"You know, I'm pretty sure there's an Articuno who lives around here," Zapdos said, swooping down and hovering next to her trainer. "Well, not exactly here, but in the Seafoam Islands. So not that far away."
"That's neat," Ash pronounced. "The same one as Noland's one, or a different one?"
"Different, I think," Zapdos said, considering it. "Unless he never let me know about having moved… then again, I didn't exactly go around passing out change-of-address notifications."
Max sniggered.
"Well, here we are," he added, pointing. "There's the Battle Palace… what's the name of the guy for this one?"
"I think it was something about… Palace Maven?" Ash tried.
Before he got further, though, a robot flew down in front of them.
Then the Battle Palace door opened.
"Ah!" said an old man, nodding knowledgeably. "You must be Ash Ketchum and his friends! Welcome to Metallica Island."
"Hi!" Ash replied, waving. "Uh… is this a Rotom, or a Porygon, or…?"
"That's Jamero," the man said. "Jamero is a robotic battle judge. And my name, so you know, is Spenser."
He waved his staff. "Come in, come in… and come right back out again, because I don't hold my battles in the Battle Palace. My challenge involves the whole of the island!"
Because the challenge did involve the whole island, none of the spectators (including Scott, who was there too) had a remote hope of keeping up with what was going on.
Latias suggested that maybe she could follow and Latios could use sight-sharing to transmit what was going on, but then Spenser said that Jamero's camera transmitted to a laptop and they could just use that to follow what was going on… while being in a balloon over the island as well, of course, just to get the best possible view.
"That sounds kind of weird, but fun," May said.
"I do my best," Spenser chuckled. "I'll have my Charmeleon set up the balloon for you… now, Ash, we will be starting on a battlefield by a mountain, but since the whole island is a battlefield you will need to keep up. It will be a battle with three Pokémon on a side, and only the challenger can make substitutions."
"That's okay," Ash said, frowning as he thought. "So… leaving the island counts as going too far away?"
"Going more than two miles from the island," Spenser said. "That includes vertically. It's the only way we could come up with that was consistent."
"Right!" Ash said. "Okay, I've worked out my team! Ibid, I'm going to need – oh, hold on… do I get to know what your team is, Spenser?"
"You have no Pokémon called: Oh hold on do I get to know what your team is," Ibid said. "Also, my name is not Spenser."
Spenser chuckled. "I don't get to know, so you should select your own team somewhere I can't hear," he said.
A few minutes of sorting things out later – and several minutes of walking, and the time for a hot-air balloon to rise into the air and get towed by Ash's Pidgey over to the middle of the island – the trainers faced off against one another.
"This should be interesting," Max said, torn between watching through Jamero's camera and watching out the side of the balloon basket. "It might be the biggest official Pokémon battlefield in the world."
"It's actually not," Scott provided. "We were hoping it would be, but there's some competition in the Orange Islands which is bigger because it's a race down a whole mountainside – a bigger mountain than this one. They measured it."
"Ash actually did that one," Brock supplied. "We can't tell you what it was like, though… none of us here was involved. Pikachu and Marshadow were, but they're down there."
"I was!" Latias squeaked, becoming visible. "I didn't see much either though."
"And there go the first Pokémon," Brock said, drawing their attention to the ground.
Ash sent out Shaymintwo as his first Pokémon, and Spenser opened with his Claydol.
"That's an interesting Pokémon you've got there," Spenser said. "Supposed to be slow, but isn't."
"Watch out, Shaymintwo," Ash warned.
"Begin," Jamero announced.
"Flame Charge!" Ash said immediately. "Go into the jungle and build up speed!"
"Ice Beam," Spenser replied, and Claydol sent blasts of ice flashing out at the speeding Shaymintwo – who jumped off the mountaintop battlefield and shot off into the jungle.
"Agility!" Ash added.
To Spenser's surprise, that wasn't an order. Instead Ash himself ran off into the jungle at great speed.
"On your left!" Ash called. "Claydol's behind that rock!"
Shaymintwo swerved to the side, popped up over the indicated rock, and used Bullet Seed. The first half of the spray hit Claydol, then the second half bounced off a Reflect screen, and Shaymintwo dropped back down again just before he got hit by an Ice Beam.
"He's using Lock On!" Ash reported.
"Okay, I let the first one go, but how are you keeping up with me exactly?" Shaymintwo said.
"Agility!" Ash replied. "Wait, hold on a minute – keep him busy, I need to ask something!"
Ash ran back off towards the mountain, and Shaymintwo went tch before bounding up from behind a ridge.
"Octazooka!" he shouted, pulling a watery tube from inside his turf. He lined it up and fired, sending a blast of water at Claydol, and the attack smacked Claydol backwards but the Ground-type just retaliated with a Psybeam.
Ash ran back in again. "So I checked!" he called, running alongside Shaymintwo. "It's okay to burn the jungle a little bit! Searing Shot!"
Shaymintwo teleported into the air and fired down, hammering the jungle with a spinning ball of flames, and that did what his flaming paws hadn't – the forest began to catch fire.
"I'm not sure the world is ready for Ash Ketchum knowing Agility," Scott said. "It's very impressive, but at the same time…"
He frowned. "What is he doing? There's a forest fire going on down there…"
Then all the smoke vanished at once.
Shaymintwo Teleported into the suddenly-clear air, smeared with soot and ash, but with his flowers glowing brilliantly.
"SEED FLARE!" he shouted, hitting Claydol from above, and a spear-shaped blast of green light drove Claydol into the ground.
The recoil drove Shaymintwo skywards, and he flipped twice before barraging the ground below with Octazookas. Each blast put out a big chunk of the flames, and he landed in one of the brand-new clearings.
"Claydol is unable to battle," Jamero said. "Challenger has won the first match. Palace Maven Spenser must switch Pokémon."
"Why is he the Palace Maven, anyway?" Max asked. "I get Pyramid King, and Pike Queen, and names like that, but Maven?"
"Someone in marketing got a thesaurus for their birthday," Scott summarized.
To Ash's surprise, the second battle didn't come straight after the first.
Instead, Spenser had them take twenty minutes out for a snack. It was actually quite relaxing, though it did mean Latias was occupied carrying small cakes back and forth between the picnic blanket and the balloon.
And Shamintwo spent much of the time simmering in vaguely edgy disdain, but that was just how he was and Ash didn't begrudge it.
"Right, then!" Spenser said, eventually. "That was nice! Now, back to the battle, I think!"
"Finally," Shaymintwo said, quickly pushing the remains of a mini-pizza into the rubbish bag. "Let's get on with it!"
"Venusaur," Spenser announced, sending out his Venusaur, then removed the top of his staff.
A Key Stone glittered inside, and Venusaur Mega-Evolved into Mega Venusaur with a flash of light.
"That's better," he said. "Jamero?"
"Battle begins again in three. Two. One. Begin."
"Ingrain," Spenser ordered.
Shaymintwo burst into motion, using Flame Charge to build up speed again, and hit Mega Venusaur twice – bouncing off each time – then pulled out a Searing Shot.
"Shaymintwo, Venusaur's got Thick Fat!" Ash warned. "Try a Mist Ball!"
"Block," Spenser said, and a pulse of energy flashed out from Mega Venusaur. "Power Whip!"
Shaymintwo hadn't quite processed the block command when Mega Venusaur snagged his paw in a vine. Then the vine whipcracked upwards, flinging him into the sky with immense force, and Ash shaded his eyes to see what was going on.
"I guess he can't teleport back to the ground," he realized. "That was clever!"
"I try," Spenser chuckled.
"Challenger's Pokémon is out of bounds," Jamero stated. "Challenger must change Pokémon."
"I know just who to use, then!" Ash said. "Snorlax, go! And, Latias, can you go and catch Shaymintwo and let him know what's happened?"
Snorlax displayed an admirable simplicity to solving the problem presented by Mega Venusaur.
First, he punched Mega Venusaur very hard.
Then, he used Extremespeed to do it at significantly above the speed of sound.
When this didn't work – and ignoring Mega Venusaur's Solar Beam attacks – he tried picking up Mega Venusaur and flinging the Grass-type off Metallica Island.
Prevented by Ingrain, he used Strength, and simply lifted up the entire chunk of ground Mega Venusaur had Ingrained into before throwing that off Metallica Island.
"Is there any of the snack left?" he asked, as Mega Venusaur vanished into the distance.
Spenser stared after his Pokémon.
"Calculating trajectory," Jamero said. "Expected landing point is three miles offshore. Battle Maven Spenser's Pokémon is out of bounds. Please select your final Pokémon."
"Sure!" Ash agreed, and sent out Purrloin.
"I meant Battle Maven Spenser," Jamero corrected.
"Oh, right," Ash realized. "Well, Snorlax was hungry, and I'm allowed to switch out, so I thought I would!"
"Fortunately, I've already picked out who I'm using for this battle," Spenser said, chuckling slightly. "Shiftry, you'll finish the battle."
"This should be interesting!" Purrloin said, bouncing on her paws slightly and flicking her blade tail up.
"...are you the same colour as most normal Purrloin?" Shiftry asked dubiously.
"I'm technically a mutant, if that's what you mean," Purrloin replied, tail flirting. "It's okay. I know you weren't trying to be insensitive."
"Three. Two. One. Begin," Jamero instructed.
"Rock Smash!" Spenser called.
"X-Scissor!" Ash retorted.
Shiftry darted in and kicked out at Purrloin, and the Mischievious Pokémon backflipped smoothly away and flicked her blade across. It glowed with a greenish light that reached past the edge of the blade, catching Shiftry a glancing blow to the stomach, and the Grass-type winced.
"Quick Attack!" Spenser said. "Then dodge to the jungle!"
Shiftry did just that, darting at Purrloin, and Ash's Pokémon dodged again – then followed Shiftry into the jungle.
"Why is Purrloin dodging those, again?" Pikachu asked.
"Appearances, I guess," Ash replied.
A tree fell over.
"Let's go and see what's going on!" he added.
Shiftry used Twister, Rock Smash, Quick Attack, Razor Wind and Swift, then – after considerable irritation – found out that Leaf Blade was a move he knew that could actually hit Purrloin.
By that point Purrloin herself had shifted through X-Scissor, Slash, Shadow Claw, Fury Cutter and Secret Sword, partly on Ash's advice and partly to try them out, and that whole area of the battlefield was littered with fallen trees and surprisingly well cut pieces of wood.
There was even a sculpture, though nobody seemed quite sure who'd cut it.
"Ah, to be young again," Spenser said, panting slightly as he reached the battlefield. "Shiftry, Double Team!"
The Grass-type blurred into a maze of duplicates, and Purrloin looked at Ash for advice.
"Sneak attack!" Ash instructed.
Purrloin jumped, put her paws together, and dove into the ground as if it were water.
"You know it's not a sneak attack if you tell someone you're doing it?" Spenser asked.
"Yeah, but still," Ash replied. "Actually… yeah, I'm pretty sure this is allowed, because Purrloin isn't going more than two miles in an orthogonal direction to reality."
Spenser paused. "What?"
Purrloin rematerialized from nowhere right in front of one of the Shiftry duplicates, tail blazing, and used Play Rough with her paws (which confirmed that that was the real one) before throwing Shiftry into the air and hitting him with an X-Scissor.
Bouncing off, she did a double backwards somersault and landed neatly on the ground – only for Shiftry to land right on top of her.
As she was a Ghost, he went through her, but it did spoil her poise slightly.
"Sorry about that," Ash said, later. "All the damage, I mean."
"I'm just glad you didn't do whatever it was you did to the Blackthorn Gym," Spenser told him. "I heard something about wrecking the roof?"
Ash looked up. "There's only the sky, though… there is that move Mew mentioned once about burning the sky?"
"As I was saying, I'm glad you didn't," Spenser reiterated. "You've earned the Spirits Symbol, and good luck with Anabel's Battle Tower."
AN:
If a sneak attack happens with a warning, is it still sneaky?