Chapter 15:  Join the Club (Part B) by Michael Keens/ Exodus  

“So, what Pokémon do you have?” asked a Pokéfan lady called Martha, a woman 
with long curly green hair.  
“Oh I have a-”  
“Yes, yes, I’ve got a Clefairy and an adorable little Oddish.” she said 
interrupting Emily.  
“Well I’ve got those too and-”  
“Look at the silky soft leaves on my precious Oddish and the shade of pink on 
my Clefairy.  Do yours have that?”  
“Well I don’t know, they usually come out of their balls to battle so I’ve-”  
“Oh.  You let them fight.” she said somewhat shocked.  
“Well, yeah, they get stronger that way.”  
“But that’ll make them bruised and dirty and what if they evolved?”  
“Well, that’s good.”  
“No, that’s bad, Pokémon are only at their best when they’re Stage 1 Pokémon.”  
“I know they’d evolve but-”  
“No one in the Fan Club owns a Stage 2 Pokémon.”  
“Are you saying evolved Pokémon are ugly?”  
“Of course not, they’re beautiful... in their own special way but I still 
wouldn’t like it if one of my Pokémon evolved.”  
“Man.” Emily thought to herself, “I can’t believe I let myself into this, these 
people are obsessed!”  
“Well, let’s see your Pokémon then.” said another woman called Gertrude, a lady 
with short auburn hair, Emily reached into her bag to retrieve the Pokéballs 
and her Moon Stone fell out, Gertrude’s Nidoran saw it and ran towards the 
Stone but Gertrude quickly picked it up.  
“Bad Nidoran, if there’s anything worse than fighting, its those Stones!”  
“Because they make Pokémon evolve, right? Well don’t worry, it has to evolve 
into a Nidorina first before it could evolve into Nidoqueen.”  
“Don’t even talk about it, I would never let my Nidoran become so ugly!”  
“But I don’t think they’re ugly, I’d be glad if my Nidoran evolved for me.”  
“In that case, I don’t think we should be talking.” said Martha.  
Both women went away from Emily, who was not liking this place suddenly.  

Chad let his Farfetch’d walk free for now, he had just made the connection, and 
Chad really liked this Farfetch’d, it was brave and heroic, Chad partly shared 
those qualities.  
It was practising its balance, bouncing and twirling the leak like a baton.  
I had to admit, Chad did a good job in raising it at this early stage.  
“Ohhhh!” squealed an old man, he rushed up and scooped up the Farfetch’d, Chad 
was quick to grab his collar.  
“That’s My Farfetch’d.  Get your own.”  
“Oh, I wasn’t stealing it.  I’m the Director of the Pokémon Fan Club, if you 
knew that you wouldn’t have tried to wring my neck, I love cute and adorable 
Pokémon and so do the ones at the club.  You can take a look if you want.”  
“I can’t, not yet, I need to find someone first, green hair-” I explained 
before the Director interrupted me.  
“Yes, her, the Clefairy owner, she’s at the club already.”  
“I guess we’ll go see this club then...”  

The doors opened and inside were many trainers with Stage 1 Pokémon.  
“My friends, we have new trainers visiting the club.  Please welcome Tetsubo 
and Chad.”  
“Come on, show us your Pokémon!”  
We looked at each other, shrugged our shoulders and let out all our Pokémon.  
“Star!”  
“Exeggcute!”  
“Ran!”  
“Odddddish!”  
“Char!”  
“CATE!”  
“Key!”  
“Gela!”  
“Dude!”  
“Fetch’d, far, far.”  
I quickly grasped Inferno as the crowd gathered round, some picked up the 
Pokémon, I sincerely doubted that Inferno was the huggable type, I was the only 
one it wouldn’t hurt for sure.  
“Ahhhh...”  
“Huggies...”  
“Cutie...”  
The strange people muttered weird words as they hugged our Pokémon or at least 
most of them.  
Chewtoy, Ragecage and Boulder got left out, but they were kind of 
intimidating.  
“Why isn’t anyone hugging my Raticate or Mankey, my Geodude I can 
understand...” said Chad picking it up as it looked a little down.  
“Stage 2 Pokémon, bad!” said a younger member.  
“And that Mankey is so mean-looking.” said a young child.  
Chewtoy and Ragecage couldn’t care less, and were soon transported back to 
their balls along with Boulder.  
There was a tapping on the blackboard, the Director was up on the main stage.  
“And now the part of the day in which we talk about our Pokémon.  Emily, why 
don’t you go up first?”  
“But I don’t know what to say.”  
“Just talk about your Pokémon.”  
“Okay...  Um, uh...  I like my Oddish, which I nicknamed Blossom... because 
she’s cuddly, and soft and her leaves are very smooth and...  Oh yeah, she can 
use a lot of great attacks like-”  
“Okay, thank you, Emily.” interrupted the Director taking the mike.  
“But I-”  
“Next, who wants to talk about their Pokémon?”  
“I will! I, CHAD THE CHOSEN!”  
“Hey you’re not supposed to be acting.” said the Director.  
“But this is what I’m normally like.”  
“I pity your friends.”  
“OKAY! CHAD THE CHOSEN’S POKÉMON ARE STRONG AND POWERFUL, THEY CAN USE MOVES 
LIKE MEGA PUNCH, AND HYPER FANG, AND KARATE CHOP AND-”  
Chad was struggling to keep hold of the microphone as the Director tried to 
take it from him.  
“THEY NEARLY ALWAYS WIN AND I’D LIKE THEM TO EVOLVE TO BE BIG AND POWERFUL!”  
Someone fainted.  
“That’s enough Mr Chad! I’m afraid we don’t talk about fighting and especially 
not about evolving here.”  
“But what’s the point in talking about Pokémon if you can’t talk about how they 
fight?”  
“I’ll show you how we do it here.” said the Director, “I’d like to talk about 
my Ponyta, she is... so soft...  So cuddly...  She gives me hugs... when I am 
feeling sad...  Her coat...  So smooth... and shiny...  Her tail...  It never 
burns me...  It is... so furry... and nice...  Thank you.”  
Our mouths were hanging.  
‘What the heck?’ was a good word to describe what we were all thinking.  
“Are anyone of you as disturbed as I am?” asked Chad, after a brief 
silence, we simply nodded.  
“These people are obsessed by the looks of their Pokémon.” I explained.  
“They won’t even let us talk about fighting and evolving.  Tetsubo, I know 
we’re bored, and that its rude to do this, but I really want to leave.” pleaded 
Emily.  
“We should, us being trainers probably disturbs them.” I said recalling my 
Pokémon and preparing to leave.  
“Oh, another speaker, you’re new, go ahead.”  
“Yeah...  Stage 1 Pokémon’re okay, provided dey’re strong an’ powerful an’ have 
somethin’ sharp on deir bodies! Yee-haw!”  
“They’re only good when they’re fierce, and preferably evolved!”  
The same person fainted again.  
“Stage 1 Pokémon are incapable of fighting powerful Pokémon, only when they 
evolve can they be properly recognised as great Pokémon, so we’ll be taking all 
of yours and doing that!”  
I dreaded to turn around, not the Elites again.  
“Scyther!!!”  
“Reeeowww!!!”  
“MMUUUKKK!!!”  
“Horrible!” shouted an obsessive fan.  
“What’s wrong, y’all? Ah thought yuh liked Stage 1 Pokémon!” said Cletus, 
referring to his Scyther.  
The people backed away while the Elites easily snatched their small Pokémon.  
“Give those back!” I shouted.  
I was about to step forward when Cletus held a Clefairy in front of his 
Scyther’s blades.  
“Not another step, Turquoise.” said Claus.  
“Or are yuh really heartless enough ta let a small Pokémon die?” threatened 
Cletus.  
“You’re the heartless ones! Do you think those Pokémon will fight and evolve 
for you?!”  
“No need, we don’t even have to train them.”  
I didn’t know what Claus meant by that.  
“You have the power to stop this you know.” said Cassie to the other members, 
“Grab his Pokémon and give them to us, then we’ll give back all of yours.”  
“Don’t do it! Its a trick!” I shouted.  
“I’m serious.” said Cassie, “His Pokémon would serve much better to our cause.  
Its one or the other.”  
The people looked at me, I suddenly felt uneasy, as if I couldn’t trust them.  
“I must get my Clefairy back!” shouted Martha running towards us.  
“CATE!”  
Chad intervened with his Raticate.  
“You should be ashamed.”  
“Bulba-saur!”  
“You think giving up Tetsubo’s Pokémon will make things right?” added Emily.  
Martha stared at Solar, a Stage 1, yet willing to fight to protect its friends, 
she thought long and hard, and had no choice but to... “Clefairy! Metronome!”  
Its eyes lit up and it suddenly jumped out of Cletus’s grip, turned while 
waving its hands from side to side and a large gust of wind flung the Rockets 
back and all the Stage 1’s were free.  
They didn’t rush to their trainers though, they stood in a line blocking off 
the Elites.  
They were ready to fight to protect their owners.  
There were a lot, but none that needed scanning in the Pokédex.  
Cutter, Panther and Chemical were ready to battle it out, it didn’t look good 
for the little Pokémon, but they jumped in for battle anyway, several against 
one, hardly fair but since when did the Elite’s play by the rules?  
Water Guns and Metronomes and Stun Spores and many small attacks were going off 
at once on the Elite Pokémon.  
“What?...” gasped Claus, “Our expert Pokémon...  Getting beat by STAGE ONES?! 
CHEMICAL! RETURN!”  
The others recalled theirs too.  
“Now what sir? Pokémon switch?” asked Cassie.  
“No! Tactical withdrawal!”  
“As in, run away?” added Cletus.  
They nodded and dived out the window.  
“Elite Rocket shall return!” shouted Claus.  

About a quarter of the Pokémon glowed white and suddenly there were a few more 
Glooms, Poliwhirls, Nidorinas, Nidorinos and Weepinbells in the room.  
The trainers were either amazed or positively sickened.  

“No, it evolved...  Now its not cute...” moaned Martha holding her Gloom.  
I felt saddened that the Pokémon might be abandoned because they went against 
their trainers’ morals in order to save them, I had to say something.  
“People, don’t you think of discarding your Pokémon because of this, little 
things eventually grow big, and your Pokémon were protecting you from those 
Rockets.  Just look at them...  They’re still the same Pokémon on the inside, 
they just look different.  Most Pokémon come with a battling spirit and you've 
been depriving them of it.  If you abandon your Pokémon just because 
they’ve changed in appearance, then you have no right to own another Pokémon.”  
Emily and Chad smiled and so did some of the group, I had reached out to them 
and changed their minds about Pokémon.  The owners retrieved their Pokémon, 
some looked oddly at them, others accepted what had happened totally, but the 
Pokémon looked so happy to have evolved, to have grown up, and that their 
trainers finally understood.  

We left the Fan Club and headed towards the Pokémon Centre with a warm 
feeling.  
Both the people and the Pokémon were happier now and it was because of us, and 
the Elites to a lesser extent.  

End of Chapter 15B  

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