Endangered - Chapter 1

For some reason the prologue isn't correctly showing in the right folder:

Endangered - Prologue

A/N: Summary of what has happened so far:

Seven years ago on the day of the licence ceremony, Tommy Halen expected to receive his first Pokémon. However the council put a new age restriction in place at the last second, meaning he had to wait until he was eighteen - another seven years.

Max, Tommy's best friend, promised to endure this horrible sentence with him so that they could start their journey together when the time finally came.

PART ONE: CEREMONY

Chapter One

SEVEN YEARS LATER

Tommy Halen stood in his high-rise flat, watching the sun slip behind Celadon’s monstrous department store, sure of just one thing: in twelve hours it would rise again over the city and bring white, wintry light to the long-awaited return of the licence ceremony.

What happened after that was anyone’s guess.

The City Square lay hidden from his vantage—even on a less misty day Tommy would hardly see much more than the head of Erika’s statue. Yet, say he could see the stone fountain she stood in, and the surrounding park, and the long stage that filled the square’s western edge, he would still struggle to imagine the ceremony actually taking place. Sure, people might gather around the fountain tomorrow. And maybe some of them would be in high spirits, eager to welcome a new wave of trainers. But the thought of the Mayor climbing the stage, mounting his lectern, and actually making good on his promise? That the council would finally endow Tommy with a Pokémon? That part took an imagination he simply didn’t have.

Ring ring! Ring ring! Phone call! Phone call!

Tommy jumped, mind lurching back to reality. He picked his way around tangled clothes and books with dog-eared covers, and stumbled over to the monitor by the door. Professor Ercus’s wizened face materialised on the screen. He looked flushed. “Ah, good. I wanted to catch you before…tomorrow.”

His careful decision to brand the next day as ‘tomorrow’ did not escape Tommy’s notice.

“Is everything okay?”

“Oh, yes. Just thought I’d check in. How’s work treating you?”

Tommy shivered, recalling the awful week he’d had at the Pokémon Post following the latest incident. The headlines were seared into his brain at this point. Titles like: ‘Thirteen dead in Game Corner disaster!’ and ‘Discover truth behind latest deadly Pokémon battle!’ tended to stick in his memory.

“Sorry, that was a bad question to ask,” the professor said gently.

“Nothing I’m not used to at this point.”

“I wish you wouldn’t have to get used to it. Ever since you got that internship—”

Tommy interrupted with a groan. “I write fluff pieces. I’m hardly in the thick of it.”

“Still,” the professor went on. “You’re around too many people who are in the thick of it. I don’t like what you must hear.”

“What I hear ends up in the paper anyway,” Tommy countered. “Anyway, I’d have to bury my head pretty far in the sand to avoid what’s going on in Celadon.”

The professor adopted a faraway expression.

“How are things your end?” Tommy asked. “City Hall must be heaving. Bad time to be a professor and a councilman, huh?”

“Tommy, you know I—”

“Can’t reveal the council’s internal matters,” Tommy recited with a bored tone. “What’s the point of having an inside man if I can’t get anything out of him?”

The professor shot a frantic look over his shoulder. Only then did Tommy realise he was still in his lab coat. “Tommy, if someone heard you refer to me as that…”

“You can tell them I’m just a lowly intern. Although, maybe that would change if I brought something good to the table. Go on, tell me about Tanner. What’s he up to these days?”

“Councilman Tanner,” the professor corrected, “is rather busy as of late. What with the ceremony tomorrow…”

“We’ve had reporters trying to get a statement from him since the Game Corner incident.”

Professor Ercus shrugged. “As I said, he’s rather busy.”

“Apparently not too busy to stonewall us.”

He froze. Tommy dove for the opening. “It’s been a week without an official statement from the council. Come on, when does he ever miss a chance to get his face on the news?”

The professor’s lips pressed into a thin, reproachful line.

“I’m just saying,” Tommy hammered on. “Thirteen bodies were pulled out of the rubble. Thirteen—and the youngest victim was six. Tanner should be rubbing his hands together.”

Professor Ercus shuddered. “Please, Tommy. That really isn’t his style.”

Tommy narrowed his eyes.

“He’s anti-Pokémon, yes. But he isn’t the type to use tragedy as a political tool. His entire career has been a vehicle to stop events like this from happening.”

Tommy clenched his fists, mind going back to when he was eleven. Tanner had been the one to interrupt the Mayor’s speech right before he announced the ceremony would be postponed by seven years. Tommy could picture it vividly; the way Tanner whispered to the Mayor, the dreadful sense of him derailing the proceedings. The way he glanced into the camera with a hint of self-satisfaction. That was the very moment that ignited Tommy’s hatred for the councilman. Tommy at times wondered if he was being irrational, but he always associated the age restrictions—or indeed any negative legislation that impacted Pokémon—with Tanner. His smug face was the immortal emblem of what had been stolen from him that day.

“Didn’t realise you were team Tanner,” Tommy said, letting too much accusation slip into his voice.

The professor recoiled. “It’s my job as councilman to understand both sides of the coin.”

Tommy felt a flush of embarrassment. “Sorry. I didn’t mean—I’m just frustrated, you know.”

The pair fell into contemplative silence.

“How did we get here?” Tommy asked.

The professor gave Tommy a quizzical look.

“Sometimes, I don’t know, it’s like I don’t recognise anything anymore. Eight years ago, eleven-year-olds were sent out into the world with a licence to carry six Pokémon. Now, at eighteen, it’s illegal for me to even hold a Caterpie.”

“They are surprisingly dangerous, you know.”

“I’m being serious.”

“As am I. I recall an unfortunate incident from my youth when I took a direct Stringshot to the eye—”

The look Tommy gave the professor made him stop in his tracks and let out a long breath. Again, his expression became faraway, troubled.

“You know something about tomorrow, don’t you?”

The professor stiffened, but one look into Tommy’s fearful eyes wilted his defences. “Not exactly. At least, the ceremony seems to be going ahead.”

“What’s the problem, then?”

“I suppose that’s it. Everything seems to be going ahead. That in itself feels suspicious.”

Tommy’s heart sank. “If the council were cooking something up again, you’d know about it, right?”

The professor glanced nervously around the lab again, then spoke at a much lower volume. “That’s just it, Tommy, I’m not sure I would. Pokécrime is at an all-time high, and there’s more reason than ever for the council to repeat history. Yet, it doesn’t seem that we will, and that’s exactly what I believed last time. Before that ceremony was cancelled, I didn’t hear a single word of new legislation passing. Not a whisper.”

“Weren’t you holed up in hospital, though?”

“Hiking injury,” the old man confirmed, cheeks reddening. “My little accident did cause me to fall out of the loop. But it takes months for legislation to pass, Tommy. Years, sometimes. There are meetings. Debates. Mountains of paperwork. Despite my absence, it’s strange that I didn’t get wind of any of it. I woke up that day and learnt of the new Pokélaw the same time everyone else did.”

“Are you saying you were kept out of the loop on purpose?” He was surprised to hear the professor speak so conspiratorially about his peers.

“Until recently, I wouldn’t have even entertained such a theory. But lately I’ve wondered—I mean, it was rather convenient, wasn’t it? What better time to pass new anti-Pokémon legislation than while one if its biggest challengers was out of action?”

Tommy considered this—the fledgling journalist in him did love a conspiracy. But ultimately he came to the conclusion that none of it really mattered. It was too late to change what happened. “Well, at least you’re in the mix this time, right? They can’t sneak in another huge change with you around.”

The professor shuffled on the spot.

“What is it?”

“Nothing. I suppose I’m probably being silly.”

“Humour me,” Tommy said.

“Well, in theory, no, changes to Pokélaw cannot come to fruition without my knowing. Not while I actively sit on the council.”

“But?”

“Well, I’ve noticed a few things. Odd behaviour. Councilmen keeping to themselves, avoiding me in passing. It could all be nothing. But then it also has me wondering…what if I’m every bit out of the loop as I was seven years ago?”

Tommy’s heart tremored.

“Sorry. I called you with the intention of helping you feel better about tomorrow. Honestly, Tommy, this really could be nothing.”

But the old man’s hunted expression clearly said he didn’t really believe that.

“Meet me before the ceremony,” Professor Ercus said, fiddling with a button on his lab coat. “If you come to my chamber first, we can go together.”

Tommy glared shrewdly at the professor’s show of anxiety.

“You’re planning to do some digging, aren’t you?”

Professor Ercus blushed. “Yes. I think I am.”

“I’m impressed.”

The old man blanched. “That’s never a good sign.”

The professor’s inner torment gave Tommy a change of heart. Maybe this wasn’t the time for him to rock the boat. But then once again his mind went back seven years, and he wondered: what if the professor had been able to change what happened?

“Good luck,” he said, then bade the professor good night.

They exchanged a weak smile before disconnecting. Tommy’s flat was thrown into darkness—the sun had finally disappeared below the horizon, taking with it the last vestiges of light.

Tommy woke with the horrible sensation of being late. With a jolt of panic, he shot out of bed, one foot landing in a bowl of half-eaten cereal.

Through the window, the cityscape was bathed in the blue tinge of dawn. 6:27 AM, the monitor by the door said. Tommy breathed a short-lived sigh of relief: an odd smell soon came his way, akin to rotten eggs. Had this been what woke him? He scoured his flat for the source of the stench, but gave up quickly. Admittedly, it could come from a number of things…

A pink tendril of smoke crept under his door.

Huh? He followed it out into the hall, as though it were a beckoning finger. It came from under the door opposite his flat.

Max. Tommy rolled his eyes.

He entered wearily (Max always kept his door unlatched) and paused in the threshold due to the stench intensifying tenfold, bringing immediate tears to his eyes. The room was full of that same pink smoke. Tommy pinched his nose and drove deeper into the flat until he found his friend sprawled on the sofa, eyes red and vacant, a goofy grin planted on his face.

Cloudy test tubes littered the coffee table.

“Isn’t it a little early?”

Max barely reacted to his sudden presence. “I’m celebrating.”

Tommy raised a brow.

“I finally discovered the missing ingredient!” He burst into hysterical laughter. “Super Potion!”

“Super Potion doesn’t affect humans.”

“It does when you mix it with Smog.”

As if on cue, Max’s Koffing—a lilac orb adorned with a skull and crossbones—drifted through the haze. It wore a goofy expression remarkably similar to its master.

Tommy scowled. Max didn’t seem to notice.

“So, Potions were too weak, right—left Smog too potent. Terrible headaches. But then Hyper Potions were too strong, not to mention expensive. Completely countered the euphoria.”

“Wouldn’t want that.”

“Right? I still have the small problem of being poisoned.” Tommy noticed Max looked rather green around the gills. “That probably won’t be good for business.”

“You’re planning to sell this?”

Max feigned shock. “I have a duty, Tommy. The people of Kanto are facing tough times.”

Tommy was utterly lost for words. Max seemed to finally catch Tommy’s disapproving expression. “I’m assuming there’s a reason you’re here. Other than to kill my buzz, I mean.”

“No, just checking in. Smells like someone died in here.”

“Well, as you can see, I’m alive and well. Sort of.” He gave a hacking cough. “So, if you don’t mind.” He gestured towards the door.

“Are you going to the ceremony?”

Max perked up. “Oh, that’s right. Today is the big day.” He trailed a hand slowly through the air, disturbing the pink haze. “Tommy Halen, finally given a licence to carry.”

“Yeah. Hopefully.”

Max shook his head. “Wake up, Tommy. Kanto has moved on since we were eleven.”

“I’ve noticed.”

“Have you? Or is your head still full of the same dreams of becoming some hotshot trainer?”

“Maybe not a trainer, but—”

“Ivy closed her gym.”

This rocked Tommy; Max’s sister had only just taken over as Celadon’s gym leader. “She—what?”

“That’s right. Apparently one of the trainers behind the Game Corner incident had only just walked away with a Rainbow Badge.”

“But that—that doesn’t make Ivy responsible for what happened.”

Max scoffed. “You think they care about that? People are dying left and right, all because a bunch of idiots can’t keep it in their pants. The Antipo mob is growing bigger by the day. Do you expect Ivy to mosey on as though nothing is happening? Gyms are a symbol of power, of glory. Those things aren’t so popular right now.”

Tommy felt utterly squashed by the weight of this development.

“But go, have fun at the ceremony,” Max said. “I’m sure the council are itching to dish out new licences. And then I guess it’s up to you to set an example for the rest of Kanto. You know, show everyone that weaponising Pokémon isn’t a monumental mistake.”

“There’s more to Pokémon than battling,” Tommy said.

Max waved his hand in gesture to the murky test tubes scattered on the table. “I’m not the one you have to convince.”

Shaken, Tommy withdrew from Max’s flat, lightheaded, closing the door behind him. Max spoke of Kanto’s political climate as though they were on the brink of a civil war. And much to his dismay, Tommy couldn’t entirely disagree with that sentiment. It was hard to find someone in Kanto who wasn’t impacted in some way by the rise in Pokécrime. Businesses had been destroyed, lives had been lost. And it wasn’t always because of a trainer battle that had gotten out of hand. To some, Pokémon were weapons.

And Max had made another good point. Even if Tommy did receive a Pokémon, what would he even do with one? If Ivy closing her gym started a trend with the other leaders, then he had little hope making a name for himself in that particular sphere. Yet, he couldn’t simply fall back into his existing routine, writing articles for the Pokémon Post…

He hit the stairs, leaving behind the stench of Koffing’s Smog and beginning his journey towards Professor Ercus’s lab. There weren’t many people out at such an early hour, so as he wandered towards the Western District, he had enough silence to mull over everything Max had said.

Soon, Tommy passed a newspaper kiosk. Something made him stop in his tracks. The Pokémon Post had used an image for today’s front page that hadn’t been published before. It was monochrome, probably to reduce the picture’s morbidity. It depicted the Game Corner, reduced to a smoking mound of brick and glass. The Rescue Squad picked around the background, coated in dust and rubble. Onlookers stood off to the side, panic-stricken, hands covering mouths.

And amidst the carnage, a Machoke cradled the ragged corpse of a young girl.