Yo!
Not a ton to say, so let's get into it!
Chapter 42
Bianca and the rest of the 128 entrants from the qualifier rounds exited off the stage some ten or so minutes after they'd gone up. It was really all just a show at this point. The matches weren't due to begin until the next day – because advertisers liked to drag things out – but once they did, they were unlikely to stop for quite a while.
Her first order of business, the moment she was off the stage, was to corner Cynthia for a one-on-one conversation.
Doing so wasn't hard, given that her girlfriend – and apparent champion of Sinnoh!? – had told her over text expressly where she'd be.
'I'm in the thirteenth dressing room. It's on the opposite side of the stadium from you.'
She'd not responded – other than to say 'ok' – but then, she was going through a lot in that moment, so sue her.
She made her way there, having to explain a few times who she was to people who stopped her – and somehow every single one knew the validity of what Bianca was saying, that she was Cynthia's girlfriend, to be true – over the course of the next ten or so minutes. By the time she finally made it to the door, she was ready and willing to have this conversation.
So, she went up to the door, placed her hand on it, pushed it open, and exclaimed, "You!"
The unfortunate part about that, however, was that this was not in fact, as Bianca had expected, just Cynthia's dressing room.
It was apparently the dressing room of all of the top ten trainers that had just been on stage.
And Bianca had just barged in and shouted right in all their faces.
For just a moment, the only thing Bianca felt was true and utter mortification. Lance, Leon, Diantha, May… so many of them were just staring at her.
Only two recognized her. One obviously being Cynthia, and the other…
"Is that you, Bianca?"
She turned to see Caitlin, of all people, smiling over at her.
"Oh, uhm…" She was still a bit caught from having made a fool out of herself. "Yes, it is. It's been a while, ma'am."
"It really has. Fourteen years, no?" Caitlin placed a finger on her chin. "Or have we seen each other more recently than that?"
They maybe had. In all honesty, if they had, it hadn't been a memorable event for either of them.
"I don't think?"
"Probably not, then." She chuckled. "Well, I suppose you're here to see a certain someone, hm?"
"Ah…" She blushed. "Uhm, Cynthia, could we talk outside?"
"What's the matter?" Cynthia teased her, lounging back in her chair with a shit-eating grin. "You seemed gung-ho and ready before?"
"Oh, you–" Bianca groaned. "Just get out here!"
Cynthia laughed, but did just that, making some jokes with the other champions in the room as she went. It suddenly made an awful lot of sense that Cynthia was so familiar with Pokémon trainers of all different regions and skill levels.
She was a damned icon!
Her girlfriend was an icon.
It was a weird thing. She'd known that Cynthia was a well-known businesswoman, but that had always been in a different field. To her, she'd known Pokémon trainers by working alongside them on sets during her work.
But suddenly, Cynthia was a major figure in her life as a trainer.
As one of the world's best trainers.
And that was a different paradigm.
"So," Cynthia rubbed a hand up and down the back of her neck as she coughed below her breath. "I'd understand if you were angry–"
Bianca shook her head, "I'm not angry."
"Oh?"
"No, not really." Bianca sighed. "I mean, I'm not like thrilled, but I'm not mad at you, either. You wanted to keep your status as a champion secret, didn't you?"
"I did."
"Why?"
Cynthia thought about that a moment.
"It's hard for me to describe, really. I had no intention of hiding who I was from you when I first approached, of course. I thought you knew who I was." She chuckled. "But then when you didn't, it… it was such a refreshing change of pace. You were the first person in years that was a Pokémon trainer to just… talk to me. I didn't want that to change if I told you who I was. But, in all honesty, by the time we'd finished that business with Mars, I should've known nothing was going to change between us if I'd just told you the truth. I apologize for not coming clean with you on my real identity."
Bianca nodded her head. "I understand. And I accept your apology. Like I said, I'm not actually mad. More… exasperated that I didn't notice, honestly. You weren't really all that subtle, now that I think back on it."
Cynthia snorted. "No. No, I was not."
They ended up laughing and joking about the situation for the next little while. There was time to kill while the people in the stadium watched a live musical performance, and then the bracket for the first round would begin.
It felt like a while, but when Bianca checked her phone as the music concluded, she found it had only been forty minutes since the initial announcement and showing of the competitors.
It was funny how time did the exact opposite of flying when one actually wanted it to.
Still, the announcer on stage spoke of revealing the bracket. Bianca herself felt a thrill shoot down her spine, even as she reached down to her phone, where they'd been told they would receive the bracket at the same time the audience did.
There was a literal drum roll up above, before Bianca's phone received a ping, and she looked down at it to see a frankly massive 256-person bracket.
Locating her own name was actually quite difficult, mostly because these brackets hadn't at all been personalized when they'd been sent out. Thusly, her name looked no different from any of the other 255 people on the bracket.
Eventually, after a good five minutes of scrolling down the page, she finally did locate her name. the person opposite her, who she'd be facing in the first round, however, was not at all someone that Bianca had expected to face so soon.
Her first opponent was Elesa.
"Oh, that's quite the interesting first match." Cynthia commented. "You against Elesa in a serious battle. I must say that I look forward to seeing it."
"I think it'll be a fun match as well." Bianca concluded, smiling over at her. "Hopefully I'll be able to win it."
"I'm nearly certain you will." Cynthia spoke without any doubt. "Elesa's good, make no mistake, but I believe you're just a little bit better."
"You're just saying that because you're dating me." Bianca glared over at her girlfriend. "And because, frankly, you owe me one for all the crap you've pulled!"
"First of all," Cynthia coughed into one fist. "That's neither here nor there, and second of all, I was being serious. I do believe you're better than Elesa in a straight fight. You beat her before, after all. Even if she wasn't able to use her real team, in the end, at the time the two of you first faced one another, neither were you."
"I had pieces of my team."
"Exactly, pieces." Cynthia noted, crossing her arms over her breasts. "But now you have an actual team, a solid strategy, and a far better mind for the battlefield."
"That…" Bianca took a slow, calming breath. "You're… you're right."
"I usually am."
"Uh-huh." She deadpanned. "Sure."
"Hey, I am!"
They bickered back and forth with one another playfully for the next few minutes, before Bianca decided that she wanted to be able to share some conversation with the other members of her little 'group'.
So, she bid Cynthia farewell for the moment, and made her way back to the section of the stadium where the qualifiers would be hanging out.
Barry waved her over, and Leaf and Brendan did the same.
"Yo!" Barry smiled. "Did you find out who you're facing yet?"
"I did. I'm up against Elesa."
"She's the electric-type gym leader from Unova, right?" Leaf asked.
"Mm. I actually fought her fairly recently, just a few months back."
"Funny how things work out, huh?"
"It really is."
"Well, we still haven't found any of our names on the list yet." Barry remarked, laughing a bit sadly. "It's big. Every time I think I've found it its someone else's."
"Ah," Brendan suddenly exclaimed. "I've found my–"
And then, suddenly, he went pale in the face. He looked like he was going to be sick, like he was face to face with some cruel monster.
"Folks," Brendan said with all the finality of a character in a movie who knew they were going to die. "Pray for me."
Leaf and Barry both seemed confused. The former walked over, and leaned down so she could see Brendan's screen "Why, what's– Oof."
Barry laughed. "It can't be that– Oof."
Bianca's eyebrows rose rather high on her head.
"What's going on?"
"Come look at Brendan's first opponent." Barry winced out.
Bianca did just that, walking over to the trio and then leaning over so that she could see what was on Brendan's screen.
And when she did…
"Oof." Was all she could really think to add.
Because…
'Brendan vs Cynthia'.
"Welp," Barry opined as he placed his hand on Brendan's shoulder in what was probably supposed to be support. "Someone had to draw the short straw."
"Thanks for the vote of confidence, Barry." Brendan spoke flatly.
"Oh man, I'm up against Bruno." Leaf whined as she looked through her own list. "Welp, my draw could've been a lot better."
"Yikes, I got that Hop guy from the qualifiers!" Barry whistled. "Damn, he was good. This is gonna' be a tough one."
"I'm sorry, are any of you actually complaining about your draws after you saw what I just got?" Brendan eyed them all.
The three of them began bickering with one another in a much less friendly, but equally fond way to what Bianca and Cynthia had been earlier, and Bianca took that as her cue to study the bracket a bit more, to pick out some important names. As she did, she began to notice an interesting pattern.
The top ten had been evenly spaced. It seemed that the entire bracket had been built around them. One side had first and second – Cynthia and Leon – alongside Diantha, Selene, and Steven – tenth through eighth. The other held seventh through third, which was to say Geeta, Dawn, May, Caitlin, and Lance.
Bianca was on the side with the latter group, opposite Cynthia.
That meant if she wanted to face Cynthia, they'd both have to make it all the way to the finals.
She wasn't quite sure if she was happy with or disappointed by that fact.
It seemed like the sides themselves were going to be randomized between each round. So, no one could simply look at their bracket and plan their most likely opponents ahead of time. Still, it wouldn't hurt for Bianca to get some idea of the trainers on her side.
She wasn't looking ahead too much, but she did notice that if she won her next match, then her potential opponents included…
"Well," Someone laughed below their breath from off behind Bianca somewhere.
She turned, and saw Blue.
One of the many people she could draw in the second round, and the rounds following.
"Maybe we'll get a change to have that match after all, Bianca?"
"Well, we could still lose." She muttered, and Blue laughed.
"We could, yeah. But I don't think you're going to. Although, it'll be a shame for you to have to exit the tournament so quickly if you run into me."
Bianca rolled her eyes. "Yes, what a terrible shame. Same to you, Blue."
"Ooh, confident, I like it!" He laughed. "Alright, I just figured I'd come say hi. Oh, but uh… I heard you made a big commotion in the top ten dressing room, no?"
Bianca groaned out in exasperation.
/
Bianca was not one of the unlucky folks who'd been called up to battle immediately, which she was rather grateful for. Barry had been one of the very first – he'd been third – to go up, and although he'd won, he'd very clearly been a bit frazzled.
"Wish I could've gotten a better idea of the arena before we went out," Barry laughed. "But I guess things worked out in the end, yeah?"
"How is it?" Brendan asked. "The arena I mean."
"It's segmented," Barry explained. "Two different sections; they seem to rotate randomly each match. For mine, it was an icy section to the west, and a rocky area to the east."
"Huh." Brendan's eyes were wide. "Sounds complicated."
"It was a bit." Barry laughed. "I think they're only doing the gimmicks for the first few rounds, just so that the audience stays entertained while there are still a bunch of matches. I'd imagine they'll cut that from the program once it's down to 32 or so people."
"Ah, I getcha'," Leaf nodded. "I don't know how many of us they're going to be able to get to today, but from how things are going, around fifteen minutes a match, and then ten in between, it seems like we're going to be here a while."
"Somehow I don't think the advertisers are going to mind." Bianca commented.
The others got a kick out of that, and sure enough, come the end of the day, less than a third of the 256 competitors had actually gone up and done their matches.
That meant they likely had another two or three days – more likely the latter than the former – left until the next round would begin.
Bianca would, likely, be fighting that next day, and she would admit that a sort of nervous excitement filtered through her as she thought of her opponent.
Elesa.
Elesa had been one of her personal heroes after the events with her father. Someone she'd looked up to when she'd been at her lowest. Someone she'd told herself over and over again that she wouldn't disappoint.
It was odd, despite knowing that she would have to beat her to do it, but…
Bianca wasn't going to disappoint her.
Not now.
She would prove it to Elesa…
Just how strong she'd become.
/
"Ladies and gentlemen! It's time for our 54th match! This round, the two trainers squaring off against one another are Elesa, gym leader of Nimbasa City, and Bianca, a trainer from Nuvema Town!"
"It seems like it's a bit of a one-sided match up here, Roxy."
"Well, that's because it is, Gabby. Elesa's not exactly considered a favorite in this competition, but she's a well-known gym leader, and someone who's competed in quite a lot of these events by this point. By contrast, this is young Bianca's first ever major tournament. We don't have a lot of information to go off of, and what information we do have is mostly hearsay from our teams who were reporting on the qualifier matches. If you ask me, this seems like a fairly obvious affair; Elesa takes it, and without much difficulty at all. I'll say she'll still have three Pokémon standing when she takes the win."
"That's quite the vote of confidence, Roxy."
"Well, I call it like I see it, Ty."
"You don't sound so convinced Ty, why is that?"
"Well, there are quite a lot of factors at play here, Gabby. From the outside looking in, it seems like a fairly open and shut case; a no name trainer up against a big shot. It shouldn't even really be worth having a conversation about. But this isn't just any no name trainer. Now don't get me wrong, by and large, this Bianca woman has sort of come out of nowhere. But one of the reporters who was watching the qualifying rounds told me something else, also, that has me doubting what Roxy's saying here today."
"And what was that, Ty?"
"That Ms. Bianca is the student of Cynthia."
"Wait–"
"As in–"
"So, Ty, you're saying…"
"I'm saying that the very same Cynthia who is the favorite to take this entire tournament by storm was the person who taught this Bianca woman. Everyone knows she was absent during this year's tournament scene. When asked for comment about such a gap she's been largely evasive in her answers. But I've been able to do some digging, and from what I can tell, Cynthia has taken this entire year off specifically to train Bianca."
"That's quite the thing to do; you're saying she saw something in Bianca, then, Ty?"
"That's exactly what I'm saying I'm saying. If you only look at the facts of the situation, if you only look at the information that we concretely know to be true, it feels obvious to choose Elesa. But I think that if what I've heard is true, then maybe, just maybe, we might be seeing the start of something special here today. I cast my vote for Bianca, one Pokémon remaining."
"Looks like you'll be the decider here, Gil. Who are you taking to advance to the next round."
"Y'know what? I'm going to trust my partner on this one; I'll take Bianca, one Pokémon remaining."
"Alright, that's all the time we have for you all today. Let's send it down to the field!"
/
To say the pressure was getting to Bianca a little bit as she stood on the precedence of her very first match in front of an audience would have been a slight understatement.
She was downright quaking where she stood.
No amount of encouragement from her peers, or well wishes from Cynthia, were quite able to prepare her for sixty thousand people screaming in anticipation of her.
Of course, they weren't really there to see her. They were there to see everyone, and in this particular match, Bianca would bet a good ninety-nine percent of them were there to see Elesa.
She'd been told that could help, and honestly, it should've been helping. Bianca was just…
Well, she was doing her best.
The jury was still out on whether or not her best was enough.
"And now, may the contestants of our 54th match please make their way to the stage!"
Bianca swallowed on nothing, her throat impossibly dry, as her legs robotically carried her forward, almost on instinct.
The roar of the crowd as she emerged from out of the tunnel was something she'd never experienced before in her life. It was… honestly, it was enough that she left her body behind for a moment.
One second, she'd been at the edge of the platform, and in the next, she was stood across from Elesa at her position on the south side of the field.
Her ears were ringing, and for once, she was pretty sure that was a purely physical reaction. It was loud; almost deafening. The crowd was electric.
It was…
It was…
Invigorating.
Energy surged through Bianca, even as doubt, panic, and fear did as well. It was an oxymoronic thing, one that had her smiling and shaking in equal measure.
Elesa waved to her, and Bianca looked up to see her mouthing something. It was far too loud to hear anything from across all that distance, but…
'You okay?' She thought Elesa was saying.
It…
It was strange, how that was the thing that had her steadying. That energy was still there, as was all the rest, but…
She reached down towards her belt, where her Pokéball's rested, and she took up one of them. She met Elesa's gaze, and she nodded her head.
Elesa smiled at seeing it, and she mirrored Bianca, drawing a Pokéball from off of her own waist.
And the announcer came on, their voice somehow eclipsing the crowd.
"Now, let the 54th match of the Pokémon World Championships…"
"BEGIN!"
End Chapter 42
Coming up on the end of this story at this point, I did some rough calculations and found that we have about 8-10 chapters left? Probably skewing higher than lower, but in theory, the story should finish around the end of December!
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