Author's note: Yo! How's it going, peeps?
A quick note. One of the appeals last chapter has been altered slightly, because what the heck, man, what do you mean Roserade can't learn Poison Powder?! I mean, I guess that one's on me for not checking, but seriously. Look at that thing and tell me it doesn't look like it can learn Poison Powder.
*annoyed huff* So yeah, I changed it to Stun Spore. Same appeal, different colour. Now it's orange, instead of purple. *grumble grumble*
But anyway! Regardless of that, I hope you enjoy the new chapter!
Chapter Twenty-one: Shocking Scoop
Back outside the pokémon centre, Buneary was buzzing with adrenaline as she ate her pellets. Though she hadn't seen Togekiss' appeal with her own two eyes, she'd heard the cheering crowd and the positive comments from the judges. Her friend had totally nailed her performance! She'd nailed it straight to the wall like a pro carpenter!
"(A good first day, wasn't it?)" Absol asked from beside her.
She smiled at him. "(Heck yeah!)" she replied. "(I can't wait for my turn!)"
Hopefully, it would be tomorrow! Then she could show the world that she was up there with the winners' crowd! She'd dazzle them all with her confidence! Her fancy footwork! And, of course, her amazing combinations! She'd been working super hard this past week, so she felt more ready than ever to strut her stuff!
"(Yeah...)" Absol looked down at his bowl in contemplation. "(... I know I'll be competing at some point, but... I wonder if it'll be good enough...)"
She beamed in amusement. This guy was so adorably modest!
"(I'm sure you'll do great! Greater than great! The greatest that ever did... great!)"
He looked at her in surprise. "(You really think so?)"
"(Yep! I'm sure of it! You'll blow 'em away!)"
A tiny blush appeared on his face. "(Well... thank you. I appreciate that.)"
"(No problem!)"
"(Are you competing?)" she heard Skitty ask nearby. "(Huh? Huh? Are you?)"
She turned to see the pink cat smiling brightly at Pachirisu, her tail wagging back and forth.
"(Yeah, I think so!)" Pachirisu replied. "(I remember Dawn saying I was. Dunno which round, though!)"
"(Oh, me too! Me too!)" Her tail wagged faster. "(I wanna watch your battle! I'll force my way out of my pokéball and watch your battle!)"
Pachirisu giggled, a bright smile on his face. "(Cool! I should do the same!)"
"(Oh, please do! Please do! I've been training super duper duper hard!)"
Her wagging tail suddenly smacked her in the face. She stared up at it in wonder. After a few seconds passed, she batted at it with her paw. Once. Then twice. Beaming, she started chasing it in a circle.
Pachirisu never stopped giggling.
"Oh, that's right!" Dawn suddenly said from the nearby picnic table. Buneary turned around to eavesdrop. "May, you said you'd tell me what distracted you guys in Sinnoh?"
Curiously, both May and Drew's faces reddened slightly. Ooh, juicy gossip! Of course Buneary wanted to hear this! She listened in intently.
"O-Oh, right..." May replied, smiling sheepishly. "Well, I did say that, so..." She glanced at Drew, but he said nothing. Turning back to Dawn, she continued. "Well... see... we started dating near the end of Sinnoh."
Buneary's eyes bugged in surprise.
Dawn leapt to her feet in shock. "What?! Really?!"
"Yeah. Don't tell anyone, though. We're trying to keep it low-key."
Dawn blinked. "You are?"
"Yeah." May smiled awkwardly. "See, Drew has a lot of fangirls... and I don't know how they'd react if they knew he had a..." She glanced around cautiously. "... You know, a girlfriend."
Drew rolled his eyes, but said nothing.
May chuckled. "Especially someone he's rivals with. I can only imagine the backlash."
"You're exaggerating..." Drew grumbled.
She lightly frowned at him. "I am not!"
"Wow..." Dawn replied, sitting back down, "well... congratulations! Though I'm sorry you feel you have to hide it." She paused. "... Wait..." She gasped. "That's right, you are rivals! And you're dating?!"
May sheepishly put a finger to her lips. "Shh, not so loud..."
"I still don't see the need to hide this..." Drew grumbled.
May turned to him, looking exasperated. "I just said why!" She turned back to Dawn, smiling sheepishly again. "But yeah... we are."
Dawn blinked. "... What's... that like?" she asked.
May blinked back at her. "Huh?"
"Dating your rival, I mean. Has it... caused problems?"
"Oh." Smiling, May sighed. "I guess it has, yeah. Aside from the fangirl problem, there's other things. Like... I thought it'd be fun to share battle strategies, but Drew really didn't like that idea."
"... I guess that makes sense. You're still competing with each other, after all, right?"
"Exactly. So, if we go to a contest, and we both want the same ribbon, only one of us can have it." May's smile turned sheepish again. "Drew beat me in two contests, so he kind of... refused to enter the next two, just so I could get some ribbons..." She glanced away awkwardly. "I won the first one, but then lost the second to Harley..." She sighed again. "We got into a huge fight over it. Me and Drew, I mean."
Dawn blinked in surprise. "Really?"
"Yeah. I didn't exactly wanna be handed the ribbon. I wanted to work for it. Though, at the same time, we didn't wanna compete for it and... it was all one big mess."
"Wow..."
"We almost called it quits and broke up... said it wasn't worth the hassle... but..." She gave a determined smile. "We managed to work past it."
Dawn's eyes widened. "How?"
"See, I... really, really like Drew... and I... really, really like competing with him. So, in the end, I said I want both!"
"Both?"
"Yeah! I wanna be together and I wanna compete! 'Cause competing helps us better each other. Plus, it's exciting! When I realised I was starting to miss that excitement, I told Drew not to hold back anymore!"
Drew gave a proud smirk next to her, yet said nothing.
May beamed. "And, then, it started working out again!"
Dawn blinked, a look of awe on her face. "So... you can compete... and still be happy?"
"Of course! Sure, the road was a bit bumpy for us at first, but it smoothed out! If you like the person enough, then... well, I guess you just have to make it work!"
"I see..." Dawn looked down in contemplation.
Wow. Such a beautiful story of love triumphing over the odds! Or at least heavy affection, whatever. Still! Buneary couldn't help but feel awed by the story.
... That, and a little bit jealous.
"Are you okay there, Dawn?" May asked.
"Huh?" Dawn replied, looking up. "Oh, yeah!" She smiled, waving a hand in dismissal. "No need to worry! I just..." She slowly lowered the hand. "Were you guys friends before dating, or...?"
"Hmm? Well, yeah!" May chuckled. "Though it took us a while to get there, too! Drew was a real meanie-pants to me when we met."
"Hmph," Drew replied. "I was not."
She pouted in his direction. "Yes, you were. You were a real jerk."
His response was halfway between a smile and a smirk as he sipped his drink. "Well, maybe a little. Sorry about that."
May was still playfully pouting. "Darn right you're sorry." She turned back to smile at Dawn. "Anyway, yeah. We were friends. Though we weren't always."
"... Could..." Dawn asked slowly, "the same be true for... two rivals who are childhood friends?"
Buneary's ear twitched in intrigue. What was this she was hearing?
"Well... maybe! Why do you ask?"
"'Cause... I have this friend... and I figured out he liked me near the end of Sinnoh. I thought about it a lot, while I was travelling though Hoenn... and realised I liked him, too..." She stalled. "But..."
May's eyes lit up in realisation. "Oh, I get it! You're worried about the whole rivals thing, right?"
"Right."
Buneary's eyes widened. Wow, this was the first she was hearing of this. Her trainer had kept this pretty tight-lipped! Tighter than a tightrope-lipped!
Dawn sighed, before continuing. "... He asked me to travel with him... which was when I realised he did like me... but I didn't really know what to think at the time... or what to do... so I said no. I just wanted to cheer Ash on in the Sinnoh League. Then, much later, when I realised I did like him..."
"You thought about the rivals thing?"
"Yeah. I started thinking... 'Is it really a good idea to travel with your rival? Won't it cause problems, like learning each other's strategies and... getting in each other's way? Won't it cause strains in the relationship?' Stuff like that."
May chuckled. "Seems we had the same thoughts on that."
Dawn took on a tone of disbelief. "Apparently!" After a moment, she also chuckled.
"Well, it worked out for me, so maybe it'll work out for you! How much do you like this guy, anyway?"
Dawn blushed. "... Quite a bit."
"Then it's fine, isn't it? We found our rhythm, so I'm sure you will, too!"
"You think?"
"Yeah!" May glanced at her boyfriend. "Right, Drew?"
Drew nodded. "Yeah," he replied. "You can be friends and rivals, and still date. We found that out the hard way."
May laughed. "He isn't wrong! It's kinda like advanced friendship!"
Dawn blinked. "Advanced... friendship?" she asked.
"Yeah!"
"We still give it our all in contests," Drew explained.
"Yep, no holds barred!"
"And we found we like it best that way."
"It's like it was before, with us being friends and rivals, but with added benefits!"
Drew huffed. "That you don't like to do in public..."
May hesitated. "Well... you never know with those fangirls..."
With a heavy roll of his eyes, Drew reached across the table and placed his hand over hers. She jumped a foot in the air.
"Drew!" she cried.
He smirked at her. "What?"
Her face was bright red as she scowled at him. "You... You... You're just impossible!"
"Well, you must like it if you're dating me."
She turned away, pouting, and Dawn burst into a fit of giggles at the display.
... Buneary couldn't deny it was cute, but, man, was it ever making her jealous. She turned away, also pouting.
The following day, Pikachu was seated on the couch of Cynthia's villa, watching the second round of the Johto Wallace Cup. Sitting around him were Ash, Iris, Axew, Cilan, Cynthia and Jervis.
There were only sixteen coordinators left, all of which would have to battle one-on-one to get a spot in the next round, later that day. They, of course, had to battle using the indoor pool, just like when they'd done their appeals. It provided an interesting new challenge, as they had to create workarounds to their combinations, to incorporate the water.
Currently, two trainers Pikachu didn't know were putting on an impressive show against one another, using every pool-based advantage they could come up with.
"Wow!" Iris said gleefully. "Contests really bring out the glamour in a pokémon, don't they?"
"(Yeah!)" Axew replied happily. "(They're so pretty!)"
"I agree!" Cilan replied. "They add quite the exotic flavour to a dish already ripe with ingredients!"
Iris groaned. "I can't believe I never knew these things existed..."
Cilan chuckled. "Well, to be fair, Unova was kinda left out of the loop on that one."
Iris paused. "... An ingredient left out of our dishes, you mean?"
He blinked. "Um... wh-why, yes! That's exactly it."
Ash heaved a sigh, resting his chin in his hands. "Aww, man..." he said, "I'm only watching this 'cause of Dawn..." He pulled a tired face. "I'm missing out on so much training..."
Iris groaned again. "Ash, will you give it a rest with the training?!" she snapped.
Cynthia chuckled lightly. "It's good to see you working so hard, Ash," she said, "though it won't do any good to obsess over it."
"I wholeheartedly agree, madam," Jervis said.
"I ain't obsessing..." Ash replied grumpily. "I just wanna get strong, so I can win the Unova League."
"Always with the league with this guy..." Iris grumbled.
Cilan chuckled sheepishly. "Well, a goal is an admirable thing to have!" he said. "Instead of a pasta salad, his dream is to aim high and make a paella!"
"... Huh?" Ash asked.
"He's saying," Iris said, "that, instead of a simple dish, you always go for the complex one."
Ash stared at her.
She heaved a sigh. "You work your butt off to aim big."
Ash smirked. "Well, of course I do! I ain't gonna be a pokémon master if I sit around all day!"
"Psh!" She smirked back. "Sometimes, I think that's all you care about."
"Is not!"
"Oh yeah? What else do you care about?"
"... Pokémon, of course."
She groaned loudly, while Cynthia and Jervis chuckled to each other.
Pikachu couldn't stop a chuckle from escaping his own lips, though he kept his eyes glued to the screen. He was eager to see Dawn's performance today. The match-ups had said she'd be up against some girl he hadn't recognised, but who was she going to use?
In a regular contest, a coordinator would be limited to only two pokémon. In a Wallace Cup, however, you could use any number up to five, since there were five rounds in total. Quite like the PWT Junior Cup, actually. Grand Festivals were a different story, as they were double battles.
In this case, Dawn had six pokémon to use in five rounds. So... there might be a chance that Buneary would be used in the tournament...
He shook his head. What was he thinking? He shouldn't be getting excited about this. After all, he'd cut ties with her. Told her it wouldn't work between them. Although he'd never wanted to cut ties completely, she hadn't seemed like she'd wanted friendship.
He huffed through his nostrils. Of course she didn't. Of course she didn't want to make it easy and remain friends. So... what? Were they just never going to socialise again? Was that it? Did she want nothing to do with him, unless he indulged in her shallow fantasies?
No. He wouldn't do that. He'd never do that.
... Though he couldn't deny that it hurt, knowing that they might never talk to one another again. Was it really over?
This thought ached away inside of him as he continued to watch the tournament.
Four matches passed by, with coordinators he'd never seen battling for a place in the quarterfinals. The humans seemed to be enjoying themselves - as did Axew - and Pikachu himself enjoyed watching contest battles. Coordinators were really talented at doing creative things with a pokémon's moves. It would be a treat getting to see May, Drew and, he supposed, Harley compete again.
But... there was only one coordinator he really wanted to watch.
Just as he thought this, she appeared on-screen. Pikachu excitedly sat up in his seat.
"It's Dawn!" Ash said, sounding just as excited.
"Sweet!" Iris replied. "I can't wait to see her performance!"
"It'll be utterly delectable, I'm sure!" Cilan said. "Truly, a feast for the eyes!"
"Yeah! Though I'm hoping for a full-on buffet!"
"(Heck yeah!)" Axew agreed. "(We're gonna pile our plates high!)"
Ash's stomach grumbled. "Aww, man, you're making me hungry..." he complained.
The camera focused on Dawn's opponent, a girl with long red pigtails that draped all the way down past her waist. Her eyebrows and mouth were furrowed, as if there was an unpleasant smell in the air around her.
She looked really unapproachable.
Enlarging a pokéball, she threw it. "Granbull!" she cried. "Get out here!"
It popped open, and the pink dog materialised by the pool. "(Yeahhhh!)" she cried aggressively. "(Let's do this!)"
Smiling, Dawn brought out her own pokéball. Pressing the button to enlarge it, she threw it across the stage.
"Buneary, spooootlight!" she cried.
Pikachu's eyes bugged. Buneary?! Here?! Now?! So she was competing?!
In a flash of white light, she materialised on-stage. "(Ready and willing to kick some butt!)" she said happily.
"Oh wow, it's Buneary!" Ash said.
"Does that mean she got her moves back?!" Iris asked.
"It must do!" Cilan replied.
"(Yay, she's okay again!)" Axew cheered.
"Well, well..." Cynthia said, sounding amused, "how interesting."
"Indeed, madam," Jervis replied.
... No way. She'd really gotten her moves back? That was... great. Really great! It meant that she was happy and stuff, right? So that was good.
Though... it also meant something else, didn't it?
Pikachu shook off the thought and watched intently as the match began.