Waking up to an Adventure - Indigo League

by pigeonsaurus

Ten year old Ash Ketchum is starting his Pokémon journey in the town of Pallet. Determined to beat his rival, Gary Oak, his less-than-stellar sleeping schedule and overexcitement makes it so he doesn't end up sleeping at all the night before. Exhausted but exhilarated, his journey to become a Pokémon Master starts here! Updates on Tuesdays.

48. The Evolution Solution

Chapter 48

It seemed that Mimey was waking Ash up earlier and earlier every day. But it didn't matter that the Psychic Pokémon had woken him up at the brink of dawn this morning, as it was the morning he was supposed to start his special training for the upcoming Indigo League atop the Indigo Plateau. Exhaustion still hung on his upper eyelids as he dragged himself off the futon on the floor and into the bathroom to start his morning routine. Once he was more awake, he noticed a commotion going on downstairs – much more than a normal morning.

Pulling his short-sleeved jacket over his torso, he headed downstairs to find no one in the house at all, so he stepped out on the front porch to investigate. The lemony yellow sun was just waking up for the day as well, and it was stretching its arms high into the air while still giving the sky a teal color. The moisture of dew was still heavy in the air as he stepped out and down his porch steps to see a long line of people with a bus driver dressed in a black uniform raising a flag to grab everyone's attention. He couldn't hear what she was saying, but saw that everyone was carrying a bag of some kind.

He found his mom at the front garden giving instructions to her Mr. Mime. The Barrier Pokémon had on its normal green apron, and was happily singing and sweeping the dirt road with a broom while it listened to its owner. "Hey Mom, what's going on? Where's everybody going?"

"Ash, I thought I told you," Delia Ketchum replied with a smile after she dismissed Mimey. "A bunch of us from the neighborhood are taking a little trip to Seafoam Island!"

"You are?"

"Don't goof off while we're gone!" a familiar voice piped up, and Ash looked at the head of the line of people to see Brock smiling at him whilst clutching the straps of his backpack.

"You're going to the beach, too?" Ash asked, and his traveling companion nodded.

"I'm gonna try wind surfing!"

A smile spread across Ash's face. "Great! I'll come with 'ya!" he said excitedly, and went to run forward. But suddenly, a hand grabbed the collar of his shirt, and he made a small gagging sound as he was pulled backward before he could get too far.

"Uh-uuuhhhh!" Mrs. Ketchum sang, pulling her son back and smiling down at him. "You have to start your Pokémon League training! At home." She didn't give him a chance to argue, either, and joined Brock at the head of the line before the line of people began to walk single-file.

"This way, everybody! Let's get going! The waves are waiting for us!" the female bus driver called, and everyone began to follow her and wave at Ash as they departed, all the while Ash was deflating more and more. Eventually, they disappeared into a bus down the road, and the Pokémon Trainer pulled the air back into his lungs, and when he did, he stuck his chest out and slammed his fists on his hips.

"It's not fair!" he pouted, but then immediately began to cough when Mimey swept the dirt path beside him and kicked dust into his mouth.

o 0 o

Typically, Ash would turn to Brock when he needed advice on Pokémon training. The Pokémon Breeder used to be a Gym Leader, so he knew a thing or two about training strong Pokémon. But with Brock gone, Ash just sat in his house absolutely alone and at square one with no ideas on how to even proceed. He sat on the couch feeling sorry for himself that he couldn't go to the beach with the others, and the T.V. played mindlessly in the background.

Silently, he wondered how Gary was doing. His battle the other day with his rival was one of the toughest he had ever faced, and it really pushed him and his Pokémon to his limits. He was extremely proud of the hard work they put in for him, but inside, he knew there was always room for improvement.

A local commercial came on featuring the three starter Pokémon of Bulbasaur, Charmander, and Squirtle. Those who had birthdays this year would be starting their Pokémon journey after the Pokémon League, and the commercial featuring the three starters also flashed a glimpse of Professor Oak. Ash blinked a couple times as the commercial faded to a food one, but it suddenly flashed off when the Pokémon Trainer hit the power button on the remote. Well, maybe he should try and see if Professor Oak had any tips for him.

It didn't take long for the dark-haired boy to reach the professor's lab, and when he pressed the doorbell, the door automatically opened, though no one was there to greet him. Furrowing his eyebrows together, he saw that the Pokémon professor wasn't in the lounge area, so he headed up a flight of steps to the older man's research area.

The room at the top of the stairs was very familiar to Ash – it was the room where Ash had received his Squirtle from the gray-haired professor, and where his Pokémon journey officially began. It was also here that he found Oak at his computer. His dark eyes were glued to the monitor in front of him, and he raked his fingers through his short hair with frustration etched on his face, messing up his gray locks and making it stick up straight.

"What's wrong, Professor? Do 'ya have a headache?"

The older man attempted to smooth his hair and swiveled his computer chair to the boy. "No, Ash. I've been wracking my brain for days trying to solve a great mystery of Pokémon evolution."

"What mystery?"

"Take a look at this." Professor Oak turned back to the monitor in front of him, and Ash stepped behind him to peer over his shoulder. On the computer screen, an image of a pink Pokémon appeared sitting on its backside. "Here we have a Slowpoke." Another Pokémon appeared beside it that Ash recognized from his Pokémon adventures. "And this is a Shellder. When the Shellder clamps onto a Slowpoke's tail, it becomes a Slowbro." The two Pokémon came together, and the screen turned white momentarily before a different Pokémon appeared on the screen. It resembled a Slowpoke, but it had a spiral shell on its tail and was standing on two feet.

"So that's how a Slowpoke evolves..."

"Yes, but I can't figure out why it happens!" Professor Oak let out a groan of annoyance and once again mussed up his hair. "I've got to solve this mystery!"

"Why don't you just use a Pokédex to look it up?" Ash suggested.

"The Pokédex doesn't have the answer, either." The two were quiet, and Ash let out a hum as he thought about solutions, but suddenly, Professor Oak sat up as a light bulb seemed to turn on in his head. "Wait! Professor Westwood! If there's anyone who knows the answer, Westwood does!"

"Professor Westwood?" Ash echoed, and to answer his question, the Pokémon researcher typed on the keyboard in front of him, and the image of a balding man with wild graying hair sticking out in puffs at the sides of his head appeared on the screen.

"He's one of the Pokologists who programmed the Pokédex!" He continued to type away at his computer, and he let out a hum of insight. "Ah, the professor lives on Seafoam Island."

"That's the place were my mom and Brock went!" Ash realized with a smile. "I think visiting him would really help with my training, don't you?" Professor Oak seemed to agree with Ash, and the Pallet Town Trainer was running home in a matter of seconds.

Quickly coming back the way he came, he hurried into his house and snatched up his backpack in his room before passing by Mimey, who was still outside sweeping the front porch. "It's beach time, Mime!" Ash called excitedly, happy that he was going to be able to go to the beach at long last. Mr. Mime waved innocently at the boy zooming by, and watched as he disappeared in the direction of the bus station.

o 0 o

When Ash stepped onto the sandy shores of Seafoam Island, the sun was high in the sky, hinting it was afternoon already. Seafoam Island was a small island that was connected to Fuchsia City by a bridge. Much like Cinnabar Island, the island was a tourist trap, though not quite as popular. The huge beaches that seemed to border the island were always filled with people, and the occasional Pokémon as well.

It was a beautiful day to go to the beach after all, and the sun's rays hitting Ash's skin wrapped him in warmth. He ignored the bits of soft, beige sand that melted from his feet with each step and slowly crept its way in between his socks and shoes, and stepped forward just in time for the remnants of a wave to rush past the rubber soles of his sneakers. The ocean mist sprayed and tickled his pores and stretched his arms high into the air.

"All right!" Ash exclaimed, and then looked out at the collection of windsurfers skimming the calm ocean surface and letting putting their faith in the breeze. His brown eyes looked back and forth until they fell on a familiar spiky-haired brunet in a blue bathing suit. "Hey! Hey, Brock! Over here!"

The Pokémon Breeder heard the familiar voice of his traveling companion and he slowed to a stop with a twist of the sail's rail and his frown was apparent even from the distance. "Ash! You're supposed to be training!"

But Ash was ignorant to it – or chose to ignore it. "I came here to do some special training!" Curiosity got the better of Brock, and he brought in his wind-board to the shore and quickly threw on his normal attire. After waiting for a few minutes for this, Ash and Brock headed out toward the more populated part of the island away from the beach with the dark-haired Trainer in the lead as he explained why he was at the island.

"We're meeting Professor Westwood – awesome!" Brock said with excitement in his voice. "Professor Westwood's the guy who programmed the Pokédex!"

"See, I told you I was coming here for training," Ash stated matter-of-factually.

The path that had been drawn out for them from a map printed out from Professor Oak's computer led them eventually to a large building near a cliffside that dropped down toward some rocks and the ocean. The building was white and square, and looked to be a military base at one point or another, and had since then been converted into a livable laboratory. There weren't very many windows on the square base of the building, but a large lookout tower that rose in its center had a weathervane sticking up like a lightning rod. It squeaked on its rusty hinges as they rang the doorbell at the front door.

At once, a man opened up that Ash recognized from his picture back in Pallet Town. He looked at the two younger males with a welcoming smile before speaking up. "Ah! Who have we here?"

"Hello, sir! My name is Ash, and I'm from Pallet Town."

"And I'm Brock!"

"I've been sent over by Professor Oak," Ash explained, and the researcher lit up at the mention of the name.

"My old colleague!" he perked up, and gestured inside. "Come in; come in! Any friend of the professor's is a friend of mine." The balding professor led the pair through a dark hallway with shining linoleum flooring, though it could hardly be seen because of how dark it was. The walls were lined to the ceiling with shelves, and each of them were stuffed to the brim with books and encyclopedias on a ton of subjects – but most of them pertained to Pokémon, of course.

"Wow, is this where you work on the Pokédex, Professor Westwood?" Brock asked, his voice echoing through the long hallway.

"Ah, 'professor' is much too formal; my friends and associates all call me Westwood the Fifth," Professor Westwood told him with his hands folded behind his back.

"The fifth?" Ash repeated as the hallway ended and they made it to a brightly-lit room that had large windows that let the sun pour in from every angle.

"Yes, the fifth," he nodded, and twisted around before gesturing to the beginning of a line of framed photos along a curled wall. "Here you see my great-great-grandfather Westwood the First, and his son my great-grandfather Westwood the Second. And that's his son, my grandfather Westwood the Third. And there's my father, Westwood the Fourth! And there's me: the one and only Westwood the Fifth." All of the portraits all featured men that looked exactly like the Westwood that stood in front of them, and Ash was reminded of Officer Jenny and Nurse Joy, how all of them were related and looked exactly the same. The only one that looked any different was the portrait of Westwood the Fifth himself, which didn't resemble how he looked at all. The painting made him look vastly different, with stronger cheekbones, a smaller nose and eyes, and his hair straight instead of curly. Lastly, a rose was sticking out of his mouth.

"The last one's a little... abstract..." Ash murmured, saying what was on everyone's mind. Though he wasn't facing them, the professor's shoulders seized up slightly, and he covered this up with a small cough and he cleared his throat to shake away the embarrassment.

"Well as you can see I come from a long line of Pokémon researchers," he stated, and turned back to them. "Currently, I'm working on updating all my research materials about the rarest, Legendary Pokémon."

"I'm into Legendary Pokémon, Westwood V!" Brock piped up instantly. "You must have tons of information on them!"

"Only what I've created myself because I'm not convinced most of them exist." Not comparing to what he actually said, he spoke as if they were talking about something as typical as the weather. "Right now, I'm working on a fictional account of the subject."

"Doesn't that mean you're making stuff up?" Ash deduced, and once again, the curly-haired researcher flinched back and pressed his pointer fingers together shamefully.

"Well, I guess you can say I'm making stuff up, I suppose..." he muttered quietly and quickly, and then hurried and looked up at the portraits that hung in their frames. "Forgive me Westwood the First! The second! The third! The fourth! The fifth! ...Oh, I forgot; that one's me."

Ash and Brock stared at the man as he cleared his throat once again, and the younger of the pair covered his mouth with his hand and whispered to Brock, "He's a little... eccentric."

"I think it's probably hereditary," Brock whispered back. "He must have gotten it from Westwoods I through IV..."

Attempting to move on, Professor Westwood V walked up to a window panel facing the sea and folded his hands behind his back as he peered out. "At the moment, I'm solving a real-life mystery... Surely, but slowly." Ash and Brock closed the distance between them to see what he was looking down at, and sure enough, standing on a rock formation down below looking out at the sea was a...

"Look! A Slowpoke!" Ash said excitedly as he pressed his face and palms against the glass.

"I want to discover why Shellder attaches to Slowpoke; I just don't understand why they evolve into Slowbro."

"Professor Oak hasn't been able to figure that out, either," Ash stated, remembering the whole reason that they were there in the first place.

"I need to study Slowpoke and Shellder until I come up with a theory to present to the symposium."

"The what?" Brock questioned with a cocked eyebrow.

"The Pokémon Symposium is the world's most respected Pokologists!" he explained.

o 0 o

Westwood V offered to let them hang out for the day to let them observe his research. Since we was such a profound researcher – despite his strange and erratic behavior – Ash and Brock happily agreed. However, they were quite confused when he led them outside on the rock formation by the ocean and sat down after dropping a fishing line in the water.

"Hey, Westwood V, why are you sitting there fishing? Shouldn't you be studying Slowpoke?" Ash questioned as he rested his hands on his knees.

"I am. Fishing is part of my research into Slowpoke's life cycle." Hearing his response, the two turned their head toward the pink Water and Psychic Pokémon, and found that in the time that they had come out, the Slowpoke had dipped its tail into the salt water and was sitting there patiently while still staring out into the ocean. "You see, Slowpoke is one of the few Pokémon that fishes."

"I'm gonna check to see what Dexter has to say about Slowpoke," the Pokémon Trainer commented, and brought out the red device and scanned the Pokémon.

"Slowpoke, the Dopey Pokémon. No one can tell what a Slowpoke is thinking, if it ever does think. Its specialty is fishing with its tail."

"Gee, that Pokédex entry is a little... mean," Ash frowned as he closed the cover to the hi-tech encyclopedia.

"Is that what you wrote about it, Westwood V?" Brock questioned, turning his head away from over Ash's shoulder, and the Pokémon researcher didn't even look up from his bobbing lure.

"Eh, maybe one of my assistants wrote that particular entry," he said, and then gave a glance to the Pokémon that was a good distance away. "But dopey does sound like an accurate, technical description of Slowpoke's mental capacity."

"I have to admit, it doesn't look too smart..." Ash agreed quietly.

"Hey, doesn't that look on its face look kind of familiar...?" Brock questioned, rubbing a thumb to his chin. "I just can't put my finger on why..." Suddenly, a flash of light burst from the Pokémon Breeder's backpack, and everyone looked as the light released from it condensed near Brock's feet, forming into his Psyduck.

"Psyduck," it uttered as it appeared, holding its head.

"Oh! Now I see it!" Brock realized, slapping a fist into his palm, and then instantly frowned once reality caught up with him. "Psyduck, why can't you just stay in your Poké Ball?"

Instead of responding to its Trainer, Psyduck's beady eyes stared blankly ahead, but it walked forward and approached the fishing Slowpoke, still holding its head. The pink Pokémon was muttering quietly to itself, but it stopped when Psyduck spoke up. "Psy?"

Hearing the other Pokémon, the Dopey Pokémon turned away from the ocean slowly and focused its glossy daze on the newly approached Pokémon. It stared at Psyduck for a few painstaking moments before finally speaking up. "Poke..."

"Duck."

"I bet this isn't the most intelligent conversation in Pokémon history," Ash commented.

"Can't say I disagree..." Brock added quietly as he watched the two Water-type Pokémon converse.

"Psy-yaiy..."

"Slow... Poke..."

"Psy?"

"Slow..."

"Duck?"

"Poke..."

"I think they're just saying 'hello', but we could be here all day before they think of anything else to say..." Ash stated whilst scratching the back of his head.

"Oh yeah..." Brock agreed with his hands on his hips while beside him, Professor Westwood was scrawling on a small notepad that he had fished out from his lab coat after observing the interaction.

At that moment, a Krabby poked its head out of the water and scuttled up onto the rock that Slowpoke and Psyduck were going back and forth on. The Krabby looked between the two before first pinching Slowpoke's tail before moving onto Psyduck's and pinching the Duck Pokémon's. Both Pokémon let out small cries and looked into each other's eyes as if frozen in time, and the Krabby jumped back into the water and submerged itself before a few more moments went by. Then, at the same time, Psyduck started to flail around as the pain of the ViceGrip attack set in its head, and Slowpoke waved its head back and forth as its brain processed the same.

"Oh brother..." Brock murmured quietly to himself, rubbing his forehead in embarrassment. As the two Pokémon continued to flail around from the pain in their tails, Slowpoke raised its own out of the water, and a Magikarp had its mouth stuck around the end of it.

"Look! It's got a bite!" Ash exclaimed. Though it was hard to know if Slowpoke even knew that it had finally caught something and it was swinging back and forth on its tail. Beside it, Psyduck was hopping around from pain, but it suddenly stopped and stood with its hands on its head as though nothing had even happened in the first place.

"Feel better, Psyduck?" Brock asked his Pokémon with a chuckle.

"All this fishing's made me hungry. Let's go have some lunch!" Professor Westwood V suggested, reeling in his fishing line.

"I want pizza!" Brock spoke up.

"Those hot dogs sure looked good!" Ash called out with a smile and a wave of his hand. Now they were speaking his language.

o 0 o

The wonderful thing about visiting a vacation spot was how often one got to indulge in the local food stands along the beach. Everyone sat on Westwood V's back deck overlooking the ocean, and had a different food item in front of them. Even Slowpoke was eating a meal in a basket provided by the curly-haired professor, and it ate slowly while rocking the bowl back and forth.

"Hard to believe a Pokémon like that has... figured out how to fish..." Ash commented as he watched it.

"How does a Slowpoke even fish with its tail, Westwood V?" Brock questioned as he swallowed a mouthful of food. "You usually can't catch anything unless you have some sort of bait."

"That's true, Brock, but you see, Slowpoke's tail is the bait." Looks of confusion passed between Ash and Brock, and the researcher explained further. "The tip of a Slowpoke's tail secretes a sweet, sappy substance naturally, and this is what it uses to catch other Pokémon."

"I didn't know that..." Ash stated, looking at the white-tipped tail attached to Slowpoke's backside.

"As a matter of fact, a Slowpoke's tail is considered a delicacy in certain parts of the world because of that sweetness," Westwood said. "But this doesn't harm them too much, since their tails grow back, but I digress. Slowpoke can catch lots of different Pokémon with its tail, but it almost seems like it's looking for a certain Pokémon. My theory is that it spends its time looking for a Shellder to attach to its tail."

"But why specifically a Shellder?" Ash questioned.

"That's what I'm trying to find out, Ash," Westwood replied. "I've seen this Slowpoke catch many Water-type Pokémon, like Goldeen, Krabby, and even Magikarp as you just saw. But none of them invoke any change in either party. So a Slowpoke will only evolve into a Slowbro when a Shellder clamps onto its tail."

"What do you mean by 'change in either party'?" Brock asked, and Westwood the Fifth reached down underneath his table and took out a laptop computer.

"Take a look at this computer simulation," he instructed, and Ash and Brock leaned in to see the screen. The image showed a Slowpoke walking by mechanically, and a Shellder hopped along behind it, and right before the Bivalve Pokémon clamped its shell onto the tip of its tail, it paused. "See here? Before it clamps on, Shellder had a hinged shell." The simulation continued with a press of a button, and a puff of smoke appeared around Slowpoke, and when it faded, a Slowbro stood in its place, and the video zoomed in on the Shellder on its tail, glaring at the camera with beady eyes. "But after it evolves, Shellder has a spiral shell!"

"Look at that! Interesting..." Brock commented.

"It's one of the most perplexing mysteries in the Pokémon world," Westwood V stated with a cross of his arms, but then his face lit up and he looked up into the sky. "If I could solve the Shellder puzzle, I'd go down as the most renown researcher in the history of the Pokémon Symposium! They'd replace the Westwood family portrait with a statue of me!"

As the older man bellowed out loudly at his own fantasy, Ash sent Brock a sideways glance. "Westwood's a little weird, isn't he?" he asked his traveling companion quietly.

"Hmm, yeah..."

Snapping out of his daydream, the Pokémon professor cleared his throat and covered his mouth with a fist as if to cover up his embarrassment. But before anything else could be said, Slowpoke stood up slowly and headed toward the stairway down to the rocks they had come from before.

"What is it doing?" Ash asked curiously.

"The day in the life of Slowpoke doesn't change too much," Westwood explained with a light smile. "It fishes, it eats, it fishes, and sleeps. Rinse and repeat."

"What a... carefree life..." Brock stated, watching as they watched it slowly trot down the staircase from the top of the deck. Just then, a familiar flash of light burst from Brock's backpack yet again, and in a blink of an eye, his Psyduck appeared at the top of the steps, holding its head.

"Psyduck?"

"Psyduck, when I put you back into your Poké Ball, you're not supposed to come back out," Brock scolded lightly. Psyduck ignored Brock – or didn't hear him – and only looked down to see its friend walking down the steps to the rocks below.

"Duck," it uttered, and stepped forward to follow after the other Water-type, but tripped and fell forward and tumbled down the steps. At the same time, Slowpoke also tripped halfway down, and both of them rolled down the stairs. Slowpoke was the first to fall on its stomach, and it simply laid there staring blankly ahead, and before it knew it, Psyduck landed beside it on its head.

The two Pokémon recovered in silence before slowly standing back up and locking eyes. "Slow..."

"Psy."

"Poke..."

"Duck?"

"Oh boy... Here we go again," Ash sighed as everyone got up and followed the pair of Pokémon down the stairs.

Slowpoke and Psyduck broke their conversation, and the Dopey Pokémon looked toward the ocean to walk to its favorite spot to begin fishing, but stopped when it saw something sitting in its spot. The pause in its steps caused everyone to look ahead as well, and they all gasped.

"Westwood V, look!" the black-haired Trainer exclaimed. There on the rocks, a purple-shelled Pokémon was sitting on the shore.

"It's a Shellder!" Brock pointed out with his eyebrows raising to his forehead.

"How interesting! This is the first time I've seen a Shellder up on these rocks," the Pokémon researcher stated. Hearing all the commotion, the Shellder opened up its shell and its beady eyes looked around before its large tongue rolled out of its mouth.

"Shellder!" it cried, and suddenly, its eyes locked on Slowpoke. The Pokémon sparked to life, and bounced after the pink Pokémon.

"Slowpoke!" Westwood the Fifth called, and Slowpoke saw the Bivalve Pokémon hurrying towards it and hurried out of the way. At the same time, Westwood's call grabbed the attention of Psyduck, and the Duck Pokémon twisted its whole body around to look at the man. Shellder had launched itself at Slowpoke, but when the Water and Psychic Pokémon moved, Psyduck was right behind it. Before everyone knew, the Water Pokémon clamped its shell around Psyduck's tail.

"It's gonna be a Psybro!" Ash joked, but Brock wasn't laughing and only looked exasperated.

"There's no such thing..."

Finally, Psyduck realized there was pain coming from its backside, and they could almost see the pain travel up Psyduck's body into its head, and while Slowpoke stood still, Psyduck let out a loud quack and began to run around in circles on the flat rock. "Psy-yaiy-yaiy! Yaiy-yaiy-yaiy-yaiy! ...Duck!" Skidding to a stop, Psyduck waved its tail and the wild Shellder finally let go and went flying into the air.

"Um, you know I made up that Psybro thing," Ash said, looking at Brock with a side-glance. But a loud call from the Shellder above grabbed everyone's attention.

"Shellder!" it announced, and began falling toward Slowpoke. It seemed like it had its eyes locked on the Dopey Pokémon's tail.

"Is it going to do it?" Ash questioned, as it seemed that the pink Pokémon hadn't even noticed that Shellder was in the air. As the Water-type closed in on the other, Slowpoke moved out of the way, and Psyduck took its place, holding its head and looking out into the ocean. This time, Shellder used its Clamp attack on Psyduck's head instead of its tail. The pain was immediate this time, and Psyduck cried out and waved its arms at its side as Shellder squeezed hard. Suddenly, Psyduck went deathly quiet, and its eyes pinched together and it held Shellder's shell on either side.

"Duuuuuuck..." Ash and Brock instantly realized what was going on.

"Psyduck only uses its most powerful attacks when it gets its most powerful headaches!" the Pokémon Breeder exclaimed. Once he finished, Psyduck's eyes ripped open, and they instantly began to glow blue. A rainbow aura shimmered around the Water-type's body, and it began to hum, and when it did, Shellder rose off Psyduck's head and floated into the air.

"It's using its Confusion attack!" Brock observed with a smile on his face.

"I've read about this attack, but this is the first time I've seen it!" Professor Westwood the Fifth said with delight, a smile on his face as he turned to a blank page and started to scribble on his notebook. He was in the middle of a word when suddenly, as fast as Psyduck's attack started, the glow instantly faded, and it cocked its head.

"Psy?"

With the attack cut short, Shellder quickly descended from the sky, and this time, when it landed, it latched itself onto Slowpoke's tail. The Pokémon was distracted by Psyduck and its power, so it wasn't expecting the aerial assault. Ash and Brock gasped, and Slowpoke's mouth hung open.

"Oh no! And I think in its own Psyduck way, Psyduck was trying to stop this from happening!" Brock moaned with a frown.

"Slowpoke..." Slowpoke muttered, and then, both it and Shellder began to glow white. Excitedly, Westwood V pulled his notebook up once again and readied his pen.

"Slowpoke is beginning to evolve!" he observed. The glow pulled Slowpoke's form upward, and its tail extended, and when it faded, a Slowbro stood on two legs in its place. And like in the computer simulation, Shellder had changed form completely, turning into a spiral spiked shell. "Ah! I'm the first researcher to witness this! Slowpoke evolved into Slowbro and Shellder changed into a spiral shape!"

"Slowbro..." Slowbro muttered, staring blankly into the distance.

"That was so cool!" Brock said, unable to help the smile that grew on his face.

"I'm sure glad we were here to see it happen!" Ash agreed.

"Now, you two are Pokémon Trainers, correct?" Professor Westwood asked rhetorically, and smiled at them with his hands folded behind his back. "How about assisting me in part two of my research?"

"Part two?" Ash and Brock repeated simultaneously.

"A Pokémon battle."

"A battle?! You can count me in!" Ash shouted excitedly, smiling from ear to ear.

o 0 o

The three – and Slowbro and Psyduck – walked onto the beach by Westwood's laboratory where there was no one to bother then, and Ash stood with a Poké Ball in his hand. "Ready when you are, Ash," the curly-haired Professor told him, standing behind his newly-evolved Slowbro.

"Right!" Twisting his hat backwards, Ash threw the Poké Ball forward. "Charmeleon, I choose you!" The burst of light that formed when the Poké Ball split opened quickly condensed into the red Flame Pokémon.

"Chaarr... meleon!" Ash's Pokémon cried as it appeared, throwing its head to the side and spitting a small flame.

"All right Slowbro; you're up," Westwood said to his Pokémon.

"What kind of attack does Slowbro have?" Brock asked off to the side.

"A very powerful one," the Pokémon researcher answered with his arms out as his side as if it were obvious, and then closed his fingers into a fist. "It's called... the Mega Punch."

"That sounds powerful to me!" Ash said. "Charmeleon, let's not give them a chance to use it! Hit 'em with your Slash attack!" Charmeleon threw its claws out and they started to glow white, and with a grunt, it rushed forward, kicking up sand as it ran.

Smirking at his Slowbro, Westwood the Fifth once again clutched his fist, but at his Pokémon. "Slowbro! Mega Punch attack!"

"Slowbro..?" Slowbro muttered, and simply stared straight ahead without blinking, or even moving for that matter. Finally, Charmeleon reached it and tore its claws across Slowbro's body before jumping back. Though the attack hit, Slowbro barely reacted to it, and in fact it just simply stared ahead as if Charmeleon weren't even there.

"They... didn't counterattack?" Ash asked with a cocked eyebrow, and Professor Westwood frowned and crossed his arms over his chest.

"It seems that Slowbro is suffering from one of the effects of one of its own attacks. Of... Amnesia." Everyone but Psyduck stumbled at his words.

"That's supposed to make its opponents forget!" Brock groaned, and Slowbro suddenly nodded and its dopey smile seemed to widen.

"Oh, now you remember Mega Punch!" While Charmeleon was trying to recover from its stumble, Slowbro reeled its arm back, and its fist began to glow brightly with a hot pink aura.

"Bro...!" it moaned, and swung its fist forward. The attack connected powerfully – leaving behind a pink streak of energy that radiated power, and Charmeleon was knocked clean off its feet. The Fire-type flew backwards through the air until it flew past Ash and skidded in the sand.

Ash and Brock both opened their mouth in a silent intake of breath, but before they could say anything, Westwood's eyes widened and glittered with realization, and he began to jump back and forth around Slowbro and scrawled erratically in his notepad. "I figured it out! My report will be the talk of the symposium! I'll get a standing ovation!"

"So, why does Shellder clamp onto Slowpoke's tail?" Ash questioned.

"Because it's mutually beneficial!" Westwood V replied shortly, continuing to scribble in his notebook while bouncing around his Slowbro.

When Ash gave Brock a confused look, the Pokémon Breeder elaborated. "That means it helps them both."

"Such an arrangement benefits both Pokémon as I will demonstrate!" the researcher stated with his nose in the air now that he was done writing. "Shellder clamps onto Slowbro's tail, which helps Slowbro balance when its stands on two feet. This way, Slowbro's front legs are free, so it can use attacks like the Mega Punch."

"That makes sense," Ash nodded.

"And because its clamped onto Slowbro's tail, Shellder may now travel on land," he concluded, and brought his notepad out once more. "I must make sure to get all of this down..."

"Shellder..!" the spiral shell on Slowbro's tail cried, and Slowbro looked on ahead at the ocean.

"Slowbro..."

o 0 o

The sun was beginning to dip below the ocean's line, turning both the sky and the sea different colors as night threatened to take over, and Ash and Brock, with Psyduck in tow, started to walk away from Westwood the Fifth's lab. But, they couldn't help but have the day's events still spinning in their mind. "Wow, that was really amazing!" Ash said excitedly.

"Ash, you didn't get a whole lot of training done today," the Pokémon Breeder scolded, but Ash only chuckled in response.

"Learning all about different Pokémon is part of my training, too!" But then a honk behind them grabbed their attention.

"Psy... Psy..." They turned around to see Psyduck looking behind at the lab they were walking away from, and a saddened look mimicked the way its arms hung low at its sides.

"What's the matter, Psyduck?" Brock asked his Pokémon, but the Water Pokémon didn't realize they stopped and collided with Brock's leg. Psyduck let out a cry and stumbled backwards, but caught itself and peered up at its Trainer. After a moment, the Duck Pokémon looked down at the ground, the sad look overtaking its features again.

"Psyduck..."

"Psyduck probably wants to say good-bye to Slowbro before we leave here," Ash realized, and then smiled and knelt down so he could look closer at his friend's Pokémon. "Don't 'ya, Psyduck?"

"Psy." The Pokémon's response was all they needed, and with the sunset as their backdrop, they went back to Westwood V's laboratory where they were led to his backyard. Slowbro was on its normal sitting area looking out at the ocean, and when Psyduck approached it, it peeled its blank stare from the ocean and beady eyes locked with beady eyes. For once, Psyduck wasn't holding its head, and the two stared at each other for what seemed like forever before Psyduck spoke up again. "Psy-duck."

"Slow-bro."

"Psy-duck."

"Slow-bro..."

The pair simply sat to the side and let the two friends converse. Both wore smiles on their faces, and Ash sat down and rested his chin in his palm. It wasn't often Psyduck got along with others so well. But this was certainly going to take a while.

o 0 o

Their plans to leave the island and go back to the Ketchum residence Town was thwarted by Psyduck taking a long time to say good-bye to its friend. By the time they had left Professor Westwood V's laboratory, it was already sundown, and they had missed all the buses back to Pallet Town. However, Ash wasn't too disappointed about this, and after finding a hotel with vacancy, Ash decided to train double-time the next day.

Early the next morning, he did just that. Instead of Brock waking him up, it was him waking up Brock. And together, they both put on workout clothes that sat at the bottom of their backpacks and decided to race the run as it was rising with a morning jog. Officer Jenny's words floated through his head as he was trying to think of ways to train.

"Ash, a master will never be respected if he won't do something he asks his own Pokémon to do."

This was back when he was trying to train Wartortle like Officer Jenny trained her Growlithe, and he figured that would be his first step in his Pokémon League training.

Wearing a white T-shirt with an orange zigzag across the chest, he also pulled up a pair of blue swim shorts over his legs. Lungs pounding against his ribs, sweat was pouring down from underneath his backwards cap as they ran down a road along a cliffside overlooking the beach and ocean. The traffic from the morning rush had yet to come out, so they were all alone, thus far.

Steadily behind him was Brock, and he could tell without looking from the way the Pokémon Breeder was puffing, and he turned his head back to look at him. He was wearing a matching jersey with basketball shorts that were red as his Charmeleon, and quickly falling behind. "Brock! Keep up the pace!" he threw over his shoulder, not wanting to get too far ahead of his friend, and despite the criticism, Brock wore a smile on his face.

"You sure are giving it a hundred percent!" he complimented. Ash returned the smile and turned forward to focus on his jogging.

The revving of an engine behind him told him a car was passing by, so the Pokémon Trainer moved to the left to get out of the way of the vehicle. But right at the moment that it shot past Ash, it ran over a murky puddle leftover in the road, and it sprayed him directly in the face. The black-haired boy flinched as dirty water dripped into his eyes, and as he cried out, smog from the exhaust pipe filled his lungs. The engine of the old Jeep sputtered and hiccoughed, and black smoke clouded his vision. Now it was Ash's turn to cough as his already-strained lungs contracted from the dirty air, and he stumbled out of the smog in order to breathe fresh air, but he was still blinded from the puddle. It was then that he heard the blaring of a horn, and Brock yell, "Look out!" before the screeching of tires sounded all around him.

What followed was the blaring of a thousand horns all around him, and angry yells from every angle. "Watch where you're going?!"

"Where did you learn to drive?"

"What?!"

"You started it!"

"You stopped short!"

"It wasn't my fault; he cut me off!"

"He swerved into me!"

After Ash was able to use his forearm to wipe the smog and water from his face, he blinked and his vision slowly returned to see cars all around him. All of them were safe, but all turned as though they had to turn suddenly. This only caused an influx of traffic behind them, and Ash looked around to see the drivers of the cars all were out and arguing with one another. "Hey, what happened?" he questioned. But before he could find out the answer, a whistle cut through the sound of an approaching motorcycle.

"Hey! Break it up!" the familiar voice of the island's Officer Jenny shouted through the arguing. And as Brock caught up to Ash, Officer Jenny went to work right away sorting out the traffic jam that had occurred. He quickly explained to her what had happened, and felt terrible, but aside from flared tempers, no one was hurt. She spent the rest of the sunrise sending cars along one at a time to get the flow of traffic going again. Her, Ash, and Brock stood to the side in the grass, and finally, when the last car in the jam was past her pointed finger, she lowered her whistle with one last blow into it, and smiled. "Well, that's over," she said, and turned her head to Ash with a gentle look on her face. "Next time be a little more careful."

"Yeah, I'm sorry," he apologized, looking bashfully down on the ground and resting a hand on his head.

"How come all of the cars have surfboards?" Brock asked. Though Ash hadn't noticed it at the time, when his friend brought it up, he realized what he was saying was true – on the roofs or sticking out of the trunk of most of the cars were large surfboards. Even on some of the cars that were passing by after the traffic jam had them.

"Because Humungadunga's coming," she answered nicely.

"Humungadunga?"

"It's a gigantic wave that only hits the island once every twenty years!" she explained, and the pair all gave a hum of admiration. They looked out onto the beach to see the sun sparkling the beautiful water, and saw that a collection of surfers had already made their way out into the salt water and were practicing their technique. As a wave rode up, a young man stood on his surfboard and rode it, however, strangely enough, he had a flag in his hand, and as he passed by a large rock jutting out of the water and reading for the sky, he drove the flag into the rock before wiping out.

"Looks like they're all trying to stick their flags into that rock?" Brock commented, and upon further observation, Ash could see that there were indeed many flags sticking out of the rock from all angles.

"They're all trying to be surfing legends," Officer Jenny told them as she folded her hands behind her back. "Like Jan was." They gave her a confused look, and she elaborated. "Jan! He was the greatest of them all! Forty years ago, he rode Humungadunga all the way to the top of the rock. Since then, surfers from all over the world have come here to try and match what Jan did. So far, no one else has ever put a flag at the top of the rock where Jan's is." Ash used his gloved hand to block out the sun above to try and get a closer look at the rock, and her words were true; only one flag was at the top and anywhere near it, and its ragged appearance waved politely at the black-haired Trainer. "But they keep trying."

"That must have been quite a wave..." Brock trailed off. While silence fell over them, an idea lit a light bulb in Ash's head, and he snickered to himself with a toothy grin.

In the next moment, Ash had discarded his shirt and hat and rented a surfboard from the local surf shop on the beach. Had he not been overcome with excitement, he would have seen the Psyduck pattern on the yellow surfboard and seen it as an omen, but he was too inspired by the story of Jan and completely ignored the hot sand between his toes as he rushed out to the ocean with a loud cheer. "This is my kind of training! Training to be the best like Jan!"

A ways behind, Brock watched his friend with a smile on his face and hands on his hips. He didn't scold Ash like he did the day before. "Ash has been training really hard, and we could all use a little fun!"

But Brock was already old news to Ash, and while the Pokémon Breeder stayed on the beach with his toes in the water, Ash was on his stomach and an unwavering smile from his face as he skimmed across the top of the water. He could see a wave starting to form, and excitedly, he got into position and balanced best he could on the surfboard. The wave formed and carried him along in its journey toward the shore, and the wind rushing through his hair and the exhilarating feeling in his stomach brought out an innocent laughter. "All riiiight!" he laughed. It was short-lived, however, when his legs and the board beneath him began to quiver, and his feet came out from under him. He let out a cry as he splashed into the cold water below.

He surfaced and found his board, and floated there for a minute in the ever-moving water to catch his breath, but a sharp pain separated his toes, and a powerful cramp nestled itself in his foot muscles. He took in an intake of air, and the pain was enough to force one of his eyes shut. "Ah! My foot! There's something wrong with my foot-" His yelps were overcome by a wave that washed over his head. The wet surfboard escaped his grip, and he quickly surfaced, though was finding swimming very hard with his cramped foot, so could only attempt to stay afloat. "Help! Help!" he gasped, flailing his hands above the water in an attempt to get Brock's attention.

He found his rented surfboard floating nearby, and paddled over to it and used it to stay afloat, but still couldn't get much farther with the pain in his foot. He felt as though he were being stabbed. "Ash, what's wrong?!" he heard Brock call from the shoreline with panic in his voice.

"It's... my foot...!" he managed to sputter out, but then the sun disappeared, and he looked up just in time to see a wave overtake him once again. He involuntarily cried out in horror as he saw this, and when the wave overtook him and forced him under, he swallowed a lungful of water.

It was an interesting sensation, trying to stay conscious. Everything was dark and cold, and he could feel water and silence all around him. He could feel his body being rocked back and forth by the waves coming from farther out in the ocean. But he suddenly felt movement in his body, and almost as if he were watching life happen through an old television set, he slowly opened his eyes, and through blurry vision, he saw a yellow Pokémon with a lightning bolt-shaped tail standing and looking out toward the water.

"A... Pika... chu...?" Ash murmured, but couldn't stay awake any longer, and the darkness overtook him.

o 0 o

When he next opened his eyes, he was lying on his back in an unfamiliar bed. His eyes still burned from the salt water that had invaded them and made his vision slightly blurry, but as he blinked back into reality, Brock's face appeared in his line of sight. His traveling companion peered down at him with concern. He had changed from his bathing suit back into his workout clothes. "Are you okay, Ash?"

Ash didn't answer the question, but instead looked around. He didn't recognize the room at all. "Where am I?" Likewise, the voice who answered he didn't recognize either.

"This is my cabin." He looked down at the foot of the bed to see an older man with long dark blue hair tied into a low-hanging ponytail leaning against the door frame that led into the room. A mustache covered half of his face, and his skin was permanently brown from the sun, hinting he spent a lot of time outside. "How are 'ya, kid? So do you hurt anywhere?" He wasn't smiling, but the natural look on his face was inviting and warm.

Pulling himself up on the bed, Ash folded his arms over the blanket that covered his bathing suit. "I'm okay. Who are you?"

"The name's Victor," he answered.

"Victor's the reason you're still here," Brock spoke up. "He saved your life, Ash!" Victor brought Ash a mug of tea, which the boy happily accepted.

"Oh, thanks!" he said graciously, wrapping his fingers around the warm cup. "And thank you... for saving me!"

"Oh, no. Don't thank me," Victor corrected, and his teal eyes flickered toward the window to his right. Ash followed his gaze to see a cliff sticking out over the ocean. It was a beautiful backdrop to see, but his eyes focused on one thing that stuck out on the cliffside. Standing at the edge was a yellow Pokémon: a Pikachu. Ash quickly remembered it as the Pikachu he saw standing on the surfboard before he went unconscious.

"Is that-"

"Thank my Pikachu, Puka."

"Puka?" The Pikachu heard its nickname and its ears twitched before it peeled its eyes away from the sea and peered back toward them. Though it was some distance away, Ash could tell that it was an older Pikachu from the tired wrinkles around its eyes, and the ruffles of fur around its head and ears. It only glanced at them for a second with deep blue eyes that were more blue than the ocean itself, and turned back to look back out at the horizon-line.

Ash sipped from the tea, but wanted desperately to get out of his bathing suit. Luckily, Brock had brought his backpack with them to Victor's cabin, and Victor directed him to the bathroom. After a few moments, Ash dressed in his workout gear that he had wore that morning and went back out to the kitchen to join Brock and Victor at the table where his tea was awaiting him.

He took another sip from it – this time longer than before – and felt the liquid soothe his sore throat before speaking up again. "So, do you live here all by yourself, Victor?"

"No, Ash," Victor responded with a chuckle. "I've got Puka."

And the boy replied with a small laugh of his own. "Yeah, that's right."

"Have you had Puka long?" Brock inquired beside Ash.

"Hmm, must be... close to twenty years now."

"Twenty years?!" Both boys responded with dropped jaws. That was almost double Ash's age.

"It's kinda unusual, because I didn't capture Puka like I would a regular Pokémon," Victor went on, and looked down at his cup of coffee in his hands. The sunlight pouring in reflected off the dark drink, and from the slight trembling of his hands, created ripples. "Puka... came to me from the sea." His eyes became foggy as he drifted down a river of memories. "I was sitting on the beach, lost in my own self-doubt. That was when I heard a small cry coming from the water. When I looked up, I saw him balancing on a piece of driftwood. It looked absolutely terrified. A wave formed behind it, and it rode the driftwood like a surfer would a surfboard, and that was when I got up and ran to it. Instantly, the Pikachu jumped into my arms, and looked up at me with the bluest eyes I had ever seen in my life. The journey must have exhausted the poor thing, because after that, it instantly fell asleep knowing it was safe.

"I can't explain how, or why it happened, but from that day on, Puka and I have never been apart..." Victor concluded his story by looking out through the opened window where Puka was visible here as well, simply looking out into the ocean as though it were an interesting television program it couldn't pull away from. "That Puka is one mysterious Pikachu."

"What do you mean?" Brock asked.

"Puka can feel the waves in its body."

"It feels the waves?" Ash echoed.

"In its body?" Brock added, and Victor nodded and folded his fingers together.

"Yeah, Puka can always sense when a big wave is heading our way. Puka can even feel how the waves are gonna break." He looked in the direction of a red surfboard with a large 'J' at the tip of it that was leaning against the wall off to the side that blended into the background until now. "Over the last twenty years, Puka and I... have surfed every big wave that's come our way." His eyes flickered from the surfboard to the line of pictures that were hanging near the entrance of the kitchen from the living room. "That's Puka and me twenty years ago." The picture featured a young man, clean-shaven and a teenager holding a Pikachu that was significantly smaller than the one standing on the cliff, but the blue eyes were unmistakable.

"Whose that in the picture under it?" Brock asked. The picture in question depicted a little boy with shoulder-length blue hair holding a yellow surfboard, and Victor chuckled.

"That's me forty years ago."

"Woah! Forty years ago!" Ash smiled.

"Uh, whose that in the other picture there? The guy with the surfboard?"

"That's Jan," Victor answered seriously. "A surfer named Jan." Both Ash and Brock gasped, remembering the name from Officer Jenny's story before this all happened.

Victor raised from his seat and approached the three hanging pictures, and looking at them as if he hadn't looked at them in a long time. Ash and Brock followed, wanting to hear more about how he knew the legendary surfer. "Back then, all the surfers wanted to be just like Jan. He was the best; he had the talent, the technique, no fear and a lot of style. I started surfing because I wanted to be just like him.

"I think Jan could sense the waves too. He always seemed like he was waiting for something he could tell... was coming.

"Then, one day, it finally came. The big wave – the one we call... Humungadunga." His serious face lightened up a bit as though unlocking a fonder memory. "That was the day Jan planted the flag on top of the rock. And became a legend."

He smiled under his mustache while staring at the smaller version of Jan grinning back at the older version of Victor. His golden hair was lighter than his sun-kissed skin, and fell down behind his back. "'Hey! You can do it too!' That's what Jan said to me when he handed me his surfboard. Then he went off, to surf the world.

"Twenty years later... I challenged the big wave." Ash and Brock smiled when they heard this, but Victor's face didn't reciprocate this, and he looked down at the floorboards as a shadow fell over his face. It was obvious it wasn't a good memory this time. "It was the biggest disappointment of my life. And I never wanted to surf again.

"Then I found Puka!" A chuckle curled his lips. "Or, Puka found me. And I learned to love surfing all over again. And so if it weren't for Puka, I don't know where or what I'd be." This time, Ash and Brock let the smiles overtake their face. The three pictures on the wall really told the story of Victor's life. "Since then, Puka and I have teamed up and conquered every kind of wave you can imagine. There's just one left: Humungadunga."

"You and Puka can do it!" Ash assured his savior excitedly. "I can sense things too and this time I know you're gonna beat it!"

"Thanks, Ash! We'll try!" While they had been talking, a strange, eerie silence had fell over the ocean. The constant breeze that was carried along with the waves had died down, but they hadn't noticed it until it wasn't there. It was the same with the constant crashing of the waves. There were none.

A boom of thunder broke through the silence in the distance, and Ash and Brock didn't pay any mind to it, but reacted when Victor did. His head twisted in the direction of the ocean, and he hurried over to peer out the window. There, Puka stood, and its tail and ears were straight up, and it almost looked like there was a faint blue glow around it. "Could... Could it be?" Victor stuttered. As Ash and Brock went to the window, that's when they saw it. Rising up in the far distance, a giant wave was coming toward them. "It's the big wave... Humungadunga!"

Victor moved as fast as lightning, and crossed the kitchen to grab the surfboard leaning against the wall, something else from a shelf, and, removing his shirt in one go, ran to the front door. "Puka!" The Pikachu was close behind him, and as the surfer rushed outside through the front door, the elderly Pikachu jumped onto his shoulder with the spry of a young one, and hurried down onto the beach.

Ash and Brock followed after him, but while they went down, Officer Jenny's whistle pierced the beach. "A tidal wave's approaching shore! Evacuate the beach and head for high ground immediately!"

"Victor!" Ash cried as the older man ignored her warnings and splashed into the water.

"Don't worry, Ash! This is the moment Puka and I have been waiting twenty years for!" he assured him. Ash was silent as Victor dove into the water with Puka on his surfboard, and him and Brock exchanged a nod before merging into the crowd that was hurrying up on the cliff that blocked off the beach. Despite being such a huge deal and drawing in surfers from all over, it seemed as though Victor was now the only one brave enough to go in headfirst. Everyone else gathered at the guardrail, and Ash and Brock pushed their way to the front to be able to see.

"Victor... Puka... I don't see them anywhere!" Ash stated, his eyes dancing across the water. But they were quickly drawn to the giant wave that was getting larger and larger by the second. It had hard to imagine a wave reaching higher than the flag-covered rock that stuck out from the water, but now that they saw Humungadunga up close, it was jaw-dropping. The wave reached higher than the rock. But as he compared the sizes of the wave and the rock in his head, that was when he saw it, and gasped.

At the top of the giant wave, his eyes locked onto Victor and Puka. As he had seen briefly when Victor saved him, Puka was squatting at the nose of the board, a small smile crossing his face. Behind him, Victor was balancing perfectly, and he looked like it was as natural as breathing to him. "They're riding the wave!" Ash and Brock exclaimed together. Puka got down on all four paws, and Victor leaned his body, dragging him to the right and down the side of the wave while still staying toward the stop. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out the object he received from his drawer, and unraveled it – it was a green flag with a red 'V' on it.

Holding it in a ready position above his head, he leaned backwards, and as the wave threatened to swallow the rock, Victor sped up and his surfboard left the wave and flew through the air. The surfer's yell was audible even from where they were at, and as he passed by the rock, he brought the flag down and jammed it into the rock, directly beside Jan's ragged flag. Seconds later, the wave engulfed the rock, and Victor's board managed to catch the residual waves and stay upright. "They did it!" Ash yelled as he threw his hands up in victory.

"All right!" Brock cheered, and the water rushed up onto the beach, swallowing the sand and anything that was left behind in the sudden evacuation. The sea spray hit Ash and Brock as the salt water crashed up the cliff, but that didn't stop the smiles on their faces from faltering at all.

"I knew they could do it!" Ash said, and chuckled, watching as Victor and Puka sat on the surfboard in the water, their backs to them as they admired their dream that had just come true. "I bet Jan would be pretty proud!"

Once it was safe to be able to go back down onto the beach, Ash and Brock were the first ones to rush onto the sand, and made it just in time for the old surfer and his Pikachu to step onto the sand as well. "Victor, that was awesome! Congratulations!" the dark-haired boy said. Victor seemed to be beyond words, and only laughed and gave him a thumbs up.

Puka was just as appreciative, and nodded up at the pair. "Pi, pi!" Victor smiled down at his Pikachu, but then his eyes looked at the crowd that had formed behind them. His eyes fell upon a pair of children. Each of them held surfboards, and their eyes glittered with admiration. His smile falling behind his mustache, he approached the children, and knelt down in front of the two, a boy and a girl, and looked at them both in the eyes.

"Hey. You can do it, too!"

Both children took in a sharp intake of breath, and exchanged excited grins and nodded in thanks at their new idol. "All right!"

Victor nodded back, and at that moment, Puka jumped up on its Trainer's shoulder. The blue-haired surfer chuckled and rubbed his head against the elderly Pikachu's. Their dreams had come true.

-end-

Ash:

Party:

Blastoise (Poké Ball)

Moves: Skull Bash, Dig, Hydro Pump, BubbleBeam

Pidgeotto (Poké Ball)

Moves: Gust, Quick Attack, Whirlwind, Double-Edge

Bulbasaur (Poké Ball)

Moves: SolarBeam, Vine Whip, Razor Leaf, Leech Seed

Charmeleon (Poké Ball)

Moves: Flamethrower, Fire Spin, Skull Bash, Slash

Tauros (Safari Ball)

Moves: Fissure

Primeape (Poké Ball)

Moves: Thrash, Mega Kick, Scratch, Seismic Toss

At Professor Oak's Lab:

Muk (Poké Ball)

Moves:

Tauros (Safari Ball)

Moves:

Krabby (Poké Ball)

Moves: ViceGrip

Badges:

Boulder Badge

Cascade Badge

Thunder Badge

Marsh Badge

Rainbow Badge

Soul Badge

Volcano Badge

Earth Badge

Brock:

Party:

Onix (Poké Ball)

Moves: Tackle, Bind, Dig

Geodude (Poké Ball)

Moves: Seismic Toss, Tackle

Zubat (Poké Ball)

Moves: Whirlwind, Supersonic

Psyduck (Poké Ball)

Moves: Tail Whip, Water Gun, Disable, Confusion

Vulpix (Poké Ball)

Moves: Fire Spin, Flamethrower, Agility