In a Pokémon Center the next day, someone waved to them.

"Excuse me?" said the waver. "My name's Robert, uh… would it be all right if I took photos of your Pokémon? I've never seen one like that in person before."

"Keldeo's not mine," Ash clarified. "He's not anyone's, really. Unless you mean Zygarde?"

"I actually meant Pikachu," Robert replied. "My hobby is taking photos of as many Pokémon as possible."

Pikachu paused.

"I had forgotten that Pikachu are apparently rare in Unova," he admitted. "Do I mean rare or not found at all?"

"I think it's anyone's guess," Lokoko said.

"You know what, if you want to take photos of as many Pokémon as possible, just ask Ash for a look at his full team," Iris suggested. "Just be prepared for a lot of Dragonite photos, and keep an eye out in case one of the illusionists fakes being something."

Three hours later, Robert sighed thankfully.

"This was such a good day," he said. "I didn't think it would ever be possible to get some of those Pokémon in my album."

He paused. "Come to think of it, I didn't know at least one of those Pokémon even existed."

"Oh?" Ash asked. "Which one?"

"The ice cream Zorua," Robert replied. "Though I also wasn't quite sure about the one your phone turned into."

"Would it help if I said Arceus a lot?" Arc checked. "I know that it is somewhat rare that people get a good look at what the Creator of the Universe looks like, but I would hope people had heard of xem."

Robert blinked. "...what was that last word?"

"Xem," Arceus repeated. "It is a pronoun equating to him or her but referring to one whose gender is Everything And Nothing At Once Simultaneously."

The photographer took that in.

"Well, I'll make sure to remember that," he decided. "Anyway… while I'm really grateful for the chance to get so many Legendary Pokémon, and non-Unovan Pokémon into my album, there's actually something else I was wondering about… it's a photo my grandfather took around here."

Robert opened his backpack, then stopped.

"Oh, um…" he began. "I think I made a mistake, the photo's in here but I buried it under all the new ones I took, hold on. I'll recognize it when I see it."

He began rummaging around, efficiently flicking through the photos and putting them to the side, and Mew floated down with interest.

"I like that one," he said, flicking one of the Mew photos into the air. "I should use that one for my next Pokémon card!"

"You're involved with the people who make Pokémon cards?" Iris guessed. "You do seem like the kind of Pokémon who'd do that."

"I'm actually on about half the Pokémon cards ever printed!" Mew announced proudly. "I take candid photos of myself in all kinds of different shapes… they don't really question it when the photos appear on their servers. But the ones which I pay special attention to are the Mew cards, of course."

"Huh, I don't remember this one," Ash said, picking one out of the pile – which showed a golden ring, and Hoopa behind it throwing up a V-sign and sticking their tongue out.

"I do," Cilan replied. "It was when you were getting hold of Phanpy so she could help the twins do the Mega Latias and Mega Latios pictures."

Mew giggled.

"Aha, here we are!" Robert announced, holding it up. "It's a picture of four Sawsbuck my grandfather took… four Sawsbuck in different seasons, but they're all in the photograph at once!"

"Interesting," Zygarde said. "Conducting climate anomaly scan; alternative possibilities include temporal anomaly and Zoruas."

"That is a good point," Robert confessed. "I suppose it could just be Zoruas. But I want to be sure, and the photo was taken around here somewhere!"

Zygarde didn't find any kind of climate anomaly, so after some thought the friends all decided that the best plan was for Ash to accompany Robert going out to look for the source of the picture.

Ash thought it sounded like fun, Cilan said that it would help out to be able to ask Pokémon what they thought even if Lokoko was on a break, and Iris just said that with Ash along Robert might well end up missing out on the four Sawsbuck but instead getting a picture of the four Creation Dragons.

"There's only three Creation Dragons," Pikachu said.

"Exactly," Iris replied firmly.

"You know, speaking of being on a break…" Lokoko began. "I think I just had an idea. Emolga, don't you know Hidden Power?"

"Yes?" Emolga replied. "What does that have to do with you taking a break?"

"Oh, I just thought I'd see if you were interested in learning something," Lokoko explained. "Plus, I'm curious about whether this will work."

"It's not an attack, right?" Iris checked. "Or, not just an attack? Because I know Emolga doesn't like battling, and that's something we need to respect."

"No, it's not an attack," Lokoko confirmed.

"Good enough for me," Emolga decided. "Now I know what we're doing while Ash and Robert are getting lost in the hills."

"She makes a good point, Ash!" Cilan advised. "You should probably take two Dragonite in case you get too lost… and not the one I'm going to be learning the secret art of biriyani from!"

"There's a secret art of biriyani?" N asked.

"I certainly don't know the sauce he's using for his information," Cilan replied.

"Oh, come on," Emolga groaned.

"I advise commencing the search soon," Zygarde said. "That way we can evade further bad puns."

"A spring?" the Deerling repeated. "Do you mean spring, as in, pink coat and flowers, or as in, a place where water comes out of the ground?"

"Weirdly, both," Robert told the Grass-type, once Ash had translated. "Do you mind having a look at this photograph?"

The Deerling thought, then nodded, and Robert showed her the photo.

"That looks very strange," she frowned. "I didn't know that was even possible."

"Nor did we, actually," Ash said. "Is the place somewhere you recognize?"

"No, but… I think I recognize one of the Sawsbuck," she said. "The winter one. That's my uncle, I recognize the markings on his right side."

"He must be old," Zygarde said. "For a Sawsbuck. The photograph is many decades old."

Deerling giggled. "I'll tell him you said that!"

Ash laughed, then brought Robert up to speed.

"But if you know the Sawsbuck, then… could we go and visit him?" Robert asked. "And ask what happened, at least."

"I guess so… wait, this isn't some kind of trick to catch a Sawsbuck, is it?" Deerling demanded, turning and waving a hoof menacingly at them. "Because it won't work!"

"No way!" Ash replied. "If I wanted to catch a Deerling or Sawsbuck enough that I'd go looking for one instead of seeing if I run into one who likes the idea, I'd ask Mew to help out! And possibly turn into an Absol and see if I can do that thing Lokoko's girlfriend is good at."

Robert blinked. "...how much of that was translation?"

"I see the problem here," Pikachu decided. "We forgot to bring an Ash to Normal translator."

"I could try," Arc offered. "I am Normal typed sometimes."

A dense mist moved in, but Deerling knew where she was going, and they followed her to a copse of trees where there was a family of mixed Deerling and Sawsbuck.

"And that's him!" she said, nodding at a Sawsbuck in Summer Form like the rest of them. "Hey, Uncle! There's some humans with a photo of you!"

"There are?" Sawsbuck replied, interested, and trotted over to have a look as Robert held it out. "Oh, I see, this is the ritual."

"What is the ritual?" Arc requested.

"It's, a little bit complicated actually," Sawsbuck said. "See, four times a year, I go to a clearing in the forest, and there I meet myself. This… involves time, somehow, I'm not clear on the details, but it discharges something to do with time and so it makes sure that as little random time travel happens around Unova as possible."

"And this, ladies and gentlemen, is an episode going off the rails," Sandile announced. "Though, given how often time, space or both get messed around with, I'm not surprised."

He flicked through a booklet. "Oh, looks like there's one around Twist Mountain, but that's about it until Kalos. Good job, Sawsbuck!"

"Where do you even get that booklet?" Zygarde asked.

"What, are you going to complain about spoilers now?" Sandile said. "You are a spoiler."

"Back already?" Iris asked, waving. "You were only gone ten minutes."

"Really?" Robert replied. "Huh. I thought it was at least a day."

"It felt like that to me, too," Ash agreed. "Arc?"

"Checking," Arc said. "Time passed during journey: ten minutes solar time, twenty-seven hours internal clock time, and a potentially infinite positive or negative amount of time according to the rhythms of the universe."

"I guess that happens when you see a time travel thing going on," Ash shrugged. "We got a photo of the same Sawsbuck in all four forms at once."

Iris stood up, interested, and Robert showed her.

"...somehow I was expecting a Sawsbuck with eight antlers," Iris admitted. "That's still neat, though. The same one four times?"

"That's what they said," Pikachu agreed.

Iris blinked.

"Did you just call me a Whiscash?"

"Not knowingly," Pikachu said, confused. "Why? Did it sound like that?"

"My fault," Emolga admitted, waving a paw. "Using Hidden Power to do translation isn't coming on well."

"You've only been working on it ten minutes," Lokoko consoled her.

AN:

It's a lot easier to solve a puzzle like this if you can ask.