Followed
Welcome to the world of Pokemon
A little girl with mussed hair stood at the pavement, one hand within the grasp of an adult, the other holding tightly onto the older brown haired girl. A poochyena stood in between them both, conflicted as to who to console. The night was still, it's air stagnant and almost choking. Tears were pooling in the younger girl's eyes and she chewed on her bottom lip, willing herself not to cry.
The older girl spoke up first. "Hyoyeonie, be good okay?"
"Taeng unni…" Her eyes stung. Damn those tears.
"Hmm?" Her hand involuntarily tightened around her sister's, then relaxed within the next moment. It wasn't the time to be clingy, her sister was off to have a better life. It wasn't the right time…
Hyoyeon in a deep breath, her pinkish cheeks inflating. She scrunched her nose and stared right at her sister. "I love you!"
"I love you too, Hyoyeonie," she lovingly looked at her sister, making sure to take a mental photograph, then added on softly. "Unni will come for you, one day."
Hyoyeon's voice dropped to a hushed whisper as she grabbed her strawberry dappled blanket from her bag, passing it to her sister. "Promise?"
Taeyeon stuck out her pinky.
"Pinky promise."
Taeyeon lifted her head and rested her cheek on her left fist. It had been four years. Four years since she's been all alone. Four years since her sister had left her. She was twelve now, and her sister would be ten. She uncurled her fingers, placing them in front of her. Ten. Would Hyoyeonnie be taller? Would she be be as cute? Or would she be jaw-droppingly pretty? She sighed, then stared at the green chalkboard.
Glancing up at the clock, time seemed to have paused, she swore it was 10:45 when she looked just now, so why was it still 10:45? Aish, when was math going to be over? Algebra… Ugh. The only reason she bothered going to school was probably because they had Pokemon classes. Only a couple more minutes till then, she thought, playing with the duly abused erased in front of her.
"Alright, so that's the end of class today." The teacher took a look at the timetable pinned onto the class noticeboard then nodded. "Those with Pokemon, your class is in A1-03 today, those without, go to B4-10 for music class."
Taeyeon shoved all her belongings into her bag in one sweep, having pre packed them five minutes ago. She grinned happily as she skipped towards the classroom.
Ouch.
She bumped into someone. A whole group of people, actually. A mental reproach - how did she not see that? - An actual one - "Yah! Watch where you're going!".
Oh. Them. The five most popular girls in the school. Well, actually, only two of them were "popular", the other three just flaunted around cash and rode on the two girls' waves. How they could stand each other, Taeyeon had no idea, she just wanted to walk away without starting any trouble.
"Sorry." She bowed in apology.
The auburn haired girl with pink highlights sneered, her probably plastic nostrils flaring. "Your poverty getting in the way of your eyesight, shortie?"
"Sorry." She repeated, a little more monotonously than she did before.
"Peasants like you need to get out of my face. My mom said they should just get rid of all of you, dirtying school property with your filthy hands." The girl looked straight at Taeyeon, spitting out venomous words. They hurt - she smiled bitterly - but they were true.
"Sorry." She bowed a little lower this time, to the girl who was probably her age. It couldn't be helped.
The girl smirked. "Yeah, know your place, peasant."
"Let's go." Before the rude pink haired girl could continue, a piercing voice spoke up and the temperature dropped by at least five degrees. The girl's face instantly paled as she hurriedly trailed after the already moving group, left behind after being told off by one of the more popular girls.
Taeyeon shrugged as she continued on her way, not missing a step. She was used to all the bullying she had in school, she felt as long as she had her small group of trusted friends and Ren, she'd be fine. The second bell started ringing just then and she hurried along, taking bigger quick steps.
"Kim Taeyeon?" The male teacher's voice boomed. "Kim Taeyeon, are you present?"
The classroom door swung open forcefully, Taeyeon rushing into class with beads of sweat running down her forehead.
"I'm sorry I'm late!" She gasped out as she tried to catch her breath.
The male teacher looked harshly at her then signalled to a seat.
"So today, we'll be learning about how Pokemon grow and evolve." He nodded to himself then pointed to a picture on the board.
"You see here a charmander, and we all know charmander has three stages of evolution, correct?"
Then suddenly, a bone flew at one of the students, startling him, making him fall out of his seat.
"Cubone! Cubone!" The teacher's pokemon jumped up and down happily, then walked towards the boy to retrieve his bone.
The teacher glared at the boy. "No sleeping in class, Donghae!"
"Back to the lesson." He paused again. Geez, his pauses were so anti climatic. "When does charmander evolve?" He pointed at the sleepy boy.
"When it wants to, or when it has gathered enough experience, sir." He stood up, articulating each word carefully and perfectly.
"Very good Donghae. How does a Pokemon gather experience then?" He paced around the class painfully slowly. "When they battle, of course!"
"Then when do they know if they want to evolve or not?" Sunny, one of Taeyeon's best friends stuck up her hand.
The male teacher smiled and scratched his head. "Well… The Pokemon professors are still trying to find that out, but it's just a feel… A feel when your Pokemon has been with you long enough."
"Um… Okay." Sunny's hand slunk back down, a little disheartened her question wasn't duly answered.
"But I do know, when a Pokemon gains experience, it is able to move faster to dodge attacks in battle, as well as hit harder and use better moves as they grow." He nodded to himself again. (It was getting annoying) "So when they seem strong enough, that's probably when. Good question, Soonkyu."
All the children in the class burst out laughing at Sunny's birth name, earning a glare and pouts from the short girl.
After which, the teacher continued talking about the Pokemon types and weaknesses of each type. It was a rather content heavy topic, but Taeyeon enjoyed it nevertheless, occasionally scribbling down notes.
"So!" The teacher clasped his hands together. Taeyeon quaked in her seat excitedly, finally!
"We'll have our Pokemon battle now. Any volunteers?"
Everyone's hand shot up excitedly, waving frantically to gleam attention from the teacher.
"Hmm… Only two people haven't battled this year yet… Taeyeon!" The teacher furrowed his eyes. "You! Donghae!"
The two children stood opposite each other, Taeyeon passively looking as she shoved her hands in her pocket. Donghae smirked, then shouted over.
"Hey poor kid! You're gonna lose!"
Taeyeon bit down hard on her teeth, containing her hurt. Why were kids nowadays so bloody materialistic?
The teacher, having seemingly missed that, nodded and called for the battle to begin.
"Go! Ralts!"
"Ren." She found no need to shout… It was overrated, perhaps?
Both pokemon appeared in a brilliant flash of white, landing on the battle ground; Ren baring his teeth, crouching low onto the ground and Ralts simply standing there, waiting for a command from it's trainer.
"Ralts! Sand attack!" Donghae shouted again. His voice somehow felt really annoying, particularly on that day.
Taeyeon didn't even flinch. "Ren, use quick attack to dodge that, then swift."
Ren ran left and right, dodging the sand completely then sent little yellow stars that hit Ralts full on it's face. It teetered around for awhile, then collapsed onto the ground.
"Ralts is out! Taeyeon is the winner."
The rest of the kids looked over in awe, clapping hesitatingly for fear of Donghae's wrath.
"How dare… A kid like you!" Donghae hugged his Ralts then ran over to the school's Pokemon healing machine.
The teacher shook his head and sighed. "Don't mind him Taeyeon. I see you've done a fair bit of training on your own?"
Taeyeon nodded then ran over to Sunny. "Sunny! How did I do?" She grinned as Ren barked happily.
"Great. Man, when did you get so strong?"
Taeyeon beamed, showing her pearly whites. "I was always this strong!"
"Haha, right. Maybe we should battle one day." Sunny slung her arm over Taeyeon's shoulder, her caterpie playing with Ren as they walked out of school.
"Where are we going?"
Sunny ignored her question. "You know, I always knew you were strong. Just one look at you…!" Sunny stared straight at her friend then broke into a smile. "But don't get arrogant!"
"Can I tell you something, Sunny?"
"Of course."
"I beat the normal type gym leader once, when he came to Seoul."
"WHAT!"
Then Taeyeon grinned sheepishly. "But I hadn't registered for the Pokemon league yet so it didn't count."
"Wait… You mean the normal type gym leader, like the fifth one?!" Sunny's jaw dropped in disbelief as she gaped at her friend.
"Shh! Not so loud!"
"Ohmygod. You're awesome." Sunny glanced back down at Ren then looked at Taeyeon. "So why don't you let him evolve?"
"I don't know I never asked." Taeyeon smiled fondly. "When he wants to I'm sure he'll let me know."
The two girls continued walking into the urban jungle, probably heading towards someplace to eat. But Ren paused for a moment, his ears twitching towards the opposite direction. He shook his head then padded off after his owner. Ren couldn't recognise the sound at that time, but it was something he had heard before;
A camera click.
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