The two trainers begin making their way towards each other.

Akoni strolls forward with an undaunted swagger and confident steps.

Broly approaches cautiously, knowing who he would be facing had stripped him of some hubris, cold sweat was dripping down his back.

He knew his Butterfrees mega drain could win it outright, but that was only if Butterfree could hit, while he had not watched many matches, he had seen the speed of Akoni's Vaporeon, so his teeth were clenched with well-deserved concern.

Broly rubs his chin, as a plan slowly formulates in his mind, he calls his butterfree close and speaks too quietly for the mic to carry his voice.

Butterfree senses his trainer's worry, he had never seen Broly so concerned, so he listens as attentively as possible.

Focusing his eyes on the Butterfree, Jared frowns, this is the second third stage pokemon I've seen, I don't understand why they are so rare, what was I thinking about last time? Oh right, next time I speak to the tutor I need to ask him what factors cause pokemon to evolve, and whether it's diet, or if it's talent.

Just then, it could have been the lights, but he could swear the butterfree was beginning to faintly glow with a dark brownish bronze color.

Not averting his eye's, Jared speaks up, "Hey gastly, does that butterfree look strange to you?"

"No, but if you look in a mirror you can find something strange."

Jared makes his tone more firm, "I'm serious Gastly, can you see a strange glow on the butterfree?"

"There's nothing like that stupid."

Jared looks away and blinks, but when he turns back the glow was gone, so he decides to put that aside for the moment, and focus on the match.

.

Akoni and Vaporeon were now standing in the center of the arena oozing confidence, while Broly was still way back on his side.

Seeing his unmoving adversary, Akoni addresses the crowd with a cocky shout, " It seems my opponent has stage fright, please cheer and give Broly some encouragement for me, will you!?

The crowd laughs and jeers, giving Broly some additional hidden pressure, but now his plan was set. He and Butterfree were ready!

As if responding to the crowd, he and Butterfree made their way closer. Butterfree soon separates from his trainer, then flew up high, and out of reach.

In a few seconds, he was above the Vaporeon, then like a bullet from a gun, the Butterfree suddenly dives down like a hawk, and unleashes a wave of stun spores everywhere, trying to give as little opportunity for Vaporean to evade as possible.

Akoni was already far behind his Vaporeon, but he moves back further with a frown. The prospect of being hit by a stun spore was not something he wanted to experience.

The Vaporeon emotionlessly looks up towards the Butterfree, and simply sat there, seemingly without any intention of moving.

The crowd gasps as the cloud of stun spore landed with the Vaporeon inside the epicenter, but some in the crowd knew what was going to happen next.

Even if one of the announcers was in the know, they still hyped up the crowd, by announcing stun spore was a direct hit!

The butterfree then fires a close range Giga Drain, but just as the shot goes off, the vaporeon starts turning into a mist, completely evading the powerful green flash!

The stun spores embedded in Vaporeons skin had now fallen to the ground harmlessly.

Confused, the butterfree stops in his tracks and looks around, and then heard Broly shout out, "DON'T STAY LOW, FLY BACK UP NOW!"

With some fast flaps of his wings, Butterfly begins his ascent, but a sudden sharp pain clipped his wing!

Vaporeon had sneakily reformed himself behind a boulder, just out of Butterfree's line of sight, and then using the boulder as leverage, he had propelled himself off it with one mighty leap!

Not letting go, the emotionless Vaporeon drags a shrieking Butterflee down from the sky, Broly eyes open wide, then shouts, 'BUTTERFREE, GET HIM OFF YOU WITH SLEEP POWDER!"

At the same time, a caster begins shouting in an excited voice, "Vaporeon locked on Butterfrees wing with a bite, is the match over before it began?!"

Unknown to everyone present, besides Akoni, when Vaporeon had landed the bite, he had begun charging a move not yet seen in all his matches. Ice energy began congregating in Vaporeons mouth, and the affected area of the wing held in Vaporons mouth begins to freeze.

The second the Sleep Powder flew, Vaporeon let loose a point-blank rainbow-colored aura-beam. This beam instantly froze Butterfrees right-wing with colorful ice!

With a leap, Vaporeon gracefully hopped off the butterfree like a diving board to avoid the sleep powder!

Thrown away, and with an agonizing shriek, Butterfree begins falling to the ground, a single wing being not nearly enough to keep him airborne, but it slowed his descent somewhat.

Broly clenches his teeth with a curse, then accurately angles his pokeball, firing a red beam which intercepted his butterfree before it hits the ground.

With a shake of his head he turns to leave, he was fuming with half part anger and half part helplessness.

.

Like a spell, a quiet lul comes over the arena, then like a dam breaking, the crowd erupts into cheers, the casters begin freaking out too, almost forgetting to speak,

"Th-this is astonishing folks, Akoni's Vaporeon came out of nowhere and clamped down on Broly's Butterfree mid-air, but that wasn't all, before Butterfree could shake him off with a sleep powder, Akoni showed a move he appears to have saved for this very moment, and won in dominating fashion! and if my eyes don't deceive me, that was an Aura-Beam!!!"

Akoni raises his hands up declaring his victory, which prompts the crowd to begin a second wave of cheering, the match had been short, but it was too eye-catching! The bright rainbow-colored aura-beam made even the lights above seem dim by comparison!

Jared had watched closely, but he hadn't even seen the Vaporeon strike until it already happened, Vaporeon was just too fast!

Cough, "Er, so... Gastly, still feeling confident?"

"Hrmph, it will be simple for me."

"Seriously?" Jared slaps his head in disbelief, "You only know lick and hypnosis, even if you put his Vaporeon to sleep, and give him a few licks, what are you going to do when he turns into mist, fully negating your paralyzing... liquid"

"Stupid human, I have sharp fangs."

Still speechless, Jared replies, "Gastly, that's not even a move, are you really just going to gnaw on the Vaporeon?"

With a confident mind smirk, Gastly gloats, "Yes, it worked last time, it can work this time."

"What are you going to do when your gnawing wakes it up, and it gives you an aura beam to the face?"

"Hmph, that stupid catfish can try."

.

Getting a drink of water from the bathroom, Jared notes that everyone around seems to still be heatedly discussing the match. Many declaring that Akoni's Vaporeon is unbeatable, while some even going so far as to dare anyone to tell them otherwise, it was as if Akoni's victories were their own, and denying Akoni's superiority was a personal attack against them.

Jared heads back to take his seat while thinking of old memories, (these guys are definitely like the football fans of earth, it seems even here the people love an all-star, someone that comes out above all the rest!)

.

Even as new matches go on, people keep discussing the match, and Jared was starting to get bored hearing the same thing repeated over and over.

Getting up, he then makes his way back to the lobby, there's still an hour before the estimated time, but he was taking no chances.

.

Back on the first floor, Jared dials up Hale, he had promised to let him know when his match was, and even if Hale was only being polite about it, he still wanted to reciprocate the kindness.

"Hey Hale It's Jared, if you're still around, my next match should be in less than an hour, but I don't know which arena yet."

"Yeah I'm in arena four, did you watch the match there? Oh man, that kid is lucky to get such a powerful Vaporeon huh?"

"Er yeah, anyways, I'll let you get back to watching your matches, I'll call you when I know the arena?"

"Yeah man, looking forward to it!"

"Now then..." Jared whispered

Fiddling with his phone, Jared types *Stream* into the search engine, but nothing relevant comes up, then he tries going to the tournament website in hopes of finding any live feeds.

He had nothing to do at the moment, and some entertainment would be welcome.

"Damn, I shoulda asked Hale, but I don't wanna call back to bother him over this."

"Number 35847 please come up"

(Oh, shit, that's my number... that was too fast, it's a good thing I came back early!)

As usual, a red ribboned security guard leads him to the tunnel where a referee takes him the rest of the way.

On his way, he didn't forget to give his friend a ring to let him know where his battle was taking place.

The sight of the arena through the tunnel jogs a memory, but doesn't give Jared pause to stop, (Just what was that strange brownish bronze glow? It was just like that time with the Feraligator... but what caused it? Is it because they are stage three pokemon? No, but they were different colors, I couldn't be hallucinating right?)

Stuffing that thought to the back of his mind, he steps through the open end of the tunnel, the next match, the round of 240 begins!