In a different time, in a different place, there was a child.
This was unusual, not because of the existence of the child in general – as was previously established, children were fairly common – but because of where the child was. She lived in a Pokemon shelter, the only other human inhabits of which was a newlywed couple that, to put it delicately, had not been expecting children when she came along.
The child was standoffish, but not quiet, tending toward violent outbursts as often as hiding and hoping nobody could see her.
This, too, was unusual, as that particular combination of traits made her a rarity among her peers. That was not the only reason she stood out, but it certainly didn’t help.
Though she lived in a house full of injured and recovering Pokemon, the child had none of her own.
This was not, in fact, unusual. The child had not yet turned 10 years old, though she would very soon. As one of the minimum requirements for a trainer’s license was being at least 10, she wasn’t allowed to handle Pokemon on a professional level, though most people turned a blind eye to the friendly, unofficial battles that the younger children got up to.
The child’s name was Mel, and on the morning of her 10th birthday, she woke up from a dream that had her tossing and turning. With her pillowcase dampened by sweat, Mel sat up, rubbing at her eyes, trying to recall the details. Though they were rapidly disappearing from her head, Mel could remember a few things: a Ditto, a Mew, someone in a gray uniform, a woman wearing a purple coat…
Then it was gone. It didn’t bother Mel; she always had weird dreams on nights after her mom told her stories about the Mew-child.
A Doduo crowed in stereo from the yard behind the shelter. His name was Blitz, and he’d been with the shelter for as long as Mel could remember. Mel had long since learned to dread his daily morning alarm, because as soon as he was awake, almost everyone else in the shelter would be waking up too.
Then Mel felt it: a dull pressure that surrounded her mind like an ocean, ebbing and flowing but inexorably making its way further and further inwards. It carried with it a familiar ache, composed of the pain and happiness and anger and sadness of everyone nearby. Not all of it was bad, but there was just so much…
Mel screwed her eyes shut and tried to force it all down. Her psychic powers weren’t new, and they had always been, well, a headache, since she couldn’t turn them off. Her parents had no psychic powers of their own, and all they’d been able to do for her had been to get advice from some of the practitioners in Saffron. With their help, Mel was learning to dampen the effects somewhat, but it was a slow process. In the meantime, though, there was at least the aspirin that her parents let her keep next to her bed. Mel swallowed one of the pills, hoping it would take the edge off soon, and rose.
Making her way to the kitchen for breakfast required Mel to avoid a group of three Pichu that were making a spirited attempt at gnawing through a power cable; in the kitchen itself was a Gulpin, the only one of its kind Mel had ever seen, trying to pry open the refrigerator. As Mel sat with a bowl of cereal, a Natu hopped from one side of the table to the other, its wide, unblinking eyes fixated on hers. A Growlithe and a Meowth tumbled past, tussling with each other, nearly colliding with her legs.
All in all, it was a typical morning – the kind that made Mel thankful she was about to leave the house to go to school.
‘School’, in this case, referred to Fuchsia Elementary, within walking distance of the Rylan Family Pokemon Shelter. The wind bit at Mel through her jacket; her parents hadn’t yet had the opportunity to get her a new one after a Slugma slept on it. Mel didn’t mind, though – the air was fresh and cool, a nice change of pace from her house’s stuffy atmosphere, which had impressed upon her the indelible odor of countless Pokemon.
As Mel walked, other students hurried past her, none of them pausing to give her even the slightest glance; to nearly everyone else in her grade, Mel was “that weird girl in ratty clothes.” It didn’t help that Mel had hit her growth spurt early and had been a head taller than everyone else for over a year. It was almost paradoxical: her size, her clothes, the smell of Pokemon on her, all made Mel stand out, and all she got for it was to be ignored almost wholly.
Almost.
A spike of malice pierced the fog of emotions that washed through her mind. Mel lifted her head. She was nearly at the school gates, and waiting for her there were…
They were in her grade; she never cared enough to remember their names, but she knew who they were. There were three of them, all boys; they looked to be roughly the same size, but to Mel, everyone at school was shorter than she was anyway. Two of them were twins, with identical scraggly haircuts and pristine uniforms; the third, the leader, was stocky and had a buzzcut so close to his head that he was nearly bald. His otherwise flawless face was marred by a misaligned nose, from the one fight he’d been in where anyone had managed to land a punch on him.
Without their names, Mel had mentally nicknamed them Twin 1 and Twin 2 (though which one was which varied based on the day) and Cueball.
“Do you smell something?” Twin 1 asked in a sing-song lilt.
“Meowth musk, isn’t it?” said Twin 2 with a gap-toothed sneer.
“Naw, I think it’s Spearow poop.”
“You’re crazy. It’s gotta be the Meowth.”
“Spearow!”
“Meowth!”
“Hey, hey,” Cueball said, holding up his hands. “Shut up. That’s not very nice of you, is it? All it is is Melanie. That’s all. She can’t help that she stinks, right?”
“Or that her clothes are nasty,” Twin 2 said.
“Right,” Cueball continued with a leery grin. “So let’s leave her alone, huh?”
Mel rolled her eyes. She knew better than to take Cueball’s words at face value.
“So how’s it going today, Melanie?” Cueball asked.
“I don’t wanna talk to you.” Mel held tight to the straps of her backpack and began to walk past them. “I’m going to class.”
The twins stood in her way, blocking the gate. “Leaving so quick?” Twin 1 asked.
“We’re just trying to be friendly,” added Twin 2.
Mel shoved through them, and her size gave it some added oomph. “I don’t care what you’re trying to do,” she said. “Stay outta my way.”
“Well, isn’t that a shame.” Cueball punctuated his sentence by cracking his knuckles. “Here we are, all nice and everything, and this is how you treat us. I guess we gotta teach you some manners.”
“Of course you do.” Mel rolled her eyes and let a breath stream out through her teeth. It always went the same with them. No matter what she said, they’d find some excuse to start trading blows. And so Mel fell back on the only thing that worked.
She ran.
Cueball and the twins hadn’t always paid that much attention to her. For a while, they’d ignored her entirely in favor of smaller targets. But as more and more people in their year turned 10, got their license, and left school to go on their own gym challenges, the number of potential victims dwindled. Their class was barely half as big as it had been at the beginning of the year, and the threat of Cueball turning his gaze on her was almost incentive enough for Mel to want a license of her own, in spite of her general dislike of being around Pokemon.
Running at full speed, Mel easily outpaced Cueball and the twins, who were reduced to bracing themselves against their knees and panting before they’d even made it two blocks. Mel didn’t stop. It wasn’t the first time she’d missed a day of school; sometimes the thought of sitting in a class with them, with everyone, all of their emotions pressing down on her, and then going home to a crowd of Pokemon with no rest in between… it exhausted her. And she had a place she liked to go.
Route 15, east of town, was a popular hangout for all kinds of trainers. Bird keepers liked the wide open area for letting their flying Pokemon stretch their wings; bikers enjoyed the long stretches of unobstructed land for building up speed. Beginning trainers, often accompanied by their teachers, often congregated closer to the gatehouse. On top of that, some of the Pokemon found there couldn’t be found anywhere else – and there were rumors that, on clear days, Articuno could be seen flying far overhead.
Mel intended to avoid all of them. By hopping the fence that lined the footpath, she could disappear into the trees, where no trainers ventured. She nestled herself in the crook of a sturdy branch and sighed as the oppressive weight surrounding her mind receded. She could still sense a few other presences here and there, but they were just Pokemon passing by, not bothering her.
A squeak rose from the base of the tree. Mel looked down. A small, pinkish-purple Pokemon with no definite shape stared back at her. It wasn’t a type of Pokemon she’d seen before, and all she was getting from its mind was curiosity. “Keep moving,” she growled, and either the Pokemon didn’t understand or it just didn’t care. Mel looked back up to the canopy and crossed her arms. Not any business of mine whatever it does.
Just as Mel was beginning to doze off, she felt a sudden pressure on her belly. Her eyes shot open. The blobby Pokemon had scaled the tree and landed on top of her. It kept its blank stare fixed on her, but before Mel could even lift a hand to shoo it away, it began to… change.
Mel frowned. She’d seen a lot of the Pokemon that lived in the area before, as well as the stranger ones that passed through the shelter. She was somewhat familiar with what they could do, and she knew that they evolved into other Pokemon when they got stronger, but this one was doing something different than evolution. Its entire body was twisting and turning in on itself, and in the blink of an eye, it had turned completely into… a smaller Mel, the same size the creature had started as, resting on top of her. It stuck out its tongue.
“That is…” Mel started before faltering. She wasn’t quite sure what she had expected it to do, but that hadn’t been it. Her mind shuffled through several different ways to finish her sentence – “weird,” “scary,” “eerie” – before she landed on “pretty cool.”
The creature let out a happy squeak.
The hours passed quickly, and as the sun began to set, Mel dropped from the tree and wandered home, and the bubblegum-colored creature followed at her heels every step of the way.
***
“Subject Mel. Do you mean to tell me that the only reason you have your Ditto in the first place is because it made a funny face at you? How… embarrassingly like you. Fitting that these memories should fade just as easily.”
There was a stab of pain, and the world around her faded to white.
***
Unlike nearly every other person in her year, Mel did not get her trainer’s license the day she turned 10. It took her parents several months to convince her that, in order to train her newfound Ditto in any official capacity, she had to be licensed. By the time she passed the trainer’s exam, most of her classmates who had gone on gym challenges had come back, having given up after running into particularly tough gyms two or three badges in. As it ended up, Mel was the only one among her peers to get a trainer’s license and not even attempt a gym challenge – she was happy enough just hanging out with her Ditto, who she named Repeat because “that’s a good name for something that copies things, right?”.
At least, that was the case for roughly five years.
Mel’s family attended the Venomoth Festival, a celebration of one of the most iconic Pokemon native to Fuchsia, every year, and the highlight was always the tournament that closed the ceremonies; the victor won the right to challenge Koga directly without having to navigate his gym.
That had been the case for as long as Mel could remember, so it caught her by surprise when, at her fifteenth Venomoth Festival, they announced a change. “No tournament this year,” the announcers had said. “Koga’s being promoted up to the Elite Four.”
There had been rumors, of course, that Koga was destined for bigger and better things. The Elite Four was in a state of upheaval: Lorelei returned to her home in the Sevii Islands, Agatha retired, and the champion disappeared into the depths of Mount Silver. The only members left were Bruno and Lance. Word was that they’d already lined up a few accomplished trainers to pad their roster back out, and that one of them was a certain poison-type gym leader.
Taking Koga’s place as gym leader was his daughter, Janine, though she hadn’t officially stepped into the role yet. The Venomoth Festival’s announcers had said that, taking the place of the tournament, there would be a special ceremony dedicated to swearing her in. It took place at the same location as the tournament, Mel noticed, with the only difference being that they’d sprung for nicer planks of wood to form the makeshift stage. She sat to the side of the audience, avoiding the crowd, with Repeat on her shoulder.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” one of the two announcers called, “please welcome to the stage… the new leader of the Fuchsia Gym! Janine!” The crowd erupted into applause as Janine stepped up.
Mel winced and closed her eyes at the sudden wave of excitement that washed over her, but it wasn’t as bad as it had been in the past. She’d learned about tamping her powers down so that they didn’t overwhelm her, and it almost felt to her like they’d gotten more manageable with age anyway. She let out a breath and opened her eyes, then felt her heart skip a beat. “Oh no,” she whispered, “she’s cute.”
“What was that, boss?” Repeat asked. In the five years since they’d met, Mel had gotten all right at deciphering what he meant when he spoke, though sometimes it still proved difficult.
“Nothing,” Mel said, clearing her throat. “Just thinking that I’d never actually seen her before. Heard her name lots though. Now shush, or else we’ll miss the ceremony.”
“Why are you so interested in—”
“I said shush!”
The ceremony passed without incident, with Koga himself taking the stage to swear Janine in and hand her the official gym badge, the one that all gym leaders kept on them as proof of their occupation. The last event of the festival, per tradition, was a closing speech by the gym leader, and Janine took the microphone with relish, though Mel could still feel nervous tension edging in.
“It’s an honor to be standing here as your new gym leader, everyone,” Janine said. “My dad has left some big shoes to fill, but I intend to be every bit the challenge he was. So, to prove myself…” She paused. “I’ll battle one volunteer. Right now. And if they beat me, they get a Soul Badge. No questions asked, no need to challenge the gym.” Another pause, then she smiled. “Any takers?”
Mel’s hand was in the air before she even knew what she was doing.
“Boss?” Repeat hissed, his eyes wide. “What—why?!”
“Um…” said Mel. She wasn’t sure herself. “Worth a shot?”
“There!” Janine said, pointing at Mel. “There’s our challenger! Come on up!” Mel took the stage, brushing herself off, and Janine clapped a hand on her shoulder, making her heart jump. “And what’s your name?”
“Melanie Rylan,” Mel said, standing stock-straight.
Janine grinned. “Hey hey hey! Looks like our challenger comes to us from the Rylan Family Pokemon Shelter! Well then, Melanie Rylan, are you ready for a battle?”
“As I’ll ever be.” Letting Repeat crawl down into her arms, Mel retreated to the challenger’s side of the stage. She tossed Repeat into the center. “Let’s get it done, Repeat!”
“Oh, a Ditto! A Pokemon worthy of a ninja master!” said Janine, twirling a Pokeball on her fingertip. “In that case… Venomoth, time to shine!” Her Venomoth likewise appeared in the center of the arena, towering about Repeat.
“Repeat! Transform!” Mel called, and Repeat immediately began twisting and changing his shape—
“Bug Buzz!”
A shrieking whine tore across the stage, driving Mel to her knees as she clapped her ears to her head. She’d never heard anything like it, and on top of how much it made her want to drive nails into her eardrums on the ground that it could scarcely feel worse, she also got a crashing wave of pain from the heads of everyone else in the audience. And that wasn’t even aimed at me, she thought, using the exercises she’d learned to try and dampen the pain in her head. Imagine how much worse that would have been if I were the one getting attacked. Mel shook her head to clear her thoughts, but when she rose to her feet, she saw that it didn’t matter: Repeat had collapsed almost immediately.
“That’s one down,” Janine said. “You can send out your next Pokemon any time.”
“I, uh… That’s it. I just have Repeat.”
Janine blinked. “Oh. Well… I guess that’s that, then. Um, good match?”
As the crowd dispersed, Mel knelt at Repeat’s side. “Hey, buddy,” she whispered, “you okay?”
Repeat grunted something that Mel didn’t know how to translate directly, but she figured meant something along the lines of “I’ll survive.” Mel picked him up. “Maybe next time,” he groaned, “we train some before you try to take on a gym.”
“Don’t worry, Repeat,” Mel said. “I don’t think I have much of a taste for it.”
***
“You tried to challenge a gym leader with only one Pokemon that you never trained? Subject Mel, you are significantly more foolhardy than I could have ever imagined. Oh well. Let us move on.”
Another sharp pain, and the memory faded out.
***
Darkness. Darkness surrounded her. She could feel nothing, see nothing, hear nothing. Complete and total emptiness. She screamed out, but her voice wouldn’t leave her throat. She couldn’t move—
***
“Subject Mel, what memory could that have possibly been? You should thank me for getting rid of that one for you. We will pick up further on.”
***
“Repeat,” Mel murmured, “get the used Escape Rope out of my bag and come this way very quietly, okay?”
It had been three years since Mel first met Janine. In the time since, Mel had watched several of Janine’s battles – not only had she trained herself to not fall over at the slightest hint of a Bug Buzz, she’d also realized something.
She could help Pokemon.
Mel still didn’t like being cooped up at home. It was crowded, and the less said about how often she’d stepped in Zubat guano the better. But, after having Repeat with her for eight years, Mel knew that it wasn’t the fault of the Pokemon. Watching Janine’s battles had taught Mel what it felt like when Pokemon sparred with each other – and, more importantly, how different it felt from when Pokemon were genuinely injured or abused.
On the morning of her eighteenth birthday, Mel begged her parents to let her get out in the field. Her psychic powers, she argued, though they weren’t as strong as they used to be, would let her track and locate hurt Pokemon that she could then bring back to the shelter.
Her parents, after checking that Mel hadn’t been replaced with a Pokemon-loving evil duplicate of some kind, heartily agreed.
That was how Mel found herself climbing Mount Moon and, while on the trail of a Paras with only one working eye, had fallen into a Clefable nest. No fewer than three Clefable were staring at her, though none of them had yet to make a move. Repeat inched around the perimeter of the crater, holding a coil of rope. Silph Co. had managed to infuse simple man-made items with the properties of Pokemon attacks, leading to the development of the Escape Rope – a single use item that, when activated, used Teleport. Afterwards, it couldn’t be used again, though it still served just fine as a piece of rope.
“Great,” whispered Mel. “Now drop it to me.”
“You got it, boss.” Repeat dropped one end of the rope into the crater.
Mel grabbed it and tugged on it, testing whether it would hold her weight, then began inching her way up towards Repeat.
One of the Clefable raised its hand. Mel stopped in her tracks, not daring to take a breath. With a wag of its finger, the rope was neatly bisected, and Mel slid back down into the center of the nest.
“Boss!” Repeat yelled as he hurled himself down into the crater. “Don’t worry, boss! I’ll protect you!”
The resulting maelstrom of Moonblasts was visible all the way from Pewter City.
After what felt like an eternity, the Clefable threw Mel and Repeat, both battered and bruised, out of their nest. The rock that formed Mount Moon wasn’t what Mel would have called comfortable, but it was better than getting the daylights beaten out of her.
“See, boss?” Repeat asked weakly, lying next to her. “I told you I’d protect you.”
Despite it all, Mel couldn’t stop herself from laughing.
***
“Subject Mel. What is this? Every memory I’ve seen of yours is one in which you lose, or you run away. You lose, or you run. Why, Subject Mel? Why do you continue, even in the face of so much… failure? Have you ever succeeded? Where are your victories? And if there are none, why do you continue to interfere? Why can you not learn this one simple lesson?!”
The pain, now familiar, returned, and the memory disappeared into light.
“Now, Subject Mel—huh? Who are you? What are you doing here?... Must I do everything myself?... Wha—no! Attack me if you must, but I forbid you from also attacking the subject, especially with a psychic attack! This is a very delicate procedure, and we cannot afford error!”
The light grew ever brighter, more than she had ever seen before, searing through her eyes directly into her head. The pain extended past her mind, coursing through her entire body, and she had the sensation of something… changing.
Mel opened her eyes. She saw… someone. And someone else. One of them wore a gray uniform with a red ‘R’ on it, and the other wore an off-white robe. She frowned. Something about that seemed important, but she couldn’t remember what. Next to the second someone, there was a Pokemon, purple and star-shaped, with a gemstone in the center.
The one in the gray uniform ran out of the room, chasing the one in the robe and the star-shaped Pokemon. A second Pokemon, blue-gray and adorned with red jewels, followed them out. There was only one other Pokemon in the room, a small pinkish-purple blob, and it didn’t seem to be watching her.
Then, footsteps. Another figure Mel didn’t recognize dashed in. This one wore a trench coat that was too big for them and a pair of glasses that obscured the better part of their face. “Ah, there’s Repeat,” the intruder muttered. “But where’s Mel?”
Mel almost volunteered her position, but she thought better of it. No idea who this person is, after all, she thought.
“I can’t waste time,” they continued. “If Mel were here, I’d ask to borrow Repeat… argh, I’ll have to borrow him anyway! When I find her, I’ll tell her that this repays the favors I’ve done for her!” They picked up the last Pokemon in the room and disappeared.
Mel watched them go. I wonder who that was. Were they looking for me? My name’s Mel, but maybe they were looking for someone different. She hopped down from her chair. Her memories were fragmented, and she could only recall so much about who she was, but she was reasonably certain that she used to be taller, and that getting out of a chair didn’t involve jumping to the floor.
I feel so… weird, Mel thought. Her head felt empty, not just because she couldn’t remember so much – some sense or something was gone, though she couldn’t figure out what it had been. She looked at her hands.
She didn’t have hands, per se – just purplish pseudopods. It wasn’t right, she knew that much, but she could barely remember why, and when she looked herself over more fully, she realized that she looked just like the Pokemon that the intruder had taken with them.
The word ‘Ditto’ filled her mind.
This was unusual, not because of the existence of the child in general – as was previously established, children were fairly common – but because of where the child was. She lived in a Pokemon shelter, the only other human inhabits of which was a newlywed couple that, to put it delicately, had not been expecting children when she came along.
The child was standoffish, but not quiet, tending toward violent outbursts as often as hiding and hoping nobody could see her.
This, too, was unusual, as that particular combination of traits made her a rarity among her peers. That was not the only reason she stood out, but it certainly didn’t help.
Though she lived in a house full of injured and recovering Pokemon, the child had none of her own.
This was not, in fact, unusual. The child had not yet turned 10 years old, though she would very soon. As one of the minimum requirements for a trainer’s license was being at least 10, she wasn’t allowed to handle Pokemon on a professional level, though most people turned a blind eye to the friendly, unofficial battles that the younger children got up to.
The child’s name was Mel, and on the morning of her 10th birthday, she woke up from a dream that had her tossing and turning. With her pillowcase dampened by sweat, Mel sat up, rubbing at her eyes, trying to recall the details. Though they were rapidly disappearing from her head, Mel could remember a few things: a Ditto, a Mew, someone in a gray uniform, a woman wearing a purple coat…
Then it was gone. It didn’t bother Mel; she always had weird dreams on nights after her mom told her stories about the Mew-child.
A Doduo crowed in stereo from the yard behind the shelter. His name was Blitz, and he’d been with the shelter for as long as Mel could remember. Mel had long since learned to dread his daily morning alarm, because as soon as he was awake, almost everyone else in the shelter would be waking up too.
Then Mel felt it: a dull pressure that surrounded her mind like an ocean, ebbing and flowing but inexorably making its way further and further inwards. It carried with it a familiar ache, composed of the pain and happiness and anger and sadness of everyone nearby. Not all of it was bad, but there was just so much…
Mel screwed her eyes shut and tried to force it all down. Her psychic powers weren’t new, and they had always been, well, a headache, since she couldn’t turn them off. Her parents had no psychic powers of their own, and all they’d been able to do for her had been to get advice from some of the practitioners in Saffron. With their help, Mel was learning to dampen the effects somewhat, but it was a slow process. In the meantime, though, there was at least the aspirin that her parents let her keep next to her bed. Mel swallowed one of the pills, hoping it would take the edge off soon, and rose.
Making her way to the kitchen for breakfast required Mel to avoid a group of three Pichu that were making a spirited attempt at gnawing through a power cable; in the kitchen itself was a Gulpin, the only one of its kind Mel had ever seen, trying to pry open the refrigerator. As Mel sat with a bowl of cereal, a Natu hopped from one side of the table to the other, its wide, unblinking eyes fixated on hers. A Growlithe and a Meowth tumbled past, tussling with each other, nearly colliding with her legs.
All in all, it was a typical morning – the kind that made Mel thankful she was about to leave the house to go to school.
‘School’, in this case, referred to Fuchsia Elementary, within walking distance of the Rylan Family Pokemon Shelter. The wind bit at Mel through her jacket; her parents hadn’t yet had the opportunity to get her a new one after a Slugma slept on it. Mel didn’t mind, though – the air was fresh and cool, a nice change of pace from her house’s stuffy atmosphere, which had impressed upon her the indelible odor of countless Pokemon.
As Mel walked, other students hurried past her, none of them pausing to give her even the slightest glance; to nearly everyone else in her grade, Mel was “that weird girl in ratty clothes.” It didn’t help that Mel had hit her growth spurt early and had been a head taller than everyone else for over a year. It was almost paradoxical: her size, her clothes, the smell of Pokemon on her, all made Mel stand out, and all she got for it was to be ignored almost wholly.
Almost.
A spike of malice pierced the fog of emotions that washed through her mind. Mel lifted her head. She was nearly at the school gates, and waiting for her there were…
They were in her grade; she never cared enough to remember their names, but she knew who they were. There were three of them, all boys; they looked to be roughly the same size, but to Mel, everyone at school was shorter than she was anyway. Two of them were twins, with identical scraggly haircuts and pristine uniforms; the third, the leader, was stocky and had a buzzcut so close to his head that he was nearly bald. His otherwise flawless face was marred by a misaligned nose, from the one fight he’d been in where anyone had managed to land a punch on him.
Without their names, Mel had mentally nicknamed them Twin 1 and Twin 2 (though which one was which varied based on the day) and Cueball.
“Do you smell something?” Twin 1 asked in a sing-song lilt.
“Meowth musk, isn’t it?” said Twin 2 with a gap-toothed sneer.
“Naw, I think it’s Spearow poop.”
“You’re crazy. It’s gotta be the Meowth.”
“Spearow!”
“Meowth!”
“Hey, hey,” Cueball said, holding up his hands. “Shut up. That’s not very nice of you, is it? All it is is Melanie. That’s all. She can’t help that she stinks, right?”
“Or that her clothes are nasty,” Twin 2 said.
“Right,” Cueball continued with a leery grin. “So let’s leave her alone, huh?”
Mel rolled her eyes. She knew better than to take Cueball’s words at face value.
“So how’s it going today, Melanie?” Cueball asked.
“I don’t wanna talk to you.” Mel held tight to the straps of her backpack and began to walk past them. “I’m going to class.”
The twins stood in her way, blocking the gate. “Leaving so quick?” Twin 1 asked.
“We’re just trying to be friendly,” added Twin 2.
Mel shoved through them, and her size gave it some added oomph. “I don’t care what you’re trying to do,” she said. “Stay outta my way.”
“Well, isn’t that a shame.” Cueball punctuated his sentence by cracking his knuckles. “Here we are, all nice and everything, and this is how you treat us. I guess we gotta teach you some manners.”
“Of course you do.” Mel rolled her eyes and let a breath stream out through her teeth. It always went the same with them. No matter what she said, they’d find some excuse to start trading blows. And so Mel fell back on the only thing that worked.
She ran.
Cueball and the twins hadn’t always paid that much attention to her. For a while, they’d ignored her entirely in favor of smaller targets. But as more and more people in their year turned 10, got their license, and left school to go on their own gym challenges, the number of potential victims dwindled. Their class was barely half as big as it had been at the beginning of the year, and the threat of Cueball turning his gaze on her was almost incentive enough for Mel to want a license of her own, in spite of her general dislike of being around Pokemon.
Running at full speed, Mel easily outpaced Cueball and the twins, who were reduced to bracing themselves against their knees and panting before they’d even made it two blocks. Mel didn’t stop. It wasn’t the first time she’d missed a day of school; sometimes the thought of sitting in a class with them, with everyone, all of their emotions pressing down on her, and then going home to a crowd of Pokemon with no rest in between… it exhausted her. And she had a place she liked to go.
Route 15, east of town, was a popular hangout for all kinds of trainers. Bird keepers liked the wide open area for letting their flying Pokemon stretch their wings; bikers enjoyed the long stretches of unobstructed land for building up speed. Beginning trainers, often accompanied by their teachers, often congregated closer to the gatehouse. On top of that, some of the Pokemon found there couldn’t be found anywhere else – and there were rumors that, on clear days, Articuno could be seen flying far overhead.
Mel intended to avoid all of them. By hopping the fence that lined the footpath, she could disappear into the trees, where no trainers ventured. She nestled herself in the crook of a sturdy branch and sighed as the oppressive weight surrounding her mind receded. She could still sense a few other presences here and there, but they were just Pokemon passing by, not bothering her.
A squeak rose from the base of the tree. Mel looked down. A small, pinkish-purple Pokemon with no definite shape stared back at her. It wasn’t a type of Pokemon she’d seen before, and all she was getting from its mind was curiosity. “Keep moving,” she growled, and either the Pokemon didn’t understand or it just didn’t care. Mel looked back up to the canopy and crossed her arms. Not any business of mine whatever it does.
Just as Mel was beginning to doze off, she felt a sudden pressure on her belly. Her eyes shot open. The blobby Pokemon had scaled the tree and landed on top of her. It kept its blank stare fixed on her, but before Mel could even lift a hand to shoo it away, it began to… change.
Mel frowned. She’d seen a lot of the Pokemon that lived in the area before, as well as the stranger ones that passed through the shelter. She was somewhat familiar with what they could do, and she knew that they evolved into other Pokemon when they got stronger, but this one was doing something different than evolution. Its entire body was twisting and turning in on itself, and in the blink of an eye, it had turned completely into… a smaller Mel, the same size the creature had started as, resting on top of her. It stuck out its tongue.
“That is…” Mel started before faltering. She wasn’t quite sure what she had expected it to do, but that hadn’t been it. Her mind shuffled through several different ways to finish her sentence – “weird,” “scary,” “eerie” – before she landed on “pretty cool.”
The creature let out a happy squeak.
The hours passed quickly, and as the sun began to set, Mel dropped from the tree and wandered home, and the bubblegum-colored creature followed at her heels every step of the way.
***
“Subject Mel. Do you mean to tell me that the only reason you have your Ditto in the first place is because it made a funny face at you? How… embarrassingly like you. Fitting that these memories should fade just as easily.”
There was a stab of pain, and the world around her faded to white.
***
Unlike nearly every other person in her year, Mel did not get her trainer’s license the day she turned 10. It took her parents several months to convince her that, in order to train her newfound Ditto in any official capacity, she had to be licensed. By the time she passed the trainer’s exam, most of her classmates who had gone on gym challenges had come back, having given up after running into particularly tough gyms two or three badges in. As it ended up, Mel was the only one among her peers to get a trainer’s license and not even attempt a gym challenge – she was happy enough just hanging out with her Ditto, who she named Repeat because “that’s a good name for something that copies things, right?”.
At least, that was the case for roughly five years.
Mel’s family attended the Venomoth Festival, a celebration of one of the most iconic Pokemon native to Fuchsia, every year, and the highlight was always the tournament that closed the ceremonies; the victor won the right to challenge Koga directly without having to navigate his gym.
That had been the case for as long as Mel could remember, so it caught her by surprise when, at her fifteenth Venomoth Festival, they announced a change. “No tournament this year,” the announcers had said. “Koga’s being promoted up to the Elite Four.”
There had been rumors, of course, that Koga was destined for bigger and better things. The Elite Four was in a state of upheaval: Lorelei returned to her home in the Sevii Islands, Agatha retired, and the champion disappeared into the depths of Mount Silver. The only members left were Bruno and Lance. Word was that they’d already lined up a few accomplished trainers to pad their roster back out, and that one of them was a certain poison-type gym leader.
Taking Koga’s place as gym leader was his daughter, Janine, though she hadn’t officially stepped into the role yet. The Venomoth Festival’s announcers had said that, taking the place of the tournament, there would be a special ceremony dedicated to swearing her in. It took place at the same location as the tournament, Mel noticed, with the only difference being that they’d sprung for nicer planks of wood to form the makeshift stage. She sat to the side of the audience, avoiding the crowd, with Repeat on her shoulder.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” one of the two announcers called, “please welcome to the stage… the new leader of the Fuchsia Gym! Janine!” The crowd erupted into applause as Janine stepped up.
Mel winced and closed her eyes at the sudden wave of excitement that washed over her, but it wasn’t as bad as it had been in the past. She’d learned about tamping her powers down so that they didn’t overwhelm her, and it almost felt to her like they’d gotten more manageable with age anyway. She let out a breath and opened her eyes, then felt her heart skip a beat. “Oh no,” she whispered, “she’s cute.”
“What was that, boss?” Repeat asked. In the five years since they’d met, Mel had gotten all right at deciphering what he meant when he spoke, though sometimes it still proved difficult.
“Nothing,” Mel said, clearing her throat. “Just thinking that I’d never actually seen her before. Heard her name lots though. Now shush, or else we’ll miss the ceremony.”
“Why are you so interested in—”
“I said shush!”
The ceremony passed without incident, with Koga himself taking the stage to swear Janine in and hand her the official gym badge, the one that all gym leaders kept on them as proof of their occupation. The last event of the festival, per tradition, was a closing speech by the gym leader, and Janine took the microphone with relish, though Mel could still feel nervous tension edging in.
“It’s an honor to be standing here as your new gym leader, everyone,” Janine said. “My dad has left some big shoes to fill, but I intend to be every bit the challenge he was. So, to prove myself…” She paused. “I’ll battle one volunteer. Right now. And if they beat me, they get a Soul Badge. No questions asked, no need to challenge the gym.” Another pause, then she smiled. “Any takers?”
Mel’s hand was in the air before she even knew what she was doing.
“Boss?” Repeat hissed, his eyes wide. “What—why?!”
“Um…” said Mel. She wasn’t sure herself. “Worth a shot?”
“There!” Janine said, pointing at Mel. “There’s our challenger! Come on up!” Mel took the stage, brushing herself off, and Janine clapped a hand on her shoulder, making her heart jump. “And what’s your name?”
“Melanie Rylan,” Mel said, standing stock-straight.
Janine grinned. “Hey hey hey! Looks like our challenger comes to us from the Rylan Family Pokemon Shelter! Well then, Melanie Rylan, are you ready for a battle?”
“As I’ll ever be.” Letting Repeat crawl down into her arms, Mel retreated to the challenger’s side of the stage. She tossed Repeat into the center. “Let’s get it done, Repeat!”
“Oh, a Ditto! A Pokemon worthy of a ninja master!” said Janine, twirling a Pokeball on her fingertip. “In that case… Venomoth, time to shine!” Her Venomoth likewise appeared in the center of the arena, towering about Repeat.
“Repeat! Transform!” Mel called, and Repeat immediately began twisting and changing his shape—
“Bug Buzz!”
A shrieking whine tore across the stage, driving Mel to her knees as she clapped her ears to her head. She’d never heard anything like it, and on top of how much it made her want to drive nails into her eardrums on the ground that it could scarcely feel worse, she also got a crashing wave of pain from the heads of everyone else in the audience. And that wasn’t even aimed at me, she thought, using the exercises she’d learned to try and dampen the pain in her head. Imagine how much worse that would have been if I were the one getting attacked. Mel shook her head to clear her thoughts, but when she rose to her feet, she saw that it didn’t matter: Repeat had collapsed almost immediately.
“That’s one down,” Janine said. “You can send out your next Pokemon any time.”
“I, uh… That’s it. I just have Repeat.”
Janine blinked. “Oh. Well… I guess that’s that, then. Um, good match?”
As the crowd dispersed, Mel knelt at Repeat’s side. “Hey, buddy,” she whispered, “you okay?”
Repeat grunted something that Mel didn’t know how to translate directly, but she figured meant something along the lines of “I’ll survive.” Mel picked him up. “Maybe next time,” he groaned, “we train some before you try to take on a gym.”
“Don’t worry, Repeat,” Mel said. “I don’t think I have much of a taste for it.”
***
“You tried to challenge a gym leader with only one Pokemon that you never trained? Subject Mel, you are significantly more foolhardy than I could have ever imagined. Oh well. Let us move on.”
Another sharp pain, and the memory faded out.
***
Darkness. Darkness surrounded her. She could feel nothing, see nothing, hear nothing. Complete and total emptiness. She screamed out, but her voice wouldn’t leave her throat. She couldn’t move—
***
“Subject Mel, what memory could that have possibly been? You should thank me for getting rid of that one for you. We will pick up further on.”
***
“Repeat,” Mel murmured, “get the used Escape Rope out of my bag and come this way very quietly, okay?”
It had been three years since Mel first met Janine. In the time since, Mel had watched several of Janine’s battles – not only had she trained herself to not fall over at the slightest hint of a Bug Buzz, she’d also realized something.
She could help Pokemon.
Mel still didn’t like being cooped up at home. It was crowded, and the less said about how often she’d stepped in Zubat guano the better. But, after having Repeat with her for eight years, Mel knew that it wasn’t the fault of the Pokemon. Watching Janine’s battles had taught Mel what it felt like when Pokemon sparred with each other – and, more importantly, how different it felt from when Pokemon were genuinely injured or abused.
On the morning of her eighteenth birthday, Mel begged her parents to let her get out in the field. Her psychic powers, she argued, though they weren’t as strong as they used to be, would let her track and locate hurt Pokemon that she could then bring back to the shelter.
Her parents, after checking that Mel hadn’t been replaced with a Pokemon-loving evil duplicate of some kind, heartily agreed.
That was how Mel found herself climbing Mount Moon and, while on the trail of a Paras with only one working eye, had fallen into a Clefable nest. No fewer than three Clefable were staring at her, though none of them had yet to make a move. Repeat inched around the perimeter of the crater, holding a coil of rope. Silph Co. had managed to infuse simple man-made items with the properties of Pokemon attacks, leading to the development of the Escape Rope – a single use item that, when activated, used Teleport. Afterwards, it couldn’t be used again, though it still served just fine as a piece of rope.
“Great,” whispered Mel. “Now drop it to me.”
“You got it, boss.” Repeat dropped one end of the rope into the crater.
Mel grabbed it and tugged on it, testing whether it would hold her weight, then began inching her way up towards Repeat.
One of the Clefable raised its hand. Mel stopped in her tracks, not daring to take a breath. With a wag of its finger, the rope was neatly bisected, and Mel slid back down into the center of the nest.
“Boss!” Repeat yelled as he hurled himself down into the crater. “Don’t worry, boss! I’ll protect you!”
The resulting maelstrom of Moonblasts was visible all the way from Pewter City.
After what felt like an eternity, the Clefable threw Mel and Repeat, both battered and bruised, out of their nest. The rock that formed Mount Moon wasn’t what Mel would have called comfortable, but it was better than getting the daylights beaten out of her.
“See, boss?” Repeat asked weakly, lying next to her. “I told you I’d protect you.”
Despite it all, Mel couldn’t stop herself from laughing.
***
“Subject Mel. What is this? Every memory I’ve seen of yours is one in which you lose, or you run away. You lose, or you run. Why, Subject Mel? Why do you continue, even in the face of so much… failure? Have you ever succeeded? Where are your victories? And if there are none, why do you continue to interfere? Why can you not learn this one simple lesson?!”
The pain, now familiar, returned, and the memory disappeared into light.
“Now, Subject Mel—huh? Who are you? What are you doing here?... Must I do everything myself?... Wha—no! Attack me if you must, but I forbid you from also attacking the subject, especially with a psychic attack! This is a very delicate procedure, and we cannot afford error!”
The light grew ever brighter, more than she had ever seen before, searing through her eyes directly into her head. The pain extended past her mind, coursing through her entire body, and she had the sensation of something… changing.
Mel opened her eyes. She saw… someone. And someone else. One of them wore a gray uniform with a red ‘R’ on it, and the other wore an off-white robe. She frowned. Something about that seemed important, but she couldn’t remember what. Next to the second someone, there was a Pokemon, purple and star-shaped, with a gemstone in the center.
The one in the gray uniform ran out of the room, chasing the one in the robe and the star-shaped Pokemon. A second Pokemon, blue-gray and adorned with red jewels, followed them out. There was only one other Pokemon in the room, a small pinkish-purple blob, and it didn’t seem to be watching her.
Then, footsteps. Another figure Mel didn’t recognize dashed in. This one wore a trench coat that was too big for them and a pair of glasses that obscured the better part of their face. “Ah, there’s Repeat,” the intruder muttered. “But where’s Mel?”
Mel almost volunteered her position, but she thought better of it. No idea who this person is, after all, she thought.
“I can’t waste time,” they continued. “If Mel were here, I’d ask to borrow Repeat… argh, I’ll have to borrow him anyway! When I find her, I’ll tell her that this repays the favors I’ve done for her!” They picked up the last Pokemon in the room and disappeared.
Mel watched them go. I wonder who that was. Were they looking for me? My name’s Mel, but maybe they were looking for someone different. She hopped down from her chair. Her memories were fragmented, and she could only recall so much about who she was, but she was reasonably certain that she used to be taller, and that getting out of a chair didn’t involve jumping to the floor.
I feel so… weird, Mel thought. Her head felt empty, not just because she couldn’t remember so much – some sense or something was gone, though she couldn’t figure out what it had been. She looked at her hands.
She didn’t have hands, per se – just purplish pseudopods. It wasn’t right, she knew that much, but she could barely remember why, and when she looked herself over more fully, she realized that she looked just like the Pokemon that the intruder had taken with them.
The word ‘Ditto’ filled her mind.