And that's what happened." Harry said.
"I see, well I'm sure you'll do better next time. Now you have first hand knowledge about what you'll be up against." Replied the purple eyed woman.
Harry was currently in the pokemon center and had just got done telling Olympia about his first gym challenge over the video phone.
"Yeah, next time." Harry murmured to himself dubiously.
"You're not going to re-challenge the gym?"
"No, I mean yes er-, I mean I want to. But I shouldn't, so I maybe might not." Harry spluttered out, sounding unsure.
"You want to try again but you're not sure if it's the right choice, correct?"
Harry just nodded. He had been shell shocked right after the battle, though once the shock wore off he had been left feeling conflicted. He wanted to go back and challenge Roark again, then he looked at the 'in process' sign light over the treatment room and had thought about his pokemon whom had all been hurt. Then he had remember Roark's words from earlier, about how he had been so nervous and distracted from the beginning that he wasn't able to actually work with his pokemon properly until the battle was more than halfway through. He thought if he went in with a clear head and a better idea of what he was facing then maybe he would have a better chance of winning. But then he would think about the pokemon he knew Roark would be using and how strong they were, none of his team had any type advantage, and that maybe even if he were to go into a battle against him, even with a level head that he would still lose and end up back here with his pokemon hurt again.
He had been thinking in circles until he had decided that, maybe, he needed some advice. It was still a bit strange, in a vaguely good way, that he had adults in his life he could look to for advice and guidance at any given time. He had ended up calling Olympia, figuring that as a gym leader herself she would be the best person to talk to.
"Harry, are you considering giving up on challenging Roark's gym specifically or are you thinking of dropping gym battles all together?" She asked, making sure that her face and voice were neutral and free of anything that could be interpreted as judging.
"I'm not sure," Harry said, furrowing his brow in thought. "I mean, the only reason I challenged the Oreburgh gym was because I wanted to try gym battles to see if that's what I wanted to do."
"So, you planned on this gym battle being a sort of trial run, like when you entered the Enlightenment Town contest." Olympia stated.
"Yes," Harry agreed with a nod. "Maybe I should just stick with contest. Oh! And I forgot to tell you earlier but thank you for the formal clothes you sent me."
"Your welcome, I thought they would be useful. Everyone should have something to wear on special occasions." She said giving him a small smile at the thanks, before schooling her expression into a more thoughtful one.
"Harry, I don't want you to think that I'm trying to discourage you in any way. But are you sure you want to give up gym battles?"
Harry frowned. "I don't want my pokemon to get hurt like that again."
"Well your Sylveon didn't come out of your first contest uninjured, correct? But you still plan on competing in the Grand Festival. It's inevitable that your pokemon will take damage or be hurt whilst in battle, whether its in a gym or contest."
"Well, yeah, I know that but.." Harry trailed off not knowing how to respond. He did know that it was unreasonable to think he could become a pokemon trainer without any of his pokemon being harmed. Causing your opponent damage was one of the main points of battles and battles were how you trained your pokemon to grow stronger, and even in the wild pokemon would battle without human intervention. Harry had learned this from his time at the research lab.
" Harry are you sure that you're having second thoughts because you don't want your pokemon to get hurt or is it because you lost your battle to Roark."
Harry flinched back a little bit, hurt and a bit angry that Olympia was suggesting that he might be so much of a sore loser that he would use worry over his pokemon as an excuse to give up gym battles.
Seeing the slightly affronted expression Olympia was quick to clarify herself. "I'm not saying that you don't care about your pokemon or that you're making excuses to avoid re-challenging Roark. I'm just saying that losing could be contributing to your decision whether or not you even realize it."
Harry relaxed a bit at her pacification, though still looked less then pleased at the subject. "What do you mean?"
" I seen your final battle in the Enlightenment Town contest, your Sylveon took quite a bit of damage from that Poliwrath, but you managed to push back and overcome the challenge and once it was over and you had won, you were overjoyed and even found a new path you wanted to pursue. But in your gym battle your pokemon were also hurt though this time you weren't able to overcome your opponent and lost, now you're thinking of stopping your participation in gyms all together."
She noticed that as she went through her explanation, Harry's expression had shifted from slightly affronted to contemplatively ashamed. She gave him a small smile and continued.
"It's okay to be discouraged after losing or to even have second thoughts because of it. If you truly don't want to participate in gym battles its completely fine. I just thought you should think and be absolutely sure about the reason why you are making your decision."
"You want to make sure that I'm not giving up on gyms for the wrong reasons?" Harry asked confuse. Wouldn't giving up for the welfare of his pokemon be better than him being upset at losing?
"No trainor likes seeing their Pokemon hurt in battle, and nobody enjoys losing, but both are inevitable in any sort of battle. Time and time again I've seen trainers who couldn't beat me the first time around and had to come back a second, third, or even twenty-sixth in some cases, time before winning against me. But every time they came back to re-challenge me they came back with the same intent, to win, to overcome their challenge, to earn my badge. And the ones that came back repeatedly were always the ones I admired and held nearest to my heart. As a gym leader it's my job to provide a challenge to overcome that you can't find in your average run-of-the-mill trainer on the streets. And whether or not every trainer out there understands that, any trainer who wants to enter into the Kalos League knows that I'm an opponent they'll have to beat if they hope to achieve their goal. And the reason they want to pursue said goal is because they find enjoyment in battling, whether it be the feeling of winning or the developing bond with their pokemon that comes with it. There are many different reasons for trainers to set out and pursue their goals and many different ways to go about it. Personally I don't think there's a right or wrong reason as to whether or not you should or shouldn't compete in gym battles. I do think you should know why you're making this decision, is it because you don't want to lose again? Is it because you don't want to see your pokemon hurt again? Or is it because you genuinely don't like gym battles? Or is it maybe even a combination of all three? No matter the reason, the choice is yours to make. However if you do want a second opinion then why not ask your pokemon themselves, find out what they think now, after all of this?"
"Ask my pokemon what they think?" Harry parroted back.
"Yes, tell me. What emotions did you feel comeing from your pokemon during your battle?"
"I-I don't know. I was so nervous about challenging a real gym that I didn't really notice what they were feeling. I don't think I even noticed what Roark's pokemon were feeling." Harry said.
Now that he actually thought about it, he was a bit shocked that he hadn't been able to feel any Pokemons emotions throughout the battle. After being constantly in the company of his own pokemon, he had gotten use to just ignoring the constant tingling of their emotions in the back of his mind, and he normally always made it a point to read the emotions of any of his opponents pokemon when ever he encountered trainers on the road.
Now that he actually thought about it, he was shocked that he hadn't realized it sooner. Even if he was used to pushing aside his own pokemons emotions to the back of his mind, a trick he had read in one of his books from Olympia to keep his Pokemons emotions from overpowering or influencing his own ,he could normally tell exactly what they were feeling at any given moment. So the fact that he had completely blocked them out, without realizing it was a bit shocking.
"Really, that's very... startling." Olympia said, her face set in deep contemplation.
"What do you mean?"
Olympia was silent for a long minute before answering. "Harry, you've read the books I sent you about psychic abilities and their applications in the bond between people and pokemon.
Harry gave a nod of confirmation to her statement before she continued.
" You also know that you yourself aren't a run-of-the-mill psychic, you're also an empath and as such you have the ability to understand and feel the emotions of the pokemon around you. Though the ability to understand the feelings of pokemon isn't uncommon nor exclusive to people with psychic powers, the ability to actually feel what a pokemon is feeling in the way that an empath does is quite the rarity. Most people have theorized that empaths have a unique ability to instinctually create an automatic psychic connection with any pokemon that they come across, and that the more time they spend around any in particular pokemon this connection will grow stronger."
"It is believed that through that connection that empaths are able to receive the feelings of pokemon, allowing them to grow closer to pokemon than other humans." Harry added in, haveing alredy had similar discussions with Professors Oak and Sycamore.
"Yes, that's right. However that's not all there is to this connection. It has also been shown that empaths that have enough control of this bond can not only feel the emotions of pokemon but can also influence them."
That new piece of information came as a surprise to Harry. "You're saying than not only can I feel what my pokemon are feeling, but I might also be able to control how their feeling?!"
"I believe you may have already done so." She said.
Harry made a questioning sound, furrowing his brows at the gym leader.
"Pokemon are naturally much more capable of picking up on the emotions of people around them, I'd imagine that yours are even easier for them to sense. I believed you were so anxious about your challenge at the Oreburgh gym that its possible that instead of assimilating the feeling of the pokemon around you, you may have unintentionally been projecting your own feelings onto them." She explained.
"So I may have screwed up in my battle before even calling a single command?" Harry asked, dolefully.
"Like Roark told you, if you allow yourself to become flustered and anxious in the middle of battle you can't properly command your pokemon. But if both you and your pokemon are anxious and confused, then it's simply going to be impossible for you to work together in any sort of capacity and any attempt at rising to any sort of challenge will be doomed from the start."
Harry just look down at the floor, trying to process everything he had just been told.
His first-time jitters may have caused his pokemon to become so scared and nervous that he and his team had practically been steamrolled from the start of the battle. Honestly it just felt like one more reason why it was his fault his team had ended up in the Pokemon Center. If he had just gotten a hold of himself then maybe things might have turned out different.
'Or maybe it would have just turned out the same and it doesn't matter if I'm calm or neurotic. It's not like any of my team have any sort of advantage over rock type.' Harry thought to himself.
"Harry, the fact that you realize what you did wrong is the first step of improvement. You can't change the past, so don't dwell on it, learn from it and try not to make the same mistake twice." Olympia told him with a soft smile.
"Now, you wanted my advice on what to do. Well I think you should try battling Roark again, this time with a clear head and some knowledge about what you're up against. I know that you're probably still having some trepidation about gym battles, but I still want you to try again. This time with a good firm first step in to the battle, not the stumbling nervous start you had before. And this time afterwards, win or lose, I want you to really think about whether or not you actually enjoyed yourself, and then decide whether or not you wish to pursue Gym Battles."
Harry looked at Olympia for a moment, taking in and thinking about what she had said, before looking up at her with a steely determination in his green eyes.
" Alright, I think I'm going to try challenging Roark again." He said with a decisive nod.
"I'm glad to hear it, and I wish you the best of luck." Olympia said with a smile. "Now is that all you wanted to talk to me about or is there anything else you want to discuss?"
"No, I think that's all I needed for now. Thank you for talking with me."
"Of course, offering advice and guidance to trainers when they ask for it is part of my job as a gym leader. And as an older sister." She said, adding on the last part with a teasing smirk.
Harry looked down and laughed, feeling a pleasant tightness in his chest at Olympia's light joke. He knew she was referring to the fact that according to his fake background in the Pokemon world, he had been made the legal ward of her late father Valhalla, making Olympia his adopted sister. It still made him feel good, in an achingly strange way, to be referred to in such a familial way.
"Oh and one more piece of advice. Don't forget, just because you're in a gym battle doesn't mean you stop being a coordinator." She said cryptically. "Goodbye, and please let me know how things turn out for you after your rematch."
Harry gave her a smile and a nod. "I will. Goodbye." He said before cutting the call.
Walking back over to the waiting area of the center, he sat down thinking about Olympias parting words.
'Just because I'm in a gym battle doesn't mean I stop being a coordinator?'
After a few minutes of thinking it hit him and a smile stretched across his face.
Taking out his Town Map he opened a file that had a collection of contest videos from various internet sites and started going through some of the older ones.
*Ding Ding DingDingDing*
Harry looked up at the familiar chime and seen his name was on the Ready For Pickup board. Standing he made his way over to Nurse Joy to get his team. A new determination in his eyes and a new idea in his head.
He and his pokemon had some new training methods to tryout.
AN: Well yep that's what you waited almost three months for...what!? At least the story isn't dead. Though I am sorry you had to wait so long for such a short chapter, works been busy and by the time I get to my days off all I want to do is sleep or do anything does not require me to use my brain or body.
Olympia may have gone a little psychoanalytical partway through her talk with Harry , I was watching Hannibal when I was writing that scene and it may have had a little bit of an impact on my writing.
Well until next time. And as always thank you so much for all of the follows, favorites and reviews you leave me, they really really inspire me and make me want to write.