8 years ago...

10-year old Nathan Teralis was immersed in the scene nature placed before him. The sun was setting in the sky, giving his hometown of New Bark a bright orange hue. He turned his head away from his house, where the sun reflected in his eyes. As he looked skyward, he became mesmerized with the way the clouds were racing through the sky; their bright glows almost making them look like little rocket ships, afterburners propelling them forwards. He thought he could a voice calling his name... 'Nathan.... Nathan....' Then he felt a sharp poke.

"NATHAN!!!" He turned around to the source of the voice. Then he was shocked to see himself standing in front of him. Then he heard a giggle. A little brown-haired girl his age looked at him from around the 'himself.'

"Sam, don't do that!" Nathan whined. "You know I hate it."

"Well, next time pay more attention to me," Samantha retorted. Samantha Jacobson was Nathan's neighbor and best friend. They had known each other for five years, when Nathan's parents bought their house in her town. They became friends, and over the years spent their free time playing with pokemon.

Samantha's family was a family of pokemon researchers. Her mom was a pokemon marine biologist, and she spent her days out at the lakes in Jhoto, studying various water pokemon. Both her father and grandfather were pokemon professors. Her father, Darrell, was also best friends with Xzavyer Teralis, Nathan's father, who was a renowned scientist, archaeologist, and pokemon trainer. Xzavyer held the record for youngest trainer to ever beat the Elite Four, at age 15.

"Okay Ditto, you can stop now." Nathan spoke to ‘himself’, remembering what he was doing previously. Nathan and Samantha had taken a Ditto from the Jacobson Lab and had spent the afternoon taking turns showing Ditto various objects and watching it transform into them. Samantha, noticing Nathan’s momentary lapse in concentration, decided to play a nifty little joke on him and had Ditto transform into a copy of Nathan.

“NATHAN!!!” Hearing another scream of his name, Nathan turned towards his house and saw his mother leaning out of a window. “Come on, Nathan, you’ve played enough tonight. You’d best come back inside.”

“Aww, Mom, why? It’s not even dark outside!” Nathan was very upset with this.

“It’s getting close enough,” his mom said without patience.

“I don’t want you out when it’s dark. You know that it’s not safe for you kids at night these days, what with the news spreading all these stories about children disappearing and people getting mysteriously ‘lost’ and turning up the next day with wounds or never turning up again!” Nathan’s mom shook her head in disbelief. “You need to say good night to Samantha and come inside. NOW.”

“Alright… Sam, I have to go in. I’ll see you tomorrow,” Nathan sighed as he walked to his house.

“Bye!” shouted Samantha as she picked up a pokeball and returned Ditto. She ran back home and let herself in her house.


The next morning at the breakfast table, the Teralis family was preparing to start their days. Xzavyer Teralis took a sip of his coffee and continued reading the morning paper. He was reading up on the results of the latest league and gym challenges. There was a picture of a spiky-haired blonde boy about 12 years old who was holding a Thunderbadge, the symbol of victory from the gym in Vermillion City in the Kanto Region, and standing next to his Ivysaur. Lt. Surge, the gym leader, was quoted in the article saying, “Well, I put up a tough fight, but this boy and his Ivysaur were too much for my electric pokemon. This boy has a lot of potential, I’ll tell you that. I haven’t had a good fight like that in a long time.” Xzavyer looked further down the page. There was another picture with just the boy. The picture said “Hector Walker, age 12, and his friend Ivysaur.” Turning the page, he saw that there was an article containing info about the new research institute being built next to the Viridian City museum. Moving back to the Jhoto news, he picked up a bagel and began to take a bite. When his attention was diverted from the paper for just a second, he heard from the TV, “…destroying acres of natural pokemon habitat.” Confused, he turned around to the TV and was stunned by what he saw next.
“Lucy, come see this…” Xzavyer called his wife, picked up the remote, and turned up the TV. On it, there was a reporter standing in a forest that was badly scarred. Trees were burned and stacked like firewood. Smoke rose eerily from the area. What was once a green forest was now a badly burned stretch of destruction. “Isn’t that right near our house?”
“Growlithe, go wake up Nathan,” Lucy said. The family’s pet, Growlithe, happily leaped up and dashed up the stairs to Nathan’s room. Lucy moved toward the TV and listened to the reporter.

“Hold on… We’re losing signal again. Do we have a lock? Good. Good morning folks, if you’re just tuning in I’m broadcasting to you live from an area roughly two miles from Violet City,” the reporter began. “As you can see behind me…” As he spoke, the camera panned away from him and focused on the surrounding area. The picture distorted violently, but it was still recognizable. “…This area has been badly damaged. Construction crews have been called in to help with cleanup, and you can see them working here.” In the background, various men and troops of Machoke and Machamp were lifting singed logs. “We still have no idea what happened. This morning a woman was going for her morning jog and came across this singed patch of what was once forest. She immediately called the local police. Now, we’ve been having technical problems since we got here because for some reason there is a lot of electromagnetic distortion in this area. But, so far, scientists have been analyzing the scene and the best hypothesis they have as to what has happened is that a lightning bolt struck in the forest and burned it down.”

“What? How could we have lightning?” Xzavyer asked, puzzled. “It was clear last night…” His wife hushed him.

The reporter was now talking to a scientist. “We will continue to bring you updates as soon as we have a better picture of what happened here. Until then, there is no need to worry. We believe this was a natural occurrence. You have nothing to fear.”

“Oh well,” said Xzavyer. “Time for me to head to work. I’m surprised they haven’t called me in yet.” Xzavyer was a member of the PSI, which stood for Pokemon Scientific Investigation. They were a group of pokemon scientists that aided police in deciphering puzzling scenes of crime or otherwise. Xzavyer put down his paper and picked up his briefcase. He walked to the door. As he reached it, he heard Nathan scrambling down the stairs. Nathan ran up to his father and grabbed his legs.

“Why do you have to leave so early?” Nathan asked, looking up at his tall dad.

“They need me at work,” Xzavyer replied. “Big incident out by Violet City. I’ll see you when I get home. Good luck!” With that he kissed his wife and son and went out the door. He pulled out a pokeball.

“Go, Dragonite!” he yelled. A 6-foot tall dragon emerged from the ball in a flash of white light. Dragonite yawned and then smiled at him. “Hey buddy,” Xzavyer said. He climbed on the dragon’s back.

Nathan watched his father and Dragonite lift off into the sky. His mother called him for breakfast. I wonder what he meant by “good luck?” Nathan wondered.

“Nathan, hurry up and eat,” Lucy said. “You have to go meet Professor Jacobson this morning.”

Nathan sat at the table and began scarfing down his breakfast, wondering what the professor wanted from him.


When Nathan finished the 150-foot walk to the Jacobson residence, he knocked on the door and stood nervously. He kept looking back towards home and shuffling his feet so he didn’t notice when the door opened.

“Good morning, Nathan. Sam will be upset that she didn’t wake up to see you,” a kind but energetic voice said. Nathan turned, startled and looked up to see Darrel Jacobson smiling at him through his glasses.

“Good morning, Professor.” Seeing his smile, Nathan relaxed a bit. “Mom said you needed to see me this morning.”

“Hmm?” The professor looked confused. “No,” he said. “I don’t have any reason… Oh!” Darrel pulled a little electronic device out of his pocket. Flicking his fingers across the screen, he pulled up his calendar. Then he smiled very brightly. “Ahh, yes! You need to talk to my father, not me.”

Now Nathan was confused. He gave his thanks to Darrel and walked out the back door that lead to the massive pokemon lab. ‘What could the professor want from me?’ he wondered. When he got to the lab door, he pressed a button. A metal plate slid back and a screen protruded from the building. The screen flicked to life and an Alakazam appeared. Alakazam, a powerful psychic pokemon, was the lab assistant for the Jacobsons. Alakazam looked very happy and started babbling. Nathan couldn’t understand a word. “Umm… Alakazam? I can’t… can you please…?”

Alakazam stopped. Then he used one of his spoons to jab a button on his side of the console. At the bottom of the screen, subtitles appeared. Some of the most advanced pokemon technology was at work right now. Alakazam began talking again. “Yes, yes, sorry about that. The professor is expecting you so I’ll bring you in.”

Nathan stared open-mouthed at the screen. He had never seen anything like that before. Then, Alakazam disappeared from the screen. Alakazam appeared right behind Nathan, put one arm around him, then teleported him inside the lab. When Alakazam let go of him, his feet were shaking. Trying to regain his balance, he took a step and fell down. “Ouch…” Nathan got up and rubbed his arms. Alakazam walked off, silently laughing. Nathan walked to the stairs up to the professor’s office.

The Jacobson Pokemon Laboratory was easily the biggest building in New Bark town. It was a remodeled design of the old lab, which was owned by Professor Elm, the previous Jhoto professor, before he had to move away for what was described as “personal reasons.” Three stories tall and as big as two houses on each floor, the lab was a technological wonder. Machines were constantly performing chemical tests. Racks and racks of pokeballs lined shelves in the main room. Computers ran calculations and tested the newest inventions. It was truly a sight to behold. All of the big machinery was on the main floor. The brightly lit 3rd floor ceiling was visible from the 1st floor because the 2nd and 3rd floors went around the perimeter, with balconies looking down into the main area.
When he got to the 3rd floor, Nathan looked out the few windows in the building. They overlooked the pokemon field, where the professors would let pokemon graze and play every so often. Nathan saw a few pokemon running around, getting their morning exercise. Then he remembered he had an appointment to get to, so he tore his gaze away and walked to the professor’s office and knocked on the door.

“Come on in,” and old voice said. Nathan touched the door and a hydraulic hiss was heard as the door slid to the side rather quickly. At the desk in the office, at a massive chair, was the infamous professor Randall Jacobson.

“Good to see you again, Nathan.” Randall got out of his chair and shook Nathan’s hand. Though he was 69 years old, he didn’t look like it. Professor Randall was an impressive man, both in stature and in intelligence.
For as long as anyone could remember, Randall had been around, revolutionizing the world of pokemon. He was part of what became known as the Elite Four of the research world; the oldest and wisest pokemon professors who were know worldwide. On the western side of the globe, there was Professor Oak (from Kanto) and Professor Randall (from Jhoto), and then on the far-away eastern side there was Professor Birch (from the Hoenn region), and Professor Rowan (from the Sinnoh region). These professors were the top authority and the most accomplished persons to work on pokemon breeding, evolution, and taming among many, many other things. The western professors and the eastern professors were also thinking about integrating the pokemon into the other regions. Each region had it’s own set of exclusive pokemon, the western with about 250 and the smaller eastern with about 150. However, there were various problems with this, as the continents were divided by sea, so no natural migration could occur. So, they decided to drop it down on the priority list.

Professor Randall was six feet tall. He wore glasses, like his son, but it always seemed like his glasses were lit up with reflecting light, giving him a sharp, cold stare. He had a mustache and beard, both very large, and he had shoulder-length white hair. When he shook Nathan’s hand, Nathan could feel he had a powerful grip. “For such an old man, the professor sure is strong,” Nathan thought. The professor took off his glasses to reveal kind, blue eyes.

“So, Nathan,” the professor started, pacing around his desk. “Do you know why I asked you here today?” Nathan shook his head no. “Did you not remember what happens when you turn 10?”
“Oh!” Nathan felt stupid. How could he forget? After young child turns ten years old, they are allowed to leave to go start their very own pokemon journey. Nathan turned ten just nine days ago. He had completely forgotten.
“Well, now that you remember…” Randall smiled and picked up his glasses. “I think it’s time to get you your very first pokemon.” He placed his glasses on his face, and the lenses lit up. Then he spoke in a more serious tone. “Please step into the elevator.”

Pressing a button under his desk, a bookshelf slid to the side to reveal an elevator door. Nathan and the professor stepped inside. “Go ahead, press the button.” The professor gestured towards the panel. Nathan looked at the various buttons and their destinations. There was one for each floor, the roof, and one that had a Pokeball design for a button. Nathan pressed the pokeball. The doors closed and the elevator began its descent.

When the doors opened at the basement level, fog spilled into the elevator, creating a dramatic effect of ominousness. Then more fog came in, then more. Nathan and the professor started coughing. “Alakazam, turn the fog off!” Randall shouted, choking on fog. A high-pitched ringing was heard, the fog disappeared, and then only Alakazam was there in the room. Alakazam made lots of indistinguishable apologetic-sounding noises. Then, he teleported away.
“Sorry about that…” Randall apologized. “I always try to make the entrance into the room where I bring new trainers dramatic. However, to this day I cannot get the fog to work properly. Neither can Alakazam.”
“It’s okay, Sir,” said Nathan. “I just wish we had that thing that helped me understand Alakazam. I would have liked to talk to him again.”

The professor smiled triumphantly. “Yes. So you tried my pokemon translator, didn’t you? Quite an ingenious idea, if I do say so myself. You see, people can interpret what pokemon say when they talk, but it only works from trainer to pokemon. You can’t understand Alakazam because he’s not your pokemon. However, I managed to program a device that takes in pokemon speech and translates it into whatever language necessary; in this case, English. However, the coding process was quite taxing and I could only make one for Alakazam. It’s good, though, because he is my assistant and I can’t always come to the door when people arrive.” Randall hit a button on the wall and a console rose out of the floor. Inside it was three pokeballs. “Well, Nathan, the time has come. Please inspect these three pokemon and find the one that suits you the most.”

Nathan moved forward, trembling with excitement. He picked up the first pokeball, felt its weight in his hand, and threw it. Out from it sprang a little, green, four-legged pokemon. “The grass pokemon: Chikorita,” said Randall. The little green pokemon ran to hide behind the professor’s leg when it saw Nathan. “Don’t worry, she’s a little shy. Go on, Chikorita, say hi to Nathan.” But Chikorita refused and stayed back.

“Return!” said Nathan, pointing the pokeball at Chikorita. It was sucked into the pokeball. Nathan frowned and placed it back. Then he picked up the next two pokeballs and decided to throw them both to save time. Out came a dinosaur-like blue pokemon and a mouse-like blue pokemon.

“The water pokemon: Tododile, and the fire pokemon: Cyndaquil,” said Randall. The two pokemon looked at each other and started wrestling.

“Hey, HEY, HEY!!!!!” shouted Randall. “Break it up, you two!” The professor picked up Cyndaquil and Nathan picked up Tododile. Tododile bit Nathan’s arm, leaped away from him, and started running around in circles. Nathan picked up Tododile’s ball and returned him.

“Professor, he bit me!” Nathan showed the bite mark to Randall.

“No problem,” he said. Cyndaquil jumped out of his arms and landed on Nathan’s face.

“Well,” Nathan started, voice muffled by the clinging Cyndaquil. “I guess I’ll haff take you becuvv you havn’t done anyfing wong yet.” Cyndaquil made a happy noise and jumped off. Nathan took a gasp of air and picked up the pokeball. “Cyndaquil, return!” Nathan minimized the ball by pressing the button in the center and he clipped it to his belt.

“Congratulations on your journey’s beginning, Nathan,” said the professor. He handed Nathan a backpack. “Inside this is your Pokedex, a reference tool for you that analyzes pokemon you come across, and five pokeballs. Now you should run home. You’re supposed to leave after lunch. I’m sure you’ll want to say goodbye to your friends and parents.”

“Thank you very much Professor!” Nathan ran to one of the doors, up the stairs, and out of the lab.


Running around the corner of the Jacobson’s house, he bumped into Samantha, who was walking to the lab. They bumped heads and then fell to the ground. Nathan rolled onto his back and then sat up. Samantha was shaking her head and was on all fours. Nathan groaned and said, “Sorry about that. I didn’t see you.”
Samantha turned to Nathan and asked, “Where were you headed in such a hurry?”

“I just finished seeing the professor,” he started. “I need to get home before lunch, so I decided to run.” He laughed. “I guess I should have looked where I was going…”

Samantha stood up, dusting herself off. “It’s okay. My dad had said you went to the lab and I decided to go say hi. What were you--? Oh…” Samantha eyed the backpack Nathan had slung around his left shoulder.

“What is it?” Nathan asked. He was confused; Sam wasn’t looking at him anymore. She just looked at everything else. “Did I do something wrong?”

“What?” Samantha said, startled, at least Nathan thought. “No, no, no… it’s… I should go home and put some ice on my head. She turned around and walked back to the front door.

“But,” Nathan started. “Okay… Bye!” He called after her, but she just waved over her shoulder. “Why are girls so strange?” he muttered to himself. Sticking his right arm through the backpack, he continued running home.

By the time he got home, he had replaced all worrisome thoughts of Samantha out of his head and was overloading his brain with worries about his upcoming journey. What would he have to pack, when would he be able to return home, if his parents would miss him… Nathan clambered up his front steps, reached for the doorknob, turned the handle and…

“SURPRI-I-ISE!!!!” A wall of sound startled Nathan as his parents yelled their greeting! Nathan moved inside, astonished. The house was decorated party-style. Growlithe jumped up and licked Nathan’s face.

“Okay, boy, hello, yes, down, down, okay!” Nathan got Growlithe off of him.

“Hi, Sweetie!” Lucy said brightly “Professor Darrell called when you left his house. We decided we had enough time to get a party set up for you.”

“Yeah, I even got off work early when I told them about this.” Xzavyer said, putting his hand on his son’s head. “Congratulations, Nathan! I’ve looked forward to this day since you were born.”
Nathan was so overwhelmed… The only question he could ask was, “But I had a party on my birthday… why one now?”
Nathan’s parents looked at each other. They smiled. “Well, we had one more present that we decided to hold off on giving to you until today.” Nathan’s mom said. “Here, give me your backpack and I’ll go get it for you.”

Nathan handed his mom his pack. He went over to the couch and sat down. Xzavyer sat next to him. “So, what kind of pokemon did you pick out?”
“A Cyndaquil,” Nathan said.

“So, taking a liking to the fire-type, eh?” Xzavyer said, laughing and leaning back. He got a nostalgic look as he looked to the ceiling. “I remember I took Cyndaquil when I was starting my journey. They’re tough little pokemon. I’ve always liked fire-types. I’ve told you the story behind Growlithe, right?”

“Yes,” Nathan said. His father would sometimes lapse into memory and tell stories of his days as a trainer. Growlithe was one of his favorite pokemon, but since he caught it at the end of his journey, he decided not to evolve it yet and keep it as a house pet when he returned home. Growlithe heard that he was being talked about and jumped around happily. “You know the funny thing,” Nathan said. “I took Cyndaquil because he was the nicest to me.” Nathan pulled out his pokeball and brought Cyndaquil. The little fire pokemon came out and sat on the coffee table.

“Hello, little fellow!” Nathan’s dad said, patting Cyndaquil on the head.

“Is that a Cyndaquil?” Lucy’s voice emanated from the stairs. “Oh, you’re just like your father Nathan.” Lucy came down the stairs holding a full backpack. She handed it to Nathan. “There you go. Everything you need for your journey from now until you’re able to come back home again.”

“Is this my gift?” asked Nathan.

“No, this is,” his father said, sitting up and pulling a key out of his back pocket.

Nathan took the key and looked at it. “This looks like the key to the closet over by the door…”

“That’s because it is,” Xzavyer said. “Go and open it.”

Nathan looked at his father and got up. He went over to the closet, put the key in, and turned it, opening the lock. He peeked inside. “OH, WOW!” Nathan shouted, throwing the door open. Inside was a brand new, collapsible bicycle. Nathan was astonished. These things were rather expensive. “How did you guys afford this?” he asked his parents.

Xzavyer shrugged and smiled. “Well, one of the guys at work… his uncle owns the bike shop, so he got me this for you.”

Nathan ran over and hugged his parents. Lucy said, “Now good eat some lunch. You’re gonna leave in half an hour.”


The sun had reached its high point over New Bark Town. The Teralis family and the Jacobsons were standing outside, watching Nathan practice putting his bike together. When he had successfully put together and taken apart his bike a few times, he was ready. Climbing on his bike, he looked back at the group of people who were seeing him off. Nathan’s parents looked at him proudly. With tears in her eyes, Nathan’s mom said, “Bye, Honey! We’ll miss you! Have a safe journey!”

Nathan’s father said. “Be sure to come back and visit us as soon as you can! Go out there and surpass me in every way!”

Nathan looked at the Jacobsons. Professor Randall said in his usual mysterious way, “I sense your potential, boy. Good luck!”

“Take good care of your pokemon and fill up that Pokedex! It’s your key to survival. Well, not really… Just have fun out there. Bye!” Professor Darrell laughed and waved.

“Bye, Nate.” Samantha sounded really hurt when she spoke.

“Don’t worry, Sam. I’ll return again,” Nathan reassured. But Sam didn’t look back up at him. Fighting back tears he said, “Goodbye everyone!” He placed his feet on the pedals and sped down the road. Nathan looked back at his friends and family, wishing him luck on his journey. Then, he faced forward and accelerated, eager to reach the first stop on his journey; the nearby Cherrygrove City.


He was probably a mile away from home when he heard a song coming from his backpack. He stopped his bike and reached in the backpack. The song came from a cell phone. He opened it up and said, “Hello?”

“Hi, Nathan!” It was his mom.

“Hi, Mom! What is it?” Nathan asked.

“Well, your father and I wanted to warn you about staying out at night. Always try to reach a Pokemon Center by sundown. Because--.”

“Yes, Mom, I know. It’s not safe,” said Nathan. “I’ll try to reach Cherrygrove soon.”

“Okay, thanks. We love you Nathan,” his mom said.

“I love you too,” said Nathan. “Bye.” Nathan began to close the phone.

“Oh, Nathan?” Lucy spoke again. Nathan reopened the phone. “Your father says to remember everything he taught you. He says it will help you.”

“Okay Mom. Bye!” Nathan closed the phone, stuck it in his pocket and biked off.


“Okay Mom. Bye!” Nathan’s voice came through the speaker. Lucy closed the phone and held it close.

“I still think that 10 years old is too young to send a child off to be on their own in the adult world.” Lucy said, worried.

“Don’t worry, Dear,” Xzavyer said. “I’ve taught him the ropes of training. He’ll do fine. Now the Jacobsons are coming over. We need to talk about what I saw at the burned forest this morning.”

There was a knock at the door. Xzavyer went to it and opened it up. Darrell Jacobson came in through the door, followed by Randall. “Hello,” Darrell said. “We should try and be brief. We left Sam on a video conference with her mother, so she’ll be distracted for a while.”

“Yes,” said Randall. “Do tell us why you asked us over.”

“Have a seat, please.” Xzavyer gestured to the living room, and the four adults took various seats on the couches. Xzavyer pulled out his briefcase and set it on the coffee table. “Okay, you remember what was on the news this morning? About the forest scarring by Violet City?” he asked as he pulled pictures out of his briefcase. “Now, we don’t know what could have produced that, but we know what did happen to the forest…”