I finally left the forest, it was not towards Viridian, but Pewter! And…" Red continued with nostalgia and gladness which then abruptly disappeared from his features. He and Lucario exchanged a glance, and it was becoming more serious by the second.
"… And here I am, half a century later," Red muttered as sternly as death, "I beat my rival, I became the Pokémon master and gained lifelong fame and fortune. So many have tried to follow my footsteps. That boy Ethan, Brendan and all the rest… Even you."
For a moment the scenery appeared to change. No longer was the edge of the cliff was occupied by an old man and a Pokémon, but rather the two greatest Pokémon Trainers of all time. The condensed experience of many lifetimes swirled around them, their minds open to everything but so full that they might explode.
"What I want to say is… I am sorry," Red finally said to Ethan, bowing his head in shame, "I am sorry for leading you and everyone like you down this path to nowhere."
Ethan clenched his fists, gripping the sides of his seat as a vision of Arceus passed through his mind. Red remained steadfast but he could not face the trainer.
"To inspire so many to throw away their lives… For Pokémon…" Red whispered with his disdain very clear in the last word, "Nobody will ever accuse me of doing wrong, but I saw your disappointment after becoming champion. I should have warned you, told you where your quest would lead and where it would end, what it would bring and what you would lose…"
"I wanted to fight an equal… I thought it would bring some purpose to it all… But here I am, still catching Pokémon to pass the time until…" Red kept going as he suddenly stopped himself and swallowed hard.
"Do you blame me for it? Ethan… If your life on my conscience…" he said breathlessly as he looked up at the Pokémon before him. Ethan clenched his fists even harder, but before he could act he was no more. Memories ran like sand in an hourglass, as it flipped and filled itself anew. Lucario put his arm around Red while doing his best to hold back the absolute cascade of emotions welling up inside him.
"How… Could I blame you for anything?" Lucario uttered between clenched teeth, "You're the first to treat me like a fellow human."
What followed was not sobbing, no tears of regret or hugs of reconciliation. Lucario flexed his arm muscles so that Red could feel it.
"Even, you know, frying my brains with electricity. Twice," he said chidingly while feigning anger. It was really difficult to gather up any bit of hostility now that he was positively bursting with feelings of relief and inner satisfaction.
"Ah, but I saw you take worse damage than that as a human," Red replied while defiantly pushing against the far stronger Pokémon's display of power, "Someone who would choose Entei out of his free will must have an attraction to pain."
The two men separated and admired each other for a moment, finding unity in seeing such personal pride reflected in the other. But the moment could not last forever as Red felt himself becoming tired, and knew he would not last much longer. He had a long ride home to Pallet Town, after all.
"What about your old Pokémon? How do they treat you now that you are one of them?" Red asked inquisitively, his curiosity far from sated regarding the unusual state of his friend.
"I haven't exactly met any of them," Lucario responded automatically, faintly remembering having been asked the same thing by Zerobi, "Or I have, and I just couldn't recognize them."
"Hmm… That Zoroark you associate should know the whereabouts of your Entei," Red prodded with whatever information his Pokémon had shared with him. Racking his brain, a memory combined with the words Red has just spoken and Lucario's eye shot open in surprise.
"That… That big monster used to be MY Pokémon!?" Lucario repeated with a mixture of excitement and terror. It felt obvious to him now that a champion such as Ethan would own powerful Pokémon, but a car-stomping giant drooling lava seemed too good to be true. He owns the strongest legendary dog, he just didn't know it.
"Not one of them? Not even your starter?" Red questioned while asking himself how Ethan could let so many Pokémon scatter to the winds and be lost forever.
"Dude, if you happen to know where any of them are, I'd love to go see them!" Lucario said while rubbing his hands together, the dreams of wielding his own army of monsters taking root once more. Red smiled.
"You overestimate my attachment to current events," he answered with a chuckle, which suddenly turned into a coughing fit. Lucario stared awkwardly as the old man recovered and suddenly stood up. His knees gave a sickening noise which made Lucario cringe, but Red seemed unaffected as he looked at the horizon.
"Ethan… Do you remember what led you on your journey?" he said before looking down at the clueless Lucario.
"To become a Pokémon trainer?" he said and thought back, knowing another visit to his long destroyed memory archives would be fruitless, "To… Become a trainer of Pokémon? I suppose?"
"If it was for Pokémon… You could've just stayed in New Bark Town, applied for a job at a Pokécenter, or educated yourself into a scientist," Red clarified and looked at Lucario expectantly, who just scoffed in return.
"Yeah, I don't think so," he muttered and crossed his arms, "Wouldn't that be fitting? Kid's a scientist while his mom's a goddamn-"
"Blue told me that he did it for the honor," Red interrupted, knowing more curse word in Pokémon tongue than he would like, "Figures he couldn't let me one-up him, no matter what. Always had a desire for fame, even when we were small he craved attention like no other."
Lucario fell silent and shifted his thoughts to Blue. Not his enemy, his contemporary, he though.
"Brendan? He wanted power above all else…" Red mumbled while gaining a troubled expression, "… Perhaps not 'power', but 'excellence'. He wanted to be able to do what no other man could."
Another contemporary, Lucario remembered. Although one he would rather keep an enemy, if at all possible.
"Ethan… Well, you… According to you, it was about the challenge," Red continued, but suddenly shook his head in disagreement with his own explanation, "But truthfully, I think you were simply curious. Wishing to see the rainbow's end, not so much collect the reward at the end of it."
Wanting to interject, Lucario could not help but feel there was some truth to that statement. However, he liked to think that his reasoning was a bit more complex than that.
"To me, it was never about the power or the wealth. The fame or the honor. Not even the Pokémon or the people," Red finished what he had to say with a deep sigh, "It was about this."
Moving his arms inside his jacket, it seemed obvious enough to Lucario that he was about to produce an artifact of great importance out of his pocket. Instead, he callously took his jacket off and handed it to Lucario, stripping himself down to a matted shirt. He held out his arms and breathed in the cold air.
"Hey, you'll freeze," Lucario stated bluntly, watching the old trainer's breath hang in the air.
"Shh," Red hushed him, "Listen."
It was there, but no one else could notice it. The stillness which enveloped everything. Silence so fully encompassing it was like a serenade in itself, before being accompanied by the harmonics of branches moving in the wind far below.
"Look," Red uttered breathlessly and tilted his head upwards. Despite the beautiful morning sun making its presence known, a number of stars were faintly visible against the purple sky. They sparkled even as the sky turned into a shade of pink, before finally drowning into the light blue heavens where they connected with the dark treetops.
"Smell," Red kept going and breathed in the unpolluted air, his lungs feeling a fresh and cool caress unlike that of any loving woman. It was the kind of air people in the countryside always tell the city folk about, unappreciated until you yourself is the one breathing it.
"Feel," Red continued this line of thought, the raw cold of nature gripping his uncovered body from all side. It was not a feeling of standing on an immobile cliff with arms outstretched, but to be one with this massive rock drifting through space. To one day return to it.
"And of course… Taste…" Red said and sat down to grab his drink, holding it up towards Lucario who seemed perplexed at first, but let the two glasses bang together in toast as the two of them shared what could only be described as a moment of wine.
A few minutes passed as the two of them finished their drinks in silence.
"Come on," Lucario mumbled with a hint of concern as he gave Red his jacket, "You're going to die."
"Yes… I am…" Red admitted with satisfaction. Soreness and a call to sleep let him know that his time was up, and as Raikou stretched his legs he threw a satchel to Lucario.
"Take this, Ethan," he said bluntly as Lucario undid the knot keeping it closed. It rustled nicely, and he was even more pleasantly surprised to see it was full of money. Not the kind you hand to beggars, but the valuable kind.
"Whoa whoa whoa, seriously!?" he stammered in shock while letting his inhuman hand fulfill a very human desire and caress the paper, wondering if there had been massive inflation since he abandoned the prospect of owning money.
"The original trainer's code stipulates I owe you half of my money for losing," Red explained as he got up on Raikou, who sprung to his feet and elevated the old man to a suitable position.
"You don't have to-" Lucario lied, hoping to be cut off as quickly as possible.
"Go on. It means nothing to me," Red answered his wishes with a nod, "Nothing does. Only what is already free. Fare well, Ethan!"
"You too, Red," Lucario replied with the biggest grin on his face as Red kicked the sides of his steed and leaped off the cliff. Not even questioning whether his reborn idol would survive the fall or not, he instead begin to make his way back to the others, a mind filled with all the real food he could buy with half a fortune.