Disclaimer: Pokémon is owned by The Pokémon Company, which in turn is owned by Nintendo, Game Freak, and probably others I forgot. The following fanfiction is me playing around in their sandbox, using characters they envisioned and created, except for the odd character that wasn't. I own nothing of this

Chapter 22: Début

Nearly eight hundred trainers stood in the main stadium, facing a full set of stands. Max and Danny were somewhere in the middle of the group, which made it very hard to see Mr. Goodshow, who was doing his usual speech at the start of a tournament. Max had heard them before, plenty of times, but being in the group of Trainers being talked to was different.

It was cool as anything ever was.

"Let this Ever Grande Conference… begin!"

The trainers slowly left the arena, under thunderous applause. Somewhere in that audience were his parents, Max knew. He hadn't seen them yet, but his Dad had promised, and he kept his promises. His sister wasn't in the audience: she wouldn't be in Ever Grande until late December 2nd.

She'd overslept and missed the boat from Slateport. Typical.

"When are you up?" Danny asked as they traversed the spacious hallways that led them outside. "I'm the tenth match in Stadium G, around half past three."

"Eighteenth match in Stadium C," Max replied instantly. He'd checked earlier, for himself, Danny, Paul, Linda, Keith, and Jane. "I'll watch you, then head to Stadium C. Paul's up in thirteenth there." All the others were up simultaneously with Max, give or take one match.

"Unlucky thirteen?" Danny quipped.

"Eh, that's superstition." They reached the outside, going from fluorescent light to pale sunlight. "Chose your Pokémon?"

"Last night. You?"

"Same." They walked onto one of the main plazas, with the clock saying it was close to noon. "I think we both know which Pokémon we chose."

Danny snorted. "Yeah, I can guess. Let's just hope we don't get some bad match-ups."

For the preliminaries and the Double Battle rounds, both trainers had to preselect their Pokémon. There was no strategy possible in sending out counters. You selected Pokémon, and bad match-ups happened on occasion, which could be a problem.

Then again, Ash had run into one of those in his Ever Grande Conference. Hadn't stopped him.

The possibility of these bad match-ups was why Max and Danny had spent a good part of the last month and a half teaching and training some specific counters. They couldn't control their opponent's Pokémon, but they could plan for possible problems.

They headed back to their hostel until Danny had to leave for his match. Stadium G was right next to the hostel, which was nice, and Max settled in the audience early, watching two girls dominate their opponents. The match before Danny's had been especially one-sided: rhyhorn versus mareep match-ups usually were.

Still, he'd been into the match enough to not notice Danny's father sneaking up beside him. His surprised yelp got him a few glares, but after a quick greeting, with the older Birch confirming Max's own parents were elsewhere in the audience with Danny's Mum and uncle, they sat in silence, watching as some diglett repaired the arena after rhyhorn had stomped a bit too hard.

Max took out his Pokénav, checking the details on Danny's opponent. It was another twelve year old boy. His name was Oliver, from Fallarbor, and he had done the small circuit around Hoenn's west: Cave, Stone, Balance, Knuckle, Dynamo, Heat, Shadow, Feather.

And then, both trainers walked out, to encouraging applause from the audience. Max clapped hard, even as he privately grumbled a tiny bit. They were at the wrong side, close to Oliver, not Danny. "Wrong side, eh?" Danny's father picked up on it. "Don't worry. We can still see him."

Oliver didn't look around, keeping his eyes straight down the field, but Danny had apparently spotted his Mum and uncle, and gave a short wave before walking into the Trainer's box.

Both Pokémon came out, revealing it would be marshtomp against a nidorina. Not the best opponent, but Max figured Danny was okay with it. Nidorina weren't speedy or primarily ranged, although the poison spikes could be a problem.

Oliver opened the battle, his high-pitched voice carrying just enough to Max's seat. "Nidorina, use Poison Sting!"

The stings met a burst of water that scattered and dissolved all of them, and marshtomp moved, trying to close the distance with the quadruped. He made it to the half way line when the nidorina spewed green liquid at him, forcing Danny to order a Protect.

"What's that move?" Danny's Dad asked as nidorina took advantage of marshtomp's momentary immobility and pounced, claws out. Marshtomp was able to avoid that, but he wasn't able to throw the Poison-type off, and a scuffle started.

"Venoshock, I think," Max said. "Works better when used on poisoned Pokémon."

Marshtomp, meanwhile, had been scratched a few times, but was able to concentrate long enough to deliver a regular old punch to the nidorina's gut, which forced her off. The follow-up Mud Bomb was unmissable, and it hit right her right on the nose. "So it exacerbates the poison?"

"Ex-a-cer-bates?" Max echoed slowly as Oliver ordered nidorina to move away. "What?"

"Make worse."

"Yeah." Max saw blue energy start to form in front of nidorina's mouth. "Ice Beam? Impressive, but not going to work."

True to Max's thoughts, the moment the Ice Beam launched, marshtomp vanished into the ground, quickly digging his way over to the nidorina. She tried to avoid the marshtomp, but it wasn't successful: the nidorina was launched several feet in the air, and upon landing, got blasted with a harsh Water Gun.

The Water Gun suddenly stopped, as marshtomp let out what sounded like a low groan, and he was close enough that Max spotted the problem: there was a small wound on his forehead. "Danny needs to finish quick."

"Or?"

"Or the poison is going to finish him."

Nidorina spat out another round of Venoshock, and Danny ordered marshtomp to dodge, which he did. The acidic attack clipped marshtomp's left arm, but not the head, and the Mud Fish Pokémon bit through that pain to launch a stream of Mud Shot.

Most of them missed, but the first few hit the nidorina on her rear, prompting another cry of pain. The Poison-type was shaking on her feet, breathing heavily, but she wasn't out just yet. "Venoshock. Get it!" Oliver yelled.

This time, the attack was too slow. Marshtomp was able to Protect itself for the full attack, and when the Venoshock faltered, he dropped the shield and launched another Water Gun back.

The tired nidorina couldn't dodge, caught the jet, and skid slightly back, buckling her knees.

"Nidorina is unable to battle!" the referee declared, microphone-boosted voice echoing through the stadium. "The victory goes to marshtomp and Danny!"

"Closer than I wanted," Danny said ten minutes later as he walked out of the catacombs, immediately going in for a hug with his Mum, and then his Dad after. "Tail spike nicked marshtomp's head after Dig. If he'd been smarter about it, I could've lost."

"But?" Max's Dad asked.

"Ice Beam was too slow. Gave me way too much time, and marshtomp is fine with frozen surfaces." He grabbed a Pokéball and gave it to his Dad. "Can you take this to the Center? A friend of ours is up in Stadium C, and we gotta run."

"Sure, let your old man do all the work." Despite the grumble, Danny's Dad nodded. "Go on, go watch your friend. Save some seats for us."

"Will do!"

Both of them ran across Ever Grande, crossing the distance to Stadium C just in time to see Paul finish his match. He had sent out dustox against a sneasel, and from the looks of the coughing sneasel, neither the Sharp Claw Pokémon nor its trainer – a Unovan boy – had any idea of how to deal with powders. The immunity to Psychic attacks was probably the only reason they caught the tail end of the match: Max remembered dustox relying a fair bit on those attacks, with only general Tackles and Gusts to cover for it.

Paul and Danny compared notes for a bit as they watched four more trainers duke it out, but they had largely finished by the time the sixteenth battle in the Stadium was about to start, and as soon as both trainers had sent out their Pokémon, Max stood up. "This is over," he told family and friends. "I'm going to prepare."

And honestly, he had no interest in watching a staraptor make mincemeat of a nincada. There were nature documentaries for that.

By the time he signed in at the official, not even two minutes later, the battle had ended. It gave Max about five minutes to prepare in one of the many rooms in the stadium before needing to come back out. He walked into the nearest empty room, closed the door, and sent out manectric, who greeted him with enthusiastic licks. "Easy, girl. Sit."

The Electric-type jumped onto the bench beside him, sitting calmly, with a large canine grin on her face. "You ready to get this started?"

"Tric!"

"Of course you are," Max said, smiling fondly. "You're always ready, aren't you." The answer to that question was more licking, and Max returned manectric, if only to make sure his face and glasses weren't covered in slobber.

Max's opponent was another rookie trainer: a boy called Matt from Mauville. They briefly met in the catacombs, giving each other a hand and wishing the other good luck. Matt was shorter than Max was, but his voice was raspy and deep, like he had a persistent cold, only not really. They walked out side by side, as all Trainers did, into the artificially lit arena. Max went left, Matt went right, and both of them grabbed the Pokéball they had selected.

Manectric and a teddiursa appeared on the field.

The average teddiursa was a bit slow, and better up close, but they had ways around that. "Thunder Wave at range!" Max ordered as soon as the referee lowered his flags.

Exactly what Matt ordered, he couldn't hear, but the small globes of white energy told Max enough. Hidden Power flew around the arena, trying to catch the manectric, but Max's Pokémon was too fast to be caught. The Thunder Wave hit, but rather than bend over, the teddiursa grinned.

And sped towards manectric.

"Always the wrong ability," Max muttered as his Pokémon easily dodged a Fury Swipes and a Shadow Claw. "Spark!"

Teddiursa tried to avoid the manectric, and did a good job of avoiding her for a bit by using her smaller profile to make tighter turns, but the quadruped ended up being plain faster, slamming into the bear-like Pokémon, sending it flying backward. It landed on its back, getting up to a sitting position with a little bit of trouble, but immediately glowing with a blue light, eyes closing.

This was too easy. "Discharge!"

Teddiursa also let out an attack, Sleep Talking into a Sweet Scent that did absolutely nothing to hinder the powerful Discharge attack bearing down on it. The bear briefly screamed in pain, and before it recovered enough to use another Sleep Talk, manectric slammed into it with a Quick Attack, sending it flying straight into the back wall.

It didn't get up, unsurprisingly. Teddiursa weren't known for being durable.

It wasn't quite a two minute match, but it was pretty fast. The applause was loud, and Max saw the faces of his family and friends in the audience, all of them clapping as hard as they could.

"Hey," Matt said when they were in the catacombs proper, off to the side. The next pair of trainers, two very nervous girls from the looks of it, were already waiting. "Good battle. Just don't go out next round, okay, or I won't hear the end of it."

"I'll try not to," Max said as they shook hands one last time. Matt walked off afterwards, making Max think that he perhaps wasn't as stoic as he'd portrayed himself to be, but that was the nature of battles. One had to win, and one had to lose.

An hour later, the full group, including Keith, Jane, and Linda, who'd all won their first rounds as well, walked into a restaurant. The proprietor took one look at who had entered, and immediately waved them on to the back room.

"I remember that trainer," Max's Dad said as they sat down at the huge table – it could seat sixteen. "He came by for his second badge just after you left. Already had the teddiursa, then, and a volbeat as well. He managed a draw with one of my slakoth and my aipom. Seemed more comfortable with the teddiursa than the volbeat."

"Teddiursa's his starter?" Paul wondered. "Man, that's a weird starter for a boy."

"Ursaring are fierce as anythin'," Alice reminded him, and Max had a momentary flashback to capturing natu. "Is it normal ta use the starter in the first battle? Paul and Max didn't, but Danny and Linda did."

"Common, for sure," Professor Birch agreed. "Trainers put a lot of faith in their starter Pokémon, so who better to fight in a one on one?"

"We did too," Keith piped up from down the table, undeterred by distance, speaking for himself and Jane, who'd been in the same stadium one match after him. "Why didn't you two?"

"Dustox is safe, and as Danny will tell you, it's a pain to fight against powders if you don't know how to deal with them."

Several pairs of eyes went to Danny, who was sitting opposite Keith. "That was five months ago!"

"Still counts." That set off a round of laughter. "Max?"

"Flipped a coin between grovyle and manectric," Max replied honestly, to more laughter, and a vaguely disapproving look by his father. "I couldn't choose, and I kind of wanted to sleep too." That soothed his father, and a waiter came in to provide them with menus.

The group dispersed two hours later, after a great dinner and a lot of fun. Max had swapped places with Paul halfway through dinner, wanting to talk some more to his old classmates about what they had seen on their journey and where they were going next.

As it turned out, both of them were going to Kalos. Together, too, but not "together-together", as Keith said vehemently. Max let it slide; he'd been the subject of enough teasing like that by Danny now that Linda was with them again.

One of these days, he was going to prank Danny for that.

"Alone again," Danny remarked as they headed off to their hostel, walking past many other restaurants full of Trainers. They were the only ones going east: Keith and Linda were in a hostel near Stadium A, to the north; Jane and the twins were in a hostel around the corner from the restaurant they'd eaten at, and the adults were in a hotel nearly outside town, all the way west. "Uncle had some good things to say about Kalos and Sinnoh. More about Sinnoh."

"Because he hasn't been to Kalos," Max countered, weaving around a joyfully snapping houndour. The young girl playing with it called the canine to her, but Danny knelt by it for a second, scratching it right under the chin. "He'd probably love to see some Kalos Pokémon," he added when Danny got back up.

"Scratch the probably," Danny said. "And you can do that for him you need to. Gotta catch 'em all, you know."

Max laughed as they started walking again. "That slogan is so old and corny. Who came up with it?"

"Stupid people in stupid times," Danny replied solemnly, but the effect was ruined when Max raised an eyebrow, and laughter ensued again. "Anyway," Danny said afterwards. "Kalos sounds fun, but Sinnoh is..."

"Sort of family tradition, you told me," Max finished for his friend. "I'm just happy your parents didn't meet in Unova, and you were thinking about going there."

"Yeah, Unova sounds like a bad idea." They continued walking, passing Stadium E along the way, a screen telling them that there was only one match left after the current one. "I'll decide tomorrow.. Maybe day after tomorrow."

"Okay."

They reached the full hostel with little more issue, and settled down for the night after Danny retrieved marshtomp from Nurse Joy. The poison had been purged from his system, but she warned Danny to not use the marshtomp in his next battle, just in case. The day after was fine, just not tomorrow.

At around half past nine, Max decided to check the tournament website to see the brackets for the Double Battle rounds. He found his own face nearly immediately: he was in the top left quarter of the bracket, as was Jane. They couldn't meet, though: the round of 64 was where their brackets converged, and that was a new draw entirely. Max was up around noon, and Jane's match about an hour later. In the same stadium.

Danny was in the lower left part, and though his opponent was fifteen, it was still her first League. Keith had not been as lucky: his opponent was a four time League participant from Johto with a walk-over in the preliminaries. Danny could actually meet her in the round of 128. Both of them were in the same stadium, Keith about an hour after Danny.

A loud cheer and the sound of exploding fireworks nearby made Max get up and close the window. No need to sleep in gunpowder smells. Once he had done that, he scrolled over to the lower right, and what he saw there piqued his interest. Paul and Linda were in adjacent slots, meaning that they'd be fighting each other if both of them won their match. "Danny."

"Hm?"

"Come here." Danny did so. "See?"

"Hope we can watch that if they go through." Danny yawned. "What time we up tomorrow?"

"Around lunch," Max said as he scrolled back to Danny's match. "Here's yours. I'm one match earlier across town."

"Right. Thanks. I'm off to bed now, try to get some sleep. Don't stay up too late."

"I won't, Mum."

~~§~~§~~

"What did you make of the matches, dear?" Caroline asked as she sat down in one of the comfortable hotel chairs. "I know you must have been watching as a Gym Leader as well as a father."

"You know I did. It's difficult to shut part of your brain off," Norman prevaricated as he poured them some drinks.

"And?" Caroline pressed. Her husband remained silent, handing her a glass before taking a seat as well. The Petalburg Gym Leader took a sip of his drink. "Norman."

Glass met a glass table with an audible clink. "It was short, but… Max looked at home in the arena. Like he'd done it a dozen times before."

"He fought nine Gym battles and won a tournament," Caroline pointed out.

"No. Those are different. The stadium wasn't that full, but Max wouldn't have cared if he was in that stadium, or the main one." Norman smiled fondly at his wife of nineteen years. "He was confident, but not overconfident, and he was fast, but thought his moves through. And I'm left wondering when my son grew up so much."

"So why didn't you tell him how proud you are?"

Norman conceded the point to Caroline with a small smile and a sideways nod of the head. "He hasn't changed that much. He'll be confident right up until where he wants to get, and then he'll get nervous. I'd rather say it then."

"I see." Caroline wasn't certain she agreed, but this was one of the differences of opinion they had about raising their children. It was minor. "And which round do you think he wants to get to?"

"128," Norman answered instantly. "That Unovan girl – Linda – told me before dinner. Smart girl, but I don't think she knows the word 'secret'. And I think he'd be okay with going out in the round of 256 if the opponent is someone like Ash: just plain better in every way."

He lapsed into silence, but Caroline could tell there was more on his mind. "What else is bothering you?"

"Nothing," came the reply. "I'm just thinking about having a friendly battle with Max once they come home. I'd love to see him up against some of my Pokémon."

Caroline smiled fondly. "There's the Gym Leader speaking. Let's hope he accepts, then."

~~§~~§~~

Waiting inside, hoping the battle scheduled before yours ended, was the worst, Danny decided after nearly ten minutes of watching a game of cat and mouse – literally. Both trainers only had one Pokémon left after a machoke and a cacnea had fallen, and it was a pikachu versus a persian.

The Double Battles were where the real tournament started, and Danny knew he was nervous. But he also knew he couldn't doubt himself, and so he did his best to ignore his queasy stomach, instead watching a rodent try to tire a cat out. The pikachu had long lost all of its stored up electricity, and could only shoot occasional Thundershocks. Danny had been expecting more, but that was probably him being used to Ash's pikachu, who was… crazy powerful.

After twelve minutes, the pikachu finally fell, much to the relief of the persian's trainer. Danny moved out of the preparation room into the hallway, finding his opponent already there, looking the exact same as the picture he'd seen online. "Good luck."

His opponent – a Sinnoh girl named Amber – didn't return his wishes, though she did shake his hand and offer him a smile. Her hand was clammy, sweaty, and the smile definitely wasn't full. It calmed Danny, knowing that his opponent was as nervous as he was.

His parents had managed to get a place near the entrance from the catacombs, and Danny heard their encouragement – polite from his mother, enthusiastic from his father – as he walked out. The stadium wasn't that full, but it was still filled to well over half its capacity.

He took both Pokéballs in hand and threw them upwards, releasing both of his chosen Pokémon. He then had to stoop to grab froslass's Pokéball, because he missed catching it, and that made sure he didn't see the opponent's Pokémon come out.

When he looked back up, Danny spotted two Pokémon very unsuited for a battle against his two Ghosts. He knew he shouldn't underestimate anyone, but neither Pokémon learned Foresight or Odor Sleuth to the best of his knowledge. That was a big help for him, especially with what he was planning to do.

A small downside was that both of them were immune to Ghost-type attacks, and dusclops wasn't the most versatile. He really should have had her practice more with Max's vulpix.

It was too late now, as the battle started. "Dusclops, move forward. Froslass, Hail!"

Hail pelted the field, and froslass appeared to sink into it, much like Terry's larvitar had done with a Sandstorm, months ago. The hail was fierce enough to completely block Danny's view of the opposing Pokémon, though dusclops was still, barely, visible, standing in the middle of Danny's half of the battlefield. "Will-O-Wisp."

As they had practised, dusclops formed a ball of flame close to the ground, and with a little bit of mental manipulation, she moved it to the side of the arena, on the other end of where froslass was probably hiding out. There, the fire danced in the hail.

As bait.

Predictably, something shot down that left hand side of the field. A familiar green globe extinguished the flame, missing everything and everyone else, and it was followed by the aipom, sort of visible by the purple energy it used to slash in the hail, in the hopes of hitting something.

Another Will-O-Wisp alerted aipom to dusclops's position, and the small Pokémon pounced in an instant, Shadow Claws raining down on the Ghost. Two or three raked across her body before dusclops could throw up her Protect, but she didn't need to do that. Instead, froslass blasted the aipom with a powerful Icy Wind from above: one that dusclops wasn't hit by thanks to careful aiming.

The aipom cried out in pain, Shadow Claw fizzling, and more pain was its part as dusclops moved in, launching a quick Fire Punch. Sure, the swablu hit another Dragon Pulse just afterwards, but that didn't matter. Dusclops could take a ton of punishment and come out okay.

Aipom, on the other hand, beat a hasty retreat, covered by a gust of Icy Wind from swablu's direction. The odd move only surprised Danny for a moment as he remembered that swablu could learn Mirror Move.

Froslass dove in with glowing mouth, but no cries of pain meant that Ice Fang had missed, sadly. It wasn't too much of a problem. Danny could wait. The hail was still pelting away at everyone, and the temperature was dropping. Dusclops wasn't immune to the hailstones, but she was better at withstanding lower temperatures as a Ghost. It would be slow, but eventually, Danny would win.

"Let the opponent come and make mistakes," Max had said when Danny had told him about the strategy he was now using. It had been in the making for a month or so, and it was working wonders.

Several Dragon Pulses flew from his opponent's end, but dusclops, while slow, had moved away. Froslass, meanwhile, was her slippery self, and probably nowhere near the balls. Danny didn't know what she was doing; he couldn't see her, meaning she was somewhere on the opponent's half.

The hail suddenly tinted purple, telling Danny exactly what his Ice-type had done. The Dragon Pulse that flew up into the air over the arena told him who'd been hit: swablu. "End the Hail and Will-O-Wisp!"

Froslass and dusclops obeyed, granting full vision of a swablu hovering unsteadily in mid-air and an aipom that looked tired. Not quite tired enough to not dodge the Will-O-Wisp, but the surprise attack from swablu – a Disarming Voice – knocked it out.

Swablu recovered from its confusion in the small downtime granted by aipom being returned, and tried to Mirror Move a Will-O-Wisp back, but the fire flickered and died as a Powder Snow intercepted it.

Before Danny could order an all-out attack, his opponent returned the swablu. "I yield!" she yelled across the field.

Just like that, Danny had made it through the first Double Battle. It felt a bit anticlimactic, but Danny supposed that his opponent recognised she had no real options. He tried to get a hold of her, but she was in the catacombs before he was, and it was disrespectful to chase after an opponent.

Danny sent out both of his Pokémon in an empty corridor, thanked them for their great teamwork and execution of the plan, and returned them, eager to go find his family in the audience. He walked up the stairs, hearing a pitched and explosive battle coming from the arena.

A woman moved down the stairs, and Danny didn't recognise her until she stopped him. "Great battle. Really hope to see more of you," Phoebe told him. "Maybe add a bit of diversity to dusclops.."

And then she was off again, leaving Danny slightly dumb-struck. Sure, he'd talked to Phoebe, and Sidney, and Drake, before, but to have an Elite Four member comment on your random battle, casual as anything, felt very surreal. Phoebe's quick departure didn't help.

His father needled him a tiny bit when Danny showed up slightly dazed, but he soon transformed into a messenger pidove, telling Danny that Max and Paul were through to the next round.

As it turned out, Keith was the only one of the group they had formed to go out in this round, and he seemed pretty okay with it, saying his opponent was plain better. That, in turn, set off short battle descriptions from everyone: Jane's battle had been hard-fought with her nuzleaf barely staying upright long enough to claim victory. Max, likewise, reported a nastily tough battle with grovyle and ninjask against a drowzee and a gabite, trained by someone on his second League.

On the other hand, Paul had apparently "won easily, duh", beating a hoothoot and a klefki – some Kalos Pokémon that looked like a key chain – with corphish and machop. Lastly, while Linda was very complimentary of her opponent, she had to concede that the type advantages her numel and baltoy had versus aron and volbeat probably won her the match outright.

They celebrated their wins – and unfortunate loss – with ice cream and waffles as they waited for other results to come in, to tell them who their opponents would be. Most of them, anyway, Danny amended mentally. Paul and Linda knew their opponent already.

Danny really hoped he wouldn't be stuck in his own battle for that.

~~§~~§~~§~~§~~

Lance,

Am uncomfortable with your idea. I see merit you propose well, but am fearful.

Can you explain in person? Schedule at your leisure.

Reg

Author's Note: Welcome to the Ever Grande Conference!