Mew's Dreams

In my dreams I am a prisoner. I'm held in a cage of glass by people who think of me only as a tool. And when I free myself, I find myself in another cage, made of my own rage and pain and insecurity.

In my dreams I am a prisoner. And when I wake to find that it is not true, that I still have the freedom of the world and the sky, mountains and water and snow all open before me, I still remember what it was like, in the dream. And it haunts me.

There is another me in the world, another me who is a prisoner, and the freedom of the air is tainted for me, knowing that is true.

My name is Mew, and in all the world there was only one of me.

Now there are two.

And one of me has imprisoned himself.

In the beginning the gods granted us gifts, great gifts to use as we chose. And in the wild we roamed freely, using our gifts. There were conflicts among us, but for the most part we cooperated and did not fight amongst ourselves.

Most of us had children. I did not. Maybe I knew what was going to happen.

When the humans came, they taught us to fight, to battle one another. I saw what happened to the children, to my nieces and nephews, and I cried. All they knew, now, was captivity and combat.

I decided I would never have a child. All the others of my kind spread forth, combining and recombining, creating children identical to their parents, or crossbreeding and creating children with the gifts of more than one. But I remained alone.

For a while, I believed that what I needed to do was to free my people from the humans. And so I fought humans-and fought them when they tried to capture me as well. I thought-spoke my people and tried to convince them that fighting was wrong, that serving the humans was wrong, that we should overthrow the humans and live in peace amongst ourselves again.

Over time, I gained wisdom, and I realized the contradiction in my beliefs. If fighting is wrong, how could I advocate fighting humans? And I began to see that most of those who fought, and served humans, did so out of a genuine desire for excellence. They wanted to be trained. They wanted to be warriors, and compete with one another.

I had not known such a desire existed within the souls of the Pokemon. But again and again I found it, and I could hardly deny what I saw. I saw some of my people choosing to befriend humans, of their own free will; I saw them evolving, attaining new powers and new wisdom from greater experiences. Who was I, to interfere with what they chose? Any of them could leave after they were captured, after all. Most chose to remain.

It is not the life I would choose for myself. I wanted freedom, earth and sky and the wind in my face, ruffling my fur as I fly. But I could not deny them the right to have the life they chose, either.

Still. Perhaps I am old. The world has changed since I was young, and I did not like the way it had changed, nor the way my nieces and nephews chose to live their lives. I would not have a child, to have my heart broken when my children were captured and trained to serve humans. That was not the life I was born to, and it was not the life I would see for any other Mews to come after me. So I did not create young. So I remained alone.

But now I have a child, one I never chose to have. And he has seen the things I have seen, without the wisdom of years that has tempered me. His pain reaches across the astral plane and invades my dreams, and I cannot escape it.

In my dreams I am Mewtwo, and I rage at the world as it has become.

When I wake, I am Mew, the hidden one, the free one, the legendary one.

But not the only one, anymore.

Shall I leave the child I never asked for to his own devices, to reshape the world in the image both he and I have dreamed of?

Shall I go to him to ease his pain, at feeling himself to be nothing but a poor copy of me? Shall I tell him he is his own creature, my child and my brother? Would he listen?

Shall I fight him, to stop him from engulfing the world in his rage?

I will go, and investigate. I will learn what Mewtwo is doing and what he wants. And then I will decide.