Anicca

A few days ago Tracy took me to see the historical sites of Violet city. She said she was "scienced-out" and needed to spend some quality time with her pokémon before he could completely win me over. It was a nice break, except I've never been a big fan of history; too ambiguous if you ask me. People who write history always twist it, no matter how hard they try not to.

Tracy has most of her memory back now. She says that she remembers everything but the last couple of months before she got injured. I guess that's a good thing, because then she'd know that she not really my trainer. Not that she does much for me...

"Blackjack I'm so nervous," he said.

"You'll do fine, just remember what I told you."

I tried to sound confident, but honestly I don't think he'll win. Not that I don't think he's good, it's just that practice in the woods and fighting nerds is no substitute for real battles. I just don't think he has the experience and knowledge required to win.

"Come on Blackjack we get to sit in the team box," Tracy said.

Why do they always pick me up! I have dignity! It actually hurts to be picked up you know.

"Marcus! Testing! This is Tango Romeo Alfa Charlie-"Tracy said.

"-Knock it off! It works!" he yelled.

"Kick his ass!" Janet screamed.

I may not know Janet very well, but from what I've heard she doesn't take rejection very well. His 'team' might actually do him more harm than good. The most important thing he can do now is stay calm and I don't think angry ex-girlfriend and Private Tracy are going to help with that.

"… master of the skies - Falkner!" the announcer blared over the sound system, "The challenger is - Marcus Green! Hailing from Vermillion city he's… never lost an official battle!"

That's technically true. He's never had an official battle. The announcers supposed to play up the challenger and get the audience fired up, but even this gym doesn't see many trainers with a completely blank record. It took a lot of convincing on Falkner's behalf to even let him battle. It's a pretty funny story actually.

"I choose you," said Falkner, "Let's make this a good match."

A skarmory huh? I wish Sarge was here so I could see if he knows the guy. With a skarmory battling first this should be an easy decision. He could actually win here.

"Go Charles, I mean Spinarak," said Marcus.

Oh no, Oh Hell no! The nerves got him, he's screwed! How could you forget the most important thing I taught you.

Confidence is everything.

"Why are you so worried Tracy, he would have sent Charles out sometime," Janet said.

"Yeah, but skarmory is part steel type. Steel types are weak to fire types," Tracy explained

"You're saying that skarmory is made of steel? There's no way it could lift off with a wing span that small! It has to be something lighter. That's the problem with biologists, they just lump all the pokémon together into groups with no consideration for others. My magnemite is called a steel type, but really it's an alloy of cobalt and…"

Looks like Tracy got Janet started on a science rant again. It the little time I've spent with her, she's done this about a dozen times. This is going to be the worst gym battle ever.

"Use spikes again," Falkner commanded.

"Try poison sting again," he said.

Well at least he's using my strategy so this may not be a total blowout. I may not fight much anymore, but I still remember enough to give him a chance.

"No, Marcus! Steel types are immune to poison!" Tracy shouted.

Aaaaand my entire strategy goes down the crapper...

"I apologize but I am weak to birds," Charles said, "I wish I could be of more help."

"That's okay, if your trainer is smart he'll have you using good strategy, we'll just work on dodging attacks."

Is it vain of me to call my own strategy good? Getting poison inflicted on your enemy and letting time take them out is frowned on by most people, but we don't have many options here. It's his job to get poison inflicted, all I can do is supply the time.

"We're going to have magnemite here swoop down and you dodge him."

"Yes!" magnemite showed.

Most people think magnemites are just computers, but I've heard they're part biological. They don't have a mouth so they don't really talk per se, but you can get a yes/no sort of answer by looking at their eye. Even though we don't communicate too well, Janet's magnemite is a pretty friendly guy… er girl?... genderless thing.

"Might I have some advice for dodging before we start?" Charles asked.

"Yeah I was just about to get to that. There are three things to remember about good dodging. One, do the least amount of work possible; you don't want to tire too quickly. Two, keep your eyes on your enemy. Three, you have to avoid falling into a pattern."

There were probably more secrets but that's the best I could do. I pretty much just make up everything on the spot. As long as you say something with confidence people will believe anything. That's why I think confidence is the most important thing a trainer can have. If the whole world believes something is true, it is.

"Well that's just great poison sting is Charles' only attack!" he shouted.

"… another thing that biologists dropped the ball on, metal types can't be completely immune to poison unless they are unaffected by the toxins themselves and even then I'm sure that poison-types don't all use the same bio-chemicals. It's probably just the carapace that most steel-types have, blocking poison based attacks. I doubt that the metal is highly…"

"That's it! You'll have to land an attack on an unprotected part of the body," Tracy said.

I guess my strategy isn't completely unusable after all. He's still going to lose though, uh... knock on wood.

"Skarmory use steel wing," Falkner commanded.

"Charles just dodge and use string shot," he said.

I don't really see what he's doing here. I didn't pay attention when the referee was outlining all the rules, but I distinctly remember the one-switch rule. You'll be at a disadvantage for a second while you regain some momentum, but at least poor Charles won't get beaten senseless without a fighting chance.

"Try another steel wing," Falkner said.

"I can't this totally nasty gunk is all over me!" the skarmory responded.

Repeat 'string shot' and 'steel wing' ad nauseum: wow this is so boring. Charles has been dodging like I've taught him to for the past fifteen minutes and half the audience is asleep. That skarmory looks like a poorly decorated ghost from all the string shot that's covering her. How much string shot can one spider hold?

"Use peck," Falkner told the skarmory.

"I better get a bath later," she grumbled.

"I'm sorry for the mess," Charles said.

Why is he apologizing, this is a fight!

"Charles, poison sting in the mouth!" he commanded.

Oh, now I get it! He's a better strategist than I thought. I'm actually pretty proud.

"Bwaaaaaa!" the skarmory howled in pain.

I can't believe that worked, he's much better than I thought. Too bad Charles went down, with that much string covering her I bet he really could have let her soften up with all his juicy little poisons. He put up a real good fight but the odds were just too stacked against him. Now his only hope to win is Laura, I just hope I taught her well enough…

"Uncle Blackjack I'm tired of this," said Laura.

"I told you to stop calling me that."

Seriously, she needs to stop it's weirding me out. Ever since I've started training her she's been calling me uncle; I feel like that creepy guy whenever she says it. That's not who I want to be.

"This is boooooooring," she said.

Yeah she may be a little more mature, but she's still a puppy at heart. At least she pays attention during battles, even if it's only for a little while.

"If you don't practice, you'll always lose."

"I don't wanna lose…" she said.

"Then hit me again."

One of the advantages of being an umbreon is that you can take a real beating. Throw up a light screen and fire barely hurts. I don't know light screen, but if I did I'm sure fire would hurt even less.

"How was that?" she asked.

"Not bad, take a step back."

"Why do I have to be so far away?" she pouted.

Why do ask so many damn questions! I like to think that I'm pretty patient, but she's just ridiculous.

"Because you're fighting birds and they'll be up in the air; range is what you need to practice."

"But, I'm tired" she whined.

"Fine, take a break. We'll train moving targets after lunch."

"Thanks Blackjack."

"Go Growlithe!" he cried out confidently.

Well this is certainly a change for the better though, I doubt it'll do much for him at this point.

"Ember!" he commanded smugly.

Holy hell! I didn't know spinarak web burned so well. I would probably be yelling obscenities like that if my body was on fire. I'm just glad Falkner had the judgment to step in when he did or there could have been some serious immolation tonight. I wouldn't tell Sarge this, but it smelled pretty good...

"… bauxite. But then the crystal structure- Hey he won?" Janet asked.

Finally, she stops with her rant. As much as I'm inclined to like his family, Janet makes me a little suspicious. She reminds me of someone I once knew. I think I'll be watching this one.

"Marcus don't get to cocky, you're down right now," Tracy warned.

She's right, I almost forgot about the spikes. I bet Tracy was a pretty decent trainer before her accident. I wonder what happened to her other pokemon?

"Go staravia!" Falkner said.

I've never seen one of those before. It looks foreign.

"Leer!" he said.

"Quick attack!" Falkner retorted.

I'm glad to see he's using moves that don't deal direct damage. That a sign that he has real potential. Of course, leer does nothing for ember, but it's the thought that counts right?

"Laura ember!"

"Wing attack!"

"Ember again!"

"Mud slap!"

"Wow this one's going by fast," said Tracy.

Okay, Tracy didn't really say that. It was pretty fast, but it wasn't that fast. I kinda got a little distracted. All I'm going to say is that when you hunt for your own food, you have to take advantage of whatever comes your way.

"Speed's not good for Mark, his only advantage now is strategy," Janet said.

What happened to 'kick his ass'? She's right but come on, she doesn't have to be such a downer. I should just be happy her stupid rant is done.

"Go in for a quick attack," Falkner said.

"Let's end this, bite!" he yelled.

I could lie here, but let's cut the crap: he won! I may have got lost in the moment a little there, but I remember Laura triumphantly standing on that bird. Just because you have the chance to lie, doesn't mean you should. I think it must have been a pretty intense match, because the crowd didn't pour out a soon as it was over. They were all screaming and shouting as he waved the zephyr badge around.

It's funny how worked up we all get when he wins that tiny hunk of metal. It hardly seems worth worth all the fuss. I guess you could say it represents the victory, but it seems like some people get more worked up about the badge. A lot of things are like that.

Take sprout tower for instance; the most famous site on the tour we were on. Tracy was so disappointed when the guide said that we couldn't go inside the "world's oldest tower" because it was closed for repairs. We had to settle on walking through the garden that surrounded the tower. I'll admit it was quite a lovely little garden; the way the tower reflected in that placid lake gave it this transcendental look, if that makes any sense. It reminded me of the last time I was here.

Anyways, Tracy managed to convince a tower caretaker to let us in and we had a personal tour of sorts. The actual history of the tower was pretty dull, but the modern history really grabbed my attention. The caretaker explained that every few months they would repair the most damaged part of the tower; whether it be the walls, the floor, the roof or any of the little pieces in between. They were all periodically taken out and replaced with newer wood so that the tower wouldn't collapse on some unlucky tourist. Only the massive center column had never been replaced.

Personally, I wouldn't call it the 'oldest tower' if everything was torn out, a column isn't a tower after all.