"Well, here we are," Max said, as they stepped off Drake's ship. "Izabe Island."
He turned back. "Thank you for all your help, Mr. Drake!"
"It was a pleasure, lad," Drake replied. "That goes for all of you, naturally… it's nice to see someone who appreciates such a fine Pokémon as a Swablu, but you've all been good company."
Then he frowned. "Though I must say, Ash, you had a strange perspective on that Magikarp that Fitzwilliam was training."
"Yeah, I still say that it's a bit weird that they don't evolve into Dragon types," Ash said. "At least, not that I know of… there's ones from other places in the world, for some Pokémon, but I can't think of any where Gyarados is a Dragon type. Maybe I'll have to ask someone about that."
"If you think you know anyone who'd know, be my guest," Drake snorted.
Ash thought he probably did have, at the very least, a way to find out, but it'd be a weird thing to ask.
At first.
It might make a good safe conversation topic if they were having trouble talking about something else, though.
"Well, now, Ash, I hope to see you at the Ever Grande Conference," Drake said, with a wave. "You now, and that friend of yours in a few years!"
Ash knew it was a polite thing to say, and that he probably didn't really stand out to Drake, but-
Well. He probably didn't stand out to Drake in terms of his skill as a trainer, because a lot of it was just that he could actually understand his Pokémon. But he probably did stand out to Drake as a person, because he was such an unusual Pokémon himself.
But it was nice, anyway. And just knowing that meant Ash could sort of… treat it as a nice thing, and also dream about how true it was as well.
"So, who do you think you're using?" he asked May, curious.
"Probably Bulbasaur," May answered. "I think she's ready now, but I'll ask her and if she's not it'll be Octillery instead."
"Octillery?" someone asked. "My my, how interesting."
The friends all turned, and saw that there was a man with a strange outfit approaching them.
"Uh," Max began. "Are you… dressed like a Cacturne?"
"Indeed!" the man said. "The best Pokémon, in my opinion, though of course Octillery is quite fine as well. Tell me, what others do you have?"
He was directing his attention at May, so she was the one who answered. "Combusken, Bulbasaur, Beautifly and Skitty."
"Hmm, now," Harley considered. "Some of that team sounds quite conventional to me, but I'll reserve judgement for now. Harley, by-the-by."
"Conventional?" Ash asked.
Probably-called-Harley looked confused. "Oh, you're a talking Pokémon? Now that is unusual. I wondered if she was going to mention you, but I suppose you and the Pikachu must be someone else's."
He waved a hand. "Well, I'm sure I'll see you in the Contest. May the best man win."
"...uh," May began. "Aren't you going to ask my name? And, I'm a girl."
"Of course, how rude of me," Harley said. "Your name is?"
"May," May introduced herself. "May Maple."
"Oh, then, May, the best man will win," Harley said.
None of the friends said anything for the next minute or so.
"He was odd, right?" Latias asked. "I'm still not great at telling that, but… he was odd?"
"So, what is a Cacturne like, anyway?" Ash asked, quietly, as Harley stepped out onto the Contest stage.
He glanced back at his bags, then did his best to get the trick right. It almost worked, and he got his Pokédex out of his saddlebags but dropped it on the way over to where he could use it.
Latias caught it deftly. "You want to scan Cacturne, right?"
"Yeah," Ash agreed. "But without making any sound."
Pikachu muted the Pokédex, then Latias held it up, and Ash watched as the information scrolled across the screen.
"Grass and Dark type," he murmured. "Neat."
Harley's Cacturne then got to running around at speed, shooting Bullet Seeds at the arena floor, and left a pattern of pockmarks in the face of a skull-and-crossed-bones.
"I don't always get why parts of an Appeal get points," Max said. "Do you?"
Ash thought about it.
"I think… maybe it's that Cacturne had such good aim?" he suggested. "Cacturne was running fast, but their Bullet Seed marks were nice and even and made the pattern. So it shows Cacturne can do art, not just run around firing at the floor."
Max nodded. "That does make sense… well, May's up next. Let's see what she does."
"Ssh!" someone behind them hissed.
"Oops," Max blushed.
They'd known May was using her Bulbasaur, but hadn't had a very good idea of how she was going to use Bulbasaur… and, as it turned out, Bulbasaur combined three different things.
The first was Razor Leaf, where she sent out a set of half-a-dozen large leaves that whipped around in a circle, and the second was Vine Whip, where she used her Vine Whip vines to snag leaves she'd already fired and flick them in different directions.
The third part was Sunny Day.
Bulbasaur had been paying attention when Koraidon tried explaining what it felt like to turn on her ability or use Sunny Day, and May and her Grass-type between them had refined Sunny Day into a more Contest-friendly bright glowing orb that shed sunlight… and Bulbasaur's Vine Whipped Leaves were able to flick past the orb at incredibly short distances, throwing shade projections over the crowd and even prompting some of the leaves to start smouldering.
It was a fine debut for Bulbasaur, and she won a round of applause – and, once the scores had been tallied, a place in the Battle Rounds.
"Hmm," Ash said quietly, thinking. "Now I wonder if we should teach Koraidon Solarbeam. It's not an especially important move for her coverage, but it would be one she'd be naturally suited to using… that or Solar Blade, anyway."
"What about Miraidon?" Pikachu asked.
"Thunderbolt first, for them," Ash answered. "They don't really need Solarbeam for much… Ground types maybe, though. I'll think about it."
Harley's semi-final Battle Round was against a Coordinator with an Azurill, and Ash still wasn't an expert on Coordinating but it seemed a lot like Azurill was too focused on the Appeal side of things and not enough on the Battle side of things.
The little Normal-type blew Bubbles and bounced between them, which did look cute, but Cacturne just popped all the bubbles with pinpoint Poison Sting attacks and prevented his opponent from continuing with that – then, followed up with a Bullet Seed barrage, which took Azurill out of the battle in one go.
"He may be weird, but he does seem well rounded," Pikachu decided. "We'll see how he gets on with May's Pokémon, I suppose, but he was certainly more ready for the battle side of things than his opponent."
Ash nodded, seeing that Latias was doing the same and thinking hard, then watched as May took her place out on the Contest stage.
Her opponent's Pokémon was a Surskit, and May closed her eyes for a moment as she visibly thought about what to do.
"Begin!" the announcer said, and May called for a Sunny Day straight away.
The flash of sunlight didn't do anything to slow down Surskit, who came charging in with a balletic spin to use a Quick Attack, but it did do something else – it sped Bulbasaur up considerably.
It had taken a while to notice that Bulbasaur was more full of energy during the time Koraidon was out and training with her sunlight-boosting ability, because normally Bulbasaur didn't move around all that much in the middle of a battle.
All her attacks could be used without moving around… but she could move fast, under sunlight, and avoided Surskit's first attack with a dodge that incorporated a twirl.
"Razor Leaf, forwards!" May called out. "Then flick them at Surskit, to your – left!"
Bulbasaur did just as instructed, firing out two large Razor Leaves before grabbing them with her vines and slinging them at Surskit. It was a lot more complicated and technical than just firing the attacks straight at Surskit, but it was much more impactful to the scores… which was fortunate, because a moment later Surskit fired a Water Pulse up at Bulbasaur's Sunny Day orb and visibly dimmed it it in a puff of steam.
That got some points even though it hadn't actually hit Bulbasaur herself, and May hesitated before pointing. "Razor Leaf, fling them through the Sunny Day and then catch them!"
The new twist helped out, losing her opponent more points when the Razor Leaf attacks struck home, and Ash tried his best to keep track of what was happening.
Then he carefully reminded himself to not think about things going better for May too hard, in case he accidentally used Confusion. It would be both cheating (in May's favour), which could get her disqualified, and wrong (on a moral level).
So there were several good reasons to be very careful to not do anything.
"Razor Leaf, all directions!" May called suddenly. "Jump!"
Bulbasaur managed to do what May was after, though it was difficult, and Surskit found itself without any good places to be as Bulbasaur fired out a kind of spiral of leaves.
"Unless she messes up in the next few seconds, she's in the finals," Latias said. "I think?"
"Looks like," Ash agreed, then began wondering if that was something you could say about Pokémon Battles.
It felt like… maybe? But he wasn't certain. It certainly felt like Pokémon Battles could be turned around more easily than Contests, simply because you couldn't end up with a points deficit in a battle.
Before the final, Harley clasped his hands and gave May a serious look.
"I hope you're not going to be all conventional," he said. "That would be dreadful."
"I guess that depends what you mean by conventional," May replied, frowning. "Do people usually lose in battles against you?"
"Of course!" Harley replied. "This isn't my first Contest, and it's not my first victorious one either."
"Then I'll try my best not to do the conventional thing, there," May said.
Harley considered her.
"Not bad," he decided. "We'll see what happens. Cacturne, make an entrance!"
He threw out Cacturne's Pokéball, and the Grass-type landed before striking an intimidating pose.
May sent out Bulbasaur in return, then got the attention of her Pokémon.
"Bulbasaur?" she asked. "I'm going to give some instructions in a moment which might seem like too much for you. If you think they are, don't follow them."
"Oh?" Harley said. "I wonder what you could be alluding to."
"You'll see," May answered. "Or not, depending what Bulbasaur thinks."
Bulbasaur gave a determined nod.
"Begin!" the announcer said.
"Sunny Day!" May instructed, immediately. "Now, Razor Leaves – straight up in the air!"
"Poison Sting," Harley said, with a flourish, and Cacturne peppered Bulbasaur with Poison Sting attacks.
May's points went down, but she pointed anyway. "Catch those leaves in your vines, Bulbasaur! Now – run your vine tips right through the Sunny Day!"
"Pardon?" the announcer asked.
Bulbasaur gulped, then lit the bundles of leaves in her own vines on fire.
That gave her a pair of flaming implements, and May pointed. "Quick – move right! And attack, one-two and both!"
Bulbasaur's vines flicked out at Cacturne, trailing smoke, and Harley called for a Bullet Seed to deflect them. That worked for one vine, but the other scored a hit anyway.
"...do you ever wonder if Ash is a bad influence on someone?" Latias asked.
"All the time, including with himself," Pikachu replied.
"Hey," Ash protested.
When the battle was over, May had her fourth ribbon, and Bulbasaur had her vines doused by Octillery to put them out.
"Maple," Harley said, getting her attention.
"Huh?" May asked. "Is something up?"
"You're not gloating," Harley observed. "That's very noble of you. I suggest learning to enjoy gloating, it's a lot of fun. But, more importantly…"
He gave her a small nod. "I'm impressed, I can admit it. Keep it up, and perhaps you'll get to be beaten by me in the Grand Festival."
AN:
Harley is a bit odd.