- Normal Gym -
William looked over his team nervously. A last minute cancellation had given an opening in the Gym schedule right before Alexa's match, and he needed to work out if his team could handle going first. It wouldn't take away an extra day of training, which had required the use of a facility that was controlled by the local Pokemon Center. Anywhere outside had been too far to walk every day, and the facility had scheduled time slots available for trainers going for a Gym match. With it being late enough for third and fourth Badges they had enough free to give his team a chance to get a bit more practice in, but they were still booked solid for the next few days.
"Might as well get it over with," Chesnaught sighed. "If Charizard can handle a match against her with Gym pokemon he just met I can handle a Normal Gym battle."
William and his entire team were still boggled a bit about that. Charizard didn't seem as mad about it as anyone had expected, even though he was now apparently a single Badge trainer who would be treated like a four Badge if things were serious. "A part of me is afraid that Charizard might be a better trainer than I am," William half joked, half complained.
"I heard that, no I'm not!" the currently liquid metal Water/Steel type shouted. "You have three entire Leagues on me and I don't even have a team."
"Getting to the League Tournament isn't the only measure of good trainer," William grumbled, but it was a good point. "Still, if you are all up for this we can go first today."
Carracosta looked uneasy. William's technical-fossil pokemon had switched out for Dedenne now that the Electric/Fairy was home for good. "So, do you need me for this one? Because I'm still trying to catch up on what happened," Carracosta questioned. "Charizard being a Legendary too is kind of odd."
"It's all of them. I'm the only changed type here who isn't apparently," Flaaffy clarified. "Actually I think the Nurse Joy said I was just a variant now, so I'm technically not type changed either."
"A new one that hasn't been seen before, but their scanners say you're stable and healthy," William repeated with some relief. The Pokemon Center had been thrown by the sight of a Magma Flaaffy, and there had been a bit of a panic during the pre-Gym checkup. "I was thinking for the Gym to use Chesnaught, Goodra, Shanker, and Flaaffy if it ends up a four verses four."
"Hey, I want to see how I stack up now that I evolved!" Flaaffy complained about that last point. "We had time for me to work out how to use Thunder Shard in the forest."
"I'm ready too, but you have worked with Flaaffy more recently," Shanker agreed as she continued to juggle a pair of her throwing spikes. "His flames and sparks are better trained than my blades right now."
That, was possibly true, and reminded William that there wasn't actually that big of a gap between when the two evolved compared to how long it had been since Flaaffy's evolution. A week at most between two events both over a month in the past. "Alright, switch the order of you two around then," he allowed, with a glance to see why Wooper had not reacted. It turned out the young pokemon had fallen back to sleep. "In that case I guess we are up for the slot."
There was a crowd outside the Gym. A very large crowd that continued to fill up space inside of the Gym as well. A crowd that was in fact so large that Charizard was the other pokemon-trainer present with William instead of Alexa who was in her pokeball to hide from the crowd.
"The good news," Whitney suddenly said from next to him with a very fake smile. "Is that we have limited the audience size for the Matches. The better news is we also have back rooms sectioned off for your two teams to prepare in." The Leader turned towards Charizard. "I'm afraid your team is going to have to watch William's match by TV to get some privacy here."
"Does this happen often?" Charizard more complained than questioned, although the mechanical voice of the translator didn't properly convey that. Their leather goods had not been finished yet so the device was awkwardly being juggled whenever the currently liquid pokemon moved too much.
"Every time we have a VIP, you only managed to avoid it a few days ago because that wasn't on the schedule," Whitney answered as she quickly directed them through the crowd to an employee entrance. "That's the big downside to being in this big of a city."
The presence of the Gym Leader cleared out enough of the crowd to get them into a back room. "Huh, I take it you do this a whole lot then," Charizard followed up while William could only follow along with relief. Being in a crowd without an illusion was rough, but it was perhaps better than this large of one just looking at Alexa and making him worry that his would break at any moment. Ironically he had been less worried by a large crowd focused on him than times when he had simply been in the same sized crowd with an illusion and without the focus of the crowd.
"Charizard, I am surprisingly upset that being around your trainer has made me more comfortable in a city as myself," William growled so Whitney couldn't understand him, and the Starter just laughed at him. "It isn't that funny."
The other pokemon clicked off his translator and put it into Alexa's bag. "Maybe not that funny, but still amusing," the metallic fluid reptile laughed. "Alexa, we're out of the crowd." The currently Lobasalt trainer emerged with a thud as the four legged, two armed lobster monster hit the floor.
"You are going to get us back out of here," Alexa declared to her Starter firmly. "Because I could barely take listening to that crowd, let alone dealing with it."
"Okay, do you have another pokeball, because that one is... ominous," Whitney said, and William realized the Gym Leader had paled at the sight of Alexa's custom pokeball. "You might not want to use that one yourself in public."
Alexa's mouth-crack shifted into a deep frown, and Charizard suddenly wasn't a happy dragon-like puddle of metal. In fact Charizard looked just a bit 'happier' than when Bugsy's match ended. "Is ominous going to be an issue?" William quickly asked before the Legendary pokemon in the room could take issue with being spotted.
"No, although- No, even Bugsy isn't dumb enough to handle an actual... ominous situation that badly if he knew he was in one," Whitney said, which was more credit than William would give the former Gym Leader but he wanted off this topic. "Right, you know what, don't use that ball out there and I'll pretend I didn't see it." She turned back towards William. "Your match is going to be four one on one fights, because you are experienced enough of a trainer to handle that with the pokemon you brought. Items and such allowed, I'm telling you now because we want to keep things moving for the crowd we've got." William nodded, a bit annoyed that he would have to use all of the planned pokemon. "Alexa, you might be getting a bit of a stronger four on four, but that's mostly because your team is listed as all being from a previous League instead of mixed with new pokemon. Both of us will only be able to change a pokemon out when a pokemon is out of the match."
"Is a team that went to the League before really worth that?" Alexa asked a bit nervously. Which was the only way Whitney could likely tell that the Lobasalt was nervous. The Fire/Rock lobster form wasn't very expressive, and Alexa didn't seem to be able to cheat as much as William could have with an illusion.
"Well, you are getting a stronger fight than I'd give a second League trainer who did have new pokemon," Whitney specified. "Actually, I might have said that wrong the first time. I'm sending a team that is stronger than what I normally use for a trainer of your proven skill because you have the same team you got that skill with, not a team stronger than what William will be up against as a fourth League trainer with new pokemon," she clarified with emphasis on how William was on his fourth League. "That is still pretty close to each other overall, the fourth Badge isn't that high on the list."
William was not reassured.
Flaaffy emerged onto the battlefield first up against a Sawsbuck, which was apparently some kind of deer pokemon that looked considerably more upset with the match up now that they could see Flaaffy's flames. "Huh, I was sure William was going to save me for a bird," he admitted with a huff of flames.
"Fire sheep?" Sawsbuck questioned rapidly. "Whitney!"
"Sand Attack and stay mobile!" the Gym Leader quickly replied, just as surprised by his Fire type.
"Flaaffy, arena hazards," William instructed, and Flaaffy happily began to try and coat the floor with patches of hot lava.
Sawsbuck did kick up a lot of dust that made it harder to directly attack them, but Flaaffy's main attacks weren't exactly concerned with perfect hits. Even if he wanted them to be, as it would be better to splash the other pokemon with lava directly instead of just making it harder for Sawsbuck to move.
"Sawsbuck, try some Double Kicks," Whitney ordered, and Flaaffy jumped into the largest pool of lava he had managed to wait for any new orders.
"Thunder Shard to keep him off, then go for Flamethrower," William countered. "Sawsbuck is part Grass type." Which told Flaaffy why this pokemon had been so surprised, as Grass resisted Electric, but was notably weak to Fire.
Breaking his claws apart to fling the shards of volatile crystal in the general direction of his opponent. Sawsbuck clearly wasn't that strong, as they flinched heavily from the resisted shocks, which turned out badly for the deer as they stumbled into one of the other lava pools.
A bad stumble, and Flaaffy immediately ran to pull the Normal/Grass type out before too much lava could cling to the other pokemon.
"That is enough Sawsbuck," Whitney said. "That's one for you, William. Although I'm not sure what I'm going to do about all this lava."
"Where was the big dangerous fight, William," Flaaffy noted as he was recalled, and went back to listening to what was going on outside his pokeball to try and work out if he just got the easy fight.
Shanker emerged out of her pokeball, looked at the Fearow across from her, and immediately flicked a pair of blades at the other Flying type's wings. As a Dark type that was just proper manners. Fearow squawked in shock and actually lost a few feathers to one of the blades before they could get out of the way, which was a lot more than Shanker expected given how worried the team had been.
"Damn bug!" the bird shouted at her. "Wait for orders first." Which was a silly thing to say, not every trainer taught their pokemon to only act when ordered.
"Shanker, keep that up," William did order, and she gladly followed up with a trio of quickly thrown spikes. "Fight them at range."
"Gladly!" Shanker cheered and gave a sharp burst of wind to make the blades arrive faster. It was an edge case if that would hit with the Flying typed air or the Dark typed blades first, but that was a perfectly fine edge in her opinion. "I can handle winds much better after I stopped being a Bug," she added for the Fearow's benefit. It looked like Flaaffy had fun given the random spots of rising hot air from the cooling lava scattered over the ground that the two of them were decidedly not going to stand on.
"I thought you used to be a Scyther," the bird complained, and then had to dive out of the way of a third set of blades.
"What does that have to do with not being Bug typed anymore," Shanker commented as she took a moderately strong wind based attack back. "William, this isn't much harder than Bugsy's pokemon were."
"Maybe if you were actually the right typ-" Fearow cut off with a squawk as they failed to pay enough attention while they tried to insult and caught a full set of blades.
"Okay, maybe not that bad, but this was still too easy," Shanker said as the Gym Leader returned the bird before they fell onto one of the cooling rock piles.
"Oh, we're to me already?" Goodra asked as he emerged from his pokeball. His opponent was a Kangaskhan, which was a notably strong Normal type. Tough mother pokemon, this one currently without a cute baby in her pouch.
"Kangaskhan, Body Slam," the Gym Leader ordered, and the brown reptilian pokemon charged forward.
Goodra didn't wait for orders, or really listen for any. He had been with William for years now, and he knew how to fight. He was the team's Dragon, and this was not a Dragon he needed to face directly.
So he simply waited for Kangaskhan to get close enough, and then melted out of the way of her path. Acid Armor was a wonderful move that gave you so many better options than just letting yourself get hit normally. He personally lost vision while his eyes shifted, but after an entire evolution without sight that was a minor hindrance at best.
Goodra's body liquefied downwards under the charging Normal type, who splattered only a couple of footprints in him before he surged up behind her in order to instantly deliver a powerful counter attack that changed the charge into a crash against a pile of hot stones that was on the arena floor.
"Alright, what next?" he asked smugly as he reformed, and then frowned as Kangaskhan just groaned and refused to get back up.
Chesnaught was ready, she was. She apparently lost track of time since she was coming out now, but that didn't mean she was panicked. Across from her was a Girafarig, a part Psychic pokemon who might be able to make illusions.
So Chesnaught came out of her pokeball swinging, felt her fist collide with the confused quadruped, heard them hit the wall, and then notice that they weren't getting back up, all before she really was able to think.
"What?" she asked with confusion. For a moment she thought maybe that was the illusion, but the Gym Leader recalled her opponent, and William looked confounded. "Wait, was that it?"
"Yeah, it went a lot easier than I expected," William growled quickly as the Gym Leader approached. "I think I might have lost some points for how hard you and Goodra hit your targets."
"Oh no, I am fully aware of my reputation, and I wouldn't give out half as many Badges if I didn't take that into account," Whitney answered, which was concerning because he had not spoken in a way humans should understand. "Have you faced a Normal typed Gym before?"
"Yes, last one was for my eighth Badge," her trainer admitted, with an attempt to be quiet enough to avoid the crowd hearing despite the fact that he seemed to have not noticed the Gym Leader understanding pokemon.
"The Charizard you are traveling with handled a lower level fight better than you," Whitney grumbled good naturedly. "Next time try and think of what Badge you are after. Eighth means you are being re-tested for access to the League Tournament, fourth is just to make sure your team can still handle professional battles. You proved that you can, but try and not panic as much next time."
"William," Chesnaught started as they followed the Gym Leader out. "You haven't said a human word since the end of the match." It was important to get that point across.
"Ear translator, expensive but needed when you are in a big city Gym," Whitney replied now that they were out of sight of the crowd. "Silph Co special originally for their home town. You would be surprised how often you get lost pokemon in a big Gym." Chesnaught didn't need to be told that not all of such pokemon were really 'lost'. "I don't use it all the time, but I figured it would be good for these matches."
"And now it is too late to warn Alexa," William sighed, and Chesnaught joined the Gym Leader in a chuckle at that before Whitney left them alone in the room with a TV set to show the arena.
"Isn't Silph in Saffron? The place with the Psychic Gym?" Chesnaught asked as they watched the area getting cleared of the hazards their team had made on it. "The Gym where the Leader can already understand pokemon?"
"I think it switches with a Fighting type Gym every few years," William replied and let the rest of the team out. "Although it isn't like Fighting type trainers don't also tend to learn to speak with their pokemon."
"So, that wasn't that hard," Flaaffy commented and pointed at the pokemon out on the arena floor clearing the rocks away. "A bit tougher than the last one, but I've kind of evolved since then. It's even easier to fling lava now."
"I think I hit mine too hard," Goodra lamented as a bit of a puddle. "It was over before I really did anything." Which explained why he was currently fully fluid.
"I definitely hit mine too hard," Chesnaught joined the conversation, uneasy with that fact. "We even got talked to about it."