This was it. I had just one Gym left, and then I was done with all eight of them. Never before had I been so excited for a goal that I had been fighting so hard to achieve! It was a breath of fresh air when I thought about it; nothing could be worse than the seven previous Gyms. Before I went overboard with my excitement, though, I had a little bit of reminiscing about everything I'd already been through.

As weird as it sounded, I missed back when life was easy, and I was just starting out on my journey, going to fight Falkner. He was a pretty cool dude, with the birds and the romance and the friends and the rival. Bugsy, to me, was just a tad creepy, and his obsession with Chuck made him all the more weird in my opinion. Speaking of Chuck, he wasn't really a girl like he thought he was. I don't think girls of any age can grow to such sizes and maintain facial hair quite as extravagant as his was.

But then I remembered the haunting experience in Whitney's Gym (and her pretty creepy boyfriend who basically wanted me dead). And that brought back the memories of Morty and his multitudes of children, followed by Pryce and his Pokémon fetish. None of those people were particularly skilled at being good memory-makers, but the three of them had taught me many a lesson, and I was quite thankful for the lesson Pryce taught me in the Lighthouse.

Finally, the most recent of all the battles was the one against Clair, the kind lady who had passed herself off as an interesting woman, just to reveal that she was the most flawed out of all the Leaders up to that point. I had no idea what this last Gym would hold, and I was scared to find out. I knew the Leader's name, which was Jasmine, due to the process of elimination I had been doing with that severely incorrect list of names.

I took a deep breath before stepping into that Gym. I knew it was my last one, so what was I so scared about? Jasmine sounded like a nice name, so she had to be a nice person, right?

Couldn't have been more wrong. Within five seconds of entering, I was being yelled at. "Who the hell are you?" this brunette lady asked me, pointing a spindly finger at me. "What are you doing in here? Little punks like you do not belong in my Gym!"

"A-are you Jasmine?" I warily said, scared for another verbal lashing, which I definitely got.

"Damn right I am! And I'm not here to babysit you, punk! Don't even try to tell me that you're a Trainer, and that you've challenged all the previous Leaders. If you do, I swear on my life that I will burn you alive."

I gulped. "I didn't just challenge them. I beat them."

"Oh really? Tell me, kid, how did you manage that? You look barely old enough to be out of diapers, let alone traveling Johto!"

"I managed that thanks to my awesome team of companions. I don't think you'd understand. You seem like the kind of lady who would use her Pokémon as elements of torture, not as friends and comrades." How smart I sounded, and I was only eleven!

She glared at me. "You sound just like that idiot Lance. Why do all guys preach at me about kindness and treating my Pokémon with it? I just want power, damn it!"

"I want a Badge from you, miss Jasmine. Could you please treat me with enough respect to give me the battle I desire, so I can get that Badge and go to the Elite Four?"

At that, she guffawed. "You? Fight the Elite Four? Listen here, kid: you'll never be able to lay a scratch on them. You're too young! You have no idea what battling for real means, and how are you going to defeat the five best people in Johto if you don't know how to truly fight?"

"Truly fight? I've got seven Badges. I think I, out of all people, would know how to fight anyone. Who do you think you are, telling me I don't know how to fight?"

"I'm the cousin of the Champion. I'm the greatest of the Johto Leaders. But you know what? My power is outranked by all the other 'last' Leaders in different regions!" She flipped her long brown hair, which was neatly kept in a ponytail. "Before you start talking big, think about that. Our Elites are just as strong as others', but ours are prefaced by eight incredibly weak Leaders. So what if you end up beating me? You're still weak."

I could have sworn that I was seeing red. How dare this woman accuse me of being weak? "I'll show you weak!" I hissed, before whipping out the Pokéball I knew contained Mareep. "I'll show you just how weak I really am!"

Yeah, bad idea.

I should have learned one thing before I ran into battle so foolishly: what type Jasmine used.

Did not expect to be given the smack down by a Dragon.

The thing is, I should have expected it. I knew Blackthorn was the Dragon city, and I knew that Lance, the Champion, used the type. But nothing connected. And I lost.

But, when someone so bent on victory loses, they come up with a way to retaliate. My way just so happened to involve going to the Pokémon Center and taking out the first Pokémon I could think of that could be of use, which just so happened to be the Dewgong I traded for with Clair. No, I didn't do anything weird for her. She just wanted this really cool Snorunt that I had, and I decided to give it to her in exchange for the Dewgong.

Had I known that Dewgong would have been useful at Jasmine's Gym, I would have brought it. As soon as I knew it was a Dragon Gym, though, I knew it would be perfect. Ice is great against Dragon, after all. And that's what I did to get my last Badge.

Oh, wait, there's still more to my run-in with Jasmine, believe me. It was right after the second challenge, right after I beat her fair and square, that she started yelling at me again. "You're still weak, you idiot!"

"Don't call me weak. Ever." I was putting away my Dewgong, and I looked at her. "I'm young, yes. Inexperienced, yes. But weak? I am stronger than Falkner, Bugsy, Chuck, Whitney, Morty, Pryce, Clair, and you! How can you call me weak after all of that?"

"Hm, let me think. Falkner's a pushover, Bugsy's a pansy, Chuck is too obsessed with his little girls to seriously care about battling, Whitney has no backbone and relies on Eusine way too much, Morty's just bad at his job, Pryce is senile, and Clair is a crippled woman! I'm the strongest, and I've still got a lot to learn to even be at the same level as the Elite Four...and my cousin Lance."

I was watching her as she said all of that, and after each name, her face fell more and more, until she was nearly in tears. "It's okay, Jasmine. I'm sorry that I beat you. Would it make you feel better if I just didn't go to the League?"

"No, go if you really want to! I'm just not going to listen to you cry when they beat you down with no regrets."

That wasn't what gave me the brilliant idea to train more before going to fight the League, but it was part of my decision. The thing was, I had been debating whether or not I was actually going to go for it or not ever since I had battled Chuck. That was when my entire thought process about the journey had changed, after all. I was raised to believe one thing, but when I started chasing the goal, I found that nearly everything I was taught was a lie. The last thing I wanted was to be extremely disappointed when I got to the League and saw everything there wasn't as I had been told it was.

When I thought about the list some more, I knew I needed to ask someone about it. It was the reason for me even going on this journey, and it was flawed. So why was it so wrong?

The answer I got was in, of all places, Goldenrod City. I went back there maybe two years after the Jasmine encounter, just to see if Cresta was still hanging around. She was, and when I saw her, I started smiling like a mad man. "Cresta!" I gleefully shouted upon seeing her.

"Shaun? Is that really you?"

"It is! Are you still working at the Gym?"

She nodded eagerly. "Sure am! Big brother Chuck takes great care of me! How are you? Did you ever become Champion?"

"No, but that's okay. I didn't really want it anymore after I came here the first time. Having your world turned upside down by a big guy with a bunch of girls really does a number on you." I pulled out the ragged list at that point. "Remember when we first met, and I asked you about Whitney?"

"I do, actually. Why did you do that?"

That was when I showed her the list. "This is how I was taught the Leaders went. Isn't that weird?"

"Actually, it really is! I've been blessed to meet all the Leaders myself, and I just cannot seem them being all switched around like that." From her pocket, she pulled out a Badge case and opened it, revealing all eight of the Johto Badges. "I honestly believe that if Jasmine had a heart, she wouldn't be taking care of a blind Ampharos."

"Or that Whitney would be social enough to hang around other girls?"

Cresta laughed at that, and agreed with me. "Chuck wouldn't be able to handle having all those kids, anyway. And could you see Morty being with another guy? I mean, ew! He's too much into women to fall for a man."

"I don't think Clair possesses a mean bone in her body." I grinned, thinking about my blue-haired woman friend in Mahogany Town. "Also, Pryce may be old, but I don't think capable of being icy and shut-in from people." As she had before, Cresta completely agreed with me, and started asking more questions about how my life had gone.

I answered each and every one of them faithfully. For each answer I gave, she told me something she had learned about one of the Leaders, before diving into another question. The more she told me, the more I was convinced that the list could not be true, not even in an alternate universe.

I liked things in Johto just the way they were.

A/N: This story has come to a close. My corruption of the Johto Gym Leaders is finally complete. Thanks for all who read and enjoyed it. I know I had a lot of fun writing this. :)

But if you liked the corruption, I'm going to be posting another story that's got the same premise but totally different characters and a completely different story. If you love Hoenn, you'd want to check out my tweaked version of their Leaders. :D It'll be up sometime soon, don't worry.

For now, though, I leave you with this: I don't own Pokémon, but I do own Shaun. And I would appreciate your reviews on how much you liked/disliked this story.

Thanks, and goodbye for now!

Signel