The next day, Brendan, Wally and May left early to do some battles on the beach, while Lisia continued to train hard with her uncle. Once they arrived at their destination, the three trainers discovered that they were not the only ones to have opted for this place. Many trainers of all ages and from all region were already warming up with their Pokemons.
"Wow, all these people look so enthusiast… It's putting the pressure on," Wally commented as they found a vacant spot.
"No, it's super motivating!" Brendan said with a smile. "Don't you think so, May?"
"Yes. Even if it's just training, let's give our best today, guys."
"As always," his best friend nodded.
They called out their Pokemons and started a two-on-one battle. Having to deal with two opponents at the same time was both stressful and exciting. May had to keep all her senses alert, she couldn't afford to focus only on Brendan or Wally. As for the two boys, battling as a duo forced them to be more cooperative, since launching attacks on their own wouldn't be enough if they wanted to defeat their friend.
It was May who won that first battle. She took advantage of a second of distraction from Brendan to send her most powerful fire attack on Scepticle. With the type advantage, it was very effective. Knowing well that her friend would be destabilized to have been hit, she continued to go after him while increasing the speed of her Blaziken in order to avoid Wally's ripostes. She ended up overcoming Scepticle, then it was a battle against Gallade only, which she also won, even if Wally gave her a hard time.
"Shit... I think we still have a lot of progress to make in terms of cooperation. I'm so used to relying only on myself that I find it difficult to count on others," Brendan observed, rubbing the back of his neck.
"And I'm not used to having to defend another trainer's Pokemon…" Wally answered. "But in any case, congratulations May. The champion has won again!"
May congratulated them as well and offered a profiterole to her Blaziken to reward him for all his efforts. It was only then that she noticed the presence of several young trainers who had come to watch their battle. She smiled awkwardly at them. She had never known how to behave in front of spectators.
"Wow, that battle was so intense… You three must be pretty strong," a young woman said as she walked up to them.
She had beautiful grey eyes and long dark blue hair, styled in two locks that framed her face. Despite the spring heat that reigned near the ocean, she wore a white woolen cap and a long red scarf. A blond boy accompanied her, although a little behind her, also wearing a green scarf and a striped T-shirt.
"Haha, thank you…" Brendan answered her. "But it's mostly the winner who must be complimented."
Although she knew it was pure kindness on his part, May didn't appreciate that he always put her ahead of them. She was already enough of the center of attention as it was.
"It's true! You managed to beat two trainers at the same time..." the young woman observed, impressed. "And your Pokemon... It really has incredible speed, I think I had never seen a Blaziken react so fast..."
"Thank you, he and I have been training together for many years… That's why."
She didn't know what else to say. How to answer in an original way to this kind of compliment?
"I'm Dawn by the way. And him, (the young woman, pointed to her blond companion) it's Barry! We came from Sinnoh to participate in the PML, with another friend of ours."
"Sinnoh? Wow, the change of temperature must be funny," Brendan teased her. "We're from Hoenn. I'm Brendan and this is Wally and May."
"May?" Barry repeated, staring at her with a puzzled look. "Oh! That's why your face told me something, you're the Hoenn champion!"
"The Hoenn champion?" Dawn repeated, amazed. "Okay, now I understand why you're so strong."
May knew very well that sooner or later she would be unmasked. When people didn't recognize her right away, it always ended like that.
"Yeah… It's me…" She said, spreading her arms.
"And you two are also in the Hoenn league?" Barry asked Brendan and Wally.
"No, no… We're just May's friends and we battle together for the PML," Brendan explained.
"Oh that's so awesome!... Excuse us actually, we didn't want to interrupt your training but...Ha..."
Barry exchanged a longing look at Dawn, which she returned before asking:
"It's awkward to ask you this but... could we train with you? It's not every day that we have the opportunity to battle a Pokemon champion!"
May realized that it was to her that they were asking, not her friends.
"Of course. If you want," she replied politely.
If they were of a good level, it could be useful to have new opponents. But if they weren't strong enough... it would make them waste some precious time.
"Great. Thank you very much May!"
At their happy look, this thought made her feel a little guilty. She was constantly torn between her desire to have fun with her friends and her duty to train hard to maintain her level. But hadn't she decided yesterday that she was participating in the PML for friendship above everything else? So it was an opportunity to get to know these two trainers and their Pokemons, regardless of their talents in battles.
They spent the morning training with Dawn and Barry and May had to admit that she had been presumptuous; they were both very good. Barry teamed with a Torterra and Dawn with an Empoleon. Even though May ended up defeating her, fighting with a type disadvantage was still a good exercise for her, it forced her to be more inventive, as she had to rely on something other than her Blaziken's best fire moves.
After their training, the five trainers went to eat in the village together, and throughout the meal, May was overwhelmed by questions about her role as a champion and the functioning of the league. She told them a bit about her job outside of battles; all the reports she had to review, the files the league needed to have up to date on every trainer in the Hoenn region... but as she suspected, that wasn't what Dawn and Barry wanted to hear about.
They would rather liked her to tell them more about the members of the elite 4, the battles, what it felt like to be the strongest. And May was doing her best to tell them what they wanted to hear, not the truth, which was that being the strongest actually didn't matter that much anymore over time. You could get used to everything, even to success, but the weight of responsibilities always remained heavy.
May quickly understood that once you had reached the heights, you could only fall back. And that most people were secretly just waiting for this, for the day where she would failed. Once they would be sure that finally she wasn't better than them, they could move out and focus on someone else.
After eating, the five trainers went to settle in one of the village's squares. With Wally's health issues, May and Brendan knew they shouldn't push their trainings too far and remember to take breaks. Especially since their friend never told them when he felt tired. He was so passionate he would have risked his health to win a Pokemon battle, but of course for Brendan and May, that was out of the question.
While Brendan and Barry added each other in contact on their respective PokeNav and Wally and Dawn watched their two Pokemons having fun together, May chose to take care of her Blaziken a little. He tended to keep his distance from other Pokemons, but with May he had always been very cuddly. Already when he was a Torchic, he liked to come and rest on her lap. But he was almost twice as tall as her now and it was more like May who came to snuggle up against him now.
"Ah…" Brendan said, looking up from his PokeNav. "Calem and Serena are offering us to spend the afternoon together…"
"Calem and Serena from Kalos?" Barry asked.
"Yup. Do you know them?"
"A little. We met here, in Pasio. They're nice."
"Would you like them to join us then? The battles would be even more interesting with them."
May gave Wally a worried look.
"Why not," this one said quietly. "We can train with them. I noticed that I learnt more when we battle new trainers rather than when we remain only the three of us."
"Make sense, yeah... captain, what do you say?" Brendan asked, turning to May. "You know, Calem and Serena, they're the friends of Kalos we told you about… Do you want to meet them?"
Even though May thought she had socialized enough for today, it was hard for her to say no.
"Yeah, of course…"
"Great, I tell them to come then!"
A few minutes later, two trainers in trendy clothes arrived in the square. The boy wore a cap with glasses over it, he had long black hair and looked quite serious. Like him, the girl had blue eyes and long, slightly frizzy hair. She also wore glasses on her hat, like they were both following some kind of fashion or something... Maybe that was the latest trend in Lumiose City.
"Hello everyone," the girl, Serena, said happily. "Oh, Dawn, Barry, you're here too! I didn't know you all knew each other."
"We didn't know either," Dawn laughed.
Everyone exchanged greetings, until the two newcomers looked at her.
"Hi, I'm May," she anticipated, waving her hand.
"May!" Serena smiled, as if they had known each other forever. "The Hoenn champion! Brendan and Wally told us so much about you, we couldn't wait to meet you in person."
"That's sweet… Me too…"
When would she be able to look less withdrawn?
"Are you okay since last time?" Serena asked Brendan and Wally. "Calem and I trained a lot this morning. We took advantage of the good weather to climb the mountain with our Pokemons. And we met a lot of trainers up there, I didn't think that it was that crowded."
"We'll have to go there one of these days. Although with Wally's asthma…" Brendan started awkwardly.
"It's not a problem," the young man assured. "I don't risk more than you, the mountain they reconstructed in Pasio isn't that high."
"And it's pretty easy to get up there, which is probably why there's so many people," Calem said.
May let all six of them speak. She was glad to see that contrary to what she had feared, Calem and Serena weren't overwhelming her with questions. Actually, like Dawn and Barry, these two trainers seemed quite warm. Serena especially. Calem looked a little colder than her, but that was surely an appearance. May was in no position to make judgements.
"Oh May, are you going to participate with your Blaziken? Wow, he looks so strong."
Blaziken gave a slight nod, as if he wanted to thank Serena.
"Yes," May smiled. "He's my most faithful ally... I've always had a soft spot for fire Pokemon."
"Me too! Fire Pokemon are my favorite! Wait…"
Serena took a Poke Ball out of her pocket and tossed it into the air. A large fire Pokemon with a mysterious aura came out.
"Here is my Delphox. It's with him that I will battle in the PML."
"That's great!... Was he your first Pokemon?"
"Yes. I had the choice between him and two other water-type and grass-type Pokemons. And it was just obvious for me that he was the one."
"My Blaziken is also my very first Pokemon… The one I feel the closest to."
"The bond you forge with your first partner is really special. It's a bond you can't find again."
May nodded. She felt a nice connection with Serena. Barely a minute of conversation and they had already found something in common.
"I would love to battle against you if you agree. I know that as a champion, you will surely win but... I always want to challenge trainers who have fire Pokemons."
For once, May didn't feel obligated to say yes. She too was very keen to measure her Blaziken against this Delphox.
"I'd like that too… Hey everyone! Serena and I wanted to have a little battle…"
Her excitement drove out her usual restraint.
"Oh great! Can we watch you?" Dawn cried. "I wouldn't miss this for the world."
"Go Serena… Show the champion how strong we are in Kalos," Calem encouraged her with a wink.
"I'm the referee! Brendan decided. "One Pokemon each, the first who faint lose."
May won the battle. But beyond her victory, she felt a joy in battling that she hadn't felt for a long time, even during her training with her friends. Serena's Delphox had psychic abilities (she didn't like it too much in general) capable of putting her Blaziken to sleep and then the Pokemon would overwhelm hers with fire moves. May had fallen for the trap once, then she made sure to move her Blaziken constantly to battle against sleep. This obstacle removed, she had been able to beat Delphox without too much effort.
"Wow! I know how it feels to lose against a champion now," Serena said, recalling her Pokemon. "Although I guess you mustn't have given your all against me."
May shrugged. It's true that Serena hadn't pushed her to her limits, but a slightly less tiring battle didn't bother her once in a while.
"By the way May," Calem intervened, "I would have liked so much to see your battle against the former champion! Was it recorded?"
"Yes… But these are confidential archives for now, the public doesn't have access to them unfortunately."
"Too bad, I hope it will be shown on television one day…"
"Calem loves watching the battles between Pokemon champions," Serena explained. "It's like he has a kind of obsession for them."
"Serena, it sounds weird when you say it like that."
"I mean who isn't obsessed with them though?" Dawn interjected. "They're the most powerful Pokemon trainers on the planet!"
"That's it..." Calem nodded. "I admire them and I envy them at the same time because me too, I dream of becoming a champion one day. And of being able to challenge all the Pokemon champions who have marked the course of history."
"Is that all?" Brendan joked.
"It may sound pretentious…" Calem admitted without breaking his determined expression, "but I'm training hard and I intend to achieve my goal one day. I've already made it to the Kalos league, I've challenged Diantha but I wasn't as ready as I thought and unfortunately... I lost. If I went through my journey in Hoenn, I would have loved to challenge Steven Stone."
Was he implying that defeating Steven would have been easier than defeating Diantha? In other words, that May didn't have so much credit for taking the title from him? May didn't want to react to what could be just awkward words, but despite that she felt a kind of pride in Calem that she didn't like much.
"You two must be really close now…" He continued, looking at May, as if guessing exactly what to say to provoke her. "How does it feel to be friend with such a famous champion?"
She almost replied that she was herself a champion and therefore that it was nothing to her, but that would have been letting her ego and impulsiveness express themselves. Actually, she didn't know how to answer that question. Why did everyone imagine that Steven and her were close? It only twisted the knife deeper in her wound.
"Oh, you know, May hasn't seen Steven so much this year…" Brendan rescued her, sensing his best friend's discomfort. "Before coming to Pasio, he had already been away for a long time."
"Yeah, we haven't had contact in quite a while," May elaborated with a grateful look at her friend.
"It's true that the champions always look so busy," Serena noted, continuing the conversation without noticing May's discomfort. "Diantha for example, I follow her on social medias and she always has so much going on… Champions must live such a hectic life! Once Calem and I met her by sheer luck in Lumiose City, she was running away from too clingy paparazzi but she still took the time to talk with me and cheered me on when I told her she was my idol… It was like I was the first fan she met, she made me feel unique… special…"
"Serena! I didn't know you liked Diantha that much, I follow her too!" Dawn exclaimed.
"Oh really? Then we have that in common! I've seen all her films. And in real life, she's so nice and just as classy as on screen." Serena put on a dreamy face as she spoke.
"And then they say I'm the one obsessed with the champions," Calem quipped.
"I really hope she manages to free herself to come to Pasio and that I can talk to her again," Serena ignored him.
"Can you imagine?!" Dawn added, just as excited at the idea. "It would be amazing! We could even battle her during the PML!"
"This tournament is really an opportunity to meet all the trainers we really admire." Wally nodded.
"I agree," Barry said. "Me, my goal is to go as far as possible in the tournament to have the opportunity to battle against Cynthia. Even if she wins, it will already be a huge chance to have had her as an opponent."
"Haha, I think we're all fans of the champion of our respective regions," Dawn noticed. "I admire Cynthia a lot too, even if I'm even more into contests than Pokemon battles."
"Oh really? Then you'll probably get on well with Lisia," Brendan mused.
"Lisia?! You mean the contest star Lisia? (Brendan nodded, amused by Dawn's sudden reaction). "Are you kidding? I absolutely love her! I would like to meet her so much."
"I sleep in the same room as her," May couldn't help but say, and she saw Dawn's eyes light up at her words. "I think I can fix that for you. She will surely be delighted to talk about contests with you."
"Really May?! You're so cool! I think you're going to be my new favorite champion now!"
Although it was a joke, May felt the words warmed her heart. How could she have hesitated to spend time with all those trainers this morning? She who claimed to want to meet new people, she had quickly let herself be overtaken by the pressure of competition... perhaps she had forgotten this stimulating, almost magical feeling that invaded her when she discussed with new passionate trainers.
Barry, Dawn, Serena and Calem all looked so positive and dynamic. It reminded her of her own attitude when she started her journey in Hoenn, with dreams of grandeur in her head. Since then, May had lost some of her recklessness and that somewhat born determination which gave her the feeling of being stronger than anything and silent her fears. Now, she no longer felt this thirst for discovery, this desire to learn and improve constantly. And she got used to living without that.
"Lisia is even going to battle with the three of us during the PML," Brendan informed the others proudly.
"And you?" May asked Serena, forcing herself to remain active in the conversation. "Who are you participating with?"
"Calem and I, along with Meowstic and Delphox, are teaming up with a friend of ours who happens to be a gym leader in Kalos. Her name is Korrina."
"This name reminds me of something..."
"She's one of the only gym leaders who can use Mega Evolution. And her grandfather also gave Calem and me the ability to Mega-Evolve our Pokemons."
"That's right, the origins of Mega Evolution were discovered in Kalos…" May recalled.
Steven had vaguely spoken to her about it, a long time ago.
"I didn't use this ability earlier as it was just training… But if we ever go up against each other at the PML with our Mega-Evolved Pokemons… I'm sure it will give an even more amazing battle…"
May found herself imagining the scene, too. Serena's enthusiasm was infectious.
"Dawn and me, we don't have Mega Evolution, I don't even know if our Pokemons are able to Mega-Evolve," Barry said in a frustrated tone.
"Don't worry," Brendan comforted him, "it's not everything in a battle. It can even become a disadvantage if you don't know how to control the strength that comes with it."
"You're right. We'll do without it, that won't stop us from beating you." Barry provoked him.
"Haha! That's what we'll see!"
May, Brendan and Wally continued to get to know the four trainers better until the end of the day, soon, it was already time to return to the Pokemon Center, to heal their Pokemons and above all, to rest a little.
May hadn't seen the time pass, and she realized as she entered in the Center the evening that she felt lighter than the previous days, despite the start of the PML which was inevitably approaching. She had to stop worrying so much, she wanted to spend more time with her friends and share more with new trainers, to really enjoy this exceptional tournament.
