It took about two weeks after Violet and I met Raine before the crowd in Santalune City began to thin out. The frantic traffic of newbie trainers trying to register was slowing down, and the kids who had managed to register were starting to leave.

A small but significant number of people were moving on to other cities, having managed to beat Viola and get her badge. A larger number of trainers practically disappeared, shocked out of their reveries by a loss (or a string of losses) to Viola, and went off to do some soul-searching. A lot of kids, especially the younger ones, just left to go back home with their parents until they were deemed to be "truly ready" to go out on their journeys. It was technically illegal to stop anyone (for certain values of anyone) from becoming a trainer, but most parents didn't have to try that hard to convince their children; after all, no-one wants to make mommy sad or angry, right?

Anyway. It was tolerable to walk in the city again, and so it was time to finally take care of important business.

I stood outside the Santalune City Gym, trying to talk myself into entering. I grew up in Santalune City, and I'd been to the gym before. I had vague memories of an eighth-grade class trip, before I and over three-quarters of my class had left for our journeys. We went to see the art museum, though, not to see the gym or any battles taking place.

You've been out here for ten minutes, Violet said.

I know, I replied.

Your leg must be hurting.

Incredibly.

Let's go in, then. It'll be okay, she said, nuzzling my leg.

I looked at her and frowned. What if we lose?

Then we try again. Even if we lose, this will not kill us. Only give us more reason to be stronger.

I paused for a second and bit my lip. I don't want to go back.

We won't, she said quickly, almost cutting me off.

I sighed. Twenty minutes later, I hesitantly opened the doors to the gym. The top floor was a gallery of artwork, most of it the gym leader's photography. It was pretty, and maybe on another day I could lose myself in the museum, but I had to stay focused. I saw a sign that said "Entrance to the gym down this hallway" and I followed it. Hung up on the wall were pictures of all of Viola's pokemon. I saw a Yanmega, and a Volcanion, and a Scizor, and I started to hyperventilate.

I have to fight those? Maybe I should get out of here.

Breathe. Those are her advanced teams, for trainers farther ahead than you. You'll do fine. Think about the maze.

I slowly controlled my breathing. She was right. I vaguely knew what the theme of this gym was, from friends who left to take the gym circuit before me. It was a maze with a spiderweb motif, and it was supposed to test your ability to observe and make logical decisions. If it was easy enough for twelve year olds to get through it, I figured I wouldn't have too much trouble with it.

The hallway suddenly ended, and I saw a hole in the floor, with a fireman's pole leading down into it. There was another sign on the wall in front of me: "My maze lies below, and I wait at the end. Shore up your courage, sharpen your wits, and give me a battle to remember - Viola."

"What." I stood there for a minute, not able to process this. I looked at my cane in one hand, and Violet's leash on the other, and wondered how in hell they expected me to get down to the gym.

I turned around and headed the way I came, hoping I could find someone and ask them what I was supposed to do now. I passed a boy half-jogging towards the gym entrance, and I dimly heard him say "Cool, a slide!" before I reached the lobby again. I frowned.

I reached a desk labeled 'Information' and waited in line. After a few minutes of waiting, one of the people at the counter waved me over. Her nametag said Margaret. "How may I help you?" she asked.

"How do I get to the gym? Like, I know how to find the pole to go down, but how do I get into the gym?" I raised the cane and the leash in my arms, to make sure she could see them. "I can't use it."

She paused. I'm not sure she really expected the question. "Please excuse me a second," she said, and picked up a telephone. "Hello? I've got a kid here who wants to take the gym challenge and can't make it down the pole. No, she's not scared or refusing, she's got a cane. Mmm. Do you really want me to suggest that?" She sighed. "Okay."

She put a hand over the microphone and said, "He asks if you can just toss the cane down there and slide after it."

I gaped. I wanted to vehemently shout, No, that's an asinine idea! but instead said, "No. I doubt it'd survive the fall."

"The floor is padded."

"No," I said a bit more forcefully.

"Yeah, I thought that wouldn't work. He wanted me to try, though." She uncovered the telephone and started talking again. "No, that's not going to work. Look, don't we just have an elevator or something we can use? I remember we had that girl in a wheelchair come a month ago and she beat Viola. Oh, it's broken. When it's getting fixed? You don't know?"

I grit my teeth. This should not be this hard. I'm obviously not the first person to come here and be unable to slide down the bloody thing.

Margaret hung up the phone. "I'm sorry, we don't see many challengers that are... like you," she said.

I wonder why, Violet said to me.

Margaret continued. "If you take a left, you'll end up in the Silver wing of the museum. Right at the end is the exit challengers take after they face Viola. A guy in a blue apron will be waiting to guide you there. It's a few flight of stairs down, is that okay?"

I nodded half-heartedly. Stairs weren't my favorite thing in the world and they hurt more than normal walking, but it was better than a nebulous 'come back whenever the elevator is fixed'.

"Good luck," she said as I started to walk off.

The man was silent as he guided me downstairs. I tried to think about the upcoming battle, about what Raine and I could do, and how we could fight against Viola. The pain in my leg interrupted all thoughts of tactics, though. All I could focus on was that this hurt, and gods, I'd have to climb back up when the battle was over?

We reached what seemed to be a dead end. I looked more closely and saw a handle the same color as the wall around it.

"Stay close to me and don't make noise," the attendant said. "Viola's currently in a match. She will deal with you when she's done."

The passage closed after me. The attendant moved to the edge of the platform, as far away from the battle as he could get. I joined him. He seemed almost bored, and I supposed he was used to seeing battles like this on a regular basis. I was spellbound, though, as I saw the challenger's Lampent glide along the battlefield, dancing circles around Viola's Pinsir.

"How many badges does she have?" I whispered to him.

"Six."

I nodded and turned my eyes back to the battle. The Lampent preferred to fight from afar. She (so Violet informed me) phased into existence, threw a gout of fire at the bug, and phased away. The Pinsir dodged three out of every four attacks. He snapped his mandibles angrily.

Violet gave me a transcript of what the pokemon were saying. He's calling the Lampert a coward, and daring her to face him head on. The Lampent is laughing. I don't blame her.

The Pinsir tried to catch his breath. The floor wasn't catching on fire, he didn't have any smoke to deal with, but hot air is just unpleasant to breathe. It makes your throat cracked and raw, your skin flake. Bug types were especially sensitive to that.

He didn't last for very much longer. He was a close-combat fighter. He was supposed to crush his opponents in the mighty grip of his pincers. The Lampent forced him to fight at range and he couldn't cope. I wondered why Viola kept him out, because she had to know he was frustrated and fading, but then I realized that she probably couldn't, and this Pinsir was the last pokemon she had.

I started to get excited because I was about to witness my first gym victory. It didn't matter that it wasn't my own. Here was concrete, rather than abstract, proof that it was possible to beat a gym leader. I smiled. The Pinsir fell a few seconds later.

When Viola handed her the badge, it felt like I was intruding on something intimate and private. The attendant next to me stifled a yawn.

The girl was directed to the staircase we'd come down on, and she practically skipped up the steps. The up and down bob of her pigtails was hypnotizing.

Be alert, Violet said, bringing me back to focus.

Viola walked over to us and pointed at me. "Who's the kid?"

I stumbled over my words when I tried to speak. I closed my eyes for a second and took a long breath. I didn't want to fangirl and I didn't want to freak out. "I'm here to challenge the gym," I said. "To challenge you."

"The maze is over there," she gestured. "You're here. Why?"

"I couldn't slide down the pole, and they told me the elevator's broken. This guy got me upstairs and brought me here to see you."

Viola hmmed, and then sighed. "You're already here, I guess, and the other challenger is still lost in the maze. Sure, I can fight you, though it makes me uncomfortable you didn't make your way through the maze like you're supposed to."

It's not my fault your gym is a mess, I wanted to say. Violet nuzzled my leg in an attempt to calm me down.

"You're cute, at least," Viola continued. "How many badges do you have?"

"None," I said.

She nodded, went to the far side of the room, and picked out two pokeballs. "Okay then. Let's make this a battle to remember."