Chapter Text
“Hoenn is also the premier home of the Pokemon World’s space institutes. Due to our location geographically speaking, we are blessed enough to have nothing but water covering us.”, The girl continued his spiel as Yoni couldn’t help but steal glances at the city. It was big, bigger than anything back home. Much better than the view of water he had had all the way around. Traveling to Hoenn by boat had been a terrible idea. It was accessible that way, yes, but nobody would claim the views were interesting. She was definitely right about Hoenn being surrounded by water.
Yoni abruptly hit the back of the teacher. She had stopped and he really had no discernible reason why - because he hadn’t been paying attention. He did his best to show some interest, pretending he had been listening to every word eagerly.
“Yes, yes, water,. Got it.”
Roxane smiled, she had been a teacher long enough to know when one of her pupils, or soon to be pupils weren’t paying attention. She decided to question him.
“What’s the matter, don’t you care for a career with rockets? Most boys your age in Hoenn love the boom they make.”
That snapped Yoni right out of his daze.
“Wait, what? Team rocket?”, the boy’s eyes practically bulged out of his sockets, swallowing suddenly seemed very hard. He knew that Team Rocket had supporters in pretty much every place in Kanto, and they had even spread their criminal tendrils to Johto, but this was Hoenn, he had traversed a whole sea to get here. A whole load of nothing. And this person, definitively intelligent, and somewhat well off in life, supported them?
“Pardon me? Yes our rocketry and aero-engineer team is the best in all of the regions, but If there is something you dislike about them, you can tell me so. Maybe you’d prefer to discuss the local tech-conglomerate? The Devon Corporation?”, Roxanne was puzzled by the apparent distaste of the young man for space, but she had seen weirder. One of his adult trainer students had had a weird obsession with skittys. This was nothing in comparison. Better to ignore it.
“Devon, huh?”, same as Roxane had chosen to ignore his shock, so did he chose to ignore her possible criminal affiliations. Though her interest in technology might indicate some nefarious plan of Team Rocket. Back in Johto they didn’t exactly have this crazy amount of tech. It was all pretty simple really, the biggest luxury they afforded themselves was basic cable, and even then most people listened to radio. But lots was different back in Johto.
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“This recent attack on the Cerulean city citizen’s habitation, who has asked not to be named is the latest on a series of attacks of the organization known as Team Rocket. Though it has claimed responsibility for the attack, the police has confirmed so far, no one has been charged or arrested.”
The Television in the background was of no particular interest to Yoni as he checked what cards he had gotten in his Pokemon Trading Card Game packet. The trips that his mother and father did to a town big enough to actually have a pokemart were few and far inbetween - stuck in the middle of nowhere like he was, his parents often remarked he was lucky the local clerk had Pokeballs. They didn’t even have a pokemon center! Routes near caves had pokemon centers, and yet his town didn’t. They had to wait for the mobile pokemon healing unit every Tuesday. But so it was in the small place he called home. Calling it a town was a disservice to actual towns. It was more of a village. A couple of houses in a hill, with rows and rows of crops in between.
It was beautiful, and it was also boring. Nothing to see or do! So when his father had told him he had to go to the city and would be back tomorrow, he’d made him promise he would bring back a pack of cards. Not that he had anyone to play with - kids were few and far, the only ones who even showed up being cousins from the city. - But he liked to collect them, and had them all organised in neat little folders. He’d asked for the fossil pack, maybe he’d get a Helix fossil to collect, or an Aerodactyl, maybe someone would have made a mistake and slipped a charizard card in there.
It was his dream.
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Yoni grabbed the sphere in his pocket as he thought about the cards, which he had stored in his suitcases as soon as he had been told the news. They weren’t exactly in Johto anymore. And if the things this possibly criminal lady told him, then Hoenn was far far more advanced. The power they held in their pockets, in their wrists. They were almost like robots! They had mini tv’s inside their phones, capable of streaming video. Whomever ran this Devon Corporation must have been either a genius, have a team of hardworking scientists working around the clock, or be stinking rich. Maybe even all three! To think.
“Of course, I am biased in the matter, but it’s not the fact that Devon chose to headquarter itself there that makes Rustboro such a lively city, but rather the fact we have the trainer school here! I am very proud of the effect education has on our trainers. Some, who went on to challenge the Elite hailed from this very school and we have partnerships with Devon and other institutions so that less unfortunate trainers can partake in classes.”, she glanced at him and he felt ridiculously self conscious as he realised she hoped he would say something. It was as if she wanted him to ask to join the trainer school, Yoni shook his head. He had been educated, he knew how to read and do math, but Trainer School didn’t appeal, he didn’t even have a pokemon to call his own yet!
His hand touched the cold sphere in his pocket and it was as if, from a moment to the next, it started weighting a thousand pounds. He was almost brought to his knees even if he knew logically that the mass of the Pokémon was all contained as digital information.
His own Pokemon.How he had dreamed of such a moment. Frankly, Yoni had always thought that one day he would get one of the three starters. Totodile, Cyndaquil or the one he had his eyes set in: Chikorita. He was from a farmer family, he couldn’t help but love the grass. But then that day had never arrived. And, as the years passed, he realised it never would. The Professor might give out Pokemon to young kids, and maybe those far away could go and pick theirs up from a Pokemon Center. But what chance did he have? Stuck near a road no one passed through. Really it had been a stroke of luck that he had had his own - and if he were quite honest it had been bribery.
“Oh, yes, I’ve heard of the Trainer School”, blatant lie, one that could be caught quite easily enough if only the teacher chose to try and do it. What had been the name she had given? Roxxy? Roja? But he figured it was well worth the risk. - “I don’t know if I would call myself a trainer, however…”
That was the truth wasn’t it? People like him and his parents worked, trainers were chosen, either by blind luck, or by birth, to go on adventures. Someone had to run the pokemarts, make the food, milk the miltanks --
Someone had to stay behind.
Roxane seemed to guess what he was thinking, for she intervened. “Nonsense, a smart young boy like you? I’d bet you a thousand pokedollars you could make it pretty far in Trainer School!”, she smiled at him, gently cupping his chin that had lowered. “Plus I see you have a pokeball in your pocket, if your wallet were that thick I’m sure you’d be carrying a whole lot of full restores”, he almost did a double take at the joke. He didn’t get it.. “So why not come at least to a few lessons? It’s complimentary! I’ll offer them.”
Yoni dug his heels at the pavement, something else he wasn’t used to. Back home everything was dirt, or, if they were fancy, stone. None of this concrete stuff. But yet here he was. Everything was so new to him.
“I don’t know if you have the authority to do that, miss.”, it was a nice thought, that she would let him come to some of her lessons, but she was probably just a teacher doing a salesman pitch. “I don’t think my mum would appreciate the bill.”
Roxanne twisted his arm- Not quite enough to hurt him, but enough to make him look ahead, finally looking her in the eye. She’d never get physical with one of her students - because as soon as he had introduced herself to him, she knew he would be a pupil. She’d never hurt any of her pupils but it would be highly inconsiderate to raise her voice.
Instead she whispered the next few words. Her tone showed no indication of hesitation, no slowness or no halting. It was as if, and Yoni thought, it was as if she had already decided he would go.
“I’m telling you it’s free. Why just recently another boy who came from Johto to Hoenn defeated me at a Gym Match and he got his badge. I’m sure you have as much potential as him, and even if it never goes anywhere, it is free, have I not told you? I am not running a scam”.
Yoni, who had stopped, almost stammered backwards in shock. The lady - she was a gym leader? He had thought her a teacher, but he never would in a million years have dreamed. He had only seen a gym leader once, Jasmine, and while she had been as kind as the woman in front of him she hadn’t had time to personally escort him around. To give him the grand tour. And to offer him such a position? He never would have thought. Weren’t Gym Leaders supposed to be insanely busy?
And then another thing jumped at him ,something he almost hadn’t realised amidst the shock.
“Wait, others? Another boy from Johto? Where was he from?”, Yoni would seriously like to compare and contrast. Hoenn had been such a surprise to him - such a different experience than he had been expecting, that someone native to his homeland would not only be nostalgic - nevermind the fact he had only been there for a day. - It would cure some of his home sickness. It would be nice to talk someone, other than someone in this Region, so foreign to him, it might as well be another world. He hadn’t even seen a pidgey! Did they even milk Miltanks?
Roxanne pursed her lips. “I would not be able to tell you where they were from exactly.”, she paused to look around. “All I can say is that they seemed well acquainted with their Pokemon, a chance I am offering you!”
Yoni had a mean spirited thought and just had to ask. “Do you get paid by head? Will your salary increase if I join your class, you’re really insisting on this.”, he actually wondered. He didn’t know what a Gym Leader earned, but every pokedollar was a godsend, right? He thought grummily to the 300 pokedollars he carried with him in his pocket. Even with all his savings and extras by his mum and dad, even with not buying the new packets of cards, he still didn’t have much.
“Honestly, no, but a friend of mine, Steven Stone has offered me a grant, and I truly do think you need a helping hand.”, Yoni wondered what it was that made him look like he needed it. His clothes? They were clean, and well worn, but they were far too hot for the climate. His lack of money? He had enough to survive, and he had never starved. His accent? He didn’t think it that thick. It sounded different from Roxanne’s refined speech, sure, but it was normal.
“It would help you fit in”, she offered, tentatively. Truth be told Yoni didn’t really have much that was expected of him. There really wasn’t much land he could farm berries or crops in here, and even then it was a job for adults. He did have a sprinkler, a novelty item, and some crushed berries in his pocket. But nothing else. He had always expected to become a farmer, but Rustboro lacked dirt to plant it.
He could see the sea port nearby. Similar to the one in Olivine where they had boarded the boat. Maybe he would become a fisherman. Who knew?
But a trainer? It was too good to be true. And yet, something in him couldn’t help but smile at the idea. He couldn’t exactly say no to it.
“I would have to clear it with my parents first.”, he smiled, and there was a brief pause. “I also don’t have much in the way of material, I don’t know who this Steven fellow is but I’d like to at least send him a letter. Do you have mail carrier pidgeots around here?”
Roxanne laughed. Then she realised he was serious, and something about his naivety and education struck a chord with her. “I can arrange a personalised thank you message. But no, I’m afraid we don’t have Pidgeots. With your parents consent I would be glad to let you borrow some encyclopedia on Hoenn Pokemon.”, she was touched at his interest. The boy seemed to perk up instantly.
“That’d be great!”