Here's a little bit of background info on my story. While my story is set about 4 years after the actual Pokemon series (Ash is 16 in this story), I'm trying to follow the story as much as I can as there are a lot of past events involved. If something doesn't follow the story completely, I'm sorry, this is based on the Pokemon episodes that I've seen (Which is MOST of them involving May and Drew). So if something doesn't tag along completely then I just want to let you know that I've tried my best to have it do that. Some of the characters have new Pokemon that they never had in the anime and some of their Pokemon have evolved, but remember that this is set in the future. This is a romance story, but it's not over dramatic, although it's got a little soap-opera feel to it. Don't worry though, there will be humor in it… I can't right angst properly. Mostly people end up laughing when I try, which is far from the effect that I wanted.

Now for the warnings: I'd rate this story about Teen. Perhaps a little swearing will be involved, and of course there is romance, but nothing TOO romantic. I don't think there will be actual violence either. This isn't exactly a warning, but this is a Contest Shipping (Drew x May) fic, with implied Cookie Shipping (Harley x May). There aren't really any other pairings that are actually important to the plot, but there are other characters that fall in love. I won't tell you them now, because I don't want to spoil the entire story. Well, enough with the warnings and other such things, let the story begin.

Make Your Move

Prologue: Where are we now?

When you're out traveling with someone who's dream is to become a Pokemon master,

you never really seem to stay in one place. You're always on the move, from city to city encountering all sorts of crazy environments. While there is a distance between the towns, you never really get bored, as something is always happening. Due to the lack of boredom throughout your quest, your question isn't "Are we there yet?" There never really is any point asking this question, as even the roads in between the cities are eventful. Instead your question always ends up being "Where are we now?"

Since I set off with Ash a few years back, my life has never really been the same. I've got a bunch of Pokemon now. Most of them were caught, coincidently, on the roads between the cities. I've also got a lot of friends now, and enemies. I didn't really know, when I met up with Ash, that he had a lot of them. Enemies and rivals. As the old saying goes, nothing is fair in love and war. So now I've got a bunch of Ash's enemies as my own. I've even got a few enemies who have nothing to do with Ash. Well, I did, anyway. I haven't seen them for a while. Since I returned home from Kanto, I stayed with my family and helped around the gym. While you don't travel much as a gym leader, you still have a lot of work to do. It's still a time consuming job.

That brings me back to the question I tend to ask so much, "Where are we now?". Well this is one of the instances where I actually know where I am. I'm in pallet town. I've been here before, but this time it's for a special reason. Tomorrow is Ash's 16th birthday. Surprising eh? How time flies. Ash was barely 12 when I met him, and now he's going to be 16. I've been in Pallet for a week now, talking to Ash about what we're going to do. I've been getting bored with helping my family around the gym. I mean, it's fascinating, seeing how people manage to tackle my dad and his Pokemon, but still, after you've spent a year or so on the move, never really sleeping in a hotel and always doing something extreme, civilized life in your home seems a bit low in standard. Ash feels the same way and so does Brock. The three of us will be setting out to the Johto region in a few days time. Ash and Brock have both been there in the past, but I haven't. The two of them just want to go back and have a look at how much the area's changed but I want to go there for another reason: Pokemon contests had finally started in Johto, and I would love to enter them there.

Of course, we aren't leaving until the celebrations are over. 16 is a rather big number in a person's life, well, in Ash's life anyway. He's gone and invited just about every single person he's ever met in his travels. That's another thing about traveling, you get to meet lots of people. While this is usually a good thing, I have a feeling tomorrow is going to be hectic. Ash decided to hold the party at his house, and guess what else he's planning to hold there? A Pokemon tournament. I sort of expected this though, throughout the years, Ash hasn't changed much.

The digital clock next to me ticked 11:00PM. I snorted. Ash would probably be thinking "Only one more hour until I get old enough to do certain things,". That's what he had spent the last few days talking about. I wonder he still awake, probably not. He usually gets to bed easily, no matter what challenges the next day is supposed to hold. I'm different though, I can never get to sleep, no matter how much I actually want to. Tonight is no different. I've been lying in bed for an hour now, and no luck.

With a sigh of no use, I got out of bed and moved towards the desk. Ash had a nice house, and I liked this guest room. It was pretty cozy. I sat down at the desk and pulled my scrapbook towards me. I turned to a page somewhere in the middle of it. I started this scrapbook when I returned home after my time with Ash. I piled up all the photos I had taken and stuck them in, in order too. I gazed at the only picture on this page, a large Au Natural photo that I had taken of Max, my brother. I wasn't that good at photography, it's just that this photo of Max with Jirachi was just so perfect that I had enlarged it. I haven't seen Max for a while though. As soon as he turned ten almost two years ago, he had left home and set of on his own Pokemon adventure by himself. I haven't seen him since. He's not even coming for the party tomorrow. We invited him but he was too far off to come, in Mirage Island. I sighed and turned the page and laid my eyes on a picture of me and my dad. It would be a long time until I see him again too. Smiling to myself, I turned another page of my book and rested my eyes on the next picture. This one made me sit bolt upright. I hadn't seen this person for a long time either, but unlike Max and my dad, this person was coming to the party tomorrow. This made me dread and want tomorrow even more than I already did. Who was this person? It was Harley.