"Just think, back when we were in the Orange Islands the best way we had of getting around was by blimp or Lapras," Ash said.
"I wasn't in the Orange Islands," Zacian pointed out, drifting slightly to the left to keep formation on the other Pokémon carrying the friends.
"Nor was I, for the first half of it," Silver added. "I was for the second half, though, and that was fun!"
"I wasn't with you for most of the Orange Islands, Ash," Brock reminded him gently, from where Articuno was carrying him. "And Articuno joined at the start of Johto."
"Oh, yeah, right," Ash said, then blinked. "...wait, is Pikachu the only person here who was with me in the Orange Islands? Huh…"
"Yes," Cranidos said straight-away.
He wasn't riding with Ash or Brock, or with Max – who was being carried by Silver, as the youngest Legendary in the formation.
He wasn't even travelling with May, who was riding Latias south.
Instead, Cranidos was serenely floating alongside the rest of them.
"How are you doing that, anyway?" Max asked.
"Fly," Cranidos replied. "I'm a bird hipped dinosaur. That counts."
He vaguely waved his tail a bit. "See? Propulsion!"
"It's more work than I have to do to fly," Latias squeaked. "Makes sense to me."
Max took off his glasses with one hand, rubbed his temples with the other, then put them back on.
Dewford was a seaside town, in a very literal sense. The town was so close to the water that it was built almost right up to the sea wall, and the beach was only a couple of minutes walk from the Pokémon Centre.
The Gym was even closer to the shore, sitting snugly on a cliff edge… and, unfortunately, currently did not contain a Gym Leader.
"This is the second time that's happened here in Hoenn," Ash said. "Kind of reminds me of Kanto."
"Hey," Brock protested. "I'm a Kanto Gym Leader."
"Yes, I can see you're in your gym right now," Pikachu pointed out.
Brock winced. "Okay, that was super effective… so, what should we do now?"
"Well, what about training?" Ash asked. "There's probably a Contest hall here, right? What about if we make it a goal to have May do her first Contest here before I do my Gym Battle?"
May blinked. "...that's kind of a lot of pressure…" she admitted.
Ash frowned a little, thinking about that. "I guess, but… the way I'm thinking about it, you don't have to win a Contest. I just think it'd be neat if you gave one a go, really, so you see what they're like."
He tapped his foot. "Plus, we could explore Dewford while we do it. I've never been here before, after all!"
May had to give it a bit of thought, and so they spent the next day relaxing on the beach.
Zygarde pronounced themselves fully approving of the sunny climate, spending most of the day lounging in the sun and the rest splashing around in the surf with Mightyena, Eevee and Suicune, while May ended up swimming out with Azurill in the middle of the afternoon to try a bit of body-boarding.
It did help her willingness to take part that Ash's Dragonite was hovering placidly overhead, wearing a large T-shirt announcing him to be a Lifeguard By Royal Appointment, but it wasn't the sort of thing that would have been dangerous anyway.
Max, for his part, built a sandcastle with the help of Shroomish, Zorua and Cranidos, and occasionally Marshadow.
"How come you aren't with Ash, anyway?" Max asked, as the Ghost-type passed him another bucket. "Isn't that your job?"
Marshadow replied by writing in the sand with the end of a stick.
I am intended to guide the Rainbow Hero. Not, necessarily, fall off a surfboard with him.
"I guess that makes sense," Max agreed, glancing over to where Brock and Vulpix were – apparently, Bulbasaur was preventing his trainer from another attempt at flirting, and Vulpix was giggling to herself, and they were a little too far away for proper translation.
"Hey, I had an idea," Zorua said. "Once we finish this, let's destroy it! Only, um, only Tackle attacks or other ones like that."
"That could be kind of fun," Max said, thinking about it.
"Ooh, that looks fun!" Zorua added, pointing out to sea. "Look!"
Max looked, and saw that Ash was managing to stand up – albeit in a slightly wobbly way – only to fall off his board with a crash, and Suicune went loping across the top of the water to check on her trainer.
He bobbed back to the surface a few seconds later, but then Pikachu came into view.
Pikachu's surfboard was smaller than Ash's was, certainly, but the little Electric-type was handling it much better than Ash had been. He slid back and forth along the top of the wave, did a kick-flip that spun the board around before he landed on it again, and when the wave broke Pikachu rode it all the way in to shore.
"I guess Pikachu's discovered a natural talent!" Zorua grinned.
"How are you doing, Azurill?" May asked, about mid-morning the next day.
"Getting kind of tired," the Fairy-type admitted. "My cheeks are aching a bit."
"Then let's give you a rest," May decided. "You're getting better at making the water sparkle, though! That's great!"
She turned to Torchic. "Think you're rested?"
Torchic nodded, his expression determined. "Let's try and get this working."
He hopped onto May's arm, and Quilava perked up from where he'd been snoozing.
"Okay, so here's the refresher," he said. "Firstly, the flames from an Ember are a bit heavy, so they move according to gravity, but you can control a lot of where they end up based on your momentum and how hard you shoot them out."
He shifted a bit. "And, secondly, remember that when you spin you come back to where you started every so often – it's more often the faster you spin."
"Got that, Torchic?" May asked.
Torchic took a deep breath, nodded, and May tossed him into the air. He used Fly, flapping his little wings hard, then dove down and shot a flame before landing with a roll.
The roll didn't go quite where he'd intended it, which had a detrimental impact on how good it looked.
"The forward roll is good, but you were a bit off to the right I think?" May volunteered. "Good start for this session, though!"
She looked up at Brock. "Do you think it's better to work on a routine starting at the start, or build the bits and then connect them up?"
"Usually I think the second one," Brock said. "But if one part needs setup, then you can need to keep that in mind… when Eevee is making her doubles dance, obviously she needs them to have been made first!"
"Hmm…" Ash said, thinking. "Maybe, uh, hydrokinesis somehow? Extrasensory can cover that, right? Then you could be walking on water, it's just that the water is floating?"
"It could work, I have to admit," Suicune replied. "Though it would also be fiddly, and I might not be able to keep it up for a long time."
"That's okay, for long term stuff running is fine," Ash told her. "Or I think so, anyway…"
Someone interrupted them. "Are you Ash Ketchum?"
Ash looked around, and saw a young man approaching with a smile on his face.
"Steven Stone," he introduced himself. "I think you've met my father… I'm glad I ran into you, though, because I've heard a lot about your Phanpy. Do you have her available?"
"She's at Oak Ranch today, but I can get her," Ash replied.
Steven smiled. "That would be wonderful… I've heard a lot about her talents in finding Mega Stones. You could say I'm a fan, I suppose."
He waved his hand. "Oh, and also you won the Silver Conference and nearly beat Lance, but that's sort of secondary."
"...they look really shiny, I guess?" Phanpy said, shrugging her ears, as they walked along the path towards Granite Cave. "There's a lot more around than people seem to think, I think… I just notice them."
"Fascinating," Steven said, writing that down in a notebook. "Did you find the Dragoniteite that Lance used?"
Ash winced. "Uh… Lance said he didn't think the name Dragoniteite was very sensible? It makes sense to me but he didn't like it."
"That's Lance's problem," Steven shrugged. "We have naming conventions for a reason, it wouldn't be right to just say that a Meganium using a Meganiumite wasn't a Mega Meganium just because it means the word Mega is in there twice. Otherwise we'd have to come up with a different naming convention, and once we've done that it might end up having results people don't like either. Like a Giga Gigalith, or for that matter Meganiumnium."
Brock laughed, tickling Vulpix under the chin as they rounded a bend. "Meganium's a tricky name to work with, then?"
"I tend to think so," Steven replied.
Phanpy had been waiting patiently during the conversational diversion, then spoke up again. "Yeah, I found it back at Professor Oak's ranch! It was all shiny, and I gave it to the Parliament because it looked a lot like one of the beads on Dragonair's tail!"
"If we do enough research, we might actually find out where Mega stones come from," Steven told her. "So thank you, any information is useful."
"I actually think I know who that is," Ash frowned. "I kind of need to check, though."
He held up his Safari Ball and opened it, and it turned out to still be Suicune. "Uh… so I kind of got the idea from Mew that Mega Stones come from Diancie, because they're gemstones?"
"That is correct," Suicune agreed, stepping to the side slightly to allow her trainer and his friends through before walking beside them on the path. "Diancie is capable of Mega Evolution herself, but in addition she is directly associated with gemstones – diamonds, especially."
"That is fascinating," Steven said, taking more notes. "So Mega Stones are like diamonds?"
"They are Adamant," Suicune answered, half-correction and half-confirmation. "Like diamonds, but not actually diamonds. Their formation involves the condensation and compression of ambient energy, and their attunement to a particular Pokémon is something I am afraid that I do not understand myself."
Steven held up a hand as they crossed a river, and Suicune splashed across the water itself – her paws turning the river a sparkling clear blue. "This is all extremely helpful, Suicune, don't apologize for not providing more."
"Ahem!"
They all looked around, to see a Corphish standing by the side of the river.
"Rude," the Water-type declared. "You don't see me coming to your home and making it messy, so don't come to mine and clean up! Some people…"
Suicune looked down at her paws, as the muttering Corphish returned to the river.
"...perhaps I should have used the bridge."
The next few days, in the heart of the island, were mostly peaceful ones.
Outwardly peaceful, at least, which didn't include the disruption caused by training… though that, at least, was going well.
Torchic's aim with his airborne Ember was improving, and he began kicking it up on landing as well – relying on his own Fire typing to protect him from the flames as he brushed it around or even wore it, which looked neat. And – at Max's suggestion – Azurill had started training up against Mightyena, the big Dark-type chasing Azurill around as she laughed and practised dancing out of the way under May's orders.
Wurmple was mostly just working on accuracy, because it'd be a big help when he evolved no matter what he evolved into.
Also, Brock caught a Mudkip… or, more accurately, Bulbasaur recruited a Mudkip.
"Look at it this way," the Poison-type said. "Maybe if we douse him with enough cold showers, he'll get the message… you know, like a spray bottle thing."
"That's cold, man," Geodude said.
"Yes, that's the point," Bulbasaur agreed, as Brock tried to quietly lament about his future of getting repeatedly soaked.
AN:
Steven Stone has his priorities straight.