"Dad, it's fur, look at it!"

Arthur and Khali were also curious and took a look at the Pikachu again but they didn't see anything amiss. Instead they were more relaxed when seeing that the Pikachu became quite and calm now. It frightened them both by several notches earlier.

Blue observed the Pikachu intensely and even the patted its fur carefully. Then a sudden gleam in his eyes revealed enlightment and amazement:

"Hmmm! You are right! My girl, you also have very sharp eyes!", he praised her under his breath.

"Sir, what's wrong with it?", Khali asked, as he couldn't stand the silent tension anymore.

"This ...", he stopped talking for a couple of seconds, starring through the boy's bodies. His mind somewhere completely else. Then he returned:

"This, I can't tell you for now. Arthur, I ... think it might not be the best time to receive the Pokemon. I mean, it's from the wilderness and it would be the best to tdo some tests first you know? To make sure everything is really really alright, right?", he asked him.

Arthur suddenly got strange vibes from Blue, as if something had happened and he tried concealing something. Very badly. But it didn't matter as Arthur fully trusted Blue. He saved his life after all:

"Sure, if it doesn't cause you any troubles I would be happy.!"

"Hahaha, good to hear that. Don't worry, it won't take long. It's actually common to do tests with wild Pokemon first. Who knows what they came into contact with otherwise. It might endanger the people even."

"Sir, I-I have another question. Earlier right before the Pikachu went unconscious. I-I was sure that I had seen you behind the desk, but then suddenly you just appeared in front of Arthur, how ...?", Khali remembered the incident from before and the shock reappeared when seeing the memories flash in his mind.

"How that was possible, you mean to ask me?"

"Yes!", Khali said promptly,

"Please say superpowers, please say superpowers, please say superpowers!", he thought intently.

"Sorry, but I don't have superpowers if that's what you thought boy."

"Oh ...", disappointment was written on his face, similar to when Blue talked about his missing arm.

"Hahaha! Your face, haha, sorry but that's how it is. Actually, it's more about ... Martial Arts!"

"Martial ... Arts?", Arthur and Khali asked in unison. Since when did allow Martial Arts people to bend the laws of physics and clash with Pokemon as if playing with children?!

"Yes! Martial ... Arts ...", Blue was about to continue his explanation when a sudden thought came to him and made him dazed for a moment. His eyes lit up and he grinned broadly.

"Sir? Is everything ok?", Arthur asked concerned, expecting that Blue might experience another traumatic memory.

"Me? I am fine! Don't worry, haha! But there is something I just remembered. Hehe, Arthur you see, there are some important procedures that I can't really take care of at the moment for our Pikachu issue to work out. There is someone I know very well though who could help you out but he usually resides in Pallet City. The thing is, I remembered that he is regularly visiting the Martial Arts Center in Viridian City! So Arthur, if possible I would like you to see him and just talk to him about it. Don't worry, I will give him a heads-up about everything that happened so far so that he isn't completely unprepared when you meet up with him.", Blue explained with a mysterious smile hanging on his face.

"Pallet City? Shouldn't it be ... Pallet Town?", Arthur thought inwardly and asked him,

"Who is that person Sir?", no matter what he had to do, he would get this job done so that his mother and his sibling could finally live a better life. His goal seemed so close, only one small task away.

"Hahaha, you should know him. He is always in the media doing commercials or competing or whatever. It's my little brother!"

Khali's eyes widened in shock at these news and he exclaimed:

"Wait ... Blue Oak's little brother ... do you mean ...?! Do you mean Gary Oak?!", Khali asked doubtfully.

"Yeah, that's him. He and my sister have taken up our grandfather's lab and research work. He is living quite well I think. At least the media loves him. Tell him to come home and visit me more often once you meet him, alright?"

"Y-yes Sir!", Arthur responded hesitatingly. Something in his mind bugged him very hard. Something related to this Gary ... but he couldn't quite get his head around the reason why.

"I guess I have occupied quite a lot of your time already, leave me with the 'business' and I will inform you once everything has been handled properly. Alfred will bring you back to the entrance. Have a nice day boys!", he bid his farewell and Khali and Arthur also didn't want to waste too much of Blue's time anymore.

Arthur was especially grateful for everything that had happened today. He would never have imagined that things would turn out the way they did, starting with Blue's identity and then the Pikachu incident. It felt almost surreal and he needed some time to process everything.

As it was already quite late, he postponed his task at the Martial Arts Center for now and just wanted to return home. He also bid farewell to Khali. It seemed like Webster had been prepared all the time for him to get out of the house and pick him up.

.................

When he got home, his little brother and sister both gave him a big jumping hug, nearly toppling him onto the ground. He played around with them for a while and then ate dinner with Aunty Latia.

"Aunty, how much do you know about Blue Oak and Red Foster?", he thought she would know more about them considering her age.

"Why do you ask?", she responded suspiciously.

He told her about his coincidental encounter and how Blue turned out to be the person who had saved him. Of course he left out the part about the Pikachu. It's not like he did not trust her but somethings were better left kept a secret.

"Hmmm, so it was him. Sigh, that brings back old memories. You remember when I talked about the golden age of Pokemon Trainers? If there had to be representatives picked out for that generation, Blue and Red would be among the TOP 10, maybe even TOP 5 candidates! And I am talking about international rankings, haha.

They were a famous duo and brought glory and honour to the Kanto region. They were one of the reasons why people moved over to this small corner of the world formerly known as Pallet and Viridian Town. Time has no mercy, on no one.", she took another sad look at Arthur but smiled,

"You remind me a lot of them. Not only because you are young, but back in the days they were infamous trouble makers, haha. Always causing problems here and there or getting into some fights. I saw them a lot in town, you have to know they weren't that well-known at the time.

They only reached that point when ... yeah, the Team Rocket incident. I am not sure if you are aware of it, but before you were born, the Viridan Gym leader had been Giovanni, the leader of Team Rocket! Nobody had expected him, an honourable gym leader, to be the mastermind of such a huge criminal organisation.

They almost would have taken over the whole Kanto region and later on they tried again in Johto! At first they were only seen as a bunch of petty criminals with no order or real power attempting a coup d'état, just a small side joke.

Who could have known they had planted spies and turncoats in lots of political and economical positions?! History would have changed by 180 degrees if it hadn't been for Blue and Red stopping his organisation's schemes! You know that movie from Marvel, hmmm Captain America: Winter Solider? Imagine that but in real life here in Kanto!", she get more and more excited the longer she talked about them. A hidden fan, obviously.

"But how was that even possible? For two people alone to take on such a big organisation? What about the government, did they just do nothing?", he had to ask. It seemed like a herculean task for two young guys to achieve such a feat.

"Hahaha, of course not, they weren't alone in this. The golden generation wasn't made up entirely of those two. There were also others like Kris Teal and Ethan Gold ... etc. who formed a small group of resistance, called 'Trainers United'. They were too young so people overlooked and underestimated them while the real authorities had their hands full dealing with enemies in broad daylight as well as deeply hidden in the dark shadows.

A couple of decades later, after the Great War and during their second attempt, they had been prepared even more and infiltrated the depths of the Johto region. Johto had been in ruins after the war and these bunch of cockroaches took advantage of the situation and again brought in their own people into high positions of power.

Red disappeared into seclusion since the the war had ended, while Blue was past his prime already. Trainers United resisted and successfully defeated Team Rocket once and for all, but ... Blue lost his wife during a crossfire.

It turned out that even the Elite 4, the elite of the elite in Kanto and Johto had been infiltrated by a traitor amongst them. Koga, the ninja assassin and poison specialist. He had fed Team Rocket with lots of secret information while remaining undercover for all those years, that villain!"

"Wow!", was the only thing Arthur could bring out in this moment.

"And he even lost his wife ...", Arthur thought further in his mind. He couldn't imagine the pain that Blue must have been through.

"Yes, very wow! Even though Giovanni their leader hasn't been caught after their defeat and people speculate him to be dead, no more problems cropped up ever since. At least not in public sight ... It's just ...", her expression turned depressed again and black lines formed on her forhead,

"time has put deep and painful scars on these heroes. I guess you have seen Blue's wound already. The Great War, it only caused massive destruction and death in its wake. Since the end of the war ... Red Foster never showed his face in public again. He has still kept on to his title of Pokemon Champ, but his wounds must be running very deep. Nobody knows the reason for why he keeps up his isolation, or where he is currently hiding but I can imagine that the horrors were just too much to handle for him."

...