“Good afternoon,” the attendant of the Eterna City Gym greeted us, after having sent a message for us to visit in the afternoon. All four of us had been summoned, making me wonder if they planned to combine tasks or something like that, but somewhat doubted it. Just because people were roughly the same age didn’t mean they would work together well and while all four of us were seriously considering making the difficult journey from Eterna City to Celestic Town together, nothing was set in stone just yet. And certainly not communicated to the Gym. They might assign a task with the intent to see if both groups could work together, regardless of personal likes and dislikes, but again, I could only speculate.

“Gym Leader Sylva will see you in a few minutes,” the attendant added, waving us into a nearby meeting room. We followed his direction and made ourselves comfortable, exchanging a few confused glances in the process.

“What do you think that’s about?” Claire asked once we were all sitting.

“Might just be that they only have difficult tasks, nominally too difficult for us to accomplish,” Lucas suggested with a shrug. “Especially the two of you,” he gestured towards Claire and me, “are on the cusp of getting serious tasks, to the point that you should make sure you have a partner that can accomplish maintenance tasks.”

“I might have to train Gem so she can help smooth over paths, or maybe Champ, so he can break rocks or move them aside. Sure, brute force can substitute skill on some occasions, but there’s always risk involved there,” he added, reflecting on his own plans.

“The task in Floaroma was merely a check-up, in order to make sure their festival was going off without a hitch,” I reminded him, only to get a nod in response.

“Sure, and for that, they misplaced our reservation for our room,” Claire groused, still annoyed by that mistake, even if it had turned out alright in the end. A simple case of a misplaced note, and we had been sleeping outside. I merely rolled my eyes, while the other two looked at us a little amused, as they had heard her grousing about it more than once. Given that we were mostly sleeping outside anyway, it was a little weird that Claire held such a grudge for having to sleep outside a few more days.

“Not sure which of my partners could actually be trained for maintenance,” I mused, thinking of my three current partners, “Charm is the most physical of them, but I’m trying to take his training in a different direction. Su, on the other hand, is much more focused on speed than strength and bulk, making hard, physical labour difficult for him,” I muttered, not even considering Vio. I loved my little fairy, but she was not a physical creature. Maybe if she managed to train her psychic abilities to the point that she could move rocks with those, she’d be able to help some, but it would talk a lot of effort to get there.

“Twiggy should be able to perform quite a bit in that regard. His ability to use vines and roots to shift earth grows by the day and at some point, he should be able to directly merge with the ground and his abilities will sky-rocket.” Claire reasoned, before groaning at the inadvertent joke at the end.

“I’m in the same camp as you,” Cliff looked over to me, “While Buddy is growing up nicely he’s still small. Meanwhile Shelly has some strength, but I don’t think she’s the right one to move and break rocks. Maybe, if the work is related to water or something,” he shrugged again.

Just as he finished his assessment of his team, the door opened again and a short-haired woman swept in, dressed in the coarse clothing of a travelling trainer. But where her clothing was coarse and a little dirty, her whole demeanour reminded me of Cynthia, making me reflexively stand in respect.

“Good afternoon, thanks for coming,” she greeted us, continuing without ever taking a breath, “Call me Sylva, I’m Gym leader here and you all want to earn by Badge.” she briefly glanced at the paper in her hand and just as I opened my mouth to return her greeting, she already continued talking.

“Dani and Claire,” she looked over to us, before looking at Cliff and Lucas, “and Cliff and Lucas. Two and three badges respectively, not bad.” she nodded.

“Well, there’s some trouble in Eterna Forest, but that’s above your abilities,” she shrugged, before grumbling under her breath, “Stupid ghosts, always have to make trouble,”

“Anyway, I’ll first give you an assessment battle, and we go from there.” she waved us to the door, still continuing to talk, “Did you decide where to go next already?” she asked, and now, it was finally our time to speak, even if we had to do so while following her, as she was already walking away.

Hurrying to catch up, I could finally give a greeting, only to be waved off, “Ok, so you are Dani, fine. Did you decide where to go next?” she prodded, her brisk attitude quite rude, but given our relative positions, I wasn’t about to call her out.

“We pretty much decided to head to Celestic Town together,” I informed her, the others following behind giving their agreement.

“Difficult journey, but all journies from here are challenging,” she muttered, slowing down a little so she was walking next to me, instead of breezing ahead. “Which route did you take here?” she asked. I was a little tempted to snub her but nothing good would come of it.

“Claire and I travelled through Eterna Forest, Cliff and Lucas took the Route from Oreburgh.” I replied, getting a brief, thoughtful look in response.

“Eterna Forest, eh?” she muttered and I wanted to ask what she meant, but before I could, she already opened one of the doors in the hallway, gesturing for us to enter.

The room was completely different from the training rooms we had been in before. Where they had featured sturdy construction, with almost nothing that could be destroyed in a Pokémon battle, the room here had a dirt floor and an incredibly high glass ceiling, letting us see the sky above. If not for the lacking wind, we could easily have been outside, even the walls were painted to give such an impression.

“Each of you will face one of my partners, in a one-on-one battle. I’ve already decided on the line-up on my side, so you can choose your order however you like, I really don’t care.” Sylva told us, directing us towards one side, where a familiar screen was set up. The four of us walked towards it, while Sylva started moving towards the screen on the other side, without giving us any additional information.

“Ladies first?” Cliff suggested, looking a little unsure how to proceed. Claire and I exchanged a shrug, before nodding in acceptance.

“Sure, Dani, you want to go first, or should I?” Claire asked, and I simply gestured for her to go first, which she easily accepted. Not knowing the line-up on the other side meant that it might be advantageous, if she started off with her weakest Pokémon, or it might be difficult. Or it might not matter at all, if all her Pokémon were strong enough to dominate our partners.

Claire took up position right behind the screen, her hand wandering across the Pokéballs on her belt, her eyes taking in the room. We had heard that Sylva seemed to prefer Grass-types, but that didn’t mean much, she was a Gym leader so she undoubtedly had a robust roster of Pokémon and trying to take advantage of some sort of perceived weakness would likely backfire.

Looking around, I began to consider the challenge and what the room might mean. It might simply be some sort of individual idiosyncrasies, that Sylva simply liked this sort of ambience or that it was suitable for her style but I doubted it. Constructing it must have taken an incredible effort, so a simple whim wouldn’t explain it.

Finally, Claire picked one of her partners and, with the press of a button, Twiggy appeared in the middle of the arena, ready to do battle.

“Let’s see what your Growtle can do,” Sylva remarked in a loud voice, “Your turn, Fluffy,” she added, sending out her own partner.

It took me a moment to recognise the gently floating Pokémon that very much looked like a stiff breeze would send it flying to never be seen again. It had a blue, round body, with three stems ending in white, poofy seedpods, reminiscent of a dandelion. It was the first Jumpluff I had seen and from what I remembered of its type, I was pretty sure Claire had a serious challenge on her hand.