All Roads Lead to the Grand Festival (Multishipping, R)

[Rave The Rich]

Chapter seventeen is here!

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4127100/17/All_Roads_Lead_to_the_Grand_Festival

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Pokemon, a creation of one Satoshi Tajiri, and is produced domestically (in the United States) by Pokemon USA/The Pokemon Company, and internationally by Shogakukan and OLM. I personally own nothing and make nothing by writing this. Please do not flame.

(Chapter 17- How Not To Approach An Open Flame)

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“So we’re just waiting for May to come back to the practice yard and train with this…sparring partner that her trainer Professor Cruz-Marin has lined up for her,” says Holly while talking to a loved one on the telephone. After waiting a few seconds for the person on the other end of the line to finish, Holly answers, “Okay. I love you too, dad. Look for me tomorrow, alright? Thank you and I love you,” she concludes, shutting her phone in the process.

As she closes her cell phone, someone immediately seeks to speak with her. “Hey Holly,” this person greets, forcing the Sinnoh native to turn around and see Kelly come walking up to her with a big smile on her face. Needless to say with the way the lilac-haired girl has spoken and acted towards her since everyone came together in the dining hall, Holly is more than a little bit caught off guard with the way Kelly currently looks.

“Hi Kelly,” is the only way Holly knows how to respond to this cordialness. Risking the possibility of her head being verbally chopped off, Holly says to her former professor, “Look, forgive me if I seem like I’m reaching with this, but I’ve noticed that in the last hour, you’ve been pretty…distant towards me. Was it something that I did?”

‘Ooh, Holly,’ Kelly thinks, ‘you are not gonna get off that easily on me, girl. For what you’ve done to Conway and what Zoey has done to Kenny, you don’t deserve any sympathy.’

“No, you’re fine, Holly,” Kelly assures her former student. “I’m sorry that I might’ve seemed distant towards you or Zoey.” Kelly, though a major in nutrition, is using psychology to a ‘T’ by mentioning the name of Holly’s future partner. Though few other people would even pay it any mind, Kelly sees that the pokemon trainer cringed a little bit upon the mentioning of the tomboy’s name. If she wasn’t sure that Holly had something for Zoey even after seeing the two teen girls kiss, then she knew it now.

“It’s just that ever since May’s dad gave me the responsibility of training her, I’ve been taking it extremely seriously. We have a training regimen, and I don’t want to break it for fear that I’ll over exert her or her pokemon prior to the appeal and the second round. So if I seemed very snippy at all, that’s why.”

“Oh no problem, Kelly.”

As Holly turns to leave for the practice field, Kelly stops her. She asks Holly up front, “I know that it’s been a while since I’ve taught you, but just what’s the story behind you and Conway Ericsson getting together?”

“Conway?” asks Holly. Feeling comfortable in this conversation with her old professor, she answers, “Well, Conway I’ve known since I was…maybe fifteen or sixteen years old. Honestly, how we got together is funny, because I had a crush on another trainer. I felt that I had let him down at one time, so I took time off to learn as much as I could about pokemon training from top to bottom.”

“So you wanted to impress him by becoming a better trainer. Am I right?”

“That was in the plans. So that’s when I spent my time in Academy. I had my one class with you, but I stayed in Rustboro and found another trainer that I met back in Hearthome City. That trainer was Conway and when I first met him, even though I’ll admit that it’s shallow, I always thought he was quite the geek. When we were in our Pokemon moves class, I got to see…just a great guy. I forgot all about the other trainer, even though now we’re now really good friends.”

“I got to see first hand just how great a team we were in battle when all of our class participated in a tag battle tournament. The thing is Conway and I didn’t win. Even though I felt that I let him down, he reassured me that I did great. I wanted to run away because I believed that I did it again. He told me that I had to stop running away when things didn’t go my way. He suggested that we talk over some coffee, and I said yes.”

“And the rest is history?”

“Yeah. That’s how Conway and I got together.”

Deciding to put her master plan into action, Kelly asks her former student, “You’d never do anything to…hurt him, would you?”

“No way.” Crossing her fingers in front of Kelly, she explains, “Conway and I are like this. He got me out of a depression that I had. I still have it at times, but he’s helped me out tremendously. He’s real cool about a lot of things and I feel like I could talk to him about anything that’s on my mind.”

“Yeah it’s rare to find someone that will give you unconditional love,” Kelly says, playing into Holly’s games as long as she can muster. “I’m happy to have found someone just like that in my girlfriend.”

That was the last thing that Holly expected to hear from Kelly. She had to make sure that she wasn’t hearing things. “G-Girlfriend? Professor…”

“Yes, Holly. I’m gay,” Kelly informs the older teen without a problem. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of at all. All I’ve done is fall in love with someone, who happens to be a girl. Do you have a problem with that?”

“No! No, I don’t honestly,” Holly defends. “I just…it…who’s your girlfriend?”

“May.”

“May is your girlfriend?”

“Yes, Holly.”

“Wow. I…” Holly is legitimately shocked out of her thigh-length boots. “I never even thought…I never even suspected it of May…or you, for that matter. That’s just something that never came up, and I’d like to believe that as teacher and student, we were pretty close. With all the times after school you helped me when I needed it and all the people you’ve referred me to, I just never thought that it would be much of a problem. And…I’ve always felt that that was something that you do in private.”

“Why, out of shame?” Kelly inquires, almost insulted by that last remark from Holly. “That’s only for people that are afraid of themselves, but I’m not. The only reason I kept it secret is because there are some bigoted people in the Academy staff and elsewhere. They don’t bother me though. I am living happily as a gay woman, and I have no problem looking myself in the mirror every morning, because I love myself and my girlfriend a great deal. In fact, I plan on proposing to her very soon. If you love yourself, then it shouldn’t matter who you’re with. You said you always thought that it was something that should be kept private. What did you really mean by that?”

If Holly Samantha Rockwell was not nervous before in her conversation with the professor, then she is definitely nervous right now. Much like May and her embarrassment towards romance, Holly felt the same way about her future encounter with Zoey and all of her prior attractions towards other girls in her life. “I just—could you not tell Conway about this?” Nodding, Holly gets her cue from the younger teen to continue. “I’ve always been…bi-curious I guess is the best way to put it, and have always wondered what it felt like, even though I’ve never done any experimenting when I was younger.”

‘Damn,’ Kelly says in her head, ‘I didn’t think it’d be this easy to get to the bottom of this. Maybe I should pull the trigger right now.’

“Look, Holly,” Kelly tells the older woman, “like I told you, there is nothing to be ashamed of if you love yourself, can accept yourself and can look at yourself in the mirror. But I want to talk to you right now about Zoey.”

The taller woman gasps, not expecting to hear something like that at all from Kelly. Even though her Academy professor says that she should feel no shame, it’s not necessarily something that she wants to talk about at the moment, and she lets Kelly know this. “Professor Cruz-Marin? I’m sorry, but I’ve said too much already. I’ve—I’ve gotta go now. I’m sorry.” Holly then runs away from Kelly much to the professor’s chagrin.

“Holly?” she calls following her student. “Holly, come back here! You can’t keep running when things don’t go your way! Talk to me, Holly!” she screams as she chases the scared girl around the Slateport Stadium premises.

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Hitting the button for bottled water on the vending machine just outside of the ladies locker rooms, May gets her one liter bottle of water to quench her thirst that she’s had since earlier that morning. After speaking to Kelly about the misdoings of Zoey and Holly towards their boyfriends Kenny and Conway, May asked for a little bit of time alone to think and reflect on everything that she heard from her girlfriend earlier. In a few minutes, she is supposed to be back on the practice field to continue her training.

Until that time, May has decided to just walk around the open area some and enjoy her water while on the impromptu trek. Even after walking for two minutes, May has to admit that the story about Zoey and Holly cheating is very farfetched no matter what Kelly claims to have seen. ‘That just sounds so crazy,’ May thinks. ‘Yeah, Zoey is bisexual, but Conway and Holly have been happy for a long time. I mean, a very long time!’

“May?”

The bandana wearing coordinator turns around and sees Zoey carrying a bottle of a beverage for herself. Walking up to May, Zoey says, “Hey, May. What’s up? I would have asked you while training, but…I don’t know if I would have upset Kelly or not.”

“Oh, don’t worry about Kelly,” May assures. “She’s just really into training me and getting it down pat before the appeal. If she is a bit…snappy, then don’t take it personally. She’s just ticked off about something really…odd.” Half explaining Kelly’s anger towards Zoey, May notices off in the distance Kenny and Conway sitting off into the distance near one of the empty stadium canopies.

“Ticked off?” Zoey asks out of confusion. “What could she be ticked off…” the short haired one stops speaking for a second as she hears her phone ring. Checking the outside screen, she sees no number. What she does see is that the phone call is from ‘DAD’. “May? Hang on a second. I have to take this.” Turning away from her friend from Petalburg, Zoey answers the phone with a, “Hey, daddy. Yeah, things are going well here in Slateport. Yeah, Kenny’s doing alright. He’s not next to me or anything. He just went off to take a break.”

Not really wanting to eavesdrop in what is Zoey’s family matter, May instead focuses on both Kenny and Conway off in the distance. Whatever conversation these two teens are sharing, it is clear that the two are really into what they are talking about. May allows only a chuckle to come out of her mouth before she sees Conway flick some of Kenny’s hair away from his face.

By no means did May expect to see this happen, and it left her with far more questions than answers. As she watches both Kenny and Conway look at their surroundings, she turns away in the hopes that they are not able to see her. Tempted to turn around and find out what happens next, May does exactly that and immediately regrets the action. What she finds are the two teenage boys from Twinleaf Town and Veilstone City French kissing each other from underneath the concrete canopy of the stadium.

May has to catch her breath when she sees this happening. She can’t believe how overt the two are being and with Kenny’s girlfriend not that far from them! While Kelly might have thought that she saw Zoey and Holly intertwined, she found it difficult to believe, but there is no way in which the Petalburg native can deny what’s in front of her right now. She is speechless as she watches the two of them now start to add some tongue into their smooching. She has to tell Kelly about this and set her straight, so she leaves her friend Zoey without any warning. She is still preoccupied with her phone call to her father.

“Yeah, you can watch the Grand Festival matches tomorrow on Fuji Television,” Zoey informs her father. “I think the time is…one o’clock for the opening ceremonies and then at 2:05 they have the first round matches.” Turning around, she asks, “Say May, do the matches…” Zoey stops as she does not see May anymore. Wherever she is, she is obviously not here.

Getting back on the phone with her father, Zoey tells him, “Just check your listings and you shouldn’t miss a minute. Okay? I’ll talk to you later tonight. Give mom my regards. Okay. Bye now.” Hanging up the phone, Zoey turns around again and gets a look at her surroundings. There are still plenty of people walking by either getting to the arena to watch the round the clock appeals, kids and their parents buying up all the trinkets and food outside the arena and a couple that has no problem showing their love to one another, even at the risk of being found out.

As Zoey watches these two guys release themselves from their stranglehold on each other, she sees their faces and laughs out loud. She laughs so hard that the two look off into the distance to find Zoey spotting them from afar. While Kenny laughs along with his girlfriend, Conway becomes very red in the face upon being found out. Yes, it’s Zoey and yes he knew that she would eventually see this, but that doesn’t make it any less embarrassing.

Waving to both boys, she leaves to head back to the practice yard. ‘Well,’ she thinks, ‘it’s good to see those two are getting along well.’

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Your thoughts?

 

[shadow_shipper]

My thoughts : you updated really too fast for me this time xD

But I liked chapters 15 and 16 for the lenght and time you took to dwell on the character's backgrounds, gets you to know better who you're dealing with ^^
Though I was disappointed that Solidad's appearance was for now, very short and abrupt...
Chapter 17, timewise, is happening right around the same time Dawn meets Solidad, and Drew has his appeal, right ?

And the thing now, well, Zoey knows what's going on, and what it means, May and Kelly know what's going on, but not what it means...drama

 

[Rave The Rich]

Time to 'Get Into the Game' with Chapters 18 and 19!

My thoughts : you updated really too fast for me this time xD

Everyone says that I update this story very quickly, including the reviewers on fan fiction dot net. I will admit I have a tendency to be quick in my updates, but I doubt few people will complain. That just means that they get more story quicker.

But I liked chapters 15 and 16 for the lenght and time you took to dwell on the character's backgrounds, gets you to know better who you're dealing with ^^

That is one of my favorite aspects of those chapters. You get a sense of what they feel as the story takes a more introspective approach as far as characterization.

It also gets you behind certain characters and against others as well. ^^

Though I was disappointed that Solidad's appearance was for now, very short and abrupt...

Solidad's role will get bigger as the story goes on. By chapter 25, I'm taking a break of about six weeks so I can work on other projects, one of which you'll see on this site in the next week or so. For now, her role will be minor, but will increase as time goes on.

Chapter 17, timewise, is happening right around the same time Dawn meets Solidad, and Drew has his appeal, right ?

That's right!

And the thing now, well, Zoey knows what's going on, and what it means, May and Kelly know what's going on, but not what it means...drama

Yes. It does mean drama, but not necessarily for those six (was that a plot bunny that just hopped by)?

I have a feeling you will love these next two chapters! Here are 18 and 19! Enjoy!

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4127100/18/All_Roads_Lead_to_the_Grand_Festival

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Pokemon, a creation of one Satoshi Tajiri, and is produced domestically (in the United States) by Pokemon USA/The Pokemon Company, and internationally by Shogakukan and OLM. I personally own nothing and make nothing by writing this. Please do not flame.

(Chapter 18- Get Into the Game: Part One)

She is sweating while she is running. While one would naturally expect anyone to do this, May is perspiring from more than just running back towards the practice field area. What the coordinator just saw a couple of minutes ago between Kenny and Conway is not something that the eyes can ever be prepared to see.

As she runs in the direction of the practice field, she comes across in her mind the most beautiful face in the world.

“I’ve been waiting for you, May!” Kelly exclaims tentatively. “I came very close to getting Holly to crack, but suddenly, she shut me down. I tried to run after her, but…she’s fast.”

As the coordinator in sweatpants runs up to Kelly, the girl from Lilycove can tell that May is winded from running, but at the same time, she can see that May appears to be very on edge. Even after catching her breath from her run, May is still taking deep breaths of the outdoor air.

“May?” Kelly questions. Getting a good look at her would-be fiancée’s face, she becomes very concerned for the girl. “May, are you alright? You look paler than a ghost!”

May would consider that logic correct as she feels like she has indeed seen a ghost. “I—Kelly, I…just, I’ll be fine, I promise. I just want to get to practice.”

Kelly is not convinced that her favorite girl will be fine anytime soon with the way she looks at the moment. “May—look at me, May. Look at me,” Kelly pleads of her while adjusting her face so that the girlfriends are now seeing each other eye to eye. “Now what happened? Does this have to do with Zoey? Did you just talk to her?”

“No,” May answers. She then turns away from Kelly as she feels the tears about to come down her face. “Kelly, I wish it was just Zoey. I…I don’t know how to say this.”

“Just say it, May! Whatever it is, I want you to just let it out.”

“It’s really screwed up, Kelly.”

“Just…say it!”

“You said that you saw Zoey and Holly kissing earlier, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, I have to admit that I didn’t really believe you when you told me what you saw, even though I asked you how you planned to go about it solving this. You were very adamant about it, but I still didn’t believe you because it sounded so cracked up. I mean those four make up two of the most loving couples that I’ve ever seen outside of us!”

As May continues, she finds herself in a better position to reveal her news to Kelly. She has since calmed down from her hysteria and can now let Kelly know just what she saw. “First off, I didn’t find Zoey as much as Zoey found me and well…I wanted to at least ask Zoey about how she and Holly know each other. It was part of the plan that you talked about. You said that we should make them crack. It wasn’t direct or anything and no one would be the wiser. Well, as I was about to ask her, she had this phone call that she took from…I believe it was her father. Off in the distance…I saw Kenny and Conway, and…”

“And?”

“They were kissing each other.”

Kelly could not believe it. She is grabbing her head as she believes that her head is starting to hurt. “Kenny…was kissing Conway? Is that what you’re trying to tell me, May?”

“I saw it, Kelly, with my own two eyes.”

“Oh my God! May, if what you’re saying is true, then that means they’re just…God! Damn them all! This isn’t even something that I can fathom happening, not even in my wildest dreams! Both are cheating on each other with one another’s same sex partners. You said that Zoey was there with you?”

“Right there with me, but she didn’t see any of this happen.”

“Okay, why didn’t you say anything to her if that’s the case?”

“For one, I was absolutely speechless when I saw it. What could I say at that moment? I didn’t want this big kettle of fish to be opened up if Zoey really is cheating on Kenny with Holly. But honestly, Kelly, I don’t mean to sound like a broken record, but I was speechless! You have to admit that’s a huge shock for anyone!”

Pacing around the entrance of the practice yard, Kelly has to think things over. Overall, there are four people, two same sex affairs, and one huge issue that Kelly addresses to May. “What the hell are we gonna do about this, May? Okay, we now know that they’re all cheating. We don’t have to walk like we’re on a tightrope to figure this out, because we know it’s all true. We know what’s up.” Taking a few more seconds to think about what to do next, Kelly suggests, “We’ll give them one chance to be honest with us. We’ll talk to them in private and give them one final chance to come clean. If they don’t, then we let it out, and…we let them settle their own ****. I think that’s for the best and whatever happens—whatever happens…happens. I think that’s for the best.”

May doesn’t react much at all to Kelly’s newest suggestion with the exception of some light nodding and shaking of the head whenever the specific action called for it. When her girlfriend came up with her final plan for the four, it made a great deal of sense and seemed to be the best fit for everyone involved. “Okay. We have practice, though, so let’s do that first.”

“Good point,” Kelly admits. “Lucy is getting her Skitty from the Battle Pike during break and Ash’s Charizard is gonna arrive any minute now. So…let’s not even think about those four. That’s their problem that they have to deal with when the time comes. Though I’ve said it time and time again to you, rid your mind of your distractions. Shake a leg, and get your butt back into the game, May. I want to see that aggression out of you that I saw earlier, but I also want to see if we can get that out of your pokemon, as well. Deal?”

“Okay,” May answers. She then hugs Kelly for a few seconds before they release the hug and head back into the practice area. While May is walking ahead of her girlfriend, Kelly once again whispers into her best friend’s ear, “So, are you ready to get your butt into the game?”

“As ready as I can be, Kelly.” What May doesn’t expect is for Kelly to propel her into the game in her own special way by giving her girlfriend her second smack on the behind this morning.

Responding to the smack just like when she woke up some hours ago, May listens to Kelly tell her while pointing to her, “Now you’re ready,” before the Academy professor runs off into the yard to avoid being chased by May.

“Come back here, Kelly!” May screams as they both turn the corner that leads to their plot of land. “One of these days, it’s gonna be your ***!”

“Yeah,” Kelly calls back to her girlfriend, “but it’s not gonna be today!”

While meandering through people and pokemon alike, May chases Kelly all the way back to the practice yard, and as they make it to their designated plot, she does indeed chase Kelly and tackle her down to the ground, essentially pouncing on top of the girl in overalls. May unashamedly does this in front of her and Kelly’s parents, her brother, his boyfriend, Brock and Lucy, all of whom laugh at the scene before them knowing just how affectionate the two can be, even in public. Conspicuous by its absence is the quartet of Zoey, Kenny, Conway and Holly.

The tandem shares a kiss on the lips before helping each other get up from off the ground. After setting up some items on her plot of the field, May waits for further instructions from her trainer to begin the second part of her training session. Once a check of the field is done, Kelly blows her whistle to get the gallery’s attention once more.

“Okay, everyone!” she begins enthusiastically. “It’s time for part two of our open training session! Ash’s Charizard hasn’t arrived just yet, so we’re gonna start with a little…‘Showdown of the Skittys’. We’ll have Lucy’s Skitty go up against May’s in a contest style battle for…three minutes, and we’ll go from there.”

“Why three minutes instead of five, Kelly?” Norman asks out of curiosity.

“Because Skitty is gonna likely be May’s appeal pokemon, and I don’t want to put too much of a strain on her if I don’t need to,” Kelly explains. “Basically, I want to see her attack ability against another Skitty and see if we can’t raise aggressiveness. So Lucy, if you don’t mind…”

“No problem, Kelly,” Lucy responds, taking her hands off of Brock and walking to the opposite side of the practice field facing May about thirteen to seventeen meters away from her.

“So to recap once again,” Kelly speaks for the gallery, “this battle will be a contest battle.” May’s trainer stops for a second as she notices both Kenny and Zoey walking to find a seat on the bleachers to watch this battle take place. Shrugging off their tardiness and their mere appearance, Kelly continues, “This is between Pike Queen Lucy of the Battle Frontier and coordinator May Maple of Petalburg City. Both will use their respective Skittys in a battle with a three minute time limit. Is that understood?”

Both Lucy and May nod their heads. The impromptu referee for this bout commands them to call out their pokemon and both call out their respective Skittys.

“Let the battle begin!” Kelly calls out in excitement.

“All right, Skitty,” May begins, “let’s start out with a tackle!”

While May would rather begin with the basics, Lucy decides to fight her own battle and attempts to systematically break the battle down into a simple science.

“Use fake out, Skitty!” Lucy calls after the call of tackle from May. The result of the two attacks is both Skittys coming together in the center of the practice field, with both none the worse for wear.

“I don’t get the rationale behind something like that,” Max admits to Brock. “I mean, in a pokemon battle with no time limit, I can understand that there’d be a feeling out process…”

“And there still is one right here and right now, Little Maximus!” Harley chimes in much to the chagrin of his boyfriend, especially after he uses his pet name from years ago. “It’s just that the feeling out process is gonna take a lot less time. By doing this, both May and Lucy are trying to find a quick but effective out for each one’s pokemon so they can stylishly end this the best way they know how.”

“Harley, I couldn’t have said it better myself,” Brock commends.

“Maybe, but May has TMs and her Skitty is at a very high level,” Max debates. “She doesn’t need to draw this out…unless…”

“All right, Skitty! Use copycat!” May commands, and the fake out by May’s pokemon used in retaliation on Lucy’s catches her pokemon off guard long enough for May to make another command. “Now, double slap!” May’s command is successful as Lucy’s Skitty feels red in the face for more than just embarrassment.

“Now I see why she did that!” Max exclaims to the people around him. “Skitty can only use the move fake out as its very first attack, but there is a loophole to that rule. Obviously, there has to be an advantage to using fake out to fool your opponent, which is probably the reason why Lucy used it, but she neglected to realize that May could do the exact same thing only through using copycat right after Lucy used fake out. And in a contest battle, judges will take off for that each and every time.”

Patting him on the back, Harley comments, “That’s my little Maximus!” to a response of growling from his much younger boyfriend.

“Man, I wish Glameow could use copycat,” Zoey laments to Kenny. “We’d smoke the Orange Islands completion over an open flame and have ‘em for lunch!”

“Don’t let that get to your head, May,” says Lucy, whose confidence has not wavered despite her most recent gaffe. “Skitty, get back into it using sing!”

Pike Queen Lucy’s Skitty then literally breaks into song, singing a very soothing melody designed to relax its opponent, leaving it open for attack.

“Skitty, don’t fall for it!” May warns. Thinking of a way out of her present situation, she decides on using a technical machine that she had been saving for a rainy day. “Okay Skitty, focus using calm mind!” Though she knows that May just beat her to the punch, Lucy does not show any negative emotion.

“Ooh, damn! That’s a smart move!” Zoey comments.

“You’re right,” Kenny retorts. “By having Skitty focus on something other than the relaxing music coming from its counterpart, there’s less of a chance of her falling victim to this modern day Siren.”

Looking at her boyfriend with an odd gaze, the tomboy asks Kenny, “When did you get so mythological?”

As the Twinleaf native explains, “Dawn, before her…change, turned me onto Professor Oak’s poetry and I’ve been a fan ever since. You might have heard me drop some quotes here and there.”

“Oh, so you’re relaxed now? Huh, May?” Lucy questions sounding almost like a goad or a coax. “Well, we have ways of fixing that very quickly. Skitty? Lay off the harmonics for now. It’s time to get physical. May, you’re not the only one with TMs in this battle. Skitty? Use double team, and let’s see how May’s pokemon likes it when it’s ten against one!”

Noticing that the sun is not directly high in the sky, Brock immediately notices a problem with his girlfriend’s plan. “Wait, Lucy! That’s not gonna work!”

“Brock,” Lucy calls back to her boyfriend, “I’ve got this! Just relax!”

“But the shadows…”

“Brock! Let me handle this, okay?” Lucy screams back to Brock. As a result of this combined with the fact that he doesn’t want any arguments, Brock opts to just sit back down on the bench and watch the remainder of the battle.

Taking in every word that Brock mentioned, including something about shadows, May looks at the numerous Skittys on the playing field that are surrounding her own. Checking for shadows, she sees that only one of them has a shadow; the one directly in front of her own.

Using another TM, May commands, “Skitty, use shock wave, front and center!” In the time in which Lucy was distracted by Brock, May was able to get in the attack that dealt very little in damage to Lucy’s pokemon and eliminated all of the other copies from the field. At that point, the damage didn’t necessarily matter as much as the fact that Lucy’s Skitty was now disoriented, leaving it even more open for attack.

“Okay, Skitty. It’s time for the dagger!” May declares. “Use double edge, now!”

Skitty’s most powerful attack in a high-charging tackle proved to be extremely effective in battle, as Lucy’s Skitty suffered a high amount of impact in a very short period of time, essentially knocking her right out of battle. Kelly watches all of this saying no words until she can clearly see that Lucy’s cat pokemon cannot go another second in this battle.

Blowing her whistle, she declares, “Pike Queen Lucy’s Skitty is unable to go on! May Maple’s Skitty is the winner in a time of…” taking only a second, Kelly checks her watch to see that the battle took, “two minutes and forty-nine seconds!”

The gallery which watched this battle take place stands up and applauds the effort of both coordinator and Frontier Brain. Norman comments, “Fantastic match up! May, you realized that you had to watch for the shadow in double team and you used your TMs to near perfection as well. Lucy is tough; let me assure you of this, and in this one, she wasn’t a pushover either, so let’s give her credit as well. Wonderful work on both offense and defense for the two of you.”

“Thank you, Norman,” Lucy humbly answers.

“Oh, dad,” May responds embarrassed at the compliments from her father, “stop it. You’re gonna make me blush in front of all these people.”

As Norman is about to comment and Kelly goes to May to congratulate her, they all feel a giant wisp of wind fly through the practice field. Not that long afterwards, a distinct growl can be heard almost like a sonic boom in the air.

Everyone in attendance looks up to see just what the commotion is, and they watch an orange winged lizard fly though the air with great speed and agility for a larger pokemon. He growls once more. To a few in the audience, it’s quite familiar. To others, they are seeing this battle-tested fire pokemon for the very first time.

Kelly looks up and watches as this flyer slows his acceleration and starts to circle the perimeter. She smiles as she says to everyone else in attendance, “It looks like Blaziken’s sparring partner is here!”

Seeing Ash’s Charizard for the first time, Kenny and Zoey are in awe. They had heard so much about him through Dawn and once or twice through Ash, but had never seen him before until now.

Kenny is impressed and informs Zoey, “It’s on…like Donkey Kong.”

Bringing her head down and face palming herself, Zoey sarcastically quips, “Some philosopher.”

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http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4127100/19/All_Roads_Lead_to_the_Grand_Festival

(Chapter 19- Get Into the Game: Part Two)

Tissues are to her left and Conway is to her right. For about the past ten minutes, this has been the case with the trainer from Veilstone right at the side of his girlfriend as she has been crying out her frustrations to him.

After being confronted by her ex-professor not that long ago in a discussion that covered how she got together with Conway in the first place, Kelly’s homosexuality, keeping feelings bottled up, and being comfortable with yourself, Kelly then confronted her old student on the subject of Zoey. While she was able to get very far into her plan and lead into this moment with Holly, Kelly could not go any further. Holly just wouldn’t allow it, saying that she’s said too much already and that she has to go.

And she went…all the way into the arms of Conway, who had gone off to spend some more time with Kenny before their activities. Kenny understood that the situation was one that should be handled between boyfriend and girlfriend, so he gave the couple their space and went back to the practice field to find Zoey.

When Conway asked Holly what the matter was, all she could do was blubber back a response in the face of tears flowing down her face with the frequency of a waterfall. It was at this time that Conway decided to lead his girlfriend back to their hotel room so she can calm down and explain what happened to her that has led her to tears.

From rubbing her shoulders to urging her to take deep breaths in and out, Conway has done his absolute best to try and soothe the saddened female trainer. He can tell that Holly’s crying fit has just about run its course and he can now go about asking the million-dollar question that has been on his mind for the past twenty minutes.

“So, Holly, I won’t press you, but you have to know that if you don’t open up to anyone, no one can help you. So what happened?”

Though sniffles, Holly is able to be the unfortunate bearer of bad news by telling Conway, “We’ve been found out.”

“What? Found out?” he asks. “How? By who?”

“Kelly, and I’m pretty sure she’s told May by now. Actually, it’s more of a case of Kelly finding me out. As far as I know, you and Kenny are in the clear. I don’t know how she did it, but she kept asking me these questions like ‘Would you ever hurt Conway?’ and ‘Do I have a problem with gays and lesbians?’, and something inside of me just caused me to…let her know that I’m bi-curious. You know that they’re a couple, right?”

“Honestly, yes,” Conway admits to great surprise from Holly. “I knew. I…it was a situation when we were at Academy in our class together. though I know I shouldn’t have done it, I peeked into an instructor’s lounge. There I saw Miss Roxanne and Professor Cruz-Marin talking about having the latter one be transferred to an Academy in Kanto because they were afraid that if word ever got out about her and May, students wouldn’t care for it too much.”

“I never even would’ve guessed,” Holly says, now much calmer than even three minutes ago. “People are too quick to judge on a lot of things. Who knows what could’ve happened? But…what ultimately caused me to snap was Kelly wanting to talk about Zoey. I suppose that the shock of her asking all these questions and leading me to that last one was too much for me to take and I ran. And that’s what happened.”

“We need to work on you running away all the time,” Conway stops.

“Like I need a freaking lecture right now!” Holly snaps.

“Slow down, okay?” he calmly speaks, trying to halt any potential arguments from being sparked. “It’s true; otherwise you would’ve disregarded that comment completely. And to be quite honest, I think that you’re crying over nothing. From everything you’ve just told me, I’m still not entirely convinced that Kelly knows about you swinging.”

“I’m pretty sure that she does, Conway,” Holly responds. “Why in the world would she ask me about Zoey? Her words were you don’t have to be ashamed when I told her that I’m bi-curious, and then she said ‘Now let’s talk about Zoey’. Coincidence? I really don’t think so, Conway.”

Pounding the side table drawer of the hotel after she finds that pounding her pillow doesn’t allow her to vent her anger enough, Holly digs her face back into the hotel pillow, wet from the numerous tears that have been shed on it. In her condition, Holly could care less if some more were added like they are being added right now as she cries once more into her bed.

Sighing in response to even more tears from his sweetheart, Conway feels for Holly a great deal. While he admits to having a great deal of nerves delving into bisexual swinging for the first time, Kenny has done a great job getting him to relax and be invigorated. Holly is either having second thoughts, Zoey is not doing nearly the job for Holly that Kenny has been doing for Conway, or it could be something else.

“Holly?” Conway asks her once again rubbing her back and shoulders. “Are you sure this is what you want? Because if it’s not, we’ll talk to Kenny and Zoey, and we can go home and forget this ever happened. But if you want to do this, you have to stop feeling sorry for yourself or feeling as if you’re gonna let people down with every little thing that you do. Who knows? This is more than just sex, Holly Rock. You could earn some good friends out of this, but you have to commit to this 100 percent like me. You understand?”

Stopping her most recent crying fit for a second, she listened to all of Conway’s words. They did make a lot of sense. “Well…”

“Don’t answer yet. I’ll give you some time to think about it alone with a clear head, alright? How long do you need?”

“Maybe…half an hour.”

“Okay, I’ll be back,” Conway says, giving a kiss to his girlfriend before he goes to leave his hotel room.

“I love you, Conway,” say Holly before her man leaves.

“I love you too, dear,” he says back to her with a peace sign as he opens and closes the door, leaving Holly on her own with only her thoughts to keep her company for the next thirty minutes.

---------

After the excitement that came with many in May’s party seeing Ash Ketchum’s Charizard for the very first time, it became apparent to everyone there that it was time to get down to business.

Everyone sitting down in the bleachers has their eyes focused on Charizard as he sits in the center of the ring eagerly anticipating his competition, but Brock is also focused on his girlfriend, who snapped at him during her contest battle mere minutes ago. As Brock watches Lucy pat both Kelly and May on the back and come back his way, he anticipates the worst, especially when she walks up to him with her neutral, concentrating face.

“Hey, Luce?” Brock greets. “I’m…sorry for butting into your battle like that.”

The Frontier Brain of the Battle Pike does not show any emotion either way to Brock’s apology. Brock decides to add to what he just said. “It’s just that with the shadows out and everything, double team becomes less confusing to pokemon.”

“I know this, Brock,” Lucy responds, showing Brock the smile that he fell in love with years ago, “but I concocted this genius plan in my head. Keep in mind that all of this is to build up Skitty’s confidence for her appeal this afternoon. I don’t want to say that I took a dive, but I did leave the door open a lot of times for May to use her TMs and maneuvers to her advantage. Like I told May and Kelly just now, if Skitty feels good about herself, the appeal will come off looking much better and she’ll give it her all.”

“So that…blowup was all part of the plan?” Brock asks in clarification.

“Yeah, pretty much. I know how meticulous you can be about battle strategy, and when something is…not the way it probably should be or someone is being careless in battle, you’ll be the first to speak out. I didn’t think my acting would be that effective, though.”

“Had me fooled,” Brock admits with a hearty laugh as Lucy joins him on the bench.

Once more, Kelly blows her whistle to alert the crowd, which now has Conway added into the mix. While Kelly explains to them that it’s the final practice session for May before her appeal, Kenny asks Conway, “Where’s Holly? I know she was quite emotional during the break.”

Trying to keep his voice low due to the many people around him, Conway answers, “She thinks that Kelly knows about her. I’m not too sure that that’s the case, but that’s what she thinks.”

“You mean the swinging?” Zoey asks.

“Yeah.”

“If that’s the case, then we let them know,” Zoey concludes. “I doubt it will be that big of a deal and we are amongst understanding friends who know a thing or two about controversies in relationships. The idea behind kissing in public or as close as you can get to public was to get the thrill of being caught and to relax people before it actually happened. It’s admittedly hit or miss and luckily, she only got discovered by a concerned friend. Anyone could misconstrue it, so the best people to let in on this would be good friends. But like everything else this weekend, it’s your call. If you want to not keep this a secret anymore, we’ll tell them. If not, we’ll keep hiding.”

Blowing her whistle loudly once again, Kelly gets the attention of Kenny, Conway and Zoey, who conversed the entire time that she explained how the sparring session. “Would you three like to share your conversation with the rest of us? I’m sure they’d all be quite interested in what you’re saying.”

Embarrassed at being singled out by May’s trainer like only a ticked off educator can do, the three sullenly apologize to Kelly. Reluctantly, she accepts the apology, and continues, “Now, as I was saying, Charizard’s trainer is obviously not here, so we’re gonna have to find a replacement. Now who would like to train him for this one battle only?”

With most of the people in attendance knowing the power that this pokemon possesses, the idea of one of them taking control of the beast sounds like a very daunting task. This is likely the reason why no one has raised their hand in the air.

“Now, come on,” Kelly says almost pleading. “Someone has to want to do this! Do I have to make this like my classroom and call for a volunteer?” A few seconds pass and still, no one answers the call. Kelly decides to pick someone like fruit from an orchard.

“Okay…dad,” Kelly says, much to her father’s surprise, “you’ve trained pokemon before. Would you train Charizard against May and her Blaziken?”

“What? But Kelly that was a very, very long time ago!”

“It’s like riding a bike dad,” she assures him, “once you get back on, it’s like you’ve never forgotten.”

“Come on, honey,” says Erik’s wife, Julia. “I’d kind of like to see you train. I mean, I didn’t meet you until after you left training some twenty odd years ago. I have a few tapes, but that’s all I’ve ever seen. I’m…quite curious.”

“Yeah, come on!” says Norman, who now gets into the act along with his wife. Slowly but surely, Erik Marin realizes that he’s fighting a losing battle as every member of the gallery is now chanting his name and egging him on to accept his daughter’s challenge.

“All right. All right!” he concedes, getting up from the bleachers and standing in the spot that Lucy stood in just a few minutes ago.

Kelly takes a few more seconds to make sure that everyone is in place and both pokemon are ready for battle before she blows her whistle once more, announcing to the crowd, “Okay everyone! This is the final practice before this afternoon’s appeal. This is a pokemon contest battle between May Maple of Petalburg City and her Blaziken. Her challenger will be…my dad Erik Marin who will stand in as acting trainer for Charizard, a pokemon of Ash Ketchum’s. This battle has no time limit. Are there any questions?”

Hearing no sound come out of either one’s mouth after a few seconds, Kelly is satisfied, and says to the two, “Then let the battle begin!”

“All right, Blaziken!” May says, grabbing the fully evolved pokemon’s attention. “We may have a bit of a disadvantage of flying versus fighting, but don’t let that get in the way of the fact that this is a fire fight!”

“How do you think this is gonna play out, Brock?” Max asks his older friend.

“I believe that this will be an interesting battle,” Brock admits. “I’m not too sure how much battling Ash’s Charizard has done since his time in the Charicific Valley as a bodyguard to Charla. He could be a bit rusty. I know that Kelly was trying her best to coax her dad into training Charizard for this sparring session, but there has to be some rust from being away from it for so long. As an example, soccer players just can’t come back to the game from a serious injury right away. They need to practice.”

“Blaziken, let’s start off with fire punch!” May’s command for Blaziken to begin with a fighting fire type move is in an attempt to try and cut off Charizard’s advantage in this battle.

“Charizard!” Erik calls, not meaning to be too deliberate in the command, “Uh…jump up in the air to dodge!”

“He’s playing against our strengths,” May thinks out loud. “Blaziken, keep your fire punch going, but slow down! We’ll head Charizard off attacking when he comes down!”

Refusing to waiver from her strategy pays off as Blaziken hits his fire punch at the moment when Charizard comes back down to the ground.

Norman cringes at the gaffe from the father of his girlfriend’s daughter and loudly suggests, “You have to time that dodge correctly, Erik, and remember that you’re in control of a flyer. Use that to your advantage!”

“Norman, stop backseat battling!” Caroline scolds.

Ignoring the commotion going on in the stands, May decides to stay the course. “All right, Blaziken! We’ve got him off kilter! Now, let’s use slash attack!”

“Charizard! Counter using air slash!” Erik commands, realizing that he has to use his strengths in order to win. With a quick flick of his wings, Charizard listens to Erik and moves the air in the direction of the charging Blaziken and pushes the fire pokemon back to the feet of May on the other end of the battlefield.

“Damn it!” she interjects, knowing that air slash would always win in that exchange. Though frustrated at this clear handicap that her pokemon possess against flyers, Blaziken doesn’t stay on the ground for long. Her pokemon wants to keep fighting, and that’s more than enough to want to keep May in the game as well.

“All right. That might have worked now, Erik, but I do have my ways about me.” May then points Blaziken into the direction of Charizard and informs him, “New strategy, Blaziken! Use sky uppercut and aim for Charizard’s back!”

“Charizard!” Erik commands, now getting comfortable in the role of trainer, “Counter again using wing attack!”

“Blaziken, evade the wing attack and follow Charizard from behind using brave bird, now!”

Being much faster than Charizard, weighing less than him and having some flying ability, Blaziken can make the mid-air directional change and drive its body into the back of the fire dragon, though the pokemon does take some damage with the hit.

Harley looks at every step of the battle so far in complete awe. “I love May’s strategy right now.”

Max turns to his much older boyfriend and asks him, “Why? She using no fire attacks whatsoever and just about everything has been fighting, and May knows that Charizard always have an edge against fighting types.”

“Yeah,” Harley agrees, “but look where she’s aiming her fighting attacks. Everything right now is aiming for Charizard’s back. Not only does that make it hard as heck to breathe, but if Charizard’s back is hurting, that’ll make it harder for him to fly.”

Max replays the last few moves in his head and notices that this is the case. “Oh! Yeah! But if I could add something, sweetheart?”

“What’s that?”

“I noticed it just right now and I can’t believe I didn’t see it, but May’s also aiming for Charizard’s wings. Attacking the strengths of pokemon. Man, this is good! If she keeps this up, no one can beat her today or tomorrow!”

“No way, no how, little…”

Pointing to his suitor, Max warns him only one time, “Don’t…say it.”

“Charizard! Get into the game!” Erik goads as he starts to really get used to battling again after an absence of over twenty years. “You know Blaziken can’t beat you, so let’s not even pull any more punches!”

“I beg your pardon?” May asks almost insulted by these comments. “I’ll have you know that I pull no punches either, Erik! Blaziken, let’s show him using flamethrower!”

“All right, Charizard!” Erik commands, noticing that he is gaining the fire dragon’s trust, “If that’s the case, then we’ll fight fire with fire. Show Blaziken your flamethrower, now!”

“This is the ultimate test for any pokemon,” Conway speaks. “Going move for move. We’ll just see who’s the strongest here and now.” Zoey and Kenny can only agree with him as they all turn to watch just who’s fire will burn the best.

Like an arm wrestling match up, tennis or ping pong, the advantage goes back and forth between the two fully evolved fire types. When it seems like Charizard will engulf Blaziken in flames, Blaziken comes back and moves the point of contact closer to the fire dragon. Back and forth they go with each holding their own for nearly a minute before the combustion of the flames becomes too much to handle and the fire explodes in front of everyone’s face.

“Oh, ****!” interjects the referee as the flames spread through their portion of the battlefield.

The trainers, referee and spectators wisely duck and cover in order to avoid getting a face full of flames and wait out any potential danger. About twenty seconds or so of the battle have passed with no activity on the field other than waiting for the smoke to clear. Once the vision on the field is clear, everyone looks up from their current position to find that both Charizard and Blaziken are down…but not out.

“Kelly,” Norman says, looking at the scene before him, “I really think that we should call this a draw. Even if they haven’t fainted, I don’t know how much they can take right now.”

Looking at the two fire pokemon, Kelly asks them, “Blaziken? Charizard? Do you two wanna keep going?” While both are clearly weak from what has been a hard fought battle, no one can question their resolve as they both nod in response to Kelly’s question. They don’t want to stop before their time.

May and Erik find it difficult to want to continue given the powerful attack that just occurred. Despite this, they both choose to continue in battle as both pokemon gingerly get back up on their feet.

“Charizard! Just do the best you can!” Erik calls. “Remember that Blaziken is suffering too. Hang in there and try using heat wave!”

Upon hearing this latest command, May decides to act while Charizard is far too weak to use its flying advantage. “Blaziken, try a blaze kick on Charizard!”

“Charizard, counter by flying up in the air!”

“I think they’re throwing caution to the wind at this point,” Zoey comments from the bleachers. “This just can’t go on that much longer for either one, so why not give it all you’ve—hey! Holly!”

“Holly?” asks Kelly and May in unison as they look up in the bleachers to indeed see the girl in her late teens.

“Am I too late for the spar?” she comments making her way over to her boyfriend and swinging partners while wearing a pair of sunglasses just like Kenny and Zoey.

Shrugging off the affection that the four show when they hug and talk to each other, May looks up in the sky to find that Blaziken missed her kick on Charizard. “Okay, use sky uppercut!”

As Erik watches Blaziken fly up in the air to catch Charizard, he takes Norman’s advice from earlier and waits out calling his next command. ‘Wait for it,’ Erik thinks. ‘Wait for it.’ Once Blaziken gets close enough, Erik decides to strike. “All right, Charizard! Use iron tail now!”

Tumbling inside out while in mid air, Charizard comes down on top of Blaziken with his steel tail and deals the final nail in the coffin in this battle as Blaziken faints coming down to the ground.

Blowing her whistle, Kelly announces to the trainers and the crowd, “Blaziken is unable to battle. In a time of six minutes and twenty-three seconds, the winners are Charizard and…my dad, Erik Marin!”

Erik and Charizard receive a healthy amount of applause from the crowd while May calls back Blaziken telling her that she did a great job. Patting the fire dragon on the back Erik says, “You were fantastic, Charizard! Now I see where you get your great reputation!” Right after he gives the pokemon its due praise, Charizard scorches him with a flamethrower, just like he used to do Ash many years ago.

Blowing smoke from his mouth, Erik comments, “Oh yeah. That’s the part I hated the most.”

“Will you be alright, honey?” Julia asks her husband.

“Yeah. Nothing a little ice can’t cure, dear.”

Kelly pays no attention to her parents as she immediately goes to May after the battle. “You got distracted, didn’t you? I mean, by Holly?”

“Yeah, I did, but I’m not gonna blame Holly for my loss. I had a disadvantage with Blaziken and she held on until the very end. Honestly, it could’ve gone either way.”

“I agree.” Kelly blows her whistle one final time to get the group’s attention and say, “All right, everyone! That concludes our practice. Everyone go and have fun and remember; May’s appeal is at 5:30 p.m. We’ll see you then!” Turning to May, she says, “Let’s go to the pokemon center for Charizard and Blaziken, and then we can deal with…them. Okay?”

“Okay!” May comments as the two walk hand in hand to the local pokemon center so that everyone’s pokemon can be in tip top condition for tomorrow.

 

[shadow_shipper]

Well, let's get into it !
I still can't understand why this is such a big deal to Kelly ?! I mean, ok, she has convictions and principles, but it's their life after all ! And if she would want to do something about it, she should go up to them and tell them straight on instead of sneaking around...

I like what I see concerning the battling aspect in your fic, since using attack has very different effects than in the anime, and especially in the game ^^
It's innovating, to say the least.

Blaziken vs. Charizard, nice battle glad Charizard won, it's actually more realistic this way !
Can't wait for her actual appeal ! And of course, Drew's results !

 

[Rave The Rich]

Well, let's get into it !
I still can't understand why this is such a big deal to Kelly ?! I mean, ok, she has convictions and principles, but it's their life after all ! And if she would want to do something about it, she should go up to them and tell them straight on instead of sneaking around...

You'll find out in future chapters that it's personal, but it also speaks to Kelly's investigative mind. As a scientist, it comes almost naturally in her wanting to systematically break down any problem that exists. She will soon find out that she has made a mistake, though.

As far as the personal thing, well, Kelly had a girlfriend before she reunited with May, and this girlfriend did something pretty bad that makes her very anti-cheating to the point she pretty much hates them. The first inklings of that will come in chapter 25 when this story will go on hiatus for a month or so.

I like what I see concerning the battling aspect in your fic, since using attack has very different effects than in the anime, and especially in the game ^^
It's innovating, to say the least.

I had a feeling you would like the battles in this fic. Everyone at FF.Net liked it, and I felt that it came off very well. Thanks for the comments about the battling being innovative. I'm not that convinced that it's innovative as much as it's just a new perspective on how to look at the art of battling.

Blaziken vs. Charizard, nice battle glad Charizard won, it's actually more realistic this way !
Can't wait for her actual appeal ! And of course, Drew's results !

The Blaziken/Charizard battle is one of my favorite parts of the fic so far. I thought that Charizard winning made sense as well given the fact that he has more experience and a slight type advantage.

You'll get some detail on May's appeal in chapter 25, and speaking of Drew's results, there next in chapter 20, and I've also got chapter 21 ready, as well!

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4127100/20/All_Roads_Lead_to_the_Grand_Festival

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Pokemon, a creation of one Satoshi Tajiri, and is produced domestically (in the United States) by Pokemon USA/The Pokemon Company, and internationally by Shogakukan and OLM. I personally own nothing and make nothing by writing this. Please do not flame.

(Chapter 20- Give the Son of the Devil His Due)

He feels very good after his appeal, and rightfully so. After his two minute long performance with his Roselia, Drew heard the comments from the judges and knew that he would be a lock for tomorrow’s battles along with Sandra. The score of forty-nine from Contesta, Suziko and the three Hoenn region Nurse Joys was all the confirmation he needed.

Now Drew is walking back to the backstage area on cloud nine after scoring the highest appeal of the day so far. Shaking the hands of a few fans, signing a couple of autographs and taking pictures are just a few of the things that he does before he goes back though the curtain and exclaims, “Yeah, baby! Everyone take a look at Mister Forty-Nine!” Turning to his girlfriend, he asks her, “Dawn, what did you think about it, huh?”

Looking very cross, Dawn simply says, “It was very good.”

“Very good? Girl, I’m all but gonna be in the second round tomorrow to get that Grand Festival trophy! Nothing can stand in my way now!”

“Really?” she asks, almost wanting to laugh at the boy’s words. Turning away from her, she calls out the name of “Solidad!” much to the chagrin of Drew.

“What?” he exclaims in total shock. He wants to believe it’s not true, but into the scene comes his long time good friend, baby stroller and all. “God, Solidad! I thought we had an agreement!”

“I’m not gonna hide this anymore, Drew, and neither should you. I don’t give a **** if you paid me four thousand dollars a month to keep quiet; this is your son…”

“Shut up, Solidad. I know he’s my son. I haven’t denied him a single day of his life.”

“You know what, Drew?” Dawn interjects, “It’s not even about the fact that you were ****ing this broad behind my back and had a baby or that you haven’t denied your baby.”

“I beg your, pardon, Dawn?”

“Honestly Solidad, the truth hurts. You knew he was with me the entire time and you still slept with him. You’re not entirely innocent in all of this, then or now, and I’ll tell you why in just a second, but I have to deal with an emerald haired piece of trash in front of me right now. Drew? I don’t know what the hell went through your head when you came up with that…******** contract so you could go out and keep living your dreams while Solidad takes care of your son!”

“I don’t know what Solidad told you, Dawn,” Drew defends, “but I’ll have you know that I take good care of him.”

“And I’ll say it one more time, Drew! That’s fine, but you kept this secret! If you had been as open about having a child as you were about cheating in front of my face with Solidad, I probably would’ve forgiven your sorry ***. But you had to be a stupid son of a ***** about it and hide your child like you’re ashamed of Damien.”

“You don’t know the half of it, all right? She told me she was on the pill!”

“And you took her word?” Dawn asks confused. “You are stupid! Both are you are stupid as hell. Drew, you’re stupid for cheating, and Solidad, you’re stupid for even agreeing to let him ‘have his space’ and keep coordinating when he should have been home with his boy.”

“Yeah, but those days are over now. I wanted him…”

Dawn turns to Solidad and angrily screams, “*****, please shut up! It should have never happened in the first place! It is not about him anymore! It’s about his son and only his son! I don’t care how much money Drew is giving Damien; it’s not a replacement for Drew himself. He’s got to be there for him. He needs—you know what? I wanna ask you something, Solidad.” Clenching her fists and shutting her eyes, Dawn prepares to ask Solidad what amounts to a very difficult question. “How many times has Drew held Damien in the last three months?”

“All right, Dawn, you’re treading on thin ice right now!” Drew informs his girlfriend, almost as if it were a warning.

“I asked Solidad,” Dawn clarifies. “So, what’s the answer?”

Bringing her head down, Solidad knows that the answer will not please Dawn in the least bit. It hasn’t pleased her much at all. “On his birth day, which was three months ago. That’s it, though. He had all of the people in the hospital sign gag orders so if anyone says something or posts something without his permission, they will go to jail. He…hasn’t held him since.”

Hearing this story come out of Solidad’s mouth makes Dawn absolutely sick to her stomach. No matter how much explaining Drew can do, nothing will convince the coordinator that her boyfriend is taking care of his son. In her mind, he is not. If he’s only held the boy one time in his life over the past three months, then he hasn’t been taken care of by his father at all. He’s played no games of peek-a-boo, not one diaper change or even a lullaby to send him to dream world.

It is one of the saddest things that the girl has ever heard in her sixteen years of life, and out of remorse for the victim of this blind tragedy in the young boy, she cries. She wouldn’t dare waste her tears on the wastes of lives in front of her.

Turning to Drew, she honestly asks him, “Who the hell are you? You’re not the same person I fell for and gave my body to at age fourteen. Is he gone or is this the real you? You’re despicable. Both of you are, but you’re worse, Drew. And you claim to take care of your child? Bull-****! Throwing money at your ‘problems’ is not the same as taking care of them! No, you may not be denying your child, but you are rejecting your child.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Dawn.”

“Like hell you don’t!” she screams through her tears. “You’re putting your baby off to the side like you're ashamed of him. I’ve been looking at you, and you haven’t even been giving your son any good looks. You didn’t even say hello to Damien when he came through here with Solidad. You were only concerned that she was here and your dirty little secret was out.”

“Fathers should be proud to know that they are becoming fathers. They should be especially proud and overjoyed to know that they’re gonna have a son. They’d happily show people the pictures of their kids, be there for their first school play, T-ball game or give him some ground rules for his first date and tell him how proud you are that there gonna go on their own pokemon journey, but not you. You told the mother of your child to leave coordinating and take fifty thousand dollars a year in a written contract so that no one would be the wiser. Yeah. Solidad told me everything while you were out there.”

Watching as Drew finds it hard to look her in the eye; Dawn puts the argument in her own hands by jerking his chin in her direction asking him to his face, “How can you be so ****ing fortunate to find some puppet to go along with that nonsense? Did you listen to anything I just said? When you have a child, it’s no longer about your life or living out your dreams. Everything goes to your baby first, so that means that if both of you are hungry and there’s food for only one, he eats! No exceptions!”

“You wanna follow your dreams? I’m sorry, but you can’t anymore! Those days are over. You no longer have that privilege. Not while you have business to take care of with your kid. You missed three months in Damien’s life. Three months, and you kept this secret for over a year! He didn’t choose to come into this world at all, and if he did, he sure as hell would want better parents…like my mother.”

“Mom, bless her,” Dawn speaks through even more tears and yet another headache. “She said that you were bad news, but I was a blind and stupid little girl then. I mean you are Andrew Patrick Emerson and you’re giving me all this attention! How fortunate could I have been then? I should have known that something was up a long time ago when I found that you were sending love letters to May’s house! Yeah, I know about those letters, Drew! It should’ve been over when I found you giving it to Solidad just like you gave it to me and May saw it. I should not have even gone this far with you had I known what you really are.”

“So I ask you one more time,” Dawn reiterates, “who in the hell do you think you are?” After not hearing an answer or any word come out of Drew’s mouth, she asks one more time, “Who are you, huh? Who the **** are you?” This time, she shoves Drew in order to coax him into answering her question. “I’m waiting!”

“You better stop!”

“You better answer my question, or can you?” After not hearing anything from him for several seconds, Dawn knows that trying to talk sense into this person is hopeless. “Okay. You may not know who you are, Drew, but fortunately, I can tell you what we are. Done!”

“Come on, you can’t be serious.”

“But I am! It’s over, Drew. I can’t do this anymore. This isn’t fun anymore. I can’t be with you knowing the way you treat your own son and his mother! That makes me even worse than you, which is saying a lot. You have only one shot to give your child all the love in the world, so you can’t blow it, Drew! You have to give it your all. I can’t…I just can’t, okay? If I can only gain you, I’ll lose too much. You better grow up and wise up, you and your child’s mother, and I mean quick. Goodbye, Drew, and good riddance.”

Walking away from the backstage area, Dawn turns around and decides to let the two have a little more of her. “And one more thing for both of you; I don’t care if you get along or not. Give Damien a chance. He needs both of his parents and not just money either, Drew! You may never get the chance to experience fatherhood again. Do not blow your one chance, or you will regret it forever! That’s it. That’s it!” And with these words, Dawn leaves the backstage area in tears and leaves the parents of Damien to dwell on everything she has just told them.

---------

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4127100/21/All_Roads_Lead_to_the_Grand_Festival

(Chapter 21- It’s Twelve O’clock Somewhere)

She has never been more ready to leave anywhere than to go from where she is right now. Dawn is in the hotel room that she has been sharing with Drew since Friday afternoon. She’s been in here for nearly half an hour, but she can’t stay much longer as her conscience will not allow it. While in even more tears, she packs up all of the items in the room, which fortunately amount to very little, and heads for the door of room number 818.

As she reaches for the door handle of the room to leave once and for all, something pulls her back into the room for a moment. She realizes that once she leaves this hotel, she truly leaves Drew. Even though Dawn broke up with the boy some time ago in the backstage area of the stadium, something deep inside of her is telling her to stay for just a minute more and take everything in.

Now reaching into her carry on bag, Dawn rustles through money, identification, makeup and other items of importance to find one wallet-sized photo. It was taken about two months after she and the LaRousse City native got together. At the time, they were at a carnival photo booth and decided to do various poses for each picture. The favorite of Drew’s was one in which the two give each other rabbit ears, but Dawn really liked the picture where she and her then boyfriend flashed peace signs at the camera.

What once stood as a small but significant symbol of the bond which these two coordinators shared is now nothing more than a trigger for painful memories. Just looking at him dredged up the times she’d rather forget, and seeing his deceptive smile made things even worse. Dawn could turn away from the picture all she wanted, but his face would still be there each and every time. The face she fell in love with became her own personal Medusa. She knows that looking directly into his eyes turned her into the person that she is now. She became a stone cold individual who turned her back on good friends like Kenny and Zoey, and even caused a great rift between her and her mother that continues to this day.

She meant exactly what she said earlier about losing too much in order to gain Drew, which she had done. The breakup between the two was inevitable and was building for quite some time ever since Drew had his affair with Solidad one year prior. Had she known that Drew fathered a child with his best girl friend from the onset, then there likely would not have been a problem, but knowing that Drew kept this a secret for so long and refused to be an active part of Damien’s life tore her apart. Even through her toughest times with her mother, Johanna and Dawn still talk, even though conversations often resulted in yelling and screaming whenever her mother wanted to bring up the subject of Drew.

“I still have a lot to learn,” Dawn admits to the room while the air conditioning hums, the water faucet drips and the florescent lighting above flickers in response. He tore him up, so she feels that it’s only logical that she return the favor. With the wallet still in her hands, she tears the picture up into many small pieces throwing them onto the carpet, not caring where they land.

Looking at the scene before her in the near spotless hotel room sans the pieces of photograph paper Dawn says “It’s a start,” before opening the door to room 818 and leaving the hotel room for good. As she shuts the door behind her, the clock in the hotel room turns over to its new time of twelve o’clock.

As the camera pans over various shots of the excited crowd in Slateport City’s stadium, the telecast reaches yet another hour of showcasing Saturday’s appeals.

“It’s twelve o’clock, ladies and gentlemen,” the host of this telecast states. The camera cuts to a desk with a male anchor sitting next to a plasma screen television while inside. “This is hour number eight of appeals for the Hoenn region Grand Festival. I’m your host Stephen Craig, and we thank you for inviting us into your homes, wherever you may be. For the next six hours, we will have three new faces calling the action, so it is my pleasure to turn the action over to three people who know that this is the time when we separate the pokemon from the poke boys...and girls. Here’s Gavin Harte, 1992 Hoenn Grand Festival champion Melinda Feliciana and the Professor of the Hoenn region, Solomon Birch. Guys?”

“Let me just say,” Melinda begins, “you were going well trying to avoid sexism until you called us guys, and clearly…”

“I’ll buy you lunch next time, I promise. Please forgive me,” Stephen humorously atones while holding up both of his hands in a form of surrender.

“We’ll talk. Right now, though, we have business to take care of in the afternoon appeals. Remember, there are a total of 314 coordinators that have come here to fill only sixteen spots for tomorrow’s second round. So far, we’ve had over 160 appeals with Drew Emerson, Sandra Van Hollen, Brianna Nolan and others scoring marks as high as forty-nine, but don’t forget that there are still more notable names out there to fill the sixteen seats at this all important tournament.”

“That’s exactly correct, Melinda,” Gavin agrees. “Don’t forget top-five coordinator Dawn Berlitz, who has been the subject of some controversy in just the last few hours. If you did not hear the news, she checked into Slateport City General Hospital early this morning complaining of headaches. She was diagnosed with a concussion and released at approximately eight a.m. She admits to not remembering how she suffered the concussion, and while there was great concern about her health, the doctors have given her a clean bill of health for competing. Dawn was scheduled to have her appeal at eight a.m., but due to her hospitalization, officials will give her the final appeal of the evening. And that’s the big story heading into appeals.”

“Indeed, the many fans of pokemon coordinating are gonna want to stay up late to see if Dawn Berlitz can make it into round two,” Professor Birch says, “and we’ll be here to cover it all, but for now, we’d like to talk about one of the true feel good stories of this year’s Hoenn Grand Festival. As Gavin mentioned, Sandra Van Hollen has already completed her appeal with a score of forty-eight, placing her third amongst coordinators so far. In her three years as a pokemon coordinator, Sandra has had the love and support of one of the top veterans of the 1990s in her mother Savannah Van Hollen, who will do her appeal in just a moment.”

“Standing ringside to tell us more about this is former Hoenn Grand Festival champion and field reporter for all twenty-four hours of this event, Robert Weis. Robert?”

After a delay of a second or so, the hardest working individual at this year’s Grand Festival says, “Thank you, professor, and good afternoon everyone. Family traditions in pokemon training and coordinating date back as far as the sport itself. Savannah Van Hollen, like most ten-year old girls, had a dream of one day becoming a world class coordinator and eventually a Grand Festival champion. She made quite the impact in her day, but motherhood called Savannah and she answered leaving her dreams behind without regret. From then on, her daughter Sandra became her everything and her dream of being the best seemed to die out like an old light bulb. But dreams have a funny way about them just like life itself.”

“One day, her daughter at age seven watched a tape of her mom on the television screen and asked her ‘Say mom, you we’re really good then. Why aren’t you out there coordinating now?’ Well folks, one thing led to another, and she has come back along with her daughter to give her dream another fighting chance. Keeping the memory of Sandra’s late father in their minds, they will work to be the first immediate relatives in over fifteen years to make it past the first round of any Grand Festival. Savannah’s appeal…starts right now. Let’s go to public address announcer Lillian Meridian for the call.”

From the restaurant at the Slateport Milton Hotel, Erik Marin looks and listens to the story of Savannah Van Hollen in awe while drinking his sparkling water with lime. He has to say out loud, “Wow. That’s a really great story if both of them can get make it through.”

“Well if both of them get in, where does that leave me?”

Turning around to find out who asked him that question, Erik finds his future daughter-in-law May Maple.

“May!” Erik happily greets. Patting the chair next to him, he says, “Come on! Come on! Have a seat and the watch the appeal with me.”

She chooses not to argue and instead sits down with Erik to watch Savannah. She calls out her Ivysaur and in a period of two minutes, she puts on a dazzling kaleidoscope show using the various grass pokemon attacks. She begins with razor leaf, bullet seed, petal dance, and leaf storm in that order. These first four attacks work in near-perfect harmony spreading throughout the arena for the first minute and a half of Savannah’s appeal, and then with a call of vine whip to tear every leaf, petal and seed into a fine potpourri, warranting a high amount of cheers from the crowd and the commendation of both Erik and May in the restaurant.

“That was real good,” May has to admit as she watches the five judges in attendance. To pass the time with Erik, she orders a raspberry flavored Coca-Cola while waiting for the results to be announced. “Say, Erik. I know I didn’t say anything at the time ‘cause I was with Kelly, but that was a great battle.”

“Thanks, May.”

“You…you kicked ***, man! Seriously, I’ve heard things about your training days from Kelly, Paul and Reggie and knew you weren’t a pushover, but…I never knew. I never knew! You could give anyone a run for their money today! Certainly gave me one,” she concludes, while taking her first sip of her soda.

“I might have been…pretty good during the late 70s and early 80s,” Erik explains, “but nobody could even touch my twin brother Sascha Marin. We were both on the cover of ‘Pokemon Digest’ our first year and while his career flourished and he went on to win championship after championship, I saw more of the business aspect of it all and found my true calling. I left training at age…either fourteen or fifteen and managed Sascha through the rest of his career. He really loved to battle, and as you know, so do my two nephews in Veilstone.”

“Hey look,” May alerts, pointing Erik to the screen, “they’re about to announce Savannah’s score.” As both of them watch the television, they see Contesta’s score first. He awards the coordinator an eight. Respectable, but Savannah will need more. Going to Suziko, she gets her wish. He gives her remarkable performance a perfect ten. So do two of the three Nurse Joys with the other giving Savannah a nine.

“Wow, a forty-eight!” Erik exclaims as the other people in the restaurant applaud the older coordinator’s effort. “Just like her daughter!”

May smiles at the great segue that Kelly’s father has given her. “Speaking of daughters, Erik, you’ve heard it…probably hundreds of times over the years. You know how much I love Kelly.”

“Oh, yeah. I do. Whether you’ve been Kelly’s best friend or her girlfriend, you’ve been very good for my daughter. The rest of the Marin family loves you. You’re…all that a father could ask for his girl.”

As Erik takes a couple more sips of his sparkling water, May gets to her point by explaining to the older male, “I want to know if I have your permission to ask for her hand in marriage.”

The shock of May’s plans cause Erik to choke on his sparkling water. Asking Erik to raise his arms only helps a little bit before one of the other patrons hands May a fresh glass of water for Erik to drink. Once his coughing fit ends, Erik decides to get to the bottom of this revelation. “Marry Kelly? When did—when did this come about?”

“I had actually thought about it for a while. Kelly gave me quite a shock last night, though. I thought she was gonna ask to marry me then and there. That would’ve foiled my plan to propose during the Grand Festival after party, win, lose or draw.” Erik breathes somewhat of a sigh of relief knowing that the two planned to propose at different times, though he remains very much on edge. “Luckily, she stopped short of popping the question. I gave her a red herring, basically, saying that I’d be ready to marry her in a ‘few years’, but I’m ready right now if she is. I have my ring and everything, I’ve thought ahead and now I just want to know, may I marry your daughter?”

What a mess. Erik would say that great minds think alike, but he felt that that would tip May off to Kelly’s plan. Of course, Erik has no problem with May’s proposal and he tells her, “Absolutely. I just…want to tell my wife about this and let her know what you want to do, but I’m all but certain she’ll say yes. In fact, I’m gonna go ask her right now. Sit tight and I promise I’ll be right back. Okay?”

“No problem, Erik, and thank you,” May responds. “This really means the world to me.”

As she watches Erik quickly leave to go consult his wife concerning the marriage proposal that May plans to give to Kelly, she can’t help but think how everything has come together for this weekend.

It’ll be up to her to keep everything doing in the right direction, distractions be damned.

---------

Your Thoughts?

 

[shadow_shipper]

20+ chapters of this, and I get the feeling you keep posting this for me only ^^' Since I pretty much am the only one to review this one xD

Ok, so Drew aced the appeal, as usual, but Dawn litteraly snapped. And I hope Drew and Solidad, especially Drew in this matter, start spending more time together and taking care of Damien.
Damn...Drew and Solidad...what was that ? A long, caring relationship ? A one night stand ? An accident ? (You may have mentionned it, but I may have not seen that in the last chapter...)

And I take it Dawn won't be there for her appeal...sad.
Well, great for Sandra and Savannah, and I'd like to see if May will be able to keep her cool, despite the "distractions" you mentionned in your comments some time ago ^^'

 

[Rave The Rich]

Here's Chapter Twenty-two!

20+ chapters of this, and I get the feeling you keep posting this for me only ^^' Since I pretty much am the only one to review this one xD

I don't mind it. I know how things work on this site. One day, someone else will review this one. I don't feel bad about it. At least someone is reviewing it and that's good enough for me. ^^

Ok, so Drew aced the appeal, as usual, but Dawn litteraly snapped. And I hope Drew and Solidad, especially Drew in this matter, start spending more time together and taking care of Damien.
Damn...Drew and Solidad...what was that ? A long, caring relationship ? A one night stand ? An accident ? (You may have mentionned it, but I may have not seen that in the last chapter...)

It will take some time, but Drew will eventually come around to accepting his son and taking care of him.

Drew and Solidad had always been friends for a long time (just like in the anime) after May left the picture, Solidad wanted it to be more, and this is the one instance in which a girl pursues Drew and not the other way around in the fic. It's a case of long time friends turned lovers.

And I take it Dawn won't be there for her appeal...sad.

Stay tuned for more information on that one. She still has time. Remember, her appeal is last. Keep in mind, all she's done right now is leave Drew's hotel room.

Well, great for Sandra and Savannah, and I'd like to see if May will be able to keep her cool, despite the "distractions" you mentionned in your comments some time ago ^^'

At times, she will show some disdain, but for the most part, she'll keep her cool. She'll figure out a good life lesson.

And now, here's chapter twenty-two!

NOTE: If you didn’t already get it from the last chapter, Kelly, Paul and Reiji are all first cousins.

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4127100/22/All_Roads_Lead_to_the_Grand_Festival

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Pokemon, a creation of one Satoshi Tajiri, and is produced domestically (in the United States) by Pokemon USA/The Pokemon Company, and internationally by Shogakukan and OLM. I personally own nothing and make nothing by writing this. Please do not flame.

(Chapter 22- Misunderstandings Mightily Misconstrued)

“So let me get this straight,” Julia says to her husband as she summarizes everything he has just told her while sitting together in their hotel room. “Our daughter is planning on proposing to May after the Grand Festival and has been pushing her to win so they can have that moment on stage. Now you come to me to inform me that May has been planning on proposing to Kelly for a while and would like to propose to her during the Grand Festival after party? Is that right, Erik?”

“May wanted our permission first,” Erik clarifies, “and I said yes. Of course you can marry my daughter.”

“But Erik…”

“I know, dear. I know. Kelly’s plans over the past few months.”

“What do we do? If she wants my permission, then she has it without question, but Erik…our girl has been working on this for so long. Everything’s in place for both of them to get the ball rolling in their long life together. Could we honestly tell either of them to not propose? First off, that would be lying because we want this for them as much as they do. Second of all, if we told them to stop, who knows what they’d suspect?”

“Good point,” Erik says. “Man, this is hard. And you know something else? We can’t tell them that either of them is proposing, and though one of the reasons is because we’d violate their trust, there’s something else. Kelly has said time and time again…that she wants to reduce the number of distractions that May has going into the Grand Festival. When you are engaged, every thought is going towards your fiancée and your marriage and spending the rest of your life with your partner. That’s a huge distraction, and given the times that each one wants to do this, they’re very smart to avoid it.”

“But someone’s gonna have their big plans ruined.”

“Hey, honey,” Erik says, “May’s waiting for me downstairs. I’ll tell her you said yes and just leave it at that, okay?”

Did Julia really have a choice? “Okay. We…I just…I wish we could do something, and not risk each proposal being let out too early.”

“Me too, dear. Gotta run. We’ll talk later,” he says, and Erik does run…all the way back to the restaurant area of the hotel to let May know the good news…for her, at least.

---------

A ring of the house phone is enough to grab the attention of anyone close enough to hear it. For Delia Ketchum, the grab is a very welcome one as she hasn’t heard the phone ring all day. After the second ring, Delia picks up the phone and gives the person on the other end the traditional greeting of hello.

“Ms. Ketchum? This is Kelly Cruz-Marin,” she greets while alone in her hotel in front of a desk. While on her cell phone headset, Kelly’s hands are left free to jot down notes on a pen and paper located on the desk. “How are you?”

“Hey, Kelly!” she responds, happy to hear from the Academy professor once again. “Is everything going well in Slateport with May?”

“As well as things can be. She has her appeal at 5:30 this afternoon, and we just had our spar with your son’s Charizard. I wanted to know if I could speak with him about some more strategy. Is he there?”

Looking from her present position to the living room and the television inside, Delia sees Ash on the couch with Paul right next to them as they both study the ongoing appeals. “Yeah, just one second.”

Putting her right hand to the phone receiver and covering it, Delia calls out to her son, saying, “Ash! Telephone!”

Getting up from the couch without saying anything in response, the world class trainer seems to drag his feet as he really doesn’t want to answer the telephone at the moment. He had to get up from a very good appeal that was ongoing for a phone call? ‘This had better be good,’ he thinks as he takes the receiver from his mom, who tells him that Kelly is on the phone.

“Kelly, what’s up?” Ash speaks in monotone, “I’m watching appeals with Paul right now. There’s this one with this long-haired chick named Jessminder that’s going pretty well.”

“Ash, your mom has DVR on her television,” Kelly reminds the trainer. “You can just rewind it back from the beginning. I just called to give you the rundown on what happened with the Blaziken-Charizard spar earlier this morning. Charizard won, and my dad trained him.”

“Erik trained him?” Thinking it over, he comes to the conclusion, “Wow! Maybe that’s why he won. Charizard might not have been doing much battling over the years, but…you know how strong a trainer your dad was in his heyday. I don’t know. That might have been…lopsided.”

“But here’s the great thing,” Kelly interjects, “it wasn’t! The battle was more than six minutes long and though Charizard might have won, it was pretty damn close. One…or two attacks that would’ve gone Blaziken’s way, and I might be telling you a different story. May might have won had she kept to her strategy. She kept a lot of her initial attacks aimed at Charizard’s back and his wings so that he’d have trouble flying and couldn’t use those attacks to his advantage. After a big flamethrower test of strength resulted in both pokemon being weakened significantly, she suddenly switched her strategy and decided to just go for the kill. I guess she felt with both pokemon so weak, one big attack would seal the deal.”

“Unfortunately, Charizard hadn’t been weakened enough, apparently. I think that if she stuck with her game plan for a little longer, she might have won. What do you think, Ash?”

“You’re right, Kelly,” he answers as his curiosity at how the battle went down has been peaked. “May can’t be lulled into any false sense of security because of a type strength or weakness. If she has a strategy that works like trying to cut down Charizard’s wings, then she has to keep at it until she’s sure that it is working. Then again, if it doesn’t work, she has to do something else. Otherwise, if she held on that long with a pokemon that has the raw power of Charizard and the talent of a trainer like Paul’s uncle, she should be fine.”

“Speaking of which, could I speak to my cousin? I wanna ask him a few things.”

“One second,” he says before calling out to Paul and telling him that Kelly is on the phone. Unlike Ash before him, Paul immediately jumps up from his spot on the couch and takes the receiver from his fellow trainer.

Thanking Ash for holding the phone as he runs back to the couch, Paul greets the person on the other end of the line saying, “Nata, how’s it going?”

“Not too bad, Paulie,” Kelly responds. “So you and Ash are preparing for the Grand Festival party tomorrow, right?”

“That’s right. Our guest list keeps growing, too. Misty will now be bringing her sisters, Casey and Tracey. We’ve also got Erica and Joshua coming, Richie, Reiji and Gary and if he’s not busy, Professor Oak. As you know, Ash just put in a huge plasma screen in the living room, and his mom is cooking, which is always a plus.”

“I tell you,” the Lilycove native says, “If I couldn’t be here in Slateport, I’d definitely be there. It all sounds really good. But I wanted to talk to you about a couple of things. One is…remember when May put her Blaziken against your Honchkrow and she won? What was it that you said was the reason for that win?”

“Well, Honchkrow might have an advantage over Blaziken because he’s a flying type, Nata,” Paul explains to his younger cousin, “but it’s really not that much at all. They’re about equal in terms of flying ability, so that battle wasn’t the best showcase for either’s flying abilities or lack thereof. Why do you ask?”

“I was just on the phone with Ash, as you know. We just had the spar between his Charizard and Blaziken. May lost, but it wasn’t by much. Charizard was being trained by my dad.”

“Uncle Erik trained Charizard?”

“Yep. He used a lot of flying moves after remembering the advantages flyers posses over fighters. Ash said that Blaziken could have won had May stuck to her strategy of aiming all of her attacks at Charizard’s wings and back. Do you agree with him?”

“That sounds right. It’s probably the best way for any fighter to combat a flyer. Anything else on your mind, Nata?”

“Yeah, there is something else I wanted to ask you. It’s a pretty crazy situation. You see, I know this…couple; a boy and a girl and both of them are bisexual. They told me and May that they are in an open relationship, and they are honest with each other. The only problem is that the next day, I caught the girl kissing one of my old female students and I also find out that May caught the boy kissing another boy. Should I—or rather, we, do something about that?”

“You said that they have an open relationship, right?”

“That’s right.”

“Nata, I don’t really see why that’s much of a problem if they’re in an open relationship, unless…” putting the pieces of the story together, Paul comes up with a conclusion. He asks her, “Kelly, do you even know what an open relationship is?”

“Yeah, both partners are open and honest towards each…”

“No. No, Nata,” Paul interrupts, trying to hold back his laughter. ‘She really doesn’t know. Well, she’s about to find out,’ he thinks before finally letting Kelly in on the big secret by telling her, “An open relationship means that each partner allows the other one to have a relationship outside of that one. The two people you’re talking about are probably allowing each other to cheat with the same sex. There are different types of open relationships, but all of them allow for one or both partners to go outside of their union.”

Thinking about it for a second, Kelly weighs everything that she’s seen. Holly did seem quite nervous around Zoey before they kissed. Kenny and Zoey did tell her and May that they were in an open relationship, and what are the odds that Zoey and Holly would have an affair at the same time that Kenny and Conway are, as well?

Kelly realizes that she’s made a huge mistake and then some. “Oh ****, Paulie! God, how come I didn’t see it? Neither of them is cheating on each other. They’re just swinging…and doing a pretty pathetic job of hiding it, too.”

“You’re starting to sound like me, Nata.”

“And I never told anyone but May that I saw these two people kiss,” Kelly adds, ignoring her cousin’s latest remark. “I treated them pretty badly for a bit. I gotta go straighten this out with them, Paul. They might think I hate them for no reason. Thanks. It was nice talking to you.”

“You know, for someone who’s planning on becoming a doctor later this year, you can be pretty absent-minded at times.”

“Shut up, smartass,” Kelly responds with a sarcastic laugh immediately following. “Good bye. Go snog with Ash later and tell Uncle Sascha I said hello.”

“Will do, Nata. Take care. We’re all rooting you and May on. Bye,” he says, hanging up the phone and leaving Kelly to think about the revelation that some of her good friends are swingers.

Leaning her head back while sitting in her chair, she thinks out loud, “I can’t believe I didn’t see it, and I put poor Holly through all of that lecturing for nothing! She must think that I think she’s the worst person in the world. I gotta apologize and clear the air for this afternoon.”

Sitting back up and looking at the three or four lines of notes she took in the advice that Ash and Paul gave along with the loose definition of an ‘open relationship’, Kelly decides to open her phone and scroll down to the speed dial option. Pressing the button for the first name on the list, Kelly awaits for a response from the other end of the line.

Hearing what is in her mind the most beautiful voice in the world say ‘Hello’, Kelly calls back saying, “May, we’ve made a big mistake.”

---------

NOTE: If you're wondering, the nickname 'Nata' comes from two places. One is Kelly's Japanese name 'Kanata' and the other is that it's short for one of Kelly's middle names 'Natalie'.

Now that that's been cleared up, your thoughts?

 

[Rave The Rich]

Wow, I've been gone for a while. Oh well. Blame finals week. Here's chapter 23!

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4127100/23/All_Roads_Lead_to_the_Grand_Festival

NOTE: This is where the ‘M’ rating really comes into play. There is mention of sexual acts and positions, but nothing is done in graphic detail.

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Pokemon, a creation of one Satoshi Tajiri, and is produced domestically (in the United States) by Pokemon USA/The Pokemon Company, and internationally by Shogakukan and OLM. I personally own nothing and make nothing by writing this. Please do not flame.

(Chapter 23- Swinging: Party of Four)

Now in what was once an area filled with activities all around, there are only a few people now that the lunch crowd has all but departed. Walking to the table that they were told to go to a few hours after sparring practice, Conway and Holly walk hand in hand across the dining hall to a table off in a corner far away from whoever else remains.

Seeing the red head and the brunette together at the table, Holly seems to walk even quicker to the more experienced couple as she is anticipating their evening session now more than ever. At one point, she was dragging Conway with her to the table, which warranted a passing chuckle from the sitting Zoey and Kenny before they stifled themselves and put on their serious faces for what is about to take place.

“Hey, guys!” Holly greets with Conway adding a hello himself. The younger pair asks for both of them to have a seat, which they do without any apprehension.

Taking a business like approach to everything that they do in swinging, Kenny begins the get together by saying, “First of all, I’d like to thank you both for coming to this important meeting and sticking with this. I realize at times it can be hard, but the best advice that I can give you both is that I promise that if you cooperate, we’ll have a lot of fun. Conway mentioned to me that you, Holly, were distraught because you thought that…Kelly discovered you. I just want to know are you okay now, and have you spoken to Kelly at any time after she confronted you?”

“I’m fine, and no. I haven’t spoken to Kelly since then. After a talk with Conway, I realized that if I don’t go through with this, the question will still be there. I’ll still be wondering if I missed out on something new, fun and interesting or not. If Kelly keeps asking me questions this weekend, then I’ll just let her know what I’m doing. She’ll understand. She always has understood.”

“Good to have you back on board,” Zoey says, patting Holly on her left shoulder. “Now onto more pressing matters. You were both asked to come up with a list of dos and don’ts for our ‘activities’ tonight. You were encouraged to do research on the various positions, and the like if you had to. So, do you two have your lists?”

Zoey and Kenny watch as their counterparts at the other end of the table pull out folded sheets of paper and place them on the table. “Very good. You came prepared. Right now, I would like for all of us to take our lists and switch them so Holly and Conway, you will be looking at our lists and we will be looking at yours. Feel free to look at one another’s lists if you like and be as discrete as possible if you see something that might appear to be shocking or you don’t agree with. Also keep in mind that there is always room for negotiation.”

“Now on the count of three,” Kenny continues as he and Zoey take out their own lists, “We’ll switch lists. One…two…three,” and on three, Conway skates his list across the table so that it meets the coordinator’s welcome hands. The tomboy opts to toss her list to Holly like a Frisbee, Kenny reaches across the table and places his list next to the bespectacled one, and the most formal looking of the four simply hands her list off to Zoey.

As Kenny and Zoey look at each list, they make mental notes in their heads like seasoned veterans as they nod at each position that Conway and Holly are either curious about or will not enter into the equation. Having done this many times over the last year or so, very few things are foreign to this pair. For them, it is business as usual.

For the item across the table, however, things are not sailing nearly as smoothly as each would have preferred. They didn’t want to say it for fear of their reactions, but as the ‘virgin’ pair collaborates with each other to look at the list and find that the dos far outweigh the don’ts, they know that they are not dealing with a couple that’s shy about their sex life in the least bit.

‘So Kenny is a uke, huh?’ thinks Conway. It was very clear to him that he would be expected to deliver the goods to Kenny tonight, as his partner likes the bottom a lot. Among the things on the do list are sixty-nine, oral, anal, spanking, licking, biting, fingering, facials, intercourse, outercourse and masturbation, just to name a few. Most of these acts have the word ‘bottom’ in parenthesis next to the act. The only notable don’ts for Kenny are oral stimulation of the ‘exit’, golden shower, and the use of a dildo.

When Holly gets a good look at the list before her, she feels some relief. The reason for this is because just about everything on her list is the same as the things that she’s seeing on Zoey’s list. Looking at Kenny’s list, it appears that her sexual partner to be drives a much harder line on her personal preferences than the super freak sitting next to her.

Each couple takes about three minutes looking at the lists before Kenny breaks the silence to ask Conway, “What’s your objection to…anal?”

“I’ve never done it before. Holly won’t let me.”

“Aw, Holly, you’re no fun,” Zoey teases.

“Hey, it’s an exit, not an entrance,” she defends.

“I still don’t understand why you…object to it. I mean, you put it on the don’ts side.”

“I don’t know, Kenny. I just…I always thought that with what I’ve read that it would hurt a lot and,” conceding to some cowardice that he’s harbored about this, Conway admits, “I’m a wimp. I thought, you know, if we are gonna have sex, just like you said, then I didn’t want it to hurt. That’s all. I just didn’t want it to hurt.”

Nodding in response to these admitted caveats felt by the person in front of him, Kenny knows the solution. “Conway, I’m not gonna beat around the bush. It does hurt, quite a bit in fact. Given this fact, for newbies, we have some solutions, but it’s gonna come at a cost.”

“Because you two are far less experienced,” Zoey states, piggybacking on what her partner just said, “you will have to buy things for us to make the whole process go much smoother, no pun intended. First and foremost, you two must buy protection, that’s condoms for males and females. For Conway, if you just pick up a lubricant and bear with Kenny for a minute or two of pain, you should be fine. And if you didn’t remember, this is a drug free session. No Viagra or any of its ******** knock offs will be permitted during sex. No street drugs, and it’s a given; no alcohol.”

Seeing that Conway was about to give an answer or some sort of response, Zoey cuts him off to add, “Hold that thought and think about it for a second. There are a few more things that you’ll have to buy. For one, you will have to buy both of us dinner.”

“What?” Conway asks.

“As the facilitators for this weekend,” Kenny explains, “you have to show us your appreciation for setting this entire session up. It’s all part of the initiation.”

“Kenny’s right,” Holly interjects. Turning to Conway, she reminds her boyfriend, “Remember when we got paired up with them in the ‘Switch Hitter’s Society’ in the first place? The group leader there said that you have to show the veterans their respect for being in the club for so long.” Referring to the couple before them, Holly continues, “They were once in our position buying a more experienced couple their dinner, buying condoms and the like. They know about going to have sex with these...near perfect strangers later that night, and we have to respect that.”

“Thanks, Holly,” Kenny compliments, “I couldn’t have said it better myself. The newbies always have to buy the veterans their dinner and you must buy us whatever we want. I’m gonna…kind of break the rules for you two, though, for the simple fact that I eat like a horse.” Stopping, he pulls out a bill from his pocket, handing it to Conway, explaining, “That should about cover our meals. It wouldn’t be fair for you to spend so much on everything. You can just fit the bill for the protection and give me the change for the food whenever.”

“Kenny,” Conway begins, fighting the urge to laugh “this is one hundred dollars! Just how much are you eating tonight?”

“A lot,” replies the younger couple in unison.

“Sex drains you,” Zoey adds. “You gotta have energy. We’ll give you a list of what we want before May does her appeal, alright?”

“Okay. And, Kenny?”

“Yeah, Conway?”

“You said that we could negotiate, right?”

“Yes.”

“Well…I’m thinking about trying it; both giving and receiving, that is. I just want to know…I can pull out of this whenever I want, is that right?”

“Yeah,” Kenny says to the point of near boredom. “If I didn’t allow you to do that, I would be raping you, and I would never do that.”

“Same goes for you, Holly,” Zoey addendums. “Though our lists are about the same, if there is anything that you don’t want to do, you don’t have to do it. I am responsible for you, after all.”

“I know this,” Holly replies matter-of-factly.

“Good,” answers the male Sinnoh coordinator. “Now if there isn’t anything else, we’ll adjourn the meeting.” Waiting a few seconds for any objections, Kenny continues, “Very well. The next thing…”

“There you four are!” a voice exclaims. Assuming that they are the only group of four in the entire dining hall, Holly, Kenny, Conway and Zoey all turn in the direction of the yelling voice to find May and Kelly running over to their table off in the corner.

As the four girls and two boys in their late teens say their hellos, May explains to them, “We’ve been looking everywhere for you two! We knocked on your room doors I don’t know how many times, and…we have something to say to both of you.”

“We owe you four an apology,” Kelly says.

The four trainers and coordinators sitting down at the table are somewhat confused at hearing this from Kelly. A couple of them openly question why the two feel as if they owe all of them an apology.

“We’re sorry for not asking you all sooner about the fact that you were swinging,” May clarifies. “We had no idea what an open relationship was when Kenny and Zoey told us that they were in one. Luckily, Kelly called one of her cousins and he really cleared things up for us. Although I’m not really for swinging, if you guys can accept me being gay, then I see no reason why I can’t accept you two being open with other people.”

While May is apologizing to the group, Kelly goes up to Holly and personally says to her, “I’m especially sorry for the way I acted towards you, Holly. I misjudged you and…I was very insensitive towards your thoughts. That’s not me at all, but when I see something that doesn’t look right or is just a little bit off, it’s in my nature to want to fix that. I just wanted to make sure that nobody got hurt. I had to make sure that you weren’t doing something you would regret or you were breaking up a good thing that Kenny and Zoey share.”

“Speaking of Zoey,” Kelly continues while looking at the tomboy, “I’m sorry for snapping at you this morning during practice. That was wrong of me, but…I guess I had to find some way to vent my anger towards you, and that was the only thing I could think of without telling everyone and embarrassing you all.”

“Well, Kelly,” Holly begins, “I…I was just scared, but not anymore. I didn’t know if people would understand or not. That’s why I kept this so secret, or at least tried.”

“Apology accepted?”

“Yeah,” she answers, and Holly and Kelly come together in a big hug which they hold onto for over fifteen seconds. Each one whispers to each other; Holly while in tears tells her ex-professor that she’s sorry that she could not be more open with her while Kelly tells her former star student that she has absolutely nothing to be sorry for and that she’s just living her life. She also says that she can be a real jerk at times and is sorry for pushing her into trying to confess. After a while, they finally let go with each one joining their respective partners.

“Are we all okay here?” Kenny inquires, “because before you two came to our table, I was about to suggest that we could all go see the sights after this? I thought what better way to let loose than that.”

“Really?” May asks. “Wow! That sounds really good. Can we go, Kelly?”

“Absolutely not.”

“What?”

“I hope you haven’t forgotten that you have a meeting with Lucy in her hotel room in a few minutes, May.”

“Aw!”

“Stop sulking,” Kelly says in an almost teasing manner. “It’s very unbecoming.”

May scoffs before saying, “But Kelly, I’ve got my appeal down pat. Do we really have to talk more about this? I’ve spent weeks on this thing!”

“Another meeting can’t hurt. Just get through this, do your appeal, and we’ll have the rest of the night to see whatever sites you want. Lest we forget, you do have a job to do. If you don’t get past this first round, all of your work will be for naught.”

‘Damn, I hate it when she’s right, even though I’ve got this. I know I’ve got this down pat,’ May ponders. “Okay, Kelly. Let’s get this over with.”

“That’s the spirit…I guess,” her girlfriend responds. Turning to the quartet in front of her, Kelly leaves them, saying, “All right, you guys have fun, and again, we’re sorry that we didn’t say something earlier.”

“Hey,” Zoey retorts, “we are somewhat responsible. We thought you knew what an open relationship was, but…we really shouldn’t assume lest we make asses of you and me.”

“True,” May speaks before turning to Kelly, despondently saying, “All right. Let’s go see the brain,” and the two walk off, feeling better about their four peers, even though they think that what they are doing is kind of weird.

It doesn’t matter, though. After all, the two should be used to the feeling by now.

---------

Your thoughts?

 

[shadow_shipper]

Last but surely not least : you ^^
5th review for today, I'll call it a day

Ch.22 :
Paul seems much more friendly and happy, caring and understanding here. Why ?
And Kelly at least accepts the fact that she made a mistake and will try to apologise ^^

Ch.23 :
Thank God for Kenny's don'ts ._.
Besides that, the whole thing will surely be entertaining, close to an orgy xD
Good luck May ! ^^

Good writing ! Keep it up !

 

[Rave The Rich]

Now, here's part twenty-four!

Paul seems much more friendly and happy, caring and understanding here. Why ?

A life-changing (perhaps life threatening) experience caused the change and helped reunite him with his family and friends.

And Kelly at least accepts the fact that she made a mistake and will try to apologise ^^

How she and May handled the situation compared to another situation in this chapter shows their maturity as people.

Thank God for Kenny's don'ts ._.

Hallelujah and Amen!

Besides that, the whole thing will surely be entertaining, close to an orgy xD

Yeah, you're right! They're not making love, they are just gonna ****. That won't fly here, so I'm debating how I'm gonna do this. The likely solution will be to do a separate chapter somewhere else and PM it to whomever wants it, but that won't be for another month or two.

Now, here's a very controversial chapter twenty-four! Enjoy!

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4127100/24/All_Roads_Lead_to_the_Grand_Festival

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Pokemon, a creation of one Satoshi Tajiri, and is produced domestically (in the United States) by Pokemon USA/The Pokemon Company, and internationally by Shogakukan and OLM. I personally own nothing and make nothing by writing this. Please do not flame.

(Chapter 24- Baby is Out of the Corner)

Waiting for the cue from the director, the host of the Hoenn Grand Festival telecast cannot wait to read to the entire world the news that he just heard from the press room. As he watches for a bright red light on the top of the camera in front of him, he wonders just what kind of impact this will have in the coordinating scene, the tabloids and every single newscast out there that gives pokemon coordinating more than just a second thought.

The light is on, and so is the host on screen.

“Ladies and gentlemen, we welcome you back to live coverage of the Hoenn Grand Festival first round. I’m Stephen Craig. While you were watching appeals, a development took place in the press room. If you remember, Drew Emerson had his appeal well over four hours ago. He initially declined requests to do a press interview after scoring a forty-nine out of a possible fifty in his appeal. After a while, Drew conceded to the wishes of the press and decided to go inside the press room and speak. What occurred next was shocking to say the very least. You will notice in this tape-delayed interview that former Kanto Grand Festival champion Solidad O’Brennan, who has been on leave of absence for the past twelve months, is seated next to Drew…along with a young child. Let’s watch as Drew talks about more than just his prospects for tomorrow’s battles. Please be advised that this interview may contain edited language and other situations that some may find offensive.”

The tape cuts to a shot of Drew bringing the press microphone closer to his mouth before speaking into it and explaining to the media, “All right. I’m sure all of you have quite a few questions to ask me. For now, though, I’ll only entertain questions on my appeal. We’ll cover…whatever else you want later. Let’s begin.”

Several flashbulbs pop as journalists and reporters ask Drew if they could be first to have their question asked. Watching from a hotel room are the group of Lucy, Brock, Kelly, May, Norman and Max gathered in front of the television watching as Drew makes a decision as to which one of the reporters will go first.

“Why isn’t he with Dawn?” asks Max almost sarcastically.

Although the question posed by Max was more than likely rhetorical, May answers it, saying, “I don’t care, and I don’t see why the heck we have to see this. He got a forty-nine with Roselia. I expected that. What the hell can I learn from seeing this?”

Lucy unexpectedly shushes May and informs her, “I wanna listen to this.”

On the screen, everyone watches as Drew points out into the crowd, saying, “Okay. You first.”

“Drew,” this male reporter begins, “Landon Bell, Slateport Examiner. What is your plan going into tomorrow’s second round?”

Bringing his head down as a sign of disapproval of the question, Drew sarcastically answers, “You do realize that other coordinators are likely gonna watch this, right?” This response warrants some laughter from the rest of the reporters in attendance. “It’s simple, really. Win. That…would be a great plan, wouldn’t it?”

“Would you care to be more specific?”

“How about…win with chutzpah or pizzazz?” Yet another humorous answer from the coordinator. Don’t try telling him that there’s no such thing as a stupid question. “Next question?”

“Yes, Drew. I want to know what you think about your girlfriend Dawn Berlitz getting the last appeal…”

Holding up his hand in defiance, Drew interrupts this reporter, reminding her, “Please do not tell me you forgot what I just said. Only questions—right now, I am only taking questions on my appeal or the second round. Now, if you have one, ask me, otherwise I’ll move on.”

“What’s your reason for choosing Roselia as your appeal pokemon?”

“Experience is the primary reason. Roselia is my pokemon that really knows the spotlight and relishes being in the spotlight more than my others do. My others really shine in the heat of battle. Next?”

“Drew, you’ve seen some of the scores of your peers in this contest. Members of the Van Hollen mother-daughter duo have scored a forty-eight, Jessminder Mentrovia scored a forty-seven and so did Brianna Nolan. My question to you is do you see anyone in this field as a potential threat to you going to the top this weekend?”

“Nobody really stands in my way if I let them…” while Drew says this to the press, May shakes her head while family and friends continue to look on inside of Lucy and Brock’s hotel room.

“What an arrogant…damn him!”

“May!” Norman interjects at his daughter’s profanity.

“No dad,” she rebuts. “You of all people should be right behind me on this! You know what he did to me. He doesn’t deserve any sympathy from me or anyone else right now.”

“You know, in a strange way,” Kelly adds, “I really think you should be thankful to Drew. It’s screwed up, but if he didn’t cheat on you, you wouldn’t have been open to pursue me, and now we’re together, May.”

No matter how crazy it does indeed sound, May has to admit that Kelly makes a good point. The break up with Drew made her a stronger person and gave her the strength to admit her feelings to her current girlfriend and be honest to those who love her the most. “Well, I guess you have a point, Kelly. It’s not like I’ll ever admit any of this to him, though. I’d have to be on crack…”

“Okay,” Lucy speaks, “there are still people that want to see this, thank you. We can debate sympathetic figures throughout history some other time. This won’t wait, though.”

While there is quite the debate going on in Lucy’s hotel room, Drew continues speaking to the media. All of the questions posed to him about his appeal and his strategy for the weekend were designed to prepare him for the great revelation he is about to present to the world. He has to admit that even after a few minutes of questioning from the third degree; he’s in a much better position to give everyone the news.

“Okay. I think I’ve kept this to myself long enough. I know you out there are probably wondering why I’m not with Dawn, why Solidad is here and why does she have this baby carriage. Well, this baby’s name is Damien Donovan O’Brennan…my son with Solidad.” As expected, this news was met with a great deal of murmuring from the press along with even more flashing of photography.

After a half a minute, the commotion inside of the press room subsides. The shock of the announcement does not come with any questions, much to the surprise of both Drew and Solidad. If you consider the magnitude of one of the most popular coordinators in the Hoenn region announcing that he has a child at the age of seventeen, anyone would understand the high amount of shock value that this news would bring.

“He is three months old,” Drew adds, silencing whatever conversation or commotion remained inside of the room, “and he’s the reason why Solidad has been out for so long. Any questions?”

“Yes, how does Dawn factor into this?” one of the female reporters ask Drew, almost screaming so the coordinator will have to pay attention to what she’s asking. “Does she know about this at all?”

“Yes, she knows, and she didn’t take it that well at all.”

“Are you still with Dawn?” she asks as a follow up question.

“You’re gonna have to ask her. I refuse to speak for Dawn. Next question.”

“Uh, Drew. Just…I’m curious to know…if you were with Dawn this entire time, how did this baby come about?”

“I’m sorry, but isn’t that something that your mom and dad are supposed to explain to you when you come of age? Yes, I cheated on Dawn with Solidad and the result is my son here. For those wondering, I’ve never denied my son. I have given him nothing but the…”

“Why don’t you give these people the truth for once, Drew?” a voice sounds, interrupting Drew at the interview table. Looking out in the crowd to find the voice, Drew again hears this woman speak, “Why don’t you tell the truth for once in your goddamn life?”

“Who is that? Who’s saying that?”

“Your ex-girlfriend, Drew,” says Dawn, who walks through the crowd of reporters and comes face to face with the sitting teen. His expression doesn’t change sans a scrunching of his face once Dawn escapes from the crowd. “Why don’t you tell them everything?” she asks as if she were one of the reporters in attendance.

“They don’t need to know everything.”

“You’re a goddamn liar, Drew, because I’m sure that they’d like to know just how well you’ve been treating your son the first three months of his life,” Dawn answers back to her ex. “Why don’t you tell them about your qualifications as father of the year? How about the fact that you paid Solidad four thousand dollars a month forcing her to sit home while you went on like nothing was wrong? What about the fact that I caught you and her in the act?”

“Why do you believe that they have to know everything?”

“Because it’s your burden to bear, Drew! And I want to know something else; why is this ***** next to you staying so quiet while you try and play off that your some kind of good person and a mere victim of circumstance?”

“Hey,” Solidad remarks, “I resent being called that.”

“Your word means **** to me right now!” Dawn exclaims to the older woman next to Drew. “Both of you mean **** to me right now! The only thing I care about is this child, but at the same time, the truth…needs to be told.”

Turning around to face the cameras and media, Dawn reveals to the press, “The Drew Emerson that you all know is a lie. He’s not a good person at all. He cheated on May Maple, he cheated on me, and if Solidad thinks that going along with his wishes and having his baby will get her closer to him, she’ll get a rude awakening when she finds that Drew will eventually cheat on her, too. This has to eventually stop. Either we all have to wizen up to these games, or we’ll all end up fooled.”

Feeling a hand touch her left shoulder, Dawn turns around to her Drew whisper into his ear, “Stop embarrassing me in front of all these people. I’ve told them everything they need to know.”

“Oh, so you now know the feeling of being emasculated for yourself, huh?”

“**** you,” he whispers back to Dawn.

“No. **** you!” she yells so all of the reporters, people in the room and people watching the interview at home can hear. “If you had shown any real compassion for your wrongdoings, I might have forgiven you, but you kept stringing me on like I was your own personal puppet. How do you live with yourself knowing how many hearts you’ve broken?”

An honest question from Dawn puts the older male front and center once again. He makes the honest comment to the world, “It’s my life.”

“What the?” Dawn asks before slapping Drew across his face. After the impact, Dawn asks him, “You really don’t get it, do you? This isn’t about your mother ****ing life anymore! This is about that child! Your boy! Your son! Do you understand?”

Drew doesn’t answer her; rather he reaches across the interview table, and grabs Dawn by the shoulders, shaking her and asking her, “What’s the big idea slapping me like that?” Dawn won’t stand for anymore and punches him in the face while cameras and media look on in shock and awe. Not that long after the punch, Dawn lunges for Drew, tackling him to the ground and punching him from behind the table. Solidad decides to leave the area with her baby, correctly thinking that the situation is far too dangerous for them both.

While behind the table, a microphone falls to the ground near Drew and Dawn, giving the world a sample of Dawn’s feelings towards Drew. While the press and those lucky individuals watching on pay-per-view or subscription channels listen to unedited and unadulterated feelings along with punches being landed, most everyone else would hear several bleeps, including everyone in Lucy’s hotel room.

Few words are exchanged between the six people inside of the hotel room at the moment when the press room fight broke out. The only thing of note in the room was the glances and glazes as people young and old looked in shock at the scene before them. It became apparent that the number one romance in all of coordinating had gone straight down the toilet before their very eyes. What more could anyone say?

“Wow!” Lucy interjects. As she watches the television some more, the film cuts back to the Grand Festival host, who explains to the audience that both Drew and Dawn have been arrested for their part in the press room melee, which took place less than fifteen minutes ago. He wraps up the piece by saying that both are expected to be released very soon. Lucy has seen all that she wanted see, and a lot more that she didn’t expect.

Not even knowing where to start from here, she decides to turn off the television and get to the real reason for her meeting with May and the others. She asks her peers, “Why don’t we all…just get started?”

Everyone thinks it’s a good idea and they gather around a table placed in the room. Once more, they don’t say much, instead opting to nod their head and walk to one of the chairs to begin their meeting concerning May’s appeal.

Shock value is enough to make the most talkative beings on Earth quieter than mice.

--------

Your Thoughts?

 

[shadow_shipper]

I finally owe you a review ^^'

I have a simple innocent question to all of this : why doesn't (or can't) Drew see the big picture ?

Besides that, yeah, shock value all the way xD
Very captivating, keep it up !

 

[Lord Aggron]

This might be the best story (not just a fanfic) I've ever read. And I'm telling you that when I read Medea's and Breezy's stories. Some of the things that you've written are a very good way to word what you mean.

Some of the things in this story are a little disturbing, but then again, we all like to take look at the other side of the fence. The thing about Dawn saying that she gave her body to Drew at the age of fourteen really make me think about what I see in girls now at school (when I get back). I like all the characterization that you have put into people and how I can forget that this a pokemon story at times. The battles sound rather epic when I read them, and just a little more action packed then the games. I don't know what to ask except for maybe two things: are Drew and Dawn the only straight people in the story (except for the adults), and where do I rate this story; I want to give this five and thanks for the staying away from the "Big Five".

P.S. Are characters from the game going to appear. And perhaps Shadow Shipper and I should tell others about this story?

 

[Rave The Rich]

By all means, go out there and spread the word!

Whoa! Someone other than shadow_shipper reviewed my story? That shocked me! Well, before I get to your very spirited reply, Lord Aggron, I do have a reply to make.

I have a simple innocent question to all of this : why doesn't (or can't) Drew see the big picture ?

In many cases, it often comes down to family or upbringing. Drew's past with his family plays a factor in his inability to see the big picture, but the greatest factor of them all is that Drew is just plain scared. Call it fear of failure or what, but he doesn't know if he can be a great father. Obviously, there is more to this story, so stay tuned!

Now, moving along...

This might be the best story (not just a fanfic) I've ever read. And I'm telling you that when I read Medea's and Breezy's stories. Some of the things that you've written are a very good way to word what you mean.

That's saying quite a bit. I've read those fics, and I consider them to be great fics as well from quality authors. If I were to do the mainstream ships just as a means of getting their feedback and not set the goals I've wanted to set for fan fiction for the past two years, then I'm not doing myself any favors. The only one I'm a supporter of is AdvanceShipping and the others just don't appeal to me and never really have.

Don't worry, though. The story is quite popular on other sites and has gotten reactions similar to your own from fellow authors, even those who are considered 'mainstream' in this section. They gravitate to the fic not necessarily because they like the ships, but because they like the story, the messages portrayed and the characters involved.

In fact, I don't believe that anyone who claims to be a fan of this work was a huge fan of the main pairs in it (Kelly/May and Drew/Dawn) before I came up with this and the precursor to the story; a one shot called 'Giving of Yourself', also on this site. That one shot has gotten rave reviews from top authors as well.

Some of the things in this story are a little disturbing, but then again, we all like to take look at the other side of the fence. The thing about Dawn saying that she gave her body to Drew at the age of fourteen really make me think about what I see in girls now at school (when I get back).

I'm not gonna disagree with you on that point. Dawn losing her virginity at age fourteen is disturbing, but I'm certain that it's going on right now with girls in Dawn's position being swept up by charmers who claim to want more than just to get underneath a girl's pants or skirt. It's sad that many out there will give it up for whatever reasons, namely a lack of confidence.

Zoey and Kenny participating in bisexual swinging when both are at the age of sixteen is considered disturbing by many people, but I'm all but certain that this is going on. I'm also certain that there are couples out there (like Conway and Holly, age eighteen and nineteen respectively) that are curious about a side of them that they've wondered about for a while. It doesn't make them criminals or degenerates in the sense that they want to act out their fantasies with other consenting couples. They're not bad people and they are not disgusting. If neither pair minds these...sexual encounters, then it shouldn't matter.

Where there is some disturbance within the context of the fiction, there is a grand streak of positivity at the center of the story. Kelly and May, two seventeen-year-old girls, are in love with each other and want to get married, though they don't know of one another's plans. I designed their romance to be like one of two high school sweethearts who against all odds are determined to spend the rest of their lives together. It's the All-American fairy tale with what many would consider the most disturbing part of it all; they are a committed same-sex pair that can work. If they do work it goes against the 'sanctity' of marriage, but at the same time, their love makes you think. Maybe it isn't as wrong as many might have you believe.

Many things make you think in this story, and that's what I strive to do.

I like all the characterization that you have put into people and how I can forget that this a pokemon story at times.

Most of my positive compliments deal with how characters in this and other stories of mine are more human than elsewhere, so thank you. I'm fortunate to hear that you don't think forgetting that you are reading fan fiction is necessarily a bad thing.

The battles sound rather epic when I read them, and just a little more action packed then the games. I don't know what to ask except for maybe two things: are Drew and Dawn the only straight people in the story (except for the adults), and where do I rate this story; I want to give this five and thanks for the staying away from the "Big Five".

Help with formatting the battles comes from the 'Bulbapedia' website. It contains all of the different attacks that all of the pokemon use. By measuring the impact of every attack, I can properly build battles to build the drama and excitement that is found in the battles.

I've gotten nothing but positive responses to my battle scenes, and like I tell people, I don't aim to do something really special with the battles. All I do is put a high amount of description into each battle (especially the condition of the two pokemon) while at the same time keeping in mind that there are people watching this and adding commentary like you would hear from Brock in the anime during May or Dawn's contests or Ash's battles.

Drew and Dawn are straight, but so are Brock and Lucy. In the real world, if you were to see Conway and Holly, they would be considered straight and so are Sandra and Savannah, and...

Spoiler: Characters that will enter the story later and the role they will play.

Kenta and Marina, who are coming into the picture in future chapters and enter into a story with Kelly later on.

But to classify people in just the three categories of homosexual, bisexual and heterosexual is really not enough, because people are more than that. People's classification of their sexuality can change over time from being bisexual to being hetero or homo or partially one of those two. How else can we explain how people can claim to no longer be gay and accept what they say? Their inner thoughts on sexuality have come into a kind of crossroads that they and only they can deal with.

I mentioned in chapter three the name 'Kinsey', and that was in reference to Dr. Alfred Kinsey, who did a lot of research on sexuality in the 1940s and 1950s that still has a great impact and remains relevant today. He created a scale that I think can better explain what I mean when I say you have to use some relativity in this subject and not consider only the absolutes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinsey_Scale

Using the chart, Kelly, May, Max and Harley and Paul would rank as either fives or sixes. Kenny, Zoey and Ash would be threes or fours and Conway and Holly would both be anywhere from ones to threes on Kinsey's chart.

P.S. Are characters from the game going to appear.

I probably will. As far as who these characters are, stay tuned, but they will likely not be game protagonists.

And perhaps Shadow Shipper and I should tell others about this story?

Well, like I said on this story's header, by all means, go out there and spread the word. Some people might get behind it, and others might not even acknowledge my work. It doesn't hurt to get the word out for something that you have responded to so well. People will come at their own pace or not at all, but if you feel that this fic is the best shipping fic on this site, let it be known!

Chapter 25 will likely come by the end of this week or earlier. It needs a bit of an edit job. Stay tuned and thank you, Lord Aggron for all of your support!

 

[Lord Aggron]

I don't like most of the major ships except for Pearlshipping. As for the other ships that I enjoy are fortuneshipping, hoennshipping and commoneershipping (Diamond and Berlitz). I can wait for another chapter, I've got video games to play (Medieval Total War).

 

[Rave The Rich]

We're at the near midway point with chapter twenty-five!

As promised, here is chapter 25! After this, new chapters of the story will come no earlier than early to mid-July. Enjoy!

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4127100/25/All_Roads_Lead_to_the_Grand_Festival

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Pokemon, a creation of one Satoshi Tajiri, and is produced domestically (in the United States) by Pokemon USA/The Pokemon Company, and internationally by Shogakukan and OLM. I personally own nothing and make nothing by writing this. Please do not flame.

(Chapter 25- Elements in Play and At Work)

---------

Like war room strategists past and present, the six people sitting around the circular table in Lucy and Brock’s hotel room realize that it does no solider any good to rush into battle without a plan. Looking at May intently and not wavering in their faces, her girlfriend, brother, father and two of her good friends watch her as she describes in great detail what she will do for her appeal in a few hours time.

“Okay,” May begins. “I’ve always felt that the best appeals tell stories through the attacks.” Using a toy Skitty model to help her in her demonstration, May places the look alike in the center of the table. “I’m going to use the many elements in Skitty’s appeal. Using TMs, she is capable of doing attacks like blizzard, ice beam, sunny day, and a few others.”

“I have all of the TMs that I’m gonna need for this appeal, so that base is covered. Skitty will start in the center of the ring. I plan on beginning with…rain dance. That will bring in the water element and seeing as we’ve gotten a lot of power out of Skitty over the past few weeks; it should be enough to drench the field for a while. From there, we cool things down and then some with Skitty’s blizzard attack.”

“That will do more than just cool things down,” Max comments. “Sounds nice so far, May, but where does this all lead?”

“I’m gonna lead up to a finale where we include thunder into the mix and just have Skitty create this powerful storm which all culminates into this…big flash. From there, the rain will keep going until I have Skitty do sunny day. From there, the rain will clear up and the appeal will end with this giant circular rainbow in the sky. I’ve been practicing this during bright days with Skitty, and we’ve got it down to a near simple science. So what do you guys think?”

As the five listened to May throughout her description of her appeal, they are now ready to form their own conclusions as to just how effective an appeal like May’s will be.

Lucy, who is sitting to the immediate left of May tells her, “I think that you’re about to get a fifty. That’s really good and a very effective use of TMs. My only problem is…what you’re talking about is a lot to fit into just two minutes.”

“I understand, and like I said, I’ve been working with Skitty for several weeks so that we could get this appeal down pat.”

“They have been. Trust me on this one, Lucy,” Kelly replies. Sitting to the immediate right of May, she asks everyone else at the table, “Does anyone else have some other words of advice that can help us out for later?”

“Yeah, I do,” Brock chimes in. “May, you talk about how this appeal should be large. You said large enough to drench the field, and if that’s the case, everyone should see it, but…I still have some concerns. The field is very large. If you want everyone to see this, I think it would be a good idea to have Skitty…do all of these attacks while she’s…what’s the word I’m looking for?”

“Take your time, dear,” Lucy assures her beau.

Brock does so, and after a few minutes of thinking about what would make Skitty’s appeal that much better, he comes up with the solution to, “Have Skitty…spinning while she attacks. Do you know what I’m trying to say?”

In an attempt to explain his strategy, Brock spins the toy Skitty on the center of the table while keeping the model on its legs. He says to May, “Keep in mind that you will be judged on more than just the moves you use and how they are used in your appeal. If the crowd loves what you are doing, then they will show it with their cheers. If Skitty is spinning at 360 degrees while attacking, it’s a given that everyone will see what she’s doing. That can influence the five judges to give you a higher score especially if the crowd is really into it, and if everyone can see this great appeal you have planned, that will make the cheers that much louder. No judge can ignore that.”

While her family and friends agree with Brock’s logic, May takes a more analytical approach to her older friend’s words. “That all sounds good, Brock, but there are a couple of issues that I have with that plan; what do we do to keep Skitty spinning that long and can she hold that pace for two minutes? That can seem like an eternity when you’re up there for so long.”

“Well, we haven’t been working on cardiovascular conditioning for nothing, May,” Kelly reminds her trainee. “I think that Skitty can do it, and…I think I know how to make her ‘spin’ for two minutes.” Whispering into the ear of her girlfriend while the rest of the members of the roundtable discussion look on, Kelly explains her brilliant plan to May as far as how to get Skitty to gracefully turn while at the same time delivering powerful attacks. As the coordinator listens to her best friend, she likes her plan more and more.

“Okay, that does make sense,” May admits. “Even if we are going to be teasing Skitty by doing it, I like it.”

“Anyone else have some more advice for my trainee?”

After Kelly asks the other people at the table for their advice, Norman chimes in with some of his words of wisdom. He says to his daughter, “I like the appeal, but my biggest gripe would probably be that…that’s a very action-packed appeal. I wonder if it’s…too much at once.”

“I wouldn’t worry too much about that, dad. The judges will give Skitty points for liveliness and activity. And one thing that we’ve been working on is pacing.”

Norman finds it very hard to argue with her daughter’s logic. “Okay. It’s your call. Good luck, May.”

“Anything else?” Kelly asks once more. After a couple of seconds of not hearing anything, she says, “Very well. Meeting adjourned. Thanks for all of your help.”

Standing up from her seat, Kelly prompts her girlfriend by telling her, “Come on, May. Your appeal is in about an hour. Let’s go meet with your mom and get ready to do this.”

“Okay, dear,” May replies before getting up. As she and Kelly leave, they thank Lucy and Brock for letting them have their meeting in their hotel room and May tells her father and brother that she’ll see them soon.

Outside of the hotel room, the girlfriends are quickly pacing themselves as they are on a somewhat tight schedule. Their mothers Caroline and Julia are already at the Slateport Stadium awaiting both of them, but more specifically awaiting May, who has to get dressed in her appeal-appropriate attire.

While making the walk to the elevators, May asks Kelly about something that has been on her mind since she called her not that long ago. “Say Kelly. I know we’ve cleared up everything with Zoey, Kenny and them, but I’m curious. Everything that happened earlier with them all stems back to...her, right?”

“I thought that they wouldn’t be honest, but given that you mentioned it, yes. That's what was happening in my head at the time. I just don't like cheating and I don't like people who lie about cheating, either. Yeah, she had a ton to do with that.”

Expecting Kelly to clear up her reasoning behind sneaking to find out the activities of her four friends, May listens intently to her girlfriend only to hear nothing but their own footsteps as they make their way to the elevator.

“So,” begins the coordinator in sweatpants, “this is what it has come to and it all led back to your first girlfriend and what happened there right after you came out to your folks?"

“I guess, but it's not just that. It’s…it’s really a big thing that was nothing, May.”

“Kelly, come on! You know that I know better than that. Damn it, we don’t do this! We don’t keep secrets from each other! What the hell are you talking about when you say that this is nothing? Are you trying to say that your life is nothing? That your emotions are nothing?”

“It’s embarrassing.”

“I don’t care, Kelly!” she exclaims as the two enter an empty elevator and press the button for the ground floor of the hotel. As the door to the elevator closes and the pair makes their descent from floor ten to floor one, May informs Kelly while looking her dead in her eyes, “Look, I wouldn’t want us to enter a commitment if we kept secrets between each other even if they are embarrassing. So what happened?”

Bringing her head down for a second, Kelly has to admit that May is right. No matter how crazy her past was, she did learn a great deal from it. “Well, you know the story that goes with my first girlfriend. Am I right?”

“Of course.”

“Well, what you don’t know is that my first girlfriend…accused me of cheating several times along with her. This was about a year before you and I came together and I was about thirteen years old at the time. It shocked me to no end because I would never do anything like that, but it did more than just throw me off. She caused a rift between me and my parents! They actually believed that ***** over me, their own daughter!”

“Why did you stay with her if she kept making these false accusations? That's the part that I don't get. Why not kick her out then and there?”

“Well, first off, that's my parent's call, not mine. Because I loved her…or at least I thought I did. I come to find out that the only reason she said all of that was because she was cheating on me the entire time. She only said that so no one would suspect her wrongdoings. I hated her for the longest time. That’s why I’m so against cheating, May. Not only because it happened to me, but because I was wrongfully accused by someone who I cared for deeply. She lied right to my face. She nearly cost me the good relationship I have with my mom and dad, and to this very day, she carries on with her boyfriend like she’s done absolutely nothing wrong. That’s why I didn’t want to ask Zoey or Holly point blank; because I didn’t want to be lied to again. It happened to me personally and I’ll be damned if it’s gonna happen to me or anyone else I care for again.”

As the tandem hears the elevator ring, they find that they have come to a stop two floors before reaching the ground floor. May makes the comment after digesting all of Kelly’s information, “That makes a lot of sense. Maybe I shouldn’t say this, but…I’m pretty certain that she is at this Grand Festival. Is that a problem?”

While two gentlemen enter the elevator car, Kelly considers the idea of her ex-girlfriend being at the Grand Festival and though she would prefer not to see her, she is more indifferent than anything else to the idea. She gives May a response of ‘Whatever’ to play off her ex’s significance. No more words are exchanged between the two as the elevator reaches ground level.

---------

Once his sister and her girlfriend leave, Max says, “I just remembered. I have to meet up with Harley before the appeal. I’ll see you all in a bit,” and no sooner than May and Kelly leave, Max exits the hotel room en route to the room he shares with his boyfriend. He leaves his father to talk with Brock about Forrest’s progress as a gym leader in Pewter City.

Unlike May, Max doesn’t have far to go to reach his room. He only has to walk down two flights of stairs to floor number eight. From there, May’s little brother still has quite a ways to go to reach his hotel room. He walks the entire distance of the hallway and then makes a right turn to even more rooms before he gets to his; the final hotel on the right.

Reaching into his pockets, Max pulls out his key card, but before he can unlock the door to his room, a hand unexpectedly touches his shoulder. Turning around and expecting the worst, Max is instead given what amounts to a look in the mirror.

“Oh! Hey, Conway. What’s up?”

“Not too much. I’m about to join my party and root your sister on in her appeal.”

“Thanks,” Max replies, “and thanks for all of your support for me and my family over the years. My family and I really appreciate it.”

“Oh, no problem, man,” Conway assures. “Like I said to you when my brother first introduced us, any friend of Seth’s is a friend of mine.”

“Yeah, about that.”

“What do you mean, ‘about that’?”

“Well, if he’s such a good friend, why was he so hard on me a year ago? I competed against him in the Kanto League Championships quarterfinals and I beat him. I tried to ask him what he though about losing to me, and he just left saying that he should have worked harder and that I battled well. You remember this, Conway? Now normally, we get along very well, but that day, he’d barely speak to me.”

“Well, Max, it’s the league championships. They only happen once a year in each of the regions. You know the accolades and the recognition and the…money that goes to whoever wins a league title?”

Thinking about it for a second, Conway’s words make more sense. Having not seen both of the Ericsson brothers in about a year’s time didn’t allow the younger siblings to talk about their classic six-on-six battle from that championship. With Conway here with him now in Hoenn to support May and Seth back in Sinnoh to compete in that league, perhaps some confusion about that moment in time can be cleared up for them both. “Yeah. I guess you make a good point.”

“Look, I admit that my younger brother can be very intense at times, but it’s only because he wants to be the best, just like us, and he just has a different way of going about it. He kinda reminds me of Paul before he came out.”

“Isn’t it funny how that happened?” Max questions. “The entire time we thought he was just a mean guy. I guess you can’t really judge a book by its look.”

“Hell, I knew him when he wasn’t an *******. Something…changed him. I don’t know if it was the death of his mom when he was five or what, but…he wasn’t always like that. He was a really sweet boy.” A few seconds of dead time passes, and Conway gets a good look at Max. “Shoot. I just noticed it,” the older male in glasses comments while chuckling. “We’re wearing the exact same shirt!”

Getting a look at Conway and then taking a look at his own shirt, Max realizes it himself. “Well, what do you know? You’re right!”

“Why’d you change shirts?” he asks the Hoenn trainer out of curiosity.

This question catches Max off guard. For one, he did not expect to hear it and second of all, the real reason is very crazy in its nature. “Well, you see…um…Harley had…I guess…spilled something on the first shirt and...” It is at this point where Max begins to go on the defensive asking his older counterpart, “Why the hell do you want to know so badly, huh? If you’re so damn curious, I was giving my boyfriend head and he came on my old shirt. There! I said it! Are you happy Connie?” Max bluntness causes Conway to open his mouth wider than Max did earlier in the day.

While Conway is in his trance, Max unlocks the door to his hotel room and informs the eighteen year old, “Quit being so goddamn noisy, all right?” and he shuts the door behind him.

Noticing something amiss with what Max just told him, Conway frees himself from his trance and knocks on Harley and Max’s room. He asks the younger teen, “Hey Max. Max, didn’t you mean to say ‘Quit being so goddamn nosy?’”

Hearing this question from the other side of the door, Max opens the door, saying nothing to Conway in the process. All he did was hold the middle finger of his right hand directly in front of the bespectacled one’s face before shutting the door once more.

“What the **** is going on here?” the swinging teen questions before he makes the long walk to the elevators and the stadium.

 

[Lord Aggron]

As always, you stun us all with your style of writing, Rave. I get the feeling that Max's harshness is telling us all something about what's goign to happen in later chapters. And just curious, but why are you going to be on hiatus for a month or so. Oh, and May's strategy sounds pretty good, and pretty.

 

[shadow_shipper]

Why such a long wait ahead of us ?

May's appeal is about to begin, and I can't wait to see what happens there
And the end of this chapter seemed to build rather a lot of tension...

Keep it up, we'll both be waiting when you come back

 

[Rave The Rich]

And just curious, but why are you going to be on hiatus for a month or so.

Why such a long wait ahead of us?

I'm committed to doing a project that will take up much of my time during the month of June. Basically, I'm doing four one shots on my country's Independence Day, July 4th. That's the reason for the delay, but I've been brainstorming where the story will go next, so right after that, you'll see regular updates. I'll tell you now that chapter 28 will have May's appeal. That's a guarantee directly from the horse's mouth.

May's appeal is about to begin, and I can't wait to see what happens there

Oh, and May's strategy sounds pretty good, and pretty.

I've got something really nice planned for it, and fortunate as well; you guys won't have to wait long for it at all.

And the end of this chapter seemed to build rather a lot of tension...

As always, you stun us all with your style of writing, Rave. I get the feeling that Max's harshness is telling us all something about what's going to happen in later chapters.

Ha-ha-ha-ha. I bet NEITHER of you know what I have planned for 'Little Maximus'. I'll just say, it ain't gonna be pretty.

Stay tuned, if you're not careful, you'll all learn something and like it!

 

[cbiesra]

if you're having such a long wait and then you write six weeks later isn't that breakind serbii rules? You know bumping?

 

[shadow_shipper]

Nope, as the shipping fic rules say that for update purposes it is allowed, and that a fic does not have a post time limit, like in the Shippers Community where it's thirty days...

Besides, you should post something more constructive on a fic thread rather than just ask about a technicality