Lei Aircuno

In order to make up from his past loneliness Lei loves making friends, be it Pokemon or Human he is generally nice to everyone, even if that “one” be evil. Lei however is not stupid (Well, not that stupid anyway…). He can act independently and can easily tell the difference between alignments making it easy to deceive those on the wrong side.  Along with this kindness, he can be emotional and shows a lot of love to those close to him; risking his life is one example of this love.

He always likes to help people and Pokemon, but sometimes he can get in the way when he is too kind or helps a little too much. When resting you would generally see Lei looking up into the sky, somewhere he’s always wanted to go despite living in a water based town.

Lei grew up in Pacifidlog Town similar to how a normal child would. Unlike this stereotypical child growth however he never really had any friends, mainly because he lost them all through being annoying, he wanted to hang around too much. He also had much different ideals to everyone who lived there. He didn’t want to work as a fisherman or a diver, besides he’d been diving for as long as he could remember, his dad forced him to do so.  His dad was the strict type, but he was more like his mum in terms of personality. Despite being a nice person, he disliked his dad for restricting his freedom and also through the constant temper he threw around.

Lack of freedom, lack of friends and nowhere to go; this led him to one place to break all of those things, the sky. It was the only thing he had to keep him the way he was. The more time he spent living at this town, the more fed up he became. It was the same old daily routine of chores, diving and being alone. Every night he snuck out in order to look at the stars, or whatever there was to look at in the vast sky. This added on to his daily routine and lasted for a while, that was until he accidentally fell asleep one night on a nearby hill and his dad caught him the next morning. This event brought upon an important decision and changed his storyline completely.

“What the hell are you sleeping outside for? What have I told you about permissions?” shouted his dad angrily. The volume of his voice woke Lei up straight away and shocked him to hear this tone of voice so suddenly. He had never heard his dad like this before; he decided to give a response a try. “Sorry…I’m sorry”. The rage suddenly disappeared almost completely from his Dad as he turned around. “Get out of my sight” he said with his back facing Lei. “Huh?” He replied, confused about what had just happened. He saw his dads fist clench and he turned around once more, this time bringing something along with him, his fist. Just before it collided with his left cheek he saw his mum running towards them, probably due to the earlier shouting. The collision threw him onto the ground where he stared at his dad in shock. As his mum came closer his dad turned back around and pushed her in temper. No…Mum! The rage was still red hot, but he was somehow keeping it invisible. Lei sat up and saw his Mum come to a halt at the bottom of the hill…unconscious? Something switched inside him and he rose to his feet providing his Dad with the same fate as his Mum. Before he knew it both his parents were lying at the bottom of the hill, one unconscious, and one getting to his feet. He realized what he had done, turned and ran before his Dad could retaliate further.

Tears began pouring from his eyes as he ran towards a specific destination. On the island he was living on there was a large forest covering over a half of the whole area. He headed towards a place where he knew no one would find him, a secret opening on the other side of the island. He was still confused about what had happened, but his emotions weren’t allowing him to think straight. At the peak of these emotions he got ready to scream, but tripped just before he could do so. After laying there for a few seconds, he rose to his knees, calmer than before. As he began to think over the situation, he heard a cry coming from somewhere nearby. It was hard to tell exactly where due to the surrounding trees, but he decided to get up and look around. Still wiping the tears from his face he came across a bird Pokemon he’d never seen before laying on some grass. It looked injured so Lei decided that he had to help it. As he came close, the Pokemon screamed out and attempted to fly away but it was having trouble retaining its flight. Noticeably they were almost out of the forest to his secret area. Oh no, what if it flies into the water?! He ran after it but it was clearly too late as he saw the Pokemon drop down into the ocean. It started struggling but thinking was not as option at this moment, Lei jumped into the water and swam over to the Pokemon in order to save its life. He reached it in time, but he was now in a very difficult situation. Sharpedo were surrounding them and they were beginning to circle closer. Was this it? Had his efforts in saving this mystery Pokemon been wasted? He held the Pokemon tight and closed his eyes.

A great roar echoed through the skies. The Sharpedo swam away hastily and Lei opened his eyes wondering where this sound came from. No sign of anything. He swam back to shore and walked to a grassy area to lay the Pokemon down, however, it wasn’t moving at all. It was too late, although he acquired help in the ocean rescue, he had still failed to save this bird.

“Life can be quite painful at times can’t it”

Lei looked around and noticed a shady figure leaning on a tree. He was unable to see him clearly due to the trees shadow. Who is this guy, more importantly why is he here? “How did you find this place?” He replied in a disheartened voice. The man started walking into the woods. “I believe you have proved yourself. Along with this Pidgey I trust you’ll follow the right path”. Lei stood up and shouted out to him, “Wait!” Before he could continue, he heard a sound below him. He looked down and saw that the “Pidgey” was up on its feet looking up at him. He smiled with content and began to cry, but quickly turned back towards the forest. He ran into it hoping to find this strange man to gain some answers.

He searched everywhere but couldn’t find him. After a short while he found himself at the exit to where his family lived. His parents were no longer lying there, so he assumed they must be inside. He slowly walked down the hill and into his house prepared for any sort of assault. Instead he found his mum and dad sitting there, his dad had his back turned, leaning on a table. “We’ve decided it’s time you went”. What now? Lei thought. “I’m sorry about wha-“ His mum suddenly cut in mid sentence. “You’re going to leave this town and never come back”. What the hell is this, why is she telling me to get out? He’s the one who needs to leave. She walked over and kissed him on the cheek. “I’m sorry” she whispered into his ear, she then pointed to a bag lying on a nearby table. He picked it up and looked back at his Mum, then his Dad then walked outside.  In a situation like this you would probably feel upset or angry, but Lei was infact happy. Was it true he was finally free of this damned town and his Dad? Wait, how am I even gonna get anywhere, I don’t have any Pokemon and there are no boats. Ah. As he looked a bit further he noticed a Wailord floating near some docks and ran over to the assumed owner. “Are you Lei?” He slowed down and nodded back. “I was asked to take you west by your Dad, to Littleroot.” My Dad? I actually don’t care anymore, i'm ready to go!

“I really don’t think you should sit there, you could fall of you know” The man said to Lei, followed by a sigh. “I’ll be fine” Lei laughed. As he leaned forward to look down something landed on his back causing him to topple over head first into the ocean. As the man helped Lei up, he had an I said so expression on his face. Not phased by his soaking wet clothing, he looked around for what had landed on him at that time. He heard a similar squawk, above him was Pidgey, the one he saved earlier and strangely it was in perfect condition. “So it was you huh!”

A while had passed and they finally arrived at Littleroot Town. As he jumped of the Wailord, he looked around at the so called “Town”. It was quite big and had many building and structures. This was quite overwhelming for Lei as he’d never seen anything like it. “You look like you’ve never seen a town before, will you be alright” Asked the man. “Yeah…” Responded Lei distantly as he began walking further into the town with the Pidgey still on his shoulder. Blinded by amazement Lei had no idea of the incoming danger approaching from his left, thankfully his Pidgey notified him quite noisily.

SCREEECHH

Lei covered his face as the SUV in front of him came to a halt. Whoa that was a close one. A man leaped out of the side to see if he was alright. “I’m so sorry about that, I should’ve been more careful, it’s just you were looking so dazed, I didn’t think you were just going to be stood in the middle of the road…” He looked around to see many cars behind one another and noticed he was blocking their path. “Give me a moment” said the man softly.

“Call me Professor Birch, I live in this town but I’m usually out researching Pokemon habitats around the region. So what brings you here to Littleroot?” It was quite awesome to meet someone new, however Lei had no idea how to answer the question, why was he here? Freedom wouldn’t exactly be a sufficient answer. “My name is Lei by the way…and to answer your question I’m not quite sure, this is my first time out of my home town Pacifidlog. I don’t really have a goal in mind at the moment” Lei laughed afterwards. Prof. Birch couldn’t help but look at the Pidgey flying around, it landed on Lei’s head. “Is that your Pidgey there Lei?” Lei grabbed the Pidgey and put it on his lap, it looked up at him joyfully. “Nope, it just followed me around after I helped it out”. “Helped it out you say…” Prof. Birch stood up and walked forward. “Do you by any chance have anywhere specific to go to?” Upon hearing those words, Lei dropped to the ground. Oh great…I was so excited about the town I completely forgot about where I’m going to stay. Lei stood back up and positioned himself accordingly. “Yeah sure, there’s got to be a Pokemon center nearby, that’ll do!”. Prof. Birch gave out a short sigh and asked another question. “I see, in that case what do you think about Pokemon Lei?”. Huh, he was asking about where I’m living a second ago…”Well, I guess…Uhm, I think Pokemon are quite amazing really, I haven’t really seen many but there’s a whole world to explore. There’s so much that we don’t know” Replied Lei, thinking about that roar he heard back when he was helping Pidgey.

“Good answer. Now then, what would you say if I asked you to come help me out for a while with my research. Since you’re quite new to practically everything it’d be interesting to see how you’d deal with being in new areas with new Pokemon. Also as a new resident you might see things that someone who knows the place well wouldn’t. It’s hard to understand but I know what I’m doing, on the plus side it’d give you a place to stay, time to think of what you want to do and you’d learn quite a lot. So? Whaddya think?”

Lei looked at Prof. Birch in amazement, was he in luck or what! “Sure!”.

Why did he tell me to meet him at his lab when he knows I have no idea where I’m going. After hours of asking for directions and figuring his way around the place he walked past a house in which had a television relatively close to the window. It displayed a dynamic battle between two Pokemon. Despite being knocked down, each Pokemon showed absolute strength and determination. Before long it was over, one had won over the other, but both trainers of these Pokemon treated them kindly after the battle was finished.

“Ah you’re finally here, come inside” Beckoned Prof. Birch. “Fortunately there’s a hotel on the other side of the road…just be careful getting there. I’ll be sure to give you the run down tomorrow, just give your name to the receptionist and they’ll help you out”.

A few months passed, Lei was quite used to how he was living now and enjoyed helping out Professor Birch in his field research. There was one thing he saw consistently however, Pokemon battles. He used to watch it a lot of his TV in his home town, but not once did he believe becoming one was possible. He saw a lot of trainers battling on field research too and he’d asked Prof. Birch about it a few times, it was becoming a wide interest of his. “Hey Lei, over here, I have something for you” He followed the Professors words into his lab. Lei was presented with his own bag. Eh? As he checked inside he saw and counted 6 pokeballs. “I think it’d be better if we worked apart, we would cover more ground and you could discover things in your own way that we may not doing the general stuff. Plus you want to be a Pokemon Trainer right Lei?” Lei looked up and smiled, he jumped in the air with joy, was his adventure finally starting to begin? “YES!” He shouted. “Thank you so much Professor, I can’t thank you enough for what you’ve done for me, I’ll definitely continue to help you!” He shook Prof. Birch’s hand frantically. “Before you do anything you will need a Pokemon, why don’t you try catching that Pidgey that’s always following you?”.

This time the Pidgey was standing on a tree branch in the front yard of the Professors home. Lei looked at the Pokeball, enlarged it and gently threw it at the Pidgey. Without any problem, the Pokeball locked deeming the Pidgey captured. Prof. Birch calmly whispered to Lei“You know the Pokeball won’t hurt the Pokemon no matter how hard you throw it, it has a special…Nevermind”  Lei looked at the Pokeball with glee“It’s finally mine now, I have my own Pidgey!…Alright, where should I begin?!” He looked up at the sky, it reminded him of his dreams to be free, make new friends and to one day fly with the other Pokemon which inhabit its atmosphere. There's also that one question about the bellowing roar he heard that day, that's one mystery he wanted to solve.