"And… that's you registered," the man at the desk said. "The first round is tomorrow."
"Thank you," May replied. "That's the… only one move allowed one, right?"
"Yes," the man told her, and slid an itinerary across the desk. "I'd love to explain further, but there's a lot of Coordinators."
"Oh, right," May realized, embarrassed, and got out of the way.
She checked the itinerary, frowning, then nodded to herself. "All right, I think that should work out nicely…"
"All set?" Max asked.
"Yeah, I think so," May agreed. "At least, I hope so, but I know what I'm doing."
She held out the itinerary, and Max took it to glance through.
"Wow," he said. "A lot of this is Appeals."
"Yeah, the plan is that there's going to be two rounds of Appeals, narrowing it down to sixty-four and then sixteen," May replied. "That bit at least is the bit you can prepare for. Then there's Battle Rounds for the last section, those are going to be quite full-on because it's up to four double battles in only a few hours."
"That is pretty intense," Brock admitted. "I hope they let you take your Pokémon to the Pokémon Centre between the rounds."
"They probably have to," Ash said.
"I wouldn't want to do four League battles in a row, same thing," Pikachu agreed.
Then someone waved to them at the door.
"Sorry, but I need to ask," she said. "You're May, right?"
"Yes?" May replied, then brightened. "Oh, you recognize me?"
"Well, I looked you up after my friend told me about you," the older Coordinator replied.
Then she pointed at Brock. "Speaking of which, why didn't you tell me about her?"
"I don't have your phone number, Solidad!" Brock protested. "You never gave it to me when I asked!"
"That's because of how you asked, Brock," Solidad said.
Brock's face lit up. "Then you mean I have a chance?"
"Not like that," Max groaned.
"You know Brock?" Ash asked. "I guess… are you from Pewter City, then?"
Solidad nodded. "You're sharp," she said. "Well done for guessing that. Yes, I'm from Pewter City – though I haven't spoken to Brock much in the last few years, since we've both been travelling.
"So, if Brock didn't tell you, who did?" May said. "Drew?"
"Well, no, but I do know Drew," Solidad replied. "He's mentioned you, but you're not who I mean."
"How many humans are there?" Latias checked. "Because it sounds like you all know one another at this point."
Ash tried not to laugh.
"I guess it is quite a coincidence that she knows Drew, Brock and someone else," he said. "I guess that other person is… probably Harley, then?"
"Two for two," Solidad said, impressed. "And you're right, Harley told me about you."
"I'm sort of afraid to ask what he said," May admitted.
"Well, Harley's… an interesting person," Solidad replied. "He said that you were… hmm, promising."
"Promising?" May repeated. "That's actually quite-"
"...and that he wasn't sure if you were going to fulfil your promises or not," Solidad continued. "But, well, that's Harley for you."
"It is," May agreed. "I'm sort of relieved now…"
She held out her hand. "See you in the Grand Festival? Or do you want to talk a bit first?"
"I've actually still got to register, but I'll join you afterwards," Solidad decided. "Then I can hear about why your friend's a Pokémon first-hand… do you think you'll be using him in the Festival?"
"I don't plan on it," May replied, shaking her head. "Ash hasn't volunteered and I haven't asked. It's up to him, but…"
Ash shook his head.
"Not right now," he clarified. "Doing it in Hoenn was helpful to let me clear my head, but… I don't think it's what I'll do this time."
The first round of the Kanto Grand Festival was an impressive display of constrained creativity. With only one move to use, the Coordinators had to do something really special to stand out, and they and their Pokémon put their all into it.
One Rapidash used Flame Wheel, doing a forwards roll with fire licking off her horn and forming a complete circle, which drew startled applause from the crowd as they saw such a large Pokémon being so graceful. Another Coordinator had their rare, delicate-looking Amaura shoot forth a plume of icy Swift stars that collided in mid-air with a crash, raining down sparkling light in the sun, and then a Golduck did a dance focused on Aqua Jet to the delight of the crowd
Harley's Banette used Will-o-Wisp, swirling around an intricate display of blue flames to show control over the move more than anything else, and that got applause as well… both for the move, and for the dramatic way that Banette had introduced themselves to the crowd, cackling and juggling flames around on their claws.
Also, Harley was dressed like Solidad for some reason. Ash wasn't really sure what that was about, but then again it was Harley.
Drew opted to use his Masquerain, having the Bug-type use Silver Wind in a way every bit as artistic as May's Beautifly could manage, and currents of glittering wind swirled around Masquerain as they rotated at high speed. That got him a good score, and Solidad followed him with her Lapras.
"I kind of miss my Lapras," Ash said. "I know he's happy where he is, now, but… still."
"It's hard to deal with saying goodbye to any friends, right?" Max asked. "But with Pokémon… you've really helped them develop and get stronger, a lot of the time. So… yeah, I can get that."
The crowd noise had died down, and Solidad pointed. "Lapras…. Sheer Cold!"
There was an explosion of blue light and freezing cold, and when it faded the whole arena floor was frozen solid, in a rippling pattern that looked like the stormy sea.
"Whoa," Max blinked. "That's… really impressive."
"It's also a bit inconvenient," Brock admitted. "Now they need to thaw the arena."
"Okay," May said, swallowing. "Here goes."
She stepped out onto the Appeal floor, bowed, then sent out her Pikachu.
The Electric-type appeared in a flash of smoke from the Seal on her ball capsule, then landed and curtseyed.
For this particular display, they'd gone back to an old outfit concept, but done properly now that they knew how her strange ability worked. Cosplay-chu was dressed as a princess, in a flowing hand-sewn dress complete with a wimple, and May let the impact sink in for a moment before raising her hand into the air.
"Pikachu, use Diamond Storm!" she called.
"Pika-chu!" Cosplay-chu agreed, raising her paws into the air, and a swirl of multicoloured light fizzed around her as she drew in carbon in the air. The light show began at her paws, spreading out to fill the arena, and little sparkles glittered in the sunlight – then, after about fifteen seconds, the last of the light condensed into her paws, leaving a mass of glittering light that didn't quite seem to have a solid form.
"And… up!" May added.
Cosplay-chu did a twirl, then threw the bundle of condensed light. It flashed and seethed, half-way unravelling into streamers of white light, then May's Pokémon clapped her paws and the whole bundle soldified at once into diamonds.
Not a single diamond. The streamers of light turned into strings of gemstones, the little sparkles around it turned into tiny diamonds as small as dust, and the main mass formed into a giant gemstone. All of them beautifully cut and shimmering, forming a glittering rain across the arena before finally the largest one landed in a flash of rainbow light.
A moment later, most of them dissolved again, though not quite all of them – the largest ones were gone, but a dusting of tiny diamonds remained to leave a pattern across the arena floor.
"Quite remarkable!" Mr. Sukizo said, from the judging booth. "I've never heard of that move before!"
"...so that was really the proof of it, I think," May said, that evening. "It has to be that the costume is hand made or mostly hand made by her or her trainer, and fits a specific… role, or archetype."
She shook her head. "But… the move it gives is somehow related, but it's not always obvious how. And yet, she becomes an expert at it very quickly, until she takes the outfit off – then she forgets it straight away, until she puts the outfit back on again."
"That's very interesting," Professor Oak said, on the other side of the video phone. "Thank you for explaining your testing procedure… yes, I can't see any issues with your conclusion, especially since you tested with the same outfit both purchased and hand made. Well done, May."
He smiled, encouragingly. "And – good luck in the rest of the Grand Festival."
The next day began with the sixty-four remaining competitors – including May, Drew, Harley and Solidad – giving their second Appeals, with only a few minutes each to impress the judges. The restriction on a single move was entirely lifted in favour of seeking creativity, and there was plenty of it on display – Ash was seriously impressed, since he'd seen how hard May had to work to get a good Appeal together and the sheer combined effort on display was amazing.
Drew's new Butterfree showed off Gust, Sleep Powder and Psybeam, forming the shimmering Sleep Powder into shapes before breaking through it. Harley's Cacturne combined Bullet Seed and Needle Arm to catch every one of the Bullet Seeds he'd launched into the air on sharpened spikes, then sent them all flying again and sliced them apart in a single move. Solidad's Slowbro combined Psychic and Water Gun, making a fountain that kept flowing for several seconds after Slowbro stopped using Psychic, letting the Water-type have a shower in their own fountain.
Ash wasn't clear about that one, but maybe it was because of what Slowbro were like.
May's Bulbasaur, meanwhile, mostly used the same combination of Sunny Day, Weather Ball and Razor Leaf attacks she'd already used – but added one more trick as a finisher, something that she'd worked hard on all the time they'd been in Kanto and finally got working.
Something that Ash had been privately dubious about, but he'd never said anything, and Bulbasaur had done her trainer proud.
"Okay, Bulbasaur!" May called. "Flaming Razor Leaf into the air… now, do your finishing move!"
"All right!" Bulbasaur agreed, her bulb lighting up in the sunlight. The Weather Ball dissipated, and flaming Razor Leaves lost their momentum to drift down like smoke… and the ground shook.
And Bulbasaur used Frenzy Plant.
The explosion of roots and woody stems came up directly underneath her, lifting her into the air with a grinding craaaash, and when it finished she was at the top of a twisting, twirling tower of wood that lifted her above the smouldering Razor Leaf leaves.
She was also completely exhausted, but she managed to slump forwards in a way that didn't actually lead to her falling off the tower, and May went through to the Battle Rounds with flying colours.
The round of sixteen saw May face off against Harley, and she sent out her Eevee and Skitty to face off against Harley's Wigglytuff and Ariados.
Quite by accident, the two-on-two Double Battle round turned out to be a sort of match between two pairs of Pokémon using similar styles. The similarity wasn't perfect, but it was definitely there, with Harley's Wigglytuff firing off precise elementally-boosted Magical Leaf attacks and Ariados using String Shot and Sticky Web to pull both members of the team around the arena.
On May's side, meanwhile, Skitty used her own magnetic Magnet Bombs to do the same kind of thing to both herself and Eevee, while Eevee relied mostly on Swift to launch out attacks no matter where he was or which way he was facing. Sometimes that meant combining his attacks with Skitty also doing the same thing, while the rest of the time Skitty was using extra Magnet Bombs to make trick-shots with Thunderbolt or sending forth Magical Leaf attacks of her own.
The funny thing was, at least from Ash's point of view in the audience, it was sometimes a bit hard to tell it was a battle. So many of the attacks being used were so precise, and being bent around in wide curves by all the Magnet Bomb attacks Skitty was throwing out, that it looked like some sort of intensely choreographed dance instead.
Then Eevee used his new trick, Pay Day, and the Swift stars were suddenly accompanied by golden coins that Skitty connected with a web of Thunderbolts, and the combination both wowed the audience and won May enough points to proceed to the next round.
"I hope you realize what this means," Harley said, without preamble, accosting May before her quarter-final match.
"A lot of things," May replied. "It means I need to switch out Eevee so I've got the Pokémon I'm planning on using for the last few matches of the Grand Festival. It means I'm facing Drew next. It means Eevee really did well… but is there something else?"
"Well, if you're planning for the last few matches of the Grand Festival, it sounds like you do realize it," Harley replied. "Of course, since you've beaten me, the only way that's going to be satisfactory is if you go all the way to the final and beyond. That way, it's like we met in the final."
May nodded. "Of course," she said. "Sorry, you're right, that was too obvious for me to mention, but I really should have done…"
"I wonder if that Absol's better at predicting when something's going to go wrong," Pikachu asked, watching May's quarter-final.
Drew had his Absol and Flygon on the field, the two Pokémon switching off which of May's Pokémon they were focusing on, and Ash frowned as he watched.
"I… don't think so," he replied, as Octillery fired three Octazooka attacks up towards Flygon – only for Beautifly to use Psychic, redirecting them down at Absol to land with a splash-splash-splash like a liquid drumbeat. "Maybe? It's hard to tell, because some of those are definitely catching him by surprise, but I think any Absol can be surprised in the right situations."
He glanced at Latias. "What do you think? Absol sense disaster, but how do you tell how good one of them is at it?"
"I'm not sure," Latias replied. "Maybe you should ask Absol."
"I think that'd spoil the experiment," Pikachu replied.
Then May called for a combination, and Beautifly hit a Water Pulse with Silver Wind just as Octillery hit it with Aurora Beam. Their timing was just right, and Octillery's Aurora Beam froze her Water Pulse just as it shattered – sending a spray of icy crystals into the air, before Beautifly beat his wings once and sent it all forwards as an impromptu Icy Wind that washed over Flygon.
"I think Absol does his best," Koraidon volunteered.
"So do I," Pikachu riposted.
Latias giggled. "Pikachu, that's unfair…"
"What?" Pikachu asked.
"Sandstorm!" Drew called. "Razor Wind!"
His Flygon whipped up a Sandstorm, and May called for a Water Pulse-Silver Wind spray combo – then it turned out that his Absol's Razor Wind was actually aimed at Flygon, and the Dragon-type buzzed his wings to bounce the attack off them and at Beautifly.
That lost May several points, and she shook her head before telling Beautifly to use Gust and Octillery to use Lock-On – then Signal Beam.
The combination looked amazing. Beautifly flew low, using Gust to blow a tunnel into the Sandstorm that scattered the sand away in a plume, and Octillery opened fire through the tunnel to get a direct hit on Absol. There was a bright impact flash, as well, one which lit up the inside of the Sandstorm like a lightning bolt for a moment, and Ash made an approving noise.
"I know we don't need to do it in our battles, but that kind of thing is nice to see," he said. "It looks really cool."
"I'm really impressed with May," Brock said. "Making it to the semi-finals, I mean… I know she did last time, but she's done it twice in a row and that means she's doing it consistently. And consistency is really impressive in a Contest situation."
"More than in a Pokémon League situation?" Max checked.
"Hmm," Brock frowned. "I think… it's hard to say. But probably it's harder to be consistent with a Contest, because you have to maintain a high quality while always reinventing yourself somewhat – I know Ash has a bit of a habit of picking up a new team, and that's admirable, but a trainer could stick with having a few really strong Pokémon that are just hard to beat. But with Contests you have to keep innovating."
"Is there something a bit weird about this?" Latias asked Ash.
Ash frowned, thinking about it, as out on the field May's Combusken and Froslass fenced back and forth against Solidad's Pidgeot and Lapras.
Both avian Pokémon had already demonstrated they knew Feather Dance, sending orange and cream feathers rippling out from the point of contact, while Froslass was keeping his teammate supported with a combination of Icy Wind and Frost Breath and keeping water attacks from actually hitting Combusken. Any Water Gun or Hydro Pump that got close ended up frozen solid before it actually hit home, letting Combusken break it in a shattering Double Kick that sprayed fragments into the air.
"A bit," he said. "You mean because I've got Pidgeot and used to have Lapras, right?"
Latias nodded, and Ash considered.
"I guess… it is weird, but mostly because of the combination," he decided. "And only a bit weird, not very weird. It's not like I'd expected to never battle someone with the same Pokémon as me, for example, so I know it can happen… and Solidad's Pidgeot is different to mine. So it's easy enough to remember."
That got another nod from the Dragon-type.
"Plus, Ash, you never had those two at the same time," Pikachu added. "You had Pidgeotto, briefly Pidgeot, then you had Lapras, then you had Pidgeot again, but never both at once."
"That's true, yeah," Ash agreed. "Hmm… now I'm wondering if I should try and find Butterfree some time. Maybe my new amulet will let him do the same thing that that other Butterfree we met did."
"That would be neat," Latias said, then gasped. "Look!"
Froslass was in trouble. He'd just thrown a Shadow Ball at Lapras, and as Combusken moved in to add flame to the Shadow Ball Pidgeot had swooped in and used Mirror Move.
That meant the Ghost-type got hit by a Shadow Ball, just like the one he'd used, and a little frosting of ice-crystals flashed out from the impact point as Froslass tried a last-minute Frost Breath that reduced the impact but couldn't fully eliminate it.
"Combusken, up!" May called. "Cancel the Fire Spin!"
Combusken whirled, his Fire Spin dissipating in an arc of fire as he negated the attack, but Solidad's Pidgeot pulled up and around in a wingover that got him into position for a follow-up attack.
A second Mirror Move went off, copying the Fire Spin, and May pointed. "Jump! Feather Dance!"
Froslass used Ice Spinner, doing a twirl to try and negate the impact, and Combusken jumped upwards. He phased right through his teammate, spinning as well, and a shower of ice-touched orange feathers blasted out in the moments before the copied Fire Spin hit them both.
Pikachu leaned forwards, subconsciously trying for a better view, and watched the whirling multi-coloured chaos in the middle of the arena.
"Is it me," he began. "Or are some of those feathers red?"
The flames dissipated, and Blaziken dropped down to land with lithe grace on the arena floor.
"Froslass, take Blaziken's hand!" May called. "Blaziken, do the motions for Fire Spin – now, let go and Double Team! Ice Spinner!"
Blaziken flung Froslass into the air, and Froslass made a dozen duplicates of himself. They all began using Ice Spinner, the same as he was using, and Pidgeot hesitated – not sure which of the Ice-types to dodge away from.
"Quick Attack!" Solidad tried, but it came a moment too late. Froslass used Frost Breath at close range, sending out a pattern of icy sparkles like a garden sprinkler, and hit Pidgeot at least four times.
"Whoa," Max said, impressed.
The third-fourth playoff and the final came so soon after May's victory over Solidad that the two Coordinators didn't really have a chance to talk, and all of May's attention was focused on the final itself – which featured Skitty using her entire repertoire of moves and Cosplay-chu's enthusiastic support with Thunderbolt and Iron Tail, until the moment when the opposing Marowak had got just a bit too close and discovered that Pikachu's labcoat costume still let her use Explosion.
That, and then the congratulations from her friends, and May ignoring her own nervous tension for long enough to thank all her Pokémon for taking her all the way to winning the Kanto Grand Festival, meant that an hour later May was only just getting around to telling her parents.
"Mom, Dad!" she began.
"We saw!" Norman told her, with a laugh. "Well done, May. That's an extremely impressive achievement."
"I'll say," Solidad agreed.
May looked around, shocked. "Solidad?"
The older Coordinator held out her hand. "Well done," she said. "I know your dad just said it, but take it from me as well – you've got an impressive ability to improvise."
"My Pokémon did so much of the work," May said, taking the hand a bit awkwardly.
"Yes, and it's good you know that," Solidad replied. "But – well, I don't know if you ever heard this or worked it out, but my speciality as a Coordinator is that I do my best to prepare for everything my opponent can do."
She smiled, a bit ruefully. "And it usually works – but some of those combinations are things I didn't see coming, because you came up with them on the spot."
"Skii-tty," Skitty said, bowing to Solidad. "Ty!"
"But I'll leave you to your phone call," Solidad added. "I just wanted to make sure you'd heard it from me as well."
AN:
Originally contemplated as two Books, but I fused them into one.