I own nothing. Nothing, I tell you!

Thank you all the people who reviewed, I hope others might consider doing it, or maybe the reviewers could just do it again. :D

The next day found us bobbing about on the waves once again. After spending a peaceful night at an island pokémon centre, Gary had insisted that we be on our way as quickly as possible, so that morning we hopped back onto Marina and set off for another island on the way to Cinnabar.

At this point the feeling of intense oceanic beauty all around me was wearing off. At first seeing the bright blue sky, shimmering water and spotless beaches on our way had been fun, but after a few hours you do get a little sick of it.

Not that I was seasick. I still couldn’t get enough of the brisk ocean breezes and splashes or spray. I had simple come to the conclusion that I was a land animal and thrived best when I had something solid under my feet.

I felt a movement behind me. I held on to my Lapras’ shell to turn around and see what Gary was doing. He was scouring his pokédex for information (which wasn’t unusual) but seemed to be worried about the time.

‘Are you in a hurry for something?’ I asked.

‘Hmm? Err…no, no…’ he seemed distracted. He didn’t even look at me, just stared off and squinted at the horizon. ‘Just a little impatient.’

Impatience normally belonged on my side of the conversation, but whatever was going on, I let it go.

‘Hey, there it is!’ His yell nearly put me off balance, so I scrambled up. As hard as it was to stand on the back of a Lapras that was continually rising and falling, I steadied myself and tried to see what he was talking about. Sure enough, an island was coming into sight.

‘Land ho!’ I said in my best pirate voice, but Gary refused to pay attention and got out his binoculars.

* * *

It didn’t take long to reach our destination, but something about this island struck me as being odd. You’d think it was odd too, if throngs of frantic people were rushing past and almost knocking you down.

We seemed to have arrived in a middle-sized town, so there were plenty of alleyways and paths in-between houses. I was about to suggest that we take refuge inside one of them, but Gary was tugging my sleeve.

‘Go this way – follow the crowd,’ he half-yelled over the commotion.

‘What? Why?’ I called back. ‘What are we doing?’

‘You’ll see when we get there.’

I gave up and let the waves of people carry me further into the town. I tried to keep an eye on Gary all the time, but in the confusion sometimes there was no telling where he’d got to. At least, I thought, we’ll both end up at the same place anyway.

As I followed the mob, the scenery started to change. I started to see fewer buildings and the view of the sea widened considerably. Pretty soon a gigantic structure came into view as we rounded a hill, surrounded by the ocean and some interesting cliff formations. The immense building we were heading towards looked like a stadium – one whose location had been chosen very carefully.

The crowd seemed to break apart as we entered the stadium, but there were already a hefty number of individuals inside. I stuck out like a sore thumb because I was the only person who had no idea what they were doing.

‘Holly!’ I heard a familiar voice. ‘Over here!’

I turned to find Gary pulling my arm. I just went along with it while he dragged me to a counter.

‘Two to sign up,’ he said to a young woman sitting at a computer.

‘You’ve left it very late… I’ll see if I can fit you in,’ was her reply.

‘Gary, please, would you tell me what’s going on?’ I asked firmly.

‘What, you didn’t guess?’ From my blank response he rightly guessed that the answer was no. ‘This is the Whirl Island Tournament! We’re going to compete in the biggest and most renowned type-specific competition in Johto!’

‘…Oh. And you left it until now to tell me because…?’

‘I didn’t want to miss the entry time. Things are getting underway in about an hour,’ he grinned.

‘And how come we were herded here in a great wobbling mass?’

‘You mean the crowd?’ inquired the receptionist, ‘Everyone from the Whirl Islands absolutely loves the tournament. They all love water pokémon so much; it’s no surprise. This is the biggest gathering of water pokémon you’ll find in Johto.’ She finished typing something into the computer. ‘I’ll just need your identification.’

Gary held out his hand in front of me. ‘Give me your pokédex.’ I obliged, although somewhat confusedly. Gary took his own pokédex from his pocket and gave them both to the receptionist.

‘Wow, real pokédexes!’ she admired which hooking them up to the computer. ‘You don’t see many trainers around with these.’ After clicking about with her keyboard for a moment, she handed them back to us. ‘There you go – Gary Oak from Pallet Town and Holly Evergreen from New Bark Town. You’re all set up. I hope you do well in the competition!’ she smiled and waved, and we walked away.

‘Wait,’ I said as we wandered, ‘don’t they need to know which pokémon we’re using?’

Gary gave a little shrug and shook his head. ‘Nah, they’re pretty laid back about it. Just as long as you’ve got a water type to use.’

A voice came on the loudspeaker system across the entire stadium: ‘The matches are about to begin. Will all spectators kindly find their seats and will Ash Ketchum and Christopher Harris please report to the preparation room.’

I stopped in my tracks. ‘Ash?’ I turned to Gary, ‘Isn’t that…’ but Gary was nowhere to be seen.

I followed all the other competitors as the group made its way to the challenger’s box. The stadium was huge, and filled with water. It was like an enormous, open-water coliseum, with arches leading out to the sea on each side. All around were stone seats falling back into the cliffs, and they were filled with crowds of people cheering enthusiastically. We had our own section of the arena to watch from, all made out of stone like the rest, but reserved for challengers.

I found a spot among the others and sat down on the carved seat, worrying where Gary was, but suddenly, he was right beside me.

‘Sorry about that,’ he shrugged off his absence, ‘I had to do some last-minute swaps with Grandpa. What’s going on?’

I said nothing, but pointed out into the middle of the arena, where Ash was clearly beginning the start of his battle.

‘No way!’ Gary muttered, taking a seat next to me. ‘Why is he here…?’

I watched Ash starting off, sending out a Totodile to face his opponent’s Kingdra. Obviously, I was on the Kingdra’s side. It had the advantage of evolution, size, type and rarity, since I figured that rare pokémon are usually stronger. Maybe I was biased towards it because I’d spent so long with many Totodile during my childhood, so I knew them better than Kingdra, and understood their weaknesses. Still, I was interested to see if I’d finally find out what kind of trainer Gary’s rival really was.

To start off Totodile had taken refuge underwater, but Kingdra countered that by starting whirlpools in the surrounding ocean. It wasn’t starting off well for Ash. The two aimed more attacks at each other, but they were both able to dodge by simply diving under again. I couldn’t hear exactly what the trainers were saying, but suddenly the field was covered with smoke and I couldn’t see either. It looked like a smokescreen attack, probably from Kingdra, because I knew a Totodile couldn’t learn that. After a few seconds the breeze began clearing the smoke, and I could see that Kingdra was powering up for a big attack, probably a hydro pump. For some reason, Ash seemed to be commanding Totodile to move towards its enemy rather than trying to avoid it. The tiny reptile made a jump and clamped its strong jams around Kingdra’s snout – disabling its attack. Then it let go, Kingdra spewed out water and was forced backwards to fly into a solid wall. That knocked it out, and the loudspeaker announced Ash’s victory.

‘Wow,’ I observed aloud while the crowd cheered, ‘he won, even though I’d have said the odds were against him. And rather unconventionally too.’

‘Yeah,’ Gary agreed, but through gritted teeth, ‘he’s got a knack for that…’

We watched the rest of the battles, which took up most of the afternoon. Not many of the fights were that interesting, and the crowd knew it - they only really expected a show when it came to the semi-finals and beyond.

Finally my name was called. I got out of my seat, heard Gary wish me luck, and followed the corridors behind the stadium around to the preparation room. Inside an official made sure I understood the rules of the tournament, running them by one last time, and told me it was a one-on-one match. At last the stately doors at one end of the room opened onto bright sunlight, and I walked out to the roaring crowd.

I was surprised by the amount and depth of the water all around – up close, it seemed that there was a lot more of it. My platform was only just above the water level. But I couldn’t be worried about that – with all the people high up in the stands cheering, I didn’t feel shy for very long.

While being briefed I had been told that I had to send my pokémon out first. It was a disadvantage in many cases, but I knew who I wanted to use, at any rate. I unclipped the most recently added pokéball from my belt team, and tossed it into the arena.

‘Come on out, Flo,’ I said, as the pokéball split open and Chinchou took form in the water. In an arena of this size, the little blue pokémon looked rather small. I still thought she would be my best bet.

All the way at the other end of the stadium, my opponent was selecting her battler. The girl was older than me, but still young. Her brown hair was pulled out to the side in an artful ponyta-tail. She gracefully pulled out a pokéball and threw it into the air, and I watched it release its occupant… the white light that formed the pokémon was growing to an enormous size, and when it had finished, a large Gyarados was towering over us.

‘And Trinity has chosen to start the battle with her Gyarados!’ boomed the speakers, ‘what an impressive spectacle!’

Calm down, I told myself… it’s only a Gyarados as big as a house. You can totally beat it with a pokémon you caught yesterday…

The whistle had gone and the battle was underway. I tried to think of ways to avoid the attacks Gyarados might use… projectiles like hyper beams and ice beams I could probably avoid with agility or getting Flo submerged… if it came out with a whirlpool attack I was in trouble, Flo was quite small and couldn’t take refuge on land, so damage might be unavoidable…

‘Gyarados, use twister!’

‘Eep! Flo, get underwater!’

Before Gyarados got its attack started, Flo the Chinchou bobbed underneath the water level and swam for cover. Then I realised Gyarados hadn’t bothered to attack – this wasn’t its strategy…

‘Now Gyarados,’ Trinity smirked, ‘create a whirlpool!’

‘Arg! Flo!’ I flustered, wondering if she could even hear me, ‘Try using supersonic!’

Gyarados’ body created a vicious whirlpool, but as Flo was sucked in, she emitted high frequency sounds through the water. Before she was pulled in, the sound waves negated the water waves, and the whirlpool cut off.

‘Yay!’ I beamed, ecstatic that something had worked, ‘Try a thunder wave!’

In the middle of the arena, Flo half surfaced, and the large, drooping yellow bulbs on the end of her antennae crackled ominously. Then specially formulated electricity shot out of them, and crashed right into Gyarados. The waves of current seemed to wrap around its body, and its muscles started to seize up.

‘Forget physical attacks then,’ said Trinity, ‘use your hyper beam!’ She seemed triumphant, as if she had revealed a trump card.

‘Flo, dive and swim as fast as you can!’

The gigantic water beast’s head, high above the stadium, had a ball of incredibly intense energy forming in its mouth. It took aim as best it could, but from such a height, a Chinchou’s small form would be hard to lock on to, and as Flo swan away, Gyarados’ paralysed muscles wouldn’t turn the right way…

A tremendous splash rocked the coliseum as the hyper beam hit harmlessly in the middle of the arena, sending water flying everywhere. I’m sure a few spectators got wet, but they seemed to enjoy it.

Flo surfaced a few metres to the side of the blast.

‘Flo, use a spark attack! And make it a good one!’ I yelled.

While Gyarados was worn out and too tired to retaliate, Flo took a moment to build up a charge, then let flying bolts of electricity loose on her opponent. Gyarados’ body thrashed about, partly from pain, and partly because of the charges coursing through its muscles. Finally the attack died, and Gyarados crashed into the pool of water on the stadium floor, completely unconscious.

‘They’ve done it! Holly and her Chinchou move on to the second round!’ boomed the loudspeaker, as the audience stood up and cheered. I recalled Flo to her ball and made a mental note to give her some sort of reward later on, most likely at a mealtime.

Savouring the sweet sound of a crowd cheering for me, I turned around and slowly made my way back through the long stone corridors to the competitors’ seats. When I got there Gary had gone, which must have meant his match would be up soon.

I sat back on the stone bench and felt, at least for the rest of today, that I could relax.