Aradia was perhaps the first person to wake up in New-bud town in the early hours of yet another bitter Monday morning. Although she would have much preferred to say it was from the excitement of getting her first pokemon, it was a nightmare that made her eyes flash open at 5:00am. Blinking in surprise, Aradia rubbed her jaded blue eyes before staring dazedly at her low ceiling for a while. The memory of the bad dream ebbed away quickly; all she remembered was running away from something… it was probably horrifying. With a worn out sigh, and a faintly amused smile, Aradia reached out and switched on her side lamp. It flickered, and then bathed the dark room in a warm yellow glow, revealing the contents of a cosy bedroom.

The room was medium sized, if a tad small, and strangely decorated. Where there wasn't an assortment of pokemon fossils and various pieces of excavation equipment, there was an assortment of clocks or posters depicting the legendary pokemon Dialga. Although a bit cluttered, the rest of the room was reasonably tidy. Aradia had had an infatuation with digging up pokemon fossils since she was very young, and her first ever fossil was sitting pride of place on a small shelf: a surprisingly smooth rock with a plumed feather marking just visible on its light brown surface. Aradia planned on taking it with her and extracting the pokemon from its fossil in Ash-tree town.

Yawning, Aradia flicked open her deep red blinds and squinted through the frosty window. Even in the dim light of dawn and with the lack of any streetlamps, the glittering white snow was still quite visible. And deep; everyone was snowed in.

Doubt I'll be able to get to sleep now, thought Aradia sullenly and, with effort, squirmed out of her comfortable, toasty bed. Still bleary eyed, she shuffled over to her small wooden desk and slumped onto the chair, before flipping open her laptop. Hopefully someone was also online. Proffesor Scratch didn't expect them until 8'o clock and that was three hours away. With that that thought, a small squirm of excitement and anticipation fluttered in Aradia's stomach. She was getting her first pokemon in three hours!

The small laptop's screen soon lit up and Aradia instantly clicked onto pesterchum. Anyone online…? Oh thank goodness, Feferi…she thought happily and opened the other girls pester chum. Of course Feferi was online. She was probably too excited to sleep at all…

-apocolypseArisen [AA] began pestering cuttlefishCuller [CC] at 05:12—

AA: hey feferi!

AA: why are you up so early

CC: ARADIA! Glub glub! 38)

CC: I didn't even sleep!

CC: I was too -EXCIT—ED about getting a Pokemon!

CC: And travelling wit)( everyone!

CC: GLUB! 38D

CC: W)(at about you?

AA: oh i guess I was excited too

AA: I just randomly woke up

AA: arent you tired

CC: Not at all!

CC: In fact I feel COMPL-ET—ELY awake! Glub GLUB!

AA: oh

AA: i don't know how you manage it!

AA: im tired and ive actually had sleep

CC: T)(at will wear off soon!

CC: It does for me!

AA: i hope so

AA: you know what pokemon professor scratch has right

CC: Yep!

AA: which one has caught your eye

CC: HMM.

CC: Well, I like the look of the water pokemon of course!

CC: Squirtle and Oshawott look really cute in particular!

CC: I guess you )(ave your eye on one as well, HMM? 38)

AA: yep

AA: id like a fire type for when i go exploring in caves

AA: most fire types have some sort of visible fire on them I think

AA: cyndaquil would be nice :)

AA: so would charmander but terezi wants him 0_0

CC: Of course Terezi wants C)(armander! T)(ey evolve into the closest t)(ing we )(ave to a DRAGON START—ER! Terezi loves dragons 38D

CC: T)(ats a cool idea, anyway!

AA: thanks :)

AA: have you seen the snow yet

AA: its even worse than yesterday

CC: I know! It will be so pretty when it gets light 38O

CC: Which will hopefully be soon!

AA: yep

AA: id better go actually

AA: get dressed and stuff

CC: O)( ok 38(

CC: I'll see you later, OK?

AA: yeah

AA: bye feferi :)

CC: BY-E!

With a grin, Aradia got up from her chair and started to get dressed. Typical Feferi…she admired her ability to stay up all night though. It was something she lacked.

Steadily, she made her way through all the daily tasks: getting dressed, untangling her long brown hair, etcetera, etcetera. All the boring everyday stuff. When Aradia had finished, an hour and a half of waiting still remained, although it would take a good ten minutes to get to the professor's house. Bluh. With a small sigh, the dark-haired girl started to slowly open her creaky cottage bedroom door. Mercifully, it hardly creaked at all and Aradia made her way carefully across the rickety wooden floor. The smooth wooden floor was cold underfoot, in contrast to the warm house. She was particularly careful past her moms room; she was a light sleeper and waking her was not an option. After that ordeal, she started to hop down the rickety stairs, skipping the seventh one because it creaked, and landing with a small, dull whump on the floor. That went much better than she expected.

Aradia lived in the smallest house in New-bud town – a rather old cottage with a musty smell which was near the edge of town. Despite all the difficulties it provided, Aradia wouldn't swap it for anything else. It had a certain character to it. Downstairs was mainly open plan, the kitchen diner was right next to the lounge. A door opened up to a utility room, which then led outside to the back garden. The garden did not match the cottage in size; it was big and contained many filled in holes which were easy to spot from the darker colour of grass that had grown over it.

With a freshly made coffee, Aradia made her way into the lounge and slumped into a deep, soft armchair before switching on the TV. It was going to be a long wait for the day to fully start.

After an episode of watching some rich kid talk about pokemon natures and watching the progress of some random trainer, Aradia switched off the TV and forced herself to stand. She found herself not being able to wait any longer, what with all the terrible programs. Grabbing her bag, she walked to the front door and let out a deep breath, readying herself for the cold. Aradia swung the door open to reveal a frosty day and a clear blue sky. Snow was almost waist height now, and she wrapped her maroon jacket around her with a small shiver. The door had revealed a small patch of ground, but from then on was snow. It covered what was a boring town. There was literarily nothing but grass, bushes, ponds and houses. Cars were not spoken of. They were either extinct or had never actually made their way to the isolated town.

With a deep breath, Aradia stepped into the freezing cold snow and started to carve a path with her ultra-thick black gloves. The snow was almost blinding combined with the cold white sun and the biting cold was getting through her many layers. Shuddering, she pulled her scarf over her mouth before continuing on. Although Aradia couldn't wait to get into the professor's lab, Feferi was right. Everything was hauntingly beautiful: the pine trees were glittering with frost and even bird pokemon weren't singing.

After five minutes of carving through snow, Aradia's hands and toes were horribly numb. She had passed Jade's house, who had left, John's house, who hadn't left yet, Kanaya's house, who had left, and now Karkat's house…there was no movement in Karkat's house at all, and no-one had left yet. He was going to be late, and somehow that didn't surprise Aradia at all. Rolling her eyes, she balled some snow into a terrible snowball and launched it with surprisingly good aim at Karkat's bedroom window. Three times in a row. As she was about to throw a fourth one, the small window was rammed open and Karkat's furious face appeared. "Aradia what the FUCK! That was NOT funny and-" Karkat started to rage before being cut off by his attacker.

"Karkat it's 8 o clock." Aradia smiled up at him. Karkat's expression turned from pure anger to shock in a heartbeat.

"Well shit."

"I would hurry up, or you might get the leftover. Sollux would never let you live it down."

Karkat didn't bother answering and slammed his window shut. A stream of muffled swear words followed him. Rolling her eyes yet again, Aradia retrieved her numb hands into her pockets and turned to start snow gouging again. Sollux had said Karkat wanted Tepig, but Nepeta had her eye on that pokemon as well. If he didn't hurry up, it would be way too late.

To her delight, no more snow carving was necessary after just half a minute – a path was carved through the snow already. No more snow carving! With a happy, tired smile, Aradia stepped into the somewhat recent path, and started to walk normally again, getting nearer and nearer to Scratch's lab.

Minutes in the past…

Whump.

What the fuck.

Whump.

Five more minutes.

WHUMP.

"I'm coming for fucks sake!" growled a particularly annoyed Karkat as he threw off his covers and stomped to his tiny window. Stupid goddamn kids…or John. Probably John, he had a stupidly good aim. Still muttering, Karkat forced his window open and leaned out to see…Aradia? The fuck was she doing up. And throwing snowballs at his window. It wasn't her kind of thing.

"Aradia what the FUCK! That was NOT funny and-" Karkat unnecessarily shouted down to her before being rudely cut off.

""Karkat it's almost 8 o clock." Aradia smiled smugly up at him.

Oh. Oh.

"Well shit," muttered Karkat, amazed at the fact that it was actually Monday. Without replying to Aradia, whatever she had said, Karkat retreated into his room and slammed his window. The rest of the time in his house was a blur for him: a lot of swearing, a lot of clothes being thrown around and a lot of tugging at his messy mane of black hair. He was going to be late and the last one there, unless Gamzee had spaced out.

But as Karkat ran out of his small house and through the paths already made by other people, he realised even Gamzee had left before him. "Shit, shit, shit, shit..." snarled Karkat as he checked his watch. 8:12. The professor was probably already lecturing everyone on stuff they already knew. And his friends were probably all picking their pokemon already.

Why was everything a fucking disaster all the time?

Tavros had decided to leave his house at 7:40am when his over-protective father had doubts about him going on a massive journey. The short, portly man had been fussing over him since early morning, and Tavros had finally left home to get his first pokemon. Excitement, fear and anticipation had gripped his body as he started to push through the snow. After a while, he came to Feferi's massive house. A path through the snow was visible, an escape from the cold snow which was biting deep into his toes. Feferi had already left her home, no surprises there. Tavros carved his way into her path. He liked the snow, but not when it was this height. Shuddering from the wet and cold, Tavros picked up his pace. Out of everyone, he was furthest from Scratch's laboratory, and he had no intention of being late.

After a long while of walking, Tavros was surprised to find himself standing outside the pure white building that blended in so well with the surrounding snow. With a shuddering deep breath, Tavros opened the laboratory door that stood before him and stepped in, taking in his surroundings with awe.

The most prominent thing about the wide, square shaped room was the fact that it was pretty much all white – even all the beeping machines. This brought attention to a long machine that held sixteen pokeballs, which were far more interesting than their surroundings. Grinning in excitement, Tavros closed the door and looked around the room for any of his friends that had shown up.

Rose, Kanaya and John were talking happily in a corner, Dave was being bothered by Terezi, Nepeta was hopping up and down in front of Equius, Feferi and Jade were sitting down with Eridan and chatting excitedly. Well, Eridan didn't join in much but that wasn't surprising. Aradia and Sollux were also chatting, but Aradia looked up at the sound of a door closing and waved enthusiastically at him. With a nervous smile, Tavros waved back before walking over to Jade. Just as she noticed him and started to smile widely, a familiar voice appeared from nowhere.

"Tavrooos!" grinned Vriska as she appeared from nowhere and spun the startled boy around.

"Uh, hi Vriska," stammered Tavros, relaxing slightly at his friend's somewhat wicked smile.

"So what pokemon are you getting, hmm? I'll make sure you get it, for as long as it isn't a wimp pokemon!" Vriska gushed, leading him away from a disgruntled Jade. "And it can't be the on I'm going to bag myself either!"

"Uhh, well-" Tavros murmured, coursing his fingers through his dark brown Mohawk. But then he was cut off by an indescribable voice.

"Are you all here, then?" Prof Scratch had appeared out of nowhere, rather like Vriska. He was a man that looked like he should be tall, but was quite short. He wore a simple green shirt with a simple white jacket and simple white trousers.

"Karkat and Gamzee are still to arrive, I believe," Kanaya's calm voice sprung from the gathering throng of approaching people.

"Well, we may as well sta-" Scratch started to say, but then was cut off by the sound of a door opening.

"It was motherfucking cold outside, wasn't it?" Gamzee smiled dazedly as he slouched over to the group. "Sorry I'm late, I got distracted by this pokemon, it was all motherfucking staring at me."

Tavros smiled welcomingly to his best friend and, upon spotting him, Gamzee's grin became even bigger. He started to move over to him, much to Vriska's annoyance.

"It is fine Gamzee, we have just Karkat to wait for now." Scratch said evenly and then continued. "You all know me by Professor Scratch, I study pokemon and-"

"Yeah, yeah! We know what you do, just let us get a pokemon already!" Vriska called out. Tavros nudged Vriska in the ribs with his elbow, slightly embarrassed by her. Vriska responded with a low snort as Doc Scratch ignored her remark, but also put aside the introductions.

"I believe all of you know what a pokemon is? Good, you can now pick one from the selection I have behind me. Settle your choices politely, please. I'm afraid Karkat will have to have the remaining one" Scratch stepped to the side.

Vriska grabbed onto Tavros's arm and dragged him along with the tidal wave of excited people. He blinked in panic as Vriska guided him towards the Sinnoh region's pokemon – not where he wanted to go. His friend reached out greedily and grabbed the pokeball neatly labelled 'Chimchar'.

"Now, which one do you want?" Vriska asked loudly over the voices of everyone else.

"Torchic…" whispered Tavros, in a daze from the noise and the suddenness everything. He was extremely surprised when Vriska actually heard him. Tossing her spiky black hair from her face, she shoved aside Eridan, who yelped after her in annoyance, and pulled Tavros beside her.

"Go on then, take it!" Vriska encouraged as he started to shakily reach out to the pokeball. This was it, his first pokemon…and then his fingers clamped around the spherical contraption. He didn't have much time to think about this, as Vriska dragged him back through the crowd, looking strangely exhilarated.

"At least you got a fire type! I thought you would get a stupid grass type, Torchic is pretty damn awesome when it evolves!" she nudged him in the ribs. Hard. Tavros grinned awkwardly as he rubbed his side. And then it hit him: in his hand was a real life pokemon! HIS pokemon…

And then, Karkat was standing there, right beside him looking exhausted and absolutely furious. "I have NOT just missed the grand Pokemon picking!" he roared.