CHAPTER 207

"That. Was. Awesome!" Denzel yelled as he clapped my shoulder. "You destroyed the hell out of her! I don't even care about the preventing her switch thing, the rest was just great."

Cecilia scoffed. "You were wonderful, but Maylene was quite rude to you—"

"She was a bitch, that's what she was," Pauline said. "Good job out there, gremlin."

"She was an asshole, that was for sure," Denzel nodded. "She said that Grace didn't work hard, I mean, are you joking?"

Stop it. Don't praise me, I thought. I knew I'd won, but they were all ganging up on the girl because I looked completely reasonable during the battle. And yes, I did expect it to happen, but I looked… squeaky clean. She was probably going to be under fire for a while for insulting a challenger.

The guilt was beginning to seep in, but it wasn't a debilitating affair. The damn goal had been to look good for my sponsor, not appear like a psychopath, and potentially make Maylene grow as a Gym Leader, and I had maybe achieved all of those. With the way my friends were reacting, I'd definitely achieved the second one.

"Grace?" Cecilia worriedly said. "Are you alright? Did the fight tire you?"

"Yeah, I'm good," I finally answered. "Just try to lay off Maylene for a bit. She was ruder than she should have been, but I'm no innocent angel either. We were, uh, we both kind of went overboard."

My girlfriend raised an eyebrow. "Did you?"

With one look at her face, I knew she'd figured something out. She knew me best, after all, and my tactic was relatively easy to spot with enough context. Cece could probably tell that I felt somewhat guilty and my confession only made it easier.

"All you did was fight a way she didn't like," Pauline said.

"Look, we can go back to the Center and I'll explain there. For now, just let the trash-talking go."

"You two spoke for a while down there," Cecilia noted.

"Yeah, I'll explain," I said. "For now, I've got to get my Pokemon healed."

The walk to the Center was a short and brisk one. Pauline couldn't stop telling me that people were being wildly toxic to Maylene on the forums. People were glad someone had finally knocked her down a peg and had stood up to her, which was fine, but the nasty comments and insults were not. I realized that thinking this made me somewhat of a hypocrite. After all, had it not been me who had planned to bring up her father? Who had subtly broken her down to the point of tears? The road to hell was paved with good intentions, and while yes, Maylene was probably going to grow from this, I could have been a lot more normal while still helping her.

That trick with Infernape, for one. I had taken it too far. Almost every Pokemon felt pain from battling, so one being hurt was nothing unusual, but drawing out the process had been needlessly cruel. The effect on Maylene probably would have been the same if I hadn't. There was an emotionless monster within me that I was not scared to embrace, but that had not been the time nor the place. There was a lesson to be learned here. While using every tool to win— including trainers and how they thought— was a valid strategy, there was a point where it stopped being appropriate for a Gym Battle, or any battle really.

So I wouldn't stop studying people, as well as their Pokemon whenever I had a tough battle ahead of me, but I would not go as far as I'd gone. Against people that wanted to hurt my friends or my family, however? No holds would be barred.

I handed all of my Pokemon except Jellicent to Nurse Joy and we made our way to my room. Thank goodness Mira was busy with other stuff. She was trying to code moves into her Porygon's brain to bypass how expensive TMs were, but she wasn't having a lot of luck so far. She probably would have chewed me out for this and figured it out right away.

Or maybe not. I didn't know if she'd care about my behavior if it wasn't related to Team Galactic.

"So? Spit it out?" Pauline demanded with her arms crossed. "Emi's sick and I need to take care of her. Denzel, you're coming with me right after this."

"Uh, okay?"

She did have a cold, which would probably delay their group's departure a little. She was really bummed out about it too. It seemed like so much time had passed, but our time in Veilstone was soon going to come to an end. So many things had happened, and yet we had spent less time here than we had in Hearthome.

"I played mind games with Maylene," I said. "I saw all of the pressure her duty brought her and I took advantage of her. Some of it was benign and valid strategy, like switching before she could get her revenge on one of my Pokemon, but the other stuff… it got pretty bad."

I was too much of a coward to tell them about Infernape.

"How bad are we talking?" Denzel asked. "I mean, it's not like you'd be the first to do this anyway. Gardenia does it all the time."

"Her crying, that was planned. Every word out of my mouth was planned too, it was all engineered to make myself look better and her look worse. I thought that the experience could change her for the better, but I wouldn't have stopped if it didn't and she completely gave up. I also… uh, kind of used her as a stepping stone for potential enemies. Real enemies."

"Yeah? Well, she deserves it," Pauline immediately said. "It's not up to the Challenger to care about a Gym Leader's mental state. They're supposed to run a damn city and you have to treat them with kid gloves?"

"I don't know…" Denzel muttered.

"I thought you looked off, but I figured that was just me. Your face was completely still. You have that stare you do when you're focused, but that went beyond that," Cecilia said.

"What do you think, then?"

"I think Pauline is right," she said.

"Even if I'm ninety percent sure that Maylene is only this way because her father is some kind of screwed up perfectionist that raised her to be a Gym Leader from birth and that she feels massive amounts of pressure because of it and I used that to my advantage?"

"Yes."

"Even if I'd planned to bring her father up to her before she cried to press her buttons?"

She hesitated this time. "...Yes. You know how I am with fathers," she said. "I'd be horrified if you used mine against me—"

"I would never—"

"I know you wouldn't," she smiled. "But you realize this was wrong. That's the difference between good and bad. You try to improve at all times, and you make the best of what you have."

"Thank you," I sighed in relief. She gently grabbed my hand and squeezed it.

Denzel finally broke his silence. "Yeah. It was arguably fucked up, but… y'know, it's kind of what I expected out of you. Wait, that sounds really wrong— I didn't mean it in a bad way. You idolize Gardenia, so I expected you to start using body language and stuff like that. I didn't know about mind games though. Just don't go that far against me, yeah?" He finished with a twinge of anxiety.

"I won't, I promise."

"And that doesn't absolve Maylene," Cecilia added. "She is horribly unprofessional, but I suppose that's what I should have expected from a person as young as her being shoved into her role. You say her father raised her for this?"

I nodded.

"I wonder if she even wants to be Gym Leader deep down," she pondered as she sat.

"I don't know, it was hard to tell."

"Can't she just designate a successor and quit?" Denzel asked.

"With Team Galactic running around?" Cecilia shook her head. "I don't think Cynthia would let go of an Aura user that she can order around that easily. You saw her during the battle, right? That thing she did with her eyes, it revealed Pokemons' weak points and it allowed her to see through the pillars."

"It's like Chase's Lucario," I said. "I don't think she sees them as much as senses them, along with moves. She's a prime military asset."

And Cece and I both knew Cynthia's more sinister leanings now. Denzel and Pauline, however, did not.

"And there's also the pressure her dad's probably putting on her," I quickly added. "It's hard to say no to your parents, especially when you lived your entire life for this purpose."

"Yeah… shit, I kind of feel bad for her now," Denzel scratched his head. "She was annoying to fight, and I got kind of heated when she started shit talking you. I guess no one came out of this the good guy."

"Eh. I still think it falls upon the Gym Leader not to have a crisis in the middle of battle," Pauline said.

"That's true, but I think I kind of lost sight of the fifteen-year-old girl too. She's not just a Gym Leader. She's a kid just like me— younger than me, even. I apologized down there when we were talking, but she hates my guts. I don't blame her," I said. "It was ugly, but I hope she'll change. Unfortunately now she's going to be flamed."

"She was already being flamed online before this, but it'll be intense for a while. I bet you that in one hour there'll be clickbait videos about her too."

"I thought the government copyrighted any of their footage?" I asked. "They're strict on that stuff."

"They are, but people find ways around all of those systems to make reaction videos. You can dim the footage, cut it, blur it. Some of it always slips past the Porygon."

I exhaled. "Nothing I can do about it now. I doubt any further apology would go well, and it'd be best to let her be. I hope she pulls through alright."

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

They didn't stick around that long after that, although Cecilia stayed. I placed Buddy inside a cold bath so he could get back on his feet quicker and remembered I did have to call Melody before hanging out with Cecilia, and discussing my contract was private. I was surprised she hadn't called me already. I had to call her four times for her to answer, which was very unusual. Melody was a punctual woman.

"Mel? Everything okay? Did the company see my battle?"

"Sorry, I felt the phone vibrating, but I couldn't answer. I was in a video call with the board of the sponsorship department. We were talking about you. Congratulations on your victory, by the way!"

I quivered in anticipation. "Thank you. So? What did they say?"

"Like I said, you're getting your raise. I only had the okay from one of them, but the full board has agreed," she said. "350,000 Pokedollars per month, effective in March. Unfortunately though, they didn't budge on moving your salary to the beginning of the month. I even tried to ask for a simple one time bonus like you got at Solaceon, but they weren't convinced. I'm sorry."

I clenched my bedsheets and bit my lip. "Did they say why?"

"Multiple reasons. One, they're just like me and terrible at battling. They don't even look at the battle, just the final result. That was why they were so pleased after your fight with Fantina. I know it's unfair, but it's how things work up there. They're in charge, but they're very disconnected from the entire thing. They have people that give them a rundown of how different battles went, and they're more qualified, but they really didn't like the score this time and there's also the fact that you stopped Maylene from recalling Infernape. Apparently people don't like that? Also, they're used to Craig, and he routinely pulls out 3-6 against most Gym Leaders, and you're supposed to replace him. It's tough, and it's not very fair, especially since you're just a first year, but that's how big companies work. To them, you're a name on a screen that generates revenue. They don't know you like I do."

"Damn it," I hissed. "I wanted a Shiny Stone so badly."

"You're still getting it next month, right? It's not the end of the world."

"I wanted to evolve Princess and get her started on flying and flying classes as soon as possible," I said. "An extra month screws me. I'm going to be very busy in a few months and I would have liked to knock the license thing out of the way."

And also, I was kind of envious that Denzel had already bought his. Not enough for it to affect our friendship, it was just me being stupid and immature. Knowing my luck, I'd get pulled into some grand conspiracy that'd stop me from going to classes, and unfortunately due to a lack of personnel, only people with a Pokemon capable of flight were allowed to sign up, even for the knowledge test.

"I'm sorry," Melody said. "There was another reason too, which is related to something important we have to talk about. Your contract's changed and I'm going to need you to come here to sign the new version. The government knocked on Poketch's door asking to alter your contract. Remember those five tournaments you had to be in? That's gone now. We'll still pay you the bonus for it, but you're no longer obligated to participate."

"What the hell?" I muttered.

I knew that Cynthia had told me about changing my deal with the Poketch Company. I had just expected her to tell me first. Had she actually screwed up Melody's pitch? The board was mad at me and it wasn't my fault at all. Yes, there was still the first point that Melody had brought up, but maybe— no, not even maybe, it would have made the board more amenable to my request.

"I'm not going to ask why the government cares about your time, but with how domineering they've been getting lately, it was out of the board's hands. It'd be preferable if you came to sign the new contract today. They've sent me a physical copy and I can send someone to pick you up."

"Fine. Send them now, please. And Mel?"

"Yes?"

"Thank you for trying. You're the best sponsorship liaison I could have asked for."

"Don't sweat it. I've got your back."

With my plans to maybe go to Unova this summer when all of this blew over, it'd be nice if Melody could come along— if she even wanted to. Someone would have to be there to represent me, after all. I hung up, told Buddy I was leaving for a bit and left my room. Slowking and the League Trainers shadowing us would be enough protection. Cece had been waiting in front of my door.

"You look angry," she noticed.

"I am angry. I'll tell you in the car."

"The car? I thought we were going to visit Emi."

"I'm going to the Poketch Building for stuff. It's urgent, but it shouldn't take long. Can you come with me, and we can hang out after? I need to destress."

"Of course. With how hard you were working, we didn't have much time to be together since our date. I was going to ask you out anyhow because I figured you'd need to relax."

"You know me so well," I smiled.

"By the way, Mira called me," Cecilia said. Her voice became a whisper, barely audible. "We got permission to go to Lake Valor today."

I restrained a scoff.

So Cynthia screwed me over, and then she did this? Did she think that would make me forgive her?

Complicated metaphor or not, Mira had been correct.

She really did think us to be characters in a damn dating sim. Even the Poketch Company, bar Melody, treated me like a pawn.

Hopefully when I grew further in strength and reputation, the company wouldthink twice about crossing me. As for Cynthia? Well, she knew damn well I wasn't going to do anything, not with Team Galactic there. Hell, I wasn't even sure if she realized I'd be pissed. I had told her that I lacked in time, and she might have thought she was doing me a favor, but Arceus, talk to me first.

All I could do for now was keep my head down, but this lack of agency was quickly getting on my nerves.

—

I had signed my new contract, and it was as Melody said. It had been written the exact same way, save for the five tournaments. Granted, them being out of the way certainly helped with my time crunch, but for Cynthia to do this without my input? I was pissed, damn it!

Cecilia took me to see some kind of tourist attraction in Veilstone's east. A set of huge craters from an ancient meteorite that had fallen there eons ago, and strangely enough, no vegetation had filled the deep gashes in the earth. Nature had not reclaimed its place, and all we were left with was an enormous quarry-like crater. The space rock had split while entering Earth's atmosphere and created the three craters, and a few chunks of the meteorite still remained deep in the hole. They were a dull grey and not very interesting, but the history of it was. Geological data suggested that a crater in the Sevii Islands in Hoenn had appeared at the exact same time, and there was some strange DNA on the rocks that scientists had never seen before, which was why going into the craters was prohibited. You could only stare from afar.

It was a nice date, and I promised I'd be the one to pick the location for the next one. Cecilia wasn't even surprised by Cynthia's decision due to how controlling the Champion was, but what truly baffled her was the fact that she hadn't even bothered to contact me. Either way, I'd make sure to speak my mind whenever I saw her again.

Even though my team was out of commission, I still found myself at home on route 214's mountainous slope. I spent hours there with Sunshine and Buddy, speaking about anything and everything. His experiences at the depth of the ocean, what school was like when I was a kid— and he even shot me a disappointed look when I explained the grading system to him and I told him I hadn't been great at it. He did strike me as someone who'd demand his kid had excellent grades. Even though he'd fainted to Maylene earlier, he was still well enough to speak and float around. Turtonator sometimes chimed in, and in his opinion, school seemed like a useless waste of time. Suddenly, Jellicent's eyes glinted with a sinister red, and I understood why soon enough. There were steps. Not unnatural, considering this was a route, but we'd never seen anyone come this high up in the mountain. It was where I'd trained the entire time against Maylene.

I slowed my breath, motioned downward with my fingers and Jellicent sank into the floor, ready to drown anyone with nefarious intentions. It was only a few seconds later when I realized that Lou probably would have intervened if this was a dangerous individual that I was about to call him back up, but Justin was the last person I would have expected to show up.

"I thought I'd meet you here," Justin said. "They say this is your favorite spot."

I recalled Turtonator before he could do anything rash.

"Justin! Are you alright?!" I asked. "I haven't seen you in forever. I… heard about you, though. And people know I come here?"

The pale boy dipped his head. His thin frame had changed and grown lean. He was nowhere as well-built as Chase, but it was easy to tell he'd been working out.

"They know, but they steer clear. I figured it'd be better to give my old teacher one last visit before I left," he said, his voice completely still.

"I thought you— wait, that might have been too harsh, let me rephrase. Did you want to see me?"

With his emotions all but gone, I would have thought Justin wouldn't have cared about seeing me or not. He hadn't even contacted us since the battle against Louis, and we'd tried to find him for hours to no avail.

"I wanted to test myself. You see, I won against Maylene around three days ago, and now I have my team back."

I froze. "How did you fight her?"

"Using the path of least resistance, of course. I hit her harder than she hit me, and she let me win rather easily," he shrugged. "When I saw that Pauline had also won, I went to go see her. It was around two hours ago or so. She told me that she'd accept when I got my head out of my ass."

"Did that… hurt you at all?"

"Hurt me? No. She was hurt, though. I could tell," he said. "Will you also deny me a battle?"

"Justin… I can't battle you," I sighed. "Most of my team is at the Pokemon Center, but even if they weren't, I can't reward you for this behavior."

I bit my lip and stopped. Was this hypocritical of me? Even I leaned into my fairy leanings at time. No, Justin was simply incapable of backing out. Of realizing what he was doing. Unlike me, he couldn't know when to back out.

"Listen, I'd like to see your Pokemon. I haven't talked to them in a while, and I heard you got two new—"

"Very well. I will be on my way, then. Apologies for bothering you."

"Wait! When you get to Sunyshore, talk to Louis. Battle him too, if you want. I'm sure he'd be willing to accept, and he'll give you a challenge this time. You want your team to grow to survive Victory Road, right? Tough battles will get them there."

Justin stared, his face unmoving. "Perhaps. If he performs better against Volkner than his disappointing showing against Maylene, then I will consider."

"Good," I sighed. "Good. And I'd like for you to speak to Mira's Alakazam too. He can figure something out and potentially get you out of this rut."

"Out? I feel fine as I am. I am progressing leaps and bounds and by next year, I will easily make it to the Conference. Then, my position as the future head of Pherzen will be secure."

"Come on, Justin. I know you know deep down that this isn't you. You just can't bring yourself to care. I just want you to take the first step. Help me help you. I'm your friend, and I… I've also been changed by Type Energy, only fairy instead of dark. Alakazam can figure something out, I'm sure of it."

His face didn't change, but he stared at me longer than was needed at that revelation. I thought that he'd changed his mind, and that me having gone through a similar event would help him talk to me, but he didn't stay for long.

"Farewell, Grace," he said, dipping his head. "We will probably meet again in Sunyshore."

Justin left the route, and I assumed he was on his way to Sunyshore. He'd probably make it in four to five days— possibly faster considering his one-track mind. If I could get one conversation in with his Pokemon… with Arcanine, his oldest companion, then I'd be able to make them stop this suicidal Victory Road idea. Was it pragmatic? Yes, and it made sense if he ignored the fact that he'd be risking his life every single day. Damn it.

"You can come out," I exhaled. "You didn't even have to hide anyway."

Jellicent slipped through the ground and emerged in front of me, right where Justin stood. The perfect position for Drown.

"He's not himself, but there's no need to be alert. He wouldn't hurt me."

Buddy had never particularly liked my friends. He even didn't care much for Denzel or Cecilia. He was a family Pokemon through and through, and he focused entirely on them. I couldn't fault him for that. They were my friends, not his. The water type clicked and said it was better safe than sorry.

"You're alright," I said, caressing his wet cheek. "It's okay to relax sometimes. You can't be on guard all the time. Anyway, we're going to be leaving soon… as soon as Chase wins his gym battle, really. Sunyshore's an electric type gym, so you'll be taking a step back for the battle, but think you can start working on Water Spout again?"

The water type nodded and began to float away.

"Not now," I chuckled. "You're on break. You were wonderful in that battle against Maylene, but it hasn't even been a day. After you master Water Spout, we'll start experimenting with your ghost side again."

It was a delicate thing to balance. Dual typed Pokemon could either lean into one side completely like Bella had or walk the tightrope. The benefits of ignoring one's type could bring fast progress with the other, but long term, I believed it to be better to not neglect either, which was why I'd started Princess on Air Cutter (beyond Maylene being a fighting type Gym Leader). It was trickier with Sweetheart. Her evolution would turn her into a rock and dark type, but Tyranitar were still as good as ground types at ground moves. Or at least that's what my minimal amount of research had told me. There weren't that many trainers with the species.

"Now, you wanted to tell me something?" I asked as I grabbed my physics textbook. My training against Maylene had made me put my studies aside for a while, and I also rereleased Sunshine, who huffed at the fact that I thought he'd randomly murder a trainer. I supposed he'd grown past that phase.

Buddy nodded as he settled next to me, his shape hugging the boulder I leaned against. He whispered something in my ear and I felt a chill. His breath was cold.

He wanted history textbooks.