AN: Just a heads up, I change things, the personality, and actions of the character in this chapter. You'll most likely notice immediately.
Disclaimer: I do not own anything, I make no money or profit from this.
Chapter 18
[Route 5]
The 3 trainers were just about half way to Saffron City and were in high spirits. Lynn found her TM Machine all of Clyde's and Ronnie Anne's Pokemon were able to learn some new moves. Milcery learned Attract, Round and Draining Kiss, while Oddish learned Sunny Day, Solar Beam, and Dazzling Gleam. Houndour learned Scary Face, Snarl, and Psychic Fangs, while Nidorina learned Ice Beam, Dig and Rock Smash. She would've taught Poochyena something, but she just put up a fight every time they tried to attached the machine to her. Now the 2 young trainers were in the process of training their Pokemon to use the new moves.
As the walked the path something caught the trainers eyes. It was a large wooden fence that surpassed the tree tops. Being curious they followed the path until they reached a part that branched off, the new path went to what looked like a gate of the wooden structure. As they approached the gate they saw a sign above it read "A.J. Gym" and under that was a electric scoreboard that had 97 Wins and 0 Losses.
"What the heck is this?" A confused Ronnie Anne asked.
"It appears to be someone's personal gym and not League registered gym" Lynn replied with narrowed eyes at the scoreboard. "This A.J. obviously likes to brag about how he never lost."
Just then the door open and 12 year old kid came out. He had Spiky Pine Green hair, Maroon eyes, wore a orange and black T-shirt, blue shorts, and a whip on his hip. "Hey there, I'm A.J. and this is my gym!" He said with a air of confidence.
"Uh hi, what's with the scoreboard?" Clyde responded unsure what to think of kid in front of him.
"That shows everyone how many victories and losses I have" he replied with pride. "I'm currently undefeated with ninety seven straight wins. When I which one hundred wins, I start my Pokemon journey by taking on the gyms. Inside is where I train all my Pokemon to become stronger."
"Doesn't he know the season already started at least a month ago?" Ronnie Anne whispered to the older girl beside her. To which Lynn simply shrugged her shoulders and stayed silent.
"That sounds interesting, can we see?" Clyde asked being curious about the boy training. Both Ronnie Anne and Lynn were about to object, one because she wanted to continue on and the other because she had no interest in the trainer or his training, when the young boy spoke up.
"Sure, follow me and I'll show you around" he replied with a large smile. A.J. walked inside with Clyde happily following, with Lynn letting our annoyed sigh and Ronnie Anne grumbled before both reluctantly following the 2 boys. Inside was large and what they thought was a fence was actually a wall of a wooden structure. It had standard battlefield on one side, while on the other side was a variety of different exercise equipment. There were also a variety of different Pokemon use said equipment, however many were the common Pokemon beginner trainers would use with the sole expectation be a Sandshrew.
"I'll admit, you got an impressive setup here" Lynn commented looking around.
"Whoa, are all these Pokemon yours?" Ronnie Anne asked focusing on the Pokemon.
"Yup, they are" A.J. replied with a smile, as the Sandshrew came to stand beside him. "This is my partner Sandshrew, he's the strongest and been with me the longest. Sandshrew here is the reason for all my victories."
"From what I can see, your having your Pokemon exercise to increase their psychical strength…" Lynn spoke up while observing the Pokemon. "...But what battle training or move training?"
"We rotate through different training everyday" the young boy started to explain. "I have my Pokemon focus on one thing for the whole day, instead of switching what they do throughout day." Lynn simply nodded in understanding, it's not how she would train her Pokemon, but everyone trains differently.
"But will you have enough time to do the gym challenge when you get one hundred wins?" Ronnie Anne asked him skeptically. "The season already started almost two months ago. Sure the three of us have two badges already, but you might not leave for another month or more waiting for your last victory."
"Well if you're that concern, you guys can give my one hundred wins" A.J. commented with a smirk.
Both Lynn and Ronnie scoffed at the bait of battle from the young boy, were surprised by what they heard from Clyde. "Sure, I'll battle you."
"Alright then" the spiky green hair boy cheered. "It'll be a one on one match, let's go to my practice field."
As the boys made their way to the field, the 2 females followed while hanging farther back. "Why is Clyde battling this guy?" Ronnie Anne whispered to the Loud girl. "He's not that bad of a guy, maybe a little to confident, but there's no reason to."
"Pot meet kettle" Lynn replied with a smirk, causing the young girl to frown and grumble. "But in a honesty, I think Clyde is slightly depressed at hearing Misty went easy on him. Clyde came on this journey to experience the same thing Linc did. So hearing a gym leader went easy on him probably made him feel like he wasn't getting the full experience. He might see this as a test for himself." Ronnie Anne just took in her words and watched her friend get ready for his battle.
"So I'll use my Sandshrew" A.J. said from his side as the Mouse Pokemon took the field.
"Then I'll use Oddish" Clyde said releasing said Pokemon from his pokeball.
"Alright then, the match begins now!" A.J. shouted while taking his whip off his hip. He then started to crack the whip around him. Sandshrew heard this and started to use Rollout. It curled into a ball and started rolling towards it's opponent.
Clyde was taken aback by his opponent using and cracking the whip, but refocused when he saw Sandshrew attacking. "Dodge that and use Poison Powder!" Oddish narrowly dodged the attack and started to release the familiar purple powder. A.J. however started cracking the whip again, this caused Sandshrew to stop rolling and dig underground.
"Interesting, he's giving orders through the whip cracks" Lynn said out loud. Ronnie Anne asked what she meant and she started to explain. "Me and Linc heard of trainers that could give their orders in different ways. I can't remember who, but we heard that someone was able to give their Pokemon commands by speaking their Pokemon's language. Another person was said to have such a close bond with their Pokemon that they could read each others minds, and that's how they battled. A.J. is another one of those trainers. He trained his Pokemon to follow the commands of certain whip cracks, this means his opponents don't know what commands he are giving."
Clyde meanwhile was watching the battlefield while Oddish was staying on guard. Suddenly Sandshrew ripped through ground behind Oddish. Both Pokemon and trainer then heard more whip cracks and tried to defend themselves. "Oddish use Mega Drain!" Sandshrew's body started to glow, but it was faster and using Fury Swipes. Oddish instinctively jumped back to gain some distance, but Sandshrew followed up a Rollout. The attack hit and the rolling Mouse Pokemon was turning around for another hit. "Oddish use Poison Powder!" This time the rolling Pokemon didn't stop and continue on. Oddish was hit with second Rollout and going for a third. Clyde told him to dodge, unfortunately he was to weak to do so and was hit. The attack was strong enough to knock Oddish out and the battle.
As Sandshrew went to its trainer, Clyde ran to check up on Oddish. Lynn and Ronnie Anne followed him and check the damage. "That's win ninety eight!" A.J. shouted with pride after healing Sandshrew. Clyde looked at little disappointed, Ronnie Anne was slightly annoyed with a frown, and Lynn had a netual expression while help Clyde heal Oddish. "So how about you two give me my hundred win?" Ronnie Anne was about accept his challenge when Lynn held a hand infront of her, stopping whatever she was going to say.
"I'll take you on" the older girl said in a netual tone. Both her students were surprised by this and Ronnie Anne was about to complain, but the look she gave them said she had a reason for accepting the challenge. Both trainers took their places and a healed up Sandshrew stepped onto the battlefield. "Let's do this Infernape" she calmly said while releasing her Pokemon. The Flame Pokemon let out a roar at being released.
The battle began and A.J. began and his whip cracking, Sandshrew immediately burrowed underground. "Use Earthquake Infernape" Lynn ordered calmly. Infernape started to stomp and hit the ground causing the earth to shake in the surrounding area.
A.J. used his whip to try to order Sandshrew out of the ground, however the rumbling earth was louder. "Sandshrew get out of the ground now!" A.J. shouted in worry and desperation.
The Mouse Pokemon popped out of the ground, looked battered from the Earthquake. "Finish it with Close Combat" the older girl commanded. Before Sandshrew could get its bearings, Infernape was on top of it and hit it with a flurry of hits. Sandshrew fell to the ground unconscious once the attack stopped. A.J rushed to his Sandshrew and was in disbelief as he looked over his Pokemon.
Lynn called back Infernape and walked towards her opponent, while both her students cheered at her victory. "You trained your Pokemon well, however you became overconfident because of your so-called victories," she said in a caring but stern voice. A.J looked with confusion on his face. "Your large sign out front, it would only attract beginner Pokemon trainers. Inexperienced trainers who have inflated ego, people who think they're the best trainer just because they have a couple of badges, or trainers who want to use you as some kind of test." She subtly looked at Clyde before focusing back on A.J. "More experienced trainers wouldn't give this place a second look. They would think you're an arrogant and egotistical trainer or just someone who likes to brag about his victories, they most likely just walk on and ignore you. Not even the trainers that are jerks would battle you because they are intimidated by your victories or they see you as too easy of a target to beat and are a waste of time. The only reason I battled you was because I saw you were a trainer working hard, but your victories most likely came from beginner trainers. I wanted to show you the difference between training in a gym and getting real world experience. Your Pokemon are strong, but they reach the limit of how strong they can get just training here and battling rookie trainers. Waiting till you get one hundred victories is all well and good, but you'll need to know that all those wins will mean nothing out there. There are a lot of trainers out there that are crazy strong and you'll never truly be prepared to take them on."
A.J. could only look at in awe, the same with her two students. They all took in her words and let them sink in. They were expecting the older girl to chastise him or look down on him, but not give him a speech of how to help him and tell him what he was doing wrong. "Thank you for all that" he said with a large smile and standing up. "While I'm not too sure about the part about only attracting beginner trainers, I'll take everything you said to heart. Now that I'm thinking about it, I might've just made that hundred wins rule because I was nervous about starting my journey. Just waiting for one hundred wins wasn't the smartest thing I could've done. However now that I battled you and have a small idea of what to expect, I think I'm ready to start my journey."
As the 2 shook hands, Clyde and Ronnie Anne watched from the sidelines. "Hey he does know there's only around six months left in this season right?" Ronnie Anne whispered to her friend.
"It's still possible," Clyde whispered back with a smile. "It'll be tough but it is possible to get eight badges in six months. Though he'll have very little time to rest in between gym matches."
They all said their goodbyes and the 3 otherworldly trainers left, upon leaving they saw the sign outside now read 98 Wins 1 Losses. They smiled at that before getting back onto the path for Saffron City. "I'm sorry guys" Clyde spoke up after a few minutes of walking. Lynn and Ronnie Anne looked at each other confused before looking at him. "After hearing about how Misty went easy on me, I felt like I didn't deserve that badge. So when I saw a chance to test myself I took and wasted a whole day."
"Hey don't worry about-" Ronnie Anne started, but was interrupted by Lynn.
"We wasted almost a whole day's travel at someone's private gym because he was too scared to start his journey" she said looking down the path. Clyde lowered his head while Ronnie Anne was about to say something, but Lynn continued. "However I get how you feel. Winning just because your opponent went easy on you doesn't feel like a win, it feels like a loss. There's nothing you can do about it now and Misty shouldn't be doing that in the first place. All you can do is not dwell on it, train harder, and show the next gym leader that deserve that badge." She then looked over at him with a smile. "Plus we helped a new trainer get the confidence to begin his journey, so I think that was worth a day's traveling. Just next time, talk to us when you're feeling like, that's why we're traveling together."
She returns to looking down the path with the smile never leaving her face. Clyde lifted his head to look at her before smiling and nodding with her words. Ronnie simply rolled her eyes with a smile at her mentor trying to act tough and cool, but agreed with what she said.