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Well . . . Joonghyuk was a fucking pokemon. Which given some of the weirder beings he’s incarnated as—like the time he was an actual sunfish(although he prefers to not remember that life)—being a sort of sentient creature with the potential for strong fighting abilities was definitely his preference.
Being an eevee wasn’t his first choice of Pokémon but it really wasn’t the worst thing he could’ve been reborn as. After all, some Pokémon were simply proverbial punching bags with stats and abilities so worthless they weren’t worth much to anyone beyond their ability to provide level up exp to others.
He was born in spring, just like all eevee are but as soon as he was able to see and walk he left his mother and siblings not content at being raised since his mind was not that of an actual eevee. He knew how this world worked, although he was making assumptions that this world functioned more or less the same way as the video game—probably should’ve verified that first before leaving. But in true Yoo Joonghyuk fashion, he chose to charge forward rather than quiestion his brash decision.
(Thats why he needs Kim Dokja by his side: he doesn’t think enough and Dokja thinks too much).
He set out to find the the weakest creature in the forest to battle against: Caterpie
He found one of the hopeless caterpillar Pokémon foraging at the base of a large tree. Without any hesitation Joonghyuk dashed forward, body slammed it, and pinned then bug Pokémon against the trunk of a tree. It let out a pitiful shrill cry before promptly falling unconscious without even having a single chance to put up a fight.
Joonghyuk winced, feeling pain in his shoulder and flank from where he hit the caterpie. He should’ve guessed that since he was probably around level one that even just physically hitting something could cause him damage. The caterpie was still worse off, with a slight dent in its insect shell, and a scrape on its head from where it had hit the rough bark of the tree.
Suddenly, a thought occurred to Joonghyuk: what was he going to do about food?
Sure, canonically there were references to “real” animals like regular fish and birds being mentioned in Pokédex entries and a few times in the anime—but was there really actually anything to eat other than other pokemon?
Joonghyuk apprehensively looked down at the unconscious caterpie. He’s eaten quite a few insects over the course of his many lifetimes—even massive ones like caterpie—but those had all either been cooked or bite sized. Well, he was a weak baby pokemon who had left the safety of his mother’s care and he’s been in more desperate situations than this one.
There was no such thing as dignity or preferences when it came to survival.
In a show of mercy(and because he wasn’t a sadistic bastard when it came to killing animals) he sunk his small little fangs into what he assumed was the caterpie’s neck right behind its head.
The caterpie groaned pitiably.
Its exoskeleton was tougher than Joonghyuk expected but he persisted, biting down as hard as he could until his baby fangs pierced the creature’s hard outer shell. He broke through the shell with a distinct loud crunch— and then oozing insect guts the texture of paste and viscous liquid filled his mouth. He nearly gagged and threw up at the most terrible texture he had ever had the unfortunate pleasure of putting in his mouth. However, because he had already started this, he needed to ensure that he actually killed the thing. So he took bite after bite, not even bothering to eat any of it until he was absolutely sure that the caterpie was compeletly dead.
He had to rest after the endeavor he had put forth. Fuck he was pathetically weak. After a brief rest period, and a bit of procrastination, he finally steeled his nerves and his stomach to finally eat the thing. It was just as terrible as he had anticipated but food was food. After finishing his meal, he immediately left the area, not wanting to risk other pokemon picking up on the scent of the dead caterpie and deciding to make a meal out of him.
Joonghyuk felt physically stronger after he encounter and healthier after consuming his meal. It seems that he could in fact gain experience from attacking other pokemon just like in the games, and gain physical health from what he ate as well.
Joonghyuk quickly became a monster of the forest to all of the weaker pokemon in the area. He fought and devoured Pidgey(which tasted much more appetizing than caterpie); brutally assaulted spearows before running away to hide less the flock attacker him; and caught magikarp from the creeks and rivers but mostly just for the taste—they didn’t provide much exp. He didn’t fuck with weedles or kakunas though: potentially being poisoned wasn’t worth the risk.
He rapidly gained experienced, leveling up his fighting abilities, gaining new attacks other than tackle like quick attack and swift. He particularly liked swift since he didn’t have to ram his body into something to attack. Fighting metapod with just tackle, bite, and quick attack fucking hurt. He could take on evolved form pokemon now as well which exponentially increased the rate of his growth as he could earn larger amounts of exp.
Still, despite increasing his strength and fighting abilities, he was still limited by the stats afforded to him as an eevee. To grow even stronger and be able to take on top tier pokemon, he would need an evolution stone to evolve. The problem was where to find one. In the games you either got them by finding items or buying them from a store. His best assumption was that they were probably similar to gemstones, in that they could be found either in surface deposits or through mining.
He just hoped that he would be able to find one on the mountain he lived on. He didn’t want to adventure to new areas until he had evolved in case he encountered trainers with stronger Pokémon. He refused to be beholden to anyone but his star and being captured would server limit his ability to look for Dokja.
Eight months had passed since he was born into this world and winter on the mountain was in full swing, blanketing the forest in feet of powdery white snow and chilling the air down to near zero. Joonghyuk had his winter coat now and was looking extra-fluffy so he wasn’t particularly worried. His only concerns were finding enough food and making sure the different sheltering spots he migrated between were adequately stocked with proper insulation such as pine needles, feathers, and fur he stole from other Pokémon.
All of the the Pokémon around his size and smaller, knew to stay away from his burrows and shelters—which was why he surprised when he entered his third favorite burrow, located in a large hollowed out tree, to find a patch of snow right in the middle of his properly insulated bedding that he had painstakingly collected. It could only have gotten there if another creature had purposefully placed it there, so understandably, he was pissed off. He would have to dig beneath the snow cover tomorrow to see if he could find more dry pine needles beneath the wet layer on the surface of the ground. Worst comes to worse, he could go and pull a buneary out of its burrow and steal it’s fur.
He was getting ready to shove the snow outside when he noticed a particular detail he had missed upon first glance: the snow was breathing. This blob of white wasn’t snow but another Pokémon!
Now angry that some other Pokémon had invaded his burrow, Joonghyuk grabbed the offending Pokémon by the fur of its neck and threw it outside in one fell swoop. The creature let out a sad pained cry, whining as it landed in the cold powdery snow outside.
Joonghyuk watched as it struggled to right it’s self in the soft fresh powder, finally standing up after an embarrassing amount of time, before it looked back at Joonghyuk.
Joonghyuk stood frozen as he took in the countenance of a fellow eevee but not just any eevee—Kim Dokja. Joonghyuk knew—just as he always did for he could never fail to recognize his life and death companion no what form he takes—that this odd silvery colored eevee was his star.
Kim Dokja was bristling, his fur puffed up in an apparent attempt at a threat display, as he weakly growled at Joonghyuk. He had surely been born around the same time as Joonghyuk, sometime during spring, but yet he was so much smaller, much too tiny for his age. He was scrawny too; his ribs were visible and his fur was matted and clumped. He looked as if he was just barely scrapping by to survive.
It was strange . . .Joonghyuk had encountered other eevee and while most had been smaller than him, they had all still been within the range of an average size for young adult eevee but Dokja was much too small. He looked as thought he was barely getting by on foraged foods, most of which became scarce during winter.
Joonghyuk scrutinized Dokja’s odd silvery coat unsure of why it was that color— a health problem maybe? But then he had a vague remembrance about shinies(its been so long since he’s played the games)and figured that was the reason for Dokja’s coat color.
Had he been abandoned by his mother then?
During spring he would have stood out like a fluffy glowing neon sign among his siblings, which would be detrimental to their survival since mother eevee, much like cheetahs, had to hide their young while they went to hunt for food.
The wind was picking up, and the clouds were stirring in the sky, a winter storm was approaching, and Dokja was already shaking like a fragile leaf in the wind. It wouldn’t due to remain outside any longer.
Making his decision, Joonghyuk approached Dokja, but the smaller eevee tried to run away, fearful of more aggression after having been harshly thrown out of the burrow. However as Joonghyuk was significantly larger and much faster, he quickly cleared the distance and grabbed Dokja by the scruff of his neck, easily carrying the struggling silver eevee back to the burrow.
As soon as Joonghyuk placed Dokja down, the small eevee scurried to the farthest corner(which wasn’t very far given the small size of the space) and hissed at Joonghyuk, eyes darting around looking for a way to escape. Joonghyuk had the only entrance blocked and guarded so there was no way for Dokja to escape. They continued to have a stare down, with Joonghyuk hoping that Dokja would calm down enough to let Joonghyuk willingly approach him. Dokja, though, could be pointlessly stubborn about things—especially when it came to his own self-preservation, even when help and care were being so obviously offerered(his trauma prevented him from recognizing it).
The storm was picking up and the temperature had dropped rapidly, and Joonghyuk was tired of waiting. So he got up, walked over towards his hissing star, and flopped his larger body on top of Dokja’s. Dokja’s hissing transformed as he squawked and growled while flailing his limbs in an attempt at escape but ultimately gave up and accepted his fate of being buried beneath Joonghyuk’s warm fluff.
Joonghyuk, likewise, was enjoying the shared warmth of their bodies; even he, the great being that he is, was not completely immune to the cold.
The winter storm transformed into a blizzard that raged for three days and four nights. So much snow fell that Joonghyuk had to continuously dig out the entrance to the tree hollow lest they become completely snowed in.
Dokja had very reluctantly accepted his fate although he was still skittish and wary of Joonghyuk. Joonghyuk had made multiple attempts to help clean Dokja’s dirty ratty fur but each time he tried, his star would jarringly yelp and flinch away, seeming to only expect pain from Joonghyuk’s actions, as if he had never experienced otherwise.
The situation was frustrating for Joonghyuk since he couldn’t communicate in words, only being able to make animalistic sounds, more similar to the sounds of the video games rather than the anime where Pokémon just repeatedly spoke their names in different variances over and over again. It seems that for the plausibility of this world to actually function, Pokemon here were much more like animals in behavior, although their intelligence levels were still higher than many animals on earth in other universes.
The moment the storm ceased, Dokja tried to bolt. The attempt immediately failed since Dokja was probably only at level three while Joonghyuk was probably somewhere around level thirty. He simply bit down and caught Dokja by the scruff of his fur and dragged him back to the hollow. Going into the icy winter forest where plenty of other Pokémon were looking for an easy meal during lean times would surely lead to his death.
Dokja finally got Joonghyuk’s point and stayed in the tree hollow, however, his obedience only lasted until Joonghyuk left the area to hunt.
Annoyed with the small and foolish eevee, Joonghyuk mercilessly tracked and ran him down, dragging Dokja back to where it was safe. He wouldn’t stand for his idiot getting himself killed not when Joonghyuk had finally found him. Joonghyuk already has a tally of Dokja’s deaths that Joonghyuk needs to pay him back for, which he plans to exact once Dokja is whole again.
For the rest of the winter Joonghyuk spent his time hunting down food for the both of them and forcing Dokja to run around the meadow by their hollow with him. Over the course of the season Dokja went from a scrawny rat with his ribs showing to a pleasantly plump and fluffy albeit small eevee. Just eating and becoming a bit healthier had increased his strength level.
He had warmed up to Joonghyuk as well although much like his fist life, he still held onto his stubborn guardedness, most likely expecting the happiness he was experiencing to be temporary.
It was Joonghyuk’s job to beat him over the head with love until he let down his walls.
Once the snow melted ushering in spring and the outside world became a little more hospitable, Joonghyuk took Dokja out to train.
It was pretty obvious from Dokja’s size that his survival method was simply to hide and run away but that wouldn’t cut it anymore: if Dokja actually wanted to live in a world where it was survival of the fittest, then he needed to become stronger—Joonghyuk would make sure of it.
Joonghyuk started off Dokja with Caterpie, obviously. Dokja looked at the worming bug Pokémon and then glanced back at Joonghyuk with trepidation. Joonghyuk—who always operated on tough love when it came to training—had no pity for the small quivering eevee, and mercilessly shoved him forward. Dokja looked back at Joonghyuk with slightly watering eyes and drooping ears but seeing Joonghyuk’s unwavering and insistent gaze, he reluctantly approached the caterpie.
Joonghyuk wasn’t entirely sure how he had been expecting things to go(probably similar to what he had done) but he definitely hadn’t been expecting for Dokja to get brutally tackled by the caterpie and knocked away. Joonghyuk sighed deeply as he watched the small eevee pitifully flop on by ground, his winter fluff and fat luckily cushioning the blow.
Clearly Dokja was going to need some help.
Joonghyuk approached the caterpie, the poor bug Pokémon freezing in terror upon sensing Joonghyuk’s murderous intent. With a single paw, Joonghyuk pinned down the caterpie, which then began to scream out high pitched shrill calls. With a nod of his head, Joonghyuk gestured for Dokja to approach. Dokja was clearly put off by the screams of the caterpie but still did as Joonghyuk directed and approached anyway.
Without having to call out or gesture, Dokja instinctually understood what Joonghyuk wanted him to do. He opened his mouth revealing his small fangs and omnivorous teeth and sunk them down into the squealing caterpie, silencing it for good.
Joonghyuk let out a barking laugh at Dokja’s face which was equal parts disgusted and offended. Caterpie tasted nothing like the spearows that Joonghyuk had been dedicatedly feeding him over winter. In a rare show of spicyness, Dokja smacked Joonghyuk in the face with his tail, very angry at Joonghyuk for making him taste something so awful. He was even more disgruntled when he soon discovered that he would have to eat it—food shouldn’t be wasted after all.
Dokja quickly gained experience and leveled up. He nearly cried when he was finally strong enough to take down a pidgey and no longer had to eat foul caterpie meat(Joonghyuk had refused to share his catches with Dokja until he was stronger than a caterpie). Under Joonghyuk’s spartan tutorship, Dokja quickly grew strong and together they became the undisputed rulers of the mountain forest in which they lived, able to take on stronger Pokémon like pidgeotto and nidoqueen as an unstoppable duo. Trainers had even come to try and catch them but they fended them off, refusing to be caught.
They hadn’t encountered any other eevee since becoming companions since other eevee knew that this territory belonged to Joonghyuk and Dokja. However just on the cusp of fall, nearly a year since they had met, as summer was nearing its end, an upstart group of young eevees invaded their territory.
Joonghyuk hadn’t been with Dokja when they first invaded. He had been off searching for evolution stones while Dokja had been hanging around the meadow watching the comings and going’s of all the Pokémon that lived there—the closest thing to reading that he would be able to get as a non-human creature in this world.
It was purely dumb luck that Joonghyuk managed to find a stone. He had searched for deposits all around the mountain but failed to locate any; either there weren’t any on their mountain or they were too deep below the surface for Joonghyuk to find.
He was leaving the area he had been searching to return back to Dokja when he spotted a murkrow carrying something shiny in its mouth. Curious, Joonghyuk jumped and used the trunk of a tree to catapult himself into the canopy. He then stalked the the bird which was pecking at the shiny thing while relaxing on a branch. With a well timed swift attack, he knocked the murkrow off the branch, scaring it away, and making it drop its loot. He didn’t bother to kill it as he had no plans to eat it. Murkrow were know for being extremely unpicky with their food, even eating straight up garbage. He wasn’t keen on eating such foul meat.
He hopped back down the forest floor and investigated the object that had fallen. To his great satisfaction and relief, the object before him was a light yellowish-green evolution stone with a flame like marking within it. He would have preferred to have Dokja with him for when he involved, but he wasn’t going to leave behind such a rare item. He was sure that Dokja would be able to recognize him by his scent even if he changed forms. He tapped his paw against the stone expecting a bright light to engulf his form but nothing happened. He tapped it again and still nothing. After a few more taps—and a rise in his frustration level—Joonghyuk picked up the stupid defective stone in his mouth to take back to his den as he had been away from Dokja for far too long.
The sun was setting, and soon all the nocturnal Pokémon would be coming out, and although Joonghyuk was stronger than them he didn’t like the potential poison and paralysis risks that came with confronting them. He arrived back at the den fully expecting for Dokja to be eagerly awaiting his arrival but their den was empty and despite his calls, he never received Dokja’s answering cry. Worried, he headed to the meadow where he had last seen Dokja.
The moment he burst through the brush and into the meadow, he witnessed a horrific sight: Dokja being attacked by a group of eevee. Wounds covered Dokja’s body and even though he was almost as strong as Joonghyuk and could wipe the floor with the aggressors, he wasn’t fighting back for some reason. He looked utterly terrified and frozen unable to do anything more than guard against the more critical attacks.
The group of eevees turned to look at the Joonghyuk who had just burst into the meadow, ready for the fight but upon seeing a fellow eevee they returned back to their task.
Joonghyuk was confused, were his threatening growls not enough to intimidate them? He looked at Dokja, who gazed at him with hopeless eyes before looking away. Then he pieced it together: they and Dokja were expecting him to join in on the attack.
Why?
For what reason?
Was it . . .because of Dokja’s fur?
Rage burned through Joonghyuk. How dare they harm what is his and how dare his fool of a star ever think that he would want to hurt him in such a way!
Joonghyuk grit his teeth together while growling fiercely, barely registering that when he bit down, the hard evolution stone was still in his mouth. A bright light encompassed his body. He felt his body grow and morph becoming larger and stronger and in matter of mere seconds, his body was no longer that of an eevee but a flareon.
Now the other eevee turned to regard him warily, but it was already too late for them to respond to the threat.
Joonghyuk’s internal rage transformed into literal physical fire as a stream of flames burst from his mouth striking the three eevee head on, even through they had tried to dodge. What he did next could only be described as brutally cruel: he tore the other eevee to pieces, tearing and burning them until they were unrecognizable.
He picked up Dokja’s shaking and injured form by his scruff and left the burnt remains of the other eevee for the nocturnal Pokémon to scavenge.
There wasn’t much he could do about Dokja’s wounds other than lick them clean but his wounds were far to deep for that to be of any real use. Making a decision, he picked Dokja up by his scruff and quickly ran towards the closest town at the base of the mountain, which he estimated to be approximately twenty miles away. He ran long into the night before he finally reached the sparse town.
Luckily as it was nighttime, the only beings out were a few stray meowths and fluttering zubat. He burst inside of the Pokecenter startling a few weary trainers and the nurses inside.
One of the nurses approached him, assessing the injured small eevee and the much larger growling flareon. Either they were more accustomed to people or the flareon was intelligent enough to realize that this was a place that could help his companion.
With swirl of her hand she directed Joonghyuk to follow her back through the doors leading to medical center, as all the trainers in the waiting room stared on in astonishment.
Nurse Joy gently took Dokja from Joonghyuk, moving cautiously so as not to startle him, and went and placed Dokja on her examination table. She cleaned the wounds and stitched up the larger gaping injuries. After that she placed Dokja into a healing pod.
“He’ll be alright.” She sweetly consoled before leaving the room.
Joonghyuk curled up at the base of the machine and stood guard throughout the rest of the night.
Dokja’s healing took until the following afternoon, during which, Joonghyuk never once moved from his spot. At some point in the late morning he heard a commotion in the waiting room—apparently word of a flareon carrying an eevee into the Pokecenter had spread around town, with people either wanting to sneak a peak or trainers wanting for a chance to try and capture them.
Nurse joy refused all visitors.
Dokja’s machine beeped around three in the afternoon, after which nurse took the very sleepy but otherwise perfectly healthy eevee out of the machine and placed him next to Joonghyuk. Dokja snuggled into the familiar fluff of his companion.
“You should wait until nightfall, there are some detestable trainers waiting for you two to leave this facility. I’ll have someone escort you both back to the forest then.” Nurse Joy relayed to him.
Joonghyuk nodded in affirmation and her eyes sparkled at the fact that he understood her.
Upon nightfall, Joonghyuk was let out of the back of the building by nurse Joy and met a young man with a red cap. He looked vaguely familiar although Joonghyuk couldn’t place his face. The man led Joonghyuk to the forest and then a few miles into the wilderness. They had only been confronted by one trainer who had immediately backed off upon seeing the young man.
Joonghyuk nodded in thanks at the man, and then bounded further into the forest to return home.
He entered the tree hollow where they first met and placed Dokja on the bedding—a mix of pine needle, feathers, and fur—then laid down beside him. Dokja cozy upped to Joonghyuk’s side, seeking comfort in the flareon. The small eevee’s fur was still matted and dirty and was too weary to make an attempt to clean it so Joonghyuk took it upon himself to attempt to lick Dokja’s fur clean. He wasn’t optimistic given that Dokja head never let Joonghyuk clean his fur. After their first encounter, the only time Dokja had ever growled at him in a non-playful way was whenever Joonghyuk had attempted to groom him—a normally common bonding activity between eevees.
To his utter surprise, Dokja didn’t growl at him when he started grooming him, and it wasn’t just because Dokja was tired, the small eevee was actually leaning into Joonghyuk’s touch!
It seemed that Dokja’s refusal to be groomed was due to his insecurity about his fur, probably fearing that he would be abandoned or attacked just as his mother and other eevee had done.
Joonghyuk thought the words that he wished to say out loud.
Fool. We’re life and death companions, it doesn’t matter what you look like, I will never abandon you.
It took about a week for Dokja to be back to his playful and mischievous self, although he never returned back to the meadow that he had so dearly loved.
Given the horrific memory of the attack, and that Joonghyuk had evolved, he thought it was finally time to leave the forest and explore the world.
They left the forest and began to travel, sparking stories of a pair of uncachable Pokémon, an eevee and a flareon, and later on a Sylveon and a flareon.
When Joonghyuk first saw Dokja’s evolved form all he could think was that the forms fae like qualities suited Dokja very much. He shone even brighter than when he had been a silver colored eevee, now a shining blue star.
And so they lived their lives on one one long grand adventure, never caught by trainers, and becoming formidable beings known through out the Pokémon world.