Hello there! Welcome to the world of POKéMON! I'm your author, RollYourInit. Nobody calls me professor, but I hope that won't stop you from giving this little fan story a try. I was struck with inspiration so hard the story practically wrote itself. Granted with fan fiction style stories, a lot of the meat is already there, but I feel like mine walks a good line between paying homage and creating something new from the source material. Anyways, this is about the time when the trainer shrinks down and turns into a little chibi avatar. Off you go!
Pallet Town
The sun was shining and the Pidgeys were chirping as Todd took his first steps of independence. It was his eighteenth birthday, a bittersweet day of celebration and goodbyes. Once upon a time, a man or woman like him would have already left home on their tenth birthday to begin their journey into the world. Capturing and training pokémon, as their ancestors had for generations. Those times were long gone. The world was different, and they'd been forced to change with the times.
His mother and younger sister waved from the porch of their house as he left his childhood behind, following the dirt road through rural Pallet Town. One last wave back, and then he was around the bend, out of sight of their cozy farm house. There wasn't much to see in Pallet. Wheat fields, an orchard and small ranch houses on large farmsteads made up most of the town itself. The only unique feature was Oak Labs, a private pokémon research institution established and owned by the Oak family.
Since the Lighthouse Catastrophe, Oak Labs was one of the last remaining centers of research focused on pokémon. Isolated in the countryside, most of the damage had been minimal. The blocky structure stood out like a sore thumb against the cottages and farmland that surrounded it. Sturdy fences extended around a pasture full of pokémon placidly milling about, a few handlers here and there grooming and feeding the animals.
A lone figure lingered in the morning shade the building offered. She leaned against the building dressed in a loose lab coat, sipping from a poké ball shaped mug. Long brown hair with a few strands of silver was pinned back with a light blue head band. When she saw him, a smile curved on plump lips. Todd recognized her instantly. Everyone in Pallet knew Martha Oak, lead professor and current owner of Oak Labs.
Professor Oak nudged her round glasses up the slender bridge of her nose and pushed away from the wall. The loose lab coat she wore parted to reveal the snug blouse and black slacks struggling to contain her curves. She was shorter than Todd, but the fierce confidence in her eyes and posture as she obstructed his path was more than enough to bring him to a halt.
"Er, morning Professor. What can I do for you?" He asked, trying not to sound as intimidated as he actually was.
"Good morning, Mr. Fischer. You're looking fresh and ready for adventure. Is it the big day already? Judging by the backpack you're wearing and the poké ball belt, I'd guess you're off to Viridian."
Todd scratched at his neck, feeling self conscious over the scrutiny while trying to keep his eyes from dropping into the cleavage the top two buttons of her blouse couldn't reach across. "Yes ma'am. Gonna grab some poké balls in town, see if I can't catch some Pidgeys and Rattatas before heading further north."
The older woman tsk'd and shook her head. "It's a bit of a walk to Viridian, with plenty of pokémon along the way. No sense risking harm and delaying your training when I've got some spare poké balls in the lab."
"I couldn't impose, it's not that far. I've been to Viridian plenty of times." Todd assured.
"That was by vehicle though, and with your folks. On foot? With wild pokémon around? There's no telling what could happen. Better to get you set up proper. Besides! I have a proposition for you." Her words were heavy with double entendre by the end as she fixed her eyes on his. Emptying the last dregs of coffee from the mug onto the ground, she turned and walked away towards the lab entrance. Her hips swayed as she walked, walking with deliberation in her stride and throwing a beckoning gesture over her shoulder.
Todd followed, picking out the shape of her bottom through the coat while she wasn't looking. She was probably a little younger than his mother, but not by much...yet that only served to make Martha Oak that much more alluring. There was no arguing with a woman like that. She wielded the authoritative status of an elder, with the power of physical attractiveness of a woman in her prime. Todd dutifully entered the lab, wondering what the professor could possibly want with a kid like him.
Inside the building, everything was sterile and white. We passed through a small lobby, where Prof. Oak greeted a receptionist before leading him deeper into the facility. Computers and equipment for studying and compiling data were everywhere. Todd caught glimpses of screens showing lines of information he didn't have time to read, as well as images of pokémon, anatomy, statistics. They passed by them all too quickly for him to register anything meaningful, until at last he was shuffled into an office room at the back.
Martha closed the door behind him with a firm click of a lock to isolate them from the rest of the building. Inside the room were several shelves filled with books, as well as mementos of family and other pokémon related decorations. Her desk was large and ornately carved with pokémon iconography, which was littered with loose papers and a computer displaying a Voltorb screen saver slowly bouncing back and forth.
Walking over to her desk, the Professor dipped behind it and began stacking items atop the loose pages. "Obviously you'll need some poké balls, but I have a few things that will help both you and me while you're out on your journey."
She placed five poké balls together, catching one as it started to roll off the table and pushing them to a more even spot on her desk. Next she placed what looked like a smart phone on the table. Todd blinked as he recognized the familiar design of the Pokédex, the signature creation of Professor Samuel Oak, Martha Oak's great grandfather and founder of Oak Labs. She couldn't possibly be planning to give him one of those, could she..?
When she finally stepped back in front of the desk, the Professor was grinning wickedly. In her hands was a trio of poké balls, each of them already occupied by a pokémon. "Once upon a time, we used to give young trainers rare pokémon to begin their journey. It was meant to give kids a leg up, but it also helped us to nurture and study the growth of these rare pokémon in the field. The kids were better protected, and the pokémon were able to gain experience and grow beyond the confines of civilized domestication."