Chapter Text
Arc 1: Cruel Naivety
Blitz's vision blurred into shades of green. There was a terrible blend of adrenaline and venom pumping through his veins. He felt queasy; it was like his stomach had tied itself into a knot. The pain was intense, his limbs felt heavy and he couldn't seem to catch his breath. He had to drop onto all fours just to keep moving.
Blitz looked around frantically, trying and failing to make sense of his blurry surroundings. The more he tried to make sense of it, the worse the twisting feeling in his stomach became. He was left as lost as when he started.
While his eyes had failed him, he found that his nose still worked perfectly. Despite the situation, Blitz wished he had lost his sense of smell instead.
On his right side, there was a purple pokémon hovering above the ground. Blitz couldn't make out what species of pokémon it was, but he could identify the pokémon as the cause of the horrendous stench that surrounded the area. To Blitz's nose, it was like being trapped in a room with burning garbage. The rancid odour almost overwhelmed his senses, but Blitz was still able to tell that there were two other pokémon around him.
They surrounded him in a triangle formation. One smelled like venom, and Blitz was positive that it was the ekans that had bitten him earlier. The last one smelled like rotten fruit.
Blitz felt his heart beating like thunder in his chest. He was terrified.
"This seems like a lot of effort for a pikachu, don't you think?" Blitz's ears twitched. The voice had a feminine quality to it, in addition to a condescending tone. The speaker was clearly human. Blitz's panic increased tenfold; how had he missed the presence of humans?
"Well, we might as well capture the pathetic thing while we're here." The second voice was definitely male, and he sounded decidedly uninterested.
Blitz's mind was numb with panic, and being unable to see wasn't helping the situation. He furiously shook his head in a desperate attempt to regain his vision. He gave himself a headache, along with a mild case of double vision. The ill-feeling in his stomach steadily increased, but the small pokémon did notice a small improvement in his sight.
Enough to see that the man was holding a yellow and orange pokéball. Blitz's eyes widened in shock. That was his pokéball.
He looked around, vision still hindered, but better able to make out the world. 'I'm surrounded by an ekans, a weezing, and a meowth.' His searching became desperate. 'Come on, where is she?'
"Aww, isn't that sweet?" The female member of the duo spoke in a mocking tone. "Does the little weakling think his trainer's going to save him?"
That got Blitz's attention; he stopped searching and focused exclusively on the duo.
The male shrugged his shoulders. "I don't know what to tell ya, she ran away after you were poisoned. Probably figured you were a goner and cut her losses."
Blitz gritted his teeth, the duo's mockery filled him with an uncontrollable rage. There was only one thought on his mind in repeat; how dare they badmouth her!
The electric pokémon was whelmed in anger. He desperately wanted to hurt these people. He could feel an intense charge building up in his cheek pouches. He planned to zap all five of them at once, and then while they're sluggish from having their muscles shocked he would retrieve his pokéball, and go off until he found his trainer.
Unfortunately for Blitz, his charging process had the very noticeable side-effect of electrical spikes around his cheeks.
His actions didn't cause the response he was expecting. The three pokémon surrounding him didn't move to stop him. In actuality, they seemed almost bored by his efforts. The female human had started to laugh mockingly and the man had only sighed.
"I order you to stop that."
And Blitz stopped. The electric mouse blinked in confusion. He tried to start charging again, but he physically couldn't bring himself to.
The male human casually threw Blitz's pokéball in the air and caught it. "You're a bit temperamental. I order you not to attack us, or to run away. I order you not to move from that position until I tell you to."
Blitz felt a weight on his mind with every order. He didn't understand what was happening, but when he tried to break the orders, to disobey, he couldn't. The most he could manage was to make his body tremble, but he truly couldn't move. It was like his limbs were stone.
"Finally." The man threw the ball to the woman. "He's a little too spirited for our needs, wouldn't you agree?
The woman looked at Blitz with a big grin and a sadistic gleam in her eyes. "So, what are you thinking? A stronger ball?"
"Precisely." The man reached into his pocket and pulled out a pokéball, obviously empty by nature of being coloured black and white.
Blitz couldn't tell what was so special about the ball. It looked no different from any other empty pokéball.
The man prepared to throw the ball. "Let's do this clean."
She nodded. She placed her hands on the top and bottom of Blitz's pokéball and started to twist it. Blitz's heartbeat increased, he was covered in sweat, and his mind was clouded by panic and fear.
'They can't break my ball! How will my trainer know it's me? Please no, please no, please no…' Blitz's mind was consumed by a single thought. He desperately tried to break the man's orders; if he could only shock them, he would have a chance to grab the ball and escape.
The hinge on Blitz's pokéball snapped and the ball split into two pieces. Blitz blinked. At that moment, when his pokéball broke, all of his anger, fear, and panic seemed to just disappear.
He was also able to move again. His momentary confusion about his emotions kept him from attacking the humans on sight, and when the idea crossed his mind, he wasn't able to act on it on account of being hit upside the head with an empty pokéball.
Blitz felt his body turning into energy and being pulled inside of the ball. It was a sensation he had never particularly cared for. He didn't know what he'd been expecting, but being inside the ball wasn't unpleasant in the least.
'What am I thinking?' Blitz thought to himself defiantly. 'I'm not going to be owned by these jerks! I'm not going to be owned by anyone!'
Blitz tried to break out of the pokéball. His attempt was met by resistance from the ball itself, and it made him feel intense pain. It was like he had run full speed and thrown himself into a brick wall, only the pain that his entire body would be in seemed to somehow be focused on his mind alone.
He kept trying. He refused to give up, even as the pain increased. It was the worse headache he'd ever had.
'Break out… attack everyone… run away…' Blitz repeated this thought, turning it into a mantra. It was all he could focus on as the pain made thinking complex thoughts nigh impossible.
Eventually, after pushing his mind close to its breaking point, Blitz felt the pokéball's resistance pop like a bubble.
Blitz materialized back into the world, to the surprise of the two humans and their three pokémon.
"How's that possible?" The female human said.
Before her partner could respond, Blitz's let out an explosive discharge. It spread around them like a dome, burning the grass and hitting both the humans and their pokémon. The humans collapsed unconscious, while the pokémon seemed to have had their muscles paralysed.
Blitz spared only a moment to breathe. He didn't think. He no longer felt a stabbing pain in his mind, only a dull throb, but it was enough to keep him from trying to form a thought.
The electric type started to run. He didn't know which direction he had chosen, or where he was going to end up. This didn't matter to him. His only concern was running away from this situation. It didn't matter that he was exhausted. It didn't matter that there was still some lingering venom in his body. It didn't matter that he no longer had a trainer.
The only thing that did matter was running.
So he did.
/
"Viridian City is the closet city to the Indigo Plateau." Cody shook his head. "No, technically Pewter City's closer, but there isn't an easy to follow path between the two. Pewter also has a museum and an officially recognised gym."
Cody was reading his favourite map, an activity that he had taken part in countless times before. The map was a more artistic interpretation of the Kanto and Johto regions. It could probably still be used for navigating, but that wasn't its true purpose.
"Cinnabar Island has an active volcano." Cody sighed, running a hand through his curly red hair. "Why do I have to live in Pallet Town? This place is so boring…”
It wasn't an unfair assessment.
Pallet was a small country town. There weren't more than fifty people living there, most of which were either fishers or farmers. There weren't any tourist attractions, so the reason people visited was that they were lost or they were travelling to or from Cinnabar to Viridian.
Pallet Town's only claim to fame was the fact that the world-renowned professor Oak was born, raised, and currently resided there.
Cody sighed. Although he would never admit it out loud, Cody's main problem with his home town was the people there.
"Are we really just going to pretend that this isn't a problem?" A thunderous voice roared from the living room beneath Cody's bedroom.
Cody jumped involuntarily at the sudden noise. He panicked for a moment, before letting out a shaky sigh. In times like this, Cody's parents were also included in his reason for disliking Pallet Town.
It was Cody's father who was yelling. Soon Cody's mother would shout something back at him. It was a common situation, and as a result of the incredibly thin walls of the house, Cody was privy to every single argument. They used to terrify him when he was younger, but they didn't have as much impact now.
"I wonder if it's about me…" Cody mumbled sarcastically. It usually was, and the boy had long since grown numb to it.
Other topics of conversations included, but were not limited to, stressful work, money issues, rumours that were spreading around Pallet Town, or drinking problems.
"Problem? What problem! It's not like it hurts anyone!" His mother roared back.
"Well, that could be either of them." Cody sighed. He went back to reading his map. "I wonder what it's like inside a cave…"
Cody's mind went wandering. He imagined what it was like to travel from town to town, camping in forests, and seeing interesting landmarks. The boy had a sad smile. "I bet it's amazing."
There was an explosion of noise from downstairs. "Yes, I'm worried! Maybe you didn't notice, but he talks to pokémon! It's weird, he hears some pokémon barking, or chirping, and he stops and starts talking with them like it's completely normal!"
Cody was unceremoniously ripped from his travelling fantasy. He clenched his teeth. His brow furrowed, and he could feel the fury burning through his veins. It was the kind of anger that would lead to him either confronting his parents or leaving the house altogether with the sound of a slamming door behind him. As per usual, he chose the latter.
Cody stood up from his bed and glanced around his room. He wasn't the most organised kid in the world; there was clothing littering the floor and draped over the shelves. After a short search, he found a black vest, and some red and orange shorts, neither of which were too creased.
Despite the situation, he smiled. The bright red of the shorts matched his hair perfectly.
"If I'm wearing this, I'll need to find something to match."
Cody dug through his cupboard searching for some clothes that would match his red, orange, and black colour theme. "I've gotta have something," the boy mumbled to himself.
After a few minutes of searching, he found an orange sleeveless jacket with a soft yellow coloured collar and trim. He had also found some yellow socks and some shoes that managed to be red, orange, and yellow all at once.
He grinned mischievously and got dressed. He looked himself over in the mirror and concluded that it was the sort of outfit that would drive his father mad within seconds of looking at him. This made the outfit perfect, in Cody's opinion.
As he stepped out of his bedroom the smile on his face vanished. When he stepped into the living room his parents went quiet.
Cody didn't spare them a glance as he made his way towards the front door, but he could feel their eyes following him.
"Where are you going?" His mother asked, her voice hoarse from the prior arguments.
"Out," Cody answered dismissively without breaking his stride.
Before another word could be said on the issue, he opened the front door and stepped outside, slamming it shut behind him. He stood in front of his house for a moment, trying to calm down. This was made more difficult by the fact that after a few seconds the ever-familiar sounds of a heated argument filled the air.
Cody grit his teeth. "I don't know what I was expecting..."
He shook his head, and just walked away from the door.
Cody understood why his father was so concerned, but it didn't make it any easier to listen to. He had been able to understand pokémon for as long as he could remember. His parent had him tested, numerous times in fact, but none of the doctors or psychologists could give a reason for this ability. Even the top authority on the relationships between humans and pokémon, Professor Oak, was stumped.
The pokémon whisperer in question wasn't interested in how he was doing it. He was more concerned with how others reacted to it. People had told him it was 'unnerving' watching him hold a conversation with a pokémon, while others believed in his ability but thought he was an attention seeker for using it, and very rarely he'd come across someone that believed he was lying and demanded proof.
'They always react negatively to the proof, though.' Cody thought to himself, feeling surprisingly melancholy about it. He honestly preferred the anger to the sadness.
As he walked through Pallet Town he kept a subtle watch on every person that he passed. The people gave him quite a wide berth, which he wouldn't complain about. He could handle being ignored quite well by this point.
Cody looked around. He had been walking on auto-pilot, too consumed by his thoughts. He was standing in front of his friend's house, Jason. Despite his bad mood, Cody managed to put a smile on his face as he walked up to the front door. The friendship between the two of them was born out of a shared situation; Jason could also understand pokémon. This meant that both boys had been subjected to similar treatment at the hands of the people of Pallet.
Cody knocked on the door and waited. It didn't take long for Jason to answer. The boy stood there wearing green pyjamas. The colour of the pyjamas matched his hair almost perfectly, a detail that Cody found humorous. Jason had been prepared for conflict; he had a suspicious look in his eye, and beige coloured pokéball in hand to ward off potential threats.
Jason blinked when he realised it was Cody standing in front of him. The pyjama-clad boy let out a nervous cough and Cody couldn't help himself; he had to giggle at the situation.
"Sorry, I would've called ahead, but I left in a hurry." Cody shrugged with a small smile on his face.
Jason tilted his head in thought before realisation hit him and he nodded. "Ah, I take it you want to go for a walk then?"
Cody felt a shiver go through his spine. He nodded as his grin wavered.
"Usual spot?"
"Yep."
Jason hummed. "Let's go then."
"Um, are you sure you want to go out like that?" Cody gestured towards Jason's pyjamas.
Jason glanced down, reacting with surprise. "Good point."
He turned around and walked back into the house. He came back out seconds later, still wearing the pyjamas.
Cody stared at Jason bemused. "You're still wearing pyjamas."
The other boy tilted his head in confusion. "Is that what you meant? I just went to put shoes on."
Cody blinked thrice in rapid succession, dumbfounded by his friend's priories, before bursting into giggles. Jason only stares at the other boy in confusion.
"Come on then!" Cody turned and started walking. Jason sighed, closing and locking the door behind him.
The pyjama-clad boy ran to catch up. "I am never going to understand your sense of humour, am I?"
Cody shrugged. "Probably not. But honestly, Jason. Just gonna walk around town in your pyjamas, are you?"
Jason nodded. "People already think I'm weird, Cody. It can't get much worse, right?"
The other boy sighed. "I guess I can see that. Out of curiosity, which of us do you think is being stared at more?"
The two boys casually walked through Pallet Town, drawing quite a bit of attention to themselves, for obvious reasons.
Jason hummed in thought. "Hard to say. We're walking next to each other, so both?"
"Fair enough."
The two boys became quiet as they walked, something that was fairly common for the duo. They followed the path through Pallet Town, ignoring the disapproving stares of onlookers, until they reached the edge of the town.
Jason was short of breath by the time they got there. "Are we there yet?"
Cody looked around, with a blank expression on his face, before nodding. "Yep, this is the boundary line between Pallet Town and Route 1."
"Wonderful..." Jason trailed off, attempting to catch his breath. He turned to look back at Pallet Town, looking for his house, and trying to avoid thinking about how tiring it was going to be to walk back there.
Cody shrugged his shoulders, turning away from Jason to gaze at the wide-open space that was Route 1. He was mesmerised by its uneven terrain and fields of wild green grass that stretched all the way to Viridian City in the distance. He stared at the route with a melancholy expression on his face.
"You know." Cody broke the silence. "I think this is my favourite place in Pallet Town."
"Ah, or it would it be more accurate to say that it is your favourite place in Route 1?" Jason turned back around to look at the other boy.
Cody let out a sarcastic chuckle. "Of course not. We'd have to walk two more steps to actually be in Route 1." The map enthusiast tilted his head up in thought. "I think the boundary line between Route 1 and Viridian city would probably be my favourite place in Route 1. I guess you'll get to see that pretty soon, won't you?"
There was an uneasy quiet between the two boys.
"I am sorry about this, you know?" Jason's voice reflected how uncomfortable he was with the topic.
Despite Jason's assumptions, Cody merely shrugged in response. "Don't be. If I were able to leave this place, I would. Take the chance while you still can."
Jason was at a loss, he didn't know how to respond to Cody's lack of anger. Fortunately for him, Cody was quick to change the subject.
"Tell me, Jason, are you planning on taking the gym challenge?"
Although Jason welcomed the change in conversation, he was still surprised by the topic. He merely nodded his head, before realising that Cody wasn't looking at him. "Probably, yeah."
Cody turned to look at Jason with a smile on his face. "Which means that's your first pokémon, right?"
Jason blinked in confusion. He glanced down at his hand and noticing that he was still holding the beige coloured pokéball. Jason's cheeks went red; he had completely forgotten that he had the pokéball with him.
"Yep." Jason let out a nervous laugh. "Do you want to meet him?"
Cody rolled his eyes. "Obviously."
Jason sighed and clicked the pokéball's button. The ball snapped open, releasing a crimson light. The pokéball's occupant materialized in front of the two boys.
The pokémon in question was a quadruped with long ears, with beige coloured fur. It had a large bushy tail with a white tip. It also had a large fluffy collar around its neck, which was the same shade of white as its tail tip. It was about the size of a toddler.
Before either boy could say a word, the small beige pokémon had already leapt towards Jason. The pyjama-clad boy reacted quickly, catching the pokémon in his arms.
"Jason!" The pokémon exclaimed, radiating excitement.
Cody tilted his head in confusion. "Does he do that a lot?"
"All the time." Jason nodded. "Hello Gizmo, there is someone I want you to meet."
The pokémon, Gizmo, had an aura of curiosity around him. "Really? Are they like you?"
"Kind of?" Jason sounded unsure.
At that point Cody couldn't help but let out a light chuckle, drawing Jason and Gizmo's attention.
"Sorry, I'm in an overly giggly mood today." Cody smiled as he turned his focus to Gizmo. "To answer that question, no. Me and Jason really don't have much in common."
Gizmo jumped out of Jason's arms and walked towards Cody with an excited look in his eyes. "But you both can talk to pokémon?"
"Yeah." Cody made a so-so gesture. "Not sure why though. My name's Cody, by the way."
Gizmo jumped excitedly. "This is so cool! I thought only Jason could do that!"
Cody sat down on the ground, getting to Gizmo's eye level. "Well think again. You're an eevee, right? The ones who can evolve into any type?"
Gizmo nodded frantically. "Yep! Although, we can't change into every type."
The red-haired boy shrugged. "Not yet, but it seems likely. I'm curious if you could evolve into any type, what would you choose?"
"Huh, I never thought to ask that," Jason spoke up. "What's your preference, Gizmo?"
Gizmo looked up in thought, his face clearly showing intense concentration. That expression was slowly overtaken with one of worry. Gizmo's ears snapped to attention, and he started looking around the surrounding area frantically.
This obviously drew confusion from the two boys.
"Gizmo? What's wrong?" Jason looked around in search of a threat, but everything seemed safe enough.
Gizmo didn't respond to the question, instead, he ran off into Route 1 at full speed towards some thick grass that was tall enough that the eevee disappeared into it. The two humans wasted no time in following the tiny pokémon.
"Gizmo! Where are you going?" Jason shouted, but there was no response.
They kept going and would've ran past Gizmo if he hadn't spoken up.
"I'm here!" Gizmo's voice came out shaky, and it was only when Cody and Jason got closer that they realised why.
Hidden by the tall blades of grass, was a small pokémon who's most noticeable features were a tail in the shape of a lightning bolt, two long thin ears, its white-yellow fur, and the fact that it was unconscious.
Cody blinked. "Is that a pikachu? On Route 1?"
"Yeah..." Jason trailed off, equally confused.
Gizmo, visibly distressed by the situation, tried to explain. "He isn't from around here. Kind of smells like he came from a forest. He's fairly recently been caught, but his trainer isn't around. He was recently poisoned, it's wearing off but it's still having an effect. I'd also assume that he's been running for a long time, which led to him fainting from exhaustion."
There was noticeable silence between the two boys as Gizmo looked up at them.
"How do you know that?" Cody asked, slightly wary of a medical examination given by a pokémon.
Gizmo rolled his eyes. "Humans. How do you get anything done with those limited senses? He smells like a forest, human perfume, low-level venom, and sweat. What would you conclude from this?" Gizmo shook his head. "It's not important! What are we going to do about this?"
Cody was taken aback by the eevee's words, but he did start thinking. They couldn't just leave the pikachu there: he was unconscious, poisoned, and apparently had a trainer who was probably looking for him. They couldn't take him back to Pallet Town, there was no Pokémon Centre and Cody doubted they would be allowed into Professor Oak's lab.
Without another thought on the matter, Cody picked up the unconscious pikachu and started running towards Viridian City.
Jason was too shocked to react to Cody's actions. It was Gizmo running after Cody that shook Jason from his shocked state.
"What are you waiting for? He hasn't got any pokémon to protect him, we've got to go!"
Jason was unable to fault the logic and quickly followed Cody and Gizmo towards Viridian City.
/
Blitz winced. He was trying to claw his way back into consciousness, not at all helped by the splitting headache he was experiencing. A part of him was surprised that that was the worst of it. After the mad charge he had done, he expected every muscle in his body to be throbbing with intense pain. But instead, Blitz found that his body felt pleasantly numb.
When he blinked his eyes open, the combination of bright light and white scenery caused him to violently recoil. Even with his eyes closed, Blitz could see various differently coloured spots dancing across his vision.
"Hey, are you awake?" A voice whispered to the left of Blitz. "How are you feeling?"
Blitz's entire body tensed at the realisation of an unknown presence. It caused him a small amount of pain.
'There's no reason to panic.' Blitz reassured himself. 'If this guy was going to do something, he wouldn't have waited until I woke up, right?'
Blitz felt his anxiety rising.
"I'm fine." Blitz whispered back. "Who are you? Where am I?"
"I'm Cody. Some friends and I were hanging around Pallet Town when Gizmo smelled you?" Cody seemed unsure of that sentence. "He said that you'd been poisoned and had worked yourself to exhaustion, so we took you to a Pokémon Centre."
Blitz took in that information and re-evaluated his situation. 'So, a trainer found me, eh? Well, as long as it wasn't one of those two, I should be fine.' Blitz let out a shaky sigh. 'Important stuff first; was I captured?'
Blitz had been born in the wild, before being captured. Now, after his pokéball had been broken, Blitz felt different. It was a subtle difference, but one that Blitz had become overwhelmingly aware of. The more he thought about it, the less sense his actions made, and the surer he was. 'I haven't been captured.'
"Thanks, I guess..." Blitz mumbled.
"Where's your trainer?" Cody asked innocently enough, but it caused Blitz to feel bitter.
It wasn't her fault that Blitz had been released, but it was her choice to abandon him at the first sign of trouble when he needed her the most.
"Don't have one." Blitz scowled. "I don't wanna talk about it."
"Oh..." As Cody trailed off, Blitz's mind surged. That tone of voice told Blitz everything that he needed to know. It was a blend of good-natured empathic sadness and potential hope.
'He's going to ask me to join his team.' The relationship between trainer and pokémon was a stressful one, or at least that was Blitz's experience. The trainer would expect the world and more of the pokémon, and the pokémon felt almost compelled to do as instructed. In fact, the more Blitz thought about it, the more it seemed like mind control instead of merely a strong compulsion.
The language barrier didn't help matters much.
Blitz softly shook his head. "I don't want to join your team, so don't ask."
There was a silence in the room for a moment. It lasted long enough that Blitz began to wonder if he'd been so absorbed in his thoughts that he hadn't noticed Cody leaving the room.
"I... don't have a team?" Cody sounded surprised and confused.
Blitz snickered. The electric mouse would've rolled his eyes if the expression could be seen and said eyes weren't still causing him pain.
"If you don't have a team, how did we get into a Pokémon Centre? Pokémon can't just waltz in here, you know?"
To Blitz's surprise, Cody started giggling.
"Okay, I think I get what's going on here... open your eyes and look at me."
Blitz grumbled, his eyes still stung from his first attempt to see, and he knew that keeping them closed for so long hadn't let them adjust to the light. Slowly he blinked his eyes open and shut, until he could keep them open without being blinded and with only mild pain.
Blitz looked around the room, but all he could see beyond piercingly white walls was a human child that he assumed was Cody's trainer. The electric type did a double-take. The child's fashion sense was very bright. The boy in question was looking at him with a blank expression.
Blitz was confused, and he kept looking around. "Okay, I give. Where are you?"
The human smiled at Blitz like he'd told the greatest joke ever. "I'm right here."
Blitz blinked at the human, his confusion level rising. Suddenly, the realisation hit him like a hammer. With the situation fully understood, Blitz did the only rational thing that he could.
He screamed.