Nothing More

Character: Red (protagonist from the games, and the one you fight at the very end of gold/silver/crystal.) They pretty much never speak in the games, but if you squint they have a personality; they never back down from a challenge, and they don't give in to bullies. I think I don't need to say any more. I think everyone has a different Red, since everyone plays the game a bit different, but, there is something rather personal about the fellow. His defeat at the end always seemed tragic, since he just... disappeared without a trace. And he was /you/. I always thought there should be sequel or something where you can play as him again, but, alas, that would be hard to make work and it never ever happened.

I felt like he deserved something a little more. Even if it is just a little. Because unlike us, he could never hit 'reset'. Just grind to a hundred.

A note on pikachu, I know he was supposed to fly with balloons and surf with a board... but my interpretation is more fun. This story is just for my amusement. Thank you for tolerating it.

,

He had defeated legends, gyms and elite champions, had seen all there was to see of Kanto and Johto. He had single handed defeated the rocket gang, who had tried to kill him more than once, and had raised his team of six devotedly. He had caught every single damn pokemon he had encountered, evolved and released most of them, simply to fill that silly pokedex for Oak. He was, he knew, a softy when it came to helping people.

It had not been enough.

He did not do anything so dramatic as sinking to his knees, or yelling, but simply glanced at the impetuous runt who wore gold and silver so flashily and proudly. His pikachu lay, the last to go, silent and crushed upon the ground. Although Red had in his time accumulate a fortune, he saw no challenge in spamming revives and had none left on him.

He had faced defeat before, but this was different. In that moment, he looked in that trainers eyes, and decided it would be the last he ever saw of them, and turned, picking up his yellow, frail looking mouse and walking away through the snow. He did not look back. He never did. They were younger, less experienced. Time spent training would not make up for that; they could simply train just as much, and keep their edge over him.

What more was there to do? With a forlorn smile, he wondered that about the trainer behind him as well about himself. He knew that Blue had taken over Giovanni's gym. That trainer must have defeated his old rival. His rival had always been seemingly ahead of him, but hadn't known when to quit until the very end. They knew better now. That much was obvious, because they had never seen each other since the league.

Red knew when he had lost. He could not defeat this trainer. Not now, anyway. Some trainers might have said there was one very obvious thing he could do, evolve his pikachu, but they were kindred spirits, and Red could never do that. Pikachu, like himself, enjoyed the raw challenge of being a weaker being out against the mightier world, and succeeding or failing simply as them-self. There was no where else to go for him, except... his eyes widened. The mystery dungeon.

Then he remembered it had collapsed in from his battle with... that thing, that twisted mew. He hadn't understood the creature, back then, why it chose to hide away in a cave. Until, of course, he'd done just about the exact same thing, hiding away in a desolate mountain himself. And now he had been defeated, just as the same. They were similar creatures. Each, powerful, at their peak, but the irony being that there was someone, something, always better out there. He had let it go... even with a master ball; he disliked such a cheap victory as that forced servitude. Perhaps they could meet again. The only flare of jealousy he had ever felt came then, as he remembered the master balls his challenger had, the legends they'd had, with the thought that they might encounter the mew first and take it for themselves.

Nameless again, he climbed down, and set off for unknown horizons. Literately, he went off the map, heading north into the mountainous and totally uncharted land. And then, if that did not work, south, then west, then east on till the end of the world, on, and on. He would seek out challenge, until his very bones crumbled.

In his arms, the pikachu stirred.

.

.

For years, he never saw another human being. Sometimes, he did not even see a pokemon for days, so inhospitable were some parts. Red was a formidable being in and of himself, and scavenged for his own food and cared and healed up his own pokemon; even if they were all fainted, which was a rare occasion indeed, he always managed to avoid fatal trouble. Outside the league, he saw no reason to pay attention to regulations, and kept extra pokemon with him, many that were technically considered wild, a chansey among them; most sticking around only temporarily, desiring to challenge him. His pokeballs, rusted and old, were used mainly as carrying devices for pokemon that could not stand the current environment, needed stasis and safe rest from the cold, or were physically incapable of moving with him otherwise, such as if he was up in the air. Many of his pokemon had grown used to being out as Pikachu was. They were his companionship.

It was hard to breath in high altitudes, or survive on little water in a desert, or go without food for days crossing ocean massively blue and featureless, but he had adapted. He had been hardy from an early age.

He drilled, and worked, and ironically, his favorite pokemon was far too powerful now. He had to intentionally lessen his, their strength if they wanted an actual resemblance of a challenge most of the time. There was something wrong about a pikachu who flew and surfed, beckoning water and air to him with ease.

When he felt his fuzzy chin for the first time, it startled him. He had forgotten men grew beards. But what frightened him most was how young still he looked. Too young. And yet he didn't recognize himself anymore.

A rattata approached, young, tiny, weak. It made him smile and stand up.

A real challenger. He had always found rattata annoying in his early days. Now he found their tenacity electrifying, and it was quite bold of this one to come all this way to meet him. But his friend, Pikachu, was training, concentrating intently on keeping lifted up a rock many times their weight, so he held up a finger in a shushing motion. When it continued to approach, he boldly shot out a hand and grabbed it by the scruff of the neck and lifted it up, and walked some distance away before dropping it.

'Ready?' he glanced at it sharply, hand going to a ball at his side just like old times, purely out of habit. 'Go!' he waved his hand down.

The rattata bounced forward towards good old Venusaur, who snorted good naturedly and sent out spores of paralyzing powder. Holding its breath, it evaded them and knocked a blow against the green giant, to whom it didn't even tickle. Venusaur bumped against them with a lazy yet powerful nudge of the head, crushing them against a rock. The fiesty rat endured the treatment, scampering out and then retaliating with a blow that sent Venusaur literately soaring through the air and crashing against the mountainside.

Red laughed, the first noise he'd made that week. "They should call you Fear." His voice was smooth, but the words were slightly garbled from lack of practice. He cleared his throat. "I think I'll move on from here. Any more stragglers following?"

'Fear' shook his or her head. Venusaur picked themselves dazedly, but then seemed to decide to take a nap right where they were.

Good, he made clear his thoughts upon his face, walking off toward Pikachu. She was at the peak, the pinnacle of her species, he mused, such that even her meager physical strength was incredibly impressive for her size. Heaving the rock, she put it down and ran to join him. With a glance between them, they could communicate so much. He could tell she felt well today, and was eager to get moving again to some place more exciting.

She was in luck, if all went well. He had heard of a place with terrible weather where powerful pokemon were said to live, deep in a jungle layered with canyons.

.

.

This time, just a few pokemon opted to come with him. That was the way it was, sometimes. Wrapping his arms around his pikachu, he watched them bunch up their legs, then soar through the air from their great leap. It was truly astounding. The ground rapidly came up to greet them, and they hit harshly, rolling with the impact. That part was less fun.

The wind here rushed and blew unpredictably, but it was relatively warm and wet. They trudged through the mud towards a distant oasis that looked promising.

He stopped.

They were here. It had been so long since he'd seen that hulking purplish gray figure, that at first, both just gazed at each other across the distance, completely surprised, though immediately Red felt keen and happy that he might get a good battle. It (they were genderless), however, was angry. Once again, Mewtwo's privacy had been invaded, but more so, by a challenger it had previously failed to defeat. It hated that the most. A cruel creature born with a drive to destroy, it lashed out at him, grabbing hold of his mind.

And stopped, just as startled as him to come across something it did not expect. { You were defeated. } It spoke in his mind, quizzical, but not stopping, simply filing through his memories slower. He didn't care. It was interesting it could speak mentally, but he wasn't surprised. Rather, he just felt honored that he was probably the only person who had heard its real, spoken voice, that strange and off putting mewl.

'Yes.' he answered it.

It saw the similarities, it saw the desire for destruction, for that was battling, plain and simple in the end, and shoved this realization down his throat.

{You are waiting to die.} It hissed in his brain. {You were hoping for this battle to be your last the moment you came here, a glorious one, because you met someone better, and saw a glimpse of the end of your potential. You are useless.}

The retaliatory thought of 'So are you by that logic' sounded in his brain, although he would not have spoken it. However, it was not given a chance for silence, picked off from his brain like a lazy fly.

He was slammed against the ground, and was immediately defended by brave Pikachu going out in front. He heard a high pitched, mewled scream as all the energy of a thunderstorm crashed violently against his attacker, though it still stood firm, their burnt nerves stitching themselves rapidly back together. Their tail angrily lashed back and forth, before subsiding to the ground. It seemed they had learned something of the world, for now they were calming down.

Red gazed ungrudging, not judging. When they had first fought, they had been matched, perfectly even. He admired Mewtwo as an equal, even if they were not yet ready to see it that way.

The cat-like clone twitched at that thought. He smiled, wondering what they were thinking..

{There must be something more. More than destroy, or be destroyed, and working together for such goals, as I know you do.}

"There is, though I've mostly forgotten it." Red glanced down at the cities far distant. "I wouldn't know how to fit in if I tried. It would seem so... mediocre after this, just living the simple life. I can't see myself as useful there."

That could have been all of them speaking, there.

{We are both useless. Created as ideals, you by your league, I by my scientists.}

Had a lot of time to think on this, then? Sounds rehearsed.

{Much, far too much.}

A pause.

{A shame to have so much power for no use, no reason. We could take over the world. That boy would not be able to stop us together. Nor the league.}

Red laughed. Now that was ludicrous, although the thought hung in his head for a moment. For a painful moment, he remembered Giovanni calling him naive. Not just for treating his pokemon with such care, which he refused to think was a bad idea, but for fighting the rockets with such abhorrence in his eyes. Not just thieves, they'd wanted to rule the world with pokemon.

No, there was no point in ruling for the sake of ruling... But... he pondered the problem before them over in his head.

Aha.

"One who can destroy, can also create." he decided. "Maybe the world could use us..."

He felt his own feelings of doubt thrown back at him. Sometimes, he rather disliked psychics. They were difficult to argue with. A part of him loved it. He didn't have to speak lengthily around them to get to the point.

Standing up, he went to explore the world with new eyes again.