"You got an email."

"Oh, thanks," Dawn said, looking at her Pokétch. "Wonder what it is – let's see..."

"It is from your mother. She is reminding you about the Twinleaf Festival."

Brock snapped his fingers. "That's right, that's this weekend, isn't it… we've got a few days to get ready, at least."

"Yeah – and thanks, Rotom," Dawn added.

Rotom buzzed once, and Ash frowned.

"So we can all understand Pokémon, but what would that sound like to someone else?" he asked. "Rotom speech sounds like buzzing… I'm pretty sure that just means that someone who didn't have Aura speech would just hear buzzing."

He shrugged. "It's not likely to be useful, really, but it's good to know at least."

"Twinleaf festival," Lucario said, turning the words over. "That sounds like… there's about forty percent odds of everything going badly wrong. Did everything go badly wrong last time?"

"No, it's just a local town festival," Pikachu assured him. "It's Dawn's hometown, that's why we're even talking about it."

"Good to know," Lucario nodded. "So… what kind of thing happens there? In the Kingdom this sort of thing would have stalls, games and a tourney."

"It's… actually pretty much the same," Dawn replied. "I'm wondering what would be good stalls and stuff, and I know there's… wait."

She pointed accusingly at Lucario. "You've been travelling with Ash a lot longer than I have, have you never run into a town festival before?"

"Of course I have," Lucario told her. "Just not in Sinnoh."

"That is kind of a good point," Dawn admitted, letting her arm drop. "Fair enough."

"Hmm..." Suicune mused.

"What is it?" Ash asked, turning towards the Water-type.

"Oh, I was thinking, I don't think I've been to one of these in a while..." she explained. "And the last one I went to sort of got overshadowed by the fact I was there."

Ash found a seat, as it was becoming clear they weren't going to be going anywhere soon. "Don't you think the same will happen here?"

"If enough of my teammates come, no one of us will seem too special," Suicune pointed out with a smirk. "Actually, I wonder if I could get my brothers to agree to our running a stall."

"A stall?" Brock repeated. "Those are kind of hard to run, it can get competitive… what kind of stall were you thinking of?"

"Rides," Suicune answered blandly. "I think a nice ten-mile round trip should be a good length. It should let us get in a few dozen rides in the space of an hour."

"You'd never be able to pry Barry off," Dawn said. "But that would still leave two of you, so maybe."

Actually, if we're suggesting ideas, I had one, Dexter volunteered. Not all the PoryDozen can be physically present, but they could run something from where they are… what I'm getting at is that we could have video games. Possibly multi-user video games.

"That could be neat," Dawn said to herself. "I mean, it's new, anyway…"

"What about rockets?" Mewtwo asked. "I've read up a lot on the safety laws around rocket launches, but not so much on what you can do in a populated area."

"I think it depends on what kind of rocket, and making sure nobody's going to be hit by a high-speed rocket," Brock mused. "So, say… if you used some kind of bottle rocket with air pressure for power and water for reaction mass, that shouldn't be too dangerous."

He shrugged. "I mean, you're a really powerful Pokémon, you could keep people safe with model combustion rockets pretty well, but sooner or later you scale them up enough and you're just turning Twinleaf into a new launch site."

Mewtwo chuckled. "Yes, I can see the problem. Well, I shall keep to something more minor… though perhaps if I could work out a way to demonstrate staging..."

"We'd better discuss that with Mom," Dawn smiled. "There might be something we can work out."

She paused, thought over what she'd said, and clarified. "For where to do it, I mean. Mom's not a rocket scientist."


Johanna paused as the doorbell rang, then put down her chopsticks and headed to the door.

Opening it, she blinked in surprise – then smiled. "Dawn! It's lovely to see you, and your friends."

"Thanks, Mom," Dawn replied, smiling, and gave her a quick hug.

"I was going to ask what brings you here today, but I'm going to ask… how you got here first," Johanna decided. "Weren't you telling me yesterday about something at Lake Acuity?"

"I am pleased to have provided transportation," said one of the Legendary Pokémon on her porch.

"Well, thank you," Johanna smiled. "You'd better all come in, though I'm afraid I was having lunch and I didn't know you were coming."

"Oh, right, sorry," Dawn said. She checked her Pokétch, which buzzed. "Yeah, we should have waited an hour or so."

"So long as you understand, it's all fine," Johanna said. "Now, I assume this is about the Twinleaf Festival?"

"That's right," Ash agreed. "See, some of us started getting ideas, then the Pokémon back at the ranch started having ideas… like, what was that one Totodile came up with?"

"He said that some of us should dress up in big ten-pin costumes," Lucario provided. "Then Pokémon could fire attacks to try and knock us over, and score points that way."

Johanna blinked. "That's… certainly an unusual one. I don't think anyone's ever done that before at the festival."

She frowned. "Where would you get the costumes?"

"He didn't say," Lucario replied. "I assume he has some sort of idea about it."

"Mewtwo has this idea about rockets," Dawn volunteered. "So there's that one as well. I guess… well, I guess the thing we really need is to work out which of these are bad ideas."

"That's always a good step," Johanna said. "Tell you what, just let me finish my lunch and I'll be right with you. I'm not sure how this is all going to work out, but I think it'll at least be a memorable experience."

"Going to the festival?" Brock asked.

"That as well."


"This looks pretty interesting," Palmer said, stopping in his walk. "What's this?"

"Greetings," a Charizard told him. "This is the Rocket Stall."

"You don't mean this is a stall run by Team Rocket, do you?" Palmer asked, chuckling. "That would be quite unusual."

"According to my plan of the event, they did not show up today," the Charizard replied. "I understand they were expected."

"...okay, so I have a question," Palmer went on, after wondering whether to comment on that. "I know from what my son has told me that Ash Ketchum's Pokémon are all kind of strange."

He waved his hand vaguely. "So… you learned to talk?"

"I was programmed with the ability to talk," the Charizard told him. "Including in most human dialects."

It paused slightly. "I have determined that the cause of the confusion is that you assume that I am a Pokémon who is part of Ash Ketchum's team. Neither is correct; I am a data entity employed by Mewtwo as part of his company."

"Huh," Palmer said, succinctly. "So… you're basically a digital Pokémon?"

"I am a digital intelligence whose preferences are for the form of a Pokémon," the Charizard explained. "Mewtwo suggested that I employ the form of a Charizard for today, as seeing multiple Mewtwo would be confusing."

Palmer absorbed that.

"So, what's the stall about?" he asked.

"Rockets, rocketry and other experimentation," the Charizard said. "Mewtwo is running two drop-in sessions, one before lunch and one after. Each session will be two hours long and will consist of a high-speed virtual space program."

As it spoke, in a voice which Palmer noticed was mostly gender-neutral, Mewtwo floated out to a piece of flat stone in the middle of a roped-off area.

The rocket is ready, he said. This is our second launch, so it has some fins on. What do the fins do?

"They make it so the rocket goes up straight!" someone called. "Because the first rocket fell over and hit the ground!"

"Isn't this kind of dangerous?" Palmer asked.

"The rockets in question employ water and pressurized air," Charizard informed him. "Their danger level is minimal. In addition, I am acting as range safety."

The rocket hissed, shooting up into the air in a cloud of spray. It rolled a little, swaying in flight, then reached two hundred feet in the air and slowed to a halt.

A little parachute popped out, floating it back down, and there was a ripple of clapping and cheering.

Very good, Mewtwo told them all. But that's not as high as we can make our rocket go. Do you know why it slowed down like that?

He pointed to someone in the crowd.

"It's because the jet got less strong?" the spectator suggested.

Correct. The jet got less strong, but the rocket itself was still quite heavy because it has to carry our payload.

"What is the payload?" Palmer asked.

"It is an empty Pokéball," Charizard replied.

Now we're going to discuss something called staging. The idea is that if you can lift a small rocket high into the air using a big rocket, the small rocket can fly higher than if it started on the ground… and higher than just the big rocket, too.

"This looks pretty educational," the Tower Tycoon chuckled. "I wonder how high they'll be going by the afternoon..."


"How are you doing?" Houndoom asked, lifting up so his forepaws were on one of the chairs and he could see how Absol was handling the pinball.

"Pretty good," Absol replied, hitting the left flipper. Her ball bounced up from near the hole in the base of the board, bounced twice off points scorers, and came to rest on a small slot in the upper half of the field.

Lights flashed, and the score multiplier went up again – and she waited a moment for the ball to re-enter play, then used her right flipper to sling it squarely into the multiball trigger.

"This is a pretty interesting training exercise, actually," Absol added, her tail flicking back and forth a little. "It's trickier than normal to predict the interactions, so it means I have to think carefully about my moment-to-moment definition of disaster. It's easy to just keep scoring, but scoring high is something else."

"Excuse me, ah..." one of the fair attendants began. "...I'm going to play it safe and say Absol… we've got a couple of issues."

"Go ahead," Absol said, turning her attention to him with a smile – though still playing as well.

Guessing roughly what she'd said, the attendant continued. "Well, firstly, there's a bit of a problem about your tail. It's… I'm not sure if you like it called wagging, but that's what it's doing, and it's kind of sharp."

Absol stopped her tail, holding it in place.

"Also, we're pretty sure that's cheating, and… you know, not really fair."

"That's a pity," Absol sighed. "It's not a money-reward game, though. How is it unfair?"

"You have been on the machine for fifty minutes," Houndoom pointed out.

Absol paused, then looked up at the sun's position. "...oh, right."


"And this is Lake Verity," Suicune said. "It's conveniently close to Twinleaf, which is helpful because it means we'll be able to visit it twice. The first time we're going to do a lap around it."

She looked back at the human who was riding her. "How are you enjoying it, by the way?"

"This is – wow," the girl said, with a huge smile, as Suicune ran at startling speed. "It feels so much faster than flying!"

"It is faster than a lot of Pokémon or aircraft fly," Suicune told her. "But part of that is also that we're very close to the ground. From high up it takes a long time for what you see to go past, because what you can see is thing like mountains and big lakes… from down low like this you can see trees and branches, so they go past very quickly."

She jumped, making the girl on her back whoop with surprise, then landed on a fallen log and raced along it to the end.

"We'll have to head back soon," she added. "But the second time we reach Lake Verity, we're going across it!"


"Ummm… excuse me?"

Johanna looked down at the boy tugging on her dress. "Hello! It's Rollo, isn't it?"

Rollo nodded.

"I haven't seen you or your mother in a few days," Johanna added. "I hope you're enjoying the festival?"

The boy frowned. "Well… I was, but now I'm confused. We were learning about Pokémon types in school..."

"Oh, I see what the problem is," Johanna said, looking at the battle currently taking place in what Lucario had insisted they rename 'the tourney'.

A Rhyperior raised her arm, firing a Rock Throw attack at Ash's Staraptor, and the Flying-type twisted in midair to bring his wing into contact with the flying rock. "Staa!"

The rock split cleanly in half at the point of contact, and Staraptor hit the fragments with his legs to send them flying right back at Rhyperior.

"The thing you have to understand, when you're a skilled Pokémon trainer," Johanna began, "is that Pokémon aren't always strong against other Pokémon just because of their type. It helps, but it doesn't mean everything by itself."

Staraptor hammered his way through another flying rock, then folded his wings and dove. Halfway to the ground he flared, speeding up again with a single powerful wingbeat, and hit Rhyperior in the knees – sending the Rock-type staggering backwards.

"Huh," Rollo said. "So… if I trained a Bidoof well enough, it could beat any Pokémon?"

"That would be a very strong Bidoof, but I don't see a reason why not," Johanna said.

She paused. "Though some Pokémon can go back in time. I don't know if a Bidoof could beat them."

"Aww..."

"I'm afraid I don't know everything," Johanna pointed out. "But if you really want to, you could give it a go."


As the festival continued, a battle took place in the skies over Shamouti.

"Take that!" Articuno called, inhaling, then shot out a blast of cold Ice Beam over his opponents. Zapdos took a hit to his wing, and Moltres countered the Ice Beam with his own Flamethrower.

"Never!" Moltres replied, shooting flames at Zapdos. "You won't beat me, and if Zapdos is out of the fight then I'll definitely win!"

Articuno promptly blasted Moltres with a second Ice attack, then closed in and rammed into him with a Sky Attack.

The explosion of golden light rippled across the sky, and Zapdos used the respite to recover – and promptly exploited it to hit both the other Birds at once with a Thunder, then followed up with a Thunderbolt which both Pokémon managed to dodge.

"You're going down!" he called. "The islands are mine!"

As the fighting continued, Silver poked Ho-Oh.

"Yes?" Ho-Oh asked. "And did your father and mother not tell you that that's rude?"

"Sorry," the young Lugia admitted. "I was kind of confused, so I forgot my manners. Um… how come you're not stopping them?"

"Well, I don't really feel like fighting today," Ho-Oh replied. "If I just let them tire themselves out, they'll be tired, but if I stop them then I'll be tired as well."

He flared his wings a little. "It seems logical to me."

"But… isn't there some reason you have to stop them fighting, apart from how they're just kind of jerks?" Silver pressed. "That's why Mom and Dad always slap them down really quickly."

"Well, your father's good at this job, and so is your mother," Ho-Oh agreed readily. "And they're definitely the Pokémon who should do this job most of the time. But it occurred to me that I had an advantage."

A rainbow wing waved at them. "The main thing that the Titans of Fire, Ice and Lightning cause if they fight is weather chaos, because Shamouti is an important weather node."

"Right," Silver agreed, then frowned slightly and looked up at the sky.

Craning his neck didn't really help, but it made him feel like he was looking more closely.

"It's a beautiful day," Silver said slowly. "Why is that… is that you?"

Ho-Oh smirked, which was quite impressive with a beak.

"I'll just let them get it out of their system," he said. "Then if they're still fighting at sundown I'll probably set them all on fire or something."


"Oh, is this a test your strength machine?" Lucario asked, inspecting it. "I don't think I've ever tried one of those before."

"I think you test your strength through much more direct methods, if I remember correctly," Pikachu chuckled. "Like lifting a boulder."

"Boulders rarely come conveniently labelled with their weight," Lucario said. "Hmm… is this one of those special heavy duty ones that strong Pokémon can use?"

"No, sorry," the man next to it said. "That's why I'm here, actually – we could only get the one. It's good for humans and moderately strong Pokémon, but a Lucario is right out."

"I say, what a marvellous idea!" Raikou announced, making the attendant jump. "I'll be glad to test my strength!"

"Sorry," the man said quickly. "You're a bit too strong for it as well."

He looked at the queue.

"...most of these Pokémon are, actually."

Metagross stamped a foot on the grass. This seems unfair to us.

"You just left a foot dent in the grass," Pikachu pointed out. "In both definitions of the word foot."

Metagross examined what they'd done. That will buff out.

"I'd say Geodude might be needed," Steelix said. "Am I out as well?"

Lucario relayed the question.

"Yes, you're too big and too strong," the attendant confirmed. "And so is that Mamoswine. And that Tyrantrum."

Brock's Chansey stepped forwards.

"You… look like you'll be okay," the man decided. "But if you're strong, don't hit it too hard for your first go."

"Pleasure," Chansey said, and walked daintily over to the machine. She bent down, and gave the pad a bap!

The bell rang.

"...why couldn't I find a heavy duty machine..." the man sighed.

Are you sure we are not permitted to have a go? We would be willing to reassemble all the pieces if we broke it.


"Aha! There you are!" Barry proclaimed.

Ash looked up. "Oh, hey, Barry. I hope you had fun!"

"Yes, but that's not the point!" Barry replied. "The point is that I'm here to challenge you to a battle! If you don't want a battle, you'll have to pay a lot of money or a move!"

Next to Ash, Palmer groaned. "Barry… that's just not very polite. You need to say please!"

"Oh, right!" Barry brightened. "Please give me a battle, or a lot of money or a move!"

"It is kind of late," Ash said, checking the time. "So… I might not have time for a battle, especially after the one I had against your dad."

Staraptor preened himself.

"You don't?" Barry asked. "But… where did the time go?"

"You spent most of the fair getting rides," Suicune replied. "And helping out with the rocket display Mewtwo was running, when you weren't getting rides."

"That would explain it!" Barry declared. "But it's not the end of the fair yet, so I still want to challenge you to a battle!"

Ash frowned.

"I do have an idea," he said. "Does your Smeargle know Extremespeed yet?"

"No, he has to get by with Quick Attack," Barry answered, then realized where that might be going. "That would be great!"

Palmer chuckled. "I'm glad to see you have a good friend here, Barry. You realize Ash could just say no, right?"

"But..." Barry blinked. "Wait, I thought that if trainers locked eyes they had to battle?"

"No, that's not a law," Palmer replied, shaking his head with a smile. "Otherwise whenever someone like Cynthia gave a speech she'd have to battle half the audience."

"That does seem correct..." Barry mused.

As he thought, his Smeargle tapped him on the thigh.

"Huh? Oh, right – I accept!" Barry declared.

Suicune gave Smeargle a nod, making sure he had his tail ready, then shot off into the distance in a blur of speed.

Smeargle gave Barry a thumbs-up.

"I have to say, Barry, I'm impressed," Palmer noted, as Suicune loped back into view. "You haven't mentioned one of your crazy theories yet."

"Why would I do that?" Barry asked. "I'm pretty sure you're in on, like, half of them, and Ash is in on the other half. And I don't want to give away any secrets of yours to my friend, or vice-versa."

"That's… an odd thought, but a nice one..."

Ash frowned. "Wait, wouldn't that mean-"

"No, let it go," Palmer advised him. "It's just something you have to get used to."


"Something wrong?" Buneary asked, looking up at her trainer.

"Yeah, kind of," Dawn admitted. "I… it just keeps getting more awkward, I was hoping this would resolve it… you remember Kenny?"

"That guy you knew once?" Buneary replied.

"Yeah, that's a description that could only apply to one person," Dawn said, trying not to snort. "Anyway, uh, I realized that we hadn't run into each other."

Buneary waited for a moment.

"Wait, at all?" she asked.

"Since coming back," Dawn clarified. "And by the time I realized, it was already kind of awkward, because… you know? If I decided to send an email to Kenny letting him know I hadn't seen him in a while, it'd be awkward, and it's got more awkward as time goes on. I was hoping I'd bump into him here, because that would make it kind of natural, but..."

Her Pokétch buzzed.

"He's doing the Unova contest circuit," Rotom said.

"...oh," Dawn replied, blinking. "I… guess that does explain it."

She raised her wrist. "How did you find that out?"

"Dragon has showed me how to do search engine result curation. It is theraputic."


Some way to the south, a Shaymin dipped towards the ground.

Her wings caught the air, making her descent a fluttery thing with plenty of slows and divergences, and after a few minutes just playing around in the air she circled around to come in for her final landing – bringing down her airspeed until she touched down with a soft thump, and running another dozen or so steps before slowing to a walk.

"I wondered how close you were going to cut it today," her friend said, tails flirting. "It's at least twenty minutes until sunset."

"Yeah, but I wanted to make sure we had time to prepare dinner," Shaymin replied. "I found a load of good berries, and I know I'm way more helpful at cooking like this."

"That's true," Kyoko allowed. "I suppose I'll forgive you this one time."

They shared a chuckle, and Kyoko used her nine tails to gather together some sticks into a pile. Once done, the Ninetales breathed a thin stream of flame onto the pile of sticks, then sat back in satisfaction as they caught.

"We've got Tamatoes," Shaymin said, digging through the saddlebag which didn't hold her Gracidea. "So we could do stuffed Tamato?"

"That sounds like a good plan," Kyoko agreed. "We still have some of the rice, right?"

Shaymin nodded a confirmation, and got to work.


Twenty-five minutes later, the now-land-forme Shaymin was nibbling on a hot stuffed Tamato.

"I think this went pretty well," she said, looking up for a moment. "Nice and crisp."

Kyoko nodded, leaning back as she held one of the other berries in three of her tails, then frowned.

"I can smell something," she said. "A human, and a Pokémon."

Shaymin listened, then nodded. "I can hear it too."

She dragged the berry under an overhang where it would hopefully survive, then walked over to right near the fire – ready to jump through the smoke to absorb power for a Seed Flare.

"Excuse me?" a male voice called. "Can we join you?"

Kyoko tilted her head for a moment, and an illusion shimmered into place next to her.

"Yes, but be careful," the human woman Kyoko had conjured said. "There's some dinner around, please don't step on it."

The human came through the gathering gloom to join them, letting his Sneasel down from his shoulder as he did so. "Hey, thanks, we kind of lost track of time. It's good to see someone else around here."

He looked at the Pokémon by the fire, then at the 'trainer', then to the Ninetales. "It's a pretty good illusion, but you missed the depth of field."

Kyoko tensed slightly.

"You two are travelling together, right?" the human added. "Mind if we get a picture? It's cool seeing how Pokémon we think of as 'wild' don't always act in a way we think wild Pokémon should."

After a pause, Shaymin and Kyoko exchanged baffled glances.

"It's sort of what we do," Sneasel volunteered, adjusting the flash equipment on her camera. "I was pretty amazed by how much you can learn from a photograph… it's like capturing a moment, so you can look at it forever, but you can make the moment beautiful in a whole different way to normal."

"I… guess it's not a problem," Kyoko said, after a long moment of thought. "What do you think?"

"Well, I guess I wanted to see the world," Shaymin replied. "Given that, I can't really be all that uncomfortable about the world seeing me."

She brightened. "Actually, what about if they came with us for a day or two? That way they could see what it's like for our whole routine."

Kyoko nodded, the idea sounding distinctly interesting to her.


"That went great, guys," Ivysaur said. "We were firing off actual rockets and nobody got hurt. Top marks."

He glanced to the side. "Probably that's partly because we tied Squirtle up..."

"I wasn't going to do anything anyway," Squirtle muttered.

"Rockets using water as a propellant?" Ivysaur pointed out, untying the ropes. "That's vintage Squirtle, don't bother denying it."

"He's got a point!" Totodile said, half his attention on balancing his Pokéball on his nose.

"But, logically, the fact you were doing something I'd have done, without my involvement, means that my involvement wouldn't have changed anything and you were doing what I'd have done anyway," Squirtle said, with a flourish of his shades. "So you were injustly keeping my burning spirit locked away from regular entertainment!"

Ivysaur gave him a flat look.

"Nope, not buying it," he said. "Mawile?"

Mawile nodded. "I can think of at least one way he could have made it much more like what he likes," she said. "And I'm not even really trying very hard."

Squirtle crossed his arms.

"That's very stereotypical, and I can't believe you'd think it of me," he said. "The fact I actually was going to ask Mewtwo if we could replace the water with high test peroxide because it's like water but with extra oxygen is completely beside the point."

"It's not really beside the point, is it, though," Ivysaur sighed. "Because it's true, and because that would mean you were going to do exactly what we thought you were."

"Well, chaps, no sense chewing old sour berries," Noctowl announced. "Pip pip, and all that blather. Now, let's see about discussing the important thing – what's up next?"

"I did actually want to talk about that," Totodile said, nosing his Pokéball up into the air and catching it. "Ash asked me about if Quilava and Meganium and I could put a Contest routine together, because of the Johto Festival."

"What's this?" Noctowl asked. "It's the first I've bally well heard of a Johto Festival, and I'm from Johto!"

"So are a lot of our teammates," Ivysaur said. "Like Latias and Latios, and all three Beasts… do Lugia and Ho-Oh count?"

"Lugia doesn't, he's from the Orange Islands," Totodile pointed out, returning his Pokéball to its place and balancing it again. "But Ho-Oh is, or used to be. I mean, we're sort of all from Kanto now!"

He indicated the ranch.

"Well… yes, good point that reptile," Noctowl admitted, fluffing his feathers up. "Top notch. But what's this about another festival so soon after we've done a festival? It's shoddy scheduling, that's what it is."

"I'm pretty sure it's just festival season in Sinnoh, Noctowl," Ivysaur said. "You know, the time of year when it's warm enough they can schedule events outside with a reasonable guarantee of not being swamped in snow?"

"Fine, fine, if you're all bound and determined to bring balderdash like logic into it..."


"Hey, Khoury," Lyra said, sitting down next to her friend. "How's the planning going?"

Khoury gave her a slightly stunned look, blinked a couple of times, then shook his head. "Oh – hey, Lyra."

"Bad?" Lyra asked, worried.

"No… not so much," Khoury replied. "Not bad, no. More like… the opposite of bad, really. I'm just still trying to work out how to react properly."

He spread his hands. "It's just… kind of… okay, so I just met Ash Ketchum, and he'd apparently heard of the Johto Festival?"

"He had?" Lyra smiled. "That's great, it really shows we're publicizing the event properly!"

"Yeah, but it's kind of… odd, too," Khoury said, still sounding a bit shocked. "Because he wants to help, and he's getting some of his Pokémon to help too."

Lyra thought through what that could mean.

"Wait, so… hold on," she said. "When you say 'some of his Pokémon', you mean..."

"Did you know Ho-Oh is very polite?" Khoury informed her. "So are his children, which is apparently what the Beasts of Johto technically are. They're very interested in joining in, and Ho-Oh said he's going to see if he can get his friend Lugia interested in a demonstration battle."

"Maar?" Marill asked.

Lyra shook her head. "I… don't really have an adequate way to react to that. Sorry."

There was a long pause, as the two friends sat with their thoughts.

"...this is really going to put the Johto Festival on the map," Khoury said. "The main thing I'm worried about is if the map's also going to need updating?"


"So I've got a question," Dawn said. "Are we still attending the Johto Festival, or do we now technically count as organizers?"

Brock chuckled, then frowned. "That's a good question, actually," he mused. "What does make it so someone becomes an organizer?"

"What about if… you say you are, and enough people agree with you?" Ash suggested. "How does that sound?"

"It does seem kind of logical, I guess," Ash's Heracross said, thinking about it. "But then again, what if you were kicked off the committee? You still were an organizer, but nobody else who knows would be willing to say you were."

"I think it depends how the breakup is, there," Brock's Sudowoodo replied. "It's kind of a matter of degree. You know, if you leave for mutually amicable reasons, and all that."

"...no, sorry, I don't really have the experience," Heracross admitted. "I've been guessing the whole time."

"Fair enough."

"This is very oddly named, you know," someone said, off to the side. "Johto Festival? We're not in Johto!"

The man who was speaking waved a finger at Khoury. "I thought my Pidgeot had dropped me off in the wrong region, young man!"

Khoury caught Ash's eye and tried to signal that he'd be able to talk as soon as the conversation was over, then returned his attention to the man. "Well… to be honest, Mr., there's not many better names for a festival celebrating Johto and the Johto region. Anything that doesn't mention Johto is going to be confusing, and anything that does is going to be confusing in a different way."

"I'm sure you could have done better," the complainer said. "Like… the Johto Culture Festival."

"That still sounds like it's in Johto, if you just hear it," Brock pointed out.

"Yeah, I guess it does," the complainer mumbled. "What about… the travelling exhibition of Western Honshu?"

"Johto isn't even west Honshu, not really," Khoury volunteered. "It's west of Kanto, but there are other bits of Honshu island that are west of Johto… and there's also a bit of Johto which is technically on Shikoku."

"What about the Celebration of Johto?" Dawn suggested.

"No, that's got the same problem as well," the complainer sighed. "...well, I suppose it sounds like there isn't really a solution. I'm sorry for bringing it up, now."

"You could include the local town name?" Ash said. "What's the name of this town anyway?"

"Sinjoh, I think," Brock told him.

"That's… actually even worse," Dawn sniggered. "The Sinjoh Sinnoh Johto festival? It sounds like Khoury managed to get to name the town to fit with the event."

The man laughed. "That's a good point, young lady. I suppose I should just enjoy the day."

As he left, Khoury sighed in relief a little.

"Thanks, I think you guys really helped out," he told them. "Again, that is. Uh… okay, so I guess I don't have to explain the point of the festival to you guys."

"I did have one question, actually," Lucario said. "I was wondering what counted as a Johto Pokémon."

"Well… isn't it obvious?" Khoury asked. "Pokémon from Johto."

"You mean any Pokémon who grew up in, or got caught in, Johto?" Lucario said, thinking. "So we technically need to ask the life history of any Pokémon here?"

"No, no, not like that," Khoury replied. "So… Sudowoodo, that's a Johto Pokémon."

"I'm actually from Kanto," Sudowoodo told him.

"...okay, that's kind of confusing, but also really freaky," the organizer blinked. "How did you do that?"

"That wasn't Sudowoodo, that was Stantler," Dawn said, patting thin air. "He's kind of shy."

"Dawn..." Stantler said, with a little chuff. "I was trying to stay incognito and help out!"

"And you are," Dawn replied. "I mean, this isn't actually where you are, is it?"

"No, but it's the principle of the thing," Stantler replied.

His Soothe Bell jingled softly. "Wait, though, what about if your herd commutes between Johto and other places?"

"And my Quilava hatched as a Cyndaquil from an egg while in Sinnoh," Dawn added. "It's kind of a woolly concept."

"I guess so," Khoury admitted, with a laugh. "And I know your Lugia's not from Johto. But for some reason I really feel like your Latias and Latios don't count as Johto Pokémon, even though Altomare is in Johto."

"You mean like how everyone else gets annoyed when Sinnohvians claim Arceus is from Sinnoh?" Brock asked.

"Firstly, Arceus visits Sinnoh more than anyone else, we've seen him do it," Dawn pointed out with a chuckle. "Secondly… no, the term is not Sinnohvians."

Rotom buzzed her Pokétch, and Dawn blinked. "Oh – it sounds like it's nearly time for the Beasts to show up."


"Everyone ready?" Suicune asked, checking on her brothers. "You know the plan, right?"

"Run along until we reach the ramp, then jump," Entei shrugged. "Seems simple enough."

"That's right, but you need to make sure you're aiming for the right place as well," Suicune reminded him. "There's a landing zone, and we can't change course much in mid-air."

"So is this a flyover?" Raikou asked. "I've always wondered what it'd be like to do a flyover."

"You haven't," Entei told him. "You've never so much as mentioned it before. Also, this isn't a flyover, because we won't be flying. We're running. This is a runover."

"A jumpover, I'd say!" Raikou insisted. "Now, hurry up, time's wasting!"

He broke into a sprint, and hit the ramp at high speed. It boomed dully as he jumped off the end, and his speed carried him clear over Sinjoh Town's town centre.

Entei went next, a trail of flame marking his path as he went overhead just to the left of where Raikou had gone, and Suicune brought up the rear with a whoosh of wind and a rainbow trail of mist marking their path.

She landed on the far side of the town, drifting a little so she could slow herself down without hitting a bench, then rejoined her siblings.

"I think that went fairly well," she pronounced.

"Right!" Raikou agreed. "Though I still think Entei should have worn his ribbons!"

"...you two are never going to let that go, are you?"

"Doubt it," Suicune told him.


"There was something I was hoping to ask," Khoury's father said, sitting down near the small arena. "Ash Ketchum. I know you've been through several regions, and you're obviously a high level battler. So how did your Johto experience compare with other regions?"

"Oh, well..." Ash began, then thought about it. "So… well, Johto was where I really started to see how strong a lot of gym leaders are – or how strong they can be if they need to bring out their strongest Pokémon. Everyone was really understanding, too, considering…"

"Considering?" the Pokémon Breeder asked. "What do you mean?"

"Well, uh… I used to have a problem, and I think I sort of still do have a problem," Ash answered. "I keep doing a lot of damage to Pokémon gyms. It's happened everywhere except Hoenn, because I was trying really hard not to do damage in Hoenn, but Johto really got the worst of it."

"Hmm..." Khoury's dad said, thinking. "I do remember hearing something about a gym being so badly damaged it was unsafe."

"Was it Goldenrod, Olivine, or Cianwood?" Lucario asked. "I seem to remember Goldenrod got wrecked, Olivine we took out the wall, and Cianwood actually collapsed during the battle."

The older man gaped, then shut his mouth with an effort. "Um… that is, I don't think it was any of them, actually… from memory it was Blackthorn. It must just have been a coincidence."

"That… kind of depends how you think of coincidences," Ash admitted. "If it's what I'm thinking of – that was a couple of years ago, right?"

"About that," the man agreed.

"Yeah, I didn't do that, but one of my Pokémon did," Ash explained. "I hadn't caught Raikou yet, and he was trying to impress me, so he did the Johto Gym Challenge himself."

He shrugged. "I… guess I probably would have done that one outside anyway. All the gyms which didn't end up outright wrecked in Johto were the ones where I had my battle outside."

"Hold on, I'm remembering a bit more about that year," the man said. "Was that the time when there was a giant tornado outside Violet City?"

"That was us too," Lucario confirmed helpfully. "Well, actually it was Pidgeot."

"Well, I hope you don't mind, but if I or my son ever open a gym you're not invited," Khoury's dad told Ash. "Though it'll probably be in Johto, so you won't need to."

Ash chuckled. "I guess so, yeah… not sure why it keeps happening, though."

"I have a guess," the man said. "I think it's the combination of the strength of your team and your imagination with your tactics. It means attacks go everywhere..."

"That does sound likely," Ash frowned. "But I don't want to say it's the only thing it could be… some of it does seem like bad luck, or that I'm just doing something wrong."

"Hey, uh, Dad?" Khoury waved, getting their attention. "Sorry, Ash – but I think there was a mixup with the eggs we got for the Egg Scramble prize."

He held up a container, which showed an egg that was decidedly not like any of the Johto starters – almost entirely a metallic silver, with a few little red lines along each side.

"I've phoned him up, and he says it's not worth picking it up again unless we really can't do anything with it," he added. "So, uh… any ideas?"

"Well, my first thought was to give Ash an Egg Scramble battle, but from what he's telling me I don't think that would be good for the surrounding town," Khoury's dad chuckled. "So, hmm…"

"What about Dawn, or Brock?" Khoury asked. "If you were going to give Ash a battle… I know Dawn has a Quilava, so she wouldn't really be able to try and win a regular Johto starter anyway, but this isn't a regular Johto starter. And Brock… does Brock have whatever this is?"

"It looks like a Steel-type," Brock said. "I've got a couple of Steel-types already, so it might be one I've already got."

"Then it's up to you, I guess, Dawn," Khoury said. "Are you interested?"

"I guess so, yeah," Dawn agreed. "So… for the regular Egg Scramble battles, it's supposed to be Sinnoh starters against Johto ones?"

"If that's what you've got," Khoury shrugged. "I've got some other Pokémon too, though, so you could fight one of them instead."

"Well… maybe I should use Quilava," Dawn decided. "I think-"

Dexter bleeped a warning. It seems that Lugia is now available.

"Thanks," Ash replied, as Lugia's Pokéball materialized. "Okay, so – Lugia, we've got the idea for you to do an exhibition battle in the skies with Ho-Oh, but that's not for a while. If you want to enjoy the Johto Festival first, though, you can come out whenever you want."

Lugia promptly emerged with a flash. "Thank you for giving me the choice, Ash," he said, as a hush spread over the nearby crowd. "And hello to you all. I'm glad to be here… and I may not be from Johto, but it is where my son and his mother live and I have visited there many times."

He spread his wings, and floated into the air – using psychic power far more than his wings – before landing again a little closer to the middle of the square. "Are those Rage Candy Bars?"

The somewhat-startled stall owner nodded, a little jerkily. "I, well – yeah, that's right..."

"Would I be able to buy some?" Lugia added. "I'd like to try one, and to get something to bring my family as a memento for the day."

"Of course!" the stallholder agreed. "I, well – you don't need to pay, really..."

"I insist, please," Lugia said. "It wouldn't be polite of me at all. Imagine how I would feel having to tell my son that I didn't have to pay for his treat!"

There was a wave of laughter, and everyone relaxed a little – Lugia's words making him much more relateable.


"All right, so – the rules are pretty basic," Khoury told Dawn, a minute or two later. "We're battling until knockout, concession, or obvious other defeat – it doesn't have to be too formal, this is basically a friendly."

"Right," Dawn replied. "So… should I tell you what Pokémon I'm using first?"

"You should pick it before I tell you what mine is, but I've already picked mine," Khoury replied. "So you can go ahead and say."

Dawn held up a Pokéball. "Well, I was thinking I should use my Togekiss."

"That sounds fine," Khoury smiled. "Okay, whenever you're ready."

Dawn sent out her Fairy-type, and Khoury released his own Pokémon onto the battlefield – an Octillery, which attached limpetlike to the stage before swivelling a little to face Dawn's hovering Pokémon.

"All right, go ahead and start," Khoury's dad called. "Whenever you feel like it."

"Bubblebeam!" Khoury called, pointing up at Togekiss.

Dawn's Pokémon did a roll, air swirling around her wings, and the swirls developed sparkles as they transitioned into Fairy Wind – which produced a quick Counter Shield, blocking the attack so it didn't reach her and producing a sequence of little sparkling impacts.

The repeated blows quickly ate through the shield's substance, and Togekiss continued rolling – spreading the attack out, so it didn't have enough time to break through any one part of the shield before the next part rotated into position and prevented it.

Hidden inside the fairy-dust cloud, Togekiss rolled faster – then abruptly stopped, flapping her wings and launching the cloud towards Octillery with a whoosh.

Octillery switched attacks, using Gunk Shot instead, and detonated it in the way of the onrushing wind. It dispelled most of the energy of the Fairy-type attack, and Khoury nodded.

"Great work! Now try an Ice attack!"

Octillery shot an Aurora Beam up at Togekiss, who took a glancing blow to the wing before managing to dodge, and Dawn frowned for a moment.

"Magical Leaf!" she instructed, prompting Togekiss to furl her wings before spreading them out again – sending out a barrage of leaves glowing with all the colours of the rainbow. Octillery tilted his body to keep her as the target of the Ice attack, then shifted his focus to the leaves instead as they got closer – each leaf freezing one by one and disintegrating into fragments.

By the time they stopped, the last leaf frozen and shattered, Togekiss was already preparing another attack – this one sending sparking patterns of electricity along the leading edges of her wings, as she charged and then fired a Shock Wave attack.

"Charge Beam!" Khoury called.

Octillery's Charge Beam flashed out, disrupting the Shock Wave, and continued on to hit Togekiss on the wing. Lightning crackled around her a little, and Dawn raised her voice. "Misty sky!"

Togekiss accelerated a little before pulling up, shedding the speed she'd just gained to make Octillery's next attack miss, then built up the energy for a Fairy Wind and rolled. Unlike the first time she'd combined the manoeuvre and the attack, however, it produced a diffuse cloud of pink and blue sparkles which quickly spread to cover the entire arena.

Togekiss was still sort of visible, from the outside at least, as a moving source of the swirling Fairy Wind which wasn't strong enough to do damage but which was making it very hard to see where anything or anyone actually was inside it.

"Flash Cannon!" Khoury said.

Octillery began shooting Flash Cannon shots into the air, each individual pulse of energy powerful enough to do damage, but with essentially no way of hitting the high-flying Togekiss except by getting very lucky.

"Okay, this isn't working," Khoury decided, after a minute or so. "We can't see what's going on, so..."

He paused. "I… can you see that too?"

The air began to move, individual sparkles drifting with purpose – then speeding up, until everything was swirling about as part of an airflow pattern. The mist began to lift, rising rapidly into the air and becoming brighter and more compressed as it was, until everything was contained in a glittering pink-and-blue-and-gold aura around Togekiss as she pulled up in a high-speed climb.

Without waiting for instructions, Octillery began firing Octazooka at the Flying-type as she crested and dropped back down. Her heavily modified Sky Attack acted like armour, protecting her from the attacks much more effectively than the weaker Fairy Wind from before, and seconds before impact Togekiss pulled up to let the energy aura smash into the ground next to Octillery without her.

The blast knocked Khoury's Pokémon backwards, overcoming the suction of his tentacles to the stage, and he bounced once before landing upside down outside the arena.

"Nice!" Khoury called. "I think I'll call that a win!"

He shook Dawn's hand. "And I'm kind of scared of what else your Togekiss would do if I didn't..."


"This feels kind of strange," Quilava said quietly, inspecting the egg Dawn had just won. "It's as if I'm seeing an alternate version of myself, except… very not."

"Oh, of course, we picked you up here, right?" Ambipom checked. "We've gone past my foreknowledge now."

"Yes, that's correct," Quilava nodded. "I remember being quite apprehensive about just who my new trainer would be… you never truly know. But Dawn's great, of course."


"So… Togepi is a Johto Pokémon," Brock said, looking through the notes Khoury's father had put together.

"Well, that's what the Breeders' Association says about them," the older man replied. "I'll be the first to admit it doesn't make sense, especially after-"

"They list Rayquaza as a Hoenn Pokémon," Lucario interrupted, reading a different section. "There's only one, and if I had to write down his place of residence it would be 'the sky'."

"I don't begin to understand the rules," Khoury's dad reiterated. "I just didn't think about it much until now."

"I do quite like that Togetic is a Johto Pokémon, but Togekiss is a Sinnoh Pokémon," Brock chuckled. "And… why is Sylveon a Kalos Pokémon?"

"Perhaps because it's all frilly? I know they like fashion in Kalos," Lucario suggested.

"Isn't that stereotyping based off Furfrou?" Pikachu asked.

"You haven't seen the wardrobe Gary had to buy to store all the clothes he got in Kalos."


"So, how do you want to do this?" Lugia asked.

"Well… first, you should probably put your bag away," Ho-Oh pointed out.

Lugia nodded, using his telekinesis to undo the strap of the bag around his neck and float it down to their trainer. "Done. But apart from that?"

"Well… it is an exhibition battle, but it wouldn't be a good idea to give everything away," Ho-Oh noted. "Perhaps we should do it as a demonstration of our attacks, and have an agreement to just defend while it's not our turn?"

"That sounds quite restrictive," Lugia said. "But I suppose it should be interesting. Who goes first?"

As he spoke, they both climbed higher into the air – almost hovering, except that they were rising with each wingbeat until Lugia was at least a hundred feet over the town square and Ho-Oh about eighty over the town hall.

"You go first," Ho-Oh invited.

Lugia nodded, and began to glow with a misty white light. It took only a few seconds to build up, and he inhaled – sucking in air while compressing it at his muzzle, not letting it out and just building it up more and more.

"Just so you remember, there are mountains behind me," Ho-Oh said. "If that's a full-power Aeroblast, it's going to cause backstop issues."

Lugia replied by firing – launching out what was not an Aeroblast, but which was distinctly similar. The attack was much less focused than even a lower-power Aeroblast was, and simply appeared as a kind of cone of shocked air spreading out towards Ho-Oh – not just a single pressure wave, but replete with cross-currents and shear waves to make it chaotic and destructive.

The attack hit Ho-Oh a little left of centre, and knocked him backwards in the sky – one of the currents hitting his left wing hard enough to spin him about in a half-circle. He lit entirely on fire, burning away the damage and letting his Ability return him to full health, then swept back up to his hovering position from before.

"Most impressive," he allowed, as curls and coils of smoke and steam rose from his feathers before dissipating – leaving him unharmed.

He inhaled, then, and let out a massive blast of Sacred Fire – a stream of seething rose flame, grouping into a bubble before taking wing and launching itself out towards Lugia. The flame-phoenix screeched, then rose up in a high turn to fling itself down on the Great Guardian – and crashed against a powerful psychic shield, enveloping it in flame before reluctantly dripping off and becoming wisps of oily smoke.

As the temperature rose, Lugia furled his wings. His shield dissipated, and he instead began to spin up a Twister – a seething tornado of Dragon-type energy carried along with the water whirling around him – and charged towards Ho-Oh.

Heat flashed out from the contact point as Ho-Oh shielded himself with an aura of reddish flame. The Twister waterspout flashed into steam, rising in great drifts of mist, and as Lugia backed away he looked up – noticing the clouds starting to form.

"Are you altering the weather?" he asked.

"Not with a move, yet," Ho-Oh replied.

He spread his wings and used Weather Ball – bringing the remaining unevaporated Twister water together, along with the fizzing Dragon-type energy that had been shed by the tornado – then fired it at Lugia, smashing it into the Psychic-type's shields with a multicoloured flash and a bang.


"It's kind of hard to believe they're not fighting seriously," Lyra said, staring upwards as it began to rain – and as the rain ran off a psychic umbrella projected by Mewtwo, letting them still watch the entire conflict.

"If they were fighting seriously they'd be flying all over the place," Ash replied. "And using moves without taking turns."

Lyra half-raised a hand, then lowered it. "Wow, uh… did Ho-Oh just use an ice attack? He's a Fire-type!"

"I'm a Fighting type and I can use Ghost type attacks," Lucario supplied. "Raikou's an Electric-type and he uses Wood Hammer. Somehow."

Lugia used Thunder, dropping a bolt of lightning from the clouds to smash into Ho-Oh. The moment of impact was visible, but then the Fire-type was obscured by an intense wash of flame as he regenerated the damage… then used Weather Ball again, shooting a ball of water right back at Lugia.

The water hit Lugia's shield and splashed off, but it distorted the shield as well – and revealed itself to contain a core of electrical energy, which stabbed through the weakened part of the shield and hit Lugia along the flank.

"Ouch," Brock winced. "That looks like it hurt. Wonder what Lugia's going to do now?"

There was a creak, and Lugia formed a ball of rock in his beak. It glowed red, and so did Lugia as he unleashed an Ancient Power attack which hit Ho-Oh in the breast.

"I don't think this style of battling is going to catch on with them," Ash noted. "I know Ho-Oh can heal, but that still looks painful..."


"No, it's not another Ketchum Incident," Cynthia said into the phone. "It's a festival. That's an exhibition battle."

She waited, then went on. "How do I know? Well, Lugia told me ahead of time exactly what was going to happen. I know it looks big, loud and disruptive, but that's how it's… yes, I know… well, next time I see him I'll let him know."

Ringing off, Cynthia shook her head. "It's not even a big battle, except that it involves two Legendary Pokémon."

Her Spiritomb muttered something with a hundred and eight voices.

"I might be getting too used to this, yeah."


Thank you all for coming, Lugia projected, using his mental voice only. I'm glad to have participated in the festival, and I hope you all had fun as well.

"Are you okay?" a young girl asked, looking at his torso. "You've got sticking plasters on you."

It's just a few scratches, thanks, Lugia assured her. My trainer's Meganium did a good job of healing me up after the battle, and I could have gone to a Pokémon Centre anyway – I just wanted to say goodbye.

Ho-Oh voiced an opinion.

Ho-Oh says he enjoyed it as well, Lugia translated, then smirked. And says that I won.

The Storm's End squawked in indignation, then fluffed his feathers in a huff.

Okay, maybe I was just joking, Lugia went on. It was funny, though, right?


AN:


And two festivals. They were close together, so I went with one long chapter.