"Hey, you know what we should do?" Starly asked. "What we should do is-"
"I think you're meant to wait until there's an answer," Moltres pointed out.
"Oh, right," Starly said. "Sorry. I get excited sometimes despite the best efforts of my sensei."
He took a deep breath. "Right."
There were several seconds of silence.
"No, what should we do?" Pidgey asked eventually.
"We should form the tiny bird club," Starly said. "The club for unexpectedly powerful birds given our size."
Pidgey hummed. "I'm mostly powerful when I'm bigger than this."
"And I'm a Legendary Pokémon," Moltres added. "Now, at least, and I'm getting used to it quite quickly. I'm small, sure, but I'm not unexpectedly powerful. I'm expectedly powerful."
"Right, right," Starly admitted. "That does sort of destroy most of my idea."
He flew alongside the others for a long moment.
"Bird club?" he suggested. "That way Swellow, Zapdos and Articuno can join. As can – wait, hold on, does Silver count as a tiny bird?"
"Starly, even you don't count as a Tiny Bird by any technical definition," Pidgey said. "I'm a Tiny Bird Pokémon. A Spearow, Natu, Rookidee… they would be Tiny Bird Pokémon. But you're a Starling Pokémon."
She fluffed her feathers. "I listen to Ibid sometimes."
"Well… Chatot counts, right?" Starly suggested. "What about a club for Pokémon who are Flying type?"
"That is the group of Pokémon which Lance would like Ash to use as an Elite Four member, I think," Zygarde suggested. "Speaking of which, Moltres, do you qualify as one of Ash Ketchum's Pokémon?"
"Let me think about it," Moltres requested.
"I think at this point it's becoming clear that your club idea is like your Bone Club move," Pidgey quipped. "Not effective against Flying types."
"Ouch," Moltres said. "Is that a smack down?"
"If it is then it just means the club becomes effective again!" Starly insisted.
"Wait!" someone called, up ahead. "Wait – you're Ash Ketchum, right?"
The woman looked nervous. "I was wondering – can you help me with something?"
The something she needed help with turned out to be a Bibarel who wasn't doing what he was supposed to.
"He belongs to an expert stonemason, but I originally trained him and I'm taking care of him today," the woman – Isis – explained, as she led them up to the trouble area. "He's supposed to help work on a bridge, even while the stonemason's ill, but he just isn't."
Just as they reached the quarry site, though, a golden portal opened in mid-air.
"AAAAAAAH!" Absol yelled, then visibly shook herself out and jumped through.
"Is everything okay?" Lokoko asked, from the other side of the portal.
"I'm fine, don't worry," Absol assured her. "It's just… Ash. I'm never ready for it."
She looked up at Isis and the others."And the bridge isn't properly designed, it's not safe. If it's finished it'll just collapse."
"That explains a lot," Isis admitted. "Especially about why Bibarel didn't want to help. The engineer who designed the bridge has been very pushy about getting it finished in time."
"Wait, wait, hold on," Starly requested, hovering in place. "So, first off, I'm all for helping build the bridge. It sounds like fun, and I can make good use of my training. But secondly, isn't that a Hyperspace Hole?"
"That's right, yes," Absol confirmed. "Unown provided it."
"But isn't that a Psychic move?" Starly said. "And you're a Dark type."
"I…" Absol began, then looked suddenly unsure. "That is a good point. Maybe… maybe it's not like Teleport because the psychic power is just making the hole in space, rather than doing the actual transportation."
"The Pokéball Transfer System is different, but what Type is that?" Starly asked. "That could be Normal type, but it certainly transferred Aten. Or did Unown use Miracle Eye or something? Does the Internet have Scrappy?"
It turned out that Bibarel's stonecutter trainer had actually been off gathering the evidence needed to prove that the bridge was badly designed. The engineer who'd been hoping for a good reputation (and a lot of money) for building the bridge on time was extremely offended, and looked likely to make it a fight right up until he realized just how many and how varied the Pokémon available to battle his half-dozen Machoke and Machamp were.
Then he left.
The town still needed a bridge, to a safe design (which the stonecutter also had), and everyone was happy to help out.
"This is an unusual situation," Absol said, plucking at her high-visibility jacket. "What does a health and safety officer do?"
"Tells someone off for being unsafe, I think," Grovyle replied, carrying a stone block past. Ash went past next, also carrying a large stone block, and then Happiny with eight blocks balanced on top of one another.
"I still think we should have cut the entire bridge out of solid stone!" she said. "I'm pretty sure I could carry that over."
Absol contemplated that, wondered briefly about leverage, then decided that if she could watch Happiny go past with eight stone blocks and her disaster sense didn't even twinge there were better things to worry about.
"So… I have this theory," Starly suggested. "Hyperspace Hole isn't a Psychic move at all. It's a Rock move which happens to key off Psychic super-effectiveness."
"Right," Pidgey replied. "Why?"
"Well, rocks are heavy, and heaviness warps space," Starly pointed out.
"Steel is heavier," Pidgey told him, as Starly lifted a slab of rock to carry over to the bridge site.
"But Shedinja are immune to Steel type moves," Starly said. "So unless we can prove a Shedinja can't use a Hyperspace Hole, the Rock type suggestion is superior."
"I think you're overthinking this," Pidgey mused.
"If I don't do that now, I'll do it during my meditation."
After the bridge was finished, and after crossing the bridge, Ash remembered that the last time they'd seen Yveltal he'd wanted to hear if they ran into a shiny version of him.
Fortunately that was easily solved by Zygarde, who sent him a message by Cell to the effect that there was a shiny Yveltal probably at Pallet Town at the moment, and they didn't even have to interrupt their journey for long enough to track Yveltal down.
As a result, they reached Solaceon Town not long later.
"This is a nice sort of place," Moltres said. "It's sort of peaceful."
The little Dark-type flew a spiralling course up into the air, then did a flip. "Huh. There's something really big over there."
"Oh, that's Solaceon!" Mew said.
Moltres did a double-take. "Where did you come from?"
"Well…" Mew began, drawing the squeaky syllable out. "There was a big egg, and I touched it, and it hatched!"
"...that doesn't answer my question," Moltres blinked. "That doesn't begin to answer my question."
"That's because you asked the wrong question, silly," Mew told him. "You asked where I came from, and there isn't really an answer to that because there's sort of a weird time snarl involved with it. So I was created after the egg hatched but I was involved with making the egg hatch. It's a Mew and Egg problem!"
She giggled. "Don't worry. Every time I tell a philosopher about this they get all confused too. The point is, I'm Mew! Is it nice to meet Mew?"
Moltres turned pleading eyes on the humans and Pokémon below. "Help?"
"I wonder if a Solaceon is what an Eevee becomes after it's exposed to a Sun stone?" Ash guessed. "Would that be Steel type? Solgaleo is Steel."
Solaceon, as Mew eventually explained, was where there had once been a temple to Dialga, Palkia and Giratina. The Giratina bit was deeper underground than the rest of the temple, and Mew took them down there to have a look, but instead of the Spear Key which was kept there they just found some very aggravated Unown.
Once the Unown had calmed down, though, Dawn pointed out that there was a Contest in Solaceon, but also that she hadn't really worked out anything new since Hearthome and so it would feel like a bit of a waste to compete.
"That means one of you could have a go," she suggested. "Or both! I know that there isn't anything stopping you normally, but…"
"Oh, I know!" Mew said. "What about if I do Lapras again! I haven't done that one in a while."
"If you don't mind, Dawn," Ash said. "And yeah, it'd be interesting to do a Contest battle… maybe Zapdos too. I'd need to pick who should be doing the Appeal and who should be doing the Battle, though."
"How do Contests work, again?" Moltres asked.
Ash began to talk, then stopped.
"Actually, maybe I should get everyone who Ho-Oh reincarnated," he suggested. "Just so they can all hear the explanation and I don't have to do it dozens of times."
"You could have Aten do the Contest," Whitney said, trying not to snigger. "He probably wouldn't appreciate it though."
"Well!" Mr. Sukizo said, once the Appeal was done. "I think that's quite a display, don't you?"
"I do indeed," Contesta said. "I wonder if Ash learned from Dawn or Dawn learned from Ash on that one?"
"Now, now," Mr. Sukizo said, waggling his finger good-naturedly. "We don't want to judge based on who someone's friends are… but purely in terms of the performance there, I have to say that I'm inclined to give that a very high score. The way that the Thundershocks provided a corona to accentuate the entrance, the use of Twister, it was all excellent."
"And the Steel Wing, as well," Joy pointed out. "Plus – I think that was Sky Attack? I'm not very familiar with it."
"Yes, that was Sky Attack," Mr. Sukizo said, with an expert's eye. "And the whole thing came together in a marvellous demonstration."
They exchanged nods.
"I'm impressed that Lapras made it work, really," Contesta added.
"Oh, boy," Kenny said. "Um… right. Breloom, remember, she can't just rely on raw power!"
"Zapdos, Thundershock shield!" Ash called.
Zapdos flared her wings, sparks of electricity crawling upon them, and in dozens of distinct bolts they formed a combined barrier that shrouded her at a safe distance.
"Now, Storm Cell!" Ash added.
"Is that even a thing?" Kenny said.
Apparently it was, as Zapdos rose higher into the air and a dark, sooty cloud poured off her wings. It formed a black layer that hissed and sparked with internal lightning bolts, and once it had formed Zapdos flew up into it and vanished from view.
"Back down!" Ash said, a moment later.
"Seed Bomb, blow it away!" Kenny tried.
Breloom hurled up a Seed Bomb, and the explosion made the Storm Cell ripple but wasn't enough to disrupt it entirely. Zapdos emerged from the weather effect a moment later, lightning arcing over her wings, and Ash pointed. "Weather Ball!"
This at least answered some of the question of what was going on, as what came down was a ball of lightning.
"Jump!" Kenny ordered, in time to have Breloom get clear of the blast. "And use Seed Bombs to disrupt what she's doing!"
"Strong Winds!" Ash retaliated.
Zapdos recrafted the Storm Cell weather into a caged tornado that hissed and seethed, then used Weather Ball again – this time creating a tornado-in-an-orb which chased Breloom around the battlefield.
"Oh, wonderful," Kenny groaned. "She's not just relying on raw power, but she's got it on top of whatever that is…"
"Dracorocco!" Ash suggested. "Then use Twister!"
"That was quite nice," Zapdos said, afterwards. "Thank you, Ash. It's not often I get a chance to feel pretty."
She contemplated the various trays laid out for lunch, then took some okonomiyaki. "Not that I need to all the time, but it's nice to sometimes… and having ethereal energy arcing off every feather is a good start."
"You do realize there's mochi out, right?" Pikachu asked.
"Yes," Zapdos confirmed. "I like it. That doesn't mean it's all I eat."
She paused, then shuffled some onto her plate. "I'm not saying no, though."
AN:
The internet, of course, is actually Bug type. With Mold Breaker.