Chapter Text
*BEEP* *BEEP*
I groggily open my eyes, which are immediately met with the sight of my peeling greenish-yellow ceiling. Another day, another monotonous 24 hours to be wasted doing absolutely nothing productive. Sighing, I pull myself out of bed and into the restroom where I brush my teeth and comb my hair while checking my phone.
“Huh. Tina’s finally gotten her starter.”
My friend Tina had turned 16 a couple days ago, and was now eligible to collect her standard government-provided pokemon, which people called “starters”. Really kind of an odd nickname though, as most people never get a second pokemon. Not in this economy, at least.
As I swipe through her pictures, it’s revealed that she chose a Charmander. A good choice for her, since she was always complaining about feeling cold even in average temperatures. One video shows the Charmander in her car as she drives back home with her new companion. The pokemon’s flaming tail is covered by one of the government-issued safety devices given to anyone who possesses a potentially dangerous pokemon.
Turning off my phone, I get dressed and head downstairs for breakfast. It’s an A day today at school…that means I have to grab my instrument. Sigh.
I quickly finish my cereal and step out of the house, backpack and instrument in tow. There’s a slight drizzle in the air- not surprising considering it is May- but the refreshing air motivates me for the upcoming 8 hour school day. It’s the last month of school, after all- I really only have 2 weeks left, and one of them is just finals week. I can do this!
The jealousy catches up to me while I’m on the bus. My birthday’s all the way in July, which means there’s the entire month of June between me and my starter. All my friends have gotten theirs already, and I can’t help but feel left out. For now though, I need to focus on my studies- I completely forgot about my pre-calculus test today!
My first period of the day is engineering. I greet the security at the door with a quick hello, and wave at his pokemon partner, a little machop who’s name is Cary. People who work in the security field are issued partners by whoever is hiring them, in this case the school district. These security pokemon are the only ones allowed on school grounds- students who try to sneak their starters in (which is a laughable idea) are suspended, or worse.
I breeze through engineering- my teacher, Mr. Burnham is super flexible and wants us to learn through having fun- and take the shuttle to the main school building, which takes about 10 minutes. After I arrive, I rush to my orchestra class to avoid being tardy. As I enter the classroom, my teacher gestures to a pile of papers on his desk.
“They’re the all-state etudes. I suggest you practice them over the summer.”
“So quick? The auditions aren’t until October…” I reply.
“Yeah, but it’s better to have a head start, don’t you think?”
I sigh and grab a packet, not bothering to look through it. I then unpack my instrument for another day of orchestra.
The class after orchestra is math. I don’t even want to talk about it.
I walk into my english teacher’s classroom ready to rant to my friends about the horrible test I just took. Instead, Mrs. Valliere hushes us all and announces that she’s graded our research essays, which we wrote a week ago. I rush to check my grade, which is a well-deserved 100. I spent a lot of time researching and writing about my topic (which was the debate of pokemon in medical fields), so if I got anything less than a 90 I would’ve crashed out. My grade average will be staying 100!
As for chemistry, my last class of the day, nothing noteworthy happened there. The entire 50 minutes was used reviewing for the final, which is to say panicking because I forgot all the material. Yay me!
When I get back on the bus to go home, I’m so exhausted I drift asleep.
“-ire! Claire, are you awake?”
I startle, rubbing my eyes to see my friend Olivia shaking me.
“We’re at the last stop already! Thankfully I saw you, otherwise…yeesh.”
“Oh my goodness, thanks for waking me up. Man, I can’t believe I missed my stop.” I groan and grab my stuff before following Olivia off the bus.
Luckily, the last stop is still in the same neighborhood as my house. My current location is the lake that marks the intersection between the main road and the entrance to the neighborhood. My house is just a few streets in, so I can make it in 20 minutes, give or take. But while we’re here, I decide to take a few minutes to enjoy the gentle spray of water coming from the fountain in the middle of the pond.
I walk down to the lakeside and set down my backpack, pulling out my violin. I always played better with fresh air, and I rarely ever came down to the lake, so might as well take this opportunity. Since I haven’t glanced at the state etudes yet, I decided to play my solo piece: Symphonie Espagnole, which I would be performing in a few weeks. I messed up a few times, but overall it was a nice performance.
*SPLASH*
A sudden noise startles me as I lower my violin. I peer into the water, and see nothing but my reflection for a few seconds until a face slowly rises. It’s… a pokemon. A pokemon! A rather goofy-looking one at that. Its adorable blank eyes stare at me while it flaps its tiny fins, water droplets rolling off its reddish scales.
“Hi little guy…did you hear me playing my violin?” I step closer to the water edge, but the pokemon shrinks back into the water. “Heh, I get it. I’ll stick to practicing, and you can listen if you want.”
True to my word, I step back and begin refining my solo. Maybe half an hour has passed before I realize I should get going- it’ll be dinner time soon. I look down at the pokemon, which I now know is called a Magikarp thanks to Google. Over time it had become more friendly, even flipping in the air a few times after a melody it particularly liked.
“Well, I’ll see you later. Gotta get home so my parents don’t think I’ve died.” I wave to the Magikarp, then sling my backpack onto my shoulders again. As I leave, I feel a bit reluctant to leave the lake. Even though Magikarp are classified as a C-C (common-class) pokemon due to its TUR (threat, utility, rarity) ranking of 1-2-1, this encounter still felt special. One thing was for sure though- I was definitely going to stop eating fish meat from now on. After all, the only reason Magikarp even has a utility ranking above 1 is because they’re mass bred for the food industry. Harsh.
I found myself intentionally missing my stop for the remaining days of school. Each day, I would settle down at the lake and practice my solo while the Magikarp splashed around near me. I was happy- it was almost like having a pokemon partner. Of course it wasn’t really mine- it wouldn’t become my pokemon unless I had one of those pokeballs to catch it with, and the government had serious regulations on those things.
“So…according to the pokedex, you’re a male. It would be easier to tell if I could actually see your whiskers, but the sun’s reflection on the water makes it pretty hard to tell.” It was the last day of school and I was lounging on the grass, looking at Magikarp’s pokedex entry.
“Males have yellow whiskers. Females have white ones.” I squint at the Magikarp in front of me. “Hrphmmm…nope. Still can’t tell shit.”
A sudden loud splash accompanies a shower of water droplets as the Magikarp flings itself out of the water, landing with an undignified flop in the grass next to me. I rush over to it, panicking.
“Why did you do that?! Oh jeez, let’s get you back in the water…” I gently grab at its scales, firmly holding it in my arms- it’s surprisingly big, at least for a Magikarp. As I lower it back into the water, I notice its whiskers are yellow, like gold.
“Hah, so you are a male. Looks like I was right after all.” I squat down to the Magikarp, meeting its- no, his blank gaze. “Don’t go jumping like that again, okay? If I wasn’t here, you might’ve been trapped on land.”
I shake my head with disappointment, reaching out to pet the Magikarp on his head. To my surprise, he doesn’t swim away. That’s when it finally registers- I touched a pokemon! There was something fascinating about that. It’s not like I’ve never touched a pokemon before; my family has a pet Growlithe named Cleo and 4 rattatas named Maxie, Fozzie, Oreo, and Waffle. But this…this was a wild pokemon that trusted me enough to allow me to pet him. That’s when I knew I had to have this Magikarp. It was special. I didn’t care that it had little to no value in the market. I didn’t care that it was virtually useless for anything except as a pet or food. We had a bond. (so cheesy lmao).
That night, I requested a fish tank and supplies as a reward for me moving up the GPA rankings in my school. My parents hesitantly agreed, and a week later a humongous tank arrived at our house. I spent hours setting it up in the game room, and soon it was all ready for my new fish buddy.
Although pokeballs are strictly regulated, it was relatively easy to obtain one for my Magikarp. Since I was a month short of being legally allowed to own one, my parents registered for one that would later be transferred to me once I turned 16. After getting back from the poke agency, my dad handed me the brand-new pokeball.
“All yours,” he said.
I stared at it, hardly believing it to be real. Soon, I would have my very own pokemon.
My parents dropped me off at the lake so I could capture the Magikarp. I strolled up to the lake and before I could even call for him, he broke the surface with a splash and swam toward me, almost like he was anticipating this too.
I showed him the pokeball. “Are you ready to live a life with me instead of this lake?”
A second passed, then the pokemon bumped his head against the pokeball. I watched in awe as his form condensed into glowing particles before being absorbed by the pokeball. What an amazing invention. I watched as the pokeball beeped, then turned green. My phone rang with a notification from the new app I just installed- the PokeSphere, Sphere for short. It tracks all things about the user’s pokemon- from the pokeballs registered to the user and the traits of the pokemon inside. It also provides a pokedex and pokenews, for all news global and local about pokemon. On my bare account, there were two notifications- one to notify me about my parents connecting a pokeball to me, and another to update that pokeball with the Magikarp that had just joined me. Curious, I clicked into that and was taken to a new interface showing an image of Magikarp and the size/weight of him, as well as the current health status of the pokemon. It looks like mine is a bit hungry at the moment, so I close my phone and grab his pokeball before running back home, excitement rising at the thought of showing Magikarp his tank.