"Hmm," Max frowned, as they entered Lavaridge.

"What is it?" May asked.

"It's more to do with Ash," Max explained. "Because – Ash, have you ever battled an ex-Elite-Four member before?"

"Uh," Ash frowned, thinking about it. "I did battle Prima? But I'm not sure if she was an ex Elite Four member at the time."

"Prima?" Brock repeated. "...oh, hold on, I think you got mixed up a bit, that's her pen name."

"She definitely said that was her name," Ash replied. "Pikachu, she did say that, right?"

Pikachu nodded. "That's right."

"Hmm," Brock frowned. "I wonder if you just met someone else. Maybe Lorelei has a twin sister who's actually called Prima and they've been tricking people all along."

He beamed. "That would be amazing! Two great trainers, and they're both hot girls!"

Latias flicked Brock on the side of the head.

"I didn't even say anything inappropriate that time!" Brock complained.

"She's a Psychic type," May said, giggling. "You shouldn't have thought it so loudly."

"But-" Brock protested, then sighed. "Anyway, Lorelei is still an Elite Four member, so no, you haven't battled any ex Elite Four members."

"So, yeah, this is going to be a new experience!" Ash said. "That's going to be really interesting!"

Lavaridge Gym, as it turned out, was a sort of two-layered structure. It had a walled courtyard with an opening for anyone to come into the outside training area, and then inside that was the actual gym building.

It also had a woman running around on fire.

"Octillery, quick!" May said, sending out her Water-type. "Miss, stop for a moment!"

May did her best to brace Octillery, and the Jet Pokémon took aim briefly before firing a surge of water at the woman. There was a hiss of steam and mist, and the fire went out.

The woman skidded to a halt, briefly surprised at no longer being on fire, then breathed out a sigh of relief. "Thank you…"

She took her coat off, and Brock gasped.

"Oh, no fire could harm your beauty!" he said. "I'm honoured to meet-"

Latias picked him up, turned him around, and didn't put him down.

"Uh," the woman said. "Is your friend okay?"

She shaded her eyes. "He seems to be trying to pretend to be a T shape in the air."

"That's just one of my Pokémon friends doing that," Ash explained.

"Oh!" the woman realized. "You're Ash Ketchum, right – there was an email – I think I read it at some point-"

She stopped, then shook herself. "Oh! Well, I should introduce myself. I'm Flannery, the Lavaridge Town Gym Leader!"

"Wow," Ash said. "I guess it's not just Team Rocket who's great at doing that."

Flannery looked completely thrown. "What?"

"Oh, I heard the Gym Leader here was called Mr. Moore," Ash explained. "So, uh, are you Mr. Flannery Moore, or…?"

Flannery shook her head. "No! No, I'm Flannery Moore, Mr. Moore – well, the previous Gym Leader is my grandfather. He left to tour Hoenn and Johto writing poetry, he left me in charge."

She looked over towards the door. "It was only a few days ago… there's a lot more to being a Gym Leader than I'd realized even when I was learning from him."

"Can you please put me down now?" Brock asked. "I can actually help!"

"It's funny, really," Ash said, once Brock had been let down and they'd started helping to clean up the Lavaridge Gym. "Because we went up to Fallarbor first, and if we'd come here first I would have had a battle against Mr. Moore instead."

"Oh," Flannery replied, quietly.

She looked uncertain. "Are you… upset about that?"

"It would have been an interesting battle," Ash replied, then waved a hoof as Flannery started to look disquieted. "But – I mean that – hang on a bit, uh, I want to make sure I have time to think about what I'm going to say before I actually say it…"

Geodude shoved a lump of beaten-up earth back into the hole it had probably come out of, then patted it down with his fists, and across the arena Koraidon tried to work out the best way to make her limbs do something that was like digging.

It was giving her a bit of trouble, but she didn't seem frustrated, and Ash struck the ground with a hoof as he tried to think.

"It would have been nice to battle your grandfather," he said. "For me. But for him it would just have been another battle, and… I feel like it's more important to make sure that you're in a good place to have your battles, than it is for me to have a challenging battle, when really he'd be supposed to give me a battle that's a certain amount of difficulty anyway."

He sighed. "And now I'm thinking about how… I know what it's like to be doing something that should be familiar, and at the same time it's a lot harder than it should be. But Brock's been a Gym Leader before, and he did that at the same time as taking care of loads of younger brothers and sisters, so if anyone's going to know how to sort out running a gym without being overloaded with work it's going to be him, right?"

"I didn't think about that," Flannery admitted. "That you'd been in a situation like that. It just said, hey, there's this trainer who got turned into a Pokémon, and I didn't think about it much. It felt like there was so much to do."

"I guess thinking about that kind of thing is hard," Ash answered. "That's how it seems to me, anyway."

"Ash, Ash, look!" Koraidon called. "I've worked out how to dig!"

"That's great, Koraidon!" Ash replied, trotting over. "But don't forget to get the dirt to land in the holes!"

"...oh, right..."

"The thing that you really need to do, I think," Brock stressed, once the main gym arena floor was back in place, "...well, firstly, I haven't seen any Gym Pokémon. Did Mr. Moore leave you any?"

"Gym Pokémon?" Max asked. "Oh, right, yeah, I know the ones you mean."

"I don't," May admitted. "What are those?"

"Those are the Pokémon which are attached to the Gym, not to the specific Gym Leader," Brock explained. "Because a Gym needs to provide all kinds of challenges, lots of times a day, they need to have a lot more Pokémon than a normal trainer carries around. And they can help the Gym Leader keep the gym running, as well."

Flannery looked a bit nervous.

"...oops," she said. "I think I forgot about them. I just thought of them as grandpa's Pokémon, so I was trying to manage with just Mag, Meg and Torkoal."

She sighed. "That's a real screw-up, right?"

"It's not great, but it's something you can fix," Brock replied. "I assume he didn't take all the Gym Pokémon with him?"

"He took Typhlosion," Flannery replied. "And, uh, Wingull but that's not a Fire type… I actually don't think he took anyone else. So there should be…"

She began counting under her breath. "Flareon, Charmeleon… two Ponyta, I think… Magmar… I think there's a special Marowak he took to Alola to evolve… two Numel, a Camerupt… Houndour… I think that's all of them."

"That's a lot better, though!" May said. "It sounds it."

"May's right," Brock agreed. "Managing a large team can be tricky, so I can help you with some tips for that, but having more Pokémon to spread the work onto is going to help."

"It's going to be a lot of work, still," Flannery said, then squared her shoulders. "I'm going to do it, though. You guys have helped so much already… I feel like you've earned the badge before we've even started, Ash, but I'll battle you anyway. Maybe we should do it outside though? It doesn't have to be on the main arena, and we've only just fixed it…"

"Okay!" Flannery began, once they were outside.

It had been longer than someone might have guessed beforehand, because Flannery went into the gym back rooms to check on all the Gym Pokémon, but now they were ready.

"So, four Pokémon a side, but I'm sort of interested to see how you fight more than anything, and it's mostly because I want to use what I think of as my full team plus one of the Gym Pokémon."

"Right," Ash nodded.

He murmured to Latias, and she lined up Pokéballs in front of him.

"Left to right," she replied.

"Thanks," Ash replied. "Okay, I'm ready!"

Flannery sent out her first Pokémon, a Slugma, and Ash responded with Mudkip.

"This is Meg!" Flannery introduced the Slugma. "Hey, Brock, mind doing the referee stuff?"

"Sure," Brock agreed, and swiped his hand down. "Begin!"

"Water Gun!" Ash instructed.

"Flamethrower!" Flannery retorted.

The two attacks hit, and the result made Flannery whistle – Meg's Flamethower might not have had type advantage, but it should have done better than that.

"Okay, new tactic!" Flannery decided. "Yawn!"

"Dig!" Ash said quickly. "Don't look!"

"Got it," Mudkip replied, plunging into the ground with a crunch, and Flannery frowned.

"Hmm, well, if that worked it'd be great, but if not… Meg, set up some Smog!"

"Smog!" Meg agreed, puffing out a cloud of thick purplish smoke.

"Mudkip, come up somewhere where Meg's Smog isn't! That means, uh, near me and a bit to your right?" Ash tried. "Now, Water Gun!"

"Smog!"

Mudkip beat Meg before long, mostly thanks to his very strong Water Gun, and then moved on to the second Pokémon in Flannery's roster – another Slugma, called Mag.

"You look familiar," Latias said.

"Yeah, I was the one who set her on fire before you arrived," Mag admitted.

"Let's go!" Ash said. "Water Gun to open!"

"Double Team," Flannery replied. "And… Light Screen!"

Mudkip's first Water Gun hit hard, but then his second one missed entirely.

"Aim for… the one on the left!" Ash said, leaning forwards as he tried to spot the differences between the copies of Mag. It took a moment, but then he was able to see which one was which just fine, and he pointed. "Now the one on the right!"

The Water Guns were much less impactful now than they had been against Meg, as Mag's Light Screen shielded him from the worst of it, and the Fire-type used Earthquake to hit right back at Mudkip.

"Don't dig!" Ash cautioned. "Being underground during an Earthquake is really bad news!"

He grinned. "Don't give up! Water Gun again, the middle one!"

Water splashed onto Mag, with a hiss of steam, then the Fire-type started to glow.

"Not yet!" Flannery said quickly. "I'm really glad you're about to evolve, but we can do it once the battle's over!"

"Great!" Ash said, some minutes later, as Flannery withdrew Mag. "Well done, Mudkip, you really kept up those attacks!"

"Thank you," Mudkip said, quite clearly enunciating both words, and swallowed. Then he glowed white, and evolved in a flash of light.

"Huh, that's neat," Flannery nodded. "Is that why his Water Gun was so strong?"

"I don't think so," Ash replied. "Hey, Marshtomp, we'll talk about how you feel now you've evolved later, okay? Do you think you'll be able to battle later in the match?"

Marshtomp rose to his hind legs, considered his paws, then flopped back down onto his front with a splatch.

Latias did her best to stifle a giggle.

"I guess not," Ash decided, recalling him. "And, yeah, his Water Gun was really strong but I think that's mostly because he was training in hot weather… uh, I can't actually remember how the rules go if both Pokémon get knocked out?"

"We both pick our next Pokémon at the same time," Flannery said, picking one of the two she had ready. "Then, after we've both made our choice is when we throw them in. At least that's what I'm deciding, it seems fair to me."

Ash picked a Pokéball of his own, holding it up, and on Brock's signal they both sent out their Pokémon.

The sun glowed more brightly overhead, and Flannery whistled. "Wow, that's a really neat Pokémon, I've never seen that one before!"

"I've never seen that one before!" Ash admitted. "That's a Marowak, right? It doesn't look anything like the ones I've seen before…"

"Yeah, he evolved in Alola," Flannery confirmed. "It's a special Alolan form of a normal Marowak! Honestly I was kind of hoping – nah, never mind."

She waved her hand. "And yeah, he's Fire type, so I can use him."

"Uh," Max began. "Isn't…?"

"That's up to Ash to know," Brock interrupted him.

"Ready for this, Koraidon?" Ash asked.

Koraidon nodded, looking back at him to make sure she could see him seeing her. "Yeah!"

"Then begin," Brock said.

"Bonemerang!" Flannery said, immediately, and Marowak took a step forwards before hurling his bone at her. Koraidon dodged left, surging into motion without Ash having to remind her, and the attack missed.

"Before he gets his bone back!" Ash said. "Rock Smash!"

Flannery leaned forwards, and Koraidon's paws gouged at the earth as she charged – and went straight through Marowak, without making contact.

"What the-" Ash began, frowning. "Wait – is he a Ghost type too? That's so cool!"

"What should I do?" Koraidon asked, turning and pacing around in a circle. "I don't have anything except Rock Smash!"

"Uh-" Ash began. "Wait, dodge right, look out!"

Marowak had his bone back by now, and hurled it at her again. This time it was on fire, and Koraidon took a glancing hit that was amplified by the sun beating down from overhead.

"Koraidon, come back!" Ash decided. "Run over here so I can switch you out!"

Ash had remembered that part of the rules, because it came up so much more often, and Koraidon skidded to a halt next to him only a moment later.

He returned her in a flare of red light, and Brock nodded. "Koraidon can be used later in the battle," he assessed.

"Bad luck with that match up," Flannery said. "Having the Gym Pokémon gives me so many more options… okay, who are you sending in next?"

"Absol," Ash replied, the Dark-type coming out of his Pokéball in a white flash. "That's okay, right? He's a Ghost type."

"Hmm," Absol said, assessing his opponent. "Yeah, I predict this is probably going to go well."

"Like you couldn't tell that based purely on typing," Pikachu grumbled.

Brock called for them to resume, and as Absol started using his horn to deflect flying bones Latias tapped Ash on the side.

"Huh?" Ash asked.

"So, I get why you called Koraidon back, because that was a match up she couldn't win," Latias said. "And I can see why you're using Absol. But who would you have used if Absol was back in Kanto today?"

"Hmm," Ash frowned. "Not Pikachu, probably, because Marowak has those Ground type moves… not Treecko because of Fire type moves, not you probably because of Ghost type moves… I'd probably have to use Taillow, which would be a shame because I feel like it'd be overusing him. He's great, but I need to make sure everyone gets a chance…"

"Yeah, Pokémon that completely change type like that when they evolve can have such a weird combination of moves," Pikachu agreed.

"Absol, Night Slash!" Ash called, and the Dark-type blocked an incoming bone swing – then got hit by a Slash attack from Marowak's claws. "And, uh… I just thought, I could have let Koraidon hit Marowak, because I've got Foresight. But that might be cheating…"

He groaned. "I might even have used it by mistake when I was trying to deal with those Double Team attacks. I'm going to have to learn not to use moves like that, now…"

"Well, that went about as well as I expected," Absol declared.

"You're on fire," Pikachu pointed out.

"...hmm," Absol said, turning to look. "I really thought that was just an Ember or something."

Ash returned him. "I'm pretty sure you won't be burned in there," he said. "Come back out if you need more urgent help, though…"

Absol declined to do so, so Ash didn't have to send Latias off to get a Rawst Berry.

What he did do, though, was send Koraidon out again, as Flannery responded with her own final Pokémon – a Torkoal.

"So, uh, Fire-type," Ash said, under his breath. "And… anything else? Might be a Rock type?"

He tilted his head slightly. "I don't think they're Ghost or Psychic, and they don't seem to be Flying… yeah, Koraidon, I think we're good!"

"Great!" Koraidon replied.

"So, I know I'm down to my last," Flannery said. "But, well… I was thinking a bit about what a Fire type trainer should be like, and what a Fire type gym should be like."

She pointed. "And the thing about Fire moves is, they're almost all about doing damage!"

"Begin!" Brock called, spotting a good speech buildup and not wanting to waste it.

"Overheat!" Flannery ordered, and Torkoal blasted out an intense wave of flame.

"Dodge!" Ash called.

Koraidon yelped, then dodged, and only her back half got hit by the torrent of flames. It still made her yelp, though, and she tried to shake off the lingering effects of the flames but growled slightly as they stayed stubbornly clinging to her.

"Okay, uh…" Ash said, thinking. "Don't go too fast unless you have to, that might fan the flames – now, use Rock Smash!"

"Iron Defence!" Flannery countered.

Turning, Koraidon hit Torkoal with both forepaws, and the Rock Smash hit but it didn't even knock Torkoal back very much. The Fire-type's shell gleamed with solid energy, all of her limbs retracted for defence, and Koraidon hit again before retreating to get a run-up.

As soon as she did, though, Flannery pointed. "Flamethrower! Then Iron Defence again!"

"Left!" Ash said quickly.

Another jet of fire spiked out at Koraidon, this one weaker, and Ash frowned. "Huh. Overheat must be a really strong move… or… wait, isn't that that one that gets weaker if it's used too much? Or are there lots of those…"

He shook his head. "Uh… Koraidon, we've got to find a way to get past Torkoal's Iron Defence!"

There was a sound over by the gates, and everyone looked around.

An old man in tan shorts and a floral shirt waved to them. "Don't mind me, I'm just here to watch!"

Ash returned his attention to the battle, then brightened. "Wait! Koraidon – come around behind Torkoal! She needs to come out of Iron Defence to attack, especially behind her!"

Koraidon did just that, charging in and using Rock Smash again, but she was looking weaker and weaker with every moment.

"Now, dig underneath the edge of her shell!" Ash instructed. "Like you did indoors – and flip her over!"

"Uh oh," Flannery said. "Overheat, Torkoal!"

This time, Koraidon was ready for it. The extra second or so to turn around meant she was able to crouch, then spring into the air over the attack the moment Torkoal fired, and came crashing back down on top of the Fire-type.

"Was that all right?" she asked, panting heavily. "That wasn't what you ordered…"

"That was great!" Ash replied. "Is Torkoal knocked out?"

Flannery answered that herself, recalling the Fire-type, and Ash recalled Koraidon a moment later.

"Well done, Koraidon," he said, bending down so he could talk to her in her Pokéball and she'd know it was for her. "And that was really good because you reacted quickly – that was exactly what you should have done."

He tapped a hoof on the ground. "I don't know everything in a battle. I try to keep track of a lot, but I can't… so it's important that you know when you might see something I don't."

"That's a good point," Flannery agreed. "Sometimes it seems like no one person can know everything… you just have to do the best you can, right?"

Then she looked up at the old man. "Speaking of… hey, gramps, you know I recognize that T-shirt, right?"

The old man froze, then sighed, and took his wig off.

"Can you blame an old man for trying?" he asked. "I was worried about how you'd do with the gym, Flannery."

"Yeah, well, I'm way more worried than you," Flannery retorted. "But I guess making mistakes isn't as bad if you work to fix them, huh?"

She rummaged in her pockets. "Uh… I know I had one on me… here!"

Flannery proffered the Heat Badge, and Ash took it. And went bright orange.

"The power of defeated giants infuses this plate," he repeated, and Pikachu began typing that one in. "That's the second one that's said plate. I wonder why?"

"Defeated giants?" Flannery replied. "Huh. I'm not that tall, am I?"

AN:

Flannery is always an interesting character to portray.