A/N: Wow, I can't believe how well that first chapter went! I want to personally thank everyone who read and reviewed and added this story to their favorites and alerts. There are no words to describe the feeling of waking up the next morning after publishing your first fanfic and seeing so many positive reviews and comments. Now I'm not one of those stuck up authors who'll only write if I get a certain amount of reviews, but I have to admit, it's really awesome reading positive feedback on your story!
I also want to take a little bit of time to address those reviewers as thanks for their review.
Tempest86: I'm very glad that you like the story! To answer your question, yes Ash will be getting all of those pokemon similar to the way he did in cannon. As to who he'll get first, well, read on…
Tendou Souji: Thank you for your very long and descriptive review! I checked out Zenith League and I have to say that I agree that we have similar writing styles. By the way, I really enjoyed your story, I may not have been writing long on here, but I have been reading for a long time and can appreciate a well written story when I see one. I'm glad that you're an honest reviewer and it's good to know that I have someone who'll crack the whip on my ass if my writing becomes sloppy.
Kaiser Haller: I'm glad that you enjoy the plot that I came up with. Good luck learning English!
Vital Info: I really enjoyed your review. I'm glad that I was able to bring back so many good memories, in my opinion, that is exactly what fanfiction should do. Hopefully this chapter should answer some of your questions and might give you an idea of what the answers are for the others. Hopefully I can continue to make this into THE story for original Pokemon fans.
exeafirm: Thank you, and here you go.
saveme57: I'm glad that you liked the Ho-oh scene. It was something that popped into my head last minute and I didn't know how people would like it.
partner555: I also really enjoy realistic smart Ash stories, they help make up for how stupid he is in the newer anime. Unfortunately, there aren't that many good ones on here so if you can't read them, write them. It's very good to know that you believe I succeeded in those areas you mentioned; I wanted those to be the cornerstones of my story.
Shades of Grey: Thanks for the review! I'm very happy that you think my story flows well, that was by far my greatest concern about my writing and the development of this story.
Thank you to my un-named reviewer as well.
Finally, I want to give a shout out to all of my foreign readers. After just one chapter, I ended up with readers from 28 countries! That's amazing and it really makes some kid from Pennsylvania feel like he's connected with the world. Please keep reading and I hope you enjoy the story!
Thank you everyone who reviewed last chapter! For all of those who were waiting for this one and for any potential new readers, enjoy the story!
Disclaimer: It's unfortunate to say, but apparently I don't own Pokemon. If I did, there would finally be a good Pokemon RPG on a home console! (Haven't you ever fantasized about exploring Kanto and battling Pokemon in interactive 3-D? I know I have…)
The Prodigy
Chapter 2: A New Partner, a New Friend
"Why did I ever agree to this!" shouted a twelve year old Ash Ketchum drenched by water from a mischievous Seadra as he was in the process of feeding the hundreds of Pokemon that inhabit Professor Oak's ranch.
Yes, for last two years Ash has been working under Professor Oak at his lab and it had been quite eventful to say the least. It had been the same routine every week for him, but as he quickly learned, things never went according to schedule.
During the weekdays, everything always started at 8'clock. At that time Ash would normally turn up at the Professor's door half asleep with a dead expression on his face. From then until 8:30, they would have a light breakfast of rice balls and morning tea, and Ash would usually have to sit through one of the Professor's poems.
Despite them being very long and boring, Ash knew better than to disrespect the man giving him such a great opportunity by telling him so. After sitting around listening to the Professor's poems for about 5 minutes, Ash had to pull himself together for the next part of his agenda, feeding all of the pokemon their breakfast.
That's where Ash really had to wake up and get moving as he had to deal with the various types of pokemon's food preferences, eating habits, and worst of all, their attitudes.
Some of the pokemon on Oak's ranch just plain didn't like Ash, one of those pokemon being Seadra. There is a story however for the reason behind its blatant animosity…
10 year old Ash Ketchum was currently being given a tour of Professor Oak's ranch by the man himself. Ash couldn't believe just how many different types of pokemon inhabited the ranch and was barely paying attention to his newfound teacher and mentor as they made their way through the various environments.
He was broken from his reverie as he heard the Professor say "Ah, and here we have the water pokemon habitat" Oak commented with pride.
"Wow…" was the only word Ash could force out at the sight before him. In front of him laid a large lake with surrounding swamps filled to the brim with every type of water pokemon one could imagine.
He saw Goldeen and Seaking race across the water at speeds so great that they seemed to skip above the surface.
He saw Tentacool and Tentacruel bobbing up and down in the sea water pokemon area as the sun light reflected off their red jeweled heads.
He saw a gang of Squirtle and Wartortle populate a small island in the middle of the lake surrounding what seemed to be their ringleader, a strong looking Blastoise.
Finally, he saw a fearsome Gyarados rocket out of the water with a menacing cry before diving back beneath the waves it had just created.
"It's wonderful isn't it?" the Professor quipped, "There truly is no sight more wonderful than experiencing the miracle of pokemon in touch with nature, it's partly one of the reason why I decided to dedicate my entire life to the research of pokemon." the Professor finished with a calm vibe.
"Professor, I can't believe this, this is unreal…" he said, his brain utterly stupefied by the magnificent sight of pokemon and nature bonding before him.
What Ash failed to notice however, is that as he was gawking at the water pokemon, he was steadily walking closer to the lake without paying attention to what was in front of him when suddenly…
"Whoaaa!" "Horseeaa!" he tripped over something and fell headfirst into the lake with a glorious splash.
"Ash!" the Professor yelled in concern.
"What just happened?" Ash asked as he surfaced disoriented. Suddenly a bright light enveloped the water right next to him successfully freaking him out as he had never seen such a sight before.
"Professor! What the heck is happening?" Ash yelled as he quickly attempted to swim to shore.
"Well Ash, that looks like a pokemon evolution from what I'm seeing but I don't know what pokemon that could be evolving. I just saw you walking towards the lake with a Horsea sitting by the shore and…" fear dawned on the Professor's face as he realized what had just happened. "Ash quick, get out of there!" he yelled.
"I'm trying to! But what's going on? he cried as he frantically increased his pace. All of a sudden loud violin music started playing out of nowhere as a fin of some water pokemon surfaced from the water and began circling him…Duh Duh, Duh Duh, Duh Duh, Duh Duh Duh Duh Duh !
"Professor!" Ash yelled now in complete terror. "What the hell is going on? What is that? and where is the violin music coming from?"
"I don't know boy! But less thinking and more swimming!" Oak yelled back now equally freaked out by the mysterious deep violin music.
All of a sudden the music died down and the fin disappeared. "Where did it go?" Ash breathed out through the tension filled air.
"I don't know Ash, but hurry up and get out of there before it comes back" replied the Professor.
Suddenly, bubbles began forming around Ash as the water began to turn violent and turbulent. "AHHHHH!" At last a giant geyser of water rocketed out from the water beneath Ash propelling him a good 12 feet in the air before dropping him oh so subtlety on ground next to the Professor.
"Owwwww" groaned Ash as rolled around on ground next to the Professor who was running damage control as he began checking Ash over.
"Ash! Can you hear me? Are you ok?" the Professor asked frantically while imagining what Delia would do to him if he returned Ash in pieces after day one.
"Yeah, I'll be fine Professor, but now can you please explain to me what exactly that was?" he groaned as he began to sit up.
"Thank god, do you even know what your mom would do to me if I hurt her little Ashy?" Oak said in a female voice imitating his mom. "Anyway, what happened was-" suddenly the Professor froze in fear as he shakily began to raise his arm to point behind him, "th-th-that…" the Professor managed to stutter out.
Slowly turning his head to look behind him, he was met with the sight of a freshly evolved, thoroughly pissed off Seadra with a tick mark above its head. Suddenly it drew back its head and began firing off Water Guns and Bubblebeams at the two males.
"Run!" they both shouted as Ash sprung up and both of them began to book it away from the water pokemon habitat while dodging and failing to dodge a few of the numerous projectiles coming their way.
"I think, we finally, lost it!" the elderly pokemon researcher said between deep breaths as they began to approach the fire pokemon area.
"That was crazy!" Ash gasped equally winded as he was bent over attempting to catch his breath.
"Ash! You've got to pay attention while you're back here! I don't think fire will simply dry out of our clothes like this water will if you pull another stunt like that over here!" Oak scolded.
"I'm sorry Professor! I didn't mean it! I was just looking at all of the pokemon and the next thing I know I'm headfirst in the water and then that happened!" Ash replied back to him.
"I forgive you Ash, I know it was just an honest mistake, but seriously though, you need to pay attention while you're back here. Can I trust you out here alone with all of these pokemon while I might be working on something inside and not have to worry about you causing a massive free-for-all pokemon battle?" the Professor asked hypothetically with a critical look.
"You can trust me Professor! I promise you it won't happen again!" Ash pleaded desperately.
"Very well then, I'll trust you. Regardless however, we might have to keep you away from the water pokemon habitat for awhile." the Professor chuckled as his anger dissipated and the situation quickly diffused.
Despite it not being as malicious as it was at first, that Seadra never did drop its grudge with Ash. Everyday Ash is accustomed to a complementary Water Gun to the face when he comes to feed the water pokemon breakfast and dinner respectively.
Other than the Seadra, nothing else bad really happens to Ash consistently every day. Sure you have your occasional rampaging pokemon or other random disputes around the ranch, but hey, what's life without some complications?
Getting back on track, Ash would usually finish dishing out all of the pokemon's breakfast by around 10:30. Then Ash would head inside, his next destination being the lab where he would rejoin Professor Oak for the next two hours helping him conduct experiments, treat sick pokemon, or run various other tests on some of the pokemon.
After that, Ash and the Professor would check on the pokemon one last time before running over to Ash's house at around 12:45 for lunch. Delia had quickly made it a tradition of inviting both of them over for a home cooked lunch after she discovered just how hard both of them worked at the lab. Not that either of them complained, it was no secret that Mrs. Ketchum had some of the best cooking in all of Pallet Town.
After both giving Mrs. Ketchum compliments on the food, Ash and the Professor would make their way back to the lab and into the spare room that was converted and dubbed as "the classroom". There, for the next three hours, Ash would sit and attempt to absorb all of the information he could from the walking encyclopedia of pokemon that accompanied him.
Ash had really surprised Oak with his dedication and how he really could use his head when the situation called for it. Despite lacking common sense, Ash proved to him that he really is a genius when it comes to pokemon. Ash even does consistently well on all of the pop quizzes that he randomly springs on him from time to time.
The Professor and Ash agreed to plan out his curriculum like this: for the first hour, they would begin with strategy, like using a battlefield to your advantage, or how to turn an opponent's greatest strength into their final downfall. The Professor would grill Ash each day with a new battle scenario and Ash would have to come up ways on the spot and under pressure to work around handicaps, complications, and other variables in order to outsmart, and systematically defeat his opponent.
The second hour would be much less demanding and would basically consist of general knowledge of the pokemon world. Facts like geography, gym leaders, elite 4, and other prominent trainers of each region were all covered. Basically, anything that Ash would have to know to sound like an intelligent, well informed trainer to any passerby just meeting him was learned in this time.
Finally, for the final hour, Oak and Ash would go through meat and potatoes of his education, the pokemon. Ash and the Professor laid out a plan that would have him learning 50 of the 151 pokemon per year, excluding Mew and Mewtwo, as not enough information was known about either of them.
This was easily the most intense and memory dependent portion of Ash's curriculum as he learned everything from each pokemon's battle moves, base statistics, TM moves, HM moves, anatomy, movement, and any other crucial information that could potentially swing a battle in his favor. Ash surprised Oak yet again with how fast he was able to absorb the tiny bits of knowledge concerning pokemon; he was practically a pokemon sponge!
What really impressed Oak however, was that Ash would not let the Holy Grail of pokemon information he was giving him go to his head. Whenever they were done in the classroom, he would instantly regain his down-to-earth personality and walk out with a slightly goofy smile on his face like a normal kid his own age. Oak really appreciated that about Ash and knew in the long run that those qualities would take him far not only as a trainer, but as a person.
After taking a quick break after their study session, around 4:30 Oak would lead Ash out to his personal battlefield for the highlight of Ash's day, battle practice. Now one may ask, why does Professor Oak, an esteemed Pokemon Researcher own his own battlefield? Well, despite becoming a researcher, Professor Oak was known as quite the trainer in his own heyday. And having Ash around for a daily beatdow…I mean battle, Oak felt the need to splurge a little bit for a battlefield to "regain some of his youth" as he would say.
Call it a midlife crises more or less. Oh, and did I mention he was an amazing trainer? There was a reason he was once known as Samuel make like a tree and leave before he battles you Oak. Ash would learn that very soon into his training. Very soon as in, the first time he battled him and couldn't leave a single mark on the Professor's pokemon.
What they would do is Oak would give Ash a battle strategy, sometimes even then one they discussed earlier in the classroom, and leave Ash to ponder it while he went around the ranch and picked two random pokemon as he saw fit. As Ash progressed in skill, eventually he would select his own pokemon, but until that point, Oak would flawlessly pick Ash apart with the knowledge of what pokemon he would use beforehand. Ash constantly complained that it wasn't fair, but hey, winning will be that much easier when your opponent doesn't know which pokemon you had was his way of seeing it.
Over the last two years, Ash had steadily improved with a wide variety of pokemon from the ranch, but he had still yet to defeat Professor Oak. Granted, he could give him a good battle and was a thousand times better than he was at first, but Oak would always pull something out at the end that would tip the battle in his favor to Ash's great annoyance.
After about an hour and a half of getting handled by Professor Oak, it was around 6-6:30 and time to wrap things up at the ranch. From there Ash would proceed to feed all of the pokemon dinner and put them back in their pokeballs, which is where we find Ash now, attempting to feed the water pokemon their dinner before being "greeted" by the friendly neighborhood Seadra.
"Rough day Ash?" the Professor asked as he approached him from behind.
"You know it Professor, everything just seems to be going wrong today." complained Ash with a sigh.
"A penny for your thoughts?" he said as he held out his hand which indeed did contain a penny.
Taking the penny with a light grin on his face, Ash began recounting his day, "Well, first my alarm clock went off late this morning so I had to scramble out of bed and get ready in a couple minutes just so I could run down here to avoid being late. Then, despite your morning poem being as wonderful and uplifting as usual, the entire morning seemed to go wrong starting with when that Kadabra managed to wander its way into the ghost pokemon mansion" began Ash.
"Yes, from what I saw and heard from the lab that didn't sound like it ended too well. Especially when I heard… "Give me back my pants! Those aren't meant as headgear!" quoted the Professor in his best Ash voice with a laugh.
"Don't even get me started" grumbled Ash. "Anyway, after finally rescuing that Kadabra, then that Growlithe decided to use my hand as its chew toy when we ran that experiment in the lab this morning. Something I distinctly remember seeing you enjoy very much." said Ash with a glare directed at Oak.
"You have to admit it was pretty funny Ash. If it happened to me I'm sure you wouldn't let me hear the end of it" laughed Oak as he remembered the particular incident this morning.
"Then to top it off, I got thrashed by you today in our battle after doing so well the last couple days, and got my daily Water Gun from that Seadra while I was trying to feed the water pokemon." finished Ash with a drawn out sigh.
"I'm sorry to hear how tragic your day has been Ash" said the Professor with light sarcasm. "But hey, why don't you just call it a day early and I'll finish up things for you here? I know you won't get to go home and relax immediately cause of your mom's daily "lessons", but now you can finish those up a little sooner and call it quits." the Professor offered.
"You mean it Professor? You don't have to; I can suck it up and finish up here."
"I mean it Ash, you're always working so hard around here and you deserve it, now go get home and deal with your mom so you can get some rest." the Professor finished with a warm smile.
"Thanks a lot Professor! I'll see you on Monday, have a nice weekend!" finished Ash as he turned and made his way off the ranch and up the dirt road to his house.
On his way home, he couldn't help but notice how quiet Pallet Town was as the moon just began to creep over the hills and into the violet dusk sky.
Things around Pallet Town certainly did become quieter after Gary decided to leave. He never really did get over losing his opportunity to leave much to the disappointment of Professor Oak. Gary spent the first year lying around grumbling about the decision before finally choosing a course of action.
He had heard of a region very far away called Unova, which due to its distance from the other regions had its own separate Pokemon League. To top it off, there were no age restrictions for beginning trainers there. Making up his mind, he spent the next three days begging Oak to let him leave for Unova immediately to begin his pokemon journey.
After seeing him do nothing but lie around and complain for the last year, for Gary's own good Professor Oak finally relented and contacted of friend of his named Professor Juniper. Through her he arranged for Gary to being his journey in Unova which he left for about 8 months ago.
Despite being bitter rivals, Gary had also been one of his first and best friends and losing him was indeed hard for Ash. It had taken a particularly brutal thrashing in one of his battles with the Professor for him to finally get his senses back.
Arriving at his doorstep, he turned the doorknob and was about to walk into his living room when…
As soon as he closed the door, he looked where the door once was only to find his mother standing there with a creepy expression on her face while slowly palming a frying pan up and down. "Would you care to try that again honey?" said his mom with as menacing a voice as she could pull off.
Did he mention his mother's complementary manners lessons? Sighing, Ash turned around right back out the door closing it behind him. Facing the door again, this time he knocked three times expecting an immediate answer.
"Be right there!" Ash heard his mother shout from what sounded like the kitchen? "Wasn't she just standing right next to the door?" he thought. Shrugging his shoulders, he waited as his mom finally opened the door looking surprised and said "Oh Ash honey! You're home early! Why don't you come in?"
"Thank you for your kindness!" he said with a painfully forced smile and tone. "Let me remove my shoes at the door so I don't track mud into your spotless house mam" Ash said as he stepped in after removing his shoes.
"Why thank you kind sir! Come on in!" she said as she led him in. Finally dropping the charade she said "See why manners are so important young man? How do you think some stranger would have reacted to some teenage boy walking into their house uninvited? she asked disapprovingly.
"But mooommm, this is my house! I've had a bad day and I just wanted to come inside without having to do this" Ash whined to his mom.
"Sorry Ash, but fatigue doesn't excuse a lack of manners in my household! Now why don't you cook dinner and you can tell me about your day while we eat." Delia said as she strolled off up the stairs into her room.
Yes ladies and gentlemen, you heard right, Ash is cooking dinner. Over the last two years Delia has had Ash cook dinner nightly as part of his "home lessons". And to Delia's immense joy, Ash had come a very long way from when first started. She no longer had to instruct him how to do anything or monitor him in fear that he might set the house on fire. Cooking wise, he had improved from inedible charred messes to meals that even managed impress Mrs. Ketchum.
"Alright mom, it'll be ready in half an hour." said Ash exhaustedly as he trudged off into the kitchen.
Forty-five minutes later we find Ash and Delia sitting around the table with chicken parmesan with spaghetti to go along with it. The extra fifteen minutes was necessary due to the factor of Ash's exhaustion.
As they dug in to the well made meal by Ash, he began to recount his day to his mom who had a growing look of pity for her precious baby.
"I'm so sorry to hear about your bad day honey, in that case, we'll skip our evening talk for tonight and I'll let you go straight to bed." his mom said with warm smile.
"Thanks mom, I'll go take care of the dishes then I'll head up to bed" as he made his way over to the sink.
His mom suddenly cut him off however "Don't worry about those Ash, I'll get them, go ahead up and get some sleep."
"Ok, thanks again mom, I'll see you tomorrow, night" he said as he made his way up the stairs and into his bed.
As she was doing the dishes, Delia couldn't help but feel proud of the man her Ash was becoming. She remembered how every night he would come home from Professor Oak's and how she would drill him on manners and "girl skills" in their nightly talks.
She had to say she was very impressed on how he took it seriously and how well he's improved in both departments. He honestly had very good manners already; she just likes to mess with him now like she did at the door earlier. She also felt proud of herself on how well she was able to teach him about girls. "Those girls won't be able to resist my Ash once they get a view of him. I'll have grandkids out of him if it's the last thing I do" she thought with smirk on her face. Finishing up the dishes, she turned out the lights before making her way upstairs and into bed herself.
(The Next Afternoon)
It was a cool sunny spring Pallet day while Ash was sitting on the chair swing on his front porch. Due to how hectic his weeks always were, he always loved taking Saturdays off from doing anything. Looking around he couldn't help but to notice how beautiful the flowers were in his mother's garden as they began to bloom. Surrounding him was a colorful menagerie of flowers which had every color from red, purple, blue, and pink. Ash also felt a sense of pride knowing that he helped his mother plant those on one of his Sundays off. Ash loved to help his mother in the garden on weekends; he found gardening a very calming and satisfying hobby for him.
He was currently in the middle of what he planned to do all day…nothing, when he saw Professor Oak running towards his house at a brisk pace.
"Professor, what's wrong?" Ash asked as he noted his disheveled appearance. Suddenly the power went out in his house, only confirming to him more that something was definitely wrong.
"Ash! We have an emergency! There seems to be an electric type pokemon rampaging around the town power plant!" he heaved while trying to regain his breath.
"That's terrible!" Ash exclaimed. "Do we know why? " he asked.
"We believe that team rocket may have been involved." said the Professor gravely. "Apparently there was a whole group of them in Viridian Forest when team rocket must have decided to attack and capture them. The one that wandered its way into the power plant is one of the few we believe to have escaped and due to its experience; it's very distrusting of humans."
"Well what pokemon is it?" Ash asked.
"I'm afraid I can't tell you that" Oak said mysteriously.
"Why not? Don't you want to save that pokemon and protect the power plant?" Ash yelled furiously, angry that the Professor would play games at a time like this.
"I do, but I won't be stopping it, you will" the Professor said bluntly.
"What do you mean?" Ash asked his anger gone, now thoroughly confused.
"I believe that it's time for a little test for you Ash. I think some field experience you do you some good. I've brought you a pokemon and a pokeball, I want you to go catch that pokemon at the power plant and bring it back to the Lab so we can examine and help it." the Professor finished.
"Alright then" Ash said calming down. He knew better from Professor Oak than to lose your cool while under pressure. "What pokemon did you bring me?" he asked the Professor.
With a serious look on his face, he proceeded to say, "I'm not going to tell you right now, but listen carefully. I want you to use that pokemon I gave you for battle, but under no circumstances are you to open that pokeball before you reach the power plant. I want you to come up with a battle plan on the spot like we've been practicing for the last two years."
"Alright, I understand. I'll meet you back at the lab with a new electric type pokemon for you Professor!" Ash yelled as he ran up the road and made his way to the power plant.
(At the Pallet Town Power Plant)
Ash took a second to catch his breath at the gate of the power plant before he decided to enter. On his way there, he realized that he seemed to be faster and tired way less quickly. "Hmmm, must be all the manual labor that slave driver has me doing, oh well, another thought for another time" he noted.
As he entered the power plant he immediately knew where his target was from the large amount of sparks coming from the generator room. Running into the building, he we met by a group of workers who were being pinned down behind a metal crate from the high voltage bolts of electricity.
"Are all of you guys all right?" Ash asked them as hurried behind the crate and approached the workers.
"What do you think you're doing kid? Now you're trapped here with us!" one of the workers shouted angrily at him.
"I was sent here by Professor Oak to stop that pokemon. Now I'll ask again, is anyone hurt?" Ash asked quickly taking control of the situation.
After hearing that, the worker decided to comply, "No, we're all fine; we're just pinned down behind this crate from all the electricity"
Nodding his head, Ash addressed them all, "Alright good, now will someone fill me in on what happened?"
"Well," one of the workers began. "We were all just going about our business when we heard a large crash from the forest followed by the cries of hurt pokemon. Then the next thing we know, this guy up here shows up with some weird collar around his neck and starts going nuts firing off lightning everywhere. It seems like the generators are strengthening him!"
"Alright, and what exactly is "he"?" Ash questioned.
"It's horrible! It's just a cute little Pikachu! Pikachu shouldn't be this scary!" one of the larger workers cried losing it while one of the workers next to him comforted him.
"A Pikachu?" Ash questioned with a disbelieving look. "How could a Pikachu be causing this much-" Ash was suddenly cut off as a huge bolt of electricity much larger than the previous ones fired at the metal crate shaking it violently and nearly bringing it down.
"Ahhhhh! Make it stop!" cried the large worker from before. After the large bolt of electricity, all lightning stopped as everything seemed to go eerily quiet. "Ok, point taken." Ash said with a sweatdrop. "Alright, I think it needs a second to rest, all of you get out of here now and I'll go up there and deal with it." scared senseless by the last bolt of electricity, the workers quickly dashed out of the generator room with their tails between their legs.
Taking a second to gather himself, Ash walked out from behind the barely standing crate and made his way towards the generators slowly and looking for a sign of movement. As he cleared the first group of generators, he was met with a heart wrenching sight.
Lying on the floor in a small clearing in front of him was a badly bruised and beaten Pikachu with some sort of collar with an R insignia around its neck. Its chest heaved up and down as it was clearly exhausted from expelling so many watts of electricity.
Ash nearly broke down seeing the condition that the Pikachu was in. Bruises, cuts, and burns littered its body in such a way that made Ash nauseous and he wondered how any pokemon could stand after going through what this Pikachu must have. Examining his surroundings, Ash realized that it wasn't the generators powering the electric rodent up, but the weird collar that it had on its neck.
Ash then turned his attention back to the injured Pikachu, "Even with that collar, that Pikachu has to be one of the strongest I've ever seen! The electric sacks on its cheeks are far larger than any Pikachu I've ever studied at Oak's! That explains how it was able to fire off such large bolts of electricity!"
Knowing how hostile it was to humans from its previous display and Oak's warning, Ash steeled himself and kept one hand on his pokeball as he steadily moved closer to the battered pokemon. "Pikachu! Don't worry! I'm here to help you!"
Hearing Ash's voice, the Pikachu picked itself off the ground and looked around curiously for the source of the noise. Finally noticing Ash and registering that he was a human, Pikachu went berserk and with newfound strength, released a large explosion of electricity that forced Ash to the floor. "Pikachuuuuu!"
Getting up, Ash yelled "Pikachu! I'm not here to hurt you! Calm down!" Remembering Oak's instructions, Ash grabbed the pokeball on his belt and with a grunt, threw the pokeball while yelling "I choose you!"
"Oh you've got to be kidding me." was the last thought that registered in Ash's mind before getting slammed in the face by a powerful Water Gun. "That's it, worldwide famous pokemon researcher or not, I'm going to kill him when I get back."
Yes, standing in front of Ash was Seadra in all of its glory with its head cocked back about to fire off another water projectile at him. As it was about to release it, it was suddenly struck by one of the stray bolts of electricity that came from Pikachu, who had now become mobile and was dashing around the clearing at high speeds while firing off powerful bursts of electricity.
Ash quickly realized that if he wanted any hope of walking out of there, he would need Seadra's full cooperation. "Seadra! Do you see the situation we're in now? I know that we don't really see eye to eye, but I need your help to stop this Pikachu! So please work with me or we're both done!"
Grudgingly, Seadra nodded its head as it turned towards the general location of Pikachu in a battle stance.
"Alright Seadra!" Ash yelled as he began coming up with a strategy. "Ok, we're at a heavy disadvantage here with both type and speed, I need to find a way to neutralize its speed, box it in, and bombard with its Water type moves since I'm pretty sure Seadra isn't high leveled enough to know any Dragon moves yet." one could see the gears turning in Ash's head as he came up with a plan.
Seeing the Pikachu approaching rapidly, he turned his hat around backwards and called out his first move, "Seadra! Use Water Gun to soak the floor but don't do it near you since water conducts electricity!
Following its orders, Seadra unleashed a torrent of water towards Pikachu and continued on to drench the floor while leaving a nice large circle around itself. Seeing the original blast of water coming at it, Pikachu quickly attempted to change directions only to slip on the now slick floor and slide into the circle, right into Ash and Seadra's hands.
As Pikachu lay in heap on the ground attempting to get up, Ash yelled "Great job Seadra! Now's he's a sitting Golduck! Now, quick use Smokescreen to blind it!"
Seadra immediately fired off an inky black sludge that landed right in Pikachu's eyes, effectively blinding it. Pikachu was now up and began frantically firing off uncontrolled electric blasts that were greatly damaging the surrounding generators, a few nearly missing Seadra, who was awaiting Ash's next orders.
"Now, use agility to avoid that electricity and circle around Pikachu!" Seadra then began to blur out of sight and began moving so quickly, that it appeared that there were twenty Seadras surrounding Pikachu, who was now being pushed into the middle of the circle by the circling sea dragons.
"Time to finish it off Seadra! Use Water Gun! Rapid fire!" As Seadra blurred around Pikachu, simultaneously all of the Seadra drew their heads back and appeared to fire Water Gun after Water Gun, each one damaging Pikachu more until it finally collapsed, unable to stand any longer.
"That's enough Seadra! Great job!" Ash yelled as Seadra ceased its attack while Ash moved towards the unconscious pokemon to examine its collar. Standing over it, Ash bent down and took a closer look. He quickly realized that the collar seemed to contain some kind of liquid that it was steadily injecting into the back of its neck.
Knowing that the collar couldn't be doing anything good, Ash began to attempt to remove it by pulling it off. Ash's attempts quickly woke the unconscious Pikachu up, giving Ash a chance to look right into its eyes.
Looking deep into its eyes, Ash saw many different emotions swirling around rapidly in its deep black pupils. Ash saw fear, pain, confusion, and dread, but most of all, he saw what appeared to be artificial rage?
Realizing the position it was in, Pikachu immediately began thrashing around attempting to distance itself from the human that had his hands around its neck. "Pikachuuuuu!" it cried as released its most powerful Thunderbolt in blind rage and fear.
Ash howled in pain from being hit by the high level of electricity at such a close range, but knowing that he couldn't give up on Pikachu, Ash braced himself as he held Pikachu close to his body "I won't abandon you Pikachu!"
Suddenly the collar snapped in half from both the powerful electricity from Pikachu and the pressure from being squeezed up against Ash. Both being completely drained, both Ash and Pikachu collapsed to the floor facing each other. As they both made eye contact, Ash once again looked deep into Pikachu's eyes, and to his relief, saw only exhaustion.
"Don't worry Pikachu. You don't have to be afraid any more, I promise I'll take good care of you." Ash wheezed out despite the pain in his chest.
They laid there for what seemed like hours bonding through nothing but their eyes, when in reality it was only about a minute. After finding no trace of malice in Ash's eyes, Pikachu let out one final pleased sigh before it finally faded off into the land of unconsciousness.
Gathering up all of his remaining strength, Ash picked himself off the ground and pulled his out his last remaining pokeball. "I promise I'll take care of you" he uttered as he tapped the white circle of the pokeball against the unconscious pokemon, sucking it into the pokeball without any resistance.
Glad that he had finally accomplished his mission, Ash turned around only to hear clapping? "Well done Ash, I have to say I'm very proud of your performance." said Professor Oak as he appeared stealthily from the shadows.
"Professor? How did you get there?" asked a completely dumbfounded Ash as another thought crossed his mind "Hey! and if you were there then why didn't you help me?" he cried out in indignation.
Resisting the urge to laugh at the look on Ash's face the Professor began explaining. "Well, I did say that some field experience testing would do you some good, who did you think was going to judge your performance? And leading into that, I didn't help you because I didn't think you needed it, you were in control of that Pikachu the entire time, I was quite pleased with your performance." he finished.
Realizing the truth in his words, Ash's anger quickly dissipated. "Thanks Professor, I used the box in strategy to neutralize its speed"
"I saw that, you set it up perfectly by using that Water Gun to trap it in your circle and effectively finished it off." he noted impressed by the feat.
"Yeah, speaking of that, why on earth would you send me Seadra? You know just as well as I do that we don't get along!" Ash yelled as he pointed at the pokemon in question. Just as Ash finished complaining, he was hit in the face by another Water Gun as Seadra made its way over with an annoyed expression, as if it was thinking the same thing as Ash.
This time Professor Oak couldn't resist laughing at the misfortune of Ash. "Speak of the devil! And my reasoning for that is simple, I wanted to put you in the worst situation possible and see you work your way around it, what better way to do that than fighting with not only a type disadvantage, but with a disobedient pokemon" he finished matter-of-factly.
"I guess you're right…" he groaned. "But I also got lucky that Pikachu was hurt before we battled him, did you see that little guy's power?"
Nodding his head, Professor answered "I sure did, that Pikachu has to have some of the strongest electric attacks I've ever seen. Unfortunately though, I managed to capture a glimpse of him after your battle and I'm afraid that it looked as if his electric sacs on his cheeks were badly damaged from the collar and too many electric attacks." he said solemnly as he examined that very collar.
Immediately concerned, Ash asked "Is it going to be permanent?"
"I don't think so, but we're going to have to run some more tests on it when we get back to the lab. There's one more thing about that Pikachu that concerns me however, from what it just went through, I'm sure it's going to have a strong dislike for humans." he noted sadly.
"What can we do to help it Professor?" Ash asked.
"That's where you come in, I couldn't help but notice that you seem rather attached to that Pikachu. I want you to keep him as your first Pokemon and gradually warm him back up to humans. I'm sure you remember from your studies that this won't be like the same relationship you have with the pokemon at the ranch. Pikachu will be yours, and you need to take good care of him and train him well. Remember the most important words you spoke as a ten year old? You owe it to that pokemon to be the best trainer you can be so that you can help it be the pokemon that it can be." the Professor finished in a serious tone.
"You mean it Professor? I promise that I won't let you or Pikachu down, I will be the best trainer I can be so that Pikachu can become the strongest Pikachu in the world!" Ash exclaimed as the fire of determination burned inside of him.
"I'm glad you feel that way Ash, you continue to make me prouder of you every day. But first things first, let's go treat Pikachu and get you some rest. I'm sure that Thunderbolt didn't feel too good huh? he said as they began the trek back to the lab, Ash making the journey with his very first pokemon, and friend onboard.
That felt so good to finally finish! I hope that all of you enjoyed the latest installment of The Prodigy!
I have to admit though, that first chapter was a kind of an experiment to see if other people thought my writing was any good and I was very pleased with the number of good reviews on that chapter. Due to the positive response, I promise you that I will finish this story from beginning to end and that I will never abandon it.
I'm sorry that you guys had to wait that long for this next chapter. Life is very hectic for me right now between high school, my new part-time job, and a ton of football stuff. However, I find writing as an escape for me so I'm always willing to sit down and work on this story. Thank you everyone for waiting and reading, keep an eye out for my next chapter! Please Review!
DBF out