Pokemon Occupational Families - Story 1

Apologies for not posting anything here in a long while, but i had this story idea floating around and decided to act on it.

(NOTE: This opening story was NOT written by me, but I did want to post it here for future usage and so that it won't get lost)

In the world of Pokemon, the female police officers are all Jennys and the female nurses who run the Pokemon Centers are all Joys. Now extend that to every job you can imagine - every reporter an Alexa/Malva, every celebrity an Elesa/Iono, every water gym leader a Misty/Nessa, and so on.

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Story 1 - Elesa

Elesa yawned as she got out of bed, stretching tiredly. Although she may have had a rare stress-free day ahead of her, that was all the more reason to get an early start and utilize the free time properly.

…Still, she could relax a little and take it slow this morning. As she made her way into the kitchen to make herself a meal, she picked up the remote and turned on the television. Verifying it was on the news channel, she turned back towards the shelves in order to make herself a meal -

After a moment, though, she paused. Had the newscaster been…different? She watched the Unova National News often, so she was fairly certain it had been a man before.

Looking again now, the newscaster was definitely different - a sharp-looking woman with pink hair and glasses. She looked familiar, though…

Elesa mentally shrugged. She figured she’d just missed the old newscaster retiring or something. She went back to making breakfast -

“And now, we have an interview with our latest up-and-coming model, Elesa!”

Elesa’s brain short-circuited. What?

She whipped back around, and her eyes widened. That was HER on the screen.

But that didn’t make any sense! She didn’t remember giving any interviews recently! And -

And this was LIVE.

Elesa’s blood ran cold as she stared at the television. Did she have an imposter out there? A doppelganger? Someone who was USING HER NAME?

Her breakfast lay forgotten as she went back into the bedroom, searching for her Xtransceiver. She had to call someone, try and figure out what was going on!

Ah, there it was, on the nightstand, right next to the photo of -

Elesa stopped short, the Xtransceiver she’d just picked up falling from her grasp and landing with a dull THUD on the ground.

She stared, beginning to tremble a little, at a photo that was completely impossible. She reached down, picked it up, and brought it closer, just to make sure that she wasn’t seeing things.

Whereas before it had been a photo of her with parents, now it was a photo of her, with…HER. TWO of her. Completely identical.

“What is going on?” Elesa whispered shakingly.

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Elesa did her best to stay calm. Something was happening, obviously, but right now the best she had was that a Psychic (or possibly Ghost) Pokemon was playing a trick on her. In which case…she was kind of screwed. She was an Electric-Type Gym Leader, and her Pokemon did not happen to include any Psychic, Dark, or Ghost types. …She did have a Bug type in the form of Galvantula, but while Bug types were good against Psychic types, they weren’t exactly ideal for finding a way through an illusion.

…What kind of illusion was this, though? Elesa frowned. If she was in her actual home, then they were only messing with specific portions of her surroundings. If she wasn’t, then the illusion was of her whole home, for…some reason? Why make her think she was safe when she actually wasn’t? And for that matter, why would you then mess it up and let her know?

…Either way, perhaps stepping outside would shed some light on things. …And it would help her get some fresh air.

She made her way to the balcony, where she could see her beloved city, Nimbasa, in all its glory. It may not have been the spectacular sight it was at night, with the buildings all lit up and gleaming, but morning Nimbasa was no slouch either.

Elesa cast her gaze over everything, frowning. …Yes, this definitely pointed to not being an illusion created wholesale - there were too many details that Elesa was familiar with enough to say were completely genuine. Even Psychic-types, with their incredible mental prowess, couldn’t replicate all that perfectly. Every building, every street, every person walking along -

Elesa’s gaze stopped dead, her eyes widening.

The people walking along the streets weren’t right. There should have been thousands of different faces - instead, Elesa saw only dozens. Dozens repeated.

…At first, she thought this was what she’d been looking for - evidence of cracks in the illusion. But no…no, that couldn’t be it. No illusion-maker could possibly be dumb enough to have all their background figures be clearly female. For that matter, many of the repeating figures had hair colors and outfits that made them severely stand out, rather than blend into the background like an illusion should. …And that wasn’t even going into how Elesa saw several versions of herself in the crowd.

Elesa stared down, mouth dry. What did this mean?

–

Elesa decided to go back into her house, hoping to find something that would explain what was happening to her, or even worse, to the world around her. She returned to her room. Everything looks the same, Thought Elesa. But maybe I need to look deeper.

Elesa looked under her bed covers. She looked under her bed. It’s clean… really clean. When was the last time I cleaned like this? Elesa looked in her closet, and there she found something. It was her wardrobe. Multiple copies of her sleeveless yellow top and her sectioned black top. Multiple pairs of yellow stiletto heels. A small box of neatly folded black tights. Elesa counted to herself. Seven of each. Enough to wear one every day, Why would I do that?

That’s when Elesa saw the small stack of magazines. She got the one on top of the stack and stared at it. It was titled Model Elesa, just like the one under it. It had her - or at least, someone who looked just like her - on the cover. Elesa pulled it out of the cover and leafed through it. It was a lot like your typical fashion magazine, or at least what a fashion magazine would look like if doppelgangers of Elesa were modeling all the clothing. All of these outfits seem to be for occasions. Nothing that would be called everyday wear. How odd. What really caught her eye was the phrase “Model Elesa.” This magazine never referred to any of the women in its pages as just Elesa, always “Model Elesa.” Could it be…

Elesa found her bag. In her bag was her wallet, and in her wallet was her license, just slightly reformatted so that her entire name could be on one line: Model Elesa. Her last name was just gone. Model Elesa tried to stare at the card that was shaking in her hand. So small a detail, placed in a wallet, placed in a bag. Either the source of the illusions was incredibly powerful… or they weren’t illusions at all.

Model Elesa caught her face in the mirror. Her pores were invisible. No wrinkles of any kind. Her face was what people talked about when they extolled the “natural look” with complete ignorance of the makeup that was actually involved. And she wasn’t wearing any makeup. Model Elesa held a hand to her face, then looked at her arm and its smooth skin, hairless and featureless in a way that only existed in photoshop, or perhaps 2d animation. Her hair, which she hadn’t gotten around to brushing yet, looked as if she hadn’t slept at all. Model Elesa tousled it as much as she could, but as soon as her hands left her head every strand of hair fell into its perfect place.

What… What’s happening to me?