And just how the heck am I supposed to get money? James thought to himself crossly as he surveyed the length of only one of Cerulean's many streets. Steal it, his mind told him as if it was a joke; the slight tingle of pain that shot up his left wrist at even the idea assured him that was definitely not an option. Besides that, he didn't even feel like stealing anything anymore.

God, James, you've gone crazy. At least, Jessie and Meowth would think so. The thought slowed him down a little, but he quickly pushed it back down. He needed to concentrate on this now.

Just the prospect of not having to think about training for the rest of the day was enough motivation. It wasn't as though he didn't feel like getting one step closer to his goal, but Myrea had really been pushing him hard for the past week. He wondered why that was.

Forgetting all that for the moment, he ran his eyes over the shops lining the street. Maybe one of them could use an hour or two of help in exchange for a little money. Singling out a clothing store as an obvious first choice, he hesitantly pushed the door open and entered.

There wasn't anyone there except for a young black-haired girl behind the counter, who smiled at him warmly. "Well, now... it's not too often that many guys come in here. Are you looking for something for your girlfriend? Or your... wife?"

That was when he realized it was a female clothing store, and felt appropriately embarrassed. "No, I just... I wanted to know if you... that is... if you needed..." he began to stutter.

"No. You know, this is the third time today I've had someone come in and ask if I need help! I'm responsible and I know how to run this place myself even if I do look young and inexperienced! I have half a mind to..."

James let her continue to ramble as he backed slowly toward the door, trying to smile in what he hoped was a soothing way. "Sorry to... to bother you, Miss..." he managed to get out before he pulled the door open and escaped. With a heavy sigh, he leaned up against the side of the shop next to the door, trying to figure out what to do next. The only thing he could think of was to try a few more places.

Unable to keep from sighing again, he was about to walk further down the street when a sudden motion in the corner of his eyes caused him to stop and look. In the space between the clothing store and the building beside it, he could see what looked like a white tail flopping up and down. Out of curiosity, he went further over to see what it was attached to.

"Seeeel," the little white Pokémon moaned mournfully. James blinked.

"A lost Seel?" he wondered aloud to himself. "How odd." But when he bent down to extend a hand toward it, it backed up and moved it's head from side to side.

"Seel!"

"Hm. Maybe it's just waiting for someone." Shrugging, James left it there to continue his mission.

An hour later, however, he felt like he had covered half the city, and no one wanted an hour or two of help. And most of them had been fairly rude about it, as well. "What's wrong with these people, anyway?" he muttered angrily, folding his arms and all but glaring at the passersby in his bad mood.

That was when he noticed the Seel out in the middle of the road, plainly trying to flop it's way over to him. "Seel?" it called out. "Seel!"

Without thinking, James ran out into the road to scoop it into his arms, then dashed back to the sidewalk in time to avoid the oncoming traffic. "Seel?" the Pokémon whimpered to him.

"Hey... you shouldn't go out into the street like that. Are you lost, little guy? Can't find your owner?" The Seel only nuzzled it's head up against his chest, and he patted it carefully to keep from poking himself on it's horn. "You weren't following me, were you?"

"Seel! Seel!" It seemed to say that it had been. James nodded.

"So you want me to help you find your owner?"

"Seeeeel!"

"Alright, okay!" James laughed as it squirmed about wildly. "We'll keep walking and see what we find."

And after another half hour of walking and finding nothing, James had little hope left that he would ever find the owner. He was tired of walking and the Seel was feeling heavier by the minute. Still, he continued on, mostly because he wouldn't have felt right about leaving it on it's own again.

"We've been on this street already," he groaned as he drew up to the corner and peered down it. There was only one girl standing on the street now, a girl with long blonde hair who was staring at something in one of the shop windows. James couldn't see anything special about her from this angle, but apparently the Seel did.

"Seeeel! Seel!"

"Oh, we found her, huh?" James asked it with a smile as he crossed the street and headed over to talk to the girl. His approach was unheeded until he actually started speaking to her. "Excuse me, but did you lose a..." He trailed off as she turned to look at him. Now he recognized her, too - she was one of the gym leaders that he'd tried to steal from as a part of Team Rocket so long ago. Hopefully so long ago that she didn't remember him.

"Oh!" the girl squealed when she saw the Seel, evidently not even noticing James' sudden silence. "Seel, it's you! I looked for you everywhere, why didn't you stay where I told you?"

"Seeeel!" was it's only response before it jumped - if a Seel could actually be said to "jump" - into the girl's arms.

"Oh Seel, I'm, like... sorry! Thanks for finding it," she added next, smiling at James. "I just wanted to go shopping this afternoon, ya know, and Seel wanted to come with me. I just had to go into the beauty shop to get my hair done too, so I, like, left Seel outside and told it to stay! And when I came out I was like, oh my god, it's gone! But you found it, so everything's totally okay now!"

James' brain whirled as he tried to sort out everything she'd said in that funny way she talked, but he soon gave up and just nodded as though he understood everything completely. "Oh, this is just so awesome!" she continued babbling at him. "But tell me, is there anything I can do to repay you, like, anything at all? 'Cause I think you deserve something for finding Seel for me!"

James smiled to himself slowly. "As a matter of fact, there is something..."

Myrea lay flat on her back on the ground, giggling uncontrollably as two pink tongues tickled her face. "Okay! Okay! That's enough! I'll get you something to eat!" she laughed, reaching her hands up to push Lemon and Lime's broad noses away from her. "I try to sit back and relax, and you two pester me." She made this part sound like she was scolding, but she couldn't keep the smile from her face.

As she got up to rummage through her bag for the food, her thoughts returned to James again. Try as she might, that was where her thoughts usually went whether she wanted them to or not. She hoped he was okay out there, getting his... socks. This produced another laugh she couldn't hold back.

Watching her Slowpoke eat, with James' Marril, having already been fed, sitting quietly beside her, she hoped he would return soon. It was pretty lonely without him around, even with the Pokémon. And it had been three hours since he'd left.

So she was extremely happy to see him finally appear over the top of the hill outside the city, and she nearly stood up to wave at him before she noticed something odd. Then she couldn't do anything but stare.

His face was the same, yet almost everything else about him seemed different. He was wearing clothes she had never seen before - a pair of dark blue jeans and a long-sleeved green shirt that hung halfway to his knees and was cut open enough to show a black shirt underneath. And he had somehow managed to pull his bluish hair back into a small ponytail, though a lot of strands still fell loose around his face. Her brother's blue and white tennis shoes were still on his feet though, and he carried the rest of the clothes he had been wearing before under one arm. It felt like she had stared at him forever before he was finally sitting cross-legged on the ground in front of her.

"What's the matter with you?" he asked teasingly as the Pokémon crowded around the two of them. "Don't you remember me?"

"How did you... where did you..." He just smiled, then told her a very interesting story that answered all of her questions.

"...and so, Daisy was so happy to get Seel back that she said she would give me anything I wanted. I said I thought I needed a new image, and that was enough to get her going. She practically went crazy over this little... 'makeover'. So, what do you think?"

"You look... great," she answered weakly. What she really wanted to say was "handsome", but for some reason she couldn't. A very strange thing.

"And here's the best part," he continued while he pried off his shoes.

Myrea grinned, suddenly feeling more like her old self. "Yep, no holes. James... you're amazing. Did you know that?"

He leaned closer to her. "I've always known that," he affirmed with a grin of his own.

"You're also humble," she joked, standing up. "Well, let's see about eating some supper, then we can go sightseeing or something, since you've more than earned the right not to talk about training for the rest of the day. And tomorrow morning we'll head over to the gym."

"The gym...?" he repeated slowly, looking up at her with an earnest expression. "Do you think I'm ready for that?"

"Oh, I think so..."

"The Cascade Badge.." James mumbled to no one in particular as he slumped against the glass of the aquarium, his nose pressed to it. "I feel sick..."

"Stop that." Myrea's voice sounded right in his ear, but it was probably because she had leaned so close to him. "You were all ready for this last night. What happened?"

"I don't know... but I feel sick."

"Well, okay. But just try to relax and enjoy the aquariums for now. You've got five minutes left. Look at that Goldeen. It's so pretty, it's the biggest one I've ever seen..."

James let the sound of her voice drown in the rest of his thoughts. It was true that he did remember feeling this same way the last time he had competed for a gym badge... but it had gone away when he was actually out in the ring and was thinking of doing his best for Jessie and Meowth. But until that time, the waiting was hard.

"James! Pleeeease don't space out on me now! It's time to go!" Myrea's voice came back up again, and he turned to look down at her anxious face, purple eyes wide with concern. Reflexively, he brushed a strand of green hair away from her glasses, but her gaze didn't waver. Looking at her, he realized that maybe he was doing this for her now almost as much as for the others, and he managed to calm his expression and to look more relaxed.

"Alright. I'm ready, let's go." Myrea merely gave him a relieved smile, then the pair walked on in silence.

It didn't take long to reach the main gym area. There was the huge pool for the gym battles, and there was another, smaller pool that must have been built only recently; one of the trio of gym leaders appeared to be teaching about water Pokémon to a few trainers there. The two other leaders were conversing at the far end of the giant pool - one of them was Daisy. The whole room echoed in the cavernous way that most indoor pools seemed to.

James swallowed hard and looked over at Myrea, who looked right back. "You're on your own now," she smiled. "Good luck." That was all she said before she went over to sit in the bleachers, leaving James standing alone and feeling rather nervous. Fortunately or not, he wasn't alone for long.

"Oh, James! You're finally here!" Daisy called over to him, waving frantically. She practically ran over to join him as the sister she had been talking to followed more slowly. "I'm so glad you're here! This is gonna be, like, the most totally awesome match because I'm sure you're a great Pokémon trainer! Oh yeah, I guess I should introduce you to my sister, Violet," she added a bit reluctantly at the end.

"Gee, what a great introduction," the purple-haired girl sighed, extending a hand for James to shake. "Daisy has been, like, so eager for you to get here that her manners have basically gone down the drain." James hadn't been able to get a word in edgewise over Daisy, but he was able to nod and politely greet Violet now. Then the final "Sensational Sister" appeared, her class having dissolved to sit in the bleachers and watch. James wasn't sure he was comfortable with so many people watching him right now, but he figured he had to get used to it if he ever wanted to be relaxed in the Pokémon League. The amount of people here would be very small if compared to that major event.

"Hey, no fair hogging the cute trainers," the third sister pouted at the other two.

"Oh, give it a rest, Rose. We, like, owe this one a lot since he found our poor lost Seel," Daisy reminded.

"I suppose you're right," Rose replied thoughtfully. "And it's not, like, every day you have your Seel rescued by a totally cute trainer." They all broke into giggles over this, and James fervently hoped that Myrea couldn't hear them or see his red face. She would tease him to no end if she had.

"But seriously," Violet began once they had all calmed down, "thanks. Seel is really young and doesn't have much experience, since we only got it after our old Seel evolved into Dewgong. It's, like, more of a pet around here than a Pokémon for battling."

James nodded. "I see."

"Yeah," Rose chimed in, "and since she met you first, Daisy wants to be the one to battle you. Which I'm not sure is really, like, fair, but we agreed to it, if only to shut her up." Daisy glared indignantly at her two sisters while they hid smiles behind their hands; James had a hard time containing his amusement, as well. The trio was silly - there was no question of that - but did that mean winning this badge would be easy? He supposed he would find out soon enough.

Despite the girls' giggling, it didn't take long to set up for the match, Daisy opposite him on her own floating platform, while Violet and Rose sat out in the audience. James wasn't too sure he trusted this surface, and it was certainly disconcerting to be surrounded by water during a Pokémon battle, but he kept Myrea's tips in mind. Maybe going over them so much hadn't been such a bad idea after all. He also kept Jessie fixed in his mind, and this all seemed worthwhile, at least - the nervous, sick feelings disappeared.

"Okay!" Daisy finally called out to him across the water. Her voice naturally echoed quite loudly across the huge room. "This battle for the Cascade Badge will now begin! Both sides will use two Pokémon each! Are you ready?"

James nodded, hoping he really was. Daisy held up her first Pokéball, but lowered her voice to say something else to him before she tossed it out. "And just because you helped me out, don't think I'll go easy on you!"

He grinned at her. "I wouldn't have it any other way."

"Right. Now go, Goldeen!"

A Goldeen? This might be too easy. "Marril!"

This first battle was easy, as James had expected. Marril was surprisingly agile in the water, and could easily dodge the other Pokémon's attacks. The Goldeen became frustrated quickly, and wasn't following orders well enough, and a few minutes later, Marril claimed the victory with a final underwater Tackle. It all seemed like it should be downhill from that moment. That was when Daisy called out Dewgong.

James had known it would come down to this, but he still was hesitant to use Victreebel. Nevertheless, there was not much other choice. Suddenly he wished that he had tried to capture more Pokémon. Victreebel had shown vast improvement lately, but... being on the wrong end of it's attacks one time too many was enough to keep him more than wary of using it.

No choice. You don't have a choice, so just do it. Carefully keeping his eyes from wandering over to Myrea for guidance, he called it out, praying for a miracle. What he got was close enough to being one.

Victreebel didn't attack him, but the attacks it used against it's opponent seemed unfocused, and it kept looking back at James as though debating whether or not to come after him instead. Up until that moment, he had been working against the Dewgong with long range attacks, but when James faltered and couldn't come up with another command for some time, Victreebel did something rather unexpected. It jumped into the water.

Horrified, James peered over the edge of his platform, afraid to see if it was sinking to the bottom or not. But it was swimming, and quite well, at that. It might not be as graceful as Dewgong under the water, but it was holding it's own as it dodged the other's attacks. All of a sudden, an idea popped into James' head, and he decided to go for it and hope for the best.

"Victreebel! Jump as high as you can out of the water!" To his surprise, it obeyed instantly, and the Dewgong followed as James had hoped it would. A split second later, he called out, "Now use Stun Spore!"

His Pokémon screamed loudly as it released the paralyzing spores; this attack was much more focused than previous ones, and the Dewgong began to stiffen as it fell back toward the water, Victreebel slamming into it hard on the way down.

"Oh! Victreebel is the winner!" Daisy squeaked hastily, diving into the water to retrieve her stunned Pokémon. The shock that came from actually winning this battle, however, didn't even register before something heavy rammed into James' back, and he toppled face-first into the pool.

"James, are you okay?"

He sat up on the hard gym floor, looking down at himself. He was soaking wet. Then he blinked at the faces around him: Myrea, Daisy, Violet, and Rose. "What... happened?"

"Like, I dunno why, but your Victreebel jumped at you when the match was over. You hit your head on the bottom of the pool and you, like, passed out," Daisy told him. "Maybe it was just happy it won."

James nodded dumbly in agreement, not knowing how else to explain that. Daisy put a Pokéball in his hand. "There it is. It's a good thing that your girlfriend, like, jumped in and saved you, since I was so busy with Dewgong. She's pretty fast."

"Girlfriend?" James mumbled, looking at Myrea. She grinned hugely, then launched herself at him in a hug. She was soaking wet too, he noticed.

"Oh, I'm so glad I could save you! How could I let something like that happen to my boyfriend?"

"Wha... what..." James began to stutter in confusion, but Myrea hushed him quietly before letting go. Not that the sisters noticed, being too busy talking.

"It's too bad... he has a girlfriend already," Daisy sighed disconsolately. "I was hoping he could stay here and train with m... I mean, with us."

"We know what you mean," Rose replied, after which they all laughed.

"But it was great while it lasted, James... you're a really good trainer," Daisy smiled. She reached out to press a Cascade Badge in his palm, and he just stared at it for a time.

"Thanks... it was a lot of fun," he finally managed to say.

"Seeel!" a voice called out. A moment later, the Pokémon ran out from around a corner of the pool and headed straight for them. "Seel! Seel!"

"Ya know..." Daisy said slowly, "maybe Seel would like to go with James. It doesn't get much training here... and I think it would be better for it in the long run. What do you think?"

"Seeeeeeeeeel!" It seemed to have made up it's own mind.

So that was how James left Cerulean City: with a new Pokémon, a new badge, a new "girlfriend", and an immense headache.

"Oh man..." James moaned to himself. "I'm starting to feel like that twerp... getting Pokémon for free..."

"Did you just say something?" Myrea asked suddenly as she walked along beside him down the road.

"Heh... no... just talking to myself," he answered nervously. She had already commended him on his win, but now she seemed strangely quiet. "So why did you tell them that you're my... my..." he trailed off, surprised at himself for even asking.

"Oh. I just didn't want them pawing all over you. You're not free property, you know." James wasn't quite sure what to read from that smile on her face. So he focused on walking again. He wondered what Jessie and Meowth were doing right now.

I'm one step closer to you...

"Ya know... it seems to me that I've seen him before. Didn't he, like, seem a tiny bit familiar to either of you?" Daisy asked her sisters some time later.

"No... I don't think so."

"You're, like... imagining things."

I'm, like, starting to feel like a Valley Girl. Like, awesome, fer sure! Send me comments, or I'll, like, be totally upset! :p

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