Modern day…
Chiro awoke with a start. He sat up, breathing hard. This wasn't the first time he'd had that nightmare, but he hadn't had it in years.
After he had calmed down, he pondered the meaning of the dream and why it might have come to him now of all times.
"Something's going to happen." He whispered to himself. "And it's going to have to do with them."
Meanwhile…
Ash woke up from the same nightmare, trembling. He too was curious about the meaning of the dream.
Unlike Chiro, however, he just shrugged it off, thinking it was because this was the anniversary of the day they'd lost Chiro.
Sighing, he got up and readied himself for the day. Pikachu yawned on the bed behind him, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes with his little paws.
"Good morning, Pikachu." Ash said, hearing the yawn and turning around. "You look like you slept well."
"Pika!" Pikachu confirmed happily, hopping onto his trainer and best friend's shoulder.
Ash thought of how Chiro would have loved to have a pal like Pikachu, but hid the sadness in a false smile and headed down to breakfast.
At breakfast, he overdid trying to act like himself and ate way faster than he normally did, attracting the one thing he didn't want: attention.
"Ash, are you okay?" Cilan asked, worried. "You look like you're trying to hide something."
Ash swallowed the food he had in his mouth and looked at Cilan. "Hiding something? I have no clue what you could be talking about. I'm not hiding anything."
"Your left eyebrow twitches when you're lying." Iris pointed out. "And your left eyebrow is twitching now."
Ash gulped. "So? I can hide stuff if I want to."
Iris glared at him and Cilan sighed.
Seeing Iris's glare, Ash gulped again. "I had a nightmare last night, but it's about a family secret so I can't tell you what it was about."
"Oh well. At least you told us something instead of insisting nothing's wrong." Cilan said.
Ash smiled lightly and looked down at his lap. "Wish I could tell you all about it though. It's a really hard secret to keep."
"You could always tell us, Ash. We won't tell anyone." Iris said.
"Nah. You wouldn't believe me anyways. You'd think I was crazy." Ash replied, standing up. "Well, let's get going! The sooner we set out the sooner we get to Virbank City!"
Iris and Cilan exchanged smiles, relieved that the nightmare didn't appear to be keeping Ash's spirits down too long.
They cleaned up from breakfast, grabbed their stuff, and checked out of the pokemon center.
They had only been travelling two hours when it began.
It started when Ash got hit from behind with a green knock-out laser that affected not just him, but Pikachu as well.
"Ash!" Iris and Cilan shouted. Iris ran to Ash's side, while Cilan spun around to face their attackers.
He gave an expression of surprise just in time to be hit as well.
"Cilan!" Iris yelped. Seconds later, she and Axew were the last ones to be hit.
All three were now perfectly vulnerable to capture, and captured they were.