Work slowed down to a lull after the volcarona incident. Skye had succeeded in getting the hostages safely out of the Relic Castle and handed the captured Team Plasma members over to the Unova League. The Unova League will take over the overseeing of the Relic Castle, including the issue of what to do with the insanely powerful wild volcarona residing in the depths of the ruins.
With the exception of several other serious events that I wasn't a part of and only learnt of from my colleagues after it had been dealt with, everything seemed peaceful on the surface until Dad called and all but forced me to do the one thing that I really detest with a passion:
To see a doctor.
Dad didn't really have any other intentions beyond those three words. All he wanted me to do was to go for one of those regular checkups that he made absolutely sure I would attend a few times every year. Usually, I would visit our family's doctor but I'm not in Hoenn right now. Our family's doctor has the comprehensive set of data regarding my complicated health condition and seeing that I will not be back in Hoenn anytime soon, Dad had found a reputable doctor in Unova to temporarily take over the job of my family doctor to monitor my health during my stay here. According to Dad, this Unova doctor is apparently some sort of super big shot in the Unova medical industry and has a significant degree of influence even on the global stage.
I never liked seeing the doctor. Since young all I ever saw from their eyes were looks of pity that they thought they concealed from me and all I ever heard from them were false assurances that I would recover. Despite their good intentioned lies I could easily tell that none of them believed that I would live for long. The most honest doctor I met told me very candidly that it's unlikely I would live past fifteen and that was him being optimistic. Granted, it was me who wanted him to give me an honest answer and wanted none of the sugar coated lies that I was frequently given, but that was how bad things were then.
My health was absolutely terrible when I was young, to the point that I was pumped with so much drugs by the time I was five that it felt as if drugs flowed within veins instead of blood. I would have respiratory attacks a few times every day, sometimes I would feel pain all over that nobody could find the origins of, and experiencing fevers and colds were simply a daily occurrence.
Thankfully, all of these lessened considerably around the time I turned nine, but that doesn't mean that I became a truly healthy girl. Now, I'm healthy enough to the point of being able to live normally even if my fitness level remains abysmal as a lingering side effect. I do not need to rely on medication to keep myself alive any longer. However, my parents were still very strict about one thing, and that's to see a doctor for a regular health checkup every now and then.
Personally, I can understand where they were coming from. They have experienced too many close calls when it comes to me during my younger years and they are not risking anything. So, even if I really resist the idea of seeing a doctor with every fibre of my being I would still end up listening to them and go see a doctor when it's time for another checkup in order to give them a peace of mind.
The doctor my parents chose for me in Unova was one Dr Kolten Lott, who's a very famous doctor here. There were also some who claimed that Dr Lott is currently one of the best doctors in the world and anyone who wanted to make an appointment with him had to queue up at least months in advance. For obvious reasons, that doesn't apply to me, because I am a Vera and we tend to get preferential treatment if we choose to push our weight around. I don't have any evidence, but I have a suspicion that the reason why Dad had managed to help me book an appointment with Dr Lott in such a short time was because he had made use of our newfound partnership with the Dandolos behind my back. He knew very well that if he had left things up to me, I would have procrastinated to make an appointment with a doctor for as long as I can.
Dr Kolten Lott's clinic was located at Castelia City so it wasn't very far from my current residence at Nimbasa. Sebastian was insistent on accompanying me and at this point it's blatantly obvious that he had received strict instructions from Dad to make absolutely sure that I went for my appointment with Dr Lott. Sebastian was here to "supervise" me on Dad's orders, so to speak.
The checkup was nothing special. The procedures were more or less the same as I had experienced countless times back home since I was a child; changing out my clothes into a hospital gown, getting myself scanned by complex machines one after the other, taking x-rays, ultrasound, and many other kinds of readings that I never really understood the purpose of. None of the doctors we found thus far could properly explain just what was plaguing my health. The best explanation that they could come up with was that I was born with a defunct immune system that makes my body go wonky and that by all means, it was a miracle that I'm alive at all.
"Take a deep breath… and out. Another deep breath… and out," I did as the doctor instructed while he placed a stethoscope on my back. There was a faint scribbling sound and I'm certain that he was jotting something down somewhere. He soon turned me around on the revolving chair I was sitting on and had a female nurse help place the stethoscope on my chest before repeating the process. Deep breaths in and out until he was satisfied with whatever he heard from me.
There were many other checks that followed. Blood and urine tests are the staple at this point. Lipid profile test, cardiac system, vitamin check… the list goes on. By the time I was done with the tests an entire morning had passed. Surprisingly, the results of all of those tests were out by the time I was done with the last test and changed out of my hospital gown and back into my normal clothing.
I guess that's the kind of service I should have expected from a world-class clinic opened by one of the best doctors in the world. Technology in the pokemon world is very advanced in certain fields and the medical field is one of those. I'm not too surprised that all the test results were out even before I could leave the clinic.
"Congrats, Ms Vera, you have a clean bill of health. Well, as much as it applies for someone with a condition like yours," Dr Lott gave me his verdict as I sat opposite him across his desk within his office. He's surprisingly young for a doctor so accomplished, only about somewhere in his mid-thirties to forties. I could see why people call him a genius in the medical field and why he possesses a certain degree of international fame in his area of expertise.
Also, he seems to be the talkative type.
"As far as I can tell your heart and lungs are functioning at only about fifty percent capacity most of the time, which is… not very good, but at least it's much better than the 35 percent capacity I was told was the norm for you when you were around three to eight years old. Your immune system is, for the lack of a better word, bizarre, but it looks a lot more normal now as compared to your past medical reports. Is there anything else that you might want to add that your other doctors have not filled me in?"
"I don't think so," I shrugged nonchalantly, just wanting to get this over and done with.
"Are you very sure?" Dr Lott asked once again, pushing his glasses up with a finger as if he's very aware that there's something vital to this health checkup that I'm not telling him but for the life of me I just couldn't think of anything that I might have missed out.
"Yes."
"I see," Dr Lott sighed softly before gesturing for the nurse to exit his office and leave us alone. He did the same for Sebastian as well, but Sebastian remained where he was standing behind me. I'm not daft, I could tell that the doctor wanted to speak to me alone, but he's in no position to order Sebastian around like what he did for the nurse working for him. The only person here who could give Sebastian any orders is me.
Might as well hear what the doctor has to say.
"Sebastian."
Sebastian frowned a little, obviously reluctant to leave me alone but he still heeded my request and closed the door behind him once he exited the office.
"I assure you, Ms Vera, that I'm very strict when it comes to my patients' confidentiality. After all, I'm a professional," Dr Lott started off before getting to his main point. "Now, since it's just us alone, you can be frank with me. Are you an Ability Holder?"
Truth to be told, I'm a little surprised that he managed to figure out that I'm an Ability Holder when none of the doctors who examined me before came to that conclusion. Now, I can understand why he made the nurse and Sebastian leave the room. In Unova, Ability Holders are not very well-received by the majority who still hold prejudice towards them. He probably thought that the presence of other people in the room was why I was unwilling to "come clean" with him earlier when in truth, I never considered that me being an Ability Holder was a factor in this health checkup.
"How did you tell?"
"I'm afraid that's my trade secret," Dr Lott shook his head slightly upon my question and mumbled thanks to the blissey that passed over a glass of water each to both of us, "but I'm not surprised that your family doctors in Hoenn were unable to figure that out. Ability Holders are not prevalent in other parts of the world but they are very common here in Unova. Many of my patients are Ability Holders, even if a great number of them did not even realise it themselves until I told them that they are one because certain abilities are indeed very hard to detect or only manifest under very specific conditions."
"And me being an Ability Holder is important in the context of this health checkup because…?"
"Because abilities do have an effect on a person's health and biological make up, the only issue is to what extent. Sometimes they are close to undetectable, sometimes you cannot hide it no matter how you try. For the latter case, the most well-known examples are psychics and aura users. Psychics are able to tap into and utilise areas of the human brain in ways that by all means, impossible by medical standards. Aura users have extraordinary vitality and metabolism, their organs constantly functioning at optimal capacity to the point that it can allow them to unlock superhuman strength and senses. Of course, these are just two examples out of many. I had seen many weirder things that had affected the human body of the people who possess such abilities."
Dr Lott had made things very obvious with his words. There's no way that I could not understand the point that he was driving at.
"You are saying that the reason for my poor health, my ability…"
"From the readings the machines gave me, that's the conclusion I arrived at, but even I cannot be absolutely certain because there's very little that I know about you beyond these reports," Dr Lott patiently explained. "Ms Vera, it's fine if you do not wish to answer my question if it's too uncomfortable for you, but your ability, does it relate to the Mind Arts Trio?"
"... Yes. Ghost types."
"Ghost-" Dr Lott's shock lasted only for a brief moment before he swiftly recollected himself just like a professional should. "I apologise for my reaction, but I certainly wasn't expecting this."
"Is there something wrong with ghost type abilities?" I asked, now curious about what's so special about people like me. There are things that the doctor knew that I don't and it doesn't seem like they are good news.
"I won't say something wrong…" Dr Lott pondered for a short moment before asking me another question. "How about… Ms Vera, how many ghost type Ability Holders have you either met, seen, heard, or known about?"
"None," I replied honestly.
"Therein lies the problem. There's very little the world knows about people like you, Ability Holders with ghost type abilities. The reason is simple; very few of them ever live past the age of ten."
"You mean people like us die young, but why?" I asked, trying my best to withhold taking a nervous gulp because I don't think I would like the answer.
"There's no definitive answer to this. As you already know, Ability Holders are rare to begin with, only commonly seen within Unova and even then, Ability Holders tend to conceal their abilities due to the prejudice held against them. Among the seventeen pokemon typings, ghost type inclined abilities are one of the rarest to encounter, which is why research about ghost inclined abilities never made any progress and why I cannot give you an answer. What I can say is this: From what I know, ghost type Ability Holders, almost without any exception, are all born with a very sickly body. Nobody knows what plagues them, what's the true reason why they are born this way, or how to truly "cure" them. Based on the data gathered about ghost inclined Ability Holders that the Unova League managed to compile, the mortality rate of such people is at about seventy percent. Meaning by the time such people reach the age of ten, seven out of ten of them would have already passed away, and that's only if we consider the ghost inclined Ability Holders the Unova League managed to identify. I'd imagine that the mortality rate would be far higher if we include those that were not identified by the Unova League as ghost inclined Ability Holders and did not seek treatment in time."
"My ability… is the thing that's killing me?"
"Like I said earlier, I cannot say for sure, but our findings suggest that it is very likely that there is some sort of connection between ghost inclined abilities and the high mortality rate of children being born with them, that is something that I am sure of."
"Actually, doctor, I have a question."
"Please ask."
"You say that for people like us, seven out of ten would have passed away by the time they reach ten years of age. Then… What about the remaining three who lived? Have you met people like them before? What's so different about them that enabled them to live where others have failed?"
Dr Lott remained silent for a short moment before he spoke.
"Before I answer your question I will have to ask you another. Now, I'm not a pokemon trainer so correct me if I am wrong, but ghost types are one of the most vicious typings out there, right?"
"That's correct."
"Then have you ever heard of the old Unovan saying, that the more Ability Holders use their abilities, the more they resemble pokemon?"
"No, but I do now."
"As for ghost types, do you know what made them stand out from other typings?"
"There are many things I could list out but generally speaking, it will be their viciousness and their supposed immortality."
"That's correct as well. Ms Vera, before meeting you I had only met one other ghost inclined Ability Holder who lived past ten and heard of another similar case of a patient with a ghost inclined ability. From my understanding these two are the only two ghost inclined Ability Holders that's been officially documented within the past twenty years. I cannot say that this is a one-size-fits-all cure because the sample size really is too small, but for both cases we managed to identify one thing that stood out for both patients that differs from the others who passed away before the age of ten."
Dr Lott took a brief pause before continuing, a serious look in his eyes.
"They made very active use of their abilities."
"Active use of their abilities…?"
"You might not feel it yet since you are a foreigner, but in Unova, it is almost second nature for Ability Holders to conceal their abilities and not use them at all. Again, the reason for this is all about the societal prejudice in this region, but I digress. Where the other patients who passed away before ten barely tapped into their abilities at all, those two patients that I mentioned who were the anomalies, they were not afraid of using their abilities in public even if it meant being on the receiving end of society's ostracisation and scorn. Everyone thought that they would die young as well but they proved us wrong when they not only lived past ten, but past twenty years of age. In the end, when we decided to investigate further on what's so different about them, we realised that unlike the other patients, those two made active use of their abilities where others would conceal its existence. That's the conclusion we came to."
I don't even know how to describe my feelings at that moment. Was it joy, or melancholy for being able to relate to people with circumstances similar to mine but had died young, or something else entirely? I don't know, but I felt very conflicted.
What I do know is that I had a sudden urge to meet them, to meet other people who, like me, had toed between the line of life and death far too many times to count for reasons beyond our control.
"Can I… Can I meet them?"
The look in the doctor's eyes dimmed.
"I'm afraid you cannot."
"Patient confidentiality?"
"It's not that… It's…" The doctor visibly struggled to find the right words to say before speaking once more. "Remember when I said that I met only one ghost Ability Holder and heard of another within the past twenty years?"
I nodded.
"The one that I met, he was my patient. When I first met him he was a boy only about eight years old and when I last saw him he had only just celebrated his twentieth birthday. That was a few years ago. He… He's no longer alive."
"But you said…"
"He did live past twenty and he did not die of natural causes. He was murdered."
"Oh…" I trailed off, not really knowing what I should say in this situation. "Then, the other one…"
"That patient's not mine, I only heard about him from other doctors when I was trying to search for records of a medical case similar to the boy that I was trying to treat back then. I never did see or meet him myself and when I heard about him again, it was also on the same day I received the news that the boy who was my patient was murdered. That second patient I talked about, he was the murderer. Last I checked, he's still on the loose."
"... My condolences."
"I have gotten over it," Dr Lott dismissed my concerns with a casual wave of his hand. "But back to the main point. I'm sure that you would have already understood after listening to my long story. For your treatment, Ms Vera, I would suggest that you try something different. I would suggest not seeing this as a medical problem, but rather one of a more… How should I put it? Supernatural nature? Rely more on your abilities. Train it, hone it, let it be a part of you. If things really develop towards the direction we hope it would be, maybe honing your abilities might be the answer to allowing you to live normally rather than relying on the power of science."
Dr Lott then took two files from his desk and passed it over to me.
"Usually, I would not let anyone else read this due to patient confidentiality, but considering that one of them is already dead years ago and another is a criminal on the run, I guess I can bend the rules a little. I'm not sure how useful this might be for you, but maybe you can glean something useful out of this where I had missed."
Under the doctor's approval, I opened the files. The first one is the medical file of a young man by the name of Bernard Havel, which I believed was Dr Lott's patient that he had successfully treated and who lived past the age of twenty.
The second one is the medical file of an older man and by my calculations after seeing his date of birth, should be currently in his late thirties. It seems that his abilities were only discovered by the Unova League rather late in his life, after the man had miraculously lived past twenty years of age and somehow without needing to make frequent visits to the hospital. His name is Emil Bonser and the one who murdered Bernard Havel.
Bernard's ability was determined to be ghost related and his ability forced him to function on very little sleep, or no sleep at all. The doctors have marked his ability as something very similar to pokemon's Insomnia ability. However, while pokemon naturally born with this ability can function and live healthily even without the need of sleep thanks to Insomnia, the human body is not made to function the same way. Bernard's health did suffer greatly from the forced Insomnia when he was younger, although ultimately a suitable treatment method was found to allow him to continue to live alongside such a condition even with this forced Insomnia.
Emil's ability was also determined to be ghost inclined but his ability is also a lot more sinister. Not much was gathered about his ability because he became a fugitive on the run after he murdered Bernard, but it was diagnosed that his ability allows him to "steal people's lifeforce" much like how many ghost types are able to do so passively. As such, he can never get in close proximity with others because anyone who gets too close to him will eventually suffer from a decline in health and if exposed to his ability for prolonged periods of time, it might cause death for the victims simply by being around Emil. It's a very sad and lonely ability to possess and honestly, the lack of human contact brought about by his ability might have affected him psychologically and caused him to turn into a murderer. To date, Emil's motives for murdering Bernard are still unknown. Before the day of the murder, none of them had met each other before.
As for me and my ability…
What am I supposed to "train" when all I could do is to speak to ghosts?
AN: I won myself a nintendo switch from a lucky draw, rewarded myself by purchasing Pokemon Scarlet with the DLC, and have been spending whatever is left of my meagre free time in the last two weeks or so slowly exploring Paldea and have been totally neglecting Genshin as a result (no regrets tho). If there's a way to finish exploring the entire map without battling the gyms at all I would, but sadly my pokemon wouldn't listen to me beyond a certain lvl and I'm forced to do the gym circuit again… I swear the game's claims about you having the freedom to do anything you want is a lie. I'm still forced to battle the gyms in the end LOL.
I don't want to do the gym circuit, damn it.
And Nemona, I know you are very enthusiastic about pokemon battles but stop trying to brainwash me to be a Champion. Am I the only one irked by how "forceful" she seems in pushing her own likes and ideology on the player? Or is it just me?
As for my opinions about the new pokemon? Kingambit is awesome, one of the most, if not the most reliable pokemon on my team by far. Finally managed to evolve my bisharp into a Kingambit tonight because I had no idea I had to have it hold onto a Leader's Crest to trigger the evolution it and I was wondering why it still hadn't evolved when it was already beyond level 65 and I had already defeated so many bisharps (insert facepalm here). It might not have the Supreme Overlord ability but honestly, Defiant seems to be more useful and it's still plenty strong. Annihilape can handle almost everything and I just love that angry monkey. Still trying to progress the story to the point where I can capture Great Tusk because damn who wouldn't want a prehistoric dino-elephant-mammoth monster on their team? Ceruledge looks so damn cool but I can only get Armarogue in Scarlet, and my charcadet is only lvl 22 because I had no idea where I am supposed to look for it and when I finally managed to catch one my entire team is already lvl 60+... Gonna take a while to get it on the same lvl as my main team. Would most likely get myself a ceruledge through trade one day after I cleared the game.
Somehow or another most of my team either has a ghost or dark typing (Kingambit Annihilape Rotom Tyranitar Skeledirge), as if the game is hinting me to be a specialist LOL and somehow I made it work despite the team being a little on the squishy side. Thankfully I still have gastrodon and gyarados to round up and swap around my team so it doesn't seem overly skewed to the point an earthquake or some annoying tanky water type can sweep my entire team. Got wiped by a npc's gastrodon once, not a fond memory. And yes, that was why I made the decision to get myself a gastrodon too. That pokemon is secretly op, I'm not kidding. Gastrodon is dastardly hard to kill without the right moves.
And have I mentioned clodsire is one of the cutest pokemon ever? Been sitting in my team as a wooper since the start of the game and only recently swapped out because it's struggling at the higher levels where I'm preparing for the pokemon league. Clodsire carried me through the early game until I caught my pawniard (now kingambit). Water Absorb combined with its ground typing plus Toxic is a lethal combo. Swept through Iono's and Kofu's challenge with just that cutie.
Currently trying to train an avalugg and charcadet because I love those two pokemon. So far the results are quite meh, but we shall see. Been wanting to catch a hariyama since the start of the game but I keep getting Whirlwind by wild hariyamas at early level and now trying to train one from scratch is going to take a looong time (looking at the little baby of my team, the level 22 charcadet). Does anyone know where to catch high level hariyamas in scarlet? Preferably over lvl 50? Idk why but I just love that sumo pokemon. It looks like it can dish out some serious damage while being frustratingly hard to kill.
I knew I said a long time ago that I wouldn't be including Galar and Paldea region into the story but now? Honestly, playing the game really makes me want to include both regions into the story somehow and I already have some ideas for it. There are some really cool pokemon that I really want to write about one day. There are also really great characters and concepts from both regions that are worth incorporating and writing it into stories as well.
Maybe I should slowly incorporate Galar and Paldea elements into my story after the Unova arc? Maybe not about travelling to those regions yet, but maybe introducing some of their native pokemon into the story? What would you guys feel/think? At least in Vel's case, she would have more ghost types that could tag along with her and it's honestly fun to just think about it. The whole theme of her story is travelling the world anyway.
Alright, enough about me fawning over my latest toy. I really should get back to writing and completing the Unova arc. Hopefully no more major changes to the plot. Really lost count of the number of times I had rewritten the Unova plot and am really quite sick of rereading all the chapters. I only just realised it's been more than half a year since I updated IJWTTW. I should really try to keep up with my updates. Sorry about that.
That said, I had never played Pokemon BW/ BW2 before so for those that did, anything you wish/expect/hope to see in the Unova arc that you haven't seen yet? Or concepts that you hope will be further expanded upon that weren't done so in the original BW game? Cos I understand BW had one of the best storylines among the pokemon franchise and while I had already read through the BW game's plot many times on bulbapedia it doesn't seem very specific about the details. It would be a shame if I missed out some important aspect of it simply because I had never played the game before.
Let me know what you guys think in the comments. If it's doable, I will see if I can make it happen.
As always, hope you enjoy the story.
Character and pokemon list:
Velda Vera, Age: 14, Female, Pokemon Trainer, Member of the International Police
Pokemon on hand:
1) Rapidash (Flamel), male
2) Swampert (Bigblue), male
3) Banette (Dolly), female
4) Flygon (Snap), male
5) Absol (Kelsa), female
6) Charizard (Toothless), male
7) Cradily (Lily), female
8) Espeon (Rena), female
9) Pachirisu (Fuzzy), male
10) Tyranitar (Kratos), male
11) Clefairy (Joy), female
12) Nidoqueen (Ness), female
13) Pangoro (Hulk), male
14) Porygon-Z (Jarvis), genderless
15) Scizor (Archer), male
16) Lapras (Chill), female
17) Gengar (Wacky), male