Chapter 3: Mark gets his second pokémon


The next day, Mark paid the woman and went on with Charmander. They walked in silence.

“Charmander, do you want to evolve?” Mark suddenly asked.

“Am I to believe you’re asking me?” said Charmander, stopping.

“Of course,” Mark said. “I wouldn’t force you to evolve if you didn’t want to. And unevolved pokémon learn attacks faster, so it won’t be a big loss.”

“Well, I don’t really have anything against evolving. Flying must be fun, though.”

“Okay then. I was just thinking about the pokémon I would have later on.”

They kept walking for a while. Then Mark saw a pokémon – a Rattata.

“Charmander, go! Scratch!”

Charmander raced at the Rattata and scratched it three times. Rattata countered with a Tackle.

“Charmander, just keep scratching until you win!”

“Charmander! Charmander! Char-man-der!” Charmander said as he scratched Rattata all over. The Rattata tried to do something but without success, and ended up just lying there, fainted.

“That was easy!” said Mark and they went on. They were silent for a while again, while it was getting darker. It started to rain, although not as heavily as the day before, and steam spouted from Charmander’s tail.

“Look!” Charmander suddenly said.

“Where?”

Charmander used Ember on a bush, and out ran a small pokémon – an Eevee.

“Whoa! Eevee is so rare! I have to catch it... wait, I don’t have any pokéballs... what can I do before it runs away?”

But the Eevee didn’t run away. It just sat there, two or three meters away from them, shaking with fear. A quiet “Eeeveee” was the only sound it made.

“Er... are you all right?” Charmander said carefully.

“Eeeee!” the Eevee shrieked, taking a few steps backwards. Then Mark saw something on the ground – it was a pokéball, just when he needed it.

“Pokéball, go!” he shouted and threw the pokéball at the Eevee that still didn’t dare to move.

“No!”

Charmander jumped up and punched the pokéball back to Mark. “Can’t you see this Eevee is scared out of its life?” he said angrily. “And it’s very young and unable to battle at his age. I thought it was well punched through humans’ skulls not to catch a pokémon that is unable to fight, because it causes the pokémon to find you untrustworthy?”

Mark looked at the Eevee. It still just stared at him, trying to make itself small.

“And,” Charmander continued, “an Eevee this young wouldn’t be out in the open except in one case – if it has lost its mother.”

Mark still stared at the Eevee. The poor little thing was homeless. It would die.

“I won’t hurt you,” Mark then said as his hand reached for the Eevee and stroke the soft fur. Then he picked it carefully up. The Eevee shrieked again and tried to get away, but the heat from Mark’s body made it comfortable and it snuggled up to him, still shaking and its heart beating very fast. It made Mark feel weird, but then he grabbed it tighter.

“Better hurry to Cleanwater city,” he said to Charmander and they started running. A lonely pokéball was left on the road in the rain.


After ten minutes or so, they arrived at the Cleanwater city Pokémon center. Once inside, Mark went to nurse Joy.

“Hello... I was just outside, and found this Eevee. It’s too young to be walking around – I think it must have lost its mother.”

“Let me look at it.” Mark handed the Eevee to her, and it tried to get away again, but Nurse Joy’s experienced hands held it carefully there. She peered at it.

“It’s a male,” she said. “Indeed very young, but he looks pretty tough. See, some scratches – he has had battles, but only in self-defense against some other very small, weak pokémon... still, being able to battle at that age... my, my, that’s something special...”

Nurse Joy seemed to have earned Eevee’s trust by now, as he had stopped struggling. “But he needs food, that’s certain, and a bit of healing.”

She put Eevee down on the desk, and went to a back room to get a Potion and a bowl of pokémon food.

“Your Charmander can eat too,” she said as she put the bowl on the desk. Mark put Charmander on the desk whil Nurse Joy sprayed Eevee with the Potion. He had obivously never had anything sprayed on him, first he screwed his eyes shut, shook himself and sneezed, but then started eating like Charmander.

“There is a pokémon gym here, right?” Mark asked Nurse Joy while his pokémon ate.

“Yes, but the gym leader, Rick... you shouldn’t let your guard down. He uses legendary pokémon, although at low levels, and he is very strong. It is said that he caught legendary pokémon with illegal Master balls he made himself and then cloned them and released the originals... oh, what am I doing, spreading these stupid rumours... Well, there are more sick pokémon around, and your Eevee and Charmander have finished eating. We hope to see you again.” She went to help some other trainers after this quick end of the conversation.

“Let’s go,” said Mark, and he went out of the pokémon center with his two pokémon.

Mark went to buy pokéballs while Eevee and Charmander searched for the pokémon gym. They found the gym easily, it was a huge building in the center of the city. There were also signs all over pointing the way and made the gym very easy to find. Then the met Mark just outside the pokémon market.

“Did you find the gym?” Mark asked.

“It was easy to find,” said Charmander.

“Eeee,” said Eevee happily. He couldn’t really say anything that made sense yet.

“Okay, good. But Eevee, are you... do you want to be... my pokémon? You know, do you want me to be your trainer, if you’ve lost your mother?”

“Eeee!” Eevee nodded and licked Mark’s hand.

“All right then. You will need to go into that ball.” Mark held out a pokéball, and Eevee turned into a red beam of light that disappeared into the ball.

“And Charmander, here’s your pokéball,” said Mark and held out another ball.

“Er... do you mind if I don’t go into my pokéball?” said Charmander. “Pokéballs make me feel uncomfortable...”

“It’s okay. Hey, I also bought a pokédex.” He pointed his brand-new pokédex at Charmander. “Let’s see how much you grew when battling that Rattata.”

“Charmander, lizard pokémon. If the flame at the tip of its tail dies, so does this fire pokémon.”

“Yeah, I know, tell me the level,” said Mark, rather impatiently.

“At level 7, Charmander should know Scratch, Growl, and Ember,” said the voice of the pokédex.

“Level seven? That’s two levels against one Rattata. Seems incredible... anyway, we’ll need to train a lot to beat that legendary pokémon gym leader.”

And they headed out to the Lake of Purity to train for the gym.