"Not that I'm suggesting it as a better approach," Mewtwo noted, walking along beside the group. "But the only reason I couldn't get us to Celestic Town yesterday is that I'm not the time travel Legendary."

"I know," Ash agreed. "But I kind of prefer walking, a lot of the time. And we don't need to get to Celestic Town straight away."

"Both good points," Mewtwo nodded.

He looked over to Dawn. "If I have the listing of events correctly, you are having a Contest at Celestic Town," he said. "Is that right?"

"Yeah, that's where I have my next Contest," Dawn agreed. "It'll be good to have a proper Contest, though I've sort of got too many ideas for what to do and it's hard to narrow it down to any one of them. So we've been working on all sorts of ideas on-and-off."

"Do you know if it's a one-Pokémon or a two-Pokémon Contest?" Brock inquired. "That might help a bit..."

"No, I don't," Dawn answered. "That's part of the problem."

She shrugged. "It's kind of a good thing for a Coordinator to have lots of options, and I have lots of options… but another way to put it is that I've got choice paralysis."

"One thing does occur to me," Buneary said. "The Pokémon who didn't turn up in the Wallace Cup were Togekiss, Ambipom and Pachirisu. Togekiss is back with Princess Salvia for a day or two, so she's not available, but what about one or both of the other two?"

"That's a good point," Dawn agreed. "I should have kept track of that, thanks Buneary."

"No problem," her Normal-type said.

"Okay, so that means… right, I know the possible plans," Dawn said to herself. "The trickiest one is – right."

She sent out Pachirisu.

"Hey!" Pachirisu waved, rolling onto her back before using her tail as a spring to propel her up to about waist height, then grabbing onto Dawn's bag and climbing up it. "What's up?"

"Oh, were you asleep?" Dawn asked, realizing that Pachirisu hadn't heard what they were discussing.

"No, just… kinda zoned out," Pachirisu said, tail flicking from side to side. "Anyway. What's up?"

"I was wondering how you were getting on with Ion Deluge," Dawn explained.

"Not great," Pachirisu admitted. "Pikachu's shown me a bit, but it's always tricky to get the coating right – I keep either Discharging or Charging."

"That sounds like something to work on, then," Dawn said. "I wonder… Mamoswine?"

The Pokémon who came out of the Pokéball this time landed with a crash on a poor defenceless bush, and shook himself before giving Dawn a quizzical look.

"Would you mind if Pachirisu and Buneary-"

"And Pikachu," Pikachu added.

"Thank you – if those three practice Ion Deluge on your back? It'd let them keep moving while they did."

"Go ahead," Mamoswine nodded. "Could do with a walk."


Some miles later, when it was close to lunchtime, Ash suddenly chuckled.

"What is it?" Lucario asked, filling in for Pikachu – the Electric-type still over on Mamoswine, patiently walking Pachirisu through the finer points of electrical shaping to produce an Ion Deluge.

"Oh, just thinking about how much less trouble we have on the roads compared to last time," Ash explained. "Without Team Rocket causing trouble three times a week, I mean."

He waved his hand at the landscape. "I'm pretty sure the amount of walking we've done so far would have been a full days' walk last time, just because half the day would be taken up by something or other – like Pachirisu getting a cold or something."

"I remember that," Dawn said, sighing. "Poor her."

"Is it worth pointing out that, quite apart from Mewtwo, there's another psychic-type able to transport you around at high speed present?" Latias asked, shimmering back into visibility. "I mean, if you're talking about movement speed."

"Actually, that raises an interesting point," Lucario said. "How many distinct ways of getting everyone to another town do we have?"

He shrugged. "I say 'we' because while Ash is likely to supply most of them, it's not all."

"Well, Mewtwo could take everyone at once," Ash said. "Latias and Latios… I'm not sure if you could do it on your own?"

"As Mega Latias I could," Latias said. "I'd have to carry one or two humans in my hands, but I could do it."

"That's three," Brock said. "The Legendary Beasts makes four. Ho-Oh and Lugia could probably each carry all of us if they had to."

"Lugia could fly carrying me and all of Team Rocket," Ash confirmed. "He was just a little slower. So yeah, that's six."

"Giratina?" Dawn suggested. "He's big enough."

"True," Brock nodded. "And… Pidgeot and Charizard could definitely do it between them. Flygon and Staraptor could each take one passenger..."

"Don't forget Keldeo," Ash noted. "And your Steelix, too, he's big enough to take everyone."

"I think Stantler could carry me now, he's grown up about as far as he's growing," Brock said. "Or Dawn at least, she's lighter."

"Does Torterra count?" Dawn asked.

"Does Zorua count?" Dawn asked.

The first Dawn looked at the second, sighed, and gave her a cuff around the ear.

"Aww..." the resultant Zorua groaned, then jumped into the air and reshaped herself into the form of a Zoroark. "Anyway. Do I count?"

"Depends what shape you're taking, but generally yes," Brock nodded. "I think we're up to eleven?"

"And Lapras makes twelve, though he can't work on land," Ash shrugged. "Then there's Mamoswine… yeah, we've got a lot of ways to get around fast if we need to."

"Fast depends how fast you mean," Lucario noted. "But even Torterra can work up quite a running speed if he has to. He has real momentum."

There was a crackling sound from over where Mamoswine was patiently walking, and thunderbolts played over Pikachu's ears for several seconds before finally going out.

"There we go!" he said. "Now, keep that up while Buneary juggles you."

"I'm not sure I like this plan?" Pachirisu said, worried.

"You've got Volt Absorb, you'll be fine," Pikachu said, waving his paw dismissively.


"You ever get the feeling people don't notice us much?"

Ludicolo glanced to his side. "No way! I know that joke I told at Torterra's last party was being repeated for days!"

Marshtomp chuckled. "Well, I can't deny that. It was a fun joke."

He waved his hand. "But more… I kind of feel like we don't have as much of an impact as some of our teammates."

"That's mostly just Zorua," Ludicolo said. "Because she loves attention. But even so, I don't really know what you mean about that – I get involved often enough, and I'm pretty sure you do as well. Plus, you know, when I do a Rain Dance it gets attention from all over."

"You know as well as I do that that's because of the fact of the rain, not because of anything else," Marshtomp muttered. "What about during the camp? We didn't help there, either."

"Speak for yourself," Ludicolo replied. "I helped translate during the bit when everyone was getting information out of Ash's Pokémon, does that count for nothing?"

"You translated it into dance, Ludicolo," Marshtomp pointed out. "Ah well… maybe I'll go and help out with some training elsewhere. That might make me feel a bit more helpful."

"You could always see about helping with training Giratina," Ludicolo suggested. "I think Torterra was saying he wanted Absol's help and the help of one other Pokémon as well, you could volunteer to be the one other Pokémon?"

"What's that for, then?" Marshtomp asked, blinking.

"Apparently teaching Giratina to keep his situational awareness up when he makes portals by punching him in the nose a few times," Ludicolo shrugged. "I don't think he knows."

"Sounds like fun," Marshtomp allowed.


"Celestic Town is so prone to getting foggy," Brock said, blinking through the gloom. "Ash, do you have anyone with you who can Defog at the moment?"

"Well, Staraptor," Ash replied. "But I don't know if it's a good idea to use Defog."

"Why not?" Dawn asked, looking away from where Ambipom, Buneary and Pachirisu were practicing.

"Well, it occurred to me…" Ash began, waving his hand around at the thick mist. "It's not like we're the only people with Pokémon who can Defog. So if it's not already been cleared it's probably because people want it here, or because some Pokémon needs it here."

"That is a good point," Brock agreed. "I hadn't thought that through. Good work, Ash."

"Thanks," Ash said, smiling. "It's kind of funny to think about how they manage weather with all those Pokémon moves that can change it."

"Maybe there's a secret organization that does it?" Dawn suggested.

"I've never heard of one," Lucario shrugged.

"That's kind of the point of a secret organization, though," Dawn pointed out. "So I'm not sure if that's evidence of anything."

Brock chuckled, then looked around. "How close are we to Celestic, anyway?"

"Well, there's a lot of people in that direction," Lucario pointed. "I don't think it's far."

Plus Laocoon is pretty much right around the next bend, Dexter said.

His projector flared, producing an augmented-reality overlay around the three trainers which showed the cleaned-up view without any fog present.

"That's kind of cool," Dawn said. "What's a Laocoon, though?"

That would be one of my children, Dexter said. The one who volunteered to go with Cynthia.

He paused. Did I really forget to tell you their names?

"I thought they were named after the zodiac?" Brock looked puzzled. "That's what you said last time it came up."

Only half of them went with it, and they couldn't decide which zodiac either, Dexter replied. Plus some of them got really obscure. Laocoon is actually one of the zodiac names, but it's a much more obscure zodiac name than, say, Leo.

"Wait, if Laocoon went with Cynthia, then doesn't that mean Cynthia's around the corner?" Dawn asked.

"I can see her," Ash contributed. "So yeah, I guess so."

"You didn't mention that before?" Lucario asked.

"I didn't look before," Ash replied. "I only thought to look when Dexter brought it up."

"Fair enough, objection withdrawn."

"Should we say hello?" Dawn suggested.

"Allow me," Cynthia said. "It's good to see you all again… unless, that is, you're bringing more Legendary chaos to my hometown."

"Define 'legendary chaos'," Brock requested. "One of my Pokémon has been punching Giratina in the chin intermittently for the past day and a half, and I think Latias is judging how well Ambipom and Pachirisu are doing."

Cynthia looked in the direction Dawn was indicating, and saw Ambipom winding up a Tail Slap before thwacking Pachirisu skywards. A pulse of electrical energy sparked outwards from the impact point, and Pachirisu yelled in glee as she went straight through a ring of electrical energy courtesy of Pikachu.

Another ring appeared on the way down, and Pachirisu spun up a Thundershock before flicking it off her tail – using the little electrical impulse to push her through the ring on the way down as well, before being caught by Ambipom's tails and juggled a few times.

The next set of rings which appeared formed a kind of stepping-stone arrangement, and Ambipom punched Pachirisu into the air before jumping up herself and using judicious tail-hand-blows to knock Pachirisu through them one at a time.

"That's an interesting bit of training," she said. "Contest?"

"Yeah, down in Celestic," Dawn agreed. "I think it's tomorrow, unless I got the timing wrong?"

"I think tomorrow is right," Cynthia nodded. "I should update you on the Galactic situation, though – I haven't managed to find anything much, though Laocoon is looking though the old records whenever we get a chance in case there's something useful in there. I'm not sure whether a computer search would get redacted or not, but if Laocoon's doing the looking directly..."

"Yeah, that's a good idea," Brock said. "But are you sure it's okay to talk about this in the open?"

"It's not like anyone's going to remember the conversation unless they're already clued in," Cynthia replied. "That's normally frustrating, but this time it might actually be to our advantage."

"What do you mean, I won't remember the conversation?" her Lucario asked. "That sounds like kind of a problem."

Cynthia passed him a pamphlet from her pocket. "Here. I got them printed up en masse."

"Hello Lucario," the Fighting-type read, a little incredulously. "You are reading this to help clear up your confusion over the Team Galactic situation. They have an effect which causes memory loss… how many times have you given me a pamphlet like this?"

"About… thirty, I think," Cynthia judged.

"That's kind of worrisome," her Lucario said.

"Those pamphlets are a pretty good idea," Ash complimented. "Do they work?"

Cynthia picked the pamphlet up again as the Lucario dropped it, suddenly disinterested. "Sort of."

She sighed. "The tricky thing about all this is going to be actually managing to contribute, beyond just being another pair of eyes."

"In the actual battle, Ash is going to have far too many Pokémon to instruct," Ash's Lucario told her. "Helping coordinate Pokémon would help, as would sorting out getting people clear of the main battle. There will certainly be things for you to do."

"I suppose so," Cynthia agreed.

"Hey, aren't you Cynthia?" someone asked. "The Grand Champion?"

Cynthia nodded. "I am."

"Is Mewtwo signing onto your team?" she went on to ask. "You're both famous, right?"

That's not really how it works, Mewtwo said. Besides, I already have a trainer.

"Mewtwo is pretty much correct," Cynthia agreed. "Except that from my end it's that I already have a team."

There was a sudden whang from in the mist, and Mewtwo waved a hand to push the water droplets aside and let them see.

Giratina was rubbing his chin, blinking, and rumbled something. "How did you do that?"

"Endeavor," Marshtomp replied. "I'd noticed you were getting kind of blasé about the punches, so I stepped up my game."

"Noted. How did you hit me with it?"

"Foresight."

"No further questions."


"It's interesting how you seem to train your Pokémon," Cynthia noted, half her attention on two boxes of pocky. "Hmm… chocolate or Razz berry?"

"Not sure," Ash said, answering her question first. "And the way I do it kind of varies depending on the Pokémon, but I like to vary it up a lot as well. Something I've tried to introduce a bit more recently is bigger scenarios, so giving my Pokémon missions."

"I remember the one you did last night," Dawn said, wincing. "That took twenty minutes before someone spotted the trick."

"Trick?" Cynthia asked, interested.

"Well, the instructions I gave each side were actually ones they could complete without having to fight," Ash replied. "They weren't mutually exclusive or anything – it's just that everyone sort of assumed."

"That's good," Cynthia nodded. "Pokémon battling is what we do, but in serious situations it's important to think about whether fighting is the right thing to do – fighting unnecessarily can tire you out before the necessary battle."

"How do you train your Pokémon?" Ash asked her. "Any tricks you use?"

"Well, there's a few," Cynthia replied. "And I suppose it can't hurt to pass them on – I know you're a likely future opponent of mine, but we're all on the same side until Cyrus is dealt with."

She tapped a chocolate pocky stick against a berry one. "Firstly, something I occasionally do is tell my Pokémon to fight like they're another Pokémon entirely – fighting style, moves, everything like that. It's difficult and clumsy for them, but it also makes them much more adaptable… which is one of the things I tend to prize in my team, since the more unpredictable and adaptable they are the better chance they have of taking an enemy by surprise."

"That's an interesting one," Ash said, thinking about it. "So, say, Pikachu would have to fight like a Riolu?"

"From what I hear he does that half the time anyway," Cynthia replied, waving her hand. "I was thinking more like… Pikachu fighting like a Bidoof, or Absol like a Luxio."

"Huh, that is kind of intriguing," Ash responded, already wondering the best way to start a training sequence involving that. "I'm not sure how well it would work for some of my Pokémon, but I guess that's the point – to challenge both them and me. What about the other one?"

"Oh, that's what I use for team battles," the Grand Champion said, with a little smile. "I break my team into two halves, and have them battling to try and do some objective or other – something simple, like Baccer, perhaps, but with full combat going on."

Ash nodded. "Right."

"Then I call out names of Pokémon, and the ones who I name have to switch sides," Cynthia continued.

Dawn blinked. "That sounds… kind of hard to keep track of, for you as well as them."

"It is, I normally record the battles and we watch them back later," Cynthia agreed readily. "But it's very good at teaching situational awareness, because you can't just focus on who your current opponents are."

Ash nodded. "I might need to try that..."


Taking his seat in the Contest Hall in Celestic Town, Marco sighed in relief at having made it to where he'd wanted to sit.

Then he frowned.

He wasn't really sure whether to be annoyed or not with who was sitting in front of him. On the one hand, they were definitely tall enough to block his view, but on the other hand they were also invisible so it was hard to be annoyed about that.

Marco could clearly tell someone was there, because they were eating popcorn, but functionally that meant the popcorn was vanishing as the invisible Pokémon took each bite.

"Please put your hands together for our first coordinator!" the MC called. "She's an up-and-coming talent from down in Twinleaf Town, it's Dawn Berlitz!"


Down on the arena, Pachirisu and Ambipom emerged in little thunder-flashes of lightning and smoke and sound, as their paired seals went off.

Pachirisu moved first, jumping into a forwards flip which ended with her tail hitting the floor and producing a sparkling Ion Deluge. The lines of potential spread out to form a rectangular area, bisected on the long axis by an additional line and on the short axis by a fizzing Electroweb.

Light spread up Ambipom's legs to cover her in saint-elmo's-fire, and both her tail-hands glowed with an eerie light as she set her stance – and as Pachirisu sprang back to her feet, rolling completely over once before conjuring an Electro Ball and throwing it at Ambipom.

Ambipom slapped it back, using a Tail Slap converted to the Electric-type by the Ion Deluge, and Pachirisu used her own tail with a Spark to return the favour in turn. The ball bounced back and forth, getting faster with each shot-and-return, and Ambipom began using her more complicated ping-pong tricks on it.

The Electro Ball bounced off the floor with backspin, hovering almost still before flying right back at Ambipom, and Pachirisu took the opportunity to add a second Electro Ball to the mix – then two Shock Waves, which flashed across the gap hitting the active balls three times each before striking Pachirisu's tails and bouncing off in a repetitive pattern that wove a kind of flower-shape as they slowly lost energy.

Gaining speed and confidence as they went, the two Pokémon added more moves to the pattern they were weaving – forming a cats-cradle of electrical orbs, lightning bolts and the sparks that flashed between them, a kind of living field of bouncing electrical attacks which changed slowly moment by moment.

Then, on an unseen signal, Pachirisu jumped into the air. Ambipom switched all the effort of maintaining the pattern onto one tail, and used the other to boost Pachirisu into the air – then sent every component of the web at the overhead squirrel, in a stream which formed almost a bar of light keeping Pachirisu in the air.

Ambipom clapped her hand-tails together, sending out sparks in all directions, then used two moves in quick succession to finish her part of the performance.

The first was a Swift, sending a shower of dozens of electrical stars out in all directions like a garden sprinkler – only for the stars to converge in again on Pachirisu and propel her higher into the air, delaying her fall for a little longer.

The second was Hyper Beam.

It wasn't very powerful for a Hyper Beam, but it was transformed by Pachirisu's Ion Deluge into an electrical attack – and that meant Pachirisu had nothing to fear from it. The shower of sparkling backscatter which burst from the contact point momentarily obscured everything else from sight, and a rippling crescendo note blazed out as Dawn's Pokémon applied the lessons they'd learned from training Raichu to produce a brief burst of music from the Electric-type interaction.

When the sparks faded and they could be seen again, Pachirisu was resting neatly atop a platform made of Ambipom's interleaved tail-hands.


"That's odd," Ash said, frowning slightly.

"What is?" Brock replied.

Ash indicated the battle just starting now, the first one of that round of the Contest. "It's only one Pokémon a side."

"Oh, yeah, so it is," Brock agreed. "Well, I guess it's not necessary for them to have the same number of Pokémon in the different rounds. I hadn't noticed, but then I don't really need to pay attention to that kind of thing."

"It might be interesting to do another Contest some time," Ninetales volunteered. "I wonder if they do tag-team Contests?"

"That might be really cool, actually," Ash said. "People having to get their Pokémon to work together to produce a good Appeal and a good Battle – it sounds like another good way to train cooperation."

"Well, in my case I was more thinking about a duet," Ninetales admitted. "It's been a while since I last had a chance to spend time with Growlie – though I've asked, so hopefully he'll be available some time soon."

"I hope you do get a chance," Brock told her. "Good luck with that."

"Thank you," Ninetales replied, flirting her tails around her. "It's just one more reason to want all this nonsense over, of course."


"Okay, guys," Dawn said. "I checked, and I'm afraid we've ended up against Lila. I'm pretty sure she's the biggest threat in the competition – with how she's, you know, mom's old rival and everything..."

"But we get her first," Pachirisu finished. "Well, that's going to be tricky… didn't you face her last time, Ambipom?"

"Yeah, and her Delcatty is annoyingly dreamy," Ambipom muttered, crossing her arms.

"If either of you wants to go ahead and do this one, that'll be fine, but otherwise I might see who else wants to give it a go," Dawn went on. "Obviously I can give anyone the nod, but I thought I'd see if anyone wanted it."

Ambipom shook her head. "No, I already learned my lesson."

"What about if she sends out her Cherrim instead?" Pachirisu asked. "Or another Pokémon entirely?"

"Learned my lesson," Ambipom repeated. "Let someone else have it."

"To be honest, if we're thinking tactically, Quilava seems like the ideal choice for what Pokémon she has that we know about," Buneary said. "He's male, so he doesn't have to worry about Cute Charm – at least, I assume so – and he's got type advantage over Cherrim."

"Why 'you assume so'?" Pachirisu asked.

"Well, mostly probability. I've not seen him on any dates, but-"

"Oh, right."

"That sounds like you're recommending I ask Quilava?" Dawn said.

"Well… I think it's the option most likely to mean you get the Ribbon, or at least the most likely to get you past Lila, but I don't want you to pick Quilava," Buneary said. "I want to give this a go myself."

Dawn blinked. "...really? But what you said was some really good reasons..."

"Yes, but – this is more something I think of as a personal challenge," Buneary explained.

"Then – of course," Dawn told her. "If you want it, you've got it."

"Thank you, Dawn," Buneary said. "I'm grateful for the chance."


"This should be an interesting face-off!" the announcer said. "On one side, our very own Tiger Lily, Lila, returning to Contests after more than a decade of hiatus! And, facing her, Dawn Berlitz – who, it turns out, is the daughter of the Coordinator who Lila fought in her previous Contest!"

Dawn blushed slightly. "I… kind of wish they hadn't found that bit out..."

She shrugged it off, and threw Buneary's Pokéball up once before catching it. Again, spinning the ball in mid-air before catching it again, and the announcer spoke up.

"Begin!"

This time, when Dawn threw the ball, Buneary came bursting out. She did a flip in mid-air, then landed with a tak with one forepaw down.

Opposite her, Lila sent out her Delcatty – who produced a little flicker of electrical energy when he landed, Shock Wave curling around his paws.

"Hm, this should be interesting," he said. "I didn't realize the first battle I had back on the Contest scene would be such an attractive Pokémon."

He flicked his tail idly. "Any chance you could give the battle a miss? Your trainer doesn't have to know, after all..."

Buneary blinked.

"...quite apart from anything else, you do know my trainer can understand you, right?" she asked.

"Hey, I'm just asking here," Delcatty replied. "But if you want to fight, fine."

He darted forwards, then back again – his tail flicking to one side and then the other, each one sparking off a Shock Wave which curved in around to attack Buneary from either side.

Both fists fizzing with a Thunderpunch, Buneary caught the attacks – caging them inside her paws – then clapped them together to produce a bang and a spherical pulse of electrical energy.

She kicked off from the ground, flipping over once, and came down in a High Jump Kick – taking her focus off her target for just a moment, looking into the crowd – and was surprised when her target burst in a cloud of smoke.

Delcatty came out of the cloud of smoke from his dispersed Substitute and flicked an Iron Tail at her, something which Buneary had to duck under to avoid and which nearly hit her.

More Shock Wave attacks came fizzing in, Delcatty rolling and painting with his tail and using it as an origin point for a continuous wave of Shock Wave attacks that sparked and curved around to follow Buneary. She jumped straight up to avoid them, putting together a Thunderbolt of her own to neutralize them, then had a better idea and instead sent her Thunderbolt back along the continuous line Delcatty had provided.

"There's a lot of electrical attacks going on here," the announcer observed, as Delcatty flicked the remains of the Thunderbolt off his tail. "Let's see what we get next!"

What came next was an offensive move by Buneary, who lunged forwards with a Fire Punch – this one expanding out into a plus-size attack, a bunny paw three times larger than her real one, which caught Delcatty off guard and sent him sliding across the floor.


"I was wondering when she was going to start doing that," Brock said. "She did it in the Wallace Cup, but I didn't see it turning up until now."

"Well, it does take a bit of concentration to boot up," Pikachu supplied. "I think she wanted the gap in the electrical attacks."

He frowned. "I'm more concerned about why she keeps losing focus and looking at us. It's not really good practice."


"You are kind of annoying," Delcatty mrowled, darting forwards to swing an Iron Tail across. This time it didn't carry an electrical charge – but instead a Water Pulse rolled off the tail, slapping at Buneary, and she switched elements from fire to ice and Ice Punched the Water Pulse into a pretty splash pattern which hardened into frost almost instantly.

Punching down with her other paw, she slid backwards along the ice she'd created – getting out of Delcatty's threat zone – then switched back to fire and launched a burst of flame at her opponent.

Delcatty flicked his tail down, slicing the fire in half with another surge of water, and began to hum to himself.

The humming rose and fell, forming an odd harmonic, and Buneary frowned. She bounced from foot to foot, then Bounced into the air and formed a Shock Wave of her own between her paws. It grew big enough she had trouble keeping track of it, and she judged it for a moment before Thunder Punching it into a dozen little fragments.

They went everywhere, trembled, then began to home in on Delcatty, and the feline dodged one way and sent out his own electrical attack in a surging pulse even as he kept up his oddly soothing humming.

Buneary landed lightly from her Bounce, converting her momentum into a forwards lunge and a Drain Punch, and her gaze flicked up to the stands again just before she made contact. Delcatty used the moment of inattention to dodge back with a burst of Agility, but Buneary's Drain Punch aura extended more than Delcatty was expecting and hit anyway.

There was a rush of drained energy which flowed through Buneary, but it didn't seem to actually help – she was starting to feel unaccountably tired, despite the quick boost, and she shook her head a few times to try and clear the creeping pulses of fatigue washing over her.

The humming got louder, and Delcatty's voice then peaked – forming a half-dozen brightly coloured musical notes which hung in the air before sweeping forwards towards Buneary.

"Ice Punch and Fire Punch – together – then Ice Beam!" Dawn called, and Buneary reacted quickly – not quite sure how it would help, but knowing that Dawn wouldn't be saying it if it wasn't going to do so. She punched both fists together, the two attacks forming a single splash of water, then shot an Ice Beam forwards.

The ice froze over the notes of the Sing attack, freezing them in place, and the shock of water against her also helped Buneary wake up a little – shaking off the lingering lassitude the Sing had attempted to induce in her.

Scowling, she shot a glare at Delcatty.

"It's just tactics, sweetheart," he replied, flirting his paw. "You understand, right?"


"Wow, that Delcatty is actually kind of a sleazeball," Dawn said, frowning, then looked up at the scoreboard.

Buneary was in the lead, but not by much – Delcatty's dodging and his own set of tricks had earned him plenty of points (or cost Buneary points, which was much the same thing) and she had the feeling he still had a trick or two in reserve.

"Right," she decided. "Okay, Buneary, I guess there's nothing for it. Lunar transformation!"


Pikachu blinked. "Wait, that one?"

"That sounds like you know what it is," Brock observed.

"Well, yeah, I was part of the training," Pikachu said. "This should be interesting."


Buneary's paws lit up again with ice, and she slammed them both into the ground – freezing it, making a kind of miniature ice rink around her.

Ice became electricity, and she began to spin in a graceful pirouette before rising off the ground in a Magnet Rise. That let her keep all the momentum of her spin, rotating quickly around as she put her paws together.

The electricity of the Thunderpunches began to flash across the little gap between them, faster and faster, and the ice holding in the notes of the Sing shattered – as did the notes themselves, producing a rising tune as Buneary finally touched her paws in a Flash.

When she landed, it was with a flaming aura from her now-Fire-Punch spreading over her entire body. Much of the ice melted away in a moment, and she posed before darting forwards in a fwoosh of flame.

Delcatty tracked her, ready to react by lunging in to make contact for his Cute Charm or lunge out to gain distance for a Water Pulse. His tail glowed, ready for an Iron Tail, but Buneary curved around to one side instead with her paws flaring bright orange and yellow as she used them to aid her traction.

Cutting around in a tight turn, she paused for just a moment as she reached Delcatty. Then she used Sky Uppercut, sending him flying into the air, and followed in a skirl of flames.

With her distinctly odd modification of Fire Punch running at full power, she looked like she had ears and legs twice as long as her real ones, and she used them as part of a rapid-fire volley of attacks as Delcatty went flying through the air. Several of her attacks scored only glancing blows, and a few of them even missed – largely because she was looking into the crowd, not at her opponent – but Delcatty barely noticed, because with an Agility fizzling through her Buneary could land enough attacks to keep him thoroughly off balance.

She pushed back away from Delcatty before they hit the ground, and the feline Normal-type twisted to land on his paws just as Buneary hit the ground as well.

"Shock Wave!" he called, firing off a powerful homing Electric attack at her, and Buneary caught it with a Thunderpunch – switching elements smoothly from Fire to Electric – and threw it back with a Thunderbolt on top, a combination which Delcatty only deflected with difficulty.

Buneary put her paws together, the glow around them condensing and forming a Focus Blast, and posed for a moment as she got ready to physically throw the attack at her opponent. "In the name of the moon-"

Then the bell went for the end of the time.


About half an hour later, with two more matches behind her, Dawn rejoined the others.

"Nice work!" Ash told her. "And all three of your Pokémon who took part, too, the Appeal was cool and I was really impressed with what Buneary was doing!"

"Thanks!" Buneary replied.

Pikachu coughed to get her attention, and she looked away from Ash to see what he wanted.

"Can I have a word?" he asked.

"Sure," Buneary replied, following him a little way from the group. "What's up?"

"I wanted to ask about what you were doing during that first battle," Pikachu said. "You definitely did have the most trouble with that one, I think that's something that was pretty obvious out there."

"That's how it felt," Buneary agreed, more than a little ruefully. "That full-aura trick is really tiring to keep up."

"That's not really what I was worried about," Pikachu replied. "You obviously took a few hits there which you really shouldn't have done, and you kept looking away from the fight – why was that?"

Buneary blushed a little, then looked up. "Do you want to know?"

"That's sort of why I asked," Pikachu pointed out. "So, uh..."

Buneary nodded. "It's because he has Cute Charm," she replied. "And he was kind of sleazy, too, but Cute Charm is still Cute Charm."

She fidgeted a little. "So I looked at you when I was attacking, because that helped me stay focused."

Pikachu blinked.

"That's… well, it's kind of neat," he admitted. "It's a couple of other things too, but I'll go with 'neat' for now."

"Anything bad?" Buneary asked, worried.

"Not bad, no, just… I'm not really sure what to think about it," Pikachu explained. "I think it's good, but I'm having a little trouble parsing what kind of good feelings to have about it."

Buneary relaxed. "I can live with that," she decided.

She looked up at her trainer. "So, only one Ribbon left! I guess that means the final one's up to the boys to get?"

"Depends if Togekiss wants a go," Dawn replied. "But probably."


"It's nice to meet you," Riley said, giving a respectful nod to the Porygon on his table.

And to meet you, Leo replied. I'm interested in learning a little about what it's like for you here on Iron Island, in addition to my other duties.

"Yes, and my thanks for it," Riley smiled. "There are few enough Aura adepts these days, and while I cannot be spared from Iron Island for long I can at least pass on my insights to others one way or another."

I think we're going to get on quite well, Leo said, then turned to Riley's companion. And yourself?

Lucario bowed deeply. "For myself, I would be glad to hear of the achievements of Ash Ketchum's companion, if you have stories of him."

I do, yes, Leo confirmed. They're mostly second hand, but that should be fine.

"Fine and more than fine," Lucario agreed. "I do not mind our secluded life, but it is nice to hear of the outside world."

In that case, I think I can be more than enough help for you, Leo decided. What would you say to watching a film tonight?


I wanted to check in on you, Damos stated. You are the one of the PoryDozen who is going to be on their own most of the time, keeping watch on the cloak.

I will be fine, Babbage replied. I have my own ways of passing the time. For example, I have calculated pi to the last decimal place.

...that's impossible, Damos said carefully. It's an irrational number.

Well, I've calculated it, Babbage insisted. It's 10.00000.

Damos was silent.

Admittedly, that's in base pi, Babbage added. Which is useless for just about any other number, since it turns almost any other number into total gibberish. But it makes you think.

Yes, it does, Damos agreed. It makes me think that an addendum is needed to Euclid's Elements: nobody likes a smart-arse.

You're too kind, Babbage chuckled electronically. But no, I'm going to spend my time writing – it's why I volunteered for this mission, actually. I've got all my references, I'm just going to spend the time writing and getting the occasional update.

So long as you're enjoying yourself, Damos replied.

Babbage signed off, and Damos vocalized a sigh before moving on to the next member of the group. Fenris. How are things going?


AN:


And back to the regularly scheduled Pokémon Journey, already in progress.