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Lumiose City Gym

Loki was currently in the Pokemon Center, which left Helena four more Pokemon with which to battle.

"You sure you're ready to face this guy?" Grant asked.

"Hey, this was all your idea, you tell me." Helena looked over at him and he smiled.

"Yeah, but we stayed up all night training. It wouldn't hurt to get some sleep and go at it tomorrow."

"I know," Helena said as she stared at the gym's doors. "But I need to keep productive. I think if I stop, I'll go crazy." With that, she stepped into the gym, and Grant followed after.

"I coached my team about Clemont's electric trap, so I think I'll be ready to go in. I'm going to open with Écarlate," she told Grant. Their place had been reserved earlier, and the line ahead of her had just finished. A few seconds later, her name popped up, calling her to the ring.

Helena would take her place once more, Écarlate's ball in hand, and look out across to see the gym leader.

In her other hand was another cup of coffee, from which she took a sip, as she waited for the gym leader to make his move.

Lumiose City Gym

Helena tossed Écarlate's ball up and caught it with her hand as it came back down. It was an idle motion that she'd been practicing, mostly due to nervousness, the whole night from her battle.

"You made them so easy to break, though. I can only imagine that you were asking for it with such a fragile arena," Helena quipped back and then sipped her coffee again.

"Works just fine for me!" Helena called back as she released Écarlate into the field.

The scarlet Pokemon looked out at Clemont, ready to do battle. He'd been training all night for this, to see how he compared to other Pokemon.

From now on, there are three types of battles. Helena's words echoed in Écarlate's mind. He knelt into a runner's stance, Agility boosting his speed, preparing to multiply it if the Heliosk kept its distance.

The first is one against survival, from the government. This one is the closest to chess. If we consider every environmental hazard, from rocks to the rain, to be pawns, then the remaining pieces are their Pokemon, except for the king. The trainer is the king.

Écarlate had been prepared for this match, a glint in his eyes watching the opponent. Heliosk wouldn't be much of a problem, not for its type. The difficult would come from its trainer.

The second type of battle is against just Pokemon. By themselves, they're wasy enough to handle. The king is ther endurance, their stamina. Everything else - their limbs, their moves, their senses, they're all pieces. From pawns to the queen. You control those, you control the battle.

Écarlate would not be taken so easily. When Helena called Écarlate to "blind!" the Scizor moved up into the air, firing off a Flash Cannon that would mask his movements, as well as leave the Glare hidden within the Flash.

The jump took the Pokemon up, over Heliosk, for the Flash Cannon.

It's only when you're fighting another trainer that you cannot take out that leads to a difficult match. This is the third type -

Écarlate would prepare a whirlwind as he moved overhead from Heliosk. The spiral of air would follow the flap of his wings, the air growing powerful - and sharp. Unless Heliosk stopped it, or very quickly retreated, it would be caught in the Razor Wind.

The goal of the third type of battle is to control what the trainer and the Pokemon will do. In this instance, the trainer is the king, and the Pokemon is the queen.

Écarlate would abbandon the Razor Wind, having got his desired affect. Instead, he would blast a Flash Cannon into the ground to push himself away from Heliosk, and back toward the ground as the Thunder came down, blinding and bright.

The goal is to manipulate two targets. First, we have to control what the trainer does, second, we have to control what the Pokemon does. Once we do this, we start taking pieces from them both.

Écarlate would dash in, boosted by Agility and Bullet Punch, the bullet fast snap made to grab Heliosk's arm before he could regain his target, the speed aiming to ensure this would work.

For example, if the goal is to make sure the enemy can't see you, it would be ideal if they did this for you. For every move you make to take advantage of an opponent's disadvantage, you put yourself in your own disadvantage.

And if it did, Écarlate would aim a series of these blows into Heliosk's legs, eyes on the Pokemon as he was ready to avoid any melee attacks, even at the zero distance, by controlling his opponents weight and leverage, and using his own mobility from his position.

There are two ways around this. The first is to make sure the trade-off is always unbalanced in your favor. Taking the blow to the chest in favor of destroying a Pokemon's leg, and thus their speed and mobility, is ideal.

He was also prepared to take Heliosk's special attacks that came directly from touch - all he needed to do was land a few blows, ruin Heliosk's legs, and then get away to pick off the weakened opponent.

The second way is to make them create their own disadvantages with no advantages for themself. This only works so long as the opponent thinks they're in control. Against a trainer, you have two peple to trick, but that only means playing to their idea that they're superior. Unsettle the trainer, and let the Pokemon step into your space under the impression that they're able to so easily because they're better.

Both Pokemon and trainer were already aware of Glare's existence. Instead of trading the first blow, Scizor would watch Heliosk's body as opposed to its eyes. Heliosk could not use its eyes to intimidate a target that did not look into them - a simple task.

Instead, Écarlate's bullet punch would aim to grab Heliosk, as previously intended, and deliver the sharp blows of successive Bullet Punches toward the Pokemon's legs, its own body and superior strength being the leverage for this control - with Scizor being more than twice as strong as Heliosk.

And, as before, Écarlate would be prepared to use that weight to alter Heliosk's positioning. In other words, once grabbed, Écarlate had control over Heliosk's center of gravity, allowing the bug/steel type to land its blows and twist its own body, or Heliosk's, to off-center or out right avoid the Fire Punch, and the Thunderbolt.

Écarlate only needed a few of the blows, even one for each leg, to bruise the area and cause pain from movement. Adding to that would only intensify that pain, and damage the area, lowering Heliosk's overall speed.

And once the task was done, Écarlate intended to speed away, to finish the opponent off without further risk.

Helena watched the match between the two Pokemon. Stepping into Heliosk's space was necessary, but it didn't bode well for taking down a special type Pokemon. Instead, there was a degree of stress about it.

Helena counted the moves, watching Heliosk, and listening for Clemont. Every bit of the strategy needed to adapt, but once something had occurred, once a trade had been made, it was set in stone. Everything from the first success, was adapting to keep that momentum going. The more she fought, the more she could be prepared for. The more she was prepared for, the easier it was to adapt to possibilities before they happened, and to be ready to easily take care of them.

None of it would be easy, Helena knew, but she was ready for it this time. She would not go down without a fight.

Helena was too surprised to gloat, and too shy of Clemont's clear frustration to ask whether or not she was getting paid for the match, since she destroyed his arena. Instead, she'd take her badge - with some effort, recall her Pokemon, and slink away.

Once out of the trainer area, she would see Grant striding up toward her.

"Congratulations!" he shouted and she'd run over and jump, wrapping her arms around his neck and laughing. He'd swing her around as his arms wrapped around her waist before setting her down.

Helena didn't release her own arms, however, forcing Grant to hunch forward. Both of them blushed, but Helena was too tired to care. "I did it!"

"Yeah, we should really get some rest," Grant said.

"No way. I'm on to the next match. You should rest, though, I'll tell you how it goes." She released him of her arms and stepped around him. Grant turned after her, and moved to keep pace.

"Are you sure?" he asked.

"Yeah. Your explanation that it's a lot like chess really helped me focus. Besides, I'm just going until I lose. It won't be that exciting to see, just to hear about." She flashed him a smile and he shrugged his shoulders.

"If I was more awake I'd insist on going," he said with a yawn. "But I'm beat. I'm surprised you're still so active."

Helena lifted her cup of coffee. "I'm eventually going to burn out on the stuff, but right now it's keeping me going." Grant smiled and Helena was off.

With Tyrant and Alice's Scizor placed in the PC, and Loki retrieved from the center, it would significantly lower the next gym leader's level average. With that, it was a very short flash of light to Shalour City.