Hibiki watched the fans intently, wondering what they would do. Never in his life had he ever experienced anything so extreme, and even the morning’s battle between Bolt and the Tyranitar seemed tame in comparison to taking down almost an entire city’s club of trainers. The members of Vermilion Fan Club were staring at Kenta and his Salamence with a new expression written on their faces. There was little indignation amongst them now, let alone hatred. Certainly, there was no more pride. Now there was only fear, awe, realization at last that they were facing a trainer several leagues above them. The club’s chairman stepped forward meekly, removing his hat with one hand while waving down his remaining few pokémon trainers with the other. He bowed his head, not looking either of the Nyna brothers in the eye.
“I’m sorry,” the old man spoke, keeping his eyes on the ground. “None of us had any idea what you were capable of. No more fighting- please?”
Kenta let out a long whoosh of breath and gave the chairman a relieved smile. “I never intended to fight you in the first place,” he said, walking up to Bolt and rubbing his scaly head. “I’d only wanted to talk.”
The chairman motioned to his club’s house. “Then by all means, let’s go back inside. Can we perhaps start over?”
“I’d like that. Um . . . sorry about your windows. I’ll pay for them soon, I promise.”
***
Hibiki hadn’t expected the trainer fan club to forgive him and his brother so readily, and judging by some of the dirty looks he was getting from the more grudging kids, he accepted that not everyone shared the chairman’s views. Each club trainer sat cross-legged on the couches and wherever there was room on the floor, watching as Kenta prepared to speak once more at the forefront of the room. Looking at Kenta for a moment, Hibiki noticed that he had become just as nervous as he was before. Kenta scratched the back of his head and smiled weakly, if not somewhat guiltily, at his listeners.
“Guys, I uh . . . I want to apologize for my rudeness earlier,” he said slowly. “It’s just that I had to stir you up and get you all listening to me somehow, and angering you was the only way I knew you’d take me seriously.”
“I was going to say earlier, you were being kind of a douche back there,” chimed in Hibiki. He ducked as Kenta attempted to smack him in the back of the head. “Shut up, runt.”
“So you’re not Brendan Birch, and I don’t even know who that kid is,” spoke the trainer who’d owned the Mr. Mime, pointing at Hibiki. “Just who are you guys?”
“That, we can’t tell you,” said Kenta in a final tone. “But we’re here to offer you something that nobody else can give you. We’re here to take back . . .” He spread out his arms. “-yesterday.”
Kenta proceeded to explain everything to the fan club, starting with G.R.I.P.’s policies, the government’s recent seizing of the Master Ball, and Kurt’s imprisonment. To hammer the coffin nail in further, he brought up Captain Arcada’s unauthorized use of deadly force against him (showing them all the red patch that had been his bullet wound), and how he and Hibiki had witnessed the police killing wild Magneton and stocking them in a truck. All throughout his testifying, he took care not to give away his own name or Hibiki’s. At one point, a male trainer raised his hand and guessed exactly who he was.
“So you got shot, you say? It said in the paper that an officer died of a bullet wound through the gut during the Silph Incident. It was a guy called Nyna. You also have a bullet wound in your gut.”
“I am not Officer Nyna,” denied Kenta smoothly, “or I’d be dead, wouldn’t I?”
“But . . . but nobody else was even reported getting hurt except for the receptionist-”
“People get shot when they seize criminal syndicates, and Nyna was just unlucky,” said Kenta, trying his best to make it sound obvious. “As for me, of course Arcada left it out of the news that he shot a fellow officer. Otherwise he’d be thrown in jail.”
Hibiki looked at Kenta, but saw no show of weakness. He was keeping a game face on, refusing to let leak that he was lying in any way. It impressed and disturbed him at the same time.
“How can you be sure that the government really intends to use our pokémon as war machines?” asked a slender-looking young man with sharp eyes, as Kenta was wrapping up. Kenta shook his head. “I have no absolute final proof on that. I could be right, and I could be wrong.” He glared as he thought of Silvaki Kurisawa’s honeyed smile on television. “But regardless, they are our pokémon. Not theirs. The only thing worse than a thief, is a thief who says he’s done nothing wrong.”
“And isn’t it strange that they’re only letting us have two pokémon now?” added Hibiki. “I could understand them limiting us from catching hundreds of pokémon that are left sitting in the PC, but they didn’t even let us keep our maximum teams of six. That’s not fair! The only reason they’d do that is to make us weak!”
“Hear, hear!” cried a girl in the front row. As the rest of the club gave a short cheer, Kenta turned his head to Hibiki and gave him a quick wink. “Nice one. It’s reasons like this that I wanted you with me.”
“Thanks. I try.”
“We want our pokémon back!” shouted a young trainer in the middle left area of the crowd. “I don’t even get to see mine for another seven years!”
“You will get your pokémon back,” announced Kenta, raising his hands for silence. “But it may cost you dearly. This isn’t your typical resistance effort against some low-down team of crooks bent on using pokémon to take over so-and-so. Our opponents aren’t Team Rocket, or Aqua, or Galactic, or any of those other minor distractions. This time, it’s our own rulers. We’re going to be doing something much bigger than just taking back our pokémon friends- we will be staring down our government face-to-face and telling them that they were wrong.”
A hush followed his words, and Kenta stopped talking. I’d better give them time to think it over. Unlike me, their minds haven’t been made up for two months now.
“How will we do it?” asked the club chairman, rising from his seat in the back center of the room. “How can we possibly hope to overpower our government now?”
Kenta smiled grimly. “It won’t be easy.”
*One day later: Saffron City Pokémon Fan Club*
“G.R.I.P. has taken our strongest pokémon, and left us with almost nothing. If we ever want to match them in power again, we’ll have to plan and work together as never before. Until now, it’s been every trainer for himself, taught to ‘stand alone in the victory circle and state his claim when the music starts.’ But I tell you now, you no longer ‘want to be the very best, like no one ever was.’ Look beside you, at your neighbor. He or she is your teammate, and is to be considered your equal or better. Pride breeds selfish thinking, and if you think you can beat G.R.I.P. by yourself, try battling me.
*Two days later: Goldenrod Underground*
“In spite of our meager condition, we have one thing our government doesn’t have- numbers. G.R.I.P. placed down an age marker that cuts out every trainer below eighteen years old as a qualified pokémon holder. But G.R.I.P.’s pokeball tracking system is limited to the merchandise in official pokemarts. You ‘unqualified’ trainers can avoid being tracked by getting custom-made pokeballs from Azalea Town’s Kurt Kuchinawa. He can only afford to give you one or two though, so make sure that whatever pokémon you decide to capture for yourself stays in the ball. And for the love of God, catch something you can rely upon! No Paras or Hoothoot, you get me? If you’ve got a legal pokémon trainer in your midst, ask him to assist you in the capture, so you might snag the wild pokémon in one go. Remember, be stealthy when going to see Kurt, or the police force may get suspicious. The password to getting your apricorn ball is ‘release!’
*Three days later: Dewford City Hall*
“G.R.I.P. may or may not have known this, but the beauty in only having two pokémon is that they get all the training attention. Battle experience won’t be spread out, as it would’ve been in a team of six. Your pokémon will grow fast, and learn tougher moves more quickly. Don’t slack off though- we haven’t got the luxury of time on our side! Train your pokémon to at least the second evolution, and be smart about the moves you let them keep. No Graveler with Harden, understand? Try to make your teams of two balance each other out. Get a special attacker and a physical attacker if you can, a sweeper and a tank, a status condition striker and a direct hitter, whatever it takes. Everything counts, down to your pokémon’s very special ability. Mix it up as much as you can, because teams of two don’t have nearly as much flexibility as teams of six!
*Four days later: Lilycove City Pokémon Fan Club*
“If any of you have been saving your money, now is the time to use it! Pool your wealth and spend it on the most powerful TMs you can buy. Lilycove Department Store is famous for its TM stock, which consists of elemental master moves like Thunder and Fire Blast. They’re not accurate like their more reliable (and eternally more expensive) cousins Ice Beam and Thunderbolt. But they’re the only guarantees we have of taking large chunks out of our opponents’ hitpoints. Buying Protect goes without saying! Also, don’t leave out Reflect and Light Screen. No matter how powerful your opponent is, his strength is cut in half against defenses like these. Reflect and Light Screen will undoubtedly save us from being wiped out in one hit. That’s all the time we need to strike back! And if any of you are holding HM03, Surf, share it amongst yourselves! Surf is the gift that keeps on giving- only three pokémon types are resistant to it, and it will never run out. Don’t stop at sharing this stuff with fellow club members, but lend a helping hand to any rebel trainer fighting for our cause!
*Five days later: Hearthome City Pokémon Fan Club*
“As you probably already know, unofficial trainers don’t get to use pokémon centers anymore. And on the day of battle, should it come, the pokémon on our side will be dropping like flies. So get ready now! Gear up with as many Revives as you can carry. Buy Lemonade from machines instead of potions from pokemarts; it’s cheaper and more efficient. Start practicing your pokeflutes, so you can ward off sleep and confusion if it comes your way. Last of all, stock up on berries against status conditions! If we’re going to stand a chance against an army of pokémon all-superior to ours, we’ve got to be in it to win it. I promise you now, if we fight for long enough, the tide of the battle will turn. I will personally see to that.
*Six days later: Crescent City Pokémon Fan Club*
“Attacking your enemies all at once is a terrible idea; you’ll end up hitting your teammates. But in everything else you do, be as close with each other as a colony of ants. You guys must learn to travel together, train together, live together, and fight together as a unit. Even if it means teaming up with Rockets, Cipher, Innuendo, whoever, there cannot be bitterness among you. To the government, one rebel trainer is a deluded idealist. Two rebel trainers are partners in crime. But an entire region of rebel trainers is a movement! There will be no single chieftain to lead you all, not me, nor anyone else. But pick for yourselves a champion for each group, so that if your leader falls in battle, other units can press on without a broken moral.
“In spite of our secrecy, it’s only a matter of time until our opponents find out what we’re up to. We have until that unknown day to prepare for confrontation. My name to you all is Brendan Birch, and I am on your side!”
“I’m sorry,” the old man spoke, keeping his eyes on the ground. “None of us had any idea what you were capable of. No more fighting- please?”
Kenta let out a long whoosh of breath and gave the chairman a relieved smile. “I never intended to fight you in the first place,” he said, walking up to Bolt and rubbing his scaly head. “I’d only wanted to talk.”
The chairman motioned to his club’s house. “Then by all means, let’s go back inside. Can we perhaps start over?”
“I’d like that. Um . . . sorry about your windows. I’ll pay for them soon, I promise.”
***
Hibiki hadn’t expected the trainer fan club to forgive him and his brother so readily, and judging by some of the dirty looks he was getting from the more grudging kids, he accepted that not everyone shared the chairman’s views. Each club trainer sat cross-legged on the couches and wherever there was room on the floor, watching as Kenta prepared to speak once more at the forefront of the room. Looking at Kenta for a moment, Hibiki noticed that he had become just as nervous as he was before. Kenta scratched the back of his head and smiled weakly, if not somewhat guiltily, at his listeners.
“Guys, I uh . . . I want to apologize for my rudeness earlier,” he said slowly. “It’s just that I had to stir you up and get you all listening to me somehow, and angering you was the only way I knew you’d take me seriously.”
“I was going to say earlier, you were being kind of a douche back there,” chimed in Hibiki. He ducked as Kenta attempted to smack him in the back of the head. “Shut up, runt.”
“So you’re not Brendan Birch, and I don’t even know who that kid is,” spoke the trainer who’d owned the Mr. Mime, pointing at Hibiki. “Just who are you guys?”
“That, we can’t tell you,” said Kenta in a final tone. “But we’re here to offer you something that nobody else can give you. We’re here to take back . . .” He spread out his arms. “-yesterday.”
Kenta proceeded to explain everything to the fan club, starting with G.R.I.P.’s policies, the government’s recent seizing of the Master Ball, and Kurt’s imprisonment. To hammer the coffin nail in further, he brought up Captain Arcada’s unauthorized use of deadly force against him (showing them all the red patch that had been his bullet wound), and how he and Hibiki had witnessed the police killing wild Magneton and stocking them in a truck. All throughout his testifying, he took care not to give away his own name or Hibiki’s. At one point, a male trainer raised his hand and guessed exactly who he was.
“So you got shot, you say? It said in the paper that an officer died of a bullet wound through the gut during the Silph Incident. It was a guy called Nyna. You also have a bullet wound in your gut.”
“I am not Officer Nyna,” denied Kenta smoothly, “or I’d be dead, wouldn’t I?”
“But . . . but nobody else was even reported getting hurt except for the receptionist-”
“People get shot when they seize criminal syndicates, and Nyna was just unlucky,” said Kenta, trying his best to make it sound obvious. “As for me, of course Arcada left it out of the news that he shot a fellow officer. Otherwise he’d be thrown in jail.”
Hibiki looked at Kenta, but saw no show of weakness. He was keeping a game face on, refusing to let leak that he was lying in any way. It impressed and disturbed him at the same time.
“How can you be sure that the government really intends to use our pokémon as war machines?” asked a slender-looking young man with sharp eyes, as Kenta was wrapping up. Kenta shook his head. “I have no absolute final proof on that. I could be right, and I could be wrong.” He glared as he thought of Silvaki Kurisawa’s honeyed smile on television. “But regardless, they are our pokémon. Not theirs. The only thing worse than a thief, is a thief who says he’s done nothing wrong.”
“And isn’t it strange that they’re only letting us have two pokémon now?” added Hibiki. “I could understand them limiting us from catching hundreds of pokémon that are left sitting in the PC, but they didn’t even let us keep our maximum teams of six. That’s not fair! The only reason they’d do that is to make us weak!”
“Hear, hear!” cried a girl in the front row. As the rest of the club gave a short cheer, Kenta turned his head to Hibiki and gave him a quick wink. “Nice one. It’s reasons like this that I wanted you with me.”
“Thanks. I try.”
“We want our pokémon back!” shouted a young trainer in the middle left area of the crowd. “I don’t even get to see mine for another seven years!”
“You will get your pokémon back,” announced Kenta, raising his hands for silence. “But it may cost you dearly. This isn’t your typical resistance effort against some low-down team of crooks bent on using pokémon to take over so-and-so. Our opponents aren’t Team Rocket, or Aqua, or Galactic, or any of those other minor distractions. This time, it’s our own rulers. We’re going to be doing something much bigger than just taking back our pokémon friends- we will be staring down our government face-to-face and telling them that they were wrong.”
A hush followed his words, and Kenta stopped talking. I’d better give them time to think it over. Unlike me, their minds haven’t been made up for two months now.
“How will we do it?” asked the club chairman, rising from his seat in the back center of the room. “How can we possibly hope to overpower our government now?”
Kenta smiled grimly. “It won’t be easy.”
*One day later: Saffron City Pokémon Fan Club*
“G.R.I.P. has taken our strongest pokémon, and left us with almost nothing. If we ever want to match them in power again, we’ll have to plan and work together as never before. Until now, it’s been every trainer for himself, taught to ‘stand alone in the victory circle and state his claim when the music starts.’ But I tell you now, you no longer ‘want to be the very best, like no one ever was.’ Look beside you, at your neighbor. He or she is your teammate, and is to be considered your equal or better. Pride breeds selfish thinking, and if you think you can beat G.R.I.P. by yourself, try battling me.
*Two days later: Goldenrod Underground*
“In spite of our meager condition, we have one thing our government doesn’t have- numbers. G.R.I.P. placed down an age marker that cuts out every trainer below eighteen years old as a qualified pokémon holder. But G.R.I.P.’s pokeball tracking system is limited to the merchandise in official pokemarts. You ‘unqualified’ trainers can avoid being tracked by getting custom-made pokeballs from Azalea Town’s Kurt Kuchinawa. He can only afford to give you one or two though, so make sure that whatever pokémon you decide to capture for yourself stays in the ball. And for the love of God, catch something you can rely upon! No Paras or Hoothoot, you get me? If you’ve got a legal pokémon trainer in your midst, ask him to assist you in the capture, so you might snag the wild pokémon in one go. Remember, be stealthy when going to see Kurt, or the police force may get suspicious. The password to getting your apricorn ball is ‘release!’
*Three days later: Dewford City Hall*
“G.R.I.P. may or may not have known this, but the beauty in only having two pokémon is that they get all the training attention. Battle experience won’t be spread out, as it would’ve been in a team of six. Your pokémon will grow fast, and learn tougher moves more quickly. Don’t slack off though- we haven’t got the luxury of time on our side! Train your pokémon to at least the second evolution, and be smart about the moves you let them keep. No Graveler with Harden, understand? Try to make your teams of two balance each other out. Get a special attacker and a physical attacker if you can, a sweeper and a tank, a status condition striker and a direct hitter, whatever it takes. Everything counts, down to your pokémon’s very special ability. Mix it up as much as you can, because teams of two don’t have nearly as much flexibility as teams of six!
*Four days later: Lilycove City Pokémon Fan Club*
“If any of you have been saving your money, now is the time to use it! Pool your wealth and spend it on the most powerful TMs you can buy. Lilycove Department Store is famous for its TM stock, which consists of elemental master moves like Thunder and Fire Blast. They’re not accurate like their more reliable (and eternally more expensive) cousins Ice Beam and Thunderbolt. But they’re the only guarantees we have of taking large chunks out of our opponents’ hitpoints. Buying Protect goes without saying! Also, don’t leave out Reflect and Light Screen. No matter how powerful your opponent is, his strength is cut in half against defenses like these. Reflect and Light Screen will undoubtedly save us from being wiped out in one hit. That’s all the time we need to strike back! And if any of you are holding HM03, Surf, share it amongst yourselves! Surf is the gift that keeps on giving- only three pokémon types are resistant to it, and it will never run out. Don’t stop at sharing this stuff with fellow club members, but lend a helping hand to any rebel trainer fighting for our cause!
*Five days later: Hearthome City Pokémon Fan Club*
“As you probably already know, unofficial trainers don’t get to use pokémon centers anymore. And on the day of battle, should it come, the pokémon on our side will be dropping like flies. So get ready now! Gear up with as many Revives as you can carry. Buy Lemonade from machines instead of potions from pokemarts; it’s cheaper and more efficient. Start practicing your pokeflutes, so you can ward off sleep and confusion if it comes your way. Last of all, stock up on berries against status conditions! If we’re going to stand a chance against an army of pokémon all-superior to ours, we’ve got to be in it to win it. I promise you now, if we fight for long enough, the tide of the battle will turn. I will personally see to that.
*Six days later: Crescent City Pokémon Fan Club*
“Attacking your enemies all at once is a terrible idea; you’ll end up hitting your teammates. But in everything else you do, be as close with each other as a colony of ants. You guys must learn to travel together, train together, live together, and fight together as a unit. Even if it means teaming up with Rockets, Cipher, Innuendo, whoever, there cannot be bitterness among you. To the government, one rebel trainer is a deluded idealist. Two rebel trainers are partners in crime. But an entire region of rebel trainers is a movement! There will be no single chieftain to lead you all, not me, nor anyone else. But pick for yourselves a champion for each group, so that if your leader falls in battle, other units can press on without a broken moral.
“In spite of our secrecy, it’s only a matter of time until our opponents find out what we’re up to. We have until that unknown day to prepare for confrontation. My name to you all is Brendan Birch, and I am on your side!”