"Splooosh—"
In one of the larger lakes on Trial Island, Gyarados lay at his ease in the water, taking a sunbath.
There were still marks of a battle some way off. The Pokémon that had held the place before had been beaten by Gyarados, and the spot belonged to him now.
Off at the far side of the lake a group of Water-types, far below him in strength, had gathered together, not daring to cross the line by half a step, watching him with awe in their eyes.
Vance and Gyarados paid them no mind. As long as they made no trouble, neither could be bothered to go looking for any.
"You've gone up another level, Gyarados. Battling really is the fastest way to climb."
Vance said it idly, stretched out comfortably on a deck chair.
Half a day stolen out of a busy life. After training this long, a man has to unwind a little.
"Grrooo—"
Gyarados answered with a low call, rolled himself over, and went on enjoying the sun on his other side.
> **Pokémon:** Gyarados (male)
> **Type:** Water / Flying
> **Ability:** Moxie
> **Aptitude:** Elite-Four-class
> **Level:** 24 (Intermediate)
> **Moves:** Bite, Tackle, Leer, Twister, Flail, Whirlpool, Ice Fang, Brine, Dragon Dance, Scary Face, Waterfall, Hyper Beam, Outrage, Water Pulse, Dragon Tail, Blizzard
Gyarados's aptitude was high, he had evolved not long ago and his strength was still in its climbing phase, and with Vance guiding him correctly on top of all that, the progress had come this fast.
"Catch, Gyarados. Get a proper feel for this ice crystal. You've got Blizzard now, so the next thing to try for is Ice Beam."
As he spoke Vance brought out a blue crystal that glittered coldly and gave off a chill, floated it over in front of Gyarados, and set it against his forehead.
"Roar—"
Gyarados's face turned serious and he was into it at once.
Past experience told him that doing what his boss said was never wrong.
"Mm." Vance was well satisfied, and was already turning over what came next in Gyarados's training.
*Gyarados is badly countered by Electric-types; that has to be accounted for. He needs a Ground-type move.* With that in mind, Vance opened the system and turned to the breeding data.
"With his aptitude, learning Earthquake shouldn't be any trouble, and Earthquake is a powerful move."
"Earthquake. The essence of the move is using one's own strength to draw the earth into motion; what it comes down to is the 'wave'. Gyarados has a large body and can set it off with the strength of that tail........."
Before long Vance had a training plan drawn up and saved inside the system.
The system doubled as a laptop, near enough.
"Right. Back to resting."
The plan finished, Vance settled comfortably back into his rest.
...............
At that same hour Bloodhand, Chief Instructor to the new intake, was receiving a middle-aged man dressed in the same Team Rocket uniform.
"That's the Boss's signature. Drop every one of these Pokémon onto Trial Island."
The man said it flatly and produced a signed order slip. Behind him, on a large green-painted truck, stood cage after cage, each with a Pokémon inside.
"Roar—"
"Whine, whine—"
The strange thing was how they differed. Some had eyes red right through, bloodthirsty and vicious-looking, beating hard at the bars; others huddled in a corner, cringing.
"Experimental Pokémon?"
Bloodhand asked it, looking at the unusual creatures.
"Mm. That's right, all of them experimental, each at a different stage. It was our own Dr. Ziegler's suggestion. Something to do with bonds, apparently. I don't understand it myself. All I know is that this new intake suits it best."
"There are a fair few in there that even I wouldn't mind having. A pity."
The man said it with regret.
"This intake's in luck, then."
Bloodhand sighed once the explanation was done, and put men on it straight away to begin the drop.
"In luck? Not necessarily. There's no free lunch in this world. No telling how many of this intake it kills."
"Drooone, drooone—"
While Vance was taking his ease, seven or eight aircraft passed overhead and package after package came down.
"Hm. An airdrop? Are those living supplies inside? I never heard anything about this. Have they changed the rules on us?"
Vance was a little puzzled by the sight, but the packages up there were already drifting down to the ground.
"Come on, Gyarados. Let's go and have a look."
Vance called it out, took Gyarados along, and made for the landing point of one of the "airdrops".
He was a step too late by the time he got there. All he found was a cage lying in a pit of earth.
"This 'airdrop' doesn't look like supplies. It looks more like something with a Pokémon shut inside it."
That was the conclusion Vance drew from the scene.
"Dropping Pokémon in. What's the intent behind that?"
His psychic sense, spread out around him, picked up a figure arriving. Vance turned, and saw a striking one.
A girl with a sweet face, skin white as snow, wearing a woman's combat uniform that showed off a slender figure.
The sight of her put Vance on his guard. Sweet-faced she might be, but there was nothing sweet about the way she went about things; he had seen it a few times at the Team Rocket base.
Cerise, that was her name. Back at the base she had been one of the top students too, excellent in every subject.
And on top of that the girl was a Psychic.
Not as strong as he was, though — Novice level. Barring anything else, he could take her inside three moves.
"Oh. It's you, Vance."
Cerise was standing in a thick-leaved tree with a Beautifly behind her, and looked a little surprised to see him.
They were of the same intake and both top students, and Cerise remembered the boy who had chosen a Magikarp.
"Mm. Why, is it such a surprise?"
Vance raised an eyebrow and said it with a light laugh, his power stirring quietly inside him. If she made the first move, he would not be polite about it.
Beautiful or not, his hand would not soften.
"Hee. Running into you here is a bit of a surprise." Cerise gave a small laugh, and then went on. "You got here before me. Did you find anything?"
"No. It was already like this when I arrived."
Vance shook his head as he said it.
"Is that so. Never mind, then. Actually, Vance — why don't you come along with me and help me collect point cards? Once the trial is over you could join my team as well."
Cerise made the offer with a smile on her face.
Her expression was thoroughly confident. She was as good as certain of this trial, and the fact of it bore her out.
She thought well of Vance, all the more so for finding him here rather than dead somewhere on Trial Island; that alone proved he was no fraud and had real ability in him.
His Pokémon, after all, was only a Magikarp, with next to no fighting strength; that he was still alive on an island this thick with danger said a good deal about what he could do.
Plenty of members with rather more strength than that had left bodies nobody could even find. That he was standing here at all spoke for itself.