Previously on Touch The Skies...

Ashlynn Ketchum, denied the charmander she scouted for a starter, runs into the forests of Route One in tears. This predictably ends in screams as she's chased by spearow, until she catches a magikarp (for some reason) and is rescued by Misty. Alakazam comes and does the Oak thing of being casually antagonistic, Misty does the Misty thing of schooling Ash in pokemon, and Ash catches a zubat to round off perhaps the worst team to ever pokemon bar those that include more than one rattata. Then, the author vanishes in a whirl of space-time for nine months and abandons you all.

My apologies for the disappearance.

Touch The Skies

Hatchling Arc (0-3)

All Fall Down

"Strong Pokémon, weak Pokémon, that is only the foolish perception of people.

Truly skilled trainers should try to win with their favorites."

- Karen of the Johto Elite Four.

"I just don't see how this is any better."

Growing up, I always imagined training sessions to involve a lot of mind-numbing repetition and the slow, but steady march towards Championship. I expected to have to sit on a log and watch as my charmander spewed piddling flames at the sky over and over until it, I don't know, naturally morphed into a Flamethrower or something. Years of watching my mom go through her morning exercise routine had conditioned me to think that the path towards amazing physical prowess was covered in annoying shrubbery that I had to cut through, one by one, achingly slowly.

This was wrong, apparently. When Misty caught me having Nova fly figure-eights in an attempt to figure out Aerial Ace, she grabbed me by the ear and dragged me towards the lake she found with her water-trainer powers. There, I found her ugly sponge thing furiously trying to tackle her staryu and getting pounded into the – well, not earth. Lakebed? – for it. Misty wasn't bothering with even the façade of attention, having set up a picnic complete with blanket and tiny sandwiches, and reclined against a tree with a paperback embossed with a stylized Suicune.

Standing at the edge of the glade, two pokéballs in hand and only slivers of sunlight peering through the leaves, I was left feeling somewhat out-of-place. The large, densely packed trees formed a natural barrier protecting the lake from invaders, and I felt like a dirty, unexpected house guest at a manor, tracking dirt everywhere but too oblivious to know to leave. It wasn't a feeling I liked, and not for the first time I wanted to shake Misty until all her common courtesy fell out.

An absent wave from her saw me releasing both Mokey and Nova above the lake anyway. For all her abrasive personality, there's still few people in this world I respect more and I'm not arrogant enough to dismiss what she has to teach me. That doesn't mean I won't question her about it, but I can give her the benefit of the doubt.

"I mean…" I motion towards the feebas, who was just knocked clean out by a lazy stream of bubbles. Water pokémon are weird. "I don't think getting beat up is, ah, conducive towards a positive learning environment? It just seems… counter-intuitive…?"

Misty snaps her book closed, the clap echoing across the clearing. I flinch, but she looks contemplative instead of annoyed. "How do I put this…" A pause, and- "Do you know why Professor Rowan focuses on evolution?"

"That's, um, the Sinnoh guy, right?" He's not as famous as Professor Oak, but he's been around almost as long and focuses on more niche mysteries, so he's, like, store-brand Oak? Something like that. "No, not really."

"Well, before he became his region's top researcher, he specialized in moves, instead. Specifically, in ways to improve the power of attacks. In the study that made him famous, he had his prinplup continuously use Water Gun at targets of variable distance and strength, and recorded the rate at which it improved. He'd change all sorts of things to see how it affected the test, like what the pokémon ate the day before, or the density of water in the air, or if it could see the targets or not."

I walk over and kneel down next to her, interested despite the seeming non-sequitur. Nova agrees, fluttering over to curl up on the brim of my hat and chitter happily at me. Maybe he just wants food, though. It's hard to tell.

"The very last variable he tried was in replacing the targets with a volunteer's flock of starly. Imagine his surprise when the prinplup improved so swiftly it evolved into an empoleon before the week was out." Her voice is dry, and I giggle. "The study's been repeated a number of times, and it's been accepted as fact that conflict between two or more pokémon is the fastest way to improve. It won't teach new moves and it won't make them any more skilled, though there's something to be said about raw combat experience in a fight, but when it comes to making a pokémon faster or stronger or tougher, nothing else compares."

"Why, though?" I can't help but ask. Results are results, but… "I mean, if the pokémon's doing the exact same thing in a fight as it is against, like, a tree or something, what does it matter?"

She taps her fingers on the base of the paperback. "That's the million dollar question, isn't it? No one knows. Researchers can figure out the what, but the how and the why are still mysteries." She hums. "It doesn't really matter, though, does it? I know how best to train and all the tricks useful in battle and breeding, and knowing all the whys and hows and whodunits won't change a thing. It's just the way it is."

I look back out over the lake. Mokey had apparently joined in on the battle, and was now swimming madly away from an underwater torrent for her presumption. The staryu was clearly holding back its punches, else my poor magikarp would be torn to strips by now. I'd cheer her on, but, well, she's underwater. And… "That's- a very unsatisfying answer."

Misty snorts. "You and me both, brat. Professor Rowan, too. My seaking wouldn't be half as strong if I hadn't followed his research so religiously."

"What do you mean?"

"It's like this." She pulls a small stone out of her pokétech pouch. "Do you know what this is?"

I open my mouth to give the admittedly uninspired answer of 'A rock?', but her droll look demands I reconsider. "…An evolutionary stone?" I say instead, already knowing I'm wrong.

"Kind of. It's called an everstone. When a pokémon eats it, they become completely and wholly incapable of evolving until they – ah – defecate it out." She cuts me off before I can interject, saying, "Again, no one knows why, it just does."

"I was going to ask, 'Why would you possibly want to do that?' Isn't evolving a good thing?"

"Well, yes, but not so soon. Pokemon are powered by some kind of universal energy source – considering the glow they give off when they evolve, it's blatantly obvious. This power grows stronger through battle, as I already explained to you. What Rowan's spent his life researching is a curious little theory called the 'evolutionary threshold.'"

She pauses, and I take the bait, asking, "What's the evolutionary threshold?"

"It's the amount of – fuck it, let's call it poképower – that a given pokémon needs to evolve. And if I know my water pokémon, and I do, that magikarp of yours is almost ready herself."

I jerk, looking back over the lake with wide eyes. I see Mokey get trapped by some cleverly aimed beams of bubbles, only to Splash her way up and into the air, diving back into the depths in a safer section of the frothing waters. She… doesn't seem any faster than the feebas…?

"Think of it… like a budget," she explains, and I wince. Maths are not my strong suit. "You work a nine-to-five and pull in, say, a hundred thousand dollars per paycheck. Fifty thousand goes towards your taxes – your electricity, your hot water, your house, your education and your land and your whatever, I don't do my own taxes. Thirty goes towards luxuries, stuff like movie tickets, nights on the town, a car, maybe a fancy new computer. The last twenty is put towards a college or a retirement fund or whatever.

"The income is the energy the pokémon gets by training, and the taxes go towards maintaining the power it already has – there are all sorts of documented cases about pokémon that give up battling and gradually grow weaker. The luxuries would be the portion of the energy that goes towards making the pokémon stronger, faster, tougher."

"So the college fund would be stored for- what, evolution? And when it grows large enough to fully pay for college, the pokémon can evolve?"

"Yeah." She smiles. "But, if they hold off..."

"…Then they'd have an even larger fund, and could afford a nicer college. They'd evolve better, somehow. Mokey would become a larger, fiercer gyarados, or your feebas would be a prettier milotic, or something."

"Exactly! It's not an unsurpassable method, of course. If your magikarp evolves right now, it could still become as big and strong a gyarados as it would be if it held off, it'd just take longer. Gyarados need more energy to maintain and improve, so they grow stronger, slower. It's simply more efficient to train in the weakest stage of the evolutionary line and only climb it once you reach a wall in your training and absolutely have to, you know?"

I nod, surprised to realize that I'd gotten lost in the conversation and had been tearing apart the grass. "That's why bug-types are considered to be so weak, right? Cause most of them evolve as soon as they can?" Dragons would be the opposite, I guess – I think I remember reading that Lance's top dragonite was a dratini for nearly a decade. And gyarados, too. They must be so strong in part because magikarp are so weak. If they only put forth, say, five percent each to maintaining and improving, than that's ninety percent that was saved for as impressive an evolution as they could manage.

"That's one of the reasons, yes," Misty explains. "There's also the fact that most bug-types are deeply communal and generally attack and defend as a hive. Taken out of that environment and forced to fight one-on-one, they can't really stack up against most solitary pokémon when their greatest strengths – their numbers and coordination – are taken from them. That's why Aaron of the Elite Four, generally considered the greatest bug-type trainer in the world, generally focuses on bugs that lack a hive mentality, like venomoth and drapion."

Logical. "Isn't drapion a poison- and dark-type, though? It doesn't really fit in with a bunch of bug types."

She snorts. "I'll grant you that it's more poisonous and dark than it is buggy, but it's still a bug-type, in the same way that charizard and gyarados are still dragon-types and flygon is still a flying-type. Trainers generally limit themselves to labeling a pokémon with two types or less so they don't give themselves aneurysms trying to calculate the best move to use in a battle, no other reason."

"Fair enough." Across the lake, Mokey evades a cage of bubbles with Splash again, only for the staryu to catch her along the flank – or is it the hide? The scales? – with a brutal Rapid Spin. Nova chitters in either mocking chastisement or kind sympathy, I don't know him well enough to tell yet, and flutters off to join the battle.

Misty returns to her book, her daily quota of mentorship fulfilled, and I spend the rest of the day fiddling with my pokédex, the stark knowledge that my cute little magikarp might evolve into a terrifying gyarados sooner rather than later sitting cold in the back of my mind.

Time passes in an idyllic haze. Day and night have no meaning in the glade, with the thick canopy of leaves and wood holding back the radiance of the sun and the siren song of flying-types every dawn and dusk. Only the blinking lights of my pokédex and Misty's own strangely rigid sleep schedule hold back the wild theories of fairies under hills and little girls who wander in one day and wander out eighty years later. Nova loves it, allowed to hide away from the sun's searing light and yet stay out of the pokéball he's taken an almost manic loathing of.

During the tail end of the first practice session, Mokey hurls herself at Misty's staryu in a slightly more effective way than she had been. This is apparently some kind of impressive milestone, heralded by the congratulations of my de facto mentor, cheery chittering from Nova, and smug looks from the magikarp queen herself. I make sure to praise her for her accomplishment and slip in some water-type treats Misty gave me with her twice-daily dose of vitamins, but I don't really understand. The pokédex backs up the gym leader's assurance that my starter has learned Tackle, but it doesn't seem to be much different than the tackling she'd been doing since she hatched.

My confusion is only compounded at the end of the second week, when Mokey tackles the staryu in a third subtly different way and promptly begins to swim victory laps around the lake.

"Flail, huh?" Misty says, a casual comfort to her voice that's been slowly growing with each passing day. Half a month spent camping with someone forges a sort of camaraderie that stretches beyond being saved from a fearow. "Your magikarp's reaching the limits of what it can accomplish without evolving. Do me a favor and wait until I leave to do that, yeah?"

I startle. "Wait, what? You're leaving?"

"This arrangement of ours was never going to be permanent." Her voice is understanding, but unapologetic. "Look, I'm heading to Pewter to help Brock examine some rare fossils found by some over-enthusiastic tunnelers in Mt. Moon. You can come along, if you'd like."

"Yeah, but…" I gnaw on my lip, watching Mokey kick off her Splash at an angle to back-flip in the air.

Misty notices and sighs, crossing her arms. "Look. Gyarados are called the Atrocious Pokemon for their nasty demeanor and genetic habit of turning on their trainers, I'm not going to lie- but I am going to level with you. If I'm there to offer my support or you in any way, shape, or form show weakness when it evolves, it will never respect you. I'm not running off to be a bitch – it's as much for your benefit as it is mine."

"I understand that, do you think I'm blind?" The words have more bite to them than I expected, and the regret is as sharp as it is immediate. I don't apologize. "Just. How!? I'm firm when I need to be firm and soft when I need to be soft, and she likes me, I can tell, she really, really does – but if she becomes some kinda avatar of destruction the moment she evolves, what in Lugia's name am I supposed to do to stop her?"

"That's a problem all trainers have to wrestle with, not just those who catch magikarp. We're just human, you know? We can't breathe fire or break stone or flap our arms and fly, but we're expected to tame monsters that can. Really, at the end of the day there's only one thing I can tell you – don't back down. Pokemon need us to become strong just as much as we need them, and so long as your soul is made of steel it won't matter if your body isn't."

I look down, jaw working furiously. Words upon caustic words crawl up my throat and are chewed on, like Misty's feebas with a stick, torn apart by deceptively sharp teeth and swallowed down like so much empty water. There's really nothing to say, to something like that, so I don't say anything at all.

And that's the crux of the matter, isn't it? Karen wouldn't have this problem. Karen would stare down the gyarados and make it kneel with her eyes alone. Karen wouldn't be terrified of her starter turning on her, because her starter would sooner die than harm a hair on her head. Karen has that kind of charisma, that kind of talent, that only champions have and isn't found in lonely girls who don't know their father's name.

I'm not Karen. I want to be, but I'm not. I may be someday – I will be someday – but that day is not today.

"Help me pack. We leave in a half hour."

Trees give way to rock, and rock to plaster and cement. Viridian City lies at the end of a long path through gentle woods and lazy rivers, populated only by squeaking rattata and the flapping of tiny wings. Pokémon are weak, on Route One, carefully pruned not by man but by the mothers of those selfsame pokémon, fearsome pidgeot and cruel fearow bickering over territory and scaring away all else who migrate here.

Beneath the hostile canopy, the mice pokémon reign supreme. Hordes of rattata gather and strike against the electric pikachu, and are scattered and incinerated by their enemies in turn. Their fallen bodies are devoured by the birds of prey above if they are lucky and their own fellows if they are not. Rarely, young nidoran slip away from their far more fearsome environment along Victory Road and poison the cyclical life along the forest, but are no more successful than the sandshrew brave or arrogant enough to leave their tunnel to Vermilion.

By night, the land is overtaken by a haunting stillness, the whispered promise of violence I know far too well. Nova chitters in outrage with the rising dawn as I draw him into his pokéball for each day's trek. Misty nods in understanding. Only crobat have skin thick enough to not scorch under the sun's light, and for all of her starmie's strength it'd be foolish to brave the night when the day is so much kinder. A neophyte I may be, but I am not foolish.

As our destination draws ever nearer, and our journey of a thousand steps shortens with every stride, I can feel my future in the sheen of the passing lakes, the danger in every blade of grass. I do not relent. And lo, the gates to the famed city rise above the endless horizon-

"We're running later than I thought," Misty says, clicking her tongue in annoyance. "C'mon, I want to hit up the Center before the morning rush."

We jog the rest of the way, the enlarging of the already immense city gates the only sign of our progress. Route One has always felt like that. All the trees look almost identical, the mammoth mountains to the north and west dwarf the rest of the horizon, and the steep, steady incline hurts my legs enough to kill all interest in navigation. Despite being the local of the two of us, I'm more than happy to leave the directions to Misty and wax rhapsodic in my mind to pass the time.

By the time we finally reach Viridian, I'm panting with my hands on my knees and violently wishing for the day when I can just fly everywhere on Mokey's back. Seeing Misty casually, relaxedly stroll over to a town map kiosk hurts my pride far more than the incline did my thighs, though. Does being a trainer grant godly endurance alongside the swimming skills, or am I really that out of shape?

"The Center is this way!" I call out, desperate to regain some small face. When she looks at me skeptically, I roll my eyes, saying, "I'm from Pallet, not the bottom of the ocean. I come here all the time."

Usually by hitching a ride on Alakazam, granted, and to this day Mom hasn't the slightest idea, but that's just details.

"I know a shortcut. We'll be there in five minutes."

My prediction proves true. Viridian may as well be Saffron for all that it's the most urbanized place I have ever visited, not to mention the furthest from home, field trip to the Forest notwithstanding, but it's still straddling the line between historic town and burgeoning city. Being the closest district to the Indigo League, it derives most of its income from tourists during the infamous tournament and is about three parts hotel to two parts rustic restaurant and one part antique boutique. As such, development is carefully controlled by a corporate union headed by the Gym Leader eager to maintain his monopoly on the local businesses. Every attempt to expand outward, upward, or even downward is arrested by a vicious PR campaign and baseless worries of disturbing the forest habitat to the North, the League to the West, and the tunnels to the South, leaving only the scenic ocean to the East, mocking in its lack of landmass to build on.

…According to mom, anyway. She doesn't talk about her past much, but I can't help but wonder what kind of changes she would have enacted in Kanto were she not burdened with me. I don't know my father, but I can say with perfect honesty that I get my honest passion from her. She rails about injustice the same way I do flying-type pokémon, with words too big and/or obscure for the other party to understand, and we share the same stubborn cunning needed to realize those dreams. Were it not for me, I very much doubt that Viridian would be as small and underdeveloped as it is now.

What I'm getting at is that the so-called city can be crossed from the longest diameter in a time frame of, like, fifty minutes. That's not even as the pidgey flies, which would be more like thirty, thirty-five minutes. That's at a brisk walk. Jogging through back alleys, weaving past nameless cafes and not at all distracted by the zero people out and about this early in the morning at the complete other end of the year from the Conference, we make good time. For once, I'm actually glad that Viridian only has the capacity to hold the richest and dumbest five percent of Conference tourists. Had it actually been larger like mom always said it should be, then the Center would assuredly have been moved farther from Route One.

But it isn't, so we reach the Center only mildly out of breath. After two long weeks living in the forest, however, breathlessness is nothing compared to the stench of sweat, smoke, and scaly pokémon that cling to us like an ekans, or the chill of the early morning air burrowing into our bones. The sight of the trademark red roof seems almost surreal, after the short journey that lasted eternities. If someone told me that it was Arceus himself that triggered the blast of heated air conditioning that rushed over us once we passed the threshold, I would have converted on the spot.

"I'm going to check my accounts, see if any of my contacts got back to me about my future team." Misty is walking towards the terminal in the corner before she so much as finishes her sentence. Unsurprisingly, she doesn't bother looking over her shoulder or asking me anything. "You make sure the nurse gives your pokémon a good look over, 'kay?"

I just blink at her. "You said they were healthy?" I have to pitch my voice high just to be heard from across the room.

"Who do you trust more, me or a licensed medical professional?" she calls back.

"Aah… you…?" Is that a trick question? I can never tell.

Nothing for it, I suppose. I head over to the desk, only to find the Nurse Joy asleep on the job. She'd pulled one of the cushion-chair-things over from the lobby and sat on it criss-cross, and managed to fall asleep on her own thigh in an impressive feat of circus-style contortion. Fighting-type attunement, maybe? Or just human flexibility?

"Nurse?" I knock on the desk three times, making sure to do it quietly. "Nurse, I need help?"

She jerks awake, snapping her head up so fast her wig almost dislodges. I catch a flash of dark brown hair and can feel my heart break. Nurse Joy isn't a natural pinkette. My entire life is a lie. Mommy-

Nah, I had that freakout years ago, when Mom showed me a documentary on the Kalos War. It's- soothing, to know that 'Joy' and 'Jenny' is little more than a cultural title, just like the pink and blue hair. Should this whole 'League trainer' thing not work out, Arceus forbid... maybe I can join the Police Corps. Maybe. It's a nice fallback to have, I suppose, though I try not to think about it.

"I'm awake!" she yelps, gaze darting across the room in search of- something. When the only face she can see is mine, Misty hidden around the back, she relaxes. "Oh. A trainer. Can I help you?"

I swipe a strand of dark hair behind an ear awkwardly. "I- yeah. I'm a new trainer. My zubat and magikarp haven't been checked over by a Nurse yet, and I thought, maybe I should get on that, and, stuff... yeah."

"Of course, dear." She smiles. It'd look motherly, if she were any older than eighteen or nineteen. "Just put their pokéballs on the tray and I'll get right on that, okay?"

I nod, and do so. The large, shiny – is the metal naturally like that or is it just paint? I never could tell – machine beeps at me, pointless LED lights flashing green. The tray retracts with a clockwork groan, and a long half-minute passes before the trademark jingle burned into the minds of every trainer everywhere sounds off. Scan complete.

...Then it beeps again, and Joy looks down at a mostly hidden screen with a frown. That frown darkens into a truly fearsome scowl over the course of the three longest seconds of my life. When she looks back up at me, she no longer seems quite so motherly, and I shiver, half out of growing worry for the health of Mokey and Nova and half out of honest fear for myself.

Slowly, deliberately, Nurse Joy brushes a finger across a loose pokéball on the desk behind the bar. There's that familiar blaze of crimson light, and a chansey stands behind her protectively, not looking quite so harmless or ridiculous as they always did to me, before. I swallow.

"I'm going to have to ask you to wait here for a few minutes, please," she says, and it is not at all a question. She rises and disappears through a door behind the Scanner, and I can't help but notice that the chansey doesn't follow her. In fact, it hasn't taken its large, glassy eyes off of me once since it was released. Something that pink shouldn't be so very threatening.

The next fifteen minutes pass about as fast as Mokey on land. Unable to return to the seating area without the chansey's intimidating demeanor spiking, unable to pull my team's pokéballs from the Scanner without climbing over the table and trespassing, I instead hide behind my pokédex and pretend to research all the worst diseases magikarp and zubat can have. My findings range from 'embarrassing' to 'holy shit what the hell,' and it only makes me feel even scummier – for what possible reason, I don't know.

When the local Officer Jenny stalks into the Center, I feel weirdly relieved that something is finally happening. Then I notice that it is Officer Jenny that stalked into the Center, and I perform the magic transmutation of turning relief into anxiety. I feel naked, vulnerable. Not for the first time, I wish Misty would complete her call and come back into the Center proper – even if she doesn't rescue me, at least I could hide behind her. She'd be a lot more effective at it than my 'dex, being bigger and capable of speech and whatnot.

But she doesn't and Jenny looks just as tense as Joy did, and I wonder if I'll have to borrow Misty's fishing rod to pull my stomach back up from the floor when this is all over. If it ever becomes 'all over.'

"Give me some ID," the Officer says, cold eyes laser-focused on me like Nova on a thrown Razz Berry. Saying 'No' doesn't even cross my mind.

I scramble through my backpack, pulling my Trainer Card out of its pocket with such haste I almost drop it and embarrass myself further. "Here, ah-"

"Hmph." She takes it and looks it over, even holding it up to the light to check its authenticity. I quash a surge of indignity. I didn't do anything wrong, but I've read enough adventure novels to know that protesting will only make me look guiltier of whatever sin presumably made Joy freak out and call her over. I resolve to just wait and keep my silence.

This decision is broken not fifteen seconds later, when Jenny pockets the card and demands I follow. I couldn't help the incredulous "What did I do!?" if my life depended on it.

"That's what I'm here to find out," she responds darkly, but against my earlier impression that anger doesn't seem directed at me. It's still there, but it's directionless, or maybe just aimed at someone she doesn't know and who she can't get to. It's- not a relief, but good to hear.

The back of the Pokemon Center is nothing like I imagined it to be. Whereas the waiting room was all comfy spherical chairs, open space and shiny white walls, the staff section is cramped and filled with half-empty boxes. I see hundreds of premier balls in a few pushed back against one wall, reminding me of Misty's comment of having a closet somewhere filled with just as many, but most seem to be holding technological parts and stacks upon stacks of papers. It takes until I see a Scanner dismantled and set in front of one that I realize that the Pokemon Center is being moved deeper into Viridian after all, and either bureaucracy or human laziness is what's pushing it back.

But even then, the red-on-white pokéball aesthetic remains dominant – until Jenny opens a door marked PATIENT ROOM ONE and leads me into something I'd expect out of Oak's private lab, not a Center. The walls are less of a cream and more of a bleach, and are covered not in motivational posters and 'interesting facts' but in diagrams detailing the worst diseases known to pokémon. One catches my eye, notable for its prominent placement and the fact that, of all the sicknesses labeled in the room, it's the only I'm not already at least passingly familiar with, from the 'dex not ten minutes ago or from hanging around the Corral these past ten years.

It depicts a fearsome-looking charizard on the left side – and a dying one on the right, bleeding from the eyes and mouth though otherwise seeming as strong and healthy as ever. It's- eerie, in a way all the other diseases just aren't.

My fingers clench. I scan it for information, any information at all, but only see four letters printed across the top in all capitals. It reads:

PKRS.

"What do you know of that... condition?" Joy asks, and I jerk back to awareness, only then noticing the nurse perched on a hard-backed chair pressed against the far wall. When she sees my honest confusion, she smiles, but it's a smaller, sadder thing. "It's called the Pokemon Virus. Generic name, but no other viruses can, ah, compare. Have you heard of it?"

I wet my lips. "N-no, Nurse Joy."

Jenny closes the door with a thud. I jump, and her hand clasps my shoulder firmly. "There can be no doubt, Ashlynn Ketchum. Do you know what the Pokemon Virus is?"

"No! I don't!" Silence follows my impassioned shout, seeming somehow louder than my words ever could. Joy sighs. "What is it? Are- can it be cured? You're scaring the shit out of me, guys."

They really were. If Mokey and Nova caught some kind of fatal disease, I don't think I could ever forgive myself. Even if I was wholly innocent, even if there was literally nothing I could do... I don't think I could follow my dream as a trainer, anymore. It's only been slightly longer than half a month since I met them, but they're already mine, and I don't have it in me to just- move on. I can't just... shrug my shoulders and start over.

I imagine it. Misty moves on to Pewter, and I return to Pallet, a failure. No one knows, not Mom, Oak, or Gary, and I'm given that charmander I so dearly wanted, and told to just- pretend this month hadn't happened, and it's that day in the labs all over again. A fresh start, the way it should have been.

I shudder, sickened. Strange. I wanted it so badly, just this morning. Now, embraced with the fact that it just might happen, I can't think of anything that could possibly be worse.

"It can be cured," Jenny says, and I sag in relief.

Joy spears the officer with a look. "I thought we decided to verify her innocence, first."

"Look at her, Catherine," Jenny says, tilting her head towards me. "I think we have that verification, now. Besides. It's not like she'd shell out the money for a dose of pokérus and then inject it into a magikarp. That's the most ridiculous thing I ever heard."

Nurse- Catherine, apparently, doesn't seem to accept what to me sounds like sterling – if baffling – logic. "Protocol is protocol for a reason, Alexis. And it's entirely possible that she bought an already-infected magikarp instead of getting the virus and the fish separately. We already know that this has happened. One of Rocket's suppliers was caught just outside of Mount Moon last month doing that exact thing-"

"I didn't, though!" I interject. I feel angry and hurt and righteous, being accused of some nefarious thing I don't even understand, and it reminds me of Oak, and I just get even angrier.

"Yes, but- can you prove it?" Catherine asks. She tugs the pink wig off, freeing her mussed tresses of earthy-brown hair. "The Scanner claims the capture was made naturally and two weeks ago, but those can be spoofed. You don't have any badges or prior Center check-overs. You have no evidence or character witnesses-"

"But I do," I say, fierce satisfaction welling in my chest. "Misty Waterflower was there. She can tell you I'm innocent."

Jenny – Alexis – snorts. "Waterflower? Seriously? What would an ACE be doing catching magikarp with a greenhorn?"

I raise my chin defiantly. "Just ask her. She should still be in the 'Comm Room." With how much steel- and electric-types mess with radio waves, she'll need to be to make a call – and she would consider waltzing off without me to be a serious breach of her mentorship duties. I don't know if she actually likes me, but she does seem at least halfway protective, and that's enough, for this.

Alexis rolls her eyes but strides out of the room, looking curious. It's only when the door closes that I realize I am now alone in a room with the woman who accused me of infecting my team with some agonizingly fatal disease.

I bite my lip, and fall onto the chair furthest from her with a huff. That gives me as large a privacy bubble as I can feasibly get while still maintaining clear sight lines of the door. I then amuse myself with counting the fluorescent lights in the ceiling and then the shiny spots they make on the polished floor, because I can't look at the PKRS poster without wanting to vomit and like hell am I going to look at Catherine.

She eventually sighs, though, and makes to apologize. "Look, kid. I didn't mean to impugn your honor as a trainer or anything-"

"Forget it," I say, cutting her off. Biting irritation can fill in the role of social courage, it seems. "This virus thing is pretty serious, yeah?" I say, and she nods. "Then you did right, if not by me then by my hypothetical abused pokémon. Just- don't expect me to like it."

She doesn't say anything, but, eventually, she nods.

It's to this strange ceasefire that Alexis returns with Misty in tow, the latter wearing a look of such pissed-off revelation that I never thought it could fit on an actual face before. "It all makes sense now," she says immediately, stalking to a center chair and violently sitting down on it. "Your 'karp, Sleek, your bat's use of Flash- argh, I'm so stupid! How didn't I see it?"

Feeling even more lost than usual, I exhale slowly. "Please explain."

"Okay. Just. One moment, I need to think." Misty chews on her inner lip, trying to put all her thoughts in order. Alexis bumps her shoulder with a hip and plops down next to her, and Misty says, "Yeah, go ahead."

"So, it goes like this." The police officer runs a hand through her shoulder-length, dark blue hair, revealing that it's not a wig at all but a shockingly good dye job. "About a decade ago, a scientist by the name of Charon discovered a microscopic life-form that, when injected into a pokémon, forms a seemingly symbiotic relationship with that pokémon. As the theory goes, there's a universal power source that makes pokémon capable of the things they are – the life-form, which he called pokérus, binds to this power source, feeds off of it, and stimulates its growth."

"In practice, this means that pokémon grow a lot stronger, a lot faster," Misty continued for her. "I explained all this to you with a budget metaphor, right? Well, think of it like taking twenty percent of your income and putting it into the bank, magic happens, and then immediately drawing twice as much back out. The pokémon evolves and gets stronger and faster and all that jazz a lot quicker and more efficiently, with seemingly no side effects."

Alexis smiles ruefully. "I'm sure you can imagine what happens next."

"A golden age," I murmur. "The League would want everyone who works for them to have access to this, to this super-steroid. With it, they could... I don't even know. A lot."

"There was a criminal organization that ruled the Kanto-Johto underworld, back then," Alexis explains. "And no, it wasn't Rocket. I wouldn't be surprised if you hadn't heard of them. Team Cross used to be omnipresent, but a League powered by pokérus crushed them within six months. There was... a lot of hope, back then."

Catherine snorts. "Only here. Fiore, Iro, and Sinnoh were much less excited about the Continent having a wonder-drug that empowered the entire Indigo League with literally no downside."

"And when that downside finally showed its ugly face, all those worries went away, so there's no point in mentioning them," Alexis shoots back. My eyes turn towards the PKRS poster, and Alexis' eyes soften. "Yeah. That's the downside."

"What... what happened?" If that happened to all the pokémon that were infected... and if all of the League's pokémon were deliberately infected... oh, Arceus.

"The Virus ate away at every pokémon's mind. In the first stage, the infected get aggressive, violent- it was worrying, but the League mistook it for eagerness as their teams adapted to sudden power surge. After the six month mark, though, the pokémon started forgetting things, confusing friend from foe, and forgetting to hold back during even the most casual of spars. After a year..."

"...Death," I whisper. The word resounds like the crack of thunder, and I leap to my feet. "You have to cure them! They don't- my team doesn't deserve that. We'll train the honest way! Just- just get that virus out of them!"

"They're being purified already," the nurse, Catherine, soothes. Then she turns to Misty, Alexis doing the same, giving me the privacy I need to sink to the floor and bury my face in my lap. "Misty- tell us everything you noticed..."

I don't say anything for a long time.

The next day, I wake up on a comfortable bed beneath a stable roof and miss the lake in the forest more than anything.

I stumble into the shower, put on a fresh-ish change of clothes, and vanish down the stairs in a haze. If anyone had asked me what color the walls were in the bedroom or if the water was hot or cold, I wouldn't be able to answer. If they had asked me how I got up to the bed last night in the first place, I wouldn't be able to answer that, either. The last thing I remember is passing out on the floor of the Center in a puddle of angst and cold fury.

Mokey and Nova were cured, as were Misty's Sleek, starmie, and staryu. As far as the Gym Leader, Nurse, and Officer were able to determine, they'd all caught it from my happy little zubat. A higher-level Scanner confirms their theory, showing that Nova had been in three different pokéballs before mine, stretching back almost four months. One of those must have infected him – likely the same one that managed to teach a baby zubat Flash, something that baffled Alexis and Catherine just as much as it did Misty.

But, the thing is- they can't determine which trainer it was. Nova could have had pokérus for anywhere from one to four months. If it was just one, then he could have a solid fifteen, twenty years ahead of him still, assuming he makes crobat- which he will. If it was closer to four, however... he may die in as little as two years. The pokérus is gone, but it still gave him the foundation for the brain damage that will one day take his life.

To say I'm furious would be an immense understatement. Making the League is now my third goal, and surpassing Karen my second. My top priority is finding who hurt Nova like that... and tearing him apart.

But, before I can do anything like that, I need to do right by my team. I need to make them strong. Strong enough to obliterate someone who deals in pokérus for a living.

It's going to be... difficult.

"Hello, Ash," Nurse Catherine says once I find myself crossing the ground floor of the Center. I don't recall how I got here. "Your team are now up-to-date on all of their inoculations and ready and raring to go!" She giggles kindly, and I smile back weakly. That she's now acting like the stereotypical Joy instead of the somewhat cynical teenager I saw beneath, yesterday, is both disappointing and weirdly relieving. I can't say why.

"That's good to hear," I say, and slip their pokéballs back into my bag. I immediately feel more comfortable in my own skin, like I were naked and a soft, warm blanket was just draped over my shoulders. "Can you, ah, do you know where Misty is, or...?"

"She's right outside, dear."

I nod, and, with my usual social grace, turn and leave the Pokemon Center. The chill of the early morning air nips at my ears, not unlike Nova would, and it's soothing, relaxing. To think – I had been so eager to be under the building's heated AC, yesterday. The thought seems almost heretical, now.

I find Misty leaning against the familiar blue-roofed shop, dressed in her usual shockingly oblivious clothes. I've never seen someone wear a swimsuit all day, every day, in Autumn- let alone a bikini top. That she wears a throwaway top over it is her only saving grace, as are the cargo pants that complete the look. I'd make a mouthy comment, but it was always Leaf that knew her fashion. I've been wearing the same generic hat and jacket since I ran away from Pallet, changed only by the handful of pairs of pants that Alakazam fetched me.

Well, that, and, now doesn't really seem like the time for smart comments. I don't know where I stand with Misty, right now. I did infect her pokémon with an infamous and fatal virus, however accidentally. She didn't seem to hold it against me last night, but she was hardly going to tear my heart apart in front of a Nurse Joy and Officer Jenny. She's not the type to air dirty laundry, not in front of people she seems to respect.

"Ah... hi," I say, and wave shyly. Misty's lips quirk, and she pushes off the wall. "We headed for Pewter, now?"

Her smile dies. "I got an offer from one of the mudkip farms, down in Hoenn," she says. It's all I need to hear.

"...Oh." I want to scuff my foot, or cross my arms, or, or, something, but I can't seem to move. My lips part to say something, but nothing comes out and they close with a click. It seems to echo, in the empty Viridian streets.

"Yeah. Oh." Misty adjusts her fancy pokétech bag's strap. I can't help but compare it to mine; two weeks old, half-empty and already falling apart. "One of their strongest swampert laid a clutch. One of them was a shiny. The manager offered it to me, at... a real steal. I'm worried he'll come to his senses and auction it off, live off of the proceeds for the rest of his life. It's the logical thing."

"The logical thing," I echo.

"Right. Shinies aren't any stronger than the rest of their kind, but having one brings a kind of renown all the same. I'll need that, if I want to impress Juan." She doesn't look at me.

"...Can I come?"

She smiles softly, and does. "I know you, Ash. You'd hate being dragged behind me everywhere. This is your first journey – make it alone. You'll learn more."

I don't hear any of that. All I hear is that it's not a 'Yes,' and I look down, hoping she doesn't see the glistening in my eyes.

"Look, Ash – Ashlynn." She rests a hand on my hair, musses it. "I haven't given you enough credit, have I? I apologize. I looked down on you, because you didn't come from a family like mine, because you didn't have money or experience or the kind of education I got. I judged you for not knowing about Rowan's training methods or pokérus, when the former is still so new and the latter has been systematically censured by the League across the past decade. That was wrong of me. I'm sorry."

I look up at her. "You... you shouldn't apologize. You've helped me so much."

"I've helped you all I can. Cliche as it is, if you keep following me around, you'll just become a flying-type mirror of me. You need to become your own trainer, do your own thing. I know you'll make me proud."

For the second time this morning, I look down so she won't see me cry. The feeling roiling in my chest this time, however, makes me dizzy for an entirely different reason.

"Look, I- you will meet people who will laugh off any mistakes you make, and say that it's just your first journey, a trial run, that what you do doesn't matter so long as you do better next year. That's bullshit. The decisions you make and the habits you pick up, this year, will determine the kind of trainer you will spend the rest of your life being. If you spend the next year just following me around, you will turn into me – and that'd be a real shame, 'cause even though I'm a mighty fine trainer if I do say so myself, and I do, you..." She laughs, a pretty, proud thing. "You have some real potential, Ash. You don't need me, you don't need Oak- all you need is your self and your team. You'll surpass Karen one day, and all on your own. I know you will."

Neither of us speak, for a long minute. Me, because I can't – and Misty, because she has nothing left to say.

"Go up to Pewter anyway, yeah? Alexis called the Plateau last night, they're purifying Route One and the Tunnel of pokérus. It's going to be crazy. Just- take your journey at your own pace, catch whatever pokémon make you happy, and..." she runs a hand through her hair. "Fuck it, I'm rambling. Ash- don't do anything I wouldn't do, alright? And- take care."

Shadow drapes us in the blink of an eye, and I look up, just in time to see the immense pidgeot catch a heat spiral as it blocks out the sun. I look closer, and- I think someone's riding on top of it. My lips twitch.

"That's my ride. I expect to see you at the conference, alright, Ash?"

"I won't just be at the conference," I tell her. "I'm going to win it."

She laughs, but she doesn't say 'No,' either.

End of Chapter Two

A/N: The 'budget' metaphor is my way of explaining the EXP mechanic in a logical manner while simultaneously foreshadowing a later plot point that will color the entire story. Kudos to anyone who can guess it, I suppose. ...Well, that, and actual battles are more interesting to me than the pokémon version of weight-lifting, so we're not doing that.

Pokémon being limited to two types, though, is not something I'm going to try to justify, and for much the same reason as limiting them to four moves. It also ties into above mystery plot point, if in a different way. In practice, this means that gyarados is indeed a Dragon-type on top of Water, Flying, and trace amounts of Dark, while crobat is also Dark and slightly Ground.

Nurse Joy and Officer Jenny being cultural titles makes more sense to me than secret cloning facilities, which was option number two. Option number three was the canon explanation of 'really large families.' I mean, really? Lame.

PKRS is my explanation for why there are so few old trainers in canon, and why the Elite Four specifically seem to be made of youths. I considered going with the 'world war' explanation vis-à-vis Lt. Surge, but that'd be lazy. Also, this gets Ash out of the 'rookie' stage a bit earlier, while tying into the main themes of independence, privilege, and personal responsibility, establishing a future villain, prepping future battles and evolutions, and explaining why everyone isn't just doped up on PKRS the entire time.

Don't know when the next update will be – I considered not posting this until I had the arc finished, but I figure I kept y'all waiting long enough.

Question: What are your headcanons for the pokéverse?