It was weird seeing Alexei-- seeing the gym leader-- sitting at the receptionist’s desk like he was there to answer phones and fetch the boss coffee. Yeah, Cyg knew who he was-- she’d grown up here, remember?-- but facing him as a challenger was a completely different slice of pie.

“Yes,” Cyg confirmed the first question, then jumped a little at the second: “Oh, yes. Shit-- er, shoot, sorry.” She pulled Anatida’s Pokeball from a pocket in her romper and released the Swanna into the world-- who immediately began squawking and flapping her wings, ready to fight. Cyg made a face and wrapped an arm around her swan’s neck, pulling her head and clacking beak close to the side of her body.

“Sorry,” Cyg apologized again, squeezing Anatida-- it was definitely out of love, but also, nerves-- “she’s really excited. I told her we were going to ‘ride into battle’ and she got a little… too hype.”

As if to demonstrate, Ana clacked her beak and couched her wings, hissing at Alexei, though she was still being embraced by Cyg-- it was the only thing holding her back.

---

wearing

Alexei Ivanov

☉

ANATIDA ♀ HYDRATION hurricane, brave bird, tailwind, defog, fly, dive

He waved away her verbal indiscretions with a flick of his hand; that, combined with the smile he gave her feral swan, endeared him greatly to Cygne. She wrapped an arm protectively around her Swanna-- for both their sakes-- as he rose to open the doors.

Cyg and Ana hadn’t always seen eye to eye. Astonishingly wild, Anatida had always begrudged Cyg her capture and hated feeling beholden to a trainer simply for the robbery of her freedom. This, combined with her presence as Cyg’s only Flying-type large enough to bear her weight, made for a rocky relationship; more often than not, it ended up with spills from the saddle or terrifying free-falling divebombs executed for the purpose of hearing Cygne scream.

Despite this, Cyg and Ana had come to an embittered agreement. The one thing Anatida craved over freedom was power, and she now realized that pairing with Cygne was the only thing that would help her achieve her higher limits. Prior to the start of this challenge Cyg had had a long conversation with Ana about expectations.

“I don’t care if we lose,” she’d told her swan, “but please, don’t drop me on my ass. Or my neck.”

The sky above them was wide and wondrous as Cyg turned a slow circle to look at the arena. Freed from her trainer’s grasp, Anatida rushed forward, honks echoing around the space, wings flapping with barely contained energy. Struck from her daydreaming, Cyg picked up a lance after Alexei, and took her position on the indicated side of the arena. Anatida waddled over shortly.

“Look,” Cyg murmured to the swan as she settled ruffled white feathers with her fingertips, “this can’t be any harder than fighting off hordes of hungry Tentacool underwater, or fighting giant, murderous fish.” She paused, then arched an eyebrow. “Damn, we’ve been through a lot together, huh?”

Ana hissed.

“Right.” Her swan toddled round and stooped low to allow Cyg to sling her leg over her back. She hefted the weight of the lance in her right hand, trying to get used to it.

“Okay. We’re ready, whenever. Read us the riot act.”

---

wearing

Alexei Ivanov

☉

ANATIDA ♀ HYDRATION hurricane, brave bird, tailwind, defog, fly, dive

Cyg didn’t see the eagle until he was upon them, lighting deftly upon the ground and curling his blue-tinged feathers up against his body like a weaponsmaster couching his blades. “Arceus,” Cyg murmured on her exhale, struck by the sharp difference between the Braviary’s noble profile and her own chaotic, bow-necked creature, who took one look at the Valiant Pokemon and arched her oesophagus and hissed.

The goggles spun in the air and Cyg caught them by the band, pinching the lance-- the pool noodle-- between her body and elbow to hold onto it. She stretched the eyewear out to examine them before sliding them over her head, accidentally snapping the strap hard against the back of her skull. “Ouch.”

She listened to Alexei go through the rules of play, watching him pantomime a correct strike as she rubbed the stinging part on her occipital bone as he did so. She looked up when he indicated, slightly relieved to see the safety net, but still not keen on being thrown from the proverbial saddle on the whims of her feral Swanna.

“Don’t get any ideas just because I can’t die easily,” she said, but she smiled as she did so.

“Nah, I think we’re good. Yip yi-- augh!” Anatida thrust her wings out and sprinted forward, knocking Cyg backward in her seat so abruptly she really had to squeeze with her legs to hold on. Her core muscles caught back up shortly and she righted herself just as the swan took to the air, buoyed, at least for the difficult part of liftoff, by the magical properties of fly.

They did a loop to gain altitude-- Ana hissing down at Kyouya as they passed-- and Cyg settled into the known comfort of sitting astride her Swanna. She looked down-- a mistake-- and swallowed hard against the panic that fizzled up in her like a shaken carbonated drink. A moment later, and the fear passed; she’d been higher, before, with no safety net.

Ana had nearly bucked her off, then, but.

They cut a broad swathe against the side of the arena, Anatida angling her body so Cyg tipped over slightly; then, the swan righted herself, as they took their place opposite Alexei’s side, utilizing fly once again to be hovering on the spot.

A lot of people imagined it took the move ‘Fly’ to actually mount your Pokemon and, well, fly. But Cyg had learned that it was more the strange, difficult, and unnatural parts of flight that the move was really necessary for: like hovering. Swans can’t hover, naturally, so Fly helps hold them in place; it’s also useful for take-off, which is the most energy-taxing portion of the flight. But even without the move, she could climb on Ana’s back and soar through the air.

“Ready when you are!” she called down to Alexei, voice echoing around the arena; she surprised herself by sounding confident-- excited, even.

---

wearing

Alexei Ivanov

☉

ANATIDA ♀ HYDRATION hurricane, brave bird, tailwind, defog, fly, dive

Cyg tangled her fingers in the feathers at the base of Ana’s nape, willing herself to relax, to not pull, to not jerk.

“Did you hear that?” she asked her mount, leaning down slightly to ensure Ana listened. “No attacking his bird, got it?”

Ana honked a disappointed affirmative.

Satisfied her swan would behave, Cyg sat up in her seat, exhaled a deep breath, and couched her noodle-lance. She gently tapped her heels to the underside of Ana’s wings and the swan shot forward with a bray-- but Cyg was ready this time, and she leaned forward into the blow, face a mask of determination.

---

H7Sy9yST

wearing

Alexei Ivanov

☉

ANATIDA ♀ HYDRATION hurricane, brave bird, tailwind, defog, fly, dive

She could hardly believe she got that first strike-- and, apparently, she had different ideas of what constituted a ‘joust’ than the gym leader. Cyg imagined it would be three passes, the two of them charging at each other as though on horseback, but instead of returning to their starting points, the Braviary pulled some incredible aerial maneuver and was somehow above her in the blink of an eye.

Cyg was still riding the high of her first point and caught somewhere between shock and confusion, but Ana was nothing if not a creature of instinct. She dropped, plummeting downwards fast enough for Cyg to rise out of her seat; then she, too, banked up and around. The two of them ended up doing intricate spirals around each other, and Cyg was getting nauseated. She tried to keep her eyes focused on one spot to fight the dizziness, and just ended up holding her pool noodle out in an attempt to make contact.

---

a5gVieDW

wearing

Alexei Ivanov

☉

ANATIDA ♀ HYDRATION hurricane, brave bird, tailwind, defog, fly, dive

“Th-thanks,” Cyg panted out, still stuck in the fight to balance her grip with her nausea without squeezing the life out of Ana. Her mount in question whirled upright and Cyg felt her jaw crack. A beat later, and, “Wait-- what does that mean?”

She didn’t know if he heard because he was off doing crazy maneuvers that she thought maybe she’d seen in Top Gun with the FA-18 Super Hornets-- but those were capable of flying at a thousand miles-per-hour, and it seemed impossible that this mere specimen of flesh, blood, and feathers would be capable of doing the same thing.

But he did, somehow.

(She secretly likes planes, okay).

She felt more than saw the push of air from the noodle, the way it crunched as it shifted in Alexei’s hands. She’d never been brilliant but was generally known to be able to cut her losses, so instead of a thoughtless counter, she just pinned herself to Ana’s back and urged the swan down out of the line of fire. Ana resisted, wanting to stay engaged, but Cyg had a feeling they wouldn’t win this portion of the fight.

---

C6D2WdKM

wearing

Alexei Ivanov

☉

ANATIDA ♀ HYDRATION hurricane, brave bird, tailwind, defog, fly, dive