Serena / January 11th

"Personally, I think we've got this tournament in the bag" Clemont said as we finished up our dinner. Ash had just won his second gym battle in Kalos against Grant and his rock-types, and we were on our way back when we realized it started to get late; we set up a table and tents next to a river, while Ash trained with Frogadier and Pikachu

"Why do you think that?" I asked

"For one, we have an advantage with the amount of type-masters that we have" Clemont answered. "Not only that, everyone seems really eager to be at their best for this, especially Ash"

Looking over, I noticed that Ash was training in the river, trading commands between Pikachu and Frogadier, but what concerned me more was that he was soaked. "Ash! You're going to catch a cold!"

I tossed him a towel and he caught it, using it to quickly dry his face. "Thanks Serena, but I'll be alright"

And then, he sneezed.

January 12th

"Looks like Ash still hasn't woken up yet" Bonnie said as we were finishing up our breakfast

"Well, he usually wakes up pretty late" I replied. "I should probably check up on him anyways though"

I got up and began to walk over to his tent, but halfway, he emerged with a drowsy look on his face, as if he had slept for the first time in weeks.

"Morning, Ash! Are you hungry?" I said

Mumbling something about the tournament, Ash walked over and collapsed into my arms. "Tournament... I have to... keep training"

"You have to rest first," I placed my hand on his forehead and checked his temperature, "because it looks like you really did get a cold"

"There's a town not too far back, Bonnie and I can go get some medicine while you stay here and take care of Ash" Clemont offered

"Good idea, thanks guys" I nodded

Clemont and Bonnie headed off in the direction we had come from, towards one of the towns we had passed through, while I got Ash back to his tent, and enlisted the help of Fennekin, Mawile and Pancham - my most recently caught Pokemon, and quite the trouble-maker at times.

"Thanks for taking care of me Serena, I don't know what I would do without you" Ash said as I applied a warm towel to his forehead

"I'm not sure either" I giggled. "Besides, it's my job to take care of you anyways"

I leaned in to give him a kiss, but Pancham suddenly bursted into the tent in a panic, pointing outside.

"What's wrong, Pancham?" Ash inquired, propping himself up with his elbows

"You stay here, I'll check it out" I said

Exiting the tent, I was immediately met by a semi-strong gust of wind as a familiar Charizard landed next to the tent, followed by Alain who had his natural smile on.

"Serena, what a pleasant surprise. Charizard here picked up your scent on the way back to Lumiose, so I thought I would drop by and deliver some news" He said

"Hey, Alain. What's up?" I replied

"There's something important I would like to confirm with you" His face went serious. "You do remember both X and Y, correct?"

"Of course" I nodded

Charizard huffed steam through his nose, and Alain placed his hand on its head. "I was talking to a couple of colleagues of mine, and it seems they weren't able to remember them at all. I've tested my hypothesis with many people, and you're the first to be able to remember them"

Flashbacks flowed through my mind - Arceus, the battle at the cathedral, and when each of them first revealed their identity to me. "That's strange. Do you have any reason why that would happen?"

"I have my suspicions, but I'm not entirely sure yet. I'll have to do some more investigating" He said. "Stay safe, Serena. I have no idea what's to come from this tournament, but something tells me it might not all be good"

It didn't occur to me until after he disappeared from my sight, that it was strange he hadn't become our tenth member in the tournament. Certainly, he would probably work better with us than Zack, and Professor Sycamore seemed to have teamwork as the forefront thought.

When I turned back around to reenter Ash's tent, from the corner of my eyes, I spotted a pair of small eyes looking back at me. I looked everywhere before spotting their origin: behind a flat rock just off to the right of the tent. It poked its head out, and I noticed that it was an Eevee with a neatly-made flower crown on its head. Whimpering, it took no more than a couple of seconds before turning around and running off.

"Wait!" I called out - for some reason, I felt compelled to run after it

It wasn't until after a five minute run that I gave up - I had completely forgotten about Ash, and was lost in the middle of the woods; I tried to find my way out, and walked in the direction I had come from.

Something caught my ears on the way back, and I turned to the left to see another flat rock in the center of a gap in between the forest. I walked towards it, and found the Eevee from before slowly climbing up to it; I watched on as it made sure there was no one around, and then began to dance around gracefully.

I watched on for only Arceus knows how long, until it spotted me and stopped, whimpering and stepping back in fear, however, it backed up too much, and slipped off the rock, which was relatively high in comparison to it. Quickly, I rushed out of my hiding spot and walked around the rock; Eevee was getting up slowly, but it had hurt one of its legs, which meant that it slipped and fell face-first when trying to run away again.

"It's alright Eevee, I won't hurt you" I walked over and picked it up into my arms. "Here, I'll take you back to our camp and we can treat your leg"

.

"Looks like we're totally lost" I sighed, slumping against a tree with Eevee still in my arms. "I'm sorry, Eevee"

Leaves rustled off to my side, and my attention quickly turned towards the direction it had come from, but I found nothing at all; I shoved it off as just my imagination, until I heard it again, this time from somewhere up in the trees. Even Eevee had a suspicious look on its face, as the rustling began to come off from different directions.

"Hello?" I said, my voice sounding a bit fearful

"Hi there" a voice replied, as a Spritzee floated down from a high tree

"A Spritzee?" the idea of another talking Pokemon slipped my mind

"It's nice to finally meet you, Serena"

"You can talk?" I inquired

"I'm just a voice in your head, what you see in front of you is just my physical manifestation" the voice explained. "You must know who I am"

"Am I suppose to?"

the voice giggled. "I'm the fairy-spirit, and the one who chose you to be the next fairy-type master"

"I, um... thanks?" I managed. "Do type masters usually get visited by their spirits?"

"Not usually, but I came to warn you, Serena" it said

"Warn me? Of what?"

"You and the water-type master are in danger. There's someone still trying to harness the Bonds of Amour" it explained. "Unfortunately, I can't tell you any specifics. Even being here and telling you that you're in danger is stretching my limits"

"But how do you know that I'm in danger in the first place"

"All spirits are connected to the Tower of Babel, and I became aware that one of the dark-type masters, who currently reside there, are going under 'Plan-D.A.K.' to form the bonds. If you can somehow get to the tower and find out what's going on, then it might be possible to stop them"

"Well, last time I was there, we got attacked by people who claims to be 'Gates of Purgatory'" I replied

"If you win the tournament, then I'll visit you again and lend you some more support, Serena. For now, I must go" there was a bright pink glow that engulfed the Spritzee, and I had to shield my eyes from the overwhelming brightness. "I'll leave you with one last gift, the Fairy Spear. You'll only be able to use it once, so use it wisely"

Before I could ask the hundreds of questions I wanted to, the Spritzee disappeared, along with the voice in my head. There was a small burning sensation on my palm, and I turned my hand over to see the fairy-type emblem burnt into it, like a tattoo.

"Mom's going to kill me"

.

Miraculously, I found my way back to the campsite and back to my Pokemon, who looked surprisingly composed, considering I had been gone for about twenty minutes. Something in the back of my head told me to check my watch, and I was shocked to find that only three minutes had passed since I had run off.

"Three minutes?"

I shook my head and brushed the idea off, reentering the tent to find Ash fast asleep, his natural, faint smile on his face. Sitting next to him cross-legged, I placed Eevee down and bandaged up her injured leg.

"There you go, it should heal with some rest" I said

It gave a look of gratitude, and I thought I had gained its trust; it turned around and spotted Ash, before jumping backwards into my lap and whimpering for its life.

"It's alright Eevee, that's just my boyfriend, Ash" I assured. "He cares a lot about Pokemon and would never hurt one, so you don't need to feel threatened"

As I waited for Bonnie and Clemont to return, I introduced Eevee to my trio of Pokemon - Pancham, Mawile and Fennekin. She was shy at first, but she was slowly getting accustomed to their presence as I bushed her fur.

"I saw how beautifully you were dancing earlier, and it reminded me of how much I want to become Kalos Queen" I said

Eevee looked up, interest glimmering in its eyes.

"If you really like to dance, then how about you and I work together?" I offered

The Pokemon thought about it for a moment before giving its approving look and nodding; I brought out a Pokeball, and smiled as I lightly tapped its forehead with the ball. Three shakes and an explosion of sparkles later, I had caught my fourth Pokemon, Eevee.

"Serena! We're back!" Bonnie exclaimed, running up to my side

"S-Sorry it took so long" Clemont said out of breath and slowly walking over with the bag of medicine in his bag

"What do you have there, Serena? A new Pokemon?" Bonnie asked

"Yeah! I caught an Eevee while you guys were gone" I held up the Pokeball

"Oh, wow! An Eevee! Can I see it?" Bonnie responded

"Well, about that..." I hesitated in letting the younger girl down. "It's pretty shy, so how about I introduce you two another time?"

"Sounds good to me! As long as I get to see it" Bonnie smiled

.

Ash recovered a few hours later, and we arrived back in Lumiose City - at Team Kalos's inn - just before dawn. Our inn - connected to the massive arena for the tournament - was like a mini-but-large hotel, where we each had our room, along with a dining and living room.

"You guys sure took your sweet time" Gary said - he was in the living room along with Shauna, Tierno, and Trevor. "I would have been in and out in a few hours"

"Sorry, one of us decided us to get sick along the way" I replied

"Pika" Pikachu sighed, shaking his head in disappointment

"My bad" Ash chuckled, rubbing his finger under his nose

"We've only got around three weeks to do some training, so we should stop slacking off and get in some real training tomorrow" Gary suggested

"Sounds good to me. It's been a while since we've battled actually"

"Classic Ash, already back to training" I sighed

"What can I say? I can't help it" Ash said. "Plus, we've got to take this seriously and not underestimate the other regions"

"The Galar region battlers look pretty tough if you ask me" Tierno said

"And the Sinnoh region has Dawn" Trevor reminded

"Right" Ash mumbled, and a hard-thinking expression forming on his face as he walked up the stairs. "Tomorrow, we have to get some serious training done"