Chapter 1 - Arrival

I awoke to bright lights and a pink blob. Hmm, this doesn’t look like the orphanage. The fever must have been bad enough to warrant going to a hospital. I try to focus on the pink blob and am surprised to see what looks to be a chansey who let out a, “Chansey! Chan!” And pushed a button. After staring in disbelief for a minute at chansey, a doctor entered the room.

“How’re you feeling kid?”

“Uh, I’m feeling better thanks. Is that a new mascot for the hospital?” I say pointing at the chansey. To which it pouted at me.

“Well, Hilda here is the one who treated you with heal pulse. More than just a mascot I would say? Wouldn’t you?” The doctor replied.

“Sorry, where am I?” I say trying to make sense of the situation. It’s probably just a fever dream anyways. Doesn’t really have to make sense.

“New Bark Town. We found you unconscious in front of the hospital with a high fever. You’re lucky kid, another hour and you might not have made it.” The doctor said, looking at me suspiciously. “So, how the hell did you end up unconscious in front of my hospital?”

I swallowed nervously. This has to be a dream right? I pinch myself. The doctor snickers and says, “You’re not dreaming, kid. What’s your name?”

“Jason Reese.” I say while trying to assess my situation. This doesn’t feel like any dream I’ve had before. I’m apparently in New Bark Town, next to a pokemon. So either this is an elaborate prank or I’m somehow in the Pokemon World.

“Well, Mr. Reese, care to give me the contact information of your parents?”

“Umm, well, I’m an orphan.” I say as I ponder whether to tell him the full extent of my circumstances. Well, first I have to get my bearings. I need to know what the state of this world is before I go spouting about alternate dimensions and potentially get turned into a lab rat.

The doctor frowns at me, “So what are you doing in New Bark Town?”

“I don’t remember. Mostly I remember the heat and the pain before I woke up here.” I say deciding to lie for now.

“Huh, interesting.” He says as he looks me over. “Well, I’m Dr. Braun. I’ll let you rest before we try to see if you can remember anything else.”

As he leaves with Hilda in tow, I exhale deeply and lie back down closing my eyes. I try to restrain the budding excitement in my chest. POKEMON. Literally my fondest dreams were of becoming a pokemon trainer. I remember the nights spent under the moonlight playing Pokemon Blue all the way up to emulating Pokemon X, the latest release, on the computer at the orphanage. I had to sneak out at night to play because I only had half an hour with the computer during the day. Not to mention my fascination with the anime.

But I have to make sure. I can’t get my hopes up over seeing one realistic pokemon. This could be an elaborate setup or experiment or something. I open my eyes and get out of bed. Looking around it looks almost exactly the same as a “normal” hospital room. Through the closed blinds I can see that it’s dark outside. I move to a TV in the corner and turn it on.

What greets me is a news anchor talking about tauros herds being redirected from Route 30. Flipping the channels, every channel features very realistic pokemon in some way. Well, I guess I’m in the Pokemon World.

In the morning, Dr. Braun checks in with me and we go through the usual charade of figuring out what a random 15 year old boy is doing in New Bark Town with no records. After probing my memories for my birthplace, relatives or anything, Dr. Braun says, “Look Jason, there’s not much that I can do for you to recover your memories. But I can give you a path forward. Why don’t you work here for a while until you’re better situated? Once you turn 16 you can think about what you want from the future. You could even become a trainer!”

And so I worked for the hospital. Which, as it turns out, was connected to the pokecenter. So I ended up doing errands and odd jobs for the nurses and doctors of both. In this time I learned a lot about the world I was in, which was vastly different from the games and shows of the “before” which I am calling my past on “normal” Earth.

You need to be 16 and get a trainers license before you can legally capture or own a pokemon. All pokemon are registered upon capture to the person who threw the pokeball. Any pokemon in excess of your limit will be locked in the pokeball until you change your current roster at a pokecenter, reach a designated training area, or are in an emergency. The limit to how many pokemon you can use at a time is dependent on the number of badges you have. You can have up to 2 more pokemon than the amount of badges you have. So for 0 badges you would have a carry limit of 2 and with 8 badges you would have a carry limit of 10. However, the limit maxes out at 12. I guess the League doesn't want people walking around with personal armies.

Also, regional starters were not given to just any prospective trainer. Only the 6 best, determined by a regionwide test, would be given a chance to choose a regional starter. I was determined to be one of those 6. The only other ways to get a starter were to buy one, be gifted one, or to capture one in the wild. I couldn’t afford anything good and nobody would gift me one, so if I didn’t get a regional starter I would have to go hunt for a rattata or something. Which brings me to another point, pokemon are deadly.

People die every day from wild pokemon. Even rattata can be fierce and tough when there are a bunch of them. This isn’t a kids game. But for some reason, that just made me want to be a trainer more. I guess it was the need to feel safe. With all these powerful pokemon around, just going from town to town became dangerous unless you had your own pokemon for protection. And I wasn’t planning to just stay in New Bark Town.

So along with working I studied on the computers at the pokecenter. Which turned out to be pretty easy. Along with the knowledge from “before” and looking over the review material for the regional test, I aced any practice tests I took. I think it’s because the schooling from “before” was more rigorous than what most people in the Pokemon World are used to. Also, I just found pokemon to be so interesting. I was always an animal lover, and now there were these pokemon which were basically just cooler animals. So, with fascination, I would study for a couple of hours every evening.

Another thing I realized was that I needed to be in good shape if I wanted to travel around and train pokemon. So I started my mornings with a workout session. Somehow, the motivation of pokemon allowed me to get up at 5 every morning. Though the first few days were rough. I did a basic routine of running and calisthenics. Needless to say, I went to sleep early every night.

Soon, 6 months had passed. I had written the regional test a month ago and was eagerly waiting for the results. Currently, I was doing my favourite task of babysitting the happiny that had been hatched a couple of weeks ago to the local domesticated chansey and blissey. They were so cheerful and cuddly, like a bunch of puppies but better. They would all pile on top of me. All of them got along great except for one that I nicknamed Chaos. Chaos would often bully the other happiny by bumping them with tackle or hitting them with pound. She couldn’t do much damage but did lower the spirits of the other happiny. So I took to roughhousing and playing with her to keep her busy, she couldn’t really do any damage to me at this young age.

I was in the middle of a tussle with Chaos when the head nurse, Jane, came into the room. Nurse Joys were not a thing here.

“Jason, you might want to check your email. The results are out.”

I quickly pulled out my phone, one of my first purchases, while keeping Chaos at bay with one hand. Opening the email, the first thing that popped out to me was a “Congratulations!” and I was swept with relief. It told me I came 2nd and would receive a choice of the regional starters in the order of the results. So I got the second choice. Since there were two of each starter, I would definitely get the one I want. Chikorita, Totodile, Cyndaquil. What to choose?

“Well, how’d it go Jason?” Jane asked. I had almost forgotten she was there for a moment. I laughed and apologized.

“I got second place. So I’ll get a choice of a regional starter.” I told her.

“That’s great, Jason! We’ll have to throw you a party!”

“Oh, there’s no need for that Nurse Jane. I’m already thankful for you letting me stay at the pokecenter and the cake you made for my birthday last month.”

“Nonsense, you’ve been a great help here and the pokemon love you.” She laughed and pointed at my legs where a bunch of happiny were climbing as well as to my left hand which was still being buffeted by Chaos.

And so we had a party. With a very nice cake, I must say. It felt good. In a week I would have my first pokemon and would be able to start on my journey. I barely thought of my life “before” and didn’t really miss anything. I wasn’t very social and didn’t have any family I knew of. But now I would be able to live out one of my dreams.