[The transmission coming from Ash's Pokégear is particularly noisy today. Nearby, a Pokémon giggles. Some distance away, a woman sobs and a man panics.]

-ling you I'm sorry! I never intended to say it out loud, I was going to keep it to myself!

[That... was obviously the wrong thing to say, because the sobbing now gains in intensity.]

Look, just because I'm not desperate enough doesn't mean- Bouncy, turn that off.

[And turn that off, Bouncy does, just in time to spare the network an atrocious wail.]

Everyone, my team has a question and demands an answer. Think about it carefully.

[The team in question can be heard, yipping and meowing and squawking animatedly. But that all stops the moment Ash takes a deep breath and speaks again.]

...Which are better: dogs, cats, or birds?

[There is a giant robot in Vermillion.

And also in Cerulean.

And Cinnabar.

There is a giant robot every-freaking-where, and if you're particularly unlucky it might land very, very close to you.

You don't need to worry, though. Now more than any other time, Captain Ash knows what he's doing.]

[The video starts with a shiny Frogadier that looks much too satisfied for its own good. But that doesn't last very long, as the frog soon grabs the Pokégear and starts hopping through the room, through an appartment, until it finally reaches a room where a man sits at a desk, working. Once in a while, he looks up at the figurine on the shelf before him for a few moments before his hands start moving again. Apparently that's not interesting enough for an apprentice filmmaker, because it jumps up next to the figurine in a single bound.

From its new perch, our amateur camerafrog starts filming its trainer's work directly. The lines of the various models are precise and technical, the notes that surround them completely illegible, and Ash's hands are-

Throwing an eraser at the Pokégear. It misses.]

...You know, acts of corporate espionage are punishable by withheld desserts and bathroom-cleaning duties in this household.

[The threat must be serious; the Frogadier gasps, and quickly ends the feed.]

So.

[Ash stays silent for a few moments after that, almost as if that word is the only one he intended to send. That doesn't last very long.]

Am I getting my weeks wrong, or was there a rather suspicious lack of confused calls coming from New Bark Town over the last few days?

[He normally would not have registered that at all, yet this time he's been thinking about it enough to make his head pound.]

...Never mind. It's probably nothing.

[On the screen in the foreground, a wet yet excited-looking Smeargle. Slightly behind and holding the Smeargle up, an equally wet Captain Ash. In the background, route 34 and a portion of its Surskit population.]

Hey, would anyone be kind enough to show off a cool attack or two? We want to try something.

[The Smeargle nods enthusiastically along, its eyes shining with hope and anticipation. But that stops when its trainer suddenly laughs.]

It doesn't even need to be cool, really. That's just a bonus. Any attack will do if you feel like sharing it.

[That last part was obviously not included in their original discussion, because the last thing that happens before the Pokégear is turned off is a brush tail slapping Ash in the face.]

Just so we're all on the same page.

[And just so he doesn't have to hit anyone, if the anger in his voice is any indication.]

If you tell a Vanilluxe that ice cream would be the best dessert for her birthday? You deserve to be frozen to the sidewalk. If you loudly declare the virtues of roasted duck prepared with spring onion around a Farfetch'd? You deserve to have that spring onion shoved up your nose. If you make jokes about using fertilized eggs to make an omelet in front of a Blissey? You deserve to spend the next three hours washing yolk out of your hair.

[Geez, it sure doesn't sound like he had to deal with all three situations over the last week.]

And if you do all of that in front of their trainer? You deserve to get forcibly thrown out of the restaurant. No complaining.

[Or else he'll have to do some hitting, and then no one will be pleased.]