Pokémon ZKhan

I always read about people finding games or some weird glitch happening that mentally or physically scared some random kid for life. However I always thought that they were just stories. That they were all just made up. Little did I know that I would be writing one of my own some day.

I guess I should start from the very beginning shall I?

I guess this all really started two years ago when I first met him. We didn't really speak much until we both had a mutual friend. However, the way I acted was like I'd known him for years. I don't know if it was just him being manipulative or if it was just something about him but I would have done anything for him. And I guess I kind of did.

It was getting towards the end of our high school years and he was getting really behind on his coursework, I couldn't just sit there and watch one of my best mates fail because we had an incompetent teacher. So I did what any good friend would do. I stayed behind for 2–3 hours every day, I stayed back 2–3 hours on top of the hour and a half bus ride I had on top of that. We were inseparable until the end of school. It was then when things went a little bit weird.

He began to call me out, it wasn't unusual as we did used to meet up a bit outside of school but after a while he stopped showing up. Now usually I would think the worse because of my paranoid nature but the was he kept on calling me out help those thoughts at bay. But stupidly I obeyed and ended up being left to walk 10 miles home. I told him I was sick of him, nobody that has done as much as I had should be treated like that. This is things went from weird to creepy. Oh how I wish I had realized sooner.

This next bit I'm not too proud of. But I was sick of people always walking all over me! I started to spread rumors about him, sending malicious text messages and emails. After about a month every had heard about him. All his friends had heard their own deep dark secrets from someone else, which I had cleverly woven back to him. Even his family were paying the price as I'd, through the actions of his brother, persuaded them that he was in fact gay.

Him being of the Muslim faith they didn't take it very well. However this turned out to be true so I guess it wasn't all bad. But on top of all that I completely ruined any chance of him making new friends because if the last rumor the secret, which had nothing to do with me, came out that he tried to kiss me. At that point in time though I was all for sticking to that rumor. I can safely say this completely ruined him. After that I never heard from him again, I think on some level he knew it was me. But I guess I'll never know.

About two months had passed since then and I'd completely forget about him and what happened. I wouldn't have connected it but it was now that I received a message from him. It was through Facebook so I completely ignored its content and sent a message back. The message basically said that he should **** off and leave me alone like I told him to. Him being the annoying type I was expecting a message back, but after two whole days and no reply I decided to go and check out what it was that broke our silence.

The message. Nothing but a URL, not even a title. I was about to click delete when I noticed where the URL lead too. It was a URL to my own site, a URL to a part of the site I was not aware existed. The URL read http://pokepasta.cz.cc/zkhan.NDS. Go check that URL leads nowhere.

The guy could barley use Microsoft word so there is no way he could hack a file into my server. So how is it when I clicked on it something happened...

The screen went white, the page was blank. I was expecting to get a 404 error and be done with it but boy was I shocked when a download started. It was a .NDS file.

By now I was thinking of the most obvious reasons of how this was happening. The most reasonable thing I could think of was that he had befriended someone with extraordinary hacking abilities and asked them to do a favor, Sound familiar?

I set the download to start and it downloaded fairly quickly when compared to the normal speed of my server. Once it had finished I plugged in my MicroSD card into my adapter and set it to copy so I could see what it was.

I booted up my flashcard and started the game, guess what I found? The name and the icon said that it was Pokémon Black! And it was in English! Could this be a random act of kindness from a once good friend? Or was it just a meaningless attempt to use up our limited server space? Either way I had an English version of Pokémon Black.

I booted up the game and got a black screen. Nothing unusual, just an antipiracy feature I though. I was a little disappointed that Nintendo hadn't been a little more creative like that Zelda Spirit Tracks game.

I put the game down and went to Google an antipiracy patch for the game and I literally jumped when the sound of the bells from the HGSS into chimed. I swiftly ran across the room to get my DS. I immediately saw that it wasn't Pokémon Black. The screen had gone from being completely black to a big white box being in the middle, The box had the word 'START' written in big black block letters right in the middle of the box. It was obvious what the game wanted me to do so why not do it?

My jaw immediately hit the floor as my name flashed upon the screen. He must have met a really dedicated hacker if he can make something as advance as this.

After a good few minutes of staring at my own name I came to the conclusion that I had to do something to make it progress. I pressed a but nothing happened. Mashing the other buttons I found out that the game progresses using only the B button. The game continued and text started to scroll up the touch screen. It wasn't much but it sent chills up my spine.

It read:

"David, I know that you were annoyed at what happened to you and that the main culprit was me but what you did to me was unacceptable. I know that it looked like I was messing with you but that was no excuse for someone to do what you did. And for this I hope you will pay. Because you went too far, too far David..."

An animation sequence started then. The camera was panning from left to right over the screen showing a messy bed room, the average bedroom of any teenage boy. A strange sensation of Déjà vu struck me as the camera stopped in the middle of the room. A silhouette appeared in the middle of the screen and once again my eyes almost lurched out of my head when I saw what it was.

It was a trainer sprite of him, the detail was amazing. It looked exactly like him from the odd shaped head to the exact thing he wore last time I saw him. The only fault I could see was that the picture seemed to be discoloured slightly just below his right eye running down his cheek.

Next thing I know was that the sprite began to shrink like it does in all Pokémon games and became an overworld sprite. Was this going to be like any other game?

Unfortunately the answer was no. as the sprite appeared in plan view of the previous image I mashed at the D-Pad but the small bundle of pixels ignored my commands. So I sat there wondering what could happen next.

A loud beeping noise was the next thing to play with my heightened tension. It was strange as I don't remember having my volume on but I was too scared to notice that at the time.

The sprite made a small shuffling animation and it had a small object in its hand. A text box popped up. It read:

"I'm here now. I swear if you leave me standing here on my own again I won't be responsible for what I might do!"

My heart sank as I reached for my phone. I opened my sent box and there it was. In plain black and white there were those exact words I had sent him.

The text box disappeared without me having to press anything so I quickly dropped my phone and paid attention to the game. A large sprite appeared on the screen. It was a mug shot sprite just like the ones that are used for the C-Gear in the game.

Slowly the face contorted into an expression full of worry and guilt. Slowly the screen faded to black.

A weird white mist was hovering around the edge of the screen and making it harder to see. A text box appeared just above this white smoke. It read:

"Several hours before"

We were now in a hallway. It was small and wasn't very cluttered like the last one. The same sprite came running up from out of the white fog and came to a sudden halt at what looked like a door. A new sprite text box appeared now but this one had something completely different in it.

It said:

میں باہر جا رہا ہوں اب چپ

This roughly translated to:

"I'm going out now mum"

I immediately pulled out my phone and began taking pictures of the text. I could send them to a friend who knew what this language was. If it was what I thought it was.

However while I was concentrating on the picture quality I seemed to have missed something and next time I looked at the screen there was another sprite on the screen. Yet another text box appeared this time from the other sprite.

This time it read:

آپ کی نہیں ، تمہارے پاس کام ارے نہیں کرنا

"Oh no your not, you've got work to do"

From this point onwards my camera flash could have given me a seizure because the next thing that happened on screen happened so fast I could barely keep up.

میں تجھ سے بیزار مجھے حکم کے ارد گرد ہوں

"I'm sick of you ordering me around"

کیا تم نے ابھی مجھ سے کیا کہا؟

What did you just say to me?

میں نے کہا... میں نے کہا کہ میں نے ہر وقت اپنے تمام کام کر کے تنگ آ گیا ہوں

"I said... I said I'm sick of doing all your work all the time"

Everything stopped.

The flow of the text seemed to seize., the fog around the screen seemed to pull back slightly in shock. The sprites seemed to stop breathing even though they weren't breathing or moving in the first place. The other mother sprite seemed to shuffle slightly only a pixel either side.

A pokéball appeared next to her. I know I shouldn't be shocked by this but it didn't seem in place in this game. The Pokéball opened revealing a Clefable next to the mother. His sprite stepped back in shock as a pokéball appeared next to him too. This one opened to release a Hitmonchan.

The screen distorted as it changed to the battle screen. But instead there weren't any Pokémon trainers, nor was there any introduction text.

All it said was:

"Clefable used Double Slap"

Next the animation played and Hitmonchan's health decreased.

Now came something I've never seen before. The trainer's backsprite appeared and the camera span round.

The camera was now behind Clefable.

The camera zoomed into the trainer sprite and his eyes seemed to sink into the back of his head leaving behind only two anger filled red pupils.

The camera shot back to normal view behind Clefable as the Hitmonchan shook rapidly from side to side as if doing some sort of speed attack. Without any warning text a series of punch animations played whittling down the Clefable's health bit by bit till it reached zero.

The screen went black.

No overworld.

Just black.

A loud beeping noise was the next thing to escape from this games the whole screen turned white. A block of text began to appear on screen.

"Just don't speak to me anymore. Don't text, don't call, don't inbox. I'm sick of it. After everything I did for you. This how it ends."

The game went deathly silent. The white text screen faded away revealing the bedroom that I had previously seen. Only this time it seemed to be darker, almost monochrome but, Except for the untouched sprite of the creator. Another text box appeared.

"What have I done?
Why have I done this?
Why?
I've messed up.
Beyond Repair.
Nothing left for me.
Only one thing to do now.
The thing that you only barely escaped from
It's going to get me"

My face froze. My hands constricted my DS stress marks stretched across it. The sprite walked across the room and stopped at a rough pokéball.

"Found Rope"

I now had tears streaming down my cheeks begging that he had made a slight error when he was typing. But as much as I pleaded with the game I didn't get what I hoped for. The next text box read:

"Used Rope"

An image of his chest appeared on top of the overworld and slowly slid across the screen. It reached the edge of the screen and with a sharp snap the sprite shot down revealing a rope wrapped tightly around his neck.

The blood slowly trickled down his chin and soaked the rope as it became a deep red. The screen faded to black. I closed the lid on my screen. And I walked out the room.

---

The story you have read was based on a true story. I have since been contacted by his older brother. He informed me that a note was found. I've been invited to the funeral by him, I guess I can finally put everything to rest now.