I Sting (Pokemon Poison Type Specialist)

Nitro silently waited for the Alakazam to finish explaining the rules for the last event of the Speed Pokeathlon, as the Psychic Type spoke on his flying platform up above, Nitro circulated the energy Virah was giving him to his back.

To no one's surprise, flying as fast and as low as he did back in the Pennant Capture had strained his shoulder muscles to the point of aching.

The pain wasn't bad per se, but it could definitely affect his performance in the next event if he let it be.

A soothing feeling soon came upon his back and Nitro, now relieved that he was healing, started doing things beyond worrying about his performance for the next event, his eyes landed on Highlander again.

The Fearow was his only competetion throughout this entire thing and from what he's seen on the Pennant Capture, Nitro felt confident that if the two of them needed to tackle each other later, he would be able to fight back just fine.

After observing his enemies, the Beedrill moved on to tracking the course using his gaze, he went as far as to rely on his ability to see the furthest parts of it.

He memorized the rocks laid on the tracks several times before taking his eyes off of it and refocusing on healing his back.

As his shoulder muscles stopped aching, Nitro thought about his placement on the last event, he had come first, which didn't necessarily mean he had a lead against his fellow competitors.

Highlander especially only had 10 less points than him back then, which means that the two of them are fighting neck to neck to get First Place on the event overall…

Nitro knew that if he wanted to win the Speed Pokeathlon and get the highest possible reward, he needed to get first place on the Relay Run, which means that his run would need to be as effecient as possible and also as fast as possible.

Distance between competitors was also a determining factor on the points he would get in the end, and not to mention, the speed in which he finished the course.

A perfect run without hitting obstacles, a good distance between him and his opponents, and then lastly, a quick finish.

Those three things are what determined his win and as the event came to a start, Nitro prepared himself to complete all three with the best results out of everyone in the arena.

When the Alakazam called the race to start, Nitro immediately kicked off with a burst of speed that made everyone behind him eat his dust, once he felt a rush of energy come down on him, he pushed himself even further.

"And it looks like the Beedrill was holding back all this time folks! Who knew that he was capable of this much speed?! I sure didn't! Do you?"

As the announcers exchanged calls back and forth, Nitro slowed himself down and allowed his back to heal, he would give himself another burst of speed when he crosses a turn or when an opponent gets close to him but for now, he simply settled on going as fast as he could.

Soon, he encountered his very first obstacle, the pile of rocks in front of him looked simple enough to dodge and all he needed to do was move to the side and fly through the open pathway and he passed it.

He knew that nothing would come after this so he picked up speed, he didn't go as fast as he did at the start of the race but he was still quick.

He passed by more piles of rocks, dodged a few boulders, but eventually, he did a turn and it was after this that Nitro knew the obstacles would start to get more complicated.

The first of the obstacles he encountered on the second part of the course was, again, nothing more than a pile of rocks on the ground.

Though instead of having an open pathway to the side like everything before this, the obstacle needed the runner to go through the center- doing so was easy for Nitro and he passed it without trying.

But Nitro knew that this was just a sign of things to come.

The next obstacle he encountered were a series of boulders that forced him to go from left to right in quick succession, he passed these just fine.

"AND HE MADE IT THROUGH! I gotta say-"

The announcer's voice got cut off as Nitro picked up speed once more, there would be plenty of open ground in this particular part of the course so gaining distance now was a good idea.

It didn't take him long to reach another obstacle and like before, it only got more complex.

Nitro flew through the open path at the center of the rocks and once he got out, he was greeted with a small open space, just enough to allow him to swerve left to pass another pile, and then another one followed after that.

Nitro gave himself a bit of a speed boost to reach the right side of the tracks and, to the excited cheers of the crowd, barely made it to the open path.

Nitro got out with time to spare and he immediately proceeded to pick up speed to head straight towards the next obstacle; another pile of rocks he needed to carefully swerve around.

After passing through, he didn't get much of a break as a series of boulders was what greeted him on the other side.

He swiftly went through the obstacle, going from left and then staying that way at the start, then to right before going left once more and then center.

None of the sudden changes in direction caught him off guard, and there wasn't much the boulders could do but tire him out.

If that was the plan, then they succeeded but Nitro thought that with the distance between him and his opponents, his fatigue didn't really matter.

After passing several more obstacles, he finally took the turn towards the last area of the course and as he flew forward to finish the race, Nitro got a boost of energy from Virah.

Briefly, he wondered about how Jet was doing, unlike him, the Zubat was tasked on spying on their enemies, though as he neared another pile of rocks, he realized that he should probably focus on finishing the race rather than his teammate.

...

Jet stopped circling the ugly looking human building and flew downward, he went on to fly across the narrow streets before perching underneath the bent of a street light near the building he was tasked to spy on.

Virah had said that they needed to know more about the gangs around this part of the city and with a his echolocation, Virah thought that Jet was the best candidate for spying.

And Jet thought that she wasn't wrong because right now, he wasn't just able to map out the interior of the building, but also go as far as to "see" the basement that held the human-to-pokemon fighting ring.

He listened in on the conversations too, and he thought that they were rather mundane.

He didn't know when all the "talking about evil plans" thing that Whitney had said will happen but he was on the lookout for them.

Right now though, the gangsters were talking about how much money they were making, which they will use for various things, and Virah had guessed right on a few of them.

Jet turned his attention towards the man who had entered the room that the two guys were counting money in and listened in to what he was about to say-

"So, how much did we make the past week?" That was an easy question and Jet mentally answered out of reflex.

The answer was 130 thousand Pokedollars or so.

"A hundred and thirty thousand boss," said one guy, "we could have gotten more if we rigged more fights to our favor, a lot of people were betting more money now that they started winning though,"

"Boss… are we going to rigging more fights after this?"

"No, not yet, not until Koga's nooks decide to leave," the man they were calling "boss" shook his head and let out a sound that sounded like a growl.

"Are we still preparing for the raid?"

"I don't think it's a good idea, especially since Efrosin is earning more than we are right now, they're probably prepared,"

The boss chuckled, "prepared? For what? The local Rocket Branch hates them, they don't have access to good Pokemon like we do, just keep buying fodder from Rocket and then we'll go and raid them when the time comes,"

Ah, so there it was, the evil planning.

Jet relaxed his tail and fell from the street light, he took off to where Kitten and Galeforce were on the Efrosin territory, he was going to relay information about the lay out of another building as well as what the Guiomar were planning.