A/N: To any returning readers, thank you for your patience. For various reasons it's been a long slog getting this chapter finished, but from now on new chapters should be released in a much more timely fashion
Evelina
Amphitheatre light glinted hard off Bailey's armour, laser-sharp. She detonated with a crunchy blast, deep-throated like a snarl. A terse belch of flame. Smoke and earth erupting in a black cloud swallowing her from sight. The ground shook tremulously like first date butterflies.
Bailey never said much. But there was something about the sheer zest of her Self-Destructs that suggested she loved explosions. The blast broke over them as a hot wave, every leaf rattling in its teeth; chunks of her armour flashed past like a shoal of serrated fish; flowers were scythed down, some still burning; shrapnel thudded heavily into the trees. Eve saw Heatmor go down spurting pallid flames of his own.
"Gotcha, you little devil!" she whooped in undisguised triumph. Assistant referees were jogging down the sidelines, Lovelace was swearing lavishly, Winters somehow silent and inscrutable. It was like the Self-Destruct had shattered most of their supporters' enthusiasm – the cheerleaders were valiantly trying to rally them.
"Forretress and Heatmor are both unable to battle!"
"What the hell?" A scowl usurped the smile on her face. What about Galvantula?
Galvantula answered that for her. It appeared from behind the shrapnel-studded trunk of a tree, calmly waving its pedipalps as if nothing had happened. A rising wave of applause broke out as everyone else saw it was hale and unharmed. Eve could see an impassive Winters through the trees, gold beads sparkling in her dreadlocks, tan blazer sharp and clean as a fresh set of scrubs. The bitch had style, damn her. A splash of hot anger flared in her chest. Panic! Make a mistake, damn you!
Eve licked her teeth thoughtfully, inwardly fuming at Winters' unbreakable calm. But Heatmor was down. She'd knocked out Lovelace's ace, the Fire-type that would have ruined everything. She scowled up at the scoreboard. Beneath Lovelace's portrait the pictures of Krokorok and Heatmor were greyed out, leaving only Leavanny. Now Lovelace was vulnerable. But Winters still had a complete team … with that eelektross lurking in reserve.
She could see that EVELINA NICE KILL! banner again.
"Right, I'm sending Lyra back in for Light Screen," she told Josh. "That leavanny's in my way."
"Ivysaur, possibly," Josh answered laconically. "He knows how to deal with bugs."
"Leavanny, back to battle!" Lovelace snapped. Safeguard swirled beneath its feet, protecting it from the Toxic Spikes hidden in the grass. A moment later it stumbled heavily to one knee as Bailey's Spikes made a reappearance.
Eve flung Lyra's Poké Ball into the cover of the trees so Galvantula couldn't instantly fry her with Thunderbolt. "Light Screen, girl!"
[There's only room for one bug on this field!] Lyra shrieked.
"Fionn, enveloppez Galvantula avec Feu Follet. N'arrêtez pas!"
Fionn took a theatrically deep breath and smothered Galvantula with Will o' Wisp. Safeguard materialised to block it. Galvantula backed away, unburned but still blinded by the flames splashing off Safeguard.
"What you gonna do, Winters …" Eve sang. To Fionn's delight Safeguard timed out, the pearlescent dome imploding, Will o' Wisp rushing in to engulf Galvantula. Lyra immediately attacked it head-on and ruthlessly tried to batter it senseless with Comet Punch. A wave of supporting yells for Galvantula broke out. Somehow it kept its nerve, sparks crawling across its abdomen. Lyra sensibly took to the air, throwing a farewell punch.
"You're doing fine, girl!" Eve yelled encouragingly as Lyra disappeared into the cover of the trees. Fionn reappeared to spit a harassing streamer of Will o' Wisp at Leavanny.
"Heal Bell, come on!" Lovelace demanded. Leavanny skidded to a halt – the high, sweet chime of Heal Bell rang out across the field.
She was an obvious target. Lyra edged from behind a branch to fling down an Air Cutter. Leavanny dodged suspiciously quickly, danced daintily around a Psywave, turned, and swiped at Fionn with X-Scissor. Hardly a second later it sidestepped another Air Cutter, the crowd cheering in time with every dodge.
[Bloody stand still!] Lyra yelled.
"Did you see that? It stops moving when it uses Heal Bell," Josh said.
"A trap," Eve breathed. Josh recalled a dismayed Fionn and flung a Poké Ball at Galvantula.
"Poudre Dodo!" he ordered. Ivysaur materialised a few feet away from it. Galvantula pounced -
"No!" Winters suddenly yelled. Galvantula wrestled with Ivysaur for a moment, and went torpid when he loosed a cloud of Sleep Powder.
Josh gave him a curt wave. Ivysaur slammed his full bodyweight into it, before thrashing it with his Vine Whips.
Come on, come on … take the bait.
"Heal Bell, again!"
"Now Lyra, finish it!"
[I've got you this time!] Lyra snarled. She ducked low under the branches, closing in on Leavanny.
"Quick Leavanny, Agility, Agility!" Lovelace yelled. Lyra's Air Cutter missed, chopping a muddy furrow in the grass. A Vine Whip snapped shut around Leavanny's leg, and Ivysaur easily pulled it to the ground. With a shriek of effort Lyra threw down another Air Cutter.
That one didn't miss. The attack sliced through Leavanny's thorax, shredding its leafy clothing. Its arm spasmed and went still.
"Nice kill!" the crowd roared even before the referee had finished declaring Leavanny out. Her supporters leapt from their seats in a wave of noise. Eve realised she was laughing savagely and applauding Lyra.
"You're finished this time, Lovelace!" she crowed. Lovelace recalled her last pokémon. She was looking decidedly shaken, as if she'd never genuinely expected to be defeated by a nurse, of all people.
"Who's domestic now?" she said half to Josh, remembering Lovelace's comments on Brightwater Mile. "You may compliment me for my tits, but you'll respect me as an opponent," she added quietly, watching her ace buzzing in triumph and threatening Galvantula.
This could be a turning point. It felt like she was winning. Their isomorphic cheerleaders wasted no time in taking back control of the atmosphere, defiantly belting out their "Invicta!" chant.
"Begin!" referee Averill declared.
"Leech Life: Ivysaur!" Winters instantly barked.
Her battered galvantula pounced. Ivysaur seized it, growling with the effort of restraining its determined thrashing. He planted a cluster of Leech Seeds onto its cephalothorax, binding it tighter with a mesh of tendrils. Lyra flickered back and forth restlessly, obviously itching to get at Galvantula but holding back for fear of hitting Ivysaur.
Galvantula kept pausing between struggles – Ivysaur withdrew his Leech Seeds. It fell into a faint, critically drained by the parasites.
"Yes!" Eve whooped. Gotcha!
"One more kill! One more kill!"
"Invicta! Invicta!"
Eve could see Winters fiddling with a Poké Ball. For a moment her heart leapt as she guessed Winters was running low on ideas.
"Elgyem!" she called with apparent confidence. "To battle!"
Elgyem let out a squealing burble, perforated by both Spikes and Toxic Spikes. Lovelace visibly blenched, covering her eyes as if she couldn't quite bear to watch. Winters, without looking round, laid a reassuring hand on her shoulder.
"Cosmic Power," Winters ordered. Lyra was already closing down the distance. Elgyem threw a Psybeam at her but Lyra jinked contemptuously around it.
"Comet Punch!" Eve bellowed.
Eve blinked and Elgyem was gone, teleported across the field leaving Lyra to overshoot with a shriek of rage.
"Psybeam!"
"Whip it," Josh ordered unexpectedly. Ivysaur slammed Elgyem into the grass with all four vines. The crowd groaned sympathetically, Lovelace swore again and covered her mouth in shock. Maybe they'd underestimated 'Melissa' after all, but the swift attack seemed to strike them as a real surprise.
But Winters was unfazed. "Recover."
"De-nied! Try agaaain!" her cheerleaders taunted, to a ripple of laughter from the stands.
Josh sighed heavily. "She's going to make this round a proper siege."
"A wall is a weird choice for Winters, don't you think?" Eve had said, idly swilling the remains of her tea around the mug. That was four days ago, when they were talking strategy at Millennium Centre. "Given that she usually likes big cannons, I mean."
There was no immediate answer from the bunk above. Josh was thinking.
"The way I see it, there are really two ways to use an ace," he began slowly. "One: throw them at the fiercest resistance and smash through to victory. That's your way. Two: keep them in reserve, until they deliver the knockout blow."
He paused again. "It's the latter method that worries me – because that way the ace hits hardest when you're least able to receive it."
Breaking the sharp edges off the resistance first, keeping the greatest threat in reserve … yeah, that seemed to be Winters' way. Eve wondered if that played on the minds of her opponents, eroding their composure, driving them towards panic. Having your opponents batter themselves to pieces against Elgyem made sense in that context. What worried Eve was that she thought Winters' pawniard was her ace.
Tynamo were difficult to find and harder to raise, evolving late, possessing gelatinous muscles and a timid temperament. Raising tynamo was a lot like dragon taming in that respect. But eventually, you got something with no type-weaknesses, that could routinely discharge two thousand volts at a time: a creature of the abyss with no fear of what lives in the sunlight.
What kind of woman uses an ace like that? Someone intelligent, someone patient. Someone with an eye for power.
[Bastard bloody Teleport!] Lyra shrieked in rage, her fists swiping at empty air. She landed for a couple of seconds, panting harshly. Eve had never seen Lyra this furious. With Recover and teleportation Winters was making her chase Elgyem all over the field.
This was stupid. Lyra was wasting all her energy in this pointless duel. "Lyra, that's enough. Return."
Lyra wouldn't like that, but she needed to calm down before she became completely tunnel-visioned.
Josh sighed. "Maybe we can trap it."
This was stupid. Who was walling who out here, anyway? Time wasn't on Winters' side – it was on theirs.
"We don't have to. Gail! You have the honour!" she called, flinging up her Fast Ball. "Here's your favourite concept: patience. Elgyem's poisoned, we don't have to do anything."
Gail glided up and alighted on a high branch. The scale of the battlefield made her look ridiculously small and dull, but for her vibrant tail feathers. She watched Elgyem with ambiguous intent.
"Listen up, Gail! I want a clean kill!" Eve yelled, trying to appeal to her instincts.
It worked. Gail had an obsessive mind; once an idea got in it tended to stay there. She incessantly circled at the edge of Elgyem's vision, swooping and feinting as she tested reaction times. It kept Teleport-dodging prematurely. Ivysaur all but disappeared into the flower thicket, only the faint phosphorescence of Growth betraying his presence. Eve glanced past the skirmishing pokémon to Lovelace arguing with Winters. I don't like passive battling either, she thought, and smiled, because Winters was left with no real choice.
"Elgyem, take cover," Winters ordered. Elgyem teleported into the thick of the trees. A reasonably intelligent move, Eve thought, but it doesn't change anything.
"Grab it, throw it," Josh said. Elgyem was looking the wrong way – Ivysaur's vines looped out from the flowers and grabbed it from behind. It panicked, firing off a Psybeam, sending it zig-zagging wildly into the branches. Ivysaur effortlessly flicked Elgyem fifty feet into the middle of the field. Gail descended, talons spread, snatched Elgyem out of the air and slammed it into the grass. She had a foot locked tight around the back of its neck. Elgyem wasn't struggling.
"Elgyem is unable to battle!"
"One more kill! One more kill!"
"Hey, Joy, better watch out! Here comes the ace!" the cheerleaders chorused, refusing to be forgotten. Eve scoffed at their tacky choreographed frolicking. Bringing your own cheer squad, how full of yourself, how Unovan. Their captain caught her eye, stopped what she was doing – and actually blew her a kiss!
You insolent bloody -
"We're nearly there," Josh murmured.
"What?" Eve snapped, distracted from a fantasy of kicking their glittering captain right in her golden arse. Fucking puppies. She turned her attention back to the field. Gail still hadn't weakened her grip.
"Let go, Gail!" Eve commanded. She did, albeit sulkily, allowing Winters to recall her pokémon. Winters didn't seem too put out. It was a minor set-back, and they all knew it.
It had been a hard battle. Fragments of Bailey's shell glinted evilly in the grass, centre field was scorched and cratered from her Self-Destruct. Clouds of black smoke rose from burning flowers. A snaking scar cut down the height of the lightning-struck tree, feathery grey ash lying at its roots. This point of a battle was hard on trainers too, Eve was learning. The mental fatigue sunk in, thoughts became lethargic – it became harder to battle intelligently, until the battle turned into a contest of mental fortitude.
With a thrill Eve savoured this complex moment. Chants showered down from the crowd of ten thousand, more yells of 'Invicta!' than of 'Cherrygrove!'. The Sinnoh Champion was talking to Madam Pemberton – Cynthia herself was a former Tigerlily Champion. Madam Pemberton looked like she was at the opera rather than a sporting tournament, saying little and signalling approval with light applause.
Eve studied Josh surreptitiously. He was tired, too, she could tell by his expression. Tired, but concentrating hard anyway.
"What do you think?" he said.
"Hm," Eve started. She was surprised by how confident she felt. Five out of six pokémon down, and now only the eelektross lay between her, and the championship. "There's no point going on the defensive. Eelektross'll blast right through us anyway."
Josh thought for a moment, weighing it up. "We ought to be cautious."
Lovelace and Winters briefly clasped hands. Winters hurled the Ultra Ball into centre field. "It's all down to you!" she declared. "Charge your batteries! Let nothing withstand you!"
Eelektross returned to the field, and it commanded attention. It writhed into the air with a flick of its tail, as if struggling free of the Ultra Ball. The markings along its head rippled with a harsh electric luminescence. Small red eyes focused on the roosting pidgeotto.
"Fly, damn you!" Eve yelled. "Show them who rules the air!"
Gail, undaunted, took flight with a yell. Ivysaur began a cautious advance, firing up another bout of Growth as he went. His eyes were fixed on Eelektross slowly coiling six feet above him. It suddenly lashed out with Thunderbolt, blinding Eve with the flash. When her eyes cleared she saw a black burn in the grass. Ivysaur had managed to dodge it.
"Twister!" Eve called. Gail churned up a fierce attack, pinning Eelektross in place for a few seconds but otherwise dealing no apparent damage.
"Poudre Dodo."
"Ascend six feet," Winters responded. Ivysaur spouted Sleep Powder, much too low to effectively engulf it, the powder merely sticking to its tail as it drifted up out of range. The cloud twisted gently in the residual Twister. Eelektross abruptly aimed a rope of Dragon Pulse at Gail, chasing her through the air. Despite herself Eve was impressed – the dragonfire was perpetually right at her tail.
The violet dragonfire was jerked off-target, sent flaming up towards the ceiling. Ivysaur had twined a pair of vines around its arm and was patiently reeling it in.
"Thunderbolt," Winters ordered quietly.
Ivysaur's vines turned into wires. You couldn't see much of the effect, but Eve could imagine it. The strike seared into his back, crisped the edges of his leaves; a random discharge of bolts crackled in a halo from its extremities.
"Boom! Thank you very much!"
"Arse," Josh breathed. "Should have foreseen that."
"I remember how you've got round this problem before," Eve countered. "With the aid of a little gale."
He looked up at her circling pidgeotto. "Winters'll work that out the moment we issue orders."
"Unless I set the timing," Eve objected.
Josh went quiet for a moment. "Ok. Ivysaur, tu retrais, en arrière, bon?"
Ivysaur backed off a few feet, crunching onto burned grass as he went. Eve shouted up to Gail, pointing her down into position.
"Charge," Winters ordered.
Eve realised she wasn't sure whether Josh had told Ivysaur to follow her lead. Augh, safe strategies don't win finals. "Gail, give me a gentle Gust! Ivysaur, Sleep Powder!"
His scorched leaves fluttered and snapped in the Gust. Fuck, if he doesn't respond right now, then -
Gail's Gust caught the Sleep Powder and unfurled it into a glittering tide, smothering Eelektross' gills in the powder. It didn't seem to make an immediate difference. How can you tell when an eelektross was asleep?
"Thunderbolt: Ivysaur!" Winters barked. Nothing. Not even a spark.
"Thank you very much!" Eve hooted, grabbing Gail's Fast Ball. "That's why you're an ace, Ivysaur! Gail, come back!"
She flung the next Ball right at Eelektross still drifting in mid-air. "Lyra, smash it!"
Manifesting like a scarlet bullet, Lyra fell on it with an eager fury. Lyra really relished having Iron Fist as her Ability. She was in no mood to give quarter, either, given her determination to beat a sleeping opponent bloody.
"Nature Power," Josh said, slightly behind the beat. On the burned grass Nature Power turned into Tri Attack.
A white-hot lightning-bolt split Eve's vision in two. The Thunderbolt's tearing crash drowned out Ivysaur's bellow of pain and surprise; Lyra screeched as she got caught and zapped by secondary discharge leaping from eelektross' arms.
"Aqua Tail: Ivysaur!"
With dreadful inevitability Eelektross unrolled itself, swung its tail around, and slammed into Ivysaur's flank. A wave leapt up from its tail, engulfed Ivysaur and broke over the field. Josh stifled a cry as Ivysaur was hurled back into the flowers.
"Whoo! Kiss the ace!" the cheer squad chimed out. In unison they licked their fingers, touching them to their butt-cheeks with a vocalised sizzle. Ivysaur's portrait on the scoreboard went grey, to general applause. Lovelace joined the crowd in congratulating Winters on that spectacular move, and threw her arms around her neck. Eve was pretty sure Eelektross couldn't control that discharge – though Winters didn't seem at all surprised, immediately capitalising on it. That was a façade, Eve was sure of it, no-one's mental fortitude was that strong -
Both assistant referees were holding up yellow cards.
"Final warning: excessive force," referee Averill announced.
Josh had been keeping his face carefully dispassionate. Now Eve could see anger in the lines around his eyes and in the set of his jaw. He recalled Ivysaur without a word, taking a few steadying breaths before drawing Fionn's Love Ball.
"Hey. Forget about that for now. He'll stabilise in the Poké Ball," Eve said mollifyingly.
"And – begin!"
"Fionn. Do me proud, kidda," Josh called, throwing her towards centre-right field. She melted into the smoke still rising from the far side of the field. Eve quickly recalled Lyra in favour of Gail. She rose steeply, frenetically, instinctively trying to take the highest position.
"Thunderbolt: Pidgeotto!" Winters demanded almost eagerly. Gail tried to side-slip, failed, and got lost in the blinding glare of another lightning-bolt.
"Boom! Aaaaah, sweet!" the cheerleaders recited jubilantly – but Eve just laughed as Gail kept flying regardless. The squad stopped bounding out of embarrassment as they realised they'd cheered a failure.
"What the hell?" Lovelace burst out.
"Fionn, Feu Follet."
Fionn detached herself from the smoke, closing in on Eelektross as fast as she could. It must have seen her out the corner of its eye, because it discharged a huge halo of lightning. Fionn shrieked in alarm and backed away. Eelektross lurched sideways as Gail Tackled it with a sound like a steak being whacked with a mallet, before taking flight again.
"Thunderbolt!"
Eelektross struck her just as she was re-gaining height. Unperturbed she soared buoyantly over the trees, limned with Motor Drive's golden haze. Eve clapped her hands in glee. She could feel the change in the atmosphere – suddenly everyone was feeling uncertain, and off-balance.
"Charge!" Winters snapped.
"She's oddly slow to learn this time," Eve said.
"It's for the Special Defence," Josh said quietly, watching Fionn opportunistically blast Eelektross with Ominous Wind.
"Whatever. Fly, Gail!"
She called just once – complaining about the lack of wind – a harsh, barbaric sound. Motor Drive fizzing in her breast muscles, she climbed quickly anyway, eating up the height with deep, rippling wingbeats. One hundred feet up and Gail hit the apex of her climb. One hundred feet, close enough to effective attack height. She hung on the air, wings splayed, then slid gracefully into a dive.
"Shoot it down. Flash Cannon," Winters ordered. For a moment Eve thought she'd ordered that out of desperation, expecting one powerful shot. But Eelektross unleashed a vicious hail of slender beams, like splinters of light. Gail tried helixing around it, refusing to give up her attack. A stray Flash Cannon round snapped away one of her tail feathers – she veered off in panic, skimmed low over the field like a taillow, Eelektross' chasing Flash Cannon chewing up the grass behind her.
"The misdreavus is in your shadow. Defend yourself," Winters said.
Eelektross didn't interrupt its fusillade. It didn't even look down. It just zapped its own shadow. Fionn screamed as the damn chanting started again – first in genuine pain, then in a vengeful banshee-wail that stabbed through the chants like an icicle.
Oh Great Rhia, give me an edge! Eve prayed. Fionn probably couldn't take many hits like that.
"Its defence is a powerful offence," she breathed. The strategy would only work with casual raw power, but that's why Winters had chosen Eelektross. Ironically Eelektross' raw power had given Gail the raw speed to out-fly Flash Cannon. She sprinted daringly through the trees on the far side of the field, screaming with the frustration of the hunter being hunted. Smoke billowed in her wake – Flash Cannon close behind – the trees turned into a boiling storm of light and shredded leaves whirling like confetti. And Gail disappeared from sight.
"Where the hell are you?" Eve whispered.
Glancing right, Eve spotted Whitney's pointing arm, her voice lost in the battle noise. Gail was ascending back to attack height. Eelektross was too busy ripping apart the trees to notice.
"Up, up, adjust your aim!" Winters yelled. Her pokémon followed her gaze, zeroed in, and fired. For a moment it looked like Gail was going to fly right into it. She somehow executed a tight J-turn, arresting her climb, Flash Cannon fizzing hardly a foot above her, then descending like a comet. Eelektross was thrice her length and over ten times her weight. But Gail could crush bone with her grip.
She slapped into Eelektross behind the head, squeezing hard. It actually thrashed around in pain, undulating its glistening body like it meant to throw her off, while Gail simply screeched in defiance and sank her talons in deeper. People were cheering 'K-O! K-O!' but who the hell for Eve didn't know.
"Hang in there!" Eve yelled. It couldn't zap her off; it couldn't dislodge her through flailing; it was going to tire eventually.
Gail's obsessive mind was a double-edged sword. The idea of attacking from a height was wedged in her brain. She suddenly disengaged, beating hard for height. She should have dived off, Eve realised, climbing up from a standing start was too slow -
"Too slow, too slow," she murmured. "Gail -"
"Flash Cannon!"
Splintered light stippled across Gail's flank. She wrenched aside, trying to confuse Eelektross with a sudden drop in altitude. It didn't work. Flash Cannon showered across her back. A hit to her wing punched her out of the air – she fluttered desperately and crashed into the grass.
Eve recalled Gail as the referee made the inevitable ruling. "Well done, girl. You had a good match."
And then there were two. Eve was left with Lyra, Josh with his misdreavus. Neither one could really withstand a Thunderbolt,.
"What do you think?" Josh said. "How much more damage?"
That was difficult to assess. Eelektross was bleeding stickily from multiple wounds – an Air Cutter laceration, punctures from Gail's talons. Some of its ribs must be broken. Usually when you couldn't tell from the pokémon, you watched the trainer. But Winters was giving nothing away as usual, and anyway she had every reason to believe she was two attacks away from victory. That thought was written all over Lovelace's expression.
"I don't know," Eve admitted.
"Begin!" referee Averill called.
Eve hurriedly unsnapped Lyra's Poké Ball from her gilet. "Stay sharp! Keep a clear head! Show them why you're the ace!"
"Future Sight," Josh said – trying, no doubt, to land a decisive blow.
"Thunderbolt: Ledian! Do not stop until you defeat it!" Winters ordered balefully.
Lyra didn't have Gail's aerial speed or her elegance. Eelektross must somehow have telegraphed its first attack – it missed and blew an unlucky sapling into kindling. The second slammed into a Protect. With the third Thunderbolt Lyra's Protect failed. The glare of three Thunderbolts had already blotted her from sight, the crowd and Lyra's yell alike drowned out by rending thunderclaps. Lyra crashed into the field, having the good sense to take flight again, trailing smoke from her singed wings.
"Invicta! Invicta! Invicta!"
Eve's ears rang and her eyes ached. She had no doubt Eelektross could throw Thunderbolts again and again, as many times as it took. It would only take one more. Twice, to finish off the misdreavus as well -
Eve realised she had one trick left.
"Fionn, Astonish!" Eve ordered.
"What are you planning?" Josh hissed.
"Stay sharp, Lyra! Show them why you're the ace!" Eve yelled, ignoring him. She was watching Eelektross carefully. All eyes on Lyra now …
The cheerleaders were watching her. Lovelace was watching her, Winters was watching her. Fionn materialised just behind Eelektross' head. Sparks started to spit and jump along its arms.
"Destiny Bond!" Eve ordered.
With a last effort Lyra raised a Protect-bubble. A second later the Thunderbolt hit it, lighting the Protect up like a miniature sun. The secondary discharges, which Eelektross could not control, crackled madly from its extremities. Some of them speared right through Fionn.
Fionn melted into an inchoate fog. Eelektross collapsed into the grass like a puppet with its strings cut. The thunderclap boomed.
"Inv-"
A moment of silence, like the eye of a storm. Eve didn't dare breathe, didn't dare assume.
"Eelektross and Misdreavus are both unable to battle! The victory and the championship goes to the team of Evelina Joy and Melissa Evans!"
A peal of ordnance blasted from the sidelines. Cannons fired a dazzling blizzard of orange and white confetti as the last portraits on the scoreboard went grey. A storm of applause joined the storm of confetti, showering down onto the field from almost ten thousand pairs of hands. More than half of it was the polite acclaim of disappointed a supporters. But there was also a growing cheer of "Cherrygrove! Cherrygrove!" and banners hoisted in vicarious victory.
"- she's done what no-one expected and caught Winters with her trousers down, a textbook example of never giving up and being prepared to make tactical sacrifices where it really counts! The Unovan's disappointment is palpable -"
Lovelace was sobbing openly into Winters' arms. Their reversal of fortune had been brutally abrupt.
A recall beam flickered fitfully across the field. Josh recalled Fionn with some difficulty while Eve tried to squeeze him to death. She paused her attempt at euphoric murder when the subdued cheer squad, resigned to the result, caught her eye. Spotting Eve in turn they dipped their LOVELACE WINTERS INVICTA banner in salute.
"We'll be back in fifteen minutes, for the Awards ceremony, as the Tigerlily Tourney ends, in joy, for Joy. This is Hassan Ali, for Metro FM."
Eve turned to the stands, an exhausted Lyra hovering at her shoulder. Obscured by a myriad floating flakes of confetti, the Goldenrod Gym trainers, Whitney, Champion Cynthia, the Imperial Champion Madame Pemberton, were all applauding sincerely. The sight was glorious. It was validation. They both raised their fists, as much in victory as in salute.