"Attention," Arc said, as they were about to leave Icirrus. "I have just received information which may affect your plans."
"That's probably not a good sign," N guessed. "How bad is it? Is my dad involved?"
"Not obviously," Arc told him. "The gym at Opelucid is closed, though I do not actually know why."
"What, another one?" Pikachu asked. "Are Gym Leaders here allergic to staying in their gyms?"
Cilan coughed.
"In my defence, I have three careers," he said. "And I didn't leave Striaton without a replacement."
"Actually, that is a point," Iris chuckled. "At this point there's two Dragonite Gym Leaders in Unova… maybe we should go there and offer to Drayden to have another one of the Dragonites run Opelucid?"
"Maybe," Ash frowned. "It'd depend on what he thought, though, and whether another Dragonite was willing to take the job on. I think maybe Dragonite or Dragonite would be interested, but I'd need to check with them before making the offer."
"And we wouldn't want Dragonite or Dragonite to get involved," Cilan pondered. "I'd lose my chance to work on my second career with them!"
"Do your careers actually have an order?" Ash asked. "So which one's most important?"
"Well, they all are!" Cilan said. "But being a connoisseur is something which makes trainers and Pokémon happy, so-"
"Excuse me," someone interrupted. "Did you just say you're a Pokémon Connoisseur?"
"I am indeed!" Cilan replied, turning and bowing. "Cilan, at your service!"
"Excellent," the man replied. "Come with me. Mr. Hatterly wants a skilled Pokémon Connoisseur to do some work for him."
He picked Cilan up, and N blinked.
"Is this normal?" he asked.
"Not really," Cilan said, fairly calmly, as he was carried over to a nearby limo. "Though I've taken commissions from some quite odd people before!"
"Hey, hold on there!" Ash said. "Cilan hasn't actually accepted yet! It's rude to just assume someone will agree like that!"
The man threw Cilan into the open door of the limo, then turned around. "You're all invited."
"This is still a violation of the Unova Standardized Criminal Code statute 14 subsection C," N insisted. "Stop!"
"Is it?" the man asked, suddenly frowning, then stepped back and looked at the limousine. "No, I'm not parked on a yellow line and I'm in the direction of the traffic flow."
"Huh?" N blinked, then sighed. "I got it wrong again, didn't I?"
"I am afraid so," Arc confirmed. "Unova Standardized Criminal Code statute 14 subsection C is about parking."
"Well, what about the one about kidnapping?" N asked.
"Can you return your Pokémon?" the man asked. "I'd rather not throw them on top of Cilan, Mr. Hatterly wants a Pokémon Connoisseur without any holes in him."
"Keldeo isn't my Pokémon," Ash said. "Nor are Zygarde or Marshadow, or really Reshiram and the Pidove either. But, can't you just… you know… ask?"
"Hold on a minute," the man requested, and got out a sheaf of paper from his pocket. "Hm."
He unfolded an Xtransciever, and tapped something out on it.
"Oh, right," he said. "Sorry. I had a kind of checkered past, and I'm undergoing rehabilitation and stuff, but it turns out that when Mr. Hatterly said 'an offer he can't refuse' he meant saying money was no object."
"That's fine," Cilan contributed, by now sitting up in the limousine and drinking a herbal infusion courtesy of Pansage. "I'm glad to help, but I'd very much like my friends to agree to come along as well."
"In that case, it's fine!" Ash decided. "Hey, Keldeo, if there's not enough space then I can run alongside."
"It's actually really spacious in here," Cilan said. "I think Keldeo will be fine so long as he doesn't use Sacred Sword. Or if he does, he'd better sit under one of the sunroofs."
Once they arrived at Mr. Hatterly's house, the man – who was a butler, bodyguard, chauffeur or possibly all three – introduced them to Mr. Hatterly and the young Miss Hatterly.
"My dear little Marigold is going to get her first Pokémon soon," Mr. Hatterly explained. "And so I decided to get the advice of A-rank connoisseurs."
"Connoisseurs, plural?" Cilan asked. "So you're not just asking one?"
He thought about that. "Well, I suppose getting a second opinion sometimes leads to a true jambalaya of a dish."
A few seconds of silence elapsed.
"I can't tell if that's a good thing or a bad thing," Ash admitted. "Which is it?"
"Jambalaya can be nice," Cilan shrugged.
"Ah, I see the other connoisseur has arrived," said a man with blond-brown hair and a Purrloin on his shoulder. "Well, let's see if you agree with me, or if you're wrong."
"That's a bit arrogant, isn't it?" Pikachu asked. "Someone thinking that if you don't agree with him it means you're wrong?"
"I don't think so," Ash replied, with a shrug. "Or, uh, I guess it depends how you phrase it, because, sure, someone should admit they could be wrong, that's just good sense and good manners, but nobody would assume they were wrong or otherwise they wouldn't think what they think. They'd think something else."
"I'm going to assume that was a good point, and nod," Pikachu decided.
As he said that, Delta Purrloin walked through the side of Ash's bag.
"Hi!" he said, loping through the air over to the other connoisseur's Purrloin. "What's your trainer's name?"
"Shouldn't that be what's my name?" the conventional Purrloin checked.
"Nah, I know that, it's Purrloin," Delta shrugged. "But he hasn't introduced himself yet, and if he's going for mystique this way I get to find out what he's called without being rude and asking him. I'm respectful and also really really curious!"
"Ricard, as it happens," Purrloin told him. "Ricard Nouveau. He's old money, oddly enough."
"So he's a rich Nouveau Rich from old money," Delta Purrloin said. "I like it! Very stylish, reversing expectations. Sort of like a Ghost and Fairy type Purrloin! I was really proud of it when I came up with this one."
While Ricard's Purrloin tried to work out what this other Purrloin was on about, Ricard examined Cilan.
"I've heard of your skill," he said. "But you reek of inexperience."
"What does inexperience smell like?" Cilan asked. "I'll have to see if I can complement it with something to take the edge off!"
"If you must know, it's sort of like soap," Ricard told him.
Cilan nodded. "Oh, I see, yes. I think that's more you than me, it's something I've run into before…"
Purrloin went squeak as Mew proved that she really was Mew, and the Dark-type fell off Ricard's shoulder, bounced once, then flipped over and poised herself.
"I meant to do that," she said, in the face of the evidence.
"...we should probably move on to trying to decide on a Pokémon," Cilan suggested.
"I agree," Ricard nodded. "So, Miss Hatterly…"
At the sudden shift of attention, Marigold bowed briefly before moving back behind her father's legs.
"Hmm," Cilan mused. "That gives me a few ideas…"
"I agree," Ricard said. "And the first idea it gives me is to see what the available options are!"
The Hatterly house gardens were extensive, and Mr. Hatterly invited everyone to come outside and view them.
As they did, N slowed a bit, then trotted over to Marigold as the discussion between Ricard and Cilan got more technical.
"Are you all right?" he asked.
"Wow," Marigold breathed. "Can lots of Pokémon talk?"
"My friend Ash says all Pokémon talk, and some humans know to listen," N said, smiling. "I think he's right."
He lowered his voice. "Do you mind if I ask you a couple of questions?"
Marigold shook her head. "I don't mind," she told him, softly.
"I noticed that you didn't seem comfortable with humans," N went on. "Would you be able to tell me why that is?"
The young girl shuffled her feet.
"It's… hard to know what to say," she admitted. "I always get a bit… well, a lot… I never manage to speak up. Is that bad?"
"I don't think so," N told her. "It's just how you are. I was worried that something else was going on. You see, I used to know someone whose father made him think that other humans were horrible, and kept him from meeting or speaking to people so he wouldn't know the truth."
Marigold's eyes widened. "That's terrible!"
"I think so too," N said, and shook his head. "But that's not what's happening with you, so I'm glad."
She smiled shyly.
"Do you want to meet my friends?" she asked.
"That sounds great," N agreed.
"Ah, you see," Ricard said. "There is a definite grass-type air to Miss Hatterly, so it is my opinion that… yes, a Petilili would be the best choice."
Ash raised his hand.
"What is it?" Ricard said, a little testily.
"Why specifically a Petilili?" Ash said. "It's a Grass type, yes, but there's lots of Grass types! Like Shaymin, or Flapple. And, come to think of it, I guess I can see why you could decide that someone's best first Pokémon was a particular type, but wouldn't you need to check how that specific Pokémon got on with her before making the decision?"
"That's part of being a Connoisseur, unless you subscribe to the prescriptivist school," Cilan said helpfully. "Matching someone with a Type is the beginning of the process, not the end. I suspect in this case that Ricard is thinking in terms of the attitude he saw of Miss Hatterly being more on the demure side of things, which means that it's likely she could find a Petilili that would fit her, but that's not something that's guaranteed."
He frowned. "Besides, I think the Grass-type judgement is a good starting place, but it's missing something."
"Are you seriously telling me that you're going to argue with my judgement but accept the word of someone talking about Shaymin as if it's a Pokémon you can just meet?" Ricard said.
"There's a lot more Shaymin than people think!" Ash volunteered. "They just look a lot like flower bushes, or hummocks or grass, so people don't realize it."
"You're disagreeing, and that is because you're wrong," said a new voice.
An extravagantly moustachioed gentleman came strolling up, holding out an S-rank Connoisseur badge. "I am… Fauxgundy, yes. And I think you'll find my methods superior."
"Well, you are an S-rank connoisseur," Mr. Hatterly admitted. "And I may not understand how Connoisseurs work, but I do know that S comes before A."
"Not in the alphabet it doesn't," Pikachu said. "Hmm…"
"Now, where's the subject?" Fauxgundy added. "I need to get to work."
"Query," Zygarde said, raising their paw. "Are we going to ignore that that person is the previously encountered individual Burgundy wearing a wig?"
"I, that is," Fauxgundy began, then ran away.
"Was it something I said?" Zygarde asked.
"Yes, but I think it needed to be said," Ash replied.
Then N trotted over, along with Marigold.
"Oh, there you are, dear," Mr. Hatterly said. "Did you have a nice afternoon?"
Marigold nodded, glancing up at N, and N nodded as well.
"Marigold showed me her friends," he explained. "Including her best friend, who's a Foongus. She says that she's a bit worried about telling you, because she wasn't sure that Foongus was the sort of Pokémon that you thought a young lady should have, but I said that I hoped you were the sort of parent who would accept the truth of their friendship."
He looked a bit embarrassed. "Then Pidove and I helped the two of them train together a bit."
"So you've been training?" Mr. Hatterly asked. "And of course I don't mind if you have a Foongus!"
Marigold lit up, but N kept going. "Since the Unova Beginner Trainer's Handbook section 4 says you shouldn't overwork your Pokémon as a new trainer, then we went and had lunch."
"Oh, it is quite late, isn't it," Mr. Hatterly admitted.
"Then watched a movie," N continued. "I wanted to see what Brycen-Man movies were like, and now that I have I think I can say that Brycen-Man Strikes Again 2 is definitely a movie I watched. And after that we came back here."
Ricard checked his watch. "My word, it seems our argument caused us to completely lose track of time!"
"Quite," Cilan agreed. "Though I have to say, a Foongus is a perfect fit for Marigold – she's a little shy and retiring, but there's more to her than meets the eye. And of course they're good friends, which always helps!"
AN:
Asking is tricky with someone who's a bit meek, but fortunately N is someone who's been named as a future King but is not currently wearing the mantle, and is in addition – due to magic – a Colt Pokémon with a horn. This means, of course, that he's a magical unicorn pony prince.