Lucas strolled through La Rambla stopping and taking a look at shops occasionally, he felt quite bored to be frank. This was his first time visiting Barcelona, he was here more out of obligation than actual holiday. But still, he had hoped for a bit more, he thought La Sagrada Familia was beautiful, probably the most stunning piece of architecture he had seen with his own eyes, but everything else was boring. He never enjoyed going away, even when he was younger, his parents had to force him round the pool, he preferred playing Pokémon in his room with the nice A/C.
He was in Barcelona playing in a basketball tournament, his eighteenth birthday was this year which meant this would likely be his final season playing, he was never that good. Still, he felt quite sad at the thought of never playing competitively again, he loved the sport.
Today was the day after the finals of the tournament, his team had been eliminated in the semi-finals playing against a huge club from Madrid. The coach had surprised the team with staying another two days to see the finals. The coach had left today as a rest day, which was much needed. Lucas felt like his brain would've melted if he had to go and travel 5 hours to get back to Manchester.
As he walked around, he saw a man directly approach him, he was wearing formal clothing and had a tablet in his hands.
"Good evening", the man said in a Spanish accent. "I hope I'm not interrupting your rest, Lucas LeBroncic?".
Oh god, is this a scout? Am I about to get scouted? I know I played well this tourney but still… Not that well! Fuck! What should I say? Shit, he's staring at me.
"Are you feeling well? Do you need a tissue?"
"Oh, sorry. Hi, yes I'm Lucas, Pray, do enlighten me—what celestial whim shall I endeavor to fulfill?"
"Uhh, excuse me?", the guy said with an exaggerated spanish accent.
FUCK! What is wrong with me, the poor guy doesn't even speak English and I'm talking gibberish because of my nerves... I think I have problems.
"Sorry once again, I meant to say, what can I help you with?"
"Yes. So my name is Gustavo, I work with Básquet Coruña, we are very impressed by what we saw in the tournament, you carried your team to the semis single-handedly."
"Oh no I wouldn't go that far, my teammates did most of the work, I just had the ball at the right time"
"HAHAHA, surely you jest, you are a great alero"
"Well anyhow, of course I am very grateful for the opportunity, how do we proceed from here? This is my first time getting scouted."
"Yes well first of al-"
BANG BANG BANG
"Ho- holy shit", what the fuck just happened.
Down the street a white van was speeding, Lucas couldn't see much, but he could hear. He could hear gunshots, as these thoughts crossed Lucas's mind the car made a sharp turn onto the pavement, funnily enough, on the same side as Lucas, huh. From there on out, it was tragic. As Lucas ran to the other side of the road he could hear screams and gunshots going off like firecrackers, he carried on running, occasionally peeking over his shoulder, the van swaying left and right with guns pointed out the window firing aimlessly. As Lucas kept running, he tripped into a pothole in the road
Fantastic, I couldn't be happier with this outcome. I'm probably about to die.
As he got back up he noted that the van was significantly closer, he ran and he ran. At one point he heard another one of the countless bangs, he looked down…
Really, I die to a terrorist attack, this is so fucking boring, couldn't even go on my own terms.
He had blood spilling out of his chest, he continued to run but no matter what he did he couldn't breathe, air wouldn't go into his lungs, as he collapsed Lucas had a think about his life so far, what would he rate it? Overall it was pretty shit, his parents passed away 7 years ago when he was 10, he continued living though, just floating along the margins of life, one of his only true passions was basketball and fortunately he was decent. Thinking back to the offer from just a few minutes ago, he would have played professionally in the Liga ACB for a while. He was so excited he started talking Victorian English. Apart from basketball nothing really tickled his pickle.
Of course, how could I forget, Pokémon, it's what actually got me through the passing of mum and dad. I remember my first ever Pokémon game being X and Y, since then I've played every release and completed the Pokédex, when I was older, I played the classics as well. Unfortunately, the games of the last 5 years are fucking awful, well with one exception.
Anyways, I feel kind of cold, is this it? I thought I would be a bit more panicked than this, I'm a bit embarrassed all these people are looking at me.
************
Lucas POV
I opened my eyes to something much unexpected, to be honest, I didn't expect to open my eyes so it was pleasant. Still, of all the things, I didn't expect to see a mass of blue vines staring at me with… eyes? The little guy just stared at me with a blank stare, it was quite strange actually, I took a few seconds to set my mind straight. I didn't know where I was, but I fucking swear this is a Tangela, surely not right? Right?
"Tangela" murmured the Pokémon, okay, I must be going crazy, or maybe this is like, heaven or something and this is my ideal world. Why the hell is there a Pokémon infront of me? Not that I'm complaining.
As I continued to debate about the mechanisms of Heaven and Earth, I pondered to myself whether or not I should punch it to see if this was real. Just kidding, it was too cute for that.
"What's up buddy?", I said. I felt a bit stupid talking to a ball of vines, but from what I remember, Pokémon are remarkably intelligent, many being smarter than humans.
"Tan- Tangela", said the Pokémon, I stared at it with a questioning gaze, did he expect me to understand?
It moved its vines towards me, I freaked out a bit but let it happen, the Pokémon reached towards the messenger bag next to me, as Tangela controlled the vines to open it, inside I saw the famous PokéBall, well 3 actually. Tangela grabbed one of them and put it in my hand, then he gestured towards himself, huh. I think I get it.
As I looked at the Pokémon, a serious glint flashed through my eyes, with all of my concentration, I launched the ball at Mach 6 (according to me) towards the Tangela.
"Tan?", well that was awkward, why did it just bounce off it?
The Tangela then proceeded to approach the PokéBall and enter of its own free will. What the fuck?
Ok so that Tangela was already mine, good to know, from that I can establish that I either occupied a dead body, unlikely given how I'm perfectly fine, my clothes don't even have scratches on them and there are no signs of attacks near me. Or who I'm going to guess is Arceus gave me a Tangela and some PokéBalls so I don't look like someone that comes from another dimension. Cool.
I looked behind me. There was a vast ocean. in the far distance I could see an island with a massive volcano on it. Around me all I could see was grass, as I looked in the sky I noticed a flock of Pidgey flying around in the direction I woke up.
"Okay, so let's assume I've reincarnated into the world of Pokémon after dying that shitty death, first things first, where am I? Looking at that island, which I will assume is Cinnabar, this is likely the grass in Route 21, it's just a tiny bit bigger than in the games, by a bit I mean I can't see anything in any direction. So I can deduce that size in the video games isn't very accurate, in fact the closest piece of land behind me seems to be about a kilometre out, but that's just my judgement, I could be very off."
Near me I could see the formation of an inlet, further confirming my thoughts. "This is Route 21 in Kanto, the Route behind Pallet town, I'm screwed, there's no way to access Pallet Town without going in the water, okay, let's start by walking towards Pallet, which I'm going to assume is the area where the Pidgey flew."
As I walked through the grassland I saw the occasional Rattata running through the bushes, they were small little things, but I'm pretty sure any of them could kill me, which was a reassuring thought.
What will I do? I really don't want to be a traditional trainer, the thought of challenging the gyms doesn't really excite me, also the hard cap of 6 Pokémon sucks, I want to be able to wander with all of my Pokémon, if this world is based on the Pokémon Adventures manga then I should be fine, but if not, that would mean not joining the League, limiting my resources, also, I want to meet people like Brock and Cindy. Battling doesn't really appeal to me much, but the thought of making Pokémon stronger does. I'm super curious about the workings of these little guys and how they translate to real life compared to in the games or anime. Like surely they aren't turn-based, and surely things like PP don't really apply, it's more than likely that Pokémon just have stamina and some moves drain more than others, oh my days, the ideas are flowing, I can't wait to actually get around to seeing Pokémon.
As my mind continues to produce ideas, I see in the distance what appears to be a town, of course way bigger than portrayed in the games, it looks like it could easily be inhabited by hundreds of thousands.
"No way, I swear there were trees between the two, I guess I can't fully be dependent on the games, or the anime, or the manga in fact. There were always a lot of overlaps, I wonder what version of the world I'm in. It wouldn't surprise me if this one was completely new, considering I've never heard of the grass in Route 21 leading straight to Pallet Town. It seems like it will be at least another hour until I get there"
So, what are the things I want to do, let's make a list:
1. Complete the Pokédex for every single region
2. Absolutely shit on every single trainer ever while shocking them to their core to make them rethink everything they knew about Pokémon (not that important)
3. The way to do number 2 is I want to create Pokémon freaks, in a good way, Pokémon that according to the games, aren't possible. Such as Pokémon that are hyper-specialized in defense or speed to the point that they are untouchable, like for example a Rattata with insane speed that makes it near untouchable, just troll Pokémon that shouldn't exist.
Hm, there's a bit of a contradiction in my ideas, I don't want to become the Champion or challenge the Gym Leaders, but I want to shock them? I guess the thought of sending out a Rattata to shit on a Gym Leader does excite me. Ok here's what I'm going to do, I'll meet with Professor Oak, ask him for a starter while explaining that I caught Tangela by accident, hopefully he will allow me to choose one, if not I'm kinda fucked. Then I'll sign up for the Pokémon League, I'll blend into the background, rarely challenging Gym Leaders while in reality I'm wandering the region catching and training up as many powerful Pokémon as I can find. I'll have to see how the League works over here, there might be the Elite Four, or there might be a tournament.
As I got closer the first thing I noticed was the sheer size of the town, it was huge, the next thing I noticed was the amount of Pokémon just walking around alongside humans, many of them being Purrloins and Lillipups, it was interesting to think about the fact that these little things could learn Giga Impact if trained enough.
As I walked around observing the first signs of civilization I had seen in this new world I was fascinated. Everything was so different, compared to Earth, this place was vibrant, it was like being colorblind my whole life only to arrive here. Sensory overload.
After asking these old ladies where Professor Oak's lab was. They kindly told me where it was, after another half an hour of walking I finally reached it.
What the hell? I don't remember it looking this massive!
In front of me was a building easily six or seven stories tall. There were people coming in and out, some in lab coats, some dressed casually and others in suits.
"Elaine, wait up!"shouted a little kid, he only appeared to be about 10, as he carried on running he accidently ran into me, as he fell to the floor, he looked up. "Sorry old man, my friend keeps running off"
"... That little whippersnapper", I think I felt the veins on my forehead becoming increasingly more prominent. "I'm 17 you little twerp".
"Oh my bad unc, my name is Trace. What about yours?"
Did this little gremlin just call me unc… " My name is Lucas"
"Lucas? Like the one that reached the semi-finals of the Sinnoh regions Pokémon League Conference, the Lily of the Valley Conference?", he asked. The longer I looked like him, the more familiar he seemed.
"No, don't know him, hey tell me, do you have a Pokémon?"
"Of course I do, I just got it a little while ago. Here, this is my Pikachu", he said as he grabbed a Pokéball from his bag and summoned a Pikachu, that's when it hit me, Trace was the name of the rival of Pokémon Let's go Pikachu/Eevee. I had heard him shout at Elaine too, who was the female player character.
"Hey unc, are you still with me?", I must have spaced out because he looked quite concerned.
"Yeah fine, that's a cute Pikachu there, what about your friend Elaine?"
"She has an Eevee, we got them about the same time, soon we are heading to Viridian City, anyways, I've got to go or Elaine will escape"
As he ran off I stood in silence contemplating his every word. As I replayed the conversation, I took note of the name Lucas, same name as me, wasn't that the male playable character in Diamond, Pearl and Platinum. I wonder if Chase exists, that would mean two protagonists per region, as well as the rival. If both Chase and Elaine exist then it's safe to assume that both Dawn and Lucas exist too -is that why Lucas only reached the semi-finals?-. As well as Serena and Calem. Which becomes an issue because supposedly only the character you play becomes Champion, but then again, they are now real people, not limited by the story or controlled by someone.
I walked into the building and was flabbergasted by what I saw, well not really because one look at the exterior and you could tell the level of this facility. It was quite spacious, Pokémon all around. Pidgey on people's shoulders. I even saw a Flareon, scary.
As I walked up to the receptionist, I wondered how I should approach this situation.
"Hello, how may I help you?", asked the receptionist.
"Hi, yes I'm looking for Professor Oak"
"Of course, do you have an appointment?
"No", well there's me fucked. It's a Pokémon Professor of course he's going to be busy!
"I see, well would you like to book one?"
"Well I kind of need to see him now". In hindsight this was a rather stupid thing to say, I was in no particular rush, I was just too excited to choose my starter.
"I'm sorry sir but that is simply not possible, as you know Professor Oak is a very busy man, the earliest you will be able to see him is in two weeks time", she said, with practiced ease in a sorry tone, she's probably said that a thousand times I thought to myself.
"Two weeks?" I muttered to myself in a quiet tone, maybe not so quiet because everyone was now looking at me, I wanted to dig a hole and jump in head first, reincarnated as a Diglet in another world.
"Sorry", I said to the receptionist, "I didn't expect it to take so long".
As I said this I saw the man himself walk out of a door, behind the door I swear I could see a roof habitat inhabited by a couple of Sandshrews and Rhyhorns.
"Hello there young man", he approached. At first I was confident coming into this new world, I mean I was no Pokémon Encyclopedia, but I considered myself knowledgeable, before this man I felt like a dirty peasant. This was Professor Oak, THE Pokémon Professor, when one thought of that title one thought of the man standing before me. He had what I like to call aura, and no, I don't mean that as a joke. His presence imposed itself in the room, everyone stopped talking the moment he came in. I remember playing SoulSilver where he was considered a celebrity, but this was another level. Still, I tried to play it cool, successfully of course.
"Hello, Professor Oak", I thought I was over voice cracks
The professor seemed to pay no attention. "You said you need to see me desperately, I'm about to go on lunch break, why don't you join me in my office while I eat"
"Of course Professor, thank you so much!"
We walked through the massive building, it was truly a masterpiece, every couple of hallways there were huge habitats filled with a variety of different Pokémon, some from other regions, I even saw an Alolan Muk. Cool Pokémon, insane typing.
"Professor, can I ask you a question", I said, this thought was bugging me since I saw him and I couldn't help but ask.
"Do you have a team of Pokémon for battling?"
"Of course, they are the Pokémon I battled with when I myself was a trainer, it includes Pokémon like Arcanine and Gyarados"
"Wow, you have a Gyarados?", I pretended to act surprised, in the Gen 1 games there was unused Trainer data of the Professor, his team, while pretty standard in terms of rarity of the Pokémon, was insanely leveled, and that was during Gen 1, who knows how long ago that was from now. If the Professor trained even occasionally then his team would be insane
"Indeed I do", he said with a smile as he opened the door. We sat down as he prepared his food. "So, tell me. What can I help you with that made you shout in sheer desperation in the reception".
"Well I wouldn't call it sheer desperation, anyways, the reason I was trying to see you was that this morning, I woke up next to the water down south. With seemingly no memories of how I got there, I then traveled through the grasslands before arriving here. The only memories I have are common sense pieces of information, well most of them, someone might have to explain some things to me. I have no idea where I come from, I don't remember my family, and above all when I went to look for my records, nothing appeared."
The Professor stared at me. "Hm, I'm sorry that happened to you, Lucas. But what exactly has that got to do with me?"
"Well, the thing is… I don't know who I am, I just know I want to be a Pokémon Trainer, I was hoping to come here and get my starter, I'm really sorry to be a bother."
Professor Oak continued to observe me, "... Ok, do you have a Pokémon already?"
"Funny you might ask, I actually do, now here is the craziest part, I don't remember where it came from either, in fact when I first saw it I launched a PokéBall at it thinking it was a wild Pokémon."
The Professor continued to stare at me with an impassive look on his face. " So if you have a Pokémon already, why would I give you a starter? Let me not even mention the suspiciousness of your claims, you say you appeared out of nowhere with no public records, you just appeared out of thin air? I'm going to be honest with you Lucas, this has happened to me a few times before, sometimes I told them to go away, other times I accepted, what I eventually came to realize was that a majority of them were spies for criminal organizations, trying to find out the workings of the League, and therefore come to me, an advisor and old associate of the League. Some of them sign up to the League, get the Pokédex and never appear again, others say they want to be my assistants, it's ludicrous, do they take me for a fool? Have I to make an example again?", he asked, his tone dripping with blatant threat.
Shit, I definitely didn't think this through enough, I'm so dumb, I went into this with the perspective of Professor Oak being a kind old man, well of course he will be in the video games where you're the main character and your rival is his grandson, I just appeared out of nowhere, of course it's suspicious, I'm still treating this like a game, like I'm going to get everything handed to me, I need to snap out of that mindset before I make a big mistake, or is it too late?
"Professor Oak, I understand now that what I said was rather rash and suspicious, and it's fully understandable for you not to trust me. How about this? What can you ask me that would make you accept the fact that I'm telling the truth? Because I am by the way, I swear I'm not part of any criminal organization and I don't remember anything about my family in this world"
"Ok, this won't really help your case, it's just to satisfy my curiosity, what is your goal?", he asked. I contemplated for a few seconds organizing my words to sound as wholesome and friendly as possible.
"Well I want to create monsters… Well that sounded better in my head, what I mean by that is I want to train Pokémon that break the stereotype, I want to craft, for example, a team specialized in speed, where even the slowest is difficult for the naked eye to follow, I want to try and push the boundaries of what is known about Pokémon, study and satisfy my curiosity for the little guys. Because they fascinate me. I also wouldn't mind completing my own Pokédex"
"Interesting, so do you have any aspirations in terms of the Pokémon League? Does the position of Champion interest you?"
"Well not really, I'm interested in battling all the Champions, especially Cynthia and Steven, but not claiming their positions."
"I see…" Professor Oak seemed to be quite interested in my ideas, I mean it makes sense he's a Professor, anything about Pokémon fascinates him, similar to myself. I'm sure my ideas must intrigue him to some degree. "Your ideas interest me Lucas, I won't lie. However I still can't be sure of your origins. How about this, you and I will remain in contact. Every day, before you sleep, you will record yourself and talk about your day. If I find any reason to believe your lying, I will immediately contact the League and have one of the Elite Four detain you. Additionally, you must make a report on your studies in the field of training your Pokémon. I want the exact specifications of your methods. Yes or no?"
This greedy fucker, he knows I won't say no, in fact he probably realized by now that I'm not a spy, he's just interested in my ideas. Who said Oak was a kind old man? He's probably used to lying and manipulating ten year olds casually, think again motherfucker!
"Ok, you could have just asked in a friendly way, I probably would have said yes considering it's beneficial for me to have good relations with the regional Professor, there's no need to be a dick about it", I said in a very polite tone.
Professor Oak, realizing he had been seen through let out a chuckle, "Forgive me Lucas, but sometimes my curiosity gets the best of me, many trainers keep their training methods private, anyways, now that we can talk to each other clearly. Let's lay the foundations of our relationship. I will give you a Pokédex and a starter Pokémon, I will also register you into the League. You will claim that you were homeless and traveled around Johto and Kanto from a young age alone, and that I took pity on you when you told me you woke up forgetting what happened to you. In exchange, I want you to attempt to beat the 8 Gym Leaders, Compete in the Pokémon League Conference and perform. I'm talking about reaching the round of 16. With that I will be satisfied. Additionally, I want you to focus on making Pokémon 'monsters' as you called them. And I want you to study them. In exchange I will pay for a large portion of your resources, including Pokémon food and heals, of course I won't be buying you TMs or Evolution Stones. Also, you can ask me any questions that should be common sense. I hope it's clear that this is in Kanto only."
I let out a breath of relief, this had gone about as well as I could have hoped for, I didn't fool myself into thinking about negotiating, the Professor had just given me an opportunity, this was no deal. "Yeah, that will work, don't worry Professor, I know to you it must seem like you're doing a favor to some random person, but trust me, you will benefit greatly from this too, I will make sure of it"
The Professor chuckled, "I hope you're right Lucas, anyway, before we go and get you a starter, do you have any questions?"
This was my chance, I needed to know what this Pokémon Universe looked like, even though this may seem strange to the Professor, I just have to know, "Yeah, I do, a really important one actually, now bear with me, some of these questions may seem strange"
"Okay, hit me"
"Is Team Rocket still a thing?", I asked, this was pretty risky, considering the Professor thought I was a spy a few minutes ago.
"No, they were wiped out a quite a while ago now by a young friend of mine"
"Can I ask the name of this 'young friend'"
"Of course, you have probably heard of him, his name is Red, the former Champion of the Indigo League, him and my grandson Blue, the current Leader of the Viridian Gym, managed to take down Team Rocket ages ago, at least ten to fifteen years ago, though my memory of when it exactly was isn't perfect"
Ok that's a lot to unpack, Blue is the leader of the Viridian City Gym, Pokémon Red and Green happened at least ten years ago. Meaning Red and Blue are at least 21, they're probably overpowered as fuck. Also Ethan is probably pretty tough too, well, it's likely that all of the main characters are broken, except for Elaine down there, who's still a young dragon about to spread her wings. Say what you like about the main characters, all of them are at least stronger than their respective region's Champions for at least one battle, truly the main characters. Still, it's pretty unbelievable that Elaine will beat Red in a fight soon, in fact I bet she won't, after all, she's not the player character anymore, hopefully. Meaning she might not immediately become a Mewto-owning Menace.
"I see, is the Pokémon World Tournament a thing? If so, who are the winners?"
"It is a thing, held in Driftveil City in Unova, every once in a while, when the higher ups of the different regions are itching for a good battle, they decide to go and battle it out, most of the Pokémon world gathers to watch it, alongside a few other tournaments that are traditionally held like the World Coronation Series. As for the winners, well it depends, because some years certain Leaders or Champions won't participate, they are all very close to each other in terms of skill and the results vary from year to year. In the Champions Tournament, the most looked forward to, the winner varies between Red, Cynthia and Leon, the Galar Champion. However, this isn't really a representation of how strong they really are, with Champions like Elio, the Alola Champion, who hasn't been participating recently."
Wow, that sounds fucking awesome, imagine a tournament with all of the main characters, all of the Champions and… wait.
"Thank you Professor, one more thing, do you know of someone named Ash Ketchum?