A/N: Here is a list of the cameos in this chapter:

Pokemon XD: Gale of Darkness - Miror B. and Area Leader Calus
Poke Special Manga - Yellow and Emerald
Pokemon Main Stream Video Games - Brendan
Yu-Gi-Oh! - Seto Kaiba and Yugi Moto
Nya-Nannu of Deviantart - Glaceon Girl, Leafeon Girl, and Eevee Girl
Unknown - Roger the Shrubber, Mr. Roger
Pokemon Anime - A.J.

Chapter 25: The First Day of Sinnoh Con

"It's finally here, isn't it?" Dawn spoke as she stared at herself in a mirror. Her outfit consisted of a rather fancy pink halter-style dress with a pair of black high heels.

"Yeap," Zoey spoke as she stepped up behind Dawn. She wore a rather fancy looking red tuxedo.

"I'm nervous..." Dawn spoke as she reached up to her hair and began to pull it up into a ponytail.

"Why? You've been on stage in front of millions of people before. Why are you nervous now?"

"Because, this isn't like a regular contest...we're hosting one of the biggest conventions in the Kanto Region...a place I'm not very familiar with...Ow!" Dawn winced as she dropped her hair after having just pulled on it.

Zoey shook her head and took Dawn's hair into her hand, grabbing a small bow off the desk. "You'll be fine, Dawn." She pulled Dawn's hair together and put the bow around it. "In your words: No need to worry. Okay?"

Dawn sighed and nodded. "All right." She turned to Zoey and smiled. "At least I have you with me, right?"

Zoey smirked and nodded. "Of course."

There was then a knock on the door. "You two almost ready?" Ash's voice called from the other side of the door. "You go on in five minutes."

"We'll be right there!" Dawn called out, then stood to her feet. "Well, this is it."

Zoey nodded. "You'll do just fine, promise." Dawn nodded slowly to that, though she was unsure herself. The two then made their way out of the dressing room and out into the Celadon Park where the convention had been set up. They stepped up onto the stage, and Dawn turned to look at the thousands of people, if not more, that had gathered here that day for the Sinnoh Convention. They all waited eagerly for the Opening Ceremony to begin.

Dawn took in a deep breath and steadied herself as Zoey took her hand. The two turned to each other for a single moment to smile at one another before turning back out to the audience. The clock struck nine, and Dawn stepped forward. "Welcome everyone to the Fifth Annual Kanto Pokemon Association Sinnoh Region Convention!" she shouted and at once several small party balloons filled with confetti were burst open. The audience began to cheer. "My name is Dawn, and I am from the Sinnoh Region. I will be serving as your host for this convention this year, along with my girlfriend, Zoey. And, yes, you all did hear that right, she is my girlfriend. Everyone give Zoey a big round of applause."

Dawn made a gesture and Zoey stepped forward, bowing to the crowd. "We hope to make this year's convention a success, just like every convention before it," Zoey spoke. "Dawn and I will be mainly hosting this year's Contest Conference which will be on the Eighth at noon, though we'll also be here to introduce each conference."

"Now then, we would like to introduce to you everyone who you will be meeting over the course of the next five days," Zoey spoke. "First, give a big round of applause to the Shittenou of the Sinnoh League Pokemon Association. First up, we have the head of the Shittenou, Lucian!"

With those words a man dressed in a red suitcoat and pants stepped forward. A black dress shirt was under his suitcoat, and a set of long, pointy glasses rested on his face. His light purple hair was rather long, going down to his shoulders all around his neck, leaving only his face exposed. "Hello everyone!" he spoke with a smirk. "It's wonderful to be here in this lovely Kanto Region. This city in particular is just spectacular on its own. I specialize in the Psychic-type, and there is no other in the entire Sinnoh Region as skilled in Psychic-types as I. I hope you all enjoy this convention. I know I will." Lucian gave a bow and stepped aside.

"Thank you, Lucian," Dawn spoke. "Next up, we have the second in line of the Sinnoh League Shittenou. Everyone welcome Bertha!"

An elderly woman stepped forward, waving at the crowd. Her hair had gone gray with age, but she showed spunk even at her age. She wore a white jacket with a black dress under it, along with a pair of slip-on shoes. "Hello, everyone! I am Bertha of the Shittenou and I specialize in Ground-type Pokemon. I may be elderly, but I'll still give you a good run for your money, similar to your Shittenou Agatha, so don't underestimate me." She gave a bow then stepped aside.

"Well said, Bertha," Dawn spoke then turned. "Now we bring you the third in line in the Sinnoh League Shittenou. Everyone welcome Flint!"

A man dressed in a rather informal bright yellow shirt and black pants stepped forward from the back. He had his red hair up in a rather large afro, while his feet were adorned with only simple black sandals. "Yo, everyone," he spoke with a smile. "Anyone who dares to face me will be burnt to a crisp from my Fire Pokemon, so you better watch out." He winked to the audience and a few of the girls in the audience seemed to instantly melt away. He then stepped aside, standing next to Lucian and sticking his hands in his pockets.

"Thank you, Flint," Zoey spoke. "Last but not least, and certainly not weakest of the Shittenou, we have Aaron!"

A boy with green hair stepped forward, looking not much older then twenty or so. He wore orange pants along with a black shirt that had orange stripes on it in the shape of a bee's nest. "My name's Aaron, and my Bug Pokemon will crush all opposition!" he spoke out before thrusting his hand into the air. "Bug Pokemon rock!"

Several girls in the crowd immediately shouted "Ewwww!" at his statement, while some of the guys cheered. He stepped aside and Zoey continued.

"These are the Shittenou of the Sinnoh League, but of course, what are the Shittenou without a Champion? I give you the Sinnoh League Pokemon Association Champion, Cynthia!" Zoey shouted.

There she was, the Champion of the Sinnoh League. She had long blonde hair that ended almost by her knees, and she wore a black pair of pants along with a black spaghetti-strap shirt. A black cloak was then over that, being closed at only one point on her chest by a silver clip. The arms of her cloak had a ring of black fluff on the ends, and the same fluff was also around the bottom of her cloak as well. "Hello everyone," she spoke with a smile. "I'm happy to be here in the Kanto Region with all of you. This city is full of wonderment and beauty." She stepped aside and Dawn smiled at the five now collected at the side of the stage.

"These are the Shittenou and their Champions and they will be hosting the Sinnoh League Conference on the nineth at noon," Dawn spoke. "So, be sure you're here then if you want a chance to talk to them and maybe even get a chance to battle them."

"Next up, we have Professor Rowan of the Sinnoh Region," Zoey spoke. From the back stepped an elderly man looking to be in his sixties or so. He wore a brown trenchcoat along with a blue vest, black pants, and a white shirt. In his hand was a small brown briefcase which held all manner of notes he had collected, along with three pokeballs. "This man is in charge of giving out the starter Pokemon to the beginning trainers in the Sinnoh Region. He is also a doctor in the field of the Study of Evolution."

"That I am," Rowan spoke. "I have concluded that ninety-percent of Pokemon are, in some way or form, linked to evolution. What we don't understand, however, is what Legendaries are, and why they have no connection to evolution. I seek to remedy that."

"Professor Rowan, you will be giving an Evolution Conference on the Seventh, won't you?" Dawn asked.

"Yes, at noon on the Seventh. I will be showcasing some of my findings, and even demonstrating some of the evolutions we have found."

"Wonderful!" Dawn said with a smile. "Then you all should come out to it," she spoke turning to the audience. "You never know what wonders you'll see. Some of the Sinnoh Evolutions are amazing, and some of them are even Evolutions of Pokemon that exist in this region, too!"

Rowan gave a bow and stepped aside, then Zoey continued. "We would now like to introduce the host of this year's Sinnoh League Tournament," she spoke. "He is the Master of Illusions and Mystery and owns his own personal island that he has turned into a large theme park based around Pokemon known as Poketopia. Everyone welcome Mysterial!"

A cloud of smoke erupted in the center of the stage and a man wearing a purple magician's hat appeared. The man wore a tuxedo composed of a purple suitcoat, black vest and shirt, and a red pair of pants and tie. His shoes were fancy and pointy, and a long purple mustache came off the ends of his face. "Welcome to the show!" Mysterial shouted. "I am the Poketopia Master, Mysterial! I will be showcasing the many different styles of battle in Poketopia from Fortune Battles to Team Battles and so much more! I'll be here tomorrow at noon to show you all of this and I'll even be hosting the Sinnoh Tournament this year. You'll all get a chance to try out the different battle styles in Poketopia as you climb the ranks of the Tournament. The first three places of the tournament will be awarded a prize, and first place will be able to choose between either their reward or the chance to face me. If that person chooses to face me and wins, they will be given an even greater prize. Fail, of course, and it will result in them being awarded nothing. With that I shall bid you all farewell for now." He gave a bow. "Enjoy Sinnoh Con, everyone!" he shouted before his body seemed to vanish into smoke, leaving only his hat behind.

Dawn stepped forward and picked his hat up, lightly tossing it back behind the stage. "You have now met the leaders of the Sinnoh League," she spoke. "We thank everyone for coming out today. Remember, Cynthia will be hosting the Sinnoh Legends Conference at noon today. She will be explaining the legends of Dialga - the God of Time, and Palkia - the God of Space, along with many other legends we have in the Sinnoh Region, so don't miss out!"

Zoey now stepped forward and took Dawn's hand. "And now, without any further ado, let the parade and with it the Fifth Annual Kanto League Pokemon Association Sinnoh Region Convention begin!"

The crowd parted in cheers and applause as the Sinnoh League Band started up a spirited marching tune. They marched down the street past the stage, followed by floats, cars, and all sorts of miscellanea. Among them were Sinnoh gym leaders, who waved at the crowds as they walked beside (or rode on top of) their signature pokemon, several predominant trainers and breeders, both past and present, several important-looking scientists, and even, as Kiai noted with a few long gazes, a very beautiful young woman with a sash across her chest that read, "Ms. Sinnoh".

The crowd had started to disperse at the end of Zoey's and Dawn's introduction, but when the parade was over they addressed the remainder. "Thank you very much for being with us over these next few days," spoke Dawn. "Please check your schedules to see a list of events, wander around as much as you'd like, but most importantly, have fun." She beamed a smile at the warm applause that followed her speech, then her and Zoey walked off the stage.

Emi opened up a schedule and looked it over. "Well, what do we want to hit first?" she asked as she adjusted the glasses on her face before looking up at Kiai. "They've got a lot of shows going on. It says the Pokemon Center is hosting a bunch of breeding sermons right now; the current is about Bug-types. There are also a couple of shows, and a lot of different shops and such."

Kiai looked over her shoulder at the schedule. The false glasses that he, too, had on his nose were terribly irritating, but after last night he realized the only way to live with them is to just accept that they were never going to be comfortable. He wrapped an arm around Emily, placing a finger on the schedule and running his finger down it. "Hmm…I don't have any pokemon of the type that they're breeding today…but we could hit up that trading card tourny. Neither of us have bothered with it, but it might be fun to learn, or at least go and see."

Emily nodded. "Well, the tourny is in an hour at the Gym." She thought for a moment. "Bet that means Erika won't be doing any Gym Battles during the course of the Con." She then looked up. "We could also visit any of the clubs, too. I know I wanted to hit the Eevee club. It looks like they have a tournament running tomorrow. I'd probably want to get signed up now so that I can take part in it tomorrow." She put her hand to her chin. "I wonder if Michelle is going to be in it as well."

"Sounds like a good place to start, then" said Kiai, smiling at Emily. He straightened up and looked around. "I wonder where they're set up…" As he looked, he realized he wasn't the only one wondering that same fact. There were several heads among the crowd, trying to peek around other heads. Some were even holding up pokemon, or being held up by pokemon, to get a better look. Kiai reached around Emily again and flipped down a corner of the convention pamplet that she held. "There's no map. That's odd, usually there is. Oh well, I guess exploration is part of the fun, right?"

Emily nodded. "Yeah, I suppose so." She turned and looked around a bit more. She noticed a few people making their way down a nearby path. "Well, seems like a few people are headed down that way, why don't we head down that path? We know the Main Stage is basically in the center of everything, so we can use that idea to get around easily."

Kiai nodded and they began their walk. He gazed around at a lot of the trees in their area, trying to recall the lay of the land, knowing that they'd have to make up their own maps as they went along. The air was noticeably more full of flying Pokemon than usual. Off in the distance he could even see several that were saddled and tethered; apparently they were giving rides, or were about to. They passed a few knots of trainers, young and old, hovering close to each other and staring at decks of colorful cards. Kiai assumed that those were the Pokemon trading cards mentioned in the schedule.

Emily glanced over at the trainers who were huddled around the cards. She could see that some of them were trading cards, while others had their decks out and were battling. "That looks like fun," she spoke as she stopped to examine the game for a moment. She slowly moved over so she could see the game better. Two particular trainers caught her interest, one a man dressed in a simple blue uniform, almost like a school uniform, while the other was dressed in a black shirt and pants with a blue jacket. The one in the blue jacket had a rather wild hairstyle, and she wondered just how much hairgel it took to keep it standing.

"Haha!" the one in the blue uniform laughed. "Now, my three Charizards will destroy you! Play your last pathetic card!"

The one with the wild hairstyle seemed rather calm. "My grandfather's deck has no pathetic cards, but it does contain this! Mewtwo!" He threw a card down and the man in the blue uniform backed away.

"Mewtwo?" he shouted. "No way!"

"Mewtwo! Psychic!"

"No way!" the man in the blue threw his cards down. "This is impossible..."

Kiai leaned toward the two interesting men and spoke, "Interesting game you gents have there. How do you play it?"

The one with the wild hair looked serenely up at him. "It's simple," he spoke, "just collect the cards that you need to make a deck that feels right, and play the cards that you draw as the situation calls for."

The apparent loser of the round they had just played slammed his fist into the ground. "You're talking out of your ass. You gotta balance statistics and probability. It's a card game, after all!" Kiai nodded enthusiastically.

"Not so. The cards have a heart, and they listen to their master."

"Psh, the heart of the cards?" the one in the uniform spoke, folding his arms over his chest. "That's just nonsense." Kiai nodded enthusiastically again.

"It's true. You should learn that some day."

"Psh. Why bother? I have money."

"Sounds like a fun game," Emily spoke with a smile. "By chance would either of you happen to know where the Eevee Club's booth is?"

"Yeah, it's down that way," the man with the eccentric hair spoke, pointing down a path. "Just take that path down and take a left about three or fourth booths down. You'll see a girl dressed in a Leafeon cosplay. She's the clubs representative."

"Leafeon cosplay, huh?" Emily spoke and turned in the direction the man pointed. "That's so cool! I've got to see that!" She grabbed Kiai's arm tight. "Thanks, bye!" she shouted quickly and took off down the path. She followed the man's instructions and sure enough, they found themselves at a large table with a sign over it that said "Eevee Club". Emily's eyes went wide as she stared in awe at the sight in front of her. There were several small Eevees running around behind the table, each looking as if they had recently hatched.

Dressed in different style cosplays were three people who Emily guessed ran the booth. One was dressed in an ice-blue long sleeved shirt that showed off her stomach along with a pair of pants the same color. A headband was in her hair that had two long Glaceon ears attached to it, though she kept the band hidden in her hair, and a Glaceon-like tail was attached to the back of her pants. A second was dressed in a brown shirt and pants, designed to look like Eevee's fur. She also had a headband with Eevee-like ears and an Eevee tail attached to the seat of her pants. The last, who was actually manning the table, was dressed in a yellowish-green halter dress that had a single strap that went around her neck to hold it up. A hairband in her hair had long Leafeon-like ears, while a long Leafeon-like tail came off the back of her dress. "Kawaii!" Emily spoke with stars in her eyes as she stared at the women and the Eevees.

Kiai took a deep breath. "Oh, here we go." He sat down on the grass next to the table as Emily enthusiastically approached the booth. He was only just beginning to drown out the excited squeals of all the girls around him when a very small Eevee walked up to him and leapt up into his lap. "Oh no…" he spoke, as it mewed up at him and began padding around in a small circle. "Don't…please…anything but that…" It let out a small, utterly adorable yawn. Kiai winced. "No…" and it promptly fell asleep on his lap, trapping him in that spot for what could be hours.

"Aww, it likes you," Emily spoke as she kneeled down and pet the Eevee on Kiai's lap. Kiai groaned.

"So, are you two here to sign up for the tournament?" the Leafeon girl asked.

Emily rubbed the back of her neck. "Well, I am...my boyfriend isn't really all that into Eevee..." she bent close to her. "He prefers powerful Pokemon over cute Pokemon."

The Leafeon girl gasped in shock, as if that was the first time she had ever heard of something like that. "That's just crazy. Eevee is the cutest thing in the world."

"I know, right?" Emily pulled out her Luxury Ball. "I even have an Umbreon myself. I named it Shadow."

"That's so totally the cutest name ever for an Umbreon!" This sort of conversation continued on for several minutes after.

Kiai had just resigned to his fate of eternally petting a small fuzzball when a finger poked at his cheek. He looked up to see that it was Michelle. "Michelle!" he exclaimed, though his hand was still on 'auto pet mode'. "Good to see you here. Please don't squeal."

Michelle laughed at Kiai's remark. "Don't worry, I think Emily and those Eevee girls are doing enough squealing for the whole of us." She smiled and pet the Eevee's chin which made it coo lightly. "You're so cute." She looked up at Emily, then quickly stood to her feet, taking a very serious pose. "You!" she shouted and Emily jumped. "You're entering the tournament, aren't you?"

"Hey, Michelle, and yes, I am," Emily spoke with a smile.

A glimmer appeared in Michelle's eyes and she took on an almost insane look on her face. "Very well then, I guess this means only one thing."

Emily tilted her head. "What would that be?"

Michelle pointed very dramatically at Emily. "You and I must compete to the best of our abilities and meet one another in the final match of the tournament!"

Emily rubbed the back of her neck. "Well, that would be great and all, but how do we know we'll be separated enough that we end up in the final? What if we get picked to go against one another in the first round?"

Michelle collapsed to the ground at those words, then grumbled as she slowly stood back up. "Emily...this is an anime fanfiction...as such, that's what you're supposed to say because that's just what people say in animes, and you're also not supposed to think about it!"

Kiai looked up from where he was sitting. "Besides which, the odds of you two meeting in the final round are about a million to one. As it happens, million-to-one chances crop up nine times out of ten, so I think you're safe."

"Exactly" spoke Michelle.

Emily smiled, "Well, guess I've got a rival now."

Michelle grinned, with an uncharacteristic spark of confidence in her eyes. "I've been working real hard since we last met, and I will win that Eevee, you can be sure of it."

Emily's eyes widened. "An Eevee is the tournament prize?" She snapped her head to the girls behind the table.

The one dressed up as Glaceon nodded. "First place winner gets an Eevee and their choice of Evolution stone," Michelle spoke.

Emily snapped her head back to Michelle. "How did you know?"

Michelle tilted her head and looked at her oddly. "I read about it online," she spoke, "the Sinnoh Eevee Club made a news post about it which was linked to the front page of the Kanto Eevee Club."

Emily's face looked set to burst. "There's a KANTO Eevee Club?" Kiai closed his eyes and calmly continued his petting.

"Well, duh, Eevee is a Kanto Pokemon after all...naturally there would be a club here in Kanto for it."

Emily grumbled and folded her arms over her chest. "Well nobody ever told me..." she spoke and turned back to the club's booth. "So, which evolution stones do you have that the winner will be able to choose from, just the normal three?"

The Glaceon girl shook her head. "Actually, no. We have something from all seven of Eevee's evolutions. The first three are your standard: Fire Stone, Water Stone, and Thunder Stone. But we also have these, which were discovered in the Orre region." She pulled out two small rocks. One looked bright and beautiful, the other seemed dark and rather plain. "One is called a Sun Shard, the other is called a Moon Shard. It is said they can counteract the need for there to be a specific time of day to evolve Eevee. For instance, an Eevee carrying the Sun Shard will evolve into Espeon whether it is day or night. Likewise, an Eevee with the Moon Shard will evolve into Umbreon regardless of time."

The Glaceon girl then put the shards away and pulled out two more shard-like rocks. "And these are shards from Moss Rock and Ice Rock, both from the Sinnoh Region. An Eevee holding these will evolve into Leafeon or Glaceon respectively, or at least that's the hope...no one's ever tried removing pieces of the rocks before...but we guarantee that either your Eevee will evolve, or you can bring it to the nearest Eevee Club in your region and we'll trade your evolution stone for any other of your choice."

"Wow, that's pretty cool actually," Emily spoke with a smile, then turned to Michelle. "All right, Michelle, you're on. I'll do my best to climb the ranks and fight you in the final round of the tournament."

Michelle nodded in response. "If you'll just sign here," the Glaceon girl spoke and handed them a clipboard. "Once you do that, you'll be all signed up. We'll give you a ticket and the tickets will randomly be selected tomorrow and placed into the tournament bracket accordingly. If at any time you wish to withdraw from the tournament, you are free to do so, just let us know. Last year we had a group of people enter but then not show up...so it messed up the tournament. So please, if you're not going to show, let us know ahead of time."

"Well, you've got at least two definites this year." said Michelle with a smile, as she jotted down her name and handed the clipboard to Emily.

"That's for sure," said Emily, writing her name underneath Michelle's.

The Glaceon girl looked down at Kiai. "And you? Are you interested?"

Kiai crained his neck in such a way as to not disturb the snoozing Eevee. "No, not big on Eevee's, but thanks for the offer." The five girls gave each other a "silly boys" glance and sighed in unison.

"I can't wait for the tournament," Emily spoke and turned to Kiai. "Well, I'm all signed up, so we just have to wait until tomorrow for the tournament."

"I can't wait, it's going to be awesome," Michelle spoke, then blinked as she turned. A strange sound, almost like disco music was coming from not too far away and it seemed to be getting closer. "What's that?" she asked and Emily turned in the direction Michelle had turned. It was there she saw a rather strange man. He wore a purple disco suit, and his hair was pulled up into a massive afro with one side of it being colored white, while the other side was colored red. Michelle noted that the disco man seemed to be doing the Moonwalk as he was making his way in their direction. At his side where two others. One was dressed in a blue shirt and jeans and had a mohawk on his head. The other wore a blue long-sleeved shirt with an orange jacket and khaki pants. His hair was covered by a strange hat that almost looked as if it had Mickey Mouse ears, but not quite, and he held a large boombox on his shoulder, which Michelle figured was the source of the disco music. All three of them each wore a different set of sunglasses as well.

"Eh, boss, you might want to look where you're going," the one in the jacket spoke, but it was too late. The afro man bumped, back first, into Emily, which made the man jump.

"Whoa!" he shouted and growled, whirling around. "Stop the music!" He stared hard at Emily. "Did you just throw off my rhythm?"

Emily blinked and gave the man a quizzitive look. "What are you talking about?" she asked. "You ran into me."

"She threw off my rhythm!" the afro man shouted and pointed at her. "You boys know what this means?" he asked as he turned to his lackeys. The two of them nodded in response. "I am Miror B, and nobody throws off my rhythm." He pulled out two pokeballs. "You and me are going to battle right here and right now, little missy."

"What the hell? If you had been watching where you were going-"

"SILENCE!" Miror B shouted. "Pull out your pokemon! This will be a dual battle!"

Emily sighed and shook her head. "You know what? Fine...I don't care..." She drew two of her pokeballs. "Shadow, Goldy, let's do this." She threw her pokeballs forward, releasing her Golduck and Umbreon.

Miror B smirked. "Let the music start!" he shouted and the man in the jacket flipped the boombox back on. At once, Miror B began to swirl with the music, then tossed his pokeballs forward, releasing two green Pokemon that looked like they were wearing Sombreros.

"Ludicolo, the carefree Pokemon," Emily's Pokedex responded. "If it hears festive music, all its muscles fill with energy. It can't help breaking out into a dance." Sure enough, as soon as the Ludicolo picked up on the music, they began to dance in rhythm with it.

Kiai's interest was finally piqued. He lovingly placed two fingers over the ears of the Eevee in his lap to drown out the music, and quietly noted to himself how Ludicolo, responding to music, is likely to get a power boost just as Psyduck gets one from having a headache. He figured Emily would pick up on this, and said nothing. "Alright cats," said Miror B, striking a pose and rocking his hips back and forth in time with the music. "Let *uh* get this party started with *uh* Mega Drain."

Both Ludicolo's waved their arms in rhythm with the music and Shadow and Goldy both felt energy being absorbed from them. "Shadow, Bite!" Emily shouted and Shadow rushed forward, quickly biting down hard on the Ludicolo making it howl in pain, this made Miror B jump a little, but he quickly stepped back into his rhythm. "Goldy, give it a Water Pulse!" Goldy pulled its arms to its side and a ball of water formed between its hands. It then threw the ball forward, striking one of the Ludicolo hard. However, it seemed mostly unaffected by the attack. Emily pulled her pokedex out once more and scanned Ludicolo's data quickly. "Great...it's almost completely immune to Water-type moves because it's a Water-Grass type..." She sighed. "However...Goldy, use Psychic!" Goldy's eyes began to glow and the Ludicolo that it had attacked a moment ago with its Water Pulse was quickly struck with a powerful psychic blast. However, even that seemed to do very little. "These things must be pretty strong..."

The music changed its beat, becoming faster and harder and, obviously, louder. Miror B pointed a long, slender finger at Emily, still shaking his hips. His two comrades clapped in unison and struck a pose, now getting into the dance themselves. "Strong enough to *uh uh* take you down girly." The beat hit its crescendo and leveled off, and all five of them began dancing in unison. Miror B spoke in time with the music, "Show 'em what we got, Return attack this little snot. Uh!" In perfect harmony, the two Ludicolo leapt at their respective targets with raised fists and a nasty look in their eyes.

"Dodge it!" Emily shouted and Shadow barely managed to avoid the attack by rush to the side. Goldy, however, was struck hard, knocking it back and causing it to roll a bit. "Goldy! Are you okay?"

"Golduck," Goldy spoke, quickly standing to its feet.

Emily nodded. "All right, he wants to play that way? Let's give him a taste of his own medicine. Goldy, Shadow, use Return!" Shadow's gold rings seemed to glow brightly as she dashed forward rather quickly. Before the Ludicolo could react, it was sent flying sky high, slamming into the ground a few feet away.

"What? No!" Miror B shouted with horror on his face. Goldy as well rushed forward slamming its palm into the other Ludicolo, sending it tumbling backwards. "No way!" Miror B shouted in horror as he noticed his Ludicolo had been wiped out. "Good show, girly, good show." He returned his pokemon, then drew another pokeball. "I'll only need this one to wipe you out, though." He tossed his third pokeball forth and from it came a strange creature. It looked like a head carved out of rock with a rather large red nose. Two arms were on its sides, both of which were short and stubby, while its feet were the same. The moment it caught the beat of the music, its arms began to shift as it began dancing.

"Another dancing Pokemon?" Emily pointed her pokedex forward.

"Nosepass, the Compass Pokemon, the Pokedex responded. "Its nose is a magnet. As a result, this Pokémon always keeps its face pointing north."

"Always faces north, huh? Interesting..." She looked up at it and Miror B smirked.

"Nosepass, give it a Shadow Wave," he spoke in rhythm with the music and Nosepass's eyes began to glow. Its body erupted in a dark aura which then shot out in a wave of darkness.

"What the hell?" was all Emily could say before the attack struck both Shadow and Goldy, sending them flying back and wiping them out in a single shot. "That's no ordinary Pokemon..." she spoke as she called her Pokemon back, then drew two more Pokeballs. "Steameon! Maneon! Let's do this!" she shouted, unleashing her two newest additions to her team.

There was a colossal squeal of interest from the Eevee booth as Steameon and Maneon emerged, but was quickly drowned out as Miror B began another annoying song, "Not ordinary is right, *uh* we got powah dark as night, *oh* girly gonna lose this fight, *ah* gonna knock you outta sight. Shadow Chill." Nosepass raised its stubby arm-like appendages to its nose and made a motion as if it was sneezing, but instead a blast of ice heavily laced with swirls of midnight blackness shot out at Maneon.

"Watch out!" Emily shouted and Maneon quickly jumped to the side, barely avoiding the attack. "I don't like this thing at all..." she spoke and gave a low growl. "All right, Maneon, give it an Aura Sphere!" Maneon opened its mouth and an orb of blue energy appeared. The orb shot forward and Nosepass took the attack hard. "Now Steamon, use Shadow Ball!" Steameon opened its mouth and unleashed a blast of darkness that quickly knocked the Nosepass back.

"Nosepass!" Miror B shouted in horror, but he then realized his horror was not needed as the creature slowly stood back to its feet.

"That thing took both attacks full force and it barely seems to have done anything..." Emily spoke, biting her lip hard.

Miror B laughed. "Give them a Shadow Wave again!" he shouted and the dark aura erupted around the Nosepass once again.

"Watch out!" Emily shouted and the wave of darkness shot forward. Both Steameon and Maneon took the blast full force, barely being able to withstand the wave of darkness. "Are you two all right?" Emily asked and her Pokemon nodded. "All right, let's wipe that thing out before it attacks again. Maneon, use Seismic Toss!" Maneon rushed forward and quickly flung Nosepass into the air. It launched itself from the ground, then slammed its paw against the Nosepass, sending it hurling into the ground hard.

"Nosepass!" Miror B shouted in horror once more, and this time, Nosepass showed no signs of moving.

"Did...we get it?" Emily asked as she stared at the Nosepass.

Nosepass very slowly crawled out of the small crater it was left in. It seemed to be on its last legs. Without word from Miror B, it switched to its defensive mode. A low hum filled the air as the magnetic field around Nosepass grew in intensity. At first nothing happened, then all of a sudden the boombox flew from the ground at Nosepass and stuck to him. Several bits of gaudy jewelry worn by Miror B and his compatriots stretched away from their bodies and flew off, also connecting to Nosepass. Miror B screeched in horror as he dashed toward his boom box and tried desperately to dislodge it. Several eyebrows were raised.

Miror B gave a low growl then pulled out his pokeball and slammed it against Nosepass, forcing it to return. His lackeys quickly gathered up his boom box and jewelry and Miror B turned to Emily. "You...you threw off my rhythm, and now I just can't get it back!" He turned to his lackeys. "Let's make a full retreat!" His lackeys nodded and Miror B turned back to Emily one last time. "I'll keep this in mind! When next we meet, you won't be so lucky." He turned and rushed off, his lackeys following behind.

Emily scratched the back of her neck. "That guy was weird..." she spoke before holding up her pokeballs. "Maneon, Steameon, return!" The two pokemon were zapped back into her pokeballs, and she re-attached them to her belt.

"Where did you find those?" the Glaceon girl asked from behind the booth and Emily turned.

"Well...I'm not really sure..." she scratched the back of her neck nervously. "Some trainer left them behind...I'm not quite sure how they evolved into these..."

The Leafeon girl gave a sigh of happiness. "A nice strong fighting-type Eevee like that would be so nice to have," she spoke.

"What was the other one?" the Glaceon girl asked.

"Steameon? It's a ghost-type," Emily responded.

"Ghost and Fighting type Eeveelutions..." the Leafeon girl spoke, "wonder what else it can turn into. Maybe it can become a big strong Dragon-type!"

"Or a Flying-type!" the Glaceon girl spoke.

"I'd love a Steel-type," Michelle spoke, then all three gave a sigh. "Eevee is so amazing."

Kiai had watched Miror B run for a few moments until he was lost from sight. "That was an interesting pokemon," he spoke a moment later, "very unlike anything I've ever seen. Has anyone ever heard of anything like that?" He turned to the girls and looked up at them. Their silent expressions gave him more than enough information than he was looking for. "Yeah," he continued, casually changing the topic, "I'd so love a Bug-type Eevee." This was met with several high-pitched "EEWWWW!"s, though at that point, he didn't mind.

"Bug Pokemon totally creep me out!" Emily and Michelle shouted in unison. This made the two of them laugh a little when they realized it. It was at that moment that the Eevee on Kiai's lap perked up. It sniffed the air a moment before its eyes began to shine with excitement. In an instant, it ran off, leaving everyone but the girls behind the booth left to stare. "It's time for us to feed the Eevee," the Leafeon girl spoke with a smile. "That particular one is always ecstatic about food and is always the first to the food bowls."

"Well, Kiai's lap is free now at least," Emily spoke with a smirk. Just for fun, she plopped down on his lap and nuzzled against him. "Yeap, I can see why Eevee would love to sit right here."

Kiai closed his eyes painfully and obediently wrapped his arms around Emily, continuing to pet her just like he did the Eevee. A harmony of "Awww!"s emanated from the girls, with an additional "That's so cute!". Several bits of manhood broke off from Kiai and floated ruefully away.

Emily giggled before standing to her feet, then grabbing Kiai's hand and helping him up. "Well, we should get moving on," she spoke. "We've seen about everything there is to see at this booth, and there's still a lot more to see, too." She turned to the Eevee girls and waved. "I'll see you all tomorrow at the tournament."

The Leafeon girl bowed. "Have fun with the rest of the convention. There's a lot of other fun booths to check out."

Emily nodded then pulled out her pokegear. "Hmm...it's almost eleven."

"Almost eleven? Oh my gosh!" Michelle shrieked. "I've got to hurry to the Pokemon Center! They're doing a Dark-type Breeding sermon, and I want to learn how to properly raise this Poochyena I got off a trainer yesterday..."

After walking a few paces to stretch his legs, Kiai turned to Emily. "I'd like to check out that legends conference, but if that starts at noon we've only got an hour…and it looked like it was going to last a while. You want to grab a bite before we go?"

Emily nodded. "That would probably be a good idea." She opened the schedule. "It looks like their pushing the main conferences, because the other places don't have anything going on during them. So a good majority of the convention will probably be there. So, yeah, grabbing food now would probably be a good idea." She looked around for a moment. "Looks like the food vendors are over there." She pointed to where there seemed to be a line of booths, all with food-related signs upon them. "I could go for some tacos right now, actually."

"You can always find fried dough at these types of things," spoke Kiai as they started down the path. He looked around a bit to make sure they were as out of earshot as they were going to get and he whispered to Emily, "Michelle recognized us. Granted she grew up with us, but maybe we should opt for fake noses as well as these glasses, eh? Maybe some fake eyebrows as well? Big, thick caterpillar eyebrows?" He playfully nudged Emily with his elbow.

Emily scowled at Kiai. "Well, we've been fine so far, other then Michelle. Nobody else has noticed who we are, and Amy did seem pretty confident these glasses would be enough to hide our identities." She shrugged. "Speaking of Amy...umm..." she turned a bit red and looked away from Kiai. "Did you notice anything different about her yesterday? Like...body-wise?"

"What do you mean?" Kiai asked a little dumbfounded.

"Well...I don't know why...but...I don't recall her boobs being as big as they were yesterday..."

Kiai blushed slightly. He hated being in these positions, but he knew the only way out was to just be honest. "Well I can't say I noticed a difference, but they were fairly…ample. Not that I don't like yours, of course. Yours are fantastic."

Emily blushed deeper and nodded. "I...I don't really know why I noticed...I was just thinking about it last night...I remember our lives when we were younger...I was always jealous of her because she developed faster and bigger than I did...of course, we are a few years apart in age...but still..."

Kiai gave Emily a long sideways glance. After some thought he decided to test the waters. "It might have been just the clothes she was wearing," he said, sounding nonchalant, "but her waist and hips had a nice curve to them." He gave Emily another glance, then added, as he watched her expression carefully, "Maybe she put on a bit of weight, and that filled her body out?"

Emily looked as if she was heavy in thought. After a moment, she sighed and shrugged. "I don't know...maybe I'll just ask her when I see her next...we'll probably run into her, Ash, and Misty after the Con closes tonight. I wouldn't be surprised." She folded her arms and looked up. "I'm also a bit curious about her relational status...I mean...does she have a boyfriend? Or maybe even a girlfriend? Is she single? She's always been one to put her Pokemon training before boys...so the latter is actually very possible..."

"Busy girl like that, I seriously doubt she's in a relationship. Besides which, she's a celebrity. If she was seeing someone, she wouldn't be able to keep it quiet." Their walk had slowed somewhat, so they were still a distance to the food vendors, who were starting to form some longish lines, due to it being just after 11 and a conference in less than an hour. Apparently getting an early lunch wasn't just Kiai's idea.

Emily nodded. "That's true. I'm also sure Amy would have said something if she was in a relationship." She looked forward at the food vendors, then looked them each over now that they had a clear view of the signs and what they were. "Crazy Tacos...I bet they serve tacos," Emily said without even realizing what she had said.

"Yeah, they probably do." said Kiai, slapping her playfully on the back. "And what an observant person you are to notice that." he added.

Emily scowled at him. "Yeah, yeah, I know, I said something retarded. Let's just go get some food." It took them a few minutes of standing in line before the two of them had gotten to the vendors and bought some food. From there, they made their way to a table and they sat down. Emily reached into her purse and pulled out some Pokemon food and set it into a couple of bowls which she then sat on the ground. She then released her Pokemon, who happily sat down by the bowls and ate. "So, we'll probably want to hit the conference next, what about after that?"

Kiai picked a piece off of his fried dough and nommed it. "Hmm…" He reached into Emily's pocket, ignoring her protest, and pulled out the schedule. Tracing his finger down the first day, his eyes immediately caught sight of what was going on at the gym. "Hey, how about that…they're opening up the gym for a free for all…that might be interesting…"

Emily thought for a moment and nodded. "Yeah, that might be interesting. We'll have to check it out. Maybe we'll compete a bit." She took a bite of her taco, then looked to her Pokemon. "Well, even after that battle, Shadow and Goldy aren't too badly hurt it looks like. They've more or less managed to recover from it. I still can't help but wonder what that thing was..." She opened her pokedex and looked up Nosepass. "There's nothing in here about Nosepass being able to use any of those moves it knew..."

Kiai's face turned grim as he stuffed another piece of fried dough in his mouth. "Something was up with that. No pokemon gets that powerful just by training... and that guy clearly was not a serious trainer." He stopped his words there, though his brain continued, and the expression on his face made it clear that he didn't like the circumstances behind that battle.

Emily nodded. "Yeah, there was definitely something very strange about that guy and his Pokemon. His Ludicolo weren't very strong, but that Nosepass...there was definitely something unnatural about it...I just wish I knew what...I wonder if Professor Oak would know...but even if he does...how would we explain the experience to him? It looked normal...but that power it had was something else..."

"Those attacks.. those were different, they all started with Shadow.." thought Kiai. "Maybe that has something to do with it?"

Emily nodded. "It is possible." She looked down at her Pokemon. "Still...something like that...my Pokemon aren't the strongest...but we still almost got wiped out in one shot..."

Kiai shrugged as he continued to pick apart his fried dough. "Worth a shot to ask…the worst case is he doesn't know. Actually...worse case would be he does know…and it's not good..."

Emily nodded. "Yeah, I just hope it's not another Team Rocket thing...I mean..." she looked around for a moment before continuing. "We may have basically wiped them out, but as Amy said, who knows how deep their influence is..." She sighed and leaned back in her chair, looking up at the sky. "Oh well, we'll have to contact Professor Oak about it tonight, maybe talk to Ash and Amy about it as well." She took a bite of her taco then looked out to the convention. People were getting up from their tables and she pulled out her pokegear and looked at it. "Almost noon," she spoke, then looked up at Kiai. "We should be heading to the Main Stage here in a few minutes."

They didn't need to follow a map or ask directions this time around, as nearly everyone was pausing what they were doing and heading toward the stage. They followed the growing crowd of people until they got right back to where they started, in front of the main stage. A few people were mulling about on the stage, and there seemed to be some discussion going on. From their faces, they weren't happy about something.

"Hey, it's Dawn and Zoey," Emily spoke as she pointed out the two on the stage. "That girl...Zoey introduced her as Cynthia, didn't she?" she asked, noting the girl standing next to them. The three of them were having what seemed to be a heated discussion with two others on the stage.

"I can't believe this!" Cynthia shouted and folded her arms over her chest. "How do you expect me to run a Conference with nothing to show?"

"Well...you see...umm..." one of the men began but Cynthia just brushed him off.

"Forget it, I'll think of something..." she turned to Zoey and Dawn. "I'll be a few more minutes then we expected I guess...I have to find something to show...I can't go explaining all of this without having something to show..." She stepped backstage and Dawn sighed.

After a moment, Dawn stepped forward and grabbed a microphone. "Hello, everyone," she spoke. "I'm sorry to say this, but the Sinnoh Legends Conference will be delayed for about ten minutes. We're having some technical difficulties..."

Kiai cupped his hands to his mouth. "Don't give up!" he called with a smile, and pumped his fist in a casual cheer. Dawn looked down from the stage at him and gave him a half-hearted smile, then turned and walked back in what one might call a huff to Cynthia and Zoey. She passed a few short words to them and they hurried off the stage.

"Man...Amy wasn't kidding when she said that it seemed like no one knew what was going on with this convention..." Emily pulled out the pamphlet. "There's no map to this place like there should have been, nobody knows what the Sinnoh Tournament prize is because no one had it until this morning, and now Cynthia's presentation is going to be late because something's gone wrong...I wonder what else could go wrong in this convention..."

"And it's only day one," Kiai pointed out. The murmuring that was slowly rising up from the crowd seemed to reflect the disappointment. "They're losing them…" Kiai muttered to no one in particular, as his eyes surveyed the multitudes. "Emily…y'think…maybe we should entertain the crowd a bit?"

Emily blinked. "Entertain the crowd? I'd be fine with that...but how? I mean, I suppose we could take our glasses off and hop up on the stage...but I think that would cause a bit of a ruckus..."

"Nah.. obviously we can't do that.. .but we gotta do something, they're our friends…they worked so hard for this…" Kiai bit his thumb, his shoulders tense as he tried to think of what to do.

Emily turned back up to look at the stage when she noticed someone moving rather quickly through the crowd. It didn't take long before the person jumped up on stage, revealing herself to be Michelle. She turned, looking back at the crowd with a rather determined look on her face. "So you're all just going to leave?" she spoke as she grabbed a microphone off a nearby stand. The crowd turned back to look at her. "Just because one person had a technical difficulty that was out of their control, you're all going to leave?"

"Why shouldn't we?" one of the members of the crowd spoke up. "They should have been prepared."

"I'll agree with you, but even the most prepared people can have technical difficulties. I used to be in the school plays, and I can't tell you how many times we had to wait to go on because of some technical difficulty that showed itself five minutes before show time." Michelle gave a sigh. "If it's such a problem, then I'll fill the space for them." She turned to Dawn and Zoey, then pulled a CD from her pack. "Can you play this for me?" Dawn nodded and took the CD, rushing off to the sound booth. Michelle turned back. "Again, I used to be in my school's plays when I was younger, and I loved singing. So please, for a few minutes, stick around. I'll sing, and then they should be ready. If not, then just...stick around...they put a lot of work into this Convention...it's not right to just blow them off for one small problem that was out of their control."

Michelle closed her eyes as music began to play over the speakers. Michelle then began to sing, and it seemed a good portion of the crowd was struck by how well this young woman sang. Emily smiled, remembering the plays she and Michelle had been in. She was always one of the singers, while Emily had always been in the background. She didn't really like acting herself, but Michelle was different, she enjoyed the stage and Emily was always there to cheer her on.

The whole crowd watched spellbound as Michelle's words lifted and soared above their heads. Emily seemed to be enjoying an old memory, but for Kiai, who had never been to the Pallet Town public schools, the words were like that of an angel. Even Zoey and Dawn, who were supposed to be setting things up, were caught for a moment and listened intently. The words rang out so clear that even the Pidgies stopped their songs to listen. When the final note was carried away, there was a deafening pause as the onlookers struggled to find their feet on the world once more, and then it was Michelle's turn to be floored as the lot of them erupted in thunderous applause.

"That was amazing!" Dawn spoke as she stepped up next to Michelle.

"She's not kidding," Zoey spoke as she stepped up to her as well. "You have a very beautiful voice." This made Michelle turn a rather deep shade of red.

Luckily for her, though, Cynthia stepped in from the back only a moment later with a smile on her face. "Thank you," she spoke very serenely. "I was worried we'd lose the crowd, but you helped us out tremendously." She looked at Dawn and Zoey with a look that seemed to state she was ready and Dawn and Zoey nodded.

"All right, everyone, we thank you for your patience, and for the wonderful music presented to us by this lovely young lady," Dawn spoke as she grabbed a microphone off the stand. "What was your name?"

"Michelle Maybelle."

"All right, everyone give Michelle Maybelle one last round of applause as she steps off the stage." The crowd erupted once more into thunderous applause and Michelle covered her face with her hands to hide her blushing. She really didn't believe she was this good at all, but she seemed to have surprised everyone. With that, she then stepped off the stage, rejoining the group. "Welcome to the first conference here at the Fifth Annual Kanto Pokemon Association Sinnoh Region Convention...man that's a mouthful to say everytime..."

"You could just say Sinnoh Con like everyone else," Zoey spoke as she stepped up to Dawn, nudging her lightly.

"But that's not its actual name."

Zoey shrugged. "Hey, that's what everyone calls it, and the people in charge never said you couldn't just use that name."

Dawn sighed. "Well, it would be less of a mouthful..." She looked back up. "Anyway, Zoey and I are here to once again introduce the Sinnoh League Champion. She will be retelling some of the different legends of the Sinnoh Region. Everyone give a big round of applause for Cynthia!"

Dawn and Zoey stepped aside as Cynthia stepped forward and took the stage. "Hello, everyone," she spoke with a bow. "Since Dawn already told you what I'm here for, we might as well get right into it..." She rubbed the back of her neck. "I must apologize, however, as you know, we hit a bit of a snag. The CD I had that held the pictures of the statues and stained glass windows that tell these legends I will be telling you was lost, as such, I had to find some other images. So, this won't be as spectacular as I had expected it to be...However, I did manage to find some rough drawings of what I needed, so there will still be images for you to see, but they won't be what I was supposed to showcase." Cynthia pulled out a small remote and pushed a button upon it, causing the screen above her to switch, showing nothing but black.

"In the time before time, there was nothing in our universe but the void," Cynthia began. "It was at the beginning of time itself when a small egg appeared in the center of the void." She pushed a button on the remote in her hand once more and a drawing of a small egg appeared in the center of the screen. "It is said that the void attempted to consume the egg, but that the egg burst open and a thousand arms reached out into the void, forcing it back." She pushed the remote again, switching to an image of a circle of light now expanding out of the egg, each ray of light looking like an arm of some form.

"It is said that, from this, the Original One appeared." Cynthia pushed a button on the remote and an image of a large creature appeared on the screen. It had four legs, which it looked like it stood upon, and around its waist was a golden band which went out into two semi-circles around its body. It seemed to have a mask of sorts over its face. "This creature, the Original One, has come to be known as Arceus. It is said that Arceus then poured his life out and created two beings. One was called Palkia, and the other Dialga." She pushed another button and the screen switched once more. It now showed two creatures upon it. One stood on all fours and had a fin-like piece sticking out its backside, though it had a tail as well. Its head was long, extending out like it was wearing a long helmet on its head. A large chestpiece covered the front of it as well, encasing a rather large gem in the center. This was Dialga.

The second stood on its rather large hind legs. Its arms seemed almost mechanical in nature, and on the shoulders of each arm was a large gem as well. It's neck was rather long and extended out to what seemed to be a mask that covered its face like both Dialga and Arceus had. Two large wings were on its back as well. This was Palkia. "To these two creatures Arceus gave the abilities of Time and Space. Dialga would therefore create and govern time, while Palkia would create and govern Space."

"It was from this that the universe was first formed, and it is said that Arceus created another universe, a mirror of this world, and gave it a governor as well. This governor is known as Giratina." Cynthia pushed a button switching the image on the screen to a large worm-like creature with massive wings. A mask seemed to cover its face as well, and several small spikes seemed to expand out from its body. "The point of this world was to maintain the balance of our world. Should something become corrupt in our world, this Reverse World would change as well to create a balance, thus preventing our world from being destroyed by corruption."

"Arceus, realizing he now needed a purpose for our universe, created from himself three beings. One who would give knowledge to the universe, one who would give willpower, and one who would give emotion. These were Uxie, Azelf, and Mesprit." Cynthia switched the image to an image of three small creatures, each having long tails and looking relatively the same. The only difference was their heads. Uxie had a large, saucer-like head, while Mesprit's head had four long ear-like parts hanging off of its head. Azelf on the other hand had a very pointed head.

"From here Arceus created everything, slowly creating many different creatures to aid in the task of creation. Finally, when the world existed, and all seemed right, Arceus created man and left the world to him. However, he noticed man was not happy in this world alone, and so he created another being, one that he would give the task of creating more creatures. This creature is what we know today as Mew."

Cynthia changed the image once more, showing a small cat-like creature with a tail about as long as its body. "It is said that, from Mew, all Pokemon were created, including more of its own kind. It is said that, at one time, a great war then erupted in the world, one seeking to claim the powers of Mew. To end the war, the Mew sacrificed themselves, becoming a lesser creature, and retaining only a single one of their abilities; the ability to transform."

"Wait, Cynthia, do you mean to say you believe Mew became Ditto?" Dawn asked when she noticed there was a moment of silence in Cynthia's speech.

"Yes," Cynthia responded, turning to Dawn. "Legend dictates there were hundreds upon thousands of Mew once in history, and after the war, there were none. Also, Ditto is the only Pokemon at current that is known to be able to transform like it can. Its DNA holds the genetic code of every Pokemon in existence, and according to research on Mew fossils, the same is true about them. I do not believe this is a coincidence."

"That's amazing, I've never heard of that part before," Dawn spoke in awe. "I mean, I've heard the story of the Original One, but the idea of Mew becoming Ditto."

Zoey patted Dawn on the shoulder. "Well, you learn something new every day, right?" she asked, which got a nod from Dawn.

"You have more to tell, right?"

"Of course, I still have one other legend to tell," Cynthia pushed a button on her remote, switching to an image of Arceus, this time surrounded by sixteen small rectangles. "This next legend is the Legend of Michina. The Land of Michina has always been a thriving land, but there was a time when it was not. Long ago, a meteor was threatening our world, and the Pokemon sensed this. They managed to alert a man named Damos and warn him of what was coming."

Cynthia switched the image to show a picture of a meteor flying through the sky, Arceus could be seen at the bottom of the image. "Damos called out to Arceus to save the world, fearing the meteor would destroy them. Arceus heard his cry and appeared in time to stop the meteor. However, it was not without a grave consequence."

Cynthia changed the image once more, showing Arceus now lying on the ground, appearing half-dead. A man was standing over his body holding a rather large, rectangular object. "The meteor badly injured Arceus, and brought him near death. However, Damos discovered that Arceus carried with him sixteen Life Plates, one for each element. With each plate, he was resistant to everything, but if those plates were removed, he would be easily destroyed. The meteor had knocked the plates out of Arceus, leaving him with very little power of his own and causing him to almost be destroyed in saving the land. Damos, however, returned the plates to Arceus and revitalized him."

Cynthia changed the image once more, showing Arceus giving the man an orb. "As thanks, Arceus took five of his plates and combined them into the Jewel of Life so that Damos could revitalize his land which had almost been destroyed by the meteor. He then appointed a time when Damos would return the Jewel to him. However...Damos betrayed Arceus."

Cynthia changed the image, showing Arceus being attacked by several different Pokemon all at once. "Arceus was enraged by this and swore vengeance upon the world. However, a boy carrying an electric Pokemon appeared as if from nowhere and revealed the terrible truth. Damos was but a pawn and instead, someone else had taken control of Damos' mind and used him to betray Arceus."

Cynthia changed the image one last time, showing the man reaching out for Arceus. "The boy freed Damos from the man's mind control and Damos returned the Jewel of Life to Arceus. None know of what happened to the man who tried to prevent the return of the Jewel of Life, but what we do know is a terrible fate was avoided on that day."

"I remember that one," Dawn spoke when she again noticed Cynthia pause, stating the legend she was telling was finished. "Ash, Brock, and I were in Michina and we were told the same legend."

"Wait, you got to actually go to Michina?" Zoey asked, sounding rather jealous.

"Yeah, it's an amazing place...and the legend was so amazing..."

"I'm jealous…I've never been there myself…" Zoey shrugged it off after that then turned back to Cynthia. "Do you have anything else for us, Cynthia?"

"No, no others that I have imagery for," Cynthia said with a solemn nod. "There are many legends of the Sinnoh Region, but if I was to tell all of them, especially without proper imagery, we would be here for years. Besides, they'd probably all die of boredom." Cynthia rubbed the back of her neck as she stated that.

"Very true, Cynthia," Dawn spoke with a giggle. "If anyone wants to know more legends of the Sinnoh Region, you're all free to take a look around the Main Stage here. Once we're off-stage some of the stage hands will be bringing out different plaques. There is a different legend on each one of them."

"Everyone enjoy the rest of today, and don't forget to register for tomorrow's tournament!" Zoey called out. "Mysterial says that if you don't have your Battle Pass by the end of the Poketopia Conference, you will not be allowed to enter the tournament!"

"Enjoy the Convention everyone!" Dawn shouted out before her, Cynthia, and Zoey stepped backstage.

After the applause died down and the murmuring picked up, Kiai turned to Emily. "Hey, you know, that Poketopia thing is tomorrow. We better go get registered, you know, beat the crowd."

"Don't bother, the crowd will beat you." said a familiar but altogether unfriendly voice.

Kiai took one of his standard deep breaths and turned around. "Hi Alex." he spoke. Alex, uncharacteristically, did not have his smug, over-confident grin plastered across his face. Instead, he appeared genuinely pissed off, and more than a little bit disheveled. His face was gaunt and fierce. Rather than being curious at the change, Kiai was simply delighted. "Wow what happened," Kiai casually asked, "did you crawl into bed with a horny Primeape?"

Alex balled his fist, ready to strike at Kiai, but he made no move. "You watch your mouth," he scowled, "you'll get yours in time."

"What're you talking about, Alex? We all know you're a prick but this is special, even for you."

"You wanna know the truth, asswipe? You cost me a damn good job. I would have been set for life if it weren't for you."

"…Cost you a job…what the hell are you talking about?"

Alex glared at him as he turned away. "See you at the tournament," he spoke, "and you will lose this time."

Emily growled. "That Alex...he gets on my nerves..." she spoke then folded her arms over her chest. "I wonder what the hell he's talking about, though...we haven't done anything that could affect his life..." She sighed then turned back to the stage as she watched the stage hands bring up the plaques Cynthia had made mention of. She pulled out her pokegear and looked at the time. "It's almost two...we should probably get all registered and then head off to the Celadon Gym if we want to get in on any of the Free Battle action." She turned and saw a stand near to the Main Stage and noticed the crowd was quickly beginning to flock to it. "That must be where they are registering for the tournament." Kiai nodded and the two quickly got in line.

It took several minutes for them to get up to stand where a rather middle-aged man sat behind a computer. "We wanted to register for the tournament," Emily spoke.

The man behind the stand nodded. "Name?"

"Umm...Em...err...Elisa Denhom." she spoke, realizing it was probably bad to use her real name.

The man nodded. "Do you have the six Pokemon you plan to use for the tournament with you?" Emily nodded. "Then set them over here." He pointed to a nearby machine. Emily set her pokeballs on it and the machine dinged after a moment. "Now just stand over there to get your picture taken and we'll have your Battle Pass for you in just a minute." She nodded again and did as she was told. Sure enough, a minute later she was handed a small card similar to her trainer card, but it showed her six Pokemon on it as well as a headshot with the name "Elisa Denhom" on it.

Kiai was next behind her. "Name?" spoke the man.

"Chris Pine."

"And do you have your six pokemon?"

"I sure do." The man talked Kiai through the procedure, and he examined his ID alongside Emily. "I look so weird with glasses…" he whispered to her. "I'm just glad they didn't ask for our Trainer IDs...we didn't get our names changed on those."

"Damn, you're right…I guess probably because this isn't a Kanto tournament, our Kanto IDs didn't matter." Emily nodded. "I think we were lucky. In either case, it seems we're all registered for the tournament." Emily flipped the card over to look at the back. "This is a pretty fancy pass for just a tournament."

"It's not just for the tournament," a voice spoke and Emily looked up to see a girl with rather long red hair. She wore a purple dress that ended just above her knees and was semi frilly at the bottom. "My name's Calus. I used to be a Mt. Battle Area Leader in the Orre region about five years ago. I quit after being beaten by a kid named Michael, though...he was rather impressive and made me realize I still had a lot more to learn about Pokemon, so I went to train. I've wanted a chance to show off my skills since then, and I figured this tournament is a great way to do it."

"That's great," Emily spoke with a smile. "But what did you mean by 'the pass is for more than just the tournament'?"

"That's an official Poketopia Battle Pass," Calus spoke. "Simply put, Mysterial is hoping this tournament will boost the amount of people that will come to Poketopia by giving anyone who participates in the tournament a free Poketopia Battle Pass that is good until the end of the year. The SS Aqua will be leaving in two weeks from Vermillion City for anyone who got a pass from the tournament and is interested in battling at Poketopia."

"Wow," spoke Kiai, looking at his pass with renewed interest. "Sounds like a mighty fun time…might be worth checking out, if we could manage it."

"It would be well worth it if you did," spoke Calus. "Mysterial is an eccentric but powerful Pokemon master, and the opportunity to see him in action, however fleeting, would be well worth it."

"Is that so..." spoke Kiai, "I think I may just go to learn a thing or two."

Calus laughed, "You don't learn anything from him unless you're already a recognized Champion. Unless you're at that level, his skills will far, far exceed yours, to the point where you'd be lucky just to recognize you've been defeated."

"He sounds powerful..." Emily spoke, turning to look at Kiai.

Calus nodded. "In Poketopia, whoever completes all of the Colosseums gets a chance to enter the Stargazer Colosseum. In that you are sent up against all of the Colosseum Leaders. Defeat them, and you get a chance to fight Mysterial himself. In the course of the three years Poketopia has been up, hundreds have fought Mysterial, but only three so far have claimed the title of 'Champion'. Mysterial is a very powerful Pokemon Master."

"Calus!" a voice shouted and Calus squeaked.

"I have to go, that's my boyfriend. I hope I'll see you two at the tournament, bye!" Calus turned and ran off after that.

Kiai waved to the back end of Calus as she ran off. "Interesting girl…wonder if that'll be her only cameo…" spoke Kiai, before turning his interest back to his tournament pass.

Emily glanced down at her Pokegear, noticing it had taken about fourty-five minutes to get through the line and get their passes. "Well, what do we want to do now? It's almost three." She pulled out the schedule. "There are a few shows going on, or we could hit the Free Battle. It would give us a chance to see some of the other trainers here, maybe a chance to test our skills a bit. It's also at the Celadon Gym, so we might be able to meet up with Erika and schedule a Gym match after the Convention if we wanted to do that."

"As much as I love business," spoke Kiai, stretching happily, "I think, for the next few days, I'm going to focus on pleasure. I'm not going to worry about badges until the convention is over. As for where to go next, I'm sort of interested in that Free Battle. What do you think?"

Emily nodded. "Sounds like a good plan to me. We can head over to the Gym and check it out." With that, the two made their way through the crowd and to the Celadon City Gym. It wasn't hard to spot due to it being a rather large round building in the north of the park with a roof that looked much like the top of a Vileplume's head. The automatic door slid open as Emily and Kiai entered, their eyes wide as they noticed the entire place was like a greenhouse in that the walls were all made of glass and the entire inside of the building seemed to be filled with all sorts of plants and Pokemon, though Emily guess they weren't wild Pokemon. "This place is beautiful."

"Yeah," said Kiai, equally impressed. "But where's the battleground?" he spoke as he gazed around.

A voice somewhere in the shrubbery spoke up, "Follow the stone path on your right, take the first gravel fork on your left, and follow that down until it turns to dirt."

Kiai and Emily looked around for the voice, but couldn't find it. "Er.. thank you.. er.. mister.." spoke Emily.

The voice replied, "Roger. Roger the shrubber."

"Mister Roger. Thank you." The two of them walked along the path, forgetting almost immediately that they were in a gym at all, but rather in a glorious arboreatum. They followed the instructions as the man said; the paths were clearly marked and impeccably well-kept. They passed through a low, shady arch of grapevine before the area opened up to a wide grass field with an earthen mound at either end, and several logs and large stones on either side. There was currently a trainer on each mound and several on the logs and stones; there seemed to be a battle in progress.

"If I didn't know any better," spoke Kiai as he looked around, "I'd say this is the battleground.

"Indeed it is," said a soft voice from behind them. They both turned to see a young, gentle-looking girl with purple hair tucked back in a red hairband, and wearing a conservative green kimono with several dirt and grass stains on her sleeves and fingertips.

Emily bowed to the girl. "Hello, my name is E...lisa," she spoke, almost forgetting to use her fake name, "and this is my boyfriend, Chris. We came because we heard the Free Battles were occurring here?"

The girl nodded. "That they are, we've got quite a few interesting trainers here already actually." She gave a bow. "My name is Erika by the way, I'm the Gym Leader here. You may already know this, but the Gym will be closed during the Convention, at least as a Gym anyway, that way trainers can come here for the Free Battles."

Emily nodded. "Yeah, we anticipated as such. We're not really ready to try claiming any badges yet, anyway." She rubbed the back of her neck. "Kind of had a rough couple weeks, we're using the Con to kind of relax." She spoke these words, trying not to say anything that would reveal their real identities.

Erika gasped, putting her hands to her lips. "Oh my, were you two involved in the events at Silph Company as well?"

"NO!" spoke Kiai, obviously a lot louder than he intended. He coughed quickly and continued, "No, not at all. We weren't even there at the time. We…uh…" He floundered for a bit, then went for broke: "A mutual friend needed help rearing a Charizard."

Kiai and Emily were relieved when Erika's expression of genuine concern turned into one of near horror. "Oh you poor things," she spoke, "I have heard they can be quite difficult. Well. No playing with fire when you're in here, alright?"

"Heh heh…wouldn't dream of it." said Kiai, relieved.

Emily gave a sort of nervous chuckle as she rubbed the back of her neck again nervously. "So...how does the Free Battle thing work?" she asked after a rather awkward moment of silence.

"It's quite simple, really," Erika spoke. "You sign up over here for the Free Battle, then we call people up at random and people get to fight each other. We have a machine here for quick revitalization of your Pokemon after each battle as well." Erika gestured over to a small yellow machine that had room for six balls on it as well as a few buttons.

"What if we don't want to fight specific people? Like...I really don't want to fight my boyfriend...he'd probably kick my ass."

Erika giggled a little at the statement. "You're always free to decline a challenge, in which case someone else is picked out at random."

Emily nodded. "That makes sense, I like that idea."

"Just remember to leave your egos at the doorstep," Erika spoke, pointing a motherly finger at Kiai and Emily, "or I'll personally take care of you like I did that boy Alex." Emily and Kiai both nodded. Satisfied, Erika continued. "Sign ups are electronic," she spoke as she gestured to another machine next to the resuscitator, "You can see your name posted on the scoreboard overhead." She raised her eyes to the ceiling and there, almost completely hidden in twisted, leafy vines, was indeed a standard gym scoreboard, with trainer names, current pokemon, and all sorts of other information. It was so well integrated into the gym that if you weren't looking directly at it, you'd never see it. "I'm afraid we cannot contact you if you leave the gym, so once you register, if you intend to battle, you will have to remain until your name is called. Trainers may choose which type of battle they wish to have, and I will oversee them all. Do you have any further questions?"

Emily thought for a moment. "No...I think that about covers it," she spoke and turned to Kiai who shook his head as well.

"Very well then, let's get you all signed up." Erika took Kiai and Emily over to a small computer where they both input their information. The process didn't take very long at all, and soon they were registered and ready. "We hope you'll enjoy yourselves here in the Free Battles," Erika spoke with a bow before turning and leaving. Emily stepped forward towards the arena to watch the battle currently going on.

On either end of the grassy arena there were two small groups of children. A boy on one end, and a girl on the other, had stepped up to the sandy mounds on either side, and their respective groups were cheering them on. At center stage there was a Sandshrew and a Doduo, and while both seemed to have been battling for some time, the Sandshrew appeared to be the better for it, much to the chagrin of the Doduo's trainer which, by the look of despair on her face, appeared to be the young girl. "Sandshrew, Scratch Attack!" shouted the enthusiastic young boy.

"Doduo! Use Quick Attack and swirl around your opponent!" the girl shouted. The Doduo quickly dashed forward, seemingly headstrong at the Sandshrew, but at the last moment it dodged out of the way and began running at great speeds around the Sandshrew.

"What the heck?" the trainer shouted in surprise as he noticed the Doduo moving faster and faster around its opponent. The Sandshrew was trying its hardest to watch for its opponent, but this caused it to simply spin in circles until it got dizzy and fell backwards. "Gah! Sandshrew!"

"I don't want to hurt your Pokemon..." the girl spoke rather sincerely.

The trainer growled. "Oh yeah? Well screw that. This is a battle! If you didn't want to fight strong, then you shouldn't have signed up!"

The girl looked away. "I just wanted to show that there are other ways to win then to senselessly beat your enemies down..."

"Screw that, I want a fight! Sandshrew get up!" The Sandshrew hopped up to its feet, turning to the Doduo that was now standing at the far end of the arena. "Let's show this girl what I'm talking about! Use Fissure!" Sandshrew launched itself into the air and quickly thrust its fist down. "Now split the ground just like I taught you!" The Sandshrew struck the ground hard, causing the ground to quickly split apart in the center of the field. The Doduo squawked loudly as the ground flew up at it, wiping it out. "Ha, see? That's the way you win."

The girl looked down and held out a pokeball. "Doduo, return." Doduo was zapped back into its pokeball and she smiled. "It was a good battle." She bowed and looked up at the board. It now said "Winner: AJ". She then turned and stepped out of the arena, quickly patting down her yellow dress and grabbing the small weaved hat off the stand behind her. "Well, maybe next time I'll win," she spoke with a smile.

The boy turned to the small band of other children around him who were now cheering, and lapped it up. His celebration was short lived however, as his name and pokemon were quickly erased from the scoreboard and a new set of names appeared: Elisa and Amanda. The images next to the names were clearly of Emily with glasses on, and another, older girl. Emily walked into the center of the playing field, but was not joined by anybody. After a few moments, Erika's voice came up over the loudspeaker, "Miss Amanda, your turn is up. Please come to the playing field."

No sooner had Erika finished speaking when a tall, serious-looking girl emerged from behind a tree. She had a fierce look in her dark eyes with long black hair down to her waist, done up in a tight braid. She was wearing a black tank-top and skirt, and black fingerless gloves. She walked briskly to the center of the playing field, her cold eyes locked on Emily's. She spoke just one word, briefly and sharply, "Terms?"

Emily looked at Amanda, a strange feeling coming over her. She felt like she should know this person, but she couldn't seem to recall any moment where she had met her. Finally, she let the feeling go and stepped up to the mound. "How about a three-on-three battle? Standard Kanto League rules."

Amanda nodded. "Fine with me." She pulled a pokeball off her belt. "Ditto, ready yourself." She tossed the ball forward, releasing, what seemed to be, a pink blob of gel onto the ground.

"Ditto, huh? All right, then." She drew a pokeball. "Maneon, go!" she shouted and tossed the pokeball forward, releasing her fighting-type Eeveelution.

Amanda looked the Pokemon over for a moment. "Ditto, Transform." Ditto began to glow brightly and its form shifted until the blob no longer seemed to exist, and an exact copy of Maneon was now left on the field.

Kiai joined Emily at her end of the field. "Ditto, huh?" he spoke, "This ought to be interesting."

Emily glared at the Ditto, now transformed into Maneon. She immediately recalled the last battle she had with a Ditto, and the odd feeling of recognition washed over her again. She shook the distraction away and shouted, "Maneon! Body Slam!" Her pokemon dashed at the Ditto with great power.

"Ditto, Strength." spoke the girl at the other end. Her Ditto flexed its formidable muscles and dug itself into the grass. Maneon thrust its muscled chest out as it flew into Ditto, and when the two collided, Maneon fell in a heap, while Ditto seemed to stumble a bit. "Ditto, Mach Punch." Ditto shook its head to clear its senses, then growled at the recovering Maneon as it leapt toward its foe, one paw raised up to swipe at it.

"Maneon! Watch out!" Maneon quickly ducked down and rolled out of the way quickly. "All right, Maneon, let's try giving it a good Fire Punch." Maneon rushed forward and reared back, raising one of its paws. It thrust its paw forward as fire burst off of it.

Amanda spoke nothing, letting the Ditto take the blow full force. She then smirked. "Now, Ditto, hit it with Seismic Toss." The Ditto quickly slid itself under Maneon and lifted it onto its back. Maneon began to squirm as the Ditto then launched into the air. A moment later, and it quickly threw Maneon down, sending it slamming head first into the ground below. "Easy as cake." After the dust cleared, Amanda was surprised to see Maneon was still standing, even if just barely. "Not enough, huh? Very well then. Ditto, use Submission!" Ditto rushed forward quickly and Emily growled. She now realized just how little she knew about Maneon and she cursed herself for not thinking things through beforehand. With that, Maneon was struck hard with the Submission, finally being knocked out.

"Maneon, I'm sorry, you did your best..." Emily held out her pokeball. "Return." Maneon was returned and she put the pokeball back on her belt. "What can I use against a Ditto? This girl...she seems to know more about my own Pokemon then I do..." She bit her lip hard as she thought, finally deciding upon her next Pokemon. "All right, Shadow, let's do this!" she tossed her Luxury Ball forward, releasing her Umbreon.

Amanda smirked again. "Transform" was all she spoke and they watched once again as Ditto became an exact duplicate of Shadow.

"Shadow!" Emily shouted, "Start things off with Confuse Ray!" Shadow howled as a blast of dark energy spat out from the air around it. "Quick Attack!" shouted the girl from the other side. Ditto phased briefly as it attempted to dash away, but reappeared a few feet off to the side as the powerful attack struck it regardless. It stumbled out of the Quick Attack and slowly, cautiously got to its feet. The girl in black frowned. "Screech," she spoke. Ditto attempted to straighten itself out and roar at Shadow, but as it did, it tripped over its front paw and landed face-down into the grass. The girl's frown turned into a scowl.

"Awesome," Emily smiled with a smirk. "All right, let's make these a little more uneven. Shadow, use Sand Attack!" Shadow pulled its paw back and slashed at the ground, causing dirt to fly up and into Ditto's face. "Awesome, now it's not only confused but it can't see as well. Now hit it with Bite!" Shadow launched forward and quickly bit down on Ditto's ear, making it howl in pain, though it did significantly less damage then it could have done if Ditto wasn't transformed.

"Ditto, use Faint Attack!" Ditto stumbled for a moment, but then its eyes turned red as it dashed forward at blinding speed. It quickly began to swirl around Shadow, who reared back, readying itself for the attack.

"Shadow, try to dodge it using Quick Attack!" Emily called out and Shadow quickly rushed forward, barely managing to get through the attack. Realizing its opponent was no longer there, Ditto stopped in its tracks and began to look around. The sand in its eyes was making it hard to see anything. "Quick Attack from behind!" Shadow rushed forward and quickly struck Ditto in the back, which caused it to yelp and stumble forward before performing a rather ungraceful head-over-heels roll, landing square on its back. "Now Shadow Ball!"

"Get up, Ditto!" Amanda spoke quickly and the Ditto tried to pull itself to its feet, but Shadow was on top of it within a moment's notice. A large ball of ghostly energy then formed in Shadow's mouth and it shot it down, striking the Ditto square in the chest. It yelped again and its form became too unstable to maintain, forcing it back into the blob-like form.

"Quick! Hit it with Faint Attack!" Emily quickly shouted. Shadow rushed forward and quickly struck the Ditto as hard as it could, sending it flying into the air a ways before it came down, slamming hard into the arena floor.

Amanda smirked. "Been a while since my Ditto was last defeated." She spoke and pulled out her pokeball. "Return." The Ditto was returned to its pokeball and she pulled out a second. "Now, let's see you face off against this. Porygon 2, ready yourself!" She tossed the pokeball forward and a very strange Pokemon appeared. Its body looked unreal, as if it was something pulled straight from a video game. Its body was pink except for a small blue patch on its underside along with a blue beak and two blue feet. Its eyes took up half of its head. "Let's see you handle this. Porygon 2, Conversion!" At once, then Pokemon's body shifted, taking on a darker look as its pink skin became black and gold rings formed around its beak and legs.

Emily bit her lip. "Porygon 2, huh? Alright.. Shadow, try another Shadow Ball!" Shadow reared back, gathering dark energy at its mouth, then hurled it toward Porygon 2. The attack hit dead-on, but didn't seem to phase it.

"Porygon 2, Signal Beam." Porygon 2 began to glow as it gathered light energy from the air around it, a task it found quite easy given the bright sun pouring in from the roof. After a second, it released a powerful beam at Shadow. The attack knocked Shadow back several feet, and when it stood up, it seemed to be disoriented.

"Crap.." grumbled Emily, "C'mon Shadow, shake it off. Use Confuse Ray!"

Shadow focused itself long enough to fire off another Confuse Ray, but her opponent quickly spoke, "Magic Coat." A shimmering aura covered Porygon 2, and the Confuse Ray simply bounced back and hit Shadow dead on. Shadow growled and shook its head, but it was clearly completely disoriented now.

"Aww damn it...come on, Shadow, you can do this..." Emily spoke and looked up at Amanda. She seemed rather sure of herself. "Shadow, use Faint Attack!" Shadow turned towards Porygon 2 for a moment as its eyes swirled in confusion. Shadow gave a roar, then rushed forward, but instead of aiming for Porygon 2, it seemed to rush off and aim at one of the stands, which it slammed head first into. "Shadow!"

Amanda gave a deep chuckle. "You're Umbreon is confused," she spoke, then turned to her Porygon 2. "Porygon 2, use Tri-Attack." Porygon 2 faced Shadow and its eyes began to glow. It opened its mouth and unleashed three beams out of its mouth which all struck Shadow hard, knocking it to the ground. "And now..." Shadow stood up, turning back to Porygon 2 only to find the after effect of the Tri-Attack freeze its feet to the ground. "Frozen and Confused." Amanda spoke. "What a shame...Porygon 2, finish it with Zap Cannon." Porygon 2's body seemed to conduct electricity from around it. It's entire body seemed to shift in form into, what appeared to be, a small cannon. The cannon then shot forth a massive bolt of electricity with electrified Shadow. With this, Shadow collapsed to the ground, obviously wiped out.

"Damn..." Emily spoke and pulled out her Luxury Ball. "Shadow, return!" Shadow was zapped back into its ball and she looked back at Amanda. "You're definitely a good trainer..." she spoke and looked down. "I...I'm not going to give up, though..." She pulled out her third Pokeball. "All I have is Water types...so this is my only other hope..." she tossed her Pokeball forward. "Steameon, go!" she shouted and the pokeball opened, releasing her Ghost-type Eeveelution.

"So, your last Pokemon is this?" Amanda asked. "Give it a Tri-Attack!" Porygon 2 unleashed another triple beam attack at Steameon, who just smirked as the blast seemed to pass right through it. "Ghost-type...I figured as much...Conversion, Porygon 2!" Porygon 2's skin shifted once again, becoming almost an exact copy of Steameon's.

Emily gritted her teeth. "So now he's a Ghost-type... which means I can't use any Ghost-type moves or they won't be effective…unless…Steameon! Use Night Shade!" Steameon's eyes glowed a ghostly white as a bright beam shot out toward Porygon 2. In the instant before Porygon 2 was hit, the beam morphed into an identical copy of it, thus striking Porygon 2 with a force equal to its own formidable strength. Porygon 2's body seemed to glitch, which Amanda clearly took to be a bad sign. There was a slight cheer from Kiai behind Emily's shoulder.

"So, you got one shot in and you think you're all hot now?" Amanda looked up at Emily. "Well, I'll just have to wipe you out in one shot. Porygon 2, build up a hundred thousand volts in your body!" Electricity began to surge throughout Porygon 2's body and Amanda smirked. Emily realized exactly what she was doing. She was maxing out her Pokemon's electric power to unleash something destructive, and she guessed it was going to be Thunder as that move always seemed to follow next.

"Steameon, we need to knock it out before it can attack! Use Astonish!" Steameon rushed forward and lunged into the air. It roared loudly, but Porygon 2 seemed rather unaffected by it. Steameon then came down, striking Porygon 2 hard. Amanda just gave a chuckle and Emily realized why. Electricity was now surging through Steameon's body, freezing it in place.

"You thought I was going for Thunder, didn't you?" Amanda asked and Emily growled when she now realized what Amanda had done. "It's true, building up the voltage in its body could allow it to use Thunder, but as well, building it up and then holding it would cause your Pokemon to become paralyzed the moment it touched yours. And now..." Amanda quickly threw her hand out. "For the Grand Finale! Porygon 2, unleash Zap Cannon with the left over extra power you have!" Porygon 2 transformed once again into the cannon, aiming directly at Steameon. Steameon tried to move, but the electricity coursing through it was too much. With a massive blast of electricity from the cannon, Steameon was wiped out.

"I guess I win this fight," Amanda spoke as she stared at Emily with a rather disappointed look. "You did good, but I'm sensing something about you..." She stepped forward across the battlefield until she was only a few inches away from Emily. She then stuck her face into Emily's face, looking deep into her eyes. Emily backed away a little, not understanding this strange motion from this strange woman. "I see it in your eyes," Amanda spoke and Emily blinked.

"See what?"

Amanda stood herself up straight. "Tell me, why do you battle?"

"Why do I battle?" Emily looked away. "Because...I want my Pokemon to be strong...I want them...to win..."

"Is that so? Then why can't you look me in the eyes when you say that?" Emily turned back to retort, but as soon as her eyes met with Amanda's, she felt like small, like a Rattata. She turned away, not speaking and Amanda nodded. "As I suspected. Your heart is not into catch and battle. You are a Pokemon Trainer who does not seek to train Pokemon, but instead to raise them, to learn from them."

"I want to train them!" Emily quickly retorted, turning her head back at Amanda.

Amanda simply shook her head. "You have it confused, little one. Training and raising are two different things, yet their very similar. You want to raise them, to live with them, to learn from them. Your heart is not into battling, but instead is into simply catching what you would enjoy as pets." Emily seemed to sink down. She had never thought of it that way before, and now that she was, she couldn't help but wonder if the strange woman's words were true. "Perhaps it would be best if you considered being a different type of Pokemon Trainer." She pulled out a small card and handed it to Emily. "If you decide to take my challenge, call this number. They'll set you up."

Amanda then turned. "Regardless, you did make someone very proud of you today. Your battle, though your heart was not into it, was exceptional. If you continue this course, remember that Pokemon are not restricted to a certain moveset. Combining moves and even using a move to the half of its potential can be some of the best strategies." She held out a pokeball. "Porygon 2, return!" the Porygon 2 was zapped back into its pokeball and Amanda turned back to Emily. "Think about it a little bit." She then walked off, deleting herself from the registry so she wouldn't be called on for another battle. She then walked off, disappearing into the crowd.

Kiai watched her go in silence, and when she was gone, he turned to Emily. "She's right, you know. You love Pokemon, but you're just not cut out for battling with them. I know this sort of thing has come up before…but maybe it's time you thought about something different?"

"Maybe..." Emily held up a pokeball. "Steameon, return." Steameon was returned to its pokeball and she placed it back on her belt. "I guess...I've never really thought about it..." She looked up at the scoreboard, which clearly stated that she had lost three-to-one. "That girl...she was really good..." She looked down. "Her style of battle...I've never seen anyone make moves like that..." She stepped out of the arena and walked over to one of the stands nearby. As she sat down, she pulled out her pokeballs and looked them over. "My Pokemon are strong...but...what really is my main focus? I don't have a well rounded team...in fact, up until recently I've just had water types...I have others now...but my main focus..." Eevee entered her head and she nodded. "It's not on how strong they are...She's right...I focus more on raising my Pokemon as friends and pets then I focus on training them to battle..." She looked back up, seeing Kiai standing over her. "I...feel kind of lost now..."

Kiai chuckled as he reached up to ruffle her hair. "Lost? I'm sure it feels like you've hit a brick wall in your career, but there are plenty of roads to choose from, so there's no need to feel lost." He wrapped an arm around her waist and led her off the field to the resuscitation platform. "All my life I wanted to be a pokemon trainer.. I wanted to beat the Final Four.. I wanted to be the best like no one ever was. But you? Your pokemon aren't for fighting or battling, and your head isn't there either. You have a love for pokemon, and there's much more you can do beyond just pitting them against each other. C'mon," he spoke with a smile, "think about it. Who do you know is famous with pokemon but doesn't fight with them?"

She thought for a moment. "Well, Professor Oak is famous with Pokemon and he doesn't fight with them..." She thought for a moment. "Now that I think about it...he's a Pokemon Trainer, but he's not just any normal trainer, he's also a Pokemon Researcher." She thought for a moment more. "What was it that girl said? 'You want to raise them, to learn from them.'" She paused for a moment as a thought began to move through her mind and Kiai could see the gears in her head turning. "Do you think maybe...she thought I should be a researcher?"

Kiai grinned that grin of his as he began placing Emily's pokeballs in the resuscitator. "You have first-hand experience with the most advanced pokemon this world has seen, what with our little scuffle last week." He held two of her pokeballs aloft. "You already have some that even Oak hasn't seen." He placed them on the resuscitator and pressed a few buttons. "You have the interest, and the motivation. That's all it takes to get started." The resuscitator beeped a few times as it worked. "And speaking of which, we need to talk to Oak anyway about those two. Maybe you could use that opportunity to ask him a few career questions?"

Emily nodded. "I'm sure Oak would be a lot of help. We'll have to call him up tonight. I can also send him Maneon and Steameon as well." She turned back to look up at the scoreboard. "Hey, a new battle is starting." She noticed the names on the board. "Brendan and Emerald...who names their kid Emerald?" She looked down at the arena Sure enough, a rather short kid stepped up to the mound and stood his ground. His hair was pulled up, almost looking like horns on his head, while a green gem seemed to be stuck in the middle of his forehead. The kid wore a rather long shirt, since the sleeves came off his arms and travelled halfway down his body. His pants were also just as long and baggy and Emily wondered how he didn't trip over himself. The other combatant was a boy about her age. He wore a simple red and black shirt with the same color pants. A red band was around his forehead, and Emily wondered if it was a hat due to the fact he had, what seemed to be, pure white hair sticking up above the band. His gloves were fingerless, like it seemed almost every trainer wore here. "Is there something cool about fingerless gloves that I'm missing?" Emily asked. "I mean...it seems like every other trainer has them..."

"Hey!" Emily heard someone shout and she turned. There she saw a trainer running towards them.

"Can I help you?" Emily asked.

"Are you Elisa Denhom?"

Emily blinked, then nodded. "Why do you ask?"

"You said you had water-type Pokemon. I'm looking for a particular kind." He pulled out a small picture and held it up to her. "Do you happen to have one like this?" Emily stared at the picture for a moment, noting it was of a Magikarp. "Well...yeah...but why do you ask? I mean...Magikarp are pretty common..."

The trainer sighed. "Try as I might, I've been unable to capture one...I stand by the rivers all day fishing...and I get a bite, and then I reel it in and it's Magikarp!" He made movements to describe what he saw saying. "So then, I throw a pokemon out to weaken it, and then I throw a pokeball...and...I don't know what happens! I just can't catch it!" Tears rolled down his cheeks. "I want an awesome Gyarados, but if I can't catch a Magikarp, there's no way I'll ever catch a Gyarados..."

Emily looked at Kiai with a look of "how could anyone fail to catch a Magikarp?" She then looked back at the trainer. "Well...I do have one..."

"Could you trade it to me? Oh please oh please oh please!"

"W-well...all right..." she rubbed the back of her neck and pulled out her Magikarp's pokeball. "What are you going to give me?"

"This." He held out a pokeball. "This Pokemon was my starter...but it never listened to me...no matter what I've done, it just never listens...so...you see...I just don't know what else to do..." He sighed. "I'm sad to let it go...but maybe...I'm just a failure...so if it can have a better home with someone else...someone better then me...maybe it'll be happy, you know?"

Emily nodded. "All right, I'll see what I can do." She smiled and took the pokeball then threw out her Magikarp's pokeball. Magikarp was released and Emily watched as it flopped on the ground. "Here you go, one Magikarp. I named it Magi, but you can change it if you want." She handed him the Pokeball and the trainer bowed.

"Oh thank you so much, and Magi sounds like a fine name." He turned back to the Magikarp. "Return, Magi!" the Magikarp returned to its pokeball and he gave a final bow before running off.

Emily stayed silent for a moment before finally speaking her previous thought. "How do you fail to capture a Magikarp?"

Kiai shrugged. "Maybe he was using a rock instead of a pokeball? Speaking of which, what'd you get? Must be something interesting if it didn't obey him as a starter."

Emily looked back down at the pokeball. "You know, that's a good question. Pokeball, go!" she tossed the pokeball forward and in a blast of light appeared a small fox-like creature. "It's an Eevee!" Emily remarked at once. The Eevee turned to look at Emily for a moment, its face looking different than the normal happy one Eevee usually expressed. In fact, if one didn't know better, one would say this Eevee looked downright pissed off.

"Eevee..." the Eevee spoke as it backed up a little bit. "Eevee! Eev eevee eev!" it shouted and Emily stared at it.

"It says 'Who are you and what happened to that retard of a fool who was my warden?'"

Kiai doubled over in laughter. "Wow, that little one's got spunk." He kneeled down and reached over to pet the Eevee, which promptly bit his finger. He leapt back and landed on his ass, a look of pure surprise on his face. His mouth hung open for a few seconds as he looked between the Eevee and Emily.

"Eevee, ee eevee eev!" the Eevee shouted.

"It says 'Don't touch me, you dipshit'...wow, this thing has some really foul language."

Eevee turned to Emily and growled. "Eevee! Eev eevee eev eevee eev eevee!"

"What did you just say to me?" Emily shouted and promptly snatched the Eevee up by the fur on its back. "Try saying that to my face!" Eevee gave Emily a rather dull glance and simply repeated its statement. "You little..." she growled and nearly tossed the Eevee onto the ground. "I may not dress the most conservative, but I'm nobody's whore!" This, naturally, attracted the attention of a few nearby trainers who gave Emily weird glances.

Emily cleared her throat as she looked around. Even the pokemon on the battlefield, in mid-attack, stopped to look. Eevee sat, obnoxiously proudly, on the grass, grinning. "Small wonder.." said Kiai, picking himself up, "that the boy had so much difficulty even catching a Magikarp…an Eevee like this would consider that a waste of time." He clapped Emily, who was still blushing, on the shoulder. "Good luck," he spoke with a grin.

"'Good luck'...thanks...that's a lot of help..." Emily spoke with a sigh. "All right, you. Enough of this. I'm your new trainer now, so you're going to have to listen to me, understand?"

Eevee turned its nose up at her. "Eevee eev."

Emily growled. "Why you little..." she took a deep breath, then let it out slowly. "Look, I'm a good trainer." She pulled out her Luxury Ball and released Shadow, who immediately nuzzled against Emily's leg. "See? All of my Pokemon like me. I'm sure that if you give me a try-"

"Eevee, eev eevee eev," the Eevee spoke and Shadow growled.

"Umbreon! Umb umbreon umb!" spoke defensively.

The Eevee gave a wicked smirk at this. Its next statement sounded as if it was taunting Shadow, to which Shadow growled more.

"Shadow...calm down...I know it calling you names and making fun of you...but that's all it is, harmless name calling. Now, let's all try to be friends, ok?" The Eevee gave a rather wicked almost cackle like sound then began to prance back and forth. Shadow growled more, slowly inching its way towards the Eevee. "Shadow, calm down." It didn't matter, the Eevee had insulted Shadow's pride, and she wasn't going to stand for it. Quickly, she unleashed a Faint Attack which knocked the Eevee back a ways. "Shadow, return!" Emily shouted and Shadow was quickly zapped back into its pokeball. The Eevee just smirked at Emily.

"Eevee, eev eevee. Eev eevee eev."

"You insulted Shadow! Of course it's going to attack you! Don't blame me and how I raise my Pokemon for you being attacked!" The Eevee just shrugged and stepped up to Emily. It quickly kicked her in the foot and Emily growled. "That's it, back in the pokeball you go!" She tossed the pokeball at Eevee, hitting it rather hard on the head and zapping it back inside. "Stupid Eevee..."

Kiai turned toward their unintentional audience and held his hand up, one finger still bleeding slightly where it was bitten. "It's ok, folks. Just a rabid Eevee. Nothing to see here. Go about your business." Slowly the people turned their attention back to the match. Kiai turned back to Emily. "Well, that was fun. How's your foot?"

Emily sighed and brought her foot up to look it over. There was a small bruise, but otherwise nothing major. "That little shit..." she growled. "I can see why that last trainer couldn't make it listen to him...it's very obnoxious...and it has the most foul mouth I've ever heard out of a Pokemon...I mean...it called me a whore and it called Shadow a 'brainwashed git' cause it thinks the Luxury Ball brainwashed Shadow to like me..."

"Well you do have a nice bod-" began Kiai before he was smashed by a hammer.

Emily crossed her arms over her chest and stuck her nose in the air. "I am not a whore!" At that moment there was a chime, and the two of them looked up at the scoreboard. It seems Emerald had just won, one to two. There were cheers and congratulations as the two walked off and headed over toward the resuscitator.

For the remaining hour of the Free Battles, Kiai and Emily sat in the stands, watching some of the battles that occurred. They watched amazing battles unfold with opponent's that were obviously from other regions and both Emily and Kiai marveled at some of the many different Pokemon that existed in the world. One battle had been a water-type against water-type battle, which Emily watched very attentively. She was amazed at the sheer power that some of the pokemon displayed, but she was also amazed at just how ugly some of the water types that were used were. When one of the trainers threw out a Mudkip, Emily about gagged at the sight of the creature and she wondered how such an ugly creature could exist, and Kiai had to remind her that it wasn't Mudkips fault it was ugly, but simply nature had designed it.

Finally, as the Free Battles came to a close, Kiai noticed his name had never been called. He had wanted a chance to fight at least once, to match his skill with a trainer from another region, but the chance never came. Finally, as Erika announced the end of the Free Battles, Emily and Kiai got up from their seats in the stands and made their way out from the gym. The final hour of the convention was mostly spent wandering, and at last, they returned to the Main Stage as Zoey and Dawn said their farewells for the day to the crowd and reminded them to all come back at nine the next morning. As the crowd dispersed, Emily turned to Kiai. "Well, it's getting late. Think we should check in and see what Ash, Misty, and Amy are up to?"

"Definitely. Do you know where they are?" asked Kiai.

"No," answered Emily, "but I know where to find them." She reached into her pocket and held up her pokégear with an exuberant flair. At that moment, there was a cheerful tune of accomplishment. Emily stared at it, wondering if she was accidentally roleplaying something from Legend of Zelda before she realized it was just a tone signifying that she had just gotten a text message. She opened up her pokégear and read it. "Wow, speak of the devil... Amy is gathering everyone up, she says we're going out to eat in a few hours."

"Sounds good to me," spoke Kiai, "but where are they?"

"I dunno, can you translate 'GONE TO NOM IN 3 HR, BR BFFS, MEET AT PC IN 5, LUV U, AMY'?"

Kiai looked over her shoulder at the pokegear. "She's collecting the crew to partake in an evening meal in three hours. She requests that you bring your friends, probably me and whomever else, along with you. We're to meet her at the Pokemon Center, so we should head there now. She expresses her admiration for you."

Emily raised an eyebrow at Kiai. "I thought you were no good with technology..."

"I'm not," he spoke, "just bad grammar."

Emily shook her head. "Well, anyway, at least someone understood that. Let's get to the Pokemon Center then so we can meet up with them." Kiai nodded and the two made their way towards the Center.

"Hello!" Amy called out to Emily and Kiai as they walked up to the Center and Emily waved back. They quickly made their way over and Amy smiled. "So, how was your first day at the convention?"

"Weird..." Emily spoke.

"Haha, that's normal. Conventions are a very strange place to be. You'll have to tell Ash and I all about it later."

"'Ash and I'?" Emily asked. "What about Misty?"

"You hadn't heard? Misty's been sick all day...She just started throwing up this morning out of nowhere..."

"That sucks..." Emily spoke. "Any clue why?"

Amy shrugged. "My guess? Probably just the stomach flu. She should be fine by either tomorrow or the day after."

Emily nodded. "That's good."

"Is Ash on his way?" asked Kiai. Amy nodded, "He said he might be late to make sure Misty was ok, but he'll be along before dinner. Do either of you need to drop your pokemon off while we're here?" Emily and Kiai both shook their heads. "Well in that case, let me grab mine."

"What do you mean?" asked Kiai, "were you involved in a battle and you didn't invite us to watch?"

Amy coughed slightly. "No." she spoke simply, and entered the Pokemon Center.

"Odd.." mused Kiai, "oh well. Must just be the busy life of a Pokemon Champion."

Emily nodded. "She's the Kanto and Johto League Champion. I'm sure that means she's got a lot to deal with. I just hope that she's getting paid a good amount for all of what she has to do...assuming, of course, she even gets paid..."

"I do," spoke Amy as she came out of the Pokemon Center, carefully tucking the pokeballs into a pouch on her belt, "but not enough. Well I don't want to ruin the surprise of your day without Ash around to hear it, so lets go do something until he gives us a call. After today, I could use a break."

"Busy day?" asked Emily. "Ugh. You could say that. I thought we had everything set and done yesterday, turns out we missed enough that I had to be in three places at once all day today.. but I'm pretty sure that's that, so hopefully I can spend the rest of the Con actually enjoying it."

"What, you didn't enjoy it with us?" asked Kiai.

"No," said Amy simply, playfully throwing her arm across Emily's shoulder and grinning, "not with you at least."

"Well, at least you'll get to relax now, right?" Emily asked and Amy nodded.

"Supposing everything is set up this time, then yes."

"That's good. I saw what happened at the stage today...Michelle pretty much saved the day..."

Amy nodded. "Well, Michelle is a wonderful girl." She placed her hands on Emily's hips. "I'm sure a girl like her would love to have a girl like you as a girlfriend, too."

Emily blushed. "B-but, I love Kiai..."

"So? Just because you have one person doesn't mean your life is full. Some people honestly need a second person to fill their life, and I happen to know Michelle is very much in love with both you and Kiai, and I can see why easily."

Emily blushed an extremely deep shade of crimson. "Wh-what do you mean?"

Amy smirked. "Well, you've got a great body." Amy moved her hands up and groped Emily's chest lightly which made Emily give out a loud "Eep!" Amy giggled and moved her hands back down. "Have you honestly ever considered it before?"

"C-considered what?"

"A threesome. I bet Kiai would love it, having two girls to dig himself into, and Michelle would love it for sure."

"N-no...but I'm only thirteen, I shouldn't be thinking of things like that anyway!"

"And yet I'll bet you do, or at least when it comes to regular sex anyway. Just out of curiosity, when was the last time you and Kiai had sex?"

"L-last night..." Emily barely squeaked out before burying her face in her purse.

Amy laughed. "You're so much fun to embarrass."

"Her? What about me?" Kiai was eyeing the area around them, himself a fairly bright shade of red. "But what's all this about Michelle?"

"Oh, she's fun to embarrass too."

"You've met her?"

"Yes, I personally thanked her after that little bit on the stage. We got to talking and when I said that Emily was my sister, well, she just would not shut up. She didn't say it directly, but she clearly cares about the two of you very much. Once I figured it out, I had her as red as Emily, pointing out how much she was into you two."

"Wow.." spoke Kiai softly, "I had no idea.. I thought she just looked up to us... I'll have to give that girl a special hug next time I meet her."

Emily nodded, "Same here.. and as for that... t-threesome.." She didn't get much more than that out of her lips, but that was all she needed to say.

Amy saw the opening and leaned into Emily with a slick grin. "Just imagine.. Michelle and Kiai rubbing their bodies against you..."

Emily winced, and Kiai shouted, "Okay!" He took a deep breath before he continued, though his cheeks were so red, if he was wearing a white shirt you'd half expect a pokemon to leap out of his neck. "Okay... that's good for now…but wow Amy, this is unlike you. You're so...forward..."

Amy scoffed. "You would be too after the day I had! I'm finally being officially left alone for the first time since I became Champion, and dammit I'm going to relax!"

"Well, I'm glad you're having fun relaxing...but maybe...we should tone it down a bit?" Emily rubbed the back of her neck.

Amy laughed. "Oh, all right." She looked around for a second before groping Emily's chest one last time, which made her give out the loud "Eep!" once more. "I'm sorry, but it's honestly been so long since I saw you, sis. I mean...yeah we had a couple days back when you lost in Vermillion, but that was mostly all training for you two. This is just family hanging out together, and I'm really noticing just how much your body has filled out over the last few years. You're not my baby sister with the itty-bitty boobies anymore." She giggled and Emily just shoved her face into her purse once more to hide her embarrassment. "Anyway, I'm done...for now. I really hope we can actually spend some time together tomorrow. I didn't see you at all today..."

Emily nodded. "I know."

"Hey! Why don't you show me those Pokemon of yours? I think you called them Maneon and Steameon?"

Emily nodded. "Sure." She pulled out two pokeballs and threw them forward releasing Maneon and Steameon.

"So, these are the Eeveelutions you told me that hunter had." Emily nodded. Amy knelt down and examined the two pokemon severely. She ran her hand along Maneon's legs and back, and although she didn't quite touch Steameon, she moved her hand around the ghostly fog it was eminating. Neither of them flinched. "Interesting…one Fighting, one Ghost…They're very well-trained, very clean…definitely not mistreated, nor have they ever been…Someone cared an awful lot about these."

Emily tilted her head. "How can you tell all that?"

"Pokemon don't usually 'attune' to a new trainer so quickly; it takes time to get used to the trainer and his or her style, but these obey you without question. Not only that, they show no signs of ill health or ever having suffered ill health. These two were bred and trained like prize show Pokemon…bred to be perfect in every way..."

Kiai knelt down beside Amy and tried to see what she was seeing. "Considering their rarity, do you think that's the reason they were so well kept?"

Amy did not immediately answer, but she was thinking deeply. "Maybe…maybe a function of their genesis that they were so well kept…" She stood up again. "You know, Emily, Professor Oak is going to be a guest speaker at Professor Rowans lecture in a few days. You should make it a point to show these two to him."

Emily nodded. "I was thinking about calling him tonight and sending the Pokemon to him via the Pokemon Center's transfer system."

Amy shook her head. "That won't do I'm afraid. As I said, Professor Oak is going to be at Professor Rowan's lecture in a few days. He's working overtime right now because of that. However, if you show them to him first thing after the lecture, he should have a chance to look them over quite a bit."

Emily nodded. "I see." She knelt down next to Maneon and began to gently pet its fur. "I wonder if Maneon and Steameon are boys or girls."

"Professor Rowan might know. He not only specializes in evolution, but also the ability to see the difference between male and female Pokemon. I don't know if he could tell you without seeing a Maneon and Steameon of the opposite gender then these...but it's possible he might have seen them before. He has done a lot of study on evolution, after all."

Emily nodded. "I see, so I'll have to see if I can show them to both of them."

Amy nodded. "Would be a good idea."

"Oh! Any extra news on that Ultra Ball?"

Amy shook her head. "Professor Oak hasn't even had a chance to look at it the last couple days. He's still fighting to get a Master Ball from Devon Corp, and with his current workload...it could be a while before he finds anything..."

"I see...well, maybe after this convention we'll all head to Mt. Silver and investigate it, right?"

Amy smiled but shook her head. "Its way too dangerous for you, little sis. You're both still fresh trainers. Maybe once you've gained some more experience I'll take you along."

"Well don't leave us out of it," spoke Kiai as he stood up, "You know we'd just worry sick about you if you went there alone, and if you took Ash and Misty with you, we'd just worry about all three of you."

For once, Amy couldn't think of anything smart to say to that. "Thanks... but I'm sure everything will be fine. We need to analyze the pokemon first, and we can't do that until we have it in the Master Ball, and even the research itself may take weeks or months, and then planning and preparation and who knows what else may come up... it's a serious matter, we're taking it seriously, and that means it takes time." Maneon growled contentedly as it rubbed against Emily's palm. "What a mystery..." spoke Amy, her voice trailing off.

"And we'll get to the bottom of it." spoke Emily, defiantly and determinedly.

Amy smiled and reached down to ruffle Emily's hair. "That's my little sis."

The trio spent the next couple hours together wandering the streets of Celadon. A good portion of the time did end up in the Celadon Department Store, where Amy bought a couple new outfits for herself and for Emily, while Kiai insisted his clothes were fine and that he didn't need any new ones. In the end, the visit to the store ended with a few new outfits purchased, as well as various Pokemon items, such as Super Potions, candy, and other minor things. Emily on multiple occasions had tried to make some mention of her day to Amy, but she was insistent upon waiting for Ash, so Emily wouldn't have to say it all twice.

Finally, the time came for them to meet up with Ash, and Emily discovered what one of the outfits Amy had bought was for. The trio met in a rather fancy restaurant, and Amy was now dressed in a very elegant looking golden, strapless dress. Emily was dressed in a considerably less fancy dress, being that hers was simply a pink halter-style dress that had no back to it at all. Kiai, much to his disapproval, had been stuffed in a white dress shirt with black dress pants, in which Emily insisted he looked dashing, but Kiai just made a face, noting how much he hated dressing up so fancy. "Just give me a shirt and shorts" he would insist, but alas, he lost the battle.

The three were greeted at the restaurant by a man dressed in a fancy tuxedo. "How many?" he asked.

"Four, should be under the name Ash Ketchum," Amy replied.

"Ah, right this way, Ash is expecting you." The man led them to a rather elegant table that had a small candelabrum on the top of it with a very fancy lace tablecloth. The wood of the table seemed to be made of the highest quality, and the dishes and silverware were of very fine china. Ash stood as the trio neared the table and he gave a bow. He had dressed himself up rather handsomely, wearing a white dress shirt with black pants, though, unlike Kiai, he also had a small bowtie around his neck. "Glad you could all make it," Ash spoke.

"Ash, this place...it's amazing!" Emily spoke as she looked around. The walls were decorated with small mirrors that reflected the light around the room, making it seem as if the room was shining.

"Well, I figured that, with the rough day we all had today, we all deserved something nice to eat, instead of just hitting up some small restaurant or even fast food place."

Kiai so desperately wanted to grumble, "I hope they have ramen here…" but he decided against it. Tonight, him and propriety are just going to have to put aside their differences and get along. "But how can you afford all this?" asked Kiai.

Amy answered that with a very, very pleased look in her eyes, "Don't worry, it's on the Pokemon Association. If there's one thing they did right, they gave us an awful lot of money to throw around. As far as this bill is concerned, I, being an official diplomat and ambassador of the Kanto Pokemon Association, am taking out an honored guest of the Sinnoh region and several of his friends out to a fine restaurant."

Ash pitched in, "And since I am registered in the Sinnoh region, and since I happened to have done an interview for Professor Oak for his bit in the upcoming lecture, I am technically," He took a deep breath and straightened his posture as he said this next bit, "an honored contributor of the Sinnoh Convention, and therefore an official guest of the Kanto Pokemon Association."

Amy broke out in a fit of giggles as he said this. Kiai shook his head and grinned. "You two are enjoying this way too much." To which they both nodded and spoke in unison, "Yep." The four of them had a round of laughter, then took their seats. Drinks were served momentarily; Amy and Ash both ordered wine, Kiai and Emily went with soft drinks.

"So, how is Misty doing?" Emily piped up after a moment.

Ash sighed. "She's still pretty sick. She's been getting around a bit more since this morning, but it's still about the same. I gave her some medicine, but it didn't help much...I'm beginning to wonder if it might be something other than a generic stomach flu..."

Emily titled her head. "Like what?"

"Well...a couple months back, we decided that we really were in love and that we really wanted to settle down and start a family. Well, after we decided on that, we basically decided that we were done 'playing it safe' sort of speak...We wanted a family, and as Gym Leaders we make good money, so we decided that she would stop using birth control and we'd just kind of let things go however they go."

"You think she might be pregnant?" Amy asked and Ash shrugged.

"It's a possibility. We weren't really trying, but we also weren't not trying, you know?" He rubbed the back of his neck. "We figured we'd just let whatever happens happen. Thinking back...it's been about six weeks since her last period...that means the possibilities are a bit higher than normal."

Amy nodded. "Are you going to try a test?"

Ash nodded. "I thought I'd buy one on the way home and hopefully we'll have news for people about it tomorrow."

Emily smiled. "Well, congratulations if she is. You'll make a great father."

Ash rubbed the back of his neck. "You think so? The idea is actually kind of scary now that I'm thinking about it."

"You'll do fine, Ash," spoke Kiai, "But that kid is going to be a better Pokemon trainer than anyone at this table, what with the upbringing he or she's going to get"

"If it's not a 'she', I'm going to have Misty's sisters castrate me." The three of them laughed, and Ash continued, "No, seriously! They told me that if I don't give them a niece to take over the gym after Misty, they're going to hunt me down in the night and tear my Onyx and two Geodudes off!" They doubled over in laughter, clutching their sides and drawing an awful lot of attention to themselves.

After several minutes they calmed down, just in time for the waiter to arrive with their menus. They spent a few minutes in silence, albeit with several interspersed giggles here and there, deciding what they wanted. Amy and Emily pointed out a few items to each other, and had the odd habit of showing each other their menus, despite the fact that they each had identical menus in their hands already. When the waiter came back, Ash and Kiai made the standard "ladies first" nod. Emily spoke first, "I'll have the chicken alfredo with linguini."

She then passed to Amy who spoke, "I'll have the jumbo shrimp, boiled not fried, and I'll take the clam cakes as a side."

Going around in that direction, Ash went next, saying simply, "Burger and fries."

This warranted him a slight nudge from Amy, who mouthed, "Fast food?" Ash helplessly shrugged.

Kiai looked up at the waiter and spoke, "I'll have the freshwater escargot with shell, in the white wine sauce. And some steamed asparagus on the side, please." The waiter jotted this all down and nodded curtly and pleasantly, then walked off. Emily, Amy and Ash all stared dumbfounded at Kiai. "... What?" he spoke, staring at them in return. "You all know I lived alone most of my life... I found a river one time…I got curious… ... what? They're pretty good!"

Emily shook her head and shrugged. "Well, anyway," she turned to Amy and Ash. "I've been anxious to tell you all about our day today. We had a lot go on."

Ash nodded. "Well, tell away. We've had a pretty busy day, too...or at least Amy has. I spent the whole day looking after Misty." He rubbed the back of his neck again. From there, Emily and Kiai explained all about their day. From their encounter with the strange Pokemon of Miror B all the way down to Emily's battle with the strange trainer Amanda.

"Well, you know, that Amanda girl may be right," Amy spoke. "I've known you since you were just two years old and some strange guy I don't even know who brought you to my Mom's house and dropped you off. I've watched you grow and bloom into a fine young lady, but your passion for Pokemon has always been the same. You love raising them. I remember back when you were five and we had a pet Persian. Oh boy, I remember you just loved that cat. Unfortunately, it did disappear one day...none of us really knew what happened to it...and you were absolutely torn up for a week about the fact it was gone. Your passion has always been raising Pokemon. Maybe you should consider the idea of dropping out of badge collecting and going into something else like researching or even breeding. Though, with your smarts, I think researching would definitely fit you best."

Kiai nodded enthusiastically. "You do have a good mind when it comes to figuring stuff out, especially when put to the test." Ash spoke up, "And research isn't just about hitting the books. A lot of the best researchers, Oak included, spend most of their time in the field, doing real and practical research on pokemon in real or simulated battles under specific conditions to find out just how they're going to behave, so you still get that aspect of it."

Amy nodded, "Good point, Oak really does get out a lot."

"And plus," continued Ash, "you can still go on your Pokemon journey with Kiai. Field research involves looking at lots of pokemon over lots of areas, and the best way to do that is the traditional circuit." Emily slowly nodded, not seeming to commit one way or the other, but heavily thinking about it.

"What exactly would I research, though? I mean...how exactly does that work out? Would I just be researching anything and everything? Is there a specific field I'd be able to research?"

Amy nodded. "Some researchers focus on specific things. For example, there's a man who lives in Johto who researches Pokemon called the Unown."

"Unknown?" Emily asked.

"Yeah, here, let me show you." Amy pulled out her pokedex and loaded up the page on the Unown. She handed it to Emily and she looked at it.

"So...not Unknown...but Unown...said the same, but spelt differently...they're weird Pokemon that look like letters..." She pushed a few buttons and it cycled through some of the different forms of Unown. "Weird..."

Amy nodded. "The man spends all of his time researching them trying to discover anything he can about them."

"Amazing..." Emily handed Amy her Pokedex back. "What about...an Eevee researcher? We can see that Eevee evolves in other ways then we thought before...Could someone be a researcher by researching that and seeing if other forms exist?"

Amy nodded. "Probably, I don't see why not."

Emily thought for a moment. "Well, maybe I'll think about it." She nodded. "Oh! Speaking of Eevees! I got this new Eevee from a trainer...he traded it to me for my Magikarp...It's...actually a really rude and crude Pokemon to be honest..."

"How so?" Ash asked out of curiosity.

Emily looked around, then spoke rather quietly. "It called me a scantly-clad whore..."

Amy about choked on her drink. "It can talk?" Ash asked and Emily shook her head.

"I...can understand Pokemon..."

"Oh, right, because you're..." Ash shut up and looked around then spoke quietly, "because your part Pokemon." Emily nodded to that.

There was a brief, awkward silence until Kiai spoke up, "Speaking of which, how's Sabrina doing?"

Amy fielded this one, "She's doing fine. She was in the Pokemon Center for a week, being looked at and after by the top scientists in the field. Since we got a hold of Team Rocket's tech and information, we've made quite a few advances. The word going around is that they've even found a cure for the Pokerus, but they need more time to test it. Sabrina, however, was a special case. I've never seen such efficient, quick research in all my life. Apparently, what she was injected with was a serum that overlays a Pokemon-type energy pattern onto the DNA of a cell, allowing that cell to have Pokemon-like properties. They were able to use technology similar to a Pokeball to remove it from her system, but the whole thing left her very drained and weak. It seems Team Rocket did more than just experiment on her... how much more, we may never know. But they said she's making a great recovery and she should be back to work soon after the Convention."

Kiai shook his head. "Experimenting on humans.. that's far, even for Team Rocket. At least they didn't get too far with their research." Amy murmured an agreement, and made an intentional but unnoticed attempt to not look at Emily for the next few seconds.

"Well, at least Team Rocket is gone and we won't have to worry about them anymore...I hope anyway..."

Ash nodded. "The computer in Saffron actually had a roster of Team Rocket members. The police have ran an investigation regarding that. What we've found, unfortunately, is that while some Team Rocket members have joined Team Rocket willingly, others were forced into it. The majority of those are the scientists, though, as Giovanni needed scientific minds to do things, he had to force some of the greatest scientists to work as a part of Team Rocket by several means, including, but not limited to, threatening to kill their families if they did not comply."

Emily shivered. "Giovanni...that man...he was a sick bastard..."

"But he got things done," spoke Amy. "The data pouring out of Team Rocket is clean and efficient. They kept records on everything; projects, research, movements of targets, you name it. That's why we're able to have done so much so quickly. There are only a scant few gaps, and most of those seem to be intentional. Even Oak admits that they were at least five to ten years ahead of us on Pokemon research, though we're all sure it's due to Giovanni's kidnapping of scientists. Not only that, the names and places of all the members and labs and hideouts are in our hands, and we've already made five stings. Jenny estimates we've eradicated 98% of their entire organization. You two really did a number on them!"

Kiai whistled appreciatively. "But you know," he spoke, "we couldn't have done it without your help."

Ash smiled grimly. "Actually you did…we just cleaned up after you two…"

"Well, I'm just glad we could be of some help is all," Emily spoke with a smile. "Hopefully now that Team Rocket is gone, we can all get back to our normal lives."

Amy nodded. "I really hope so as well." Amy stretched and looked around a moment before looking back to Emily. "Hey, Emily, it's been a while since we had any time between just the two of us. Why don't I pay for a room for Kiai, and then you and I stay in my room tonight. We can have a sister-to-sister talk and such, things we haven't had in a while."

Emily nodded. "That sounds fine, as long as it's okay with Kiai."

Kiai nodded with a smile. "It's fine."

"Thanks, Kiai." Emily hugged her boyfriend and smiled. The group got their food, ate, and finally separated. Amy bought a room for Kiai to stay in for a night on his own while Emily and her made it to her room. Emily then lied down on the bed and smiled. "I miss the days we used to play together."

Amy smiled. "It has been quite a while, hasn't it?"

Emily nodded, then looked down at herself. "I forgot my clothes are still at the Pokemon Center..."

Amy smiled as she lied down next to her. "Not a problem." She grabbed hold of the top of Emily's dress and undid the top.

"Eep!" Emily squeaked and covered her chest.

Amy kissed Emily gently on the shoulder. "Oh relax, we used to bathe together all the time, and we're both girls anyway. So it's not like I'm seeing anything I haven't before." Emily blushed and nodded before lowering her hands. "You know, Emily, I really care for you."

Emily blushed a little more. "Well...you are my sister..."

Amy shook her head. "Not in that way." She gently brought her lips down against Emily's neck and she blushed rather heavily. "I mean I really care for you. I've always cared for you." She brought her hands up and gently groped Emily's chest. "I know that you love Kiai, and I know Michelle cares for you more than I ever could...but I want you to do me a favor..."

"A f-favor?" Emily asked as she shivered a little.

Amy nodded. "I want you to let me have you for one night. I don't care about after that."

"B-but we're sisters."

"Not really. Mom adopted you, but you and I have nothing genetically in common. We're two completely unrelated people because of that." Amy gently kissed down her shoulder. "Just for tonight, ok?"

Emily nodded slowly then closed her eyes. The next moment the two shared was a special moment of heated passion. As the night passed, the two enjoyed themselves. Finally, as the sun began to rise, Amy stood over the bed. She gently kissed Emily before pulling out her pokegear. She remembered that Emily had left her pokegear with Kiai, and thus she called him up. "Kiai, when you come over to get Emily, make sure to bring some of her clothes with you. All she has is the dress from yesterday, and I think she'd prefer to wear more casual clothes throughout the day." She then hung up and smiled. "Thank you, Emily," she spoke silently and opened the door. She left a note on the door to tell her that she had left for the Convention to help with the day's events. The first day of the convention had now come to a close, and the second day was about to begin.