-The cold opening starts with a bunch of scenes from later in the episode. We see scenes from the Potchama vs. Hikozaru fight as well as some shots of Habunake (and a bunch of other pokemon), trapped in a glass case, being tackled toward the edge of a cliff by a bunch of Zangoose.
-The opening theme is updated with an all-new image of Satoshi with Hikozaru and his other pokemon. The shot of Satoshi and Shinji facing off against each other is updated as well.
-Title screen
-Takeshi is making stew for everyone while Pikachu and Potchama enjoy the smell. The narrator tells us that the gang just finished competing in a Tag Battle tournament and that they're now aiming for Tobari City.
-Satoshi asks if the food's ready yet because he's hungry...Takeshi yells at him, saying that he shouldn't complain since he isn't doing anything to help. So, Satoshi calls out all his pokemon to help speed things up. Hikari sees this and decides to do the same. Takeshi follows his friends' lead.
-As all the gang's pokemon walk around, helping out the best they can, Hikozaru watches in amazement. It seems surprised at the happy scene before it.
-Hikozaru then has a flashback to the meals it used to have when Shinji trained it. We see Shinji put down some pokemon food, still in its can. Hikozaru starts to greedily eat from it. Shinji then turns around and leaves, telling Shinji to go find him when he finishes eating. The flashback ends.
-Satoshi then hands Hikozaru a dish of pokemon food and tells it to eat up. Hikozaru is apprehensive at first and only tries one pellet. The pokemon happily smiles...maybe it hasn't had food this good before?
-Elsewhere in the forest, the Rocket-Dan sit down for their own meal. All of their pokemon are out of their Monster Balls. As the gang eats on a meager helping of soup, Habunake perks up and starts to glare in the distance. Musashi asks her pokemon what's wrong, but it just continues to stare in the direction where the footsteps seem to be coming from. Suddenly, without warning, three Zangoose jump out from behind a bush and attack Habunake all at once! Musashi, Kojirou, and all their pokemon scream and run behind a different bush as Habunake fights off the three pokemon by itself.
-As the fight continues, Musashi starts to worry about her pokemon, so she recalls it back to its Monster Ball. However, as soon as she does, Habunake just pops out again and resumes the battle where it had left off! After Habunake's Poison Tail attack misses one of the Zangoose, Musashi recalls it again. Habunake emerges from the Monster Ball again and continues fighting. Musashi starts to tear up and recalls Habunake for a third time, but as soon as it enters the Monster Ball, it pops right out again. Suddenly, the three Zangoose all use a Slash attack at once, hitting Habunake. The snake pokemon is knocked into Musashi-tachi, causing an explosion that sends everyone blasting off into the distance. However, Nyasu seems to get separated from the others during the blasting off...
-Back at Satoshi's camp, Hikozaru watch our heroes' pokemon train. Various training battles seem to be going on simutaneously. After looking around for a bit, Hikozaru focuses its attention on a battle between Hikari's Buoysel and Satoshi's Pikachu. Buoysel uses Aqua Jet, but Pikachu is able to dodge it. Without missing a beat, Buoysel jumps up and uses Sonic Boom, but Pikachu is able to deflect it with an Iron Tail attack. Next, Pikachu uses some kind of speed attack. As the pokemon runs around all over the place, Buoysel struggles to keep track of its foe. Hikozaru, who's still watching the battle, also has trouble keeping up. Suddenly, Pikachu appears behind Buoysel and hits it with an Iron Tail, sending it flying. Takeshi calls the match off, declaring Pikachu the winner.
-After the battle, Satoshi pets Pikachu on the head and congratulates it on a battle well fought. Hikozaru looks on in shock. It then sees Hikari petting Buoysel, telling it that it did a good job as well. Hikozaru doesn't know how to take all this.
-Hikozaru then has another flashback. This time, it's fighting against Elekid and wins after hitting it with a powerful Flamethrower attack. After calling Elekid useless, Shinji recalls the Monster Ball as Hikozaru does a little dance. Shinji then turns his attention to his fire-type and yells at it, telling it that the fight that it put up was pathetic. The flashback ends.
-Satoshi approaches Hikozaru and asks it if it wants to try a training battle. Potchama steps up and volunteers to be its opponent.
-The battle begins with Potchama using Bubble Beam. Hikozaru uses Dig attack, dodging the water attack. Hikari tells Potchama to be careful because it doesn't know where Hikozaru will come out. The monkey pokemon finally emerges and hits Potchama. It immediately follows up with a Fury Strikes attack. Potchama retaliates by using Peck.
-All of the gang's other pokemon, who had been doing their own sparring up until this point, stop what they're doing to watch the Hikozaru vs. Potchama battle. Everyone starts cheering for the two pokemon.
-The two pokemon continue taking turns Fury Swiping and Pecking each other.
-Meanwhile...Nyasu is walking alone through the forest. It hears Satoshi-tachi's pokemon cheering and investigates. As Nyasu watches the battle from behind some bushes, Hikozaru hits Potchama with Dig. The attack sends Potchama flying into the air. Hikozaru then aims a Flamethrower up at Potchama. The water pokemon counters with Bubble Beam. The two attacks collide in mid-air and struggle for a moment before Potchama's Bubble Beam powers through. The water attack hits Hikozaru, knocking it backward. Takeshi calls the battle off.
-Hikozaru is upset at its loss. It then has a flashback to the moment Shinji released it. Satoshi goes over to Hikozaru and picks it up, asking it if it's OK. Hikozaru is surprised. Satoshi tells his pokemon that it was great and has some really powerful attacks. Takeshi interjects by saying that it had a good variation of attacks. Hikari tells Potchama's opponent that its Flamethrower attack was really cool. All of the gang's pokemon cheer for Hikozaru. After being showered with all this praise, Hikozaru starts to tear up before breaking down and crying. Satoshi wonders what's wrong and hugs his pokemon. Takeshi guesses that when Hikozaru was being trained by Shinji, it never received any positive reinforcement and doesn't know how to handle it. Nyasu, still watching from behind the bushes, cries as well.
-Later that night, everyone is asleep. The humans are in sleeping bags while the pokemon are sleeping, outside their Monster Balls, on a giant mat. Hikozaru stirs in its sleep as it seems to be dreaming...
-Hikozaru has yet another flashback...this time, it's fighting a Golone perched on a cliff high above. The pokemon is using Rock Throw, sending CGI rocks falling toward the monkey pokemon. Shinji yells at Hikozaru not to dodge the attack, telling it that it needs to be able to endure it if it hopes to become strong enough to defeat the Zangoose that had tormented it. As Hikozaru is buffeted by rocks, it looks up at the Golone and remembers the Zangoose who had attacked it before. Suddenly, Hikozaru wakes up, startled. After looking around and seeing everyone asleep, it wanders off into the woods.
-Nyasu is still wandering around the woods, looking for Musashi-tachi. After he finds a clearing where the full moon can be seen, he hears something rustle in the bushes. Suddenly, Hikozaru emerges. The monkey pokemon tenses up and prepares for a battle, but Nyasu tells it not to worry. He invites Hikozaru to gaze at the moon with him, commenting on its beauty. He then starts to tell Hikozaru that even though they're always failing in their task to capture Pikachu and are always hungry, his teammates and him are happy overall. As Nyasu gets up to leave, he tells Hikozaru to make a good life with its new friends.
-eyecatch-
-It's a new day, and everyone is running around the camp, helping out with another meal. Hikozaru wants to help, but it doesn't know how. Satoshi notices this, so he approaches his new friend and asks it to help it gather water at the nearby river. Hikozaru happily agrees.
-Meanwhile, the Rocket-Dan are flying in their Nyasu balloon while a rope hangs below the basket. It is soon revealed that the rope is attached to a suction cup that's attached to Nyasu's butt, pulling him up to his teammates. After Nyasu is reunited with everyone, Musashi asks Nyasu to help guide them to Satoshi-tachi's camp. It doesn't take long to find it. Nyasu hits a button on a control panel that produces two glass cylinders. The two cylinders open up and fire nets onto our heroes' pokemon, grabbing everyone and pulling them up. The pokemon are trapped inside the two glass cylinders...Pikachu, Naetle, Potchama, and Mimirol are in one, while Aipom, Mukubird, Gureggru, Usokki, Pipinku, Buoysel, and Pachirisu are in another.
-At this time, the Rocket-Dan perform their motto. It's mostly recycled animation except for the part where the members say their names, which has this neat roulette
effect going on.
-After the motto, Hikari tries to recall her pokemon into their Monster Balls, but the cylinders prevent that. She then orders her Potchama to use Bubble Beam while Takeshi orders his Gureggru to use Poison Sting. Neither attack does any damage to the cylinders.
-Suddenly, Habunake lets itself out of its Monster Ball. Musashi looks around, worrying that the Zangoose are back. Her fears become reality when the trio of Zangoose climb the tallest tree closest to the low-flying Nyasu balloon and slash it apart with their claws. The balloon plummets to earth. When the smoke from the crash clears, Musashi, Kojirou, and Nyasu all work together to hold Habunake back from the three Zangoose. The captured pokemon are still in their prisons. Eventually, the Rocket-Dan decide to jump into one of the cylinders to protect themselves, so they drag Habunake into the one with Pikachu-tachi in it. Habunake is not happy.
-The three Zangoose begin to tackle the glass cylinder with Habunake in it. Habunake responds by tackling the cylinder from the inside. As the two pokemon have their "battle," the cylinder gets pushed closer and closer to the edge of a cliff.
-At this time, Satoshi and Hikozaru return from fetching water. Hikozaru sees the Zangoose and becomes scared, remembering the ones who attacked it long ago. Satoshi tells Hikozaru that he knows it's afraid but tells it that it's the only one who can save everyone. Pikachu and the others cry out for help. Hikari and Takeshi smile in a "we know you can do it!" kind of way. The pokemon in the other cylinder begin to cheer Hikozaru on. The monkey pokemon starts to remember all the happy times it's had with Satoshi so far and the talk it had with Nyasu and finally decides to go for it. Hikozaru jumps on Satoshi's shoulder and lets its trainer know that it's going to save everyone.
-Hikozaru uses Flamethrower as "Together" plays in the background. The attack misses the three Zangoose but succeeds in causing a diversion. Hikozaru hits one of the Zangoose with a Scratch (?) attack. One of the other Zangoose jumps toward the fire-type with its claws bared and is about to attack. Suddenly, Satoshi throws himself between Hikozaru and the Zangoose, taking the scracth on his shoulder! Hikozaru looks up at the trainer who just shielded it and becomes determine to repay him. Hikozaru uses dig, causing the three Zangoose to become confused. Hikozaru pops out of the ground and hits one of the Zangoose, knocking it out. It then uses Dig again and reappears behind the remaining two Zangoose. As the pokemon charge toward Hikozaru, it unleashes a powerful Flamethrower attack that causes its oppoents to faint.
-After the battle, Satoshi hugs HIkozaru and tells it that he knew it could do it. As Satoshi celebrates, Hikari sees the Rocket-Dan trying to sneak away, unnoticed. Our heroes order their pokemon to attack all at once, so Pikachu, Naetle, Potchama, Mimirol, and Hikozaru all attack the Rockets at once. This sends the trio blasting off again.
-As the other pokemon cheer, Hikozaru starts to imitate them. The episode ends with Hikozaru dancing.
The ending theme is updated to include Hikozaru in the various group shots.
Orchid-Hakase Big Encylopedia: Gablias. After Orchid-Hakase talks about how speedy it is, the pokemon dashes out of the lab, causing the professor to spin around.