“If you have any Pokémon companions who want to stretch their legs, you can let them out,” he offered.

“Sometimes, having them perpetually stuck inside their Pokéballs isn’t good for their moods—especially when they’re temperamental, or if they love running around.”

It wouldn’t take long for them to come across several Pelipper who were cawing like the bowl-birds that they were, trying to look for some new nesting material as the avians flew off in the opposite direction.

“Majority of my Toucannon have their own separate aviary, because they’re all so rowdy and they love making noise,” he explained as he pointed to one of the several aviaries in the distance; singling out the one that had a more tropical vibe to it.

“You know how Toucannon are. They’re wild, they’re rowdy, and they’re rather noisy. But they know how to put on a show for the kids that come by,” he added with a laugh.

“There’s another aviary there for the newborn Pokémon to take refuge in; while their kids are getting used to flying around under their parents’ watchful eye,” he would explain as he pointed out the second aviary; one that had noticeably open windows that allowed whatever Pokémon was inside to come and go as they please.

“The Sanctuary also happens to be along several known migratory routes of Flying-types—as well as those that aren’t considered to be Flying, but you know. They have wings all the same,” he added as several Vivillon flew overhead—each of them sporting vastly different wing patterns.

“Overall, I try to accommodate and have Pokémon live with nature, instead of around it—because you know how Fortree isn’t like most of the other cities, right? Most everything can be found up in the trees, though there are also places that are down on the ground.”

From one caretaker to another, he could understand why she was stressed out about having Pokémon play nice. He was also speaking from experience, for one thing.

“Sometimes, though, there are particular Pokémon that don’t like being socialized, and need a hell of a lot more attention for them to get used to being around humans first, before integrating them with other Pokémon afterward,” he mused. “However, not giving up shows the Pokémon that you shouldn’t be underestimated.”

Once the crackling voice in his ear reminded him that the course was ready, he then angled the Dragonite to fly skyward; inviting her to follow him.

“Well, if you look at it from another angle… it’s preparing oneself for any aerial battle situations. Because not every single battle happens on the ground, there are also fights in the water and also matches to determine air superiority.”

He hummed a little bit before they eventually reached the starting line, where one of his receptionists out front was riding Idun the Pidgeot (as always).

“Alright, so,” Ethan began the explanation—mostly for the challenger’s benefit. “It’s a four-part course. The both of you will be flying through it, and the main objective is to make it to the finish line. No time limit, no speed, no flying over the obstacles because that’s cheating, and—good luck out there,” he added, giving Alex this ‘are you for real’ look before taking the starting point—

“On my whistle, and—”

The race was now on!

The first obstacle was made up of the vast majority of his Toucannon Armada™, firing off a combination of Beak Blast as well as Bullet Seed attacks all throughout the first stretch. The reason why the attacks looked extremely potent were due to the fact that all of the Toucannon present had the Skill Link ability, so…

“So… yeah, see you over there!” he chirped, before flying straight into the insanity.

---

Part 1; the Toucannon™ Gauntlet: due to all of his Toucannon knowing the ability Skill Link, Bullet Seed will always hit five times! Accompanying the hard-shelled barrage is the Beak Blast opening cannons; the powerful bursts blocking any singular clear way through.

Roll lower than the total of Alex’s rolls to proceed; do you want to know what happens if you miss the target?

“Yep… that tournament,” he nodded as he helped himself to a serving of pasta. Mm, tasty.

“There were so. many. legendary Pokémon that appeared at the end of that tournament, it’s insane,” he continued. He’d actually lost count of how many had appeared—or in some cases, reappeared to bless those few who were lucky enough to be noticed.

Before he could grab the bread, a sudden blur shot by, and once the dust had settled—

“Aw, come on! Hey!” he yelled after the rogue Pokémon who’d made off with all the bread. “That’s not nice!” he added afterward, rolling his eyes.

Look, man wanted his garlic bread, okay?!

Why did he know that trouble was going to come following them the moment they went straight into the belly of the ‘beast’, the moment they arrived down there?

“Help,” he continued in that same quiet voice, because by now he was well-aware of how the Wandering Stormbringer did things—not with loud and excessive gestures, but with the quiet grace of the wind itself.

Just as the other twisted version of the ‘Cobalion’ was about to attack Miss Elise, the cloud-man djinni then rushed forward in a Dragon Hammer body slam-like attack!

“Stay away from her!” he yelled; unknowingly switching languages as he pulled out another deep-red Cherish Ball and practically yeeted it at the head of the not-Cobalion that almost attacked Miss Elise, almost cleaving her in half had Tornadus not come to their rescue.

“Are—are you alright?!” he called her way, grabbing the fallen Cherish Ball once it had caught the robotic Cobalion-like… thing.

(He had no other words to call the robotic Cobalion but a mockery of the original, what else was there?)

---

↠ Tornadus incoming! The Wandering Stormbringe rused Dragon Hammer to knock the other Iron Crown out of the way!
↠ Birddad™ is pissed, yeets a Cherish Ball at the other Iron Crown to catch it!
↠ he then checked on Miss Elise if she’s okay

Once he’d brought Lam into the meeting proper with more pizza, he grabbed another slice of pepperoni for himself; folded it and crammed it into his mouth. Look, he was hungry, okay?

To Noah—or Fernando, it was either one of the two of them, he had a response to what they had to say about the ‘dynamax’ that was going on with the giant Pikachu.

“You can say that, but… but have you also considered that Team Rocket may also have the knowledge to do the exact same thing that we’re showcasing out there right now?” he responded to the hanging question.

“That was what I meant by ‘what if it goes out of control’, it may be more than certain they already know how to use the ‘dynamax’ as much as we do, and will use it against us if we’re not ready to counter them,” he added.

As for being attacked by Rocket, well…

“I know it’s impractical to have constant APBs out for all the publicly-known Rockets, but even then their M.O. changes every time they come out in public and… well, do shit,” he shrugged.

Okay, back to the question!

“So. In case Fortree gets attacked, well… don’t slouch off my staffers at the Sanctuary—they can also hold their own in a Pokémon battle or two.”

He knew that Claire of all things had… well, an interesting past, that only he was aware of.

“Although… there was a time I was attacked by someone from Rocket pretty recently, came in disguise as a challenger to my Gym however I could see through the disguise and recognized who he was.”

There was nothing else to it: he namedropped Tempest Quinn after that last statement.

“Thankfully, no injuries here on my end. He got away, though.”

Plus, I have a husband partner who will fight through the depths of hell to protect me if ever a single hair on my head gets touched… he continued to himself in the back of his mind, knowing full well that Guillermo Marceliño was always there—even though he was the Fortree Ranger Captain.

“As for using ‘dynamax’… can we look further into the long-term effects of using this on Pokémon? It’s impossible that there are no aftereffects from this, and what happens if there’s too much energy for them to take.”

His mind flashbacked to the time in the alternate Galar when he’d managed to pull it off with the Stormbringer, however who knew if there was a side-effect when the same was done in this reality…

---

• upon his return with Lam in tow, gets back to Noah / Fernando’s quip about Dynamax and makes a reasonable guess that Team Rocket may also know how to use the ‘dynamax’ phenomenon and can turn it against them at any time
• gives his feedback about how Fortree can hold their own in case they come under attack
• namedropped Tempest Quinn as a Rocket who came by recently to ‘attack’ the Gym
• makes the reasonable suggestion to further investigate ‘dynamax’ and the long-term effects it can have when used repeatedly

While little Josh had already shown up, he found it unusual… wait a second, where was lam logan?

Lilycove’s Birddad™ was late to the meeting, and it was right in his own city—wait a second…

“Okay, so… thanks for bringing the pizza, Josh,” he began as he grabbed a pepperoni slice for himself and hastily folded it down the middle before taking a rather big bite out of it—and he didn’t miss the remark about the kaiju-sized Pikachu either.

“Yeah, it’s fun now, but think of the collateral damage they can cause when they go out of control,” he remarked in the Pikachu’s direction at FERNANDO SILPH’s remark. For one thing, he… well, he had a rather strong opinion about kaijus suddenly coming to life.

And then there was the matter of someone who was stuck outside, along with so many other delivery riders who…

“Gimme like, five minutes. Gotta rescue someone,” he remarked as he noticed Lam waving from just outside—

Cramming the rest of the pizza into his mouth, he fought his way over to the entrance and then immediately spotted the odd one out wearing this ‘PIZZA’ cap and he sighed. He just sighed.

“Lam. You can take the cap off now, no wonder you’re stuck out here,” he joked as he immediately approached his fellow Birdfather™ and gave the younger man an affectionate noogie.

“No wonder you can’t get in, c’mon, let’s get your… ooh, you got more pizza and more drinks? Nice,” he chirped, looking over at the Decidueye that was carrying aforementioned drinks.

“Need a hand with the drinks?” he offered the greenette.

---

• Alex hungy, grabs pepperoni pizza slice
• thanks little Josh for bringing pizza; however doesn’t miss Fernando’s remark
• is about to go into a discussion about Dynamax when he noticed that someone’s outside (hello Lam)
• brb rescuing the other Birdfather™
• comes out to the front and picks up Lam, is excited there’s even more food and drinks (yay more sugar)
• rescuing Lam from the delivery rider traffic outside!
• macarons: why are the macarons all pastel, they taste great though

He turned to the cranky ol’ man, and let out a tiny little sigh before a familiar-looking Noivern had sighted them; and immediately brought…

“Miss Elise, are you okay?!” he exclaimed upon her arrival; because holy shit things were still going on!

Then, the inevitable question about if he recognized any of the strange things that were now laying waste to pretty much everyone around them—

“They’re some perverse versions of the Swords of Justice… I take you saw the little one running around?” he confirmed with her.

Of course, he was talking about Keldeo.

“They look very close, but at the same time not quite so. Kind of like that strange mechanical Hydreigon I own,” he mused—before…

“No. Miss Elise, you can’t possibly be thinking of…” he trailed off as he looked towards where the strange, perverse, robotic versions of the Swords of Justice were pouring out.

“Are you kidding?! What would Remy say if he found out?!” he exclaimed as he raised his hands in surprise.

“What if something happens to you down there?!”

It was like they had the conversation with their eyes, and he fully understood the intent that she wanted to do…

“I swear, if something bad happens to you and Remy finds out about it you’re never going to hear the end of it from him. Or me.”

He turned to look over at the dedushka, circling them in a defensive formation before he sighed.

“Fine. Just know this: if anything bad happens down there. We are getting out of there, no questions asked. Do you swear.”

---

↠ Alex tries to dissuade her from going straight into the middle of where shit is unfolding! rip
↠ he begrudgingly agrees to it though, on the caveat that he goes along with her because if anything happens to her, he is 10000% sure Remy will ream her for it

It didn’t take too long for them to eventually get to the Draconid shrine, and then there was something else for them to do—ooh.

“Hey, if you still have time, you want to try the… writing a letter with your hopes and dreams? I know, I know, absolutely cheesy, but it’s an offer there!” he pointed out, taking a few minutes to read through the paper there with instructions on what they were supposed to do.

“Oh, you can address it to someone else?” he continued as he read downward, wondering if it was a good idea to—no, if it was hopes and dreams… wait.

Maybe he would.

Maybe he would actually put that one dream of his in writing, and hopefully never have the other person read it because apparently the letters were going to be sealed and then burned at the end of the year.

“What, are you willing to write a letter? Because I am!” he chirped as he grabbed a piece of paper and then looked for an empty bench where he could sit down and write down what he wanted to say…

Simply, his letter read only this:

‘I wish for the courage to be more open, and if you would say ‘yes’ to the one big question I wanted to ask you. I know, it’s too fast, but… remember the time we thought the entire world was going to fucking explode? Well, we can take it slower now, so. You know. I wanted to ask the big question, but I don’t know what you’re going to answer when I do.’

Obviously this letter was going to be addressed to Guillermo Marceliño, before he folded the paper up hastily and added some notes in Russian cursive at the bottom before sealing the envelope and making sure nobody else could see what he wrote down!

---

↠ prompt: Write a short letter with your character's hopes and aspirations for the new year.
↠ decoration (97), top (69), middle (35), top (1)

Honestly, now that he had the cranky ol’ man around… things were starting… to look a little better?!

At least, he hoped that the earlier frigid wind helped stick or at least trip up some of the iron-coated ‘monsters’ that were rampaging around and trying to indiscriminately hurt and/or injure people.

He wondered if this would make a difference before—

He’d gotten so lost in thought a Hoopa fist almost knocked him off his feet, twice, had the cranky ol’ man not come to his rescue with a Dragon Hammer body slamming attack before the fist actually landed a direct hit on him. Yikes!

“Wha—oh, thank you,” he breathed out, realizing that there was a quickly-disappearing golden ring where the Tornadus had jumped in to block the cheap shot that was aimed his way.

---

↠ Tornadus used Dragon Hammer to block the earlier cheap potshot Hoopa attempt trying to smack Alex!

He had to keep his panic in check, he had to keep his panic in check… come on, come on, come on…

Where are you?! he all but internally screamed in his head, cycling through pretty much the entire spectrum of emotions all at once as he hovered above the battlefield; before… uh-oh.

Uh to the fucking oh, what were those… huh? Why did the new ‘challengers’ on the field look like…

They looked like some perverse versions of the Swords of Justice that he knew existed.

One of them, in particular, looked like the one that was traveling with MATIAS SILPH, the one he met while at the hot springs and gave him a leaf… (said leaf was pressed between the pages of his own collection of handwritten tales, in case one was curious) and.

“What the absolute fuck.”

The Charizard came to a stop in mid-air, before suddenly bellowing a challenge at all the danged things that were literally… okay. Okay… this was going to be a little too much… but then…

“Ravana, bring me down.”

Much as he was loathe to land, he knew he had a better shot of actually—trying to hit the robotic, twisted versions of the Swords when he had that Pokémon out, and so once he’d been set down on the ground (despite his best judgment) he recalled the Charizard, and quietly slipped out a Cherish Ball before popping it to full size and summoning what was inside…

“Help,” was all he would say quietly in the Wandering Stormbringer’s direction; before the cranky deduskha took exactly one look at the mess going on and sighed his way, before huffing and crossing his arms.

“Y-yeah, I know… it’s an absolute madhouse… but we need your help!”

It was like the Stormbringer’s face said, ‘say no more’ and then whipped the cloud-tail around, before dropping a Bleakwind Storm at a bunch of incoming… Virizion-adjacent things that were headed his way!

(They were green, but metallic! What else was there?!)

---

↠ against his better judgment, Birddad™ lands on the ground right as the Paradox Pokémon come pouring out to cause mass chaos
↠ swapped out Charizard for Tornadus because shit about to hit the fan!
↠ Tornadus used Bleakwind Storm!

Had she been stood up by her new partner…?

“You know,” he began as he conspiratorially leaned down to whisper in her ear, “…Mr Rose always kept his word and would come on time. I don’t know about this one, though…”

Look, it was the gay friend in him just rearing its concerned head, okay?! Where was her partner, anyway?!

(Plus it didn’t help that he knew Mr Rose personally to boot [and was also probably one of the few people that respected him, in all honesty, when Gym Leaders were concerned].)

Either way…

“Oh, hey, you want to check out the Draconid Shrine?” he offered as he tilted his head in the direction of aforementioned shrine. Maybe this was related to the one that was in Meteor Falls…? He knew that the same shrine from before had opened its doors once more, so there was that…

“Come on, let’s go! Gotta keep ourselves busy while waiting for your partner to show up…” he teased, as he led the way to said shrine, offering macarons to anyone they would pass (come and take one or several, just leave some for the next person to get too).

---

↠ prompt: visit the Draconid Shrine (and also sharing macarons along the way)
↠ decoration (97), top (69), middle (35)

Oh, no.

For a few moments he thought he heard Shalin going off in another direction to save someone, so he would let her be.

However, in those precious few moments of… uh-oh!

“Frog?” he began quietly as he raked the battlefield below—where had he disappeared off to?! “F—M-Memo?!” he continued as the panic began to bubble up inside him; where had his partner gone off to?! Surely they hadn’t gotten frozen by the—

“Memo?!” he went on, his voice rising in a panic as he urged his Charizard to fly lower, closer to where everyone was either screaming for help or throwing everything (including the kitchen sink) at the strange thing that was threatening to bring down eternal winter upon them all.

“W-where are you?!” he exclaimed as the Charizard swatted away at something that tried to knock her out of the air.

---

↠ Alex loses track of things as Shalin flies off somewhere
↠ but where is his amphibious partner? W H E R E IS H E

“Of course! It’s winter, after all,” he hummed; shame his partner Guillermo Marceliño didn’t like it as much as he did! Seeing that the macarons were much welcomed, he opened the first box, allowing her to grab a few from the pile of pastel-colored ones inside.

At the mention of her… partner not showing up yet, he raised his eyebrows.

“Oh? Who is this new person? Is it…” he trailed off, looking around and unfortunately not spotting the one he was familiar with.

“Ah. Definitely someone I’m not familiar with,” he hummed while he left the boxes piled up on the bench as he sneakily rolled up a snowball… before catching Miss Elise by surprise with it!

“Boo!” he teased.

---

↠ play in the snow! (throw a snowball!)
↠ decoration (97), top (69)