"Wait, what do you mean Contests are already a thing?"

Brendan and Lisia exchanged look, Brendan folding his arms. Kahn and Tess, the organisers, looked awkward.

"Well," Kahn pulled on a lock of his spiky bleached hair. "Our notes seem to have Kalos and Kanto mixed up. So I guess you're going to be here for publicity and to meet with the stars of the Kanto contests. That's what you were scheduled to do in Kalos."

"Oh," Lisia glanced at Brendan again. "All right, I guess."

"We're sorry!" Tess cried.

"No, no, it's fine!" Brendan held up his hands to chest height. "We're not upset. It's just a surprising change to the plans, right, Lis?"

Lisia shook her head. "Of course there's no problem. We're just a little unprepared, but you know, we can handle it! Coordinators like us have to be prepared for any surprises. Right, Brendan?"

"Right," he grinned, his hands on his hips and tilting his head. "We just have to talk a bit about it, yeah?"

Lisia nodded. "Give Brendan and I, oh, ten minutes?"

"Ten? I was thinking five at most. The show must go on, Lis, and we can't keep the public waiting."

Lisia gave a melodious laugh. "You're right. Five minutes."

"Okay," Kahn said, approaching the door. "You two finish getting ready, then. We'll see you in ten."

He and Tess left, closing the green room door behind them. Brendan sat down to fix the feathers into his hair, picking up a clip to push his hair out of the way.

"So I guess we're doing some kind of... meet and greet?" he asked, frowning at his reflection as he attempted to make a loop with his hair.

"I suppose," Lisia said, setting her mega tiara down on the beauty table beside Brendan's and taking her hair down. "But do you really think people here would be interested in that? I think I'd like to have fun and do a contest with them. Maybe Kanto does their contests differently from Hoenn!"

"Oh, I hadn't thought of that," Brendan said, dropping his bead down his shirt on accident. "I kinda hope they do, it'd be so interesting to see the differences. Maybe they battle."

"I certainly hope not..."

"Ah, I think Ali would be okay, and you can use some of my team. If needed, I can coach you on battling."

Lisia shook her head. "It's not that I'm no good at it because I don't try- I don't like seeing Pokemon get hurt battling."

"Yeah, I don't, either, but..." Brendan gave a small shake of his head. "My team loves to battle, and it's a thrill for them. It's rare I do it."

"If we ever come aross a place who battles to show off Pokemon in a contest like these, we should show off our style," Lisia secured her tiara in her hair. "Contests are a way to show off the beauty and magnificence of Pokemon without hurting other Pokemon."

Brendan shrugged, still fighting with his hair. "If it's their way of doing it, I don't really think we should impose unless there's a reason for it. Lis, a lot of Pokemon just love to battle, even if they get defeated. You should try battling with Ali at least once, and see if he likes it. You can battle me."

Lisia gave a small sigh. "I don't know, Brendan. I just don't really care for battling."

"Have you tried it?"

"... No," she admitted, standing up to help Brendan clip the feathers in.

"Then you can't say you don't like battling. Here," he held up one of his PokeBalls. "You don't have to fight with Ali, you can use one of my team, and we're going to have a battle."

"But-"

"Humour me. I want to have a battle with you."

Lisia gently pushed his hand away. "No, Brendan."

"I insist," he said. "Because what are you going to do if you get in a jam and need help against someone using their Pokemon against you? I want to teach you for your own safety."

"My safety?"

"Yeah. I want to teach you some of the basics of battling. You said you've never battled, meaning that even if you know what the basics roughly are, you've never put what you know into practice."

"W-well, that's true," she said awkwardly, pinching the fusion link closed around his hair and the red feather.

"You should practice it. You don't have to battle competitively, but you are a trainer, Lis, and you should at least be able to hold your own against an experienced fighter, long enough to either scare them off, or be able to escape with your Pokemon without getting trapped or injured or worse."

Lisia sighed. "I know you have a point, Brendan, but I just... I don't like the idea of battle."

"Sometimes it's inevitable. Ali is definitely strong, but if you can't battle, you're going to be in a bit of a pinch. You two trust each other, but can you work in sync when you're in danger? And sometimes you may have to work with a Pokemon you're not familiar with. Remember when our PokeBalls got switched, and I had to use Ali, and you had to use Sunny? And we had to improvise?"

Lisia blushed. She'd been quite thrown to find a Blaziken inside the PokeBall she'd thrown, and had barely scraped third place due to forgetting all of Sun Striker's moves but High Jump Kick for the first two rounds, where Brendan had rather easily gotten over the surprise and worked neatly with Ali to secure first. Lisia didn't really care about coming in third, apart from it showing how she could be just as startled as Sunny had been. She'd recovered, but her errors in the first two rounds had cost her a bit of confidence in her skills, whatever Brendan said.

"Lis, I just want you to be safe," he said, looking up at her. "You don't even have to fight using Ali."

Lisia secured the yellow feather in his hair and sighed again. "Let me think about it, Brendan, okay?"

"Thanks," he said, fluffing his hair back in place. "And please do."

Lisia looked very doubtul.

"So considering the surprise we just had about where we are, I suppose we should call this chapter 'Surprise Twist! Meeting Kanto Contest Coordinators!', what do you think?" Brendan grinned up at her, swiftly changing the subject.

Lisia smiled and laughed, hugging his shoulders and resting her cheek on his head. "That sounds absolutely perfect. Come on, let's go."

Brendan slipped his Keystone out of his Mega Bracelet and into his Mega Cuff. "Ready."

Lisia smoothed him out and gave him a glowing smile, her fingers laced behind her back. "You look magnifique, Brendan."

He grinned, brushing his finger over her cheek to brush off a few locks of hair clinging to her cheek. "You speak Kalosian?"

"Not much," a faint blush stained her cheeks. "It just seemed appropriate."

"Fair enough," he walked out of the room head of her. "Well, let's get going."

Lisia took a moment to follow after him. She let out the breath she hadn't realised she was holding, running her fingers through her fringe. "Oh... no."

It took her a moment to find Brendan, Tess, and Kahn. Kahn and Tess were talking with a quirky-looking woman with long blue hair, and Brendan was sitting off by himself, scrawling or drawing in a notebook and studying the Pokemon the woman had with her. Lisia leant over his shoulder to see what he was doing. He didn't seem to notice, too busy working on a sketch of the Pokemon and labeling the parts in his spare, angular cursive, the second page covered in notes about it.

The sketch was extremely well-done, especially for a quick sketch. Lisia rested her arms around his shoulders, watching him. Brendan, rather used to this sign of affection from her, didn't say anything. Lisia watched him draw with a charcoal pencil, shading in and completing his drawing, labelling it 'Venomoth'.

"That's really good."

"Thanks," he said vaguely. "I've been drawing Pokemon since I can remember, beacause I always wanted to be like my dad."

He looked at her, smiling. "Someday I hope I can see every Pokemon."

"I'm sure you will," Lisia assured him, squeezing his shoulders in a hug before shifting her hands to rest on them. "We are travelling, you know."

She smiled serenely. "Just don't get distracted."

"I won't," he promised, setting a sheet of wax paper between the pages and closing his book. "Look, here they come."

"Brendan, Lisia, this is Ronice. She's the Master of Ceremonies for Kanto, and like Khan and I, she's an organiser, too."

Ronice made a note on her clipboard, then looked up with a smile. "Welcome to Kanto, it's a pleasure to have you here."

"It's a pleasure to be here," Brendan said eagerly.

"Thank you for having us," Lisia added politely.

Ronice beconed them towards her. "Now, this is a Kanto Contest Hall. It shouldn't look much different than yours, does it?"

"No, it doesn't," Lisia looked around. "This is really a beautiful hall."

"Thank you. All of our Halls look very different, though it's to my understanding all Hoenn halls are the same?"

"Yep," said Brendan. "I think it's out of a belief that symmetry is beauty, but our four Halls are totally identical."

"We have four as well," Ronice picked up a pair of switches (buttons? Brendan wasn't sure) hanging down on a large, thick cord. "This is our largest hall for the Master Rank contests. This stage you see here is used for showing off a Pokemon's elegance, grace, and skill."

She pressed the raised switch, and the stage sank into the ground, the floor of a battle arena replacing it. The ceiling opened up onto the clear blue sky above. "This is the second half of the contest, the Battle Stage."

"Battle?"

"Yes," Ronice seemed not to notice the hesitation in Lisia's tone. "Do you not battle in Hoenn?"

"Not in our contests," Brendan explained, glancing at Lisia's expression. She looked like she wanted to say something. "We battle, we have a whole League- my best friend is actually the regional Champion back home- but battles are not part of Contests."

"Can you battle?"

"I can," Brendan answered. "I originally wanted to become the Hoenn Regional Champion, but I realised that wasn't likely to happen. I'm a strong trainer, but I'm not the strngest. So I stopped persuing that goal and instead put a lot more effort into Contests."

"Then you'll enjoy our contests."

"Can battling be optional?" asked Brendan. "I mean, out of curiosity."

"Nobody's ever requested it, but if you didn't want to battle, you would only be able to compete in the first event, so you'd never be able to win."

Ronice pressed the other switch to change the room back to the first set, then indicated they needed to follow her again. Brendan started walking, but quickly became aware that Lisia wasn't following him.

"Lis?"

She didn't answer, frowning at the arena. Brendan didn't think she was that bothered by battling. She'd originally told him she wasn't a very good battler (or something to that effect), but considering she just told him she'd never fought... Brendan wondered if something was genuinely wrong, and made a mental note to ask her later, and Wallace if she refused to tell the truth. He gently attempted to get her attention by resting his hand on her shoulder. Lisia jumped and looked around.

"Oh! Brendan. Sorry, I was lost in my thoughts," she gave him a dazzling smile. "Let's go!"