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Manon casually tosses the Pokéball up in the air and catches it a few times, not pressing the button that will release her Sylveon inside. “It’s been a while, hasn’t it?” she asks. Under the surface, she feels a little bit more nervous, but…it really has been a while since she last saw Chris.
“It has,” he answers, mirroring her gesture. “You still prefer coordinating over battle?”
“You still obsessed with winning?” she retorts.
“Well,” he responds, smirking, “I am the Champion.”
“I thought you were going to hop around Alola for a while,” she says. “Did the Battle Tree wear you out too soon?”
One of them is going to have to break, but it won’t be her.
He shrugs. “Just wanted to come home. It’d be irresponsible for me to miss any challengers that came my way, after all.”
“Oh, so you’re prepared to take things seriously?” she asks.
“That’s a low blow, and you know it,” he responds. “And you’re making fun of me for not taking things seriously when you’re a fairy-type specialist?”
“Hey, fairy types are legit,” Manon says. She’s not going to break first. She’s not going to be the one to challenge him, because it would be foolish to challenge the region’s Champion, even if she is the best coordinator. They take different skills. “They have their own strengths and weaknesses, and they’re good for coordinating because they’re all show-offs.” She smirks. “I don’t think you could do what I do.”
“No, but you couldn’t do what I do, either.” Chris looks at the Pokéball in his hand — from all the wear, it’s probably his starter. She wonders what became of it. “You were never able to beat me in a fight.”
She shrugs. “I’m not particularly interested in all that. Being the Champion’s too much work, you see.”
There’s a crowd gathering around them — Kalos Champion Chris Lahifffe and Top Coordinator Manon Chamack. Six years is a long time — most people have forgotten that they used to be friends, once. Manon got half of her gym badges before she decided to become a coordinator, and Chris kept going, all the way up.
It’s been a while, indeed.
“Ah, yes, and you don’t do work preening your Pokémon to make them contest-ready?” Chris’s smile almost looks predatory. “I’ll tell you this. Let’s battle. If I win, you have to fight my challengers for a day. I know your Pokémon are high enough to do it. If you win, I have to enter my Pokémon into a contest.”
“What are the terms for the battle?” Manon asks.
“Casual, three versus three,” Chris responds. “No restores or healing. If someone gets paralyzed or anything, that’s the end of the line for them.”
She looks down at the ball she has in her hand, and swaps it out for something else. “You’re on.”
The chatter of the crowd falls silent. Manon closes her eyes. She doesn’t need to show off here. She just needs to win.
She tosses her Pokéball out. Her Azumarill comes face to face with Chris’s Delphox.
While Chris is getting over his shock at her luck (it was a plan, really, simple observation), she takes the moment to prepare. “Use Rain Dance, Azumarill!”
Chris glares at her as clouds settle over the field.
“Delphox, return,” he declares. It’s not angry — not yet. She needs to get Chris to lose control of his emotions. That’ll be the key to victory. “Alright, Heliolisk, let’s do this.”
That is, if he doesn’t get to her first. They’ve always been the best at pushing each other’s buttons.
“Use Water Pulse,” she commands Azumarill, but it won’t be very effective. Heliolisk looks just fine afterwards.
“Electro Ball, Heliolisk,” Chris orders, and the Pokémon uses the move.
“Dodge, Azumarill!” she says, and it rolls out of the way of the ball of electricity. “Alright, Azumarill, you’ve done a great job. Come on out, Dedenne.”
Sparks of electricity spark under the rain.
“Oh, so that’s how you’re playing this,” Chris says. “Dragon Pulse— crap.”
It doesn’t work.
“I know my types just as well as you do. Or don’t, I suppose,” she answers. “Alright, Dedenne, use Dazzling Gleam!” She averts her eyes as Dedenne lights up with a flash. Heliolisk takes a moment to shake its head, but it wasn’t overly affected by it.
She needs to decide which of her team will be her third. Azumarill, Dedenne, and one more…
She’ll have to wait and see if Chris decides to switch out his Heliolisk for something else, considering that none of his moves are effective right now on her Dedenne. At least, she’s pretty sure they won’t be.
Chris hums, and switches out his Heliolisk for…a Toxapex?
Oh no. Okay, that’s going to be hard to work around, but she can do it.
“Alright, Dedenne, use Electric Terrain!” In combination with the Rain Dance, it’ll make her life easier. She’s used this strategy before in competition — she hasn’t done a real battle in years, but the way it makes the raindrops sparkle and crackle as they hit the ground is a hit with the judges.
Chris’s eyes widen. Yes, she thinks to herself. “Toxapex, Toxic,” he commands, but his voice wavers slightly.
And then Dedenne gets poisoned. She should’ve known. But she looks at the little mouse, and it’s determined to keep fighting.
The rain fades away, but she can do this. “Thunder Wave, Dedenne,” she commands, forcing her voice to be level.
With the combination of the Electric Terrain and the type weakness, the damage to Toxapex is substantial.
“Cross Poison,” Chris commands.
“Dodge it,” she commands Dedenne. It manages, but only just, and she sighs with relief. “Another Thunder Wave!”
“Come on, Toxapex,” Chris says, “get out of the way…”
But the Pokémon is moving slowly, and it doesn’t evade Dedenne’s attack. That causes it to go down for the count, but the poison’s wearing on Dedenne. It pants. It’s still holding on, but it doesn’t have much left.
“Delphox, let’s do this,” Chris says, bringing his starter back out. “Blast Burn!”
The fire swarms the field, and Dedenne’s down for the count. She returns her Dedenne to its Pokéball, and takes back out her Azumarill. It’s the best weapon she has against Delphox, after all.
Chris hums. “Let’s do that again, Delphox.”
She glares at him. “You really thought that would work? Azumarill, use Hydro Pump.” The move really affects Delphox, who doesn’t look well.
Chris sighs. Delphox might be pretty high level, but her Pokémon are well-trained, too. Manon knows what she’s doing. In a way, this is almost easier than the battles in coordinator contests, because right now she doesn’t have to worry about the aesthetic of her moves. All she has to worry about is type and such.
“Delphox, thanks for your service. Come on out, Heliolisk.”
Right. The electric type of his team. Well, she still has one more Pokémon for this fight that she hasn’t used. The debate now lies in whether she should bring out her Sylveon, or something else. She considers her team.
She might as well make it starter for starter. “Alright, Sylveon!”
Sylveon’s the Pokémon that helped Manon make the decision to settle on fairy types. They’re surprisingly powerful, even if she has some holes in her team, and poison types aren’t common among coordinators anyways — they’re hard to make look nice.
She doesn’t have much, but she has something. She can try.
The score is 2-2. She’s got this.
In the end, it comes down to Sylveon and Delphox, starter for starter. Heliolisk takes out Azumarill, but her Sylveon does the finishing blow to Heliolisk, so it’s fine.
“Alright, Sylveon!” she says. She’s waiting to see what Chris will come up with, but she needs to make sure her Pokémon stays hyped up. They’re not friends for nothing.
“Mystical Fire,” Chris commands.
“Do the same, Sylveon!” she commands back, and she watches the expression on Chris’s face morph into surprise. The fires overwhelm each other until she can’t see what’s going on really, which one will overpower the other.
They wait in terse anticipation — which Pokémon will come out on top?
When the dust settles, both Pokémon are knocked out.
Manon steps towards her fallen Pokémon, and returns it to her ball. “What does this mean?”
“It’s up to you,” Chris says. “Whether we both try once in the other person’s shoes, or we stay as we are.”
“You know what?” Manon says, looking at him head on, taking him in as he is, “you might make one heck of a coordinator. I want to see how you do. So…let’s try it.”
“The League won’t admit any of the battles you do,” Chris says, scratching the back of his neck. “I shouldn’t have said that when we were setting the terms. But…I mean, even if they’re not admissible under League rules, you’ll still have an idea what it’s like.”
“Isn’t that unfair to your challengers? If they’re expecting a fight with the Champion, and all they get is…” She doesn’t say it, but there is bias against coordinators. He’s already referenced it in their verbal sparring.
“I think you’ve demonstrated you’re worthy here, since we tied.” Chris shrugs. “So, let’s just see how things go.”
“Sounds good.” They shake on it, and then walk to the Pokécenter together to heal their Pokémon from the battle.
Apparently, someone filmed their battle, because the next day it’s all over the Web. It seems their title from the old days when they were rising stars is back — the prince and princess of Kalos return, one headline reads, and Manon just…isn’t ready to face it.
At least Mom refuses on principle to write any articles about her or Chris, no matter how many hits they would gather. She has no qualms with her station publishing them — news is news — but she won’t be part of the journalistic forces responsible for those articles.
It’s a little less objectively disconcerting than it used to be. Manon remembers trying to get away from her own disgust at people imagining subtext to the relationship between her and Chris and realizing just how young the two of them were — they were ten, and people were placing so many expectations on the two of them, rising stars.
Well, Chris was more of the star before she won Top Coordinator, but they were connected before — people were seeing these two kids from Lumiose, these two kids that traveled together partway through the journey of getting gym badges before parting ways.
And, of course, Kalosians were always especially inclined to look at a boy and a girl and expect the worst.
The speculation is less objectively disgusting than it was before, when they were ten. She’s willing to accept that it’s more from a subjective perspective than an objective one now. She and Chris grew up together, being babysat by the same set of people. It’s a little bit weird to think of him like that, but…they’ve both grown up, she can (begrudgingly) admit.
It’s not every day that Chris concedes to coordinating. She was always willing to go through with the conditions of the agreement, of course, but…
Well. It’s something.
Manon remembers how to battle, too. Coordinating isn’t just about looking pretty — though it’s about aesthetic value above all else, Pokémon still have to prove themselves capable. Fainting is one of the worst aesthetic failures of all, but making the battles timed prevents that for the most part.
She’s going to be using her regular team, of course. There haven’t been many champions that choose to specialize. She can only hope for the best. The battles may not be League official, but losing would reflect badly on her.
How many people challenge the Champion on a daily basis, anyways?
She makes her way to Victory Road, wearing her hair up in a bun. She tucks a visor over it. It’s more “traveler” than “coordinator”, which is fine. She doesn’t really want to present that much as a coordinator anyways, though it might lead some people to underestimate her.
“Manon Chamack,” she says to the person in the lobby. “Chris and I had a wager of sorts.”
“I’m aware,” the person replies. “You know, it’s been a while since I last saw you, Manon. You’ve changed.”
“Well, if it isn’t Ella Césaire,” Manon says. “It’s good to see you. How’d you end up here?”
“Alya helped. It’s not…commentating, but it’s nice to see all the people that come here, looking to battle Chris. Though I guess today…are any of your battles even League-admissable?”
“No,” she says. “Tell anyone that comes through that, though I guess some people will want to challenge me anyways despite that.”
***
The day passes really slowly. Okay, now she knows why Chris would leave for Alola, under these conditions. Only a few challengers spice her day up; there’s not a lot of people who want to challenge the Champion on a good day, let alone challenge someone the Champion tied in a battle over something inane.
(She can admit it was petty. But it was still fun, and it reminded her of all the reasons she wanted to follow the path of the gyms, back in the day. She’d probably destroy most of them now, even despite going to follow the path of a coordinator.)
“You know,” one trainer says to her, “I admire your courage for being here.” They lost, of course. “I mean, you’re not really a battle trainer, you coordinate for a living. And yet you’re still capable of going toe to toe with the champion.”
“I just…know him better than most,” she says. “I mean, you’ve probably heard all the things they’ve called us. But we’ve been…professional rivals for a while. And friends, but the rivals part is always more important to them. Sometimes I think that’s the part of our relationship that matters more to him, too. I think he still feels hurt by the fact that I left to follow the contest circuit, instead of sticking around and following through on getting the badges. Congratulations, by the way — and good luck when you face the real Champion.”
“Thanks, Manon,” the trainer answers. “Have a good day!”
(“That trainer comes by on a daily basis,” Ella tells her later. “They were enthusiastic about facing someone new instead. They’ve been able to wipe the Elite Four clean, but they haven’t been able to beat Chris yet.”)
All in all, she doesn’t think she would mind being Champion, but it does seem lonely to just sit at the end of Victory Road all day.
But now she’s done walking a mile in his shoes to say that.
The next contest isn’t for another month, so they have plenty of time to prepare Chris for it. After all, he doesn’t need to get the contest ribbon or anything, he just needs to participate as a coordinator in it.
There’s apparently a welcome back party for Chris being held by Nino at his and Adrien’s apartment. It’s a pretty roomy apartment — but Adrien’s rich, so that only makes sense.
And Chris has personally invited Manon, which is weird because it feels like she clings too much to their friendship and he doesn’t do it enough. Anyways, Etta and Ella are going to be there. She doesn’t know if Alya will be there. Marinette probably will be. Manon hopes her mother isn’t, but she doubts she would be.
They get a training session before the party, at any rate. Chris’s Alolan Ninetails enjoys the spotlight, and Dazzling Gleam is a classic in the world of coordinating. Chris has a little bit of a knack for it, but he’s still just a novice at this. The high level of his Pokémon makes his moves stronger, and he’s trying to make it work. The composition of his Pokémon team leads her to believe that an “intimidation” approach would be stronger than a “cutesy” approach, especially in the appeal. There’s a certain beauty to distance, to the appearance of untouchability.
They decide that Chris will design three possible appeals. One with Delphox, one with Ninetails, and one with Absol. Absol and Skarmory are the pair set out for battles, with the secondary team-up of Heliolisk and Delphox. Heliolisk, surprisingly enough, also knows Rain Dance — but the water will both electrify and produce steam for Delphox, which will win the judges over when Delphox burns the rain out of the sky.
She assesses Ninetails’s appeal, as that’s the primary option. It’s fairly simple, but the slightly dimmed Dazzling Gleam is enough to make both Ninetails and the snow around it shine.
She claps at the end of the performance. “Great work! You’ve come a long way since we started with this.”
“Thanks,” Chris responds, smiling over at her. “You ready for the party, now?”
“I’ve got to get home and change,” Manon says, “but I’ll be there.”
“Okay,” Chris says. “I’ll see you there, then.”
Manon receives a text right when she’s about to head up the stairs to Adrien and Nino’s apartment.
Nino and Alya fighting, Chris texts.
She frowns. abt what? she texts back as she climbs the stairs. already on my way up
Alya’s new gf, Chris answers.
Well. Manon supposes that her arrival will break the tension there.
She exits the stairwell and knocks on the apartment door.
Chris’s face is the sight that greets her. “Hey, Manon.”
“Hey,” she whispers.
“You shouldn’t have brought her here,” Nino yells. “You’re always so insensitive, you don’t think about how your actions affect other people.”
“I don’t need you to defend me,” Adrien says, but it’s soft, not part of the argument really. “I trust Alya. You should too. I know it’s hard, but…”
“Who’s the girlfriend?” Manon says, leaning in to whisper to Chris. “I’ve never seen her before.”
“That’s Lila,” Chris whispers back. “She used to babysit me when Alya and Nino were still dating. She and Alya were friends. I thought they had a falling-out.”
“Oh,” Manon whispers back.
“We will…reserve this argument for a future date, then,” Nino says. He’s looking at Adrien, so clearly he’s lovestruck enough to disrupt whatever he has against Lila. “This is about my brother, who’s been lingering like a wallflower…wait, hi Manon!”
“Sorry I was late,” she says. “Hello there.” She waves, but it feels awkward. At least the tension is officially broken.
“You’re Manon Chamack?” Lila says. “I always thought you were older.”
“Wait,” Manon says, looking at Lila. “I’ve seen you before. Vanserra Ribbon, right?”
“Yes,” Lila answers. “I didn’t manage to get the eight necessary, but…that’s alright. Coordinating isn’t my fate either, it seems.”
“Where are Luka and Marinette?” Alya asks. “I was looking forward to seeing her.”
Adrien shrugs. “Probably…with each other, I’d suspect. They’re still a little bit in that honeymoon phase. He just got back from touring, so…”
Alya wrinkles her nose. “I see.”
“Sometimes I want to ditch too,” Chris mutters under his breath.
“It’s your party,” Manon says, nudging him.
And then a doorbell rings, and Marinette and Luka come into the apartment.
“Hey,” Marinette says. “Sorry we were late. We were doing some stuff.”
“Okay, okay,” Chris says. “Everybody’s here now. I guess I should say something. It’s good to be back in Kalos, even if I already managed to get myself into a situation.” He looks over at Manon. “I’m ready to meet what comes next with open arms. Alright, can I leave now?”
“This is your party!” Nino says. “You should enjoy it, bro.” He rustles Chris’s hair. “And hey, there’s some people whose company you enjoy.”
Chris pushes Nino away. “Gross.”
Manon grabs some crackers and cheese from a table and eats. The snacks are always the best part.
About a half hour later, Chris taps her shoulder. “Hey. You wanna get out of here? I can get up to the roof.”
“That’d be nice,” she answers, tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ears. “Let’s go.”
Another couple flights of stairs, a trapdoor, and they’re greeted with fresh air.
The sight of the Lumiose skyline is absolutely gorgeous. “Wow. It’s really pretty up here.”
“I didn’t know that it was this good either,” Chris says. “I was expecting worse, with all the pollution.”
“It’s nice.” She sits over close to the edge of the roof.
“Careful,” Chris warns.
“I brought Togekiss,” Manon says. “It’s the only one I brought tonight, but…I always bring one of mine, in case. The city can be dangerous.”
“Yeah,” Chris answers. “I get it. But it’s safe up here, as long as you aren’t afraid of heights.”
Manon hums. There’s an atmosphere about this moment, something that makes it different. “I’m not afraid.” She scoots closer to him. “But it is a little cold.”
“Serves you right for wearing a sleeveless dress,” Chris teases. “You always dress to impress.”
“Part of the deal with coordinating. Everything has to be impeccable.”
“But I think I like you better when you’re not trying to be that,” he says. “Like when we fought, or when you were helping me. You never look like yourself when you’re in a contest.”
“I had no idea you were watching,” she says. “But…don’t you do the same sort of thing? It’s about survival.”
“I guess,” Chris says. “But I still prefer the real you.”
“I could say the same.”
Again, another shift — this one more minute, but still perceptible.
Manon doesn’t know what it means, but she wants to find out.