"THfaR" (AOLWTO) 00

Civilization is saved, and nobody notices.

Amidst the sirens and alarms, the blinking lights and blaring klaxons, Nuclear armageddon is barely averted by the barest happenstance. One ICBM operator turns his key. The other, turned into a Meowstic, a feline barely two feet tall, cannot reach the keyhole.

By the time he figures out how to use his psychic powers to telekinetically manipulate the key, the alarms have stopped blaring, and the order to stand down has come through secure channels.

~oOo~

Light.

A tunnel.

The afterlife?

I open my eyes. My surroundings are pitch black. I don’t freak out-- yet.

I feel pin pricks as my claws dig into my paw pads.

What.

What.

I flail wildly, as I tangle myself up in some sort of shroud. The distinctive sound of tearing cloth mixes with my confused vocalizing. Not screaming, exactly, but the kind of squeaks and grunts you make an hour into trying to troubleshoot a software issue.

Several disjointed scenarios race through my mind. Reincarnation? A nightmare? Insanity? A part of me is annoyed that I’m panicking. The rest of me panics without reservation.

As I struggle against whatever holds me captive, a thick mane of hair falls off of my face. I can once again see the ceiling, dimly lit by the street light filtering through the blinds.

This takes my panic from an 8 to a solid 6, and I regain some level of coherency. My eyes focus, and I realize I’m still in my dorm room.

On my roommate’s bed, a dark, indistinct blob groans while turning over.

I take my glasses off.

On my roommate’s bed is what is unmistakably a Noivern-- a batlike dragon (or dragonlike bat?), dark grey and purple.

“Dude? Are you okay?” Richie asks blearily.

“I’m fine,” I reply reflexively.

“Great, then shut the fuck up. I’ve got an eight o’clock final.” He turns back over, and goes back to sleep.

Panic level down to 3, I finally start trying to figure out what’s going on. Item of interest number one: how the hell did I take off my glasses with paws?

~oOo~

Eventually, I remember what woke me up in the first place-- my bad habit of drinking lots of water right before bed.

The feeling of my clawed toes scraping on the rungs of my lofted bed is bizarre and unsettling. I hyperfocus on each movement of the alien digits.

At some point, I realize I’m missing a finger on each hand. Up until that point, my arms had been moving on autopilot. I’m briefly paralyzed. I count my fingers one-by-one. Six fingers, two dewclaws.

Feeling my panic rise back up, I try to focus on something completely unrelated. Item of interest number one: what the hell is up with my nose? I can see it even if I’m not cross eyed, which is incredibly distracting, now that I’m focused on it.

Before I know it, I’m on the ground. I land, light on me feet.  My elongated legs absorb the impact with ease.

I’m starting to get the hang of my new body. All the muscle memory is there; just, translated somehow into my new form. As long as I don’t think too hard, I move on autopilot.

Though, ‘not thinking too hard’ is easier for some actions that others. The less said about my trip to the bathroom, the better.

At some point, I realize I no longer need my cane. Something that hasn’t been true since sixth grade.

With the fur on my paws still damp from my attempt to wash my ‘hands’, I’m hesitant to use my laptop, so I take some time to think.

Instinctively, the first thing I want to do is run outside and try to use an attack. The old, childish desire to have immense magical powers at my beck and call; to lay waste to all before me.

Pragmatism wins out. I don’t know nearly enough about what’s going on.

It could be that I was transported in an alternate universe where everyone had always been Pokémon, and Game Freak made a fighting game where you trained teams of “Humans” to fight each other. It could be that I was still in my own universe, but the only people turned into pokemon were me and my roommate.

It could be a localized effect, or a global one.

Or I could just be nuts.

I’d long been of the opinion that a delusion indistinguishable from real life is real life, but had never been in a position to put that belief to the test.

What could I do to convince myself this really was real? What would I do if I found out it wasn’t? I at least knew I wasn’t dreaming.

My paws were still damp, but dry enough that I could use my laptop.

I waited anxiously for it to boot up. Out of habit, I navigated to Reddit.

The euphoria of being not-crazy mixed with a sense of dawning horror.

If there were any humans left, I wasn’t finding them there.

~oOo~

One of my roommate's wings handles a spoon, delivering oatmeal from his bowl to his mouth. The other wing holds his phone, which he looks at while idly eating breakfast.

I’m flabbergasted.

“Do you-- do you seriously not notice what’s going on?”

“I notice.”

“Holy shit man, you’re a fucking Noivern!”

“And you’re a Zoroark.”

He yawns.

I briefly wonder if I’m going crazy. If the news articles were lying and reddit was playing a practical joke on me. Were we always pokemon? Was being human just a delusion or fever dream? I decide to ask him. “Were you-- were you a Noivern before today?”

“No. Of course not.” He gives me a flat look. If looks could talk, this one would say “dipshit.”

“They how are you not freaking out!?”

He shrugs. “I’ve got an 8AM final.”

“What, you think anyone’s going to bother to show up?”

“Either the professor shows up, and I fail if I don’t, or he doesn’t, and I don’t lose anything. Anyways, I’m already awake.” He frowns at his cup of coffee. In a quieter voice, he says, “and if I didn’t have something to distract me, I’d probably go insane.”

I don’t respond verbally. The sombre look we trade is enough.

I try to put on some pants, but give up quickly; I’ve lost almost half a foot in height (although if bulbapedia is any indication, I’m pretty tall for a Zoroark.) Instead, I put on some shorts. They threaten to fall off, so I fasten them around my waist with a belt.

A brief look in the mirror confirms my suspicions-- I look positively ridiculous. I decide not to put on a shirt; no point compounding the stupidity.

Wallet, phone, keys, and pocket knife in my pockets, I finally venture outside of my dorm room. The hallways are empty, but I can hear muffled freakouts happening in other rooms.

Midway through my walk down the stairs, the relative peace is interrupted by an ear-splitting shriek. On a higher floor, one of the windows shatters.

Finally outside, my thick black fur blown about by the early morning breeze, I’m at a loss for what to do.

I can see a few other people wandering around in similar states of confusion and distress.

One stands apart, figuratively and literally: an Alolan Raichu on the tips of its toes. I wonder what she’s doing.

My question is soon answered.

The world flashes pure white, and I stumble back.  When I reopen my eyes, the Raichu is on her back, laughing helplessly. The area around her is scorched black. “Holy shit, that was awesome!” She yells, then resumes giggling.

For lack of anything better to do, I approach. “What was that, Thunder?”

She takes notice. “Naw, Thunder’s a little risky, on account of being so inaccurate. That was just a Thunderbolt.”

“Hell of an attack,” I said, impressed.

“What about you?” She asked. “Tried any attacks yet?”

“Uh, no, not yet.”

She nodded. “Okay. Well, as a Noivern, you probably know-- uh, gust? Wing attack? Maybe Aerial Ace? I’ll have to check--”

“Wait, Noivern?” I blink, and look back down at myself. I can still see my black fur and claws, but overlayed are the translucent, batlike wings of a Noivern.

I pinch myself, and the illusion shatters.

“Neat,” remarks the girl.

I re-assume the mental state I’d been in just after her Thunderbolt. Yellow fur shimmers into place around my own.

“Neat!”

This time, I can dismiss the illusion without pinching myself. I have an inkling of how the ability works, but for now it’s mostly just instinctual.

For a little while after, we stand in awkward silence. I’m flipping my illusion on and off, and the girl is thinking about who knows what.

Finally, she speaks up. “You might want to step back a bit, I don’t have very good aim with this.”

I comply; no sense getting shocked.

The panic fades as I watch her (from a safe distance, of course.)

Yeah, the world has gone crazy. But it’s not like everything is worse now. I feel a familiar itching in the soles of my feet, one I’ve felt for years, but not been able to act on. At least, without shooting pains going all the way up my spine.

I want to run. So I do.

~oOo~

A news broadcast.

A Watchdog holds the microphone. He’s chosen to wear a suit, although it of course looks ridiculous on his prairie-dog like body.

“...President Trump has so far declined to make a public appearance, but the Secretary of Homeland Security, John F. Kelly, will be speaking on behalf of the executive branch.”

The press pool, depleted as it is by no-show reporters, breaks out into murmuring as Kelly reveals himself. The secretary is a Flareon. Large for his species, but still short compared to many other fully evolved pokemon.

There’s an underlying note of hysteria-- to see such a powerful man reduced to a three foot tall, bright red-orange canid is simultaneously hilarious and terrifying. The camera microphone picks up a muttered reference to “Clifford the Big Red Dog.”

The secretary coughs into the microphone. When the murmurs fail to fully abate, he bursts into flame.

The crowd shuts up.

The fire extinguishes, and he begins his speech.

“The United--”

He adjusts his stance, having a little trouble getting his muzzle lined up to the microphone.

“The United States, its people and its government, are in shock. Not in a hundred, or a thousand, or even a million years could we predict anything remotely like this would happen. And I’ll-- I’ll be blunt. We don’t know why this happened. We don’t know who or what caused it. And we’ve only just confirmed the scale of this event.”

The secretary looks nothing like he used to, but his voice is crystal clear-- a perfect match for every prior recording of him.

“Everyone. Yes, everyone, without exception, has been turned into what is known as a ‘Pokémon’--” (he pronounces this ‘Poke-ee-mon’, which is a fair approximation, but not quite on the mark) “--which are a kind of character from a popular Japanese video game franchise.

“This situation is terrifying. We understand that. But to the citizens of this great nation, I must ask of you: Don’t Panic.”

Some of the reporters chuckle. Kelly smiles, revealing the reference to be intentional.

“We are doing everything we can to get to the bottom of this. It doesn’t matter if this phenomenon is extraterrestrial, paranormal, religious, or what have you. We are exploring every possible avenue to find out what caused this, and how to fix it. Our diplomats are in contact with the Japanese government and the Nintendo and Game Freak companies-- the creators of Pokemon. We are mobilizing every asset available to us, including the military, NASA, and the American public university system.”

“So for now, let’s all do our best to keep society running. The president has declared the remainder of today to be a federal holiday. I encourage everyone not performing emergency functions to take the chance to meet with your families and neighbors, to help them through this crisis, and to seek their support should they need it. To our firefighters, our policemen and women, to our ambulance drivers and to all of our emergency personnel who have worked through this crisis, you have this nation's deepest gratitude and admiration. And tomorrow, I urge everyone to return to their workplaces and schools, to keep America running, no matter how difficult it seems.”

“We have, collectively and singularity, overcome every single challenge that faced our nation. We will stand, one nation, indivisible, before this one. God bless America!!”

His parting words are met with applause, first scattered, then thundering. Some clap in a traditional manner, bringing together hands or paws. Others stomp the floor, and the rare functionary slaps flippers together.

The camera cuts to a news studio, picture-in-picture still showing the reaction to the speech. The news commentator, a surprisingly thin Slaking, begins to talk.