The sunrise came all too soon. I always slept the best after a full day of cycling. I gave my morning stretch and felt the light burn in my calves. Maybe I needed to take breaks for myself today. It had been some months since I'd rode such a distance in one go. Studies had taken priority over my riding, sadly.

Sleep quality was probably the only reason I was up this early, as well. The electronics once again agreed with me, as it was seven. Gave me time for a morning walk around at least. My movement caused the bed's other occupant to stir as well. She looked over to me with a sleepy blink.

I whispered. "You can stay in bed if you'd like. I'm just up early. Going to take a small walk around town."

She hummed and tugged the blankets over her further. I didn't blame her.

Quietly, so as not to wake Simon, I went about getting ready for the day. I exchanged the clothes I had unceremoniously tossed beside the bed with a new outfit from the pack and changed and got ready in the bathroom. Leaving a note for him in case he woke up before I was back, I made sure to grab my 'dex and set the alarm for nine before leaving then set out into the still sleepy streets.

I was content to wander aimlessly. A few cars travelled the roads and even fewer people joined me on the sidewalks. I passed one of the official League marts but I held off on purchases as I still needed to go through my pack yet to see if I needed anything major. Procrastination had got the better of me on that. Before long, my walk led me to the massive stadium that housed the Contest Circuit in Verdanturf. I thought it over then shrugged and entered.

The reception area reminded me of a larger, fancier version of a movie theater I had gone to in Rustboro. The walls held monitors, or were monitors, that broadcasted previous events and some of the flashier appeals of recent note. The concession stand and ticket booth were empty – no contests today apparently – but a couple people had their pokemon out and were chatting with each other.

A bright flicker from the wall beside me drew my attention back to the monitors. Being shown now was an appeal from the semi-finals of last month's sophomore major held here. A boy took the stage in regular attire, as costume wasn't being scored, and called out a pokemon I wouldn't have guessed.

'Let's put on our show, Caldera!'

In a flash of smoke and fire a camerupt appeared front and center with a loud bellow. With a flourish of his arm, the boy gave his next command.

'Set the stage!'

From the twin stacks upon its back red hot rock erupted and rained upon the stage and littered the ground with gravel. It spoke measures to its control that a circle of bare stage surrounded the two.

'Now light the skies!'

The gravel rose and clustered into five separate balls that hovered in the air around the duo. First, a pair, and then the other three soared into the air above them and burst outward into embers like fireworks before all coming together in a single ball. With a snap of his fingers, the orb of earth exploded out to cover the full stage in glowing coals, wisps of the dust burning out just before reaching the stands. The pair bowed as the last motes fizzled out to the fanfare of the entire crowd.

I had almost decided to use my last two years of schooling to become licensed as a Coordinator. The couple career aptitude tests given during high school had me more pinned as an engineer, and I had plenty of time to decide on a non-Training job, but there was something about being able to make imagination come to life with pokemon abilities. The career counselor was the one to give me the advice that led me to choose the electives I did and learn more about how pokemon could do what they did.

Power was like a muscle where you could work at gaining more in a fairly straightforward manner. Control, however, required knowledge and understanding. So, I signed myself up for a grueling course list of deep sciences and entry-level university work that I regretted almost instantly. I lost nearly every scrap of free time I had with my nose in a book trying to fully understand the concepts being presented to me. In exchange, I was able to see a glimpse of what truly happened in that appeal.

Most immediately think of the psychic type when it comes to manipulating objects, but in truth every type could control their aura outside of their bodies with varying difficulty. That appeal was a manipulation of ground and fire type aura on a scale I'd never seen before. These were the moments I had to remind myself to be mature with my envy. I could be great regardless of the fact a boy a few years my junior had enough practical experience to create fireworks with his camerupt.

A flash from a colorful commercial blinked me back to reality. I walked to a nearby table and picked up a pamphlet on the Contest Circuit. It was something I could leaf through and ask Clara about. It'd give me a good idea at what she'd like to do at least. Maybe I'd look back into my old school journals to rehash some ideas while I was at it.

I slowly paced myself back towards the Center, idly flicking through the pages as I let my thoughts wander. I was cautious entering the room to keep quiet but it seemed I didn't need to as Simon and his two were spread out on the bed watching television. The sound of the door shutting drew their attention and Simon's eyes were on me as I entered the room and seated myself next to my less sleepy bedmate. He looked to my pamphlet and grimaced.

"Aw, I thought you were cool. You want to do contests?"

I didn't skip a beat as I tapped him on the head with the paperwork and then chuckled at him. "I want to do what my team wants to do, whether it be battles, contests, or otherwise. Don't worry about popularity until you can get to a point where you can earn it." Turning off the yet-to-go-off alarm, I finally went about grabbing my giant hiker's pack and opening it up for inventory, setting aside my packed clothing.

"Alright, let's see what we got in here. Lords know it was heavy enough to lug around."

All in all I wasn't too surprised with the contents. There were more campfire tools than the essentials with a foldable grill-top setup for cooking over fires alongside a fish descaler as our main meat intake in Hoenn was from non-sentient seafood. Simon watched on as I set aside things like striking flint and different sized but matching sleeping bags. Clara's bag even seemed to be ready for her evolutions with how it was adjustable. The bottom of the pack had the items that surprised me.

The solar-powered radio was a nice thing to have to save charge on our handhelds and certainly had better speakers. The emergency medicines were pricier than I'd have expected to be given for free, but definitely something nice to have on hand just in case. It was the innocuous album laying at the bottom that got to me the most. It was a picture album consisting of different moments of Clara's life. I only glanced through the first pages right now as too much more and I'd be starting the day off emotionally and we still had to make it to Mauville. It was definitely something I'd be looking through tonight.

"Wow, they gave you a lot of stuff."

I sighed. "Yeah, it's why I was putting off looking through it. I have to pack it all back up. Why don't you go get ready for the day while I take care of this stuff. We can get some breakfast and head out here shortly."

He turned off the tv and hopped off the bed onto his feet. "Sure, I'll be out in a few!"

So began my repacking in relative silence. I felt the eyes upon me even before I'd started but I wanted to see how long it would take to make her act. To her credit, she lasted fifteen seconds longer than I thought she would, and ended the timer by poking me firmly in the cheek. I finished zipping up the pack to turn to her pouting face.

"I'm sorry for ignoring you, but I thought this would be my easiest way to test your patience. I needed you to not know I was testing you. You did very well. Will you forgive your poor trainer for tricking you?"

I put on the saddest face I could. It got me poked on the nose. I rubbed the spot.

"Alright, alright.. If you promise not to tell anyone, you can have anything you want for breakfast."

She folded her arms and tilted her head.

I sighed and dropped my head down in defeat. "Yes, anything."

"Ralts." She hugged the top of my head and I laughed.

"I'm starting to wonder who's training who around here."

She giggled and pointed to herself.

"Ain't that the truth.. Alright, let's pick up a bit and then we can set out for the day."

I set Clara on Simon's bed as I worked the sheets and pillows back into place on mine. Just because someone would come through to tidy the room up after we left didn't mean we should leave it in a poor state. Simon came out to the sight of me fluffing the pillows.

"Please tell me you're not one of those people.."

I looked over in confusion from where I was hunched over the bed. "What?"

"With the fluffy pillows and the towels you can't use and the fancy soaps. Bleh!"

I could only look at him incredulous with an eyebrow raised. "Um.. no? If you're talking about me making the bed, it's just common courtesy to pick up after yourself in a place that isn't yours."

"But why when you don't have to do it?"

"Well.. I guess you'd call it one of those grown-up things. The pretty answer is it shows you're thinking about more than yourself. My reason is my parents made me when I was younger. You're right that we don't have to but I'm sure it would show your parents that you're serious about being responsible and it would be a step towards being able to travel alone."

He sighed in defeat. "Fine.. It's fun travelling with you though."

I gave a half-smile as I picked Clara up so he could make the bed. "Thanks, but I'm going to be a lot less fun once we start training. I'm going to head down and put in for breakfast. I'm trusting you to check us out at the front desk, alright?"

"Sure, I'll be just a minute."

After having grabbed the pack and essentials, I quietly walked to the cafeteria with Clara on my shoulder. After some of our charades, Clara gave her breakfast request. I knew it was a bad idea as I was ordering it but a promise was a promise and so I could only watch on at the monster that was being created in her having an oran berry pancake. I swore I could feel her happiness as she ate her new favorite food.

Simon came down not too long after we seated ourselves and within the hour we were exiting Verdanturf with filled bellies and high hopes.

Mauville City put us back into the heart of urban life. Known as the Crossroads of Hoenn, Mauville drew in tourists and trainers alike due to its location in the center of the continent. Thankfully, tourist season hadn't started yet so travelling through the streets was still bearable. With any luck it would mean there'd be readily available training facilities as well.

I stopped us after our couple hour ride at a rest area near the city limits to give Simon's lungs a break and to look up a hotel to get situated in. Clara had hopped out of her basket to sit beside me on the picnic table, snacked on the remainder of the berries we had, and watched as I used my 'dex to browse for a reasonably priced mid-grade hotel to spend the next couple weeks in. If it was a single night I wouldn't care as much, but might as well be comfortable at the end of the day for after the physical training I was going to put us through. Softer beds were best for aching muscles.

We followed my G.P.S. app to our new temporary home to drop off our excess baggage and to swap into more fitting clothes for the workout, then headed on our bikes to a nearby gym/training complex. The younger generation automatically attached the term 'Gym' to the League, but it also referred to a place of physical improvement. Access to some light weights and a calm environment would be a great help.

Parking our bikes then getting situated in our own little section in the back, I began walking Simon and our 'mon through some basic stretches, a couple having to be adjusted for Radar's quadrupedal frame.

"We're only going to do some light training today. I'll ramp up the difficulty over this next week until we get to what will be our daily schedule. You might be frustrated with not seeing results instantly but this is the best for long term improvement. However, you have the final say. It's your team and your training and I'm sure things will need to be adjusted either way." With that I gave a small shrug. "Remember, I'm new to this as well. I have a lot of theory but I'm sure things'll change as we go."

I wasn't sure how much of that Simon heard as all I saw was a fire in his eyes.

"We'll train and train until I can win the league and you.. well.. you can make Clara into a big, bad gardevoir! Yeah! She'll fly, and shoot lasers, and win every battle!"

Clara had her hand over her mouth and was distant in thought. I was glad Moonblast was a very far away concept because maybe in a couple years she could be responsible with the power of fairy lasers.

"It might not seem like it, but this is going to be a step towards firing larger energy blasts."

Simon looked down at his legs then looked back up at me. "Stretching?"

I laughed. "No, Simon, strength training. Even if Radar were capable of firing an amount of water that qualified as a Hydro Pump, his legs wouldn't be strong enough to hold him in place. He'd be knocked backwards with almost the same force he was giving." I didn't want to derail the message with the fact that this opposing force could be used in unorthodox manners in battle.

Standing up from his calf stretches, he bounced on his feet. "Let's get started then!"

And we did. Two hours of touching on different muscle groups and core, leg, and arm strengthening. To be fair, Simon didn't start complaining until a half-hour in, so maybe to some degree he knew this was rough but possible. I could tell I was paying for slacking off in my routine due to being worried over finals. Even I felt a burn as we headed back to the hotel for the night.

Another change of clothes and we caught our breath relaxing back on our beds. "It gets better with time. Rest up. Everyone will need to stay out of their balls at night while we're going through this to promote the muscle growth." I heard a trio of groans. "Sorry guys, not doing it to make you suffer but the balls default you on entry so you'd be sore just the same when we let you out and a healing machine would rid you of the damage, which wouldn't make the muscles grow stronger."

Simon groaned and rolled over to face me. "How can you still be all smart when we hurt like this? I can barely think."

I chuckled then helped Clara and I under the sheets. I could tell she was grateful by the way she flopped onto the pillow like the dead. "I'd been exercising to some degree since I was young. Did sports clubs early on until I went full academic in high school. I've spent a lot of my life preparing for these days, so I'm glad I only hurt a little for it. It'll take a while but you'll get used to the workout with time. I'm beat though, so I'll see ya in the morning."

A mumble of agreement and the lights turning off led to a good night's sleep.

I added a half hour each day for the next four days, splitting the sessions between one in the morning and evening. There was a small session in the afternoons for going over elemental techniques and light sparring with the rest of the day being mealtime, downtime, or helping Simon get ideas for his upcoming gym battle.

Soon enough it was Saturday and I gave Simon the day off so I could meet up with Catherine and Clara's parents.