Zackary Laburnum

Name

Zackary Richard Laburnum

Nickname

Zack

Age

38

Birthday

March 4th

Gender

Male

Sexuality

Heterosexual

Pokémon

Serperior

Typing

Grass

Moves

Well… Zack does have a moveset, the moves being Leaf Storm, Leech Seed, Dragon Pulse, and Leaf Blade, though all of these moves are unusable. This is mainly due to the way he became a Serperior and the fact that he is… Deformed because of this, that’s the best way to put it

Personality

I’m going to say this right away, Zack’s Personality is rather negative as it is… Though it never was always that way, due to the combination of trauma and very poor choices Zack has really gone downhill rather quickly. Once being rather supportive of those close to him, having a soft spot for Pokémon, and more nice little bits to him have since faded. Sure, some of them are still there, but his negative traits that have been formed and ones that have grown worst really overshadow these nice parts.

With that out of the way let’s go over the biggest parts of Zack’s personality, Zack is quite intelligent and is quite logical, tending to lead towards a more scientific approach to matters and having a bit of a “not real until proven” mentality. Despite this he tends to process things a bit slowly, he can make great things yet he really does need time to come up with these things and it doesn’t help that he sometimes pressures himself into being hasty, making poor choices when not given the time he needs and his way of thinking has been hindered even more as of late.

One thing that he has retained through all these events is how incredibly calm he is. Despite the small… Event he had after being turned into a Serperior he actually is very calm, it takes a lot to actually make him angry. Sure, he comes off as being annoyed easily but his actions really show that he is much more tranquil than that and can rather gentle when the time calls for it… Though sadly that gentle side doesn’t tend to show up much.

And now we finally get to mention this guy’s negatives… First off Zack is rather sarcastic and rude, most of the time when you try talking to him he’ll not at all be nicest person ever. He feels that Pokémon are much less intelligent than him and so hardly ever befriends them, it really takes a lot to try to get close with him because of this.

As hinted before Zack is rather judgmental towards Pokémon and he tends to hold a lot of strong opinions and can be rather ignorant towards the opinions of other which causes a lot of problems with others who do not share views similar to him. For example, and one of the worsts is Zack’s homophobia which he tends to rant out when the topic is brought up, thinking of it as against the science he believes in so much. He will outright avoid those who are homosexual because of this though when it comes to his other opinions it tends to vary how he will view the situation. It is also very important to note that this ties in with how long he tends to hold grudges and will have very strong opinions towards those he does hold a grudge against,

Lastly is something that has developed since the recent events he has been through, even though Zack really doesn’t straight out say it he actually has very low self-confidence, extreme guilt, feelings of worthlessness… Honestly just a lot of things that are fed by his feelings of isolation seeing as he is no longer able to even communicate with those he cared for before. He constantly has to hide as well knowing that others do in fact want to kill him due to an event after he was transformed into a Serperior. He really isn’t in the best mental state whatsoever but with the situation he is in he really can’t do anything about it, leading to all these factors getting worse and worse over time to the point where he doesn’t seem fazed by the thought of dying.

Backstory

Zackary started off from rather humble beginnings. For the majority of his life he was a human and was born one. Zack was rather spoiled as a child though was quite well behaved, earning the chance to go on a Pokémon journey of his own at a young age after being given a shiny Treecko, which he named Gex, by his aunt who was a Pokémon breeder. Accompanied by his older cousin Derick they sat out on an adventure in their home region, Unova. Even though he did enjoy is it never did feel right for the young Zack, eventually dropping out of journey around the time Gex has evolved into a Sceptile

After this Zack ended up giving away most of his Pokémon to the local professor though ended up keeping Gex with him as a sort of pet. He and Derick remained rather close and when Zack was older ended up being educated in the ways of science, hoping to one day become a Pokémon professor. At the age of 20 Zack began a relationship with one of his fellow classmates, a woman named Hailey, and when they both completed their education they became married, moving to Kanto in pursuit of work together.

The first job Zack ended up getting was… An interesting experience for him to say the least. The workplace was rather normal, doing minor tests on Pokémon and seeing their potential to be used in new ways of working alongside humans, although unknowing those those working there the lab was owned by Team Rocket and were manipulating a few things, though nothing much really came of it, the team simply using the information in order to see new potential Pokémon to steal. Only major incident from his three years working there was an accident where Gex had become trapped and injured his tail during a bit of testing, due to some complications the Sceptile’s tail was forced to be amputated half way.

Soon a few of the scientists had to be laid off, Zack being one of them, although there was one good thing to come not long after as soon Hailey was confirmed pregnant a month later and soon they had their first and only child, one they named Cody. He was rather supportive of his son and respected that he wanted to follow in the path that he chose to leave, that being a Pokémon trainer, although due to his wife’s views of sending children out alone so early at the age of eleven as most did they agreed only to let him follow his dream once he was 18.

After his son was a year old Zackary was once again offered a job, one which he fit into quite nicely as the subject of study wasn’t too different from his previous one, this time being the potential in the human and Pokémon bond and how exactly it works. The place was rather small though quite a lot of work was successfully done, Zack being able to keep this job for around fifteen years. After a while the lab ended up running out of funds and soon all were fired and the owners of the project ran bankrupt. It really didn’t help that around this time Hailey had been injured at work after tending to an injured Garchomp who’s pain was being eased through anger and, in a bit of rage, had broken quite a few of her bones.

Being rather desperate and not wanting his son to know about the struggles this caused the family money wise Zackary ended up applying for a job as a scientist once against for an unnamed group, yet this time the work was much more different… And flat-out illegal, the main research being transforming humans into Pokémon, something that would surely fail yet for whatever reason the ones funding this project were paying massive amounts of money to those who worked there. Lying to his family over the subject matter of this new work he left all the way to the other side of Kanto for his work alongside his partner Pokémon.

The new environment really wasn’t very pleasing and it seemed many of the others working there also had been having the same problems as him, though there were quite the vocal few who were much more extreme to say the least. First few weeks did not go well whatsoever as due to a bit of miscommunication one of the other workers there, a man who went by the name of Argent, had mixed up Zack’s Sceptile for a Pokémon which was meant to be killed for needed DNA, resulting in Gex’s death. Zackary was devastated and was planning on leaving as soon as possible though remained knowing that it would cause more problems for his family and didn’t need his son and wife worrying.

When it came to the testings they weren’t at all successful, test subjects experiencing painful transformations until they eventually died slowly. Luckily Zack never really did have to see this for the majority his time there, being on the team which made the formulas for these tests, but that would not last for long. After a few months the place was rather tense, the founders of the private project pressuring those who worked there more and test subjects were vastly lowering. Not thinking straight whatsoever Zackary planned to use Argent as a test subject expecting for the exact same results as every other time it had been done, a failure and death of the one tested on.

It was rather easy for Zack to get Argent away so that he could do this, the tired man being very easily manipulated without even really trying, and soon Zack out the needle into him as a sort of revenge and waited for the results… Though it did not at all go the way he had planned. Even though in immense pain Argent was alive and now a Darkrai. Finally knowing how he had messed up badly Zackary wasn’t even sure what to do now, though soon realized that he would be paid quite the fair amount for his success. Though that never did happen in time.

After a day after what he had done to his coworker Argent ended up disappearing and everything quickly went downhill from there. Zackary forced himself to keep quiet about his successes knowing he didn’t have Argent to prove it yet in a few days Argent did return… Though the new Darkrai didn’t plan on letting him have this reward, using what he had done to him against him, finding out the formula Zack had made and when alone snuck up on him and used it, transforming Zackary into a Serperior. With Argent vanishing quickly afterwards he was left to force himself to leave knowing what the others in the laboratory would do if they found him as he now was.

Now forced into hiding Zackary’s mental state quickly deteriorated, the isolation, situation, and the fact that he knew how badly he had screwed up basically just made him break. He had no way to defend himself as even the powers he was supposed to have as a Serperior never worked… So he grew desperate, and that desperation led him to drastic measures, mainly him using a toxin he was able to create, one that could affect even poison and steel types and kill any Pokémon in seconds, and use it to manipulate the creatures to serve and protect him.

This has worked almost too well with Zack basically having been able to create his own army and even though he didn’t need to worry too much about being attacked that didn’t fix the other factors, he still wasn’t satisfied and in an attempt to put the blame on someone other then himself, knowing that he most likely would never find Argent again, put this blame on the Pokémon for whatever reason. With the large amount of Pokémon he had on his side, he planned to use them to attack any of those he put the blame on in their path.

Soon his group began to train some smaller Pokémon as a way to allow it to grow in numbers, one of these Pokémon being trained was an odd Togetic who called themselves Comet, after witnessing the Togetic kill one of his strongest protectors, a Garchomp, he decided to take the small bird Pokémon under his wing. Eventually, this Togetic would evolve into a Togekiss and showed great promise, leading many of the attacks Zack had planned out.

Zack’s “army” was rather successful at this point, though it seemed clear that many of them were finally becoming braver and attempting to leave, which would only get them killed, or even attempt to kill the Serperior behind it all. Only one of these times came close and would be the first time Zack would actually kill someone by himself, a Scizor challenged Zack and with one of their allies blocking the way to Zack’s toxin he was left to fight the bug alone, bringing it to its end with a bite to the neck.

The tone was shifting much more within the group after that and soon were faced with a much smaller group of Pokémon, being led by a Zoroark, Sableye, and Typhlosion, which were bringing a much biggest challenge for the group. Of course, Zackary was not too happy with this and would constantly be ordering for his army to take them down… Though what he didn’t expect was to find that the Togekiss was apart of the reason why this small group constantly seemed to know when they would be attacked. Before a proper confrontation with Comet the small group had managed to find Zack’s main base, leading to a final battle.

Despite the large numbers Zack his poor tactics caused by his much more forced mindset lead to his downfall. Little of his group listened to him by this point and soon Zack was face to face with one of the leaders of the small group, the Sableye. The fight between the two happened rather fast with the Sableye quickly being able to jump out of a Shadow Sneak and slash Zackary’s neck with a Shadow Claw, resulting in the end of the Serperior.

Well, this was supposed to be the end of him at least, if it wasn’t for something a bit odd that happened. For a quick moment Zack met Venus, the Serperior whose DNA was used to transform Zackary into what he was now. Venus was a fairly powerful spirit and ended up coming to an agreement with him, that Venus would revive him if he would be allowed to remain with him, and so Zack was revived with no recollection of Venus and the original Serperior took the form of Zack’s shadow, though with the ability of possessing the current Serperior… Yet Venus has yet to do anything and it’s questionable what his real intentions are.

After reawakening the first thing he came back to was Comet, that very Togekiss that had betrayed him, standing next to him crying. It took awhile for the Togekiss to realize that he wasn’t dead and despite all that happened Comet quickly took it soon himself to continue protecting Zack, especially since so many would not be out to kill him for all he had done. Although Zack still really doesn’t trust the bird Pokémonhe really doesn’t care much, he had calmed down a lot since his past event and now seems to just lay around hidden unless Comet said they have to move. He has yet to see the Pokémon who went out of their way to try to kill him, though Comet assures him that they wouldn’t cause him more harm if they ever did come across the small group that had been lead by the very Sableye that attempted to kill him.

Fun facts

Zack’s favourite Pokémon type is psychic as he admires the intelligence they have, he’s always wanted to have a Beheeyem when he was little as it had been a long time favourite though never was able to find one.

He does not believe in an afterlife, sure there are ghost types out there who have shown indication of once being human, but there still has never been any evidence in his eyes of a proper afterlife, it’s either you become a ghost type Pokémon or you are faced with a vast nothingness of death.

He’s really not very healthy in all honesty, Zack doesn’t feel the need to do much of anything most of the time as he views it as just sort of worthless and his hygiene really isn’t the greatest because of this.