Grey light was leaking through the windows when a rapping on the door roused him.
"Rise and shine, Ash!" Rosaline's voice was calling him to rise. "Today the start of the tournament!" She sounded cheerful and bubbly.
Ash groaned. How does she get so much energy in the early morning? Ash wondered what it must be like in her head, and what thoughts filled her waking hours. She was one of the three Elites (the other two being Jude and Phillip) that had loving families that believed in them that Ash ultimately didn't find in his mother. In fact, as one of the younger Elites, Ash wondered if Rosaline would even leave home if not for the fact that she crossed paths with Pakura, who by that time, was an Elite member. Ash remembered Rosaline only left home to follow Pakura on her journey, although Pakura never invited her along.
'It's nice to grow up in a loving family, but it's heart shattering when they don't believe in you and side with the traitors.' Ash thought bitterly. 'Wonder if I would have as much enthusiasm if my mum still believed in me at that time.'
"Wake up, Pikachu." Ash mumbled, shaking the mouse awake. "Time for breakfast." As the mouse stirred, he staggered to the bathroom, and refreshed himself. He dressed in his standard trainer's clothes, a navy blue shirt complete with a black short jacket, followed by midnight blue jeans and his cap that looked like his first Pokémon cap except the white parts are now black. Of course, it's complete with a hoodie that shadows his face very well. He also put on his fingerless gloves, where on its left glove, a Key Stone was imbedded into it.
Pikachu hopped onto his shoulder and he entered the dining room. As soon as he did, he sent out all his Pokémon to have breakfast in the lounge.
Ash looked to his Elites. As usual, Pakura is missing, but her Pokémon's out here eating breakfast.
"Morning, Ash! Come have a seat!" said Phillip, waving him over. The moment he slid into his chair he was served an enormous platter of food. Eggs, ham, piles of fried potatoes. A tureen of fruit sat in ice to keep it chilled. The basket of rolls set would last a family for an entire week. There's elegant glasses of orange juice, cups of coffee, and cups of hot chocolate. Ash took an empty plate, and filled it with a substantial amount of everything on the table, before starting to eat.
"Is Pakura awake yet?" Ash asked.
"She is. She's the one that woke me up." Rosaline replied, pouring herself a cup of hot chocolate.
"She used the connecting door to get to your room didn't she?" Jude enquired. There were two connecting doors for each pair of rooms. To gain access to two rooms, both of them need to open the connecting door in their own room. Only Rosaline couldn't get into Pakura's room because she always kept her connecting door locked, and only unlocked it briefly to wake Rosaline up, before going back to her room and locking it again. Apparently, she wanted to prevent Rosaline from going into her room via the connecting door.
"Yeah." Rosaline confirmed. "Supposedly it's to keep me out." She looked rather hurt. Why would Pakura do this to her? Hadn't they known each other before she became Elite? Didn't she trust her? The questions were racing though Rosaline's mind.
She was interrupted, however, by the sound of a door opening, and Pakura coming out of her room, dressed and ready to go. She was wearing one of her trainer outfits- an electric blue top with a black skirt, complete with black boots, a light pink jacket and a belt to hold her six Pokeballs. Her hair was loose, and put up in a hairband. As soon as Skitty saw her, she hopped onto her shoulder, and nuzzled her affectionately. Pakura absent-mindedly scratched her under her chin, which made her purr in contentment.
"Morning, Paku." Ash greeted his Leader. Pakura nodded.
"What Pokémon are you going to use today?" Jude enquired.
Pakura looked around at her Pokémon, and pointed to Jynx, Skitty, and Audino.
"You're going to Mega Evolve your Audino, aren't you?" Phillip voiced his suspicion. The PAL Elites were also well-known to use Mega Evolution during battles, and each of them had their Key Stones worn as part of their outfit, while their Pokémon had the appropriate Mega Stones. Jude's one was in the form of a bracelet, Rosaline's a ring, Pakura's one was a charm, and Phillip's one is a stickpin he attached to his shirt.
Once per battle, only a single Pokémon for each Trainer may Mega Evolve, while this is true, another thing about the PAL Elites are, their bonds with every single one of their Pokémon are so strong; they can Mega Evolve their Pokémon anytime, thus bypassing the rule. Ash discovered this loophole shortly after he became Champion, thus he was the first person to Mega Evolve more than one Pokémon when he was battling.
Pakura simply shrugged at them.
"By the way, I have news for all of you." Ash said, since all his Elites are here now.
"Yeah, what?" Phillip sounded curious.
"According to Mewtwo, The five Leaders and their guards had escaped from jail." There were cries of shock from his Elites except Pakura, who stayed quiet. The Pokémon looked up, wondering what the chaos was about.
"Enough!" Ash shouted, trying to calm his three Elites down. They shut up upon hearing Ash shout. "They will come for us, and I want you to have your guard up at all times. You never know when they will attack. That's all." He didn't mention Mewtwo's warning of being careful of the quiet one, because he still didn't know what it meant yet, and wanted to figure this out himself.
"Got it." They said in unison, as they finished their breakfast and joined Pakura in the lounge to start returning their Pokémon back to their Pokeballs (except for those intended to use for battle later), and went to place all of the Pokeballs into their respective rooms, before meeting back in the lounge.
When Ash went back to the lounge, his Elites were already ready and waiting for him. All of them had at least one Pokémon out of their Pokeballs, like Ash: Jude's was Purrloin, Rosaline's was her Espeon, Phillip's was Emolga (previously Iris'), and Pakura's was her Sylveon and a Skitty (previously May's) that was riding on her shoulder and hidden in her hair.
"Come on, let's go." He said, and they rode down the elevator to the lobby, and walked out of the tower to the Arena.
When they arrived, it was empty. They must be the first ones to appear. Ash noticed a huge board full of headshots of people.
"The tag pairings must be out." Ash remarked, as he and his Elite got closer.
Ash scanned the board for his face, and found it somewhere near the top few rows. Next to his face was Cynthia's.
'Cool, I got Cynthia.' Ash thought.
Jude raised his eyebrows at his partner. It was a girl with pink hair that is short and spiked at two ends of her hair. She also had matching eyes, and a patch on her nose. She looked rather young for a Gym Leader.
"Maylene, Leader of the Veilstone Gym in Sinnoh. Specializes in Fighting types." Pakura mumbled, startling them.
"How did you know?" Jude asked.
"She used to travel around and collect Gym Badges with her previous travelling companion before she started Coordinating. Did it only for fun though, since she never registered for any Conferences." Rosaline explained. "I also collected Badges when I was travelling with Pakura, but by that time, she already had all the Badges from Kanto to Unova, so she started collecting Ribbons out of boredom."
"Really? What Badges do you guys have?" Ash asked them.
"Pakura has the Badges from Kanto to Unova." Rosaline answered for her. "While I have the Badges from Johto to Sinnoh."
"Wow! Same as me." Ash exclaimed to Pakura. Pakura stayed silent.
"Ok, whatever, let's see what who are our other partners." Phillip interrupted.
"Hey, you got Flannery, the Lavaridge Gym Leader. She specialises in fire types." Rosaline commented to Jude. "And I got…." She trailed off when she saw who her partner is. "…..the guy who hit on me during the breakfast gathering yesterday. Who did you get, Paku?"
Pakura silently pointed to her picture, and they excitedly looked to where Pakura was pointing.
"Oh! It's the Kanto Elite Leader and Johto Champion!" Phillip said, looking at Lance's picture next to hers.
"Whatever." Pakura mumbled. Who cares what his positions are at this point, anyway?
"Hey, Red." A voice said. Ash turned to see two people smiling at him. The first person had brown spiky hair and black eyes. He was wearing a black polo T-shirt with a brown jacket. He was also wearing khaki pants. The second person had shoulder-length purple hair and black eyes, and he's wearing an outfit similar to his original outfit- a black shirt with a jacket that is predominantly black, but has ultramarine colour in the middle of the jacket and the wrist part of the jacket sleeves over it.
"Gary! Paul!" Ash greeted them enthusiastically.
"Hey, we're here too!" A voice said. Ash looked up to see a boy with black hair and matching eyes wearing his usual green shirt and orange pants. He also wears an orange bandana around his forehead and is carrying his trademark sketchbook. Another was a late middle aged man with grey hair and black eyes. He is wearing his usual lab coat over his red shirt and fulvous pants.
"Tracey, Professor Oak!" Ash smiled.
"Hey, Red. Long time no see. How are you doing?" Paul asked him. "And how is Pikachu?"
"Great." Ash grinned.
"I've never been better!" Pikachu gave the peace sign.
"I heard you became the very first Champion of this region. Congratulations, I must say." Professor Oak complimented. "You were amazing in your battle against that Pakura girl. Thanks for sending us the footage of the battles. It was really entertaining."
"You're welcome." Ash nodded. "My win was all thanks to Pikachu here."
"How modest, Ash." Pikachu said, earning a laugh from him.
"Who are your partners?" Ash asked.
"I got Candice, the Gym Leader of Snowpoint City." Gary replied.
Paul sneered. "Max Maple. Can't wait to just take out his Pokémon, and win myself." Ash gave him a wry smile.
"Speaking of Max, I heard a Red Satoshi kicked Max Maple's ass last night during a mock battle, is that true?" Gary enquired.
"Yeah." Ash answered. He then told them the story about Max accidentally bumping into him when he and his Elite were trying to get out of the Pokémon Center as fast as possible to avoid conflict, but failed, and he was forced to have a battle so that they would shut up, although he was tired since they were flying during the night just to come here to prepare to welcome the guests.
"Well, that explains why they were complaining about some guy wearing a hood beating Max." Paul shrugged. "Then they came up and tried to ask me if I know about this guy in a hood. Told them to go away, but they persisted, even asking me if I knew anything about their missing Pokémon. Apparently they vanished simultaneously some time back. Who knows what happened to them? I don't know and I don't care. So to make them go away, I had Froslass use Icy Wind on them. You should see the looks on their faces when they were frozen into human popsicles." He concluded, chuckling. They laughed, imagining them as human popsicles.
"By the way, Ash, we got to tell you something." Professor Oak suddenly sounded grim. Gary and Tracey suddenly had solemn expressions on their faces too. Paul had his usual stoic expression. "I'm sorry we didn't tell you earlier, and we wouldn't tell, but Paul insisted that you need to know." He glared at Paul who shot him a look that clearly told Professor Oak he has the right to know.
"What is it?" Ash frowned.
"You see, a few days after you left Pallet Town…" Professor Oak hesitated.
"You mother vanished into thin air. No one could find her." Paul finished bluntly.
Ash froze. Wait, what did they just say?
When his brain finally comprehended Pauls' words, he stood up, looking down on the ground. "I need some time alone to think." With that, he abruptly stood up, and ignoring his friends' calls, raced out of the Battle Arena lobby, followed by Pikachu and Lucario, who are calling for him to wait up.
A pair of amethyst eyes, which were watching him since the reunion started, narrowed slightly, and the owner of those eyes silently slipped out of the Battle Arena after him.