We looked around, taking in the green of Route 1. Bushes ran in a straight line across the horizon, looking like it would stop us from moving on to Accumula Town.
"Wow," Bianca exclaimed as she followed a flock of Unpheasants as they flew across the sky. She took a few steps towards the bushes and twirled to look at everything in a 180 degree view. The professor came up behind us.
"It's pretty cool, isn't it? Going off on a new adventure in a foreign land; it's…adventurous!"
I whirled around, startled at her sudden appearance. Cheren just pushed his glasses up on his nose.
"My dear professor, you're being a bit redundant."
"Yes, I know. I've been staying up late lately coming up with new Pokémon names, so don't be too harsh. Anyway…" She paused as she tried to change the subject. "I'm going to teach you how to catch a Pokémon. First, step into this tall grass."
To demonstrate, she entered some grass about waist high, sending some scared Lillipups and Patrats skittering around in the grass. One brave Lillipup ran up to her, bent its front legs menacingly, and growled. I saw the professor smirk as she brought out a Pokeball from her PokeBelt.
"Let's go, Minccino," the professor said in a small, smooth voice as she tossed the capsule towards the Pokémon. The Minccino popped out in a flash of red, and I saw the Lillipup back up a little. However, it quickly recovered and only growled louder.
"Alright, Minccino. Let's use tackle." The Minccino seemed to disappear as it sprang towards the young dog. Milliseconds later, the puppy flew back and skidded on the ground, flattening some of the jungle-esque grass. Before the dog could recover, the professor whipped out another Pokeball and threw it at the hurt Lillipup.
The red light snaked out, encompassing the puppy and bringing it inside the ball. The ball landed on the ground, bounced, then twitched once, twice, three times. The middle circle turned red, and the professor walked over and picked the ball up.
"See? It's just that easy." She handed the Pokeball containing Lillipup to Bianca, then turned to her Minccino. "Return." The Minccino returned to the red and white ball as the professor stood in front of us, her hand on her hip. "I'll meet you at Accumula Town. I have more things to show you, but for now you're on your own. Ciao~." She waved her fingers as we stood, still processing what all had happened in those few seconds.
Bianca was the first to recover and turned to Cheren and I. "Hey, do you guys want to have a contest?" she asked eagerly when the Professor was gone.
"What kind of contest?" Cheren asked, squinting his eyes, not sure if he was going to get into something he would consider stupid or not. Bianca smiled.
"It'll be a competition to catch the most Pokémon." She said, beaming as if it were the best idea in the world. Cheren half stared, half frowned at the girl, who had missed something really obvious.
"Um, Bianca," I pitched in, catching what Cheren was thinking. "You've technically already won." She whipped her head to face me, confused.
"What do you mean?" She asked, not catching up with Cheren and I.
"The Professor hasn't given us any Pokeballs, and she gave you the Lillipup she caught. That means you have two Pokémon whereas Thomas and I only have the one we got at the Professor's lab." Cheren said, answering for me. "We can't catch any until we get to Accumula Town simply because we have nothing to catch the Pokémon with." He said, finishing his thought before either Bianca or I could say anything.
"Well, we do have one thing." I put in. This time it was Cheren's turn to look at me with confusion. I held out my arms, waving my hands for attention. "We've got these." Cheren sighed as he gave me a glare with enough ice to freeze the sun. "Well it's true," I muttered.
Cheren just shook his head. "Whatever, I don't care about the stupid competition anyway," he said, starting to wade through the grass and move away from us. Bianca looked at the ground, disheartened. I put my arm around her to console her.
"It's alright," I said, as she raised her head to meet my eyes with hers. When she was finally looking in my eyes I gave her a reassuring grin. "I can't promise much, but I'll play." I heard Cheren give a loud sigh as he turned around.
"Okay, fine. Release the Pokémon the professor gave you." He said walking up to us, obviously impatient. Bianca released her Tepig, and I just got out Oshawatt's Pokeball. "Now give me the 'Balls." Bianca and I obeyed.
Cheren turned around, just like he had when he healed the Pokémon. A few seconds later he turned around and handed the Pokeballs back to us. We took them and glanced them over. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary.
"They're no longer tied to that Pokémon," Cheren explained. "Essentially; you can catch other Pokémon with them now."
Bianca smiled. "Thanks Cheren," She said, then dashed off into the grass, her little fiery pig following her. "C'mon Thomas, let's go catch a few Pokémon!" She shouted back behind her.
I started walking, ensuring that my little water otter was following behind. As I waded through the unkempt grass, I heard more skitters of whatever Lillipups had stayed behind. As I took one more step I heard a growl come from almost underneath me. Shocked, I backed up to find I had almost stepped on one of the small dogs.
I hesitated for a second before commanding my Oshawatt. "Oshawatt, use Tackle!" The little water Pokémon sprinted for the Lillipup, which dodged with plenty of room to spare. I cursed before commanding my little otter to use Tackle again. The attack hit this time, but the dog looked barely hurt. I grimaced, cursing the wild Pokémon that looked to be really strong. But then the Lillipup took a step towards my Oshawatt and I noticed a small limp. It gave me new hope.
"Oshawatt, Water Gun!" The otter took a millisecond to get the attack ready and I noticed a small hesitation in the wild Lillipup's stature, along with a small uncertainty and regret in its eyes. The attack hit and the Lillipup fell over.
Oh no, was it dead? I thought Pokémon were essentially immortal. Maybe it's different for wild Pokémon? But slowly, the blue streaks of light reached up towards the sky; a sign that the Pokémon had just fainted. However, that meant that I wasn't able to catch it. The damn government made it pretty much impossible to catch a Pokémon without its consent.
Apparently, Pokémon have the same rights as humans do; at least, that's what I've heard my mom say when she's talking about Pokémon. The Pokémon have the right to refuse a Pokeball and the reason why you have to fight them is to win their trust. If you throw a Pokeball too soon, the Pokémon will fight, and will usually break free.
The one loophole that no one has figured out is the reason why the government allows you to catch a sleeping Pokémon. After all, what's the difference between a fainted Pokémon and a sleeping one? Unfortunately, the government has kept that information to itself, and I doubted no one from the outside would learn the secret anytime soon.
I looked at the spot where the fainted Lillipup had been, then shrugged. "Alright Oshawatt, let's keep going." Without a word the little monster gathered behind me and we started walking down Route 1.
The route was filled with new trainers and I ignored them the best I could. Finally one popped out from the grass, which was easy for her to do as she was no more than a child. She grinned at me with a holey smile—she had lost a few baby teeth it seemed—and held up a Pokeball. I rolled my eyes in frustration.
"Alright mister, I'll send out my super-special-awesome Purrloin!" She tossed the Pokeball and a red light snaked out, leaving a small, purple cat washing its paw and foreleg. The Purrloin noticed that it was outside of its home and stopped its bath, cocking its head to one side to study us.
"Meow?" It let out as it looked back at the little girl.
"Alright, use Tackle, okay?" The little girl goaded the cat excitedly. The Pokémon did nothing, just sat there. "Purrloin." The girl's voice was low and had a warning tone. "I said use Tackle." The cat still sat there, much to the frustration of the little girl.
"Um, miss…Purrloins have Scratch as their base attack, not Tackle." I had reached this conclusion just seconds ago. I myself thought it strange that the Purrloin didn't attack, and I went through what my teacher had taught me in Pokémon Basics. It wasn't till I realized that the claws were better for attacking than a normal tackle that it hit me.
The girl's face turned red in embarrassment. "Purrloin, use Scratch," she commanded correctly this time. The purple feline jumped up and made a beeline towards Oshawatt, who was very inconveniently behind me.
"Oshawatt, Dodge," I yelled, before jumping to the side myself. The skittering grass behind me gave me relief to know that my otter had gotten out of the way in time.
"Alright, use Bubble Beam," I commanded my Pokémon. The creature stared at me blankly. You're kidding; he can use Water Gun, but he can't use Bubble Beam?! What kind of…no, I had to think. Oshawatt looked at me, as I heard the little girl call out some attack. I shook my head, before my eyes landed on the shell on the blue otter's belly.
"Oshawatt, use Razor Shell!" I cried, and my little water Pokémon went into action. It sidestepped, pulled the shell from its stomach, and slashed all in the same motion. The Purrloin took a few steps before collapsing. The red light from the Pokeball snaked out and retrieved the fainted kitty.
The little girl looked horrified and dropped to her knees. The red and white sphere containing the now fainted Purrloin dropped to the ground. Tears welled at the youngster's eyes and she quickly covered her face in her hands.
"It's all over," she sobbed. "I was only out for a day and already it's over." A knot formed in my throat. I slowly walked over to her and put my hand on her shoulder. She shrugged it off.
"I'm sorry." I wasn't sure if she'd believe me, but I said it anyway. She looked up at me with contempt.
"Yeah right." She had anger, pain, and sadness all in her face. I made another move to try to comfort her, tell her that she was really young and she still had her life ahead of her before she got up and ran away from me. I looked down and saw the Pokeball just sitting there.
"Hey wait!" I yelled, picking up the ball. "You forgot your Purrloin!" There was no answer. Oh well, might as well keep it.
Quick Edit (10/15/2013): Changed "Tohya" to "Thomas" and made some very minor edits.
