Puh. Puh. Puh.

Muffled sounds in the distance.

Footsteps outside.

His body reflexively tensed and his ears perked up. While listening carefully, he ran his right hand against the small fanny pack on his left side, unzipping it halfway.

A familiar jing-jangling of keys and the click-clack sound of a door unlocking allowed him to release a breath he did not know he was holding.

The front door opened for a bit and then quickly shut with a slam afterwards.

"I'm home!"

"Welcome home, Mom!" Ken shouted right back.

His mother came into the wide open living room, threw down her tan duffle bag onto the three-seater couch and rushed over to his corner, where he was currently sitting and typing away on the family desktop computer.

"How was school?" She asked casually while squeezing the living daylights out of him with a hug from his right side.

"It was good. We covered some Kantonian history, but most of the lesson was on pokemon biology, specifically native species, habitats, and ecology."

"Any homework?" She got to her main point.

"Just now finished it up. They want us to choose a common regional pokemon and write a one-page essay on it. Here's the list they gave us." Ken handed her the sole sheet of paper on the mostly empty desk.

His mother barely skimmed it over, turned her head to the computer screen, and searched with her eyes.

"You chose magikarp, not gyarados? Am I reading this wrong?"

"Yup, magikarp. I already know a ton of other kids are going to pick its evolved form, but I know nobody will choose the most 'boring' pokemon."

"So why did you pick magikarp? They are very common," Ken's mother politely rephrased.

He explained himself, "That's part of the reason why. Magikarp are an essential part of Kantonian pokemon ecology; almost every single water pokemon and many land pokemon eat them, and they also provide tons of money in the form of seafood trade for coastal cities. Also, since the lesson was on pokemon ecology, I'm definitely going to get bonus points for tying all of this in."

He quickly added in a low voice, "And I might've been influenced by that monster 'karp Dad and I caught that one time..."

Her eyes narrowed dangerously. "The one from three years ago? The one where you both went who knows how many miles off-route from Pallet City? The one where my calls could not connect because you were so far from comm range?"

"Mooooom. We were fine. Dad prepared for everything, plus he brought Flapper AND Wally. Wally is like super strong; he can take down gyarados." Ken still could not begin to fathom the strength of his father's Starter pokemon.

She shot right back, "A tentacruel can only do so much on land. What if you ran into a luxray pride? Or a nido' herd?"

It took not a small amount of effort to stop himself from rolling his eyes. "Really, Mom? I haven't finished my education, but even I know those pokemon are closer to Central Kanto. And Foreigns would've been even more rare to see. They actually talked about that today in class about how 'they constantly struggle to adapt to the region and find a stable place in the food web.'"

Exasperated, his mother sighed and walked over to the sofa, "There's just no arguing with you, is there?"

Then, she shifted into a more comfortable sitting position. "Well, I'm glad you're doing well and learning lots at Star Private Academy. I know I've told you countless times already, but I'm so proud of you for receiving a full scholarship to go to such a prestigious school."

"At your age, we were still learning our letters and arithmetic and maybe categorizing pokemon by type, let alone writing full essays about them," his mom reminisced wistfully, more to herself than anybody present.

As she continued to recount her school days out loud, he finished triple-checking his write-up for typos and printed off the paper. He interrupted his mother's self-reflections by walking over and handing her his completed assignment to read over.

Halfway through reading - he could tell by following her amber eyes - she stopped and looked up at him.

"Nothing happened today, right?" Her brows knitted in slight worry.

He knew what she was referring to and took a seat. "No. Nothing happened on my walk straight back from school as I didn't stop anywhere along the way, I didn't burn the house down trying to cook because you left plenty of snacks in the fridge, and, well, I'm assuming I don't need to continue."

"You know a mother can't help but worry when her child is at home alone. Anything could happen. Are you sure you don't want a babysitter? We have more than enough money for one," she ignored his blatant sarcasm.

"No, I'm more than fine, Mom. You know how I can easily take care of myself. I told you, you should just put that money towards my Trainer fund instead and save it for when I'm older. And if the absolute impossible happens, then you also know that I always have THIS just in case."

Ken unzipped the rest of his fanny pack, moved his hand into a secret compartment, and took out the pokeball sheltering one of his father's wingulls inside, holding it up high to demonstrate his point.

"And nobody knows you have that, right Ken?" His mom’s voice reduced to a whisper without her realizing it.

"Yes. I constantly make sure nobody knows, and that they wouldn’t have any way of finding out either. I'm taking the test for my pokemon Holder license next year when I finally turn 8, so then it won't be a big deal anymore."

Technically speaking, it was illegal for children to even possess physical pokeballs, let alone give orders to the monsters, most of whom are bigger than they are, that dwell within. One too many accidents and tragedies from kids playing with their parents' belts led to strict laws about better supervision and pokeball possession.

To be honest, it was annoying. He was most definitely not your average child.

The Holder license was originally intended for children of breeding and ranching families and a myriad of other niche helper positions such as trader and nursing assistants.

However, most importantly for Ken, it legally allowed him to carry one well-trained pokemon registered to his parents — with potential to hold more — on his person, and in extenuating circumstances, command it in actual battle if the need arises.

Ken stopped fiddling the pokeball around in the palm of his hand, put it away, and finally looked up to find his mother silently staring at him, love and affection in her gaze.

"You're growing up so fast, Ken… are you sure you still want to leave Pallet City to be a Trainer? You can go to the University and get a steady and very high paying job with your smarts. It's also much safer."

"I'm positive, Mom. Oak University is a great place for higher education, and I’m sure I would get an excellent job with a good degree from there."

The college dedicated to its namesake and renowned Pokémon Professor was indeed fantastic. When the Oak family decided to transform extra land around the lab facilities into a full-fledged campus, the massive half-research, half-education complex pushed Pallet from its town status back in the day to official city due to the unprecedented growth as a result from its development.

After that, it only took a short five years to get a gym officiated by the League and added to the Kanto Circuit. The rest was history.

The boy interjected, "BUT, you and Dad and I and practically everyone else knows that strength is what's most important in this world. I need to be a Trainer."

He felt like he did not need to elaborate any more than that. In a world where a horde of savage beasts or a few exceptionally strong ones decimated villages in the olden days, Trainers were an absolute necessity to fight them off and to just plain survive.

Some older parts of Kanto still called them Tamer-Warriors. And back then, they did NOT have pokeballs or their built-in training programs to help condition pokemon. All they had were grit and sheer willpower born out of the need for survival to force these monsters to submit to their new masters, train them to fight and grow stronger, and hope that the next wave of wild monsters would not be their last.

Nowadays, it is not nearly as bleak, but the attacks are still commonplace and dangerous enough to hold significant risk to mankind; these are the natural disasters of this world.

His mother's silence was her concession. She let out a soft sigh though. Concern was partly evident on her face, yet it became mostly overshadowed by resigned acceptance.

Eventually, Ken broke the silence, "Oh I forgot to mention this before, but can I go watch a pokemon battle two days later?"

Ken's mom raised a brow, signaling him to continue.

He quickly added, "It's between these superstar newbie Trainers that have apparently been rivals since forever ago. They just graduated yesterday from Pallet Central, got their Starters officially registered, and are now doing some preliminary training before their battle. Everyone and their mom knows them, so half of the city is going to be there."

"And how will you get there? The Center won't be letting me off early tomorrow and your father and his crew are not due back from his expedition out at sea for at least a couple more days," the pokemon nurse rebutted.

"Thomas' dad. Mr. Brown can take me and watch over us. And you already have his number too." Ken really wanted to go.

"Oh, Albert? That should be fine then. I'll just have him check in with me later," she paused, most likely to make a mental note to herself, "Now, tell me about these two amazing rookie Trainers that apparently I was supposed to already know about."

"You know Chloe. She babysat me some when I was younger. Brown hair, green eyes," he replied.

"Ohhh, I remember her. She's a very lovely and pretty girl," his mother commented. "Wow, she's already 16? I remember like it was just yesterday when she was always telling me how ridiculously cute and well-behaved you were when she babysat to save up for her Trainer funds. Time flies by so quickly."

Coughing in slight embarrassment, the kid tried his best to seamlessly continue on. "And there's Mason. Literally everyone knows the Sakai family. He's their prodigy."

"Oh yes, Mason Sakai. I've always heard he's been quite the talented young master of such a family. I'm assuming he's taking over the family business after his Trainer journey is over...?"

He affirmed, "Yeah. If he doesn't change his mind later on."

"Hmm, that's very old-fashioned of them. It makes sense though. Considering the lineage of their family, they must highly value tradition and personal strength," she pondered out loud.

Then his mom turned to him. "Well, now you have me wanting to go see this battle. Record it for me, Ken. It sounds very exciting. I sure hope Chloe wins though — she was a very sweet girl."

"Will do, Mom," he smiled, eager for the showdown to come and simply enjoying the pleasant company of his mother.

'Ha, never thought I would have moments like these.'

"Now, come help me with preparing dinner," his mom said.

She rose from her seat as he nodded, and together they headed towards the kitchen.

 

---

 

He and Thomas (and his dad) arrived there early in order to get good seats for the battle, which was taking place at the largest outdoor battlefield at Pallet Central.

Even then, it looked like the white bleachers might fill up by the time the main contestants arrive.

It was quite unorthodox and mind-boggling to actually think about if you got right down to it.

Here are a ton of people with enough free time on their hands to watch three-day-old Trainers battle with beginner level pokemon. Yet, Ken could not even criticize them because he was in the same boat, and he was feeling pretty pumped too, not even fully understanding why he was so excited himself.

They looked around for their friend group from school, found them with front row seats, and swiftly scurried on over.

Exchanging greetings and whatnot, they quickly tore into the meat of the conversation that everyone really cared about.

What pokemon were Chloe and Mason going to use?

No one knew the specifics.

People said that Chloe selected a Tier 1 Kantonian Starter from Oak University, which was unsurprising, as the institution traditionally gave Tier 1s out only to the students who both placed at the very top of their class and performed exceptionally well on the Trainer licensing examination.

It made sense. Nobody wanted to give a baby fire dragon to an incompetent trainer; that was just a ticking time bomb of a disaster waiting to happen.

Mason forewent the University's sponsored pokemon and received extra supplies instead. Apparently, he decided to register his starter as a newly hatched pokemon from his aunt, an acclaimed and well-known breeder from the suburbs of Saffron.

That part was a bit controversial; your registered Starter needed to be somewhat new and participate in every official Gym challenge as the pokemon is a physical representation of your growth as a Trainer, in the words of the League.

Ken overheard some of the adults whispering about the pedigreed privilege, how money and connections can get you anything nowadays, and how the younger generation doesn't need to work as hard. He tuned all that out and focused back on his peers.

Most of the girls were chatting about how Chloe is the most beautiful and prettiest ever, how super smart she is, and how she will definitely beat Mason hands-down. And most of the boys were not having it. Thomas, especially, became heated about Mason as he bragged about how he met him once and allegedly learned everything he knew about battling from his hero, which obviously means he is the better trainer and is for sure going to win.

Ken softly snickered at them with amusement as he listened on and waited patiently for the show to start.

The waning sun slowly sank toward the horizon, and the warm air nipped him every now and then, reminding him how he was glad he chose to wear shorts today.

Tightly packed with dirt, the actual battlefield was a good-sized rectangle, its perimeters and zones delineated with freshly painted lines.

The volume of the chatterings of the crowd increased over time as more and more people shuffled on into the stands, the overlapping voices becoming a shifting song of sorts.

All of this was interrupted when a random and boisterous cheer from a group of people broke through. Shortly after, the group applauded which spread throughout the rest of the audience like a rambunctious storm as everyone began to realize what was going on.

The main actors finally appeared.