Excerpt: Together We Stand?

[b]Chapter 1: Good News[/b]

“Hey, Alex get in here! Hurry!” The excited voice of the subject of the demand’s younger sister beckoned.

Alex paused to roll his eyes before he continued to paint the drawing he made of his dream pokemon team which consisted of the final evolution of the starter pokemon he would have chosen four years ago if he had been allowed to start his journey. Alas, he had turned ten the day after the announcement that the Pokemon League in the United States had been shut down and that it would not open until the mystery surrounding the disapearances of twenty trainers was solved.
“Alex honey, you really want to see this!” His mother called.

Groaning in frhsation, the boy plopped the paintrbrush into the bowl of water and relunctantly rose from his chair. With shoulders slumped, he left his room and stomped down the stairs. “What is it,” he asked as he came into the livingroom where his mother and sister were watching the television.
[b](insert commercial jingle here)[/b]

“Alex, guess what!” Sammi exclaimed as she jumped out from the couch and skipped over to him. She danced around him as she continued to speak before he could guess, “They’re opening it again!”

“Opening what again?” He couldn’t help but laugh at his sister’s exuberance.

“The League of course, dummy!” She grabbed his arm as she started jumping up and down while screeching in excitement. “They’re letting us train pokemon again!”

“Huh? Really?” He looked over at his mother for confirmation, not wanting to believe only to have his hopes dashed.

“It sounds like it,” she verified. “They’re going to give more information after the commercials.”

He went over to sit next to his mother, not knowing exactly how to feel.

“Isn’t that great, Alex?” Sammi asked as she danced about the room. Then she stopped with her hands on her hips as she regarded him with tilted head. “What’s wrong, I thought you would be more excited than I am!”

“Um… you’re celebrating enough for all of us. I didn’t want to get in the way.”
“Oh, pooh!” She waved off his comment before resuming her high-spirited bounding around the room.

He studiously stared at the TV screen as though he were interested in what the salesperson was hawking… a set of beautiful florak-print dishes for the miss priss doll’s dollhouse… and tried to ignore the fact his mother was staring at him. He wondered himself why he wasn’t jumping up and down with his sister. There hadn’t been a day that went by since they shut down the Pokemon League he hadn’t obsessed about becoming a trainer. [b](NOTE: change earlier statement that he’d turned 10 the day after they closed the league to the day it closed, and had gone to get his starter pokemon only to find the doors to the lab closed.)[b] He thought he should feel ecctatic about the news. Yet he didn’t feel any emotion at all. It was as though he was just observing himself and life in general from some outward point of view, and was detatched from what was going on. He felt his mother touch his arm just as the news came back on, and his sister plopped down on the opposite side of the couch.

[i]“The big news today is the Pokemon League has re-opened with some new rules. Harry Johnson is with the League Commissioner now for a live interview.”[/i]
The screen changed from the perky face of Lois Kent, the channel 12 news anchor, to that of the reporter who ws standing in front of the League Headquarters with a stately looking elderly gentleman. [i]“Mr. Gordon, considering there hasn’t been a break in the case… or cases, rather… of the disappearances of trainers four years ago, why open the League now?”[/i]

[i]“Well, Mr. Johnson, we feel that we have come up with enough rules and regulations that will safeguard our youth as much as possible.”

“What would those be, sir?”

“The first is that everyone from age 10 to seventeen must take a three-month course which will cover wilderness survival and basics in pokemon training. At the end of the course, they must pass a test which will have forty randomised questions on what they studied during that time.”

“That sounds reasonable, but that doesn’t seem to be much protection if the disappearances of the trainers four years ago was a result of foul play.”

“Of course it isn’t, but it isn’t all we came up with. One of the rules is that no trainer under the age of eighteen can travel alone. Trainers aged 10 – 17 must travel in groups of at least four. Any minor trainer caught travelling alone will be sent home and cannot resume their journey until the next year when they must join another group of at least four other trainers. Each qualifying trainer will be given a league pokedex that will include a global nav unit as well as other helpful features. There will also be checkpoints between the towns that have gyms that the trainers must check in at every day.”

“How far apart are these checkpoints, and what if the trainers get lost between them?”

“Depending on the terrain, they will be anywhere between a quarter mile to two miles apart. The nav units they will have will make it unlikely for them to get lost, as all they have to do is look at the screen at any given time and it will tell them which way the next checkpoint is located.”
“What if a trainer loses his pokedex?”

“Remember, they will be travelling in groups, Mr. Johnson. It is unlikely all four or more trainers in a group will lose track of their ‘dexes.”

“Are there any more changes in the rules?”

“Those are the main ones. The rules and regulations are posted on the Pokemon Leagues website at www.Pokemonleague.org. Trainers will be excited to know that we have extended the list of starter pokemon from three species to six.”
“That’s very interesting. So in additon to [b](pokemon name which is grass/water, pokemon name which is fire, and pokemon name which is normal)[/b], which other pokemon can trainers hope to have as their first pokemon companion?”

“[b](Pokemon name)[/b], which is, of course a bug/ground type, [b](Pokemon)[/b], which is steel and (Pokemon) which is a flying/ice type, will all be available for the novice trainer. There was some debate on wethr or not to include ghost, psychic, dark and electric types, but it was determined that the majority of those types tend to be too difficult for the average beginner to handle effectively.”[/i]
The reporter’s voice held amusement as he replied, [i]“Even more experienced trainers have been reported to have trouble with those types as well.” [/i]

The commissioner chuckled, [i]“Indeed, my own experiences with my ghost, [b](Pokemon)[/b], was not promising at first. Thank goodness I can now call [b](name of Pokemon)[/b] one of my finest champions in both gym battles and contests.”

“When will the courses the trainers must take be available, and where will they take place?”

“Sign-ups begin today. Kids ten-years-old to seventeen may register online for courses that will begin the beginning of next month. Every middle school and high school in the country will be set up with a qualified instructor in the course.”
“It sounds as though you were planning on doing this for quite awhile.”

“Not just me, but the rest of the League’s officials have been working with law inforcement, the board of education within each region, and the government ever since the league’s activities were curtailed four years ago. We feel we have set up a safety network for the kids that will still afford them the independence to learn and grow with their pokemon.”

“Thank you for your time, Commissioner Gordon.” [/i]

The distinguished League Official shook hands with the reporter as he said, [i]“Always a pleasure, Mr. Johnson.”[/i]

The words of the reporter and the news anchor were drowned out by Sammi’s excited squeels. “Oh, mom, can I sign up? Pleas, please please please?” Even as she asked, she jumped up from the couch and hopped with each shriek plead.

Alex had felt excitement rise within him as he listened to the report on the news, but as his sister asked for permission to register for the course, he realized what had given him misgivings at the start. [i]Even if the League was indeed starting back up, their parents may not allow them to go[/i]. He could understand the reluctance he saw in his mother’s bearing. Their next door neighbor’s oldest son was one of the trainers who had disappeared four years ago… and he was fifteen at the time and had accrued four league badges. “May we, mom?” He asked quietly. “I’m sure it’ll be alright if we travel in a group. All the kids who disappeared last time were travelling alone.”

Both Alex and Sammi looked at their mother expectantly as she got up and walked over to the bookshelves. She picked up the family portrait that stood atop it and looked at it for a few moments before sighing and turning back to the kids. “Wait until your father gets home and we’ll talk about it.”