Unexpected discovery, raging battle

"Treecko!" Max rushed towards his fallen friend, but the little lizard was already sitting up slowly. The withdrawal of the adrenaline flow which had sustained him had apparently caused the faint.

"You were fantastic Treecko! A new move, and so much power! I'm so proud of you!"

"Treecko!" The pokemon answered, looking pleased with himself.

"Hey, you two, I need help here!" Bonnie called. She and Timmy had been inspecting the crates. As she suspected, they were full with the pokemon that the duo of thieves had pretended to keep for the "immunization treatment". All fast asleep. Bonnie saw Dedenne right away, but as there was nothing she could do for him directly, she forced herself to free the other pokemon first. They were opening the last crate when Officer Jenny arrived.

"What happened here? First I was called for a commotion, then I saw two people in a big truck rush away. Mighty suspicious if you ask me, so I chased them for a while, but my poor motorbike was not up to the task. And now this!"

Quickly, Max and Bonnie told the policewoman what had happened.

"Mincie!" Timmy had just found his little companion. "Oh please, can someone help me wake her up?"

"I'll contact Nurse Joy right away!" Officer Jenny replied. "She'll come here with a potion."

Meanwhile, Max had returned to the other side of the big tent, and was looking at the Wonder-Healing-Machine with curiosity. It had been a very good and very efficient machine, and he wondered how to pokemon thieves had managed such a feat. He turned around the big box, and stopped at the back, where a square panel seemed to promise entry into the machine's secrets.

"The thing is," he told Treecko, who had followed him closely, "I'm no mechanic or scientist, so I probably wouldn't understand how it works even if I opened it. But it's very much a mystery!"

"Tree? Tree-treecko!" The green lizard looked like he wanted to get inside the machine himself.

"Hey, what are you doing Treecko?"

"Tree!" His companion pointed vehemently at the back door of the machine.

Pausing, Max listened closely. And understood what Treecko had meant.

"You're right, those are muffled cries! That does it, we need to get inside! Treecko, use bullet seeds on that panel! Good, now do it again, and focus on the sides!"

With a bang, some of the screws holding the door together were ripped out by the bullets, and the door half-opened. Max seized the metal panel and heaved with all his might. He felt arms around his waist and someone helping. Five, ten seconds… Then the panel broke away entirely, and Max, destabilized, stumbled and landed on his bottom. Treecko disappeared inside the machine with a gleeful cry, answered by an unmistakable, if faint, "Chansey?"

"Max, you found Chansey!" said Bonnie's voice on his right, and he turned his head to see his friend get back to her feet and run towards the big metal box. The blond girl peered inside, and sure enough, here was Nurse's Joy Chansey, locked in a sort of cage. Beyond the bars ran the moving band on which the pokemon were "healed", which really was Chansey using heal bell on them. The thick padding on the inside of the "machine" prevented anyone from hearing Chansey's cries. The usually-jolly nurse's assistant looked pale and exhausted, and Bonnie's heart constricted, seeing her in this state.

"Chespin, can you use vine whip to open that padlock?" She asked the little hedgehog, who was still at her side. It took a minute or two, during which Max and Treecko joined them, but Chespin was ultimately successful. Chansey staggered out of her cage, so weak she could barely walk.

"Those bastards," Max raged. "They exploited Chansey's sweet nature until she dropped, knowing she would want to help all the poisoned pokemon anyway!"

Bonnie was also enraged, all signs of her normally sunny demeanour vanished.

xxx

Half-carrying Chansey, they headed back to where the other pokemon were. Nurse Joy and Laura had just arrived, and the red-haired nurse was very distraught upon seeing the state her beloved assistant was in. She and Laura were making a round of the sleeping pokemon, giving them lum and chesto berry juice. Nurse Joy told Laura that Chansey could only be treated at the centre, and could Laura take care of the pokemon here herself? Of course Laura agreed, and Nurse Joy departed immediately with Chansey in her ambulance. Quickly, Bonnie and Max called up Litleo and Ralts so they could also be dosed with the juice. Upon awakening, Dedenne jumped into Bonnie's arms, and Mincie did the same with Timmy. When all pokemon were treated, Laura asked Max what had been going on.

"I don't quite understand," she said once he finished his tale. "Why did they capture Chansey in the first place? Or at least, why have her cure poisoned pokemon at all, if all they wanted was to steal as many pokemon as possible?"

"I'm not sure," Max admitted.

"Well," Bonnie said, approaching her friends, "I think I understand, but it seems overly complicated. Let's see if I got it right: first, the two thieves from Team Rocket, Cassidy and… Buff, I think? Anyway, they captured Chansey right away. Then Buff posed as a doctor, had the tent and the "healing machine" set up, while Cassidy went around the village leaving poisoned berries everywhere for other pokemon to find. This way, all the pokemon would come directly to them for treatment, very convenient!"

"I think you must be right, that makes sense," Max agreed. "Why cure them I get it, but why in front of the trainers? They could have just told all trainers to leave their pokemon for treatment in the first place!"

"Well," Officer Jenny interrupted, approaching the trio, "I believe that is where they got too cute for their own good, if you know what I mean."

Four blank stares greeted her remark, and the policewoman sighed.

"I mean, I have been looking at the pokemon here, and there isn't one single Johto pokemon in the whole lot. This cannot be a coincidence. Which leads me to think that those two thieves were targeting specific pokemon, and only offering the so-called immunization treatment to the pokemon that interested them. And even making most people pay for it! They were trying to have their cake and eat it, and that's what bit them in the… hmm, rear, in the end."

Bonnie smiled at Officer Jenny's down-to-earth assessment.

"I still don't get it, but you sure showed them!" Timmy exclaimed happily in the ensuing silence, as the three friends were digesting the officer's explanation.

Max laughed, and ruffled Timmy's hair affectionately. "Yes we did, didn't we?"

xxx

"So how come you know of Team Rocket?" Bonnie asked Max that night.

The rest of the day had flown quickly, between getting all pokemon back to their trainers, Timmy and Mincie back to his parents, and helping Nurse Joy heal those who needed treatment. Treecko was among those, but he was not seriously hurt. The red-haired nurse had declared that his state was part- exhaustion, part-adrenaline crash. With Laura's help, she had prepared a mixture to help with that. The nurse was still monitoring Chansey closely though. The usually happy and energetic pokemon had had a nasty experience, and was still trembling from exhaustion and the after-shock of her kidnapping.

Max looked up from the low sofa where he was sprawled with Treecko. The little lizard had not left his side the whole time. As his trainer, Max was so proud of him that he thought his heart might burst out of his chest. Treecko had really come through for him big time! What a splendid energy ball! And that fierce protective attitude had been a huge surprise. I knew he could do it, the black-haired boy thought, but know Treecko knows it too, and that's the most important part.

"Sorry, did you say something?"

"Yeah, how have you heard of Team Rocket?" Bonnie repeated, plopping herself on the cushions next to Treecko. Interested, Laura, who had been practicing his psychic move with Espurr, came closer.

"Some guys from the organization used to follow my friends, my sister and me around when I was travelling around Hoenn and Kanto a few years back," Max explained. "Not those guys though, but the ones they referred to: Jessie and James and Meowth. A talking Meowth, if you can believe it. I had not thought about them in years."

Bonnie's jaw had dropped sometimes during the explanation. "Are you kidding? Those are the exact same guys who used to follow us around Kalos when I travelled with my big brother and our friends! Always trying to steal our pokemon or those of other trainers!"

By now Laura's eyes were huge. "Wait a minute you two! BOTH of you used to deal with pokemon thieves on a regular basis? No wonder you kept your cool when that hunter kidnapped you, Bonnie! And you met the same guys? What are the odds? Did… did they ever succeed?"

"No, fortunately," Max replied, and Bonnie nodded in agreement.

"My brother and our friends and I always managed to beat them off," she confirmed. The blond girl was looking at Max with an amazed expression. "What were the odds that we would know of the same criminals? They must have traveled a lot! Hoenn and Kanto are not that close, but Kalos is a lot further away!"

"Who knows what criminal minds would do? Those guys were crazy anyway!" Max replied. "When I met them, they had been following one of my friends around for a while, their main goal was to steal his pikachu. Fixating on one pokemon like that? Crazy, I tell you! What, what did I say?"

Bonnie was looking at Max as if he had sprouted antlers. She seemed to have troubled finding her words, a rare occurrence for the usually voluble girl.

"I don't believe it," she finally said, obviously flabbergasted. "It can't be… but a pikachu? And Team Rocket?"

"Yeah?" Max did not see what his friend was getting at.

"Was your friend called Ash? Ash Ketchum?" It was Max's turn to be speechless.

Then both tried to talk at the same time, with high-pitched voices, interrupting each other so much that the result was totally impossible to understand. Laura watched the scene with Espurr, astonished and amused. Bonnie and Max suddenly stopped trying to speak and started laughing, a belly-laugh, until tears came to their eyes.

"I can't believe we both travelled with Ash," Bonnie commented a while later, when she had mostly regained her composure. "I guess I knew he'd been on his journey quite a long time before coming to Kalos, but I never met any previous travelling companion, and I just never really thought about it."

"Who is this Ash?" Laura asked, curious.

"A good friend," Bonnie replied. "A Kanto-boy who travelled much of the pokemon world for years. An amazing trainer, even if he never saw it that way: his specialty is to gain the friendship and trust of his pokemon. They'd do anything for him because he never asks anything of them that he's not willing to do himself, and so they surpass themselves to prove worthy of his trust. I learned a lot, watching him."

"All true," Max confirmed. "But you forgot the part where he rushes into things before thinking them through, and then his friends or pokemon have to get him out of trouble!"

Bonnie laughed again. "Also true, though it did not happen that often. Gosh, travelling with Clemont, Serena and him had been the highlight of my childhood. So many happy memories!"

"Same here! That's why I was so bummed out when I could not start my pokemon journey directly, I wanted to have these experiences again."

"You said that already, but you never explained why you couldn't go," commented Laura.

"I'll tell you one day," Max promised, "even though it's not that interesting. But not tonight, I'm too bushed. And still amazed to discover we have a mutual friend!"

"Hey, we should call him! That would be a great surprise!" Bonnie suggested. She rushed to the phones.

"Wait!" Laura called. "It's far too late to call anybody!"

"And do you even know where to call?" Max added.

"Oh, you're right Laura," replied Bonnie, disappointed. "We'll call him in the morning, then. As to where, last I heard he was at his mother's house. I don't have the number with me, but my brother does. I need to call him anyway, he'll be tickled to know you used to travel with Ash too! Drat, I was really tired but now I'm so excited I don't think I'll be able to sleep at all!"

xxx

In the end, Bonnie still slept, though she lay awake for a while before that, lost in memories. From the way Max was turning back and forth in his bed, she suspected she was not the only one taking a trip down memory lane, either. The odds of two of Ash's travelling companions meeting each other had already been astronomical, but travelling together, even if it was only for a short while? Was there any number beyond astronomical? Ash sure had moved around a lot! She found herself envious, a little. But then her own journey was just beginning, who knew how many places she would see, how many people she would meet? Like they did in Kalos. Yes, it felt good to be on the road, even though she still missed her old group of friends at times. She wondered how Ash had done it, saying good bye time and time again. But then, he was not the kind of guy to look back very much. And her current companions were pretty cool as well. Laura was already a very good friend, and Max was on the way to becoming one too. Maybe saying good bye was necessary if you wanted to keep meeting neat people? Food for thought… Her mind was going round and round in circles until her eyes finally got heavy, and her thoughts slowed…

"Hello big brother! I have some news for you!" Bonnie had just reached Clemont on the phone.

"Bonnie? You're up early today!" From Clemont's sleepy voice, it sounded like she had woken him up.

"I just couldn't wait to tell you, and it was already too late to call last night!" Briefly, or at least as briefly as she could, she summarized her crazy day, from Chansey's disappearance, the unveiling of another Team Rocket gang in Johto, and the amazing discovery Max and she had made in the aftermath.

"Some news indeed!" Clemont agreed when he managed to get a word in edgewise. "Not that I'm too happy that you managed to find Team Rocket trouble in Johto, but hey, congrats on driving them off. Do be careful though! I know you have Dedenne and Chespin and Litleo, and now your new friends, to protect you, but you're still my baby sister and I want you to stay safe, ok."

He stopped for an instant, and his eyes started to sparkle. "But that piece of news about Max and you both travelling with Ash a few years ago, that's golden! I'm sure you'll have lots of stories to swap, things are never boring when Ash is around."

"Speaking of which, we'd like to call him together, do you have his mum's number?"

"Sure!"

After a few minutes, Bonnie wrapped up the conversation. Max, who had called his sister at the same time, had already hung up and was waiting for her with Laura. Together, they called Ash's mother, who Max had met before. He said she was a nice lady, very easygoing though feisty at times. Delia answered quickly. She had trouble recognizing Max at first – it had been years since she had seen him, after all –but was very happy to hear from him. The coincidence of Max and Bonnie meeting amused her, but when Max asked to speak to Ash, she regretfully shook her head.

"He's gone again," she explained.

"Oh, did he go back to Kalos already?" Bonnie asked. "Meeting Alan again was his last plan, as far as I know."

"Well, he's still planning to, but that'll have to wait a bit. No, he was doing some intensive training around here for a while, undecided whether to go on another journey or not. You know how he hates being uncertain!"

Both Bonnie and Max nodded.

"Anyway Misty, you know, the water-type gym leader he used to travel with, she was here the other day, and she told him he shouldn't train by himself so much, since he always gave his best against strong opponents. She suggested he should do a tour of the Kanto gyms for training purposes. Well Ash thought it was a great idea, so he took her up on it. Before you knew it, he had won against all of them, and realized he had all the badges again, and an Indigo Plateau Conference was coming up…"

"So Ash is participating in the Kanto League right now?" Bonnie asked, surprised.

"Hey, wait a minute!" Max exclaimed. "I used to follow the pokemon leagues quite closely before, never missed a battle if I could help it. Can't do that now, of course, but I remember the dates for the Indigo Plateau Conference, since I thought about watching the final battles in a pokemon centre if the occasion arose. I forgot last night, since we had such a busy day, but that was the semi-finals, wasn't it?"

"Indeed, and my boy won easily!" Delia answered proudly. "The last battle will be tonight. You can try to reach him at the Indigo Plateau pokemon centre, or you wait until tomorrow, so as not to distract him."

"Yeah, maybe we'll do that," Max replied with a smile. So Ash could not resist the temptation to give the Indigo League another try, eh? That battle was going to be interesting! No way he was not watching it tonight.

"Thank you very much, Mrs. Ketchum" Bonnie was saying. "We'll try to get in touch with Ash after the League."

xxx

The evening found all three friends watching TV with great attention. Laura had confessed to never having watched any league battles, and Max had reacted by explaining every single rule with great detail, until he had totally bored his audience. They were not alone in the hall of the pokemon centre either: the Indigo Plateau Conference was quite the event for pokemon trainers in Johto, since Kanto was literally next-door, and quite a few trainers had gathered to watch the finals.

"Here's Ash!" Bonnie exclaimed suddenly with great excitement. "He's looking well!"

"I wonder what team he's put together for the League?" Max said.

"How many pokemon does he have?" Laura asked. She was watching the black-haired boy on the screen with attention. He was wearing a blue jacket and red cap, and a pikachu rode on his shoulder.

"I don't know," Max replied. "A lot. Thirty something, maybe?"

"So many! How does he manage?"

"Most of them stay at Professor Oak's laboratory, he has lots of space." Max answered. "Professor Oak is the best known pokemon professor in Kanto, you've never heard of him?" He added, shaking his head in wonder at seeing that the name meant nothing to Laura. "Anyway, Ash's mum lives nearby, so that's quite convenient for Ash."

"Oh, the battle is about to start!"

Bonnie's cry shushed all conversation in the room, and all eyes focused on the screen. Ash's adversary was a tall, blue-haired girl with a black leather jacket and a fierce expression, called Athena. The finals began with Snorlax and Nidoking. Ash's snorlax was decidedly ahead in terms of brute strength, but Athena's nidoking was quicker than he looked, and snorlax had difficulty landing his attacks. An early poison attack was weakening him little by little, and a double brick break was finally more than he could bear. Both Bonnie and Max made a sound of disgust as the first point went to Athena. Recalling Snorlax, Ash sent out his sceptile, who was apparently in great form and made short work of Nidoking. Cunningly, Athena chose her typhlosion. But type disadvantage scared neither Ash nor Sceptile and the green lizard gave it his all: after a fierce duel, both adversaries were declared unable to continue. The next duel opposed Ash's noivern and a vileplume, and Bonnie smiled as she recognized the dragon-type bat she had first seen as a newly-hatched noibat. Noivern did great with Vileplume, but Ash's opponent then sent out her gyarados, a strong beast who used its ice moves extensively. The third ice beam knocked Noivern right out of the sky, he landed with a "thud" and did not get back up.

"Three left on each side," Max murmured. "But Ash has the advantage, his three are all fresh, while Gyarados has already battled once."

"Oh, I'm so excited I can hardly stay still!" Bonnie exclaimed. "I have to say though, Ash seems even more in control than at the Kalos League, and that Athena is no Alan."

"Alan?" Laura asked.

"The guy who beat him in the finals at the Kalos League two years ago. He has an incredibly-strong mega-charizard."

Meanwhile, the terrain had been changed, from grassy to rocky. The battle resumed. This time, Ash did not grab a pokeball, but made a sign to the small yellow figure at his side.

"Pikachu, yes!" Bonnie and Max exclaimed in unison.

The electric mouse was its quick, agile and strong self. Gyarados, at a type-disadvantage and much slower, did not stand a chance, though it did manage to land a few hits. Rather than continuing with Pikachu, Ash then chose his infernape, while Athena sent out a skarmory. The steel bird was very fast and had a very good sense of timing: it took quite a lot time for Infernape to get the measure of his adversary. But when the dust settled, it was the fiery monkey who was still standing.

"Oh, Ash's opponent is down to her last pokemon!"

It was a medicham, and did not look very strong, but appearances were deceiving. It was very proficient with psychic moves, with a predilection for zen headbutt. Infernape was tired from his previous battle, and had to concede the fight pretty quickly. Ash called up Charizard.

"Whao, Ash has a Charizard too? Way cool!" Bonnie cried out.

Upon seeing its new, fresh adversary, who landed on the terrain with a roar, Medicham glanced at its trainer. She nodded, and took hold of a pendant around her neck.

"Is it what I think it is?" Laura asked shyly.

"Yes, Medicham is going to mega-evolve!" Bonnie replied.

"That's going to be tougher for Ash and Charizard," Max commented.

The big fire pokemon did not look too impressed though. The battle started, all the fiercest on Athena's side since it was her last chance. Flames and waves of psychic energy spurted around the terrain. Ash tried to get the upper hand by having Charizard fly high, but Medicham was floating around and, thanks to teleport, moving at the same speed as the fire lizard. Some shots landed on both sides with no clear advantage one way or the other. Still, Medicham had to be tiring, mega-form or not, thought Bonnie. It was really a small thing, a dodge just a little too slow, and Medicham suddenly went spinning around. Charizard caught it with a wing attack, then threw a point-blank flamethrower at it, and Medicham fainted. Charizard landed in the suddenly silent stadium.

"Medicham is unable to battle, Charizard wins. The victory goes to Ash Ketchum from Pallet Town!"

END OF CHAPTER

As some of you called it, I couldn't go on much longer without Max and Bonnie realizing they had a common friend. And while I don't want to have Ash as a central character in this story (got a few ideas for another story with him but it won't be soon), he's just too intense a person to not appear in it from time to time. It was fun writing about his first league victory, that was way overdue! Though it was kind of hard to strike a balance between too much and too little description of the battle. It would have been easier in an anime! Anyway, I hope you liked this treat !

Next chapter someone will get a new companion, so last chance of calling it! You can also make suggestions for all three characters if you want, I had it pretty much settled a while back but as the story unfolds I find out that it tends to take me in unexpected directions so everything can still change…

As for those of you who would love to see Squishy back… Patience IS a virtue, they say! Joke aside, yes, I do plan to have a Bonnie/Squishy reunion one day, but no, it won't be anytime soon, so I hope you'll like the story enough to wait!