Laurie Hitoki

Name:	Laurie Hitoki
Nickname/Alias:	N/A
Gender:	non-binary
Sexuality:	Straight
Age:	21
Height:	5'11"
Ethnicity:	Kalosian-Sinnohian
Birthday:	1/1/1999
Attribute:	N/A
Trainer ID:	11111
Home:	Eterna City
Pokéform:	N/A
Starter:	D'Autry
Status:	Alive

Appearance

Laurie Hitoki is a blue-eyed, 5'11" young Trainer with medium-length shaggy brown hair. They are constantly seen in square black glasses and a blue hat, and the clothes they wear are generally blue with some yellow undertones. Their most common outfit is a yellow undershirt, with a dark navy blue jacket over top of it. The dark navy blue jacket has a yellow collar and yellow undertones all over. They also wear blue jeans, black socks, and bright neon-blue shoes, and serve in direct contrast to their sibling Cole, who wears mainly yellow clothing with blue undertones. Laurie also is sometimes seen wearing a yellow bracelet on their left wrist, which either belonged to Cole before their disappearance or is worn mainly as a memento of them.

Biography

Born in Eterna City to a Kalosian museum curator mother and a Sinnohian miner father, Laurie Hitoki had always been quiet, reserved, and intelligent, even before their sibling's disappearance. Much of their time was spent alone in their room, reading books and listening to music-- specifically rock and metal music, with a bit of Celtic punk on the side (mainly in the form of Flogging Molly). While they never learned Monese, they did study for their classes at the Trainer's school diligently, and eventually learned both semi-fluent Kalosian and a bit of Japanese. When they turned 10 years old, two big things happened that would change their lives forever. The first was that their younger sibling Cole was born, and they would soon grow to love, care for, and teach their sibling over the course of the next 10 years. The second was that Laurie's father gave them their first Pokemon-- a kindhearted, optimistic Sandshrew with a love of rock, metal, and country music. That last part left Laurie- who was the farthest thing from a country fan- very perturbed, and they ended up tolerating their new companion at best. However, they didn't like him enough to actually give him a name.

All that changed one day when the family left to go to Driftveil City on a vacation. One night, Laurie's Sandshrew snuck his Trainer out of their room in order to come with him to see a performance of the Grand Ole Operetta, otherwise known as simply the GOOprix or the GO2. Laurie was not amused at all upon seeing the country radio show, and while the Sandshrew seemed to think it was the best place in the world, Laurie thought it was nothing but mindless drivel. They booed all of the GO2 acts and immediately made haste for their hotel room as soon as the show was over, but Laurie's Sandshrew kept wanting to talk to their Trainer. Laurie, however, did not speak Monese and went straight back to the hotel to get away from what they believed to be an annoyance. As soon as they did, they opened up Pinwheel Prime and, as if to spite them, found a country music documentary waiting for them, by someone named Ken Burns. Laurie was not amused, but was a bit intrigued, and begrudgingly clicked on the documentary. Much to their Sandshrew's delight, they ended up loving it so much they watched the whole thing three times, and grew to appreciate the genre a lot more than they previously did, recognizing a link between country, rock, and metal they hadn't considered before. Eventually, country music became their third favorite genre of music, though it wasn't nearly as good enough in their eyes for it to eclipse rock or pop. A few days after their third watch, Laurie announced to their Sandshrew that they would finally be naming him, and subsequently named him D'Autry, much to his delight. A few days later, D'Autry learned that Laurie couldn't speak Monese and offered to be his teacher through notes that the two of them would write to each other. Laurie immediately accepted, and the two have been friends ever since.

Years later, Laurie graduated from high school as valedictorian, D'Autry evolved into a Sandslash, and Cole turned 10, meaning that they were about to get their first Pokemon. By that time, Laurie had grown to have a love of Pokemon history to the point where they wanted to go back in time themselves to see what old Pokemon looked like for themselves. They invited their parents, Cole, and D'Autry to come along and see the finished product. By that time, Cole, Laurie, and D'Autry had developed a very close relationship with one another. Much to everyone's surprise, the portal actually worked, but Laurie still exhibited caution with anyone actually going inside. Cole, however, got a little too excited and started to approach the portal's entrance. Laurie desperately tried to get Cole to stop, as did their parents, and tried to pull them back from the portal entrance. Cole, however, was so excited to see what the past looked like that they jumped into the portal without a second thought. Desperate to try and get their sibling back, Laurie started fiddling around with the controls, actually showing genuine fear for the first time in their lives. However, in doing so, they accidentally pressed a button that succeeded in destroying the portal Lee House-style, trapping their sibling in the past for supposedly forever.

Laurie was so shocked and so guilt-ridden by this that they became a complete hikikomori for the next year of their life. With few exceptions (such as to eat), they spent all of their time in their room trying to get their sibling back and fix the portal. They barely even listened to music anymore, with Jimmie Rodgers' classic "Miss the Mississippi and You" being the only thing they would listen to for the next straight year. D'Autry began to get severely worried, and nothing that Laurie tried worked. It got to the point where Laurie and their parents started assuming the worst. Upon doing some research, Laurie found out that the place they had sent Cole to was Hisui, which was what Sinnoh used to be called. It was filled with extremely dangerous Pokemon, and upon hearing this, Laurie, realizing that Cole had not yet received a Pokemon, immediately assumed that Cole was dead. They broke the news to their parents, and all three of them mourned for days. It took a whole year of recluse, Jimmie Rodgers, and mourning before Laurie accepted that Cole was likely dead, and set off on their Pokemon journey at the age of 21 with D'Autry by their side.

At the start of their journey, Laurie caught a timid and kindhearted Aron, an energetic and fun-loving Magnemite with a love of the radio, a serious, stoic, and perfectionistic Beldum, a snarky yet still good-hearted Houndour, and a composed, reserved, yet hyper-prepared Medicham who was counting down the days until his death. They were respectively named Draiman, MC-DC, Hetfield, Slipknot, and Zoltan. Laurie never went up against any Gyms or Leagues- they just went straight into catching Pokemon, and Draiman evolved into a Lairon during the capture battle against Zoltan. All five of them were introduced to D'Autry, who got along well with pretty much all of them and particularly introduced Draiman and MC-DC to the GO2, and all five of them were told about Cole. Laurie also discovered, much to their relief, that they were able to understand three of their new friends: MC-DC via sound waves that were converted to speech, and Hetfield and Zoltan via telepathy. Shortly after Zoltan was caught, though, MC-DC began picking up on strange signals. These signals suggested that not only were Hisuian Pokemon still in the Sinnoh region, but, more importantly, that Cole was alive-- and not only alive, but thriving with a full team of 6 Pokemon. Delighted by this new turn of events, Laurie immediately decided to search for their sibling, and possibly find out more about the Hisuian mons along the way. Currently, they are doing just that in the hopes of possibly finding their sibling again-- but even as they search for Cole and learn more about Hisui, Monese, and the Pokemon from long ago, their guilt over losing their sibling all those years ago still remains...

Personality

Of the two Hitoki siblings, Laurie is the more quiet, reserved, and intelligent one. Even before their sibling Cole disappeared and was lost to time, Laurie usually put all of their time and effort into their studies, and would often stay in their room for long periods of time. They've grown a bit out of their solitary personality ever since travelling on their Pokemon journey, especially now since they have three Pokemon that they can easily talk to despite their very limited knowledge of Monese. Despite that, however, they usually prefer to keep to themselves most of the time, only ever talking to someone if they approach them first. Due to their solitary nature, Laurie doesn't say much to other people, instead preferring to talk to their Pokemon and specifically to the ones that they can understand-- D'Autry (if only a little bit), MC-DC, Hetfield, and Zoltan. The only person that they have ever talked to on a semi-regular basis is Cole, but now that they're gone, Laurie usually spends almost all of their time trying to look for their long-lost sibling. Laurie is extremely intelligent, having graduated from high school as a valedictorian and being able to speak semi-fluent French. They know a lot about music in particular, and have a vast knowledge of music history and music theory (they are, notably, the only human character that Goldenheart388 has written for who can canonically count beats and tell time signatures). They were also able to create a functioning, working portal to Hisui at 19 (though they were unable to recreate it). Despite that, though, they don't know everything, and are extremely socially awkward.

Further Details

• Debut: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=12971269370A74820100&page=23156

• Starter: D'Autry, their Sandslash

• Pokeform: Unknown

• Likes: Cole, D'Autry, their family, their Pokemon, metal music, rock music, country music, studying the history of Pokemon and Pokemon regions

• Dislikes: Their guilt over losing Cole all those years ago, being reminded that Cole is supposedly dead, the thought of anyone hurting Cole or D'Autry, the thought of anyone hurting their Pokemon

Pokemon

Original Six

D'Autry

Draiman

MC-DC

Hetfield

Slipknot

Zoltan

Sinnohian Captures

Plant

Trivia

• Laurie's name, and Kalosian ancestry/semi-fluency in the French language, are both derived from children's music artist Laurie Berkner (who was born in France), and thus serve as a correspondence to their sibling's name basis, Coles Whalen. Both Berkner and Whalen were artists that Goldenheart388 listened to in her childhood and had recently rediscovered for nostalgia's sake by that point. Ironically, Laurie- who is named after the artist that stuck strictly to children's music- is the more reserved and mature of the two, whereas their sibling- who is more energetic and childlike- is named after the artist who branched out beyond children's music (and in fact started as a non-children's-music based artist).
  • "Hitoki", meanwhile, is derived from a combination of the Japanese words for "person" (hito) and "time" (toki), likely referencing Cole's disappearance.
• Laurie's Pokemon follow the same naming scheme as Kimberly Bond's, with the added bonus that the mons are mostly restricted to metal and rock bands and members. The only exception is D'Autry, who was named after both the rock band Daughtry (and their lead singer Chris Daughtry by extension) and country music star/"singing cowboy" Gene Autry. For the rest of the mons, in order:
  • Draiman the Lairon was named after David Draiman, lead singer of Disturbed.
  • MC-DC the Magnemite was named after AC/DC, along with a radio emcee.
  • Hetfield the Beldum was named after James Hetfield, lead singer of Metallica.
  • Slipknot the Houndour was named after the band of the same name.
  • Zoltan the Medicham was named after Zoltan Bathory, lead guitarist of Five Finger Death Punch, as well as the Zoltan hand gesture.
  • Plant the Dewott was named after Robert Plant, lead singer of Led Zepplin.
• Both Laurie's birthday (January 1st) and their ID number (11111) reference their solitary nature, as does their regular chat handle solehitoki1999, which also ties into the fact that, ever since Cole's disappearance, Laurie is indeed the sole Hitoki sibling remaining.
• According to Goldenheart388, Laurie Hitoki's favorite bands, in order, are Disturbed, Flogging Molly, Slipknot, and DragonForce.
• According to Goldenheart388, Laurie Hitoki's English character theme is "Wrong Side of Heaven" by Five Finger Death Punch, while their Japanese character theme is "Raison d'Etre" by Eve; the title of the latter song, when translated out of French, means "reason for living".
• Laurie Hitoki is the only human character that Goldenheart388 has written for:
  • To have a sibling, albeit a disappeared one.
  • To have their ID number be all one number.
  • To be at least somewhat invested in country music (and to have a Pokemon named in part after a country artist).
  • To have started out with 6 mons and not have a name for said first 6 mons upon their debut (Ingrid had the A*Team, and Owen had the Jura6).
  • To be of mixed ancestry.