Welcome to Gaia! ::

"I'll give you both one thing; you're both stubborn and tenacious. I like that." Lenora said with a smile. "But those qualities alone can only get you so far. Now then, let's polish you off and move onto the next one. Herdier, Hyper Voice." The gym leader ordered.

Choosing not to risk engaging in close combat Lenora would order her Pokemon to use a ranged move, the Herdier giving off deafening and painful howls and barks insistently. Each bark and howl had a wave of Normal energy behind it, harming the Pokemon that heard its cry.

The Focus Blast would strike true, downing Herdier with all its Fighting type fury. Lenora would simply recall her pup as it fell to the Gardevoir. "You got some good Pokemon. I suppose I'll have to step my game up just a notch." She said, taking out another Pokeball and tossing it onto the field.

"Watchog." Muttered the Lookout Pokemon as it appeared from its ball. The Normal type would stand up firm and staring straight ahead at Rala, the Pokemon's big bright eyes never appearing to move and yet never left Rala's own gaze. It was kind of unsettling.

"We're going to make this one quick. Watchog, keep your focus on that Gardevoir." Lenora said to her Pokemon and yet nothing appeared to happen, the Watchog simply stood there and kept its eyes locked onto Rala. Okay, this was really getting uncomfortable.

Watchog didn't seem to respond to this development, however Rala would notice a quick shine of red in its eyes, its gaze never even bothering to pay the copies a second thought.

"Sorry hun, but you can't escape the gaze of my Watchog. Use Iron Tail!" She ordered the Norma type.

It was at that moment where Rala and/or Terashi would realize that the Watchog had prepared a Foresight prior, the Watchog now towards the real Rala, leaping off the ground once near and spinning around to smack her with its straight turdy tail now coated in Steel energy. It might also be noted that the attack had incredible power behind it, the Watchog having analyzed Rala while it waited, allowing it to seek out her weak points with its Analytic ability.

Right after the Iron Tail smacked into the real Gardevoir the Watchog would be greeted by a blinding flash of light and for a Pokemon that had superior eyesight this wasn't exactly favorable. Once the Flash ended Watchog could be seen stumbling around, blinded by the Flash.

"That was pretty good! If I had a hat I would tip it to you." Lenora said with a laugh. "That puts a damper on things but nothing we can't handle. Why don't we even the playing field a little bit? Confuse Ray!" The gym leader ordered.

While the Watchog couldn't see it wouldn't need to for this move as it unleashed a bright flash of light from the stripes on its body that made its 'jacket'. While it wasn't a blinding light like Rala's it was just as bad as it threatened to befuddle her and her thoughts.

That wasn't too bad. There was a chance of Rala dropping a move to hurt herself, but it wasn't completely debilitating. Time to go back on the offensive. "Focus Blast!"

Rala gathered Fighting-type energy into an orb once again, packing as much energy as she could into the orb before launching it at Watchog, hoping that the attack lands.

"Not a bad strategy," I commented with a smirk. "But much like Watchog, Rala has a way to counter it, if in a different way. Hyper Voice, Rala," I ordered, holding my ears shut.

Rala focused her Normal-type energy in her throat before screaming at the top of her lungs, focusing the energy to stretch out all around her. The nature of this move meant that it would be hard to avoid taking damage, and since five of the six Watchog were just energy clones, that meant that the clones would dissipate after taking damage from Rala's attack, leaving only the one enemy to focus on.

Rala cried out when Shock Wave hit, having been weakened by Iron Tail earlier. She wasn't out of energy, though, and while did feel a bit weak, she wasn't out of the count yet.

Meanwhile, I was trying to figure out how to put an end to this match. "..can't go for Focus Blast again, she'll just Double Team again, and we'll be going in circles. Sod it. Psychic, Rala."

While Moonblast had a bit more power to it than Psychic, her strongest Psychic-type move also had the chance of lowering Watchog's defenses when it came to special attacks. Part of me wanted to go for the throat, thinking that Watchog couldn't have much energy left in it, but I'd learned from that mistake already, and wasn't about to repeat it.

Rala focused on Watchog, pouring as much Psychic-type energy as she could into its mind in an attempt to crush it via Psychic.

I took the badge humbly from Lenora. "Thank you for the battle. It was an honor to challenge you," I said calmly, but with a smile on my face that I couldn't contain. I turned my tie around to pin it next to my Trio Badge before turning around to show Keiko. She was a bit more focused on the fight that just ended, though. "That was crazy close!" she exclaimed with a wide smile. "Rala would have lost if Confusion ever kicked in. I was holding my breath near the end of that."

"Probably wouldn't have been as close if I was allowed more than two Pokemon, but rules are rules," I shrugged, grabbing one of Keiko's hands gently. "Next gym?"

Keiko and I waved farewell to Lenora and made our way out of the Nacrene City gym. I headed to the nearest Pokemon Center to heal Angeal and Rala up only to discover that there were more than eight gyms in Unova via a poster in the center.

After some time spent coercing GRAY, Claydol showed up and teleported us to the Aspertia Town Pokemon Center, from which we walked to the local Gym and knocked on the door.