"I still don't get why Charles Goodshow wants to see us." Jude said, as they made their way to the ballroom that was located in the Plaza Hotel.
Ash shrugged. "We'll find out soon enough."
The ballroom is a high ceilinged elegant room decorated with a tasteful crystal chandelier shone bright lights that reflected off the highly polished floors and decorations, making the ballroom rather sparkly. In the middle of the ballroom there was a long table covered by a white table cloth with laces and a single red line near the bottom. There were cloth covered chairs as well with cushions to be more comfortable. Along the walls were tables filled with various food and drinks, buffet style. Standing around the food table or sitting down on the table in the middle were the Elite Four and Champions of the five regions.
Ash opened the door, and they went in without being noticed by anyone, since they were too busy talking to each other.
Except for Charles Goodshow.
"Ah, Ash, my boy!" he came over to greet Ash and his Elite.
"Hello, Mr. Goodshow." He smiled at Charles.
"Good to see you and your Elite. We are just having a little social gathering, before we have a briefing. Just go ahead and enjoy yourselves for a while, maybe talk to the others"
"Ok." The PAL Elite nodded, and went to get some food for themselves. They were hungry anyway, since they haven't eaten breakfast.
Meanwhile at the table, Lorelei was looking at a PAL leaflet. "According to this, the PAL Elite is made up of these four, according to ranking, starting from the lowest: Jude Harrison, Rosaline Pyra, Phillip Robinson, and Pakura Ameyuri, with Pakura being the Leader of the Elite. There's no info on the Champion, only the fact that he was crowned Champion two years ago." She was talking to her fellow Elites. "There are no Gym Leaders at all, only Elites. If one wants to take the Elite challenge, they are required to win all the 12 parts of the fur symbols of their Battle Frontier, and then win the Trainers Tournament. Also, they need six Pokémon, as all battles are six-on-six, though they are allowed to rest It says here they have separate rooms."
"Then how does it work, if they have a Leader of the Elite? The Leader must be the strongest among them." Bruno said.
"Well, according to the pamphlet, you need to defeat one Elite at a time to unlock the next door. In the beginning when trainers first enter, all doors are locked except for Jude's. After he is defeated, the next door gets unlocked and the same goes for the third. Pakura is the last to be challenged." Lorelei read from the pamphlet. "Each Elite has his or her own distinct door, unlike Unova, which all of them has the same door, although they can be challenged in any order."
Lance took the pamphlet. "It says here that Jude is famous for being a supermodel and an S-Class Pokémon Connoisseur, Rosaline is famous for her Mahou Shoujo manga writing and she's a Pokemon history expert, Phillip's famous for his inventions, he can invent loads of stuff the world hasn't even thought about, and Pakura's famous for being a Top Coordinator."
"What else does it say?" Agatha asked.
"It says that PAL Elites is well known to specialize in two types. I don't know what types they specialize in. It doesn't say here." Steven frowned. (A/N: Because Kanto's Champion in the Games is your rival, in the anime, they technically don't have a Champion, so I'll put Steven as Kanto's Champion while Wallace is the Hoenn Champion.)
"If you must know, I specialize in Water/Dark. Mainly Water though." They jumped and turned, only to see Jude smiling at them. He was holding on to a toast.
"Who are you?" Bruno asked.
"Jude Harrison. I'm surprised you didn't notice us come in the ballroom. Then again, you guys were too busy talking to each other." He bit on his toast.
"Hi, nice to meet you, Jude!" The Elite members smiled at him. So this is the first member of the PAL Elite. The boy had black hair with smooth bangs brushed to the side with wide amber eyes that was filled with mischief. Pale skin and soft lips that oozes out the desire to be kissed. He had a slight muscular build and is fairly tall. He was rather cute looking. He was one example of a pretty boy.
Jude smiled back. "Yeah, nice to meet you guys too. You guys are the Kanto Elite, right?"
"How do you know?" Lorelei asked surprised.
"You guys are known even in this region." Jude shrugged.
"Really?" Bruno asked.
"No, I'm lying." Jude said playfully. "Of course! One of the fellow Elite told us about you. Apparently, the Elite met you before."
"What? Who?" Lance asked.
"Sorry can't tell ya." Jude said, winking, making the female Elite members blush.
"So, tell us more about this Elite of yours." Steven said.
"Hmm….I'll just tell you this: all of us have our titles. Nicknames, you know. For instance, they call me the Merman. Also, we also have jobs outside besides being an Elite. I mean, we all think we should do something else to be useful to the society besides being an image to our region. It gets boring after a while, being an Elite, and staying at one place, don't you think?" The others nodded at his statement.
"So, you guys have a life outside of being an Elite?" Lorelei asked.
"Yeah, I mean, no one ever gets past me when they took the challenge, except for our Champion, and that was like 2 years ago. It's boring for the other Elites too, so we go outside our Plateau and travel around and do other stuff, like participating in events and doing contests, helping to solve mysteries, hunting for treasures, inventing things, stuff like that."
"So tell us more about your Champion." Lance requested.
Jude shrugged. "He was so strong that he was the only one to be able to defeat all of us, we were surprised that our Leader got defeated, although she somehow did manage to get him to use all six of his Pokémon. He only used at most four when he reached Phillip. He used only two against me and Rosaline."
"Wow…." Steven said in awe.
Jude finished his toast. "You know, I'm gonna get more food now, and maybe grab some coffee. We are tired from the late night Poké-flight here. I'll see you later." With that he sauntered off to get more breakfast.
"I'm getting more breakfast too." Bruno said, getting up.
"Me too." Lance mumbled, and he left the table as well.
"Charles really outdone himself. Breakfast today is rather extravagant." Bruno said, gobbling on the scrambled eggs. "How does he afford all these?"
"Hey, save some for the others, won't you?" Karen frowned at him. "You're not the only one wanting to eat, you know."
"Yeah, we need to eat too you know." Will glared at him. "I was looking forward to the scrambled eggs."
Koga stayed silent, while Lance just shook his head. Bruno always eats lots of food, saying he needs the energy for training. There's no way he'll cut down the amount of food he takes in.
Just then, Drake appeared. "Hey, Lance, have you heard about the Legendary Dragon Duo?"
"You mean the world famous Dragon Duo that every Dragon user dreams to battle someday? Yes I heard of them. It's the one where it consists of two people, a boy and a girl, that is said to be able to tame even the wildest Dragon Pokémon. Individually, they were given the title Dragon Prince and the Dragon Princess. They are said to know the hearts of the dragons and have the ability soothe their hatred if any. They can also fully utilize their potential, and they have the gift to be able to summon Dragon Pokémon for help. They can also very fluent in the dragon language, being able to understand what Dragon Pokémon are speaking and write in said language. They are said to have powers that can match the most powerful Dragon Pokémon."
Drake nodded. "I was talking to Charles earlier, and he told me about them. Apparently, this is their home region."
"I definitely would like to meet them." Lance replied.
"That's the thing. They vanished into thin air five years ago, just like that Ash boy you mentioned." Drake sighed. "There were rumours they were going to get married and they were lovers, since they were so close, but something happened and they suddenly disappeared!"
"They….disappeared?" Lance widened his eyes. "Like Ash?"
"Yeah I'm just telling you because they originated from this region." Drake said. "Oh well, I'm going to talk to my fellow Elites now, later!" With that, he left.
'Disappeared, huh?' Lance thought. 'What if the PAL Elite has something to do with both disappearances?'
"Alright, sorry." Bruno said, apologizing for taking all the food. He turned his attention to a rainbow cake with chocolate layer. "Oh, it's the last slice! I get dibs!" he shot out a hand to take it, but a delicate hand was faster, and snatched up the cake in the split second.
Bruno turned to glare at the owner of the said hand, but his glare died when it met amethyst eyes. She could be considered beautiful with her shiny black hair that is rippling in the slight breeze from the air-con and glossy pink lips. She also has a voluptuous figure. She is staring at them while nibbling at the cake she had taken, after removing the protective plastic around it.
"Oh My God, she's beautiful!" Will said. Bruno dumbly nodded.
"Hey, I'm Karen, nice to meet you!" Karen smiled at her. Instead of smiling or greeting back, the girl stayed silent, and looked rather wary. She just gave a curt nod after a while.
"Are you one of the PAL Elite?" Will asked eagerly. Pakura gave a single nod.
"What's your name?" Karen asked.
Pakura stayed silent for a long while, chewing her cake, before saying quietly, "They call me Pakura."
"Pakura?" Bruno said, remembering the name from the pamphlet. Wasn't she the Leader of the Elite?
Pakura finally finished her cake and said, "I'm going somewhere else. Later."
"So soon?" Lance asked her. "Why not stay a little longer and chat with us?"
Pakura shook her head, and left quickly before they could say anything else.