Fanfic / Infinity Train: Blossomverse

Three stories, two heroes^note and an Anti-Hero, one cult, and a train of infinite possibilities. Deconstruction, nightmares and Wonderland references optional. ^note Starting from the left, counterclockwise: Gladion, the Knight of the Orange Lily, Chloe of the Vermillion, and Goh.

Infinity Train: Blossomverse is a trilogy of Crossover fanfics of Pokémon: The Series and Infinity Train written by Green_Phantom_Queen with added help by co-writers ShadyMissionary and Crossoverpairinglover of Pokémon Reset Bloodlines.

In each story, a Pokémon character is thrust into the Infinity Train where they are given a number and must traverse the Train's numerous cars and solve puzzles to confront their problems head-on if they ever want to go home. While back at home, life continues and the impact of their disappearance can be felt, changing things for the better or worse.

Linking the three stories together on the Train's side is the deadly cult, The Apex, who have insisted that they are above all else and will inflict damage on the denizens (or "Nulls") for their own use and to increase their numbers. It's up to each of the protagonists to confront this cult to bring peace onto the Train, but at what cost? And what comes after that when there is no cult to stop?

Fans expecting an atypical Pokémon journey across the Infinity Train are in for a surprise as the author makes it quick to deconstruct usual conventions in the atypical "Character gets a Pokémon, travels the world, fights others to become a better person and saves the world from an evil group" for a more personal experience while still maintaining some conventions (ie characters still get a partner and travel and also fight off an evil organization) to make something new. The stories tend to focus on personal struggles and shifting worldviews as the characters meet up from anything including flying books, living statues, music notes, and everything in-between.

And horror. Lots and lots of horror.

On July 16th, 2021, the first anniversary of Blossoming Trail, the author has announced that she has created the "Blossomverse", where readers are allowed to create fan art and stories that have significant changes to characters and settings or perhaps have other Pokémon characters on the train at the same time as Gladion, Chloe or Goh, hoping to inspire more people to truly write their own tales and focus on mature themes as the original show did.

Stories included in the series:

• Infinity Train: Blossoming Trail: The original story, which takes place before Episode 29 of Pokémon Journeys and at the beginning of Infinity Train Book 3 (particularly "The Jungle Car") where Chloe Cerise runs away from home in hopes to escape a world where everyone loves Pokémon and expects her to do the same. Complete.
• Infinity Train: Knight of the Orange Lily: The prequel to Blossoming Trail set in the Alola Region after the Nihilego arc and in between Book 2 and 3 of Infinity Train, where Gladion enters the train after his sister realizes that he's mostly at fault for why her trauma went unnoticed. Complete.
• Infinity Train: Voyage of Wisteria: The sequel to Blossoming Trail, and the Grand Finale of the trilogy, where Goh is now on the Train and struggles to question what he will do now. Complete.

Side stories

• Infinity Train: Branching Paths: A side-story anthology set in various What-If Scenarios.
• Infinity Train: Court of Cyclamen: An Interquel sidestory that focuses on Bede during Acts 2 and 3 of Blossoming Trail.
• Infinity Train: Chrysanthemum Shepherd (link): An Origins Episode focusing on the Infinity Train version of Alex Shepherd.
• Infinity Train: Poppies for Flauros: A collection of stories that focus on the Fog Car before Chloe's arrival.
• Cherry Blossom Furisode (link): An Alternate Universe Fic detailing a potential scenario where the Cerise family moved out of Vermillion City to Laverre City in Kalos and Chloe decides to become a Furisode Girl.
• Blossoming Christmas (link): A Holiday 2021 special set after the events of Wisteria.
• Visitors Of Achilles (link): A separate epilogue regarding Parker. Written by ShadyMissionary.
• Grave Of Lobelia (link): A one-shot exploring the final conversation between Chloe and Yeardley in a world where the latter died. Written by Exotos.

Spin-offs by Other Authors

• Infinity Train: Seeker of Crocus by SpinnerNite (writer of The World Ends With You: Espoir De Vie) that focuses on a What If? scenario that asks if Professor Sycamore got on the train during the events of Blossoming Trail in search for Alain, diverging the events differently.
  • Orchid Observer (link): A side-story involving Jesse Cosay and Lake trying to research the Apex members in order to tell their parents the truth. Written by Green Phantom Queen
  • Rey Mysterio Vs. The Cosmos (link): A story based on Rey Mysterio Versus La Oscuridad primarily written by Green Phantom Queen that focuses on Aerostar prior to his entrance onto the Infinity Train.
  • Unfinished Bloom (link): A side story to Voyage of Wisteria that focuses on Alain and Professor Sycamore during the Darkest Day and after, bridging the Crocus timeline with that of the main trilogy.
  • Fury Of Thistle: A crossover one-shot with the main trilogy, written as a response to Visitors of Achilles. It has since been deleted.
• Infinity Train: Cherry Bloodlines: a three-shot story that is a Fusion Fic by Cross that is merged between the ideas of Blossoming Trail and Cross's own stories (mainly Reset Bloodlines).
  • Cherry Prince And Princess (link): An additional story in the AU that focuses on Ash and Acerola.
• Infinity Train: Royal Pain (link): Written by Exotos135. Taking more of a Broad Strokes approach to both canon and the general flow of the Blossomingverse, this one focuses on Acerola and features Chloe going to Alola.
  • Infinity Train: Crown of Thorns: Reboot/Revamp of Royal Pain. Co-written with Cross.
  • Akuma Numerology (link): A spin-off of Crown of Thorns primarily written by Cross that follows a train trapped Marinette who was trapped on the train with others by an Akuma.
• Orange Rose Gathering: A Lighter and Softer spinoff of both the main Blossomingverse and Reset Bloodlines by Cross and Exotos in an alternate universe where a teenage Chloe gets a vacation job at the Ketchum Family Reunion as part of a plan to help Chloe out of her shell. The first M-rated story in the verse.
• Infinity Train: Ashes Of Spiderlily (link): Written by Eli, depicting Chloe and Goh's talk after the events of the original trilogy.
  • Infinity Train: Bridge Of Iris (link): Set in the same timeline as Spiderlily. Now with Ash and Goh having a talk.
• Infinity Train: Crown of Hydrangea: Written by Eli, depicting a take on Wisteria with Goh not being found by the Red Lotus Trio.
• Blossomverse: Concerns Of Zinnia (link): Written by Cross and Exotos, an alternate take of an earlier Blossoming Trail scene with Trip due to the presence of Goh.
• Infinity Train: Shield Of Vermillion (link): A What If? story that asks how the Blossomverse would begin had it taken place after The Darkest Day. Co-written between Exotos and Cross.
• Infinity Train: Wake Me Up: In this story, Professor Fennel is given a message from Professor Juniper about something having gone wrong in Vermillion City. She discovers Colress having devised a plan involving corrupted Dream Mist, and while the Cerise Institute team deals with it, she goes to the Infinity Train to help Chloe finish her own trip.
• Interdimensional Milkshake Bar (link): A lighthearted Blossomverse crossover where characters of the different works get trapped in a Milkshake Bar. Written by Eli.
  • Blossomverse: The Chloe Respite Car, An one-shot inspired by Milkshake Bar featuring a meeting of Chloes based on various Blossomverse stories that takes itself more seriously. Co-written by Cross and Exotos.
• Blossomverse: Mother Of Pearl (link): A one-shot focused on four moms in an alternate post-Cyan Desert Car. Written by Cross.
• Blossomverse Game Show: A one-shot what-if where Ash and Goh participate in a charity based game show for missing persons while Chloe watches from the Infinity Train. Written by Cross.
• Infinity Train: Amour de lis (link): A what-if with two notable changes: Miette entering the Train before Serena makes her debut in canon, and a Changeling Tale twist to Chloe's presence on the Train. Written by Exotos135.
• Blossomverse: Ash Goes Missing, A one-shot exploring the complaint some have that Chloe and guys are treated differently when they go missing in the verse. Co-written by Cross and Exotos.
• When Blossoms Scatter A three-shot set in a continuity where Chloe vanished for three months, but not to the Infinity Train, following the aftermath. Written by Skyloftian Goddess Hylia
• Blossomverse: Post-Gameshow-Goes-Missing (link): An AU sequel to both Game Show and Ash Goes Missing where both happened simultaneously and Goh wakes up a week later. Written by Cross.

Loosely connected Stories:

• Infinity Train: Boiling Point: Written by Exotos135 and inspired by Blossoming Trail, including having an alternate version of Chloe as a supporting character. Green Phantom Queen is also working on a prequel Infinity Train: Melancholy Afterlife that explains how she got on the Train and made a name for herself as Chloe of the Vermillion.

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General trope examples (shared with the Blossomverse)

• Deconstructed Character Archetype
• Deconstruction Fic
• Double Standard
• Dramatic Irony
• Everyone Has Standards
• Foil
• Foreshadowing
• Irony
• Poor Communication Kills
• Shout Out
• Take That
• Unwitting Instigator Of Doom

General trope examples (shared with Blossoming Trail)

• All For Nothing
• Ascended Extra
• Bittersweet Ending
• Continuity Nod
• Freudian Excuse Is No Excuse
• Innocently Insensitive
• The Reason You Suck Speech
• What The Hell Hero

General trope examples (shared with Boiling Point)

• Deconstructed Character Archetype
• Foil
• Spiritual Antithesis

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This fanverse as a whole features the following examples:

• Action Girl: Many female characters are perfectly capable of kicking butt, though whether they do it by weapons, Pokémon, or something else depends on the character.
• Action Survivor: Most former Passengers are this by default, since even if they don't become badass or remain completely normal, they still survive the Infinity Train.
• Adaptation Expansion: Due to Infinity Train having each book being only 10 episodes long (each being ten minutes), the fanfics flesh out more aspects of the Train while adding more things to them. More importantly, it also gives scenes of what's going on in the Pokémon world while the focus character of each story is going on their train trip. Blossoming Trail is essentially the author's intent on giving Chloe a bigger role than she's usually seen as, particularly because Chloe only had a sole episode focused on her (Episode 11; the story was first uploaded before her second one — Episode 29.)
• Adaptational Angst Upgrade: Practically everybody in these stories have some sort of angst on them, whether it is by being Bullied into Depression (Chloe), being turned into a scapegoat (Goh), or being forced to face the reality in the harshest way possible (Gladion). And that's just the main characters!
• Adaptational Badass: Anybody who has been a former Passenger and survived is automatically this. Those who do become Passengers eventually do gain one or two levels through their journey.
• Adaptational Context Change: Some scenes or events from canon are changed to either help the narrative or make characters come across as better or worse than others.
• Adaptational Dumbass: Unfortunately this is rather common, though it's equally possible the culprit is this as well as Fury-Fueled Foolishness.
• Adaptational Jerkass: A lot of people are a lot nastier than in their original source, either being nastier to begin with or taking a level in jerkass throughout a story.
• Ad Hominem: This is a common result of someone who practices Brutal Honesty allowing it to go way too far; soon forgetting about being honest in favor of just attacking the person in order to get them to stop questioning their logic. Of course, being honest isn't a requirement to reach this, it just tends to be a common prelude to this trope.
• Adaptational Jerkass: Several characters either gain a level of unpleasantness to them or have their actions re-contextualized to make them seem worse.
• Adaptational Karma: When it comes to the Infinity Train side of the story, characters who either got off scot-free (The Cat) or with little consequence (The Apex) get a hefty dose of karma to balance things out.
• Adaptation Species Change: If a car was based on an existing piece of media (for example Silent Hill or Hazbin Hotel), the characters have been changed into becoming denizens.
• Adaptational Sympathy: Depending on the characters, their actions can either be given more sympathetic reasons or not.
• Adults Are Useless: One of the recurring themes is how adults pay little to no attention to the problems around them and exasperate them. It also is played with since some could have done more if they were given more information as to what was happening.
• The Alternet: The stories feature The Infinet, the Infinity Train's equivalent to the internet, which is a communication system where passengers can talk to their loved ones back in the real world.
• Alice Allusion: The Train itself is an entire allusion to the book but the trilogy ramps it up even further. Knight of the Orange Lily has white rabbits and playing card motifs, Blossoming Trail has a girl who is based on Alice herself getting an Unbirthday and spouts out numerous quotes from the book, and Voyage of Wisteria has a lot of butterfly imagery.
• All Abusers Are Male: If a character is shown engaging in abusive behavior, whether it's actual abuse or something misconstrued as abuse, chances are high that the character will be male. This isn't to say there aren't female abusers, but the males far outweight the females.
• Always Chaotic Evil: The Apex in the first two stories for the trilogy, Blossoming Trail and Knight of the Orange Lily is depicted as being composed of sociopathic hellspawns who are more than willing to ransack Cars, cause chaos, and rub salt into the wounds just to name a few. Voyage of Wisteria instead tries to subvert this notion by not only exploring how much damage they actually did, but whether it was as bad as everybody makes it out to be.
• Amusement Park of Doom: The Shock Street Car and The Dead Carnival Car are amusement parks of monsters and gore.
• Anger Is Not Enough: Anger is a pretty constant feature across these stories, but it always makes the situation worse rather than fixing anything.
• Animate Inanimate Object: Many of these are found on the train from living books to music notes to statues.
• Anyone Can Die: The Pokémon side rarely features any deaths and if they do, most of them get revived very quickly. Here, both denizens and humans can die while on the Train with the only thing stopping Chloe from returning home with a cracked skull was a Pendant of Life.
• Arc Symbol: The fan art has a symbol for each of the protagonists.
  • Gladion: The orange lily, since his name is based on the Gladiolus ("Sword Lily") and the flowers are representations of hatred because of how Lillie hates her brother for keeping the Nihilego incident secret.
  • Chloe: A red lotus, the red symbolizing her personal color and the flower representing personal growth.
  • Goh: A green butterfly, a symbol of rebirth and also due to his personal encounter with the Unsub, Ogami.
• Asshole Victim: Given the high number of jerks and/or malicious characters in the trilogy, it's safe to say that among the many, many victims of the angst and misery, there are some who well and truly deserved it.
• Author Appeal: A few things to look out for when reading the stories:
  • Food. The author is a foodie and any time she has a chance, she'll bring out descriptions of food and people having conversations while eating.
  • Horror. Every story has its own collection of nightmares and brimming with Psychological Horror. To give you an example, Blossoming Trail crosses over with the psychological horror juggernaut Silent Hill.
  • Specter whom the author has a fondness over. He appears as a character in Knight of the Orange Lily and Voyage of Wisteria and expies exist in some capacity in the trilogy.
  • Female focus. Girls in the trilogies shape the actions of others and the stories also take a look at how girls get unfair treatment in the Pokémon world with Blossoming Trail written due to a lack of female focus when Journeys was airing.
  • References to Alice in Wonderland are also very frequent, although this was also seen in Infinity Train as well.
  • Music plays an important role whether it's being sung or the titles of the arcs/chapters reflecting the mood. The most prominent songs come from The Birthday Massacre (The author's favorite band)
  • Pro-wrestling. Paul London is one of the main characters in the trilogy, and every time he's around, expect him to spout out numerous shout-outs to wrestling storylines.
  • Books; the author loves reading and she brings up references to classic literature and kids' books. Lexi is from the Library of Flying Books (a Shout-Out to The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore) and Chloe herself is a Cute Bookworm.
  • Deconstruction. No matter the story, at least some sort of trope is going to get taken apart and re-examined, even if said trope happens to be the very premise itself.
• Being Evil Sucks: Being an antagonist in these stories is effectively a constant set of misery. You either, at best, become a social pariah that everybody hates and has everyone around you ready to tear you apart if you so much as breathe, and at worst, have your whole life and/or mental health (sometimes both) completely annihilated beyond repair, and that's assuming you don't end up dying beforehand.
• Being Good Sucks: While being evil is infinitely worse, being a good person isn't much better. Sure, your nicer personality means some people might like you, but they won't be able to save you from being subjected to the same horrors the antagonists face.
• Being Tortured Makes You Evil: Here's a pro tip: if a character has been thoroughly tortured before they arrive in the story, then they'll be this, assuming they're not an Empty Shell of their former self.
• Big Bad: The Apex are the overarching villains throughout the trilogy as their actions have affected the lives of the denizens in some way, shape, or form. However, whether they play this trope straight or act more like Greater-Scope Villain depends on the story.
• Black-and-Grey Morality: What the trilogy basically boils down to after several bouts of black and white morality and insanity; the protagonists are never clear cut nice people (Ash Ketchum remains Ash Ketchum, but he also tends to be sidelined by a Guilt Complex), and all of them have some baggage to some extent, but the people they fight against are almost always infinitely worse than they are, from a cult bent on destroying a group on the Train to a butterly monster who wants to topple the Train to achieve paradise.
• Black-and-White Morality: Zig-Zagged. The early parts of the stories go with the idea that this is the case, with the heroes being good, the villains evil, and everybody else depending. However, as the stories go on, Graying Morality starts taking place.
• Black-and-White Insanity: Since the stories work on a Morality Kitchen Sink level, anybody who subscribes to the idea people can only be good or evil is either not thinking straight, or are outright insane.
• Blaming the Victim: This is a favored tactic of people who either can no longer claim to be innocent or are too stubborn to admit that they were wrong, assuming they have a victim to blame in the first place. And no, the heroes are not exempt from using this trope, as Chloe's vicious call out to Paul/Despair shows.
• Bloodier and Gorier: While anything too explicit is either a dream sequence or just an imaginary tale, the verse features some grotesque scenes that aren't for the faint of heart whenever the horror isn't just psychological. Tokio's tattoo, Trip's miscolored eyes, the Unown incident, Chloe's head cracking open...
• Both Sides Have a Point: Arguments happen but the stories like to point out that both sides have valid reasoning for their actions and reasonings.
• Brutal Honesty: When it comes to people being honest in these stories, they really don't bother with any filters; they just say what they truly believe.
• Character Shilling: The stories have many moments where the narrative tries to paint certain characters as better than they actually are. Though whether it's taken at face value (Blossoming Trail), initially deconstructed only to backtrack later (Court of Cyclamen), or deconstructed and committing to it (Voyage of Wisteria) depends on the story.
• City of Canals: The Canals of Fondue Car is a city based on Alto Mare with cheese fondue rivers that each hero of the original trilogy visits.
• Cold-Blooded Torture: There are at least two signifcant examples of this trope across the trilogy: the "nightmare therapy" that Goh is forcibly put through is nothing but a giant torture session made to let Parker appease their desire to see the guy hurt by putting them through an Unwinnable by Design simulation, Walter tortures Paul in order to get him to become one of the components for the Cage of Flauros.
• Color Motif: A minor motif is that each story fits with some sort of color.
  • Knight of the Orange Lily: Not orange, but black and white. Gladion starts off the story wearing black but swaps it for white and leads a group called the White Gestalt, as each member wears white. It also reflects the Black-and-White Morality that goes about.
  • Blossoming Trail: Red, to reflect Chloe Cerise's red hair, her city being Vermillion City, and her group the Red Lotus Trio (later Quarto)
  • Voyage of Wisteria: While one hasn't been established yet, gray is the best one as shown in the fan art. Goh wears a grey hoodie and has a glum demeanor from the hell he went through in Blossoming Trail (It's a Long Story) to contrast Gladion's black hoodie and Chloe's initial white dress.
• Coming of Age Story: Like in both of the series, the fanfic talks about how the characters must come to terms with the world around them and how they must change their world views to become something better.
• Contrived Coincidence: These happen once in a while, and more often than not only make things worse for everyone.
• Cool Train: The Infinity Train, of course! It's an interdimensional train with cars filled with their own universes and some of them are based on other forms of media from a car built with LEGO, a car based on a horror circus game and even a car filled with fog and psychological horror.
• Crapsack Only by Comparison: A big theme in the original story, that gets expanded upon in the sequel, is that Vermillion City is a terrible place to live where Chloe was forced into a corner, compared to the Infinity Train, where she has the freedom to be herself. However, as the sequel goes on and the trope is explored more, it becomes clear this perception is only possible by Chloe getting the worst hand possible dealt to her; being stuck at school where she gets bullied, staying at home where she doesn't do the things she wants to do, and these two things only happen because Chloe herself refuses to either speak up about her problems or actually work on herself in order to change her situation. As for the Infinity Train, while it gives her a brief power trip, it doesn't take long to see that Chloe is much more trapped in it than she ever was in Vermillion City, as she won't be able to go back home if she doesn't get her number down to zero, which would involve facing her inner demons and ditch the power fantasy she's grown obssessed with, or stay there and potentially die to reincarnate into a Denizen, wherein she will be truly stuck on the Train forever.
• Creator's Culture Carryover: The main writers are westerners writing characters set in a Japanese-originating series^ExplanationGreen Phantom Queen herself was born and raised in America but was living in Myanmar when the trilogy was written. and thus the views the narrative often addresses, such as in regards to therapy and bullying, matches far more towards the western views on the topic than the japanese viewpoint.
• Creator Thumbprint: The various writers have some key ticks that can let you determine who is writing what section of a story, for example a section written primarily by Green typically includes food porn, torture porn, horror elements and references, wrestling references, a constant reference to Specter...
• Crossover: Obviously, it's a collection of fanfics where Pokémon characters enter the Infinity Train but they also crossover with other works due to numerous cars being based on them.
• Darker and Edgier: The stories are much darker than the Pokémon anime due to the nature of the Train, but there is a bucket load of nightmare fuel for each story that you don't usually find in the anime and perhaps even beyond the original Infinity Train series itself. For example Blossoming Trail dedicates one entire chapter to a Psychological Horror fest called "nightmare therapy". End results? A ten-year-old boy goes under Suicide Watch.
• Deceptively Silly Title: Rule of thumb: the more innocent the name of a car is, the higher chances of there being very dark content. The most prominent cars are the Cyan Desert Car and the 400 Rabbits Car.
• Deconstruction: As a whole, the stories break down the supposed plot of "Characters travel the world with a Pokémon" by their side by having them be thrust onto a train that will not let them go until they confront their traumas and mental walls along with explaining what the repercussions are for their loved ones if they're gone for weeks if not months on end and how things could be different if their problems were noticed.
  • Another thing they like to point out is the conventions of the anime. For example, Gladion was heralded as a hero for being the one doing everything to protect his sister while Lusamine was chewed out for ignorance...but in truth, Gladion knew everything about what happened to Lillie and could've told his mother what was going on much much sooner, thus preventing most of his sister's tragedies.
  • One could also say they deconstruct the vitriol-filled Accusation Fic and Revenge Fic. Anger and revenge play a significant role in all stories, but here they only serve to make things worse, and the situations are a lot more grey than other examples of the same genre.
  • Another question it points out is can you be a character or get your own growth if you're not associated with Pokémon? What person are you if you don't have those creatures on you or if you just don't like them?
• Demographic-Dissonant Crossover: While the main focus is on the family-friendly Pokémon and the more mature story-filled but marketed for kids Infinity Train, they later start crossing over with other darker series like Silent Hill, Yu-Gi-Oh! VRAINS and Voyage of Wisteria has a car based on Hazbin Hotel.
• Demoted to Extra: Ash is usually the protagonist of the anime, but he's regulated as a supporting character to let Gladion, Chloe, and Goh have the focus on their train ride.
• Disguised Horror Story: The story can initially start off with children entering a whimsical train of strange and fantastic worlds...and then suddenly twisting into a mess of psychological horror and nightmares.
• Driven to Suicide: A trope that shows up way too often across the trilogy is characters losing the will the live so thoroughly that they try to end it all before the world continues to torture them for their sick pleasure. Most of them do get the chance to regain their mental faculties, however.
• Early-Installment Weirdness: Title-wise, most stories after Blossoming Trail usually go with a [Noun] of [Flower] title theme. While this isn't the case for every story, those are still in the majority.
• Extraordinary World, Ordinary Problems: Despite being set in a fantastic world of adventures, much of Chloe's problems originate from mundane things like bullying at school, a disconnect between herself and those around her, and family issues.
• Females Are More Innocent: The universe initially plays the trope straight, as the number of mean-spirited or jerkish female characters is lower than male ones, but it later defies it; making it clear that no matter what, males and females can be equally guilty no matter what one may believe.
• Feminist Fantasy: While Chloe is the sole female who has adventures on the Train, Blossoming Trail is focused through her lens in her role of "female who is forced to join with Ash", with many important characters from both the Pokémon world and Train being female. Whether they be the ones who instigate the plot (Lillie) or be support (Lampetia, Amelia, Hazel) or even the bad guys whose actions cause everything to transpire (Amelia again, and Grace).
• Floral Theme Naming: Characters who don't have canon last names (Read: nearly every single one of them) are given surnames named after a flower with a few exceptions.
• Flower Motif: Flowers are a major part of the story. Each story is titled after a flower and many characters get surnames relating to them, with the meanings behind the flowers reflecting their personalities. As shown in the fan art above, Gladion is associated with orange lilies (the "F you" flower) and Chloe has a red lotus (Lotus flowers represent rebirth and self-reflection).
• Food Porn: There are a lot of scenes involving food, some justified (Mallow's family runs a restaurant) and some because of Green Phantom Queen being a foodie.
• From Bad to Worse: No matter how peaceful things may seem in this verse, once things go wrong, it doesn't take long for things to spiral into further chaos.
• Fury-Fueled Foolishness: Chances are that if a character does something detrimental either to themselves or the situation at hand, it's either because they're Blinded by Rage or in a very bad mood.
• Gone Horribly Wrong: Chances are that if a character does something without thinking things through, or otherwise gets utterly caught up in their emotions, the more dramatically it will blow up in their faces.
• Good Is Impotent: The characters in this story who are well and truly good without some sort of baggage on them are small and few in between, but unfortunately, they also happen to be the most helpless in getting the situation to work, simply because the world itself refuses to repay their kindness with anything but rejection.
• Good Is Not Nice: If there's a character on the side of the heroes who can actually do something of value, they'll tend to be a Jerk with a Heart of Gold at best, and an utter jerk at worst.
• Good Is Not Soft: Even if they really are as nice as they seem, however, that doesn't mean they're gonna be a pushover in a fight.
• Hard Work Fallacy: This forms the basis of a lot of arguments the characters have; basically saying that if the people in question had put more effort into some particular point of interest (paying more attention to Chloe's pain, noticing how Gladion going missing was something worth fretting about, and so on), then a lot of pain and misery could've been averted. Of course, as the stories grow more complex, this trope starts getting taken apart, showing how simply "putting more effort" wouldn't be enough to magically fix everything.
• Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: The title of each chapter has two parts with one side the car that's being focused on and the other one depending on the story itself. For Knight of the Orange Lily, the first title is based on fairy tales, and both Blossoming Trail and Voyage of Wisteria are based on Pokémon Abilities. In Blossoming Trail a third title is added, based on one of the lyrics to Alex's Theme.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: How many characters die or get seriously injured.
  • Knight of the Orange Lily: Grace shanks Utahoshi by driving her celestial bronze knife into his head. Alex Shepherd, as Pyramid Head, stabs London through the side with his spear and prior to that, Lampetia stabs his throat with hers.
  • Blossoming Trail: Alex stabs Henry with a spear before drowning them both. Walter is killed when Grace stabs her knife into his head.
  • Voyage of Wisteria: Grace is killed by Ogami driving a blade into her stomach. Also counts as Karmic Death, given what she did in Knight of the Orange Lily.
• Kid Hero: The main protagonists are kids with Gladion at 14 and Chloe and Goh at 10. Bede of Court of Cyclamen also counts as he's also 14.
• Kids Are Cruel: On both sides of the crossover, kids can be horrible things if no one keeps an eye on them.
  • On the Train side, the Apex is a bunch of scavengers who gleefully hurt denizens and in some cases murder them. They also attack other kids who aren't like them. And in Chloe's case, state that she deserves to die just after she was killed.
  • On the Pokémon side, Chloe's problems were caused by classmates who bullied her for being different and jealous of her "cushy lifestyle". And then Parker decides to retaliate with the Unown...
• Late-Arrival Spoiler:
  • Minor spoilers include the truth of Lillie's trauma and that Ash is the Alola League Champion, both of them being the impetus to how Knight of the Orange Lily and Blossoming Trail pan out.
  • The average reader should at least have knowledge of Infinity Train Book 1 to get the gist of what's happening as it already reveals the truth about One-One being the true conductor, Amelia's role and how the train kidnaps people so that they can go through much-needed therapy.
  • Knowledge of Book 3 is also very important so fans can get a gist of the inevitable fates of the Apex.
• Mature Work, Child Protagonists: The stories are usually in the T ratings and deal with themes of abuse, bullying, isolation, separation and is filled to the brim with psychological horror. Not something you'd ever see from a Pokémon protagonist getting on a therapy train.
• Men Are the Expendable Gender: If there's a character in the story who's either utterly beaten to near death or put through torture or Mind Rape until they snap, they will most likely be male. Females, by contrast, have it either placed in the background or a flashback until they play an important role.
• Mind Rape: The trilogy features this trope to an uncomfortable extent, and the situations plus context for them are rather varied: from a young boy using the power of the Unown to break Goh until he snaps, to a grown man gaslighting another guy into staying asleep, to a freaking rabbit mentally conditioning a young boy to become a replacement for his lost leader.
• Missing White Woman Syndrome: The original story had this be the basis of Chloe's Train trip, though it didn't become quite apparent until the sequel and prequel came out: once Chloe gets snatched by the Infinity Train, people go completely nuts over it, with news about her absence rapidly spreading and causing several characters to either doubt how much they actually knew her, realize how unintentionally they hurt her, or make them go off the deep end trying to ensure that she doesn't return to the Train out of spite once she comes back. This is in direct contrast with Gladion and Goh: the former got taken by the Train with nobody being any the wiser, with knowledge of his trip only coming out long after he returned, while the latter going missing was made public, but outside of his parents, practically nobody cared and instead focused on other things.
• Named by the Adaptation: Numerous background characters like Chloe's classmates, Grace's parents, and the Apex, get names.
• Neutrality Backlash: One of the most common sources of call-outs is against people who don't do anything to help the situation. Of course, it doesn't help that most of the time, the stories can't tell the difference between "willingly did nothing to help" from "did nothing to help for a legitimate reason." Keyword being most of the time.
• No Bisexuals: The verse, particularly the original trilogy, has a decent number of Queer characters, mostly men, who are in a relationship with fellow gay characters, and the extended verse includes examples of lesbians too, but characters who like both sexes basically don't exist.
• No Sympathy: While it's more common for people to show Lack of Empathy instead, they're just as capable of showing this, regardless of whether the other person in question has gotten on their bad side or not.
• No Sympathy for Grudgeholders: Word of advice; if you decide to hold on to a grudge in these stories, then don't bother trying to come up with a good reason or elaborate explanation for why you do it; people just won't be sympathetic towards it.
• Older Hero Versus Younger Villain: The Big Bad throughout the trilogy is the Apex which has kids that can be around 8-12 and the 18-year-old Grace and Simon. The heroes include the late 30s Paul London from Knight of the Orange Lily and the 60+ Amelia in Blossoming Trail.
• Ominous Fog: The Fog Car in both Knight of the Orange Lily and Blossoming Trail is an important car that hosts Silent Hill. There's another car like that called the Dark Parables Car but it's not as terrifying as the former.
• Once an Episode: The Canals of Fondue Car is visited once per story.
• One Side of the Story: Deconstructed. As a rule of thumb, most people in the stories will only take the time to hear the side of the story they're able to hear and, whether because they buy into it right away or can't for whatever reason hear the other half of it, they'll generally take it as the absolute truth until further proof is found. Every time this happens, it only makes the situation worse.
• Perfect Solution Fallacy: A big reason why so much pain and misery befalls the characters; nine times out of ten, they're likely to decline if not outright reject a solution that could've saved them a lot of trouble, simply because said solution doesn't fix all of their problems right then and there.
• Poor Communication Kills: Long story short, if people actually used their brains or talked things out, the verse wouldn't exist.
• Power Fantasy: The original story and the prequel has the basic setup of one; a character finds themselves dissatisfied with their lot in life, and once they get taken by the Train, they begin living the life that they desired far away from reality. However, later down the line the trope gets deconstructed: The Infinity Train is in reality a Gilded Cage that can't provide what the characters truly want, and instead of being there to appease them, it's there to help them grow up and move on from their issues. And the more the characters treat the setting like a Power Fantasy, the more they shoot themselves in the foot.
• Psychological Horror: You wouldn't expect a crossover of kids with adorable cuddly critters and a train of infinite worlds would have this but you'd be so wrong.
• Recurring Character:
  • Infinity Train side: One-One and the Apex. Justified in that the former is the Conductor who wants people to get better while the latter is a major threat that has to be stopped. Varon from the Canals of Fondue Car shows in each story since his car is visited by the protagonists.
  • Pokémon side: barring Ash, the initial one-shot character Tokio Chisou (Goh's friend who wanted to hunt for Celebi in Journeys Episode 32) has an impact on both sides of the Train.
  • Non-Pokémon/Infinity Train related: Jaden Yuki has either been seen or referenced in a few stories (seen in Blossoming Trail and referenced in Knight of the Orange Lily and Seeker of Crocus).
• Recurring Element: Along with Author Appeal but there seem to be a lot of Specter expies with Lexi, Easter and Zeno. They usually share similar traits:
  • Light-colored hair and blue eyes and dressed up in white/silver. There is also a tendency to focus on their eyes.
  • Usually have chips on their shoulders or kooky personalities, with a tendency to smile a lot.
  • Are (usually) on the side of good but their sinister appearances make them more Creepy Good and fall under Light Is Good or Light Is Not Good.
  • Are human in appearance but not in species with unique abilities (Lexi is a book, Easter is a lightning bolt, Zeno is a dream construct)
  • Act as advisors but tend to cause Advice Backfire and can be somewhat pushy.
  • Has a tendency to get critically injured and lash out at others (Lexi was torn apart by the Apex, Easter was kicked out of a window by Specter himself) due to this.
  • Their forms were "created" by someone else (Chloe drew and folded Lexi into her "Specter of the Black Forest", Easter was a lightning bolt before fusing with Specter, and Zeno is a dream construct wished up by Parker).
• Reference Overdosed: The author (and co-authors) love sneaking in references to just about anything.
• Revenge: Whether in the foreground or the background, people desiring revenge is a constant feature of the verse.
  • Revenge Before Reason: And more often than not, they tend to focus on said revenge rather than the consequences of it.
  • Revenge Is Not Justice: Also a frequent feature; no matter how hurt you are or how justified it is, seeking revenge against a person more often than not fails to make anything better.
• Rousseau Was Right: While the stories are filled to the brim with spite, wrath, and blame throwing, the number of characters who are absolutely evil can be counted on one hand. Most people in the stories are generally decent people who are way out of their depth, and even the most malicious people either have a Freudian Excuse or are malicious due to events out of their control.
• Rotating Protagonist: Each story focuses on a different character: Blossoming Trail is Chloe, Knight of the Orange Lily is Gladion and Voyage of Wisteria is Goh.
• Rule of Empathy: The verse's relationship with this trope is interesting; since just about everybody has a certain degree of Lack of Empathy, how they get hurt depends on whether they keep the lack of empathy; characters who are unempathetic but eventually do learn their lesson, like Goh, aren't at risk of dying but are instead significantly hurt in an emotional and psychological manner. Meanwhile, people who refuse to learn to be empathetic, like The Apex, are typically treated with utmost scorn, and even if they aren't killed, it's because they haven't suffered enough, not because anybody has any delusion that they can actually change. This isn't quite guaranteed, though: Utahoshi, who's a fairly empathetic individual, kicked the bucket before the story began, while Mr. Bradbury, who's a petty and spiteful individual later down the line, is left alone before being Demoted to Extra.
• School Is for Losers: One of the more consistent ideas spread across the trilogy is the fact that, if you're someone who goes to a proper school (the school in Alola is both Out of Focus and not a traditional school), you're, at best, an utterly ineffective prop who serves to push the plot forward, and at worst a sadistic bully who makes everything worse just by existing. Chloe's time at Vermillion School was positively miserable, and Class 5-E, her primary tormentors, would rather go out and actually be trainers than stay in the school longer than necessary. Goh, who doesn't go there outside of tests, is shown to be doing just fine without the compulsory education, and when people try to convince him to enter it like a normal person, the conversation is never about how it would be better for him. Meanwhile Ash doesn't go to school at all, and when people aren't giving him guilt complexes he's easily the most stable, happy, and healthy of the characters around his age.
• Series Mascot: Out of a whole, Chloe is the face of the Blossomverse since her story was the first one written and the central story out of the trilogy, not to mention the sole reason the Blossomverse was made (as the author herself was tired of waiting for Chloe to become prominent in the anime).
• Shown Their Work: Mythology, demons, and supernatural references are abound in the stories and the author even posts a handy guide to point out that she's done her research.
• Sliding Scale of Gender Inequality: Level 6. Most male characters in the series tend to fulfill one of three roles: a supportive character who helps the heroes, an antagonistic obstacle meant to be taken down, a catalyst for pain and angst on the characters, or some odd mix of all three. Female characters, meanwhile, are almost always the ones actually getting things done, and even when given supportive roles they're still given more to do than their male counterparts.
• Sliding Scale of Unavoidable vs. Unforgivable: The trilogy, at least at the beginning, falls so heavily on the "Unforgivable" that it shatters the ground; most characters who have been wronged, whether in a major or minor way, or regardless if they were actually wronged, will hold a grudge to the ends of the Earth and refuse to forgive the transgressor, even if they show themselves to be remorseful over it. However, as the stories go on and people actually analyze the situation at hand, they gear more towards "Unavoidable" as if the wrongdoing wasn't done by mistake, it was done as a result of people trying to do what they could with what little information had, if even that.
• Straw Character: These always appear to some capacity, though whether they're blatant examples or actual characters depends on the story.
• Sunk Cost Fallacy: There are multiple instances where characters, whether they have a lack of understanding of the current situation or actually know what's going on, decide to delve further into the same tactics they've been using before despite it being proven that they're not effective, simply because they either don't have any other options available or are too stubborn to consider there might be another solution.
• Talking Animal: As usual in Infinity Train from returning character Atticus, King of Corginia to plush penguins to bipedal rabbits.
• There Are No Therapists: You'd think that these kids would have at least some sort of therapy to avoid being thrown into the therapy train but none is given due to 1) the stigma in Japan that mental health is something unheard of and 2) the adults not actually noticing their children enough to even give them said therapy. This is highlighted the most in Blossoming Trail as both Chloe and Goh could've had their problems fixed if their parents had noticed this.
• Trapped in Another World: Like in Infinity Train, the main characters are stuck in one of these. However, the difference is that the fanfic also talks about the homeworld is reeling from the disappearances.
• Weird Crossover: Pokémon has made a lot of crossovers, but this is the first time Infinity Train has had a dip in that world. Knight of the Orange Lily crosses over with Yu-Gi-Oh! VRAINS, Blossoming Trail makes Silent Hill the final location of its third arc, and Voyage of Wisteria has a car based on Hazbin Hotel.
• What If?: The stories were spawned off by different questions.
  • Blossoming Trail: What if Chloe got sent onto the Infinity Train after getting sick and tired of people pushing her to get into Pokémon?
  • Knight of the Orange Lily: What would happen if Gladion was called out for hiding information about his sister's trauma?
  • Seeker of Crocus: What if Professor Sycamore never told Ash about Alain's appearance and got taken away by the Infinity Train?
  • Court of Cyclamen: What if Bede got sucked into the Train after he was called out for his apathy?
• Women Are Wiser: It varies. Some female characters, mostly grown-up women, play this trope straight, being the Only Sane Man, or at least trying to be, in a constant Blame Game. However, other female characters, main characters or otherwise, can not only be as problematic as the male characters but even more so.
• World of Symbolism: Anything and everything in the stories have some sort of symbolic meaning to them. Especially the numbers many of the passengers gain on the hands, usually relating to an episode of the series associated with them, a number related to a Pokémon, or a significant airdate.
• Would Hit a Girl: Numerous characters like to attack/kill those of fairer gender. List includes: Tuba, Chloe, Grace...
• Would Hurt a Child: Just take a drink for every single thing that happens which include sledgehammers to the face, tattoos on the back, dying in the claws of a dragon...

---

The expanded universe of stories, in general, have the following examples:

• Adaptational Context Change: Some events, assuming they're not Adapted Out or changed, tend to have bits of their context altered even when they're kept mostly the same. Commonly affected elements include.
  • Goh and Yeardley's actions, which tend to be given a layer of mental illness to them instead of just being insensitive (Goh for his social issues and Yeardley for his misbehavior).
  • Chloe is often moved from the point of view character to a major supporting character, which alters the perspective of her actions generally to the negative.
• Adaptational Karma: Sometimes, characters who did something wrong and either didn't get punished for it or got off too easy are given a proper comeuppance for what they did. Whether the punishment is too harsh or not depends on the author and readers.
• Adaptation Relationship Overhaul: The various side stories can give old relationships a new context.
  • Hydrangea takes Goh's issues with Trip from taking Ash's attention away from someone with platonic only friend feelings to unrequited feelings while emphasizing the negative parts of his and Chloe's relationship.
  • Orange Rose eventually reveals that Chloe's issues with Ash and Parker's dislike of him all stem from Chloe having feelings for Ash she struggles to process due to her personal issues (and Parker dislikes Ash for being someone his sister is attracted to).
  • Several spinoffs by Exotos give Sara legit weight to her dislike of Chloe beyond her original trilogy self's jealousy of the girl.
• Adaptation Name Change: Several works alter names a bit, usually in the form of introducing dub names to characters that in the original story used their sub names. A few characters occasionanly are given different last names in some works, such as several Gohs being given the last name of 'Forward' in Chloe Respite.
• Adaptational Sexuality: Some examples of this exist such as Goh in Hydrangea (who was not defined in the original trilogy but shown to have a clear crush on Ash in Hydrangea) and Chloe and Sara in Orange Rose (who goes from only having crushes on male characters and using the 'Create-a-Boyfriend' app to Sara being implied to be attracted to girls and Chloe being shown to be interested in both guys and girls). Several stories show the otherwise only associated with male partners Delia and Talia having dated as teenagers and being Amicable Exes.
• Adapted Out:
  • Given the sheer number of characters, events, plot points, and so on in the original trilogy, it's only natural that some of these won't be carried over to certain stories in the expanded universe.
  • Of particular notice is Trip; whether because the stories take place before his arrival or not, he's rarely featured in the expanded universe, especially those not written in part by Green.
  • Infinity Train companions, like Alan Dracula and Atticus, tend to not be present with Infinity Train stories primarily written by Cross. While Lexi and Atticus will typically remain, anyone else tends to either be alone entirely or paired with a fellow passenger (such as Sara being partnered with Waspinator instead of a denizen).
  • The wresting related characters tend to be absent in non-Green stories, with their cars and origins at most referenced off handily as little more than easter eggs and references.
• Adaptational Sympathy: Some characters get either better or worse treatment than in the original trilogy. Particular note is given to Chloe: depending on the story, people might give her their full sympathy, feel sorry for her without ignoring her flaws, or outright take the Delia stance of seeing her as a spiteful brat who burned bridges and caused needless suffering without expressing regret until the damage was already done.
• Adaptational Wimp: The Infinity Train itself tends to be a lot less powerful in Cross written stories, with magics and sciences from other realities being able to match or overpower it.
• Age Lift: Occasionally stories will have the characters start the story older and explore butterfly effects from there and themes that are more relevant at older ages than Chloe and Goh's 10 years of age.
• Alternate Self: Chloes have met each other a few times.
• Alternate Universe Fic: To the original trilogy for several stories. The extent varies based on the story in question ranging from 'basically the same story but with additional concurrent parts' to 'completely alien'.
• Armed with Canon: Many stories written by the other writers, particularly if it is written by Crossoverpairinglover, it'll typically use the canon anime's thousands of episodes and nearly two dozen canon movies, as well as ideas from the games and manga, in order to contradict a couple of facts and ideas established in the original trilogy, among them chief among them being the idea that the Infinity Train is impossible to trespass or escape without getting your number down to zero and that nothing in the Pokemon World can comprehend or understand it. Another popular target of canon is Chloe's mindset and views, which is typically torn apart by something from Pokemon's vast continuity by these writers.
• Ascended Extra:
  • A number of characters who are minor in the main stories are given focus and prominence as leads or major supporting characters: depending on the story in question this includes Professor Sycamore, Acerola, and Akemi.
  • After being a minor part of Deal With The Devil, the Piplup hatchlings from the end of the Cresselia and Darkrai two-parter get their own story in the form of Adopt a Piplup that is loosely connected to the wider verse if at all.
  • After being discussed mostly as a fictional character in-universe as 'The Ledyba Hero' and several mentions of the 'other Chloe', Marinette appears in person in Crown of Thorns and gets a story of her own in Numerology.
• Breaking the Fourth Wall: The Team Rocket Trio break it in Mother of Pearl, telling the titular mothers, and the audience, about how they are quite happy they are usually Demoted to Extra during the Infinity Train mess in the Blossomverse and don't want to be dragged into its messes.
• Bribing Your Way to Victory: Essentially the concept of Deal With The Devil, where Professor Cerise deals with Sara by giving her the means of being a trainer and telling her to get as far away from Vermillion and Chloe as possible.
• Creator Thumbprint: Like in the original trilogy, you can spy certain writers quirks in bits they write that stand out from others.
• Death by Adaptation: Spinoffs will occasionally kill a major character off from the main series to establish business or a very different scenario. Examples include Ogami in Crocus, the Apex and Lexi in Crown of Thorns, and Chloe herself in Cherry Bloodlines (albeit the one of the previous timeline).
• Deconstruction Fic:
  • Stories from other writers are frequently deconstructive of elements suggested or argued in the original trilogy. For example, Chloe is examined more critically in every way from 'flawed but still kind girl' to 'outright antagonistic force'.
  • Mother of Pearl clearly goes into the discussed concept of Parker getting off easy and makes it clear just how screwed he (and his family by association) would be if the full weight of the law and public opinion came down on him. While Ash and the others involved would have a lot of reasons to not unleash the full blunt of the law on Parker (and by extension his parents and Chloe), it is also shown clearly that it wouldn't take that much for it to get out and between those involved including a class full of children and two celebrity trainers (Ash and Serena) with lots of connections all over the world, the backlash would be so severe that the Cerise family lawyer would bluntly suggest such extreme methods of disowning Chloe and Parker, and faking their own deaths to minimize the damage because public outrage is that severe.
  • Blossomverse Game Show also put a bit a pin in the idea of the Infinity Train as an Outside-Context Problem: people in the Pokemon world study alternate dimensions, so the Infinity Train isn't that far beyond their comprehension.
    • In addition, Game Show deconstructs the Blossomverse's tendency to portray Ash and Goh's dreams (Ash wanting To Be a Master, and Goh's efforts to catch every Pokémon) as wrong on the basis that Chloe does not like or understand Pokémon and wants them to pay more attention to her. When Chloe is forced to watch the boys compete on a charity game show, she has to work overtime to rationalize how she can dislike them for raising thousands of dollars to help locate missing persons, not to mention working literally nonstop for an entire day to locate her. Chloe does come up with a few reasons (for instance, Ash and Goh enjoy the work they're doing, they happen to be earning fabulous prizes and general rewards for their efforts, and the game show provides them with an even bigger spotlight while making them out to be the heroes instead of the insensitive jerks that drove her to run away.) But as the hours tick by, she grows increasingly uncomfortable that that's what she's choosing to focus on. Lexi, meanwhile, does not come out looking too good due to being 100% serious that Ash and Goh raising awareness about missing persons and personally rescuing half a dozen people does nothing to make up for their sins- nor for being equally determined to hate the boys because the Train chose to lock the Red Lotus Trio in a car for a day with nothing to do but watch the game show and eat popcorn.
  • Ash Goes Missing' goes into the double standard about how Chloe is treated when she goes missing versus others, typically guys, making it clear that the complaint ignores the context of everyone going missing. While Ash going missing does create a different effect than Chloe, that is because Ash goes missing by random chance, and he didn't try to make anyone upset first the way Chloe does when she goes missing.
  • Chloe Respite Car builds on ideas mentioned in stories like Orange Rose Gathering, Mother of Pearl, and Ash Goes Missing to deconstruct several common aspects of the Infinity Train plots.
    • The idea of the Infinity Train being some incomprehensible, untouchable thing to the Pokemon world. In fic it is shown that the Infinity Train isn't so alien a concept to the Pokemon world. The universe deals with multiverse stuff so often that the Infinity Train isn't all that incomprehensible, they just need to figure out where it and they can get there.
    • Chloe's actions and responsibility for the events of Cyan Desert are put into sharp focus. While usually the idea is that Chloe's punishments are entirely up to her parents and ground level authority figures for her fault in Parker's actions, here the severity is played a lot more seriously. Chloes can and have been arrested for their involvement in Cyan Desert, and not even the Infinity Train is a truly safe haven. The Pokemon World can get Chloe if it wants to wherever she goes, they just need to 'aim' properly.
• Demoted to Extra: Just like how some characters get the Ascended Extra treatment in the various stories, some others get this instead.
  • The Infinity Train itself is demoted in most of the stories written by Cross, who tends to focus on the Pokemon world far more. While the train is never Adapted Out, it rarely if ever is center stage.
• Depending on the Writer: With three primary writers (Green_Phantom_Queen, Crossoverpairinglover, and Shady Missionary) and several other, minor writers (and Exotos135), several things in the expanded universe are gonna be different.
  • How the Infinity Train taking someone is treated varies between writers. Under Green's pen the Infinity Train is treated as a mysterious force that is beyond comprehension and poorly understood and seen as dangerous and problematic. Exotos writes the Infinity Train as a more understood, almost benevolent force that is ultimately helpful and inevitable. Cross, when the Infinity Train does come up, writes it as something a lot more fallible and comprehensible, a problem that the Pokemon World and other worlds in the multiverse can easily study and overcome with their own sciences and magics with its influence clearly a negative one.
  • How strong a grip the Train has on its passengers also depends on the writer. In Green's take, the Infinity Train has a near absolute grip on them, with only some sort of unexpected accident giving the passengers a chance to leave early, otherwise being stuck on the Train until their number goes down. While Shady and Exotos follow this idea for the most part, Cross instead has it so that the technology of the Pokemon World allows them to outright pluck the passenger out before intended, with it more often than not only not happening because the characters didn't want to. He also created the concept of 'Golden Letters', a counterpart to the traditional numbers that are used by visitors who come to the Infinity Train on their own will to rescue others from the train that allow others to travel to it on their own, and Akuma Numerology showed that Kwami powers can both trap people on the Infinity Train who had no business being sent there and allow Kwami and train originating items to travel to and from the Infinity Train via Marinette's Yo-Yo. Seeker of Crocus would add in its own take on the Golden Letters via the Moonlight Passengers.
  • Green's writing tends to emphasize the Journeys-esc take on the Pokemon World as like the real world but with Pokemon in it, while other co-writers tend to lean into the older aesthetic of 'a Pokemon World with humans in it'. In this method Exotos tends to emphasize special powers like aura more while Cross's emphasizes aspects of a Adventure-Friendly World.
  • Under Green's pen, characters fall into specific morality roles that they do not leave or differ without a lot of character development and or suffering. Chloe is the hero, Grace and Simon are unredeemable sociopaths, Yeardley and Sara are barbaric bullies, etc. Under the pen of other writers such as Shady, Cross, and Exotos, the characters aren't as restricted to specific roles and fill a more varied set of roles and treatments.
  • Chloe in particular is treated in the following ways:
    • Under Green's pen she is The Hero. She is always, if nothing else, well intentioned and traumatized from coming from a world that doesn't understand her. She is willing to harm those who wrong her, but is always horrified when suffering extends beyond a certain level of pure catharsis.
    • Shady writes the closest to the above, but his Chloe is more fallible, more willing to admit to mistakes and make a honest, if struggling, attempt to do better than she previously did. She is a bit more introspective and self-critical.
    • Exotos writes a more villainous Chloe. She is a lot more likely to be interested in causing direct harm to others and expecting people to treat her better even as it is clear she is not. She is the most likely to be outright racist against Pokemon, deliberately treated as abusive in her relationship with Goh, and tends to alienate herself from others the most quickly, drastically, and with long term consequences.
    • Cross's Chloe tends to play her with her snark and hobbies as developed by Green, but frequently explored without the Infinity Train. This Chloe is always shown to have the ability to be a better person than she was in Blossoming Trail, but she has to work to overcome her problems and it is also easy for her to fall into bad habits. If this Chloe screws up, she is the most likely to be heavily scrutinized if not outright punished, more than even Exotos Chloe. When she does overcome her problems, she is frequently written as being the more 'normal' perspective amongst a Pokemon World that is filled with adventure and oddities and those who think little of these things.
  • Like his big sister, how Parker is depicted varies between writers. Green depicts him as ultimately an Anti-Villain, a child who decided to Be as Unhelpful as Possible and ultimately caused a lot of damage, but ultimately had a point and wasn't as bad as the other people who caused him to snap the way he did. Cross, meanwhile, does to Parker what Exotos does to Chloe; give him the villainous treatment, turning him into an unreasonable brat at best, a ticking time bomb at worst, with just about everybody coming to hate his guts for his inability to admit his faults, judgemental attitude and tendency towards violence. Shady and Exotos are somewhere in the middle; they're more willing to point out how his actions hurt a lot of people and don't have people flock to defend him, but he's never turned into the trigger happy violent brat that Cross always writes him as.
  • How sympathetic The Apex are also depends on the writer. Under Green, they're generally seen as a bunch of jerks who paid their debt with karma quite heavily, with even the members shown to try become better having moments where it becomes clear they're sociopaths in the making. The other writers, more often than not, take a more neutral stance; Cross ignores them, while Exotos tries to depict them more as people.
  • Goh and Chloe's relationship and how its depicted is different between writers, as well. Green generally takes the stance that Goh is primarily at fault for the friendship falling apart, and the damage is emotional and psychological in nature. Exotos, meanwhile, has the opposite: believing that Chloe is the one who has done the most damage to the relationship, with their friendship coming across as being physically damaging. Cross and Shady, meanwhile, tend to depict both of them as being at fault.
  • Ash Ketchum:
    • Under the pen of Green he is intended to be The Ace, but a combination of taking the events of Blossoming Trail incredibly personally render this as an Informed Attribute. He's shown to be a lot more emotionally fragile, prone to self doubt. He's typically written interested in Trip and is generally demoted to extra while still being fairly relevant.
    • Shady writes him, often after Green, as more emotionally stable and both forgiving, but willing to give those who have done wrong Tough Love. He's highly invested in resolving issues to a point of ignoring genuine problems for the sake of stability. His love interests are not particularly important but are retained if they exist. He's more prominent than under Green, but typically in a distinct lower rung of protagonist status.
    • Cross writes Ash closest to the show, being a genuine top tier trainer who is as often The Protagonist as he is the Big Good to Chloe's protagonist status. While he does feel negative emotions, he does not wallow in them as much or as long as much as Green's Ash and goes from them to means to overcoming the problem in his own way fairly quickly and with a upbeat attitude. He's rather forgiving and open to others doing better, showing himself to be willing to help Chloe and others through hard times, though if those he helps show themselves to be particularly wicked, he will swiftly turn against them and see them dealt with. He tends to be written as Book Dumb and uncultured for various understandable reasons, but with a lot of life experience and a few unusual interests and talents, including a fondness for Star Trek. He's generally written with a variety of female love interests depending on the story.
  • The Pokemon themselves, both Ash's and Goh's. When Cross writes them they tend to be universally on Ash and Goh's side, very notably holding greater grudges for Chloe's actions and their effects than their human partners. This tends to be accepted by the human characters, even Chloe in later Wisteria, as their right. When under the hands of Green their views don't get as much focus, but Raboot notably is on the Goh negativity trend in early Blossoming Trail in a scenario where, under other writers, Raboot would blame Chloe, and they are treated negatively for disliking Chloe or Parker for their actions. Also while other writers, especially Cross, tend to aim for both Ash and Goh to catch all canon Pokemon and often others or evolve canonically unevolved mons, this tends to be much lesser in Green led stories.
  • Goh's intelligence tends to be downplayed in Green stories, where Goh is often shown to be doing poorly in school due to his absences. This is typically part of the narrative of the problem of Goh not going to school. In other works, such as those by Cross, he tends to get fine grades despite not going to school that often.
  • Sara tends to be written as poorer than Chloe, and generally in poor financial state, in Cross and Exotos stories, as well as the original Blossoming Trail. In later spinoffs, including by Green, she tends to be richer than Chloe in the vein of her inspiration from the Ballard of Sara Berry.
  • Chloe's interest in horror has different origins depending on which story one is reading. In the original Blossoming Trail it began from catching a playthrough of Shin Megami Tensei III. In Crocus it originates from a hide and seek game with a Pumpkaboo. In Cherry Bloodlines it comes from a variety of media exposures, including several of Ren's own recordings of old series with some horror to them such as the infamous 'Demon Boulder' episode of Thomas and Friends. In Orange Rose Gathering it is implied to be from her favorite book, The Endless Trail.
• Diligent Hero, Slothful Villain: A trope that appears, intended or otherwise, frequently with Chloe across the many stories. Depending on the story, Chloe is on either side of the trope.
  • In stories like Crocus when contrasted with an antagonist like Sara, Chloe is the diligent hero who works hard and earns her talents and skills, while the villains would rather manipulate others than actively act on their own.
  • Meanwhile in other stories, either outright stated like Shield of Vermillion or more subtextual like in Blossoming Trail, Chloe is the slothful villain, or antihero, to Ash and Goh's diligent heroes. Where Ash and Goh actively work towards their dreams and improving themselves, Chloe stewed in her own problems and didn't act on them until they reached a boiling point and the Infinity Train acted to make her change.
• Dimensional Traveler: A trait seen mostly in Cross's stories is this, characters with the ability to enter and leave the Infinity Train on their own. Originating with Maccadam in Wisteria, this list has expanded to include the Kwami via Ladybug's Yo-Yo in Numerology, various Pokemon characters with Aether Foundation technology, and Luz, Amity, and Marcy (presumably with the power of the latter's Calamity Gem).
• Expanded Universe: Color me stunned.
• Fix Fic: Several of the stories, when they're not deconstructing parts of the universe, instead focus on fixing said parts, though how effective they are at this usually depends on the author.
• Fusion Fic: Both Cherry Bloodlines and Orange Rose Gathering are fusions of the Blossomverse with the verse of Reset Bloodlines.
• Lighter and Softer: Orange Rose Gathering lacks the overt bullying, character cruelty, and dramatic plots of the bulk of the stories, focusing instead on Chloe bonding, somewhat despite herself at first, with Ash and his myriad of Resetverse siblings during a school vacation.
• Not Worth Killing: Shield of Vermillion has Sara outright tell Chloe she's not going to bully her anymore because Chloe's so prone to self-pitying and drowning herself in her own misery that Sara literally cannot make Chloe more miserable than Chloe makes herself.
• Offscreen Moment of Awesome:
  • Because Game Show is from Chloe's viewpoint, we don't see Ash and Goh's completion of challenges, we just see the results on the scoreboard. Thus Goh capturing nearly a hundred Pokemon in 24 hours and Ash defeating 10 Great Class opponents (including four Frontier Brains, three Galarian Gym Leaders, and a rematch with Drake from the Orange Islands) as well as a match with Leon.
  • When Ash went missing in the titular story, it dropped him in Hisui, where he promptly survived for several months without human contact.
    • 'Game-Show-Goes-Missing combines the above two events into happening at the same time, while adding to them Goh capturing an Iron Bundle, a Pokemon considered in-universe to be even rarer than Mew.
  • In Chloe Respite Car Luz, Amity, and Marcy defeated Elipzo with a mixture of their canon abilities (magic and the green calamity gem's power) plus two Kwami and the powers of being a daughter of Athena, respectively.
• Other Me Annoys Me: The Chloe Respite Car is basically the Blossomverse Chloe meeting several alternate versions of herself, each depicting a different facet of how she's written in the verse, and being promptly driven nuts by how terrible they are.
• Public Secret Message: The Endless Trail, a book that appears in a few expanded universe stories, was written by a Train Passenger and is based on the Infinity Train, featuring expies of Denizens such as 'The Skitty' in place of the Cat. It's meant to let other Passengers know they aren't alone and can contact him. Chloe is naturally a fan of the book when it shows up before going to the Infinity Train itself, though no story so far has focused on her being an Ascended Fangirl about it.
• Running Gag: Several Exotos-written side stories have Goh mention the Suicune was a 'really unusual Ditto'.
• Sci-Fi Writers Have No Sense of Scale: Most stories have Vermillion City in shambles after a big scandal is made at the school. However, Vermillion City is big, to the point several thousand people would need to suffer in order to have a chance of destroying the city. In fact, a tragedy involving a couple hundred people would mainly lead to a few really active news cycles for the city at large. As for Chloe’s disappearance and the Calling Chloe hashtag, it certainly isn’t impossible that it would make that big of a splash, but for most people it would probably amount to a single human interest story, easily forgotten within a week. In general, while the effects would be devastating, the stories blow the actual damage done way out of proportion.
• The Stations of the Canon: Regardless of the story and how it is focused Chloe is usually a passenger in some way current or past, with the exceptions to this rule being few and far between.
• Throw the Dog a Bone:
  • In a general sweeping sort of way, nearly every story beyond the core three treats Ash far better than he was in Blossoming Trail. The only exceptions are Melancholy Afterlife, which was written by Green Phantom Queen herself and is one of several things not retained when the story reaches the modern-day of Boiling Point, and Seeker of Crocus following Green Phantom Queen's fuller participation as co-writer.
  • Goh frequently is thrown a lot of slack in stories outside of the core stories and Crocus. This can range from being praised for his efforts at finding Chloe and reducing the slander he gets (such as in Gameshow) to shifts repelling the blame game before it can get going (as in Zinnia).
• What If?: These are pretty much the bread and butter of the expanded universe; when the stories aren't adding to the original trilogy or take place in their own continuity, they're based on a butterfly effect-kinda deal where something small changes, leading to big repercussions.
• Writer on Board: The Chloe Respite Car is basically Crossoverpairinglover growing tired of all the back and forth in regards to Chloe's characterization in the verse, and showing how Chloe herself would react if she saw what a mess her personality is in the form of the alternate Chloes.

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