Ash and co. have finally arrived in Goldenrod City, where Ash plans on challenging the Gym Leader for a Plain Badge. The group stops off at the Pokémon Center, and Misty spots a group of kids, huddled around a book on fortune telling. She asks them to please let her see it (in her usual way, which is "Gimmee! Gimmee! Gimmee!"), and they tell her to get her own copy, they're giving them away at the local breeding center. Misty drags Ash and Brock to the breeding center, and speaks to the owners, a nice old man, and a nice old woman. They give her a copy of the fortune telling book, and return to checking Pokémon guests into their center. Later, while walking through the Nature Park, Misty reads her friends their horoscopes. Ash is disappointed to learn that his zodiac Pokémon is a pitiful Bellsprout. Brock is an Onix, which suits him just fine. Misty then looks up her own birthday, hoping she'll end up with a cute Pokémon like Vaporeon for her zodiac. Then she finds out she's a Gyarados...which upsets her to no end, and she explodes, crying, "I'm nothing like Gyarados!!!" Ash whispers aside to Brock that she's performing her Dragon Rage attack. ^_^; Team Rocket chooses that rather inopportune moment to attack the kids, and Misty's so angry, she hurls the fortune telling book at them, sending them flying! After shaking off their injuries, the Rockets begin to page through the book. Jessie is delighted to learn that she's an Eevee. Meowth asks for his zodiac, and Jessie snatches the book away from him, saying that he's already a Pokémon, so he doesn't need a Pokémon zodiac as well. Then she looks up James' zodiac, and learns that he's a Moltres...which causes her to sweatdrop violently, because James is nothing like Moltres! She reads aloud Moltres' attributes, and James decides that if he's Moltres he's Moltres; and like the fire bird, he'll rise from the ashes of his defeats, and become a stronger person. So saying, he dubs himself "Moltres-James," and storms into the breeding center, proclaiming, "All of these Pokémon will become the property of Moltres-James!" The old lady responds by hurling him up against a wall. Jessie and Meowth are flabbergasted, and cry, "Who are you people?!?" The old lady and the old man remove their costumes, revealing themselves to be Butch and Cassidy! They're quick to tie up the other three Rockets, and lock them up in the storeroom, where they can't do anything foolish, like switch sides and alert the cops. Moltres-James won't stand for that sort of treatment, he breaks through the ropes, and busts through the storeroom door, leaving Jessie and Meowth in shock. Annoyed by their hesitance to act, he picks them up roughly, and carries them to safety. Around the same time, Misty storms back to the breeding center, to demand an explanation for her Gyarados zodiac. She and her friends find Butch and Cassidy standing amidst a store of stolen Pokémon, in full Rocket garb. Naturally, a fight ensues. Misty, screaming at them for distributing phony fortune telling books, sends out Staryu; Ash uses Totodile. Butch and Cassidy send out Primeape and Raticate, who start beating up on Ash and Misty's Pokémon. Just then, the other Rockets reappear, James dressed in a Moltres costume. "Stand aside, little brats--this is a job for Moltres-James!" James sends out Victreebel, who tries to glomp him...but when it does, it receives a kick upside the head! James tells Victreebel that it may have gotten away with trying to eat him before, but he's Moltres-James now, and Moltres-James don't play that.Victreebel nods shakily, and proceeds to beat up Primeape and Raticate. James laughs, and tells the other Rockets that they'll never defeat him, because he's Moltres James! Butch scowls, and cries, "That zodiac was fake, you moron!" James is instantly deflated, Victreebel loses the battle, and he, Jessie, and Meowth are sent rocketing off into the sky. As he's soaring through the air in his burning costume, James exclaims that he really is a fire bird. Jessie and Meowth just sigh. Ash and co. finish off Butch and Cassidy, and as they're being carted off to jail, Officer Jenny presents Misty with a real Pokémon Fortune Telling book. The Rockets find a legit copy as well, but we don't get to hear what their true zodiacs are.