Chapter 84, everybody! On to the Princess Festival…which, apparently, is based on a real festival in Japan, so that's interesting.
The garden is waning, so now it's back to writing more frequently—my intent is to knuckle down on all my active fics in October and maybe finish the writing for this one before the year is out. I think the major tentpole events left for the fic are Mewtwo, Blaine, Giovanni and the League, so we'll see. We're definitely breaking 100 chapters though.
Moving on…some minor worldbuilding here and there, mostly focused on how gyms work in this universe. Also Jessie and James are 100% theater kids and you cannot convince me otherwise. Meowth is quoting Iago from Aladdin, by the way.
And now for reviews: thanks to DeathCrawler, Gouravsilentreader, Black Knight Lucario, Dragonkeeper10, Kayuri Igrimakeon Pax, forward-smash, griffin blackwood, talesfanjmf, quadehays4, Johnny Spectre (maybe!), Segwayman, Luckenhaft, SkeletonBisque, MurderOfBael38, Reader, thor94, Guest, epantoja521, RJMeta, and Macdadivali for the reviews! Love reading them. :D
MurderOfBael38, thanks for the reviews! Wanted to address them because oh good night I love the concept of Giovanni actually being Ash's uncle I don't think I've seen that idea circulating and if it doesn't happen in this fic it is happening somewhere because I love it. :D
RJMeta, Macdadivali, both of you asked about if I'd post this to AO3 and I do have plans to do so (probably next year). Hopefully I'll have the writing finished by then and won't have schedule slip as bad on that website. ^^;
Pokémon © Game Freak; Nintendo
And now, for something completely different:
Galarians swing like the pendulums do, bobbies on bicycles two by two! Hulbury, Postwick, Rose Tower, Axwell—the shiny new badges of trainers do tell!
The sight of the next town a week later was welcoming for a number of reasons, the promise of running water being one of them.
It wasn't until they were in the town gates that Ash had cause to question the décor.
"What's with all the pink?" Ash asked, looking up at the banners hanging from the lampposts.
"Maybe it's the official color here," Brock mused.
"Let's ask," Misty said, dodging around a gaggle of giggling girls to ask a street vendor.
"You don't know?" the man asked her when she posed the question. "Today's the day of the Princess Festival—girls from miles around come for the sales and the specials; today it's all about the ladies."
"Really?" Misty asked, immediately brightening up at that news.
"Why make a specific festival for that though?" Ash asked, starting to feel a little concerned as the scent of perfume from every direction started getting overwhelming; he was having flashbacks to the Celadon Perfume Shoppe and wasn't enjoying it.
"Counterbalance years of misogyny?" Brock guessed.
"I don't know what that means."
"Let's just say the girls deserve a day."
Ash shrugged, nodded sideways—it was as good an explanation as any. "So long as I don't get my forehead stamped again."
"Only if you really misbehave," Misty said, thanking the vendor—and accepting the free shish-kabob he gave her. "Now come on! I want to see this Princess Festival from top to bottom!"
Ash still wasn't sure what to make of all this, but followed her as she maneuvered through the festival.
"How long do you think this is going to take?" he asked Brock as they followed Misty into a store.
"In this particular store?" Brock asked, looking around. "Well, clothes…but it's hard to tell with Misty."
"I kind of mean the Princess Festival thing."
"Ah. Probably not more than a day."
"Okay…."
"Look at it this way: it's a break for you from training."
Ash groaned at that.
"Ash, chill, it's just a day," Brock chided.
"Yeah, but—it's pink. And girly."
"Well it's not called the Prince Festival, now is it?"
Ash considered that. "That doesn't really change anything—maybe more glitter and guitar riffs."
"Wrong Prince. Maybe I'm explaining this wrong," Brock said, adjusting himself so he was facing Ash better—they certainly weren't moving from their spot near the counter anytime soon. "Technically, this is your journey—we're just along for the ride. I am because keeping track of three people is a major vacation for me and going with someone else's flow took less effort than trailblazing by myself. I'm not entirely sure what Misty's reason is, but if I had to hazard a guess, I'd say it had something to do with her sisters. Now, we've been travelling with you and supporting you since Pewter—I think you can spare a day for Misty's interests, don't you?"
Ash considered that, nodded finally. "Does that mean you'll be getting a day sometime?"
"Yes. I want you to be aware of it now so you can schedule around it."
"Fair enough," Ash said, looking around. "Now what?"
"Now we just support Misty and…probably find someplace to sit—this is going to take a while."
Ash and Brock ended up sitting on the bench outside the store, Brock working through his paperback and Ash looking up Pokémon data on his Pokédex.
"Oh hey, look at this," Ash noised, poking at his Pokédex. "It says here that Eevee and Riolu are almost extinct in their native regions, but they introduced them in Kalos and now they've got a full wild population."
"That's nice," Brock noised. "Wonder what makes Kalos such a great place for them."
"I'm not sure—there's Misty."
Ash sat up and Brock put a bookmark in his book as Misty came over, several bags in hand.
"I'm glad I didn't spend everything in Celadon," she said. "The store clerk told me that everywhere in this town has deep discounts for girls today!"
"That wasn't you spending everything in Celadon?" Ash echoed, blinking several times as he tried to process that.
"I get a salary from the League, since I'm a gym leader," Misty explained. "How else do you expect gym leaders to pay out to their challengers and pay for repairs?"
"Somehow that never occurred to me," Ash noised, looking at the bags. "So are you done?"
"With that store. Come on, there's still a lot to go!"
"Want me to carry those for you?" Brock asked, standing.
"If you don't mind."
Ash minded—mostly because by the end of the fifth store, he was carrying bags too. And not just a few, either.
"How much work is it being a gym leader?" Ash asked Brock after they left the seventh store—Misty had a few bags in hand, but Ash and Brock were carrying the Pyroar's share. "Because if this is what their salary brings, I want to be one."
"It's actually more work than it's worth," Brock said. "Misty probably has extra money to burn because of her sisters' water shows—but don't say that to her. You can say that gym leaders are often looked to as town leaders and have a lot of weight in their community—something goes wrong in a gym town, people automatically look to the gym leader. It's a lot of responsibility, and a lot of work—it's why it's so hard to get the gym leader position. Also why it's so hard to lose it too—too much work to find replacements."
Ash's head was buzzing. "Then—wait, how come Giovanni and Blaine can just go missing like they do?"
"One main reason is because they're high-tier gym leaders—you'd be surprised how few trainers starting out even get five badges. Right now you're in the upper percentile."
"Nice," Ash mused.
"Very. So they can afford to be absent when the need calls for it—you get into upper-tier positions, then you pretty much have free reign."
"I'm going in this one next," Misty said, pointing.
"Oh thank you," Brock sighed, putting the bags he was carrying down. "Can we get a room to work from? I started losing feeling in my hands a while ago, and I don't know how Ash's arms are holding up."
"I still have arms?" Ash asked.
"We'll do that after this—we can find a room and then lunch!" Misty declared, depositing her bags next to Brock and dashing into the store.
"It's not even lunch time?" Ash asked, appalled.
"Einstein's theory of relativity coupled with time dilation," Brock said, helping Ash put the bags down. "Basically summed up as time flies when you're having fun."
"I'm definitely not having fun then," Ash said, groaning appreciatively when Brock finally freed him from his bondage, feeling light enough to start floating. "So about the gym leaders," he prompted, waving his arms around to return feeling to them.
"Right. Upper-level gym leaders enjoy almost the same privileges as the Elite Four—travel wherever they please, no carry limit, free entry just about anywhere—it's actually a very cushy job, mostly because most of the people who would challenge you are already wiped out by the lower-tier gyms. It's not like my gym or Misty's, where we're seeing challengers nearly every other day. When trainer season starts, I get—well, got challenged about five times a day, because everyone hits the Pewter Gym first. Misty said that her sisters just started giving badges away at shows—probably because they were dealing with the same numbers I was."
"A lot of people seemed to challenge Lt. Surge," Ash pointed out.
"And you'll notice that most of them failed—Lt. Surge is generally the first major pinch point as far as weeding trainers out. The Pewter and Cerulean gyms knock off a few people trying the gym run for a lark, but the Vermillion Gym is the one that starts weeding out the weak."
Ash grimaced at that, but inwardly glowed a bit at the fact that he won and kept going—felt that glow fade a bit when he realized just how close he was to quitting the night after the battle.
"After Vermillion, gym leaders have some leeway," Brock continued. "You'll notice that Erika and Sabrina don't stay in their gyms—they don't have to have their homes be in their gyms, because by the time trainers reach them, they've been whittled down to a manageable number. By that point, they can afford to have gym matches scheduled and be at the gym then. You'll notice that Koga was the same way, even though he lived in his gym—we walked in on him and Janine playing go."
Ash nodded. "And those three were really tough, so…that's the next pinch point."
"Yes. Not very many trainers manage to vault those hurdles. By the time we get to Giovanni and Blaine, we're talking maybe…I don't know, ten percent of the trainers that started that year?"
Ash gaped at that. "You're kidding!"
"Nope—some years it's even lower. I understand in Unova and Kalos the number is a bit higher, but they also start their trainers a little later—around fifteen instead of ten."
"Oi," Ash balked—he couldn't imagine waiting another five years to start his journey. Waiting until he was ten was bad enough. "So…I guess to challenge Blaine and Giovanni, we've got to…what, set up an appointment?"
"In an ideal world," Brock sighed. "But you have to keep in mind that of the eight official gyms, Viridian and Cinnabar are the ones that get challenged the most, and by people who aren't in a position to challenge them. That's why Blaine took off—he kept getting challenged by tourists. And what was the first city you passed through on your Pokémon journey?"
"Viridian," Ash said.
"Exactly. You started in Pallet Town because Professor Oak is there, and a lot of trainers do start there. A lot of trainers also start in Viridian, because that's the closest city to the Pokémon League. And what do they do when they first get their Pokémon?"
"Battle?"
"Battle. They want to challenge the gym and start getting badges. And what's the first gym if you start in Viridian?"
"Giovanni's gym."
"Exactly."
"Then why have a gym there at all?" Ash asked, exasperated.
"Because Viridian is also the last stop before going through Victory Road to the Indigo League. It makes sense to have the last badge be the last stop—it's just a little unfortunate that the last stop is also the first stop."
"I think Misty said something like that," Ash muttered, leaning forward on his knees with his chin in his hands. "It still doesn't make sense though."
"It doesn't," Brock agreed. "I know there's a lot of regions that have it laid out differently—but there's a lot of regions where you have to double back as well. Norman from Hoenn only accepts battles from trainers with four badges, and he'd be the first one you'd encounter if you left from that region's Pokémon research lab."
"You'd think they'd organize it better."
"You'd think," Brock said, looking up when Misty came over. "Are we ready to find a place to drop all this off?"
"Most definitely," Misty said. "I want to get some lunch and then shop till I drop!"
"Can we shop till I drop?" Ash asked.
"Mmm, no—you look like you're about a minute away from doing so."
"I mean it is a lot."
"They were having a sale," Misty said simply.
So in other news, they had reset their carry limit by renting a room and depositing everything including their bags there, only really keeping their Pokémon. Ash was assigned hanging on to Togepi—well actually he volunteered, Misty asked and when he realized this meant he wouldn't be carrying bags he jumped on it.
Lunch was good though, Misty buying extra helpings to work around Ash and Brock having to pay full price, and then it was back to shopping until someone dropped.
"Okay, what do you think?" Misty asked.
"Since when do you wear dresses?" Ash asked.
"Oh sure like I'm really going to dress up when I'm roughing it ninety percent of the time. Sometimes there's a need."
"I feel like warm colors would just clash with your hair," Brock said, looking pensive. "Go with cooler colors."
"Dang, I liked this color," Misty sighed, looking at the dress one last time before ducking back into the fray.
Granted, this was starting to go from fun to frustrating, considering people were starting to get mean about grabbing what they wanted. She ended up tossing the dress at a tighter cluster of women before moving on to a less-populated cart—blinked in surprise when she realized she recognized one of the women.
"Okay, so while on the one hand I'm not surprised…what are you doing here?" Misty had to ask.
Jessie immediately adopted a pose. "Prepare for trouble, we're on a shopping spree!"
"And make it double, it's buy one get one free!" James rejoined, popping in out of nowhere with his arms loaded down with clothes.
"I have many questions," Misty decided.
"Have them later, it's starting to get nasty here—back off," Jessie snapped at someone trying to snatch away the dress she was holding.
"It's like every day after a major holiday plus Black Friday, all rolled into one," James sighed. "But in other news, I managed to liberate several outfits!"
"You guys aren't stealing this, are you?" Misty asked.
"At these discounts, yes," James said, holding an outfit up. "And Jessie I know we're shopping for you but consider me in this—and then this one for you so we can go with matching outfits."
"For a scheme, or for everyday wear?" Jessie asked.
"Either-or."
"Waugh," Meowth moaned, panting as he scrabbled into the cart—and then immediately popped back up to point at Jessie, waving a hat in frustration. "Dat's it, I'm stickin' ta sittin' in da cart and guardin' da stuff—look at me, look at dis, youse see all dese patches o' fur dat got ripped out from dese crazy ladies? Look at me, I'm so disgusted I'm shedding."
"But at least you got the hat," James pointed out.
"Yeah, well next time ask some other Pokémon ta slip through dat crowd. It's gonna take forever fer my fur ta grow back."
"You know, maybe I've shopped enough," Misty said, looking at the increasingly irate crowd.
"Oh good someone tinks so," Meowth said, hopping onto her. "Take me wid you."
"I would, but we recently had a negative experience with Team Rocket, so I'm not feeling really charitable."
"You know there's a form you can fill out for that if you found your Team Rocket experience unsatisfactory," James said as Jessie peeled Meowth off.
"Seriously?"
"Yes, but it requires knowing the names of the grunts in question and then filing it in a timely manner. I think we were going to have the form on our website?"
"Team Rocket has a website?"
"All good organizations do," Jessie said.
"Well technically we're a bad organization," James clarified. "Just not when it comes to paperwork."
"Or life insurance," Meowth said, sagging back in the cart. "By da way, I'm totally cashing in on dat I'm pretty sure I used up at least one life today."
"Fine, give me the website," Misty said. "I know the grunts' names anyway—Butch and Cassidy? I mean yes we wiped them out but if there's a form that gets them in trouble with their boss I'm for it."
The trio froze a moment, processing this—
James was immediately next to Misty. "Can I get you anything? A hat, new outfit, dress? This periwinkle would look good on you."
"I thought you got those for me," Jessie said.
"I did but we have options—like yes there's periwinkle but we also have teal and turquoise here—I mean look at this one it has sequin Butterfree on it and then we can get those Butterfree hair clips to go with it."
"Ooh gimme," Jessie said, taking that one.
"I'm confused," Misty said.
"Well see, with your hair color it's best that you go with cooler colors," James started.
"We have dis longstanding rivalry with Bozo and Cassidy," Meowth said. "It's a ting."
"Ah," Misty noised, not feeling that confusion dissipate.
Five minutes later, Misty sought out Ash and Brock.
"So I've decided that clothes shopping is starting to get too dangerous," she announced, depositing what she had gotten on the checkout counter. "Maybe we find something else, see if they have movies half-off for girls too."
"Sold," Ash said, weakly waving an arm.
"Was that Jessie and James you were talking to?" Brock asked.
"Yeah. Also turns out Team Rocket has a website," Misty said.
"A web—why?"
"I don't know, it got really surreal."
"All I heard was that we're done clothes shopping," Ash said. "Also I feel sorry for the Pidgeot that's carting your stuff."
"Yeah," Misty sighed. "Probably shouldn't have splurged so much for it all to get shipped back home…boy I hope my sisters don't root through it all."
"Have Muk hug it first."
"Ew, no." Misty finished up, scooped up her purchases. "So anyway, let's go find something else to do."
"Preferably somewhere where we don't get trampled by women shopping," Ash suggested.
Which turned out to be harder to find than they had anticipated. They worked their way further into the town, looking for someplace where they could sit and enjoy themselves for a while, instead found an increasingly growing crowd the further they went.
"'The Princess Contest,'" Brock read from a flyer. "Hmm…'show off your stunning appearance and moves in this dazzling highlight of the Princess Festival.' That should be interesting to watch."
"Or participate in," Misty said, considering. "Might be a good time to test out one of my new outfits."
"Not hardly," some other girl looking at the flyer said.
"Yeah, I thought you were a boy at first," another girl said, snickering.
"Hey," Misty started—Brock caught her.
"Let it go, Misty," Brock advised.
"Yeah, listen to your boyfriend," a girl said.
"Besides, there's no way you can keep up with a real woman."
Misty glared at Brock, who put his hands up.
"Just so sad, but you're better off grubbing in the dirt with those boys," what looked like the queen of snooty girls said. "A tomboy like you doesn't belong in a contest like this."
Misty, steaming, finally broke.
"Oh yeah?" she asked, pointing angrily at the snooty girls before slamming her hand down on the table. "Sign me up! I'll show you that a tomboy can hack it just as well as you girly girls!"
"Oh boy," Brock muttered.