Chapter 2: Enter leaf green!
It was morning in Kanto.
While it was a standard day for most of the region, any local from the isolated town of Pallet would know that it was a rather important date, kind of a holiday for the small community, in that Pallet´s chosen trainers would receive their starter Pokemon from Professor Oak, the local Pokemon expert.
In the pallet outskirts, Rebecca Franc was waking up; her eyes were slowly opening, and the sunlight was reaching her body through the hole that Aphrodite had made last night.
"Weird. I don´t have a window in my room." She thought as she felt the heat in her chest.
Oh, wait, she was not in her room; she was in a dirty attic.
She was a little bit groggy, but the realization eventually came:
She truly was in the Pokemon world. It was not a dream; it was not an illusion. This was the real deal. And she had a journey to start.
Determined, Rebecca forced herself to stand up and quickly made her way to the house´s door, eager to leave. Confidently holding her wallet in one hand and Aphrodite´s poke ball in the other, she stood proud. "I´d probably get robbed if I got out like this in real life. A bag would be nice," she ironically said to herself.
Rebecca gently opened the door, left the mysterious house, and never looked back.
Step by step, she slowly started walking through Pallet´s grassy plains. The clean air, chipping birds, and blue sky were refreshing for someone accustomed to huge cities from the earth she was used to living in.
Rebecca had walked a few steps from the house, a little slow while she appreciated the landscape, when she suddenly heard a loud, feminine voice.
"What are you doing here? Why are you in the abandoned house?"
Fuck.
One of the few things Arceus had said to her in a direct manner was to "try not to get seen by anybody," and she just messed that up. Great. Maybe she could murder the person who saw her, she joked to herself.
Wait, who saw her? She turned to see the source of the voice, and...
"Leaf?!" She screamed, kind of surprised.
"Yeah, it´s me! Leaf Green! Now, tell me... Wait, how do you know my name? I never saw you before." Leaf said as she walked towards Rebecca.
Fuck. Rebecca had fucked up again in the span of a few seconds. She had to fix this.
"What?! No, I said leave, not leaf. That is a nice name, by the way."Rebecca confidently answered.
By that point, Leaf had already reached the point where Becca was standing. The two girls were facing each other.
"Oh! That explains it, then. But now, can you explain why you were in the abandoned house? This place is forbidden! It is said that ghost Pokemon reside there, so it could be dangerous for bystanders!"
The girl certainly talked a lot. She was starting to annoy Becca already, but she had to be nice to this girl either way.
"Sorry for the misunderstanding! I am a traveling trainer from the Pasio region, and I just used this place for shelter for the night! I did not know that it was forbidden, and I told you to leave because I guessed you were some kind of lost child. Once again, I am so sorry." As Becca said this, she handed Leaf her trainer card to prove she was a normal citizen and flashed a beautiful smile to her face.
This was enough to fool Leaf, who did not have any further questions for Becca.
"Well, forget about it then!" Leaf finished.
Leaf started to walk north and signaled Becca to follow along; Becca did so. "Well, Rebecca Franc, let me properly introduce myself to you then! My name is Leaf Green, from Pallet Town! My dream is to be Kanto´s strongest trainer and to catch all 146 Kanto Pokemon."
The constant blabbering on Leaf´s part still mildly annoyed Becca, mainly since she already knew most of the stuff she said. but the last part was indeed important. Guess the Kanto region, or at least, the public consciousness, has not figured out legendary Pokemon yet.
"Well, I should introduce myself too, then. My name is Rebecca Franc, but you already know that. My dream is to be the most powerful Pokemon trainer ever."Rebecca said, smiling confidently all the time.
"Wow, you sure do think big, huh?" Leaf remarked.
"I disagree, actually. You are the one who is thinking too small. Being the strongest in the Kanto region? Who is even strong here? Lance? Professor oak? Please, give me a break. And also, you should stop with that "Pokedex completing" nonsense; you should have a more focused team, use only the most powerful Pokemon, or at least grow the weak into being strong. Sorry, I may have gone a little bit overboard." Rebecca replied, her meaner side shining through.
"... It´s fine; I guess I don´t mind, but please don´t talk badly about Professor Oak. We are even making our way into his lab now! He is a great Pokemon trainer and researcher. Who do you think is a strong trainer anyway?" Leaf blushed as she said all of that stuff. She was clearly annoyed by Becca´s previous remark.
"Strong trainers? Besides me? There are only two: Cynthia and Diantha, Sinnoh and Kalos region champions! They are the real deal: strong trainers, strong teams, and girl bosses. I dream of one day defeating them in battle, or even better, taking their hands in marriage," Becca said, mostly as a joke but with a hint of honesty.
"Wait, you want to marry a girl? Ew, Gross. Can we talk about something more normal, please?"
Wow. I guess the Kanto region is way more homophobic than Becca ever expected, since a child is spitting things like that. I guess she had to be more careful about who she talked about her sexuality with.
"Uh, sorry for that, I guess... Let me ask you then, What are you going to do in Professor Oak´s lab, and why did you have to bring me along?" Becca asked, even though she already knew half of the answer.
"Well, me and my rival, Blue Oak, are going to get our starter Pokemon today and start our journey. Professor Oak is our sponsor. So, naturally, we should start at his lab. And I brought you along to make sure that you don´t get in trouble again! You are a foreigner after all!"
Leaf was really nice after all, if a bit annoying. I guess she had a bit of an unfair judgment.
The rest of their walk was spent in a comforting quiet. Becca observed Pallet Town carefully. It was not as small as the games made it up to be, but it was a tiny place. There are a lot of houses, a few smaller apartment complexes, and street markets. It is a very rural but beautiful town.
She noticed a lot of Pidgey and Rattata walking around, but none of them were probably domesticated.
She also noticed an alarming number of weird-looking flags standing in windows and backyards; they all looked the same: a dark blue background with a white square in the middle. Probably the Kanto region flag, if she had to guess.
"Finally, we are here!" Leaf exclaimed.
The Lab was a towering building, probably the biggest in the whole town. Made with plastic and porcelain, it was white with a few details in grey. If this was a movie, it would look like a villain´s lair.
Leaf walked up a set of stairs leading to the main entrance to Oak´s lab, and Becca followed her along.
"So, here we are; this is the place my life as a trainer starts! I´m so excited!" Leaf anxiously said.
"Cool. Anyways, you should get in; I'll wait outside," Becca replied in a kind of nonchalant way.
"Huh? Why? It will be nice! We can even battle! Also, the lab has a brand new air conditioner system! It´s way more refreshing than the heat we are getting up here." Leaf argued, but in Becca´s opinion, she just wanted to keep an eye on her. Rebecca obviously, in truth, did not want to meet Professor Oak and risk being more thoroughly interrogated; besides, she just wanted some alone time at that point.
"I like the heat, actually. Besides, we can battle here later anyway. "
"Can you females stop with your silly bickering?" A voice that was gradually approaching said it in a joking manner.
Rebecca knew the voice really well. Blue Oak. He was usually just a bit of a jerk in canon, but her first impression of him here was casual misogyny. Yikes.
"Who are you to call me a "female"?"Didn't your parents teach you to respect girls?" Rebecca answered, towering over Blue as he walked up the stairs.
"You are the one who should be respecting me! Future Pokemon world champion Blue Oak!"
Rebecca just laughed in reply. A pesky, egocentric laugh.
"You? I doubt a tiny wimp like you can even defeat me, let alone be the world champion!" Rebecca said, looking directly into Blue´s eyes. The kid was clearly humiliated.
"Wait, I'll get my first Pokemon today! I challenge you to a battle as soon as I can! And I'll prove once and for all that a female like you could never defeat me!" Blue said, finding his footing again.
"I´ll gladly accept. And honestly, just to prove you are a joke, I will let you and Leaf battle together against me. And I'll win."
"Humph. Leaf is just going to be a bother, but sure, let´s do this. Come on, leaf, let us get our Pokemon." Blue replied, walking towards the door of the lab.
"Hey Blue, Come on now, don´t talk about me like that!" Leaf angrily said as she followed Blue along to the lab.
It seemed that the distraction was enough to convince Leaf to let Rebecca wait outside.
Thanks to that, she experienced some peace and quiet, with the gentle breeze hitting her hair and Kanto´s sun hitting her body. For a few seconds, until a sudden voice put her back on reality—a voice that Rebecca did not initially recognize, in fact.
"You know, my boyfriend would really like you; he also loves bashing my little brother like that." The voice said, in a chill manner, gradually coming closer to Rebecca.
The voice walked up the stairs; its source turned out to be a beautiful girl with honeycomb hair and green clothing. She was smiling as she lit up a cigarette. That was Daisy Oak, Blue´s big sister. a fairly forgotten character, but still canon.
"You want a smoke?" She offered it to Rebecca.
"No, thanks; I don´t smoke." She actually did, in her past life at least. But having a more dangerous life in the Pokemon world meant she had to take more active care of herself.
"Who are you, by the way?"
"My name is Daisy Oak. Local black sheep, and that kid´s big sister. What about you?"
"My name is Rebecca Franc; nice to meet you, Daisy." Rebecca shook hands with Daisy. She liked the older girl.
The pair stood in front of the lab, enjoying some peace and quiet for about 5 minutes, when finally Leaf and Blue came back through the front door, boasting poke balls in their hands.
"S-Sis? What are you doing here?" Blue said as soon as he left the lab.
"Well, there was absolutely no chance that I would lose the opportunity to see you lose your first Pokemon battle." Rebecca giggled at that. Daisy was really cool.
"W-Well, whatever... Are you ready, leaf? Rebecca? I´m going to show y´all who is the best!"
"Sure!" Rebecca replied in a super cutesy manner. "Bring it on."
Losing no time at all, Blue sent out his Squirtle, a clearly determined Pokemon, and Leaf followed along rather quickly, sending out her happy-go-lucky Bulbassaur.
Rebecca did not want to waste any time either. She held up her poke ball and trowed it with all of her might.
As soon as Aphrodite entered the field, both Leaf and Blue ordered their Pokemon to attack, shouting, "Use Tackle, Now!" At the same time, despite not knowing a thing about the Pokemon they were facing,.
"Aphrodite, I want you to focus; is that okay?" Rebecca quietly ordered, acting like the battle was already finished.
Aphrodite obeyed the words and did not even bulge when the opposing Pokemon´s attacks reached her.
"What even is this Pokemon? Is it not going to attack?" Blue shouted confidently, but with a confused undertone.
"This does not matter, blue! Let´s order our Pokemon to attack again to get this done!" Leaf replied, and quickly both of the Pokemon were about to hit Aphrodite again.
Aphrodite did not move an inch, no matter how much both of the Pokemon hit her. Time after time, the Pokemon stood in place, with her eyes closed and soul elsewhere.
However, Rebecca knew this was not going to last forever; Deino was no tank after all; it was just resisting this much because of the training she had to go through last night. So, she concluded it was time to finish it.
"Aphrodite, time to breathe!" Rebecca shouted in more of a proud manner than she usually did.
"What? Breath? What is this? Some kind of yoga tactic?" Blue said, practically laughing at Rebecca´s face.
"Squirtle, Bulbassaur, It's time to finish it! Give it your best attack!" Blue and Leaf said, basically at the same time.
However, as soon as the two Pokemon got an inch closer to Aphrodite, she opened her mouth and released a powerful dragon breath point blank at the duo.
They were knocked out in one hit.
"Good job, Aphrodite!" Rebecca said as she hugged and caressed her Pokemon.
"What just happened?!" Leaf said after returning her Pokemon to the safe space of the poke ball.
"Well, what happened was that I just proved Blue is a huge loser! But I guess you want the specifics of it, correct?" The comment got a laugh from Daisy, who was already having the time of her life watching her brother lose his first battle in a comical way.
"Yeah, I would like a more detailed explanation." Leaf said, mostly to herself.
"I had my Deino use Focus energy while you two attacked it. She got close to losing, but as soon as she released her dragon breath, you were done. This was not a flawless tactic, however. If any of you two tried using the tail whip or growl, I'd probably lose. But, like I said, you two are not good trainers. Better luck next time!"
Suddenly, an older, more mature voice replied, "Yes, Rebecca is correct. While she could have been more mild-mannered, you two definitely under performed."
Rebecca instantly knew who the owner of the voice was.
It was Professor Oak.