The Academy Chapter 1 “Don’t worry son, you’ll be fine!” “But mom, why do I have to go to a stupid pokemon academy!” “Because you got a scholarship, and also because your too young to start your journey!” “Sigh… mom, please can I just stay home?” “No. You will leave tomorrow. No questions asked ok?” Hi, my name is Ryan O’Conner. Sadly, I am sort of a pokemon genius. Why is this sad? Well I just got a scholarship to this dumb academy located in god knows where for “Upcoming elite trainers.” Sounds stupid right? I got in the academy for doing some work on dratini’s roots, and functions of life. I only did it because I love the dragon. Well my mom found the report, and sent it to the school with an application form, without telling me. Apparently, they liked it so much that I got a full scholarship. The only problem here though, is that I don’t want to go to the dumb school. Sigh. Here’s the note sent by the stupid headmaster… [i] Dear Ryan,[/i] [i]You have been chosen to be part of our elite school, due to your brilliant work on your essay about Dratini’s roots… Thank you for applying here, and we hope to see you next week![/i] [i]From,[/i] [i]Headmaster Lucas S. Online[/i] I got that letter last week, and continually I have been pestering my mom not to make me go. But of course, she wants me too because it, “Helps me to learn about the journey I will go on, and also teaches me proper battling techniques.” Like she even knows how I battle… Man I just wish I could have a pokemon right now. I would whip all challengers…. Awww…. But that’s just wishful thinking…. God damn stupid school… Oh well, I am already packed, and It starts tomorrow…. might as well make the best of the situation. At least it’s a pokemon school, and not a normal school, so at least I wont be learning academics and shizz like that. That kind of stuff bores me… so at least ill learn more about pokemon. But what else is there to learn? I sigh as I try to close my eyes to get to sleep. Visions of the school now invade my thoughts. The pictures I was sent made the school look like some sort of huge mansions situated on a flat plain surrounded by a lake, a field, a forest, and mountains on every side. It was the most desolate and deserted looking place I have ever seen. Thoughts of the people I would meet there, friends I may make, enemies too… These things made me rack my brain till 3 in the morning. Finally, I drifted to sleep due to fatigue… My mother woke me up 3 hours later. Man was I groggy. She made me make sure I looked extra special. I couldn’t wear jeans or anything comfortable… But, just when I was about to scream my head off at her, she compromised by letting me wear some cargo pants, and a t-shirt. Not the best choices, but whatever, its School. After doing my hair, and eating breakfast, I picked up my bags, and left the house before mom could get all teary eyed. That was something I didn’t want to deal with at 6:oo AM… I Walked down the road, and neared the bus station. From there, I took a 30 minute ride to another, bigger town, whose name I couldn’t make out. Then I went to my uncles house, where after a short second breakfast that he made me eat, and after giving me a bunch of cash, that I neglected to pick up from my mom, I set off again to the airport. At the airport, I took the 9:oo Pidgeot to Vulcan peninsula, the home of the esteemed Pokemon Academy… Stepping off the bird, I realized that it was downpouring. Already, it was a bad day…. After trudging up the short hill, going into a train station, and taking a short train, I finally arrived at the academy. My first impression of the place, was, “WOW! That thing is !@#$% huge!” I saw a couple of other kids walking up to the front door to check in, and I followed suit. Sighing plenty, I walked up to the receptionist, and checked my name off. I then walked through the doors of the school, and entered the registration area. I quickly received my name tag, and room keys. My room number was 113… lucky I guess. I decided to skip the lecture for a basic intro. on pokemon, and went strait to my room. The room was a pretty nice size. It had 2 twin beds, 2 drawers, 2 desks each with internet access Ethernet plugs, a small fire place, (can we say, wow?) and a nice sized Tv in the center of our room. Already I was liking the place. “I guess things aren’t going to be that bad after all…” I set up my stuff, including my lab top, and quietly waited for an announcement of sorts to signify what was next on the agenda. I flipped on the TV, and flipped through the channels to find nothing on. I looked around for something else to do, and noticed a video bookcase, with a bunch of pokemon videos. I put one in, and watched a pretty old pokemon league match with the current reigning champion, Juno Maxwell. Juno totally wiped the floor with the guy he was up against, and beat all of his pokes with just his dragonite. “That’s the kind of trainer I want to be…” I thought. After watching some more battles, in which Juno was just basically kicking ass, I started to get bored, and turned the tele off. Since there was nothing else to do at the time, I decided to go for a walk around the campus, just to see where everything was. I got to see a lot of the classrooms, all of them set up differently, and some of them seemed pretty interesting. When I came across the cafeteria, I noticed that a lot of people were eating lunch. I realized that I was pretty hungry, so I decided to eat aswell. Picking up a tray ladened with various meets and a salad, I sat down at an empty table. I started to eat, and while doing so, I reflected on the past events. So far, the School seemed pretty nice. It had nice classrooms, kick ass dorm rooms, and good food. But, this was no substitute for real training, and for that reason alone, the whole things just sucked. I really want to actually go training, but ever since the rule was changed so that you have to be 16 to train, I now have to wait another 3 years to actually start. I guess, this is the best alternative, but Id rather be at home… Too engrossed in my thoughts, I hadn’t noticed that a girl had come to sit at my table. “Hi there!” I jerked awake, then sheepishly blushed. She just laughed. “Hi…” I responded. “I noticed that you were alone, and since I am also alone, I decided to join you, I hope you don’t mind…” Wow… already ive made a friend, at least that’s a plus. I warmed up quickly to this girl, and found out her name was Ashley Rose, and she was 13, just like me. We started to talk about our origins, interests, and other things. We both love pokemon, but it seems that she wants to be a water type trainer… Soon the bell rang, and both of us went to the auditorium, to hear the beginning lecture. On the stage of the auditorium stood a young man, most likely in his 20’s, leaning on a podium, waiting for all the students to come in. Ashley and I sat together, near the middle of the auditorium. In our row were a few kids, all around our age, and some younger. In rows sat many diverse kids, all from different parts of the world. The ages of these kids varied some what. The youngest kids were all my age, that is to say 13… The oldest were 15, the year before all of them could start their pokemon journeys, and most likely primed and ready for them. Finally, all of us settled into our seats, and the man up on stage introduced himself As Lucas S. Online. “Lucas S. Online? That’s the headmaster, right Ashley?” She nodded, but she was clearly in disbelief, expecting the headmaster to be some old geezer. I myself wasn’t too surprised. It takes a lot of originality and imagination to run a place like this, and this guy must be some brilliant Harvard Law student, or maybe some corporation’s high executive. Lucas then went on to say how he preferred to be called LSO, and then started to talk about the school. “Welcome students, to pokemon academy.” He started. “Many of you have been here before,” he glanced at the older students, “others have only just begun. I’m here to tell you that this school is great opportunity for all of you to find your place in this pokemon world. Whether you will be a trainer, breeder, executive, headmaster or anything involving pokemon, this school will give the jump and head start needed to have a successful life. Now I know all of you were probably prepared for a long opening speech, but I’ve said all that can be said about this school. The rest you’re going to have to find out by yourselves. I would like to please have the older students stay a brief bit longer, while you other students, the newcomers, please report to room A101 to receive your pokemon. I perked up to that announcement. “Pokemon? We are getting pokemon? I thought it was too good to be true…” Ashley just laughed. “Of course silly, how else are we going to learn.” Ecstatic, I left the room happily, and practically dragged Ashley along on my run to room A101. I wanted to be there first, just to make sure I wasn’t dreaming. It turns out I wasn’t there first… Some other kid had beaten me. He was a boy, about my height, and build. He had this sort of cocky smile on his face that made my first impression of him be, “Creep!” Ashley followed behind me huffing and puffing. “Why the hell are you running, were all going to get our pokemon… geeze… Do you run cross country or something, I could barely keep up! Don’t ever do that again!” “Maybe he came so fast to make sure they had enough pokemon for the people bound to fail, like him.” The other boy said that. “Huh? Who the hell do you think you are to say something like that?” I reply, some what astonished that he just insulted me. “You heard me. You’re probably going to fail. Only truly powerful people, get truly powerful pokemon to help them succeed. You on the other hand, are probably like those other worthless jerks going around school, thinking they will succeed. It takes brains to succeed in the real world, you should know that, or are you too dumbstruck to realize it?” My jaw dropped... Why the hell was he randomly insulting me? This guy has some serious issues. Ashley was apparently struck dumb as well. “Once again I ask,” I say trying to calm my self from beating this shizz hole senseless. “Who the hell do you think you are insulting me like that. I mean, you don’t even know me, and you already label me as a failure?” “My name is Mavel Spike, and I am going to be the greatest trainer that ever lived… Hell, I am even going to beat Juno Maxwell! This school is meaningless to me, its only 1 little step to my stairway to greatness!” More kids started to approach the area, and the people issuing our pokemon through the doors. Mavel smirked at me and calmly walked through the doors. I was about to follow the kid and smack his ass down, but Ashley stopped me, and said, “That jerk isn’t even worth your time don’t worry about him, ok?” Sure, that made me feel better…. Yah right. We were all ushered into the room, and the Professors introduced themselves. I wasn’t really paying attention to that, my eyes were instead transfixed on the many pokeballs lying on a nearby table. Soon the professors started to call out names, in alphabetical order. The prof’s explained that pokemon were decided specifically for the students, based on their essays and application papers. Also, the pokes were all bred with specific moves, listed on a paper that the prof’s would be handing us. One by one, people’s names were called out, and they received their pokes. No one was allowed to release their pokemon inside the crowded room, but many of the students were starting to get excited, especially the ones with pokemon already. Finally my name was called, and I shakingly went up to get my poke. A professor smiled at me and handed my a black ball with an intricate design on it, along with a piece of paper stating the poke and the breeded moves. I glanced at my sheet real quick, careful to cover the name of the pokemon. It seemed silly, but I wanted to see if I could guess what it was just by looking over the breeding moves. My eyes grew large, and wishful thoughts came into my head as I looked over the list. It described every move that my favorite pokemon could be bred on to it. I lifted my hand up that was covering my name, and my thoughts were confirmed. Inside the poke ball, was my very own dratini, level 5 male… I was in my own little world, and was dreamily staring into space, until Ashley poked me, and showed me that she received a staryu. We both started to jump up and down, happy that we got our pokemon of choice. For once, things were looking up for me… Chapter 2 I left the room as soon as I could. Right after Ashley and I received our pokes, we were out. The school gave us the rest of the week (2 days plus the weekend) off to get to know people, our pokemon, and to get acquainted with the campus where we would be staying for the school year. Ashley and I were going to take a walk, apparently it was chilly out side, but for her that meant a whole change of clothes, instead of just throwing on a sweater or something. She quickly gave me her room, and cell number to contact her, and rushed to her room, saying, “I hope my roomate’s here!” As she ran down the hall, it hit me. Duh! I have a room mate… But he hadn’t shown up yet, or did he? I decided to go back to my room to check it out. While on the way I took out the pokeball holding dratini, and was going to release it, but then I realized that now was not the time, nor the place to do so. I wanted to get acquainted with the little guy in more of a private area, preferably my room. Secretly I was hoping my roommate wasn’t there, simply for that reason, but then I realized that that’s a really selfish thought, and quickly shoved that to the back of my mind. I told my self that one of the plusses of this school would be making new friends, and I intended on doing so. Well, it seems I already made an enemy… so another friend or two, that wouldn’t hurt at all. By the time I was finished with my thoughts, I was already in the north wing, where my room was situated. I knocked on the door, but received no response. “Hmmm…. I guess no one’s here…” Taking my key, I opened the door. The other bed was now made up. The other desk, now occupied with a computer, and some writing utensils. Hooked up to the TV was a game cube. When I saw that, man was I happy. “Hey, this kid plays vid games, and that’s always a plus…. Hehe.” The kid, however wasn’t there, so I just decided to go ahead and finally do what I have wanted to do for the longest time, release my new pokemon dratini. My hands and body shook as I Slowly took the pokeball containing Dratini. I never had a problem with sweaty palms before, not even around pretty girls, but for some reason, the anxiety was making me sweat buckets of cold sweat…