Chapter Text
Out of every month, June was always the most awaited, like someone's sweet sixteen.
While it would be a pretty celebrated month nontheless due to the end of the school period, there was specifically one thing that set it apart: The trainer test.
The name pretty much gives its function away; a test that every child from the age of ten can take — although a majority of the quiz takers were at least thirteen — to decide wether someone was ready or not to be a trainer, and if yes which Pokémon to assign them.
It was very awaited, even if the test was only taken in the capital city of the region, and not anywhere else, which meant travelling all the way. It wasn't really a problem usually, but the influx of youngsters coming in made it especially tiring, not to mention how you had to call early otherwise you might not get a spot (would you really be that lucky between millions of kids?)
But today, this June, was an especially packed day, maybe because it was near the end of the month, and when the month ended so did the test.
"I told you we should've picked an earlier day!" A girl complained to her friends, hoodie wrapped around her waist as she fanned with her hands to let herself a bit of freshness, "You know we made this reservation in March, right? If we waited one more day we probably wouldn't have made it so suck it up" her friend beside her shrugged pettily, "Plus, I got the earliest day possible!" Her friend groaned, "Let's not argue, shall we? It really wouldn't look good" another friend interjected. Right, psychologists were looking at them. Felt kinda creepy to think about honestly.
They finally reached the desk where a woman was working, looking like she was going to faint at any second. This was a tough time of the year to work in. "Hello, names?" She asked robotically, already running her eyes through a checklist, "Miuzz, Mery, Cristo and Elly" Miuzz said, whom hadn't really talked much up to that point. The woman took a couple of seconds to check the names, wrote something down and gave each of them a note (a ticket?) with numbers on it.
"The next test is at 11, go outside of the rooms whose number is written on the strip of paper and wait there, numbers one to twenty are on the first floor, twenty-one to forty on the second and so on, the test lasts two hours, we will call you back in a week." The worker informed them, they thanked her and moved on.
It was a six floors building, which implied at least a hundred twenty rooms, "Hey, what number are your rooms?" Elly mumbled, reading hers, "Three. Luckily on the first floor" Mery answered first, letting out a sigh of relief, "No way? Me too!" Cristo elbowed Mery playfully, "Think I can cheat off of you?" She joked around. "I'm... Room sixty-one" Miuzz showed her strip to the others. "Cool, I'm room a hundred and eighteen" Elly sighed.
"We should meet up in front of room three then, it's less tiring" Mery suggested, and the others agreed.
***
"Arceus, when do these stairs end?!" Elly groaned internally, now on the ninth flight of stairs. Sure, she stated she would rather die than take a teen-filled elevator, but now she kinda regretted it.
At least she was almost there, reaching the fourth floor. She still refuses to get in the elevator.
Another four sets of stairs and "you can do it" repeated like a mantra later, she finally reached the room, settling down on one of the couches in front of the room. She checked her rotomphone, seeing it was still 10:40.
"Nice bow" a girl beside her spoke, and Elly... Didn't really notice. She was busy thinking about the test and getting anxious. What if she failed? She didn't want to go back to school!
"–are you okay?"
"Mh? Oh! Hi!" She snapped out of it once the girl tapped her shoulder, "...Hi," she repeated, lowering her tone. It was embarrassing to be caught zoning out. "Sorry, I'm... Elly, you?" She ended up asking, trying to seem chill and definitely not nervous.
"Ary!" The girl shook her hand "I'm from Mediola city!"
"Oh, that's far, right? At least two hours on the train..." Elly reminisced, thinking about the time she went there herself, "Tell me about it, I came here by car" The girl slouched on her place. She did look tired. "It took nine hours with traffic, I don't know what's got in my parents' heads." She sighed. That did sound rough.
They chatted for a bit, talking about their goals and aspirations, how Ary wanted to become champion and how much she loved Sylveon and hoped to get an Eevee. Eevee was always a popular Pokémon so a lot of trainers hoped to get one. It was known since people often interviewed the kids after they got out.
Once the deadline was reached and the people already in the room got out, they all were let in.
The room was a square, with neat white-colored walls and twenty desks all separated from each other, where the test was already placed upside down. The disposition wouldn't ensure not cheating but some questions ought to be open.
Elly sat next to the wall, as to not get distracted. There was a guy in a beige coat in front of a whiteboard, older than anyone else in the room — a professor.
"Alright," the guy called out, causing the room to stiffen, "You will get two hours for two hundred questions, a hundred about general knowledge and another hundred more personal." He let a moment pass, just to let the tension rise, "You may start." He announced, and everyone flipped their sheets and started writing.
The stress in the room was... Palpable. Of course not everyone was in the same mood, but it was clear anxiety was the sentiment most felt.
Elly started from the personal questions; she deemed them easier and more important. They were easy, hypotheticals and personal ideologies, not really a struggle.
The... More general ones were okay. She knew just enough to be sure about thirty questions and to guess thirty more.
In the end, it took her the whole two hours between writing and revising her answers. To think her behavior was getting analyzed, she wanted to appear proper and graceful, even if she moved like a drunk Phanphy.
She basically ran down the stairs aftery trying to reach room three as soon as possible and almost falling down. But at least she got there before Miuzz.
"Hey!" Cristo exclaimed, waving at her. Elly stopped to sit next to Mery, panting, "How did... How did you go?" She asked. Mery shrugged while Cristo gave a similiar answer. "Same." Elly sighed.
"I met a nice girl, but I forgot to talk to her again, but she was from Mediola city anyways." Elly whined, resting her head on Mery's shoulder.
Miuzz arrived not too much later, telling them about a girl in a red hoodie that was confused where her "new acquaintance" went.
They walked out right after Miuzz joined them, because they were too tired to wait any longer in that place that smelled of hormones and terror.
And, on cue, a duo came to interview them, "Hello!" The woman greeted, holding a mic to Miuzz's face, slightly too close for comfort, but she seemed to realize pretty quickly and retracted it a bit, "Sorry, sorry!" She waved her hand dismissively, "Anyways, you just did the trainer test, right?" She asked, pushing the mic again, "Ah... Yeah, but we don't have the time..." Miuzz answered, taking a couple of steps back before moving away, her friends following suit, muttering a couple of apoligies.
They got back on the bus, each a different one except for Elly and Mery, who lived close to each other. They talked, well, it was mainly useless gossip about their classmates but it was fine.
"Hey, is it true that your parents want to host a party with Fra's family for our first Pokémon?" Elly questioned, while her friend tought about it, "Yeah, sorry" they answered. Right, they both pretty much disliked Fra, but their parents were friends so they didn't have much of a choice. Elly groaned, knowing she wouldn't be able to convince her parents to let her stay at home.
"Well, you can always leave early, pretend you're sick, you know?" Mery reassured her, patting her shoulder lightly, trying to be of any comfort. "Besides, we have a whole week to get the call! You can prepare yourself," they giggled, "Way less nerve-wracking than the test." It was probably meant to be some sort of joke, but it definitely came out wrong, as if they were meant to say the opposite, but it still got a light laugh out of the two.
***
The week was packed to the brim with anxiety, Elly couldn't stop looking at it's rotom phone, hoping to get the call — or even a text or email — telling it, "You and your friends all passed! Stop reclusinh yourself in your room, it's 40 °C outside!" Well, maybe not necessarily the second part — it could very well tell itself that already, as just proven — but Elly really needed to stop thinking about it. How long had it been? Two days? Time went so slow lately, and it was so out of it that it wouldn't be surprising to assume the four were going to melt out of the nervousness.
Elly was taken out of its toughts when it heard the bedroom's door open and its mother's Vulpix came in, making the room even warmer, but at least the teen was taken out of its toughts, crouching down to pet the creature. Sure, the added heat did little to ease its annoyance, but Elly wasn't about to go off on a Pokémon.
"Hey! Hey, Vivi! My girly, how are you?" Elly pet the Vulpix (Vivi), "So mom is back! Didn't hear her at all! Must be the music volume, huh? Blasting music in my earphones wasn't that good, huh?" It kept talking, not getting an answer from the Pokémon, that was just enjoying the pets she was recieving.
"Elly, I'm home!" Its mother came in soon after, Vivi turning her attention to the older woman. "You should get the call today, right?" She smiled. Despite the region's very poor service, this part of the year was usually the most organized, and getting calls later than exactly a week was a pretty big mistake.
"Fra got called two days ago-"
"Did he pass?"
"He did, he got a barboach-"
"Poor Pokémon..."
"Just let me talk, okay? We're organizing an outing to celebrate, even if you don't wanna-"
"Yeah I know, Mery told me."
They remained silent for a while, mostly because it would be kind of expected for Elly to be annoyed and complain, but it didn't.
The scenery was kind of awkward until Elly's rotomphone started ringing, and it basically rushed to answer.
"Hello?"
"Is this Elly?"
"Y-yeah! Yeah..."
"You'll be happy to know that you, Mery, Miuzz and Cristo all passed the exam, please come by tomorrow at 11.30 AM in the same rooms you were assigned to take the test"
The line went dead right after, obviously, those people had more important things to worry about, like calling an insane amount if kids back.
Elly turned to its mother, already grinning from ear to ear, "I did it! I did it! Ohh, I gotta tell the others!" The woman didn't have time to react that her child's phone was already ringing. Luckily for once its friends answered pretty quickly, out of all if them, Elly called Mery first;
"Hello? Elly? Did they-"
"They called me! They did, and we passed! All of us!"
"No way?! Really?! Are you- you're not kidding, right?!"
"Why would I joke about this?! This is so great, I can't wait to get my Pokémon! My very own Pokémon! I can't wait to start travelling either! Arceus, I'm- oh, I've been yapping a lot, sorry... Uhm..."
"No worries, so they called you and?"
"Oh, AND we gotta be there at 11.30 AM in the same rooms, okay?"
"Great! So, uh, pick me up at 11?"
"Okay! Bye!"
"Bye!"
"Bye-bye! Mwah!"
And another flat line. A similiar conversation happened with the other two aswell, exclude all the talking about travelling together, though the four had promised eachother they would.
After the news, as the fourtet expected, sleep didn't come in easy, because sooner than they could realize, they would officially become Pokémon trainers.