Work Text:
Unova.
Cynthia licked her ice cream as she absently watched the Junior Cup battle between two promising Trainers.
An orange blur whisked across the arena inches in front of her face, blowing her hair back with the vortex from its wingtips. Opposite him stood a shifty Krokorok with black stripes and dark shades. A boy commanded this Pokémon with fluid grace, his long spiky black hair shifting with the force of his gestures. Cynthia had seen this boy – Ash – battle before, in the Sinnoh League, and he still fought with the same intense, emotional style. On the other side, a girl seemed to be struggling to get her orange Dragonite to listen to her.
“I said Flamethrower!” she tried.
This time, it seemed to work, with a blow of scarlet flames bursting from her dragon’s mouth. They landed square on Krokorok’s chest, blasting him into the wall of the stadium. The crocodile lay face-down on the dirt. The girl jumped, pumping her fist in the air and causing her hair to bounce enthusiastically. Ash lifted his eyebrows, impressed that she had finally got Dragonite under control.
Cynthia was more sceptical. The attack had started a split second before the command.
Her tongue lapped up a chocolate chip on the side of the ice cream cone.
Cynthia recalled her first encounter with the girl. She had come to meet Ash in Unova, unexpectedly running into his friend, an aspiring Dragon Master named Iris. The girl had excitably leapt at the prospect of a battle with Cynthia’s dragon type and dear friend Garchomp. Never one to turn down a battle, she had begun seriously, attacking strong and fast. Iris scored a few surprising hits with clever tactics and sheer grit before she was overwhelmed by force.
Now it was Iris who used the overwhelming force of Dragonite to her advantage. Ash was on the back foot, but Cynthia had seen him here before. She waited. Krokorok’s weakened body seemed to grow larger on the field as Ash thought of a way out. No. Cynthia squinted. Not seemingly. Krokorok was actually growing larger, its legs growing claws, arms extending, and tail lengthening until it couldn’t be called Krokorok anymore.
“Krookodile, Dragon Claw!” exclaimed Ash with his trademark passion.
The crocodile hopped in a clean arc, rapidly closing in on Dragonite.
“Dodge it!”
Cynthia had her suspicions confirmed as Dragonite refused to budge. It stood proudly, puffing out its chest in preparation of impact. She’d seen this before. Ash had too. In the Sinnoh League quarter-finals, Ash had fought a similarly adamant Trainer who took hits fair and square.
Cynthia realized, with a sweet bite of chocolate, that she knew the winner already.
Ash grinned, adjusting intuitively to Dragonite’s stubbornness. With an emphatic punch, he ordered the Pokémon to throw its full weight behind the attack. A second hung in the air. Cynthia stopped eating her ice cream. Krookodile wound up its arm. Instantaneously, its claws bludgeoned Dragonite’s ribs, throwing it downwards with a sonic boom. The dragon’s tail slammed the ground, displacing a tsunami of rock into the air all directions. When the dust cleared, Dragonite sat motionless in an impact crater the size of Sinnoh.
Iris’s eyes shined with tears; she’d just learned there was more to battling than simple power.
Cynthia noticed her arm had somehow formed itself into a claw. Her ice cream had started dripping while she was engrossed in the battle. A few stray drops slid down the side of the cone.
She considered the Trainers in front of her with new eyes. Her imagination began to soar high in the skies…
What a day it would be when she would face them both in the Champion League.