"Heeheehee, Ash, look! I have a ribbon now, too!"
After saying goodbye to Kenny and leaving Floaroma Town on the road to Eterna City, Dawn walked in front of Ash, showing him the pink ribbon in her hand. Her beautiful eyes curved into crescent moons as she kept repeating the phrase to him.
"Alright, Dawn, this is the 52nd time you've mentioned this today!" Ash said, nodding while also teasing her. He didn't expect this sweet girl to be so repetitive. They had barely left town, and she had already repeated it 52 times; his ears were starting to hurt.
"Only you, Ash, would remember that so clearly!" Brock rolled his eyes. He could already smell the sweet scent of a budding romance.
"Hmph!" Dawn's face was slightly red. She replied stubbornly, "I don't care! You just have to listen!"
"Oh no!"
Before Ash could react, Brock and Pikachu, who was on Ash's shoulder, exchanged a knowing look. They both nodded and quickly ran to the front of the group. They decided they were no longer going to put up with the PDA. Dawn, satisfied with their actions, looked at Ash with a mischievous grin.
"Dawn, you have one more chance to rephrase that."
"Rephrase what? I didn't say anything wrong, hmph!" Dawn stood with her head held high, still defiant, but her face was flushed.
"Don't say I didn't warn you then!" Seeing her like this, Ash couldn't help but want to tease her. In Dawn's eyes, Ash was grinning mischievously and walking closer to her. She took a step back with each of his steps.
"W-what do you want?" Dawn panicked. She remembered what he had done last time, and her face flushed with embarrassment. She held her short skirt and ran away.
"What do I want?" Ash replied, still walking. "Of course, I'm going to teach you a lesson, Dawn!"
He slowly chased after the girl who was now running away frantically. When he caught up to her, he grabbed her and threw her over his shoulder. As he continued walking, he "viciously" lectured her.
"You meanie! Let me go!"
Dawn hit Ash's shoulder with her small fists, trying to get him to put her down and escape the embarrassing position. But just like last time, he was a solid wall, completely unaffected by her struggles.
"Why are you so strong?!" She was out of breath and her face was red from trying to get away. She wondered why his strength was so amazing. Was she just going to have to let him do whatever he wanted?
"It's because you're so light!" Ash replied casually. He was the same guy who could lift the 200-pound Larvitar above his head. A beautiful girl who weighed less than 100 pounds was nothing to him.
To calm her down, he increased the force of his "lesson" on her.
"What are those two doing back there? I'm hearing some weird sounds!" Brock, who was walking ahead, asked out of curiosity.
"Pikachu~" Pikachu had no idea what the strange sounds were either. It wanted to turn its head to look, but Brock's hand stopped it.
"Pikachu, that's their private business. We shouldn't look," Brock said with a strange expression, pulling Pikachu's head forward. He then picked up his pace. Pikachu pondered this for a moment, then nodded in agreement and walked forward.
Ash, with Dawn on his shoulder, kept up with them. The three of them and the one Pokémon maintained a strange rhythm. Dawn had also quieted down and stayed in that position. It wasn't that she didn't want to yell; she was just too tired. Her voice was hoarse, so she drank some water from Ash's canteen to soothe her throat.
The group continued to walk until they reached a Pokémon Center in a forest.
"Honestly, Ash, how do you have so much stamina?" After he put her down, Dawn rubbed her sore body and butt and complained.
Brock turned his head away, pretending he didn't hear a thing.
"Ahem, Dawn, be careful what you say!" Ash coughed a few times, hinting at Dawn to watch her words while glancing at the nearby Brock.
Dawn: ...
Dawn suddenly realized how scandalous her words sounded. She immediately covered her mouth, and her face and neck turned red. It was a while before she went back to normal.
"Nurse Joy, I'm here!" Brock said, noticing the Pokémon Center sign and rushing in like a maniac.
"Dawn, let's go inside!"
"Okay!" Ash walked in first, with Dawn now acting like a good girl, following behind him.
Once inside, they noticed that this Pokémon Center was a bit different from the ones they were used to. Instead of a spacious lobby, it was a regular house. Of course, there were still treatment machines and a transfer system, but there was no Nurse Joy at the front desk.
"That's strange. Where is Nurse Joy?" Brock looked around with a confused expression, searching for his "angel in white," but he couldn't find her. He wondered where his beloved Nurse Joy was.
"This is the first time I've seen Nurse Joy not at the front desk!" Dawn said. After traveling for so long, her impression of Nurse Joy was that she would always be at the front desk waiting for trainers to arrive.
"Nurse Joy is human, too. It's normal for her not to be here sometimes," Ash said, not feeling like anything was strange. He pulled the girl, who wanted to wander, to wait with him.
After a while, a young girl who looked like a miniature Nurse Joy came out. Without waiting for them to ask, she ran back inside. She then came back with a beautiful young woman who looked like a grown-up Nurse Joy and a mature woman who also looked like Nurse Joy.
"Nurse Joy!" Brock's spirits lifted when he saw the familiar face.
"Mom, these are the guests!"
"Okay, Mai. Mom and Ayaka already know," the mature Nurse Joy said, bending down to touch her daughter's head.
"Hello, trainers. How can we help you?" The young woman, named Ayaka, came up to them with a trademark smile.
"..." Brock's passion slowly faded. He then crouched in a corner, drawing circles on the floor under a dark cloud. His Croagunk came out but didn't know what to do with Brock in this state.
"Haha!" Ash and Dawn didn't know what to say.
"But... I think there's a legendary Pokémon around here," Ash thought to himself. He remembered from the story that there was a "fishing net Pokémon" nearby. He wondered if he should go and try to catch this legendary Pokémon that had been stripped of its title!