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The Johto League

Chapter 5

On The Road

    The following morning, I woke up in my own bed for the very last time. I’d decided yesterday to wait until tomorrow to begin my journey, so I could get a good night’s sleep, and now, tomorrow was finally here. I’d been so excited it was a wonder I’d got any sleep at all.

    I turned and looked at my bedside clock… and realised I had planned to leave for good over an hour ago. I sat up sharply.

    Thump

    ‘Ow!’

    I looked over the side of the bed.

    ‘Sorry, Meowth. I forgot you were there…’

    ‘You’d better not be doin’ that every morning, or else I’m gettin’ my own sleeping bag,’ he said, picking himself up from where he had fallen off.

    ‘Holly!’ called my mother from downstairs, ‘There’s a visitor here to see you!’

    ‘Can it wait?!’ I yelled back, ‘I only just got up!’

    ‘He says it’s urgent!’

    Rolling my eyes, I ran downstairs to see what was so important, but stopped in my tracks when I discovered Gary in our living room.

    He raised an eyebrow. ‘You know, when you’re on the road, you’ll probably want to keep your clothes on when you sleep and only wear pyjamas at Pokémon Centres. Just a bit of advice for the newbie.’ I looked down and accidentally blushed when I realised I hadn’t even changed out of my Jigglypuff pyjamas.

    ‘Excuse me, young man, but what is your name?’ my mother inquired, having realised that Gary didn’t pull his verbal punches.

    ‘I’m Gary Oak, ma’am, grandson of the world famous Professor Oak.’

    To my utter dismay she went starry eyed.

    'Oh my gosh! Professor Oak’s grandson… in our house!’ she looked at me in that way that makes me dread whatever she’s about to say. ‘I’d be a lot more comfortable with you leaving home so soon if an accomplished trainer like Gary here went with you to make sure you’re all right.’

    Gary responded before I could protest. ‘That’d be fine with me. I wouldn’t mind having a protégé around for company. And you’ll get a great head-start in your training – I bet there aren’t any other newbies who get to be personally taught by trainers of my calibre.’
His blatant arrogance left me lost for words.

    ‘Why don’t you head back to the Pokémon Centre, Gary, and I’ll send Holly over as soon as she’s ready,’ Mum beamed, before heading back to the kitchen.

    ‘Don’t be too long,’ Gary smirked at me as he passed by on his way to the door, ‘Gary Oak doesn’t like waiting around for Slowpokes.’

    With that, the front door closed, and I was left standing alone in the room, having not said a single thing.

 

    I got ready to go and checked the contents of my backpack again as quickly as possible and said goodbye to my mother, who made me promise not to leave town without Gary. I’d started thinking about doing exactly that. Then I had to head over to the laboratory to tell Professor Elm that I’d be leaving home early and I wouldn’t need one of his starters. While I was there he changed the setting on my Pokédex so that it would automatically send my extra pokémon to his transporter. He wished Meowth and me luck and said he was looking forward to taking care of the pokémon I would send him.

    Finally, I checked the Pokémon Centre. Sure enough, Gary was ready and waiting.

    ‘You need to register yourself for the Johto League competition while you’re here,’ he reminded, ‘I’ve already done it.’ All I had to do was give Nurse Joy my Pokédex for identification, and a machine registered me so that I was guaranteed entry to the Johto League Competition in roughly a year’s time, if I managed to earn at least eight badges. It seemed like eons away at this point, even if I was able to win eight badges, but I still wouldn’t wait to get started.

    The three of us headed to New Bark Town’s western exit, which opened onto a dirt pathway surrounded by pine forest. I turned back just before stepping onto the path and took a last look at my home, then hurried on to rejoin the others.

    ‘Where are we heading, then?’ Gary asked, getting out his map.

    ‘Cherrygrove City isn’t too far from here,’ I interjected, ‘and I’m sure we have to pass through it to get any of the other towns in Johto. It doesn’t have a Gym, though.’

    ‘Hmph… I guess getting my first badge will take longer than I thought…’ Gary grumbled. We walked quietly for a while, during which time I squinted in-between the trees as we passed by to see if there were any wild pokémon around.

    ‘All right, out with it, then,’ I said, folding my arms, ‘why did you offer to let me come with you and make it so I couldn’t refuse?’

    ‘…Would you believe, out of the goodness of my heart?’

    I raised an eyebrow in a way that clearly said “yeah, right”.

    ‘Okay, fine, I promised Grandpa that I’d make the offer so I could keep an eye on that Meowth of yours,’ Gary relented. ‘He wants to make sure I can report anything weird that happens if it levels up. And I, for one, wouldn’t mind keeping an eye on him because I still think anyone from Team Rocket has to be morally bankrupt.’

    Meowth and Gary fiercely glared at each other.

    ‘For your information, twoipo, we may have been bankrupt but we had our standards. We never actually ever managed to steal anybody’s pokémon anyway, so dere.’

    ‘You two had better not be fighting the entire way around Johto,’ I sighed.

    ‘Well, for once in my life, I’d appreciate not being treated like a test subject,’ Meowth remarked at Gary. ‘…Actually I’m kinda tired already. I used to travel long distances by hot air balloon, so a good walker I ain’t.’

    ‘That’s okay, here, I’ll give you a ride,’ I smiled, picking Meowth up and placing him on my shoulder. He made himself comfortable by sitting on the end of my backpack.

    ‘Hee, I could get used to dis!’

    Then suddenly, I saw something dart through the bushes ahead of us. I jogged forward, leaving the others wondering what was going on, until I caught up with it. I couldn’t have imagined it, so there must be a pokémon hiding under the foliage.

    ‘Meowth, c’m’ere! I need you to flush out whatever’s in this bush.’

    Meowth ran over obediently, and slashed the leaves apart with his claws, revealing a small purple and white coloured pokémon with large front teeth. A Rattata.

    ‘You can take this one, Meowth, use fury swipes!’

    Meowth lashed out at the tiny rat with his paws, but the Rattata jumped out onto the pathway and evaded the swings. Then it turned and ran away from us.

    ‘After that Rattata!’ I yelled in dismay, and we all set off in hot pursuit. However, the Rattata had the advantage of being nimble and on four legs, so as we ran it got further and further away. Then all of a sudden the trees fell away from the path and we were standing in a small field. The Rattata dived into the long grass and, with a rustle, it was gone.

    I groaned loudly. ‘That one could have been my first capture!’ Then I sighed and turned to Gary, ‘I suppose it’s usually difficult to get started, right?’

    ‘Eh, no, I did it on my first try,’ he replied brightly. With that we carried on, until in the middle of the field I spotted a group of four or five Hoppip floating on a breeze several metres in the air.

    ‘Stand back and watch the pro,’ Gary boasted, unclipping one of his pokéballs and hurling it into the air. It burst open to reveal someone I was already familiar with - his Fearow. Fearow flew up to the Hoppip and followed Gary’s commands to use agility, so they wouldn’t escape, fury attack to damage them all, and then peck on one of them to knock it down to earth. The little pink pokémon couldn’t use its leaves for floatation any more and hit the ground with a bump, then didn’t get up. Gary grabbed a spare pokéball, pressed the button to enlarge it and ready it for capture, and threw it. It hit the fallen Hoppip, transformed it into energy and sucked it inside, then barely wobbled at all as the pokémon resisted before falling still.

    Gary paraded over and picked the ball up just as it was teleported away back to Oak’s lab.
‘And that’s how it’s done!’ he gloated cockily.

    I pouted and walked past him, pretending not to care. ‘And do you actually have any friends?’ I asked rhetorically. That shut him up quite nicely.

    He caught us back up once he’d recovered.

    ‘That’s not funny, you know. I’ll have you know that when I travelled around Kanto last year, I had a whole car full of fans following me around everywhere. They had routines set up to cheer me on with, and pom-poms and everything.’

    ‘Fans doesn’t necessarily mean friends,’ I said in a tentative way, in case he hadn’t yet realised it. ‘What happened to them all, anyway?’

    ‘Well, they got kind of annoying after a while… and they weren’t very fun to talk to…’

    Over to one side I saw a pokémon rise out of the grass. I recognised the cute, brown pokémon as a Sentret, standing on its tail.

    ‘Hey! You there! Sentret!’ I called as I ran over, ‘I challenge you to a battle!’

    The Sentret didn’t seem to understand and cocked its head quizzically. When Meowth leapt over and struck it, it seemed to get the message. To my surprise, it tried to hit Meowth with a move right back instead of fleeing.

    ‘Okay, let’s do it right this time! Use fury swipes!’

    Meowth scratched his opponent furiously, leaving marks, and the Sentret seemed dazed. It tried to retaliate half-heartedly, but was too slow, and when Meowth got in one more blow it toppled over.

    Heart pounding, I realised this was the time to use a ball and fumbled around for one, then threw it, hoping that I could aim properly. Sentret was pulled inside the ball and it lay on the ground rocking back and forth as its captive attempted to escape. I kept my eyes glued to the ball, waiting for what seemed like hours. Finally the ball pinged and was still.

    I walked over in disbelief and picked up my pokéball. Then it sank in and I felt joy welling up inside me.

    ‘I did it! I did it! I captured my first pokémon ever!’ I whooped and danced around the meadow.

    ‘Sheesh, it’s just a Sentret…’ Gary rolled his eyes. ‘Are you going to be doing this the whole way?’

    ‘Yes I am, mister grumpy pants,’ I said and went back to thanking Meowth and prancing about with glee.