A/N: Hey y'all, I've got a big tease in this chapter, some of you might finally figure out Serena's big secret from the summary.
"You were awesome, Sere," Ash said. Wait a sec, when did I start calling her that?
May and Dawn both smirked at Serena who was blushing like crazy.
She took a breath, "Thanks, Ash."
"Aww, you two are perfect for each other," Dawn said.
Both of their faces turned bright red, "DAWN!" they yelled.
"I ship it," May muttered under her breath.
"What did you say," Drew said quietly.
"Nothing," She quietly sang.
"You got any macaroons though, I'm starving," Dawn said.
"Yes, I always have some, and I have some PokePuffs too," She said, nodding at Pikachu.
"Pika," he cheered, causing the group to laugh.
"One of my friends in Alola tried to make them and Pikachu may or may not have thrown up because of them," Ash said.
"Seriously, Pikachu were they that bad?"
Pikachu nodded his head.
"Well, I think mine have only gotten better since last time," Serena giggled, holding one of the brightly colored treats out to Pikachu.
He snatched it out of her palm and scarfed it down.
"Pika pika," He yelled in delight.
"Not that it was any competition, but according to Pikachu, your baking is a lot better than Mallow's."
Serena blushed at the compliment, she felt a small pang of jealousy when she heard Mallow's name but brushed off almost instantly.
She's cute when she blushes, wait a sec, was that the first time I've ever noticed her blush? Ash thought.
"Aight quit staring at her and tell her," Go said, nudging Ash.
"Tell me what?"
"About his contest experience," Go said.
Serena raised her eyebrow, "Spill."
"I, uh, actually competed in both May and Dawn's first contests," Ash said, scratching the back of his neck.
She blinked a few times in shock and turned to the other coordinators.
"That true?"
"Yep."
"Uh-huh."
Serena smiled at him, causing him to blush a bit, "I guess I should have asked you for pointers before I left, huh?"
"Yeah, I guess, but uh, you've been doing great, in at least the ones I've been able to see," Ash said.
"Yeah, I'm assuming it was hard to watch them all especially since you can't find them on PokeVision."
"What's that?" Dawn asked.
"Right, I forgot that it's not really a thing outside of Kalos. It's something where you can make videos and share them, I've done a few myself."
"Y'all in Kalos have some crazy stuff, I mean I've heard of Holocasters, those things are nuts."
"What's even crazier is the guy that invented them was a madman who A. kidnapped the legendary Pokemon Zygarde who one of our friends was taking care of, B. brainwashed and mind-controlled it to destroy Lumiose City, C. kidnapped me, D. used a harmless Chespin as a power source, and a lot of other stuff, but the good thing is, he is 100% dead, watched him die in front of me," Ash said.
Of course what you don't know is that his organization is still around and hunting me down because I have the one thing that can stop them for good and I think they know that I've been trying to fake them out and a lot of other people know and I'm sorry for not telling you, I-
"Sere, you alright?" Ash said, he noticed her expression went from normal to guilty once he said that.
"I-"
He placed a hand on her shoulder, "Is there something you wanna tell me?"
She jerked her shoulder out from his grip, "I'm fine, I just," she looked at him with guilt, "I need to be alone right now," she said, standing up.
She walked into her dressing room and sat against the wall, hugging her knees to her chest. She stayed like that for a bit before one of her Pokeballs began to shake. She recognized it as her seventh Pokeball immediately and held it out in front of her.
"I know, I know, I should stop lying and just tell him what's happening. I know he can help me, he's a Champion now for Arceus's sake, he could probably take them down and I would never have to worry about Team Flare attacking me, again," she looked at her leg, the burns she received from the Houndooms had healed, mostly, but she still noticed them.
"But what if they just sent more people, what if he gets hurt or kidnapped or," her eyes started to water when she thought about the finally possibility.
"Would they do that to him, if they had the chance?"
The Pokeball shook a little, a clear yes to Serena, who had tears rolling down her face.'
"I should tell him but if they would do that, I can't lose him forever."
The Pokeball stayed motionless.
"I'm just being selfish, if Team Flare attacks, he needs to know and I would be risking the fate of the world if I keep him in the dark any longer, but-"
The Pokeball shook violently in her hand.
"You're right, I'll tell him the minute this is over," She said, wiping the tears off her face.
The Pokeball shifted a little.
Serena smiled, "Once again, I shouldn't have been so selfish, I should have given you back when I first saw him again."
She smiled one last time, "Thanks for listening-"
"Serena come on, they just announced who's moving on."
"Coming Dawn."
She grabbed her stuff and returned the Pokeball to her bag, hiding it just under her jacket.
A/N: *Casually edits chapter cause I'm indecisive af* So I'm going to try to do consistent weekly updates but my other fic will be sporadic cause of my writer's block but most of you read this one anyway so no big deal.
Amourshipper35 - Glad you liked it
WhiteLotus21 - Yeah, the stress of a fully online school year at a new school after literally being in class with the same 11 kids for four years but I'm doing a lot better, and yeah that makes sense but I'm curious, is the whitelotus part because you're a fan of atla?
Ashpool - Nah she's pretty understanding about it, and no neither Goodra nor Gibble will be showing up, I've given him Noivern and I have the return of another pokemon planned *hint hint*
UnKnownGuy2006 - Nah bro I'm cool with long reviews, it gives me something to do.
- Yeah, the Chloe being a fangirl wasn't my original intent, but after some headcannoning about how Serena could come back, I decided to make her one.
- YES, it's really weird and I wish they would give some explanation for why.
- I wanted to include other pokemon that she caught and that meant sacrificing Pancham cause I wanted Sylveon and Delphox here.
- Maybe, I'll do some thinking on it.
- Yes, the main villain is Lysander because he's a cool villain and kinda the only one I know anything about because Lusamine is good and Chairman Rose hasn't been formally introduced in the English Dub and I kinda want to see how he is in the anime before I go writing about him from what I know in the games.
- I'm for both FourthWheel and LazerBlade (I do have a FourthWheel fic if you wanna check it out, it doesn't have LazerBlade because I'm kinda a multishipper when it comes to other characters) but Bonnie and Clemont are not planned to be in this (but Korrina is)
- Maybe, maybe not, I'm not sure
- That's a question for the writers in Japan, I'm just following what I'm seeing
- No, they will not, BUT Alain and Korrina will show up closer to the end
- *see answer above*
- As I said in my response to Ashpool's review, I do have the return of another Pokemon planned that I teased at in this chapter if you can guess it
