"You've both grown much since the last time we saw each other," Lucario said. "I look forward to seeing exactly how much."

Jack and Jason looked at each other; aside from Greninja, Maylene's Lucario was the single strongest opponent they'd ever fought. If Machamp was anything to go by, Lucario must be far stronger now as well; this might not end well.

"Are you ready Jason?" Jack said with a confidence he didn't feel.

Jason nodded. "I'll try not to beat him up too badly."

Jack and Maylene called their attacks at exactly the same time, but neither Lucario nor Jason needed to hear it to know what the opening move would be. Auric bone met auric bone, as the two clashed with Bone Rush; the only thing the audience could see were repeated flashes of blue light.

At times, the flashes came so quickly that one was impossible to distinguish from the next; they blurred together into a blue glow so intense it was impossible to look at directly. Both sides were totally focussed on one thing, and one thing alone; victory. There was no time to think of anything else, one lapse in concentration would mean defeat; and neither of them was going to lose this.

Then, so quickly that no one saw it happen, Jason was flung backwards by a blow so powerful it created a shockwave which raised a cloud of dust in its wake. Jason righted himself mid-air with Psychic, and launched a blast of aura down at Lucario; the older Pokémon batted it aside with Bone Rush and launched himself into the air at Jason with Mach Punch.

Jason was taken completely by surprise, and threw up a hasty auric shield which Lucario shattered with contemptuous ease; Lucario's Mach Punch landed like ton of bricks, and sent Jason crashing to the ground. Lucario readied a Bone Rush and prepared to bring it down on Jason's prone form, but Jason flipped himself into a handstand at the last moment and lashed out with his legs at Lucario's midriff.

Lucario fell headlong onto Jason's impromptu Counter attack, and was knocked across the arena; he got up, gasping for breath.

"Impressive," Lucario said once he'd recovered his breath. "You learned well, but it is time we ended this little duel."

"I was about to say the same thing, Master," Jason replied.

Neither trainer had to say a word; this was between Jason and Lucario now. As one, their dreadlocks standing on end, the two Pokémon began gathering as much aura as they could; they summoned so much power, their entire bodies glowed from within like twin lamps. The next blow would decide who won, and who lost; the student, or the teacher.

Jason and Lucario held out their paws, and each began to pour aura into the space between them; focussing it, packing it into as small a space as possible. There was easily enough power there to fry most Pokémon to a crisp, but they weren't finished; they kept going, drawing on every spark they could grasp. Their Aura Spheres shone like twin suns; and finally, they could gather no more aura.

As one, they released their attacks at the other; the explosion tore up the ground like sand, and was so bright it almost blinded the onlookers. Neither attack had overwhelmed the other, it was a stalemate; but it wasn't over.

Before the glow even began to dissipate, Jason and Lucario were off; syphoning aura from the air as they went, concentrating it into their paws. They raced straight at each other, through the auric maelstrom left behind by their previous attacks, unable to even see their opponent but with no doubt as to where he was, and used Focus Punch.

When the glow finally dissipated, and the spots had disappeared from people's eyes, the two auric titans were standing about ten feet apart with their backs to each other. Then, as one, they turned around and looked at their opponent; a look of what could only be described as respect passed between them, and then as one they fell backwards onto the ground. Both unconscious.

Jack and Maylene recalled their respective Pokémon, and then looked at each other.

"Our Pokémon have fought hard," Jack said, "For the sake of us finding out who's stronger."

"Yeah," Maylene said with a small grin, catching his drift. "They really got into it; but this is between you and me, isn't it."

"You've got that right," Jack agreed, mirroring her grin. "Let's finish this."

The two trainers reached for the belts on which they stored their six Pokéballs; as one, they undid the buckles and let their belts fall to the ground. They were both already dressed for a fight.

To a roar of approval from the crowds, Jack and Maylene stepped onto the battlefield; they didn't need their Pokémon to fight their battles for them, they were both more than capable of doing it themselves.

"Are you ready?" Maylene called. "Don't go holding back on me now, I want to see exactly how strong you've become."

"As you wish," Jack replied.

The two friends bowed to each other, then assumed combat stances; they closed on each other until they were within easy striking distance, then they circled.

"She said not to go easy on her," Jack thought to himself, "But if I don't I might very well kill her; or at least seriously injure her. I hope you'll understand, but I'm going to have to hold back on you Maylene."

They circled a few times, but Jack didn't feel like wasting time; in a move straight out of one of Maylene's lessons, Jack leapt into the air and spun to gain momentum. When he was almost on top of Maylene, he extended his leg and brought it down on her head like a hammer. Or at least, that was the plan.

At the last second, Maylene reached up and grabbed Jack's leg with one hand; she let gravity pull the rest of Jack's body down until it was in range, then she spun in place and kicked Jack across the arena.

Jack was caught completely by surprise; not as much by the fact that Maylene had stopped his attack, as how she'd stopped it. She was incredibly strong, far stronger than she was last time they sparred; he was tempted to call it superhuman, but he didn't see how that was possible. Unless…

Jack's train of thought was derailed by Maylene.

"I told you," she said. "Don't hold back. It's not just my Pokémon who've gotten stronger, I've been training by butt off too; I have a pretty good idea of what you capable of, and I want you to show me. Now come on."

Jack sighed. "If you want to see what I can do, then be my guest."

With an air of resignation, Jack raised his right arm into the air; above the stadium, dark clouds began to gather. They quickly obscured the sun and cast a black shadow over the arena, forcing the stadium lights to activate just so people could see.

"This is a trick I developed a while ago," Jack said, drawing attention back to himself. "I've only had to use it once, but if you want to see what I can really do then there's no better demonstration. Have you ever heard of the Ability, Motor Drive?"

Maylene was getting a little nervous, but she nodded in acknowledgment.

Jack grinned, but there was a hard edge to it. "It's something like that."

Without any further warning, a bolt of electricity arced down from the clouds and struck Jack's outstretched hand; it was so loud it made the crowd's ears ring, so bright it made them see spots, and so hot it partially melted the ground under Jack's feet turning it into glass. And yet, it was nowhere near as powerful as a real bolt of lightning.

When the spots cleared from Maylene's eyes, she could see sparks of electricity arcing across Jack's entire body; he was vibrating slightly, as though so much raw energy had been packed into his body that he could barely control it. This was only partially true however; he could control it perfectly well.

Jack had two reasons for this display of power; the first was the same reason he wanted to hold the match in the stadium, and make it a public event. He wanted to call attention to himself, and how powerful he had become; someone was stalking him, and Jack wanted to bait them into making their move where and when he could control the terms of their engagement.

The second reason for this, was that he had an itch in the back of his head; a doubt, one which he wanted to either confirm or disprove for certain.

"At this point," he thought to himself, "I'm certain I'm the reason my Pokémon are so… unique. Somehow, and for some reason, me being around them has made them more powerful than is natural; maybe I was around Maylene's Pokémon long enough to have the same effect on them. What troubles me though, is that now Maylene herself is showing almost superhuman strength and reflexes; what if it's not just Pokémon who become more powerful from being around me too long?"

Jack didn't have an answer to that question; partly because it was rhetorical. Even so, he wanted to know for sure whether Maylene had the same kind of superhuman abilities he did. From what he'd already seen, she was still no match for him; especially not when he was lightning-charged. That being the case, now was the perfect time to surreptitiously test Maylene's newfound power.

With the same amount of physical effort as it would normally take to hop a few inches off the ground, Jack launched himself twenty feet into the air and landed behind a very surprised Maylene; she got over her shock quickly, and roundhouse-kicked him in the face.

Jack took the full force of the impact, and didn't move so much as a centimetre; then responded with the exact same move, a roundhouse-kick. He timed it precisely so that a person with even a slightly above-average reaction time wouldn't be able to dodge it; lo and behold, Maylene evaded it with almost contemptuous ease.

"Are you toying with me?" Maylene asked, slightly disconcerted.

"Not in the slightest," Jack replied.

Without another word, Jack went on the offensive with a flurry of rapid back-to-back punches; Maylene either blocked or dodged all of them, and then launched a counter-attack in the form of a left jab, and then a staggering right cross. Both hits landed hard, but it only concerned Jack because every blow seemed stronger than the last; although he still couldn't say for certain whether or not it was beyond normal human limitations.

Not feeling like beating around the bush any longer, Jack landed one open-palmed blow right to Maylene's midriff; passing through her defenses as though they weren't even there. The hit flung Maylene back several metres, and should have been enough to knock the wind right out of her.

Jack wasn't surprised in the slightest, however, when Maylene didn't even pause for breath and instead came right back at him. She attacked with a rapid volley of left and right jabs, like a boxer; Jack blocked and deflected all of them with ease, but he noticed that her attacks were starting to get faster, and stronger.

Jack decided he'd seen enough for now, and went in for the kill with feint to the left and then a right cross. Maylene seemed to take the bait with the feint, but when Jack tried to go in for the real strike she wasn't where he expected her to be; she was too close to him, which meant…

With a shock Jack realized that Maylene had not only anticipated him, but had moved quickly enough to avoid his attack; more than that though, she could've moved back but instead she ducked his punch and darted in. Almost as if she was going to…

It was at that moment that Jack knew, he messed up; a right cross left him wide open to anything that could get close enough, and Maylene knew it. She uncurled like a spring, and sent her open palm into Jack's lower jaw with the force of her whole body behind it.

The attack lifted Jack off the ground and flung him back several feet; he hit the ground hard, and had the wind knocked out of him. He got up, but he was unsteady; Maylene's attack had not only hurt, but Jack's vision had gone blurry from the impact. His vision cleared just in time to see Maylene's foot make contact with the right side of his face.

Jack went down again, but this time he was a little faster about getting up; the shock had worn off, and he had made a conclusion. Maylene could move faster, hit harder, and take more hits herself than any normal human could. Jack was both relieved, and deeply concerned; the potential repercussion of this were beyond the scope of his imagination. But for right now, he had a sparring match to finish.

Maylene was coming in for another attack, but Jack was done messing around; leaving only a trail of electrical sparks in his wake, Jack closed the distance between Maylene and him before her brain could even register that he'd moved.

What Jack did next would, if he was facing an opponent who could move as fast as he could, have probably cost him the match; he'd seen it in a video game, and figured it was the perfect way to end the fight.

Before Maylene knew what was going on, Jack had leapt over her head, flipped upside-down in mid-air so he could grab her shoulders, and used his momentum to lift her off the ground with him. The moment his feet touched the ground again, Jack braced against it and slingshotted Maylene over his head.

Maylene flew halfway across the battlefield, and hit the ground hard; she rolled several feet before coming to a stop. To Jack's relief, she got up; she looked exhausted, and she was bruised all over, but that was about it. Even so, Jack could see in her eyes that she knew she'd lost.

Jack walked over to the beaten gym leader, and offered her his hand; she shook it, and then pulled Jack into a tight hug. He was initially surprised, but then he figured he should just accept it; it was a friendly hug, between two comrades. Even so, Jack could hear the crowds going wild above them; he had a sneaking suspicion that this scene would be viral by tomorrow, and most likely blown out of all proportion as well.

Even so, as he and Maylene walked back to his suite, he was happy; or maybe… content would be a better word to describe it. Maylene was a good friend, and he was happy to see her again. Her newfound power was a troubling omen, but that didn't really bother him as much as it originally had; at the very least he was confident that, if Maylene did become like him, the power would be in good hands. Better than his at any rate.

As they were walking down the hotel corridor to Jack's suite, Maylene suddenly stumbled; Jack caught her before she could fall, but he could see that she was in worse shape than she let on.

"Are you okay?" Jack asked, putting his right arm around her shoulders.

"Yeah," she said. "I'm okay; just tired."

"I'm sorry," Jack said. "I took it too far."

Maylene shook her head. "No, if it's anyone's fault it's mine; this whole thing was my idea, and I egged you on at every turn. Even when I knew I couldn't beat you."

"You came pretty close though," Jack said. "Here, let me help."

Before Maylene could object Jack put his right arm behind her back, swept his left one under her legs, and began carrying her down the hall bridal-style.

"I don't need your help," Maylene said, somewhat softer than she intended.

Jack looked down at her and grinned. "It doesn't look like you mind all that much; besides, you're not exactly in a position to refuse."

"So, you're going to help me whether I like it or not?" Maylene said skeptically.

Jack nodded. "That's the general idea, yeah."

Maylene sighed and closed her eyes. "If that's the case, then I guess it's alright. Thanks," she added, as if it was just an afterthought.

It took all of Jack's willpower not to laugh, or stare; he'd spent the better part of a month training with Maylene, and pretty much living in her house for all that time, but this was a side of her which he'd never seen before. She was never exactly a stickler for tradition or ceremony, but she still usually maintained a certain amount of decorum.

Jack had always looked up to Maylene as his teacher, but now he was the stronger one. More than that, if her abilities evolved any further he might have to help her master and control them; so what was she to him now? And just as importantly, how did she see him?

For the sake of his mental health, Jack didn't try to answer those question; in all probability, the answers would reveal themselves in due time. And with his luck, he probably wouldn't like them one bit.


Me: Good grief, that was a lot of writing; I only started these chapters this week. And if you're wondering what I was doing last week, it's the same thing I'll be doing next week; some of you might know this already, but I'm actually in the process of writing a proper novel. It's still in its early stages, really early stages, and I'll probably have to revise it to within an inch of its life once I get the first draft done, but at least I'm making progress. And every review I receive, every tip of the trade or insightful comment, helps me get closer to my goal of becoming a successful author.

Jack: Wow; I thought you were just going to plug your novel, but it turned into some first rate fluff there at the end. Slightly narcissistic fluff, no less; congratulations.

Me: Shut up. Anyway, with that out of the way I have another recommendation this week.

Jack: I love how you assume people actually listen to you.

Me: Shut up. The story I want to recommend today is Dimensional War by OseanSoldier; some of you might remember it from back when I did my top 5 favorite stories over 100,000 long. Well, what can I say; things have only gotten more interesting since then, and they promise to only get more interesting from here. Seriously, things have gotten pretty crazy recently; evil doesn't even begin to describe it. If you're not already following this amazing story, you have no idea how much you're missing out on… How much on which you're missing out?

Jack: Looks right, sounds wrong.

Me: Yeah, I don't know; English is weird. Just go read Dimensional War, it's worth it. See you next time.

Jack: And kids, don't do drugs.

Me: …

Jack: What?

Me: Jack… that was beautiful.

Jack: Can we just end the chapter already?