John's Team
Tyrant - Slaking
Vordt - Ursaluna
Smough - Snorlax
Klee - Blissey
Port - Mantine
Zephyr - Pidgeot
Klaus - Wyrdeer
Luna - Clefable
Pixel - Porygon
Euphie - Eevee
Ornstein - D-Zigzagoon
The New Normal – 4-7 – A New Journey
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the charity match against Giovanni was very well received by both the public and by the other leaders of Indigo. I was obviously very pleased by the outcome of the match, both with the victory and with the positive feedback that we got from it. We had raised more money than both of us expected, and we made a very public donation to Olivine with the big fake cheque and all. It was very good for PR.
Although the thing that made me very pleased was seeing just how elated Giovanni was after we met up to speak after the battle. He hinted that the charity match has led him to reconsider a few things about his operations in the future, and once again thanked me for 'opening his eyes to other possibilities', as he said. Also, with his recent success, I asked if he wanted to be in the posters that we had for the family business, and he agreed for a cut of the profits and if he could take his own photographs. We easily accepted.
We were aiming to milk his recent popularity and roll out Giovanni's posters as quickly as possible while he was still trending.
I truly wished that he meant what I thought he did and that he was going to start turning over a new leaf. Oh, Giovanni would probably still be a manipulative and scheming man, that was always his nature, but hopefully he would now be a more heroically inclined one.
The charity match and the discussions that came out from it dominated the headlines for a few days, and was still received sporadic mentions even now, a good two weeks later. The Viridian Gym was now known far and wide as THE Kanto Gym, and had gained a reputation for being a strict, but fair and charitable Gym that perfectly exemplified the best qualities of a Gym. Giovanni as well got a lot of credit, both for his charitable management of the Gym on top of his respectable personal strength, which I'm sure pleased him greatly. I idly wondered how many more challengers he would receive when the circuit finally started up again with his boosted reputation.
Of course, the other incident that took up most of the headlines for the past 2 weeks was about my so-called 'PIT Technique'. Scientists and sceptics had made their way over to 'check over' my process, but fortunately for me they were quick to approve and verify my results.
As I sadly expected, many had tried to attempt to replicate my actions with their own eggs to try to create or discover a new Pokémon, only to be met with failure and tragedy in a large majority of cases. This forced the Indigo League to actually have to react and pass a new policy to ban all non-authorised experimentation, which did succeed in preventing more future damage or deaths towards the Pokémon eggs.
Still, that meant that hundreds of thousands of Pokédollars were now being funnelled into scientific research, which I approved of.
Interestingly, Lance did actually message me on behalf of the Blackthorns and asked if I had any ideas about any kind of alternate forms for Dragons, but I simply said that I didn't know anything at the moment, nor was I working on 'discovering' other Pokémon using this method either for the time being. Giovanni also asked about it as well, but only on behalf of Ariana, who said was interested to doing some research with me if I wanted to. I told him I would consider it.
I even got thanked by Agatha for allowing her apprentice to participate in the experiment, and for allowing Karen a foot in the door of the scientific community. Sure, Karen's participation in the experiment was seen by the public as a footnote to my success, but it still put her name in the spotlight. Agatha promised to pay me back in some way in the future if I continued to develop Karen's scientific credentials, which I was happy to hear and do.
In the meanwhile, I was glad to at least avoid much of the blame for the sheer number of failed experiments and lost Pokémon eggs, with the Indigo League suffering some of the blame for failing to implement these new laws in time. On the other hand, I still got a few angry letters from people about how my experiment caused them to lose their precious egg or what not, but I was mostly able to just ignore and dispose of them since I knew I wasn't responsible for their recklessness.
On a happier note, I knew that the next week was going to be full of excitement and surprises, with both the circuit starting up and Lance's battle against Pryce happening at the end of the week. Poor Whitney was a mess as she spent her remaining time at home in an almost crazed mix of both anticipation about the journey ahead and sadness at the thought of leaving home for such a long period of time.
I frequently reassured her that she could call home anytime that she'd like, and I would even visit her sometimes during her journey if I had free time to do so.
My parents were equally as worried as my sister, though they were able to hide it a lot better. Also, the fact that I had went through my journey beforehand and turned out so successful somewhat eased their worry, although that would never fully alleviate their concerns. I was able to reassure them all that Whitney's Miltank was sufficiently strong enough to serve as a guardian and protector, so Whitney should be safe from harm.
My father was still a bit unwilling to send his 'baby girl' out on her own, but he eventually acquiesced as he realized that forcing Whitney to stay at home would be a huge waste of her potential. My parents weren't great trainers, but even they could see that Whitney had the potential of becoming something great.
Nevertheless, Whitney roped me into spending much of our remaining time together making sure that she was ready for her journey. However, instead of more training like she expected, I actually spent more time with her going over some of the tips that I learnt while I was on my journey.
I spoke about how you should always pack more food than you think you need, and how to properly plan your journey so you don't end up stuck in a cave for too long. I explained the need to leave a Pokémon on sentry duty if you're in hostile territory with plenty of aggressive wild Pokémon.
I also warned her about stranger danger, since I wasn't exactly sure if my parents had gone through this with her or not, and told her to be friendly, but wary, of any strangers. I also told her to immediately report any suspicious activity to the Indigo Police, and to drop my name if you have to. I made sure that fact was properly ingrained into her head by the time she left on her journey; her safety was my number one priority.
More jokingly, I told her that she should probably warn a few of her earlier Gym Leaders about how strong her Miltank just so she didn't accidentally harm their Gym Pokémon. She gave me a cherubic smile at that.
Then we moved onto the more practical demonstrations, and I had her repeatedly demonstrate to me that she knew how to set up a tent and cook food. Eventually, I was satisfied that she knew what she was doing and would be able to make it through her journey and the circuit safely.
Truthfully, I considered getting a protection detail for Whitney, but ultimately thought that protection was probably overkill and would be far too stifling, especially after Giovanni informed me that his sources were saying that Team Rocket had been all but expunged from Indigo. I didn't know what they were up to in Hoenn, but they seemed to be lying low for the moment, meaning that I wasn't too concerned about Whitney being in danger from them.
With any extra time we had left between those 'survival skill' training sessions, I focused on having Whitney train with her Whismur. I noticed that she was starting to make the overly common newbie mistake of focusing too heavily on her starter, so I wanted to correct that before it became a bigger problem. I also made sure to remind her to be careful with new captures, and ensure that any new addition to her team would actually fit in. She nodded, but I wasn't exactly sure if she really understood.
Now that Whismur was far less shy than she first was when I first found her in Hoenn, I got Whitney to work with her to train her sound attacks, practicing with attacks such as Echoed Voice, Disarming Voice, and eventually, Uproar. The latter was still very much a work-in-progress, but I was at least satisfied that Whismur would be more than capable of handling a 1st badge battle.
I even told Whitney that if she wanted a challenge to try to have Whismur fight the first gym by herself, and to only use Miltank as a backup. Her Miltank was far too strong anyways.
And so, the days flew by, until it was almost time for Whitney to set off for her journey, but I had a final challenge for her to overcome before she could start her circuit.
(Whitney POV)
Whitney marched out nervously into the fields with her Miltank and Whismur. Apparently, John said that he had something he wanted to do with her before she left on her circuit tomorrow. He wouldn't say anymore though, and Whitney was left nervous and confused about what it was.
As she arrived, she saw that John was standing there idly in the clearing. She couldn't see any of his or Karen's Pokémon around, which was very unusual. Normally, she would find the two of them training with each other if John wasn't focused on her.
The lack of Pokémon only served to make her more nervous though, and she carefully made her way to where her brother was standing.
"It's a shame that I don't have a piano for this." She heard him mutter as she got close, then he suddenly turned around and she felt the air get colder as he faced her down.
"I hope you've been keeping well Whitney." He started, and she was confused for a moment before she saw him draw two Premier Balls from his belt. "On your journey, you and your Pokémon will need to overcome the many challenges that you will face, however difficult. You will need to battle against your own personal weaknesses too, and triumph over them. You will need to learn to make use of your Pokémon's power, and how to wrangle it to your benefit. But that's enough talk. Let's get on to why you're here. Tomorrow, you will head off on your journey, but not before you show me everything that you've learnt so far."
As she listened to John, she grew increasingly wary and instinctively took a step back while her Miltank stepped in front of her protectively. Miltank began growling as she felt the familiar aura of battle that was radiating out of her brother.
"Come, sister, and show me your determination!" Her brother declared while throwing out two Premier balls, revealing his Porygon and his D-Zigzagoon.
Before she could properly react, she saw his D-Zigzagoon bounding straight for her Whismur. Miltank quickly tried to get in the way and block him, but a Thunderbolt from his Porygon cut her off.
"You need to react quicker than that, sister!" Her brother taunted, before he gave new commands to his Pokémon.
"Tackle and get close to her Whismur, Ornstein!" "Keep your distance and Thunderbolt, Pixel!"
Whitney quickly snapped out of her confusion as she watched her Whismur falling backwards, panicking slightly, but not completely lost yet. Fine. If her brother wanted to test her like this, then she would show him what she could do.
"Whismur, Pound that Zigzagoon! You're stronger than him! Don't be scared!" "Miltank, you need to get close to Porygon and knock it out!"
Miltank roared out and charged at the Porygon, but her brother just smirked.
"It's not going to be that easy, Whitney! Pixel, Magnet Rise!"
Her Miltank just barely missed reaching his Porygon and was forced to watch helplessly as it floated out of range of her devastating strikes. She needed to change tactics.
"Rock throw, Miltank! Knock it out of the sky!" She ordered, and Miltank quickly hurled a huge slab of rock at Porygon, but it was easily dodged.
"Thunderbolt her Whismur now, Pixel!" Whitney rapidly turned around in alarm as she remembered that her Whismur was busy fighting his D-Zigzagoon too, only to see her Whismur getting struck by a strong Thunderbolt before a follow-up Tackle from his D-Zigzagoon finished off her Whismur.
"You weren't properly keeping track of things, Whitney." Her brother admonished, less softly than he usually did. She almost let out a growl of frustration at herself for forgetting about her Whismur and promised to make it up to her later.
"Thunder Wave, Pixel!" Whitney almost let out one of those curses her brother and Karen often use when they thought she couldn't hear them; she was letting herself get distracted again even when she had just told herself not to be!
"Rollout and dodge it, Miltank! Focus down his Zigzagoon!" She commanded.
Luckily, her training with her Miltank paid off as she was able to quickly curl up into a ball and dodge to the side, avoiding the Thunder Wave entirely. Her Miltank then continually rolled around the battlefield and chased after the D-Zigzagoon, slowly catching up to him.
"Keep running, Ornstein!" "Thunderbolt her, Pixel!" John tried to use Pixel's Thunderbolt to disrupt her Miltank's Rollout, but she proved far too manoeuvrable for Pixel's Thunderbolts to catch up with and was now in striking distance of his D-Zigzagoon.
"Body Press him, Miltank!"
"That's enough! Return, Ornstein."
Before her Miltank was able to crush his D-Zigzagoon with a supereffective Body Press, John quickly withdrew his Pokémon from the field. Whitney gave a questioning look to her brother before it turned sheepish at the stern expression that John had.
"Whitney, I warned you about how powerful your Miltank was. If that move had successfully landed on my newly hatched Ornstein, you might have done some serious damage to him. Others may not have the reaction time or the awareness to withdraw their Pokémon like I did; you have to keep this in mind during your journey." He reminded her sternly, and all she could do was nod sheepishly.
"I will." She promised, and he gave her a scrutinising look before he nodded.
"Good, then let's return to the fight. Thunderbolt NOW, Pixel!" Before both herself and Miltank could respond, his Porygon landed a direct hit with his Thunderbolt.
"Hey, that's cheating! I wasn't ready!" She complained, scowling at her brother. But John simply shrugged dismissively.
"Some people won't fight fair against you, Whitney." He lectured solemnly, totally pretending to not be the cheater that he was, "Not everyone will play by the rules. Some trainers will do everything they can to win, even using underhanded methods like cheating. You need to be ready for them."
She gave him a dubious nod and then returned to giving commands. "Miltank, keep dodging the Thunderbolts with Rollout! We need to wear it down!"
Miltank obeyed and started rolling around the field in a random manner that managed to avoid Porygon's attacks. Whitney frowned as she realized a critical weakness of her team, she seriously lacked any ranged options to knock down flying targets that were out of reach of her Miltank.
She also realized that that was probably why John chose to fight this way; he wanted her to think of how she would counter this method.
She locked her eyes onto John's Porygon, trying to spot any potential weaknesses that she could exploit. She furrowed her brow as she stared hard, and eventually, she spotted something. His Porygon would temporarily slow down when trying to fire off a Thunderbolt and seemed to need to take some time to recover after every attack.
She could use this! "Miltank, you have to endure past the Thunderbolts and just Rock Throw!"
Her Miltank gave a Moo of approval and transitioned out of her Rollout as she suddenly stood still in the open. And, just as Whitney hoped, Porygon took the bait and decided to strike with what it thought was an easy Thunderbolt onto Miltank, but then this inadvertently exposed itself by being too slow to dodge the incoming boulder that was being hurled its way.
Whitney let out a small cheer as she finally saw Porygon be knocked out of the sky as the boulder smashed into it; and she missed the smile that John was directing her way. She was about to order Miltank to finish off the Porygon but John cut in before she could.
"I withdraw my Porygon." He announced, looking pleased. He patted his Premier Ball for a moment before turning to face her. "You did well. I'm sure you realized by now that your team is weak against Pokémon that can fly out of range of your Miltank. You should probably think of ways to counter that, either with specific moves or by catching other Flyers to deal with them."
"Yeah, I get it, bro. Thanks." She said idly, as she went to hug her Miltank and congratulate her on a job well-done. John seemed to let her indulge herself for a few moments before he interrupted her with a cough.
"I'm glad to see you celebrating your victory, Whitney, but we're not done yet." He replied with a sad smile, which felt ominous to Whitney. "I have one more test for you. I'm sorry to have to do this, but this might be your most important lesson yet. Are you ready?"
She looked to Miltank and received a firm nod in return, and she did the same to John. John smile then suddenly turned wrong, and without any more warning, he sent out his Pokémon.
"SLAKINGGGG!" His mighty Slaking roared out as he emerged from the Premier Ball in all of its glory. As Tyrant lowered his gaze onto Whitney, it was like she couldn't breathe. The air felt heavy, every single instinct of hers was telling to run away, but no matter how much she willed her limbs to move, they refused to.
Then, suddenly, Tyrant charged straight towards her Miltank faster than the two of them could react and backhanded her Miltank across the field and outside the fenced area where they had been training. Whitney remained frozen, both in panic and in despair.
W-what was that?! What could she do against that?! Her brother must know that she had no chance of winning against his Tyrant, so why would he even send it out against her?!
Without any commands, her Miltank charged at Tyrant in a futile attempt to try and take out his Slaking, with expected results. Tyrant easily caught her Miltank's extended arms with his hand, before effortlessly lifting Miltank up by the arm and smashing her into the ground.
"Whitney!" John's voice suddenly snapped her out of her despair, and she turned her frightened eyes towards her brother. "Remember what I said! Sometimes, there are fights you CANNOT win!"
Suddenly, it clicked. She understood what she had to do. She nodded to herself and willed herself to move and took off with a sprint to where her Miltank was.
"Miltank, we need to leave, NOW!" She shouted out in a hurry, "We can't win, we need to run!"
Her Miltank quicky listened and followed after her in a sprint, staying just behind her to protect her from any attacks from Slaking. Sure enough, Slaking started hurling huge rocks towards the two of them, forcing Miltank to slow down to smash them apart before they could harm Whitney.
If she hadn't been so occupied with running away and escaping, perhaps she would have noticed that Slaking was easily capable of firing far more and larger chunks of rocks than he currently was. Furthermore, she probably should have realized that her Miltank should not even be conscious at the moment after taking two hits from Slaking, and yet here she was continuing to protect her by smashing through one rock after the other.
Eventually, the barrage of rocks seemed to peter out as Slaking seemed disinclined to chase after them from beyond the fenced area. She looked around with Miltank, and seeing nothing, the two of them gave off synced sighs of relief.
"Congratulations." The familiar voice of her brother startled her so much that she fell onto her butt. "But you must remember that nowhere is safe until you make it to a Pokécenter. You shouldn't have relaxed until you returned to somewhere you know is certain to be safe, in this case, that would be our house."
"…How did you get behind us like that?" She asked after she recovered from her surprise.
"No one bothers to look up." He said simply, casually reminding her that he probably flew ahead of her using his Pidgeot or Mantine. She nodded simply at that, too tired to fire back a remark.
"But I was being sincere when I gave my congratulations. You did well, sister, and I'm proud of you. You have passed my ridiculous final test. I'm sorry if you got scared, but learning when to run is always important. You can't win everything." He patted her on the head and carefully lifted her by the arms. It's been a long time since he had carried her like this. She missed it.
"Come, it's already getting late. Let's get you home and get some food in you." He told her before he turned to her Miltank. "Klee is waiting for you back at the field, Miltank, so you can go to her to get healed." He said kindly, and her Miltank waddled away with a happy smile and left the two of them alone.
Whitney allowed herself to be carried back home, and she barely remembered showering, sitting through dinner, and falling asleep. All she could barely remember was her mom scolding John for being too harsh on her or something. She was just that tired.
She woke up much earlier than she usually did the next day, and she wasn't sure if it was because she went to sleep earlier than usual or because she was excited to finally start her circuit and her journey.
She went down to the breakfast table and was surprised to see the entire family, plus a surprisingly awake Karen, waiting for her there. Her surprise must have shown on her face as her mother chuckled.
"Are you surprised, dear?" She asked rhetorically. "Did you think that we wouldn't have realized that you were going to wake up earlier? Do you remember how your brother was when it was time for his journey?"
Karen turned to her brother with a smirk and seemed to be laughing at him with her eyes. Her brother blushed slightly before trying to change the topic, "Whitney, everyone in this room knows how hard you've prepared for your journey. And we know that you move on to do great things. So, we all got a small farewell gift for you before you leave."
She wanted to say that it was unfair since her brother didn't get anything before his trip because they were too poor to do so, but her slight edge of maturity pushed through for a second and told her to keep her mouth shut and just nod.
"Your mother and I got you this, sweetie." Her father said, as he passed her a small, wrapped package. She inspected it curiously for a moment before her father gestured for her to unwrap it, which she proceeded to do, revealing a small rectangular flip phone. She turned to her parents with a surprised, but happy, expression.
"Now that you're going to be on your journey, we felt that you needed some way to communicate with us." Her father explained, "Your brother helped us with the model, and said this model was famous for being unbreakable and waterproof. It's nothing fancy, but it should be reliable."
She marvelled at her gift for a moment before she put it down and hugged her parents, her eyes moist. Her parents hugged her tightly for a few moments before her mom started to cry, causing her to start as well.
Her brother and father tried to remain stoic, but she could tell that they were just holding it back. Karen looked a bit uncomfortable, but then patiently waited for them to break off the hug and for her to clean herself up before passing the gift to her.
"It's a TM for Shadow Ball." She explained, looking a bit embarrassed. "I really had trouble trying to find something personal to give you, but John said that this would be a very good gift to get you started. Use it well, and take care of yourself out there, Whitney."
Whitney carefully pocketed the TM before she engulfed Karen in a hug, which was promptly returned.
"Take care of my brother for me." Whitney whispered cheekily.
"I will." Karen whispered back, and the two of them shared a knowing smile together as they broke apart.
John then made his way forwards and crouched down to her level, before passing a very small metal box towards her, giving her a look to open it. She did so, revealing a stack of printed business cards with his brother's name and contact details on it, with the genuine mark of the Elite Four stamped on each one.
"I told you before that I would be there if you need me." Her brother said, "If you ever need to use my name to get yourself out of trouble, use those to prove my identity to them, and I'll be there as soon as I can. Now, go out there and make some friends! Enjoy yourself! We'll always be proud."
She glomped her brother and gave him whispered appreciation and thanks, ignoring the tears that threatened to fall from her eyes once again. He simply told her to stay safe out there and to come back home every once in a while. She promised to do so.
Then, the family, and Karen, all shared breakfast together. It was the last breakfast that she would have with her family for a while, but she tried to not let that get her down. Surprisingly, Karen seemed more uncomfortable just joining them at the table, but her mother repeatedly insisted that they were fine with it and that she was welcome to be there.
"I'm sure you will be joining us more often, Karen, so don't feel shy!" Her mother teased, causing both her brother and Karen to blush. Though Karen recovered quicker.
"Yes, unfortunately, your son insists that we train often so I'm always forced to be here. He's quite the slave driver, am I right?" Karen teased back.
"Oh my, I never knew our John was so possessive. He's just like his father." Her mom said with fake surprise, causing both her brother and father to share a look of shared commiseration, and John muttered a few words to himself that she was sure she wasn't meant to overhear.
While they were eating, her brother asked if she wanted him to drop her off at Pewter, but she told him that she would make her way there herself.
Eventually, breakfast was over, and it was time for her to go. She spent the next few minutes double checking everything, making sure that she had her trainer ID and registration on hand. Then she had to double check everything AGAIN after her parents kept asking if she had forgotten something.
Then it was finally time to leave the house. Her mother insisted that they take a photo before she left, and they all squished together in front of their doorway for a picture. Karen said that she shouldn't interrupt a family photo, but both her parents insisted, and she caved.
Photo taken, she gave all of her family members, and Karen, one last hug before she stepped out of her house and started on her journey.
Whitney turned around one last time and looked at her family, trying to engrave their expressions and faces into her memory. She saw that there was not a single dry eye among them, and she realized that she was on the verge of tears as well.
No, she refused to cry again. She was not a cry-baby any longer.
Before her resolve could falter, she gave one last wave towards her family and turned around again, leaving her family behind, and starting on her journey.
It was time for her to pave her own path.
A.N. AND Whitney is finally on her journey! Sorry for the POV shift like a third of the way into the chapter; hope it wasn't too jarring.
Also, I hope I dropped enough hints for people to realize where John's pre-battle monologue is from. I just repurposed it. And to anyone who wants to support me, please check out my p atreon at CartecTNN where you can read 8 advanced chapters! Thanks to those who have supported me already!
This chapter has been BETAed by Allute! Big Thanks!