As it turned out, the Mossdeep Gym was distinctly unusual.

Not in having two Gym Leaders… in having two Gym Leaders who challenged Ash at the same time.

"It's our focus as gym leaders!" Tate said. "It's about cooperation!"

"And about teamwork!" Liza agreed.

Max raised a hand, hesitantly. "Isn't that the same thing?"

"Well spotted," Tate smiled. "Now, Ash – our challenge for you is that the Pokémon you use must have a connection. We'll be using Pokémon from the same evolutionary family!"

Brock frowned. "That seems a bit restrictive."

"I don't know…" May mused. "I think it depends on how that's defined. There's a lot of possible connections it could be."

"Good!" Tate told her. "But it's up to Ash. What Pokémon will you use?"

"Well…" Ash began, frowning. "I can't use Latias and Latios, they have the same Pokéball. Same for Suicune, Entei and Raikou… but I guess I could use Dratini and Dragonair! That would work, right?"

Tate and Liza exchanged a grin.

"That sounds good to us!" they said, simultaneously.

"Hey, before this begins," Pikachu said, raising his paw. "Would sharing the same Type work? Or does it have to be a bit more involved than that."

"A type isn't really a theme, per se," Tate replied. "You'd have to make a good case for there to be a thematic connection."

"Also, thank you, Brock's Vulpix," Liza added. "Very smooth. We barely noticed."

"Ooh, appreciation!" Vulpix said, preening. "And I didn't even have to pointedly ask this time."

"Now, because it is a battle with Ash Ketchum, we're using the outdoors arena…" Liza said.

"Do you have to halt gym battles while rockets are being launched?" Shroomish asked, almost falling over as she leaned back to look up at the sky. "They must be really loud to get all the way up there!"

"They're loud, but they're a long way away," Tate told her. "So we usually don't have to… our father works there and we've done training in zero-gravity battling, though that's not going to happen today."

Liza held up a Pokéball, and her twin did the same.

"Go!" they announced in unison, sending out a Gardevoir and a Gallade.

"Let's do this, Gallade!" Liza added, fitting a Key Stone pin to her tie.

"You too, Gardevoir!" Tate said.

"Huh," Pikachu mused, glancing to his side at Marshadow – who was clambering out of Ash's shadow. "You'd sort of expect the girl to have the Gardevoir… um, what are you doing?"

Marshadow reached back inside Ash's shadow, and pulled out a bag of crisps.

"Want some?" he asked. "They're cheese and onion."

Pikachu thought about his possible responses to this situation.

"Sure," he said.

Marshadow tore open the top of the bag and held it out for Pikachu, and as he did Ash sent out Dratini and Dragonair.

"Okay, remember, Dragonair, you're the one who can fly!" Ash said. "And Dragon moves won't work on Gardevoir!"

"Let's go!" the twins called, and both their Pokémon mega-evolved at once.

"Aura Sphere!" Liza ordered.

"Hyper Voice!" Tate added.

"Twister shield!" Ash called, and both his Dragon-types whirled up a Twister at once. It blocked the Aura Sphere, fell apart against the Pixilated Hyper Voice, but there'd been a Hydro Pump underneath which dampened and absorbed most of the force from the Hyper Voice.

Then Mega Gallade teleported into the air and used Ice Punch, hitting Dratini hard enough to blast him into the ground with a crash despite Dragonair flicking the Twister shield around.

"I'm okay!" Dratini called, then sprang back out of cover from the shield with his glowing tail aimed at Mega Gardevoir. "Bullet Punch!"

Dragonair swirled the Twister shield at the same time, launching most of the tornado at Mega Gallade, and the Fighting-type used Psycho Cut twice to slice it into halves and then quarters. All four fragments fell back down, then – as Dratini was slammed back past Dragonair – the larger Dragon-type re-caught them in a Twister and hurled them at Mega Gardevoir instead.

The Twister might not have affected her, but the water still did.

"Refresh the shield!" Ash called, as Dratini used Twister to get himself up out of the crater he'd ended up in. The smaller Dragon used Hydro Pump as well, then Ice Punch, and this time the water was near-freezing and Mega Gardevoir's Dazzling Gleam made it freeze into solid ice.

"Extremespeed, Dragonair!" Ash said.

Dragonair turned and hit Mega Gallade, bouncing off to go after Mega Gardevoir, then both of them hit him with a Fairy Wind at once and he vanished in a sparkling explosion.

"Still okay?" Ash called, into the cloud, then a Whirlwind and Twister swept it away.

"I'm here!" Dragonair called, and Dratini came up beside him as they combined their efforts into a Twister.

Fifteen minutes later, both Mega Gardevoir and Mega Gallade were panting.

"Keep it up!" Tate implored Mega Gardevoir. "I know they keep taking your best hits and coming back for more, but they can't go on forever! Stored Power!"

The Fairy-type raised her arm and fired a blast of psychic energy, knocking Dratini into Dragonair, and a swirl of Twister rose up to hide them both.

"Now!" Liza added, and Mega Gallade charged in. His blade flared up as he ran in and lashed out with a Poison Jab, only for the Twister to burst aside and reveal not Dratini and Dragonair but Dragonite and Dragonite.

"All right!" Ash called. "Dragonite, use Hydro Pump! Dragonite, focus on Gardevoir with Bullet Punch!"

Brock shook his head. "The sad thing is, this isn't even a record for the amount of Pseudo Legendaries who-"

A Dratini appeared on the field.

"Aww…" she sighed. "Was I too late?"

The battling stopped.

"Dratini," Dragonite began.

"Ring ring, ring ring," Ibid announced, into the silence. "Phone call."

"Huh?" Ash asked, taking out his Pokédex. "What's up?"

Ibid changed into a miniature version of Professor Oak.

"Ash, there you are," he said. "Do you have any idea why there is a pile of two dozen unconscious Dragonite on my lawn?"

Dunsparce fell out of her Pokéball, started giggling, and didn't stop for several minutes.

"Okay, so… please let me make sure I've got this straight," Tate requested. "Your… Dunsparce? Or possibly your Mew?"

"I don't know which did it," Ash supplied. "Or if they're the same Pokémon, because once a Pokémon knows Transform you lose track pretty quickly and it seems rude to ask – Suicune taught me about how rude it can be to ask how someone started out, what matters is what they say they are… anyway, yeah. So one of them taught the whole Ryuunited Kingdom what might be Teleport or might be Ally Switch, or maybe Baton Pass?"

He waved at the embarrassed-looking Dragonites and Dratini standing (or lying) by the side of the battlefield. "And, uh… I guess they were kind of eager to evolve? All of them? So all of them except Dratini and King Dragonite cycled through the battle whenever you couldn't see someone."

Ash scratched the back of his neck. "I… think they were probably sandbagging a bit too, to make the fight go on longer. So I don't know what that means."

Liza touched her right temple with her forefinger and middle finger. "This has got to be something unique. Those sessions on competitive battling rules didn't even cover this."

"Am I going to get a chance to have a proper challenge battle?" Ash asked. "I'm willing to start again tomorrow if Gardevoir and Gallade need a rest…"

Ash didn't need to wait until tomorrow, because Tate and Liza had another pair of Pokémon that were ready for a challenge battle.

There was a bit of a delay as Ash shuffled Pokémon around so he had the right ones ready, but then the twin Mossdeep Gym Leaders were ready for another battle and so was Ash.

"All right, here we go again," Liza said. "Just two Pokémon this time, I hope?"

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure of that," Ash agreed. "This time it's two Pokémon I made friends with before I met my starter Pokémon!"

"That's a nice group," Liza told him.

Tate sent out a Solrock, and Liza sent out a Lunatone.

"Interesting," Max said. "Those Pokémon are associated but they're not part of an evolutionary group."

He looked at Brock. "Why are you sniggering?"

Ash sent out his Pokémon… Silver and Zapdos.

"I actually think Pikachu might have been the first non legendary Pokémon Ash ever met," Brock said.

Tate and Liza exchanged a glance that said a lot.

"...at least we've got type advantage," Liza said. "That's not nothing."

Tate shook his head.

"Begin!" he called. "Trick Room!"

"Water shield!" Ash called. "Spread it out, Silver!"

Silver used Hydro Pump and Extrasensory, catching the water he was firing and whipping it up into a wide, swirling shield. It wasn't a solid blob of water that would soak up attacks, but instead it had speed and momentum – it was as much attack as defence – and Solrock and Lunatone began using Calm Mind as they prepared to break through it.

The whole battle had an odd, unreal quality to it, as the two Legendary Pokémon moved significantly slower than Solrock and Lunatone did – looking like Silver and Zapdos were caught in glue, while the two Rock-types were zipping around at accelerated speed.

"Add in Cosmic Power!" Liza called. "Then… now! Lunatone, Gravity!"

"Earth Power!" Tate added.

"Attack with the shield!" Ash called. "Zapdos, Needle Arm!"

Zapdos' wings hammered the air as Lunatone's Gravity pulled her lower, and the shield vanished as Silver sent the whole thing at Lunatone – nearly knocking that Meteorite Pokémon out of the air. The other Meteorite Pokémon took a smack from Zapdos' wing with Needle Arm, cancelling the Earth Power just before Zapdos crashed into the ground.

"Replenish it!" Ash said. "Zapdos, Drill Run!"

Zapdos shook herself out after the crash, then jumped and dove into the ground with a grinding sound.

"That did not look like it should work," Liza complained, then paled. "Wait – Lunatone, cancel the Gravity-"

The Electric-type burst out of the ground again just as Lunatone cancelled their Gravity, but the impact was still enough to knock Solrock into the air.

"Electrify the shield!" Ash ordered. "Silver, Aeroburst!"

"Well, at least the second time went better than the first," May said. "And you've got your seventh badge, Ash!"

"Yeah, I'm glad they let me have a rematch," Ash admitted. "And I do understand that Dratini and Dragonair were feeling impatient to evolve… and they couldn't really have done that that way and have it be a legal Gym Battle… but it's still rude."

He glanced at Brock. "Do you think I was too hard on them, though?"

Brock shook his head. "No, I don't. I think it's good you understand why they felt like they did, but you weren't too hard on them."

Ash nodded, glad for the reassurance.

"So, we're heading to Sootopolis next, right?" Max checked, as they reached the docks. "Straight away, or…"

"We can probably take a few days to get there at least," Ash said. "I'd like to get some training in, and we've got plenty of time before the Conference… I assume?"

"Yeah, no rush," Brock confirmed. "I'm interested what the Sootopolis Gym will be like, though. You might enjoy it too, May – both the last two Gym Leaders are real Coordinator stars."

"That's right," someone said.

A grizzled-looking sea captain clambered down from the ship they were walking next to. "Wallace used to be the Champion of the Hoenn League," he told them. "Really good at his job. But then Steven came along and beat all of us, and decided to take the Champion spot."

"Oh, you're Drake!" Ash said. "It's nice to meet you… you're the Dragon type trainer for the Hoenn Elite Four, right?"

"That's me," Drake agreed. "And I've heard about you as well, Ash Ketchum."

He put his hands on his hips. "I've just got one question to ask you."

"Sure!" Ash replied.

"Have you found a Mega Stone for Flygon?" Drake said. "It feels like there should be one."

"Uh… no, actually," Ash said. "Not last time I checked what was in my collection. Diancie might be able to do you a custom job, though…"

He snapped his fingers. "I do have Latias and Rayquaza with me, though. I feel like I should mention Rayquaza because Lance was quite annoyed I didn't mention her to him."

"You caught Rayquaza?" Drake repeated. "Rayquaza's male, though."

"No, that's Big Rayquaza," Rayquaza said, nosing out of Ash's jacket. "I'm Little Rayquaza, or Shiny Rayquaza. Or Ash's Rayquaza."

She waved. "It's nice to meet you."

"Oh, isn't she lovely!" Drake beamed. "That's what I like in Dragon types… elegance and power at the same time. How many other Dragons do you have? Any more from Hoenn?"

"No, none from Hoenn," Ash replied. "I've got, um… Latias and Latios, and Charizard's sometimes a dragon, and Zygarde's Dragon-type but I'm mostly mentioning them for completeness because they're not actually one of my Pokémon."

"Woof," Zygarde said, offering a paw, and Drake shook it.

"And twenty-seven Dragonite and one Dratini," Ash finished. "But all of them except one Dragonite are in time-out at the moment."

Drake blinked a few times.

"Twenty-seven?" he asked. "I… actually think that might be a record for the trainer with the most pseudo-legendary Pokémon. They're supposed to be rare, lad, but I can't really find it in myself to be annoyed…"

"Hmm…" Misty said, pausing halfway through raising her Pokéball. "I just had a weird feeling…"

"What do you mean?" Paul said. "A feeling? We're supposed to be having a battle."

"No, just…" Misty waved her hand. "A feeling that a friend of mine said something about Pidgey being rare."

She shrugged. "Anyway. Where were we?"

"I was challenging you for the Cascade Badge," Paul reminded her. "You said it was three Pokémon each. I'm ready to begin."

"Right," Misty said, nodding. "Okay – send out your first Pokémon!"

Paul sent out a Parasect, and Misty opted to send out her Politoed.

There was a cracka-thoom, and it began to rain inside the gym.

Paul smirked slightly. "Predictable. You're only helping Parasect."

"Begin, already!" Daisy shouted.

"Giga Drain," Paul rapped out.

"Bounce!" Misty replied, sending Politoed bounding into the air. "Now – Ice Punch dive!"

"Cross Poison," Paul ordered.

Parasect's pincers swiped out, but didn't actually hit Politoed – instead, the Water-type had hit the pool with an Ice Punch, vanishing beneath it at the same moment, and the icy power of his punch turned the whole of the pool into a lid.

"Break the ice," Paul commanded. "Seed Bomb."

Misty clapped her hands three times. "Punch!" she called.

Politoed broke back out of the ice, slid along the surface, then hit Parasect with a Fire Punch.

Paul blinked as his Parasect fainted.

"...Politoed can't learn that move," he protested. "Can't they?"

"Clearly mine can," Misty answered. "Also, he used Belly Drum."

"But how can a Politoed know Fire Punch?" Paul frowned.

"Yeah, don't even try asking those questions!" Daisy shouted. "Misty either doesn't know what you're on about or she starts blaming some Ash kid."

In Pallet Town, Professor Oak looked up from his computer.

"How does this sound?" he asked. "Community behaviour in large Dratini-line populations, part seven. Section one, a study on how the Ryuunited Kingdom has read parts one to six in this sequence and are taking suggestions; section two, premedtiated mass evolution; section three, a statistical analysis of the differences caused in Dragonite dietary preferences when twenty-six of them evolve on the same day. Section four, Dragonite photobomb album."

Tracey considered it.

"Bit wordy for a title, isn't it?" he asked.

"Most of that is the subtitle," Professor Oak corrected. "And after getting all that information about their food orders, I needed to do something with it…"

AN:

The Dratini and Dragonair got impatient.

So now Ash has 27 Dragonite and a Dratini.

Lance presumably doesn't know yet.