I Sting (Pokemon Poison Type Specialist)

Virah woke up with something that felt like serenity at the top of her head.

She wasn't really sure what the light headed feeling was though so just to be sure, she walked over to the water dispenser of her room and gulped down an entire cup of water.

Once the cup got emptied, the relieved pang that followed told her all she needed to know about her light headedness being nothing more than thirst.

'Peace,' Virah thought in mockery as she moved inside the bathroom and checked her face in the mirror, 'yeah right,'

Virah ran a hand through her hair and fixed her bed head before going out.

She silently crossed the empty halls of the breeding center, and after making sure that her Pokemon were still in the nursery, she headed to the cafeteria for breakfast.

Once done, she walked around the center for a bit before watching a few professional matches on her room's tv before finishing her morning with a shower.

She wasn't exactly planning on exercising at the moment, instead, she wanted to focus on training her Pokemon in preparation for her gym battle a week from now.

Virah wasn't exactly confident in her chances of winning against Whitney's dad, after all, just because Virah was friends with his daughter didn't mean that he would go easy on her. If anything, it would be the opposite.

'He'd definitely want to check if the people journeying with Whitney are strong enough to protect her,' Virah thought as she twisted the shower's dial off.

Walking back to her bed, Virah finished drying her hair off before tossing her towel onto the laundry basket.

She sat on her bed and grabbed her notes while her other hand reached for the remote. She turned the TV on again and let the voices of the announcers start calling out the moves being executed on the field.

Various moves and guessed tactics awashed her room and Virah intently listened in on them while reading through her notes.

Virah was confident that both Jet and Nitro's current moveset were more than enough to get her the win but at the same time, she was well aware that there's a reason why Goldenrod Gym is considered to be a newbie killer.

'I don't really have anything to resist Normal Type moves,' Virah chewed on the bud of her pen.

Despite having no Type that resists their attacks, Normal Type moves as a whole had enough power that it didn't matter if whether or not their attacks were super effective because honestly, with how strong the moves themselves were, a hit might as be super effective.

It was why Goldenrod Gym was called the newbie killer of Johto, because not only do Normal Types have little to no weaknesses (they only had one, which is Fighting,) their powerful attacks also didn't need to be super effective to K.O their opponent.

Usually, trainers dealt with this kind of problem by fighting fire with fire.

Which is to say, literally- they usually throw out something like a Fire Type, whom Normal didn't resist but at the same time, the common Fire Type moves also packed enough power that they would be equal, if not better than their opponent's.

'Not to mention, they also had the chance of burning,' Virah wrote down the words "status" on her notes and underlined it.

Poison was a decent status condition, it wasn't as good as Burn or Paralysis but it didn't need to be, as the entire point was so that it would wittle down the enemy bit by bit.

'And in the case of Toxic, force the opponent to risk a switch or faint,' Virah wrote down all the moves she knew immediately inflicted the status condition.

'Poison Gas, Poison Powder…' and that's very much it, there are no other starter moves that inflict poison upon execution and everything else just had the chance to do it.

The problem is, though, most Poison Type moves at her current level are weak, like really weak, which meant she might just have to rely on her Pokemon's secondary typings to boosts the power of their attacks…

'Jet has Wing Attack, but that's not enough,' Virah hummed, 'he's on his way on learning Aerial Ace though but will he do it before the Gym Battle?'

'He would. Definitely.' Virah wrote it down with confidence.

'Now as for Nitro…' Virah mulled over her starter's current moveset, him learning X Scissor had been unfortunately delayed by the fact that they've all gotten sick but she's sure that Nitro would be able to do learn it in just a short amount of time.

'He's already gotten the basics down anyway,' Virah thought with a nod. 'It's settled then, I'll use my Pokemon's secondary typing to match the Gym Pokemon's power,'

Because really, the only way for a trainer to win against the Goldenrod Gym was to either:

A. Resist the attacks,

B. Have super effective moves against it,

Or C. Copy what the Gym Leader does.

And Virah really had no other option than the last one so that is what she is going to prepare.

'Bug Type moves for Nitro, and Flying Type moves for Jet,' she wrote that down and stood up, "right, guess it's settled then,"

She got out of her room to start training with her Pokemon properly and after picking them up from the nursery, she headed for National Park where she quickly got them out of their Pokeballs.

"Alright you two," Virah said to both Poison Types before they even materialized fully, "what we're going to do now is prepare for our Gym Battle so you're going to have to start preparing the moves we'll be mainly using during that time,"

Jet and Nitro nodded in response.

"First off, we'll determine this entire thing with three main criterias; first is the speed in which you'll be able to execute your attacks, we'll work on that the most since, after all, most battles are determined by how fast a Pokemon can use their moves,"

"Zubat!"

"Beedrill!"

"Good!" Virah smiled and nodded, "next is that we'll work on the strength of the moves themselves, which, I'm sure you both know will help out in actually taking out your opponent,"

The two Pokemon nodded again and Virah clapped, "so with that being said, how about you both start your training by sparring with each other?"

Virah lead her team to an open field and waited for the two of them to stand on either side of the square-shaped ring, when they got there, she explained the basic rules of the spar.

"First, I want you both to just do enough to hurt yourselves but not so much that you won't be able to train afterwards," after all, when it comes to training, it's better if the fighters actually treat it as an actual fight, since that'll prepare them for the real thing.

Her Pokemon nodded, "after that… I know this'll sound unfair on Nitro's side but I want the two of you to only use Bug and Flying Type moves respectively,"

Virah eyed her starter and… noted that Nitro didn't seem to care about the rather disadvantageous rules of the spar.

"Well, since you're both okay with it, how about you start fighting now?" Virah then pointed towards a bench to her right, "meanwhile I'll go and see if I can prepare a meal plan for both of you, yeah?"

Virah walked away as the sounds of heavy battle erupted behind her, she wasn't sure if Nitro would be able to withstand Jet's constant barrage of Wing Attack's but she's confident that her Pokemon would know what to do.

'I really need to start gathering more bets,' Virah thought as she dusted the bench, she took a seat and hummed, 'after all, it's not like Nitro and Jet will lose any low level fight right now…'

Virah observed the aforementioned Pokemon duel it out and what she saw in the scant few seconds where she kept her eyes on them only reaffirmed her beliefs on the matter.

So her Pokemon were strong enough that they'd be able to win against most of the people lingering around battle plazas across the city, that meant that she'd be able to earn a lot of Pokedollars just from battling alone.

'I also definitely need to give Jet a Black Sludge, that'll help a ton this following week,'

It wasn't the damage boosting item like she'd hope for but a Black Sludge would help her Zubat last a whole long longer during fights, and honestly that's kind of a big deal when it comes to Gym Battles.

'Hm… should I help Jet with learning Roost too?' that was a possible option, but one that she should consider after he learns Aerial Ace in the following week.