"So this is Pallet Town" Jaime told himself quietly "Well what do you think Rosene?" Jaime spoke to his Roselia "It almost looks… magical coming out of the horizon like that don't you think?"

"Rose…" Rosene looked at her trainer, who was gazing at the town emerging from the horizon with an almost nostalgic stare.

The ferry from Hoenn to Kanto had taken three days, three totally wasted days, no battles, no friends, and missing the pokemon contest that he was supposedly going to do with Rosendo and Dawn. Even Lukas himself had agreed to go and see them perform.

"Why on earth did I offer myself volunteer to help Rowan? Lukas could have done it… he doesn't participate in the contest…"

Roselia looked up at her trainer reproachfully

"Rose! Roselia! Ro!"

Jaime looked down at her and smiled at his pokemon's comment.

"Ok so he did give me my supposed starter and my pokedex, you are right Roselia, there is nothing wrong with helping him by delivering this…" His stare lowered to the envelope on his hand, the same envelope he had been staring at ceaselessly for those three days in the ferry trying to guess what it might say.

"Besides" He smiled "We can do some tourism around! No one in the family has yet placed a foot on Kanto!"

"Roselia!!!" The pokemon beamed.

"Ash get up already!"

…

"ASH!"

"Whoa whoa whoa!! Mum! I am only wearing my boxers!"

Ash blinked and saw his mum in a kicking position with her eyes closed shut.

"It must be something really important if she kicked the door open…"

"Good morning dear, I got breakfast ready downstairs, I just thought I'd wake you up because today Oak asked you to go to the lab remember?" Delia smiled wit her eyes still shut.

"Damn! The lab!"

A hurricane formed in Ash's bedroom out of it jumped a fully awake and dressed Ash Ketchum Pokemon trainer with a half sleeping pikachu dangling on his shoulder.

"bye mum!" Ash pecked his mum on the cheek ant rushed outside like a bolt of greased lightning.

"Ash?"

Delia was standing in front of her sons room with her eyes strongly shut.

"Pikachu, wake up already will you!? You can't arrive in the lab asleep on my shoulder!"

"Chaaaa"

Pikachu yawned and blinked, what is this? He could only see blurs! Suddenly Ash stopped dead on his feet and pikachu was propelled forwards onto Oak's laboratory door.

"Pikachu!!"

Suddenly the door opened and a pair of hands got caught of pikachu.

"You really should take better care of your pokemon Ashy boy"

Ash raised his eyes from pikachu onto the twinkling green gaze that along with the superior grin could only belong to one person in the whole world.

"Gary! Boy am I glad you were here! You saved my pikachu from, er, from"

"Squishing itself to a pulp because of your poor sense of attention"

Ash looked downhearted.

"Come on Ashy, you know I am kidding, come inside!" He smiled, pikachu jumped from his shoulder onto the floor and smiled, letting Gary go inside first.

"Why thank you pikachu!" He laughed.

Pikachu made signals to Ash so he would cross too. As soon as Ash walked behind him Pikachu smirked evilly and shocked him from the back.

"I got the picture…"

"Pika!" Pikachu smiled.

Ash stepped through the entrance hall and into the lab itself he made a hand gesture to Tracey who absent mindedly returned it while looking at an endless rain of digits in one of the computer screens.

"Oh Hi professor"

"Ash my boy! So please to see you again! My my, you are singed, just like the first day over five years ago, do you remember Gary?"

Gary laughed and winked at Ash

"How could I forget, first thing I see after I get my Eevee is an Ash running around in pyjamas half singed by his pikachu and still shell shocked due to the discharge!"

"Hey!" Ash looked at his best friend angrily but started laughing when he saw that both him and the professor were cracking up, even Tracey was sniggering under his breath while counting digits.

Still with tears in his eyes the Professor turned back to Ash while Gary was still chuckling.

"Well Ash, you see a friend of mine from the Sinnoh region, Professor Rowan wanted to send me an envelope containing a letter and a chip for our latest pokedex improvement which I am to finish off"

Ash nodded wondering what the professor might want.

"You see Ash, we didn't want to send it by mail in case the chip might suffer damage, so he sent one of his young trainers, Jaime over with the materials, His Ferry is going arrive in the harbour any minute now and I wanted you to go and collect him, take him here and then, if you don't have any other immediate plans maybe you could give him "the tour" around Pallet"

Ash grinned, he liked the professor being able to count on him.

"Sure thing professor, Gary, you coming?"

To his great dishearten Gary shook his head slowly.

"Sorry Ashy, But I am going to Mt Moon right now to see the phosils, new things have been found, and I am not talking only of pokemon fossils, there is supposed to be a chamber of some sort there, and as pokemon investigator I think I ought to go investigate!"

Ash looked at the floor, then rushed at Gary and hugged him. Gary looked surprised but accepted the hug, Ashy-boy was always like that, so huggable and childish needing to hug everything to say goodbye.

"Ok professor, so how does this Jaime guy look?"

Jaime stepped out of the docks and waited while kneeling against the wooden archway at their entrance, he still couldn't walk straight after three days on the ferry, he almost thought that the ground was too static to be normal.

"You feeling the same too Rosene?"

Rosene was zigzagging along when she suddenly tripped and fell flat on the ground.

"Maybe you should take a rest… Rosene, return!"

A beam of red light shot our of the pokeball he had just taken out o his pokeball pocket and absorbed the roselia back in for a well deserved rest.

"I wish I could go in a pokeball too…" Jaime muttered

Ash ran toward the docks at top speed a growl of pikachu reminded him what would happen if he stopped abruptly so he slowed down. The docks were deserted! Damn! Had he arrived too late? Maybe he shouldn't have stopped to order a burger on the way, but heck he was starving. He paced around a little and found another boy looking at him from the back of the archway kneeling against it.

"That's got to be him!" Ash thought. The boy fitted with Oak's description perfectly! He was about one meter sixty, thin, pale, and with sleek blonde hair falling over his deep, emerald green eyes. Jaime was wearing black trainers, a pair of dark indigo jeans ripped up at the knees, an orange long sleeved shirt with the legend "Temperamental Artist" a small waist pack and a normal, green trainer backpack, he wore three black and silver bracelets on his right hand, a black watch on his left and a thin silver chain on his neck. Ash couldn't help but think that for a boy's standard, this Jaime was actually quite good looking.

"You are Jaime right?"

Jaime looked at the boy who had just spoken, he had sparkling auburn eyes, jet black messy hair and tan skin, he was wearing a plain, black T-shirt, jeans and white trainers, he also had a Pikachu sitting in his shoulder. Jaime blushed slightly, the boy seemed older and fitter he was quite attractive; he pushed the thought away and limited himself to answer.

"So I am and who might you be?"

"Hi! My name's Ash, I am from Pallet, Professor Oak told me to come and collect you, am I too late?"

Jaime smiled

"Not at all, I was just kneeling here to recover from my original dizziness, three days on a ferry don't do much for your sense of balance"

Ash laughed at the comment, this guy was fun.

"Ok, so now I am taking you to Oak's lab, after that, if you aren't tired we can go see Pallet town"

"Fine with me, but I need somewhere where I can leave my pokemon, I have the feeling their first ferry voyage was quite and adventure for them"

"We can leave them at Oak's lab, no problem, so you are a trainer?"

"Coordinator, but I am a decent fighter too if that's what you wanted to know. What about you?"

Ash smiled smugly.

"Trainer, so far I have participated in the Kanto, Orange, Johto, Hoenn and Sinnoh region leagues"

Jaime stopped on his tracks.

"Wait, so you are The Ash Ketchum?!"

Ash nodded "Oh, and before I forget this is my best pal pikachu!"

"pika!" the yellow pokemon raised his hand in salute.

"Then you are the one Dawn keeps talking about!"

"You know Dawn?" Ash asked.

"Of course, She, Lukas, Rosendo and I are best friends!"

"Oh well, say hi to Dawn from me when you see her again ok?"

Jaime nodded and the said abruptly.

"Can we have a pokemon match?"

Ash turned and smiled at him.

"You just said your pokemon need to rest"

Jaime opened his mouth but stopped, Ash was right.

"Well, I suppose I could wait for a while"

Ash nodded and lead the way to the lab. He couldn't help but think that in a way Jaime reminded him of Gary, the way of speaking and challenging him just like that. He blushed at the thought of Gary, ever since the silver conference and their friendship had been restored Ash was constantly thinking about telling him his true feelings. He was snapped back to reality by Jaime.

"So, after we deliver the professor this letter, what stuff is there to do here?"

Ash blinked and thought, what could they do after he gave Jaime the tour? Cinema? Bowling? Shopping? What would he like?