The fighting on the field ran exactly as Vance had expected it to, and did what he wanted it to do.
Let the Sandslash and the Onix rest, then send them back in again — that took care of their stamina and kept a certain pressure on them.
As much sharpening as the two of them could be given.
"Ssh-ssh—"
This time there were two Water types to face, and the Sandslash did not have it so easy. One was a Cloyster, the other a Poliwrath.
One to attack and one to defend, each strong in a different way, and between them they put those strengths together against the Sandslash.
The two of them were not much good at working with each other, and that was where the Sandslash's chance of winning lay.
Vance would never set up a match that could only be lost. Reach a certain standard and the win would come, and what he had prepared for it now was exactly that — a "standard".
Meet it and the Sandslash cleared the stage. It amounted to Vance building the pair of them a "dungeon" by hand, matching opponents to each of them and setting a certain requirement of training to be met.
"Waah—"
"Ssh-ssh—"
The Sandslash drew back, frost still clinging to its claws as they cut through the water, while chunks of ice came down overhead and the cold that came with them struck the Sandslash and went right through it.
This was a great deal harder than facing that Kingler.
"Bang, bang, bang—"
Several charges one after another, and still no progress.
At this point the Sandslash decided it was time to put that clever head of its to work and see whether it could think out an answer to so awkward a situation. Short of a dead end, short of genuinely not being able to manage, it was not about to go asking its Trainer for help.
That would make it look so useless.
A run of slashes left their marks on the Poliwrath and drove it back. Overhead the chunks of ice had become spikes of ice now, giving off cold, coming straight down, covering the whole stretch of water it stood in.
The Sandslash had no choice but to gather its strength again and meet the spikes as they came.
It cut one apart, used the force of that to spring onto another and ran along the tops of them; and taking the opening it had made by driving the Poliwrath back, it closed the distance to the Cloyster. Settle that one first — otherwise, in the thick of a fight with the Poliwrath, this thing kept putting in a hit here and a hit there, and the Sandslash was having a wretched time of it.
Besides which, this one was the weaker of the two, and would do as a place to break through.
Standing on a spike of ice it threw itself into a jump, rolled its body into a ball and went straight at the Cloyster; with a dull thud it struck, and the two of them flew up together. Sharp claws came down on it one after another, then the Sandslash turned, and its small tail took on the colour of steel through and through — the move Iron Tail.
That crashed down on top of it, and then star after huge star of Swift appeared and went off in its face.
"Boom—"
After that quick, unbroken run of moves from the Sandslash, the Cloyster took heavy damage and dropped into the water.
Only then did the Sandslash take its eyes off it and turn to the Poliwrath that was left.
Only you now. The Sandslash went over the water on the blocks of ice, fast, and met the Poliwrath.
With the Cloyster no longer striking at it from the side, things were a great deal simpler; all it had to do was give this Poliwrath everything it had.
Keep its temper, wait until it found the weak spot, and then it could go at it hard. This fellow would come to no more than that.
Over on the other side, what the Onix had drawn was a Golduck, and with it another Tentacruel, both a little stronger than the last pair.
The Tentacruel had already been settled by the Onix, and it was facing the Golduck now.
Its record and its pace were not much behind the Sandslash's.
The Sandslash worked by skill, relying on quickness and then a burst of damage to finish an opponent, while the Onix worked by sheer strength, hard against hard.
Two different ways of fighting, each with its own character.
"Gyarados, get ready. A big wave in a moment — a group battle this time."
Seeing how far the fighting had come, Vance already knew how the rest of it would go. Two fights done, and the pair of them would have found their feet by now, so let it be a big one.
"Hss-kek—"
"Gastly's turn to go on. Will you take yourself out there, or shall I send you?"
Vance said it to the Gastly, which was grinning away beside him.
Ever since it had been caught, with its board and lodging found for it, the Gastly had grown comfortable.
For the sake of its healthy growth it needed rather more fighting.
"Hss-kek—"
The Gastly shook its body to say that it would take itself out, and drifted off towards the battlefield.
"Kirl—"
Kirlia appeared at his side, asking to be sent in.
"All right. You could do with more of it too."
Vance agreed. Kirlia would of course be going in; he was not going to go easy on her for being a girl. In ordinary things, fine, but not where it mattered.
And Kirlia's own sense of it was good; she never needed Vance to push her, and was eager every time.
She gave him no trouble at all.
Zoroark, which had come out with her, wanted to be sent in as well, and Vance talked it out of it.
"As for you, Zoroark, there's no need. If you went in there wouldn't be enough of them to keep you busy."
The Pokémon he had lined up for them were not all that strong, and if Zoroark's strength were added in, the fight would be turned on its head and there would be no training left in it.
"Oo-oo—"
Zoroark nodded and stayed obediently at his side; and as for Blaziken and the rest, that went without saying.
This was the Sandslash's field, and its fellows' — a "babies' cup", not a grand final.
If they joined in there would be no game left in it.
"Ssh-ssh—"
The Sandslash floated on the surface, out of breath, and on the water beside it lay a Poliwrath with its eyes turning in circles, no longer able to fight.
After a hard fight the Sandslash had taken the win after all.
It had spent a good deal of stamina, though, and had taken a few hits along the way; it hurt all over, and it was soaked through.
Looking over to where the other sounds of fighting came from, the Onix and the Golduck were near the end of it too: the Golduck was bound up in the Onix's coils, unable to get free, and not far from losing.
In under a minute the Golduck, as expected, was out of the fight, and was then moved away by psychic power.
This time Vance gave them no rest. Gastly and Kirlia came out onto the field and waited quietly.
"Group battle coming up. No breaks in the middle."
Vance called out.
Hearing that, the Sandslash scrambled up onto a block of ice floating on the water, lay down on it and set about getting its stamina back while it could; the Onix coiled itself up as well and settled on a platform of rock of its own making.
"Rraah, rraah—"
Over the way came the Gyarados's roar of anger, and Water types came at them one after another, ten or so of them, ranging from Intermediate to Elite.
Gastly and Kirlia floated above the water and did not have to wade.
The Sandslash, still dog-paddling in the water, saw that they could fly and envied them very much. If only it could fly.
Watching the Water types come rushing over, the Sandslash's eyes suddenly lit up. It had an idea.
"Ssh-ssh—"
The Sandslash shouted up at Kirlia where she hung in the air, a whole rattling stream of it.
"Kirl—"
Kirlia nodded, psychic power wrapped itself around the Sandslash, and it rose out of the water and left the surface behind.
The Water types over the way came on all together, and a dozen-odd Pokémon in one mass made a considerable show of it.
The Sandslash rolled itself into a ball at once, spinning round in the air, and Kirlia carried it off towards them.
It came down head-on into a Seaking at the front of the charge and knocked that one senseless before anything else.
Then a swing back round, and, working with Kirlia, the balled-up Sandslash went weaving through the mass of them.
Down again, and a Staryu was knocked out of it; up and down again, and every time it came down it hit one, like somebody working a yo-yo.
"Hss-kek—"
The Gastly drifted up in front of the Onix, having decided to hold the line here alongside it. If the sky fell in there was somebody tall standing there to take it, wasn't there.
And the Onix was that "somebody tall".
That was how the Gastly saw it.