They didn't go straight to Cyllage.

Instead they stopped off at Professor Sycamore's laboratory, partly because they were in the area and partly because it was getting quite late, and (despite looking slightly harassed) Professor Sycamore agreed to let them train there for the rest of the evening.

In Serena's case, that mostly meant working on Ember and trying to have a conversation with Fennekin about it, while for Bonnie it was playing a back-and-forth game with Dedenne's Thundershock and the GS Ball (occasionally retrieved by Zygarde).

Clemont, meanwhile, was back to fiddling with another of his Gears.

"What's this one, sir?" Bunnelby inquired. "If you don't mind my asking, that is."

"It's the one I had an idea for after Ash's first Gym Battle here," Clemont replied, taking out a screwdriver and twiddling with one of the components. "In Kalos, I mean. It's supposed to be used for target practice, so it fires out an artificial sticky web composition…"

He looked closer, then tapped a switch, and some lights came on. "Aha! I think that's ready… Ash! Can I borrow Fletchling to test something?"

"Sure!" Ash replied.

"I'm sure I'd be able to do whatever you need," Bunnelby told him.

"I know, Bunnelby," Clemont said. "But I'm not confident about my aim. If I miss I could hit the greenhouse wall, and Fletchling's able to catch anything that goes high."

He lifted up the Clemontic Gear, aimed it, and pulled the trigger.

A green blur shot out, whizzing over Bunnelby's head, and Fletchling darted up to catch it.

"It's meant to be for Ember practice!" Clemont added, hastily, then frowned. "Wait… what are you doing, Fletchling?"

Fletchling nibbled at the non-blurred green thing. "Eating?" he replied. "It's quite nice, if you like macarons."

"Really?" Clemont said. "Huh. I thought this thing was meant to make sticky web… let's try that again?"

The second one went lower, and Bunnelby caught it in his ears before bouncing it into a paw.

"Yes, seems quite well baked to me," he announced. "Good work, sir. Even if it's not quite what you intended."

"You made a food dispenser by accident?" a Chespin asked. "I think you might be the best human I've ever heard of!"

She jumped up and down. "I want a go! I bet I can catch one in my mouth!"

Clemont raised the Gear again. "Well, it's not the kind of training I was expecting, but let's give it a go…"

Chespin turned out to be very motivated indeed, and so was Dedenne, and before long Clemont was firing the instant macarons across the whole length of Professor Sycamore's greenhouse for the Pokémon to run and catch.

"That Chespin seems to have taken a liking to you," Sycamore said. "Did you notice?"

"I'm not sure if it's me or the food launcher, Professor," Clemont replied, taking aim and firing again.

"Still, you should ask her if she wants to come with you," he suggested. "I know she's not an Electric type, but I understand that type isn't an overriding concern with you."

Clemont nodded, then fired again.

The macaron went sailing through the air, almost high enough to hit the glass, then dropped back down again – and a flash of golden light appeared.

Two Hoopa-Rings formed, one either side of the macaron, and a Munchlax jumped out of the left one. It made a sort of wakka noise as it intercepted the pastry treat, then vanished through the right one, and Chespin looked quite upset.

"What just happened?" Clemont asked.

Ash got Arc out of his pocket, and dialed a number.

"...May?" he checked. "Yeah, it's me. I was wondering, do you know where Munchlax is?"

A pause.

"Yeah, that was probably him then. Glad to hear you're enjoying Orre!"

Several miles away, between Lumiose and Cyllage, a man named Dolan chuckled softly to himself.

"Dumb cops," he said, parking his truck. "They always watch out for the wrong things, right?"

His Diggersby chuckled, managing to do so sycophantically.

"Now, let's get some Scatterbug and Spewpa," Dolan went on. "Remember, only one to a cage, and watch out for any special ones."

Diggersby nodded.

"And watch out for the cops," Dolan added, waving Diggersby away to start work.

Two and a half hours later, Diggersby lifted the final cage onto the back of the truck with a hiss of effort.

"Not bad," Dolan decided. "Not bad at all. This was a pretty good haul, heh."

Sneaking into a Pokémon preserve had been hard work, but it had paid off all right, and Dolan went back down the line of cages checking them off.

There were twenty-two Scatterbug in the cages, with plenty of subtle differences in their dot patterns – a sure sign that they'd turn into differently patterned Vivillon, and exactly what he was after to sell to collectors. Sure, they usually demanded that they get a look at the Vivillon pattern to make sure it wasn't one they already had, but it was easier to catch them before they evolved instead of afterwards.

And that was before getting into how one of them was a shiny Scatterbug. That – and the shiny Spewpa he'd found, too – were great luck, and Dolan could already imagine how his buyers would go crazy trying to be the highest bidders for such unique prizes.

There were a whole layer of other Spewpa, as well, two of them the rare-but-sometimes-seen giant Pokémon. Those ones had taken Diggersby extra effort to transport because they were so heavy, but when he thought about how much money giant Vivillon would go for it left him feeling a bit weak at the knees.

And then there was the actual Vivillon he'd found himself, paralyzed on the ground and with a pattern he'd never seen before. Mostly black, but with asymmetrical red patches on both wings.

It might even be unique, and unless he saw another example he was certainly going to claim it was.

"All right, Diggersby," Dolan said. "Let's get going. We're going to be so rich after today's job…"

One of the giant Spewpa began laughing.

Not in a Spewpa sort of way, either. A high-pitched woman's laugh.

"Is that a simple fool I hear?" it asked, wiggling around inside the cage.

"If it is, they're loud and clear!" replied the other giant Spewpa, in a male (?) voice.

The first one rolled over. "In a guise!"

"In this guise!" the second one agreed.

"In disguise!" the shiny Scatterbug said.

Dolan's jaw dropped. "What."

"Dig-by," Diggersby agreed.

"So many Bug-types, all around," the female talking Giant Spewpa said.

"And yet not a real one to be found!" the male agreed.

"When you're poaching, take our advice," the first one said, as Dolan looked closer.

There was something wrong with the Spewpa, now he was paying attention.

"And pay our boss a hefty slice!" the second one said, then there was a zrrrrip sound and both giant Pokémon unzipped themselves – revealing humans with spectacular and brightly coloured hair, who threw the costumes into the corners of the cages.

"Jessie!" the woman said, with a smirk.

"And James!" the blue-head agreed, twirling a rose in his gloved hands.

"I think the zipper's stuck!" the shiny Scatterbug muttered, struggling back and forth.

"Diggersby!" Dolan snapped. "Get those cages down, we're leaving them here!"

"You might think we're out of luck," the woman said, gesturing at the cage she was still inside, and the man took up the thread.

"But you're not Ash. So here comes Muk!"

Dolan had just enough time to wonder what that meant before a large Muk landed on top of him with a very loud splat.

"Observation: I could have just bombarded him with the ice cannon," Porygon said, as Ambipom brought the Mecha Giratina up into a hovering position and decloaked it.

"Yeah, I get that," Ambipom replied, adjusting her flight goggles. "But it's good to keep your hand in on stuff like highly competent disguises."

"Grudging admission: you have a good point," Porygon conceded. "Amused question: how are we getting Meowth out of that costume?"

"Well, I've still got Seviper and Arbok in the bomb bay," Ambipom replied, floating backwards a little and watching as Victreebel disabled Diggersby to the accompaniment of loud om nom nom sounds. "So dropping Seviper on him is probably the quickest option. Still kind of impressed that he loaded up that truck with ten Ekans, ten Koffing, eight Wynaut, Yamask, Jessie, James, Inkay, Dustox, Meowth and not a single actual Vivillon-line Pokémon…"

"I think I understand the idea," Fletchling said, alongside Grovyle. "So I can use an attack, then use that as a disguise for a second attack, except that actually the original attack was the serious one?"

"Almost," Grovyle replied, ducking under a tree branch. "It's more flexible than that. Don't tell anyone I said this, it'd give away the mystery, but a lot of the trick is that you don't have a real attack and a false attack. You have two attacks, and whichever one works is the real one – you're ready to commit to whichever one your opponent doesn't respond to correctly."

"You realize we can hear you, right?" Serena asked, giggling.

"Did you say something?" Grovyle replied.

Flechling suddenly swiped at Grovyle. "Aha!"

He held up the Soothe Bell in his beak. "Got it!"

"Really?" Grovyle asked. "Because I've got it here."

He held up the Soothe Bell.

"But…" Fletchling began, then looked at what was actually dangling from his beak.

It was a nut with a hole drilled in it, painted silver and with a winky face drawn on it.

"That's annoying," he said. "I thought for sure I'd got you that time."

"That was your mistake, then," Grovyle replied.

"Hold on," Fletchling frowned. "Is this all tied into the same lesson? Is it going to turn out that actually it's whichever one I didn't grab?"

"No, no, that would be more Croagunk's style," Grovyle answered.

"Then are you actually Croagunk?" Fletchling pressed.

"...no, but that's actually a good idea," Grovyle said. "I'll have to try it on Froakie some time."

"I can hear you as well," Froakie pointed out.

"But you'll never know when I'm doing it," Grovyle noted. "Or if I'm doing it at all and this is just to deceive you."

"I'm getting a bit of a headache," Fletchling complained.

"Well, yes, that happens," Grovyle said. "Once you realize the ninja who's been on Ash's team longest is actually Zorua, you start to get the hang of it."

"What about me?" Mew demanded, springing from their position on Ash's belt as a Voltorb as a seventh Pokéball. "I'm a ninja, right?"

"Good question," Grovyle considered. "I think it depends what form you're in. As Primeape you're a bit more of a street samurai."

While that was going on, Serena watched carefully as Fennekin blew out a little plume of flame.

"That's definitely going in the direction we want," she said. "Hang on, do that again?"

Fennekin obliged, and Serena frowned.

"I'm trying to think about this the right way," she explained. "We want something that's thin, but strong enough to keep going a long way… right?"

"Fen!" Fennekin nodded.

"That is the challenge I set you, yes," Lokoko agreed.

"So… if I whistle, I'm only leaving a small gap for the air to come out," Serena said, thinking out loud. "And the smaller the gap, the higher pitched the noise… can you try doing an Ember while you're making a high pitched noise?"

Fennekin's ears flicked, and she tried it.

The result wasn't quite a thin, long plume like they wanted, but it was closer, and both trainer and Pokémon brightened.

"That's great!" Serena said. "So… maybe try taking a big breath, and then blowing out harder while you do it? And see what happens?"

What happened, as it turned out, was that they set fire to Fletchling.

"You're lucky that I'm excited and this doesn't actually hurt!" Fletchling said, turning around and glaring at them.

"Oops!" Serena winced. "Sorry…"

Marshadow popped up out of Ash's shadow, gestured at Fennekin, then gestured at Fletchling. When he did the latter, the fire abruptly went out.

"...feen-kin?" Fennekin asked, head tilting to one side.

"What happened?" Serena checked, and got a nod. "Well… maybe he stole your Fire-type and then stole the fire, and it didn't burn him because he was fire-type?"

"Good instincts," Lokoko told her. "Well done."

AN:

That time I did the motto myself.