Rival Me This [Pokémon Fanfiction]

01| Straight Outta Galar

Blue knew he was in for an interesting day the moment his alarm woke him up almost two hours earlier than usual.

   He was rudely torn from his sleep by the blaring of his alarm, and he nearly smacked his phone off his nightstand trying to turn it off. As sleep still hazed his mind, he was briefly confused when he saw what the alarm was for. "Leader Mentoring." Then it hit him.

   "Oh shit, that's this week?" he questioned rhetorically, eyes widening.

   A couple of weeks ago, Blue had gotten a call from the Pokémon League Board. Apparently Opal Poplar, the Ballonlea Gym Leader—well, former Gym Leader according to her—had finally found a successor to her Gym.

   Even though Blue wasn't too familiar with regions outside of Kanto and Johto, he knew the other region's Leaders and their business. Opal had been looking for a successor since before he had become Viridian's Gym Leader, and her hunt was almost infamous. It had been made note of at each year's Leader conference, where it was expected that each Leader and Trial Captain give status updates about their state of affairs. Now the search had seemingly been concluded.

   Following the call from the Board, Blue had received some basic information about Opal's apprentice. He was a young man going by the rather eloquent name of Bede Bedivere. Blue knew of him, a former Galar Gym Challenger endorsed by the region's Pokémon League Chairman. He had been known to be a cocky, arrogant, egotistical Trainer who never liked to admit that he was wrong. Blue had heard that descriptor in reference to himself before, but he personally couldn't see it.

   Even if I had been, at least I mellowed out, Blue thought, rolling out of bed. After grabbing a change of clothes, he stumbled to the bathroom to get ready. He needed to look like not just a person in twenty minutes, but a bona fide Kanto Gym Leader, the Blue Oak.

   With Bede taking Opal's place as Gym Leader, he was going to be subjected to the same process every new Leader had to go through. Part of it involved the trainee spending a month in a region besides the one they would be leading in. This was meant to help them become familiarized with another region's Leaders as well as learn a few things from them, and Bede had chosen Kanto. By now, the boy had already been with with Kanto's other Leaders, and now he was to spend his final three days in Viridian City with Blue.

   Blue was honestly a little nervous about all of this. Despite being a Leader, he wasn't the best with kids. It was difficult to not flaunt his skills and gloat about it after crushing his challengers' hopes of winning the Earth Badge into the floor. That slightly more unsavory reaction was why Blue's previous attempts at Leader mentoring hadn't gone that well. It was thanks to trainees' already-existing awe of him that kept them from becoming discouraged after Blue's "lessons." At least by the end of it, they knew their type-weaknesses inside and out.

   Still, Blue tried to be optimistic about this. Unlike when he'd been stuck with Clemont and Tate and Liza, Blue thought he had a half-decent chance with Bede. He could already relate to the kid on a few fronts with him being the rival of a Champion and having to make a name for himself in the aftermath. Hopefully things would go Blue's way with this... even though he hadn't exactly planned anything. Still, he was a master of improvisation, he could do this!