The first volunteers were sent over to the auditorium to for the exchanges.  After a few minutes of waiting, Vapor walked in “It took me a moment to find the book I put that spell into.  Some witch named Lily had somehow gotten a hold of it and thought the spell was for mind reading.”  She rolled her eyes, “let’s see, since Ash has already done one half, we might as well start with him.  You will need to give me one of your hairs.”
    Ash looked nervous and then pulled one out “Here.”  She took it and put it in a bottle she was holding.  She said something in another language and poured the premade mixture on pikachu.  She looked back down at the book and started making complex gestures.  An evolution field surrounded pikachu and the pokemon began to grow.  When the field dissipated, a teenage girl with yellow blonde hair with brown streaks, grey-blue eyes and slightly protruding canines was sitting in the usual anime position of surprise on the floor, completely naked.  “Oh, yes, clothes only follow the transformation if they existed before.”  Vapor said without looking up.  She then snapped and pikachu had on an outfit similar to Duplica’s, but where a star was on Duplica’s tee shirt, a thunderbolt existed.  Ash had meanwhile fallen to the floor in surprise and was just now managing to get up.  “Why didn’t you tell me you were a girl?”
“Well” she said in melodious tones “you may understand most of what I say, but I would have had to resort to very crude language to communicate this.”
Misty started laughing and said “Ash’s notorious lack of awareness strikes again.”
“You couldn’t figure it out, either, and believe me I tried on both of you.”  Which wiped the smile off Misty’s face.
Duplica took this moment to say indignantly “And why is she wearing clothes made in my image?”
Vapor looked up and said “Pikachu is a naturally cute creature, so I instructed the spell to give her the clothes of the cutest person in the room.”
Duplica blushed “Oh.”
“Yes” Vapor looked down again and said in a deadpan voice “if I had instructed it to copy the clothes of the most gorgeous thing in existence, it would have given pikachu a robe like mine.”
    Pikachu rose unsteadily to her feet and said, “I think I’ll change back now, being bipedal gives me the heebie-jeebies.”  There was a burst of smoke and the normal pikachu was back.
Ash grinned widely “If I’d known that pikachu was such a looker, I’d have taken her instead of Misty.”  A mallet appeared behind Ash and whacked him in the head.  Misty looked in his eyes and there was a K in the right and an O in the left.  “It appears I hit him rather hard.”
Saliaven floated down from his chair on the ceiling and produced a large bucket of water from his pocket.  He splashed it on Ash and went back to his chair.
Reviving, Ash said “No one can take a joke around here.”  In a last attempt at humor he looked a pikachu and said “Now how is Misty supposed to trust you when you sleep at the foot of the bed?”Earning him a dark look from pikachu who only remarked, “I haven’t interfered with you two yet and I’m not starting now.”
Misty walked up to Vapor and said “We might as well go on with the entertainment, I volunteer myself as the next subject.”
Vapor shrugged and asked “have you chosen your pokemon?”
Misty threw a pokeball, revealing starwe.  “This one will be preferable.”
“OK, I think I’ll change the pokemon first.”  She took one of Misty’s hairs and threw the mix on.  An evolution field surrounded the pokemon, but before it could dissipate, Saliaven snapped.  “What was that about?”  Misty yelled up.
“Vapor forgot the clothes again.”
    Vapor had the decency to look embarrassed as the field dissipated, revealing a tall, broad man with red hair and a red beard in a claymore and a kilt. <Authors note: For anyone in my realm, yes.  Starwe is a Scotsman. > “Well, Misty my lass, I’m honored you chose me to exchange with.
Blaze, who had been talking to Gary up to now said, “Now it’s Ash who has the romantic rival.”
Misty looked starwe over and said “Nah, I prefer cute over rugged.”
Starwe looked around and said, “I think I’ll change back so that we can go on.”
Vapor took some water from its water gun and sprinkled the mix on Misty.  There was blue smoke and when it cleared, a Vaporeon with wide blue eyes and a red ponytail stood where Misty did.  Misty looked at herself and said, “My pokemon form is definitely cute, that’s for certain.”
Ash looked Misty up and down and said, “I agree, a certain improvement from the Gyarados I was expecting.”  Misty used a tackle on him and bared her teeth.
“Gyarados, aye?”
Ash put his hands up “just kidding.”
Misty closed her eyes, licked his cheek and whispered, “We’re going to have fun with this.”  She then took a step back and transformed back into human form.
    Gary moved forward and said, “If Ashy-Boy and his wife are done, I’d like to be the next one, I choose Umbreon as my partner.”  His Umbreon stepped forward and accepted the potion with Gary’s hair.  There was the obligatory evolution field, in which Vapor remembered to add clothing first.  When the light cleared, a young woman with black hair streaked with white-blonde stood in regal garb.  Ash put his hand to the side of his mouth and said “figures” over to Misty.  Gary then approached, taking the potion with Umbreon’s moonlight inside.  Just before the potion hit Gary, Saliaven floated down to the floor and said, “Uh-Oh. I knew something had been forgotten.”  Before anyone could ask what that meant, the potion hit Gary and pandemonium broke out.  A thousand Garys going a thousand directions sprang up, and Saliaven came to the fore of the crowd around him.  “What’s going on?”  Misty yelled over the noise of two thousand feet in a few squares of tile.
“I never wrote the obligatory fic about Gary’s past, so now that his soul is being searched, all the Gary’s that ever were or could be are trying to enter and take charge here.  Lord Garick, Garina, Garassys, the lot.”  He then spoke to Garys “your past may not have been decided yet, but remember your present, and who you are now.  Second of four, Master of capture, the last descendant of Lord Samuel Oak, the almighty mage.”  The field of Gary looked up and smoke began to surround him.  “He’s resolving.”  The haze cleared to reveal a pokemon resembling an eeveelution, but not like any they had seen before.  It was snow white to the point of radiating, it had large green eyes, and of course, spiky brown hair on its head.  It had three tails and they waved back and forth.  “What am I?”  He asked, looking around.
Saliaven looked at Mew and said, “This is your field more than mine.”
    Mew nodded and projected his voice ‘We have here proof that not only is Gary a true master, but also that one day he will be a very powerful mage.  I guess magic runs in the family.  There was a new stone, the sun stone, discovered in the Johto area.  This stone did not work on Eevee’s, just as the moon and leaf never have.  The reason is simple, the eevee’s created by these stones were of a more powerful nature than the others and needed more power to exist, power that until recently was not available.  The leaf stone makes floreon and the moon makes lunareon.  The sun stone, in fact, makes two kinds of eevee, depending on the trainer.  It will not work at all if the trainer is not kind and gentle to his pokemon.  If the trainer is, then the next test is administered.  If the trainer is no more than this, the eevee will become a solareon.  If the trainer is pure and always works for the greater good, this creature you see before you is made, divineon.  Both sun evolutions are of the light type, but divineon is as close to legendary as can be made of an evolved form.  The fact that Gary became one means that he is truly a powerful and great trainer.’
Ash looked at Mew and said, “If I am the chosen one, as it has been pointed out to me ad nauseam, why am I not able to transform into something of that magnitude?”
‘You have done something that could be considered a step better, Misty has shown power towards her element by becoming it, Gary has shown dazzling skill by becoming a form of the pokemon he took his form from, but you are so close to pikachu and her entire kind that your transformation made you a pikachu.  The spell that was made those years ago by Lily would have failed if this weren’t true, so be honored that your skill with a particular is so great that its power can merge so seamlessly with your own.’
Vapor beamed at Ash and then looked around, saying, “Who is to be the next on our wild ride?”
Duplica ran up and said “Me!  And for my partner, Ditto.”
Mewtwo went rigid and said ‘Now see here, I thought we were already fused.’
Vapor stared at Mewtwo for a moment and said “I’ve seen that one, your minds and bodies are only combined, your essences are divided <Authors note: aye? aye?>”
Duplica stuck out her tongue and approached the lectern.  (For anyone who is wondering, Gary and Umbreon have gone back to their natural states.)
Ditto was the first to be treated, as per the unofficial protocol that had been introduced.  Nothing happened.  Vapor cleared her throat and said, “While we’re waiting for this, I’ll just take some of this ditto and see if Duplica is any more responsive.”  The mix was sprinkled on Duplica and she also was unaffected.  She stomped the ground and yelled “Rats!”  She then bent down to pick up her ditto and as soon as she touched it, there was a flash and the ditto disappeared.  “Now my ditto is gone, what’s going on here?”
Vapor said, “I’m not sure, but I think I have an idea.  From your association with Mewtwo, you know what it feels like to use pokemon transformations, right?”
“Of course.”
“Try now.”
Duplica closed her eyes and began to glow.  She shrunk and became a raichu.  “How’d I just do that?”
“Congrats to Duplica for the best upstaging of Ash.  She’s managed a full essence fusion, she and her ditto are now one.”
Ash’s eyes bugged out and he spluttered  “But I thought I was the chosen master to do this sort of thing.”
Saliaven said, “Duplica has a lot of hidden powers.  Did I say that out loud?”  He then began to whistle innocently.
Ash yelled up at him “Is there anything else we should know about her?”
“Would you believe she’s your younger sister?”
“These days I’ll believe anything.”
“That’s a good answer, but I very much doubt that she is.”
“Is there any relation to anyone in this room?”
“I haven’t decided yet.  She might be Misty’s twin sister.  In fact I think I’ll go with that, it explains where she comes from and where the Waterflower parents went.”
    It went on like this for a while and no one noticed that Ash was no longer present until much later. <Start Sympathy, from Mystery> That night, Ash lay with his hands under his head in the field where he and Misty first affirmed their love.  He looked up at the stars and wondered, why me?  What was so special about the boy from Pallet town?  He always wanted to have an interesting life, which was why he had become a trainer; ambition was one of the greatest factors in deciding to go on a trainer’s journey.  The prophecy had said that the world would turn to Ash, they never said how many times.
Presently, Misty appeared, walking out of the forest and humming a tune that Ash didn’t recognize until she sat down next to him, putting her arms around her legs.  He smiled at how fitting it was to hear that song right now.  “It’s a whole new world we live in.”  He looked over and started to hum another song.
Misty smiled back “Each pokemon to understand the power that’s inside.  It’s interesting how that power turned out to be in humans as well.”
Misty hummed again and Ash looked at himself “Magical powers, in the lush grass.  But I have something even closer he said and hummed.
Misty giggled and said, “What kind of pokemon are you?  Getting personal now, Ash.”
“I somehow knew that one day I would be a great and powerful trainer.”  He sighed and looked back at the stars.  “I only wish I weren’t quite so important in the scheme of things.  This world owes itself to me many times over and maybe its good that there are others now to help me.”
“I’ve always been here.”  Misty said, her eyes shining.
“Me as well.”  Pikachu whispered, in human form as she came to join them.  She had traded her shorts for one of Misty’s and now wore one of Ash’ jackets over her thunderbolt top.  She took Ash’s hat off him and ruffled his hair as she put it on.
“All of us have been ready to keep you from screwing up, and have done so several times to my memory.”  Gary stated, as he approached with Brock and the other trainers.  Holding Ash’s pokeballs out he said,  “You shouldn’t leave these around where everyone can find them.”
Mew floated down “I’ve done my share of the diversions, as has Lugia and the others, but you’re right.  It’s time that the chosen one became the chosen many.”
Saliaven walked up from behind “It doesn’t take great power to move heaven and Earth, Ash.  You’ve proven that.”  He put the moon between thumb and forefinger and in a displacement of perspective started to flip it between his fingers.  The then blew and it was back in the air.  “Anyone here who can read power signs knows that I didn’t exert any supernatural force doing that.  You just have to know where the right place is and when the right time occurs and everything comes out just right.”  He gestured to the heavens and a meteor shower began.  Everyone settled down in their preferred form and body position to watch.  Ash took his pokedex from his pocket and said “The others might want to see this too.”  He pressed the white button and all his pokemon joined him.<End Sympathy>

 
Author’s note and yes there is one: I really wanted to fit the pikachu is a girl plot in.  The last scene is something I just kind of knew I should add.  This wasn’t as hard to write as the earlier, I think that’s because I really wanted to.  Its funny, everything I write is an exposition for the next story almost.  I guess that’s how you know its good; there is always a beginning of an end and an end of a beginning no matter where you look.