Akira's Story

Time before the preliminaries

Akira woke early the next morning and realized that she hadn’t practiced her martial arts since meeting up with Will. Remembering what her sensei said about practicing where possible the eighteen year old dressed, grabbed her bag and headed out the door of her hotel room. She stopped half way down the corridor Akira realized that she hadn’t left a note for her friend (who had yet to appear from his room) and set out to find paper and pen to write and tell him of her plans for the morning. Once she had written the note, the girl taped it to her friends’ door before leaving the hotel. After she left the hotel Akira headed to a clearing which she had noticed on their way into White Forest. Once she reached the clearing Akira removed her coat, arm warmers, bag and shoes, she placed the items in a nearby tree. She then called each of the poke’mon on her belt and explained what was going on. The poke’mon nodded in understanding and scattered themselves around the field. Flit and Slicer opted to sit in the same tree as Akira’s bag, arm warmers and jacket, Ginny sat underneath a tree opposite to the pair. Indy chose to sit in the shadow of a tree near the entrance to the clearing out of the sun light, Spirit stationed himself across from the dark type poke’mon on the other side of the entrance. Badboy moved to the centre of the clearing with his trainer and took up a fighting stance at the same time as his partner.

“Ready?” Spirit called “Go!”

With Will…

Will had woken a couple hours later than Akira and had taken his time leaving his room. When he left his room, he found Akira’s note and was slightly confused at the meaning of the message.

“Practice what?” he muttered under his breath as he moved down the corridor.

‘Why not go find out?’

‘I will, after breakfast,’ he replied as he headed towards the dining area.

Twenty minutes later Will was heading towards the entrance of White forest, intent on finding his elusive friend. He walked down the path and found the mentioned clearing, as he walked through the trees he heard a shout come from ahead of him. Upon hearing this he rushed forward and entered the clearing to find Akira pinned to the ground by Badboy.

“Hey what are you doing,” Will shouted entering the clearing.

Badboy looked up and released Akira, who jumped to her feet as if nothing had happened.

“What is going on?” Will demanded.

“Practice, I didn’t think you’d come out here though…”

“I’m not going to let you wander around alone.”

“I should have thought of that… sorry if you were worried,” Akira apologised before turning to face Badboy “take a seat we should be done by lunch.”

“Take a seat?”

“Yeah in a tree,” Spirit replied, causing Will to turn and face the ghost poke’mon.

“I don’t climb trees.”

“Well sit under one then,” Spirit retorted.

Will and Scorch sighed in unison before taking a seat under one of the nearest trees. The pair sat under the tree and watched the pair spar in the centre of the area, wincing every time Akira was pinned to the floor by the Blaziken.

‘Practice for who?’ he thought watching as she was pinned to the floor once more in a different hold.

‘For her,’ Spirit replied.

‘How is being pinned to the floor practice?’ he retorted mentally.

‘Why not ask her.’

The older trainer sighed and stood from where he was sitting. He dusted his clothes off and walked towards the sparring pair, he stopped a metre away and cleared his throat. The pair stopped and Akira turned to face Will.

“Something wrong?”

“I was wondering how this is practice when you’re the only one that gets pinned to the floor.”

“I learn from experience.”

“How does that work?”

“It just does.”

“That doesn’t make sense.”

“It makes plenty of sense,” Akira shrugged.

“To you.”

“No to us,” she corrected gesturing to herself and her poke’mon, who nodded in agreement with her statement.

“You’re all crazy,” he muttered, crossing his arms in front of his chest.

“Would you like me to demonstrate?”

“Please do.”

“Alright then, attack me.”

“What?”

“Throw a punch,” Akira demanded.

“But…”

“Just do it already,” Spirit called lazily.

Will sighed and threw his fist towards a seemingly unprepared Akira. A few seconds later Will found himself pinned to the floor in the exact same way, Akira had been pinned by Badboy once she had held him for a few seconds Akira allowed Will to stand. Will slowly got up off of the ground and rolled his shoulders.

“Do you see now?”

“I guess so.”

“Well now that that’s done, why don’t we go and get some lunch?” Akira suggested heading towards her hanging items.

Once she had re-dressed Akira recalled all of her poke’mon and walked with Will and Scorch back into White Forest to have lunch.

“I’ve been thinking Will,” Akira started.

“Yes Akira?”

“Maybe we should split up when we want to train.”

“So when it comes down to us fighting we don’t know what the other’s strategy is?”

“Yeah something along those lines,” Akira nodded.

“Alright…but we should still meet up for lunch at least.”

“I have no problems with that.”

After lunch the pair split up and went to different places for last minute training.

Over the days leading up to the preliminaries Will and Akira only saw each other for lunch and in passing. Four days of training later the pair found themselves lined up with all the other trainers in the main stadium to receive their instructions and official induction into the league.