Please note, this is very much a test for myself. I don't expect this to be any good, but i haven't written any type of story for years (at least 10).
For this reason i will be definitely taking any reviews seriously.
There is also a possibility that this will never be finished (as much as i want to finish it now) and any updates will certainly be infrequent.
So this story came into being as a direct result of there being a distressing lack of any ghost Pokemon transformations. Oh, don't get me wrong, there are many transformation fanfictions. However i haven't really seen many where a character is changed into a ghost Pokemon, whether that be from the normal random shenanigans, or character death etc.
Warnings (?):
Character death (But it is not the end)
Minor blood / injury
Possible Swearing
The day he died.
Chapter 1
Pokemon were everything to 9 year old ash. He has lived with Pokemon his entire life, spending many mornings at Professor Oak's lab and having a Mr. Mime as part of the family.
Over time his love of Pokemon gave birth to a dream. That dream was to become a Pokemon master.
Therefore it was only natural that when 'Grandpa Oak' approached Delia and Ash about taking a trip to Hoenn, both as a vacation and as a research trip into evolutionary stones, they could only accept.
Slateport, Mauville, Mt. Pyre, Sootopolis, and Fallarbor. The places Professor Oak took them to, in his pursuit to collect rare evolutionary stones, were amazing. Even Mr. Mime, who Delia had brought along, was enjoying getting to meet fellow Pokemon from another region.
They were now coming up on their final location, before making the trip back home, Meteor Falls.
Oak, who was leading the group, turned back to Ash while fiddling with a camera crudely attached to his head.
"Just like at the other places we have visited, i am going to be recording everything on a head mounted camera. Hopefully the footage will be good to cross reference with my findings.
Oh, and please stay close now Ash. The cave up ahead can be quite dark and is filled with Pokemon that don't like to be disturbed."
Ash responded with a sharp nod, but the warning did not detract from his excitement.
He didn't think his smile could grow any bigger than as they walked into the main cavern. Walking across a bridge above the cave floor, and at least 30ft up, he could see Pokemon everywhere! Zubat sleeping on the ceiling, lunatone and Rock floating around here and there. Delia and Oak's smiles grew also, upon seeing how happy Ash was.
"Wow, look Grandpa! See how to zubat form groups!?"
Unfortunately, in Ash's excitement, he forgot to keep his voice down as to not spook the wild Pokemon. The zubat in particular, being sensitive to sound, all took flight in their panic. Delia, Oak and Mr. Mime saw the bat Pokemon swarming in their direction but realised too late that, in his excitement, Ash had moved too far ahead that they couldn't reach him.
They could only watch in horror as Ash was forced off of the bridge backwards under the sheer amount of zubat. There was almost a pause. A single moment where the young boy locked eyes with his mother and then his 'Grandpa'; A look of horror and confusion on his face.
"ASH!"
And time resumed. The three adults, and one Pokemon, ran to the edge of the bridge desperately hoping for some sort of miracle. Only to hear a thump, and then silence.
A quick glance before rushing for the way down, didn't reveal much. However, their arrival was greeted by the limp body of the young child. A pool of blood surrounded him but was centered around his head. It seemed he had landed almost upside down.
"Nooo! Ash!" "Oh, Ash…" "Mime…"
Delia and cradled his body. They couldn't believe it. How could this have happened to Ash?
Oak dropped to his knees, spilling his evolutionary stones everywhere. Ash was as close to a grandson to him as Gary was. He loved him like one of his own, and now he was gone.
Three things happened right then and there.
Delia begged in her head: wishing for something, anything to save her son.
One of Professor Oak's Dusk stones fell onto Ash's hand.
Mr. Mime cried for his owner's son. A member of his own family, who treated him almost like an older brother. He cried for someone, he believed, didn't deserve a fate such as this.
Oak choked back a sob. Ash was glowing. What was happening? He looked around. Nothing was out of pla- wait. The Dusk stone touching Ash was also glowing. He looked up again to tell Delia to open her eyes when he saw it. Mr. Mime's tears. His teary eyes widened with both shock, realization and small bit of hope as he saw the Pokemon's tears being almost magnetically attracted to Ash.
"D-Delia! Look at Ash!"
She opened her red, watery eyes before rearing back in surprise. Did her wish come true?
She noticed that as the light reached a crescendo, Ash's body seemed to become less solid; Her hands almost seemed to be passing through him.
Blinking the bright spots away after a last burst of light, they all noticed that Ash was no longer there. Instead there floated, a Mismagius.
It opened its eyes blearily, as if it had just awoken, until it saw where it was.
The other three then heard a familiar voice in their heads: "W-What!? I- I died?" It looked up at Delia. "Mom!?"
Delia had a look of disbelief, but had a small glimmer of hope in her eyes.
"A-Ash?"
"Mom!" The Mismagius practically threw itself at Delia and wrapped its' two tattered cloth like appendages around her, then began weeping.
"Ash, is that really you?" Professor Oak was almost sure he knew what just happened.
"Grandpa Oak? Yeah, I… I remember the Zubat... " Ash replied in a shaky voice, still in their heads, while simultaneously murmuring quietly in Pokespeak into his mother's shoulder.
"I think i know what happened to you then Ash" he said wiping away a few stray tears and moving forward to join the hug. "There are legends that suggest people can become ghost type Pokemon in certain situations. I think that Mr. Mime's tears enabled you to come back, when combined with the power from a few of the rocks i have been collecting."
At this Mr. Mime ran over and joined in the group hug.
"I thought i lost you Ash. I thought i lost you" Delia mumbled into the top of Ash's 'hat'.
After everything had been handled by the authorities and Ash's new status had been confirmed by the police and the league, the group of Pokemon and humans prepared to travel back to the Kanto region.
Professor Oak had asked Ash if the footage recorded by his camera could be viewed by the police, the league and a few colleagues. Ash's agreement had played a huge part in enabling any officials to accept what had occurred.
Oak had theorized that the fact that there was only one Pokemon providing tears stopped Ash from coming completely back to life. The location, and the dusk stone especially, had played a role in what he came back as. Ash didn't mind much, after he came to terms with everything; He thought being a Pokemon was not only really cool, but it would also allow him to bond more closely with his future team.
Ash, had not allowed his dream to die along with him and had started training himself in preparation for his Pokemon journey only a few weeks after returning home.
It all hinged on whether the league would allow a human-turned Pokemon to be a trainer.
Today, nearly a month after the incident, was the day he would find out what they had decided. For that, he needed to head over to Professor Oak's lab.
Floating past their neighbor's yard, he saw someone familiar also heading towards the lab.
"Gary?" He projected into the mind of the person ahead.
"Oh, Hey Ashy-boy" Came the reply from his friend. "I was just heading over to Gramp's lab to hear the news. Come on, let's go."
The rivalry between the two had all but died out once Gary had learned what had happened to Ash. However their friendship remained stronger than ever. Gary was responsible for helping Ash work out a few moves as well as allowing him to open up about the darker thoughts being a ghost type brought out.
"I really hope they accept me as a trainer…"
"Mhm. Hey, you're getting better with the telepathy thing. You're not mumbling your species anymore"
"Thanks Gare."
Ash waved one of the tattered cloth arms towards a few townspeople, getting a few smiles and waves in return. The people in Pallet were told what happened but warmed up to the idea of a ghost-type Ash Ketchum surprisingly quickly.
"Ah, there you are Ash. Step inside you two, the league is already on the communicator." Professor Oak had a serious look on his face making Ash and Gary start worrying all the more.
"Ash!"
"Mm…"
"Ash! Wake up ash!"
"Mismagi~"
"Ash Ketchum, you are going to be late!"
"Mis-!" Ash bolted up from the bed so quickly he almost levitated into the ceiling.
"I made some breakfast for you, why don't you have something to eat before you head over to the lab?"
Meals hadn't changed much. Despite the smaller portions, Ash would still eat just about anything. His favourite though, were his mother's homemade pokeblocks designed for ghost type Pokemon.
"Ahh, that hit the spot."
"Glad you liked it. I've packed some of the pokeblocks you like for when you are on the road later, as well as a bit of pokechow."
"Thanks mom, you're the best."
Gary was waiting for Ash and Delia when they got to Professor Oak's lab.
"Alright Ash, i will wait here. You should go in now with Gary."
The inside of the lab always seemed to be the same. He had been making frequent visits, since the Pokemon league accepted him as a viable trainer over seven months ago, so he would have noticed if anything was different.
Gary decided to break the silence while waiting for his Grandpa to make an appearance.
"So Ash, what starter Pokemon are you thinking of getting?"
"I'm thinking of something non-traditional. I can never choose between the three main starters."
"Well you might just be in luck Ash, i caught a new Pokemon just this morning and wasn't quite sure what to do with him." Explained Prof. oak, whilst entering from a side room.
"If you just come over here, i can get you two sorted." He gestured towards the machine he was now standing behind.
On the machine's table-like surface there rested three pokeballs.
"Okay Gary, please choose your starter Pokemon."
"Hmm… I think I will take the Squirtle."
Picking up said Pokemon's pokeball and releasing it, revealed the turtle Pokemon in a beam of red light which promptly showed its happiness.
Upon seeing Ash however the Squirtle froze, frightened and unsure of the presence of the ghost Pokemon. Surely his new trainer and the nice Professor can't have missed the Mismagius floating surreptitiously off to one side.
"Oh don't worry about Ash, Squirtle, he's a friend and fellow trainer!"
Ash nodded animatedly.
"A Pokemon is a trainer? Wait- A ghost type Pokemon is a trainer?" Squirtle asked, now more curious than scared.
"Yeah, the Pokemon league approved me. I used to be a human until about a year ago. Long story short, I died. I still want to be a Pokemon trainer though, and who better to train Pokemon than another Pokemon?"
Squirtle agreed and decided he was starting to like his new trainer's friend.
"Okay, me and gramps only got a little of that. You slipped into pokespeak again, Ash."
"Woops"
"Right Ash, here is the Pokemon i caught this morning." Said professor Oak as he pulled out another pokeball.
Pressing the button revealed a Pikachu.
Ash could now be seen floating down the path leading away from Pallet town. He had just finished saying his goodbyes to his mother while Gary had gone on ahead. His new Pikachu had found his favorite position, hitching a ride on his trainers 'hat'.
"So you actually died?"
"Well i'm a ghost aren't i? Trust me, it wasn't pleasant."
"So, what can you do? What moves do you know?"
"Well a lot of the non-move stuff i know by instinct. I knew how to do most of it pretty much straight after being brought back to life.
Things like traveling to the ghost realm is almost automatic. Becoming solid or making something, or someone, else faze through things is easy. As an example, because you are touching me right now, we are both able to move through things. The same concept works for invisibility as well.
Getting illusions and hypnotism down was tough. That stuff i had to learn from scratch.
The telepathy requires focus to pull off, but i didn't need to learn that one.
I actually have all of my stuff, including my pokeballs and pokedex, stored away in the ghost world right now."
"Well what about moves?"
"Aha, well that is that is one point why having the Kanto region's Professor as an unofficial grandfather is such a cool thing. I have been asked to 'test' a few TMs in the past few months.
My moveset is basically Psychic, Dazzling Gleam, Hex, Hypnosis, Shadow ball, Dark Pulse, Phantom Force, Dream Eater, Protect and… urm… Hyper Beam"
"Woah, You've been training really hard huh?"
"Well yeah, i mean what is point in helping train up my future friends and teammates without doing anything myself? I decided that the best way to help you guys become as strong as you can be, was to at least try to get there myself as well."
Pikachu decided, at that moment, that he would do practically anything for who was quickly becoming a very good friend.
"You know Ash, you're alright… you know, once you get past the whole ghost thing"
"Thanks Pikachu. But you still haven't come to the ghost world yet. That is one thing i will have to get all Pokemon on my team used to. We may spend a fair amount of time in there. We can use my area there for training, resting and even faster traveling. You might even get to meet a few friends i have there."
At that, Ash grinned. Under the shadow cast by his 'hat' he looked almost malicious, with glowing eyes and crooked smile.
Pikachu, somehow picking up on the aura of mischief ash was giving off, just sweatdropped. He had an idea of what to expect in the near future, after all you do hear rumors about ghost types while living in the wild; Ash, while seemingly holding back some of the more dark tendencies, seemed to be living up Pikachu's expectations.
Fishing in the middle of a forest was one of the most relaxing things she new of, in her opinion.
Misty Waterflower was hoping to catch a few water Pokemon to train up, hopefully a Poliwag or two. She had some siblings to prove her Pokemon training ability to, after all.
Bike set up by the waterside, fishing rod cast, some good weather and no one around for a few miles. Maybe today would be a good day.
Wait.
She was feeling something. Something was wrong.
Misty slowly turned her head, trying to find what it was. When she finally turned toward the tree line just behind her, she could see something in the shadow of the trees. Eyes… red glowing eyes, framed by a crooked smirk.
"Miiii~" The ghostly sound echoed out while the shadows seemed to reach out towards her in thin spindly tendrils.
Screaming, she scrambled away to put some distance between her and whatever demented creature this was. This had the effect of dislodging her bike, causing it to crash into the water.
Suddenly all sound ceased, only to be broken by laughing.
She watched, still in a state of shock, as the dark shape moved out and revealed itself to be a Pokemon. She recognized it as a Pokemon from a foreign region, a Mismagius. On closer inspection it seemed to have a Pikachu sat on the brim of it's hat.
"HEY! That wasn't funny! Wait- Oh no, not my bike!"
Now having calmed down a bit, Ash could finally find the concentration to speak telepathically.
"Ah, woops. Oh hey, how about i buy you a new one… once i get the money, heh heh."
Misty was surprised to see one of the tattered cloth strips rub the back of the Mismagius' head in a surprisingly human gesture, before she then realised the Pokemon had actually spoke in her head.
"What do you mean? Where is your trainer so i can give them a piece of my mind!?"
"Trainer? I don't have a trainer. I'm a licensed trainer myself. In fact, here is my ID" Said the Mismagius before a pokedex materialized out of nowhere and levitated up to her eye level. The was a little image of a Mismagius the trainer's picture should be.
-Ding! I am Dexter. A pokedex programed by Professor Samuel Oak for Pokemon trainer Ash Ketchum of Pallet Town. My function is to provide information about Pokemon species and their habitats. If lost or stolen I cannot be replaced.-
Picking her jaw up from where it rested on the floor, Misty decided to take things in stages. She was still angry, but there wasn't much she could do; You can't exactly hit a ghost Pokemon, no matter how much his smirk wanted to make her try. She wanted a new bike, but didn't want to travel with a ghost type Pokemon. Especially one that had already embarrassed her.
"Since i would assume you are heading to Viridian city, I will meet you there later; I'm expecting a replacement for my bike."
Ash just gave her a nod and a mischievous smile that was shadowed under the brim of his hat.