Professor Juniper opened the door to her lab.

"What are you doing here?" she asked.

"Well, I thought I'd ask what would be a good place to visit in Unova that we haven't been together yet!" Ash explained. "And while I could just ask Arc, I thought I'd see if there was anywhere you thought would be a good idea."

He held up Dewott, who waved. "Plus, I wanted to see if you'd heard of both kinds of Samurott that Dewott can turn into with his Eviolite. Some of the people I talked to were really confused about that."

Professor Juniper rubbed her temples.

"Under normal circumstances, a Pokémon Professor doesn't turn down any information she can get about any topic," she said. "But my focus is really more into the origin of Pokémon."

"Oh, in that case maybe it'd be better for you to chat with Mew?" Ash suggested. "Or Ho-Oh. Ho-Oh can make Pokémon, though it sometimes doesn't quite work out how he planned it."

"Most Pokémon can only really fill you in about their own origin, which usually involves parents," N added. "But I suppose that Unown might be able to help, depending on whether they remember everything that ever happened to the Unown hive mind…"

"Actually, I'm not sure how more Unown come about," Ash admitted. "I asked once but I can't remember the answer… it might have been something about them being Psychic? Or it could have been something else to do with typing."

"Let me rephrase," Professor Juniper said. "I think you should tell someone else about all this… though I did have a message from my father, who was interested with working with you again. He says there's important archaeological clues he's digging up that point to something around Icirrus, but it might take weeks for him to confirm that."

"What's a good route, Arc?" Ash asked.

"That depends on whether you want the fastest route or not," Arc reminded him. "If you want the fastest route, teleport. Otherwise, one recommended route is to go via Aspertia City."

"That sounds like an excellent idea!" Cilan said. "We could introduce you to Cheren – you remember, he's a new Gym Leader. Iris, Keldeo and I, and the Pokémon, met him at the Vertress Conference."

"He was nice," Iris agreed. "He took over correcting Keldeo about rules."

"It was strangely comforting," N said.

Zygarde raised a paw for attention. "I wish to inform everyone that there is a human outside the door who does not seem to want to come in," they stated. "They have been there for several minutes."

"Oh!" the girl gasped, as the door opened. "Is the lab full of Galvantula?"

"Nope!" Ash replied. "I don't think there's even any Joltik. Oh, are you like my friend Misty? She was a bit nervous about Bug types at first."

"It's not Bug types," the girl said. "Or, um, I just don't see why other people aren't worried about things? You go over a bridge, and… what if the bridge collapses?"

"I'm sure bridges wouldn't collapse just because you walked over them," N replied. "In fact, I think it'd be a violation of the dictionary."

"Bridge," Arc contributed. "Noun. A card game in which-"

"Not that one!" N interrupted.

The girl started giggling.

"Sorry," she said, holding up a hand and trying to stop. "I just… that was… that is, I'm here to get my starter Pokémon, but… how does that even work? You go somewhere and they just give you a Pokémon? There has to be some kind of catch."

"Actually, no!" Cilan told her, popping out from behind Ash. "Normally, when people get a Pokémon they do catch it, even if only to prove they're capable of doing that, but the Starter Pokémon given out by Pokémon Professors in particular are the ones who want to be someone's Starter Pokémon. So in a way you could say nobody's caught the Pokémon!"

"I mean, do you have to do anything?" the girl fretted. "Maybe you'd have to beat the Pokémon League, or catch one of every Pokémon, or… or…"

"You don't need to worry about that," Ash told her. "In fact, what I usually find is that you don't really need to be worried about much of anything, so long as you've got Pokémon who are good friends of yours and you take care to be a friend first and anything else second. It's okay to think about things, sure, and maybe you're just someone who doesn't like taking risks much. But sometimes you have to just tell yourself that you're going to enjoy your journey!"

"Actually…" Cilan began. "That might make a perfect way to match up a trainer and a Pokémon! We can see which of the Pokémon Professor Juniper has comes out as a perfect fit for you, and they can help you out by letting you know when you're over-thinking things?"

After fifteen minutes of work, which included asking a number of questions of the girl (whose name was Nanette) and just as many of all the available Pokémon Professor Juniper had, Cilan nodded to himself.

"I have it!" he said. "I know you mentioned anxieties about all three Pokémon if they evolved, but fortunately an Everstone pendant is the perfect solution to that until you feel confident enough. Which means it's down to personal compatibility above all, and… it's this Tepig who I feel you'd get on best with."

"You're sure?" Tepig asked.

"Well, I am an A-ranked connoisseur," Cilan said. "So either I'm right or I'm nearly right, and nearly right sounds good enough to me!"

"That makes sense," Nanette admitted.

Then a Hyperspace Hole opened in the air, and Absol came through.

"AAAAAAA!" she yelped.

"AAAAAAA!" Nanette reacted, jumping onto the nearest table with a clatter and thump of falling books.

"AAAAAA!" Absol repeated.

"AAAAAA!" Nanette said, not remotely calmed down.

This went on for about another minute.

"Why are we screaming?" Nanette asked, eventually, after taking a breath.

"Oh, goodness," Absol replied, also sounding quite out of breath. "Where do I begin… I don't know why you're screaming, but I have a good idea why I'm screaming, and it's going to take a while to explain."

"Huh," Ash said, frowning slightly. "I thought maybe Emolga was doing me too, but that doesn't sound like how it does when Emolga translates."

"Yes," Absol agreed. "Lokoko convinced me to learn, so that I can explain myself to people. I've been practising on customers."

"You mean I can actually understand you?" Nanette checked. "Wow. That must have been hard."

"It was uneasy," Absol confirmed. "There's all kinds of rules and I do not think I got them all… but perhaps explaining will be good practice."

She glanced at Ash, and winced. "You might have heard that Absol can tell when there are disasters… well, Ash is… Ash. And we first met when I sensed there was a disaster not far away from where he was, so I went there…"

"I find myself curious," Professor Juniper said, as Absol kept talking and Nanette occasionally asked her to clarify or suggested a different word. "That Pokémon screamed when she saw you. Is that normal?"

"Yeah, usually," Ash agreed. "I don't quite get it myself, but she's a good friend and she makes Lokoko happy. So putting up with a little quirk like that is nothing."

"I think I understand," Juniper said. "But, then… isn't it difficult to use her in battle?"

"Absol isn't my Pokémon," Ash said. "She's a wild Pokémon, technically, sort of like Zygarde is, but she works at my Mom's cafe sometimes with her girlfriend who is one of my Pokémon."

"Every time," Juniper sighed. "Every time I speak to you I have more questions than answers, and I find the answers don't do what answers are supposed to do which is resolve the questions I had in the first place."

"Wow," Nanette said, drawing their attention. "I actually feel less anxious now."

She swallowed. "Absolutely terrified of the immediate future, but… less anxious."

"So Absol can talk in a way Nanette can understand," Iris said. "But she's the only one, and I don't want to presume that she'd want to go with Nanette. But maybe if we could get Nanette an Absol as a Pokémon, maybe even as a therapy Pokémon, would that help?"

"Oh, right!" Ash said. "So about hearing what she should be anxious about?"

Iris glanced at Ash. "I meant more about letting her know when there's no disasters to be anxious about."

"That's a thing?" Pikachu said.

Nanette thought about that.

"I guess it'd help, if they could explain how much or how little risk there is," she said.

"Can a Pokédex do text-to-speech?" Ibid asked. "A normal one, not one of me, that is."

"I don't see a reason why not," Professor Juniper admitted. "It would take a while to type out, but that's a lot better than nothing."

Deep in the heart of Hoenn, an Absol looked up at the twilit sky, and sighed in contentment.

Then a golden hole opened in space, and another Absol landed in front of him.

"Hello there, cousin," she said. "What would you think about becoming a trainer's Pokémon?"

"No!" the local Absol replied. "Absolutely not, Absol! I know who you mean and I'm not coming within ten miles of him if I can possibly help it!"

He slapped the ground with a paw. "I remember the way you put it! A living tornado of chaos!"

Aaaabsol shook her head. "It's actually not him, or one of his companions," she told him. "It's someone else they met, who-"

"So can I pick what kind of Pokéball I get?" Absol interrupted.

As the sun set over Unova, Nanette frowned suddenly.

"Huh," she said.

Her Tepig and her Absol both looked up, one concerned and the other confused.

"Soool?" Absol asked, then glanced at his tail and horn to make sure the little red rubber balls on the points hadn't come off by accident.

"Oh, nothing to do with you," she assured him. "I just wondered if she remembered to tell any of the others about that thing she mentioned to me."

Absol frowned, tilting his head a little, then held up his paw for her Pokédex. She handed it over, and the Dark-type tapped something out.

Proably, the synthetic voice said, and Nanette giggled slightly.

When Ash arrived in Aspertia City, en route to where Cedric Juniper's excavations were going on, he immediately sought out the gym.

"Hi!" he said, as Cheren opened the door.

Cheren swallowed visibly. "Umm…" he began. "Are… are you here for a battle?"

"Yeah!" Ash agreed.

"Why?" Cheren asked. "I'm a new gym leader, and you've already got eight badges! You won the League! You'd be Unova Grand Champion now if you hadn't turned it down!"

Ash frowned.

"Oh, yeah," he said. "Huh. Force of habit, I guess!"

Cheren let out a heartfelt sigh.

"I think I need to sit down and calm down a bit, now," he said. "Though… why are you here, then?"

"I guess since I'm not here for a battle, I'm seeing what your gym is like!" Ash decided. "A lot of Unova Gyms are also other types of building, right? This one looks kind of like a school."

"That's because it's a school," Cheren replied. "We do a special – hold on."

He rummaged in his pocket, got out a piece of paper and a pencil, and wrote something on it before folding it over.

"Anyway," he went on. "We do a special program so that kids can learn what it's like to train Pokémon early, including having their own Pokémon who they're responsible for personally. Did you ever run into that kind of thing on your travels?"

"Well, kind of?" Ash said. "My friends May and Max kind of shared Pokémon for a while, because Max wasn't old enough yet. He got a Shroomish, a Mightyena, a Jirachi and a Houndour that way, though I can't remember if that last one was before or after he became a proper trainer… he has a Ralts now too, but that's more of a psychic link thing."

Cheren unfolded the paper, where he'd written 'young child with a Legendary' on it in pencil.

"I think I've won something," he said. "I'm not sure what, though."

Around the same time, in a hidden facility, Colress picked up a clipboard.

"Test result… success," he said. "We're still working on it, sir, but I now feel confident in saying that we will be able to use electromagnetic influence to control Pokémon."

"When will you be finished working on it?" Ghetsis asked.

"Soon," Colress replied. "I can't give you an exact estimate. If I could, I'd already know what to do."

"Then do your best to be as fast as possible," Ghetsis ordered. "I want the back-up option in case N cannot control Reshiram… or in case N does not want to do what we need."

"Of course," Colress murmured. "It would be quicker if-"

"I'm not letting you experiment in the open," Ghetsis interrupted. "If the boy's going to be of any use then he has to think we're freeing Pokémon from oppression… his capacity for self-delusion is impressive, but I'm not letting him anywhere near these experiments. If he speaks to a single Pokémon who knows, that whole half of our plans was worthless."

Colress spread his hands. "I'm just the scientist here, this is all pure research."

"Quite," Ghetsis agreed. "Keep it up."

AN:

This is normally when a mysterious green-haired young man who can speak to Pokémon would show up, but…