Pokémon: Midnight Blue

The Semi-Finalist

I breezed through the rest of the week. The battles were practically handed to me for the next five days. The preliminaries were over after that, and that meant it was time for the Semi-Finals. Robin was paired up against a trainer from Fuchsia City, and I was up against none other than Kylie.

Robin's battle was cake. He rolled his opponent up and tossed him aside in a matter of minutes. Meanwhile, I felt a bit nervous about going up against Kylie. I gulped as I stepped onto the field. I gazed into her eyes and realized she was callous. She was not battling an old friend. She was not battling an enemy. She was battling a stranger, which was possibly the worst impression she could give me. She knew that.

Defeating her was quick and seemed effortless, but as she walked out of the stadium, sulking in defeat, I reminisced on that day in Cinnabar. I exited on my side and scrambled to hers to catch up with her.

"Kylie!" I yelled fer her, "Wait!"

"What do you want, Brian?" she demanded. "We have nothing left to say to each other!"

"That's not true. I still have to apologize about a million more times for what happened on Cinnabar Island. I need to congratulate you on making it this far in the tournament. You're a much better trainer than I ever gave you credit for, and I'm sorry for that too. But most of all I need you to beg you to forgive me and tell me we're still friends."

"You don't need my forgiveness, Brian, or my friendship for that matter. You couldn't care less about either of the two. It's Robin. He's the one you need to forgive you and offer his friendship. Not me. I'm nothing to you."

"That's a load, and you know it, Kylie. You were there before Robin. Your friendship means just as much to me as his."

"Then answer me one question, Brian." Kylie approached me, eyes blazing. "If my friendship means so much to you, why do you constantly go out of your way to criticize and complain about anything I do or say? And I don't mean just recently. I'm talking about before your little mental breakdown. Before Cinnabar, before Saffron--hell, before we even set foot in this world! You have been such an asshole to me for years now, and I think I have a right to know why!"

"Look, Kylie," I choked up a bit, "when you're right, you're right. I have been a tremendous ass to you, and I am extremely sorry. You don't deserve that. I'd give anything to go back to the way things used to be. We used to be really close, you remember? We used to be able to tell each other damn near anything and everything. We used to be best friends."

"Yeah," Kylie laughed, seemingly fighting to hold back a sob. "We were. And I'd like to know what the hell happened to that."

I held back my thoughts for a moment, but I could tell Kylie demanded a response. I looked down and away from her and replied softly, "Robin came out on top again. And then everything changed after that, in ways that I wasn't really fond of."

I looked back up at Kylie, who seemed really surprised at my response. She looked away and shook her head and replied with the exact words that I knew she would, "Well, I'm sorry you feel that way."

She began to walk away, and I tried calling out to her again, "Kylie, wait!"

Kylie spun around on her heel and snapped at me, "I'm sick of being involved in this, okay? Do not talk to me again until you work things out with Robin. Do you hear me?"

I nodded softly as she spun around again and walked off.