In which Lily uncovers the possible truth behind Officer Jenny and Nurse Joy, questions Pikachu's sexuality, and almost blows her own cover several times in one day.


Determined to become a pokémon master, Ash continues on his quest. Gaining skill and knowledge and catching new pokémon along the way. His fierce pokémon battle with gym leader Brock earned Ash a boulder badge and a brand-new friend. Brock, hoping to be a pokémon breeder, decided to join Ash and Misty on their journey. But with his rival, Gary, way ahead of him, Ash Ketchem is still playing catch up.

Lily and Lenin, determined to get home to England or else become Pokémon masters themselves, continue on their parallel quest to Ash's. Lenin has been dealt some serious moral blows as he tries to come to grips with the new world he's found himself in while Lily finds, for the first time, a reasonable goal in life. Together, both have excelled as trainers thus far in their own unique ways, earning their first gym badges from Brock for themselves. However, with the mysterious events on Mt. Moon, where Lily briefly gained the opportunity to evolve then declined it. Lily picked up a new pokémon and friend, Clefairy, as well as a new ominous note to their quest and Lily's own state of being.

We can only wonder what lies ahead of them.


"Ah, it's a great day to just enjoy the sunshine!" Ash declared as he stretched his arms with a grin on his face, apparently forgetting a about his desperate sprint ahead only the day before, Lily, however, was not nearly as fortunate.

After a good sprint Lenin, Brock, Misty, and Pikachu had all caught up with Lily's newest friend and zealot Clefairy in tow. As a result, as the edged closer and closer to Cerulean City, Lily found herself dragging her feet, walking slightly ahead of Misty (who was also oddly dragging her feet) and dutifully ignoring Clefairy staring up at her with hopeful blue eyes while still carrying a chunk of moonstone in her tiny claws.

"And while you're enjoying the sunshine," Brock calmly noted calmly, as if he too was discussing the weather, "Gary's catching more pokémon."

Ash nearly fell over, as Brock continued, "But I guess a pokémon trainer can catch pokémon and enjoy the sun."

Lily, needless to say, was not enjoying the sunshine.

"Clefairy?" Clefairy asked to which Lily did not even look down but instead said the standard answer that she had been giving for the past twenty-four hours.

"No."

"Clefairy?" a more drawn out, dejected, yet somehow adorable sound.

"Not going to happen," Lily emphasized while Wizard Lenin walking beside her simply sighed, as he had been sighing the whole morning as he witnessed Lily and Clefairy's song and dance.

"Lily, can you not argue with… Whatever the hell this thing is?" Wizard Lenin asked, head stuck in the trainer's manual again as he idly flipped through pages, "It's getting rather tiresome."

"You try being almost turned into the divine leader of their cult!" Lily hissed without any sympathy whatsoever, which of course, Wizard Lenin only responded to with pale raised eyebrows and no sympathy whatsoever.

"Lily, I already have my own cult, as you so often remind me," Wizard Lenin said, apparently fed up enough to call the Death Eaters by what they really were, "I don't have to imagine anything."

Then, staring at Clefairy he summoned the stone out of her hands only to store it in his backpack, "There, problem solved."

"Clefairy!" Clefairy cried in dismay, stubby pink arms reaching out for the cruel and indifferent Wizard Lenin while Lily herself felt torn between feeling bad and feeling somewhat relieved. Because honestly, she didn't put it past Clefairy to try and use it on Lily while she was sleeping.

Before Lily could get too relieved though Pikachu, walking beside her, turned around with a questioning glance, "Pika?"

"Hey, wait a minute!" Misty called, running up towards them, Pikachu letting out a delighted, "Cha!" at the sight of her.

Pikachu, for whatever reason, had a rather large soft spot for Misty that Lily wasn't quite parsing. Except being the apple of Clefairy's eye meant that Lily wasn't entirely sure the adoration of yet another pokémon was something she wanted or needed.

"Where do you think you're going?" Misty asked Ash, the de facto leader of their group for whatever reason, in dismay.

Ash, oblivious as always, said, "Oh, I know where we're going. We're going to Cerulean City."

This, apparently, was the last thing Misty wanted to hear, "Cerulean City, what are you going there for?!"

"It was the next city on the map," Wizard Lenin dully stated, not so much mad about the destination as he was about the fact that they were forced to follow this metaphorical yellow brick road to the Indigo League, "And since there appears to be only one conveniently unpaved road in Kanto I didn't think we had a choice."

Ash sniffed in offense at Wizard Lenin's lackluster attitude, "Well, I don't know what that jerk Lenin is doing, but I'm going for more badges!"

Misty hesitated for a moment, which was rather odd for her because aside from being an unusual paragon of logic, she also tended to be rather headstrong and outspoken. Misty had made no pretense of her feelings in one way or another since she'd joined the group.

"Uh, Ash, you don't want pokémon from there, trust me," Misty hedged vaguely, her turquoise eyes rather distant and her face pale, making Lily wonder if there wasn't something truly wrong with Cerulean City.

Ash, of course, was clueless as always, "Why not?"

"Because they're all…" Misty trailed off, suddenly losing steam even as she leaned in closer towards Ash.

"All what?"

"All…" her eyes flicked towards Lily then Clefairy in desperation, "All scary alien pokémon who want to kidnap you to space like Seymore the Scientist!"

"Clefairy!" Clefairy cried out, no doubt speaking against this constant slander against her alien race who may or may not be hell bent on enslaving humanity and turning Lily into a… something.

For a moment they all stared at Misty, perfectly serious about the dangers ahead, and then Ash laughed, "Oh man, that's hilarious Misty."

And just like that they were walking again, with a now alarmed Lily standing behind as she realized that of all the people on the journey thus far, Misty had been by far the most rational and thus was the most likely source for dire warnings about alien cultists, "Wait a minute, I don't think I can handle anymore close encounters this week! Seriously, Ash!"

"There's only one road in Kanto," Wizard Lenin muttered under his breath as he too started walking, like a man sentenced to death.

"Come on, let's go everyone," Ash said, bound and determined to move ahead, with or without Misty or Lily's consent.

"Hey, hey, wait a second!" Misty darted in front of the moving group with record speed, blocking their path forward, "What about Vermillion City? It's right on the water, and there are lots of neat pokémon, and you can watch all the giant yachts pulling into the harbor, and there's a little park way up on a hill where you can sit and watch the sunset that's so romantic!"

"One road in Kanto," Wizard Lenin repeated, eyes burning, "Believe me, I have studied the map."

"Yes… but if there are alien cultists then I'm siding with Misty," Lily pointed out, "Seriously, does no one else see how round two of that might be a bad idea?"

"Clefairy!"

"Except you Clefariy," Lily corrected without even looking at the giant pink blob, "Your opinion doesn't count."

"We'd just have to go around Cerulean City! It's not like we have to pass through it!" Misty insisted only for Wizard Lenin to whip out the map.

"Look at this, do you see this map?" Wizard Lenin asked, apparently having reached his limit and allowing some of his rage to shine through so that even as a twelve-year-old he was terrifying, "Tell me, Misty, exactly how many roads exist in this godforsaken country? That's right, one, one road exists, and that road takes us from Mount Moon to Cerulean City. And only by passing through Cerulean City can we even think of heading South towards Saffron City and finally your promised land of Vermillion City. Which means, that goddammit, whether you like it, or Lily likes it, or I like it, we're going through Cerulean City!"

"Right," Ash said after a too long pause, "What he said."

"Oh, you men are so pig-headed and stubborn!" Misty cried out in rage and despair, even as Wizard Lenin, then Ash, Brock, and even Pikachu followed.

Clefairy stared longingly after Wizard Lenin's backpack, the moonstone inside, and then down at her empty claws as if just waiting for the moonstone to reappear inside of it.

Lily, meanwhile, put a consoling hand on Misty's shoulder, more than feeling her pain as she prepared herself for the trial ahead, "When they're sacrificed to the alien gods of war and death, or kidnapped for the human zoo on Traflamador, we'll make sure to say, 'I told you so."


"So, this is Cerulean City?" Ash said as they made their way through what looked like any urban neighborhood.

"Pretty nice place, isn't it?" Brock asked.

"I don't know, it looks alarmingly like every other town I've seen so far," Lily noted, well not Pallet Town as that had clearly been the sticks, but Viridian City and parts of Pewter City had both looked like this street at least.

In fact, that very alarming similarity was putting Lily sort of on edge because at least Viridian City had been bigger, Pewter City had been… rock themed, but thus far this looked normal. The kind of normal Lily would expect an infiltrating alien race to take on to lure them into its trap. Where it was so close to what you would expect that it became something entirely unexpected.

"You're overthinking this," Wizard Lenin said in the voice that said he was entirely done with Lily's shenanigans, "Besides, I thought you wanted cheeseburgers."

"Not from here," Lily responded, but Wizard Lenin didn't seem to care, instead he was looking about in interest, probably thinking on whether they had a library or not. They hadn't had too much of a chance to do research in either Viridian or Pewter City and that was sure to make Wizard Lenin antsier than usual.

"Hey, that's weird," Ash noted as he looked over his shoulder back towards the road behind them, "Misty's not following us anymore."

He was right, of course, Misty had gotten out of dodge ages ago leaving Lily to mildly panic as she wondered if she really was walking to her doom for the second time in the course of a week. Of course, she couldn't let Wizard Lenin and Pikachu walk to their doom, and she supposed she should put in some effort to save Ash and Brock while she was at it, but each step she took through this otherwise pleasant town had her on edge.

The moonstone called to her from Wizard Lenin's backpack, even a small part of it, and it sounded like a deafening drumbeat inside her head.

"Chu…"

Lily blinked, saw Pikachu staring morosely behind them towards the horizon where Misty should have been, and forced the thoughts out of her head. As she followed his gaze towards the rolling hills where Mount Moon and its tribe of Clefairy still danced.

"She really didn't want to come to Cerulean City, did she?" Brock noted rather pleasantly, as if it wasn't odd at all that Misty had insisted on circumventing this city entirely.

And for the first time Ash started to look genuinely concerned, "I wonder why she hates this place so much."

The moment didn't last long though as he shrugged and said, "Ah, we'll never figure out girls."

Now, Lily didn't think of herself as a die-hard feminist, per se, but she couldn't help but feel her eye twitch at that sort of blasé statement of Misty, who clearly had some reason to avoid this place that they should probably pay attention to, being written off by Ash the dumbass because, "she's just a stupid girl."

Maybe Lily would leave Ash to be sacrificed by the alien cult.

Lily would have said as much if, as they walked and rounded the corner, they didn't happen upon a great mob of people and the sound of police sirens.

"The police," Ash noted in surprise, "I wonder what happened."

They then rushed up and pushed their way through the mob to the front of the police tape. Ash looked over to a man standing there next to them, arms crossed and surveying the scene with quiet interest, "Excuse me, sir, do you know what happened here?"

"Some burglars broke into that store last night," the man said, watching at least seven police officers consulting with the proprietor, standing guard to hold back the mob, and investigating the scene of this heinous crime.

"Burglars?!" Wizard Lenin balked, "You mean all of this, is for a simple robbery that happened last night?"

He then motioned to the officers, all intent on their work, as well as the curious mob surrounding them as if all of these things only furthered the point he'd probably been suspecting since Officer Jenny had taken on babysitting Lily and Wizard Lenin the first time , "Does crime not happen in this universe? Is this, and pokemon robberies, the only thing these officers deal with?!"

"It's a bit alarming when you put it like that," Lily noted, because now that she thought about it, that meant this world was probably as close to paradise as humanity could get. And yet, they had built their empire on the backs of slaves who supported their masters through legalized cock fights and gambling.

A dystopian utopia in ever sense of both terms…

"A bit alarming? Really, only a slight amount?!" Wizard Lenin asked, no doubt about to say more when he was interrupted.

"And what would you know about burglars, young man?"

Lily looked over and then blinked, because there was none other than Officer Jenny in the flesh, staring at them as if she'd never seen them before in her life and was considering them her prime suspects for the heinous crime of late-night robbery.

As if to confirm this, she said with a narrowed red-eyed gaze, "You four look very suspicious to me."

(And Lily also had to wonder how two twelve-year-olds, a ten-year-old, and the slightly older Brock could possibly look suspicious of burglary of all things.)

"Officer Jenny," Lily asked in mild alarm, "What are you doing here? Aren't you stationed in Viridian City?"

Officer Jenny paused for a moment, blinked, then, as if this was perfectly natural, said with a bright smile, "Ah, you must have met my sister-in-law."

"Whose name is also Jenny?" Wizard Lenin asked slowly, looking as if he was still in shock from a world that seemed to be without murder, let alone the idea of the Jenny clones. Who, now that Lily thought about it, were rather similar to the Joy clones they'd seen thus far.

"It's a really common name," Officer Jenny said, not even noting the fact that her sister-in-law also shared her strange eye and hair color as well as every other physical feature, with a smile before glaring down at the four of them, "But if you know my sister-in-law that means you probably have had some dealings with the police in Viridian!"

Ash paled, "I…"

"Now maybe you just stopped to ask her for directions," Jenny said, a smirk crawling on her red lips, arms crossed and leaning intimidatingly towards them, "Or maybe you found a wallet on the street and turned it into her, or maybe you're a burglar who broke out of jail!"

"I've never been to jail!" Ash insisted while Brock chimed in, "Neither have I, ma'am."

After a moment's pause Lily and Wizard Lenin chimed in lamely, "Neither have we…"

Which was technically true as Wizard Lenin had blown himself up before getting caught and sentenced and Lily had never been charged with any actual crimes.

That, of course, was when Misty's dire warning clicked and at least some of the pieces, or the symptoms, fell into place. Lily pointed, horrified, at Officer Jenny, "Lenin, it's her!"

"Yes, I know," Wizard Lenin said dully, no doubt thinking that Lily was referring to the fact that she looked the exact same as her supposed sister-in-law, not even the cousin explanation that Nurse Joy had gone for.

"No, I mean Misty's warning, it's about her and Nurse Joy!" something, something terrible was going on backstage, something far worse than murder or violent crime. Something that masqueraded as something human and had blended in so well that no one questioned it anymore.

"You better bet it's about me," Officer Jenny said with a grin, as if she had any idea what Lily was talking about then with a brandished pair of silver handcuffs said, "And that's what they all say."

Brock paled, shook his head, and insisted, "We just got into town and saw the crowd and…"

And whatever Brock was going to say was cut off as Lily reached for her pokéball with Stack of Bricks inside. Unfortunately, Officer Jenny's sharp red eyes caught the movement and drew a pokéball into her own hands, "Hold it, thief! Don't think you can get away with the help of one of your pokémon!"

"Lily," Wizard Lenin said, already rubbing at the bridge of his nose in irritated despair, "Please don't do what I think you're about to do."

But Lily was way ahead of him, no longer willing to take any chances on this place, instead looking down towards Clefairy with desperation, "Clefairy!"

"Fairy?" Clefairy asked, startled at Lily's noticing of her.

"If you want to see me become your dread god and prophet, then letting us be thrown in jail and assimilated into the Officer Jenny or Nurse Joy Borg is not in your best interest!" Lily hissed and at that Clefairy seemed to understand what Lily needed her to do, as she nodded then held up two pale claws.

"Oh Christ," Wizard Lenin said, paling, as he remembered what had happened the last time Clefairy had put on this little show.

"Lily, what are you doing?!" Ash cried out even as Pikachu cried out with him, "Pikachu!"

"Saving our asses!" Lily said in return with no regrets and as Clefairy began to chant and her fingers began to move as a metronome, Lily summoned her own power, creating a great fog and wiping the memories of the mob and the officers while Pikachu darted up onto her shoulder and she scooped Clefairy up into her arms.

Unfortunately, that was right about the moment Clefairy finished the metronome, and the store as well as the rest of the block, was engulfed in a burning ring of fire.

And even as Lily ran away from the scene of the crime, Brock, Ash, and Wizard Lenin with her, she shouted, "I regret nothing!"


"Lily, why would you do that?!"

They reconvened on a bench in a park far enough away from the fires to avoid any attention. Which was nice, because Ash, Brock, Wizard Lenin, and well basically all of them except Clefairy were hardly pleased and expressing their discontent very vocally.

"I did not want to turn into an Officer Jenny!" Lily retorted, arms crossed and not in the mood to argue with Ash Ketchum of all people, "I don't know Ash, did you want to turn into an Officer Jenny?"

"What are you talking about?" Ash said, tearing at his hair, and looking as if he was almost in physical pain.

"Officer Jenny, don't you find it alarming that we've run into two now that look exactly the same? And that's not even getting into the two Nurse Joys we've met so far. Maybe they're not really cousins or in-laws or whatever but instead captured victims whore are Joyified or Jennyified and placed into new towns at the alien overlords convenience! And maybe Cerulean City is where it all goes down!" Lily ranted before finishing with a nod towards Clefairy, who was blinking and staring out at the urban park in wonder, likely never having seen anything like it in her life, "Besides, Clefairy was the one who lit it on fire I just…"

Lily trailed off, realizing that now was hardly the time to admit to her own supernatural powers, and finished with a lame grin, "Watched."

"Even for you, Lily, even for you…" Wizard Lenin said with a sigh, as if he didn't agree with every word she said, even after hearing Misty-the-logical's warning about this hell-city.

Pikachu muttered an equally exasperated and somewhat bewildered, "Pikachu."

Still, at least Clefairy seemed to side with Lily, and god, what a sad statement that was. At this rate, Lily would end up god of the Clefairy and Clefable in no time at all.

"Well, I guess there's no helping it now, even if I wish we could have proved we weren't burglars," Brock said, again with alarming ease, because now that Lily thought about it Brock had taken everything with weird ease. His dead-beat hobo father returning to take care of his brothers and sisters, the run in with Seymore the Scientist, Lily's own quasi metamorphosis, and now Clefairy blowing up half a block.

And Lily was reminded again that there was a reason Misty's was such a lonely voice in this world along with Wizard Lenin's.

"Either way, Ash, shouldn't you head for Cerulean City gym?" Brock asked, and Ash blinked, "Oh, right, I guess I should… Hey, Brock, you have any inside info on the gym trainer there?"

Then with a laugh and a grin, as if also ultimately unconcerned by Clefairy decimating an entire city block, "I just want to find out as much as I can about them before we have our match. Know yourself, know your adversary, and you hold the key to victory!"

"Wow," Wizard Lenin said in genuine surprise, "That was surprisingly deep for you."

Ash then flushed before holding up his red calculator, "Well, I learned that one from Dexter."

"Well, I never actually met the trainer here," Brock mused as he stared out into the park "But I know his pokémon's special move."

Ash's smile grew wider as he asked, "Yeah, what is it?"

However, Brock, like a rock, was not to be budged, "I'm sorry, Ash, but I can't give you that information."

"Why not?"

Brock just smiled and noted, "I'm a gym leader too after all, I can't tell you out of respect, you understand."

Ash seemed to get it, or at least, the idea of it, because he didn't put up too much protest.

He then stood and said, "And I think that's where I'll take my leave, I have some stuff to do today, so the rest of you are on your own."

"Stuff?" Ash questioned, standing with him, but Brock just smiled and looked off into the distance, where all his vague and mysterious, possibly alien overlord, stuff awaited him. Or else Brock was just a normal strange resident of this universe and Lily really was overthinking everything.

"Just stuff," Brock clarified with extreme vagueness and then walking off he called back "I'll catch up with you later."

"And that, I think, is my cue as well," Wizard Lenin noted before looking directly at Lily, "I'm going to see what this city has as far as libraries are concerned. Try not to blow anything else up while I'm gone."

And just like that it was Ash and Lily alone in a park, staring out blankly to where Brock then Wizard Lenin had walked off, with Pikachu and Clefairy still sitting dumbly on the park bench. Lily blinked, shoved her hands into her pocket, "Well… gym time?"

"Yeah, right, gym time!" Ash said with a nod, ignoring the look that passed between Clefairy and Pikachu at the determined grin on his face and the sheepish look on Lily's. Still, she supposed as long as this gym battle didn't end with her Jennification, Lily was more than fine with the circumstances.


"Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the star of our show, the sensational Cerulean City Synchronized Swimming Sisters!"

Ash and Lily walked into a gym very different from Brock's, instead of an empty, intimidating dark blue room they found themselves wandering through packed stands, overlooking a great pool with a diving well at one end. There, on the platform, a spotlight fell on three beautiful women, one with pink hair, another with blue, and another a strawberry blonde, each in flattering one-piece suits.

The three then head first, arms over their head, dove into the pool where they then began what looked like a synchronized swimming performance, just as had been advertised.

"Huh," Lily noted, "Well, this is different than I expected."

"But I thought this was the pokémon gym," Ash said in confusion as he looked at their surroundings again.

"Well, that is what it said on the sign," Lily replied, in bold rainbow writing with a giant unicorn seal no less.

Pikachu, however, had no time for Lily or Ash as his eyes were wide and brown and mesmerized by the swimmers, "Pika…"

Lily narrowed her eyes, looked at the pale legs of the women, then back to Pikachu, "Um, Pikachu, I hate to ask this because it's sort of a weird question but you're not… Into human women, are you?"

Because today, actually, a couple times it had struck Lily that Pikachu paid an awful lot of attention to people, girls in particular like these or even Misty, than she ever would have expected a giant yellow mouse to.

"Pikachu!" Pikachu asked, looking horrified and offended, but in a way that made Lily suspect he doth protest too much rather than genuinely being insulted by the very idea of it.

"Because that would be weird," Lily said, "Really weird… And I like you and all, but I have to tell you, I don't think they'd be interested in a giant yellow mouse."

Lily really should have seen the offended and angered electric shock coming, but somehow, she didn't.

"Clefairy!" Clefairy said, rushing to Lily's side once the frying had stopped, reaching over to pat her down with tiny claws while she glared at Pikachu who was now focused once again with entirely too large and adorable eyes on the swimmers.

"It's alright, I don't think anything's broken," Lily rasped as she picked herself up off the floor, flattening her hair and brushing off her burnt clothing. Still, it was nice that at least someone was concerned for her wellbeing.

Soon enough the performance ended and Lily, Ash, Pikachu, and Clefairy made their way down the bright orange staircase towards what should be the pokémon gym.

"I can't understand it," Ash said and then, when they reached the bottom floor noted the walls of glass and the water and fish held inside, "It's like an aquarium, how can this be a pokémon gym?"

It certainly was different than Brock's gym had been.

"The crowd was totally awesome," a voice echoed down the corridor, in a strange, almost ditzy accent that Lily wouldn't have expected from anyone in this world.

"I know, that was so great."

Down the hallway were the three divers from earlier, each with their distinctive hair colors, still in their swimsuits from the show as they talked to one another.

The blue haired one in the middle said to the blonde, "Daisy, the dive you did was super!"

The blonde, presumably Daisy, answered with a pleased and somewhat smug smile, "The practice really paid off."

"Totally," agreed the third pink-haired sister on the other side of blue hair. Then the three laughed, as if this had been the ending to some unheard joke.

"Uh, excuse me," Ash said turning towards them, but they didn't let him get a word in.

"I'm sorry," the pink one said in a tone that was hardly sorry at all, "But if you like, want an interview, you'll have to like call our manager."

"No, it's not that…" Ash insisted only to be cut off again.

"We don't do autographs," pink insisted, this time with a little bit of distaste.

"I don't want one," Ash said with a small, awkward smile, "I really just wanted to know if this was a pokémon gym."

"It sure is," one answered, as if there shouldn't be any room to doubt this place's authentic pokémon gym nature.

"Well, we're looking for the gym trainer," Ash said, motioning to Lily as well.

"You're looking at them," another responded, leaving Ash momentarily dumbfounded. Then, almost as if sparkles surrounded them, Daisy said, "The three of us are the gym trainers here."

"We're the Sensational Sisters," the pink chimed in, as if this more than any other was a title to be proud of.

"We're world famous," the blue in the middle insisted, leaving no room for either Ash or Lily to doubt its veracity. Not that Lily would know, being a rather new addition to this world herself. Ash, however, seemed completely taken aback.

"But what's with all that swimming?!" he asked, mouth open, eyes wide, and body stiff with the shock. Which, going from Brock to these women was indeed quite the jump.

"It's like our hobby," the pink said with a grin, "And our fans love to watch us perform."

"We pool our talents to make a big splash!" Blue insisted, only for all three women to descend into giggles as if she'd just said the wittiest thing since George Bernard Shaw. Which, given some of Ash's puns, maybe it was.

"Well then," Ash cried out, determination written on his face, "I challenge all of you!"

Suddenly the women were not giggling, and instead were looking rather awkward, staring off into the stands and the distance and anywhere but Ash and Lily.

"We don't feel much like battling anymore," Daisy confessed rather awkwardly, and at that, Lily felt her attention focus. Because Brock had had his own reasons, but the way these women looked, as if they knew that they were expected to battle but none the less didn't want to…

Lily wondered if she'd finally found the people in this universe that agreed with Wizard Lenin.

"What do you mean?!" Ash cried out in dismay.

"We just got beaten three times in a row by kids from this nowhere place called Pallet Town," Blue explained somewhat sheepishly, only furthering Ash's despair as he realized that once again, he'd been more than beaten to the punch by the other local kids.

And apparently these were not Wizard Lenin's missing comrades.

"It was just one defeat after another," Blue continued in a way that showed that they had not been easy losses for her to swallow at that, "My eyes were spinning from all the losses."

"We had to like practically rush all our pokémon to the pokémon center," Daisy continued for her sister.

Pink then held out a pokéball and dropped it anticlimactically on the floor, "This is the only one left."

A burst of white light and then a flopping orange fish with a horn on its head appeared, chanting, "Goldeen" over and over again.

"You mean all you have is a Goldeen?" Ash asked as Pink returned the pokémon back into its spherical prison.

"If it would evolve into Seaking we could use it," Blue explained with a chagrinned and rather embarrassed expression on her face, "But all it can do now is its horn attack."

"So, like, there's no point in battling," Daisy concluded, apparently more than willing to write this off as a forgone conclusion.

"Now, instead of having matches, we have time to make ourselves look more beautiful than ever," Pink continued, as if this truly was a marvelous turn of events for the three of them, and had been quite an issue in the past when they'd actually had legitimate jobs.

Ash opened his mouth and leaned forward but before he could say anything Daisy smirked and said, "I know what you want," she then clapped and cried out, "Seal!"

A great white Seal with dark eyes exited the water and flopped onto the land, barking out, "Seal!"

It then stuck out its tongue revealing two teardrop blue stones which Daisy then held up, "A cascade badge, this is what you want, right? You can have it."

Lily took hers slowly, not willing to question the gaining of another gym badge as she stowed it into her pocket to join its brother the boulder badge.

"Lily!" Ash hissed out, eyes wide and worried, but Lily just shrugged in turn as if to say she wasn't about to turn down free candy.

Ash hesitated and apologetically said, "Thanks, I'd rather earn my badges."

"Take it," Daisy insisted, still with that air of superiority, as if Ash was truly stupid for not simply getting it, "A badge is a badge."

Except… Except Brock had taken his job and position very seriously, even when it was not his passion or his dream, and the way these women acted… Even if Brock was a little strange, just like everyone else here, just like these women, the way these women acted was disrespectful for everything he stood for.

At that Ash seemed to give up, moving towards the offered badge, and was about to take it when Misty's voice sounded down from the stands affronted as always, "Hold it right there!"

"Misty!" Ash cried out while Pikachu let out a far too delighted, "Cha!"

Misty, with an alarming amount of athleticism, jumped down from the stands onto the floor below, "Alright, Daisy, if you don't want to battle him, I will!"

"What do you mean?" Ash cried out in shock.

"I'm a Cerulean City trainer too," Misty announced, "I'm the fourth Sensational Sister!"

"There are only three Sensational Sisters and one runt," the pink haired one quickly corrected, earning Misty's gritted teeth and ire. And looking between them… Misty was clearly younger, and there was some family resemblance, but it was more than clear that Misty really was the black sheep of the family.

And that her sisters, likely more than anything else, had been the ones to driver her away from her hometown.

"Oh," Lily realized, putting together the real reason for Misty's desperation earlier, "Oh… Oh shit, there probably weren't any aliens."

Well, no, there could still be aliens, or this planet could still be completely insane, but it was much more likely that Misty like everyone else wasn't in the know and hadn't realized how alarming it was that all the Jennys and Joys looked the same, that nothing ever seemed to bother Brock, or that they lived on a society benefiting from the slave labor of sentient beings.

… Lily clearly had no choice but to set fire to the entire block.

"So, little sister, it's a surprise to see you back so soon," Daisy noted, as if this was the most unpleasant surprise she'd had all week.

"That little girl with the big mouth who said she wouldn't come back until she was a great pokémon trainer, wasn't that you?"

Misty looked away, chagrinned, "I guess I did say something like that when I left."

"So, that's why Misty was so dead set against coming here," Ash said to Pikachu, apparently just cluing in himself.

"Misty," Pink said, "You left here pretending you wanted to become a pokémon trainer because you couldn't compare with us, because we're obviously much more talented and beautiful than you are."

"That wasn't the reason!" Misty shouted, flushed, but her sisters paid no mind.

"Well then, I guess like, you came back because you couldn't make it as a pokémon trainer," Daisy concluded only for Misty to shout before pointing accusingly at Lily and Ash, "It wasn't my idea to come back here, the only reason I'm here is because they wanted to come!"

Daisy looked Ash over then glancing side-eyed at her younger, plainer, sister, "Well, he's totally not someone I'd choose for a boyfriend, but you're no prize yourself."

"He's not my boyfriend!" Misty shouted before glaring at her sister with death in her eyes, "If I battle him then I'll prove I'm not a quitter and just as good a trainer as you three!"

"Well," Daisy said, "You are the only one of us with a pokémon that can actually battle."

And just like that, it appeared to be on.


"So," Lily asked Clefairy and Pikachu (who had chosen to sit this one out, apparently, liking Misty more than he did Ash), "Who do you think will win."

"Pikachu," Pikachu said with that dry, almost Lenin-like look on his adorable mouse face, which all but screamed that he thought Misty would wipe the floor with him.

"Me too," Lily said, but then paused and considered Ash, "Although, every once in a while, he does have these odd moments of brilliance."

Not really strategy, he was pants at that according to Wizard Lenin, but he really had shown… something in his fight against Brock. A bullheaded, dangerous, determination that could almost defy the laws of physics when combined with Pikachu's absurd power. So, maybe just by wanting it enough, Ash could win this.

"Fairy," Clefairy said, dipping her feet into the water and splashing slightly, to which Lily took to mean that Clefairy didn't have much of an idea what was going on either way, understood this pokémon battling concept even less than Lily did, and was really just along for the ride or until Lily chose to embrace her divinity.

"My answer's still no," Lily said, to which Clefairy pouted slightly before brightening again and watching the battle between Misty's giant gold starfish Staryu and Spearow unfold.

Actually, now that she thought about it, as Lily watched the star spin and spurt water out at the Spearow, knocking it into the water where it flailed desperately, she was having an unusually easy time parsing what Pikachu and Clefairy were saying. She normally found it a little harder to get Pikachu's meaning, but lately, maybe since Mount Moon, she hadn't even really had to guess for either of them. Sure, the words were still non-sensical iterations of their own names but…

Lily blinked, looked across the pool to where Misty's sisters and the giant seal looked on with disinterest, apparently long since concluded that Ash, of all people, was going to win this fight.

"And I thought I disliked my relatives," Lily mentioned to her companions.

"Pikachu," Pikachu agreed firmly.

"What are you talking about? You just spent half an hour today gawking at them," Lily said, eyebrows furrowed even as she watched Ash return Spearow and release Pidgeotto into the fray, Misty returning her starfish for another giant purple starfish.

"Pikachu!" Pikachu insisted, as if to say he was not doing anything so undignified and creepy as gawking.

"Yes, you were," Lily said, "You thought they were the hottest thing you've ever seen in your life until Misty showed up to ruin the moment with family drama."

Pikachu's cheeks sparked in warning, emitting a harsh and dangerous, "Pika"

"Fairy, fairy, Clefairy!" Clefairy said, waving her stubby arms desperately as if to break up the fight before it could start. Both Lily and Pikachu looked away for a moment, back towards the battle, watching as the purple starfish pummeled the giant pigeon.

With her eyes on the fight, taking in the desperate crying pokémon fighting each other for money and amusement, Lily said, "You know, it's okay. I mean, it's weird and pretty deviant but… I'm not one to talk about people being deviant, in any capacity. So, if you like Misty or her sisters, or even me, in a way that's maybe a little beyond friendship, I don't mind."

Before Pikachu could respond Ash's giant pigeon sent a powerful gust towards the flying starfish, slamming it into the door, where it slumped and fell to the ground, jewel in the center of its chest blinking in agony.

"Starmie!" Misty cried out, and whether she'd keep going and push Starmie past his limit was a question for another day, as with a great rumble, the wall caved in and there, in a vehicle that looked like a cross between a tank and a boat, Team Rocket emerged right on schedule.

"Sorry to break in on you ladies," Jessie cried out in a tone that was not apologetic in the least.

"Allow us to introduce ourselves," James added, now holding a slightly pale blue rose in place of the usual seductive red.

Right on cue, Jessie began the rhyme, "To protect the world from devastation."

"To unite all peoples within our nation," James added, and likely Jessie would have joined in at this point if it weren't for Lily.

"Nope, nope, not in the mood for this today," because by god, if Lily could burn down half a city block then she could certainly take care of Team Rocket, and with that, with nothing more than a wave of her hand, Lily lit the great tank on fire, pushing it back out, a flying burning meteor streaking out into the distance, sealing the wall even as Jessie, James, and their giant cat friend cried out, "It looks like Team Rocket's blasting off again!"

"Well…" Ash said, blinking, that was kind of anticlimactic. Then, he looked at Lily, eyes wide, "Wait a minute, that wasn't Stack of Bricks! You didn't release him from his pokéball!"

Everyone looked at Lily, clearly waiting for some sort of an explanation that would bring everything to light. Lily, for her own part, stared back in a silence that was far too long and weighted. Finally, Lily pointed to unwitting Clefairy standing right next to Lily, "Clefairy did it."


(Still, it was nice that at the end of the day they ended up giving Ash a badge for doing practically nothing. Still, Lily figured that it was more an attempt to get him out of their gym already and Misty along with him.

The important part was, with a new gym badge, a rather miffed Misty, and Wizard Lenin and Brock not showing up until after everything was over, everyone was much too busy to question Clefairy as Lily's latest and greatest scapegoat.)


Author's Note: Ash has a habit of earning these badges that, in all technicalities, he has absolutely no right to be earning. Oh well, it's a pattern I enjoy, and more of the ramifications of Lily's almost jaunt into godhood next chapter. Probably.

New in the world of "Wearing the Faces of Men" is "A Gym Leader Covets" where we get a non-canon glimpse into the future with Sabrina of Saffron City.

Thanks for reading and reviewing, reviews are much appreciated.

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or Pokémon