The next day, the second of the one-year stay of Anthony and Zubat in Pallet Town, was the day of orientation. Anthony and his Pokémon are looking at their drinks, dark and unsweetened coffee and tea, respectively.
"Ugh... we shouldn't have talked with mom and dad the whole night..."
"Zuuu..."
The two partners are currently battling a searing headache because of their sleep schedule being jumbled, as both of them are training their foundations. They always make it a point to sleep as early as 9 or 9:30; however, they just didn't sleep until midnight, so it was expected that their brains would be aching.
_Who would have thought that cheering up Zubat would give me a migraine, my first one in my first all-nighter in college..._
Anthony has long been used to all-nighters in his previous life; of course, besides frequently not sleeping because of activities, he also developed a natural skill in time management, which made him able to sleep for at least 5 hours a day, even though his nightly sleep is more often than not just 2 to 3 hours.
That was in his first life, however, so Anthony, despite being looked at strangely by his classmates who had just finished their jog, still clutched his hair and tugged on it quite tautly.
"Are you not a morning exercise type of person?"
One of the interns who had become his acquaintance earlier asked while wiping her face with a towel. Anthony and Zubat just glanced at the little girl for a moment before going back to solemnly looking at their drinks.
"Don't worry, my brain is jugging inside my skull."
The girl chuckled for a moment before saying 'be well' and going to the counter of the cafeteria to buy a melon-stuffed bread. In the end, Anthony took about 1 hour to shake off the headache, thankfully, the oreintation will only start at 8 and he and Zubat has a hobby of waking up at 6 in the morning, so the trainer and the Pokemon still have 30 minutes to jog around the circumference of the apartment, have breakfast with the interns, take a bath and go to the battle-field owned by the lab of Prof. Oak in time for the orientation.
_Oh man, what a horrible feeling to have as a child... well, at least Zubat has started to warm up with the other Pokemons..._
While sitting on a bench alongside the interns who had their varied Pokemons sitting on their laps, Anthony mused while watching Zubat poke the strange-looking tail of the Skitty of Anthony's girl acquaintance.
Indeed, Zubats that are social in nature are very easy to recover with the company of other Pokemons and their trainers. Watching his Pokémon play around with other Pokémon, Anthony suddenly heard the voice of the Pokémon Professor himself on the microphone in front of the crowd.
"Good morning, everyone. How was your first day of stay in the Intern's Apartment?"
Anthony, and all the kids, who are of course, aspiring to work close, or even remotely close to Prof. Oak, weren't able to answer, and their posture straightened up. Anthony is even able to see some of those kids who act all composed, try their best to make the 'Gary Oak' smug smile, to no avail, of course.
Knowing the impact he has on the children, Prof. Oak wasn't angry with the sweaty responses of the interns; instead, he continued.
"Today marks the first day of your internship to be a future associate field researcher... though this is just one of your requirements to be one and arguably the hardest, so I wish you good luck."
Apparently, Professor Oak is not very good with long speeches, that, or he is just lazy, but after some words worth of only 2 paragraphs, he immediately went and announced the first activity of the students.
"... With that out of the way, I'm actually here to announce your very first project-based activity as an intern."
Prof. Oak paused for a moment and then looked at the two assistants at his back, who had a handful of papers. Knowing the cue, the two assistants went and distributed the papers in their hands.
There is a total of two papers per student, an official document, and a CBL, as well as general schedules.
_So it's as expected, the whole period of internship, we will be given physical and stamina training while very weekdays, we will be tending the different types of Pokemons inside professor Oak's lab... in Saturday, we will be giving assistance to satellite labs or help Prof. Oak or other associate field researchers float their questionnaires for their degree given we are given proper researcher's ethics training..._
_Furthermore, we can also use any training facilities of the lab for our Pokemons, whether it's related or not to the job..._
At the last part of the job description, Anthony was quite happy, after all, this is what his mother and father have promised to him and is one of the few reasons why does he want to be an intern so early, besides of course, asking Prof. Oak for guidance in battling strategies that he unfortunately doesn't have time to do so at the moment.
Going back, the second document is a letter of sorts, a certificate that goes: This is to certify that [Individual's name] is given a special permission by Samuel Oak, PhD, Pokemon Professor of the Kanto region to acquire and care for another Pokemon in the premise that it shall not be used as an official Pokemon and shall live until their ripe age of ten in a day care center where the owner of the daycare and the owner of the Pokemon will have 60-40 ownership rights to the Pokemon.
This made Anthony, or perhaps the whole class, dumbfounded for a moment. After all, all the children have a high level of reading comprehension, which caused someone, as expected, to blurt out the thoughts of all the people on the battlefield.
"We... we can train Pokemons?"
A boy in front said in utter shock, after all, the world government, AKA the Pokemon league imposed an Act that prohibits children under 10 to have two Pokemons due to 'childish acts of negligence or maltreatment', this law will make the parent or direct supervisor of the child that caused the abuse or maltreatment to be in jail while the child will be banned from handling Pokemon at all until they became 10 years old.
Imagine a mother not letting a 4-year-old watch over a 3-month-old child; that would result in a lot of possible trouble.
Hearing that the boy in front of him was flabbergasted like he intended to, Professor Oak smirked a little before nodding.
"Yes, in a way, these documents are given to you and duly signed by yours truly to make any relevant authorities know that you're allowed to carry, not in a Poké Ball but in your physical self, a second Pokémon."
At this answer, another intern, now a little girl, can't help but ask.
"Will the permit be only available for the duration of the internship?"
At this surprisingly mature answer, Prof. Oak chuckled and shook his head.
"The permit will be valid until you're 10, when you can now put them on Poke Balls. That being said, the permit will permit you to own it 100 percent. You have to have a notarized contract with a daycare to have joint ownership with that Pokémon, valid also until you become 10. This way, you can be corrected by licensed professionals on what you are doing right and wrong."
Prof. Oak smiled at the girl, who also nodded in satisfaction upon his question being answered. He then asked if there were any more questions. Seeing that there seems to be none already, the Pokémon Professor continued.
"Now, of course, I didn't only give you that permit to have another new friend, that permit is actually related to your very first activity: Persuade a Pokémon in any means other than cheap tricks like ambush or drugging them, to be trained by you until the end of the internship. Whether or not they will agree to be your friend after that will not affect your grade; however, what will is how strong you made it by the end of the internship."
"There are rules in this activity, of course."
Pokémon Professor Oak then put his index finger up before continuing.
"You are only permitted to have one Pokémon trained. You can contract others to be a training companion, but at the end of the internship, you will only be able to take home your main Pokémon. This is crucial as the permit I gave you only covers one Pokémon, and anything beyond that will cause a monetary penalty that would be paid by your parents."
After emphasizing this point, Prof Oak put up his middle finger. Again, he continued.
"Second, you are only allowed to go to the designated and marked spots inside the Viridian forest, which consists of a 4ths of its total circumference. There are wild Pokemons there that would be too dangerous for interns such as yourselves to encounter without the proper guidance of associate field researchers."
And again, Prof. Oak put up his ring finger.
"Third, you have until exactly lunch to persuade a Pokemon to be your internship project, remember: No coercion and no cheap tricks, there are real Pokemons of me and my researchers that will monitor every move of yours and anyone who will try anything I mentioned above or anything of the same spirit will be subjected to immediate disqualification to and total ban from being an intern again."
"If you are unable to find any Pokémon in the allotted time, you will be given until Friday to properly have one. After that time period, you too will be disqualified, though you can still try next year."
At the last words of Prof, Oak, the students gulped quite audibly, but for them, who are of course mature due to their extensive preparations for this internship, knew the reason behind this strictness: If an intern can't persuade a weak Pokemon to be his friend and training partner in this short span of time, how are they supposed to persuade Charizards and Tyranitars to count their children?
A trained, or perhaps, a natural affinity in persuading and befriending Pokemons will be helpful to do such dangerous bare minimum stuff. Professor Oak asked one last time if there were any more questions, and seeing that the children, despite being tense, seemed to be formulating their plans and who to catch from the pokemons they knew that inhabited the Viridian forest and the bay area, the Pokémon Professor nodded in satisfaction before saying:
"If there are none, again, you have until lunch. Your timer starts now."
All students flinched for a moment before fetching their Pokemons and rushing out of the field. All of them have the basic battle formation for a rookie trainer, a Pokémon in front, and the trainer at the back.
The most optimal is having about two at the least, but the interns have to make do. Anthony also ran towards the Viridian forest to see if there were any other good Pokemons there, while doing so, he started formulating a plan.
_If I remember correctly, it is theorized... or confirmed that the Bulbasaur's Mysterious Garden of the anime is inside the Viridian Forest... if that's the case, I would love to befriend one and use the expertise of Venusaur to train it in the future... But besides that, Pikachu is the only good stuff I can remember... and it's so rare in Gen 3..._
_I can try with the Krabbies in the bay, but a Kingler and a Crobat, both have electric weaknesses and are both known to be physical attackers, both of them are also not-so-versatile because of not being normal types..._
Anthony realized that his options are quite limited; however, he shook such a feeling off, after all, like he said, why is it called Pokémon training if you knew that the Pokémon would end up strong? That would defeat the purpose. Finally, he and his Zubat, which has been shooting small supersonics all around to detect their surroundings, finally entered the forest, causing Weedles and Caterpies to immediately scatter because of the mass intrusion inside their den.
"Zuu... Zu..."
Zubat, as it's in its official first duty to protect its trainer, is quite cautious; it constantly looks over its trainer despite not having eyes while it is positioned in front. The fur on its whole body is bristled slightly, obviously ready to jump on anyone or anything that will attack it first.
There is a lesson that Anthony reiterated to Zubat a fair number of times: Fighting can be used as a way to persuade a Pokémon if all means fail or if Zubat is not the first one to initiate the attack. The said Pokémon will surely abide by this rule.
Again, Anthony was not shocked by this display of maturity.
_That being said, even though the marked area is quite deep, it seems like it's not deep enough for me to find the truly rare ones; all I can see are bugs and some foreign, non-invasive Pokemons._
Anthony looked at a bunch of Caterpie and Metapods riding a Heracross as it silently sucks the honey out of a Combee hive. Anthony wanted to try and have a dialogue with it since its species is inherently strong, but seeing that it has adapted a life of symbiosis with Caterpies and Metapods, he refrained from doing so as that might endanger the weaker Pokémon.
_There are some Pinsirs too, the Heracross-Pinsir rivalry to continue..._
As Anthony walked into a certain clearing, he continued his pondering until he alongside Zubat froze in their spots simultaneously.
In front of them are heaps upon heaps of injured Pokemons, mostly bugs, but scattered Bulbasaurs, Pichu, and Pickachu can also be seen.
"What the hell happened here?"