Silver: Seeking Respect.

I was flying through the route as fast as I could, so far, none of them had noticed what I'd done. I looked down at my palm to see a tiny ping-pong sized ball wobbling in between my fingers and smiled. It was mine. This pokemon was mine to command and nobody would stop me from becoming the champion, and then taking over Team Rocket. I would finish them once and for all.

Ha, how such a tiny, insignificant object contained a real living thing. I rolled it between my index finger and thumb, clicking the button and making it expand and shrink time and time again. I hadn't been watching where I was going. Turns out, neither had she.

I smashed into her with a loud thud, my momentum pushing her backwards so she cracked her head on the floor. Puddles from the continuous bloody rain splashed up at me and soaked me, and I spluttered as we lay sprawled at the edges of Cherrygrove city.

She coughed and muttered protests of pain as she shook her head and opened her eyes at me, her almond brown eyes widened. It was the girl back at the lab, the one who'd nicknamed her pokemon something stupid. She'd been oddly nice, despite how rude I'd been to her to get her to leave. "Oh! Sorry!" She squealed in a pitch that humans shouldn't hear let alone reach. She looked down at the way we were lying, and I realised what she was blushing at. My hand had landed at a very inappropriate place, and I recoiled away from her quickly. I grunted and scrambled back, holding a hand out to her for some reason.

She blushed and muttered her thanks as she took my hand, and I hoisted her up. She didn't let go of me straight away, and shook my hand politely. I raised an eyebrow, what a moron. She smiled at me, obviously as confused at my contrasting actions as I was. Uncontrollably, I tried to make her see that I wasn't somebody to be messed with. "You should watch where you're going." I snapped, and the confusion in her eyes grew more evident. Clearly, I'd made it worse. I rolled my eyes.

"I said I was sorry." She insisted. All I could do was grunt again, to which I mentally slapped myself.

"Oh, you dropped your trainer card." She bent down and picked it from the mud, wiping it on a clean part of her stupidly short dungarees and looking at it. Feeling a little violated, I snatched it from her and pocketed it quickly. How dare she just look? I didn't offer, did I?

"Silver," She smiled, and I winced. "That's a nice name."

I glared at her, Silver meant second place. I would never come first in my father's eyes. Of course, I was striving to prove I was better than the name I was given.

"Is something the matter, Silver?" She asked me, her insistence to use my name in a friendly gesture was starting to annoy me. Her eyes wandered over me, and lit up as she pointed to my hand; "You have a pokemon now! Did Professor Elm give it you?"

"Not exactly." I muttered, but she didn't seem to hear.

"We should battle! I've gotten really good at it while I travelled with Ethan. He left earlier to give the Professor his... uhh... parcel, and I stayed to train! Isn't that lucky?" She grinned at me. Who Ethan was, I didn't care, but I smiled inside at her suggestion. For I knew I had the upper hand. With practised ease, I clicked the pokeball's button and released my Totodile. It looked at me, slightly confused as to where it was. "We're going to battle now." I told it, and it seemed to understand the meaning in my words and nodded.

"Wow, your Totodile is strange!" She exclaimed, her eyes wide with surprise. She pulled a device out of her pocket, which scanned in my pokemon. It didn't seem bothered, but I was infuriated. How dare she insult my pokemon when her pathetic excuse for a fire type was called something ridiculous!

Upon seeing my glare, she shook her head; "It's definitely meant to be red and blue, see?" She showed me the screen, which a Totodile with blue skin and red spikes stood in its regular stance. I looked down at my Totodile to see it was green, with blue scales. I wouldn't have known it was any different, but the girl insisted it was true; "I've seen trainers go with a Totodile quite a few times, I've never seen one that colour. It must be really rare! Professor Elm must have really liked you."

I stiffened, yeah sure, I'd stolen his rare Totodile. Of course he would like me. Trying to act casual, I stepped away; "It's still stronger than your pokemon."

"We'll see." She beamed, even winking at me happily. I couldn't help but smirk with pity. "Come on Flo! Let's show Silver how good we've got!"

"Flo! Use tackle!" She threw her arms outwards enthusiastically. I had to roll my eyes again as I told my Totodile; "Dodge that." It did so quickly, and her Cyndaquil wheeled to try and tackle it again. Totodile jumped and looked at me for directions.

"Water gun." I told it, and it landed to look at me in confusion. The girl giggled as Cyndaquil rounded back and managed to tackle Totodile finally.

"Looks like your Totodile doesn't know that yet!" She beamed at me, seeing her chance. "Lets show them our Smokescreen!"

The fire type nodded and opened its mouth to release a jet of black smoke, engulfing the area to block my view of Totodile.

"Now tackle it again!" I heard her call.

"Scratch it!" I growled, surely it could do that, even I could do that. Cyndaquil came sliding out of the cloud, shooting a worried glance to its trainer as it shook out the pain.

"And again!" I yelled, taking advantage of the shocked pair. Totodile leapt out of the smoke, creating a stream following it as it fell towards Cyndaquil with a raised claw.

"Dodge it, Flo!" She cried, that sickeningly sweet smile wiped from her pretty little face. My smirk grew even wider as Cyndaquil narrowly dodged, but Totodile swung around to smack it with its outstretched tail. Clearly not a move, but it knocked the pokemon off it's feet.

"Come on Flo!" She cheered; "give it another tackle!"

The pokemon, all credit due, got up and began running. Totodile rolled its eyes. "Again." I grunted, and it started changing too. I was beginning to like this pokemon, of all the luck, I got one that was as determined to win as I was. It began dragging its claw along the floor, ripping up the ground as it ran fully tilted forward. This clearly wasn't the average scratch attack, it must have known something more.

"That's slash!" She exclaimed, and Cyndaquil backed out of the tackle attack to slide sideways out of the way.

"Let's switch to special attack!" She grinned, and I was - though I wouldn't admit it to her - impressed she knew the terms; "show them our ember attack!"

I scoffed, all that admiration suddenly flew out the window, I didn't even order Totodile to dodge. It smiled and took the attack, but we were both taken aback by the sheer force it caused, shoving Totodile across the space, into the remains of the smokescreen.

"Now Tackle again!"

"Slash it!" I barked, squinting to see, to no avail. Cyndaquil ran straight into the smoke, knowing exactly where Totodile was, and a mighty thump indicated an attack had landed.

"Quiiil!" The fire mouse pokemon flew out with no flames on its back, and landed in a skidded thump, unable to battle. The collision had caused the smoke to rise, and Totodile had too been thrown onto its back. It struggled, but got up and smiled at me.

Ha, my first battle and I won it. I beamed at the girl, who was picking up Flo.

"We can still win this! Go, Furry!"

Furry. Really? I frowned at her as she threw her pokeball, the ridiculous looking creature landing at her feet on its large fluffy tail. She grinned at me; "I never said it was a one-on-one battle!"

Dirty cheater, of course, she was right. Totodile and I couldn't back out now we'd accepted the challenge. It nodded to me with a new found strength. Before I could say anything, it was determined to show me it was ready, jumping in the air and, to my surprise, spouted a water jet in Sentret's direction. Why couldn't it have done that earlier? The battle with Flo would have been so much easier.

"Defence Curl!" She threw her arms out like before, enthusiasm sparking in her again. The Sentret coiled its tail around itself, taking the water gun easily, and shook off the drops. Even with the rain beating down to make Totodile's water attacks stronger, we weren't going to do much when it was defending itself.

"Now use Quick attack!" She called, excitement dripping in her high pitched voice. It made me want to vomit.

"Slash." I ordered, and Totodile planted its feet. The Sentret landed, but fell with Totodile because of the momentum. This gave Totodile chance to land a strong slash attack, sending it flying in the air.

"Water gun!" I jumped at the chance, and Totodile fired from where it lay, landing with deadly accuracy. The Sentret was sent higher in the air with a cry of pain.

"Furry!" The girl squealed, and Furry responded by expanding its round body and glaring down at Totodile. "Totodile is tired from Flo's battle! Lets finish it off with quick attack!"

She was right, but the Sentret was weak. It began to fall with outstanding speed, and I nodded to Totodile, who timed its jump to collide a slash attack with the quick attack. Taken by surprise again, the obviously lighter, but now faster Sentret landed its attack first. With gravity on its side, Totodile didn't have time to try and land its attack, and crashed into the floor with Sentret still stood on it. That ridiculous creature stood victorious, as my rare Totodile shuddered into unconsciousness.

"Yay!" She squealed with delight, jumping in the air and catching Furry. My eyes rolled for what seemed like the thousandth time since I'd met the girl, and I returned my pokemon.

"Are you happy now?" I said with disbelief, how had she won with that thing?

She stopped in her tracks and frowned slightly; "Well yeah, I won."

"Well I'm going to get better, and get more pokemon too. You only won because you outnumbered me." I growled, pushing past her. She grinned slyly as I did; "Keep telling yourself that, Silver."

I will, because it's true. I shot her another annoyed look, one that seemed to bounce off her vibe without her feeling it at all. Her smile did not falter, and she looked extremely amused, to my annoyance.

"I look forward to seeing you again!" She winked again, and I turned as red as my hair in anger as I clamped my teeth onto my bottom lip. Saying anything would only egg her on more.

"...Humph."