"I wonder what Uxie will be like," Miraidon said, tilting their head as they paced alongside their sister. "We have met most of our uncles and aunts now… if I am recalling correctly, we have not properly met Groudon, and we have not met Mew or Uxie."

"There might be Xerneas and Yveltal," Ash pointed out, then stopped. "...oops."

"You forgot to ask Giratina about them," Pikachu sighed. "Honestly, sort of what I expected, Ash."

"Be fair, we forgot as well," Latias sniggered.

"There was a lot going on and dad was very busy," Koraidon pointed out. "So I understand why that happened… and we'll get another chance, right?"

"Most likely," Miraidon agreed. "But I know we're a long way from Lake… is it Lake Acuity?"

"I think that's the one," Ash agreed. "I could ask Dawn what they're like?"

Miraidon considered.

"I'd rather find out by meeting Uxie," they decided.

"I'm guessing that's about a legendary Pokémon that you haven't met yet?" Dawn checked. "Which means… probably Uxie."

She shrugged. "I'm here to ask if you want, but I'll only answer if you want."

"That sounds good," Ash agreed. "Now, uh… just to check, Cynthia, we are on the road to Celestic Town, right?"

"I'd have spoken up already if we weren't," Cynthia replied. "It is my home town, after all… and after Dawn's description of Cogita I think that's been the case for a truly ridiculous amount of time."

"Is it ridiculous?" Mew asked, floating up from their spot on Miraidon's head.

"Is it ridiculous," Ash passed on. "I guess everyone's got to be from somewhere, right?"

"While it's true that everyone has to be from somewhere, from a historical point of view it's unusual to have evidence that your family's lived in Celestic Town since hundreds of years before it was Celestic Town."

"She's got a point," Pikachu nodded. "But, well, she's good at that."

They reached a turn in the road, and Ash stopped for a moment to look out over the slope curving away below them – the tops of the trees forming a coat of green, sometimes interrupted by the sight of a Pokémon or a bit of rock rearing up.

"I wonder how much Dad was involved with making the world look like this," he said. "And how much of it just… happened, without him needing to make any decisions. Or if it's something in between."

"Another one for the list?" Pikachu asked.

"Yeah, I've got a lot of things to think about," Ash agreed. "But some of them, I'm thinking now… maybe I don't need to ask Dad what the answer is, I more want to ask what his answer is. And I want to ask for things where I have an answer of my own, to see if they're the same."

He glanced up. "Does that make sense?"

"It's like seeing if there's anything you've missed," Latias suggested. "I think it makes sense to me."

"It's almost like peer review," Cynthia contributed.

Then someone waved, to get their attention.

"Ah, there's no mistaking you!" Professor Rowan said, from up ahead – there was a truck parked where the path intersected a clearing, and he and his assistants were halfway through unloading it. "Champion! And Ash Ketchum, of course, and… that must be Dawn! How is your Piplup getting along?"

"He's doing great!" Dawn replied. "I'm surprised to see you here, Professor. What are you researching at the moment?"

"As it happens, nothing, directly," Professor Rowan said. "This is where the Pokémon Summer Camp is run – we're in the middle of setting up, and it'll be starting tomorrow."

"I went to a Pokémon summer camp, once," Ash said, thinking. "It didn't involve many Pokémon, though."

"Ah, this one's different," Rowan told him. "It's entirely up to you, but if you're passing by anyway – want to help us get set up?"

"What's a summer camp?" Koraidon asked. "And would it help if they had summer weather?"

"It's sort of… you go somewhere that isn't home, and you do things?" Ash said, realizing that he didn't have a very good way to sum it up. "I guess it would be a bit annoying if it rained all the time, but …actually… Professor, would it be okay if some of my Pokémon took part?"

Rowan looked at Ash, then at the interested-looking 'raidons. And Mew, though the transforming Pokémon was back to looking like a Smeargle.

"I don't see why not, though you would have to help translate," he decided.

"Whoa," someone said. "This place has some really weird Pokémon!"

"Don't you recognize that white one there, with the gold ring?" someone else replied. "That's Ash Ketchum! I bet those are his Pokémon."

"That's him, all right," Conway agreed. "One of those is Koraidon, and I can see Dawn over there."

"That sounds like you know them both?" the trainer asked.

"Well… a bit?" Conway replied, shrugging, and adjusted his glasses. "Dawn and I were in a tag battle tournament against Ash, and his Koraidon was involved in beating my Aggron."

Someone gasped.

"Look!" she said. "That's Cynthia!"

One of the other Summer Camp participants sat down heavily.

"We're doomed," he said, faintly.

"All right, everyone!" Professor Rowan said. "So there's plenty of people here, including some sign ups late yesterday, and I'd like to make sure that some things are properly cleared up. Firstly, neither Ash Ketchum nor Champion Cynthia are going to be taking part in the Summer Camp directly."

"Oh thank goodness," Angie said, with a sigh of relief. "I just know there's going to be a battle as part of this summer camp at some point, and battling Cynthia would just be… terrifying."

"However," Professor Rowan went on. "Some of Ash Ketchum's Pokémon will be taking part, and because Ash will be required to translate for them they're going to be on the same team. I know it's a bit complicated, but it'll make more sense in a minute… for the purposes of the summer camp, everyone is going to be divided into one of three teams. Red, blue and green."

"Raaiii-don, kooor!" Ash's Koraidon said.

"Gle!" his Smeargle agreed, nodding. "Smeee-argle."

"Zor?" a sleepy, odd-looking Zorua asked.

"Don," Koraidon nodded firmly.

"I could ask," Ash suggested, holding up a hoof, and waited until Professor Rowan looked at him. "Is that because of Groudon, Kyogre and Rayquaza?"

Professor Rowan frowned for a moment.

"Yes," he decided. "I was going to say it's because they're colours, but that's a better reason."

"That's pretty cool," Angie decided. "Hey, Ash has a Latias, right? Do you think he knows Rayquaza? I've heard all kinds of weird rumours about him."

"Nah, why would one Legendary mean you'd know other Legendaries?" Kendall asked. "I know the rumours you mean, but it's the same as the ones about Cynthia."

"Some of the ones about Cynthia are true," Angie protested. "She destroyed a gym with a Feebas once, I heard from someone who saw it!"

"Ahem," Professor Rowan coughed. "Once you have your team, the members of the team must choose a leader, but that doesn't actually matter and it's just tradition. Then each of the campers will pick out a random Pokéball from a collection of them we have up here. That will be the Pokémon you work with over the course of today, for a battle tournament that will take place tomorrow."

"That's kind of cool," Kendall decided. "So it's a test of how quickly we can get to know a new Pokémon…"

"I think it would be weird to be leader of Groudon Team, just because he's my uncle," Koraidon said, a few minutes later. "Because he's your uncle too, Mew, Miraidon. Right?"

"You make a good point," the Smeargle-ized Mew agreed, though Koraidon did get an odd look from Angie's Shinx.

"Dad?" Koraidon added. "How many Pokémon do we take? Is it one each, or just one?"

"How many-" Ash began to pass on, but Professor Rowan held up a hand.

"We did think of that," he said. "Your Pokémon have an advantage as Pokémon, of course, but the simple answer is that you should take two because that's how many more Pokémon there are than human campers."

"Oh, that makes sense," Riolu realized.

"Are you part of our team?" Miraidon asked, looking around. "I am actually not sure of the answer."

"I'm mostly here to watch," Riolu explained. "And maybe do wise answers and stuff, I'm a Riolu and I've got to be good at that by the time I'm a Lucario! If I do evolve. Not actually sure yet."

Miraidon tilted their head, a question-mark symbol briefly appearing on both eyes.

"I still don't think I know the answer," they admitted.

"Okay, here we go," Koraidon said, a little later, and held up the borrowed Pokéball.

A Raichu came out of it, and Koraidon sat back on her haunches and waved.

"Hi!" she said.

"Um," Raichu began, scratching his head with his tail. "Where's the trainer?"

"If you mean dad, he's over there," Koraidon said, pointing. "But I'm doing the summer camp, or we are but I'm the one we picked to be in charge of our little group, that's why I'm wearing one of dad's spare hats. My name's Koraidon, and these are Zorua and Sandshrew."

Raichu looked at Zorua and Sandshrew.

"I don't recognize either of those Pokémon," he said. "Not as what I would have expected them to look like, anyway. Did you get left out in the sun and end up bleached?"

"Koraidon can make it sunny, if that counts," Sandshrew said.

"Big Pikachu," Zorua marvelled, muzzle slowly tracking up as he looked at Raichu until he was looking at Raichu's big lightning-bolt tail-tip over his head.

Then he fell over backwards.

Koraidon stifled a giggle.

"Zorua's a kind of Zorua called a Hisuian Zorua," she explained. "They used to be from around here, actually. They might still be around here, but nobody would know because they're… Zorua."

"Okay, fair point," Raichu admitted. "And I've never heard of a Koraidon. But what about you?"

"I'm an Alolan Sandshrew," Sandshrew explained. "Well, I was born here, but that's why I'm Ice-type not Ground-type… and Koraidon's unique."

Koraidon nodded.

"So!" she added. "Do you know about what we're supposed to do?"

"It's something about a battle tomorrow, right?" Raichu asked. "I'm not really sure I'll do much good, really. I'm not great with Electric attacks, and that's supposed to be a Raichu's whole thing."

Zorua had rolled back upright, and he scratched his head.

"Hmm," he said, visibly pondering. "Swift?"

"Ooh, good point, that is a move you know, you could teach Raichu," Koraidon said. "Oh, but if we're supposed to be helping you, Raichu, what about if you start out by showing us what your Electric attacks are? That way we can see how you can improve… our dad's starter Pokémon, Pikachu, is really good at electric attacks, and I guess if it's really important we could get help from Miraidon as well but that's sort of like cheating…"

"It is nice to meet you, Grimer," Miraidon said.

"You seem upset," Mew added. "Is everything okay?"

"Meh," Grimer said, shrugging. "Not bad."

Miraidon processed that.

"I think I know what that means," Mew frowned. "Grimer, the way you said that, I remember feeling like that… it's when things are bad, but you're trying to pretend they're not. So you tell yourself that it's not, and sometimes you even believe it."

Grimer gave Mew a very confused look.

"I didn't know Smeargle did psycho-analysis," she said.

"They do a lot of things," Buneary pointed out. "That's sort of their entire thing, as Pokémon."

"...yeah, fair," Grimer allowed. "But… still, we're doing battle training. That's the bit that's actually important here, isn't it? And I don't have a problem with that bit, certainly."

"That's not the bit that's important," Mew replied. "The important bit is you being okay, okay? Actual battle training is almost completely irrelevant by comparison."

They twisted their paint-tipped tail. "That's a lesson that it took me a while to learn, even… well… dad put a lot of effort into making sure I knew that and understood that. And if the way this works out is that you're happier and you give up immediately at the start of the tournament because you're not ready… that's better than you being upset about yourself."

"I'm going to have to write that down," Riolu said, very quietly.

"There you go, see?" Dawn asked. "You can eat electricity, but Magnemite don't need to do that – they can get their electricity from themselves. It means they're not quite as strong, but they can still do it and it gives options."

Magnemite buzzed, then reached out, and Pachirisu gave the Electric-type another boost.

"Lup-pip?" Piplup asked. "Pip-piiplup."

"They were around back in Hisuian times," Dawn explained, getting out her copy of the Hisuian Pokédex and showing him. "There, see? So they can't need to drain electricity from power lines, and there were sometimes several days in a row without even a rainstorm so there's no way a thunderstorm would work."

"Pa-chi-risu!" Pachirisu said, clapping her paws together.

"Now, let's see about the next bit," Dawn added. "Since I'm a Coordinator, this is going to have a bit of Coordinator flair to it, but what I was thinking is… magnetic fields and electricity are closely related. So you can use those magnets of yours to control your electricity a bit even after you fire it – or, that's the idea, at least."

"Chii-risu!" Pachirisu pointed in Ash's direction. "Pa-chi-pa, Pa-chirisu!"

"You're talking about Pikachu and Miraidon, right?" Dawn asked. "Yeah, Pikachu especially is good at controlling his electricity. So it doesn't even take magnets, but having magnets could help out… then what you can do is add a twist to your attacks. Which is pure Contest style!"

Magnemite hummed, contemplatively.

"Let's give it a go against a stationary target, first," Dawn decided. "What's your best Electric-type move?"

"And… now," Cynthia said, with a nod, and her Eevee's tail flicked back and forth in concentration. Then it glowed, and she exhaled a cloud of leaves.

"Roww-let!" Rowlet declared.

"I think you're right," Cynthia agreed. "That was definitely a Mimic of your Leafage."

"Ee-veee," Eevee panted.

"It's taken you a long time to learn, but it's entirely worthwhile," Lucario said. "Mimic is not an easy move to pick up… and, of course, that means now you can start doing what the primary point of this was in the first place."

"Vee!" Eevee agreed, brightening in interest. "Vee-eev-eee!"

Cynthia considered, then nodded.

"I think we can give it a go today," she said. "At least, as long as you can reset?"

"Eevee!" Eevee agreed, and twitched her tail back and forth. The glow from when she'd first done the copy had faded, but it was still there… then she relaxed, and the glow dissipated entirely.

She breathed out again, coughing, then nodded.

"Very good," Cynthia told her. "Rowlet, can you go and ask Buneary if he can come over here for a minute?"

"lett!" Rowlett said, taking off, and circled once before flying over to where Miraidon and the rest of their group was helping Grimer out.

Shading her eyes for a moment, Cynthia looked in the same direction, and saw that Ash was metaphorically hovering nearby. Close enough to hear what was going on, but far enough that he wasn't obviously trying to get involved.

Just… there, in case something happened. And so he could listen in on what was going on, as Miraidon and Buneary and the disguised Mew talked to Grimer and Grimer exercised.

On Rowlet arriving, though, Buneary spoke to him for a moment, then nodded to his friends and bounced over.

"Bun!" he said, landing. "N-eary-bun?"

"Vee!" Eevee agreed.

Rowlet settled down on Cynthia's shoulder, basking in the evening sun with his wings spread, then Ash's Buneary used Ice Beam.

"Vee!" Eevee said, focusing, and used Mimic. This time, of course, she copied Ice Beam, and looked very impressed with the results – a splash of ice across the ground.

"Thank you, Buneary," Cynthia said. "All right, let's really get to work, Eevee – try and feel how that move works. The icy sensation as it builds up, then rushes out – and try and work out what you can and can't do with it, right now. That way you'll have a good foundation for when you evolve."

"Vee!" Eevee agreed, ready to put that into practice.

"I think that's good," Koraidon decided, checking the time. "Now, though, it's time to stop."

"Really?" Raichu asked. "I thought we were making real progress!"

"We are," Koraidon agreed. "But I need to think about this in the way Dad wants to think about this."

"Is that the same as the way he thinks about it?" Raichu said, confused now.

"Not all the time," Koraidon replied. "Because Dad can get excited about things, and forget to get enough rest. And I know that happens, but it's a mistake when it does… it's more important to get a good night's sleep, and if you want to do more training we can do it tomorrow morning just before breakfast, so you get a good break before the actual tournament. Okay?"

Zorua nodded, lending his support.

"Good appetite," he said, then yawned, and Sandshrew stifled a giggle.

"What I mean is, uh… the way your dad wants to think about it?" Raichu said. "That's a weird way of putting it."

"Not really," Koraidon replied, sitting back on her haunches. "Because it's what happens. Sometimes Dad does stay up late, and sometimes it works, but sometimes he wakes up in the morning and feels like he's been silly for staying up that late. Because it looks different from the middle of the night than it does next morning."

She shrugged. "We can keep going if you really want, but it has to be something that's important."

Latias tried very hard not to giggle.

"I think Koraidon just told me off, without even meaning to," Ash said, sighing. "Okay, I'd better get to bed myself…"

The next morning, after some last-minute training from several of the trainers, Professor Rowan had everyone tell the group something about their Pokémon.

That meant translation work from Ash, but he didn't mind.

Then, once that was done, Rowan began explaining how the tournament was going to go. He got about halfway through explaining that everyone from one team would be matched up against someone from a different team at first – and that, despite the naming, Team Rayquaza was not guaranteed to automatically win – when there was a crunch sound nearby.

The ground began to shake, and Ash looked around. The trees off to one side were shaking back and forth, in sequence.

"What's that?" Latias wondered.

"Is it an earthquake?" one of the campers asked.

"Can't be, I haven't been knocked out," Miraidon's borrowed Grimer pointed out.

"Oh, hold on, I think I can guess," Pikachu said.

A moment later, a giant mechanical Heatran crashed through the bushes, limbs planting themselves either side of the shower block and heat simmering off it.

A hatch opened on the top, and two familiar trainers rose out. Jessie wearing an explorer's outfit, complete with a pith helmet, and James wearing a tight-fitting dress.

For some reason.

"Prepare for activity!" James said, sweeping his arm out to the side.

"It fits our proclivity!" Jessie announced, adjusting her helmet.

"...what are these guys doing here?" Angie asked, very confused.

"To set you a challenge you'll all have to face!" James said.

"And one coming well before the relay race!" Jessie pointed out.

She flicked a control, and the Heatran-bot exhaled a cloud of smoke.

Meowth ran past with a wheelbarrow full of coal, and James coughed for a moment before waving the smoke away. "To battle some kids with a Heatran-alike."

"It's the perfect showing-off chance for a bike!" Jessie agreed.

The two trainers did a high-five.

"James!" James said.

"Jessie!" Jessie introduced herself to the campers.

Meowth leaned out of the Heatran's mouth, waving a shovel. "And don't forget da stoker cat! Meowth's the name, how about that?"

"Uh…" Conway mumbled.

"It might be that Team Kyogre feels damp," James said, with a shrug.

Jessie folded her arms. "But how could we miss a chance to be 'camp'?"

"What is even happening?" Kendall asked.

"Oh, you must be new to this," James realized. "Welcome!"

Their stage lowered back into the Heatran, and it made a mechanical roar sound.

"Stop recording me!" it said, and Latias stifled a giggle.

"I guess they've got to get recordings of a Heatran somehow," she said. "What do we do?"

"Raichu, let's get ready for this!" Koraidon said.

Seeing Raichu squaring himself up, Dawn snapped her fingers. "Right! Remember, everyone, we've got Pokémon we can use to fight them off!"

"I guess… get ready to help out if they have trouble," Ash decided. "But I don't want to jump in like I think they couldn't do it by themselves."

"Good plan," Cynthia agreed, Garchomp's Pokéball ready as she came over to join him.

Once the battle against the Mecha-Heatran was over, and Team Rocket had been sent Blasting Off Again (assuming they actually still were part of Team Rocket, which was something Ash had started to be quietly curious about), they tried to move on with the tournament, but it sort of turned instead into showing off what their borrowed Pokémon could do in battles and how they'd improved. Nobody actually fought a second match, partly because so many of even the winning Pokémon were exhausted, and Professor Rowan had a word with Cynthia before asking everyone to pick one trainer from each team and explain how that trainer had developed their bond with their Pokémon.

That actually ended up taking up the whole afternoon, first as everyone wrote out what they thought – with Ash's help for Koraidon as she had trouble writing, and Latias helping Miraidon as Mew wasn't really as good with a brush as a natural Smeargle – and secondly as Professor Rowan went through all the trainers and read out what their fellow campers had said without actually identifying who had written what.

Which led nicely into dinner, always an important part of the day. Especially when it involved sandwiches.

AN:

There's a lot of Summer Academy.