sorry about how short this one is

Chapter 3: Grave expectations

"Ash! Welcome home!" Mrs Ketchum cried as she saw Ash walking back home. "How did you like the statues, what did Prof. O-?" Whatever she was about to say next was cut off by a loud explosion, an explosion from the Oak Labatory.

"Come on Pikachu! Lets go and see what the explosion was!"

"Pikachu pikapi chupi pikachu chupipikachupi!" (I'll stay behind for backup!)

Oak labatory

"What do you think we should do with him Jesse?" James asked, nervously nudging the bleeding and unconcious Prof. Oak.

Meowth turned away in disgust "Who cares? When we capture dat Stalker da boss hill give us a huge promotion!" he exclaimed, his gaze falling on the still standing and motionless stalker.

"HOW DO YOU PLAN TO CAPTURE ME?" the stalker asked, sounding amused despite his robotic voice.

"Like this!" Jesse explained, pointing a strange silvery gun thing at him…

Shrike looked at the silvery gun blankly until a memory came to mind from oh so many years ago…

Shrike twisted Lammergeier sideways, shielding himself with the other stalker's body as Wavey pulled the pistol's trigger. The pistol made a thin whining sound, almost lost in the clash and scuffle of the struggling stalkers. Lammergier, caught by the blast, went rigid, juddering.

If Shrike had ever been able to feel fear it would have been then with the silvery Old Tech weapon pointed at him. There was a flash of light and nothing more.

"Hurry up will you?" Jesse hissed as they dragged the motionless stalker up the stairs and to the meowth baloon.

"Da twoip is here!"

"So…"

"Prepare for trouble!"

"And make it-"

"Hurry up and get to da balloon!"

a few seconds later…

Ash had just enough time to see a large Meowth balloon fly away with the stalker hanging from it in a net.

"Come back!" he shouted after the shrinking balloon.

"Ash…" Ash turned to see Prof Oak stumbling towards him, coughing up blood as he . "Sorry."

"you need to rest, you've broken a few ribs and…"

"I don't mean that." He interrupted "I mean the whole thing with Celebi."

"What do you mean?"

"My full name is Samuel Oak, but my friends just called me Sammy."

"You're?"

"Yes I am, I am sorry for not telling you before. But if I had we might never have met in the first place." He suddenly bent over, gasping in pain "Listen, Ash. You need to get Shrike back, if he tells them about this weapon thing he told me about anything could happen, you have to stop them. I trust you to do this."

For the last time in his life Professor Samuel Oak, the world famous pokemon expert and pokemon poetry connoisseur, was at peace.

a place unknown.

But as Fever started to move towards the doorway, the Stalker Shrike barred her way.

"WHAT AM I?." He asked "WHO AM I? WHAT HAS BEEN DONE TO ME?

"I don't . . . I don't. . ." said Fever, not knowing what to say.

A touch on his hand. He looked down. Dr Zero's fingers were resting lightly on his armored fist. She was smiling properly now. Behind the thick lenses of her spectacles her eyes were filling with tears.

She said, "The moment of the rose and the moment of the yew tree are of equal duration."

And Shrike understood.

Shrike regained consciousness in a small room where a once-born sat smiling.

"Greetings, Mr Shrike," he said, "What can you tell me about ODIN…?"

pewter city

"Croagunk! Let me go! I'm only going to the pokemon center to get my pokemon checked!"

"Croag croagun gunk cro." (Do you honestly expect me to believe that?)

Reluctantly Croagunk let go of his struggling 'master' and returned to his pokeball. Looking around and deciding it was safe to go on, Brock started to walk towards the pokemon center, luckily for his gut, he was distracted by a loud noise, an explosion.

"That explosion came from pallet town! Where Ash is!" and with all notion of visiting the pokemon center, he ran, towards Pallet Town.

originally i was going to have Prof Oak being Ash's father but then decided against it

Please review!