Space Twisted into incomprehensible shapes, colors he had no name for blazed past in comet trails that seemed millions of miles long. Structures that seemed both familiar and alien blazed past in a blink while, simultaneously seeming to take lifetimes. His brain felt like it was on fire while the rest of his body seemed frozen like a glacier. Throughout all of existence, his mind stretched in an infinitely accelerating blur against the cosmic background of immateriality.
Like a rubber band, his existence solidified from a blistering torrent of cosmic energy. He came into existence at a great speed, a film of leftover energy all that kept him from pasting his newly reformed body against the ground at a thousand miles an hour. The film did not protect the ground, for which it buckled under the force, a crater 10 meters in diameter crumpling the ground, in which at the epicenter lay a body, naked say for the incongruous existence of a notched belt holding a singular small red and white ball.
The appearance of the crater in the ground sent dust billowing up dozens of meters into the air. The shockwave and noise spooked almost every nearby creature into fleeing, birds took to the air, and bugs to their burrows. All as the cause of the crater groaned pitifully before falling to blissful unconsciousness.
Keyon Brown felt like several people had taken sledgehammers directly to his skull. Really his entire body hurt, like every muscle had been pulled simultaneously in opposite directions. Luckily the pain was fading quickly, but still, he chose to lie down… wherever he was for at least a little bit longer.
After about 5 minutes of laying in the dirt, Keyon forced himself off the ground, the light seemed too much for his eyes as he tried to wedge them open. When his eyes finally adjusted Keyon goggled at his surroundings. His memory of the last couple hours was a bit hazy… but not waking up in a crater with no idea where he was hazy, also he was missing his pants. All of his other clothes too but it was his pants missing he noticed first as, he in fact, still had a belt. The walls of the crater were about 5 ft tall and curved, normally that wouldn’t have been an issue but Keyon seemed to be about 6 inches shorter than his usual 5 '11.
Things just kept getting weirder it seemed, but nevertheless, Keyon had never been one to be stopped by weird scenarios with a small running start he forced his way up and over the ledge of the wall of dirt. Before his eyes a summer forest stretched into the distance, vague mountains could be made out towards the south. It was then that he noticed it, or rather the lack of it, there was no movement in this forest, despite a vibrant underbrush and canopy (how you had both of those Keyon had no clue) no sound echoed from birds or small mammals. It was eerie like there should be something there.
It was probably deserted because of whatever created the crater but you could never be too careful so Keyon crouched and tried to move as quietly as possible for some nearby bushes. He had just settled in to wait for wildlife activity to resume when his train of thought was interrupted. Said interruption being a foot-long bug with what looked like three hairs and buckteeth looking up at him from two feet away.
Keyon let out a light-keening noise that was NOT a scream and jumped back nearly a meter. The bug in question seemed to… quirk its eyebrow at him? Before it just… left?? What the hell??? Keyon was freaking out, that bug was WAY too big and had square pupils? Did he see that right? Why did a bug have square pupils? Why did it have pupils at all? Bugs don’t even have pupils. And more importantly why was it familiar looking to him?
He just stayed stock still for nearly half an hour trying to figure out where he was. It wasn’t until movement had begun to reappear in the area and Keyon saw a certain yellow rat run over to the crater that the facts began to click. Pokemon he was seeing POKEMON. It was official, he had gone insane. Wait no he wasn’t insane people aren’t aware they’re insane and he was way too lucid to have it be a dream or something similar.
If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.
The shock must have finally been wearing off, he had to calm himself. This may be the first time he was in a situation this weird but he had been in ridiculous situations before. He could handle this, he just needed to stay calm and remember his wilderness survival lessons. He could get lost super easily and didn’t have a direction to go in, he could assume no one was coming to get him if this was an entirely different world, and thus needed to start moving towards a direction and try to survive as long as possible, the only reliable direction he had was the mountains in the distance, no Ideal but it was either summer or late spring which meant he would be relatively safe from the cold.
So Keyon started to walk, the undergrowth here was dense and hard to walk through but he managed without too many scratches to his delicate bits. As he had already noted Keyon was shorter than normal, but it seemed his height wasn’t the only thing that regressed given how he was panting and struggling after only around 5 kilometers.
With a huff, the young man leaned against a tree and attempted to regain his breath. He was starting to get thirsty and he didn’t have a water source, that was dangerous for several reasons but he only walked for about 2 hours and had some time before he was in true danger of dehydration, but more importantly, he needed to find shelter and (hopefully) some clothes. He had woken up around High-sun which meant he had roughly 3-4 hours left to make a sufficient structure.
Keyon was unfamiliar with the night temperature of his current region. He wasn’t super familiar with the games but he knew he could rule out Alola, which he was sure was warmer, and probably Galar(too warm for a U.K based region) and Hoen too given he was almost certain the only mountain there was Mt. Chimney, and Keyon didn't see any smoke plumes.
He kept walking for almost half an hour before a suitable place was found for him to set up base. A large tree hollow, without his shrunken body it would have been horribly uncomfortable, but now it was acceptable. The tree was sturdy and the area seemed safe enough. The largest thing he had seen was a long weasel thing, he was pretty sure it was a Linoone and hadn’t displayed any aggressive behavior.
He was starting to get pretty thirsty and hungry but had yet to find anything to eat or drink. So he was stuck for now, but it was highly likely he would find some kind of stream or river the closer he got to the mountains, ice melt tended to be fresh and clean for drinking.
As night finally fell Keyon got ready for bed. He had cushioned the inside of the hollow with leaf litter and was just nestling onto his side when he felt something cool press against his bare hip. The displaced man jolted up, fingers flying to his side. Somehow he had gone almost 7 hours without realizing he had a… was this a Pokeball?
Keyon’s heart leapt into his throat. He had been utterly terrified of running into one of the stronger Pokemon that could be inhabiting this forest. He had been extraordinarily happy to have not run into an aggressive Machamp or god forbid something especially dangerous like a Tyranitar. Keyon had zero confidence in his ability to survive a Hyper Beam or Giga-Impact, but if he had his own ‘mon to fight with that could all change.
Keyon held his breath as he pressed the button on the front, the small metal sphere expanded to slightly smaller than his fist as he pressed the button again and dropped the ball to the ground. The breath escaped him in a rush at the view before him.
A three-foot-tall pale yellow dinosaur stared back up at him. Its two tusks gave its face a sharp look as its pink eyes bored up into his head. A shiny Axew; and it was beautiful.
