Two days after Ran’s team finally starts working with his friends’ teams, rather than alongside them, at twenty past three in the afternoon on a perfectly pleasant day, he walks into the Olivine City Gym. Josie, Doro and Grady trail only a few steps behind him, conversing calmly amongst themselves and leaving Ran to his thoughts. It’s a gesture he rather appreciates as, despite how confident and comfortable he’s been of late thanks to his streak of victories against all of the Gym Leaders he’s faced so far, he’s still become rather nervous over the past few hours, now that the time for his match against Jasmine has actually arrived. With his team fully rested and on his belt however, the time for hesitation or doubt has passed, as he marches through the Gym’s lobby and towards the challengers’ waiting area, whilst his friends head towards the stands.

  The large hangar which houses Olivine City’s Gym is very different from the other Gyms he’s been inside of thus far, a trend that continues with the waiting area. No efforts have been made to provide challengers an opportunity to relax, meditate or otherwise prepare for the match. Instead, the narrow hallway he finds himself in is spartan in the extreme. Only some five feet wide, there’s a low, hard bench running along the wall on both sides of the hallway, simple steel doors leading back towards the lobby and, presumably, towards the arena. Above the door to the arena, there’s a pair of lights, one red and the other green. The red one is currently lit, making it quite clear just what the signal for the next challenger to head to the arena is. Other than the pair of lights however, there’s no decorations, with four simple sheet metal walls making up the rest of the austere, industrial space.

  The only distraction is the waiting trainer sitting on the bench to Ran’s right, who likely has the match slot right before Ran’s booked. It’s actually an older trainer, someone Ran would guess to be in his mid-twenties, but judging from his heavy and irregular breathing, he’s not exactly the most experienced trainer. Something which is further supported by the meager two pokéballs on his belt. As Ran examines the guy, from his already withdrawing hairline, to his pale face and suspiciously new and clean walking shoes, the trainer looks at him as well.

  Not particularly feeling any real need to talk, Ran merely offers a polite nod, before wandering taking the few short steps to the unoccupied bench. That’s apparently enough of an invitation for the other trainer to start a conversation however, as his shaky voice breaks the silence.

  “Hi! I’m Greg,” he introduces himself, one clammy hand raised in greeting, “I’m challenging for my first badge in a few minutes. How about you?”

  “I’m Ran,” Ran replies calmly, though he doesn’t address the awkward raised hand, “I’m challenging for my fifth badge in about fifteen minutes, so I figure I’m next after you.”

  Greg lets out a low, impressed whistle, “Fifth, huh? Wow. You must be very good then! Any advice for a rookie like me?”

  “I’m in my rookie year myself, actually.” Ran replies honestly, somewhat surprised by Greg’s seeming assumption that he isn’t.

  “Really?” Greg gapes, gaze dropping to the five balls on Ran’s belt, before goggling even further as he seems to put the two things he knows about Ran so far together, “And you’re challenging for your fifth badge already?!”

  “Well, yeah,” Ran confirms, inevitably drawn into the conversation as Greg’s awe in turn draws his interest, “I’ve got the Zephyr, Hive, Plain and Storm Badges, so this’ll be my fifth. Is this your first try at getting your first badge?”

  “It is,” Greg admits, before wincing, “Or well, technically it isn’t. I challenged this Gym once before, back when I was fifteen, when I thought I’d make it as an unsponsored trainer, but I got beaten badly and then my parents demanded I go back to school and get my degree.”

  “And now you’re giving it another go?” Ran hazards an educated guess, earning a wan smile from Greg.

  “Yeah,” he agrees, “My girlfriend was talking about making a ‘serious commitment’ and my boss was looking at me to train the new hire and all of a sudden I realized that it was now or never, you know? I’ve got to know if there’s any chance for me to do the circuit, otherwise sooner or later I’ll be this old man who never chased the dream, you know?”

  “Not really,” Ran shrugs apologetically, “I’m fifteen.”

  “Heh, right, right…” Greg chuckles awkwardly, their conversation ending on that note as he falls silent and stares at the ground between his feet. Ran looks at the older guy for a few long seconds, before leaning back and closing his eyes.

  Battling Jasmine won’t be easy, considering the defensive advantage the steel-typing gives her and her team, but he’s got a plan. With his eyes closed, it’s easier to picture how things will play out.

  He’ll start with Golbat. With his usual plan of poisoning his opponents unavailable, Golbat’s mobility, paired with his access to Supersonic, Screech and Bite, should make for a flexible starter to begin their battle. Of course Croagunk has the obvious typing-advantage, but if Jasmine were to start out with a Skarmory, that could be disastrous. Because then he’ll only have Caesar’s Fire Fang left as a surefire way to land super-effective damage. There’s Dig of course, but none of his team has fully mastered the move yet, even if they all made a lot of progress over the past few days, under Dynamo’s tutelage.

  After Golbat, things become a lot murkier to predict of course, his choice not to scout Jasmine’s Gym and battling style now coming back to bite him in the ass. Then again, no plan survives contact with the enemy anyways. He’s got a good opener in mind, which should be enough to give him an early advantage in the match. From there, Croagunk and Caesar’s super-effective moves should be able to win them the match. Aria or Skorupi might not even be needed.

  As Ran ponders his upcoming match, his thoughts are briefly disrupted by a sharp buzzing sound. Opening his eyes, he notices that the red light has turned off, the green one having turned on instead. Glancing to Greg, Ran feels a bit of pity at the sight of the other trainer’s suddenly rather green face, which is only further emphasized by the light over the door.

  Greg doesn’t move, seemingly frozen in place as he stares at the bright green light. After a few long seconds, Ran finally speaks up, offering some words of encouragement, “Just go with your gut and you’ll be fine.”

  The twenty-something rookie is jarred out of his stunned state by Ran’s words, blinking rapidly as he turns to meet his eyes for a moment. Then he swallows, nods firmly and finally stands up.

  “Right! Right,” He states, more to himself than to Ran, “Now or never. Thanks, Ran.”

  “Good luck.” Ran encourages the other trainer, watching as Greg strides to the door, throws it open with exaggerated bravado and strides out of sight.

  The door closes with a metallic clang, leaving Ran alone. It’s then that he finally realizes just how quiet the waiting area is. Despite how basic and austere the Gym appears at first glance, there’s clearly been a real effort made to invest in soundproofing at the very least. Which, under the circumstances, isn’t actually all that helpful, as it leaves him without any distractions whatsoever.

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  Or it would, if the door leading to the lobby wasn’t opened at that exact moment. Ran turns in his seat to look at the entrance, to see just who is about to join him. Unsurprisingly, he doesn’t recognize the young girl that enters. A single glance is enough to pin her as solidly younger than him and, as a direct consequence of that, sponsored. She, in turn, seems to pigeonhole Ran at a single glance as well, her pigtails dramatically flopping about as her expression pinches together and she lifts her nose up disdainfully at the sight of him.

  Clearly, she doesn’t feel any need to break the silence and Ran isn’t looking to try and be friendly to a cocky twelve or thirteen year old, so he simply breathes out, leans his head back and closes his eyes once more. It’s hardly the most entertaining way to pass the time, but there’s worse things he could be stuck doing. He could be sharing the waiting room with someone openly antagonistic, rather than merely disdainful, for example.

  The wait actually feels longer than ten minutes, some of Greg’s anxiety clearly infectious, as Ran twice has to stop himself from tapping his foot, a sign of nerves he catches himself indulging in. Eventually however, with another loud buzz, the lights switch from red to green once more, leaving him free to get up, offer a polite nod to the girl, which is ignored, and then head out the door.

  He finds himself at the foot of a narrow metal stair, which he dutifully climbs. At the top, there’s another door, set to the left of the stairs. Opening it, he steps through onto an elevated metal catwalk, as he looks out over an impressive arena.

  It feels almost as if he shouldn’t be overlooking an earthen battlefield, but rather some kind of massive steel craft, like a submarine or a plane, with the way the catwalk he find himself upon allows him to overlook the ground floor below. Opposite Ran’s own position, on a similar catwalk at the other end of the arena, Jasmine stands calmly, observing him as he takes in his surroundings.

  To either side of the massive hangar, similar catwalks to the ones Ran and Jasmine are on have been constructed. However, these are wider, and where Ran and Jasmine have their catwalks to themselves, these wider catwalks to either side of the field have been transformed into massive tiered stands, which are filled with eager spectators. It only takes Ran a few moments to catch sight of his friends, who sit clustered together on the third row, about halfway between the end of the stands closest to him, and the middle of the stands.

  There is nothing of the quiet focus and almost sacred privacy that Cianwood Gym’s arena bestowed upon all those that entered it. Instead, each step Ran takes has the metal under his feet clatter loudly yet coldly, the sheer scale of the arena and the distance between the trainers and the field their pokémon are to battle on giving the entire proceeding a clinical, industrial feel. As he glances about the space once more, he notices the seeming absence of a referee.

  Only as he glances down towards the field, he notes that there is actually a lone person down there, a Mr. Mime on either side of him. It’s an older man, wearing a white shirt without the usual black stripes over black dress pants and, somewhat surprisingly, a red bow tie. Over the hubbub of the crowd and the clattering of the metal catwalks and stands, Ran wonders for a moment how the referee will manage to draw attention to him, especially considering his position down below on the ground, making his task to be heard by the people up above even harder.

  Ran’s worries soon prove to be ill-founded however, as the man draws a single breath before speaking in a voice that fits the twin descriptors of passionate and booming to a t.

  “GYM LEADER JASMINE HAS BEEN CHALLENGED AND SHE HAS ACCEPTED THE CHALLENGE!” He thunders, immediately, earning everyone’s stunned attention, his strong voice easily carrying throughout the cavernous hangar and reverberating back off of the steel walls to add further impact to his words, “I officially declare this a four on four singles match at the fifth badge level, between challenger Ran Carr and Gym leader Jasmine! Each trainer is allowed three free switches, after which any additional withdrawals of battling pokémon will be permanent! Held items are allowed! Trainers, choose your first pokémon, you will release them on my signal!”

  Ran idly notes that the referee doesn’t even check to see if the rules are clear with both of them, but then he is challenging for his fifth badge at this point, so perhaps by now the referee (rightfully) assumes that he knows what he’s doing. He grips Golbat’s pokéball, weighing it in his hand for a moment as he awaits the referee’s call to send out his first chosen team member.

  On the other side of the hangar, so far away from him that Ran has a hard time making out any major details about her, Jasmine selects a pokéball of her own, passively holding it by her side as she stands stoically. It’s already going to be hard enough to get a read of his opponent, considering the arena’s sheer scale, if Jasmine remains as impassive throughout their battle as she appears so far, Ran will have a hard time getting much of a read on her.

  “Pokémon trainers ready? Pokémon, battle!” The referee announces energetically, causing Ran and Jasmine to throw out their pokéballs simultaneously.

  Both balls fall down to towards the ground, easily twenty feet below them, opening just a few feet above the ground to release their respective occupants, before rebounding upwards and back to each trainers’ hands through the peculiar recoil physics that each pokéball seems to obey. On Ran’s side of the field, Golbat arrives with a confident cry, the high ceiling stoking his already significant self-confidence even further, as he starts to take wing immediately.

  However, on Jasmine’s side of the field, a small and unremarkable Magnemite appears.

  Ran’s reaction to the sight of the electric-steel-type, probably the only option Jasmine has available to her which he absolutely didn’t want to put Golbat up against, is concise and to the point, consisting of a single annoyed word.

  “Shit.”

  At least the distances involved ensure that nobody hears him give voice to his annoyance, which is a small mercy. But as he looks at the Magnemite hovering on the other side of the field, with the completely neutral Jasmine observing silently from her own platform, and as he catches on to the amused murmurs that reach him from the stands, any thought of immediately switching Golbat out is forgotten.

  It’s not an ideal match-up. Golbat and he don’t have fond memories of electric-type attacks and the Magnemite-line is known to be capable of some rather powerful ranged electric attacks. But on the other hand it’s just a Magnemite. An unevolved pokémon known for its lack of speed and, especially for being a steel-type, its frailty. Perhaps it has the advantage of being able to land super-effective hits, but even with that, the power discrepancy between both pokémon should be large enough for them to overcome Jasmine’s first battler without too much trouble.

  Rather than overanalyze and risk giving Jasmine the initiative, something he’s already provided her too much of an opportunity for, given that their match has started and that he hasn’t acted yet, Ran opens his mouth to speak. It’s at that moment that he notices the way Magnemite’s magnets have been tilting forwards without any visible or audible instruction from Jasmine, before finally locking on to Golbat’s form.

  His eyes widen in surprise as he realizes that, without a single command given, Magnemite immediately executed a Lock-On upon appearing on the field, a move it clearly just completed, without Ran doing anything to stop it.

  “Supersonic!” He hurriedly shouts out to Golbat, trusting in the experienced Bat Pokémon to outspeed Magnemite and salvage the truly bungled start to the match.

  Jasmine’s order, given simultaneously, is softly spoken and yet somehow it carries across the hangar in a way that ensures that everyone hears it, as if she’s standing on the stage of a theater and projecting her voice so that all are sure to hear it.

  “Zap Cannon.”

  Golbat’s maw falls open, a painfully high-pitched scream tearing out of him for just a moment before the pitch rises far out of human hearing range. For all that Magnemite doesn’t have any visible ears as far as Ran can tell, it noticeably wobbles in its levitation for a moment, even as the poles of its horseshoe magnets glow and spark with ominous amounts of electricity.

  There’s a moment where he dares to hope that it will lose control of the building energy and hurt itself as a result of the Supersonic-caused confusion. But those hopes prove to be in vain. In mere seconds, the crackling sparks coalesce into an ominously lightning blue ball of energy which hovers just in front of the tips of Magnemite’s magnets. Before Ran can give another order and before Golbat can even think of dodging, there’s a blinding flash of light and an ominous ZAP.

  Ran has to blink the stars out of his eyes, but when he regains his sight and catches sight of the arena below once more, he regrets no longer being blinded.

  Golbat is down and out, his clearly unconscious form resting flat on his back on the arena floor, smoldering wisps of smoke rising off of his form from where the Zap Cannon made contact. On the other side of the field, Magnemite’s magnets glow red with residual heat, returning to their natural position as it levitates unsteadily on Jasmine’s side of the field.

  “GOLBAT IS UNABLE TO BATTLE! CHALLENGER, SELECT YOUR NEXT BATTLER!” The referee calls loudly, gesturing energetically in Ran’s direction with a knife hand.