PD: Walk Like A Champion, Talk Like A Champion

Being a Champion sucked. It had been cool when I wanted some power to throw around to help fix some things, but mostly, it was like being babysat. I had schedules laid out for me during certain seasons, I had to play nice, and honestly, my pokémon had to be even stronger than I'd original anticipated, since we had to squash opponents without hurting them.

"I want out," I told Lucian.

"Like you wanted out of your gym?" he replied coolly.

I went to Volkner and Flint next, and they were a little more sympathetic. "Remember when you had to fake a loss? It will be like that, except worse."

"Way worse," Flint agreed. "We're gonna have to vet them, you realize? And then you're going to have to throw yourself under a bus defending them after they take the crown."

"It's not that bad afterward," Volkner said mildly, eying his friend, "but it will be hell for a couple weeks. You'll have to pick someone who's not only an excellent battler, but someone who can deal with all of the issues you were unaware of when you took the position."

"Then why did you let me take it?!" I demanded, peeved that no one had warned me.

"We knew it was gonna be you, kid," Flint said with a shrug. "Ever since the gym race, we knew it was gonna be one of you to take back over. We couldn't have it any other way, it'd look like we were afraid of the new power."

"Once you killed Sayre, you had the press and half the training population behind you. The best we could do was hope to guide you."

Their advice, however helpful, left a bad taste in my mouth. But I knew it had to be someone clever, strong, but who would work well with others. Sinnoh needed more of a team player than I had admittedly been. I knew I could throw a match—enough people came in hoping to exploit double weaknesses that it wouldn't even be that difficult—but I had no idea how to choose someone to run the training government.

I spent many sleepless nights, with rotating members of my team, going through databases of eligible trainers. Some were repeat challengers, and I favored them, but there were quite a few who'd been through Victory Road, or hadn't made it through the Elite Four to me. I staunchly ignored Cossette Beaumanoir's name on the list. I'd take another eight years as Champion if it meant she didn't become it.

Not that I didn't trust her. She was a fine trainer and a good person. But I wouldn't wish this job on her, not without preparation.

"Do you just not want her to overtake you?" Des asked by my shoulder.

"I don't have any problem with that," I lied, but that wasn't my reason for it, I knew. "...Sinnoh needs someone unconnected to me, to Nick, to all of that crap that went down. She was, because of me. It's not about Cossette, it's about what's best." Wasn't it?

"So mature," Ike yawned from the bed.

"Go back to sleep. If I'm avoiding friends, that means I'm down half the list. Shit." I buried my head in my arms on the keyboard. Maybe there had been a reason Cynthia and Lucian had been a little more reserved than I had been. I didn't want to seem like I was playing favorites, but I liked talking to some of the trainers who repeatedly challenged me. Most of them. There were a couple of people who were just skilled trainers, and I was certain at least one girl got to me on luck alone, but on the whole, it was a good batch of people.

I spent almost a month with little sleep like that. Hanna caught on at once, and started drilling me on values I should have for the new Champion, while making sure I was napping with Gwen every time she visited. Then, it spread to Cossette, which was far more problematic; there were already tabloid rumors (and had been for years, if we were being honest) that she was some sort of foreign lover of mine. After I trounced her in a battle, she did not need to haul me off to the bedroom, even if it was just for another nap.

A month and three days after I'd told Lucian about my plan, I figured out who I wanted. Her name was Samantha. She was seventeen, feisty, an excellent battler, and wholesome in a sort of way that you could only get with kids from small towns. Her team was balanced, but in an organic sort of way, not the way that came from obsessive planning. I could appreciate that.

Lucian dug up her pre-Elite Four evaluations and Aaron assured me that Cossette was going to shit bricks if I chose someone else. "She doesn't need it, and she better not be trying to use me to better her chances."

"No, I'm just saying, you're picking a pretty cute girl. She's gonna flip out on you."

"It's not like that," I told him for the millionth time. Her crush was gone... mostly. And I was fairly certain Samantha could take her in a battle, which meant I could relax on that as an excuse.

"She wasn't a traveling trainer when the Sayre things started, although she had pokémon at the time. She doesn't have any other major red flags in her history," Lucian announced.

"Sweet, we've needed a woman's touch around here again," Flint said with a happy grin.

"She's seventeen," Volkner replied thinly.

"Not like that, and you know it. It just doesn't look good, modern-day region with all dudes at the top."

"Would you like to retire, then?"

"Hell no. Kick out the kid and bring on the lady."

"Thanks," I said flatly, and that was that.

Now we just had to get her back into challenging me. The Elite Four couldn't throw matches, even if they wanted to, although they could hold back a little. She had to reach me on her own power. ...Which took entirely too long. We couldn't exactly invite her back, not without raising suspicion, and she had seemed content to wander around in Victory Road for the longest time. And then, the first time she challenged, she made a stupid mistake against Aaron and lost. The next time, she got up to Lucian until he got a lucky hit in and she was down to a hawlucha against three of his team.

"We really had it easy with Zach and Cynthia, didn't we?" Flint asked at the next meeting. "They just glided on in, well, she did. You sort of stumbled."

"I made it on my first try, didn't I?" I shot back.

"Yeah, well, Samantha didn't. Do you have any backups chosen?"

My silence was answer enough. Lucian slid forward a paper with a list of four other names. "We've each chosen a potential trainer for your consideration."

I irritably scratched off Cossette's name and Flint snorted back a laugh.

"It's a pity we can't hold open elections," Volkner said and sighed. Aaron nodded beside him. "Maybe you should reform the training government on your way out."

"It would look bad if I did that and just left. Make her do it."

"Then you don't get a say in what she does. Are you content to sit on your hands after you retire?" Lucian asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Hey, retired Champions still get plenty of respect."

"Respect, yes. Power, no."

"I am fine with stepping down. I'm really tired of this all."

When Samantha finally made it to me for another challenge—her third in two years—I knew I had my work cut out for me. Trying to sneakily throw a Champion battle was one of the most stressful things I had ever tried. I knew she got suspicious when I sent Carlita out against her hawlucha, but the joke was on me when Carlita won. Somehow. The universe was still conspiring against me, I was sure.

The rest of the battle was closer after that. She relied a lot on items, which was nothing new since her team was exhausted, and I purposefully ignored mine. If she noticed that, then she didn't remark upon it. While it hurt my heart to watch, Des went down easy against an enemy earthquake, and Ike soon followed. Alice stood her ground against a starmie for some time, seemingly not comprehending the memo about wanting to throw the match, but finally an ice beam caught up to her.

Zarek was knocked out by the same starmie's thunderbolt, and then I was down to Kostya. He easily took care of the starmie, then flinched when he felt my glare on his back. Samantha was down to her last pokémon, and so was I. But Kostya was one of my sturdier battlers.

Samantha called out a delcatty. Kostya bit back a giggle, hands pressed over his mouth. At least it wouldn't be too hard to throw a battle, since he was now severely restricted. He danced around the arena, ducking into shadow sneaks, but the delcatty simply sat back and fired ice beams. It took most of an hour, but it whittled him down. I hadn't lost a professional battle in years, I'd realized as I watched him fall over, out like a light. It strangely hurt.

Samantha looked at the fallen dusclops with eyes like dinner plates. "...Was that... W-Was that your last pokémon?" She stared at me as I returned him and put a hand on my hip.

"Yeah. That's it." Wait, I probably should have figured out what to say about this. "...So, uh, congrats. You're the Champion now."

"Wh-What?!" she squeaked. At least she was surprised. Maybe I was a better actor than I'd thought.

"Yeah. I step down, so congratulations, and if you'd follow me, we can register—"

"I don't want to actually be the Champion!"

"...What."

"I want to be a Champion, not the Champion. Don't trainers who defeat you get honorary titles without taking the actual rank?"

"...In Kanto and Johto!" I exclaimed, unable to believe this was headed south so fast. "Uh, maybe Kalos does it too, I'm not sure—but that's not the point. We run on the absolute trainer government model, or whatever Lucian calls it, and that means you win, you're the Champion. The only other Champions in the region are retired ones." Even if Cynthia had retired peacefully to Unova.

"I-I don't want to be! Sorry! I can't handle that sort of responsibility!" Samantha said, shaking her head wildly. "Take backsies!"

"You already won!"

"I don't have any sort of training, or know anything about politics! I'm barely a decent trainer! My pokémon carried me through this all, trust me."

"I know that feeling, believe me. And we'll train you, don't worry, you don't have to take the position right away—"

"I don't want it at all, I can't take that from you—"

"No, believe me, you'd be doing me a favor—"

"I'm just some girl from the boondocks, I can't follow a hero like you—"

"I am not a hero—"

"Children, please!" Lucian to the rescue. If anyone could talk others in and out of things, it was him. I hoped.

We led Samantha into the records chamber, recorded her team and her video, despite her shell-shocked expression. She had stopped protesting taking the job, at least. Lucian explained that she would be trained and I would publicly stay the Champion until she felt more comfortable with the role. I could tell she was slowly warming up to the notion, but at the end of several explanations, she asked quietly, "Why me?"

"Because you didn't want it," Lucian replied and while I couldn't exactly fault his logic, I could tell it didn't reassure her. Oh well. He was already more helpful towards her than he had ever been to me.

She stayed quiet through a small tour and a sit-down with her pokémon team, which, amusingly, were all for the idea of being a Champion's team. They held more sway than we ever could. But the final straw was when we showed her the private kitchen. "This would be mine?"

"This entire wing would be yours. Private apartments for when the Champion stays on premises," Lucian replied. There had certainly been perks to it, though I had hardly ever stayed there for long periods of time.

"I'll take it," Samantha said with a grin.

-.-.-

Four months later, we released the video of her defeating me and her dazed acceptance speech. I stepped down from the role with a small ceremony that Lucian certainly never suffered through, and then I was home free. Well, after Samantha let me go. She turned out to be a huggy person.

"You'll come visit me, right?"

"Uh, yeah. If you want."

"I do! I'm already sweating bullets with all these cameras around. I'll probably end up losing my first battle."

"You'll do fine. Just make sure it's not to Cossette." While we had been careful in keeping Samantha a secret until the announcement, naturally, Cossette had figured it out. And she had challenged me weekly in a vain attempt to try to take the title before it was officially passed. Des had been the only one to come out of that happy; he got to see Adele weekly for a month and a half.

"I have you on speed dial," Samantha warned and only then did she release me. I ducked out well before it was socially acceptable, reveling in my freedom, and hardly got out of the building before I was picked up by Jacques.

He dropped me in front of an irate French girl. "Are you happy now?"

"Incredibly. Want to battle?"

"No! I don't have any use for you if you're not the Champion anymore," she declared, nose in the air. I got up, dusting off my dress pants, and was assaulted by a teenaged girl for the second time that day. Her hug was even more crushing than Samantha's. "But now I am not your foreign mistress. I'll miss that."

"Oh god, please don't joke about that. You would not believe how many headaches I got just announcing Samantha as my successor." Why didn't Lucian have to deal with anything concerning me? Oh yeah, because everyone was more interested in my scandals than his. Maybe picking a normal, down-to-earth girl was a bad move.

"Well, your other mistress has already planned a party for you, ma puce." Cossette let go, smiling brightly up at me.

"I know what that means, and I know it's a feminine word."

"And that's why you don't mind it. Shall we go?"

"Yeah, let's go." Cossette and I walked up the road to Hanna's ranch, arm in arm for the first time in forever. I finally could walk around with my friends again, because no one would care again. I could disappear into the wilderness and not have the Elite Four calling me all the time, I could visit Vai and Alicia without it turning into some sort of political meeting, Jude might finally stop trying to sell me pokémon, and I could have Harlan and Fargo out without anyone giving me disgusted looks.

The dinner party was predictably lively. Carlita loudly lamented that she wasn't a Champion's pokémon anymore, Ike and Harlan curled up around Gwen after dessert, and Hanna and I accidentally fell asleep on the couch, wedged up against each other by Des.

I managed to sleep through the entire night (even if we both woke up sore as hell the next morning).

"Oh my god, it's noon," Hanna groaned, somewhere near my throat. I mumbled something noncommittal into her hair. "Do you know when the last time I slept in this late was?"

"Do you know the last time I did?"

"Why hasn't Gwen woken us?"

"Cossette took her out with Adele and her team this morning. I think they were helping Jude with the chores," Des rumbled sleepily.

"Why didn't you wake us?" I asked and tried to kick him, but my legs were so tangled up in the one blanket someone had thrown on us that it was futile.

"I like to sleep sometimes, too, Trainer," he replied. He sat up and waddled out of the way, stretching in that weird way of his, and I promptly fell off the couch without him to pin me there. Just what I needed when my entire body was complaining about movement.

"I feel hungover."

"Hungover from being a Champion?" Hanna asked, dropping the blanket on me as she stood up. Her back cracked several times as she stretched.

"Maybe."

"You should have let me succeed you."

"Hanna, I love you way too much to let you do that."

"Is what why you didn't let Cossette?"

"Maybe a little. Mostly, I didn't want her dealing with all the political shit. And now I can continue to hold it over her head," I said with a grin, hidden by the blanket.

"Even passing the mantle of the highest ranking official trainer in the country, you sound like—a brat," she said, and we both fell silent. We knew I hadn't sounded like a brat; I sounded like a certain other older trainer.

"Can I stay here for the week?" I asked, changing the subject. On my first day of freedom, I did not want to think about him.

"You're more than welcome to, but why? I thought you'd be out of the country on the first plane."

"I'm technically homeless and without a job right now. I figure you wouldn't mind me bumming off of your great fortune once again."

She snorted and threw one of the cushions at me. I threw it right back. "You're helping with the chores and I'm not protecting you from Jude. He'll want your pokémon for breeding."

"He already got two of Harlan's kids."

"I'm just warning you."

"Can I request Adele?" Des asked, reminding us he was still within earshot. I laughed and Hanna threw the cushion at him.

"You talk Cossette and Adele into that, and I'll talk my husband into it. Until then, up, we should at least help with lunch."

As it turned out, Cossette had not taken Gwen out to help with the chores. According to her, she had asked if Gwen wanted to see a pokémon battle, and of course the little girl had said yes. And there was nothing wrong with that. What was problematic was that she had taken her to the Elite Four to show her a pokémon battle.

She made it to Samantha before Hanna and I got there. "Mama, look! Cossette's gonna win!"

"Oh, she better not!" I growled as Hanna scooped her up.

"Yeah, she better not," Samantha agreed from across the field. "Cute kid. Yours?"

"No, despite all of my wild flings and incredibly public romantic life, I have not managed to father a child. Cossette, out of here!"

"Non. I am here officially."

"You brought Gwen! You're—uh—you're grounded!"

"You can bring guests along on your challenges," Samantha reminded me unhelpfully. "And she was going to be a cheerleader."

The parallels made me cringe. "Gwendolyn, we can cheerlead for Cossette later. Right now, we need to make lunch. Aren't you hungry?"

"And Cossette, you're still grounded! Samantha, force the match to a close."

"I can do that?"

"Yes."

"Non! I made it this far!" And I was scared she'd make it further. Cossette's main method of training had been against my team, after all. "Stop treating me like a child! At least let me finish this battle! I've earned it."

I sat down on the sidelines, arms crossed, and glared at the match until Samantha (thankfully) beat her. It had been alarmingly close in the beginning, but I was gratified to see that the new Champion could handle herself. Gwendolyn cheered and ran up and down the line excitedly, Hanna pattering along after her to make sure she didn't get in the middle.

Cossette wouldn't look at me for a week after that. And Gwen kept asking to see more Champion battles.

"He wouldn't have wanted you to become the Champion, either," Hanna told me one night. She was right, of course. "Maybe you could go a little easier on Cossette? You are sort of neurotically overprotective of her. And not just on this."

"I just don't know how to treat her. The past eight years, all it's been is preventing anyone from seeing us together outside of a battle, and then trying like crazy to come out on top every time. Before that, she was a child."

"Well, acting like him certainly isn't going to help," Hanna said sourly.

"Should I act like you?" I shot back.

"Act like you. Act how you want, but for god's sake, learn to stop suffocating her. And show Gwen more battles. She's on a kick and she needs to watch more than Cossette and her Elite Four runs. I blame you entirely for this."

I could retire from being a gym leader, from being the Champion, but what I really needed to do was retire from trying to emulate Nick. At least the new start allowed for some change.

I stood up, checking my phone. Cossette should have been halfway through Lucian if she was lucky.

"Where are you going?" Hanna asked warily.

"I'll grab Gwen and take her to see the battle. I'm going to go cheer Cossette on." Just because I had no drive didn't mean I should squash hers.

"After you make sure Samantha is braced for her and will show her absolutely no mercy?"

"Hell yes." There were perks to having the Champion on speed dial, after all.