.:Clash Of The Titans:.

.:A FanFiction By CreatorOfDisastor:.
[Chapter One]
[Hitting The Road]


Author’s Note: For all those times when I was bored; I wouldn’t have to look far for amusement and excitement in times of dire need. For rainy days, or long car rides or simply times when I felt like it would be fun to absorb myself into another virtual world – my second self – all I would have to do is turn on that switch and watch the little electronic screen. In colour and perfected graphics I could choose my character, starting pokemon and capture all the new exotic types. Sure some of the pokemon were … disappointing in most aspects concerning time taken to train them and their physical appearances, but I will never forget the ever-changing storyline. It is true, you could be a boy or a girl, go for training a sole type, or go for variety at the least. You could choose to be competitive in battling, against your friends, people in the game or test your abilities on the Pokemon league. There were many qualities to that game, and being the first I ever owned that had colour in it, it was to be my most treasured. That was until Fire Red came out though, but what will never change is my first love for Pokemon Sapphire.

This story is based on that very same Pokemon Sapphire game, with the recurring appearances of Team Aqua and Team Magma in the odd place and the mention of legendary Titans with the godly control over the elements of Earth, Sea and Air. With the three main characters being Joey – a boy from LA –, Davina – the daughter of Professor Birch – and Brendan – the son of Norman, Petalburg's latest Gym Leader – you might find all three are based on the characters that appear on the odd occasion throughout the game. Enjoy ^^;

-------------------

To be brief with the cheesy introductions I’ll just say Hi and introduce myself as I am, the independent and artistic Joey McCaughrean.

I’ve just moved here about four days ago from sunny LA. What I would do to go back there than live in this idle village town right about now. Not only is this place idle, it’s the hometown for starting trainers and is the only place to go if you want to have an official starter pokemon.

I’m guessing you want to know more about me right? Well physically I’ve got blonde hair, blue eyes, fair skin and I’m average height for a thirteen year old. I’m pretty light, weight-wise and skinny too. Well I’m more of that person who enjoys their own company than feels secure in a large group, and I like art. Sketching, painting, drawing – I love it all. But I never sketch anything alive, and definitely never pokemon. I hate pokemon you see, but if you hate pokemon so much like I do doing what I did is NOT the way to go.

I dislike pokemon – as I’ve already said – and yet I am being head-butted on the shin by a mud fish with attitude problems. Funny how these things work huh? Well I decided when we moved here that I didn’t want to spend the rest of my childhood in a sleepy town so I said mum, dad I’m packing my bags and hitting the road. But unfortunately for me, wild pokemon inhabit the region so you need your own pokemon for security reasons if you want to travel. I’m pretty desperate to leave this place and besides, I love travelling by myself and sketching the landscape with my watercolour pencils and sketchbook so I said okay then, what do I have to do? Bad thing to say when you’re mother can go ballistic with just food shopping. You guessed it. She took me shopping. An entire morning dedicated to just finding shoes. It took the rest of the afternoon and early evening to shop for the ‘latest’ designer Trainer wear. Luckily for rucksack hour, I cut it short by many minutes by picking for me a large rucksack that had like five individual compartments. I choose it mostly because it appeared like it would be large enough to hold an A3 sized sketchbook, a tent, sleeping bag and large amounts of food. Well the day after that I was pooped enough as it was and my mum still wasn’t finished. One word … supplies. Yup, another glorious and sunny day spent inside shopping for various items just for pokemon. Pokeballs, hyper potions, full heals, maps … after all that, I didn’t know there were so many items associated with pokemon! Well luckily the time spent on buying supplies and clothing was just two days, knowing my mother, it could have stretched out to two weeks. After that pandemonium in the local mall, it was that ‘special’ day that I would always remember. The day when I pick the little critter to be with me for the rest of it’s puny existence. More happiness for me. Well it took about three hours at a guess to have a lecture from my dad about the responsibilities and all, then I finally got to pick a pokemon out of three types. Grass, water or fire. I liked neither but blue always was my favourite colour so I picked the water typed pokemon. Mudkip it was called and they were supposed to have a timid temperament. This one is far from timid. The moment I left the laboratory, the little beast broke out of it’s pokeball. After many useless attempts, I gave up and let the Mudkip walk with me. I gave it what it wanted and the least it could do is stop head-butting me.

My only friend in Hoenn so far is Brendan, but he lives in Petalburg City which is unfortunately some distance away from Littleroot Town. I met him through connections. Since my dad had just recently aced a job as an assistant for this famous guy in Hoenn called Professor Hugh Birch, we had to move into Littleroot so it wouldn’t be a long distance to travel to get to the professor’s lab. Professor Birch being a pokemon professor and all knows some pretty important people like the Elite Four for instance and some Gym leaders in particular. Well dad insisted on treating me to a tour of Professor Birch’s laboratory and that’s where I met this boy who was outside – my dad pointed this out proudly – in the lab’s very own pokemon enclosure. That was then where I met Brendan who was sitting on the branch of a tree with this green gecko creature – which my dad pointed out to be a Treecko too. My dad then said that this guy had just received his pokemon and was spending the night at the lab in the guest rooms since he won’t get to Oldale before nightfall. Well Brendan and I talked soon after we said our greetings and I soon found out that he just so happened to be the son of a Gym leader. I really wanted to hear about Brendan’s story as the son of an adored street trainer. I soon realised that this guy’s family had a known and respected reputation of being tough battlers, and that Brendan himself disliked battling but entered his pokemon into contests. When I asked what these contests were about, Brendan went crazy showing off his pokemon to me. Apparently he’s a real fan of pure typed pokemon, hence the Treecko which is one hundred percent grass. Despite me hating pokemon and all, I was pretty interested when Brendan started showing me these photos of his family and all their pokemon. There were loads. It was amazing how his entire family could be so into pokemon.

Okay, so here I am now.
You’ve probably gathered by now that I’m a Pokemon Trainer – and there were some obvious hints to those who weren’t listening before – and well right before I left I was told that a new law and been put into motion that beginning trainers had to travel with a partner. Well Brendan would have been my choice but his sister Brianna had come to drop him off back in Petalburg where he would travel with this boy called Wally. Well this Wally sounds like a wimp and when I got Brendan's side I learnt he was a wimp. But it wasn’t his fault; it was this sickness he had where he would get suddenly nauseous and sickly. Despite his frailness, Wally had persuaded his family to let him travel … but with Brendan. Enough with Wally, I bet you’re all tense wondering who I’ve got to travel with. Well I can tell you now without giving away much that this was someone who would have been at the very bottom of my ‘to travel with’ list, someone who is seriously famous at a young age and is loved by all. You would know her if you spared one glance across the road but for me, someone who hardly watches the news or listens to gossip, well I treated her like I would treat any other human being.

Well my travelling buddy is the least of my troubles.
Picture a waste-like landscape with a tarmac road, trees about fifty yards away from this road and long grass at about knee-length. Now picture me walking completely unshielded to the glaring heat of the mid-day sun somewhere in- between the place I’ve come from, Littleroot, and the town I’m trying to get to, Oldale. Now to add the sound effects, imagine the irritating chirruping of the Taillows in the trees, the faint pad of shoes against the road. Now to add in the authentic touch effects. Think burning sensation of the soles of your trainers on the blistering tarmac road and a stubborn Mudkip head-butting you on the shin. Now that you are in my point of view, you can’t exactly blame me for wanting to move back to LA – can you?


“Joey. Hurry up. We’ll never make it to Oldale if you keep up that Slugma pace!”

That’s Davina, my travelling buddy. Brown hair, hazel eyes, peachy skin, slender figure … the usual works. Basically, she’s good-looking to be blunt. Literally everything I’m not. She’s popular, famous, pretty, adores pokemon and pokemon adore her back. If I was to walk down a street and a Skitty would pass me by, the Skitty would most likely hiss at me and bare it’s teeth. But if it were Davina with a Skitty passing by her, the Skitty would purr at her and nuzzle her leg affectionately. And to back up everything I’m saying, she’s just got her pokemon and already it’s evolved for her in it’s first battle. I may not be the world’s leading expert on pokemon, but I know that was not meant to happen oh-so quickly. And in just one morning. See my point? Davina’s also the daughter of a famed pokemon researcher in this region, so let’s just say her popularity status just had a tremendous boost.


“I’m not used to this harsh heat. I’ll get sunstroke” I reply back.

Checking my arms I see my skin is already turning a faint raw pink. Great, my first day on the road and I’m already regretting it.


“Well then walk a little faster and in the shade” she says turning to me, giggling, probably because she sees that Mudkip still head butting me, “See, Mudkip wants you to hurry up as well!”
“No it doesn’t Davina, I’ve already told you this thing wants to ruin my life.”
“I don’t understand you Joey. You’re a Pokemon Trainer and yet you dislike pokemon, look why don’t you return Mudkip to it’s pokeball if it’s being difficult?” she says covering her eyes from the sun.
“You know what Davina. That’s a great idea. Such a great idea that I would have done so if only the little beast would actually stay in it’s pokeball” I say, over-emphasizing the word ‘stay’ to the Mudkip.

The Mudkip stops and looks up at me with these pleading eyes. I have that same look from my baby cousin when she wants something she can’t have, which I usually answer with my standard unresponsive look, the same as the one I’m giving the Mudkip right now.


“Some pokemon are scared of going in their pokeballs, or just come out if they are too strong and don’t respect you” Davina explains in ‘know-it- all’ voice flicking her brown hair over her shoulders and tying it up in a rubber band, “Check your PokeDex, it’ll back me up.”
“I don’t need to check the PokeDex since I am pretty sure this one’s just stubborn right Mudkip?” I ask the little pokemon as it head-butts me again. The Mudkip looks up at me with those pleading eyes and shakes it head and says “Mud” whilst Davina laughs in the background.
“See Joey? Mudkip,” the Mudkip turned to face her, “You don’t like you’re pokeball do you?” she asked it softly.
“Kip, mud. Mud kip!” it replied back to her. Davina just nodded her head as if she understood everything the little creature had said and then to me she replied, “Mudkip isn’t scared of his pokeball, he just wants to travel with you outside of his pokeball isn’t that right little guy?”
The Mudkip nodded and wiggled those disgusting orange gills on either side of it’s cheeks. Davina just laughed and petted the pokemon on it’s head before getting up and stroking her Combusken too.
“Maybe we should stop for a snack break, Combusken looks a little hungry from that morning battle.”
“Nah. The faster we get to Oldale the faster I can rest” I said to Davina who was scowling at me and toggling some buttons on her PokeDex.
“Aah, here it is, status checker. Knew this had those. Come and look Joey”

I nodded my head not really listening to her while shooing Mudkip away with a flick of my foot. It stopped and looked up at me with that look and panted heavily.
“Look” Davina shoved the red device in my face and I pushed it away gingerly, “The PokeDex has this mode where it can check your pokemon’s health, status, age, gender nearly everything. Isn't this so cool?”
“Yes, yes. Wonderful Davina, it’s the world’s fifth wonder!” I reply to her sarcastically, “Go on then. Do a demo, you know you want to”

Davina obviously didn’t understand my teasing and she pressed a sequence of numbers before pointing it at her Combusken. An inferred laser shot out of the PokeDex and scanned the Combusken and then in an electronic voice it said: “Data scan complete. Species: Combusken, Height: 2’10”, Weight: 39.6 lbs, Gender: Female, Age: 18 months roughly, Health Status: perfect health condition, slightly famished, status … none.”


“Wow. It can talk. That’s a large leap for man-kind” I replied using my leg to shoo away Mudkip again who had begun it’s ‘head-butting’ routine on me, “Grrrrr. Davina get this thing to stop annoying me!”
Davina barely sparing a glance to me said in an obvious tone of voice “It probably wants your attention. Why don’t you try handling it?”
“Handle it? Pah as if, no way I’m touching this thing.”
“Mud” it whinged.
“Naaaaw. Look, you hurt Mudkip’s feelings” Davina cooed.
“It doesn’t have feelings Davina. It isn’t human like us.”
“So?” she replied walking in front of me with Mudkip in her arms, “It’s a pokemon and it’s a living thing like us therefore it has feelings”
I stopped and said in a bemused way, “So you’re telling me my back garden is alive and has feelings?”

I heard Davina sigh and whisper something to Mudkip in which I said under my breath and barely audible, “Thought not”.

~

Joy for me.
It’s midday now and I am ravenously hungry, yet I am being challenged to a battle by a bug catcher and his fellow bug maniac. What? They are though. One’s in green shorts and a yellow T-shirt with a Wurmple on one shoulder and a moth pokemon – which I checked with Davina to be a Dustox – on his head. The other one is the bug maniac who is wearing creaseless trousers and a white shirt; in one hand is this book titled ‘The Bug Maniac’s Guide To Hoenn’s Bugs’ and in the other is a handful of marble sized pokeballs, only these pokeballs are an ocean blue with a black criss-cross pattern like a net’s on them.


“How about a double battle?” the bug catcher said.
“Alright then!” replied Davina full of pep and confidence, “I’m Davina Birch and this is Joey McCaughrean, me and my friend accept your challenge”
“What?” I dragged her away by the arm and said “Are you completely loco? I don’t want to battle!”
“Too late Joey! If you decline then you forfeit and we both lose before we even battle” she replied with a smile, “And besides, this will be a good chance for you to get accompanied with your pokemon”
“I don’t like pokemon Davi. You know that”
“Why are you a Trainer then silly?” she asked me, then to the bug couple she said “We’ve decided on our pokemon. It’ll be a friendly match; the first team to lose all of their pokemon on the field loses.”
“Davina!” I shout to her, “We only have one pokemon!”
“Exactly. A friendly match won’t wear our pokemon out much and it’ll give them some exercise. Come on Joey. This is going to be so much fun!”
“Maybe for you, for me - this is going to be the living equivalent to hell”.
“Here, you’ll need Mudkip if you want to battle,” she says handing the Mudkip to me who immediately whines in my grasp, “I’ll take Combusken. When I use Ember, you use Water Gun on the opposite. When I go in for a Quick Attack you do a Tackle and when I use Sky Uppercut, you use Bide. Got it?”

The thing with Davina is that sometimes she has this habit of talking really fast that you can hardly understand anything she says. It’s like hearing a Pichu on helium.


“Davina, I didn’t understand a thing you just said”
Davina just sighed and dragged me back to the bug couple.


“Everything sorted guys?” questioned the bug maniac flicking through the pages of his guide to Hoenn’s bugs impatiently.
“Yep, we’re ready to take you on!” Davina replied in which the bug maniac grinned evily.

I don’t mean it was like a criminal grin, it was more of an insane evil grin. The kind of grin you don’t worry about in terms of bad guys, but you more or less worry about if the boy has problems or not. Well at this I just smiled nervously back and hissed to Davina that if she ever does this to me again she will certainly pay the price.

Well there wasn’t much to say about the match except it totally reeked of failure. Combusken leaped about landing hit after hit on the bug maniac’s Ninjask. Mudkip was low on terms of speed and I soon realised that the little blue creature relied on good defence and unexpected reflexes to evade some attacks like String Shot and Fury Attack. Apparently, double battles were all about team work I later discovered when both Dustox and Ninjask used Double team and attacked with multiple String Shots which Combusken dodged by leaping once again into the air. Well Mudkip, as I said before was useless in speed, and was hopelessly bound in silky strings. Combusken then came back to free Mudkip with an Ember which incinerated the silk, only to be String Shot itself. The string of silk landed perfectly and tied itself around the Combusken’s beak. With Combusken struggling to get the silk off it took one Psybeam to wipe Mudkip out. We had lost and didn’t even realise it until the bug couple cheered and did this highly humiliating victory dance around us.

You could tell that Davina was more or less upset about her pokemon whilst I was disappointed with the loss. Can this Mudkip do anything right? Well I am pretty sure the answer is a big NO so I returned Mudkip to it’s pokeball and handed a pen knife to Davina who was trying to pull the silk string off with her bare hands. When we were all sorted out and Davina had checked Combusken with the PokeDex’s Status Checker a record-breaking ten times people, we finally carried on. We happily agreed on no more pokemon battles, no matter how tempting, until we get to a Pokemon centre. I agreed so we could get to Oldale faster, Davina because she didn’t want to see her beloved Combusken get thrashed by a crew of insects again.

Nothing much happened on the way to Oldale after our first loss in a pokemon double battle except that we passed a stream where Davina ordered a halt. Fortunately for Davina, a group of Zigzagoon were drinking there and she absolutely insisted on catching one. Well I must admit that Davina and Combusken made a cool team. She stood there commanding a combination of moves that resulted in helpful blocks and reflexes. A Quick Attack with a combined Ember was very useful I saw when stopping a Zigzagoon’s Pin Missile move, and especially helpful in stunning it temporarily. It was an extremely easy capture and with just one toss that Zigzagoon was caught.


“Yeah!! I just caught a Zigzagoon!!!” cheered Davina.
She spun, pivoted and even did some ballet just to show her happiness, in which her Combusken joined in with. I couldn’t help but laugh as she held that pokeball in the air and hugged it, making a big song and dance of her first capture. Eventually she stopped and let the same Zigzagoon out. She even took the pleasure of introducing herself to it, after that she let it walk alongside us though it sometimes stopped to sniff the ground or climb up the trunk of a tree and call out happily into the wilderness.

That was about all that happened if you don’t mean the fact that Mudkip broke out of it’s pokeball again. Besides that everything went according to plan, we kept to the road and searched the landscape for a sign until we finally climbed up a tiring hill and saw at the very bottom a large town. On the outskirts were a few ruins, not much just slabs of stone poking out of the ground here and there.

~

In the nearing dusk – I had just learnt – the odds of finding two bedrooms in your average Pokemon centre to stay in are low, very low. So low that me and Davina are stuck with sharing a bunk bed in a box sized and shaped room. Mudkip who was still out of it’s pokeball had cleverly learnt to perch itself on my shoulder. Luckily it wasn’t that heavy although after a few hours that one shoulder would start to ache and it would take a long time to coax the little pokemon to shift to the other. Right now, Mudkip was standing in the middle of me and Davina, literally. And at this stage of life on the road, I had just learnt that travelling with a girl isn’t as easy as the eye gives away:


“I deserve the top bunk, ladies first after all!” she said to me, looking me up and down and flicking her hair out of her face cockily.
“Lady!” I exclaimed, “You are anything but a lady Davina!”
At this, Mudkip simply sighed and slowly retreated to the wall out of the way.
“And what is that meant to mean Joseph McCaughrean?” she asked, her voice rising as she took a step closer to me.
“Well let’s just say we don’t see many girls becoming Pokemon Trainers these days, they’re just too …” I said smirking to Davina as her jaw dropped and she shook her head at me, “too, skittish” I finished, taking a step closer to her.
“Well for your information I am not skittish” she replied as she pushed me backwards roughly, “And look who’s talking. You don’t even like pokemon Joey so how dare you tell me that girls cant travel because they’re skittish.”

Despite being pushed by a girl, it was pretty amusing to see her go completely fanatical. In a few seconds flat, she was already starting a one- sided debate on how girls are equal to boys. By this time, Mudkip had somehow returned itself into it’s pokeball I had noticed when I saw the little blue creature disappear in a flash of red light and the ‘ping’ sound coming from the pokeball.


“This is it Joey. I am never talking to you again” she finished turning her back on me and picking up her shoulder bag from the floor and tossing it onto the top bunk.
“Whatever, maybe I can get some sleep now that you’ve decided to go on strike”
I looked up at Davina to see her response from this comment, but all I got was her back and an angry ‘Humph’.

I then replied under my breath, but loud enough for her to hear, ‘Girls’. Davina turned her head slightly, but then decided against it and continued ignoring me in which I grinned happily knowing that I had partially won the fight. After all it was survival of the fittest. No pain, no game.
And with that I closed my eyes and willed myself to sleep.



----------------------------

Author’s Notes [2]:


If you liked this readers, then just press the 'back' button on your browser and go on to read Chapter Two.

Also, as a last and final note for this Chapter anyway, I beg of you to please review me. Tell me what I need to improve on and what you like the most about the story, characters, plot line etc etc. Greatly appreciated.