Ahmad Iravani was three weeks away from turning eleven years old. That was the same age Champion Ash Ketchum began his journey. It was also the same year that Champion Cynthia Shirona started hers.
Yet Ahmad's Mom wouldn't let him leave the safe embrace of Altomare until he was at least sixteen. It was unfair. Not only that, it was painfully unfair.
Sure, he had read that Ash Ketchum hadn't actually been approved to leave. Ahmad had read his book, From Dirt to Brass, at least a dozen times. His father had been killed by some terrorist group, so he had stolen three pokemon from Pallet Labs using a feral Pikachu and had left in search of revenge. Cynthia had a different background. The Shirona family held lots of prestige in Sinnoh. She had bonded with her starter, a Gible by the name of Boron, at the age of four years old.
Ahmad couldn't even pronounce four syllable words at that age, and Cynthia was given a freaking dragon?! This stupid world was so unfair. But it did have its small mercies.
Today's New Year Celebration was something Ahmad had been looking forward to for the last three months. With most regional tournaments being held in late spring and early fall, it had been quite a few weeks since he had seen any real action.
Kalos' shock and awe Iron Man contest wasn't terrible. It had been fun watching elite trainers compete along the air, ground, and water. He remembered how one of the grass specialists set up traps using frenzy plant, trapping dozens of other racers in the thick mud. Another trainer knocked out handfuls of trainers in the air with electrowebs the size of fishing nets they use to catch Dondozo in Paldea. But compared to the Indigo Plateau or Evergrande conference, it just couldn't hold a candle. Ahmad's personal favorite was Starfall's Gulag Tournament. It only took place every five years. It was rumored to be the most brutal fighting tournament to exist in any format anywhere. Ahmad had only seen some shaky clips that people had personally taken from the viewing stadium. No online footage was available to the public, but the last tournament had Champions and internationally wanted felons competing. Since they used the simulation format, they hosted the only tournament where criminals could compete. It wouldn't happen again for two years, but that was just another one of the dozens of reasons Ahmad wanted to start his journey early. All he had to do was have enough money to bribe a mule, or have a competent enough psychic pokemon of his own. Two years. Then he could try and go watch it. But those thoughts were for later.
Ahmad whistled, trying to get the attention of Skipper. The playful dragon usually liked to hang around near the Violet Gardens. Many other of his kind did too, but only Skipper paid Ahmad any sort of attention.
There!
A bush in front of Ahmad seemed to warp as a figure appeared in front of him. An angular head with sapphire scales and white tuft smiled at Ahmad, its sharp red eyes bouncing around as it watched every brush of movement of every leaf swaying in the wind.
"Skipper! And here I was wondering if you had finally moved on to become a warrior." Ahmad laughed, grateful his Latios friend hadn't abandoned him.
Skipper lifted his head and let out some playful chirps in response. They sounded like bubbles popping, yet at the speed of a frog's croak.
"That's what I thought. Want to see if we can beat our record?" Ahmad asked, pulling out his speedometer.
Their record was 157 miles an hour. They had to make sure not to alert any of the other Latios and Latias, as well as any of the patrolling Rangers.
Ahmad tied his scarf around Skipper's head and then wrapped it around his hand multiple times. The scarf is one that they had specifically made for the Altomare rangers. Sometimes the brave ones would try and get one of the warrior class Latios and Latias to notice them. To be a rider of a legendary pokemon was usually a title reserved for Champions. But here in Altomare, the only city in the world with commonplace Legendaries, there were almost a dozen.
The mingling Latios and Latias who helped bump tourism by giving out friendly rides didn't count. Skipper was a bit of a special case, being the outcast that he is, but maybe one day he and Ahmad could number as one of Altomare's elite fighting force.
Skipper lifted off, silent as a sparrow, flying smoothly along the watery canals. Ahmad laughed in delight, brushing his hand along the wavy currents.
Tickets for the New Year's Celebration had been steep. In fact, even if Ahmad had saved up his allowance from the last two years combined, he still wouldn't have been able to afford seats in the nosebleeds.
Luckily, Skipper also wanted to see the celebration. And he could change the pigment of his scales at will. Extra psychic voodoo let him naturally feel the environment around him, and his draconic mathematical calculation let him subconsciously chart the vectors so his camouflage matched the environment around him. Or at least that's how Skipper had explained things to Ahmad.
All it meant that people looking from the stadium below would be looking at Skipper's underbelly, which he would change from sapphire and white to whatever the clouds looked like above. They might see Ahmad's floating feet though.
Ahmad wasn't sure why anybody would be looking up at the clouds instead of the celebration though, so he was probably in the clear. The biggest danger would be any patrolling Rangers. There were always patrols at any big event. Luckily, most patrols were now entirely psychic. Only a few actual patrollers would be there. And since Latios and Latias signatures were impossible to fake, and they were allowed basically anywhere they damn pleased, the psychics who noticed Skipper wouldn't alert any authorities.
And Skipper was talented enough in his psychic ability to hide Ahmad's aura signature within his own. Legendary psychic dragons were powerful, even when they were as young as Skipper.
Ahmad held on tight as Skipper picked up speed, space itself seeming to bend as the world blurred by. The stadium was all the way across the city, yet they were there nearly in an instant. Skipper circled around, slowly making his way down from the clouds.
"Damn! Almost! One hundred fifty four. I'm sure if we went outside the city limit we could definitely do it!"
Skipper clicked and shook his scales in response, causing Ahmad to laugh. "Yeah whatever. Maybe one day we can ignore all the rules our stupid parents give us."
The white fur along Skipper's back shook as the young dragon laughed. If only his mother weren't so scary. High priestess Latias were quite powerful. While warrior class Latios and Latias focused on their speed and durability, others like Skipper's mother could wield the more esoteric psychic and draconic powers, manipulating energy and matter from afar.
Ahmad and Skipper could feel the life in the stadium from a mile away. The stamping and clapping of hundreds of thousands of people was loud, but there was more. The energy of so many people laughing and enjoying themselves was almost overwhelming. The more people there were, the more that energy resonated and grew. Mob mentality scared Ahmad, but when it was a light and happy energy like this he could soak in it all day.
An outcropping above the announcers box caught Ahmad's eye. It would have a great view, and the metal framing would hide them well in case of any patrols. Ahmad tapped Skipper's side. "Right there, above those rafters."
After getting settled in, the sounds of the stadium finally started making sense.
Interim Champion Wallace, replacing the supposedly busy Steven Stone, was swimming through the air like a Finizen. His legs were dolphin kicking, gliding along the wind with only a couple inches of water surrounding him, his white sailor outfit and red scarf floating elegantly whenever he slowed down to change direction.
A Floatzel followed him, spinning around in a spiral of water.
Behind them, a Slowking raised its hands, bringing forth a surge of water. The water rose like a swimming pool with no walls, a solid block of water with sharp corners. Then, frost rose from the edges of the water, and the Slowking thrust its hands down, freezing the entire building-sized block of water in an instant.
Wallace and Floatzel turned back in the air, diving straight into the block of ice. The sharp water surrounding them seemed to slice through the ice as if it were soft cheese. The two figures seemed to dance within the block of ice, mirroring each other from across the pool of ice.
Their movements seemed random, but the crowd picked up in excitement as the ice began chipping away. Entire sections were cut off as the master sculptors got to work, using themselves as scalpels for the world's biggest ice sculpture.
Features began to emerge as more ice was carved away. A powerful blade protruded out. Sharp ridges rose as ice fell away, frosty smoke rolling off in the warm sun.
As the sculpture came closer to completion, a whistling sound was getting closer. Ahmad could only hear it because of how high he was, but soon enough others began to hear it too. Not that Ahmad really cared to see what it was. This was Altomare. There were Latios and Latias flying at hypersonic speeds every day. Warrior class Lati's had to hit mach 1 as a prerequisite to start training. That being said, this was far closer to the ground level than Ahmad would think was safe. Flying at hypersonic levels required a certain altitude in order not to shatter windows and rupture eardrums.
Skipper on the other hand, noticed that there was a psychic protection weaving into place. A tunnel that led towards the middle of the stadium, to the middle of the sculpture. An extra net lay covering the crowd, seemingly in case the tunnel was somehow ruptured. The psychic weaving was some of the most sophisticated and powerful he had seen before. Even his mother struggled to create threads with her psychic powers, and this protection was miles long, as wide as a Steelix tunnel, with each square millimeter knit together with perfect precision, all in merely a handful of seconds. Skipper tried to find what was making the psychic protection, eventually finding the source to be the same Slowking who had raised the ice block. That Slowking was clearly worthy of its name.
Ahmad jolted in excitement, finally realizing just what the sculpture was. The top layers had been finished, cutting away to show a streamlined head with rows of teeth. He could recognize that head anywhere.
Garchomp.
But not just any Garchomp. This Garchomp had a very sharp and powerful jaw. Its skull was bigger and thicker than other Garchomp. Its arms weren't just bladed fins, but actual scythes. An aberration among Garchomp, but in the best ways possible. As far as Ahmad knew, there was only one Garchomp like this in the world. And it belonged to Champion Cynthia Shirona of Sinnoh.
The whistling noise got louder as the final shavings along Garchomp's legs fell away. The crowd cheered, coming to the same realization as Ahmad. The ice sculpture stood fifty feet tall, its teeth the size of doors, its tail big enough to cleave a skyscraper in two.
The crowd only got a moment to see the finalized sculpture, as the whistling sound finally reached its climax. A blur came from above, smashing straight into the middle of the sculpture. The ice shattered into millions of pieces, each tiny piece quickly being locked into a psychic grip before hitting the crowd. The ice dissipated into snow and mist, raining down onto the crowd.
And in the middle of the now barren stadium were two figures. One, a twenty foot tall monster of a Garchomp, its blood red scythes and eyes somehow seeming more dangerous than its former fifty foot tall twin.
Atop its back was a woman. Her black cape fluttered in the wind, her blond hair flowing like water. Her gray eyes pierced through the crowd, her aura demanding respect. Garchomp looked to the sky and roared, a powerful guttural sound that made the ground shake. Again, a psychic protection had been weaved into place right in time, shielding the crowd from permanent ear damage.
The crowd erupted, cheering on the now smiling and waving Champion. She hopped off of Garchomp's back, landing on the ground below with the grace of a Liepard. She strode forward, accepting Wallace's handshake in front of the roaring crowd.
The two rose together to deliver a speech to the crowd. Ahmad nearly fell asleep, not even a single word registering in his head. He was here for the action. And soon, the action began.
Ahmad tapped the side of Skipper's head excitedly. He knew it wasn't a real match. Only a mock battle, but it would still be very fun.
Mock battles were the norm before simulation battles. It required a panel of judges who watched the match in real time, assigning points for attacks landed. Based on their own evaluations, they would signal a knock out when they thought enough damage had been incurred. This was the way that battles could still be competitive without the pokemon being in mortal danger, but it meant that pokemon couldn't use anywhere near their top power, which Ahmad thought was rather lame.
Still, seeing a Champion's pokemon in person was nothing short of incredible. Even with a handicap like this, Cynthia Shirona was the youngest Champion in the world for a reason. Gary Oak had shaken the world when he ousted Lance Wataru, Champion of Indigo, at only the age of sixteen. His short reign came to an end as Ash Ketchum took the title for himself later that year, at only fifteen. Then, two years ago, Cynthia Shirona barely scraped out a victory to become Sinnoh's Champion at only fourteen. She pushed her advantage though, and has only grown stronger and stronger since.
Today would be a mock battle between her and two of the Indigo Elite Four. The battle would be four versus four, with Cynthia using six pokemon total and the Elite Four using four each. This meant the two Elite Four working together had eight pokemon between them, against Cynthia's six. Despite the two pokemon advantage, Cynthia was still favored 3:1 in the casinos. She was that good.
Ahmad didn't even pay the announcer any mind. He was spouting something about international relations, a big leap forward, maybe something about international fishing? Ahmad just wanted to see Cynthia's pokemon in action.
Eventually, the two Elite Four stepped up, butting elbows in a show of camaraderie. On the left was a weirdo wearing purple robes, and the right was a bespectacled woman in light blue clothes that seemed more befitting of a substitute teacher than an Elite Four, in Ahmad's opinion.
It seems Cynthia was having her Garchomp stay next to her on the trainer platform to watch. She then released her four Pokémon she'd start the battle with, causing Skipper to reel back in shock.
"What is it? … the dog thing?" Ahmad asked.
There was a green and black dog pokemon, one he had never seen before. "Is it powerful?" Ahmad asked.
Skipper bobbed his head. "More powerful than her Garchomp?"
Skipper shook his head. Not that Ahmad really had any doubt. There weren't many pokemon in the world that were more powerful than Cynthia's Garchomp. It might even take multiple warrior class Latis to take it down. Leon's Charizard might be able to do it, but that thing was a monster among monsters.
Still, the fact that something had a strong enough aura to bother Skipper was interesting. Just what was this green dog pokemon? Its limbs were sleek, not even looking very muscled. It seemed to be very quick though, merely a blur whenever it moved.
Alongside it was another furred pokemon, a navy and silver Lucario donned with sharp steel spikes. In the air rose Cynthia's Togekiss, emanating pure elegance as it hummed through the air. A small green figure on the ground with a red rose marked Cynthia's Roserade.
On the other side of the stadium four other pokemon were released. One was a towering dragon with thick blue scales. The Baxcalibur was accompanied by an Alolan Ninetails, its fur shimmering in the noon day sun.
A streamlined purple figure with four wings shot through the air above them, the Crobat changing directions at breakneck speeds. Another figure was flying below it. Each of its four arms had a sharp stinger at the end, with an even more dangerous stinger at the end of its abdomen. While not as quick as the Crobat, its stingers each leaked a potent purple poison that sizzled when it dripped to the ground.
The match began, both sides carefully setting up the battlefield.
Lucario summoned a blue bone shaped like a bo staff, swirling it in its grip. Roserade shot out some toxic spikes that Lucario batted like a professional baseball player with its bone rush, sending the spikes flying at ridiculous speeds towards the Alolan Ninetails. The feline barely dodged, the purple shards shattering against the psychic barrier.
Crobat, being the fastest flier, did its best to try and box in Togekiss. With the threat of Crobat's poisonous talons, as well as the approaching stingers of Beedrill, Togekiss struggled to get any breathing room to send any attacks out. Pressing the advantage, Baxcalibur shot up powerful icicles, coordinating with the two fliers to try get an early knock out on Togekiss.
However, Togekiss was no pushover. It shot out two fire blasts in quick succession at the approaching icicles, flying straight down through the ensuing explosion. After all, Crobat and Beedrill weren't going to be in the way of the approaching icicles.
Togekiss turned back around in the smoke, bending the wind to its command. The tailwind helped it gain height incredibly quickly, while also picking up the few remaining ice shards. Togekiss concentrated and collected all the ice shards, condensing the air and sending an ice shard infused air slash towards the Beedrill, while also imbuing its wings with steel to deflect a cross poison from the quick Crobat.
Any sludge bomb sent toward the Togekiss was easily taken away by the wind. Crobat was a master flier, but Togekiss held supremacy over the air.
The fight quickly began to shift in favor as Cynthia's pokemon gained momentum.
Togekiss flew low, utilizing the fact that Crobat and Beedrill were chasing it so that Zygarde could get some easy hits with its green showers of projectiles. The hundreds of earthen shards almost looked like comets, with a trail of energy following each piece of the barrage.
In the meantime, Lucario was trying its best to take down the towering ice dragon. Using flash cannon to make sure it didn't run away, the fighter used its steel aura infused bone rush, bashing the defending Baxcalibur's forearms. The dragon would have taken far more damage had the Alolan Ninetails not coated it with a shimmering veil of energy that looked like an aurora borealis.
The need to concentrate on shielding its comrade as well as dodging the Roserade's attacks meant that it couldn't get the chance to attack anything.
A quick order from the Elite's had the Baxcalibur replaced with a Froslass, and the other pokemon coming back to regroup.
The crowd wasn't interested in the Elites or their pokemon. Instead, they were busy watching Cynthia's mystery pokemon. The green dog pokemon was glowing in the same green color that its attacks had been coated in. When the light faded, a gargoyle-like figure was in its place instead. Two black wings were on its back, with claws at the ends of its arms and legs. It was smaller than the size of a Staraptor, yet the implication was staggering.
Cynthia's new pokemon was a shape-shifter. The only known shapeshifter was Ditto, but everybody knew that Ditto weren't battlers.
The mysterious green and black pokemon took to the sky, joining Togekiss. Lucario and Roserade went back to batting practice, keeping Ninetails on its toes. The toxic spikes hardly held together after being hit so hard by Lucario's bone rush, but the shards of a toxic spike was arguably even more effective, especially since it could spread like grapeshot.
The battle picked back up, with Froslass sending an icy ball into the sky, bringing shards of hail raining down, for all of half a second. Togekiss' orange ball banished the clouds immediately.
Ahmad laughed. Unless you were really committed, weather conditions simply never lasted long in a professional battle. Some trainers really focused on stage control, and could afford to keep sending out weather changing energies into the air, but Cynthia Shirona and her team stomped any trainers that relied on setups. Her pokemon were too fast. Too powerful. Getting distracted trying to set up the weather just meant that her pokemon had free chances to get knockouts.
The battle continued, and the Elites still failed to get any purchase on Champion Cynthia's invincible team. The mystery pokemon was wicked fast, had incredible range and precision with its weird energy projectiles. Her Lucario was the perfect defense, utilizing its steel energy to negate almost every attack. Her Roserade danced grass petals as sharp as razor blades into existence, hiding among a blizzard of leaves. With its ability to send out globs of poison from within the storm, it was almost impossible to hit. Even Ninetails icy winds barely froze the petals.
Alolan Ninetails had incredibly cold ice. A mere exhale of its breath could freeze bones solid. Yet even the petals that the Roserade willed into existence were so potent in life energy that they were almost impossible to freeze.
Togekiss was the epitome of a flying type. Its command over air rivaled a Master's Cornerstone Pidgeot. It made split decisions instantly, weaving through attacks despite pressure on multiple fronts, gracefully taking advantage of every possible moment.
Ahmad heard a whine sound building up. Not like the whistling sound of the supersonic Garchomp. This was a feeling he felt more in his core than he did his ears. Like pressure was building.
The blue and red patterns along Togekiss fur began to glow brightly. It swooped down, approaching Froslass from behind. In an explosion of colors, the dazzling gleam shredded Froslass apart.
The crowd exploded at the powerful display. Going for a knockout in a mock battle was very taboo. However, ghosts were the only exception to that. While still frowned upon, Ahmad knew that an Elite's ghost pokemon would be able to reassemble multiple times in a single battle. Their fragility could be used to their advantage in a real fight, especially with moves like destiny bond and other soul linking energy.
Sure enough, icy blue and purple energy coalesced back into a very pissed off Froslass, but it was quickly returned since the judges signaled a knockout.
With a roar, the Baxcalibur came back out from the Elite's side.
Despite the incredible display of fortitude, the Roserade was soon signaled as knocked out as well due to the continued ice moves from the Ninetails. Despite still being in pretty good shape, Roserade made a face at the judges before being returned by Cynthia.
A blue and brown snail like pokemon joined the battlefield, warbling a war cry. The Gastrodon slithered along the ground with surprising speed, but was quickly bombarded by attacks from the much faster Alolan Ninetails.
Lucario continued putting pressure on Baxcalibur and Ninetails, but Ahmad pondered at why Cynthia's pokemon were so disjointed. Earlier in the battle they had seemed like a well oiled machine, with each pokemon complementing each other in every interaction. Despite their own battles, they seemed to know exactly what their teammates were doing and where. Now, each pokemon seemed isolated into their own battles.
The center of it seemed to be the green gargoyle pokemon, which had previously been a green dog like pokemon. It seemed to be moving unnaturally through the air. Togekiss kept aiding its movements with precise updrafts and tailwinds, but it looked like a fish out of water.
If Cynthia wanted to win this, she would have kept the weird green pokemon as its dog form. It was clearly more comfortable with it. Its movements had been fluid. Then Ahmad realized what Cynthia's game was. She was already confident that she could win either way, and wanted the green pokemon to have experience against worthy adversaries while in its flying form. That had to be it.
Ahmad sat back in awe. That's what it meant to be a Champion. Cynthia utilized every possible moment as an opportunity to grow. Having done things like this every single day of her life, it really was no wonder that she had grown to be so powerful. Even a mock battle against Elite Four members was a way to train her pokemon in things they didn't excel at yet.
"Skipper, one day I'll be like that. I know I can't be a Champion at fourteen. She had too big a head start. But I'll get there. Even if I don't make it until I'm forty, when my bones are creaky and my hair is gray. I'll do it. Just you wait." Ahmad stated with resolution. This was true power. Being a Champion was not a test of strength. It was a test of wills. Of wit. Strength was the bare minimum, already implied. Everything else is what determined who could be a Champion, and who got stuck doing odd jobs with ACE.
Skipper ruffled his wings in agreement, still in awe at the power being exuded by Cynthia and her Garchomp. Icy winds that had missed Roserade or continued past had hit Cynthia and her Garchomp straight on. The psychic barriers only covered the crowd, not the trainer. Yet both seemed completely unfazed. Cynthia's eyebrows had a slight bit of frost on them, but she brushed it off with a smile on her face.
Any single one of those icy winds would have sent Skipper to the infirmary. Even if he mustered his strongest shields. He knew that for sure. Yet those two had no defenses. Garchomp were notoriously weak to ice. Yet they stood immovable, invincible.
Skipper had already thought that becoming a warrior class Lati was a big enough goal. An already unattainable goal. Only the strongest five percent of Lati's ever got to join the ranks of the warrior or high priest class. Of all of the hundreds of Latis that Skipper knew, only a handful had made it that far.
Yet that girl and her Garchomp stood above them. Only the most powerful Latis could stand a chance. Skipper grinned. And here he thought that Legendary meant something. He would have to work even harder than he thought.
The match continued. The titanic ice dragon was felled by Lucario. Beedrill fell to a couple of fire blasts from Togekiss. Cynthia even returned her Togekiss, wanting practice for her Magmortar. The purple robed Elite's powerful Nidoking took down Lucario.
The weird green pokemon finally took down the Crobat, their dogfight lasting ages with both struggling to hit the other. Despite the green pokemon's incredible range of options, it simply was too inexperienced in the air to utilize its full potential. Crobat's speed let it dodge around for quite a while, but none of its attacks reached the green pokemon. Its green projectiles also shifted around its figure to form shields whenever it wanted, blocking sludge bombs and bug buzzes handily.
The purple robed figure's final pokemon was a powerful looking Gengar. While the species was normally corporeal and hardly existed in the mortal plane, this one had a thick aura and naturally sank to be halfway in the ground. The icy mistress released a Dewgong that seemed especially powerful.
Ahmad's head spun as he watched the dazzling display. He knew that none of the combatants were using their true power. The Elites were held back more by the mock battle than Cynthia. They had to coordinate with one another. The ice mistress especially seemed to struggle. She usually relied on overly powerful area of effect attacks. The mock battle setting meant her pokemon couldn't use their strongest moves. Cynthia truly proved to be a generalist in every sense of the word. Not only did she utilize pokemon of vastly differing types, she also seemed to be a master of many different kinds of battling. Her pokemon were ridiculously quick and versatile in applying different strategies based on the situation.
They took the limitation of not being able to use their strongest attacks in stride, utilizing their fine tuned control over their aura to focus on tagging their opponents with as many small weak moves as possible. Bigger area of effect moves boxed their opponents in while team members peppered attacks while the enemy couldn't dodge.
Both Elite trainers could likely hold their own fighting a half dozen veteran trainers at once. They didn't stand a chance against the Cynthia Shirona. She never used her most powerful pokemon. She even benched her Togekiss when it was doing too well.
Ahmad couldn't wait to tell his mom about the battle. He got to see Cynthia herself in action. Said to be the equal of Ash Ketchum. She might even have a chance at the title at next World Championship Well, considering Leon wouldn't be busy with other things, Ash Ketchum no longer would be the true reigning Champion. Everybody knew that if Leon competed in the tournament, things probably would have gone differently. Hell, Ash Ketchum barely beat Steven Stone. Leon trounced Stone two Championships ago. Although that was mostly just his monster of a Charizard sweeping Stone's army of steel types under the rug.
Both Skipper and Ahmad left the stadium with their heads buzzing with excitement. They both had quite a ways to go before they could keep up with every little detail of the battle, let alone compete at that level.
One more year down. One more year closer to achieving their dreams. This was quite a Happy New Year indeed.