At the Battle Chateau

At last, the group arrive at the Battle Chateau. It's a huge castle, with large windows to watch the battle through, and a few different turrets at the top. Although none of them are sure if those are only for decoration or if they actually once served a purpose. Max and Bonnie immediately run in and look around the building, wide eyed. The four from Sinnoh follow after, telling them they need to stay close because of how busy it is. Barry calls them over to a poster, saying that they recently made double battles an option for the Chateau, however they need to be Barons in order to participate. According to Bonnie, who'd been to the Chateau before, they only need to win one battle to earn that title. With that settled, they walk over to the reception desk to register for a battle.

However, they're informed that a battle is already in progress, between Grant, the Cyllage City gym leader and Korrina, the Gym Leader of the Shalour City Gym. Bonnie perks up at this and drags Max over to the window. Sure enough, two people are standing there, ready to begin their battle. One of them is a tall man with dark skin, black hair and greyish eyes. He wears three stones in his hair, coloured yellow, red and blue. He also wears a grey suit with a black undershirt and brown shoes, and a purple cloak completing the look. The other contestant is a tall and slender woman with very long creamy blonde hair tied in a big, thick, high fluffy ponytail, grey eyes and a fair complexion. She wears red sunglasses and a grey V-neck over her white top, as well as a white skirt. Completing her look are a pair of roller-skates and a red cloak.

Bonnie becomes giddy with excitement at the sight of the woman. "Who's that?" Max asks. "That's the leader of the Shalour Gym, Korrina," Bonnie replies. "She's an old friend of me, my brother, Serena and Ash!" Then she leans in and whispers, "And my brother has a huge crush on her." Max giggles at that. "I've been trying to get him to ask her out for ages, but he's always too nervous, so this is my chance to set them up myself!" Max laughs harder. "I know how you feel," he replies. "My older sister has a massive crush on this guy back in Hoenn, but she never does anything about it."

Before they can continue their conversation, the referee steps forward and announces that the battle is about to begin. At this, Bonnie tells Max to pay close attention to the match. "Grant is the next person I need to battle," she explains. "I need you to help me develop strategies against him." Max nods and starts analysing the match. Unbeknownst to either of them, Dawn and Zoey saw their whole conversation. "Those two are so cute" Dawn giggles. "They really have no idea that they've fallen for each other" Zoey marvels. Dawn nods. "It's like watching Lucas times 2" she comments. Both girls burst into near silent laughter.

As the battle between the two gym leaders begins, Max subconsciously enters his Observant State. Bonnie's eyes begin swapping between the battle and him. She cannot explain why, but her eyes always end up wandering to Max whenever he enters this state. The sight of this makes Dawn, Zoey, and even Barry struggle to contain their laughter. Max remains unaware of this, his eyes totally glued to the battle in front of him. Grant has sent out a large dinosaur pokémon, identified as a Tyrantrum by the pokédex. Korrina is using a Lucario, although this one is Mega evolved. Tyrantrum used rock tomb on the Lucario, but Lucario began to climb it. Max makes a note of that move for the future. Then, Lucario uses Aura Sphere and slams it down on Tyrantrum's head. Max thinks about all of the ways Bonnie can pull something like that off.

Bonnie, meanwhile, is trying to work out why the hell she keeps getting distracted by Max's Observant State. She decides to ask Korrina about it at the same time as when she tries to convince her to ask Clemont out. Eventually, the match ends, and Korrina is declared the winner. Bonnie cheers as she's handed a purple cloak like the one Grant wears. After that, the group heads back in and registers themselves for battles to make themselves Baron in order to challenge the double battles being held later that day. Their names are put in amongst the others, and eventually a scoreboard is shown. To everyone's delight, none of them will need to battle each other. The order goes as follows; Lucas's match, then Zoey's, then Bonnie's, then Dawn's, then Barry's, and finally Max's. The rules of the match are simple as well. Only two pokémon are permitted, the battle ends when one of the pokémon can't fight, and if the pokémon is thrown out of the arena, the battle is automatically over, even if they can still fight.

First up is Lucas. He steps confidently into the arena to face his opponent. He chooses his two pokémon carefully, throws the other four over to Barry, then readies his first ball. The referee calls for the battle to commence, and Lucas sends out his Medicham, and his opponent sends out a Golem. Lucas grins. This is going to be easy. Lucas starts the match with a high jump kick, but the Golem is able to catch it. However, that's what Lucas planned. "Alright, Mach punch!" Medicham lets the energy build into his fist and launches it into the Golem's face. The Golem cries out in pain and let's go of Medicham's leg. "Finish the high jump kick Medicham!" Lucas orders. Medicham throws himself into the Golem and his leg slams into it, sending it flying off of the ring. "Golem is unable to battle!" the referee calls.

Lucas's friends cheer as Lucas and Medicham give each other a high five. Then, the other trainer smiles as they send out their next pokémon, a Crobat. Lucas grins. "I see you went with Medicham's flying type weakness," he comments. "But you're forgetting something." And with that, he has Medicham use psychic. His opponent watches as their Crobat is lifted up and thrown to the ground, dealing major damage to it. "Medicham is also a psychic type." The opponent swears but tries their best to fight back. They have the Crobat use wing cutter, but Medicham is able to didge it. Then, he disappears from sight for a few seconds, before reappearing right behind Crobat. "Zen-headbutt!" Lucas orders. Medicham gathers psychic energy into his head and slams it into the Crobat at full force. The Crobat slams into the ground, causing a small dust cloud. When it clears, everyone can see the swirls in its eyes.

"Crobat is unable to battle," the ref calls. "The winner is Lucas! You will be given your Baron cloak after these other matches." Lucas bows his head in thanks, then walks over to his friends. The crowd can't do anything other than gape. Lucas had managed to win the battle without his pokémon even taking any damage. "That was amazing Lucas!" Barry exclaims as he hands him his pokéballs back. "I don't think anyone has managed that before here in the Chateau!" says Bonnie excitedly. "Congratulations Lucas!" says Dawn. Then, they hear Zoey's name being called. Zoey hands four of her pokémon to Dawn, receives a good luck kiss from her, then heads out onto the arena.

The ref goes through the rules again, then calls for the battle to commence. Zoey sends out her Leafeon first, since she's the one most suited for battles. Her opponent sends out a Pyroar. Zoey curses her luck but refuses to back down. The battle commences, and Leafeon immediately has to dodge a flame charge, and only just manages to do that. Then, thinking quickly, Zoey has Leafeon send a vine whip in response. It strikes but doesn't do a lot of damage. Pyroar sends out a flamethrower, which just about singes Leafeon, which does a bit of damage. Then, Zoey comes up with a plan. She orders Leafeon to wrap her vines around the Pyroar. Leafeon does so and raises the Pyroar off the ground. Her opponent has Pyroar use overheat in order to defeat the Leafeon before she could go through with this plan. Leafeon is brought down to half her health, but managed to throw Pyroar off of the arena, winning the match.

The opponent returns the Pyroar and sends out their next pokémon, an Umbreon. Zoey swallows nervously, but swiftly comes up with a plan. Umbreon starts from a distance by firing a Dark Pulse at Leafeon. As it reaches the halfway point between the two pokémon, Zoey finally gets an idea. "Use Razor Leaf for as long as you can!" she commands. Leafeon does so and is just about able to cause the Dark Pulse to dissipate before it reaches her. Next, Umbreon throws out a Hyper beam. But Leafeon is ready for this. During the contests the two have been in, Zoey trained Leafeon to utilise her razor leaf as a shield. "Razor shield!" Zoey orders. The leaves around Leafeon stop spinning and form a wall in front of her, absorbing most of the damage from hyper beam. A small bit of damage still manages to leak through, however. Umbreon charges in at that moment with a crunch, and that's when Zoey finishes her plan. The leaves resume their spinning as Umbreon comes closer. But, as Max notes, because of the amount of spinning they did, the leaves must've become so much sharper. As Umbreon comes through the leaves, they cut through its fur, doing massive damage. As Umbreon slows because of the hits, Leafeon finishes the match with a headbutt, knocking Umbreon out.

The crowd goes wild at this match. Zoey returns to her friends and is immediately pulled into a tight embrace by Dawn. Max gushes over how clever Zoey's strategies were. Zoey notices Bonnie's eyes wander over to the boy as he does, which causes her to giggle a bit. Max's gushing is interrupted by the call for Bonnie's match to commence. Bonnie hands for of her pokéballs to him, he wishes her luck, then she heads out onto the ring. Her opponent is roughly the same age as her. She has long black hair and green eyes. She wears a red t-shirt and brown shorts. As the two walk onto the arena, Bonnie notices the girl's eyes wander over to Max. She can't explain it, but Bonnie doesn't like the way they do that. Once the two are on the arena, Bonnie catches the name of her opponent from the ref, Trixie. Once the announcement and the explanation of the rules is done, the two choose their pokémon, and the battle commences.

The girl Trixie sends out a Pidgeotto, to which Bonnie smirks. Then, she sends out Dedenne. Then, the battle is called to begin. Trixie orders Pidgeotto to use fly in order to avoid Dedenne's attacks. But, thanks to Max's analyses, Bonnie was prepared for this. As Pidgeotto flies up, Dedenne charges up his electricity as much as he possibly can, then empties it all into the sky. The electricity fills the clouds, then strikes Pidgeotto full force, causing it to fall back to earth. It still was able to move, but before Trixie could do anything to fight back, Bonnie ends the battle with a nuzzle.

The crowd gapes, then erupts in applause. Bonnie looks over at Max and gives him a thumbs up and a smile as thanks, which he returns happily. Trixie notices and asks while picking out her next pokémon, "Oh, you know him?" Bonnie looks at her opponent, confused. "Yes," she says, hesitantly, "he's my best friend and travelling partner." Trixie smiles. "He's cute," she comments. Bonnie can't explain why, but that really rubs her up the wrong way. She tries to brush it off and urges her to choose her next pokémon. Trixie grins at the affect her words have on the blonde, then she throws out her next pokémon, a Klang. Bonnie smirks, then returns Dedenne. She releases Fennekin, then the battle resumes.

Bonnie takes great delight in the way Trixie's face falls. But, the girl's face hardens as she's still determined to win the match. She tries to get Klang to wrap Fennekin in a bind, but Fennekin is able to avoid it with Flame Charge. Then, once she's behind Klang, Fennekin strikes it with Ember from behind, successfully landing a burn. Then, Klang comes launching back with a Gear Grind, but Fennekin uses its momentum against it, and sends it flying towards the edge of the arena with Flame Charge. Klang is able to stop itself in time, but not quick enough to get out of the way as Fennekin launches another Ember at it, causing it to fall out of the arena. Bonnie is declared the winner, much to Max's pleasure. He cheers loudly as she makes her way back to the others. She hugs Max tightly, thanking him for his brilliant idea of using the clouds to attack moves like fly. He blushes a bit and says it was nothing, which makes Dawn and Zoey smirk a bit.

After that is Dawn's match. She sends out Pachirisu to face off against her opponent's Noivern. Pachirisu has a bit of trouble against the Noivern, since it's a powerful dragon type, but it's also a flying type, so Pachirisu is still able to inflict major damage. In the end, Pachirisu comes out on top. So, in response, the opponent sends out a Diggersby. Diggersby is able to take out Pachirisu with dig, since it was weakened from Dawn's match against the Noivern. So, Dawn sends out her final pokémon, Empoleon. Dawn hears her opponent curse, then go in for another dig. But Dawn took a leaf out of Bonnie's book. Only, instead of sending electricity into the sky, she pumps a large volume of water into the ground, flushing Diggersby out and doing major damage. Then, while it's in the air, Dawn has Empoleon use slam to slam Diggersby into the ground, bringing an end to the match. When she returns to her friends, it's Zoey's turn to give her a congratulatory hug and kiss.

Then, it's Barry's turn. He steps forward and sends out his own Empoleon. His opponent sends out a Gigalith. Barry grins at this, then orders Empoleon to use water pulse. Gigalith tries to dodge it but takes a good chunk of water damage. In response, it sends a volley of rock throws, which deals a bit of damage to Empoleon. But Empoleon finishes the battle off with surf. Then, Barry's opponent sends out a Torterra. Barry decides to keep Empoleon in, and spam water gun over and over again, while dodging at the same time. Torterra does the same with razor leaf. What follows is a relentless back and forth match between the two. It looks to be anyone's game, and it is, as both pokémon eventually collapse from exhaustion. However, since Barry still has one pokémon, so the match goes to him.

At last, it's Max's turn. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Bonnie cheering him on louder than the rest of the crowd. There's some black-haired girl doing the same as well. Max refocuses on his opponent, itching to battle. Since he isn't challenging the League this time, he hasn't had the same number of chances to battle as Bonnie has. He looks at his opponent, when something about him catches his eye. He's wearing a large cloak, but Max can just about make out a green t-shirt and brown undershirt under the cloak. Max freezes. Unless he's very much mistaken, Max is about to do battle against a Team Terra agent. Well, whatever they're after, he'll make sure to foil this plan here and now.