Chapter 1: Welcome to the jungle
"Andrew! Wake up already, we have to get off the train." My mother shook me violently to return me to the land of the living.
"I'm up!" And so I did.
"Come on you two, we're losing daylight." I fetched my bags and put on a pair of sunglasses to shield my eyes from the harsh sunlight. Mom came up to me asking if I had applied any sunblock to my skin, to which I answered with a mumbled "Yes". The weather conditions in the newly founded Holon region were not to be trifled with, this was proven by dad's terrible sun burn on his balding head once we found our way to the tent that we would be sleeping in later that afternoon in Settlement Foxtrot. While my parents were busy unpacking their things, I had decided to explore the settlement to try and find my sister, whom we were visiting on vacation.
"And what is my favourite little brother doing, snooping around my workplace?" I heard my sister come up from behind me, turning just in time to face her as she snatched me up in a crushing bear hug.
"Anne- can't breathe-" I managed to croak before she immediately let me go.
"Sorry! Here, let me hel-" Before she could continue, a lab coat wearing researcher came running after her. "Anne, we need you back at the tent, the delta ball prototype has had its first successful capture!" He reported. "What!? That's amazing! C'mon Drew, you have to see this, it's awesome." Anne extended her hand to help me up.
"Delta ball? Like, a pokeball designed to capture delta pokemon?" I questioned. Sure I had heard about pokeballs designed for specific types of pokemon, but never before had I thought that delta pokemon were plentiful enough to justify a custom pokeball just for them.
"Yep. Holon is filled to the brim with delta pokemon! One of our researchers even speculates that there might even be delta legendaries. Although we don't actually have any evidence to support that theory."
Needless to say, I was impressed. I've never even seen a legendary pokemon in my life, let alone thought that there might be delta variants of them. Just as we were about to enter the tent, our parents came to say hello to Anne, much to her displeasure. "Oh, hey mom … dad." The words left her mouth awkwardly. It was clear for me to see that the relationship between them had not improved since she left to research in the frontier region all those years ago. After a rushed conversation ended by her, Anne dragged me along as she left mom and dad behind. Entering the tent, we walked past various machines to a veil that seemed to be covering some pillar.
"Anyway, I work as Professor Pine's assistant. She gave me the spectacular job of overseeing the development of the delta ball!" She said as she unveiled a glass case that contained a white and blue ball atop a red cushion.
"Don't you think it's a bit much to have the ball be displayed like its some crown jewel? I don't want to be rude but doesn't it only make it easier to catch deltas?" I asked.
"I agree with you on its unnecessary extravagance, but it is the only pokeball designed to catch deltas, meaning that when we patent the final version we'll be the only ones producing delta balls in a region that is overflowing with delta pokemon! We'll never have to worry about funding again!"
Obviously I had not thought of the potential revenue that could be produced by having such a monopoly in a new market. Anne was given something by the researcher that called us here and tossed it towards me. As I caught it I recognised it as a delta ball. "That's the first successful delta ball prototype we have. Want to see what we caught with it?" She asked.
I nodded and immediately released the creature. From the flashing white light emerged a green frog pokemon which I immediately recognised as a Froakie, the pokemon that I had always wanted as a starter. Seeing the amazed look on my face, Anne started grinning. "You can keep her. None of us here are allowed to keep pets and we aren't trainers either, except for the guards of course, but they wouldn't want a pre-evolution pokemon to babysit."
This strange, mutated, delta Froakie was to be my starter pokemon. I was immediately infatuated with the idea of having my very own pokemon. I crouched down to the frog and held out my arm. The creature hesitantly came closer, but once she realised I was not going to attack her, she started scaling my arm towards my shoulder and started nestling her head against my cheek.
"See? She likes you already. Just make sure to hide her from mom and da-" My sister was cut off by a loud screech coming from the entrance of the tent. The three of us turned to find my horrified mother and furious father enter the tent as the entrance flap swayed behind them. "Get that thing off our son this instant! Why would you even think of letting him near one!?" Dad was fuming, looking even more red than usual with his terrible sun burn.
Anne immediately stood in front of my pokemon and I. She knew how bad our parents could get when it came to pokemon, her love for the creatures is the reason why she had to leave and research them in a different region than my parents. "Seriously!? I thought you two would have gotten over this stupid phobia of yours when you offered to come visit! And you can't keep Drew from pokemon his entire life like you tried with me!" Anne started the yelling tournament this time. Usually it would have been the other way around, but she finally seemed to be fed up with their hatred for pokemon.
"We will never 'get over' this! Your grandfather was killed by pokemon in the war! How are we supposed to 'get over' that!?" My mother added. At this point I was holding my Froakie- whom I had decided on naming Shinobi- in my arms to comfort her. She was not getting a wonderful introduction to the world of humans.
"You can't blame a pokemon for doing what its trainer tells it to do! And the Torren-Kanto war ended thirty years ago, five years before I was even born. When will you stop trying to force your beliefs unto your children? Forty years from now, when you're both probably dead? It's pathetic. C'mon Drew, we're going for a walk and maybe some training for your Froakie."
Anne, Shinobi and I left our parents behind in the tent. My mother was crying and my father was trying to comfort her. I felt somewhat guilty. Anne probably noticed it and gave me a hug, which I returned. "So have you thought of a name for her yet?" She asked as we continued walking under the setting sun.
"Shinobi. Since Froakie's final evolution is the ninja pokemon, I thought it would be suitable. Although I might end up just calling her Ino for short." Ino croaked happily at the new nickname from her position, perched atop my shoulder. Despite my parent's horrible outburst, this might be the best day of my life.
"Shinobi … isn't that the name of those Kantonean assassins? Way to stick it to mom and dad, Drew. I'm glad you realize how ridiculous they're being, but don't worry, once you get your trainer's license you can start living on your own! You could even come live here with me. That way they can't try to separate us again." She started walking backwards in front of me to keep eye contact.
I'd love to see Anne regularly again. After she got kicked out for trying to get a trainer's license for us, things just weren't the same. I missed my best friend. "I … missed you. A lot. I missed having my best friend around." I managed the courage to speak my mind for once.
"I missed you too, Drew. Okay, enough moping around, let's see how that grass type of yours fares against some rock and ground types in the desert. It should only be another hour's walk." Another hour? The sun had already started setting when the argument started. Anne noticed my worried look towards the sunset. "Don't worry, we have guards all over the place. No dangerous pokemon are going to be able to reach us before they do. The only place we really have to worry about going is the jungle. Way too many poison types there."
"Wait, did you say that Ino was a grass type?" I asked, deciding to trust Anne's judgement.
"Sure did. We checked her typing while we were registering her into the pokedex, it's also how we found out that she was female. Although we're not sure of what her final form's typing will be. I'm assuming it'll be a dual typing once she reaches it, but it's just speculation based off of her normal greninja counterpart." We had reached the desert after walking through the grasslands and through another settlement. Somehow, even though the sun had set, the desert was neither cold nor warm. Perfectly in between. Despite this strange desert weather I had decided not to look the gift ponyta in the mouth and continue on our journey. After another half an hour's search for any wandering pokemon to fight, we had found nothing.
"I guess we're just out of luck. We can try again tomorrow morn-" For the third time today, my sister was interrupted but a loud noise. This time, however, it was not caused by a human.
A large boulder had been destroyed, sending debris flying in all directions. Anne tackled Ino and I to the ground to save us both from a large chunk of rock flying our way. The three of us stood up after the debris had stopped flying everywhere to see a guard's corpse crushed beneath one of the rocks. My sister tried to cover my eyes before I saw it but I already had. The image was ingrained into my mind. Surprisingly, for the first time seeing a real corpse, I was calm. Did that make me a bad per-
My train of thought was interrupted by another crashing sound nearby. My sister and I turned to look in its direction, only to see two large, brown pokemon battling each other. The titans both had similar looking faces, dots, or gems arranged in a way that looked like braille. These monstrosities were destroying everything in their wake. Despite their distance from us, I had a feeling that we should be running even further away from them.
"Is that Regirock!? What's a Unovan legendary doing here?!" Anne yelled. I couldn't tell which of the two was Regirock considering how similar the two looked, but I knew for sure that one of the two titans was losing the battle.
"What have you two gotten yourselves into!?" My father's voice came from behind us. My mother, who was walking beside him, saw the guard's corpse and immediately looked mortified. "C'mon, we need to run!"
"Mom? Dad!? Were you follow- Nevermind, let's just get out of here!" The four of us started running towards the nearest settlement, hoping for protection from the guards against these … monsters. But it was too late.
This was the last time I would ever see my family together, and alive.
To think that this was supposed to be the best day ever.