C1AMA: G1: A Beautiful World, For Beautiful Heroes

by lumpeistbark3

Just when they thought they were finally able to go home, something unexpected knocked 1A of course from returning to where they needed to be, now in an even stranger place than before but not as unrecognizable. Despite their hasty arrival in the strange realm they have been tasked with guarding three key individuals that hold the future of region or world itself in there hands.

2. Month 1: Week 1: Strange New Friends

The Morning After: Ash, Clemont, Bonnie, Serena, Iida, Eliot, Tierno, Calem, Trevor, Shauna

Ash along with clemont and Bonnie had just begun to leave Professor Sycamore's damaged research lab, there was for the moment a large rugged tarp that had replaced the roof of the place to defend itself from the elements thankfully it wasn't going to rain or snow much of anytime soon so there wasn't going to be too many problems before the professor could get the place refitted, although during the night it was a bit windy and cold for many of the assistance that worked and slept their which were only Dexio and Sina but Ash and company didn't make any fuss about it however and simply thanked the professor for allowing them to stay the night regardless but just as when the trio was about to turn around and leave, they were halted by none other than Froakie the small pokemon having sat by the gate along having had just pelted Ash in the face with one of its frubbles to get his attention.

The Pokemon rolled the Pokeball by nudging it with its head and calling out to Ash. Ash moved forward and bent down so that he could look the Pokemon eye to eye and asked it if this truly was the choice it wanted to make, to answer his question, the Pokemon gave a sharp croak in its tongue before pushing the button itself and being absorbed into the Pokeball, which was as great an answer as any Ash figured as he scooped the ball up with a large smile on his face as he raised the Pokeball high into the air. It was his first Kalos region Pokemon, and he couldn't wait to get even more as he continued with his journey.

Speaking of his journey, he had to get registered for the Kalos league, and for that, he needed to go to the nearest Pokemon center, which clemont agreed to lead him to. As the trio began to walk off, they had began to walk for about 10 minutes before the always excitable Bonnie began to run forwards as the Pokemon Center got in range of sight, Pikachu joining the excitable girl as they raced forwards, spinning on her heal, and waving the two forwards to hurry up, although the two didn't share in the girl's enthusiasm as the center wasn't going anywhere.

The trio eventually made it into the Pokemon Center. It was a fairly massive building with a few dozen people inside going about their day. Despite the regions being different, Ash noticed the one that stayed the same was Nurse Joy. As the woman at the front of the desk in a pink nurse uniform greeted them, Ash told the nurse what he was there to do, and she gestured for the boy to touch his Pokedex on the center of the table in front of them. The table lit to life as a robotic voice read out Ash's name, hometown, and how many badges he had before remarking that he was now eligible for the Kalos league. Nurse Joy also informed him that all eligible trainers are awarded a Kalos region badge case for their adventure, which Chansey brought out also dressed in a nurse uniform. Ash took the case and placed it in his backpack, but before he left on his adventure, he wanted to inform his professor back home about his status.

He looked around and found a phone booth and dialed the proper number, but he was surprised when on the display that rotom appeared instead of giving him a mild jump scare. Eventually, Professor Oak pushed the rotom out of the way and greeted Ash himself. He told the professor that he had successfully made it to the Kalos region. He also told the professor about his newly caught Pokemon and displayed the froakie to him, but to his surprise, the professor had already known this Pokemon, showing him once more how intelligent the professor was. The rotom came back onto the screen, blocking his view once more, and as the professor attempted to push him away, the rotom shocked him, causing a micro explosion. Ash chuckled at the process before catching up more with Professor Oak and bidding the man farewell, he wished him luck in the league and told him he will be watching him when it premieres.

Ash hung up the phone, he made a quick jog outside where Bonnie and Clemont waited for him. Clemont wanted confirmation if the 1st gym he wanted to challenge was located in Santalune City. Ash confirmed that was the place to go, and Clemont suggested that the fastest way to reach that city was to head down Route 4; it would be a straight shot. Ash thanked him for the information and was going to say goodbye, but he was surprised when the two wanted to come with him.

Clemont told him that his outstanding courage during the events of the previous day spurred him into action, and he believed that by following him he would be able to get stronger and maybe one day he could be as courageous as him. Bonnie argued that given what had happened the previous day, they were all good friends now and that they should continue to help each other since they worked so well together. Ash wasn't one to dissuade against such passion, and he could use the company on his journey and agreed to let them join him on his adventures. The group shared in a small huddle, putting their hands together along with his two Pokemon, Froakie and Pikachu.

---

Vaniville Town

Elliot woke up bright and early in the morning, he was always a morning person but today he had an even bigger burst of energy that he normally didn't have, he stood up stretched, and then hurriedly looked himself in the mirror giving a single sigh of almost like he was exhaling all of the nerves that may have crept up into his body but even with that he murmured to himself a self-motivating chant, he can do this, he studied, he's practiced and now he was ready for his pokemon Journey, he reached turned to his nightstand and took the Pokeball there pressing the button in the center as a red beam deposited the contents it was his trusty sidekick a Marshtomp that he nicked named Seaquake it was a bit on the nose name but it was what he named it when he was younger and he saw no reason to change it now especially since he adapted to it so well.

He quickly rubbed along the Pokemon's head; he responded positively with a big smile and a chirp in its natural tongue. He asked if he was as eager as he was for the coming journey, and the response was easy even getting a slight splash to his face from a small water gun, which the Pokemon began to chuckle at, and he did as well, and it also woke him up fully from his rest, he playfully smacked the marshtomp on the head and told him to get out of the room and to go get something to eat while he got dressed. He quickly got dressed, not only for the day but for the entire rest of his journey. He didn't know how long it would take to go around the region and collect all the badges, but he often saw trainers always pack light, so he only carried around the bare essentials along with around four sets of clothing that fit neatly inside his large bag along with his books.

The next thing he needed to do was to carefully check over the list of things his father wanted him to have for his journey: potions, antidotes, full revives, repels, poke balls, berries, and last but not least, his national pokedex, which he stuffed into his lighter bag. With that done, he was ready to hit the road after he ate, of course. As he opened his door, he clutched onto his two large satchel bags before closing the door behind him and heading down to the sweet aroma that awaited him.

As his footsteps met the floor of the home, he was immediately called over by his mom. Wanting to spend one "last" meal together, he rolled his eyes at the women's theatrics as he responded that it was not like he was going away forever. She knew that, but she remarked that it highlighted his next big step in becoming an adult much sooner than she thought it would have been, so she was practicing for when that time came. His father, on the other hand, simply said to eat so that he could have the strength to face any challenges he may face out there on the road while also holding out his hand so that he could inspect his bags, which he gave him as he sat down to eat his food.

There wasn't much to discuss except for the journey he was going to undertake. He would be going towards Lumiose City to register, but while he was on the way, he might as well go and beat the Satalune City Gym first just to get it out of the way and not make him backtrack, which his father complimented his forward thinking for. The mention of the large city did bring up a tense silence given what they saw on the news; they still didn't know what to think, whether the events were real or not, deciding to wait for more information to come to the public before making any hasty judgments.

Elliot was thankful, but he knew as soon as more information did come out if things turned out bad, his mom would have an uphill battle to climb about him being away. He just hoped that by that time he'd be far away enough to not be immediately called back, and to do that, he needed to get a move on, so as soon as he was finished and his father deemed his preparation good, he was ready to head out the door, but as he approached the door, there was a knock at the door.

He looked behind him to his parents and asked if they had company coming over, but both shook their heads and asked who was it or that it may have been the neighbors coming to welcome them in since they had been out. He made his way to the door and found two people outside his doorway.

One of them was wearing a suit, a red jacket that was zipped up with burgundy jeans, and a black cap with red colored shades on top of his head, and next to him was a dark-skinned girl in a pink shirt and incredibly short shorts with a single scruffy black wrist bracelet. Both of them had satchels, one colored blue while the other was colored pink. He told his parents that it seemed to be people in the neighborhood, or at least that's what he expected, but as he opened the door fully, he noticed that the girl wasn't looking over at him, but instead, she was looking next door and waving.

He turned to his left and noticed that she was waving at his next-door neighbor who was feeding her rhyhorn. He remembered his father being tentative about having such a "mindless" Pokemon off-leash, although he wasn't going to be disrespectful to his neighbor to call it out, and he respected her confidentiality of being a world-renown rhyhorn racer that she knew her Pokemon better than he ever could.

As he opened the door, all attention turned to him as the three of them turned their sights on him. He once more recognized how small they were in comparison to him, signifying to them their age difference; he wasn't a huge guy, only 5'5 and still growing, but people usually start their Pokemon journey at age 10, while he was a whopping 15, but he put that aside for now as he put on a large smile. The boy opened up first.

"Welcome to Vaniville Town; the name's Calem. I live two doors down from you."

"And I'm Shauna; we're here because the professor asked us to come to get you." The dark-skinned girl remarked

"Hi, I'm Serena, by the way! We didn't get to meet the other day because I had Rhyhorn practice with my mom." The blonde girl next door remarked with a wave.

"Nice to meet you, all of you, I guess. What does Professor Sycamore want with me?" Elliot remarked, waving back as the girl turned back to head inside her home before focusing on the conversation at hand. `

"Oh, you know the professor?" Shauna asked

"Not personally, but I'm well-informed about this region; I had to do a bit of studying about it before I got here." Elliot remarked

"Smart thinking." Shauna commented simply.

"Well, Sycamore holds a raffle of kids in the region and selects five of them, and you were a lucky one, selected a bit surprised since you were new and all, but I guess your time spent here doesn't matter." Calem remarked

"It stinks that Y-ey's sister wasn't selected though." Shauna stated, openly looking over to their next-door neighbor's door once more.

"The other two are waiting in the next town over, with our brand new partner Pokemon! Come on, we should go now." With a pumped fist, Calem remarked excitedly.

"Alright, that's fine with me, although I already have my Pokemon" Elliot remarked as he closed the door and went to his home, not without waving to both of his parents.

The trio began to move. Calem and Shauna were curious about what Pokemon Elliot already had, and he showed them as they walked that a seaquake popped out of his Pokeball since the two were native to the Kalos region. They had never seen this type of Pokemon before, so they were both especially intrigued by it, examining it closely. They were also surprised when he took out his national pokedex; they were curious about what Pokemon Elliot already had, and he showed them as they walked as Seaquake popped out of his Pokeball since the two were native to the Kalos region. They had never seen this type of Pokemon before, so they were both especially intrigued by it, examining it closely. They were also surprised when he took out his national pokedex; it was the Unova variant national pokedex, despite his technical partner Pokemon being one from Hoen. He explained that his father was a Pokemon researcher, so they travel a lot from region to region, although this would be the first time he would be on a journey around this region.

The three of them continued to walk, just talking amongst each other about frivolous things or stuff that spontaneously came to mind. He found out that Shuana also had a Pokemon, a furfrou, but she didn't carry it around with her and mostly left it at home. This would be Calem's first Pokemon journey as well. He turned 10 a couple of months ago in comparison. Shauna and the rest of the two they were meeting were 12. It was 30 minutes later they finally arrived at Aquacorde Town. At the entrance, they were greeted by a wonderful aroma of smells as the cafes and food courts littered the opening from Vaniville Town.

They walked for a couple more minutes before they were called over by someone on their left. Calem waved back and gestured for the two of them to come over. Elliot went along with Shauna. They all got to the table and pulled up their chairs. There was another large boy with them in both height and width, along with a smaller boy with orange hair in a bowl cut.

He sat next to Calem while Shauna took up a seat next to the other two boys. As he sat down, Calem went down the line and was going to introduce the two new boys, the first one of whom was Tierno; he was nearly the same size as him; he wanted to be a dancer when he grew up, and the next boy was called Trevor. It was apparent from his greeting that he was timid, but he was smart, and he wanted to grow up and become a Pokemon researcher.

Shauna popped up and remarked about how Elliot's father was a researcher, so they would most likely have a lot in common, both probably being bookworms and all that stuff. Elliot remarked that he probably wasn't as smart as his father, but he would be glad to offer him advice or something to help him achieve his dream. This seemed to perk Trevor up a good decent bit, and he thanked him for the advice and hoped that they could compare notes in the future.

"Oh, I got it since we were all selected, maybe we can become a tight-knit group if we give each other nicknames. Can I call you Mr. E?" Tierno remarked

"I don't want a nickname, and besides, Elliot isn't that hard to say at all," Shauna commented.

"I don't mind a nickname; it could be fun." Elliot countered

"That's the spirit, hmmm. What about E-miester?" Tierno remarked

"What about little E? You come up with one for Trevor." Calem suggested before passing it off to Trevor.

"W…well … I don't know how I feel about calling someone a nickname since we just met, but if you're ok with it I guess Big E would be my suggestion" Trevor spoke

"Well, what are you going to go with?" Shauna asked

"I think Big E is fine. I do seem like the tallest here, along with being the oldest after all." Elliot remarked with a small chuckle

"Yeah, that makes sense. What about the rest of your names?" Shauna remarked

"Well, Y usually calls me Tierny, so I guess I'll go with that. What about you, Calem?" Tierno remarked

"I think I'm with Shauna on this one; Calem is fine, short, and sweet already." Calem suggested

"Well, what about you, Trevor?" Tierno asked

"Well, I guess Big-E can choose my name since I chose his." Trevor replied, turning the attention back to the new guy.

"Hmmm, how about trevs?" Elliot suggested

"How original." Shauna remarked off to the side.

"I like it though; it's fine." Trevor piped up in support.

"Well, now that, that's out of the way the Pokemon show them to me." Shauna said, a degree of excitement edging into her voice.

"Yeah, I was excited too when I and Trevor first got our Pokemon" Tierno remarked as he bent down and picked up a large suitcase, put it on the table, and opened it up to see three different Pokemon. Above each was engraved the name of each Pokemon: Fennekin, Froakie, and Chespin.

"Aren't we supposed to go visit the professor to get these Pokemon? This seems irregular," Calem remarked.

"Yeah, you're right, but didn't you see the news the other day? Something big went down in Lumoise City, so he had me and Trevor come here with them instead." Tierno remarked

"So what we saw on TV was real after all!?" Shauna remarked somewhat astonished.

"Yeah, I couldn't believe it myself; thankfully, my home was just out of reach of the garchomp's rampage; the entire hibernal avenue was destroyed, and there was so much chaos happening," Trevor stated.

"Yeah, yeah, that, but what about that handsome guy on the TV? The one with the ice powers!?" Shauna remarked, slamming her hand down on the table, making Trevor slightly jump from her sudden burst of energy.

"Well, well, I couldn't get any photos of that guy, but there were even other people around that also drew interest; I even got pictures of them." Trevor remarked excitedly as he took his camera out and began to show them the pictures he could capture of the others who were around that day.

It was nighttime and there was chaos happening as evacuation orders were being sent, so he couldn't get too many good shots, but there were at least three distinct silhouettes that could be spotted in the pictures, and as he showed the group, he explained what he visually saw. The first picture was of someone he remarked was probably a girl; she stuck out like a sour thumb compared to the others with her pink and blue costume, and due to the light, he couldn't see her face through her visor.

"This one was like a strong psychic, almost like an espeon or even an alakazam. Anything she touched began to float up into the air, and not only that followed her around." Trevor remarked before switching to another slide; this time what appeared was a rather large, inky-shadowed creature that almost looked like a giant deformed haunter or Gengar.

"This, I think, maybe a new Pokemon! I've never seen something like this before; it came out of someone on the ground; he was wearing a full-on mask with an almost honchkrow-like design, so it could be just a part of Pokemon completely! The large shadow was defending us against the debris that had been raining down from above or scattered about. The next image seemed to just be a bright flashing light that wrung out above them; he attempted to zoom in on a small, dark dot behind the explosion before explaining.

"Believe it or not, but this was also from one of them; the psychic from the first image was using her power to lift all the debris, and after a moment, a large explosion in mid-air destroyed it all. It was amazing, but I paid too much attention to that instead of my surroundings. Trevor remarked as he turned to the next slide, which was horrendously blurry; you could only somewhat make out a pink appendage that had extended past the lens to the person instead.

"Would you believe me that this wasn't a Licklicky or Lickytung? It was one of them; this one was a girl who used her tongue to grab me just like those Pokemon and lifted me out of danger as a piece of a building fell nearly on top of my head. She told me to save the pictures for later and just get to safety. I followed her instructions, put my camera, and started running so I couldn't get any more pictures, but from the news, I know it was the one in green with the goggles on her head." Trevor remarked as he swapped again to another picture, although this was a downloaded image of the news station previously.

"Woah! That's insane! If you weren't there, I probably wouldn't believe it," Calem remarked.

"Where do you think they went?" Elliot asked

"I don't know. They just suddenly disappeared as quickly as they came without saying much of anything. I think they only talked to one other person except for me, which was that boy that was also on the tower." Trevor said.

"You mean, ash?" Elliot remarked

"You know him?" Calem asked

"I recently saw him on my plane ride here the other day, so I recognize the clothes he wore" Elliot remarked

"You seem deep in thought, Shauna; what are you thinking about?" Tierno remarked

"I'm trying to think about why that name sounds familiar to me. I've heard it from somewhere, but I'm trying to remember where." Shauna remarked, rubbing a hand on her chin before noticing Serena taking off down the road with incredible haste.

"Yo Serena! Where's the fire!?" Tierno remarked in an attempt to call her over, but other than a short acknowledgment and a wave, the girl continued to hurry off in the direction of the forest.

"Oooh! I remember now! Hehe, good luck, Serena!" Shauna yelled with a huge smile on her face.

"What is it?" Calem asked noticing the instant change in demeanor.

"Oh, nothing; it's just girl things." Shauna remarked with a cheeky smile

"Is it ok if she just goes off on her own like that in the forest? Does she have a Pokemon?" Elliot asked

"She'll be fine; there isn't anything dangerous in that forest" Shauna replied

"Speaking of Pokemon, you all didn't pick yours yet" Tierno remarked as he tapped the briefcase once more.

"Well, if it's no trouble, I would like Chespin." Elliot stated

"Well, then I'll take Fennekin" Calem commented right after him.

"Geeze guys, what happened to girls going first, huh? Well, it's fine by me; I'll take froakie." Shauna remarked as each of them took the respective ball.

"Oh, and to go with that, we also have this to give you; it's a Pokedex. It allows."

"Don't bother; he already has one." Calem remarked, cutting Trevor off.

"Don't be too hasty; I would still like a regional one." Elliot remarked

"Huh? Why?" Shauna asked

"Well, National Pokedex is cool because you can see all the Pokemon in the world and all, but other than telling you what Pokemon is generally in a region, it doesn't give you where in that region the Pokemon most likely exists." Eliot explained pulling out his black pokedex and showing it off to the others who were intrigued by the device.

In comparison to the pokedex that Trevor had pulled out, the Kalos pokedex was almost completely digital with no physical buttons, simply a touch-sensitive holo screen in between two hardpoints. In comparison, his national pokedex was a dual-screen system with a touch screen. It also lacked buttons on the traditional beside the two on the side, which were the power buttons on the Kalos version; it was located on the upper portion of the device instead.

He took the Kalos device and turned it on as he began to register his information into the device which was quickly followed by the other three as well, the last order of busy was that before he could embark on his journey however he needed to have his letter signed by his parents which Shauna pointed out as being dumb that they would hadn't brought that up before and now he would have to make Elliot backtrack back to his home but again Elliot remarked that it was fine and he would just run back home quick and go, with everything handed out and settled everyone was about to go on their separate ways both Teirno and Trevor would head into the forest and go hunt for some pokemon themselves while Elliot got up and was about to dash back to from where he came but he was suddenly stopped by Shauna.

The girl had wanted to battle him using their new Pokemon; she wanted to see what he was capable of since he came from a different region. He offered to challenge her with his marshtomp instead, given that Chespin had a type advantage against her froakie, but the girl was adamant about using their new partner Pokemon, and it being new should counteract it being effective typing, and he somewhat agreed with that. So the two went off to a small Pokemon area near the cafe and tapped their Pokeballs together, accepting the duel and the natural bidding currency, which for this match was 500.

To be a gentleman, he allowed the girl to have the first move. She mockingly accepted as she asked her froakie to use Pound's forelegs glowed a bright white as it hopped into the air and came down hard, he too. He chespin to dodge it and then immediately followed by using Growl, A deep grumbling came from the chespin's chest, which was supposed to be threatening but came off more harmless. The lowered guard the attacked offered allowed his next move, which was vine whip, as two long tentacle-like appendages extended from out of his shoulders, slapping the froakie in the face and forcing it on the back foot.

it regained its footing before Shauana told it to use a water gun the blast of water was fast-hitting chespin before it could have a chance to dodge out of the way but the growl reduced the damage allowing him to mostly shrug it off on top of it not being effective he counter back with another vine whip just as the attack sailed off striking the pokemon dead center throwing the froakie back once more, Shauna wanted to even the odds and used Growl as well but this left her open for his next attack which was a tackle the move was too quick for the pokemon to dodge and the quills along chespin head grew white as it slammed home into its target causing it to fling back once more and this time stay down unconscious.

Elliot won the match and minorly celebrated before offering advice stating that Shauna should have immediately decided to use Growl first to lower his Pokemon's attack damage so that his type advantage wouldn't be as dangerous. The girl was somewhat peeved about her first loss but considered his words; she offered him a free potion for her loss, and he gladly accepted it, putting his chespin back in his ball before tapping the cartridge on the ball center. With that done, he discarded the cartridge to the nearest bin and decided he was about to head back home, although on his way he was considering a name for his chespin, and as he passed by the green trees and shrubbery, a name came to mind Evergreen.

---

Santalune Forest

Serena had gotten up early in the morning and fed Rhyhorn. She was momentarily surprised that Y's friends had shown up given that Y was currently in flight school at the moment but they were here for their neighbor instead. She greeted the boy before making her way back inside to get dressed. She had just finished digesting what had happened the other day, and other than the strange person with ice powers, the other boy that was present on that tower was someone she knew well from her past, and she needed to hurry over to the city to catch up with him.

She scoured her room for what to look for as she prepared; she would also stop by and get her own Pokemon as she was heading over from Professor Sycamore. She had put on a red dress along with black leggings and a black T-shirt that had a white collar. Now the only thing she needed to do was decide on which hat she would wear, so her mother had come in, allowing the perfect opportunity for a deceived decision. She asked her mother which she should choose, and whichever she did, she would choose the opposite.

She didn't mean in the way that she thought whatever her mother picked was ugly; she liked both hats, but her mother was a lot more subdued in her appearance, and she wanted to stand out more and look cute... For herself, of course, not for anyone in particular, she remarked to herself with a blush on her face. The hat chosen was a top hat, which was pinkish with a black ribbon circling it. She gave herself a once over in the mirror, and then off she was to Lumiose City. Her mother asked about which Pokemon she was going to choose, but that was going to be a secret for now. To be honest, while she had a general idea of which one she wanted to choose, she still hadn't completely made up her mind.

She said goodbye to her mom as she dashed out of the doorway, her othering waving goodbye, but even on this day she didn't want her to forget about her rhyhorn practice, which she responded with "I won't," which was funny enough could be taken as both a confirmation and a decline. She had no doubt her mother would think of it as the former instead of the latter as she does, but it saved a possible argument from happening, so she didn't bother clarifying. As she continued on her way, she went past Aquacorde Town, where she passed by Y's friends and her neighbor once more, but she had her mission to attend to so she didn't slow down.

As she made her way into the forest however she started to realize her over-eagerness as her constant running had quickly made her out of breath, causing her to take a break along a large tree stomp she fished into her backpack and fetched out a water bottle and took a big gulp down, unbeknownst to her behind her a trio of Pansear, Pansage, and Panpour had been working together arms linked to stealthy sink down into her now open bag and was taking out snacks and stuff from her backpack they had managed grab two items but before they could get the third the pansear let off a sneeze knocking its head back and making it strike along the pansages hand causing it to drop it and in doing so drop the sear on it's back.

Serena jumped at the sound of the thud of the impact behind her, quickly picking up her bookbag and letting off a small shout. Readying herself for anything only to see a small red creature with a fiery mein and long red tail, she turned her head upwards to see the other simial Pokemon, one color green and the other colored blue, but she was somewhat upset when she saw the other two holding two of her snacks for her adventure.

She swelled with annoyance and demanded that they give her her stuff back, but while sheepish, the Pokemon did not seem forthcoming, instead seeming to offer her a trade of some kind, as the green one had ripped several leaves from its head and given it to her while the other one had taken up her knocked down-watered bottle and produced water from it, filling it back up to full.

She wasn't going to take the trade, but given that she had no way of really doing anything about it, she was forced to accept the deal. The Pokemon wasn't just content with that, as they gestured for her to eat the leaf, and after a heavy sigh, she did so and was pleasantly surprised when she felt full of energy once more. She turned to the Pokemon, who all had cheeky grins on their faces, and she couldn't help but slightly smirk along with them as she agreed with the trade—at least a bit more now, although she did want a bit extra for her snacks as one of them was her favorite, which the Pokemon was alright with lending her.

She shook hands with the group of Pokemon as they climbed up into the trees and disappeared almost like they were never there. With the leaves, she could run continuously for the entire time, which could cut probably a five-hour journey into maybe three depending on if she doesn't get caught up again by a different Pokemon, but after she was out of the forest she would have nothing to worry about other than people, and speaking of such a thing, just as she zipped up her bag once more and was about to start running, she was halted when in front of her was a robot?. Of some kind, it was fairly tall and had exhaust pipes sticking out of its legs, stomach, and on its arms. Her anxiety shot through the roof, but when the seeming robot opened up its face to show it was a person she calmed down at least somewhat.

"Ugh..hello!" Serena remarked with a half-hearted wave full of anxiety.

"Hello there! I know my appearance may be somewhat new, but I promise you that I mean no harm. I was checking on a scream I heard in this direction, seeing if someone needed help." The robotic stranger remarked

"Oh, that was me, sorry. I was just taking a small break, and a group of Pokemon spooked me for a bit." Serena remarked.

"Are you injured?" The robotic man asked

"Oh, no, no, I'm fine." It was just a little prank some Pokemon pulled on. I gotta get going now. I'm kind of in a hurry." Serena remarked

"Do you need help getting there? You don't seem to have any Pokemon with you; it could be dangerous." The half-robot remarked Serena contemplated that for a moment and guessed that if she could arrive there faster, it could be ok, and the boy didn't seem to be too bad if he was going to help someone in need, but as she came down from her anxiety, this armor seemed to be familiar to her.

"Do you have a car or something?" Serena asked.

"Something like that. You could say that I am a car. Where are you trying to go?" The robotic stranger asked

"Well, I'm trying to get to Lumiose City." Serena remarked

"Alright, that should be no problem. Just hop on, and we should be there in no time." The robot man remarked she was confused before the individual turned around and knelt, and his back seemed to pop open to reveal a seemingly padded area for where her legs and arms should go. She was tentative and went back to thinking that this may be a real robot, but she still went along with it as she fit her legs and arms into the designated places before there was no place for her head to go so she could still see at least to her sides as there was a window in front of her but most of the view would be blocked by the person's head once he stood up.

"You alright back there? I will not lie that this is the first time I'm using this new feature of my new suit." The boy remarked, which wasn't too flattering to hear once she was already inside of it, but it was comfy, and she seemed to be locked into place as the pieces came down upon her back to keep her there.

"Yes, I'm fine, so I guess you can go now." Serena stated, still a bit skeptical. The boy gave a reassuring nod before he began about to move. She didn't know what she was expecting, but she couldn't describe the feeling of being lifted and moving so fast. She could tell by how fast the trees and shrubbery looked as they blurred by, and by the time she noticed that they had already stopped, he kneeled back down, and the pieces on the back released her.

"What's wrong? Is there a problem?" Seran asked

"We have arrived," the boy responded simply, and Serena quickly got out, untangling herself from the device and pulling her hands and stuff free before staring aghast at the large wall in front of her that decorated the surroundings of Lumiose City; they were on the right side of route four, a little ways from the garden. But to make that trek of what 16 kilometers? In three seconds was insane, almost as insane as that Ice teen from the TV the other day, and that's when it clicked for her.

"You were on the news yesterday," Serena stated boldly.

"Yes. We were, which is why I dropped off here instead of at the front gate. I wouldn't want to catch you up in all the stories probably being written about us." The boy remarked

"Woah, you are like, really fast! how? Is it the suit? Are you a part robot or something?"

"Something like that—weren't you in a hurry? I hope with the extra time you have time to properly prepare yourself for whatever activity you need," the boy remarked with a wave.

"Wait… I can't have you help and not offer anything in return; I can like tip you or something." Serena suggested.

" it is... wells….well, I offered to take you myself, but if you have anything spare I would gladly welcome it" The boy remarked prompting Serena to fish into her backpack once more getting out her wallet and taking out her wallet and handing the boy 2000, it wasn't much, but the boy seemed to think of it as being extremely generous, which she found somewhat strange, but he had suddenly gone silent for a moment and looked elsewhere and then suddenly wished her lucked and dashed off completely out of sight within the blink of an eye.

Serena still couldn't believe it and she didn't even get the boy's name either but she focused up once more as she turned towards the gate of the large city and proceeded to make her way inside, as the boy suggested there was an odd influx of people going into the city at the time a number of them seemed to hold cameras and worked for news stations and even further down the wall seemed to be a large 12-meter gap in the section that was missing from the rampage being filled in by worker pokemon and people alike but she ignored that for now and got through the checkpoint and made her way to the professor's Lab it didn't escape the damage however as the roof had been still getting fixed along with a couple of the buildings next door she entered inside and was surprised Sycamore himself wasn't present so one of the assistants Dexio had offered up the three partner pokemon the three being brought out by another assistant Sina.

Dexio offered her a pokedex, which she eagerly accepted as she used it on the three partner Pokemon as it read out their descriptions.

Fennekin: Eating a twig fills it with energy, and its roomy ears give vent to air hotter than 390 degrees Fahrenheit.

Chespin: The quills on its head are usually soft. When it flexes them, the points become so hard and sharp that they can pierce rock.

Froakie: It protects its skin by covering its body in delicate bubbles. Beneath its happy-go-lucky air, it keeps a watchful eye on its surroundings.

Each of them was unique but she already was leaning toward a particular partner ever since she started and nothing had swayed her opinion so far so she proceeded forward and knelt in front of fennekin which the small quadruped perked up at as it gladly hopped into her arms with a yip as she brushed it along its body, she could feel the heat coming off its ears before she continued forwards using a Pokeball to capture it and putting it on a clip on the back of her bag.

Before she left however she asked about where the professor was and Sina remarked that he was still busy with the police around the incident with his Garchomp from the day prior, Serena was shocked to hear that it was the professor's garchomp that went wild, and not random trainers she asked about how that happened and was filled in on some villainous organization known as "team rocket" had put on a harmful collar on that caused it to go wild. Serena hoped the Pokemon was ok and the two assured her that it was doing just found the police just wanted to put it through some domestication test to ensure the collar had no lasting effects on its behavior which Sycamore was looking over.

Serena was relieved to hear that but she also wanted to ask about the boy on the TV although initially, the two assumed that she was talking about the boy with ice powers which they had no information on Dexio let it slip that his name was Todoroki but other than that they had no other information to share, Serena clarified that she was more interested in the boy with the red hat named Ash and at that, the two did have some clue about where he was as the boy expressed that he was going to challenge the Santalune Gym so that would be her best bet in finding him.

She mentally smacked herself in the forehead at that, so she would have probably run right by him if she had decided to just huff it on foot by herself instead of being helped by that guy. She decided to forget that for the moment however as she thanked them for the directions she took off with a wave back down Route 4 luckily she still had those leaves so now she could continue running without any circumstance, she may even be able to run into him before he got to the city if she was lucky.

---

Santalune Forest

1A

The class had a somewhat peaceful night's sleep. Not much had happened during the night as the group of 20 began to camp out in the forest. Given they had momo, they had the potential to create tents and even futons that they could use to sleep on. Traditionally, the girl wouldn't have liked to create these items, but given that they were completely divorced from the currency of the world, there wasn't much they could do about it. It allowed them to be comforted from the elements and able to get a good night's rest, although sometimes Pokemon would occasionally get too close or cause disturbances in the night.

The one thing that Ashido pointed out about Pokemon in comparison to animals in their world was that since they were much larger, it meant that they had much less to worry about crawling on them in their sleep without being noticed. However, for one of their classmates in particular, this seemed to be no issue at all as multiple people stared and Some even took pictures of Kaminari's sleeping situation, the boy electing to forgo the tents and sleep out in the elements proper, and as a result, multiple Pikachu's surrounded him as he woke up. Around five of them cuddled next to the man, electricity flowing between them. When the teen had woken up, he had unintentionally spooked them into running away, which bugged him a bit as he called for them to come back.

The group all huddled up once more as everyone woke and were again talking about their next steps. They were likely plastered on a bunch of news outlets for their stunt the previous day, so the conversation was about what they were going to do about that—will they conceal themselves, especially with some of their more mutant members, or will they just act normally and whatever happens from it happens? The teens didn't see much of a point in hiding away given their performance the other day; they believed embracing the fame could lead them to get more opportunities to get into the swing of things similar to the previous world.

They still needed identities, and with them, they could get some jobs, but more importantly to some of the others, they could go out and capture their Pokemon. The thoughts of going back home and not progressing forward even further without them, lightened the mood of not returning and increased the experiment of being where they were, almost like it was an opportunity for them to have fun, although Todoroki was quick to point out that not everything is fun and games as they were also tasked with a mission from that mysterious voice from before.

This brought the conversation to focus on Ash once more as Momo gave an update on his whereabouts; he was headed in their direction from the city. According to the physical map of the region, there was a gym in Santalune City, and if he was a trainer, it was where he was likely to go, so they once more discussed what they would do with the information. They weren't thrilled about following a kid around like some creeps, so it was likely they had to reveal themselves in some fashion to the kid and his two companions, but conversations were put on hold as their stomachs started to grumble.

They had two more packs of the hyper-dense meals that Pig God had given them Sato to share, so they did, but this wouldn't last forever, so they needed to go around the forest in search of food. Iida immediately began to go on a tirade of rules and grouping, but for the most part, everyone ignored him as they scattered about the forest with their own premade groups of people. Around 14 of their number had gone further into the forest in groups of three or two, promising to bring back some berries or things of that nature, while the other six would go search for a water source that was close by according to the map.

Iida, Sato, and Aoyama had been gathering berries for a moment before Iida's suit picked up a silent scream coming from his left. He told the others that he would go investigate, finding a small girl there and offering his assistance to help the girl to her destination. The game version in their world would often have trainers start young, but he assumed that was just to appeal to its player base, but to have actual children running around without a quirk no less would be extremely dangerous in hindsight, so he wanted to help her get safely to her destination, which she allowed thankfully.

He told his class about what he was about to do and off he went, it was a short trip for him and he hadn't even gotten into full gear yet but he wanted to be mindful of his passenger so he dropped the girl off when she offered him the money he wanted to refuse as it was a hero duty to help others in the community however given their circumstances he needed all that they could so he would accept she handed him golden coins with a P on the top and bottom of it which she called "poké" worth 2,000 they came in two distinct kinds one was a darker color and slightly bigger almost the size of a dollar coin on the inner print of it he could see that these larger coins were worth 500 poké while the smaller lighter coins the size of a quarter seemed to be worth 100 poké he didn't know it this was a generous amount of money or not but he didn't have to much time to think about it when suddenly Momo had remarked that Ash was in trouble so with a quick goodbye he rushed off to help as he deposited the money into his suit.

---

Route 4

Ash, Bonnie, and Clemont were traveling down Route 4 on their way toward Santalune City although, for the most part, their journey wasn't too eventful until the leaves and trees started to rustle and shake extremely rapidly and as the wind picked up suddenly blowing in their direction as something blurred passed them in the distance that they couldn't make out through the trees and shrubbery around them the sudden violent wind had also the unintended effect of dropping something straight on top of Pikachu's head the small yellow pokemon and its blue companion having been walking alongside them as Bonnie took point, as they looked into the direction of where the blur was going, Ash asked clemont if he knew anything about that but he expressed not having any clue about what that could have been the attention of the two was brought back to Bonnie as she made a yelp of pain in front of them.

Clemont turned around immediately to his sister and ran up to her, asking if she was ok and asking the girl what had happened to her. The girl responded that she couldn't see very well but something had hit the acorn, which caused it to strike her in the forehead. She replied as she looked up and scanned the trees for what had produced the yellow attack.

Bonnie scooped up the berry in her hands and found it was somewhat burned as she speculated aloud if whatever hit her may have wanted this berry, almost like it was responding to her inquiry. The Pokemon itself had come out of the brush and rushed straight for her. Pikachu had intercepted the smaller Pokemon in a defensive position in front of Bonnie.

The small Pokemon that revealed itself looked a lot like Pikachu instead, however, being much smaller, only 8 inches tall compared to its, which was over 1 foot tall, and compared to his Pikachu, which was taller than average, it dwarfed the smaller pokemon. Other than size, this new Pokemon was also majorly orange in color with a beige belly and black colored ears, at least on the outside, with a beige inner working. The small mon also had bright red cheeks on its face similar to Pikachu, but it had additional whiskers that sprouted out of them, and to complete its look, it had a long, slender, all-black tail.

{Get out of the way; that berry is mine; I found it fair and square.}

{No way, you hurt someone I'm traveling with; go find another.}

{You just want my berry for yourself.}

"It doesn't seem to be afraid of us." Bonnie remarked

"There are electric types, so they probably communicate with each other using electricity." Clemont speculated as the two Pokemon shared electricity between each other. Ash, in the meantime, took out his pokedex to scan what this new Pokemon was, and it read out.

Dedenne: its whiskers serve as antennas. By sending and receiving electrical waves, it can communicate with others over vast distances.

Upon learning of the Pokemon's name, Bonnie was smitten with the creature wanting her brother to catch it for her, Ash was a bit confused but his brother reminded him that his sister was still a year too young to legally own Pokemon herself in Kalos the youngest age a person can own a pokemon is six years old meanwhile Bonnie was 5, the anticipation had led the girl to sometimes ask her brother to capture pokemon for her in preparation for her crowning day but Clemont was always hesitant to do so including currently but with some encouragement from ash even going so far as to offer to catch it for them he agreed to catch dedenne, although the girl was one step ahead of them offering to grant the pokemon the berry that had hit her.

As the little girl handed out the berry, however, the Pokemon was hesitant to just straight up and go for it, but once it looked at the smile on her face and reassurance from Pikachu, it resolved to move forward and attempt to eat the berry, but just as he did so, something else came from out of the trees, quickly swooping down and scooping up the berry with its feet and flying up into the air back into the opposite tree.

The Pokemon's head was mostly red with a black beak and big round black eyes with a grey body; it held the berry with one of its feet while it stared down at them. Clemont identified the Pokemon as a fletchling. Bonnie yelled at it for stealing Dedenne's berry, but in response, the fletchling lifted the berry, threw it in the air, and ate it, making the three gasp in shock before the Pokemon began to taunt them.

{It seems like the berry was mine after all, hahaha!}

Ash took out his pokedex to scan the Pokemon, and it read.

Fletchling: Despite the beauty of its lilting voice, it's merciless to intruders that enter its territory.

In response, the dedenne was completely saddened by the act, nearly crying before running off; this caused Bonnie, who wanted to catch it, also about to burst into tears due to losing her first potential Pokemon. Froakie, noticing the sad look on the girl's face, quickly jumped up into the air and used his frubbles around its neck to shoot the fire type down, but it was incredibly more nimble than expected as it swished and dived between every one of them.

The display of skill got Ash pumped up, and he decided to catch the fletchling himself. Clemont remarked that since fletching is a flying type, Pikachu should be used since it's an electric type, and Ash accepted his advice, planning to use Pikachu to attack. However, froakie held up its hand in front of the yellow Pokemon before leaping up once more directly at the Pokemon using its frubbles once more, but the mon avoided the attack once more.

Ash admonished the Pokemon for not waiting for a plan of action and instructed Pikachu to use Thunderbolt but once more the Froakie held out its hand halting the Pokemon as it jumped up one more this time using a water pulse but the flying Pokemon started to evade again this time moving so fast that it started to create after images which Clemont recognized as double team, Froakie didn't falter from the oncoming assault aiming for center mass hopping the explosion would take the rest even if he missed but this proved to not be the best as it missed one at the far right which was proven to be the pokemon itself as it dashed in its beak glowing a bright white in peck that struck the Froakie hard in the chest slamming it into a tree.

Froakie went flying into a tree where it slid down. Ash caught it before it hit the ground. Even though Ash wanted it to give it a rest, the Pokemon wasn't backing down, crawling around Ash, ignoring his words as it leaped at the Pokemon once more, although his next attack was still fruitless as the last two before it as the fire type dodged, and to make matters even worse, the flying pokemon had the advantage of using its flight to force Froakie to continue to jump into the air to attack it, which meant it couldn't dodge out of the way of its attacks as another peck struck this time going for Froakie's head. However, the blue mon was able to put up a block, which mitigated some of the damage.

It was flung hard into the ground but Ash was there once more to catch it from tumbling too far back and there he caught a firm hold of the Pokemon making it harder to attack once more, Clemont mentioned that Scyamor informed them of this Froakie tendency of not following orders but Ash didn't think that what it was doing at least not now it was battling with pure emotion which was a lot how he battled drawing a connection between the two as he tried to get Froakie to listen to him but before he could the flying mon continued its attack this time its wings glowed a bright white as it flapped them in their direction as white blades of energy came at them forcing Ash to dodge out of the way along with Clemont and Bonnie.

Ash and company crashed into a tree. Ash flinched for a moment as a bruise formed on the amr that slammed directly into it, but he asked if his two Pokemon were ok first. When they confirmed they were, he checked on both Bonnie and Clemons, which were also ok. He finally had a moment to talk to Frosty and remarked that while it was honorable that he wanted to get revenge against Fletching for making Bonnie sad, hearing that made Bonnie extremely grateful, hugging the small Pokemon closely and rubbing her face against it, causing it to blush.

Now that Froakie was calmer, he could finally explain that they wouldn't be able to get anywhere unless they came up with a plan, and the first thing they needed to do was figure out a way to get around the Pokemon's flight, and that, Clemont was the one who said he had a plan.

The future is now thanks to science! Clemontic gear on! Presenting my flying-type Pokemon attractor machine!

Clemont boldly announced that although Bonnie gave him flack for the name, Ash was impressed by the invention; it was a gramophone in looks, and the machine worked by interfering with the Pokemon's internal compass by emitting a high-pitched frequency. However, as he began to pump the machine handle and waited a couple of seconds, the mon was completely unaffected. After another moment of this through the trees, several eyes started to poke through the darkness of the trees, glowing red eyes that permeated around them surrounding them, causing them to want to suggest that Clemont stop cranking the machine.

He was stubborn, however, wanting his machine to work, so the evil eyes continued to get closer until it was revealed that the Pokemon that had been surrounding them were beedrill 20 of them; in fact, they had immediately begun to run away, but Clemont continued to crank his machine, believing that the machine would work in attracting flying-type pokemon and that he would only need to adjust the frequency to be a bit higher, but that seemed to only increase the beedrill aggression as the buzzing got even more frequent in step, but Clemont wouldn't stop with his cranking—that was until a large shockwave was heard over everything.

The group had only managed to turn around as massive wind pressure struck them in the chest, nearly knocking them off their feet. The dust that it picked up made them shield their eyes from the coming storm. By the time they opened them again, they were shocked by what appeared to be a robotic knight in front of them. The 20 beedrills had all been scattered about the small forest.

"Wow! Thank you, Mr. Robot!" Bonnie remarked, but she was stopped from approaching the thing as her brother hooked an arm around her.

"Thanks for the save there; that is some astounding piece of technology." Clemont remarked, surprised and excited but cautious of the situation.

"Is everyone OK?" The person remarked as his helmet split open down the middle and receded, revealing the person underneath.

"We're alright, thanks to you, that is. That's an awesome suit!" Ash remarked as he closed the distance between them to get a closer look at the new arrival. Ash's boldness in welcoming the new arrival as well as revealing itself to be a person eased Clemont's nerves a bit to release his sister, who followed in Ash's footsteps, outpacing him to get to the individual even with excitement clearly in her eyes as she looked him over.

"Wow! So are you like a part robot or something?" Bonnie asked outright, causing the individual to chuckle slightly.

"No, I'm still a person. Well, I may have a little extra compared to the rest of you, but this is just a suit I wear." the person remarked

"So anyone can wear it?" Clemont asked as he stepped up to examine it more thoroughly, looking all around it.

"No, it personally suited for me; it wouldn't be very helpful to others anyway." The person remarked

"Oh? Does this suit help you move around?" Clemont asked.

"No, not like that..hmm, I guess you could say that the speed doesn't directly come from the suit; it just helps regulate it." The man remarked, earning a burst of intrigue from Clemont at what he meant by that.

"Excuse my manners. My name is Iida. It is good to meet you all, Ash. You met one of my friends the other day, Todoroki." Iida responded, and this got their attention immediately.

"Wait, you know that, boy with the ice powers from the other day!?" Bonnie and Ash yelled in surprise.

"Yes, he is one of my trusted friends." Iida replied

"Oh wow, so the way he produced all that ice on Lumiose Tower was also through technology of some kind?" Clemont inquired

"No. That was his natural ability." Iida announced

"How natural is it?" Bonnie asked

"It's something we call quirks; all of us have them; it gives us supernatural abilities." Iida remarked

"Wow, that's sounds super cool. My name is Ash, by the way."

"I'm Clemont"

"And my name is Bonnie."

"So you were the one that had run past before that caused the large breeze; are you just going around helping people on this route or something?" Clemont asked

"Oh! Oh! Oh, are you and your friend's heroes like Blaziken Mask!?" Bonnie asked

"Well, back home, that is something we wanted to aspire to be. Yes, I was helping a girl get to Lumiose City before getting a message that you all were in trouble." iida remarked

"A message?" Ash questioned.

"Yes, we have been keeping an eye on you, Ash. We were told by someone that you are important or, more like, will be important to this region." Iida remarked as he chucked a thumb upwards just as a small drone resembling that of a round berry with butterfly wings on its back sunk from above to be visible to them.

"Woah, Ash, see, we knew that you were cool." Bonnie remarked

"Well, who told you all that? This is my first time here." Ash asked

"We actually don't know, but as I said before, we aspired to be heroes back home, so if someone needs our help, we will help with all our might." Iida announced.

"Wow, so cool!" Ash remarked

"Does that mean you will be traveling with us?" Clemont asked

"If you all will have me, I see no reason not to; there are a great many things that I'm new to that I would gladly accept you all helping me with." Iida replied with a bow of the head.

"Sure! We'll gladly have you if you are going to be watching our backs in the first place. Honestly, with you all around, I'm sure Team Rocket won't be much of a problem at all." Ash remarked before turning to Pikachu and nodding, getting a positive affirmative back.

"Where is everyone else anyway?" Bonnie asked

"They are in Santalune Forest for the moment; it's going to be where we call home until we figure things out." Iida replied. Clemont was about to question what he meant by that, but the group was distracted when the sound of chirping came from overhead; it was the fletching from before, almost like it was taunting them for being unable to catch it.

Now that they had been done with the distractions, they had refocused on the bird Pokemon. Ash bent down towards his two Pokemon once more, focusing on froakie, who wanted to battle, but he made sure to point out that he was its trainer so that it should listen to him. He came up with a plan to get fletching; he just needed to give him a little time. As he looked around the field, there were a bunch of trees scattered about that should give an ample amount of cover and elevation that should allow his Froakie to at least not get beaten down by being out in the open.

So his first order was a bit unorthodox, as he told Froakie to go into the trees themselves. Still, in the opposite direction of where the flying type was perched, causing the Pokemon to tilt its head in confusion. Although it still began to flap its wings in preparation for an attack, Froakie took a roundabout way to get towards the flying Pokemon, using the shadows of the trees to cover for itself. However, the thing that gave the Pokemon away was the rustling that it had to generate as it was jumping between the branches, allowing the flying Pokemon to notice and leap out of the way just in time to dodge the frubbles that the mon used to throw its way.

The bird countered as its wings began to glow a bright white once more and Ash ordered froakie to dive back down into the trees which it followed just in time as the razor winds started to rain down upon the object, it took several blows before the tree finally fell as the mon was distracted by the falling tree, Froakie raised behind as it jumped from a different tree high into the air where Ash ordered it to use water pulse however this fletchling was still incredibly quick even while off guard it was able to narrowly avoid the attack swinging around it before diving straight at the blue mon as it beak started to glow a bright white once more, froakie instinctively puffed out the frubbles on its body to better withstand the attack as it was struck once more in the chest.

The frubbles bled onto the other mon's face momentarily blinding it and causing its next attack with its wings to go wide, missign where the blue mon landed by a couple of meters as Ash started to think once more, the two Pokemon entered into a game of cat and mouse as Froakie would pop up and out from the tree tops attack the mon where it would evade and strike back missing as the blue pokemon disappeared into the leaves once more, this fletchling was smart however as it started to notice the shaking of the trees to predict where the froakie would be but this was just a ploy by the pokemon itself using its frubbles to jostle the leaves and leaving it open once more as Ash ordered to use bubble which landed squarely against the mon making it fall from the air, Ash was prepared as he threw a pokeball directly at the mon hitting it squarely as it dropped to the floor however it only shook once before the fletchling broke free once more.

It took to the air immediately as it laid down another barrage of razor wind. Iida remarked the move was hitting multiple trees in the hope of flushing the Froakie out of hiding. All the wind blades chopped off chunks of the trees around, creating so much debris that rained down upon the froakie, which it used to hide behind, which gave ash and the idea he didn't want to just hide, so he ordered his froakie to use a water pulse on a tree in the direction of the flying pokemon. The explosion blasted and caused a wave of debris to launch up at the Pokemon, causing it to be blinded as Froakie jumped high into the air above it.

The Pokemon took evasive maneuvers once more as it used double team, creating multiple afterimages of itself, but Ash was prepared this time using bubbles to clear them all out and striking the Pokemon once more to boot. The Pokemon was now vulnerable as Froakie used its frubbles to rain down upon it, trapping its wings to its sides, and then Ash ordered it to use a water pulse, which by the time the flying type shook the frubbles off, was hit directly, and it began to fall straight to the ground once more, where Ash threw another pokeball and, after three shakes, was finally caught by the trainer.

Everyone clapped for Ash's success and congratulated him on his victory and capture of Fletchling. Ash owed it all to Froakie's perseverance and strength as he was starting to get a better handle on the small rebellion Pokemon. Clemont remarked that their bond had gotten better due to the battle, which both froakie and Ash agreed with. Ash released fletchling once more and told it that now they would be journeying together and would be great friends, making the flying Pokemon chirp happily, although Bonnie did inform the small mon that it should always ask for food and that taking food was wrong, making it let out a remorseful sad chirp, which Bonnie accepted as its apology, and to truly makeup, Clemont handed all three pokemon an oran berry, which all three pokemon eagerly gulped down. With his second Pokemon in hand, Ash was ready to head right towards Santalune City with his new companion as well; a long journey awaited him.

---

Aquacorde Town

Elliot quickly made his way back from his home, giving his mom the letter that she signed and offered back to him. She also told him to not forget his scarf before he left, which she thanked her for as he grabbed the large red scarf that he draped loosely around his neck. He once again said goodbye to his mom and dad for real this time, as he wouldn't be back until he had beaten all the gym leaders. Both of them wished him luck and to be safe before he ran back out and back to the town. He was somewhat surprised to find that instead of waiting for him, there was a letter at the table telling him that everyone was heading for the forest; it had all of their phone numbers on it, which told him that they likely hadn't taken off from that long ago, so he would need to hurry up and catch up with them as he rushed forward. As he got to the bridge, an older gentleman had warned him to go into the forest about wild Pokemon, which he would, but in his response, he didn't pay attention to where he was going and seemingly hit a brick wall or something that wasn't supposed to be there as he went crashing down.

As he landed on his butt, he hissed out in pain as he looked up, and flinched in pain from the landing on the brick road. He looked at what he had hit and was surprised that he had actually run directly into a person; it was another teenager. It seemed with blonde hair that could only be described as exploding outwards in all directions. He looked down at him, and he couldn't help but slightly shrivel up at the piercing gaze of his red eyes, but the anger left his face as quickly as he continued forward, remarking that he should watch where he was going in an almost growl-like fashion as he stepped around him and kept walking towards the city.

He was picked up by another person who held out a hand for him to get up, he took the outstretched hand and was almost completely hoisted into the air by the teen, this teen had red hair in a similar style to the person that passed him although a bit longer in the back, he was a bit taller than him and he was very strong as he lifted him so quickly he was incredibly friendly even somewhat apologizing for his friend somewhat rudeness however he was quick to comment that no it was his fault he should have been paying attention to what was in front of him, the redhead nodded as he left to catch up to the blonde as he to got a move on, he passed two other individuals crossing the bridge one was someone with yellow hair with a black thunderbolt in it, he knew Pikachu enthusiast liked to dress up that way so it was like a red flash about what pokemon that the man likely had The other one that he was consulting with was a very small boy with a lot of hair; he's seen hair wrapped up in buns before, but nothing really like that, but he avoided attempting to stare, and he was definitely attempting to avoid eye contact given trainer etiquette.

He continued forward before stopping before entering the forest proper. He sent a text to Calem to see which part of the forest they had entered so he could catch up with them, and he received a reply almost immediately, and off he went. Just as he was about to enter the forest, something jumped out at him, causing him to jump, and he immediately turned to face the threat, but it was a young boy a little over half his height. The surprise had caused him to look the boy up and down, which included in the eyes as well, which was likely the kid's goal as he laughed.

"Haha, when two trainers' eyes meet, a Pokemon battle begins." The young boy remarked as he immediately throughout his Pokeball revealed a Zigzagoon. Although he made no moves to throw out his own Pokemon, he was tempted to just get the battle out of the way quicker, but he would be fair and out of respect for the kid's ploy of getting a trainer battle from people.

"Huh? Aren't you going to battle? We looked in the eyes. You have to battle me!" The young boy remarked with impatience.

"Aren't you skipping a step?" Elliot remarked

"umm… I don't think so." The young boy remarked, rubbing along his chin in thought.

"To start an official trainer battle, you first need to click the pokeballs of the Pokemon that will be battling." Elliot explained

"Oh yeah, I remember that," the young boy attempted to say as he came closer and set his Pokeball outwards, and Elliot did the same, clicking the balls in the center as they lit up, signaling confirmation of the battle; the zigzag glew a bright blue for a brief moment also as confirmation.

"Oh, did you know? Well, why do we have to do that first? If you answer correctly, I'll let you get the first move." Elliot suggested, and the boy was super excited at the prospect, so he started to think, pacing back and forth as he did so before an idea came to his mind.

"Oh, I remember it's so that money can be properly transferred between two people, right?" The young boy remarked, and he couldn't help but chuckle, as that was the boy's concern; it was the likely reason he wanted to jump scared people into battles; he couldn't disrespect the grind at least.

"Well, that's one of the things it does anything else?" Elliot asked

"Uhmmm...I don't remember." The boy finally relented with a slight pout as he kicked the dirt.

"It's fine; while it does handle the transaction between battles, it must importantly equalize Pokemon that are battling; some Pokemon are naturally stronger than others to the point where the battle is too one-sided, where a battle is pointless to think of a Pikachu vs. an Onix or a wailord vs. a whiscash, and it also gives insight to the Pokemon center of how your pokemon got beaten up." Elliot explained as he took a step back and used his Pokeball, and out came his marshtomp seaquake.

The young boy was surprised by the Pokemon, but he quickly shook it off as the battle officially began. Elliot allowed the boy to go first but he didn't expect his first move to be a growl the pokemon let out a small growl and as a result his mon was briefly showered in a blue and red aura, he counted with muddy water a brownish water cannon emerged from marshtomps mouth striking the pokemon head on causing it to flinch backward but was still able to get back to its feet although groggily, the trainer did another attack this one was again a debuff which was Tail whip the pokemon turned around and swiped its tail in his marshstomp direction, the sparkly wind consumed his pokemon as more red and blue aura consumed his mon this time his defense falling instead of his accuracy from the previous attack.

He again took the opportunity to launch an attack of his own, this time using a water gun. A blue stream of water rocketed out of Marshstomp's mouth, slamming directly into the Pokemon's stomach, and this time as it was about to stand up once more, its knees fell out from under it, causing it to fall unconscious. The kid pouted at his loss before recalling his Pokemon back to its ball. Elliot commented that he shouldn't focus on debuffing your opponent too much as it leaves him wide open to attack, which would and did cost him immensely before moving on into the forest proper. It didn't take too long for him to find where everyone had gone.

It was Shauna who had found him and led him to the area where everyone had been generally around they walked for a couple of minutes to arrive in a semi clearing as they returned they found the posse looking over a battle with Tierno and some other young trainer he had a corphish he had just used sword dance the claws pincer slamming together rhythmically as a large red aura briefly enveloped the creature just in time as his opponents fletching swooped down with peck the trainer didn't time the distance correctly or it was likey using it's flight to stay away and hammer down on the corphish from above with no way of counter-attack but as the peck came in Tierno countered with vise grip the two pincers on the pokemon glowed a bright white and it used both of them to grab hold of the extended flying pokemon's wing stopping its attack cold and making it flinch and cry out in pain, The vise grip held for a long time as the crab slammed the pokemon in its grip from side to side as it held onto it.

Its trainer ordered for the bird to escape using growl; the vibrations from it traveled up the Corsphis pincer, losing its grip and allowing the Pokemon to escape. Tierno used the opportunity as the Pokemon was recovering to use leer. The flying Pokemon hesitated as it looked into the red Pokemon's eyes but ultimately shook it off as it prepared for another assault.

It's the next two orders were simultaneous with each other as the young boy ordered his bird to use quick attack while Tierno tasked him with using water gun, the pokemon trailed a bright white aura as it was coming down straight at its opponent Tierno mon had waited for the perfect opportunity to wear it mon was point blank to strike or maybe it was just an accident as the pokemon came down at an incredible speed but the two attacks clashed causing a micro explosion that created a cloud of dust that concealed both pokemon but quickly come flying out of said smoke was the fletchling slamming it's back into a tree causing its trainer to run over to it with concern o his features, Calem and Trevor praised Tierno for his victory before they turned towards him and Shauna which followed suit in their friend's footsteps.

The five of them checked up on the young boy before wishing him luck as they continued to walk together through the forest. Calem would often run off to the side through the shrubbery and leaves going off somewhere ahead of them, forgoing the paved road for them. It was a quicker way to catch Pokemon that way by almost literally running into them, as he could spot a couple of scatter bugs moving out of the way of the mad trainer, although he didn't seem like he cared much to catch any of them.

Using his friend's dash through the fields to his advantage, Trevor had taken the opportunity to take many pictures of the small scatterbugs, highlighting very minute details in their appearance, whether that be the length of their tufts of feathers on their heads or the specific pattern of their coat being slightly different than average. Shauna was less than amused by what he displayed, as these differences were very minute and not something to be getting as excited about as he was, which was shared by Tierno but in a more friendly way.

Elliot wasn't that different. If he was being honest, it was like being surprised that humans all didn't share the same facial features or body hair. However, he did highlight that the fact that he could spot these straightforward things with a single glance was a good skill to have for a Pokemon researcher, so he shouldn't stop doing what he was doing, which Trevor seemed extremely happy to hear about as he continues his hunt for unique Pokemon to take pictures of.

Shauna had been steadily walking alongside him instead of roaming further away like the others. She pointed out something in the grass, gesturing toward it and moving over in that direction, telling him to wait for her. He did so, and she returned with a large see-through pokeball case.

"I saw this sticking out of the grass over there; I'm sure you know what it is, right?" Shauna remarked as she began to open it up.

"Yeah, it's a Pokemon care package; Pokemon rangers place them around the routes where trainers usually travel; they usually carry useful things for trainers like supplies and even TMs." Elliot remarked.

"No kidding, this says it's a paralysis Heal, do you want it?" Shauna asked suddenly

"What? I mean, you found it, which means you should keep it." Elliot remarked

"I think you would probably have more use for it than me. I'm not aiming to be a Pokemon master." Shauna remarked as she dropped the heal into his hands; he nodded before putting the chip into his bag.

"Are you not into Pokemon battling?" Elliot asked as the two continued to walk down the path, and the girl shook her head.

"Nah, I'm more into Pokemon showcases." Shauana remarked

"Pokemon showcase?" Elliot asked

"Yeah, it's this popular thing in Kalos where a handful of contestants compete to become Kalos queen." Shauna replied

"Oh yeah, I think I've heard something about that in my research of the region. I think the reigning queen is Aria, right?" Elliot asked

"Yup, you're right, but her reign is coming to an end because I'm going to take the crown from her this year." Shauna replied with enthusiasm, which turned into a disgruntled frown when she heard Elliot chuckle.

"Well, I hope the best in your adventure. Give it your best shot." Elliot remarked

"I don't need you to tell me that. Well, what about you? I assume you're aiming for the Kalos League." Shauna remark

"Yup, I got my entire Pokemon team that I want to have ready, although thinking about it now, I'll probably need to get a bit creative to get some of them because they are not traditionally found in Kalos. Hey, are there any electric types in this forest?" Elliot remarked mainly to himself as he looked up before turning back to Shauana to ask her a follow-up question.

"Hmmm? Yeah, I think, Hey Trevor! Are there any electric types in this forest?" Shauna remarked before yelling out to the boy as they passed, this making him jump as the boy was in the middle of taking the picture of what appeared to be a sleeping Kakuna.

"Huh!? Oh yeah! Yeah, there have been records of Pikachu roaming this forest here and there!" Trevor yelled back before attempting to quickly turn back and get more pictures of the Kakuna, only to find the Pokemon had moved on; otherwise, they were likely annoyed by the loud sound, causing the boy to pout a bit before moving on.

"Hmm Pikachu, eh? That maybe could work." Elliot remarked mostly to himself as the two continued to walk, although they were stopped a short time later by a young woman. She wore a black dress shirt with a white shirt undeniably with a pink ribbon and red dress. The blonde-haired girl seemed to have overheard their conversation.

"Oh, did I hear someone ask for an electric type? Another electrifying young trainer in the making, I assume? " The young woman remarked

"Something like that, I'll need an electric type for my team. Do you know where I can find them in this forest?" Elliot asked

"I do. But if you want that information, then you're going to have to beat me in a Pokemon battle. The name Anna." The young woman remarked, holding out her Pokeball in her hand.

"My name is Elliot, and I accept your request" Elliot remarked as he held out his own Pokeball, clicking togather and glowing green, signifying the battle acceptance.

The three of them went off to the side of the path so they didn't get in the way of other trainers passing by, and the two of them both sent out their Pokemon at the same time; Anna sent out a Pikachu while Elliot sent out Evergreen.

"Dang, it seems we got the short end of the draw, but don't think we'll be intimidated because you have a type advantage," Anna remarked before ordering Pikachu to use charm. The Pokemon quickly went into a cute pose, which had the desired effect of completely captivating his Chespin, having heart shape in its eyes. The next thing Anna ordered was for her Pikachu to use quick attack.

The Pokemon started to glow a bright aura as its pace quickened as when straight for Chespin, which it likely perceived as a hug as it held its arms wide open for him like the mon was coming in for a hug. The attack was a jarring experience for him as he went flying back from getting struck in the chest, but he recovered quickly as he used the rolling to come to his feet, shaking his head from the delusion it was experiencing.

He immediately ordered Chespin to use vine whip as two long vines extended from his back and went to attack the yellow Pokemon, which narrowly avoided. Anna ordered the Pikachu to use thundershock. Elliott countered by remarking that Evergreen should simply run through the attack with tackle. As the quills on his Pokemon grew white, it charged forth directly into his opponent's attack. It landed squarely, but his Pokemon continued to chuck through the attack, not being very effective. The surprise was enough for him to land the tackle squarely against his opponent, causing it to fling backward.

Elliot once again ordered it to use vine whip, but Anna was quick with evasive maneuvers as she ordered her Pikachu to use double team the dozen or so after images, allowing her mon to avoid the attack once more, although it still cleared them all, allowing him to use tackle to strike the pokemon, this also missed, and to make matters worse, the Pikachu used its tail to trip his chespin up, causing it to spin and hit the tree, its sharp spine embedding into causing it to get stuck momentarily.

Pikachu was about to use quick attack once more, but Chepin was able to narrowly dodge out of the way by rolling once more. Elliot saw the flicker of white on its head spines as it did so, making him have an idea as he ordered chespin to roll into the Pikachu. The Pokemon, despite the odd request, did so rolling somewhat clumsily, which easily allowed the Pikachu to dodge out of the way of the attack before using another thundershock this time causing chespin to take the hit and become paralyzed, Elliot sucked his teeth and asked Chespin to attempt to fight through it to roll once more at the Pikachu, which it did, but the Pokemon just dodged it once more, but the white light was getting brighter on its' quills. Anna used a quick attack once more, and he wanted Chespin to use vine whip, but the paralysis was too much for that move, forcing him to take the attack head-on once more, forcing Chespin back.

Chespin was looking a little worse for wear from taking those attacks but he was confident that if this move was what he hoped it was it would lead to his victory anna used another quick attack aiming straight for him which was his chance he ordered chespin to use rollout and then spun on the pokemon grew white and extended a the pokemon rolled extremely fast before striking out against the Pikachu move the attacks clashed but Pikachu was blown backward he asked chespin to continue with the attack striking once more and hitting the pikachu before it could recover anna ordered Pikachu to use double team and now it was his turn to choose and he chose one of the clones int he far back right and it turn out it was his lucky day as that was where the pikachu was hitting him and knocking the pikachu unconscious.

"Wow, you risked it all there at the end; nice battle." Anna commented as she recalled her pikachu.

"Thanks; I honestly shouldn't have focused on learning a new move in the middle of a battle, but it was also really effective on electric types, so might as well try, I guessed." Elliot commented with a smile.

"Well, as agreed upon, you can find some pikachu in the upper left portion of the forest; they like to keep next to the city due to the powerlines running through it. Good luck in catching one." Anna commented as she went on her way, and Elliot waved goodbye. As he proceeded in the direction she labeled Shauna was right on his tail, congratulating him for his win along with Calem, who seemingly came out of nowhere, the young boy offering him a couple of pokeball since he heard he was going to capture a pokemon, although he already had a full set of them and even some of the more specialized versions, like that of a great ball. Although he wouldn't use it for this encounter, the group of three continued to progress through the forest, approaching near the end of it when they had finally managed to get on the trial of where their target lies.

The indication of their pikachu nearby was the atmosphere being charged and some berries being completely burnt to a crisp, so it was here that they all began to spread out and search for where the pikachu could be, it was an elusive Pokemon for the most part easily being able to slip into the brush and leave any number of places so it was fairly surprising when Elliot came about pushing through a few shrubs and bushed to reveal that he had found several actually but more than that he found each of them crowding around a fairly large boy the major thing that stuck out to him was that on the top of his head lied a strange sight a rather large horn that extended dar above by a couple of inches almost like a rapidash or something.

The pikachu huddled around him but other Pokemon as well, such as pansear, pansage, panpoue, a couple of skitterbugs, and even a fletchling from above. Elliot speculated that this likely wasn't all the boy's Pokemon, and as he pushed through the shrubbery to ask about it, the Pokemon had all begun to scatter in different directions, but the shocking thing that had happened was that teen was also just gone as well. This was the truly bizarre thing, as some that big shouldn't be able to move that quickly, could they? Or was he just hallucinating someone being there? It could have been the work of a Pokemon playing a prank on him, but he let that lie for now as he tentatively made his way toward where he saw the Pikachu head off.

It took a couple of minutes of searching before he was able to spot the yellow Pokemon once more but he locked it in his sights, there would be no need to get his other Pokemon out for this as he readied his ball and threw it directly at the Pikachu, it landed squarely with a thud on the back of the Pikachu's head before it as absorbed by the red glow, the ball shook once, twice, and three times before it was finally captured, Elliot whooped at his catch before rushing out and snatching the pokemon up looking at it for a moment before stowing it away, he took out his phone and message Shauna and Calem that he caught it before telling them that he was about to exit the forest, every messaged for him to wait up as they should all exit the forest together.

All five of them grouped up together nearing the exit of the forest and exclaimed in surprise about how quickly he was able to capture the Pikachu, especially given how his Pokemon had already been in battles beforehand. Elliot explained that the reason he was able to capture the Pikachu so quickly was due to his use of a quick ball he pulled out the Pokeball with yellow and blue coloring, earning each of the group's attention as they asked how this Pokeball was different from the standard version, and Elliot explained that the quicker a pokemon, the healthier it is, which stumped the group as that was the complete opposite of what they had been taught about pokemon.

They then went on to ask about what other types of pokeballs he had, and he pulled them out. He had 10x pokeballs, 5x great balls, 1x ultra ball, 8x friend balls, 3x netballs, and 8x quick balls. the first three balls he listed were simple to explain all offered just a slight decrease to the amount of damage he needed to do to a Pokemon to allow them to be captured, the netball increased the rate of capture on water and bug-type Pokemon while the friend ball increased the pokemon fondness towards you once caught it was something that his father forced him to have which is why it was his second most plentiful ball beside the normal one, the group was completely awestruck by the new variations and he could tell by their looks that they wanted some for themselves so he offered them one each of them could choose which ball they wanted to have besides the ultra as he only had one of those and wanted to keep if a special occasion popped up.

They were each incredibly thankful for the opportunity, and each grabbed a hold of a ball of their choosing; Tierno and Calem both took a quick ball, Trevor took a netball, and Shauna took a friend ball.

With the group as pumped as ever for their adventure, the group decided to continue forward onto the city, heading out of the forest and seeing the city just a couple of kilometers away. As they began their hike, Elliot couldn't help but think about the scene he came upon once more and even asked some of the others if they had seen a tall person with a horn on top of his head during their time in the forest, but each of them shook their heads on the matter, not seeing anything familiar to that, after a brief moment, thought that his entire head kind seemed misshaped now that he thought about it, either that or he had a very strong jawline.

Trevor fiddled with his camera for a moment before displaying an image, it was of the news from before about the teens this time unedited although a further closer shot that someone allowed them to see their faces and he pointed to one of them near the back of the formation he had a costume on that mirrored the colors of leaves green, burgundy, and reddish orange but the thing that Trevor wanted to highlight was horn on top of his head, leaning to an air of mystique appearing as all of them turned back to the forest, Trevor remarked that the stranger seemingly vanished from the rooftop but super slow motion cameras have said they moved or more precisely jumped away from the city and most important they jumped in this very direction down route 4 so unless they changed course it could be reasonable to assume that he may have come across that one in particular.

The reactions were of deep fascination as they stared into the forest; however, the group ultimately elected to keep moving forward toward the city, if whoever they wanted to keep private would allow them, and they wouldn't want to chase them down, especially someone that held the power to defeat a garchomp with just one move, although it gnawed at the back of their minds each step of the way. As the group approached the gates of Sanalune City, the group all huddled to gather once more to get an idea of what each person wanted to do in the small town. A majority of the group's goal was obvious: Calem, Tierno, Trevor, and Elliot all wanted to challenge the gym leader so that they could enter the Kalos League, although Tierno also wanted to just walk around and see how other Pokemon moved and grooved, while Trevor wanted to take pictures of all the other Pokemon that weren't in the forest as well. His secondary goal was to get a picture of all the Pokemon in the pokedex.

Shauna was the odd one out, as she wasn't aiming for the Kalos league, so instead she would spend time getting to know her little Froakie a little more. With the group, huddle finished Calem was the first to break away into a full-force sprint into the city wanting to be the first one to get to the gym leader before anyone else, Calem was eager to join him as well, although he would be making a quick stop towards the Pokemon center not only to get his pokemon checked up on he also had to do something with the Pikachu he captured so he quickly past through the area passing numerous trainers making sure to keep his head down to not get drawn into another battle, it worked for the most part as he got to the pokemon center, to his surprised Tierno had been right on his tail the entirety way and he had come into the pokemon center right behind him.

He also wanted to heal up his Pokemon before heading out even informing him of a pokemart that was around the corner just in case he needed anything although the boy remarked that he was so prepared that he likely didn't need it which was mostly true his father reinsured that he was prepared before stepping out of the house and there had been a couple more care packages he had discovered on his way towards the center they gave him even more supplies which he could sell to the pokemart now that he thought of it but that was for later for now however he handed two of his pokemon over to nurse joy, Evergreen and Seaquake the third pokemon the Pikachu he captured in the quick ball he had a different assignment for as he began to walk around the front desk towards the back of the center through a couple of doors.

Tierno intrigued, joined him in his travels in the back, asking what he was doing and what this place was. Elliot explained that this was the trading zone officially called the Global Trade System, where trainers could trade Pokemon not only between each other but also between other regions. This was the reason why he wanted to capture an electric type; while Pikachu was somewhat less than ideal given how prevalent they are across the globe, he would attempt it anyway. Tierno asked what Pokemon he was hoping to get that wasn't in Kalos. Well, there was two mon he wanted that weren't in Kalos, but the one he was aiming for, for now, was an elekid. He always liked the look of its final transformation, Electivire, as a kid.

Elliot went up to the desk and deposited the ball, scrolling through the device that the helper gave him to select the Pokemon he wished to trade him for. He quickly typed the name of the mon he was looking for before selecting it, and now came the second part: how long would he like to hold the Pikachu before it would be released back into the wild? The longer he held the mon waiting to be traded, the more money he would have to pay. Thinking that a Pikachu likely wouldn't draw too much attention in the market, he didn't want to hold it for an entire month but offered a little under half instead of just two weeks.

The total price was 4,500 poké. He quickly tapped his Pokedex on the screen and paid the amount just in time as his familiar jingle rang out, singling that his Pokemon was ready for pickup. He hurried back to the front with Tierno on his tail as well, and he picked up his mon, who was about to head out towards the gym. Tierno had to wait a bit more but wished him luck in beating the gym with a twirl and a thumbs up.

---

Ash, Bonnie, Clemont, Iida

The group of four had continued their trek towards the Santalune City Gym. The conversation between the group had mostly centered on the new arrival in bright white amour. The road that they had taken was mostly barren; not many others had been around to see him and draw even more attention to the group. Iida answered any of the questions he could without triggering the seals that they had on themselves. Iida asked his fair share of questions, which likely seemed strange to them. However, they didn't mention it to him directly, but he could feel it. Questions such as How much value is "poké" exactly, he found that it was likely that every 100 poké was about the equivalent to 150 yen or about 1 US dollar where they were from so that made things a bit easier to understand.

He asked about what type of berries could be eaten without any risk to a person's well-being by being given a holographic image of several berries that the group had managed to gather on their journey through the forest. A good majority of them were all safe for human consumption, but a few were just better than others, which Clemont listed. The three decided to take a break, and Bonnie asked if she could take care of grooming Pikachu for Ash, which the boy allowed her, making the girl bounce up and down as she took the yellow Pokemon up in her arms, rubbing along its face and chest before gently petting the tail, which caused the pokemon to yipp in joy.

Taking note of that, Bonnie brushed over it once more, giddy that she was making the Pokemon feel good; her brother had joined in with testing the observation himself before finishing her brushing of Pikachu and asking Ash if she could take care of fletchling next. The boy once more agreed, taking out his Pokemon and allowing the girl to brush along its wings.

Ash opened his bag to take out some Poke-chow, giving each of his Pokemon one of them, but as he was about to give out, the third one of them was snatched from his hands by a small mon. It ran along with the poke puff in its mouth, climbing up on a branch. The Pokemon seemed to be the same dendenne from before, and it had been following them the entire time. Bonnie still wanted the Pokemon and asked for her brother to catch it, but just as he was about to pull out his Pokeball to do so, the small creature began to run off, forcing the group to follow after it. Iida was incredibly quicker, tearing through the brush and up the slope within a split second, scooping up the small orange mon and presenting it to the group firsthand as it struggled within His grasp.

The trio once more expressed bewilderment at his speed, Bonnie thanked him so much for catching Dedenne for her, although Iida couldn't just hand the Pokemon over just yet as it attempted to escape his grasp by nuzzling along its cheeks and shocking him. Luckily, his suit could bleed off the spare charge, so he wasn't effective by the attack.

{No! NO! I don't want to fight!} Dedenne remarked, squirming in the human grasp.

{You won't have to fight.}Pikachu replied as it went forward, climbing onto Iida's shoulder and speaking to the smaller mon. Its voice makes it cease its struggling for a moment.

{What do you mean? Humans capture Pokemon, and then they force them to fight, don't they?}

{Not all humans do that; some just want a friend. The small girl that wants you isn't even allowed to battle, it seems.

{Wait? So I get to just have fun and eat food all day while being safe from predators?}

{Yeah! Sounds super fun, doesn't it? Even when bad guys do show up, we'll protect each other as we're part of a group!}

{Hmmmm. Well, I'll go along, but only if I don't have to go into one of those balls.

{Alright, I'm sure they'll let you do that.}

Pikachu and Dedenne had been consulting with one another as the others waited when it became apparent that Dedenne was on board with the group. Pikachu gave a small thumbs up before hopping off of Iida and back onto Ash's shoulder, although when Clemont went to capture the creature with a Pokeball, it began to move once more, using Iida as a shield to hide away, causing Pikachu to shout out once more, shaking its head. The group had gotten its meaning and acknowledged the small mon request not to go into a ball as it seemingly poked its head from back around Iida's body. Bonnie approached it next with a friendlier option, offering her mall green bag that she held as something the small mon could be carried in.

Instead of even offering the small mon another puffin for its trouble, Iida extended his arm, allowing the small mon to run down it towards the smaller girl, and after smelling around and investigating the bag for a moment, hopped down into it as the girl hopped with excitement herself and fed the pokemon the puffin as it gave its delighted chirp in response.

With a new Pokemon "captured," the group continued their way to the new city as the sun started to set, although they had forgone going to a Pokemon center and elected to keep going on foot as it was the night so that they could get to the city by the morning of the next day, where the challenge of the gym leader eagerly awaited them.

The group walked until nightfall when Iida bid the group farewell as he had to return to his friends to make sure things were in order. Bonnie asked if they would meet again, and Iida confirmed that they would and that next time he may bring some of his other friends along as well before wishing them all a good night and returning to Santalue Forest.

---

Santalune City Gym

Elliot had gotten to the gym in the nick of time, one might say. Although he wasn't the only one stationed here on top of Calem already there waiting around, there had also been a small collection of a mixture of young boys and girls—about seven others in fact—all huddled outside of the gym. As they waited around, he was about to ask Calem what had been going on, but before he could, young women approached him, asking him if he was there to take on the gym. The woman had a camera hanging off her neck and a white T-shirt that exposed some midriff with blue jeans and black boots.

Elliot, despite being surprised, nodded at the girl's question, and the young woman acknowledged that before getting everyone's attention and welcoming everyone to her gym, meaning that this woman was Viola, the woman gestured for the eight individuals to follow her into the large gym; inside they had come into a semi-large room surrounded by paintings of different bug-type Pokemon highlighting the gym's specialty in bugs before Viola once more got everyone's attention to give a speech.

She spoke about how everyone present wanted to challenge, and she apologized for the inconveniences she indirectly caused for being out the day before, but given the number of them, she likely wouldn't be able to get to them all by the end of the day; she would likely only be able to take half of them before night falls and the gym closes, so they were going to decide right now on who would be getting the opportunity to challenge her. She wouldn't force them all to fight amongst themselves as that would leave their Pokemon at a disadvantage if they lacked potions or things of that nature, not the method she would use to decide the challengers would depend on their skill as a trainer and their "skill as bugs."

As she went towards the side of the room, the eyes trailed along them before she flipped a lever and wished them luck suddenly out from under them. The floor simply opened up, forcing the group of kids to begin to fall.

Everyone had been surprised by the rapid turn of events, but some were more calm and collected than others. As visible white lines started to show through, Elliot landed directly hard on one of the white lines he clutched onto it for dear life. He felt the appendage bend as it actualized itself to his weight before coming back up and settling once more back into its natural position. He looked to his left just in time to see Calem begin to fall. He passed him down below his body and moved for him as he reached out an arm, stopping him from continuing his fall toward the ground.

The white line, which he now focused on realizing was a thick white rope bent once more, attempting to accommodate the both of them. Elliot used the ropes swinging back up as a way for Calem to get himself a handhold on the white rope, which the younger boy did so, allowing him to pull himself up and somewhat stabilize on the thick rope himself. The two looked around and found four other people had also managed to stabilize themselves on the white lines before looking down below. Just 3 or so more meters were the two others that had been with them; they had hit the floor, which was a mix of crash pads and trampolines that would ensure their safety when falling.

All of them turned to a small hut filled with cameras and equipment for them as Viola made her appearance once more, calling over to all of them. She remarked that she was surprised that more people weren't eliminated from the initial fall but remarked that it was still a sight to see; they were now caught. In her spider's web, it was up to them to escape it and earn the honors of being able to face her for the gym badge; the first four over get the remaining challenges for the day.

Everyone still participating quickly turned to the other before deciding on what they should do as they looked around the room. They were tightrope walking, and although the rope was so thick that they could easily press both feet down side by side without much trouble, it was still difficult to move due to the surface. Calem thanked Elito for the help there, and Elliot remarked that it was no problem at all, but not wanting to get in each other's way, the two decided to go in opposite directions of the spider's web.

They had been the furthest away in comparison to the others, so they had some room to make up for it. Their movement had gotten the others moving, but everyone stopped once more when one of the ropes that someone was stepping on completely snapped off, causing the young boy to fall to the floor. Multiple camera flutters marked his fall as Vioa let out a small snicker. She remembered it wouldn't be that easy of a challenge; some threads may not be as strong as others.

With that out of the way, people began to take their time progressing more slowly, looking and checking to make sure that the rope that they had been going on wouldn't be a trap. Elliot continued forward, trying to make note of what the difference was between a trap and a regular rope, and he spotted it, or at least he thought he did, as someone else had fallen for the trap and fell to the bottom. Unlike the bouncy rope, the traps seemed to be made of silk, almost like from a spider, so he would carefully touch the rope, and if it stuck to his feet, he would avoid it and go a different way. Given that there were only four people left, it was now a battle for positioning. One of the contestants was fine with that, however, and remarked that he would just wait it out on one of the wooden safe platforms, but he, Calem, and a young girl were more competitive than that as they continued forward, eager to get to Viola first.

Eventually, he was the first to cross the line and enter the small shack that Viola was situated in. Calem had made one last dash to get there and narrowly avoided falling for one of the traps; however, the boy had managed to jump and catch himself on one of the wooden platforms beforehand, stopping his fall. The girl, however, was unlucky in this regard, attempting a similar stunt; she came in at fourth while Calem came in second, and the boy who waited came in at third. Now that things were set and everyone mostly had filtered out for the day, Calem stayed by his side wanting to see how the gym leader battles for his match next, although it would be in an hour after his battle commenced after her Pokemon was done healing.

Viola brought them out to a field surrounded by plants and flowers. A referee took to the stage in the center to announce the battle as the two of them clicked the pokeballs that they would use. The challenger was allowed to substitute, but the gym leader had to continue to play her mon, and with the rules stated, the battle was a go as the two throughout their Pokemon. Viola throughout a surskit while Elliot used evergreen.

Elliot wasn't taking any chances so the first move he used was growl the forbidding rumble from his Pokemon caused the surskit to take a step back as a red glow came over it for a moment lowering its attack, he then proceeded to use rollout it was the only move in his arsenal that was super effective against the mon as his chespin fins began to extend and glow as he rapidly sprints in a ball and charged forwards to his surprise Viola stood her ground and used protect a wall of blue energy coalesced up in front of the small blue pokemon completely halting his attack and fling his chespin backward this was quickly followed up with by a single beam the struck landed while he was in mid-air as an explosion pushing chespin backward but the mon was able to recover skidding to a stop as he did so, this was going to be challenging he thought as he thought of his next steps he one more used growl lowering the attack of his opponent even more.

His opponent took the opportunity however to do something unexpected as it used ice beam not on chespin but on the very ground itself, he thought better of it however as he told chespin to use his vine whip to block that attack coming towards his side, two large whips came from behind the creatures back blocking several of the ice blasts headed in is direction leaving the field half covered in ice while the other half remained normal, the gym leader complimented his quick thinking before tasking her surskit to shoot off another signal beam he ordered chespin to dodge it and use rollout once more as he dodges the blast wave and rolled forwards this had the unintended effect of increasing his attacks speed allowing him to land a hit on the surskit pushing it backward, he shouted for chespin to continue but on the icy ground, he was in his opponent habitat as it was able to easily dodge the follow-up attack as it took a moment for chespin to slide back around.

The mon used an ice beam this time to attack, a chespin was coming around once more, and Elliot ordered Chespin to use a vine whip to dig up the ground and use it as a makeshift shield. She wasn't the only one that could use the environment to his advantage, he remarked as the smoke cleared and chespin was unharmed from her attack. She ordered her surskit to get around the cover, and Elliot waited for that, letting the Pokemon skate near as he ordered Chespin to use a bite. The Chespin uses bite.

The chespin's teeth glowed a bright white, and it leaped out from the cover, biting onto one of the blue mons splendid legs before tossing it over to the dark side of the arena, fearing a follow-up attack. Vivian instinctively wanted to use protect once more, but her Pokemon flinched, and Elliot took the opportunity and used rollout one more time as the chess rapidly dashed forward, striking the surskit dead center, bouncing it backward as it rolled and tumbled before falling unconscious.

Elliot cheered for a moment, and Viola complimented him for his skill but remarked that the battle wasn't over yet. As she sent out Vivillon next, the referee asked if he would like to switch his mon, and after a moment of consideration, he chose not to. The opponent quickly took to the air while they took the initiative and used psychic chespin was helpless pulled into the air before being slammed back down hard completely unable to do anything about it, he had told chespin to attempt a vinewhip but the opposing Pokemon countered with gust blowing his attack away along with chespin for a second time he couldn't do much he knew that without someone how getting the pokemon to come down to his level so he told chespin to run towards the icy side of the field once more as the Vivillion used energy ball being so far away had it's on disadvantage of travel time but he had to do something while her psychic was on cooldown any one move likely would spell chespin defeat and even with the distance he only narroly avoided the energy ball as it flung him to the given side allowing him to enact his plan as he wanted his mon to use rollout once more using the frozen piece of ground as a makeshift launcher to get high into the air alogn with the ice to increase his speed allowing the attack to land but he couldnt cotinue the attack as he was forced to land and as he did so he was caught in a psychic once more and chespin was knocked unconscious from the slam into th icey ground.

He called back Chespin, thanking him for his hard work. Being only one hit, he must be reeling from that attack he had to imagine, as it was a super effective move against it, but he wasn't going to be careless; he called out his next monsoon seaquake. The marshtomp came on the field with a thud eager to battle as it looked up at its opponent. As he expected Viola went for another energy ball and he told Seaquake to doge it and counter using supersonic marshtomp cheeks began to inflate before it let out a deafening sound wave directly at the Vivillon causing it to become confused,

Viola powered through the sound attack and countered with gust the wind battered against Seaquake but he remained standing as he returned fire with muddy water as a dark mirky liquid shot out of the marshtomp mouth and hit ho against the dazed flying Pokemon covering its eyes in pseudo filth that it could barely see out of lowering it's accuracy although it wouldn't need such a thing as it used psychic once more as his pokemon was picked up into the air and slammed down so much for confusion he thought as he struck out with a water gun which narrowly missed its target in return for his effort received he as going to receive an energy ball but the confusion worked in his favor as the attack destibalized and exploded in the pokemon own face allwoing him to land another water gun squarely against the flying mon and dropping it from the sky as it fell unconscious.

There the referee called it, and Calem congratulated him as he went to the field and patted him on the back. Viola remarked that she knew that he was special, going by the looks in his eyes that he was special, and his marshtomp showed her an entirely new depth of field; it wasn't every day she could battle against such a Pokemon, correctly summarizing that he was a traveler to Kalos and not native-born. She awarded him with the badge, but he stopped telling the others about it not until Calem had his turn to win in an hour. The hour came and went, and it was Calem's turn; he had caught himself fletching to go along with his fennekin.

The battle was intense, but in the end, he won himself the bug badge, and they both reported it in their group chat, which gained them a round of applause from the others. It had been getting close to nightfall, so he would have thought that they would go and rent a room, but Calem wanted to continue his adventure and would sleep in the wilderness, so he wished him luck on his adventure and remarked that they would all meet up again at the professor's lab, which he agreed to as she shook the boy's hand, saying farewell.