A Jewel in Water

Part 9

Ash turned his head abruptly to see who was speaking to him.

"Paul?" he asked shocked "What are you doing here?" Paul took a bite from a cheese sandwich he had gotten from the kitchens, and said

"Better question is: What are you TWO doing in here, ALONE?" Elliot got extremely embarrassed, but Ash seemed to look cool about it.

"Private matters, which we'll get back to later," he turned and looked at Elliot, "I'll talk to you later." Elliot took this as a chance to leave. Once he had left, Ash turned back to Paul.

"Paul!" he cried. "It's so good to see you!"

"Yeah, whatever loser," Paul replied whilst absorbedly eating his sandwich.

"So I'll ask you again, what are you doing here?" Ash asked.

"Is it so wrong to visit my cousin?" Paul said.

"…Cousin…Cousin?" Ash said dumbfounded.

"Yep, you got it right. Want a medal?" Paul said, but then he realized "Oh no. You aren't one of the three choices? Are you?" Ash, after having a completely shocked look on his face, started to laugh extremely loudly, which caused the guys in the next room to come over and see what the commotion was about. Ash couldn't take any more. He wasn't laughing because anything was funny, but because he was too shocked to react any other way. What a day, eh?

Dawn entered the room and saw Paul, mouth wide open with bits of his sandwich still visible.

"God, Paul. Can't you chew with your mouth closed?" Dawn asked disgustedly.

"Oh Paul? I think I saw you on TV," Kenny quizzed. "Hmmm, where was it?" Paul was suddenly awakened from his stupor and looked around, to see Kenny and Dawn standing there staring at him. "Oh, it's you." He stated simply.

"After all this time, that's all I get?" Dawn asked, ready to get into a fight.

"Hey guys, calm down. It's been a while, let's not get too negative with each other!" Ash cooed.

Misty walked into the room to see Paul, with his sandwich, and said:

"Oh, you got your food, that's good." But then she realised that Ashton, Kenny, Dawn and Paul were looking at each other with familiar looks on their faces. Paul looked at Kenny and then suddenly something clicked on his head.

"Oh, I remember you. You were the one that lost the first round of the Grand Festival a few years ago!" he stated. Simultaneously something clicked in Kenny's head too.

"I remember you too! You are Misty's cousin that was with her the first time I saw her," Dawn looked at Kenny in an annoyed way for bringing up Misty. So she turned her head to Ash, and grasped his arm. Misty looked over to their direction and felt a pang in her heart. Jealousy?

"Are you sure the twerp is here?" cried Meowth

"That's what he wrote on the letter," moaned Jessie.

"Come on you guys! Let's sing a song while we walk," James said encouragingly. "To protect the world from devastation, to unite all-,"

"Oh shut up James!" cried Jessie and Meowth at the same time. As the continued to argue, Meowth came across a sign saying 'Pewter City Ahead →' and said:

"Look here guys, we must be close now!" Jessie looked ahead at the sign hesitantly.

"But you know... there is that cave we have to pass..." she mumbled.

"...What kind of cave?" James asked unwillingly.

"I don't know what's in it, but I know there'll be a lot of wild Pokémon in there and if we are even more unlucky, there'll be a lot of trainers just itching to have a go at us." she cried.

"This is all the twerps fault! I just hope that he gets a whole lotta bad luck for putting us through this," Meowth cursed.

Back at the castle, whilst everyone had relocated to the lounge to talk, Ash let out a huge sneeze. Was someone talking about him? He could guess who it was. Obviously the Team Rocket trio hadn't enjoyed the revenge that he was carrying out for all the years he was tortured by them. Everyone looked at him, as he had, yet again, stopped all conversation in the room.

"Um... I'll just take a walk outside, be back soon," he said embarrassedly. He saw Dawn about to open her mouth, and guessing what she would say, he replied "Wont be a minute, need some time on my own," and ran out the room. Once he made sure he was far enough away from the others, he got out his mobile phone and quickly typed in some numbers and held the phone to his ear. As the phone rang, he looked around where he was standing. In front of him was a large pond, and some Poliwags were swimming around in it and playing. Next to the pond stood a large tree with other wild Pokémon playing... and a Pikachu? A very familiar Pikachu in fact. Ash hung up the phone as he drew nearer to the Pikachu, keeping his eyes fixed on it.

"PIKACHU!" he cried. "What are you doing out here?" Pikachu turned quickly and saw Ash. It looked guiltily at him before making a hasty get away. "No PokéCham for you. Next time you want to come out, ask permission!" he called after it. Then from the room behind him, someone poked their head out of the window.

"Are you alright, Sir Ashton?" said the King very curiously. Ash was taken aback. Oh no! Had he gotten on the wrong side of the king already?

"Oh, er, yes your majesty, sorry for the disturbance." he said nervously.

"No matter, I was getting a bit bored anyway. Would you like to join me for a cup of tea?" the King asked as if Ash had a choice.

"Of course, I'll just make my way around." he said as he started to make his way around.

"Oh no need for that! Just jump through the window" the King guestured towards the window whilst moving out the way.

But deep inside the castle, a sly and cunning monster had awakened from his slumber.

"Oh must have dosed off," he said as he looked at his watch. "Now to check on myself before I try and get Misty." he chortled but to his surprise, there were no mirrors in his room. He could have sworn they were there before! He whipped around and headed towards the doors. What fiend could have stolen all the mirrors in his room? He could not have guessed quicker, even though it was the wrong person, and he rushed to find Ash, not knowing what adorned his face as he did so...