"How's Ditto doing?" Dena asked the Nurse Joy at the Rustboro city pokemon center. They'd arrived at the city nearly an hour before, and had rushed the injured pokemon to the nearest Pokemon Center where it was currently being treated.

"It's condition is stable and recovering nicely. I'd even go as far to say that it'll be up and moving within an hour or two." Nurse Joy responded quickly as she dashed off to help more injured Pokémon.

Dena breathed a sigh of relief at the good news and looked, through the large observational glass window, at the pink putty like Pokémon resting peacefully on a gurney. It looked worlds better than when she'd brought it in, back then it had practically been melting into a pink puddle of goo and she'd needed to borrow Ash's cap just to keep the poor creature from slipping out of her hold.

As her mind went to Ash's cap she realized she hadn't called the rest of the group, who were all out running errands and setting things up for the next day or two, and pulled out her cellphone to give them the good news.

"Ditto is doing better, will text you guys if anything changes.^u^."

Around the city five phones received this text message and everyone but two responded with: "glad to hear it" or "thank goodness", and one person who used only emojis to say, "hope ditto feels better soon, call us if you need anything". The only responses Dena didn't get were from Ash and Cal who were somewhat preoccupied at the time and couldn't pick up their phones.

Both boys had been so eager to get to the gym and claim a badge that Dena had let them go, and pretty much sealed their fate for the next few hours. For what Ash had neglected to remember, from his past trip to Hoenn, was the Rustboro City Gym doubled as the Pokémon trainers school; and upon entering the building they had been mistaken for two students known for cutting class and were hauled off to Evolution 101, where they'd had their phones taken away within the first five minutes after responding to a text from Serena and Aura, asking what everyone wanted for lunch.

The boys made the best use of their educational imprisonment and tried their best to make sense of what their teachers were trying to explain; but each of them seemed to not have the academic gene in them. Throughout the next hour of Evolution education, Ash and Cal only managed to learn how to make paper footballs, thanks to their fellow students, and a few well known facts about evolution like: Pokémon can evolve due to their emotional attachment to people, interaction with certain objects, and/or by gaining experience in battle.

After enduring the evolution lesson they were escorted by security guards, (whoever they were being mistaken for obviously had a reputation for ditching), to their next class which was battle tactics. A few seconds after they were seated, a woman in her mid twenties walked out to the front of the class; she had two buns of coal black hair tied above the temples of her head, and the excess hair looped down her neck as two pigtail like lengths of hair. Her outfit was mainly composed of a shin length grey skirt over scarlet leggings and she had a matching grey blouse with a salmon pink ascot around her neck.

At first Ash didn't recognize the woman, but as soon as she spoke something clicked in his mind and he began grinning like a madman as he recalled her name. Roxanne, part time teacher, part time archeologists and full time gym leader of Rustboro city. Right now though she was his and Cal's teacher who was busy addressing the class.

"Welcome back students; today we're going to watch some videos from some of my past battles as the Gym leader." An assistant came out from a side door with a selection of tapes and Roxanne chose one at random. "During this viewing I will be stopping the video at specific points and ask you, as a class, to tell me what the trainer should do next, as well as critique what each of us do. Now let's begin."

With that she inserted the tape into a television set and let it run. A few seconds passed by before a grainy image of a younger Roxanne standing on a Pokémon battlefield with a young trainer in blue jeans and jacket, and a red cap standing across from her looking exceptionally determined to win the match even before it started.

After staring at the screen for a moment Cal nearly burst out laughing as he realized he was looking at a young Ash challenging the Rustboro Gym. Cal didn't find Ash's challenging of the Gym to be funny, in fact his admiration of the trainers only grew from learning Ash had pit himself against Gyms from a young age; what he found funny was how short, young and full of spunk Ash looked in the video. Ash couldn't help but grin a grin that said, oh man did I really look like that, before he continued to watch the tape.

He and the class watched as Roxanne sent out the boulder Pokémon Geodude, who looked like a floating rock with a face and arms, and young Ash sent out the gecko Pokémon Treecko who looked a lot like Cal's Treecko, only Ash's had a twig it insisted on putting in its mouth. At any rate the video continued to play and showed Ash trying to win against a Geodude with physical attacks despite the rock Pokémon's high defense against such attacks, a point that Roxanne paused the video to highlight on.

Resuming the tape the class watched as Treecko continued to fight with physical moves and was eventually rendered unable to battle by a K.O.ing Mach Punch to the face. Some of the students cringed when the move hit the grass type and had their cheering for when he got up, stifled as he fell to the dirt. In the video the younger version of Ash recalled his Pokémon and thanked it for fighting so hard; this loyalty to his Pokémon and commending them for giving their all to help him, made the entire class root for the past Ash.

Their cheering for him to win quickly turned into stunned silence as he sent his Pikachu out against the ground/rock type Pokémon, a very very bad matchup by any standards. The class continued to watch with dismay believing the match to end right then and there, but were surprised to see the electric mouse level the battlefield and hold its own against Geodude. Their surprise turned into shock and disbelief as they watched Pikachu deliver a point blank Thunderbolt in Geodudes face and render the Pokémon out cold. Never before had they seen a Rock type, let alone a Ground type get taken out by an electric attack.

There was a bit of outrage in the classroom as some students claimed the challenger must have cheated, since electric type moves aren't able to harm ground type Pokémon. The claims of young Ash cheating caused both Ash and Cal to want to take action but they were beat to the punch by Roxanne who assured the class that Ash had fought fair and square.

"There are just some events that are so outlandish that you wouldn't believe them unless you saw them with your own eyes." Roxanne said to the class in explanation of the phenomenon of Pikachu taking out Geodude.

Continuing in the video, the young Roxanne recalled her Pokémon thanking it before sending out a blue Pokémon with a red nose and closely resembled an Easter island head. It was the compass Pokémon Nosepass, known for its ability to use its nose as a compass and to control electromagnetic waves.

The match between Pikachu and Nosepass had the entire class on the edge of their seats, watching as the little yellow mouse held its own against the sturdy rock type Pokémon. At one point in the video the entire screen was covered in a brown dust like view, and Roxanne took that moment to ask her class a question.

"Can anyone tell me what my purpose for using Sandstorm was?"

There was a bunch of mumbling in the first few rows before one student raised her hand to answer the question. "You did it to disorient Pikachu and inflict some reoccurring damage as per Sandstorms nature to do damage every once in awhile after use."

Roxanne smiled at her prized pupil, "That's part of it but there's just one bit you're missing, can anyone tell me what it is?"

There was a silence as the students milled over whatever it was that their classmate had missed; from the back of the room Ash had Eevee pass a note to Cal telling him what the answer was. Ash didn't say the answer himself because he was waiting for his moment to make a grand spectacle of his presence, and didn't want to spoil his fun with a simple question.

Cal took the note from Eevee's mouth, patting the Pokémon affectionately on the head for a job well done, and raised his hand to explain that Nosepass could see in the Sandstorm, thanks to his magnetic nose, and could inflict devastating surprise attacks on Pikachu from within the swirling sand.

Roxanne smiled at Cal's answer and continued the tape showing most of what he said happening, Roxanne didn't continue with her surprise attacks which left young Ash just enough room to claim victory. He and Pikachu quickly turned things around on Roxanne using her own moves against her and finishing her off with a well placed Iron Tail on the rock Pokémon's head. Just before he claimed victory the Ash from the tape said, "The stronger our opponents the harder we fight!" He was completely full of himself and assured in his and his Pokémon's abilities to claim victory despite the odds.

After the tape ended Roxanne moved to the front of the room again and asked if there were any questions. Most of the ones she got were about what happened to the trainer after he had beaten her, where he was now, and what his name was.

"After he won the Stone Badge I heard that he managed to collect all eight Hoenn Gym badges; compete in the Hoenn Pokémon Tournament, the Hoenn master class division of the Hoenn Pokémon Contest, and fight his way through the Battle Brains. Of those three he went on to tie for first in the Master Class Contest, come in the top eight of the Ever Grand conference, and beat all of the Battle Brains but declined the position that came with his victory." Roxanne said with perfect simplicity, as if winning all the way to fight amongst the best was a simple feat for Ash.

"As for where he is now, I don't know. But I do remember his name;" she stopped to giggled for a moment. "He said it so full of pride and self confidence, as if it were his very own badge of honor, that you couldn't forget it if you tried. He was-"

"Ash Ketchum from Pallet Town, and I've come back to have a Gym battle!" Ash said with gusto as he rose out of his seat, looking as determined as the version of him from the video.

The entire class was quite for a moment, some students sitting in awe of the trainer others sizing him up to determine whether he was really all he was cracked up to be. Roxanne eventually broke the silence with a short burst of laughter. "Ahahah, ahh. I was wondering when I'd get to face off against you again; this time I'll be sure to use my strongest Pokémon so I hope you're ready, Ash Ketchum of Pallet Town."

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Okay sorry I haven't updated this story in awhile I've been engrossed in my writing for Zygarde and the Bond Phenomenon and neglected this story a bit. I'm probably going to write a few more chapters for this story before going back to my other one because it recently dawned on me that I need to push the Zygarde story forward more if I want to be able to have these two sync up.

Anyways I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter, feel free to vote and comment on it, and I'll see you next chapter.

Shoutouts:AmiyaJones GreninjasStar AmourAndEgo5ever jey032001 & jirachi8.