"Who are you going to use for the Hearthome gym, Dad?" Koraidon asked. "Sorry if you haven't decided yet, but I'm curious."

"I haven't decided yet," Ash admitted. "It's… about growth, a bit. I'm wondering if Sandshrew is going to be ready yet, or if Absol needs a battle since it's been a while… it's like how I was talking about it with Cynthia, before."

He frowned, then shook his head. "Though maybe I am putting too much thought into it – maybe it really would be easier if I just tried to win the battle."

"Who would you use if you were trying to win?" Pikachu said.

"Noctowl," Ash answered. "And myself… and for a third, either Zorua or Typhlosion."

He glanced over at Koraidon. "Can you tell why?"

"Hmm," Koraidon said, sitting back and frowning. "I think… it must be because Noctowl has Foresight, so she can see through any Ghost tricks, and Feint Attack so she can hit them with especially strong damage. And you for the same reason, except you can be Normal-type so you're immune to Ghost moves…"

She looked contemplative. "Zorua's the same sort of thing because he's got immunity, and he's got lots of good moves. And Typhlosion… oh, he's got that Ghost move, but he is weak to Ghost moves too so it's a bit more of a different balance."

"Yeah, he's just plain stronger in raw strength," Ash agreed. "Zorua is more about not being hit, Typhlosion is more about hitting harder than Fantina's Pokémon would."

He shrugged, a kind of back-and-forth rocking motion. "I might think about Buneary, too, only the other two gyms we're definitely doing are Ice and Steel and his moves are like yours – they're both better for that – and Buneary doesn't have the same weakness to Ice that you and Miraidon do, either."

"Or there's some of the other Pokémon you had before Sinnoh," Koraidon frowned.

She was silent for most of a minute, watching as Latias did something that happened to be both training Staravia and also providing visual demonstrations for her brother in Altomare.

"Do you think this kind of thing is what it's like for Grandad?" she asked. "You know. Thinking about how to make sure everyone is happy… or just that everyone is getting on okay. Having to make sure he doesn't do something wrong, or… something like that?"

"Maybe," Ash agreed. "I don't think we can know until we met him. And when we do… maybe we still won't."

"What do you mean?" Pikachu asked, curious.

"I mean… it takes ages to get to know someone, right?" Ash replied. "And I hope that I'll be able to get to know Dad. To, understand him. But… maybe I won't."

He sighed. "I guess I'm just… worried, maybe."

"I'm sure Grandad will like you, Dad!" Koraidon reassured him. "Or he could be wrong, instead..."

She looked worried, then shook her head. "But that's not something to worry about… right? Because we can't change it. And even if the worst thing happens, I think you're great."

"Thanks, Koraidon," Ash said, touched.

The Fighting-type was puzzling something out in her head.

"So… um… if Grandad doesn't like you, then he's silly," she decided. "But if he does like you, then he's not. I think that's right."

About half an hour later, they were in the middle of lunch when someone familiar came along the road.

"...why do I keep running into you?" Paul asked, stopping, and he looked more confused than anything.

"Confirmation bias," Cynthia replied, half her attention on scratching Eevee under the chin. "You notice it when you run into us, but you don't notice when you run into other people. We're going between towns with Gyms, the same way as you are, but there's a large sample of people who you could run into."

Paul did not look enlightened.

"It's statistics," Cynthia explained. "How have you been getting on with your Pokémon recently?"

At that, the trainer frowned, then looked conflicted.

"...actually, it would help to be able to talk about that," he admitted, after a long moment. "But – look, uh… how is Chimchar doing?"

"He's doing great," Dawn replied. "You can ask him yourself if you want, though."

Paul looked momentarily confused, then saw the Fire-type lean out from behind the much bigger Samurott and wave a bit hesitantly.

"Right," he said. "And… is he using Blaze?"

"No," Dawn replied, immediately. "If he wanted to use it, then he'd ask. But I only want that happening if he's completely okay with it."

"I guess that's…" Paul began, then closed his eyes.

"Why do I find it so hard to know what to say?" he asked, mostly himself.

"I know the feeling," Grotle muttered. "Awkward situations, right?"

"Right," Sneasel agreed.

"I wanted to – I want you to check the same kind of thing with my Pokémon," Paul explained, after a long moment. "Because… I did what you wanted. I did the same thing as with Chimchar with my other Pokémon, and some of them didn't want to battle any more. I think… and two actually left, even with that option. I don't really know what to think about that."

Ash frowned.

"If you already asked, then-" he began, then stopped. "Uh… do you want to make sure that the ones who didn't leave are worried about what you'd think?"

"I don't know what I want," Paul said. "It always seemed so simple before, but now – now it doesn't."

He shook his head. "And I'm not going to ignore that. I just don't know what to do now."

"What do you think about Paul as a trainer?" Buneary asked.

"You mean… my experience?" Chimchar replied. "Or… since then?"

"Both," the Normal-type replied. "Either. I don't know. But I've only ever met him when he came across us, and you knew him before."

Chimchar considered, then shook his head.

"I guess he's changed," the Fire-type decided. "The way he was before – I don't think he'd have done this. I mean go through all his Pokémon and ask. He just… I think that's the change."

"The change is that he asked everyone?" Buneary checked.

"The change is that he cared to," Chimchar replied. "It's a good change."

Buneary looked at him.

"Are you regretting your decision?" he asked.

"No," Chimchar replied, with a shake of his head. "I think it's good that Paul has changed. It's really good. It means all his Pokémon are going to be happier, or… maybe not Ursaring, Ursaring might be less happy. But all the rest of his Pokémon are going to be happier about it… and part of that is that the ones who really don't work with Paul's style don't have to be there any more."

He flicked his tail. "It's like… you heard when he asked about Blaze, right? That's still the first thing he thinks of when he thinks of me. That just wouldn't have worked out."

"Good point," Buneary agreed. "I felt like I had to ask, though."

A shrug. "I am a Buneary, after all. We're one of the happiness evolutions – even if part of why I haven't evolved is that I'm happy as a Buneary!"

"Funny how that works," Chimchar admitted, stifling a laugh.

"Doing this properly seems to be a lot harder than not doing it properly," Paul grumbled.

"Does that mean you're unhappy about doing it properly?" Ash asked, turning from his discussion with Paul's Weavile.

Paul paused.

"I don't know?" he said. "I mean more that… it doesn't seem fair to anyone that doing things properly is harder."

"There's lots of things where doing it properly is the easiest thing to do, right?" Ash asked. "Like… uh… walking, I guess. Or other things where we barely even think about them, because just about everyone does them the same way and nobody does them differently. But this isn't one of those, not really."

He thought about it. "Or… maybe it's that you didn't get taught enough about taking care of Pokémon and why it works that way? There's something there that didn't work out."

"Maybe," Paul said, looking unsure.

"And I guess there's something else, too," Ash said. "It just came to mind – that, uh, you need to be able to think quickly to be a Pokémon trainer. To be able to help your Pokémon develop… your Pokémon need to be developed in a way like that, and to be comfortable with what's going on so they can go further, and, there's all these kinds of things that can make someone better at being a Pokémon trainer… and you can even benefit from luck, too. And the more they all line up together, the better, but you can get a long way with just some of those things. So you don't realize what's gone wrong, because when you start reaching the limits of what you can do with what you do have, it feels like you just need to do whatever you were already doing, better."

He waved a hoof. "But, because of that stuff, if a lot of what you were doing is the stuff that helps, even something that's – that's wrong can still be part of a system that works right. So if you do more of that it only makes things worse, and it's so hard to tell that."

Paul didn't have a response to that for several seconds.

"I hate how much sense that makes," he decided.

"Um," Weavile said. "So, can I add… I'd kind of appreciate moves that actually work better with my style of fighting? Blizzard and Ice Beam are okay, I guess, but I'm a Weavile, not a… I don't know, Glalie or Glaceon or something."

"Moves that work better, right," Ash said, nodding. "Close-in moves?"

"Exactly," Weavile nodded.

Paul wrote that down.

"And, there was something Honchkrow told me to pass on, ask me about that once we're done?" Weavile added. "But before that, uh… this is for you as much as Paul, but is there a way for me to actually say that it's time to take a break?"

"That's a good question…" Ash frowned. "That's probably a good thing for any trainer to have, but I guess it would matter more for someone who pushes their Pokémon hard… an actual injury just makes training take longer, even if you don't mind the Pokémon feeling uncomfortable…"

AN:

We don't seem to be anywhere near Damascus.

But facing up to a problem in the way you do things is hard.