"The gym leader's still not here?"
What kind of gym leader left their gym for more than a week? There were people who wanted to get badges. Even if the gym leader was taking a vacation or something, were they really too cheap to hire a temporary replacement? Geez.
"Um," said Lana, "the note says she's back today… but she's judging a Pokémon Contest first." Lana affixed the sticky note back onto the door and looked down towards Kevin. "Well, we can't do anything about that, so… What?"
Kevin was grinning. "The contest is happening now?"
"Yeah, but…" Lana said.
"But what? I wanna see this," Kevin said. His grin grew larger.
"Wouldn't that be wasting time?" asked Lana, giving him a slight frown.
"Nah, the leader's there so it's not like we can challenge her. Under normal circumstances, I wouldn't suggest it, but hey, I like contests. I haven't seen one in a while." He wondered if the contests in Sinnoh were any good compared to the ones in Hoenn. Judging by the conversation they'd had earlier in Eterna Forest, he supposed they at least had similar rules, but whether they held up or not was another question.
Lana still seemed to be uneasy. "Well, okay. Um… I'll ask if the others want to see it, too."
The five other Pokémon soon materialized once Lana opened all the Pokéballs. A couple of them looked around, wondering why they'd all been sent out. Lana smiled half-heartedly at them.
"Uh, hi guys. Slickky wants to see a Pokémon Contest and the gym leader's not here, so, um, does anyone else want to go, too?"
Kari snorted. "No. I think I made that clear the last time the topic came up." Ouch. Grouchy Kari was back.
Cheri frowned at her. "Tu n'as pas le respect, madame!"
"Tu n'as pas l'intelligence, dumbass!" she retorted. Huh. She was really in a bad mood.
Cheri gasped. "Je n'ai jamais—"
"Really, you two, you should stop!" Styler tried, unhelpfully clicking his beak. Kari glared at him.
"Just saying the truth," muttered Kari. Lana returned her to her Pokéball before she could say anything else.
Out of everyone else, only Cheri really wanted to go (fantastic), so they were all returned to their Pokéballs before Lana, Kevin, and the Pachirisu left for the contest hall. It was a short, somewhat familiar walk for Kevin, having briefly been in the area before, after all, but now that he wasn't getting lost he appreciated the content air of the city.
Once at the contest hall, Lana announced with dismay that the contest had already started. After a bit of pleading with the guard, though, she was allowed into the cheap seats section – but hey, Kevin wasn't complaining. At least they got in.
The appeal round was already pretty much over by the time they were seated. Unfortunately, Kevin's poor eyesight didn't help him see the remaining appeals all that well from where he was positioned in the large stadium, but with the help of the MC he was able to take it in.
First up was something that looked like it was related to Magnemite. The MC quickly announced that it was called "Magnezone", so his hunch was probably correct. It started off by creating a Light Screen force field around itself, glowing pink. Its trainer commanded it to use something called Mirror Shard, a move that Kevin had vaguely heard of once or twice on television. The Light Screen turned a shade of silver before breaking into six sections further away from it.
Magnezone was then told to use Discharge followed by a Shock Wave. A series of blue and yellow currents of electricity quickly shot out from the yellow antenna on its head, reflecting off the Mirror Shards and bouncing between them. Finally, each current made its way back to the antenna and the mirrors shattered. Like always in contests, sparkles mysteriously rained down upon the audience.
The judges' reactions were mostly synonymous. The first man nodded and praised the trainer, a young woman, on using her Pokémon's natural mathematical ability to calculate the exact angles of the electricity being reflected off of the mirrors and… Wait, what? It took math to do that? Kevin raised an eyebrow.
The second judge, who Kevin guessed was the gym leader, clapped and cheered. "C'est magnifique! Bravo!" Oh great, more French. Cheri shouted something in French beside him, too.
The last judge to speak was remarkably familiar, Kevin noted. He could've sworn that that particular judge was at every contest he'd ever been to. Maybe he had a lot of identical cousins like Nurse Joy?
The MC was visibly impressed as well. "Let's give it up for Marianna and Circuit, everybody!" The audience applauded. Kevin didn't really know what his opinion was in particular, but he knew she was experienced, that was for sure. She'd probably be in the top three at worst.
There was only one more appeal left, that being someone with a Zigzagoon. The Pokémon of choice made Kevin frown. Not that he had anything against Zigzagoon in general, but he had something against Zigzagoon in general. They had called him a demon back home far too many times for him to be optimistic. Unfortunately for the Zigzagoon, his trainer looked to be a beginner and accidentally told him to use Growl, of all things. The judges tried their best to gently tell her to practice more.
Since they had just arrived, instead of leaving for the intermission, Kevin stayed in the main stadium with Lana and Cheri. The Pachirisu was completely exhilarated. She was sparking everything she could get her paws on (including Kevin himself), trying to come up with an appeal. She lacked any other useful moves to combine it with, Kevin thought, otherwise she probably would be okay for a contest.
Upon the contest's resumption, the sixteen winners of the appeal round were shuffled into a random, tournament-style chart to see whom they would be battling for the first round. Other than the obviously experienced Marianna, there appeared to be several others at her skill level, most likely all aiming for a fifth ribbon to be eligible for the Grand Festival. Kevin supposed that it took place around the same time as the Pokémon League did much like it did back in Hoenn.
Apparently Hearthome was weird and liked to do things differently, because each round would be single battles save the final, which would have a double battle instead. Huh. Despite the weirdness, the battles were quite entertaining, for Kevin at least.
Gardevoir versus Persian pitted an unfavourable match up, though not at first glance if one only took Pokémon types into consideration. The sleek, smirking Persian quickly made short work of Gardevoir in only a few bites (Kevin decided that she must have been a Technician) and with four and a half minutes out of five to spare. He absentmindedly wondered if Gardevoir could learn any fighting type moves. His Aunt Lily certainly hadn't.
Meanwhile, in an absurdly mind blowing battle, a Teddiursa with enough strength to lift a piano was able to take down a mighty Blissey in a surprisingly exhausting fight. The Blissey had appeared to be winning first, spamming Softboiled in a haughty way, until the Teddiursa snapped (Kevin supposed it had something to do with the taunts Blissey was uttering as well) and essentially threw Blissey to the other side of the stadium, resulting in a one-hit K.O. Teddiursa's trainer looked extremely frightened of her Pokémon once the match was over.
Marianna didn't use her Magnezone for her battle, instead opting for a small parrot Pokémon that Lana identified as a Chatot. The Pokémon had a nasty glare that also gave Kevin an unpleasant reminder of some residents of Petalburg Woods who didn't like him. Regardless, he was able to appreciate the Pokémon as it took down opponents nearly ten times its size. An angry ground type, Hippowdon, the MC called it, put up an impressive fight with a beautiful-looking Stone Edge that circled the entire field with ease, but Celestine the Chatot rebounded with Sing. The soothing melody put the Hippowdon and a few members of the crowd to sleep, leaving Celestine to quickly finish her job with a swift… Heat Wave? Sinnoh Pokémon had some weird move sets.
It was no surprise to Kevin or the rest of the audience at this point that Marianna was in the finals. The other trainer that made it, an Eevee-themed trainer who'd used a different evolution for each match, was coolly eyeing her from across the field. He hadn't seen Eevee-guy's appeals because of his late arrival, but Kevin figured he had to be pretty good, judging by the crowd.
The MC excitedly announced the final match. "This is it! The winner of this contest is either previous Grand Festival winner Marianna or the dark horse newcomer, Evan! Ready? With five minutes on the clock, the match starts now!"
"Cecily, Circuit, let's go!" shouted Marianna. Kevin wondered why everyone on her team had an alliterative name. (His mind darkly decided that Marianna had renamed all her Pokémon to suit her own tastes, and he frowned.) The Magnezone from before and a sturdy, also steel type penguin emerged from the white light, the metal on their bodies gleaming. They looked impressive, all shiny like that.
Evan smirked and flung his two Pokéballs as well. "Espeon and Umbreon," he said needlessly.
Kevin blinked a few times. That was stupid. Both psychic and dark did nothing to steel types. And he was pretty sure that neither of them knew Heat Wave, either.
Marianna also seemed to be confused, but the timer quickly motivated her to get started with the battle. "All right, then, let's open with the Flashing Cannon Combo!"
The "Flashing Cannon Combo" lived up to its name. Cecily charged up a silver beam attack as Circuit readied a Shock Wave, and the two fired their attacks simultaneously. The Shock Wave appeared to be magnetized to the steel-type move, circling round the beam like a ribbon. Oh, and it sparkled, too.
Evan told his Umbreon to move in front of Espeon, shielding it from the attack. At least that made a bit of sense. If Espeon had been hit with that brilliant move, Kevin doubted that it'd still be standing. The judges, due to lack of anything fancy on Evan's part, took away some of his points.
"Dig, both of you," Evan said, and his fast Eeveelution duo complied. Marianna rolled her eyes.
"It's not like I haven't seen that strategy before, you know. Wash 'em out with Surf, Cissy!"
Cecily smugly sent a wave of (sparkling) water over the stage, flooding the newly made holes and sending both of Evan's Pokémon gasping up for air. The judges removed more of his points.
Now visibly frustrated, Evan arrogantly retorted back at her, "We're not finished yet! We've got fancy combos just like you! Gold and Silver, go!"
Gold and Silver was indeed a fancy combo. Combining Morning Sun and Moonlight, Espeon and Umbreon healed, sparkling as they did so, regaining health and eliminating some of Marianna's points. Since it was daytime, Espeon healed more than Umbreon, but that evened out because Umbreon was the bulkier of the two.
Marianna narrowed her eyes. "All you're doing is stalling the fight. I'm going to finish this. Blackout combo, guys."
Cecily and Circuit smiled at each other (Well, whatever the robotic equivalent of smiling was, for the Magnezone) and began their attack. Cecily sent out a second wave of water, this time a larger one. She jumped back as far as the field boundaries would allow her, letting Circuit take her place. Circuit put its magnet appendages into the water, sending a current through it that looked quite painful, if Kevin did say so himself. Espeon and Umbreon braced themselves; electricity coursed through their bodies before they fell limply on the dirt floor. Evan was just as stunned as his Pokémon.
The audience exploded with applause. Kevin let out a whistle. Well, the Sinnoh contests had definitely exceeded his expectations. Once everything got settled down with the Shades, maybe he'd find a way to enter one. He hoped he wouldn't have to encounter Marianna and her team in battle, though.
The MC had eventually started wrapping everything up while the applause kept going. "Congratulations to Marianna and her partners, Cecily the Empoleon and Circuit the Magnezone! This is Marianna's fifth ribbon, so expect to see her in the Grand Festival, as well as the Pokémon League, in which she'll also be competing!"
Ah. He had to go and jinx it, didn't he? Lana actually cried "What?!". Well, he could worry about that in December. Right now, he had to think about getting their fifth badge.
"That's a wrap, folks! This was Hearthome's November 2010 Pokémon Contest! See you next year in January, everyone!" The MC finished. Everyone was cheering… except Kevin.
"…2010?" he repeated, his mouth opening slightly. Whoa, lady, that wasn't right, it was only 2000, wasn't it? She'd probably just slipped up or something. Yeah, that was it.
He felt uneasy when he turned around to leave, seeing a poster. He couldn't read the letters, but he knew numbers pretty well, and what they said agreed with her.
"November 2010… What?!"