Chapter 3 - Smackdown VS Paw!

Okay, first things first.

Oak's a fucking Dragonite in human skin, confirmed!

Second of all, for all that I'm a pretty chill dude I can apparently crap my pants in fear... okay thankfully not. Close call though.

As I'm walking along the path of route 1 I cant help looking down at Major, who has elected to walk with me instead of riding my shoulders.

When Oak did, whatever the hell it is that he did, I felt like I was drowning in air, even though I knew that wasn't a thing. It was like the air, which should be weightless, just randomly decided 'fuck it, lets squish this motherfucker!'

Yet Major barely even reacted. I'm not too sure what that means. Are Pokemon unaffected by whatever the fuck it was that Oak pulled off? Perhaps they're simply a lot more resistant than humans when it comes to shaking it off?

Either way It's good to know that even in the future, even if I am weighed down by some mystical force, my Pokemon can still defend me. Speaking of.

"Thanks Major, for jumping in front of me back there."

The little bear looks up at me with a small frown on his cute face.

"Ursa, Teddi urs urs!"

Heh, couldn't of put it better myself. It's what partners do.

With a smirk on my face I give my starter a fierce nod, followed up by a fist bump.

Travelling down route 1 is rather intense. Not for any particular reason, mostly for what it means.

I'm on my own Pokemon journey. Walking past the idyllic trees swaying in the breeze, with a shining sun giving the day that perfect temperature for walking. It's almost too perfect if I'm being honest.

I spot several Pokemon scurrying about along the edges of where the path meets the forest. Mostly Rattata's and a few Zigzagoons, with some Pidgey's in the tree's. While I'd love to be able to go all gamer mode and start throwing Pokeballs like an absolute madman, I cant. I have to be able to look after the Pokemon I carry with me, and send any extras back home. Yet It's not like Professor Oaks ranch, which that lucky git Ash got. Mom made it clear, that with the space available in the garden, the communal pond (more like a tiny lake) and what she's actually willing to commit money wise, she'll only let me send back four Pokemon.

Even then It's not a guaranteed four. Which makes sense, after all four Snorlax's would in no way be equal to four Pidgey's when it came to upkeep. No, that's a loose four spots back home, though I'm gonna try and not need them. I want my main team to be my focus, at least for my first circuit. I can focus on B-teams afterwards.

Which means I'm gonna have to be careful with what I catch. I already know one Pokemon that I will be getting, one of the best in all the Pokemon games, at least in my opinion. I am in no way allowing personal preference to bai me here. No sir!.

Along with one I'm hoping I can get, though it will be tricky due to how the event in the games happens. I cant see it being a perfect one-to-one scenario, and even if it is, that will have it's own problems seeing as how we're not in some childish game world.

Nidoran was my initial starter, at least he was going to be. Yet I dont think I'd be able to stop myself if I do run into one. Nidoking is just the best!

With a happy sigh leaving my mouth, along with dreams of future Pokemon shining in my eyes, I almost dont see the swaggering form of the kid heading towards me.

"Hey, you know the rules! Two trainers have to battle when crossing paths!"

Which is absolutely not the rules. Hell, there are no rules saying that trainers have to battle at all.

I give the kid a quick once over. He looks around my age, maybe a year or so older, though given my build I'm already taller than he is. He's wearing shorts, a short bright yellow top, and he's got scuffed knees with a bandage on his face.

"... You alright mate?"

He loses that spunky smug look for a second before his cheeks flush. Anger or embarrassment, I'ts hard to tell. Hard to care as well honestly.

"Oi, dont try to wiggle your way out of this battle! Lets go."

I shrug my shoulders while giving Major a quick nod.

My partner takes a few steps to get in front of me before settling into an aggressive stance, claws pointed out beside him, leaning forward a little in preparation for take off.

"One on one, Standard challenge rules?" Basically meaning the standard rules apply, plus a wager. While I dont know if this kid has a badge of not, I obviously dont, which means the highest the wager can be is 100 dollars.

He gives a nod before sending out his Pokeball, releasing a Pidgey. Though It's easy to tell this isn't like your normal everyday Pidgey. It's feathers are shinier, it's a bit bigger, and it's eyes instantly lock onto Major. Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if this Pidgey was close to evolution.

The kid crouches down to pick up a pebble, before yeeting that bad boy up high.

While waiting for it to come down, I thought i'd be more nervous. Though I suppose one of the pros of spending some extra time training at home with Major is showing itself. We weren't just training his body, his base stats if you will. Nor were we just focusing on his moves, and improving the power and efficiency of them.

No, we were also training tactics. We couldn't do too much of course, since we dont have all that much experience, yet the one thing we were able to train for was this moment. The starting bell.

As the pebble came close to the ground, I could see Major tensing his muscles, both in his legs and arms. As soon as the rock hit the ground, words were instantly leaving my opponents mouth.

"Pidgey, use Pec-

I didn't need to say anything of course. While a true battle would involve a whole bunch of back and forth between trainer and Pokemon, we managed to execute our opening move quite well. Unless I state otherwise, or give Major a signal that we're gonna do something else, Major is to instantly leap forward, using that jump move we had created and practiced with. While flying forward with great acceleration, Major is to initiate the move Metal Claw on his way to his opponent.

By the time my opponent is halfway through his order, Major has closed the gap by a large margin, and with another assisted forward leap, he starts gathering steel type energy in his claws.

The other kid instantly tries changing his order, but it was too late. Major slammed into the opposing Pidgey at high speed, well high speed for a Teddiursa, though he wouldn't of needed much of a force multiplier anyway given he went in Metal Claws first.

Though props to the Pidgey, even without his trainer instructing him, he instantly tried dodging. Mostly by trying to flap his wings and push himself simultaneously off the ground and further back. Unfortunately, he was still too low to the ground, and Major had simply gotten too close too quickly for it to matter.

While practicing, I had instructed Major to mainly aim for the throat, a weak spot for most Pokemon. With the Pidgey's reaction time though, he only managed to land Metal Claw into the Pidgey's gut. Of course, the gut tends to be a weak spot as well, especially to strong physical attacks.

Pidgey instantly went rolling, bouncing once of the ground before coming to a stop at his trainers feet. While it was still conscious, it wasn't even trying to move. Just laying on its front and breathing heavily. I'm guessing the wind had been smacked out of it, along with the damage Metal Claw had actually done, leaving it unable to fight.

"Pidgey!" The other kid instantly kneeled down next to his Pokemon before scooping him up in his arms. "Are you okay partner?" With clear concern on his face, he instantly reachedsinto his own black hole of a backpack, and pulled out a potion bottle. Giving his Pidgey a few spritzes, it instantly starts to look better. While it would still need an actual look over at a Poke centre, it at least doesn't look like it's gonna keel over at the first stiff breeze.

"It's okay buddy, you take a rest" With a red flash, the Pidgey is gone, just leaving the kid by himself. He instantly rises off his knees before scowling at me.

"That was a cheap trick!" he blurts out with clenched fists.

While I hardly expected a pat on the back, his response confuses me.

"How so? You challenge me, I crushed you, end of story. It's a tale as old as time really." With a flush creeping up his neck, he instantly starts shouting.

"You didn't even issue an attack! He just moved on his own! Did you get him from you parents or something?"

With a smirk on my face, I shut this idiot down.

"Look we both know the reason you're even here, only a few hours from Pallet town, is so you can try and catch the stragglers who didn't feel confident enough to leave with the first wave."

He instantly cringes back, losing some of his indignation.

"Yet what makes you think the only reason kids hang back is to try and work themselves up the courage to leave? Me, I just wanted some time to train with my new Pokemon. I was hardly going to go on an adventure without knowing what we could handle."

With every word, the kid just seems to lose more and more steam. Should I feel bad? After all this kid is a true beginner. He wouldn't be trying to cheese it, or trying to come up with training schedules and battle plans. he's just going out blind like most of the other kids and taking it from there.

While I still think he's an ass for throwing a tantrum instead of taking his loss on the chin, again he's just a kid.

"Look, dont take it so seriously. Everyone loses at some point-" almost everyone I think, god damn Dragon man "Just take a lesson from it and move on."

While he doesn't look too impressed, mainly cuz I'm hardly trying to sound like some cringy friendship is magic protagonist, and am instead just trying to get this encounter over with.

He sighs but grumbles he could of handled himself better. The kid gives me 100 dollars, then starts on his way to Pallet town. While I didn't recognise him, he might actually be from there, though he's probably just going to stop by there to go to Oaks lab and get his Pidgey healed up. After all there's hardly a Poke Centre everywhere, and Pallet town is closer than Viridian City.

"Ursa?"

I look down at Major who had a slightly worried frown on his face, no doubt wondering if he did something wrong.

I quickly scoop up my surprised Pokemon before laughing out loud.

"You did it Buddy! Our first ever battle, and you brought it home!" While I give him another spin and squeeze, he instantly loses the worried look, and starts chiming in with happy 'Ursa' noises.

Spirits lifted after our first win on our Pokemon journey, we carry on.

While Viridian City isn't too far off, just several days, I wanna make sure we get as much experience as we can. While I dont think we'll run into anymore trainers today, or until we get closer to Viridian, there are plenty of wild Pokemon around us.

While keeping the path mostly in our sites, we take our time in the outskirts of the forest, looking for Pokemon that are willing to fight. We run into several, defeating most handily, though surprisingly enough there was one Rattata which was annoying, simply cuz it kept speeding around Major. When he did manage to hit the Rattata, with a series of scratches at that, it was game over.

While in the fight with that kid and his Pidgey it may have looked like Major was fast, the truth is he wasn't. That forward jump is thanks to the strength Major is able to gather in his legs, leading to a fast take off. It's mainly acceleration based. In an actual battle with speed, Major is going to have to use a different strategy. Mainly his toughness letting him tank hits while waiting for the perfect time to counter.

After a few more battles it's time to camp up. We find a nice wide patch of uninterrupted grass a little ways off the path, where we set up camp.

I set out a bowl of chow for my partner, which has him happily digging into his meal. With a fond shake of my head, I head on over to the hot plate I have, cooking my own food. As I sit down, I give a big stretch.

'Today was pretty insane, well, the start of it at least.'

Thinking about Oak has me wondering about the kind of people I'll meet on this journey. Just how many strong people am I going to run into?

Thinking about mom's sad face when she looked at Adam has me wondering just how many bad people I'll be running into on this journey.

Hmm, I wonder what Team Rocket is like in this world? While Jessie and James were mostly there for comic relief, weren't they actually pretty competent? At least when it came to everything besides catching Ash's Pikachu?

Noticing my own food is ready, and that Major is still eating his own, slowing down for the last half of his bowl like he wants to actually enjoy it, I go to remove my food from the hot plate.

Which is when I hear a rustle in some bushes a little ways away.

I Stop reaching for my food and instead slowly stand facing where the noise is coming from. Major quickly joins me, standing in front of me quietly, though in the aggressive stance he's taken a liking to.

The rustling get's closer and closer, and while I'm not scared, I am getting ready for a battle.

Then finally the bush right in front of me shakes, and out comes a Pokemon.

'Okay, that's not good'.

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A/N: While I tend to hate cliffhangers myself, I'm probably going to update in a day or two anyway so it's not too bad XD. Though dont worry, Ill try not to make a habit of them.

First battle scene, which actually didn't come out too well. Michael is the MC, he's a special snowflake. It's his destiny to rise to the top, which I dont think would make sense if he's struggling against the common rabble.

Now dont worry, there are going to be plenty of tough fights for him in the future, it's just that this very first one was meant to showcase that every little trainer fight isn't going to be mentioned, simply cuz he's already a step above them. His training regime, plus his ability to think ahead and plan things out, gives him an advantage.

Also not every trainer fight is going to be easy, with some actually pushing him quite far, it's just that he's only just started his journey so he's hardly going up against experienced trainers himself.

Please by all means offer feedback, even if you think I wont like it. I'm a big boi! I only cry every other day now! Much proud, such wow!