"Wow!" Ponyta gasped. "This looks amazing!"
"I've only ever heard of this place," Serena agreed. "It's called the Kalos Canyon, because…"
She shrugged. "Apparently we're not very imaginative?"
"Or maybe Kalos is named after the canyon?" Bonnie said. "Zygarde, which came first, Kalos or Kalos Canyon?"
"That depends what you mean by Kalos, and what you mean by the Kalos Canyon," Zygarde told her.
"Oh," Bonnie replied. "I was hoping there'd be a nice simple answer."
"Sometimes, if you want a simple answer you have to ask a different question," Lokoko chuckled.
"Wow," Rayquaza said, peering out from Ash's jacket. "That is big. And pretty… is that water at the bottom of it?"
"Looks like it!" Ash agreed. "So it's a kind of pretty made by Groudon and Kyogre put together, do you think?"
"I think most things are supposed to be like that," Pikachu volunteered. "Well, volcanoes would be mostly Groudon… right?"
"Actually, no," Arc replied. "Volcanoes that occur in water are of course associated with water. Volcanoes that occur on land are usually related to subducting oceanic crust or the formation of new oceanic crust and oceans."
"Huh," Pikachu mused. "Wow. It's good having someone along able to fill in the stuff Brock would otherwise fill in."
"I am mostly reading from notes left by my grandprogenitor," Arc said. "There is also a lot of complaining about how Groudon and Kyogre keep competing about things."
"I've met them," Rayquaza agreed. "That's about right."
"Look!" Bonnie said, pointing. "That's a battle!"
"That's a Sky Battle," Clemont agreed, as a Talonflame and a Skarmory battled back and forth across the sky with two trainers wearing wing-suits following them. "I've heard about them, but I've never actually done one before."
"They look neat!" Ash said. "I wonder if one of them would like to have a battle once they're done!"
"You won't have long to wait," Pikachu judged.
Pikachu was right, as only a few seconds later the Talonflame hit Skarmory with a Fire Blast attack.
"I see you're watching the Sky Battle," a man said, approaching them from along the trail. "Any of you interested in trying it out?"
"Sure!" Ash agreed. "Come on, guys, let's go ask!"
The man's expression went slightly gelid as Ash rose smoothly into the air, without any apparent means of support, while Pikachu formed a Surf-board out of water and followed him.
"Um," he said, intelligently. "How did that just happen?"
"Which part do you mean?" Ponyta asked. "There's quite a long list."
"I mean that!" the man said, pointing at Ash and his partner.
"Oh, well, Pikachu knows Fly," Ponyta answered. "That seems quite obvious, because he's flying. Is there something about that that I'm not understanding?"
She brightened. "Oh, well, he also knows Surf. If that helps?"
"I have more questions than when I asked," the man admitted. "How am I even getting answers from a Ponyta? How is that kid flying?"
Ash sent out Zekrom.
"…can you get him to stop for long enough that I can actually start getting answers?" the man added.
"Good luck with that," Fennekin said, ears flicking.
Once the man had calmed down a bit, and introduced himself as an instructor for trainers in how to conduct Sky Battles, he took them to the facility where they trained people in how to use wingsuits.
Serena didn't have a Pokémon that could fly, at least not yet – there were magic spells to let that happen, but they were a bit beyond her and her team – but she was interested in learning and took to it quite well, while Clemont just grumbled about how hard it was to steer. And they didn't have a wingsuit that fit Bonnie, so she felt a bit disappointed up until Ash came up with an idea.
"If you want to have a go at Sky Battling, why don't I get some of the Dragonites to help?" he asked. "Would that be okay?"
"Dragonites, plural?" the instructor asked. "How many do you have?"
"Twenty-seven," Ash said. "I was thinking that Bonnie could ride one to stay up in the air, and then Dedenne could ride one, and Serena's Fennekin could ride one, and they'd all get to experience Sky Battles without it being unfair on Fennekin or Dedenne."
He frowned. "I think Ponyta might fit, too, but the Dragonite would have to be a bit more careful… and obviously Bunnelby couldn't use Dig, but Chespin would be able to battle okay."
"Do you want a job?" the instructor asked.
Ash didn't, but everyone had fun with Sky Battles anyway.
Even if it did confuse a local Pokémon Watcher.
"Where are we now?" Bonnie asked, a few days later. "We left that big canyon behind, so where next?"
"Well, we're not far from Shalour City," Serena replied. "But we're not going straight there yet. We're taking a big loop instead of going straight to Shalour City, and that's giving us the chance to visit a lot of nice places. Like Kalos Canyon!"
"Kalos Canyon was nice," Bonnie agreed. "So where are we now? Or is it just near Shalour?"
Serena got a map out of her pocket, unfolding it, and passed it to Bonnie.
"Look just south of Avignon Town, okay?" she said. "That's close to Shalour. Do you see where it says Reflection Cave?"
"Oh, yeah!" Bonnie agreed. "So is that where we are?"
"I don't think we're in a cave," Dedenne pointed out, giggling. "Or we'd be underground!"
"Dedenne's right, but we're nearly there," Serena confirmed. "In fact, it should be pretty close…"
Ash sent out Fletchinder to have a look, and the Flying-type blurred around in a circle for a moment before vanishing.
"Found it," he said, reappearing. "This way."
Then he vanished again.
"I think he sort of went that way!" Ash declared, pointing.
Reflection Cave, true to the name, turned out to be full of reflective surfaces.
"This is amazing," Ash said. "I wonder how this happened?"
He rummaged around in his backpack, and pulled out his mirror. "Giratina? Do you have any idea why this place is full of mirrors?"
They waited.
"Shouldn't he have said something by now?" Serena asked.
"He might just be somewhere else," Ash shrugged. "I could ask Giratiny if he knows, though, or just wait."
"Ash?" Pikachu said. "I don't meant to alarm you, but your reflection isn't holding a mirror."
"Huh?" Ash asked, looking up at the big reflection that covered the whole of the nearest wall. "Oh, yeah, that's weird! I wonder if these are like funhouse mirrors?"
He stepped closer, reaching out, then touched the reflection and there was a sort of lurching movement.
Then they were all in a translucent mirror-lined cube suspended in misty space, along with Giratina, who seemed a bit surprised.
"Did you want something?" he asked. "Oh, hold on, were you in Reflection Cave when I tried seeing what you wanted? Oops, now you've met an As-As Not… give me a few minutes to fix this…"
He swam away through what seemed to be the Reverse World.
"That's… what Pokémon was that?" asked Ash.
Not the one who was holding the mirror.
"That's Giratina!" Ash-holding-the-mirror replied. "Hey, quick question – Mew, Ditto, Zorua or Zoroark, other assorted or miscellaneous Pokémon shapeshifting ability, illusion, robotic double, time clone, lookalike, parallel universe, evil twin, good twin, Team Rocket scheme, or something I didn't think of?"
"That was a quick question?" asked the other Serena.
"...got such a cool set of Pokémon," Other Ash marvelled. "I didn't know anyone could have that many Dragonites, and you've even got a Lugia, and…"
He shook his head, but Mirror Ash was trying not to laugh.
"Hey, you've got great Pokémon too!" he pointed out. "I could never catch Pokémon like that, I don't have enough luck."
"Really?" Other Ash asked. "I guess everyone does tend to be surprised with what they can do!"
He patted his Bidoof on the head, and the Normal-type made a wordless purr before jumping down and starting to chase Zigzagoon and Rattata in circles.
"You know, my Ash absolutely has a point," Mirror Pikachu said. "There is no way he'd be able to meet and catch a Rattata and Bidoof and Zigzagoon, and that's before counting Patrat and Sentret and the other Pokémon you've mentioned."
Other Pikachu sniggered. "It seems so wrong that Mirror Ash has met all those Legendary Pokémon, though… and even caught them. It's fundamentally bizarre because of what happened all the times I ran into Legendary Pokémon."
"You've run into Legendary Pokémon?" Other Ash asked. "When did that happen?"
"Ten times a year at least," Other Pikachu told him. "You're just always looking in the wrong direction, or in the middle of trying to teach Bidoof how to use Cut as Rock Smash, or in extreme cases asleep."
"So that's what happened when I woke up and you were all looking guilty," Other Ash realized. "And the roof was missing."
"Technically that was because of what that Zekrom did, not me," Other Pikachu clarified. "But at the same time, yes."
"It feels weird to meet an Ash who doesn't understand Pokémon," Mirror Ash said. "Hmm… do you have a Pokémon who learns all kinds of tricks?"
"That's probably Bidoof!" Other Ash decided. "Hey, Bidoof, can you come over here for a bit?"
Bidoof came bounding over. "Yes? Ooh, a new trick?"
"Bidoof knows how to use Surf, Cut, Flash, Rock Smash, Strength, Rock Climb, Dive, Waterfall and Whirlpool!" Other Ash explained. "We're working on Defog and Fly but it's being tricky."
Bidoof reared up, flapping her forelimbs as hard as possible, and rose about two or three millimetres off the ground.
"Well, aren't you a talented one," Lokoko said. "Now, let's get started…"
"This is really interesting!" Other Serena said, peering through a magnifying glass. "Is that an induction delay coil?"
"That's right," Mirror Clemont agreed. "I put it in so that the translation software would be influenced by previous syllables and phonemes, but treat them as less important – that's because sometimes you need the context before you can properly translate."
"Can I see? Can I see?" Other Fennekin asked, tail wagging so hard it looked like he had two of them, and Other Serena lowered it down enough for her Pokémon to get a look in.
"What about if you flip the translation back in on itself several times?" he asked. "That way it'd end up stripped of a lot of the idiosyncratic meaning, but if you build the algorithm right so it doesn't go off on false pathways then it should always give you a bland-but-right translation. Then you can undo the recursive translation and have an improved algorithm!"
"That sounds like it might work," Mirror Clemont frowned. "Though it'd make it a lot slower."
"Sure!" the chirpy Fox Pokémon agreed, tail still wagging. "But do you want it to work or do you want it to be quick? I guess quick can help once you've got it working properly, but otherwise all you're doing is running down blind alleys at hundreds of miles per hour."
"A potion that can transform humans into Pokémon?" Other Clemont asked. "That's very interesting… my usual spells are more to do with finding things and pointing us in the right direction."
"Divination, right?" Mirror Serena said. "I've done that a couple of times, but since I got introduced to magic by the potion that's kind of been a lot of my focus."
She shrugged. "And I did manage to get the hang of understanding my Pokémon, which was a lot of work!"
"The human-to-familiar bond is fascinating," Ponyta agreed, adjusting her glasses. "I'm looking in from the outside, which is of course the best perspective to study it, but I'm very much appreciating the comments by Serena – ah, sorry, Mirror Serena and Mirror Fennekin."
"Why are we the Mirror ones?" Mirror Bonnie asked.
"Because your Ash had a mirror, remember!" Other Bonnie pointed out. "He did say it was the easiest way to remember… otherwise Clemont could have made all of us glow in different colours, and that would show which of us was which!"
"All right, I think I've found what caused the problem," Giratina said, swimming back over through the Reverse World. "I can get you and your As – As Nots back to your original universes whenever you're ready."
Other Bunnelby adjusted his longbow and green cap. "You know, I think they might be a while, my lord. They've hit it off like a house on fire."
"Oh, I have a question!" Mirror Fennekin said. "What's an As-As Not?"
Giratina looked slightly embarrassed. "Sorry, forgot that most people don't know the relevant terms of art… it's someone from a parallel world which went differently in a lot of oddly appropriate ways. I've been co-ordinating things with my own As-As Not, trying to work out how to resolve this, and we were talking shop."
He flicked his tail. "It's just as odd for me, that one's got a thick Alolan accent…"
AN:
Well, that's Explorers of Sky Battle handled, plus the non-Mirror Universe.
Other Pikachu has been handling all the movies, just under Pikachu Short rules.