Pallet Town smelled different.
Not in a bad way. Just… honest. Like wet soil, woodsmoke, and the occasional waft of Tauros dung when the wind blew east. The air tasted clean, but heavy—like nature was watching. Waiting.
Brutus Pine stood on the sloped edge of a hill overlooking the town. Hands resting on his knees. Breathing through his mouth like he'd just finished a jog, even though he hadn't moved more than a dozen steps since sunrise. His hoodie clung to him in a damp hug. His body felt foreign — too warm, too slow. And his guts churned like they'd been given bad intel.
It wasn't just the body.
It was the fact that this wasn't Earth.
Not really.
Not the one he remembered, with its concrete jungles, mobile phones, and slow death-by-commute. This place had familiar names — Oak, Pallet, Red, Blue — but there were no posters, no toy lines. Just… whispers. Real stories. Half-told truths. Blood, not theme songs.
He wiped his forehead with the sleeve of his hoodie. His arm jiggled a bit too much.
He was fat. No two ways about it. Soft chest, thick neck, stomach that peeked from beneath his shirt when he stretched. Seventeen years old. The old Brutus — the real Brutus — had been this kid. He'd lived here. Parents scraping every penny to pay for his eventual starter registration. Spent weekends helping Mom haul water from the nearby creek. Studied the League handbook like it was a sacred text.
This kid had dreams.
And now he was gone.
And someone else — a regular, underslept nerd from another world — was piloting his body like a sleep-deprived Mankey on Nyquil.
---
His name had been Jason. Or James. Something forgettable. Back then, back in the other world. It didn't matter now. Nobody here knew that name, and even if they did, it wouldn't mean anything.
Here, he was Brutus Pine, and his birthday was tomorrow. Which meant — if Oak's schedule held — he'd be called up to the lab at dawn.
Starter Day.
"Shit," he muttered aloud. The sound startled a Pidgey in a nearby branch.
Brutus sighed and dropped onto the dirt, legs crossed, belly folding over his lap. He dug his fingers into the ground — the soil was cool and crumbly — and tried to remember what he actually knew about this world. Not the game world. Not the anime world.
This world.
---
His memories were like two old film reels running at once. The new ones — Brutus's — were soaked in feeling: the crackle of Dad's back giving out while loading crates in Oak's lab; Mom's sunburned arms from standing in market queues just to grab cheaper Pokéchow; the taste of Magikarp jerky; the pain of being picked last in sparring class. But under all that, faint and ghostly, was himself — the one who'd watched Red win pixel fights on an emulator and thought a world of Pokémon would be paradise.
Yeah.
That guy was an idiot.
Because Pokémon killed people here.
That fact wasn't even hidden. There was a wooden board nailed to the Pallet Town notice post — faded, scratched, and all too real. On it, names of the dead. Underneath: species and cause.
JAMIE ROWE — Age 15 — MAULED (URSARING)
CAL THOMAS — Age 19 — BURNT (NUMEL)
SERA KAYE — Age 11 — VENOMED (ARIADOS)
Each name was carved by hand. And none were removed. Not even the kids.
Brutus had read them all before. As Brutus. The real Brutus.
Now he read them again. As… whatever he was now.
---
Pallet Town wasn't some game map. It was a collection of about thirty homes, clustered close for safety. Buildings made of plaster and local stone, reinforced with reinforced metal shutters for wild attacks. Solar panels, yes — tech wasn't primitive — but nothing sleek or futuristic. Just practical. Weathered.
At the edge of town sat Professor Oak's lab, big and white and humming with quiet power. But it wasn't open to the public. No fancy automatic doors. You needed clearance. Appointments. Favor. Or lineage.
Red had walked out of that lab at ten.
Blue had followed.
And now everyone else was living in their shadow.
Including Brutus.
Especially Brutus.
---
He didn't have rivals. He had classmates who'd moved on or dropped out. He'd barely passed his League Aptitude Test. Barely. But his parents? They'd doubled shifts, skipped meals, and scraped together enough registration points to get him a spot.
His starter.
Not a gift. Not a surprise. A purchase. An investment.
And now their son wasn't even their son. He was… him. A stranger.
Brutus exhaled slowly.
The weight of that hit him right between the ribs.
He didn't belong here.
But the real Brutus had wanted this so badly. Had dreamed of it every damn day.
And now?
Now he'd have to carry that dream forward. Somehow. Even if it crushed him.
---
A wind rolled over the hill, ruffling his already messy hair. Far off, he could hear the crack of a Scyther wing — sounded like snapping branches. Somewhere else, a child screamed. Not in fear. In excitement. Maybe they'd caught a Caterpie.
Brutus stood up, wobbling slightly.
His knees hated him. His thighs chafed.
He ignored it all.
There were no trainers yet. No rivals. No talking girls with perfect quips. No shortcut to confidence.
Just a boy with two sets of memories, a soul that didn't fit right, and a starter waiting somewhere beyond the dawn.
And it probably wasn't going to be Charmander.
---
END OF CHAPTER 1