Grant and horsea woke early the following morning. Neither had really gotten much sleep, since they slept on the ground, but it shouldn’t take them too long to arrive in the Viridian Forest Village.

“I want to get a little more training in before we leave.” Grant said. Horsea wasn’t exactly raring to go, but he knew the training was necessary. They ate breakfast, granola bars and dry pokemon food, and then practiced the different water gun attacks. Grant thought that maybe, just maybe, the pressurized attack had been a little bit stronger. There was definitely a little more water in the attack at the very least. After training, Grant told horsea about the training they would be doing while on the road.

“I mentioned yesterday that one of the three things I want to work on is your speed. I think the best way for us to do that is sprint on and off the rest of the way to the village. Also, I want to make running a regular routine for us.” Grant said. Horsea cocked his head and pointedly looked down at his lack of feet to run with.

“I know you can’t ‘run’ but I think working on the speed you can manipulate the water globe you float on will achieve the same thing. Let’s just try it okay?” Grant asked. Horsea nodded, and they ran.

After ten minutes of sprinting Grant was bent over gasping for air. The positive thing was that horsea was in the same shape, as he sucked in great gasps of air. Which meant the training was helpful, and Gran was definitely onto something. They just needed to pace themselves and they would make it to the village in no time.

It was after their third ten-minute sprint, when Grant felt like he might keel over right there in the road that Grant called a stop to the running for the day. Horsea, who half a second earlier looked as if he might murder Grant in his sleep if he ordered more running, slumped in relief.

“We’ll do this before bed and when we wake up.” Grant said through gasps.

“Sea.” Horsea said dejectedly.

“Hey you!” Grant’s head whipped around at the voice. A boy, probably Grant’s age, was running up to Grant a mean looking smile on his face.

“Why me?” Grant questioned right before the boy did exactly what Grant had feared.

“I challenge you.” Grant and horsea groaned, still not recovered from their run.

“I accept.” Grant muttered. Their watches beeped, flashed, and a battle arena was projected onto the ground.

“Grant Wilson has accepted the challenge of Gideon Wright. This will be a 1v1 challenge. The loser will have 100 pokedollars credited to the winners account. Trainers and pokemon take your positions.” Grant groaned as he stood up from the road. The boy, Gideon, threw a pokeball, and he had a slugma. Grant’s eyes lit up at the sight of the slugma. Horsea had a serious type advantage here, they might have a shot.

“Horsea, we got this.” Grant said. Gideon snorted.

“Yeah right. My sister challenged you yesterday, and she said you were the easiest challenge she fought yet. What kind of trainer recalls his pokemon before they even take any damage?” Gideon said, sneering. Gideon’s last name suddenly clicked into place; Grant thought it sounded familiar. Well, if this was Ashley’s brother Grant would definitely enjoy beating up his slugma.

“The challenge will begin in 3, 2, 1”

“Horsea smokescreen and then watergun!”

“Slugma smog and then rock throw!” The battlefield erupted in a mix of purple and black smoke. Grant hadn’t expected Gideon to take the same approach as Grant, but if anything, it worked more in Grant’s favor.

“Horsea be sure to stay out of the purple smoke we don’t need you getting poisoned and keep those water guns coming!” Horsea’s first water gun had narrowly missed slugma, but some of the water splashed onto the lava pokemon, and Grant could hear the slight sizzle as the water boiled away. A big rock came hurtling through the smoke at horsea, who barely dodged in time, the very edge of the rock skimming the bottom of his tail. Horsea fired off another water gun, and this time it connected. The sizzle of the water gave away slugma’s position, making it easier for horsea to lock on with his attack. For the first time horsea did some real damage, as slugma let out a roar of pain as the water gun struck home.

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“Horsea dodge!” Grant called too late. A pair of rocks had come shooting through the air, dispersing the remaining smoke and smog. Horsea was too late to notice, and one of the rocks smashed into him.

“Horsea are you okay?” Grant shouted. Horsea looked a little dazed, and Grant doubted horsea was going to be able to move out from under the rock quickly.

“My sister was right, you are weak. Slugma send out another rock throw.” Gideon laughed. The urge to run over and punch Gideon in his smug face was strong. Horsea must have been feeling much the same, as he wiggled half of his body out from under the rock and was glaring daggers at Gideon.

“Horsea intercept the rock throw with water gun.” Grant called desperately. There was no chance horsea would be able to dodge pinned as he was. Grant watched as the rock soared, and a jet of water struck it just hard enough to throw it off course.

“Great job! Now water gun!” Grant saw the water build in horsea’s mouth, but he didn’t fire. For five long seconds the attack built, and as it did so slugma closed in. Then at the last possible second, when the slugma was right about to drown horsea in lava, horsea unleashed the strongest water gun Grant had ever seen. The attack geysered out of horsea’s mouth and smashed into slugma. The slugma screamed and went flying backwards a good five feet. Grant and Gideon froze staring at their pokemon. Slugma tried to rise, but the water gun was too much for him, and he collapsed.

“Grant Wilson is the victor of this challenge. Your league record has been updated to 1-1. 100 pokedollars have been added to your account.” Grant’s watch said, but Grant wasn’t listening. He was grinning and running over to horsea.

“You did it horsea!” Grant called, before flinging the rock pinning horsea down, and scooping the exhausted pokemon up in both hands. He was breathing rapidly; the last attack clearly took a lot out of him.

“Sea.” Horsea said weakly.

“How did I lose to a weakling like you? My sister’s mankey destroyed your horsea!” Gideon shouted, breaking the nice moment between Grant and horsea. Gideon’s face had gone red with anger, and he was steadily marching towards Grant. He hadn’t even bothered to recall his injured slugma yet.

“I don’t know what to tell you.” Grant said. Gideon put his face right up in Grant’s face.

“I want my money back.” Grant was stunned, never had he heard of a trainer losing a challenge and demanding their money be returned. It was simply not done.

“Um no.” Grant said. Under no circumstances would he be giving up his hard won pokedollars.

“Then I’ll have to take it from you.” Gideon growled and pulled a fist back to punch Grant. Before he could though a vine whipped out and snagged the boy’s wrist. Gideon stumbled and fell to the ground. Grant was just as surprised as Gideon, but Grant was quick to pull up his watch and flip through a few screens. At last, he arrived at what he wanted, just as Gideon broke free from the vine.

“Leave now, or I will send this.” Grant said and gestured to his watch screen. It was a form all trainers had access to so they could report illegal conduct in regard to a challenge. Threatening another trainer to get back challenge money definitely counted as illegal conduct.

Gideon’s face paled slightly at the sight of the form. Gideon could lose his pokemon if the league deemed the crime severe enough. Grant didn’t think that would happen, but if he had actually hit Grant with that punch.

“Fine I’m going.” Gideon grumbled and recalled his slugma. Then he started down the road back towards Pallet Town.

“This isn’t over.” Gideon promised. Grant wasn’t listening though, he was staring into the grass on the side of the road, wondering what had shot out the vine to stop Gideon from hitting Grant.