Chapter One

The machines beeped as I lay in my hospital bed, measuring the fading of my life with steady beats. I glanced over at the mirror on the wall, and for the millionth time I regretted it. My body had wasted away. My face looked like a skull with a thin layer of skin stretched across it. I looked away, depressed. I had been handsome once. Girls used to look at me. Now I scared small children.

I was 25, and I wouldn't live to see 26. The cancer had ravaged my body, eating away at me and leaving nothing behind. Wisps of white hair covered my bald pate where thick black locks once grew. My hazel eyes were sunken in deep sockets, like gem stones shining from deep caves, as if the very light of my fading soul was escaping through them.

My parents had left, they couldn't bear to see these last, labored moments as my existential hourglass ran down, the last few grains of sand circling the drain forlornly.

"Mr Hall? Are you ready?" A nurse asked as she quietly walked in.

"Scott." I croaked, my voice, once deep and melodious now sounded like a creaking door, it's hinges in bad need of oil. "Call me Scott. I'm ready nurse."

She nodded respectfully as she walked slowly to the machines that kept me clinging to this life, this pain. A lawyer followed her into the room, to witness my last decision.

"In accordance with the patient's wishes, I am terminating life support, effective this date, in order to allow the patient to pass on with dignity. Nurse Mary Angeles presiding." She reached over, and one by one, began to shut off the machines.

I felt the weakness hit me like a freight train, my lungs felt like a grown man was sitting on them. Breathing became hard, my vision began to blur. Tired. So tired. I drifted off to sleep, perchance to dream.

I achieved consciousness and gaped in awe. I beheld a great, golden wheel, and the wheel span, and the universe ground on. And the wheel was an old man, his beard white as the snow. And the old man was my father, and love shone from his eyes. And my father was a young man, his palms bled crimson, his hands held out as if to take mine. And the young man was my mother, nurturing, and gentleness and care radiated from her. And my mother was the great wheel, spinning and spinning. And it all was all, beginning and end, forever and ever amen.

A pair of crimson eyes opened in the nothing that was everything, and the peered into my very soul.

TOO SOON. FAR TOO SOON. I CANNOT SEND YOU BACK, YOUR DOORWAY TO THAT LIFE IS CLOSED, AND ONCE CLOSED, CANNOT BE REOPENED.

A voice boomed, reverberating throughout my entire being. Then the voice spoke, in a gentle tone, as a parent to their child.

Behold, I have prepared a place for you, one of my favorites. Live long, prosper. Be fruitful and multiply. This is my JUDGEMENT.

And the wheel became a white deer, and I gaped. I knew this being. Had seen it before, in my best childhood memories. Beams of light flew through the air, from the spokes of the wheel, and they arced, and struck me, and I fell.

The stars wheeled and streaked, galaxies spun around me. Suns birthed in explosions of light, grew, aged, then exploded, only to give birth to new suns in turn. The cosmos continued on as it always did, and it was beautiful. But then the heavens washed out in blue, and clouds streaked past as I fell through the sky. I hit the ground with a thud, and I knew no more.

I came to to the indescribable sensation of having my mind, well, poked, for lack of a better term.

Curiosity

Concern

Excitement

Anxiousness

Fear

Concern

Curiosity

Awake?

My eyes blinked open, stabbed by the bright morning sunlight. I coughed dryly as I rolled over onto my side, groaning. "Son of a rip-roaring b- huh?" I trailed off in utter shock, almost refusing to process the image my eyes were sending me.

There, not five feet in front of me, was a tiny little being. About a foot tall, a greenish cream color, sporting a light green, helmet-like bowl cut, two red horns poking through the hair, was what could only be a Pokémon. A Ralts, to be precise. What made this so hard to accept was that I had only ever seen one through the screen of a gameboy.

It, she, was frozen to the spot, shaking like a leaf. I tried to remember what I knew about the species, pokemon ruby and sapphire had been a long time ago, but it all came back like it had been yesterday. Ralts was a psychic and fairy type, they like quiet areas and calm thoughts. I tried to think calming feelings, but I'm not sure how effective it was. My own emotions were roiling. Confusion, shock, unease. I had no idea where I was or how I got here, only vague memories of a past life and unbearable pain.

"Um, Ralts. You can feel what I feel, right?" She nodded, still obviously scared. "Good. So then you can sense that I'm not going to hurt you, right?" She nodded again, beginning to calm down. "My name is Scott. I think I might be a little lost. Can you help me find a town or a village? Somewhere where there are other people?"

"R-Ralts." She replied, barely above a whisper. At the same time, a sensation that can only be described as agreement brushed across my mind. I hauled myself to my feet and stretched, my back popping and cracking. I took a deep breath of pure, clean air, filling my lungs to their fullest, marveling at the ease with which it happened. No pain. No cancer. I checked myself over and groaned. I was… far smaller than I remembered. Puberty. Again. Oh joy.

I looked down at the small fairy by my feet, smiled and said "lead on Ralts."

Joy-of-the-Spring-Dawning had lived a fairly ordinary life, for a wild Pokémon, that is. Every morning she woke up, thanked the wheel that she was alive, tried to survive and avoid notice. Most days she found food. Didn't help with the loneliness though. She remembered how her mother would tell her stories of humans. She would listen with rapt attention as she heard stories of far off places and strange pokemon. Glorious battles and exciting adventures.

She wanted so badly to go see and do things like that.

Then one morning she saw a young human literally fall out of the sky.

At first, she just watched, her natural fear keeping her from getting any closer. She sat uncertainly, internally hating herself for her indecision. She had yearned for adventure her entire life, and when it was laying right there in front of her, she couldn't act.

Pathetic.

Steeling herself, she inches closer to the human. She reached out with her senses, trying to make a connection. She brushed his mind with hers, gently. Tentatively. Scanning his surface mind, she marveled. He had lived with some kind of great pain, but his heart was still good. He was a good person. Maybe he'd be her partner?

She got a sense of surfacing, of awakening. She sent a quiet query. His eyes flew open, and his mind swam with the typical process of someone unconscious coming back to consciousness.

He locked eyes with her, and his mind showed her surprise, disbelief, and finally wonder. He looked at her with wonder. Her fear began to abate a little, she sensed no danger from this boy. She watched as he looked around, lost flickering across his mind scape. He spoke sounds at her, and she tried to understand. He was asking something… help with finding…? A town! Yes! She would help the lost human find a town!

"S-sure! I'll help you!" She said.

We spent hours tracking through the forest, following the Ralts' gentle directions. She got tired fairly quickly, and after a few moments of indecision, she accepted the offer to ride on my shoulder. As the hours passed, we started to bond, the insistent pointing whenever we needed to change direction slowly becoming a general sense of that way, and we talked.

There was an obvious language barrier, but with Ralts' empathic abilities providing a running sense of the feelings and intentions, we understood each other. We talked about ourselves mostly. I told her what I could remember of my life, going to sleep deathly sick and waking up in the middle of the wilderness. She told me of her desire to find a human partner, to travel and train with. Someone to help her get stronger.

I had often wondered about that. The games never really went in to why pokemon chose to travel with humans. It was just always a given that they did. I asked Ralts about it and all I got was a sense of growing together. Maybe some kind of subconscious synergistic ability? I wasn't sure.

Ralts herself was just as fascinating. Psychic abilities were always a myth in the real world. I couldn't help but wonder what promulgated the telekinesis that some Pokémon had, let alone the extra sensory perception. Were they reading electrochemical patterns in the brain? Or was it something else? What allowed them to receive the thoughts the read?

Anyway, after a time, we found ourselves walking out of the woods and into a small town. I stood rooted to the spot as I read the name on the sign.

'Welcome to Pallet Town! Shades of your journey await!'

No fucking way.