Into the Unown (Pokemon Fanfiction OC)

“What do you think, Kerry? Will this be a problem?”

During Sir Clodington’s Evolution process, the Dragon Scale earring he was wearing fused with his skin for whatever reason, forming a teardrop shaped bump on his forehead. Worried that this might somehow affect his health, Nina asked Kerry to do an examination of her Clodsire just for good measure.

Kerry shrugged. “We’ll have to do more detailed scans to be sure. But just quickly examining it, I don’t really see any issues. As far as I can tell, the scale is purely cosmetic and doesn’t really reach beyond skin level.” The girl explained that the phenomenon was probably a conscious decision on Sir Clodington’s part, since some Pokemon may choose to actively preserve some meaningful marks or scars during their Evolution.

Nina gently caressed the Clodsire with a pair of disposable gloves she got from Kerry. Sir Clodington’s poisonous membrane had only become more potent with Evolution. The girl sighed, thinking that her hopes for a cuddly blob pillow was well and truly dashed. “I should go buy a full set of protective gear so I can cuddle with Clody when I feel like it.”

“Have you seen anything like it before?” Nina asked. She had heard of certain cosmetic traits being carried over in some form or another during Evolution, but never a foreign object being fused like this.

Kerry hummed. “The closest equivalent I could think of would be prosthetics or implants. I don’t really know, Nina… I’m just an apprentice so I’ll have to ask my aunts about this.”

Nina responded with a warm smile and a gentle pat on Kerry’s shoulder. “No worries, Kerr. I’m just being a bit paranoid. I’ll bring Clody to the Pokemon Center for a more thorough checkup later. Come on, we’re going to be late for the lecture.” 

The girl thanked Kerry for her help and beckoned for her companions to follow, which Sir Clodington did, with a deep, drawn out “Clooood.” The Pokemon dragged his body forwards with his stubby little legs, his flabby belly wobbled and jiggled each time it lifted and landed on the ground, eliciting a swoon from Nina. 

“Clodsires are still super cute blobs, even if I can’t cuddle with him the way I want.” Nina really wanted to throw her whole body onto Sir Clodington and just bury her face in all that jelly. But that would likely result in a very nasty chemical burn.

On the bright side, Sir Clodington seemed to have mellowed out a bit on his zealotry post Evolution. Or perhaps, the spiny fish Pokemon simply became less energetic with his much larger and cumbersome build. Either way, it was a change that Nina welcomed, if only for some peace of mind.

***

“Hello there, my name is Professor Ivy,” began the sleepy-eyed, violet-haired beauty. “Some of the more studious among you might know my name from my existing work, such as ‘Pokémon Adaptive Variation as a Function of Regional Distribution’.”

The female Professor paused to assess her crowd, only to sigh in disappointment at the lack of response.

Nina held back a chuckle. “Oh professor, nerds like us aren’t prone to standing out in front of a lecture hall full of extroverted jocks.”

Outside of battle tournaments and various outdoor activities, the inter-school meet also featured interesting lectures from various guests invited to the event. Professor Ivy’s talk on Interregional Pokemon Folklore being one of them. And naturally, sitting in a musty lecture hall for hours on end wasn’t exactly suited to the disposition of some students. So all around her, Nina could see a bunch of bored kids either sleeping on their desk, quietly whispering to the new friends they made during the week, or playing on their Pokegear underneath the desk.

Nina knew who the woman was of course, Brock’s former paramour in the anime, an enigmatic researcher from the Orange Islands who dumped the wannabe casanova for unknown reasons, and an expert on the subject of the Regional Differences between Pokemon Physiology. 

That last point was because Nina had actually read some of her published work. In particular, Professor Oak had recommended his protege’s papers when Nina questioned him about Alolan Vulpixes all those years ago. The woman did quite a thorough study on the differences between the two vulpine variations.

Professor Ivy cleared her throat, pulling Nina’s attention back to her. “Indeed, for those of you who have heard of my name, I’m typically known for my work on Pokemon physiology. But did you know? I also take an interest in collecting Pokemon folklore as well — which will be the topic of our lecture for today.”

Nina straightened her back and prepared to take notes. Even back in her past life, Miles always had an outsized interest towards eclectic folklore and myths, an interest that remained as strong as ever in this second life. If anything, that fascination had only grown due to all the fantastical elements of this Pokemon world, which meant that any legends and myths were all likely to have some nugget of truth to them.

“In all of my travels and my ongoing quest for interesting hearsays and folktales. One particular subject was always disproportionately popular among all my gathered material — that of the romance between humans and varying species of Pokemon.”

Nina nearly dropped her pen in shock, a sentiment that the rest of the lecture hall also shared as every student suddenly perked up in interest. If this was a deliberate ploy by the Professor to capture everyone’s undivided attention, she succeeded without a doubt.

“One of the most intriguing ones I found pertained to a man and an Octillery.” The Professor continued, completely heedless of the commotion that she had just caused. “Even in modern day erotic media, humans have always had a fascination with tentacles. And with the sheer amount of stories I’ve gathered with similar depictions among our ancestors of yore, one can’t help but wonder if a certain subsect of humanity are genetically predisposed to developing a sexual interest towards the writhing appendages…”

“What the heck! I thought this was just a bit!” Nina exclaimed when the callous Professor started going into explicit detail about various human-Pokemon mating rituals that she gathered over the years. “Some of these kids haven’t even started on sex ed yet! Someone save us from this lunatic!” 

And indeed, Nina could see various members of staff frantically running around, trying to obtain guidance on what to do about this situation, too worried about offending the esteemed Professor. To her side, Nina could see Kerry’s eyes glazed over, the poor girl’s soul visibly detaching from her body. In front of her, the twins, Nina’s two innocent juniors, were huddled together in distress, each covering the other’s ears to avoid tainting their fragile minds.

Matsuri, though, seemed inordinately excited at the topic and Thomas was furiously scribbling notes into his own notebook. “What the heck are you two doing?! You’re supposed to be our student council representatives!”

The unhinged woman then went on to describe a romantic encounter between a human and a Lapras. But worst of all was the story about a Typhlosion. Oh Arceus, Nina could never look at a Typhlosion the same way ever again.

Nina raised a hand to ask a question, in an attempt to divert the topic of conversation. “I need to buy time for the staff to intervene!” The girl determined.

Professor Ivy seemed to light up at the prospect of finally getting some audience participation and eagerly permitted Nina to speak.

“Thank you, Professor…” Nina said, with a feeble and exhausted voice. “I err…” The girl sputtered as she received an encouraging nod from the Professor. “In all of these err… stories that you shared. A lot of them end with the creation of offspring between humans and… Pokemon. I was just wondering if that was possible, if these hybrids actually exist?”

“A good question!” The Professor exclaimed. “In fact, this is one of my ongoing studies…”

Nina sat down as the Professor spoke, feeling relieved that she successfully derailed the woman’s prior topic.

“On a biological level, there are definitely some Pokemon with uncannily similar DNA structures to humans.” Ivy continued. “But then again, so do certain plant life so that may not be as significant as you might think.” The subject was a nuanced one, because merely sharing related genomes with certain species did not make the two related in a broader sense. For example, a human’s DNA is supposedly 50% similar to that of a banana, and yet the two could not be any more different.

“There are certainly storied clans out there who claim to have been descended from Pokemon,” said the Professor. “The Draconids for example, have always insisted that they possess Dragon blood in their ancestry. Their extraordinary affinity with the species, and some of the incredible feats that members of the clan have been seen performing over the years certainly lend a degree of credence to this assertion.

“However, one could also just as easily argue that the clan’s proficiency with Dragon Taming comes from untold generations of tradition and guarded knowledge. And that the incredible physical prowess of the Draconids come from the relentless training of their youths and a side effect from the prolonged exposure to their ancestral lands rich with Dragon Type Energy.”

“So does that mean that human-Pokemon babies don’t actually exist?” One of the students in the lecture hall chimed, sounding a little disappointed as she did.

Professor Ivy let out a wry smile. “The honest truth of the matter is, we don’t know. On a scientific level, it seems nearly impossible. After all, humans are mostly devoid of Type Energy, and we have yet to discover a hybrid between animals and Pokemon in the wild. But then again, outliers like Ditto exist, and certain humans are capable of harnessing Type Energy in the form of aura. So who’s to say what’s possible or not? 

“Though it does make me wonder, isn’t it too much of a coincidence? That so many stories from all these different regions depict similar occurrences. Is there truly not a shred of truth to them? Or is it really just a product of humanity’s collective imagination?”

The rest of the lecture proceeded in a much more subdued manner, after one of the staff members went up to the Professor and passed her a note from the faculty. Probably admonishing the woman for her previous behaviour.

***

“Maybe we should skip Johto when we go on our journey next month…” said an apprehensive Kerry, as they left the lecture hall.

NIna giggled and pulled her paranoid friend in for a reassuring hug. “Don’t worry, Kerr. It’s all just unverifiable folklore. If Typhlosions were really that degenerate, do you really think Professor Elm would hand them out all willy-nilly as starters like that?”

Kerry nodded, but there was still a great deal of doubt on her face. Even the twins were looking a little frail from the mental torture of a lecture they just went through. Nina sighed and dragged them along, it was lunchtime now and a good meal would help distract her friends from the filth that was just forcefully shoved into their ears.

As they walked, Nina could sense a stir in her shadow and a muffled scoff. “What is it Sebastian?” The girl asked, worried that something bad was about to happen.

Nina’s shadow writhed and came to life, depositing Purple Shadow in his butler garb to her side, a feat that she had learned was only possible thanks to the man’s Gengar who was always with him. Having the ronin escort Nina was part of Alfred’s arrangement to secure the girl’s safety from her own self-inflicted blunder.

Purple Shadow scoffed once more, just to reiterate his disdain. “That woman was messed up in the head, but you’d be a fool if you think Nephilims don’t exist.” He replied.

Nina’s companions, sans Kerry, all jumped in fright at the sudden interloper, but the girl reassured them by saying that he was a subordinate of Lilian’s butler. “When you say Nephilim? Are you referring to human-Pokemon hybrids?” The girl continued to ask her escort.

“Sure, take for example that Psychic kid you met the other day. What was his name? Mash Potato or something? I wouldn’t be surprised if he had some Pokemon blood in him.”

“Did you call?”

Nina jumped in fright at the voice that suddenly came from behind her. Even Purple Shadow took on a guarded stance against the gloomy boy who managed to sneak up to them without alerting his ninja senses.

“Err… Hi, Mash…” Nina greeted as she tried to calm her beating heart. The girl had become really sensitive to ambushes as of late. “Nope. Not at all! My escort here was just talking about mashed potatoes. Confusing, I know. You must get that a lot huh? Not that there’s anything wrong with your name or anything.” The girl added in haste.

The young Psychic walked up to Nina’s side with a nod, her companions making way for him and shifted to the back in vigilance. 

“Indeed. Mob and I do love mashed potatoes. Though we can’t seem to agree on which is best — smooth or chunky? I myself am partial to a smooth velvety mouthfeel, but Mob prefers his potatoes chunky.” The boy said.

Nina nodded in response, feeling a little disconnected from how ordinary the conversation was. “I like both,” she said. “But it really depends on what I’m having the potatoes with, you know? Since it is a side dish and all, it should really complement the main.”

“A salient point.” Mash acknowledged, as an awkward silence descended upon the group. Until the boy spoke up again to break the ice. “Actually, I’m here today because I would like to reserve your time tomorrow, Nina.”

The girl tilted her head in confusion, too flustered to really think properly. “What about tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow is the free-for-all.” Mash explained. “Every year, there will be an opportunity for the representatives of the inter-school meet to engage in an unrestricted exchange through battle, regardless of age and academic year.”

“Oh right…” Nina gaped in realization. She had forgotten that was happening. “Right, I did promise you a match with Espy didn’t I?”

Mash nodded with an almost childish smile. “Yes, Mob and I have been eagerly awaiting a chance to cross spoons with her since we saw Lady Espy’s stellar performance in your prior battles. Outside of the trainers in Lady Sabrina’s Gym, it is not often that we encounter a worthy opponent within our immediate circle.”

Nina chuckled at the boy, fully sympathizing with his struggles. It was the same issue that Lilian had when she first met her. “Of course,” she responded. “I’d love to make time for you tomorrow.” There wasn’t really a strict format to the free-for-all. Anyone was free to challenge whomever they wanted so long as the other party agreed to it. It was more of an informal tournament than anything else.

And with that, Mash thanked Nina and exchanged a few more pleasantries before disappearing as abruptly as he appeared, invoking another round of surprise from Nina’s companions.

“Damned Psychics…” Nina sighed, a sentiment that Purple Shadow was in full agreement with as he quietly sunk back into her shadow.

***

Author's Note:

I just released the last chapter of Part Two over on Patreon. So if you wanna binge it all in one go, now would be a good time.

Also, I decided I won't be doing daily public releases for that final ten chapters, since it'll coincide with my vacation time.

Additionally, I might need to put public releases on hold for a little bit after the end of Part Two while I gather up a bit more of a backlog and focus more on the quality of Part Three.

I figured, consistent chapter releases over a longer period of time was preferable to a long break right?