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Disclaimer: I do not own Pokémon. Pokémon is the property of Game Freak and Nintendo and all of those awesome people who invented it.

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Chapter 1 ~ The Model Kanto Family

The twilight had just barely grazed the small town of Pallet, and from the outside all seemed at peace. All of the town's residents were returning home after the long, hot day of work. An overweight man sat near the shore with his fishing line dancing in the water, his gaze locked on the boat that sat on the horizon, gradually approaching the town. It was a boat privately owned by a business that worked on the nearby Cinnabar Island that allowed workers to live in the peaceful setting of Pallet without sacrificing their high-paying jobs. Men and women cycled in from the path to the north, Route 1, also returning from their daily shift in the city of Viridian. It seemed that no one spoke that day. The rustling of leaves in the gentle wind and the occasional plop of the water as a Magikarp surfaced truly defined the general feel of the town. No one could hear the noises coming from the Direnetti household in the northwest part of town.

Outside the house, a teenage boy sat up against the wall next to the front door, his head turned and staring in through the semi-transparent curtains. Even if he hadn't been looking, he knew what was going on inside. This was the house of the boy's best friend, Mitchell Direnetti, a seventeen year old with whom he had grown up. No one traveled near this quiet part of town with most of the housing located to the south, particularly in the southeast where Professor Oak had set up his laboratory. No one was exposed to what this boy, Kenneth Adler, heard about and saw on a nearly daily basis.

The action had moved into the living room, which sat off on the right hand side of the central hallway that Kenny was peeking into. He could see Mitchell's mom standing in the hallway, one of her hands covering her eyes. Even through the tan curtain he saw her face, nearly glowing red and streaming with tears. She was sobbing but trying to hold it back when she could, shouting into the living room at something. Angered, deep shouting boomed back at her and her streams of tears turned to rivers. She reached for her cell phone and began dialing a number.

This was where it suddenly became much different from what Kenneth was accustomed to seeing. As Amber turned around and began to mouth something to whoever was on the other end of the line, her husband flew out of the living room and backhanded her across her already red face. A bruise began to form where his ring impacted her cheekbone, but this was not the extent of his rage. He took the phone and threw it as hard as he could at the front door. Kenneth could hear the individual pieces hit the cold tile and watched as Edward Direnetti lifted his wife from the spot that she had fallen and punched her again on the other side of her face. She screamed for help, but the house was too far for anyone to hear her cries. Kenneth was too shocked by what he was seeing to think to go in and help her. It was really a shame, to have Amber's beauty, talent, and charm wasted serving the pig of a man that Edward was. He did not need to work since inheriting his dead father's fortune and told Amber that she wouldn't have to either. Since the marriage, she had done nothing but work. Whether it was cleaning, mowing the lawn, the laundry, cooking, or bedtime chores, she never caught her break. She spent her nights crying herself to sleep, hoping that one day she might be able to escape from him.

Edward picked her up off the ground again and pulled his fist back, his shiny silver double width ring gleaming in the light. Kenneth had finally recovered from the intense awe at what Edward had done and was standing up now, readying his body for a charge through the front door. Amber was too nice of a woman to have to deal with this any more. Kenneth positioned himself like a football player and backed up, when he heard yet another scream from inside. This one was loud enough for him to hear each word clearly.

"Get off Mom!" he heard. The teenager looked back in through the window in time to see Mitchell suddenly standing behind his father, his lean muscular arms gripping his father's retracted forearm. He twisted it over his father's head and dropped to his knees forcefully, hearing a sinisterly satisfying crack as Edward's radius snapped in half. Edward let out a feral roar of pain and rage and dropped Amber, who rushed into the living room, probably to grab the landline. Whoever she had been talking to must have been confused, possibly scared for her. When they couldn't reach her cell phone any longer, they would phone for the police.

Edward snapped his other arm backward and slammed his fist into Mitchell's chest, dropping him to the floor. He was fueled by adrenaline and did not feel the pain from the powerful punch and stood back up, grabbing his father by the shoulders and kneeing him in the groin. His eyes rolled up in their sockets and he dropped to his knees, gasping for breath. His son pulled his leg up to his chest and kicked forward, driving his heel into his father's forehead and leaving him unconscious on the hallway floor. The thud of Edward's limp body began a period of eerie silence for Kenneth, who stopped and stared at the man. Was he dead? His useful arm twitched.

Inside, Amber was lying down on the couch, her head propped up on a throw pillow. A table lamp was on and shining in her direction, the light showing how discolored and bruised her face had become. It was already swelling, but thankfully there was no blood. Mitchell was moving in a rushed manner, looking around the living room frantically. Amber was fading in and out of consciousness and mumbling something to Mitchell, but he could not make anything out of it. He wasn't trying, either. All he knew was that he was going to get out of there.

Why had everything escalated so suddenly? It didn't help that Edward was drunk, as usual. Amber had not said a thing to him. She was too afraid. Mitchell kept telling her that he needed to get out of there, but she insisted that he stay. When Mitchell turned ten, nearly all of the town's children his age had left to become Pokémon trainers. Of everyone he could remember, only he and Kenneth had stayed behind. Kenneth did not want to become a Pokémon trainer like everyone else. He wanted to stay in Pallet and study under Professor Oak. Mitchell wanted to get out of there as quickly as possible, and becoming a Pokémon trainer was the quickest way. Amber supported him as much as she could. Edward told him that he would not leave Pallet as long as he lived. Over the years, Amber slowly began to tell Mitchell that he could not leave, either. She had a much different reason. She feared that Edward would kill her if Mitchell were allowed to leave.

What had happened today was different, though. Edward had commanded his son to start digging a hole in the backyard so that he could install a pool. Kenneth had been there only seconds before the pounding on the locked bedroom door began. He slipped out through the window and sat on the roof over the garage, his head just below the windowsill. He heard everything that went on. He felt responsible, somewhat, for what went on that night had been because of an idea he had presented to Mitchell. The lock on the door gave and Edward came through the door, looking over at his son. Mitchell was tall, standing around six feet, just under his father's height. He was stretched out on his bed in a pair of sweats with no shirt on, showing his toned and tanned body. He had a youthful, handsome face and piercing blue eyes under his well-groomed brown eyebrows. His hair was short and messy. His arms were crossed over his chest and he stared his father deep in the eyes, his expression changing to one of disgust and malice. His father reiterated his command.

"Fuck off," he told his father, "Why don't you get off your fat rich ass and do it yourself?"

It had been Kenneth's idea, to stand up to Edward regardless of what Mitchell had to say or do. Make him feel threatened, subordinate, maybe instill a little fear in him. His abuse of power had gone on for too long. But it didn't work. Edward's fury grew increasingly as Mitchell denied his demands. Edward stomped over to Mitchell's bedside and grabbed him by the hair on the back of his head. He spat in his face and threw him to the floor and kicked his side.

"You'll learn to regret saying those things to me, you fucking arrogant teenager. Get the fuck outside and start digging my pool,"

Mitchell stood up and clenched his teeth and fists. Edward seemed unafraid. Mitchell told his father that he was going to leave and never come back. That was where the screaming and the yelling began. Mitchell reached for a nearby shirt and his beanie and walked quickly down the stairs as he pulled on the clothes. His cell phone was still in his room, in the back pocket of his jeans that sat in a wrinkled pile at the foot of his bed. His wallet was in there, too. Now that he was actually thinking through it, he had left a lot of his stuff upstairs that he was going to need. He turned around to go back up and get it, but Edward was right there behind him, his girth blocking off the narrow stairwell. By now, Amber had seen them and was coming down the hall, her face becoming red and teary when she realized that they were going to fight again. Edward saw her and barked at the top of his voice that she had put these ideas in his head to leave home. He pushed Mitchell down the stairs and stepped on the boy's arm as he barreled toward his wife, his mouth flowing with curses toward her and the entire female gender. Mitchell did not think that he would actually hit Amber, not yet at least. But he knew the perfect distraction. At the close end of the living room sat one of the biggest televisions that Mitchell had ever seen, Edward's baby. He sat in front of that thing all day and night, never bothering to get up from the chair unless he was in need of a sexual favor from Amber. Right next to it there was a small wooden stool.

Mitchell grabbed the stool and swung it ferociously into the screen, only denting it the first time but sending the stool completely inside the second. The sound of his baby being destroyed incited anger inside of him that Edward had never known before. He turned his attention from his cowering wife and ran into the living room where Mitchell stood in front of the destroyed TV. He screamed at Mitchell and approached him with a heavy book from a nearby table and brought it up high above his head.

"No, don't touch him!" Amber cried out to her husband. He stopped for only a split-second, glancing back at his wife.

"You're next, you filthy cunt, so shut the fuck up or I'll come over there right now! You wait your turn!"

Amber pulled out her cell phone and dialed her mother's number, realizing that she could not go to sleep in that house tonight. Edward saw this and flew after her, destroying the phone and beating his wife. Kenneth had seen most of this from outside the front door, though Mitchell was not even sure that Kenneth was still there. Now, the teenager was the only one fully conscious in the house. He was going to let his mother rest for a while before helping her get out of there. He would not spend another night under his father's roof.

Mitchell looked into the reflective surface of the table lamp and saw a bruise on his face forming as well. He touched it lightly with one hand and remembered the book slamming across his face. It didn't sink in that he may have killed his father. He only knew he was going to save his mother, whatever it took, and then he would get as far away from Pallet Town from possible.

Mitchell walked back into the entry hall and looked at his father, who had landed in an awkward position and was lying with one arm tangled up in his legs, the other falling away from his body. He could see the bone sticking up underneath the skin where Mitchell had broken it. This sight would be the last one he saw of his father, and a satisfying one it was. It only took a minute or so upstairs for Mitchell to grab everything he needed; his phone, his wallet, a lighter and some cigarettes, and an extra set of clothes. He stuffed it all into his backpack and put it on, walking down the stairs and stepping over his father's body. There was a pharmacy not too far away, and they would have first aid supplies. Edward had never bothered to go out and buy a kit for the house in case of accidents.

As he passed through the front door, he saw Kenneth standing off to the left, at the end of the porch. He was wearing clothing very similar to Mitchell's. His beanie covered a mess of shaggy blonde hair, which hung over his brown eyes and high forehead. He wasn't as tall as Mitchell but was in healthy fighting shape, his muscles showing even through the dark blue sweater he wore. He had an amount of stubble on his chin but it wasn't visible anywhere else on his face.

"Are you okay?" he asked, noticing the large bruise on the side of his friend's face. Mitchell was happy that he had stuck around to see the fighting. Now there was someone in town to testify in court that Edward had beaten Amber aside from Mitchell. Mitchell could leave town with no worries now.

"Can you stick around here and make sure she's alright? Just hang out near the window, don't go in. If Dad wakes up then call me and I'll get back here as fast as I can. But if he hurts her," Mitchell stopped, as if he was thinking something over. He was. It was something he had considered every day of his life, something that would have ended the family's misery long ago if he had had the courage to just act.

Mitchell slipped his hand into his backpack and pulled out a shining 9mm pistol and handed it to Kenneth.

"Kill him,"

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Author: Well, I think that's a good place to stop for Chapter 1. I'll tell you; yesterday I had no idea I would be sitting here writing this today. I'm not too much of a Pokémon fan, but I've always been in love with the originals, and FireRed and LeafGreen (since they are almost as simple and fun). Yes, I know, there was a lot of cussing, a lot of violence. The cussing will tone down. I won't say it was exclusive to this chapter, but I don't think there will be nearly as much of it all at the same time anywhere else in this fanfic. In the next chapter Mitchell will return home from the pharmacy and come upon some unfortunate happenings at the house.

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