The lights dimmed, and with it the whole party has gone silent. Well, except one. "So what, is Team Rocket actually gonna show up?" Ash quipped. This earned him an elbow to the ribs from Misty and Brock. Both of them. "I was just kidding. They followed me all the way to Unova, but I'm pretty sure that they wouldn't follow me on this little side trip I made."
He got elbowed again, this time a little harder. "I didn't hit you because of that pitiful excuse of a joke," Misty whispered in a harsh tone, "but because you're ruining the moment. As if you didn't already know, but May's special Appeal Exhibition is about to start. Now SHUSH, or I'll literally sew your mouth shut!" Ash's lips were tight, but it's rather obvious that it's not to his liking.
In the middle of the dance floor, four torches, arranged in a way that made it look like they're circling perimeter, all lit up, though the source is currently unknown. From the center of this "stage", a bright ball of light erupted, illuminating the entire area. Once everyone stopped rubbing the glare out of their eyes, May's Venusaur appears at the center of the torches, apparently the source of the light earlier. The room darkens again, and the only lights are those from the torches.
And then there was a gust of wind, and Ash felt a few soft articles brush past his face. When he reached into the darkness to grab one, he realized it was a cherry blossom petal; indicating that the gust of wind came from Venusaur using Petal Dance. When the Petal Dance calmed down, the lights of the ballroom all lit up again, this time without any apparent Pokémon source. Venusaur is inexplicably gone, but the cherry blossoms are still there. Prominent amongst them are four slightly larger ones, falling slowly right towards the torches. When they touch, however, instead of the petals burning up, they seemingly merged with the torches, which then grew and turned into icicles! Icicles that kept growing until the entire torch stand was encased in an icy prison...
...pink ice (most likely a side effect of having "grown from" cherry blossoms), for that matter. The ice continued to grow past the torch stands, until they touched each other, and encircled the entire stage while forming a magnificent icicle at the very center. One of the perpetrators of this trick, Wartortle, appeared from out of nowhere and jumped to the top of this column, not to stand on it, but rather to drill vertically through with Gyro Ball. The other culprit, Skitty (not Glaceon, surprisingly), also showed up, this time from the opposite direction of where Wartortle came from, and reinforced the "column" by blasting it further with another Ice Beam, seemingly trapping Wartortle, still somehow spinning wildly, inside. After that was tense silence from the audience. ...a silence that was shattered by the, er, shattering of the entire ice structure. Instead of ice needles getting sprayed at the audience, the ice instead reformed into two, lengthy "ribbons" winding around the still-spinning Wartortle and creating a spiral effect. From the darkness Glaceon and Blaziken appeared outside the torches but opposite each other, and then firing Shadow Ball (four of them, spinning around) and Fire Spin, respectively that collided right on top of Wartortle, resulting in an explosion of pink smoke and rainbow glitter (actually eensie ice bits) that engulfed the entire area and showering the audience with that glitter. Once the smoke is gone May appears with hands raised, surrounded in a circle by the Pokémon she used for the appeal. Another explosion occurred, except this time it's of the audience and their deafening applause, to which May and her team all took deep bows.
After a silent (and longest, as it felt for May) five seconds, the entire audience got to their feet and started applauding her. Anyone would have gone deaf from the intense volume of claps, but nobody cared, and everyone loved her performance. May just beamed at the ovation she received. She turned to the table where her family sat, then to the adjacent table where most of her friends were, and the clapping from that direction only intensified and more deafening when they realized where she was looking. Once the ringing from all the loud noise is gone from her ears, did she start having focus again.
"That was amazing!" Dawn exclaimed as she and Misty rushed to their friend to pincer her from both sides with a hug. "I knew you had it in you, even though I didn't see you practice. You still pulled through!" Misty merely nodded her head in agreement.
May was a little sheepish as she scratched the back of her head. Reminds you of a certain someone? "I don't know if I should take that as a compliment but…thanks anyway."
"If I was your mother, I would be proud of you," Dawn continued her rave as the rest of the gang rushed to the stage to praise May. And then she started looking around nervously. "Caroline didn't hear that, did she? Please tell me she didn't."
That was when May realized that someone was missing from her circle of friends. Someone whose glaring absence caused May's eye to twitch horribly, even though she was still smiling. She strode across the stage, across the dance floor and towards the tables.
"Where is he?" May asked in a hoarse whisper, once she reached her friends' table.
"Where who?" Dawn was the first to ask. She started looking around, and the others (most of them, actually; there is an exception that will be explained shortly) followed suit. They stopped clapping when the realization struck them as well. All except Pichu, who hasn't stopped clapping. At all. "Wait, where did Ash go?"
"He was here a while ago," Misty pondered, just as perplexed, "making a crack about those buffoons when the lights dimmed before your show started." She started thinking a little more. "And if I remember correctly, during the performance he looked like he was scheming about something in a corner with- Hold it right there, Brockster! Where do you think you're going?"
Misty shouted just in time before Brock could bolt the table and pull a disappearing act. He stood at attention as soon as Misty spoke, since she sounded like a dreaded drill sergeant. And right now she was, only much worse. "Now, Misty, I know when you use that," this time it was Brock's turn to have a twitch in the eye, "nickname of mine when you want something. I was just going to fetch a drink." At that instant, everyone at the table stared at the refreshments table, which was in the exact opposite direction where Brock was going, then to his glass; it was full, was on the table, and he hasn't even touched it yet. "FOR YOU! I meant for you, that is." Misty's glass was not only on the table and not on Brock's hand, but also full, too.
For the first time in his life, Brock has the attention of several girls. But it's not exactly the kind of attention he actually wanted. It looked more like Brock was a convict facing a prejudiced jury and a ruthless judge and executioner. "He's definitely hiding something," Dawn muttered, narrowing her eyes.
The three girls crowded around Brock, piercing him with inquisitive glares. Brock immediately made a motion to slide his finger over his lips, pantomiming a zipper to his mouth. He started saying something, but all that came out are incoherent mumblings, and Brock was grinning (somehow without even baring his teeth) the whole time. This only angered them further, especially Misty. She then turned to a certain ally of hers, someone in the Pokémon group. Someone everybody knows Brock is afraid of, who answered Misty's summons with relish.
Although that wasn't enough to frighten Brock. Misty had to give him a command first, and only then did Brock panic. "Croagunk, Code E again. You know what you have to do."
Brock made the zipping movement with his lips again, though this time in reverse. "How about acting like you're MY Pokémon for once!?" he exclaimed as Croagunk's poisoned fingers were mere inches from who-knows-where. Still wearing a menacing smile on his face, Croagunk didn't look like he heeded Brock's plea. "Okay, okay, I yield, I yield, just call Croagunk off, PLEASE!"
With a snap of Misty's fingers, Croagunk halted his approach and walked back away from Brock, standing beside Misty. The look on the Pokémon's face makes it clear that he was disappointed Brock gave up so easily. Well, we're waiting," Misty said, arms crossed and tapping her left foot impatiently.
"Ash was preparing a surprise for May," Brock muttered, looking away like he was dismayed at himself. "He asked me for advice, although I never actually got to give him one." Everyone was taken aback at this answer, but none moreso than May herself. "And then during the program,. Ash told me he has to take off to do something,. It seems related to the question he asked me earlier so that's all I can tell you. That, and he said I should keep all of it a secret. Not that I had anything to know about it anyway..." Croagunk's hands lit up in a sickly purple glow again, at Misty's slight gesture. "That really is all I know about Ash's scheme, I swear!"
Dawn shook her head. "Really? It's not like May wanted him especially to see her show. That's rather irresponsible of Ash." She paused. "...no, no, wait, that's exactly the Ash we know, isn't it?"
No one answered her, because right then did the groom himself, his loud clapping interrupting Dawn, stepped up to greet May. "Amazing! Truly amazing!" Wallace said. "I knew I was right in picking you for such a performance, May."
His bride couldn't agree more. "Should you use that kind of appeal in a Contest against Wallace here, why, I believe you might even beat him." She gave a rare (for her) smirk and gave her groom a disparaging look. "Oh, wait, isn't that exactly what happened? In fact, it-"
Wallace started "ahemming" aloud several times to interrupt her. "Moving on to other important things...May, I believe congratulations are in order. You've already heard it from practically everyone else, but maybe I'll try it in some different words: You have truly outdone yourself."
May could only half-listen to Wallace and Winona's praises, her mind still on Ash's abrupt vanishing act. And then a small yellow blur jumped into her unsuspecting arms, did something audible finally came out of her mouth. "Oof. Hey!" she exclaimed, tightly hugging the baby back. "You shouldn't have surprised me like that," May continued in a slightly scolding manner. "It's too dangerous, and I might have dropped you."
By then Winona also noticed the absence as everyone else. "Hmm, I seem to be missing someone among your number," she began.
Only when she mentioned it did Wallace catch on and finish her train of thought. "Now where did that young man go?" He shook his head. "Knowing Ash, I would have thought he would at least stay for the feast." Winona elbowed him in the ribs rather hard. Wincing while grabbing the part of his abdomen where he was hit, Wallace added, "Don't tell me he missed the whole show?"
"I'm not sure," May replied, sounding hurt a little. "Everyone was paying attention to my performance so they don't know when he actually left."
Dawn and Misty both put a reassuring hand on either of May's shoulders. The latter added the motion with a glare in Brock's direction. "I already said I don't know where he went, how come you don't believe me at all?!" he declared. "I'm never gonna live this moment down, am I?" He didn't need a reply from the others to confirm such.
Sensing a certain yellow puffball swaying itself from side to side in her arms, May looked down at the baby Pokémon who was staring back at her wide-eyed and smiling, seemingly oblivious to her mood. "I don't suppose you knew where Ash went, do you?" she asked, not even expecting an answer. And then she realized that Pichu was actually holding a folded piece of paper in its hands, holding to it so tight that it has become a security blanket of sorts for the Pokémon.
May took the paper and Pichu didn't even put up a fight, as if it meant for its "mother" to get the paper anyway. May unfolded the paper, and, sure enough as she expected, there was a written message on it: "Saw everything. I figured you might get upset that I missed your show, but believe me when I say...I have the best seat in the house." There was two more words included in, but they were inflated in text: Look up
Following the instructions, May craned her neck to look in that direction, and the rest followed suit. There, a hundred feet above the hotel and thus the party, Charizard was flying in a circle, and it's apparent that he's been doing so for quite some time now.
All of a sudden Charizard dived straight down to the ground at an angle, startling the spectators. As he loomed closer and closer May realized that what she expected was wrong: Ash wasn't even on Charizard. Rather, she caught a glimpse of Snivy and Oshawott, who had Vine Whips and Razor Shell at the ready. Charizard halted his descent just a few feet off the ground before lifting off and circling again; specifically, Charizard was actually encircling May's exhibit. There was a flash of blue and green lines as Charizard flew, although the display was still intact until Charizard started flapping his wings more rapidly than normal.
Somehow Snivy's whips danced around the ice field following the flow of the wind, and together they were carving something out of the ice. The sharp ice fragments as well as the strong gust diverted everyone's attention away so they couldn't make it out at first.
The solid chunk of ice is gone, replaced by a tall pillar of ice, with a rectangular slab on top. Snivy and Oshawott then jumped from Charizard's back and sliced at the slab in one stroke, and the slab instantly transformed into a flower. A rose, to be exact.