Hard Enough-Chapter 289 - Training Camp days I

Humphrey shifted in his seat. Around him, other trainers chattered or called out to each other as everyone returned to the stadium after the intermission they’d been granted after watching Forrest’s fight Brock.

Humphrey had to give it to Forrest; he’d come a long way with his team. There were still several areas that he was obviously weak in and if Humphrey ended up fighting him at the end of year tournament, he was going to nail Forrest on those.

He had to give Forrest his due however. He’d raised a strong-looking Aggron. If possible, he hoped to compare notes with Forrest on that later.

As was common with most sporting events, holding an intermission after such an electrifying match had seen a lot of sparks sweep through the crowd, especially with how they all had to stay close.

Thankfully, Brock had prepared for this and the battle courts had been made ready for all the charged-up trainers who’d wanted to vent some of their energy. Humphrey had been able to get into a quick one-on-one against a trainer by the name of Pete Pebbleman.

After a quick victory, Humprhrey had retreated to watch others brawl, glad for the chance to watch others in action. Sadly this hadn’t continued for long before everyone had been called back into the Gym.

When everyone was in, or close enough the stereo system pinged, announcing the need for quiet from the crowd as Brock stepped out onto what acted as the referee’s podium during a match. It was a good spot as no one was forced to look at his back.

“Welcome back and welcome to the official start to the Pewter City Training camp!” Brock announced as the last few people found their seats.

“This camp is meant to offer a boost to any trainers that will be undergoing the end of year circuit. I know the majority of you have already gathered up your eight badges.” Brock’s gaze flickered around the room, pausing on various individuals.

Humphrey straightened up when Brock looked in his direction.

“To you I offer my congratulations! You are in a great position to be polishing off your tactics with your team of pokemon for the upcoming end of Circuit.” Brock’s smile shifted into a frown. “Sadly, there are some here that have not completed your eight badge requirement. To you I have the following words. If you are only requiring one or two, it is doable in the coming week but book something in now! If you want any shot at making the tournament then you have to collect those badges!”

Brock’s face twitched for a moment and his hand went up to an earpiece that connected to the microphone. “I am being reminded that the only other option you have if you don’t qualify with eight badges is to sit the Pokemon League Admissions Exam.” He then coughed. “Barring if you, for some reason, attend a Technical institute for four years and graduate with good enough grades,” Brock muttered.

Humphrey frowned as a chorus of confused murmurs rang out. He had heard some people talking about an Admissions Exam but never really followed up on it. It had seemed… well a cheap way of getting to the League Tournament and not something that would do him any favours at the end of the day.

Then again if you’d had a run of bad luck and needed a shot at making it… perhaps it wasn’t such a terrible idea?

Brock raised his hands and tamped down on the air. “It is not a well regarded method of gaining entry into the tournament, but it is possible. With what we know of the numbers that will be taking part, I would strongly advise against it. Only the top point five percent will be allowed to advance and you will still be required to fight your way through the pre tournament qualifications rounds, but I will be addressing that.”

A hand shot up and a young boy rose to make himself taller. Brock pointed at him. “Yes?”

“What if we need more than two badges?” asked the boy.

“You will need to haul your backside to the Gyms that you need the badges for to lock yourself in. Or, if you can, I would suggest applying for a hold on your admission to the Tournament.”

Brock once more held up his hands as murmurs broke out but this time it was a clear minority of trainers and those who did quickly fell silent as they realised that talking up now would be outing themselves among their peers.

Brock made a placating gesture. “Lots of trainers typically take two years to build their teams up. Most times the eventual winner of the tournament is in fact a trainer that has had longer with their team!”

Brock then sighed. “Regardless, for those that want to have a shot and still need badges, your chances of making it aren’t completely dashed but you do need to hurry things along. I have some ideas that might help you and if you’re looking to discuss them, come and see me during one of the breaks that will be available each day, or at the end of the day!”

Brock then clapped his hands and a boom echoed out, stopping anyone from attempting to ask any more questions. “This Camp is something new but it’s also something that I’ve been considering for a long time now and to make it fair to everyone, along with not causing logistical issues we are going to be splitting everyone into three distinct groups.”

That got everyone to sit up.

Brock smirked. “You will be assigned into three teams. To make things interesting there will be points given out for individual excellence, teamwork, or other acts and at the end of each day there will be small rewards for the day’s total, while a total for the entire camp will be kept for a final prize. Please check the back of your identification tags if you have not already!” Brock announced.

Humphrey grabbed the lanyard that he’d been told was going to act as his security badge and keycard. On the back another picture of himself stared back blankly with a blue Articuno symbol surrounding it. The words, ‘Team Mystic’ stood atop his image with his name printed out beneath it.

People started looking left and right and Humprhey found that he was sitting next to a trainer from Team Instinct, symbolised by a Yellow Zapdos, along with another from Team Valour, symbolised by a Red Moltres.

Murmurs of appreciation rang out only for a taller boy to shoot to his feet. “LET’S GO TEAM VALOOOOOOOOOOUR!”

Humphrey stared at Pete Pebbleman Jnr and shook his head. No wonder he’d had such an easy time beating him. He was all passion and no brains.

This time Brock didn’t try to get the crowd back under control, simply letting things play out with various trainers throwing banter around at their fellows.

When things started to settle, instead of Brock speaking up Flannery, one of the power trio, marched out with a red vest on. “Alright people, that’s what I’m talking about! I’m Flannery and for Team Valour I’ll be your Team Leader!”

She held the mic up close. “And we’re going to crush Team Instinct!” she shouted as her eyes darted maliciously off to the side.

Roxanne, the dark horse of the Indigo Circuit, stepped forward and bowed politely. “Greetings, I’m Roxanne, the Leader of Team Mystic, and we will also be crushing Team Instinct,” she declared with a small smile, pointedly not looking to the side.

Behind them, Brock shifted and pinched the bridge of his nose.

With two of the Team Leaders revealed it was rather obvious who the last one would be.

“Ahahaha Oh dear I think I’m in danger! Sup dude and dudettes! I’m Brawly! Leader of Team Instinct!” Brawly joked as he stepped forward.

A few people murmured approvingly at this development while others wondered what Brawly had done to earn his traveling companions’ ire.

Humphrey didn’t care for that, Brock had secured the three strongest trainers of the upcoming tournament to act as guides for them! If he played his cards right he’d be able to get lessons with them and insights into his pokemon team!

Brock set off another chime to regather attention back on himself. “Alright, I can see there’s a lot of excitement over this news. Let’s keep things friendly though!”

He shot Flannery and Roxanne pointed looks only for them to not even notice.

“You will all be getting a timetable for the various sessions that we’ve got lined up starting tomorrow. Tonight, your team leaders will give you tours of the facilities, and then there will be dinner for all, provided by the Kitchen Committee of Pewter, who have signed on to cover food for this event. Please be polite to anyone working here, as we want to make this a good event not just for you but also for the staff!” Brock declared.

He then held up a finger. “The final announcement has to do with the dining room. When you enter, I do not want you to merely stick with your friend groups! If possible I want you to focus on filling up partially filled tables over claiming your own spaces. This is deliberate on my part as I don’t want any cliques forming up.”

Brock gave a self-depreciating smirk. “I understand this is somewhat contradictory after assigning teams but the dining room is not somewhere that such things will matter. I want people to talk with new faces, make new friends and to share your stories and experiences, which above anything else might just end up being one of the best things you get out of this camp. Grow your minds, but also your friend groups!”

Humphrey stiffened a little at that. He knew he was rather notorious as a lone Mightyena with how he travelled alone and didn’t have any companions.

That order to sit with others… he wasn’t sure if it would help him or hinder.

Guess everyone would be in the same boat for once, not knowing everyone else they sat with. So that was good?

Humphrey remembered the girl from last year who had made it as the Sponsored Gym Trainer. Celia would have loved this. She was always going on and on about looking to make more friends. Maybe Brock had done that while thinking of her?

Brock clapped his hands. “Alright, I’ll turn you over to your Team Leaders!”

From there the first meeting broke down with Humphrey following after Roxanne with a handful of others. When he spotted Silver, Gary Oak, and Hillary he relaxed a little. It was good that he knew at least some people so at least it wasn’t going to be too awkward.

Pete Pebbleman Jnr didn’t like wasting time so he cut to the chase as soon as he and the other trainers were led away by Flannery. “So what did Brawly do and why are we so gung ho on crushing him?” he asked.

An orange-haired girl slapped him on the shoulder. “You can't just ask things like that out of nowhere!”

“I can, and I did!” Pete refuted, using his impeccable logic.

Flannery shot everyone a quick look over before humming. “Well if you must know, he’s been toying with a maiden’s heart.”

The girls in Team Valour all gasped. “He didn’t!” “Will she be alright?” “Tell me she used protection!”

The last comment got everyone glancing over at a slightly older girl who blushed and refused to meet anyone’s gaze.

Flannery coughed. “Well regardless, we’re going to be educating him on the error of his ways so during some of the head to head games and competitions we have coming up I want you all to put your hearts and souls into it!” she said, slamming a fist into a palm.

“Ora!” “We’ll do it!” shouted the girls.

Pete shrugged, not really seeing what had gotten their skirts all twisted around but when in Johto, do like the Johtoans, as the saying went. Or was it Johtonites? He always forgot, cause Johto was weird with their different districts that preferred one over the other.

With his first question done Pete decided to follow up with other important questions. “When’s dinner and what is it?” he asked, earning a round of scoffs from the girls.

Flannery just laughed. “Brock has us having a barbeque out the back with the reserve, pro tip? Don’t sit on any random boulders that are scattered around. They might be pokemon. Sit in the indicated areas and don’t feed the pokemon if they try and beg, they’ve been fed and are just conning you.”

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This earned a few laughs but Flannery shot them a serious look. “I’m serious, no matter how cute that Slugma or Growlithe or Houndour are, don’t feed them extra,” she said.

Pete thought that a bias might be showing through there but decided to not point that out. It wouldn’t be polite afterall and his Ma raised a gentleman!

Before they were led back around to the reserve, they got a quick tour of where they’d be spending their time and a breakdown of what would be required for the trips into the mountains during two of the training camp days.

Pete didn’t waste any more time by marching up to the barbecue and grabbing a plate. Once he’d loaded his plate up he searched around and saw an open table with a few younger looking trainers which he plopped himself down with.

“Heya folks! I’m Pete Pebbleman Jnr! Nice to meet you!” he greeted before stuffing his face.

The others all blinked at his rapid arrival and introduction before a dark-haired kid wearing a Team Instinct Badge waved. “I’m Ash Ketchum and this is Pikachu!” he said.

Another kid with a slightly hairy Pikachu waved. “I’m Ritchie! And this is Sparky!”

Pete narrowed his eyes. “Was the requirement for Team Instinct that you needed to own an Electric mouse or something?” he asked, making the logical leap as he noted the same badge on Ritchie’s lanyard.

Ash and Ritchie shared a look and started to shake their heads only for a girl to giggle. “Oooooh he might be onto something there! I’m Mia and this is Silly Mouse!” she declared, lifting up a Raticate who waved cheerfully.

Another girl from Team Instinct giggled like a loon while a purple-haired boy shook his head fondly. “I’m quite sure that wasn’t a requirement. Remember the personality quiz?” he said.

Pete shook his head. “Nope!” he squinted at the lanyard and made out the boy’s name.

Bugsy blinked. “Uhmmm it was during sign-in before you had your picture taken?”

“I just ticked boxes and got here as quick as I could!” Pete declared proudly.

“Oh.” Bugsy deflated slightly, having thought the personality test was more infallible than it actually was.

“Hey there Pete,” said Misty as she sat next to him before nodding at the others. “Ash, Ritchie, Bugsy, Mia,.. oh I’m Misty,” she said to the other girl.

“Dora, I’m from Pewter City!” declared the girl and Pete raised a fist in solidarity while his other hand secured his steak. With all these mouse pokemon around and Flannery’s earlier warning Pete wasn’t going to have his steak stolen.

Not today at least.

Pete got a feel for his dinner partners and learned that all of them bar Misty and Dora had collected their badges for the final tournament. Misty only needed one while Dora needed four.

Despite this she had no issues with merrily declaring her intentions to keep exploring and enjoy herself. Apparently the Pidgey she’d gained as her starter was a great benefit for this as she’d evolved it fully into a Pidgeot that saw them flying wherever the girl felt like going.

Pete had to admit that it sounded wonderful.

While everything was friendly during the meal, Pete made sure to subtly get the measure of each trainer. He suspected that Ritchie or Bugsy were the strongest with Ash coming in third, then Mia and Misty.

Pete rather liked the way this was set up. With a good meal and good dinner companions he felt like he was making some serious progress in just one night. Should he come up against anyone here, he felt like he’d have a good handle on their temperament.

Forrest yawned. He had ended up staying awake a lot longer than he’d intended but then again he wasn't sure what he’d expected after all the excitement of yesterday.

Suzie gaining a rare pokemon had been the cherry on top of the cake. He hadn’t been able to extract himself from talking with his family until late. So late that Brock had remonstrated with everyone involved for staying up so late. Suzie had tried to act defiant, wanting to stay up and monitor her new friend only for Togepi to happily devour a meal that Brock offered, and then curl up on itself like an egg which prompted Suzie to cuddle up with it.

From there Brock had swept through the rest of his siblings leaving Forrest to talk with dad even later into the night. They’d talked a lot about almost everything they could think of and… it had been nice.

Sadly he was paying for it today.

Both with how tired he was and the fact that he’d missed out on being able to join Team Valour where Misty was. Instead he’d been stuck in Team Mystic as a late entrant to keep things even.

When Brock entered the ‘lecture room’—which in reality was just the employee office area repurposed— the crowd went quiet.

Brock smiled. “Alright let’s get things started. Now, I imagine that a lot of you have your sights set on winning the Tournament and winning all that sweet, sweet prize money that comes with it.”

Almost everyone nodded and Brock smirked. “Well good news, with the number of applicants this year the money is better and will extend down as low as to the person that places eighth on the ladder instead of just first and second getting a pay out.”

Forrest grinned. That was much more manageable with some of the powerhouses and their teams getting around.

Brock shook his head though. “That however isn’t the main point I want to talk about.” A slideshow appeared behind Brock and he waved a hand towards it.

“Becoming financially solvent during your journey is something that a lot of trainers struggle with, but if you can manage it your Journey will be something that won’t rely on sponsors or winning matches.”

Forrest groaned. Urgh, Brock was talking about accounting! This was going to be boring!

Brock smiled. “Let’s watch a video and I think I will make my point clear. Now this video, for expediency's sake, is fast forward but I’ve slowed down a few points where I want you to pay special attention.”

Forrest frowned as murmurs of confusion began to spread through the room. Brock didn’t seem to mind as he started the video.

Forrest’s frown deepened. Had Brock seriously lined them up to watch one of those live streamers that were popping up on the pokenet? He’d seen some of them but they tended to switch between being extremely boring or so out there as to be unbelievable.

Seriously? Who wandered around Johto and encountered a bunch of Legendary pokemon in a burned-out tower? That particular video got flamed hard with only a few suckers being naive enough to believe it.

Forrest watched as some kid set up his recording device before breaking his camp and setting out. For the next five minutes the video accelerated only to slow down five or six times before Brock finally paused the video.

Brock smiled innocently out at the crowd. “So? Who noticed them?”

Everyone shifted and Forrest frowned. Noticed them? Noticed what? They’d just spent almost ten minutes watching some kid stumble along his journey. Literally at one point, he’d tripped, and his recording device had fallen under a bush!

An arm rose into the air and Forrest watched as Gary gave a confident look. A moment later, ‘Silver’ joined him and Brock considered both boys before indicating that Gary could go first.

“He missed out on picking up some useful gear that people had overlooked,” Gary said. He waved his hand. “At the two-minute mark, he passed by a previous campsite and I thought I saw an Ultra Ball peeking out of the grass.”

Forrest blinked in surprise as the video shot to the indicated timestamp and the Ultra Ball in question now practically stood out.

Forrest straightened up. “But wait, he can’t use that if it’s another trainer’s pokeball! They’re stamped when they’re sold!”

“Yes but returning it to the shops allows the finder to secure a two hundred pokedollar reward. Now if he gets questioned about it guess what? He literally recorded his finding the item and that it had been left behind,” Brock said.

That got some appreciative murmurs. Two hundred pokedollars wasn’t anything to scoff at, especially with it just lying on the ground.

Brock held up a hand. “Now if that pokeball had a pokemon in it, there might have been a different reward.” He pointed to Silver.

“John, you had something else?”

Forrest held in a snicker as ‘Silver’ sat up from his seat on the side. Forrest just knew that he’d only chosen that position because it was a window seat. It was what was jokingly referred to on the pokenet as the ‘protagonist’s position’.

“At the third minute mark there was an Energy Root and a Revival Herb under that bush. Also I answer to Silver these days, Gym Leader,” Silver said.

“Oh apologies, I hadn’t seen the name change on the paperwork I’ll make sure to remember that,” he replied without missing a beat. He brought the video to the specified moment and Forrest and everyone else got to chuckle as the hapless kid tripped over his own feet once more.

This time Forrest got a good look at the underside of the bush and there was a hairy looking root and a leafy looking herb among the grass and weeds. Were they worth anything?

“Energy Root and Revival Herb!” Brock stated with the image paused. “Both of those items are good if you are in a tough situation, such as finding most of your team knocked out and you need to struggle to civilisation. If you’re going deep into the wilds it is imperative you know your bushcraft as items like these can save you and your team from perishing.”

Brock clicked his remote and another projection was shown to the side with a table with items and their selling price. “Now retail prices for these are much greater because merchants are scummy like that, but if you find certain items like this, well,” Brock whistled as he clicked and the selling price for the three items was revealed.

Forrest whistled in just those two moments. The kid had unknowingly passed by one thousand three hundred pokedollars worth of items that he could have sold easily.

Forrest was starting to see the purpose of today’s lesson. How many times had he or Ash or Misty simply walked past a bush or some stray items and not batted an eye at them?

If Brock was to be believed, this random kid had at least three other instances where he’d missed out.

Brock smiled. “Let’s watch the video through from the start this time and we’ll pause when you think you spot something shall we?”

Needless to say they were much more observant this time and Forrest was stunned that by the end of the video play through they’d found no less than ten items totalling in at six thousand pokedollars that the kid had missed out on.

That was enough to pay for two months worth of stabling rights. Lots of people were doing the same math in their heads and they were frantically trying to memorise the items and their worth.

Brock waved a hand to calm down the frantic actions. “I have written up a list of certain rare or unusual items that are part of the training camp material that was supplied to you when you entered, If you’ve lost that you can request a new one or look up the Pewter pokenet page and log in for a digital copy using the tags on your lanyards.”

Instantly people either dove for their bags or loaded up their transceivers to check. Forrest was rather stunned to find a much more comprehensive list of items than they’d covered on display.

Forrest’s mouth went dry as he started flicking through the list and what they could expect to get from selling these items. Comet shards, and Big nuggets of gold… When he reached the bottom of the list his eyes bulged. “A single gold coin that is a relic?” he asked.

“Ah, yes if you find a single gold coin from anything dating two hundred years or older, that is the starting value,” Brock explained.

People’s eyes were glued on the information, and Forrest twitched, wondering if he could convince Ash and Misty to go explore some more ruins with him? If they found even a single stash of coins… they’d make it big!

“Is this why you always run into those weirdos and ruin Maniacs when you’re travelling through tunnels and caves?” asked Hillary.

Brock chuckled. “The ones with the weird pieces of equipment that get super territorial about you approaching them? Bingo, them and Hikers for different targets.”

Forrest felt like a lightbulb had just gone off in his head. That explained everything about those weird old guys always being on the routes. They were literal treasure hunters!

It also explained why Brock was so secretive about his cave of diamonds!

Another voice called out. “Is a single mushroom of this Balm Mushroom really worth that much?”

Brock nodded. “Yup! Those mushrooms are rare to find as they are a delicacy for a lot of pokemon, but they are also amazingly useful for lots of pharmaceutical companies. A single mushroom is said to be able to create something like a thousand doses of specific medicines.”

“Woah!” Forrest said, looking over the list once more. He grimaced as he encountered more than a few things that he knew he’d walked past before.

An idle thought occurred to him, one that might not to others, but with people like Team Rocket so often trying to jump them it was a question he felt worth asking. “What’s stopping people just stealing some of this stuff from other trainers and hawking it off? You mentioned that Ultra Balls the pokemart will reward you with a cash back, what’s stopping people from doing the wrong thing?”

“Mostly the police,” Brock said with a touch of amusement. “But you’re not wrong that people can still exploit the systems that are in place.”

Brock shrugged. “Sadly it happened. It’s why it can be so important that if you lose something or have it stolen in front of you that you report it. For the young man who recorded this video? He has evidence if it comes down to a ‘he said she said situation’.”

Forrest had never thought that he’d want to start ‘livestreaming’ his day but now there seemed like a lot more arguments for doing it rather than against.

He’d mostly engaged in chasing down the people who tried to steal anything from him, but that usually meant it was Team Rocket who were pretty easy to beat once you got around their tricks.

A chime caused everyone to glance at a nearby clock. Brock chuckled, “Ah! Well that’s our first session coming to a close. We now have morning tea, please enjoy your half an hour off. Afterwards you will all be joining A.J., Missy, Rocko, and a trio of other trainers in working through common tactics that people like to employ or as I like to call them, ‘Metas’ that rise and fall with popularity.

After lunch you will get a chance to employ some of these as you’ll all be linking up against Team Valour and Team Instinct.”

Brock shot Roxanne, who was sitting in the front row a pointed look that she ignored causing him to sigh. “Class dismissed!” he called and a chorus of people shooting to their feet to get out, avalanched out as people turned to each other and started discussing what they’d just learned.

Forrest approached Brock only to find he wasn’t alone. In fact a solid majority of the class approached Brock to ask questions, with Brock happily answering their questions before sending them away.

When it was just Forrest and Roxanne the older girl waved Forrest forward.

Forrest coughed self-consciously. “That was a good lecture Brock, kind of wish I knew that before I headed out.”

Brock snorted. “I only considered it as a topic a few weeks ago when I reviewed a certain video, but don’t worry about it too much. Keeping an eye on the ground isn’t the best way to enjoy a Journey,” he said.

Forrest nodded and stepped back, curious about what sort of questions Roxanne would have only to blink as she started asking about how Brock had prepared for this lecture. How he’d paced the lesson. What structure he’d used, even going so far as to ask about the specific wording he’d chosen.

Forrest backed away, leaving his brother to his fate with what appeared to be the ultimate bookworm. He could see why she was the leader of Team Mystic, they mostly seemed like a pretty switched on group.

Forrest checked his watch and found that he had ten minutes before the next session started. Maybe if he was quick he could catch Misty and chat with her?

Forrest chuckled, in so many ways it was like being back at school, but at the same time so much better.

He found himself looking forward to the future sessions and what he’d learn.