"Alright mate, are you excited, feeling strong?" Joey asked after he released Rattata into his room back at the orphanage, with a visit to the Pokecentre in between. His starter vigorously nodded his small head. He seemed like he was one catchy tune away from doing a little dance.
Joey sat on his bed and kicked off his shoes.
"Well, you should. You just won yourself a gym badge against a type-disadvantage. Sure, we used some interpretive tactics, but technically we just played off a weakness inherent in our opponent. We were being smart, and prepared," the youngster rattled off. "The issue is, we can't rest on our laurels. This was just the first step of many, and if we want to win the next badge we're going to have to up our game. And with that, I mean, make our battles less boring. Honestly, it's just two Pokemon trying to hit each other with one of their body parts. The audience was yawning and falling asleep. I swear one guy started grilling in the back row."
Rattata tilted his head dubiously at those words. Seemingly asking with the gesture. 'So what if it's boring. We won.'
Joey pretended not to see that. "You agree, good. Well, I have a plan. With Detect and Hyper Fang you're the most dangerous Rattata in Saffron, but there is one thing missing that will make you the best battler in Saffron," he nodded. "Range, we're missing range. Thankfully Kong coughed up quite a lot of money, which means… When we're going to Celadon in six weeks, we can get you a technical machine. Swift, maybe thunder-wave. Should be the easiest gateway into harder stuff later. Until then, we're going to work on your-"
Someone interrupted Joey's speech with a knock on the door, causing both Youngster and Pokemon to perk up. "Come in," he shouted, curious as to who was bothering him this late. It was almost 8 pm, time for good boys like him to go to sleep.
Theresa poked her head into the room, quickly followed by Mia and lastly followed by Lil Mouse. "I knew it," the older woman said to the younger girl. "Look at that pose," she said and pointed at Joey, sitting on the bed, hands steepled in each other supporting his chin.
The boy was looking down analytically with some instability in his pupils at an attentive Rattata who looked confused, but also like a soldier attending an important briefing. One on drone warfare perhaps. Or perhaps on how worth it it was to bomb a whole house of civilians just to get at one potential enemy insurgent. Considering that Rattata was a bit stupid and disproportionately ambitious and confrontational considering his actual strength, he was obviously a hot-blooded American, at least metaphorically. The answer to the previous question was therefore that it was always worth it to bomb a house full of civilians on even the smallest suspicion.
"Look at him plotting," the closest thing he had to a mother hissed. "Already thinking about his next move, not enjoying his success for even a minute. Beating Kong with a type disadvantage? More like being behind schedule. He's been like that since he was a child, always thinking and never sitting down to smell the roses."
"Roses don't have a smell," Joey complained but remained ignored, like the ugly guy at an orgy.
"That's why you have to create the celebration for him," Theresa continued. Wait, was Mia taking notes? She was scribbling something on a notepad.
"Hey, excuse me," Joey said. "Rattata is getting a whole box of berries tomorrow, he's celebrating."
"Yes, dummy. But you aren't," Theresa said, finally speaking to him, rather than about him. "You have to be an impressive trainer to do what you did, where's your reward?"
Joey puffed up his cheeks. "The lamentations of my enemies are the only thing I strive for, the sweet sounds of their Pokemon falling unconscious. Their brittle bones being crushed beneath my feet as I stride over their fallen bodies. Brittle bones, breaking silence, my grandpa always used to say-" He was about to continue, but Theresa interrupted him with a roll of her eyes.
"Anyway, I made celebratory pizza. It's waiting downstairs."
Joey paused. "You made it the way I like it? With a tomato base and mortadella, a bit of basil and lemon wedges on top?" he asked.
"Yes, exactly like that. I also have some freshly squeezed orange juice and some Oran berries for Rattata. I remember you told me they were his favourite."
The youngster stood up with a sigh. "I'll reimburse the ingredients."
"Free of charge, my dad really liked the battle!" Mia spoke up. At Joey's confused look, she elaborated. "He's the boss of the supermarket at the corner of Jigglystreet and Fight Avenue."
"That's nice of him," Joey said.
The trio of humans, and the duo of Rattata who excitedly started talking to each other the moment they entered the corridor, made their way to the large room in which all the orphans ate their meals. Joey blinked in surprise when he entered and found everyone present, waiting for him.
He smiled nonchalantly and accepted the well wishes from the other kids. The older ones, struggling to find a job so they could leave and were only here for the pizza, and the younger ones, who were looking up at him with starry eyes, as if he'd just won the conference.
Maybe his win could show these kids, who didn't have any parents to learn ambition or the prerequisites of success from, that they too could succeed. Joey had never interacted much with the other inhabitants of his home, but perhaps he would manage to leave a positive impression on the place by the time he left next year.
It was a fun night of eating pizza, drinking juice and playing stupid games. Bellsprout did a dance on one of the tables. Rattata gorged himself on his oran berries, sharing some with Lil Mouse, and Mia excitedly quizzed Joey once again on his training stratagems.
All the while, in a corner, with a little cone hat on her head and a slice of pizza for herself, Theresa sat, watching proudly. Her eyes were watery and at that moment she looked like a mother whose child had graduated from university.
Joey too, at one point shed a tear. Not out of joy at the victory he'd just accomplished. Or the inherent sadness of being surrounded by a bunch of orphans all savouring little slices of pizza as if they were the most precious of treasures.
He shed a tear because he'd been given a second chance. To live a life in this beautiful world. And despite all of that.
The fact that someone else had thrown this party for him. Validated his efforts and deepest desires.
It just reminded him of all the things and people he'd lost upon being born.
And the fact that he was starting to forget the fact that he'd ever missed them at all.
-/-
"One trainer licence, please," Joey said after he'd unceremoniously walked up to the receptionist in the Saffron league office and slapped down his youngster card. The table wasn't staffed by the nice blue-haired lady, but by a soulless-looking brown-haired man who was looking through, rather than at Joey.
"Oh, you already got your badge. That's nice," the man muttered, before sending Joey off robotically. "Corridor on the right, third door on the left. Knock and wait."
The youngster picked up his licence again and started walking through the pastel corridors to his new destination, passing the usual plastic plants, plastic chairs, and plastic picture frames.
Once he reached the door, he was about to knock but paused when he heard an angry voice shouting inside the office. It seemed like they were on a heated phone call as there was no one physically answering them.
"You think the youngster tournament will commemorate the end of the program? Think again, it will show its usefulness!" the voice shouted. It was female.
Silence answered.
"We already have one youngster with a gym badge in Saffron! I heard Cinnabar did as well! This won't stand, I tell you!"
…
"It's an amazing bonding experience and a safer start than the usual traditional route. The youngsters that become trainers are 90% less likely to get hurt out in the wild, or to have their licence suspended!"
…
"It's not just pre-selection! It's a better start. The only issue is that you people don't allow tier-1 starters!"
…
"No, you're impossible to work with!"
…
"Your mother is a Drowzee and your father smells like Magost berries!" the woman shouted, before apparently slamming down the phone violently, causing Joey to wince. The youngster considered if he should knock, or if he should maybe let whoever was inside calm down first.
After a few seconds of consideration, he decided that he wasn't scared of no bureaucrat, especially one seemingly defending his interests as a youngster. He knocked and was promptly bid inside.
He didn't know what to expect when entering, but a tiny old woman, as small as him, working at a desk and furiously typing away at a computer wasn't it. The crone stopped in her efforts and brought up a wrinkly hand to part her grey hair and look at him.
"Ah dearie, sit down. What can I do for you?" she said pleasantly with a gentle smile on her face. Joey awkwardly took place in a comfortable bean bag on which he could face the old woman. A plate of cookies was promptly shoved in his direction. "Take a biscuit." He was prompted, and reluctantly took one of the stale-looking oatmeal cookies. They were surprisingly good actually, if a bit chewy. He swallowed and met a pair of watery blue eyes, which were boring into him, prompting him to speak.
"Well, I just came to upgrade my licence really. I beat Kong yesterday," he said, once again putting his youngster licence and newly acquired badge on the table. He noted a perch built into the upper corner of the room on the left of a woman. A Butterfree was gently snoozing there. Its purple body and wings were seemingly slightly washed out, which was why he hadn't immediately noticed the Pokemon.
"You did, did you," the woman crowed. But it didn't seem like she was denigrating his efforts and calling him a liar, but rather that the information invigorated her. She sat up straighter and beamed at him. "Jonathan, right?" she asked as she picked up his licence and inserted it into a card reader. "I'm Ruth," she introduced herself as she glanced at the screen and her smile widened. "With a Rattata as well, ha! That will show that arrogant boy," Ruth muttered. She quickly typed something on her keyboard and the card reader made some concerning sounds, a bit of smoke coming out of it, before the licence was ejected again and pushed toward Joey.
The new trainer picked it up reverently, looking at the word trainer, now embossed onto it. He grimaced when he noted the Youngster regulations, right beneath.
"A smart cookie like you will obviously already know what it means to upgrade your licence like this during your youngster tenure, but let me explain it to you again," Ruth said and held up three fingers. "Number 1: As a trainer, you can now catch and train tier-1 Pokemon. Similarly, your carry capacity has increased by one," she said and put down one finger, opened a drawer and rolled a red and white Pokeball towards him. Joey caught it and clipped the miniature device onto his belt.
"Number 2: Because you upgraded during the youngster circuit, the same travelling restrictions still apply. No travelling the routes and no leaving the gates behind by more than a kilometre, which is just a bit more than you could stay away previously," She rolled her eyes. "Complete nonsense of course, a youngster with one gym badge is much more credible than a trainer with none. Mark my words, soon enough they'll try to raise the age limit for getting a licence to fourteen, ridiculous. Anyway, you'll get more privileges if you get a second badge." Another finger went down.
"Number 3: A recent change, even if you don't get the travelling privileges of a trainer, at least you get the stipend now. I think the amount is twice what you get currently? Anyway, when you enter your trainer circuit next year, you have as much time to get five badges as everyone else before it expires. Four to go. Try to be responsible with the money. You'll need it to feed more and more Pokemon. If you start saving now then you can go longer without a win when the circuit starts."
The last finger went down, leaving a fist. "Any questions?" Joey perked up, having absorbed the information, now able to bring forth his other reason for being here.
"The gym-challenge trip to Celadon, when is it and how do I sign up?" he asked.
Ruth nodded thoughtfully and typed something on her computer. "It's in a month and a half. I just added you to the list for a two-badge challenge. You'll get the specific time at which the bus leaves on your PokeNav a bit closer to departure. Anything else?"
The somehow-still-a-youngster shook his head.
"Good, a few pieces of advice," Ruth started, considering. "Don't buy Pokemon from breeders with your increased stipend. It might seem like a good idea but if you end up incompatible it's just a waste of money. I'm sure sending out a fire-type in Celadon, a rock type in Vermillion and an electric type in Cerulean seems like the best way forward. But it's not. Just catch a Pokemon. There are Vulpix in the area and lots of Pidgeys. The bond you'll create will be more genuine if you go through the normal process. The only exception is if you get an egg, but since we can never fully predict what will hatch from it…" she trailed off.
Joey nodded, thinking about what he was most likely to spend his newfound money on. It was nice to have a bit more spending cash. Disregarding his gains at the battlefields and his win over Kong, the youngster's stipend had been enough to provide himself and Rattata with nutritious meals and some equipment every now and again. No savings had really been possible, those had come from his victories. He was more likely to spend the money on more technical machines or a good tent set-up for when he left next year. Technically the league provided one in the basic trainer package, but it wasn't really that good. At least so he'd heard.
The only Pokemon he was really considering buying was a Happiny. He wanted a Chansey on his time, just to decrease the already low likelihood of one of his Pokemon ever needing serious medical assistance but being too far from a Pokecentre.
"I mostly try to capture Pokemon I share common goals and beliefs with," Joey said and stood up.
Ruth did the same and the two of them shook hands.
-/-
Of course, while Joey wanted to find a Pokemon that had the work ethic to back up the ambition they generally had, he wouldn't mind some species over others. Surely if one met a thousand Vulpix, at least one of them would synergise with his attitude towards life.
The issue was naturally that Vulpix were rarer than Pidgey so it was easier to meet a thousand Pidgey than a thousand Vulpix. But then one also had to consider that Pidgey generally were less likely to have the preferred attitude than Vulpix, since they were stupider.
In the end, it was complex, and Joey preferred to keep it simple. If he met a Pokemon that matched his standards he would catch it, if not, then not. Sure he could affect the odds, by training in the west of Saffron where Growlithe and Vulpix were running around, but in the end, fate would decide.
Funnily enough, he'd had the same experience with dating in his last life. It was when you stopped looking that you generally found, and it was when you were incredibly set on a specific thing that you would end up regretting your decision.
"What do you think, Rattata? What kind of team member are we interested in?" Joey asked his Pokemon as they exited the league building and entered the scorching heat of the city. Today he was going to go to the south gate, to check up on the Caterpie they hadn't trained with in a while, before making a bigger decision later.
"Ra, tatta," the Pokemon chittered while shrugging his shoulders. He threw a few lazy punches in the air and did a few push-ups as they walked.
"You don't care much, huh. As long as they're motivated," Joey muttered.
Rattata seemed to consider, before going on his hind legs and shaking his left hand with his right.
"And they have to be nice?" Joey asked and received a vigorous nod. "Sounds like a good set of criteria."
They walked, one of them still basking in their recent victory, and the other already working on the next set of issues. Namely, how they were going to beat the Celadon grass-type gym. It was a bit of a stupid thought, but Joey considered just continuing to work on Quick Attack, Hyper Fang, and Detect. Without a technical machine, it would be tedious to try and learn a ranged move.
Technical machines were currently the cheapest and most readily available in Celadon. He didn't feel like organising his own trip sooner if the league bus was taking him anyway later.
The easiest thing would be to just wait until the bus took him to Celadon, beat the gym leader, buy the TM, and then train it when they got back to Saffron. Technical machines were just TE-infused memories of a move, so you still needed to practise. This meant that even if he got one now for a higher price in Saffron, it might not be ready in time for the gym battle.
It would be tedious as fuck, but quite frankly Rattata would most likely continue profiting from just working on his basics. His Detect, Quick Attack and Hyper Fang combo had won him the previous battle, and there was no reason why it couldn't win him the next. The only real difference between the match-ups was the fact that the grass types in Celadon would use more ranged moves and more status effects. If Rattata trained Detect to a higher level he could simply dodge everything and end the battle with Hyper Fang.
There were so many strategies and possibilities available to Joey when he bought some technical machines, or when he got a new team member. But currently, fundamentals were the most important. The only thing was that while he was maybe ok with the mind-numbing task of just doing the same exercises again and again for the next six weeks, his starter might not be.
"The best way to beat the next gym would probably be to just continue working on Detect, your speed and Hyper Fang. Basically, the same regime we've been doing for the past two weeks. There's not much point in branching out into other dark-type moves until we've mastered Bite, and that will probably still take a while."
Ironically, Rattata seemed to have less talent for dark-type energy than he did for fighting-type energy.
"Pursuit or Sucker Punch would be great, but I don't know how feasible it is right now. It would probably be a bit mind-numbing to continue doing the same thing, but, well. Results are results. What do you think?"
Rattata paused and turned towards him with a tilted head, before pointing at himself and flexing a bicep with a wide grin that shoved off his incisors. Then he pointed to Joey and made a scrunched thinking face.
"Ra,ta,ta,ta,ta," he said in a strained tone of voice, as if he was trying to mimic the loading screen of a computer.
Joey laughed. "You're the muscle, I'm the brain?"
A nod.
"Alright then, I'll brain our way to the next badge. You just have to follow my instructions, correct me when I'm wrong and give it your all," he said.
A young female voice suddenly addressed him from his right. "I heard you beat Kong."
Joey turned his head with a half-lidded smile.
"Hello Sabrina," he said as a greeting, looking the green-haired girl up and down. She looked the same. Purple dress and abra in her arms. The only difference was that there were now two Pokeballs clipped to her belt. "Already caught a second team member?" he asked, receiving a mechanic nod in return.
"It only made sense to do it as soon as possible. That is the point of the youngster licence, to get a head start on training," she said robotically. The hostility in her eyes had lessened in comparison to their previous interactions and she didn't bother bringing up any psychic energy in his presence. For all intents and purposes, in front of Joey, Sabrina was forced to be a normal girl.
"Two more badges and you'll be able to evolve, huh, little guy," Joey said, addressing the Abra in the girl's arms. This seemed to trigger something and the trainer of the psychic type drew back from him with a frown.
Rude.
"You're the only other youngster who managed to beat Kong. I already beat all the Saffron trainers that did it before they left. Battle me," the girl demanded brusquely.
Joey looked at Rattata the same instance that Rattata looked at Joey. It was an oddly similar situation to their first battle with Michael. Unprepared for an abrupt challenge.
The only difference seemed to be that Rattata now trusted Joey to make the decision for the both of them. "I know you want to," Joey said to his starter with a smirk, before turning to his challenger. "But I don't think now is the best time. You signed up for the Celadon gym bus, right?" he asked and got a hesitant nod.
"Well, since we will both be doing the second-badge challenge, it will be a two on two battle. How about you wait until I capture a second Pokemon and then we have a battle like that. A week before the bus. It would be good training," he offered. Also, it would give Rattata more time to work on Bite, currently the only dark-type move in his arsenal. Without it, he would simply be defenceless.
"Alright, a two on two battle in five weeks," Sabrina agreed. "I'll find you," she said.
"Ominous," Joey joked, but the girl had already teleported away.
"She's somewhat dramatic, isn't she?" Joey remarked to his starter as they continued on their way.
Rattata chittered in agreement
It wasn't like being dramatic as a trainer was a bad thing though. It could work great with one's brand to create sponsorship opportunities. He didn't really think that Sabrina was being dramatic on purpose, however. The girl was just maladjusted, Joey noted with his adult gaze. What she probably needed most in her life right now was not a successful Pokemon career, which she would inevitably have with her gift anyway, but a friend. A positive role model. Perhaps even a rival.
Issue was.
Joey wasn't fit to be that person. He didn't even like children, and quite frankly, the simple act of spending an inordinate amount of time with them hurt him on a psychological level. Mia was alright because she behaved like a little sister. In a way, she understood that there was a maturity gap and acted accordingly, despite being technically older than him.
Sabrina, Michael, Hitoshi and others would never realise a gap existed, they were too stubborn. Sabrina due to her powers and what they'd done to her social development, Hitoshi because he'd been raised by a bunch of roided-up monkeys, and Michael because his brain cells had issues retaining their plasticity and forming new connections.
Perhaps they'd feel a gap, or realise there was one. But that would lead to resentment, not any sort of positive change.
Joey had been a lone wolf since he'd been reborn, and he was likely going to stay one. The only star on the horizon was the fact that now being a teenager, he was approaching the age where he would be able to start having meaningful conversations with his "equals."
"We're the best," the youngster said out loud as they approached the southern gate. "I'm smart and you're hard-working. I'm wise and you're resilient." Rattata chittered in agreement while Joey burst out in laughter. "A certain character would say that you're gutsy, actually. Maybe they're right, and that is the most important attribute. The tale of the gutsy Rattata. It has a nice ring to it."
"Rattata!"