Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Early Winter Chapter 1

I figured that as long as I was paying for this domain, I might as well host my new story here as well. I’ll do my best to finish this one. Word count of Chapter 1 is 2,196.

Evening had arrived in the Wellesley household, and the home’s middle-aged man and woman (who made up both halves of a perfectly Biblical marriage) had settled in for the news broadcast.

Now, when I say news broadcast, most people will likely picture a mainstream channel with those annoying talking heads who try to normalize everything the President says. After all, that President gave the media their highest ratings of all time, so why wouldn’t CNN et al be in the tank for him?

However, Mr. and Mrs. Wellesley were far from satisfied by the mainstream media. Even Fox News, which some might call a “gateway drug” to the greater “patriotism” of other channels, was not sufficient. Instead, the farmers from rural Alabama sat on their ratty old sofa, Mr. Wellesley downing a Miller Lite every ten minutes.

“When is Weldworth going to get to the good part, dammit!” Mr. Wellesley barked, banging his fist against the arm of the sofa. “We pay good money for our cable package!”

“Dad, nobody watches cable anymore,” their daughter, Rosemary, pointed out quietly.

“Clearly not nobody, because we do” Mr. Wellesley replied. “But we’re not going to be sheep. We’re not followers. Just because the rest of the world is switching to streaming doesn’t mean we have to.”

“But you’d save money doing it” Adam, the couple’s son, piped up. “If we didn’t have to spend so much money for the sake of a few channels we never use, we could…”.

Mrs. Wellesley clicked her tongue. “That doesn’t mean it’s worth it. Again, there’s a reason we don’t conform to this world. That’s because this world is not the goal for any of us.”

Adam sighed quietly. Not for the first time, he wondered if he’d been born on the wrong planet. Whenever his parents mentioned that all they wanted to do was worship Jesus Christ for all eternity, Adam wanted to roll his eyes.

“Oh, there we are!” Mr. Wellesley exclaimed in between chugs of beer. “Here he comes!”

A man (who was probably on the wrong side of middle age) appeared on screen. His hair stuck straight up as though he enjoyed sticking his fingers in light sockets, and he gave what many of Adam’s classmates would have called a “shit-eating grin.”

Not that I’d ever be allowed to use such language.

“Good evening, America!” the anchor announced. “My name is Charles ‘Upchuck’ Weldworth, and let me tell you - you’ve been chucked!”

That was the craziest thing about OAN. It wasn’t just that Weldworth and the other talking heads parroted such insane conspiracy theories. Rather, it was that these people seemed to have no self-awareness whatsoever. Who the hell calls themselves “Upchuck” and doesn’t expect to be totally ridiculed?

“You see, today’s the first day of the new presidency! And it’s a new morning in America! Some would even say it’s an American sunrise, isn’t it?”

Mr. and Mrs. Wellesley gave massive whoops, the former smiling even more widely than the man on screen. By contrast, neither of their children betrayed any such amusement.

“That’s right! After four years of stagflation under President Fiddlesticks, that demented old man who can’t keep from shitting himself, we’re seeing a resurgence in national pride! All over the world, from the Netherlands to the Philippines, America’s being respected again!”

Ugh. If only.

“I’m happy I’m not drinking Bud Light!” Mr. Wellesley announced proudly. “I would never spend a cent on that woke beer!”

“What if someone else bought it for you, then asked you to drink it?” his wife enquired.

“Then I’d shove it up their ass and tell them it’s a conspiracy! That’s because it is! The woke liberals are a disgrace to this country, they are the enemy of the people, and they deserve nothing but hell!”

Upchuck Weldworth cleared his throat. “Now it’s time to play a glorious song that reminds us just how lucky we are. We live in America, the greatest country in the history of the world, and that’s a damn fact!

“So now let’s stand for what might as well be our national anthem - ‘The Chosen One’ by Natasha Owens!”

The room in which Weldworth stood vanished from the screen, to be replaced by a music video featuring the newly elected President of the United States. 

As Adam listened to the song, he struggled to hold back his recent dinner of grits and country ham. The song started by clarifying that the new President was not something divine, even if he got in trouble “bigly” on regular occasions. Even if he was controversial, the song alleged, a perfect God could use people who were anything but for His purposes.

Couldn’t God have picked anyone else besides a convicted felon? Like, LITERALLY ANYBODY ELSE?

“That’s right!” Mr. Wellesley barked. “Our new President is in fact the chosen one!”

The scene then shifted to an image of those people whom the singer claimed were persecuting the President. Apparently the nation was under attack from the southern border, and Andreas Fiddlesticks hadn’t been the real President during his tenure. 

In other words, the song was what Adam’s classmates would have called “Cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs”, except that Cocoa Puffs were considered too “woke” for the Wellesley children to consume. Adam wanted to chuck a remote at the TV, but he knew that doing so would lead to a punishment of Biblical proportions (no pun intended).

Rosemary sighed. “This song is insane!”

Mrs. Wellesley turned to her daughter. “Rosemary, that is blasphemy. The President is the chosen one, and there’s no doubt about that. He won, and you know it.”

“Yes, he did win,” Rosemary replied. “But that doesn’t mean I have to be happy about it.”

“Shut up!” her father exclaimed, and that’s when Adam knew there would be hell to pay. When Mr. Wellesley got angry, he thrust himself into a fit of blind rage, sometimes to the point where he’d yell incoherently at the sky. 

“But you’re not supposed to say that…”.

“I can say whatever the hell I want, Rosemary! Unlike how this country would be if the Democrats had been allowed to steal the election, we have freedom of speech! Besides, I bet the next thing I know, you’re going to rant and rave about Pokémon cards…”.

Adam frowned. “I wasn’t going to mention them.”

“Don’t interrupt your sister, Adam!” Mr. Wellesley bellowed, downing another couple swig of beer. “What truly matters is that kids these days are being brainwashed!”

“For once, I agree with your father” Mrs. Wellesley continued.

“For once?” Maybe you two aren’t as compatible as you might have thought when you got hitched in Vegas. It’s almost as if a few drinks over a poker table isn’t enough to know whether a marriage will last.

“Pokémon cards are Satanic” Mr. Wellesley proclaimed. “They are of the devil. And as much as that company Nintendo loves to pretend that they are exclusive, do you know what’s truly exclusive and invaluable?”

Neither Adam nor Rosemary needed to offer a response. It was light-years beyond obvious what their father would say next.

“Your eternal souls, children. Your God-given eternal souls are more important than ephemeral fantasies like Pokémon. For all I know, you’ll both want to turn into Pokémon one day, and then our society will really go down the tubes.”

It was then that Adam remembered an old story he’d once heard about the boy who cried wolf. It pertained to a boy who worked on a farm and “joked” about there being wolves when there weren’t any, which ultimately meant that the shepherds didn’t believe him when he spoke the truth later. In other words: If you gain a reputation for being a liar, don’t be surprised if nobody takes you seriously anymore.

Much like the farmhand in that ancient fable, every time Mr. Wellesley announced that America’s youth were heading for pure degeneracy, Adam had learned to take it with a grain of salt. Of course, given whom his parents had voted for in the most recent election, perhaps it was the older generation that had lost its way.

“I need a break from this” Adam announced, stepping up from an armchair that had seen better days.

“No way!” his mother exclaimed. “Evening is OAN Family TV Time™, and you can’t skip it! Don’t you support family values, like spending time together?”

Adam would have loved to lecture his parents about “family values” right then and there, but he knew it would get him nowhere. Besides, he truly did not want to spend another minute in the presence of these zealots who were supposed to be his parents.

“I’m just going for a walk,” Adam insisted. “I’ll be back before bedtime.”

“But what if a migrant from the southern border comes to our farm and kidnaps you?” Mr. Wellesley asked. “That’s far more likely to happen at night, and if it does come to pass, the police won’t be able to help you.”

“Dad, we live on a farm, with a giant fence. I’m sure I’ll be safe.”

Before his parents could object any further, Adam stepped out into the January evening. The night air was chilly, even in the Deep South, and the boy could almost see his own breath in the automatic light.

He had no destination in mind at first. However, his legs seemed to move on autopilot, propelling him forward on his way to the stables. 

It was Adam’s job to clean the stables every day, no matter how filthy they may have become. Consequently, he’d basically grown numb to the smell of manure, not to mention the way the hay and dust tickled his nose. Just like any other uncomfortable situation, exposure was the way you grew accustomed to it.

Opening the stable’s doors, Adam was struck by just how different it was compared to his living room. Yes, he might have resided in that house with his parents and sister, but in his mind, the stables were truly home.

One of the horses, a Palomino named Jack, stood in the corner of the stables, whinnying uncomfortably as he saw Adam approach.

“I’m not going to hurt you, pal,” Adam insisted. 

Jack paused, sizing up the boy for the moment. Then, the horse seemed to smile.

“I said, I’m not going to hurt you.”

Adam need not have clarified this again, because the horse visibly calmed down after that. Jack gestured at his designated area, which contained numerous strands of hay strewn all over the ground.

“It was a rough day,” Adam admitted. “Mom and Dad…well, you know how they are.”

This was a common occurrence. Whenever Adam spent time alone with the horses, he liked to speak to them. It didn’t matter that the animals couldn’t speak English (or any other language the boy would be able to recognize). Something about the horses’ demeanor made Adam feel like they understood him more than his parents.

They probably think I’m mentally ill. And maybe I am. But I’m going to do what feels good, in the words of one of my favorite musicians.

“They were watching Upchuck Weldworth on TV. Honestly, that show makes me want to upchuck, because that man’s just so insane. He keeps talking about mental institutions being emptied out into the country. I would literally go nuts if I had to watch another few minutes of that stuff.” (Adam was careful not to use the word shit, because he worried it might make Jack feel disrespected).

“They probably think I belong in one of those institutions” Adam continued. “They think I’m crazy, even if the actual word is neurodivergent. But that doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with me.”

Jack sighed, a very loud noise that a city slicker would have been alarmed by. To a farm boy like Adam, however, it was the sort of sound one could fall asleep to.

“I might spend the night here if you don’t mind.”

The horse didn’t seem to object, not that he could use anything resembling words. A slight whinny was all it took for Adam to be convinced the answer was yes.

Adam selected a bed of hay just outside Jack’s designated area. Unless the horses decided to make a break for it in the middle of the night, the boy had no reason to fear getting trampled. And if that did happen (which there was no reason to think it would), his parents would have far greater problems on their hands.

As he curled up into the fetal position, Adam tried to forget the indignity of what he and his sister had been forced to watch with their parents. He tried to forget how infuriating he found his mother’s homeschool curriculum, which included fresh venom each day. And he tried to forget the notion that God above wanted him to suffer.

Maybe there’s still Something out there, the boy told himself. Maybe It’s not so judgmental as my parents want me to believe It is. And maybe there’s still hope for an oddball like me.

Little did Adam know, however, that when he woke up, everything would be very different.