Sorry this didn't come out yesterday, but I've been swamped with work since College restarted. But I have a 3 hour gap between classes today, so I decided to update it today. I've also decided to change the update schedule to fit mine better, so now each chapter will be coming out on Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays. Also, I'm bringing another new character in, and I've decided to give them Autism, since I've always felt that Pokémon has a huge lack of representation, and I don't just mean LGBTQIA+. Everyone in the series is neurotypical (accept Ash, who definitely has ADHD and absolutely nothing you can say will change my mind on that), so I'm adding a neurodiverse character to the roster. I hope you enjoy this chapter.
Chapter 48:
Wordless Way of Battling
The next day, Max and Bonnie meet up with Ash and Serena again by one of the city's fountains. They plan on heading out to Laverre City next week, in order to give Bonnie time to actually begin learning about Aura. In particular, she wants to know how Ash managed to learn how to control it the way he does. "It's actually a pretty complicated story," he tells them. "You remember the Tree of Beginning, right Max?" Max nods his head. At the look of confusion on Bonnie and Serena's faces, the two boys explain what it is (which I'm not going to do because I can't be arsed. If you want to know, go watch Lucario and the Mystery of Mew). Once they're finished, Ash continues. "Well, shortly after the Masters Eight Tournament, I heard something calling to me from the Tree. I went to investigate, and found the crystal that Lucario and Sir Arron disappeared into. It showed me a vision of Mt. Silver, so I took it up there. When I did, Sir Arron and Lucario came out of the crystal, like ghosts. They were the ones who trained me."
Everyone is amazed by this tale. "So, Aura allows you to speak with ghosts?" asks Max. "More or less," Ash replies. "I can speak with the ghosts of previous Aura Guardians, but only those who bonded their Aura to something before they died, like Lucario and Sir Arron did." Bonnie is practically bouncing with excitement at this. "Oh, I can't wait to get started!" she exclaims. "I've never seen Aura before now!" This sentence seems to jog Ash's memory. "Oh, that reminds me," he says, "you have actually seen Aura before!" Bonnie's jaw drops at this. "When?" she asks. Ash smiles and pulls out a pokéball. "With this guy!" he replies, before sending the pokémon out. Max can only describe the pokémon that came out as a ninja frog, with a long pink tongue curling around its face like a mask. Bonnie's eyes widen at this. "Ash-Greninja!" she exclaims, running over to hug the big frog.
Ash smiles at her reaction. "Through Sir Arron, I finally learnt how Bond Evolution works!" he tells her. "How!?" both Bonnie and Serena ask immediately. "Through a connection made with Aura," Ash replies. "Greninja's Aura connects with mine when our emotions are in perfect sync. When that happens, a connection is made, and Bond Evolution occurs." Bonnie's eyes widen at this. "Do you think this could happen with me and Fennekin when she finally evolves into a Delfox?" she asks. Ash nods. "I'd say so," he replies. "Then you'll have your own Bonnie-Delfox." Everyone winces slightly at that. "That doesn't have as nice a ring to it as Ash-Greninja" Serena comments. Bonnie nods. "Let's think about something else" she agrees. "How about Aura-Delfox?" Max suggests. "Since this Bond Evolution is triggered by a strong Aura connection, I just thought it fit." Everyone thinks about that, before Bonnie nods enthusiastically. "I like it!" she announces. "Let's go with that!" Max blushes, but looks pleased.
The conversation moves on to other matters, such as Bonnie's next badge, and how Max's book is coming along. After about half an hour of this, they decide that Ash should finally start training Bonnie in Aura. But right as they're about to leave, they hear a voice call out to them. "Ash, is that you!?" Everyone spins around, as a look of recognition crosses Ash's face. he person calling out to him is a young woman about his and Serena's age. She's blonde, with her hair tied back in a ponytail, and wearing a white dress. Accompanying her is a small gathering of people. There's a tanned girl with green hair, a pale girl with blue hair, an even more tanned and muscular boy with black and red hair, a short and rather rotund boy with yellow hair, a pale boy with bleach blonde hair, a dark skinned boy with auburn hair, and a tall, pale boy with jet black hair and blue eyes. They're all waving to Ash from a nearby café.
Ash brightens when he sees them. "Hey everyone!" he calls. "It's good to see you all again!" Then, he leads his group over to the bigger one and introduces everyone. The blonde girl who called his name is called Lillie, the green haired girl is called Mallow, Lana is the blue haired girl, Kiawe is the tall, dark skinned one, Sophocles is the fat one, the emo guy is called Gladion, and the other guy with dark skin is called Hau. As for the last boy, Ash doesn't know him. "His name is Elio," Lillie explains. "He moved to Alola about 3 years ago now." Elio waves, but doesn't say anything. "Where are you originally from?" Max asks. Elio picks up a white board that was sitting on the table and scribbles something down. "Kanto" he writes. Max wonders why he doesn't speak, but Lillie answers his question before he can ask.
"Elio is unable to speak," she explains. "So he uses sign language and white boards to communicate." "Why can't you speak?" Bonnie asks, before quickly realising how rude of a question that was and apologises. Elio waves his hand to say it's fine, then writes something else. "ASD" he explains. "So, what brings you to Kalos?" Serena asks the group. "We're here to support Elio," Hau explains. "He's here to challenge the league." Max's eyes widen at this. "If you don't mind me asking, how can you challenge to league if you can't speak?" Max asks. Elio picks up his whiteboard again to start writing, but Sophocles stops him. "How about you show them instead?" he suggests. Elio thinks about that, before nodding. He pulls out one of his pokéballs, and Max pulls out his, curious to see Elio's battle style. "Will we do a one-on-one?" Max asks. Elio nods, but Gladion steps in. "How about a two-on-two?" he suggests. "To truly show them how you battle?" Both Max and Elio agree to this, and step out into the street.
Lana volunteers to be the referee, and lays down the rules. Once she's done, she calls for both battlers to choose their 1st pokémon. Max decides to use Mightyena 1st, and Elio sends out a big red and black bipedal cat, that Max's pokédex identifies as a Incineroar. The battle begins with Max ordering Mightyena to use Assurance. In response, Elio raises his right leg and stamps down hard. As soon as the noise is made, Incineroar leaps to the right, successfully avoiding the attack. Then, Elio claps his hands once. At this, Incineroar charges forth with a Flame Charge, striking Mightyena dead on. Max counters with crunch, with does a bit of damage, but not a lot. Elio then jumps in the air and slams both feet into the ground. At this, Incineroar rushes in with Darkest Lariat, dealing major damage to Mightyena. Mightyena tries to hit Incineroar with Snarl, but Elio stomps with his left foot, and Incineroar dodges left. Then, Elio claps twice, and Incineroar uses Fire Pledge, finishing Mightyena off.
Max returns Mightyena, and to his surprise, Elio returns Incineroar. Then, the two send out their next pokémon, Max sending out Gallade, and Elio sending out a giant bat-like pokémon called Noivern. Max expects to hear the same sound commands as last time, so he's quite surprised when Elio starts off by snapping both of his fingers. Noivern immediately uses Air cutter, which Gallade isn't quick enough to dodge. Gallade goes in and uses close combat, which does some damage. But Elio puts his fingers to his lips and whistles. When he does, Noivern shoots out a Dragon Breath, doing loads of damage to Gallade. Gallade tries to use slash, but Elio stomps to the right again and Noivern avoids it. Then, Elio finishes the battle off by cracking his knuckles. When he does, Noivern uses sky attack, knocking Gallade out.
Max, Bonnie, Ash and Serena are stunned by this. "That's incredible!" Max shouts. "That must've taken so much effort to perfect. You're amazing!" Elio blushes at this and does a sign that Max can only assume means thank you. "See?" Hau exclaims, wrapping his arm around Elio's shoulder. "He'll have no problems with the League!" Serena chuckles at that. "I bet you've already won the Alola or Kanto Leagues by now too" she comments. At this, Elio shakes his head sadly. "He only got his first pokémon 3 years ago," Mallow explains. "He tried to compete in the Alola League, but he got disqualified." "What? Why?" Bonnie asks. "He was accused of cheating," Gladion explains with a hint of bitterness in his voice. "Many of the contestants, and even some members of the League, believed that Elio was lying about being mute in order to use sounds to direct his pokémon. They called his tactics underhanded." "That's totally unfair!" Serena exclaims. "He probably had to work twice as hard as everyone else to train his team too!"
Lillie and Hau nod at this. "He did," Hau replies. "What he did was he got his pokémon to trust Lillie and I, and had us call the order for a move. Whenever his pokémon did a move, Elio made a sound after it. Eventually his pokémon learnt to associate the noise with the move." "But what if he's accused of cheating again?" Ash asks. Lillie smiles at this. "You seem to forget that Gladion and I are rich," she replies. "We managed to use some of our wealth to talk the League into accepting Elio's tricks, on the condition that Elio shows them what each sound means beforehand, so that they can broadcast the meaning onto big screens behind his head in official matches, taking away any advantage an opponent may claim he has." Elio smiles happily at Lillie, which causes her cheeks to go slightly pink. Bonnie notices and grins. "Oh, are you two dating?" she asks them.
Elio and Lillie go bright red and Elio shakes his head furiously while Lillie responds with, "No we aren't!" This causes everyone from Alola to laugh. "They won't admit it," Gladion explains. "But they're head over heels for each other!" Elio glares at him, before he scribbles down, "That's rich coming from you!" Gladion goes red at this, while everyone else except Hau laughs. "Who does he like?" Max asks. At this, Elio turns to Hau and signs something to him. "What? Where?" he asks, quickly turning around. While his back is turned, Elio writes, "Hau!" on the board. The whole gang erupts in laughter, which only increases when Hau turns back around and says, "There's no skateboarding Furfrou!" Mallow and Lana seem to be laughing particularly hard at the Aether siblings, something Sophocles is quick to stop. "Don't know what you two are laughing about," he points out. "I've seen the way you glance at each other when you think no one's looking." This makes the pair stop laughing and go extremely red. "I don't like her like that!" they both announce, which makes Sophocles laugh. "I never said you did" he replies, which makes them blush even more.
Noticing that Kiawe and Sophocles hadn't been teased yet, Ash asks, "What about you two?" Both of them laugh at that. "Absolutely not!" Sophocles replies. "I'm as straight as an arrow." "And I'm Aroace" Kiawe explains. Seeing the look of confusion on Bonnie's face, he quickly explains what that is. Bonnie understands, and Max can hear her quietly whisper to herself, "I am so glad Clemont isn't like that." After that, the conversations move on to other matters, and before they know it, the whole day has passed. Ash agrees to begin training Bonnie the next day, which she can't wait for. The group from Alola head off, explaining that they're going to the park for Elio to get more training in. "It's easier for him to train at night," Lillie explains. "Less sound, so his pokémon can hear him better." Max and Bonnie follow Ash and Serena for a bit, before leaving them at the entrance to route one.
But as they're saying goodbye, Max's head suddenly explodes with pain. He crumples to the ground and clutches his scalp, crying out in agony. The other three immediately gather around him, and Pikachu tries to shock it out of him, not that that works, of course. After a few seconds of panic, Ash makes his hand glow blue from Aura and places it on Max's head. After about a minute, Max's pain subsides. "Thank you" he says, panting from the pain. "What was that?" Bonnie asks. "Essentially I just used Heal Pulse," Ash explains. "I used my Aura to alleviate Max's pain. But more importantly, what happened?" Max thinks about this, unsure as to where it came from. "It's like that time on the mountain," Bonnie points out. "When your head started hurting after the Jade Orb fell down it." Max nods. "That's what it is!" he says. "The Jade Orb was warning me!" Ash and Serena suddenly grow concerned. "What was it warning you about?" asks Ash. "Danger is coming," Max replies. "It's Team Terra. They used the Orb. They've captured Rayquaza!"
Sorry for the abrupt ending, I didn't want that to be in the next chapter, since that one will be focused on Team Terra. Now, I know that my explanation for how Ash learnt how to use his Aura powers was strange, but my original plan was for his Lucario to teach him how to do it. But then I rewatched Lucario and the Mystery of Mew and realised that didn't work, so I came up with that instead. As for Elio being on the Autism Spectrum, I did that because I wanted to add some neurodiversity into this fic, and I also wanted to explore the idea of a pokémon trainer who can't talk. I'm well aware that not everybody on the Autism spectrum is unable to speak, both of my siblings are on it. I myself have some of the symptoms, but that's just due to ADHD. I feel like the Alola gang's introduction could've gone better, but I didn't really know how to do it any other way. If I think of one, I may change this. But anyway, with that, I shall see you all on Friday with the next chapter.