"Yes, actually," Margaret said, digging into her bag for her TM case. When she found it, she started to sift through it. "Aha!" She grinned and pulled out a couple of TMs. "Zap Cannon and Grass Knot. I'll have to see if I have Signal Beam later on, but these will do." She grinned.

Aleron snorted and shook her head. "Alright, have fun." She was keeping track of Gyarados still. He seemed calmer now.

Going over to her Starmie, Margaret had an actual conversation with it and manage to convince it that learning Grass Knot and Zap Cannon were a good idea. In the process, she learned that Starmie had acquired Psybeam during its evolution, which rounded out its moveset nicely. Once she was done teaching it the TMs, she recalled her pokemon.

"So, are you ready to head into town again?" Aleron asked, looking over at Margaret. Gyarados had even wandered back over towards them, taking his time lounging in the water.

Margaret nodded.

"I want to go take on the gym and see how bad it is," she said. In her experience, there were three kinds of gyms; gyms where she did really, really well (such as Fuchsia and Ecruteak), gyms where she did really badly the first time or two (such as Saffron), and gyms where it could go either way. She wasn't sure where this gym ranked, but she was going to find out.

Aleron snickered but nodded, recalling Gyarados and heading for town again. She was curious to see how this would go.

It didn't take Margaret long to find the Gym; it was the biggest building in town. Testing the doorknob, she grinned when it turned easily. That was a good sign, it meant the gym was open and she could challenge it now. She went through the door, and promptly slipped and fell on a sheet of black ice. Well... that wasn't the best way to start a gym challenge.

Aleron hung back, since she wasn't challenging. She'd done this one already. "Oops. I forgot about that. Sorry." She couldn't help but grin.

Margaret rolled her eyes, but grinned and got back up. Once she got her footing, she went further into the Gym. She was kind of surprised to see that the Gym leader was just this mean old man, but after a second of thought, it made more sense. He would know a lot about battling, having so much experience, so it made sense that he would be the Gym leader. It didn't take long for Margaret to make her challenge. After essentially being called a young upstart by Pryce, the battle started.

Never was Margaret so glad to have taught Starmie Zap Cannon and Metagross Thunderpunch. Pryce led off with a Seel and a Dewgong, both of which were part-water. They went down quickly to the Electric-type attacks. The Piloswine that he brought out was a bit harder. After a moment of frantic thought, Margaret left Metagross out on the field. He didn't know any fire-type or water-type moves, so she had him use Iron Claw instead. Pilowswine went down, and she blinked. She hadn't realized that a steel-type move would be so effective. It felt almost like dumb luck.

Aleron snickered as she watched them. She remembered this battle. Vulpix and Jolteon had had a very easy time of it. She shook her head, remembering that he liked to grumble, but she didn't say anything.

Margaret waited while Pryce grumbled about having to surrender a badge. It was no worse than having to wait for Whitney to stop crying. Once he finally handed it over, she thanked him and put it into her badge case.

"That... wasn't too hard," she said to Aleron when she got back to her friend. "I thought it would be more of a fight."

"Hey, it depends on your pokemon. My battle was even shorter than yours, with only Vulpix and Jolteon." Aleron grinned.

"Those two are also perfectly suited to taking on an Ice gym," Margaret pointed out. "My best player was Metagross." She grinned. "Still, I got the badge."

"Yup. That's all that matters." Aleron grinned. "Hey, now we've got the rest of the day to ourselves, and then spend the night at the pokemon center."

"What do you want to do, then?" Margaret asked. "Hang around town, or go out and see if we can't trip over more legendaries?"

"Hmm. Well, it wouldn't hurt to take a look around," Aleron said with a shrug. "I doubt we'll be able to make it to Blackthorn by sundown, so we can just start heading in that direction, if you want. See how far we get."

"Sounds alright to me," Margaret replied. "I wouldn't mind heading out... I kine traveling more than staying in one town for very long." And for all she knew, they would bump into more legendaries on the way out. That's how it had been happening so far, anyways.

Aleron nodded her agreement and made sure she had everything before she started walking. "Alright. Well, let's get going. Unless you wanted to stop at the pokemon center again?"

"Stopping there on the way out wouldn't be a bad idea," Margaret said. "Get everyone checked over after that battle. After that, I'm all for heading out towards Blackthorn."

Aleron nodded and led the way back to the pokemon center, letting Margaret handle that. She waited outside, letting out Vulpix so those two could relax for a little while. At least until Margaret was back.

Margaret went inside and gave her pokemon to Nurse Joy. The only one she kept with her was Natu, since the little bird didn't participate in the battle. She would work on training Natu outside of battle until she felt confident that the psychic-type could handle herself.

Once she got her pokemon back, she went back out to Aleron.

"Ready when you are," she said.

"Awesome." Aleron got up again and started walking, Vulpix trotting next to her.

"So. Towards Blackthorn?"

"Towards Blackthorn," Margaret agreed, letting Espeon out so the pokemon could walk around.

Aleron nodded and started walking, taking her time heading there. She knew it would take more than what time they had, so she was content to just kinda meander.

And maybe run into another legendary.

Margaret had no objections to just meandering. The landscape around Mahogany was beautiful, so close to the mountains, and she was content to enjoy it for a while. She also wanted to see how common Jynx were in the Ice Cave she heard was around, but she didn't necessarily WANT a Jynx. She heard they were more trouble to take care of than they were really worth, and besides... they were kind of creepy.