The Miss Pokemon Academy Contest begins! How will things go for our lovely ladies? And how did this whole mess with Sango even start? We'll have to see how it goes, the contest is ready to begin now, it's going to be interesting, to say the least!

Chroniclerpoke: Maddi wouldn't have entered.

Hellraiserphoenix: Not exactly the whole Appeals Course, no, but there will be some time for it to shine.

KedharS: More fun for Ayame than Sango I imagine.

Thunder Fire: Giselle isn't as popular as some of the other girls sadly.

Rowlets and Oshawotts: Yeah, it's definitely going to be interesting, that's for sure.

Aakareo Kokokuhikari: Thanks for pointing out those errors! Please, feel free to point those errors out as they appear, it's a lot of help!

Tambry96bj: Yeah, hopefully this should be interesting.

Venoms Cross 2: In theory.

Pokemon Academy: Beginning of Beginnings

Chapter 731

When Sango first heard about the Miss Pokemon Academy Contest, she hadn't given it a second thought. Or a first one, for that matter. There were other things for her to be concerned with at the time, namely the upcoming battle between Blake and Elaina. And even without that specter looming over everyone's head, it still wouldn't be the sort of activity that she would find herself invested in. So she hadn't stopped to think about it for a moment, and instead threw herself into her schoolwork to take her mind off of things.

Unfortunately, the way Sango dealt with the stress of an upcoming showdown between Blake and Elaina by working herself even harder wasn't a universal release.

Cynthia, for example, often worked off her stress by overcompensating in other areas of her life, most often her pranking and perversion. So instead of facing the upcoming battle with clear eyes, she instead retreated to online forums, where she found out about the contest.

And then, as a release for her inner stress, she thought it would be a funny little prank to nominate Sango for the contest. After all, Sango wouldn't ever think to check those sorts of things, so if she got few votes she wouldn't feel bad. And while Cynthia didn't expect Sango to WIN, if she got a lot of votes she could show her then, and try to cheer her up. Otherwise, Cynthia expected to keep it her own little secret, thinking maybe a few people would give Sango some strange looks as they passed her on campus.

So imagine her surprise when Sango got a huge amount of votes compared to the average student, not to mention being a first year, and she had to go to Sango hat in hand and let her know that there was a decent shot of Sango winning.

Sango had not taken the news well.

Furious, she demanded to know what was going on, and when she saw how many votes she was getting, she let Cynthia know under no uncertain terms that if she won, she was absolutely NOT going to participate.

Thus, Cynthia was more than shocked to see Sango had actually gone through with it, walking out onstage in the one nice piece of clothing she owned, forcing a smile onto her face. It had made Cynthia burst out laughing in shock.

Although, upon closer look, Sango didn't actually look that bad.

Cynthia's shock was not an uncommon reaction, either. While a lot of the crowd was a little confused, their little cluster of friends was filled with the most surprise.

Blake's friend Claire Suzuki was the first one to get past the feeling of shock, standing up and applauding Sango, along with Nikita and Kitty. The rest of them soon joined in, and even Kate was giving a polite bit of clapping. Cynthia joined in, cheering as loudly as she could for her friend.

Maybe if she did, Sango wouldn't kill her when this was over.

"And so, let's give another round of applause for our 8 semi-finalists! These lovely young ladies will compete against one another for the honor of the title of our fourth 'Miss Pokemon Academy!" Lukas announced, and the crowd went wild.

Most of the girls did their own little poses to appeal to their fans. Even Alcea and Ayame, who Cynthia would have thought would be above that sort of thing, were getting into the spirit. Sadly, the girl Cynthia was rooting for (and the one she'd voted for) wasn't getting in on the fun. Serefina stood still as a statue, trying to downplay her winning figure instead of playing it up, much to Cynthia's disappointment.

Gabrielle and Sango weren't much better. Girls Six-Eight weren't trying to show off at all, unlike the others who were used to showing off, whether onstage, or in battle, or on the track.

"Wooo! Go, Serefina!" Cynthia cheered, hoping the encouragement would get Serefina to show a little more skin.

No such luck.

"I'm sure the ladies appreciate your support!" Lukas said, clearly loving this contest. "Let's see what the judges think!" Waving his hand at the screen, the television set shifted to reveal a series of polls. Of course, Olivia's line was the longest, the ranks descending in order from the first.

Lukas continued, "the ladies will earn points depending how they do in each contest!" He explained. "For each event, they have a chance to earn anywhere from 10 to 0 points! To start, let's look at the points they began with, judging from their initial votes from the preliminary rounds! Let's take another look!"

The polls shifted to display numbers inside the lines.

Olivia: 10

Alcea: 8

Ayame: 6

Lila: 5

Darla: 4

Serefina: 2

Gabrielle: 1

Sango: 0

"Interesting," Nikita said. "The distribution of the numbers isn't equal. Taking first and second in the events are worth a lot more than the other places. I would think there would only be a gap of 1 point, but no, it's 2. And not only that, there's another gap between the bottom three, as well, and if you get last you don't get any points. I wonder if that's a method of motivating the girls to do their best? Maybe…"

Cynthia didn't care about Nikita's little number rant. All she knew was that it wasn't fair that Serefina's points were so low compared to the others!

"Now that we've seen what our girls are working with, let's move onto our first event!" Lukas declared. "I'm sure you're all on the edge of your seats, wondering what it could be! Well, for that, we'll spin the wheel!"

On the screen, a wheel with five options appeared, colored Red, Blue, Yellow, Green, and Pink. Each slice was labeled, Coolness, Beauty, Toughness, Cleverness, and Cuteness. The wheel began to spin quickly.

Cynthia wondered what the competition would actually be. It didn't seem fair to have all the events just be Pokemon Contests; only three of the girls there were actually coordinators! No, it would definitely be something else.

The wheel pulled to a stop on the blue slice, "Beauty". Lukas grinned.

"How fitting!" He declared. "The first competition for our ladies is the Beauty Event! This is the perfect way to start things off, a nice, easy competition! The girls here will each take part in a Pokemon Contest, to show off how beautiful they and their pokemon can be!"

The audience went wild, clearly excited to see these beautiful girls show off their pokemon and their beauty. Cynthia sighed, slumping back down into her seat. Well, she should have seen that one coming. So much for Sango's chances.

Sango herself looked like she was chewing a mouthful of glass as she looked up at the spinning wheel. Clearly she didn't share in the audience's excitement.

"We'll be calling up our girls in order of their current point totals, but for now, let's give these lovely young ladies a break to prepare! Let's take time off for about half an hour, okay?" Lukas asked, and the audience let out a few groans, but were ultimately okay with it. The lights onstage dimmed and the curtains pulled shut, the large room lighting back up.

"Wow, that was… wow," Blake said, shaking his head. He couldn't believe what he had seen. Shock after shock. First, his brother was a judge. Next, Aya was a competitor (although that one obviously made sense) and finally, SANGO of all people was in the competition, and had made it into the top 8? Even if she didn't get any further than the semi-finals, the fact that she had been ranked that highly out of all the female students in the school was astounding!

That being said, she didn't look all that proud.

"Well, I'm going to go give my regards to her highness," Kate sniffed, standing up from her seat and walking down the aisle. Everyone else felt a little tense.

"So, what now?" Reiner asked, putting words to the air of discomfort hanging around everyone.

"Um… I guess…" Cynthia wasn't any more sure herself. She hadn't actually expected Sango to win, after all, and while she was going to support Serefina, the notion that her friend had actually made it into the top 8 was a little strange.

"I want to go see Sango," Nikita decided. Her eyes were shining. "I'm so surprised she made it to the top 8! I'm gonna wish her my best!"

Cynthia resisted the urge to say something snarky. Knowing Sango, she probably wouldn't react that positively to someone sending their regards in this situation. But she shrugged her shoulders, there wasn't much she could do.

Besides, she was tempted to ask Sango why she'd agreed in the first place.

"You guys have fun," Blake said, getting up out of his seat. "I have someone else I want to check on," he replied.

Cynthia grinned and opened her mouth, ready to unload the best line she could think of on him. But before she had the chance, she was beaten to punch.

"Oooh, gonna give your girlfriend a little helpful encouragement?" Claire teased, her eyes shining mischievously. Blake rolled his eyes and shook his head, heading off.

Cynthia shut her mouth, more than a little annoyed. Teasing Blake with stuff like that was supposed to be HER thing, who did this girl think she was, butting in on him like that? She scowled. Claire glanced back and gave her a saucy wink, flouncing after Blake.

Well, Cynthia chose not to give it another thought. Nodding in agreement with the others, they headed over to give Sango their best.

Sango was not in the mood for anyone to give her their best. She was seething with anger, even while trying to remain calm. In her dressing room, Silver floated beside her, looking concerned. It made sense. As her only pokemon, that meant he'd be the one taking part in the Pokemon Contest portion of the event with her. And he'd never done anything like that before, so of course he would be a little worried. Trying to be reassuring, Sango forced a smile to her face.

"It's okay, Silver, don't worry," she smiled. "I don't care if I get last. We can just do whatever for our performance. All that matters is we give it our all!" She reached up and patted her pokemon on the head.

"Cast!" Silver cooed, nodding eagerly.

Sango let out a sigh. Honestly, she hadn't wanted to take part in this stupid event in the first place. It wasn't even her idea to sign up for it, that had come from Cynthia, an act that had seriously pissed her off, and made her consider hitting her friend in frustration. Hot off the heels of the stressful battle between Blake and Elaina, it had been brought to her attention just what Cynthia had done, and to say she was angry about it was an understatement, in no small part due to the stress she'd built up about the whole Elly/Elaina mess finally having an outlet to be released.

Sango had been really hurt by what Cynthia had done, too. She needed some space away from the redhead, and it didn't matter to her that Cynthia seemed genuinely apologetic. If not for the fact that Cynthia told her that even if she won she could still drop out and not be in the semi-finals, Sango might have seriously considered ending their friendship.

In the end, though, it had just been a prank, so Sango couldn't stay TOO mad. She would just let the chips fall where they may, and if by some shot-in-the-dark miracle she got enough votes to make it to the semi-finals she would tell the judges that she was dropping out of the competition and let the ninth place person take her slot instead.

Unfortunately, it hadn't quite shaken out that way.

Sango was surprised by how many votes she was getting, and more than that… she actually felt a little happy about it.

It wasn't like she expected to win, in fact, she was quite certain that against the girls in the front, Olivia, Alcea, and even Ayame, there was no way she could hope to compete.

But it still made her feel rather warm inside that so many people saw her profile for the contest and thought that she deserved to be on the same stage as cool and beautiful girls like those.

Sango had always lived in the shadow of the "popular girls". In middle school, girls would talk behind her back about how she dressed like a boy, how she always cut her hair super-short, or how she never tried on makeup or always smelled like sweat or how she worked way too hard in PE or one of a hundred things that Sango had just tried to ignore.

And like it or not, that gossiping had left a chip on Sango's shoulder that she would eventually have to deal with. Falling for Blake was the next worst thing, because she knew that he wouldn't pick her over a girl like one of those. Even when he'd eventually revealed he was in love with Ayame, that still hadn't convinced Sango that she'd ever had a chance.

Ayame was a tomboy like her, but she was handsome and cool. When girls said Ayame looked like a boy, it was a compliment filled with eager appreciation. When they said Sango looked like a boy, it was behind their hands and with scorn and derision in their eyes.

She'd always assumed that stuff like looking pretty or drawing boys' attention was beyond her, until Olivia Himeko showed her that with a little prep and a little care, she could look just as lovely as anyone else. Sure, maybe she was still a little boyish, but in a cute way, not in a "god, why is she wearing a skirt?" way.

And now that other students were validating Olivia's words with votes of her own, Sango couldn't help but wonder if maybe the Empress had been onto something. Maybe Sango wasn't as unappealing as she always thought she was. Aidan had confessed to her, after all, so she couldn't be that repulsive, right? Yeah, boys could find her attractive.

It had made her feel a little better about herself, and almost made her want to thank Cynthia for signing her up, but she knew that was absolutely out of the question. If she expressed any gratitude at all to the redhead that would just be endorsing this behavior, and Sango wasn't about to have more of these shenanigans messing with her life.

And besides, as pleased as she might have been, it was one thing to feel warm and fuzzy seeing her vote counts rising, but it was a whole other thing to actually enter the contest and compete onstage in front of the school.

Sango may have been flattered, but she wasn't the kind of superficial girl who would make dumb decisions based on her ego. That had all the makings of a horrible mistake, one she absolutely wanted no part of.

And yet, here she was, sitting in the dressing room and preparing for the first competition of the contest, entering a Pokemon Contest for the very first time, and for what? To show off her beauty? Sango was probably the least prepared girl on the stage.

So what had done it? What had been such a powerful influence on Sango that she had changed her mind about the Miss Pokemon Academy Contest, and agreed to take part in the semi-finals after all, once she'd counted her votes and gotten the confirmation email that she'd made it?

Well, it had been her friends in the Ranger Course. Most notably, Erik, the Sarge.

When Sango had first learned how many votes she'd won, her kneejerk reaction was to ask herself "why". Who was it that was voting for her? She wasn't so naïve as to think that she was really that much more of a beauty than the girls she'd gotten more votes than, even if Cynthia HAD used the picture she'd taken from the night Olivia had done Sango's wardrobe and makeup as a reward for her success in the Probationary Exam.

So where had the votes come from?

Randomly floating the topic past the Sarge had given her the answer. Erik had told her that last year, Marion had actually taken part in the contest and made it into the semi-finals, and had gotten a large amount of votes from her followers in the Ranger Course and the Caretaker Course. Sango understood the reasoning behind that, since Marion was passably cute, and her charismatic energy and love of fishing would certainly attract admirers.

There was a reason so many people flocked to her, she was practically the idol of the Ranger Course, after all.

Then, Erik told her the full story. Apparently, Marion had sent an email to most of the Ranger Course, letting them know that since she wasn't there to participate, they needed to stop and consider who would be the one to take up her baton once she graduated. Which girl in the Ranger Course demonstrated her skills and devotion the best, and deserved a chance at the title for "Miss Pokemon Academy"?

Hearing his explanation the pieces began to fall into place.

It wasn't that Marion had set Sango up, not in the way that Cynthia had. But because she couldn't compete for herself, seeing that Sango was competing had ignited something in her, and she encouraged her followers to vote for Sango in her place, and THAT was where most of Sango's votes had come from.

It had initially taken the wind out of Sango's sails at first to hear that people weren't voting for her because they thought she was the best, but because Marion had told them too, but when she stopped and considered what that meant she felt a lot better about it.

Marion was encouraging them to vote for her because she thought that Sango was the best that the Ranger Course had to offer, that she was a symbol for the future. And the others had agreed, and that's why they'd voted for her.

Thinking about it like that made the whole thing seem kind of heartwarming, Sango realized, and she wondered if it was really okay to just squander all the goodwill.

So in the end, she'd made a decision that she was currently regretting. She'd decided to leave it up to her friends and colleagues in the Ranger Course. If they believed that she was a worthy successor to the title of "Idol" of the Ranger Course, and voted enough to actually push her into the semi-finals, then Sango wasn't going to spit in their faces by saying no. She'd accept the position and try to do her best, even knowing she would probably lose.

Of course, a big part of the reason she made that decision in the first place was because deep down, she was still insecure, and thought that there was no way she could possibly make it into the semi-finals in the first place.

And, well, she'd almost been right. It had only been by a few votes, but she'd managed to inch ahead, and now here she was.

Sango let out a frustrated groan.

What have I gotten myself into? She asked herself.

So, Sango's approaching the Miss Pokemon Academy Contest fully prepared to lose! What will result from this? Will she, against all odds, be able to emerge the victor? Or will it go exactly as she expects, with her total loss? We'll have to find out!