A twitch of Don's wings as the wind around us changed caused my focus to slip and I growled in annoyance.
Don matched my frustration, which oddly made us more aligned in a way. The method of mega evolving was slow.
Which didn't surprise me at all as I'd spent months working with Jormungandr in preparation to make this happen.
A scant week was barely time for Don and I to deepen our bond enough.
Although, to claim that deepening it was enough was a major exaggeration. I needed to finesse the way I used my aura. How I thought, how I gave orders, and how I acted with Don.
It was like having a blank key for a lock. Only I had no idea what shape the blank needed to take as I couldn't copy a previous example, as each lock was different.
There were some similarities that allowed some progress to be swift, but in other ways, there were many nuances that I had to work through.
At the same time, I had to coach Don on doing the same from his end. It was a strange experience as I both had to guide and command him, alternating between building him up after his failures and wrestling him back to the right path.
The way he oscillated with his temperament made the training sessions far more tiring than they should be. In a way, it made me suspect that I was the one at fault.
But at the same time, I had to remind myself that this was how Dragon-type pokemon, or those with personalities like them, were trained. They could be harder as they fluctuated emotionally.
They were a bunch of drama queens impacted by their pride or perception of their pride.
"Gible!" chattered another dragon.
I glanced to the side and found Gible had half his poffin in hand and was sharing it with Tyrunt who snatched it out of his hand.
Rather than being upset Gible just laughed like it was a game.
Tyrunt tried to act smug but it faltered in the face of Gible's unwavering good mood.
Gible was going to ruin my expectations of other dragons with his laid back and jolly attitude. That little dude was a true blessing of his type.
Gible himself was getting close to evolving. I could tell thanks to notes that Cynthia had left for me regarding his species.
The fin had started to lengthen, and on his knees some small bumps were starting to jut out.
When he evolved into Gabite, hardened spikes would jut out, adding to his naturally Rough Skin with points that could rip and tear into other pokemon.
His tail had also gained some small nubs that would eventually serve as his dorsal fins. With the communication lines established to the Trinity Nations, I could send highly secured messages to Cynthia.
That said, if these messages were the pokemon equivalent of cute cat pictures featuring a small shark pokemon were irrelevant. Nor were her responses where she'd scrawled messages of 'Cute!' and 'Look at his little chompers! All over the initial pictures.
Somewhere in the League, there was a security analyst who was having to review this and either overthinking it, or just enjoying the break from text-heavy documents.
They must be rather surprised by how candid the Champion of a foreign region was being with me. She'd offered more than a few suggestions in how to raise him when I sent her cute Gible pictures.
"Alright, let's take a break Don, go show your daughter how to dive bomb a target yeah?"
Don perked right up at this, and his confidence surged. I shook my head. With how Don was acting, I was starting to compare him to Archen.
Thankfully, he wasn't anywhere near as bad with their Defeatist ability, but he was certainly struggling against this training.
Perhaps that was the point. He was struggling currently, whereas a lot of the previous training I'd had him do was straightforward and easy for him to develop.
It wasn't until I'd had Tide match him in strength with his Hyper Beam that he'd started knuckling down and putting proper effort into his training, which was again a point of pride.
So was the trick that I needed to demonstrate the Mega evolution with Jorm? Make Don worried about his position? He'd certainly commit harder if I had another Mega Stone available.
I jotted down my thoughts for later perusal on training methods that I would employ or merely consider. Instead, I turned my attention to Gible.
"Ready to start working on your Draco Meteor?" I asked. Gible spun in a tight circle, his little jaw gnashing in ecstasy.
"Gib Gib gible!" he chanted, which let me know his feelings on the matter.
Gible sprinted to the centre of the training area and I began setting up different targets.
"We'll start with target three and go to two, then one," I told him.
Gible stared at me in confusion, as he shot glances at the three targets.
"Ah? You…. don't know which ones are which, do you?" I asked and he shook his head.
"Red one first, avoid hitting the others until it's their turn," I ordered, indicating the other two targets I'd laid out on the field.
Each target was far enough apart that a normal Draco Meteor from Gible wouldn't be an issue.
Issues arose when he wasn't focusing. He could cause the spread of the attack to be much greater than it should be, which impacted the result.
Gible built up the charge within his mouth and launched it high into the sky, where it exploded into a flurry of meteors that streaked towards the ground, sending small explosions out with each impact.
A quick count showed that he'd only gotten seven break offs with the attack.
"Hmm, we're going to have to keep working at that," I muttered. I wanted to reach at least ten meteors from the initial burst before evolving him according to the notes Cynthia had given me.
Apparently, as soon as he evolved he'd then have to retrain the ability thanks to the increase in power that came with his growth. It was something that many trainers decided to push for as quickly as possible, but Cynthia's notes had actually warned against the trap as finesse was harder to train in later.
"DM!" I called with a slash of my hand towards the righthand target.
Gible tilted back like a tiny artillery piece.
"Giiiiiiiible!" he launched the orb high into the air and I grimaced as I spotted some instability in its upward trajectory.
"Danger close!" I shouted, and the watching pokemon threw themselves into handy holes nearby.
Or rather, almost all of them did.
Tyrunt stood firm, staring up at the glowing orb cluelessly.
"Tyrunt! Get in a hole!" I shouted only for her to blink at me.
Then the Draco Meteor erupted, causing a plume of descending energy blasts to slam around Tyrunt causing her to stiffen in shock. She whirled back and forth as each rained down, only for the final, an eighth, I idly noted, to slam down behind her and launch her across the field where she skidded and lay in a daze.
I sprinted straight towards her. While it had only been a glancing blow, the super effective nature of her taking a dragon typed attack meant she'd have taken a lot of damage.
"You alright girl?" I asked as I skidded up next to her.
"Runt!" she grunted as she staggered to her feet only to stumble into me.
"Here, let me clean you up," I offered, subtly palming a potion bottle to spray and heal her up. She shot me an annoyed look and when Gible scuttled up he became the focus of her ire.
"Tyrunt!" she snapped at him.
He rubbed his dorsal fin and gave a sheepish little laugh.
"Sorry girl, he didn't mean it, it's a failed move cause of how we're pushing for more with the move. You'll get to learn it one day, so you watching on is a good idea but we're going to have to teach you how to dodge," I said over the top of her low growling.
She sniffed and raised her head imperiously, which gave me a chance to get under her chin to swipe my cloth.
The Larvitar triplets decided that would be an appropriate time to poke their heads out of the hole they'd dove into. They instantly started what I can only assume was cat-calling Gible and Tyrunt.
Tyrunt whirled on them and sprinted over to bite them only for them to duck back into the hole, resulting in what looked like a game of whack-a-diglett.
Or in this case, bite-a-diglett.
Gible watched on in amusement, and I hummed. "You got the eighth plume of energy to work, but we're going to have to work on stability," I murmured.
Gible nodded happily, and I hummed. Hadn't Ash's Gible had some issues learning this move in the cartoons?
I seem to recall something of a running gag with Dawn's Piplup always ending up being blown away.
I could only hope that such a dynamic wouldn't play out going forwards with Tyrunt.
I decided then and there to teach her Dig, or duck and cover with a Protect at least. As much as I wanted to continue training Gible, I decided Tyrunt's failure to dodge took precedent for the moment.
"Alright, Gible, think you can work on your Draco Meteor over there? I need to make sure Tyrunt knows how to follow orders, Dodge, or at the very least use Protect."
"Gib!" he responded with a happy nod. Then he toddled off.
Tyrunt and the triplets were still in the middle of their game, which was more bullying, with how the trio were ganging up on her, they were completely oblivious to Gible moving off until he shot off the first of his Draco Meteors.
This caused one of the triplets to linger above ground as she caught sight of the fireworks.
She was lucky that Tyrunt flinched and then got distracted, as otherwise she would have gotten a Bite for her lax attitude.
"Eyes on me!" I ordered.
Instantly I had several eyes turning my way from the various Geodude, Onix, and other pokemon that had taken to watching Gible. Gible didn't turn around, knowing it wasn't for him.
The Triplets popped out of their holes and stood watching me, while Tyrunt ignored me in favour of continuing to watch Gible.
I clapped my hands, and she whirled around. "Runt!" she barked in surprise.
"On me Girl," I said firmly. "You and I are going to do some work today cause I don't want you getting hit like that again."
She growled and stomped her little feet in agitation.
"And neither should you," I replied. "It's unbefitting for one such as yourself," I continued, knowing that this Tyrunt had an odd inflection with how she spoke of herself to other pokemon.
She used a Royal form of speaking.
Which after a bit of thought actually made some things easier with how I needed to get her to complete objectives. I just needed to present tasks as worthy, or certain acts as beneath her.
Tyrunt blinked at me then perked up with a proud nod.
"Right, so the first method of training we're going to do is to play a game of tag, Triplets! Are you interested?" I asked.
The triplets smirked and nodded.
I mirrored them but then drew a firm square in the ground. "No leaving this square! And no digging for now!" I ordered, causing them to lose some of their confidence.
Then their interest returned as I drew out small markers with different colours. "When you're tagged you can use your markers to indicate if a touch has been made!"
"Tyrunt, you can hold yours in your mouth. I got you a Royal Purple."
She stomped her feet in a happy dance and I subtly filmed her antics. It was kind of cute watching her play around like this.
The triplets all fought over the green marker so I played up the importance of red and blue to get them to choose different options.
I then drew out my own black marker with a smile. "I'll start!" I declared before lunging at the closest triplet to tag her.
She squawked with surprise as I swiped her snout only to dance away from her retaliation strike.
From there the game was on. I stood back when I could and called suggestions to the players or demonstrated dodges, feints, and methods of juking.
It was basic work but by the time ten minutes were up my pokemon were a riot of colours with the occasional black squiggle on them.
Tyrunt looked extremely pleased with herself but when one of the triplets tried to tag her after the game was done they earned themselves a nip on the hand.
"You need to respect her personal space. The game was over, and you were trying to be a brat," I judged firmly. "Now, you trio will need to play this game going forwards. I'll mark out three different squares for this game. One will be like this, one will have boulders, and another will have holes that you can all run down," I announced.
It would be a bit of work to get the Onixes to make tunnels in such a manner but it would also help the young pokemon train.
"Izumi the Geodude is going to referee your games to make sure you all play nice," I added, giving them a firm 'no-questions' asked look. "Remember that if you don't listen she can smack you down from two hundred paces at least!"
Tyrunt cocked her head to the side. "Runt?" she asked glancing from me to the triplets who nodded emphatically and began chatting. To my ear it sounded like they were talking up Izumi's scary feats of accuracy.
I nodded, knowing that if Izumi had been above ground when Lance pulled his antics he'd have had a bit more trouble.
"Others will join in to make it more interesting. Remember, for now, no Dig, or other pokemon moves," I stated as I brought the impromptu training session to a close.
"Now you can either let me wash you off with a spray and wipe or go for a sand bath near the volcano," I offered.
As one the group turned towards the volcano only for Tyrunt to power ahead with a cheerful roar that sounded like she was taunting her 'friends'. I chuckled and left them to it as I turned back to Gible.
Hopefully, we could get another plume of Draco Meteor to form by the end of our session today.
By the end of the next hour we hadn't achieved it, but Gible wasn't outwardly bothered. I still made sure to praise him for his efforts.
"You've done well today. Your attack is getting stronger and you're also increasing the coverage. It'll be a potent attack and area denial move for us in future." I ran my gloved hand over his dorsal fin as he liked causing him to purr in delight.
"Keep up the good work and thanks for being a Champ with letting me see to the others. They're all watching you and you're serving as a great role model."
"Gib!" he flapped his stumpy little hand at me in a shy manner and I laughed. "They are up at the volcano washing off the pen markers if you want to hang out with them," I suggested.
"Gible!" he cheered as he scurried off to join in with his friends.
With that work done, I turned to the next pokemon on my list. I whistled once and braced to— a small form slapped into the back of my neck with a squeal of delight.
I shook my head as my ears suddenly developed a slight ringing. "That was fast Sakura girl," I said. "Please keep the Screech away from my ears though. I'm too young to develop Tinnitus."
"Crooooo," she crooned, nuzzling into my neck.
I sighed, knowing she'd slip up. I'd just have to look into treatment options. Surely with our healthcare system something like damage to the ears was a minor issue?
It went onto the list of things to ask about later when I next visited my doctor.
For now I was going to train with Crobat. "Alright girl, let's do some dancing," I announced, holding my hand out and letting her zip around it, her wings barely fluttered at my coat.
I continued to move, letting her flow around me.
The reasoning behind this was to get a bit more of a feel for her. How she moved, how she reacted, and also allow me a chance at opening the bond we had.
It was obvious enough that I should have a bond with her. She was a friend, a really easy going pokemon that adored me. I wanted to be able to commune with her but as of yet we hadn't established the same bond as with some of my other pokemon.
I was more established with Link than I was with her.
So the delay in forming a bond through which I could give silent commands was either a matter of time, or her flying nature clashing with my own rock nature.
Seeing that there was a potential for such a blockage to have formed, it became essential to examine my methods, and feel for any forming bond or 'echo' of her reaching out to me without me registering the attempt to link.
By studying how much it changed, I hoped to get more insight into flying types and improve my understanding of my current flying-type pokemon with Don and Zephyr.
Understanding, along with time, was what I needed with Sakura right now.
Which was honestly easier with Sakura than it had been with Don.
It was a good thing that I'd acquired Don as early into my journey as I had. I'd been able to use him in numerous fights and build up a reputation with him. He'd gotten to experience lots of situations along with me growing as a trainer.
To this day, I was still growing as a trainer, it was just in different ways than I had when I was on my journey.
I might not be out there in the world, experiencing something new or travelling around as much as a Journey trainer would, but I was still expanding my skills. Testing, reevaluating old methods and growing stronger.
As Sakura flitted around me I sighed. This wasn't working.
I took off my coat and then my long sleeve shirt, leaving me just in a thermal singlet. The wind blew across my exposed skin causing goose pimples to form and my hair to stand on end.
Perfect.
"Try again," I asked and this time I felt the fluttering of Sakura's little wings on my flesh.
I felt the way the air shifted with every twist and shift. When she hovered above my palm I felt the multitude of wing beats that made up her thrumming pause in the air.
I had her rotate, marvelling at the way the air shifted as she performed a perfect pirouette.
"Huh," I murmured. Shutting my eyes I began to do a slow movement that saw me basically sliding and waving my hands about in slow, semi-coordinated movements.
I tried to 'send' what my intentions were before I did each movement. I could feel Sakura reacting and shifting around me, twirling and circling me. At one point she spun around my neck so that her wings kissed my cheek only to twirl away as I twisted in her direction.
After a few minutes of this, I stopped and opened my eyes. While I'd been moving, I realised I couldn't just let this be a one-way deal, so to speak.
"Your turn, you control the way we're moving," I suggested.
Sakura tilted her head. Then she hesitantly flitted towards me, getting in close. I swept my hands in and around her, not blocking, but attempting to stroke her head to touch the tips of her wings as lightly as I could.
Whenever I managed it she lurched to the side, causing me to adjust how soft I was. I wanted no impact beyond the touch.
Even with her leading, I still had to move around more than I had, but she got into more hovering points than she had before when I'd given her the order to twirl.
In fact, she zipped and jagged more than she twirled, cutting in rather than moving gracefully.
It gave me an insight into how she moved. Asking her to be a ballerina of the sky was all wrong.
She was more like… more like a hummingbird with an electric beat to its movements. She wanted to zap and zip… which made sense to me at least.
With that insight, I felt something shift within myself. It was a simple enough revelation of how she moved naturally.
But with that, I could feel a small inkling of her emotions, and when she stiffened, I knew she too felt something of mine.
"Holy heck," I muttered, staring at her. Had we just— a surge of delight shot through the tiny bond we'd formed as I realised what was about to happen.
Sakura slammed into my face with a happy trill and I flailed in surprise before allowing myself to fall back into the snow.
"Yeah, I should have seen that coming," I said aloud as Sakura nuzzled at me happily.
I lay there despite the cold snow and freezing wind sweeping over me enjoying the moment.
This was a success beyond anything that I'd expected. I'd only planned for half the training and it had seemed a throwaway idea.
It had turned into so much more.
I sighed as I realised I probably needed to do this with Zephyr and Don as well. Both of them flew differently, but this idea of 'dancing' with my pokemon as they flew around me…. It wasn't quite right… not for them.
I toyed with the idea some more as I laid there, only for a shiver to run through me. I sat up and shuddered. "I think that's enough dancing around in the snow for now girl," I declared, grabbing up my clothes and deciding to head for home.
Right about now, something warm sounded perfect.
I sneezed as I walked, causing Sakura to fly off my face.
She shot me a horrified look as something dripped off her body.
"Sorry!" I called as she shot away. "It wasn't on purpose!" I called after her only to shiver.
I threw on my coat and trudged inside. When I reached the house, I asked Nanny Grav to make up some soup and toast while I slipped into the bath to warm up.
As the heat of the bath suffused through me I sighed in relief. "That was a good, and a not so good idea," I mused aloud.
Big win with the bond training, but not so good an idea doing it during winter.
I sneezed again.
Alright, it was an outright terrible idea.
A knock on my door had me looking up. "That you, Nanny Grav?" I called thinking I was about to get a meal.
The door slid open, and I sank down in the bath as Lola called. "Brock honey? Are you feeling alright?"
"Privacy woman! I'm a grown man!" I shouted through the sliver of the open door I'd left open into my bedroom.
"Oh wow! Your room is so much bigger than mine!" she gushed. "Is that a walk-in wardrobe? Wait! You have one of these in everyone else's room but Flint and I's? Why don't I have that?" she called from the room that was attached to the bathroom.
"GET OUT OF MY ROOM!" I bellowed.
Lola's footsteps hurried out of the walk-in wardrobe to the hallway. "Well! If you want to be that way! I want you to know that Rachel is here looking for you! I'll leave your soup in the kitchen!" she said primly.
I groaned into the water making bubbles as I fumed. Damn annoying woman.
I wanted to linger in the water, soaking up the warmth and being lazy. I felt like I'd earned that.
But my mood was ruined now and I doubted just lying back and thinking of nothing would make it come back. I was too agitated, and a headache was starting to build behind my eyes.
Damn that woman.
So instead of lying there, I rose, towelled myself off and got dressed to march back out to meet Rachel.
"Hey Rachel," I said, greeting my 'Gym's PR' manager, among other things, only to cough.
Then cough again. Then a sneeze erupted out of me with a lot of phlegm. "Urrr," I groaned as I wiped my nose with a tissue.
Rachel inched back from me. "Oh dear, getting a cold?" she asked.
"Maybe," I admitted. "I was doing some training with my Crobat," I told her as I sat down and began to devour the soup.
It wasn't like there could be much else to handle. We already had the maze being built in the Gym.
"This is mostly just a formality right?" I asked, watching my soup and missing the way Rachel's eyes darted from side to side.
"Yeah! There's a few items we need to check over with you but it's pretty straight forward!" she declared.
I sniffled and nodded. "Awesome. Let's begin."
Rachel bounced on the spot. "Soooo, I've gone through some ideas with all the interested parties," she announced. "We had some ideas we wanted to pitch to you."
I held up a finger as my headache continued. "One moment," I replied as I reached into the medicine drawer and grabbed some tablets to relieve the forming migraine I had.
Urgh, dancing around in the cold wasn't a good idea, who knew?
I rubbed at my forehead. "Sorry I have a killer headache and a bit of a niggle in my throat. Can we go over this later?" I asked.
"Some of the things we'd need to start setting up for tomorrow. I could call the construction company today and get it set up?" she asked carefully.
I blinked at her, the headache that wasn't in any way her fault spiking. I groaned.
"Oh fuck it, summarise it for me?" I asked, already leaning towards just rubber-stamping it to just get this meeting over with.
"We want to create an obstacle course with cameras set up in the Gym Proper, and then have a Rhyhorn riding course out the back. These could be semi-permanent fixtures that the Gym could use at various periods of time with it being a recurring event. There are already clubs for riders so why not expand into Rhyhorn riding? It is also important for—"
I held up a hand to stall out any more commentary she had.
"Approved," I grunted. "What else?" I asked knowingly.
"An egg carting game where people carry an egg through a course against others with a timed failure point. Using a fake glitter bomb egg would make it—"
"Approved," I grunted, signalling for her to continue."
"Built in tests of character to see what people are made of with crying kids, grenade jumps and—"
"Approved."
Rachel licked her lips. "Magical glow up contest with people getting access to a stage with judges for a few minutes where they can accessorise or dress up or down to their hearts content? We reached out to Monique the dress maker and she was very int—"
"Approved but only for the final selection," I grunted through the forming migraine. Come on tablets, do something! I thought to myself.
"Sabrina mentioned she wants to—"
"Approved," I said without a second thought. I wasn't about to gainsay her and she usually had good insight so I'd let her have it. "That all?" I asked.
Rachel glanced at her sheet of papers only to nod incredulously. "That's uh… everything?" she replied uncertainly.
"Good, I'm going to go lay down. Tell Alexa I'll need someone else to feed up this afternoon and tell Dennis, I think he's on today?" I said as I departed for my bed.
I didn't want to linger out in the communal spaces lest my family start wanting to play, or worse, one of my siblings started shouting. I didn't think my brain could take that right now.
I reached my room without incident and slid into bed deciding that this was enough for the day.
I'd gotten away with too much and not played it smart with the weather. That joke proverb was a lie.
It turns out that idiots can catch colds, I thought as I pulled a pillow over my eyes and decided to take a nap.
_______________
Rachel walked back to the meeting room, where Alexa, Georgina, Monique, and Bertha were all sitting around a table with various images spread out along with plans.
Alexa glanced up. "So? What did he approve?" she asked.
Rachel glanced down at her notes. "Everything?" she replied incredulously.
The group all blinked at that only for Bertha to let out a victorious cheer.
Getting everything approved? That was so much better than their wildest dreams.
"Is Brock feeling alright?" Alexa asked. "This is going to take a bit of work."
"I mean… he knows in a way," Rachel admitted, "He seemed to be coming down with a cold and he couldn't focus much cause of a headache so he speed ran the meeting points."
Everyone blinked at that.
"Did you trick him?" Alexa asked, leaning in.
Rachel waved her hands and shook her head. "No! No! No! I announced each point but he cut me off after hearing the short version of everything! He gave his approval for it! I even left him the summary documents we made!" she hurriedly stated.
"Hmmmm, maybe we should wait to ask him again when he's feeling alright?" Alexa suggested.
That got the group to pause.
Rachel tapped the obstacle course along with the Rhyhorn riding competition. "We need these started in the next day or so," she pointed out.
That got a few worried looks and Bertha waved a finger as she tapped on both trying to argue for their importance.
Alexa sighed. "He'll probably let us continue having already given it, even if it was… with less than ideal circumstances, but let's keep his workload on this light if he's not feeling well."
Georgina, the accountant, coughed pointedly. "Also, we're controlling spending on this. No open bank," she declared. "Anything too big we run past him, or Sabrina if he's still under the weather."
The rest of the group agreed, a current of energy running through them as they realised they were going to do this.
Alexa clapped her hands. "Let's get to it! This Magical tournament isn't going to make itself!"
The group set about their tasks, knowing they were about to bring something amazing to Pewter.
__________________
A.N. Thanks go to my Patreons for your continued support.
Thanks also go to Twmmy for proofreading this.
I mostly wrote the secondary part of this chapter, referencing Brock giving his approval for everything as a reference to when I wrote the NNT quest. I recall getting my wisdom teeth out during one particular point of the quest.
I allowed the voters to get away with murder for almost a week straight while I was high on meds.
If you know, you know.