Like No One Ever Was

Freddrick stomped off well before I could even offer a handshake, muttering about how this was unfair. I barely noticed, cheering a few more times before returning to my cohort. “That was truly spectacular, Young Miss,” Leah greeted me. “I’m sure your parents will be thrilled to see you in action.” She said, putting away her phone before excusing herself to go off and collect her winnings.

“Excellently done, a wonderful use of Terastalization.” Professor Turo congratulated me as well. He put his own Rotom Phone away. Was he recording the match as well? I wonder why. Turo seemed quite pleased, and I wasn’t going to question it. His fellow Professor was a bit more critical, though.

“You pushed Dun pretty hard, will he be alright?” It was true, he looked pretty rough even after the healing items I had used on him.

Holding him up to look him in the eyes, I asked him “How’s it going? You did great so far, if you don’t-” he was starting to squirm in disagreement. “No really, you beat the strongest Pokemon here.” Dun quickly glanced over at Tulip’s compact mirror at her side. “Besides yourself, of course,” I rolled my eyes. “We can bow out here and it wouldn’t be bad at all.”

He thought about it momentarily before shaking his head, still keen to go on. “Dun, Dunsparce!” Friede ruefully shook his head at that before nodding in understanding. He might have been surprised that we went that far, but could accept Dunsparce’s desires and my efforts to achieve them.

“Alright then, just one round left,” I said, glancing over at the arena where the other semi-finalists were getting ready. They had a Pawmi and a Clodsire. The Pawmi could be a problem, but the Trainers seem equally skilled, so the Clodsire will probably win due to Type advantage, and we have ways of dealing with a Clodsire.

“Yeah, we got this. Rest up buddy, you’ll need your strength for what’s coming.” Returning him to the ball, he could rest slightly easier in there, though the Potions had already had a huge effect. I don’t think it’s going to be that hard - no one else in the tournament was anywhere near as strong as that Corviknight. Still, good to keep him hyped and in the zone.

“Heck yeah, you got this! That was so cool. I never saw the point of battling before, but I might want your help in teaching Popplio a few Moves when she hatches” Cyan admitted.

“Sure thing sis.” Inwardly I was already thinking about the kinds of Moves that Popplio could learn. They gain the Fairy Typing once they evolve, but they can probably learn a bunch of those Moves as well early on, good to get them used to it. Plus, they probably have access to most voice-based Moves, beyond Boomburst.

“That was incredible, Terastalization is amazing! I want to try it too, Dad!” I gaped at Arven’s words. Did he not give a Tera Orb to his own son?!

He blinked. “I didn’t realize you were interested in battling, my son.”

“Well, I mean Nemona will probably push me into it anyways. And it looks really cool!” At that, Turo smiled.

“I’d love nothing more than to teach you all about Terastalization.” Arven cheered, pulling out a Tera Orb from his pocket and releasing Maschiff, excitedly telling him the news. Ah, maybe I jumped the gun in assuming the worst there. Arven already has a Tera Orb but just didn’t feel confident using it on his own.

Watching the tender moment, I wondered if I was wrong about other things. If there was still a way to pull Turo away from his ruinous experiments. My thoughts of the future were dragged back to the present by Dendra and Tulip moving closer.

“Osuuuu! That was an epic, blood-pumping battle!” The martial artist girl cried out, punching the air excitedly. Even the fashionable girl beside her had lost some of her cool and was looking on at Dun and I with awe and worry.

“It’s not to my taste, but I was right; your beauty shines the most when you battle.” There was an odd shimmer in her eyes. She’s viewing my Aura, isn’t she?

I hadn’t won the tournament yet, but I couldn’t help but ask: “Soooo, what did you think?”

The fashionable teenager let out a heavy sigh and I felt some trepidation. “I’m really regretting making that deal.”

“So you’ll teach me? Awesome! Wait- why are you regretting this?”

Shaking her head, she clarified. “Because I fear - no I can tell - you’re going to want to learn everything, and truthfully I know little on the topic. I have a gift for it, but I only learned the basics before pursuing other goals.”

“Oh.” Right, that makes sense. While she’s had little displays of power, she’s no Sabrina. I didn’t think she could read my thoughts, but she might have felt something there, her eyes narrowing.

“Ah, I mean that’s fine. Anything you can teach me would be appreciated.”

“You’re welcome. It might take a while, but I’ll try to track down my old teacher and see what more I can learn.” I notice she’s not mentioning Aura directly. Maybe it has something to do with the Professors being around?

Her friend offered her support as well. “Osu! And I’ll be happy to train you too! I might not know everything she does, but I’ve got some solid conditioning plans in mind for you and your Pokemon.”

“Thanks! I’ve- that sounds super cool.” I corrected myself before I could say something wrong. Right, ‘Nemona’ hasn’t had any martial arts training, while I have almost twenty years under my no longer-existent black belt. I might be able to tell Dendra I trained before, but Cyan would know I was 'lying' about that. Still, this is going to be awesome. Honestly, I’m almost as excited for the martial training as I am for the Aura stuff.

The semi-final match ended, with the Clodsire winning as I expected (It almost certainly had the Poison Point Ability given the way the Pawmo had been staggering after it had laid its fists on him, I’d be ready for that).

Then again, Clodsire’s trainer has familiar green hair and she’s wearing a button-up shirt… I think that might be Rika! I hadn’t expected to face a future Elite Four today, but in any case, I was pumped up. This is gonna be great!

Surprisingly, they didn’t call for the next match right away, most of the officials were busy somewhere else. It was getting later in the night, the full moon rising above us, but I didn’t care. I was riding a buzz like I got from a great D&D session and was sure that I wouldn’t be able to fall asleep for hours after.

My friend and sister were cheering me on, excitedly chatting about the matches. Turo and Friede debating the matches and their merits. Dendra and Tulip discussed some training plans and exchanged their phone numbers with me. Leah returned, smiling smugly as the bookies reluctantly handed over the money and barred her from making a bet on the final round.

Which is when it all came crashing down. “Attention everyone, we have an announcement to make,” Larry said in an oddly somber tone. What was even more attention-grabbing were all the different referees gathered beside him as well, including the head judge. This doesn’t feel like they’re just about to announce the start of the finals.

“We have deliberated and decided that Nemona Glitterati is disqualified from the 27th Junior Tournament.” Whispers spread through the crowd like wildfire.

“What do you think she did?”

“I knew there was something wrong with a girl that young making it this far.”

“Will the rest of the tournament go on?”

I could barely comprehend what was going on, my mind struggling to put it together. “Why?” My words came out as a broken whisper that Larry definitely couldn’t have heard. Nonetheless, he did elaborate.

“After much consideration, the judges have decided that Nemona’s use of the Tera Orb broke tournament rules, and therefore-”

“Wait a moment!” I shouted, finding my voice again, and stepping forward. All eyes turned back to me and I could feel their stares weighing me down. “I didn’t break the rules, there was nothing against Enhancement Effects being used here, only Battle Items, but Tera Orbs were ruled as an Enhancement Effect.”

“I- uhhh…” Larry looked at a loss, glancing between me and the head judge, who stepped up and grabbed Larry’s microphone. The head judge was a tall man with long white hair and a thin mustache.

“Some places may have ruled it as such.” There was a quick glance back to one of the other judges, the familiar-looking woman who oversaw my quarterfinal match. It was easily overlooked, but it was clear there was some dissent at the judge’s table. “Tera Orbs were not listed as such in our rules.” At the end of the day though, he had the final say.

He continued. “As such, your act of throwing it onto the field counts as interference by the Trainer, thus costing you the match. Given your age and inexperience as well as, ahem, difficulties in rule interpretations, we will not be placing this on your record. It has no bearing on your ability to compete in future Junior Tournaments. In light of the error in this breach not being called immediately, we will be giving both you and Miss Delcroft the reward prize fitting for third place.”

The Pawmo’s trainer perked up, seeming pleased with that. The rest of the audience generally nodded along as if this was reasonable. As if this was in any way shape or form right. I shook in place with barely constrained rage, but they didn’t notice, already moving on.

Larry took the microphone back from the dry head judge. “Thank you Mr. Rovali. This was a tricky situation, but don’t fret for what it means for the finals. Luckily, young Freddrick van Grough is ready and able to compete, despite the injuries Corviknight took.”

The smug boy stepped forward, snatching the microphone out of the announcer’s hands.

“Corviknight can’t be put down by some worm.” But she was! Dun beat your Pokemon into the ground!! I wanted to scream.

“Thank you for that,” Larry said, taking the microphone back. His words were much less sincere this time, especially since the mic caught him muttering “What is with everyone grabbing my mic?” Then he cleared his throat. “Ahem, with that little issue out of the way, who’s ready for the finals?”

It took maybe a second longer than usual, but the audience was soon cheering again. Like nothing had ever happened. Like all of our sweat and tears up to this point didn’t matter. Like Dun, struggling to prove himself to the world meant nothing.

Amidst the din of chatter and cheers, I heard Freddrick’s voice, whispering to the head judge as they walked away from the center. “Thanks for helping me out Uncle, I owe you one.”

“Yes well, don’t try to make a habit out of it. Geeta was quite obstinate…” The older man whispered back.

Seeing red, my body started moving forward. Visions of me grabbing Freddrick and punching his smug, dumb face danced in my head. Taking him down and just wailing on him, fists and elbows until I broke his- “Nemona, stop!”

Tulip’s panicked words snapped me back to the moment and reminded me where I was. Halfway across the battle court, making a beeline for Freddrick. The crowd was whispering, wondering what I was doing. My friends looked confused, all except for Tulip, who looked worried for some reason. Then it clicked for me, remembering she could sense my emotions. Could See all the rage and anger I was feeling and likely guessed what I was about to do.

Like a glass of cold water splashed in my face, I brought myself back under control. My emotions were boiling under the surface but the shock was enough that I could wrestle them back under control. Turning, I started walking away before Freddrick taunted me. “Gonna run off and cry, little girl?”

Blinking, I realized tears were welling up in my eyes. The temptation was there to turn back around and lay into him. Verbally, physically, whatever. But it wouldn’t be right, it won’t help things. With great effort, I kept on walking, off the battlefield and through the crowd.

Picking up speed, I ran until I made my way off the main plaza. Behind me, I could hear the others calling for me but couldn’t bring myself to go back. Everything that happened was so embarrassing, and then I made an even bigger fool of myself, what would they think of me? So I ran. Of course, that’s the problem with running - there’s always an ending.

My ending was a bench on a side street nearby, as I was caught between having nowhere else to go but not ready to go back. There were few people here at this time of night, and those that did pass by either didn’t notice a small girl silently crying on a bench or didn’t make it their business.

A minute or two passed until a tall shadow loomed over me. Looking up (and up and up) I saw the referee from before looking down from me atop her Espathra. “You gave us quite a scare there.”

“Any other admonishments you want to throw my way?” I spat out bitterly. Some distant part of my mind recognized that was uncalled for. The rest was angry and sad. The fact that she paused at that didn’t help matters. “Oh wow, you really do.”

“I… would advise caution in your future matches. Personally, I felt you pushed your Dunsparce too close to the line.”

“What the hell do you know?” She raised an eyebrow at my vitriolic words. Wow, tell a referee she knows nothing about her job, great job me. I should try to shove in the other foot next. “It’s fine. I… I pushed him hard, but he’ll be fine. He needed this.” Or at least I thought he did.

She gave a tilt of her head, partially conceding the point. “Perhaps.” She got off her Pokemon and we were both quiet for a moment.

I was always bad with awkward silences and this one being interrupted by my sniffling didn’t help, so I broke first, asking her: “Why are you here? Don’t you have a tournament to preside over?”

“My fellows don’t seem to care for my opinions.” The bitter words slipped out of her mouth, seeming to surprise even her. “Apologies, I meant to say that I was sent to look out for you. We care about the well-being of every participant in our tournament. I’ve also been authorized to give you your reward for achieving third place.” Her Rotom Phone floated out and my Rotom did the same, a small buzz from each as the transfer was received.

“Yay,” I said, lifelessly. Rotom gave me a concerned look but decided not to say anything with the referee around and floated back into my pocket.

“You did quite well, you know.” She tried to encourage me. “Getting third place in your first tournament is quite an achievement, especially at your age. 50,000 League Points is nothing to sneeze at either-”

“I don’t care about that! It- It doesn’t matter how far we made it. If Dun had been taken out by that Sky Attack, if it had been a bit faster than him, though really it was already so fast, that Corviknight was sooo strong, but it didn’t and he wasn’t and he won and if it was fair he should be the winner still and- and-” I was babbling and breaking down. “And then Freddrick just goes up to his uncle, the head judge, and gets me kicked out-”

“Wait, what?”

“Freddrick, that jerk was thanking the judge after his speech.”

“I… didn’t hear that.” She admitted and I looked at her oddly. You were so much closer to him than me though! But… how did I hear that from so far away? I didn’t imagine it, did I? Before anything more could be said on that we both heard Leah exclaim as she saw us, running down the street towards us. “Ah, it appears your caretaker is here. I’ll leave you in her care, but I hope you aren’t disheartened by this experience. You have much potential.” I nodded fiercely, blinking out the last of the tears out of my eyes. This may have ended on a sour note, but I’m still going to be Champion someday. Nothing is going to stop that. She added, “Rest assured that I will be looking into this match. There were a few discrepancies that need to be investigated.”

“Good evening,” she said as a farewell to Leah and me, while the maid wrapped me up in a near bone-crushing hug.

“Oh you’re alright, thank goodness. Do you know how worried we were? What were you thinking, running off like that?! It’s going to be ok, you did fine…” She alternated between berating me and trying to console me. She’s as frazzled as I am.

“Can we go home?” I asked tiredly. I knew I’d be chewed out for running off (and rightfully so), but I couldn’t deal with that at the moment.

“... That’s fine, Young Miss. We’ll need to find the others first, they’re looking all over Mesagoza for you.” I whipped out Rotom and began sending out texts to all of them, letting Dendra, Tulip, and Arven know I was fine but heading home and telling Cyan where I was. “Oh, so now you can use your phone?”

“Bzzt, apologies ma’am,” Rotom offered. “It appears I was still in ‘Do not disturb’ mode and missed your prior calls.” Leah calmed down, accepting the excuse. I wasn’t sure that they were being truthful about missing the messages, but I understood that they were just trying to give me a minute to calm down, which had actually helped

Very quickly I saw a familiar Charizard flying over, Friede and Cyan on his back. They landed and Cyan jumped off, running over to hug me. Leah went up to the young Professor and thanked him. I picked myself off the bench to do the same, my sister holding onto my hand.

“Thank you, Friede. You helped me out a lot today and I deeply appreciate it. Sorry tha-” he cut me off raising his hand.

“It’s no problem, honest. It was good to get out of the lab, and I learned a lot today. You’re quite the insightful young girl.” I couldn’t resist a small dismissive huff at that. I’m really not. He wrote out his number and exchanged it with me. “If you ever need a hand or want to ask about anything Pokemon-related.”

“You might be the one needing my expertise,” I said, sticking my tongue out. My puffy red eyes probably took away from the friendly teasing and just made me look sad, but Friede laughed easily.

“I might just take you up on that. Have a good night.” Waving us goodbye, he flew off and we went and hailed a flying cab.

Leah told the cabbie to go fast, and they did, rocketing us home so fast I had to double check

we didn’t have a mega-Latios flying us (we did not). When we got there, the house was quiet, with most of the staff on sight sleeping for the night. Hamber greeted us, letting us know that my parents were still out and I just mutely nodded, marching up to my bedroom.

Here, Dunsparce popped out of his ball, wondering what was going on. “Dun dun, ar?”

“Hey there. Sorry, but it looks like we won’t be in the finals. We uh, got kicked out.”

“Unn! Arce dun?!”

“They said Terastalization was against the rules- I know, I know! We checked it should have been ok- but… Freddrick was able to get the judge to rule his way, so we’re out.”

“Dunspar! DUUUUN!” He squirmed around angrily, crashing about the room, and knocking over the chair to my desk. I winced but a part of me wanted to do the same. I think he’s more likely to hurt the room than himself, but I should still stop him.

Scooping him up into my arms his tail-drill whirred angrily, but I gave him a look of warning and he calmed down enough for me to climb into bed. There was still rage radiating off of him, but he made no other moves in my arms and I just lay there in my bed as I slowly drifted into unconsciousness.