***

  League Tower, an architectural marvel. Built by the hands of men, and the strength of pokémon. Nestled well within the heart of Ever Grande city, where many trainers arrive with a dream and leave with a lesson.

  Crowning the League Tower is the Champion’s apartment, set above everything else so that the Champion may stand guard at the East, where Johto once threatened to pour through and invade, under a different name, in a different age.

  Walls of polished granite rock carved out and unbroken all the way to the foundations. Gilded with pale platinum engravings that glistened like running mercury, and a tall ceiling, 50ft high. The apartment was ample and open-plan, fitted with an office close to the entry, and a long, oval table big enough for a royal feast at the center. There were square, clear windows low on the far-right side, for a view overlooking the great city, and tall, blue-tinted ones above them, running up to a few dozen feet short of the ceiling.

  There was a loft on the far-left side that served as the champion’s private space and sleeping quarters, with chalk white steps leading up and down from it that had met with the soles of a great many champions. They were fenced by a meticulously hand-crafted wooden balustrade of deep brown mahogany.

  The light of dawn was reflected on a set of mirrors at the upper edge of every high window, sending sheets of sunlight running parallel across the ceiling that illumed the room with natural light.

  At times, Steven Stone regretted taking on the Champion’s mantle. The title, for all its boons, laid on you its equal measure of demands.

  If anybody thought it was a simple job, anybody needed to check their sources. This was not a job you ever got cruising on, or one in which you got the privilege of comfort.

  When you didn’t know any better, the Champion was simply the best pokémon trainer in the region, and that about summed it up.

  Show your face at the yearly Conference, defend your title against the top contender if needed, make several public appearances and a couple of interviews – all the showbiz pizzazz...

  A little dash of politics and ambassador work to help maintain regional stability, and serve as the country’s military poster boy or girl, should the situation demand it.

  If only.

  A champion was an elite battler – yes,

  A champion was at a competency level reserved for the top most percentile – right,

  A champion had what it took to lead both people, and pokémon – absolutely.

  But Steven Stone wasn’t the Champion because he was the best at any of those things, per se. He was just the rare type of person that had the trinity of blessings needed.

  The skill.

  The desire.

  The timing.

  If you lacked any of those three, becoming the Champion was impossible. Skill was hard enough to acquire, but desire was either there or it wasn't. Timing could be engineered, but in the end, it really did come down to luck.

  You could be the very best trainer in the world, take down the Elite 4 and pluck the champion cherry from the top, but that still wouldn’t earn you the title if the LCA didn’t like you. In practice, defeating the reigning champion only made you a candidate for the position.

  He had learned that first-hand after defeating the previous champion, Ludael. The endless screening, appointments, and finally, introductions.

  Ludael had served as champion for eight years before Steven came along, and though their Conference battle had been glorious, even a younger Steven could catch the hints of fatigue in the man’s eyes.

  After a few years holding the title, Steven now understood why. He wondered if that’s how he’d go out too, eventually. Tired and hoping someone with the right disposition would come along to relieve him of his post.

  He had asked Ludael, more than once, if he had purposefully, with perfect subtlety, thrown the Conference final to allow the new champion’s rise to the throne, so to speak.

  Ludael always denied it. “I have a rule, Steven, and that is to never spend yourself completely. Never give 100% of yourself to a battle. After all, of what use is the win if you cripple yourself? If you wind up at the mercy of death?”

  At the time, Steven hadn’t been completely sure what he meant, and Ludael could see that.

  “Don’t you fret about it. You forced me to go as far as I was willing, and you still came out on top. That’s what matters here… Unless you really came here for my head?”

  …

  Steven learned a lot from his predecessor, more by personal inference than actual discussion, yet he took those words to heart. Unless the option was off the table, never give a fight your 100%. Leave enough in the tank to escape and recover. The best kind of champion was a living champion.

  However, what he did give himself fully to was the idea that the Conference, the region’s top sport though it was, was not a stage to insult the public’s intelligence.

  He had made his Elite 4 enter pact and promise to depose of challengers as quickly and efficiently as possible. Especially in public.

  Trainers needed to know just how much further they needed to go, and allowing them levity for the sake of spectacle was a disservice to the region. It went against the reason why the League was founded in the first place.

  People today tended to forget that pokémon battling didn’t start out as a sport. It started out as a necessity for survival.

  The desk phone rang.

  - “Mr. Stone, Councilman Nesmer wishes to meet with you,” said Geneva over the line.

  “A councilman? It wasn’t on my schedule.” He gave the slightest shake of his head. A chat with a councilperson at this early hour didn’t particularly enthuse him. It normally meant more work on his table. At the very least it meant having to sit through another talk on how precarious the League’s finances were becoming as of late, with the whole New Age of Trainers overhaul.

  He sighed. “Any idea what it’s about?”

  He could hear the tiny huff and picture Geneva smiling courteously over the line.

  “He’s right there, isn’t he…”

  - “He is, sir.”

  There was a brief scuffing as the phone exchanged hands.

  - “Steven, you can make the time,” Councilman Nesmer said gruffly. “I presume you’ve heard the news of Lilycove?”

  Steven’s brows sprang up. What’s happened now…

  “The news – what news? Good morning, Councilman.”

  Nesmer scoffed. “How is it you’re always the last to know?”

  Steven’s apparent lack of attention to every minute detail of what went on around the region had become a point of irritation for many a councilperson.

  “Come on now, Councilman, even I need to sleep, unfortunately. Whatever it is, I’m sure you’ll forgive my ignorance.”

  …

  - “Another earthquake, Champion,” Councilman Nesmer said in a tone of voice that made it seem as if it had been Steven’s own fault. “5th magnitude this time!”

  Steven opened his mouth to speak. The words got caught in his throat.

  He glanced across the spacious room at Baramelor, his mighty Metagross, who was currently in a session of psychic sleep and clinging to the polished, earthen backwall like an arachnid on a web.

  “Come up, Councilman,” he said dryly.

  “Thank you.”

  The phone was handed back to Geneva.

  “Geneva, let him through, and cancel any workshops scheduled for the week.”

  - “The entire week?”

  …

  If there had really been another one of those earthquakes, it wouldn’t be a matter that’d be settled in days.

  The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  “Yeah, go ahead, just to be safe.”

  As Councilman Nesmer rose up the floors on the elevator to the Champion’s apartment, Steven fidgeted with the daedalium ring around the base of his pointer finger, picturing the city of Lilycove…

  Viseya, come to me.

  Within a few seconds, a Claydol came hovering down the stairs from the loft, whining faintly and tunefully as she moved through the air.

  Steven felt her prod his mind.

  ~ We move now, soon? ~ she impressed upon his thoughts.

  “No,” Steven replied aloud, then continued telepathically. We have a visitor coming. When I tell you to, I want you to make him leave. Be as careful as possible, Viseya. He should think it’s his idea.

  ~ I do it. ~ the Claydol reassured him.

  Steven placed a hand on Viseya’s smooth, stone body. Cool as always. The rings on his fingers clinked against her, and he let his hand rest there momentarily. Her rosy, gem-like eyes glowed faintly as she psychically infused the rings.

  Any morning lethargy evaporated from Steven’s mind. Thanks, Viseya. Now go and hide.

  ***

  “A-one! A-two! Fire!”

  Salia fired a concentrated barrage of Bullet Seeds at Pern, who had rooted himself in the ground, bracing low, and took the entirety of the volley head-on.

  “Keep it up for as long as you can, Salia!”

  Salia whined emphatically as the glowing pellets shot out of her mouth and zipped through the air, striking the Aron on the iron shell-like carapace encasing his head. It rang like a school bell.

  Andrea watched them attentively, paying specially close attention to the sound her Aron’s metal made when struck.

  It’s not quite there yet, but it’s changed so much.

  Pern, like all other aron, benefited greatly from blunt force training. If you were a trainer and failed to incorporate the method into their training, they’d instinctually go ahead and smash into things themselves. They needed to strengthen the metal in their armor through hard impacts and the right mineral diet.

  Despite being a known steel-type, the metal on a wild or a neglected aron was much closer to iron than steel, and that had quite the negative impact on its defensive capabilities.

  They said iron was inferior to steel in everything save its fire resistance, but since aron was also part rock-type, it was more durable against fire than other kinds of steel-types.

  For now though, hardening Pern’s steel was Andrea’s top priority. Doing so would develop the Aron’s ability to use extremely strong physical moves without suffering injury, and as a consequence, also be able to withstand attacks that’d normally knock him out.

  This kind of training would have been faster if she had caught herself a geodude already, but the closest golem cave was almost half a day’s trek away, and a few ranks too high for her to attempt going solo.

  Her seven-year-old little brother and his Slakoth just wouldn’t cut it as her backup.

  She even looked for one on the RTS at her local Poké Center, but geodude just wasn’t a very in-demand pokémon currently. The only trade offers she saw were for pokémon that were nowhere near the Slateport area. One wanted a chimecho, another wanted a numel with Yawn, and another offered an “about to evolve” female geodude for a cacnea.

  She hadn’t even bothered with the WTS – the fees involved were just a little too high, and importing pokémon from abroad could be a lengthy process. In international trades, the pokémon you sent over wasn’t received by the person you were trading with. It first got sent to the region’s Pokémon Trade Customs Center, where it spent a variable amount of time, getting thoroughly checked before getting cleared for trading.

  Besides, she didn’t want a geodude with a history. She wanted her very own.

  “Harden, Pernie, and stand up!” she cheered encouragingly amidst the ringing din of bullet seeds bouncing off his iron-encased head.

  Pern, eyes wincing, pushed himself up from the ground on his short legs. He whined defiantly as the iron on his body took on a light-catching gleam.

  The ringing sound of the bullet seeds striking metal went up an octave. The octave of steel.

  “That’s how it needs to sound without using the move!” Andrea reminded Pern. “Walk toward Salia! – Salia, take a breath and Bullet Seed again!”

  ***

  On one of Clearcloud’s shores, dressed in her wetsuit, Luvia strolled up the beachside with Mida at her heel, and Taillow on her shoulder.

  It was the weekend, October, and she had almost read through the entire folder of exam notes twice. She hadn’t totally memorized it, but she was confident she could come up with an answer to any question posed on any of the topics.

  Nelly’s birthday gift, the berry book, she had also added to her studies. She had been surprised and delighted that some of the sections on the exam notes mentioned berries, and Nelly’s book went into even more depth, allowing her to beef up her answers to the mock questions littering the end of every section.

  Everything was looking well on track.

  She had finally used Glacia’s gift of Aurora Veil in actual battle, and come to understand why the woman had referred to the move as a “shield.”

  The pretty lights took the smack, the slap, the crash, or snap of pokémon moves used on her.

  Against a playful trio of wingull, buffeting her with water gun attacks, she had called for Aurora Veil and seen how the water blobs reacted when they met with the shimmering, cascading halo of light that’d surround Mida briefly. The water seemed to spray and slow way, way down.

  It was weird.

  She thought it was an icy effect of the ice-type move, but when she looked close, she saw that it wasn’t so. It was more like whatever passed through the light had entered a different medium. Like throwing rocks into a pool with all your strength, only for them to slow and hit the bottom with a gentle little tap.

  Not quite to that extent, and in no way like the sure proof barrier Protect provided, but good enough that Luvia saw why Glacia had called it a shield.

  An added bonus was just how enchanting the move looked. The auroras would flare and change color when something went past them, and the effect of the move would linger for a few seconds after Mida stopped channeling it.

  In battle, it really did need careful timing.

  …

  Taillow on the other hand…

  Taillow hadn’t learned a move yet. At a month old, that was kinda worrying.

  Twilly. That’s what Luvia named him. No new moves and still the occasional dropping to clean up in the house. She had made a promise to call him something silly, and stuck to her guns.

  But it wasn’t even a bad name. Certainly not as bad as Poopy Dillydum-dum. The ‘T’ and the ‘W’ and the double ‘L’ from ‘taillow,’ and a small dose of deserved ‘silly.’

  It was cute, and Luvia felt it suited him the moment it had come out of her mouth.

  Maybe when he evolved, she’d change it to Swilly… or just outright Silly if, god forbid, he hadn’t learned a move yet.

  No, that won’t happen. He’ll pick one up today. I’m sure he’ll pick one up today!

  The beach sand shifted under her sandalled feet as she moved along, for a surprise meeting with one of the only other bird trainers she had met on the island.

  Racerboy Kevin. The boy was in the distance, further along the beach, clique of friends hanging and milling around.

  His pair of wingull worked in near-perfect sync during his races, blowing gusts against the sails of his wonky racing ships. Luvia figured he might know something about teaching birds new tricks.

  She had come with a backpack stuffed with Mida’s harness – just in case he asked for a race in return. She hadn’t seen him since their first one, despite Luvia promising to return. There just hadn’t been much of a reason to. First of all, she didn’t actually enjoy being around a crowd of boys. She didn’t enjoy being the center of any crowd. Period.

  She had only looked past that the first time because she really needed the money.

  She would only look past it this time because Twilly really needed a move.

  It was something she’d have to get used to though, if she planned to challenge a Gym or take part in a contest, so she buckled up and braced herself for the noise and the torrent of stupid silly banter.

  “You’re allowed to poop on any of them, Twilly,” she said, shifting her head slightly at the Taillow on her shoulder. “I hope you do.”

  Boys were sure to love that, and it’d help make everything less awkward.

  When they spotted her approaching, they cheered from the distance and Luvia watched them alert Kevin, who had been squatting next to the latest model of his ship, checking something within its single-person hull.

  His head bobbed up, and his eyes darted from her, to Mida, to Twilly, then back at her.

  His friends were already asking where she had been all this time, why she hadn’t shown up for the rematch, if she planned using Taillow today. She could only answer the volley of questions with sheepish smiles and single words.

  “Finally showed, huh?” said Kevin, wiping his brow. He had a new haircut – one of the fashionable mainland fades that were becoming popular on the island.

  “I did.” Luvia cringed out a smile.

  “Girlfriend’s back to put him in place!” whooped one stupid boy, much to everyone else’s delight.

  Kevin looked appalled. His eyes flicked nervously from Luvia to his friend as his brows tightened in a livid frown. “What the hell, dude?!”

  He gestured apologetically at Luvia with a hand. “He’s just joking.”

  Well, duh. Luvia waved it off. “It’s fiiine,” she said in a practiced cheery tone.

  The boys groaned happily. Luvia laughed at their sheer dumbness.

  “You hear that?” one said. “She said it’s fine!”

  Kevin turned and grabbed the rim of his racing ship’s hull. He began dragging it to the shore, keeping his face a straight as he could and choosing to ride out the teasing.

  *Chirp!* *Chirp!*

  Twilly had been chirping, but in that crowd, Twilly was outchirped. Luvia had overestimated the Taillow’s presence. The little bird was a nobody to these boys.

  Mida still got plenty of love though, getting a playful tag here and there, which she knew well enough to take in stride.

  Luvia jostled up her backpack, holding the straps, and walked beside the racerboy.

  “I didn’t come here to race,” she told him. He eyed her but kept dragging his ship along.

  “I’m still getting in the water.”

  “Oh, ok…”

  Twilly chirped loudly again, this time at the pair of wingull circling overhead, seemingly right over Kevin. Luvia recognized them.

  “How’d you teach them?” she asked, leaning closer so that he’d hear her over the noise of banter in the background.

  “The birds?”

  “Yeah!”

  He glanced at Twilly on her shoulder, whose tiny, clawed feet kept digging at the wetsuit as he shifted for a better view of the other birds in the air.

  He was a boisterous whirlwind at home, but he went meek when pokémon besides Mida showed up.

  “Teach them what – blowing on the sails?”

  Luvia shook her head quickly. “No, like, a move. Just a move.”

  She didn’t like the way his brow crinkled up.

  “What do you mean, like gust?”

  Her eyes lit up and she nodded repeatedly. “Yeah!”

  “Oi, Kevin!” one of his friends called out behind them. “What’s the pot today?”

  “None with her – she ain’t racing!”

  Luvia smiled wincingly as the chorus of mankey cried betrayal.

  “Why’s she here then!”

  The troupe of mankey cooed. “She came for a chat?!”

  “Should we leave you two alone, bro?”

  “You taking her offshore in that ship of yours?”

  Laughter.

  Luvia huffed in exasperation, but she couldn’t hide her smile.

  “Growl, Mida!”

  Tail fin flickered, Mida turned and faced the boys.

  “Rweah!” Her scream cut through the air like a saw. Kevin’s wingull squawked back in agitation. Twilly let out a loud chirp that tickled Luvia’s eardrum.

  The little group of boys staggered in surprise, some of them yelping out, then immediately started guffawing with laughter.

  “I’m here to race!” Luvia announced. What the hell, she was in the mood now. It was only fair, anyway. Give something, take something.

  “Eyyyyy,” they cheered.

  Kevin was smiling too, still dragging his ship.

  “If I win, you’ll help teach my Taillow how to use Gust, alright?” It was perfect. Why hadn’t she been like this from the start? This is how you dealt with boys. Play their games, then make demands. Simple!

  Kevin looked confused, but he nodded anyway. “And if I win, you pay me back double the previous pot – did you bring your boat?”

  Luvia’s mouth fell open. ?800. That was double the last pot. ?800 on a stupid race? That was a pokéball in the mainland with some change to spare.

  She remembered that it was technically what they had kind of, sort of agreed to when he paid her at the end of their last race.

  Oh, well… She could feel Neela’s ghost breathing down her neck. “I brought the leash. Don’t need the boat.”

  “You don’t need the boat?!” he echoed loudly. “What, are you gonna swim?!”

  Luvia smiled cheekily and nodded.

  He shrugged and shook his head with a smile of his own. “Easy money, then.”

  “Pfff,” Luvia scoffed. “Okay.”

  She pinched the lenses of her swimming goggles hanging around her neck and brought them up to her forehead.

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