We move onto Sunday, the last day of the Phantom Cup. What surprises await us today? We'll have to find out, but there's certainly going to be one fun little surprise here. Remember to review!

KedharS: Hopefully is should be.

Hellraiserphoenix: That's a pretty long list of battles. Some of them will happen, some will not.

Aquahaze675: Yep, but they're tricky to write.

Zera Of The Damned: Probably about 6 months.

Thunder Fire: Minor characters.

JoshGamerV: That's good, thanks! I'm glad you liked them. I will keep that use of themself in mind. My computer autocorrects that, which might be an issue, but I'm glad I learned something knew.

Just a Bad Writer for Fun: Good, I hope the inevitable battle will be enjoyable for you!

Pokemon Academy: Beginning of Beginnings

Chapter 584

Will was in a position he could not quite understand.

Having kept a low head this entire semester, he had tried to keep from getting drawn into this whole deal with the Phantom.

It wasn't that he was regretting allying himself with the Phantom and his associates. He'd learned a lot of new techniques for training his pokemon, and was promised a Dusk Stone to evolve his Doublade Agni and Rudra whenever he liked. He had also been organized to enter into an informal internship under a gym leader in his home region of Johto over winter break thanks to the Phantom, and had learned quite a lot from the gym leader of Ecruteak. And when it became summer, he was going to Olivine City for another internship, to help train his Cobalt so that the Beldum could evolve into a Metang.

Still, his relationship with the Phantom's organization was complicated.

Particularly, things were getting… odd with Misato Daisan. Which in and of itself wasn't that odd, since Misato was… well, odd.

Or perhaps she was perfectly normal for a Mechadoll, but that wasn't what Will was particularly concerned with right now.

Misato Daisan had asked him out on a date.

Not to accompany him to the library to pick up books, or observing him to make sure he wasn't doing anything that would go against the Phantom's goals and objectives.

She asked him if he wanted to get coffee. And she didn't DRINK coffee.

So needless to say, Will was a little confused when he had gotten her call. He had tried to tell her that he wasn't interested and that he would rather spend his Sunday sleeping in and maybe get some training, but she told him that it was important and that she had something important that she wanted to discuss with him.

As a Mechadoll the flat affect of her voice couldn't exactly convey seriousness or urgency, because everything sounded monotonously serious to begin with. So he couldn't be sure if she actually wanted to talk about something serious or not.

But that was just him making excuses. He knew that Misato wasn't the kind of person… robot… Mechadoll to make exaggerations or lie, or say anything except what she was explicitly requested to, permitted to, or a truthful observation.

So if she said that it was important, then it was probably important. He sighed, shaking his head, and got up out of bed, beginning to change his clothes.

Misato was an annoyance, an inconvenience. But at the same time, Will found that she was something that he wasn't exactly capable of ignoring, either. There was just something about her that made him feel like he couldn't leave her alone, even if he desperately wished sometimes (most times) that she would leave HIM alone.

But that wasn't something he could tell her, of course. He had found, in the months that he had gotten to know Misato Daisan, that things like this, things that he couldn't logically explain, were best left unspoken. Because Misato needed logic to function. Anything he brought up that she questioned him on he would need to explain, and if he couldn't, well, she would keep asking him questions until she arrived at a conclusion that satisfied the need for reason in whatever she had in place of a brain. And he couldn't sort out for himself what it was, so it would be a topic that he would certainly be avoiding today.

…No, he wasn't running away from his feelings. He dismissed that errant thought, clearing his head and moving forward, changing into an outfit that he assumed would be acceptable. He was going out to coffee with Misato Daisan after all, that was about as far from a real date as you could get. He didn't have to actually put effort into it.

Will was stunned at what he saw when he got to the coffee shop. Misato Daisan was there, alright, but for a moment, he couldn't recognize her. Maybe it was because he had seen her in exactly one thing every time he had run into her. She was a Mechadoll, basically the epitome of "not changing" in terms of appearance.

But she looked different now, sitting there at the table in the coffee shop, even if she was sitting as motionless as she always did.

To start with what was most noticeable, her hair. Before, Misato had hair the color of the sky, which tumbled down to her shoulders in a long tangle of curls that looked like it had never seen a brush before (which was probably true).

While it still had the sky blue coloring, it had been cut much shorter, the tips dancing around her chin. Cut short like it was, the stormy knots that had plagued it before were gone, giving it a more natural waviness as it pointed out at the ends. Altogether it gave her a much neater, more "human" image, actually looking like she had taken care of her appearance by brushing her hair. What shattered that image, though, was that her eyes were still the same dull, lifeless golden color, which was how he had recognized her in the first place.

Will had been so surprised by her new hairstyle he hadn't noticed the change in her wardrobe. Before, she would wear the uniform, if slightly altered, unbuttoned at the front to reveal a sky blue tank top, which the Phantom Cup had made him realize wasn't an outfit for fashion, but for function, letting her merge with her Rotom as easily as stripping off her shirt. But today, that outfit was nowhere to be seen.

Misato hadn't reacted to detecting her presence, so after he took a moment to regain his bearings he stepped forward, walking around the girl and studying her curiously. It was a rude thing to do to a date, but Misato wasn't exactly a normal date, either.

While there was nothing special about the tight leather pants she wore, she was wearing a sweater, colored grayish-white, with thin black lines running vertically down it. It clung to her voluptuous figure, emphasizing just how… "female" the Mechadoll was. The sweater was cut in an interesting way, the neckline wide enough to bear most of her collarbone and her shoulder blades, and it was held up by thick black straps over her shoulders. The back of her sweater plunged down, almost to her waist, which made him question whether or not it served any purpose as a sweater at all; then he realized it would still allow her to merge with her Rotom that way, since her back was exposed.

And then, staring at her back, he realized two things. One, the section where her back opened up to reveal the mechanism that she merged with her Rotom showed no trace of even the slightest seam, just smooth and milky artificial skin. Two, he didn't see a bra line. Which made him realize he shouldn't be thinking that way, and he felt his face burn up. He cleared his throat and walked back around to sit down across from Misato.

"Hello…" He said, trying not to get too embarrassed by the thoughts that had gone through his head at the sight of Misato in her new appearance. "Hey, Misato. So, um, you said that you wanted to speak to me?"

Misato stared blankly at him. He couldn't even tell if she noticed him or not, because her face didn't change. He knew that her… visual receptors? Is that what they were called? He knew that they had obviously registered him, but he didn't see any sign of acknowledgment, and more annoyingly, she wasn't speaking. So he tried again.

"Misato? You said you had something important that you wanted to talk to me about? So we came to get coffee?" He asked.

Misato didn't respond.

"Hello there, can I get you anything?" A pink-haired waitress came up to their table.

"Not right now, we're talking about something," Will replied, not even glancing her way. The waitress scowled, not amused.

"Well, your… date here came in the second we opened, took a table without saying a word, and has been sitting here for the last four hours refusing to order something," the waitress said, putting her hands on her hips. "See, we accommodate students, but not that much. So when I told her she couldn't keep the table without ordering, she said her date would be the one to order, and from what I can see that's you. So order, or I'm kicking you both out, got it?"

Will sighed and glanced up just in time to see the woman blow a fringe of hair up out of her eyes with an exasperated huff. She crossed her arms in front of her chest and raised her eyebrow, tapping her foot on the floor.

"…Fine, one coffee," he said.

The waitress kept her professional smile, but it was a little shaky and her eye was twitching. She clutched her pen so tightly it made a cracking noise. She scribbled on the pad, and said under her breath, "fine. I'll have one coffee."

She turned on her heel and stormed off, muttering "keeping me waiting four hours for one measly cup of coffee with a 50 cent tip my frigging…"

Putting the irate waitress out of his thoughts, Will turned his attention back to Misato, his expression serious.

"Listen, Misato-"

"You did not order for me," Misato finally spoke, and it was to rebuke him? He was so surprised he couldn't remember what he was going to say, staring at her in confusion. Misato continued, "elaborate. Why did you not order for me?"

Will's jaw dropped.

"You wanted me… to order for you."

"Affirmative," Misato replied.

No, that still wasn't connecting. He asked again to make sure he was hearing right.

"You," he said, as clearly as he could, pointing at her, "wanted me," he pointed at himself next, "to order for you."

"Affirmative," Misato repeated. "I do not understand why you did not order for me after you placed your own order."

"Because you don't drink," Will said, trying very hard not to shout. It wasn't that he was angry with her, just… exasperated? She'd been ignoring him when he arrived, and it took him not ordering her a coffee to finally open her mouth?

"Negative," Misato replied. "As you are aware it is within my capabilities to consume liquids orally. You have observed this on many occasions."

Will's eye twitched. He sighed.

"Okay, but you don't need to drink, so I didn't think you would want to… you know, drink coffee," he explained.

"Affirmative. My functions do not require consumption of food or drink to sustain themselves. Furthermore, I derive no value in the practice of eating or drinking personally," she agreed with him. That didn't make him feel better.

"So then why did you want me to order you a drink? Or think that I would?" Will asked. Part of him knew that they were getting far off-track from the original conversation, but he couldn't help himself. He just had to get at the truth, even when he should really know better, and should keep his mouth shut.

"I was informed that such an action was standard practice," Misato replied. "It is customary on a date for the boy to be the one to order the drinks and pay for them. Please inform me if this information is inaccurate, and I will correct the misunderstanding."

Will took a second to process that.

"Wait, what? Date? What?" Will asked. "This isn't a date."

"Negative. This is a date," Misato denied.

"But I don't want to go on a date with you," Will replied.

"Affirmative. That is why it was necessary to convey the importance of information that I possess in order to entice you into a discussion, so that you can assist me in my study of human behavior by going on a date with me," Misato explained.

So this was a date. Misato had lured him here so that they could go on a pretend date for her to learn more about people. This was another one of her "studies of humanity" as it were. And he had walked right into it, thinking that she wasn't the type of person… Mechadoll who was capable of deceit. Not that he knew it really was deceit.

"So do you even have anything important you want to talk with me about?" He sighed, resigned to the fact that he would be continuing with this date either way. He'd like to tell her to shove it, but at the same time he knew that this was an important thing to her.

Yeah, his relationship with Misato was a complex one.

"So is there anything else that you think is necessary for a date?" He sighed. He had a sinking suspicion about who had given this information to him as well.

"Affirmative," Misato said.

"…Would you like to elaborate on those things?" Will asked.

"Negative," Misato replied. "This is a controlled study to verify the accuracy of the information I was provided. If I inform you of what is expected of your performance on this date, that could result in you attempting to fulfill those obligations, which would alter the content of the study. It is imperative to my study of human behavior that I observe you expressing yourself on a date in a natural setting, with no expectations beyond those of a date."

Misato paused.

"I am asking you to be yourself," she added, phrasing her request in a more informal way. "Is that acceptable to you?"

Will sighed.

"So is there anything else that I've done that was outside of your expectations for this date?" He asked her.

"Affirmative," Misato replied. "When you first arrived, you stared at me for a period of time that lasted 4 minutes 56 seconds."

Will shook his head. "No, no, no way it was for that long."

"There are no inconsistencies with my internal clock. For your benefit I reported the time to you in the form of minutes and seconds, but if you require a more precise answer I can inform you of how long you staring at me down to the number of zeptoseconds which would be exactly-"

"No, no, it's fine," Will interrupted her, his face going red. "I believe you. I just didn't want it to be that long. …Add that to your records," he added after a pause. "When human beings are embarrassed by the fact that something is true, they will often lie to try and convince other people and themselves that it isn't true, because it's too embarrassing to accept that it is. When that happens, you can spare the dignity by dropping the topic."

"Elaborate. A topic is a term of subject classification for a matter dealt with in a text, conversation, or form of discourse. It is not a physical thing that can be dropped."

"…Yeah, just like that," Will dryly replied. "It means forget about it."

"My memory banks can retain all information I receive through my sensory receptors. I am not capable of forgetting about anything without purging that information from my storage drive. If you would like me to do so, please elaborate on the content that you would like to-"

"Okay, so you were saying something about staring?" Will loudly interrupted her. "About how that wasn't appropriate for a date?"

"Affirmative," Misato replied. "According to my records, that length of focused analysis of the appearance of another person without request from the observed party is an action that constitutes rudeness. However, given the fact that my appearance has changed since you last observed me it is an action that is well within the expected parameters."

"Next you'll tell me you wore that outfit specifically to draw my attention?" Will chuckled, not sure why he did. Misato didn't get sarcastic humor, or jokes of any kind. Maybe it was a coping mechanism to keep him from freaking out about the fact that he was on a date with a robot.

"Affirmative," Misato said, which caused him to do a double-take. He opened his mouth to reply, but before he could say anything the waitress returned.

"Here's your coffee," she said, putting on as cheery of a smile as she could, setting it down in front of him.

Will didn't even thank her for it, he barely recognized that she was there.

The pink-haired girl sighed, turning away from the table and rubbing her temples. "Come on, keep it together, Carrie," she told herself. "You need this job, you can't snap and punch out one of the customers…"

"So you wore that outfit for my sake?" Will asked.

"I was informed that an effective tactic for a first date is to alter ones appearance drastically in order to make an impression," Misato replied. "If it is successful there will be an observable change in the date partner compared to how they normally react when they see you. In order to facilitate this I cut my hair and wore new clothes. It was successful. Compared to the last time we interacted I detected a statistically significant acceleration in your heart rate, pupil dilation increased to 200% of standard diameter, noticeable swelling in your-"

"Okay, let's cut it off right there, there was no swelling anywhere," Will said, turning bright red as he looked around the coffee shop, squirming uncomfortably in his seat. People were starting to look there way.

"By a factor of-"

"Misato, stop… repeating your analysis," Will begged.

Misato stopped.

"All detected signs indicate one of three statistically significant possible causes of those physical adjustments resulting from your brain chemistry. In descending order of probability the responses were due to sexual attraction, romantic attraction, or spontaneous arousal in response to fear, resulting in a physiological compulsion to leave behind descendents before death."

Will thumped his head against the table.

"All other possible conclusions are not statistically significant. Please indicate which theory is correct for the summative assessment."

"I'm… not going to do that," Will said, shaking his head.

"Negative. Your response is required in order to draw the proper conclusion," Misato rejected him. "You did not make the initial response to seeing my change in appearance that was given as the standard response. In order to understand the reason for you diversion from the expected response for a date, this line of questioning was determined to be the most statistically probable way of eliciting the necessary response."

"How, by embarrassing me in front of… wait, what?" Will hadn't followed all of that. "What… what was my initial response supposed to be, then?"

Misato paused for a second.

"…You were supposed to say I looked nice," she said.

For a second she actually looked… upset?

"…Yeah, you look great," Will said, trying as hard as he could not to blush as he said it.

"Affirmative," Misato said. "It is customary to say thank you in this situation, correct?" She waited for Will to nod before continuing, ignoring his eye roll. "Thank you. You look nice as well."

Wait, I thought Misato didn't lie to spare people's feelings? Will reminded himself.

"Thank you," he replied anyway. "Now-"

"Returning to prior question, which reason is correct?" Misato asked again.

"I'm not answering that," Will said, his face bright red now. He grabbed his coffee and drained it as fast as he could, desperate to do anything to avoid talking. When he was finally done, there was nothing to do but reply. He sighed. "Look… can we just… put that aside for now, and move on with the date?"

"Affirmative," Misato agreed. "I was informed that after coffee, the next step on a first date is to proceed to the bedroom to engage in sexual congress. This body lacks the physical capabilities for the process, but it is still possible for me to provide relief in a variety of other methods."

Will smacked his head against the table again. Oh yeah. Sylvia definitely was the one who had given Misato the information to use on her date.

So, Will and Misato on a nice little date! How cute! What a great way to start the day, right?