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The two boys sat in the office by themselves, both boys sitting on the comfortable chairs in front of the wooden desk. Satoshi received a phone call the other day from his doctor. It was a few days ago, the doctor kindly asking him if there was any day he could come in. Satoshi made the appointment, and asked Gou to come with him.
The office they were sitting in was brightly lit and dark at the same time. Plaques of awards, certifications, and patents filled the walls with professionalism and comfort, but the atmosphere of melancholy and cold made the room feel deserting and dead. The desk itself was mostly empty minus the name plaque at the front of the desk covered in dust. There was also the mug filled with random colored pens sitting at the front right of the desk. All the pens were mostly full of ink, minus the red and blue pens where they were uncapped and dried. There was also an intercom system at the front left of the desk, the only object on the desk that wasn’t covered in dust.
Satoshi looked over to his best friend sitting beside him. Gou sat patiently, both arms on his laps with his hands fidgeting with each other. He hadn’t taken the news too well; a bit nervous that Satoshi’s doctor had asked him to personally come into the hospital instead of revealing the test results over the phone. Since the reveal, the poor boy was always checking on him and looking out for any symptoms of any sicknesses since that call. It was heart warming and touching that his friend was looking out for him like that, but he didn’t think today’s session was serious enough to warrant that.
“I still think you didn’t have to come today,” Satoshi said, making Gou snap out of his state of mind. “I don’t think anything is wrong with me Gou.”
“Satoshi!” Gou said in a mid-scream slash yell. “If it was nothing, the doctor would have told you over the phone! There’s something going on here, and I’m really worried about you!”
“It’s gonna be fine Gou,” Satoshi said, reclining himself to the back of his comfortable chair. “The doctor is probably gonna tell me that I’m about to go through puberty or something.”
“Satoshi!” Gou sighed loudly, “We’ve already been through this. You are already going through puberty. That’s not it.”
Satoshi slapped his right hand over Gou’s left shoulder. “Don’t be so worry about it Gou. We’ll get through this. Together?”
The two boys have been “dating” for the past few months. “Dating” as in they both recently admitted that they liked each other, but Satoshi still hasn’t realized that Gou liked liked him. Gou brushed the whole thing off due to him dying in embarrassment, but in reality he preferred things to be like this… for now.
Gou gave a loud sigh once again. He looked over to the other boy in the room and rubbed his temples with his free right hand. “I’m gonna get gray hairs early because of you.”
It was at that moment that the door to the office opened. The two boys became silent as the doctor entered the room. She was a pretty tall woman. Blonde, somewhat wide, and pretty young as well. With her lab coat and stethoscope hooked around her neck, her presence alone emitted professionalism and seriousness. She greeted the two boys in the room as she headed straight to her desk.
“Good Morning you two,” she said as she pulled her rolling chair out of the desk and sat on it. “And Satoshi is you?”
Satoshi raised his hand just above his shoulder. “That’s me.”
“Okay,” she set the file of papers on the table, separating the papers across so that she could visually see all of them displayed out. “And the other is…?”
“Gou,” Gou told her his name. “My name is Gou.”
The doctor raised her head so that her blue eyes could peer directly to Gou. “And your relation is…?”
Gou looked down at his lap in embarrassment. “I’m… I’m his b-boyfriend.”
“Aww,” the doctor acknowledged. “How cute.”
The two boys sat in silence as the doctor made one last read over her notes and files. They both watched the doctor sigh loudly, a hand going to her temples as she read over the results once again in her head.
“I’m…” the doctor admitted to the boys. “The news I will be sharing today will not be for the faint of heart.”
“Oh…” Gou whimpered. “Oh no.”
“Let me just show you the results.”
The doctor lifted up the x-ray results and showed them the image. The x-ray results showed Satoshi’s skull from a sagittal plane. The skull was brightly outlined in white, as well as the thick layer of skin and other anatomical parts of his head. However…
“We got your CAT scan back,” the doctor brought the x-ray to the light, and flipped the switch to turn the monitor on. “And unfortunately… we found something.”
The doctor moved away from the monitor to allow the boys to see what she was talking about. Their jaws dropped as they saw the light behind the skull.
“We… we found a backwards fitted cap.”
“Oh…” Gou’s voice weighted at the sound of that. “Oh my god.”
“I’m sorry,” the doctor prefaced before stating the diagnosis, “But you are… a full on… basic pokemon trainer.”
“B-But that’s impossible!” Satoshi exclaimed. “O-only coordinators are basic!”
“Not true,” the doctor replied to the boy in front of her. “I’m afraid pokemon trainers can be just as basic.”
Gou moved his legs up upon his chair, wrapping his arms around it to give himself more support.
The doctor lifted up a sheet of paper, reading off the results of that test. “You refer your pokemon as ‘your partners,’ you brag about your victories from pokemon battles so much so that your friends get sick of it, and your topic of conversation is always who the pokemon you battled last night were-“
“My team and I fought against this trainer,” Satoshi cut her off, “who had a Exploud, a Salamance, and a Walrein! And it was so cool because-“
The doctor eyed the boy, “and you never remember the person who you fought.”
“T-that’s not true!” Satoshi defended himself. “He was blonde and tall and was wearing green!”
“Satoshi,” Gou looked over to his direction. “She had brown hair and wore a pink dress.”
“This is very serious Satoshi,” the doctor sighed. “Very… Seriously basic. Are you experiencing any other symptoms?”
“I….” Satoshi paused, reconsidering his diagnosis and is now considering how much of a predicament he’s in. “I guess I joke about how… I’m gonna catch them all, but really I’m not. I… I make quotes from a tv show I used to watch as a kid with professor Oak in them, here and there…”
“-do you rip on trainers who don’t treat their pokemon right?” The doctor continued to ask, “Do you continue to rewear the same clothes every single day without seemingly needing to do laundry?”
“Yes,” Gou frustratingly answered.
“Shit is basic,” the doctor assured them. She sat up from her chair, clearing her throat at the same time. “The good news is, we caught your basicness early. If you can ease yourself from pokemon battles and you actually take the time to remember who you’ve battled,” the doctor paused once more. “Then you might be able to salvage a personality.”
“Umm…” Satoshi paused, grabbing the attention of both Gou and the doctor. “I… I haven’t been honest about myself. I…” Both Gou and the doctor gravitated towards the other boy in the room. They both leaned in towards Satoshi, giving him all of their divided attention. “I’ve been feeling a pain in… this area?” He gestured his chest.
“I… I think I have a crush on Leon.”
“Oh my god that’s basic,” Gou winced at the comment. His left arm raised up instinctively as it started to rub his own cheek.
“Satoshi, you really need to be upfront about all this basic shit,” the doctor said, looking down at her drawer just at the side of the desk. She bent down and picked up a few cards from the drawer, each card holding an image of some sort. “I’m going to show you a series of images. I just want you to tell me the first thing that pops into your head.”
She set the stack of cards on the table, making the loud clap on the desk top. The images themselves were within one inch of the margin of the full size paper. Black and white and printed with fine detail. The first image was a picture of Wyndon Stadium panned from a far view so that the whole area was within the image. The support arks that go over the stadium can be seen with detail, as dozens of lights and special shielding technology can be seen being emitted from them.
“Perfect stadium,” Satoshi said, not even batting an eye.
The doctor showed the next image, which was a picture of a random Pikachu holding a piece sign, standing on its hind legs.
“My partner Pikachu!” Satoshi said, smiling off a bit.
The next image the doctor pulled up contained an image of a scone from the Galar region. It was lightly frosted with vanilla white icing, and served single on a plate with a small cup of hot milk tea on the side.
“Those little triangle thingies!” Satoshi perked up, his mouth watering and salivating at the notion of warm food.
The last image, the doctor pulled up, was a picture of Gary Oak holding the trophy of his recent tournament win. Confetti, camera flashes, and streamers could be seen in the background as Gary accepted the trophy.
“FUCK YOU!” Satoshi screamed with a raised voice. Gou jumped from his seat and almost fell from the sudden scream. He looked over to the boy next to him with eyes filled with horror and sadness.
“A teenage boy,” the doctor stated. “With serious opinions about pokemon battling tournaments involving rivals. You are a Stage Four… Basic Pokemon Trainer.”
Gou scoffed at the diagnosis. “You did always take training pokemon a little too seriously.”
“But the real victim is you,” the doctor pointed towards Gou. She handed a pamphlet to Gou, who immediately went to opening it up and reading its contents. “Basic pokemon trainers spend their days training and battling and going on journeys with an unearned sense of entitlement. It is you who has to not feel humiliated when Satoshi battles another person but in reality they’re just normal people.”
Gou looked over shockingly to Satoshi, an open mouth of shock and the look of disgust filling his face.
“That’s right Gou,” the doctor sighed. “He will ask anyone to battle, regardless if they’re trainers or not.”
Satoshi looked down at his lap, tears starting to form from his eyes.
“Because he’s basic,” the doctor said, looking at Satoshi’s crumbling form. “Basic as fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck.”