~Falkner~

Sweat dripped down the back of my neck as I approached the one person in this world that scared me most. Respectfully of course, I was terrified, almost to the point of turning away. And while I swept in I found myself twitching in anticipation, my fingers daring to reach out in front of me and touch the cold stone of my father. He was flat and scuffed up, rough around the edges, and yet somehow still elegant. My hands found their way over the tiny pinholes in the rock where water and weather alone had decayed it. I took a deep breath, looking down at my father.

Six feet in the ground lay a man who gave his life to his gym here in Violet City. The same gym that I grew up in, the same gym he died in. This was the same gym I was destined to lead one day, motherless and determined with little more than expectation. My father, though deceased, taught me every day what it meant to be proud of whom you are, and why you did the things you did. He taught me in silence with the help of his faithful birds, by my side and as glorious as ever despite the graying of their feathers and scarred talons. I was taught by the emptiness of knowing one day I would soar with the most magnificent of birds, just like my father did today.

"One day." I nodded to the gravestone just outside of our previous gem of a town. He was planted here because this used to be his training grounds and because this was apparently the place he met my mother so long ago, when the violet trees bloomed every spring. I never met the women that gave me her brilliant sky colored eyes, but from what I heard she was beautiful.

"I wish you could see how things were going…" I laughed sadly to the tomb of the legend gym leader. "I wish you could make fun of the way I was running things around here, or the way I dress sometimes, or—or the horrible paint job I did on the fence out back."

There was no response, just a lonely wind that swished the pale grass across my hands and made me smile. I was always afraid of my father growing up, he had been strict and we often didn't get along, but he had shaped me into the person I was today, which was something to be proud of. I missed him more than anything in the world.

"I'm going to be official today." I talked simply, remembering the way his rough voice would have cut me off. "I'm getting my gym leader license at the Indigo Plataea. It's the monthly meeting between leaders too, which means I will get to meet everyone personally."

Despite my father being a gym leader his whole life he had never introduced me to the other leaders, claiming that they were always changing at that when the time came I would meet them on my own. He said it would mean more to do it that way too, which I realized now was his motive. As a child I thought he just didn't want to take a nuisance like me along for the ride, but now I realized he had been setting me up for this day for as long as I could remember.

"There's Clair… I've talked to her on the phone once before, but she just yelled at me claiming that I was too young to be a leader. And Price, he was actually really genuine and understanding when I met him a month ago, but I felt like he pitied me. And I know, I know." I shook my head as if he was there to scold me. "I'm not supposed to take people's pity; don't worry, I didn't."

The cold stone stared back at me, unblinking.

I sighed. "Right…" What was I doing? Talking to a rock… "I love you Dad… I—I hope your proud of me."

I pushed myself up from my knees and turned to leave the forgotten battlefield as it was. I didn't not look back as I went, but mentally prepared myself for the initiation I would have to face tonight. My father would want me to stand tall and be pompous around the older, more experienced leaders. He would tell me to learn from them and hold my tongue, but show no sign of weakness. I would have said that was irrational and being a shadow of him wasn't going to get me anywhere, however later I knew I would take his advice gratefully. Indeed I was a shadow of my father, whether I liked it or not.

Tonight was the night that I became my father's prodigy. Second next to my father himself; and I was nervous as all hell. Tomorrow I would open the doors of the fixed up gym that he once loved so much, and I would accept challengers from all over the world. Hopefully I would defeat them easily, but there was no guarantee I could keep all those badges to myself.

With a strangled whistle I looked to the sky, awaiting my best friend to find me so I could ruffle his feathers. The docile Pidgey—appropriately named Zephyr- was never too far away, and always eager to please in situations like this. He would be accompanying me to the meeting tonight, since I could bring a single pokemon with me, and—like myself—needed a good scrub down first.

I whistled again, leaving the thoughts about my father behind at his grave and heading home towards the Gym. Moments later the bird found me and landed on my shoulder, looking as though he had gotten into some honey of some sort. His wings were sticky and his face was plastered with pollen.

"What did you do Buddy?" I pulled my hand up for him to step onto it before making him face me. He merely butted my chin with his tiny head in response, apologizing before I even scolded him. I smiled lightly as he chirped.

"We've got a lot to do today; you can't go getting into trouble." I eyed him carefully, teasing. "Today I become an official Gym leader… Zephyr this is the biggest thing that's ever happened to me."

He pecked me in the cheek and then turned his head away stiffly.

"A little support would be nice." I muttered. If only my father was here… he had a way with making even the most absent minded birds listen to him. I rolled my eyes as the tiny Pidgey launched himself from my hand and over the roof of the gym. I knew he was heading for the sanctuary in the back, where his mother—my father's Pidgeot—would coddle him and pluck out lose feathers where they did not belong.

I pushed open the tall glass door of my father's gym with ease, wiping my feet before entering as he always told me to, and looking around to face the high beams above me. Ladders upon ladder lead up to my particular room in this place—which was renovated from the tobacco smelling cave that my father once inhabited. It was my own sanctuary up there now.

I approached the first ladder easily, set to climb while wishing I had wings like those of a Staraptor. I had to mentally correct myself as I went. This was no longer my father's gym with my single room in it. No. This was my gym. Every single nook and cranny of it belonged to me now.

And as of tonight I would be its leader.