Grave Robber

It happened on a Monday. I was at a garage sale and found a copy of Pokémon Red for the Game Boy. It had a price tag reading $5. I asked the man running the garage sale why it was so much. He told me this: "Oh, that game is... special. It runs in the family. Gets passed down."

I was confused and asked, "Why would you sell it then?"

He simply looked sad and stated, "I just want it gone."

I gladly payed him the cash and rushed home.

As I turned on the game, I noticed something. The trainer on the title screen was a girl instead of a boy. This was before being a girl was even an option so I immediately knew it was hacked. In the back of my head, I hoped that it wasn't the only hack.

I kept playing and when I got to my mom in the game, she said, "Billy, remember I love you".

I had entered my name as Red, as I do on every Pokémon game. I got interested to see if that was what I'd be called the whole game. I went to go into the grass and got stopped by Oak as always. But this time he said "Billy! You're not allowed to go on a Pokémon adventure until you clean your room!" I was confused but laughed. I then figured out that the game was hacked by the old man's family. They personalized it for who I'm assuming is probably their Son Billy. I saw what the old man meant at this point about the game "running in the family". It was honestly kind of heart-warming. I followed Oak to the lab where Gary was. Gary was saying "Dad! Come on dad! Buy me the Mercedes! Dad! Dad you ignorant-" then Oak interrupted. "Nicholas, you won't get a Mercedes. We're broke! Don't you understand!" Gary didn't say anything.

Oak looked at me and said "Billy, good to see you! Please pick a Pokémon! Any Pokémon!"

I noticed the starters were hacked. They were Mew, Charizard, and Squirtle. I picked Mew. As soon as I did that the game froze. I powered the Game Boy back up. As soon as I started there were two options. Continue and Options. I picked continue. I was in Oak's office, except I was alone. As I walked outside, I saw a grave. I read it and it said "Nicholas". I realized that this was Gary's name, and if Oak was his dad and Oak also told me (Billy) to clean my (his) room, then Oak was my dad and Nicholas was my brother. I was creeped out not by the grave exactly, but the fact that this family who obviously personalized this hack had a scene where a member of their family dies.

I decided to walk around some more and there were no random encounters. No fights at all exactly. I just kept wandering until I found another grave. It had been about ten minutes. This grave said "Lionel". I didn't know who that was. I just basically kept walking and finding more graves until I got to Lavender Town. There, there was no graves. There was a sign in the middle of the town though that said, "Graves have disappeared. Hero needed to find them."

That's when I started to think that this was a complete new storyline hack. I was honestly getting into it. I went back to the graves and pressed A and instead of reading them, I added them to my inventory. I picked up every grave in the game in about ten minutes. I got to the Elite Four where there were four graves and I picked them up. There was one grave that wouldn't budge though.

Now, I had beat the game. I decided to take the game back to the man since it obviously was a big family treasure. It was a good game. I had fun with it. I knock on the door and the old man opens the door. Nobody is inside. I ask, "Where is everyone?".

He stared at me in a frightening manner and spoke words I will never forget: "You killed them, Grave Robber."