Pokemon-The Lost Master

Chapter 18

As the orange beam fired at Golduck Misty called out another command and Golduck dived out-of-the-way. From the smoke generated by the attack, Golduck fired his own Hyper Beam straight back out, crashing into Ursaring and sending the Hibernator Pokémon flying. Grinning, Golduck stepped out of the smoke, his arms crossed, whilst the smoke at the other end of the battlefield was still obscuring the form of Urasaring. As it cleared, it showed Ursaring lying on his back, out cold. Misty recalled Golduck, a grin on her face, before waving to the crowd on her way off the battlefield. At the other end of the field, Joseph recalled his downed Ursaring, before looking thoughtfully after Misty.

"Well done Mel" Sam said, the two young trainers walking through the village near the Silver Conference. "That was a good battle."

Mellanie just looked at her friend. "Yes Sam. He was rubbish, you know that. Totodile was fuming at the end, he expected a better battle."

Sam stopped and looked at his friend, her defiant gaze meeting his eye. They held this position for a long moment, before collapsing with laughter, Mellanie falling into Sam whose arms caught her instinctively. People around them looked at them amused; it was a common sight to see young trainers enjoying themselves at these tournaments. What most people didn't realize was how these two trainers would most likely soon be all over the news. Mellanie had utterly destroyed her opponent in her opening match. Both knew that the early rounds were where the weaker trainers were weeded out, but Mellanie's match had been one of the most one-sided yet. How her opponent had managed to get eight badges, she wasn't quite sure. Totodile hadn't needed an instruction from Mellanie as he ran the Furret that he had been up against ragged, the poor Normal-Type having been unable to even get close to Totodile.

The two of them started to stroll through the town once again. Having both had one battle, and both having won their battle comfortably they were pleased with the start to the tournament for them. They were both on course to progress through the preliminary rounds, with the happy assumption that if they won all three of their preliminaries they would be certain to qualify. As they turned a corner, they saw a Pokémon Center with a screen on the outside. Walking up to it, they saw that their match-ups for the following day had appeared. Sam was matched up against a trainer that had never competed in a major tournament before whilst Mellanie was up against a trainer that had only made it out of the preliminaries once. Noting down what time their matches were, they turned and walked away again, heading towards their accommodation whilst chatting about the various battles that they had seen.

As they reached the cottage that they were sharing with the rest of the group, they found Delia Ketchum in the kitchen cooking. When the youngsters walked in, she smiled and hurried over to them, making a fuss. Within minutes the two young trainers were sat at a table with plates of food in front of them, not sure how they had managed to end up there.

"So how did your battles go?" Delia asked, sitting across the table from Sam and Mellanie.

"We won." Mellanie said, whilst Sam started eating. "My opponent was inexperienced; this was his first Johto League, and he struggled." Delia nodded, before turning to Sam.

"How was your match Sam?"

"Fine" said the boy. "He wasn't particularly skilled, Quilava didn't have too many problems."

As the two youngsters ate, a comfortable silence stretched out. Delia watched them a small smile on her face. She was happy to be looking after the two of them, it reminded her of when she used to look after her son. Being at this tournament was hard for her, it brought back painful memories. She remembered watching Ash compete at the same place, against his rival Gary, remembered watching her son triumph with his novel strategy, and remembered the happiness on his face. Even now, years later, she remembered everything about her son. She was just waiting for him to come home.