A number of scientists were standing in front of a crystal containment cylinder filled with a strange liquid. Within it was a boy, about six years old, with jet-black hair and green robes.

"Sir, the subject is developing quite well. His spiritual powers much higher than that of Arceus."

"Good. Soon we will have the supreme power over the universe at our disposal." The lead scientist mused. "Then we can dispose of the one in the next tube…" He murmured, glancing at the boy's brother in the next cylinder, who had been created at the same time as the first but hadn't received the same genetic coding. The first one had aged much more quickly in the tube, so they were positive that the other would prove unnecessary.

"Sir! We have a problem!" a scientist at a monitor called.

"What is it?"

"SB1's consciousness has gone into hyperdrive! He's awake!

"What? It's too early!" shouted another scientist."

"Don't worry. As long as he contains the obedience coding we should be alright."

The boy's eyes suddenly flared open. They were a piercing emerald, with unusual golden specks. Fascinated, the lead scientist leaned closer.

Apparently, it was the wrong thing to do. The boy recoiled, then held up his hands to the cylinder.

"Sir, we have bad news." The scientist at the monitor said.

"What is it this time?"

"We double-checked SB1's genetic coding, and the obedience codes are totally not included."

"WHAT??!!"

"Yes sir. This one's a wild card. He could break loose any minute if he wanted to."

As they spoke, the boy narrowed his eyes, and the crystal began cracking. A moment later it splintered into a thousand shards that exploded away, ruining equipment and creating chaos.

"Contain him!" shouted a man. A man held up his hand and let loose a volley of fireballs. The boy dodged, then smashed the cylinder that contained his brother wide open and pulled the other boy out, then proceeded to flee, rapidly shimmering out of view and quickly reappearing a ways off.

"Contain them if possible! Kill them if not!" roared the lead scientist, pulling toward him a large tidal wave.

The boy held up his hand and froze the tidal wave in its tracks. Then he turned and let loose a deadly volley of lightning bolts…


"Ae-rín!"

"Coming mom!"

Winona, gym leader of Fortree, sighed as a spunky six year old girl bounced down the stairwell.

Now, I don't know what you think when I say bounced. Whatever it is, it doesn't have enough energy. Picture a little girl in gray-blue clothes with long lavender hair. Now picture her bouncing ten feet into the air while traveling down the stairs, and tripping on a little Swablu to land with an almighty crash at the bottom of the stairwell.

"Aerín! Are you okay?" Winona called. Mother's instinct. Even when you know your child will be alright, you still rush over just in case.

"Just fine!" the little girl replied cheerfully.

"Don't scare me like that!" scolded Winona. "You know that it's not safe to bounce like an oversized Buneary down the stairs!"

"But mom, it's fun!"

Winona sighed with exasperation as her daughter giggled and skipped off to breakfast. Even though she looked like a younger clone of her mother, you could barely tell that Aerín and Winona were related. While Winona was serious most of the time, Aerín was like her opposite number, always cheerful, delightfully mischievous, and full of energy.

"She must get it from him I suppose," muttered Winona. She looked at a photo that hung on the wall.

In the picture was a set of surprised faces. One was her own, from about six years ago. Another one was that of her husband, Wallace, the League Champion of Hoenn. The final two were the faces of Salon Maiden Anabel of Verdanturf Town and Ash Ketchum of Pallet Town.

Standing in the background, looking like the smuggest teenager in the world, was a nineteen year old boy with jet-black hair. His eyes were a brilliant shade of emerald. If you inspected it closely, there were some golden specks in his eyes that were radiating a warm glow that was comforting in a time that put people down in the dumps.

Winona sighed and touched the picture. Will you ever fade…Aeron? She wondered. The scar that his apparent death had left on the four was still there. Only they had known who the boy really was.

Her train of thought was interrupted as Aerín called out. "Mom, Ash and Aunt Anabel are at the door!"

"Wallace, what're you doing up there?!" Winona shouted. "Do you honestly have to take this long to do your hair?!"

"Winona, I woke up this morning with my hair in a complete mess, and dyed completely white! Somebody bleached it during the night!" Winona groaned as Aerín giggled.

"Honestly, Aerín. I don't know how you get away with all this." Winona sighed.

"I don't know. Daddy just never noticed." Aerín said, still giggling.

"Hey, Winona, you in there?" They heard a male voice call, accompanied by knocking.

Winona walked over to the door and opened it to reveal two teenagers. One had short purple hair and identical colored eyes. The other had jet black hair and dark eyes. Both wore smiles on their faces.

"Sorry to keep you lovebirds waiting." Winona said, with a slight smirk as she said lovebirds.

"Winona!" The two groaned, simultaneously. Totally unrehearsed.

Winona laughed and invited them into the house. "Wallace is going to be down here in a few minutes. Somebody…" she glared at Aerín, "bleached his hair and messed it up last night." Aerín giggled mischievously.

"She did it, huh?" Ash asked, throwing a grin in Aerín's direction.

"Quite right." Winona sighed. "Honestly. If I didn't know better, I'd say the father was Aeron!"

Aerín's ears picked up on the name Aeron. "Who's Aeron?"

Winona froze, having unintentionally revealed some "classified" information. She looked in Ash and Anabel's direction.

"She should know the truth." Anabel said quietly. Her face had fallen into sadness as soon as she had said Aeron's name.

Aerín looked at all the sullen faces. "Well, mom? Who is this Aeron?"

Winona looked at her. "You are not a normal child Aerín. You were not born the normal way. You were born from the life energy of a friend, as he lay dying. You are his last gift to us."

Aerín was stunned. "I'm…special?"

Winona nodded. Wallace came down as they had discussed this, and saw their faces. "She knows?" he asked. Winona nodded.

Wallace sighed and sat down. "Sit, Aerín. We have a long tale to tell you."

For the first time ever, Aerín was completely silent.

"Aeron Solo was our friend that we met prior to a new crisis in Hoenn."

"The war against Cipher?" Aerín broke in.

"That's right. Actually, Anabel and Pikachu-" she nodded at the electric mouse Pokémon sitting on Ash's shoulder, "met him long before that."

"Really? Aunt Anabel, you know that guy?"

Anabel nodded, still not used to being called Aunt when she was only nineteen. "Aeron was my mentor during the years that I lived in Verdanturf. He was the only one that I could truly call friend without any doubts. He taught me how to use my empathic abilities."

"Wow..." Aerín breathed. "Imagine that, someone who can teach you to use a special power.

"Aeron was special to me. He was almost like my brother." Anabel's eyes had a faraway look to them, as if she was in another world entirely. "Then one day I learned that he wasn't human. Well, not entirely."

"Not human? How?"

"I'll answer that later." Anabel shifted in her seat. "If I may, I'd like to start."

"Go right ahead, Anabel." Ash said. He grasped her hand and gently squeezed it. She smiled at him gratefully.

"It began six years ago, when I had all but forgotten him…"


Anabel! Wake up!

"Mmm…" a girl with lilac hair murmured, trying to stay asleep.

A cat-like Pokémon with pink fur and a gem on her forehead sighed. She's never been much for mornings, the Espeon muttered telepathically. And she forgot to set up her alarm clock last night.

Espeon climbed up to the top of a bookshelf that was close to Anabel's bed. Oh well. I guess it can't be helped.

Banzai! She shouted (with her mind, obviously) and jumped off, landing on Anabel's torso.

"OW!!!" Anabel shouted, bolting awake. She saw Espeon sitting innocently on her chest and groaned. "Espeon!"

What? Espeon asked. You forgot to set up your alarm clock and that was the fastest way to wake you up. Besides, you have to go to the Battle Tower today, don't you?

Anabel groaned. She had completely forgotten about that.

Thought so. Aeron would've been ticked off if you had done that back in those days, Espeon commented, reminding Anabel of her childhood.

Anabel got up and changed. She then called Espeon back to her Poké ball and left to go to the Battle Tower, where, as the Frontier Brain, she was in charge of.

As she walked her thoughts trailed once more to her distant past, where a young man had taught her how to use her empathic abilities...


"Ahhh!!"

A young Anabel ran from a bunch of large, older children. All male as it happens.

"C'mon, little girl, give it up!" laughed one.

"Never!" Anabel shouted, still running. She was holding a shopping bag with their food for the week, and Pokéballs, Potions, and Berries. All stuff that the boys wanted.

"If you're not gonna give it up, I'm gonna-OOF!!!" shouted a boy, stopped in the middle of his sentence by a rather powerful blow to his behind, causing him to stumble and trip his companions.

"All right, who did that?" asked the leader, a teenager with red hair and icy blue eyes.

"Leave, you. I despise boys who attack little girls just because they have something you want." A boy in his late teens with black hair and green eyes shot through with golden specks stood tall over the boys, his eyes flickering with anger.

"Uhh... let's leave." The leader said nervously, obviously disconcerted by the stranger. They made a run for it, not looking back. It was just as well, because if looks could kill they would've died horribly.

"Now who might you be?" The stranger asked, turning to Anabel, his eyes losing his anger. They actually seemed very friendly now.

"Err..." Anabel said, not sure how to respond. Parents always tell their kids not to talk to strangers, and Anabel's mother was no exception.

"You've been told by your mother that you shouldn't talk to strangers, right?" the boy asked, before Anabel had any chance to respond.

"How did you...?"

"Do that?" he broke in, once again seemingly able to finish Anabel's thought before she could get it out. "Sorry. I always creep people out when I do that. I'm... special." he said, a flicker of emotion flaring through his eyes as he said the word 'special', almost as if he'd rather not be it. "And you're special too, I might add."

"What do you mean?" Anabel asked. She had never known about any special powers inside her.

"You've got something deep down. Let's see..." he tapped his fingers to her forehead and closed his eyes. The fingers began glowing green, and then stopped just as quickly as he opened his eyes and took his fingers off her forehead. "Yes, very special indeed. You're an empathic."

"A what?"

"An empathic. A person who can convey his or her thoughts and feelings to someone else by linking with that person or Pokémon's mind. It's a rare type of power that only crops up once in several generations. A person wielding this power can command his or her Pokémon with the mind rather than the word, which is much more efficient, as you can allow your Pokémon to use unorthodox tactics in battle just by picturing how you want it done. Very effective."

"Oh..." Anabel said, her tone hiding her excited mind.

"Don't try to hide your emotions from me. I'm an empathic too, and empathic people can sense the emotions of others."

"Could you teach me how to use my powers?" Anabel asked, wondering what her mother would say if she knew that she had been talking this much with a stranger.

"Sure. By the way, I'm gonna make sure you get back to your house without any more ambushes. You can't be too careful with kids like those."

As soon as he had said this, Anabel caught sight of a flash of silver; a knife aimed directly at her mysterious companion. "Look out!" she screamed.

The knife glanced off of his neck in a shower of sparks, the screech of metal against metal distinctive. Anabel gazed, dumbfounded as the stranger calmly plucked the knife out of thin air, tossed it to the side so as not to hit Anabel, and then fired a lightning bolt straight at the place from where it was thrown from. Instantly there was a surprised yelp of pain, and then silence.

"Did you...?"Anabel asked, afraid to say the last two words.

"Give him eternal sleep? No. He's just out cold. My name's Aeron by the way."

"I'm Anabel."

"Anabel... that's a nice name."

"Thanks."

The two walked into the distance, talking as the sun went down...


It had been a while since Anabel had last thought about Aeron. The Salon Maiden hadn't needed to give a thought for her mentor in a while. Yet even so, her thoughts were straying to him a lot. She wondered what he would say about her being in love with Ash Ketchum.

Are you kidding? Of all things you could ask, you had to pick one that should be addressed by a female, she heard, as if he was nearby, transmitting thoughts through empathy.

She sighed. I must be going crazy, she thought to herself as she stepped into the Battle Tower.


A yellow mouse Pokémon woke up on a bedside. "Pi?" He looked at the clock, showing that it was a bit late in the morning, then looked at the bed and saw his trainer, Ash Ketchum, still sleeping.

"Pika..." Pikachu sighed. Ash had never been much of a morning person, and as usual, he was waking up late. There was usually no way to wake him up. That is, unless you were Pikachu.

"Pi-ka...CHU!!!" Pikachu shouted, letting off a powerful Thundershock attack that zapped Ash with its power.

"WAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!" Ash yelled, feeling Pikachu's electricity course painfully through his body.

"Pika-Pika!" Pikachu said cheerfully, jumping and landing on Ash's shoulder.

"Pikachu, what was that for?"

"You're a bit late in waking. Your mom and Mr. Mime are usually finished eating breakfast about now." Pikachu commented. (Obviously, words in italics are translations.)

"Ah, man! Is it really that late?" Ash asked, checking the clock. "Oh no!" He vaulted out of bed, hurrying to get changed.

He did so, then quickly ran down the stairs. "Please tell me breakfast isn't over yet," he muttered, racing to the dining room.

Delia Ketchum looked up as Ash raced in. "Slow down, Ash. Breakfast won't run from you."

Ash did slow down, seeing that breakfast was still on the table. He sat down and gathered himself some, then began to eat. Moments later, Pikachu came to join them.

Pikachu watched as Ash wolfed down his breakfast. I must make a note to thank him if I ever see him again, Pikachu thought, his thoughts drifting to the time before he had been given to Ash...


"Hey! Professor Oak!"

Professor Oak saw a young man with black hair and green eyes (predictably, with gold specks) running up. "Hello Aeron. What can I help you with?"

"Can you give this Pokémon to the last person who comes to claim a Pokémon?" Aeron asked, handing Professor Oak a Pokéball with a lightning bolt on it.

"How can I be sure he or she is the last?" Professor Oak asked.

"Give all the others out first." Aeron answered. "Be careful. This little guy's a bit of a wild card."

"Really?" Professor Oak released the Pokémon from the Pokéball.

The white light coalesced in the form of a yellow mouse eith red cheeks and a lightning bolt shaped tail. "Pikachu!" the Pikachu said.

"Why hello there little AHHHHH!!!!" Professor Oak made the mistake of touching Pikachu.

"By the way, it's not a good idea to touch him without rubber gloves on." Aeron said, grinning.

"Ha, ha. Very funny." Professor Oak said, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

"This little guy's a special one. His electrical power is unusually powerful for a Pikachu. You could power a house with this little guy," Aeron commented, scratching Pikachu gently behind the ears. Pikachu relaxed as he did this, seeming to enjoy the scratching.

"Well, why a Pikachu?" Oak asked, wondering why Aeron had come to him with a Pikachu. Pikachu wasn't a starter Pokémon.

"Because this Pikachu will do great by the side of that one." Aeron answered. "I can see them together, accomplishing incredible feats, succeeding against all odds. They will go against everything that comes there way together, and they will always pull through."

"All right." Oak said. "Come back, Pikachu."

Pikachu, however refused to go back into the Pokéball.

"By the way, he hates being confined in a Pokéball." Aeron added, holding out his hand. Oak noted that it seemed like he was asking him for the Pokéball, so he handed it to Aeron.

Aeron scratched Pikachu behind the ears again. "Hey, Pikachu, I know you hate being in a Pokéball, but can you endure just for a while? It'll only be for a day or two. Besides, when you come out again you'll never have to go back in."

"Pika… (All right…)" sighed Pikachu, allowing himself to be called back to the Pokéball.

"Thanks." Aeron said, handing the ball to Prof. Oak. "Now, take care of him, okay? I've grown to like him in the time that I've had him."

"I will." Oak promised. "Now, I'm heading back to my lab to get all the Pokémon ready."

"Good. That means Pikachu won't have long to wait." Aeron said. He then bid the Professor farewell and then left.

Oak looked at the Pokéball in his hands. "Special indeed…" he muttered.


Pikachu finished breakfast and then bounded after Ash. Ash was heading out to
Tohjo Falls to meet up with his girlfriend, Salon Maiden Anabel of the Battle Tower, and Pikachu was eager to meet her Espeon again.

It's gonna be a good day. Pikachu thought.


"Alright Altaria. That's a wrap."

Winona called back the humming Pokémon, having beaten her opponent in battle. Lately, things had been going in her favor. She hadn't lost a battle in over a month.

I wonder how Wallace is doing at Evergrande City? She wondered, thinking about her husband.

A few months ago, she and Wallace had married in the aftermath of the titanic battle between Kyogre and Groudon. She and Wallace had rediscovered their love for each other, resulting in, well, you can figure it out. Since then Wallace had come back to Fortree for every evening to stay with his wife. It wasn't a perfect system, but hey. Life isn't always perfect.

Currently, she had won a rather intense battle against her opponent, a trainer that used rock-type Pokémon in battle. Despite the type disadvantages, she had taken him out with moderate effort.

"Alright, who's next?" she called.

"May I challenge you?" she heard. She turned to see a boy in his late teens, with midnight blue hair and blue eyes. He wore blue garments that were laced through with white trimming.

"What's your name?" she asked.

"Axel Nightblazer. I'm honored to be able to battle you." Axel said.

"Aren't you good at flattery?" Winona asked with a grin. "Alright. You know what to do." She gestured at the opposite platform.

"Got it." Axel jumped right onto it and they went up.

After the referee had stopped saying all that junk, Winona selected a Pokéball. "Altaria, come on out!"

"Aeireon, let's do this!" Axel called.

Aeireon? Never heard of that Pokémon before. Winona mused, watching as a gray-blue cat-like Pokémon came out of its Pokéball. Looks rather like an Espeon.

It did look quite a bit like an Espeon, except that the fur on the back of its legs streaked back to give them a feathery appearance. Also, the fur on its tail was much bushier, also looking rather feathery. The gem on its forehead was blue, and it gleamed with a strange light. It seemed to stand on thin air.

"Where'd you get that?" Winona asked, interested. "I've never seen anyone use that before."

"Let's just say I found it on accident." Axel said. "Why don't we go higher?"

Winona wasted no time in raising the platform. Likewise, Axel did the same.

"Aeireon, let's go!" Use Sky attack! Axel called, the first phrase with his mouth, the second with his mind.

Aeireon trilled, letting off a harsh light.

"Altaria, use Dragonbreath!" Winona called.

Altaria blew a stream of green gas at Aeireon, thick with the power to paralyze.

Aeireon, use Aerial ace while you charge and combine the power of Sky Attack with it! Axel ordered.

Aeireon vanished from view and then reappeared directly behind Altaria, still glowing. Aeireon promptly smashed into Altaria with all the force she had to offer.

Altaria cried out as the attack connected, as the speed boost combined with the tremendous force of Sky Attack was devastating. It sent the humming Pokémon careening out of the sky.

"Aeireon, catch Altaria before she hits the ground!" Axel called.

Aeireon bounded through the air to catch Altaria in midair, then slowly lowered her to the ground. Altaria had fainted.

"Altaria is unable to battle! Aeireon wins!" the referee shouted.

Winona was stunned. With a single attack, Altaria had gone down. True, Altaria had been drained from the last battle, but no typical trainer should've been able to overcome Altaria that easily. This guy was not to be toyed with.

"Swellow, let's fly!" Winona shouted, sending out her only Shiny Pokémon.

"Swellow!" cried the bird Pokémon, flaring open his wings.

"Swellow, huh? Aeireon, return!" Axel called. Aeireon returned to her Pokéball as a stream of red energy. "Glaceon, you willing?" Aeron asked. A Glaceon that had been perched on his shoulder all this time rubbed against his neck affectionately. "Okay, okay, I get it. Go on out." Glaceon trilled briefly before jumping out to open air.

And promptly stopped in midair, as if she had landed on an invisible platform.

Hm. That's interesting. Winona thought. "Swellow, use Aerial Ace!"

Swellow vanished from view with a flourish of high speed. Axel closed his eyes, frowning.

Glaceon! Behind you! Blizzard! Axel thought.

Glaceon turned around and blasted the space behind her with a storm of ice particles. Moments later, Swellow screeched as he was nailed in the middle of his attack.

This may take a while. Winona thought grimly.