“— at this point we’ve been able to control the field with the earlier Surf helping us out. Flannery then goes for Sunny Day with her Torkoal,” I said while looking towards the camera I had set up.

Next to me Flannery threw up her hands. “Alright! So I might have been able to play that out a bit better!”

I bobbed my head in a so-so gesture. “What were you going for apart from empowering Fire type moves and drying the field out?” I asked.

“Nah that was my main objective with what I was going for,” she replied, scratching the back of her head sheepishly.

“Hmmm well it achieved that, but it also cost you your Torkoal. You might have been able to change the orders you gave if you wanted to get more from your Torkoal.”

Falnnery shot me a thoughtful look. “Like what?”

I hummed. “It’s been pointed out to me that I excel when matches become straight forward and I have to agree, if fights stay that way I can usually dominate them. I’d suggest looking into some more status effect moves.”

I began ticking off my fingers as I listed off options which I loaded up from a pokenet page I’d found that had a pretty good spread of moves that pokemon had been reported to be able to learn. Amusingly they’d broken things down into two sections with ‘naturally learn’ moves listed at the start before moves that could be learned through special circumstances, Move Tutors, or Technical Machines taking up another section.

“Hey! What’s that?” Flannery asked, leaning over me and inspecting the screen.

I tried to angle my screen to show her, but gave up and just shared my screen so everyone watching could see the video and showed off what I was looking at while minimising the video of Flannery and I.

“Oh this is a site I found that is really accurate for a lot of information. It’s a great reference for what you can do with your pokemon naturally and when you need to seek out instructors. It’s based off public sightings of pokemon performing certain moves and they even include links to validate their claims,” I replied. I nudged Flannery to get her to stop leaning on me so much but she was too entranced by the various pages I was clicking through.

“Pokepedia? The free encyclopaedia available for all?” Flannery read aloud. She whistled. “Oh wow the University of Celadon set this up?”

“Ah, it is supported by the University of Celadon, not run by them,” I corrected before chuckling, “And from what I’ve read floating around the pokenet it was just that a serious group of students getting caught testing and adding supported content on the site.”

“Huh, what happened to the students?” Flannery asked.

“Supposedly the Professor was extremely relaxed and rather impressed with their work ethic. It got funding and I think the students are all working on it as a paper to be released later this year on the effects of improved information sharing. Each of the students is observing a different impact with battles, pokemon evolution and capture rates, Gym Badge acquisition percentage, and more.”

Flannery whistled. “Damn, the pokenet’s gonna make people a lot smarter!”

I opened my mouth to correct her before shutting my mouth. No need to remind her of the old adage of how a lie could run around the world before the truth had its boots on. Hmmm, perhaps I should hire a full-time I.T. and forum manager rather than just having someone on call and Rachel who liked posting comments.

A dedicated expert might also have their job include adding to the list of possible moves that the various rock-type pokemon that the Gym owned could use.

Food for thought but one that had serious potential.

“Right I think that’s enough of a tangent,” I steered us back to what we were actually here for. “Now the list of moves that are currently known for Torkoal include things like Yawn, Smog, Smokescreen, and set the stage for other options,” I reported, getting the video back on topic.

Flannery perked up as we started going through what could have been possible and what still might be an option for her in the future for one pokemon.

“You already have a really strong pokemon, especially when we take into consideration that it was able to take two Hydro Pumps from Shin, so you could add other things in,” I suggested.

“It’s just that…. Hmmm no, actually if I used Rapid Spin to make Torkoal more mobile then,” Flannery rubbed her chin as she started to consider the list seriously.

I coughed, “Maybe so we’re not handing off all your tricks to future competitors we’ll end the discussion of Torkoal there and turn to other moments in the fight,” I prompted, causing Flannery to blink only to recall that we were recording this.

“Ah! Sure thing!” she chirped but she made a note of her thoughts on a small pad that was actually rather littered with points of discussion he’d had tonight.

I went through a few more moments of the fight that stood out to me before deciding that we’d done enough for the video. It was already over an hour and a half long.

“Alright let’s wrap things up there. I doubt I will have gotten everything but this video is already stretching out a lot longer than I thought it would. Who knew that including another person would cause that?” I said sarcastically.

Flannery laughed, “It’s just good content!”

I nodded, not doubting that the trainers that had access to this would gobble it up. “Alright folks this has been a fun experiment but I doubt I’ll be able to always secure a trainer post match to talk through. That being said I might ask Brawly to come back in and talk to me. I didn’t get a chance last time with him unlike Flannery,” I said.

Brawly had held a small celebration after his victory which had been rather amusing to attend as the opposite party. More than once a few of the surfing buddies applauded something he did only to turn around and commiserate with me.

As Flannery’s face fell I kept talking. “It might make for an interesting video with him being able to respond to the various criticisms and praise I gave out along with reading through the comments that people have been posting.”

The top comment that people seemed to be locking onto was that Brawly had literally set up one of the best fights for himself with his team. I was catching a bit of flak as well for letting him go ahead with the challenge instead of making him get a random selection.

I had responded to it by posting a small ‘meme’ that featured a picture of me shrugging with the caption of ‘eh, my challenge, my rules, my outcome,’. It hadn’t taken long for someone to extract the video and start posting it across the various pokenet pages.

It wasn’t trending as well as ‘fame kid geodude’ but then again my gif wasn’t something that had been broadcast internationally.

“Hmmm Brawly isn’t going to like that. As it is he’s barely on the pokenet, so he’s in for a rude awakening about what some of the keyboard warriors think of him,” she said.

I was rather glad that I’d shut down the recording as otherwise I might have accidentally drawn the ire of a few of said ‘keyboard warriors’ onto Flannery.

It was still incredible to know that there was an ongoing flame war between most of the world and Hoenn over Contests due to the recent letter I’d received.

Nothing mainstream media was going to report on but there was certainly an undercurrent there. I kept track of it these days just to make sure nothing untoward was going to rear its head with Celia in Hoenn. Her recent successes in the last two Hoenn contests she’d taken part in were bound to draw some attention her way.

I was going to have to do something nice for her when we met up at the tournament at the end of the circuit. By this stage, I had no doubts in my mind that she’d be a top-four contender for winning the Hoenn tournament, from what I could see the vast majority of trainers were in Kanto.

Flannery pulled up her transceiver and began scrolling through Pewter’s Pokenet page only to tilt her head and glance at the computer. “You don’t post all the videos?” she asked, pointing at the file I had opened that now had a few hundred videos of me discussing pokemon matches.

“Oh, they’ve all had their time in the open before, but they usually get replaced when a better match comes up showcasing a style or type usage. I don’t think I’ll get a better example of a fighting or fire type trainer for quite some time however so you and Brawly’s videos will probably hold up really well,” I commented.

“Which video is the oldest?” Flannery asked only to pause. “Wait! Is it the ghost expert’s match?”

I nodded. “Ghost type trainers are rare cause there’s a lot of risks with capturing and training ghost pokemon,” I mentioned. “That might change with Agatha getting a bit more freedom. I know she’s got one student at the moment but give it a year and I think she’ll get stir crazy and snatch up a handful for herself,” I commented.

“You make it sound like she’s going to walk into a daycare and steal them away!” Flannery said with laugh.

I tilted my head and considered that for a moment. Would she do that? I could totally see her doing just that. The headline would read, Class of fourteen missing, signed adoption papers found in classroom.

Flannery blinked. “Hey, that was a joke!”

I clicked my tongue, “Yeeeeeeeeah,” I said before shrugging. “I know her current student and her butt heads a lot but then again she is quite acerbic.”

Flannery nodded slowly at that before leaning back in her chair and propping her chin up with a hand. She had a thoughtful look on her face as she let her eyes wander around the office space. She paused on the play area I had set up for my youngest siblings along with the walls that still had some crayon markings on them.

She considered the door with its security features and even glanced at the computer for a while. Then she turned to me, “You do a lot more than I thought you did.”

“Hah, yeah it can be a bit much and I don’t always stay on top of things,” I replied, pleased that she noticed.

Flannery shook her head. “I don’t think I’d be able to do all this. I’d love to see the Lavaridge Gym being bigger and just… more,” she said, splaying her hands out to indicate ‘more’. “But I don’t think that I could balance it all.”

“Hmmmmm,” I took a moment to think before replying. “The issue is that you’re seeing where I am right now rather than what I started with,” I stated.

At her frown I waved a hand. “Come on, they haven’t yet gotten rid of the old Gym so we can go for a tour.”

It was barely a ten minute walk to the old Pewter Gym and it passed in a thoughtful silence.

When we got close enough to see it in all its derelict glory Flannery whistled. “Damn! That building is a shithole!” she said before slapping a hand to her mouth. “Oh shit! Sorry, that used to be your family’s home didn’t it?”

I chuckled. “Yeah it did, and it was a shithole. The house is actually tucked around the back and it’s not the worst but…” I shook my head. “Flint and Lola had a lot of kids,” I stated.

“Yeah ten kids is certainly something,” Flannery laughed.

I inclined my head. “Just so.” I waved a hand at the grounds. “Now, when I took over I had a lot of my current roster of pokemon. All of whom were powerful pokemon and this gym… it wasn’t rated to be able to handle them fighting in it, so straight away I knew I needed to change things up. The family home around the back also wasn’t big enough for my family as they were pretty much on top of each other constantly which led to a lot of fighting. This meant that instead of sitting around I needed to do something unlike a lot of other Gyms that inherit or take over their gyms.”

I waved a hand in the direction we’d come. “My new Gym? It needed to have a lot more capabilities with space for my pokemon, for my future trainers, for my staff, for my family. This meant I needed to dream a little bigger. I endured this gym for a year but that let me workshop some things before moving in.”

I pointed back at the old Gym. “I didn’t start with a nice new gym and suddenly have all the duties and extra workload that I do now. I had something extremely humble that wasn’t working for me. I could have learned to work with it but I felt too constricted so I made a change. Since then I’ve been taking slow steps to improve the gym in lots of little ways.” I began rolling my hands forward building a metaphorical path in front of myself.

“I started my community outreach by talking with locals about influential people that deserved honouring and I created information plaques for young trainers along with making up handy tips for them when they’re out and about, that started to draw people in. I made sure to have battle courts that young trainers can use easily.”

I waved a hand. “The reserve was always meant for the Gym’s pokemon as while you can get away with storing pokemon in pokeballs for long periods of time they never perform as well as those that get to roam around in an enriching environment. That’s why Oak’s farm and some of the big stables have the best results for trainers that use their facilities,” I commented.

This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

“And from there things grew,” Flannery said.

“Yeah, the breeding program for some of my Ancient pokemon has only really taken off this last year with the arrival of a breeding expert. I expect we’ll have a lot more variant geodude soon enough, but then we’re also looking into new pokemon as well like my Relicanth, Corsola, Magcargo, and even Growlithe,” I said idly.

Flannery nodded along only to blink. “Wait, what? What was that last one?” she asked as her head snapped around to lock on my form.

“Oh? Have I not shown you the new addition to the reserve? We built a volcano,” I said.

“Yes, every girl’s dream garden addition, go on,” Flannery said.

I paused and considered asking if she wasn’t just pulling my chain before shaking it off. I’d only caught Yolanda messing around with the volcano once and that was cause.. she knew I was close by so she was messing with me.

Probably..

“Right so the volcano is for something else that we’re looking into which is a fire-rock variant Growlithe that we think is possible.” I wasn’t ready for Flannery’s response.

She twisted her whole body and grabbed me by the shirt. “Why have I not heard of this before now? Let’s go right now! I demand to see the fire puppies!” she shouted starting to walk only for my body to not move.

I raised an eyebrow at her. “We’ll meet the growlithe when we stop for dinner, trust me. They barely ever sleep in their caves in the volcano these days,” I informed her with a sigh. “Bianca, our breeding expert, thinks that might cause delays in potential variants coming about but at this stage the damage is done. They’re all inside dogs.”

“Heh, gotta have a firm hand with growlithe,” Flannery barked out a laugh.

“It’s more my siblings that are the issue,” I replied drolly.

Flannery relaxed, knowing that the Growlithe and the volcano weren't going anywhere. She turned back to the old Gym and gave it another look-over. “Huh, it is kind of crazy to think about where you started but I guess it makes sense. If you were comfortable with what you had you might not have built the current gym,” she said.

I nodded at that, giving the old Gym another look-over. It still had a lot of construction tape laid over it warning people from entering and there didn’t appear to be any signs of entrance for a good while now. I still stepped up and put a hand on the doorframe.

“Kinda sad to know they’re just knocking it down,” Flannery remarked and part of me resonated with that.

“Yeah,” I replied slowly. “Yeah it is.” an idea began to stir in my head. While I didn’t want to create another ‘gym’ there wasn’t any reason that this space couldn’t be used… apart from needing to be updated and probably reinforced a good deal. I’d have to make some inquiries about acquiring it from the local council so I could renovate it.

“Let’s head back and I’ll introduce you to Spot, Lady, Snuggles, Cuddles, Clifford, Mr Woofers, Hepaestus, Agni, Sirius, and Spyro the growlithe pack.”

Flannery smirked. “Awwwwww you named all of them! They sound like good boys and girls!”

“Again, you can thank my siblings for that. I think it took all of a day for them to spot the Growlithe and to start arguing over names,” I replied.

Flannery sniggered at that but I had my revenge when we entered the front yard of my house to find my family out the front with Flint working the barbecue.

“Hey s-Brock!” he said, adjusting what he was going to say.

I gave him a long look before replying, “Hey Flint,” I replied pointedly reminding him of the line I’d metaphorically drawn in the sand when he’d first come back. Flint nodded, his smile not losing a watt of its intensity.

“Brock, look what Grumpy can do!” shouted Cindy as she lifted up an extremely angry-looking Larvitar under its armpits. I was rather impressed that she could do that let alone continue to hold on when it squirmed.

I was about to reprimand her when the Larvitar curled itself into a tight ball and spun its way out of Cindy’s grip.

Cindy giggled as the Larivatar rolled away from her and back towards where Empress was lounging near the small stream. Around her the Lileep shifted as the other two Larvitar and one Teddiursa played a game of chase with Munchlax.

Terra stood atop her mother’s knee with Yolanda sitting next to her with Eevee in her lap. Eevee looked like she had a slightly crooked tail which told me that she’d become a cautionary tale for playing with pokemon that were much heavier than you.

Munchlax, exhausted but still with his arms pumping as he continued to run, looked like he understood that lesson but wasn’t sure how to escape it. It was one of the cutest things ever, if only Rachel had been nearby to record it.

Yolanda rescued him by scooping him up with two hands and depositing him to her side. She then deftly had the Larvitar’s focus switch to a long expanding pole with a treat on the end that she held out to the side.

All three Larvitar instantly shifted, including ‘Gurmpy’, who lunged after the treat.

My siblings watched on and I turned my attention to Cindy who looked roughed up but otherwise fine. “I don’t think it’s a good idea to treat the Larvitar like you do the Growlithe Cindy. Also, don’t try naming them. I think Grumpy is grumpy with you primarily because you force things with her.”

“Are any of them boys?” asked Tommy.

“No, they’re all girls,” I replied. Seeing as they were all genetic clones of Empress, I thought to myself.

I walked over and put a hand on Empress’ flank sending a query through the limited bond we had. I needed to make sure she wasn’t annoyed by my siblings’ treatment of her children.

She sent back an amused response and reminded me that she’d been raised in a tribe, young children were expected to be rough with each other. I snorted at that and decided it was good enough.

When I turned around I found Flannery staring. “You have three more Larvitar already? Damn! What are you trying to do? Set up a team of nothing but Tyranitar?” she asked.

I snorted. “Heh, while amusing, that would be a very one dimensional team.”

“But scary powerful,” she cut in.

“Eh, not really. And as for these little girls? Well they’re just growing up for now cause they’re quite young. Anything else can come later,” I said while glancing around at my family. They might like having a powerful starter like a Larvitar when they went on their journey but I’d leave that up to them.

Yolanda would be the first to head off and she already had Terra, and Spot lined up as part of her team. As Munchlax and Eevee leaned into her for some affection I wondered if she didn’t have a few other potential candidates already but decided to wave that thought away.

Both Eevee and Munchlax hadn’t displayed any desire to train or fight since our excursion to Mt Moon. That might have changed but I doubted that was the case for at least Munchlax. Eevee… Well she had been disappearing every now and then and was a bit dirtier than the others.

Perhaps she was trying?

“So I know it’s not Tauros Bar and Grill but…” I waved a hand towards the grill and Flannery laughed.

“Hah! I’ll call Roxy and Brawly to come around!” Flannery instantly had her transceiver out and was firing off messages.

I decided to send off a few of my own and soon enough Sabrina had teleported in with Oak, Daisy, Rocko, Dennis and his family, and Crowley and his assistant.

Crowley however instantly locked onto the various anceint pokemon I now had around the reserve. I spotted him seconds before Anorith leapt at him and he went down with a “You’ve grown!” before the other pokemon that recognised him piled on.

I left him to it. He seemed happy… right up until Cranidos spotted his downed form. Then he needed saving.

Oak grinned at me. “Well this is a welcome reprieve! What’s the occasion?” he asked me as he claimed a steak and drink for himself.

I took a moment to look over my family and friends all mingling together. “Eh, it’s a Thursday,” I replied, taking a long sip of my drink and just enjoying myself.

Samuel just nodded at that and took a sip himself, his eyes tracking to where Daisy was talking with Suzie as my sister told her all about the special egg she was raising.

Yeah, this was a pretty good way to end any day, special or not.

The next day saw two challengers for the Gym at the third badge tier. I happily met them only to find one of them weren’t up to scratch with the second literally trying to challenge the gym with already weakened pokemon.

I pulled them aside for a quick chat to remind them of the importance of entering a Gym with healthy pokemon only to learn that they’d had some very unfortunate luck with running afoul of a Hoenn trainer.

Urgh, I made a point to break up any group of Rookie Crushers that got comfortable within Pewter but there was nothing that I could do about trainers that were from out of town coming in and weaker trainers.

I got the guy’s details, which pokemon he used and then sent A.J. and Dennis out before turning my attention to other duties.

I wandered out the back with the young trainers of the gym and found Flannery and Missy getting along rather well. Missy was actually getting some extremely helpful tips on how to get her Arcanine’s fire to burn hotter than she had achieved so far.

“Yeah breathing exercises are the best option here. You can work a lot more if the lungs work at top capacity, depending on who you do it. Small little puffs of air can be shifted into nasal breathing. Also… as annoying as it can be for fire types, get them to work on diving underwater if at all possible, the weight of water works wonders on them,” Flannery lectured.

Missy nodded and jotted this down while I looked towards Spyro who was whimpering at the news he’d have to start going for some dunks. Next to Yolanda, Spot puffed his chest out bravely.

Interestingly it wasn’t a one-sided exchange of knowledge between Flannery and Missy. Missy, due to having Growlithe as her starter pokemon, had learned a number of neat tricks with her Arcanine.

“So you can shoot off a Fire Spin that will blow through the water of a wave and that’s where you make your passage rather than jumping through. I’m not sure if that will work against someone like Brock with Shin but there’s at least less distance to cover with the hang time being the biggest issue.”

“Huh, you don’t have the intensity of flames but I’d say you put a lot more force behind your attacks,” Flannery commented as they watched Missy’s Arcanine perform that very sequence against another of her pokemon in her Starmie.

Greta I noticed was recording all of this on her pokedex while the others watched on. By the end of the free time I had before my next Elite challenge for the day Flannery and Missy both looked very pleased with themselves. I led the group back into the Gym and made a point to walk beside Flannery.

“Look at you getting in good practice as a Gym Leader,” I commented .” Thanks for giving Missy those tips.”

“Ah?” Flannery glanced my way. “No hassle, those are the easy things. I’ll have to look over your volcano some more to see if some of the other stuff is possible but otherwise it was good fun!”

I nodded and we made our way to the front where Roxanne was waiting in the Trainer Lounge. I checked the clock and found that we had another thirty minutes before the match started.

Roxy was sitting in a rather formal ose with her legs tucked around her chair in a demure fashion, a small cup of tea in front of her. Brawly on the other hand had what looked like a club sandwich and a large drink on the table that he was currently devouring. They made an interesting study in contrasts.

“You know I think you three are getting a bit too comfortable coming in and relaxing before a match with me like this,” I teased.

It was mostly Brawly making use of the facilities I knew, but it didn’t stop Roxanne from sitting upright and bowing to me. “I’m sorry! I just wanted to relax before the match!”

“He’s just jerking your chain Roxy!” Brawly said with a laugh and I rolled my eyes. He wasn’t wrong.

“Yeah, that’s true.” I waved a hand towards his meal knowing that lunch was still an hour off. “You had an early day or something?”

“The surf was best just before dawn so I got up early yeah,” Brawly responded before taking a huge bite of his meal.

I made to sit down only for a tone rang out on my Xtransciever.

It was a shrill buzzing tone that instantly had me sitting up and paying attention. I didn’t stop to check the caller I.D. instead swiping to answer the call. “Brock here what’s the situation,” I commanded without a hint of the joking tone I’d had moments ago.

Jules, one of my sponsored trainers, albeit one that only had access to lessons, review sessions and financial support from me.

“Brock! We were investigating an old decommissioned power plant and Bugsy found a hidden cave network that led to a valley! We didn’t enter but a landslide occurred from us talking in front of it! We ran back into the cave system but now we can’t get out cause there’s a giant lightning bird flying about! It’s causing a huge lightning storm and we need help!” wailed the young trainer.

I knew exactly where he was and what pokemon he was talking about. I’d looked into it only to find that there were plenty of people that had reported going there to catch stray electric types but there had been no reported sightings of any Zapdos like in the games.

That apparently wasn’t the case for this ‘hidden valley’ they’d found.

What was with young kids stumbling into secret areas that others hadn’t found before? This sounded more like a plot point for Ash and friends from the anime than what Jules would get up to. “Who else is with you?” I asked.

Jules shifted and Bugsy and Ritchie both waved at me.

Huh, so it wasn’t Ash this time but his doppelganger? “Alright if things are safe I’d advise hunkering—” I started to say only for the cave around Jules to shift and debris to fall from the ceiling.

Alright, that wasn’t going to work. “Sit tight,” I said. “I have your location and will be there soon.”

I kept the line open and toggled another screen to begin firing off messages. Within moments Sabrina was at my side with what looked like her Elite load out.

“Brock, shall we?” she said, holding out a hand for me. I reached for it, ready for the teleport only for Brawly to launch himself up.

“Woah! Woah! Hold up! If you need back up we can help you out!” he argued. “Take us with you!” he implored.

Sabrina and I shared a look. If we took one of them we’d be taking all of them we both knew. Brawly, Roxanne, and Flannery were all strong trainers with good pokemon, but were they ready to face off against a Legendary Bird?

“Oh no, someone just used a move against it!” cried Jules from the still-opened line. “It’s turning towards Cerulean!”

Sabrina and I made a call right then and there. Sabrina released her Alakazam and nodded.

Brawly, Flannery, Roxanne, and Missy all stepped forward. I glanced at Missy in surprise. “My Rhyperior is one of the best pokemon to help out and Arcanine can keep me safe if push comes to shove, or we can help in rescue efforts,” she replied.

Sabrina spoke up, “We won’t let it get that far.” We then vanished in a flashy teleport.

The instant I felt solid ground underfoot I started releasing my pokemon. A moment later a thunderclap heralded lightning splitting the sky overhead as all of us turned our attention to the Legendary bird of lightning.

It was starting to fly west and I could see a distant gaggle of people and pokemon launching attacks at it. Ah, poor fools didn’t realise what they’d done.

I levelled a finger at the angry Zapdos.

“Get it’s attention,” I ordered aloud, letting my voice rumble over the hills and plains we found ourselves in.

As one they shifted into a formation that had them in a U shape with Sanchez standing slightly in front of the gap in the U. Sanchez took a knee and began Charging up lightning into the ground all around him with the twin prongs atop his head pointed towards Zapdos.

As one my team of pokemon twisted, performing a move we only ever got the chance to practise, never use.

Sabrina’s Alakazam shifted behind us and began to glow and a moment later a gigantic boulder was torn from the earth only to be fired like a super-sized cannon.

The theory behind it was more like a participle accelerator but the result spoke for itself.

The thunder from before had boomed, and this attack exploded into life as the boulder tore through the sky.

It rocketed towards the Zapdos and it was only the smallest of margins that saw the attack miss. The rock kept sailing on, probably to ruin someone else's day but the powerful attack did what I’d asked.

It had gotten Zapdos to turn and face us.

It was far enough away I couldn’t see it, but I could imagine it locking eyes with us.

I stared right back at it as it sparked angrily. “Again,” I ordered.

We might have been caught unprepared last time, but Sabrina and I had been working on our responses to Legendary birds for quite a while now.

It was time to put that work to the test.