2.

Monkey Farts

Living life through the night,
Thin line of a lightning strike

The Sunyshore Tower was a hulking, upside-down rocket-shaped structure at the edge of the city — a feast for the eyes of some phony sustainability board.

Volkner had designed it that way. It would never have gotten approved otherwise, unless he put fifty bike racks out front, (which he nearly did out of spite.) But regardless of aesthetics, it was a puzzle of purpose and a menace to maintain. Not only did it process solar energy from cells plastered all over the place, but its space-age shell was built over a set of old hydro transformers that ceased functioning with erosion. The turbines had since been extended and replanted further down the coast, but only as an afterthought.

I was gonna suggest we go fully nuclear, Volkner thought as he turned a rusted key into the Tower's ancient ground-level entrance. But it's city planning suicide, and you can't renovate it. Once it's in the ground, it's set for centuries.

In another life, (other than the thunder god,) Volkner may have been solely an electrical engineer. Or perhaps a gifted programmer. His parents were technicians with the company that made Trade Machines — the kind who traveled to Pokémon Centers the world over to decipher and dislodge error codes for a lofty fee. Volkner himself had been adept with machines from a young age. At seven he tore apart a junky old Trade Machine left in the basement and managed to fix the loose screws. By eight he was building simple robots. And nearing ten, it was an honest question whether he would take the traditional life path of training a Pokémon, or succumb to the progressives and throw himself into the secular life.

"He could invent something that changes lives!" his mother stressed, Minun on her head. "We need to let him learn about engineering!"

His father shook his head, Plusle swinging from his shoulders. "If he goes to the Lay School, he'll peak there and end up like that loner kid Cyrus who smokes in the convenience store bathroom. Kids are supposed to interact with Pokémon. That's where real knowledge comes from."

At the time, the city had one Lay School for children not interested in Pokémon. It had an impressive STEM program, with a robotics club and easy access to apprenticeships down the road. Volkner had spent the day with a gaggle of other nine-year-olds touring the campus. "Open-concept classrooms," the recruiter had stressed. "Collaborative spaces with the newest technology. An award-winning curriculum that evolves with industry standards. Programs and assessments designed to challenge each student's individual talents."

He'd been following along intently up to that point. Then the freckle-faced and frizzy kid next to him starting making armpit farts, which sent the whole group into a fit of giggling. The recruiter sighed, wondering if nine-year-olds even understood what "STEM" stood for.

Volkner did, but he pretended that he didn't. Life was more fun that way. The frizzy kid with the fart noises didn't know at all what it meant, and for the rest of the day he was the coolest in the group, making it clear by explaining everything about himself. His name was Flint. He had his own bicycle. His favorite color was yellow. He had his own yellow bicycle. He lived in an apartment near the beach with his grandma and baby brother. He liked cinnamon candy and chucking rocks at trees as hard as he could.

Also the next day was his birthday, and they were all invited to his party, where he would share cake and teach them how to draw the Cool S, and his grandma said that if he didn't lick all the frosting off the cake before she cut it this time, then he could go choose a Pokémon afterwards to be his partner. And Flint had already decided he wanted to choose Chimchar because it was a Fire-Type and it had opposable thumbs so he could eat cinnamon candy and chuck rocks at trees with it and teach it to draw the Cool S.

The tour group fell apart completely then. All the Lay School's promises lay abandoned once a Pokémon was mentioned.

A few of them went to Flint's party the next day, watching his grandma bawl when she saw her grandson had friends for once. Volkner couldn't understand why anyone wouldn't want to be Flint's friend. He had his own yellow bicycle, and he could make fart sounds with his armpits. Plus he had Chimchar, a real Pokémon with a tail made of fire!

"My Pokédex says its tail is fuelled by gas in its stomach," Flint explained.

"So it's farting all the time?" Volkner asked.

"Uh-huh!"

"That's so awesome! I want a Pokémon too!"

After that, they were inseparable. Unbearably so. Even when Volkner took Pikachu, his first partner, out with Flint to chuck rocks at trees. Even when they spent days battling gangs in the back alleys of Flint's neighborhood, and Volkner's parents smacked him for doing dangerous things with a "hooligan boy." Even when Volkner finally met up with him again months after, and the first thing they did was battle, first with Pokémon, then with their own fists, until they were tired and bruised and decided to be friends again.

Flint forged ahead. All eight Sinnoh gym badges. Lily of the Valley Conference champion. An eight-month stint as Sunyshore City's Gym Leader and a training tour before getting recommended to an Elite Four seat and bawling on national television when he realized where he was and where he'd come from.

Volkner was right on his heels. Shining, Shocking Gym Leader of Sunyshore, self-taught engineer and inventor, half a degree in city planning, clapped a bawling Flint on the back on national television and informed the viewers Sunyshore Beach was now a very safe and beautiful (and disgustingly expensive) place to live, and the one behind all of Sinnoh's major blackouts.

And as Flint had told him just an hour ago, that last one was really becoming his new moniker.

Deep inside the old hydro plant, beneath the tower, he navigated by the light of Luxray's golden eyes. Pipes were banging and unseen waves were crashing and gurgling against the rocky surface outside. A horrible crushing, grinding noise intensified — metal against rusted metal.

"Raichu, use Thunderbolt on the old dynamo. Luxray, show me which transformer overloaded this time. I know that's what it is. Trust the hydros to be backup in a storm and they'll start up so fast they shock the whole system."

Luxray growled. Raichu flashed. In the sparkling, splintered static, Volkner's lips twitched up in a smirk. He felt a stray string crawl up the back of his right hand, then under the sleeve of his jacket and up to his chest. He gasped, and his heart rate jolted. The transformers stood before him in the shadows.

Corroded steel. Tangled wires. Melted strips of old electrical tape and cables come loose in their fixtures.

Of course the hydro backup wasn't functioning. Of course the photovoltaic failure plunged half the city into immediate darkness. This was a disaster waiting to happen. If left to work overnight, it was a guaranteed Volkner Level Threat to Sunyshore's electrical integrity.

"I'm gonna be here all night," he realized, smirk growing to a full-on Volkner Level megawatt grin. "That's… I could fix it… and leave it to break down again, leaving more work for me over time… or… I could fix it and make it better, more efficient, more powerful…"

Raichu cocked its head and tugged on its trainer's pants, hoping to shake him from his electrical ecstasy, but it took a good few minutes of staring at the wreck — assessing, analyzing, cataloging, planning, cross-referencing and reimagining, all behind glazed ocean eyes, until Volkner could see the transformers transformed. Get rid of all the extra wiring, skip the intricate circuitry, and install one enormous Tesla coil across all four, then connect that to a dynamo, and of course dig out the old turbines — replant them. Yes. And make the whole thing a cool neon blue shade. And green. With lightning bolt patterns streaking the back wall. And LED rope? The kind that outlined stuff in clubs? Heck yeah. In purple.

Volkner took one step forward, lost fully in the vision. He would spend a week here. Shut down the gym again. There weren't any strong challengers around this time of year anyway. Order all the parts in one huge expensive click. Call up Fuego Ironworks and the guy who designed Byron's gym — get a quote on the steel. Just beams. He could weld them together himself. Then strain his eyes making out loose sparks in the darkness. Twist wrenches and screwdrivers until his hands were shaking. Twist an ankle crawling between hot metal ribs of a brilliant new structure.

Stupid, freaking bike racks for sustainable certification. Volkner would rip the plaque off the front of the tower and tape it back up when he'd turned the old transformers into pillars of the future. He'd time it. Watch how long it took to renovate the place. Set an example for the rest of Sinnoh.

Raichu tugged on his pants harder, squeaking in protest. Luxray rubbed up against his knees, letting the static in its fur spike up his legs and diffuse through his body. His heart quickened and slowed with his breathing. His chest went cold, and he shivered.

"You guys can't stop me. You know that. That thing isn't just ugly. It's dangerous."

Luxray folded its ears back and hissed, black mane sparking.

"Yeah, I know I can't fool you. But listen, is it gonna take more time and energy to replace all the photovoltaics in the city with thermal sensors? Or renovate the old transformers?"

Raichu hugged around Volkner's legs, wrapping its cord of a tail up around his torso and squeezing his arms to his sides.

"Oh, of course we'll replace the photovoltaics. But that involves tearing up the walkways above the city. I built those years ago. I know where they're sloppily designed. And the city council and planning board won't let me do that until we have a way to keep the lights on in a storm, right? Come on, admit it, I'm the only one who could make it actually work and look cool. Just like the gym."

Luxray blinked. It could see Volkner's heart pumping inside his body, the arrhythmia from years of electrical injuries somehow balancing into one stable pulse.

"Raichu, go to the gym and get my blueprint paper."

Raichu pouted.

"I'll let you have an extra bowl of berries with every meal for a week."

"Rai!"

"You wanna go to the Battle Tower? Maybe… leave Electivire at home?"

"Rai-rai."

"Uffda, the Battle Train in Unova. I know that's your favorite. So much nostalgia. The absolute thrill of unleashing a Gym Leader's strength on some late-night hooligans and totally kicking their butts. Well, I'll take you there if you just help me tonight. Get my blueprint paper and my protective gloves and goggles, and soak up any stray currents that come shooting out at me while I play with that thing."

Raichu had finally uncoiled its tail from Volkner's torso and was waddling back toward the stairs. Luxray growled, revving its staticky fur for a Thunder attack, but Volkner tapped his fingers along its nose.

"Trust me," he said. "The city needs it. The… city needs… me…"

Outside the storm raged, and the night was a blur.

~N~

I finished the season of Journeys that's up on The Pokémon website, and I wondered why Ash and Goh get to be "research fellows" while Chloe has to go to school. Their society must value worldly knowledge and relationships with Pokémon more than booksmarts, hence the reason most kids become research fellows and coordinators and gym challengers. There's Kukui's school in Alola, which gave Lillie the opportunity to learn about Pokémon despite being afraid of them at first. But Chloe's school seems unrelated to critters, so she must have to attend it because she's uninterested in befriending them.

Seriously, I had to take an urban planning class last semester. LEED certification is broken. The frickin' bike racks.

Next chapter will bring in the main story!

Published by Syntax-N on FanFiction . Net December 27th, 2021. Reposters cursed!