From: Continue (continue2@mindspring.com) Subject: [PW!] The more things change, the more they stay the same Newsgroups: alt.games.nintendo.pokemon Date: 2001-04-01 20:32:02 PST [NS]: Revised WG either tomorrow or the next day. "Hey, has anyone seen BR?" Damian queried of those that were present in the lab. He could see one guy with his back turned, making adjustments on a laser. Another sat typing something at a control console and he heard someone at work underneath the table on which an experiment?s tools normally sat. The guy at the laser didn?t even turn around as he responded "Nope. Why? Is he needed for an experiment?" "No, I was just getting some of the pokemon items for one test and noticed his club wasn?t there. I?m thinking he has it and might break something." Damian told the guy who he recognized as Keith upon hearing his voice. The man at the console swiveled around in his chair, but Damian couldn?t put the name to the face. "I saw him about 15 minutes ago, he was heading toward the pokemon storage area." Damian?s t-shirt suddenly read "Batter up!". He shook his head before offering "Thanks!" and quickly heading out of the lab. He made his way through the nearly-labyrinthine hallways on this floor of the building until he came to a specific door. Although this door looked like most of the others doors that he had passed, this had a nearly-black plastic plaque with white lettering that gave a room number and the label "Pokemon Storage". Pushing down on the swing handle, Damian opened the door just in time to hear a cracking sound, like something hitting an item made of plastic. Looking toward the source of the sound, he saw the holographic image of an Igglybuff squealing gleefully heading straight toward him. The image was projected in front of a pokeball which nearly sailed right into the young man?s face. He quickly put his hands up to catch it securely, but he fumbled with it as he caught it and had to juggle it between hands for a minute until he grasp it firmly. The Igglybuff whose image was being projected giggled its name happily while Damian was getting a good grip on the ball. The young man looked over to where the sound, and ball, had come from. He quickly spotted exactly what he was expecting to find, a Marowak with a Thick Club in hand. "BR, I thought I told you not to do this anymore." Damian admonished the pokemon. "Maro maro wak?" BR shot back defensively. The pokemon proceeded to cup the hand that wasn?t holding the club as if it were rasping a spherical object, then moved in a manner suggesting putting the imaginary object down in front of itself. "Wak wak wak wak wak marowak" BR said, punctuating all but the last word by swinging its club repeatedly at where he had placed the imaginary object, then looking up at Damian with a shrug. Damian looked around the room, seeing the racks that covered every inch of wall space, filled with pokeballs. "Yeah, I know that the new pokeballs are all more durable, I even participated in several of the stress tests, but there?s still a chance that you could break one, especially with repeated hits. And if you do break one, the pokemon inside will be lost." Emphasizing his point, Damian flipped a switch on the pokeball he was holding. The holographic image of the Igglybuff began to fade, with the happiness leaving its expression as it disappeared. He walked over to BR and placed the ball in an empty slot that was eye-level with the Marowak. "Do you really want to be responsible for that?" BR shook his head "Wak." Before anything else could be said, the door opened. A man walked in and quickly surveyed the room. Upon spotting Damian he said "Hey, Damian, didn?t you have that meeting with Mr. Harrowood this afternoon?" The young man looked down at his watch and remarked "Yeah, I didn?t notice what time it was!" "Are you going to have enough time to change?" the man asked casually. "Not a problem." Damian told the man. His red t-shirt now looked to be a white linen shirt, complete with a black tie. "The shirt has a trick or two up its sleeves. I just need to grab a jacket now." The man was scrutinizing Damian?s shirt and tie before he pronounced. "That tie looks real, not just like someone printed it on the shirt. And what?s with those little eyes on it?" "I don?t know," Damian shrugged "It?s all part of the illusion, I?ve never been able to get it to look like this without them. Anyway, I gotta go. Catch ya? later, George!" Damian waved as he left the room. "That?s just freaky." George commented after Damian left. "Wak" BR nodded. -------------------- "Have a seat, Mr. Fox." The older man told Damian. This man still had a strong frame over which rested his well-tailored suit, complete with a red power-tie. A full head of white hair with a relatively unwrinkled face placed the man as somewhere in his late forties or early fifties. His office was furnished extravagantly, including the leather chair that Damian was directed to sit in with a hand gesture. Mr. Harrowood picked up a folder on his desk and looked inside. "You?ve got quite an impressive record, Mr. Fox. You went out on a pokemon journey at age 11, like many youngsters. After spending over a year on that journey, you were able to beat the Elite Four at age 12. After returning home, you showed excellent scholastic ability, skipping several grades and ending up at Rosetta University nearly a year-and-a-half ago. While there, you showed extraordinary technical skills and an above-average ability to handle pokemon. With being able to test out of so many of your classes, it?s no wonder you got so many good reviews. At age 17. when you applied for internship here at Silph Co. a half-year ago, there wasn?t much of the competition that even came close to matching you for this position. The reviews from your section manager also notes that you adapted to the environment here very quickly and have become quite productive, participating in the creation and lab testing of several of our new product initiatives." Harrowood paused long enough to put the folder down and look Damian in the eye. "It is because of this list of qualifications that you are now the number one choice for a new project that is about to be undertaken by the company. We have a batch of new products that we?ve been developing, as well you know. While they?ve undergone lab testing, we have yet to test any under real-life conditions, especially for the extended durations that they would be likely to see out in the field." The elder executive now leaned back in his chair. "What we would like you to do is go on another trainer?s journey with our new equipment." Damian blinked a few times, the full weight of the situation starting to sink in properly. "Well, sir, the last journey I took did last awhile. How will that affect the status of my internship?" Harrowood waved a hand in a dismissive gesture. "No need to be concerned about that. If you decide to do this, arrangements will be made with Rosetta University and you?ll have the equipment you need to do any telecommuting for work here that you want to participate in." Just as Damian began to make motions as if to pose another question, the older man reached for one of the drawers in his desk and cut off whatever the young man was going to say. "We are going to be giving you something to make sure you don?t have to scrounge around to survive." The older man put down a credit card in front of Damian. "You?ll have your own corporate charge account. We?re not setting any hard limits, but we expect you to be somewhat reasonable with expenses and not buy your own private jet or anything. So, do you need more time to think about it?" Damian?s eyebrows knitted in thought and he stated "No, but I?ll only go if you give me one other thing." Harrrowood?s eyes narrowed slightly. "What is that?" he ventured cautiously. "One of the lab pokemon, BR." Damian noted flatly. "BR?" "Yes, sir, " the young man began to explain "He?s a Marowak. You saw him at the company picnic two months ago, the one that was playing on the techs? team for the softball game." Harrowood?s eyebrows raised a bit and he chuckled. "Wait a minute, you mean the one hitting homers? Weren?t you calling him Babe Ruth after he started pointing?" Damian let a small grin appear. "Yeah, but last month he found out the meaning of ?babe? and ?ruth? separately, but doesn?t understand who the name belonged to originally. Since he doesn?t like those, I call him BR. He doesn?t know it?s just an abbreviation." The older man still had a mirthful grin on his face. "If that?s what you want, I think we can spare it. Besides, if you?re gone for a few months with him, management?s team might win the next time." The young man appeared somewhat amused as he relayed "I wouldn?t bet on that. One of the guys is trying to teach a Rhydon how to play." "I think I would pay money to see that," the older man shot back "which our health insurance probably will be if it tries to steal home." The images conjured up by that hung in the air for a few seconds before Harrowood asked "So, will you be touring Kanto again?" The answer was "No, I think I?ll head to Johto this time. I don?t think it?s worth it to go through the same trip I did before. Besides, the equipment won?t be tested well enough if I know where to go in order to avoid all the problems that I encountered before. New challenges are what the trainers out there will face when they go out, so the equipment needs to be tested under those conditions." "Alright, then," Harrowood stood up and offered his hand "Congratulations on your new opportunity." Damian firmly grasped and shook the outstretched hand. The older man gave the final offering of "Mr. Johnson, the one in your department, will show you which pieces of equipment we?re sending with you to be tested. You can set out at your earliest convenience thereafter." ---------------------- A quick knock on the open door served to give notice that someone other than an overbearing manager wanted to talk to him, so Ernest Johnson looked up from his computer screen. "Oh, hi, Damian, what?s up? You becoming a suit-type?" he indicated Damian?s t-shirt with a nod of his head. "Oh, uh, no, I just came back from a meeting with Mr. Harrowood, " Damian explained "he told me that I was selected for a company sponsored journey to do field-testing on some of the new equipment that we?ve had under development." Ernest nodded "Yeah, I remember he sent me an e-mail about that last week. Hold on a sec." He pushed off and sent the chair he was sitting in rolling to a short metal cabinet on the other side of his office. After opening the top drawer he pulled out a duffel bag and a small rectangular item that was obviously made of plastic and had a pair of straps on it. "Take a load off." Ernest instructed Damian as the former set the two items at the edge of his desk. Once Damian sat down in a chair and pulled it in close, the researcher started to breakdown what he was handing over. "These two items were something you never got a chance to work on. The duffel bag is a prototype model of the trainer?s backpack that we?re going to be putting out. It uses the same technology as the pokeballs for storage of much larger items. To put in or remove an item, you just need?" he held up the rectangular item "the control unit. It straps onto your forearm and has an LCD touch-screen display. You can toggle to have the display run across either the length or width of the screen. It also has removable storage memory units for additional data collection." After unzipping the duffel bag, Ernest tapped the screen a couple of times and a beam of white light formed into an object a few centimeters above the bag. The researcher caught it before it dropped and presented it to Damian. Staring at it curiously, Damian took the sunglasses. "Does the bag hold anything larger than these?" Ernest chuckled "Large enough to let us play a joke on Nick the other day. We put his pick-up truck in here. He was about to call the police before we let him in on it." Damian held up the sunglasses. "So, are these just for style, then?" "Nope," the researcher shook his head "they were in there because it took up less space in my office. It?s another of our projects. It wasn?t originally intended for trainers, but we think it might end up being sold to them yet. It?s actually intended for researchers or medical personnel. They have a built-in sensor suite utilizing the old Smartdust technology. All of the sensors are actually embedded in the frame, though. The information is displayed in overlay fashion in the lenses and the controls are integrated into the trainer?s backpack control unit. The scans run full-spectrum and can give heart-rate, breathing, blood pressure, pretty much everything. We?ve also been matching patterns so that we can get pokemon moods, but we can?t get much here under lab conditions. One of the reasons that we?re sending this out with you is so you can get some readings in other settings, where you?ll be able to get the full range of emotions out of various pokemon. With a complete database we can get that function to work properly." Damian now regarded the sunglasses he held thoughtfully. "Any reason to make them as sunglasses?" "Style." Was Ernest?s straight-faced response. He waited about three seconds before grinning "Okay, partially. We thought the sunglasses were something that wouldn?t be something too embarrassing to walk around while wearing. We had thought of going with single-eye eyepiece but found there were too many problems with that. In the short term, they?re flimsy and distracting due the extra effort needed by the brain to process things coming in through only one eye. In the long term, extended use, for whatever reason you could have for doing that, causes headaches due to the sensory dissonance." Damian nodded "What about pokeballs?" "We?ve only got a few types for you right now. Basically I was told that every department had to sign off on each item that was being sent along with you. Marketing didn?t agree to any of the ones that hadn?t come up with their own name for yet, something about not having to overhaul their database for new names after you?ve already been passing in comments. I know things are a lot easier to change than that, but it?s not up to me. Anyway, we?re setting you up with some bi-directional sensory feedback balls, which they?re calling view balls, secure-release balls, which they?ve dubbed as roaming, and the network balls, which they?re got as community balls." Damian nodded. "Yeah, I?ve helped with these before. None of the condition-oriented balls got through yet?" Ernest shook his head. "Nothing so far. I couldn?t even find out who was holding them up, so that?s all the stuff for now." Damian was about to stand up when Ernest spoke up again "One other thing I forgot to mention. The trainer?s backpack control unit has the pokegear functionality incorporated into it. It?s a late addition, but we figured that it would be handy." "Thanks. With all this stuff, the trip should be really different from my first one." Damian stood up and offered his hand. "I appreciate the effort you?ve gone to here." "Sure, no problem." Ernest looked surprised a second after shaking Damian?s hand as he saw Damian?s t-shirt. It had returned to it?s normal appearance and now read: "Where does he get all those wonderful toys?" "One last thing," Ernest pointed at Damian?s t-shirt "You?re not supposed to be telling anyone who made the items you?re being given to test out. They?re still in experimental status, so there?s a bunch of issues with that, including legal. Don?t tell anyone unless you have to, okay?" "Yeah, I understand." Damian gathered up the items. "Thanks." As the young man headed out the door he turned and asked "Do you think it would be a good idea to try out the trainer?s backpack on Harvey?s chair just as he?s about to sit in it?" Ernest shot back a devilish grin "Only if you call me first, so I can watch." ---------------------------------------- "Hey, Damian, is that one of the Magnetons from the lab? I thought you were only taking BR?" Keith asked Damian as the young man sat down at his computer. "I am. I got this one during my first pokemon journey. It?s name is Bulletproof." When Damian said its name, the Magneton spun around in place over his left shoulder. "Oh, okay. Say, what are you still doing here for? Weren?t you supposed to be leaving ASAP?" "I had to say my good-byes and get everything ready for me to go. I think I can spare a couple of days for that since this could last a year. After I download some stuff here, I?ll be heading out, though." Damian explained. "Ah?well, have fun. The rest of us?ll be here wishing we could get a year?s worth of paid vacation." Keith waved as he walked out. After Keith had left, Damian proceeded to download files from his computer. Waiting in boredom for the operation to finish, he idly opened up his e-mail, convincing himself that he should make sure nothing important had come in the last three days, not that it seemed likely. He noticed one unread e-mail. It had come in this morning, an hour ago from the time stamp. It was a little odd that there was no subject, but he wasn?t paying a lot of attention until he opened the electronic missive. It?s contents consisted of a short and simple message that read: Come and see me before you leave on your journey. I will be waiting. Damian then noticed who it was from, Sabrina, the leader of the Saffron Gym. The young man had never heard of the Psychic gym leader ever sending a summons to someone by e-mail. He had never been summoned by her by any means, so he didn?t know for sure, either way. This summoning seemed strange, however. He decided it would be worth it, especially since he had to head to Saffron for the train to Johto, anyway. Once the files had been downloaded he shut off his computer, stood up, and turned to Bulletproof. "Do you remember Saffron? We need to go to the Gym there." The Magneton began to glow and touched Damian. They blinked out with only a small flicker of light. The next sight that appeared to Damian was the exterior of the Saffron City Gym. It hadn?t seemed to have changed in the slightest in the five years since he had been here last. After going up the steps to the front door, he found one difference. When he pulled open the door, it swung open easily, like any other door. He saw a woman standing at the reception desk as he walked up to it. Before she could offer some form of standard greeting, he told her "Hello, I?m here to see Sabrina. My name is Damian ?" "Fox." She finished "I was already told to expect you, Mr. Fox. Sabrina is waiting in the challenge room." "Thanks." Damian made his way down a vaguely familiar hallway. He quickly reached the doors to the challenge room and entered. Across the room, Sabrina could be seen quite clearly sitting on her throne. As he crossed the room he offered up "I just got your e-mail and came by. Why did you want to see me?" "For several reasons." Sabrina?s voice seemed as cool as ever, not changing at all from either of the previous occasions that he had met her. "The first is to thank you for giving me the Pokenomicon after your first journey, as you had promised. The information that I have been able to get from it has been invaluable in preparing my Psychic pokemon to deal with Dark-type pokemon." Damian shoved aside any memories of the contents of the book. He didn?t think Sabrina could possibly have been reading the same sections he had been, otherwise she wouldn?t be so thankful. "You?re welcome, but I?m sure your others reasons are something more significant than that." If Sabrina was in anyway affected by the young man?s words, she didn?t show it. "The second reason is I wanted to see if you could find someone while you were in Johto. It is someone who you knew before. This someone came to me a little over five years ago and struck a bargain with me in order to secure items from me that would help him start his business. I lost track of him when he entered Johto not too long after and have not been able to find him since." After a moment of silence, Damian asked "And this person is?" "Not a person," Sabrina corrected "or at least not human. The someone in question is a Dragonite that goes by the name Drake." Involuntarily, Damian looked down at his right hand and flexed his fingers in the fingerless glove on it , remembering what he considered to be one of the biggest mistakes of his life. "Fine, if I happen to run across him, I?ll let you know. Is there anything else?" "Yes, one last thing. There is someone from my gym who will be accompanying you on your journey. I don?t think you?ll mind too much, since you also used to travel with her several years ago." With that pronouncement, a female figure entered the room near Sabrina. Although she had changed since Damian had last seen her, Damian thought he recognized her. "Sarah Jane?" His t-shirt now read "!" <TBC?> Jeff Hauser* *Sig Sold Seperately