Inconspicuosaurus
Bone-ified dinosaur
The title has changed, the story is planned, the re-writing is finished (for Chapter 1 anyway), I bring you: The DreamScope Chronicles!
If you were a previous reader of JAJ then prepare for a shock, alot has changed, not too much I hasten to add, but enough.
If however, you are a new reader, then welcome! I'd like all the readers, reviewers and C+Cers i can get, so come on in! Also, I'm restarting from Chapter 1 and re-writing as I go, so you won't get left behind, don't worry!
Okay, here's the index, but it is for the old version, and as such, names are subject to change (not the book names, they're here to stay). As each chapter is written it will become a hyperlink to that post, so if a chapter's highlighted, it's posted.
And now the PM list, just PM, VM or post saying so if you want to be added/deleted.
Without further ado, on with the fic!
Chapter 1: Of Problematic Parents and Ingenius Inventions.
A spectacled man with greying blonde hair hurried about the small, cluttered room; his white lab-coat trailing behind him. Countless piles of books, data disks and sheaves of paper towered discordantly over him like ruinous battlements, lit in harsh contrast by a desk-lamp placed precariously on top of it’s own tottering pile. The man seemed oblivious to his surroundings as he abruptly sat down at shadowed desk and one of the more dramatically leaning towers collapsed into a heap, adding to the further mess on the floor. He cleared the desk in front of him with a purposeful sweep of his hand and placed the object he had been looking for gently down in the space he had created.
“Finally,” he said quietly to himself, “I knew I put it somewhere for safe-keeping but what on Earth possessed me to store it in the toaster?”
Picking it up in his hand again, the man marvelled at the sparkling jewel, the specks of charred bread failing to dampen it’s brilliance in the slightest.
“Steven’s calculations better be correct or this will never work,” he muttered.
His hands shaking with excitement and apprehension, the man manoeuvred the stone into a framework of microchips and tangled wires - the result of he and his few co-workers’ countless hours of theorising, investigating, calculating and manufacturing. With the stone safely in place, the man carefully slotted the pieces of the smooth, metal casing around the outside. Each fragment slotted into place with a soft ‘click’.
“At last, it is finished. Now I’ve just got to tes-”
“Dad! Dad!”
Suddenly, tall youth burst into the room, his long, curly blonde hair trailing behind him. The bright, white light from the hallway strip-lights poured in as well and the man shielded his eyes to allow them to adjust without frying his retinas.
“Dad, your acting like a vampire Golbat. When was the last time you went outside?” asked the boy accusingly, skilfully avoiding the haphazard stacks with precision that indicated years of living of practice as he picked his way towards his father.
“What are you talking about? I went out to the shop to get some milk yesterday.”
“Dad, that was last Tuesday.”
“Really, but… Wait, then today is-”
“Yes, I was just about to leave but I thought I’d see if you’d remembered first. Obviously I was mistaken.”
The boy turned moodily to leave, but the man called him back.
“Wait, James, have you decided what you’re going to get yet?”
“Yeah, of course I have,” the boy replied, feigning confidence, “But I’m not going to tell you, am I? You’ll have to find out when I get back.”
The man groaned, his son would be like this for days now. Forgetting his birthday was one thing, but forgetting his thirteenth birthday - the day he would pick his first pokemon and start his journey - that was an entirely different and more painful state of affairs.
“It would have been so much easier to guess back in my day when there were only three to pick from,” said the boy’s father, remembering his own travelling days with fond nostalgia, but feeling incredibly guilty that he’d let his project take over his life so much that such an important date in his son’s life had slipped is mind.
So much had changed in the thirty years since Gerald Martin had started his journey. those were the days of heroes like Ash and Tyson all of whom began their adventures at the tender age of 10. The ambitious youths of today had to wait an extra three years before setting out across the world, but on the plus side, now traditional starters from all the major regions could be chosen by anyone.
James Martin, however, was not as concerned as his father thought. Or rather, he was concerned about something very different.
James Martin was a kind, caring boy, if a little argumentative at times. He only had a small group of friends and was generally quite shy. But there was one thing that James Martin had always wanted to do, and that was become a pokemon trainer. He wasn’t particularly interested in defeating the league or becoming a gym leader; sure, a few badges would be nice, but what he’d always wanted to do, for as long as he could remember, was get his pokemon and just travel.
James had grown up on Cinnabar Island. Or rather, in Cinnabar Island. His father was head of experimental technology at the Cinnabar Lab - a complex that had grown so huge that it now covered almost the whole of the surface of the small island and also stretched beneath the ground to make use of the geothermal energy that had fuelled the now dormant volcano.
All the employees’ apartments, including the Martins’ were located within this labyrinth of underground, chrome-plated corridors; and, as much as James liked getting new gadgets before they where released, after being confined for so long, he longed to travel the vast Kanto region, and maybe even beyond. But that was all he wanted, just to travel, just to be just another kid who went on just another journey.
The thing that was concerning James was that to start a pokemon journey he needed to pick a starter pokemon, and that he just couldn’t do.
His dad had started with a Charmander - a good-natured pokemon called Crimson who had evolved into a Charmeleon during their journey and was currently dosing in the living-room as per usual. But his father hadn’t exactly been a successful trainer. He’d got as far as Pewter City before falling in love with pokemon science, and, a few years later, a young lab assistant, at the Pewter museum.
James quickly brushed away thoughts of his mother, he didn’t want to start crying in front of his dad, or he would too. It was since she had died in a catastrophic cave-in of one of the lower underground tunnels that his dad had withdrawn to his studies and started staying in his room for days at a time.
‘Enough of that,’ thought James determinedly ‘this day is supposed to be happy, Mum wouldn’t want me to spoil it. But it’s not going to be very happy if I can’t decide what starter pokemon to pick.’
He shook his head.
‘Grrr, never mind, I’ll decide on the way.’
“Dad, I’m going to go now, okay?” he said out loud.
Gerald shook his head too, it seemed he had been musing about the past again, “Yes, what? Oh sorry, what did you say?”
He groaned. “Never mind, see you Dad.”
James stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind him before he could stop himself. James didn’t ever exactly ‘fall out’ with his dad and they never really had ‘arguments’ but it was times like these when James wished his dad wasn’t so scatterbrained, even if he did have a good reason.
Striding along the strobe-lit corridor, James’ thoughts returned to the choices for his first pokemon. Would his shyness be represented as one of the grass types: Turtwig, Bulbasaur, Chikorita or Treeko? But, then again he could get pretty angry when provoked, did that mean the fire types: Cyndaquil, Torchic, Chimchar or of course Charmander were best suited to his personality? And what about the calm, collected water types: Squirtle, Mudkip, Totodile and Piplup, were they going to be his choice? And, no matter what ‘heroes’ had arrived late to the selecting, James definitely did not want to end up with the reserve. Whatever that would be this month.
Arriving at the storage station for the lab’s golf-buggy-like vehicles, the dark-eyed boy hopped on to one and drove off to meet his life-long partner to be. Exactly which life-long partner that would be he’d have to decide when he got there.
As the buggy climbed the last of the spiral ramps and emerged onto the ground floor, James breathed in a deep breath and slowly exhaled, enjoying the clear air.
‘Ah, I love being above ground. And to think, I might never have to live in that stuffy maze ever again!’ he thought to himself.
A few minutes passed and finally a sign saying: “Welcome to the Sammy Oak memorial section,” passed overhead.
Another couple of seconds and James found himself about to enter the lab proper. He stored the buggy in the nearest station and pushed his way through the throng of clamouring parents and through the gleaming sliver doors that modestly proclaimed the place beyond as simply “Oak’s Lab.”
The lab was a cacophony of grunts, squeals, croaks and chirrups ringing off of the curved, metal walls, and that was just the newbie trainers. The remaining pokemon sat on the long silver table in the middle of the huge, tech-filled room. Some were waiting patiently while others were eagerly trying to attract the attention of the undecided trainers.
An aging man with a shock of greyish-brown hair came striding over to James, traversing the tiled floor with wizened grace.
"Morning, Professor Oak," James greeted him
"James, I would of thought you'd be the first here, you living so close and all. Oh, and don’t bother with all that ‘professor’ stuff, please, call me Gary."
"Yes, Professor. I mean… the reason I’m late is… Dad and I had a errrr, y‘know."
“Oh no, he didn’t forget, did he?”
The look on James’ face must have given away the answer because the professor’s face suddenly turned very grave.
“I told him he was spending to long on our project,” said Oak, “but he won’t listen, I’m afraid he’s not going to get any sleep until he finishes the damn thing.
"But we shouldn’t worry about that now, come and look at the pokemon. Zach and Michael are already here."
"Really."
"Yes, and already arguing."
"Ah."
Zach and Michael were James’ best friends, and twin brothers, but far from identical as they were always trying to do as much different as possible. They both had brown, scruffy hair, in completely different styles of course, and were both quite short for their age. And most distinctly of all, they were always arguing.
"But we can't both have fire types, we can't be rivals with the same type of pokemon!" Zach was protesting, whilst holding a rather frightened-looking Cyndaquil.
"Fine then, I'll have Piplup," said Michael.
"What's this, a compromise between the Allen twins." Remarked Oak.
"Hah, that puny penguin?" Countered Zach.
"Maybe not then."
"You'll change your tune when I beat your Cyndaquil's *** every time with my water type."
"Guys..", James attempted.
"Yeah, well, once your Piplup becomes an Empoleon it'll get a weakness to fire."
"Guys!"
"And a resistance to grass." Michael retaliated.
"GUYS!!!"
"Oh, hi James" the twins said in perfect sync.
"Jynx!" They also said in sync.
"No I Jynxed you!" Said Zach.
"Yeah, well, I triple-ice-punch-lovely-kissed it," argued Michael.
"I'll ice punch you in a minu..."
"GUYS!!! I'm trying to get to the pokemon before the Miltank come home! Arceus, you guys are so immature."
"Oh, sorry James, its just that Michael wanted a Charmander and..."
"You, take the Cyndaquil and you, take the Piplup and get out of the way!" James resolved angrily.
"Piplup's better anyway.." muttered Michael.
“Ugh,” groaned James, “Y’know, some day you guys won’t have each other to argue with. What are you gonna do then, hey?”
“It’s Zach,” explained Michael, “he’s the one that always winds me up.”
Blocking out Zach’s more-than-likely retort, James began to walk towards the starters’ table. The knowledge that the time to chose was almost upon him weighed heavily in his heart. But at the same time he was unbearably excited. Aside from TV, Crimson, and Zach and Michael’s family pet - a Goldeen who’s fascination ran out after he’d seen it swim around it’s bowl thirty times - these were the first pokemon James had ever seen.
His train of thought was unceremoniously severed as he suddenly realised that the whole lab had gone quiet, even the hyper-active Totodile that was chasing it’s new trainer around the lab had lessened it’s hysterical croaking. James turned around to see what everyone was staring at, but all he could see was a tall figure blocking out the neon light from the doorway. James turned again to see the Professor looking stunned, which was unusual as he was renowned for his calm and collected attitude.
“Well, well, well,” said Gary Oak, “If it isn’t my old friend and rival - Ash Ketchum.”
Everybody in the lab gasped and the silence in the room seemed to somehow intensify even more.
“But that means,” James whispered, “Oh no.”
Another, smaller, but still quite tall, shadow appeared by the figure of the renowned Ash Ketchum. The second figure stepped forward and her red her glinted in the sunlight from the windows high up in the labs ceiling.
“Amber Ketchum,” James finished. Although the daughter of the so-called “hero” Ash Ketchum lived across the sea in Pallet Town, the sand-banks and islets in between were occupied by Cinnabar Islanders and those from Pallet Town alike during the Summer. And throughout their encounters over the years Amber and James had built up a strong rivalry with each other.
“Good to see you, old friend,” said Ash ,“has my pokedex been useful for your new project?”
“Well blow me over and call me a Jigglypuff, it was young Amber’s birthday last week wasn’t it,” exclaimed the Professor “Well, I’m quite unprepared for this, there’s actually only one pokemon left…”
The unthinkable had happened - in the process of arguing with the twins and the unexpected arrival of Ash and Amber the rest of the pokemon had been chosen and so now only the Charmander the twins had been squabbling over was left.
Amber and James met each other’s gaze for a second before sprinting for the table. James may have been closer but she was taller and faster and her out-stretched hand reached the table a mere millisecond before his.
“I guess your coming with me then Charmander,” said Amber, beaming triumphantly.
“Char!” Growled the flaming-tailed lizard in reply.
“I’m afraid,” said Oak “that leaves you with the…”
“NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!”
“Pleasebegood, pleasebegood, pleasebegood.” James hoped frantically as Professor Oak led him down the dimly lit passage to the lab’s storage room later that morning.
“The thing is,” he said “we’ve only started using him as a reserve because he wasn’t picked at the initial choosing so many times.”
Did this mean the reserve was one of the regular starters? James sure hoped it did - at least he knew that they were all reasonably good.
“He was the runt of a litter you see, smaller than the average Bulbasaur…”
A Bulbasaur! James was saved. Or so he thought. They turned the corner and Oak unlocked the door that had come into view with a old-fashioned key from his pocket.
“As I always say ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ and these locks are far safer than those voice-rec. thingies some other doors have,” explained the scientist, but largely to himself as the blood was pounding in James’ ears too loudly for him to here a single word.
James followed Professor Oak into the storage room - or rather, into the glorified cupboard which consisted of four walls of floor-to-ceiling plain, metal shelves stacked with assorted cardboard boxes. The professor was rooting through one of these boxes and after a couple of muttered “I know it’s in here somewhere”s he pulled out his hand clutching a red and white standard pokeball. By the triumphant look on his face you’d have thought he’d just climbed Mount Silver.
“Right, let’s get the little guy homed at last. Go, Bulbasaur!”
As a white light poured out of the ball and coalesced into a diminutive reptilian shape with a small, green bulb on its back, my look of abject nervousness turned to utter disappointment.
“Oh. He is quite small isn’t he,” he remarked.
“Yes, as I said earlier - the runt of the litter.”
“Wait. The runt of the litter?” James asked hopefully, a thought had just occurred to him.
“Yes, the…”
“Who was his mother bred with?”
“Who… I don’t know actually.”
“So he might have some good bred moves?”
“Yes, I suppose, but moves aren’t everything.”
“I’ll take him!”
“You know you don’t really have a choi…”
The Professor’s statement was cut off by a beeping sound emanating from one of the pockets of his lab-coat. After another arduous search, he produced a nondescript black pager and examined it closely.
“Gary, come quick,” he read of off the rolling screen, his confusion heightening with each new word, “It’s amazing, you’ll never believe it, it actually works!”
He paused and scratched the back of his head.
“Hmm, very strange… It seems as though you’ll have company for the journey home, James. That message was from your father.”
Oak’s jaw was firmly set as he drove the buggy at just a little over the complex speed limit along the gleaming corridors. As the identical grey doors whipped past, James wondered why the middle-aged scientist wasn’t as overjoyed as his father had been in his message. The truth was that Gary Oak was worried about his friend and partner. Their project had been consuming so much of Gerald’s life that on one hand this supposed success could be the high-point of his career; but on the other, Gary feared that Gerald could be jumping to uncertain conclusions in his sleep-deprived state.
Eventually, but sooner than should have been possible within the limit, the entrance to the Martins’ apartment came into view. As they parked the buggy and approached, strange noises started reaching the pair’s ears from beyond the door. It sounded as though James’ father was having a loud, excited conversation with himself.
James scanned his key-card through the receiver in the wall and the door obediently slid open with a faint hiss of pneumatics. Wary of what they might find, James and Oak tiptoed cautiously into the apartment and through into the front room.
The sight that met their eyes could best be described as perplexing for both of them. Gerald Martin was talking excitedly and gesticulating wildly in an animated conversation with, or so it seemed, Crimson. The red, flame-tailed lizard was up and out of his comfortable chair by the holographic fire for first time in as long as James could remember. The lizard himself was staring drop-jawed at his trainer, but despite his lack of facial movement, seemed to be contributing to the conversation; well, Gerald seemed to be answering questions from him anyway.
“Yes, yes, it’s wonderful isn’t it?!” he was saying, “to finally be able to talk to each other after all these years together.”
“Yes we’ve always been able to communicate,” he continued after a gap where it seemed Crimson had had some sort of input, “but this is just something else, isn’t it?!”
At that moment, Crimson noticed Gary and James entering the room behind his trainer. Gerald noticed him looking over his shoulder and spun round to see us.
“Gary, James, finally, come and have a look at this!” he shouted, “It’s finished! And even more astounding, it actually works!”
At ‘it,’ James’ father pointed at a strange object on his ear which had previously been hidden from view when he was facing in the opposite direction. It looked like a single headphone. It was fashioned from a polished, slivery metal, and in the middle was embedded a strange gem. The gem was of the deepest indigo, so dark in fact that if you stared into it’s heart it would feel as though you’d been thrown into an underwater ravine, the bottom of which was purest black. Except, it was not all dark. The stone was surrounded by thousand, millions of glittering, swirling motes of light that could only be seen as Gerald danced into the shadowed parts of the room. When his wild motions took him into the area beneath the room’s strip-lights, they seemed to vanish amidst the greater brightness.
The object was fastened to Gerald’s head by a black plastic clip that moulded around his earlobe and up and around to grip the top of his ear.
“Dad, what are you talking about?” James asked cautiously, “What is ‘it’? What has this project been about?”
“This, my son,” he answered, “is the DreamScope, the finest bit of technology I have ever had the fortune to build and design with my good friend Gary here.”
“But what does it do?”
This seemed to be the question he had been waiting for and for a dreadful moment James thought it was going to be like one of those parts in a musical where a character suddenly bursts into song. To his relief, however, Gerald simply beamed like a madman and launched into his explanation.
“By a combination of my technology, Gary’s data and a remarkable fuel source in the form of this gem, kindly donated by Steven of the Devon Corporation, this machine translates a pokemon’s communicative brainwaves and channels them directly into the wearer’s temporal lobe,” he briefly paused for breath, “Thus, enabling the wearer to here the thoughts of said pokemon.”
James and Oak both stared, as gob-smacked as Crimson had looked moments before.
“Y-you mean, it works? All our hard work paid off?” said Oak.
“Yes,” replied Gerald, still smiling, “wonderfully!”
“Wait,” interrupted James, “so you were? You and Crimson were? You were talking to each other?”
“Yes, yes, isn’t it amazing, think of the implications! This invention could promote understanding and provide new insights into the pokemon world, the likes of which have never been seen before!”
“Well, could I, y’know, maybe, try it on?”
“Well, I don’t see why not. Here you go,” James’ father removed the precious machine from his ear and handed it carefully to his son.
As James turned the gadget over in his hands, marvelling at its beauty, Gary and Gerald continued their heated discussion.
“You’ve really out-done yourself this time,” said Oak, openly impressed, “when I provided the pokemon data, I really never truly believed that this day would ever come.”
“Well,” said Gerald sheepishly, “there was one small problem.”
Oak glared at Gerald like a parent who’s just found out there son really did have something to do with the crayon lines all over the wall.
“You see, you know the data Ash collected - the same data you provided me with for the Scope?”
“Yes,” said the Professor through gritted teeth.
“Well, it wasn’t… I couldn’t… there was a… What I’m trying to say is, it didn’t work.”
“What! But you were talking to Crimson just now!”
“Yes, but I programmed the Charmeleon data in manually, I couldn’t do that for every single pokemon, it would take years! The DreamScope needs the exact data for the brain-wave patterns of each new pokemon if it is to function effectively.”
The Professor and Gerald both stared glumly down at the floor, looks of utter despair on both their faces.
At that moment, James brought the DreamScope up to his ear and was just fastening the clip when-
“AAARGH!”
James screamed as violet lightning erupted from the ‘Scope and leapt at James’ head. The device was yanked from his hand and clamped firmly to his head by the static field. There was a hissing sound and the commotion stopped as suddenly as it had started. The faint purple glow that had been surrounding the ordeal vanishing instantaneously.
Gerald and Gary whipped round rushed to James’ aid as the noise roused them from their stupor; but it was too late.
James tottered where he stood, but aside from a dazed look of shock and a new, spikier hairstyle, he seemed remarkably un-injured.
James’ father reached out to steady him but was instead treated t a powerful static-shock.
“Ouch!” he cried and reflexively retracted his singed hand, “James, are you okay?” he asked, worriedly.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m perfectly… wait a second, I suddenly feel a bit-” with a sickening ‘thud’ James collapsed, missing the soft armchair by a foot and instead connecting his head with the hard, wooden coffee-table.
Ooh-hoo-hoo! I'm mean aren't I?
You'll have to wait till I've finished re-writing Chapter 2 to find out what happens next, see you then.
If you were a previous reader of JAJ then prepare for a shock, alot has changed, not too much I hasten to add, but enough.
If however, you are a new reader, then welcome! I'd like all the readers, reviewers and C+Cers i can get, so come on in! Also, I'm restarting from Chapter 1 and re-writing as I go, so you won't get left behind, don't worry!
Okay, here's the index, but it is for the old version, and as such, names are subject to change (not the book names, they're here to stay). As each chapter is written it will become a hyperlink to that post, so if a chapter's highlighted, it's posted.
Book I - Just Another Journey
Chapter 1: Of Problematic Parents and Ingenius Inventions
Chapter 2: Of Dodgy Data and Inhiliated Instalations
Chapter 3: Of Silent Stalkers and Fond Farewells
Chapter 4: Of Woodland Warfare and Capricious Captures
Chapter 5: Of Dangerous Duality and Tiresome Training
Chapter 6: Of Rival Rematches and Amazing Alterations
Chapter 7: Of Acrobatic Acts and Team-up Tournaments
Chapter 8: Of Shady Showboaters and Mysterious Mysteries
Chapter 9: Of Magnetic Mayhem and Electronic Enigmas
Chapter 10: Of Fording Fatalities and Explosive Eggs
Chapter 11: Of Coastal Cottages and Boisterous Battles
Chapter 12: Of Forgotten Friends and Panicked Pursuit
Chapter 13: Of Dreamy Discussions and Flying Fiascoes
Chapter 14:
Chapter 15:
etc...
Book II - Titan
Book III - Equilibria
Chapter 1: Of Problematic Parents and Ingenius Inventions
Chapter 2: Of Dodgy Data and Inhiliated Instalations
Chapter 3: Of Silent Stalkers and Fond Farewells
Chapter 4: Of Woodland Warfare and Capricious Captures
Chapter 5: Of Dangerous Duality and Tiresome Training
Chapter 6: Of Rival Rematches and Amazing Alterations
Chapter 7: Of Acrobatic Acts and Team-up Tournaments
Chapter 8: Of Shady Showboaters and Mysterious Mysteries
Chapter 9: Of Magnetic Mayhem and Electronic Enigmas
Chapter 10: Of Fording Fatalities and Explosive Eggs
Chapter 11: Of Coastal Cottages and Boisterous Battles
Chapter 12: Of Forgotten Friends and Panicked Pursuit
Chapter 13: Of Dreamy Discussions and Flying Fiascoes
Chapter 14:
Chapter 15:
etc...
Book II - Titan
Book III - Equilibria
And now the PM list, just PM, VM or post saying so if you want to be added/deleted.
Meteor64;
Otaku-Dono;
Titan500;
Jaxonferz;
SamuraiDragon1;
Yonowaru In Chaos;
Poke Poke;
~Magic Thunderbolt~;
Crystic;
Chibiipompom;
Flyboy1308;
Shadow Lucario;
Killer Grunt;
Ysavvryl;
MarshtompMan;
Darkdragontamer
Otaku-Dono;
Titan500;
Jaxonferz;
SamuraiDragon1;
Yonowaru In Chaos;
Poke Poke;
~Magic Thunderbolt~;
Crystic;
Chibiipompom;
Flyboy1308;
Shadow Lucario;
Killer Grunt;
Ysavvryl;
MarshtompMan;
Darkdragontamer
Without further ado, on with the fic!
The DreamScope Chronicles.
Book I - Just Another Journey.
Book I - Just Another Journey.
Chapter 1: Of Problematic Parents and Ingenius Inventions.
A spectacled man with greying blonde hair hurried about the small, cluttered room; his white lab-coat trailing behind him. Countless piles of books, data disks and sheaves of paper towered discordantly over him like ruinous battlements, lit in harsh contrast by a desk-lamp placed precariously on top of it’s own tottering pile. The man seemed oblivious to his surroundings as he abruptly sat down at shadowed desk and one of the more dramatically leaning towers collapsed into a heap, adding to the further mess on the floor. He cleared the desk in front of him with a purposeful sweep of his hand and placed the object he had been looking for gently down in the space he had created.
“Finally,” he said quietly to himself, “I knew I put it somewhere for safe-keeping but what on Earth possessed me to store it in the toaster?”
Picking it up in his hand again, the man marvelled at the sparkling jewel, the specks of charred bread failing to dampen it’s brilliance in the slightest.
“Steven’s calculations better be correct or this will never work,” he muttered.
His hands shaking with excitement and apprehension, the man manoeuvred the stone into a framework of microchips and tangled wires - the result of he and his few co-workers’ countless hours of theorising, investigating, calculating and manufacturing. With the stone safely in place, the man carefully slotted the pieces of the smooth, metal casing around the outside. Each fragment slotted into place with a soft ‘click’.
“At last, it is finished. Now I’ve just got to tes-”
“Dad! Dad!”
Suddenly, tall youth burst into the room, his long, curly blonde hair trailing behind him. The bright, white light from the hallway strip-lights poured in as well and the man shielded his eyes to allow them to adjust without frying his retinas.
“Dad, your acting like a vampire Golbat. When was the last time you went outside?” asked the boy accusingly, skilfully avoiding the haphazard stacks with precision that indicated years of living of practice as he picked his way towards his father.
“What are you talking about? I went out to the shop to get some milk yesterday.”
“Dad, that was last Tuesday.”
“Really, but… Wait, then today is-”
“Yes, I was just about to leave but I thought I’d see if you’d remembered first. Obviously I was mistaken.”
The boy turned moodily to leave, but the man called him back.
“Wait, James, have you decided what you’re going to get yet?”
“Yeah, of course I have,” the boy replied, feigning confidence, “But I’m not going to tell you, am I? You’ll have to find out when I get back.”
The man groaned, his son would be like this for days now. Forgetting his birthday was one thing, but forgetting his thirteenth birthday - the day he would pick his first pokemon and start his journey - that was an entirely different and more painful state of affairs.
“It would have been so much easier to guess back in my day when there were only three to pick from,” said the boy’s father, remembering his own travelling days with fond nostalgia, but feeling incredibly guilty that he’d let his project take over his life so much that such an important date in his son’s life had slipped is mind.
So much had changed in the thirty years since Gerald Martin had started his journey. those were the days of heroes like Ash and Tyson all of whom began their adventures at the tender age of 10. The ambitious youths of today had to wait an extra three years before setting out across the world, but on the plus side, now traditional starters from all the major regions could be chosen by anyone.
James Martin, however, was not as concerned as his father thought. Or rather, he was concerned about something very different.
James Martin was a kind, caring boy, if a little argumentative at times. He only had a small group of friends and was generally quite shy. But there was one thing that James Martin had always wanted to do, and that was become a pokemon trainer. He wasn’t particularly interested in defeating the league or becoming a gym leader; sure, a few badges would be nice, but what he’d always wanted to do, for as long as he could remember, was get his pokemon and just travel.
James had grown up on Cinnabar Island. Or rather, in Cinnabar Island. His father was head of experimental technology at the Cinnabar Lab - a complex that had grown so huge that it now covered almost the whole of the surface of the small island and also stretched beneath the ground to make use of the geothermal energy that had fuelled the now dormant volcano.
All the employees’ apartments, including the Martins’ were located within this labyrinth of underground, chrome-plated corridors; and, as much as James liked getting new gadgets before they where released, after being confined for so long, he longed to travel the vast Kanto region, and maybe even beyond. But that was all he wanted, just to travel, just to be just another kid who went on just another journey.
The thing that was concerning James was that to start a pokemon journey he needed to pick a starter pokemon, and that he just couldn’t do.
His dad had started with a Charmander - a good-natured pokemon called Crimson who had evolved into a Charmeleon during their journey and was currently dosing in the living-room as per usual. But his father hadn’t exactly been a successful trainer. He’d got as far as Pewter City before falling in love with pokemon science, and, a few years later, a young lab assistant, at the Pewter museum.
James quickly brushed away thoughts of his mother, he didn’t want to start crying in front of his dad, or he would too. It was since she had died in a catastrophic cave-in of one of the lower underground tunnels that his dad had withdrawn to his studies and started staying in his room for days at a time.
‘Enough of that,’ thought James determinedly ‘this day is supposed to be happy, Mum wouldn’t want me to spoil it. But it’s not going to be very happy if I can’t decide what starter pokemon to pick.’
He shook his head.
‘Grrr, never mind, I’ll decide on the way.’
“Dad, I’m going to go now, okay?” he said out loud.
Gerald shook his head too, it seemed he had been musing about the past again, “Yes, what? Oh sorry, what did you say?”
He groaned. “Never mind, see you Dad.”
James stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind him before he could stop himself. James didn’t ever exactly ‘fall out’ with his dad and they never really had ‘arguments’ but it was times like these when James wished his dad wasn’t so scatterbrained, even if he did have a good reason.
Striding along the strobe-lit corridor, James’ thoughts returned to the choices for his first pokemon. Would his shyness be represented as one of the grass types: Turtwig, Bulbasaur, Chikorita or Treeko? But, then again he could get pretty angry when provoked, did that mean the fire types: Cyndaquil, Torchic, Chimchar or of course Charmander were best suited to his personality? And what about the calm, collected water types: Squirtle, Mudkip, Totodile and Piplup, were they going to be his choice? And, no matter what ‘heroes’ had arrived late to the selecting, James definitely did not want to end up with the reserve. Whatever that would be this month.
Arriving at the storage station for the lab’s golf-buggy-like vehicles, the dark-eyed boy hopped on to one and drove off to meet his life-long partner to be. Exactly which life-long partner that would be he’d have to decide when he got there.
***
As the buggy climbed the last of the spiral ramps and emerged onto the ground floor, James breathed in a deep breath and slowly exhaled, enjoying the clear air.
‘Ah, I love being above ground. And to think, I might never have to live in that stuffy maze ever again!’ he thought to himself.
A few minutes passed and finally a sign saying: “Welcome to the Sammy Oak memorial section,” passed overhead.
Another couple of seconds and James found himself about to enter the lab proper. He stored the buggy in the nearest station and pushed his way through the throng of clamouring parents and through the gleaming sliver doors that modestly proclaimed the place beyond as simply “Oak’s Lab.”
The lab was a cacophony of grunts, squeals, croaks and chirrups ringing off of the curved, metal walls, and that was just the newbie trainers. The remaining pokemon sat on the long silver table in the middle of the huge, tech-filled room. Some were waiting patiently while others were eagerly trying to attract the attention of the undecided trainers.
An aging man with a shock of greyish-brown hair came striding over to James, traversing the tiled floor with wizened grace.
"Morning, Professor Oak," James greeted him
"James, I would of thought you'd be the first here, you living so close and all. Oh, and don’t bother with all that ‘professor’ stuff, please, call me Gary."
"Yes, Professor. I mean… the reason I’m late is… Dad and I had a errrr, y‘know."
“Oh no, he didn’t forget, did he?”
The look on James’ face must have given away the answer because the professor’s face suddenly turned very grave.
“I told him he was spending to long on our project,” said Oak, “but he won’t listen, I’m afraid he’s not going to get any sleep until he finishes the damn thing.
"But we shouldn’t worry about that now, come and look at the pokemon. Zach and Michael are already here."
"Really."
"Yes, and already arguing."
"Ah."
Zach and Michael were James’ best friends, and twin brothers, but far from identical as they were always trying to do as much different as possible. They both had brown, scruffy hair, in completely different styles of course, and were both quite short for their age. And most distinctly of all, they were always arguing.
"But we can't both have fire types, we can't be rivals with the same type of pokemon!" Zach was protesting, whilst holding a rather frightened-looking Cyndaquil.
"Fine then, I'll have Piplup," said Michael.
"What's this, a compromise between the Allen twins." Remarked Oak.
"Hah, that puny penguin?" Countered Zach.
"Maybe not then."
"You'll change your tune when I beat your Cyndaquil's *** every time with my water type."
"Guys..", James attempted.
"Yeah, well, once your Piplup becomes an Empoleon it'll get a weakness to fire."
"Guys!"
"And a resistance to grass." Michael retaliated.
"GUYS!!!"
"Oh, hi James" the twins said in perfect sync.
"Jynx!" They also said in sync.
"No I Jynxed you!" Said Zach.
"Yeah, well, I triple-ice-punch-lovely-kissed it," argued Michael.
"I'll ice punch you in a minu..."
"GUYS!!! I'm trying to get to the pokemon before the Miltank come home! Arceus, you guys are so immature."
"Oh, sorry James, its just that Michael wanted a Charmander and..."
"You, take the Cyndaquil and you, take the Piplup and get out of the way!" James resolved angrily.
"Piplup's better anyway.." muttered Michael.
“Ugh,” groaned James, “Y’know, some day you guys won’t have each other to argue with. What are you gonna do then, hey?”
“It’s Zach,” explained Michael, “he’s the one that always winds me up.”
Blocking out Zach’s more-than-likely retort, James began to walk towards the starters’ table. The knowledge that the time to chose was almost upon him weighed heavily in his heart. But at the same time he was unbearably excited. Aside from TV, Crimson, and Zach and Michael’s family pet - a Goldeen who’s fascination ran out after he’d seen it swim around it’s bowl thirty times - these were the first pokemon James had ever seen.
His train of thought was unceremoniously severed as he suddenly realised that the whole lab had gone quiet, even the hyper-active Totodile that was chasing it’s new trainer around the lab had lessened it’s hysterical croaking. James turned around to see what everyone was staring at, but all he could see was a tall figure blocking out the neon light from the doorway. James turned again to see the Professor looking stunned, which was unusual as he was renowned for his calm and collected attitude.
“Well, well, well,” said Gary Oak, “If it isn’t my old friend and rival - Ash Ketchum.”
Everybody in the lab gasped and the silence in the room seemed to somehow intensify even more.
“But that means,” James whispered, “Oh no.”
Another, smaller, but still quite tall, shadow appeared by the figure of the renowned Ash Ketchum. The second figure stepped forward and her red her glinted in the sunlight from the windows high up in the labs ceiling.
“Amber Ketchum,” James finished. Although the daughter of the so-called “hero” Ash Ketchum lived across the sea in Pallet Town, the sand-banks and islets in between were occupied by Cinnabar Islanders and those from Pallet Town alike during the Summer. And throughout their encounters over the years Amber and James had built up a strong rivalry with each other.
“Good to see you, old friend,” said Ash ,“has my pokedex been useful for your new project?”
“Well blow me over and call me a Jigglypuff, it was young Amber’s birthday last week wasn’t it,” exclaimed the Professor “Well, I’m quite unprepared for this, there’s actually only one pokemon left…”
The unthinkable had happened - in the process of arguing with the twins and the unexpected arrival of Ash and Amber the rest of the pokemon had been chosen and so now only the Charmander the twins had been squabbling over was left.
Amber and James met each other’s gaze for a second before sprinting for the table. James may have been closer but she was taller and faster and her out-stretched hand reached the table a mere millisecond before his.
“I guess your coming with me then Charmander,” said Amber, beaming triumphantly.
“Char!” Growled the flaming-tailed lizard in reply.
“I’m afraid,” said Oak “that leaves you with the…”
“NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!”
***
“Pleasebegood, pleasebegood, pleasebegood.” James hoped frantically as Professor Oak led him down the dimly lit passage to the lab’s storage room later that morning.
“The thing is,” he said “we’ve only started using him as a reserve because he wasn’t picked at the initial choosing so many times.”
Did this mean the reserve was one of the regular starters? James sure hoped it did - at least he knew that they were all reasonably good.
“He was the runt of a litter you see, smaller than the average Bulbasaur…”
A Bulbasaur! James was saved. Or so he thought. They turned the corner and Oak unlocked the door that had come into view with a old-fashioned key from his pocket.
“As I always say ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ and these locks are far safer than those voice-rec. thingies some other doors have,” explained the scientist, but largely to himself as the blood was pounding in James’ ears too loudly for him to here a single word.
James followed Professor Oak into the storage room - or rather, into the glorified cupboard which consisted of four walls of floor-to-ceiling plain, metal shelves stacked with assorted cardboard boxes. The professor was rooting through one of these boxes and after a couple of muttered “I know it’s in here somewhere”s he pulled out his hand clutching a red and white standard pokeball. By the triumphant look on his face you’d have thought he’d just climbed Mount Silver.
“Right, let’s get the little guy homed at last. Go, Bulbasaur!”
As a white light poured out of the ball and coalesced into a diminutive reptilian shape with a small, green bulb on its back, my look of abject nervousness turned to utter disappointment.
“Oh. He is quite small isn’t he,” he remarked.
“Yes, as I said earlier - the runt of the litter.”
“Wait. The runt of the litter?” James asked hopefully, a thought had just occurred to him.
“Yes, the…”
“Who was his mother bred with?”
“Who… I don’t know actually.”
“So he might have some good bred moves?”
“Yes, I suppose, but moves aren’t everything.”
“I’ll take him!”
“You know you don’t really have a choi…”
The Professor’s statement was cut off by a beeping sound emanating from one of the pockets of his lab-coat. After another arduous search, he produced a nondescript black pager and examined it closely.
“Gary, come quick,” he read of off the rolling screen, his confusion heightening with each new word, “It’s amazing, you’ll never believe it, it actually works!”
He paused and scratched the back of his head.
“Hmm, very strange… It seems as though you’ll have company for the journey home, James. That message was from your father.”
***
Oak’s jaw was firmly set as he drove the buggy at just a little over the complex speed limit along the gleaming corridors. As the identical grey doors whipped past, James wondered why the middle-aged scientist wasn’t as overjoyed as his father had been in his message. The truth was that Gary Oak was worried about his friend and partner. Their project had been consuming so much of Gerald’s life that on one hand this supposed success could be the high-point of his career; but on the other, Gary feared that Gerald could be jumping to uncertain conclusions in his sleep-deprived state.
Eventually, but sooner than should have been possible within the limit, the entrance to the Martins’ apartment came into view. As they parked the buggy and approached, strange noises started reaching the pair’s ears from beyond the door. It sounded as though James’ father was having a loud, excited conversation with himself.
James scanned his key-card through the receiver in the wall and the door obediently slid open with a faint hiss of pneumatics. Wary of what they might find, James and Oak tiptoed cautiously into the apartment and through into the front room.
The sight that met their eyes could best be described as perplexing for both of them. Gerald Martin was talking excitedly and gesticulating wildly in an animated conversation with, or so it seemed, Crimson. The red, flame-tailed lizard was up and out of his comfortable chair by the holographic fire for first time in as long as James could remember. The lizard himself was staring drop-jawed at his trainer, but despite his lack of facial movement, seemed to be contributing to the conversation; well, Gerald seemed to be answering questions from him anyway.
“Yes, yes, it’s wonderful isn’t it?!” he was saying, “to finally be able to talk to each other after all these years together.”
“Yes we’ve always been able to communicate,” he continued after a gap where it seemed Crimson had had some sort of input, “but this is just something else, isn’t it?!”
At that moment, Crimson noticed Gary and James entering the room behind his trainer. Gerald noticed him looking over his shoulder and spun round to see us.
“Gary, James, finally, come and have a look at this!” he shouted, “It’s finished! And even more astounding, it actually works!”
At ‘it,’ James’ father pointed at a strange object on his ear which had previously been hidden from view when he was facing in the opposite direction. It looked like a single headphone. It was fashioned from a polished, slivery metal, and in the middle was embedded a strange gem. The gem was of the deepest indigo, so dark in fact that if you stared into it’s heart it would feel as though you’d been thrown into an underwater ravine, the bottom of which was purest black. Except, it was not all dark. The stone was surrounded by thousand, millions of glittering, swirling motes of light that could only be seen as Gerald danced into the shadowed parts of the room. When his wild motions took him into the area beneath the room’s strip-lights, they seemed to vanish amidst the greater brightness.
The object was fastened to Gerald’s head by a black plastic clip that moulded around his earlobe and up and around to grip the top of his ear.
“Dad, what are you talking about?” James asked cautiously, “What is ‘it’? What has this project been about?”
“This, my son,” he answered, “is the DreamScope, the finest bit of technology I have ever had the fortune to build and design with my good friend Gary here.”
“But what does it do?”
This seemed to be the question he had been waiting for and for a dreadful moment James thought it was going to be like one of those parts in a musical where a character suddenly bursts into song. To his relief, however, Gerald simply beamed like a madman and launched into his explanation.
“By a combination of my technology, Gary’s data and a remarkable fuel source in the form of this gem, kindly donated by Steven of the Devon Corporation, this machine translates a pokemon’s communicative brainwaves and channels them directly into the wearer’s temporal lobe,” he briefly paused for breath, “Thus, enabling the wearer to here the thoughts of said pokemon.”
James and Oak both stared, as gob-smacked as Crimson had looked moments before.
“Y-you mean, it works? All our hard work paid off?” said Oak.
“Yes,” replied Gerald, still smiling, “wonderfully!”
“Wait,” interrupted James, “so you were? You and Crimson were? You were talking to each other?”
“Yes, yes, isn’t it amazing, think of the implications! This invention could promote understanding and provide new insights into the pokemon world, the likes of which have never been seen before!”
“Well, could I, y’know, maybe, try it on?”
“Well, I don’t see why not. Here you go,” James’ father removed the precious machine from his ear and handed it carefully to his son.
As James turned the gadget over in his hands, marvelling at its beauty, Gary and Gerald continued their heated discussion.
“You’ve really out-done yourself this time,” said Oak, openly impressed, “when I provided the pokemon data, I really never truly believed that this day would ever come.”
“Well,” said Gerald sheepishly, “there was one small problem.”
Oak glared at Gerald like a parent who’s just found out there son really did have something to do with the crayon lines all over the wall.
“You see, you know the data Ash collected - the same data you provided me with for the Scope?”
“Yes,” said the Professor through gritted teeth.
“Well, it wasn’t… I couldn’t… there was a… What I’m trying to say is, it didn’t work.”
“What! But you were talking to Crimson just now!”
“Yes, but I programmed the Charmeleon data in manually, I couldn’t do that for every single pokemon, it would take years! The DreamScope needs the exact data for the brain-wave patterns of each new pokemon if it is to function effectively.”
The Professor and Gerald both stared glumly down at the floor, looks of utter despair on both their faces.
At that moment, James brought the DreamScope up to his ear and was just fastening the clip when-
“AAARGH!”
James screamed as violet lightning erupted from the ‘Scope and leapt at James’ head. The device was yanked from his hand and clamped firmly to his head by the static field. There was a hissing sound and the commotion stopped as suddenly as it had started. The faint purple glow that had been surrounding the ordeal vanishing instantaneously.
Gerald and Gary whipped round rushed to James’ aid as the noise roused them from their stupor; but it was too late.
James tottered where he stood, but aside from a dazed look of shock and a new, spikier hairstyle, he seemed remarkably un-injured.
James’ father reached out to steady him but was instead treated t a powerful static-shock.
“Ouch!” he cried and reflexively retracted his singed hand, “James, are you okay?” he asked, worriedly.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m perfectly… wait a second, I suddenly feel a bit-” with a sickening ‘thud’ James collapsed, missing the soft armchair by a foot and instead connecting his head with the hard, wooden coffee-table.
***
Ooh-hoo-hoo! I'm mean aren't I?
You'll have to wait till I've finished re-writing Chapter 2 to find out what happens next, see you then.
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