Disclaimer: I do not own Pokemon.

The only bad thing about living in Pallet Town is that everybody knows everybody. So when word got out that I was coming back from Unova I'm pretty sure my Mom's heart skipped a beat.

It all happened on a Tuesday, I had just finished my last journey from Unova and was coming home to check on Mom before I decided to make a decision on where or what I was going to do next. I had Pickachu on my shoulder and a couple of pokeballs in my pockets, No Pokemon were in them of course. I had a green hat on, for a surprising change.

It took forever to get back home. Between shipriding and walking I was exhausted. So it came to no surprise that I felt a surge of energy whenever I finally saw my house. I started to Sprint toward it like I had never had been in my own house before, when I finally reached the door I turned the knob and walked in.

"Mom." No reply. Surely my Mom knew that I was coming home?

I scanned the house. Not even Mr. Mime is here.

"Hello?" I paused. Nothing.

"Suprise!" All of my friends from Pallet Town jumped out of their hiding places.

"Welcome back Ash!"

I looked up and saw a giant Welcome Home banner.

I dropped my jaw. "Wow guys, you really went all out this time."

Mom walked across the room to give me a hug. "I'm just glad your home."

Professor Oak walked over and put a hand on my shoulder, "Good to have you back, Ash."

I gave professor a warm hug and turned around to see Misty and Tracy.

"Hey guys, Misty I didn't expect you to be here."

She shrugged her shoulders, "I wouldn't let you take off on another journey without giving you a level head."

Tracy head popped over Misty's shoulder. "And I wouldn't let you take off on another journey without looking at some of my sketches."

He walked up to me and handed me his sketchpad. "Feel free to look through look it", then he put his hand on his head and started to rub his hair. "with the exception of my Officer Jenny drawings."

I smirked, "Of course." I started to flip through pages, most of them were really good, Tracy could make a Magikarp look beautiful with paper and pencil.

Halfway through it I stopped. I turned around to Tracy, who was conversing with Misty. "Hey Tracy."

He turned his head and looked at me. "What is it."

"Come over here."

He walked over and peered over my shoulder to look at the scratchpad.

"Who is this, Tracy."

The girl we were looking at had long dark-blondish hair with a straw cap on, she was setting on a swingset.

Tracy put a finger on his lips. "Ummm... I don't remember. Why?"

"She looks familiar."

"Everyone looks familiar to you Ash."

"Good point."

Later on in the day everyone had gathered around the table to eat dinner.

"Really guys this means a lot."

Mom put down her fork, "Anything for my Ash."

I nodded my head and went back to eating, but really that wasn't what I was thinking about. Tracy's sketch was still bothering me, that girl looked... familiar.

"Excuse me." I got up from the table and took a sarcastic bow. "I really appreciate everyone coming over here to surprise me, but I'm beat from all the travelling. I think I'm going to take a shower and go to sleep."

Later that night

I decided to go through some of my old pictures. I think I upset Mom when I decided to leave dinner early... oh well.

She will probably won't even remember it by tomorrow...

The only time ever spent digging through old pictures is when I return home. I looked at a picture at the top of the first page. That's me, Misty, Brock, Mom, and a younger looking professor Oak.

I turned the page. "That's me, Max, and May." Whispering barely loud enough for even me to hear. I looked at May, that's the first time I ever had to mentor someone.

Skipping through a couple of pages I found a picture of Dawn and Pikachu. Didn't take long for those two to become friends...

Then I found a picture of Iris and Cilan, I rolled my eyes and turned to the next page.

The last page of the book was wrinkled and clearly older than the rest of the pictures. I was in the middle of a giant group of kids accompanied by professor Oak.

This really looks familiar. Come on Ash think, Oak, kids, outdoors...camp!

It was a pokemon camp. "Well that brings back a lot of memories."

"Memories of what?"

I screamed and fell off the side of my bed. "What are you doing?"

Tracy looked embarrassed, "Sorry." He pulled out a pokeball with green rings at the top of it. "I was just going to give this to you before I leave, it's a new pokeball called the ring ball. It's supposed to help catch any kind of pokemon that's not in its original form. In other words it helps you catch shiny pokemon. Anyway, professor Oak made it himself, I thought you might want it before you start another journey."

I took the ball from Tracy and examined it by spinning it around with my fingers. "Wow, thanks Tracy. This is awesome, I just wish I had something to give back to you in return..."

"Don't worry about it, just be sure to bring back some new pokemon so I can sketch them."

"No problem."

"Thanks." He walked over to the picture book laying on my bed, then pointed. "That's the girl I sketched, just a lot... younger."

I stood beside Tracy to look at the photo. Right beside me was the girl, with what appeared to be a towl around her knee. "Yeah... it is."