With Josh being far ahead on his community service work due to how much he had pushed himself when the late SHAWN RICHARDS was in charge of his Gym, he could take some time off to go to a costume party in uptown Mauville. It was a good thing the main hall was two stories tall, because his Manectric was part of his costume. Josh himself was dressed in a solid yellow, knightly outfit with a lightning motif to it. He even had a lightning bolt-shaped plastic sword in his hand, a light on the inside making it flash like a Thunderbolt from one of his Pokémon.

The lad was seated atop his Manectric, complete with not only his thundercloud saddle, but also painted black stripes, a mask in the likeness of the Johto Beast's face, and a blue, jagged dongle covering his tail. The electric-type looked like the spitting image of the Pokémon he adored.

Many people recognized the masquerading Gym Leader from other parties. Even those who did not knew; there was no helmet hiding the face of Josh Devlin this time. Among those people was Laurence Anderson , Josh flagging him down and tapping the business end of the "Lightning Sword" near the pirate's blade. "Right on time!" he greeted the arriving Captain.

"Nope, no need!" Josh chirped, flicking on the light switch on his blade. The bolt-shaped prop glowed like a striking lightning bolt, the make-believe Avatar striking a victory pose before switching it off and sheathing it. "Besides, Mauville should be able to see their Signer in all his glory, right? The one Raikou chose?"

The Gym Leader let out a fake chuckle before dropping the charade at least a little. "You have no idea how much I wish it were true. The danger doesn't bother me at all. You know how much work I did at Dewford? I was able to stop Rocket from scoring a major haul of Dynite and Terastal ore." He wasn't proud of the kill count he had accumulated while doing so, though. He also wasn't proud of losing his Braviary; rest in peace, Slider. You will be missed.

"Nothing like pinball, EDM, and good eats, is there?" Josh asked, wandering over toward a line of pinball machines, most of which were older than he was. Of course, there was also adult entertainment at the party. Read: gambling.

Those sandwiches looked good. Rather than be a glutton like his former superior was, the young man grabbed only one or two, savoring them while he listened to Lars' assessment of the Dewford operation. "You probably wouldn't have a good time meeting Ao, then," Josh replied, referring to his own Roaring Moon that had been painstakingly broken to the bridle. "And I highly doubt it's worse than my experience," he brought his voice down. "How many times were you shot at with Bullet Seed SMGs and Aura Sphere launchers?"

Lars seemed more attracted to the adult entertainment as opposed to the pinball machines the Gym Leader had his eyes on. "I could. You play Hold'em, right?" he asked Lars, sliding down from his Manectric's back to take a seat at a low-stakes poker table. 300 PD was money he could afford to lose if things went awry.

Josh's quirk was his willingness to put a saddle on nearly any Pokémon strong enough, fast enough, and properly shaped for it. The Roaring Moon had some real speed to him, but boy did he take some nasty hits during his first few rides on the Paradox Pokémon. "You're not the only one. I still can't believe how badly we bungled Dewford One. Feels like every effort I made there went to waste. But enough of that for now. Let's play some poker."

Cold decked for over an hour, Josh's eyes shifted when he looked down at his hand after several orbits. He beheld the best hand in Hold'em: Pocket Rockets. Sticks. Bullets. Many names for the hand players dream of getting:

Pocket aces.

"Reraise." The young man was showing no subtlety, putting in a cold four-bet. He wondered how many strong hands there were out there that could call such a large bet.

This was concerning: Josh had earned not one, but two customers capable of calling a four-bet. With the pot swelling, he awaited the flop with bated breath, his eyes on the dealer's hands. The top card was an innocuous three of spades. When the remaining two were unveiled, the Gym Leader was remarkably less happy on the inside. He really did not want to see a king. When he saw there were also two clubs on board, he peeked at his hole cards one more time.

One of his aces was a club.

With a blocker to the nuts and potentially scary hands out there, the only hand he was losing to was cowboys. Rather than try to extract value, he needed to end the hand quickly. He cupped his hands around the remainder of his stack and slowly pushed it forward.

"All in."

Lars did have Josh's stack covered, so he wouldn't go broke if he lost the hand, but he would be the short stack. When all the chips went in the middle, he excitedly flipped his cards over. "Bullets, buddy!" he announced as he stood up, rubbing his hands back and forth as he waited for Lars to turn his hole cards face-up. His excitement was tempered upon seeing a paired king with two clubs. There were a lot of outs to dodge.

The turn card was red and had no paint. No help for Lars. "Ace! Ace! Ace!" Josh chanted, thinking about his rash, red-headed Gym Trainer whose name was also Ace. He held his breath as the dealer put out the river card. Pumping a fist and sounding a cry of triumph at the meaningless spade, he shouted perhaps a little too loudly, "That's how you double up!"

After several more hours, the table broke apart with Josh having made a tidy profit and Lars losing a very small amount of money, doing well to claw back after losing such a large hand. After cashing out, the two headed for the line of pinball machines on the other side of the divider, the Gym Leader losing track of time...