This one almost didn't make it. You're lucky the other writer is dedicated to our work. (On a related note: visitors two weeks in a row interrupted writing time. We're not that lazy)

"Sure," Lisia said over the Pokenav phone, which Brendan had decided to call to test it out. Apparently, she had connections to Devon herself, through this supposedly famous uncle of course. "I'll be your third officer. Team Breakneck, was it? I'll have to ask Laura to make our uniforms. Does the shade of green matter?"

So it began. Brendan had to hide how happy he was that she'd agreed. "You could do mostly black with green as a secondary color, May says. I haven't put much thought into it."

Lisia laughed. "It's not a big detail, don't worry. I'm assuming Pikachu might want something to match?"

"She might. I don't speak Pokémon."

"Did Lisia say yes?" May asked, and Brendan held a finger up to demand quiet. "Hey, who agreed to make Team Breakneck a thing? I deserve recognition, darn it!"

"Shut up, will you? I'm trying to get Lisia to use her influence to get us some more minions."

There was a reluctant hum from the other end of the line. "I don't know about that, Brendan. Fame is a great power, and with great power comes great responsibility."

"Is that what your uncle told you?"

"No, that's what superheroes taught me. I thought boys were into that stuff." She seemed to be having fun with the idea. "You're procrastinating on facing your dad in a battle, right? That's what this call was about, wasn't it?"

"No!" Brendan's answer came a little too fast, but it wasn't a lie. He liked Lisia and was getting excited about building his own evil empire with her and May as his backup. So what if he was a little nervous about going up against Norman? It wasn't anything he couldn't handle. "I can go and battle my dad at my own pace, this isn't a procrastination call."

"So are you on your way to Petalburg City right now?"

Brendan tried to come up with a response to that, but his brain had other ideas. "Just go and do your performance thing already, May and I can handle things without you."

"I'm glad we had this talk, Brendan," Lisia teased, but the sounds of lasers in the background meant that she'd turned her show back on. So her anime selection wasn't exclusively 'magical girl.' That, or the genre actually had some decent options. "Meet me at the Contest Hall in Lilycove City, you can check out our team uniforms when you get there."

She ended the call before our heroes could do anything more. But she had made a good point, and Brendan and May decided that they'd done enough procrastinating.

It was time to go meet Norman.

Going through Mauville to Verdanturf, then through the now completed Rusturf Tunnel and finally through Petalburg Woods, the two found themselves back in Petalburg City, staring nervously at the Gym.

"I'm not sure about this," Brendan said, not even trying to keep his nerves hidden. "My dad might not want us here. I threw a public temper tantrum once in recent memory, and then there was the soda thing."

"You were moving to an entirely new region. I'm pretty sure he doesn't blame you for the tantrum."

She didn't sound positive, though. She'd never seen Norman as a father, only a Gym Leader. But if he could be friends with Professor Birch, he couldn't be a bad person.

They'd been standing in front of the Gym for a while, neither of them willing to enter first but both knowing that unless he got the badge from his father, Brendan's journey to the honorary Championship would end here. He really couldn't tell which he would've preferred.

May was the one who pulled the door open, letting Brendan go inside first. "Norman's not here. You should be safe."

"Maybe he went home to see Mom," Brendan suggested, turning to go right back out the door. "I kind of miss her, too. Let's go back to Littleroot Town and just stay with our parents for a day or two."

"But what about Team Magma and Team Aqua? They won't wait for us to spend time with our families." She stopped, making her thoughtful face again. "Will they?"

He hated to admit it, but she was right about that. He turned around again, checked on Adam and Breloom, and started the march to the doors in the back of the Gym. There had to be some kind of puzzle, like Flannery's rocket geysers or Brawly's obstacle course of death.

The first door was marked with a sign that said 'Speed Room.' The other was marked with a sign that said 'Accuracy Room.'

"Speed and accuracy?" May asked, looking at Brendan in the hope that Norman had explained things to him. Seeing that her friend was just as confused as she was, she turned her attention to the Gym guide that they hadn't noticed. "So...we should ask him about it, then?"

"Nope," Brendan said, pulling her into the Accuracy Room. "We'll wing it. It's worked for us so far."

Well, he had a point there.

Adam had evolved into Blaziken in the Accuracy Room. Brendan took that as a sign that this battle was going to go as well as the other Gym battles. He didn't want to lose against his father.

Choices were made by the usual 'wild guess' movement, and even Aron got to shine in the One-Hit KO room, her Sturdy ability making all attempts to use such attacks utterly worthless.

"And you're sure you don't want Jerry, who has way more battle experience than Spoink?" May asked, stopping just in front of the Gym Leader's door. "No one has to know, we'll just swap Pokeballs here."

"No," Brendan said, though his hand did pause on Spoink's ball for a short second. "I will defeat my father with my own team. You can understand that, can't you?"

"I'm the only one in my family with a talent in battle. I could sweep any team my dad assembles with Masquerain alone." May placed her hand on the doorknob but didn't turn, looking Brendan in the eyes with an entirely serious face. "I would definitely not understand."

"Maybe you're the wrong person to talk to," Brendan decided. "But the point stands. It's a pride thing."

May smiled innocently and opened the door.

The room was open and well-lit, but that did nothing to calm Brendan as he tried to process that he was finally going to battle with Norman. It was the ultimate father-son bonding activity, and he was not ready.

If Norman had any doubts of his own readiness, he didn't show them. "You've gotten stronger," he noted, believing that to be the perfect ice breaker. "It's not just your Pokémon, Brendan, but you yourself."

"I'm not really sure how that works," Brendan said carefully, trying not to panic. This was necessary, and Norman had told him to come back once he had four badges. "My Pokémon do the battling, not me."

"And yet they follow your commands. You're a team, Brendan." He spared a glance toward May. "And I hear you're in Contests now."

"Two Cool ribbons," May said, forcing a smile to hide the fact that she had never felt more like a third wheel in her life. "It's about as impressive as four badges - halfway to the mega stardom and all."

"Yes, I suppose so." His attention went back to Brendan, who wished it wouldn't stay long. "As I promised, I will have a battle with you. But I warn you, as a Gym Leader, I will do everything I can to win."

"As a challenger," Brendan said, "I will do everything in my power to not lose."

Norman laughed at that, just a small chuckle. "Then let's get down to it."

Norman's Spinda didn't stand a chance against Brendan's Breloom and his Mach Punch. But the Spinda was like Flannery's Slugma, there to fill a spot on the party and tire out an opposing Pokémon's super effective moves. The Linoone wasn't much better. The Vigoroth, on the other hand, was a tough opponent, but Brendan managed through a combination of Aron's Sturdy and relentless Rock Smashes and Hyper Potions.

He knew what his father had in store for him, and he was not disappointed.

The Pokémon was big, fat and lazy, but Brendan knew not to underestimate it. He'd heard about the power of Slaking.

"You know what to do, Adam!"

Adam did know what to do, and started the round with a Double Kick. The immediate retaliation of Façade wasn't a surprise, but Brendan wasn't sure whether to take advantage of the relatively useless Truant ability for another Double Kick or to heal Adam's Façade-induced injuries.

"Is that all it can do, Dad?" he asked, nerves gone by that point as he formed a plan and backup plan in his head. "Façade? I guess you can't teach an old Pokémon new moves."

Slaking, taking offense to the comment, pointedly scratched its butt.

"Is that all you want, Brendan?" Norman asked, almost a warning. "You only want me to give a different command?"

"It would be nice," Brendan said, not seeming to notice. "Adam, use Double Kick again!"

Slaking took both hits, letting Adam take a turn with no retaliation. Then Norman took his son's advice and made the first command.

"Slaking, prepare Counter for..." His voice died as he saw Brendan bring a Super Potion from his bag and start spraying it on the mostly-unharmed Blaziken. "What are you doing?"

"Wasting a turn," Brendan said casually, covering Adam's minor scrapes with Super Potion.

Well, that left Counter to be completely useless, leaving Slaking open for another Double Kick attack. "Clever child," Norman admitted to himself, somewhere between proud and annoyed. Brendan tended to invoke that reaction a lot in his parents. He made a mental note to go back to using Façade. And so he did, letting the next Double Kick strike and taking the turn after that to use a Hyper Potion before the next attack could take Slaking out of the battle.

May slumped in her seat, unable to suppress a groan. "I wish I had one of my story notebooks," she said to the floor, refusing to accept her fate of utter boredom. Slowly, she forced herself to tune out the battle, and was eventually rewarded for her efforts by calling to mind her latest idea.

She wasn't sure what she would call it, but there was a team of bad guys, not entirely unlike Team Magma and Team Aqua, who went around stealing Pokémon from trainers. She should probably name them Team Something, too. Not Team Breakneck, of course, they were her team, but something similar...

Team Stormbringer? Team Nightshade?

She'd work on that later. Right now, she just needed something to pull her attention away from the battle and everything related to it, before Brendan started to cheat.

She wasn't sure how cheating would work, but she wouldn't put anything short of murder past Brendan at this point. He'd looked pretty frustrated.

Brendan and Norman caught on to each other's battle strategies pretty fast, and as a result, the near-winner was constantly changing. Once, Brendan took advantage of Slaking's ability to switch Adam for Breloom again.

Then came the deciding move.

"Slaking, use Façade again!"

"Breloom, Counter!"

Slaking moved surprisingly fast, and Breloom had to act even faster. But by the time the smoke cleared, Slaking was finally down, and Breloom was giving a loud war cry.

May jolted to attention. "Did you win?" she asked stupidly, blinking reality back into focus. "Is Slaking down? Does he have another?"

"He won, May," Norman promised, calling back his Slaking as his son ran up to congratulate Breloom. May swore she heard her traveling partner promise to use no Pokémon but his own in battle from now on. "He's won five badges now."

"Speaking of my fifth badge," Brendan said hopefully, "can I have it?"

"You'll get it, Brendan," Norman said, pushing away the boy's eager hands. "This is not a moment to be taken lightly. Your Pokémon, and you, have grown stronger still in our battle. You might want to take a moment to respect that."

There was a moment of silence as Breloom retreated to his ball. Then Brendan slowly held his hand out again, an eager smile on his face.

Norman facepalmed and handed over the Balance Badge. "I thought you would have learned patience by now."

"Of course not." Brendan clicked the badge into place, and turned to leave. "Thanks for the battle, Dad! Next time you see Mom, tell her I said hi."

"Wait!" May squeaked, holding out a hand to stop her friend from leaving. "Before we go, I want to hear a certain story about Brendan's experience with the law."

Brendan groaned. "No, May. You don't."

Norman understood too well. "Is this about the soda thing?"

"YES it's about the soda thing! I've been dying to get an explanation almost since this journey started, and Brendan never told me!" She stamped her foot like teenagers on TV, not seeming to process that she'd done so. "Please, Mr. Norman? I've already missed one fascinating story from a Gym Leader, I don't want to miss another one."

"Dad," Brendan warned, "if you tell her the shoplifting story, I swear I will never come back to Petalburg City as long as I live."

"As tempting as that sounds, I wasn't going to tell her," Norman reassured him, letting him know that the first half wasn't serious. "But do you really think that the girl you're traveling with doesn't deserve to know why you're a wanted criminal?"

He was teasing, Brendan knew, but he also knew that May was going to bug him until he told her. So, he decided to let the co-founder of his evil organization in on one secret.

"All right, Songbird, listen up." Norman's confusion by the use of codenames was quickly wiped away by the fact that all kids went through a spy phase. "I'm only going to tell you this once, and you had better not use it in a speech at my Champion inauguration, your book dedication page, or your speech for if we manage to conquer Hoenn and you become vice president. If you do, it's instant termination from Team Breakneck and my friend list."

"Can I work it into a Space Heroes fanfic?" May asked. "Possibly for my 'self-insert' character?"

She'd made the quotation marks with her fingers, but her point was made. Everyone does dumb things. Brendan, rather than give her permission, drew a deep breath. "It was right after Dad told me he was looking for a new job, hopefully in the Gym Leader position..."

Pokémon teams:

Brendan: Adam (Blaziken, evolved after first warm-up battle) Breloom, Aron, Spoink

May: Jerry (Marshtomp) Masquerain (with Birch) Pikachu, Torkoal