Alright, here's a quickie!

"Alright!" the announcer, Marian, shouted, "Welcome to the Sandgem Town Pokemon Contest! This contest is exclusive to Rookies, and we have a lot of pokemon ready to show their stuff! So, let's introduce our lovely judges."

I breathed out slowly, looking from behind the stands. Contest day. I sat Saria down, and fastened the Toxic Orb around her neck. Yep, you'll see why I did that, though.

"First off, Grand Festival winner, it's Zoey!" Marian smiled and looked at the red-head. I had recognized her from TV, but she wasn't very familiar. She had a quirky pair of sunglasses on her, too. "Haha! Great to be here, I can't wait to see all the pokemon!" she announced.

Marian giggled, "Always in touch with contest styling, here's Mr. Contesta!"

It was a salt-and-peppered haired man, with a bright red suit, with blue "tendrils" sticking from the bizzare neckpiece. I had heard he went through a strange fashion stage. "Oh my, I'm certainly excited to be here!" he chortled and clasped his hands together."

"Finally," the hostess grinned, "Sandgem's Nurse Joy was busy... so we got a special guest tonight! It's Professor Rowan!" He gave a big smile through his mustache, but said nothing.

I had just remembered what he said to me minutes before.

-(-)-

"I'm extremely sorry. My mistake," he had apologized. I sweatdropped, putting a hand behind my head, "No... I really didn't want to do those gym battles anyway."

I gave him the badge case back. There was a new rule that coordinators and Official Gym battles cannot be mixed, and I chose contests over badges.

Rowan smiled and patted my shoulder, "Good luck!"

-(-)-

"This poison's really getting to me," Saria moaned. "Shhhh!" I hissed, and looked at my outfit. It was a simple black tux, with a little Eevee patch on it. I adjusted her Toxic Orb necklace and we prepared to walk out.

Marian pointed to the crowd, "So here's out first contestant, Nick! So let's get busy."

We waltzed out, with crowd cheering and hollering at us. We smiled and I picked up Saria for a moment.

Marian frowned and the crowd got quiet, "A Toxic Orb? What's this trainer got up his sleeve?"

"You'll see," Saria smiled, and with that, time started ticking down.

I put her on the ground and shouted, "Okay, start out with Work Up!" Saria hopped and bounded around, creating a red aura. I was hoping this would power up my next move and get the cuteness factor into the crowd. It worked 100% as he crowd all smiled and went "Aw..."

The hostess adjusted her mike, "Isn't that adorable, using such a fierce move as Work Up, and turning it something so cute, amazing!"

"Now, Saria, jump and use Facade across stage!" I exclaimed, as she took a long bound. The Toxic Orb powered up Facade, and created a purple version due to poison, and when the shadow of her started moving across the stage, I shouted, "Use Dig attack, and try to break that Facade!"

"Can do!" she squealed and dug into the ground. Three seconds later, the facade burst into red and purple streamer-like energy. I rushed over to catch her, and she tumbled into my hands, and nuzzled noses.

Marian widened her eyes, "My my! What a great start to the Sandgem Contest, but let's see what the judges have to say!" She turned towards the odd trio, gesturing with an open hand.

Zoey smiled and went first, "The cute twist to Work Up was an excellent touch, and the quirk of using a Toxic Orb was awesome!"

The next one, Mr. Contest boomed out, "Ah! Saria's leaps and bounds were by far spectacular, and the amazing colors, beautiful!"

Stoic Professor Rowan went last, and with a fix of a mustache, he simply said, "The bond between you and Saria was shown greatly, perfect!"

Marian smiled, "All right! Let's move on to the next contestant!" I walked off stage as she announced, "Here's Deanne!"

I brushed off a sweat as I sprayed Saria with an antidote, anxious to see what was next.

-(-)-

After a while, Cass and I met up. She was extremely nervous, shaking her leg up and down and biting her lip. "Hey!" Chloe snapped, "Not so tight!" Cass quickly apologized and we both looked up to see who the next contestant was.

"Yeah! Now, we have the mighty Max!" Marian declared as she introduced a familiar little boy with a green suit on.

"Max!" Cass and I exclaimed at the same time, and we shoved through the contestants to see the screen better.

He used Ralts, the same one he had used yesterday, but I knew he had something planned.

"Alright Ralts, use Confusion on the ground!" he ordered and Ralts spun around pink rays shooting the earth. It created a pink dust cloud that blocked any sight. "My!" Marian exclaimed, "The entire stage is shrouded in mysterious dust. What's going on here?"

Max's voice could still be heard, "Now use Teleport then Growl and repeat!"

Even though we couldn't see the little pokemon, it's eerie cry reverberated through the stage. Marian shuddered, "Uh... such a creepy performance. Let's see what our noble judges got out of it."

The three went in the same order, exclaiming,

"Using a Ralts's ability to use Teleport was excellent, and finished off the creepy scene!"

"I agree, using a Psychic types mystic powers were just the tip of the iceberg!"

"...Ralts and the coordinator were perfectly in sync, there's no other way to put it."

Marian gave out another introduction after Max hurried off. "Okay folks, it's the last performance of the day," at this point Cass paled, "Give it up for Cassandra, or better known as the go-get-em girl Cass!"

Chloe and her rushed to the stage, anguish coursing through her veins.