Disclaimer:  I do not own Pokémon.  I don't own "The Shining" either.  Both these wonderful things belong to their respectful owners.

So there is no confusion, all the characters are the same age and appear as they do in the TV show.

Last time, Misty had the most horrific night of her life in the honeymoon suite.  But was it Ash, or something else?

Summary:  Something's not right about the Fireside's Warmth Hotel, and Ash, Misty, and Brock are not sure if they want to find out what it is.

Midnight!  Pokéball Go!

by Spruceton Spook

Part 7:

The Morning After

            Ash jumped back in shock at the anger-stricken face Misty shot at him when the two met each other for the first time the next morning.  She was grinding her teeth, and her eyes tore into him like daggers.  She held Togepi in her arms, and Ash noticed that the Pokémon was a bit upset.

            "What's your problem?" Ash asked her, concerned.

            "You little creep!" she shouted at him, stepping a few strides over to him.  He backed up immediately. 

            "What are you talking about?" Ash asked.  He was worried now.  "What did I do this time?"

            Misty glared at him.  "YOU KNOW WHAT YOU DID!"

            They were standing in the front lobby.  Bright sunlight gleamed through the windows, and the heater had just begun to pump warm, circulating heat throughout the hotel.

            Ash shrugged, his eyes widening.  "Are you referring to me leaving the toilet paper roll empty in the bathroom?"  he asked.  "Because if it is, I swear I don't know where the extra toilet paper is!"  He cowered, waiting for her to take a swing at him.  Due to experience, he was always prepared.

            "I wasn't talking about that, no!" Misty replied, her face turning a beet red.   "Stop fooling around!  What the hell were you doing outside my room last night?!"

            Ash threw her a confused look.  "I wasn't anywhere near your room last night," he said simply.

            She growled and shoved him as hard as she could.  He fell back a couple feet, but caught his balance before he went down.  "What do you MEAN YOU WEREN'T OUTSIDE MY ROOM last night?!  I heard you snooping around out there!  Don't lie to me!  It wasn't funny.  You scared me!"

            Ash looked down at Pikachu, who looked back up at him in a twisted face.  "I meant that I WASN'T outside your room last night," he shot back rudely.  "I was in my room all last night.  Ask Pikachu."

            "Kachu!" Pikachu agreed, pointing at Ash.

            "You're lying!" Misty yelled, making Ash cringe. He was slowly becoming angry.  If she wasn't going to accept the truth, he would walk away from her, and who cared what she thought?  He certainly didn't.

            "You're just trying to hide it!" Misty continued.

            "Hide WHAT? What the hell are you talking about?"

            "You lost the bet!" Misty shouted.  "You weren't suppose to leave your room last night and now you're playing dumb to hide it!"

            "I was in my room ALL NIGHT," Ash confirmed again. 

            He was astonished, however, when he saw Misty's eyes cloud up with tears.  "Please, Ash, please!" she said, now begging.  "Please...if it wasn't you.....but no! It must have been you--because..."

            "It could have been Brock," Ash said matter-of-factly.

            Misty fell silent.  She rubbed her forehead as if she had a headache. Ash figured she probably just gave herself one.  As much as he was mad for her accusing him of something that he didn't do, he couldn't help but feel concerned with the way she was acting.  She was scared and disoriented, and Ash wanted to know what was wrong.

            "Come on," Ash said gently.  "Let's go get something to drink."

            Starting off to the kitchen, they stopped when they heard Brock hopping swiftly down the stairs.  He was wrapped in one of the hotel's clean dark green bathrobes.  FWH was embroidered on the front of it.  Ash wished that he had looked inside his closet, for now he was wearing simply his fall coat.  It kept him warm enough, but he felt like he was outside all the time.

            "Hey, Brock," Ash welcomed him happily.  "How was your night?"

            Brock smiled warmly.  "It was awesome.  That bed is sooo comfortable."

            "Yeah, for the amount of time you were actually IN it," Misty said in a snide remark.

            Brock looked at her strangely.  "What does that mean?"

            Misty just sighed, and turned away.  Brock turned to Ash and shrugged, giving him a "what did I do?" expression.

            "Why were you scaring Misty last night?" Ash asked, smiling slightly.

            Misty caught his little smirk.  "Oh, you think this is a big joke?!" she roared.

            Brock grabbed her shoulders.  "Misty, calm down!" he ordered.  "What's the matter with you?  If you think I was bothering you last night, you're wrong. I went to sleep as soon as I got to my room."

            Misty looked into Brock's sincere eyes.  For some reason, she could always believe Brock.  And now as she stared into his eyes, she could tell that he wasn't lying.  Brock released his grip on her, and she looked down.

            "I think I need some food," she said, and began to walk.

            "Togi!  Togepi!" Togepi whined softly in her arms.

            "I know, I'll get you food right now, okay Togepi?"  Misty said sweetly to Togepi.  She still had a frightened tone in her voice.

            Ash and Brock looked at each other, then followed Misty to the kitchen.

            About fifteen minutes later, Misty was quaffing down coffee as if she hadn't had a drink in her life.  She hadn't said a word to Brock or Ash since they entered the kitchen, and although she didn't want to admit it, she could feel that neither one of the boys were lying.  They were looking at her so sincerely that she was convinced.  But the fear pronged at her as she thought of her experiences the night before.  She couldn't have been dreaming, could she?  She asked herself that over and over, but she was certain that she was awake.  Misty knew the difference between dreams and real life.

            Ash was sitting down at the counter next to her, and occasionally he glanced worriedly at her.  A couple times he wanted to say something to her, but he was afraid that she was just going to yell at him again.  Something was definitely bothering her.

            Brock set three plates down on the counter.  They were each stacked with three, fat pancakes drenched in strawberries.  Seeing the delicious meal before him made Ash's mouth water.  Brock placed the plate carefully in front of Misty.  She looked up at him and he smiled pleasantly.  She couldn't help but smile back.

            "Thank you," she said softly.

            "You're very welcome," Brock replied, speaking to her in a kind tone.

            He sat down beside Ash and the three began to eat.  Pikachu and Togepi were also chowing down happily on Brock's Pokémon food.  Ash had just swallowed a mouthful of pancakes when he finally broke the silence between them.

            "Hey, guys, I had the weirdest dreams last night," he said wiping his mouth. 

            "Oh, yeah?" Brock replied, interested.  "What were they about?"

            "I don't know.  But Gary was in one of them. I was upstairs in the Presidential Suite, and I was looking down at him playing roque."

            Brock laughed gently. "That's weird, all right.  But not like my dream.  I dreamt that I was walking the hallways of the hotel, and my siblings kept popping their heads out of the guest rooms.  They kept telling me to come home and stuff."  He laughed again.  "I guess I've been away from home too long."

            "Maybe," Ash agreed.  He turned to Misty.  "Did you dream at all last night, Misty?"

            Misty shrugged.  "Not that I know of."  She was still acting bizarre.

            Brock looked at her in a tender way.  "What happened last night, Misty?" he asked carefully.

            She breathed in deeply.  She glanced up at Ash and Brock, and she could tell by the way they were looking at her that they were innocent.  But if it wasn't them, then what was it? She breathed in deeply and shivered. 

            "It--it was so weird," she started.  "I went to bed like around twelve, and I was sleeping and all 'cause I was so tired.  But, like, a couple minutes later I heard someone walking around outside my room.  And then I heard someone talking, but I couldn't hear anything that was being said."

            Ash and Brock were hanging on her every word. She spoke to them as she played around with some strawberries on her plate with her fork.

            "Wait a second," Brock interrupted.  "You--you heard voices?  People talking?"

            "Well, no, one person talking," Misty corrected, now feeling a little better talking about it.  "Like I said, I thought-- I  thought it was Ash playing a prank on me."

            Ash shook his head.  "I swear Misty, it wasn't me."       

            This time, Misty smiled sensitively.  "I know, Ash."

            She continued, more nervously this time.  She didn't know if Ash and Brock were going to accept the rest of it because it seemed so farfetched. 

            "When I screamed out, thinking it was Ash and all, it stopped.  But later on after I had slept for a while I heard, well, I think I heard a laundry cart or something go by my room."

            A chill ran down Ash and Brock's spine.  This was getting to creepy, but yet the dead-set look on Misty's face confirmed that she wasn't fooling.  They kept silent in order to let her proceed.

            "I-- I thought that that was it.  You know, Ash fooling around.  'Cause I screamed out at him again...." -- Ash was smiling softly the whole time she was telling this-- "...and it stopped again.  So I figured he had gone off to bed.  But then--then--"

            She stopped suddenly and looked at Ash and Brock.  They were so interested, but now their eyes were wide open and barely blinking.  They were breathing steadily and heavily out of their mouths.  The smile on Ash's face had now faded due to the terrified expression Misty wore. 

            "Then what?" Brock asked.

            "More voices," answered Misty, and she choked back a sob.  Her eyes were welling up in tears, though.  "I heard voices again."

            "Wait, wait!" Brock stopped her, his hand raised.  "This time it WAS voices?"

            Misty nodded.  "Hundreds of them.  They--they--" She began to cry loudly.  "They were whispering my name.  Over and over again.  I-- I didn't see anything because I was scared.  But I felt eyes on me, oh God!  Someone was watching me, I swear..." At this, she stopped and she cried into her hands.  Ash immediately went to her and began to rub her back in an attempt to calm her.

            Brock stared at her in disbelief.  Her crying mellowed out suddenly, and she grabbed a napkin to wipe her eyes.  Ash could feel that she was shaking.  What the hell is going on? he wondered.

            "I'm sorry," she said, her voice muffled. 

            "No, no! That's okay," Brock said finally.  "I-- I just can't believe it."

            Misty's red eyes met his.  "Serious?" she asked.

            "No I believe you.  But...I don't know, I just feel like this is too crazy.  Are you sure you weren't dreaming?"

            "Brock, I wasn't dreaming," Misty replied.  "It was too real to be a dream."

            Ash smiled at her.  "You're not going psycho on me, are ya Misty?" he joked.

            Misty only shook her head.  "I certainly hope not."

            There was silence now, and each of them were in deep thought.  Finally, Misty raised her head and looked at the two boys beside her.

            "I must have been dreaming," she announced suddenly to Ash and Brock's shock.

            "Why do you say that?" Ash asked.  "Two minutes ago you were sure that you weren't!"

            Misty just shrugged and hugged Togepi.  "I just must have been.  Who am I kidding?  This hotel's not haunted.  There's--there's no such thing as ghosts."

            "Well, there are ghost Pokémon," Ash said.  "Maybe..."

            "No, I know those Pokémon well enough now," Misty said.  "I know it wasn't them.  What happened last night was definitely something out of the ordinary.  That is, if it really DID happen."

            Ash looked to Brock for some sort of explanation, but Brock's face was vague.  But he was thinking.  Or he was scared.  Ash couldn't tell which.

            "I'm going to get dressed," Misty said.  She looked down at Pikachu. "Come up with me, won't you Pikachu?"

            "Pika pika!" Pikachu replied and jumped up onto her shoulder. 

            "I need someone else with me," she said to Ash, and he nodded.

            "Don't let anything get to her, Pikachu," he said, giving Pikachu a thumbs up.

            "Chu pika pikachu!" Pikachu replied, and Misty started up toward the honeymoon suite. 

            When she was out of the room, Ash turned to Brock, who had just gotten up to collect the dirty dishes.

            "What a morning, huh?" Ash proclaimed, and Brock just shrugged. 

            "You didn't hear anything last night, did you?" Brock asked, looking seriously at Ash.

            Ash shook his head and waved his arms out in front of him.  "Nuh uh."

            Brock returned to his work.  Ash began to help him as well. 

            "What do you think is going on?" Ash asked skeptically.

            Brock sighed.  "I don't know.  I-- I think she was dreaming."

            "You do?"

            "Yeah."

            "Why?"

            "Because I don't believe in ghosts, either."

            Ash could have objected to that himself.  He did believe in ghosts.  He wasn't ashamed to admit that; there was nothing wrong in believing in another world.  He didn't throw the ghost theory away yet as Brock and Misty did.  But he didn't know if he was ready yet to accept that he owned a haunted hotel, either.    He didn't want to see any ghosts, he had already had his fill of that when it came to ghost Pokémon.  But ghost Pokémon weren't scary anymore.  This was something a lot more frightening, something Ash wasn't sure he wanted to handle.

____________________________________________________________________________________

            Outside, in the blistering cold, yet gorgeous, fall morning, Team Rocket sat over a small fire.  They were settled in the bushes beside one of the hotel's many sheds.  They had tried many times to get into one of the sheds to spend the night, but had failed.  James was the first to wake that morning, finding Jessie snuggled up close to him and Meowth between the two of them.  He could feel their body heat, and he was almost convinced that that was the only thing that kept them alive last night, the night being so cold and all.

            Jessie sipped her coffee out of a plastic cup, the same plastic cup she had been drinking out of since two towns back.  They had not had enough time to pick up new supplies, lately.  She didn't care though, the coffee was hot and it tasted good.

            "Are we actually gonna do somethin' today?" Meowth asked.  He was bundled up into a ball in one of the sleeping bags.

            "Yeah, like break into that hotel and terrorize those kids?" James asked, a mischievous gleam in his eyes.

            Jessie nodded.  "Of course!  Now that we know they're alone in there.  This is the perfect opportunity to nab that Pikachu."

            "Oh, sounds like you have an idea!" James cried excitedly.

            Jessie smiled proudly.  "I always have an idea, James."

            "Yeah, unfortunately they never work," Meowth smirked.

            Jessie whacked the cat out of his resting position. "I'm sure this plan's gonna work!  It's almost infallible!"

            James was looking up at the hotel.  "So what is it?"

            Jessie laughed.  "I'll tell you soon.  First, we have to find a way into that hotel."

TO BE CONTINUED. . . .